RS: This one is made for Kratos!
Kratos: I don't like that look on your face.
RS: Oh, come on. It's Christmas time! Smile!
Kratos: I will not smile about a holiday that was created to satisfy people's greed.
RS:…you're really depressing, you know that?
Chapter 1: The Copper Cup introduction
It was snowing in the world of Sylvarant. It was the winter solstice, and it had started to snow. As was customary of both worlds, the people of Sylvarant were celebrating the end of the Holy Kharlan War. This was usually celebrated by treating everyone, even those who you hated, as if they were your own siblings. This was to be a yearly reminder that everyone was your friend, and it was to show the fruitlessness of war. You were to give a present to everyone in your family as well. All were merry, except for one man.
Kratos Aurion was walking along in Luin. He was aware enough of other people to move by them, but other than that, he was oblivious to everything around him.
That is, until he stumbled over a street urchin.
He turned and glared at the puny thing that had tripped him. It was a boy, a ragamuffin if Kratos ever saw one. He wore a small, ragged shirt, and a pair of shorts, clothes that were clearly not suited for the weather. He had brown hair and bright green eyes. He held a small copper cup in his small hand.
"A coin, sir?" He asked quietly. Kratos heard him clearly, but a normal man could barely hear the boy he was so quiet.
Kratos just continued to glare at him. "Where's your mother?" He asked.
The boy looked at him blankly. He looked as if he had no idea what the word meant. He blinked his small green eyes and Kratos. "My mother? I don't have no mother." The boy said.
Kratos sighed and looked around, trying to spot someone who could possibly be the boy's caretaker. He saw a blond haired girl of about 16 running toward him and the boy. She looked at Kratos with a sort of fear. He flinched inside himself. He hated it when people did that. But he kept his face cold and expressionless.
"Sir, the boy just wants a coin! Please don't hurt him!" She called. It was a busy city street, and the air was very cold, so there was a puddle that had frozen over, and the girl was running right for it.
"Watch –" Kratos shouted. He ran to try to help the girl. But she had already stepped upon the ice, and she began to fall.
Kratos was there in an instant. His knee was bent into a kneeling position, his arms out to catch the girl. She fell softly, bridal style, into his arms, for she weighted very little.
"Probably from not having much to eat most of her life…" Kratos thought to himself.
She looked at him with a certain degree of fright, but Kratos thought possibly a less of a degree than when he was talking to the boy.
"Are you alright, ma'am?" He asked.
"Y-yes. I'm fine." She stammered. She was blushing terribly, and Kratos supposed that she was cold, but he could have sworn that her face had been slightly less red. And she seemed very warm…
He gently bore her up onto her feet again. He saw how she shivered in the cold, her legs trembling slightly. He took the scarf that his landlady had forced him to take with him, and he held it out to her. When she didn't take it, but seemed, in his opinion, to grow even redder, he went closer and wrapped it around her neck for her.
"Are you this boy's caretaker?" Kratos asked as he stepped back. The girl looked uneasy. She sort of stood there, shuffling her feet in the snow. "Are you his mother?" He asked.
At this, the girl looked up at Kratos, a very indignant look on her face. The boy looked angry as well. "I told you, I ain't got no mother!" He said to Kratos.
"Then what are you?" Kratos asked, sighing at how difficult these two were being with him.
"His friend. I'm his friend, sir." She said.
Kratos raised his head and made a silent gesture with his head, as if to say 'ah, that's it'. "You both look like you haven't had a hot meal in a few days." He said, conversationally, or what he supposed was conversationally, because he hardly tried to have anything close to a conversation after…
The girl tsked. "Not our fault. People keep their money in their pockets, and the church keeps their doors closed." She said.
Kratos' emotionless features shifted from possibly angry to the merest hairs-breath from slightly confused. "Isn't the church supplying the homeless with food?" He asked.
The girl with the blond hair laughed dryly. "Yes, they will pay you a meal; if you can pay the donation to get into the church." She said, glaring in the buildings' general direction as she did so.
Kratos looked at the church as well, the slightest hint of anger upon his features. He turned back to the street urchins. "What are your names?" He asked the girl and boy.
The girl swallowed. She seemed afraid to tell Kratos her name.
He sighed. "Young lady, I'm a stranger to this town. I don't feel any inclination to send it's inhabitants to prison. I would just like to know your name." He said.
"It's…Ana. My name's Ana." She said. Kratos looked like he had been struck by her. He seemed very surprised by the name.
She quickly looked down at the ground. "I'm…sorry to have offended you sir." She whispered, possibly even quieter than the small boy had spoke, when he had asked Kratos for a coin.
Kratos quickly recovered himself and then he was back to his normal self. "No, I apologize. I just…it is nothing." He said, a little quicker than he had done in the rest of his life.
The girl didn't seem to notice that he seemed slightly embarrassed. Well, maybe it wasn't so hard to imagine, since she was blushing slightly, and her natural instinct was to apologize to Kratos. But she couldn't think of a reason that she could give for her having the name 'Ana'. Maybe it was an unusual name, but it was nothing that she could apologize for.
Kratos was still looking distracted when he felt a tugging on one of his pant legs. It was the small boy with green eyes.
"Hey! What about me, mister?" He asked, indignantly.
Kratos looked slightly agitated, he asked in with a slightly condescending tone, which was barely discernible. "Well, then, what is you're name?"
Although a normal person would have probably had to listen to that twenty times to be able see the condescending tone, the small boy seemed to realize it in an instant.
He turned on his heel and walked over and faced a wall, seeming to think that the worse punishment that he could inflict upon the man who had offended him would be not to talk to him, or even look at him. Kratos was a first inclined ignore this behavior. The boy was being a brat. He tried to keep his eyes trained on the girl, but he kept glancing over his shoulder at the boy. He started to drum his fingers on his thigh, tap his foot slowly, and show other signs of restlessness.
The girl seemed to see his agitation. For the first time, she smiled at Kratos. "You wouldn't believe what how much money he gets from rich people by doing that." She said, the smile spreading on her face as she looked fondly at the ragamuffin.
Kratos turned around and looked at the boy. "I apologize." He said hurriedly, and quietly, so that the other people would not hear him.
The boy smiled and put his hand to his ear. "Pardon, sir?" He asked, obviously knowing what Kratos had said.
Kratos glared at him. "You heard me the first time. I will not-" Kratos began, but then he stopped himself.
"Kratos, you are arguing with a toddler. Stop." He thought to himself.
The boy seemed to see that Kratos was getting irritated, so he shrugged and said, "Fine, apology accepted. My name's Tom, by the way." He stretched out his hand in a greeting.
Kratos looked at the hand for a moment, as if to say, 'Are you serious, kid?'. Then, almost resigned, he kneeled down to his level and shook the boy's hand.
Ana was lucky that Kratos didn't look around, because he would have been very cross to find her about to burst into fits of laughter. By the time that Kratos had turned around, Ana had gotten herself somewhat under control, although she still had to put her hand to her mouth to stop herself from giggling.
Kratos seemed to be in a sort of awkwardness that a gentlemen who keeps to himself usually feels when he is in the presence of a lady, vagabond or not.
"Um…" He began, seeming to try to think of a way to phrase his question.
Ana looked at Kratos, which, instead of encouraging him to say what he wanted to tell her, made him even more awkward than he had been a moment ago.
He chided himself on his behavior. He had not been this way when he had been with…with her.
He took a deep breath. "Would you and your friend like to accompany me to dinner?" He said, turning a bit red, but it was not clear if it was from the cold, or if he was blushing.
Only Tom, who didn't really understand the other meaning of that question, looked at both in puzzlement. He was the only one to recognize that both of them were almost beet red. But, since he didn't understand what there was to be embarrassed about, sort of nudged Ana and gave her a look that plainly said, 'Look, I don't know what's wrong, but I do know one thing: I'm hungry'.
Ana curtsied as was fashionably possible in a very ragged skirt to Kratos and said, "We would be happy in the acquaintance…sir." She said, almost forgetting the formality that was required.
Kratos, trying to remember exactly how the formalities of the age, since he had lived through a great many of them, bowed. "Please, call me Kratos." He said, hoping that that level of intimacy was appropriate.
Ana seemed to grow even redder. Immediately, Kratos was all bows and apologies. "I'm sorry if that was inappropriate." He said, blushing almost as much as she was. Why was he so nervous?
"No, no. It's just…"Ana began, but then she stopped.
Tom sighed. He really didn't see what the big deal was about.
"Can we just go, already?" He said, grabbing both of their hands and dragging them towards the downtown streets. He had grabbed Kratos's left hand and Ana's right, so they we're looking at each other while being dragged down the streets, and since there was about a foot between them, they we're both blushing while they're faces were only a couple of inches from the others. Needless to say, they were both getting a little hot.
Kratos managed to get his hand free and then stopped Tom. "Where are we going?" He asked.
Tom stopped, then put his hand on his chin, as if he hadn't thought of that part.
"Where do you think we should go?"
Kratos spoke very readily. "Well, to go to any sort of inn or respectable restaurant, you're probably going to need better clothing than…you're present attire." He said, matter-of-factly. It wasn't that he was rude, it was that he said it with a very keen frankness.
Ana didn't seem to mind. She did point out a sort of problem, though. "Um…si-um…Kratos…we don't own anything other than these." She said, indicating her clothes.
Kratos smiled. Then he said something to them that he never in his life had ever said, and had only heard once from the lips of his wife.
"Guess we'll have to go shopping, won't we?" He said, then he winked, just the way Anna had done.
Ana blushed profusely.
RS: …I hope I didn't total screw up you're character, Kratos.
Kratos: …
RS: Kratos?
Kratos: I don't blush, and I most certainly never wink.
RS: Oh, come on. Even you must get lost in the moment, Kratty!
(Fangirls appear, and beat him half to death)
Fangirls: NEVER CALL KRATOS-DONO 'KRATTY', YOU LITTLE BRAT!!!
RS: Okay! Okay. Not 'Kratty'. Got it.
Kratos: …I think that that's their only usefulness.
BONUS! (Not really)
(Sheena appears and grabs Red from behind. Zelos appears also)
Sheena: Read and review!
RS: (is blushing slightly) This is a dare, isn't it?
Sheena: Yeah. He said hug a guy, and you're the only guy he didn't suggest.
Zelos: Cheater…