Disclaimer: I wish I could say, "star light, star bright, grant me ownership of everything Fire Emblem" but I can't. I live in a city and there are just too many lights at night. It makes it impossible for me to find a star; hence, Fire Emblem doesn't belong to me.

A/N: The lack of good Sothe/Tormod fanfiction makes me cry at night. Not really, but let's go with that emotion. So here is my attempt to make the world a better place. The shonen-ai and the yaoi will start in the next chapters.

-x-x-x-x-x-(Because one cannot know joy with first knowing suffering)-x-x-x-x-x-

Chapter One "They say that first impressions are everything"

At midst of the entire struggle and the clashes of swords, Ike smashed a locked door open with his heavy armor-slayer, "Sothe, get the valuables and leave, I'll stay out and stand guard." he ordered, letting the green haired thief sneak into the room.

Ike watched Sothe enter, but then saw his little sister running off to heal Rolf in the heat of battle. "Dammit," he grunted as he ran to her aid.

"Now where's the treasure?" the green clad thief wandered once he made sure the room was free of incoming danger. The fact that he had just walked into a room where some newlyweds were trying to consummate their love was of no consequence to him.

In a crystal light-like pedestal he found the targeted treasure, and in pure Sothy style he effortlessly unlocked the treasure box. But before he could peek at its contents he saw something moving in the expensive glass… it was the reflection of an incoming attack.

The green thief dashed to the left as an axe barely braised his chest. This aggression was soon followed by a full frontal tackle to Sothe's gut. The impact was so fierce; the thief was shoved to the ground.

Taking an instant to glance over to the door frame, the thief noticed his commander Ike was nowhere in sight. "Shit! Probably playing hero somewhere else."

"Take out your sword and prepare for battle. My knight's honor forbids me from attacking you while you are unarmed, but then again, who are you to understand the chivalrous spirit?" the axe knight boasted to the fallen teen.

The teenage thief stood up and took out his dagger. Both stood there measuring each other with their eyes, this would be an equal match. The knight attacked first with a standard sequence of axe swings. Sothe successfully dodged them all.

Pointing their weapons at each other, they began to circle as an excuse to cover more ground, but in reality they were observing each others' footwork. The knight attacked again with an expert axe fighting style, but seeing how Sothe accurately predicted and dodged every axe swing, the knight went berserk.

His swings were brutal but not fast, therefore Sothe managed to dodge roll to the right and propel a dagger to one of the joints of the knight's armor, but the opponent blocked it with his knight's shield and soon proceeded in a rampage attempt to tackle Sothe with it.

The olive eyed thief parried with his dagger and dashed backwards to distance himself from his heavily armored adversary.

"Fierce swing, but your footwork is kind of stiff" Sothe provoked.

"Coward! Let's see you dodge this" the knight announced, and as he slowly lifted his axe, Sothe noticed that his dagger had just broken.

Sothe's mind painfully registered the scene before him and its logical outcome.

"Fuck," the teen inwardly cursed. The knight was about to perform a critical hit on the now defenseless thief.

"Wait!" his inner self quickly interrupted, going through his skills to see if hopefully the thief had equipped himself with the Miracle Skill.

…nope. He only had a skill called Blossom.

"Yep, I'm done for." Sighed the green-clad teen as he waited for his inevitable death. His mind briefly wondering if the wind mage Soren would only remember his death as a casualty.

"Time to die!" The axe wielder announced before a huge ball of fire made impact on his left side, sending the armored knight flying against the stone wall.

It took another two seconds for the thief to comprehend that his life was spared. But just as quickly as he pondered to the skies "who saved me?" he cursed said skies for answering instantly in the form of an annoying redhead.

"Hey, you!" The redhead squealed in pure fan boy fashion, kneeling right before the injured thief.

"I remember you!" the red head squealed again, bringing his face closer to the scowling thief. "You were with us during the attack the other day, right?"

The green haired teen sweat-dropped at the lack of personal space the mage in the red cloak applied, but unwilling to let fall the impassive and arrogant mask he had worked so hard to perfect, the nimble thief simply feigned ignorance. "I don't know what you're talking about." he responded.

"No, I remember you!" the redhead nodded twice, his red eyes shinning with excitement. "I saw you shanking enemy soldiers with that tiny little blade of yours. You were amazing! By the way, did you know we're almost the same age? Oh, sorry... I'm Tormod. I may not look like it, but I'm pretty much the most dangerous mage arou-".

"Look out!" Sothe yelled, but it was too late, the enemy knight was already lowering his axe to decapitate the fire mage.

"Little one!" a powerful and menacing looking beast shouted as he pounced on the unsuspecting knight. Devouring and clawing the strangled knight in ways so gruesome the rating of this fic would have to go up to explain.

It took another three seconds for Sothe to comprehend that his life has been saved yet again in under a minute. But before his brain could conjure up another thought, red eyes that put rubies to shame stared back into his olive eyes, and in a baritone voice said, "So as I was saying, I'm Tormod. And you are?"

"…Sothe."

"What a cool name!" Tormod squealed again, breaking more than one eardrum in range.

"Ugh…" grimaced the thief. He could already tell that this Tormod fellow was going to be an unwelcomed annoyance.

-x-x-x-x-(End of Chapter One)-x-x-x-x-

-Miracle is a skill that halves the damage received on lethal circumstances.

-Blossom halves the experience received in favors of better levels.

-And yeah, the beast that clawed the armored knight was Muarim.

A/N: That's it for today. Please comment, holler, predict, etc. Reviews are healthy for an author's soul. And a healthy author updates faster. Think 'bout that.