The Power of Grief
He had buried her himself, returning her broken lifeless body to the Bionis in Paradise Park, so in her eternal slumber she could look over Colony Nine as she had with Shulk and Reyn so many times. Squatting in front of her grave, he remembered her. Her laugh. Her smile. Her eyes. They were all gone. Forever. Fresh tears began to well in his electric blue eyes. The realization of how much he had lost, how much he would never see again... A tear escaped one eye. And another. And another. Soon the tiny trickle had transformed into a massive downpour. Raw sobs were wrenched from his lungs as the raw grief over-whelmed him. Colony Nine heard him. Especially a certain spiky red-haired Defence Force soldier. Upon hearing those heart-wrenching sobs he abandoned his post, running at a sprint through the Residential District and up into Paradise Park.
And there Shulk was. His knees hugged to his chest in front of the mound of soil that he knew was Fiora's grave.
"Shulk..." Reyn began gently well-aware of how delicate his friend was feeling.
After a few stammering sobs Shulk turned to face Reyn. Reyn's heart jolted. Shulk looked... terrible. His face was red and covered in quickly drying tears. Snot hung in ribbons from his nose. His hair was now a tangled mess.
"Aw man... Shulk... you look..."
Shulk gave Reyn a wobbly smile. Reyn wasn't looking a pretty picture either. His body was riddled with cuts and bruises, the worst of all on his forehead. The nasty looking cut had blood crusted around it, the bandage doing nothing for it. Reyn too, had been mourning. For Fiora, for Square-tache, for his Defence Force comrades who had lost their lives. Squatting down next to Shulk he closed his eyes.
"You buried her... yourself..."
Shulk nodded slowly.
Neither said anything more.
Together they watched the sun rise above the cliffs around Colony Nine, and their first Fiora-less day began. Shulk again felt his grief claw through. He looked at Reyn. He looked at Fiora's final resting place. He looked at Reyn again. Then, without thinking, he launched himself at Reyn, wrapping his arms around Reyn's familiar torso, dragging him into a tight embrace. A few awkward seconds passed. Then Reyn returned the favour, wrapping his arms around the slender, dirty-blonde haired boy. Shulk began to sob into Reyn and the red-head buried his face in Shulk's matted hair. Neither knew what to say. But they both knew one thing:
It felt right.