What I Wouldn't Sacrifice
A Shadow of the Colossus Fanfiction

When Faulklin's awareness returned, it was accompanied with a scream of unadulterated pain and they were still within the vicinity of the 6th Colossus - Barba's - lair. It was shortly after waking that he realized Daijoudan was kneeling over him and his sudden yell had startled the man, making him withdraw a hand in surprise from trying to align his ribs properly.

The younger boy spit and cursed at him banefully, but Daijoudan only snapped at him to shut up and try to stay still while he tried to right the damage that the boy had caused himself in his idiotic bid for victory. It was excruciating, but the adolescent endured it through to the end. The pain didn't stop when Daijoudan was finished, and Faulklin could distinctly taste blood, but he refused to let the older man talk him into giving up his quest due to his injuries.

Utterly refused.

Even under threat that Daijoudan would knock him out again, but Faulklin wasn't so slow that he couldn't figure out it was an empty threat. Daijoudan wouldn't make his injuries any worse than they already were, not when they were this bad, no matter how annoyed or how much the other male hated him.

It was a long, tiring argument later that Faulklin managed to whittle away Daijoudan's patience too much to give a damn about trying to stop him and they found themselves riding back for the Shrine at the center of the forbidden lands, though all that Faulklin could manage to tolerate was a soft canter, rather than a full gallop, his wounds aching too much to endure anything more than that for now.

They rode up to the forest in silence and slowed to a walk as they reached the cave because even that was becoming too much for the brunette. Daijoudan had no complaints with slowing their pace and even suggested they stop entirely. To their right was a grassy, open glen and a wide but shallow lagoon that would have been a perfect place to take rest, but Faulklin would have none of it, and the older male didn't feel like arguing with the human equivalent of a brick wall.

So they pressed on through the forest beyond, and the only cooperation Daijoudan managed to earn out of his unpleasant companion was to eat some of the fruit that he offered as they went, since they were taking far longer this time to return anyway.

Their trek back was long and slow-going, and Faulklin couldn't help but stretch forward and rest his head against Rebel's neck, letting his consciousness drift in and out. Even Daijoudan took the time on horseback to rest as much as he could, trusting Ayametsuki to get him to his proper destination in due time. The steady, smooth gait of the mare and sun on his back as they came out of the forest and into open fields was soothing, and he was in no rush to return only to go rushing off into another battle.

Hopefully, neither would Faulklin, because annoyance and exhaustion aside, he didn't think the kid would survive another fight. He had no intention of picking up where Faulklin left off, and no desire to take part in escorting a child just shy of twenty years toward his death, even if Faulklin had no problems with it. The horses occasionally paused to nibble a few patches of tantalizing grass, but otherwise they marched on uninterrupted.

When they reached the Shrine's interior, another one of the statues had already crumbled and Dormin's voice immediately peeled down from the sky.

"Thy next foe is... A ruin hidden in the lake... A ripple of thunder lurks underwater."

Faulklin couldn't help but groan, burying his face against Rebel's nape. "Why does it have to be another lake?"

Daijoudan only hummed. "If you have a problem with it, we should rest anyways. You won't be able to fight for a while with those injuries."

Predictably enough, Faulklin didn't listen, only turning Rebel back towards the outside and nudging the stallion into a walk. Daijoudan sighed, but decided it probably best that he didn't leave the kid alone as he went. At the very least, it appeared as if he couldn't manage to tolerate more than a walk out of his horse, and the dark animal seemed to sense its masters physical distress and moved with care, so it would take them some time to reach the next one. It would be best if they stayed where they were, but resting on horseback on the way to the next area was an option as well. Less ideal, but still an option.

The light of the sword took them across the sea behind the Shrine over the natural bridge and retracing their way back to the arena of the 3rd Colossus, though if it had a name like the others, he hadn't heard Faulklin utter it. It was just as slow as their return to the Shrine had been, but Daijoudan had no desire to speed to the next Colossus territory and Faulklin was too battered to be impatient for once, simple resting atop Rebel's back in a state of pained half-awareness. Probably for the better, anyway.

When they finally reached the lake of the third Colossus, half a day must have gone by with their sluggish speed, and the shadows prevented them from following the sword further. They wondered if the other Colossus might be underneath the water of this area instead of on top, but somehow Daijoudan doubted it and Faulklin hadn't the energy to dispute it.

Instead, Daijoudan hopped off his horse and took the sacred sword, climbing to the top of the spiral path across the lake while Faulklin waited with his and Daijoudan's horses, bent over the saddle tiredly and trying not to let his ribs or ruptured insides bother him too much. When Daijoudan returned, he sheathed the blade back at Faulklin's side and jumped onto Ayametsuki's back, gathering up the reigns.

"Further down the ravine continues. It's somewhere northwest of here beyond that, probably at the end of it."

Faulklin merely nodded mutely and let Daijoudan lead. Just as he said, the ravine continued, and they followed the linear path straight for quite a ways. It intercepted with another branch of the ravine to their left, but they continued straight. Finally, a fork in two different directions forced them to choose, and they headed right. At another fork, they paused, trying to discern whether to go left, further into the mountains, or right to what was clearly a more open expanse.

Ultimately, they chose to head to the right again, where sunlight finally reached them and Faulklin was able to hold up his sword to point their direction.

As luck would have it, they were right where they needed to be, and they soon found the ruin they were searching for, short walls dividing them from the expanse of a deep lake below just beyond carved pillars and shallow stone steps, a bridge extending out high above the water.

Faulklin pulled his horse to a stop near the end where the bridge crumbled away, looking more alert now than he had the entire ride there, and Daijoudan followed his eye towards three dancing spots of light that flickered just beneath the depths of the water far below.

"What the Hell is that?"

"The Colossus," Daijoudan guessed. "Most likely."

Faulklin nodded, but he was still baffled. The light moved in angry flickers, like branches or writhing snakes, and it brought to mind bolts of lightning he had seen sometimes in the sky. Then he remembered Dormin's words, something about thunder, and he couldn't help but frown.

He and Daijoudan slid from their saddles and walked to the edge of the bridge, kneeling down to get a good look from a safe distance. Obviously the same problem weighed on their minds as they surveyed what they would have to work with and tried to assess how they were going to handle this fight.

"Your plan?"

"I'm thinking on it," Faulklin huffed. This time he had not just one problem, but two. He still hadn't the slightest idea of how to swim, and once he entered the water, he didn't imagine he'd get the time to learn. He was also still injured, and that was going to make him more ineffective. He needed to be more careful now than ever in how he approached this particular fight.

His eye trailed further, taking note of the spiraling structure just beyond the bridge, which they would have to leap to, but it wasn't too far off, and it continued upwards. He decided the best thing to do was to leap across - which he did, grunting and almost doubling over as he landed with how his body protested - and walk to the top where he could get a better vantage point.

At the top, he quickly discerned that there wasn't much in the way of structures to use, other than the bridge they had just come across and the spiral-path tower they were on now. It looked like there was a segment of bridge below that had long ago crumbled and sunk, with only a small, circular platform and the narrowed edges of the path still in-tact and partially submerged at a tilt. Beyond that was another segment of bridge, still rising proudly far above the water, but disconnected from any other structures and impossible to reach.

Suffice to say, there were little options for this fight for someone that couldn't swim, and Faulklin still wasn't sure what sort of Colossus they were dealing with. So far, three had been semi-humanoid, one a bull, another a bird, and the last out of those being a horse. He could tell, looking at the lights and their positioning and the subtle movements he could see, this one was probably serpent in form, yet no less large than any previous. If not in width, then definitely in length. The spacing of the furthest lights alone appeared to be about as long as Avion had been from beak-to-tail and at least as wide discounting the 5th's wings.

Peering over the edge, he noted that the spiral led all the way down to the water, so reaching that or climbing back out shouldn't be difficult. Now they just had to lure the Colossus out from hiding.

Straightening up, he walked down the path to reunite with Daijoudan further down.

"Alright, kind of the same as with Avion... you lure it out from the water, and try to get it to come close to the structure. I'll figure out how to finish it off from there." Daijoudan didn't look happy, but he didn't argue, Faulklin raising a brow at him imploringly. The older of the two could tell that Faulklin wasn't any happier about having to ask for help, but the lad was smart enough not to refuse it at the moment either. "Ready to play fish bait? You came to help me, after all, so make yourself useful."

"Just don't screw up," Daijoudan told him, undoing his hair tie for a moment and tying his long hair almost into a bun, so it would be well out of his way in the water, and making sure his swords were tightly secured to his belt, before he waded in, pushing off the stone to further out.

Faulklin was watching the dancing lights carefully and saw them begin to grow closer, moving more purposefully now rather than merely drifting along at a lazy pace. The longer he stared, the more he also noticed a blue glow that he could only guess was an eye, and confirmed as it began to come to the surface that it was indeed a serpent of some sort, its back lined in three spines that emitted those crackling lights and trailed dead plant matter caught around them. A long, paddle-like tail emerged from the depths as it dove and circled around again, and Faulklin thought he saw a glimpse of fur there, but he couldn't be entirely certain.

After a moment, he saw its entire body illuminated by a bright light as it slipped through the lake far below, giving a clear indication to its full size, proving itself twice as long as Avian had been and a little wider in body, long whiskers like that of a catfish trailing from its snout. The Colossus vocalized an odd, guttural growl muffled by the water, like the moan of a whale.

Faulklin spotted that radiant blue light become reddish beneath the waves and its head begin to ascend towards Daijoudan.

"Here it comes," Faulklin warned, getting ready himself for whatever it was going to do and calculating what he needed to do in response as well. He could hear the crackling noise of those lights as it drew closer and Daijoudan, wary of them, wisely swam away from those spines as the head of the beast dipped beneath him.

The first spine passed underneath the water harmlessly, but as the second spine came up where Daijoudan used to be, the surface of the lake rippled with electricity, covering a broad range that would have lit the man up like a Christmas tree had he not moved. The third spine surfaced with the same effect before disappearing beneath the waves.

Finally, they passed, and Faulklin saw its tail arch up toward the surface, preparing and then throwing himself forward just before it rose out of the water, grabbing onto the fur there just before it dove and not hearing Daijoudan shout at him, save for an unrecognizable garble that the waves swallowed as water filled his ears and blinding him.

The Colossus pulled him along like an underwater speeding locomotive and within mere seconds, the pressure made his ears pop painfully in his head and his lungs constrict from the pressure, quickly pulling him a good twenty feet deep in an instant. His wounds panged fiercely and almost made the adolescent gasp, but he stubbornly held his breath, trying to crack his single eye open. His vision was met with a hazy, deep brown mass of waving fur that was growing lighter in shades as the Colossus rose from the deep to breach the lake's surface once more.

Open air came almost within reach, and Faulklin tilted his head up to hopefully snatch a mouthful of air, but its large oar of a tail pulled him down again as it propelled itself forward, making him grunt in vain protest, his chest feeling as if it would burst from the forced current of the Colossus' movement alone.

Just as he thought he couldn't take any more, its tail arched out of the water and he drew in a sharp gasp of air, and another. It dove again before he could move forward, and as a row of short, round spines illuminated its body, he feared he might be electrocuted, but no shock came.

The second time it surfaced, he drew in a quick gasp and then stood, stumbling forward along its back as quickly and steadily as his legs would carry him, kneeling down to grab onto its fur as it slithered beneath the churning waves once again. It dove another time just before he could reach the first spine, and he worried once more that he might be in for a nasty sensation, but the electrical current that he could hear crackle from one of those tall, orange spines didn't reach. He knew though that if it dove again and he drew closer, it would definitely hurt him.

His sword pulsed in its sheath, and he could see a teal-black fissure just behind one of the spines. He wasn't sure what sort of effect stabbing it would have, but there was only one way to find out, and he prepared himself as it dove and surfaced again, turning its head and bellowing displeasure to find Faulklin hitching a ride.

When they were well clear of the water, he ran forward. The fur transitioned there from brown into a rusty orange, and as soon as Faulklin's feet touched that segment, he could feel an unpleasant tingle that traveled up his legs, making his muscles tighten and breath seize, every hair on his body standing up involuntarily from the sensation.

He knew then and there that he had to avoid getting pulled underwater where the effect would only become that much worse and plunged the sword down deeply into the crack, felt the entire Colossus twitch and writhe in pain, changing directions, and the light of the farthest-back spine died to leave it nothing but a black, harmless protrusion. A fountain of black gushed skyward, then became a thick, inky cloud as the Colossus dunked him again, but that nerve-tingling feeling dissipated away like a bad dream.

One down, two to go.

He waited for the Colossus to submerge itself once more, lightning crackling around the second spine, before he rushed towards it and ran his blade into this crack as well, making the middle spine lose its light and power now too, getting an unpleasant spray of black blood in the face and furiously wiping it away as it stung his skin, but the water washed it away well enough.

So far he hadn't seen a single major glyph, only those cracks, but with any luck, one of them would be just ahead. All he had to do was finish off the last of those lightning-infused spines, hope that they wouldn't regenerate, and then find the major sigils.

He jumped up and ran for the last one, raising his blade as he fell to his knees and grasped its fur, so as not to be dragged off by the water with no grip as it dove back underneath, but it went under quicker than he expected, this time straight down instead of forward, and he instantly felt the current of deadly electricity course through him, its power exemplified ten fold by the water, and water flooded his airways as he screamed agony.

As soon as the Colossus came at him, Daijoudan moved aside towards the half-submerged bridge segment. He didn't like the sound of that crackle nor the way the lights on its body flickered like underwater lightning. He had seen what lightning could do to a tree before. He didn't want to even begin to consider what it could do to a human body.

Just as he hauled himself clear of the water and spun around, he saw Faulklin leap off the spiral path and onto the Colossus' tail, getting dragged under too fast for him to do anything except shout in exasperation at just how blatantly idiotic the brat continually strived to prove himself to be.

All he could do was watch as the Colossus dove a couple stories deep, too deep too quickly for any person to be able to stand without suffering, and he grit his teeth as he waited to see if Faulklin would emerge with the Colossus or if the little fool had been swallowed with the depths and drown. He saw the Colossus' head come up with one spine, then the others, but not its tail at first.

Then at last, he saw it, its massive rudder barely breaching the surface with Faulklin still holding on, only to disappear again. When its tail breached open air a second time, the scrawny idiot began to make his way forward, crouching down to hold on each time it bobbed underwater, before he made it to the first spine and stabbed just behind it, and the electrical fin went dark, much to Daijoudan's surprise. Then the second one soon went out with another stab.

He saw Faulklin go for the third, but he could already tell before Faulklin noticed that it was a mistake, yelling a warning, but if Faulklin heard it at all, the boy ignored it, and the Colossus arched straight down towards the bottom, entirely engulfing the teen in a mass of crackling, deadly light.

Daijoudan cursed and jumped off the structure as he barely saw a pale face come up without breath, then vanish again, sinking beneath the murky, deep blue.

He dove underneath the water and swam hard, silently swearing as he saw Faulklin sinking deeper, not struggling at all. Daijoudan had to struggle to reach the depths that he was falling to by the time he reached the same place, clawing through the water to grab him and finally managing to grasp the boy's wrist, kicking back towards the surface. Even underwater, he heard the Colossus moan a low, reverberating roar, but he focused on getting air first, gasping as he broke the surface of the water.

After three good breaths, he swiveled around and saw the bulk of the Colossus' head coming straight up, and he quickly pedaled back and heaved Faulklin away from its last crackling spine. He paused just long enough to hold a hand against the boy's lips, which dribbled blood diluted by the lake water, and felt no breath from him, growling low in his throat in fury.

He turned and swam as best he could towing the petite male along, having to avoid the Colossus' attempts at finishing them off three times before he was able to reach the stone structures and pull them both out of the water to safety, soaking wet and only one of them technically alive. The Colossus gave an angry groan of its own and dove between the legs of the structure with an audible splash and a smack of its tail that sent a drizzle down upon them, but Daijoudan ignored it. So long as it couldn't reach them, he needn't worry.

Only sparing a second or two to recover himself, he laid Faulklin out supine and bent his ear to the boy's chest, hoping that he had merely drawn conclusions too quickly, but there were no signs of life and he breathed out harshly. With Faulklin's ribs broken from the last fight, resuscitation was going to bring back as many problems as it was going to solve, but there wasn't much other choice other than to leave him dead without even trying to revive him, and he wasn't willing to allow that, even if Faulklin was the largest pain in the ass he had ever known or probably ever would.

Pressing his hands to the boy's chest, he began compressions, silently counting each one in his head before giving a breath, tasting far too much blood, but he ignored it and kept going, silently wondering to himself as he did so if he was just wasting his time.

He was finally awarded with a spluttering cough of both water and blood mixed, and he rolled the boy over onto his side so that Faulklin could clear his lungs. The Colossus gave another moan of anger and impatience, and Daijoudan felt the entire structure of the crumbled bridge rattle as it brushed its body against it below, but the ruin held despite the monster's efforts and Daijoudan spared it little attention.

Faulklin coughed and rolled onto his arms to push himself up, bent over and coughing roughly, before coughing turned into heaving, vomiting what looked like a slosh of coffee grounds and dark red blood, causing Daijoudan's brows to knit in baffled scrutiny. Faulklin slowly lifted his head with a slight lolling motion, looking up at Daijoudan, but his single eye was glassy and his lips and chin coated in red and pink, and after a moment his eye rolled into his head and the boy slumped again. Daijoudan caught him before he hit the ground and laid the boy carefully on his side, feeling his pulse and his breath, finding it thankfully still there.

If he was in no condition to fight before, though, now he was in no condition to even move. He wouldn't be finishing this battle.

The Colossus however either didn't notice or didn't care, moaning again demandingly and butting up against the supports of the bridge segment, harder this time.

Daijoudan scowled and turned his attention to the sacred sword. Even after all that, Faulklin still hadn't let go of the damn thing. The man dreaded the idea of killing off the Colossus, especially since it wasn't a task he had agreed to and still held his suspicions about, but it wasn't looking like there was much choice. So, he pried the blade out of Faulklin's hand and left the boy there on the safety of the ruin, while he stood on the edge and shone the blade to find out where its weak points were.

His annoyance lessened a degree when he found that the only place it pointed was the Colossus' head and nowhere else, but he was under no delusion that it would be easy.

First he had to contend with that other electrical spine.

He leapt into the water and waited for the Colossus to come to him, and when it did, he dodged away from the first spine and didn't worry himself with the other two that had gone dark, grabbing onto its tail as he had seen Faulklin do as it came up.

The force of the water resistance was even worse than the wind had been atop the bird Colossus two fights prior, but he managed to hold both his breath and his grip until it surfaced once again. In all of a few seconds, he could already feel the raw power that coursed through the Leviathan, even now that the two rear spines were rendered powerless. One jolt of that energy would be enough to stop anyone's heart in their tracks and potentially fry their innards to pulp, and he once again found himself cursing Faulklin's heedlessness as he recalled the dark, bloody mush the boy's body had expelled.

Running down the length of the Colossus' body was comparatively easy, but he could feel the energy of that first spine as he drew close, being much more wary than Faulklin had. If he wasn't quick enough, he just might end up dead, just as Faulklin almost had and potentially still might. He would have to be quick and precise.

He waited for the exact second when the Colossus dove and rose again, then sprinted forward, bringing the blade down with all his speed and might so that the last one finally went dark. Just on the other side, the top of the Colossus' head, a glyph sprang to life in the presence of the sword. The Colossus bemoaned the loss of its electrical defenses and dunked Daijoudan underwater as he lunged at the last glyph, dragging the man down and then up as it threw its head out of the water, then back down, making him take in a mouthful of water and sputter as he came back up, but Daijoudan still didn't waste the chance to drive the blade down.

Once. Twice. Three times. He paused to shake the water out of his eyes as he came up sopping wet, but it was entirely wasted as the Colossus dipped its head down again, making Daijoudan squint his eyes shut and hold his breath. Four times. Five was the final strike, and the Colossus keened as it threw its head out of the water and writhed back and forth, creating small tidal waves and sending white foam into the air to sprinkle down like rain.

Its body began to sink first, then its head slipped under, and Daijoudan let go, paddling on the surface as he watched its shadows form become overtaken by a black veil. He swore softly and began to swim back towards the structure as quickly as he could, though he wasn't fast enough to reach it before those tendrils of darkness spiraled out of the beast and into the air. He half expected they might go into him, since he had slain the Colossus this time and held the sword, but they went for Faulklin again and disappeared inside him.

When Daijoudan reached the ruin and ran to Faulklin's side, he checked for signs of life, and found Faulklin still breathing. Weakly, but still breathing.

He sighed and relaxed, only slightly, sliding the sacred sword back into its scabbard at Faulklin's side and carefully picking the smaller boy up. One more Colossus down, and nothing else to be done except carry Faulklin out of this Gods forsaken place.