Due to harddrive failure on my PC computer I lost the finished product of this story (among some other completed works), BUT thankfully I've experienced this problem multiple times in the past and learned from it. The beta read version was still in my e-mail and I only had to finish editing the last handful of chapters again, so Impact will be gaining momentum from this unfortunate turn of events. This was probably a sign that I should finish posting this story so from now on I will be uploading in pairs for these last four installments.
Hanging around Sora made Tidus feel old. There couldn't be more than a two-to-three year age gap between them, but nonetheless he imagined this must be what a parent felt like. Not that Sora was a handful. He was energetic and funny, so spending time with him wasn't a chore.
In a matter of speaking, they could be considered close in more ways than years. But there was an aspect to him that brought out Tidus' latent need to protect that no one else could muster. Whenever he joined their team, Tidus was inclined to stick close and watch his back.
Mentally, he acknowledged that if Sora was good enough for Cosmos, then obviously he could handle himself. He wouldn't still be amongst their numbers at this point if he weren't, but all the same Tidus couldn't dismiss the urge to guard over him.
Sora didn't seem to mind the company, thankfully. He sort of relished it; confiding in Tidus and requesting to spar whenever the opportunity arose. He was happy to oblige – the kid had an acrobatic streak in him that rivaled Tidus' own. It wasn't often someone could keep up with him in that department.
And there he was again, sounding ancient like his old man, but Tidus endured. If it meant he ensured that Sora made it to the end of this conflict, then he'd be ten times cooler than his own father had ever been.