Starry Night

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. The characters depicted within are not mine, and I do not claim any credit for their creation or usage, save for within this fiction. Monster Rancher is a trademark of Tecmo. Please do not sue me. Comments, quips, insults and flames should be directed toward

Platinum_Dragon@usinternet.com.

Feel free to MST this work, but please be kind enough to send me a copy when you're done.

***

What exactly am I doing here?

He fell asleep almost two hours ago now... He just said, "I'm going to sleep," and then he did just that. He turned over, and went to sleep. I could have just healed my ankle and left, two full hours ago... but I didn't. Instead of doing what I should have done, and just moved on, I pulled the blanket that he loaned me up a bit, and just kept laying here, looking out at the night sky. I can't even get myself to go to sleep. I should just heal myself and go, but even just getting some sleep would be better then laying here, wide awake, in the star light, with only the soft sound of his breathing as company. But for some reason... I can't... I don't know why, and I don't know what it is that's keeping me here... but there's nothing I can do to stop it from keeping me here.

For that matter, I've had plenty of chances throughout the day to just heal my ankle, if for no other reason then so that I didn't have to have his help to stay standing, to keep moving... but just as I can't do what I should do now, I couldn't do it then, either. All that I could do was... let him keep helping me. I told him that I didn't need, or want his help. I shouted it at him! But he wouldn't listen... He wouldn't just leave me alone so that... if the scaled jells had come... I could have just told them that he'd been killed in the landing. I suppose that it's a bit funny, that I'd be more willing to let myself die to give him a fair chance to escape then I would be to let him help me. Funny that... I'd be afraid to let him help me again, after he's already saved me twice...

Yes, I suppose that I was afraid. That... I am afraid. He's already saved my life twice, once in helping Big Blue and I to set ourselves free of Moo, and once when he caught me as I fell from Moo's floating castle. Why should I be afraid of somebody that has saved my life twice, and wants to do it again? But that's not what I'm afraid of, and deep down, I know that... And it's not the idea of owing my life three times over to the same person, even if that person is a human, either...

I'm... afraid of trusting him. Of... of letting myself trust him. And what I'm most afraid of is that I know that he is worthy of that trust. I know that he wouldn't betray me, or that trust... I'm not sure how I know, but I am, the same way that I knew it was him that had caught me before I even opened my eyes, and the same way that I knew that he would survive me blasting him off a cliff. It's... a certainty I have, a... a feeling, at the very bottom of my heart... I once wondered if I could have a heart still, after all that I've done. Now, I know that I do, because it is what is telling me that I could trust him, if only I dared take the chance...

But no matter how strong that certainty is, I can't help having doubts... For too long, I was a slave to the humans. For too long, had things done to me that no one should have to endure... I know that he would not do those things... but I can't let go of the past so quickly. My fears still wake me up at night... I can still see my family being torn away from me, by humans... and now that one is trying as hard as he can to prove that they're not all like that... I still can't help but be afraid. I know that he would not betray me... but I can't help thinking that he might...

The simple truth is, I am a coward. I've hidden behind my hate; I've hidden behind my vengeance, I've hidden behind Moo, and I've hidden behind unconcern... I've hidden behind anything that I thought might be enough to protect me... There is nothing left for me to hide behind, nothing to hide myself from my fear, and this time, I can't even run to try and buy myself time. My time has run out, and... I am afraid to face my fear. The worst part is that I think... I know someone who might be able to help, if only I could find the... strength to ask. But to find the strength to ask, I'd have to face my fears. What a tangled little web I've woven for myself.

I pause, as I hear him shifting behind me, before his breathing settles back into that of deep sleep. For a moment, I remain motionless... and then I find myself slowly sitting up slightly, and turning toward him. It's odd to see him like this... so still, so quiet... I guess that I've gotten used to the hyper-active kid that he is when he's awake. Even the determined set to his expression is missing now. When he's awake, he seems so much older then he actually is, but now... His expression is so peaceful. Strange that just seeing that expression somehow makes me feel somewhat calmer as well. I wonder... do I have such an expression, when I sleep? Or is my soul too tarnished to allow it, too dark to let that little bit of peace shine through?

It's troubling thought... one nearly as frightening as the idea of letting myself trust. Have I really gone so far, done so much wrong, that even in sleep, I can't find peace? I haven't dreamed in a long, long time. Is it because I've forgotten how, or because even my dreams can't find their way past my darkness? How is it that it takes one sleeping child to make me ask myself these questions? One sleeping child that I am afraid of because I find myself daring to trust him?

One sleeping child, that... despite all of our differences, despite all the walls of hate I'd built for his kind, despite... all of my fears... is a friend? It feels strange to think that, even just to myself... A human, a friend. Even after all the hate, the fear, and the rage, even after what I did to him and his friends... he still wants to try to be my friend... He doesn't care that I've tried to kill him, enslave his friends, or that I am a monster by his kind's standards... He still wants to try... to be... my friend.

There's a lesson there, somewhere, I think. I wonder... I hope that some day, I might have the sight to see it, but... If I know anything, if I have learned anything as I've been thinking just now, it's that I'm not ready to return that... friendship offered, not yet. Not the way that I should, and not the way that he deserves... for being willing to forgive me for my wrongs. I can't return that... friendship until I've learned again what it means to have a friend like that.

I find a strange comfort in the idea that that friendship will be waiting for me when I am ready to return it... and I know that it will be. That is the way that he is... the quality to him that helped me despite how hard I fought against it. He was... just there for me, when I was ready to accept what he offered. The only thing that he could offer; the same thing that he gives the rest of his friends...

One sleeping child, so willing to fight against what is wrong, as I once was.

One child sleeping under the starry sky, so willing to turn around after that fight, and give the one he just defeated his only gift: the unconditional love of a child.