A/N: Ah I love humor. I don't write it too often, which is a shame since I think I have a wonderful and fairly unique sense of humor. I'll let y'all decide that though. Anyway…

I had nearly given up on this idea as it was at the bottom of my priority list (number 8 of 8). Then, recently, a good buddy of mine on the site, Lloyd Irving Aurion, wondered about the status of this story and all I could say was that I'll do it someday. Well, I was brainstorming at work and finally came up with some good ideas for the story.

So anyway, on with the story. This goes out as a personal thanks for everything he's done to help me improve. Hope you enjoy it man. The same goes for the rest of y'all.

Super-duper Fan-frickin'-tastic Disclaimer: Ahem. I do not own or claim to own Tales of Symphonia or any characters, places, items, or ideas found within said game. All of these things which are not found within said game are of my own creation and I do declare ownership upon them. (man I sound so professional)

Note 1: The characters are going to be, more or less, ooc. This is only because this is a humor fic.

Note 2: This is in no way tied to any of my other ToS fics.

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Kratos' New Sword

Kratos' munched quietly on a spoonful of Zelos-O's as he stared at the back of the box, seemingly lost in deep thought. A spoon in one hand and a pencil in the other, Kratos was determined to not lose this time. He had failed in this contest of wits many mornings before-hand but he would be damned if he lost again this particular morning. His pencil paused for a moment as he examined everything once more. His spoon tapped the edge of the bowl of his bowl as he contemplated his next move. Finally, a grin spread across Kratos' lips. "I have you now," he said with dark confidence as he made one last movement with the pencil. He dropped his spoon and grabbed the box with both hands, examining all of carefully planned moves. His smile widened as he went further and further on. Was this it? Was he finally victorious? His smile faded as he examined his last move and he quietly set the box back down. Apparently, the "Help Zelos Find His Hunnies!" maze had gotten the best of him yet again.

"Damn you maze," he said with a snarl. He grabbed the now-empty box and tossed it onto a pile of cereal boxes with similarly failed treks through the maze on them. "Damn you to hell."

Life was almost too easy now for the aging (relatively) angel. With Mithos and the Cruxis organization defeated, there were very few exciting things left to do in the world. Like the other days of the past half-year, this day was supposed to be equally uneventful. Only one thing this day different from the rest: today was his birthday. This didn't mean anything to him though. He figured it would be no different than the rest of the days. As he questioned whether or not he should eat another bowl of Zelos-O's in order to take another crack at the, as he called it, "Maze of Utter Madness", Lloyd and Sheena walked into the room, Sheena holding something behind her back.

"Mornin' dad!" said Lloyd with an overly cheery smile on his face.

"Mmm. Mornin'," said the not-quite-as-cheery Kratos.

"Happy four-thousand thirty-ninth birthday!" yelled Sheena with glee.

"Four-thousand twenty-ninth birthday," said Kratos, correcting her.

Lloyd and Sheena stared at him for a moment, questioning looks on their faces. "What?" asked Lloyd.

"When you get to be my age, every year matters more and more, and not in a good way," said Kratos.

No one said anything for a moment. Breaking the silence, Sheena cleared her throat and said, "Anyway, we went to Luin to get you a present and we saw this really neat weapon shop that imports weapons from all-over the world! So we got you a new and very cool sword from there!"

Lloyd nodded excitedly. "Go ahead, give it to him!"

With a giggle, Sheena showed off what she had been carrying behind her back all-along. It appeared to be a finely shaven piece of wood that seemed to resemble a club. It had a fine handle but it did not seem to have a blade of any sort on it. "There you go! Hope you like it!"

Kratos grabbed the strange weapon and swung it slowly from side-to-side. "This is… is… not a sword," said the angel, a hint of confusion in his voice as he did so.

Lloyd laughed. "Sure it is, dad! The guy in the weapon shop told me so!"

Kratos sighed and shook his head. He muttered, "Martel rest Anna's soul, neither herself nor I were this mentally incompetent. Everyday, I grow more and more convinced that Lloyd was actually the Milkman's."

"Huh? What's that dad?" asked Lloyd.

Kratos shook his head. "Nothing. So, uh… what is this?"

Sheena pointed to a certain part of the weapon. "Read that."

Kratos examined the fine bold print on the side of the club:

Authentic Meltokio Slugger Baseball Bat (Caution: Not for use by children under the age of two or anybody with a mental condition of any sort.) Meltokio Slugger Industries - Meltokio, Tethe'alla

"…it's a baseball bat," said Kratos.

Lloyd nodded. "Yup! It's a new style of sword!"

Kratos sighed. "One that doesn't utilize blades, correct?"

Lloyd nodded again. "Yup! It's the latest craze!"

Kratos shook his head. "Am I the only one that realizes it's not a sword?"

Both Sheena and Lloyd looked at the ground and shuffled one foot each. "W-we're sorry dad," said Lloyd. "We just thought that you might like something that what you might be used to getting."

"At least give it a chance," pleaded Sheena. "We could put on a demonstration if you like."

Kratos rolled his eyes but nodded. "Very well then. I shall give this 'baseball bat' a chance. Show me."

Sheena clapped and immediately leaned over to whisper in Lloyd's ear. He nodded and took the bat from Kratos. He stayed to the edge of the door leading from the kitchen to the living room, just out of sight of anyone that felt like walking through.

"Ready? Here we go!" said Sheena.

She walked into the living room to find that Zelos was sitting on the couch, watching the latest episode of, "Angels Gone Wild". She slowly crept up on him and, as she did so, she heard him mumble, "I wish Sheena would do that stuff."

"Oh Zelos," said Sheena with a hint of lust in her voice.

The startled former Chosen turned to see Sheena standing next to the couch. "Gah! What are you doing here? I'm trying to watch TV!"

Sheena said nothing but moved her hand to the top-right part of her vest, lowering it just a bit to expose to Zelos a little more breast than he was used to seeing on her. She then made a "come here" motion with her finger and walked back into the kitchen.

Zelos couldn't believe what he just saw! "Hot damn! Ask and I shall receive! It's about time she gave up Lloyd for me!" Wasting no time, he leapt from the couch and walked into the kitchen. Sheena was half-sitting against the table, an evil smile on her face. "Whoa, you wanna do this on the table? Kinky!" He was ready to take his vest off when he noticed that Kratos was there too. "Hey wait… this isn't gonna be somethin' weird now is it? I don't like shar-"

WHAM!

The baseball bat connected full-force with the back of Zelos' head, instantly sending him to the ground. With a smile, Lloyd flipped the bat in his hand. "See dad? Just because it doesn't have a blade doesn't mean that it's not a useful weapon."

"Hmm, indeed," said Kratos thoughtfully. "Perhaps you are right after-all. I think I'll go out and try to find some monsters to test this out on."

Lloyd handed over the bat. "Alright, glad to hear it!"

"Have fun Kratos!" said Sheena.

He nodded. "Then I'm off! I'll be back later!" With that, he made his blue wings come into existence and flew out the open kitchen window.

Lloyd shook his head. "Why does he always do that? Doesn't he know that we have a door?"

Sheena shrugged and looked down at the traumatized Zelos. "Hey, he looks pretty hurt."

Lloyd nodded. "You're right. I guess that blow to the head didn't do him much good."

"We should go find Raine and have her heal him," suggested Sheena.

He nodded again. "You're probably right."

A long silence followed. Afterward, Sheena said, "So… wanna go make out?"

"Sure, sounds like fun," said Lloyd.

Hand-in-hand, the two ran back to the living and plopped down on the couch. From the floor, Zelos mumbled, "That's so cold…"

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"This sucks," complained Kratos as he soared the skies of Symphonia. "Ever since we beat up stupid Mithos and his stupid Cruxis goons, there aren't any stupid monsters left to beat down. "I'm about to get medieval on some townsfolk, just for kicks. After-all, what good is a baseball bat if I can't hit anybody with it?" Kratos halted in mid-air and searched around for the nearest town. "Hmm, now let's see… ah! There! Luin will do nicely!" With that, the angel soared downward and landed right at the gates of the now very impressive city of Luin.

The streets were eerily quiet and eerily deserted. "Creepy," said Kratos to himself as he walked along one of said streets. "I wish someone would pop-up. I'm getting bored.

"Awright! Nobody move!" yelled a gruff voice from not far off.

Kratos grinned. "Looks like I got my wish." He ran around the corner of a building where he thought the noise was coming from and, sure enough, a large group of people was gathered here, maybe forty townsfolk and what looked like perhaps seven or eight men dressed like pirates. "A buncha filthy pirates trying to rob a bunch of innocent townsfolk? This sounds like a great opportunity to try out my bat!" Completely ignoring the fact that these were the same townsfolk that he was going to beat up, he immediately rushed to their aid.

"Awright lady, fork over the purse, nice and-… who the hell are you?" asked one of the men to Kratos.

"Me? Heh…" He drew his bat in a fashion similar to that of a sword and pointed it at the pirates. "I'm Kratos Aurion, and you're about to get the crap beat outta you."

One of the pirates tugged on the shirt of the leader and said, "Hey boss, he's got one of them new-fangled blade-less swords!"

The boss nodded back and a very strange looking bird on his shoulder squawked. "Yes he does. He might be a tricky one. Let's play it safe and use one of our most powerful weapons right off the bat." He looked towards the corner of a nearby weapon and yelled, "Hey Gordo! C'mere!"

A loud stomping noise could be heard and, from around the building, came a very large man, perhaps seven feet, six inches tall and weighing well over four-hundred pounds, all of which was pure muscle. He stomped his way towards the startled Kratos, causing many of the townsfolk to run away in fear. He stopped in front of Kratos and folded his arms.

"Meet Gordo!" yelled the boss. "By the time he's done with ya, you'll be crying for your mama! Get'im!"

Gordo leaned down and stared Kratos dead in the eyes in an attempt to intimidate him. "Are you ready, little man?"

Kratos nodded, his bat ready. "Anytime you are, punk."

Gordo stood to his full height and grinned. "Yo mama is so old, she used to bake cookies for the ancient heroes!"

Several calls of "Oh man! That's harsh!" could be heard as they began to laugh their heads off. More of the townsfolk took off, tears streaming behind them as they did.

Kratos sighed and lowered his head. "Sad, but true. My mom used to fly Yuan, Mithos, Martel, and myself to school every morning. Before I could even get in the building, she would always spit in my hair and try to fix it, right in front of my friends and the other kids at school. It was really quite embarrassing."

The pirates and remaining townsfolk stared blankly at Kratos, unsure of what to make of what he just said. Moments later, Kratos cleared his throat. "Ahem, yes, well… your mother is so stupid…" he looked up at Gordo, an evil grin crossing his lips as he did so. "…that she had you."

Wild cheers erupted from the townsfolk as the pirates looked around in horror. Gordo took one step back, then another. Tears ran down his cheek as his lips quivered. "M-mama…" He then ran away, crying as he did so. "Mama! Why you not love Gordo!"

A pirate nervously tugged on his boss' shirt again. "Boss! Did you see that! He took down Gordo with just one hit!"

Cold beads of sweat ran down the boss' face. His bird flew off of his shoulder and perched itself on the sign of a nearby pub. "Man, this guy must be really powerful. No more foolin' around boys! We have to all get him at the same time! Let's go!"

"Yar!" yelled all of the pirates as they rushed the lone angel.

Kratos began swinging wildly at the onslaught of pirates, hitting them in various spots ranging from the head to the kneecaps, knocking them all down one by one. Two men behind a desk with microphones kept yelling, "Foul! Foul! Foul!"

When it was all said and done, the badly beaten bodies of several pirates surrounding Kratos, their moans of pain filling the summer air as they did so. The boss got off luckier than most of his companions and managed to get away with only a single hit to his right kneecap. As he scooted backward, he said, "This isn't over yet! There's no way you'll beat my most faithful companion! Get'im Polly!"

"Squawk!" yelled the bird as it rose from its perch and flew towards Kratos.

"Wow, look at that folks!" said one of the men behind the desk. "It's not every day that you see a Cockatrice, right Bob?"

"Right you are Jim," said the other man. "One bite from that bad boy and Kratos is gonna become nothing more than a memorial. This is his one chance to end the battle once and for all."

The world seemed to move in slow motion as the cockatrice screamed towards Kratos. He readied his bat, knowing that he'd only have one chance to do this. If he failed, he'd become nothing more than a poorly sculpted granite statue. His wings sprouted on his back once more as he readied himself. Several of the townsfolk that had run away before had rejoined the spectators, many of which had their eyes covered by their own hands, not wanting to see Kratos get turned to stone.

"This is it Kratos," he said to himself. "This is for everything."

The cockatrice finally came within striking distance and he began his swing. The entire crowd gasped as they saw the bat connect with the head of the strange bird, sending it flying. All eyes were glues on the cockatrice as they watched it soar through the air. Kratos watched too, even as he felt the sudden urge to drop his bat and begin running around the pirates in a diamond-pattern.

"It has a chance! It has a chance!" yelled Bob.

Just as Kratos reached the top of his diamond pattern, the cockatrice flew over the far wall of Luin, causing the crown to erupt in wild roars of applause.

"It made it! It made it! Homerun!" yelled Jim. "It's over! The Angels have beaten the Pirates one-to-zero in a fabulous battle of guts and determination! Never before have I seen a battle this great before!"

For another unknown reason, Kratos waved to the crowd as he began to reach the bottom part of his diamond. Feeling one last sudden impulse, he slid into the body of a body that served as the bottom part of his diamond. As he stood up, a man wearing a breast-plate and helmet ran up to Kratos and hugged him. Several other townsfolk followed suit and all of the hugging bodies began to jump up and down simultaneously.

"What a way to end it all!" yelled Bob. "The Angels are the champions, no questions about it! Can't help but feel sorry for the Pirates though."

"Oh you know they fought a good fight," said Jim. "In the end though, they just couldn't pull it off. All they can do is shake their heads as they head back to their boat. Hey, I think one of them is crying!"

Bob shook his head. "He sure is, but give the poor guy a break. After a tough loss like this, we can't say that we wouldn't feel the same way."

"I'm sure you're right Bob," said Jim. "And now, we join Suzy on the field as she prepares to conduct an interview with Kratos, the hero of today's battle. Suzy?"

A woman in a fine looking suit with a microphone in hand smiled. "Thanks Jim. I'm about to see if I can get a word or two out of Kratos. Excuse me, Kratos!"

Kratos emerged from the hugging townsfolk and walked toward the woman. "Yeah?"

"Kratos, what have you got to say about this battle?" she asked.

Kratos wiped the sweat from his brow and smiled. "Well y'know, it was a hell of a battle up to the end. The Pirates put up quite a fight and I have all the respect in the world for them. I think we just got lucky today and we came out on top."

"Well said," said Suzy. "Now that you've won the battle Kratos, what are you going to do?"

Kratos raised his bat and yelled, "I'm going to Altamira!"

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Kratos quietly shut the door behind him and set his bat and trophy on the kitchen table. It was fairly late into the evening now and Kratos was rather tired. He made his way toward the living room and heard something snap as he took a step.

Looking down, he saw that he had stepped on Zelos' ankle. "Oops, sorry about that Zelos."

Zelos sighed. "Nah, it's okay. Ain't the first time it's happened today."

Kratos stepped into the living room to see that Lloyd and Sheena were still at it. "Hey guys."

"Mmf! Hi dad!" said the muffled Lloyd. "Like the bat?"

"Yes," replied Kratos. "Thank you both very much."

Sheena gave Kratos a thumbs-up as she continued her make-out session. "Mmf! Glad you like it!"

Kratos nodded and walked back into the kitchen, hearing yet another snap and "Oww," as he did so. He was prepared to turn in for the night when he saw that there was a half-eaten box of Zelos-O's on the table. He sat down at the table and poured himself a bowl. As he ate, he picked up his pencil from earlier and began to write on the back of the box. "Oh yea maze… the night shall be mine."

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Heh, how was it? Not bad I hope. Just be sure to leave some reviews for me. Hope y'all enjoyed this, 'specially you Lloyd Irving Aurion. If y'all actually liked this, maybe I'll try some other ToS humor later. Until then…