Forever Strong

A/N: To make an extremely long story short, my vacation was awesome and now I'm back and ready to write.
As a child, Zelos had been told a million and one times not to exaggerate. Obviously that still hadn't gotten through to him considering a ten-year-old could've though of, or even bested, his 'smarter than a scholar' plan.

Sheena, keen to the possible true ideals behind his scheme, let her cowardice speak, "Zelos, I'm not agreeing to this unless I know you're being careful. Especially since you're known best for recklessness."

He blinked, noticeably disheartened. "You don't trust me much, do you?"

"No, no, it's not that. I...I misled you. What I mean was, uh..." she found herself in a tight squeeze. In all honesty, she was still very afraid of being used again, an apprehensive fear that should've been laid to rest. She didn't want to bother him with her almost childish qualms, so instead used a common paranoia as her excuse. "...I'm just a bit afraid of heights... that's all."

"Oh, I see," Zelos smiled considerately, "Well, no worries. The monsters I've had to hold off probably applied far more G forces than just carrying you." A swing and a miss; he turned to face the body of water before them.

Sheena's face glowed a soft shade of red from both the anger and the embarrassment of being compared to the monsters they've fought. "That's hardly the issue here!"

Oblivious to her complaint, Zelos drew his phosphorescent wings and looked optimistically towards Sheena. "Ready to depart?"

"Might as well get this over with..." She allowed herself to be picked up bridal style, quite awkwardly in fact, by the former Chosen. With a large flap of his orange wings, they managed to leave the ground.

After a while of gliding, he noted Sheena observing the water below them with adoration in her eyes, "I thought you were afraid of heights," he said coyly.

She smiled somewhat sheepishly, "Well, I was, but then when I looked down, I didn't think about how far down the ground was but instead, of how weird it is to be so high above land."

"Isn't that the same thing?"

Sheena shrugged, "If the shoe fits—"

They were interrupted by heavy turbulence, Zelos barely managed to regain his place on the mainstream wind. "Sheena!" Fear and urgency nestled in his voice, "Don't shift your weight like that, I'll get knocked off this air stream and we'll have to swim!"

Just as shaken, Sheena began to nod, but quickly corrected that with a quick but sincere, "Sorry." Minutes later, lush, green landscape breaking abruptly into tan mountains and sandy deserts could be seen over the horizon. At the sight, Sheena beamed, "Wow. Zelos, look! The mountains' look so tiny! Even on the rheairds they were huge, this is incredible!"

His heart swelled; Sheena was happy in his arms and if she was happy, he was ten times as glad. "Yeaah, it is really... incredible." He kept his eyes on the land ahead, and spoke in a gentle, calming voice, "Sheena, I...—aagh!"

Immediately, they began to lose altitude at an alarmingly fast rate. Sheena instinctively flung her arms around Zelos' neck, "What's wrong Zelos!" her voice was panicked and almost a cry.

A multitude of inescapable arrows came soaring their way, the first pierced Zelos' right leg and others struck him in various parts around his torso. The two final arrows of the first wave drew near and Sheena buried her face into the falling angel's shoulder in fear. They pierced her in the back, forcing her grip around Zelos to weaken and finally give in to gravity's tug.

Struggling through the pain, she raised both her arms in hopes that one could grasp Zelos' out stretched hand. Their finger tips brushed before Sheena fell to the ocean below and landed with an audible splash.

Running solely on adrenaline, he hung in mid air as he fruitlessly searched the water below for any sign of survival.

His heart stopped when the air bubbles ceased to surface, his wings faded into an ocean mist and he plummeted lifelessly unto the forest below.

Dear Corrine,

Zelos here... I'm sorry... I'm so sorry... I couldn't save her...

But don't worry... we'll be with you...

We'll be with you in heaven soon enough...