Love Child

Fadingshadesofpurple

Once again a disclaimer: I do not own anything. It is all copyright Naughty Dog/SCEA.

Chapter 1. Dinner with the Baron

It had been nearly three weeks since she had last seen him. Sure, she had met him on the streets during his patrols, both smiling slyly in the direction of one another as they passed each other on the crowded streets of Haven City. But, it had been three full weeks since she had last spent time with him. Special alone time where they could be "adventurous" yet again.

And those last three weeks had been sheer hell. She'd had to deal with patrol after patrol, a sneak attack from ensuing Metalheads on the Strip Mine, and her father's own dangerous missions. The warmth of him inside of her, next to her, all around her, had long since been replaced with the coldness of the city she lived in and dealt with everyday and night.

She longed for that warmth, and his touch nearly every waking moment of her days, and even now, as she ate dinner with a her father. It was a routine meal, and one of the very few times of the day where she spent time with her old man.

Usually, there dinners consisted of a nearly impenetrable silence, broken only by the clinks and clatters of forks and other eating utensils against plates and bowls. She usually stared off into space, aiming her gaze at the glass floor beneath them and the table, where the entire city could be seen in all of its "glory."

Occasionally, her and her father would break out into shortbits of conversation, usually pertaining to the war with the Metalheads, or some other small oddity.

Tonight, no sound flowed between the two of them, however. She watched him carefully as he ate, keeping her silence. Her fork barely touched her plate only once or twice; she couldn't tell if it was the richness of the food, or simply the stagnant silence that had caused her to not only lose her appetite, but to feel queasy. She focused her attention on the city below. The view, however dizzying it was to others, had no effect on her, and she watched as the city slowly spun beneath her as her father's immense palace drifted in a circle.

Grey buildings.

Bleak roads.

Black skies.

Would it ever change? Would the city every live up to its name...?

"Ashelin." Her father's booming voice entered her thoughts.

"Father," she acknowledged him.

"You're not eating."

"I'm not all that hungry tonight."

His only to answer to that was to give her a raised eyebrow. "The people of this city would kill for food that good, and here you are, sitting here, wasting i-"

"I don't feel well," she snapped at him, cutting him off, and narrowing her golden eyes as she glared at him.

He leaned backwards in his high back chair. "You don't look well."

"I don't?"

"You look paler than usual. If you aren't feeling well, that's no excuse for you not to eat something."

She looked down at her plate, at the fish and other foods laying there in no particular order or fashion. Taking her fork, she picked a bit of the fish off, ate it, and almost instantly regretted it, as her queasy stomach tightened once again. Dropping her fork with a clatter, she stood up, and both the sound of her clattering fork, and the screach of the chair on the floor as she pushed it back, caught his attention, and he looked up at her, gazing at her fiercely with his one eye.

"Where are you going?" he demanded.

"To bed. It's been a long day."

He didn't say anything; he merely nodded and continued to eat his own meal, as she walked off.

Mealtimes with her dear old father were always a pleasure and a joy.

Beneath her, the city moved about, and she felt, for the first time, herself beginning to feel lightheaded and dizzy just from watching it. Inside, her stomach clenched and tightened itself together, so much that she felt as if she would puke.'

Cursing the rich meal yet again, she entered a red panelled hallway from her father's grand dining room. Unbenknownst to her, the seed of something very special was beginning to sow itself deeply inside of her...