Disclaimer: I don't own anything!

Author's Note: I saw Green Lantern and it was awesome. Just letting everyone know. I still liked X-Men: First Class better, but that may be because I've always been more of a Marvel girl than for DC.

Happy (Late) Father's Day to anyone celebrating.

-/-/-/-

My father used to play with my brother and me in the yard. Mother would come out and say, "You're tearing up the grass." "We're not raising grass," Dad would reply. "We're raising boys." ~Harmon Killebrew

-/-/-/-

"I'd expected more from the both of you. That was irresponsible and…"

Kratos and Yuan are tuning out the rest of the blistering lecture that they're sure that the old man has rehearsed. Kratos has a broken arm and Yuan is cut and bruised along his face and arms. Then again, planning to climb the bell tower in the middle of the night just to stand at the top was probably not the best idea to avoid all that.

"It was totally worth it." Yuan murmured.

"Speak for yourself." Kratos muttered in reply.

"Boys." Both of them wince at the sharp tone. "I want an honest answer from both of you. What possessed you to climb the bell tower?"

Kratos and Yuan glance at each other. Yuan is the first to speak. "I wanted to see the horizon again."

The old man, still riding his temper, is about to tell the boy that it was perfectly possible to see the horizon with both feet safely on the ground before he remembers that Yuan is what he is: a boy. And, while it has been a century or two, he can remember what it was to be a boy, to climb and hike and swim and challenge the world with youthful arrogance.

So he can understand, if only vaguely for Yuan is not a normal youth by any means with intelligence and curiosity and potential in bucket loads, why Yuan did it. It's Kratos that he can't understand.

"And you, boyo?"

Kratos shifts uncomfortably. "I don't know."

No, the old man thinks as he looks at the way the boys are standing, he knows. The boys might not be aware of it just yet, but the old man knows –and-someone's when he sees them. His own brother had been an –and-someone once. They'd already chosen who they were going to follow and that was each other and no one else.

"I suppose you don't want to tell me what was going through your heads when you decided to not have a safety measure just in case you fell?" This was mostly directed at Kratos because he was the one that actually fell. Yuan had sort of thrown himself off after him, landing himself in the trees where Kratos hit the ground after the trees slowed him down.

"We...didn't think about it at the time?" Kratos suggests.

"It was kind of spur-of-the-moment." Yuan adds.

The old man has to fight to keep his temper on the leash. They were boys and boys would be boys. Impulsiveness was the nature of boys and perhaps it was better that they were doing this sort of thing now rather than later, when they might not have each other to catch them.

-/-/-/-

"That was kind of amazing." Kratos says that night. They're both lying on their backs, watching the ceiling and lying on top of the sheets because it was far too hot for blankets.

"What?"

"Being up so high…it was like I could see the whole world unfolding in front of me."

Yuan rolls over onto his stomach, resting his head on folded arms. "You've never been that high?"

Kratos shakes his head and Yuan wonders how that's possible. Most of his childhood had been spent in the pomegranate trees of his home. He used to look out at the fields, trying to find his brother's flock. He used to watch the sky until he was lulled to sleep in the branches, used to look down on his village and sometimes he would pretend that he was something of a guardian angel and he would fight invisible enemies.

"It was…a once in a lifetime experience."

"Only if you want it to be. I'll do it again with you if you want." Yuan offers.

Kratos laughs, nervousness coloring the edges. "I think once was enough."

Yuan is quiet for a long time before he asks, "Have I ever told you that I want to fly?"

"Fly?" Kratos repeats.

"Yeah, like a bird? Fly."

"Why would…?"

This is one thing that Kratos doesn't understand, empathetic as he is, as he has the potential to be. He is as human as they come, a creature of the earth—solid, uncomfortable away from it. Yuan can remember the old men in his village, can remember that, when they would see him coming down from one of the trees, they would sometimes tell him that he truly was an elven child, even if only a little, because elf blood remembered the sky when the elves came on Derris-Kharlan.

Or so they said. Yuan wasn't entirely convinced. He likes to be so high up because the air is so much…more up there.

"Think about it." Yuan says. "No restrictions, no one grounding you…it would be the most amazing in the world."

"You can fly on your own. I'll cheer you on from on the ground."

"Relax, Kratos. One day, we'll be flying and, I promise you, if you fall, I'll catch you. You're like a cold."

"That makes no sense."

"You catch a cold."

Kratos snorts in laughter. "Go to sleep, Yuan."

"You're lucky you've got a broken arm." Yuan grumbles, burying his face in the pillow. "Elsewise, I'd be pushing you out of the bed. Or kicking you. I'm not picky."