Sunset Symphony
: Verse III :
Blue Traitors
FLOP!
Was the sound when Sora crashed the dust ground as he trained.
"Get up, wimp," said Cloud swaying his sword to the right.
Sora quickly got back up, without brushing off the dust on his face and clothes. He was training with his new teacher out at the back of the old dojo. From behind him was Skye, sitting on the stairs of the house, cheering for him… not that cheering would help him one bit.
The brunette got back into a fighting stance, ready for anything, as it would seem.
"Loosen your grip," demanded Cloud, "Learn how to relax your fingers even in an important battle."
"How could you say that?" said Sora, almost whimpering.
"Ey, Cloud!" exclaims Skye, standing up from her seat. The two males turned to her, waiting for her to speak up.
"It's almost sundown," starts Skye, "We have to get back."
"So you can get back to being 'grounded'?" teased Cloud.
"Oh hush!" exclaims Skye, "I'm sure Sora'll come back tomorrow."
"Better," says Cloud, glaring at the brunette, "I'll have to ask you for the pay tomorrow then."
"Oh, no problem!" says Skye, "I'll send it right over."
With that the two teens walked out of the training facility and back into town.
When they reached the city, everyone was back at their homes, and it was already lights out.
"This is strange…" said Skye, "It's still pretty early…"
"Skye… there's food steps…" says Sora in low voice. The two rushed into an alley and kept quiet.
To their luck, the footsteps grew louder. Their misfortune got worst when they find that the two men who created the sounds stopped close to where they were hiding.
"It looks like no one's here," says a deep voice.
Another voice then spoke up and said, "We can always storm into the apartment and burn it down."
"That would be suicide," said the other, "This is their territory."
As the two conversed, Skye silently mentions Sora to follow her, but to the worst of luck, as Sora turned the other way, he hits a trash can, and making it crash to the ground.
"WHO'S THERE!" exclaims one of the men.
Without thinking, Skye grabbed a near by pipe, mentioned to Sora to stay still, and rush out attacking the two.
One of the men blocked with his sword and was able to repel the attack.
The man had long red hair with spikes on the top of his head and green eyes. He wore black and red attire with dark armor underneath his cape.
The other man appeared to be blonde with brown eyes wearing similar attire as the red headed man.
"If it isn't a ferines," said the blonde man.
"Who are you people?" asked Skye, acting as if she was a normal civilian.
The blonde man laughed hysterically, "A ferines wants to know who I am?"
Skye remained silent, so she wouldn't blow her cover. But as she concentrated more on the blonde man, the red headed man pushed her off roughly, but she was able to keep her balance.
"Why are you up so late, young lady? It's past your curfew," said the blonde, drawing his sword.
Skye took a battle stance, a common one so that they wouldn't realize she was a noble.
The blonde lunged an attack at her but as she blocked, the pipe broke in half and she stumbled down.
Sora almost screamed out her name, but nothing would come out of his mouth.
"I hate hurting a person with a pretty face," said the blonde, "but you didn't know what you were in for."
He readied another attack, but just as he is about to attack, Sora jumped in and tackled the man down.
"Sora?!" exclaims Skye. As he stood back up, Skye ran to him and whispered to him, "Idiot!"
The red headed man then readied his sword, but seemed to have no intention of attacking.
The blonde, on the other hand, stood back up with the angriest expression to date.
"You shouldn't attack defenseless people," said Sora, with an angry tone matching the blonde man's expression.
The blonde started to laugh hysterically again, after a few seconds he says, "How romantic! An orerines and a ferines!"
Sora remained silent, as he does not know the big difference between the two races.
"It makes me sick to look at," the man says. A small orb around his neck started to shine brilliantly. The light then manifested into a black and red griffon and flew behind him.
"A teriques?!" exclaims Skye in shock, "You're… a ferines?!"
"HIM?!" exclaims Sora, shielding his eyes against the wind the 'teriques' was creating.
'This isn't right…' though Skye, 'How am I supposed to… I don't even have my own yet…'
Without any warning, the griffon released a gust of wind with deadly winds shaped as spikes attacked the two. And to Skye's surprise, Sora covered her from the attack.
Within seconds, the attack stopped.
Sora released the shaking Skye, who took a step back from him.
The brunette turned to the 2 other men without a word. His blue irises then slowly started to turn into a shade of red.
"Sora?" starts Sky, nervous as ever, "What did you…?"
'Red eyes?' thought the red headed man.
The blonde started to chuckle, then said, "Interesting."
He lunged an attack at the brunette, but Sora held out his hand and a sword made of fire started to ignited upon his hand.
Sora ran toward him aswell, but time stopped. The ferines man's attack missed and was hurt on his left shoulder with the sword of flame. But the red headed man rushed to the middle and stabbed Sora…
-------------
Hours later, Sora wakes up and found himself in a spacious room. When he tried to sit up, he felt a stabbing pain on the right side of his stomach. The brunette looked at himself and found that he was shirtless but bandages were around his stomach. He then began to wonder… how he got such a fatal wound. Regardless, he stood up from the bed, took his shirt, put it on, and walked out of the room.
Already lost from entering the hallways, he decides to give the princess a late visit. He walked to the right and eventually; he found a slightly opened door.
Knowing that he was supposed to give others privacy, his curiosity got the best of him and got him to take a peek inside. He didn't see anything and decided to walk in quietly.
He found that he was in an art room where sculptures and paintings were kept. The beauty of such works got Sora to wondering why it wasn't guarded as heavily. He turned to his right and found a painting covered with a cloth.
Still curious to find out, Sora removed the cover, and found a very peculiar painting.
It was of the Princess Skye in her casual clothes and glowing, blue hair with a teen that strikingly looks like him. They were embracing each other in a shining ocean, as if the ocean itself was happy for the pairing.
Entranced by the painting, he heard someone enter the room, and he quickly covered the painting with the cloth.
He didn't make it in time, but instead, he found that the woman named Tear walked in.
"I SWEAR I'm not stealing," Sora whispered.
"I know, you look to wimpy to carry such a thing anyway," said Tear.
It was true; the painting was as big at Sora himself. Whether Sora took that as an insult or a compliment, we don't know.
"Don't worry it's not like the princess has an obsession with you since you came," said Tear.
Sora looked at the elder woman confusingly.
"She had this dream since she was a young girl," said Tear, "She would always tell me about how she wanted the dream to come true. Eventually, she wanted to keep it locked away."
"And then?"
"She painted it and forgot about it," said Tear, "It's her way of forgetting things."
Sora could only look up the painting again before heading back to his room. But just as he turned the knob, Tear spoke up saying, "You're leaving tomorrow… Walter got enough soldiers to create the fonim needed to get the ship going."
Sora turned back slightly, but as he was about to speak up, Tear interrupted him for the third time today, "If you want to see the princess, she's at the fountain."
With that, Sora began to walk out of the room and went on a journey to find the princess within the castle.
After 20 minutes, he began to hear a tune…
Yatto tadori tsuketa ne
futari meguria ega basho ni
toki
no dakenaniimo ne
hoshi wa tanata kimi e
tooi itami no
sanata
megai gooruode
kokoro kitsuki
urashita hito ni
de
dakedo matashi o
mitsukete kureta
He walked toward where he heard the singing voice.
aruta sekai no hatete
fureta kiseki no iro
shiroi yuki
no you ima
sotto fureaiyuku
anata tootashi futari de toke ai
yatto honto no jibun ni nareru
He got closer and closer.
"MIEU"
He got startled and fell on a bush.
The song stopped. But Sora didn't notice this since he was too busy trying to get out.
He looked up and found a hand being held out to him. His eyes followed the hand, then to the arm, and when he looked at the person's face, it was the princess looking down at him.
Sora took the hand and was able to get back to his feet.
"How's your wound?" asked the princess with a worried face.
"It's fine… I guess…" said Sora, scratching the back of his head out of embarrassment.
"That's good…" Skye mutters, "I have to thank him for that…"
Sora looked at her confusingly since he wasn't able to hear.
"It's nothing," said the princess. She walked toward the fountain and sat down on the edge of it.
Sora's slow reaction only let him notice that she re-dyed her hair back to the dark color.
"Umm… when I was looking for you, I heard some singing," said the brunette, "was that you by any chance?"
"Am I that loud?" She says startled, almost falling off her seat.
"I guess it is you…" he said, "You have a really nice voice… You should be a vocalist in my world!"
He grinned at her but there was no reaction from her face this time.
"I'd like to…" said the princess. She stood up and faced the fountain and looked at herself.
"But?" asked Sora, thinking that there was more to what she was saying.
"I can't," says Skye, "I have to stay here… locked up in my own palace… this must be how he felt…"
Sora didn't hear the last part and said, "But… you were able to go out today…"
"I sneaked out," said she, "my bodyguard isn't around right now, so I have to stay here."
There was silence between the two and then Sora spoke up.
"Well…" Sora says, "It becomes a matter of others' freedom, you know?"
"That's what River said," she says, almost in an irritated voice.
"Isn't it true though?" said Sora, "If you love your country… you would do anything for them."
"I keep saying that to myself," says Skye, "But… it's just hard…"
"I was taught that you have to do everything you can to be happy," says Sora, walking up to her, "I'll help you, you just have to smile and…"
"And?"
"Kick the asses of those who get in your way."
The princess slammed her right hand on Sora's back and caused him to lose balance and fall into the water with a huge splash.
"What was that for?!" he exclaims, sitting up.
"No reason," she says, crossing her arms, "just felt like doing that."
As she spoke, she felt water splash into her face.
"HEY!"
"'I just felt like doing that,'" Sora mocked.
"Youuuu…"
And so, the two began a battle within the fountain, getting soaked, smiling and laughing.
Soon, the silver blue haired prince walked through the halls and got to the dock behind the palace.
He approached the blonde named Walter, who was speaking with a soldier.
"A word please," demanded River.
The Soldier ran off and Walter faced him.
"What's with the tone, commander?" asked Walter.
"Cancel the departure."
"…What?"
"You heard what I said, Delques."
"… Why…? I don't understand…"
"He has more use to us than expected…"
Tsuzuku