Catharsis: The purging of emotions or relieving of emotional tensions
A boy named Lucas trudged across the mountains to the north of Tazmilly, his home town and the only place that he had ever known. A single memory was seared his fragile mind. He vividly saw his mother's bulging eyes and wide open mouth hopelessly calling out in anguish as she was brutally impaled by a Drago's tooth. He could see his mother's desperation written in bold ink on her face; he recalled how she had hopelessly squirmed around on the Drago's tooth even when she knew that it was far too late to have a chance of survival. That was a memory that Lucas could hopefully put to rest. Lucas arrived at a clearing that he had visited just days earlier, except this time, everything seemed darker. The malicious grass seemed to latch onto Lucas' leg in an attempt to pull him into oblivion, and the once gentle breeze now howled in pain. It was there that Lucas found his prey.
In the clearing, a baby Drago stood complacently. Even though it was only a baby, it was about as large as Lucas. Dragos were massive, bipedal reptiles with huge jaws. Everyone said that they were friendly. Lucas believed that too, and then he saw one butcher his mother. That memory haunted him in more ways than he thought were possible. At night he lay on his bed, paralyzed by fear and anguish until he eventually cried himself to sleep and entered the safe haven of a nightmare. In a strange way, these nightmares comforted Lucas. At least after a nightmare, he would wake to find himself safe in his own house. Not so with the horrible reality that he faced. Even thinking about his mother's death now, tears clouded Lucas' vision. He wiped them away defiantly. Now was not the time to get emotional.
He took a step towards the baby Drago, and his restlessness returned. He couldn't describe the emotion that overtook him any better than that. After a while of crying and questioning the meaning of life, he itched to lash out at everything around him. It wasn't rage, but something… cool and calm, like how a baseball player itched to hold a bat in his hands after several weeks off. Lucas figured that he could get rid of these feelings if he got revenge on the Dragos for murdering his mother. He so badly wanted to hurt the Dragos for what they did to Lucas' family, and if he could make the restlessness go away then his victory would be that much sweeter. These cathartic feelings would have horrified Lucas just days earlier, but that was before mother died.
That was before his family had been ripped to bloody shreds.
Lucas pulled out a kitchen knife and slowly advanced towards the baby Drago. The reptile just looked at him curiously with wide eyes, unable to process the danger of the knife that Lucas feverishly gripped in his hands. Trepidation began to build in Lucas' heart. Lucas tried to dismiss the fear. The other townspeople called Lucas a crybaby when he lingered at his mother's grave. They said that he should get up and do something. That was what he was doing now! He was finally ready to shrug off the cramped coil of emotion. Besides, after all of the pain that the Dragos had inflicted on Lucas' family, didn't he have the right to do this? Lucas stood right in front of the Drago and raised his knife, preparing himself to plunge it into the beast's eye.
Tears came to Lucas' eyes, begging him to stop. Lucas gritted his teeth and tensed up, still prepared to murder this child.
It was just a baby.
Lucas raised the knife still higher, desperately trying to force his body to end someone else's life.
It was just a baby!
Lucas dropped the knife and fell to his knees, sobbing hysterically. He screamed, releasing all of the dull rage built up in his tiny vessel of a body. He couldn't do it. He was too weak! The baby Drago looked at Lucas, seemingly concerned by Lucas' wretched state. Footsteps sounded behind Lucas, prompting him to turn around, and then yelp in terror at what he saw.
In front of him now stood an adult Drago, several times larger than Lucas, and with jaws large enough to engulf a boulder. Lucas feebly raised an arm to protect himself, even though he knew that it would do no good. So this was how it felt to die! First his mother, then his brother Claus had disappeared after hunting one of these things, and now Lucas would never be heard of again!
"I'm sorry, father," Lucas whispered. "I guess that you will be left all alone in this world."
The Drago moved its mouth closer to Lucas. Lucas closed his eyes, hoping that the end would be painless.
The Drago muzzled Lucas affectionately.
Slowly, Lucas opened his eyes. He sat there for what must have been minutes, frozen in place by the shock of still being alive. First hope and then joy gradually began to overtake him. The Drago wasn't going to kill him! Lucas hugged the Drago, releasing all of the hate and despair that had weighed him down. He opened his eyes wider and took a deep breath. The world changed around him. The dark, treacherous grass turned lush and lively. The tormented wind turned once again into a gentle breeze that caressed Lucas's cheek. Lucas looked up into the adult Drago's eyes and saw nothing but kindness. He looked to the baby and then back to the adult.
"You must be his mother!" Lucas exclaimed. "I almost tore your family apart! How could I have done that to you, after experiencing the pain myself…" Lucas trailed off.
He didn't know who had killed his mother and defeated Claus, but this Drago certainly was not the culprit. Lucas sighed and then took another deep breath of crisp, fresh air. He looked up at the sun in the sky, a shimmering beacon of hope in this world of terror.
"You know," Lucas said to nobody in particular, "I'm not really cut out for this revenge business. I think that I'll focus on the people around me that I have left. Because… life is good."
The Drago mother seemed to nod in agreement. Lucas smiled for the first time since his mother died and was surprised to find how good it felt. He shook his head and lied down on the grass without a care in the world, letting the sun's warm rays engulf him.
"If this isn't true catharsis," Lucas said wistfully, "I don't know what is."
Author's Note:
Thank you for reading my first fanfic! Please offer any constructive criticism that you have; it would be a huge help for new writer like me!
Also, I have a couple of newbie question that I hope someone can help me out with. Is it not allowed/ frowned upon to create and use your own characters along with characters from the original game? For having rights to use images, are images from google images considered to be free to use? Thanks!