A/N: Climax, go!
Lloyd stood before them, his brilliant wings overshadowing them. Then they folded; even the vastness of the room could not accommodate his wingspan comfortably.
Behind him, Yggdrasill helped the woman who had emerged from the magitechnological device to stand on her feet.
"Dear sister," he said in complete awe. He drank in the sight of his sister, though in the body of another, riven from its own soul. "You've finally come back to me!"
"No way…" whispered Genis. "Colette!"
Presea glanced between Genis and Colette's body, which now housed Martel. Martel, the sister of Mithos, who had died four thousand years ago and was revived this very minute by possessing her friend.
And preventing them from running to her side was Lloyd, his eyes once more a bloody red.
Genis looked ready to collapse; only the firm grasp of his elder sister seemed to keep him on his feet.
"Mithos…"
Her head whipped back to Martel. Were those tears beginning to form beneath the eyelashes?
"What have you done?"
Yggdrasill blinked in confusion. "Sister?" Then he blinked again in realisation.
"Oh, you mean my body." He chuckled and gestured to himself. "I hastened my growth to have an appearance befitting the leader of Cruxis. Wait just a moment. I'll switch back to my old form."
Light encompassed him, and a moment later there stood the Mithos they had known and laughed with and travelled with. The same Mithos who had attacked them and suppressed their friend without remorse. Presea fingered her axe, itching to fight the boy who had betrayed them so. Yet she could not bring herself to interrupt such a reunion.
Martel shook her head. "No, Mithos, not that. I've been watching all this time. Unable to move, unable to do anything." Her hands came to rest on her breast.
"I watched all those foolish things you've done. Have you forgotten everything? We stopped the Ancient War because we dreamt of a world where humans, elves, and those in between could live in harmony."
So Yuan had been correct in his assessment. It was they who had misinterpreted Martel's desire. In their despair over her death, the light and guide of their lives, Yuan and Kratos and Mithos had lost their purpose. In trying to rediscover it, they had lost their way. Mithos had turned not to reconciliation but to retaliation.
Mithos stared, his forehead creased. "What are you saying? This after all the trouble I went to prepare a new body for you?"
"Presea, please forgive Master Regal."
If Presea had not heard the voice of her sister one last time, asking her not to begrudge the one who had shattered her very heart…
"Please."
She might have been lost to vengeance, as well.
"But I see; you don't like that one, do you?" Mithos mused.
She might have been driven to this, too.
But Alicia had not wanted a second chance at life. Neither did Martel.
"Mithos, please," Martel pleaded. "Listen to me. What you have done is wrong. It is not what we strived for."
Mithos' legs were frozen, his voice wintry. "Wrong? Are you rejecting me?"
The vowels echoed in the chamber. The consonants were needles on her skin.
"No, I want you to remember." Martel's eyes locked with her brothers, mournful. "Please stop this and become your old self again."
But Mithos' ears were closed. He was chewing at his lip now. The beginning of a scowl creased his features. "Martel, even you reject me? No. Martel would never say something like that."
She opened her mouth—and his laughter filled the room.
Now it was that Presea raised her axe. Beside her, Regal's whole body tensed, his legs ready to kick off the ground. Out of the corner of her eye, Raine readied buffs and Genis chanted under his breath.
Good. It seemed that he had managed to pull himself together.
Mithos screamed. "I won't allow that, do you hear me?!"
Light burst from his body.
Everything began to shake. A boulder fell, forcing Presea to leap aside. Lloyd sprang towards her again, his blades high, as though what remained of Mithos' sanity had kept Lloyd's Cruxis Crystal tethered.
And now the full weight of its power bore upon them, alongside the might of a summoner prodigy.
Presea grunted as she deflected a blow. Her immense strength, once greater than Lloyd's, seemed on par with him now. But if she could keep him at bay, then the others could keep Mithos busy or perhaps even overpower him until Kratos arrived with the key crest.
"Don't forget!" called Regal.
"Yes!" she returned. "I won't hold back. I'm sorry, Lloyd."
Vibrant red flashed behind Lloyd and across Presea's vision.
"What are you doing?!" Mithos screeched.
There was a key crest on Colette's choker now. The one that had been carved for her and refined in Altessa's forge.
"Zelos!" said Presea. She almost lowered her axe in her surprise, which cost her the advantage: Lloyd swept in past her guard, aiming for her neck. Acting on pure instinct, she shoved the hilt of his sword away with the back of her forearm. That would soon develop a nasty bruise, but no matter.
Zelos winked as she and Lloyd continued their back-and-forth. "That's my name; don't wear it out!"
If he had retained that when Mithos had removed it, to return it now, did that mean he was truly on their side? Or was he trying to cover all his bases, as he had been doing previously?
But this far into the struggle, there was no choice but to choose.
"I thought you wanted me to set you free of your fate as a Chosen!" Mithos growled as he threw a ball of intense light towards Martel.
"Oh!" Zelos grinned even as he pushed her out of the way. "You know what? I changed my mind. That won't matter after we beat the snot out of you, anyway."
Raine gave him an icy frown. "And what, precisely, were you hoping to achieve with such a scheme? You had better pray that your reason is sufficient for us."
"Aw, Cool Beauty, your moniker suits you to a tee! But yes, I was picking this up." Zelos dug into his pouch and brought out a rough, misshapen stone. Presea knew quite a bit about geology, having spent some years with Altessa; although she remembered little of it, she was confident that she could identify most unrefined minerals that existed on sight. Yet she did not recognise this one.
The gasp that issued from Raine, however, told Presea that someone did.
"That's aionis, is it not? Kratos did disclose that he had plans to acquire it but would not tell us how."
The final piece in order to forge Origin's Ring of the Pact.
Zelos' fingers closed back over the rock and he thrust it back into the folds of his clothing. "Yep! Kratos said it was needed, so here it is! Now, all we have to do is take out the Big Bad Mithos!"
"So that's what you were after," murmured Mithos.
"That's right!" he sang in reply.
"Zelos, you idiot."
He whirled around. "Oh, Sheena! Glad to see you've finally joined us."
Finally joined us? When had she split?
Sheena shook something at him. It took Presea a few seconds to realise it was that same sword that had been wedged between the doors outside. "Only after picking up your trash!" she said mulishly.
"That was yours?" asked Genis, bewildered.
"What kind of clue to your allegiance is this supposed to be!" Sheena continued to rant. "Is it supposed to make up for what you did so we'll forgive you?"
Zelos gazed at her, still. "Maybe," he said in the smallest voice Presea had ever heard from him.
Sheena faltered then.
Then she threw the blade at him, and Presea watched in amazement as Zelos successfully caught it by the hilt without slicing his fingers off.
"Dammit, we'll talk later! Just get him!"
He beamed, his blue eyes light. "On it!"
"Damn you!" Mithos cursed. "Humans… Traitors, all of you! Let my sister stay here!"
Martel smiled at him sadly. "Goodbye, Mithos. This is my final wish. Please, return this twisted world to its original form."
"No! Martel! Don't go!"
Tears were gathering in his eyes.
"If things were going to end up like this, perhaps the elves should never have left Derris-Kharlan. If they hadn't, people like us would never have been born…"
Light left her body, returning to the blue of the Great Seed. Colette's body collapsed. A thump in the all-consuming silence, until it was broken once more.
"So… that was it."
Genis bit his lip. "Huh?"
"That's what she wanted," continued Mithos. He had stopped attacking them, but Lloyd had not; Presea grunted as she heaved her axe to meet his blades. "You just wanted to leave this filthy world and return to Derris-Kharlan. Then let's."
His eyes. They were afire.
Empty.
Rage and despair had incinerated what was left of his heart.
"No," said Colette, climbing to her feet. "Everyone, we have to stop Mithos! Martel wants us to stop him!"
"Shut up! Martel would never say something like that. You miserable failure!"
A talisman slashed his cheek.
"Don't call Colette that!" Sheena yelled.
And the fight began again in earnest. It was hard to fend off Mithos and Lloyd at the same time, especially now that Mithos was fighting seriously instead of playing with his enemies. But they had to.
"Holy Lance!" exclaimed Mithos. White spears of light formed, jetting towards Regal. He somersaulted away, kicking aside the few that he could not avoid.
Colette cast Holy Song, giving strength after the purple aura and the scattered feathers. Then she got distracted.
"Zelos!" Colette skipped over to Zelos, a smile splitting her face. "I knew we could trust you. I knew Lloyd was right about you!"
His eyes were wide as he stared at her. "What?"
"Yes! Zelos, we trust you! And you came through!"
"You…"
"Judgement!" Mithos cried, calling down white-hot pillars all along the battlefield. Raine threw up her Field Barrier to protect them. Presea jumped up in the aftermath, but Lloyd intercepted her; one sword caught her axe while the other arced towards her belly.
She let go of her weapon and slid across the ground. Her wrist shot out to grab his ankle as she passed. To her slight annoyance, Lloyd didn't trip, but her weight was enough to tie him to the floor as she swung around and snatched up her axe again.
"He's getting way too many opportunities to cast his spells!" complained Zelos.
Sheena's eyebrow twitched. She had been attempting to call upon one of the summon spirits for some time but had had to cancel the invocation at every turn. "If you would do a better job of interrupting him…!"
"May the merciless embrace of frost take you! Absolute!" shouted Genis. Frost condensed, and ice erupted; only a quick Yggdrasill Laser saved Mithos from a frozen end. "Less talking, more fighting!"
"My sister means everything to me," Mithos growled. "Don't get in my way! We're going home to Derris-Kharlan. Gravity Well!"
A huge dome of purple and black appeared to swallow them up. Luckily, Colette had just finished preparing Grand Cross; its light nullified the dark magic.
"If you do that, the Giant Tree will not germinate," Raine gasped.
"This is what Martel wanted!"
"No, it isn't!" Colette retorted. "Mithos, don't make your sister suffer any longer!"
Presea felt Raine's Acuteness settle on her axe's edge, sharpening it beyond what her whetstone could do. "Destruction."
The ground split. Rocks flew everywhere, pelting Lloyd. Mithos' eyes narrowed.
"I tire of this," he snarled. "None of you understand how I feel."
"That's not true, Mithos!" said Colette.
"Time Stop."
A translucent clock appeared, its golden hands ticking down.
"No!"
Too late. Mithos gazed coldly at their grey figures. "I won't let you interfere."
A blue magic circle enveloped everything in sight.
"Indignation Judgement."
Lightning began to rain down.
"Stop!"
Mithos watched in astonishment as a green barrier appeared, absorbing the attack.
Time restarted.
"Kratos. You continue to defy me?"
Presea's eyes were wide as she gaped at the scene before her. To her, it appeared as though Kratos had been fashioned from thin air.
"Kratos!" Sheena gasped. His eyes did not move to her, however; instead, they rested on Lloyd's for a time—never before had their colour matched his father's so perceptibly—and at last, they steadied on Mithos.
"You are mistaken. I am only atoning for my sins." Kratos bent his knees slightly, his flawless stance honed from millennia of conflict.
"Sins?" Mithos laughed, yet his expression radiated wrath. "You mean the sin of falling in love with a lowly human? No, even worse: an experiment? The sin of siring a senseless child with her and resisting Cruxis for so many years? You couldn't even protect her! You couldn't protect a child. And all those years ago…"
His fists clenched. The ground rippled in a myriad of colours.
"You couldn't protect Martel!"
Kratos dove out of the way as countless columns of refracted light plunged from the sky.
"That isn't it, Mithos," said Colette after the Prism Sword had dissipated. "Kratos protected her."
He glowered. "What? She died! What speaks of failure more than that?"
Colette shook her head. "Protecting someone means more than defending them. It means to love them, to teach them how to love, to know how to give and be grateful to receive."
Kratos looked at her in characteristic silence.
"Although I wasn't there when your sister was still with you, I believe with my whole heart that that's what he did." Colette smiled, her chakrams falling to her side. "Because that's what he taught Lloyd. And that's what everyone has taught me."
"But no one loves me. Only Martel does."
"Mithos, don't say that!" Genis objected. "We all care for you! You journeyed with us, shared stories around our campfire… Does that mean nothing to you?"
He glared. "And yet you stand between me and the greatest wishes of my heart. Is this not what discrimination is? All I wanted—all I dreamed of—was a world for my sister and me. If we aren't all the same—if we aren't all lifeless beings, then how can discrimination cease to exist?"
Regal shook his head. "That is conformity. It is not the same as the lack of discrimination."
"That's correct." Raine nodded. "Acceptance comes from knowing others, seeing their differences, but most of all it is in finding the unity in all that lives. Love cannot flourish in a world such as that which you strive for. I know that much, now. And it is Lloyd and everyone I have met who have shown me that."
"Enough!" Mithos shouted. "I'm sick of all of you telling me the so-called right way! I have looked for it all this time! It's arrogant of you to believe that I'm wrong when you haven't seen what I have; you haven't seen what humanity is capable of!"
"But I have," answered Kratos quietly. "And it is worth fighting for."
A scream of raw rage and bloodstained grief gashed the air.
It galvanised Lloyd into action; he leapt straight at Kratos, and so did Mithos.
"Rock Pillar!" two voices cried simultaneously.
Massive boulders thudded into the ground before the leader of Cruxis, stopping him in his tracks.
Zelos smirked. "Not too shabby, if I do say so myself."
"I suppose you make a decent teammate," Genis grumbled.
"Kratos, we will battle Mithos." Presea met his eyes. "Please, take care of Lloyd."
He nodded.
Lloyd continued to weave between the flames of Flamberge, his scarlet eyes reflecting scarlet.
"Lloyd."
An edge crashed against Flamberge, near the guard; Kratos' control at such a pivot point allowed him the merest flicker of his arm, and one of Lloyd's swords went flying.
Stripped of conscious thought, Lloyd was very good at fighting. However, Kratos knew that he had the potential to surpass even himself with all his skills at his disposal—that included his heart.
"Lloyd!"
The other blade came in hard and fast. Kratos had never managed to get too far in teaching Lloyd how to wield only one weapon in case he was disarmed in a situation just like this, but the boy was of a stubborn ilk and had refused to dedicate himself to such a task until they were nearing the end of the Journey of Regeneration. Despite that, Lloyd, as he was now, switched between one-handed and two-handed styles with ease.
"My son."
Lloyd stopped.
With trembling fingers, Kratos fished out the key crest, gleaming along its golden surface. He took Lloyd's hand and gazed at the sapphire glow of the gem. The key crest was set upon the Cruxis Crystal, slotting in as though it had always belonged there.
"Anna… I will put this right."
Slowly, excruciatingly, as though each movement was weighed down with thousands of tonnes, Kratos sheathed Flamberge to give Lloyd something he had not given in fourteen years.
He hugged his only son.
The Cruxis Crystal shone, so dazzling it should have burnt their eyes. Presea could see dark lines branching into fine, jagged ones—a Purkinje tree, Raine had told her once while practising the Photon spell. Yet it was warm, like a blanket draped over Presea, half-asleep in the winter; she would blink up at her father, who would smile as she snuggled under the covers. Like the ache of tears in her eyes and on her cheeks and down her throat when she said goodbye to Alicia, heartbroken and immeasurably glad. Like the warmth that raced through her veins when Genis looked at her and spoke with stars in his eyes and glue in his voice.
Presea gasped as a woman clothed in blue rose from the jewel. She looked at them, one by one, lingering on Colette, and settling on Kratos.
Her hair, her eyes, her smile. If her emergence from Lloyd's Cruxis Crystal did not speak volumes about her identity, her appearance screamed it.
Her hand stretched out to Kratos. As though tied to a red string, he drew towards her, his posture slack, his eyes flickering with hidden wonder. His hand came up—slowly, fearfully—and he whispered.
"Anna."
She smiled more brightly then. The blue pulsed.
He needs us.
Their fingers met.
It was a little difficult to carve in the flickering light of the fire, but she was accustomed to it. She could tell that Lloyd was struggling more than she was, however. He kept shifting around, flipping his little carving back and forth and squinting along its length. It did not help that only a sliver of the moon remained hanging in the sky.
"We can move closer for surer lighting, if you wish," Presea offered.
Lloyd looked at her, momentarily nonplussed. He blinked a couple of times before his expression cleared. A lopsided grin formed. "Yeah… maybe."
They scooted nearer to the campfire, just out of reach of its tiny, glowing embers. Lloyd set about his work again, now confident. The tip of his tongue poked out the corner of his mouth as his knife whittled away the cedar. Fragrant ribbons fell into his lap; every so often he would gather them up and toss them into the flames. Presea observed in silence, unnoticed; maybe she could learn a technique or two.
"Wow, this smells awesome!" Zelos remarked. "Nice woody scent—maybe it'll help in winning over the ladies? Not that I need any help!"
Sheena groaned. "Stop winking like that. It's disgusting."
"Hey, this isn't for you!" Lloyd protested, swatting at Zelos' greedy fingers.
"Oh, really? Who's it for? What's it of?"
"None of your business!"
"It's for Colette, isn't it?"
"Shut it! Go away!"
"Ooh, I hit the mark! What is it? A dog? A ring?"
"Argh! No!"
"Stupid Chosen, just leave him be!"
"Aw, but I gotta encourage my bud!"
"This is not encouragement! And people are trying to sleep! Colette couldn't sleep for months—don't rob this from her!"
"You're just as loud, Sheena."
She hid a smile at the flustered blush heating Lloyd's face and neck and pretended to busy herself with her own figurine. Colette had already fallen asleep; her deep, even breathing signalled as such, as did her lack of response to the unfolding squabble. Presea had gotten into the habit of noticing things after sixteen years of being unable to.
Later, when Lloyd was left in peace to work at the wood, she threw sidelong looks at him. After all these weeks travelling with him, it was still disconcerting how he could be so rowdy for so much of the day and yet fall so silent in concentration when he was doing something he loved. Like when he trained, blades flashing as they caught the firelight, eyes hard and body fluid as he moved through each form. Like this.
His exsphere lay within easy reach in the event that enemies came upon them; the extra strength it granted meant his control was less precise, and the latter was preferred for crafting. An artist did not want to break their creation.
"That is your mother's, is it not?"
He glanced over, following her line of sight. A tender smile shone as he stretched out a hand to touch it.
"Yeah." He caressed it. Blue glittered between his fingers. "She's always with me."
"Always with you…"
Lloyd looked at her, his gaze seeming to pierce through her thoughts. "Even if you destroyed Alicia's exsphere, she's still with you in your heart. So's my mother." He cracked a self-conscious grin this time. "I know I'm really protective of her exsphere. It's all I have left of her, physically. But I wonder: is she trapped in here just like Alicia was?"
"Lloyd…"
"So I don't know what to do yet. But I still need her strength to help us save Sylvarant and Tethe'alla. I'll figure it out when the time comes. I don't want to rush this decision." He closed his red-clad fist around the exsphere.
Presea nodded. "You cannot take it back if you destroy it. But if we fight for the sake of those who fell victim to exspheres to break this tragic cycle, I am sure they will be put to rest."
He stared at her, shocked. She blinked at him. Had she said something odd? But in the next moment, Lloyd's eyes softened and he nodded firmly.
"Yeah. Let's do it."
A/N: Concrit, concrit, concrit!