[Legend of Sun Knight] fic: Long Live the Sun Knight (oneshot)
Yay, writing! Since my WIPs aren't speaking to me, I wrote a oneshot instead. Uh, happy belated Valentine's Day? This is somewhat more of a romance. Somewhat. But not really.
Title: Long Live the Sun Knight (oneshot)
Fandom: The Legend of Sun Knight
Words: 3,314
Summary: "How... no, who..." Lesus couldn't seem to make up his mind about what he wanted to say. I just wanted him to stop suffocating me. Or better yet, I just wanted to wake up. Finally, he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. How did I know? Well, he opened his mouth and said, "You must be someone who knew me before I became the Sun Knight." Lesus/Grisia
Notes: The result of a conversation between Kiyutsuna and me a month or two ago. This didn't turn out like how I imagined it, haha. I thought there'd be more action and crack, but it just turned into a lot of talking!
Long Live the Sun Knight
"I'm dreaming."
I had to be. I mean, I could see with my eyes, and what I saw was bizarre.
In front of me stood Lesus Judgment with shining blond hair. I'd know him no matter what he looked like, but I never thought I'd see him with blond hair. Of course, there was the slight possibility that I really was mistaking someone else for my best friend -- I mean, why would Lesus ever want to dye his hair, and blond even, it didn't suit him at all -- but then Lesus turned, and that was definitely his face. Except, he blinked at me with clear blue eyes instead of dark ones, and he had a wide smile on his face, much like one I might use to politely greet one of our followers.
If I wasn't dreaming, then I'd have to have gone crazy.
"Lesus?" I blurted.
The slight crease between his eyebrows was a familiar sight, but that ever present smile was definitely not. Neither was the fact that he was clad in white and had the Divine Sun Sword by his side.
I really should have put all the clues together by then, but my mind refused to work, and you couldn't really blame me for that. Lesus's skin was startling fair.
"Might I know you?" Lesus asked, voice a bit higher than I remembered. I might have thought it to be a result of nerves, but he kept speaking in the same pitch. "I haven't heard that name spoken in a long time." It was like he had exchanged his gloomy darkness and deep baritone for all this shining brightness.
"Lesus," I said. "Stop trolling me."
His polite smile was still stuck on his face, but his eyebrows creased further.
Who am I kidding? There's no way Lesus would ever put on such an elaborate bout of trickery.
If this was a stupid dream, no, nightmare, I'd really like to wake up. Like, right now. Before I descended into insanity. That was, if I wasn't already insane. I was starting to doubt myself.
"Seriously," I babbled, "What happened to your black hair?"
At those words, his smile finally dropped, but before I had a chance to sigh in relief at having his face return to a more familiar setting, he'd flown forward and covered my mouth with his gloved hand, intimately introducing me to the fine cloths and threads that went into the production of said glove. For some reason, I could almost imagine myself in a field of daisies. Actually, it must be because of the fresh scent I smelled from him, or well, more from his glove, and the way my intake of air was being obstructed much like how it'd be if my nose were stuffy from allergies.
It was a very unpleasant feeling.
And Lesus's skin was truly very, very fair.
"How... no, who..." Lesus couldn't seem to make up his mind about what he wanted to say. I just wanted him to stop suffocating me. Or better yet, I just wanted to wake up. Finally, he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. How did I know? Well, he opened his mouth and said, "You must be someone who knew me before I became the Sun Knight."
Lesus is the freakin Sun Knight. The freakin Sun Knight!!!!
Now I'd truly seen everything. I could only stare. Even the mark of the Judgment Knight was missing from his forehead. It made his forehead look way too bare.
"So, am I right?" he asked. A moment later, he recalled that I wasn't exactly in the best position to answer him, not with how he was suffocating me with the scent of daisies. He let his hand drop. "My apologies. Force of habit."
What kind of habit is that?
I'd never known Lesus Judgment to be nervous, but this Lesus in front of me was definitely nervous and had wanted to silence me through the laughingly naive way of clasping a hand over someone's mouth.
Also, this Lesus didn't know me.
Lesus...
I took a deep breath, trying not to think of heart-to-heart talks with Lesus in the bathroom because that definitely hadn't happened with this Lesus. This wasn't my Lesus. I gave him a lopsided smile. "I guess you could say that."
"So, what's with your force of habit?" I asked. "Do you try to administer death by suffocation to every person who unnerves you?"
By this time, I was pretty sure I was dreaming or insane, or maybe the world had gone insane without my knowledge, because Lesus and I were drinking in a tavern. In one of the private rooms, even. So I decided to just roll with it. It wouldn't have been all that strange an event if Lesus actually knew me, but he didn't. It was awfully trusting of him to follow a stranger to a tavern and share drinks with said stranger when not a moment ago, he was more than willing to silence me with his pristine white gloves. I would warn him, but this was Lesus!
Lesus should be able to take care of himself...
Lesus looked apologetic as he nursed his drink. "It truly was a force of habit. I was afraid that you would reveal even more incriminating details about me. If my teacher were to hear..."
"Chasel? He wouldn't do any..." I stopped mid-speech.
Oh. Right. Lesus is the Sun Knight. That means Neo must be his teacher?
While Chasel wouldn't harm a single hair on Lesus for not maintaining the image of the Judgment Knight, and Lesus had never needed any threats to have the image down pat anyway, Neo most certainly would if his student couldn't maintain the image of the Sun Knight.
I felt slightly mollified that I wasn't the only one cowed by Teacher's "loving" teaching methods, but just as I was thinking that, a bout of melancholy seized me.
Neo isn't my teacher here.
I downed the wine in front of me, not knowing why I didn't feel happier over that revelation.
Lesus had that wrinkle between his eyebrows again. "How do you know of the former Judgment Knight? Even though his influence on my teacher is great, he can't stop my teacher if my teacher truly wills something to happen."
Sounds like there's a story behind those words.
By the time Lesus finished speaking, he had grown melancholic, much more than me. He had also seemed to take my words as meaning "Neo wouldn't do anything as long as Chasel is around" instead of a mix-up. What I really wanted to say was that Chasel wouldn't do anything to Lesus...
"Oh, ah, I wanted to become a holy knight," I said in response to Lesus's question. It was true enough, and it side-tracked Lesus enough for him to stop questioning how I knew Chasel. Or well, knew of him, according to Lesus's assumptions.
"Did you want to be one of the Twelve Holy Knights?" Lesus asked. He took my expression to mean, "yup." He picked up his bottle of wine and sipped from it as he pondered out loud. "Hm, let me guess, you wanted to become the Leaf Knight?"
I laughed. "Do I look that kind to you?"
"Well, you're listening to my woes right now, aren't you? Your hair would suit the Ice Knight, but you're much too expressive for that. Or hm, maybe the Cloud Knight? But no, you seem like someone who would stand out. You wouldn't be able to disappear like him."
I lifted a strand of my hair, startled to find that it was white and that I hadn't noticed until it was pointed out to me.
"So, who did you want to be?" His eyes seemed to ask, Did I guess right?
Before I could think to make something up, I blurted, "The Sun Knight."
He smiled softly with sad, blue eyes. "That would have been nice."
If someone had declared in my face that they wanted to be the Sun Knight, I would have smiled at them like one might smile at someone who didn't know better, and inwardly I would have totally laughed at them because the position was mine, mine, mine.
However, Lesus didn't seem to hold the same regard for his position now that he was the Sun Knight. It made me deadly curious how he had ended up as the Sun Knight.
"Why?" I prodded. "Do you feel I would have made a better Sun Knight?"
Lesus took a bigger sip of his wine, like he was stalling for time. Finally, he said, "Yes."
I blinked. He would think a stranger he just met to be a better Sun Knight than himself? "Do you not like being the Sun Knight or what?"
He sighed, hand reaching towards his blond hair. It would never stop being weird seeing Lesus with blond hair. "It's not that... I do like it."
He let his hand drop.
"Then what?"
He frowned. "It's just that I had prepared myself for a different path. I know I should be over it by now, but I can't help thinking what things would have been like if they turned out differently."
"You didn't sign up to be the Sun Knight?"
"No, I didn't." He fell silent and finished off the bottle of wine. I glanced at the bottle. The Lesus I knew would have face-planted after such a bottle, and if not that, his cheeks would be rosy by now. Truthfully, a perfect fit for the Sun Knight, except for the fact that Neo believed Sun Knights should never truly get drunk and had to have the upper hand in such a situation. It seemed that Lesus had received similar training like what I remembered going through.
"Well, I revealed who I wanted to be. Who did you want to be?" I figured I pretty much knew already, but with how whacked up this dream, hallucination, whatever it was, was turning out to be, it never hurt to check.
"The Judgment Knight. Shocking, right?" Lesus said with a wry smile and picked at his white sleeves.
I shrugged. "Not really. You dominated the color black, yeah? You could have done it."
And you'd do a ridiculously good job of it too. You did, actually.
Lesus stopped fidgeting with his sleeves. "Ah, right, you knew me from before. Few people remember that. No one who looks at me now would connect me with the Judgment Knight."
No one but me, of course, I thought. Lesus was now a shining beacon of light, nothing like the Judgment Knight, but how could I think of Lesus as anyone other than the Judgment Knight?
"How did you end up as the Sun Knight then? Dyeing your hair must be a pain," I said.
"I wasn't the Sun Knight, not at first," Lesus murmured. "And you're right, dyeing my hair is a long and involved process. My hair is very dark, after all."
"Wait, what?" I placed down my bottle of wine.
"Dyeing my hair is a long and involved process?"
"No, no, the part before that."
"Ah." Lesus explained, "Not very many know of this, but for a short time, I was the Judgment Knight-in-training. I thought my path to be set. I was prepared to walk the path of shadows, to deal judgment to sinners, to be the darkness to the Sun Knight's light..."
"What changed that?" I asked, and whoa was Lesus wordy. Must be a result of being the Sun Knight.
He sighed. Normally, I would have joked about his sighing, but hearing it now actually calmed me. At least that part was familiar out of all the craziness.
He rubbed his temples even though surely I wasn't the one who had put the headache there this time. That gesture was familiar too. This was...Lesus. Not the Lesus I knew, but he was still Lesus. "I hadn't even taken up the mantle of the Judgment Knight before disaster struck. I was supposed to be his sword and protect his path."
My hands tightened. "What happened?"
"He... the Sun Knight-in-training died."
I... died?
That would explain why Lesus didn't recognize me. That was, if "I" had been the Sun Knight in-training here too. That could have been different. Who knows. But considering the fact that Lesus didn't bear the mark of the Judgment Knight, which he received before we were officially introduced to each other at the age of thirteen, three years after we were chosen, it likely meant that his Sun Knight passed away before they were even introduced.
"How did he die?" I asked, voice quiet.
Lesus gulped and lowered his voice. We were the only ones in the room, but considering how he was basically telling me the gossip of the year, I understood where he was coming from. It was a wonder he was spilling all of the Holy Temple's secrets to me. Should I be worried? He whispered, "He kicked my teacher's door."
"...You're kidding me," I said even as I shivered.
He shook his head. "You don't know what my teacher is like."
Oh boy do I know what your teacher is like.
"It was... an accident," Lesus said forlornly.
Accident or not, how could Chasel have let something of this magnitude slide?!
"I still don't get how you ended up as the Sun Knight," I said instead, not able to wrap my mind around a single thing coming out of Lesus's mouth.
"My teacher never chose a back-up knight."
Right. That's Teacher all right.
"My teacher..." Lesus looked pained as he corrected himself, "I mean, the former Judgment Knight was very angry at my... teacher. The Pope was too. But both agreed that there must be a Sun Knight. The Holy Temple may be without any of the other holy knights, even the Judgment Knight, but never can the Holy Temple lose the Sun Knight."
"So he stole you from Chasel."
Lesus nodded. "I wouldn't say he 'stole' me, but..."
"Why?"
Why you, of all people? Wouldn't it be easier to pull someone from the Sun Knight Platoon?
Adair or one of the others could have done it. They wouldn't have to be completely wrenched out of their places. They already thought of themselves as sun knights after all.
Sighing, Lesus said, "He told me he knew of no other child kinder than me. The former Judgment Knight had told him of my distaste of the interrogation room. Somehow, he ended up believing that I would be the best replacement despite my black hair and eyes."
Although I hadn't grown up with this Lesus, I could detect the self-doubt that plagued him. He must be wondering, Was I not worthy of being the Judgment Knight?
My mind spun. "Then who's the Judgment Knight now?"
If Lesus isn't Judgment, then who in the world is Judgment?!
"I doubt you would know of him, but the Judgment Knight is a highly skilled swordsman--"
"Don't tell me it's Roland!" I shouted. Who else would Lesus praise as a "highly skilled swordsman"?
Lesus blinked at me again. "How did you know?"
Roland, the Judgment Knight? What in the world? "That makes even less sense than your becoming the Sun Knight! Roland wasn't even a holy knight, right? And I'm nearly one hundred percent sure he didn't participate in the Judgment Knight selection!"
"You...know a lot about the Holy Temple," Lesus said haltingly. "And yet, I am not alarmed. I feel like it is only...natural. Why is it so easy to tell you all these secrets?"
Because. We're confidants. We don't put up masks with each other in private.
At least, that was how things should have been. But perhaps what we were doing right now wasn't all that different.
"I don't understand how Roland became the Judgment Knight. Surely Chasel had selected a back-up?" I asked.
"He did indeed," Lesus replied. "But Teacher felt remorseful of snatching me from the position, so not soon after, he returned with Roland."
"...and Roland agreed?"
Lesus shrugged. "He wanted to deal out judgment and punish all criminals. He is actually more suited to the position than I ever was."
"Does he dye his hair black?"
Lesus blinked once more and regarded me in curiosity. "He does."
I groaned. So much hair dyeing going on. You might as well be the Twelve Hair-Dyeing Knights!
"Why didn't Neo choose Roland as the new Sun Knight instead? It would have made your life and Chasel's life a lot easier!"
"Roland as the Sun Knight?" Lesus asked and tilted his head. "I can't imagine it..."
"Really? Why not? Roland had always wanted to be the Sun Knight."
"Eh?" A look of surprise crossed his face.
"What, don't you know that?"
Wait, don't tell me you and Roland are on bad terms?
Lesus shook his head. "I didn't know that."
Then, he sighed. "Knowing my teacher, he probably acted on impulse when he decided to snatch me away before he remembered there was another possible candidate.
Knowing Neo... That sounds about right.
I pushed a bottle of wine towards him. "Do you have any other worries? Feel free to keep on talking. Here, have some more wine..."
Growing up under Neo's tutelage had clearly done a number on Lesus. No one could empathize with him more than me, and it was now clear to me that Lesus didn't have any bathroom-confidants, not if Roland and Lesus had never hit it off and the Grisia here had been stupid enough to kick a door that wasn't ever meant to be disturbed, leading him to kicking the bucket instead.
Lesus had always listened to me prattle off, and he'd always supported me from the shadows. Perhaps now it was my turn to return the favor.
I downed bottle after bottle of wine. Lesus did much the same as he talked through the night. He never learned that he was talking with a ghost.
Neither of us got drunk.
When I opened my eyes, all I could see was darkness. My head hurt, like it was about to split open, but it couldn't be that I had a hangover. I hadn't had a hangover since the time I managed to outdrink my teacher.
It was so dark that I couldn't see anything, so I extended my sensing ability. Immediately, I sighed in relief.
Of course I couldn't see.
Of course my teacher wouldn't have killed me just because I kicked his door.
All was right with the world.
I climbed out of bed, pulled on a shirt, and tiptoed out. I knocked on the door next to mine.
Lesus opened the door. "Grisia? What are you doing up at this hour?"
Yes, yes, that's my name! Grisia!
Without answering, I entered the room and threw myself on his bed. I hugged his pillow and decided I might as well snuggle under the blankets too.
Sighing, Lesus closed the door.
"Well?" he said and came closer to the bed. The bed dipped down.
"Your hair is black, right?" I asked, voice muffled by the pillow. I hurriedly lowered the pillow, not wanting to recall the sensation of smooth white gloves against my mouth.
"Of course."
"Roland is the Hell Knight, right?" I continued to ask.
"You're the one who made that happen."
I breathed in deeply. No scent of daisies here, nope.
"Are you going to return my bed to me?" he asked.
"No."
With another sigh, Lesus nudged me to make me move over. Then, he crawled under the blankets too.
"You know we're not children anymore," he said.
"Of course."
I could sense him roll his eyes.
After a long moment, I murmured, "What would it be like if you were the Sun Knight?"
Lesus was probably on the verge of falling sleep. He mumbled, "That would never happen."
"But I dreamed it! You had golden hair and clear blue eyes! You chugged down bottle after bottle of wine! I was dead because I kicked Teacher's door!"
"...What in the... Nevermind. Go to sleep, Grisia. You've had a long day."
I grumbled, "Fine."
Although I was already starting to forget the details of the dream, some part of me would always recall that man with sad blue eyes, that man who didn't have anyone to be his confidant. He may have walked the path of the light, but it was a path that he walked alone, led by tragedy... and absurdity.
I snuggled closer to Lesus, glad that I wasn't alone, that he hadn't been dealt such a fate here. He mumbled something incomprehensible and pulled the blankets toward him. I tugged them back.
Even though things could have turned out a lot differently, I quite liked my life the way it was. I wouldn't wish for things to be any different. Lesus probably thought the same way.
With Lesus by my side, I slept much better than before and even managed to forget about my headache.
the end
And then, the next morning, Grisia will remember that his dream came about because Blaze was kicking down too many doors. XD;
This fic was the result of chatting about Chikus's propensity of kicking down doors and how his teacher Fahr is pretty helpless about it. (What a doting teacher!) While on the other hand, if Grisia ever dared to do something like this, Neo would probably kill him. But oh, if Neo kills Grisia, who will be the Sun Knight then? Neo can snatch Lesus away from Chasel! But if that happens, who will be the Judgment Knight? Ah, Roland would be a good fit! Remember his answer to Neo in "For You All?" And then, and then, Neo and Chasel would both wonder why they went through the trouble of making Lesus the Sun Knight when they could have gone with one less step and made Roland the Sun Knight instead... But of course Neo would have already been dead set on Lesus by then, and yeaaaaah.
Anyway, it was an idea full of crack... So dream sequence it was. What I really wanted was for Grisia to meet Roland as well, and to come across Lesus as he performed his duties as the Sun Knight (showing off how awesome a job he does and how he gets to be kind and all that), but when I sat down to write this fic... It just turned into Lesus pouring out his life story to Grisia. At least, it meant this fic stayed a oneshot, haha. Otherwise, it'd have been much longer, and it's already long enough for such an absurd fic.
I'm sure Lesus would make a fine Sun Knight, and he'd be admired by all! It just... didn't fit in this fic because of how he became the Sun Knight here. And Neo got to him at a young and impressionable age, ahhhhh.
Title: Long Live the Sun Knight (oneshot)
Fandom: The Legend of Sun Knight
Words: 3,314
Summary: "How... no, who..." Lesus couldn't seem to make up his mind about what he wanted to say. I just wanted him to stop suffocating me. Or better yet, I just wanted to wake up. Finally, he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. How did I know? Well, he opened his mouth and said, "You must be someone who knew me before I became the Sun Knight." Lesus/Grisia
Notes: The result of a conversation between Kiyutsuna and me a month or two ago. This didn't turn out like how I imagined it, haha. I thought there'd be more action and crack, but it just turned into a lot of talking!
Long Live the Sun Knight
"I'm dreaming."
I had to be. I mean, I could see with my eyes, and what I saw was bizarre.
In front of me stood Lesus Judgment with shining blond hair. I'd know him no matter what he looked like, but I never thought I'd see him with blond hair. Of course, there was the slight possibility that I really was mistaking someone else for my best friend -- I mean, why would Lesus ever want to dye his hair, and blond even, it didn't suit him at all -- but then Lesus turned, and that was definitely his face. Except, he blinked at me with clear blue eyes instead of dark ones, and he had a wide smile on his face, much like one I might use to politely greet one of our followers.
If I wasn't dreaming, then I'd have to have gone crazy.
"Lesus?" I blurted.
The slight crease between his eyebrows was a familiar sight, but that ever present smile was definitely not. Neither was the fact that he was clad in white and had the Divine Sun Sword by his side.
I really should have put all the clues together by then, but my mind refused to work, and you couldn't really blame me for that. Lesus's skin was startling fair.
"Might I know you?" Lesus asked, voice a bit higher than I remembered. I might have thought it to be a result of nerves, but he kept speaking in the same pitch. "I haven't heard that name spoken in a long time." It was like he had exchanged his gloomy darkness and deep baritone for all this shining brightness.
"Lesus," I said. "Stop trolling me."
His polite smile was still stuck on his face, but his eyebrows creased further.
Who am I kidding? There's no way Lesus would ever put on such an elaborate bout of trickery.
If this was a stupid dream, no, nightmare, I'd really like to wake up. Like, right now. Before I descended into insanity. That was, if I wasn't already insane. I was starting to doubt myself.
"Seriously," I babbled, "What happened to your black hair?"
At those words, his smile finally dropped, but before I had a chance to sigh in relief at having his face return to a more familiar setting, he'd flown forward and covered my mouth with his gloved hand, intimately introducing me to the fine cloths and threads that went into the production of said glove. For some reason, I could almost imagine myself in a field of daisies. Actually, it must be because of the fresh scent I smelled from him, or well, more from his glove, and the way my intake of air was being obstructed much like how it'd be if my nose were stuffy from allergies.
It was a very unpleasant feeling.
And Lesus's skin was truly very, very fair.
"How... no, who..." Lesus couldn't seem to make up his mind about what he wanted to say. I just wanted him to stop suffocating me. Or better yet, I just wanted to wake up. Finally, he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. How did I know? Well, he opened his mouth and said, "You must be someone who knew me before I became the Sun Knight."
Lesus is the freakin Sun Knight. The freakin Sun Knight!!!!
Now I'd truly seen everything. I could only stare. Even the mark of the Judgment Knight was missing from his forehead. It made his forehead look way too bare.
"So, am I right?" he asked. A moment later, he recalled that I wasn't exactly in the best position to answer him, not with how he was suffocating me with the scent of daisies. He let his hand drop. "My apologies. Force of habit."
What kind of habit is that?
I'd never known Lesus Judgment to be nervous, but this Lesus in front of me was definitely nervous and had wanted to silence me through the laughingly naive way of clasping a hand over someone's mouth.
Also, this Lesus didn't know me.
Lesus...
I took a deep breath, trying not to think of heart-to-heart talks with Lesus in the bathroom because that definitely hadn't happened with this Lesus. This wasn't my Lesus. I gave him a lopsided smile. "I guess you could say that."
"So, what's with your force of habit?" I asked. "Do you try to administer death by suffocation to every person who unnerves you?"
By this time, I was pretty sure I was dreaming or insane, or maybe the world had gone insane without my knowledge, because Lesus and I were drinking in a tavern. In one of the private rooms, even. So I decided to just roll with it. It wouldn't have been all that strange an event if Lesus actually knew me, but he didn't. It was awfully trusting of him to follow a stranger to a tavern and share drinks with said stranger when not a moment ago, he was more than willing to silence me with his pristine white gloves. I would warn him, but this was Lesus!
Lesus should be able to take care of himself...
Lesus looked apologetic as he nursed his drink. "It truly was a force of habit. I was afraid that you would reveal even more incriminating details about me. If my teacher were to hear..."
"Chasel? He wouldn't do any..." I stopped mid-speech.
Oh. Right. Lesus is the Sun Knight. That means Neo must be his teacher?
While Chasel wouldn't harm a single hair on Lesus for not maintaining the image of the Judgment Knight, and Lesus had never needed any threats to have the image down pat anyway, Neo most certainly would if his student couldn't maintain the image of the Sun Knight.
I felt slightly mollified that I wasn't the only one cowed by Teacher's "loving" teaching methods, but just as I was thinking that, a bout of melancholy seized me.
Neo isn't my teacher here.
I downed the wine in front of me, not knowing why I didn't feel happier over that revelation.
Lesus had that wrinkle between his eyebrows again. "How do you know of the former Judgment Knight? Even though his influence on my teacher is great, he can't stop my teacher if my teacher truly wills something to happen."
Sounds like there's a story behind those words.
By the time Lesus finished speaking, he had grown melancholic, much more than me. He had also seemed to take my words as meaning "Neo wouldn't do anything as long as Chasel is around" instead of a mix-up. What I really wanted to say was that Chasel wouldn't do anything to Lesus...
"Oh, ah, I wanted to become a holy knight," I said in response to Lesus's question. It was true enough, and it side-tracked Lesus enough for him to stop questioning how I knew Chasel. Or well, knew of him, according to Lesus's assumptions.
"Did you want to be one of the Twelve Holy Knights?" Lesus asked. He took my expression to mean, "yup." He picked up his bottle of wine and sipped from it as he pondered out loud. "Hm, let me guess, you wanted to become the Leaf Knight?"
I laughed. "Do I look that kind to you?"
"Well, you're listening to my woes right now, aren't you? Your hair would suit the Ice Knight, but you're much too expressive for that. Or hm, maybe the Cloud Knight? But no, you seem like someone who would stand out. You wouldn't be able to disappear like him."
I lifted a strand of my hair, startled to find that it was white and that I hadn't noticed until it was pointed out to me.
"So, who did you want to be?" His eyes seemed to ask, Did I guess right?
Before I could think to make something up, I blurted, "The Sun Knight."
He smiled softly with sad, blue eyes. "That would have been nice."
If someone had declared in my face that they wanted to be the Sun Knight, I would have smiled at them like one might smile at someone who didn't know better, and inwardly I would have totally laughed at them because the position was mine, mine, mine.
However, Lesus didn't seem to hold the same regard for his position now that he was the Sun Knight. It made me deadly curious how he had ended up as the Sun Knight.
"Why?" I prodded. "Do you feel I would have made a better Sun Knight?"
Lesus took a bigger sip of his wine, like he was stalling for time. Finally, he said, "Yes."
I blinked. He would think a stranger he just met to be a better Sun Knight than himself? "Do you not like being the Sun Knight or what?"
He sighed, hand reaching towards his blond hair. It would never stop being weird seeing Lesus with blond hair. "It's not that... I do like it."
He let his hand drop.
"Then what?"
He frowned. "It's just that I had prepared myself for a different path. I know I should be over it by now, but I can't help thinking what things would have been like if they turned out differently."
"You didn't sign up to be the Sun Knight?"
"No, I didn't." He fell silent and finished off the bottle of wine. I glanced at the bottle. The Lesus I knew would have face-planted after such a bottle, and if not that, his cheeks would be rosy by now. Truthfully, a perfect fit for the Sun Knight, except for the fact that Neo believed Sun Knights should never truly get drunk and had to have the upper hand in such a situation. It seemed that Lesus had received similar training like what I remembered going through.
"Well, I revealed who I wanted to be. Who did you want to be?" I figured I pretty much knew already, but with how whacked up this dream, hallucination, whatever it was, was turning out to be, it never hurt to check.
"The Judgment Knight. Shocking, right?" Lesus said with a wry smile and picked at his white sleeves.
I shrugged. "Not really. You dominated the color black, yeah? You could have done it."
And you'd do a ridiculously good job of it too. You did, actually.
Lesus stopped fidgeting with his sleeves. "Ah, right, you knew me from before. Few people remember that. No one who looks at me now would connect me with the Judgment Knight."
No one but me, of course, I thought. Lesus was now a shining beacon of light, nothing like the Judgment Knight, but how could I think of Lesus as anyone other than the Judgment Knight?
"How did you end up as the Sun Knight then? Dyeing your hair must be a pain," I said.
"I wasn't the Sun Knight, not at first," Lesus murmured. "And you're right, dyeing my hair is a long and involved process. My hair is very dark, after all."
"Wait, what?" I placed down my bottle of wine.
"Dyeing my hair is a long and involved process?"
"No, no, the part before that."
"Ah." Lesus explained, "Not very many know of this, but for a short time, I was the Judgment Knight-in-training. I thought my path to be set. I was prepared to walk the path of shadows, to deal judgment to sinners, to be the darkness to the Sun Knight's light..."
"What changed that?" I asked, and whoa was Lesus wordy. Must be a result of being the Sun Knight.
He sighed. Normally, I would have joked about his sighing, but hearing it now actually calmed me. At least that part was familiar out of all the craziness.
He rubbed his temples even though surely I wasn't the one who had put the headache there this time. That gesture was familiar too. This was...Lesus. Not the Lesus I knew, but he was still Lesus. "I hadn't even taken up the mantle of the Judgment Knight before disaster struck. I was supposed to be his sword and protect his path."
My hands tightened. "What happened?"
"He... the Sun Knight-in-training died."
I... died?
That would explain why Lesus didn't recognize me. That was, if "I" had been the Sun Knight in-training here too. That could have been different. Who knows. But considering the fact that Lesus didn't bear the mark of the Judgment Knight, which he received before we were officially introduced to each other at the age of thirteen, three years after we were chosen, it likely meant that his Sun Knight passed away before they were even introduced.
"How did he die?" I asked, voice quiet.
Lesus gulped and lowered his voice. We were the only ones in the room, but considering how he was basically telling me the gossip of the year, I understood where he was coming from. It was a wonder he was spilling all of the Holy Temple's secrets to me. Should I be worried? He whispered, "He kicked my teacher's door."
"...You're kidding me," I said even as I shivered.
He shook his head. "You don't know what my teacher is like."
Oh boy do I know what your teacher is like.
"It was... an accident," Lesus said forlornly.
Accident or not, how could Chasel have let something of this magnitude slide?!
"I still don't get how you ended up as the Sun Knight," I said instead, not able to wrap my mind around a single thing coming out of Lesus's mouth.
"My teacher never chose a back-up knight."
Right. That's Teacher all right.
"My teacher..." Lesus looked pained as he corrected himself, "I mean, the former Judgment Knight was very angry at my... teacher. The Pope was too. But both agreed that there must be a Sun Knight. The Holy Temple may be without any of the other holy knights, even the Judgment Knight, but never can the Holy Temple lose the Sun Knight."
"So he stole you from Chasel."
Lesus nodded. "I wouldn't say he 'stole' me, but..."
"Why?"
Why you, of all people? Wouldn't it be easier to pull someone from the Sun Knight Platoon?
Adair or one of the others could have done it. They wouldn't have to be completely wrenched out of their places. They already thought of themselves as sun knights after all.
Sighing, Lesus said, "He told me he knew of no other child kinder than me. The former Judgment Knight had told him of my distaste of the interrogation room. Somehow, he ended up believing that I would be the best replacement despite my black hair and eyes."
Although I hadn't grown up with this Lesus, I could detect the self-doubt that plagued him. He must be wondering, Was I not worthy of being the Judgment Knight?
My mind spun. "Then who's the Judgment Knight now?"
If Lesus isn't Judgment, then who in the world is Judgment?!
"I doubt you would know of him, but the Judgment Knight is a highly skilled swordsman--"
"Don't tell me it's Roland!" I shouted. Who else would Lesus praise as a "highly skilled swordsman"?
Lesus blinked at me again. "How did you know?"
Roland, the Judgment Knight? What in the world? "That makes even less sense than your becoming the Sun Knight! Roland wasn't even a holy knight, right? And I'm nearly one hundred percent sure he didn't participate in the Judgment Knight selection!"
"You...know a lot about the Holy Temple," Lesus said haltingly. "And yet, I am not alarmed. I feel like it is only...natural. Why is it so easy to tell you all these secrets?"
Because. We're confidants. We don't put up masks with each other in private.
At least, that was how things should have been. But perhaps what we were doing right now wasn't all that different.
"I don't understand how Roland became the Judgment Knight. Surely Chasel had selected a back-up?" I asked.
"He did indeed," Lesus replied. "But Teacher felt remorseful of snatching me from the position, so not soon after, he returned with Roland."
"...and Roland agreed?"
Lesus shrugged. "He wanted to deal out judgment and punish all criminals. He is actually more suited to the position than I ever was."
"Does he dye his hair black?"
Lesus blinked once more and regarded me in curiosity. "He does."
I groaned. So much hair dyeing going on. You might as well be the Twelve Hair-Dyeing Knights!
"Why didn't Neo choose Roland as the new Sun Knight instead? It would have made your life and Chasel's life a lot easier!"
"Roland as the Sun Knight?" Lesus asked and tilted his head. "I can't imagine it..."
"Really? Why not? Roland had always wanted to be the Sun Knight."
"Eh?" A look of surprise crossed his face.
"What, don't you know that?"
Wait, don't tell me you and Roland are on bad terms?
Lesus shook his head. "I didn't know that."
Then, he sighed. "Knowing my teacher, he probably acted on impulse when he decided to snatch me away before he remembered there was another possible candidate.
Knowing Neo... That sounds about right.
I pushed a bottle of wine towards him. "Do you have any other worries? Feel free to keep on talking. Here, have some more wine..."
Growing up under Neo's tutelage had clearly done a number on Lesus. No one could empathize with him more than me, and it was now clear to me that Lesus didn't have any bathroom-confidants, not if Roland and Lesus had never hit it off and the Grisia here had been stupid enough to kick a door that wasn't ever meant to be disturbed, leading him to kicking the bucket instead.
Lesus had always listened to me prattle off, and he'd always supported me from the shadows. Perhaps now it was my turn to return the favor.
I downed bottle after bottle of wine. Lesus did much the same as he talked through the night. He never learned that he was talking with a ghost.
Neither of us got drunk.
When I opened my eyes, all I could see was darkness. My head hurt, like it was about to split open, but it couldn't be that I had a hangover. I hadn't had a hangover since the time I managed to outdrink my teacher.
It was so dark that I couldn't see anything, so I extended my sensing ability. Immediately, I sighed in relief.
Of course I couldn't see.
Of course my teacher wouldn't have killed me just because I kicked his door.
All was right with the world.
I climbed out of bed, pulled on a shirt, and tiptoed out. I knocked on the door next to mine.
Lesus opened the door. "Grisia? What are you doing up at this hour?"
Yes, yes, that's my name! Grisia!
Without answering, I entered the room and threw myself on his bed. I hugged his pillow and decided I might as well snuggle under the blankets too.
Sighing, Lesus closed the door.
"Well?" he said and came closer to the bed. The bed dipped down.
"Your hair is black, right?" I asked, voice muffled by the pillow. I hurriedly lowered the pillow, not wanting to recall the sensation of smooth white gloves against my mouth.
"Of course."
"Roland is the Hell Knight, right?" I continued to ask.
"You're the one who made that happen."
I breathed in deeply. No scent of daisies here, nope.
"Are you going to return my bed to me?" he asked.
"No."
With another sigh, Lesus nudged me to make me move over. Then, he crawled under the blankets too.
"You know we're not children anymore," he said.
"Of course."
I could sense him roll his eyes.
After a long moment, I murmured, "What would it be like if you were the Sun Knight?"
Lesus was probably on the verge of falling sleep. He mumbled, "That would never happen."
"But I dreamed it! You had golden hair and clear blue eyes! You chugged down bottle after bottle of wine! I was dead because I kicked Teacher's door!"
"...What in the... Nevermind. Go to sleep, Grisia. You've had a long day."
I grumbled, "Fine."
Although I was already starting to forget the details of the dream, some part of me would always recall that man with sad blue eyes, that man who didn't have anyone to be his confidant. He may have walked the path of the light, but it was a path that he walked alone, led by tragedy... and absurdity.
I snuggled closer to Lesus, glad that I wasn't alone, that he hadn't been dealt such a fate here. He mumbled something incomprehensible and pulled the blankets toward him. I tugged them back.
Even though things could have turned out a lot differently, I quite liked my life the way it was. I wouldn't wish for things to be any different. Lesus probably thought the same way.
With Lesus by my side, I slept much better than before and even managed to forget about my headache.
the end
And then, the next morning, Grisia will remember that his dream came about because Blaze was kicking down too many doors. XD;
This fic was the result of chatting about Chikus's propensity of kicking down doors and how his teacher Fahr is pretty helpless about it. (What a doting teacher!) While on the other hand, if Grisia ever dared to do something like this, Neo would probably kill him. But oh, if Neo kills Grisia, who will be the Sun Knight then? Neo can snatch Lesus away from Chasel! But if that happens, who will be the Judgment Knight? Ah, Roland would be a good fit! Remember his answer to Neo in "For You All?" And then, and then, Neo and Chasel would both wonder why they went through the trouble of making Lesus the Sun Knight when they could have gone with one less step and made Roland the Sun Knight instead... But of course Neo would have already been dead set on Lesus by then, and yeaaaaah.
Anyway, it was an idea full of crack... So dream sequence it was. What I really wanted was for Grisia to meet Roland as well, and to come across Lesus as he performed his duties as the Sun Knight (showing off how awesome a job he does and how he gets to be kind and all that), but when I sat down to write this fic... It just turned into Lesus pouring out his life story to Grisia. At least, it meant this fic stayed a oneshot, haha. Otherwise, it'd have been much longer, and it's already long enough for such an absurd fic.
I'm sure Lesus would make a fine Sun Knight, and he'd be admired by all! It just... didn't fit in this fic because of how he became the Sun Knight here. And Neo got to him at a young and impressionable age, ahhhhh.