Current mood:	relieved
Current music:	Iron Man - Black Sabbath
Entry tags:	colloyd, horror, multi-chapter, r, romance, tales of symphonia, the devil's love song

The Devil's Love Song: Chapter Eight (Tales of Symphonia)
Title: The Devil's Love Song (Chapter Eight)
Author: Queenie Z
Fandom: Tales of Symphonia
Rating: R
Warnings: Lloyd/Colette, violence, gore, strong language, adult situations, multi-chapter
Spoilers: Various end-game details

Summary: Thrust into a world deep within his soul, Lloyd is faced with an agonizing onslaught of guilt and nightmares.

The Devil's Love Song
Chapter Eight: Weakness

---

A weakling who isn't strong enough to fight...

A coward who can't bring himself to face the truth...

A failure who can't protect the one he loves...

...Should never have been born at all.

---

Lloyd slowly awoke to the sound of crashing thunder and the overwhelming stench of wet earth. Raindrops pounded onto his body, stinging him like millions of needles falling from the sky. The swordsman knew he had ended up outside... but how?

Although his limbs felt heavy and his vision was blurry, Lloyd had to figure out where he was. He moved his fingers and felt them digging into the soft ground as he pushed himself up. Wiping the mud from his face, he looked at his surroundings. He was shocked by what he saw; these trees, this path, these hills - they were all too familiar to him. This was his home. This was Iselia Forest.

"How did I...?" he muttered to himself. Suddenly, he heard a piercing, inhuman screech. The boy turned around, his hands instinctively reaching for his swords, only to see the silhouette of a human figure lingering near a cliff. A flash of lightning revealed the figure to be that of a woman, beaten and bloodied, about to topple over the edge.

The woman on the cliff aroused Lloyd's memories... painful memories, comforting memories, memories he had not recalled since he was a small boy. Memories of love and lullabies. Memories of the part of himself he had long since lost. Memories of fear... of loss... of falling...

It made no sense. There was no way this could have been happening. However, Lloyd had no time to comprehend what he was seeing before instinct took over. He cried out, dashing towards the woman, leaping for her hand and catching it just as she toppled over the cliff's edge.

"Mom!!" he cried, holding on to his mother's hand harder than he had ever held on to anything in his life, "Mom... it's me... I'll -" he felt her hand slipping away from him before grabbing her arm with his other hand, "I'll save you!! I won't let you die!!"

Lloyd desperately tried to pull her back onto solid ground, his desire to save the mother he lost running through every muscle in his body. But the woman wouldn't budge - instead, she continued to slip away, smiling up at her son the entire time.

That was when he met eyes with a young boy, clutching helplessly to his mother's bosom. The mother and child slipped from Lloyd's fingers and fell into the endless abyss below.

He stared into the chasm in horror, his arm limping weakly over the edge of the cliff. Time stood still around him as he laid speechless on the muddy ground, the wounds of his failures tearing open wider than ever before. Not even now - not even now, when he was older, stronger, faster - could he save his mother. Not even now could he save himself from the guilt, the loneliness, the emptiness that had plagued him for fifteen years.

"Mom," he muttered, the rain washing tears away from his face, "I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..."

He finally glanced up, his eyes focusing on a dark cloud forming in the sky. Smoke. There was a fire... and Lloyd knew exactly where it was burning.

Running through the wet path as hard as his legs could take him, he headed towards Iselia. The smoke grew thicker and thicker as he came closer and closer to the town. Finally, he reached the gates, where he beheld a sight that robbed him of whatever breath he had left.

"No..." he said shakily, "No... not again... not again...!!"

He saw Desians rounding up a group of townspeople. He saw a man being stabbed for resisting arrest. He saw a mother held hostage with her crying daughter, watching helplessly as their home burned to the ground. He saw the same fire, the same destruction, the same horrors he had witnessed not even a year before. Lloyd began to boil over with rage.

"Damn you..." He drew his swords and turned towards a group of Desians. "Damn you!!" He charged at them, violently slicing at them with all of his strength. However, he was shocked to see that his blades simply passed right through their bodies. He charged again, shouting obscenities at his enemies, only to find them, once again, completely unscathed. Despite this, Lloyd was prepared to attack the Desians again in his fit of anger, only to be stopped by the hand of a large creature, tossing him into the wall of a nearby building.

When he recovered from the attack, he looked up to see an exbula, writhing and screaming in pain. At the sight of the creature's suffering, Lloyd stepped out of the rubble and approached it.

"Marble..." he said, reaching out to the monster, "It's me... I can - I can save you! I can save everyone! I can... I..."

Marble swung her monstrous arm at the boy again, sending him flying into a tree. Helpless, hopeless, as weak and limp as a torn rag doll, he lay dazed as the town he couldn't save burned before him. The nightmare of reliving his worst fears and deepest guilt began to destroy him, more so than the edge of any blade or the wrath of any beast. There had to be someone - someone he wouldn't have to let down... someone that wouldn't leave him all alone...

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a glimpse of salvation from his personal hell. By the burning buildings, unscathed by the smoke and flames, stood Colette, looking into the fire, her hands folded gracefully behind her back. She was there. She was okay. He could still save her - he could still protect her - he could still keep her by his side, where she would forever stay to heal him of his loneliness.

Lloyd painfully limped over to her, draping his arms over her shoulders, holding her as if he was holding the single most precious object in the whole world. He choked back a sob as he rested his weary head upon her shoulder.

"Colette..." he croaked, "Colette... I... I couldn't save Mom... I couldn't save the village..." He tightened his grip. "But I'll protect you... I'll save you... I'll never abandon you..." He placed a hand on top of her head, his gloved fingers shaking, entangled in the girl's golden hair. "I love you... I love you so much... I'd - I'd do anything for you... I'll never let you leave me again!!"

The broken swordsman felt his love's arms embrace him. He looked down at her smiling face, hope glimmering brightly in his eyes.

"That's right..." he said, "You still love me, don't you'll? You'll - you'll let me be the one to protect you, right?" He smiled. "And then... everything will be okay... won't it...?"

He closed his eyes as Colette reached up to cup his face. Her touch was his healing elixir - the promise that she would love him and take all of the pain away. Lloyd knew he was a failure, too weak to be anything to anyone... but as long as she was there, none of that would matter anymore...

...Then the warmth of her hand vanished. Lloyd could only watch as his last hope slipped from his fingers, disappearing into the flames.

"Colette..." He fell to his knees. "No..."

The world around him shattered as he began to fall, screaming into the abyss, plummeting into the vast reaches of darkness.

---

"First Aid."

As she finished her spell, Raine placed her hand upon Lloyd's forehead. Colette looked on from behind her.

"Professor," she asked, "how is he?"

The older half-elf shook her head. "I’ve managed to heal the wound on his forehead and control the bruising in his brain. In other words, she should wake up." She removed her hand, replacing it with a fresh, wet towel. "But, somehow, something is preventing him from regaining consciousness."

A shadow crept across Colette's face. She knelt beside Lloyd, tenderly touching his cheek. "Lloyd... please, wake up... No matter what you've done... we still love you..." The tears that were forming in her eyes began to spill onto the bed. "I... I still..." Her uncontrollable sobbing prevented her from finishing.

The Professor looked on, grieving for the unfortunate boy and the girl who cared for him the most in her own, silent way. She could only imagine the kind of burden these events had placed on the two. But she knew, whether by logic or merely intuition, that Lloyd was not entirely responsible for his actions. As she gazed at the darkened exsphere on his left hand, she began to put the pieces together: if this gem contained the soul of Lloyd's mother, then could the contamination be a result of...

...Of course, there was no way that could happen - at least, she hoped that it wasn't the case.