Fanfiction: Him

Title: Him
Author: Lewis
Writing: Digital Devil Saga fanfiction- it's a PS2 game I was fawning over for the past several weeks. But I just recently lost the game, and didn't get to finish it...
Word Count: 514

“What’s He thinking?” Cielo asks suddenly.

“W-what?” Sera looks startled- shocked, even- that someone would ask such a question.

“You’re always talking about how He sent you to us on da mission to help people,” Cielo mumbles, chastised. “If God sent Sera to help us, why even send da Virus to begin with?”

“We already went over this,” snarls Heat. “Some stupid fucking test, that’s all. Did you forget? It was the same even before the Virus. The only difference is that there’s a new way to kill. Can’t say I hate this power, though.” Arms folded, he strokes the flame atma mark with a free thumb. “Anyway, the point is that we need to protect Sera. The Wolves could be at our borders any minute now. Or past them. I’m going to check patrol.”

Brooking no room for argument, he pulls his cape closed around himself and sweeps out of the room.

“What’s gotten into him?” Argilla snipes, eying the open hallway with distaste.

Cielo shrugs, and Sera just turns her eyes back to the window and continues to sing. The unfamiliar tones and language are eerie and just as coldly beautiful as they were the first the Tribe heard them, but the notes today dip and waver.

Argilla listens intently but pretends not to notice the differences. They bring to mind Jinana’s dying face, and the question.

What is sad?

Sera has explained before- many times, at Gale’s prompting- that the song she sings to calm the demons and return them to human state is called a Prayer. It’s a tribute to Him, she says, an entreaty for him to have mercy on the suffering. It becomes clear to the team that although the concept of the existence of an all-powerful being has been firmly ingrained into their minds, there exists no ritual whatsoever in the Junkyard that pays homage of any sort to this God. Cielo suggests that they all try to learn Sera’s Prayer so that everyone can use the skill and somehow win God’s favor, but knows the moment he says it that it won’t work. Sera’s special. “The black haired girl,” or so Angel called her. The key to Nirvana.

He still can’t make sense of why only one person is allowed to Pray, though. Isn’t it a bit unfair?

Serph thinks that maybe Heat is afraid of questioning Sera- especially Sera. The way Heat warms up to her is unusual; it’s the kind of inconsistency Gale would have categorized alongside Argilla’s recent bouts of “sadness.”

Though- after Lupa, Gale has been less often labeling them inconsistencies and seeing them as objects of greater importance. Serph isn’t quite sure if he’s comfortable with Gale’s “awakening;” Gale certainly seems much more motivated to reach Nirvana now, but the nature of the mission feels different now. It’s not reaching Nirvana and a life without war- for Gale, now, it’s to find Lupa’s child and tell him to become “a man of honor.” And though Gale seemed to understand, Serph is still grappling with the meaning of that word- honor.

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Artist's Note: Hi, this is Lewis! Sorry for not posting for so long! I actually haven't written anything for a long while. Haha, as I'm writing this I am procrastinating on a Very Important Homework Assignment. At any rate, I would say that this would be my first ever piece of fanfiction. Yup -__- I didn't provide a lot of background for the stuff I wrote here, and there's not a lot of order to it because I was just spilling little things I was wondering about while playing the game.
I guess I should at least understand that killing someone and eating someone are on different levels of depravity.
Haha, sorry for rambling.
Toodles.
~Lewis