Hey, here's a random one-shot I thought of. For ToC readers, this doesn't happen in that timeline and Lloyd really is Lloyd. For everyone else, that last sentance probably made no sense to you so ignore it. And hey, this is my first one shot! Accomplishment!

Ignorance

"Hey, Kratos?"

He looked up from the papers he was looking over, detailing the next Chosen of Sylvarant. Mithos said Kratos would have to accompany her again, after the disastrous last few attempts. Kratos had escorted Spiritua on the first journey earlier that century, but since her, all the Chosens in both worlds had either failed or died during the course of the journey. It seemed they were incapable of accomplishing anything without Kratos' help.

Currently, Mithos was walking into the office with a troubled look on his face. To Kratos' relief, he was in his Mithos-form, as he usually was when around just Kratos or Yuan. He typically only put on his Yggdrasill-form when showing off for the angels or Desians. Personally, Kratos hated that form. It was rather...feminine looking, and he and Yuan had both struggled to keep their faces straight when Mithos first showed them almost fifty years ago.

"What's wrong?" Kratos asked as Mithos took a seat opposite him. Mithos had changed so much since Martel died, and it saddened him. He hoped they'd get the energetic and courageous child he had trained back soon. Yuan was almost back to his former self, so Kratos could only hope Mithos would snap out of this in a little while, too.

"Well..." Mithos was saying, face twisted in confusion. "I don't understand why we aren't getting any new angels."

"Uh..." Kratos frowned, wondering what he was talking about. Mithos hadn't created any new angels since the first hundred or so he'd given their initial Cruxis Crystals to, so how was he expecting to get new ones? "I don't know quite understand what you mean."

"There are no baby angels. None of them are having children."

"Well, that's understandable," Kratos said. "Didn't you realise this would be the consequence when you made them lifeless? Lifeless Beings have no sex drive, and thus, no babies."

Now it was Mithos' turn to stare at him in blank confusion. "What are you talking about? What is a 'sex drive' and what does it have to do with having babies?"

Kratos stared at him with rising dread. "Uh, Mithos, you do know where babies come from, don't you?"

"Of course!" Mithos said quickly. "Who doesn't? Martel explained it to me when I was little. When Maxwell, he Summon Spirit of Birth, decides to bring a new life into the world, he creates a baby and sends it down to a woman to give birth to."

Uh-oh. Kratos couldn't even form words as all his worst fears were confirmed. How could Martel have never explained this to him? He was fourteen, for Origin's sake! How could the leader of Cruxis, the most powerful person in the world, not even know the basics of reproduction?

Upon thinking that, an even worse dread came over him. Mithos simply couldn't continue life thinking babies were sent down by Maxwell. It just wasn't right for a person to never learn about sex. Mithos had to be taught, and as much as he hated to admit it, Kratos was the only man for the job. After all, when Martel was still alive and they were traveling together, Kratos had been his mentor. He was the closest thing to a father-figure Mithos had, except maybe Yuan, who was perhaps more like a brother-in-law.

No, there was no way around it. Mithos needed The Talk, and Kratos would have to give it.

"Look, Mithos," he began, trying to figure out how to phrase it. "That's not...that is, what Martel told you..."

Mithos was staring at him innocently, still not aware of Kratos' horror. "What are you talking about, Kratos?"

"Babies do not come from Maxwell!" he finally said.

"Huh?" Mithos said, eyes wide with surprise. "Are you trying to say Martel lied to me?!" He was angry now, frowning and narrowing his eyes.

"Er, no," Kratos said quickly; after a hundred years he was accustomed to how violent Mithos could get when it came to Martel. "Martel told you the same thing I was told when I was little. It's just that we, uh, lost her before she could give you the full story."

"Oh, ok," Mithos said, calming down just as quickly as he'd grown angry. "So then...where do babies come from?"

"Well, you see, Mithos...when a man and a woman love each other very much, they might decide they want a baby. So the baby grows from an egg inside the mom..." He was only just beginning to feel the effects of immortality, but with this conversation he was dearly wishing he had died eighty years ago like he should have.

"Wait, so babies grow from eggs like chickens?"

"Um, sort of. But this is different. See, there's an egg cell and that's in the mom and then...the cell from the dad fertilises it, and it grows into a baby..." He was just glad Yuan wasn't here to see this. That damn half-elf would be laughing hysterically at this point.

"But how does the dad's cell get into the mom's cell?"

"They do a special...thing...with their, uh..."

"Come on, Kratos, tell me!" Mithos whined. "I'm the leader of Cruxis; I need to know this or I'll never know why my angels aren't reproducing!"

Kratos took a deep breath. He couldn't keep putting this off. He couldn't keep shirking around the subject. Mithos needed to know, and he couldn't learn from vague allusions. Steeling himself, Kratos blurted it out, giving Mithos a long and anatomically detailed description of exactly how a baby is made.

Half an hour later, Mithos sat there wide-eyed while Kratos put his head in his hands on the desk, wishing for death. "So..." Mithos said in horror. "You mean, Yuan and my sister...?"

"Yes," Kratos sighed, not looking up.

"Every time they snuck off into their tent and Yuan told me they were doing 'grown-up things' and I'd understand when I was older?"

"Yes."

"They were doing...doing that?"

"Yes!"

Mithos gaped at him, then said, "I don't think I want anymore angels if it means they have to do...that."

He got up to leave, still wide-eyed and looking scarred for life as he stumbled out of the office. Kratos' face was burning, and he cursed Martel's memory for never explaining it to her brother like she should have. He was quite certain he would never, ever have children, for the sole reason of never having to give this talk again.

--

Lloyd was staring at him from across the fire, a pensive look on his normally quite carefree face.

Ever since rejoining the party after releasing Origin's Seal, Kratos had felt awkward around Lloyd. He always felt like Lloyd was staring at him when he wasn't looking, and he'd grown somewhat accustomed to Lloyd's random questions. "When's my actual birthday?" "What did Mom look like?" "Were you and Mom officially married when I was born and if not doesn't that technically make me a bastard?"

Kratos usually just sighed and answered as well as he could, and he could tell that Lloyd was prepping himself for another one. The rest of the party was asleep, stretched out in their sleeping bags under the trees.

"Hey, Krat - Dad?" he finally asked.

He always flinched just a little when Lloyd called him 'Dad'. "Hm?"

"Uh, where do babies come from?"

Kratos froze. No. No way. There was no way he could live to seventeen and still not know this. "You don't…don't know?"

"Well, Dad told me that babies spring up from holes in the ground, but I think that might be just dwarves. So…will you tell me?"

Kratos just stared at him in horror. When he'd lost Anna and Lloyd, the only compensation he could think of was that at least he wouldn't have to do this talk. How could that dwarf have neglected to tell him? He had a horrible flashback to a certain conversation with Mithos, and even as he slowly nodded and consented to telling Lloyd all he ever wanted to know about sex, inside he was screaming, Not again!

Ok, so how was it for my first one-shot and first time writing from Kratos' PoV? I wasn't exactly sure what he'd be like in the first part. It's set only about a hundred years after becoming an angel, so who knows how long it took him to become the emotionless bastard we all know and love.