A/N: No matter how long this takes I am going to finish this story and see it through to the end. This is my promise and it is done so on my integrity as a decent person, my love of fashion, art and my passion for writing.

I leave the writing in this unchanged so I can see my progress.

Disclaimer: I don't own Tales of Symphonia.

Nightmare

The black of night engulfed everything that Kratos saw until the image of his dearly beloved tore across his field of vision and wrapped his entire being in terror. It was a nightmare that he had no wish to come to pass and now that it had all he could do was stare at the image that would haunt him to the depths of eternity. Anna's lifeless body was strewn helplessly across the cold ground with rivulets of her own blood coursing down her paling skin from the wound that he had inflicted by his own sword.

He failed them. He failed Anna and her youthful optimism and Lloyd and his childlike innocence.

"Lloyd!" He snapped out of his daze in a panic. By the Goddess, Lloyd. Where is my son?

Kratos scoured the surrounding cliff side making full usage of his senses for any sign of the little boy that he had become so attached to. He could not allow such a young life to be wiped out so early. He could not allow his own son to die. Not before he did. But there was no tiny boy to greet his eyes nor a corpse to scar his mind. The only sign of Lloyd that he found was a tiny boot encrusted in blood so close to the body of his dearly beloved. He knelt down and picked up the boot in his own hand, stunned.

So this is all that is left of Lloyd, Kratos thought, feeling his entire being succumb to a hopelessness the like he had never experienced before.

"Why?" He said to himself, staring at the boot and imagined all of the pain that Lloyd and Anna had to endure because of his mistake. "Why did this have to happen?"

"Kra…tos…"

It was a voice Kratos knew intimately and his eyes snapped to Anna, whom he had assumed dead. He let the tiny boot slid from his hand and fall softly to the ground as he walked closer to her, the tendrils of fear that gripped his heart prickling painfully.

"Yes, I'm here."

"I…Lloyd is…" Anna's chest was struggling to rise and fall and her attempts at speech only worsened it. Her eyes, which glistened in the light of the crescent moon, turned to his and what he saw made his chest constrict. Her eyes that were normally so full of life and love and joy were now encumbered in such a pain that he had never seen her hold.

"Shh, Anna," he said maintaining the facsimile of calm if only for her. "Don't speak, it won't do anything but worsen your condition."

Her pain-filled eyes mixed with an expression of emotional pain.

"I...I'm sorry. I only wished to…to allow you to have some peace before you…you…" He broke off, hearing his own voice crack. Emotions were threatening to roil to the surface which he would not allow her to see. He failed to protect her in every way possible even before she died.

Kratos saw her hand rise and tremble as it reached out to him. He bridged the gap immediately and gripped it in his own. She squeezed his hand weakly. So in the end she was attempting to comfort him. That held a bitter irony, did it not?

There must be something he could do to comfort her other then watch her slip away from him. Then an epiphany dawned on him.

"Anna, I am going to cast a healing spell, please remain still," Kratos rose his emotionless mask because he needed to be strong for her.

Kratos closed his eyes to create the concentration which had taken him millennia to hone, he knew that the sight of her in such a state would break it. He muttered an incantation under his breath and harnessed all the mana in his body that was safe to use towards the spell. A warm rose in him and he felt that mana escape his body and head towards Anna whom he had visualized in his mind in this basic spell of first aid.

He opened his eyes and saw the ethereal glow that accompanied mana usage surround her body. Her breathing had steadied and her wound did not look as deadly which made Kratos catch his breath in hope. But his mind chastised his heart's hope, he knew that such a simple spell could not save her, it could only buy her time and lessen her pain.

"Thank you," Anna whispered and Kratos' eyes locked with hers. "Now I can say goodbye."

"You're not going to die."

"You and I both know…that I'm gonna die."

"No," he whispered. He did not want to believe it.

Anna smiled a smile that commingled with the pain in her eyes which made the memories of her smiles come to his mind. This smile tore Kratos apart. "I'm so glad I met you, you've done so much for me. You even…killed me for Lloyd, it must have been so hard," Her eyes shaped a desperate tone. "Lloyd's alive, you know, you did it, you protected him."

"Anna, Lloyd is dead. I could find no trace of him," Kratos could not hide the truth of the situation to his beloved, he would only end up regretting it.

"No, I gave Lloyd to a dwarf…and I told him everything so maybe one day Lloyd would know what happened to me...he's safe, you've gotta find him," her tone became as desperate as her eyes and her weak hold tightened around his hand. "Lloyd must be so scared right now, he must feel so alone. Please, go to him."

Kratos felt hope surge through his system at the knowledge of his son's survival yet he was torn as Anna's pain-filled eyes bore into his own.

"What of you? If I search for Lloyd now, what will become of you?"

"Don't worry about me…Lloyd's more important. I'm already dead, anyways."

"No, I will not leave you to die alone," his voice broke when he said 'die' and he did not attempt to hide it anymore. His mind could not think coherently, it was breaking down. Her death was a nightmare and he was living through that same nightmare now.

"I'm being selfish, aren't I? I don't want you to go away too. I must be the worst mother ever."

"Never say that. You're an amazing mother, you've even given your life so Lloyd can have his," Kratos could not allow her to think of herself any less then she was, especially in her final moments. "I promise that I will find Lloyd after you…after…"

"Shh," she whispered to him while squeezing his hand yet again, "I know you care for Lloyd and you'll be such a good father that you'll make up for me not being there. You don't have to say anything else. I love you and I don't regret anything about being with you. Don't you dare forget that."

Kratos stared at her incredulously. Anna knew him well, she knew that these were the thoughts that would plague his mind. "But Anna with my own sword, I killed you."

"It wasn't your fault…Kvar…" And Anna began to convulse which made the tendrils of fear that gripped his heart tear painfully against him and he tightened his hold on her hand.

"No! Please, don't die! Don't leave me! Please, Anna, please..." he felt waves of despair wash over him as he watched her convulsing body slump and her eyes slip closed. And the hopelessness and the despair and the weight of reality all came crashing down at him at once. If she could die...he had never thought that she could die. He had never thought that he would fail. He was watching her slip away from this world and there was nothing he could do. Nothing. "Anna, no, Anna…"

"I've never seen you beg before, Kratos. Its rather unbecoming of a seraphim of Cruxis."

Kratos felt shock course through his system at the familiar drawling voice that he had no wish to hear at that moment. His eyes abruptly came to Yggdrasill's cold and mocking ones.

"How did you find me?" Kratos seethed, unable to control the anger that rose in his voice.

"I read Kvar's report a few moments ago," Yggdrasill said with a tone that did not acknowledge his anger. "I wanted to stop what he was doing but I guess I was too late. I'm so sorry, Kratos, she's dying."

Yggdrasill's gaze dropped briefly to Anna that lay below Kratos. Kratos' eyes narrowed and suspicion rose in him. He doubted Yggdrasill had no idea of Kvar's plan that night and he also doubted that Yggdrasill would have any qualms about her death. All that mattered to Yggdrasill was that his precious Origin Seal remain unharmed and Kratos' mind was not so deluded to believe otherwise. But there was something about Yggdrasill's wording that caught his attention.

"Dying? You mean that she is not already…gone?" Kratos felt hope swell inside himself despite his best efforts to suppress it.

"No, not yet, I can still sense the mana in her body but it's weakening by the second. Soon she'll die. If only I had known about her and her condition sooner, you could have always come to me. I would have commissioned a proper key crest for her that would have worked to suppress her condition and I could've kept Kvar away as well," Kratos glared at him, If I had done that I would be under your power yet again. "Kvar's methods are just too extreme, it was cruel to keep her suffering like that. But if I knew that someone dear to you was suffering, I would have helped. I want you to know that."

"Humph," Kratos' glare intensified. Yggdrasill was insinuating something by his way of speech and Kratos knew that it would not be something that he would like.

"You don't believe me?" Although Yggdrasill's voice mimicked the tone of being hurt, his face held the same impassive expression. "I can't believe we've drifted apart so much in the years you've been away. I care about what you're going through, really I do. Perhaps the healers on Derris-Kharlan could take a look at her, I'm certain that they could save her."

Kratos' eyes narrowed and he fought with the hope that surged throughout his entire system. Yggdrasill had wanted Anna to die, or to almost die, so he could then convince Kratos to return to Derris-Kharlan. That was why Yggdrasill had descended upon Sylvarant at this particular moment. Kratos was no more then a mere pawn in his plan, the Origin's Seal, and Yggdrasill needed to ensure Kratos' loyalty, or at the very least, to keep Kratos near him.

The very logic of the situation was drowned out by the terror in his heart as his gaze shifted to Anna's unconscious form. Her skin was paling beyond what was natural and her hand was limp in his own.

"Very well, I will ascend to Derris-Kharlan. However if she does not receive immediate medical attention…"

"Don't worry about that, of course she will," Yggdrasill's lips twisted into a conniving smile and his crystalline eyes glinted in the light of the crescent moon. "You can trust me, Kratos, I'll make sure she doesn't die."

With that Kratos felt the familiar sensation of the transportation that Yggdrasill favoured to ascend to Derris-Kharlan. Kratos gripped Anna's hand that held as a constant to him as his dark surroundings dissipated about him in place of the cold and lifeless surroundings of Derris-Kharlan.