Author's Notes: Strange piece of work. Thanks to Jackidy for beating this.

New Hope

They hadn't used their given name for centuries, settling for the tittle they had been at a time long past. It was something that they didn't which for strangers to learn, so it passed away in the sands of time. By now, the few that knew of their existence called them Duke, unaware that it had been many years since they had lost that right long ago. Content to live in their own, a balance found within themselves that allowed them to craw for no company but their own, time passed with little care towards them.

The other avatars were younger, only born after the pact was broken and the world began to heal, and they saw them seldom, each with their own worries and missions. The only one they approached regularly was Phoenix, the eldest one and most like them in temper. Humans would have feared them, their immortality and power far beyond their own capacity to understand.

But the world was crying and the one from were they were born was growing weaker, his voice reaching them now only as an echo.

Humans were strange creatures, doomed to repeat the same mistakes again and again. Duke had seen it from the moment they were born, creatures that forgot to easily and desired to govern everything about them. Their own greed had unleashed the bitter poison into their world, but they were to blind too realize it. Where they all incapable of learning but the smallest of lessons?

So they watched, patient, curious as to how this would unfold, ready to intervene before it was too late. They were intrigued by the raven haired man, even helped him a bit on the way to reach his goals. But when the princess was captured and the foolish man unleashed the terror in the world they knew it was time to act. It was foolish to trust mere humans with the fate of the world, no matter how much the voice cried. They had probed numerous time they were not to be trusted.

So why did they hesitate?

The raven haired man stood at the centre, struggling to command a power too great for a human. For a moment, he remembered another one, a red headed boy who had known too little about the world but had been forced to face so much for it's sake. They remembered a lost child abandoned by his family, wandering and chasing the shadow of a man who never wished them more than death. They remembered how they battled to find a place to call their own and each other when the world tried nothing but make them hate each other.

For a moment it was not the man's companions that stood around him, but painful shadows from the past. The princess from the country that rose from the merge of a kingdom and empire had been deemed more precious than the fate of the world. Her powers heralded the end, but she was rescued at the cost of so many. Why? Their own companions had done little to stop them. They could not comprehend it.

The blond man was almost identical to their own knight, a green haired boy standing on the guild master's place. The little pirate became a raven haired girl standing defensively in front of the boy protected herself by the mage's spells. The old man's lazy stance was eerily similar to a monster best left buried, but deeply respected. Surely it was not a coincident that the Kritia was there? The descendent of the city that had lived buried in the miasma only to rise into the air when their people began to look so different that their fellow humans' beings began to fear and despise them. Even the dog served to remind them of the annoying voice and unwavering loyalty, as unwanted as it had been.

They should stop them, this fruitless effort that only served to place fake hope in their hearts. Even now they realised that they were not enough, even with the entelcaia aiding them. They were only prolonging the suffering, it was best that they ended it like they should have done from the beginning. They took a step, but stopped, gasping as the one who they hadn't hear called towards them, his power joining their children's.

"Asch..." They hadn't called themselves by the names for so long, why start now? Why now when the end was so close? Why when hope had all but disappeared? "Asch!"

"Why?" Why again? Why when the humans failed to live up to themselves again and again. Why now?

"Asch." They could see that the raven man wouldn't last much longer, even with his friends support. But hadn't they been the same way, once? Weak, scared, but struggling for the ones they loved? One who only allowed himself to love a few and the other who loved too many, too deeply?

"Luke." Maybe... Maybe they could give the world one more chance? For the sake of the few who stood up to defend themselves and the ones they loved. "Lorelei"

The raven haired man stared when they joined their power with the rest of the world, but he welcomed them, welcomed Duke to his side despite the fight... Or maybe due to it and the scions of a forgotten deity welcomed him, the human who had forced them to remember the time when they had been humans. The time they had fought and cried, the time when they had felt love and hate so deep that nothing had been able to match it in several thousand years nor had they want it to.

Maybe, maybe Yuri was right, even if he didn't know what he was saying. Maybe there would always be someone who would rose, like they have, like he have, and lead the world back into the right track, one soul at a time. Maybe all Duke, Asch, Luke had to do was believe again in the one who sang two thousand years waiting for their birth.

Maybe it was time to dare to hope again.

Author's Notes: Yeah... Anyone who caught the reference to Luke and Asch from the first paragraph gets an internet cookie.