… Youtube, I love you…

Title: Conditions of Love
Author: Shadow/Phantomness
Pairing: Championshipping (Lance x Red/Ashura)
Fandom: Pokémon
Theme: #13, Introspection
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Pokemon belongs to Nintendo and Shogakukan Comics. This non-profit, non-copyright infringing fanfiction belongs to me under international copyright laws and taking it is plagiarism. Thank you. *Phantomness bows*

Notes: <> for telepathy, ** for thoughts, italics if a pokemon talks

Warnings: Fanon AU, het

Love, Lance thinks, is very hard to define. Of course, perhaps it is difficult for him, because he sees so little of love, and so much at the same time.

He feels love, certainly, from his dragons, from all dragons, and every winter he completes the cycle as Dragon Master and begins a new year. They will die without question, they will obey without reward, and they will never, ever leave him. Even if he dances them down the path into hell, they will walk at his side.

That is unconditional love.

He feels loyalty, but not love, from his cousins – Clair, Lorelei – and then from his friends and fellow Guardians – Agatha and Sabrina, Morty and Karen and Will, Erika and Falkner and Bugsy…

That is also unconditional, but with conditions. It is a paradox. How can such exist? For they do not love, but they will obey without question, even if he moves them around like chess pieces and they die.

They don’t mind dying for duty.

Is it cruel of him to use them then?

They are pawns after all – but pawns for a good cause.

He sees wary loyalty from Charlotte. She is of equal rank as he, and he admires her devotion to her duty, and now that they are more accustomed to each other, it is easy to die one after another.

In the end, they all do it to save her.

Ashura, and Red, Ashline and Ashton… Names are quite meaningless when it all comes down to the wire. No, that is incorrect. The last Guardian must be protected at all costs, and though it may be love, it may also be loyalty.

However, Ashline and Ashton have both fallen by the wayside, and only Ashura and Red are left. They are the twin halves of a soul that is pure, and innocent, and deserves Guardianship. The others deserve nothing.

But in any case, they know – without really knowing – that they are doing the right thing. They have to be.

Otherwise, they would have nothing.

Duty is all they have left – and duty encompasses honor, and it encompasses pain, but most of all, it encompasses love.

You don’t die for people you hate after all.

They are no longer pawns, but puppets, and they dance what the legendaries wish. They know this, and so, they sit together over tea, and smile sadly, seeing the weight of honor, the depth of devotion, carved in each other’s eyes.

When it all comes down to the wire, is there a difference between duty and love?

Sometimes, Lance thinks the answer is yes. At other times, he’s sure it’s no.

Is it cruel of him to pick duty over love? Or should he be selfish and love one person over the world?

Sometimes, he isn’t sure.

But Lance loves Red, he really does, over and above the call of duty, and Red appreciates that, when she can remember.

That is not to say that Lance shirks duty.

Because sometimes; Lance’s duty is to love Red – Ashura – for they are one and the same.

That’s all.

End Fic

Completed 8/28/06

Edited 8/14/09

YES! This one practically dropped right into my lap! Dude… yay for prompts like this! I always write introspective fic anyway, so yatta~!

Straight Phantomness fanon, so head over to the guide, please!