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It’s easy to fool Charlotte into thinking that the baby is theirs.
A few sweet words and gentle touches is all it takes. She believes every word without a second thought, her heart too caught up in the romance of it all. He tells her that it must have happened during one of their many amorous nights underneath the moon, with their passion spilling over into something far greater than either of them could ever conceive. Ever the wide-eyed girl to believe in the miracles of love, she accepted his explanation immediately, perfectly prepared to raise the child she apparently fathered.
His commanders require no explanation; they bow their heads in immediate understanding, as if such a mystery is merely a facet of their god’s powers. As for his subjects, the news of his miraculous conception sweeps through the streets of Falconia like wildfire, igniting both awe and zeal within their already devoted hearts. If their king was carrying a child, the heir to their great empire, then it was as it should be.
Griffith finds himself lounging in the tranquil shade of the palace gardens a few months later. Charlotte is curled up against him, her delicate hands pressing against his ever-growing belly as she hums a melodic tune underneath her breath. “Do you think they’ll be a boy or a girl, Lord Griffith?” she asks as she leans down to lay her head against the curve of his stomach, trying to feel for a rare sign of life.
He strokes her hair absently. “I wouldn’t concern myself with such a manner, princess. Our child will be perfect, regardless of the gender that they’re born with.”
Charlotte smiles at him with all the love and wonder a princess like her is capable of. She drops a kiss on his stomach and begins to whisper of all the grand dreams she has for his child. Griffith says nothing in response to her ministrations, looking out into the distance, thoughts still lingering on the empire he’s still building and the final piece he’ll need to complete it.
The quiet of night gives way to sound and sensation, a memory rendered in vivid and perfect clarity by Griffith's quicksilver mind…
Two full moons had passed since that fateful day in Elfhelm when Griffith felt his presence traveling across Midland. Except it wasn’t truly him–it was the Beast from within, channeling itself through his body. He allowed for three days to pass, spurred by reports of violence from the villages it had apparently attacked.
Touching down in an empty field, he inhaled the earthy scent of dirt and copper. The grass brushed up against his trousers as he began to walk, almost pushing him towards the dark presence that lay ahead. It was then that he saw it–trudging through the grass at an uneven pace–like a rabid animal.
Its head snapped up the instant he took another step forward, red eyes gleaming with uncontained bloodlust. It let out a fearsome shriek before it rushed at him, closing the distance within a heartbeat.
Griffith reacted immediately, his hand reaching for the hilt of the sword just in time to block the massive blade about to crash down on him. Were he still human, he would’ve been sent flying back at the force of the attack. “Griffith,” a garbled voice came out of the Beast’s helmet, voice barely human dripping with venom.
“Guts,” he greeted back.
A savage growl tore through the air as the Beast lunged forward, gripping his hips with a bruising force. It was a move that Griffith could’ve easily dodged were it not the feeling of his dead heart bthumping in the second. The sharp pressure sent a sudden jolt through his body, red-hot zeal flooding within his veins, stirring something warm within the chambers of his cold, unfeeling heart. For a fleeting moment, Griffith felt as if he was truly alive again.
He evaded several of the Beast’s careless blows with ease, parrying each and every one of them with a grace that bordered on mockery. When it swung a wide arc over its head to bring down on Griffith’s head, the blade only landed a mere inch above his head–close, but not enough to split open his flesh.
“Have you learned nothing from our previous encounters, Guts?” Griffith murmured, tilting his head at the armored fiend of darkness before him with subtle amusement. “I wonder, why are you so close to my territory, away from your comrades? What happened to them?” He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, savoring the familiar scent of leather, smoke, sweat… and something deeper. Much more primal.
“You talk too much,” the Beast growled, the distorted rasp grating against the air. Its helmet withered away, finally revealing the bruised and bloodied face of the man within its armor. Hot rage burned within his dark eyes, crimson red staining the corners of his mouth.
“And you still clench your teeth when you’re angry. You knew we’d meet again, Guts, for better or for worse. How fortunate we are though, to do so on a warm day like this.”
“Shut up!” Guts roared. He swung at Griffith again with reckless abandon.
Griffith only had to step to the side to dodge the predictable attack. “Do you wish to see me bleed?” he goaded, now behind Guts with his own sword against his neck, almost like a barricade against his chest. “What is it you fantasize about? Killing me? Watching me choke on your blood as I die a helpless death at your feet? To exact your ultimate revenge?”
A laugh escaped Griffith as he allowed himself to be knocked back from a particularly rough swing. He didn’t bother standing back upright again, instead opting to wait if Guts would raise his sword again, now that he finally managed to land a hit on him. Their eyes met. The way Guts held his blade was slightly off from his usual solid stance—it was wary, even defensive
His grip was looser and his features were calculating, as if he was trying to figure out if Griffith was an illusion of some kind.
Golden flecks of sunlight danced across his skin as a gentle breeze rustled the trees at the foot of the hill. He appeared so out of place, so foreign to the serene environment with his scars and his armor—like a nightmare walking amongst a daydream.
Griffith felt a small pang bthump within him, deep within his core… remorse? No… something darker, more cutting. Pity, perhaps.
But it was beneath those surface emotions that another sensation coiled around his heart—jealousy. And longing.
Guts look like he’d lived through an entirely different lifetime—without him. It was a life that didn’t include him, a life that he would never be able to grasp. The realization clawed its way across his being, relentless in its onslaught. Because Griffith, too, had built a life for himself without Guts… and yet—
Bthump.
It was in this moment that Griffith saw the threads of causality appear in his mind. Some led to familiar chains of events while others branched off into entirely new paths. And then… there it was. The one causal sequence that would give Griffith everything he wanted.
“Is that all?” Griffith cocked his head to the side, mockery dripping from his teeth. “I see you’re still the brute that you always tried to pretend not to be.”
The guarded look on Guts’ face twisted back into rage in a blink of an eye, and with an incensed roar, he attacked Griffith, coming at him with monstrous speed. Like before, Griffith took the blow, but this time, he maneuvered around him, slipping past Guts and sweeping his legs out from under him. He had Guts pinned beneath him just a moment later, firmly straddling him in place. Guts snarled at his entrapment, struggling against Griffith when his hands came up to hold his wrists above him. “Get off of me, you fucking bastard!”
“Quiet, now,” Griffith murmured, before leaning down to capture Guts’ lips with his own. Guts only froze for a brief second before he surged forward to grab Griffith by the shoulders, slamming him to the ground with a force that should have knocked the breath out of him, were he still human.
“Fuck you,” Guts growled, then leaned down to claim Griffith’s mouth like a beast that had just caught its prey.
The kiss was viscous—teeth clashed against teeth and blood was swapped like spit. Any lesser man would’ve submitted to the raw violence of it, but Griffith welcomed it, feeling high from the rush of intoxicating adrenaline that ripped through his veins. There was no resistance, only surrender.
Not in submission, though, but a much darker invitation. Cold and black claws shredded his tunic and trousers in one swift, brutal motion, leaving him exposed. Even with the cool air kissing his bare skin, all Griffith could focus on was the beastly creature emanating pure bloodlust above him. Guts’ eyes were pitch black with fury; but Griffith knew what lay beneath just beyond the surface.
“Devour me,” Griffith says, voice thick in barely concealed desire.
Guts surged forward–thrusting into him in one unyielding motion, his blood acting as a sordid kind of slicking oil. The lack of hesitation and brutality of it sent a wave of heat down to his core. Griffith gasped as pain and pleasure dissolved into nothingness; the sensation left as it came, making every new thrust electrifying. Every nerve cried out at the delicious agony of being roughly dominated–every inch of his newborn being felt alive as Guts treated his body like it was a tool to use at his disposal; just another sword to swing.
There was no physicality–only a union that was forged in the pale fires of blood and fury. There was no past or present–no fate or causality. There’s only them: two inhumans reveling in the wreckage of the bitterness of long lost memories and desires.
They came at the same time, sharing in the moment of raw ecstasy. Guttural growls of pleasure spill from Guts’ throat, drowning out his broken gasps of the feeling of being filled. The scent of sweat, blood, and slick sticks to their overheated bodies in an intoxicating way.
Griffith’s body was greedy to absorb it all, shivering violently as he felt the moments Guts’ seed took; it almost brought another orgasm out of him–knowing that the threads of life were winding around him, nestling itself in his womb.
Griffith brought Guts’ forehead down to rest against his own in a moment of tenderness. Their breaths mingled, gradually evening out when the high of the moment faded. They remained locked in each other’s gaze, time slipping away, as if they were trying to catch all the unsaid emotions gleaming in their eyes.
Eventually, Guts slipped his softened cock out of Griffith and crawled off of him. He stood on shaky legs, fixing Griffith with an unreadable look before collecting himself. Turning away, he reached for the Dragon Slayer, which lay just a few feet away from their violent coupling.
Bthump
As he watched Guts walk into the distance, fading into the unknown, Griffith smiled to himself as he laid a hand over his stomach, knowing that their paths would cross again very soon.
It’s during the early hours of the morning that Griffith feels the beginnings of labor pains. He awakens to find the lower half of his body soaked with a warm and visive fluid; an uncomfortable wave of cramps collides with him soon after.
Oh. So it’s begun.
Careful not to wake the sleeping princess beside him, Griffith slips out of their chambers and down the long corridor to the main balcony overlooking the city. Zodd is already waiting there, and with a brief nod, the apostle transforms. Griffith grips his stomach as they fly towards the World Tree.
They land near the base of the mountain of Midland’s eastern border, far away from any assuming eyes who would dare to witness the birth of the heir of the New World. Zodd leaves him once he’s settled against a soft bed of moss beneath a shaded tree with a vow to return once his child is born.
The pain that spasms through his reborn body is unlike anything he’s ever experienced. Griffith has been tortured before—his tendons slashed, his skin flayed, and his tongue severed—but nothing compares to the sharp and ceaseless pain in his abdomen. Eventually, he sheds his soiled sleepwear, unable to bear the sensation of his sweat-soaked body clinging to the thin fabric any longer.
It would be easy to will away the pain, to seamlessly birth the child that he’s been carefully growing in his womb after all these months. But something inside his core tells him to embrace the agony, to hold it close and endure the closest thing he’ll ever have to truly feeling human again.
“Child,” he rasps after he hits the twelfth hour of excruciating labor. “I believe it’s time for you to come now, don’t you agree?” His body seemingly agrees because the contractions quicken shortly after. By the end of the hour, he’s holding a bloodied infant against his chest, hungrily suckling at his teat. The babe—a boy—didn’t cry upon his entrance into the world, only whimpering at the exposure to the air around him.
His hair is white like Griffith's own, but his eyes… his eyes belong to his father. A swell of pride spreads throughout his chest; of course their child would be the perfect blend of him and Guts.
“Soon, my son,” he promises as he cleans him of the blood and fluid sticking to his little body. “Soon we’ll be reunited with your father and all will be right.”
It’s half past dawn by the time they return to the palace. Charlotte is eagerly waiting for him, nearly stumbling in her rush to greet him. Behind her, his captains stand in silence, observing the scene.
“Lord Griffith,” Charlotte tearfully smiles as she takes his son into her shaking arms. She probably woke up not too long ago, judging from her frumpled nightgown and unkempt hair. “He’s beautiful. An exact image of you. And look, he has my eyes. Our child will be so loved.” She presses a tender kiss to the babe’s forehead and moves to show Anna their heir.
“I do hope I didn’t worry you too much, princess,” he says. “I’m afraid I left our bed in less than ideal conditions earlier.”
Charlotte chortles. “I must admit, I was rather hysterical when I saw the state of your side of the bed, but I knew in my heart that you would be alright. And here you are, bathed in the light of dawn with our newborn child. It’s truly like something out of a storybook legend.”
“It is, isn’t it?” The warmth of the peaking sun is pleasant against his bare skin. With his son returned to his arms, Griffith turns to head back inside; his commanders kneel in silent respect as he passes them. In the distance, he can hear the morning cries of the seabirds.
It's time to start the day.
Guts doesn’t exactly know what brought him back to the Hill of Swords. Maybe, after months of endless wandering—haunted by Casca’s sudden betrayal and the deluge of old memories—he just needed to return to something familiar.
A familiar ache stirs within him as he walks through the rows of swords that still stood tall against the snowfall. Judeau, Pippin, Corkus, Gaston… and now Schierke, Isidro, Farnese, and Seripco. Is he truly alone again?
Just as he prepares to find more blades to erect in honor of his fallen comrades, a fierce blast of wind cuts his thoughts off, howling through the graveyard of swords. For a moment, everything is still… until he feels it. That unmistakable presence he can never escape.
His heart clenches as he whirls around; and there he is—Griffith, standing tall and untouched by the cold as his armor shimmers under the dim sun. He looks every bit of the Falcon of Light that he’s hailed to be, a triumphant aura radiating from his body, but there’s something in his gaze—a subtle glint in those unnerving calm eyes—that tells Guts that he’s here to bear witness to his torment. It’s as if he’s telling Guts that all his suffering, all his loss, was just as it’s supposed to be.
“You…” Guts begins to seethe. He feels the Beast pull at his agony, sinking its teeth into the painful memories of the past, telling him to give in. And he almost does, until he sees what Griffith is carrying in his arms. Even from afar, he can see—it 's a baby.
Bthump.
“You call yourself a god, how—” Guts stumbles on his words, trying to rationalize the sight in front of him. “Demons like you shouldn’t even be able to breed—”
Bthump.
Griffith stares straight at Guts as he slowly approaches him, his bare feet making only the faintest of sounds against the fresh morning snow. He doesn’t shiver as the wind picks up, but the babe in his arms does, curling into Griffith’s chest to seek any semblance of warmth that its mother’s cold, divine flesh can offer.
Bthump.
"You bastard," Guts chokes out as every muscle in his body screams at him to kill the monster and its spawn before him. "This isn't real. None of this is real."
Bthump.
“Oh, but it is,” Griffith says, his voice soft. He’s standing in front of Guts now, looking at him with such intensity, as if he can read every thought that's racing through his head. Griffith gently soothes the baby when it begins to fuss, rocking it with an ease that Guts never knew he was capable of.
It’s then, with a quiet and deliberate tone, that he asks, “Would you like to name him?”
“What?” is all Guts can manage, feeling his breath becoming short as he flicks back and forth between Griffith and the squirming bundle he was holding.
“Name him,” Griffith repeats. “Our son. It would be rather crass for his father to have no say, don’t you think?”
With those words, the weight that had been pressing down on his shoulders suddenly becomes too much to bear. Guts nearly crumbles beneath it.
A son. He has a son. With Griffith.
“You’re lying,” Guts grits out. “That’s impossible—you’re a man. Men can’t get fucking pregnant.”
Griffith tilts his head at him as his lips quirk into that infuriating unbothered smile that Guts remembers all too well. “And yet, here he is. The blood that courses through his veins says otherwise. I didn’t carry him inside me for eight months just for you to deny his parentage.” There’s a teasing undercurrent to his next words. “I’d like to think you haven’t forgotten that time when you took me in that field. Rather violently, I may add.”
Guts is about to retort at him when a soft whine cuts through what he’s about to say. His eyes drop down to the snow-haired newborn in Griffith’s arm, both awe and horror blooming in his chest. Such a tiny thing looked right at home in his arms-
Guts’s mind halts. Right—he had a son. A son that still needs to be named.
“I don’t—” he begins. “I’m no good with names. You can’t just expect me to come up with one on the spot like this.”
“Why not?”
Guts’ jaw tightens. “You know why, Griffith.”
He’s transported back to a day after another successful raid—before the mess in Midland and when they were just boys chasing a singular dream. They had set up camp near a lake and the two of them were skipping stones across the water.
“I have to ask,” Griffith had started as he flicked a stone gracefully across the surface. “Why did your parents name you ‘Guts’? Did your father lose a bet?”
Guts huffed, “No. And what’s it to you?”
“Curiosity, I guess. In many cultures, names hold power. The simple act of naming a person sets them on the path to achieving their destiny later on in life.”
“I’m sure you feel just peachy with the name your mother gave you, huh?” Guts responded. “She practically set you up from birth.”
Griffith chuckled at that. “I actually don’t know if she’s the one who gave me my name. I was a street orphan, remember? I was called ‘Griffith’ by townspeople around me and never really questioned it.” He stared off at the crystal blue water before them with an unreadable expression. “I’d like to think she named me though. It would be the only thing she left me with.”
They fell silent for a couple moments, taking in the weight of what Griffith said before Guts finally relented.
“I’m called ‘Guts’ because it’s how I was found,” he said, voice tight. “I was born from the corpse of my birth mother when she was hanged. And when I was taken in, my adoptive father called me a bad omen.” Guts laughed bitterly. “He didn’t want anything to do with me and gave me my name as a reminder of where I came from… my mother’s guts.”
Griffith’s expression softened in sympathy. He rested a hand on Guts’ shoulder, squeezing it gently. “Thank you for sharing that with me, my friend. I’m sure that couldn’t have been easy.”
A shrug from Guts. “It is what it is. I guess you’re right with the whole ‘names predict the future’ thing. I’m here chopping everyone into guts for you.”
Griffith let out a bark of laughter. “Yes, I suppose you are.”
Guts blinks, and the warmth of the conversation melts away, swallowed up by the frost around them. It’s in the moment that his son finally opens his eyes and—oh, they’re his eyes, staring right back at him. His breath hitches as the newborn coos softly up at him—whether it be out of curiosity of recognition, Guts can’t tell. For a split second, he almost reaches out to take him out of Griffith’s arms and hold him close against his chest.
But then another memory surges forward—a demon fetus, dead by his own hand–and the urge slips away as fast as it came. Everything rushes back to him within the moment: the Eclipse, the Godhand, the Hawks, Casca—where’s Casca? What happened to her? He should be protecting her, not standing here with the man that—
“Guts,” Griffith’s voice rings through the flashes of violent echoes and then, the rage is back. The Beast of Darkness unfurls itself from within, coiling around his skin to consume him once again. But before it solidifies over his head, Guts’ vision flashes white. When he blinks, the snowy terrain of the Hill of Swords is gone, and only Griffith stands before him. “Guts,” he says again. He sounds the same but something is tugging Guts forward, into the warm and comforting light that radiates around him.
“Griffith?” he calls out, dazed. The figure before him flickers, shifting between a familiar face of the past and the unfamiliar one of the present, slowly merging into an uncanny combination of the two as he stares longer.
“A name,” Griffith reminds him. The light fades away and they’re back in the Hill of Swords. Once again, Guts’ eyes drift down to the infant curled up in Griffith’s arms. This time he gives into his impulses, reaching out to take the child. The weight of a living being has never felt heavier.
A few seconds pass before Guts finds his voice. “August,” he murmurs. “I’ve always liked that name.”
“Augustus, then,” Griffith replies, sounding pleased. “To us, he’ll be our August.” Seemingly content with his name, August’s mouth stretches into a gummy smile. It’s the cutest thing Guts has ever seen.
A sharp gust of wind cuts the moment in half and brings August to upset tears. All Guts can do is place his son back into the comfort of his mother’s arms. Griffith gives him an amused look as he gently begins to rock the babe to soothe him.
“It’s time that I return,” Griffith says, voice barely above a whisper. He raises a hand to cradle August's flushed, rosy cheek, as though intending to thaw his chilled skin. “August could fall ill in this weather and I would hate to see the suffering that it would bring to his delicate little body.” Griffith then looks up at Guts with a neutral expression and a cadence that’s hard to decipher as he says, “You should come too.”
Against every instinct screaming at him to run, every muscle telling him to plunge his sword into the familiar-eyed demon in front of him, Guts nods.
And with that, he follows Griffith into the snowy abyss.