Chapter Text
Again and again, for hours on end every night, a human boy stared at the sky, at the stars, at the moon. He had no prayer in mind, but his heart could only yearn for what he didn't know was missing.
He watched, even under rain or snow, laying on his back against the grass, how clouds would slowly move across the sky, how it would come in and out of view in shades of dark blue.
He found the night sky to be fascinating. While at day the sun made looking up difficult, at night he could stare at its endlessness with little issue, almost feeling welcomed by it every time he looked up just to be received by a million bright lights his mother said shone just for him.
Sometimes he counted the stars or made up figures. Sometimes he spoke as if holding a conversation with it, as if it was answering him. He talked about his day, about how hard he had to work, how he'd managed to get enough from the village down the hill to buy food for another week, how his mother had been getting better from her illness thanks to the medicine he managed to get from a traveling merchant.
He often talked about his dreams, which he often fell into after drifting to sleep while talking to the sky, the boy's mother having to carry him back inside when he did. Dreams of flying, of touching the stars, of becoming a knight, and defeating a dragon. Dreams of going away, to a place where everything stayed the same and time didn't sink its teeth into people's happiness.
Of course, he figures time meant nothing to the endless sky.
As time passed one night the boy, now seventeen, lay down on the grass for the last time in what would be a long time. His eyes swelled up in tears that he tried his best to contain.
“My mother passed away,” He whispered, his voice quivering. “It's been a long time coming, and I know she's better off now, but,” He covered his eyes as if to hide his tears from the sky. His mother had never hidden it from him, that her illness would eventually take her away, so she made sure to teach him everything she knew to ensure he would be fine once she died.
“I don't know what to do now,” he said, his shoulders shaking as he struggled to contain his sobbing.
Don't cry when it happens, Asta. Remember me with a smile on your face, yeah?
His mother's words, not her last but the ones that Asta would carry with him for the rest of his life, kept him from fully breaking down.
“Can you tell me what to do?” He reached out with one hand, lips quivering as he fought to keep a smile on his face. “Please…”
He closed his hand around nothing, and let it fall back onto the grass.
Night passed in silence after that, the boy only staring, waiting for something. For the first time, Asta prayed for an answer, a sign, anything. Everything.
It wasn't until the sun began to chase away the night that his tired eyes finally caught a glimpse of movement in the sky. So quick he almost missed it, what his mother once told him was known as a shooting star raced away from the sun and towards the west.
Asta stood quickly, following its trail with his eyes. He knew it would simply continue its course through the sky, never hitting the ground, but he decided to run after it regardless.
Unbeknownst to Asta, that night something reached back, it held his hand when he asked for help and moved the stars when he begged for a sign. An existence that had always been and would always be, but that didn't have a will of its own until recently.
Shapeless and endless, the boy couldn't see it, but he now carried the night sky on his shoulders.