"What are you talking about?"

"The color of this world has been drained of everything it once had.."

"Laetus you always keep talking about this 'color' but you've never explained what that is.."

Laetus; a disheveled old artist, whose prime faded with time, now covered in wrinkles, his head and face covered with hair as white as snow.

"I could never explain what color is, especially not to someone who has never seen it.."

"Whaaaaat are you serious?"

"Listen kid. I'm starting to lose it"

"Wasn't that obvious"

the kid said under his breath

"I meant my eyesight.. I'm not sure how much longer I can hold on to the colors I can see.."

Laetus looked down at the kid from his wooden stool. He adjusted himself in the stool and took in his surroundings.

He could see the sunlight shimmer through the window, its rays penetrating through his wooden shack, and shining upon the boy, giving his brown hair a soft velvet hue, and his brown eyes a coffeelike shine.

The man stared for a couple seconds, his eyes squinting, he could see something, despite no one in this world being able to see colors other than black and white, he could see the boy was special.

"Hey kid.."

"Yeah?"

"Why do you like my art.."

"Your art?"

"Well despite your weird way of somehow drawing with so many whites, it's very beautiful"

The boy points at one of the paintings hanging from a string on the wooden shacks wall

"That was is the most beautiful of them all"

Laetus looks behind him to see the painting

Laetus looks deeply at the painting for a moment, staying in absolute silence

The painting had very vibrant colors, colors the boy could not see, yet it still shined brighter than anything in his little shack to the boy

On the painting, a vibrant sunset was portrayed, the sun as orange a freshly picked tangerine, the sky approaching the top of the canvas as pink and as fleeting as the sakura of foreign trees, at the edges of the canvas remains the remnats of the sky, with its blue as deep as the ice glaciers in the artic.

And a man. Standing so tiny amongst the giant sun, yet so giant among the soft green grass of a hill, his shadow reaching the depths of the painting, the man does not look at what is behind, but at what he sees, the sun, in it's entirety. Yet for Laetus the sun is half covered by the mountain, and the boy, can not see it at all.

Finally Laetus breaks the silence between them

"That is.. probably the most beautiful painting here.."

Laetus looks softly at the painting as he talks

"Listen kid, one day.. I won't be able to see it anymore, the colors, the moment that happens.."

Laetus looks down for a moment

"The moment that happens, I would have finally lost my mind.."

Laetus turns to his canvas.

"There's something i want you to have.."

Laetus grabs his paintbrush, its bristles ragged and messy, yet carefully cared for, its bristles as soft as the grass of spring and the breeze of autumn. He looks at his paintbrush for a moment, and then turns to the kid.

"This is paintbrush, is a very powerful tool, it can bring color to the lives of those who lack it, and it can cloak the sky in a beautiful array of hues. I want you to bring color to this world.."

"WHAT?"

"Old man I don't think you know what you're saying"

Laetus leans forward and grabs the kids hand.

He hands the kid the paintbrush and cups the kids hands over it.

"Take it, and go.."

"I can't take this.. isn't this everything for you?"

"Nevermind that. It is yours now.."