Truths: Style

"Style is being run out of town and making it look like you're leading a parade."

Balthier

"Watch for trouble," Balthier warned, doing his best to look noncommittal. Fran put a hand on the wall as she left, half-turning to face him. He raised an eyebrow in return.

"You'll be all right?" she asked, long ears twitching. Gesturing grandly, he crossed his legs and folded his arms.

"Fran, please. We'll be fine, upstanding gentlemen as we are. I'm sure I could squeeze a lovely conversation from either of our houseguests. Find us a way out quickly – I'd rather my clothes didn't reek of death." He could have sworn Fran rolled her eyes as she left the little antechamber. For a moment his eyes followed her down the stone hallway, but with a sigh he shot Vaan a disparaging look.

The boy was sprawled on the ground, where the soldier had thrown him. They had been kind enough to arrange his limbs into more… agreeable positions, but not once had he moved. The knock to the head had lasted him all through the journey to Nalbina, and all the way down to the bottom of Nalbina Fortress. There were flecks of blood on his cheeks, probably by now dried, and sand dusted his body. Balthier felt a little sorry for him, especially with the way he had been shaking and moaning from nightmare or another. Still, it was not his job to be a babysitter.

"Look at you," he said. "Between you and our other guest, he's the life of the party." As though affronted, a few of Vaan's fingers moved before settling down again. Foolish boy, he thought with a bit of a sneer. He couldn't be less than sixteen, but the faces he made and the way he acted placed his age at about five. How Vaan had obtained his blonde little girlfriend, he would never guess.

Balthier couldn't contain a smirk now. The thief's girl had so easily been sidetracked from her noble quest to save Vaan with a handsome face (he didn't flatter himself – it was just a fact) and a handkerchief. Two peas in a pod, he chuckled. Still, he'd rather get his handkerchief blemish-free, which wasn't going to happen if they didn't break out soon. Surely Fran's exceptional nose would be able to sniff something out.

Speaking of which, he thought, getting a whiff of his sleeves. He would need new cuffs, just as he had thought. Ah, how the trials of this night seemed to be piling up.

There was a sudden flash of orange from one of Vaan's pockets, catching Balthier's attention. "Strange," he said to himself. He was sure the flash came from that stone Vaan had taken from the palace, but he couldn't see how the soldiers had missed it. It would be, he thought with a bit of a sigh, so easy to just take it now. Despite that tantalizing thought, it really didn't matter to Balthier anymore. After getting into all this trouble, he couldn't care less what Vaan did with it.

"All I want now," he said to himself, "is a good meal, a change of clothes, and a hot bath." Almost sardonically, he looked down a little past Vaan and raised an eyebrow. "What about you? What is it you could possibly want?"

He never expected it to answer. Rather, he took the silence to study their companion, white with age or decay he would never know. The Bangaa's eyes were still open, gazing out blearily towards the ceiling. With the milky whiteness of it, he would say the poor fellow had lost his sight long before his death. Who knew how long the corpse had been down here. Knowing the Archadians, it could have been years since he had been thrown in to die and forgotten. Cleanliness had never occurred to them, even in the form of picking up those who had died and disposing of them in a sanitary place.

Rather, the dirtier everything was, perhaps the faster their prisoners would off it. Less trouble for them.

Those milky eyes stared while Balthier took a drink from the leather pouch off his waist. He tried to take only enough to cool his throat, knowing full well that it would need to last them for a while. There would be no refills, either – he had seen that water in the basin outside. It had been tainted brown from filth or blood, and from the way a Bangaa had been slurping at it while its muzzle bled, he was like to say the latter. In short, they weren't taking any chances.

"Don't look at me that way," Balthier said to the corpse in a bored tone. "You're already dead – at least you've hit rock bottom. I still have a ways to go."

The sound of shuffling drew his attention, and in a flash his hand went for his gun. When his fingers grappled at his empty holster, he cursed loudly. He had forgotten that they were stripped of their belongings beforehand. After a moment, he saw it didn't matter. Moving slowly past the room's entrance was a broken man, broken from the shackles thicker than a Seeq's neck around his hands and neck. Balthier stifled a sigh of relief and relaxed again. Had it been anyone else, he would have been in trouble.

Briefly, the man glanced his way before he left, curiosity obvious. When their eyes met, he almost jumped, turning away quickly and shuffling a little faster. The prisoners here had been taught not to make eye contact, and their decrepit, hopeless state saddened Balthier a little. The men he had seen on the way in looked just the same.

Funny thing, Balthier thought with a raised eyebrow. Now that he thought about it, he was almost positive Fran was the only woman he had seen in Nalbina Prison. There had been none at all on the way in – were they kept separately? If so, why hadn't Fran been put with them? No, he was sure – there were no women. Some form of Archadian chivalry – the thought was laughable. Even so, he never really knew: there were Bangaa everywhere, and he had never been able to tell with them.

Fran… the Viera had a spark in her yet, but Balthier couldn't help but be a little worried. No doubt she could hold off a few burly yet stupid Seeq, strong enough with a weapon or without. Archadian soldiers, however, or even a judge would be too much for her to face alone. He could only hope she found them a way out quickly, and without being noticed. The sooner, the better.

From the ceiling fell a little trickle of sand, no doubt from the desert above. It pooled beside Vaan's face, and peering a little closer, he saw that Vaan's eyes were open. "You're awake," he said. The thief looked his way quickly, confusion in his eyes. It was about time he stirred, Balthier thought with a little bit of a smirk.

"Where are we?" Vaan asked. Balthier sighed and shrugged, leaning forward.

"Prison, where else? More a dungeon, but it's really all the same." Vaan slowly stood, holding the back of his head – where the soldier had hit him. For a moment, pity etched Balthier's typical glance, but it dissipated quickly.

Cries of pain – of torture – echoed through the entire dungeon, and Vaan seemed to lose his grip. Stumbling backwards, fear shining in his huge eyes, he trod upon the fingers of the Bangaa corpse before Balthier could think to warn him. His eyes got even bigger, if that was possible.

"Relax, it's just a corpse," he said, shaking his head. "Jump at every little thing down here and you'll wear yourself out." Sudden exhaustion seized Balthier, forcing him to yawn languidly. "It's not even a proper dungeon. They just sealed off the bottom level of the fortress. Take a look around. We're not the first they've thrown down here." Balthier began to stretch, confused by how tired he had become so quickly. It was a wonder.

"Where's Fran?" he asked.

"She's off trying to find us a way out." The look on his face surely betrayed his underlying worry. Fran had been gone too long – anything could have happened by now. She had found them many an escape route within a few minutes. Another tortured scream drew his attention away from his thoughts, and with a grunt Balthier stood up. "Remember what curiosity killed. Just a friendly word of advice."

Vaan began to turn away, his short attention span already pulling him elsewhere. Holding up the pouch of water, he raised his voice so that the thief would be sure to hear him. "This is all the water we've got. I'd save your strength if I were you." Vaan waved a hand, still barely attending, and drifted away. Balthier smirked. Ever the same.

With a bit of a sigh, he tucked the pouch back into its place and sat again, putting a fist on his chin. "Alone at last," he said dully to the Bangaa. "Fran's beginning to make me nervous." Why hadn't she come back? They had been partners for how long now, and she had always been able to get them out of any situation when he (rarely) couldn't. But was it just nervousness at needing to leave? No, he almost – just almost – was able to admit to himself that he missed her.

Trying to retain another yawn, he let his head sit heavy on his fist, eyes drooping. "Got to keep a sharp eye out," he told the dead Bangaa. "I doubt our fellow prisoners have the energy to come in and do anything drastic, but those Archadians have always been tricky." It was getting harder and harder to stay awake. Yawns kept coming, and his eyes continued to fall.

Finally, he gave in. When did a nap hurt anyone, he reasoned. He had always been a light sleeper anyway. Besides, he reasoned, stretching his arms and locking his fingers behind his head, what could go wrong? What could possibly make this situation any worse than it already was?