Contest Fic for Jadie and Cyclone Gunner.
Basch / Ashe
During Game
T for language and mature themes
Begun approximately 09:54 GMT, 28 November 2006
Completed 10:45 GMT, 28 November 2006
Seven Pages, MS Word, Times New Roman, Size 12

Penitence in the Ashes
or
A Night in Jahara

The Garif, once they became acquainted with the party, had a manner that bordered on the downright friendly. As Ashe and her entourage re-entered Jahara late in the evening, some or other chief was at hand to offer a tent and an invitation to the evening meal at the village fire. As was tradition, the men sat together, the women sat together, and the children sat together. Lharsa was irritated by the quiet insistence that he be seated at the west of the large fire, but he quickly learned that it afforded him the best place from which to listen to everything that transpired around him.

And a fateful night it was, that so much transpired within the range of his ears.

The women sat to the north of the fire. Fran, Penelo, and Ashe grouped together out of familiarity more than fondness, but the friendship spawned in the forced close-quarters of a travelling party lent to their looser tongues—as did the Jaharan wine. Only females were allowed the indulgence of the berry wine—but only males were allowed to smoke.

To the south of the fire, the men passed around the communal pipe with repressed enthusiasm. Basch declined, but inhaled enough of the smoke to feel light-headed and relaxed anyway. Balthier moderated himself, having experience with such mild hallucinogens before. Vaan, however, was scooted up next to the war-chief and animating his recent fights with his hands. The war-chief braved the performance with a gentle and tolerant laugh, but took the first opportunity to disengage himself from the one-sided conversation.

On the north side, Fran set aside her emptied shell of wine and spoke amiably with the village women, learning their culture and as much about their lore as she could absorb. Penelo and Ashe kept to themselves, and this was what Lharsa noticed first.

"I think Basch likes you," Penelo stated matter-of-factly, flopping onto her back and balancing her soup-shell on her stomach.

Ashe choked on a mouthful of wine and took a moment to compose herself. "I—I don't—I think perhaps—"

"I'm serious," Penelo said, sounding grave. "No oath in the world would make a man follow you like he follows you, even when you do stupid shit."

She remained flustered. "I—what?"

"He digs you like that."

"Are you mad? I'm his liege-lady, he is sworn to—" she began, but Penelo cut her off.

"He doesn't heal himself, you know," she whispered, suddenly covert for no particular reason. "In battle, you know. He only heals you. And sometimes the rest of us when it looks like we're going down. But you, even if you have a paper cut, he jumps right up with a healing spell. He could be dying of the plague, but if you sniffled, his world would stop right then and there." She nodded not-subtly. "He wants you."

Ashe shifted uncomfortably and placed her shell on the ground in front of her. "I—I don't know what to say. I never even considered that—"

"Of course you didn't!" Penelo squeaked, sitting up in a hurry and nearly dumping her shell of soup onto her lap. "And he'll never, ever say anything."

"That's ludicrous, Captain Basch knows that he is free to speak his mind and be heard." The Princess settled into sitting cross-legged, then crossed her arms for good measure.

"But he won't, because then you'll feel all uncomfortable like you were just then when I said it and then he'll feel all weird for saying anything and there will be this weird uncomfortable awkward thing between you both and the rest of us will get all awkward too and pretty soon we won't even be able to work together without the threat of someone accusing someone else of touching someone's po-po." Penelo huffed indignantly as she brought her rant to a close.

"I… What?" Ashe squinted at her companion. "What is a 'po-po,' exactly?"

"Lady Ashe," Penelo whined quietly. "You've gotta go talk to Basch. He's, like, dying in his own personal puddle of angst and self-hatred. You're just what he needs."

She squinted and brought her thumbs and forefingers up to her corresponding temples, as if trying to pinch the nature of her confusion physically. She failed miserably. "I'm going to walk for a little ways."

"I'll go with you!"

"No, just inside the camp. Thank you, however, Penelo." Ashe got up and walked off, seemingly unnoticed, before Penelo or Fran could follow.

The differences between Mars and Venus, as it were, do not amount to the chasm popularly attributed to them—for, on the other side of the fire, a very similar conversation occurred. Lharsa may vouch for it.

"I think Lady Ashe is pretty," Vaan told Basch candidly. "No, not just pretty. Lady Ashe is beautiful. And not just graceful and strong and totally sexy, but she's… I mean… I think Lady Ashe is pretty."

Basch raised an eyebrow at his stoned compatriot, and tried to pretend that he didn't notice the fuzziness of his own senses and the sudden deep, dark quiet that was blanketing his mind. He repressed the sudden urge to hug someone and hold on tightly.

"Ashe is one finely-formed specimen of femininity," Balthier agreed, taking a slow puff from the pipe and passing it on. "She knows what she wants, and she goes after it. I could almost respect a woman like that, if her other attributes weren't so… distracting."

"You will respect her, regardless of her other attributes," Basch snapped at the pirate.

"Ooh, a mite defensive are we?" he smirked and glanced at Vaan, judging how much verbal swordplay of which his partner in crime was capable in his present state.

"I am sworn to her defence," Basch pointed out, recognizing that he was being baited but not able to find a way to avoid the subject.

"Tch," Vaan scoffed. "He's grumpy, out of all of us. He's always grumpy."

Basch looked into the fire, avoiding eye-contact. The weed smoke was playing with the images in his mind—images that were always there. Rasler with an arrow through his heart. Raminas hunched over in the chair at the treating, his life-blood in a pool before him. Reks—the too young, too eager Reks—with a knife in his gut. The face of Reks staring at his brother, thinking he was staring at him. The face changed. The face of Vaan, staring up at him; a too-familiar voice asking, Captain… why…? Basch closed his eyes and bowed his head, unable to stop himself from internalizing the horror.

"You're right," Balthier broke his grotesque line of thought with a feigned despair. "He's always so melancholy and he just stands around, brooding. Angsting all over the place."

"Like someone kicked his puppy," Vaan added.

"Or like he's in love," the first suggested pointedly.

Basch gave Balthier the most scathing glare he could conjure.

"Sharp," he deadpanned. "You almost put my eye out with that glare. Hiding something, are we?"

Vaan snickered.

Basch remained silent.

"Guilty by omission—he isn't saying anything!" Vaan declared.

Balthier skipped the part where he corrected Vaan's grammar and jumped right back into the game. "You know, Captain, you don't have to be so uptight about it. It's all over your battle tactics and in the way you act while she's around. Trying to be all manly and take the hits. Healing her every hangnail."

Basch was about to release a scathing remark on a knight's duty, but Balthier just kept talking.

"That's not how it's done. You have to sneak up on a woman, be smooth. Make her think she's the one in control of the situation, and she'll come right to you. Hellfire, if there's one thing the Lady Ashe loves, it's control. Take it from me, I know women."

Vaan giggled. "Yeah. Balthier knows lots of women."

Basch rolled his eyes.

"Oh please," the pirate scoffed. "That disdain isn't real. Your denial wouldn't stick in court if it were pasted on with mahlboro slime. You know you want her. You want her in the worst possible way."

"Standing up in a hammock?" Vaan tipped his head to the side cluelessly.

Balthier paused to give Vaan a stare, then continued slyly. "You know, she wants you, too. She needs someone to get her mind off that dead husband of hers. I took her ring, so now she can't pretend she's anything other than a widow, free and single. And the way she started looking at you in Giza on our way here—you should attempt to display a little more of yourself. The sleeveless look is alright, but women these days like to see a little more chest. And you've got it, so show it off. Now me, I've got a pretty face to do the work for me. You're…" he stopped short and regarded Basch sidewise, out of one eye. "You're alright, I guess, but that mug of yours just won't carry you. It could have been the conditions of Giza that helped you out this time, though. You know, I think I like the seasonal rains in that part of the world. There's nothing that makes a situation more interesting than everyone getting a little wet, wouldn't you ag—"

Basch put his fist through the place Balthier's face used to be. Balthier went down like a sack of bricks. Basch stood and bowed slightly to the War Chief. "I am sorry for disturbing the peace of your fire. I beg to be excused."

The War-Chief laughed quietly. "You're quite understood. If you hadn't hit him, I would have."

Basch shared a half-smile with the masked Chief, and turned to pace away from the village centre. He burned from anger and— it would have amused the sky-pirate— a keenness he didn't want to admit. The fog of the Garif pipes, the continued imagery, and his nearly criminal lack of human contact for the past few years all came together to betray him in the most uncomfortable way. He quickly decided that a quick swim in the river would be a most expedient way to clear his mind… and solve other problems.

He marched at an even pace to the river bank, nothing but anger in his internal monologue and need in the way his body expressed him. He shed his armour, stuck his sword into the sand nearby, and splashed right into the water. With a deep breath, he submerged himself completely.

Lady Ashe was decidedly unsettled; so much so, that she was pacing circles about the village. She wanted definite answers to the questions that were wandering through her wine-addled brain. Was there some sort of strange tension that existed between her and the Captain? Was she truly the object of her knight-protector's romantic thoughts—his lust, perhaps? Was there some sort of oath-breaking, world-stopping, kingdom-smashing Problem-with-a-capital-P with her even considering being in love?

This is madness. After all, she told herself, I am a grown, independent woman, perfectly capable of falling in love and restoring a kingdom at the same time. I loved Rasler dearly, but he is gone. Surely he wouldn't mind if I decided… with someone. Not necessarily Captain Basch von lovely Ronsenborg, but someone, someday, on my own terms, perhaps with the moon and oh Gods, there he is.

Lady Ashe stopped dead in her tracks as her unsteady steps took her to the river. There, in all his quiet, stoic glory, was the object of her wayward thoughts. The moon reflected off the water to illuminate the lines of his body, and the water plastered his hair to his head in wild clumps. It dripped off his hair, down his face, along his strong brow and down his chin, over his—

This is madness. I must be going mad.

Basch resurfaced and took air, thankful for the cold water and the breeze in the evening. He left his eyes closed and let the water drip out of them, then pushed his hair back and opened them. The very first sight he beheld made his swim a pointless endeavour. All of his thoughts crowded back into his skull in a hum that would deafen him if he listened. Instead, he allowed his eyes to wander over her proud stance, admiring the way the moonlight played along her soft hair and the way her garb accentuated all the right curves of her body, and left just the right places exposed to the eye.

Oh Gods. I'm having inappropriate thoughts about my liege-lady. Lord Raminas, Lord Rasler—strike me dead from the heavens. You would have just cause. I'm going mad.

He averted his eyes quickly and backed into the deeper water, providing some cover for his bare chest. "My Lady," he acknowledged in a stilted tone, "I apologize, I did not expect anyone to be about."

She raced to collect her composure, and summoned all the pretence of dignity possible. "No need to apologize," she assured him with a measured tone. She marched over to the least-dusty part of the river bank and sat down, staring up at the stars.

Basch felt a flush creep over his face and neck. He prayed that it read as embarrassment. "Uh, My Lady, if you would be so kind as to turn your back, I would prefer not to expose to you—"

Trying to play it cool, she cut him off with a tone that brooked no argument. "Semantics. It's nothing I haven't seen before, Captain."

Make her think she's the one in control of the situation, Balthier's words echoed in his mind; and for once, they sounded like an excellent idea. Basch shrugged slightly and stood up. He twisted his mind into knots during the march up the bank, trying to decide the best way to retrieve his clothes from the ground without mooning his princess. He settled for kneeling on one knee, shielding view of himself from her side. He retrieved his pants and undershirt—he used the later to dry off before donning the former.

Attempt to display a little more of yourself, the misguiding little voice repeated. Quietly, he laid his shirt out to dry on the rocks, and sat beside Ashe.

There was an extended silence, in which both of them tried to look at the other, but not look at the other.

"Something troubles you?" Basch inquired, ever dutiful. He suddenly felt wounded by the idea that his princess was looking at him—indeed, that he was inviting it—in such a way as to preclude any respect for himself as a person. Was he merely the subject of a girlish fancy? Did she care for him only as a soldier and as something to be looked at and toyed with?

Ashe glanced away, frowning. "You said today... You said today that you would bear any shame to save one person the horrors of war."

He nodded, grateful for the distracting subject. "If lasting peace were promised as a result, I would accept being stripped and lashed in the street, where anyone could spit upon me if they wished. I would have the world think me a kingslayer again, if that would only stop the fighting."

"And yet," she observed, "You are a soldier. You are a career soldier."

"I am a knight," he corrected gently. "I fight for peace. As you do."

She bit her lip and turned to him, not meeting his eyes. Instead, she traced a few of his scars with her fingertips. "You have been called a kingslayer before, and you… you have been lashed before. And for what? Are you not angry?"

He tensed as her fingertips traced their torturous patterns on his flesh. This is madness. "And for two years, there were peace, and I contented myself with that." He looked up and met her eyes, and found only soft concern and compassion. See. She is truly concerned. She does not harbour feelings of that kind for me. She is not lusting after me.

"You would accept shame, hardship, and indignity?" she whispered in disbelief and partial disgust, leaning closer to him to stress the point. "You would willingly accept total subjugation in favour of peace?" With each word, she backed him towards the ground, getting further into his personal space until he was propped up on his elbows, face tilted towards hers, completely at her mercy.

"I would accept," he whispered back, breath sliding across her lips, "anything you asked me to accept."

A long moment passed. Ashe studied his face intently, eyes sweeping over his scar and along his cheekbone, and finally settling on his lips. She pressed him to the ground forcefully and sealed the moment, engaging him entirely. She rested her weight almost entirely on him, holding both sides of his face with her hands and enjoying every second of an act she momentarily forgot to regret. He froze for a moment, then reacted as softly as she was strong, accepting every touch she gave to him. She pulled his hands up to her encouragingly, and things began in earnest. She broke away from the kiss in a moment she knew would leave him hanging, and ran her hands along his chest, paying attention to each of his hard-earned scars. She rolled to the side and he with her, all hands and lips and loud breath. Just as he reached around her to undo the pinnings of her over shirt, she whispered, "Gods above… Rasler… Please…"

Something inside Basch von Ronsenborg shattered. He forcibly disentangled himself from Ashe and rolled to his feet in a great hurry, stepping away. He made for his undershirt and pulled it on, and strapped his sword belt around his waist.

She stood as well, and began a startled apology, but he cut her off by embracing her strongly and placing one hand on the side of her head, and pressing his face against the other. "I will. Always. protect you." He told her. "Know that. Always. No force on this planet could ever change that. I do not harbour you any ill thoughts, and I wish there not to be any uneasiness between us on account of… this. I would beg you to forgive my transgression, but that is something of which I cannot even forgive myself." She tried to interrupt him, but he continued and did not listen. "I love you. I will always love you, and I will always protect you. But in this moment, I need to be alone." He released her, picked up his armour, and marched away from the village.

Ashe stared after him, then at nothing, then at the ground. Her shock was complete; she was silent and still for a few moments, then—

Shit. Shitshitshitshishit. What am I doing?

She pulled straight her clothes and attempted to fix her mussed hair, then paced another two circles around the village, all the while cursing to herself. Shit. Shit. Shit.

Basch marched. He marched out of the village, slunk along the shadows where the monsters would not follow him, and through the plain until he found a hollow in which there was just enough room to curl up and disappear. He tucked himself into the rock, invisible from the outside but still able to see. Then, he cried.

He cried for shame and for betrayal and for honour and for duty. He cried for want and sorrow and deep-seated need that ate away at the pit of his being. He cried for oaths and solace and a solitude so complete it threatened to break him. He cried for the world and he cried for himself, until he was numb and exhausted. He knew that no one would ever know of his betrayal—Ashe would keep it a secret for her own sake as much as for his.

And she did. They never spoke of it, nor hinted around the subject. They never approached each other nor spoke of each other in any but the most chaste tones. There existed, however, an understanding that had not been there before; a horrible understanding.

One night, when the captain took the middle watch and the princess was unable to sleep, she left the tent and found him sitting on the high ground. They stayed in each other's presence for an hour or more, unmoving and unspeaking, until Ashe grew tired and stood to leave. Basch looked back at her, over his shoulder, making and holding eye contact for a long moment. In that moment, Ashe caught a glimpse of what could have been their mad romance; but then, the soul of the gaze weighed down, and deepened into an unbearable loneliness. He looked away, out over the empty horizon, and knew solitude. And Ashe knew that solitude, and that was their horrible understanding.

This is a fiction composed for Jadie and Cyclone Gunner's FFXII fiction contest. The challenge was as follows:

The contest is to see who can write the craziest romance between any of the following couples:
4. Basch x Ashe

The true contest is to see who has more congruently defined 'crazy,' I believe.

- Cpt. L