Follow the Moon Chapter 1, a suikoden fanfic

Disclaimer: I've never played either Suikogaiden, so much of my knowledge of Elza's backstory comes from the info provided by the Suikoden wiki and the suikosource and suikox websites. However, that's not a substitute for actually seeing events firsthand, so I apologize if anything I've written here is contradicted by the gaidens.

As a structural note: This was written as a oneshot, but because of its high word count, I've broken it into several parts. The scenes are meant to be read in the order I've set them, but I've also numbered them chronologically in case you want clarification.

Suikoden is the property of Konami. Rating is for violence, suggestive themes, and language. Some content may be disturbing and/or triggering. Lines from Suikoden and Suikoden II have been paraphrased.

Follow the Moon

I'd been careless.

That could be corrected. It helped to think so as I lay back, determined not to flinch. Even here, where I knew the doctor's seen every manner of weakness, it was like the trainers were still watching me and I couldn't cry out. If you cry out, they'll oblige you and make it hurt worse.

I flinched once, up from my shoulders, and the surgeon tsked as she readjusted her fingers on the needle. Poked it through the skin of my cheek, patiently stitching from my right temple to my left, from pulse to pulse.

"How'd you manage this?" was what she'd said to me between "Let me take a look" and "Lie back", followed by, "Lie as still as you can".

As I said: I let my guard down.

There were three of us left.

Year by year, lesson by lesson, all of the other children in our class had been cut down: accidents in training, gangrened wounds they were too frightened to mention, sickness in the barracks. And the punishments. We three had taken shelter in the fact that we were surviving, we were among the best, and look, there were plenty of other apprentices as worried as we were.

But they were all gone now, and only the three of us remained.

I remember whispering to the other two, partly a joke, but really a very frightened truth: "I'm going to hate it if we all die."

I believe that's what I said. Sometimes I remember it as, "I won't let us die."

I was five years old when sold by my parents, one of the many children who came from the outside world to the Howling Voice Guild. What most of the world called a tower, we called a garden, and the low-ranking gunners who oversaw the young initiates styled themselves gardeners. They made hardship a privilege and inflexibility a point of pride. If you had skill but overstepped yourself, they punished you swiftly. Yet they killed their students even more quickly, a chastisement and an ultimate dismissal at once. And a warning to the others.

I shut my teeth on my fear and trained harder so that I wouldn't be next. But I could never relax, knowing there was no one to put my back against. I already understood that you can fight as hard as you can, but you cannot truly protect yourself when you're alone.

Then there was Kelley. Kelley was strong, but he was never good at his hiding his feelings, so we knew he could be hurt. As for the first one who died in our class, it was a girl. She had been training alongside Kelley, the two of them set up with quarterstaffs against one of the gardeners. The girl was small, chosen for her quick mind and accuracy with a slingshot rather than for her endurance. She was tiring, faltering badly, and Kelley kept edging in front of her, taking as many of the hits for her as he could get in. We were all around six or seven then. Her name was Jenna, I believe.

The gardener stepped back, fighting defensively, drawing Kelley into an attack, and Jenna hung back, trying to catch her breath. And the gardener slid his foot – a very smooth sort of accident – overextended his swing and hit her across the neck. Some of us laughed. Seeing another apprentice get punished broke up the often monotonous training sessions. But I also heard the snap, and I saw how Jenna dropped. As if for a moment the length of her spine was unstrung, and she fell, her face and neck bent under her shoulder.

Jenna taught us how easily we would be killed, whether as full-fledged guild members or as students. There would be more after her. After a while, it became less of a shock and more of an inevitability. Soldiers in a battle, though all may hope to return home, understand that some of them will still die. We knew that too.

But Kelley. That night after Jenna, he was in his corner of the floor, sobbing into his pallet. I was awake, and I heard some of the others uneasily shifting in their blankets. We didn't cry much any more, used to punishments, home a distant memory, and sympathy could easily harden into contempt. I wish I knew something to say to make him stop. I always thought sleep was the best healing, better than a resurrection rune, because for a while you forgot everything. If he slept, Kelley could forget that he'd been there, had seen the staff connect with her neck. Maybe seen her eyes.

I opened my own eyes when I heard, amidst all the whispers, a shushing sound – someone's pallet being dragged across the floorboards. I lifted myself onto one elbow just in time to see a blond boy, Clive, he was so small then, spread out his pallet and lie down next to Kelley. The others had stopped whispering for a moment. Then it started up again. Some of it sounded scornful. If a gardener had seen Clive then, he might've seen this show of sympathy as the ultimate liability and we would have lost another apprentice that night. I lay back, trying to feel disdain, trying not to feel heartsick. And for the first time in a long time, I couldn't ignore how hard the floor was and how cold my shoulders were, and how much I still missed listening to my brother and sister breathing as they slept.

The whispers stopped again. I didn't meet anyone's eyes as I hoisted my pallet under my arm and picked my way across the dark room. I did see the hard edge of Clive's eye as he half-rolled to watch me, and I knew he was daring me to try something, kick Kelley or laugh or call him soft. Parrot the gardeners and talk about how if we died it meant we were weak and it was our own fault.

I knelt down on Kelley's other side, tight against the wall, and smoothed out my pallet. Kelley was lying on his stomach, and he glanced at me, face splotchy, and folded his arms up so that neither Clive nor I could see his face. I curled up next to him, careful not to touch. By then the whispers had started again.

So I did some whispering of my own. "It wasn't your fault."

Kelley choked – sobbing again, I think – and Clive hissed, "Shut up, Elza." He'd never really talked to either of us before then, and already he saw that I was making things more painful for Kelley. And already I guessed he was right.

I watched Kelley as he got himself under control, his breaths steady if wet. He swallowed, then whispered, very softly, "This place is rotten."

"That's not true," Clive said on his other side.

Neither pistol was meant to be mine. Star and Moon. I stole them both.

I'd seen them before, the ancient dueling pistols of the Howling Voice Guild in their wooden case. Star, the beacon of protection and trust. Moon, the assassin's eye, the light of betrayal. Kelley had implacably lifted Moon, leaving me with Star, leaving me with an absurd sentimentality over the both of them. The guns. And them, yes: Clive and Kelley.

In all this walking, the long nights in rough inn rooms, and glancing into shadows, I've thought a lot about the guns and why they're named so. The stars, in their tightly bound constellations, shift all together through the sky, rise and fall as one. I suppose the moon is troubling for changing on its own.

People in the Guild boast how Master Sauro's students puke blood before they turn up the best in the business. I was one of those kids. And Kelley and Clive were not supposed to be there in the girls' lavatory with me after that one training session, but they followed my wavering steps because they were lapdogs who had nothing better to do. Kelley was holding my hair and rubbing my back, for pity's sake, and Clive was just watching cross-legged on the floor with this seriousness that was somehow professional. And I was puking so hard some dribbled out of my nose, and that's where the blood came in. It was from my nose, that's all.

No big deal.

Hell. I loved watching him sleep. Because when he was serious, when he was in deadly earnest, when he tried to convince me, Clive was more likely to make me laugh. When he dropped that, was distracted, wasn't pushing himself to be perfect, was him at his best. Relaxed and remote from himself, with no reason to be self-righteous and defensive. At the same time, I always wanted to see him run himself to the limit. He is a fantastic gunner. What a beauty.

And somehow, without even training myself to do it, I always woke up before him. When it was still dark, and I could watch the light gradually find his features.

I noticed before Clive did. I always do.

It wasn't just that Kelley had less time for us. All of us were of age, had graduated, and after that leap, the elders supposed we could be trusted to take on jobs by ourselves. Sometimes we'd gone together, but just as often we split up. I remember that first time, we were fifteen, and Clive and Kelley went on a job to Marid and I went south all the way to Lenankamp. And at first I just kept taking in the scenery and the gorgeous novelty of being alone. I think it was the first time in my life. Master Sauro would've shot me, but I whistled my way from Rockaxe to Muse. My first time alone in an inn, careful not to get drunk, careful not to look new at any of this. Swallowing a delighted shock when, town after town, guys kept trying to pick me up, me with a Howling Voice pistol hidden under my cloak. But after a while, heading through Southwindow, traveling down Scarlet Moon, I dimmed. I got tired of all that walking, all the checking over my shoulder because there was no one to guard it. Only having myself to talk to, and always thinking damn you, boys, where are you?

But after a few years, I was better used to it, and I think Clive was born used to being alone. Kelley made the best of it.

Then Kelley was raised to Guild Master. Before, we were three gunners, separate but still friends. Still equals. Now Kelley was master.

I felt uneasy when he didn't come to my room to celebrate with us, but I supposed he had to drink with the elders.

"He might as well. It's their fault."

Clive, on the other side of the low bench we used as a table, shot me a sharp look. "It's a matter of fault?"

I watched him, his frown, and leaned back so I could feel the late glare of the sun coming through the window. "Jealous, handsome? How far would you go to become Guild Master?"

Clive rolled his eyes. "Don't complain. The Guild's in good hands now."

True enough. There hadn't been a Guild Master for years, no young Knight Gunner to take up Storm, the sacred rifle. But the three of us had all passed our trial, been raised to Knight rank, and the elders should be grateful they'd had their choice of Guild Master. If it had been only me, they knew some of them would have been in trouble.

Still. There Clive sat across from me, ruining a perfectly good cork as he tried to get the wine bottle open. Not so hot with beverages but hot as hell with a gun, and tracking, and spying, and above all respecting the Guild's laws. Always the designated leader when he was sent out in a group, always discreet, and always accurate.

I tipped my head back against the wall and for a long time wondered if I should ask it.

"Why Kelley?"

"Kelley's a Knight Gunner."

"We're all Knight Gunners."

Clive hesitated before he poured the wine. "He gets into less trouble."

I laughed, and, seeing Clive's raised eyebrow, I think this time he actually welcomed it. He had a point. The Guild all knew what I thought of Masters Dareb and Cathari, and even Clive had pulled rank in the field, once. Kelley just went sweet and smooth as honey.

"Well." I rocked forward and crossed my legs, reaching for my glass, not bothering to make a toast. "Maybe now we'll all get into less trouble."

And I'll admit a little relief when Kelley came in an hour later, sheepish and happy. Clive broke into this wide smile, so clearly it was an occasion for more wine. Kelley was smiling himself, but he kept his eyes down, too abashed and flattered to look at either of us.

When I said something about Master Dareb's scowl souring half the wine in the garden, Kelley did look up. He grinned, then shrugged. "Eh. The elders aren't so bad."

That didn't seem to bother Clive. But Clive will never be me.

The first time Clive caught me watching him while he slept, his eyelashes fluttered, then his eyes shot open and he hitched his shoulders. "What the hell?"

"What what the hell?"

His eyes tracked around my room, looking for who knows what. He slumped but was still a little spooked. "It's like you're sighting me from a blind."

I was propped up on my elbows, looking down at him. "There's no room for a sniper's rifle here." I rolled over, presenting my back, which, in the training ring, would have been no small insult. "Honestly, Clive. I never should have left Kelley."

Now he sat up, voice rising and incredulous. "What?"

"Me and Kelley. Before you." I closed my eyes. "He didn't take everything so seriously."

I could feel him staring, and, really, I should have opened my eyes just so I could see his face. But I heard the flatness in his voice. "You were a virgin the first time we –"

He stopped reasoning with me when I started laughing. He usually did.

When we were sixteen, there was a bad job. Not in its basics: a rogue Temple Guard on the run from an especially vengeful bishop's wife. But we had to take business into Rockaxe, and the elders thought it better if we worked in a group, rather than give any appearance of a lone gunner randomly killing a man in the knights' city. So Clive and I were dispatched, but we went under the command of Aulay, a gunner some years older than us. He was huge and quick with a blond beard and a heavy jaw. He had an easy way with him, made good conversation, but he didn't spare any time making sure his partners kept up with him, or were all right.

Everything went well enough until the Temple Guard drew us out of Rockaxe's alleys into an inn's backyard. Clive and I didn't wait for Aulay's orders; we both peeled off, trying to come in from opposite sides, a pretty standard strategy. There were some people there, two grooms standing up quickly, shocked. Most people have never even heard of a gun, let alone seen three at once.

The Temple Guard fell back against the high rock wall, spinning to face Aulay and met a bullet in his chest. Clive and I both lowered our guns – and I turned in time to see one of the grooms running forward, shouting something at Aulay.

Who flung himself around and shot the groom in the stomach, clear through his spine. The man fell – Aulay swore – then shot him in the head.

I'd heard the shots, but Clive's voice was the first sound I really registered. "What – ?"

Aulay looked over at the other groom, who was staring blankly at his fallen friend. With a tired breath, Aulay sighted and shot him in the forehead.

"What are you doing?" Clive shouted.

"Listen, the elders will know we did it," Aulay said, staring with dissatisfaction at the three bodies. "But it'll go better if we're the only witnesses."

"You want us to lie to the elders?" I said, unsure whether or not I should buy this. "We should say what, these two grooms came at you with riding crops?"

"It was a –" Aulay cut himself off. It was a reflex, of course, he'd shot that groom on nothing more than adrenaline.

"You should be killed for this."

Clive startled me. I looked at him, his gun lowered but his body set, glaring at Aulay with more vehemence than I'd ever seen from him.

"What are you saying there?" Aulay asked, a new snap to his voice.

"You lost control on a job." You lost control while working for the Howling Voice Guild and killed a bystander. It was far worse than losing control and crying during training, or panicking and losing a duel. Enough people inside and outside of Harmonia were upset by the Guild's existence, and when they didn't pay us to guard their hides and do their dark work, they were looking for a reason to bring us down.

"You think you're going to go back and say so?" He didn't cower or equivocate. I could see his knuckles whiten over the grip of his gun.

Clive lifted his rifle to his shoulder. I didn't laugh at his seriousness. My blood was rushing. "As an officer of the Howling Voice Guild," Clive said, "I will either return you to the garden, or I will end your life here and now."

Aulay glanced my way. I lifted my pistol.

Aulay aimed at me. I'm not sure what he was thinking, perhaps that it would distract Clive. I rolled and shot. Clive just shot. Aulay fired again. Then he staggered. Two bullets, one in Aulay's stomach, one breaking his collar bone.

Killing a fellow gunner is also punishable by death, but that can be overlooked when it's done to protect the Guild's interests. I kept telling myself that as we removed Aulay's weapons and wallet, and I pressed a flame scroll to his face to obliterate his features. Then we made our escape, me following Clive's dark shape through the alleys. He didn't slow down, but he did look back.

And no one talked until we were out of the city and had gotten a few miles north, a few miles closer to home. Then Clive stopped by the wreckage of an old stone fence and looked as if he wanted to wreak it a bit more.

"Hey," I said. "Hey, come on. We have to keep moving."

"Damn him." Clive was breathing harshly. "A full-fledged member of the Guild. How could he just –?"

"It happens."

"It shouldn't be allowed to happen! The Guild shouldn't initiate gunners who can't even control their weapons."

I'd closed in on him, guarding his shoulder, though I don't think we were ever followed. I turned to face him, and then I was scared, because Clive never shows it if he can help it, and his head was down and his eyes were red. It was unfair of me to be surprised. He was just a kid. But he'd never cried, that was Kelley, and he didn't throw tantrums because that was my territory. He always just took what came because a perfect gunner is never limited by his surroundings. A perfect gunner is never thrown off his guard. A perfect gunner is never so upset that he just can't keep going.

"Hey, Clive. Clive, come on, it's okay. It's – damn you, you're bleeding!"

Clive pivoted so I couldn't see his left arm, but I shoved in between him and the wall, jerking back his cloak. Somehow Aulay's second shot must have winged him, but it wasn't deep, a long splatter of blood down his bicep.

"It's fine," Clive said, looking at neither it nor me. I stared at his profile, disheveled hair, sweat streaked across the bridge of his nose. I could feel him breathing, and I suddenly realized I'd pressed myself up against his shoulder. I didn't move, just wished I could get him to stop whatever thoughts were storming through his head. And, detachedly, thought of tipping my forehead under his jaw and letting him rest against me, not as a serious plan, just a nice idea. A nice idea I'd never had before because there'd been too much else to think about.

But I didn't and, poor boy, I don't think he noticed at all.

"No, I don't think you should," I remember Master Cathari saying.

I knew of her – at one point, every female apprentice in the garden seemed to want to be her – but I'd never seen her up close as a child, and when I came of age, she was down south in Falena watching all those goings-on. When she returned she took her place among the elders, teaching her own particular students. By then I was out of the garden as often as in. So I hardly knew her, though I knew she could nail a hummingbird at a hundred paces. I knew she was strict and fair, and the elders didn't frown at her, even though she'd killed some people who weren't her designated targets. Nether Gate mooks. I suppose that counted for something. From what I saw, even from far off, she had a way with her, a distant seriousness that made the elders purr, and a still more distant humor that must have kept her from going crazy.

So imagine my surprise when I walked into her office and she knew who I was.

She was behind her desk, a surprisingly slight woman with close cropped auburn hair and sharp blue eyes. Those eyes lit up when she saw me, then her mouth pressed into an unwelcoming line. "Hello, Elza."

I brought my fist to my shoulder. "Master Cathari. I was told to come to you. I have a request – "

"I know why you're here." She leaned her small chin in her palm, but there was nothing lazy or indifferent in the gesture. "And no, I don't think you should."

I hunted for words. I'm certain my face didn't change, but she probably knew anyway. "I believe I have the skill to become a Knight Gunner." Her flat blue stare told me to just shut up and put myself out of my misery, but I pushed on. "I am asking permission to commence training for the trial." Cathari shook her head. I knew that she'd taken over the Knight trials ever since she'd returned, and in that time twelve gunners had gone into the Blood Rooms and none had come out alive. "I'm stronger than them," I burst out. With a short breath, I steadied my voice, even lifted the corner of my mouth into a smile. "I think I deserve a shot."

"I know what you can do," Cathari said, a bit of a smile on her mouth. "You're one of Sauro's three. Three students out of your class survived to adulthood. I don't know whether we're proud of you or disgusted with him. And I suppose –" she stood "– you and the other two want to test your luck further."

"I'm not speaking for them."

"You don't have to. When you were younger, you kept a dog, didn't you?"

"How did – " I cut off my words, covering my shock.

"You three hid her well, I'll give you that. But I remember seeing you in the smoke house courtyard, getting her to roll over so you could scratch her stomach." She chuckled.

All right, fine, master, I'm still a better gunner than you'll ever be. "The dog's gone now, if you still want to punish us for keeping an animal."

"I know. She got too big to hide, so I let her go. But I believe I'm correct in saying that where one of you goes, the others will make it their business to follow."

"But you aren't going to let me take the trial. And you're going to keep Clive and Kelley from it too?" Words caught in my throat, then I let them out. "Damn you."

Her eyebrows jumped. "No, I'll let them through. Either is a fine candidate."

"What makes you think that – I am just as good as either of them!" I tried to control my voice, but what I wanted was to call her out, get her into the training ring and show her just how I'd survived this long. And I knew she saw it, exactly what I was thinking. So all I could do was smile, just a bit, to keep my mouth from shaking with anger.

"Elza," she said softly. "You are excellent. But I won't allow you to advance. If you become a Knight Gunner, you could be raised to Guild Master, and, I assure you, many of the elders will not welcome that."

She meant Master Dareb. "I'm not afraid of them." Right then I wasn't.

"Don't be a fool. You have enemies, and it doesn't matter how good you are once you're outgunned." She watched me, waiting to see if I'd try any other argument, and when I didn't, just tried to keep my breathing quiet, she sat down again. "Far better that you live as a simple gunner than die with one of our bullets in your chest."

I made it to the firing range, and after sundown Clive and Kelley found me still there, setting up a new target.

"I can't believe she wouldn't advance you," was the first thing Kelley said. "That's bullshit."

I didn't look up, just jammed the target into place.

"Maybe – " Kelley ducked his head, trying to catch my eye, but I wasn't cooperating. "Maybe – did she just say you need more training first?"

"She said no," I snapped, "no, not at all." I lifted my pistol and shot. Almost dead center.

"That doesn't make any sense."

"What a breakthrough, Kelley." I shot again. Farther off target. Tears were burning my eyes, but they were just going to stay there, I wasn't here to cry. "Damn it."

Clive walked over and, as close as someone could to shouldering me out of the way without making physical contact, raised his rifle and fired. Not a dead shot, but closer than my last. I'd opened my mouth to say something angry, but I noticed how he was sighting through his scope like I wasn't even there, then told myself to shut up and focus. Fired. Dead center.

Clive lowered his rifle and smiled at me.

Then turned, because someone was walking towards us. Cathari didn't look at me. "Clive, Kelley, I need a word."

Kelley glanced at Clive, but Clive didn't move, so they both stayed put. Cathari acknowledged this with a small grim nod. "Sauro tells me neither of you is trying for Knight Gunner."

I stared at Clive. Damn you, don't do this.

"We..." Kelley's attention trailed to me, then back. "We decided not to."

"Is that it?" Cathari demanded. "She's not going through with it, so now none of you are?"

What none of us did was answer.

She glared at the two of them, not angry, but almost desperately. "You have a chance. Don't waste it."

No answer.

Finally, almost unwillingly, Cathari glanced at me, sighed with exasperation, then turned and left us.

I wasn't going to say anything while she was there – there was never any point in showing anything but a united front – but once she was gone I shoved Clive with all of my strength. "What the hell is wrong with you? You want to be Guild Master!"

Clive had only stumbled a bit, but he didn't fight back, and Kelley reached a hand towards me. "Elza – "

"Don't talk to me," I said, and they didn't.

The next morning, Master Dareb came to us, told us we had all been approved to begin training for Knight rank, and that we would commence immediately. He insisted.

Actually, Kelley did kiss me. A little over a couple years, until I suppose we both realized we could probably find more exciting people to kiss. That first time, I was thirteen and we were by the east fence, waiting for Clive to meet us after a class. Kelley had been turning an empty cartridge over in his hand when he not at all casually said, "Hey, Elza, have you ever kissed someone?"

"What the hell, Kelley?"

"Look, I'm just asking!"

And I was just laughing. "What. The hell. Kelley."

"Never mind." And he crossed his arms on his chest and didn't look at me.

After thinking a moment, I said, "You can kiss me."

"Huh?"

"I mean, if, like. You know. If you want to, I don't care."

Kelley, who'd just begun to lighten up, slumped.

Really, Elza. "I mean, I don't mind."

"Oh. Um. Cool." Then he looked around, in all directions (Master Sauro had drilled that into us, though he'd placed it in the context of looking for counter-assassins, not kissing) then leaned down and kissed me on the mouth. Really. He was always so innocent about it.

And he was so pleased he seemed to be surprised by it.

"Did you think I was going to shoot you?"

He laughed. Blushed. And said, "Don't tell Clive."

"Oh hell, no." Neither of us explained, even to ourselves, why we weren't telling Clive. He hadn't even noticed girls as girls yet. I stared off into the distance. "Can you – can you imagine his face?"

"I don't have to imagine." And Kelley lowered his eyebrows and bent his mouth into a semi-circle of deep disapproval.

"No, no, you have to start with this look of dumb amazement." I made my eyes as big and blank as possible. "Elza? Kelley? What the howling voice hell are you doing?"

"Yeah, and then you'd have to kiss him too, just so everything was fair."

"And then you'd have to kiss him 'cause I'm not going to do all the work."

"And then when he becomes Guild Master he'll drop both of us in an oubliette for shaming the Guild and melt our guns."

"And use them for tooth fillings!"

"What the hell?"

We looked over. Clive, dusty from class, was staring at us, his eyebrows lowered dubiously.

"What the hell are you doing?" After a moment, he shook his head and sat down on my other side. "Stop laughing like that, Kelley. You sound like Elza."