Sky Pirate and Gamer

Disclaimer: I don't own FFXII or any of its characters, not even Balthier. Squaresoft does. Isn't it sad?

Disclaimer Part Two: I do, however, own Jessica Blake (and she isn't based off of anyone, so apologies if she sounds like you). She's mine. You can't have her.

Summary: Jessica Blake is transferred into the world of FFXII one night, and has to quickly adapt to her new life, and work out how to stay sane when she's basically living with the one character in the story that she can't stand – Balthier Bunansa.

Main Pairing:

Balthier/OC

Prologue

Jessica Blake glared at the screen of her tiny TV, swearing under her breath. The words GAME OVER shone dark red on the screen – all her characters were dead once again. She swore and hurled the controller across the room. This was so stupid, she'd lost once again and it wasn't even that hard a boss. When she'd bought Final Fantasy XXII off one of her workmates for a ridiculous price she'd expected it to be good, not so difficult she couldn't get past the third major boss. She flung herself on her bed and glared moodily at the ceiling.

"Why can't I do this? And for that matter, why am I, at nearly twenty-one years of age, still playing Playstation games in every bit of spare time I can get?"

She groaned and covered her eyes with her hand, not liking to admit that really, the game was pretty cool. The characters were interesting, and the story was good. The only thing she had wrong with the game was… Balthier. He was so obnoxious, arrogant and up himself. And he was way too good looking. And as for those super tight pants… What the hell was he trying to prove?

She sighed and rolled out from under the warm covers of her bed, padding into her tiny bathroom. Glaring into the mirror she saw a small, pale, nearly-twenty-one-year-old with long unruly black hair and seriously weird silvery grey eyes with black flecks in them. The girl in the mirror was scowling, straight black brows drawn down over a small nose. She was pretty, in a scary sort of way – she looked the way a dark angel should probably look, except for her hair. Her hair ate brushes.

She turned the shower on as hard and hot as it would go, then stripped and stepped under the scalding water, hissing quietly in pain then closing her eyes against the spray, letting the water pound away all her frustrations, not only with that dumb game, but also with her meaningless life. She slept, she worked, she ate (when she could afford it) and she just basically existed. But she didn't enjoy it. Her love life was non existent – she'd had one boyfriend in high school and then nothing, not even a date, ever since she'd caught him in bed with the school skank. She'd tossed him out of her life, and claimed to anyone who cared (read: no one) that she didn't miss him. Cos she didn't. The fact that she'd got all sniffily when she'd found some of his old stuff in a box in her cupboard was utterly beside the point…

As she washed her hair in untangling shampoo (which didn't work), she found herself thinking about how nice Balthier's ass actually looked in those super tight leather trousers. She was horrified at herself.

What the fuck?? For god's sake, Jessica, he's a fictional character in a video game! You are not that desperate. Yet.

She switched the shower off and got dressed in her awful work uniform (which was made up of a scratchy, pink, woollen, knee-length pencil skirt, icky white heels and utterly awful baggy white blouse). She battled with her hair for a few minutes before giving up in disgust and just whacking it back in a bun. Then she grabbed her wallet and keys and stomped downstairs, climbing into her elderly car and driving off to the tacky estate agents where she worked. She quickly forgot her thoughts concerning Balthier's behind.

XxXxXxX

Jessica staggered home at about six o'clock in the evening and swiftly changed out of the hated uniform into black jeans and a thick blue jersey. She thought about dinner, then remembered that she was supposed to have gone shopping on her way home and there was nothing edible or um-mouldy in the entire house. She rolled her eyes. "I suppose we'll be giving dinner a miss tonight," she muttered to herself and collapsed onto her bed, reaching out to switch the Playstation 2 on. "At least I'll have some entertainment…"

Half an hour later, she was nearly screaming with frustration. She was dead all over again. "Why the fuck can't I just beat this frigging thing?!" she yelped, slamming her fist into her pillow over and over again. "I just don't get it!!"

She rolled over and glared at the ceiling. Then she restarted the game and loaded a different file. She ran around inside the game for a few seconds then settled back to watch the movie again.

"…Incidentally, what is the going rate for rescuing princesses theses days?"

Jessica glared at the screen, feeling her hatred for the cocky sky pirate growing again. That was better – so long as she had someone to be mad at she couldn't be depressed.

"Food would be a start – the good stuff mind you."

Halim Ondore said something, I barely registered what, I was busy watching Princess Ashe's face go blank as she realized that her uncle really wouldn't be helping her… and that this stupid sky pirate was more worried about his stomach than he was about her.

"… Time enough for a bath, I hope. Dirty business, you know. Ah, best bring a change of clothes too."

Can we say neat freak?

What a jerk.

Jessica watched the next scene, where Ashe was trying to get the airship started, trying to find a way to save her people. Vaan was arguing with her, telling her that she couldn't steal the wonderful Balthier's airship. Jessica rolled her eyes. Well, why not? It'd do the cocky bastard some good to have someone steal from him for a change. Maybe he'd come back down to earth and realise that he wasn't so great after all.

And here he was, waltzing in and acting like the moron he was. "That's quite enough, your majesty."

Vaan and Ashe both twisted around and stared at him, lounging against the doorframe and actually talking into the intercom when he was only a few feet away from the two of them. Dick.

"What do you think? A bit over the top?"

Jessica groaned and switched the PS2 off. She'd thought being mad at Balthier would make her feel better, but really she was just getting more and more depressed. She couldn't believe that she'd sunk so low that she needed to get mad at an idiot in a game to feel better about herself.

She staggered to her feet and got changed into a pair of black satin boxer short and a t-shirt, deciding to read in bed for a few hours then have an early night. But for some reason, she kept yawning, feeling utterly exhausted all of a sudden. She gave up eventually and turned the light out, snuggling down into her bed and going to sleep instantly. For some reason she dreamed of Balthier.

She could never have known that the next morning, when she awoke, she'd be somewhere very different with a certain sky pirate standing over her, looking amused. Her formerly boring and "meaningless" life was about to get very complicated…