Static in Her Ears
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy XII or any of the characters there within, they are property of Square Enix etc…
It was worse than the last time she had come. She could hear nothing but a dull roar as her companions argued. So this was what it felt like. The utter, crushing dejection of abandonment weighed heavily on her heart. And there before them stood a barrier; a wavering, blue web of rippling, waving Mist too thick to penetrate. The all too tangible object of rejection by her kin; by the Wood.
Vaan tapped the blue screen and recoiled as the elasticity squelched and bounced back at him in retribution, the same consistency of putty.
"What is it?" he asked.
"The jungle denies us our passage." Fran said without drawing her eyes from the barrier. Having voiced the terrible revelation did little to ease the ache in her heart. The princess, Ashe, looked over to the viera warrior in a mixture of anxiety and disquiet.
"What have we done?"
Fran's eyes narrowed at the screen and she stepped back; knowing what had to be done and unsure of the reception she would receive. There could be no other way. She began to head down the very familiar path.
"We? No. I."
Balthier had fallen instep beside her, guessing her intentions as Vaan shouted in confusion behind them.
"What's that mean? How are we supposed to get through that?"
"Making an appearance?" Balthier asked, ignoring the young boy behind them.
"I am." Fran affirmed his suspicions.
"I thought you'd left for good."
"Our choices are few."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the pirate nod agreement. The barrier was due in part to her kin that existed just out of sight in the jungle. They would have to ask permission of the other viera to cross to the plains, and Fran would be unable to join them to make the transaction. But she would help them any way she could, even facing that rejection from her sisters once again. Jote, what had she been doing all these years? A stirring rose in Fran's chest; oh how she missed her sisters.
Vaan was still demanding an explanation for the pairs' odd behavior.
"Fran. Balthier!"
"This is as much for you as it is me." Fran said, hearing Balthier's steps slow on the ramp behind her.
"Oh?"
The viera warrior paused in her stride at the threshold of the hidden path that would lead them to the Eryut village; a hitch in the pirate's voice resonated in her ears. Faint, tremulous, uncertain. The determination of this slight inflection was a small solace in the face of the white noise she heard of the Wood. Her ears had not failed her entirely yet. She turned back to face him.
"You are ill at ease. The nethicite troubles you?" She voiced just the concern that had so gripped the pirate, and there, in his eyes, she saw it again. The same unspoken, compassionate understanding that had drawn her to him the first time they had met all those years ago. They could speak to one another without truly speaking. Her head tilted to one side. "You've let your eyes betray your heart."
It was a rare occasion that left Balthier speechless and he was careful not to let the dead space after her serenely perceptive statement spoil on the muggy breeze.
"Right."
"What are you doing?"
Vaan had joined up with them at last, figuring the only way to properly gain their attention was to follow and inquire after them (as loudly as he dared). Fran had already snapped her finger's and was drawing the glyphs that spoke of passage on the air; leaving behind only the faint, green afterimage of the ancient writings. Slashing the final line to the last glyph, she drew her fingers to her lips and exhaled her soul to the air; giving the hovering glyphs the life and spirit of viera and sending the message leaping and bounding across the vast crevice.
"Soon you will learn." She said to him and turned back to the path when a rush of wind rushed up to greet the party that had regrouped around the pirate and viera. The way had opened to them. Fran tilted her ears lightly down the steadily rising green path. "We go to seek aid of the viera who dwell ahead."
"I bet they'll be glad to see you after so long." Penelo smiled helpfully at Fran, allowing the excitement to be going to so secret and sacred a place flow into her voice in hopes to cheer the viera who had so suddenly fallen into herself. Fran was silent a moment as she considered these words and they weighed heavy in her heart.
"I am unwelcome. An unsought guest in their wood."
The silence that followed was even more deafening than the static that crackled in her ears from the stillness of the Green Word. No one moved. Fran glanced back up at the company and every one of them watched her in anxious sympathy. Her red eyes slipped over to a pair of hazel ones and she found quiet support there. Balthier was silently determined in those eyes; he knew what she faced should she return to the home she had long ago abandoned and a wordless conversation passed between them.
Fran nodded to him and was the first to set foot on the sacred path the others had dared not tread should the precarious lane collapse beneath their unworthy feet. But with the viera leading them, they proceeded onward.
Having walked up the grassy pathway and passing through the grand arch, the party entered the threshold of the beautiful Eryut village. The grass gave way to an elegantly carved path that drew the eye up to the heights of the wide stretch of village beyond. Sunlight spilled through the expanse of treetops and the calming rustle of a thousand thousand leaves stirred to life around them. The smell of earth mixed with the floral scent of flowers that made one pleasantly sleepy. A collective sigh of awe rose within the company as their footsteps stuttered to a halt, having to take the whole sight in to appreciate its sheer beauty.
Fran stopped on the foremost platform, feet rooted to the spot as though a barrier similar to the one that had barred them in the jungle had stopped her short. She would proceed no further.
"In the village ahead you will find her: Mjrn. Bring her to me. She will know why you call her."
The party moved forward. Fran watched Balthier go with a steady gaze. He glanced back at her once as the rest moved into the village, concern still apparent on his features. She tilted her head, a silent signal for him not to worry. The sky pirate appeared to understand and nodded curtly once, careful to bring up the rear of the party.
The viera warrior sighed. Oh, she remembered this place well. The warm sunlight and gentle breeze kissed her face, a perfect air of peace and tranquility surrounded the village. Everything was absolutely flawless…it was boring. It was because of the utter stillness of the Wood that she could not stay. Fran had always been restless within the village, much to Jote's distress. She would be first to volunteer for missions beyond the safety of the gate and many of her sister's would watch after their unruly sister in distaste.
Fran remembered how Jote's expression had fallen when she announced her severance from Eryut to a live life beyond their borders. It was almost as if the new leader always knew this day would come and was still shocked when that day came.
"The viera may begin as part of the Wood, but it is not the only end that we may choose." Fran had said.
"Fran…" Jote had begun, concern written across her face, but a member of the counsel readily leapt into the conversation.
"You will no longer be welcome here. You will be of us no more." She said, stepping forward. Fran nodded her understanding; accepting of the terms. Fran looked once more at Jote, as did all of her surrounding sisters, but the leader had been made silent by the conjoined, unspoken will of the village. They gazed at one another, leader and warrior, sacred sister's of the Wood; Fran poised to leave and Jote wishing to speak her mind. The moment passed and Fran turned away; walked away from her family and home and into the unknown.
Of course, Fran had met other exiled viera on her travels and they spoke with grim severity of their deafness toward the Wood and the Green Word. The viera warrior knew this fate was to eventually befall her as well and one fateful day, she returned to the Wood to see how far she had fallen from its embrace.
Her clawed toes touched the familiar soil of the Golmore Jungle and she was greeted with a horrific silence. Perking her ears, she listened carefully to the sounds of the forest. A wind moaned high above in the tops of the trees and a few creatures snuffled and crawled around the ancient paths, but she could hear nothing from the Wood. Perhaps she would not be quite as deaf if she were closer to the forest heart. She walked the well-known path, ingrained in all viera from birth, to the village. She would not enter, she did not dare incur the contempt of her fellows, but she would proceed until she could hear a proper semblance of the voice of the Wood, if such a thing were even possible anymore.
The faint rushing sound in her ears was growing louder and along with it, the warm, tender voice. She released the breath she had been holding in relief, but her ears pricked suddenly to the grating blare. Something was amiss. There was pain and panic in the garbled message of the Green Word; the Wood was in agony as a wild creature ravaged her on a violent rampage and she cried piteously for one who was lost. Pain shot through Fran like a spear through her heart as she listened to the cry.
Dying…sister fading…failing…path…open…unprotected…
These words repeated through Fran's mind, over and over at varying speeds and volume, like the hopeless crackling radio signal in a failing airship.
The path! The path to the village was unguarded; this much the warrior knew. But why?
Fleeting over lane and stair, Fran bounded the remainder of the way to the hidden path of the Eryut village. A putrid stench had filled the air as she ran, assaulting her sensitive nostrils. Her heart dropped and she skidded to a hazardous stop at the sight of the open, flowering pathway, and a Hume far along its reaches stalked cautiously forward upon it. Fran leapt from her perch, retrieving bow and arrow in one fluid move before landing to the lane below. She felt a rush of familiarity and instinctive need to protect the sacred path she thought she had long since buried. Knocking the bow, Fran hurdled up the path to the unsuspecting Hume.
"Stop!" she shouted, a mere few arm lengths from the male Hume, her bowstring drawn and arrow aimed between his shoulder blades. The man turned slowly to face this new predicament. The instant their eyes met, Fran felt her heart stop for a moment and it was suddenly very difficult to breathe. The usually steady bow had begun to tremble in her hands and her aim jumping with it. The viera swallowed, trying desperately to obtain control of her body once more. Whatever had invaded the wood was affecting her, not the Hume's presence.
Her ears quivered imperceptibly as the man slowly raised his hands.
"Wait, I mean you no harm." He said. The effect on Fran intensified and she considered simply loosing the arrow and being rid of this discomfiting reaction, but she held back. Fran's silence prompted the man to continue. "I…this path seemed much nicer than what I have been walking so far and I thought it might lead somewhere equally nice." Still Fran gazed at him with intense eyes. He swallowed with a wary glance at the drawn bow. "I do apologize if I've intruded, quite rude of me really. I actually saw one of your friends just go running by but I lost her in the thicket back that way and…"
Fran snapped back to reality and lowered her bow a fraction. The Wood had spoken of a "lost one." Perhaps for now, they could work together to unravel the mystery and she could observe this Hume for further scrutiny.
"Where you last saw her, take me there." She said sharply. The Hume nodded at the unspoken agreement between an unfired bow and the favor of aid and dropped his hands.
"All right. I last saw her running this way." He motioned to the left and led Fran back down the path, away from the village, toward the heart of the forest. They jogged for quite some time down a single lane and the odor Fran had smelled before now reeked through the trees with such magnitude she could feel the rancid air being absorbed by her skin. It was a wonder the Hume was not made sick by the stinking rotted smell hanging heavy in the air. Fran shook herself of her revulsion, though her stomach still churned in a sickening manner. She refused to let her pace slack, though her sensitive nose and eyes were burning.
Suddenly the lane split and the Hume slowed to a halt.
"I don't know which way she might have went." He said, glancing back at Fran with a helpless shrug. And where Fran might have usually been able to either smell her sister or listen for the voice of the Wood, she could do neither. The rotten smell of decay was agony on Fran's senses, even her eyes had begun to water, but there at last, she saw the form of another viera, lying prone in the open on a wide platform.
Fran charged forward, bow ever at the ready, and the Hume followed in her wake. The viera warrior dropped to her knees when she reached her sister's side and laid down her bow as she lifted the other viera gently. Her sister had been beaten and bruised badly; her eyes and throat were swollen shut as she lay immobilized on the ground. Only one creature could have done all this—this deliberate attack on the forest and creatures of it.
Fran's senses were almost completely dulled when the Hume drew a gun from his back strap. Betrayal seared through her mind and her bow lay listlessly on the ground; not fast enough to best a lead bullet. But the Hume did not turn the gun on her, instead turning partway down the lane, he ground out lowly:
"We have company."
Fran turned to see the perpetrator of the crimes done within the jungle; a Great Malboro. The Viera's worst foe. Even the strongest of warriors often met a tragic fate while intoxicated by the vile poisons inflicted by this beast. Two against one stood a better chance against the monster, but even the chances of succeeding to bring it down were minimal. Coming back to the jungle might not have been such a brilliant idea. Jote would have been right in saying viera lives began and ended in the Wood.
The Hume began firing round after round at the creature and Fran was loosing arrows as quickly as her thundering heart. The monster screamed in pain and advanced on them, tentacles whipping and writhing and slackened maw gaping; a nightmare in motion. Her eyes and nose were streaming as it drew near, the stench was so great. It was a moment longer she discerned that it was not possible for her to fire arrows as quickly as she was, but she continued her volley until the proximity to the monster was too unbearable.
The Great Malboro then spewed its most devastating attack which caught Fran in its toxic green cloud. Her final fleeting thoughts were of her fallen sister and the male Hume that had meant something significant as she sank into darkness.
Author's Note: Yes, I finally posted this story. I'm thinking it's going to be a three chapter monster of a fic, and this is really just a teaser. I love Fran and Balthier, they are just too much fun to write for. I hope I got their voices down pat...I plan to delve a little into both of their pasts in a later chapter. Should be very interesting.
Hmm, don't have much else to say but this will get pretty juicy. And unlike Fran, I would love to live in a place like Eryut! (Then again, sharing company with a dashing sky pirate is pretty high up there too...)
Please leave a review and I'll post again soon!
Blackfire 18