Note: All characters, places, ect belong to Square Enix, not me.

In Threes

By Zero9grl

Chapter One: Life Calling

When she was little the world was still and blue and dead. The people did not speak, only watched, and everything different was quickly crushed. The dead were why the population lived and it was all pervaded by the soft silence of the grave. Now that she is older, there is color and sound and the world is vibrant. But the world is not her world. That sunshine, that moonlight, those tides and stars, they are not the earthly forces she was born to. She's a guest in this world, a refugee brought to haven, an outsider taken in. One world dead, one world living, one girl straddling both and unable to partake in either.

"Meow" I woke up to the feeling of claws in my chest and something furry attempting to lodge itself up my nose. "Meow," my cat called again, demanding my attention as I attempted to roll on to my side and go back to sleep. With a slight groan I flopped out of bed, clothes all rumpled, eyes half-shut and hair probably sticking up like a haystack. It was another morning on Gaia and I looked like something a Mu had dug up. Thank you Gaian mornings. By the way, when I died, my afterlife goal would be to re-kill the man who had invented mornings.

"Meow," Rubyeyes, my lovely cat, caterwauled, not interested in morning grumpiness and future re-murderings. Slouching over to the cupboard, I pulled out the milk, which was probably warm and going bad, and a bowl and gave the cat some of the lumpy, cottage cheese looking mess that splotched out. Looking at the whole unappetizing thing, Rubyeyes gave me a slow glare of reproach before digging in. That look promised a future in which he was sick all over the floor later to get back at me. Cat fed, sort of, I pulled a kettle out of that wonderful device called a cupboard and filled it with water before setting it on the little stove to boil for my morning tea. Except the stove wasn't lit. Giving voice to an incoherent sound that could only be described as, "Mmnff," I went off to get some kindling and find where I had tossed that flint.

In the end I skipped breakfast, drank my tea lukewarm and watery, tripped over Rubyeyes no less than five times, washed my face amid much splashing, got soap in my eye, managed to find a set of clean if immodest Cleyran clothing and proceeded to search for a cloak or some such thing to protect against the day's chill. All the same as every morning, though sometimes the milk was fresh, the clothes Alexandrian or Terran and the number of trips over Rubyeyes more or less than five; the tea though, was always lukewarm and watery. I hadn't had a truly good cup of tea since I lived in Burmecia.

"There better not be any disgusting surprises on the floor when I get back," I told my cat, whose only sign that he had heard me was to flick his tail in the self-absorbed language of felines, and I headed out the door. A long windy climb awaited me as I tenaciously walked up the steeply rising steps of Observatory Mountain. At least I could say I was perfectly healthy if I made it to the top without collapsing (and I'm told an old man used to make this climb with ease). Cresting the top, only slightly winded after two months of making the ridiculous climb daily, I spread my arms in the ferocious wind that tugged my hair this way and that, the orange pendant that stood at the top of the lookout slapping a sharp tempo against the rock of the mountain. I probably looked like a crazy scarecrow that someone hadn't gotten quite right, this tall, skinny, long-limbed girl with her fly-away-straw-hair, ridiculous yellow satin gloves, scanty body-hugging clothes and oversized leather boots, standing on top of a want-to-be mountain as if to scare all the crows away. I'm sure the birds were trembling all right, about right after they stopped laughing themselves into a coma.

The moment of girl-meeting-world-for-the-day ending though, I turned to the North and looked out to the distance. "No cargo ship yet…" I mumbled, looking for the airship that came to Dali once, sometimes on a lucky pass twice, a week. There was no dark speck on the horizon though. Leaping onto the wall, I wrapped my tail around the pole of the pendant, trying to see better. Still nothing met my sight. The ship probably wouldn't arrive till noon then. I supposed I could go into Dali and play cards with Eve to while away the time as I waited. She might even have some kupo nuts in stock; that would be nice. Well, to Dali it was then.

This is my life, day in and day out. It's a hodgepodge of little things stuck together with twine and lots of spit. I'd throw a prayer in there somewhere, but my faith is weaker than a goblin's knobby ankles. It's a relatively ridiculous life for an angel of death, but necessary. After all, not every person can have world shifting adventures that would make any sane person soil themselves, run home screaming to hide under the covers and wait for mommy to make the bad thing go away.

That cat there? I picked it up in Lindblum while living with the engineers who like to imitate Cid VIII (the famous engineer regent owned a cat). The yellow gloves I gained in Treno working at the auction (a noble left them behind). Those big boots are from Conde Petie, made for oversized dwarf feet. The shirt hails of the ddisplaced ancers of Cleyra, the skirt a thing I won at Daguerro. Each and every thing I own comes from somewhere far and roamed.

When I first left Black Mage Village two years ago, I hadn't thought of settling in Dali or any of the places I've been. My mind had been set to move to Alexandria, closer to Zidane, closer to that 'brother' who'd come to be my only 'family'. Alexandria had felt like a struggling beast, still trying to recover from the devastating effects of war and winning successes oh so slowly, only by the tenacity with which Garnet and Zidane urged the city on. I'd wanted to scream, watching walls go up slowly, slowly, and rubble disappear sluggishly. I did not stay in Alexandria long.

Next had come towering Lindblum with its high walls and encroaching buildings. Airships constantly flying overhead, engineers always talking, always searching for that next improvement; I'd found no rest there either, setting my head to engine problems and flight velocities.

Drizzling Burmecia, indulgent Treno, chipper Conde Petie, ghostly Madain Sari, muggy Qu Marsh, no matter where I went it wasn't right. Even now I don't know how much longer I'll be in placid Dali before I can't stand to be within its bound any longer. It doesn't help that I don't know or understand what drives me from place to place or what I'm looking for. My feet want to move though, there's a pain in my chest and I feel like I'm drowning, slowly, slowly, oh so excruciating slowly in this world I've never known and it doesn't make sense, but no one ever promised me logic, so I keep trying to make it all right and figure out this problem, solve this equation, set to rights the bizarre arithmetic. But it doesn't make sense and it's doubtful it ever will, so I keep moving and moving until I'm dizzy and the feeling that I'm drowning does not leave.

This is my life and someone save the bastard who messes it up. Again.

There once was a little girl who liked to laugh and play. There once was a little girl who never spoke and genetically engineered her own friends. A little girl should be happy and free. They should play games and laugh and run and spill the tea set they put grape juice in on the good rug and get into mommy's perfume when no one's looking. This little girl played with numbers and spilled chemicals on the floor that no one cared about and if she smelled different it was only the biological substances she splashed on herself by mistake. All little girls love to be hugged and so did this little girl, but nobody ever hugged her. Her friends never said hello.

"Good morning Mikoto!"

I kicked a chest over and dropped down on to it, looking at Eve over the counter of the only store in Dali. "Hello," I drawled back, watching as she pulled out her cards and began to look through them. We had done this routine many times and we'd probably do it many more before I left. "Cargo ship coming late today?" Eve asked, setting down the Tetra Master board. The avid player that I was, I already had my own cards picked out and Eve was flipping the coin, not even having to ask what side I was calling. It landed heads: Eve went first.

"It'll probably be here by noon," I told her with lackluster, contemplating a moment over her opening play before choosing a card to put down.

"I've never seen someone so devoted to getting their mail, yet so completely unenthusiastic about it," Eve remarked innocently enough, though I didn't miss the small, wheedling, excited tone underneath. "Do you think you'll have another letter from that guy?"

"Probably." I played a cactuar and took her fang and lizard man.

"What do you think it'll say?" She threw down a bomb in my cactuar's open angle, the sneaky little—.

"Something about the village and sunlight and how they all miss me." The carrion worm in my hand took care of the double she'd just gotten.

Eve paused for a moment, studying the cards carefully. This was her second to last card. If she didn't watch it I'd win with another Perfect. "I feel bad for him. He writes you all the time and you don't even respond. You should say something nice, like that you miss him too or that you think of him or--" She timidly place down a goblin. I slapped down my Su, knowing I had her. There was no way she could beat that formation. No possible place to play that could turn the game back to her advantage. Maybe I could get another Perfect today...

"--or at least tell him that he's a nice guy," Eve finished, playing her last card with slight disgust. I beat it immediately. "You're too good for me Mikoto. When's that card tournament?"

"In a few weeks. I don't know if I'm going to go though. I like living my life of secluded hermitage, letters from creepy fawning boys or no letters," I informed her dryly, giving her back her cards (after a while of routine games we'd agreed that I just wouldn't take her cards anymore or she'd have none left). The 'boy' in question was actually a black mage from the hidden village of like name (though of course I couldn't tell Eve of the place so he was just, 'the boy'). He made my skin crawl. There was nothing wrong with him. Just the way he tried to talk to me...and give me things...and help me in whatever I happened to be doing...and was as sweet as sugar-spun pastries. Nothing wrong with him at all. I was under the entire assumption that it was me that something was wrong with--after all, Eve seemed to like him a lot, whereas I couldn't stand to hear him ask a question in his kind, caring voice. "Do you think maybe I could help you with that Mikoto?" No, no I think not. Not unless you know the way to pull out a person's brains without killing them, letting them enjoy your saintly company in the sweet bliss of the lack of all intelligent thought of any sort.

Eve giggled and gave me a little shove at my words (she is truly the common girl who lives in the village in the middle of nowhere that isn't even on most maps). "You're not a hermit! You come and see me and Hal and Gumo all the time!" Gumo was the moogle who lived at the inn and suspected all milkmen of conspiracies and political intrigue. He was always watchful (or so he said) and he was always trying to catch the local milkman (who was only milkman by the default that he owned the only cow) in the act (what act none of us really knew).

"Don't try and disillusion me Eve. I'm determined to suffer this in dramatic silence and you're ruining the effect," I told my cheerful village friend as dryly as if I had just read a passage from a book entitled, "The World: A Genealogy", sitting down to play another round. Eve just laughed outright at that and gave me another playful shove. "I don't know how you say those things with a straight face!"

Once I ate a caterpillar and it slithered down my tongue, squirming down my throat and probably danced an evil jig in my stomach. I felt awful that day and I swore I'd never try any questionable foods Quina handed me again. I felt like that caterpillar had come back to unholy life and was dancing an encore and this time he had brought friends.

I'd gotten my letters alright and with them I'd gotten the news, the wonderful, glorious, gut wrenching news: I was officially an aunt. Garnet had been expecting for some months now, but I'd never really thought about the whole thing in relation to me. The cheerful letter Zidane had sent me set straight any possible thoughts of having absolutely nothing to do with this strange new child. "Hello? Mikoto? You're an aunt now! Here's a list of all the things for you need: birthday presents, babysitting hours, list of compliments to effectively shower upon us the next time you see us, a big sticker so the kid can pick you out as one of the people its allowed to drool on and so forth and don't worry if she summons anything on you, it's just a phase. Oh and that black mage boy says he misses you. See you at the naming ceremony!"

I never had been good with children. Either they cried and cried and cried, ran away and hid or did things they knew they shouldn't be doing and became angry at me when I wouldn't sympathize with the ow-ey they gained. Now I had a niece. Her name was Cornelia. She had a tail and a horn and oozed royal drool.

Sitting atop the lookout on Observatory Mountain with Zidane's letter in my hand, I felt like I was going to be sick and I believe I would have been, had not something happened. This something was an it, in actuality, and this it did not so much happen, as fall from the sky.

"Mission…retrieve…"

I looked up to see a –giant bird?—winged thing fly up above the mountain lookout, tattered and beaten, wings flapping sporadically, barely keeping itself up.

"Mission…retrieve…" It said again, bright yellow eyes glowing out from underneath its ripped hat. It looked sort of like a black mage, but not any type I had ever seen.

"…Retrieve…"

It raised a bent and warped staff streaked with dirt and badly scratched. The staff began to glow; it was going to cast some spell… And then it gave a shudder and its wings folded. The black mage thing dropped from the sky like a rock, faster than a rock, the black mage could have beaten the rock in a falling contest; enough about rocks. Random as this event was, it seemed determined to make me do something about it; point in fact, the black mage landed on me, nearly making me a Mikoto flapjack.

"Ow… Get off of me!" That's the nice thing about first person pronouns. Me, I, my, there's an obvious connection between you and said word. There are no words like that in the dead language of Terra. It's all we, us, our or if you must single out an individual, you use their name, if they have one. No, Gaian is healthily supplied with words to express your needs, your wants. It's all about you, individualism, being separate from all the other creatures of the planet. I loved expressing my individualism, especially when it came to getting bizarre masses of winged black mages out of my personal space, especially bizarre masses of winged black mages that had just knocked me onto a rock floor and given me a splitting headache. By the way, there was a slap with that expression of individualism, but it didn't seem to be noticed. Indeed, there was no response.

So I decided to try again. "If you'd kindly remove yourself from my person, I'd be most appreciative." This one was accompanied by an encouraging kick.

"Uuuugh…" That was Mr. I-love-birds-way-too-much black mage, glowing eyes flickering slightly in the mass of darkness that was his face. "Mission…" he croaked, staring at the stone floor.

"Yes, yes, mission, I understand. First though: get off me! Secondly: who exactly are you so I know what authorities would be the proper ones to contact over this matter."

"Uuuuugh… Black….Waltz…No. 3….." He muttered hoarsely before passing back into the land of the blissfully unconscious, noticeably without moving himself somewhere else. I wasn't so worried about that anymore though. I'd gone still, breath caught in my throat. I'd heard about the Black Waltzes… I'd been told of them and what I'd been told had not been good. What exactly had just fallen on top of me?