The mud is as cold and wet as the foggy river. Micaiah thinks she might sink into it. Though she doesn't believe it has been long since she limped off the front lines and into the cover of plumed swampgrass and driftwood, the mud has started to form a mold that cradles her aching body. She pulls her cloak tightly around her, wincing as she unthinkingly shifts her twisted right ankle.
She spares a thought for how out-of-place the billowing plumes look imposed over such an ugly scene. Sothe is close enough to see through the grass and the darkness, moving with grace and ease. A gray-haired laguz fall at the end of his blade, and she closes her eyes tightly. The image dies on the backs of her eyelids, but a voice from earlier echoes in her head.
Freedom fighters to bigots – how do you feel about this, Micaiah?
She shivers in her cloak, and thinks of how it is so different to watch instead of participate, of how her ankle throbs, of how much she wants this all to be over. And of how Sothe told her not to close her eyes, not after she hit her head, but she isn't going to fall asleep, no.
Her eyes remain shut. It will only be for a moment.
"Micaiah."
She starts.
"What- Sothe-" She blinks. "Is it over?"
He gives a humorless snort. "No. But first, are you all right? I told you not to fall asleep." His spindly fingers reach for hers – almost laughably gentle in a place like this, she thinks.
"Sothe, please. Tell me what's happening."
"They keep coming. It's like there's no end in sight." His hand withdraws, and his eyes harden, and it is then she notices the scrape across his cheek, the tired lines defining his face. "Micaiah, please hear me out. Not only is this all wrong, but-"
"Can that wait, Sothe?" comes a deep, familiar voice. Nolan steps out of the shadows and wastes no time brushing past Sothe and moving toward Micaiah with something – someone – in his arms. "We have to do something, now. Laura is out of staves, and he's in really bad shape."
It takes but a moment for Micaiah to understand, and when Nolan lays Leonardo's limp, unconscious body carefully beside her, when she sees the deep red, brown, blue-black and all the other colors one should never see coming out of a living being, she cannot help but gasp. Her hands fly to cover her mouth, in a mixture of shock and nausea that washes over her like the chilly water on the riverbank. But for all she wants to look away, she finds herself transfixed.
"Y-you shouldn't have moved him, you should have come to find me first-" Her voice sounds like it is coming from outside her own body as she scrambles to her knees, ignoring the ache in her head, the stab in her ankle to hopefully do as she has done countless times before – to perform a miracle.
"Micaiah! You can't-"
"Sothe, what are you saying?"
"You know what happens when you use Sacrifice!" He takes her hands into his own, as if this will somehow change her mind, somehow make her understand. At the same time, she is uncomfortably aware that Nolan is looking away, shifting his bulk from foot to foot, trying to pretend he is not witnessing something he isn't meant to see. "You're badly injured right now yourself!"
"Sothe, please, don't-"
"You always say yourself it's dangerous-"
"What would you have me do? Let him-" She stops, unable to bring herself to say it.
His hands suddenly loosen around her own, as if he has been bitten. "I want you to think of yourself, for once."
Sothe says nothing else. Micaiah tries pleading with his aching eyes, but they speak for him. What about you, what about me, what about us? Micaiah disentangles her hands, and (like the charlatan that only he knows she is) silently begs Sothe's forgiveness one more time.
Nolan and Sothe both look on with grim expressions as she hovers her hands inches from the angry gash, just as she has done so many times past. She prepares as she always does, follows the same train of thoughts, sees the same images in her mind's eye. But she knows immediately that something is not right: there is no surge, no weightlessness, no transference, no sudden loss of energy.
Golden eyes flicker to Nolan and Sothe, who each remain fixed upon her, expectantly.
She tries again.
Again. Again.
Again.
"Micaiah, what's-"
She cuts off the concerned voice that is still by her side with a short I don't know and tries once more. She has lost so many, too many battles today, and she will not, she thinks, she will not lose this one too. And it does not work this time either, but she continues trying, again and again and again, even as she begins to wonder if she truly has any energy left to transfer, any health of her own left to give. Again, again. She continues trying and failing, trying and failing, with fear and panic mounting in her head, with pain lacing her every move, with total exhaustion creeping ever closer. Again, again, again.
"Micaiah." Sothe's voice is soft now, not like it was before, but she has no time to think about that. "Micaiah... it's over."
And finally, she stops, and realizes.
Micaiah automatically stretches two shaking fingers toward the spot where a pulse should be racing, beating, fluttering – anything. She feels nothing but pallid, clammy skin.
She is numb for but a moment before she knows saltwater is streaming down her face, and Sothe's hands are there again, at her shoulders, at her back – absurdly, impossibly gentle. Too gentle for the situation, for the time, for the place. For the edge of a battlefield, for beside the body of a fallen friend.
Perhaps even too gentle for her.
This fic was written for the fe_contest community on Livejournal, for the Game Mechanics challenge. The game mechanic I chose to use has, of course, to do with Micaiah's Sacrifice skill - and specifically the fact that if Micaiah's HP is reduced to 1, you are unable to use the skill until some more of Micaiah's HP is recovered.
It is also meant to take place during Chapter 6 of Part III, if you were curious.