Chapter 1

I don't own any of the characters or places from FF 12, you know. Hope the story is enjoyable!

A Pleasant Surprise?

Another city, another tavern; it was all the same anyway, right?

How long was Balthier planning on traveling with the Dalmascans anyway? The thought of going back to his life prior to Vaan and the others seemed unappealing now. The world surely had gone mad when HE, Balthier the sky pirate was unable to fly alone.

For a long time now Balthier struggled to come to terms with Vaan and Penelo's involvement in helping the Princess Ashe and former Captain Basch in their efforts to restore Dalmasca to its former glory. Well not so much Penelo. She seemed to have gotten involved because of Vaan, and stayed involved because of Vaan. He often thought it might have to do with being Dalmascan or maybe to avenge his deceased brother, but that just didn't seem quite it. Vaan seemed to seek adventure or strife, he wasn't sure which yet. These thoughts however only led the man to question his own part in the whole mess, which, as of late, had begun to falter.

The sky pirate downed his mug of beer in an attempt to do away with such thoughts. He scanned the noisy Sandsea to find his companions, half-bored gaze flickering from one person to another. Lady Ashe and Basch sat ever serious at a table on the second floor of the place discussing something unknown to him. Occasionally he tired of the Lady Ashe's dismal attitude and the Captain's boring manner of doing things. Sure he was Captain Basch Von Ronsenburg but the man was so stuffy.

He turned to see Penelo whirling about gracefully to the singing of one of her female friends, surrounded by clapping drunks cheering them on. Larsa sat among the men, a bit flustered, but whether it was on account of the sots surrounding him or Penelo's dancing Balthier was unsure.

Fran was back on the Strahl; she'd said the "noise of the humes" was not pleasant to her ears and if she could avoid it that'd be preferable. He was sympathetic though, she put up with the screeching of his world enough as it was.

Peculiarly, Vaan was nowhere to be seen. Balthier slowly rose from his barstool, leaving the barkeep a tip, and stumbled over to the crowd surrounding Penelo.

"Lovely dancing dear, but have you seen Vaan this fine night?" he tried to keep his tone bored and his face uninterested but if that failed he could always blame his curiosity on the alcohol.

Several men frowned and gave him dirty looks for distracting their entertainment but she answered him, oblivious.

"Oh! I was having so much fun that…no I haven't seen him since…god, afternoon or so. Do you think he's alright? Maybe I should go look for him…he usually hangs around when we're all together…" Worry was etched into her pale face until Balthier put a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"No worries, Penelo. I only asked out of boredom, those two aren't much company," he motioned to the Princess and Basch, eliciting a giggle from her and a smile from Larsa, "so you and Larsa should enjoy yourselves! I'll go look for him, we're big boys; we can handle ourselves."

Penelo laughed a little sheepishly at that, "Of course Balthier. I suppose you should try looking for him in Lowtown, he may be there."

He nodded his thanks at her and as he walked away she resumed her swinging and swaying to the sound of clapping and the bar once again sparked to life.

"Lowtown…? What the hell could that mean…?" Balthier mumbled to himself.

Just his luck to be stumbling through the streets of Rabanastre, intoxicated, looking for Vaan in a place he'd never even heard of. Not to mention it was rather late and all the kindly citizens were asleep like the good people they were.

After a few minutes of unfruitful searching for "lowtown" a friendly Bangaa explained that it was below the city and pointed out the stairs leading to it, adding that even long-time citizens of Rabanastre had trouble finding the elusive stairs.

Once beneath the ground, Balthier had no idea where to begin searching for Vaan and decided he was in no state of mind to go adventuring tonight.

He sat in an empty alley, enjoying the dimness of Lowtown and thinking aloud.

"Maybe if I just sit here for awhile…Vaan will… stumble upon me. That sounds like a good plan."

Seconds passed before Balthier's third and fourth round of alcohol hit him. His head was spinning and the world got a tad dizzier. He was glad to be sitting at this point in time. It was even nice how this young man had come to stand in front of him and keep him company, a nice quiet companionship. He was content with admiring the youth's tanned, chiseled chest as he waited for Vaan.

Wait.

Bare-chested, tanned youth?

His gaze drifted up to the boy's face to find familiar blonde locks and devious garnet eyes staring back into his own amber ones. Vaan held a large bottle in his right hand. It was filled with clear liquid, presumably alcohol.

"Well look who's happened upon me on this fine night? None other than the infamous Balthier, sky pirate extraordinaire! What are you doing drunk in an alley?" His voice was light and teasing, eyes shining with mischief. What was he about to get into?

Balthier could not remember his slurred reply to the blonde, only thinking over exactly how many times he really had been drunk in abandoned alleys. More than the average man is all he could come up with. However, he did remember (slightly) an abandoned shack, tattered and blue, with a table in the center. He recalled lying on the surprisingly clean carpet with Vaan, drinking whatever Vaan had given him. He deduced that the tanned street rat was a lightweight concerning hard liquor (for it could not have been anything else) and he speculated on whether the blonde had only drunk to impress a certain sky pirate.

Past these things Balthier could summon nothing from his memories of the previous night.

So, under aforementioned conditions, anyone would be at least slightly confused to wake up in Balthier's position.

Balthier calmly closed his eyes, counted to ten, took three deep breaths, and re-opened his eyes. Balthier had experienced many unusual things, but when he took in his surroundings for the second time that morning, he was still baffled as to what he should do next.

He found himself in a sunlit room, light glinting off of shiny and incandescent objects strewn about the comfortable room. He soon came to the realization that this was because he appeared to be in the treasure room of the palace, where he first met Vaan. All he knew was that it definitely was not the tattered blue room of the shack in Lowtown.

Next, he noticed small goose bumps running up his arms and discerned that the room was rather breezy for one without open windows. He soon concluded that this was due to the fact that he was butt naked, clothes scattered across the rug. At first, he thought this could possibly be some cruel joke Vaan was playing on him and waited for the boy to jump out of a suit of armor hysterical with laughter, but when this did not happen he noted that a reasonably tanned arm lay across his abdomen and quickly identified it as the aspiring pirate's. Upon closer inspection he observed that Vaan was bare as well.

Wonderful. It seemed he'd finally gotten some (for the first time in days) and he couldn't even remember if it was good or not. All this accompanied by a blaring hangover and worried friends to deal with later; and the day had really just begun.

Balthier sighed, squinted at the slumbering thief, and wondered why he bothered with life at times like these.