Hey, after years of abscence I'm here to make the revised version of my previously well received story. Having grown up considerably since then I feel I can do much better than the original. Therefore instead of continuing where i left of and possibly breaking the flow or changing style completely I've decided to start over. Enjoy :) please review if you have the time or the heart to, I appreciate all that i receive.
Legend
Five hundred years have passed since the reign of the Queen and King of Alexandria, Garnet and Zidane. The story is legend, the truths of their "great adventure" shrouded in fiction and hidden by time, long forgotten.
Eidolons and Terra are misconstrued and twisted in children's stories, they no longer bring feelings or horror and despair in citizens but instead are brightly coloured animals in picture books. The power hungry no longer stare at their image in hope and longing but sneer in contempt.
The world has progressed in the thousands and thousands of days that have since passed. Technology has spread enveloping the worlds and people now live in places their ancestors declared inhabitable.
A quickly growing percentage of the population have tails and a few mysterious horns pop up every once in a while too. All that remains of Queen Garnet and Zidane are their graves, the castle at which they once lived and their names.
Lindblum high school greets a seventeen year old girl named Dagger and a boy named Zidane...
Starting Over
Lindblum's streets were busy, packed with school children on their way to their first dismal day of the school year.
Dagger frowned up at the school's main doors from the bottom of the steps. Her stomach was heavy with foreboding, weighing her down. At the age of seventeen she couldn't claim to have had many friends, thanks to her overly protective parents, and now that she was here at a new school in a new city it was her chance to start over, to push through her parent's too tight embrace and fight free. She just wished to be a normal young adult, to not stick out as "the odd one" anymore. But, now that she had been kept from others for so long, she had to overcome her unbearable shyness before she could tackle any other obstacle.
Taking a deep, shuddering breath she stepped forward onto the first step, struggling to get her body to comply with her wish to climb the stairs to the top. Walking slowly towards the doors she felt the brisk early autumn wind blow her dark brown hair off of her shoulders, she hoped her windswept appearance and rosy cheeks from the cold wouldn't be so bad.
A shrill bell rang a warning throughout the halls to the surrounding mass of students as she opened the large, heavy door and entered into the lobby. Facing the three long corridors that branched off of the entrance she felt her heart sink. Which way?
'619' she thought, repeating the number she had drilled into her head after her meeting with the headmaster the previous week. '619, now all I have to do is find it' she sighed as her feet began to walk down the left corridor. "710, 711, nope not this way..." she muttered to herself retracing her steps and going up the middle hallway instead, "520, 521" she glanced to the opposite wall quickly. "650." So, she thought, that must mean... she glanced down the long corridor worriedly, it seemed it was the busiest. The students were all milling around, dressed in more colours than Dagger had ever seen. Generally, in Alexandra, people wore bland low key colours to school. She found the drastic change... disconcerting.
She made her way up the hallway gradually, dodging through the crowd and finding it very difficult to locate her locker when she could barely see any of the numbers. Eventually she reached the other side of the crowd to where the corridor quietened considerably. She'd reached the end, only a staircase and door leading out into the school grounds was in front of her. Crap, did I pass it she frowned back down the corridor, fighting the annoyance welling up in her. Glancing to her side she caught the number 635 and quickly traced the numbers back to 620 before she hit the edge of the crowd.
A boy she guessed to be roughly her age was leaning back against the locker, his arms folded and his tail waving impatiently as he listened to someone she supposed was his friend. His short blonde hair was messily spiked, the front few fell into his blue eyes and he flicked it to the side, waving his hand in dismissal at what was said to him. "Nah I'm not too bothered. We'll still do it anyway." He grinned. The locker number 619 was visible as he shifted to a more comfortable position.
"Excuse me?" Dagger asked as their conversation lulled. "Can I get to my locker, please?"
"Sure," he smiled at her, stepping aside to make room for her. Very little room for her she corrected distressed even as she replied quietly, "Thanks."
Placing the silver key she had been holding tightly in one fist into the lock she twisted it. Crap, wrong way she franticly twisted it the other way trying to ignore the boy watching her and heard a click before tugging on the door. Nothing, it refused to budge. Feeling her face flush she tried to prise open the door that was fiercely resisting, fully aware that a few of the boy's friends were now watching also.
"Do you need help?" He spoke up a short while later, his hand brushing through the back of his hair.
"Please," Dagger sighed, gratefully taking a step back and giving him more room to access the locker than he had her. She dodged his twitching tail as he stepped in front of her and watched as he peered into the locker through the small gap that the jammed door would allow. He dropped his bag onto the floor and slammed the door shut forcefully. "Can you pass me your key?"
She handed it to him, wondering what he could possibly be doing; he didn't think that would work surely? She watched, surprised as he tugged the door open with ease.
"There you go." He turned with a smile, "The hinge got stuck, happens a lot when they haven't been used for a while. It should stop in a few days."
She nodded, "Thanks." Now that he was fully facing her she was able to get a better look at him. He was rather good-looking in a boyish sort of way with his short blonde hair gelled into spikes and eyes that couldn't quite decide what colour they'd rather be, blue or green?
He turned away to the locker next to hers and opened it before unceremoniously shoving his books in. The group of people he had been talking with had also dispersed throughout the corridor to their own lockers during the exchange; she noticed having turned to look behind her to find no one there.
Taking her own books out of her bag to place in her locker she took a deep breath, gathering her courage to talk to him. She was, after all, here for a new start so why not try to make friends with the first people she met. If they didn't click she could always try again.
She was just opening her mouth to speak when he said, "Legend? You believe in that then?"
Dagger glanced at him confused as he nodded his head indicating the book in her hands.
Looking down she realised that the book titled `legend' was at the top of the pile in her hands. She was just about to leave her house this morning when she'd hunted through a still packed box to retrieve it just in case she got bored during the day at her new school.
"More a curiosity than a belief," She said defensively, lying through her teeth. She knew all too well what most people's, especially students, reaction was to anyone that believed in a `children's story'.
He shut his locker door with a slam as he replied, "Ah I believe in it."
"You do?" she said unable to keep the surprise from her voice.
He leaned against his locker, his arms folded, frowning at her, "You new here?" he asked suddenly, not answering her question. Then just as suddenly he grinned, "I think I'd remember such a pretty face, maybe not the name." He laughed holding out his hand to the blushing girl, "Zidane." She grasped his hand, smiling slightly, reminding herself silently not to let it go to her head and that he probably said the same to everyone even as she marvelled at his name. "Dagger, pleased to meet you."
He laughed, "What a coincidence."
"Quite," she nodded, berating herself for speaking so properly when she noticed the odd glance he threw her. She'd have to try to imitate the others.
"So, I take it you are new here? Who's your form tutor?"
"Erm," she hunted through her brown leather satchel for the sheet of paper the headmaster had given her. "Mrs Bat," she read trying to lace confidence into her voice and failing miserably.
"Ah, Mrs Bat. People call her Batty, so ya know." He motioned for her to follow him as he began to walk down the corridor.
"Why?" Dagger frowned, trying to keep pace with him.
"She's going a bit mad, ya know... batty." He answered simply pushing open the door to what she supposed had to be her form room. "I'm in here too, though I thought you were younger." He admitted striding across the table towards the teacher's desk. "I can introduce you to my friends if ya like?"
"Err... sure, I'd like that." Well, she thought, that was a lot easier than I'd thought it'd be...What's the catch?
The bell rang shrilly above her head, startling her out of her thoughts and breaking her gaze away from Zidane. Feeling the familiar feeling of embarrassment she followed him across the classroom to Mrs Bat who had previously been studying the register but was now looking up at Zidane with trepidation.
She straightened up in her chair already frowning in his direction leading Dagger to come to the conclusion that he wasn't a well behaved student. "I'm keeping my eye on you this year Mr Ryan!" Her gaze shifted to Dagger who waited nervously a step behind him, "Another victim of yours?"
"No," Zidane answered bluntly, "This is the new student ya should be expectin', my new best friend Dagger." He winked at the girl behind him suggestively before returning his attention back to their form tutor. "I'm honoured you remember me," he grinned and turned to join his friends who were chatting loudly at the back of the classroom.
Dagger endured Mrs Bat's scrutiny as she tried to process whether the seventeen year old was going to be any trouble. "Your second name dear?" She asked eventually.
"G-Gilla," she stuttered before turning to the class apprehensively. She was surprised to see Zidane waving her over, his friends watching her expectantly. He was keeping to his word then? She hadn't expected that, she honestly thought after thinking it through he was just being polite. But then she hadn't seen a single student in Lindblum yet that could be said to have good manners.
She walked over and hesitantly took the seat by the window next to Zidane. She'd barely been sat for a second before a very pretty girl with jet black hair pulled into a pony tail and long eye-lashes framing her icy blue eyes spoke up from the middle of the gang of friends. "Heya Dagger, the name's Jess. Where ya moved from?"
"Erm hi, I moved here a week ago... f-from Alexandra." That raised a few eyebrows amongst the group she noted. Alexandra was a city famed for its wealth and its well spoken population. It had its rougher parts, true, but for the most part it was for the upper classes.
"Don't get many Alexandrian's here in Lindblum," one sandy-haired boy replied, "Sam." He held his hand out to shake with a friendly smile. "I hope you'll not find us to... coarse" He joked, trying to speak as properly as he could. The others laughed appreciatively, Dagger on the other hand only managed a small smile, unsure whether he was making fun of her or not.
"This is Kerrie, Martin, Marcus, Rose, Alex and Amillia." Zidane said pointing to the people who hadn't spoken yet. He'd barely finished before Mrs Bat called across the classroom for everyone to take their seats. "Don't worry about learning everyone's name," he whispered to her, "We rarely hang out as a big group. Mostly just me, Jess, Sam and Alex."
Dagger nodded, frowning down at the table. Did that mean he expected her to hang out with him or that she was excluded from that group?
Looking round the room she noticed the many whispered conversations taking place and vaguely wondered why Mrs Bat ignored them. Immediately as the last name was listed off the register the noise level in the classroom rose.
Dagger sat silently, staring out the window and wondering if Zidane regretted sitting next to a mute.
"What have you got today? Can I see your timetable?" He asked suddenly drawing her attention away from the grey sky outside.
"Oh...sure," she hunted through her bag before handing the spiral bound diary to him.
"Science then history," he read off, "I can show you to those. You'll wanna get Jess or Rose to show you to math. You're in top set."
"Yeah, math is the only thing I'm good at," Dagger lied trying to sound as though she wasn't too smart.
"Well it's lunch after that so ya should be fine until then." Zidane continued, taking her lie at face value.
Once the bell had rung she'd followed Zidane to Science and taken the seat next to him when it had appeared to be the only one available. She had thought to take one close to Jess or one of the others so that she didn't feel like she was latching onto Zidane's friendly reaching hand for dear life. It was as uneventful and dull a lesson as any of her lessons back in Alexandra and she'd spent a large portion of her time staring out the window as Zidane doodled continuously on his notepad cover.
It didn't feel like long at all before Zidane was leading her through the halls to history...
