Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles or any characters or locations within, only the names of the made-up Tipa caravanners and their families.

The Decision

It stood before them, towering and ominous, even more so than the miasma stream that the caravan from Tipa had crossed to reach it.

"Mount Vellenge," breathed Lydia, one of the two fair-haired Clavats in the caravan. "They say no one who ventures this far ever returns."

"Some of them do," replied her older brother, David, "it's just that there's a monster living here who steals the memories of those who try to fight it. Remember the Black Knight? Remember Hurdy? They tried to rid the world of miasma, and wound up losing their memories."

A Lilty caravanner, a strong lad named Dimo Nor, looked up at David in despair. "But so will we, won't we?" he asked. "Maybe we better go back."

Both young men looked up at the Yuke caravanner, Khetala, who had led them here. She stood still, apparently thinking hard.

"There has to be a way we can clear the miasma, or at least cut it off at the source so that it stops flowing and in time we can be rid of it for good—we must at least be getting close," remarked the final caravanner, a lavender-haired Selkie girl named Anaїs Nin.

"I have good news and bad news," answered Khetala at last. "The good news is that Anaїs Nin is right. The source of the miasma lies somewhere on the mountain—if we can destroy the rumored Meteor Parasite, in due time the world will be rid of miasma and people may travel freely once again."

David smiled with a remark of "That is indeed good news."

"And the bad news?" asked Lydia with trepidation.

Khetala looked up at the mountain again. "The bad news is that David is also right—there also lies on this mountain a monster that feeds on the memories of all our races of people. Should we venture forth to destroy the creature that sends the miasma over the whole world, we will awaken the dragon Raem."

"Raem," repeated Dimo Nor. "That must've been the beast that stole the Black Knight's memories!" Khetala nodded assent but said nothing, so Dimo Nor asked her, "Then how do we keep it from sucking our memories out of us?"

They could all tell by the way that Khetala hung her head that it surely involved suffering. "The only way it cannot take our memories from us…"—she faltered and took a deep steadying breath—"…is if we are already dead when it reaches us. If we are to destroy the source of the miasma, it will cost all of us our lives."

"So what you're thinking we should do," answered Anaїs Nin, "is that dealing the final blow to the Meteor Parasite will awaken Raem. So as soon as we deal that final blow, we drop the chalice and run away, hoping the miasma kills us before Raem catches anybody?"

"It need not end like this," said Khetala at last. "Our chalice is two-thirds full; we need only one more drop of myrrh before we must return to Tipa. There are four months and some odd days left in the year before our fellow townsfolk expect us to return."

David looked at Khetala, and then at Anaїs Nin. "We can continue as we have for many long years, collecting myrrh to keep Tipa safe from the miasma until we choose to pass the chalice on to new caravanners…" he thought aloud, "or we can all sacrifice ourselves to try and cut off the miasma at its source. So that when Tipa's crystal loses the power to keep the miasma at bay, it won't have as much miasma to repel and the townsfolk will still be safe that way."

Anaїs Nin shook her head in dismay, explaining, "It can't work—the miasma won't kill us quickly enough." She was thinking of the Selkie scholar whom the caravan had met in Shella, De Nam, and his experiment of drinking miasma-tainted water in order to develop immunity to miasma, as he chronicled in his letters to her for years after their meeting. De Nam had bidden the caravan from Tipa come to Conall Curach in his last letter, but when they arrived, all that they could find of him was his favorite bandana.

"Unless Khetala got the idea because we'd all be winded after a big fight—we all know that afflictions always kill those who are already weakened faster than those who are strong," suggested Dimo Nor halfheartedly.

Khetala nodded slowly, turning to her fellow caravanners in a way that indicated now to be decision time. "We may turn back now if we so choose, or we may ascend Mount Vellenge and make our final stand against the Meteor Parasite that sends the miasma over our world. Does anyone wish to back down?"