Note: All characters, places, ect. belong to Square Enix.
Also, I'll try to keep Wensday as a regular update day for this (I know it's kind of late on Wensday for this update, but hopefully the next one will be much earlier), unless I get ahead of myself (which is unlikely, but if I do), in which I'll update earlier. And thanks for the reviews!
Case of Mikoto--Dying Treasure
My throat is constricting and I'm crying the first tears I think I ever cried. I'm breaking down inside. I just want to kneel down in the flames and give up. I can't win. One way or another I'm going to die and the fear of it, ending without fulfilling some purpose, is driving me crazy so that I'm biting through my lower lip trying not to howl like a dying animal.
There's blood in my mouth, I can taste it, tangy and sweet, metallic. This is it, this is the end. The universe is out to get me. I can't live. I should just lie down and cry until the flames have eaten me alive and leave only a charred skeleton behind if I'm lucky. I'm worthless to this world anyways. Why fight the inevitable?
But no, hands are tugging on me and little faces sob into my skirt. I can hear the screams all around and see the shadows running like bugs that have been found by a vindictive child. Some of them are clustering around me, hands reaching out to grab me. Help us! What do we do? Save us!
I can't give up and die, no matter how much I feel it is what will be. They need my help. I have to swallow this fear that is making me shake and my stomach cramp. I try. I really do. But all that goes down is blood and spit and ash. Hands are grabbing me, tugging on me. Telling me to do something. What do I do?
I shake them off and yell for quite. I need to think. Just…if they'd give me a moment! But I don't have a moment. In desperation, I ask myself, what would Zidane do and I remember back on Terra when he led us all to safety, to Gaia, away from our burning home world. Then I had been helpless too, but I had been so calm, as if I had foreseen it all and decided that maybe I'd stick it out to the end, just for kicks. I'm not calm now though. I'm on the verge of panic.
Think Mikoto, think!
I gather them to me; these scared Black Mages and Genomes. "Start heading out of the forest. Pick up anyone who's still alive that you see. You four check the buildings for anyone who's trapped. Load the eggs in a cart and have Bobby Corwen pull them. Move!" I'm shouting now and I don't know where these orders are coming from, but they sound logical. I start shoving people to their tasks. Some run to check the buildings like I say; others to fetch Bobby Corwen and a cart for the eggs from which new black mages are born. The rest of these scared creatures I hardly recognize in their panic start heading towards the distant ocean, running as fast as I can make them to get away from the forest.
Black Mage Village is burning down to the ground around me and I, in some stupid thought of heroically buying time, advance towards the culprit who started this all. He is easy enough to find: I just have to look for the worst fires which are in the center of the village. I think my knees are about to give out as I move to jump the figure who wears black mage clothing, but is not one of those I know so well.
Then he turns and I drop in mid-leap; horror is clawing its way up my spine.
He doesn't greet me, but those eyes, that face…
"You're running out of time," he tells me coldly in a small voice and I hear screams as he sets a fleeing mage on fire. "Soon they'll all be dead…"
Cold hands shake my shoulders and I sit up with a stuttering gasp as if taking a first breath after nearly drowning. I realize my face is wet and sticky with tears and sea salt and I try to brush it away with one hand, the other twining around the little mage who woke me and pulling him close. It's afternoon and that was last night. The soot is still in my hair and the dried fear sweat doesn't make me smell like roses, but I don't think Bibi cares.
Around us the other Black Mages and Genomes who were able to flee are already up and huddling together or alone depending on their temperaments, making it obvious that I'm the last to awake. They stare at me with that look again, the one that says, Help us! What do we do?
Looking back at these ragged survivors with burnt hats and coats, missing gloves or shoes or in some cases tunics, I count them up and there are too few, only thirty or so including the eggs. I know each one by name as they know me and the absence of so many makes the tears start again.
The ocean waves roar behind my back; our escape to the sea has been completed, but it doesn't fill me with joy. For a village of over a hundred to be reduced to so few in only a night… I can already see that of Vivi's children, Sisi and Kiki didn't manage to escape. He'll be heartbroken. And my own friend, a genome who is sister in all, but name, is also absent. I will never be able to talk to her again and another wound opens to weep in my heart.
I think to myself, maybe some escaped that didn't come with us, but I know it's doubtful. We barely escaped ourselves. Yet hope likes to tease us. I thought Garland beat hope out of me long ago, but maybe not.
I take a breath and plunge back into the pool of fear and despair that is the waking world. "We need to leave in case he tries to track us down. We can't live on the seashore forever. Let's head for the Dwarves home. We'll have to take the long way around, but that's better than starving or being turned into dust. We'll leave in five minutes after we take care of the injured," I tell them quickly and stand up, removing Bibi's grimy hands from me so I can use the small cure magic I know on others.
There is none without a wound. I even have some, though I don't remember ever getting the burns which stripe the insides of my arms or the cut on my shoulder that stings every time the cloth of my tunic touches it. There are some who are clearly beyond help and others who passed away in the night; we send them into the sea, as much of a burial as we can afford for the moment. Everyone wants to cry I think, but we're running out of tears. We're dehydrated and hungry and this part of the shore is rocky and barren. There is nothing here, no matter how much we wish there were.
"Are you alright Mr. 288?" I ask the mage who is the friend of my heart and has taught me Gaian ways. He's bent over double as if in pain, but I don't see any wounds or burns hidden among his rags.
His eyes light up in a way I have come to recognize among the black mages as happy; he is glad that I have asked about him. I understand that, but I don't know how to react to it, so I look away. Before I came to Gaia…if I asked questions about a person, there would only be hard words and painful smacks as an answer. I don't ask many questions anymore. Mr. 288 seems to enjoy it when people asked him questions though. Now he takes my hand and places it on his chest where I can feel the rasp growing inside. It's obvious to both of us what this is and what it means.
"You can ride in the cart with the eggs," I tell him softly, not wanting the others to hear. To them Mr. 288 is everything. To me he's everything. Mr. 288 always knows the words to be said. When I begin to hate this purposeless life of mine, it's always him who shows me that there is still some purpose to what I do. I need him.
He's shaking his head no though and croaks so quietly I almost don't hear him, "I'll keep up somehow. Just don't tell…they'll worry." Small coughs take him and I help him up. For the first time I'm angry at my healing skills, the only spells I know being basic. I can't cure his longs of all the smoke he's breathed in. It's obviously hard for him to breath. I have to face it: he may die.
After tending to everyone as well as I can, we set out at a slow pace, more of a crawl than the fast speed I feel we need to deter following, but the best everyone can manage. Bibi flits in and out of this crowd, searching for his brothers and friends. Every five minutes he returns to hold my hand dejectedly.
He makes me think of last night. He makes me think of Vivi. My stomach is curdling at the thought and I feel like throwing up. Vivi. I told him I'd watch his sons while he went to get their tickets this year. Now I only have one. My hand tightens around Bibi's, stopping him from running off again. What will I tell this young mage's father? What can you tell a parent who's lost several children in one night?
I don't know and I feel a little sicker. There's a hole inside me from the dead and lost; I love these little boys who I baby-sit whenever Vivi leaves them behind. I've put them to bed and told them stories, fed them my cooking and washed their dirty clothes. Sometimes I feel like their big sister. If there's an empty place inside me for them, what will there be inside Vivi who waited for their eggs to hatch and spent the hours of everyday with all of them. How can I tell him I only have one?
Mr. 288 coughs next to me and begins to falter. I grab him before he drops and hold him up. "You have to make it," I'm whispering in his ear as the group slows down even more to match me. "They need you, I need you. Just a few days walk."
He seems out of it. His eyes aren't following my face. Instead he stares off into the distance as if into something great and tiring I can't see. He nods though and we continue on, hand in hand, Bibi in one and Mr. 288 in the other. The sun is nearing setting, but we have to make as much time as we can.
"And then the Prince and the Princess went home to the castle to live happily ever after." I'm yawning, it's so late. I think it's something like eleven. I like to go to bed by nine. I'm sitting in a chair in Vivi's house that is too small and has my knees bending to my chest, watching over six little mages who should really be sleeping.
"And then what happened?" Nini is demanding, still wide awake. They all lean forward expectantly, knowing I'm nearing the end, that I can't take much more of this bedtime story stuff. The parts I tell then are their favorites. The parts I tell then are the ones Vivi says I shouldn't, but when I'm so tired and they won't stop whining for more, I just can't seem to care.
"And then, a giant, man-eating worm with big bloody fangs colored red by his past meals and spit dripping from his mouth barged into the castle to assassinate the Prince and Princess and there was a tonberry there with a big rusty knife and a cactuar with sharp, pointy spikes and everyone said 'Oh no! We're doomed!' and the Prince said, 'Where the hell is my magical sword?" and the Princess said, 'I know you've been cheating on me with the scullery maid! I wish I never married you!' and the Minister said, 'Good because I've had the hots for you Princess since before you met this bumpkin. Would you care to elope with me?' and the man-eating worm said, 'I'm here to eat everyone, so shut the hell up and let me get on with it!' And then everyone got eaten," I tell them and they giggle to each other because I said hell and they know that's a bad word that gets your mouth washed out with soap.
"And then what happened," Nini orders and I'm falling asleep after a long day's work towards correcting the black mages short lifespan so I mutter, "And then the Prince realized his magic sword was actually being used to prop the table up so he grabbed it as the worm ate him and then cut his way out with it, freeing everyone and the worm said, 'So I am vanquished' and perished and everyone celebrated for many days and nights."
"And then?"
"And then they all got really fat and had to go on diets and the Princess was upset because she couldn't fit into any of her dresses anymore." My eyes are closing and I know I'm mumbling now.
"And then?"
"And then the Minister revealed his new exercise program, certain to make you…"
Suddenly the house is on fire and the children are gone from their beds and I'm standing alone in a collapsing room screaming their names. What's going on? Did I knock over the candle? Did one of the children have a nightmare again?
I rush outside and I can see now that the whole village is burning. The inn, the shop, the stable; they're all in flames. Even my own house where all my hard work is stored and chronicled is blazing like a signal to the sky and I can see my papers turning to ash through the window. I'm choking up as I look around and I think I'm crying, but no, I never cry. Not when Garland beat me, not when Kuja locked me in the laboratory, not when Zidane left me. I don't cry. But I am and I feel like this was the inevitable because I should have died on Terra five years ago. I think I'm whimpering, but the fire is so loud I can't tell. There are shrieks and I can see my friends burning around me and I'm so helpless—
I open my eyes and I realize I've ripped the covers of the tiny bed I'm in, having bitten on the fabric to keep from screaming. It's dark now, though the light of early morning is beginning to shine through the shutters. I'm in a guest room at Conde Petie where we arrived last night.
I stare at the ceiling and force myself to think of that night three days ago. I'd fallen asleep telling bedtime stories to the children. I only woke up when a ball of fire crashed through the window and the room had begun to burn. The children had still been in bed, I remember. I'd rushed them outside as they sleepily pulled on coats and hats.
Outside hadn't been any better. That's when I started to loose it. How are you supposed to react when you wake up to a burning village? That's my defense, but it sounds pretty weak. I was originally created to takeover planets and I can't handle a fire?
"How Terra's angels have fallen," I laugh softly to myself, more hurt than amused. I close my eyes again as I remember the worst part. After we'd all gotten away to the seashore, I was getting pretty hysterical. I remember screaming something like, "I thought there was a place for us! Was it just a lie? We're not part of nature's plan, so we have to die!" And then I think I threw some rocks at the sky. I'm laughing now and crying a little bit. Some leader I am. I get some of us out alive and then I throw a temper tantrum and at who? At the sky!
Now I'm really crying though and I think I'm ready to bawl. They're all gone! All of them! The Genomes and Black Mages I saw everyday, still see in my mind, only thirty of them are alive! "Only thirty!" I scream and throw my pillow across the room, angry with it all.
"Only thirty?" Someone inquires and I realize belatedly that I have a guest. I look up and for a moment the words escape me. I recognize him immediately, but I haven't seen him in years. "How…" I begin, but he tosses his head with that indifferent way of his, as if it doesn't matter so I don't continue.
He doesn't enter, but then again, he never did come into any room I slept in. It was his own chivalrous little quirk. Looking at him now I see something I thought I'd never see; I think he's actually concerned and that just makes me cry again. How can he be here and how can he care?
"What happened?" He's asking as if I weren't putting on the most personal display in front of him, embarrassing myself by being so openly emotional.
I take a deep breath and try to calm down. He has to know what happened. It would be unlike him if he didn't already. That night comes up again and suddenly I remember that face (You're running out of time) and I'm whispering to him, half unbelieving myself, "I know him."
The village burnt and the survivors lost, Mikoto has to wonder how Zidane ever managed to be so strong. That face though is so familiar, who is it? What does it mean? And how do the other heroes fare? Next: Reclaiming the Dead Jewel--Regret of Eiko.