Chapter 2
Disclaimer: I don't own...
Note: Sorry about the misstep in the first chapter. I realized later that day that Rikku hadn't joined the group then... Oopsy. So I went back and edited the chapter and then replaced it. Again, Sorry. I'd really love it if people would start reviewing. I don't care what you say. Anything is better than nothing.
"Hmm?" the tall blue-haired man stopped walking.
"What is it, Maester Seymour?" a Guado guardian asked his master.
"Over there," Seymour gestured to a tiny trail leading away from the main road. On either side of the branch off were rock walls. "Something is out of place."
"Shall we be seeing what it is?" the other guardian asked.
"Mmm," Seymour nodded and led the way. It was a tight fit for the three even when they walked single file. Seymore had a rough time fitting his broad shoulders through the tight walkway. It wasn't long before Seymour stopped and looked around again. Spotting another, tighter passage, Seymore told his guardians to stay behind, going on alone. It got so tight in the passage that the man actually had to turn sideways to go on. Soon, the squeeze let out into a round area that was rather large. "Ah." In the centre of the circle lay a body seemingly void of life. Seymour entered the clearing and strode to the limp figure, discovering that it was a girl...or a woman. Not far from her lay two weapons, guns, but he paid them no attention. The low walls of the clearing gave the person no protection from the high sun of noon and she'd gotten a horrible sun-burn. She shivered all over from the fever caused by the exposure. Seymour picked her up only where she was clothed: her back where the tank top was, and her legs by the shorts. Carefully he brought her back to the place that his guardians were waiting for him.
"Maester Seymour?" they stood and stared for a moment at the silver-haired woman in his arms.
"I'd say she's out of place wouldn't you?" he asked laying the girl down and putting the guns he'd found in one of the groups packs. After looking in awe at the weapons, the Guado nodded. "I'd like to help her recover, but we can't do that here," Seymour stated.
"We are going back to the last travel agency, then?" the younger guardian inquired.
"Yes, we are."
With the two Guado's and Seymour's help, the girls burn healed overnight and left, hardly tanning her skin. Now, a day later, all three waited anxiously for her to wake. The sculpt of her features and especially her silver hair reminded them of Seymour. For Seymour...he thought she could be a lost sister. When finally she did wake, she remembered little, only her name, age, and her father's name.
She was Harper: a twenty-five year old woman, and the one and only daughter of the nightmare, Sephiroth. Harper didn't remember Sephiroth's significance or why she shivered when on the brink of remembering some things. Those shrouded memories that chilled her so weren't remembered, and for that she was happy.
Harper walked into the common room of the travel agency and sat on a couch beside Seymour. "Where are the Guado?" she asked.
"Asleep. Healing you was hard work," he said in reply.
She could tell by his tone that it wasn't any kind of accusation. It was almost as if he meant to poke fun at her just by way of that simple statement. So Harper laughed and rested her head against the back of the couch, Doing so was like falling into a solemn mood; the maester beside her seemed to notice.
"We will move on when you've remember everything you can, or you may not wish to stay with us...Whatever suits you."
"Where would I go, Maester? With no memories, no idea how I stand with other people.."Harper trailed off, letting Seymour figure the rest out for himself.
"I see. How are you doing with memories?"
"Hmf," she rolled her eyes even though they were closed. "Not, great, but I'm getting closer to something. I'm not sure I really want to know what's happened. See...if memories scare me when I can't remember...what will it be like when I know what they're of?" Harper explained.
"It would be hard to start from scratch, and lonely. I'm sure some thing from your past, you would like to remember," Seymour objected.
"Like:
"Well," Seymour closed his eyes in thought. "Wouldn't you like to know if you're married or not?"
"Mmmm...maybe., but what if I didn't like my husband?" Harper countered.
Seymour laughed. "I do hope you remember something."
"Thank you, Maester Seymour."
"Please," he objected as he stood, "just call me Seymour."
Harper smiled and nodded. "Thanks, Seymour," she corrected herself. "So...where are we going?"
"Mushroom Rock. Perhaps on the journey you'll discover some things about yourself, and this Sephiroth...Harper?"
It was the first time someone else had said Harper's father's name, and it jarred something in her locked-down memories. A string of events rapidly unfolded for her. Shinra, Mako, Jenova... Sephiroth...and so on. Almost everything. Avalanche... but one piece was left out...and she didn't know it had been. "Seymour?" Harper questioned after she had finished telling him what just happened. "Am I...bad?"
"Bad?" he echoed. "I certainly don't think so—"
"But..."
"We would know by now if you were," Seymour assured her.
"Thanks, You know, I think I have everything now," Harper said, feeling somehow good as new. "All the empty spaces seem filled in now...but..."
"I suppose you feel strangely about being from this...Midgar place as there is no such city in Spira." Harper nodded to that. "You know, I met a young man in Luca who had a story much like yours," Seymour started. At Harper's surprised and confuse look, he went on. "His name was Tudus. He was from Zanarkand, a city that was destroyed one-thousand years ago."
"What?" She sat up now and looked at him with wide eyes. "How..."
"Apparently he was brought here by Sun: it seemed a simple explanation to him, but for Harper...
"Sin?"
Seymour laughed good-naturedly at her ignorance. "You really aren't from Spira, are you?"
"Hey!" Harper defended herself.
Seymour's laughter ended slowly. "Very well then..." the two stayed there most of the day as Seymour answered every question Harper threw at him. For Seymour, it was a relief to be talked to as an equal for a change, and not as a maester of Spira. For Harper, it was a relief to have a friend in a strange world. It was a world exactly the opposite of everything she was used to. A world run by people and beasts instead of by machines and tyrants. It was unreal, and at the end of the day Harper was exhausted.
Quick, hard knocks on her door woke Harper. "Hey! Maester Seymour and his guardians said they're leaving with or without you!" It was a worker in the agency.
"Nuh..." At first it didn't register with Harper, but that didn't last long. "AHH!" She jumped out of bed and grabbed the guns Seymour had given her (they WERE hers) from the dresser-top as she flew though the door, down the hall, and through the entrance/exit door to the agency. She burst through the door still pulling on her shoes. "Hey!" Harper shouted to the shrinking trio. When they didn't stop or slow at all, she yanked her boot laces into knots and took off after them. Harper was out of breath by the time she caught up with them. "Hey—Ow!" She grimaced and clutched at the pain in her side from running. The stitch subsided enough and she stood, planting her hands on her hips and glaring at Seymour and his guardians. "You could have woken me up you know." Harper relaxed and noticed her terribly askew hair. Groaning, she began fighting with it with her finger. "Now I'm a mess and I've made myself look like an idiot in front of you three."
"Nonsense," Seymour dismissed her attack with a wave of his long-fingered hand. "I was unsure if you were coming with us, so I decided that since you know what you need to of Spira, and have you memory back, you would decide to stay behind yourself. I'm sorry for the trouble caused you."
"Oh, okay. Sorry, then, for barking at you like that," she offered. The guardians looked as if they expected something more from her. Harper stared at them. "What?"
"Well," the shorter stepped forward. "It is customary to address Maester Seymour by his title when speaking to him." He said it very nicely so he didn't offend her.
"Hnnn..." In her mind Harper fidgeted with what Seymour had told her the day before and what she was being told at that moment. "Oh. Sorry, Maester Seymour." She decided that in public she would abide by custom, but when away from everyone he would just be Seymour.
That decision was drowned instantly by Seymour's playful rebuke. "What did I tell you yesterday?"
Harper laughed as the four started walking again. "Alright, Seymour." She looked at the Guado who had spoken as she said that. In response, he looked ahead emotionlessly. "You don't mind my coming, do you?" Harper asked while she concentrated on walking and buckling her gun belt.
"Of course not," Seymour replied. "If I did, I would have never offered in the first place."
"Good."
"Why's that?"
"Because I was beginning to thing you're too nice to be trusted," Harper said, all jest aside.
"Had some experience you haven't told me about?" Seymour asked with the same seriousness.
"Nope. Not that I know of. But...what makes you think I'd tell you?"
"Nothing. I guess somewhere in there," he meant her personality, "is the twenty-five year old woman you claim to be."
Harper laughed nervously and scratched at a nonexistent itch at the back of her head. "She's buried deeply sometimes. But I lived with a four year old and a seventeen year old...do you really expect me to act my age all the time?" she tested.
"No, not at all," came his understanding reply. A note of concern found its way into his voice when he asked suddenly, "Can you defend yourself?"
Harper was taken back. "You think because I'm a girl I can't do things for myself?"
"I'm just concerned. You see, I don't know about your world but it's not safe here in Spira, so you need to be able to protect yourself from whatever may decided to come your way," he explained.
"Hm...Well, it wasn't safe back home either. In Midgar you had to watch out for the creatures the government, Shinra, created—are you really that surprised?"
Seymour nodded and said that he would never do something like that to the citizens of Spira.
"Yeah, well, Shinra was good for those people who could afford to live upper-level..." Harper shook off the Seymour's look of confusion when she realized that she hadn't told him of Midgar's construction. "Different story. Well anyway, you had to watch out for the monsters a lot, but you had to keep a closer eye on the people. For instance..." she went off into the story of how Cloud was forced to cross-dress to save Tifa from the clutches of Don Corneo. There were funny parts to the story, but neither forgot the reason the story was being told. That day, a lot of stories were told. During the entire story telling time the Guado were so silent that Harper almost completely forgot about them. So it surprised her when they interrupted her to announce that they had reached the entrance to Mushroom Rock Road. The rest of the current story was left untold. "That was quick," she commented.
"We were not far from it to begin with," Seymour objected.
They entered the highway silently, and only a few steps down the road Seymour called the party to a halt. He had the same feeling as he had had a few days ago when he found Harper. Seymour quickly explained the feeling and dismissed it as whatever it was moved off.
At the end of the days walk they turned done a side road and made camp. When the Guado had got the fire started Harper exited her tent and sat on the ground beside Seymour. "Cow close are we now to the gates?"
"We will be there by noon tomorrow," a Guado answered.
"Mmmm..."Harper nodded and wondered why Seymour wasn't talking. "You feeling okay, Seymour?"
"I'm fine," he answered softly, absently.
"Okay..." she stood quickly, catching the other's attention.
"What are you doing?" Seymour asked when she stretched her legs and arms.
"I..." she bent to grab for her tows and rolled out of that position, stretching then her back muscles. "...am going look for whatever it is that's out of place."
"But...Maester Seymour has said nothing more about it" a Guado, not the one who had spoken before, objected.
"Well...he's not the only one who felt it, you know; I did too and it hasn't left me, only dimmed when we stopped here. So, I'm going to find it," Harper stated. There would be no changing her mind. The other's felt her resolve as she turned and went to her tent. She came out a moment later with her two guns. "Besides," she started, "if anything gets messy...I can handle it!" To emphasize her point, Harper took out Silence and spun it flatly in her pal, caught it by the handle suddenly and opened the bullet chamber, checking to see if she had enough shots should she run into something. Silence and Final Judgment were full; she even had one extra clip for each tucked away in pouches on her belt. "See?"
"Seymour nodded approval which he knew she didn't care about. Harper would go whether or not he liked it, and he didn't doubt her claim of being able to protect herself. "Are we to expect your return? Or are you leaving for good?"
"Neh..."Harper shrugged. "Depends on what's found. I know where you'll be tomorrow," she shrugged again. "I'll find you if I need to!" With that, she turned and trotted off into the encroaching darkness.
Note: How's that for a long piece of work? R&R please!