Macalania blues
As they headed through Macalania Wood, the party was silent and thoughtful. Macalania seemed to be a naturally quiet place. They were only attacked by fiends once or twice. Even the monsters seemed to respect the natural silence of the forest. Finally they stopped to rest. Then, Tidus came running up to them.
"Guys, guys! Guess what I found?!"
"Apparently you won't be satisfied until we guess, so what did you find?" asked Auron.
Tidus frowned. "You didn't have to be so snobby about it. I found a great clearing with a stream and everything!" he was practically dancing with excitement.
"Let's find this 'clearing' said Lulu.
As the party went along, they expected a mud hole filled with disgusting slime, and matted with dead grass. Instead, what they discovered was wilder than they could have imagined. The clearing was beautiful and grassy, on the banks of a crystal clear stream. Thick trees of the clearest blue crystal lined the banks as well.
Shiava almost gasped. It was in this place that he and Arenna had spent a lot of their time when they traveled to Macalania. "This place…it…I've been here before" Shiava whispered.
"This place…beautiful?" asked Kimhari reluctantly. He seemed uncertain for the human word for beauty.
"Yes, beautiful. This place is very beautiful" said Yuna softly.
Soon they had set up a camp. Wakka and Tidus went looking for food, and Kimhari and Auron went to gather water. Lulu and Shiava pitched the tent, while Yuna and Rikku cleaned everyone's weapons. When the chores were finished, everyone sat around either talking or, in Shiava's case, brooding.
"You alright?" asked Tidus. He looked concerned.
Shiava allowed a big "Everything-in-the-World's-Fine" smile to paste itself across his face. "Oh, sure everything's great. I'm just thinking about the Bikanel Desert. It's going to be a weird experience. I mean, I've never been to the Al Bhed homeland, I've only heard about it in stories."
Tidus smiled. "Yeah, tell me about it. I've been there though. It's an interesting place, hot as Hell though. And Rikku's father Cid is the leader of the Al Bhed, so we got treated well when we got to the Home. Basically, the Bikanel Desert is hot, huge, and filled with fiends. It's really wild. I mean, you can go for miles without seeing a single town or settlement, not even a house or outpost."
"Wow" said Shiava. "That's really weird compared to our stuff."
Lulu came over to them. "Dinner's ready" she said. "Yuna cooked something that's actually edible this time."
Shiava frowned questioningly. "What do you mean 'edible this time'?"
Tidus smiled. "We've been staying at inns and stuff so you don't know Yuna's cooking. She has the fine touch of burning something as easy as a piece of bread, and that's just getting started!"
"Well, come on. We'll see what she cooked this time" said Lulu.
Yuna had cooked some kind of bird meat that Wakka had killed with his blitzball. It was actually quite good. "MMMM good" said Tidus, and promptly burped.
"Class act" said Lulu.
As they sat silently over dinner, Shiava let his mind touch the trees. The ancient monoliths of the forest were familiar with him. Why you're here again little one said a particularly ancient tree. It had sat by the stream for as long as Shiava could remember. He felt it question. Where are your other companions? You have new friends, yet where are the others?
Shiava responded with his own mental voice. "They're not my friends. I…I'm using them" he spat finally.
What?
"I'm using them, damn it!" Shiava screeched mentally.
"Whoa" said Tidus. He looked at Brotherhood, which suddenly vibrated.
Shiava started. His mental scream had been so loud that the inanimate objects with which he communicated picked it up. Trees had also shaken. Some had cracked their branches with the outburst. Shiava felt himself blush despite the fact that none of the others would guess what had happened.
Suddenly Yuna cleared her throat. "My guardians" she said softly. "Tomorrow we will be in the Bikanel Desert, home of the Al Bhed."
"Yeah baby!" Rikku shouted suddenly.
Lulu frowned at Rikku's outburst.
"Rikku, please try to control yourself when Yuna's talking."
Yuna began again. "We will be arriving in the main city of the Al Bhed, the Home." She stopped talking for a minute and sighed. "There we will be talking to my uncle, Cid about how to defeat Sin. We will ask him for his support in this fight, and the support of his, my people." Her voice became stronger. "We will win this fight! Sin must not return this time around. We will stop it if it costs us our lives!" she raised her staff in the air.
Shiava felt the need to confess his terrible secret burning inside his mouth, blistering the skin off his gums, and boiling his teeth. He needed to spit it out, the corrosive acid that was eating his soul. But at the same time, Shiava found he couldn't. What would the others say? Would they hate him? Probably. They might even kill him. And Shiava couldn't afford to die. Not yet. He had to free Arenna, and then he could die anytime he wanted. Yet Shiava knew it would be better for them to find out from him than from someone else. "Fine" Shiava thought "I'll tell them when we reach the Home."
Auron stood up. "I say we should get into bed now. We must get an early start if we want to be a good distance across the Bikanel Desert. With that, they all went to bed.
When the Kimhari woke all of them, it was still dark outside. "Oh, for goodness' sakes" said Shiava irritably. "Can't we get a little more sleep? Even at the Palace of St. Bevelle, we didn't have to get up so early. What time is it anyway?" Shiava checked his watch. He didn't like what he saw. "Three twenty five A.M.?! Are you freakin' nuts or something? I can't be up at this time of morning! And without coffee? You've got to be kidding me!"
Kimhari ignored Shiava's screams of outrage. The tall Ronso went over to the other tents to get the others up. Sleepily, Tidus and Shiava staggered around the camp trying to get everything packed.
"And we're getting up at this unholy hour again because why?" asked Lulu irritably. The sorceress was stuffing her belongings into the Omnicase. Her face was tired and drawn, and even paler without its usual makeup.
Tidus was in full agreement. He turned to Auron, who wasn't in the least perturbed. He did seem a bit worried though. "Is this your idea of an 'early start'?!"
For once Auron did not comment on Tidus' rudeness. Instead Auron sat down with a sigh. "No, I was planning on more of a four o'clock get up time. Then…I spotted something that requires our awareness."
"What…what is that?" asked Yuna sleepily. She had emerged from the tent and was rubbing her eyes.
"A party of soldiers, warrior monks. Moving eastward."
Shiava was furious. "You woke us all up an hour earlier just because you saw some freakin' warrior monks?! Bevelle's only four miles from here! Of course we're going to see warrior monks!"
Auron looked calmly at the irate sword mage. "Are you quite finished?" he asked. "If you are, I have another bit of news. This wasn't a mere party of them. This was an army. There were literally hundreds of them, all marching from Bevelle. There were Firstblades at their head. It was as if they were readying some kind of war."
"That can't be!" Wakka cried. "Hasn't been a war for a thousand years, ya?"
"It does sound a bit strange" said Lulu. "Yet I agree with Sir Auron. We must remain vigilant." The sorceress paused. "What I want to know though, is where could they be going? From what Sir Auron describes, this was no simple party sent out to quell a provincial rebellion. This was an army. The whole world is united under the State of Yevon. Who…" her voice trailed off.
"You don't think…?" began Tidus.
"I do" answered Lulu.
"The Al Bhed" whispered Yuna fearfully.
They all nodded.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a minute. Why would Yevon just up and attack the only independent nation in the world?" asked Shiava. He didn't get any of it.
There was an uncomfortable silence. Suddenly, a yawn interrupted them.
"Wow, it sure is too early to get up like this…hey guys!" Rikku came running up to them. The Al Bhed girl's hair was tousled and more disheveled than usual.
"It's nothing Rikku" said Yuna nervously. She was fiddling with her staff. "We just decided to get up a little…earlier than we planned last night."
"But what about the arm---" Shiava began, but was elbowed simultaneously by Wakka and Tidus.
"We should get going" said Auron abruptly.
As they packed half an hour later, Shiava turned to Tidus. "What was all that about?" he asked angrily. His sides still hurt from the sharp elbowing he had received from his friends.
Wakka turned away. "Rikku's got her heart set on seein' her city and her people again, ya? We don't wanna take that from her."
Tidus set his face. "I don't know what's going on" he said, "but if, for some reason Yevon is attacking the Al Bhed, we've got to hurry. We can't have Rikku slowing us up with her worries. It just makes things worse."
Shiava nodded. "I understand."
Tidus suddenly grinned. "I bet it's nothing. Probably Auron just being paranoid. We'll probably find the Al Bhed fine as rain!"
Shiava stared to smile but stopped. Tidus was smiling in a reassuring manner, but his eyes told how worried he was.
They trudged through the crystal forest of Macalania Wood for two hours after that. They met no other travelers on the road.
"I don't like this" said Shiava to Yuna. "I can…feel the trail of the soldiers. I can sense the emotions that their weapons and armor felt. There was fear and hate…"
"What do you mean?" asked Auron suddenly. He seemed genuinely interested.
Shiava began to explain to the two. As a sword mage I can sense the emotions of inanimate objects. These feelings have certain…" Shiava struggled to find the words, "colors, for lack of a better word. I could feel the red of anger and hate, and the grayish of despair…" he paused.
They didn't talk for a while after that. Shiava noticed that everyone was acting a bit nervous. Even Kimhari seemed to be a bit tentative. He walked over to Yuna and signed something, pointing to Rikku. He saw Yuna sigh sadly. Shiava also noticed a change in their surroundings. The trees that they passed now were shorter and more than one was dead. They were no longer completely crystal like the ones in the center of Macalania Wood. The air was also begging to get warmer. Soon it was very hot. And this was when Shiava began to notice something else. It started at first with a small buzz. At first Shiava thought he was imagining it. He looked at the others. They were fine. Soon the buzzing got just an inch louder. It was like a gigantic multitude of voices, all just below his hearing range. Once again Shiava looked to the others. They seemed to be unaffected the voices. By now the trees had all but vanished. The air was very hot and now sand littered the ground. Then, he heard Kimhari shout. The Ronso pointed up ahead. There was a large break in the sparse trees. Beyond it there was only a vast expanse of sand stretching out under a massive clear blue sky.
"Race you to the desert!" yelled Tidus. Wakka laughed.
Shiava grinned. "You're on!"
The three of them laughed and ran as fast as they could. Behind them everyone, even Auron smiled. They had finally done it. After all the places they had traveled, they had reached it.
They had reached the Bikanel Desert.