2)---------- In Which, something very strange happens to Kain

2)---------- In Which, something very strange happens to Kain.

The search for survivors wasn't going very well, mainly because of the ever-increasing darkness.

Finally, however, Cecil managed to locate the first sign of native life they'd seen since landing.

"Kain . . . " he called to the Dragoon, who'd wrapped an oilcloth around the spearhead of his Lance and lit fire to it, making his weapon a makeshift torch. In any case, it was the only light source they had.

Obliging quickly, Kain came over and held the light over the limp form Cecil had found near the main barn on this poultry ranch.

It was a young woman, young-looking, at least. Long, light blue hair tangled up all around her and obviously burnt in some places. Poor kid.

"Try and wake her up," Kain urged as Cecil just looked at her.

Seeing the sense in that, Cecil knelt down beside her and shook her slightly.

"Um . . . wake up?"

The girl made no response. Shrugging at Kain, Cecil began to chant a CURE spell. She didn't seem badly hurt, but he saw no reason to take the chance.

*

Forciara felt the healing tingle of his spell penetrate through the comfortable dark shell she was held within. The tiniest hint of consciousness returned . . .

Then WHOOSH! Her senses all returned in one great blast, overwhelming her for a moment, senses bringing back images before she could even open her eyes as her talent spun out of control before she could grab a hold of it.

Mild confusion - concern. That's what was her first impression. Then it went deeper.

Honor. Determination. And deep sense of beauty.

Very deep. Very deep sense of beauty.

A Paladin? The thought crossed her mind. She'd heard tales, of course . . .

"I think she's waking up."

"Yes . . . let's see what she can tell us about all this . . . "

The voices shook her, and she weakly opened her eyes, the memory of the fire that had fallen from the sky on top of her reasserting itself in her mind.

Returning her gaze was a face she was certain she'd seen before once . . . long ago, was it? Bright green eyes boring straight through her, it seemed, a fringe of violet hair shining almost silver in the moonlight . . .

"Who are you?" she mumbled, unable to draw a full breath because of all the ash in her lungs.

"Don't be afraid," he replied in a soothing voice. "I am Cecil, Paladin King of Baron. We saw you were under attack and came to help."

"I think . . . Sir . . . I think that . . . "

She broke up coughing.

Cecil put one arm under her shoulders and helped her sit up, allowing her to cough up the dust in her throat more easily and ignoring the mess.

"Yes?" he prompted.

She managed to look up at him, suddenly rousing her common sense enough to block her talent.

"I think that you're the most beautiful person I've ever met, Sir."

*

Cecil blinked when she said that, caught totally off guard.

It was all Kain could do not to laugh.

"You seem to have that effect on young girls, Cecil," he pointed out. "They always swoon for the holy warrior radiating the inner light of goodness and purity."

"Euh . . . "

Cecil did not seem to be very comfortable with this development.

"Oh, calm down. The poor kid's not thinking clearly. Let her wake up, then she'll make more sense," Kain assured him, snorting under his breath.

"Let's hope so."

The girl stirred again - she'd fallen into a funk for a few moments there, still trying to regain her senses fully.

"My mother . . . " she murmured, sighing slightly and collapsing fully again, all but burrowing into Cecil's chest.

"Flirt," Kain mouthed at Cecil, who glared at him.

"We haven't found her yet," Cecil told the girl aloud. "But we're looking."

" . . she's not here. She saw them coming . . . ran for her life . . . "

"She left you behind?"

"I was s'possed to be gone already . . . she didn't notice I was still here . . . not her fault . . . "

"King Cecil!" came the urgent shouts of one of the Redwings. "I think you should see this!"

With a relieved expression, Cecil picked up the girl and handed her to Kain, grabbing the spear-torch for himself.

"Watch her for a bit," he told him with a grin.

The girl spastically flung out her arms for a moment, then reached back toward Cecil, total terror showing in her manner.

"Don't leave . . . "

"Don't be afraid," Cecil assured her. "This is Kain, head of the Dragoons and my longtime chum. I need to see to something. If you need anything, let him know."

Too weak to object, the girl let her arms fall limply to her sides.

"I hate you!" Kain hissed after Cecil, who smiled and waved as he followed the Redwing.

Sighing inwardly, and having far less patience than the other, he set the girl back on the ground.

"Okay, you're never going to get back to your senses if you just sit there. Let's see if you can walk."

She looked up at him with an expression of confusion.

"C'mon," Kain prompted, taking her hands and trying to pull her to her feet. "You've got two feet, let's see you use them."

Without saying anything, she used his grip on her hands to heave herself unsteadily upright and stood there, wobbling.

"Okay, that's good," Kain acknowledged. "So . . . what's your name?"

Before replying, the girl threw him one strange expression, and then a psychic force blew him off his feet.

*

Cecil turned back just enough just in time to see a bright light flash between the two of them, and then see Kain go flying backwards about twenty feet, landing ungracefully on his rear end, blinking as he hit the ground with a squeak.

Startled, the girl flew back in the other direction a bit and toppled over.

After staring at each other in shock for a few moments, they both clamoured back to their feet.

Not for long in her case.

Kain jumped straight at her, knocking her flat on the ground.

"Who are you?!?!" he yelled, a note of fear and bewilderment in his voice as well as a whole lot of rage. "What did you do?!?!?"

"Y-yy-y----y---you . . . I don't understand! How could you - "

"Stop babbling, you little - "

"Kain!" Cecil exclaimed, rushing back over to the pair.

Kain glanced up at him and reeled right back off his feet again, landing on his backside with a metallic clunk from all his heavy armor. It was actually a silly sight. The look on his face was anything but silly, however.

"Akkgh, Cecil! Cut it out!!!"

Cecil stared at him, aghast.

"Cut what out?"

The girl pulled herself up to her feet.

"You've got the power! I don't believe it! You've got it!" she babbled, repeating the same basic thing over and over again.

Kain looked around wildly as if he were being attacked from all sides by creatures he couldn't hope to defeat. Then he turned his gaze back to the girl, clamping his hands over his ears.

"I don't know what you just did, but undo it! Now!!!" he snapped, all but spitting fire.

"I can't!" she objected. "I . . . I didn't mean to do anything! I don't know what went wrong! Really!"

"Both of you shut up and tell me what's going on here?!?!" Cecil demanded.

"I haven't a clue," Kain told him, before passing out cold on the ground.

The girl screamed.

"Now that, that one I didn't do!"

Cecil checked him quickly.

"No, he knocked himself out. Lock the knees, cut off blood-flow to the brain, pass out. What I want to know," and he turned an evil glare on the young survivor, "is why."

"I don't know what happened! That's never happened before!!" she insisted.

"You obviously did something," one of the Redwings interjected when it looked like Cecil was going to seriously lose his temper. No one wanted to be around when Cecil lost his temper. The man had a long rope, but when it finally snapped, well . . . it wasn't pretty. "What was it?"

"I . . . I . . . I . . . well, how was I supposed to know he had the power?!"

"I'm sick of this!" Cecil snapped. "You!" he called, pointing to the man who'd interrupted, "Put her on the Airship. I'll deal with her later."

"What about Kain?" another asked, gesturing to the unconscious Dragoon.

"In a minute," Cecil replied shortly. "Now move it!"

The Redwing hauled the babbling girl off to the Enterprise, and Cecil flagged down a Black Wizard who was in the crew.

"Put him under a SLEEP spell and make sure he gets aboard."

The Wizard nodded, not about to ask any questions when Cecil was upset.

Cecil took a series of deep breaths and then went back to the Redwing whom he'd been following earlier.

* * *

Chocobo reported as ordered to Chia's Call, depositing Rydia and returning as his powers dictated.

As he vanished, Rydia shook her head and looked around. She'd done a lot of Calling, but had never been Called before. It was . . . strange.

"Rydia?" Edward greeted, walking to the center of the courtyard where she stood. "What's going on?"

"Jinn's gone insane. He tried to block the passageway from the Land of Summoned Monsters to the underworld, and ended up setting off a chain reaction that's destroying the whole place. Leviathan expects the second level to collapse within an hour, and after that, well, it just keeps going until the whole place is gone."

"Jinn?"

"Jinn."

"But why?"

"I don't know. None of us know. But I have to get everyone out of there while I still can."

"Yes, I see. Can we help?"

Rydia shook her head at the King and Caller.

"Not really." She handed the Twinharp to him. "Thank you. Just when I was beginning to think I'd never need it . . . "

"I wish you hadn't," Edward grimly replied.

"I agree," she agreed.

Then she hurried away for the Gates, wanting to be well out of the Kingdom before Summoning the many great monsters.

* * *

"Look at all this," the Redwing instructed Cecil, waving a hand around the interior of the farmhouse's remains. "Everything's Toroian."

A quick examination told Cecil that he was right. There were even a few Toroian potted plants sitting around decoratively.

So the Toroians had launched an attack on Toroians?

This made less sense every minute.

After glancing in the closet, things began to fall together, though.

"Well well," Cecil whistled, pulling out a garment that he recognized quite easily.

"My goodness!!" exclaimed his companion. "That's the robe of a Cleric!"

Cecil nodded, spreading the robe on a bed that stood in a corner on the one-room dwelling.

"Someone's really come down in the world . . . from ruling one of the five major civilizations of the world to breeding chickens."

"You think we're dealing with Maylara?" the Redwing inquired, referring to the Cleric who had vanished without a trace a year ago.

"I've little doubt. So that would make her Forciara, Maylara's daughter."

"The Toroians have been after them for a year. If they located them here, it seems they're mad enough to even invade us."

"It would seem so."

"Why would they be raising chickens in Baron?"

"I couldn't tell you. We're going to have to wait for our little princess to start making some sense to get any answers."

"So . . . exactly what did she do to Kain?"

Cecil had to shrug.

"I don't know. But rest assured, we're going to find out."

*

Forciara was more than agreeable when they joined the others on the Airship.

"I'm sorry," she told Cecil, blocking his way when he tried to get on. "I didn't mean to hurt him."

Cecil raised an eyebrow at her.

"Would you mind not blocking the stairs when people are coming through?"

Squeaking, she jumped back.

"I'm sorry!" she exclaimed again, this time shedding a few tears. "I never meant any harm. I still don't know why he reacted the way he did. Will he be okay?"

"You tell me," Cecil replied sternly. "It's hard for us to tell when we still don't know what you did to him." He waved to the Pilot to take off.

"Where are we going?!" she cried as they began to rise.

"Baron. And I'd like to know what's going on before we get there."

The Toroian dropped her head and stared at the ground.

"I scanned him. Just slightly. Nothing harmful. I don't know how to do anything harmful! It shouldn't have hurt him, he shouldn't even have noticed! It wasn't even as deep as the one I did on you!! Um, Sir."

Cecil frowned.

"Excuse me?! Who else did you 'scan'?"

"Oh, just the two of you, Sir. When I woke up, at first, my talent kicks in before I fully awake, and I couldn't control it for a few moments . . . Sir."

"I'll accept that for now. Then why did you scan him?"

"Um . . . curiosity?"

The look Cecil gave her was not friendly.

"Exactly what is this power of yours?"

"Well, Sir, um, Your Majesty, I . . . uh . . . I'm an Empath. A . . . yeah. An Empath."

For another long moment, Cecil just looked at her. Then he shook his head and turned away.

"Okay. That would explain it."

"Your Majesty," cut in the Pilot, "we're over Baron now."

Cecil nodded.

"Good."