The Spring Festival Celebration

A/N: The last chapter. I know it's nowhere near Easter anymore. I got way sidetracked. A lot of things (TLA, for example) started happening at once. But I am finished, and here it is for those of you who want to know exactly what Picard was up to that day…

Rabid Felix Fan: It's really late, but I hope you enjoy this last chapter!

Triad: Hey! You showed up after all. Put Picard in PH. Or else. Oh, yeah, and read this chapter too! ^_^

Midnight C: I thought you knew by now not to give me ideas like that!

Alex: I'm done! See! Lookie! Finally!

Oh, yeah. Cascade was mentioned in chapter one. Shade is mentioned in this chapter here. They're the same Djinni, it's just that chapter one was pre-TLA and this one is obviously post-TLA.

Now go read.

Chapter Three: Vale Will Never Forget

         "Is everything ready?"

         "Appears to be."

         "You did tell them they're not allowed to change spots?"

         "I got it covered."

         "Everyone knows they're looking for strange-colored creatures instead of eggs."

         "Far as I know. For Sol's sake, Ivan, light the lantern! I can barely tell who I'm talking too!" Garet snapped, and Ivan shot a spark that lit the lantern.

         "Why are we out here in the dead of night, anyway?" Jenna asked. "I'm freezing! You're not trying to look for Djinn early, are you?"

         "No, not that. Picard never showed for dinner, and I want to know why. He's out here somewhere, doing whatever mysterious thing he has planned. I want to know what it is."

         "Can't you just leave him alone?" Ivan asked irritably. "You're always looking for some chink in his personality."

         "Fire and Water are natural opponents."

         "Jenna and Mia get along just fine."

         "Jenna and Mia have something in common."

         "They do?" "We do?" Ivan and Jenna's questions were simultaneous.

         "Think about it for a while," Garet said smugly. "I'm hunting down that Lemurian."

         "You do not need to. He's already here." Picard stepped out from a shadow. Garet jumped. Ivan and Jenna nearly collapsed in giggles. "Trying to discover my surprise, are you?"

         "Um…no, we were just…passing through…" Garet said, looking at the ground.

         "I guarantee that you will see what I have planned by tomorrow night, Garet," Picard said with a faint smile. "Until then, kindly leave me to my plans."

         "You heard him, you big oaf!" said a random voice from above.

         "An egg," Ivan noted. "Come on Garet—we stay up any later, and you won't be up early enough to start the hunt. You might even miss breakfast."

         "Back home we go!" Garet said enthusiastically. He turned and walked quickly back the way he had come, Ivan following close behind, Jenna bringing up the rear. She turned for a moment and noticed Picard still watching them.

         "Sorry about your shirt," she said, shrugging guiltily. "I'm trained on reflex."

         "That's alright. It will give me something to do when I get bored," he said, glancing at his torn sleeve. "Before you ask, Jenna, yes, I did actually eat dinner, and no, I won't tell you my plan. I wouldn't even tell Shade."

         "And I've been with him practically forever," Shade said from some dark hiding spot. "I was never quite this attractive shade of blue before, but still."

         "See you in the morning, Jenna," Picard said with a smile. With a, "Good night," he disappeared into the shadows again. Jenna shook her head.

         "Where in the world did he learn to do that?" she asked herself, then turned and hurried to catch up to Garet and Ivan.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

         "Up and at 'em, Isaac!" said Dora, shaking her son's shoulder excitedly. "It's the morning of the Spring Festival!"

         "Five more minutes," Isaac mumbled, rolling over and pulling the blanket over his head. "Just this once. I cleaned all day for you yesterday."

         "Isaac, I'm shocked," said another voice. "You'd miss the Djinn Hunt just to get a few extra minutes of sleep?" Isaac rolled back over and squinted in the direction of the voice. It was Mia.

         "Yes," Isaac said sharply. "Bane's out there somewhere, after all. And my head feels empty, without the Djinn connected to me. I'm not in a good mood."

         "That's never bothered you before," said Sheba from her position in the rafters. Isaac looked up at her and made a surprised noise.

         "What is this, the 'watch Isaac sleep' convention?"

         "Might be," said Felix from the doorway. "Might also be the 'everyone come to Isaac's for breakfast' convention. I remember being invited."

         "Oh, right," Isaac said, rising and running a hand through his messy hair in an unsuccessful attempt to get it to look somewhat flat. "Hey, when we go out there today, no one have some sort of tragic and totally preventable accident, alright? I'm not in the mood to deal with it."

         "Well, maybe we won't, but any of the villagers—" Ivan began, but Sheba, who had leapt lightly to the floor, shook her head.

         "The villagers are far less clumsy and have more luck with such things than any of us, except possibly Mia," she said, following the others (except Isaac) downstairs and grabbing a fruit from the bowl on the table. "Anyone else notice that we eat a lot of fruit for breakfast?"

         "Well I think Dora's out of flour for anything else," said Jenna, smiling. "Besides, Garet doesn't need anymore food."

         "I heard that," said a voice from outside.

         "What's he doing out there?" Mia asked.

         "Trying to spot a Djinni or two, is my guess," said Isaac, joining the others downstairs. "Maybe he actually misses the company."

         "My head is an empty place," Garet agreed, sticking his head in the window.

         "That has nothing to do with your Djinn," Jenna joked, and Garet frowned, tossing his apple core at her. Jenna reached up, caught it, and flung it back at him in one movement. Garet ducked, and the apple hit an unlucky passerby. Garet turned around to find a startled-looking Lemurian staring at him.

         "Uh, hey Picard," he offered lamely. "I didn't do that, by the way. It was Jenna."

         Picard said nothing. Instead, he walked around to the front door and joined the other Adepts inside. Jenna looked quite sheepish, her face a pink shade and her eyes focused on the apparently enthralling pattern of the wood on the table.

         "Sorry," she said.

         "No need to sound so down about it," Picard said brightly. "It was only an apple."

         "What brings you from your hidden activities?" Sheba asked, wishing there were rafters to sit in on this floor.

         "I'm here to see you, actually, Sheba. I have need of a Jupiter Adept to help me…get things going."

         "And why can't I help?" asked Ivan indignantly.

         "Because you are one of last night's conspirators, and you will come running back here and tell everyone what I've been planning to do," Picard said with certainty.

         "Not running. Perhaps a fast walk."

         "The speed does not make a difference. Sheba…I request your assistance."

         "Tell me that isn't a switch," Mia said, though only Isaac and Felix picked up on the joke.

         "Sure, Picard," Sheba said with an indifferent shrug.

         "You'll miss the Djinn Hunt," Picard said, as though this point had only just come to mind.

         "That's alright. I think it would be really pitiful if I beat everyone to it and came back with seventy-two Djinn," Sheba said with a sly smile.

         "You would not!" Ivan protested.

         "I would say 'watch me' but I remember now, you can't," Sheba mocked. Ivan turned a shade of red that matched Garet's hair quite well.

         Sheba and Picard left, leaving the others to wonder anew exactly what the Lemurian was planning to do, and now, why it required a Jupiter Adept to get it done.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

         "Everyone ready?" asked the Mayor of Vale, and there was a collective nod from all of its current residents, excluding Picard and Sheba, of course. Every citizen and visitor of Vale was armed and ready—well, if you could call carrying pastel-colored baskets 'armed'—for the hunt. The Djinn Hunt.

         "Then get on with it!" said the Mayor, and the approximately two hundred Valeans that were gathered instantly split off into the forests and cliffs, looking for Djinn.

         "It's a good thing they're all Adepts," Ivan muttered as he walked away. "Less questions about tiny animal-like things that are really the personification of the powers of the elements."

         "Animal-like! The insults grow worse every day," said a voice from the trees.

         "Oh, good morning Whorl," Ivan said cheerily. "Come on now, into my basket, you gave yourself away." Grudgingly, the green-and-yellow Jupiter Djinni flew from the tree into Ivan's basket.

         "Besides, that isn't us," said Whorl, and Ivan stared down at him.

         "What isn't you?"

         "The elements personified. That's—"

         "Be quiet," Ivan said suddenly. "I hear another egg." Whorl looked about as pouty as a Jupiter Djinn covered in green and yellow paint could look, but Ivan didn't notice. He was already on the move.

         Garet had chosen the cliffs to do his searching, and had already nabbed Coal, though that had meant a speedy chase through dense foliage and rocky between-cliff areas not big enough to be called valleys, and Fizz, who had protested greatly against being pulled from between rocks in the river, completely washed of paint.

         "Stupid place to hide," Garet had said. "Got all the dye washed away."

         "I did not enjoy being bright orange," Fizz said in a sickened tone. "That is a Mars color, and I am a Mercury Djinni!"

         "And I'm a Mars Adept. Shut up." Garet was quite pleased with himself when Fizz complied.

         Mia was hot on the tail of one of the Jupiter Djinn—she thought it might be Zephyr, with how fast it was moving—when she ran smack into Isaac, who was headed in the other direction. Both of them ended up on the ground, and Mia grabbed whichever Venus Djinni Isaac had found before it could run off.

         "Quite the morning I've been having," Isaac muttered, pulling a twig from his hair. "Woken up by several hyper Adepts, running through thorns and such chasing Sap there—thanks for catching her, by the way—and then running right into you when I should have been looking where I was going. My apologies, Mia."

         "No, it's alright Isaac," Mia said, standing and brushing herself off. "I was after a Jupiter Djinni…Zephyr, maybe…I ran into you, not the other way around."

         "Yes well…shall we look together?" Isaac ventured. Mia reached up and pulled a leaf off his head.

         "Fine by me."

         Deep within the forests, cliffs and underbrush, the Djinn that had not yet been found shifted their positions. Simply because Ivan had told them they couldn't move didn't mean they were going to listen, after all.

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

         "Bane! Bane! I know you're out there, somewhere!" Isaac called. He and Mia had been searching for hours now, with a break for lunch, and still no sign of the Venus Djinni.

         "Call him back, then," Mia said.

         "Can't. He's not allied with me right now, remember?"

         In five minutes the population of Vale would gather in the plaza and count Djinn. Whoever had the most would win the chocolate. And deny it though he might, Isaac really wanted that chocolate. Partly to annoy Ivan, of course, but partly because, for all that he was a 'hero,' he had never won the chocolate in his life.

         Five minutes later, with no sign of Bane and the sun on the move towards the horizon, Isaac and Mia joined the others in the plaza. Isaac figured, with seven Djinn, he stood a chance.

         "Someone else might have found Bane, you know," Mia said as Garet, Jenna, Ivan and Felix joined them. "There are a lot of people in Vale."

         "Not nearly as many as in Tolbi," Ivan pointed out.

         "Tolbi is a city," said Garet with some significance. The others waited for more, but Garet remained silent.

         "And?" Felix ventured.

         "So it's bound to have more people!"

         "Simply because it's a city and not a town or village?"

         "Well…yeah." Garet frowned. Suddenly his brilliant comment sounded rather foolish.

         The Mayor stood on a platform and made a great show of counting everyone's Djinn. The winner, by sheer luck (of which she had more than enough), was Mia, who had nabbed Zephyr after all as Isaac had gone off looking for Bane about an hour before they'd come to the plaza, and had a total of eight Djinn.

         "Chocolate," Ivan said enviously, and Garet stared at the food like it was the only thing he'd ever need in life. Jenna hit him over the head.

         The Djinn were put together into one basket, and immediately Isaac noticed something amiss.

         "Bane's not here," he said, looking for the telltale bright pink of the most ancient Venus Djinni.

         The crowd went silent, and Bane himself walked through the small pathway that had been made for him, stepping with some difficulty (he eventually had to jump) onto the Mayor's platform. He was the usual Venus Djinni shade of dirt brown.

         There was a long, quiet pause.

         "Well really," Bane said in a dignified voice. "Did you expect me to stay like that? Put me down, old man!" he added ferociously as the Mayor lifted him into the air.

         "Which Adept's basket did you belong to?" the Mayor asked. Bane sniffed.

         "Isaac's," he said, his tone conveying that really, there was no other option but that one, and you were stupid to think otherwise.

         "Then I'm afraid Isaac and Mia have tied for the basket of chocolate." Isaac looked up at this, and his face lit up like that of a child with a new toy, or Kraden upon entering Lemuria.

         "I've never won before! It was always Garet!" Isaac said excitedly, grabbing one of the chocolates and eating it, savoring the sweetness of victory.

         "That explains the fact that he's massive," Ivan said innocently.

         "It's muscle," Garet protested.

         "It sure isn't brains," Jenna said in agreement. Garet looked hurt. "Aw, come on, you know I like you anyway."

         The Djinn rejoined their respective Adepts, including Sheba's and Picard's, who set out in a large group to locate their plotting Adepts. Ivan felt Squall's presence absent from his mind, but Squall had always liked Sheba's company and had probably gone to look for her, he decided. Indeed, Whorl had decided to stay with Ivan, and sat perched on his shoulder as he joined the rest of Vale in the large dinner that was more dessert than anything else.

         The sun had set and stars were beginning to wink into being when Isaac remembered.

         "Picard said we'd know what he was planning by tonight, and I'm still not seeing it," he said. He and the other Adepts were seated atop the tallest cliff in Vale, looking down at the rest of the celebrants. "Tomorrow, we start planting. Just take me now," he pleaded jokingly, looking to the sky.

         "If they did that, the world would be minus one hero," said a voice behind him. Isaac tilted his head backwards and looked up at Sheba.

         "Hey, you look tall from down here," Felix joked. Sheba stuck her tongue out at him, then joined the others, sitting with her legs hanging over the edge and a sly smile on her face.

         "Alright, spill it," Ivan said finally. "What were you doing all day?"

         "You'll find out all in good time," Sheba said mystically. "All you need do is continue to watch."

         "That reminds me," Ivan said, looking at Whorl. "What were you saying about the personification of the Elements?"

         "I was saying," Whorl began haughtily, "that—" But he was cut off yet again as a purple streak ran into Ivan's head.

         "Ouch! What the?"

         "Ivan, I cannot believe you!" said Squall, looking up at him angrily from where she stood on the ground. "Two hundred people and no one found me? You didn't even come looking afterwards! Thank you all so very much!"

         "I thought you were looking for Sheba."

         "Likely story." Squall sighed, re-allying herself with Ivan, as Whorl did the same with Sheba. Isaac was about to ask Ivan what he had been talking to Whorl about, but there was a sudden sound, almost like a whistle, that made Isaac and the others jerk their faces skyward, following the noise and a tiny pinpoint of light.

         In truth, only the seven Adepts got to truly witness the beginning of what made this particular Spring Festival unforgettable. It looked like a giant, blue, Psynergetic flower was blooming in the sky. It lingered for a moment, and was joined by a purple one, a red one, and a green one. As those faded, a giant yellow burst of light brightened the area so that it looked like the sun was still up.

         There were five sounds that reminded Felix of the booming noise that had happened when he had shot the Magma Ball at the wall in Loho. Multiplied by ten. Infinitely.

         "It took us ages to get the mechanics right," Sheba commented as Picard joined the others. They all looked at him quizzically.

         "The Mercury Djinn are running this one," he said, smiling faintly. "Sit back and enjoy the show. Psynergy makes lights in the sky, and they take on different shapes, usually like a starburst, or perhaps resembling a flower. The explosion you hear is an actual explosion, by the way. Tomorrow, I might explain it all. But it is…or it was…quite popular in Lemuria."

         The Adepts did as Picard asked, their eyes fixed on the sky as burst after burst of colorful Psynergetic light made the night truly something to remember.

         "No wonder I couldn't find my Burst Brooch," Jenna whispered in an awed voice. "Picard took it."

         "I did," he admitted, grinning. "It was worth it, yes?"

         "Oh yes," Mia said breathlessly. "It was so worth it."

         Each of them smiling, the eight Adepts sat together watching the wonderful show Picard had engineered and enjoyed something they didn't often get in the saving the world business—the chance to relax and celebrate being alive, together, and still mostly sane.

         Djinn or no Djinn.

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Before anyone says it, I know there weren't any battles or anything like that in here. It was just meant to be funny and a little insane. It was also meant to be finished by Easter, but it wouldn't be this good if it had been.

And no, the fireworks (that's what they were) aren't in there to tie into the Fourth of July. There were going to be fireworks way back when I began the fic. Ok. So. That button there. No, not there, here.

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