I don't own Squaresoft, I do own the OC's, and I appreciate the reviews! That being said, this may be the last chapter I write for a while, because Hurricane Ivan is heading my way. If my house isn't blown away, then I'll get back to you with more "Broken Boundaries", I promise. Thank you for reading and enjoy this new chapter.

Chapter 4: Journey

Ria stared out the living room window at the sweeping expanse of her front lawn, and sighed. "It's been three days, and they should have come back by now, but there's no sign of them."

"Are you talking about your family?" Auron asked her.

"Yeah, I'm really worried about them," she agreed. "I've tried calling them several times, but nobody's answered their cell phone or the one at the hotel they were staying in."

She paced back and forth, stopped, and sat down on the couch, her face buried in her hands and unease like a leaden weight in her stomach. Auron watched Ria carefully, gauged what her possible reaction might be, and finally told her the idea that had been forming in the back of his mind. "We could go look for them, you know?"

"What?" she looked up at him, nonplussed.

"We should go search for your family. It shouldn't be that difficult to find them."

Ria gave him a jaundiced glare. "Auron, are you out of your damn mind? Do you have any idea how far away Panama City is?"

When he shrugged, she continued to rant, "Not only that, but we'd have to walk the whole way, because my car was completely wrecked!"

Auron let her finished ranting, and told her, "I've walked further, and it's not like you have anything better to do, since your store was destroyed."

"That's true," she conceded, and got up. "You're right; I don't have anything holding me here, so we can go find my family."

They locked the house up and left the next day. Before the journey, Ria changed from her usual blue jeans and t-shirt to a pair of baggy black Capris, a forest-green tank top, and a pair of black steel-toed boots. Deciding that she needed a weapon, she also went into her brother's room and took his baseball bat. Auron watched Ria's preparations with an expression of faint amusement on his face, but only said, "Not bad."

The two of them traveled for a couple of days, reaching Mobile, Alabama, where they made an unfortunate discovery. The bridge spanning the bay was ruined during a previous fiend incursion, leaving them with no way to cross. Ria groaned and looked up at the sky. "Now what?" she asked herself.

"If we can't go across, then we will go around," Auron told her.

"That was a rhetorical question," she muttered.

That night, they camped out in a forest north of the city, and the swordsman decided to address an important issue. "Ria, we need to talk."

"About what?" she asked while poking at their small campfire with a twig.

"You said that the Zu encounter was the first experience you've had with the use of magic, am I right?"

"Yes."

"Then you need to get some kind of training in your powers, otherwise they'll become a danger to everyone."

"And just who, exactly, is supposed to give me the training I need?" she eyed him warily.

"Well, since we don't have a mage around, I guess that I'll do it." he stood up and offered her his hand. "Shall we get started?"

A few hours later, Ria was drenched in sweat, and had made very little progress. "Auron, this isn't working," she complained.

The swordsman shot her a grim stare and said, "Try it again."

"I've tried it a billion times already! Look, unless you've got some more of those nasty Ethers floating around in that weird bottomless space you keep everything in, then we have to stop, because I'm about to drop!"

Suddenly, a high-pitched warble rang out through the night air, startling them into silence. "What was that?" Ria whispered.

Auron didn't reply, but put out the fire, and motioned for her to follow him. They crept through the underbrush, until they came across a clearing that was full of birds. "Oh, wow, they're beautiful!" Ria breathed her eyes full of wonder.

There were ten of them milling around in the moonlight. They were massive birds, twice the size of an ostrich, and all but three of them had sunny yellow feathers. The other three were turquoise blue, silvery white and shadowy black. "Those are chocobos," Auron explained. "On Spira, people ride them to get around quickly."

Then a bellowing roar shattered the peaceful moment, as a giant fiend came tearing out of the other side of the clearing. It was short, with long arms, and a huge mouth filled with razor sharp teeth. The fiend roared again, and flung itself at the chocobo flock, sending them fleeing in terror, and pinning down the black one. "And that," Auron yelled while charging at the attacker, "That is a Chocobo Eater."

The swordsman whirled his katana around, in a counterclockwise horizontal strike. As Ria watched, red flame suddenly enveloped the blade as it struck the Eater repeatedly. The fiend let out an angry bellow, and it swung its long arm around and smashed Auron with a fearsome right hook. The warrior was briefly stunned, but he got to his feet and immediately resumed his assault.

The Eater staggered backward under the heavy blows of the sword, and tripped over the prone black chocobo. The fiend tried to get up, but found itself unable to, and Auron continued his assault, now aided by Ria and her baseball bat. "Take this, and this!" the young woman shrieked, enraged by the Eater's attempt to devour the chocobos.

Suddenly, the Chocobo Eater waved its arms and the ground around them shook violently, knocking Ria and Auron off their feet. The girl retaliated by whirling her bat in the air, and shouting, "Tornado!"

The wind in the vicinity picked up, and a huge twister lifted the fiend into the air. Then the vortex vanished and dropped the Eater on its head, cracking its carapace. The fiend rolled to its feet and screamed, and then rushed at Ria, until Auron stepped in and buried his katana up to the hilt in its skull. The Chocobo Eater thrashed around violently, and died, dissolving into a pyrefly swarm. Once again, the pyreflies pulsed and turned red and black, but they didn't change back before vanishing this time. Once again, Ria fainted from the overexertion of her magic.

She woke up again at sunrise, sat up, and looked around. "Did you sleep well?" the swordsman asked her.

"Yeah, but I'm still a little tired."

"Your magic is still kind of low because that was a powerful spell you cast last night."

"I suppose that'll change when I get some more training, right?"

He nodded, and then Ria said, "Auron, can I ask you something?"

"Go ahead."

"Why do those lights, I mean pyreflies, keep turning those awful colors?"

He didn't say anything at first, but finally replied, "I don't know." Then he smiled, "It looks like you've made a friend, Ria."

The young woman suddenly found herself being nudged from behind, and she turned and saw the white chocobo standing there, gratitude apparent in its intelligent blue eyes.

"Wark," chirped the chocobo.

Ria petted the bird and turned back to Auron, who was now being lavished with adoration by the black chocobo. "Well, it looks like we found a ride," she grinned.

"Yes, now we can get across the broken bridge."

The two of them got up, and prepared to start their journey anew, and Ria thought to herself, "Somehow, I don't think that this is the only broken bridge we'll be facing on this trip…"

That's it for chapter 4. That was a pretty spiffy battle, wasn't it? Well you know what I want: review and pray that Ivan doesn't blow my damn house away! Thank you and good night.