After
Chapter IXPaine tried to assume a welcoming posture as the re-united pair neared. It would be to everyone's advantage to conclude the meeting as quickly as possible and set the long separated lovers on their way to completion and happiness. She felt it was her responsibility to speak first since it was due to her that they were all at this juncture.
"You're probably wondering why I've called you all together," she began and was poked in the back by Nooj. She restarted, "We are gathered here to ..." Another poke, harder this time. "When in the course of human ..." At the third poke, she turned on him with a snarl. "All right! You do it!" Stomping off, she plopped herself down with her back to the others.
Nooj pushed his spectacles back up on his nose, took a firmer grip on his cane and intoned, "Shuyin and Lenne, ..."
"See, Shuyin, I told you they were the ones who found me. Aren't they awesome?" The flageolet disguised as a woman interrupted. "They've been doing what I whispered to you about. Paine told me what they do."
Nooj glanced at Paine with a question in his eyes. She blushed, spread her palms up in a gesture of helplessness and shrugged.
"I know; they told me too." Shuyin had a knowing leer on his face.
Looking at the yellow-haired man, Nooj suddenly realized what was so irritating about him, aside from the whining. His mouth was upside down. The upper lip was fuller than the lower and the cleft in his narrow chin was not enough to distract from that anomaly. Nooj was so bemused by his discovery that he was oblivious to the incessant babble of sound emerging from the two in front of him.
"For heaven's sake, Nooj. Say something to them." Paine reentered the conversation.
"Look at him. His mouth's upside down."
"Good grief, you're right. ... I wonder how that happened. Do you suppose some of the pyreflies got into the wrong order when Yuna sent him?"
"Beats me. I think they're both mistakes that somehow got past the inspectors. In fact, Paine, I think this whole place – this FarPlane and all its tentacles – is nothing more or less than a work in progress and not perfected at all. How else explain his mouth, her voice and my body?"
"And that little gap between your front teeth."
"What? Oh, that. It's always been there. I was born with it."
"I remember it from our days in the Crimson Squad. I've always liked it. I think it's sexy."
He looked at her from over his spectacles and under his brows, "Sexy, hmmm .... Harumph! Back to duty."
She obediently pondered, chin on hand, "You may well be right about a work in progress. We'll have to follow that line further. Now, what about them?" She gestured toward the pair, now listening with puzzled eyes, mouths agape.
"Lenne and Shuyin – now that you're together again, it is time for you to fulfill your obligations on this Plane and earn your passage to euphoria." Nooj spoke from deep within his chest, sounding like the veritable voice of Yevon or whatever god his auditors currently revered. "First, you must apologize to Paine and to me. We will forgive you or bless you or whatever the hell we have to do to get rid of you and send you on your way, rejoicing and comforting one another. Do you understand?"
Shuyin nodded somewhat peevishly. "OK. Nooj – I'm sorry I used your body to make you do things you would not have done otherwise; Paine – I'm sorry I made him shoot you. Is that what you want me to say?"
"It'll do. Now, we forgive you, so hop on the nearest descending rock and begin your journey through death together." Paine held out her hands in what looked like a sort of benediction.
"What are you doing?" Nooj whispered.
"What does it look like?" She shot back.
"That's why I asked."
"It's a blessing ritual. I just made it up. Looks pretty good, doesn't it?" She repeated the gesture with undeterred pride.
"If it gets rid of them, I'll do it too."
But Lenne was already pulling at Shuyin's shirt, urging him toward a just docked floater. "Come on! I know a great place by a waterfall. You're gonna love it. Come on! I'll show you some things I learned."
Leaning against his shoulder, Paine muttered into Nooj's ear, "Be grateful for the uses of frustration."
"Let's stay here for a while and let them get a head start. Unless, O Lady of the Boundless Compassion, you want to shepherd them into the realms of bliss."
"To be truthful, I'm more interested in finding a bit of bliss for myself."
"Aha! You did promise me a reward for that compliment." He caught her by the waist and pulled her to him.
"And you shall certainly have it."
"Up here before god and everybody? Lenne would have hysterics."
Paine made a face, "Happily, she won't see it."
She felt Nooj, who was looking over her shoulder, stiffen. "You spoke too soon. They're back."
"Why?" She asked with understandable irritation.
Shuyin plodded toward them, Lenne lagging at his heels, her thumb in her mouth and her eyes fixed on the ground. "I don't know which way to go. Lenne wants to go to the waterfalls and I don't know if that's where we're supposed to be. I don't want to start this whole thing over and you're the only people I know here and where am I supposed to go? I can't find any other people and Lenne says she met someone who told her things but she can't find them again." He took a deep breath, "So what am I supposed to do?"
Nooj walked with what authority he could command over toward the yellow-haired man. Planting himself near the docking place of the floaters, he pointed with his cane. "I am going to tell you exactly what to do and exactly where to go. Listen as carefully as is possible for one of your limited capacity. ... You are to get on the next descender and go down to the meadow. You are never to set foot on this particular location again. You will walk at random until you have met everyone you have wronged and begged their forgiveness. And if I ever see you again, if ever you come within my reach again, if ever your whining voice pollutes my air again – I will thrash you until death is the most minute, inconsequential, meaningless problem you have ever had. I will make you endure a multitude of millennia of pain, loss and frustration if you ever come near me again. Now, get on that damned floater or jump!"
As the astonished pair sank below the level of the cork island, Shuyin's plaintive voice could still be heard, "All I wanted to know was where I should go and ...."
"Now, where were we?" Nooj sat down on the nearest corky ledge.
"Here, Captain. And may I say what a fine lecture you delivered. For that as well as your compliment to me, you deserve the best the house has to offer." Paine, who had swiftly doffed her mage's costume, advanced upon him with a purposeful glint in her eye. "So out of that cassock and prepare to be piloted to heights never before ascended." She knelt before him and his fingers caressed her temples, exploring the delicate hollows. And it was as if Lenne and Shuyin had never been.
After a time outside time ... he moaned urgently, "Paine, so close!" She felt his hands tightening and then the taste of the sea flooded her mouth until she drowned.
And then she was aware again, lying on the shore of his body, her lips fluttering against his, "Is it still strange? The taste?" She gloried in knowing she could make him cry out in passion, could slip under his defenses into the heart of his mysteries.
He answered her without speaking. When her mouth was her own again, she gasped, "Still arous ... Ah?"
His hands were tracing intricate patterns on her body. "Do you need to ask?" His words were thunder in the distance and a whisper inside her ears.
"No. No ... ohh!" She wrapped her leg over his hip, the metal of the sheathe cold against her fevered skin.
And then ... After fervor, stillness.
"I wonder why they don't talk about this aspect of eternity. It's much the best part." She drawled with dreamy satisfaction, lightly running her fingertip along his cheekbone.
He stroked her tousled pewter hair, teasing it out across his chest with his fingers. "It doesn't fit in with the rigid morality of the priests. Think how embarrassed Baralai, for example, would be explaining exactly what his followers had to look forward to. The entire populace of Spira would become Deathseekers if they knew what we know."
He felt her lips form a smile as she reached out to trace the swooping line of the synthetic skin that blended his machina arm to his human flesh. "Does this still bother you?"
"Not so much. I've almost forgotten how my real arm felt. Except for the fact I have no sensory feed-back in my left hand, this limb is acceptable. It's not like it was on Spira when I hurt all the time. Sometimes so much that ..." He fell mute, remembering those days when he had sat huddled into himself, waiting for the agony in his body to abate so he could function again or,worse, when he had fallen to the floor, convulsing and screaming in pain.
Paine tried to read his silence, "Was it so bad? Could nothing be done?" She gently stroked the area where the sheath connected the machina leg to the stump of the thigh.
"No. It was a complicated situation; too complicated to explain right now. I ought not to have mentioned it. It's not something I'm comfortable talking about yet, nor reliving. Perhaps later, when there's more distance between the memory and me. After all, there's no rush; we have nothing but time before us. Time to discuss and explore everything."
Seeing her expression was still troubled, he relented, "I'm mostly accustomed to the implants after all this time – all of them, the hidden ones as well. The leg has always been the most irksome; it's never worked right, but there's no pain anymore and that's enough for now."
"I'm glad in a way you're not hurrying to get your old body back," Paine murmured sleepily. "I've always felt safe with the machina bits wrapped around me."
"Then rest safely." He held her against him with his left arm.
After a while, she shifted her position across his body and lazily sat up. "Wake up, Nooj. We've slept again."
He stretched and yawned enormously. "Again? We must be getting used to this place or it to us or we've earned some special privileges. Do you see any clothes or shall we dispense with them thereby proving our superiority to the petty, ever mutating rules of whoever is in charge?"
"I think we'd better be as conventional as we can for a while yet. I see something behind that outcropping over there." She hurried back with the usual clothing and "Shoes! Look, Nooj! We've got shoes!"
There was a pair of ankle high black lace-ups for her and a single short boot for his right foot.
"Humph! Parsimony seems the watchword for this wardrobe manager. Wonder if we're expected to cross hot sands or thorny barricades this time."
"Don't complain. At least somebody's listening. Be grateful." She pulled on the footwear with enthusiasm. "They're a perfect fit."
When they were both dressed, they considered the choices before them. They could return directly to the meadow and risk meeting Shuyin and Lenne again or they could take the other path and run the gantlet of the Elite Guard on their way back down. Both courses were less than appealing.
Nooj looked reflectively at his mismatched feet and mused, "If we go through the meadow, there's a better than even chance Shuyin will run if he sees us. I think I scared him enough to make him keep his distance. I don't know about Lenne, though. She's too scatter-brained to be frightened off for long. On the other hand, if we go down the stairs past those women, I don't see any hope of avoiding another encounter with them. So, to the meadow!" He limped off to the docking area, trying to adjust his gait to the presence of the single boot.
"I don't know who has these peculiar ideas about costuming. Would it have bankrupt the deity of this place to have supplied a pair of boots?"
"Oh, stop complaining. At least the fake foot isn't going to be feeling anything. Step lively, now." Paine had scant sympathy for small complaints.
Once on the surface of the FarPlane again, they – without debate – set their course for the jeweled forest. It had the most attractive attributes of any single section of this world, including the presence of the stream that had proved useful in keeping the machina limbs in good repair. They had not gone far when Nooj stopped short and swore, "Another Call. Now who?"
He passed though the curtain of light like the veteran he had become, not waiting for the Gatekeeper, and went without guidance to the whirling column which marked the site of his appointment.
"Great god! Gippal! What are you doing here? We weren't all that close when I was alive. Why are you bothering me now I'm dead?" He threw himself down in the chair and stared in surprise at the one-eyed man across the table.
To his credit, Gippal seemed a little ashamed of his importunate appearance. "Baralai. He asked me to come talk to you. He's afraid to come because he knows he can't be civil and you'll walk out again."
"What does that dark-souled half-albino want this time; does he still think he can reserve Paine until he works up the courage to jump out a window?"
"Well ... that's part of what he wants me to talk to you about. Oh, by the way, LeBlanc is going to have your babies any day now! Congratulations!"
Nooj clutched his head in his hands and groaned. "Time. Time. Thank you for the news, Gippal. How long have Paine and I been dead?"
"Huh? I'm not too good at keeping track of things, but I think it's been about nine months or so. Why?"
"Never mind. What does Baralai have in mind – and I use the word loosely – now?"
Gippal interlaced his fingers and leaned forward over the table. "He wants you to agree that the relationship between you and Paine will continue to be a platonic one until she can make her choice between the two of you." He sat back with a relieved air, having delivered his memorized message without flaw.
"What!" Nooj began laughing, laughing like Gippal had never seen him laugh before. "How'd you let him talk you into doing something this stupid and useless?"
"You know me," Gippal grinned. "I'm easy."
"She's already made that choice; she told him when he Called her the first time. She wishes him well – every happiness and all that rot, you know. But she is not available to him and will never be. She wants to enjoy her piece of eternity in peace – with me. Gippal, that sanctimonious ass already knows this; he just won't believe it. If you're his friend, help him to accept that she's lost to him, not just for awhile, but forever. She and I are ... Oh hell, you understand what I'm saying."
The Al Bhed scratched the back of his head. "Sure, I get what you're saying. You and Paine are getting it on. That's all right with me. After all, you did it while you were alive, why not now? Are you sure Baralai knows this?"
"Both Paine and I have tried to make it clear to him. If he didn't understand us, maybe you can put it in the sort of simple explicit language he can process in that excruciatingly small brain of his. If you have to, draw him technical diagrams. Or stick figures which are probably more at his level. And tell him from me that his idea of Heaven is lacking in any number of amenities – and, conversely, makes some generally unmentioned delights readily available. Wait! ... Just tell him this and make sure he understands it is a personal message from me to him. Say: 'Agape is not the only form of love commonly experienced on the FarPlane.' That should give him a stroke."
Gippal laughed with real pleasure. "You've lightened up a lot. Guess finally getting what you hunted for all those years helps. I don't understand completely what you mean but I think I get the general idea and I'll tell Baralai. By the way, how come you've still got those machina parts?"
"That's one of the missing amenities. I don't know. Baralai will tell you it's because I'm a hopelessly damned heathen instead of a believer. But I admit, I don't know. It doesn't really matter; I'm used to them. Was that all?"
"Yeah. Come to think of it, I guess this means I'll have an occupation when I get to over there. Maybe I can be your maintenance man again. I always got a kick out of fooling around with your joints back in the old days ... Good to see you again. Give my regards to Paine; hell, give her a kiss from me."
"I will. One more thing. If you see her, tell Yuna that Shuyin and Lenne are finally together – in the full meaning of the word."
Gippal smirked and gave a thumb's up sign as the spinning color closed behind him.
"Well? Who was it?" Paine demanded. "We are sharing things, aren't we?"
He stretched out an arm and pulled her down beside him. "We're sharing everything. This isn't like it was back on Spira. There's no reason not to be open here. You know, Paine, it's not easy to realize we're in the place I never expected to be." He leaned on his elbow and idly sifted through a random patch of grass. "This is such a peculiar situation I can't get a focus on it." The customary brooding look returned to his eyes.
Nooj continued, speaking mainly to himself, "I'm wondering about this Call system. There seems something suspicious abut it. Why should the presumed peaceful eternity of the believing Dead be subject to the invasion of any acquaintance yet living? What are their affairs to us? Or ours to them? Surely the very nature of dying should have severed the bonds that held us before. I think this is just another example of how poorly planned and executed this so-called Paradise is. I doubt anyone has spent any time on making it work with any logic at all. After all, why should a mortal be permitted to try to interfere..."
Paine drew a deep, calming breath, taking her impatience firmly in hand. "As much as my intellectual development profits from your seminars, you are not answering my question!" The last six words were spoken with separate, exaggerated emphasis. "Are you going to tell me who Called you and what they wanted?"
Nooj gave a little start and looked at her. "Uh? Oh, of course. It was Gippal."
"Gippal? What for? I always liked him; he could make me laugh even when I didn't want to but what does he have to do with us now?"
"He was acting as an ambassador from your distraught discarded lover, Baralai. He who expects us to live platonically until he can present his case in person. Oh, by the by, LeBlanc hasn't given birth yet."
Paine jerked her head around to face him. "What? More time disjointings. How long has it been, anyway?"
"Gippal says about nine months. I've given up trying to do any correlation; there is no evidence of any orderly process of time in this insane place. Not one that makes sense anywhere else. There's no sense of orderly progress anywhere in this ..."
"What else did Gippal say?" She leaned into his embrace,at the same time pulling him back to the subject.
"He said to kiss you for him." He delivered the message at enthusiastic length. "And I told him to inform Baralai that you had made your choice and wished him well. That was what you wanted to say, was it not?"
"Of course, I chose you long before I was involved with him. Why can't he get it?" Paine pushed him gently back into the grass. "Let's cuddle while you tell me everything Gippal said."
"Just cuddle? Nothing more?"
"Until you've told me all – then we'll see."
He stretched out, his head supported by a convenient hillock and drew her down to rest comfortably on his chest as he began an exact recitation of the conversation in the circular room. She sighed with deep contentment and listened with increasing amusement and smug satisfaction. This was beginning to resemble a proper Heaven. She decided she could tolerate the messiness.
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