Chapter 4

It was dark. Jitan started to open his eyes, but he realized that they already were. He tried to look about him, but everything was pitch-black. He began to wonder what was going on, and then a voice:

'So nice to see you again, Jitan.'

"I know this voice." He turned around, trying to find its source.

'Yes, I should hope that you would recognize the voice of your maker.'

"Garland?! But...but you died! Back on Terra!"

'Oh, did I? Yes, well I suppose I did die back on that ledge; but surely you didn't think that wreck of a body was the only thing connecting me to the world of the living, did you?'

"Then what the hell is?!"

There was a faint red glow in the dark, coming slowly towards him. Then an outline began to frame the pulsing red light. The shadowy figure was soon only a couple of meters away, and now the outline was definitely that of a man.

"You."

"Me?"

"Yes. You and your brother are what keep my soul anchored in this...purgatory."

"Then, you cannot exist outside our subconscious; you are weak. I'll—"

Garland was suddenly in front of him, and he gasped as Garland's arm shot out like a snake and gripped his throat in a vise. Jitan struggled to free himself, but the grip around his neck only tightened.

"Do not ever think that you, a mere creation, a defective puppet, could ever measure up to me!"

"Don't," he coughed, "Don't be so sure. Ku-Kuja destroyed much of you, leaving you weak and—"

Garland gave his neck one last squeeze before he threw him to the ground, coughing and gasping for breath.

"Kuja..." He seemed to reflect on the name. "Kuja was my first genome experiment. Unlike you and the other genomes—who were only given a soul after their body's completion—I gave Kuja a soul from the very beginning. He conscious was awake during the whole process of his creation; he heard and saw all that happened around him. He knew everything about me and my original plan to absorb Gaia into Terra." He stopped. Turning back around to face him, his face held an expression of mild interest. "Would you like to see?"

"See what?"

"Your brother's past."

"How do I know you won't just lie and make stuff up?"

"You have my word."

"Ha! That's about as useful as dropping a grain of sand in the desert."

"Do not mock me, Jitan! Never forget that I made you; that I created you from nothing!"

"Blah, blah, blah...We've heard that story before. Tell me something I don't know."

"If you do not control your tongue, I'll—"

"You'll what?"

Garland gave him a look that could have made a stone bleed.

"Alright, alright, let's get this over with. (The sooner we finish, the sooner I can wake up).

"What was that?"

"Nothing. Look, can we just get star—"

Jitan was suddenly standing in what looked to be a lab of some sort. Looking around, he recognized it as being the very same lab that he had been in while on Terra when he'd confronted the other genomes. Looking more closely, he observed that it was a little different than what he remembered, but before he could investigate further, he heard footpsteps outside the door followed by a shadow that framed the doorway. Unsure what to do, he ducked behind some equipment just as the shadow entered the room.

It was Garland, though he looked a bit different; younger. Jitan watched as he walked over to a machine and began accessing charts and what looked to be medical data. Every now and then he spied Garland look up from the charts towards a rather large tube attached to the wall. It was filled with a bluish substance that appeared to glow with an inner light. Jitan recalled similar tubes from his previous visit; they were used to grow genomes.

From his current position, Jitan could hardly see a thing. Wanting to get a better view of the tube, he slowly crouched below a counter and crawled closer. He peeked around a corner to see if Garland was still going over the data only to find that he was face-to-face with a rather large knee.

"Uhp!" he whipped his head back around. 'I hope he didn't see me.'

'Of course I didn't see you, you nit wit.'

"Huh?" Jitan managed another peek at Garland who was still standing on the opposite side of the desk plugging in some data on a screen.

'You dolt! Stand up. There's no need for you to hide behind that desk. I told you I was going to show you your brother's past. What you see now took place over twenty-two years ago. You cannot affect this world in any way; it is just an image, and you are merely an observer.'

"Well, you could have said something earlier!" Jitan grumbled as he stood up and pretended to brush dust off his pants. "(Making me crawl around on the floor...)"

'I thought you would have figured it out by then!'

"Are you gonna keep butting in, or can I watch the show?"

'Jitan, mind yourself!'

"Yeah, yeah. Bug off!"

After hearing a rather rude sound followed by a string of curses, Jitan felt that he was alone again. And just to make sure that he really couldn't affect anything, he tried to pick up an instrument that was lying on a table, but his hand went right through it. He then walked right up to Garland and made a rude gesture that, under real circumstances, would've landed him a fist in head. Nothing. Satisfied, he walked over to the screen Garland was currently occupying and looked at the data being displayed. Apparently, it was receiving data from one of the machines and spewing out recorded data that was categorized in different sub units, (brainwaves, heart rate, and other vital signs).

Jitan was beginning to wonder what all this had to do with Kuja, and then Garland looked away from the screen with a content look on his face as he turned around and walked over to the glowing tube.

"Well, well. It looks as though you're coming along nicely, Kuja. Your readouts are perfect. Soon you'll be in your next stage of development, and I will be that much closer to fulfilling my goal."

Colors blended and faded into each other and Jitan found himself back in the lab, but some time had passed—perhaps a month or two—and he saw Garland standing in front of the tube again with an electronic chart as he made annotations and reviewed more data. Jitan looked past him at the tube and he could see the form of a baby in fetal position floating in the middle of the tank. He walked up to it and peered through the glass at the infant, who already had a head-full of light, wispy hair hovering around its head. "Aww. He looked so cute as a baby." He reached up to tap on the glass, but remembered in mid-motion that he couldn't touch anything, so he reached up and pretended to scratch his head—just in case Garland was still watching him.

'Hahahaha. You don't fool me for one second, Jitan. Come; let's skip ahead a little, shall we?'

Jitan rolled his eyes and focused on the wall while Garland enjoyed yet another of his follies. It didn't last for long, however, as once more the image in front of him absorbed into itself and then reformed again, revealing the past.

He was now standing in a different room, but lab equipment was still present along the walls and spread across the few tables that were placed around the room. He turned at the sound of footsteps and watched as Garland entered, followed by a small child that looked to be about five or six. "Kuja?" They crossed the room over to some instruments and Jitan watched as Garland placed some patches that were attached to wires onto the child's temples. The wires were linked to a key pad—which Garland was now holding. After a few seconds, the machine beeped and a light blinked somewhere on it. Still reading from the pad, Garland looked up.

"Very good, Kuja. Once again your scores are perfect; however, you could improve on your concentration during spell casting. I almost thought you were incapable of destroying that third level beast when you used Fire against it." He removed the patches. "I want you to have fully mastered Fire in time for tomorrow's exercise." He turned towards the door, "Don't disappoint me again."

"Yes, sir."

After Garland had left the room, Kuja stood there for a few minutes. Jitan couldn't tell what he was thinking until Kuja clenched his fists and mumbled, "I will not disappoint Master Garland again." And with that, he walked over to a door Jitan hadn't noticed before and pressed his hand on a pad attached to the doorframe. The red light on the door changed to blue and the door quietly slid open. Kuja walked on through and Jitan quickly followed, passing through the door as if it wasn't there.

Kuja stood in the room's center, his arms slightly spread apart.

"Begin practice: Level One, Fire."

Jitan could hear the soft hum of machines working somewhere on the other side of the wall. He turned in circle trying to get some sort of clue about what was happening, but the smooth walls' metallic surface gave no indication.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a small ball of orange flame billowed out towards Kuja. "Hey! Watch out!" But Kuja merely stood there and calmly raised a hand to the approaching fire, and it abruptly stopped a few feet away. Jitan watched as the child slowly closed his hand and put out the flame without ever having touched it. Jitan gaped at the child for being able to manipulate the black magic at such a young age. He watched as the boy merely stared ahead and continued.

"Begin second phase: Level Two, Fira."

This time, two balls of fire, slightly bigger than the first one had been, came hurdling towards them from nowhere. Kuja raised a hand to each of the flames and, with what looked to be little effort, caused the balls of magic to perform an intricate dance of yellow and orange and red flame. Jitan looked on as signs of stress could be seen darting across the child's features, and the heated dance that was taking place above them was brought to an end as Kuja quickly clasped his hands together, and the balls of flame hurdled towards each other and collided in a burst of dazzling sparks. Though, not a minute passed by before the child-like Kuja straightened and spoke:

"Begin third phase: Level Three, Firaga."

There was a change in the machines' hum from where Jitan was standing and suddenly what looked to be a small red comet came spiraling down from the ceiling, and even though he knew Kuja couldn't hear him, Jitan shouted out to him, "RUN!" but the child only stood there as the space between him and the huge, fiery orb rapidly diminished. When the spherical flame was only two meters above him, however, it seemed to hit a barrier of some sort and there was a deafening blast as the black magic struck the shield and crackled against Kuja's protective spell, trying to break through.

Kuja hadn't moved from his spot in the room's center, but his arms were now held up in a defensive position above his head, his muscles tense. The pulsing globe above his head continued to smolder threateningly and Jitan could see it inch ever so closer with each passing minute; the shield wouldn't last. Sweat trickled down Kuja's face as he struggled to control Firaga and maintain his barrier at the same time. The minutes passed and the huge fireball was now only a meter above them; Jitan could almost feel the heat on his skin as the room was now filled with a crimson light that merely grew in intensity. 'It's too powerful for him,' he thought, 'He's only just a kid.' He stared ahead as Kuja's small form looked so hopeless in comparison to the monstrous, blazing sphere of fire that hovered not but a couple feet above him. 'It's futile, Kuja,' Jitan thought at the child who was almost to his knees under the stress, 'Why don't you call it off?!' But then he heard:

"I will...not...disappoint...M-Master Garland again.." And then Jitan saw as Kuja broke the link with his shield and concentrated his magic only on the fire that now reigned down upon him as he tried to break it up into smaller pieces. The plan seemed to be working and Jitan felt relieved until he turned his head and saw Garland standing on the opposite side of the entrance door, a scowl upon his face. At first he didn't understand when the corners of the old man's mouth raised in a sadistic smirk, but when he heard Kuja's cry of dismay and turned around, he realized all too well.

The fireball was now double its original size, and Kuja, now on his knees screaming at the computers behind the wall to shut off the inferno, was draining his mana reserves to hold up a Protect shield around himself. He was so frightened that he wasn't fully concentrating on the spell, and it became apparent when tiny pieces of burning rock slipped past the barrier and singed his skin and clothes. He cried out for someone to help him, to make the fire go away, but no one could hear him—save Jitan and the monster that watched from the outside. 'Garland, you bastard,' he seethed under his breath. He turned away, not wanting to witness what would happen when Kuja's Protect finally gave way...

It didn't take long, however, and the room was soon filled with the sound fire and a child screaming in agony over and over..... Jitan covered his ears and shouted for it to stop, but all he could hear were the screams—again and again—echoed by cruel, hollow laughter.

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A/N: sooooooo.....was it worth the wait? (again, sorry i took so long) but what d'ya think? R&R!!!