Disclaimer: I own nothing of FFTA except a tiny cartridge with the sticker on it. FFTA, Marche, Shara and all those other miscellaneous personages who I don't seem to own are property of Square Enix. Yadda yadda yadda, now can I have my cookie already! Mmmm…cookie…

I have only the hugest apologies to make to all the readers out there. I'm sorry I haven't updated for…well…months. I;ve been caught up in school, farewell parties and debating, three things you have to live with. Leastways, for me.

To all you Nils fans out there…beware… XD

To my reviewers:

Mako-Streak: Let's just say….Marche + chocobos not fun for Marche.

The reviewer I still insist on referring to as BrokenblueHeart (great, even my capital letters are screwed, aren't I stupid.): Thanks for reviewing!

All my reviewers, you keep me alive. Review and I may stand a chance at posting more regularly. No promises, though…I'm really sorry to say that updates will be irregular at best. I know, it makes me sad too.

Anyway! Story!

"Oh, god…" mumbled Loraine, as lancing pain shot into her shoulder, through her neck and around her wrists and ankles. Wait, no, she hurt all over. And where the hell was she?

The bouncing gait and yellow feathers. She was on a chocobo. Lying on a chocobo. Where? She had been captured by that damn clan who thought she was Killer Rayne…oh, bloody hell.

This was not a good day.

"Well, my good fellow Haiver, what are you doing here?" sneered the ninja. She saw her brother flush dully and got up, staring at him all the while.

"Nothing," he muttered. Even though he was taller and bigger than her, always had been, she had the edge in verbal battles.

"Liar," she scoffed. "You've always been purposeful."

"Nothing," he repeated, climbing to his feet and brushing himself off. The blue mage uniform looked tattered and worn, as if it hadn't been changed in ages, and he looked quite similar. He seemed tired, and his face was carved with anguish where time and emotion had stretched him out.

"Come on, brother dearest," sighed Ingg, putting an arm around his shoulders. "If you won't tell me what you're doing, then you can at least do me a favour." Guiding him towards the little moogle's body, she waved at it. "Heal him. Please."

Matias gave her a look and bent down beside the tiny moogle form, his hands moving complicated swirls around it. He was conjuring up a wind.

"White Wind," he said softly. The wind took form and colour, the pure white colour of angels, and swirled until Oskar stirred and moaned, "Oh, kupo, did you get the licence plate of that cart?" very drunkenly. Then the wind died away.
"Done. Are you happy?" asked Matias tiredly.

"No. I'm not. Where's your hunter friend?" she asked. He blanched.

"Who told you about that?" he croaked. Ingg felt a small spark of sympathy light the old sibling love, and he looked so helpless that she just wanted to pat him like a hurt animal. Instead, she gave him a hug. She felt his body jerk in shock, then he hugged her back.

"Hey, who's the scallywag who spirited away me buddy – agh!" yelped a very shocked hunter, emerging from around an alleyway corner, a small bag by his side. Then he softened. "A reunion. Aw, this is a Kodak moment!"

"What's Code-ack, kupo?" asked Oskar, now less groggy as he looked up at Nils from his seat on the floor.

"I dinnae know meself, lad, but it be glorious," exclaimed the human, bending down and picking the little moogle up. "And who might you be?"

"Oskar," said the thief. Meanwhile, the siblings let go and looked each other up and down.

"You've grown," they exclaimed simultaneously, and both smiled.

"What brings you, my good brother, to this neck of the woods?" asked Ingg, after she'd suppressed her own humour.

"The same thing I should be asking you, my dear sister," he replied, raising an eyebrow. His face creased with worry. "Is everything all right?"

"Yes," she said, surprised. "Why?"

"Then you're lucky," he said darkly. She opened her mouth to ask why, then decided against it.

"Come on, brother," she said instead. "There's problems. One of my clan members has been kidnapped. We're going to find her." She turned to the little moogle. "Oskar, kindly detach yourself from the poor human's purse, run back to camp and tell everyone we're going to look for her."

"Okay, kupo," said the thief obediently. However, as he walked off, Nils said, "Hey, come back here with my jellybean sack!"

"Oskar!" snapped Ingg. "I told you to detach yourself from his purse!" Very reluctantly, the thief did so and began running back.

"I didn't know soft toys could scurry!" Nils called after the moogle, who stopped briefly to stick his tongue out at the hunter.

"Kupo! Marche!"

The blond looked up from the effort of trying to pour healing potions over his back to see Oskar running towards him.

"What?" he asked, wincing as Katarina, rather roughly, rubbed the content of a bottle across the various bullet marks on his arms, whispering all the time rather darkly about the stupidity of human males.

"Lori-kupo been kidnapped, kupo," gasped Oskar. The summoner and the archer gaped. Or rather, the archer gaped and the summoner groaned.

"By idiots who still think she's Killer Rayne?" she asked. This was affirmed. Kat threw up her arms in disgust, screwed close the jar of salve and had the camp mustered in a matter of minutes. Etoile looked furious.

"No one kidnaps one of us and gets away with it!" she yelled.

"What she said, kupo," agreed Basil.

"Well, we'd better move fast, then, or else we'll have no trail to chase, will we?" remarked Katarina tartly.

"Whee!" yelled Nils, airborne on the back of one of his dragons. The creature's pace quickened as they saw a convoy in the distance: a clan, laughing, chattering, a seemingly normal clan except for the figure of a viera, tied across the back, their lanterns a beacon in the dusk landscape.

Matias and Ingg hung on behind him, the blue mage calm and collected, the ninja's eyes screwed tightly shut and her brain busy in prayer.

"Why didn't I think of this before?" shouted Matias jubilantly.

"Because of bomblifulness!" screeched Nils. Ingg yelled, "You maniac!" just before they tipped into a dive and all the rest of her scathing remarks were ripped away by the sight of the ground rushing towards them.

"Kamikazeeee!" howled the hunter, swooping towards the clan; who were caught off balance by the attack. The chocobo screamed shrilly and bolted, dragging a white mage who was holding on to its reins off with it for a short distance before the mage let go. The clanners raced after the chocobo, a couple stopping to help their battered comrade.

"Who's your friend?" asked Matias over the howl of the wind. Ingg hesitated. Her brother would finally know that all his heartbreak and anguish had been misplaced.

Her brother was frightening when he was angry. She didn't want to see that. But she owed him the truth, after years of betrayal, seeing the hurt and pain in his eyes as she backstabbed him and shot him down again and again.

"Matias?" she said softly.

"What?" he said, turning back and grinning. "Who is it?" Seeing the happiness on his face, the starlight reflected in his eyes in the thrill of the ride, she looked away. Not now.

"I'll tell you later," she muttered, her voice a bare whisper. The pounding of her heart changed to panic as she realized Loraine wasn't masked at all. She would tell him now or endure his anger forever.

His face froze slightly, the grin looking hurt, but he shrugged it off.

"Okay, if you don't want to tell me, don't." His voice had developed a painful inflection to it.

"I'm sorry, Mati-" She braced herself as Nils guided the drake after the fleeing bird, oblivious to the conversation behind him. The dragon's claws barely raked the chocobo, sending the captive on its back into sudden chills.

An illusionist and a soldier materialized in front of the pack-bird, grabbing its reins as it ran on and vaulting onto its back. The soldier began guiding the panicked bird towards the forest as the illusionist, with a wave of his – her? hand used a touch of the magic to seemingly vanish the bird.

"I didn't know illusionists could do that, Matti boy!" yelled Nils.

"They can sometimes!" Matias shouted back, his eyes shooting a fiery glare at his twin sister.

"What do we do now?" called Nils.

"Track the clan, later! We can't chase an invisible bird!" Obediently, the hunter wheeled the wyrm around and sent it chasing the wind back along the road to Baguba.

"There's a dragon!" yelled Katarina, glaring at the sky and drawing her Rod.

"Don't!" yelled Darios, grabbing her arm. "There's people on it!" He looked down at where his hand was holding her bare arm and up to her face. A hot blush was spreading across her face, just as his own cheeks burst into flame.

She drew her rod and whacked him solidly, sending him sprawling backwards.

"You creep!" she shrieked, but she was still blushing. "You pervert!" Running up to him, she raised her rod and would have pounded him to a pulp if Etoile hadn't come up and managed to forcibly restrain her. Darios scrambled backward, as the moogles began to snort with suppressed laughter and Marche looked away.

"No! No! Don't kill him, Kat! We still need him!" yelled the sniper. The summoner looked back over her shoulder, into the eyes of the sniper, and saw an almost imperceptible flash in the eyes, accompanied by a little nod. Slowly, Katarina dropped her arm from its striking position and sighed.

The whole clan, as a single entity, ducked as the wyrm taxied over and landed a while down. A hunter and blue mage in worn clothes jumped off, along with a familiar ninja. The hunter seemed to be comforting the creature before it took to the air again, in the direction of Cyril.

"How'd it go?" Marche asked the ninja as she approached.

"Hm? Oh. Not well. We lost them," Ingg said briefly, as she kept walking. Marche looked at her advancing back in confusion.

"It's that time of month, kupo," Montblanc said softly, patting Marche as far up the back as he could manage. He was whacked by Etoile for this insolence.

"Marche of Clan Nutsy?" asked a voice so startlingly like Ingg's, yet definitely male, that he turned around half expecting to see the ninja there. Instead, the tattered blue mage in ragged clothes was standing there with an outstretched hand. The facial resemblance to Ingg was striking. Her twin brother, perhaps?

"Ah," he said slowly. "Are you Matias?"

"Yes," answered the blue mage. "That's Nils. He's mostly insane." The hunter was peering at Etoile, and Katarina was preparing to give him a concussion. He paused. "Would you be considering recruiting any time soon?"

"You-?" Marche choked. "You'd like to-"
"Well, if you want," Matias said, his voice suddenly dropping as he hung his head. "I've done things I'm not proud of. But if you want to accept us…" He stood straighter and his face grew prouder, his stance stronger. "I'm a very experienced blue mage with some Fighter background, and Nils comes with his entire monster bank account." He grinned disarmingly. "And if that isn't a bribe I don't know what is."

"You're in," answered Marche, rummaging through his pack for enrolment forms.

When the kidnapped clanner awoke, she was still bound hand and foot, but leaning against a tree instead of a nauseating chocobo ride. Obviously they had stopped.

"Killer Rayne?" asked someone at the edge of Loraine's vision. Loraine kept silent and mouthed to herself unflattering opinions about these bounty hunters.

"I know you're awake," continued the voice. It was soft and female, with a kind of nervousness to it and a strange familiarity. Good, Loraine thought grimly, before realizing that she should be encouraging people against the idea that she was Killer Rayne.

"'m not Killer Rayne," she muttered, her voice slurred from lack of use.

"Whoever you are, just eat," the voice said.

"Please?" asked the nervous female, when she received no response.

"No," growled Loraine.

"Look, if you want to get your strength back, just eat," pleaded the female. That had an effect on the stubborn viera,

Getting her strength back…maybe at one stage she could make a run for it? All the same, it was good to at least pretend to cooperate. Unwillingly, she nodded.

The blindfold was removed to show a little viera, slender, almost familiar, definitely nervous. She could see the girl shaking! As a result, the first thing out of her mouth once the blindfold was off was, "Do I know you?"

The viera's eyes widened in disbelief. "Raine?" Now, the realization of who that voice belonged to hit her like one of Kat's stray Ifrits between the eyes.

"Miserie!"