Avari: bashes head against wall I hate the uploading issues. Hate them, hate them, hate them. But thanks for pointing them out along with the misspelling of Conservato's name.
Daidairo: My head just defied the square-cube theorem. Either that, or I'm dead and still capable of typing.
Freek: There's a fine line between magic and insanity.
MiraiEvo: I'd been looking forward to the flashback with Lunpa for a long time so I'm glad you liked it. And yes, there are WAY too many subplots; it's starting to be a bit of mental juggling.
Rozzlyn: First off, I must congratulate you on doing what I thought was impossible. You are now the Reviewer of the Longest Review, beating the former holder by total of three words.Well done.
Thank you. And I aim that more than one would think at your comment at Piers' relationship with Andrew and the comments on Oliver; I edited and edited, but they've never seemed to come out right. Your opinion was very helpful and, at the least, very encouraging.
End of Response Section
I remember how way back, I jokingly said that if the pace slowed down, I wouldn't have this done before 2005. The pace slowed down. Eight days until 2005. I think I'll try for 2006 instead.
Anyway, as I doubt I'll update within the next eight days(though you never know; feel free to email me and tell me to get back on my lazy butt and start writing if it's been a week), I'll tell you now that I hope you enjoy the holidays or whatever time you've got off. And long live Santa Hats, the joy-giving headgear that promotes commercialism.
Disclaimer: Rallalon does not own Golden Sun, any of its characters, items or locations. Nor does she own couches, shelves, mats, puddles, lessons, cliffs, dirt or nonexistent voices. She does own the word "Caely" when it's used to refer to a caline.
:begin:
He'd been at this for days. Actually, the clock in the room told him it had only been a few hours, but he had lived through days. And days. And days.
And Adrian was getting rather sick of it. Currently, he was taking a break, seated on a couch, taking turns staring at the door hanging and the tapestry. Lemurian or not, there was only so many of these disorienting trips a person could make in a day. This was by far the weirdest thing he'd ever done and, once the small amount of novelty wore off, it gave him the most awkward sensation.
He was prying into his king's memories. Prying into anyone's memories was rude, far too intimate, and . . . well, prying. Prying into the king's memories was . . . undoubtedly worse.
"Crrreow."
Adrian reached down from his seat and gave the caline an absentminded pat before scratching it behind the ears. "I need to find some order to this, caely," he mumbled to the animal. "How does Picard, uh, Kings Piers know which has what? I should know the way he thinks by now . . . That's probably the reason why the lock's so hard to get past; otherwise the other Senators could . . ."
As he trailed off, his hand stopping its scratching, he became rather unsettling aware of the magnitude of what he'd done. He'd entered without permission before hitting onto something that could, and would if revealed, be, if not the completion, the furthering of King Piers' downfall.
And, after learning so much, the thought of that downfall gave him a new sort of dread to go along with the ones he had already had: a personal one. If so many glances made up a look, then he'd been staring long and hard at what made the king who he was, and he'd found he rather liked the man. He hadn't a clue as to what the king thought of him as of yet but that was beside the point. He would keep trying; King Piers deserved it.
Taking a long, controlled breath, he rose from his seat, telling himself that it was uncomfortable anyway. A few quick steps led him to the shelves. He held his hand out, nearly touching a crystal he was sure he hadn't "peeked in" before. Another breath. Another.
"Crreow. . ."
"I know, I know," he told the creature, his hand still hovering above the crystal.
"Admit it! You're one of the Champa, aren't-"At the sound of the strange, harsh voice, Adrian wheeled about and ducked, hiding behind the couch. Hearing nothing but the sound of a frightened caline scampering away, he peeked over the furniture.
No one was there.
That was . . . peculiar. An affect from too much contact with the crystals? He looked about again and noticed something else: Where'd Aquae's pet go? "Here, caely-caely-caely," Adrian called quietly before stopping. Talking loudly in these rooms was just . . . disrespectful. And, truth be told, having the caline with him was a comfort he go without for a few moments.
Yet another somewhat steadying breath.
Adrian straightened and inspected the crystal he'd had his hand over. Maybe . . . He put his hand back over it and tried to get close to it without touching. Nothing happened, besides how one of his fingers twitched.
"Crrrreow."
Twitch. Breathe.
"Admit it! You're-"Twitch and pull away. Breathe. Touch.
The now somewhat familiar sensation of being in King Piers' body came over him once more and this time, the man was in clothes he was very comfortable, if unusually unclean, in. He was indoors, staring at wall that seemed to be made of dried something. It looked dirty. As did the floor that was only partially covered by something resembling a grass mat, even dirtier than the floor. Adrian couldn't mesh his mental image of the king and this place. By the salt, why would anyone go to a place like this?
There was something new here, though. There was some emotion King Piers was feeling that was completely unlike anything Adrian had ever felt from him. It was a ferocious rage, barely kept in check. And under this, to his complete disbelief, was a fierce panic.
In the other memories, he had been angry, confused, thrown-off his guard in varying degrees or sorrow-filled. Never, not once, had he been this afraid, this terrified. This young or inexperienced.
"Admit it! You're a Champa, aren't you Piers?" That was what Adrian had heard before, the very same words and voice!King, er, Mariner Piers shook, from rage or fear Adrian couldn't determine.
"Speak!" anther voice commanded. "Or let your silence condemn you!"
Piers shook his head and stated as calmly as he could, "I told you already . . . I'm not a Champa."
"Then where did you come from?" the second demanded, still using his harsh tone.
Adrian recoiled mentally as the younger version of his king took a few steps to the center of his cell. That's was this place was: a jail cell. But why would King Piers be in a jail cell? When he was innocent of what he was accused,Adrian added mentally, knowing somehow that it was true. "The heart of the EasternSea . . . If I told you where, you'd never believe me." That, sadly, was the truth as well.
This only fueled the man's already angry mood. "Look at me when I'm talking to you! Are you trying to mock me?!"
Adrian felt the . . . mariner frown as he was reminded of Conservato and the man's claims that he was not fit for what King Hydros wished of him. Conservato didn't think he could manage anything on his own. He'd show the lord that he didn't need help once he completed his quest!
Picard Piers turned about to face the brown-haired man, his grip on his temper slipping. How long had he been in here? How many cold nights spent sleeping fitfully on a poor excuse for a mat? How many times had he been over this? He wasn't a Champa! Whatever it was. "I implore you," he said, still outwardly calm though his tone was not of one who begged, "do not anger me."
The brown-haired man smiled in a manner more than slightly unpleasant. "Oh, do you? So what's doing to happen if I make you angry?"
Before the not-yet-king could make a retort, the first man, black-haired and possibly a guard, turned to the angry one. "Hey, Shin . . . Maybe you should go easy on him . . ."
The angry man, Shin, turned to the guard and yelled a reply. "Hey, it wasn't your girlfriend who got hurt!"
There was an opening here; an act of healing would bring gratitude. "I'm sorry she was injured, but I cannot-"
"I don't want your sympathy, freak!" Shin raged, glowering. "I want you to get angry for me!"
-heal her unless you let me out!
The feeling that coursed through the mariner was highly hostile. Neither of the two experiencing it liked it. "Stop, please . . . Even my patience has its limits."
"Hey," said Shin to the guard, "don't you want to see what he'll do?"
The guard had the good grace to look nervous. "I think we should just stop . . ."
What Shin would've done yet, the mariner didn't wait to find out. He had left his homeland and though it had been unwillingly and by complete accident, he was going to have left anyway. To help these people. Indirectly, of course, but to help them all the same! And only the elder thought him a good man, but could be moons in proving it! He would have offered healing to these people! How dare this toddler of a man, all the toddlers of this town, accuse him of piracy!
The mariner's gaze landed on Shin and the puddle he was standing, Adrian burning with the other man's rage. "If my words will not cool your temper, then . . ." FrostAdrian heard Piers mentally command the water under the fool's feet.
A column up ice shot up from under the imbecile and knocked him over. The man promptly ran out of the jail, yelling something along the lines of: "Waaaaaaaaaahh!"
The guard looked to him fearfully, "Did you do that?"
". . . What did your friend expect?" Adrian was relieved when Picard closed his eyes, unable to stand the fright in the other's eyes.
"You monster!"
Picard's eyes shot open. "I . . ." He hadn't meant to harm Shin. He hadn't, really; just frightened him. He- he'd deserved it, provoked him. "I am no monster."
His words did nothing to dissuade the guard's growing terror. "Help!!!" the man screamed and ran past a group of four.
What have I done? Picard asked himself, appalled. As the mariner grew steadily more horrified at his rash and harmful actions, Adrian knew that this was not the same man he barely knew. Not yet. He would be, someday. But not yet.
The group approached. "Piers, wasn't it?" one of them asked conversationally, a cloaked one who both Piers and Adrian assumed was the oldest by his gray hair. None of the group seemed to be afraid, but curious instead, of which he was grateful. It was reassuring, no matter how depressed the younger boy seemed.
"Picard Piers, yes." He paused. "Ah . . . When will that kindly elder return and end my imprisonment?" he asked them. "I have no time to wait, but I don't want to have to hurt anyone. . ." Not that it stopped me with Shin . . .
The transition left Adrian disoriented as always. He shuddered and wished he could rid himself of the experience. Why would King Piers wish to save that . . . rage, terror and guilt? He had nauseated himself and yet he'd chosen to remember it, to hold on to how he had once been.
There was a lesson in that, if Adrian could bring himself to look. However, there was another thing he had learned from the experience. First, holding one's hand over a crystal long enough would allow a person to hear the words of a memory. Possibly, if he were to close his eyes, he would see it as well without fully entering the memory.
Second, King Piers had gone on a quest. This was more than likely part of the world-saving thing Alabaster Conservato had mentioned in another of the king's memories. Those he had met in the jail cell might well have been four of the . . . what, eight companions? It was a start. And he knew the voice of one them as well as the appearances of four at one point of their lives.
Though he was deeply shaken from his mental image of King Piers, he had never been surer that he was onto something.
:elsewhere:
What in the name of the Elements . . .
He was standing at the edge of a cliff, the salty spray and crashing roar of the ocean reaching him from down below. He knelt down and looked over, wondering way the water looked the way it did as his hands rested on the dirt-covered stone. The sea – his Psynergy told him it wasn't large enough to be an ocean – seemed weak and insubstantial, as if, in a way, it had become less dense in terms of both matter and Psynergy.
Or maybe the water was the same, but the rock different, sturdier, more solid. But why would either of water or rock be so? Or was he just imagining it?
No matter what the answer was, peering over the edge like this was making him dizzy. He got up carefully, rubbing his hands together to get some of the dirt off, only now realizing how precarious his position was. Leaning over a long drop like that with his back to a forest where any hostile creature or person could…
Forest?
He focused his full attention on the trees, his back now to the sea. Had those been there a moment ago?
Of course they had! They were trees; trees didn't just plant themselves down when a person's back was turned! He'd just been too confused to notice them before. That had to be it. But it was very quiet for a forest…
Where had the roar of the sea gone?
He turned back around and nearly fell over from shock, barely catching himself in time. The sea was gone. Just… gone. In the few moments he hadn't been looking, it had transformed into another forest, or another part of the forest. He realized his hands had touched grass and that he could tell that there was no longer bare dirt under his boots.
A frightening question occurred to him: Why hadn't he felt the water go?
Making himself remain calm, he focused on using his Psynergy. There was nothing. Nothing was there. He tried again, harder, still trying to fight back panic.
"Be at ease, Mariner King, for there will be no lasting harm. It has been absorbed, but it will return to you."
Startled once more, he turned around yet again. There was woman standing among the trees. He hadn't heard her approach and neither had he seen her when studying the trees, though he still had the impression that he'd seen her somewhere before. There was something wrong with her speech, as if she were but repeating sounds that held no meaning. Something was most wrong here.
"You speak of my Psynergy." Something told him that he needn't make it a question. "What has it been absorbed into? If it's gone, why aren't I dead?"
"Moisture disappears into the sand, the droplets into the roots, hidden yet present."
No, there was meaning there; he just couldn't find it. The words were as much of Psynergy as they were of sound waves, giving him an inexplicable feeling that he was only understanding a sliver of the message, the rest as beyond his grasp as the horizon. Her words did have meaning, but not as words, not as anything he could comprehend.
But who… The reason behind the familiarity abruptly came into the light. "Mirante Veinu." It shouldn't have taken him that long to realize. Who… what else would have greeted him here? "What has it been absorbed into?" he repeated, knowing the other's statement answered his second question.
There was no answer from Mirante Veinu besides a level gaze, telling him that answering was something she did not intend to do. Or had already done.
She chose to make a statement that he was sure wasn't an answer. "Ye who seek to climb Venus Lighthouse, the lady knows your desires." Yet again, the full message didn't come through.
Cryptic, as he had suspected it would be and would obviously be again. He asked anyway. "What do you mean?"
"What do you fear, Mariner King?"
Immediately, a mental shield went up and he blinked to find a watery wall separating him from the human version of the Lighthouse. A quick look proved the barrier was on all sides; his breath caught for an instant. Had he just . . . ? He hadn't used Psynergy, that was for sure . . .
"What do you fear, Mariner King?"
This was a Lighthouse, not a human and definitely not anyone interested in Lemurian politics; being so, why would she . . . it ask?
Mirante Veinu waited for an answer.
The wall wavered and, hesitantly, went down. Half a moment of thought brought him back to a jail cell all those years ago. ". . . Small places. Being left alone."
"Not all the isolated are unhappy, not all the surrounded content."
"Loneliness, then," he corrected himself.
"Mariner King, do you fear Death?"
Blunt. Very . . . blunt. "Whose?" Andrew's, yes. Oliver's, yes. The Djinn, assuming they ever would, yes.
"Your own," she asked the man who had lived too far beyond his years.
"No."
The ground vanished from under his feet, leaving him to plummet to unknown depths.
:elsewhere:
Gary sat down heavily on the Aerie floor, facing the floating platforms that led to the down-going elevator. He kept staring at them, trying to figure them out. The cold stone quickly chilled his rear, but he didn't stand. Anything to ignore it, anything. It hovered behind the edges of vision, giving him the feeling that a quick turn of the head would reveal the physical form of the presence. He refused to look just as he refused to hear the words aimed at him in another language, words he would understand the moment he wished it, words muted through his own will. It took conscious effort, but his breathing stayed regular.
"Ga- ah… Hey." Jen sat down next to him, pulling her right leg up to her chest, resting her arm on her raised knee. "So."
"Yep."
"Okay then."
Thankfully, Jen was distracted at the moment by her cousin ranting up on the level above them. Gary looked past her and up the stairs, listening.
"You two are staying away from the beacon. You are staying away from the edge. As am I. Absolutely no falling, you hear me?" There was an edge to his tone that was more than slightly commanding or a tad bit paranoid. "And, yes, Menardi, I am ordering you around. But no one, and I mean no one, is going to fall off. Understood?"
Falling . . . Gary immediately stomped on that train of thought, not liking the memor- Not memories. Not memories.
He turned his gaze to his left, staring off the Lighthouse, feeling the chilly air blow past him. Somehow he knew he wouldn't be blown off despite how his only hold - if it could be called that - was his hands resting on the cold stone. Gary shuddered and screwed up his eyes in concentration. He was not going to listen to some nonexistent voice in his head, because it was nonexistent.
Unexpectedly, a gentle warmth and weight came to rest on the top of his hand. Gary stifled his impulse to twitch as he quickly realized it wasn't one of those Djinn things. How he knew so immediately without looking he was unsure, but it might've had something to do with how it felt like hand.
His fingers intertwined with those of the girl sitting next to him, taking comfort in her silent support.
:elsewhere:
A yell burst from his lungs as he fell, the side of the hole to far from his reach. Instinctively, he reached anyway, grabbing out at the wall of dirt only to hurt his hand when contact was finally made. He grabbed again and again, trying to stop his fall, the sound being ripped out of his mouth, the air rushing past his ears. He was falling, falling, falling, on and on and on, down, down, down, never ending, always going down, down, down, faster, faster, faster!
It stopped.
Cutting off his yell, he tumbled forward onto his hands and knees, breathing deeply as he sunk his fingers into the grass covered soil. His heartbeat was pounding in his head and he felt oddly limp, as if he'd just gone through something exhausting, which, in fact, he had. Trembling from nerves and the adrenaline still racing through him, he took a few shaking breaths as he raised his eyes to the… person before him, separated by the semi-transparent wall that had reappeared.
His gaze was met levelly. Mirante Veinu waited for him to move.
He gathered his wits tighter and forced himself to be calm, the walls rapidly becoming thicker and coming closer, too close. Far too close!
The wall sped back only to return as he braced himself. Out . . . in . . . out . . . in . . . While it wasn't exactly control, he had at least the power to affect the wall. In fact, it would make sense that he had made the wall as well. Mentally. Which makes this wall alright, he told himself unconvincingly.
Mirante Veinu was still waiting, observing. What did she . . . it want? He asked her… it… the Lighthouse the question.
"Much is unknown, Mariner King."
Cryptic. This would take a while.
:elsewhere:
Breathe in… Breathe out… "Dolgorukii."
Satornil turned to her, breaking off a tense conversation with Dr. Crade, a slight raise of the eyebrow forming an unspoken question: "Aren't we on a first name basis?"
Makrina ignored it and chose to carry out what she had planned, speaking in Russian so no others would understand. Well, Matthew might, but he some tact; besides, he seemed busy arguing with the Brazilian girl.
'For some reason, that doesn't surprise me,' Menardi told her. 'Now go for it. If you think you have to, then you have to.'
"There's something I've been meaning to talk to you about," she continued in her first-language, using Menardi's ever-present determination to keep herself from stopping.
Satornil nodded, following her to the side. "Of course."
There was a pause and Makrina found herself staring at the other's ears, hoping something would be given away. No such luck; he was holding his ears in a neutral position.
She took a steadying breath while trying to seem as if she weren't. "You remember when Menardi joined with me?" When I kissed you. It was more of a statement than a question.
The ears still gave nothing away. He had to either have no influence on them or be controlling them; there was no other way they could be so still. Satornil nodded, his face a still mask. "You were most likely compelled to do so. Some of their last moments were together in a way that made them one person. Coupled with their obvious attraction to one another . . ."
"Exactly."
"I understand."
"So everything's settled between us. Back to the way it was before."
"Yes."
"Good."
Satornil nodded and broke what was sure to become an awkward silence by walking away. Everything was sorted out and the way it should've been.
But then why did she feel as if she'd just stabbed herself in the chest?
Her attention was drawn away from that feeling as Menardi noticed the Lighthouse beacon acting up again.
:elsewhere:
"Physical shall rejoin physical," Mirante Veinu told him, somewhat randomly. The problem was that nearly all of the comments seemed random and would only cease to be so if he had enough time to think of them, if he was capable of grasping all that was implied.
He didn't bother to ask what she meant. Asking left him stranded, though waiting for questions to answer left him bored. But he was Lemurian. So he waited.
"Mariner King."
She waited.
"Yes?"
"Prepare yourself for an experience."
"What sort of experi-"
Everything changed.
It was like living in a forest and discovering the wide sky of a plain. The grandness and sheer enormity of what he perceived was awe-inspiring and fear-provoking. Everything was new and different and amazing. He was filled with wonder and pain and longing, the sensations of being physical replaced with something else, something that couldn't be described by words. It was something that made words unnecessary, fulfilling their purpose, even as it made the having of words more wonderful.
It was a cross of touch and smell, of hearing and taste. He could see in a way he could never have before, a way eyes did not allow. There was no contrast, nothing to be compared to what he saw and felt and experienced. Nothing could be compared to itself and it was everything. Truly, it was everything: the world, the Elements, the very fabric of what he thought of as reality.
But that fabric changed and flowed as he saw it, only the grandeur and magnificence of it remaining the same. It was disgusting and beautiful in every sense of both words at once. It was physical and it was emotional; it was everything that had ever existed and it was all extraordinary and horrendous, every last bit of it. Flowing sorrow and solid rage; glee in tangible form. It almost didn't matter what it was; the sheer act of experiencing, knowing, discovering made every nuance wondrous.
And then it changed again. It was different and yet familiar, as if he had only to re-adjust and then everything would make sense. There was a sort of pressure as well as a noise. The pressure was all . . . around, like an outline, and the sound was coming from beyond that.
There was a feeling that there was something not . . . solid, that was the word, moving against that outline as that outline . . . moved. It stopped moving.
The sounds began to change, taking on a frantic edge: "Milord is not breathing! He's stopped breathing!"
"Don't panic, Andrew!" Rather abruptly, a new pressure, a solid one, pushed in on the outline and moved it. Something within the outline moved as a reaction. A gasp, that's what it was called. It made what was inside the outline feel . . . improved. It kept happening, in a more relaxed manner. "Picard's head just needed re-adjusting."
There was another sound that he knew meant something was amusing. A laugh. "I never thought we'd ever actually have to use what we learned in health class." A laugh at . . . irony, maybe? But it seemed . . . tense, that was it. Tense and worried. Over what? Over "Milord"? Over "Picard"?
Him! Over him!
Picard's eyes shot open, golden eyes staring up at person he recognized as Ian. Eyes, his eyes, part of his head, his body, what made him physical . . .
"Milord!"
Andrew! Within moments, Picard had pushed himself up, with a little help from Ian, into a sitting position. The pair of Lemurians stared at each other for a short length, Picard taking everything in, all that his senses told him and all that he felt emotionally. Then, as he felt the younger man give a surprised jerk from being unexpectedly hugged, Picard realized what it was he had felt before during his . . . experience. Laughter built up inside him and burst out.
Life. That's what it had been.
Marvelous and repulsive life.