The Birth of Pain
Disclaimer: See Prologue.
A/N: I apologize profusely for the wait. My excuse is that the first draft of this chapter royally sucked but I couldn't muster the energy to start from scratch so for a while I was diverted from BoP by a FFX-characters-in-our world story which I may post soon under the working title Urban Fantasy. Anyway, now Birth of Pain is back and hopefully I can get out of the momentary block that has killed so many of my other fics. But I must finish this fic. I WILL finish this fic!
Edited: August 13, 2004
A Father.
The words rang in Auron's head, superseding all other thought.
He was going to be a Father.
The world seemed to tilt around him and he was only saved from a graceless fall to the floor by his proximity to the bed. Even then the extra support of his arm was a welcome balance.
"I found out this morning from the Healer when I told them about how I've been getting sick every morning," she smiled, "I think I already knew but I wanted to make sure before I told you."
"...Does anyone else know?" Auron asked, speaking the first coherent thoughts that came to mind.
"I think Rikku figured it out when I turned green at breakfast before she left for Home yesterday, but you are the first one I told. As if you wouldn't be!" Leyla laughed, taking a seat on his lap.
"So what do you think? A boy or a girl?" Leyla asked seriously.
"Either. It doesn't matter as long as it's our child," Auron said with complete honesty. He knew that most father's had a preference for sons, perhaps a predisposition that grew out of the desire to see a smaller version of themselves running around but the idea of a baby girl, perhaps with Leyla's beautiful eyes and something of him in her nose or mouth seemed equally attractive. Leyla's smile widened, obviously that had been the right answer.
"I almost forgot," Auron said, shifting her weight to the side so he could reach inside his coat. When his gloved hand emerged there was something wrapped around his fingers, shining in the afternoon light from the window.
It was a necklace.
Leyla's eyes widened in delight and she pulled her tightly braided hair away from her neck so Auron could do the clasp. It hung just below her collarbone like a silver flower suspended from simple chain the color of her hair. Its design was a strange one, like petals emerging from an upside-down heart.
"Oh, Auron, it's beautiful," Leyla said, "But how...? You only just found out about the child."
"I saw it in a shop while on my way to see Lord Braska," Auron shrugged, "It reminded me of you."
Leyla touched a finger to the pendant, tracing its design with her delicate white fingers. Leaning forward planted a kiss on Auron's lips that was returned fervently. Just as things began to escalate pleasantly a polite knock sounded at the door. Auron was the first to break it and Leyla scooted off his lap to allow him to stand.
"Enter," Auron called, a tinge of annoyance in his voice.
A sixteen year old boy with a shock red hair that turned orange at the tips poke his head into the room, oblivious to the fact he had just broken up what was fast becoming an intimate moment.
"What is it, Yanno?" Leyla sighed, walking towards the door. "My apprentice," she explained, glancing at Auron over her shoulder.
"Sorry if I interrupted anything, my lady mage, but we were supposed to meet for lessons a half hour ago," Yanno said.
"Why didn't you just take the day off then?" Leyla asked but the look of complete bafflement on the apprentice's face drew another sigh and she shrugged helplessly at Auron. "Perhaps you can go tell Lord Braska the news while I'm gone."
"I shall," he replied, at a loss for anything else to do with patrols done an hour ago. The idea of being a Father stilled swirled excitedly at the back of his thoughts, only mildly dampened by the interruption. Leyla kissed him chastely on the cheek as he passed by, the apprentice dodging out of the red-coated warrior-monks path.
The city was quiet today but there was a murmur of excitement beneath the calm facade that passed from person to person like an electric charge. Whatever the cause it was infectious and Auron was surprised to find a slight grin twitching the corner of his lips. Or perhaps that was just because of the child.
Auron knocked on Braska's door, knowing that at this time of the day the priest was certainly home to take care of little Yuna. Before Braska had come from Home with Rikku as his new wife he had lived in the temple like most of the other priests. However, the constant disapproval of the Yevon clergy had been wearing and the couple had moved into a modest home in the city in order to find some measure of peace.
Auron waited a moment but the silence that followed led him to knock again, this time more insistently.
Strange, he thought to himself, is it possible he's still out?
He a final time and was just about to leave when he heard a muffled sound from within. Taking that for an invitation to enter, he hesitantly cracked open the door and let himself in. The first thing he noticed was Yuna, now over six months old, asleep in her crib at the far side of the room near the entrance to the kitchen. The next was a crumpled form, lying just passed the open door to the bedroom.
"My lord!" Auron cried, running to the fallen priest's side. A wave of relief rushed through him as he took the man's shaking form into his arms and realized with a feeling like the ground giving way to a bottomless pit that Braska was crying.
The word had come this morning in the form of a jubilant Bevellian fisherman.
An Al Bhed ship that had been sighted leaving Bevelle the other day had been followed by a contingency of warrior-monks and Crusaders who saw this as their chance to discover the whereabouts of the Al Bhed Home. Few had known about the venture outside of the maesters and the crew, for even the teachings of Yevon were not enough to dissuade all Yevonites from fraternizing with the Al Bhed and a word in the wrong ear could ruin everything.
This was their chance to strike at the infidels, perhaps cripple them permanently. After an attack that destroyed the center of the Al Bhed population several options opened: allow the scattered remnants to be hunted down one by one until their race was eradicated or show mercy and bring them under the wing of Yevon on the condition that they swear permanent allegiance to Bevelle and convert in their entirety. Either outcome was favorable to the maesters.
They had briefly lost sight of the ship as it approached a large island under the cover of darkness but a refracted light had caught the eye of one of the crew members and the black sailed ship powered secretly by mechs had resumed its stalking.
Only their faith in Yevon had saved them from what happened next. Sin emerged from the water like a gargantuan misshapen whale, its toxin floating across the water in all directions, a swirling black miasma that drove all the members on board the Bevellian ship below deck. The sound of Spira's Suffering followed them below, inhuman moans and cries that rang in the men's head's even when they covered their ears to block out the sound, as if the death knells of the millions of Spirans who had succumbed to Sin over the past millennia were drilling inside their skulls in order to say that this was the suffering they had known before they died.
Then the real screams had begun.
Even the bravest and most weathered veterans of the warrior monks cringed in fear, some dropping down into a crouch, hands over their ears to stop the sound of screeching metal and tortured screams that were all too real. One young Crusader had run screaming for the deck, crying that he was a Crusader, damn it!, and he would fight to protect all the people of Spira, not just the faithful! Someone had had the presence of mind to knock the boy senseless with the pommel of their sword, thus silencing his protests. The Al Bhed did not deserve this boy's zeal or their lives.
Even with that in mind, however, many of the warriors who waited amongst the ragged gasps of their fellows, trying mentally to drown out the heathens' death cries could not stop the small corner of their thoughts that agreed with that reckless youth.
The trill of machina and crunch of metal had quieted but could still be heard in the distance throughout the night. The Crusaders and warrior-monks, sworn protectors of the people of Spira, stayed within their ship, afraid to move a muscle.
When morning came one brave soul had gone to the deck. What he saw worse than any scene of carnage dreamt up in nightmare.
The ship they had been tracking along with the entire island that had undoubtedly held the Al Bhed Home, was gone, reduced to flotsam and jetsam floating in and out on the tide. Had the man noticed he would have seen a single ship, a different one, larger, than that which they had been stalking the night before, fleeing the destruction.
Truly a great victory for Yevon.
The senior commander had been about to give the order to return to Bevelle with all speed and 'attracting Sin be damned' when the zealous young Crusader from the night before had approached him, sporting a large lump on the back of his head from where he had been struck, frantically telling the commander to hold his order.
The boy had been in training to become a Summoner the year before but his nerve had failed him outside the Cloister of Trials in Djose. Ashamed at his own cowardice he had given up on being a Summoner but could not shake his desire to help the people of Spira and so had become a Crusader.
All he asked now was the chance to direct the souls of the Al Bhed who had died here to the Farplane.
The senior commander had considered calling some of his own men to take the boy out of his sight. A failed Summoner, one that had given up his pilgrimage and his duty to defeat Sin and bring the Calm was lower than dirt but he could see the desperation bordering on frenzy in the boy's eyes and had relented. If Sin had not attacked them yet, then likely it it had moved on and another hour in this place would not make any difference. And besides, thousands of Al Bhed were bad enough but thousands of fiends would only make his job harder in the future. With a dismissive wave he had given the boy permission to perform the sending providing it took no more than an hour. The boy had thanked him profusely and run off in search of a staff.
The senior commander had seen many sendings but none of this magnitude. The boy had stepped out onto the water, still in his Crusader's armor, a borrowed black mage's staff in hand and began the sending dance with a circular swoop of his staff. His movements were shaky at first but they gained confidence with each practiced step. A geyser of water shot up beneath him, obscuring the boy from sight then revealing him again, dancing at the top without having missed a step. Hundreds of pyreflies began to swirl around him, then thousands, coming from miles around and engulfing the boy in a vortex.
A pyrefly floated lazily past the commander's face and despite himself he reached out to touch it.
...A baby girl, with mismatched blue and green eyes cradled in her arms...
... Gazing across the bed at a beloved husband, his long blue hair in a tangled pool around him as he slept after a night of lovemaking...
...warmth bubbling inside at the sight of her Home...
...Love...
...Betrayal...
Lost.
Whoever that woman had been was lost. The commander realized he was weeping silently at the loss of life. Of Al Bhed life. But for once it didn't matter and the sheer magnitude of pyreflies that obscured the young Crusader from sight suddenly lost its beauty and became monstrous as each shining streak became a piece of what had once been a living, breathing person who had laughed and loved just as any follower of Yevon.
It did not surprise him to see tears in the eyes of those around him as the Crusader twirled the staff one last time, holding it upside-down as the geyser diminished. For a moment the boy seemed to glow with power as he strode back to the ship, his last step landing him gracefully on the deck. A single pyrefly disappeared into the sky behind him and was lost from sight.
No words were spoken as the ship made its solemn way back to Bevelle Port. Those who had seen the display disembarked and returned to their families if they had them, the need to see and hold their loved ones driving all thoughts of duty from their mind. Those who had not spread the news, saying the time of Atonement, when Sin disappeared for good was perhaps near at hand for the heathen Al Bhed had been nearly eradicated along with their machina.
The senior commander and announced his resignation that day.
The young Crusader, having found new resolve, re-donned his Summoner's robes and resumed his pilgrimage.
And Braska had learned from a jubilant Bevellian fisherman, smirking at the genocide of the Al Bhed, that his wife was dead.
"My lord, what has happened?!" Auron asked as Braska sobbed like a child in his arms.
"She's dead... oh, Yevon... I-I...so muja ec tayt!" Braska cried. "Sin has taken her!" and with that his words degenerated back into sobs.
"Rikku is dead?" Auron said, the words sounded unreal.
"All of the Al Bhed are gone," Braska rasped.
"But my lord, that is impossible! How could..." The words stuck in his throat. "Sin."
"Sin destroyed her ship then her Home," Braska said, his voice ragged and hoarse. "My love is dead." He swayed to his feet and crossed the room to his daughter's crib. Her mismatched eyes were closed in and her delicate pink lips were parted as she slept on despite the noise, unaware of her loss.
Braska stroked her downy soft hair, twisting the light brown strands between his fingers. "This world is not safe for you, Yuna. I have tried to protect you all of your life and your mother as well," another tear slid down his cheek, "But in the end I could not. I am...so sorry."
"Its not your fault, my lord," Auron said, "There are some things that you cannot change. Only a Summoner could have stopped Sin."
Braska looked at him, his startling blue eyes all the more so for the red that rimmed them, and for a moment Auron was afraid. Afraid of the strange light that he saw flickering in his friend's eyes. He blinked at its intensity but when he looked back it was gone, leaving him to wonder if it had just been his imagination. "You're right, Auron. Only a Summoner can protect Yuna from Sin."
"My lord?" Auron's eyes widened in realization, "No, my lord! You can't become a Summoner! Who then would care for Yuna?" Auron said. Braska's shoulders sagged and he stopped his idle tracing of Yuna's features.
"Don't worry, Auron. I would not leave Yuna alone," Braska said. "Why did you come here, Auron?" Braska asked suddenly, catching the warrior-monk off-guard.
"My lord, this may not be the time to tell you..." Auron said.
"Please, Auron," Braska said with a pained expression, "What news could be any worse that what I have already heard today?"
"Leyla...is with child, my lord, she is due in six months," an idea struck him; "If it is a girl perhaps we could name her in memory of Rikku."
The skin around Braska's eyes tightened for a second, "No. But thank you, Auron, for your consideration. I would...rather not have another bear Rikku's name. It was hers and one of the few things I have to remember her by," Images of his beautiful Al Bhed wife flashed through his mind and tears returned unbidden to his eyes.
"Congratulations, Auron, may the three of you have many happy years together. If you'll excuse me..." Auron bowed his head respectfully and closed the door quietly as he left his friend with his daughter and his grief.
1) So muja ec tayt!
My love is dead!
A/N: Thank you for reading. The next chapter is hopefully going to be the best so to get it fast please review to show how much you love (or hate, flames don't bother me unless they have proper spelling and grammar) me.
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