Chapter Three
Our Good-Byes
When Jonas finally woke up, he was back in his room. He looked outside, it was dark. How long was he out? He groggily rose to his feet and shuffled to the kitchen, hearing someone moving around there.
The person in the kitchen stepped out, a young lady not much older than Jonas. "Well, look who finally decided to get up!" she smiled, "Dinner's been ready for a while now, and I was kinda hoping you'd stay asleep so I could splash water on you like I always do."
Jonas laughed, "Sorry, sis, guess you didn't get to have any fun."
They ate their meal in general silence, as most of their dinners were. It wasn't from any family differences, it's just that Jonas was never good at starting conversations and his sister Adrienne never found anything interesting to talk about. Today was different, though. Adrienne put her utensils down and said, "Tomorrow."
Jonas nodded, knowing what she was talking about. He swallowed his bite, "Tomorrow" he repeated.
"Truth be told," Adrienne began, pushing her plate aside, "I can't tell whether I should pray you succeed, or pray that you fail.
"What are you talking about? Why would you want your own flesh and blood to fail?
"You know what'll happen if you succeed." She said simply, her hands strategically placed over her quivering lips.
Jonas sighed. He thought he was going to have to go through this with her sooner of later. "Look," he began, prepared to give the speech he had rehearsed in his head over and over. "You know my friends, Sain and Arthas? Arthas lost his mother to Sin, and Sain lost both of his parents. I… I wanna make a world where people like me can have peace of mind knowing their loved ones are safe from it." Adrienne was about to speak, but Jonas cut in, "I know the concept of my dieing isn't very plausible, but look at it this way: there are hundreds of summoners out there, probably better than I am, they are all after the same thing, so the chances I'll be the first is…" he trailed off, knowing this probably wasn't helping.
Adrienne finally piped up, picking up her fork, "If you end up dying and you bring the Calm," she said, her voice breaking, "I will understand that, and I can move on. But if you end up being killed by something trivial like a fiend or a stupid bandit…" she pointed her fork at him, her voice suddenly becoming angry, "I'll kill you! I don't care if you're already dead; I'll dig ya up, breathe like back inta ya, and then kill you again! Got it lil' bro?"
Jonas beamed, then threw his hands up in mock horror, "Oh no Sis!" he screamed, "Don't kill me with your fork of doom! I'm too young to die, come back then die again!"
Adrienne leapt from her seat and tackled Jonas to the ground, unmercifully tickling his little brother till he squirmed.
"Hey stop! Stop that!" Jonas protested between raucous laughter, tearing, "I'm a summon- hahahaha! I need… heeheehee… to be more hero like. Summoners don't… hohoho…. Get tickled."
The sound of his high pitched, frenzied laughter echoed through the night as the tension finally lifted in their house.
V
Arthas opened the door to his home and plopped down at the kitchen table, where his little brother was busy stabbing his meal with the fork. "Where's Adonis?" Arthas asked, grabbing a plate obviously meant for him.
"Upstairs," the child replied, not taking his eyes off his food, "With a lady."
That was all Arthas needed to hear. Arthas' older brother was more than a bit famous for knowing the names of all of the neighborhoods young ladies. He always boasted at having bedded ninety-nine women, though that was probably a lie, because he probably used that one boast ninety-nine times himself. Aramis (Whoever decided to give the three names that began with the same letter was anyone's guess.) Author's Note: (Clears throat) Arthas's younger brother, hopefully didn't know what "Upstairs with a lady" meant, but he was a sharp kid.
"You know," Aramis said, still engrossed on probing the food, "Things are gonna be different here with you gone."
"Different how exactly? It's not like I do anything important here."
"The food's gonna be lousy." Aramis remarked sourly.
"What?" Arthas laughed, "Come on, it can't be that bad, can it?"
Aramis picked up the plate and showed it to him, "Do you know what this is? Do you? 'Cause I don't. This barely looks edible, let alone good! It looks like a squatter monkey mud pie!"
Despite himself, Arthas couldn't help but laugh at the childish opinion of what looked like some kind of casserole. "Aramis," he said, blinking away tears, "Don't worry about it. I will be coming back, it's not like I'm going to some other country, and I'll try and drop you a line every now and then." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pouch of Gil. "Listen, When you finally can't stand Adonis' cooking, tell him to take you to some restaurant, my treat."
Aramis took the Gil, probably more than he had saved up and nodded. He then whipped his head to the open window. "What's wrong?" Arthas asked.
"I think… I just heard some kid being tickled to death."
V
Sain knelt before two markers, tombstones marking the burial sites of his parents:
Felix and Sierra Kontei
Crusader Chapter XXVII
Died before Lord Braska's Calm
Attacked by SinSpawn
Southern bank-Moonflow outside path
"Hi" Sain began, talking to the tombs, "I'm leaving, first light tomorrow. I know what you'd say. Mom would say, 'It's too dangerous. He can't fight Sin; my little boy is too weak and innocent blah-blah-blah' and Dad would be all, 'Let him go, Sierra. He's old enough to decide for himself. Let him go fight Sin, after all, that's how we met.' And than you'd get all romantic right in font of me, kissing and huggin'…" he shuddered, "Well, these guys are my friends, I've told you about them. Jonas wants to save the world and what not, so I'm going to help him. We-we're..." he trailed off, his attention wandering to the weirdest noise. Laughter? A little girl being tickled, perhaps? "We're going to bring the Calm again, you'll see." He stood and walked slowly to his home, relieved he didn't really have to argue with his parents.