xxx
"What honor is there in death?"
- Balbanes "the Siegebreaker" Beoulve to Cidolfus "Thunder God" Orlandeau, at the Siege of Riovanes.
xxx
Chapter 9: End of the Line
Every morning, Delita woke up as the sun first rose in the sky, its blinding rays making him squint as he peered upwards at it, shading his face with a hand. The chills of the night before still plagued him, and he clenched his fist as he glared against the light, feeling just as powerless as he did the night before.
Once again, he couldn't do a damn thing. He was left behind, endlessly chasing after the back of the two leaders of the company. As the Beoulve scion's ostensible adjutant, it was his job to stand at Ramza's side, supporting them, and yet… It hadn't felt like he was the one standing at Ramza's side in a long time.
He grit his teeth as he walked, marching towards the same place he always did: slightly away from the camp, but not so far that he couldn't still hear the murmurs of people waking and moving around. Around him was nothing but grass and hills, the winds whispering quiet words into his ears as he stood still, taking a deep breath.
He closed his eyes, and painted a picture in his head. The battlefield of his mind's eye was small and focused - a square where only two bodies could stand. Inside of this area, no one else could exist. A faceless opponent, holding a sword and shield. Delita took a step forward, slamming his elbow into a shield, before his sword pierced an imaginary gut. The faceless opponent fell, and Delita returned to position.
Every morning, after he woke, Delita fought a hundred times in his head. And for every opponent he fought, he slowly improved. Agonizingly, at a pace like a snail, but it was an improvement.
Delita Heiral was so ordinary it was surprising. The sword he held was simple and easily replaceable. The leather on his body was well-worn. His technique was straight out of the textbook. There was no flair, trick, or deceit inside his sword. In another world, Delita would have been praised for his technique; a gold standard that all cadets could be measured by.
But this was a world of violence.
When Delita saw them in combat, he had felt in his soul. Deep in his heart, he had known, even if he wanted to deny it.
He grit his teeth, and pictured a blond boy. Slightly taller then Delita himself, holding a spear in one hand and a sword on the other. There was a grin on his lips, as he raised the sword at Delita, a question in his eyes.
Delita took a step forward, barely managing to dodge the spear as it came shooting at him, feeling it clip past his arm. His blade cut through the air, but it was slow. The other boy's arms moved like a whirlwind, his body twisting as he blocked the blade with his spear, before lightning carved across his sword as he raised it, a smile on his lips. His hair covered one of his eyes, the other glinting as he mouthed a phrase:
Sorry, Del.
Delita fell on his back staring at the sky as he breathed. He could hear Degurechaff in his other ear, yammering away. What a disgusting display of ineptitude, Heiral. Beoulve's so obvious in his tells it's almost pathetic. Couldn't you see that his sword tinged with mana before he moved? It's not like he hides it or anything.
In his heart, he knew. But he had to try. He stood up, and built the monster in his head. His hands shook as she walked forward, her staff tapping against the ground. She smiled, a thin dangerous line on her face as she cocked her head to the side, leaning forward as she raised her staff in the air.
Well, Heiral?
Even in his head, she was more abrasive than an animal caught in a trap.
He obliged her, raising his blade as he dashed forward, his arms lunging in front of him as he tried to stab her -
- But she vanished with a flicker, and when he whirled around, a katana was aimed at his throat.
He lost.
Even in his head, he couldn't defeat them. He couldn't even touch them.
There are two types of combatants: the talented and the talentless. Those who achieve their results without any efforts at all, and those who must work hard to see even the slightest improvement.
Delita Heiral was a fighter without talent. He fought like a book come to life. And he knew in his heart that Ramza and Degurechaff were nothing like him.
They had left talent behind, and entered the realm of monsters.
No matter whichever poor soul the noble boy managed to drag into a duel, the space between himself and Ramza had long since become a chasm. Chasing after him seemed beyond impossible. The clock had ticked forward without him noticing, and suddenly the boy standing at his side had climbed a mountain.
It is not as if I'd leave you behind, Ramza admonished him in his head. You think too lowly of yourself, Delita.
As if, Degurechaff retorted. Let's look at Heiral's achievements so far as battle commander: preparing for night maneuvers so poorly that I could have taken our campsite alone, losing both of his superiors, and sustaining no injuries only through the grace of the enemy, may he look at them like God.
Now Degurechaff-
Delita tuned them out. The abduction might turn out to be a blessing in disguise: the amount of time he spent around Degurechaff and Ramza was starting to affect him. He didn't need their damned voices in his head.
He readied his sword again, and started to raise it -
"Training again, Heiral?"
Delita turned with a deep breath, lowering his sword as he glanced at the speaker. A blonde with bright green eyes stood nearby, arching her back as she crossed her hands high above her head, stretching her body with a sigh. She wore dark colors, as always - Vinya always preferred a blend of dark blues and blacks over all else. She watched him with pursed lips, arching an eyebrow when he met her eyes.
"Aye," he said, raising his sword and taking a swing. "Our loss was an embarrassment. Ramza and Degurechaff won't be pleased if we don't improve ourselves before their return."
"You say that as if you expect them to escape."
"Do you not?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "Do you expect them to simply sit and wait for us?"
She clicked her tongue, before turning away. The girl stared out at the hills, the ash of last night already having been blown away by the wind.
"...I feel useless," Vinya said, her shoulders sagging. "Degurechaff and Beoulve - what are we but chains attached to their ankles?"
Without comrades, why would we march towards death, Hieral?
"Neither would view their subordinates in such a way, Villipede," Delita said as he lowered his sword, glancing at the blonde. "Do you truly have such little faith in our superiors?"
Vinya looked away, staring at a blackened tree in the distance. It stood alone on a hill of flowers, but the ground around it was barren and covered in ash - it had been struck by lightning, a monument to the awesome wrath of nature.
"They need guidance as much as you or I," Delita said, raising his sword once more and taking a deep breath. "Do you believe Degurechaff is capable of brewing a decent coffee? Ramza, a fair cook? Look at the position we're in now. It's all the fault of our good-for-nothing superiors, in the end."
It's Beoulve's fault, brat that he is. Oooooh, Tanya, please don't kill the good-for-nothing bandit! What if she has a family, Tanya? Wouldn't you feel bad, Tanya?
Degurechaff, is it not crass to mock our enemies in such a manner? While they may be brigands, they are as deserving of kindness as you or I.
And now we're both kidnapped, Beoulve. Whose fault is that?
...Don't blame yourself. Blame fate. Or God.
Beoulve, you lousy-
"And you propose we simply go after them? Not return to Lord Dycedarg, not ask for reinforcements, just go off without a plan?"
Vinya's words broke Delita free of the argument he was watching between two people who weren't here. It was frustrating, leading. He hated being in charge. Having to make the decisions that decide who lived or died. Knowing that a moment's hesitation could be the difference between someone leaving the battle with all their limbs attached, or having their throat cut.
"Do you think Degurechaff would allow me to put such a blemish on her record? She'd skin us both alive if we reported that the mission was a 'failure' due to 'temporary misplacement of the commanding officers'."
If it isn't in the report, it didn't happen.
Delita wasn't sure whether it was Ramza or Degurechaff who said that. But Degurechaff lied as easily as she breathed. Her reports told tales that were strictly untrue, if one went by the facts. Such as her Dorter report, which he had looked over himself.
Attempted negotiations with an enemy superior officer. After failure, hostile targets at Dorter were engaged. Easily dispatched. City secured with minor structural damages.
Was it her natural bluntness? Was it deception? It was impossible to tell with Degurechaff.
Do you have a problem with my reporting style, Heiral? Does my way with words not leave you at ease?
"...I suppose you're right," Vinya murmured, flicking her thumbnail off the front of her teeth. "Especially because it's all Ramza's fault."
"Degurechaff's fault," Delita said automatically. "The enemy was disarmed and fleeing."
"Fleeing back to her commander," Vinya replied as she crossed her arms. Her eyes narrowed. "To continue their campaign on Gallione."
Was it sinful of us, Delita, to be born?
"It is as you say." Delita said. He looked towards the hilt of his sword, and he clenched his fist. "Ajora's mercy got him killed, in the end."
"Are we here to talk of scripture?"
"I'd sooner slit my own throat. Let's talk of action. Get the maps out. Bring Algus and Caim, they know the area the best. I want to know where the enemy has to stop."
Delita sheathed his sword, and headed back towards the camp. Vinya looked at the blackened tree for a moment, watching a burnt leaf snap off the end, falling down. She turned and followed him.
The time it took for Delita and Vinya to collect Algus and Caim was rather annoying; first to drag Algus out of bed, his hair still mussed and he growled out a complaint before following along. Caim, even more tediously, was already in the map room, glaring mulishly at a large map of the plains that surrounded them, a dagger in his right hand stabbing repeatedly into the wood. Algus himself wandered into it soon after, carrying with him an almanac of forts that he'd found in Tanya's tent. Delita was grateful enough for the book that he didn't even bother asking why Algus had been in Tanya's tent in the first place.
"There's too damned many places," Caim said as he stared at the map, his brow furrowed. A stray lock of black hair fell over his grey eyes, and he flipped the dagger around in his hand. "And the Brigade is scarce of resources. Such as the ones that would be required to restrain the commanders for long."
Algus clicked his tongue, frowning as he looked down a book, before murmuring a question that all of them had been thinking.
"How would you restrain Degurechaff or Beoulve?"
Everyone paused. Delita's brow furrowed. He could barely even match either of the two in his mind, let alone in reality. How would he restrain them? The only reason they were even captured was because the camp had been held hostage, and both had been injured.
How could you restrain demons?
xxx
The march we were forced to embark on was annoying, and not really a march in the first place. In all honesty, it was the most relaxed and easy traveling I had ever done since entering Ivalice. We were tied together, Ramza and I, forced onto a chocobo that was tied to another, and then all of us set off at once. We didn't even have to steer, we were simply being dragged along.
This is the problem with a medieval society. If everything is based on martial prowess, there is no intellectual advancement necessary, outside of warfare. The 'roads', loathe as I am to call them as such, of Ivalice are of such low quality it makes me want to cry. The smooth concrete of my previous life is like a distant memory here, and the replacement is dirt and dust. The roadsigns themselves are useless, and so far we've spent more time stopped and cursing at maps then actually moving.
"Your subordinates are worse than useless Ser Gragoroth," I said as we stopped for the seventh time in an hour. "Do they perhaps need the help of a halfwit like you in order to navigate their own country?"
"Beoulve," the man replied in a light tone, looking over his shoulder at me with amusement dancing in his eyes, "If you find yourself incapable of being silent, I'm more than happy to gag you."
"Haa? Forcing yourself on such a young girl like that, Ser Gragoroth?" I gasped as I spoke, my eyes widening as I raised my tied hands to cover my mouth. Ramza's arms moved a bit behind me, but I thought nothing of it. "Is it truly the nature of bandits to be so crass?"
"Where did a noble girl learn such harsh language?" Gragoroth said with a sigh, staring at me with pitying eyes. "Should you not try to be more understanding of the perspective of another?"
"The moment I kneel in respect to a bandit is the moment you cut off my head."
He looked at me for a moment, before smiling brightly. With a laugh, he slowed his chocobo down, stopping next to the two of us.
"Need I remind you," he said with a warm grin on his face, "That you are our prisoners, Beoulve?"
"Prisoners we may be," Ramza said in response, "But are we not going to meet your leader, Gragoroth? To put an end to this senseless violence?"
"So he says," Gragoroth answered as he shrugged his shoulders. The man rolled his neck in a circle, and I could hear it crack as he turned his head to look at us once more. "I'm more of the mind to ransom you for our wages, but Wiegraf was always the… kinder of our merry band. It's his desire that stays my hand, not yours."
He then started looking at the map and pretending like we weren't there, kicking his heels into his chocobo to send it back towards the front. I almost pitied the man, but it was always hard for me to pity an incompetent. Incompetency is like a virus. It spreads from person to person, infecting them with the insidious idea that they have the right to be useless, or are in a situation undeserving of who they are as a person. Gragoroth was the definition of a useless person. Obsessed with the arts, that is, if you could even consider that dreary play art in the first place, in a position of power over his subordinates, but with no idea whatsoever what he wants to be done. Gragoroth, is, in a word, a waste. You cannot prescribe his position to 'talent'. The way he wields his sword is an embarrassment, the way he moves on the battlefield is disgusting. Gragoroth is a person who gained his position in a similarly disgusting way. Like a cockroach, the last to be alive on a battlefield is the one who is the victor. And after achieving such cockroach-like victories again and again, he marches out on the battlefield with all the confidence and bluster of an intern who's just been added to their first big project.
It's almost pitiable. But I cannot pity the incompetent. To pity someone who is willfully and actively sabotaging themselves is to pretend they aren't already on the chair, cheerfully tying the rope around their own necks. As a manager of human resources, these were the types of people who were simply incapable of helping themselves. If you tried to explain to them what they were doing, their response would be something like 'Eh? Aren't I just doing this for the good of everyone, though?', which completely misses the point entirely. If you are training your replacement, the point is to do a competent job, naturally. However, by doing your competent job, you have shown yourself to be an incompetent. Your lack of sabotage has resulted in you sabotaging yourself. In a word, you are disgusting.
"I want to kill him," I hissed to Ramza. "You can't stop me. He's annoying."
"...Perhaps only maim him," Ramza muttered, as everyone began to remount, and the line tugged on our chocobo, dragging us along. "I can't have you killing all the people you dislike, Degurechaff. You'd never run out of people to stab."
"The world will never run out of people that need to be killed, Beoulve. Even now, are we not surrounded by them?"
He didn't reply to me, staring ahead. The chocobos moved in silence, none of the men muttering to each other as we traveled. Terribly annoying, that; if they had spoken, it would have been a simple thing to extract information about them. It is a natural occurrence when human beings work with each other, that in their boredom, they begin to gossip. Who is succeeding? Who is failing? Who hurt her? Who loves who? These little byplays of life are rampant in any and all places of business, loathe as I am to have to acknowledge them. Taking up my precious free time with your useless yammering… That's the one thing I can't accept.
But gossip is useful. Soldiers are natural gossips. It is a skill that only those who are left to laze around all day can really master; the art of talking without actually saying a word. If these damned metalheads around me would just speak…!
"You," I said, staring at the man flanking us to the left with a spear. He glanced at me in response, before turning his face back to the front. "Don't ignore me. Where are we going?"
Silence was my response. I smiled.
"Haaa? Not even a plan in between your empty heads, is there? Was it all your clever leader's brilliant idea; to attack a cadet camp and steal us away in the night? I can see why he'd think it was a good idea."
Still, no reply. I continued speaking.
"You're just following orders, right? That's why it's fine to steal, right? To kill. To rape. To devour our precious country in the blood of its citizenry. Is it not our right as knight cadets to gut you like the filth you are?"
He turned his head to me once more, and smirked. His teeth were covered in grime, and his beady eyes peered out from beneath his helmet.
"All you nobles do," he began, his voice dragging my mind back to the slums the orphanage was in, "Is talk. You can talk for hours, yeah? But at some point, there needs to be action. What have you given us, after all these years? Piss-stained pants and bodies piled miles high?"
He spat on the ground, glaring at Ramza and I.
"To hell with the lot of you. If I had my druthers, the two of you'd be tarred and feathered. Left on the roadside to rot, like the devils you are."
He looked forward towards the front, where I could almost see Gragoroth's mount in the distance as it turned around, waiting for the rest of the column to catch up.
"But Gragoroth… Wiegraf… Mileuda… They've got more cleverness in their ring fingers then I've got in my entire body. So if he says that we can't, we can't. Gotta take you to Wiegraf, see? So don't worry, Beoulves."
He smiled, with far too few teeth and with daggers in his eyes.
"You'll be meetin' our leader sooner than you think."
At that, he kicked his heels into his chocobo, and left us behind. Our mount squawked as the man riding ahead of us tugged on the rope, and it quickened its pace. Ramza let out an aggrieved sigh.
"Degurechaff, must you antagonize everyone we meet?"
"It's only to keep them off balance. Isn't the far more curious thing your desperation to befriend all the brigands we run across?"
"It is not as if I'm trying to befriend them," Ramza muttered from above my head, and I smacked my leg into his shin. He flinched, before continuing. "But is it not possible for us all to exist in a companionable silence?"
"Look around you Beoulve," I said with a bark of laughter. "They're certainly silent enough, but I wouldn't dare call them my companions."
The trip continued with neither of us speaking. Ramza was deep in thought, and I didn't care to interrupt his slow realization that I was correct. If anything, isn't he the one in the wrong? Aren't we here because of him? If he had just let me kill that damn woman, wouldn't this entire situation have been avoided?
The plains were calm, with a slight breeze on my face as we continued our journey. Hills blurred into valleys, grass into dirt, and rivers into would stop at nights, upon which our wonderful traveling companions would allow us a small meal of the finest stale bread and lukewarm water. We rose at dawn, and stopped at the dead of night. It was a miserable time, just in general. It was a journey of several days, and throughout them the only real conversation I could get was with Ramza. The guards were useless. Gragoroth just babbled nonsense and then fled our presence as fast as he could, like the incompetent he was.
So instead, we plotted.
Not real plotting, with concrete plans, strategies, and execution; there wasn't really any time for that. After all, we weren't planning to break free, after much discussion. What's the point? We'd be in the middle of nowhere, when they're currently taking us to the upper brass. Even if Ramza doesn't want to, it's not as if we can't end the negotiations in a more final manner than 'we'll take your demands to Lord Dycedarg.' The two of us? In a room? With the entire upper brass? It'd be a slaughter. Our plot was on information. The issue that the Corpse Brigade has created is that there is an information gap between what we, the Northern Sky know of them, and what they actually are. If they were simply bandits, things would be so much simpler, right? But no. They had to be 'unpaid workers of the crown', who want things like 'equal rights'. I'd ordinarily be in full support, but they're making my life so much more difficult than it needs to be! Seriously, just take what victories you can get, alright?! Don't you know that the nobility is completely unreasonable in the first place? When you're working with a superior who has unrealistic expectations, you can't just say 'well I quit' because they're being unreasonable! You ruin their reputation so that way they're no longer treated seriously!
Honestly… Some people are just simplistic.
The winds were quiet the further we rode, and our wonderful comrades were quieter still. It was like a sensation of death had pulled itself over all the men, which cheered me up immensely. The campaign that Zalbaag had embarked on must be going splendidly, if their faces look so grim when returning to meet with the upper brass. Feeling a demotion in your future, Gragoroth? Don't be scared! You'll surely be brought down to a level where your competency can be showcased! It's not your fault, you're simply standing in a position outside of your abilities. You've been poorly managed as a resource, and given power that you can't possibly wield. It's for the best if you're demoted! Preferably, in front of me!
When we came to a halt again, I was staring at an old, beleaguered windmill. Vines of ivy were climbing up the sides of the stone walls, but the building was a half-finished mess. There was a sloppy bit of masonwork that added an additional room to the building attached to the mill, and hastily added iron bars on the windows.
"Not prepared for guests, are we?" Ramza asked with such astonishing ease I would have thought him smug for voicing it. "Your… accommodations seem a bit quaint."
"Alas," Gragoroth said as he shrugged his shoulders, "While our accommodations may not be the likes which those of the Beoulve name have grown accustomed to, I assure you they are more than sturdy enough to keep you contained."
I examined the building with some skepticism. It looked like it would fall over if Ramza punched it too hard.
"Have some time mages around, then?" I asked, and Gragoroth looked away. "No. Not time. White? A barrier spell. But how would you use it to seal-"
"No more questions," Gragoroth said in a hurry. Our ride came to a halt, and he yanked at the rope tied around our wrists. "Off the chocobo. It's time to meet the man of the house."
We walked into the building in another long silence. The walls were old and worn themselves; the masonry that had covered the inner foundations having been carved off by the onslaught of time. The wooden floors creaked with every step, making any sort of stealthy approach almost impossible. He halted in front of a thin wooden door, and I could sense a faint energy pulsating around it. Gragoroth opened it, revealing a small room inside, with a wooden table and three ancient chairs. A man stood near the table, and he turned as the door opened.
"May I present to you, Wiegraf," he said with an exaggerated bow, "Lord Ramza Beoulve, accompanied by his sister, the Lady Alma Beoulve."
I walked in first, because I was in front of Ramza anyways. Looking at Wiegraf, he seemed almost… ordinary, in a way. He was a tall man, to be sure, but his shoulders were in a permanent state of sagging. His brow furrowed over a fine face, with a chiseled jaw and high cheekbones, and a set of piercing brown eyes that looked directly at Ramza and myself as we entered.
Gragoroth shut the door, and the three of us stood in silence.
"Your father," Wiegraf began as he moved to the table, and sat down. He beckoned to the two of us, and Ramza bowed, seating himself. What was Wiegraf trying to pull? An honest negotiation? Absurd. The members of the Brigade I had met were anything but honest and true. There must be a trap. I flicked my eyes to the left and right, hesitantly reaching out to my mana to examine it further. "Was a friend of mine."
"It seems he was a friend of many," Ramza said in response. I couldn't reach for my mana. It was cut off. How? Where? I looked around the room again, but couldn't discover how the devil they'd managed it. Cutting off mana? It was like a second set of blood that ran through everyone's veins. You'd need some serious power to manage something like this. What was it? Where was it? "And some less noble than others."
Wiegraf barked out a laugh, before looking at me. I still hadn't sat down, and slowly sat into a chair, still trying to grab my mana. A barrier spell. It had to be. But powered by what? Where's the keystone? There's a source somewhere in this building, but I was simply unable to uncover it yet.
"Your father rarely kept company with nobles in the first place," Wiegraf said. "Apart from the Thunder God, I'd have to rack my brains for a man Balbanes spoke to outside of when necessary that was a member of the nobility."
He looked at me.
"Even your mother was a commoner, was she not?"
My brain came to a screeching halt. Ramza's mother was a commoner?
"Aye," Ramza said, staring at Wiegraf with steely eyes. "But that is naught but-"
"-a circumstance decided at birth," Wiegraf finished with a smile. He leaned forward on the table. "Your mother oft said the same thing."
"My mother was a good person."
"Your mother was an assassin," Wiegraf stated. I could no longer hear Ramza breathe. "And the spitting image of your sister, as well. Pale as a vampire, eyes like they were chipped from ice, hair as fine as spun gold… She was so striking that it was easy to be drawn into her spell. And yet, in spite of how kind she was to the likes of us, she had such an easy time sinking a knife between her enemies ribs."
"Assassin!? My mother would never-"
Wiegraf looked at Ramza, and his eyes seemed dead, like there wasn't any possibility light could enter them in the first place.
"It was war. Do you think your father - the Siegebreaker, only took honorable actions during the war? That Ivalice was a stronghold of justice and truth in such a bloody period of our history?"
Ramza didn't reply. I didn't say a word. I was still trying to track down this damned keystone.
"Look around you, Ramza Beoulve," Wiegraf said, slamming his fist on the table. He stared into Ramza's eyes, his gauntlet clenched. "Do you think I enjoy working with brigands? That I take comfort in the slaughter of our people? But what else is there left? The nobles ignore us, as we beg for scraps. The commoners starve, while the nobility feasts. The knights promised us fair wage for bloody work, and cut us loose as if we were mercenaries, and not their own countrymen. Is there another option? If there is, please tell me."
"Petition of the king-"
"The king who has ignored us? The king who allows his people to be stamped underfoot by his precious nobles, who ignore the people that they rule? No, I say. I will not barter with a man who is so detached from his kingdom that he is unable to rule. I refuse to barter from a position of weakness. Is it not our right, as Ivalicians - no, as humans - to be paid? To live? What crime have we committed, aside from being born into the wrong families, the wrong lives?"
He looked Ramza in the eye, and extended a hand.
"Ramza," he said quietly, "Do you truly think the way those beneath you are treated is just?"
I could see Ramza clench his fists.
"That the nobility cares for their needs? That they desire for those beneath them to stand at their side?"
This rot Wiegraf was spewing was starting to make me sick.
"As if you give a damn either, Folles," I spat out, glaring at him. I crossed my arms when our eyes met, narrowing my own. "Do you think we've forgotten what your precious band has done to our citizens? While you talk a grand thing, talk is cheap. Your words were spent the moment you drew blood."
"Freedom, Alma," he said as he looked at me, "is worth any price."
"Freedom? Are you not free to till the land, and create a legacy? Are you not free to start a business, and gain coin? Are you not free to sell your sword, and bleed for work? What part of you, Wiegraf Folles, desires freedom?"
He looked out the window, covered as it was by bars of iron. The sun was reaching its apex in the sky, and the light reflected off of the iron lamp hanging above us, tinting the table with a yellow glow.
"The only freedom commoners have, Beoulve," he said quietly, "is the freedom to die."
The freedom to die?! Don't say such absurd things with such a solemn look on your face! As if you're in possession of the right to die. As a manager of human resources, I understand full well the 'desire to die'. It hurts. It's too hard. I'm unhappy. I don't want to work anymore. All of these harmful complaints of your employees are what you, as a manager, must control. These complaints are the feckless whining of a weak spirit, and it is your job to stamp them out before they get too deeply embedded into people. Society is naturally hierarchical. It's not a fault of the system, but a fault of human beings, despicable that we are, that we naturally categorize things.
'This person is smart.'
'This person is dumb.'
'This person is competent.'
'This person is incompetent.'
As we categorize more and more thoroughly, and narrow down on the actuality of the scenario, we come to a conclusion: every person in the world has their place. Society is designed from the top down, in order to allow for people to achieve means equal to their stature. In a capitalist system, this is all about allocation of resources. A competent, intelligent person will naturally be more valuable to society then an incompetent idiot. As such, the fruits of their efforts will be rewarded, in a way that is immediately recognizable. More pay, more responsibilities, easier work; there is always an immediate reward to the efforts you are shown in a capitalist system. This is what makes 'signaling theory' the truly ultimate theory in human interaction. If one signals themselves as a competent, then one will be rewarded with work befitting of a competent. As a manager, I have met many people like Wiegraf Folles. People who feel as if their job is unbefitting of them, that they're not valued correctly, that their work is unfair. These people are, almost universally, incompetents chafing against their own nature. They desire to be competent, but cannot manage it.
So, instead, they choose to give up. Totally unacceptable for any major Japanese corporation. As a former corporate slave myself, I pity those who are incapable of finding any enjoyment in their work. If you do not enjoy your employment, then how can you possibly seek advancement? Wouldn't it be easier for you to seek out a different source of income, instead of wasting everyone's time with your constant bemoaning of the state of affairs?
"That's more freedom than most ever receive, Folles," I said with a roll of my eyes. "As soldiers, we're not even granted that. The only time we are truly free, is when we're killing each other."
He smiled sadly at me in response, before standing up.
"I," he said, "Am free. The king has no hold over what I do. The nobility cannot tell me what to do. Even my own men - as much as they chafe against me, and mutter amongst themselves, cannot tell me what to do. Only I, and I alone, decide what path I will take."
He looked at me with an expression I couldn't understand in his eyes, as if he was… Oy, this bastard. Is he pitying me?
"Can you, Beoulve, say the same?"
Well, naturally I could. After all, I wasn't Alma Beoulve in the first place. I was Tanya Degurechaff, an orphaned brat whose only claim to nobility was that I was in Ramza's squadron, and an aid to Dycedarg. His speech was for an entirely different person, and an entirely different situation. But before I could reply, he walked towards the door.
"We will speak more on the morrow," Wiegraf said, turning to face us. "Do try to be more accommodating, would you?"
He left, and I was alone with Ramza again. He looked at me, and I looked at him.
"Well," Ramza said as he clapped his hands, "He's clearly mad."
It took several hours for me to finally manage to track down the keystone. Ramza was pacing around, testing our newfound cage for physical weaknesses, but it seemed completely useless. The thing was, in spite of its meagre foundations, reinforced in some manner, presumably through the same sort of magic that powered the barrier itself.
"Ramza," I said, and he looked over at me from his position, hand frozen mid-tap on one of the bricks. "Hoist me up. Keystone's in the damned brazier. As expected of incompetents, they've tried to hide it in plain sight."
I hopped onto his shoulders, and he straightened his back tall enough that I could just barely peek over the edge of the brazier. Inside, was a glowing golden stone inscribed with an insignia; a giant X that seemed to almost encompass the entire rock. Even through the barrier, I could feel it. There was an absurd amount of power hidden inside this tiny rock.
"Find anything, Degurechaff?"
"There's a magic rock," I said, stretching my back to try and get more reach. "Go a little higher. I can't grab the thing."
Ramza stood even taller, and half my body was dangling from the brazier at this point. The rock's light shone brightly on my face, almost making me squint as I looked at it. I reached out with a hand, touching it -
Well, a voice echoed through the room. It had gone dark. The torchlight, which had been brightly flickering, was frozen in place. Ramza's body felt cold on mine. It was like all light and warmth had been sucked out of the world, leaving me in a cold and dark existence. You seem to be having fun.
I knew that damned voice. That obnoxious, completely undeserved arrogance. That disgusting cadence that desperately pretends to have 'sympathy' and 'empathy' for the plights of the people it oversees.
"You…"
How long has it been now? Fifteen, sixteen years?
"You…!"
I do hope you've grown a sense of respect. Our last conversation was rather… Impolitic, shall we call it?
"I knew you were behind all of this! There was no way it just happened by chance! You lousy excuse for an omnipotent force!"
Oh. I see you haven't improved in the slightest.
Of course. It all makes sense now. It's only natural that things would go so horribly wrong. It's only natural that this completely routine exercise for our early graduation would turn into a kidnapping attempt by the absurd leader of the enemies we're trying to hunt down. It's all this damned Being's fault! It's all this annoying, useless, rotten excuse for a 'God', loathe as I am to even associate such a word with this nonsensical being. Naturally, it's not my fault. It's not Ramza's fault.
"It's all your fault! Of course! I knew you had to be behind this, Being X!"
xxx
my only excuse is that this was originally supposed to be a chapter entirely focused on Delita, and it took me almost this entire time to write the opening bit. In my attempts to showcase other character's POVs and how they view the intrepid duo, I failed miserably in being anything close to timely. I apologize for this. It may mean that any sort of 'interlude' nonsense or the like, is going to be a little less likely in the future, but that's fine. Let's be real, nobody here was reading this for the side characters anyways.
Tune in sooner rather then later for when I actually post again!