((A/N: Okay, so I know I said everything would get cleared up in this chapter... well... It's not... much... kinda... It doesn't exactly clear up the Ren/Nooj situation, but you'll just have to keep reading to find the rest out because I don't want to spoil anything. Well, Read, Review, Enjoy. Sorry for the some-what/not-so-much-white lie in my last note. Also, I couldn't figure out how to make the scene changes in this chapter easier... so I did it as follows. ...I don't much like it, but it works...))

Chapter Nine

Smiles, Laughter, Tears, Memories

Head down, Ren wiped the blood from her face onto her aching arms. Aitigus hadn't let her be without doing something he'd been almost dying to do. Her face was now decorated in brown, blue and black bruises, as well as trickles of blood from her busted lip and above and below her eyes. The guards had returned, but she didn't look to them, it hurt to move, it would hurt to speak.

The only thing still movable was her mind, and it began to return to when she was younger, running around the village without a care in the world. Mind sinking into her memories, she became lost within the thoughts.

Four young boys and a young girl sat on a grassy cliff that hung over a small gorge. They stared up at the dark night sky, watching the stars.

Ren's memory skipped ahead a few years.

The five children were older now. The oldest at fourteen, the youngest at twelve. They sat on the steps leading up to the girl's house, Ren's house, eating ice cream, enjoying the Calm. "What do you guys wanna do when you grow up?," asked a young man with unruly blonde hair and spiraled-green eyes. He was Al Bhed, but he couldn't speak the language, and neither could his brother who sat a step below him, his orange-ish hair appearing as if he had left it that way after waking up that morning.

"I want to travel the world," said a young man with dark hair and deep blue eyes. "I want to see everything, live everywhere. My home won't be one house, it'll just be Spira."

"Why don't you just become a summoner, Kal?" said a young Nooj as he pushed his glasses up on his face and looked to the other boy.

"Because I don't wanna die just to bring the Calm," the boy replied with a shrug. Looking to the blonde, he asked, "Eiolis, what do you want to do?"

Considering it for a moment, the blonde said, "Chalta and I are gonna go back to Home and we're gonna learn who we really are and where we came from."

The orange-haired boy, who sat below his brother, nodded and said, "I wanna see what real Al Bhed are like." Looking to Nooj, Chalta asked, "What about you Nooj?"

"I think I might become a warrior monk for Yevon," Nooj said, thinking about it. He then grinned and said, "Or I'll go to Luca and become a fisherman."

They laughed at Nooj's proclamation of becoming a fisherman. Looking to Ren, Eiolis asked softly, "And you Naoska? What about you?"

Standing up, Ren began to walk down the steps and away from the group.

"Sis?" the dark-haired boy said, looking to her awkwardly.

Looking down and watching the ice cream melt in the warm sun, Ren said softly, inaudibly to the four behind her. "I want to be a summoner."

Leaning forward, Nooj said, "We couldn't hear you."

Turning to them, a defiant expression on her young face, she said, "I want to be a summoner."

They froze, staring at her. Dropping his ice cream, Nooj stood and quickly walked up to her. "What? Why?"

"You guys may be thinking about your futures, but what about the futures of everyone else in Spira. When Sin returns... people will die. I want to worry about their futures," she said to Nooj and the others listened.

Getting to his feet, Eiolis said, "Let someone else do it, Naoska."

Looking to him, anger in her eyes, Ren said, "That'd be your way of doing it, right Eiolis? Let someone else do the dirty work. Let someone else risk their lives for yours. Why should you care, right?" Turning quickly she ran from them, throwing the ice cream away as she went.

Nooj, Chalta, and Ren's brother Kalvaras looked to Eiolis with annoyed expressions. "Now look what you did," Kalvaras said.

Tears welled up in the ex-summoner's eyes as she remembered that day. She remembered the happy expressions on the faces of her friends as they thought of a future that might never come.

The group sat together around a fire near the cliff that hung over the gorge. Ren sat next to Nooj, head on his shoulder. His hair was longer now and she trailed her fingers through it as they sat there.

"You guys make me sick," Eiolis said and childishly stuck his tongue out at them.

"How is it that you're older than us, but you act like such a child?" Nooj asked and narrowed his eyes at the blonde Al Bhed.

"Don't be mean," Ren said them and leaned forward wrapping her arms around her knees and staring into the fire.

The youngest of the group, Chalta, turned to them as he stood near the edge of the cliff. "Guys, we gotta make a promise."

"A promise?" Kalvaras asked.

Nodding, the orange-haired Al Bhed told them, "No matter what happens, we have to stay friends. Promise me we'll all stay friends."

They all nodded and promised the boy.

"If we're no longer friends, then we really have nothing," Chalta said, turning around to look at the stars. He was quiet for a moment before turning back to them and exclaimed, "Blitz season starts tomorrow!"

"Let's go to the game!" Eiolis said. Looking to his little brother, he then asked, "Who's playing?"

"The Fiends and the Psyches," Ren and Kalvaras said together, their voices dull.

"You two don't seem too happy about that," Eiolis said looking from one to the other.

"Their sister plays for the Fiends, remember?" Nooj said, annoyed with Eiolis at the moment.

"Doesn't she have a boyfriend now?" Chalta asked.

Nodding, Kalvaras said, "Yeah, I only met him once... but I hear him all the time."

Curious, Ren looked to her brother, wondering what he meant.

Seeing the expression on Ren's face, Nooj told her, "He means they're always together."

"Well I got that part," Ren said, still a little confused.

Shaking his head, the blonde told her, "They're trying to be polite, but they mean sex, Naoska."

The expression on the girl's went from pleasant to disgusted. "... Ew..." she said.

"You don't have to hear it," Kalvaras shuddered and ran his hand through his dark hair.

"Sick," Eiolis grumbled. Regaining himself, he looked to Ren and Nooj and bluntly asked. "So have you two slept together?"

Picking up a fiery stick, Ren stood and turned to Eiolis. "I'm gonna set you alight, Eio!" she said and he got up so quick that he tripped over his own foot and fell to the ground as he tried to run away. Dropping the stick back into the fire, she sat back down but with a bit of space between herself and Nooj.

Still hanging there in the silent room, the ex-summoner raised her eyes and glanced to the guards who paid her no attention. One of them was actually sleeping. Looking to the floor and seeing no signs of light coming through the barred window, Ren closed her eyes and let her mind wander once again.

The group of five sat in the stands at the blitzball stadium in Luca. As they spoke, a young man with short, spiky blonde hair passed in front of them to sit on the other side of the group. "He's Al Bhed," Chalta said excitedly.

"Chalta," Ren muttered, "It's a Psyches game. There're gonna be a lot of Al Bhed here." The way she'd said it, it had sounded as if she was annoyed, yet she was just speaking matter-of-factly.

"You got a problem with the Al Bhed?" the spiky-haired boy asked, glaring at them. The other Al Bhed he was sitting with turned and also looked at Ren with annoyed expressions.

"What?" Ren said looking to them, eyes wide. "No, I don't have a problem with the Al Bhed," she told them. "They're Al Bhed," she said and pointed to Eiolis and Chalta.

Standing up and looking to the two spiral-eyed young men, the strange young man eyed them suspiciously and said, "Fryd'na ouin hysac?"

The two looked to each other and Eiolis tilted his head slightly to the side and said, "No?"

The strange young man laughed and said, "What?" Turning to his companions, they laughed and then he said to Eiolis, "You look Al Bhed but you don't speak our language?" When the two brothers shook their heads, the group of Al Bhed laughed even more.

Getting up, Ren punched the stranger and sent him into the people that sat in front of them. "Don't be a jerk!" she said to him.

The group of Al Bhed stood in defense of their injured comrade, and the boys of the Mi'ihen Highroad stood in defense of their strong, wannabe summoner. Pushed to the back of the group, Ren tried to fight her way back to the front, but was blocked by Chalta, who shook his head at her and told her not to.

Climbing back to his group, the Al Bhed teen that Ren had struck rubbed his face and then extended his hand to Eiolis in an apologetic gesture. "Sorry about that," he said. "I'm Naji." The two shook hands and then Naji continued with, "This's Blappa, Nimrook, Lakkam, and Danaalin."

With a nod, Eiolis said, "Um... I'm Eiolis, this's Nooj, Kalvaras, my little brother Chalta, and the one who hit you is Naoska."

After things settled down, Ren, Eiolis, and Chalta spent more time learning Al Bhed from Naji than actually paying attention to the game. The Mi'ihen Fiends won the game. There was a few minutes of down time, and then the Fiends played against the Ronso Fangs.

One of the few times Ren looked to the spherepool, disaster struck. Her sister had the ball and was almost to a safe area where she could shoot for a goal, yet she was tackled by one of the Ronso. The force sent the teenage girl flying from spherepool, and into the stands. In the middle of an Al Bhed lesson, Ren jumped to her feet and took off running, tripping over her own feet as she dashed to her sister's aid.

Unable to fight through the crowd, she looked up at the screen that recorded the incident and she watched as her sister's boyfriend cried over the lifeless, bleeding body. Ren fought then. She fought to get through, struggling and shoving people aside. When she made it to the middle, everything went blank.

Ren couldn't remember that day completely. She barely remembered the funeral, but she remembered the day afterward, and that was where her mind returned to.

Eiolis sat next to Ren, her eyes were half closed and she seemed very tired. Kalvaras stood off to the side of the steps where his sister sat, his head bowed in deep thought. Chalta sat on the bottom step just below his brother. Nooj sat above Ren, one leg on either side of her. They hadn't said much lately, one thing might lead to laughter, which might lead to thought, which might lead to memories and then tears, so they said few words.

Finally, Eiolis said, "What did he say his name was?"

They all looked awkwardly to him and Kalvaras said, "I don't remember."

"I get the thought of fish when I think of him," the orange-haired Chalta said.

"I get the image of shooting fish in a barrel," Nooj muttered. They looked to him with awkward expressions and he shrugged in response.

Thinking for a moment, Ren stood up and began pacing. Stopping, a look of deep thought on her face, she bent slightly at the waist and held her hand out, saying softly, "Hello, my name is—"

Hazel eyes swiftly opening wide, one soft word slipped from the ex-summoner's lips, "Baralai."