Chapter 18: Oh Mother
"Oh mother we're stronger for all of the tears you have shed"
Oh Mother – Christina Aguilera
I've noticed that as a child the word "forever" came so easily and rolled of the tongue as a statement rather then a vain promise, and I have also noticed that as a child we never do comprehend that forever does not exist.
Once upon a time I never did comprehend my parents would divorce, my brother would leave home, Jame and I would not be on speaking terms and that I eventually would leave home myself.
If someone how told me a year from now this would happen I would smile politely and them to bury their head in the sand while suffocating slowly.
If only I knew then what I knew today.
My outlook on life had been somewhat more positive beginning from my sixteenth birthday, as it was a firm belief of mine that life begun at sixteen. The familiar low hum of the SphereVision was all but extinct because I had decided to give up a rather pathetic dependency on it.
In it's place I tried reacquainting myself with Machina, but I sadly found the magic and wonder it once held for me was now dull and diminished. It was just a simple, logical science now.
Surprisingly I had been reading the ancient Al Bhed scriptures in the attic and teaching myself the old tongue. It was tedious and complicated but took up a delightful amount of time, though as I read I begun to ignite with injustice at the full extent of the hardships my early people had suffered by the hands of Yevon.
In truth I had always known, but I considered it dead history, if it wasn't affecting me so I felt I didn't't have to care.
My mother had dedicated her adolescence to defending the world and preserving the Al Bhed culture, she had put her very life on the line to save the very people that had ridiculed and despised her simply for her heritage. Once upon a time I didn't believe I would ever do what she did.
My mother believed in change, she did not fear it but instead embraced it, change was her motivation to defend her life for a world that did not accept her, she needed to believe that she could change society's misconceptions about the Al Bhed people, and that's exactly what she did.
If one wants to move on from a less then desirable situation I think they need to accept change and embrace it. I had already accepted that Jame was no longer in my life but I hadn't yet taken on the mentality that change could very well be the thing I needed in my life.
"Neeka, get out of the attic, you have dust allergies" Mum called out from the foot of the stairs, her voice echoing of the cold stone walls of the attic. She cared not for the fact I had practically been living in the attic and my deeply tanned skin was succumbing to a pasty albino shade, but rather well, dust.
I didn't even think to reply as I begun flicking through an aged photo-album with dry pages that were crinkled up like prunes. I'd seen these photos many times, of strange people and exotic locations I didn't recognise, but back then I had been too young to take vague interest in the stories behind the photographs. It was just dead history.
"Neeks, remember when your throat swelled up like a puffer fish and you nearly died" mum pressed, cautiously descending down the termite ravaged stairs. Of course it was a rhetorical question, near death experiences aren't so easily forgotten as opposed to the last time you cleaned your ears out.
See the problem with me is that I had always been a bit sickly in comparison to the rest of my family. I was always prone to falling victim to ailments such as: desert fever, allergies, falls and psychotic malfunctioning robots. Whereas Khan was always strong, clever, athletic, and mum and dad will go down in history as magnificent warriors … which leaves me in the dust.
"That was cause was peanuts, not dust, and yes I remember quite vividly thanks" I replied, noticeably shuddering as memories of my constricting chest, vain gasping breaths and Khan poking me with worry came tumbling at once in quick disturbing flashes.
"You were always a little bit delicate, a pre-mature birth as well, maybe that's it" Mum scooted next to me and made herself comfortable on a large stack of tomes.
"Don't condemn me" I sulked
"I'm not condemning you, when I was your age I wasn't the strongest Al Bhed going around and I had a paralysing fear of lightening … thanks to our charming Brother"
"Mum, you had already changed the world at my age, and you were all buffed up"
"Yeah I know, but really my point is don't be cynical, your still a baby in my eyes and you don't have to be the next Lord Braska to be a significant person"
"I'll never be as good as Khan at machina"
"Khan is a boy possessed, there is more to this world then fighting and machina, the only problem is you haven't seen any of it yet, well properly anyway"
"Are you giving me permission to leave home?"
"Well when your ready" mum replied with a tight smile, though the tone in her voice implied that I wouldn't't be ready until I was at least on the edge of forty five years old.
Turning a page of the album, I coughed into my hand as lifed dust danced in the stale air. Mum made a move to take the album from my grasp but instead begun to stare intently at one of the photos.
"Vegnagun" she whispered simply
"That's Vegnagun?"
I studied the background of the photo which was focused on a large cheering crowd and in the distance I could spot the darkened shapes of three men on a high balcony, probably giving a speech.
"It's just the Luca Stadium, before it was re-constructed obviously, that was a very important day in Spiran history, its when the three independent governments decided to band together after the destruction of Vegnagun"
"Oh, but what's Vegnagun?"
"Vegnagun was\ an enormous piece of sociopathic machina hidden underground in Bevelle, it could have desolated Spira with a single blast" Mum answered brightly
"I assume you had a helping hand in destroying it?"
"The last major battle I ever really fought, kinda miss the action, when your in a battle it's just you and the fiend, nothing else really matters but what your fighting for, everything else just fades in the backdrop"
"I'll never experience that" My stomach kind of did a little kick and a drop, because I wasn't much of a fighter and what mum was describing to me had to be the most exhilarating feeling you could feel … I felt, in a way almost cheated, like I would never experience every aspect of life.
"There is a large emphasis on battle in the world, but believe me when I say it's not everything, there are better and greater things in the world that warriors sometimes forget exist"
"I always was the boring one in the family"
"Your not boring, how many other Al Bhed princesses are there in Spira, and you just haven't found yet what you really love … it was never as easy for you as Khan, and in a way I am glad because it means you can really branch yourself out"
"You don't want me to be a Machina Engineer or Warrior" I asked with a sly smile
"Be whatever you want, just be yourself" and with that final word she kissed my head and made her way out of the basement, her feet loudly banging on the rotting steps"
"I'm telling your dad to fix these stairs before one of us ends up crippled" she added.
That night I stared into the mirror, not just a sweeping glance as I brushed my hair but for the first time I really stared hard at my face. A mix of my parents stood out blatantly before me, it wasn't as beautiful as one would assume, nor was it ugly, just plain with a standout set of my mothers stunning green eyes.
I wasn't a warrior as my mother was, nor the captivating beauty but I did share her eyes, and I think in a way our hearts did beat as one.
As long as we shared a heart I could be capable of great things.
The world wasn't going to last forever, time always moved forward, always moving until I just wanted to freeze everything frame by frame and never miss another beautiful scenery, another historical moment, or another one of my brothers smiles.
Yes, forever certainly didn't exist, it was time to leave and it meant I had to move now, and with that final thought I opened Khans map and begun to study.