A/N: Okay, welcome back to FERD! I'm back to this story after so long. Sorry for the delay on my other stuff folks but my muse works in mysterious ways. I do have a chapter for Nexus in the works, but it, like much of my fanfiction related activities, has been slowed down by RL. Real Life. This happened because I had a few hours and a lot of ideas. I'm warning you right now; just because I don't have people who shouldn't be in Tellius (besides myself) yet doesn't mean there won't soon be. There aren't any in this chapter, just so you know. Doesn't mean that there aren't characters that shouldn't be present though. Hehehe…
I suppose my last line was a bit misleading. I didn't know what it entailed in truth. The reason?
"I need you two to make sure this bottle of wine gets dropped into the sea near Kilvas or in sight of one of the Raven Laguz. They'll make sure it gets to who should have it," Sephiran stated, pushing the bottle into one of my hands. Where he got that bottle, no one knows. I doubt even he does.
"Die Sub-Human scum!"
We all turned to the door and stared. "Well, I guess that would be our cue. What ship are we supposed to be boarding?" Zihark quirked an eyebrow at me acceptance of the situation as I carefully set the bottle down to put one of my razor shields in place on my right arm. With the dark blue motif I was sporting all I needed was Falchion and some hair dye and I could call myself Marth!
"You'll know it when you see it. There'll be a group of mercenaries trying to board it. Their leader has blue hair, and their second-in-command has red hair. She's a fierce former knight, so you shouldn't have much issue in locating them amongst the crowd. And Bahamut…be careful. Especially around the Laguz." I pondered Sephiran's odd worry over me for a moment before nodding my head and moving to grab the bottle. Much to my surprise, the Prime Ribroast Minister swung a satchel into my gut.
"What's…in here? A ton of books?" I asked, trying to regain what breath I'd lost.
"Yes. Read them over in your spare time, my son. A friend recommends them." I blanked for a few seconds after he said that and just slung the strap over my shoulders, securing the back behind me.
"That damnable dog…" I growled under my breath. Yes, just to clarify this, but I am apparently the illegitimate love child of Sephiran and an unknown Laguz. I can't express how freaking awesome that feels to be able to say that and have it be true! Sephiran is just such a freaking magnificent-uh…well you get the idea.
"Indeed, he is quite an interesting canine." Sephiran stated with a smile on his face. Apparently he likes the thought of being used as a genetic donor to reconstruct the body of a random guy who just happened to unintentionally create a nigh-omnipotent Deus ex Machina out of childhood daydreams. Or perhaps he just likes the idea of being a father? I never did find out for sure since he just seemed to warm up to me pretty quick. You'll see later on what I mean.
"What the hell are you two talking about?" Zihark asked, halfway ready to burst out the door. The sound of fighting and loud animalistic growling was coming from the other side, but I was ready. I grabbed the wine and stuffed it into the satchel before setting my second shield on my arm.
"Nothing important Zihark, nothing important. Now, I do believe we have some potential allies to save!" I chirped gleefully. Perhaps it's a side effect of being a Branded, but now that I'd had my first kill I couldn't wait to fight more people to the death.
I swear I wasn't this violent in life. Or…first life? Not sure anymore what I am. Well…never mind that, I'm not talking about this right now.
Anyways, I slipped my second razor shield on and Zihark burst out the door with me behind him, catching everyone…who wasn't a vicious shapeshifting badass…off guard. I moved fast enough to fling my arms out to the sides and slice open the sides of the two closest Daein soldiers' throats. Zihark was past me in an instant, running a third guy through the…damn it man, why did he actually go for a man's most sacred part?! I know it's a battle but really man?
"Look out!"
"Sub-Human sypmathizers?!"
"Argh!" That one came from behind me. I spun, ready to block any attack sent my way, only to see a big blue vicious and yet epic looking car staring up at me with mismatched eyes.
"Uh, thanks?" I asked/said.
"No problem," he replied. **** yeah, it's Ranulf!
"I'll just go back to killing things now," I said, prior to turning away just in time to duck another blur of fur, this time yellow-orange, which I took to be Lethe. I realized there was a riderless horse galloping past me a second later and put two and two together. I didn't look to see Lethe tearing the guy apart. The screams were vivid enough.
Instead, I took a good look at the carnage erupting around us. I saw Ike with…Ragnell. Okay, I'll admit my memory is kind of shitty. I don't even know if I spelled that name right. I saw Titania tearing into the enemy ranks like a boss. I saw Oscar saving a civilian from a rather misbehaved Daein soldier. I saw Jill behead said soldier, odd since she wasn't supposed to be fighting Daein and where is her wyvern? She shouldn't be on foot.
I paused, staring at her, and she noticed me, likely recognizing me judging by the look on her face. I bet she'd heard about the prison break I led too. Knowing Petrine she'd probably tried to show off that even the most strong-willed soldier of Crimea was breakable when Haar was hanging around. I probably embarrassed her. Hehehe.
"Die scum!" cannon fodder shouted out from the left. I almost absentmindedly went to raise my left arm to block, despite seeing that my inattention had likely cost me my head. To my shock…his head hit the ground. After rolling off my shield. I avoided making eye contact with Jill again; I didn't want to appear to be attempting to intimidate her. I learned to respect her from playing the games and from a (probably) male figure who operated under the title 'FoxwolfJackson'. I was just glad I didn't have any form of attraction to her like he did in his story…which now that I think of it may not have been a story given the life I've led. Huh. Good on him for nabbing Jill, even if only for a time. Wait, that means that Jay was the one posting his adventures, doesn't it? Ugh, this is confusing and totally off-topic.
Oh right, I went on a thought tangent like that at the time as well, and when I came out of it I was almost soaked in the blood of my enemies. There were a lot of severed limbs and corpses in a path behind me and I was right at the foot of the gangplank to what I assumed was the right ship. It was also the only one. "Huh. Don't quite know how I feel about this…"
"Just get on board you shield-wielding psycho!" Jill was right behind me, equally soaked in blood. "The Black Knights coming after us so hurry up!"
I ran up the gangplank with the ex-Daein soldier at my heels and just in time too; 'dad' showed up and stopped the crazy death omen right when the gangplank had been pulled up. I took the opportunity to seek out Zihark. I absently noted that Ranulf was there when he really shouldn't be, that Jill was being forced to surrender her weapon – for now at least – and that everyone was covered in blood except Soren and the ship's crew. I just had a much healthier coating than the rest was all!
"Well…next time I want to bathe in the blood of my enemies, I should really just gather it all up and bathe properly. Now my hair's going to be all messy!" Miraculously, the utility belt and satchel were blood-free.
It then occurred to me that I'd apparently gone into some kind of berserker state earlier and I immediately turned on my heel and threw up violently over the edge of the ship.
"Well…that was a bit anticlimactic," a slightly stunned yet equally amused voice stated from my left. I noted that Ike was apparently addressing me.
"I don't normally do things like this…" I gasped out.
"Sure didn't seem like that. The Black Knight actually changed targets from me to you midway through the retreat to the ship because of how many soldiers you killed." People whose futures I'd stolen.
"Yeah. That's the bit that I don't normally do. I'd probably still be stuck there if I hadn't been…I don't really even know how to describe it. You'd probably want to lock me up if I did manage to either way."
"Oh? Why might that be?" asked an older, much wiser sounding voice behind us. "I'm Nasir, this vessel's captain." Captain…was that what he was? Or did he just own the ship? Can't remember if that was the way the game went.
"It would sound like I'm a raging psychopath," I admitted.
"I was under the impression that you are." Touché Nasir. Touché.
"I'm not. That's the first time that's happened to me." I noticed my left leg hurt. "I think I got hit on my left leg though. That, or I even attack myself. Which would suck."
"There was a soldier who cut you on his way…down," Jill cut in.
"Ah. Well, I'll need to add that to the 'To Do' list, won't I?" I rather sarcastically commented, counting down in my head until-"OW! DAMN IT THAT-" I then proceeded to swear so loudly and so masterfully that even the sailors blushed. Nasir just looked a bit embarrassed, so I guess I'm not up to his level yet. But he must've been a bit interested too, seeing as I said things like "illegitimate love child of a dragon and a senator!" in my long list of curses. Which, by the way, was the point I realized my Branded history.
Sephiran and some poor lady dragon were implicated as my parents. I hoped the lady dragon didn't suffer the usual fate of losing her powers though. That would just suck on so many levels.
"Done yet?" Zihark asked, just before dumping a bucket of cleansing water over me, washing away all the blood like magic!
"-son of a monkey's two-tailed mutant teenaged ninja," I finished rather weakly. They all stared at me. Long. Long and hard. I flipped my shoulder length brown hair, which had come loose in all the fighting back and away from my face, fished around in my trusty utility belt for a second and then pulled out a thin royal purple ribbon I used to tie it back in a short tail.
"That was a pretty impressive list of swears psycho," a playful voice suggested from my left, just out of sight.
"Thanks. I've been saving that all up since I led the prison break a few days ago. Knew it would come in handy to wait for an audience to swear above and beyond the call of sailing. Nice to meet you miss…?" I covered up my shock and surprise rather well for an inexperienced, unworldly eighteen-year-old.
It looked like Lethe. It sounded like a happier version of Lethe. It was also a Cat tribe Laguz, like Lethe. But it was wearing a purple shirt instead of a green one, and I could see Lethe glaring with a mix of shock at the two of us. Or rather, at her sister. She didn't deign to acknowledge my existence at that point. Mordecai was watching both of us though, and he looked rather amused about the whole thing.
"Lyre. Nice to meet ya psycho!" she chirped, holding out a hand in greeting.
"Name's Bahamut, but you could also call me psycho if you'd prefer. Name doesn't mean much to me, just what my dad calls me is all. And I don't think your, ah, sister? Yeah, I don't think she wants me to make anything remotely similar to physical contact with you." Lethe did turn her eyes to me in vague surprise at my observation before she went back to pointedly ignoring me.
"Oh, who cares about what she thinks! You helped me and the Captain out of a tough spot earlier," Lyre waved my concerns away and looked playfully at her sister out of the corner of her eyes. I briefly wondered if I'd been caught up in some kind of sisterly spat.
"So that was you who took down that cavalryman then? Thanks for that."
"Oh, it was the least I could do. If it weren't for you and that sword-wielding albino guy we'd probably have had to stay behind and run back to Gallia. We might not have made it if we had to do that," Lyre pointed out. Lethe cringed slightly, but only Ranulf, Mordecai, and myself seemed to notice. The rest had wandered off to deal with Jill and her wyvern, which was apparently on the ship from the vague snatches of conversation I'd overheard a few passing sailors in, and recovering from an injury. That explained why she was on our side. I processed all of this in a split second however. My brain is my forte; physical stuff was either luck or a blood rage at that point.
"There can be only one…" I muttered under my breath while rather dramatically closing my eyes. "You're talking about Zihark. He is pretty damned good with that blade…but what do I know? That was my first actual fight. I doubt I'll do even remotely that good next time, not without some formal training. All I've got is a few months of brawling in a prison with other POWs."
"That was your first fight?" Ranulf cut in, his mismatched eyes appraising and carefully neutral as they observed me, likely reading my body like an open book. My body language, body language! Anyways, I really appreciated how he was willing to grant me the benefit of the doubt due to how I first encountered them. Most Laguz probably wouldn't have given me the time of day. Like Lethe.
"Yeah. I only killed a prison guard prior to today, and that was to help a bunch of Crimean soldiers escape imprisonment in the northern reaches of the country." Ranulf seemed to be appraising me a bit more openly now, no longer hiding the hints of long held prejudice against Branded. Parentless, I suppose, would be a more appropriate term when talking about how the Laguz viewed me.
"So…I'll just be going now. I'm fairly sure I may need to go sort out sleeping arrangements before I get left up in the crow's nest or some such arrangement," I chuckled, taking a step back to make it clear I was just as uncomfortable around them as they were me…before turning smack into Kyza. Or I would have had I not continued to pivot like a professional dancer and spun around him and kept my pace of walking even after that without looking back. I didn't even bother to be surprised he was there. He always seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with Ranulf back in Radiant Dawn.
Damn it though, I felt like a badass after that turn.
"That was kind of cool." Thank you Lyre. I'll be on the ship for a few months!
"So…all the passenger space and crew quarters are full and the Daein girl is being kept in my cabin until we get far enough away from land to keep her from escaping," Nasir began.
"Just in case she isn't sincere about joining forces with us, right?" I asked, wanting to defend her case. The girl had apparently been ordered by her father to defect to Crimea's side, as he was of the opinion that Daein was not in the right and wanted at least one way to get on the good side of Crimea in case the war did go our way.
Yes, our way.
"That's right. I trust her just as much as you do. Why you trust her, I don't quite know…"
"Hey, she watched my back while I was caught up in a blood rage. She hasn't given me any reason not to trust her. She's even made an effort to try and break her, ah, bad speech habits?"
"Ah, yes. That was a rather awkward sight. It was soon after you left them as I heard it."
It had been a few hours since Lyre had decided to chat me up, and evidently Jill had tried to prove herself by attempting to talk to Lethe in an effort to expand her world-view. It had been awkward to say the least. Not to mention the revelation that Jill is apparently also a Branded, which was why her dad told her that her mother was dead due to the Laguz. It was the truth, and in a twisted way he was protecting the family the poor woman died to protect (as I like to believe) by making Jill think they killed her mom. Daein traditionally hates Laguz after all.
I was kind of proud of the soldier girl for deciding to give the whole 'become a full-on traitor' thing a shot earlier than the game (as far as I can remember at least; which isn't much, just some major plot points.).
"So as I was saying…you're going to have to sleep up in the crow's nest."
"Seriously?" I groaned.
"Yes, seriously. Unless you'd rather sleep with our furry friends?" Nasir's question stopped me cold. A shiver of fear ran up and then down my spine. Lethe would have killed me in my sleep. And Lyre might have used me to get back at Lethe for some other petty thing she said.
"No, this sounds like a great plan!" I smiled at him, sincerely believing that.
"It does get cold up there though, so don't be surprised if I ask them to check on you every-so-often. Though they'll likely be able to tell by sound if you're freezing to death or not," Nasir joked.
"Hardy-har-Haar," yes I said it that way on purpose; no, he didn't notice. "I guess I'll go settle in then. Want me to keep my eyes out for any ships while I'm up there?"
"No, the lookout on duty will handle that. You're just there to keep them company at night. There should be a chest up there you can store your things in, too."
"Why?"
"Why not?" Pokemon! Hehehe…
"Understood. Skyward I go!"
I missed the calculating look in Nasir's eyes as he turned around and walked across the deck to converse with Mordecai. I only know who he was speaking to because, well, Mordecai. You can't really miss him.
I climbed my way up the ropes and settled in a little bundle of them that was knotted like a seat about halfway up. I turned my attention downwards and saw Lethe standing a little ways off from a group of what seemed to be all the other females on the ship. The orange blob with the green I picked out as Elincia, the purple haired blob was Mia, and I could only figure out Mist by process of elimination, Lyre was there too, as was Jill? And Titania? That surprised me. And some other woman who looked fragile as glass; she had pale while skin and very silky looking golden hair. She reminded me of the Heron royal family.
"Hey. You wondering what they're talking about too?" a cheeky voice, with an undertone of caution, asked from my unattended and therefore blind side.
"Yeah…don't think I caught your name earlier, but I think I know who you are since Lyre mentioned a 'Captain'…and you're the only person here with mismatched eyes." Ranulf chuckled at that.
"It's Ranulf. You know, I'm kind of surprised you think of Laguz as people. The other two of you on the ship either try to ignore us or have no idea how close to death they came earlier by trying to understand us." Well, he couldn't have made it more awkwardly obvious that he was trying to see past the haters' opinions on Branded/Parentless.
"You mean Soren and Jill?" I asked. Ranulf looked at me, a bit interested in the fact that I knew who he meant.
"Yeah, those two. The tactician I don't mind so much, but the girl should know better," Ranulf replied.
"She may not have ever spoken to a Laguz before. From what I can tell the only interactions she's had with any Laguz would involve weaponry."
"True enough I suppose. Do you think she even knows about her heritage?"
"No. I don't think so. Otherwise, she might have felt differently about things a long time ago."
"What, like she'd suddenly ask 'maybe I'm killing family right now?'"
"Maybe. Who knows? I barely know soldier girl."
"She's talking about you right now, oddly enough. Seems she knows a good deal about you too." Ranulf's words drew an interested eyebrow from me.
"Really now?"
"Yeah. Something about a prison and you being a champion pit fighter. Sounds kind of like the contests of strength back home, to be honest." The Cat's tail lazily waved into view as he scratched at his chin in thought. Talking with Ranulf is awesome! "And now Lyre's asking about the prison break you claim to have led…" Ranulf paused, one ear flicking to face the gaggle of women and girls. "Huh."
"What?" I asked, wanting to know what exactly had caught his interest.
"You did something pretty damned impressive, tricking the infamous General Petrine like that," Ranulf admitted.
"Oh…uh, thanks."
"Don't let it get to your head."
A silence settled in like a sudden storm, neither of us wanting to continue talking because the only thing that remained seemed to be the subject of the Branded. I silently vowed to personally uncover the mystery behind the loss of the Laguz's transformation powers first chance I got.
"So, you got stuck up in the crow's nest after all?" Ranulf finally asked.
"Yeah. Nasir said something about having you guys keep an ear out so someone'd know if I died up here or not in the night," I chuckled.
Ranulf smiled thinly, but his eyes flicked back to the group of girls, who were now watching Lethe and Lyre argue with surprise on their faces. I could hear their voices but not the words. The shock on the Cat tribe member's face did clue me in to the fact that it was well beyond the norm for the twins.
"So…that's not normal I take it?"
"No, not at this level and I have never heard them speaking of this topic before. I'm just glad they stopped speaking your language otherwise we'd have to be explaining quite a few things."
"Terminology?"
"Terminology."
"Understandable. Besides, even if they were speaking a language I could understand, I doubt I'd be able to make heads or tails of it."
"Oh?"
"Women are very complex creatures. I'd thought you would have known that by know Ranulf," I joked.
"Only Beorc women. Laguz are pretty damned straightforward about what they want and they just know when they find the one," Ranulf countered, looking somewhat creepily smug.
"Ranulf…you're not coming onto me are you?"
"What…hell no! I have someone already!" the man protested. Me thinks he doth protest too much.
"So you and Ike then…?" I joked. Ranulf looked about ready to throw up before he caught my growing smirk.
"Oh, ha ha. Very funny. Have fun at the expense of the open minded why don't you?" Ranulf shot back. I raised my eyebrows, but wisely chose not to comment. It could also be a reference to him actually speaking to me. I notced the argument was reaching an end as only one of the sisters was still shouting…growling.
"Well, this has been fun, but I think I'll go settle in up top now. Gotta put some things away before I figure out the most badass way back down to the deck," I shifted, turning around and setting myself up to start climbing again.
"Sure thing. You're a pretty good guy for a…" Ranulf trailed off and made a pained expression.
"Parentless. You can say it if you want. Branded works too. I know how the majority of the Laguz views me. I don't care. So long as there are people like you in this world who are willing to keep an open mind…" I grinned, playing off Ranulf's earlier comment.
"Now you better not be coming onto me. I believe I made my point quite clear on that," Ranulf jokingly responded. Both of us laughed at that. Then I went up and he went down.
"Support Rank C." I'm going to have to make a coded list and keep track of my relationships with this lot using the Support system.
I clambered up into the crow's nest, a bucket-like part of the ship situated at the top of the mast where a lookout can safely perch, and found my unlikely roommate.
"A hundred gold. That's how much I charge to be forced to eat with you all," I heard a slightly muffled voice say.
"I'm not here about that. This is where I'm bunking. This ship is rather crowded after all."
You can say that again, bucko.
"The hell? Shit, Umbreos, stop ripping off fanfiction!"
"Is that so?" Volke asked.
"Yep. So…hi roomie." I threw caution to the wind and just leapt over the side of the crow's nest, locating the chest Nasir mentioned. "You using that?"
"No. Why?"
"I'd say it'd cost you a hundred gold to find out, but that would be unreasonable," I joked.
Volke snorted.
"But in all honesty, I wanted to store my stuff in there. Good ol' pops made me take this dusty tomes with me when we parted ways in the port and all."
"So Sephiran is your father?"
"Yes."
"You're not going to ask how much it'll cost to keep my mouth shut?"
"Because I can already tell you've already got a price in mind – a rather high one at that – to get the information out of you."
"…"
"A thousand gold as to how I can possibly know you that well."
"I can guess. As a sign of trust, I'll tell you your dad hired me to make sure you did the job he asked you to do. The bottle's still intact I take it?"
"Yeah."
"Alright then. I won't pick the lock on the chest to check later," Volke outright lied. And we both knew it.
"I'm going to go see about getting some training in," I responded, satisfied my satchel was locked away safely. I stood up and took my shields off, carefully laying them down near the chest, before running through the stretches I made up in prison.
"Training? For what?"
"Fifty gold."
"Deal."
"What?"
"You heard me."
"Okay. Gold first."
"Here." Volke threw a small pouch of jingling gold coins at me. I didn't bother counting them once I'd caught it, just stowing it away in my utility belt.
I. Am. Batman!
"I'm a bit practiced at using my environment as a weapon, so to speak."
"Ah, free running. Well, you may have some competition for that right now."
"Say what?"
"Just look down."
I did. I found Lyre scaling the mast like an acrobat. "Figures she can do that. Gallia probably has trees much bigger and thicker than this mast."
"…"
"Yeah, yeah, I won't tell anyone you're hiding up here. Now, if you'll excuse me…" I promptly jumped up onto the edge of the crow's nest and pushed off, snatching a pulley that was meant to lift heavy objects and letting it slow my descent to the deck.
Edward Kenway, eat your heart out.
"And that, my friends, is how I move with style!" I said to no one in particular. The only people on the deck were the girls (minus Lethe; wow, Jill's already been fully initiated into the gaggle by Mist, I'm impressed), who mostly just looked at me with no particularly discernable reaction, Lyre, who was now rapidly descending the rigging, the ropes on the sides of the ship, and the crew who just rolled their eyes at my dramatic entrance. "Now to find some grub. Can't train on an empty stomach."
I ignored the voice in the back of my head asking how women can be so synchronous at times.
And that's a wrap. All right folks, you know the drill. Review, review, and review. Let me know how you think Bahamut's doing. And yes, the repeated interaction with the Laguz was on purpose.
