Chapter 6: The Search for Gau
Cyan awoke from his nap late in the day. The sun was already setting in the northwest and the castle was growing darker by the minute, long shadows streaming through the windows as the light waned. The sky had become a delicate shade of maroon and puffs of clouds from a partly cloudy day gently floated by overhead. Disoriented, Cyan awoke from a shallow dream, almost falling out of his seat before getting his bearings. Realizing that he shouldn't have fallen asleep in the first place, the former Doma Retainer called for one of the squires talking with another near the door by tapping his sword on the ground.
The one on the right quickly appeared in front of his liege while the other came to immediate attention, "You called sire?" The squire asked as he got on one knee and bowed his head down.
"Yes. I was told Sir Gau was here, yet he was not shown in! How do you mean to explain this?" Cyan snapped.
"Well, sire . . . we meant to tell you but you were fast asleep at the time and we thought it wise not to wake you," the knight-in-training rebutted.
"Tell me what?" Cyan asked as he stood up and adjusted his armor. The hilt of his sword had dug into his side as he had snored atop the throne, causing everything to shift and cause him discomfort.
"He left. We saw him go up the stairs to come here to meat with you, but then he rushed back downstairs a couple minutes later, clutching something in his hand with a paranoid look on his face," the boy explained.
"I think it was glowing!" the other guard quipped in, interrupting. He was met with an indifferent stare by the king but then quickly added, "he didn't say goodbye either . . ."
Cyan thought that it was weird of Gau to do something like. It just wasn't like him to pass up a meeting with a friend he held in such high regard. Cyan chuckled as he walked away from his throne, remembering the days when the wild boy and himself first met. Then he was known only as Mr. Thou, "Where are you going sire?" The squire wondered, tagging along as he walked over the burgundy carpet of the throne room and towards the stairs to the stables.
"To find Gau and you're going to accompany me," he said, smiling as he placed his hand on the shoulder of the young boy, "Ready the chocobos!" Cyan yelled with vigor through the lower levels of the castle. Another yell repeating his command echoed to another person on the level below, and that person yelled to the next one and so forth until the order reached its destination. Without question the boy followed him and observed the workings of Doma as the whole castle seemed to be preparing for their departure. After walking through a maze of hallways and doorways, they arrived at the stables to find two stalls with sturdy and ready chocobos waiting for them. They warked and shifted about as bridles were put under their beaks and pouches were mounted on their backs. The boy was handed a short sword in a sheath that was quickly tied around his waist and a small, versatile Buckler shield was tied to his back against his wishes. Working fast and efficiently, the stable hands grabbed the young lad by the shoulders and raised him to the bird's saddle. The head breeders walked around the chocobos, double checking that everything was properly tied and tightened around each bird as their humble lord easily mounted his royal, feathered escort, "What's your name squire?" Cyan asked. He tossed him an extra pouch of feed for the bird and the boy lunged forward, grabbing it but almost falling off before catching himself on the saddle.
Blushing from near embarrassment, the boy spoke up. "Baram," he told Cyan, straightening his body on the bird and putting his legs in the stirrups, "Baram Arrowny at your disposal sire," Cyan raised an eyebrow as this name was revealed to him. It seemed like a name he had always known, so familiar, yet so foreign. Where had he heard that name before?
He shrugged it off as unimportant and gave his mighty bird a gentle nudge with his boots, "Ye-aww!" Cyan shouted, coaxing the chocobo out of the pen, the other one slowly filing in behind him as the two made their way towards the exit. With any luck, they would find Gau soon and find out what this whole misunderstanding was about. But when the doors of the stable doors swung open and the cold wind blew the hay lining the floors outside, their hopes dwindled. The sun was less than an hour away from setting and dark clouds were a precursor to a long and arduous journey.
Main Land, Middle Continent
Gau set his feet on the beach near Nikeah for the first time in almost two years. The sand was soft and soothing on his calloused heels, passing harmlessly through his toes with each step. He was unaware on how he had arrived on this beach though. It was like he had merely just awakened from a dream after falling out of a bed, but how far had he fallen? His head was swirling in thought and was in a constant state of flux, wondering how he had crossed the Doma Sea without remembering it. He continued walking the unbeaten path down the lengthy isthmus that also contained Kefka's fanatics, but the mountains that shielded that compound was far off in the distance. Something told him he wouldn't be traveling that distance anyways. His sight was foggy, his mind just as clouded as sometimes he tried to think straight. Gau was lost in the middle of nowhere as far as he was concerned, and on top of that, he had developed a pounding headache. Something was in his head, behind that rough green hair of his, causing him extreme pain in the depths of his cerebellum. The pain seemed to be relieved little by little with each step he took in the right direction, so he figured that once he reached the place this pain was driving him to, the pain would cease. The boy from the Veldt mindlessly walked forwards, staring at the ground and his feet as they trudged onward, not even under his own control. He dare not look up, the bright, setting sun and crisp wind caused him pain as well.
Neo Vector, located near the center of the continent . . .
Cranes and scaffolds littered the landscape around the outskirts of Neo Vector. A wall was being raised around the mighty iron city to ward off the Returners wishing to enter this haven of empirical ideals. Those rebels against their cause brought only hate and destruction to the people of this 'reborn' Vector. Increased attacks from the Returners and other anti-Empire terrorists had created insecurity between the Empire sympathizers of Neo Vector and the rest of the world, making such a deterrent absolutely necessary to preserve their way of life. The first Vector was a marvelous work of ingenuity and art before the overzealous Kefka destroyed it by shifting the balance of the goddesses at the peak of the Floating Island. It sent the world into ruin, tearing apart cities, flooding over islands and killing thousands of people.
Rail systems connected and crisscrossed from one side of the 5 mile diameter city to the other, and the urban center's airspace was protected by the huge air force that never ceased it's superiority of the skies. There were hangars in every major city tower, strategically placed near important tactical centers and government buildings. Neo Vector had no long range bombers yet, but there was only one other airship that could possibly form an attack against them; The Falcon. There had been no mistaking its military power in the past, but the fact that the Empire had to build a new city from scratch was daunting and severely limited their resources. One of these days, with their army rebuilt, the Empire would once again conquer the far reaches of the planet, but until then they lay in wait, plotting and producing weapons capable of even greater destruction than what their air force could accomplish.
The scientists and researchers of this city were also in a race with the rest of civilization to create a more powerful and destructive technology, namely next-generation Tek armors. In the meanwhile, Magitek armor had to suffice as their main defense when a threat needed to be dealt with. There were too many holes in their defenses and until the city was finished, the funds from the city's taxes were being used to keep the peace with what little resources they had.
"This is Sector 12 reporting in," a transmission buzzed to the central city dispatcher in a tower 400 feet in the air.
"Go, ahead," the dispatcher said.
"Nothing threatening or hostile in sight, construction has gone unhampered today," the soldier in the walking armor continued, the background noise of hydraulics and heavy stomping mixing with static that came from the swift blowing of wind, "continuing patrol."
"Roger that, out," the dispatcher ended the conversation, "Okay, time to go to the next patrol . . ." he said, talking to himself. He was bored, very bored with his job, "Seven-thirty, nothing," he mentioned to himself as he wrote the events in his daily logbook. He leafed through the pages of the book, trying to find something exciting that happened. But he already knew the answer to his search, "Yesterday, nothing. Last week there was nothing. Today, NOTHING!" the dispatcher cried out as he punched the intercom system, "I've been working this job for the last seven months and nothing has ever happened!! Those big wigs up at headquarters are just wasting their money . . . nobody in their right mind could ever hope to attack us with an army. I should be out in the field, putting my skills to use, why those Returners wouldn't stand a chance-"
And in that fleeting moment, it seemed that his prayers were answered. When he had hit the intercom he inadvertently triggered an open channel to the patrol person in the southwest quadrant of Neo Vector, "Figure approaching sector 6, I'm going to check it out, "the soldier told his buddy in another Sector about a mile away.
"Alright, don't have too much fun with him," his friend joked, the communication between them timing out. The dispatcher silently listened as the Magitek armor's heavy feet pounded the ground. He could just imagine the dirt being imprinted, and the dust flying outwards at the mechanical monsters feet. What he wouldn't GIVE to be able to pilot one of those instead of having this 'desk' job. The hydraulics in the leg gears and joints of the metal beast could be heard through the transmission, adding to the noise as the legs stretched and bent to move forward. Intrigued, the dispatcher looked up the frequency of the pilot and found out it was coming from the Sector 5 patrolman.
The patrolman spoke again, "Halt, you are entering the Royal Empire's territory, any further progression through this land without expressed permission will be taken as an act of aggression and you will be dealt with harshly! Identify yourself!"
Gau answered him with silence, looking up slowly and showing his horridly bloodshot eyes. With disheveled hair and clumps within the palms of the tortured boy's hands, he looked back down and kept on the path set before him. The soldier took him as being insubordinate and started up his bolt beam. It clicked with a spark and whirred loudly, collecting a static charge to shoot within its iron maw, "I said stop!" the soldier ordered. Gau stopped dead in his tracks, cringing at tone of the pilot's voice. His chin nodded understandingly as though he had just agreed with somebody. Removing the newly found materia from its pouch, he held it like a baby, softly caressing it with hands on each side. He had started walking on his way again and only managed to take another step when the soldier became outraged and stepped in front of him.
"That's it!" he yelled. The Sector 5 scout pulled the trigger and released the massive electrical charge at Gau. Thousands of bluish-white individual lightning bolts fired over his target, crackling and popping in the air as ground was ripped up and underbrush burnt to a crisp. At first, the shot seemed to go through the wild boy, but in truth they flowed harmlessly past him. The soldier in the Magitek armor stared in both wonder and disbelief as the bolt discharge drained harmlessly into the shiny stone that the boy held so dearly in his hands.
"What in the world?!" the soldier exclaimed in shock. A bright white ball of light gathered inside the glasslike object and started to spin around inside it sporadically. This unknown gem floated out of the young boy's hands, starting to orbit over Gau's head and building enormous amounts of kinetic energy. It spun faster and faster, the clear rays of light flashing about and enveloping the Magitek captain in a nightmarish dance. When the soldier tried to move his suit, the hinges were locked up ceased to function. The bars and wires had somehow fused together and now trapped him inside the vehicle.
The object suddenly became indistinguishable from human eyes, blurring and eventually appearing as a small flickering cloud to the soldier. This made him deathly afraid of what might happen next. His whole body tensed up as he tried to escape, pushing at his restraints and tearing at the belts that held him in place. In his panicked state he managed to remove the nylon straps but couldn't undo the small mechanism with his shaking hands. His veins popped through his skin as he strained to free his arms but the suit refused to move an inch.
He was stuck . . . there was nothing he could do. The armor that he thought would save his life would soon be his coffin.
He screamed and pounded on the metal bars as a supercharged streak of lightning flew through the air towards him and seared his skin from his body, zigzagging and streaking through his body over and over again, "Ahhhhhhhh!!!!" His high pitched, terrifying shriek was abruptly aborted back in the control room.
The dispatcher fell back into his chair, stunned and shocked at what just happened. All he could do was stare at the controls blankly as if he was brain dead and listen to the static being broadcasted from Sector 5's frequency. Something was horribly wrong . . . magic had killed the man, magic. That was the only explanation for it. No machine had that kind of power. Only a human with the power of an Esper could be so destructive . . . Something that should have disappeared with the destruction of Kefka had returned and killed the soldier.
Cyan awoke from his nap late in the day. The sun was already setting in the northwest and the castle was growing darker by the minute, long shadows streaming through the windows as the light waned. The sky had become a delicate shade of maroon and puffs of clouds from a partly cloudy day gently floated by overhead. Disoriented, Cyan awoke from a shallow dream, almost falling out of his seat before getting his bearings. Realizing that he shouldn't have fallen asleep in the first place, the former Doma Retainer called for one of the squires talking with another near the door by tapping his sword on the ground.
The one on the right quickly appeared in front of his liege while the other came to immediate attention, "You called sire?" The squire asked as he got on one knee and bowed his head down.
"Yes. I was told Sir Gau was here, yet he was not shown in! How do you mean to explain this?" Cyan snapped.
"Well, sire . . . we meant to tell you but you were fast asleep at the time and we thought it wise not to wake you," the knight-in-training rebutted.
"Tell me what?" Cyan asked as he stood up and adjusted his armor. The hilt of his sword had dug into his side as he had snored atop the throne, causing everything to shift and cause him discomfort.
"He left. We saw him go up the stairs to come here to meat with you, but then he rushed back downstairs a couple minutes later, clutching something in his hand with a paranoid look on his face," the boy explained.
"I think it was glowing!" the other guard quipped in, interrupting. He was met with an indifferent stare by the king but then quickly added, "he didn't say goodbye either . . ."
Cyan thought that it was weird of Gau to do something like. It just wasn't like him to pass up a meeting with a friend he held in such high regard. Cyan chuckled as he walked away from his throne, remembering the days when the wild boy and himself first met. Then he was known only as Mr. Thou, "Where are you going sire?" The squire wondered, tagging along as he walked over the burgundy carpet of the throne room and towards the stairs to the stables.
"To find Gau and you're going to accompany me," he said, smiling as he placed his hand on the shoulder of the young boy, "Ready the chocobos!" Cyan yelled with vigor through the lower levels of the castle. Another yell repeating his command echoed to another person on the level below, and that person yelled to the next one and so forth until the order reached its destination. Without question the boy followed him and observed the workings of Doma as the whole castle seemed to be preparing for their departure. After walking through a maze of hallways and doorways, they arrived at the stables to find two stalls with sturdy and ready chocobos waiting for them. They warked and shifted about as bridles were put under their beaks and pouches were mounted on their backs. The boy was handed a short sword in a sheath that was quickly tied around his waist and a small, versatile Buckler shield was tied to his back against his wishes. Working fast and efficiently, the stable hands grabbed the young lad by the shoulders and raised him to the bird's saddle. The head breeders walked around the chocobos, double checking that everything was properly tied and tightened around each bird as their humble lord easily mounted his royal, feathered escort, "What's your name squire?" Cyan asked. He tossed him an extra pouch of feed for the bird and the boy lunged forward, grabbing it but almost falling off before catching himself on the saddle.
Blushing from near embarrassment, the boy spoke up. "Baram," he told Cyan, straightening his body on the bird and putting his legs in the stirrups, "Baram Arrowny at your disposal sire," Cyan raised an eyebrow as this name was revealed to him. It seemed like a name he had always known, so familiar, yet so foreign. Where had he heard that name before?
He shrugged it off as unimportant and gave his mighty bird a gentle nudge with his boots, "Ye-aww!" Cyan shouted, coaxing the chocobo out of the pen, the other one slowly filing in behind him as the two made their way towards the exit. With any luck, they would find Gau soon and find out what this whole misunderstanding was about. But when the doors of the stable doors swung open and the cold wind blew the hay lining the floors outside, their hopes dwindled. The sun was less than an hour away from setting and dark clouds were a precursor to a long and arduous journey.
Main Land, Middle Continent
Gau set his feet on the beach near Nikeah for the first time in almost two years. The sand was soft and soothing on his calloused heels, passing harmlessly through his toes with each step. He was unaware on how he had arrived on this beach though. It was like he had merely just awakened from a dream after falling out of a bed, but how far had he fallen? His head was swirling in thought and was in a constant state of flux, wondering how he had crossed the Doma Sea without remembering it. He continued walking the unbeaten path down the lengthy isthmus that also contained Kefka's fanatics, but the mountains that shielded that compound was far off in the distance. Something told him he wouldn't be traveling that distance anyways. His sight was foggy, his mind just as clouded as sometimes he tried to think straight. Gau was lost in the middle of nowhere as far as he was concerned, and on top of that, he had developed a pounding headache. Something was in his head, behind that rough green hair of his, causing him extreme pain in the depths of his cerebellum. The pain seemed to be relieved little by little with each step he took in the right direction, so he figured that once he reached the place this pain was driving him to, the pain would cease. The boy from the Veldt mindlessly walked forwards, staring at the ground and his feet as they trudged onward, not even under his own control. He dare not look up, the bright, setting sun and crisp wind caused him pain as well.
Neo Vector, located near the center of the continent . . .
Cranes and scaffolds littered the landscape around the outskirts of Neo Vector. A wall was being raised around the mighty iron city to ward off the Returners wishing to enter this haven of empirical ideals. Those rebels against their cause brought only hate and destruction to the people of this 'reborn' Vector. Increased attacks from the Returners and other anti-Empire terrorists had created insecurity between the Empire sympathizers of Neo Vector and the rest of the world, making such a deterrent absolutely necessary to preserve their way of life. The first Vector was a marvelous work of ingenuity and art before the overzealous Kefka destroyed it by shifting the balance of the goddesses at the peak of the Floating Island. It sent the world into ruin, tearing apart cities, flooding over islands and killing thousands of people.
Rail systems connected and crisscrossed from one side of the 5 mile diameter city to the other, and the urban center's airspace was protected by the huge air force that never ceased it's superiority of the skies. There were hangars in every major city tower, strategically placed near important tactical centers and government buildings. Neo Vector had no long range bombers yet, but there was only one other airship that could possibly form an attack against them; The Falcon. There had been no mistaking its military power in the past, but the fact that the Empire had to build a new city from scratch was daunting and severely limited their resources. One of these days, with their army rebuilt, the Empire would once again conquer the far reaches of the planet, but until then they lay in wait, plotting and producing weapons capable of even greater destruction than what their air force could accomplish.
The scientists and researchers of this city were also in a race with the rest of civilization to create a more powerful and destructive technology, namely next-generation Tek armors. In the meanwhile, Magitek armor had to suffice as their main defense when a threat needed to be dealt with. There were too many holes in their defenses and until the city was finished, the funds from the city's taxes were being used to keep the peace with what little resources they had.
"This is Sector 12 reporting in," a transmission buzzed to the central city dispatcher in a tower 400 feet in the air.
"Go, ahead," the dispatcher said.
"Nothing threatening or hostile in sight, construction has gone unhampered today," the soldier in the walking armor continued, the background noise of hydraulics and heavy stomping mixing with static that came from the swift blowing of wind, "continuing patrol."
"Roger that, out," the dispatcher ended the conversation, "Okay, time to go to the next patrol . . ." he said, talking to himself. He was bored, very bored with his job, "Seven-thirty, nothing," he mentioned to himself as he wrote the events in his daily logbook. He leafed through the pages of the book, trying to find something exciting that happened. But he already knew the answer to his search, "Yesterday, nothing. Last week there was nothing. Today, NOTHING!" the dispatcher cried out as he punched the intercom system, "I've been working this job for the last seven months and nothing has ever happened!! Those big wigs up at headquarters are just wasting their money . . . nobody in their right mind could ever hope to attack us with an army. I should be out in the field, putting my skills to use, why those Returners wouldn't stand a chance-"
And in that fleeting moment, it seemed that his prayers were answered. When he had hit the intercom he inadvertently triggered an open channel to the patrol person in the southwest quadrant of Neo Vector, "Figure approaching sector 6, I'm going to check it out, "the soldier told his buddy in another Sector about a mile away.
"Alright, don't have too much fun with him," his friend joked, the communication between them timing out. The dispatcher silently listened as the Magitek armor's heavy feet pounded the ground. He could just imagine the dirt being imprinted, and the dust flying outwards at the mechanical monsters feet. What he wouldn't GIVE to be able to pilot one of those instead of having this 'desk' job. The hydraulics in the leg gears and joints of the metal beast could be heard through the transmission, adding to the noise as the legs stretched and bent to move forward. Intrigued, the dispatcher looked up the frequency of the pilot and found out it was coming from the Sector 5 patrolman.
The patrolman spoke again, "Halt, you are entering the Royal Empire's territory, any further progression through this land without expressed permission will be taken as an act of aggression and you will be dealt with harshly! Identify yourself!"
Gau answered him with silence, looking up slowly and showing his horridly bloodshot eyes. With disheveled hair and clumps within the palms of the tortured boy's hands, he looked back down and kept on the path set before him. The soldier took him as being insubordinate and started up his bolt beam. It clicked with a spark and whirred loudly, collecting a static charge to shoot within its iron maw, "I said stop!" the soldier ordered. Gau stopped dead in his tracks, cringing at tone of the pilot's voice. His chin nodded understandingly as though he had just agreed with somebody. Removing the newly found materia from its pouch, he held it like a baby, softly caressing it with hands on each side. He had started walking on his way again and only managed to take another step when the soldier became outraged and stepped in front of him.
"That's it!" he yelled. The Sector 5 scout pulled the trigger and released the massive electrical charge at Gau. Thousands of bluish-white individual lightning bolts fired over his target, crackling and popping in the air as ground was ripped up and underbrush burnt to a crisp. At first, the shot seemed to go through the wild boy, but in truth they flowed harmlessly past him. The soldier in the Magitek armor stared in both wonder and disbelief as the bolt discharge drained harmlessly into the shiny stone that the boy held so dearly in his hands.
"What in the world?!" the soldier exclaimed in shock. A bright white ball of light gathered inside the glasslike object and started to spin around inside it sporadically. This unknown gem floated out of the young boy's hands, starting to orbit over Gau's head and building enormous amounts of kinetic energy. It spun faster and faster, the clear rays of light flashing about and enveloping the Magitek captain in a nightmarish dance. When the soldier tried to move his suit, the hinges were locked up ceased to function. The bars and wires had somehow fused together and now trapped him inside the vehicle.
The object suddenly became indistinguishable from human eyes, blurring and eventually appearing as a small flickering cloud to the soldier. This made him deathly afraid of what might happen next. His whole body tensed up as he tried to escape, pushing at his restraints and tearing at the belts that held him in place. In his panicked state he managed to remove the nylon straps but couldn't undo the small mechanism with his shaking hands. His veins popped through his skin as he strained to free his arms but the suit refused to move an inch.
He was stuck . . . there was nothing he could do. The armor that he thought would save his life would soon be his coffin.
He screamed and pounded on the metal bars as a supercharged streak of lightning flew through the air towards him and seared his skin from his body, zigzagging and streaking through his body over and over again, "Ahhhhhhhh!!!!" His high pitched, terrifying shriek was abruptly aborted back in the control room.
The dispatcher fell back into his chair, stunned and shocked at what just happened. All he could do was stare at the controls blankly as if he was brain dead and listen to the static being broadcasted from Sector 5's frequency. Something was horribly wrong . . . magic had killed the man, magic. That was the only explanation for it. No machine had that kind of power. Only a human with the power of an Esper could be so destructive . . . Something that should have disappeared with the destruction of Kefka had returned and killed the soldier.