Chapter 30: The Dream

The battle with Seymour forced the group to wait another day among a series of ancient pillars to recover, and Charlene found yet another of the strange treasures: a dark grey disc with the word "Shabtay" and a motif of thunderbolts engraved on it. Once the seven of them finished resting, they set off up the mountain pass. Blocked by the walls of rock, the keening of the icy wind faded, but a strange sound, almost like a huge collection of sighs and pyrefly-song took its place. "What in the world is making that noise?" Charlie wondered aloud, almost bumping into Yuna when she came to a sudden stop.

"Wow!" the summoner gasped, her eyes wide with amazement.

Charlie looked around and blinked. She rubbed her eyes and blinked again, but the scene did not fade. On the right side of the path, a wall stood, filled with huge circular carvings and statues of countless people. A glowing blue-green mist poured out of them, drifted across the path, and swirled into a lake surrounding a huge shimmering pillar of water that reached endlessly into the sky. "W-what are those?" Wakka stammered, clearly unnerved by the amazing sight.

"Those are fayth," Yuna explained, edging nearer to get a better look. Then she paled, stepped back, and exclaimed, "A summoning! Someone is using these fayth! Someone is drawing energy from all of them!"

"This many?" Rikku said, her eyes as round as saucers.

"Who wields power on this scale," Lulu wondered aloud. "And what could they be calling?"

"That is a very good question," Charlie replied.

Just then, Rikku trotted up to Auron, gave him her most stubborn look, and said, "Hey…you know something, don't you?" When he did not answer, she added, "C'mon, spill the beans!"

"Look not to others for knowledge," he said, pushing past her. "This is your journey, too."

"Yunie might die, you know?" the little thief replied, her tone more subdued.

Charlene looked at Auron, then at Rikku, and then walked over to the wall of fayth and said, "Well, if no one else is going to try to find out what's going on, then I guess I'll have to."

Without waiting for a response, Charlie reached out her hand, touched one of the glowing statues, and then dropped to the ground as a haze of the mysterious light filled her mind.

…Flash…

Charlie opened her eyes and found herself lying, not on Gagazet's path, but a stretch of grass that looked very familiar. Sitting up, she looked around, and spotted a house that she had not seen in over three months. She was home! Eager to see her mother again, she sprinted across the lawn, but then came to a halt when she heard a terrible noise, part laugh and part hiss, ring out behind her. Slowly turning around, Charlene felt her heart stop for a moment as she got a good look at the source of the sound. It was tall, taller than anything she had ever seen and blacker than night, with a long tail ending in a stinger instead of legs, and a pair of forked wings that somehow defied physics and kept it floating above the ground. She looked up past the sleekly muscled torso, to its eyes, which glowed with cold grey-violet light, and stammered, "Y-you can't b-be here! It's not possible!"

The demon grinned. ::Can't I? I am a part of you now, remember? Anywhere you run, I will be sure to follow you…::

Charlie took a step backward, and then another, all the while reaching for a sword that she no longer had. Realizing that she was unarmed, she bolted toward the house, hoping against hope to find some means of escape inside. Suddenly, something hard and heavy struck her across the back, and she hit the ground just a step away from her front porch. Charlene rolled over onto her back in time to see the shadow-creature withdraw its tail, apparently having used it to knock her down. ::Oh, I'm sorry!:: it said, its voice dripping with mock sympathy. ::But I'm afraid that running away is no longer an option for you, little one…::

The demon surged forward, moving with incredible speed despite its size, and all Charlie could do was scoot backwards, one arm raised above her head in a feeble attempt to defend herself. At the last moment, however, she managed to get onto the steps, and a wall of silvery energy erupted from the ground between her and her attacker. Enraged at the loss of its prey, the creature let out a bellow of fury and slammed its head against the barrier. As it continued its tantrum, Charlie got to her feet, and finished climbing the steps, just as the front door opened.

"Welcome home," Bahamut said, as a few pyreflies drifted out of his body.

Charlie blinked, her terror overcome by confusion. "What the hell are you and THAT doing here?" she demanded.

"Never mind that now," the little fayth replied, moving so that he no longer barricaded the still-open door. "Why don't you come inside so we can discuss things without your "friend" interrupting us?"

Instead of arguing, she followed Bahamut into the house and plopped onto the couch with a sigh. "That…thing…it can't get in here, can it?"

The fayth shook his head. "No, as long as the barrier still stands, you'll be safe. Yojimbo was right, though; that wall will not hold forever, and…"

"And I need to get help for it, I know!" Charlie snapped. "What in the name of all things holy am I supposed to do about it, huh? Who am I supposed to tell? Hell, who would believe me?"

Bahamut glared at her, looking very much like a teacher with a hopelessly dense student. "Have you even tried telling the others about your problem, Charlie?"

"No…but in case you hadn't noticed, we were in the middle of climbing a mountain, and I didn't think that it would be a good time to tell them." When the fayth continued staring at her, she added, "I promise that I'll do something about the whole mess just as soon as we get back to civilization, okay? Now would you stop eyeballing me and tell me what's going on? I thought you said I wouldn't be able to go home until everything in Spira was settled."

Suddenly, Wakka appeared between them, but when Charlie took a good look at him, she noticed that his form was transparent. "Hey, what's gotten into you?" he demanded, before vanishing.

Confused, Charlene blinked and rubbed her eyes, but before she could ask the numerous questions bubbling up in her mind, a ghostly image of Rikku appeared. "Wake up! Wake up!" the Al Bhed cried, before disappearing a second later.

"What the hell is going on?" Charlie demanded, turning her attention back to Bahamut. "Am I dreaming, or what?" The little fayth nodded, but said nothing. "Okay, I'm dreaming, and you're here, so I take it you have something important to tell me?"

"Yes…long ago, there was a war."

"I remember Lulu telling me something about that. People were using machina to fight and almost destroyed everything, right?" Charlie asked.

"Actually, only Bevelle was using the machina…and it assured their victory, despite the power of Zanarkand's summoners." Bahamut sadly hung his head. "Zanarkand was doomed, so we tried to save it within a memory."

Charlene paused, confused by those words. "A memory? You mean that the Zanarkand I ended up in was a memory? So that's what all those fayth on the mountain are calling?"

Bahamut nodded. "Not only the city, but all the people within it as well. All of them are dreams of the fayth. And if the fayth stop dreaming, then Zanarkand, and all of its people, will disappear."

"Why would they stop dreaming, though?" Charlie wanted to know. "I thought the whole point was to preserve the city?"

"We've all been dreaming for so long. We're tired. Charlie…that's why we brought you here."

Charlene got to her feet and stared down at Bahamut. "That's another thing that's been bothering me! How did you manage to bring me here in the first place? I'm not from Spira, and I'm not from Zanarkand, or the dream of Zanarkand, or whatever the hell kind of Zanarkand it's supposed to be, so why was I picked for this?"

"Because we could see you," the little fayth replied.

"You could 'see' me? Just what in blue hell is that supposed to mean? What, have you been spying on me all my life or something?"

Bahamut shook his head. "No, we were never able to see into your world before the day we brought you to Spira, and even then, we could only see you, Charlie."

"That still doesn't answer my question!" she cried.

"We panicked. Tidus wasn't supposed to die in that blitzball stadium, but when he did, none of us knew what to do…we thought that our last hope had vanished. Then we saw you watching, and in our panic, pulled you through the Veil from your world to ours."

"And then what? Hoped that I didn't disintegrate or something?" Charlie snapped. Then she noticed Bahamut's shamefaced look, and yelled, "You mean that could have actually happened? What is wrong with you people?"

"I'm sorry Charlie, but we didn't have a choice. It was either you or no one."

Just then, a ghostly image of Yuna appeared. "Wake up! Wake up, please!" she cried, before fading away.

Charlene glowered down at the little fayth a moment longer, and then sighed. "I guess it doesn't matter how I got here…at least you finally told me some of what was going on."

…Flash…

Charlie awoke to the sight of everyone standing over her, looking as if they were deciding to poke her with Yuna's staff. "Well, that was fun," she said to no one in particular.

"Are you all right?" Yuna worriedly asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Charlie replied, getting to her feet.

"What happened to you?" Rikku wanted to know.

"Nothing, really. I just had a crazy dream, but it's over now, so let's just get out of here."