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Athanasia[09.18.01] » by Amanda Swiftgold --Uh…
damn. Look at all this blank space
here. I don’t even know what I’m
writing. I have absolutely nothing to
say, but on the other hand I also have absolutely nothing to do. So I figure I’ll give this a shot. Maybe later on I can put this book in a
chest and hide it somewhere for some adventurer to find and keep, as if my damn
journal will help him in his quest somehow. The thought of that kind of amuses me. Keep this book, kiddo. Find all the others and bring ‘em to the
lady in Lindblum who will pay you a crapload of gil for ‘em. Right.
Where exactly is this lady, you ask, even though it’s been a hundred
years since I hid this? Well, see here,
you have to find a bunch of clues… Ah,
what a bunch of bullshit. I’m just
going to write what I feel like whenever.
And if anyone I know reads this then I’ll kill ‘em. (This includes you, Lani, don’t think it
doesn’t.) I could care less who gets
this after I’m dead. Use it for
kindling or toilet paper, whatever. Anyway, this is my book. Who am I?
I guess I’m kind of famous, in a way, having helped save Gaia and
all. Not like Zidane or the queen ever
got to be, though. I must have found
fifty paperbacks novelizing their meeting and adventures and ‘doomed love’
already. I don’t mind not getting the attention. It’s much better this way. I get all the benefits of fame, like having
most of those damn bounty hunters stop getting after me, but I’m not important
enough that people follow me around asking for my autograph, like they do to some
of the others if the mood strikes them.
That might also be because I don’t exactly look approachable… You know, this is all just
stupid. Why am I even writing in
this? Maybe I will just hide
this in a cave for some adventurer. I
guess that’s who I’m writing to here, because I have to be writing to
someone. I already know all this for my
own self, so I don’t need to keep it for me. Well, if you’re still reading,
whoever you are, don’t expect anything.
At all. Uh… so a while back Zidane gave me
this book he found. It’s got nothing in
it so he said I might like to have it to write things down in. Whatever.
I won’t ever know now what he expected from me, but of course I never
did quite understand that. Zidane I don’t want to believe he’s just… gone, after
everything. He always seemed to have all the answers. Well, the little shit didn’t think
about how I was supposed to write in this thing, did he? Regular pens are too small for my hands so I
had to swallow my pride, get a griffin quill, and get Dr. Tot to make me one I
can hold better. It works pretty good
and the end is whittled down small so I don’t take up half a page with a few
words. If you’re at all familiar with the
people I’ve mentioned you probably know who I am. I bet you’re wondering now when someone like me ever learned to
write at all. (And learned to use ‘big
words’, too. Heh.) Well, tough. I don’t feel like explaining all that right now. I’m not what a lot of people think I am,
though maybe I used to be, once. This is getting ahead of things. I guess if I’m going to sit here and talk
about myself on paper I may as well start at the beginning. I don’t know how
old I am exactly but I figure I was born somewhere between twenty and thirty
years ago. So that is when it starts. My beginning was just like everyone
else’s in the world, except the Genomes and the Black Mages if you want to be
technical about it. I don’t exactly
know who my parents were but I do know, from what I was told and figured for
myself, what happened between them. I’m not human, I know that much. I mean, all you have to do is look at me to
tell. Maybe there’s part of me that is,
somewhere. My mother was probably the
same race as old Queen Brahne used to be.
Light blue-skinned, human-like, I guess it is, and treated the same, but
not quite the real thing. Ah, hell, I’m just going to be blunt about
it. No use dancing around the
issue. My father is some mountain
creature who attacked and raped my mother while she was traveling alone to
Treno. He was probably some kind of
humanoid type, at least something close enough. I don’t know really, I’ve never met him. Hell, me or Zidane or someone with us
probably killed him along the way somewhere and I never knew it. No loss there. What would you say in a situation like that anyhow? Besides being assaulted, which started me, she
got to Treno okay and stayed there after she found out what she’d been cursed
with, just waiting for me to be born. I
guess they thought I was going to be twins because I was so big and they didn’t
find out the truth until it was too late.
I was born in a river of my mother’s blood and killed her with my very
birth. I’ve had those kind of stains on
my hands ever since the moment I took breath so I suppose it was just an omen
of things to come. I
don’t re
…Damn it, that’s enough of this. I’m through with this shit. --
Well, I told myself I wasn’t going to mess with this stupid book anymore, but
before I knew it I had it in my hands again. It’s still been quite a few
months, maybe even a year or more since I first opened it, though. I’m not even
sure how it got in my pack, but since it’s here… Alexandria’s finally been rebuilt and Tantalus
came to perform a play in honor of the rededication or whatever you want to
call it. We were all invited, of
course, and so I went. Lani sort of
followed me there too, though I don’t know why she seems to insist on tagging
along with me nowadays. Maybe it’s her
old bounty hunter instinct, that’s all I can think of. She has changed some though since she was
saved by Eiko’s moogles and was living in Madain Sari. She’s still kind of annoying but I’ve gotten
too used to having people around all the time so I just let her be. I try not to show it but that bastard Zidane’s
really messed me up. I don’t know if I
like it but I guess I owe it to him that I’ve… mellowed out a little, I guess
it is. I still won’t buy into that
whole love-and-togetherness shit but there is truth in his saying that people
need each other. Oh, notice I say ‘is’? He just kind of came
back today, showing up in the middle of the play and making Dagger’s dreams
come true I guess. I couldn’t help but
smile at them, clapping along with everyone else. (Eh, not like anyone noticed me with the ‘reunion of the century’
happening right there.) Stupid kid must
be blessed with something that keeps him alive. I won’t lie, it feels right now that he’s back. Zidane was the central part that held
everyone together. So now we’re all here in the castle, kinda
staying for a while since they’re so happy now. Eiko has sort of been adopted by Cid and Hilda so that’s that,
and Steiner has Beatrix and his queen to protect. Vivi has his ‘kids’, or we have him through them. I’m not too sure what to think about that
even now. Quina has the kitchen and Freya has Burmecia
to rebuild and someone for her too, I guess someone she found again after a
while. I don’t really know or care
about the whole story, though I hear something about memory loss and that
sounds a little odd to me… well, it’s none of my business. Anyway, she’s
leaving to go back to Fratley or Flatley or whoever he is in the morning. Me, I guess I’m okay too. It’s enough to just watch everything like
that, it always has been. But maybe I’m
lying. I don’t know. Zidane would point
me to Lani, sure, but I don’t think she even knows what to feel about
me, and if she doesn’t I sure as hell am not going to push. I learned my lesson about that and that is
not something I’m going to talk about now, or ever. --I’m
writing in this thing again… even though I seem to stop abruptly all the
time. Well, you know what, I’m just
going to write what I happen to write and I’m not going to lie about anything,
or cross it out, or take it back. If I
don’t want it to be said, well, I just won’t say it to begin with. I guess that will work. Maybe Zidane knew what he was talking about
when he gave this to me because the more I bother with it the more I seem to
like it. And maybe I want my memories
to go on too. Maybe that’s all the
immortality you can ask for, not like I want to live forever in reality. As
long as this paper lasts who I was will last too. Ugh, that’s too much philosophy. Screw it.
So… what do I say now? ‘Today I did nothing in particular, just like
every other day.’ Yeah, right. It’s really raining hard out there tonight. I
haven’t seen rain like this in Alexandria for a very long time. I’m supposed to
leave tomorrow, dunno where I’m going to, but if the roads are all washed out
I’ll have to stay here some more… Well… Lani just left to go back to her inn.
She was sitting around in the castle sitting place with me for a while but it’s
getting kind of late, and I can’t sleep anyhow, reason for me writing this now.
So she left. Now that I think about it,
she really has changed a lot. I’ve heard
almost dying can do that to you and I guess it’s true. But I understood her a lot more back when
she was all full of shit and fire and all that. Nowadays she seems to have been taking lessons from Dagger or
something. I’m not even going to try to
figure why. Just proves to me that I was right to --- I suppose I should explain why that
page up there is smeared and there’s ink all over it? Right. Guess I can write again now that Freya’s sleeping. Oh, I have to explain why she’s here too,
eh? And sleeping, nonetheless. Well, I will, since it explains why I just made
a mess of this page. So I was just sitting here writing
away like a good little scholar (sure) and suddenly the door closes, makes my
hand jump, okay, not a big deal. And
then I hear this kind of scream, and when I turn to look there’s Freya standing
in the room all dripping wet and looking like hell, didn’t expect me to be in
here. So I had to slam the book closed
so she wouldn’t see, and there’s your explanation of that. The thing is, Freya did go back to
Burmecia, but when she got there something bad happened between her and that
guy, Fratley whoever. She wouldn’t
really say what happened exactly but I figure they had some argument or something
and she wouldn’t stay in Burmecia anymore and came back here to see
Dagger. Dagger’s not up though so she
came in here ‘cause the fire’s still going. If you ask me, she loves her memory of Fratley
better than the guy he’s turned into after getting amnesia, but no one asked
me. And no, I wasn’t callous enough to
tell her that, though I wanted to. At
first I wanted her to just leave me alone… I mean, when she got over her surprise
of seeing me she first looked like she wanted to leave again anyway, but I
guess I’m her friend and she would probably have spilled it all to old Brahne
at that point, she felt that bad. She said she was cold and asked to sit down,
and I told her to get a blanket then, but she said something kind of odd,
something like her soul was cold and only someone else could warm it up. I still didn’t want to let her… I mean, Eventually when she got warmer she started
dozing off, on my shoulder of all places.
So now she’s making my arm fall asleep.
I’m too nice for my own good nowadays, really. I just noticed how soft her hair is now that it’s dry. I tried to
start writing again before but she asked what I was writing and I couldn’t show
her of course. Much too personal to
show her even though a complete stranger is probably reading it now. That’s just how it is. This is too weird. I mean, I remember how I met her, with that tough look in her
eyes and how we nearly started fighting a moment later, and if you’d told me
then I’d be sitting here with her sleeping on my damn shoulder I’d have laughed
at your ass and then smacked you one.
But she’s here anyway and I guess it didn’t hurt me to help her out. Damn you, Zidane, for making me think this
way. Now I want to get to bed too but
what, do I just leave her here? Bring her to her room and have the guards on
the way whisper and cackle like fuckin’ hens?
I never thought… about this before. --The
rain stopped, finally. It’s muddy as
hell out now though, and as we were crossing the courtyard to go to the dining
room for lunch (me, Freya, Eiko and Steiner clanking along behind) I guess I
was still feeling weird from last night ‘cause I just went and picked up Eiko
and Freya too and crossed the mud with them.
Eiko made some kind of annoying noise and said she didn’t think I had it
in me, so I almost dropped her in the mud but didn’t. Freya was blushing some, you wouldn’t think you could see it on
her face, her being a demi-human and all, but you can, and she said she could
have jumped it just fine but thank you anyway.
Even though she wasn’t really impressed I kind of liked doing it. See what all that last night did to me?
Shit. Oh, in case you were wondering, I
ended up sleeping as best I could sitting there on the couch with her using me
for her damn pillow. I was expecting
her to say something about it, but she was gone after I managed to fall asleep
one time and when we met up again she acted like nothing happened and she’d
been here the whole time and hadn’t just come back. It pisses me off a little but at the same time I’m glad she’s not
suddenly acting like I’m her best girlfriend. For some reason today I remembered the time
when we were trying to get into Terra and had to fight at all the shrines. I resented Zidane sticking me with Freya,
but who else would he have sent with me?
Well, I guess Freya telling me her stuff last night reminded me of this,
now that I remember it. When Zidane
came back for me in Ipsen’s Castle I sort of had an eye-opener and I kind of
told her about it when the Fire Shrine guardian popped up. I wasn’t planning to tell her that I had
been wrong about myself and everything all these years, but I’m sure she wasn’t
planning on telling me about that ass Fratley last night either. I think after that she really did become my
friend. I never really knew Vivi too
well and Eiko goes out of her way to piss me off sometimes. Steiner and Dagger I still don’t know
too well either, and Quina’s… Quina. If
I was meant to… know someone… and Zidane had everyone else to deal with because
he’s our connection… then maybe it’s natural for Freya and I… ah, hell, I don’t
know what I’m saying. I’m just rambling
about nothing. But if she happened to
change her opinion of me when we fought at the shrine, I think I started to
then too. After the fight with the
guardian we were pretty torn up but she didn’t act like it even bothered her,
even when she was bleeding all over the place.
I couldn’t help but notice that, how strong she is on the battlefield
and then her eyes last night after coming all this way… I
really need to shut up now. I’m making
a fool out of myself here and the more I write the dumber it gets. She’s gonna have to leave again sometime and
then I’ll get back to normal. --
I have to get out of Alexandria.
There’s nothing to do here and I’m bored blind. I don’t even know why I’m still hanging
around here. Eiko’s gone back to
Lindblum and Quina went away too.
Everyone else lives here but Freya but she hasn’t gone though. I should
be leaving too but I haven’t yet. I even had a chance to go when Lani left. She practically begged me to go with her
like we were before Zidane came back, and I almost said sure but it came out
no. She yelled something at me I don’t
get, more like her old self then, and if I’d had a chance I really would have
gone along with her then, maybe gone out to fight something if she was going to
stay that way. But I’m not going to run
after her now so I guess we meet when we meet again. My whole point in starting with this was to
tell about myself so I should go on with that and not mess with the stupid
daily shit that’s been going on. You remember I grew up in Treno, right? Well,
like I told Zidane when he was trying to come to terms with his own origin (I don’t
think it really did anything for him but he did ask) my first memory is
the face of a guy I had to fight. What happened was someone along the line
decided not to kill me after my mother died, and for some reason I ended up
belonging to a noble named Caleb Coral.
At the time of my memory I was like five years old but I was strong even
then and big for my age of course. He
(Caleb) used to take me places with him, made me wear this collar Some guy who thought he was real tough I guess
was walkin’ around talking a big show, and Caleb went and bet with him that I
could take him out, even just being a kid.
I remember this guy’s face, all broad and sweaty, little mustache
hanging down, a big nervous grin as I just stared at him, wondering what was
going on I guess. I didn’t get that
they wanted me to fight him... I don’t think I got much of anything. He started in hitting me, laughing at this
stupid bet Caleb had made, and he made me bleed. Looking at my own blood that I wiped from my mouth, I just got so
angry… I killed that man with my hands and my teeth, just kept hitting and
hitting and biting and tearing until he stopped screaming, tasting all this
blood like metal on my tongue. They had to hit me with a cane to knock me out
and stop me from ripping his corpse apart. That’s my second memory, one I never
told Zidane. I did tell someone else
though, when I could. He was important
to me and the reason I can actually write this now, but he comes in later. Back then I really wasn’t more than an animal,
just a screwy kid who was too strong and with bright red hair like no one had
seen. That’s what most of them commented on first, and then the fact I was just
five, with Caleb all proud to own something so damn weird. I guess now it’s easy to tell why I hate Treno
so much. It’s changed some since I
lived there but the nobles still run the show.
It’s better than it was but there used to be certain parts of town where
regular people had to live, and they put up these huge grates to keep them out
of the other areas. I remember going with Caleb to the market square one time,
all the nobles got to buy things first before they let the others get what was
left, and there were all these people pushing and climbing on the gates, just
looking at the food and things they couldn’t get to yet. Even before I was aware of myself I knew
they were like me. They tore down the
walls and gates a few years later but it didn’t make much difference. The darkness hides just about anything that
people can do to each other, and the nights in Treno are long. I hate the place, but I keep going back there
over and over again… at least now I don’t have to let them walk all over me anymore.
More rambling. I think that’s more than you wanted to know, and likely more than
I wanted to tell, so I’ll stop here for now. --
I’m gonna make this short but I feel like I have to write it down. If I’d known
that I’d be a slave to this stupid book I’d have tossed it in the fire straight
off. Anyhow, I had this dream just now,
and I’ve had it before, I know. When I
went to Oeilvert with Zidane, Eiko, and Steiner, there were these strange…
stone monoliths dotted about the place, they all had like memorial words carved
on them, and when we got too close to one of these epigraphs they’d open, and
out would pop the image of a person. I hated
those things and even though it’s been so long I just dreamed about them. You
can’t use magic in Oeilvert but I think Zidane brought Eiko along anyway to
protect her, us not knowing that the others would escape their cells and all. Even though Eiko annoys me, I know she’s just
a kid and she can’t help it… and I wouldn’t wish this on her… well, let me
explain. Sometimes the images of the
ones we left in Kuja’s place came out of the epigraph, and those were hard
enough to fight, but when one of us four came out it was a lot worse. See, when one of our doubles came out they
would insist they were the real one and throw up a death mirror in front of
you, knocking you out right away. I was on the receiving end of one of those
once but that when it happened wasn’t what makes me have nightmares about it. So Eiko was with us, and when her
double came out and killed her I made the mistake of reviving her. We hadn’t been fighting these things for too
long and she was the first one of our group to come out of the accursed
things. We were all trying to tear up
the epigraph so it wouldn’t pop out any more people, before we could get up the
nerve to kill the Eiko-double, but even when it was destroyed she didn’t go
away. So I brought her back, not
knowing that the damn double would just kill her again, and she was only six at
the time… I can still hear the voice of the double saying ‘Who are you?’ all
little and innocent and then killing Eiko again before she barely had a chance
to get to her feet. Who are you… imagine hearing that from someone who looks
like you… I know Eiko has nightmares about it too sometimes. Maybe she really
was too young to fight with us, but she was strong, maybe the strongest of all
of us if you take that fact into account.
I just can’t get that echoey, hollow voice out of my head. Maybe getting this down will make it go
away. It’s still late (you can tell, I
made no sense) and I want to go back to sleep. --
I think this is going to be one of those times when I’m actually writing
something in order to try and work it out and understand it, cause I sure as
hell don’t get it right now. I’m just… very
confused, and I’m trying not to destroy anything. Don’t be surprised if there are pages ripped though. I just wanna hurt something… She drives me insane, she makes me
furious, but I didn’t want her to stop, I couldn’t believe it and I just didn’t
want it to stop. I don’t even remember how
it started… well, maybe. I think it
started when she asked why I have my hair over my eyes the way it is. Everyone else had got baskets of food from
the kitchen and gone to eat outside and I thought she’d gone with them but she
hadn’t, I’m starting over, take a breath,
that’s it… all right. I’m acting like an idiot, on paper even. So Freya was in the hall just leaning there
on the wall like I do, and she made this remark about my hair covering my eyes,
which I do because they just make me look like even more of a freak, since they’re
blue. I probably got it from my mother
but they look out of place on me, and I can still see just fine with hair over
them anyway. I don’t remember what I
told her (though I’m sure it wasn’t the truth), or why I let her walk with me,
since I was going back to my room to get my stuff and leave. I’m sick of Alexandria, I’m sick of being
here and I should go but now I can’t go, She followed me there, we started
talking, something stupid about wanting to get to know me better, that I’m her
friend and she wants to know the real me.
But I am the real me, I’m not holding back some nice guy inside,
not going to suddenly be Zidane or fuckin’ Fratley if she just says something
right. She better know that, maybe she
does, maybe she doesn’t, do I even know that? She
asked me all these questions, and she was happy, she looked like she wasn’t
even thinking about him at all, maybe trying to distract herself by messing
with me. She talked about growing up
and being a Dragon Knight, which I guess was a hard thing for her to do being a
girl and she got a lot of shit for it from everyone else. She learned not to let things get to her,
learned to be very formal there, she learned to be a tough bitch and yet
there’s this part of her that crumbles when anyone looks at her the wrong
way. I let her say her piece, no skin
off my nose I guess, fine, fine, I’ll be your counselor, talk away, no
different than me writing in this stupid book to some unknown person in the
future. But after that she wanted me to
talk, but I didn’t want to say anything so I didn’t, and she just looked at me
as I was sitting there on the bed edge, and then she sat behind me and real
slowly put those little hands on my shoulders.
I truly think she was scared of me getting pissed at first, snapping at
her or lashing out, and she was right to be, ‘cause I would have, I know it,
but when she did that I couldn’t move or say anything. It’s like she cast Stop on me ‘cause I
stopped, right there. She started rubbing my shoulders and
my mind was saying ‘get away’ but I didn’t say anything, and she said that I
walked hunched over so bad and I should relax, a whole bunch of stuff I didn’t
really hear because I was trying so hard to tell her to leave me the hell alone
and I couldn’t say it, like my throat was just locked up. She made me lay on my stomach on the bed so
she could reach better and I just went and did it, why did I do that? Every part of me was yelling that she could
just jab a knife into the back of my skull, that I was just so defenseless like
that but maybe I trust her? It makes sense; why would she try to kill me now
anyway? Maybe I trusted her even though I didn’t, you know? Anyway, she asked why I’m always hunched over
and also about my childhood but I really couldn’t tell her about either of
them, those being connected and all. I
didn’t have the heart to tell her that she could rub all she wanted and I’d
never straighten out, no matter how nice it felt or how much I wanted it to be
true. I’m stuck this way since Caleb
kept me in a cage for so many years, that he didn’t think to get a bigger one
as I kept growing, that I had to sit there with my head nearly between my knees
to fit in there before I was able to get out of there for good. Did she want to hear the way I cried,
unaware of my own existence, my own humanity, only feeling the pain and wanting
it to make it stop? How could I tell
her that and then be able to take the look of pity on her face? Oh, what the fuck am I saying? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Okay, I’m calm now, I’m going to
continue because I guess it needs continuing.
Paper makes a very satisfying noise when it’s ripped but I’m sure you
knew that. Anyway, I have more problems
now so I don’t need to drag up the past anymore, even though crap like that is
part of me and I guess it has a place in a book about me too. It happened and I said I wouldn’t cross it
out. Something else happened too, and I’m
going to write it down despite the fact that my brain is sending off warning
signals that I shouldn’t. The thing
just should vanish itself from existence but it’s also the real reason why I am
so confused right now. You see, I don’t
remember what made it start but Freya decided to show me her Burmecian dancing,
and all I’m going to say is that after a while of watching her dance around in
that little shirt I made sure to stay laying on my stomach on the bed. I was damn uncomfortable, and I’m not
talking about my belt buckle pinching my gut either. I’m not going to embarrass myself by intricately describing it
but you probably know what I mean. In
fact, if you’re a guy you probably know exactly what I mean, and if
you’re a girl you probably know exactly how to make it happen. Are you done laughing at me now? Fine. So
she’s a demi-human… I don’t know if you’d call her pretty, in the conventional
sense of the word. She’s Freya, that’s
all I can really say about her. But
when she looks back over her shoulder at you with eyes like emeralds and her
white hair swinging around her face, it doesn’t matter that she isn’t human,
that those tiny hands of hers only have four fingers, that she has a tail with
a little damn ribbon tied on it. When
she smiles and makes you feel like you’re the only person in the world and that
you matter, that your life means something because it means something to her
- it doesn’t matter that she’s a Burmecian.
It just doesn’t. I know there
are quite a few people who might not understand this, who might think it
unnatural, dirty… fine, whatever. I
sure as hell won’t be able to change your mind. You can sit on it and rotate for all I care. Besides, it’s not like I’m human myself,
when you get down to it. Don’t ask me
why I’m trying to rationalize this anyway, since it’s all a big waste of time. I’ve gone and ruined anything that might
have happened between us. ‘Between us’, fuck, listen to me talking like
I know what I’m saying. Freya was
trying to be a friend or something and I start acting like a fool. How could she let me lose control like
that? Didn’t she know what she
was doing would affect me like that? She had her hands on my shoulders again, and
then she was leaning down to say something to me, her hair falling into my
vision like this silk curtain, and I just lost it I guess, flipped over and
pinned her down before either one of us knew what was happening. I have to be imagining it, wishful thinking or
something clouding the way I remember this, but she didn’t seem scared or
angry, or anything other than surprised a little. I think we just kind of laid there staring at each other, and
then she reached up and kind of brushed the hair away from my eyes. She was startled when she saw them, like
most people, and gasped, and when I heard that, I dunno, it just kinda set off
something in me, this thought that I didn’t want it to happen again, that if I
let myself hurt Freya I would kill myself. So I just ran away, even when I
heard her call my name I didn’t stop, I just got out of there and hung around
town for a while. When I did go back I
made sure to avoid her or any of the others she might have told. I ought to be on my way to Treno now but I’m
staying holed up in my room until I can force myself to actually go. Stupid, I know, cowardly, dumb, it's all the
clichés you've ever heard. Shout at the book, 'you know you love her, don't run
off and ruin it with that hackneyed 'I'm afraid I'll hurt her' thing!' Go
ahead, it won't change the fact that I did in fact do it, have in
fact hurt someone before, and I'm not just talking about some broken
heart. Besides, I don't know if I love
her, I don't know anything, I don't understand anything. I really need to leave Alexandria now, but,
for some reason, I don’t want to. But I
don’t want to see her either and try to explain what happened, or apologize, or
anything like that. Maybe I just want
to keep that one moment, when I knew I meant something, safe with me here
without having to talk to her, and risk having her take it back. --You knew it. I know you Okay, so I guess from everything else I’ve said before
about me being Caleb’s property, it seems like I would have never stopped being
a mindless animal, never turned into what I am now, which I’m sure isn’t
perfect but is better than being that.
And I probably wouldn’t have, if it had just been up to me alone. But actually I owe myself to one person,
since most everything I know I got from him. See, Caleb wasn’t always a noble but a merchant’s son,
and before he came into money he was a normal kid like you can find anywhere,
like all kids cruel and kind both unwittingly, and when he was a boy he had a
best friend named Sust. When they grew
up they went their separate ways and while Caleb got rich Sust became a monk
and learned to fight and meditate and all that stuff real monks learn. I was about nine or ten, as far as I can
guess, when Sust came back to Treno and visited his friend. I can’t sit here and tell you exactly when I realized
that I had thoughts, control - humanity.
It’s not as though someone just flipped some damn switch and all the
lights went on upstairs. It must have
happened slowly, and I don’t know how he did it. I do remember, though, looking at my hand, moving my fingers, staring
at them as I moved them and thinking ‘this is me and I am here’. And when that happened, Sust was there. Somehow he must have come across me in my
cage while over at Caleb’s and took it upon himself to wake me up, you might
say. He’s the one who gave me my name;
I don’t even remember what Caleb called me, probably just variations on ‘him’. He left a lot but always came
back to teach me something new, first speaking and then writing and
reading. It took me a long time to
learn but then again I had a lot of time to practice that stuff, since I was
mostly locked up unless Caleb decided he wanted to parade me around or make me
fight someone stupid enough to bet that he could beat me. And it got so that I didn’t want to do that
anymore, when I could feel people’s stares in my skin and feel… ashamed,
embarrassed, angry that the fucker could do this to me, that I could let
him do that to me. As you might expect, Caleb was none too happy that his
beast had become an actual person who fought against his imprisonment and was
now too much of a rebel to lead around on a chain. He made a deal with Sust which did make me a slave (rather
than a dog), but at least it let me move around freely. The cage was gone, but too late, the damage
had already been done. I could go
around his mansion, though his wife hated that and was probably scared of me,
and eventually I was trusted enough to go into town on errands. I didn’t even think of running away - where
would I go? Besides, if I went away I
knew Sust might not be able to find me again, and at that moment in time he was
the only thing that mattered to me. The last thing he taught me over those years was to fight
with control, without that animal rage, like a monk does with his hands and
body as his weapon though I did pick up the claws later on. He taught me ways to use my ki, my life force,
as a way to heal and hurt my enemies with sheer force of mind. This self-control is, well, my most prized
possession I guess you could say.
There’s no way in hell that I’m ever going to go back to what I was,
even for a moment, though saying that’s really just wishing it was true. There have been times it’s happened and I
hate myself all the more after each one. And the more I learned, the more I started to hate
Caleb. But Sust made me promise not to
attack him, so I didn’t. Since I
couldn’t kill him I just refused to listen to his orders. I’m not going to talk about how he punished
me for that, some things I just don’t want to go into, even with a stranger
like you. Naturally none of it was very
pretty. But this more than anything
taught me that no matter what, I had to win.
Losing meant worse than death, even against the bullies that lived in
Treno and all they wanted was to strut around after knocking you down. You let them walk over you even once and
they will keep doing it, and I wasn’t going to let anyone else do it even
though Caleb did. I couldn’t help that
but I could make sure no one else messed with me, that no one else was good
enough to mess with me. With Caleb it
was just a battle of wills I guess, since I’d promised not to fight him for
real. This all got Caleb real mad, I guess he felt that Sust
had just stolen his property right out from under him since I was no longer his
pet half-breed monster and could pretty much leave whenever I wanted to. I’m sure other nobles laughed at him for
this, that he owned me but not for real.
All that gil wasted, and all that.
I guess I can understand that but I can’t ever forgive him for what he
did about it. So one day when I went to the
house where Sust stayed when he was in town, he wasn’t there. I thought he’d gone on one of his trips
around the Mist Continent and I waited and waited, but a month passed and he
never showed. I knew right away
something was wrong because he hadn’t said goodbye. He turned up finally bobbing in the canal, his face purple and
his eyes open wide, bulging, very dead.
He’d been dead that whole month, and the sucker-plants that eat flesh,
that live under some of the bridges in Treno, especially where the common
people live, had held him under for that whole time and ate away at him. I like to think that he was dead before the
sucker-plants got to him; it’s the only thing I can do, as if thinking it Some city guards hauled his
body from the water, it looks so peaceful in the lights that are always lit
since it’s always so dark, and they laid him on the stones as all these people
gathered around to gawk. You could see
the water pooling around him, and there were stars in it. I stood and watched too, got as close as I
dared, and before a moment was over I knew what to do. I dunno why I did it, it’s
not as if he could have heard me, but before I left I told him I loved
him. He’s the only person I’ve ever
said that to. No one’s ever said it to
me. Of course I knew who had Sust
killed, and you do too. So did everyone
who knew about the situation and they all waited to see what would happen, what
I would do. That very minute I went
straight back to Caleb and challenged the little shit, as you might have
guessed, since I didn’t have anyone to hold me to my promise anymore. He was a noble, not a fighter, so he didn’t
have much of a chance. I splattered his
blood all around his office and it was the one thing I’ve done I regret the
least in all my life. I still keep his
last name, you know, as my own, kind of like a trophy. I’ve never bought into things some criminals
do, like some guy I knew who kept a bit of hair from each person he
killed. But I’ve got his last name now,
Coral, and taking it was the best thing I could think of, the most fitting. Of course everyone knew I’d
killed him, when they found out about it, but either they were afraid to try
and arrest me or they just hadn’t liked Caleb enough to bother with
charges. Nobles, who knows. Sure didn’t stop them from putting that
bounty on me years later for ‘stealing’ from the Auction House, but that was
probably a whole different generation of the bastards in charge too. Anyhow, I went out on my own after that but
came back to Treno every once in a while, mostly before I even knew I was going
there just like it is for me now. I
mostly ended up wandering around looking for fights, until I met Zidane, and
later joining up with him. And so there
you have it. What a sad sack of shit I
am, hm? Well, I’m not going to
apologize for anything - what happened is what happened. I’ll let you think of it what you will, as
if I could stop you anyway. So, now what?
I’ve done what I said I’d do and wrote about myself. There’s nothing left to say that the history
books won’t cover for you. Well, nothing
left that I want to tell you.
I’m not under any contract to tell you my secrets, after all. So I guess this is it. --I’ve
gone and done it now. I had this chance
just sitting there waiting and I went and killed it. You bet your ass this has to do with Freya, and while I’m still
sort of calm I’m going to explain it here.
Fuck it, now that she knows it’ll get out to everyone, and I
might as well include it here so that you don’t get the impression that I’m a
decent kind of person or anything. At least
it’s a chance to give my side of it, not that I’m trying to defend what I
did. I’m not that kind of crazy,
not that it means anything. I don’t know if she fell on her head
or what, but for some reason Freya decided to go find me, heard I was still in
town because of course someone like me doesn’t exactly blend in, you know. I went and left the castle but was taking my
sweet time like an idiot in getting out of town, mainly because I’ve been most
everywhere already and wasn’t too thrilled about seeing it all again. Okay, who am I kidding? I’m lying, I’m lying, I didn’t want to leave
because, I don’t know, I guess I really did still want to talk to her, I wanted
her to know I wasn’t just some coward who ran off because our faces were, like,
this close, you know, and because she gasped when she saw my eyes? And
well, she did come to find me because she thought I ran off because I thought
she was ugly, that I didn’t want to roll on the bed with a demi-human, that I
was feeling sick for liking her and she’s got a tail. So she’s telling me all this, kinda going around and around the
subject till she gets there, she’s actually got these tears in her eyes at
implying that I’d have wanted her in the first place, and here I’m thinking oh
shit, oh shit, oh shit. I really didn’t want her to look like that at me, and
she isn’t the one who needs to apologize, and so - I told her. I told her what I wanted never to tell anyone,
just to make her feel better than me, to make her be the right one and not
me. And when she heard it she just got,
I don’t know, stunned, and those eyes went wide and I saw fear there, maybe not
so much, and then I knew I just could never see her again and I left. I left with the memory of her scared of me,
she’s never scared of anything, you don’t hear her say so much as ‘ow’ on the
battlefield and when I went away all I left of me was that, being scared, and
her eyes saying ‘I’m hurt’ even though she never says that. I hurt her and I
hurt her and I’m not ever seeing her again, is that a good enough
punishment? I just made a mistake! I told her about when I was younger, on my
own after So these ‘friends’ thought it would be funny
to set me up with some whore in Lindblum once, it was as far as I ever traveled
then and I was just so in awe of everything but trying to look tough so no one
would try to bother me, and I didn’t even know what was going on. They gave her some gil to kiss me and she
was adventurous and did it and they all laughed while I just wondered what was
going on. They gave her more money to
do more stuff and then take me back to her room and I guess I was better than
starving so she took it, and everything that happened, it was a blur. But I somehow
I lost it, something that happened made me go back to that way I was, without a
mind, animal and without anything, I just hurt her and lost it and didn’t know
anything, but I hurt her like that and oh those brigands laughed at me and at
her, said she deserved it taking their money for that. I
didn’t know, I just - well I told her!
I told her that was why I ran away and now I can’t ever see her again, I
left her with pain and I can’t ever see her again can’t ever come back again-* --Okay,
look, I’m only writing this down because Zidane told me to. He caught up with me on the road, actually
got ahead of me and was waiting for me all sitting on a boulder acting casual,
the asshole. Being ‘dead’ sure didn’t
do anything to help his smarts, ‘cause he didn’t know better than to argue with
me and try to get me to go back. And I
know you’re reading this over my shoulder, thief-boy. Go away. I know how bad I fucked things up
with Freya, and I don’t need him to tell me about them. I’m sorry, but you just don’t look at
someone the same way after they’ve told you about the horrible things they’ve
done, and I’m not going to give her a chance to look at me with fear or
disgust, no matter how much Zidane begs. Well, I let him read it. This, yeah, what you’ve got in your hands
now, rather than say out loud again what I’m so afraid of. He’s trying to give me advice even though
none of it will work, none of this is as simple as to be fixed the way he fixes
things, with a grin and a gleam in his eye and besides, I am the wrong one, the
bad one here and this is the best thing to do. I told him to shut up while I’m writing but dammit, he doesn’t
listen very well. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like
running away. But I can’t just be going
around looking for fights anymore, and I Zidane thinks there’s a way to fix things, or
at least explain everything, but I’m not so sure. It would still mean I wouldn’t have to go back to Alexandria, at
least, since he would do it for me. I
have to think it over, and I’m going to take my time. What does he know? Let
him sit out here and bake in the sun and wait for me, it’s the least he
deserves. I could be halfway to
Treno by now. All right, all right, I’ve been saying all
along that I’m writing this for whoever might happen to find it in the
future. But, now I’ve thought it over
and I’m going to take Zidane’s advice, even though it’s sure to embarrass me
and maybe ruin things even more. But
what can I do? Nothing, that’s what,
but this. So, Freya, I guess this is for you. Understand me more, hate me more, it’s all
up to you now. I can’t apologize for
anything in here, can only say that it’s the truth as I know it. My book At
least you’ll know who it was who fell in love with you. Addendum
--I
have been persuaded not to leave things here and torture you poor future
souls with ambiguity, and to finish off my book by telling you the outcome of
Zidane’s advice. So, you really want to
know what happened after he took this back to the castle for Freya to read?
Actually, the whole thing smacks of a ten-gil paperback, same as all the ones
about Zidane and the queen. I won’t
blame you for stopping here and keeping your sense of drama intact. All right, I give up. What happened was, I went on to Treno, not
expecting very much. Why is it that I
always go here when I have nowhere in particular to go? There are many, many better places around
the world to end up in. But, like it or not, Treno is where I was,
just hanging around and stuff. Stopped into the inn, and since I helped save
the world I guess I’m not really ‘wanted’ anymore and so the innkeeper, that
grouchy old bastard, gave me my old poster he’s had hanging in the corner for
so long. I don’t know what he thought I
might want with it, but I took it rather than pitch a fit, and then I went down
to the nearest bridge to drop the damn thing in. Now, okay, this is where it gets
melodramatic. You don’t live in a place
like Treno that’s built on water without learning to swim. You just learn, or else, well, you
won’t be living there any longer, right? So when I heard this splash I didn’t
think one damn thing of it. There’re
always people jumping off the bridges, whether it’s for a dip or maybe you’re
just out of money and out of luck, goodbye. So, yeah, I didn’t care. Dropped the paper in and turned to go find
something else to do, a bar to sit in for a while maybe, but then I hear this
splashing and some voice, and a girl screaming her head off. Now who knows why, but some kid’s in the
water, and he’s being dragged under by the sucker-plants, since nobody really
gives a damn about clearing them outta there around the bad side of town. Cleans out the trash, you know. This kid’s gonna be drowned and eaten, maybe
not in that order, and I’m standing there.
Now, maybe once I would have just walked off and figured that it’s just
not my problem. But that would have
been before Zidane screwed me up, better or worse, and so I went in after him. I’m willing to bet you’ve never messed with a
sucker-plant before. I don’t know if they’re really all plant or what, maybe
something like a plant-monster that eats meat.
But they’ve got these little feeler things on tentacles that wrap around
you and keep you from being able to move too good. It had that kid wrapped up pretty good, and it was real dark
under there, but I had the claws so I just started tearing away, mucking up the
water even more with its sap or blood or whatever. When the little feeler things start getting at
you, it doesn’t hurt too bad, at least at first, kinda like Eiko pinching you
when she doesn’t get her way. But they go for the same spots over and over
again, pinch pinch pinch, and then it really starts to hurt. And I had to get close to it to get the kid
out, and some of those vine whatevers got around my arm and latched on, and
they started that pinching that was really like - nibbling, until they got to
some blood and then it felt like hell. I think the kid was passed out by then,
couldn’t hold his breath that long, and I wasn’t feeling too good either, kinda
hacking away blindly and trying my best to kill it or at least make it let us
go, and then it got tighter and tighter and I just couldn’t breathe, and the
only thing I could think by then was this was what Sust felt, because I just
know they tied him up and threw him to the plants, and they just sucked away
his life until he was dead, eaten up by the little teeth and here I was going to
have the same thing happen to me because I was so fucking stupid as to help
some damn kid, because I thought that if I didn’t - well, that’s just not who I
am anymore. That sentence was much too long. I’ll never make a good paperback fiction
writer. For shame. Anyway, yes, it was getting dark and I was
thinking that was it, I mean, even after offing Kuja and that whatever-thing
who had the mind-numbing chorus of screams in his amphitheater at the end of
the world - whoever the fuck he was - after that, and Amarant Coral
can’t fight off one damn plant by himself.
Well, no, I can’t, not with it sucking my life away bit by bit - and it
was underwater, give me a break. But then there was this flash of light and
some streams of color and then I felt myself going upward, kinda slow but maybe
I was seeing it wrong. Just up and up till finally I hit the surface and could
breathe again, which was real nice.
Some other people helped get me and the kid up on the bridge, since
Freya couldn’t really push us both up there without the water to help carry us;
she’s such a little thing after all and she knows it too even though she makes
a face when you say it. Oh, yeah, it was Freya who saved us. I guess after she read my book she decided to come find me and
there were all these people around talking and I couldn’t really hear her voice
when she explained it, I just didn’t want to hear anything. I don’t know, I was just shocked that she
was even there, I mean after what I did and everything. I could only look at her and watch her speak
even though I didn’t really hear what she was saying. But maybe my writing makes me sound like some
okay guy because it made her think that anyway. And since she comes to find me and has to save me because I was
saving some kid, well, that just makes the whole thing complete, I’m so
completely redeemed and Not So Bad.
You’ve got another Canary play right here. It makes me sick. So I’m sitting there wet and I
finally get the mind back to ask her if she’s really going to forgive me for
what I did, and I suppose that was what she was talking about because
she gave me this huge whack upside the head which I didn’t appreciate because
I’d just almost drowned. Everyone was staring around at us and someone
was thanking me and I don’t know, I just wanted it all to go away - except
Freya of course because I didn’t think that I would have seen her again and
suddenly there she was, so she shouldn’t have to go away. But everyone else had
to and I told them to and they did, because I was pissed off and I don’t look
like the kind of person you want to be around when they’re pissed off,
especially when I’m bleeding and wet. So they all left. Except Freya. And since it’s quiet
now and everything you say is suddenly really loud and in front of you, we’re
quiet too, and I realize that she’s put her coat around my shoulders and it
looks all ridiculous and is too small and doesn’t help me one bit getting dry,
but I leave it there. And we’re just looking at each other in a pool of water
on a Treno bridge, and she’s just everything all at once, you know, she’s not
just many parts of one thing like most people, she’s many parts of many things
and that maybe I don’t see them all, maybe the stuff I like isn’t the most of
her. And it turns out that was what she
was thinking about me, that she was wondering if I was really what she saw,
until she read this book. And the book
didn’t change her mind, just made it up for her I think. Now, I can’t help but think that’s
kind of unfair, that she can know the parts of me that senses can’t sense and I
know only what I can see of her.
Okay, well, that’s about it. I really am finished with this now, since
the rest of what happened isn’t interesting at all. So I’m not going to bother you with the way she gently brushed my
hair from my face, looking straight into my eyes. I won’t describe the warmth of her arms around my neck, the way
her hair tickled my cheek as she leaned in close, or the taste of her lips
pressed against mine. After all, some things should remain
private. --Amarant Coral 7/11 |
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