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Disclaimer: Final Fantasy IX game, characters, and game story are copyright of Squaresoft and their respective creators etc.--------------------------------------------------
Streams of Life
Chapter 1 :
A young girl, who looks older than she physically is, looked up into the entwining vines of the Iifa tree. Although appearing no older than twelve, her mentality is very much refined. She knows she is in reality, much younger than anyone thinks. She swished her tail, which danced together with the little pink ribbon on it.
The foliage was thick; the vines gigantic, resembling complicated piping that would frustrate any plumber. Navigation was not a problem. She knew just where to head, and who to look for.
Jumping into a natural tunnel created by vines and rock, she found herself in a small cavern of some sort, at the bottom of a large, stony structure that looked like a cross between a boulder and a small platform.
Then she saw masses of vines slowly slinking away, revealing what they had been surrounding at the top of the platform.
The blond girl climbed up the boulder as the Iifa tree roots parted to make way. She arched her fine eyebrows, then frowned in a near childish manner.
With arms akimbo, she tapped her foot on the almost jade-like ground she was standing on.
"Oh my," her voice echoed though the green cavern, "I just leave you both alone for a while and look what happens!" She then shrugged, her shoulder length hair bobbing ever so slightly as she shook her head.
With the Iifa tree roots all out of the way, Zidane lost his firm, half-kneeling position of concealing what was underneath him and collapsed into a rubbery pile on top of a man he was trying to protect.
Mikoto hurriedly pried Zidane's arm off Kuja's vital breathing apparatuses, namely his nose and mouth. Then she stuck a finger below the silver-haired man's nose to ascertain his survival.
"You would kill him by suffocation right after saving him!" She reprimanded, although the unconscious blond boy was not listening. A drop of sweat trickled down her face as a sign of half-exasperation, half-resignation.
She squatted down, and poked Zidane in the arm with her tail.
No reaction.
She took out a potion and threw it at Kuja's head.
The bluish glass bottle broke, the liquid within that flowed out seemed to be curing him, but at the same time, a painful-looking bump formed on his forehead.
"Hm? Potions doesn't work like that?" the girl in pink thought to herself.
A silvery eyebrow furrowed in annoyance. Kuja slowly opened his eyes and stared blankly, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the bit of light that was coming from the hole above.
Someone familiar came into his view, and he sat up immediately, disregarding what pains that wrecked his body.
"Mikoto!" he exclaimed, just before dizziness hit him in the head, forcing him to shut his eyes tightly and mumble a string of unintelligible curses.
The aforementioned Mikoto blinked. "You are awake now? It seems that you'll be all right. Now we got to get Zidane up..."
Kuja felt something warm and sticky dribbling down his face. He put a hand to it, and saw blood. Instinctively, he was tempted to whip out a mirror from nowhere and start whining, but on second thoughts, he decided to act more logically.
"Mikoto, did you do something to me? I don't think that there would be glass in the Iifa tree." He questioned, plucking out a shard of glass from his hair.
Mikoto fumbled through her inventory, and pulled out another bottle of potion. She handed it over to Kuja, who more or less gathered information on what the glass in his hair belonged to. Mikoto struck a throwing pose, ready to apply the same technique she used on Kuja onto Zidane in hope of waking him.
Kuja raised an eyebrow, and swatted at Mikoto's hand.
"No, Mikoto. You don't throw glass bottles at people, if that's what you're going to do."
"But it worked on you." Mikoto contemplated.
A dark cloud started to form on top of Kuja's head, while he gave Mikoto a "oh-so-that's-what-you-did-to-me look".
"Potions are meant to be drunk. Not thrown. Aren't I a very good example of what happens if potions are misused?" Kuja took a sleeve and gently wiped his forehead, and at the same time, meticulously preening his hair for any dried blood and glass.
Mikoto shrugged, then popped open the cap of the potion, and stuffed the neck of it into Zidane's mouth. Kuja slapped a hand onto his own face in exasperation at Mikoto's lack of common sense, then decided to help by propping up Zidane's upper body and regulating with small pulses of knocks and hits on his back to ensure the smooth swallowing of the potion.
After which, Kuja made sure Zidane was still breathing, so that he would not be an accomplice to murder.
There was a small cough from the unconscious Genome, which attracted the other two's intent attention.
Zidane's features contorted into a face of pain as he slowly entered reality. Beads of cold sweat started to form on Zidane's unclothed arms and face. The fur on his tail stood on its ends, and he rolled to a side, his hands clutching his right side, just above his abdomen.
Kuja looked in horror as Zidane's breathing suddenly became haggard and heavy. Mikoto shouted for Zidane to say something, or where it hurt, but Zidane remained oblivious to his surroundings.
Kuja chanted something, then raised his hands into the air. A Curaga spell was in the process.
"I don't know if I have enough magic..." He thought, as he gritted his teeth in pain, his life and magic gauge dangerously low. The wounds he sustained started to open slowly, freckling his already dirty clothes with spots of red.
A Curaga spell came thundering down and hit the curled-up blond point blank. Due to over-exertion, Kuja fainted on the spot before seeing any results.
Mikoto looked at the both of them. Kuja would be fine with enough rest and some basic curing, but Zidane...
The Curaga spell had no effect at all. There was not any strange statuses on Zidane, neither was he poisoned, yet why does he look so tortured and in pain?
In fact, the Curaga spell seemed to have worsened his condition.
Suddenly without warning, Zidane went limp. His hands slid off his ribs and his pained expression faded.
Mikoto searched carefully on his chest for any signs of injury.
An Iifa tree root had gone cleanly through his side. A small trail of blood had been trickling steadily down the side of the boulder, nearly unnoticeable. Without delay, she first tore up a part of Kuja's skirt-like bottom and wrapped up Zidane's wound to stop the bleeding.
Kuja's complaints can come later.
There was something that still felt wrong. Being unable to carry her two elder brothers anywhere, she explored the place. On the Iifa tree roots-covered wall of the cavern, she spotted some blood stains. For a moment, she thought she saw a spot of luminous green on it.
Maybe it was just her imagination; all the roots are greenish anyway.
Anyway, better try to find a way to get Kuja up again and see if he could whisk them outside with that teleportation spell of his.
***********************
Zidane's eyes snapped open.
So it was all just a nightmare. A rather intriguing nightmare, it seemed.
Slowly, his senses all came back to him.
He twitched a finger.
"My hands work," He thought.He wiggled his toe.
"This too,"Then he waggled his tail.
"Oh boy, I think I'm back into business," Zidane grinned to the ceiling.Before he could make his way out of bed, he felt a warm breath on his face. He turned his head and found himself face to face with his elder brother. Kuja was so close to him that Zidane nearly bumped his head into his. The awakened monkey moved back a little so his eyes would not cross looking at something so close.
A streak of relief passed through his heart that all his efforts of going back to the Iifa tree did not come to waste.
Upon observing Kuja's sleeping face, Zidane noted that he was much like himself in many ways. Well, minus the eye-shadow, the hair dye, the lipstick, and oh, the nail polish, both of them looked very much alike.
It was extremely tempting to pull the silver feathers out of Kuja's head to see if it was really just an attachment.
Then it suddenly struck Zidane with a small shock that he might look exactly like Kuja if he has the same accessories and make-up.
"Well," Zidane shuddered inwardly, "you're my brother after all."
"That's all beside the point," Zidane dismissed all his digressed thoughts, "now I gotta figure where we are. Judging from the condition of the room we're in, it looks like we're safe for now.
Besides, even his clothes were changed to loose pyjamas, so someone must have been meaning to help them all along.
Wait a minute. These clothes look kind of cheesy. They smell a little funny, and Zidane swore he saw the same floral pattern somewhere before, but he just couldn't put a finger to it.
He got up, careful to avoid waking a sleeping beauty of an elder brother, and headed to the door. Kuja tossed over and mumbled something in his sleep. Zidane grimaced as he felt a sneeze coming. Must be Kuja insulting him in his dream.
There was not much pain in walking, just a very nagging ache near the side of his abdomen. He slouched a little to compensate for the pain, and then pushed open the door to the main hall. Suddenly, everything fell into place.
"You're awake?" A jolly voice squawked.
"Doctor Tot?" Zidane grinned, glad to see a familiar face and surroundings.
They were in the observatory in Treno, the house of Doctor Tot. So the bedroom belonged to the elderly doctor, Zidane mused.
"These pyjamas are yours too, right?" Zidane chuckled, "no wonder they looked familiar to me," he pinched the front of his clothes for emphasis.
"Hahaha! Looks like you're going to be in a fine shape, my boy!" The short man adjusted his glasses on his ridiculously large beak. Putting down the book he was reading, the old doctor went up to Zidane and poked him gently in the stomach.
"You must be hungry; you slept for three days."
Zidane scratched his head and gave a sheepish grin. "Actually, I'm not that hungry. But something warm might be good, y'know."
"There's a pot of soup in the kitchen. You just sit down here and I'll just warm it up for you." The kind old man offered as kindly as he could, his keen medical sense noticing Zidane's slight hunch in posture. He must still have wounds that hurt.
"How did we get here?" Zidane inquired, as the doctor brought out a steaming bowl of thick soup and set it on the small wooden table.
"Three of you just appeared right outside town. I had a couple of people help me carry your companion and you in."
"Three of us?" Zidane wondered to himself.
As if reading Zidane's mind, the bespectacled man described the third person who were with them.
"There is a little girl with a tail like yours. She left, though, saying that you'll know where to find her."
Zidane immediately recognized Mikoto at the word 'tail'.
"Doc," Zidane sipped from his spoon, "how is Kuja?"
"That young man's name is Kuja?" Doctor Tot stroked his beard.
"Yeah."
"He'll be fine. He is only exhausted from over-exertion. From what I heard from your other companion, he teleported all of you here. An amazing magical feat, I must say."
"Well, he's powerful enough to destroy a planet and a half..." Zidane mumbled to himself.
Upon studying Zidane's features, the doctor concluded, "You know, it is interesting how much that boy looks like you."
"Really?" Zidane forced a bitter grin, for he did not know if it were a good or a bad thing.
"And it was very interesting how he coils up his tail, and how he refuses to uncoil it even when unconscious," the doctor remarked with delicious interest.
"...tail?" Zidane perked up his ears.
"One like yours. But silver in colour."
Zidane was more interested in the 'coil' part than the 'tail' part.
Oh, the lengths Kuja went to be different from the average Genome!
He felt like laughing. Now there's something to blackmail his elder brother with."Ahem, and Zidane, there's something I should tell you about," the beaked-one coughed, sinking the subject back into seriousness. "The wound you have there..."
A clumsy thud coming from the bedroom interrupted their conversation.
Both of them turned their heads and winced when a crash rang out before the echo of the thud died.
"Woah! Hold it, bro! What do you think you're doing?" Zidane exclaimed as he ran into the room. What he saw was a mess of blankets on the floor and a fallen chair.
The wise, bearded yet beaked elder shook his head, stroked his beard and gave a beaky* smile. Young people, always in a rush. They have time to do what they want, yet they won't relax. Such thoughts are always running through Doctor Tot's mind. Yet something about this silver-haired man bothers him. The bird-like elder walked up and observed.
*note #1: there is no more appropriate way to describe how a being with a beak would smile.
Kuja lay there, peeking out from the pile of blankets that smoldered him.
His gaze slowly turned and matched the old doctor's scrutinization.Doctor Tot looked at him and decided to take back his thoughts on Kuja being young.
Beneath the arrogant glare he has in his eyes, there is some sort of resignation he bears. It was the sort of passiveness an aged man would possess, one that has seen past death and no longer fears it, even perhaps welcoming it as a part of life. Doctor Tot is such a man himself, but he never thought that someone that young would have the same look in the eyes as him.
Kuja stared at Doctor Tot and asked, near to the point of complaining, "What are you looking at?"
"Nothing," Doctor Tot replied, adjusting his glasses again, then went out to set the table for one more. Perhaps it was just his glasses that needed fixing.
"Sheesh," Zidane pried the blankets off Kuja, "you didn't have to try and kill yourself with blankets."
Kuja pouted, his elegantly arched eyebrows frowned. He struggled to get up but could only get into a position where he was leaning against the wall, barely sitting. There was an ache banging against his temple, which he believes, is beyond just a headache. Perhaps a hangover would have been a better way to describe it.
"All right," Zidane ignored his sibling's expressed annoyance, "can you stand up?"
Kuja looked down, bent over, and attempted to get up. Which failed, and made him land on his bottom which was already sore from the first two noisy falls.
"Hey! Don't force yourself if you can't do it." Zidane patted his brother's shoulder before sliding an arm around his ribs. With a heave, Kuja got up with Zidane's support and both of them tumbled on the bed.
"You're heavy." Zidane panted as he sat up.
"Shut up," went the moody Genome, turning over and burrowing his face in the pillow in an attempt to ease the headache obtained from over-exertion.
Kuja's pain was understandable.
After all, it is easy to see that it isn't easy for one to ease up a teleport spell after getting a glass bottle smashed in one's head by one's own younger sister.
Zidane slapped the lethargic Genome's bottom. "Get up, lazy! Don't you want to eat something? You haven't eaten for days too, right?"
Kuja kicked Nuisance right in the chin, causing it to bite its tongue in the process.
"Go away!" He shooed, very bothered to be bothered.
Zidane rubbed his sore jaw and stuck out his hurt tongue, fanning it with a hand as Doctor Tot walked into the bedroom with a mug of soup for the bedridden.
Then the tongue-ached boy commented, "You really have a tail down there..."
That particular observation he made earned him another kick in the waist from Kuja, promptly sending him off the bed in pain.
"You two young ones will need to cooperate, or you'll be staying here longer than you think," The beaked elder chortled, "and I'll be just outside if you need me."
Zidane stood up and sighed, gently rubbing his pained waist.
Well, so much for rescuing a brother.
He scratched his head and shrugged, then decided that after a nice bottle of potion*, he would be healthy enough to wander around and get some sun.* note #2: The company which produces potions should include an exemption clause - "not responsible for anything that happens, inclusive of health hazards and emotional damage whatnots, if product is misused".
Kuja had a good mind to sue the company for not including that clause. That is however, out of the question and not relevant to the story for now."I'm going out for a walk. Anything you need?"
"New clothes," Kuja wagged a finger for emphasis, his face still refusing to get out of the soft pillow.
"That reminds me. I should change before I go out of this observatory." Zidane felt uneasy at the fact he had nearly wore cheesy pyjamas out into the streets of Treno City. Indeed, he would rather wear the set of clothes tattered by the Iifa tree roots..
"Zidane," Kuja cranked his head till an eye could be seen.
"What's up?"
"I don't think you would have any money with you now, do you?"
"Um..." Zidane searched through the pockets of his old clothes and found some change.
"40 Gil...50 Gil..." he counted.
Kuja felt a vein pop in his head.
Then he decided not to bother with such matters before his hair decides to turn from silver to white.
"I'll figure a way out," Zidane chirped optimistically, then exited the room.
"Good luck," Kuja mumbled and turned his face back into the pillow.
Then he heard the currently scatterbrained Zidane storming into the bedroom again, flustered. The blond boy hastily took the set of his old clothes and changed before heading out again, giving his surroundings a sheepish grin as he did so.
*************
- End Chapter 1 -
2.11am, 25th July 2001
Please do not mind the silly *notes I have, I won't do it as often as I have in the chapters to come.