timeandtides_backup | But the time of talking, using symbols, using words

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Entry tags:

firion,
tidus

But the time of talking, using symbols, using words

Characters: Firion and Tidus
Progress: Ongoing
Summary: Firion meets up with Tidus in Alexandria and have a talk.
Location: Alexandria
Date: March
Warnings: Fluff?

He had only just entered the city when he spoke to Tidus and agreed to meet at the docks. It was odd, to finally be out and exploring after staying in Lindblum for over a month. Not that Cloud and Tifa were bad hosts or anything but it showed that he really didn't know much about the world. This wasn't like his own at all. Who knew how long he would be here and if he were to be here for a long time, he would need to get to know the place. And so, it wasn't long after he had gotten the Orb of Minwu that he set off on another journey. His first stop was Alexandria.

And here he was, at the docks, waiting for a certain blond blitzball player to show up.

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It took a lot longer than either of them had thought to get there. And Tidus was being followed by a couple of soldiers when he did. He didn't pay any attention to them, though, walking fast, almost running to the docks. He lifted an arm to wave once he spotted Firion. "Hey! Sorry it took so long, he decided to be an even bigger moron!"

And hopefully he was ready to leave, because Tidus was definitely grabbing his shoulder and pulling him along whether he was or not.

"Come on, let's get out of here fast."

Firion gave a surprised yelp as his shoulder was grabbed and he was suddenly pulled. "O-Oh, alright," Firion stammered slightly, unsure as to why Tidus wanted to get out so fast.

"Any particular reason why we are rushing?"

"Me and that guy started yelling at each other and the Queen had to get involved so I'm getting out of here before I make anyone else mad." Or get thrown in jail, again. Tidus was now actually running - not nearly as fast as he could, but still - down the dock, having let Firion go so they could both move better. His goal was a ship obviously different from any others - not built around a hull, but based on two pontoons, with a long and wide two-level deck fully big enough to fit a good number of people on it. As a home went, it wasn't that big - as a boat went, it was a pretty good size for a personal craft. Stenciling down both sides read "The Marela."

And Tidus just grinned as soon as he got within range, skidding to a halt on the dock to stare up at her. She was beautiful, even with her sails down - and he'd thought he lost her forever. "I'm back," he said very quietly, under his breath, before moving to the edge of the dock where the ship was cleated to keep it from drifting off. "Come on, grab that other one and let's get out of here!"

Firion also marveled at the boat. Small for a home, indeed, but a good size for a personal craft. He followed Tidus' instructions, untying the sailor's knot and throwing the robes back onto the deck, jumping on soon after. It had been awhile since he had even been on ship of any kind.

Actually, it'd been awhile for him as well - most of Spira, at least. But while he was a little rusty, his body remembered the old motions. The Zanarkand houseboats normally stayed docked, but they would go out on the sea for breaks and vacations.

Tidus grabbed his own rope and made the jump to the deck easily, bracing himself to give a good kick off the wood, making the boat start drifting sideways. He left the rope on the deck for the moment to rush through the door (after unlocking it, of course - at least they'd fixed the door) and ducking down the stairs and around under the foredeck to the small room that held the wheel and engine controls. "Hang on up there!" He didn't know what he could fuel her with on Gaia, but she had plenty to last for awhile - and he wanted to freak the people out a little, as a parting "thank you" to Steiner. So Tidus was grinning that smirking grin as he put the key in the engine... and revved it, causing more than one person around the dock to jump at the sudden noise.

"All right, we're outta here!"

The sudden noise made Firion jump as well. It sounded like Cloud's motocycle only... deeper. Louder, too. It's odd how these machines were used in such small vehicles. Airships were one thing but boats and motorcycles? As the boat took off, Firion caught the rail out of reflex more than needing to actually hold onto something.

And then, they were off. Alexandria was becoming smaller as they left its shores. It seemed like a lifetime since he had been on a boat and sailing the seas. It felt nice.

Very, very nice.

Being part fish meant that Tidus acquired his sea legs again very quickly; he... never really lost them in the first place. Steering the boat was easy as well, the helm responding with her usual ease to his hands, as Tidus guided them past other boats and around buoys to the mouth of the harbor, grinning all the while like a little kid with his favorite toy.

Once they were out of the harbor and pointed in the right direction, he cut the engine and let them drift - no use wasting power. Time for the sails, as long as Steiner hadn't taken those, too.

"Okay, we're good!" Climbing the stairs onto the deck again, Tidus was still grinning - he'd missed the water. It was part of why he'd suggested going to Luca to Yuna, but this was where he belonged. "We're gonna have to stop for food and water and stuff soon, but we can wait until we see a town, then I can go in. It'll probably take us a couple days to get to Luca."

"That's fine, I'm sure we will hit a town before we starve," Firion smiled as he turned to Tidus. "I have never been Luca, I look forward to it."

He had never been to many places, so it was exciting to know that he would be seeing so many new places now. Though he wasn't sure if Tidus was staying in Luca or not. He didn't worry about it, he could travel alone if he must.

"So, my friend, how have you been?" Firion asked, leaning against the railing now that he got used to the water again. "Besides nearly getting yourself thrown in jail again, that is."

"Luca's from Spira - it's the closest thing Yuna and I have to a home, here. She'd probably like to stay in Besaid, but it didn't come over - and Luca's a good place." He almost could believe they really were in Spira, there. It was so cut off from the rest of the world in some ways, so more of that culture remained - including blitz.

And Tidus rolled his eyes at that question. "I'd drag you with me if I got thrown in jail again, you know. But it's... pretty good, really, aside from that. I'm here, Yuna's here - we're not gonna lose each other."

"I have yet to check the world map to see if there are places from my world here," Firion nodded. "Though I doubt it would matter much. Fynn will always be my home, no other."

He grinned and laughed. "Well, I could always claim that I have no idea who you are. Perhaps they would have let me go while you were dragged down again." He would have gone back to save Tidus though, should that have actually happened. He calmed and smiled. "That's good that you have Yuna with you. Someone you know is always good to have in a foreign land."

Tidus shrugged at that. "There's gotta be something, everyone else I know's got something. Zanarkand's here, but..." He trailed off. His memory was clearing more rapidly now, with exposure to people from other worlds and just more time process things and make connections. He remembered that he hadn't mentioned Yuna and the Pilgrimage much, if at all, and Zanarkand and his history there seemed to be the big things he focused on. He even had a small idea of when all that had happened, relatively.

"Yeah - did I tell you? I asked her to marry me."

"None of the people from my world are here, so I don't know," Firion sighed. "Even is some of the land is here, none would really keep me grounded. Fynn is ruled by the Princess Hilda and The Emperor ruled Palamecia. I was just part of the rebellion that stopped him."

"Did you?" His eyebrows shot up but he grinned happily. "Congratulations! Do you have a date set?"

"Sometime in the summer - I'm leaving it to the girls, I can't figure out any of that stuff. But it's gonna be in Luca, too." Tidus looked up and behind him as he felt some of his hair start to ruffle in a breeze - felt like a good wind was starting to kick in. "Come on, let's get the sails."

They were easy enough to find, stored in hatches in the deck; all they had to do was clip the rings to the lines and haul them up. Okay, yeah, really it would've been better to do all that before leaving the harbor, but he'd wanted out of there.

Firion nodded, pulled up the thick material and clipping the rings with ease. Together, they hauled the sails up, even if the breeze pushed at them as they did so. It had been a long time since he worked on a boat, but he didn't mind the work at all.

It didn't take long, either, and within minutes they were hauling the sails up the masts and lashing them in place. Now as long as the wind kept up right, they could cruise for hours. And Tidus was honestly tempted to jump in the water and go swimming, but he held back on that. Instead, he sighed with contentment and just flopped on the deck, spread-eagle and looking up at the sun. "Finally. I haven't seen this for a year and a half."

"Must be hard to not see your home for so long," Firion murmured, sitting down on the deck. He knew what it was like, in a way. It had taken a while to get Fynn back from the Emperor, not to mention they had been run out of their own home.

"I didn't think I was gonna see it ever again." It was nice to be on the water again, with the waves against the hull and the gulls cawing above them. They were still in easy range of the coast, to use it for navigation and to spot a town. Eventually.

And Tidus didn't mind telling Firion about his history. Firion was comfortable, a good friend - even if he didn't remember it all. It'd come at some point. "This place and the Void weren't the only times I got dropped somewhere new. Zanarkand got destroyed... I think me and Auron were the only ones to make it out. We got dropped on Spira, which was fine for Auron 'cause he was from there anyway, but I was lost."

"Is Spira another world or it is the same from where Zanarkand is from?" Firion asked, he wasn't sure he understood how Tidus got to Spira from Zanarkand other that that it was destroyed. Was it another world entirely? Or the same?

"Uhh..."

He'd told Cloud, so he didn't really have any reason not to tell Firion. But his history was strange (to say the least), and he still felt... It was almost like playing with fire, in a way. It felt like the more people he told, the less likely it was that he'd actually stick around.

Of course, Mjrn and Faris had found out anyway...

"...Promise you won't get weirded out?"

"Promise," Firion nodded, curiosity peaked. What exactly could be so weird about Tidus? Well, okay, lots of things. But the teen looked even a little worried. He wondered what was up.

Tidus sat up again, bracing himself on his hands, trying to figure out how to say it. In the end, he just went with his usual - just saying it.

"Zanarkand... There were two of them. My Zanarkand wasn't real." Pause. "I wasn't real. I am now... I think. I don't think I could be here if I wasn't, or have gone and met you or any of that. But I was just... made up. Dad, too."

Okay, that was extremely weird. But, ultimately, he wasn't entirely phased by it. They all came from strange worlds and times, while he didn't know much about Tidus' story. He knew his friend was real, even if made-up. He never revealed that to any of them in the Void. Neither did Jecht.

"That is rather... odd," Firion finally said. "What do you mean by 'made up' though? You're real, I think. You are your own person, no one can deny that."

At the point that Tidus had gone to the Void, he hadn't known. And Jecht had never learned it - the fayth had only told him to beg him to allow them to be put to rest. The explanation was never easy.

"Spira had this... monster, called Sin. It was huge - the size of a mountain or bigger, and it just... went around the world, destroying things and killing people. Sin was supposed to be the punishment Spira got for using too many machina, after the war that destroyed Zanarkand - the real Zanarkand - and almost destroyed this other big city called Bevelle. And there was a religion called Yevon, and part of Yevon was that people would dedicate their lives to stopping Sin by going out and fighting it and killing it, and when it died there'd be something called the Calm - until Sin came back. It always came back.

"And those people were summoners, and they traveled from temple to temple to pray to the fayth. The fayth were people that gave up living to become these statue...things that their souls lived in, and when they agreed to help the summoners they'd give them some of their power and the summoners could call on the fayth's aeon to come fight. They used aeons to fight Sin at the end of the Pilgrimage. But the fayth weren't dead, they were sleeping - and as they slept, they dreamed, and they made another Zanarkand in their dreams, including all the people and everything there. I was from that Zanarkand, and I think I was Bahamut's favorite - I always used to see his fayth, he used to remind me about stuff, like when I was busy. He's the one who told me about the dream world. And they... wanted to stop dreaming. So when they did, I... disappeared.

"Yuna cried... I made Yuna cry more than anyone."

Firion looked down, saddened at that. He could only imagine the heartbreak Yuna suffered for having her loved one disappear. All the other stuff, about the religion and Sin... much of it he didn't completely understand but the core of it, he did.

He wasn't sure what to say. "I'm sorry," Was all he could muster. For such a cheerful teen, he had a rather sad story to tell.

And Tidus shrugged. "Better me than her. Summoners... Summoners and guardians would die stopping Sin. Always. Yuna would have, but we did something different - she would've died, or both of us. That's how Dad went. But... Better me than her."

He really believed that. Normally when he spoke he was energetic, friendly, always conveying some strong emotion. This was just a simple truth he believed, and always would believe.

And he looked over at Firion, then reached out to hit him lightly in the shoulder. "Come on, it's okay. I'm here, right? Bahamut said I'd become something more than a dream, and I'm breathing and all that other stuff. Nothing's gonna change that, but telling people... It's hard, so I don't do it much."

"I know you're here," Firion chuckled softly. "It's just... it's sad to think that along with the conflict's end... so is yours. But, you are correct. If you are more than a dream, then you are safe from a complete end."

Tidus always said that it was his story to tell. That his adventure was his alone. So, perhaps his story just never finished. Gaia could be just another chapter. Just like it was for all the Sky People here.

"How is Yuna?" Firion asked.

"Yeah. I knew it was coming, but I didn't tell anyone - I didn't wanna think about it. I didn't tell anyone why it happened until I got over here, and you're only the third person I've told." Though a couple people found out through Memoria, but he trusted them both.

Tidus grinned at the question. That... was a whole lot easier. "Yuna's great. You're gonna like her - she cares about everyone and everything, and you can just tell it. I finally got her a real ring, too."

Firion nodded but smiled when Tidus told him about Yuna. "She sounds like a good person. It would be a pleasure to meet her once we reach Luca."

He chuckled lightly at the mention of the ring. "I'm sure she wears it proudly, too."

"She's... amazing." Yuna was simply the best person he'd ever met. She inspired people everywhere she went - that she'd fallen for him was still something Tidus had a hard time believing sometimes.

"Never takes it off. And I told her about you - about the Void and stuff, what I can remember. She wants to meet you, too. And you can stay with us as long as you want."

You just... might want some earplugs.

"I wouldn't want to impose, Tidus," Firion protested slightly, he had already taken up residence at Cloud's home for a time. He wasn't so sure about doing it again.

...earplugs? Really? Oh boy.

Tidus just shrugged again. "We've got two houses now, how's that imposing on us? You can stay on the boat if you want; I trust you." Maybe not in the techno-advanced kitchen, but Luca had plenty of places to eat anyway. "And the season starts soon, so you gotta be down here for that anyway. I'm not saying you've gotta live with us, but visiting's good, right? Besides, you've gotta help with my memory.

What? They were eighteen. Hush.

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But the time of talking, using symbols, using words

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