Post by NortheasternWind on Feb 20, 2011 21:56:57 GMT -5
Danse Macabre, a Tales of Phantasia fic by Northeastern Wind.
Status: Incomplete, two chapters done.
Warnings: ...Morbid descriptions?
Genre: General Adventure
Pairings: None. But it takes Mint/Cress and Chester/Arche as canon.
Find it here on Fanfiction.net, if you'd rather leave a review there.
You know it's time to start posting a fic when you really want to write the sequel. LOL. This fic actually has a prequel set in the past and starring Klarth, Arche and Milard, but I wanted to write this one first T_T They're completely separate besides one thing, so that shouldn't be a problem. I use Cress and Klarth, in case that bothers anyone. Everyone will now behold my epic fail pacing skills.
DISCLAIMER: This fic contains things I do not own, crap description, and hastiness. Enjoy anyway!
Thunk.
Cress' eyes blinked open blearily. He'd been just about to fall asleep, too... What was that? It was a very soft sound, like someone had... fallen on a pile of pillows or something. Or grass. There was a lot more grass around than there were pillows, so that had to be it. It sounded very muffled...
It came again, louder this time. The swordsman frowned, rubbing at his eyes as he sat up. It... seemed to be coming from the ground somehow. Well, he was outside... He pulled his pillow away from its spot under his head and laid an ear on the ground.
What was that? He wondered if it had actually sounded louder the second time, or if he had merely been more aware after hearing it once. It had sounded muffled, kind of like someone had stomped on the ground somewhere nearby, or had set off an explosion somewhere far, far away.
The sound did not come again. Cress sighed, grabbing his pillow and laying his head on it again. Could have been some of the building materials falling, he guessed...
The swordsman fell asleep at once, and did not remember the odd sound in the morning.
"Man, it feels so weird to be going up this road again after being on it in the future." Chester hitched his quiver higher up on his back. "It's right back the way I remember it."
Mint tilted her head. "You two went up to Euclid before all this began?"
"Of course. Cress's got an uncle living up there, and it's the nearest town besides, so sometimes we'd come up and visit and just hang out."
"That was fun." Cress said, nodding. "And we used to take Ami, too..."
"Yeah... No matter how often we came, she used to get just as excited every single time." Chester's eyes slid over the road ahead of them. He still missed Ami, and Cress would still find him outside training late into the night, but now when he looked into the distance it was never with a scowl. He might never 'get over it,' as he would probably put it, but Cress was glad to see that Chester was doing his best to look back on the memories with a smile.
"She was little, so it probably looked much bigger to her than it did to us."
"Yeah."
Cress smiled, and turned his gaze ahead to follow Chester's. "I wonder what happened to my uncle. He wasn't there the last time I checked..."
"Who cares?" Chester snorted. "He sold you out to Mars. For all you know, he might not have been there because he was avoiding you."
"But he's still my uncle! And anyone would sell someone out if their life depended on it."
"I wouldn't. You wouldn't."
"Well, I guess we're not just 'anyone' anymore, then." The swordsman frowned. "You know, even before falling under Dhaos' spell, Mars had a hideout with soldiers and a dungeon... I wouldn't be surprised if my uncle was afraid of him."
"They used to be friends." Mint said. "Our parents, and Mars. Your uncle probably did know him because of that."
That was true. Cress hadn't paid very much attention to his parents' friends from outside the village, so for all he knew he might have met Mars before the village was destroyed. "I'll ask my aunt if he came back."
Chester sighed. "...You're the most forgiving person ever, you know that?" But he dropped the subject. "We gonna stop for the night in Euclid?"
"I don't know. Do you have money?"
"Nope. Klarth carried it all."
"Then it looks like we're camping out tonight, doesn't it?" Cress turned to Mint. "Is that alright with you, Mint?"
The priestess frowned. "You know, we're almost to Euclid, and I don't feel tired... We could probably keep going, if we wanted."
"But then we'll sleep all day tomorrow."
"Aha. Well, we'll see."
The three friends weren't actually headed to Euclid: it was only a stop on their way towards their true destination. The few weeks that had passed after arriving back in their time were spent in the small, beginning efforts to rebuild Toltus, but they weren't getting very far. Chester, tired and put out, had finally suggested that they go and visit Arche. They'd wondered if going to see her so soon after having watched her leave would be selfish of them, knowing she would have waited a hundred years already, and so they had held back before. But all three now agreed that they'd waited long enough. They wanted to see their friend again.
Cress wondered whether things would be the same when they finally met up with Arche again. Half-elf or not, a hundred years was a long time; people changed drastically in a tenth of that time, or less, and even with Klarth's company the witch will have spent much of it alone. How much will she have changed...? The others, Cress knew, were thinking the same thing, and while Chester was remarkably more energetic than he'd been when he suggested the trip the swordsman could see that he was worried. He didn't want a new Arche, who had been through a hundred years of trials without him. He wanted their Arche.
"Actually..." Chester frowned. "Did Arche ever say that she was still living in Bart's house?"
"...Um..." Cress rubbed his head. No, she hadn't.
"...Well, crap."
"She wouldn't have gone somewhere we couldn't find her." Mint said. "And Bart's house isn't all that far from Toltus and Euclid. She'd've wanted to stay as close to us and Klarth as possible."
"I dunno, sounds to me like she would travel a lot..."
"But she still has to have a home."
"We'll just have to hope she stayed." Cress said. "Even if she didn't, we'll find her eventually."
"It's easy to say that now..."
"Aw, cheer up."
"Hey, you see me complaining?"
Arche would probably say yes. Cress, on the other hand, just put an arm around his friend's shoulder.
"Don't worry about it." he said. "We'll find her, and then we'll have a lot of catching up to do."
"You make that sound like fun. For all you know, she could have crazy stories about visiting us as little kids!"
Cress blinked. "...Uh oh. I hadn't thought of that."
Chester rolled his eyes. "She'd do it."
The swordsman grinned. "Yeah, probably."
"But I don't remember seeing her, so even if she did, it must have been when we were really little..."
"Yeah... Or maybe she didn't at all."
"I'm pretty much convinced she did now."
"You don't know that."
"Yeah, I do."
"No, you don't."
"Man, I hope she doesn't hold it over my head about how cute I was..."
"Oh, you don't think you were cute?" Cress smiled. "Didn't my mom give you a haircut once and—"
"That never happened."
Cress laughed, both at the memory and at his friend's response. "If you say so."
Chester gave him a flat look that clearly meant this was never to leave his mouth again.
"C-Cress!"
The boys blinked, looking up from their small argument. "Mint? What's wrong?"
"Look!"
They looked at each other, and then followed the cleric's gaze to the road ahead of them. It didn't take long to find what Mint was referring to.
"O-Oh...!"
"Hey!" Cress broke out into a run. "Hey, are you okay?"
"Cress, wait!"
"I don't think he can hear you..."
"Cress!"
With his headstart Cress had reached the prone figure on the ground some time before his two companions. Even from a distance, he looked horrible: he was lying in a small puddle of his own blood, and his hair was singed and falling off his head. "Hey, are you oka-"
Cress turn the man over, and jumped back with a yelp. The face had been burned clean off, and the contents of his torso now spilled onto the grass beside him. Cress stumbled backwards, covering his mouth and nose.
"Cress, what's wro..."
But as Chester came up closer, there was no need to finish his question. He knelt down next to the body as his mouth fell open. "What... What the hell is this?"
"Oh, no..." Mint lowered herself next to Chester, also covering her mouth. "This... must have been very painful..."
"What's out here that could do something like that?" Cress asked. "There aren't a whole lot of fire monsters around here..."
"Then it must have been a person." Chester rose to his feet, smoldering. "Probably a magic user."
"..."
"Of course it wasn't Arche, idiot. She was never that much of a sadist."
"That's not what I was thinking!" Cress said. "It's just that, how many magic users are there all the way out here? Maybe they just had a... pet or something."
Mint frowned. "I hope it wasn't a person... I can't see any reason to put someone through something like this. Look, you can't even tell she's a woman..."
"It's a girl?" Cress asked, floored. He hurried forward and knelt down for a moment. Now he saw it: that curve in the torso that definitely didn't belong to any man. He hadn't even noticed the first time.
"...Anyone bring a shovel?" Chester's mouth thinned. "I hate to get rid of the body so soon without trying to look for her family, but I don't want to drag her with us and I don't want to leave her here for another bunch of travelers to just stumble across like this."
Cress shook his head. "No. We left them all back in Toltus." He rose to his feet. "Let's hurry on to Euclid. We can get a bunch of shovels and maybe find out if anyone knew her there."
Chester sighed. Selfish though it was, he had to hope that they wouldn't find any of the mysterious woman's loved ones. He hated being the bearer of bad news, and telling the family they'd found her charred and barely recognizable on a road somewhere was not a task he was looking forward to. And if they found them before they'd buried her, they would probably have to take the family to see her. That wouldn't be pretty. "Sounds like a plan. Come on, let's go."
Mint nodded, turning back to the body and folding her hands in prayer. "Rest in peace."
Euclid was almost just like they'd left it in the future. The whole city was made of stone, but rather than the dreary gloom of Midgard it was full of life and activity. That traveling circus was still here for some reason, playing in the square, and the usual ring of children stood before them giggling and clapping along. Cress smiled at them. It was a happy sight.
"So, uh, where could we find a shovel?" Chester asked. "I mean, from the blacksmith, sure, but you know anyone that would lend us a couple for free?"
Cress frowned. His aunt probably had a few, but he felt nervous about going to see her. "Let's go to my aunt's house. She lives in the northwest corner of town."
Mint nodded. "Yeah. And then you can ask her about your uncle."
"...Yeah."
Cress loved his uncle, just as he'd loved his father and mother and as he still loved his aunt. And he did forgive him for his betrayal, as he'd told Chester earlier. But there was no getting around the fact that the man had handed him over to a bloodthirsty knight that had already killed Cress' parents. Cress understood that he really couldn't judge until he'd been forced to make such a decision himself, but the heartbreak the younger Cress had felt at the time still lingered. The swordsman took a deep breath, and stood up straighter. If his uncle was still alive, they were going to talk about it. There was no use letting the subject hang over him like this.
The trio marched along the road silently, letting the sounds of the city wash over them until they stood at the foot of the northwesternmost house in town.
"Ah... Is this it?"
Cress nodded. "Yep. Here goes."
He walked up to the door and rapped on it twice. There was a short pause in which he bit his lip nervously, but after a moment the door slowly creaked open, and the familiar face of Cress' aunt Joanne lit up at the sight of him.
"Cress." Without waiting for him, Joanne pulled her nephew into a hug. "It's been far, far too long..."
"Aunt, it's only been a few weeks." Cress said, returning the hug anyway. Of course she wouldn't know about his long journey across time, but for her it would feel like no time at all. "But yeah. It's good to see you again."
"It's good to see you too." She released him, turning to his friends with a smile. "And you too, Chester. I'm very sorry about your sister... She was such a sweet little girl."
Chester responded with a strained smile. "Yeah."
"And who is this?" Joanne turned to Mint. "May I have your name, young lady?"
"Ah... This is Mint. Mint, this is my aunt Joanne."
"Hello." Mint said, smiling. "It's nice to meet you."
"The pleasure is all mine. Cress, you never told me you had a girlfriend."
"Ah-!" Cress felt his cheeks go red. "W-Well, we only met when I escaped from Mars' hideout..."
"Hey look, he's admitting that she's his girlfriend."
"I didn't admit anything...!"
"Haha. It's alright, dear." Joanne opened the door and stood aside. "Well, come inside. You look famished."
"We ate already, actually." Cress said, feeling rather guilty. "Actually, we have one more errand to run before we barge in on you. Do you have a few shovels you could lend us?"
Aunt Joanne frowned. "There are a few in back, actually. Why do you need them?"
"...We found a body on the road on our way here."
"Oh, no... Do you know who it is?"
"Unfortunately, she's unrecognizable."
"That's horrible... The shovels should be somewhere around back." she said. "If you want, I can ask around for her family while you're gone."
"That would be nice of you." Mint said.
"It's no trouble. Are you sure they won't want her buried in the cemetery...?"
"We can't move her from where she is."
"That's too bad... Well, you should be on your way if you want to get back by nightfall." She smiled. "And if I finish in time, I'll have dinner waiting for you."
Cress sighed, smiling. "Thanks, Aunt. Well..." He turned to his friends. "Let's go find those shovels."
"Yeah."
Status: Incomplete, two chapters done.
Warnings: ...Morbid descriptions?
Genre: General Adventure
Pairings: None. But it takes Mint/Cress and Chester/Arche as canon.
Find it here on Fanfiction.net, if you'd rather leave a review there.
You know it's time to start posting a fic when you really want to write the sequel. LOL. This fic actually has a prequel set in the past and starring Klarth, Arche and Milard, but I wanted to write this one first T_T They're completely separate besides one thing, so that shouldn't be a problem. I use Cress and Klarth, in case that bothers anyone. Everyone will now behold my epic fail pacing skills.
DISCLAIMER: This fic contains things I do not own, crap description, and hastiness. Enjoy anyway!
Chapter One: Jane Doe
xxx
xxx
Thunk.
Cress' eyes blinked open blearily. He'd been just about to fall asleep, too... What was that? It was a very soft sound, like someone had... fallen on a pile of pillows or something. Or grass. There was a lot more grass around than there were pillows, so that had to be it. It sounded very muffled...
It came again, louder this time. The swordsman frowned, rubbing at his eyes as he sat up. It... seemed to be coming from the ground somehow. Well, he was outside... He pulled his pillow away from its spot under his head and laid an ear on the ground.
What was that? He wondered if it had actually sounded louder the second time, or if he had merely been more aware after hearing it once. It had sounded muffled, kind of like someone had stomped on the ground somewhere nearby, or had set off an explosion somewhere far, far away.
The sound did not come again. Cress sighed, grabbing his pillow and laying his head on it again. Could have been some of the building materials falling, he guessed...
The swordsman fell asleep at once, and did not remember the odd sound in the morning.
xxx
"Man, it feels so weird to be going up this road again after being on it in the future." Chester hitched his quiver higher up on his back. "It's right back the way I remember it."
Mint tilted her head. "You two went up to Euclid before all this began?"
"Of course. Cress's got an uncle living up there, and it's the nearest town besides, so sometimes we'd come up and visit and just hang out."
"That was fun." Cress said, nodding. "And we used to take Ami, too..."
"Yeah... No matter how often we came, she used to get just as excited every single time." Chester's eyes slid over the road ahead of them. He still missed Ami, and Cress would still find him outside training late into the night, but now when he looked into the distance it was never with a scowl. He might never 'get over it,' as he would probably put it, but Cress was glad to see that Chester was doing his best to look back on the memories with a smile.
"She was little, so it probably looked much bigger to her than it did to us."
"Yeah."
Cress smiled, and turned his gaze ahead to follow Chester's. "I wonder what happened to my uncle. He wasn't there the last time I checked..."
"Who cares?" Chester snorted. "He sold you out to Mars. For all you know, he might not have been there because he was avoiding you."
"But he's still my uncle! And anyone would sell someone out if their life depended on it."
"I wouldn't. You wouldn't."
"Well, I guess we're not just 'anyone' anymore, then." The swordsman frowned. "You know, even before falling under Dhaos' spell, Mars had a hideout with soldiers and a dungeon... I wouldn't be surprised if my uncle was afraid of him."
"They used to be friends." Mint said. "Our parents, and Mars. Your uncle probably did know him because of that."
That was true. Cress hadn't paid very much attention to his parents' friends from outside the village, so for all he knew he might have met Mars before the village was destroyed. "I'll ask my aunt if he came back."
Chester sighed. "...You're the most forgiving person ever, you know that?" But he dropped the subject. "We gonna stop for the night in Euclid?"
"I don't know. Do you have money?"
"Nope. Klarth carried it all."
"Then it looks like we're camping out tonight, doesn't it?" Cress turned to Mint. "Is that alright with you, Mint?"
The priestess frowned. "You know, we're almost to Euclid, and I don't feel tired... We could probably keep going, if we wanted."
"But then we'll sleep all day tomorrow."
"Aha. Well, we'll see."
The three friends weren't actually headed to Euclid: it was only a stop on their way towards their true destination. The few weeks that had passed after arriving back in their time were spent in the small, beginning efforts to rebuild Toltus, but they weren't getting very far. Chester, tired and put out, had finally suggested that they go and visit Arche. They'd wondered if going to see her so soon after having watched her leave would be selfish of them, knowing she would have waited a hundred years already, and so they had held back before. But all three now agreed that they'd waited long enough. They wanted to see their friend again.
Cress wondered whether things would be the same when they finally met up with Arche again. Half-elf or not, a hundred years was a long time; people changed drastically in a tenth of that time, or less, and even with Klarth's company the witch will have spent much of it alone. How much will she have changed...? The others, Cress knew, were thinking the same thing, and while Chester was remarkably more energetic than he'd been when he suggested the trip the swordsman could see that he was worried. He didn't want a new Arche, who had been through a hundred years of trials without him. He wanted their Arche.
"Actually..." Chester frowned. "Did Arche ever say that she was still living in Bart's house?"
"...Um..." Cress rubbed his head. No, she hadn't.
"...Well, crap."
"She wouldn't have gone somewhere we couldn't find her." Mint said. "And Bart's house isn't all that far from Toltus and Euclid. She'd've wanted to stay as close to us and Klarth as possible."
"I dunno, sounds to me like she would travel a lot..."
"But she still has to have a home."
"We'll just have to hope she stayed." Cress said. "Even if she didn't, we'll find her eventually."
"It's easy to say that now..."
"Aw, cheer up."
"Hey, you see me complaining?"
Arche would probably say yes. Cress, on the other hand, just put an arm around his friend's shoulder.
"Don't worry about it." he said. "We'll find her, and then we'll have a lot of catching up to do."
"You make that sound like fun. For all you know, she could have crazy stories about visiting us as little kids!"
Cress blinked. "...Uh oh. I hadn't thought of that."
Chester rolled his eyes. "She'd do it."
The swordsman grinned. "Yeah, probably."
"But I don't remember seeing her, so even if she did, it must have been when we were really little..."
"Yeah... Or maybe she didn't at all."
"I'm pretty much convinced she did now."
"You don't know that."
"Yeah, I do."
"No, you don't."
"Man, I hope she doesn't hold it over my head about how cute I was..."
"Oh, you don't think you were cute?" Cress smiled. "Didn't my mom give you a haircut once and—"
"That never happened."
Cress laughed, both at the memory and at his friend's response. "If you say so."
Chester gave him a flat look that clearly meant this was never to leave his mouth again.
"C-Cress!"
The boys blinked, looking up from their small argument. "Mint? What's wrong?"
"Look!"
They looked at each other, and then followed the cleric's gaze to the road ahead of them. It didn't take long to find what Mint was referring to.
"O-Oh...!"
"Hey!" Cress broke out into a run. "Hey, are you okay?"
"Cress, wait!"
"I don't think he can hear you..."
"Cress!"
With his headstart Cress had reached the prone figure on the ground some time before his two companions. Even from a distance, he looked horrible: he was lying in a small puddle of his own blood, and his hair was singed and falling off his head. "Hey, are you oka-"
Cress turn the man over, and jumped back with a yelp. The face had been burned clean off, and the contents of his torso now spilled onto the grass beside him. Cress stumbled backwards, covering his mouth and nose.
"Cress, what's wro..."
But as Chester came up closer, there was no need to finish his question. He knelt down next to the body as his mouth fell open. "What... What the hell is this?"
"Oh, no..." Mint lowered herself next to Chester, also covering her mouth. "This... must have been very painful..."
"What's out here that could do something like that?" Cress asked. "There aren't a whole lot of fire monsters around here..."
"Then it must have been a person." Chester rose to his feet, smoldering. "Probably a magic user."
"..."
"Of course it wasn't Arche, idiot. She was never that much of a sadist."
"That's not what I was thinking!" Cress said. "It's just that, how many magic users are there all the way out here? Maybe they just had a... pet or something."
Mint frowned. "I hope it wasn't a person... I can't see any reason to put someone through something like this. Look, you can't even tell she's a woman..."
"It's a girl?" Cress asked, floored. He hurried forward and knelt down for a moment. Now he saw it: that curve in the torso that definitely didn't belong to any man. He hadn't even noticed the first time.
"...Anyone bring a shovel?" Chester's mouth thinned. "I hate to get rid of the body so soon without trying to look for her family, but I don't want to drag her with us and I don't want to leave her here for another bunch of travelers to just stumble across like this."
Cress shook his head. "No. We left them all back in Toltus." He rose to his feet. "Let's hurry on to Euclid. We can get a bunch of shovels and maybe find out if anyone knew her there."
Chester sighed. Selfish though it was, he had to hope that they wouldn't find any of the mysterious woman's loved ones. He hated being the bearer of bad news, and telling the family they'd found her charred and barely recognizable on a road somewhere was not a task he was looking forward to. And if they found them before they'd buried her, they would probably have to take the family to see her. That wouldn't be pretty. "Sounds like a plan. Come on, let's go."
Mint nodded, turning back to the body and folding her hands in prayer. "Rest in peace."
xxx
Euclid was almost just like they'd left it in the future. The whole city was made of stone, but rather than the dreary gloom of Midgard it was full of life and activity. That traveling circus was still here for some reason, playing in the square, and the usual ring of children stood before them giggling and clapping along. Cress smiled at them. It was a happy sight.
"So, uh, where could we find a shovel?" Chester asked. "I mean, from the blacksmith, sure, but you know anyone that would lend us a couple for free?"
Cress frowned. His aunt probably had a few, but he felt nervous about going to see her. "Let's go to my aunt's house. She lives in the northwest corner of town."
Mint nodded. "Yeah. And then you can ask her about your uncle."
"...Yeah."
Cress loved his uncle, just as he'd loved his father and mother and as he still loved his aunt. And he did forgive him for his betrayal, as he'd told Chester earlier. But there was no getting around the fact that the man had handed him over to a bloodthirsty knight that had already killed Cress' parents. Cress understood that he really couldn't judge until he'd been forced to make such a decision himself, but the heartbreak the younger Cress had felt at the time still lingered. The swordsman took a deep breath, and stood up straighter. If his uncle was still alive, they were going to talk about it. There was no use letting the subject hang over him like this.
The trio marched along the road silently, letting the sounds of the city wash over them until they stood at the foot of the northwesternmost house in town.
"Ah... Is this it?"
Cress nodded. "Yep. Here goes."
He walked up to the door and rapped on it twice. There was a short pause in which he bit his lip nervously, but after a moment the door slowly creaked open, and the familiar face of Cress' aunt Joanne lit up at the sight of him.
"Cress." Without waiting for him, Joanne pulled her nephew into a hug. "It's been far, far too long..."
"Aunt, it's only been a few weeks." Cress said, returning the hug anyway. Of course she wouldn't know about his long journey across time, but for her it would feel like no time at all. "But yeah. It's good to see you again."
"It's good to see you too." She released him, turning to his friends with a smile. "And you too, Chester. I'm very sorry about your sister... She was such a sweet little girl."
Chester responded with a strained smile. "Yeah."
"And who is this?" Joanne turned to Mint. "May I have your name, young lady?"
"Ah... This is Mint. Mint, this is my aunt Joanne."
"Hello." Mint said, smiling. "It's nice to meet you."
"The pleasure is all mine. Cress, you never told me you had a girlfriend."
"Ah-!" Cress felt his cheeks go red. "W-Well, we only met when I escaped from Mars' hideout..."
"Hey look, he's admitting that she's his girlfriend."
"I didn't admit anything...!"
"Haha. It's alright, dear." Joanne opened the door and stood aside. "Well, come inside. You look famished."
"We ate already, actually." Cress said, feeling rather guilty. "Actually, we have one more errand to run before we barge in on you. Do you have a few shovels you could lend us?"
Aunt Joanne frowned. "There are a few in back, actually. Why do you need them?"
"...We found a body on the road on our way here."
"Oh, no... Do you know who it is?"
"Unfortunately, she's unrecognizable."
"That's horrible... The shovels should be somewhere around back." she said. "If you want, I can ask around for her family while you're gone."
"That would be nice of you." Mint said.
"It's no trouble. Are you sure they won't want her buried in the cemetery...?"
"We can't move her from where she is."
"That's too bad... Well, you should be on your way if you want to get back by nightfall." She smiled. "And if I finish in time, I'll have dinner waiting for you."
Cress sighed, smiling. "Thanks, Aunt. Well..." He turned to his friends. "Let's go find those shovels."
"Yeah."