None of Us Would Ever Come Home Again [closed]

[Naunet]

"We'll just have to be sneaky about it, then." Thal flashed a grin that turned into a grimace when he looked down at himself. "... and work on getting something to hide this mess." Tail flicking in anticipation, he glanced up towards D'aijeen. "Kid, you know this area, yeah? Quietest way to Ul'dah?"

[Twinflame]

K'aijeen ducked her head at Thal's question. She curled forward and became even smaller, her tail moving slowly behind her. "I'm not very clever. I don't know how to hide things or sneak places. The other me could help."

 

"Oh, the other you. Great." K'ile shook his head. "The Amal'jaa hunt by scent or tracking. We can't just put hoods on and travel at night. We'd need to disguise ourselves visibly, and disguise our scent, and leave no tracks. And that's assuming the Amal'jaa don't just bite the moment they can't find us."

[Naunet]

"Disguise our scent." Thal made a face. "All kinds of gross things to roll around in out here I'm betting. As for tracks, going through the rocks'll as much as possible'll help. Keep us out of sight, too."

[Twinflame]

"Better to just take chocobos." K'ile looked away. "They stink and they get us off the ground. Cover your bodies and our hair and our tails and then we'll all look the same to the Amal'jaa."

 

K'aijeen's ears stood up and pointed behind her. "You want to get us back to a town so you can send the Immortal Flames after us again."

 

"Ul'dah's a town, too. Just a bigger one. That's where you want to go."

[Naunet]

"Nah, kid, hate to say it but this time--" Thal lifted one hand and shook it at K'ile, "--just this time! He's got the better idea. Only problem is how to go about getting the birds. Thinking we need those disguises first, unless I want to trust you in getting them for us."

[Twinflame]

"Hey, you're the guy in charge." K'ile waved a hand over his shoulder, not looking at Thal. "I'm just your cowed prisoner, a Tia in distress waiting for his huntress to rescue him. I've got no power myself."

 

"Get them from Highbridge instead of Drybone. No one knows us there." She pointed at Thal and then at K'ile. "You take his clothes. That will cover your body."

 

K'ile pulled at his collar. "The one time I wear a shirt and it's a liability. I knew it."

[Naunet]

Thal chuckled, but it was a flat sound. "Highbridge. Right." Then he turned to K'ile and gestured. "Alright, off with 'em. And be quick about it." He looked past the Tia, outward towards where they'd fled from, and grimaced. No sign of anything so far, but who knew how long that would last.

[Twinflame]

"Yeah, fine. The damn thing just gets in the way anyway." K'ile pulled at the shirt, but it didn't come off as easily as it had gone on. There buckles on the arms and chest to hold the white armored plates in place, and he pulled at these in frustration. "... Twelve damn this Ul'dahn... overdone... Why do they need metal buckles anyway?" he crouched and worked at them in frustration, tail whipping around behind him. His ears twitched and growled, stretching his limbs on occasion to test the looseness of the chest piece, but he really was going to have to undo all those buckles.

 

K'aijeen, meanwhile, began down the side of the rock ledge. "I wanted to go home."

[Naunet]

"Not right now, kiddo." Thal watched the Tia struggle for a moment before interjecting amusedly, "Want some help with that?"

[Twinflame]

"Go die!" K'ile continued with his sisyphean labors. "Some more. Better."

 

K'aijeen reached the ground and stumbled as her weakened limbs failed to stop her momentum completely. After she caught herself, she straightened and shifted her back and shoulders oddly, as though putting her innards back into place. She put a hand over the wound on her throat and frowned at Thal from beneath her tattered veil. "You're never going to take me home, are you?"

[Naunet]

"We'll just have to see what happens." The battered miqo'te flashed the young, very dead girl a quick, reassuring grin. "One thing at a time though, huh? Kind of like an adventure. Let's save the world! Or, well, a tribe. The tribe." He gave K'ile a sidelong look. "Such an evil thing for us dead people to do."

[Twinflame]

"Well, yeah, if you mess it up and end up bringing death to the tribe?" K'ile paused to glare at Thal. "Yeah. That's evil, in the end." In frustration her tried to force the shirt off, but it got tight between one shoulder and his neck when it was half off and he got stuck with on arm up and his head conceal. She shifted and growled and struggled and pulled and his tail shook behind him. "Damn this thing!"

 

"Ul'dah for now then." K'aijeen said, calmly. "Those people will help too. They'll take us home."

 

"We don't want a bunch of Ul'dahns pushing their way into the tribe! This has come up before." K'ile threw the shirt down at Thal's feet. "Well-meaning Ul'dahns wanting to protect us with their weapons and give us food like we're hungry children."

[Naunet]

Lifting the shirt with one foot, Thal set to pulling it on. "Messing things up and bringing death to the tribe... well now, that's pretty close to what you were gonna do. Maybe I should go around calling you evil, too, huh?" He grunted as he worked it over his tattered skin, trying to preserve as much as he could for no real reason. "Just learn to accept help when you need it. Nothing says you have to keep shaking hands with these Ul'dahns afterward. Bet they'll be glad enough to be rid of some Amal'jaa. I sure know the Woodwailers took any chance they could get to beat up Ixali."

[Twinflame]

"If someone spends all their time walking around with their hands out waiting for generosity, they can never use their hands to fix their own problems." K'ile stretched his limbs, letting the sun fall over his chest and arms. "Ul'dahns never do anything for free. It's always debts that you can't pay. That's how they work."

[Naunet]

"What good're your hands to fix your problems when you apparently have no clue how to use them?" Thal rolled his eyes and adjusted the shirt a bit before throwing his arms out. "There. All disguised. Let's go get us some smelly birds."

[Twinflame]

K'ile made an ick-face at that. "I should've stabbed you in the head. Oh, but you've got some creepy Gridanian mask. Put it on so I can pretend you're someone else."

 

"I'm not disguised." K'aijeen prowled behind Thal. She peered around the man to glare at K'ile with suspicion.

[Naunet]

"We'll find you something. In the meantime, just stay out of sight when we get to that Highbridge place." He ignored K'ile's suggestion, instead turning his attention outward, sniffing the air. "Let's get going." Reaching behind him, he urged D'aijeen along as he started to move.

[Twinflame]

At the urging, K'aijeen walked alongside Thal. She pouted, mostly to herself, "I wanted to go home."

 

"The home you're thinking of doesn't exist any more." K'ile said, stretching again and then walking behind them. "Not since the Calamity. Not since the famine. I've been looking for it and trying to bring it back. Everyone else has too, but it isn't there. The whole tribe, even the exiles, are all just trying to go home. But the home we're thinking of? None of us will ever go home again."

[Naunet]

"Maybe you should stop looking and just make something new then," Thal offered in all of his simplistic, entirely unasked for wisdom. His ears flitted about as they moved, and he did his best to keep their pace brisk.