dizzyspells | In a world without magic

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ambi and jessa write gross stuff

In a world without magic

In the months after Kefka's tower collapsed, the world changed rapidly. Though some of the damage to the land was irreversible, life began to flourish once again. For the first time in years, the trees budded, flowers grew, and even the sky turned blue. Everything seemed to be heading back to the way things were, though there was something distinctly different about their new world. When Kefka died, so too did magic, and with it, many of the monsters became less aggressive, and some species died out completely. To the average person it wasn't entirely a terrible trade-off, since travel became safer, but still, things were different.

Few felt the difference more than Celes. Unlike most of her friends who learned magic from the shards of Magicite, Celes was genetically modified from a young age. There was hardly a time in her life that she could remember not at least feeling that presence of magic, to be able to call forth fire or ice at a whim. Even now, she could feel the incantations on her tongue, but there was nothing to fuel it. Like a lamp drained of all of it's oil.

For all of the changes in the world, the one place that stayed the same was the mountains of Narshe. Still abandoned since the cataclysm, the frozen peaks saw few visitors. Few, save for the two climbing a long and winding frozen path. Even though it was spring, the mountains were as cold as ever, maybe even colder. Maybe the loss of magic had more of an effect on her than she'd like to admit, but Celes couldn't remember feeling quite this cold before. She'd be the last one to speak up though, so she kept her arms wrapped around her center, trudging forward silently in the snow.

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It was cold. The kind of cold that would turn a gust of wind into a knife, freezing your breath and sinking into your bones. Not unlike being hit with a blizzard spell, really. It shouldn't be so cold, not so close to spring, but even with the forces of the world evening out, there were occasional bouts of temper. Growing pains, maybe. Either way, it didn't change the facts. It was damn cold, and there was little they could do but press on in the steady snow.

Locke cast a glance back at Celes to be sure she was still behind him before turning back to the climb. She'd been so quiet, but they had little breath to waste, and she'd never been loose with her words. His boots fought for traction on the icy pathway while he studied the terrain with sharp and expert attention. There was an entrance to the mines around here, somewhere. He used to know this place like the back of his hand, even in a blizzard. In the wake of the cataclysm, the old familiar landmarks weren't so familiar, anymore.

Sure enough, she was still trudging forward, and the only signs of her discomfort came out in short, shuddering breaths. She was shivering but trying oh so hard not to, her body tense and tiring from the harsh conditions. Faster than she was expecting, and the weather didn't look like it would be calming down any time soon.

"I-" She started, too quietly and her words were stolen by the wind. Clearing her throat she tried again, "We should find shelter soon..."

It was the closest she'd come to admitted she needed to stop.

Her voice is so faint at first that he'd almost thought he'd imagined it. He stops walking long enough for Celes to catch up to him. Takes her hand in his to still her, leaning in so he can answer over the howl of the storm.

"I know there's a way into to the mines around here. I'll find it," he insisted. Clearly frustrated. And stubborn. They could have make it back to town if they'd turned back at the first sign of the bad weather, but he'd gambled on the storm being mild and pressed on anyway. Obviously, he'd been wrong. They had a while before the sun would set, but not too long. The conditions would only get worse once night fell.

As if summoned by his words, he finally hits upon a familiar place after they start forward again. He kneels by the edge of the mountain, shoving aside the worst of the accumulated snow to reveal a trapdoor built into the face of it. His hands are numb and shaking as he fumbles the latch, and while it creaked and groaned with rusted disuse, the door opened easily enough to the darkened interior of the caves. Locked wasted no time in hopping in, holding a hand out to help Celes down the icy steps.

It's tempting for her to refuse the help, she's climbed a mountain in worse conditions, she can get down a couple of steps, but she's so relieved to finally get some relief from the storm that she didn't give much thought to taking his hand. It's warm against the cold, even though the gloves. He's always warm though, to her, even when he's shaking and shivering in the snow.

She doesn't say a word as she steps inside though, her teeth clenched against the cold. The cave is incredibly dark after being out in the white snow, and Celes is momentarily blinded, feeling her way down the stairs with Locke's hand there to guide her.

The door stayed open behind them, (closing it now would leave them in total darkness, after all,) so the wind blew stray clouds of snow in with them. He led her forward a little too quickly and they slipped slightly on the last step before regaining their balance. His grip on her hand was tight.

"Sorry," Locke muttered once they were on solid ground again, brushing snow from her shoulders as he did. He no longer had to raise his voice to be heard, which was good, because already it was hoarse and shaky from cold. It was noticeably warmer inside, by virtue of being out of the wind and the wet, but it was still on the wrong end of freezing. The mines themselves looked just like he remembered them, if messier. There was abandoned equipment strewn about, and with it a small cache of firewood next to a dented and dirty stove. A wide pipe ran out from the top to vent the smoke out and away from the miners as they gathered around for a break or a warm drink.

"We oughta be able to find plenty more where that came from," he said, looking away from the fuel and frowning over at her as she shivered in silence. "Why don't you get that started while I go looking."

She nodded, finally getting her bearings as her eyes adjusted to the dim light. Releasing his hand, she reached up to peel the hood away from her face. The cold still nipped at her cheeks, but it was already an improvement from the wind outside.

A few moments later, she found herself crouched over a small pile of firewood. Start a fire, that was easy enough. Back in the old world, it would be just a matter of words before they had a fire to last them the entire night. But that world wasn't their's anymore. With shivering hands, she searched her person for the piece of flint she carried, tossing her gloves to the ground with an impatient grunt when she couldn't feel the rough stone in her pockets before searching again. Still nothing.

Off-put by her continued silence, Locke was tempted to stay, but the sooner they could set up camp the better off they'd be. Instead, he turns away from the door and looks out into the dimly lit caverns. Treasure hunting meant navigation in low-light environments on a pretty regular basis (thieving as well, if not moreso,) and he didn't plan on going far without her anyway. The miners wouldn't have kept the fuel far from where it was needed.

Still, Locke listens for her voice as he wanders the halls of scattered equipment carefully. An overturned cart, a broken crate that would work in a pinch, but he'd rather find something drier...

He'd only just disappeared from sight when a shout and a loud crash echoed back at Celes thought the tunnels.

Celes was just checking her pockets a third time when the crash reverberated off of the wet cavern walls, and she was up on her feet in a flash. Her hand instinctively went for the sword at her side.

"Locke?" The words were barely out before she was hurrying over to where the sound came from.

Locke was sitting at the edge of a tangle of rusted junk. When Celes turned the corner he looked up sharply and held a hand up to stop her.

"It's okay! There was something hiding under there. I think I scared it."

And caused an avalanche of scrap and disused equipment in the process. There were fewer and tamer monsters roaming the world, these days, but they were far from gone entirely. From the look of it, it might be more accurate to say that it had scared him. His face was white in the dim light. He didn't move to stand from where he had fallen against the far wall.

She let out a relieved breath when she spotted his form in the dim light, and she felt her cheeks heat up slightly at how quickly she had jumped to his aid. It was as if they hadn't both survived impossible odds several times before, but the thought of him being hurt made her more anxious than she'd like to admit.

"Are you alright? You should be more careful."

"Celes..."

Fortunately for her, it was too dark to see her flush, her face a grey blur in the cave. Unfortunately, Locke's visible pallor didn't come from surprise or fear. He took a shaky breath and sat forward, but hissed in pain and stopped, suddenly. There was something sharp and jagged behind him. A broken rail, sharp as a knife and tipped with blood. Easily overlooked in favor of the monster when he stumbled backward out of its way. Leaning forward revealed a ragged tear in the back of his heavy jacket that was already dark and wet at the shoulder. Just a piece of scrap, left over when the earth shook. Not malevolent or feral or vicious on its own. Stupid dumb luck. He had to clear his throat before speaking again.

"Give me a hand?" He asked, sheepish.

It was hard to see in the dim caverns, but that hiss of pain told her all she needed to know, and that feeling of anxiety was back. Wasting no time, she rushed over to him, using her hands to do what her eyes couldn't. Gentle, yet determined with her hands, his blood on her fingers was incredibly warm compared to the cold of everything else around them.

"I can't see anything here, can you stand?" She offered her arm, any assistance she could.

It took Locke a second to answer as he took stock of himself. He accepted her help without even thinking.

"Yeah, 'course," he said finally, pulling himself up and wincing as it tugged at the wound. It even made breathing painful. His heavy jacket had taken some of the blow for him, but he'd assumed the worst and scrambled up and away before he realized it wasn't a monster that had attacked him. The sudden movement had only served to widen the gash. He'd had worse, much worse before, when they were battling overpowered creatures and magical dieties. Still, his grip on her arm was white-knuckled as they made their way back toward the door and the fading light of day. He frowned over at the stove as it came into view.

"Thought you were getting a fire going?"

At least he wasn't distracted by being cold anymore.

"You didn't really give me much time before going and getting yourself hurt." She helped him over to sit where the fire would be. There was some light here, but it was getting dimmer by the second. She needed to get a fire going, first, as much as she wanted to check his wound.

"Do you have the flint? I couldn't find it."

"...no, I-"

Oh. Yeah, he did. He fished the tin with the flint and steel clumsily out of his pocket and offered it to Celes with a wan smile. At least he had the decency to look apologetic about wandering off with it and bleeding all over the place and generally making things difficult.

"Sorry."

She sighed testily, not because he was making things difficult, just that... things were difficult and she wasn't working through them as smoothly as she'd like to.

Luckily the adrenaline from Locke getting hurt made her hands stop shaking in the cold, and it only took a few tries to get the fire started. Once she did, she didn't waste any time before kneeling in front of Locke, starting to peel his coat off so she could see the wound.

Even leaning into the tepid warmth from the growing fire, Locke's hands weren't quite so steady. He'd managed his gloves, at least, by the time she turned back to him and batted his hands away to help him struggle out of his coat. His shirt beneath it was mostly a lost cause. Bloodstains were always ugly, but it probably looked worse than it was.

"Sorry, you're probably going to be cold for awhile." Gingerly, she started tugging at the shirt before realizing that the pain of taking it off normally wasn't worth saving the ruined shirt. Gripping the fabric, she tore through the sleeve, then proceeded to pull off the rest of the shirt, taking extra care where the fabric clung to the bloody wound. At least the rest of it could be used as additional bandages.

Finally, she got a good look at the wound itself. It was deep, definitely painful looking, but not life threatening.

"How do you feel?"

Locke was quiet through most of it, uncharacteristically so. When she addressed him, he looked up and gave her a smile, lips pressed into a thin line.

"Pretty silly, mostly," he admitted, aiming for light and succeeding only partway. The effect fell dramatically flat when coupled with the tenseness of his posture and the shallowness of his breath. Better him than her, but Celes probably wouldn't have stumbled back onto the damn thing in the first place. She paused, and he found her hand with his. Even now, with the fire going and his blood on her hands, she's cold to the touch.

"Go on and put me out of my misery, before I freeze to death."

"Don't be so dramatic." She said quietly, easing her hand out of his. As much as she'd like to linger, she needed to take care of the wound before it did become something worth worrying about.

"You're going to need stitches."

Watery smile turned up to a bona-fide grin at being called out as dramatic, his cheer and his face fell when she delivered judgement, though he tried to hide it. Honestly, he was hoping not to hear that. Locke took a careful breath and sighed, the cold air misting between them.

"Yeah, alright," he said, hunched over in the cold, tense from pain and to keep from shivering. "I trust you."

She didn't like it as much as he did, and couldn't help but wish that she still had even a little bit of magic to help. How spoiled had she been her entire life? Each cut and wound had she healed over with just a murmur of words?

Rolling the discarded shirt into a ball, she pressed it against the wound. It had bled freely long enough to hopefully clean it out.

"Hold that." Standing up, she crossed the room to close the secret door to the outside. Now that there wasn't much light coming in from there, it was pointless to leave it open. Plus hopefully this would help Locke warm up a little. With that in mind, she shrugged off her outer cloak, wrapping it around his other shoulder gingerly as she knelt down behind him, beginning to search through their gear for the first aid.

Obediently, Locke reached up with his good arm to staunch the bleeding as well as he could while she prepared to stitch him back together. With the door shut to the storm, the sound of the howling wind quieted to a mutter.

"If this doesn't let up, we can probably make our way back to town through the mines," he suggested, mostly to distract himself from what she was about to do. Tempted as he was to watch, he was sort of grateful the wound wasn't somewhere he could easily satisfy his curiosity. Instead, he kept his head bowed and the bloodsoaked rag of his shirt held tightly in hand.

"We should probably stay here for the rest of the night, I don't think you're in any condition to keep moving." Or her for that matter. She was still cold, tired, and hungry, but that was easier to shove aside now that there was something that needed to be done. Now that he needed her.

Quietly, she laid out everything she would need, while mentally going over what she needed to do. She balled her hands into fists in her lap, trying to steady them. Maybe it was cold or nerves, but it was a bad time to have unsteady hands.

"I'll try to make it as painless at possible..."

"By morning, I mean," Locke shook his head as he corrected himself, and regretted it when everything decided to spin a little. Must have bled out more than he thought. "If the storm doesn't let up." He sure wasn't planning on going anywhere else for a while. But as long as the passes were still intact, it would be easier to wind their way through the mines than it would be to fight their way through the snow. It was sort of his fault they were stuck up here in the first place, he was already trying to work out how to fix it while she was trying to fix him. His hand on the bloody remains of his shirt tightened perceptively at "as painless as possible." The expectation was as bad as the real thing, sometimes.

"Too late for that," he said with forced cheer and a breathless laugh. Hurts already. You're off the hook, Celes. "Don't worry, I'm probably not gonna faint on you yet."

Probably not going to faint on her yet, that didn't make her feel any better. Taking the needle she poised it in her hand carefully, but she didn't make any move to start yet, instead taking a deep breath. Why was she nervous? She's done this before. It's been a long time, but she knew what she was doing.

"Here-" She took his free hand suddenly, taking the cloth from it and moving it back so he could rest it on her leg, "Hold onto me." The pain would definitely make him tense, if she could keep him focused on gripping with his left hand, there would be less chance of him moving the right and ruining her work.

He'd been exaggerating. Probably. Locke's strained smile got a little easier with the suggestion.

"Time and a place, Celes, don't you think?" he asked with no actual reproach. He caught her real meaning, though, and followed her lead faithfully. Hanging on too-tight already and she hadn't even started. Go on, they can't do this all night, or he will end up passing out on her.

She was too busy worrying about what she was about to do to even blink at his joke. Once she thought he was ready, she took one last steadying breath before beginning. Trying to work swiftly, but carefully, she pierced the skin with the needle, silently grateful that it was sharp enough to go through without much resistance. Slowly, laboriously she started stitching the hole shut.

So much for trying to lighten to mood. He shut his mouth and his eyes to focus on keeping still for her. And to his credit, he didn't flinch for the initial stitch, though he hissed a breath out sharply. A few more, however, and she hit a particularly sore spot. He jerked away on reflex, biting his tongue and forgetting to keep his hold on her entirely.

"Don't-" The command was out on reflex, and out of sheer luck, his reaction didn't cause her to tear the skin. She just barely managed to hold onto the needle though.

Muttering under her breath, "If only I just had my magic."

Too little, too late. Gone white all over again, he caught his breath slowly as the pain faded.

"My kingdom for a cure spell, huh?" Either he'd heard her, or he'd been thinking the exact same thing. His voice was dry, but shaky. If she asked, he'd blame it on the cold.

Half of her wanted to try, to see if there was any oil left in that proverbial lamp. It was so strange, to grow up with something and it was just gone now. The price was certainly worth it, but it certainly was convenient.

Steadying herself again, she continued on, trying to be careful not to hurt him again as she worked. Occasionally she had to stop to still her hands, but she was focused on the job, and she was determined to do it right.

Locke hadn't been exposed to magic for nearly as long. Hadn't ever gotten used to it, not really. But there was no denying it was nice to have in situations like these. Without cure magic at their disposal back then, they would have had a lot more trouble. But this wasn't the first time he'd had to be stitched up, and though in the cold everything seemed to feel a little sharper than usual, she had already managed the worst of it. When Celes would pause to still her hands, Locke would catch his breath, leaving his hand on her knee as instructed to let her know when he was good to go on.

It was a tense, quiet few minutes that felt like an hour as she finished the stitches, but finally she pulled the thread through and tied it off securely, letting out one last sigh of relief.

"There, I think you'll survive." Letting her body slack a little with relief, she rested her forehead on his shoulder lightly.

He let Celes lean on him for a moment or two before moving. Mindful of preserving her hard work, Locke pulled himself gingerly away from her to turn toward her and wrap his arms carefully around her waist.

"My hero," he said, not without humor, but not insincerely so. Almost too quiet to hear over the echoing wind, but he leaned in to speak it into her ear. The air was warmer, now, if not warm, and they'd have to melt some snow in the tin kettle to wash the blood from the both of them and wrap the stitches properly. He was content, however, to put it off for just a little while.

She doesn't push him away, as she might have in the past. After over a year of travelling together, she wasn't just used to having him around, but displays of affection got easier, more natural to her.

"What would you do without me?" She even went so far as to tease back quietly, as she reached around him to tug the shawl back around both his shoulders, content to settle in close to him for now.

Best-case scenario, without her he probably would have ended up with a pretty ugly scar for his troubles. (As it was, it still might scar a bit...he'd have to think up a suitably heroic spin to put to the story before anyone asked where he got it.) But that was the least of it. He hummed and pulled her closer into his lap when she asked. Locke was better, these days, when it came to dealing with the deep-seated fear and guilt he had harbored after Rachel fell. It was unlikely, however, that he'd ever be able to forget it entirely. Not any time soon.

Celes didn't object, so he went ahead and buried his face tiredly against the crook of her neck as she made herself comfortable, holding her against him to share his warmth and the length of her cloak.

"Your hands are cold," he observed absently into her shoulder. As if she hadn't noticed.

"And you're warmer than you have any right to be, in these conditions." But Locke always seemed so warm to her. He was the fire to her ice. She wrapped her arms around his sides, warming her hands against his skin. It was probably more comfortable for her than him, considering that her hands must feel like ice cubes, but she knew he wouldn't mind, he never did.

His earlier words came to mind, and her earlier frustration, both with the fire and his wound, "Do you ever miss it? Magic?"

Edited 2012-03-17 08:57 (UTC)

"I'm hot-blooded," he claimed boldly, though he hardly sounded it, voice rough and leaning on her and a little lightheaded from the wound. "All good adventurers are."

And indeed, even if he was the one who was half-dressed, he didn't flinch away from her hands as they huddled beneath the cloak. He was quiet for a spell after her question. Her magic wasn't as dangerous a topic as some. Not as taboo as bringing up Rachel or that fateful day in Vector, or anything like that. But it wasn't common for either of them to talk about it without cause. Even if he wondered, sometimes, when he saw her or Terra. He never asked.

"I guess," he said, finally. "Sometimes. But I always sort of felt like I was only borrowing it anyway, you know?"

Freely given, for the most part, but borrowed power all the same. Even Phoenix was little more than another pretty stone, now. Free of cracks, but powerless all the same. The espers had given their lives so they could gain magic from the magicite. And then magic itself had been sacrificed so they could save the world. As dramatic as it sounded, it was true enough. He reached over to take one of her chilled hands between both of his own before returning the question, carefully.

"What about you?"

She nodded, spreading out her fingers, palm up in his hands, "I would be lying if I said I didn't. I wasn't born with it, but I don't remember a time when it wasn't a part of me." It was a little sad to think that she'd never feel the tendrils of magic on her fingertips. "Sometimes it feels like I lost a part of me."

But she could never forget why she was given that power, and everything that's happened afterwards. Even when she was a child, the Empire sought to abuse it, and before Kefka even touched those statues, it tore their world apart.

She closed her hand into a fist, decisively, "But it's a small price to pay to make things right again."

He wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to say to something like that. So he didn't say anything for a while. It was more than they've spoken on the subject in months. He didn't want to ignore it. He didn't want to make light of what she and Terra had lost. Because even if he'd had access to magic once, he couldn't understand what it meant to have it running through your veins for so long, and then to feel it die. Not really. Not even close.

But he knew what it was like to lose. He'd lost a piece of himself when he lost Rachel. Spent years trying to hold himself together with the hope of fixing something that was already gone. Because the thought of moving forward without it was too much to bear. Losing that hope all over again had only hurt all the more. Celes knew better than that. She always was smarter than him.

"...I'm sorry." Quiet, and he folded her hand in his again to warm it. Back then, he'd always thought it was the ice in her veins that made her feel so cool. It could just as easily be the chill in the air from the storm. Maybe it wasn't that complicated. Maybe it was just Celes.

"Don't be." She shook her head. It wasn't uncommon for Celes to reject pity, but it wasn't just that, "I'm not."

As wonderful a gift as it was, Magic, and the greed for it's power was dangerous. Even though things were starting to return to normal, some things would never be the same. There wasn't a person alive who hadn't lost a part of themselves in the cataclysm. Even before that, how many lost family, like Cyan or the brothers Figaro? Or loved ones, like Locke? How close had she come to losing everything?

It was nowhere close to losing a loved one, she knew that now, after the time she spent on the island. Unlike Locke, and so many others she got her chance to make things right again, and find those she had lost.

When she thought of it that way, magic was a small price to pay. After the first War of the Magi, the Goddesses must have realized this too. It's why they sealed away their power. Because as wonderful as magic was, there was no comparison when it came to friends, family, and homeland.

And what really had she given up? The ability to create fire on a whim? A fire that, because of magic's nature to protect it's caster, never really felt all that hot to Celes in the first place. It was a dull heat compared to the warmth in Locke's hands around hers.

Realizing this, she offered Locke a small smile, "I have no regrets. Given the chance, I'd do it again in a heartbeat."

How's that for self-sacrificing. No regrets, but that wouldn't stop him from worrying over it. Loving Celes wasn't the same as loving Rachel. He'd realized, deep down, that he ought to stop comparing Celes to her. But it was easier said than done. Sometimes he just couldn't help it. The differences sometimes struck him like a blow to the gut. A harsh reminder of what he'd lost, as unfair as it was to either of them for him to dwell on it like that. As if Celes really was a replacement. As if Rachel ever could be replaced. The similarities were more like a bolt of lightning. Rarer, but shocking in intensity when they came out of the blue. He honestly couldn't say which hurt more.

For now, he huffed a laugh, breath misting out between them, and leaned his forehead onto hers. Reluctant to move overmuch, because yeah, it's cold, even in here, and he was as close to comfortable as he'd be with his shoulder aching and his head spinning (and he's still lacking a shirt, let alone anything warmer than the cloak he's sharing with Celes.) They were going to need to build up the fire again before long, though. Eventually he brought her hand up to press a kiss to her knuckles.

"You're really something, you know that?"

Thanks to the cold, her cheeks were already red, but his comment managed to make her flush. Maybe it was modesty, or just not being used to letting someone be so close to her, maybe she wouldn't ever be used to Locke treating her like something special.

"It's not anything that you wouldn't have done." Or anything that anyone else did. Terra was dealing just fine with the loss of her magic, seemed happy about it sometimes, even. Not waiting for an answer, she ended up pulling away, turning towards the fire, "We need to get some more wood." As always, dealing with work that needs to be done was the easier thing to do.

She turned back to the fire, but Locke didn't seem inclined to let her go right away. More wood, huh?

"Time and a place Celes, remember?" he snickered into her ear. Biting cold or bloodloss be damned, he still seemed to be feeling well enough to be a pain in the ass. He'd survive. She did have a point, though. He carefully began to unwind himself from around her. "Does this mean you're done putting me back together?"

That just made her blush more, and she gave him a light shove- on his good shoulder of course.

"You're acting well enough, I estimate a fast recovery." Not that much could keep him down for long. She was relunctant to move away from his heat, but once he unwound himself, she pushed herself to her feet.

"Stay here, I don't want to risk you running into more jagged spikes."

"I see your wit hasn't suffered from the loss of your magic," he said, slowly stretching out the injured arm with a bit of a wince. You say that like it was his fault. (It was his fault.) But Locke was always quick to bounce back. She might need to sit on him to be sure he didn't try to bounce too far too quickly.

"Luckily, I already cleared the path for you." By stumbling through it. "A torch oughta keep the critters away."

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In a world without magic

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saaaaaap warning

lets not kid ourselves that applies to like, this whole thread

hahaha yeah true

doing this on a psp is difficult, but I can't sleep anyway

:'|

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