Floating in Fantasy, Ch. 4

Yep, the 4th chapter is finally alive and kickin', and I thank all of my readers for being patient. I have just started college, and through a bunch of unforseen events, I have had little time to actually get on the internet, much less write anything. I don't blame you if you don't read immediately, I'll understand. Anyway, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Probably anything and everything (with the exception of my two main characters, Lan and Roan) does not belong to me. A sad day in time, I know, but Squeenix has stopped answering my calls. My hopes are down right now... lol.

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Chapter 4
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A dark room, a table sitting in the middle of the room, held the five people that had just quite recently gone through a fight. Moans and groans issued from them all, but they all shushed as the biggest of them all stood up and started speaking.

“Here's the plan! Tantalus, the infamous band of daring thieves (that's
us), is headin' to the kingdom of Alexandria... Our mission: to kidnap the heir to the throne, Princess Garnet!”

Another stood up as the leader sat back down, letting the new speaker take the floor.

“I'll take it from here, so listen up! Our ship's about to dock at Alexandria… And when it does, we're gonna put on our costumes… …and perform 'I Want to Be Your Canary,' the most popular play in Alexandria! Break a leg, Marcus, 'cause you're playin' the lead!”

A man with a bandanna on his head spoke up, interrupting.

“Leave the actin' to me! Of course, the real kidnappers'll be Blank and
Zidane!”

The leather bound face man, Blank, gave up a few words after Marcus finished his short piece.

“I'll distract the audience from the backstage with these little buggers. I can't stand oglops… But I'll manage, so don't worry about me. And that'll be
your cue, Zidane!”

And then, Zidane came in with…

“That’s when I kidnap Queen Brahne, right?”

“You bet! You’re gonna kidnap the fat-ass, butt ugly Queen Br- What… What’m I sayin’?

A roll of quiet snickering filled the air, followed by Zidane’s revised reply…

“Okay! That's when I kidnap Princess Garnet, right?”

“You bet! You're gonna kidnap the most babe-ilicious beauty in all of
Alexandria, Princess Garnet!”

“Hey Boss!” The call from outside the door came.

“Benero, how many times do I gotta tell ya not to interrupt us in here? Do I have to go knockin’ heads around to get some quiet!?” Baku yelled. *He had best have a damn good reason for this… dammit.*

“Boss, we have an extra passenger here with us!”

Baku sighed, thinking that that was code for ‘monster alert, come save us.’ “Well, take care of the damn thing and hurry it up!”

“But Boss, it’s a kid!”
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“So, wait a minute… we gotta climb up THIS thing!?”

Lan was more than a little miffed looking up the business end of one of the largest ladders up a cathedral shaft to the bell above that. “Forgive me if I seem a little worried, but walking across building tops? I didn’t think it was that good of a play to risk our lives over!”

The rat boy gave him a devilish smile that practically said what he was going to. “What, ya chicken or somethin’? That’s not even that high up, and already you’re wimpin’ out! What happened to the guy who would take on the ground if it looked at him wrong?”

Lan heard a small snicker from beside me that issued from Vivi, who tried to pass it off as a cough. *Ignore the mage, ignore the mage, ignore the mage…* “But that’s the point, isn’t it? The GROUND! Here, let me spell it out for ya: G-R-O-U-N-D! I don’t soar through the skies, waiting to fall out of it to a fiery burning death! How stupid do I look?”

Another quick snicker issued from the black mage beside me, and more than anything he wanted to tackle the teen down and throttle him. Looking down at the mage, he muttered darkly, “I don’t see you climbin’ up there, Chuckles.” The snickering vanished almost instantly, replaced by an awkward silence between the two of them.

*That… that was probably too far…* Even from the small amount of time he had known Vivi, Lan knew that the teen was insecure in himself, almost to the point of depression it seemed. Their “employer” seemed to be able to hit all the holes that filled the mage’s personality in Lan’s first meeting with him.

“Slave #2, just start climbing!”

“Alright…” Casting a final look towards Vivi, Lan took hold of the wooden ladder, gripping the strip of wood and pulled himself upward. He tried to pull himself away from the silent mage, tried to excuse his harsh words away as he climbed up one, two, three…

“Geronimo!!!”

Lan looked up, saying, “Wha… WHAT THE HELL?!?” and caught a face full of white fur. His hands came loose from the ladder and he collapsed to the stone paved ground below, landing with a sickening thud. Thick colors flashed past his eyes even though the fur that knocked him down was gone, and his head pounded with the force of a hammer stroke, over and over and over again.

“Lan! Are you alright?” A hatted figure appeared over him, his hands on his head.

“But Mommy, I don’t wanna go to school today! I want to stay home and bake cookies with you!”

Another figure stepped into the fallen teen’s vision, looking like the biggest white and red cloud Lan had ever seen. “Excuse me, kupo! I didn’t mean to hit you!”

“Oh, Slave #2’s alright, he’s just a little wimpish!”

“He’s not wimpish! That probably hurt a lot!!!”

*That was a new voice…* Still disoriented and shaking heavily, Lan sat himself up, nearly returning back to the ground on his first attempts. “You guys… owww, you don’t have to yell. Everything’s spinning enough as it is…”

Eyes focusing in and out of clarity, he could make out several shapes in the area. The white and red cloud was standing to Lan’s left, with the big brown blob to the left of it. He figured that the brown was his slave driver, and the “cloud” must have been the thing that hit him. *But where’s Vivi? I know he was here with us just a few moments ago… wasn’t he?*

The rat kid tensed up (that or his face imploded on itself) and crossed his arms. “Well, Slave #1 started it, yellin’ at me and all that! He’s lucky that I don’t stop him from comin’ to see the play! Jeez, what a bunch a’ bull!” He raged on for a few minutes more before yelling, “Alright, Slave #2, get your lazy ass up the ladder now or we’re gonna be late!”

His vision finally clearing up, Lan stood up and shook himself. “Fine, fine, just stop yelling, please…” Sighing to himself and wondering what was going on, Lan moved to the ladder, taking special care to make nothing was coming from the other direction.

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The hum of the Mist engine played gently in the background of the hushed talk between the Tantalus and their giant of a boss. Roan sat towards the middle of the room, a table to his back and a carpet underneath his nude body. His “rescuers” had yet to give him anything to cover up with, let alone given him any reassurance that they wouldn’t throw him off the ship in a heartbeat, and according to the one they called Blank, it was a LONG way to the ground. He didn’t want to think of how high it may be.

Roan shivered slightly against the frigid air around him, and he wished that they would stop talking long enough to fetch him a blanket, but all they did was whisper between themselves, occassionaly glancing back his direction. *It’s so cold… what’s taking them so long? At least if they threw me overboard, it might be a bit warmer on the way down!*

A picture of Lan flashed in his head, and not for the first time did Roan wonder where he was. He himself had awoken alone and frightened, and the two that had found were not exactly gentle, despite their goofy appearance. Adding to the fact that he had been offered nothing while he waited, Roan was very nearly close to losing hope of ever seeing his best friend, and lover, ever again.

“I just wanna see him again…” Roan’s arms wrapped around himself, his body rocking back and forth slowly, bringing memories of Lan in and out of vision in his mind’s eye. Lan smiling, Lan scowling, laughing, frowning. Lan happy, sad, depressed, hurt… it all flashed through his head. Roan’s chest started to ache, the pain growing exponentially with the more pictures of Lan he saw until it felt he was full to bursting. Tears covered his face in seconds, but he didn’t make a sound. The ensuing footfalls covered up his small sniffles, and Roan only noticed too late that he had someone above him.

"I think we know what to do with you."

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And there you go, the finished result. It's about five pages long, give or take, so I hope you all had a good fill for the moment. I'll try to get the next chapter off the ground, so give me lots of luck and hope that I get time. And for the moment, I will wish you all a fond, but temporary, farewell!