Manly Request Week: Duties (FFIX, for scribe_protra)

[first-seventhe.livejournal.com]

Title: Duties
Fandom: FFIX
Characters/Pairings included: Steiner, Vivi
Rating: PG
Warnings: A few bad words.

Summary: Steiner learns to look for the little things.

For scribe_protra. Written for Manly Request Week.

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There had been a brief period of time where everyone was looking for something to laugh about, something to smile for, something that resembled hope because it was becoming so easy to lose their collective hope over Zidane. Even Amarant, who was professionally an asshole, understood it; and though he griped and complained about Alexandria Castle until Freya struck him over the head with her pike, he never once made to leave, because leaving was giving up hope. All of them stayed, even the new Great Royal Lady Princess Eiko (her own title), whom Amarant would have sent packing had he any choice in the matter (choice in this case being defined, again, in relation to the severity and frequency of Freya’s pike-jabs). All of them stayed.

It had been this period of time in which Steiner felt his failings most acutely: he felt almost guilty, as he’d spent so long railing against Zidane in private (well, and in public, to be fair) that he’d perhaps made it happen with his mind, or something. Because now the shifty thief was gone, and he should have been happy, and it should have made Garnet happy and free and married to some other suitable and eligible young prince: but it wasn’t working out as it should. Even he had come to … well, respect was such a strong word, but he couldn’t exactly limit himself to the word tolerate … well, he was worried about the young tailed rascal, even if it was certainly all for the princess’s (no, queen’s) sake. Where was his duty?

But it was during this time – this introspective sort of dead-time when he was wondering where he’d gone wrong and, in fact, where he’d ever gone right – that Steiner noticed young Master Vivi. The little Black Mage had taken to wandering all around the castle, peering out windows and doing something which sounded disconcertedly like singing to himself. Steiner began to follow him, using the excuse of patrolling, and quickly discerned that something was wrong with the little mage. As the patrols began to, more and more often, cross the mage’s path, Vivi began to talk a little: halting stammered little sentences, and Steiner realized that all was in fact not right in the Orunita world.

And so he mused. Vivi was worried – he had no home, he had no family, he had no friends save the small group of adventurers stubbornly camping in Castle Alexandria, and he was worried to the brim about Zidane. And if – when – Zidane returned, where could Vivi go? Their family would disassemble and go their separate ways, and Vivi would be homeless.

One day Steiner found Vivi perched on a windowsill, staring out over the lands of Alexandria. His misty-black little face had turned to face Steiner long before the knight had reached the sill (it was impossible to move quietly in armor, yes, he knew; but he didn’t find much honour in sneaking around stealthily!) and as he neared the scene, Vivi looked back out the window and sighed.

“Enjoying the view, Master Vivi?” Steiner put as much cheer as he could into this greeting.

Vivi gave a little chuckle. “Just thinkin’,” he said. “We sure did see a lot, didn’t we?”

“Assuredly,” the knight replied, shuffling and clanking to stand at attention beside the mage’s crouched form. “We have been most everywhere, haven’t we? Ah, this glorious land.”

“W-What do you remember best?” Vivi asked abruptly.

Steiner opened his mouth, ready to deliver a regal sermon on the beauty of the lands they’d traveled and the richness of other cultures, but then – the crash of inhuman claws against Zidane’s daggers, the howling as Garnet’s Bahamut escaped out of her soul, and his own sharp yell, brandishing his sword to catch Vivi’s magic –

“Not much,” he admitted, his shoulders sagging.

“Me too,” Vivi said, and then gave a nervous little half-giggle: “Um, me neither,” he corrected softly.

“Well,” Steiner began, “we were distracted by the most noble of causes! Saving the world is the most noble of causes, young Master Vivi! We have all the time we’d ever need now to view the beauty of the lands we helped to save!”

Vivi sighed, and glowing golden eyes blinked in the shadows of his hat. “I – I’d like to s-see the dwarf village again,” he said eagerly, the words bubbling out. “A-and the – and Freya’s town. And Eiko’s village.”

Steiner gave a firm, solemn nod and reached out to ruffle the mage’s hat. “There is nothing stopping you now, Master Vivi,” he said gravely. But Vivi only shrugged and turned to look back out the window, his little patched shoulders drooping.

“Vivi,” Steiner said regally, and in retrospect he realized he had said it without thinking: “I would be honoured to take you on a tour of the fine nations of the world.”

“Really?” Vivi chirped, excited all over again. “Really, y-you mean it, Steiner?”

“Of course, my young friend,” Steiner said, internally thinking, yes, just abandon the Alexandrian throne to traipse about the planet with a lonely little mage; Steiner, are you daft? Beatrix will kill you if your own sense of abandoned duty fails to do the job! He panicked.

(Although in reality, the Lady Beatrix was far from killing him when she found out. She was in fact a little bit proud.)

“W-we should wait for Zidane to get back,” Vivi said then, haltingly, and Steiner bowed his head.

“Yes, we should,” he said solemnly, and that was the end of that for the day.

The next day, Steiner found Vivi in the kitchen, watching the Alexandrian maids put together a huge meat pie, and looking happier than he had in days.

“When we go,” Vivi said resolutely, “I want to see Black Mage Village, too. I want to pet Billy Corwen.”

The days then filled themselves with talk of the long journey ahead of the two friends – the wild lands they would see, the fiends they would fight, huge castles in the air spun from gold and sugar and words and fairytales and the attempt to distract themselves from the lack of Zidane. There would be wonderful stories to tell, and sunsets, and maybe treasure. (Vivi declared he’d share the treasure with everybody: even Eiko, who very obviously wanted to be invited on the voyage but wasn’t; and Amarant, who – even Vivi admitted - was professionally an asshole.)

It became their one source of hope and happiness and laughter and thus it was no big surprise that when Zidane finally returned, all thoughts related to the great and implausible voyage were pushed aside.

It was only months later, when Freya finally returned to her rains and Eiko was packaged off to Lindblum and Quina had marched off muttering about frogs and one day they’d woken and Amarant was just plain gone, leaving only a slightly offensive picture of Kuja in a dress scrawled in the dust on the mirror in his room – one of these days, when Steiner was on a real patrol and came across young Master Vivi scuffling about Alexandria Castle and looking glum and everything came back to him in a rush of duty, part guilt and part – just a little – excitement.

“Master Vivi,” the knight greeted the mage warmly, and Vivi looked up.

“Something on your mind, young Master?”

Vivi shook his head hesitantly, and then vigorously, gaining confidence. “N-no, it’s just … no, nothing.”

Steiner stood for a second, thinking, the weight of everything flowing slowly around his armor-built mind, and then smiled down at the young mage. “Well, then, you’d better get ready. Young mages have no time for sitting around windows!”

“Ready f-for what, Steiner?”

Steiner smiled again, this time heart-felt. “Don’t we have an exciting journey waiting for us?”

Viv gasped, and if Mist could have lighted, his entire face would have lit up like a Flare. “Y-you mean it, Steiner?”

“I don’t see why not.” And, in fact, he didn’t. Spending his life in service of the Queen was a noble cause, but he’d never done anything for himself. And Master Vivi was his friend. And, he thought, in a deep corner of his mind which had never been breached: I’d like to pet Billy Corwen, too.

Later, when telling the Lady Beatrix about the trip (said Lady sitting across from him at a table, a sly smile on her face), he’d meant to make it a grand tale of adventure: battles, and mysteries, and glorious sunrises over fruitful plains, and maybe some pirates and treasure. But what came out were the little things: the way Vivi lit a fire at night, giggling, for Steiner to roast the dinner over, or the way the dwarves had helped fix the dent in his armor, or perhaps the meal Mikoto had made for them, smiling shyly in a manner quite unfitting of the Third Angel of Death. The fact that Vivi had decided to stay in Lindblum with Eiko for a while, and that Eiko had gotten glasses and grown her hair out. The fact that Freya was training a new young class of Dragon Knights, and one of them was a little runtling.

He’d stopped in midsentence after that one, disturbed by Beatrix’s unusual (albeit attractive) laughter, and wondered. When had the weight of the responsibilities, of his duties, become such a little thing in itself?

Steiner paused, and smiled to himself.



About this fic:
I wrote parts of this last year for a Christmas fic exchange, I believe for protect_vester. I never liked the tone of it, so I didn't finish it. When scribe_protra suggested Steiner-positive fic, I immediately thought of this, because I liked the concept. I came back to this fic and revised the heck out of it.
I think what I don't/didn't like about it is that it's half in Sev's voice and half in Steiner's voice, rather than picking one. It's me telling a story about Steiner rather than showing Steiner's thoughts. Redoing that would have meant starting from scratch, which I guess I could have done, but didn't.

Anyway, scribe_protra, enjoy.