Spoiler Warning: If you don't know who the hell Gelda Nebillim is,
then go play some more TotA and come back once you do.
This isn't
exactly true to the story given in the game, but still.
This was written a loong time ago, shoved off to the back shelf on my LJ, and then recently I went back and cleaned it up. Now I think it's ready to put out in a more public place. (Not that my LJ isn't public, it's just that nobody knows of its existance, heh.)
Jade Curtiss wasn't in the habit of running. But there were certain points in time where he was forced to. A practical example would be when their group first met the Behemoth. Horribly outmatched, they were forced to run every time the creature caught up with them enough to try and force them into battle.
A more abstract example would be his retreat from his childhood in Keterburg. However, poor Jade had always had an easier time with the more concrete aspects of life. He was still very much the same person he had been, even from so long ago.
He loved challenges, whether physical or mental, hence why he had involved himself in both military and scientific pursuits. He always found himself terribly bored if he wasn't stretching his skills to the limits.
In the past, he had set his own standards to an obvious role-model: Gelda Nebillim. Of course, that was before he had accidentally killed her with his incessant curiosity. Even now, he was still trying to find closure to that.
Well, not exactly. A more truthful way of wording that would be: He was still trying to run from that fact. As cliche as it sounded, he still woke up abruptly in the night, in a cold sweat, attempting to shake images of his late teacher's burnt visage from his mind.
He had always figured it this way; it was alright to kill things as long as you meant to do it. Once it became an accident, then there was a problem. And what had happened to Nebillim had been an accident, utterly and completely. He had only been trying to see if it could be at all possible to teach the Seventh Fonon, rather than counting on luck to have someone birthed with both the gift and the motivation to take advantage of it.
Some said it was from jealously, an envy Jade had harbored from being told he couldn't use the Seventh Fonon, and that he never could use it. That was why he had tried the experiment itself, much to Gelda's chagrin, but he had never intended to harm her. Not then, and not at any point before then.
To this day Jade didn't know how he had escaped the inferno that had resulted. Though there was no proof, among those that knew the story, the vast majority agreed that perhaps just a bit of the power he had intended to use had worked properly. Just enough to save Jade. Of course, that seemed at once too melancholy and too thematic for the Fonist.
Saphir had been the first to find out. He had been on his way to go meet the two most important people to him; his beloved idol Gelda, and his best friend, Jade. He had been the one to suggest that they could simply recreate her, and without thinking, Jade had agreed.
Now, older, and apparently wiser, Jade always considered his options carefully. He knew the consequences of jumping headlong into a situation all too well.
The first human example of Fomicry, and the best example of why it shouldn't be done. Jade and Saphir had done the deed of copying her crudely with their own power, but without the help of either fon machine or Melodist, they had been unable to utilize the Seventh Fonon, the one so essential to balance.
With the replica in a blank stupor, and the real, mortally wounded Nebillim weakened further by the strain of Fomicry, the doctors had all but proclaimed that both were to slowly die. Gelda did, but the replica had slowly come to a short while after it's original's passing.
It was soon obvious that, though she looked the exact same, this new replica was not the original Nebillim. She was much more violent, swearing and striking things at the smallest injustices to herself, and she had no memories, or feelings at all for that matter, for her two star pupils that had given her existence. In fact, she seemed to only hold contempt for them, for not providing her with Rem and Shadow.
Nephry had not made things much easier for the now-distraught Jade. She cursed him up and down for what he had done. She constantly asked him, 'Why?' Why he had decided to replicate her, why he had involved Saphir in it, and, most of all, why he had killed her in the first place.
Even now, Jade doubted that she truly believed it was an accident. He didn't blame her, after all, he had claimed that all the hapless monsters he had tested his skills on had 'accidentally' died afterwards. Perhaps she was right, maybe he truly was a demon of some sort.
At some point in time, the new Gelda had disappeared, and soon after several reports of missing Fonists began to come in. As much as he tried not to draw the conclusion, it was only obvious. And soon enough, it was proven, with their own eyes. Nebillim had taken to killing those with fonic talent, the lack of Rem and Shadow having driven her mad. Jade had tried his best to destroy the dangerous creature, but alas, they had replicated her well enough for her fonic power to rival that of their old professor. Options quickly running out, and more Fonists dying by the day, she was simply sealed away by the military.
It was at that point he was noticed by the Curtiss family. They assumed he had created this terrible monster on purpose, and intended to adopt his intellect into their ranks. Perhaps this Fomicry theory of his could be put to good use in war. There was no contest, and soon Jade found himself being taken away from Keterburg.
Saphir seemed jealous, thinking that the honor of being adopted should have been his, and upset at the prospect that his last strong relationship would be taken away. Jade would have gladly given him that 'honor' any day, had it been his choice.
It was at that point that Jade and Peony began to become good friends. Before that point, Saphir had jealously guarded Jade from the to-be emperor, during the few points in time when the royal family had vacationed in Keterburg. Jade quickly found that he much preferred the easy-going, laid-back Peony as a best friend anyways.
He had little time to make many more friends beyond that, as his adoptive family quickly enrolled him in the best schooling Grand Chokmah could offer, and as soon as was legally possible, put him through rigorous military training. They expected nothing short of perfection from their offspring, whether biological or not.
He appreciated the exhausting schedule for one overpowering reason; the less time he had to think about himself, the less time he had to think of Gelda Nebillim. So he continued until it became a hazy memory in the back of his mind, and he was able to easily push away any thoughts that did occur. And so went the life of Jade Curtiss. Luckily, there weren't too many snags after that.
But now, at the foot of Nebillim's Crag, with the results of his childhood failure standing in front of them, he couldn't run anymore. Well, at least not without looking like a fool. And so, he gritted his teeth, and brandished his spear.
That always was the best way to deal with this sort of thing.
I know I write exceedingly slow. Forgive me. I really do hope to crank it up a tad bit faster in the coming months.
(On a related note, any beta-readers up to helping me find and fix the country tone in my writing? Everytime I write something, I sit here trying to figure out which exact phrases, slang terms, et cetera, make this story blatantly obvious, at least to me, that a rural author wrote it.)