"My father is a bird;
My mother is his mate;
Over the water I sail without boat.
Over the water I sail without boat.
My mother is a bird;
My father is her mate."

***

The first thing Joe ever felt was feathers.

Feathers. Warm, soft, downy. Dusty-smelling, bird smelling. They gave him life. If there had been anything the child could have had, anything he could have wished for, it would have been great winged pinions, like the rest of his family.

The only family little Joseph had ever known came in colours of green, blue, black, and gold. Although he was a strange child, wingless, featherless, and beakless, his adopted family loved him and cared for him just like a normal chick. No one ever reminded him of his disabilities, and, other than having no wings, he thought himself quite normal.

The only creatures that knew the origin of young Joe were the Chocobos.

***

The strange story had begun on a stormy day two years before, in the vast nothingness of the Kalm Plains. The matriarch of the flock, a great blue River Chocobo, had been looking for greens, as per usual. Instead of tasty greens, however, she had found a human baby, hidden in the grass by a stream.

True, he did look odd. And the noises that came out of his mouth were enough to make an eight-year old black cob molt in the middle of summer. But he was alone, and the cries he made reminded the bird of her own chicks. So, without really knowing why, the River Chocobo gently picked him up by his swaddling and carried him back to the flock.

The dark-haired child, abandoned and unwanted at birth, had found a home without even knowing it.

And for the past two years the man-cub had been raised as well as the chocobos could manage. They fed him, kept him warm, and protected him from the many predators on the plains, just as any chocobo chick would be protected. At night he slept in the middle of them, in a pile of feathers that would have made the most comfortable feather bed feel like stone.

When the nomadic flock moved, he was carried in the gentle beaks of his flock. Later on, when he was a little bigger, the child learned to ride on their backs, gripping a handful of neck feathers tightly. From the time he could walk, he was on the backs of the chocobos.

The chicks he had been raised with were his brothers and sisters, although they grew quicker than their tiny sibling. They never pecked at him or beat at the little boy with their powerful wings, as they often did each other in rough horseplay. They treated him with infinite gentleness.

One especially, a small black male, was never far away from the adoptee. He watched over him with the vigilance of a protective mother, and the two were inseparable. It was the black whom Joseph rode most of the time, and when the bird flapped his wings and ran, the toddler would hang on and laugh wildly, enjoying the soaring sensation.

Joe might have spent his whole life with the birds, living a nomadic existence. He might have known nothing but peace and freedom for the rest of his days, except for the event that occurred his third year with the chocobos....

****

It started out like any other day. The flock was scattered over a section of marsh searching for the ever elusive Greens. When some were found, a wark of triumph would erupt, and then silence would settle again, the only sounds the low clucking of the chocobos and the scritch scritch scritch of their great claws as they scraped the earth.

Joseph and his black-feathered brother weren't there at the time. The black enjoyed roaming the mountain peaks, and his companion on these forays was almost always the little boy, who enjoyed the high places almost as much as his mount. This particular day they were gone until almost dusk, and by the time they returned the skies were painted with the gold and red of sunset.

Silence reigned over all, and as Joe and his brother topped a hill near the marsh, they could see the flock still scratching peacefully for greens. It was a pretty tableau, the colorful flock pecking idly in the sun's last rays.

It was the last time Joe would see his chocobos in peace.

As the black chocobo descended the mountain to join his flock, there was a sound of clattering stones and footsteps from the other side of the valley. Every feathered head in the flock snapped to attention. The birds were used to the various dangers of monsters and the elements, but none were prepared for what occurred next.

A shot rang out in the dusk, and a yellow chocobo fell, a bright red stain spreading out from it's breast. The bird kicked it's powerful legs several times convulsively and was still. The rest of the flock, seeing this sight and hearing the gunshot, panicked and ran, scattering to the four winds as they went. But no chocobo, however fast, can outrun a bullet. Several more were brought down by the unseen marksman, and soon only half their numbers remained. The survivors fled into the gathering gloom, and soon the silence returned. The only sign of what had happened were the strewn bodies of the dead, bloodstained and pitiful.

When a caravan of gypsies passed through the valley later that night they came upon a strange sight. In the glow of the oil lamps sat a small child, stark naked, sobbing and clinging to one of the bloody bodies. His face was buried in the blue feathers of the dead matriarch.

***

The little caravan crossed the plains like a tortoise moving towards a lettuce leaf - not fast by any means, but determined to get to it's destination sooner or later. A small cloud was kicked up by the chocobos pulling the wagons, the dust of the road covering their feathers, the wagon covers, and the brightly embroidered clothing of the gypsies that drove the birds onward over the plains.

Behind the wagons, bringing up the rear, was a boy of about 9, riding bareback on a chocobo. Like the rest of his family, he wore bright clothing. A large floppy hat three sizes too big rested on his dark head, red and black with embroidery. His clothes matched the hat, and they itched like crazy. He would have preferred to ride naked, but that wasn't allowed here. It hadn't been an available option for a long, long time.

When the gypsies had first tried to put their hands on Joe, he had gone quite berserk. The foundling had flapped his arms as if he had wings, and when that hadn't worked, he had tried to peck the gentle hands that picked him up from the chocobo's body. He had screamed and made noises that sounded remarkably like an angry young chickabo. In short, Joe had behaved every bit like the wild creatures that had raised him. He hated and feared men, and had tried to run away from his captors several times.

But the group that had found him had been gentle. A family of chocobo-trainers and performers had taken him under their wing *so to speak* and tamed the wild boy. Eventually Joe was taught to speak, wear clothing, and behave as a normal human child. He had an uncanny way with the chocobos, and when he was big enough helped train the tame birds for the shows his adopted family put on whenever they passed through a town.

He learned how to do handstands and backflips on the back of a moving chocobo. He taught them tricks that astounded even his family, and was soon renowned as a master trainer of the birds. At the age of 9 he had become something of a celebrity among the caravan -- Chocobo Joe, the wild boy.

The chocobo he rode was the same black steed that he had ridden in the high mountains so long ago. After Joe's capture, the black bird had trailed behind the wagons like a bloodhound on the trail of a wanted criminal. Thinking it to be an omen of some type, the gypsies had roped the black and tied him behind their wagons.

The young black cob was a hellion. He wouldn't let anyone touch him. If they tried, they would have his powerful beak and feet on their skull in a matter of seconds. There were serious thoughts about selling the troublesome bird off at the next village and letting a chocobo-breaker deal with him, until Joe and the bird were reunited.

When the little boy had seen his old friend in those unfamiliar surroundings, he'd given a happy shriek and wrapped his arms around the bird's scaly legs. The bird had recognized his old adopted nestmate, given an equally happy wark and nuzzled the boy's cheek with his downy coal-coloured head. The gypsies had just looked at each other in astonishment and backed away.

The following years had been happy for both the boy and his chocobo. The gypsies were never in one place for too long, and Joe got to see much of the world from the back of his black bird. At the moment they were headed for a town the youth had never been to before : Midgar. He hoped it would be big and exciting; if there was one thing Joe enjoyed it was an adventure.

***