Charlie: I am back from Yosemite, and ignoring my parent's complaints that the heater doesn't work… because frankly, after sleeping in a log cabin without a heater during a snowstorm, I couldn't really care less. But before I try to crank out another chapter of Fourteen Days, I need to take a break, so I'm gonna write out a dream (filling in the gaps of course) I had about being the tactician of the FE group. (Trust me, it wasn't exactly fun, but it was funny when you tell it to others.) Oh and my glasses got completely totaled… I mean, irreparably broken, while skiing. Maybe I'll tell the story though Fourteen Days if I feel like it. But anyways, on with the show.
Oh and I don't own Fire Emblem…seriously, if you didn't know that by now… I just don't know what to say to you.
Rooming Assignments
They say pleasing everyone is impossible. Now, I don't know who they are or when these mysterious entities people randomly refer to in their lifetimes say these things, but I find that "They" tend to speak the truth. So, while doing my job, I personally do what works and what makes me happy.
Now, I'm a tactician. Specifically, I'm the guy who's supposed to keep everyone alive during a battle, and currently, "everyone" encompasses every noble, merchant, peasant, thief, beggar and vagabond crazy enough to march into certain death, under the command of a teenager, for a few shiny pennies. Yet for some reason, people seem to think of me more than that. Somehow, I've been named the quote unquote leader of this group.
The way I see it though, I've been called many names, things and phrases. I've been known as "son," "hey you there boy," "person," "sir," "kid," "bastard," "bitch," "son of a bitch," "motherfu-" okay I think you get the point. My given name however, is Charlie. And, reiterating, the way I see it, this army is called "Eliwood's Elite" or some crazy ass thing like that, not "Charlie's merry gang of suicidal travelers." You see my drift?
Okay, so being a leader is kinda cool at times. I mean, I get all this power to do whatever I want with it. I could even tell Marcus to get me a glass of lemonade during a fierce battle and he'll do it. Unfortunately, I'm usually too busy or not bored enough to abuse my position like such. And to ADD to my woes, everyone has a problem with many of my off the field decisions; the biggest one being…rooming assignments.
Rooming assignments on the field are usually not a problem. I like to do a rotating sleep cycle, where a third of the army is always up on guard duty or working on some other menial task while everyone else sleeps. Since we have enough tents for the other two thirds, everyone gets their own personal sleeping space and everyone is happy. Yay!
However, once in a while, we have the good luck of arriving at a town big enough to have an inn. Now, with the amount of time I force people to spend at arenas, the army always has enough funds to spend. But, inns have limited room, so we must share rooms and heaven forbid beds. EWWW!
But seriously now, I'm under the impression that I was leading a group of adults and professionals. That is, I am under the impression. The reality is though; half of my army is younger than I am (though in this time and age, all of them should already be married… for some reason, only Pent and Louise are, and they're a few years older than I am). And with youth, comes the belief that the opposite sex…carries cooties.
For being alive for seventeen summers, I have never, ONCE contracted a disease from contact with females my age, and I have never ONCE seen my female cousins contract diseases from associating with males their ages, so this concept was completely alien to me. Yet, here we are, professional mercenaries, nobles and others of the sort, completely refusing to cooperate because of rooming assignments.
Now to give people credit, only one girl in the army really has a problem with the opposite sex. Everyone else just seems to… use her as an excuse to exercise violence on people in the army they don't particularly like. Normally, I'd just close my eyes, tell myself it's not my problem, and move on. Unfortunately, one night in a town on the outskirts of Ostia, it became my problem, and I had no way out.
From the nation's capital, it was a good three-day's march until we reached the boarder of Ostia. Luckily for us, we happened upon a nice boarder town with, more importantly, an inn and warm beds.
Now, considering the sheer number of people we have, I wasn't about to get a room for everyone, simply because these small towns don't have massive hotels. So we have to share rooms. Being a fair tactician, and frankly, knowing every soap opera, drama type love triangle, square, hexagon, dodecahedron, whatever in the army, I normally assign roommates, simply to prevent two people who like the same guy/girl from fighting to the death over such things.
Now, as a something just to make things simple, I carry a roster of the army. And normally, I just make a fold, and start matching people, sticking close to the gender lines to prevent any "Hey, how come he gets to go with her but I don't get to go with her!" kind of thing from going on. But sometimes we do have to cross gender lines and usually people are good about it.
This time however, I had THE worst luck of leaving Florina the odd girl out. I swear, the minute I read out her partner, Wil, the entire room was ablaze. For obvious reasons, Fiora and Farina were in my face threatening to lynch me if I didn't alter the rooming. Lyn was halfway between hating me and strangling Wil. And well, everyone else just took the chance to bitch about their assignments as well.
So what could a tactician do? Being observant of my army off the field, I already know who Florina liked (surprisingly enough) and who liked her (as more than a friend), but nobody else notices since well, unlike me, they aren't paid to think. Five minutes later though, there was no sign of any stoppage. In fact, I could've sworn Fiora was playing around with the idea of ripping a ring out of her skirt to make a noose for me. I decided not to take my chances. Grabbing my hiking stick, I slammed it into a table, making a deafening crack before yelling at the top of my lungs, "SHUT UP!'
That got everyone's attention.
"Okay…" I heard myself say. "This is getting ridiculous… SOOO… here are the keys. Pick your own partners, and don't kill each other."
With that, I pulled out the bag of door keys, and tossed the bag onto the table, causing keys to spill out everywhere. I quickly grabbed two and backed away, waiting for the carnage. The two I took? Well, one was for me, and the other was for Pent and Louise. For some reason, marriage seems to make people more rational. So the three of us stood to the side and watched the battle scene.
It unfolds with Sain, being Sain, attempting to grab a room with every single girl available. I must say, it does do my cynical heart good to see him get slapped over and over again. Next we have the whole Florina business. Having two sisters, both were in a fierce argument over who would protect her. That fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your point of view) was resolved quickly when Lyn stepped in. The sisters agreed, since Lyn, sadly enough, has probably spent more time with Florina recently than either sister.
The next comical scene was dear Serra. Oh Serra, how cute, how loud, how boisterous, and how unsuccessful in getting her beloved Erky to bunk with her. Erk had a double fold task, one being to avoid Serra, and the other being to get to Priscilla before Guy does. Well, being a tactician, I decided that the level of physical violence was about to rise beyond my capacity to handle, so quickly I retreated up the stairs.
As I settled into my comfortable bed with a feathery cushion, I heard a bit of commotion downstairs. Chief among the commotion was the slappings Sain continued to receive, and an odd noise that suspiciously sounded like a brutal beating. When I heard the door to the inn open and two rather loud thuds, I decided not to ask and just try to drift off into dreamland.
I'm a sporadic sleeper. Which means, I feel the need to wake up almost every bloody hour before continuing on with my dreams. It was by my second sleep "rotation" as I called them that I started to hear things. Well, by things I mean the movement of feet. I groaned. Turing over to my side, I started to make a mental tally. Since to, well, most of the army, I was genderless, which meant I pretty much knew who everyone liked and disliked and which love polygon existed and who's together and who's too shy and all that crap, simply because everyone felt I was the right person to tell. Why, I don't know, but I have yet to exploit anything, which I am really starting to plan on doing if people kept pissing me off.
But back on track here, the thudding of feet on the wooden floor lasted about ten minutes. Not surprisingly, most people would find that with the random selection of roommates, unless they were stalking their mates during the mad scramble for the keys, there was no way for anybody to know where everyone else stayed. Plus stealing my roster would be completely useless, as no doubt Legault or Matthew have already found out. I was fairly certain most people snuck out and realized that they had no idea where their lover was, and thus going back to their own room. But just as a safety precaution, I got up and slipped on a robe, intending to see if anyone was actually beat to death for trying to enter a wrong room.
As I walked, I noticed a moaning coming from outside the inn. I grabbed a torch and headed out the main entrance. There, on the ground, covered in bruises and cuts, were Erk and Guy. I looked back at the table and saw one solitary key that was untouched. It took about three seconds for me to realize who did the deed. Slowly, I turned around and headed back up the stairs, stopping in front of Pent and Louise's room, and knocking. A few minutes later, a rather tired looking couple greeted me. I motioned out the door and mumbled "Raven" and the couple got the picture. Each pulling on something warm to wear, the two followed me down the stairs and out the door.
Once outside, the couple quickly started tending to wounds, Louise using bandages and Pent using a staff. Finding nothing to do, I stood to the side mumbling "quoth the Raven, nevermore" over and over again until Pent smacked me upside the head.
Well, long story short, the rest of the night passed quickly, like the calm before the storm, and unfortunately, there WAS a storm. It started when Lyn woke up, only to find herself alone in her room. She opened her door to see Kent sleeping on the ground with a blanket draped over his body.
Now, Lyn was normally a rational person… unless her friends, pride or life was on the line. Then well, she was SCARY… and I mean SCARY! Poor Kent experienced her fury first hand when he found himself waking up at sword point.
At that moment, I encountered this sorry scene, and berated myself for missing Kent on my nightly rounds. I looked at Lyn, and calmly told her to put the Mani Katti away. At that moment though, I had no clue she was pissed off…other wise I wouldn't have been that suicidal. Sadly enough, Lyn then turned her sword onto me, forgetting all the memories we shared, (mainly me waking up unconscious inside her hut after I was attacked by ravens in Sacae and got pecked half to death.). At that point, aside from reexamining my life, I instinctively backed up.
Just as Lyn was about to make minced meat out of me, I was saved by the bell, or a rather loud horrendous scream. Lyn quickly forgot her anger and accompanied me as I ran towards the source. In hindsight, I really wish I didn't, as I found at the source of the scream, two rather infuriated Pegasus sisters raising swords to a certain paladin.
Yes, I must admit, I did know that Sain and Florina had feeling for each other. Unfortunately, I was the only one who knew. Though any normal, rational person would have assumed that, Florina, in her birthday suit, draped around Sain without any signs of resistance, was an indication that she willingly shared herself with the young paladin. Unfortunately again, at this point, Fiora, Farina AND Lyn were completely beyond rational thought.
Now, though I may be a tactician, and have absolutely no technique in sword fighting, I do carry a sword by my side since it would be just plain stupid to go into a battlefield completely unarmed. At this point, I felt it was a good time to pull it out. Now, though I cannot fight, my six foot four frame really intimidates, as is the fact that the three girls are trapped in a narrow hallway, with a guy who doesn't know how to handle a sword… if I decided to swing wildly, it could possible kill everyone within a six foot radius. I chose this moment to give Sain a look that positively screamed something like… "GET THE FREAKING HELL AWAY FROM HERE…NOW!"
Sain obviously, feeling the gravity of the situation, dressed and scrambled away. Moments later, I would be trampled underfoot as the three girls ran me over, drawing swords to dice the poor paladin.
Sighing, I told Florina to dress up and went down.
Honestly speaking, I have no clue how rumors are spread, but by the time I got to the lobby, everyone, and I mean EVERYONE knew about the hanky panky that went on between Sain and the shyest girl in the camp. So, naturally, everyone else was BITTER that they didn't get a chance to ahem…
Anyways, finding myself literally bombarded on all sides by well, really querulous people asking me questions like "WHY…WHY…WHY!" I decided to go out and camp out in a command tent I set up just outside of town. It was quite simple, a table and a cushion for me to sit on.
Unfortunately, my morning was not destined to be peaceful, as Fiora and Farina, obviously finished with their skewering of Sain, stormed into my tent looking for blood.
"Charlie, we demand you take a responsibility for this occurrence!" Fiora said, a bit louder than usual. "Our little sister's innocence was unwillingly snatched from her last night. I demand you implement a separation of sexes immediately. And I mean complete separation. As in no association whatsoever!"
I was amazed that the two actually had written out an entire decree for me. I rolled my eyes.
"A few problems ladies…" I started. "One, why the hell are you here if FLORINA was the one violated?"
"She's too shy."
"Ohh!" I was now sarcastic. "She's to shy to speak for herself…and I suppose she was the one who asked you to come in here and demand justice for her lost virginity? I also suppose she told you specifically that it wasn't consensual. And I'm pretty sure she was also drugged by Sain when she kicked Kent out of his room am I correct?"
"Well…"
"Ladies, I'm asking simple yes or no questions here…did she or did she not?"
"Well, no…she didn't…we just knew…"
"Oh, so now you can read minds? Wow, I didn't know that." Farina was still armed, but at this point, I really didn't care. "I suppose next you're going to tell me that Sain brutally beat her and raped her, then brainwashed her and mysteriously made her bruises disappear."
"Sir…I would appreciate it if you took our proposition in earnest." Fiora said, looking down a bit. "Regardless of what happened, we must prevent further violations as such…and our decree, modified from the one Kent and I created, would be a stone wall to any further debaucheries."
I glanced at the decree and grinned. Despite my worsening morning, it would be fun for my sadistic mind to make these girls cry… or something like that.
"Ahh, very interesting." I said, again, sarcastically. "So, you want me to tell Pent and Louise they can, not only no longer see each other, but they can't even talk to each other?"
"No sir, I didn't-"
"Ahh, but you did." I pointed to a clause. "No association whatsoever… so that should mean that our lovely married couple can't even chat about the weather. Oh and plus the fact that on the battlefield, I will be forced to let you die."
"Sir, I'm asking you to take this serious-"
"But I am." I pointed to the same clause. "Unless I'm mistaken, I am a male, and you are a female…therefore, we cannot have any association. Which means, the next time an archer wants to put an arrow through your head, I am not allowed to warn you."
"Sir, there are excep-"
"Oh, but they aren't written here! You have to write out all the exceptions!" I had an evil grin now, and I knew it. "What happens if the next time this happens, you're in here claming Florina was raped, and Sain's in here claming Florina was in heat the night before screaming for him to do things to her? Who should I trust?"
"Us of course!" Farina said banging my table.
"Ahh, but you weren't there." I smiled sweetly. "And you haven't even TALKED to her yet… so why would I believe you over him?"
"Sir…"
"Okay, tell you what." I rolled up their decree. "You take this… feed it to your boyfriends who are standing out there, and yes, Fiora, I know about you and Kent and you Farina, your little nightly excursions with Lord Hector, I'm paid to think ladies. Now, you take this, feed it to your boyfriends, and we'll pretend nothing happened. Go talk to Florina, I think you'll be surprised…and get out of my sight."
"Sir…"
"I mean…NOW…before I actually implement the decree and well, then I guess I won't be able to tell you the next time you're about to get killed."
I took grim satisfaction as I watched the two girls storm out, ripping up their decree and feeding it to their bewildered boyfriends on their way out. Sadly, my morning was far from over.
Lyn stormed in soon after, with her Mani Katti drawn. In my rather, agitated mood, I was either really brave or really stupid, especially when I demanded that she lower her weapon. I must've been really lucky since Lyn decided not to mince me.
"I demand that you punish Sain." She said after her Mani was sheathed.
"For doing what?" I asked calmly.
Lyn was furious. She gestured wildly towards the general location of the inn. "THAT! That… DEBAUCHERY!"
"Debauchery? That's a big word." I wasn't in a good mood. "But it's so negative."
"NEGATIVE! SAIN JUST RAPED FLORINA!"
"Okay, again, you, like Florina's sisters, have a communication problem with me. You see, for it to be rape, she would have to be unwilling."
"What do you mean!"
"Okay, I'm tired, so let me put this straight for you: Florina…is…in…love…with…Sain. Okay, there, I've said it."
"What! No! I refuse to accept that!"
"Well, that's your problem. We all have our choices. Like me." I pulled out my blade and held it at Lyn's throat menacingly. The key word is menacingly…since I really don't know how to use it. "For instance, you can accept that Florina loves Sain, or you can't… it's up to you…but if they get serious, you'll have to square with that one. And me, I can slice your throat here, but I care for you too much to do so. Now, you can leave me alone… and talk to Florina before you come in here and try to dice me… or you can not to, it's up to you…but one thing is for sure… I may not know fencing, but I do know how to swing around wildly, and in this confined space, me swinging this thing around wildly could cause some harm."
Lyn gritted her teeth. "Fine, but you better be right."
On her way out, I sank into my cushion and set my head against my desk. My head was hurting bad. I looked up to see Lyn looking at me from the tent flap apologetically. I sighed, smiled at her, and waved her off.
Moments later, Matthew and Legault entered. That meeting was short, I just raised my sword and told them to bugger off. Frankly, neither of them has anything to argue about, unless one of them got stuck with Serra. But if that happened, I really don't particularly care.
After menacing the thieves out, I put my head on my desk, hoping to rest for a bit. I jumped when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see Pent and Louise standing there with some medicine. Thanking them, I took the medicine and saw them off. Unfortunately, on their tails, Erk entered, followed by Guy. I sighed; it was going to be a loooooooooong morning.
"What do you two want?"
"We want Raven out of here." They said in unison.
"And why is that?" I asked.
"He's too damn overprotective of Priscilla" Guy complained.
"That really takes away our chances." Erk added.
I nodded. "mmhmm, so you want me to tell him that he should let two guys just take away his beloved adopted sister just after he found her again after so many years?"
"Uhh…when you put it that way…"
"Oh, and what would you do AFTER I told him to chill?"
"Excuse me?"
"Well, once Raven backs off…say Priscilla's there, with the key, and both of you want to be with her… well, she can only be with one of you." I shifted my icy gaze from one man to the other. "Well? What's next? Do the fire tomes and the killing edges come out?"
Guy and Erk looked at each other and couldn't find the words to reply.
"How about this…" I said. "I'll ask Raven not to actually physically harm you two, but if you two kill each other, I'll make sure you're stuck with Serra…for the rest of the war. Capeesh?"
The two shuddered and nodded, before scrambling out of my tent, fearing that I may give them an even worse punishment.
And so my morning dragged on. Everyone had something to complain about, and some people's arguments weren't even related to the whole fiasco that took place earlier this morning. Now I know that some of the members of the army aren't exactly the most book smart people (Bartre comes to mind), yet I don't really think anyone would be that mentally retarded to actually mistake me for a psychologist. I'm not a psychologist; I'm a freaking Tactician, but unfortunately, that concept was lost as a long stream of people came in. Frankly, I considered resorting to the clichéd "I think this all started with your mother" routine I so often read in books.
Sometime near the noon, I realize that rest would do me well, so before I gave a chance for my next "patient" to get in, I yelled for Pent and Louise. The two didn't look surprised when they came in. Frankly, they were used to me asking for their advice; again, I find that married people are so much more sensible to talk strategy with, as long as neither of them is in danger of dying.
"We're staying here…for a week…" I muttered darkly.
This they did look surprise at. Pent gave Louise a nod before letting out a small cough. "Err…are you sure that's wise Charlie?"
"No, but then again, if we leave right now and get attacked, I would be VERY tempted to 'accidentally' not see that third sniper, if you catch my drift."
They definitely caught my meaning this time. If my words didn't tip them off, the sarcastic poison in my voice definitely did. They both nodded and gave me a pat on the back. At that moment, Karel made his entrance. I looked up at him and groaned.
"What do you want?" I asked. Louise looked a bit worried, not surprisingly since I was pretty much barking at someone who kills for pleasure.
Karel didn't say much. He just stood there, glared at me, and then launched himself onto me, trying to strangle me. Well, in my… quite deranged mood, I decided to fight back. Looking back at that moment, I personally think that it was the stupidest mistake of my life.
Being well, the guy who sits back and thinks, I had probably about a tenth of the strength Karel had. Needless to say, I quickly found myself running out of oxygen and in great… GREAT pain. Pent and Louise tried to help me as much as they could, but well, Karel was Karel, and neither Pent nor Louise were exactly known for their strong upper body strength.
Eventually though, the noise worried some of the people outside, and I was released from my death grip by a bewildered Hector, a terrified Eliwood and a worried Lyn. But even as Lyn pulled me away from Karel, I was still snarling and flailing to get at the madman.
Next thing I knew, I woke up five hours later, watching Lyn put a cloth over my forehead. It actually reminded me of the first time we met really… except this time I was more wondering what happened rather than "holy shit… hot girl."
It took me a few days to recover from hitting my head against Lyn's jaw. Things cooled down considerably since, especially after everyone found out that little, shy Florina actually had a thing for Sain. Fiora and Farina even begrudgingly let Sain off, after seeing the joy in their little sister's eyes, but as usual, they couldn't pass up the chance to threaten Sain with castration if Florina ever got heart broken.
As for me… well, I never found out why Karel was pissed at me directly. Although, after observing his interactions, I had a sneaking suspicion it had something to do with my making his sister cry. I would often hear him mumble about how it 'wouldn't be a challenge anymore.' Though looking at Karla cut down bandits like a hot knife through butter, I wouldn't put money on that.
As for what I did to Karla… well, lets just say the love of her life is looking into plastic surgeons after my harsh words.
And as I write this, I can hear the kids crying again, so the rest of the story will just have to wait. But eh, I figure I might as well wait for the history books. Since I'm pretty sure what we did warrants at least... well a tiny mention in the books eh?
And hopefully, my children will never become anything like their father.
Charlie: Eh, it was a weird dream. Seriously though, I really hope my children inherit very little from me. Haha, I scare myself sometimes with the things I do. Anyways, hope you liked this, I'll see about getting Fourteen Days out sometime during March… but I gotta get all my Yosemite makeup work done.
Until later.