Chapter Text
“Therefore let us go forth together.”
“Yes Your Majesty, as you wi-” Noah paused. “Wait…” What had started as Noah and friends being curious about Queen Nia’s motherland had somewhat spiraled out of hand.
“Ah, forgive me, Your Majesty,” Taion cut in. “I don’t think we quite heard right.”
Nia’s polite smile seemed to grow a bit impish as she replied, “I mean to say that I will accompany you on your travels. That way, I’ll be able to continue my tales. Night and day, every day if needs be!” Nia stiffened before leaning forward earnestly. “Ah… I mean, that is not NOT to imply that being cooped up here the whole time is as lonesome as it is tedious… or that I’m well pleased with myself for inventing an elegant, way-sneaky excuse to get out… It’s nothing like that at all… Please do not misinterpret it thus.”
“No one was saying that anyway.” Lanz replied, shrugging indifferently. Who was he to argue with her joining them?
Looking a bit embarrassed, Nia continued. “Uhm… I suppose it may be a bit much, eh…?”
Seeing her reaction, Noah was quick to reassure her. “Uh, we weren’t saying that either…”
Immediately popping back up and smiling brightly, Nia replied. “All right then, it’s decided! A “deal”, shall we say?”
“Y-yes, Your Majesty,” Noah stuttered out. Utterly baffled while she turned away and celebrated to herself. Did the Queen of Agnus really just say ‘Aw yiss’ to herself? Shaking the thought from his head, he continued. “Ok then… uhm… we humbly beg your grace, Your Majesty. Or was that ‘respectfully’...?”
Nia waved it off. “Oh, come now! No need for such formality. I ask only for your kind support, Noah. Oh.. and from now on, I’d like you to address me simply as ‘Nia’. From now on, I’ll be just another of your ordinary fellow traveling-folk!”
Lanz clapped his hands together. “Alright! Let’s get this show on the road then, Your Ma- I mean Nia.”
“Yeah!” Sena said. “This’ll be so much fun!”
Taion pushed up his glasses, his trademark smirk in place. “It will certainly boost our chance of success.”
“Yeah yeah,” Eunie cut in, shoving him lightly. “It’s the snuffin’ Queen of Agnus!”
Mio glanced at the others before turning back to Nia. “Are you sure about this?” Her gaze shifted back to Lanz and Eunie in particular.
Nia laughed it off. “Absolutely. Not like they’d be more annoying than some of my old friends.” Her smile wobbled a bit. “Zeke would’ve been a trip for all of us, I’m sure.”
Noah cocked his head slightly in curiosity. “Zeke?”
“Ah,” Nia blinked. “Right. You’ll know when I get to him with the stories I share, but we should head out, yeah? We can talk more on the way.”
Noah nodded, turning as footsteps were heard approaching. Turning, he noticed that Fiona, Segiri, and Ashera had caught up, the latter looking worse for wear barring the huge grin on her face. “Right.” Turning to address the new arrivals, he spoke. “Great timing you three, we were about to head out again.”
Eunie stomped over to Ashera, fussing over her, while the Lone Exile gave Noah a jaunty salute. “Yes, sir!” She chirped cheekily. “Just had a few rough surprises out the- AH! What the snuffin hell, Eunie?”
“Had a claw sticking out your arm there, love.” Eunie didn’t seem at all concerned about Ashera’s reaction, tossing the mentioned claw aside and pulling out her staff. “Couldn’t snuffin’ heal you with it still in.”
“Sometimes, I think you enjoy my pain,” Ashera retorted.
Eunie nodded. “Too right, that. Serves you right when you’re bein’ a spoon.” After a moment the glow from her staff subsided. “Alright, Noah. We should be good to go now.”
Noah nodded, a bit uncertain at the interaction. “Right… No time to lose, then. First back to the City to check in with Samon and from there we should be heading back into the Cadensia Region to make our way towards Origin.”
“A sound plan,” Taion said. “Maybe we should stop by the colonies in Cadensia to top up on supplies.”
Eunie nudged him with a smug smirk on her face. “You just want to check in on Nimue, yeah?”
Taion sputtered, trying to regain his composure by pushing his glasses up and crossing his arms. “Certainly not. I just want to make sure we have enough food just in case we have a repeat of the incident with the Tirkins.”
“Sure…” She didn’t look the least bit convinced.
“Alright,” Noah cut in. “That’s enough, you two. We really should be going. No time to waste, yeah?” Seeing everyone settle down, he sighed in relief. “Onwards, then.”
The trek out of Cloudkeep was mercifully short and soon enough, boot tread met the snow covered ground of the Upper Aetia Region. As they continued their trek, the wind kicked up and with it, the weather turned sour. Shivers racked the party as visibility plummeted. Mio, in a stunt similar to their time in Fornis, was once more hanging off of Sena trying to leech any heat she could get from the fiery lifter.
Quickly it became a search for cover, though any hint of the surrounding geography eluded them as the wind whipped harder. When it seemed like that there would be no relief to the pounding buffets of chilled air, suddenly it all stopped.
Calm.
Slowly the surrounding snowstorm died down and visibility settled back in. White and grays melting away and giving away to vibrant greens. Gone were snowy slopes of Aetia, replaced with a vibrant field of green, though the familiar peaks could still be seen.
“Queen’s wings,” Eunie muttered. “Where the hell are we now?”
Lanz’s eyes were wide as he took in the change of scenery. “Wild…”
“Hey guys,” Sena cut in, pointing to something in the distance. “Doesn’t that sort of look like a colony, over that way?” Eyes snapped to the structure she had indicated.
“There’s no Ferronis,” Taion argued. “It could be a settlement similar to the City, but we shouldn’t assume they’re friendly.”
“That still doesn’t tell us where we’re at now.” Lanz groaned in frustration. “This doesn’t look anything like where we’re s’posed to be! Forget the colony over there or whatever, we’re dead lost right now.”
“Need to be calm.” Riku cut in. “We all together. The where not important if everyone panicked.”
“Gormott…” Everyone turned to the soft utterance, Nia’s golden eyes glimmering with tears. “We’re on the Gormotti titan, but this shouldn’t be possible. Torigoth wouldn’t have survived the merging.” Her eyes slipped from the capital of Gormott, catching on the wide expanse of white that encroached on the very horizon. “The Cloud Sea… How…?”
A hand on her shoulder caused Nia to jump. Golden eyes locked with those of a similar shade, a concerned look on Mio’s face as she stared at the Agnian queen. “Are you alright, Your Majesty?”
Shaking herself out of her funk, Nia nodded, composing herself. “Just fine. Apologies to you all, but I recognize where we are, even if the how escapes me.” Taking a steadying breath, she continued. “Like I said, we are on the Gormotti titan. The ‘colony’ you see, is the capital, Torigoth. This being the case, it means we have been transported to Alrest, my home.”
“Alrest?” Noah questioned. “Your… home?”
Nia nodded. “One of the two worlds that merged to form Aionios. This is where I was born.” Her brow furrowed. “Something that bothers me more, though, is the Cloud Sea. It shouldn’t be around anymore, if we had simply arrived in Alrest. It was gone well before Origin became a necessity for the two worlds.”
A small hum had everyone turn to gaze at Segiri. “If this Cloud Sea should not be present, due to it being gone before Origin, would that not mean that we arrived before it disappeared?”
Sena’s eyes widened. “So time travel?” Seeing the blank looks on her friends’ faces, she giggled, embarrassed. “I read a couple of those novel things in the city and one of them talked about traveling to the past. Maybe that’s what happened?”
“Makes sense to me,” Lanz replied, shrugging. “What do you think, Noah?”
“It's the best we have for now.” Turning to Nia, he continued. “Any ideas as to what we should do, Your Majesty?”
“Jus’ call me Nia, yeah?” The Gormotti muttered. “If we’re really in the past, I’m not the queen yet. Anyhow, we need to figure out exactly when. If it’s any time around when I was traveling Alrest, there’s plenty of stuff happenin’.”
“Any ideas on how we do that?” Taion asked. “Maybe we should ask the people of this Torigoth place?”
Before Nia could respond, her eyes snapped back to Torigoth at a glint of light and a loud explosion of noise thundered, the last cry of Torigoth’s water tower as it came crashing down. Nia blinked. “Ah, no need.” Glancing around, she noticed just where they were. “All we need to do is wait here. We should meet some friends pretty soon, I reckon.”
Today sucked, Rex thought. Horribly so. Started off well enough with getting the parts for Poppi, even if having to wander off to get the needed parts was a hassle. Now they had Alrest’s first artificial blade at their back after the lightshow in Tora’s house.
Navigating the Ardainian warship was a slog for sure, but with Tora’s help, they’d soon found Dromarch, and not long after, Nia. All in a day’s work, nothing out of place until Nia mentions that there wasn’t an execution planned in the first place.
A trap, how lovely.
First a fight with Dughall, who was more or less of a pushover. Now their second opponent is where things took a turn: Special Inquisitor Morag Ladair and her Blade, Brighid.
The fight had been fierce and thanks to a bit of quick thinking, they managed to bring Torigoth’s water tower down on the pair and make their escape. So, here they were running on fumes and soaking wet, peeling across the landscape or Gormott, trying to put some distance between themselves and the capital.
As they closed in on the Waytree, Rex managed a breath of relief and they closed in on the towering roots. Slowing down, he turned to the others, all in a similar state of disrepair. “I think it should be safe to rest here!”
Nia wasted no time plopping down on the ground, dust kicking up around her. “Finally. Any further and I think my legs would fall off.” Dromarch settled beside her and she collapsed into him. “Ah, much better. Thanks, Dromarch.”
“A pleasure to be of service,” the tiger rumbled. Turning to look at Rex, he spoke again. “Many thanks to you both, Master Rex and Master Tora; You as well, Ladies Pyra and Poppi. I’m sure My Lady agrees, but your help has been invaluable and our rescue most fortuitous.”
Rex laughed as he sat down on a nearby log, Pyra settling in next to him. “Could hardly leave you alone, even if the rumors about Nia being executed were made up.”
“Tora agree! Friends are very important! Any friends of Rex-Rex are friends of Tora!” The Nopon chimed in before chuckling sheepishly. “Also helped with Poppi, so Tora wished to help for that too.”
A comfortable silence settled as Pyra went about starting a fire for them. Once she sat back down, they began chatting about anything, just trying to push the events of the day behind them.
-SNAP-
Rex jumped up, Aegis blade in hand while Nia started. Tora pulled his weapon from his back and looked around frantically. “What was that?” The salvager asked. “Who’s there?!”
To his surprise, a voice responded. “We come in peace!”
Rex’s eyes darted to the source, as someone his age walked out from behind one of the roots of the Waytree, dark hair pulled into a ponytail and a bright red jacket. The teen’s hands were held up, no weapon in sight. Behind him walked out others, soon outnumbering Rex’s own group. When the last walked out, his eyes widened. “Nia?”
Behind him, he heard a gasp. “Wot?!” Looking back, he saw the familiar yellow jumpsuit of his first friend on this journey before turning back to the newcomers. Though slightly different, this other Nia’s outfit bore a striking resemblance to said jumpsuit.
She looked older, for sure, and her ears were quite a bit longer than the Nia he knew. She smiled brightly back at them, though he could see the strain in it. She waved, a bit shy. “Yeah, that’d be something to explain. That said,” her smile brightened. “It’s good to see you all again.”
“WOT?!”