Final Fantasy XII The Fire Inside

A/N: Fran/Balthier, in time for the holidays. Rated a hard M for sexual content. This is actually a companion piece and refers to events in "Confusion, or" but stands quite well alone. Enjoy!

# # #

Fran woke up slowly, suspiciously warm metal at her back and a dry wind stealing the moisture from her mouth. Her head throbbed with dehydration and exhaustion and something else entirely, like a giant had taken a club to her skull with intent to smash. The rest of her body was slack like putty, muscles aching with lack of water and too much recent exertion.

She considered cutting off consciousness entirely, mostly in hopes of waking up again later in more pleasant surroundings. Despite how close she was to unconsciousness the ever-present flow of Mist through her said she was in no danger and thus there was no need to force true awakening. She was near enough to the darkness still to invite it to swallow her again, but before she even had the chance white healing magic burst across her skin like a slap to the face, like an ice bucket upturned over her body but without the moisture her body so desperately craved.

Though the healing magic did little to improve her head or her dryness, she managed to open her eyes and winced; even her eyes felt deprived of wet, and the acrid wind whistling through wherever she was made her eyes burn.

A second, more insistent burst of healing power cut over her body again with the same chill, and this time she knew it was from Balthier, and he was starting to get fearful at her refusal to wake. With a sigh she let the wanted darkness go, and forced her eyes open despite the dryness.

Her gaze met the top of Balthier's head. She was laying flat on a metal surface, dim crimson light from a setting sun tinting her surroundings with burnt orange and bronze reflections. Metal was everywhere, twisted and jagged like a ship tossed out of jagd and bounced across Ivalice for some perverse athletic pleasure of the gods. Balthier was on all fours over her supine position, head bent down to her breasts with exhaustion, elbows threatening to cave under him, fully dressed but drenched in sweat.

For a moment her vista was clouded with absolute confusion: the positions they held seemed rather sexual in nature, but her utter fatigue and his desperation had nothing to do with carnality.

Then, she remembered.

Bahamut. Vayne. Vayne's fall. The Bahamut losing its glossair power core and threatening to destroy Rabanastre. Balthier on the intercom with the princess.

Most of what eclipsed after had been lost to Fran, since falling debris had knocked her out of the realm of knowing for a while. But they were definitely still on the Bahamut; Fran's wakening senses were picking up on the abnormally strong rivers of vaporizing Mist escaping from the metal and back into the atmosphere.

They must have made it. Balthier must have been successful, as they were both still alive, and Fran's Mist reading abilities, as sluggish as they still were, told her that nothing within sensing distance had adversarial ambitions.

The idea of success shocked Fran for a moment. She had been fully expecting to die.

Her amazement at still being alive was broken by a choked noise from Balthier, who had not realized yet her return to consciousness and was unsteadily flickering white trying to drudge up enough energy for another cure spell. When Fran opened herself to his emotions he was bordering on frantic, afraid that something was wrong with her that he couldn't fix.

Fran opened her mouth to speak, but all that came out was a croak: it was as if the Westersand had taken up residence in her throat. Barring the recourse of speech, she managed to summon enough energy to lift a hand and put it to his cheek.

His head snapped up and Fran didn't need a viera's supernatural senses to read his overwhelming relief. Balthier's mouth dropped open a soft sigh, and his eyes sagged shut.

"Praise gods," was all he said, before his elbows finally buckled. Thankfully, he had the presence of mind to roll to his side so as not to crush Fran, who was unsure if she could have supported the weight.

They both lay in silence for a while, too exhausted to even talk. Fran welcomed the quiet to take the time to coax moisture back into her mouth, and when she flicked her eyes over to Balthier he was laying prone, his face pressed open-mouthed to the smooth metal floor, a small puddle of saliva starting to form below his lips. It was testament to the exertion, Fran thought with a quiet sense of humor – she had never seen him look so undignified and undone, not even when drunk to the point of insensibility, not even when besieged with confusion for days on end.

"Bahamut?" Fran managed after a moment, her voice a desiccated rasp against the evening sky.

"Uh-huh," Balthier said, nodding his head against the floor. When he realized the puddle of drool he made a face and carelessly wiped it away with a hand that clearly had lost all semblance of small-muscle control; a long streak of shine reflected the dying sun where he had banished the saliva. "It's done. It's… over."

Something about his voice made her turn her head. Balthier hadn't opened his eyes since rolling off of her, and his breath was slow and steady, as if he had taken with illness. His aura radiated complete exhaustion, a measure of triumph, relief at Fran's awakening, and…

Fran's next words felt like briars tearing through her parched throat. "You are injured," she accused him as she finally detected an underlying current of steady, increasing pain starting to overwhelm him.

"Mm," Balthier replied distantly, and at his incoherence Fran forced herself into a sitting position and managed to crawl the scant distance separating them, pleased that her vertigo was only slight.

"Where?" she demanded, her long fingers pressing carefully along his spine. Balthier made another little noise in the back of his throat at the caress, but Fran ignored it, pleased that she had discerned that he had no major back injuries.

When her hand slid down to his side, it came in contact with sudden wetness and Fran jerked her hand back to find it stained red with blood: Balthier's thick vest had kept him from bleeding on her when he was relentlessly bombarding her with cure spells, and the dark complex patterning of the brocade hid the staining.

"Don't," Balthier said quietly, as Fran quickly rolled him on his back. She hissed: the entire front of his vest was shades darker than usual. He had lost a lot of blood.

"Fool," Fran cursed, feeling along her belt for her dagger; fortunately, throughout all the recent turmoil it had managed to stay on her person. Carefully she angled the sharp end up under the lower half of his vest and neatly sliced it up the middle; the clasps for proper vest removal were at the back of Balthier's neck, and it certainly wasn't worth the sake of his further injury to save the garment.

With the camouflage of the vest gone, Fran's teeth gritted at the gory mess under it. The front of Balthier's white shirt was soaked through with blood and matted in sopping wrinkles to his stomach and chest; the smell of old iron and blood clot was enough to make Fran's head swirl for a moment. The material of Balthier's shirt was thinner than the vest and she forsook the dagger for simply tearing it down the middle.

"Is it disturbing," Balthier's voice asked, and even though he sounded hazy and distant Fran was happy he spoke actual words, "that I find this arousing?"

Fran's voice stilled in the desert that was her throat for a moment, unable to reply. Balthier's chest and stomach were embedded with metal and glass shrapnel; eerily, they reflected what was left of the setting sun in the same way that the burnished metal of the ship around them did. Most of the shallower cuts had scabbed over by this point, but the deeper ones still wept blood sluggishly.

"It matters not whether you find it arousing," Fran managed. "I doubt you have enough blood left for your manhood to work."

At that Balthier laughed, and Fran immediately regretted her wit since his laughing made him bleed faster. Not to mention his laugh sounded more like a hyena's cackle – he was probably just as dehydrated as Fran was.

No matter, Fran thought. It was obvious she couldn't remove the shrapnel herself: she didn't have the tools and even if she did, it would likely cause Balthier to die of blood loss, as taking out the shrapnel would be like pulling a cork on a wine bottle. The best thing to do would be to heal around the shrapnel and contain the bleeding until they could get to real medical care. He would scar, but that was the least of her worries.

"What happened?" Fran asked, preparing to heal. She was as much half-dead with exhaustion as he was, but there was nothing to be done for it. It was either find the energy or leave the pirate in the hands of the gods, a gamble that Fran wasn't willing to take without a fight first.

Balthier sighed and rolled his head to the other side before answering. "After… I fixed the rings and you had passed out, I was looking… for a place to hide."

Fran smiled as her hands started to glow the white of healing. As much as Balthier was as good of a warrior as anybody could expect out of a hume, his first and forever instinct would be to hide or flee.

"Didn't want… Imperials…" Balthier's brow creased; speaking was obviously an effort. "Came here. Brought you in. Went out to close the door, but… trap went off."

Fran concentrated on the ugliest gouges first: a particularly large piece of black debris had embedded itself like an arrow just above Balthier's right hip. The blood bubbled before it hardened, new skin attempting to grow around the foreign object. Fran stopped the spell before it had a chance to entrap the metal permanently.

"Just glad I didn't… hit it when… I was carrying you," Balthier panted, gentlemanly as ever. He squirmed slightly with the discomfort of Fran healing metal into his skin. "Take it out," he begged her, hands clenching and unclenching into fists and out again. His breath quickened and face contorted; Fran knew he was trying to keep silent.

"I cannot," Fran said gently, fingers moving to the next deep cut. "You would bleed to your death if I did, I have not the energy to heal you completely… we must go soon for a healer."

"Giza Plains," Balthier sighed, crooking a finger upwards. Fran looked in its direction: they were clearly in a side room that was used for some sort of storage, but the crashing of the ship had torn a gash in the hull, which was what allowed the sky to shine through. Though the sun had sunk and left the room in darkness, Fran could see the distinctive shapes of the sun-absorbing stones by the light of the moon.

Fran nodded. The people of the plains knew their group well, and doubtless they would have a healer or at least a wise woman to attend to Balthier's wounds. Part of Fran would have rather gone to Rabanastre, but the village was probably closer. In addition, Rabanastre's hospitals were likely full of soldiers at this hour. By virtue of their connection with Ashe, Fran was sure they could get immediate attention irregardless of how many patients there were, but Fran wanted to lay low and expected that Balthier wanted the same thing. When they were both fully well again, if they wanted to make a grand entrance and claim the rewards rightfully due for saving a kingdom, they would do so at full capacity, not half dead and begging for medical attention.

That was one personality trait that Fran could always count on in Balthier: his pride. It was almost as unyielding as hers.

When Fran could heal no more, she cut the rest of Balthier's shirt and vest away from his body and used the thick vest to pad out the parts of the cuts that she could not heal and wrapped the cleanest strips of his shirt she could salvage around it as bandage.

Fran, exhausted, slumped up against the metal wall, warped with the crashing of the ship. "Why did you not heal yourself?" she asked, voice a little sharper than she intended.

Balthier, still laying much in a puddle of his own blood on the floor, moved his eyes slightly in her direction. With the healing he seemed to be on a slightly steadier keel. "You were unconscious," he said quietly. "Even when I did spells that usually bring a still-living being back… I was afraid you weren't going to wake."

Fran took a deep breath and turned her head to the ceiling, fatigue and thirst threatening to overwhelm her completely. His genuine concern effectively killed any will she had to berate him for stupidity. "And leave you here, a victim to your own devices? I think not."

"Thank the gods," Balthier countered immediately, which made Fran feel a thousand times better. "Who knows what kind of ruin I would cause?"

Fran let a small smile cross her lips; she sidled a little closer. Gently, she slid her long-nailed hands under his head and lifted it to rest in her lap. He sighed gratefully and turned his head against the soft skin of her exposed thighs.

"I don't know," Fran said softly, running her nails through his hair. Exhaustion was clearly making both of them uncommonly tender; in general, their relationship was more competent than this, but Fran couldn't bring it in her to truly care. The quiet defenselessness was soothing after fighting for so long. "They let you out of Archades and you destroy an empire. Who knows what would happen if I wasn't here to mind you, indeed."

Balthier shuddered against the rapidly cooling metal floor, the stubble of his cheek rasping against Fran's thighs with the movement. "Don't even jest about it," he admonished her. "A sky pirate without a partner is like…"

"Being castrated?" Fran interrupted him sweetly, still moving her nails through his hair.

At that, Balthier stilled. "Don't jest about _that_ either."

Fran smiled, her free hand resting on Balthier's bare shoulder. "Sleep," she told him, changing the subject. "Tomorrow, we shall make haste to the plainsmen."

"Mmph," Balthier said, eyes fluttering closed. "You'll sleep too?"

Fran shook her head, leaning back against the bent, ruined wall of the Bahumut and gazing out through the rent metal of the opposite wall; a full moon rose, glossy and heavy like a soap bubble on the horizon. "I'll keep watch. You sleep."

Balthier stirred slightly, clearly not liking the idea of sleeping all night while Fran sat on solitary watch. "We'll switch off then," the pirate said. "Wake me in three hours."

Shaking her head again, Fran moved her fingers to press against Balthier's temples. "_Sleep_," she commanded, a tiny mote of power sparking from the pads of her fingers to coax Balthier's body into resting.

Fortunately, the sky pirate was so exhausted his body didn't need much convincing. Fran heard him take a sharp breath as if to start arguing, but Balthier released it in a long slow breath of sleep. Fran's fingers slid back up to their job of gently caressing Balthier's skull, and she settled back to watch the moon in its nightly path across the lands of Ivalice.

# # #

He wanted her. Fran lay on her back on a tall pile of thin, long cushions that the plainsmen used in place of a bedframe and mattress and gazed pensively through the perfectly round hole in the ceiling. The round, mushroom-like dwellings that the plainsmen lived in were bigger inside than they at first appeared, and smelled heavily of tanned hide and old smoke. The hole in the top of the hide-fashioned tent was for ventilation; now that the fire in the center of the tent had died to a swath of embers, it offered a perfectly round vista into the clear night skies of Giza. To Fran it was like looking through a microscope's lens, as if the stars were insignificant like glowing microorganisms in the primordial soup of the sky.

Beyond that, she was as aware of Balthier's wanting presence outside the tent as she was of her breath steadily entering and exiting her lungs, that unforgettable and that necessary. Over the years they had traveled together they had developed an informal relationship regarding Fran's extra-sensitive relationship with Mist and emotions; she knew what he was feeling all the time and though she was aware it made him uncomfortable, he realized it was as natural and unstoppable to her as breathing. But now they were both aware that he desired her companionship and that she knew it.

A week past they had stumbled into the camp. It had taken the better part of a day and a complete miracle to make it out of the Bahumut and across the short distance of plains to the nomads' camp. Part of Fran had been unbearably frustrated with how long it had taken: had they been well, the distance could have been easily traversed in less than a couple of hours. But it had been hard going, as Balthier could barely stand and Fran was unable to carry him due to her own fatigue. They had stumbled out of the abandoned ship as unsteadily as drunks, leaning against each other and bumping into the warped rails and walls and staggering around the motionless mechanisms of the Empire's rooks, the broken pieces of Balthier's father's legacy. Fran could only focus forward and be glad that most of the Mist that the Bahumut had absorbed had left by this hour. They both knew that if anything with hostile intent came after them, neither would be able to survive the fight.

When they finally managed to work themselves free from the unforgiving metal maze, there was the dry expanse of plain to cross. By this point Balthier had all but passed out standing, Fran half-dragging him across the dirt, leaving a tell-tale plume of dust to rise behind them from the drag of Balthier's boots. Fortunately, the influx of Mist and the incredible excitement of the fight in the sky between the Resistance and the Empire had scared most of the hostile plains animals into their dens, so Fran's only enemy was the distance between her, Balthier, and medical help, as well as the ever-increasing thirst.

_I must endure this_, Fran thought steadily as Balthier finally fell into darkness and collapsed lifelessly in her arms. The sudden increase in weight made Fran stagger to her knees. _We can't perish now. Not now!_

She spent a couple of moments dwelling on how undignified of a death it would be, sprawled out on the desiccated land of the plains, picked to bones by hyenas and buzzards. She shook her head weakly and hooked her hands under Balthier's armpits: she could only drag him a few scant paces before strength left her completely and she fell with a great cloud of dust on the ground.

Senseless with exhaustion and thirst Fran gazed listlessly at the sky, an unsympathetic swirl of harsh blue, and closed her eyes.

Movement behind her caught her attention; she was too far gone to react to it properly, but even without her Mist senses she knew it wasn't Balthier. The sound of its gait was too light, like a whisper on the dust behind her. It settled, and Fran felt a sense of great questioning from whatever it was, as if it didn't quite know what to do with her.

Then, healing magic filled her body and her eyes sprang open to come face to face with a fluffy white rabbit, shifting its weight from side to side, red eyes looking down at her impassively. When Fran's surprise registered, it twitched its pink ears at her.

More rabbits then, bounding across the plains, like a great migrating field of cotton flowing across the dust, spattering the pair of them with healing spells like a gift from the gods, like a surprise rainfall during a drought.

Balthier's eyes opened with a great dry gasp after being battered with a barrage of cure, the air rattling in his throat. He blinked uncomprehendingly at the sea of white fluff with twitching ears for a moment. "I'll be damned," he said hoarsely. He managed to lift his head from the ground and he coughed weakly, his throat thick with dust, his exposed shoulders and back pink with burn from the sun.

Another burst of healing magic across Fran's body made her laugh, giddy with incredulousness and joy like a kit, the swaying field of rabbits like a dream; for all she knew she _was_ dreaming, insensible with exhaustion and thirst and dying in the middle of the plains. If she _was_ dying, at least this was a pleasant, if not bizarre, note to go out on.

Of course, being rabbits the cure spells they offered weren't potent enough to fix what ailed the both of them, but it was enough to force Fran unsteadily to her feet, swaying on her heels as if she was part of the gaggle of rabbits herself. She giggled at the ridiculousness of this miracle, clapping a hand over her mouth to muffle the noise.

"I must be dead," Balthier managed, voice more a moan than anything else. "Are you _giggling_?"

"We are not dead," Fran said, squatting and putting a hand on Balthier's burned shoulder. "We just got saved by what we used to eat for dinner."

At her touch Balthier struggled to a half-sitting position, gazing around at the crowd of silent rabbits with utter shock written across his face. "I'll be damned," he repeated, clearly bewildered and without any other words to express it. "I'll be _thrice_ damned by a son of a-"

"If you have no wit nor ability don't waste your energy on swearing," Fran interrupted him. "We still have to get to the plainsmen."

Fran hooked her trembling hands under Balthier's arms again and helped haul him to a standing position, in the center of a sea of white rabbits who were still occasionally throwing twinkling cure spells at them, the white magic exploding as carelessly and joyfully as celebratory fireworks. Balthier stumbled forward and Fran caught him and Balthier laughed, a low, hoarse, terrible noise that sounded more pained than anything else.

"Come on," Fran whispered. "We must go."

Balthier pulled back, eyes half-lidded against the dryness of the plains and he leaned forward and kissed her, a move that startled Fran into taking a half-step back, before fear that she might trample over a rabbit reined her back in. Balthier's emotions were muddled in such a confused, pain-laced exultant delirium that Fran couldn't read him properly, and Fran suspected that the pirate didn't know what he was doing himself. But Fran obliged him, one hand going up and cupping the back of Balthier's head gently before pulling back painfully – their lips were so dry that they had sealed together of their own volition when they touched.

"Come on," Fran had whispered softly, the sting on her lips as raw as if she had carelessly gulped boiling tea. "We have to-"

She was interrupted by the realization that a group of three children, dressed in the unmistakable garb of the plains, were standing at the edge of the sea of rabbits and staring unabashedly at them. Fran looked around, looked at Balthier who was twined around her body in a mix of desire and physical inability to pull away, looked at the waving group of at least forty rabbits that still hadn't moved, and almost had another attack of the giggles at how utterly ridiculous it all was.

"We need medical help," she informed the children, who still stared, wide-eyed and paralyzed for a couple more moments before one of them peeled away from the group and ran back towards the village, hidden behind a dent in the earth.

Moments later a stream of women came running outside the village gates, kicking up a storm of dust behind them, and the sea of rabbits quickly dispersed like a cloud cut by a ship, darting away in all directions like they had never been.

What happened next was all in a blank haze: female hands pulled Balthier away from Fran's grip and hissed sympathetically at his wounds before bearing him away, and a second group carefully supported Fran on the walk back to the village, one of them holding up a waterskin fat with cool green tea to Fran's mouth, which Fran had drained in a moment, the excess spilling out of her mouth and onto the ground in her desperation for moisture.

Somehow they managed to walk Fran into the village, into one of their tents – Fran couldn't remember the walk itself, no matter how hard she pondered on the subject. They had lowered her supine on the pile of flat, thin cushions that currently supported her back as she stared up at the perfect circle of stars and felt the pull of Balthier's want from outside. Here she had laid for a week, half-dead from exhaustion and dehydration, sustained by teas, clear broths, and the innate, undeserved generosity of the plainsmen. Nobody had asked questions, nobody demanded explanations. Nothing but the touch of competent hands and the feel of a curved clay bowl against the bow of her lip when they plied her with potions or sustenance.

In short, blessed silence. Soft snores from her female bedfellows played against each other in quiet harmony, punctuated by a distant howl of a plains wolf in the distance. There were eight other women sleeping in the tent with her, the over crowdedness likely due to the fact that, by the strict social mores of the plainsmen, the women couldn't share a tent with an of-age unmarried man. Balthier had likely gotten shoveled into a tent full of pre-pubescent boys, and Balthier's guaranteed consternation to that arrangement made Fran smile.

Finally, Fran couldn't deny Balthier's want any longer, and slowly rose to her feet. She was barefoot – somebody had removed her spiked shoes during the past week – and the feel of the earth flat beneath her feet was somewhat disorienting. Once she had found her center of gravity, she silently picked her way across the prone bodies of the sleeping women and pushed her way out of the tent.

Balthier was not hard to find: he had been leaning up against the tent across the way from hers, arms crossed, knees bent at a casual angle, his face gazing up at the same sky that Fran had been contemplating moments earlier, the pallor of his face reflecting the cast from the moon. Fran only had a moment of this candid vista before the fluttering of the tent flap caught Balthier's attention and his head snapped forward toward her, and he readjusted to face her more clearly. The women had removed Balthier of his blood-covered garments and instead dressed him in loose, drawstring homespun pants that billowed in the slight wind and revealed his chapped, bare feet. He wore no shirt, but a tight bandage of clean linen wrapped him firmly from ribcage to down below the waist of his pants.

"I was beginning to think you'd never grace me with your presence," Balthier told her, a hint of annoyance on his voice.

Fran raised an eyebrow, covering her relief to see him healed, competent, and walking once more. "You ought to be recovering," she scolded him lightly, crossing the distance between them and running the back of her hand over the bandage. The plainsmen healed in ways that were startlingly similar to viera, relying more on salves and potions than raw healing magic. This close, Balthier's natural scent was mixed with the odor of poultice and liniment; Fran inhaled and her sharp nose detected fennel, lye, rose, and willow bark.

Balthier's stomach trembled slightly under her caress, and his head tilted back slightly to the moonlight, as if he were trying to drink the moon's glow. Fran smiled as she felt his desire rise, and ran her fingers across the bandage again, with more intent. "Do you ache?"

Balthier raised his eyebrow at the double entendre. "Does _what_ ache?" he asked, reaching up his own hand to still Fran's on the bandages. Between Balthier's naturally pale skin and the absolute whiteness of his bandaging, he reflected so much moonlight that it hurt Fran's eyes. "I know you can read me if I am in pain."

Fran sighed and closed her eyes, opening her senses, letting Balthier rush over her like a stream of mountain water; humes were mercurial by nature, and delving into one was like being whisked unstoppably through white water rapids. His desire for her coupled eternally with his ever-present resentment of her being able to understand him so thoroughly yet him never being able to do the same; his latent triumph over the events of the past two years and coming out alive and victorious, the fear of disfigurement from the shrapnel that had buried itself in his skin. The urge to flee was rising in him again, Fran noticed with a smirk, not from enemies this time, but simply for the want of movement. His was a restless nature, Fran had come to appreciate: he could own the world and yet never want to spend a moment's idle contemplation in it.

"Have you not yet seen?" Fran murmured, eyes still closed, inhaling his scent once more, letting it slowly intoxicate her with its earthiness.

"Seen?" he asked, one of his hands still preventing her from caressing his bandages, his free one reaching out to press gentle fingers against her neck.

She said nothing to the soft touch, instead opting to splay her hand across his dressings, opening her eyes again to meet his gaze, which had gone hard. "Your belly."

His lip twisted as he looked away and up, as if he couldn't even bear to look down at the bandages. "Nay."

Fran sighed and pulled her hand away, leaving him with his own hand resting self-consciously over his torso. The moonlight lit the village almost to day with its brightness, and Fran was suddenly aware that any one of the villagers could see them, could be watching, and the thought made her uneasy.

"Follow," she commanded, turning away and stepping out of the circle of tents. A soft grunt and the shifting of sands behind her said that he was obliging, and she allowed herself to close her eyes, reveling in the feel of cool sand beneath her bare feet. The village was cupped by a ridge of earth, rising as a natural barrier to ward off the lesser monsters.

"Surely you aren't suggesting we take a casual stroll around the plains unarmed at night?" Balthier asked dryly, breaking her reverie.

Fran shook her head and stepped out beyond the small cup of earth, leading them into a small valley formed by low hills about the height of Fran's shoulder. "I would speak to you in private," she told him, her hand motioning vaguely in the direction of the sleeping village.

Balthier raised an eyebrow and Fran almost smiled at the wave of giddy anticipation that emanated from him. They were still visible to the village from the shoulders up; they would remain so unless they lay between the small mounds of earth.

Fran turned toward him and cupped the side of his face with her hand; eagerly, he closed his eyes into her touch, turning his face slightly into her warmth. Leaning forward, Fran pressed her lips against the shell of his ear and felt him take a sharp breath. The plainsmen had removed all of Balthier's jewelry while nursing him; that combined with the lack of fancy clothing made him seem less formidable, softer, more hume, and Fran felt her maternal instincts rise at his vulnerability, which made her smile against his naked ear at her own silliness.

"I shall remove your bandages," she whispered, and felt his muscles tighten in repulsion to the idea, before he laughed softly.

"I know… I realize I sound silly and stupid, but I'm terrified of it," he said, and Fran knew it cost him to admit it aloud. "I'm terrified of my own flesh. I've fought against legions of the undead, what seems like most of the monsters of legend, even my own father, and nothing has terrified me as much as what might be below these bandages."

"I was already aware of your vanity," Fran said dismissively, pulling back in time to see him roll his eyes. "Lay down."

Balthier smiled wanly at her before lowering himself down to the small valley between the two humps of earth, carpeted with the tough serrated grass of the plains and dust. He gazed up at her and Fran sunk down, straddling his hips between her bent knees, and felt his pulse rise beneath her body.

He arched up at the same moment she bent down and their kiss was slow and tender, lips soft and pliant in stark contrast to Balthier's incoherent attempt on the plains where their mouths had sealed together painfully due to their dehydration. But this time their embracing skin was supple and smooth, tongues brushing against each other, almost hesitant. Balthier tasted like sweet green tea and cleanliness, and Fran hummed with approval as she broke the kiss and trailed lips down the side of his neck, over the pleasant roughness of stubble and the throbbing beat of blood where neck joined shoulders.

"…been a long time," Balthier breathed, tilting his head back to allow her better access as Fran recharted the well-known territory of his shoulders and chest with fingers and tongue, her teeth leaving little pink marks where she couldn't resist a soft nip at his flesh.

"Oh?" she asked when she had reached the beginning of his tight-wound bandage, her fingers gently running over the linen in search of the free end. She found it tucked against Balthier's side, and her long fingernails gently coaxed it loose. "So little blond Dalmascan boys don't count?"

Balthier stilled, and for a moment Fran wasn't sure if it was because of her comment or his fear at having his scars exposed, but then he laughed against her touch. "Not when he only came after me because he was possessed with Mist."

Now Fran smiled, looking up as she unwound the first tight coil of bandage. Balthier kept his head studiously tilted up toward the sky as she pulled it away, neither fighting nor welcoming the exposure of his flesh. "Only for the Mist? Sky pirate, you were never blind; don't take me for a fool by pretending you are. He worships you."

"And now he has my ship, the bastard," Balthier countered, as if Vaan had been a usurper instead of taking his orders.

"And it shall be returned to its rightful owner," Fran reminded him, slowly and deliberately unwinding the bandage. The first few inches revealed perfect skin, as Fran expected: with each slow unravel of the white fabric Fran brushed her lips against the newly exposed flesh, causing Balthier's breath to quicken in his throat, and his skin to pebble against the ghosting touch. Fran could feel his arousal starting to grow more insistent underneath her, but she ignored it, moving lower and removing more of the bandage.

The first scar was from the large, arrow-shaped piece of metal that had been embedded above Balthier's right hip: now removed, it left a large pink pockmark in the shape of a diamond. When Fran paused in her caress to take it in, Balthier's breath accelerated faster, and Fran felt a sharp wave of fear from him.

"I can't look," he said, eyes closed, head tilted back. "I can't bear…"

Fran cut him off by bending over and pressing her lips against the marred flesh, causing Balthier to hiss at the sensitivity of new skin and shudder beneath her. The acrid smell of liniment assaulted Fran's nose and burned slightly against her lips with each wet, open-mouthed movement she made against his skin, but even that was somehow enticing: when her tongue reached out to brush against the scar she was rewarded by Balthier's moan.

From the diamond-shaped weld in Balthier's hip onward, each twist of the thick bandage was like unveiling a tapestry of pink against flesh: long, shallow scars were woven interconnected with darker, deep red where shrapnel had rent deep into Balthier's skin. Fran traced each delicate, thin trace of scar with tongue and fingers and paused to gently suck at the larger blemishes, mouth applying soft suction and lips nuzzling at each mark.

Balthier's stomach muscles were shaking beneath her ministrations, his hands palm-up to the sky and head tilted back as if beseeching some unknown deity. When the last twist of bandage had been done away with Fran pulled away and moved up along his body so that they were laying aligned with each other, Balthier's legs straight out and together with Fran's splayed across them, their abdomens touching, scant inches between their lips.

"Balthier," she said, as his eyes were still closed. "Look at me."

For a moment Fran thought he was going to be churlish and refuse, but then his eyes slowly opened, revealing wide pupils and an overbright gaze, his cheeks flushed pink and lips parted.

"You must look," she told him. He sighed deeply; Fran could feel her own body rise and fall with his, feel his unwillingness as if it were her own. "You must."

When Fran pulled away Balthier's eyes followed, slowly craning his neck down as if the motion hurt, and when Fran slid down to straddle his hips and Balthier finally took in his disfigured flesh, he did so with the air of somebody examining a displeasing work of art. As if it were not his own body.

"I know I am being silly," he said, his eyes flicking from his stomach up to her, "but all I can think about is that this will never go away, I could get old, I could die tomorrow, but either way I will always have this on me; whenever I lie with somebody they will notice, whenever I take off my shirt everyone will stare."

Fran felt her face soften at his quiet despair. "They are the marks of a hero. You fought a battle that few in history have had to endure; these are not brands of shame."

Balthier shook his head. "It's not even that. Fran, I fear… I'm a mortal man, I'm scarred, I'm getting older."

At that, Fran raised an eyebrow. "Twenty-two is hardly-"

"But I _will_ get old," he interrupted, and the sudden flash of fear caught Fran by surprise. "I will get old, and fat, and I won't be able to pirate anymore."

Fran leaned forward, curious as to what he was getting at, what he was trying so desperately to say and not say at the same time. "It is the way of life," she told him. "All things grow old."

Balthier was silent for a moment, staring up at her. "_You_ won't," he whispered.

_Ah_, Fran realized, looking down at the hume before her, the mercurial, flighty nature and the doom to die after a chaotic, too-short life despite their brilliance, their movement, their heat. In fact, Fran thought that it might be the very passion that had humes ruling the world be what made their lives so short: they burned, burned, _burned_, and no mortal flesh could withstand so much heat. Fran paused before replying, instead choosing to close her eyes and take another heady breath of Balthier's scent: of healing ointments, earth, sweat, pride, fear, never-ending fire.

"You will get old," she told him, eyes still closed. "You will get old and wise, you will have seen more of this earth than most beings of any race, you will be old and rich from your pirating years, you will be old and fly the Strahl at your leisure. You will be old and free."

Balthier looked up at her, still silent, and when she met his eyes it was like looking down into a chasm of clear gray with a whirlpool center of implacable black.

Fran's lip tucked up in a half-smile. "And you will be old and I will be older yet," she reminded him. "Older than you will ever be. And we will still fly together in our leisure years."

Now Balthier smiled, and Fran knew she had said the right thing when he surged up onto his elbows and kissed her once more, and she was overwhelmed with his desire once again. His fingers quested along her back, searching for the zippers and snaps that held her armor in place and Fran smiled against his lips, letting him struggle briefly with the clasps before they fell away and he pulled against the opening, dragging it down her arms and exposing her breasts, swaying gently in the cool night air once freed of their confines.

At once Balthier was distracted from his task, his hands going immediately to the soft curves of flesh, his eyes closing with pleasure at the touch. Fran snorted and pushed him away. "Finish what you started," she admonished, gesturing to her half-naked state. Balthier had the grace to look sheepish before hooking his fingers in the waist of her gear and allowing Fran to shimmy out of her clothing; once naked she shivered at the feeling of being exposed in the moonlight, gooseflesh pricking along her back and between her thighs.

Balthier's clothing was far easier to remove, but for the fact that his hands kept on seeking out the soft turns of her body and interrupting Fran's concentration: hips, thighs, breasts, shoulders. His touch was hot like fire in the cool night air of the plains, and Fran couldn't help but shudder beneath his hands, pausing to savor the eagerness of his touch before tossing aside Balthier's borrowed drawstring pants to land in a graceless heap along with her own armor.

When they embraced skin-on-skin it was pure warmth, pure heat, and Fran would have called it ecstasy had she been fond of superlatives. Their mouths sought each other out relentlessly and Balthier made a surge move to push Fran on her back or side, but Fran's knees remained firmly planted on either side of him, denying him leverage as she pinned him back against the sandy ground.

"Fran," Balthier said impatiently, his hips rolling up, insistent. He was still flat on his back and Fran straddled him over his stomach, over the rough skin of his scars, which she could feel brushing against her inner thighs and the slick heat between her legs. At her back she felt the warmth from Balthier's cock, fully aroused and gently brushing against her skin.

Fran shivered at Balthier's want and her own desire for it; her pulse beat frantically between her legs and she exhaled slowly, forcing her heated blood to cool, forcing her limbs to stop trembling. She couldn't stop her back from arching and pressing down against Balthier's stomach, however, nor could she stop the smile crossing her face when Balthier nearly whined at the wetness he felt against his skin from her when she did so.

"What if," she asked on a pant, closing her eyes against the exquisite pain of making them both wait, "that's not what I desire?"

She felt more than heard Balthier's rumble beneath her. He shifted and she gasped as two fingers slid between her legs and inside her, and she thrust down against the internal massage. Slowly, Balthier withdrew his fingers before pushing upwards once more, and Fran swallowed a moan, her head dropping against her chest with the repeated sensation.

"You can't be telling me you don't desire this," he said dryly, withdrawing his fingers and showing them to her, shiny with wetness. "Your body seems to believe otherwise."

"You misunderstand my meaning," Fran said, recovering from the surprise assault. With a trembling hand she reached out and grabbed Balthier's wrist that was showing Fran her own desire and pressed down, maneuvering Balthier's hand toward his mouth. Balthier raised an eyebrow when Fran touched his damp fingers against his lips, but showed he was quick on the draw by parting his lips and pulling his digits, slick with the evidence of Fran's lust, into his mouth.

When Fran released him, Balthier kept his fingers still for a moment before pulling them slowly from his mouth, one knuckle at a time and looking upwards, eyes heavy-lidded and humming in the back of his throat. "I stand – lay? - humbly corrected," he said, his own lust reducing his voice to a deep roll.

Fran smiled and lifted herself up onto her knees, her hands planted on either side of Balthier's head, and Balthier slowly slid down until his head was level with her pelvis, one hand slowly trailing down her body in his wake, cupping the sway of her breasts, caressing the curve of her thighs and the plane of her stomach, his fingers feeling strange and naked against her skin without the metal harshness of his rings.

When his fingers ghosted against the scant hair between her legs Fran shuddered and bent her knees until his nose touched the coarse curls of hair and his mouth, hot and wet and smooth, pressed against the heat between her legs with such insistence that Fran gasped and reflexively grabbed handfuls of grass to keep herself still.

The cold air stinging her back and thighs rent a delicious counterpart to the rising heat of her trembling stomach and the work of Balthier's almost unbearably hot mouth. The massage of his tongue, flicking a light yet constant rhythm against her sex, coaxed beads of sweat to prick between her legs and breasts, caused her muscles to seize and release as if with apoplexy. Shaking, Fran pressed her mouth against the earth and tasted dirt and nearly choked on the effort it took to keep silent.

Electricity and fire radiated out along her limbs, burning everything else away but the hammering of her heart, the bellows of her breath, and Balthier's mouth that made her blood boil and her nerves blaze. It would consume her, Fran realized, one of her hands beginning to move of its own volition across her skin, cradling her own breasts, stroking along the curve of her hips. It would consume her, and she would let it.

Suddenly, Balthier's hands settled gently against the backs of her thighs and Fran started, moaning slightly as his fingers kneaded into her skin and slid farther up to the junction of her thighs.

When two of his fingers pushed inside her once more her muscles seized, overtaken by the fire, the heat, the boiling and she nearly choked on a gasp as she hit release, her body convulsing and fingers digging deep into the flesh of the earth in an attempt to gain purchase against the overwhelming tide of sensation. Balthier's tongue didn't stop: almost as soon as the first explosion of heat and desire had burnt its way across her flesh a second, then a third, then a fourth.

Soon, Fran could withstand no more and she pulled away, her entire body trembling with the sudden release of tension and pressure. She felt movement under her: Balthier's chest pressed against hers as he maneuvered his way back up, and when Fran managed to open her eyes his expression was amused and self-satisfied in a way it hadn't been since they left the Bahumut.

"I don't suppose you'll be wanting a kiss?" Balthier asked, smirking. His mouth was still shiny with her fluids and Fran managed a wan smile back before tilting his head forward with a trembling hand and kissing him deeply, tasting herself on his lips.

When Fran pulled away, Balthier's face was flushed quite red and it appeared he couldn't open his eyes fully for want, his hands going back between Fran's legs, fingers stroking the over sensitized skin gently. "Do good deeds get rewarded?" he asked, and Fran shook her head, sighing.

"Do you ever… take your time?" Fran breathed, world still spinning slightly with vertigo, muscles beginning to slacken.

"Says the woman who already got hers," Balthier snapped, tilting his head back as Fran trailed a lazy finger down his chest, his nipples visibly tightening in the cool night air.

"Temper, temper," Fran scolded, entirely oblivious to his impatience. Slowly she moved down his body, and when she removed her weight from him Balthier attempted to roll her over once more, but Fran still wouldn't let him, pinning him back against the dirt with her hands against her shoulders.

"_Fran_," Balthier said again, between his teeth. Fran almost laughed at the pure irritation starting to emanate from him, but managed to keep it to a smile.

Fran carefully drew her hand down across the flat surface of Balthier's stomach, fingers slowly dragging against the new scars, which caused Balthier to still and his eyes to flutter at the touch. When she twisted her wrist and closed her fingers around his cock, his eyes flew open and he braced his hands against the earth as if the sensation might throw him away from the earth's gravitational pull.

"Patience," she said in a low breath, angling herself on top of him with closed eyes, running the soft skin of the tip of his prick against her wetness and savoring the strangled noises from Balthier as she did so, "is a virtue, haven't you heard?"

Balthier looked as if he would retort and Fran quickly slid down on top of him, catching him by surprise and causing the beginning of a shout to come out of his throat before Fran hurriedly clapped a hand over his mouth.

"Shh!" she admonished. Balthier's eyes fluttered closed as his skin flushed red in the moonlight and he moaned beneath her hand in reply.

Fran shuddered at the recoil of sensation; she had taken him in much quicker than she had meant to, but the slickness of her insides had allowed for easy – too easy – entry. Beyond the stretching and pressure there was the throb of his blood through his manhood that set her blood to beating rapid to match his pace. Along with the oversensitivity she was already experiencing, the fire lit anew was almost too much: her head longed to spin off its neck with beautiful vertigo. Instead Fran surged upwards in one quick draw, the sudden change in feeling drawing soft noises from them both.

She lowered again with a twist of her hips and felt Balthier's mouth open in a silent scream beneath her hand, his body struggling to thrust a faster rhythm but not having the leverage to do so. Another slow pull upwards and Fran's blood was boiling again, heat lancing through her body in sharp defiance to the chill wind that swept across the plains.

Balthier's shaking hands reached out and found her hips, stilling her against his pelvis when she had taken him in fully again, and he rotated his own hips beneath her; she shivered at the intimate internal massage. Her hand still covered his open mouth, and his tongue reached out to taste the salt of her skin and everything was suddenly too much: she had to draw her hand away as even the touch of his tongue against her palm threatened to consume her far too quickly in the blaze.

"Fran," Balthier said again, once his mouth was freed. This time his eyes were closed and he arched his back against the ground as he said her name: sand grains specked his back and shoulders, adhering to his sweat.

At that she leaned down and their mouths found each other again, though Fran could barely control the kiss. It was as if every pore of her skin merely demanded more, with no allocation for finesse. Her hands grabbed his shoulders roughly and she felt their teeth clack against each other as the kiss turned into a feral bite but both of them were beyond caring: she lost control over the leverage and Balthier managed to pull away from her in one sharp movement, throwing his weight to the side and causing her to land with an ungraceful _thud_ on the grass next to him, throwing up a cloud of dust in the night. She winced as tough grass and the grainy bite of sand scoured her flank.

At once Balthier was back upon her, one hand against her shin, forcing her leg to crumple inwards and her hip to rotate up toward the sky: he bent his own leg across her own and pushed their pelvises together. Carefully he leaned upwards on his elbow and curved his abdomen in a near-impossible movement before thrusting back inside her; the strange angle caused Fran to gasp sharply and brace her arms against the ground in an effort to hold the position.

"Quiet," Balthier mumbled, his head bent down, his face wrinkled in concentration as they both worked to find the center of precarious balance.

Fran laughed silently at that and pressed her lips to his forehead, causing his face to relax and tip upwards for more attention. Even though Balthier's hips were starting to piston in a faster, more uncontrollable rhythm and Fran was nearly matching his speed in response, their kisses were soft and lazy, tracing the contours of lips, jaw, and nose.

Fran could feel Balthier's pulse hammering faster in her body: his thrusts became more and more erratic as climax threatened to overtake him and his body trembled with the effort of holding position. Fran gasped again as one particular stroke knocked colors across her vision, a panorama of red and orange flashing across her eyes as sparks and Balthier's mouth found hers again, heat and suction and the salt of sex on his lips and Fran responded accordingly: her breasts pressed against his chest as they neared the end and sought to prolong it with the heat of the other.

And that was all Fran could sense or feel, even above the ever-present flow of Mist through her was that of warmth, of fire, of sweat and the boiling inferno building between them that seemed as if it would consume anything it touched, as if it would burn everything away and then, and _then_ there it was, and Fran's vision blazed with the heat – the _heat_ –

Balthier suddenly stilled, shuddered, his entire body gave a great tremor and he was there, warm fluid spilling inside of her once, twice, three times and Fran's own body arched backwards of its own volition and she barely managed to bite off a cry before Balthier claimed her mouth in a kiss again, both muffling their sounds in the lips of the other.

Silence, then: the wind rattled the sparse grass of the plains and an owl hooted. Fran could hear distant ringing in her ears as her blood attempted to cool and find its normal pace once more.

They nearly fell asleep like that, lips and bodies still locked together in the most intimate of ways, before Balthier managed to pull his lips from hers and gently withdraw, causing both of them to wince at the sudden emptiness and cold. "Gods," Balthier managed, sounding thoroughly dazed.

"If they're watching, they might have learned a thing or two," Fran murmured, unable to keep her eyes open. The cool air of the plains almost felt like a welcome caress: her nipples tightened against the chill as her body ached deliciously from both the sex and the acrobatics. "I don't even know how we managed to stay like that for so long."

"The genius of the moment," Balthier replied. Fran heard him reaching over her for his clothes, with effort. Fran made no move to assist and when he was unable to grab for the homespun pants his arm collapsed across her, and he sighed deeply at his own weariness. "You could help me get dressed, you know," he pointed out. "We can't very well be lying out here nude when the village awakes."

"You can dress yourself," Fran retorted, reaching out a heavy arm and grabbing the bundle of cloth Balthier had been wearing. She threw it carelessly into his face and Balthier grunted at the mouthful of cloth. "You are no invalid. Or at least, five minutes ago you weren't."

Muffling something that sounded suspiciously like a giggle into the pants, Balthier rolled over and Fran could hear him sliding them on over his hips. "I don't suppose we could rewrap the bandage…"

Fran opened her eyes to see him standing over her. The moon was beginning to sink and Balthier was right to be worried about the villagers: they would begin awakening soon, now that dawn was starting to touch the sky. He looked down at her, looking weirdly regal in his simple trousers with the mottle of scars twisting up his body like some kind of vine, beginning below the waist of the pants and ending just under his ribcage. The wind tossed his hair back as he bent over, searching for the bandages.

"I don't think you require them any longer," Fran told him quietly, forcing herself to sit up, shaking the dirt out of her hair.

He paused in his search for bandages, clearing his throat awkwardly. "Fran, if we don't put them back on…"

"You'll hardly bleed to death," Fran interrupted him, reaching for her own armor and sliding it on over her legs. "If nothing adverse happened while we were… _involved_ in such a way, I doubt you will encounter problems while sleeping."

"It's not that," Balthier said, sighing. "Fran, if we don't put the bandages back _on_, everybody in the village will know that I took them _off_."

Fran paused in her dressing for a moment, looking up at his suddenly prudish expression with a growing smile, unable to hide her amusement. "And you think that wrapping you in dirty bandages is going to stop the entire village from knowing that you were up to no good last night? Please, Balthier. They're plainsmen, not imbeciles."

Balthier shook his head, letting the bandage flutter back to the ground, throwing his hands up in irritation. "Well, forgive me for at least _attempting_ a sense of propriety."

Still smiling, Fran pushed herself to her feet and stood very still until she was sure her balance was on. Carefully, she rehooked her armor and rotated her shoulders in an attempt to work out some of the kinks. "Forgiven," she told him.

Balthier's lips twisted as he bowed mockingly, one hand sweeping out in a measure of faux chivalry. "I'm honored," he told her.

Fran stepped forward, unable to stop herself from pressing a kiss to the twist of his lip. Clearly surprised, Balthier rested his hands against her shoulder and kissed back, still tasting heavily of salt and musk. Fran hummed in approval before stepping away.

"Come along," she told him softly, motioning back towards the small circle of tents, which were starting to fill with the early morning roll of voices. "We should try and get some rest… soon we must reclaim the Strahl, yes?"

A small, genuine smile crossed Balthier's features at that, and he reached down for her hands, pressing his palms against hers and measuring: her hands were only slightly smaller than his, but her claws extended far past the length of hume fingers. "Yes," he whispered. "And then we shall fly."

"And then we shall fly," Fran repeated, keeping their hands together for just a little while longer, holding their mutual gaze of clear gray into dark red. Then, she turned away and he followed her silently back into the circle of tents, where the plainsmen studiously ignored the pair of them walking back into the village, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary to disappear for hours at a time during the night.

When Balthier disappeared nonchalantly into his tent, Fran sighed and turned to her own, but paused. There, sitting on the crest of the hill that Fran and Balthier had spent the entire night behind, were a pair of white rabbits, their ears rising and falling indifferently, silhouetted against the sky.

Fran opened her mouth to say something, forgetting in her exhausted state that they were _rabbits_, before shaking her head at her own folly. Nevertheless, she gave them a two-finger salute at the front of the tent.

And Fran could never be sure, but it seemed as though the rabbit on the right dipped its ears in her direction, before turning away and bounding down the hill, its partner in loyal pursuit.


End file.

Final Fantasy XII