Look Out for the Kids

Disclaimer Note: I do not own Fire Emblem, either 9 or 10. It's property of IS. Long attempted Shinon fic here, although I'm a little skeptical about its quality. I'm out of practice, I guess.

She left me.

I think I must like kids because I never was one.

I spent my childhood, for the most part, waiting for her. Waiting days, weeks . . . damnation. I think I'm still waiting for her.

I have a reason, you know. I had a reason. I mean, this late in the game, this late in life—she's ain't going to appear before me all of a sudden.

Rolf's mother, she turned up in Begnion. Did you know that? Rolf, the kid that follows me around? Rolf? Yeah, him. His mom, she turned up in Begnion, and she didn't want to see him.

I mean, he didn't want to see her.

I don't have any clue why not. He wants to meet his dad—not his mom? The hell. They both walked out on his baby ass. If my mom turned up in Begnion, I'd want to see her. I'd want to talk to her.

I got some words for that bitch.

I never told this to anyone. I wouldn't tell you if I could avoid it.

My mom, she walked out on us too. Sold my sister. I'm from Begnion—did you know that? No one does. Maybe I've been in Crimea too long. Sound like I'm Crimean. I've been all over—worked for everyone. Begnion, Daein. Gallia, now, even. Subhuman shit. I was seven during the massacre. My dad, he was in it.

Did you know that? Makes you think twice about me, huh? My dad, he lit fires and turned Serenes into charcoal dust and mud. He got executed in the ruckus that followed. You know, most of them, they got executed.

I don't even know if he cared about Misaha.

Misaha—she never did shit for us. Always the subhumans. Beorc, you know—they sold beorc too. Still sell 'em—but in Begnion you sell everyone.

My sister, I don't know. She was five or six years older than me. I don't know what happened to her. She got sold just like one of those precious subhumans—you never see a beorc emancipation army. You never see someone for the kids that get sold, who aren't kids after that.

Misaha, she never cared about the beorcs that were just garbage in the road. We were too low even for her. Lower than the subhumans. I know how much a subhuman goes for. A tiger went for a thousand. A pregnant female, she went for two, three thousand. A heron—I never saw a heron sold. The last heron ever sold open like that, she went for a whopping fifty thousand.

My sister, she went for fifty. Just fifty.

Garbage in the road.

So what. Hundreds died in the massacre—so what. Hundreds die in the street, killed off, screwed up and murdered for it. In Begnion, in cities like Crianna and Sienne and Flaguerre. Whole familes. Kids, kids with all sorts of shit wrong with them.

No one got sold in Crimea. King Ramon—he looked out for beorc kids. Kept 'em kids. No one cheered harder than me when he got Fat Recht the pimp strung up the gallows. Queen Elincia, she looks out for the kids too. The orphans. She's alright by me. She keeps the brothels' hands off of them.

Guy like me, you'd think—hey, he buys a girl in every town big enough for a bordello. Too much of an ass, too much poison in him for a real girl—gotta buy them. Sometimes I do. It's not like I got principles. But I have rules. I don't like looking them in the eye. I never get one that's older than me. I tip.

Maybe you wouldn't think that. You probably can't imagine it.

Too innocent. Naïve, sweet, pure. All the rest.

Probably can't imagine it, the gangs in Sienne—you just look for a filthier place. Tell me if you find it. The gangs in Sienne, they make the senate look like the sweetest things.

The senate, they have magic armor and goddesses and staves that take you places—the gangs in Sienne, they're disgusting. They're the ones that rot your eyes just for looking at them, your heart for just thinking about them. The nobles, the nobles this and that. They're corrupt, they're using subhumans for slaves and kicking puppies and staying up too late.

You look at corruption from the other side. From below.

I left Begnion. Sixteen. Maybe younger. Drifted into Daein, where they hated subhumans hard as I did, for different reasons—made it to Crimea.

Wanna know how I met Greil? Ike? Ike, he was eight years old when I met him first.

Liked him better then.

And then I joined up, joined the mercenaries. Me, Titania, Greil. We weren't a joke, though there was just the three of us, plus Greil's two kids. Later we added on Gatrie—this girl, Merty, who got herself killed. I never liked her. Begnion, like me. But upstairs upright Begnion. Former military. Pegasus knight. We sold the peg for a lot when she died. Oscar, the other two—Boyd, Rolf.

Been with the Greil Mercenaries, on off, over ten years. That's more than my mother has. My real dad.

Greil—he looked out for me.

He looked out for me, he cared if something happened to me. I was just a kid. He was looking out for me because I was just a kid. His kid.

If the Greil Mercenaries, if we're a family, then I was Greil's eldest son. Company should've gone to me.

But blood, it's blood, right? So Ikey, he got it instead.

Blood doesn't matter. Blood sells out blood. My own mother, she sold our eldest sister to the pimps, the gangs, the filth. My other sister, she got sick and dropped dead. I left Begnion after she did.

Where did she go? Where's she now? If I knew . . . I don't know. I would find her. I'd hit her. I'd kiss her. Early on, I looked for her.

My sister, she sold her. To save me.

I was sick first. So Anna, she had this idea, and my mother, she took Anna to the pimp and she was going to my medicine with that money. Anna's idea.

Wasn't enough.

Never enough. I got better on my own. Julie, she didn't.

So I tried to find her when Julie died and mom left. Gave up. Got disillusioned. Got drunk.

Mom used the money Anna got us to buy herself drinks. To numb the pain of being garbage. Started me on it too. Then left me.

Begnion, Daein, Crimea, mom, the girls, Greil. They all left me, what was left of me. Now I try to leave everyone else.

You, you. You look at me, and you know all this. I don't even have to tell you. Because you herons, you read hearts and minds. I've seen Reyson do it to Ike.

She never said she'd come back to me. All I have left. Anna disappeared into the garbage. It all looks the same. When I finally stopped waiting, there was nothing left for me in Begnion. Misaha, she never did anything for us garbage and then she died. Jargos, her son, the regent, he couldn't do shit either. I left. Either that or get in trouble.

I didn't want to be lost in all that garbage.

My sister, she looked out for me. Because I was a kid. When she left, I was left waiting for her. No one looked out for me. I learned to look out for me and no kid should do that. I look out for Rolf, because he's just a kid and I'm his elder, his master—Mist, she's a kid too, but she's got Ikey there, he's good for something. He takes care of her like he should.

I don't want to tell him that. If you can hear me, don't tell him that.

Your brothers, those bird kings—they must take care of you too. You look grown up, don't you, but you're just a kid. They look out for you like they should. You're a subhuman, but damn it if you aren't a kid as well.

I'll look out for you for now. It's right. It's what I should do. I won't leave you. Follow me.

The archer beorc looks at me like he's swallowed something sour. I don't care, I have a headache and his heart is like poison in my brain. I smile and nod, and assume the pain in his heart has something to do with what he's saying. I know he wants to protect me. For whatever reason, it's painful—

Oh . . . I wish he would think in the old tongue.

"Follow me," he says. Gibberish.