Title: Beginnings
Fandom: Final Fantasy XII
Characters: Fran, Balthier
Genre: General
Rating: K

Other: Written for seventhe's birthday; all standard disclaimers apply, most important being that I make no profit from this. I bet the editor will make my punctuation, spacing and italics look like crap. I apologize in advance.

Beginnings

When he first found her, she was hardly recognizable to herself. Curled against one of the many faceless walls in Bhujerba, she was alone, uncertain and questioning the very reason she had left the Woods in the first place as she watched the others pass her by unheedingly.

He had stopped to look at her; she had glared. Her silent warning went unheeded; this was most likely because it had taken an unusually long time for his eyes to reach her face. When they finally did, he was not cowed by her fierce red gaze, like most other Humes usually were. He was - amused.

This infuriated her. His next words only added to her ire.

"Took a wrong turn on your way out of the forest?" he said had archly, lifting one eyebrow. She told him in no uncertain terms to mind his own business and emphasized it with a loud crack of her knuckles. But he had only smiled and winked at her before sauntering away.

Hours later, when he wandered by again, she was still alone, uncertain and filled with questions. He, however, was not. Alone, that is. If he had questions, his personable smirk hid them well. The little creature waddling behind him stared up at her with round, curious eyes and she stared back at it coldly.

A moogle. Strange creatures; they were the ones responsible for waking a greed nearly as great as a Seeq's in the Humes, with their airships and war-machines - tinkering, hovering, building, twitching constantly. And yet they were welcomed, everywhere, even among her own people; no one ever considered a moogle to be a threat. Perhaps it was because they were so disarmingly cute.

She, however, did not appreciate cute. She glared at the little creature. Then she glared at the Hume in front of it for good measure.

"Fancy meeting you here again," he told her, his arms crossed. "What a pleasant surprise."

She hadn't thought so. The idea that she had made a great mistake reoccurred then, rather painfully. Before she could descend back into her thickening cloud of morose introspection, he interrupted her. Again.

"So tell me, do you actually have a tail in there or do you wear that little accessory just for show?"

The question was so blunt that she forgot to glare in favour of simply staring. Not open-mouthed, however. Viera did not do open-mouthed.

"I've always wanted to ask one of you that," he continued blithely. "What about your toes? Do you actually mould those shoes around your claws? Can't be very practical, now can it."

A muscle in her cheek jumped.

"Oh, so it IS a tail," Balthier noted, watching the motion interestedly. A muscle in her other cheek jumped, this time showing a bit of fang.

"I don't think she likes you, Mr. Bunansa - I mean Ffamran," the little pom-pomed creature behind the Hume stated. "Maybe we should just leave, kupo."

This brought about a stronger reaction that either she or the moogle could have anticipated.

First, the Hume groaned. Then, he ran his fingers through his hair, a disgusted grimace playing across his face. Finally, he turned on the moogle with a deadly glare. "How many times have I told you, Nono. It's Balthier now. Not Bunansa. Not Ffamran. Balthier!"

Her eyebrow lifted slightly. Well, well. So the little Hume didn't find his name agreeable. Well, two could play at this game. It would be the first time she had ever deigned to speak directly with a Hume; she was somewhat proud that her first words were an insult of sorts. She pointedly told Ffamran what she thought about his theories on Viera tails and toes. She carefully skirted around her own opinion of Hume fashion and pointed to his sandals as evidence of her arguments. And finally, she complimented him on the overwhelming masculinity of his full name. "Ffamran" would even suit a Viera well. Most likely a salve-maker, though. No self-respecting warrior Viera would be caught with a name like that.

It was the most she had spoken in days. It was the most she had spoken since she left the Woods. The entire exchange left her eyes blazing, her nostrils flaring, and - to her surprise - filled her with a sense of ease and relief which she hadn't realized she had missed. And she was no longer curled up against the Bhujerban wall like a wounded panther.

The Hume only smiled at her. "Touché," he replied, dipping his head in an amused salute at her ire. "You look much better that way, my dear." She was left staring as he turned and sauntered away from her, apparently satisfied. The moogle nearly strained its neck, twisting its head between them before shrugging and scurrying after the Hume's retreating back.

Confused, and slightly indignant at the Hume's presumption - did he really believe his crass jokes were helping her? - she called for him to wait. Her pride would not allow herself to demand an explanation for his antics, not when she suspected that they both already knew the answer. She had always suspected there were more to the Humes than her sisters realized. It was still maddening to be proven correct by such an infuriating experience, however. Were all Humes as bothersome and irritating as this one? This study of contrasts, this flamboyant buffoon with the cunning eyes? Her questions were endless. She demanded answers. Her lips froze around the words, battling against decades of conditioning, of Viera thought and philosophy. He was a Hume, she repeated silently to herself, shocked at her own behaviour.

And he grinned at her, that cocky, self-assured, purely Hume grin, and gave her a careless shrug. "Well, are you coming? I can assure you, you won't find answers to your questions by watching my backside. The assumption is, however, flattering," he added with a smirk.

She strode towards him, noting how his eyes were almost instantly glued to the swing of her hip as she moved. A strange twitching lifted the corners of her lips; the first of many automatic reactions, she would come to understand, that were brought about simply by this man's presence. And then she smugly informed him that she wasn't studying his backside, but rather his footwear.

A look of annoyance passed across his face; "I knew these things were a mistake," he swore, glaring down at them. Then he looked back at her. "And how long might I expect to have the pleasure of your company, my lady?" he asked her, once again filled with oil-slick charm and gentry.

She considered; he did keep company with a moogle, after all.

But he had made her forget, if just for a moment, the feeling of being alone.

She told him she would remain until she understood the logic of his shoes. He was still wearing those sandals to this day.