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hqmillioncorn · 7 months

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FFXIVWrite Day twenty-one: Grave

with @windupnamazu 's Lunya Lanya

Babycorn watched as Cherrypit turned himself into liquid and moved himself past a crack in the wall. She was a little worried about him but as soon as she had started getting really worried, he was back and had transformed back into his regular baby self. “Wow!” Babycorn clapped. “You’re so talented Cherry!” Cherrypit clapped along with her. Not really understanding that the clapping was for him. “I wonder what else you can do…?” It was a little scary not knowing everything that Cherrypit was capable of, but it was also a little exciting!

It had been a few days since Babycorn had helped the others defend Ishgard from a horde of dragons trying to breach the city. Just as it had also been a few days since Cherrypit had shown off just how powerful he could be to the scions and about maybe a hundred other people.

Since then Babycorn had been hiding in her room in the waking sands, avoiding other people like the plague.

As surprising as it sounded Babycorn’s worst fears didn’t come true right away. The scions and her fellow warriors of light didn’t immediately turn their weapons on them to try and kill them. It was still such a shock. On the bright side, the Isgardian soldiers took care of that part during the initial fight.

Instead they had all rushed at her to ask her if Cherrypit was okay.

Babycorn was stunned into near silence. “U-Um…Yeah…?” She slowly nodded. She was carrying a very tired Cherrypit in her arms. Why would they not think he wasn’t okay?

It never crossed Babycorn’s mind that other people weren’t used to Cherrypit’s (slightly) dramatic ways of catching his enemies off guard. Which this time involved running his way past wave after wave of dragons until reaching the front and getting himself purposely crushed under the foot of the biggest dragon of all.

Once he had done that it was literal child’s play to melt himself down and spread around almost the entire bridge. Small clawed hands erupted from the black mass that had entirely trapped Vishap in place, like a huge glue trap.

Other dragons tried to fly away in a panic but were quickly grabbed and slammed back down onto the ground.

‘Oh he’s mad mad.’ Babycorn thought to herself while screams of terror erupted around her.

The black mass that was attacking the dragons so ferociously completely ignored everyone else that was trying to defend Ishgard. This, however, did not do anything to deter the horror that everyone else was feeling being surrounded by something unknown and so scary and horrible and every other word under the sun that means completely terrifying.

And none were more terrified than the Ishgardian knight's themselves.

Some of them tried to fight back against the mysterious hands only to find a clear opening wherever they struck.

Babycorn noticed one of the knights trying to swipe at a hand that was moving a cannon out of the way. “Hey!” She rolled one of her sleeves up and ran towards the knight, “Leave Cherry alone!” With strength that one would never expect of her, Babycorn grabbed a single cannonball and hurled it towards the knight.

It missed entirely thankfully but it had scared the knight enough to get them to stop attacking her baby brother.

Yda paused mid snap punch. “Cherry?!”

Next to her, Papalymo interrupted his very important cast. “As in-The Cherrypit Pit we know?”!

“We only know one Cherrypit so it must be him!”

Babycorn froze. ‘Oh no…’ Now everyone would know. Everyone knew. Everyone.

From behind she could hear B’ig Nunh’s muffled voice yell out, “THAT’S CHERRYPIT?!” as he danced around to try and avoid stepping on his good friend. Vertical was right next to him as they fought back to back. “looks like it.” There was nothing left for her to fight, Cherrypit was taking care of that.

A hand came out from the ground behind Babycorn, grabbing her and pulling her up in the air.

Either Cherrypit could see it coming or he had just gotten really lucky because just at that moment Vishap began to try to fly away, slowly beginning to flap its wings up and down. This created a powerful wind, strong enough to knock a few people on their backs.

‘Now you’ve done it…’ Babycorn watched as several misshapen human-like figures emerged from the black mass. Grabbing hold of the dragons and throwing them far off the bridge. A few of the knights tried to retreat and Cherrypit gladly let them, if it meant they would be safe.

A wall raised itself in front of Lunya to protect her from a gust of wind. She didn’t know quite what to think when the wall in front of her formed itself into the shape of a mouth. “Wuwuu..” She heard it say to her. “Kay’?” It continued.

Normally she would have been a little freaked out (truthfully she still kinda was) or even angry at Babycorn for letting her two-year old baby brother onto the battlefield (she also still truthfully was) but having just remembered that she had once known both siblings so many years ago...

“Oh Cherry…”

Suddenly, there was a rumble throughout the entire bridge.

Cherrypit was getting frustrated.

He concentrated all of his strength into taking Vishap down, wrapping everything around them and with one powerful movement managed to throw the dragon off the bridge. With one last smack for the road.

“well damn.” Vertical leaned on over the bridge and looked down at the abyss below.

Everything that was ‘Cherrypit’ all slowly collected itself, forming himself back up in the air. Until in an instant everyone’s favorite little normal baby toddler had appeared once again. “Heewlo!” He said waving his arms up and down, his sleeves had been torn and so had most of his outfit. Cherrypit hovered in the air a bit before floating back down and landing safely in his sister’s arms.

“Hey Cherry.” Babycorn gave her brother a kiss on his head and a hug.

“Bebe!” Cherrypit giggled and pointed and the gates of Ishgard in front of them. “Good?” he asked.

“Yeah. That was pretty good.”

Babycorn hugged him tighter. Afraid of what would happen next. Would her so-called friends turn to attack them next? Maybe since she had helped save Eorzea they would give her a ten second head start to run. Were her mama and papa ever come back?

Most of these questions were answered in the next few seconds, when Babycorn suddenly felt impact after impact hit her all at once. It felt pretty warm, if not a little suffocating. “Wha-What’s going on?!” Were they trying to squeeze her to death or something?! That was a little unconventional. If it were up to Babycorn she would have used a sword or something.

Babycorn felt herself being lifted off the ground. She looked around, Reese was holding both her and Cherrypit in a tight hug. They weren’t saying anything but Babycorn could tell this wasn’t a bad hug. It felt…nice.

“Reese? Is everything okay?” She asked.

“I’m glad you’re both okay.”

“M-Me too?”

Just as suddenly as Reese had picked them up they were put back down. Only to get picked up again in another tight hug.This time Babycorn got what she expected, a small on her head by a book. “Ow!” It hadn’t really hurt, it was more like a force of habit.

It was Lunya, she was holding onto the two of them like they were going to disappear or something. Which was closer to the truth than Lunya knew. “Don’t do something like that ever again!!” Lunya was almost in tears. It caught Babycorn off guard.

“...huh?”

Even now, days later, Babycorn was still confused at how everyone had responded.

Why hadn’t they come and driven them out yet? What was taking them so long? Babycorn would have rather everyone done it right away rather than have her wait here locked in her room until…

Well, she wasn’t ‘locked’ in her room per say. She had locked herself in here with Cherrypit.

Babycorn sat on the edge of her bed, she had turned it in the direction of the door to make sure that no one snuck up on them. There was a knife in her hand as she turned to look back and forth at her brother playing with his toys and the door to her room.

“Are they just toying with us?”

Babycorn didn’t appreciate that. She had been tricked before, by someone she once thought close to her Left alone in the dark in her room, waiting for an answer. Only to receive an answer in one of the worst ways possible. But this and that are totally different! She thought to herself. These are your friends! Your…Your…fami-

Babycorn threw the knife to the ground with a scream. Cherrypit jumped, “Bebe?” He was a little scared.

Babycorn reached under her bed to grab her staff and a large bag. She grabbed the bag and sat next down to her brother, making sure to give him a pat on his head and a smile she hoped that he would believe. The last thing Babycorn wanted to do was scare him.

“Cherry. Help me put your toys in here. We’re leaving.”

It was dark when Babycorn decided to leave.

The rising stones never truly slept but with Cherrypit’s help she was able to pass right through the walls of her room all the way outside. She never liked traveling that way since last time she almost lost a finger but thankfully Cherrypit had more practice with it this time.

Babycorn started to walk away but she felt someone tugging at her robe.

Cherrypit looked up at her, he was chewing on his sleeve. “Wabwab?” He took his other sleeve and pointed back at the rising stones. He was probably asking her something along the lines if Babycorn was going to tell anyone she was going somewhere.

Babycorn sighed, “We’ll be back soon, okay?” That was a total lie.

“Chelinka Starsinger. What did I tell you about lying?”

Babycorn dropped her staff onto the ground. She didn’t bother to pick it up as it began to roll towards the girl that stood in front of them. Lunya Lanya was standing right in front of them, hand on her hips and an expression that was a mix of exasperation and patience.

“...What do you want, Yeyema.” Babycorn decided to use the name Lunya entrusted her with too. It was only fair. And she secretly hoped it would get the other girl so mad that she would leave them alone.

“Yeye!!!” Cherrypit let out a cheer and ran towards his old-new friend. Lunya bent down and opened her arms to let Cherrypit jump into them for a hug. “Yeye! Yeye!!”

“Hi Cherry! It’s nice to see you too!”

Lunya had been a little confused about how Cherrypit had barely changed from how she remembered him looking in her regained memories about the siblings but now his appearance was just the tip of the iceberg of questions she had about him.

“We were just leaving.”

It was ironic really.

Babycorn had just reunited with one of her closest friends that she once thought dead, or worse and now she was being forced to leave again. It had been an emotional reunion. So emotional that Babycorn couldn’t remember most of it. She had been drowning in so many feelings at the time.

Anger, relief, happiness, grief, regret. It felt like every emotion that she had ever known hit her all at once.

“Will you be back soon?” Lunya asked. She was playing along for now.

Babycorn shrugged. “...Probably. I don’t know. But we have to go.”

“Where are you going to go?”

Babycorn was starting to get annoyed at all the questions. “Why do you care it's not like-” Babycorn cut herself off. ‘It’s not like we’re friends.’ It was something that she had said to Lunya all the time back when they first met. Back then Babycorn thought it was their first meeting but it wasn’t, not really.

They were friends. A friend that Babycorn had missed dearly.

’But Yeyema didn’t miss you.’

That was a lie. Lunya had said herself she had forgotten a large majority of her memories from back then, her and Cherrypit included. Babycorn knew that. “Sorry. But we can’t stay here. We’ll be in danger just like we were in Ul’dah.”

“Then I’ll protect you! Just like I did back then!” Lunya protested.

“Eh?” Babycorn was taken aback. Sure Lunya had been a big force to be reckoned with back then, and she had even been smaller back then. Not to mention now she was stronger than ever before. Babycorn had seen it first hand. That didn’t mean that Lunya was capable of fighting back against her own friends if they decided to go after Babycorn.

She didn’t want to have Lunya go through something like that.

“We have to but I promise I’ll be back sometimes. Like in secret or something? I-I don’t know where I’m leaving but…”

“Is that really what you want to do?” Lunya asked. Cherrypit looked up at her, confused. The conversation she and his sister were having was lost on him. The only thing he was sure of was that they both looked really sad. He leaned his head on Lunya’s shoulder.

Babycorn turned away.

The truth of the matter was that she did not want to go. She wanted to stay here, with everyone she had grown close to. There was no way she would ever admit to anyone that she would consider these people family. She couldn't think like that! Because then it would hurt all the more when they turned on her.

Just like it had last time.

The thought of any one of her new friends, her family, trying to kill her or Cherrypit made her want to curl up into a ball and cry. But it was going to happen. It always did. It had to!

Babycorn balled up her hands, gripping her robe.

“I…I want to stay…”

A sob finally broke through her facade and she fell to her knees. “I want to stay with everyone! I don’t want everyone to think we’re monsters! I want to be your friend! I want Reese to hug me more! I want to keep listening to Papalymo’s boring stories! I-I want…”

Lunya set Cherrypit down and watched as he ran to his Babycorn’s side. He hung onto her arm and pet the top of her head. Something that she did for him whenever he got upset. “Kay’! Kay’!” He told her. ‘It’s okay!’

Lunya knelt down next to Babycorn, resting her hand on her friend’s shoulder.

“Then stay.”

#ffxivwrite2023 #Babycorn #Cherrypit #Lunya #ahahahahaha #sorry to llunya lanya in particular i had no plan for this one it just happened really which is why it took so long #awu #babycorn in arr is fine shes normal shes not digging herself into a deeper hole because she thinks its the only outcome #which has only happened like what three times? ahahaha #cherrypit can just do that thats been in my mind for a WHILE how steps of faith plays out with them #sorry hes a freak #Reese mention and vertical and big nunh :)

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