Seeing Red (Ralph/Elias)

[Elias]

[[Takes place before Bones of a Dead Land and after the topic that came before that]]

The scene was set, a lonesome road, unused and fallen into disrepair. A land where even bandits fear to tread, which was saying something seeing as bandits were a naturally renewing resource that could potentially be the solution for work hunger if people just gave cannibalism a chance. It was quiet, little else but the chirping of birds and the sounds of the wilderness. He lived in the wilderness most of his childhood, and while he found it dumb and preferred the bustling city life, he couldn't help but have an ear for these things.

This would be the perfect setting and backdrop for a hero's legendary journey, a young man valiantly marching towards a dead country to unravel the plagues of the land. Of course he was no hero, and probably would never be. Ugh. Now he was bumming his self out. So of course he sidled over to a person to lighten up the mood. It was quiet, and boring, and stupid. What was the point of traveling companions if they didn't even speak or anything? If he wanted silence, he would of become a mute. Even traveling alone had more conversation. Insane conversation in which he talks to his self, but it filled the silence.

His first choice was the blind dude who saw by not seeing and wore the hideous green outfit but stylish and cool red specs. It was an oxymoron, how can one be so unfashionable but have such incredible accessories?! It drove him INSANE. "Hey, your name is Ralph right?" It wasn't often he used names, well real names. He preferred his Oh-So-Clever nicknames which should seriously be the person's real name, but their parents weren't blessed with his naming sense.

[Ralph Meglane]

"Yes, that's right, Elias. I'm Ralph Meglane." he replied, not looking at Elias. After all, there was no reason to turn his head, he could hear Elias just fine.

"Did you need something?" The mage seemed a little eccentric at times, but Ralph could tell that he was good at heart. Elias even reminded Ralph of himself when he was much younger, a little. "Back when I could see..." he muttered under his breath without realizing it. He always looked for the day when he would be able to see again, but it never came.

[Elias]

"I was just wondering about your glasses. They are so incredibly stylish, I just have to know where you got them." Not one to mince words, Elias quickly dove into the thing foremost on his mind. Well foremost that wasn't the horrible awkwardness that was about to occur when he went home, those were the kind of things that always went better unthought. "I mean, I wouldn't of guessed such a thing from a distance, but you have a keen eye for cool accessories, but you're blind so it confused me on how you could find such cool thing like those." He continued, cheerful. His voice was skipping in tune with his own walking, and he smiled widely. Of course not that Ralph would know but...

"Oh, and also I suppose I wanted to know why you wanted to follow me to Ostia too I suppose. I mean it's kinda a crappy place to be for most people, it's not often you find people clawing for a group headed that way. I mean there's like wolf zombies and zombie demons and demon zombie wolfs. That would scare most people with functioning minds away." His voice slowly fell with each word, until he was more or less muttering.

[Ralph Meglane]

"You are right, it would be kind of confusing for me to wear strange glasses like these. I have a strange condition where sunlight that isn't filtered through red burns my eyes. I don't know how or why it happens, it's just something I have to live with. I used to wear a red blindfold, but uh, I got to distinguishable."

Ralph didn't know whether he should tell Elias that he was a wanted criminal. It didn't seem like something you would bring up in a random conversation.

"I need to find out what has happened to Ostia. I owe at least that much to Rayl." Ralph wanted to be the hero for once at least. He failed in that during the Bandit War, so now was finally his time to do something for Good.

[Elias]

"What a stylish case of blindness." Elias mused. "If you gotta be forced to look at any color for eternity, Red is definitely the best one to be stuck with. These glasses are cooler then any blindfold though, must be hard to get though. I barely see glasses in the first place, unless you're super rich or something. Most people can't afford them." He ended it off with a shrug that will FOREVER REMAIN UNSEEN.

"I wanna know what happened to Ostia too. It's always good to kn- Wait did you say Rayl? Dude, THE Rayl?!" He suddenly smiled, sounding excited. "I read his book like a bajillion times." He was a hero, like the ones in the stories except he was ALIVE. Of course Elias knew all about him. "I'm soo jealous. I've never met anyone cool."

[Ralph Meglane]

"It wasn't easy. I had to get a favor from a friend of mine who makes stained glass for St. Elimine churches make it for me. Took a bit of time too." Having plenty of connections in Pherae had turned out to be a good thing, it seemed. People also were nicer to the blind in general.

"Oh, yeah. Rayl. I promised that I'd help him out, but I came here... uh, at his request. He really needed someone to check out the situation here for him."

Ralph didn't enjoy lying, but this man clearly thought highly of Rayl, who Ralph thought was kind of a jerk.

[Elias]

"Well we got some holy eyeware here, maybe if we're lucky Elmine will protect us from the monsters." He chuckled at his own comment, as if it was a little joke. Which it was. "I wouldn't think Stained Glass would be easy to see through, I mean how do you know where you're go- Oh yeah. Right. Blind, sorry." Woops, he forgot for a moment there. "You seem to be fairly capable of getting around though, all the other blind people I've met have been... Well I haven't met any actually. But by definition you'd think it'd be hard getting around."

He crossed his arms and nodded. "Well anyways, it's cool that you know Rayl. I mean, I've never met him, I just hear lots of stories. I HAVE met Richter though! I mean, it was only a split second, and he didn't say anything to me, but I saw his incredibly pink hair. Like a field of fresh flowers." His voice trailed off near the end, dwelling his memories that have since been tainted a nice rosy pink by nostalgia. "We were, like, burned in a church or something." He added with a shrug, that once again would go unseen. How unfortunate, this man cannot witness the awkwardness that is Elias' body language. Though he couldn't see the mage's oh so punch-able face so it was win-lose.

"I know all about the heroes of the Bandit war because... well... It's not important." Aw now he bummed his self out again.

[Ralph Meglane]

"It is... very hard to get around. I used to have a companion who would see for me, but he disappeared a couple of days ago." Ralph hoped that Caecus had not left for good. He didn't think that he has been a bad owner...

Ralph had no idea what Elias was talking about. He moved through the conversation too fast for Ralph to follow, although he did catch that last part.

"Wait, the heroes of the Bandit War? Do you know where Matis is?!" The one thing Ralph wanted more than anything else, even more than his sight back, was to apologize to Matis.

[Elias]

"A companion who could see for you?" A million stupid little idea floated through the mages head. One of which being a creature attached to Ralphs head like a pair of goggles. "Hrm... Fascinating..." He muttered as his mind thought of more ideas, each one more unlikely then the last. Of course he didn't mean what he said quite so literally, but that was lost on the mage. He shook his head heard, shaking the ideas out of his mind when it dawned on him that what he was thinking was quite simply crazy.

"Anyways, if you need help getting around I can help. I mean, I've never done it before and will probably suck badly and you might run into a beehive and get stung to death or something. I forget my point." He looked blanky ahead to the distance, his face flat.

"Oh Matis? I've heard of him, he used a bow and had a foul mouth." Elias tapped his temple, remembering back. "He disappeared without a trace years ago though, no one has seen hide nor hair nor heard a single swear from him for years now. I can't really help you there, sorry." He disappeared before the end of the war, oddly enough. It was simply as if he stopped existing. "Did you know him?"

[Ralph Meglane]

"Oh no, that's alright. I'm sure Caecus will return to me eventually. Falcon, by the way, so that you aren't confused. I found him injured in the forest one day, and he's been my helper ever since."

Ralph thought about Elias' description of Matis for a second, knowing immediately that it wasn't Matis, but it did sound familiar. "Oh! No, no, that was Matthias. Matis had a sword, and kinda dirty blonde hair. I think he had a red-haired cousin that hung around him sometimes." If Ralph was sure about one thing in his memory, it was Matis. "Yes, actually, I traveled with him for a bit when I was young. Good man, he was, a real hero."

[Elias]

"Oh. OH!" Elias wapped his self on the forehead. "Erm, whoops. Sorry about that. All the name and people kinda... they kinda blend together... heh heh... Hunh..." He felt really bad now, it said a lot, and reminded him of things he didn't really want to remember. He didn't... He studied all about the heroes of the bandit war. But did his father force him too? Did he do it his self? He couldn't... But maybe...

"Ugh, my head huuuurts." He grumbled, gently rubbing his temple. "I'm sorry, I misheard you. Yeah Matis, he was the other swordsman along with Kenshin. Word is he travelled back to Sacae with his cousin Kenshin and the swordswoman Katara. He started a village and suddenly left about five years ago. Two years after the war had ended. No one has heard from him since."

[Ralph Meglane]

"Oh Kenshin, that was his name." Ralph decided to put that missing piece of information back in his memory. Kenshin hadn't stood out much to Ralph, but he seemed to recall hearing that name recently.

"Yeah, I know that all too well. You see, I fell into a comatose state during the War, by the time I woke up he was already gone. I was blind, so I had more important things to worry about by getting used to it, rather than searching for someone nobody could find."

Ralph fell silent. He didn't like having his hope laid out in front of him like that. Matis was likely still alive, waiting for the time that the world would need him.

[Elias]

"Wow, that sounds like it sucks. I hate sleeping, I can never sleep more then a few hours or then I feel like I'm wasting so much time. It just drive me mad. I always have to be doing something, or I just go crazy." He chuckled, nervously. Scratching the back of his head as he did so. Looking up he saw trees, dark green and hiding the sky above them. How would it be to never be able to see this? Never see anything? Live life in perpetual blackness...

"Where you born blind?" He mused. "Or did you become blind?" How sad it must of been to lose the gift of sight so suddenly, never to see again. But perhaps it's even worse to have been blind from the start, it is better to have then lose then never to know what it was like to have at all. Of course that was easier said then believed. It might be harder to lose something you've grown so used to, grown to depend on. Pain of removal, it may be simply better to never have gotten it given to you to have been taken away...

"Oh, I'm sorry. Just ignore that." He laughed. A fake laugh, but still a laugh. It was better to laugh through the sadness, rather then to wallow upon it. "I hope you find him again one day."

[Ralph Meglane]

"Yeah, sleeping for a few years wasn't fun, but it was... comforting..." Ralph still clearly remembered the dreams of his mother he had while asleep.

"Come on now, Elias. I did give a description of Matis after all. After I awoke, I was blind."

He paused for a second, "It's strange you know. You don't know what you've got until it's gone. Though I hope that I find Matis someday as well. Perhaps on that day he will be proud of me."

[Elias]

"Yeah, yeah you're right. I suppose that was a silly question, wasn't it?" It was a depressing thought all the same. He tried to smile, but it didn't quite come, not a real smile. It looked pathetic, tired, just like he was. It didn't matter though, Ralph couldn't see. No one could, he had no reason to fake it anymore. Then why did he continue to do so? Lying to his self, once again, his eye twitched as he poked and prodded at the raw bits of his mind. Like a scab that had been picked far too early, just puss and pain remained as it hurt to think. Not physically, but emotionally, mentally.

"Don't know what you got until it's gone, I see." He didn't even bother smiling. He touched the temples of his head, rubbing lightly in small circles as he thought. Things were so much simpler before, back when he wanted to be a hero, back when he was traveling around for no reason. When he wanted no more then to be the crimson mage. Then he met Garnet, Razzle and Mana. His reality was shaken, and then shattered in those ruins.

"I'm not a hero, and I never will be." He quietly spoke to his self, looking at the ground below. His favorite color was white, not red. Razzle came and reminded him of his father, of his before he left. Garnet was his first friend, he broke through with his kindness and poked at the layers underneath what he usually showed. His psyche was broken, and through the cracks little bits of what he tried to hide underneath it like dirty laundry began to show. Not to others, no no no, not to others, but to his self. And that was far worse then any one else knowing.

He looked at Ralph, thinking. "Ralph." He barely knew the man, but that may be just what he needed. A stranger. "What would you say a hero is?"