Fanfiction:Zipp Dementia Chrono Break 3
Chrono Break
By Zipp Dementia
“... and so they want the taxes lowered.”
Nadia’s voice was a calm amidst chaos. Lucca’s main room, as always, was packed corner to corner with odds and ends, tidbits and tinkerings. And now, children. Crono sat on a rickety chair with an orphan on each knee, bouncing both of them in a steady creaking rhythm while they played a clapping game with each other, calling out a memorized rhyme in time with the claps. Nadia sat nearby at a cluttered table, sipping tea that two other children (now chasing each other around the cluttered room) had prepared for her.
Lucca Ashtear herself poked her head out from behind a mess of electronics and metal and wiped her forehead with an oily rag. Though usually quick to reply, now she simply regarded Nadia, as if debating whether an answer was required of her. Of the three friends, she had perhaps changed the most in appearance. Although still a bookish girl, she looked even more ruffled these days, as if personal hygiene was a secondary function in her life. Her hair was cropped short to prevent her the trouble of caring for it, and her nails were chewed to the quick. She rarely wore socks, so her feet had a blackish tint to them, as if she’d walked through soot. Her glasses were huge, rather than large, and gave the constant impression that she was studying intently whatever she looked at.
When she finally did reply, she ducked back under the machinery and spoke as she worked, as if not really wanting to be part of the conversation.
“You could raise taxes in Poore. They would pay without a fuss. They enjoy the fruits of the kingdom too much to complain.”
Crono dismissed the idea. It had come to him many times already. “Truce enjoys the same treatment. I won’t have one city paying more to make up for the faults of another.”
“Fault? And what exactly is a fault?” Lucca’s voice was quizzical. Crono had known her from the time he was a child, and he was keenly aware of all her little ways. He recognized her voice now as the voice she adopted when talking herself through a difficult problem. He prepared for a lecture. Lucca didn’t disappoint.
“I suppose first we must look at the etymology of the word. It comes from the Zealian word fallere, which means to deceive or disappoint. But then it is also used in geology, where it indicates evidence of relative movement as designated by a fracture. Taban, could you hand me that wrench?”
One of the children running around the room veered in their course to grab the wrench and put it in Lucca’s outstretched hand. She went back to talking, grunting occasionally as she tightened one bolt or loosened another.
“Of course, a fracture indicates a break between two objects. In the case of geology this can be represented as a chasm or as a simple crack in a rock... which is really just a small chasm. I suppose that’s another line of inquiry, though, the relative nature of perception as based on size.”
Nadia and Crono shared a bemused glance. Lucca certainly hadn’t lost her ability to chase tangents.
“In this case, though, that is irrelevant. What really defines your situation is the nature of the fracture that you are perceiving as present. Obviously Truce hasn’t broken in two, so it is to be assumed you are discussing a fracture between intent and action, or maybe more specifically, between expectation and reality. Which brings us to the question... what are you expecting out of Truce?”
Lucca looked at Crono, her eyes magnified behind her glasses. He felt like he was a specimen under one of her microscopes. The children clapping distracted him, he couldn’t formulate a real answer. After a moment, Lucca continued.
“Of course, another meaning to the word fault is weakness, which implies then that you see Truce as weak. Which brings us to another discussion on the point of what makes something weak. The correct answer in this case, especially if the problem is mechanical, is to define where something is structurally weak and then tighten it.”
As if to illustrate her point, Lucca began furiously tightening a screw bolt on the top of her machinery. A blast of steam seemed to indicate that she’d done enough. She stopped and looked at Crono again.
“Of course, tightening it too much can result in too much pressure and can bring down the whole system. In this case, strength becomes the ultimate weakness, or fault, if you will.”
For a moment, the room was silent. Then Nadia giggled. “You always go too far with your explanations, Lucca.” Her laughter was pleasant to Crono, relaxing him, allowing him to laugh as well. Certainly laughing was easier than trying to decipher Lucca’s riddles. Nadia took another sip of tea and continued. “Anyway, the solution is simple. It’s as you said, Poore’s taxes will increase, and we’ll lower Truce’s.”
Crono stopped bouncing the children on his knee. Oblivious, they continued their game. “And give in to the demands of rebels?”
“They aren’t really rebels. No one is contesting our reign.”
“Before you know it, they’ll be writing their own trade agreements and charging us for access to the harbours!”
“Love, this is simply natural discontent. The kingdom is growing fast, and no one wants to be left behind.”
“You’re not speaking sense. No kind of discontent is natural.”
“It is natural when a reign is changed. Early on a king has to be generous, to win the hearts of his people, to show them that their lives will go on as normal. There’s been a lot of change lately. People are nervous. Give it time, and the grumbling will go away.”
Crono put the children on the ground and stood up. “That was the way of your father. Just wait until it becomes someone else’s problem.”
“That’s not what I meant.” Nadia’s voice was cold.
“Where would we have been if we’d waited for the future to just happen? Things don’t just magically get better. Someone’s got to take charge.”
At that moment, a young girl came running in.
“Lucca! Lucca! Kidd is crying!”
Lucca got up and wiped her hands on her trousers. Seeing her standing, Crono realized how thin she’d become. And there was something tired about the way she carried herself. It wasn’t until she’d left the room, Nadia and the children following, that he realized she had simply gotten older.
Alone in the room now, Crono walked around and looked at the product of years of tinkering and collecting. Lucca had certainly kept busy. He wandered over to the machine she’d been working on before she left. To his eyes it appeared to be a random assortment of pipes, levers, and keyboards. Some parts seemed to have limited locomotion, and steam would occasionally blast out from an exposed tube. Wires stretched all over the contraption, marked with little sticky notes labeling them in an untidy scrawl which was as indecipherable as the machine itself. He felt slightly ill looking at the mess. His own room had always been relatively tidy. He was somewhat compulsive about the order of his space. He needed things to be simple in order to function. He wondered how the children who lived here fared, and suddenly imagined an entire house of Luccas, all as disorderly and chaotic as her.
He could hear her voice now, coming from the other room. She was talking to Nadia about Kidd, the little girl she’d found in the woods near her home a year ago, the girl whom she believed had some connection with the events they’d all been involved in five years ago. The girl who had the same pendant around her neck that Nadia wore, the pendant of the royal family passed down by the Zealians. How the pendant could exist twice in the same era (for Nadia still wore hers) was a baffling conundrum. Lucca, of course, had her theories, but Crono tended to try and steer her away from such postulations. They made his head hurt.
When she’d first found Kidd, it had seemed to Crono that Lucca viewed the child as simply a fascinating paradox. The very fact that Lucca hadn’t simply named the child Kid, as if categorizing her, seemed to support this theory, but listening to her coo over the child in the other room, Crono had to admit that Lucca seemed to have real feelings for the child. Nadia wasn’t saying much in response and Crono imagined the pain she had to be feeling. He knew that Nadia longed for a child. She had become pregnant shortly after their marriage, but the birth had ended prematurely, and she hadn’t shown signs of carrying a child since.
Though their child had never made it into the world alive, Crono still felt strangely attached to its memory. He tried not to think about it, but sometimes the sight of children would bring a sadness in his heart so strong that he would have to fight back tears. He and Nadia never talked about it. Each was left to their own longing. Even so, he prepared himself to silently support her when he heard them coming back into the room.
However, his concern proved unnecessary. The two girls were talking contentedly about nothing in particular. Seeing Nadia so seemingly carefree made Crono feel strongly displaced. He said little more until they left.
From: Fanfiction