Page 30 - coversp09

Lone Wolf of the Sword
By Richard Soloyna
As a player of the game
we don’t know a whole lot about Beatrix; we know that she has a good heart in spite of her somewhat dismissive attitude. She was per- haps my favorite supporting char- acter from Final Fantasy IX; she was very enigmatic, and here I am just extrapolating her character.
days as an inexperienced dueler I was hailed as having a near- aw- less skill. Like all youths, I was pleased with the compliments, and pushed myself to the limits. I began to seek ghts— ghts with anyone and anything capable of taking me on. I fought out of anger, unhappi- ness and a dire need to express my- self. I left behind the friends who couldn’t understand and set out on my own. But then again, how could they understand? Even I didn’t know precisely what I felt. How- ever, I knew one thing for sure: my aggression was my freedom.
I cannot a warrior be...
It’s not my nature, nor my teaching It is the womanhood in me
As years went by, my expertise was requested by Queen Brahne. Defending Alexandria and the royals became the focus of all my thoughts. To me, anything and everything that interfered with my duty had to be (and was) elimi- nated. My only companion was the haughty captain of the Knights of Pluto. At rst, our only com- munications were the necessities, but...well, things changed a bit,
I suppose. We became almost, all due emphasis on ‘almost’, friends. But at the festival for Her High- ness’ birthday...
conniving mind all his own.
He was shrewd and clever
Why do we ght? As a child, I had initially despised
I watched helplessly as Queen Brahne drowned in her own greed, and I was alone: Steiner had left long ago to rescue the run- away princess. Around this time my conscience—or, rather, a few wise words of Steiner from long ago— nally protruded through the surface. Following the destruction of Cleyra, I defected and left them to destroy one another...my loyalty to Alexandria, not to the evil that had befallen it.
violence or con ict of any sort to get ahead; peaceful means were
far greater to my liking. I was truly placid when I was younger. Fight- ing seemed to me to be a brutal and unnecessary last resort.
I am known for my “lack of feeling”. Lack of feeling? I don’t believe that at all; I simply consider myself to be imperturbable. It is not at all a lack of feeling; it’s merely a refusal to submit to the vulnerabil- ity that comes with accepting emo- tion. But my heart is lighter now that I am on the side of justice, and I say my name with pride. I am not Beatrix, t he terrifying sword ghter from the dark halls of corrupted Alexandria. I am Beatrix, the lone wolf of the sword.
I can and will a warrior be,
I was a shy and lonely girl, With the heavens in my eyes, And as I walked along the lake, I heard the echoes of her cries
I cannot ght
It wasn’t until the death of my parents that I found myself vul- nerable. In the years before, vulner- ability would not have bothered me in the slightest, but it had been that exact same trait—no, not a trait, it was a aw—that had resulted in the death of those that loved me most.
I cannot a warrior be...
It’s not my nature, nor my teaching It is the womanhood in me.
I was a lost and angry youth, There were no tears in my eyes,
I saw no justice in my world,
Only the echoes of her cries
I cannot ght
I picked up my rst sword soon after, and even in my early
I am an older woman now And I will heed my own cries And I will a erce warrior be Till not another woman dies
It is my nature and my duty, It is the womanhood in me. I can and will ght
I can and will a warrior be, It is my nature and my duty, It is the sisterhood in me.
I can and will ght It was soon after that Queen
Brahne began her vicious rampage on the world. Her right hand man was a demon who, in my opinion, feigned his courage and thought little about his schemes. I believed Kuja to be an overcon dent, un- derestimating servant with a dark
2008/2009
29
(more so than I preferred to admit), and I wondered how the queen remained so blissfully unaware
of his traitorous ways. However, my expectations were horribly wrong—each believed they were pulling it over the other.