#when yda and papalymo get back she does thank thekm but throws an ear of corn at both their faces

[hqmillioncorn]

I cannot bear to see you fall

Babycorn stopped dead in her tracks with a scream, falling backwards into a pile of leaves.  “Woah! I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you!” The strange miqo'te that had caught Babycorn by surprise leapt from the trees and landed right in front of her. “Here! Let me help you up!” He held his hand out and pulled Babycorn back up onto her two feet. “My name’s G’nash by the way! Nice to meet you!”  Babycorn was still a little stunned, too stunned to speak.  Uninterrupted, G’nash continued to speak. “Sorry about scaring you again! It’s just…” He nervously tugged on his singular sleeve. “You probably don’t want to go that way. Some of the people over there can be really mean.”  “What do you mean?” Babycorn finally managed to ask. “Just…” G’nash hesitated for a second. “I mean I wouldn’t go over there. Unless I didn’t have a choice or something…”

ffxiv write day 3: Tempest

in a way theres a lot cherrypit doesnt understand about the world more than babycorn doesnt understand. hes still growing after all.

At the same time theres also things he can see that other people cant.

Cherrypit noticed a change in his sister almost immediately.

It’s a little hard to spend your entire life (and semi-afterlife) with someone and not notice these sorts of things. 

Being as young as he was, his attention to small details wasn’t the greatest. If he had to guess when this all started it would have to be sometime during their second trip to Gridania. At the time he had been distracted by a cool looking table he was thinking about biting. “Yummy…” He babbled to himself. 

The sound of his sister raising her voice was enough to make him jump on top of the table in surprise.

When he looked towards her voice he saw her talking with another tall person he didn’t know. 

“I’m going out of my way to help you! Not like any of you even deserve it!” 

Neither Cherrypit or Babycorn would have had any idea that she was yelling at a wood wailer. The protectors of Gridinia itself and who were also very notoriously very wary of any outsider. He hadn’t heard anything before Babycorn’s outburst. 

It was the first time in a very long time that Cherrypit had heard her voice that loud before. 

At this point Cherrypit’s desire to bite the table was long gone. Instead he was far more interested in potentially biting the leg of the person talking to his sister. He didn’t understand a lot of the words coming out of their mouth but he could feel that most of them weren’t very nice. 

Not a lot of people were nice to his sister. It always made him a little sad whenever people would stare at her a certain way. 

Before Cherrypit had the chance to act on his thoughts the wood wailer had made their exit. As they did, Cherrypit stuck out his tongue. That would show em’! 

“Stop calling me that! My name is Babycorn Corn!!” Babycorn screamed out. “I’m not an adventurer…” That last part was said as quietly as she could.

From behind her desk Mother Miounne tried her best to defuse Babycorn’s anger. Not that there was no reason for her to be mad after being told she couldn’t be trusted. There just seemed to be something else there. Another reason why Babycorn was taking this so personally. 

“I’m sorry about that-” Mother Miounne wasn’t about to get halfway through her apology before Babycorn turned around and stomped out of the building. 

Just before she was out of sight Babycorn turned around and shot a glare at Miounne. A way to try and let her know that while she was doing what she asked her to–Babycorn wasn’t happy about it. “Let’s get this thing over with.” It was a chore for gil and food. Nothing more. 

As Babycorn walked away, Cherrypit waddled right after her. 

Once he was walking beside her, he noticed her hands were shaking. They were balled up into a pair of fists. Her eyes were wide as she looked straight at the ground. “Bebe?” Cherrypit raised one of his oversized sleeves up to her. Babycorn liked to hold hands when they were scared and right now she looked terrified. 

Babycorn gasped and took Cherrypit’s hand, walking towards a big blue (and tasty looking) crystal surrounded by a large crowd. It was strange. Usually his sister always told him they needed to stay away from lots of people. 

Once Babycorn had done what she had needed to do she took off with Cherrypit again. This time she picked him up and held him close to her as she took off to who knows where. 

Whenever someone would walk past them Babycorn would glare at them. Occasionally when someone would stare just a little bit longer than usual she would look right back at them and either growl or make it seem like she would bite them if they got any closer.

Sometimes even both! 

Cherrypit wondered if his sister was sad about something. Or maybe she was mad. Like when they would get chased by scary people yelling at them. One time one of them threw something sharp at his sister. It really hurt her and Babycorn didn’t want to talk to anyone after that. 

All Babycorn would do was stare at people walking by and tell them they deserved what was coming to them. Today sort of felt something like that. 

It was like a little storm cloud was constantly hovering over her head. 

Just as the idea crossed Cherrypit’s head, he felt Babycorn stop. He looked around to see where they were. There were no people around unlike just a few minutes ago when it felt like they were surrounded. 

Now they were somewhere else Cherrypit didn’t recognize but they were still in Gridania, he could feel it. There were some toys on the ground and a lot of weird shapes all around them all made of wood. If Babycorn hadn’t been hugging him so tightly he would have run off to play on them and bite as much as he could. 

He heard his sister let out a sniffle. Cherrypit felt Babycorn lay her head on top of his, ruffling his hair. “I’m really sorry Cherry…” Babycorn whispered. “Are you doing okay? Are you tired?” It had been almost a straight trip from Limsa Lominsa to here without almost no rest. Even Babycorn had to admit she was a little exhausted from everything. 

Cherrypit chewed on his oversized sleeve and thought about it. He didn’t feel sleepy. He felt like running around looking at everything he could. “Play!” Cherrypit happily said. He turned to look at his sister and put both of his sleeved hands on her cheeks. “Play! Play!” 

At this point the dark circles under Babycorn’s eyes were just something Cherrypit assumed had always been there. 

Babycorn gave her brother a small smile. The first in a long time. “Okay Cherry.” She grabbed his hands and held them as tightly as she could. “We’ll play when we’re all done. Okay?” 

“Okay!” Cherrypit repeated. That was enough for him. 

Things got both better and worse when they joined the scions of the seventh dawn.

All of a sudden there were so many new people that Cherrypit didn’t know. At first he was a little scared of them all but as time went on he was able to see that they were really nice. Some of them gave him candy and treats! Others would tell him really funny stories! 

And a lot of them were really fun to scare!

The only big problem was that Cherrypit could tell that the storm cloud over Babycorn’s head had grown in size. Getting bigger and bigger every day they spent helping the scions with things. 

No matter what they asked her to do, Babycorn always found something to complain about. Sometimes she would even go so far as to insult the scions, all of them. Most of them would brush her off. The only one that would really get on her case about being rude to Minfilia was Thancred. 

Or as Cherrypit knew them, ‘Mini’ and ‘Thanky.’ 

Every night Cherrypit would hear Babycorn whispering to herself that tomorrow would be the day they finally would have enough of her. That tomorrow they would finally get kicked out. The only problem was that Cherrypit liked it here but if his sister wanted to leave then he would have to go with her. 

There had to be some reason she didn’t like it here…

Cherrypit knew that Babycorn got into a lot more fights than just with Thancred. He didn’t really understand what the fights were about. In Cherrypit’s opinion there was nothing worth fighting with people for unless it was for extra candy for dinner. 

Fighting just wasn’t for him. Playing with people was a lot more fun!

There was a nice talking piece of armor that sometimes played with him. He had a funny name but Cherrypit just liked to call him Big. Sometimes Babycorn would even join in too! She would walk up next to Big and hold her leg out for him to trip over. Big would fall onto the ground with a funny noise that made Cherrypit laugh. 

Then Cherrypit would be able to jump up and down on Big, sort of like a big trampoline that didn’t actually bounce you anywhere! At least until someone else would come over and tell them they weren’t allowed to do that. 

Which was strange because it was a lot of fun!

While they were being told not to do that, Cherrypit would notice a strange smile on Babycorn’s face. It wasn’t the sort of smile that she usually gave him. It didn’t make her look like she was happy. Usually the person talking to them would get even louder when Babycorn would start to smile like that.

Especially if Babycorn was talking with Lunya. 

There was just something about those two that set the other off. Even Cherrypit could tell. It almost started to feel like a necessity that the two had to argue over something every day. 

Cherrypit didn’t understand it. As she chewed on his sleeves he wondered if there was anything else they were going to do today. (he had a short track mind) He looked over to his sister who had just stormed off from fighting with Lunya over her not bothering to carry emergency potions with her. 

As Cherrypit waddled behind Babycorn he looked at something he noticed the first day they arrived. He noticed it, but he still didn’t get why Lunya of all people also had her own storm cloud over her head.

“So what’s the secret?”

“Bwrah?” Cherrypit took the cookie out of his mouth and stared at Yda in silence. Both of them were on the ground, seemingly already having a conversation before this. Yda was lying on her stomach, kicking her legs back and forth. “You know-! The secret to being Babycorn’s friend! She’s always so nice to you–I figured you would have some advice.”

Cherrypit chewed on his cookie and looked around. 

Papalymo gave a heavy sigh and finally looked up from the book he was fake-reading from. “Why are you asking a baby this question?” 

“Because Cherry is the only one Babycorn is nice to!” Yda sat up and scoffed. The answer seemed so obvious why couldn’t her partner see it? 

The older lalafell looked at Yda and then over to Cherrypit, who was very busy making his chocolate chip cookie as soggy as he could using his own drool. As disgusting as that was, it only helped prove Papalymo’s point. “I believe the answer to your question would be to simply have been born as Cherry instead.” 

“That can’t be the only solution!” 

“The girl doesn’t even call us by the right names.” The idea that Babycorn would suddenly turn around and like them with one simple trick given to them by a baby sounded as impossible as it was actually pulling it off. “We’re just going to have to live with it.”

Having finished his cookie off Cherrypit moved to chewing on his chocolate stained sleeves. “...Corn!” He suddenly squeaked out. 

Yda sprang to her feet with a gasp. “That’s it!!”

“What’s it?” Papalymo was almost afraid to find out. 

“We get her corn! As a sign of friendship and camaraderie!” 

“Doesn’t she have enough of it in her hair?” 

“She could always have more!” Yda helpfully added. Right after saying that she took off running, leaving Papalymo in the dust. “Y-Yda?! Wait a second-?!” He struggled for a second to climb off of the crate he had been sitting on, making sure to take his weapon just in case they ran into trouble. Neglecting to also take his wallet. 

As Cherrypit watched both of them disappear off into the night he wondered if Yda’s plan would ever work. He hadn’t been lying in saying that corn made his sister happy. He remembered it used to make her really happy back when they lived with their mama and papa but it had been a long time since they had eaten it. 

“Bebe…” He really hoped it would work. 

It would be nice if more people could make his sister smile.