The razor limb of the great insect whistled through the air in
search of its target. It would avenge its dead mate with what little
strength remained. Sadly, it was not nearly enough. Butz reflexively
sidestepped the strike and responded with an open palm blow to the
thing's head. It died as it fell next to its mate.
	Butz tore off a strip from his traveller's cloak to bind the cuts
across his left arm. As he bandaged his wound, he began to take in his
surroundings. The burning red of the skies immediately told him that he
was far from home.
	"Well, Boco, look where your master's foolish curiosity has led
us," Butz remarked to his companion.
	The chocobo's response was intoned more as a statement of
wonderment than as a chiding of his master. It was not so much his
master's previous action, which was the not so clean dispatching of a
pair of alien predators, that invoked this particular reaction, but the
fact that they were clearly far from Lix. The avian's eyes would not lie
fixed to any single spot. Boco vigorously scanned the land for even the
slightest grain of comfortable familiarity.
	As the bird searched, Butz kneeled down for a closer look at his
assailants. Having never been much of a scholar, Butz's only conclusions
were "big, green bugs".
	"At least they don't smell," he thought to himself. Still, he
regretted killing them. It was not so much the gash across his arm, and
it was damned painful, but a nest of grubs nearby. Apparently, he was the
one who had done the evil. A thousand he would curse Exdeath and the
nothingness which had led him here.
	He began to approach Boco's saddlebag for some food, when
suddenly the great bird shrieked. In the chocobo dialect of shrieks, coos,
and chirps, the words for "look over there" were not particularly easy on
human ears. Still, Butz had neither the opportunity to cover his ears,
nor the luxury of addressing the anguish in them. The chocobo began
running towards what he had seen. Butz reacted quickly to restrain the
chocobo. Unfortunately, he only managed to latch his hands on to the
saddle bag. The bag was fastened tightly to the bird, which could be
interpreted as boon or bane. Boco dragged Butz across the field in
blissful ignorance. Although this gave Butz a firsthand chance to survey
the new terrain, he noted with considerable displeasure that the dirt of
this world lacked the tangy aftertaste of the dirt back home. Eventually
the bird allowed his master to rest. Butz's mind began the formation of a
n above average scolding. "Bad Boco" just wouldn't do for a felony of
this scale. As his mind worked, his mouth began the unenviable task of
spitting out the dirt, with his shirt sleeve aiding with that hard-to-
reach dirt in between his teeth.
	He approached the bird with the perfect lecture, then saw the
object of Boco's attention. Boco was busy accosting a female chocobo (Butz
was one of the few humans who could differentiate on sight). The lecture
long gone from his thoughts, Butz gave Boco a healthy smack over the head.
"Now what would Coco and kids think?" he asked the chocobo. Butz was
completely oblivious to the approaching figure.