Life can be understood backwards;

But it must be lived forward.

AVALON WAS SITTING IN THE CAR WATCHING THE TREES AND OCEAN GO BY, she stares forward listening to the background music. Letting out a breath, she leans back stretching her arms over her head. Looking up at the sky as the clouds passed by. Her hair flying back against the wind, smacking against the car and her face. 

They were on their way to Duscae, the Wetlands and it was taking a little longer to get there than normal. At least in Avalon's mind. Letting out another quiet sigh, she looks back down seeing Noctis sleeping, Gladio reading his book, Ignis driving and Prompto on his phone. 

"Augh, I'm bored." Avalon mutters under her breath. "When are we going to get to the Chocobo Post?"

"Shouldn't be too much longer, Avalon." Ignis responds back to her question. "About another five minutes at most."

Avalon nods and sighs looking back up at the sky. She felt a little raindrop hit her face and she flinched. She blinks a couple times as she felt another couple of drops. Ignis sees this, and presses a button making the roof cover them from the rain. Avalon takes out her phone and looks at it intently, wondering who would ever call her. 

After five minutes of driving, the gang arrived at the Chocobo Post. Avalon smiles as Gladio got out and she followed soon after and they began walking up to the Post.

"Excuse me, we'd like to ride some Chocobos." Prompto asked the man as soon as he saw someone. 

The man turned to them with a small frown. "The Chocobos, huh? I hate to break it ya'll but we can't permit our birds to leave the Post." The man informed them. "Not while Deadeye's still about. He's an uncommonly ferocious behemoth that's taken to prowlin' these parts of late." The man sighs a little bit. "His scent makes our birds nervous an' to prevent accidents an' tragedies, we have no choice but to suspend rentals."

Avalon sighs a little looking at her childhood friend's face as it held a small frown. "But hold on-" The man started once more, Avalon looked at him. "Are you lads, and lass, hunters that have been makin' a mark? You reckon you can handle the likes of Deadeye?"

Avalon smiles seeing Prompto face light up. As they began heading towards Deadeye's lair, Avalon began to feel nervous. Something about this mission set her anxiety up. Letting out a quiet breath, she heard a loud growl in the distance.

"The hell?" questioned Gladio as they all stopped. 

Avalon looked up seeing a tree falling in the distance as well, she was sure the men heard it too. "Something's amiss."

"C'mon." Gladio encouraged everyone as they nod and continue going. Avalon bit her lip gently as they continued onward. 

As they continued, they heard another loud growl. "Geez, that thing sounds very unhappy." Avalon commented quietly with a frown painting on her face. Avalon noticed the further they went in, the heavier the fog got. The made her more nervous than she already was. 

When they got to a place where they had to crawl through. Gladio stopped Noctis from going a little further. Avalon, of course, understood why. Gladio motioned everyone to follow his lead; Gladio went first, then Noctis, followed by Ignis, Avalon and Prompto. Biting her lip, she could hear her heartbeat in her ears. She wondered if anyone else could hear it. While quietly crawling through the thing, Gladio motioned everyone to stop. Avalon felt the stomps from the behemoth, quietly gulping the young girl looked up seeing the beast standing there shaking his head. 

She finally realized why he was called Deadeye. Biting her lip, the young girl watched the behemoth growl lowly as it was eating something. Gladio motioned everyone to move, Avalon quietly followed behind Ignis. She saw Gladio move to the side when the behemoth stomp and Avalon stopped moving seeing the snout in front of Noctis who stopped almost frozen. Avalon's eyes widen when Deadeye let out a very loud roar. Avalon bit her lip tightly trying to keep from moving any further until Gladio said so, she could feel the blood drop from her lip from the tooth impaling her lip.

When he motioned everyone to move, they all did so quickly and quietly. Avalon got out after Ignis feeling her heart pounding against her chest. She stared at the place where he walked off. 

"Missing an eye and a horn. That's why he's called Deadeye." Avalon informed everyone making Gladio nod. "Exactly, Vee." He added.

"We'll keep our distance until we exploit his blindspot then." Ignis added making everyone nod and follow Deadeye without being seen.

This lasted for about five minutes, tracking the behemoth in the fog was more troublesome than anything Avalon noted to herself. When they got to his lair, Avalon was deeply impressed but also curious on how they would catch the beast off-guard. Grabbing her staff, she began chanting quietly feeling everyone's energy spike a little bit. Smiling, she began listening to the plan of attack.

Everyone nodded at the plan, Noctis was to detonate one of the barrels to weaken the beast, Avalon and Prompto would try to distract it enough to guide him to the barrel while Ignis and Gladio help weigh it down with attacks. Taking a deep breath, Prompto and Avalon both head down there to find the ferocious beast standing tall on the peaks in front of them. Extending her staff, she stood tall with her best friend by her side.

"Ready Vee?" questioned the blond looking towards her. Avalon nods whistling towards the beast, the behemoth glances at them and roars loudly. "Bring it on!"

Prompto and Avalon saw the beast rushing to them, both friends ran to the nearest barrel while Ignis and Gladio jumped from the beasts blindside and knocked him down while Noctis tossed a fireball towards the barrel hearing it explode. Prompto held Avalon while the blast nearly knocked them off of their feet. They look back seeing the behemoth breathing heavily. Avalon walked away from Prompto and stayed enough away from the beast to stare into his eyes.

"Don't worry, you'll be fine. You've been through a lot but you won't hurt anymore." Avalon whispers to Deadeye. Avalon smiles towards him. "We'll see you on the other-side, Deadeye." Deadeye roars quietly one last time before dying.  

Smiling, Prompto jumps for joy. As they all walk away from Deadeye, Avalon couldn't help but feel bad for the beast. Stopping before anyone noticed, Avalon quietly runs towards the beast, touching his mane which felt dirty and matted. She whispered to him once more, and then ran away.

~

After getting back and reporting to Wiz about the behemoth now dead, he was more than happy to let them use Chocobos for riding pretty much anywhere. Prompto jumped for joy running to a bird and petting it's beak. Laughing a little bit, she walked up to one as well, it was a rare white one, she noted. She touched his beak and it let out a small kweh nudging more into her hand. She giggles as he nudges past her hand and into her stomach.

"Well, aren't you an affectionate one." She tells him with a giggle. He kweh's again leaning up pecking her nose a little bit. "Aww, I love you already."

"We better get going soon you two." Ignis tells them. Prompto and Avalon both groaned not wanting to leave. But they knew they would see their birds soon. "Hurry along now, we don't want to keep Iris waiting."

"Coming!" Both best friends chimed together as they look at their birds once more. "We'll see you soon, buddy." Avalon cooed to him hugging his neck close. "And then we'll have all kinds of fun together, yeah?"

He kweh's loudly making her laugh. Avalon begins walking away and got into the middle of the Regalia, they all waved towards the Post and headed back on the road to Lestallum.

~

A/N: Oh goodness, I'm so sorry this took so long to get published. I do have an idea how this is going to go - and I'm very sure you guys will either love it or hate it. WITH THAT BEING SAID, could a sad or happy ending. Who knows?

Anyway, I really loved how Avalon spoke to Deadeye during his last moments, it was sweet of her. She knows she has a knack to grieve for things who are hurting. But eh, we'll delve into that in the later chapters.

Let me know what you think of this chapter and this story if you would. I love my readers so much and you make it possible to write this!