Authors Note: I love the movie Atlantis. Especially Milo. He is my favorite character, and I had been planning to write an Atlantis fic for sometime when a pretty odd idea for one popped into my head. For a few days, I toyed with the thought of Milo in Atlantis after the end of the movie, and I finally came up with a plot I was satisfied with. I have written a few other fics and thought this would be easy. I thought wrong. I am a good fanfiction author as I can copy other author's styles really easily. A movie, however, does not have a narrative style. I have written this four different times, in four different styles and perspectives. This is the best I could do, so don't crucify me.
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Milo lay, pale as death, on the stone slab. To an outsider, it would have looked quite uncomfortable, but the Atlantians had covered it with gray sheets and pillows. His chest barely rose up and down and the young man seemed to be sweating slightly in his unconscious effort to breathe. His periwinkle blue robes were immaculate, and gave no sign of how long this body, so near death, had been lying in the same state.
Kida stood by his side. She was not a patient woman at the best of times, and now she paced back and forth by the edge of her best friend's bed. Milo had made the decision to stay with her in Atlantis less than a month ago, and for the first week, it had been the happiest time of Kida's life. Milo taught her to read, and write, in her native language, and together, they spent hours pouring over the books in the remains of the palace library. She took him exploring in the ruins of the old city, which had just recently been drained of water. He told her of new inventions, such as the telephone, the engine, and the electric light, while she taught him ancient Atlantian games and told him stories of the Greeks, Egyptians and Aztecs. For the first days they were together, they wondered constantly how they had survived without the other.
But slowly, a change began to come over Milo, and he began to grow sick. In the early stages, no one noticed how at night he would cough constantly in his sleep, or pale slightly with any exertion, but when he could no longer walk a short distance without running short of breath, Kida began to worry about her friend's health. No one in Atlantis had ever suffered anything more than the most minor cold, the crystal took care of that. And Doctor was just a title, and all the doctors had fallen out of practice of the old remedies long ago. Any attempt to heal Milo with the aid of the crystal just seemed to aggravate the situation.
Kida grew frantic as one of the city's doctors after another tried, and failed, to cure her friend. Her only confidant was Kamila, a palace guard. Kamila knew how much Kida cared for Milo and was willing to do what ever she could to help.
Kamila walked into Milo's bedchambers carrying a tray with a hot drink and plate of grilled fish for Kida.
"What is wrong?" Kida said lifelessly with out turning her head, as she always did when her friend entered the room.
"Come eat Kida, you need food," Kamila said softly.
"I'm not hungry," Kida replied.
"Is there another doctor today?"
"No. There are no more doctors in the city," Kida replied, her voice full of anger.
"Is there nothing they can do?"
"No, there is nothing they can do!" Kida nearly shouted. "If they could have done something, Milo would not by lying like this!" She spat the last word as if it were something to be gotten rid of as soon as possible and gestured violently at the immobile body lying silently on the bed. She grimaced and put her head in her hands, ashamed by her sudden outburst.
"There must be something someone can do for him!" Kamila said, trying to be helpful, but feeling horribly as if she were failing.
"No. The only way would be if the doctors could remember the time when we cared for outsiders with similar symptoms. But that information was lost. They only way to recover it would be..." Kida had been speaking listlessly but suddenly, she jumped up, he eyes bright. "Would be the writing! In the library! Oh, why didn't I think of it before?"
And with that, Kida rushed from the room, her blue skirt flailing out behind her. Kamila rushed after her yelling, "But no one can read the old language! What do you plan to do?"
Panting, Kamila pushed open the library door to find her friend already combing the shelves of hundreds of books for something that might help.
"But Milo has taught me to read! Now, you must help me."
"But how?" Kamila asked. "I can not read!"
"Look through the books I pull out for pictures of people like Milo," Kida commanded, her royal air returning for the first time in days now that she had something to do. "And hurry. It may already be to late."
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Many hours later, the two young women sat at a long wooden table, surrounded by piles of books. Books of all sizes littered the woven purple rug on the stone floor and piles more at high on the table. For over seven hours, they had been pouring through any old records that looked useful, but to no avail. Kida was finally giving up hope again and Kamila's eyelids drooped as she looked at picture after picture. It wasn't until Kamila's head dropped onto the table in a stupor that Kida decided to call it a day.
"Wake up," she commanded, shaking her friend. Kamila groggily raised her head and gave Kida a wry look.
"We should go to see how Milo is," Kida said, by way of excusing herself from failing to find an answer. Kamila looked bemusedly at her and yawned and stood up, following Kida from the library. Just before they left, however, Kida turned one last time to look around the room in the vain hope that some solution might present itself. Kamila, not realizing that Kida had stopped, walked right into her and knocked her right into a bookshelf. Books toppled bown from the fifteen-foot high case and Kida and Kamila ducked and covered their heads. When the thudding had stopped, Kida got up and gave Kamila a playful punch on the arm and set to straightening up the books. Apologetically, Kamila got down on her hands and knees to help. Suddenly, she let out a gasp.
"Kida! I don't believe it! Look!" and she handed Kida a book, which had fallen open to a page of a man. A man who looked as if he had the same condition as Milo. Kida goggled at the picture.
"Read it," Kamila whispered. "Read it out loud."
Kida took the book back to the table and Kamila, suddenly wide-awake, followed her. Kida not daring to take her eyes away from the page, lest it disappear, began to read the faded, handwritten script.
Long ago, when the five sets of twin sons of the god Poseidon split this continent into ten parts and named it Atlantis, no one could have possibly imagined that it would one day grow to be the greatest civilization in the world. Today, however, nearly 15,000 years after the great water god blessed this nation with the gift of the crystal, the Atlantians control all the trade, all the power and all the wealth of the world. Everyday, hundreds of people would flock to our great city to learn, trade, and view our arts. We have fine lodgings for these travelers to stay in and food for them to eat, but when these outsiders stay to long in our city, they become quite ill, suffering at first from fever and cold-like symptoms, but prolonged effects are comas and finally death.
At this Kamila gasped and Kida looked at her and her eyes seemed to say, "As if we didn't know it all along." Kamila tuned her eyes down and Kida continued reading.
At first no one was sure what this was cause by, but after extensive research, our best doctors and scientists found that when foreigners stay for long periods of time, they crystal, which has a mind of it's own, believes this person to be a new resident of Atlantis and tries to take their soul under it's protection. However, only one of true Atlantian blood can be successfully accepted by the crystal, and if the visitor does not leave the city immediately at the first sign of the disease, they put themselves in mortal danger. As their body fights to reject the powerful crystal's protection, it slowly eats itself away, unable to completely resist the crystal's power.
"Milo is being killed by the very thing he worked so hard to save," cried Kamila with tears in her eyes.
Kida, however, stood up and looked determined. She turned to Kamila and said, "well, there is only one thing to do then."
Kamila looked up, startled by the sudden authority in her friend's voice.
"We must contact the other outsides and send him back."
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AN (again): I am NOT planing on killing Milo. I love the guy. As I said he's my favorite character. But I'm having trouble writing this, and I don't want to take the time away from my other work to write something crappy. So if you like it and want more, please Please PLEASE review this story. Otherwise, it'll be gone. Oh, and one more thing, Kamila is pronounced with the stress on the "Ka" like Camelot. The name is NOT Camilla. Thanks!
~Meaghan