When my daughter and I played, Vaan was the one who always ended up with the "feather of the Flock" and therefore had the ability to understand what the Cockatrices were saying. It's absolutely eaten my brain.
Oh! And if that wasn't enough to make you really nuts, I just worked out their calendar for FFXII, so I could use it for Ark of the Nethirym. And you know what, though their calendar seems to gel with ours in that it has 29 days. Problem is, it has something like 31 months in a year! THis is presuming the Old Valendian Calendar is the dating system used in the Project Memorandums during the Urutan-Yensa part of the game. Background info on the Calendar is sketchy. But the memorandums were dated over a 31 month progression.
So, that creates a conundrum--or two.
First, this means that Humes age slower in Ivalice than they do in the real world, because if they didn't, then Vaan's 17 years would actually equal nearly 44 years old. And he DOES NOT look nearly 44. This comes from comparing total months. A 17 year old in the real world is 204 months old. Whereas if Ivalice's calendar works as I suspect, according to the Project Memorandums, then a 17 year old there is 527 months old--or in our terms, 43.9 years old. Ergo, they must age a lot slower than we do. Lets not even talk about how old that makes Basch, otherwise.
And Secondly, This means that if the game's adventure happened within a year's time according to the Old Valendian Calendar (which is what the Archadians use at very least. And since it was set up at the turn of the original Galtean Alliance, then it is probable the rest of Ivalice uses it too.) Then it didn't happen in slightly less than 12 months, it happened in slightly less than 31 months. And considering the Calendar month has 29 days, that is a lot more time to form a bond between comrades (or lovers) than I had thought at first. THat means that Vaan and Balthier could have spent as little as 90 (three months) or as much as 800+ days (30 months) together--depending on how long you think the chronology of the game runs.
It also means that after the fall of the Bahamut, it was 899 days before Balthier and Fran reclaimed the Strahl. And in terms of my post game fic, it means that it was probably close to 1800 days between the fall of the Bahamut and when Vaan finds the Nethirym Shard.
Wow....
Okay, my brain hurts now. I stops.
Walks off rubbing skull wondering why I can't just write fic without researching it.... This can only end in tears....