Disclaimer: I do not own characters such as Yuffie, Gado, or any other Final Fantasy characters. All characters are copyright their respective owners. (So don't come to me)
This is my first attempt at a one-shot story, and I hope it will be successful. I do not want this story to wind up like squalmasy's I Promise (22,000+ words), so if it starts winding up that way, expect a rather sudden end. Just a warning, I'll try to avoid that at all costs.
Yuffie deserves her own story because she is so kickass, doncha think?
Totally Ninjas
The water was calm, not a ripple disturbed its pristine surface, even as a young woman stood in its midst, waist-deep. The materia lifted off of the girl's palm and into the air, glowing a soft blue. Without moving, the girl concentrated on the materia above her hand, and she felt a strange warmth come from it. Just a bit more…
Snapping her eyes open, Yuffie Kisaragi launched the materia into the air with but a thought, the surface of the river underneath Wutai erupting into a pillar of liquid fury, raining down forcibly back into its riverbed. Raising her arm into the air, the river swept up in an awesome display of ribbons of water and coalesced into a massive orb of water above the town. Spreading her arms and closing her eyes to the sky, the orb exploded into the form of a massive dragon with wings the size of small houses, and a great roaring noise could be heard for miles. Yuffie closed her arms and the dragon reformed into the orb of water and it slowly filtered down, back into the riverbed once more. The "Flood" Materia floated back down to the ninja girl and she snatched it out of midair before turning and heading back to her house at the eastern edge of town. The girl ignored the wild cheers of the people of the town as she headed back to her pad.
Yuffie had been awarded quite the stash of materia after Meteor, and she had sold most of the precious stones to put money into Wutai's economy, so that it could once again be a boisterous town that did not bend the whim of tourists. She had kept a few of the materia for herself, and had been practicing with it for the seven months since Meteor, surpassing what would be seen as normal levels of mastery of the gems. Such displays as water dragons, flaming butterflies, and, Yuffie's personal favorite, a light that resembled the face of a certain delicate woman with a pink ribbon in her ponytail, were often seen on Da Chao Statue or in the riverbed of Wutai, as the young ninja practiced.
Lord Gado had given Yuffie command of the Five Gods Pagoda, claiming his daughter as the strongest warrior that Wutai had ever produced. Yuffie didn't know about that – she'd read of some great warriors in ancient times, and doubted that she was truly better than them. She wasn't a humble person in the least – she just hated being praised unduly.
Yuffie reached her house on the eastern edge of town and noticed a note on her front door, written in a woman's handwriting. It read, Your title is mine, Kisaragi!
Confused, Yuffie headed into her house and onto the mat in the back of the den for a nap.
Yuffie awoke two and a half hours later, awake and alert. She exited her house and headed for the Pagoda, as she was to wait for any challengers that made it to the fifth floor. That never happened, as the other four members of the Pagoda were able to defeat every challenger that they encountered. Yuffie had not seen a challenger in the four months that she had been the fifth god of the Pagoda.
Once Yuffie reached her spot on the fifth floor, she sat cross-legged on the floor and began to practice once more with her materia, this time focusing on using light as a barrier to better defend herself and others. Since the Meteor incident, Yuffie had stopped caring so much about herself and more about the welfare of others, but she only did it if it benefited her.
So maybe, just maybe, she hadn't changed very much in the past months.
Two hours passed as Yuffie practiced her magic and it finally came to pass that she heard a knock on the staircase door.
This was unorthodox, as no one but former fifth gods could enter the fifth floor of the Pagoda unless a challenger had reached it through defeating the other four gods.
Yuffie gasped. Had someone defeated the other four? Was she actually going to be tested?
Staniv appeared in the doorway in his aquamarine robes, turning and finding his spot along the western wall of the room. Chekov followed him, stopping in his redviolet robes a few feet away from Staniv. Shake, in his sun yellow robes, and Gorky, in his grey robes, followed suit.
Yuffie was confounded. There was a challenger! Who could have defeated the other four? Yuffie's eyes moved to face the stairs. Her eyes went wide when she took in her challenger's appearance.
A young girl, about Yuffie's age, appeared in a bright yellow sundress. She had auburn hair that flipped up at the sides as if gigantic hair rollers had been glued in place and ripped out quickly. She had brilliant green eyes and a massive set of nunchaku strapped to her back. Her face was chipper and bright, and her eyes shone with excitement.
"So you're the final guardian of Da Chao?" this new girl asked Yuffie, inspecting her from afar.
Yuffie didn't know what to say. She choked on her words as she thought of them. Eventually, she nodded, her eyes not moving from the girl.
"My name is Selphie Tilmitt," the challenger said, holding out her hand to Yuffie. "I'm your challenger this afternoon."
Yuffie didn't take Selphie's hand. Instead, her eyes switched from astounded to ticked off. How dare a challenger be so carefree about conquering this Pagoda! Yuffie had even had some semblance of respect when she ran up the stairs and faced her father Gado at the top. This girl just seemed to be playing around, like this was an interesting thing to do that she decided to do yesterday.
Yuffie lifted into the air, into a spin, landing daintily on her feet behind Selphie, her massive shuriken at the ready. Her eyes were full of grudge and she intended to release such a grudge. "Get ready, kid," the Wutainese ninja girl cried. "This is where we get serious!"
Yuffie held her arms out and several small orbs began to float around her. Materia began to glow from eight different points around here. "Ready?" Yuffie asked rhetorically. "Omni-Change!" she cried, and the materia converged on her shuriken, enhancing it. Its brilliant four points shimmered in the yellow lighting of the tower's lanterns and Yuffie stood at the ready.
Selphie nodded, her smile not dimming a smidge. She whipped her nunchaku out in an impressively display of mastery, landing in a stance that was ready to rumble. She held one end of the nunchaku at her side, away from her opponent, and the other perpendicular to her body.
Yuffie's memory became mildly fuzzy from there, as the two of them engaged in a deadly dance of flashing bladed shurikens and wildly-swinging nunchaku. Selphie would toss one end of the nunchaku out to hit Yuffie aside the head, who would backflip out of danger and counter with a boomerang shuriken, which Selphie either parried using the metal of her weapon or ducking under the blades themselves before countering herself. The two of them fought for what seemed to Yuffie like hours, but mere minutes had lapsed by the time that Selphie had begun to tire.
"What, giving up already?" Yuffie mocked, breathing slightly heavier than usual. A sardonic grin was plastered to her face.
Selphie responded with a grin, despite her heavy breathing. "I'm just getting warmed up!" she cried, flinging one end of the nunchaku towards her opponent. As it traveled towards Yuffie, the tip of the weapon burst into colorful flame that enveloped the entire end of the chained weapon. Yuffie dodged into a backflip, narrowly missing being singed by the flaming object, but she could still feel the heat of the flame graze her legs as she avoided it.
Yuffie landed low to the ground, her eyes narrowed. "Bad pun, kid," she growled. Yuffie kicked off with her legs, forcing herself high into the air into a display of aerial acrobatics that would make a hummingbird jealous, coming out of her spin with a downward slash with her shuriken. Selphie rolled to the side and flung out her nunchaku, whacking Yuffie upside the head. Pain exploded from Yuffie's skull and she cried out in anguish as she missed her landing, falling into a somersault on the floor. She was up and on her feet in no time, but she was disoriented.
Selphie noticed this window of opportunity. The girl in the sundress placed the ends of her nunchaku together and concentrated. After a moment, she snapped the chain taut and a strange presence filled the room.
Electricity crackled from nowhere, lightning striking the ground and walls of the Pagoda. Yuffie shook her head, clearing her vision, and noticed a massive bolt crash into the ground in front of her, between her and her challenger. The lightning continued to pulse into the floor at one point until it began to take a different form, gaining massive wings and beautiful tail feathers. Yuffie was surprised, but she wasn't about to let some summon creature get the best of her.
Electricity continued to crackle around the tower's final floor before the summon creature reared its head back and threw bolts of lightning towards the ninja girl. Yuffie did an impressive display of acrobatics to avoid them, but the second volley of lightning was much faster than the second, and she was hit by three separate bolts.
Yuffie's eyes snapped open and her vision was filled with electricity as she cleared her sight, only to see Selphie's summon creature charging up for a third volley. When it finally threw it forward, Yuffie noticed that it was immediately different than the other two volleys. This was not a barrage of small lightning bolts, it was a massive ball of lightning that began floating in the air towards the airspace over Yuffie's head. Yuffie had a bad feeling about it.
A certain encrusted jewel on Yuffie's weapon began to shimmer and, with a simple hand motion, Yuffie cast a wall of light that would dim the effects of the lightning blast. She didn't take any chances, however, and rolled backwards along the floor to avoid as much as possible. The lightning centered over where Yuffie had been moments before and unleashed a massive jolt of lightning straight into the floor that exploded into a sphere of electricity that surely would have fricasseed the ninja. Auxiliary bolts of lightning were halted by Yuffie's magical encasing, so she was unscathed through the assault of lightning. The summon creature folded its wings and was gone in a flash of lightning, leaving the battlefield back to Selphie and the lord of the Pagoda.
Yuffie decided that it was time to end this. She turned away from Selphie and ran straight at the door, narrowly avoiding running Shake down (not that Yuffie would have minded hospitalizing the runt) and charging up the opposite wall. Selphie was astounded by what she saw: Yuffie was literally running up the wall of the floor. The ninja girl continued up the wall until she reached the intersection of the wall and the ceiling, turned, and kicked off with great force, sailing straight down at Selphie, her shuriken brandished as if it were a sword.
Selphie wasn't expecting quite a move, and Yuffie's shuriken struck its mark, cutting into Selphie's left arm. Selphie cried out and dodged backwards as Yuffie sprung up from her landing somersault into a vertical leap into the air and a forceful downward slash that barely missed her challenger. Blood trickled down Selphie's left arm from the wound, but she continued to hold her nunchaku as before, ready for action. Yuffie had to admire the girl's confidence, but this was beginning to get annoying.
Selphie struck out with her nunchaku, this time imbued with the essence of what seemed to be smoke. Yuffie attempted to roll away, but the weapon tagged her foot. It hurt, but Yuffie was more worried about the impending shadow that overtook her body and made it nearly impossible to see Selphie.
How did it go? Yuffie strained her memory to remember the special skill that a friend of hers had taught her a while back, but nothing came to her. She thought she saw something fly towards her, and attempted to dodge, successfully avoided being hit by the end of the nunchaku at the top of the head. Twirling around and bringing the shuriken up in a defensive position, Yuffie continued to think.
Selphie almost felt sorry for her opponents who fall victim to what she liked to call "Darkstrike," which enveloped their eyes in a permanent shadow that prevented them from seeing her clearly enough to do much to her. Almost. Selphie charged forward and swept low with her nunchaku, but somehow Yuffie had sensed her, flipping backwards swiftly, completely avoiding Selphie's assault. Selphie was impressed, but was even more impressed when she threw one end of her nunchaku out at the girl, who held up her shuriken to catch the end of her opponent's weapon. The end of the nunchaku wrapped itself around the shaft of one of the four points of Yuffie's shuriken and locked into place. Selphie braced herself to attempt to dislodge the shuriken from Yuffie's hands, but before she could, Yuffie ducked into a forward somersault, wrenching the nunchaku from Selphie's hands as it was engulfed underneath the spinning ninja girl. When Yuffie stood up again, she had a four-point shuriken in one hand and Selphie's massive nunchaku in the other. Selphie was worried that Yuffie was holding them in such a way that she looked like she knew how to use them one-handedly.
Yuffie smirked. This was too easy. The ninja backflipped away from Selphie, reaching a safe distance, and concentrated. She remembered the skill her friend had taught her. Placing the two weapons in what looked like a praying position, Yuffie threw down her arms. A simple incantation was all that was needed: "Breath of the Earth!" Yuffie cried. A mystical wind enveloped the girl, relieving her eyes of the darkness that had trapped them.
Selphie nodded solemnly. "Looks like you win," she admitted.
Yuffie laughed. "You're giving up? Man, how did you beat the others?" She stood up straight, still holding both weapons.
Selphie rolled her eyes. "Those four were wimps." She took a glance around the room at the other four guardians of the Pagoda. "No offense, guys."
Yuffie cracked into hysterics. She liked this girl! "You're not joking," she added. "'Specially Shake there."
Shake growled quietly.
Selphie smiled. "I'll be leaving now. Can I have my nunchaku back?" she asked, her eyes innocent.
Yuffie didn't trust her completely – after all, she was the Pagoda challenger here. Yuffie nodded, but she said, "I'll escort you off of the fifth floor, where any sneaky moves you make won't count against my record as undefeated."
Selphie was slightly hurt that Yuffie didn't trust her, but she understood. "Okay, then, let's get down there," she agreed. Yuffie stepped up next to her and led the way down to Staniv's floor, the fourth floor.
"Here," Yuffie said when they reached the bottom of the staircase, handing Selphie's nunchaku back to her. "You're not too bad."
"You're not either," Selphie replied. "What's your name?"
Yuffie stood up proud and tall and grinned mischievously. "Me? I'm the great ninja Yuffie."
Selphie made a sound of realization and grinned. "So you were in AVALANCHE, right?"
Yuffie shrugged. "Kinda. I guess you could say that I was an honorary member."
Selphie smiled warmly. Yuffie really liked this girl's attitude. "Hey, Selphie, if you want, we can go get some ice cream down the road from the Pagoda. We have some awesome vendors along here from back when the town was a tourist attraction."
Selphie jumped and laughed. "Ice cream!" she cried. "I haven't had ice cream in almost a year. Let's go!" She cried, giggling and running down the stairs to the third floor.
Yuffie raised an eyebrow and her face was shocked and mildly confused. Maybe she wasn't quite the girl Yuffie had expected her to be. With a shrug, Yuffie took off after her acquaintance, looking forward to some ice cream after such a grueling battle.
Woo. Finished. Not 22k words, but it's good, in my opinion. Whatja think? R&R, pleaseohpleaseohplease.