I came up with this at random, so I decided to write it down (or type it up, whichever). Also I've got writer's block something horrible on my other story so… yeah… Meh, hope you enjoy! Ah, before I forget, I don't own FFX-2 or any other Final Fantasy game. ~Imps. P.S. Sorry if I don't exactly capture the attitudes of some characters right.
P.P.S. Nearly forgot,'This is thoughts', 'This is speaking in Gnoll'
What a Long, Strange, Trip
Chapter 1: Relocation
Ugh… why does everything hurt?
…
And why is everything so dark.
Oh. My eyes are shut. Duh.
Okay, First thing I remember…. Uh…
I got stepped on by the Terrarast. Then I felt like I was falling, and then I hit something.
(A/N: I think that's how it's spelled. Giant monster; eats villages whole.)
Alright, let's get up.
As I got up, I noticed that, wherever I was, it certainly wasn't home. My home had a lot more open plains, and that huge human town next to the village. And there certainly wasn't an ocean. Well, at least I'm on a dock, not in the drink.
As I observed my surroundings, I noticed that there was a lot of stonework architecture, but even more metal architecture. … wait… YOU CAN MAKE BUILDINGS OUT OF METAL!?! Awww, that's AWESOME! I bet it's a lot sturdier than the old hide huts we had in the village. It probably takes a lot of metal though. I decided to leave this train of thought until later, and get a good luck at all the things which weren't metal buildings.
More accurately, the fight that was going on not too far from my current position. I turned around just in time to see a girl clad in a white shirt, blue skirt, and numerous bracers with brown hair do a sort of Somersault Twist while using two objects in her hands to rain pain upon two men, who, though similarly dressed, couldn't have been further apart in physical stature and choice of weaponry. One was tall and thin, wielding Two Objects similar to the ones held by the girl with brown hair, while the other was short and fat, armed with a large shield. The brown haired girl was accompanied by a black-clad girl with silver hair, and a formidable looking sword, as well as a scantily, but brightly clad girl with her hair in numerous braids, and a pair of deadly daggers. Many people would've stayed away from a scene like that, but hey, I love a good brawl, and besides, fighting for someone is a good way to make friends.
Without a second thought I charged up to beside the female trio and said "Hey, mind if I join?" The group gave me a sideways glance, which held for a while. Can't say that I blame them, Gnolls aren't exactly a normal sight, and I'm slightly tall for a Gnoll, only slightly though. I stand about 7'7", and have brown fur with black spots throughout. I wield a War hammer that's intended to be two handed, but, due to my strength, can be wielded with one hand. I only have armor covering my chest and my thighs, but I found that too much armor restricts movement. All three gave me a short nod, and we prepared to battle the strange duo before us.
I heard the fat one give a call of "What? Reinforcements? No Fair! Oh well, we'll take care of him, right Logos?" "Indeed we shall, Ormi." His Thin compatriot responded. The black clad girl and the brightly dressed girl charged forward, as did I, as the brown haired girl provided covering fire. We hadn't gotten far before the one named Ormi started spinning at high speed. I hesitated a bit, as this wasn't a battle tactic I was familiar with, but I soon learned what it was when he cried "Feel like taking a spin?" and hurled his shield at me. Without blinking, I caught it in my left hand and chuckled, replying with "Why yes, it does seem like such a fine product." I assumed a more defensive stance, now that I had a shield to do so, and charged at the one called Logos, who was currently berating his partner for such idiocy. I didn't catch much before I bashed him with the shield, but I think it went like: "You Idiot! I told you: Any move where you throw away your weapon is a bad mo-OOF!" I grinned in satisfaction as I watched him hit the wall and tumble to the floor. He managed to prop himself up on one knee before shouting "This… Cannot… Beeeee!!!" The way he said it was so hilarious, I had a hard time keeping myself from laughing. As I turned my attention to the now-disarmed Ormi, I saw my allies making short work of him now that he was left without his shield. When they finished beating him, he fell on his rear and I heard him mumble "Ugh…. Boss…?"
As I wandered over to the group I heard a distinctly female voice say "That's quite enough sniveling boys." In the manner of an impatient mother scolding her children.
I turned and saw the two men we had just beaten flank a girl who looked exactly like the brown haired girl earlier described, except in blue with white frills. "Persistent, aren't you?" Oh geez, what's going on, Evil Twins? I hate it when that happens. The brown haired girl glared at her double and held out her hand "My Grid." She demanded. "You give us back Yunie's Garment Grid right now!" the girl with braided hair piped up.
I was mildly confused, but one thing was clear, blue over there took something from the brown haired girl, who was called 'Yunie', although I'm assuming that's a nickname, and she wanted it back. "Didn't you girls ever learn to share?" the double replied, "Give it back." 'Yunie' demanded, in a fairly threatening tone. "Very well, it's yours;" the clone replied, in an 'I don't care' tone of voice, before throwing something at the double on our side. The 'Evil Twin' then promptly pulled a large black and silver fan out of nowhere, obscuring her face with it. She then turned into a woman with a semi-revealing violet dress with white patterns on it. She then pointed the fan at us, revealing both blonde hair, and a heart tattoo on her exposed chest and saying "But it won't be yours for long, loves!" Then the battle started. The brown haired girl did something that I'm assuming involved the so-called 'Garment Grid' and changed into the blue-clad form that we'd just been talking to. Oh woof, she better not be evil now. I then returned my attention to the fan-wielding woman in time to catch the dagger-wielding girl steal a pair of silver bracers from our foe, right before the leather-clad girl performed a forceful slash. Not one to be left gawking when my allies are having a good time, I charged in and scored a hit with my Hammer. Suddenly, I heard a brief rumble, and then I got zapped with some sort of electrical charge, which caught me off guard, stunning me briefly. Luckily, our foe wasn't able to take advantage of that, as the now-blue-clad girl had done some sort of dance which conjured a cloud of some sorts to obscure the blonde woman's vision. To keep a long story from being even longer, we made short work of her after that.
With a flustered yell of "I won't let you off so easily next time!" the violet-wearer and her goons ran off. "Get back here!" the braid-haired girl shouted after them, and moved to chase them when the silver-haired girl called "Rikku." I turned to see what they were staring at, and saw that the brown-haired girl had started dancing uncontrollably, and I noticed a huge red object flying towards us.
************************ On the Celsius ***********************************
SINCE WHEN DID METAL FLY!?! This is freakin' amazing! Wherever I am, technology is really advanced! I had been marveling over this craft for several minutes, and it appeared that nobody even noticed me, except Tall, Dark-clad, and Angry-looking, Woof, I decided I wouldn't be messing with her anytime soon. "You looked like you were enjoying yourself." the one I had recently learned was named Rikku teased the one called Yuna. "I was," Yuna replied, "It felt like some other person's excitement just took over." "That can happen when you use the Garment Grid." a kid named Shinra stated; "The emotions of the person recorded in the sphere pass to the user." "Isn't that Dangerous?" Rikku asked. "I can't really say." a man named Buddy piped in "But it's your invention." "I'm just a kid." Apparently this was Shinra's Catch Phrase, so to speak. Just then, a man with pants, suspenders, and tattoos all over his upper body coughed violently. I almost thought he was actually going to cough up a lung. "Dancing Yuna!? I want to see!" He yelled, using extremely exaggerated body movements. "It'll cost you!" Yuna playfully replied. The one named Brother gasped; "One moment….." he then started patting all his pockets, and I realized he was searching for his money. "She's kidding." the silver haired one called Paine interrupted. Another dramatic body movement, "What? No Dance?" Then suddenly an alarm blared, interrupting the current conversation, and I heard Brother shout "Ehlusehk tydy! Gullwings, du ouin cdyde!"1 Buddy, Brother, and Rikku promptly jumped into positions in front of the massive window in the fore of the room. I assumed they were piloting this massive metal craft, so I decided against bothering them, and Yuna went around the room, talking to everyone. I had no idea, what I was supposed to do, if anything, so I stood there and thought for a bit, before I wandered over to Shinra and asked him to give me a rundown on everything.
Thanks to Shinra, I learned that what I was on right now was the Celsius, an Airship owned by the Sphere-Hunting group, the Gullwings, which was made up of everyone on the ship, now including me. I decided not to take the entire explanation of what sphere hunting was, figuring I'd find out on my own soon enough.
Apparently not. Despite the alarm and everything, we still had to wait for buddy to pick something up on a scanner, which was taking quite a bit, so I decided to wander around the ship, which consisted of 'The Deck', which was actually the top of the ship, the engine room, which was appropriately named, the cabin, which had beds and a bar, manned by a 'Hypello' called Barkeep, the Bridge, where I had just come from, and the living quarters, also called the Rooms. I decided against mucking about in the Rooms too much, as it hadn't been established where I would be sleeping. I returned to the bridge and discovered that Yuna had gone down to the Cabin to take a nap while Buddy searched for whatever he was looking for. I decided to second that motion, moved to a corner of the bridge, sat down and fell asleep.
I was awoken by another alarm and Brother shouting something in what I had learned was Al-Bhed, followed by "Gullwings! Report to the Bridge!" I stood up, cracked my back, and wandered over to near Buddy's position, where Yuna, Rikku and Paine had already gathered. Buddy half-turned and reported "Treasure Sphere waves! They're coming from those ruins they found at Gagazet!" "Alright!" Rikku shouted, while Brother bellowed "Haqd Cdub: Gagazet!" with a dramatic forward point, and I felt the Airship shoot forward. Soon afterwards, I watched storm clouds fly past as we ascended above Mt. Gagazet, and I heard Yuna and Rikku gasp "Hey, the rocks are floating!" Yuna marveled, while Rikku groaned "Don't tell me we gotta climb up that thing!" Buddy chuckled and responded "No worries, I'll take you to the top."
**************************** Ruins of Mt. Gagazet *************************
Soon afterwards, we jumped off the deck and landed on a thin bit of stonework ruins, with pain landing the most gracefully, Rikku falling on her butt, and Yuna staggering a bit. I won't lie, I was the least graceful, falling flat on my face, earning a sigh from Paine and a chuckle from the other two. Yuna got a bit of vertigo, but was fortunately caught by Paine & Rikku. While attempting to pull Yuna up, in response to a question from Brother about our status, Rikku yelled "Disasterrific!" I finally managed to get up, walk over and help them pull Yuna up, while Brother was berating Rikku for using a non-existent word. After we rested a bit, Yuna replied to Brother's frantic calling, letting him know that we were all right, and agreeing to keep an eye on Rikku. We then ran up a winding path, jumping over a gap, up a small ledge, and over a larger gap. As we rounded the corner, Rikku noted that we weren't going anywhere this way, and Paine suggested going another way, so we went down a nearby set of steps and into what appeared to be a dead end. As Rikku studied a blank wall, and Paine looked over the edge of a cliff, Yuna walked up to a wall with a weird glowing thing in it, which she called a machina, and asked if we thought it still worked. "Worth a try." I stated, and the others nodded. She then pressed the glowing thing, causing the platform we were on to sink suddenly, startling us, before it started descending slowly. "I wondered how safe this is…" Yuna mused, right before the elevator stopped again, causing us to look around for a second. Then it went down at a much faster speed than before, when it finally stopped at the bottom of the shaft "Owie…" I heard Rikku whine. 'Owie' indeed, I can barely feel my legs! then we heard Brother frantically call over the radio "What happened?!? Is Yuna okay!?" "Things are… ow… Disasterrific." Yuna replied, causing me to snicker a bit. "Disasterrific? I am on my way!" Brother announced, giving my snicker a promotion to a chuckle, before I finally managed to stop myself. He'll poke at Rikku for using it, but Yuna uses it and he comes running. "What about me?" Rikku said sadly, like a kicked pup. We then leaped down a series of rocks before encountering a pair of strange worm-like beasts with guns for heads and what I had learned was a female LeBlanc Goon, LeBlanc being the blonde woman I saw earlier.
We dispatched them with such ease, that they didn't even manage to attack us. We then climbed up another series of rocks onto some more ruins, where we encountered the violet-clad lady, LeBlanc, and her two goons, Logos and Ormi. A brief bout of witty wordplay followed, where LeBlanc called us amateurs about four times, and Yuna, Rikku and Paine made fun of her. Then the battle started. Their formation was simple, LeBlanc in back, Logos and Ormi up front. Standard order, casters at the rear, fighters at the fore. Once again, Yuna transformed into what I had learned was the 'Songstress' Garment, and performed a Darkness Dance, obscuring the vision of the enemy a bit, then LeBlanc used some ability where she waved her fan and a shockwave rocketed towards us. It didn't hurt that much though, I've had worse. Rikku then proceeded to steal from more things from them while Paine and I set to swinging. I decided I'd keep the shield-bearer occupied this time, and I swung at him, hitting him with the shield I'd stolen from him. "Hey Ormi, new shield?" I taunted, and let loose one of the high-pitched battle laughs characteristic to my kind. "Why you…!" he growled, and charged at me. I easily deflected his attack, and then I beat him until he fell on his rear, yet again. I noticed Yuna had fallen down, and Rikku was tossing something at her, which caused her to stand up again, and Paine tossed her something which made her wounds heal. While my comrades got ready to act again, I set about distracting the remaining foes, Logos and LeBlanc, swinging at them wildly, forcing them to back up and focus on me. Then Rikku, Paine, and Yuna charged forward and, to make a long story short (A/N: Too Late.) We beat them handily.
LeBlanc seemed rather miffed that we won, and threw down a smoke bomb so she and her cronies could make their escape. Then we realized that they were now ahead of us, so we started running up a path made of fallen pillars and platforms, leaping over gaps, and fighting off several of LeBlanc's goons and a few fiends in the process. Then we climbed up a tall set of ruins, pausing to marvel at how LeBlanc, Logos and Ormi had somehow all fallen over the same ledge while going after a chest and now formed a rather comical human chain from dangling from the ledge. We then climbed up, grabbed the Belt that was in the chest they had been after and moved on. Afterwards, we found a place with a ton of water, and lots of pillars. as we slowly advanced up the walkway towards the center isle of stone, with a rather ornate column of sorts, a huge crab-like fiend jumped off the ornate column and attacked us. I'm not sure what happened, but it somehow managed to knock Paine, Rikku, and Yuna pretty far back down the walkway right off the bat. I realized that it would take them a bit to get back up here, so I raised my shield and took a defensive stance. Didn't help much when the fiend used it's pincers to rip my shield off my arm and throw it down the walkway, so I went with my second option, which was 'Go into a screaming fury and beat it until one of you is dead.'. My vision became tinted with red around the edges, and I let out a fearsome roar, charging my victim and leaping on its head. I then raised my War Hammer and smashed it into the fiend's ugly mug multiple times, before summoning up some sort of power, and performing a sort of flourish ending with an extremely powerful strike, causing the crab-fiend to explode. As the red haze faded and the rest of the Gullwings ran up to me, I voiced the first thing that crossed my mind: "I'M COVERED IN CRAB GUTS!!! EWWWWWW!!!!" this caused even the stoic Paine to snicker a bit. I sighed "I'll be fine, let's get the sphere and bug out."
We soon entered the chamber contained in the ornate column, which held the sphere we were looking for on a pedestal. Right before we were about to take the sphere, we heard steps behind us, we turned to find a rather tired, injured, and angry looking LeBlanc, who simply said: "It's obvious to the trained eye, that sphere's just a dud. Perfect for the Dullwings." I chuckled, "Sore Loser." "Youth wins again!" Rikku bubbled. Yuna turned and grabbed the sphere, saying "Well, I guess we'll be taking this!" she then held it up in a victorious pose. Then we returned to the Celsius to discover that Brother had gone missing. Happily, he was found shortly after. Apparently, after he heard Yuna was in trouble, he'd jumped off the ship. Everyone else blew it off, so I guess that kind of thing happens often. Paine asked Shinra to analyze the sphere we'd found. Yuna comforted brother and then walked over to Shinra for the Sphere Analysis. Apparently it showed some place called 'Zanarkand' and a guy talking about how he was happy about shaking someone's hand. Shinra dismissed it as junk, but on the plus side, it could still be used as a Dressphere, the Black Mage Dressphere apparently. I didn't really care about any of that, so I just decided to head down to the cabin and ask barkeep if I could use one of those beds for now. Woof, am I tired, or am I tired? I yawned, and fell into the bed, and a deep sleep.
Holy Monolithic Paragraphs, Batman! Heh, sorry about that, also, yeah, my OC is a Gnoll, don't know what that is? Look it up. I'm going to give him a name next chapter, and yes, this is pretty much a novelization of the storyline, with bits of my own added in at points. Sorry if this isn't exactly your cup of tea, but hey, I'm not the best writer in the world. Anywho, hope you enjoyed, please leave a review, or my suckiness will remain! ~Imps
