Rikku stirred and tried to open her eyes. Bright light flashed across her vision and she quickly closed them. Her head pounded and she brought her hand up to massage her head, noticing a huge bump on the back. She scrunched up her face.
"Ouch," she muttered.
"Rikku? Are you up?" a woman's voice asked.
Rikku tried to open her eyes and after some painful minutes, her eyes adjusted and her vision cleared. She saw Nhadala and Cid enter the room. She looked around and suddenly noticed that she was defiantly not in her room at the camp in Bikanel Desert.
"Where am I?" she asked.
"You're at Djose temple," her father said.
"Why?" she asked.
Her father waved a hand impatiently. "We'll talk about it later. You feelin' alright kid?"
Rikku nodded. "What happened? How long has it been?"
"You were only out through the night." Nhadala quickly reassured her. "You remember going out yesterday alone, right? Good. And you were going to come back and you said you found something?"
Rikku nodded several times.
"And then some guy had to be mean and hit me!" she finished.
Nhadala nodded but she still seemed worried.
"Do you-"
"Ah Rikku, you're awake," a healer said as he stepped inside the room. "Cid and Nhadala, would you mind if I have a moment with Rikku? I want to see how she's doing."
They nodded and left and Rikku laid back and answered the doctor's questions and letting him examine her bruises.
"Unfortunately, you fell onto the hover craft when you were knocked out so you may see other bruises Other than that, you look fine and as long as you take it easy over the next couple of days you should be even better. Contact me if you experience any pain."
As the doctor left, Rikku hopped out of bed and headed to the temple. As she did, her mind wondered off as she thought about yesterday and how she was attacked. Who would do such a thing? And more importantly, why? What did they want from her?
Suddenly Rikku jumped and came to a halt. My box! Good for nothing thief took my box! Oooooh, they were in some serious trouble now.
As she opened the door to the temple, Nhadala, Cid, Brother, and Gippal, who was the machine faction leader, were talking. They all looked at her when she approached them.
"Hey, it's Cid's girl." Gippal pointed out for all of them. "Cid told me about your small tumble in the sandbox."
Rikku smiled at him, white teeth flashing.
"I have a name, you know?" She said, and threw him a playful punch to the shoulder.
Brother coughed and gave Gippal a death glare. He did not like Gippal, why, Rikku was never quite sure.
"Now that Rikku's here I feel that we need to address the issue that she was attacked and what we can find out about it. The last thing we need is someone else getting hurt."
"Let's take it to my office," Gippal offered, who was the machine faction leader at Djose temple after all.
Rikku stared wide-eyed as they stepped into a room toward the left side of the temple. This was Gippal's office? It had nice furniture and expensive machina all around the room.
"Whoa…who died and gave you all this?" Rikku asked as she started poking at a small machina on one of the bookshelves.
"Nice, huh?" Gippal said with a smile and winked. Slowly, he pulled her hand away from the machina and walked behind his desk.
"So Rikku…do you remember anything?" Nhadala asked.
"Well…I found this really cool box." She started, eyes alight with glee. "I'm sure that's what he was after…or do you have it?"
Cid and Nhadala exchanged glances.
"No," Cid said.
Rikku pouted. "Darn, because it was this really cool box! It was nice silver and it had all these weird gadgets and gears on it with this funny symbol like and X on the front. I really want to know what's inside but I couldn't open it.
"Oh Spira!" Nhadala gasped.
Gippal was looking down at his feet shaking his head.
Cid swore and Brother began to moan by the door and muttering in Al Bhed.
"What?" Rikku demanded, looking at each of them.
"You don't know what you found?" Nhadala asked.
"Naw, she fell down too many times when she was a kid to pay attention." Gippal said.
Rikku made face at him. "That's cause you pushed me."
Gippal smirked.
Rikku turned back to Nhadala and scratched her head. "Um…no…I don't know… I'm guessing it wasn't a good thing."
"Rikku!" Gippal cried in frustration. "That was Garpadah's box!"
"Garpa- whose box?" Rikku asked, even more confused.
Gippal gave up and shook his head with a sigh.
"Garpadah's box." Nhadala repeated, trying to explain. "Year ago when you were probably very young Rikku, there was a time of high anti-Al Bhed movements, much more so then there were a couple of years ago.
"Because we disobeyed Yevon and began using Machina as you know, we were discriminated against, people saying we went against the teachings. Many summonses even refused to send our people into the farplane, and many fiends stalked our Home during this time.
"There was one such event that occurred with a father, Garpadah, and his son, Raman. Garpadah's son died one day out in the desert while he was working. Torn between the fact that his son would become a fiend and wouldn't go to the farplane, Garpadah took his son's pyreflies before they turned into a fiend and placed it into a box…the box you found. He made the box complex hoping that no one would be able to unleash his son and the powerful fiend that he had become."
Rikku nodded slowly as the words processed; the story was starting to make sense and it did sound somewhat familiar.
"There's more," Gippal said, picking up the end of the story. "Many people have tried to find that box since Garpadah hid it away but sine Home was destroyed, many believed it was destroyed to."
"Well…how did this guy know about it? And what would they want to do with a powerful fiend?"
Gippal shrugged. "Who knows how this guy found out about it and knew you would find it? As for what they would do with a powerful fiend, they thought they would be able to control it?"
"Really? Is that possible?" Rikku asked, surprised. That would be scary.
"Anything possible, kid," Gippal said.
Rikku pondered in thought. "Wow…creepy." She said and shuddered. This did not sound good at all. What had she done?
"But…he doesn't have the key, and he probably doesn't know the combination of the box. If we we're really lucky, he just took it thinking he could get some extra cash off of it.'
Gippal frowned. "Somehow I doubt it."
"Fine," Rikku said and stuck out her tongue.
"Rikku's got a point though. He can't do anything if he doesn't have a key." Nhadala said.
Rikku nodded and gave Gippal an I-told-you-so look. See, she knew what she was talking about.
However, as she looked around the room, Cid had a guilty look on his face.
"Oh no, what now Pops? You're hiding something."
"See here, it may just have been a fluke that Rikku found the box but…we didn't keep you in Bikanel because it wasn't safe. See kid, someone tried to break into your room after you were attacked."
"Why would they think I would have anything in my room that was good? It's not like I have the key."
Cid swore and rubbed his face.
"That's just the thing kid, you do," he finished.
………………………………………………………………………………………………
The man sat in his room, now staring at his newly acquired box. As much as he tried he couldn't get the box open. He knew he needed a key but the girl didn't have it on her and he hadn't been able to get into her room. No matter, she would be back to her rooms soon and he would slip in then and search. Everything was going according to plan.
(A/N: Sorry its taking me so long to build up the plot but there will be romance I swear! I just have to get this extra stuff in. There will hopefully be Gippal's oint of view(I hope his character sounds right!) if not please feel free to tell me. Please review and thanks to Hommeles for reviewing! It was nice to hear your comments! Hopefully I can get another chapter down tomorrow)
