Yeah, this took forever, I know. School is totally unbearable and I've still got writer's block, but your guys' reviews inspired me, so I just have to continue! It doesn't help that I FINALLY bought FF8 and am totally engrossed in it... So, let's get on with stuff! I wanna thank all the people who've reviewed since my last chapter. You guys are awesome! And sorry in advance for the crappy formatting. This thing isn't doing what I tell it to do, so I guess you guys'll just have to work with it.
Solid Shark – Glad you think its interesting. I try my hardest not to bore people to death with this.
Dragoon Swordsman – Yeah I totally love that fight scene. It reminds me of the Squall/Siefer match at the opening of FF8 now that I've actually started playing it.
YojimbosBlade – Thanks. I appreciate that!
Greeneyedgirl1 – Kayla you're the best! Keep reading girl! And PLEASE be on the net from time to time, k? I can never find you anymore!
Dragon and Sword Master – I totally plan to expand on the Rin connection, but not too soon mind you. That ties in to the Big Picture. Him losing control should be a one-time thing. It just really fit the situation. I'll try to explain it later, but it'll be WAY later. And I'd be happy to be your beta reader. If I'm slow in responding from time to time though, forgive me. Life's gotten hectic.
Glaciours – Yeah there's definite backstory starting to show. It'll begin to show over the next few chapters. Thanks for sticking with me!
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The command center wasn't much to speak of, just a bunch of tents on a cliff overlooking a bay. From what I'd overheard from the soldiers, Sin would enter the bay. Al Bhed cannons and a "Supreme Machina" would engage from the cliff, while the Chocobo Knights and the Crusaders would protect the command center and the cannons from the shore. Our job was to watch and be prepared for, as Seymour had put it, "unexpected occurrences." So we just hung around until the divisions were prepped and ready. Rikku had scrounged up a spare lightning gem for me. My sword looked the same with it in, but occasionally a few sparks would jump from the blade.
The other Maester present, a round bald little man, gave the order to release the Sinspawn. Sin must have been in the neighborhood, because it only took 10 minutes for the beast to rear its head. Things got ugly from there. Cannons began to fire, shredding Sin's skin. The pieces fell into the bay as Sinscales and began to charge the beach. We watched the fight, and watched its swift end as a power wave from Sin destroyed a full half of the beach guard. This wave also rocketed a huge Sinspawn right at us. It was at least twenty feet tall with spindly legs down its back. Huge arms graced its sides. It roared at us and stomped its feet. Wow, it looked pissed. Looks like we wouldn't just be watching after all.
Tidus scanned it as soon as it landed. Since Kimahri never seemed to speak, we managed to teach it to Tidus so the rest of us would know what's going on.
"It's called Gui!" he yelled out. "Kill the head or it'll poison us! Swords go for the arms, Lulu go for the body!" Wow, he really got his act together in a fight. So we all took his suggestion. Wakka charged up an ice ball and smashed the head. Lulu followed it with a fire spell, putting it out of the fight. It roared anyway, which was strange considering we just got its head, and began flailing its huge arms, smacking back Auron and Kimahri. Auron crashed down several feet away, but Kimahri did several flips through the air and landed quite nicely. Yuna was busy tending to Auron and Wakka, whose ball rebounded right into his face. So Tidus, Rikku and I began our game of 'tag' with the monster. It worked like this: tag the beast without getting tagged yourself. The three of us were too fast for it, but it was armored. None of us were dealing considerable damage. And arm reared up to hit us, then disappeared it a blaze of fire. Looking back, I saw Lulu smirking with smoke rising from her fingers. I nodded back and landed a hit on Gui's body, which I was pleased to learn wasn't armored. It roared in agony before kicking me with one of its stubby legs, which I had forgotten it had. They were strong for being so small though. I flew about ten feet and landed flat on my back. Rikku, now out of work since Lulu had blown up the other arm, flew to my side faster than I thought possible. She pulled a small vial that looked almost like a potion, but not quite.
"Drink this!"
"What is it?"
"It's an Al Bhed potion! Now hurry up before it tries to get you again!"
I allowed her to pour it down my throat; I wasn't feeling that great so I wasn't about to argue. In like two seconds I felt a thousand percent better. I smiled gratefully before hopping up to continue my job. In my few moments down Gui had managed to find itself some new arms. None of the fighters could get back to the body, and we didn't have the energy left to tear through its arms again. I had one last idea.
Charging straight for the body, at the last second I spun to the left and rolled under the arm, coming up behind where it couldn't defend. I slashed its back twice, then plunged my gunblade all the way in. The Sinspawn screamed in rage and spun halfway around, taking my sword with it. Lulu, seeing the opportunity, fired a thunder spell right for the blade. It landed on the handle, following the blade inside and frying Gui's innards. I grabbed my blade as soon as the spell had passed, and not a second too soon. Gui stomped the ground and fell back from the cliff edge I was right next to. His stomping however, had weakened the rocks at the edge of the cliff. The ground beneath me began to give way, and before I could move to get away, it splintered from the cliff with me still on it. I heard Rikku cry out for me. The others looked on in horror, but Yuna seemed to be concentrating on something. Just as I lost sight of them I saw four white balls go shooting into the sky.
I was a long way above the sea. I saw the ground fight still raging below me. Though the Chocobo Knights had been hit hard by Sin's blast, most of the Crusaders were still able to fight. The Sinscales were getting the better of them, and the soldiers were beating a steady retreat from the shore. After viewing the ground where I was to meet my death, I looked back to the sky, not wanting my last sight to be the ground rushing to meet me. The bird-like bullet racing towards me rescued me from my near end though. Valefor caught me very close to the ground and set me down amidst the fight. I expected it to stay and help, but at that moment it snapped its head upwards and took off for the command center. Guess Yuna needed some assistance. I however, was stuck in the middle of a losing fight. I immediately began to hack my way through the masses around me hoping to get to some allies. That small bit of lightningstrike Rikku got for my gunblade was really paying off. The Sinscales were wet, so every time I hit one I managed to stun it as well. Within a few minutes I had found my way to the Crusaders' rendezvous point. Everyone stayed very close together to watch everyone else's backs, and we were doing pretty well for ourselves. With Sin so close producing more scales though, it was only a matter of time.
The next thing I remember hearing was the rending noise of metal on metal. I looked towards the huge machina tower to see it split in half.
They should have used the other one.
I had no idea where that thought had come from, but I couldn't dwell on it now. The Sinscales were driving us back even farther. Sin had finally turned to leave, and now that it was out of range of the cannons, they turned on the scales around the shore. With the cover fire, we dispatched of the remaining scales pretty quick. Exhausted, worried, and confused, I welcomed the darkness that over took me amongst the cheers of the survivors.
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I awoke to a nearly empty beach. I wasn't sure how long I'd been out, but it must have been long enough for the remaining Crusaders to clear out. Only the dead remained.
'Evidently they thought I was dead,' I thought as I rose to my feet. After five minutes of exploring the battle-scarred beach, I saw a few familiar faces. Namely my friends. They were now on the beach for some reason. Everyone was knocked out at the moment. Tidus was awake, but he was yelling something and swimming out to sea. Whatever. The only person I didn't see was Rikku. At that moment I was spun around and crushed in the biggest hug I've ever gotten in my life. Rikku had her face buried in my chest, and when she finally pulled back to look at me I saw tearstains on her face.
"I thought you were dead..." she managed to choke out before latching herself onto me again. I didn't say anything; I just let her hug me. When she finally let go she seemed in control of herself again.
"Arek?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't. EVER. Scare me like that again, k?"
"Deal."
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No one really felt like speaking. We were nearly to the Djose Temple, and I hadn't heard anyone speak a word since the beach. Yuna had sent the fallen soldiers. Rikku walked very close to me the whole way, like she was afraid I'd just drop dead or something. We arrived at the temple around dusk. Yuna was the one to break the silence.
"Djose, the Temple of Lightning. They say the prayer of the faithful will open the way." She said before making the Yevon Prayer.
"Lightning?" Rikku asked, her voice quavering just a little bit. No one had the chance to respond to her pointless question though, for at that moment the rock formation before us exploded, the boulders held together by thick strands of electricity. Everyone jumped a little at this, some more than others. When we went to go inside we were stopped again by the guards.
"How dare you Al Bhed desecrate this holy ground! Get out of here now, before I..." But he never got to tell us what he'd do, because I grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off the ground. His face was less than half a foot from mine, and I held him there while I explained our situation in an even, yet very dangerous tone.
"Now listen and listen good, you piece of crap. I've just been to hell and back. I've been nearly killed, fought for hours, seen more death in a day then you'll see in your LIFETIME, and now you've got the guts to tell a Guardian to get lost? I'm gonna put you down, and if you so much as LOOK at me funny, I'll slice your head clean off and give you assholes another reason to hate our people. Got it?"
He nodded dumbly, in total shock. He probably wet himself. Instead of setting him down nicely though, I dropped him, letting him crash to the ground with a thump. He never said a word though. Nor did anyone else. After we had gotten inside, Auron turned to me.
"I understand you're upset, but control yourself. Though what you did was by all means justified, Yuna will be held responsible." I didn't even nod, just kept walking.
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The cloister went by fast, except for Rikku's strange mood. She was easily as pale as Lulu and she still wasn't speaking, even though my temple-boy beat down had shaken the others out of their little stupor. When we got to the antechamber outside of the Fayth's room, and everyone collapsed, Rikku doing so sweating all over and shaking just a little. I was sitting near Wakka and Tidus and we talked for a bit while waiting.
"That other summoner seemed like a nice guy." Tidus mentioned.
"Ya. Issaru was his name, wasn't it?" Wakka asked.
"Yeah, that sounds about right."
"It's kind of morbid though, racing to defeat Sin, don't you guys think?" I asked.
"Hunh? How so?" Tidus said. Oops. Tidus didn't know, did he?
"Never mind. I'm just thinking too hard."
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Yuna was done with the Fayth within the hour, and Ixion was ours. It was after dark by now though, and a very nasty storm had kicked up, so we decided to stay at the temple once again. One of the priests showed us to the summoner's rooms. They were upstairs through a door just inside the cloister. The rooms all had windows that allowed a view of the grounds outside the temple. Every so often a stray lightning bolt would drift down and flicker past. We all had separate rooms again, so I settled down in mine and stared out the window thinking. What exactly had I meant when I thought 'They should have used the other one?' I pondered this for a few minutes to no avail, so I gave up and scrounged around for something to do. I found a copy of "Spiran Digest" in a drawer and had just opened it when there was a knock at the door. Getting up to answer it, I was surprised at what I saw.
Rikku.
"Can I come in?" she asked timidly. I opened the door the rest of the way to allow her inside. She had only made it a few steps when a crash of thunder drove her to the ground shaking. I ran over to her, almost thinking she was joking were it not for her strange mood all day.
"Are you okay?"
"No! I hate lightning! I hate thunder! I want to go home!" she exclaimed softly. A tear slid down her cheek. I felt so bad for her.
"Hey, it's okay. We'll be fine here," I told her gently. "Besides, I'll protect you. It'll be fine."
She looked at me for a minute before nodding. "Okay, but... can I stay with you? Just for tonight?" she asked in almost a whisper.
I just smiled and picked her up, plopping her onto the bed. She giggled a little at this, which brought a smile to my face. At least she was feeling a little better. We lay in bed, reading that magazine together and commenting on everything from the ignorant Al Bhed hater in the "Letters to the Editor" to the feature article "100% of Spirans Agree Baseball will never beat Blitzball."
"Nice jammies," I told her. "Where'd you get 'em?"
"Found them in my closet! Cute, aren't they?" Indeed they were. They were light blue with cartoon chocobos all over them. Why they'd keep these at a temple I'll never know, but they sure made Rikku look cute. Well, cuter than she already is.
Wait, did I really just think that?
A huge blast of thunder cracked outside the temple, and Rikku chucked the magazine and dove for the closest thing – me. She buried her face in my chest and shook. I couldn't help myself when I put my arm around her. I couldn't fight the urge to pull her close. There was no way I couldn't hold her and keep her safe. So I did. Even after the thunder passed, we stayed like that. Right before we fell asleep in each other's arms I heard her say one thing.
"...my guardian."
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Awwww, how cute! I got just as far as I'd planned to. Go me! I'll try to start on the next chapter soon, but I don't know what to do aside from moving the main plot. Review cuz I'll love you guys for it and I'll see ya next time!