Chapter 25: Besaid Island
"Everyone remember how to get back to the dock, as we'll be staying on this boat for the first part of the journey" Auron's words were a little wasted as everyone was already half down the dock – running full pelt down to the sea in swimwear.
All I could do was lay down in the hot sand.
"Hey, stick in the mud!" Rikku forced me to my feet and started pulling me towards the water.
I kept telling her I was still in my clothes, but she wouldn't have any of it. Yuna and Rikku were playing tag and just put me straight into their game – it was kind of hard to move around in wet clothes, but it was good fun none the less. I'd had enough of the water and started back to the beach, I could feel the warm sand through my drenched baggy shorts and my shoes were completely waterlogged, my white shirt and tank top were almost see-through and I found myself hopping they'd dry faster. Yuna waved to me and beckoned me back in, I shook my head shouting back 'maybe later' Rikku had dragged her in with her clothes on as well.
Wakka was just floating on his back peacefully in till Lu came and sat on him, Gippal and Baralai were pissing off Leblanc by splashing her – Nooj was conked out on the beach with a book draped over his face snoring away. Brother, Buddy and Shinra were building a huge sand castle, that was in till Cloud fell face first into it – he wasn't watching where he was going and tripped over a bucket, they just laughed and started building another. Christie was fishing up on one of the rock faces, and some of the boys were trying to surf – Squall got tangled in Christie's line and she treated to stick the hook through his mouth if he did it again. It was basically a day at the beach with fun and laughter. General high jinx and many stupid comments from Rikku and sarcastic comments from Paine.
I had been sitting on the beach for about three hours now, Yuna had come to join me and to dry off.
"Want to see the rest of the Island?!" she asked excitedly, I nodded eagerly and followed Yuna as we ran to the path to the village.
Besaid was truly beautiful, the lush plant life, refreshing waterfalls and calming scenery – it looked far better than any of my wildest expectations or dreams. Yuna stopped when we came to the hilltop and told me lots of stories about the village and growing up there, she also told me about the first time she meet Tidus in the temple and her feelings for him.
"He certainly stuck out!" she laughed. "I never expected him to come and talk to me by the fire. Even though I wanted to get to know him more – the monks from the temple shooed him away" Yuna started to stare off into space her eyes glittering in the low sunlight.
"You never expected to fall in love with him, is that what you're trying to say?" Yuna looked startled by my question.
"No, I didn't. But I did find him interesting and he said he was from Zanarkand, I never would have thought we would grow so close" Yuna hovered her hand over her heart and was once again caught up in her memories.
"You need to be alone?" she shook her head.
"Just some quiet…" she said softly looking off into the distance, I sat on the ground and took in the view as Yuna sat there remembering.
The gentle breath of the wind played with Yuna's hair, making it flick and dance in its breeze. Her small blue braid jingled slightly, which could clearly be heard in the silence. No sadness was on her face, all there was, was a grateful smile as she dived in happy memories.
"Well!" Yuna broke the silence jumping up "Should we head back?" she asked cheerfully, I nodded and we set back for the beach. "I'll take you to see the temple tomorrow!" Yuna promised with a smile.
"Even if we have to sneak away?" Yuna nodded
"Yup!"
I was ripped from a peaceful dream by the sound of an airhorn
"Wake up lazy bones!!" Rikku's shout was all too familiar.
I groaned and put a pillow over my head holding it tight so she couldn't pull it of – Yuna did the same and I heard Rikku ask Paine to sound the airhorn again. "Come on you two, up!" we groaned again.
"I can get them up" Gippal's voice came from the door.
"How?" Paine asked eagerly.
There was a few footsteps that stopped next to the bed, the mattress tipped up and we slipped of the bed and landed in a heap on the floor. Paine was laughing her lungs out.
"I've got to remember that for Rikku!" she wiped a tear from her eye and Gippal dusted of his hands.
"Okay…I'm up" Yuna and I said in unison.
Sleepily I walked towards the deck, but forgot about the small flight of steps in front of me. I stepped into thin air and connected face-first with the floor – it didn't help that Yuna did the same no brainier and landed on me a short second later. Wide awake I shot up to my feet, Rikku was rolling around on the floor laughing hysterically, while most of the others were just shaking their heads ashamed to know us. Gippal was laughing so hard he had to use a railing for support, Christie found it irritating that her peace had been shattered so she knocked Gippal over the railing.
"Can we just go before I strangle Rikku?" Christie sighed and Rikku stopped laughing
"You're no fun Christie!" Rikku whined.
"I'm an assassin, I'm not paid to have fun…" her comment seemed to annoy Rikku even more.
"Then at lest TRY to have fun!" Christie put a finger to her chin in thought.
"Pushing Gippal over the edge was fun" she smiled.
"HEY!!" Gippal's shout came from over the edge. Christie gave a lazy wave to him showing she didn't really care.
It turned out that Yuna and I wouldn't have to sneak off to see the village, Tobli was taking a group there – it was only me and the others, Nooj and Baralai were sunbathing when we left. I could hear Gippal muttering under his breath about revenge. Rikku was doing stupid things, like trying to put her hand under the waterfalls when they were miles out, and reaching for coconuts on palm trees over the cliffs. "Help!!" everyone spun round to see Rikku dangling helplessly from a branch of a tree. Wouldn't have been to bad if she weren't over a edge of a cliff, clinging onto a single coconut that looked like it was about to break off at any given moment. Yuna and Paine had already ran over to the rope barrier and were reaching for Rikku's boot.
"No good, Yuna we're going to have to" Yuna sighed.
"I know…" Yuna balanced on rope.
At first I thought Paine was going to hold onto the gunner outfits side skirt but…she grabbed Yuna's long braided ponytail and lowered her out. Yaouch! That's gotta hurt! Tears were forming in Yuna's eyes as Paine lowered her out, Rikku clung to Yuna when she got close enough – she took the coconut with her, Paine reeled the two back in.
"That was the most stupidest thing you've ever done Rikku…" even though Paine said this in a hard tone, she did looked relieved that Rikku was alright.
"I'm sorry" Rikku sniffed in a small voice and offered to split her coconut with them – Yuna looked to be holding something back and was twisting her side skirt.
"You okay Yuna?" Wakka asked, Yuna took a deep breath
"OW!!" she screamed as hard as her voice would allow.
"Uh oh…see ya!" Gippal started high-tailing it down the path.
I noticed the cloud of dust at the start of the path round the waterfalls, it was travelling at speed and didn't show signs of stopping…Fiends!! We all turned on our heels and start to bolt after Gippal, all whaling at the tops of our voices – it only made the Fiends more excited and they ran harder to catch us. A Coyote was snapping at Yuna's heels – well her ponytail anyway, tears struck her eyes as it caught it and gave a yank.
Yuna booted it into orbit, the rest of the fiends shrunk to the size of peanuts as Yuna marched over to them. We stood around and caught our breaths as Yuna yelled her head off at the fiends, she was yelling so hard that it was really starting to scare everyone – some fiends had suffered heart-attacks while others were having seizures.
The village was exactly like I pictured it, quiet, peaceful and carefree.
"Okay class, have a good time looking around and remember, we'll assemble here when he want to go back, now run along now" I didn't catch all what Tobli said afterwards, he always speaks to fast.
Yuna instantly took my arm and led me up to the temple, she took me quickly through the main hall and up a slight flight of stairs – she stopped.
"This is where I faced my trials to become a summoner, no one else is allowed in here except for a summoner and their guardians. When Tidus came here, I'd been in there for two days…I promised myself I'd become a summoner no matter what. Tidus came in after me and that's how I first ever saw him" Yuna did not take a step forward or a step back. It was as if it was a place of her memories and, entering would corrupt this place.
"You can not be in here!" I spun round at the voice, a monk was trying to make Christie leave.
"Calm down old man, I'm just her to get these two…we're heading back" Yuna started quietly down the steps and I held my head low as I passed Christie.
The monks shooed us out the temple apologising to Yuna as they did so.
"Lady Yuna!" a child's voice cried happily and Yuna turned to see the boy running at her.
About four others came over and hugged Yuna just like the little boy was doing, they were asking her questions like children always do – Where were you? Did you miss us? Who's he? Who's she? Did Wakka come back with you? Yuna answered all their question with a smile – she seemed to have quite a way with children. Yuna gave a cheerful goodbye to the child's who said goodbye and got me and Christie's names wrong – they called us Mac and Ice lady. Neither of us minded, and I heard one of the girls say how pretty Christie was and how she wanted to look like her – when I told her, she blushed.
The next day I stayed at the beach just having fun…well I stayed on the boat really, Rikku was diving from the boat and had Yuna join in. They stopped diving when Brother whacked his head of a rock while trying to impress Yuna, Buddy and Gippal just called him an idiot. Rikku kept Yuna from helping Brother – she said he was just faking to get her attention. Nooj was napping, again, and Baralai was making a shell necklace for Paine – Paine was chatting to Christie about random stuff, and how much it would be to have her kill Baralai. Rikku and Yuna were now building sandcastles down on the beach, Yuna dragged me along at first but I started to enjoy myself. Squall joined in with us and start complaining about how Zack and Bayman were hogging waves, and how there was not enough room on the boat for him and Zell to skateboard. Every late in the day everyone was called back to the boat, the beach was left spotless and the lights of the boat cut through the night like a beacon.
"So that was our last day huh?" Rikku asked while stuffing her face with a sausage.
"Kilika next! Ya?" Wakka dodged a flying bowl of creamed rice thrown by Helena. Which hit Kasumi in the back of the head and Hayate and Ryu chased Helena with a sponge pudding.
"Ah desert!" Rikku rubbed her hands together as a pizza was placed on the table.
She and Brother took a piece straight away – while the strange smell kept the rest of us from it.
"What the hell is in this?" Gippal screwed up his face.
"It's pretty good!" Baralai was already on his second slice with his first barley down his throat.
Rikku said something but we couldn't understand her.
"Shallow Rikku" Yuna reminded her cousin and she did after much effort.
"Flan! Its Flan pizza!" she chirped and took another bite.
Now no one would touch it even if you paid them. Baralai ran of to the toilet to throw up, his face green. Christie threw her slice over her shoulder, which slapped Tina in the back of her head. She had no idea where it came from. Christie had a smirk her face as she watched her out the corner of her eye.