Holly sat up and stretched her arms, it was hardly light, still a ways from dawn. She looked at the freshly started fire and at Galeon sitting across from her. He quickly looked away blushing lightly.
Holly slid over closer to the fire to warm herself looking at Galeon as she did.
A cold wind blew quietly through the crisp morning air causing Holly to shiver and wrap her arms around herself. She slid closer to the fire as she glanced up at Galeon again.
Galeon was sitting watching her trying not to let her catch him. He quickly looked away as she caught his glance and began stoking the fire with a stick.
Holly pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them as she began to doze off again, shivering occasionally.
Holly jumped a little as she felt something fall around her shoulders. She looked down at the black cloak draped around her shoulders and then back at Galeon who was walking off.
She sighed and bundled up in the cloak as she slowly fell back asleep.
Genki sat up and looked around, Holly was sitting by the fire wrapped in Galeon's cloak asleep. He pulled himself out of his sleeping bag causing Mocchi to wake up and pull the sleeping bag back shut as Genki got out.
Genki stood looking at the sleeping Holly for a minute before realizing where she had got the cloak from. He watched as she smiled contently and sighed in her sleep. Genki clutched his fist tightly as a new emotion washed over him. He looked around and dropped himself by the fire as he grumbled.
Holly began to dream about years ago as her smile faded to a frown, she dreamt about her mother and father, she moved a little as she remembered the horror of watching her mother die and then remembering what she had seen the weeks before on Mu's floating castle. Tears began to form in her eyes as she woke suddenly.
Holly jumped to her feet looking around quickly. She glanced around at the others sleeping and Genki and Tiger sitting by the fire.
"What's wrong?" Genki said as he looked up at the girl.
Holly sighed and dropped the cloak from around her shoulders as she turned walking off as tears came to her eyes again.
"Holly?..." Genki got up and started to follow her as something caught his heel tripping him.
Genki fell on his face and rolled over jumping to his feet. "Hey, what's the big idea?!"
Tiger shook his head. "Let her go..."
Genki glanced back as Holly disappeared into the forest. "She looked like she was gonna cry."
Tiger nodded. "She wants to be alone..."
"Well, if something is bugging her she should talk to us..."
"If she wanted to talk to you she would..."
"Well, she needs to let it out, she doens't need to keep it bottled up inside..."
Tiger sighed. "Well, crying is a way of getting it out. And she'd have an easier time talking to someone that's been through what she's been through." Tiger looked back as Galeon stepped through the underbrush back into the camp.
Genki looked back at him also. "Why would she talk to him?..."
"I didn't say she would."
"But we don't even know why he's such a bastard..."
Galeon sat down beside the fire looking at the boy and monster.
Genki sighed and dropped himself onto the ground beside the fire.
"Galeon?"
Galeon looked up from the fire. "What?"
"Why are you so mean?"
Tiger dropped his head. "Genki, don't go there..." he sighed.
Galeon sighed. "I'm not explaining it now... I'll tell you later, if you can handle it."
Genki scowled. "Hey! I was just asking!"
"Atleast you're blatant with what you want to know..." Tiger said as he layed down.
Holly pushed her way through the underbrush back into camp, after wandering for a minute clearing her mind, and finding a place to relieve herself, she had found her way back into the clearing and stood looking at the others.
"Good morning." Tiger and Genki said in unison.
Holly smiled weakly. "Good morning Tiger, good morning Genki..."
Galeon sat looking up at her. "Good morning..." He finally answered.
Genki climbed to his feet. "Time to wake up!" He said loudly as he went around tapping the sleeping monsters to wake them. "It's almost breakfast time!" Genki looked back at Holly. "Isn't it?"
Holly sighed and shook her head slowly. "I'm afraid we're out of food..."
"Wha?! But how?!"
"We ran out quicker because we had more mouthes to feed..."
Genki looked at Galeon. "Ooh, you ate all our food!"
"I ate all your food?! That's hardly payback for saving your ass!" Galeon yelled as he jumped to his feet.
"Ha! We could've made it!"
Mocchi got up and stood beside Genki "Please stop fighting, chi!"
"Mocchi, stay out of this!" Genki pushed the little monster back some with his foot.
Mocchi sat down beside the fire and began to cry as the two kept argueing.
Holly kneeled down hugging the little monster. "Don't cry Mocchi."
Galeon glanced down at the teenage girl and turned his back on Genki crossing his arms.
Genki did the same, sticking his tongue out as he did.
Hare yawned and walked over looking down into the next valley a little ways down the path. "We might as well get going then. Where to Holly?"
Holly climbed to her feet and pulled the Magic Stone from her shirt holding it in her hands as she concentrated. "Um." The silohoutte of the bird appeared and morphed into the arrow point off to the south. "That way."
Hare looked up. "Straight down the path then..."
Cujo shook himself straightening his fur from sleeping. "Where will that take us, Daina?"
The Pixie hybrid rummaged through her backpack finally pulling a map out looking at it. "If we keep going that way we'll hit the ocean in about...A few hours..."
"Gol, Golem not like water..."
"We won't be going in the water." Hare said as he walked past the monster to gather up his things.
"Gol, okay."
Suezo grumbled. "Another day of walking...Perfect..."
"Well, maybe you'd like to teleport us there." Hare said with a glint in his eye.
Suezo jumped up and down. "Yeah, I could!" He concentrated for a second. "Come on, come on..." He then sighed. "I can't..."
Hare shrugged. "Oh well."
The group packed their things as they got ready for the day's journey to the ocean.
Golem picked up the set of saddle bags Antares had left and slung them over his shoulder. "Gol, they have rocks at ocean?"
Suezo nodded. "Yep, they have a ton of stuff, albeit we can find a town even!"
Genki finally gave up his cold shoulder and went about putting his sleeping bag up and caught up with the others a ways down the path.
As the Rebels moved Galeon seemed to make it a point to stay to Holly's back right. He watched every move she made with a kind of enjoyment.
Genki had noticed him and trudged along grumbling to himself not even noticing he was starving.
They had been walking for several hours and it was nearly lunch time, they had managed to find a small stream and a few fish to eat before moving on still feeling empty.
After a few more minutes Cujo and Tiger both began sniffing the air around them.
"Hmm? What?" Suezo walked past them up the path.
Tiger smiled. "I can smell the ocean."
"Me too." Cujo added.
As they came to the next valley they looked down to see out over the ocean and then slowly made their ways down to it.
Holly stood on the edge of the dropoff that lead down to the beach looking over the beautiful scenery. She smiled weakly and sighed taking in the scene as much as she could until finally being talked into moving by Genki who wanted to get to the beach.
Golem picked Suezo and Holly up in his hands as he slid down the slope hitting the sand with a thud.
The others quickly followed and stood looking around listening quietly to an approaching whistling.
A Niton rounded the corner and stood looking at them for a second before his face was gripped with greed and he ran to them.
"Well, what do we have here? Travelers huh? Albeit you can use some supplies."
Genki looked at him a second. "Well, yeah..."
The monster laughed. "But of course, the name's Pirrateu, and I have everything you need right here!" He worked his tentacles for a second and pulled a pack off his back that he layed out on the sand showing everything he had.
Pirrateu looked around at all of them smiling. "Whatever you need, pick something out." He looked at Suezo and smiled picking a purple cylinder up in his tentacle and sliding over to him. "Hey buddy, I bet you could use this, you can see practically anywhere with it!"
Suezo took the object in his tongue looking at it. "Wow, a real spy glass, I bet I could!"
The Niton grabbed a red fold off the mat and skittered next to Mocchi holding it out whispering. "Hey, just between you and me, this is a magic flying cape, anyone who wears it can fly!"
Mocchi smiled taking it and putting it on himself. "Chi, wow, chi!"
Pirrateu looked at Holly and grabbed a cooking pot. "Here little lady, this pot is rust proof, dent proof, stick proof, and everything else, it makes everything taste better!" He put it in her hands and looked across the others.
"Hmm." He grabbed a vanity mirror and jumped over to Daina. "Whaddya think of this? Pretty good, huh?"
Daina took the mirror looking at herself in it and smiled.
Pirrateu noticed the rollerblades on Genki's backpack and smiled. He grabbed an oil can off the mat and went to Genki. "Here ya' go, this'll help!" He squirted a little oil on one of the wheels of the skate and spun it listening to the sleek sound it made.
"Wow! Cool!" Genki smiled taking the can.
Pirrateu went back across the mat grabbing a small bag and leapt up on Golem's shoulder. "Hey bud, I bet you eat rocks, right?"
Golem nodded. "Yeah, gol."
The Niton held the small bag up. "Well, this here is the best white sand seasoning you can get, straight from the shores of Ikawa."
Golem took the bag between his fingers. "Gol, thanks."
Pirrateu hopped back down hardly stopping. He looked at Cujo, Tiger, and Galeon standing a ways off watching him and grabbed a can making his way over to Tiger.
"Hmm, looks pretty bad."
Tiger raised an eyebrow at him. "What does?..."
"Your tail! Look at these split ends, but not to worry, I have just the thing!" He said opening the can. Pirrateu spread a little on Tiger's tail before being knocked away.
"Hey! Who said you could touch me?"
"Whoa, easy champ, I'm just tryin' to help, look at your tail now."
Tiger moved his tail around so he could see it and smiled at the shine his fur had.
Pirrateu looked at Galeon and thought for a second then noticing his sword. The monster scuttled back over to the mat grabbing a sheathed sword and made his way back to Galeon.
"Hey, nice sword. But I bet you'd like a new sharper one, wouldn't ya'?" Pirrateu reached up to take Galeon's sword and recoiled into his shell as he was kicked away.
Pirrateu popped out of his shell when he stopped rolling. "Hey! I'm just trying to help you!"
Galeon shook his head. "I don't care if the others want to buy from a Shady Shellfish, I'm not."
Genki shrugged. "Come on, are you paranoid or something? There's nothing wrong."
Galeon growled. "I'm sure there isn't."
Genki laughed. "Quit being such a wet blanket."
Galeon scowled.
Holly looked over at Hare. "Do we even have enough for this stuff?..."
Hare shrugged pulling out his abacus. "Hmm, let me see."
Pirrateu shook the kick off and smiled seeing Hare. He picked up a brown square and went over looking over Hare's shoulder.
"What?" Hare said as he stopped.
"Oh, nothing. I see you have an abacus, huh?"
"Yeah, so?"
"I used to, but then I gave mine up for this. A real calculator, fully functional."
"Wha?!" Hare stared at it. "Wow...I gotta have that."
Pirrateu smirked and handed it to him as looked up at Holly and almost began to drool when the the jewl encrusted dagger hanging from the strap around her neck caught his eye.
Hare sighed dropping his arms to his side. "We don't have anywhere near enough."
Pirrateu smiled. "Well, we may have a deal, I'll give you all this stuff for that dagger."
Holly looked down at the sheath hanging from it's strap. "B-But it was my fathers..."
Pirrateu shrugged. "And it looks like it may be worth just enough to buy all this stuff."
Genki shook his head. "No way, that's gonna help us find the Phoenix."
Pirrateu looked at him. "Huh? Phoenix?"
"Yeah, the Legendary Phoenix's Mystery Disk." Genki said as he shrugged.
Pirrateu thought for a second and flinched. He pulled back into his shell and popped out with a red-brown disk smiling. "You mean this?"
Holly gasped. "Tha-That's the P-Phoenix?!"
Pirrateu smiled and nodded. "Yep, yep, it is, I had a long hard fight trying to get this from the, uh, Kawrea Volcanoe."
Galeon snorted. "I didn't see you there when everyone was leaving after the eruption."
Pirrateu jumped. "Er, well, that's because I went there and got caught in an after shock, uh, when Mu's troops were searching the place, yeah! So see, and this can be yours for just that dagger."
Galeon walked over to Pirrateu and kneeled down in front of him bending his wrist back as a half foot spike detracted from under his gauntlet. "How about this; you hand that disk over or I see if I can reach my hand up in that shell and take it along with your life."
Pirrateu gulped. "Uh, that wouldn't be very nice."
Holly reached down and touched Galeon on the shoulder "No, don't...I'll give it to him. It was supposed to help us defeat Mu...And this is definently helping."
Galeon stood up pushing the spike back in and nodded weakly. "Okay..." He stepped past her leaning back against the tree again.
Pirrateu smiled as Holly removed the dagger's strap from around her neck and held it out. "Here..."
Pirrateu took it quickly handing her the disk. "You can even have the other stuff too!" He grabbed what was left on the mat and wrapped it up quickly running off into the woods.
Holly smiled looking down at the Mystery Disk pressed against her chest. She slowly moved her arms up and down the edge. "We finally found it...Come on! Let's go find a Shrine!"
Genki laughed and nodded. "It's finally over!"
Daina took out the map running her finger along it as Hare looked over her shoulder.
"There's the Shrine." Hare stuck his finger down over a small grey box on the map. "It's that way!" He pointed to the northwest.
Genki nodded as he finished pulling his rollerblades on. "Okay, let's go!" He skated up the path as the others followed.
Holly hung back for a second as she wrapped a flat object in a cloth and then jogged to catch up. She walked beside Galeon glancing over at him occasionally and finally moved in front of him standing looking up at his face.
Galeon stopped looking down at her as the others moved on.
Holly looked down blushing lightly. "Um, you forgot this..." She brought the flattened object up infront of her.
Galeon put his hand on it feeling along finding a hilt at one end. He took the sword from her pulling the wrapping off of it.
Holly blushed a little brighter as Galeon put his metal covered hand on her shoulder lightly. "Thanks..."
Galeon took his hand off her shoulder and stood looking at her as he removed his old sword from his belt and buckled the new one to it putting the cloth around the older sheath and then sticking it into his backpack.
Holly leaned forward kissing him on the cheek and then stood smiling weakly as the blush reddened. "Happy birthday..."
Galeon looked a little shocked and blushed. "H-Huh? B-But my birthday was day before yesterday...While I was out cold...Not like anyone cared..."
Holly looked down. "Daina told me...And I cared..."
Galeon blushed brighter. "W-Why?..."
Holly looked off to the side trying to avoid his gaze. "I...I...I k-kind of li-"
"Hey guys, come on! You'll get lost!"
Galeon looked up the path at Genki standing on the next ridge looking at them.
"Come on already, we gotta unlock the Phoenix!" He held the disk up in his hand.
Holly looked back at him and nodded as she turned slowly starting up the path. She felt a hand wrap around hers and blushed brightly smiling to herself as Galeon lead her up the path.
"Come on, we don't want to get lost out here, do we?"
Holly shook her head slowly as the smile made it's way out.
Genki skated down the dirt hill onto the short cobblestone path. He hardly stopped to kick the large metal doors to the Shrine open and went in side as quickly as he could.
By the time the others arrived Genki had lit the torches and put the disk in.
Holly looked at Genki and nodded as she went to the control panel as the others gathered around.
The disk began to spin as light glowed from around it. Holly pressed her hands down on the large button and concentrated. "Unlock!" the disk glowed bright as the process began.
The white disk began to rise form the hole but suddenly shattered to pieces strowing itself across the floor.
Everyone gasped as the pieces slid in all directions.
Holy stepped out from behind the control panel staring in disbelief. "No...The Phoenix....no..." She fell to her knees as tears came to her eyes. "Oh no...I did something wrong..." She began to cry as Hare picked up a piece of the shattered disk.
Hare looked at it scraping his finger along the edge. "Hey! This isn't the Phoenix's disk! It's not even a Mystery Disk!"
Holly climbed to her feet wiping her eyes. "W-What?"
Hare threw the piece down. "Ooh, that sleezy little thief..."
Suezo yelped as he looked at Tiger. "Tiger! Your fur!"
Tiger looked at the monster. "Huh? What?" He looked down at him self and let out a half yelp half bark when he saw the fur polish had made large pink blotches on his fur.
Suezo pulled out his spy glass looking through it. "Hey! I can't see a thing!"
Golem took the bag of seasoning and stuck his finger into it licking some off. "Blech! Salt!"
Genki sat down and spun the wheel on his rollerblade to hear it creak from rust. "Huh?!"
Galeon looked down at the sword on his belt and grasped the hilt pulling up. With a snap the hilt detached from the sheath.
Galeon growled dropping the hilt on the ground and unbuckling the sheath. He pulled the cloth wrapped sword from his backpack turning towards the door as Tiger sprinted out.
Tiger left as fast as he could followed closely by Galeon as they both yelled. "Pirrateu! You're dead!"
Captain Jell brought his whip like arm down on the Niton's shell sending it rolling. "Strength Suits my ass!" He balled up the navy blue shirt and hit the monster with it. "You'll die for this treachery!"
Two of the Jells grabbed his bag strowing it across the ground. Captain Jell looked down picking up the bejewled dagger. He smiled wickedly as he pushed it sheath and all into his body for safe keeping.
One of the Jells whipped the Niton again leaving him cowering in his shell.
The group of troops looked up at to see where a low growl was coming from. Captain Jell, followed by the others, begin to laugh as they stared at Tiger. "A pink, poka-dotted, tiger! Ha!"
Captain Jell was suddenly knocked off his base by Galeon and lay writhing for a moment pulling himself together. He stood looking at Galeon before yelling. "Get him! Attack!"
Two Jells rushed Galeon as he brought his sword around wounding them both at once.
Tiger leapt into the air looking down. "Torpedo Attack!" The Jells were zapped by the attack and layed writhing before jumping to their bases and running for their lives.
"I'll be back, with the rest of my troops, just you wait!" Captain Jell yelled as he disappeared into the forest.
Galeon turned facing the shell that had two tentacles protruding from it's opening slowly dragging it away. He leapt over stomping his boot down on it's side causing the tentacles to recoil inside.
"Hand over the dagger and maybe we will kill you quickly!" Tiger yelled as he slinked over to the monster.
Pirrateu came out a little ways. "I-I don't have it! The Jells do!"
"What?!" Galeon kicked the shell spinning it across the ground.
Pirrateu shook his head climbing to his feet. "It's not my fault, they jumped me!"
"But it is your fault for this crap you sold us!"
Pirrateu laughed nervously. "Uh, um, you mean it didn't work?"
Galeon drew his sword lifting it above his head.
"W-Wait, wait, I know where their camp is, it's up there on that cliff, in the cave!" Pirrateu point his tentacle towards the nearby cliff face.
A wicked smile crossed Galeon's face as he brought the sword down a little. "Thank you for the information, now you die."
Pirrateu began to plea bargain. "Wait, wait, wait! I'll get it back, I promise, I'll go alone! Please don't kill me!"
Galeon lowered the sword to his side. "You have until morning. If you aren't back then I will hunt you down and gut you."
Pirrateu nodded and quickly ran into the woods.
Genki and the others caught up to the two and stood trying to catch their breath.
Genki looked down at the Mana Stone hanging from his neck as it flashed blue and then dimmed slowly as he felt his energy coming back. "W-Where's Pirrateu?"
Tiger sat on his haunches. "He's gone to get the dagger back from the Jells."
Holly sat down under a tree pulling her knees up to her chest. "I shouldn't have trusted him...I'm the reason it's lost..."
Genki shook his head. "No you're not, we all thought that was the real thing."
Galeon sighed. "It's my fault, if anyones. I knew he was cheating us..."
Holly looked up at him sadly. "No it's not...I was still the one that gave it to him...That's all I have left of my father and family..." She lowered her head again.
Genki crouched down beside her. "Come on, we can go setup camp by the ocean, there'll be a nice view."
"We can go fishin'!" Suezo chimed in.
"Yeah, a nice fish dinner'll make you feel alot better." Hare added.
Holly nodded weakly pulling herself to her feet. "Okay..."
Genki took her hand leading her down the path. "Come on, you'll feel alot better."
Holly nodded looking back at Galeon who was standing leaned back against a tree watching her.