Snow dusted her hair, ice crusted her eyelids, and the layer of sweat between her clothes and her skin told her that she'd never feel warm again so long as they were on Gagazet.

   Rikku trudged, knee deep in snowdrifts, clutching a torn black cloak shut with one hand and wishing that Lulu could clear them a path.

   "In an ideal world, whoosh, Lulu would melt us a way to Zanarkand and we'd get there in ten seconds flat," she complained to Kimahri, the owner of the nearest set of ears. With a little gasp, she clapped a hand over her mouth.

   "No, I didn't mean that, I didn't! It's much better to slog through this snow. Builds muscle and saves on magic. Yeah," she said in a rush.

   The Ronso looked at her for a moment with his unnerving yellow eyes. "Rikku is right," he said finally, as if remembering that she had told him she liked to get a reply when she talked to him.

   "Yeah."

   It had been four days since they'd last seen a regeneration point, places where magic bubbled to the surface and refreshed both health and magic stocks. That had been just prior to the most recent battle with Seymour—one that had heavily sapped both Lulu and Yuna's mana.

   That guy should just die for good already, she thought, blowing out a little hhhmmph of air. She rubbed her hands together and stomped her feet to try to warm herself up.

   I'm a creature of the desert, darn it. I'm not made for this climate.

   Her eyes lighted on Wakka, to her right and half a dozen paces ahead of her. He wore a bright yellow cloak that matched his blitzer uniform. At least there was no chance of losing him out in all this white. "Hey, Wakka! Wanna donate that to a good cause?"

   He paused, and waited for her to catch up, which made her hopeful. He thought she needed looking out for, didn't he? And it was often annoying, but at heart Rikku was highly opportunistic. Maybe he'd be all manly and self-sacrificing and stuff, and let her borrow his cloak.

   "Donate what?" As she caught up with him, he reached out and brushed melting flakes from her head.

   "Thanks," she said, returning the favor by flicking ice from his shoulder guard. "Your coat, obviously."

   "What?"

   "I guess that's a no," she pouted. "Aren't you worried lil' me will freeze to death out here?"

   He snorted, and said, "You'll be fine," but only after looking her over surreptitiously.

   Rikku tried to look as pitiful and sickly as possible—laughable, really, since she was healthy as a Ronso despite her much smaller frame, but Wakka didn't need to know that.

   "Well…"

   Sensing he was caving, she darted forward and under his cloak. "Never mind the donation. This way I get free body heat too."

   When she glanced up at him, he looked surprised at having her tucked against his side and under his arm, perhaps because of how deftly she had helped herself to his space before his blitzer's reflexes had kicked in—

   "You're getting ice in my armpit," he said through his teeth.

   Or maybe that was why his eyes were so wide.

   "Oops," she said unrepentantly.

   "You little—"

   "Hey!" A shout from Tidus cut off whatever Wakka had been about to say. "Look, it's the caverns!"

   Rikku ducked away from Wakka and stumbled forward in the closest thing to a run possible in three feet of snow. "Shelter," she squealed happily.

~*~

   After each party member took advantage of the regeneration point just inside the entry way, they used conventional methods to start a fire. Cloaks and blankets and scarves were hung in shifts to get vaguely dry, the guardians either huddling together under whatever wasn't currently draped over makeshift racks, or branching off in a scouting party of three.

   Her cloak strung up over the fire, Rikku chose to share with Tidus. "So?" she hissed at him.

   "Um…so?" he asked, scratching his head.

   "Yunie," she said flatly.

   "Oh. I don't have any ideas yet. C'mon, you know more about Yevon and Spira than I do. You must've come up with something."

   "You promised Cid," she said sternly, his last comment echoing in her head.

   "I know…" His eyes flickered away from hers, and when she followed their path, she saw he was watching her cousin with something indistinct but sad in his eyes. When Yunie glanced up at him, he quickly looked down at his feet.

   Having done her bit of Tidus-prodding for the day—and feeling a bit bad for him after observing the look he sent Yuna—she settled back against the stone and fiddled with the ends of her twin braids. "So, what happened?" she changed the subject abruptly.

   "Huh?"

   "Back by the fayth," she elaborated.

   "You mean with me blacking out and all?"

   "Yup."

   "I just fainted. Nothing major, not in a valley full of magic and fayth and other stuff that'll make your head spin."

   She chewed on her lip. He seemed to be telling the truth, and probably it was just her imagination, seeing dangers to her friends where there were none—but it continued to nag the back of her mind.

   Lulu, Wakka, and Kimahri returned to the campsite then. "There's no point in continuing to dry your things," Lulu informed them. "Part of the tunnel is underwater."

~*~

   "Water?" Tidus repeated.

   "Water," she confirmed.

   "Cold water," he continued.

   "Probably frigid."

   "We're going to swim it?" Tidus asked in a resigned tone.

   "Well—that or walk across it, but since she said underwater and only one of us is a summoner anyway, my money's on swimming."

   "Let's blitz, then," he said without any enthusiasm whatsoever. Wakka and Tidus had recently taken up the traditional sports cheer as a sort of battle cry.

   "Yup," she said, fingering her damp but warm cloak mournfully.

   "Hey, you two!" was the only warning she got before Wakka shouldered his way in between them.

   "Hey," Tidus said distractedly, all his attention on the sudden dip of the tunnel straight ahead of them. There, a dark pool of water lapped gently at the cave's floor.

   Wakka, she thought, looked far more enthusiastic about this than anyone sane had a right to be. "You look happy."

   "Sir Auron says there's some sort of Trial under there." He gestured with a jerk of his head. "You," he gave Tidus a friendly punch on the shoulder, "me, and you," he moved to do the same to Rikku, but she dodged quickly out of the way, "are gonna go and make a stairway appear somewhere."

   She glanced over at Tidus. "And this explains why he's happy?"

   " 'Course it does. He's clearly insane, and—ow—"

   Wakka had tackled Tidus into a wall. Rikku giggled. "Boys, boys, boys!" she scolded, shaking her finger at the two older men.

   "What is this?" Lulu asked as she rounded the corner, mild amusement showing in her voice.

   Wakka looked up guiltily. "Uh—haha. Slippery there, ain't it, brudda? Want a hand up?"

   "I think he just killed me. Thus, swimming just isn't going to happen," Tidus groaned, propped up against the wall.

   Rikku grinned. "You big baby. Don't worry, we'll make him kiss it better—"

   Wakka yelped and reached for her, but she scooted out of the way.

   "Okay, Yunie can kiss it better!"

   Wakka yelped louder. "Don't give him any ideas!"

   Her cousin, Rikku noted, was blushing.

   There was the sound of Sir Auron's throat being cleared, followed by the owner frowning pointedly at the water.

   "Looks like we got a job to do, ya?" Wakka said.

   "We're counting on you three. If it gets dangerous, pull out quick," Lulu instructed.

   "Right!"

   "Be careful," Yuna added quickly to all three of them, but her eyes were on Tidus.

~*~

   The first Trial was easily accomplished, thanks to Tidus' blitzball-gained ball-handling skills; the second took a moment of thought, but required no real effort on their parts. A hard battle with the Sanctuary Keeper followed, which left Kimahri with a mild concussion and Rikku with a broken arm—but Yuna quickly took care of that, and then there was nothing left to distract Rikku from the mix of ghostly blue and brilliant white on the horizon.

   Zanarkand.

   Fear choked up in her throat. Yunie's going to die. There wasn't anything left to do. Tidus didn't have any ideas, Sir Auron wouldn't let her have time to "rest" (but actually to think), and she wasn't winning her argument with Yuna.

   "Tell Cid thank you."

   No. Cid would break Tidus' neck for this, but that wouldn't make her feel any better, and then he'd look at her with all that disappointment in his face. All the summoners she had helped save, and she couldn't rescue the one who mattered most.

   "No, you can tell him yourself!" she flung out, trying to cram all her emotions into her eyes so that Yunie would see just much this hurt her. Willing her to realize how pointless, how stupid all this was.

   "Please…"

   "Yunie, don't say that because…we're going to see each other again, okay?" her voice rose with every word.

   There was no answer.

   She thought about how she'd just been teasing Tidus and Wakka earlier, how she'd wasted that time that she could have been thinking, and it was all her fault, and—

   Don't do this, don't do this to me and Dad and Brother and Tidus and Wakka and everyone. Please don't, don't die, don't die—

   Her thoughts ran on, chaotic and rambling and tinged with hopeless desperation. She had to force her feet to move for every step down the winding path. Tidus, she noticed vaguely, wasn't there. She wondered if he were hiding from her wrath, or what. But fear and hurt crowded too much of her head to leave room for anger.

   It wasn't his fault, anyway.

   She felt her mouth twist into a miserable frown.

   She felt like she would burst from all the useless frustration bouncing around in her head.

   She hated nothing more than feeling futile.

   Then her mind seized hold of one last, wild idea.

~*~

   Damn this. He hadn't thought about how horrible he'd feel once they reached Zanarkand. It would be better if he could just forget until after the fact and then it would hit him like a brick oh, Yuna's dead. But at least he would be able to concentrate on keeping her alive until the time came for the Final Summoning.

   It wasn't just him, either, because even he could tell it was at the forefront of everyone's thoughts. A grim air had settled on them all like a veil, and since Rikku's outburst no one else had said anything. They were a silent, solemn line moving down the final stretch of mountain.

   Like a damned funeral procession.

   Caught up in his thoughts, he started violently when a cold hand grabbed his bicep and a feminine voice hissed in his ear, "Wakka!"

   He turned around, briefly entertaining the thought of wrapping a hand around Rikku's throat, just to scare her, and then blaming it on reflex.

   "What?" he asked.

   "Help me kidnap Yuna," she said. Her eyes were intent, almost sparking with emotion, her fair brows drawn low over them, and her mouth set in a determined frown. He had never seen her quite like this before, and it was a little unnerving.

   "Uh—"

   "You care about her, right?" she demanded.

   He frowned at her.

   "Okay, that was an obvious question," she said, waving one hand in what might have been an apology. "You and me—I'll, um, tell her I have something to give her in private and then you sneak up behind her, and then we'll tie her up and drag her off to the airship before Sir Auron figures it out."

   She was fierce with desperation, despair too if he read her face right. He felt bad for her, but…

   "Rikku—" He bracketed her shoulders with his hands.

   "You care for her. Friends don't let friends kill themselves!" she squirmed in his grip.

   That hit him like a sucker punch, and brought his temper flaring up. How dare she. "You think I didn't try to talk her out of it?" he snarled. "When she first started talking about being a summoner?"

   "Well—"

   "You think Lu didn't? Kimahri too—what, you think you and Tidus are the only ones who don't want to see Yuna die?"

   She was biting her lip. His hands, he noticed, were clamped on her upper arms so tightly that her skin had gone white around his fingertips.

   He released his hold on her.

   "Then stop her," she said, and it came out as a whimper. "Stop her. Please."

   Eyeing the imprints he'd left on her guiltily, he took a deep breath. All right, let's see if the girl would listen to sense. Funny that he'd be the voice of reason for anything, really, but life was weird sometimes. "So—say we stop her—"

   Her eyes widened. "Yes," she said eagerly.

   "Say we stop her. This is purely hypothetical, ya?"

   "Yeah," she said, but he didn't think she believed him.

   Well, she'd figure it out soon enough. "Then what?"

   "Then we take her to the airship."

   "Then what?"

   "Then, we hang onto her until she figures out we're right and promises not to go back on pilgrimage. Then she can go back to Besaid, or stay with us, or whatever."

   " 'Figures out we're right?' So, what if she doesn't? Then what?" He crossed his arms over his chest.

   A flash of realization scrawled across her features. But she said, "Then at least she's alive!"

   He shook his head. "You think Yuna would want to live in a cage?" he asked softly.

   "It's not a—not really, not that much, oh hell." She kicked at the ground, and then knelt with her elbows resting on her knees.

   She looked so forlorn that he tried to comfort her. "Just try not to think about it, ya?"

   Rikku jolted to her feet so fast that her head slammed into his jaw. "Don't say that!"

   And with that, she tore off down the slope, leaving him to wince and wonder what he'd said wrong this time.

~*~

   At the base of the mountain, they had made camp for the night. A makeshift shelter was propped up against a dip in the land; flames roared in an open pit; dinner had been prepared and then eagerly devoured by most. Discarded cloaks and blankets were strewn here and there to make another, hopefully more successful, attempt at drying them out.

   They were settled around the fire, spaced out in twos and threes. And that damned silence had finally been broken. Directly across the fire, Sir Auron and Lulu were speaking in low tones. Tidus had finally reappeared nearly a half hour after he'd fallen behind them, and now he and Wakka were making half-hearted attempts at conversation to her right. The four familiar voices blended into a babble of background noise that was oddly soothing.

   She, on the other hand, was unusually quiet. Her knees hugged to her chest, she rocked back and forth lazily, most of her attention riveted on Yunie.

   The older girl sat closest to Kimahri, who stood at attention, facing out from the fire. Her hand was curled loosely on a fork, which she used to push food around on her plate. Flame and shadow shifted in changing patterns across her serious face. The flickering light did things to her appearance, made her look one moment like something fierce and deadly and not-quite-human, a creature out of an old legend, and the next like a vulnerable little girl.

   After a long time, Rikku crossed over to her cousin. She had to make things right, before.

   "Yunie? Yunie, I'll go with you all the way and fight Sin and watch you—watch you summon the Final Aeon. I just wanted to let you know," she said in a rush, the words tripping over one another on her tongue. If she took her time she was going to cry.

   A pause. "Thank you," Yunie said.

   "You do realize I'm only saying this because Wakka and Tidus won't help me kidnap you," she added.

   Yuna gave a breathy little laugh. "I wondered if that might be the case."

   "You know I don't approve, and you know if I had a say in it, you'd be far, far away from here," Rikku continued.

   The answering nod was little bit jerky, and she thought she saw tears in her cousin's eyes, though it might have been a trick of the firelight. "I know."

   "But I decided this a long time ago: that if I couldn't stop you, I'd at least be there with you when it happened. Got that?"

   And when she hugged her cousin, she did cry, but she swallowed her accompanying sobs so Yunie wouldn't know.

   Later, she noticed her left shoulder was wet again.

~*~

   "If one of us has to become a fayth…I volunteer." Lulu.

-

   "This is my story. Either it'll go the way I want it to go…or else I'll end it here!" Her heart leapt to see Tidus stepping forward, doing something—he'd come up with something!

   "Wait. You say it's your story, but it's my story, too, you know? It would be so easy... to let my fate just carry me away…following this same path my whole life through. But I know...I can't. What I do, I do... with no regrets." Yuna, no, Yuna, don't do it—wait, did she say something about not following the same path her whole life? Yunie what are you thinking?

-

   "Sin is an inevitable part of Spira's destiny. It is never-ending."

-

   "The Final Summoning…is a false tradition that should be thrown away." Yuna, her strength finally showing through like tempered steel.

-

   "Sorrow cannot be abolished. It is meaningless to try."

-

   "I will defeat sorrow. I will stand my ground and be strong. I don't know when it'll be, but someday I will conquer it. And I will do it without…false hope!"

   Rikku pumped her fist in the air.

-

   "Yuna! This is our story! Now let's see this thing through together!"

~*~

   "We killed Yunalesca," Wakka said.

   She caught Tidus in a fierce hug as he and Auron entered the airship's bridge. "We killed Yunalesca!" she sang out. Adrenaline from the battle mixed with bubbling elation. "We did it, Tidus! Okay, so I didn't come up with anything exactly and maybe it was mostly thanks to you but it happened anyway and Yunie's safe and we did it!"

   "Yeah..." Tidus glanced over at Yuna, his mouth splitting into a broad grin. When he ran over, yanking her into his arms, Rikku's gaze swept back to Wakka.

   He was staring at his blitzball—the weapon that had dealt the final blow to Yunalesca's last form. "We killed the first summoner," he told Rikku when she trotted over to him and propped her elbow companionably on his shoulder.

   "Yup!" Looking up at him so that her jaw rested in the crook of her arm, she caught his eyes with her gaze. Oh. He had brown eyes. Pretty brown eyes, like chocolate or like rich mud you could drown in—

   Well, that proves that I have no poetic skill. And besides, the color of his eyes is neither here nor there.

   "Aren't you happy?" she asked, tilting her head quizzically and staring at his nose.

   "We killed Yunalesca," he pointed out again.

   "Yup!" Happiness roared back up inside her. Containing it was impossible. She flung an arm around his neck and kissed him hard. "The Final Aeon is gone—and Yunie's fine—and we're all still alive—and now we'll go get Sin some other way and live happily ever after, all of us together and—"

   "All right, I get the point, y'know?" he said, laughing. He gave her a friendly fist to the shoulder. "See? We didn't even have to kidnap her and it all worked out. Told you it would be better not to worry about it."

   She sighed contently, her joy still wriggling around inside her. She was far too happy to bother refreshing his memory, which seemed to have been curiously edited just a bit.

~*~

   Even if you did defeat Sin…Yu Yevon the immortal would just create Sin anew…

   He had a bad feeling about Yunalesca's last words. They'd just killed a legendary summoner, and he suspected they would have to kill God before this was through.

   But it was a little late for regrets. He'd tossed his lot with Yuna long ago, and sealed it with his actions in the Dome at Zanarkand. "Ha! I'd never forgive myself—no way! Not if I ran away now! Not even in death, ya!" he had said, and it was still true. Even if the only other option was death—because how could you kill an immortal?—he wasn't going to run.

   Listening to the burr and buzz of the engines, he absently toyed with one of Rikku's weapons, a Ninja Claw, that she'd left on the table in the small compartment Cid liked to pretend was a "suite." It was where Yuna and guardians were currently housed, when they were on board.

   They'd done a scan using the airship's machina sensors, and located a ruined something. Might be a temple, Cid said, and so they'd locked in a course and now the engines churned noisily, propelling them toward their destination.

   He traced the claw's curving blade carefully with his thumb. It, tellingly, didn't slice him. She'd need to sharpen it if she planned to take it into battle.

   His eyes sought her out. On a cot in the far corner, she lay, sprawled out in sleep. Her mouth was open and she was drooling, he noted with amusement, filing it away in his mind to tease her about later.

   She was beautiful.

   It wasn't a new thought. He was a guy, she was hot. He wasn't blind. Normal stuff.

   But it was supposed to be more of an observation, the way he sometimes noticed Lu's darker beauty. A distant bit of lust, one he'd never dream of acting on. If sometimes he harbored a thought or two about her long legs or the bronze curve of her hip, it was a vague fantasy with no real connection to Rikku. Just a shapely blonde with a pretty face; interchangeable with any other shapely blonde in the world.

   Rikku was a girl with a ready grin or smirk; hair she liked to play with; small, practical hands, calloused on the palm and fingertips; an accompanying stream of words because she never did shut up; with a stubborn streak nearly as wide as his and a bubbly laugh.

   And recently, he had begun to give a thought or two to that. Not intentionally because they tended to sneak up on him, sandwiched between innocent thoughts, but it was definitely Rikku in them, not just some cute girl with a spill of wheat-colored hair down her back.

   He shook his head. Better to think of her as a little sister, another Yuna, even though Rikku was too—(sleek/tanned/grinning/fierce/stubborn/giggly/silly/brilliant/perfect)—different for him to think of her as a second Yuna. But she probably liked him in a purely platonic fashion, like he was another Tidus to pal around with, joke with, flirt with but not seriously.

   Anyway, some things were better left unsaid. He'd get over this little crush, without her ever needing to know—

   "He~ey," she chirped, opening one eye. "Been watching me awhile, huh? I'm cute, ain' I?"

   She stretched her arms lazily, her slim back arching.

   "Uh—" he winced. Sneaky Al Bhed. "Cute? Yeah, that little strand of drool right here," he nudged the corner of his mouth with his knuckle to illustrate, "is charming. And the way you snore is too cute for words, ya?"

   He was rather pleased with his swift recovery.

   Frowning, she flung her legs over the side of the cot and sauntered over to him. Her hands were planted on her hips. "For one, I don't snore."

   "Of course not. I forgot. Girls don't snore, they hum through their noses, ya?" He grinned up at her, aware that she didn't snore and determined to pretend that she did.

   "And for another—" She leaned over, one hand splayed on the tabletop, the other grabbing a handful of his vest. "You think I'm cute."

   "Eurgh," he said intelligently, his brain short-circuited by her scent.

   Her nose was almost brushing his, and then she bent her head a little and grazed her mouth over his. The kiss was dry and gentle, a featherlight version of the one she'd smacked him with after Yunalesca's defeat, but he could still feel heat rising to his face.

   "You're blushing," she whispered.

   "So are you," he pointed out, brushing his thumbs over her rather pink cheekbones.

   "I am not." She pulled back and gave him a lopsided smile. "Later. Oh, and by the way? I like the way you look when you're confused."

   He watched her flounce out of the room, feeling completely bewildered and very embarrassed.

   "You just threw one hell of a wrench in Operation: Think of Rikku like a sister," he called after her.

   Her laugh echoed back to him, quickly followed by her still-pink face poking back inside their 'suite.' "Good," she said. "If you dare complete that mission, I'll have to hurt you."