Chapter 3 – Can I Be the New Sin?
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"Good day, Harold," Freda the Tonberry greeted her fellow green lizardy cleric thing.
"My dear Freda!" Harold replied warmly, sliding into the chair opposite hers at the table covered with a blue linen cloth and set with the fixings of a most lovely tea party. "Truly, it has been too long. Been a bit busy around the ruins of late, what with all the adventurers coming in and knocking various monsters into orbit."
"Yes, I do wish those adventurers would kindly push off. And take that noisy Omega Weapon with them," Freda agreed, shaking her head.
"Haven't seen him around much lately," Harold noted, reaching for a lemon biscuit.
"Haven't seen who much around lately?" a third voice asked.
"Oh, good day to you, Cecil," Freda called. "Take a seat, will you?"
"I will, thank-you, Freda," Cecil replied, pulling out the chair next to Harold.
"Harold was just remarking how we haven't seen Omega Weapon around much lately," Freda said, passing him a cup.
"Ah, yes, I have noticed a general improvement in the quality of the air around here," Cecil agreed.
Harold chuckled.
"Quite, quite."
"Good day, everyone," a fourth little green lizardy thing called merrily approaching the tea party.
"Oh, hello there, Penelope," Cecil replied. "We're just having a spot of tea. Join us, will you?"
"Yes, nice weather for it. I think I will."
"Oh, lovely," Freda beamed. "Harold, would you kindly start the sandwiches?"
"Of course, my dear," Harold agreed, taking two and passing the plate to Cecil. "They look delightful, by the way."
"Oh, do go on," Freda said, waving away the praise modestly and blushing slightly, if such a thing is possible for Tonberrys – we wouldn't know, having never embarrassed a Tonberry.
Suddenly, just as Penelope had begun to pass the sugar to Freda, an alarmed voice, somewhere off in the distance, exclaimed,
"Hey, guys, it's a bunch of Tonberrys! Let's kill them before they can kill us!"
"Oh, bother," Cecil sighed as the band of travellers descended upon the table. "There were some advantages to having Omega Weapon here. The adventurers seemed less inclined to go poking around and interrupting our tea party."
"Oh, dear, and there are no Chef's Knives around!" Freda lamented.
"Well, how about this…butter knife?" Penelope suggested.
"Wonderful idea love," Cecil said dryly. "This is the last time I ever come for tea here."
"Yes, I expect it will be," Harold agreed as he received a hefty blow across the back of the head from a Blitzball.
"I hit one, ya?!" a voice, different than the first one, declared proudly.
"Ouch," Harold lamented.
"He's throwing a ball at us," Cecil noted in disgust. "This is rather humiliating. He's beating us to death with a ball."
"You always were first out during Dodgeball, weren't you?" Penelope recalled.
"I hated that game," Cecil said viciously. "If I'd known I would end up here, I would have put in more hours of practice."
"Hindsight," Harold said with a sympathetic smile.
"Yeah," Cecil agreed as the table burst into pieces due to a well-placed bolt of lightning.
"Eh, you missed, Lu," the voice that the Tonberrys had come to associate with the ball, laughed.
"Oh, did I?" a more feminine voice asked.
"Ya!"
"Oh, really!"
"Yes," a different voice replied. A rather gruff, crusty, curmudgeoney voice, Freda noted idly.
A pause.
"Oh." Another pause. "Really?"
"I'm afraid so," a sweet, halting feminine voice said kindly. "I'm sorry."
"Oh," the other girl sighed sadly. "Well, if I missed with Thundaga, I'd like to see them dodge this! Ultima!"
"Oh, dear," Penelope said a little worriedly, being the possessor of a great gift of understatement.
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"I wonder what they were doing," Tidus said, nudging the dried husk of what had previously been a Tonberry wearing a little flowered hat.
"Ya," Wakka agreed. "I don't know why a Tonberry would have a teapot."
"Ah, Wakka, if you knew two things, I suspect you'd know twice as much," Lulu said pleasantly.
"You think so?" Wakka asked. "Maybe after we beat Sin, I can go to university or somethin'!"
"Yes, I'm sure they could use a pool boy."
"Really?" Wakka asked excitedly.
"Oh, come on, Lulu," Tidus said lightly. "You're just mad because you missed."
"Oh, did I?" she asked viciously.
"Yeah, I think I remember something about that," Tidus replied.
"Well, be warned. I never miss twice."
"Rikku never misses at all," Tidus noted.
"Grumble-grumble-grumble," said everyone.
"Gee, I wonder what Rikku's doing right now," Yuna said.
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"Please…let me be the new Sin!" Seymour begged fervently.
Sin lowered his enormous whiskey bottle and swiped blindly in the direction that the annoying voice was coming from.
"Pleeeeeeeease?" Seymour wheedled, eyes wide and shiny.
"I work alone, kid."
"But I wanna be the new Sin!"
"Tell ya what: if you can kill me, you can be the new Sin. Don't even have to do all that crap with the final Aeon. Just gimme all you got. I got a couple seconds. Don't know what the hell's keeping that idiot whiner son of mine," he concluded with a grumble. "On the plus side, I got plenty of quality time alone with my favourite things: whiskey, and a bottle. To hold the whiskey, of course."
"Yes. Of course," Seymour agreed shortly. "Very well! If defeat you I must, then defeat you, I shall!"
"Like you defeated my kid?"
"Shut up!" Seymour whined.
"Look. If Whinesey McWhinesalot can beat you, there's no way you're gonna take me down."
"I'll show you! I'll summon the most powerful of all Aeons! Anima!"
The skies grew dark, and the clouds rolled back. From the heavens, a voice proclaimed,
"I'm still mad at you for turning me into an Aeon, young man! You're grounded!"
"Aw, ma!" Seymour whimpered. "Not again!"
Sin chuckled nastily.
"Having a little trouble performing?"
"Shut up! I got interrupted on my wedding night!"
Sin sighed.
"Meanwhile, I still live. Now, go away. There's whiskey to be drunk, and I'm the hideously freakish end boss to drink it!"
"I'm not done yet! There's a whole bar full of Aeons, and I bet one of them will come!"
"Hmph. Probably Carbuncle."
"Who's Carbuncle?"
"Long story," Sin replied laconically, taking another swig. "And it's not my story."
Seymour frowned.
"Why aren't you drunk yet?"
"Look at me," Sin suggested. "I weigh twenty-five thousand tons. Do you have any idea how much I need to get me tipsy? I had an idea, a few years back. I was gonna take all the fruit in the world and throw it in the ocean. Then I'd take some yeast and throw it in there. Then I was gonna take Spira and move it away from the sun. Then I'd finally have enough. An ocean of liquor!"
"An ocean of liquor?!" a voice repeated excitedly from above.
"Ah! Excellent!" Seymour noted. "Bahamut! You were next on my list!"
"Who're you?" Bahamut demanded.
"I'm Seymour! Guado? Funny hair? Dead?"
"Doesn't ring a bell. You got beer?"
"No," Seymour replied reluctantly. "I have the power to control Aeons and bring terrible calamity upon the world as the next Sin!"
"But you don't have beer," Bahamut clarified.
"No, not as such," Seymour admitted.
"Hey, Bahamut!" Sin called jovially. "What say we dump this loser and head up to the bar?"
"I don't think you're welcome there," Bahamut said thoughtfully.
"What're ya talkin' about? I'm an Aeon! I'm the ultimate Aeon! Summoned by Yu Yevon himself!"
"Yeah, but you're a dark Aeon, see? We're all light Aeons. There's a sign, see? We're not allowed to bring in dark Aeons."
"Damn discrimination's what that is!" Sin growled. "Why are you guys always trying to keep the dark Aeons down? We have to ride at the back of the bus, we don't get the vote, we don't get to go to the damn bar! You know, one time there was this chick I was makin' time with. Shee…Shin…Sheila…no, wait, S-something. Anyway, she was a real hot little number. Body that wouldn't quit. But cold as ice."
"Hot, but cold as ice," Seymour murmured, puzzling over this.
"You wouldn't understand," Sin scoffed. "Probably never seen a chick in your life."
"I've seen them," Seymour protested. "Usually, they're running away in terror because I kidnapped them and tried to force them to marry me, but I have seen them!"
"Can I go on, please?" Sin requested, annoyed.
And since Sin talks when Sin wants to talk, he did.
"Anyway, this one time, she and I went to the Moonflow. I destroyed it, but she wasn't impressed."
"You have to work so hard to impress some women," Bahamut said sympathetically.
"Yeah; not like he'd know," Sin chuckled, pointing with a giant flipper to a very annoyed Seymour. The subtlety of the gesture was somewhat lost…
Bahamut frowned, rather suspicious.
"Hey…didn't you say something about an ocean of liquor?"
"That'd be great," Sin sighed with the Sin-equivalent of shiny eyes.
"So…what you're trying to say is, there's no ocean of liquor."
"Yeah," Sin shrugged. "Be nice, wouldn't it?"
"Bahamut is going home!" Bahamut proclaimed, pouting.
"Well, it was good to see you again, old buddy!" Sin called after him as he departed. "Hey, hold on; you have a spare Mega Flare to take care of my little pest problem here?"
He indicated Seymour with another gesture of his huge, un-subtle flipper.
"No beer, no Mega Flare," Bahamut said, turning away airily.
"Geez…he's becoming as mercenary as Yojimbo," Sin commented aside to the wall, since the only other thing around to talk to was Seymour, and he couldn't count on the boy to understand the big words he was using.
Seymour looked up at him hopefully, poking in the flipper.
"So, can I be the new Sin yet?"
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"Yeah," Tidus was meanwhile agreeing. "I'll bet Rikku's somewhere, having a great time and gaining tons more experience!"
"Damn her," Auron growled.
"I'm sorry…Auron," Yuna hastened – sort of – to apologize.
"Not you," he sighed.
"I'm sor-"
"Yeah, alright," he interrupted. "We get it. Hey, kid," he continued, turning to Tidus. "Don't you think you, Wakka, and Lulu have had enough fun?"
"I thought we were trying to get money, not fun," Tidus mused, scratching his head.
"Let…him live…Auron," Yuna pleaded, trying futilely to restrain the man currently advancing menacingly on Tidus. "He's…kind of…cute. He…makes me want to…wear…short…shorts."
"Fine," Auron grumbled. "I won't kill him. Perhaps…a song. C'mere, boy. Here's a number, just for you. Row, row, row your boat-"
"Stop it, Auron!" Tidus pleaded.
"-gently down the stream-"
"I mean it!"
"-merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily-"
"Noooo!" he whimpered. "Don't finish that!"
"What's he so upset about, ya?" Wakka asked.
"For once, Wakka, we're all as in the dark as you are," Lulu said, somewhat mystified.
"Ahem," Auron said, slinging his arm about Tidus' shoulders. "-life is but a dream," he concluded with a wink.
"I hate you!" Tidus cried. "Not as much as Dad, but I hate you!"
With that, he ran, sobbing, into the next room.
"Where…do you think he's…going?" Yuna wondered.
"Maybe he wanted to leave for a bit, learn how to become a man of substance," Auron suggested, snickering.
"Kimahri not get this joke, either," Kimahri noted, adjusting his paisley print bathrobe.
"How many time we gotta tell you, ya?" Wakka asked, exasperated. "You don't wear the robe in battle!"
"Kimahri not battling," Kimahri pointed out. "Kimahri enjoying fruits of labour. Specifically, labour of others, as fine aristocrat would. Gothic chick," he continued, flicking a hundred-gil piece at Lulu. "Fetch Kimahri a drink."
"Fetch this," Lulu said ominously, beginning a spell.
The next moment, Tidus' scream drifted in from the next room.
"I don't get it," Lulu murmured, a hand to her forehead. "As funny as it was, that wasn't intended for him."
"Gothic chick get sloppy in her old age," Kimahri noted wisely.
"I'll show you sloppy!"
The next moment, a loud zap echoed through the ruins, along with another scream of pain from Tidus.
"Lulu! Please stop! You're…killing…him," Yuna pleaded.
"I know, but I'm trying to kill him!" Lulu said, gesturing to Kimahri and his monocle.
"Maybe gothic chick should aim for Wakka," Kimahri suggested. "Maybe gothic chick luck out and hit Kimahri."
"It couldn't hurt to try," Lulu agreed, beginning another spell.
"Ya! It could, ya! It could hurt me!" Wakka exclaimed. "But I don't know if magic really hurts or not. I'm so confused about everything!"
"I'll…uh…be over there," Auron announced, stepping into a corner. "Away from the kid."
The next minute, a cold breeze blew in from the next room, and once again, Tidus let out a howl of pain.
"It's cold! It's cold! It's cold!"
"This isn't happening!" Lulu insisted. "I'll get it on the next one."
"Lulu, please, aim for me," Tidus suggested as he bolted into the room.
"Everybody run," Auron commanded.
Lulu glared at him.
"I do not have bad aim!"
"I dunno, Lulu," Wakka said thoughtfully. "Seems like you couldn't hit the broad side of a Shoopuff with a blitzball!"
"Do I look like I'd touch a blitzball?"
"I don't like to judge people by appearances," Wakka said seriously.
Lulu sighed.
"Never mind, Wakka. Just…go play."
"Alright, ya! Who wants to blitz?"
"It's about to get very, very wet in here," Lulu announced as Wakka sort of wandered off.
Tidus pointed emphatically to himself.
Lulu nodded.
"Waterga!"
The next moment, Tidus found himself swept away in the massive ball of water that had first descended upon him from the skies.
Lulu nodded, quite satisfied with the outcome.
"I'm back!"