**And this marks chapter twenty. Thanks to all of you for stickin' with me so far on this. I appreciate everything ('specially reviews and feedback! ^_^)! I checked the words on this chapter, and boy, was I surprised--around 2700 words (without this intro)! w00tage... Anyway. I also want to say that, as the holidays approach, I may be a bit more slow coming with the chapters. I'll admit it--I get lazy around this time of year. ^_^;; So be patient with me!!! Also, I will have a new pic up from the story tonight--of Niet stuffing her face. Gomen, Saito, but it was just ASKING for a picture! XD So, onward we go!**
Yueh had her head in her hands. "Great, now everyone knows we're here..."
Arashi waved her hand lightly as the Kicker's center got the ball and booked for the opposite goal. "They would have in a short amount of time anyway, Yueh. I'm actually getting used to it." She smiled kindly. "Don't let it ruin the game."
"I don't think I'll ever get used to it," Yueh commented. This wasn't heard, as the crowd was, as a single entity, wincing and "ooh"ing at a tackle the Kicker's center had received from a teenaged, long brown haired boy. The boy stole the ball from her easily and tossed it from where he floated all the way across the sphere to a teammate, the Runner's center.
He's kinda cute, Yueh thought. Like...like Solid Snake and Dante crossed or something. She shook her head, blushing deeply. I shouldn't be thinking like this...
"Ooh, nice hit there by Hunter! And a clean pass to Jinni, who shoots and...GOAL! One point for the Runners!" one of the announcers said. Yueh couldn't tell which. The half of the crowd behind the girls and Ben cheered wildly, but across from them, the audience booed. Yueh plugged her ears--the noise was ear shattering. The others seemed unaffected, although she guessed that, at least Niet was preoccupied.
The game went on for longer than the normal five minutes per half, however, watching them as the exited the sphere pool at halftime, she noticed that they each spit out some small, glowing sphere of some sort. Yueh looked over at her companions. "Did you guys see that?"
Arashi nodded, while Ben stared blankly across the arena, eagerly awaiting the next half. "Yeah. I think--I mean, I saw it in fanfic once--that they use that for long breath. Very few people can hold their breath for that long, although there is this tribe I heard of in South America or something that can do that, but--"
"Okey, Ar'shi, bu' wha' ish ih?" Niet asked. A touch of food came out and nearly hit Arashi in the face. Luckily, Arashi was too busy explaining to notice.
"A bit of magic, like an oxygen supply only without the tank," Arashi explained. "It was in this cute Wakka/Lulu fanfic that I read. Maybe we can go in the sphere after the game?"
Ben perked up at this and turned his attention to Arashi. "Really? We could?" He began jumping up and down in his seat like a three year old on Christmas morning. "Awesome! We could make our own team, with me as captain of course. And--"
"Here comes the rush…" Yueh closed her eyes as she felt the people rush by her to greet Arashi and the others, herself included. Most, by some instinct Yueh couldn't comprehend, went straight to Arashi and began shaking her hand and bowing to her. Niet tried to talk with her mouthful, which ended up in a food shower for most of the front row spectators, none of whom seemed to mind.
One little girl pushed through the crowd and tugged on one of Yueh's red arm warmers. Yueh looked down to see a brown eyed, black haired girl in a pink dress smiling at her. The little girl continued to tug on her arm warmers as she spoke. "Are you a guardian?"
She kind of looks like me... Yueh smiled back at the little girl. "Yes, I am. I'm Yueh. What's your name?" Like me, before...before...
"I'm Lily!" The girl hopped up onto Yueh's lap and giggled. "Yueh's a funny name, guardian!"
Ben stood up and began playing the macho card. He pushed the crowd back from the girls, saying, "All right, all right, that's enough. The Lady Summoner just came to watch the game, people, she'll talk with you later." He shooed the people away, and Arashi shook one last hand before Ben pulled the person away. "Later, people!"
Yueh shook her head, laughing. Lily looked puzzled and asked, "What is it?"
"Nothing. You'd better go, before Ben here gets to you," she said, setting Lily down on the ground. Smiling, she went on. "In case I don't see you, take this." Using some of her old magic, she conjured up a mog doll from FFX and handed it to Lily, whose eyes lit up.
Lily gave a Yevon-style bow with the mog in her hands. "Thank you!" She began to run off, and Yueh could hear her laugh happily as she did. "Thank you, Yueh!"
Thinking for a moment, Yueh conjured up another mog doll and set it on her lap. I'm a black mage...so why not? She looked over at the others. Ben was finally sitting down, and Arashi was shaking her head and reprimanding him. Niet had gotten more free food from the bystanders, so she was definitely occupied. Yueh stood the mog doll up on her lap, animating it in the same manner Lulu always had. She made it bow, and she laughed.
"Nice to meet you...Lily."
*-*-*-*-*
Mariana had passed on Guadosalam and its star attraction of the Farplane. She had heard of it as a child, and of the Guado, and had never had any desire to see either the Farplane or the Guado who watched over it. She had seen one, once in her life, and she hadn't liked it.
The boy had seemed human enough. But, his fingers had been too long, though, and his hair was an unnatural blue hue that stuck out in all directions. Lighter blue veins ran through the young boy's face and uncovered chest, along with some tattoos on his chest. And when he spoke...
Mariana put the boy further out of her mind. She had seen him again, in that wretched game. Too often. Once had been too often for her.
Genki also seemed rather happy to skip Guadosalam. And, of course, he had told her every single little reason why on the way to their next stop up the coast, the Thunder Plains.
"...Seymour was creepy, and he was only half Guado! That girly voice--I muted the TV every time the guy came on the screen," Genki said as he tromped along behind his summoner. He shouldered the backpack up higher and gave a grunt. "And Tromell--what a creep! The guy lets him go and totally defies the laws he's supposed to obey by the whole Yevon crock and lets Seymour become an unsent! Even after he finds Seymour killed Lord Jyscal! I mean--"
"Hush, Genki. We're here." Thank goodness. My ears couldn't put up with any more of his prattling. She swept out an arm and pointed to the sparking sky and dark lands before her. "Welcome to the Thunder Plains."
She had to suppress a smile as she saw Genki gulp. "The Thunder Plains. Right." He tightened his shoulder straps and marched onward dutifully. "Dodging thunder was never something I was good at..."
Mariana gave a chuckle and followed. "You'll get good at it very quickly. Trust me." She played with her long bangs a bit as she walked along. "Lightning cannot kill you here, but it will hurt quite a bit." She sidestepped as a bolt hit about a foot away from her. "So I suggest you avoid it as well as you can."
She laughed again as Genki dived from a bolt that was at least five feet to the left of him and hit the dirt. He spit out the bits of earth and stood up, brushing off his pants.
Mariana did another sidestep as she passed alongside Genki. "That is not the way to dodge it, Genki. You'll learn."
"I've been following her for who knows how long...I don't think I'll ever learn," Genki mumbled to himself. He trudged along behind Mariana and kept a close watch on the sky.
*-*-*-*-*
"And we're back, with the score at 3 to 1 in favor of the New Luca Runners. And here's the Blitzoff..."
The Runner's center got the ball and tossed it to the brown haired Dante-boy from before. Hunter, Yueh thought his name had been. He swam up to the goal and did a spin kick to where it flew into the other team's goal, making the buzzer go off and starting up the crowd again.
The boy went to give a teammate a high five when his eyes crossed paths with Yueh's. The two stared at each other for a moment, and the young man went to swim towards her when all heck broke loose.
Screams of the unhappy kind erupted from all around Yueh, and she soon found out their cause. A large group of fiends had come into the stadium, with the local crusaders following closely and trying to kill them. They were supposed to be guarding the stadium, but somehow the fiends had managed to escape them. It didn't help that most of the "guards" were middle-aged and rather pudgy around the midsection.
The four companions jumped up. "Of course, this would have to follow the game's story line, now wouldn't it?" Yueh said with a sigh. She took a quick glance back at the sphere, but Hunter and the others were gone now. She set her mod doll in her belt and picked up her flute.
Niet took one last gulp of popcorn and, after wiping her hands off on her pants, pulled out her rapier. "Ah, a guardian's job is never done, is it? To work!"
Ben was grumbling as he pulled out his own sword. Yueh was rather happy that she couldn't hear all that he had to say about the situation, as she was sure most of it was less than appropriate. Readying a Thundara spell, she followed Arashi towards the highest platform, from which the announcers had been broadcasting. At the moment, the announcer's screams were amplified over the loudspeakers.
"Why are we saving their sorry rear-ends?" Yueh asked as they ran through the screaming masses. She shot a Vouivre with Thundara, which was a major overkill. It shattered without another hit, and Yueh kept on running.
"We're not just trying to save them, we're getting a better vantage point!" Arashi shouted back. "I can do a summon from there, and you can cast magic!" They all dodged another charging Vouivre, which Yueh promptly iced. "Niet, Ben, you two should keep the fiends from attacking us from the rear." It seemed to Yueh that Arashi was a little too short of breath.
"Got it!" Yueh kept up the attack spells as they ran, shooting ice and thunder left and right. As they reached the stairs, Yueh heard someone shouting out her name. She skidded to a halt on the very bottom step, and Arashi turned back.
"What is it? Yueh?"
Yueh searched the tumultuous crowd and saw a small figure in pink waving around a mog doll. She heard the scream again, and the figure was tackled to the ground by yet another Vouivre. Yueh shouted back at Arashi.
"I'll be back! There's--Lily--"
"I understand, just go!" Arashi waved her off wildly before running up the stairs with Niet and Ben. Yueh nodded as her friend disappeared up the stairs and ran off to find Lily, who was still screaming.
She found her huddled against a wall, her dress torn at the bottom hem and a small blood stain near the knees. Lily was crying and clutching her doll tightly to her chest, still screaming for Yueh. Yueh took in a deep breath and threw her own mog doll at the Vouivre to get its attention. "Yo! Baka!" It growled and turned around, stomping a foot on Yueh's mog doll. Yueh winced before going back to coaxing the fiend away from Lily. "That's it! C'mere, you stupid monster!"
Lily sniffled and stopped crying a moment to glance at Yueh. Standing up using the wall as support, she began to scoot the other way. Yueh looked her way and nodded, agreeing with what Lily was doing. "C'mon, closer, you idiot. Come on..." A few more feet... The fiend began to charge and Yueh shouted a war cry. "Got you!" She ran at it and cast a Blizzaga spell as she went past it. Yueh ran into the wall in her charge, and the Vouivre disapparated in a flurry of pyre flies. Lily flew back to Yueh and jumped in her arms, sobbing and crying. Yueh tried to calm her, patting her on the head and saying reassuring words, but the words were caught in Yueh's throat when she saw what lie before her.
Five Vouivres, all stamping their feet and growling, stood in a semicircle, surrounding both girls, trapping them against the wall. Suppressing a gulp, Yueh stood herself and Lily upright. The fiends inched closer, and Yueh couldn't help but think they were almost savoring the attack on them. She whispered just loudly enough for Lily to hear over the growling and the other people's screaming.
"All right...I want you to pretend with me. Pretend you know magic, okay?" She took one of Lily's shaking hands into one of her own. "Cast a spell with me, okay? Aim for all the fiends, and think HARD." Using her other hand, she grasped her flute and played a one handed melody, which ended up a bit mangled, but still worked. Yueh could feel Lily take a deep breath and remove her hand to take full hold of the mog doll. Immediately, Yueh used her now free hand on her flute, and hastened the melody.
"Fiends!" Lily held up her doll as both it and the flute began to glow a bright white. "Freeze!"
Yueh released the last note on her flute and screamed. "NOW!"
Both girls channeled all their energy through their respective weapons, and from both emanated a long string of ice. It shattered upon impact on the first fiend, and made a chain reaction, exploding the others into pyre flies just as well as the first. As the glowing of the fluttering pyre flies died down, Yueh looked over at Lily.
The drain of magic had been hard on her. Lily had fainted, her mog doll still in hand. Yueh took a deep breath and, just to reassure herself, checked for a pulse. To her great relief, there was a strong heartbeat. A bit slow, but definitely strong. Yueh stuck her flute back in her belt and scooped up Lily in her arms, making sure the doll was still there as well.
As for Yueh's own doll, which was a bit flattened but otherwise fine from the fiend stomping, she animated it and had it follow at a quick pace to the stair case once more. The screams over the loudspeaker had stopped, and Yueh could hear a low singing coming from every direction. It was in Japanese, as far as she could tell. It must be Arashi.
Yueh ran up the stairs and was almost tackled by Niet, who was still in battle mode, her paralyzing rapier out and ready. She sheathed it as Yueh jogged up the last few steps.
"Arashi's summoning."
Yueh pushed her way past Niet and set Lily gently down on the floor, sitting her up against the only wall in the booth. "I could tell. You can hear her over the loudspeakers."
Niet, a confused look on her face, shook her head. "No, the speakers...they're off. The only microphones to the speakers are on their heads, and they're both out cold." She pointed to two slumped over figures, most likely Jimma and Bobba. Ben was trying to revive the two, albeit unsuccessfully. Niet let out a stage whisper. "He doesn't know any white magic."
"Just…maybe they just fainted. They don't look hurt…"
Niet shook her head and finally saw the little girl Yueh had brought up with her. "Who's she?"
"Lily, I met her at halftime, and--" Yueh stared across the platform.
Arashi was standing on absolutely nothing but air, her skirt and hair flaring in the winds that seemed to only affect her. Her singing was still amplified greatly, even without the speakers.
"What is she doing?"
Niet stared out across the way, unphazed. "Summoning."