**
Part Three: Eyes Like Firelight
**
"Rikku, fyga ib. Wake up."
The voice was accompanied by a hand gently stroking her face, stirring her from her sleep. Rikku muttered incoherently, swiping at the hand. "'Mup, Pops."
"Sure ya are. You're not up til you're out of that bed and moving around."
Rikku peeked an eye open, looking at her father, who was standing over the bed, really just a couple of cargo crates pushed together with a thin mattress stretched over the top and an equally threadbare blanket pulled over her shoulder. She had been sharing the room with the Al-Bhed Psychs, who had all apparently departed before she had awoken, to judge by the empty state of the room.
She pushed the blanket away from herself, cautiously sitting upright and covering her sleepy eyes to protect them from the lights of the cargo bay. "See," she said, voice sleep-roughed. "Moving."
Cid chuckled, moving away from her to give her some room to fall off the crates and stumble around looking for her belt pouches and accessories that she had removed the night before while he sat down on a nearby low crate. "Get a good night's sleep?"
Rikku snorted indelicately as she crouched down next to some sort of mesh cage and fumbled around looking for her goggles. "I was sharing a room with a bunch of over-hyped blitzball players who think that if you stand still for a couple of minutes, you'll drop dead." She peered over the rim of the cage at her father. "I slept like a baby. I've had a very tiring few months."
Cid made a sound of amusement and shook his head at her teasing tone of voice.
Rikku continued talking, half to herself and half to her father, as she continued crawling around looking for odds and ends that had been misplaced during the night. "I was also dreaming of dinner. You know, a proper meal with fresh greens and not the rehydrated meals we have on board or the strips of dried meat and stew from the Pilgrimage."
"I still can't believe you went on the Pilgrimage of all things. Idiot child."
"Worked out, didn't it?"
Having found all her items, and finished attaching them to her clothing, she stood, patting at her head. Her hair fell haphazardly about her face, having been dislodged in her sleep. She'd removed the clips and feathers for fear they would get damaged, and as a result, there was a distinct impression that a rat had attempted to nest in her hair. She immediately set about sorting it all out.
It was then Rikku noticed that her father was staring at her. Rather self-consciously, she un-braided one of her plaits and began again, weaving the chocobo feather tighter into her hair. When he did not stop staring, she gave him a confrontational glance.
"What?"
Cid didn't back down. "You look a lot like your mother."
Rikku didn't quite know what to say, as she quickly set to work re-braiding the other plait. She knew she looked a lot like her mother; many of the Al-Bhed said the same thing. Her mother had been a marvellous hydroponics engineer, making it possible for the Al-Bhed to survive in the harsh environment of the Sanubia desert. She had mastered cross-breeding various plant species to get maximum nutrition from them, and she had even devoted a part of her time to creating an oasis at the centre of the Al-Bhed Home, which had stood strong for many years and needed so little attention to blossom.
Her mother's favourite time of year had been when the rains had come, she remembered, when the desert filled with life for a brief few hours.
"I wish she could have lived to see this day."
Rikku paused in resettling her clips. "I don't think she'd have wanted to see us try and rebuild our Home after it was destroyed and the people in it killed."
"Like Keyakku?"
She gave her father a dirty look and didn't say anything in response, just patting her head to make sure her hair was all in place before placing her goggles around her neck and folding her arms. "So how close to Bikanel are we?"
"We arrived a few hours ago."
Rikku stomped her foot, creating a hollow clanging noise on the deck plates. "And you didn't wake me?"
Cid got to his feet, glaring down at her. "Were you that eager to see the remains of our Home again?"
Rikku wilted somewhat. "No, but you shouldn't have tried to hide these things from me. I'm not a child."
"No, you're not. And that's why I didn't wake you." When Rikku gave him a strange look, he turned away slightly. "You've been through more than I wanted any of my children to have to go through, even as hard lives as the Al-Bhed lead. Didn't think you had to go straight back into it."
He started to leave the room, when Rikku spoke up with, "Thanks, Pops."
Cid didn't pause but carried on straight out of the room, heading back towards the bridge.
**
The blackened and burnt bark splintered beneath her fingers as Rikku almost absent-mindedly pulled at the tree's rough exterior. It had been curiosity that had driven her to see how far the damage went beneath the surface, she was gratified to find that the interior was paler, green-white in colour, but she could see that it was starting to turn yellowish through lack of water. She was standing in the dip in the ground which had once been the artificial oasis which the Al-Bhed had placed in the center of their home, created by her mother, pulling at one of the palm trees which had surrounded it. But the water had been boiled away through the force of the explosion that had destroyed the great monument to Al-Bhed engineering skill. She had been surprised to find this burnt remnant of a tree trunk still standing, surrounded by a vista of twisted metal, and a sea of glass.
Some things, it seemed, could survive anything. Rikku wished there was enough left to transplant and take it with them, but she knew that it wouldn't survive the next week, never mind a trip to another island.
At least, she assumed they were moving to another island.
Around her, Al-Bhed were picking through the rubble, many holding picks which they used to crack the inch of glass that had formed in the heat of the explosion to get at anything that might have survived underneath. Very little of anything that the salvage teams had found thus far was useful, though some of the metal they had collected was due to be melted down and recycled for usage in the new Home, wherever that would be.
"Rikku!" The girl flinched as her brother's voice echoed across the space between them. He stood near the top of the cliff which dropped down into the crater where Home had stood. "Stop messing around with that tree and get on with your work!"
Rikku waved her hand impatiently at him, ignoring him for the most part, but taking the point that her standing there contemplating the remnants of the tree wasn't exactly productive.
She began kicking her way through the remnants of Home, brushing aside sand dunes and twisted metal with her boot, eyes scanning the ground for anything that might catch her eye. It might seem to the uneducated that she was simply wandering, but she was moving with a purpose that was hard to explain.
Rikku made her discovery as she stepped into the shadow of an upright panel of metal, the edges melted and malformed, that had once formed one of the exterior walls. As she stepped out of the direct glare of the sun, a faint glimmer of light, no more than a candle being lit in the middle of the desert in brightness, caught her eyes. She crouched down, brushing at the sand that covered the imperfect glass, trying to get a better glimpse of whatever it was that glowed with its own light.
She knelt, extracting a small hammer and chisel from her tool belt. She had been handed a mineralogical sample kit on disembarking from the ship, and as such had been tacitly assigned the task of sampling the ground materials from all around the area where Home had once stood, to see if it was possible to build there again. She set the chisel along a crack in the murky glass, and gave it a single firm tap with the hammer. The glass split, breaking off into a lump about the size of both of Rikku's fists pressed together.
Levering it free of the sand underneath, she held it up to the light with one hand, turning it to see if her eyes had been correct in spying what they had. There were fire gems contained within. The most common way of finding said gems was in the wake of fiends who were predominantly fire based, often they were produced as a by-product of their unnatural existences. They contained fire, trapped within a solid exterior, and something as simple as throwing them could cause them to ignite. It had been heard of to find fire gems on the slopes of volcanoes, but no one had possessed of the time, or inclination, to go combing mountainous slopes for the tiny red gems. It seemed that the destruction of home had been trapped in the glass it had produced, forming these gems, suspended within.
Rikku made a small "heh" sound, and got to her feet, putting away her tools and cradling the lump of glass in her hands. She would have to tell her father and the other teams, and tell them to keep alert for any other gems beneath the surface of the desert. The little crystals were very useful, and if they came out with a small stash, it wouldn't go unappreciated by Cid.
There was something that caught her attention, though.
The glass was getting warmer.
With a yelp, Rikku threw the stone away from herself as the sunlight focussed through the mostly transparent material heated up the gems to the point where one or two closest to the surface spontaneously combusted, exploding with a flash of light and a shattering of the glass about them. Fire gems found in the ashes of volcanoes or explosions were potent, but notoriously more unstable than those exuded by fiends.
She patted her face and arms, checking that none of the flying shards had cut her. Satisfied she was fine, she bent down to pick up her find again, making a careful note to keep it out of direct sunlight.
Rikku bent down to pick up the chunk and froze, eyes alighting on something, some anomaly beneath the surface. It wasn't the same as the fire gems, there was no inner light to be seen. It was something darker, and Rikku had the distinct feeling she shouldn't be looking closer.
Nevertheless, the pulled on her goggles, the ones she'd had specially adapted to examine fine machina, and crouched down, squinting at through the murkiness to try and discern what had caught her eye. Her scream upon realising what it was brought several of her compatriots running towards her, fearing for her, in time to see her scrabbling away backwards, still crouched on the ground, from the darkened spot in the sand.
Beneath the surface was a body, mostly charred and burnt away to ashes, but still recognisably holding up a hand, as if trying to claw for the surface.
**
In spite of Cid's reassurances that everyone who had still be alive when Home fell had made it out on the airship (excluding, of course, the attackers that had descended upon them), Rikku refused to be comforted, and wouldn't respond to the entreaties of anyone to speak for the rest of the day. She had returned to the airship with the fire gems she had collected, as well as any others that people brought to her. At the end of her day's labour, she had a cache of softly glowing warm gems ready for use, along with an untouched plate of food that Rin had brought here somewhere around the middle of the afternoon. She slipped some of the gems into her leg pouch for her own use, before storing the rest carefully in a reinforced box.
"Rikku?" Rin again, and he was looking disapprovingly at the still full plate left beside her. She pointedly ignored the look, instead returning a questioning gaze. He gave her a slight, sad smile. "Come on, it's time."
Rikku's fingers contracted around the fire gems she had been locking away, quickly finishing her task, before she joined the others on deck for the service to commemorate all those who had died in defence of their Home.
**
The service was over, and the Al-Bhed that had assembled on the open deck of the airship were, to a man (or woman), dirty, tired and most were sitting on the deck looking numb. Picking through the remains of your home would do that for you. Most of the salvaged components were stowed safely belowdecks, bodies had been properly interred, and everyone simply looked as if they wanted to sleep for a year or two.
But Cid was having none of it, pacing in front of the Al-Bhed as he spoke, forcing all eyes to him.
"We're not going to be rebuilding on Bikanel," Cid said, looking at everyone in turn, his gruff voice not inviting argument. "It's too dangerous."
Rikku, who had been resting her head on the shoulder of Keeya, a young female medic whose task it had been to prepare the bodies for death and who was sitting next to her, felt as if she should speak out against her father, and say that the days of Yevon terrorising them were gone, that Sin was gone, and that everything was going to be alright.
But a part of herself knew that was only a childish dream. Maybe it was just the fact that she, like all other Al-Bhed, had spent her life being hated, feared and despised, for her knowledge and skills and for the fact that they did not worship as others did. She knew the darker side of Spira's nature, and the Al-Bhed had often been on the receiving end of it, and so all of them had a very hard time believing whole-heartedly, as Yuna did, that an age of peace and prosperity had dawned.
Cid continued pacing as he spoke, and an observer might have found it comical how most of the Al-Bhed heads watching followed him from side to side. "Sin might be dead, and Yevon might be dying, but too many people hate the Al-Bhed for being Al-Bhed, and they know Bikanel now. They came and destroyed our Home, and we will not let them have that opportunity again. Some of us have chosen to settle in Luca, the Djose region, and other places besides. But there will always be a place in Spira that Al-Bhed can call Home."
The Al-Bhed nodded silently in agreement.
Cid paused, looking out over the ruins of Home, the deep pit where it had once stood, and around which the airship drifted lazily, searchlights crossing over the wreckage. The illumination leeched all the colour from the ruins, giving it a silvern quality, and cast long shadows that moved with the motion of the craft. It looked ethereal and untouchable, and Rikku was faintly glad that it looked like that, rather than the bodies were all in the open on display.
"We'll continue the salvage tomorrow morning," said Cid, "And finish as soon as we can. Then we begin a search for a new place to call Home."
**
Kimahri had taken to standing outside the door of the hut, Yuna knew, and she also knew that was also the reasoning why the number of visitors she had been receiving had suddenly curtailed in the last day or so. Which was why she was able to sit on the low couch near Kimahri's bed, by the table, quietly drinking tea which she vaguely remembered one of her temple instructors swearing was supposed to be soothing to the mind and body. Yuna couldn't say she'd noticed any such effects taking hold.
She was determined to leave the hut today, though, and head out into the village proper. She refused to let Lulu and Wakka get all her food for her, saying that she was neither an invalid nor incapable of living for herself. Still, the pair insisted on meeting she and Kimahri on the outskirts of the main square, where there were stalls laid out for the market that day, and people from throughout the village milled around, perusing the various wares.
Yuna's first stop was to the weaponsmith, on the very outskirts. She had made Kimahri help her in carrying her old weapons and armour to sell. She was hardly poor and in need of the gil, but she was determinedly telling herself that she no longer required them, and so off-loaded them quickly to the woman who clucked over their obvious overusage.
Yuna hadn't sold everything. She hadn't been able to bring herself to do that.
So, that task done, she set about moving throughout the market with her little entourage. It was different, she knew, than when she had been journeying. There, whenever they had moved into a populated area, her Guardians had been tense, expectant of an attack. Here, it was more like friends going for a stroll, which was just as it should be. No one should have to fear an attack in their own village.
She had progressed halfway through the market, and was in conversation with the fishmonger about how hard it was to find decent yellowback shoals in the waters near Besaid when she heard the shouting.
"Lady Yuna! My lady!"
Yuna turned automatically at the call of her name, and her Guardians automatically shifted in what she recognised from long familiarity as readying for anything that might threaten her. She supposed she shouldn't chide them for their ingrained habits of being ready for an attack. That morning, she had awoken, and in her half asleep state, had flung on the first clothes to hand, reaching about for her staff and her armour before she had even realised she was preparing herself to face a day of battles. Would she, she wondered, ever get used to the idea that she did not have to fight, and that her life would not end in violence now?
Possibly not. She could try, which was why she had divested herself of most of her armaments earlier that day.
But the one who was calling her name did not appear to be much of a threat. He was a young man, not even Yuna's age, and his feet and clothes were stained from the dirt of the road. He had a slightly officious bearing about him, and that combined with the official sigil he bore on his chest as well as his state of dress, tipped her off about who it was she was talking to.
He was a messenger, and by the look of the emblem he bore, he came from one of the companies who spanned Spira. A chain of stores that sold weapons if she recalled correctly, having had reasons to patronise several of those establishments in the last few months. Yuna had heard that the family behind the shops was fairly wealthy, weapons always being in requirement for all walks of Spiran life. Pacificists, after all, did not last long against fiends.
"Yes?" she peered out from around Wakka's bulk, since he had moved in front of her to protect her from harm. "Can I help you?"
The messenger gave a curt salute, before barrelling ahead with his message.
"Master Liberam, owner of weapons shops throughout Spira, offers what he hope is a most enticing proposal to the Lady High Summoner Yuna. His son, Chandar, is of equal age to the Lady High Summoner, and will one day in the future inherit his father's empire of weapons shops and smithies. He believes that an..." And here the messenger stumbled over the words slightly. "... alliance between the two of you would be appreciated not only by both families."
Yuna couldn't help but wonder whether she should point out that her only surviving family was Al-Bhed, but decided against it.
"And so, Master Liberam wishes you to know of his son's eagerness to meet you, my Lady High Summoner, with the future possibilities of a permanent bond between the two of you."
"He's proposing marriage?" That was Lulu, apparently in shock.
The black mage stifled something between a gasp and a giggle, while Wakka cleared his throat awkwardly and looked embarrassed. Kimahri was impassive as always. Yuna felt her mouth kink into a smile, and she tried to think of a way to best phrase the sentence 'not a chance' in a manner that would be diplomatic and tactful.
She was saved, however, from answering by the timely cackling of the old woman at the fish stall that Yuna was standing at. The messenger's confused eyes flicked to the old woman and back to Yuna, before he looked closer at the fish seller.
The old woman shook her head, still chuckling, "Ah, young man, obviously your master has not been paying attention to the world," she chided. "For all of Spira knows that the Lady High Summoner is already wed! To the Lord Maester Seymour! Though the words say that he rests in peace on the Farplane, surely you do not expect a bride to forget her husband so soon."
Yuna had to turn away to prevent herself from choking on the sentiment the woman's words evoked. She had to wonder if a marriage counted if you only went along with it to kill the groom.
The messenger seemed distraught, wringing his hands together. "Lady Yuna, is this true?"
Yuna turned back, pasting a solemn expression on her features. "Alas, it is so." It wasn't a lie. She had progressed through the entirety of the wedding ceremony, albeit reluctantly, before she had thrown herself off the tower. She thought that had very eloquently expressed her feelings on the matter. But if this truth in which she herself did not believe conveniently solved her problem, then she had no problem in wielding the information judiciously. "Please convey my apologies to your master, but I cannot accept his proposal."
"Oh," The messenger was wringing his hands again. "Oh dear, oh dear. Thank you for your time, Lady Yuna. Oh dearie me." And he shuffled off, looking somewhat nervous and dejected.
Yuna felt slightly sorry for him having to deliver such news to his master, which would obviously not been the answer that Liberam was hoping for.
"Heh," Wakka nudged her with an elbow. "Never thought I'd see the day when you'd claim marriage to that Seymour."
"Neither did I," Yuna said, with a slight smile, accepting the parcel of seafood that the fishmonger had finished preparing, placing it on top of the fruits in her basket. She examined the products of her hard days labour of shopping and hefted the basket in her hands. "Come back to my home this evening," she offered to her friends, "You have all spent so long seeing to my needs that I want to return the favour."
They were halfway through the evening meal when yet another visitor had come calling. But this one, Yuna found, was a little more welcome than the others.
**
The scholar Maechen had become a familiar face to Yuna and her Guardians on their travels. He had told stories of the history of their locales when anyone had wanted to listen, and their newcomer from a different Zanarkand had never heard any of them before, and so always asked to hear them in full. They had all become accustomed to listening to his stories, passing time sitting by the trail during a break as he sat by the fire and spoke until he had no more information to give.
Maechen had accepted a plate at her table, and was telling them, in his stenatorian tones, what had happened since they had last parted ways on Mount Gagazet. He told them of seeing the lights that had signified the destruction of Sin reaching even Besaid Island. He had apparently briefly mourned Yuna's passing, before he had heard that she was still alive and travelling with the Al-Bhed. He told of how it had gladdened the hearts of so many to hear that, and that the unusual matter of her survival had done much to encourage the idea that Sin was gone forever now.
He had started to travel to Luca, but hadn't arrived there in time to hear her speech, apparently, though he had invested in a sphere copy. He said that one day he would write the story of her Pilgrimage and the final defeat of Sin. He asked that she tell him her story, so that he would know, and be able to record the story for generations to come after.
Yuna had already spent so much time in the last few days telling people of the final battle against Sin; dry facts, revealing little of the more personal aspects of the destruction of the great evil that had plagued Spira for a thousand years. But now she felt compelled to tell the whole story. Maechen was not a man who wanted to hear tales of how the heroes won the battle, how they fought bravely and destroyed evil and lived happily ever after. He wanted to know what happened simply for knowing's sake. It was a selfless sort of seeking which Yuna appreciated: the fact that he wanted to know not only for the sake of himself but for others betterment as well.
So she began to tell him everything. She started at the point where she had first learned that her father had died, in the process becoming a High Summoner. She told him of her meetings of her Guardians, including, and she was distressed to realise with a quaver in her voice, the blond Guardian who had appeared from another Zanarkand. She told the story from beginning to end, with the three who had travelled with her staying silent for the most part, only clarifying a few points here and there. Lulu held her hand through a good portion of the telling, and Yuna drew strength from that. Her voice became hoarse repeatedly, and by the end she thought she had nearly lost it.
Maechen, it seemed, was not unaffected. At her recounting of her final greatest Sending, he had raised his napkin to his eyes and dapped at them delicately. "Oh, my Lady High Summoner Yuna," he said, giving her the full title accorded to her. "Such a tale. Greater than many the balladers weave, I wager. And told with such humility. You may not feel yourself worthy of the honour that others would heap upon you, but you are. And so are your Guardians, for they are as much a part of your story as you."
Lulu gave her hand a squeeze, and Yuna smiled at the man, feeling somewhat better for having told the entire story to someone who wanted to hear it, and didn't think any the less of her for being imperfect, for wavering in the darker moments or realising that Yevon was corrupt and had lost its way.
"I think I need a drink," she said, releasing her friend's hand and moving to get a fresh jug of water.
Yuna got to her feet, and felt more than saw an instant dimming of her vision around her edges. She blindly thrust out a hand and fortunately grabbed onto the back of the chair she had been sitting at. She swayed on her feet, but before she had toppled over completely, she realised Kimahri had sprung up with his innate swiftness and caught her, cradling her gently in massive paws that could crush her easily. Perhaps that was what she had always loved about him. He was so gentle with her, even though he could be otherwise.
"Lady Yuna!" It was Maechen, and he had taken one of her hands, anxiously patting the back of it. "Are you unwell, Lady?"
Yuna tried to sound dismissive, "Oh, I'm sure I'm well, my dear scholar. I just seem to be rather tired at the moment. Perhaps simply the strain of retelling the story of my pilgrimage."
"Nu-uh." Wakka waved his hand in a cutting motion. "No way I'm going to believe that, ya? Not after you were ill on the beach."
"Yuna! You've already been ill?" Lulu this time, and Yuna wished she could reassure them all that she was fine, but they were all determined to believe otherwise it seemed. "You must go to the temple and seek a healer's aid!"
"I will not go to the temple," Yuna said, stubbornness lacing her voice.
"Then I will fetch a healer directly," Lulu said firmly, and before Yuna could offer up any further objections, she had stood up from her seat and strode from the room.
Yuna sighed, resting her head back against Kimahri, devoutly wishing that she did not having the feeling she would be revisiting her dinner very shortly.
- End of Part Three
Part Three: Eyes Like Firelight
**
"Rikku, fyga ib. Wake up."
The voice was accompanied by a hand gently stroking her face, stirring her from her sleep. Rikku muttered incoherently, swiping at the hand. "'Mup, Pops."
"Sure ya are. You're not up til you're out of that bed and moving around."
Rikku peeked an eye open, looking at her father, who was standing over the bed, really just a couple of cargo crates pushed together with a thin mattress stretched over the top and an equally threadbare blanket pulled over her shoulder. She had been sharing the room with the Al-Bhed Psychs, who had all apparently departed before she had awoken, to judge by the empty state of the room.
She pushed the blanket away from herself, cautiously sitting upright and covering her sleepy eyes to protect them from the lights of the cargo bay. "See," she said, voice sleep-roughed. "Moving."
Cid chuckled, moving away from her to give her some room to fall off the crates and stumble around looking for her belt pouches and accessories that she had removed the night before while he sat down on a nearby low crate. "Get a good night's sleep?"
Rikku snorted indelicately as she crouched down next to some sort of mesh cage and fumbled around looking for her goggles. "I was sharing a room with a bunch of over-hyped blitzball players who think that if you stand still for a couple of minutes, you'll drop dead." She peered over the rim of the cage at her father. "I slept like a baby. I've had a very tiring few months."
Cid made a sound of amusement and shook his head at her teasing tone of voice.
Rikku continued talking, half to herself and half to her father, as she continued crawling around looking for odds and ends that had been misplaced during the night. "I was also dreaming of dinner. You know, a proper meal with fresh greens and not the rehydrated meals we have on board or the strips of dried meat and stew from the Pilgrimage."
"I still can't believe you went on the Pilgrimage of all things. Idiot child."
"Worked out, didn't it?"
Having found all her items, and finished attaching them to her clothing, she stood, patting at her head. Her hair fell haphazardly about her face, having been dislodged in her sleep. She'd removed the clips and feathers for fear they would get damaged, and as a result, there was a distinct impression that a rat had attempted to nest in her hair. She immediately set about sorting it all out.
It was then Rikku noticed that her father was staring at her. Rather self-consciously, she un-braided one of her plaits and began again, weaving the chocobo feather tighter into her hair. When he did not stop staring, she gave him a confrontational glance.
"What?"
Cid didn't back down. "You look a lot like your mother."
Rikku didn't quite know what to say, as she quickly set to work re-braiding the other plait. She knew she looked a lot like her mother; many of the Al-Bhed said the same thing. Her mother had been a marvellous hydroponics engineer, making it possible for the Al-Bhed to survive in the harsh environment of the Sanubia desert. She had mastered cross-breeding various plant species to get maximum nutrition from them, and she had even devoted a part of her time to creating an oasis at the centre of the Al-Bhed Home, which had stood strong for many years and needed so little attention to blossom.
Her mother's favourite time of year had been when the rains had come, she remembered, when the desert filled with life for a brief few hours.
"I wish she could have lived to see this day."
Rikku paused in resettling her clips. "I don't think she'd have wanted to see us try and rebuild our Home after it was destroyed and the people in it killed."
"Like Keyakku?"
She gave her father a dirty look and didn't say anything in response, just patting her head to make sure her hair was all in place before placing her goggles around her neck and folding her arms. "So how close to Bikanel are we?"
"We arrived a few hours ago."
Rikku stomped her foot, creating a hollow clanging noise on the deck plates. "And you didn't wake me?"
Cid got to his feet, glaring down at her. "Were you that eager to see the remains of our Home again?"
Rikku wilted somewhat. "No, but you shouldn't have tried to hide these things from me. I'm not a child."
"No, you're not. And that's why I didn't wake you." When Rikku gave him a strange look, he turned away slightly. "You've been through more than I wanted any of my children to have to go through, even as hard lives as the Al-Bhed lead. Didn't think you had to go straight back into it."
He started to leave the room, when Rikku spoke up with, "Thanks, Pops."
Cid didn't pause but carried on straight out of the room, heading back towards the bridge.
**
The blackened and burnt bark splintered beneath her fingers as Rikku almost absent-mindedly pulled at the tree's rough exterior. It had been curiosity that had driven her to see how far the damage went beneath the surface, she was gratified to find that the interior was paler, green-white in colour, but she could see that it was starting to turn yellowish through lack of water. She was standing in the dip in the ground which had once been the artificial oasis which the Al-Bhed had placed in the center of their home, created by her mother, pulling at one of the palm trees which had surrounded it. But the water had been boiled away through the force of the explosion that had destroyed the great monument to Al-Bhed engineering skill. She had been surprised to find this burnt remnant of a tree trunk still standing, surrounded by a vista of twisted metal, and a sea of glass.
Some things, it seemed, could survive anything. Rikku wished there was enough left to transplant and take it with them, but she knew that it wouldn't survive the next week, never mind a trip to another island.
At least, she assumed they were moving to another island.
Around her, Al-Bhed were picking through the rubble, many holding picks which they used to crack the inch of glass that had formed in the heat of the explosion to get at anything that might have survived underneath. Very little of anything that the salvage teams had found thus far was useful, though some of the metal they had collected was due to be melted down and recycled for usage in the new Home, wherever that would be.
"Rikku!" The girl flinched as her brother's voice echoed across the space between them. He stood near the top of the cliff which dropped down into the crater where Home had stood. "Stop messing around with that tree and get on with your work!"
Rikku waved her hand impatiently at him, ignoring him for the most part, but taking the point that her standing there contemplating the remnants of the tree wasn't exactly productive.
She began kicking her way through the remnants of Home, brushing aside sand dunes and twisted metal with her boot, eyes scanning the ground for anything that might catch her eye. It might seem to the uneducated that she was simply wandering, but she was moving with a purpose that was hard to explain.
Rikku made her discovery as she stepped into the shadow of an upright panel of metal, the edges melted and malformed, that had once formed one of the exterior walls. As she stepped out of the direct glare of the sun, a faint glimmer of light, no more than a candle being lit in the middle of the desert in brightness, caught her eyes. She crouched down, brushing at the sand that covered the imperfect glass, trying to get a better glimpse of whatever it was that glowed with its own light.
She knelt, extracting a small hammer and chisel from her tool belt. She had been handed a mineralogical sample kit on disembarking from the ship, and as such had been tacitly assigned the task of sampling the ground materials from all around the area where Home had once stood, to see if it was possible to build there again. She set the chisel along a crack in the murky glass, and gave it a single firm tap with the hammer. The glass split, breaking off into a lump about the size of both of Rikku's fists pressed together.
Levering it free of the sand underneath, she held it up to the light with one hand, turning it to see if her eyes had been correct in spying what they had. There were fire gems contained within. The most common way of finding said gems was in the wake of fiends who were predominantly fire based, often they were produced as a by-product of their unnatural existences. They contained fire, trapped within a solid exterior, and something as simple as throwing them could cause them to ignite. It had been heard of to find fire gems on the slopes of volcanoes, but no one had possessed of the time, or inclination, to go combing mountainous slopes for the tiny red gems. It seemed that the destruction of home had been trapped in the glass it had produced, forming these gems, suspended within.
Rikku made a small "heh" sound, and got to her feet, putting away her tools and cradling the lump of glass in her hands. She would have to tell her father and the other teams, and tell them to keep alert for any other gems beneath the surface of the desert. The little crystals were very useful, and if they came out with a small stash, it wouldn't go unappreciated by Cid.
There was something that caught her attention, though.
The glass was getting warmer.
With a yelp, Rikku threw the stone away from herself as the sunlight focussed through the mostly transparent material heated up the gems to the point where one or two closest to the surface spontaneously combusted, exploding with a flash of light and a shattering of the glass about them. Fire gems found in the ashes of volcanoes or explosions were potent, but notoriously more unstable than those exuded by fiends.
She patted her face and arms, checking that none of the flying shards had cut her. Satisfied she was fine, she bent down to pick up her find again, making a careful note to keep it out of direct sunlight.
Rikku bent down to pick up the chunk and froze, eyes alighting on something, some anomaly beneath the surface. It wasn't the same as the fire gems, there was no inner light to be seen. It was something darker, and Rikku had the distinct feeling she shouldn't be looking closer.
Nevertheless, the pulled on her goggles, the ones she'd had specially adapted to examine fine machina, and crouched down, squinting at through the murkiness to try and discern what had caught her eye. Her scream upon realising what it was brought several of her compatriots running towards her, fearing for her, in time to see her scrabbling away backwards, still crouched on the ground, from the darkened spot in the sand.
Beneath the surface was a body, mostly charred and burnt away to ashes, but still recognisably holding up a hand, as if trying to claw for the surface.
**
In spite of Cid's reassurances that everyone who had still be alive when Home fell had made it out on the airship (excluding, of course, the attackers that had descended upon them), Rikku refused to be comforted, and wouldn't respond to the entreaties of anyone to speak for the rest of the day. She had returned to the airship with the fire gems she had collected, as well as any others that people brought to her. At the end of her day's labour, she had a cache of softly glowing warm gems ready for use, along with an untouched plate of food that Rin had brought here somewhere around the middle of the afternoon. She slipped some of the gems into her leg pouch for her own use, before storing the rest carefully in a reinforced box.
"Rikku?" Rin again, and he was looking disapprovingly at the still full plate left beside her. She pointedly ignored the look, instead returning a questioning gaze. He gave her a slight, sad smile. "Come on, it's time."
Rikku's fingers contracted around the fire gems she had been locking away, quickly finishing her task, before she joined the others on deck for the service to commemorate all those who had died in defence of their Home.
**
The service was over, and the Al-Bhed that had assembled on the open deck of the airship were, to a man (or woman), dirty, tired and most were sitting on the deck looking numb. Picking through the remains of your home would do that for you. Most of the salvaged components were stowed safely belowdecks, bodies had been properly interred, and everyone simply looked as if they wanted to sleep for a year or two.
But Cid was having none of it, pacing in front of the Al-Bhed as he spoke, forcing all eyes to him.
"We're not going to be rebuilding on Bikanel," Cid said, looking at everyone in turn, his gruff voice not inviting argument. "It's too dangerous."
Rikku, who had been resting her head on the shoulder of Keeya, a young female medic whose task it had been to prepare the bodies for death and who was sitting next to her, felt as if she should speak out against her father, and say that the days of Yevon terrorising them were gone, that Sin was gone, and that everything was going to be alright.
But a part of herself knew that was only a childish dream. Maybe it was just the fact that she, like all other Al-Bhed, had spent her life being hated, feared and despised, for her knowledge and skills and for the fact that they did not worship as others did. She knew the darker side of Spira's nature, and the Al-Bhed had often been on the receiving end of it, and so all of them had a very hard time believing whole-heartedly, as Yuna did, that an age of peace and prosperity had dawned.
Cid continued pacing as he spoke, and an observer might have found it comical how most of the Al-Bhed heads watching followed him from side to side. "Sin might be dead, and Yevon might be dying, but too many people hate the Al-Bhed for being Al-Bhed, and they know Bikanel now. They came and destroyed our Home, and we will not let them have that opportunity again. Some of us have chosen to settle in Luca, the Djose region, and other places besides. But there will always be a place in Spira that Al-Bhed can call Home."
The Al-Bhed nodded silently in agreement.
Cid paused, looking out over the ruins of Home, the deep pit where it had once stood, and around which the airship drifted lazily, searchlights crossing over the wreckage. The illumination leeched all the colour from the ruins, giving it a silvern quality, and cast long shadows that moved with the motion of the craft. It looked ethereal and untouchable, and Rikku was faintly glad that it looked like that, rather than the bodies were all in the open on display.
"We'll continue the salvage tomorrow morning," said Cid, "And finish as soon as we can. Then we begin a search for a new place to call Home."
**
Kimahri had taken to standing outside the door of the hut, Yuna knew, and she also knew that was also the reasoning why the number of visitors she had been receiving had suddenly curtailed in the last day or so. Which was why she was able to sit on the low couch near Kimahri's bed, by the table, quietly drinking tea which she vaguely remembered one of her temple instructors swearing was supposed to be soothing to the mind and body. Yuna couldn't say she'd noticed any such effects taking hold.
She was determined to leave the hut today, though, and head out into the village proper. She refused to let Lulu and Wakka get all her food for her, saying that she was neither an invalid nor incapable of living for herself. Still, the pair insisted on meeting she and Kimahri on the outskirts of the main square, where there were stalls laid out for the market that day, and people from throughout the village milled around, perusing the various wares.
Yuna's first stop was to the weaponsmith, on the very outskirts. She had made Kimahri help her in carrying her old weapons and armour to sell. She was hardly poor and in need of the gil, but she was determinedly telling herself that she no longer required them, and so off-loaded them quickly to the woman who clucked over their obvious overusage.
Yuna hadn't sold everything. She hadn't been able to bring herself to do that.
So, that task done, she set about moving throughout the market with her little entourage. It was different, she knew, than when she had been journeying. There, whenever they had moved into a populated area, her Guardians had been tense, expectant of an attack. Here, it was more like friends going for a stroll, which was just as it should be. No one should have to fear an attack in their own village.
She had progressed halfway through the market, and was in conversation with the fishmonger about how hard it was to find decent yellowback shoals in the waters near Besaid when she heard the shouting.
"Lady Yuna! My lady!"
Yuna turned automatically at the call of her name, and her Guardians automatically shifted in what she recognised from long familiarity as readying for anything that might threaten her. She supposed she shouldn't chide them for their ingrained habits of being ready for an attack. That morning, she had awoken, and in her half asleep state, had flung on the first clothes to hand, reaching about for her staff and her armour before she had even realised she was preparing herself to face a day of battles. Would she, she wondered, ever get used to the idea that she did not have to fight, and that her life would not end in violence now?
Possibly not. She could try, which was why she had divested herself of most of her armaments earlier that day.
But the one who was calling her name did not appear to be much of a threat. He was a young man, not even Yuna's age, and his feet and clothes were stained from the dirt of the road. He had a slightly officious bearing about him, and that combined with the official sigil he bore on his chest as well as his state of dress, tipped her off about who it was she was talking to.
He was a messenger, and by the look of the emblem he bore, he came from one of the companies who spanned Spira. A chain of stores that sold weapons if she recalled correctly, having had reasons to patronise several of those establishments in the last few months. Yuna had heard that the family behind the shops was fairly wealthy, weapons always being in requirement for all walks of Spiran life. Pacificists, after all, did not last long against fiends.
"Yes?" she peered out from around Wakka's bulk, since he had moved in front of her to protect her from harm. "Can I help you?"
The messenger gave a curt salute, before barrelling ahead with his message.
"Master Liberam, owner of weapons shops throughout Spira, offers what he hope is a most enticing proposal to the Lady High Summoner Yuna. His son, Chandar, is of equal age to the Lady High Summoner, and will one day in the future inherit his father's empire of weapons shops and smithies. He believes that an..." And here the messenger stumbled over the words slightly. "... alliance between the two of you would be appreciated not only by both families."
Yuna couldn't help but wonder whether she should point out that her only surviving family was Al-Bhed, but decided against it.
"And so, Master Liberam wishes you to know of his son's eagerness to meet you, my Lady High Summoner, with the future possibilities of a permanent bond between the two of you."
"He's proposing marriage?" That was Lulu, apparently in shock.
The black mage stifled something between a gasp and a giggle, while Wakka cleared his throat awkwardly and looked embarrassed. Kimahri was impassive as always. Yuna felt her mouth kink into a smile, and she tried to think of a way to best phrase the sentence 'not a chance' in a manner that would be diplomatic and tactful.
She was saved, however, from answering by the timely cackling of the old woman at the fish stall that Yuna was standing at. The messenger's confused eyes flicked to the old woman and back to Yuna, before he looked closer at the fish seller.
The old woman shook her head, still chuckling, "Ah, young man, obviously your master has not been paying attention to the world," she chided. "For all of Spira knows that the Lady High Summoner is already wed! To the Lord Maester Seymour! Though the words say that he rests in peace on the Farplane, surely you do not expect a bride to forget her husband so soon."
Yuna had to turn away to prevent herself from choking on the sentiment the woman's words evoked. She had to wonder if a marriage counted if you only went along with it to kill the groom.
The messenger seemed distraught, wringing his hands together. "Lady Yuna, is this true?"
Yuna turned back, pasting a solemn expression on her features. "Alas, it is so." It wasn't a lie. She had progressed through the entirety of the wedding ceremony, albeit reluctantly, before she had thrown herself off the tower. She thought that had very eloquently expressed her feelings on the matter. But if this truth in which she herself did not believe conveniently solved her problem, then she had no problem in wielding the information judiciously. "Please convey my apologies to your master, but I cannot accept his proposal."
"Oh," The messenger was wringing his hands again. "Oh dear, oh dear. Thank you for your time, Lady Yuna. Oh dearie me." And he shuffled off, looking somewhat nervous and dejected.
Yuna felt slightly sorry for him having to deliver such news to his master, which would obviously not been the answer that Liberam was hoping for.
"Heh," Wakka nudged her with an elbow. "Never thought I'd see the day when you'd claim marriage to that Seymour."
"Neither did I," Yuna said, with a slight smile, accepting the parcel of seafood that the fishmonger had finished preparing, placing it on top of the fruits in her basket. She examined the products of her hard days labour of shopping and hefted the basket in her hands. "Come back to my home this evening," she offered to her friends, "You have all spent so long seeing to my needs that I want to return the favour."
They were halfway through the evening meal when yet another visitor had come calling. But this one, Yuna found, was a little more welcome than the others.
**
The scholar Maechen had become a familiar face to Yuna and her Guardians on their travels. He had told stories of the history of their locales when anyone had wanted to listen, and their newcomer from a different Zanarkand had never heard any of them before, and so always asked to hear them in full. They had all become accustomed to listening to his stories, passing time sitting by the trail during a break as he sat by the fire and spoke until he had no more information to give.
Maechen had accepted a plate at her table, and was telling them, in his stenatorian tones, what had happened since they had last parted ways on Mount Gagazet. He told them of seeing the lights that had signified the destruction of Sin reaching even Besaid Island. He had apparently briefly mourned Yuna's passing, before he had heard that she was still alive and travelling with the Al-Bhed. He told of how it had gladdened the hearts of so many to hear that, and that the unusual matter of her survival had done much to encourage the idea that Sin was gone forever now.
He had started to travel to Luca, but hadn't arrived there in time to hear her speech, apparently, though he had invested in a sphere copy. He said that one day he would write the story of her Pilgrimage and the final defeat of Sin. He asked that she tell him her story, so that he would know, and be able to record the story for generations to come after.
Yuna had already spent so much time in the last few days telling people of the final battle against Sin; dry facts, revealing little of the more personal aspects of the destruction of the great evil that had plagued Spira for a thousand years. But now she felt compelled to tell the whole story. Maechen was not a man who wanted to hear tales of how the heroes won the battle, how they fought bravely and destroyed evil and lived happily ever after. He wanted to know what happened simply for knowing's sake. It was a selfless sort of seeking which Yuna appreciated: the fact that he wanted to know not only for the sake of himself but for others betterment as well.
So she began to tell him everything. She started at the point where she had first learned that her father had died, in the process becoming a High Summoner. She told him of her meetings of her Guardians, including, and she was distressed to realise with a quaver in her voice, the blond Guardian who had appeared from another Zanarkand. She told the story from beginning to end, with the three who had travelled with her staying silent for the most part, only clarifying a few points here and there. Lulu held her hand through a good portion of the telling, and Yuna drew strength from that. Her voice became hoarse repeatedly, and by the end she thought she had nearly lost it.
Maechen, it seemed, was not unaffected. At her recounting of her final greatest Sending, he had raised his napkin to his eyes and dapped at them delicately. "Oh, my Lady High Summoner Yuna," he said, giving her the full title accorded to her. "Such a tale. Greater than many the balladers weave, I wager. And told with such humility. You may not feel yourself worthy of the honour that others would heap upon you, but you are. And so are your Guardians, for they are as much a part of your story as you."
Lulu gave her hand a squeeze, and Yuna smiled at the man, feeling somewhat better for having told the entire story to someone who wanted to hear it, and didn't think any the less of her for being imperfect, for wavering in the darker moments or realising that Yevon was corrupt and had lost its way.
"I think I need a drink," she said, releasing her friend's hand and moving to get a fresh jug of water.
Yuna got to her feet, and felt more than saw an instant dimming of her vision around her edges. She blindly thrust out a hand and fortunately grabbed onto the back of the chair she had been sitting at. She swayed on her feet, but before she had toppled over completely, she realised Kimahri had sprung up with his innate swiftness and caught her, cradling her gently in massive paws that could crush her easily. Perhaps that was what she had always loved about him. He was so gentle with her, even though he could be otherwise.
"Lady Yuna!" It was Maechen, and he had taken one of her hands, anxiously patting the back of it. "Are you unwell, Lady?"
Yuna tried to sound dismissive, "Oh, I'm sure I'm well, my dear scholar. I just seem to be rather tired at the moment. Perhaps simply the strain of retelling the story of my pilgrimage."
"Nu-uh." Wakka waved his hand in a cutting motion. "No way I'm going to believe that, ya? Not after you were ill on the beach."
"Yuna! You've already been ill?" Lulu this time, and Yuna wished she could reassure them all that she was fine, but they were all determined to believe otherwise it seemed. "You must go to the temple and seek a healer's aid!"
"I will not go to the temple," Yuna said, stubbornness lacing her voice.
"Then I will fetch a healer directly," Lulu said firmly, and before Yuna could offer up any further objections, she had stood up from her seat and strode from the room.
Yuna sighed, resting her head back against Kimahri, devoutly wishing that she did not having the feeling she would be revisiting her dinner very shortly.
- End of Part Three