By the time that the rowboats have slid upon the pale-sand beaches of Kilika, I can feel exhaustion dragging on every inch of my body. Humidity clouds the air. It attaches weights to my arms and legs, to the lids of my eyes, and to my mouth so that I yawn with every two steps of walking down the gangway.
The guards who followed me from Luca had been assembled once more for duty with remarkably little fuss. No protest came from them during my informal orders at sea. I instructed them to keep violence at a bare minimum if possible, to display no unified force assembled. If they had clothes to spare, their uniforms should remain unpacked. Leave all sign of Yevon hidden. Say nothing of our business here, but play at traders.
With luck, we may avoid difficulties this way.
Once we hit port, disembarking is performed a fair distance away from the actual town. Kilika has always suffered the most from Sin's ravages, being directly on the ocean and not sheltered by the natural cove defenses of Luca. The people here were in a constant state of reconstruction. Homes were only token buildings, as thin as reeds against Sin's wrath. Toxin was common. Deaths, equally so.
With Sin's defeat, the village has had to readjust to the idea of permanency. Ill weather will always remain to threaten the homes, but the fiend population has dropped, and now layers of architecture are being drawn up with intents of decades of use. Supplies have been brought in alongside construction. Life bustles.
A positive sign, but it makes for difficulty when trying to find a clear span of beach.
Our ship weighs anchor along a line of other vessels. Fishermen have taken a healthy trade with these warmer months; the nets that I see hauled and hooked upon the wide bellies of their boats are all plentiful, and laughter is called frequently upon the air. Some of Kilika's visitors are merchants. Others, travelers, freed to journey now that the threat of Sinspawn is greatly reduced.
Upon landing, I instruct two of the guards to find our lodgings. The rest, to spread out through the village. Kilika is not a vast town. If the Al Bhed is here, all I need to do is to look.
The initial sweep of the western half of the village reveals nothing. Conversations ricochet back and forth across the wooden dockways that double as sidewalks, suspended above the ocean water and swollen damp with moisture. I gather rumor of the latest clothing considered fashionable in Luca, the prices of bluewater fish, and one family's laundry that had apparently gone scattered free in a high wind the other day and plastered itself over another family's windows.
Phrases strain themselves out of the gossip-stew as I walk.
"The weather, you know, it's going to be like this for, oh... three more days..."
"Told her it wouldn't work! But she said she had an idea of how to fix it, she said .."
"And then the fiends just rose up over the rocks all at once, so I grabbed the machina like this and fired..."
Following the captive gasps of the latter's audience, I redirect my steps along one of the side platforms. Wood groans quiet underneath my feet; the noise is concealed beneath the patter of the small crowd that has assembled in this corner of the port-village, whispering commentary to one another behind their hands.
Then, in the midst of a knot of bystanders, I see him.
Gippal.
The blond cock-ruff of his hair shines in the sunlight, gold against the darker hair of the Kilika people. The Al Bhed is pure animation. He is alive, pure and simple in the midst of all these politics, denying even the idea of death through sheer energy alone.
I am trapped looking at him. Hypnotized.
"Then the salvage crew went back to the boats 'cuz there wasn't anywhere else to go and--rumo vilgehk fayth, Baralai, is it really you?"
His yelp penetrates the tale-spun spell. Numb to stop him, I can do nothing as the Al Bhed shoves his way through the gathering towards me, latching onto my arm in a fierce grip.
"See this?" he crows to the crowd. "This here's the man! Baralai--"
"Gippal." Bowing my shoulder against his exuberance, I fight to wrestle myself away. The last thing I need is to have announcement of my presence blared to every inch of this port. "I'm glad to see you, but--"
"He's a pain in the ass when you need someone at a party, but lemme tell you, he's deeper than he looks--"
"Gippal." My fingers tighten on the Al Bhed's hand. Surprised by the force, he looks down to me, solitary green eye wide with befuddlement.
The man's confusion defuses my need for immediate concealment. "In private," I offer. "Let's talk out of the way of everyone else."
Sensing that their entertainment has come to an end, the crowd begins to disperse in knots. Gippal follows the tug I apply to his sleeve. "I'm sorry," he says, fingers in motion to rub against his temple, against his clothes, a bundle of nervous energy. "It's just been, I mean, you know--so long! And I didn't expect to see you here--"
"I know."
I do not trust standing in such an open area. Finding one of the smaller walkway twists, I haul the Al Bhed along behind me as he rambles apologies mixed with sputtered relief at my appearance. Only when we have fetched up against the end of a stunted pier do I turn, and finally regard the blonde.
"You're alive."
"I could say the same thing about you, man!" Voice lifting once more before he can catch it, Gippal flicks his hands up in the air in a helpless surrender. "How have you been?"
"I've been better." The phrase drops wry from my mouth. Rather than go into further details, I change tactics. "What about you, Gippal? What are you doing in a place like this?"
Readily swayed down the new path of conversation, the Al Bhed gives me a brisk nod, hair bobbing. "I heard stories--nothing big, y'know, just rumors. Stuff about Nooj. They say," he continues in a sudden hush, glancing up and down the wooden piers, "that he's joined Yevon. As some kind of a Seeker, and he goes around and collects spheres, and he's been seen around here the last couple of weeks..."
Inwardly cursing myself for not keeping better tabs on the Deathseeker's current assignments, I nod as blandly as I am able.
Gippal does not notice my silence, rattling along the carriage of his thoughts aloud as briskly as ever. "So, I thought... you know." The toe of his boot scrapes against a stack of boxes, absent-mindedly kicking at the wood. "Might as well come find him. I mean, I haven't seen you or Paine, not since the Highroad. Woke up one afternoon and you guys were gone."
No rancor is in Gippal's voice while he speaks; only a wistful pragmatism, coupled with a brow-lift of bewilderment.
"The clerk at the desk said she took off shortly after you did. And I've been thinking all this time. Before we lost Home, I figured we Al Bhed could just survive. Make it through, yeah? And then... I don't know anymore. Someone I met told me being a jackass was good, that you gotta make waves if you want to get shit done. Someone I completely didn't expect."
Startled out of my private thoughts, I consider the philosophy presented with such irreverence. "Who?"
"One of the High Summoner's Guardians." Lopsided in his grin, Gippal turns back to me, hooking his thumbs in his pants. "Never expected that one, huh? Makes more sense, now that I know what she ended up doing. So, uh... where've you been? I was worried."
Suddenly, I do not want to admit that I have been among the Guado. I had arrived much too late to do anything about the attack on Home, but I am hesitant to speak of the truth. Even to Gippal. Of all the Squad, he is the only one I can look at who does not yet glare at me.
It is better for me to lie, or say nothing at all.
"I've been around." The evasiveness slips off my tongue with natural grace. "Here and there. I came down to Kilika looking for you."
"Oh!" Revelations paint Gippal's face pleased with relief. "You mean you heard of the spheres too? Yeah, I've got them." One hand dives into the inner pockets of his pants; groping around in a manner that would be provocative save for Gippal's utter nonchalance, the Al Bhed eventually produces a handkerchief rag that looks suspiciously as if it has been torn from someone else's shirt. One corner is unraveling. Grease stains are smeared across the sides.
Gippal hasn't changed one bit.
"Don't know why there's a fuss over them," the Al Bhed explains, unknotting the ties. "Complete accident. Doing a salvage venture off the coast, and came across this one sunk. A bunch of ships down there, most of them with Sin damage. Some of them a lot older too. Looks like Yevon cargo, judging from the machina parts mixed in. I had swimmers go down there, looked like a crate of records, most of it's paper that's been damaged. A few machina panels. And this stuff."
Finally the cloth comes free. The prize in Gippal's hand gleams a ruddy orange, wide as his palm, a streak of oil across the top.
Spheres.
Gippal found spheres.
This is what I get for skipping out on Bevelle mission briefings.
I examine the evidence he presents with appropriate curiosity, falsifying a level of interest that is only minor at best. "Have you looked at any of the contents yet?"
"Nope." Bouncing the orb in his hand like a toy, Gippal spins colors off the surface. Red of fire, blue of the sea. "This one's pretty big. Must be good. But it's weird... Yevon's got this thing for collecting spheres now, right? To show off the past?"
A hollow second passes before I realize he is waiting for my nod of affirmation, and then he continues.
"Why?" Sharp-eyed wariness drills into me. "Yevon doesn't like telling people about what's gone on. This new guy I hear, Trema, he's the one who's all up about it. It's creepy. I mean, Baralai," he winces, "I found one of our spheres in that excavation. On one of the more recent ships, near the top of the debris."
"One of ours?" Startled, I parrot the phrase back.
"From the Squad." Gippal's confirmation is serious. "It freaks me out, to think that Yevon's got these people out looking for this stuff. I don't want them to see my life. And this one's got--cred, Baralai, I don't ever want to see what's on that one again, and I sure don't want anyone else to either."
I do not know if I want to hear the answer, but I steel myself to ask regardless.
"What... exactly is on that sphere from the Squad?"
"I don't know, man, it's got Nooj on it and he's... " Finger spider through the air again and again as Gippal's nerves twang as poorly as a novice minstrel's chords. "Turned it off halfway through when I realized what was going on. It's from the Highroad. You know, back when. Haven't watched it all yet. I got as far as seeing him shoot us in the back and then--"
Repetitive thumps interrupt the litany, breaking the tense melody of Gippal's recall. Both of us fall silent. Summer winds whisper around the docks, carrying hints of marketplace laughter, and then a third voice pours itself upon the air.
"So what is it that I hear when I get into town, but that two of my old friends are having a get-together."
Words seep towards us as the speaker approaches, as thick and heavy as congealed honey.
"And they didn't invite me?"
Turning, I watch the crates stacked up near the entrance of the dead-end pier as the dull noise scrapes slowly closer, and then Nooj steps into sight.
Gippal, for once, is speechless.
The Deathseeker's metal leg drags as heavy as an executioner's axe as he pulls himself towards us. "I should have known New Yevon would send one of its flunkies sooner or later," he observes in my direction, murmuring. "So are you here to arrest Gippal... or just to watch while your soldiers do the actual dirty work?"
Stories move swift upon Kilika air. It could have been no trouble at all for Nooj to catch news of the Al Bhed visitor, particularly one who had interrupted his own story in order to meet with another. It wouldn't have been hard for him to guess who.
And that had given him time to prepare.
Gippal's eye darts between Nooj and myself, skittish as a fly. "What's he saying? Hey, Baralai," he repeats, voice wavering in its sun-bright confidence, "what's this about New Yevon?
"Go ahead, Baralai." Nooj's lips are light with a smirk as he draws himself to a halt and watches me, poised as smug as a battlefield victor. "Didn't you tell him yet? How you're one of them now. Go on. I think he deserves to know."
Staring at the Deathseeker, I am unsettled to realize how quickly violence is becoming a remarkable temptation.
The swell of anger is forced away. I shoot one last glare at the Deathseeker before looking steadily back to the Al Bhed. Or so I try. In reality, I stare at Gippal's stomach, at his legs, at his ear rather than meet the Al Bhed's eye directly.
"It's true, Gippal."
Gippal's hands break into motion. "Oh man, oh man," he moans, shoving his fingers into his hair as he stares at me, stomps his feet in distress. "You joined Yevon? What were you thinking? Baralai! Are you crazy? Do you need to get laid? What?"
"I did because I wanted to find out what was going on!" Stung by the possible accusations, I snap my head towards him. "I'm here as Bevelle's representative, not as a military force. We're not here to do anything to you, Gippal, please calm down!"
Gippal whirls on me, his fingers spread plaintively. The sphere in his hand gleams hot in the sun.
"Yeah? So what is going on?"
I open my mouth to speak, and then shut it once more.
"If you'll excuse me." Nooj's interjection cuts smoothly between us. "Some of us don't have time to quarrel." Another long scrape, and he pulls himself a step closer. "As a registered Seeker of Yevon, I have come to collect what is my due. I'm afraid that sphere you have belongs to me now, Gippal. Would you be so kind as to hand it over?"
My eyes snap to the Deathseeker. Before I can stop it, I am speaking. "You'll be taking nothing, Nooj. The sphere should be turned over to me. As Trema's acolyte, I--"
"Trema?" Gippal jerks away from us both, spitting out the Founder's name in blonde horror. He backpedals, stumbling over a coil of rope in his haste, slapping his empty hand upon a storage crate with an empty thump. The impact causes his fingers to open as he waves his other arm desperately to regain his balance, dropping the record sphere like a stone from the sky.
The sphere hits the dock. Rolling. It veers dangerously along the Kilika walkway, dodging one break in the wooden boards before an irregularity in the dock's surface sends it careening off towards the edge.
We explode into motion. Nooj tries to throw himself forward, but stumbles down to one knee when his own limp trips him up. His cane clatters against the dock. I collide with Gippal, getting tangled in the taller Al Bhed's limbs when we both attempt to dive for the sphere.
My chin bounces off the dock. Gippal's ribcage goes pressing into the side of my head, and when I kick a heel out automatically, I think I hear Nooj grunt at the impact.
The Al Bhed's fingers scramble over the crystal. It clicks.
Light bathes us all as the playback activates.
First rises the translucent pitch of darkness projected through light; the scene which rises out of the sphere is one enclosed in shadow, dimly lit by all save the scrambled blue of Yevon script. Yellow boots enter the frame of reference next. A man, a young one, treading a pathway that leads to the bulk of a shadowed beast.
I find my breathing slow. By the shallow pulse of Gippal's ribs by my face, I know his has as well.
I remember that man. The scratchy quality of the record flickers, wailing static through the display, but I could not forget the features of that blonde figure no matter how hard I tried. Yellow boots, shorts, red-woven straps. Gloved hands.
It is the same man as was in the memories forced inside us during the Den of Woe.
The room, I recognize twice over now; it is the underground chamber which cradles Vegnagun, and by that I suddenly realize just what is on this sphere. It is a directional map to remind all three of us from the Squad of the nightmare that has haunted us since the Den, and now it is turned on for display.
The horns of the locust-skull frame the unknown stranger. The print of Yevon scrolls around them both.
Behind me, I hear Nooj's gritty whisper of revelation. "Bevelle."