A/N-WEE!! YAY! crazy voice Lotsa reviews! I'm so happy you guys like this story! I hate my life SOOOOO much right now, though. My older sister is such a pain to have around. I mean, she's the type of sister who's only nice to you when she wants something. It makes me really mad, but reading you guys' reviews cheers me up, so please keep your authoress happy so she doesn't write crappy chappies! For those of you who want me to speed up the romance, hold on! Both Rikku and Gippel are stubborn people, so you'll have to wait, but in every chapter, there is a hint at romance! Well, I don't have much to say (good thing for you guys, huh?) So let's get on with the story!

♥Every Heart♥

Chapter Eleven: Accident

Believe it or not, even after the embarrassing, silly, and fun-in-a-twisted-way date, I remembered that Gippel had to wear a nicotine patch starting today. I hopped out of my bed with a mission in mind. I shrugged out of my flannel pajamas and raced to my closet, grabbing my default Thief dressphere. Quickly, I threw the sphere into the air as it engulfed me in a welcoming light, removing me of my nightwear and piecing together my dusty green miniskirt with the yellow pockets, the orange and yellow bikini top, blue and white boots, white arm ribbons, red fingerless gloves, multicolored scarf, blue bandanna, and colorful beads.

I moved around, getting the feel of my outfit. The frayed ends of my scarf almost touched the ground and as I moved out of the room, I nearly tripped over them. It was a warm day today. The sun's rays filtered through the temple's windows, warming my body and tickling my bare tummy. I greeted a few up-and-working Al Bhed people who cheerily replied to my greeting. I felt in a great mood today, but then, I was usually never down.

My swirled eyes scanned the perimeter and I spotted Gippel's room. Skipping over to his door, I opened the door a crack and peered inside to find that the Machine Faction leader had already gotten up and disappeared.

"Ooh…where could he be?" I muttered, half-heartedly sounding annoyed. The sound of footsteps resonated behind me and I turned around to greet whoever it was. "Oh! Hi, Uppahc!" I smiled warmly at the handsome man, waving energetically. He chuckled, his voice low and throaty.

"Good morning, miss! I happened to be walking by and you look like you needed to find someone, miss! Maybe I could help, yes?" I nearly rolled my eyes at his politeness, but waved my hands instead and replied.

"Call me Rikku. Well anyways, have you seen Gip—"I stopped in the middle as Leblanc passed by, a warning look on her face, "—er…Gippy-Wippy this morning?" I muttered quickly. She smiled pleasantly and winked, continuing her way down the hall.

"I'm sorry, Miss Rikku, but I could not hear that correctly," Uppahc replied, looking confused. I looked around quickly, darting my swirled eyes around the halls and when I saw no sign on that evil, conniving woman, I whispered.

"Have you seen Gippel?"

"Oh! Why didn't you say so, Miss Rikku? Gippel? Well, he's working on the supermachina up those stairs in the main hall!" Uppahc spoke loudly and chuckled heartily. I nearly slapped my palm to my forehead. Just as I had suspected, like a flash, Leblanc came zooming back to us.

"Did I hear the word…Gippel?" she asked suspiciously, crossing her slender arms and tapping her left foot impatiently.

"Why yes, miss! We were just talking about where Gippel was. Why?" Uppahc answered for me, unnoticing Leblanc's evil eye on me.

"That's none of your business, love. Rikku, come with me," Leblanc replied curtly, grabbing my right arm with her leather glove. I was dragged off to the outside of the temple where she continued to drag me over to the far left side and sat down on one of the rocks jutting out. Once she let go of my arm, I rubbed it, wincing.

"Geez, you have a strong grip."

                "Rikku, Rikku, Rikku…"

"Whhhhaaaaaaaaaaaat?" I whined as the morning breeze flew by.

"You didn't call him…you-know-what."

"Oh come on, Leblanc! You don't expect me to call him by his pet name every single time! I mean, I'm sure that you don't do that with Nooj!"

"That's beside the point. Noojie-Woojie and I have been in this relationship for a longer time than you and lover boy, and we're married." I huffed. Why did it feel like my life was being controlled? Oh well, at least it's nothing that drastic…I guess I could just humor Leblanc…

"Oh…fine," I muttered, sounding defeated. She grinned happily at me and stood up, patting me affectionately on the shoulder.

"Good! I need to go visit Noojie-Woojie at Mushroom Rock Road so I'll see you tonight for the second dinner date!" And before I could protest, she had zipped away and out of sight, walking over the stone bridge. I sighed. What did she have in store for us tonight? I trudged back inside the temple doors and looked at the stairs that led to the room that contained the supermachina. That's right! The nicotine patch!

I rummaged in my skirt's pockets until I fumbled out a small patch that I had tucked away. Feeling happy that I was going to do a good deed, I skipped up the stairs where an Al Bhed soldier glanced at me before smiling and letting me pass.

I strolled down the halls and turned to my left where a small set of stairs resided. Taking them two at a time, I entered the spacious room that contained the supermachina Yunie, Paine, and I had defeated all those months ago. Gippel immediately sensed someone else's presence in the room and he turned around, smiling smugly as he waved.

"You like? We're making this baby even better!"

"What purpose does it have? I mean, are you going to try to see if we can defeat it this time or something?" I chirped, skipping over to him and placing my hands on my hips. He rolled his eye, ruffling his spiky locks.

"Yeah right. We just used you guys to see what weaknesses our supermachina had, and then we fixed it. So there's no way that you can win." I frowned as he laughed and turned away, crossing his arms and commanding his fellow Al Bheds.

"Ooh! I bet a million gazillion gil that we can beat your stupid "super" machina!" I stood on my tiptoes so that I was near his level, glaring at him hard. He waved a fingerless gloved hand at me nonchalantly.

"Fine, fine, whatever."

"Hmph! You big meanie!" I pouted and crossed my arms as well, watching the supermachina in process. He chuckled slightly, his voice deep and throaty. After a while, I decided to speak. "So…when's it gonna be ready?"

"Just a few more minutes, I suppose. We just need to add in the Assembly Piece Z."

"Oh…" I rocked back and forth with the heels of my boots, waiting impatiently for it to be finished. "Oh wait! I almost forgot!" Quickly, I fumbled around in my pockets. "Now where did I put it?" I felt something in my hand and looked at it, bewildered, before I remembered that I had placed the nicotine patch in my palm. Feeling very stupid, I handed the object over to Gippel who raised a fair brow.

"What…is it?"

"Your nicotine patch that I promised you! Now you can stop smoking and breathe better and live longer!" I spoke quickly, gasping for air.

"Thanks, but no thanks."

"Oh no! I'm not taking THAT for an answer!" Without any warning, I grabbed his right arm and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, attempting to smack the patch onto his arm.

"No! Don't you do that!" He growled and tried to drag his arm away, pulling me in the process.

                 "No! It's good for you!" I squealed as he continued to drag me along with him. My free hand hung in the air as I tried desperately to place the patch onto his bare arm.

"Fydlr uid, oui kioc!" Too late. As Gippel gave one last hard pull, I collided with his hard chest, and sent the two of us flying straight into the supermachina. I cried out as Gippel smacked hard against he machinery, his arms instinctively wrapping around me. He cried out in pain, and slowly, the supermachina started to roll away as its wheels turned. It smashed through the walls, tumbling down the stairway. Cries of surprise echoed up to us as a huge crash sounded, and my swirled eyes widened in fear.

"Oh no!" I screamed, bolting from my position in Gippel's limp arms. I had to help! People were in danger! I quickly looked over at Gippel to see that he was rubbing his shoulder blades, wincing. "Lusa uh, Gippel!" Without turning back, I jumped down the stairs and gasped in horror when I saw the supermachina colliding with precious statues. Al Bheds were futilely attempting to stop the supermachina, jumping out of the way as it continued to roll around. It was much too heavy to be stopped by just one person! What should I do, oh what should I do?!

My dresspheres were all in my room, and I didn't have the time to go get them. Many people were already seriously injured from colliding with the supermachina. Without a moment's hesitation, I jumped in front of the supermachina and pounced on top of it.

"There must be a way to dislodge its Assembly Pieces!" Quickly, I tore out the mechanical bits, wincing as the sparks singed my skin. The supermachina rolled around in circles, continuing to gain momentum. I hung tightly to it and squeezed my eyes shut, fearing that I would fly off if I let go. What made it worse was the oil and grease that coated it to keep the metal from rusting.

"Miss!" That voice…it sounded so familiar…I looked up, opening my previously shut eyes. Uppahc? I was surprised to see that he was wielding a blitzball. Only Wakka used a blitzball as a weapon. It surprised me to see that he was wielding a weapon at all! He had a determined look on his handsome face, blitzball poised to strike, its blue and white stripes glaring back at me. After muttering something, Uppahc thrust the ball at the supermachina, sending it toppling over. I jumped into the air and did a flip, landing safely on the ground. "Miss! Are you alright?" Uppahc rushed over to my side, concern in his deep blue eyes.

"Rikku! Watch out!" I screamed as someone roughly shoved me to the left. I gasped. Paine! When Uppahc had thrown his blitzball at the supermachina and knocked it to the side, it had started to spasm uncontrollably and had unintentionally dislodged a rather large part in my direction. Paine had taken the blow, and now the piece of metal had lodged itself into her abdomen, blood dripping to the floor profusely.

"Oh--!!! PAINE!" I screamed as the older woman collapsed onto the ground, her ruby red eyes fluttering closed. "PAINE!!!" I screamed again, horror seeping wildly into my veins. Gippel staggered down the stairs then, still rubbing his wounded back.

"What…happened?" He whispered hoarsely, his jade green eye widening at the sight before him. Tears dripped down the sides of my face as I looked back at the unconscious Paine who was being lifted and moved to her room by some Al Bhed men. Yunie entered through the temple doors then with Tidus holding her hand.

"Oh my! What…what happened?" She gasped and a pale hand fluttered to her mouth in shock as she saw Paine's limp form. "Rikku…Paine! Is she…? What…? Oh my--!" She stuttered and her face grew paler as Tidus supported her when she fainted. Not soon after, I felt my control slipping as I sobbed and shook wildly, feeling frightened to death. Warm arms embraced me consolingly and my tears seeped into his chest as he whispered comforting words to me. I fainted soon after, the blackness enveloping me.

A/N-BWAHAHA…I'll leave it at that! Oh no! Poor Paine! What's gonna happen? Review and find out my friends! Oh, FireRaven2, sorry! I completely forgot about your request. I had it glued to my brain to translate the words for you, but I kept forgetting. Well, I'm not sure if you still need the letters, but here they are (English-Al Bhed):

Q-X
T-D
W-F
X-Q
Z-W

I hope that helped! Anyways, I'm sorry I haven't updated in a long time! My mom thinks I spend too much time on the computer, so she limited my privileges to homework only, and 30 minutes of free time if she feels like it. TOTALLY UNFAIR. ARGH! I'm sorry you guys, but it might take longer to update because of this. I hope ya'll will understand. Ok, just wanted to tell ya'll that I'm currently obsessed with Kingdom Hearts and Xenosaga, so I will be stopping this fic for a while. HA! Did I scare you?! Lol, I'm just kidding. Dunno why I did that…Oo; But it's partly true, because I really am obsessed with KH and XS right now, because in FFX-2, I'm doing the Cloister Trial with 100 levels, and it's not exactly a joy ride. I can't wait until KH2 comes out! I think it'll be coming out next year, and I'm so sad that it takes a year to translate the game to English! sad pathetic sob And Sora looks so HOT. I WUV SORA.

Translations:

"Fydlr uid, oui kioc!" : Watch out, you guys!

"Lusa uh, Gippel!" : Come on, Gippel!