I'm hanging onto every word you say
And even if you don't want to speak tonight
That's alright, alright with me
'Cause I want nothing more than to sit
Outside heaven's door and listen to you breathing
Is where I want to be
-"Breathing" by Lifehouse
"I've got what we need."
"Finally! Bring it here, please! We need to hurry. She's still unconscious."
"Okay, Yuna, with these potions and what magic you have left, we should be able to cure her."
"Here, I'll pour the potions onto the wounds on her arms and legs."
"What do you suggest we do about her face?"
"Yuna should cure it with her magic, ya?"
"Good point, Wakka. Okay... everyone ready?"
"Yes!"
"Alright then, let's start."
"Hello?" I whispered, my voice raspy from not speaking for ages. I blinked open my eyes, but I still couldn't see anything in the dark room, except for the shadow of a person sitting on a chair near my bed. I tried to move my hands, or my big toe, or something, but everything still felt sore. At least my whole body wasn't on fire anymore. "Yuna? Lulu? Who's there?"
I saw the shadow shift a bit, but whoever it was stayed quiet. Maybe they were sleeping, but regardless, I kept trying names, trying to get their attention. "Wakka? Tidus, is that you?" I whispered a bit more loudly.
It grunted. Grunted so loudly, in fact, that I just about jumped out of my skin. "Okay, maybe you're not Tidus. Well, Auron wouldn't be in here, so..."
"Rikku, do you EVER shut up?" the voice exclaimed from the darkness.
Oh shit. Of course, it just had to be... "Sir Auron! Is that you?"
"No, it's the Chocobo Fairy," he said dryly.
I decided to ignore that smart aleck comment that he made, and tried to bring the focus back to more pressing matters. "Where's Yunie? What happened? Is everyone okay?"
I heard a click and a soft light suddenly filled the room. Auron was surprisingly without his coat, just lounging in the chair with what seemed to be black pajamas. But, when has Sir Auron the Almighty ever worn pajamas? His katana was leaning against the armrest, and his sock-covered toes were up on the side of the bed. His face was expressionless, but that was the norm, so I wasn't very surprised. "You honestly don't remember?"
"I remember Chimmy and cinnamon cookies and burning in Hell and lightning... lots and lots of lightning. And I was stuck in a fuzzy fog for a long time, and someone needed a potion, which I had one in my pouch, but I couldn't get out of the fog to help them. And..."
"What happened was that you decided to run ahead of the group, instead of staying behind to protect your summoner. Then, because of that, you ran into a Chimera without the rest of us, took so much damage that Yuna did not have enough magic to heal you, and caused us to rush you here."
"Ohh..." I nodded.
"Where "Chimmy", "cinnamon cookies", and "burning in Hell" fit into all of that, I will never know," he grumbled.
"But, where's Yunie? Is she alright?"
"Yuna is resting in her room, after sitting awake next to you for more than half of the night. When she finally dozed off, the rest of the group was asleep, so I was told to watch you and alert her of any changes. Other than being tired, she is fine, as are the rest of us."
My mind was spinning with all of the new information. "But... someone smelled like love and sake and cinnamon cookies..."
"That must have been a fabrication in your mind while you were unconscious."
"But, whoever it was said that they would protect me!"
His eye grew pitch-black as he stared at me, searching my face for some sort of answer that I obviously could not give. "Are you sure of that?"
"Of course! I just don't know who it was! But they smelled like it, ran like the blazes to get me here, and told me that they would protect me..."
"And it is love, sake, and cinnamon cookies?"
"YES!" I yelled, sitting up quickly from the bed. Of course, that was a bad move, because instantly my face, arms, and everything else on me started burning again. With a whimper, I laid back down.
Compassion seemed to flash in his eye for a moment, before the expression left his face again. "Rikku, try not to move. The wounds cannot heal if you're jumping around."
I laid stick straight, staring up at the ceiling, refusing to look at his face. "You don't believe me, do you?"
"About?" he asked nonchalantly.
"The person who saved me..." I mumbled.
"It depends. What else does it smell like?"
"The forest on a summer night... The desert after a perfect rainstorm..."
"And your savior smelled like all of these things at once? It hardly seems realistic."
My heart seemed to twist up in my chest. Of course he wouldn't think it was realistic. Then again, this is Mr. Cynic, Mr. I-Don't-Believe-In-Anything, Mr. Thinks-He's-Way-Smarter-Than-Me. He would never believe that someone good, beautiful, WONDERFUL, showed up to take care of me.
"Fine," I whispered, unwanted tears filling up my eyes."Don't believe me, I don't care. But if you don't believe me, youdon't need to stay in here. I'm perfectly fine by myself!" I stared at the ceiling, willing myself to fall asleep, or maybe just disappear off of the face of Spira.
As the tears threatened to spill over, I tried to make myself calm down. Breathe-one-two-three. Breathe-one-two-three. In-one-two-three. Out-one-two-three. In-one-two-three. Out-one-two-three. Breathe, Rikku. Just breathe.
Auron was silent, but I could still feel him watching me. I felt incredibly embarrassed, considering I really needed to prove myself to him, it seemed, but I was making a fool out of myself. Then, I felt more than saw him shift out of his seat.
I closed my eyes as tight as I could, hoping that he would just leave.
Then again, I'm never that lucky, am I?
There was a sudden weight at the edge of the bed, and I rolled slightly towards it, skin burning the whole way. I cracked open my eyes a bit..
"Amazing," he said quietly, the back of his dark shirt facing me, his face staring off at the wall about two feet away. There was nothing really that interesting about that wall, I'm sure, but he never moved his gaze from it.
"What is?" I said, my voice cracking again.
He didn't respond for a moment, blinked, then shook his head. "Nothing is, Rikku." Then he suddenly stood up, turned back to face me, and said, "Go to sleep. You need to be up early tomorrow morning, unless you wish to be left behind. Yuna needs to continue on her pilgrimage, regardless of your medical state."
"Where are we?" I asked quietly.
"Just outside of Guadosalam. And we've spent far too much time here, catering to your needs. It's time to move on." His dark eye stared down at me, daring me to contridict him.
But, of course, I didn't have a response quick enough for him. He turned away, slipped into his coat, and walked out of the door, quietly shutting it behind him. And I was left behind, tears starting to trickle down my cheeks, as I wished I had never agreed to come along on this stupid trip.
And as I breathed-one-two-three over and over again, I finally realized something that made my dreary day look up a bit.
The pillow and the blanket next to me smelled like it.
