Don't be scared of anything at all
Everything we have is all we need
All the spotlights streaming into angry skies
Means there's no one watching as we leave
Say the first thing that
Comes into your mind when you see me
If it looks like it works and it feels like it works
Then it works
With the sun on your face
All these worries will soon disappear
Just follow me now...
-"Wow" by Snow Patrol
I pulled away from Auron slowly, feeling a silly smile come to my face. I couldn't even speak, really, and it seemed like he was in the same predicament. We just stood there together, holding each other as tight as we could, and I thanked everything from the stars to the sea that we were there together, even just for a moment.
"So..." he grunted, his eyes twinkling with something close to glee, "Still hate me?"
My eyes opened wide in shock, and he started laughing. "Just how long were you standing there?" I screeched, and he laughed even louder.
"The whole time. Yuna sent me to follow you, and I had you in my sight and hearing range the entire walk here," he grinned. "Besides, you were screaming, princess. It wasn't too hard to hear you."
"Oh no... oh no..." I mumbled, looking away from him, feeling extremely embarrassed. I mean, there I was, screaming out my feelings because I thought no one would hear me, and someone just had to be listening the whole entire time.
"Hey..." he said quietly, his hand coming underneath my chin and making me look him in the eye. "You had every reason to hate me. I wasn't exactly acting mature..."
"No, it's not your fault," I said quickly. "And I didn't hate you. I was frusterated, yes, and misrable, and lonely, but that's still not a good enough reason for me to be standing there, screaming about hating you so that everyone from here to Bikinal could hear me."
He started combing my hair out of my eyes with his fingers, and my eyes teared up quickly, at the pure sweetness of it. "I still don't blame you."
"You should."
"I was being an ass."
"No, I was."
"Rikku," he sighed, obviously exasperated with me. "Stop. You didn't do anything wrong."
I pulled away from him and started pacing back and forth, my hands slapping against the sides of my legs as I walked. I know it was an unconcious nervous action, but I couldn't help myself, and I certainly wasn't going to stop myself. Auron stood back, watching me, smiling slightly as if he knew exactly what I was thinking.
"It's just, I don't know what to do these days... And I'm really nervous about being here, and having to go there, because what if everything goes wrong? And what if I do get everyone killed, or what if he does drag me away without anyone being able to stop him? What if I can't stop him, Auron?" I rambled on. He tried to answer me, but I just waved his words away, and kept talking.
Maybe, maybe, if I just kept talking, everything would just away...
"Everything about this feels wrong, and I don't know if I should even be here. Not this, as in you and me, but THIS. This whole damn situation. And I don't like this, and I thought I had the perfect solution, but even that backfired..."
"What was that?" he interrupted. "Staying away from me?"
I looked away from him for a moment, holding my breath. Maybe telling him everything would be the proper way to go about things... "Well, yeah. Staying away from you."
"Hm," he grunted. "That didn't work."
I stopped for a second, staring at him in shock. He stared back at me, same normal expressionless expression on his face. Wow.
"Thank you, Captain Obvious," I said without any expression, before I burst out laughing, shaking my head. "I can't believe you even said that."
"What did I say?" he asked, slightly confused.
"Obviously, my plan didn't work, or else I wouldn't be talking to you right now. I would be... ah, probably sitting in a tree somewhere, contemplating what I was going to do with the years of my life spent in a dirty dungeon in the basement of Seymour's humble abode. I mean, I shouldn't complain, because it probably would be kinda entertaining, because I still wouldn't be in the dungeon yet, so that would be a plus. But I mean..." my voice trailed off as I realized that he was staring at me. "... Yeah. Uh... What?" I said slowly, brushing at my face to make sure I didn't have anything on it.
Not that I would have anything on it, mind you, but the fact that he was staring so intently at me made me think that something had to be wrong.
"Amazing..." he said quietly.
"What is?" I asked nervously, my hands clasping behind my back as I leaned on the heels of my feet.
"How brave you are..." he whispered, smiling slightly. "You're walking off to what very well could be your death and everyone else's, if you're not careful, and you're still trying to laugh and make jokes. On one hand, that could be considered slightly immature..." He put up his hand to stop me from protesting. I just shut up and let him keep speaking, considering he let me ramble on without interrupting before. "But because it's you, it's not immature. It's brave."
"Why do you say that?" I asked, my knees giving out underneath me, causing me to sink into the damp ground. "It is immature, Auron. I should be more serious about this."
"No," he shook his head. "You shouldn't."
He sunk down to the ground in front of me, and held my face with his hands, forcing me to look at him. "You're trying to keep everyone happy, Rikku, at the expense of your own feelings. And if I didn't know any better, I would probably be just as fooled as everyone else," he chuckled slightly. "But I do know you better than that. Your smile hasn't reached your eyes in days... but you just keep on smiling. Not only that, but you've been trying to take on everyone else's problems, and bury them into your quick wit and understanding. That's brave, Rikku. Braver than I could ever be, and I admire you for that."
My eyes held his for a moment, and I melted at his words. He really did believe everything that he was saying, and I couldn't understand why. "I'm not brave, Auron... I'm just dealing with the cards I've been dealt, that's all. I'm sure you would do the same thing, if you were in my position."
He got really quiet for a second, and something clouded over the emotion in his eye, closing him off. "Auron?" I whispered, reaching out to touch his face, but he grabbed my hand and stopped me.
"I was never dealt your cards before," he whispered slowly, forcefully, shocking me with the tone of his voice. "But I was dealt something close. And I didn't do what you are willing to do, I did something else... Something idiotic. I reacted without considering my options, and everything instantly became worse."
"What happened?" I asked shakily.
"All in due time, princess. You'll find out eventually," he said, closing the subject without a second thought. Standing up, he brushed off his knees slightly and looked down at me. "We probably should get going, Rikku. Yuna will be needing us to keep watch."
"Uh... Okay," I said, slightly confused. "Let's go then," I mumbled, and picked myself off the ground. We started walking back to the camp in silence, and I couldn't help but think about how weird the whole last bit of our conversation had been.
Why wouldn't he tell me? I mean, it wasn't like he HAD to tell me what happened. It would have been nice though, because that would have meant that he trusted me and everything else that was good and kind and lovely about being in love with someone, you know, how he claimed to feel about me. I couldn't understand it, but I just decided to drop it, considering the fact that he was right. I would find out eventually, even if that meant I had to pester him to death to do it.
And I wasn't above pestering him, not by a long shot.
Suddenly, I felt his hand grasp mine, and we slowed down. "Princess?"
"Yes?"
"Promise me something," he said quietly, turning my body to face him.
"Like what?" I giggled slightly. "The moon? The stars? Cinnamon cookies? Tell me."
"Promise me that you aren't coming up with some cockeyed scheme that involves saving me and killing you, or something just as stupid.Whateverhappens, we're doing this together. Agreed?" he said seriously, staring at me with that eye, and I couldn't move a muscle, let alone disagree.
"I promise..." I whispered. "Whatever happens, we're in this together."
"Good," he said, turning to leave again, but I stopped him.
"But, you better not complain, Auron, because you asked for it!" I said, and he started laughing.
He leaned down, gave me a kiss, and I saw stars. "I asked for it, all right..." he whispered, before we continued on to camp.
AN: Gone for the weekend, hopefully everyone likes this one! Most likely another update next week. Wow... this story has my flying by the seat of my pants, haha. Oh, and if you haven't noticed, each place takes a few chapters. So I'm not going to have them take forever in the Thunder Plains and then just buzz right past Macalania Forest just so that they can chat with Seymour. That would be too easy, lol. So, you guys get to wait a bit longer for that chapter.
