-Chapter Three-
Mission Starts!
A/N: Gosh, thanks for all your reviews! Made me so happy! XD Anyways, here's chapter 3!
Rikku and Gippal continued their walk in silence, without even looking at each other. Rikku mumbled something sometimes, and Gippal opened his mouth once, but other than that: nothing.
Rikku felt really stupid as she looked down at her feet and mumbled for the third time. There really was no reason for her to be angry, but for some reason she had a problem with this guy.
A couple of minutes of awkward silence later they finally reached a big, blue tent which was the crusaders headquarter in Mushroom Rockroad.
"Finally…" Rikku said with a sigh as she put down her heavy bags on the ground and looked at Gippal. She was just about to say something about how slow he was, when she saw that a little man was looking at them and now hurried up to run inside the tent.
"One of the crusaders…" she heard Gippal say to himself in a low, bitter voice.
Then he started to walk closer to the tent and stopped just outside. Rikku followed him with a troubled look on her face. She wanted to go home and continue doing nothing for the rest of the summer.
"Gipp-" she started, but Gippal waved with his hands.
"No! Let's hear what they're saying, 'kay?" he whispered as he pointed towards the tent. Rikku snorted, but she kept her mouth shut and moved closer to the tent to hear what was being said inside it.
"Sir! They're here!" Rikku guessed it was the little guy who spoke. His voice sounded almost as tiny squeaks.
"Man…What a bother. I can't stand those bloody al bheds…" another voice said, probably the 'sir'.
"Fryd!" (What!) Rikku whispered to Gippal with an angry look on her face "What kind of a welcome is that!"
Gippal gave her a surprised look.
"You didn't except a nice welcome from the crusaders, did you?" he whispered back and shook his head "Man, in that case you're really naive…Or stupid…" he grinned which caused Rikku to punch him on his shoulder. He sighed with a smirk on his face and then he continued: "They won't even let me join them...just because I'm al bhed. They don't trust us for a second. No one in Spira does." Then he grinned a sarcastic grin at Rikku and walked away a bit from the tent.
"Don't call me naive, meanie! And don't grin like that!" Rikku said as she followed him, wondering why this Gippal wanted to join the crusader. The only things the crusaders did were dying, right? Wasn't he to young for that? And why wouldn't they let him just because he's al bhed! And if they hated al bheds so much, why did they come running to Cid, begging for machina! That was really low…
"I really thought that you'd know about this whole 'Spira-hates-all-al bheds-thing,'" Gippal said "After all I guess you're Cid's little princess."
But Gippal was wrong. Cid never told Rikku anything about what happened in the world, because he thought that could…hurt her. As a result, everything Rikku ever did was tinkering with machina and that was what her childhood had been all about. Then of course, she was blissfully ignorant of everything that happened in Spira.
Rikkus faced turned red and she started to make weird sounds, which was supposed to be words. Five seconds later she managed to say "Meanie!", but that was all. She didn't like the fact that this annoying Gippal knew more than she did, and she didn't like to be called 'princess'.
Just as Gippal opened his mouth, the little man with the squeaky voice came out from the tent, followed by another man who Rikku guessed was the 'sir'. He even looked like a meanie.
"Oh, nice to see you. We've been expecting you." The 'sir' said as he looked at the young al bheds with a look on his face that clearly showed that he wasn't pleased at all at the sight of them. Rikku recognized the voice; it was the 'al bhed hater sir'. Why did he pretend to be so nice? What an….
"My name is Beren.." he continued and cleared his throat.
"Why, you are--!" Rikku started to yell at the man, but Gippal gave her a meaning look and then he looked back at the man.
"You know why you're here, right?"
"Yes, sir. Where should we start, sir?" Gippal said with a polite voice.
"Why are you so nice to this idiot and so mean to me! Man…he really hates me…" Rikku thought as she put her arms in a cross over her chest and turned around. But then she tried to figure out why Gippal was such a jerk, and realised that she didn't even know. That made her "mood-meter" sink down even lower, staying at minus 11.
"As you know the machina we got from you aren't working the way it should. Your mission is to fix them." Beren continued "The most of the machina is located just around Djose highroad, so you should go look there first. Understood?"
"Understood, sir" Gippal said and looked at Rikku "We'll get going then."
"Yes…" the man said as he turned around and started to walk towards the tent again. But then he suddenly turned around, just as Rikku turned around and started to stick out her tongue at him. He looked at her with a raised eyebrow and then said; "Report to me when you're done."
"Yes, sir" Gippal said and gave Rikku a little smile. Rikku blushed and turned around again.
Then the man got into his tent and Gippal started to chuckle. "Well done, Cids girl…I guess he likes al bheds even more than before now, thanks to you."
"Oooh, stop calling me that! My name is Rikku and—"
"So that's your name…" Gippal grinned "I knew you would tell me it sooner or later"
Rikku blushed of anger when she realised that he'd got her – again!
"Hey! That counts as cheating!" Rikku said as she pushed Gippal away from her and lifted up her bags again.
"Want some help?" Gippal grinned as he looked at Rikku.
"Not from you, meanie!" she grumped back "Which way is it to Djose highway, anyway?"
"This way…" Gippal smirked and began to walk.
Rikku sighed when she lifted up her bags. Why didn't she let Gippal carry her bags?
A short while later they reached the Djose Highroad. And now Rikku understood what the problem with the machina was. They ran around, totally out of control. As it looked now Rikku doubted that they could even see the difference between a fiend and another machina.
"What should we do?" Rikku said, with a dejected sigh.
"…" Gippal looked as if he thought exactly the same thing. Then he frowned and looked at Rikku.
"The best thing to do would be to take 'em apart and then put 'em together again…Then we'll find the problems and fix them…That'll take some time though…"
Rikku sighed. "Guess we have no choice…"
"Let's start then…" Gippal grinned and took up some tools from his own bag and gave some of them to Rikku.
"Here, take these…" he mumbled with his own tools in his other hand. Then he gave her a very strict look, similar to Cids.
"Don't get yourself hurt or anything…" he said as he scratched his head. Rikku felt how she blushed.
"Now h-he cares about me!"
"…'cause Cids gonna kill me if you do…" he continued with a little grin.
"Damn…That's so obvious…Why didn't I understand it right away…" she let out an sigh.
"Don't you get yourself killed either, 'cause then I won't find my way back to the headquarters!" Rikku grinned back before she looked out over the machina.
"Let's take that one first…" Gippal said and pointed at small machina with weird arms sticking out from it.
"Why should I do what you tell me to do, meanie?" Rikku heard how childish it sounded one second to late.
"Because…" Gippal smiled his cocky smile again and took up a large rope from the ground and waved with it.
"Alright! Alright!" Rikku said as she nodded and then they started to move closer to the machina. She didn't want him to tie her up on a tree or something like that. It was bad enough as it already was. So she did what he told her to do. His plan was that Rikku would catch the machina with the rope and he would…watch?
"I'm not doing that!" she said "Lets do like this; I'll watch and then YOU tie it up!"
"You sure?" Gippal teased and waved with the rope again.
"A-alright! I'll do it!" Rikku said, taking four step backwards, away from Gippal and the rope.
"Alright…" Gippal said with another grin "Let's start then, before you'll start whining again…"
And so they started.
A short while later they were finished with taking the first one apart and the young al bheds proudly smiled for themselves.
"Let's start rebuilding it, shall we?" Gippal asked and pointed at the pile of machina parts on the ground.
Rikku told Gippal that she didn't want to, giving him a look that clearly showed him that they weren't friends or anything.
Gippal just nodded with a smile on his face and leaned closer to the machina which made Rikku a little bit of angry. She wanted him to say "Please don't go" or something like that. But no. Just a stupid smile…
"Then I'll go fix the tents while you fix that…." She said before she walked away, as a final try to make him ask her to stay, just so she could say no. But he didn't even answer.
So she just sighed again and started to look for a good place for the tents. She found one after a couple of minutes, which lay a good bit away from the crazy machinas – just in case.
"Let's start with the tents, Rikku!" she said to herself as a try to cheer herself up.
And so she started. There was only one problem – Cid had just packed one tent in her bag. One tent for her, alright. But she couldn't remember that Gippal had had any bag…Which meant… One tent – two persons.
"Ohhh! Poopie! Prepare to sleep outside, Gippal!"
She put up the tent a good bit away from the crazy machina, with just some smaller problems.
Then, when she was done, she heard something that sounded like a scream, coming from the Djose Highroad.
"G-Gippal!" she screamed in panic. What had happened!
She ran as fast as she could to the place where Gippal had been sitting, and found him lying on the ground, now panting and shaking, with his hand pressed over his right eye.
"Gippal!" she said with a shaking voice as she sat down next to him "What happened!"
No answer. Rikku looked at him and saw that blood was running out from under his hand.
"Has s-something….happened to your eye, Gippal?" she said with a very scared voice. Still no answer. She decided to take him to the tent so that the machina wouldn't hurt him even more; it looked bad as it already was. But he was too heavy to carry there…
"W-wait here!" Rikku said as she stood up and on shaking legs started to run towards the tents again. There she took a blanket with her and hurried to run back to Gippal. Then she helped him to lay down on that, and started to pull him to the tent.
"How…pathetic!" Was the only words that flew through Rikkus head as she slowly came closer and closer to the tent.
When they finally reached it, she helped him go inside the tent and lay him down on the little mattress.
"Ough…ow…." He said with a pitiable voice, still holding his hand over his eye.
"L-let me see it…"
"N-no…You don't wanna…" Gippal coughed, still with his eyes closed.
"Uh…You're right…I don't want to but I have to…" she looked at Gippal who opened his other eye.
"You really are strange…" he grinned back, but not as relaxed as usual. "Fist you seem to hate me….and then you seem to actually care about me…"
Rikku blushed and looked away "I-I care for myself by doing this! Otherwise...I…I'll get lost! Or get killed by that crazy machina!"
Gippal smiled and closed his eye again.
"Wi…W-will you be alright?" Rikku asked as she looked at him again, now that he couldn't see that she did,
"…Yeah. I'm fine." He did an attempt of smiling.
Rikku sighed as she looked at the boy in front of her. He seemed to be in such pain…well she didn't like him, but still… it's not funny to see someone be in such great pain as Gippal was now…knowing that you can do nothing about it. She sat there all day, looking at him, as he fell asleep and woke up again, just a few minutes later, panting, all wet of sweat. She took one of her clean socks from her bag and held some of the water from her bottle with water in on it and put it over his eye, without looking. Gippal really was right. She didn't want to see.
"I-it'…a…sock…." Gippal said with a pitiable voice "I don't…want your sock in my face…" he grinned and closed his eye again, couching in pain. Rikku rolled her eyes, but with a little smile on her face.
"Someday…I'll fix those damned machina things…all by myself…I gonna build the best machina ever…" he grinned "Better than Cids anyway…."
Rikku sighed, still with the little smile on her face. Yeah, he was a little bit of annoying sometimes…But maybe he was okay?
A/N: Stupid, I know. Really stupid. Gippal isn't that clumsy! Argh:p But you have to admit that Gippal sure fixed those machinas by being the leader of the machina faction later ;p Hope it wasn't too bad ; And I wanna give credit to my friend, Cissi, who helped me with this story. Thanks a lot! And to Linn, who always let me borrow her computer ;D My own is broken…X'P I hope you'll continue reading, and MOST OF ALL that you actually find this fic…readable:) That's all from me! See you (hopefully!) in the next chap! (Sorry for my bad grammar and spelling X'I I suck! X'S)
