Disclaimer: FFX, FFX-2 – neither of them belong to me, I'm just a poor, starving fan : )
A/N: Well this chapter was a tough one to write! Trying to decide how Rikku would react to kissing Gippal … as you can probably tell from this chapter – I couldn't really make up my mind. Rikku acts VERY irrationally and she keeps changing her mind from one second to the next about how she feels … anyway, I really hope this is realistic. Having never been in Rikku's situation – kissing a previous archenemy – I can't really visualise how she would be feeling so … I had to guess. If I've horribly missed the mark then please let me know and I'll do what I can to improve this chapter
As always, HUGE thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far … I am always awestruck by how many reviews I have : ) Oh and this chapter is dedicated to X2 Aeon Darkness IX as a welcome to the story!
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Rikku's Story
By: JoeyStar
Timeframe: Set a month or so after the 'happy' ending of FFX-2
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Chapter 6
You know those defining moments that you have, the ones that help to shape your life? The ones that seem so insignificant until they've passed and you realise that a part of you has passed with them. Your first step; first word; first tinkering with a piece of machina … and of course, the all-important first kiss. Events that you look back on and smile fondly or grimace at in embarrassment. The times in your life that your parents feel the need to reminisce loudly about to whoever will listen.
I think this could have been one of those times. But then I, in true Rikku fashion, managed to completely ruin it.
SMACK!
I don't know which of us was more surprised, me or Gippal. He staggered backwards, a white hand print standing out starkly against his red cheek. I pressed my hands to my throbbing lips and willed the ground to open up and swallow me.
Why in Spira's name had I slapped him? One minute we had been kissing – and I couldn't deny that I had been wonderful – and then …
Maybe it had been some kind of reflex reaction. Maybe my sanity had finally returned from wherever it had been hiding and had reminded me that I was kissing Gippal. Who up until a few moments ago had been my worst enemy, the bane of my existence, the personification of the words 'arrogant', 'infuriating' and 'self-absorbed' and was now …
"Somehow that wasn't the reaction I was hopin' for."
During my frantic thoughts, Gippal had composed himself. He was watching me from a few feet away, eye slightly wary.
"I … uh …" I replied cleverly, my mind racing around and around in circles. I stared at him helplessly, eyes almost begging him to say something that would get us both out of this mess.
"Rikku?" he reached out to catch my shoulder and I stepped backwards quickly, wrapping my arms around my waist and hugging myself. It was a curiously child-like movement but at that moment, I didn't care. I don't think I've ever been so confused in my life.
I couldn't meet Gippal's eyes but I heard the gusty sigh that followed my withdrawal. "So what have I done wrong this time?"
His words were so unexpected that I momentarily forgot my confusion and blinked up at him, a frown darkening my face. "What do you mean?"
"I've obviously done somethin' to annoy you – to make you react like this, so why don't ya just tell me and put me out of my misery?" he tapped his lips, affecting a thoughtful expression. "I've never had any complaints about my kissin' technique before."
I hated that he spoke like that – that he made me sound like simply another girl in a line of conquests that stretched onwards into infinity. Was that all the kiss had been to him? The most recent inflation of his ego? Something to brag about with his friends as soon as he cast me aside?
"So what did I do?" he persisted.
I didn't want to deal with this. Things had been so much easier to interpret when Gippal and I had been enemies. I had known exactly where I stood with him and there had been none of the confusing emotions that threatened to overwhelm me now.
He was still waiting for an answer, that irritatingly superior expression on his face as if he assumed I was simply waiting for an excuse to fall into his arms. Unfortunately for both of us, I didn't have that answer to give and in the place of my absent sanity, a far more basic instinct took over and I did what any sensible girl would do.
I ran.
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Unfortunately when the flight of fear took me over, I forgot that I was standing in an airship. I also forgot that the airship in question was currently mid-air and approaching Djose Temple and no matter how far I ran I would end up having to hide to get any solitude. And I also forgot that as this was Gippal's airship, there wasn't going to be anywhere that I could hide where he wouldn't be able to find me.
I just ran blindly, dodging technicians and sending a particularly small Al Bhed flying, leaving such a destructive path that even a blind Flan could have followed it. Yet another thing I forgot; it wouldn't exactly be difficult to find me if Gippal so desired.
I couldn't believe what had just happened. If someone had told me that on this particular day I would wind up kissing none-other than Gippal in a private room of his airship, I would have laughed myself sick. It was a completely ludicrous suggestion, which made the fact that it had actually happened even more baffling. Trying to rationalise the kiss was enough to make me run straight to New Yevon and beg them to let me become a priest.
When exactly had my opinion of Gippal changed? When had he gone from being a thorn in my side to being someone I wanted to give my heart to? I attempted to examine my emotions but only ended up feeling more unsettled. To me, nothing seemed to have changed between us so where in Spira had these new emotions come from?
And what were they? Did I … did I love him? I laughed at that particular thought but there was an unhealthy edge of hysteria to my tone. Hearing it I wondered if I was going mad … certainly I must be to have done such a thing as let Gippal kiss me …
A solid presence jolted me out of my reverie and I found myself confronted by a door that I couldn't simply run through. I slapped the door-panel frantically but to no avail; the door remained stubbornly closed.
"I think the door's locked Rikku."
Tyssed! (Dammit!)
Apparently Gippal had followed me after all.
I spun around and found that he was standing a couple of feet behind me, his arms folded across his chest and unusually serious expression on his face. It was only then that I realised how small the room I had retreated into was and I shifted from one foot to the other, peeking over his shoulder and mentally judging the distance to the nearest escape route.
Gippal sighed when I wouldn't meet his eyes. "What's this all about Rikku? Seems I can't win here. What is it exactly, that you want?"
"I … I don't know," I confessed, stalling for time and hoping something brilliant would come to me if I held out long enough. Something to explain this madness.
"Not that I'm gonna protest. Contrary to popular opinion, I don't get kissed like that every day."
The arrogant little … if my eyes had been daggers, Gippal would have been riddled with holes. It appeared that, for him at least, nothing had changed. He was as cocky as ever and it precipitated the reflex reaction of making me grit my teeth. However, it did give me the confidence and clarity I had been looking for. Self-effacing, irritating Gippal – this was something I knew how to deal with.
"Let's get this straight," I said sharply, my mind made up. "You kissed me." I wanted to be completely clear on this point. It was the only way to explain what had happened. After all, I would never have instigated such an action myself, you know? This was Gippal for Spira's sake!
"I like to think of it as more of a mutual action."
"No. You kissed me," I accused with certainty. Of course, why hadn't I worked this out sooner?
"Come on Rikku," he scoffed lightly, "it didn't hear you complainin'."
"I couldn't! I had your tongue in my mouth!"
Gippal shook his head. "I can't believe you're buildin' an argument out of this. Why can't you accept it for what it was?"
"It was – it was …" I searched around for an appropriately harsh term. "It was a violation!"
"Oh for Spira's sake!"
"It was," I insisted. "I wouldn't choose to kiss you if you were the last man in Spira!"
"Rikku!"
"Gippal!" I mimicked, enjoying having the upper hand for a change.
"Fine," he said throwing his hands up in the air. Then his look turned crafty. "Just tell me this. If you – how did ya phrase it? – 'wouldn't choose to kiss me if I was the last man in Spira' then why d'you kiss me back instead of pushing me away?"
So much for having the upper hand. In the lack of a good response I settled for glaring darkly at him as my mind searched for something to wipe that lazy smile of his face. "Did you forget the slap so quickly?" I retorted triumphantly, tone sickening sweet. "I'll have to work on that – make sure it's harder next time. Or perhaps I should just give you another one now …?"
" 'Next time?' " Gippal echoed, eyebrow arched. "You're sayin' there's gonna be next time?"
"Yes! No!" I back-pedalled swiftly. "Of course not! Do you think I'm ever going to let you near me again?"
"Do you think you can stop me?" he challenged, stepping forward and taking me by the shoulders so quickly that I squeaked in surprise.
I stared up into his undeniably handsome face, and suddenly the situation didn't seem so confusing anymore. In fact, it seemed very clear and I felt as if I was regarding him through new eyes. "I'll scream!" I promised him, the look in my eyes contradicting my words. I was standing on the edge of a precipice and my resolve was crumbling. Suddenly it seemed like such a good idea to jump off. After all, hadn't I been looking for some kind of purpose to fill my life?
"Screamin's for girls," he told me, his grip not loosening.
"In case you hadn't noticed, I am a girl," I retorted, but the normal bite was lacking from my tone and the response was half-hearted.
The corner of his mouth curved upwards in a half-smile, by far the most honest expression I had ever seen on his face. "Oh I've certainly noticed. And …"
"And?" I whispered. My mind was screaming at me but I ignored the insistent warnings and let my emotions take over.
"And … " he drew the word out, speaking agonisingly slowly, "I've noticed something else as well."
"What?" I breathed.
"You're really a very little girl aren't you?" he said in a conversational tone, drawing backwards and studying me as if I was an interesting piece of furniture. Wrong-footed once again, all I could do was gape as he released my shoulders and patted me affectionately on the head, as if I were a pet dog. "You make a very effective armrest."
I can't begin to describe how I felt at that moment. Incensed? Humiliated? Frustrated? Pick one and you'll probably be somewhere near the mark. In all the years that I had known him, I thought that I'd seen Gippal be insulting in every conceivable way. Apparently, I had been wrong. He had bested himself this time.
SMACK!
Unfortunately on this occasion, Gippal was prepared for my attack. He caught my flailing wrist and held it immobile in the air, as I struggled against him. "You know Cid's girl, you've really gotta come up with a more original response than that."
"Let me go!" I protested, wriggling futilely.
He ignored me, still addressing the room at large. "You're becomin' almost predictable Rikku – somethin' I never thought I'd say about you."
Predictable eh? He thought that I was predictable? For some reason, this insult aggravated me more than all of Gippal's previous words combined. I was Rikku, the light-hearted, fun-loving Guardian and Gullwing. I was the most unpredictable person in Spira!
Determined to finally gain the advantage and wipe that smug, superior smile off Gippal's face, I twisted quickly and freed my wrist. Instead of dancing back as Gippal obviously expected, I darted forward and gave him a hard shove in the chest.
Caught completely by surprise, he stumbled backwards and his back hit the wall with a dull thump. Swallowing back any residual doubts about what I was about to do, I pounced upon him, wrapping my arms around his neck and pressing my lips hard against his.
When I stepped back again from the entirely own-sided kiss – Gippal had been too stunned to respond – and looked up, he was staring at me dumbly. He shook his head slightly, his expression a curious mixture of shock, wonder and admiration.
My own expression became more and more glazed as I realised what I had just done. Gippal didn't seem to notice.
"Rikku … " he shook his head again, "I will never say you're predictable again."
I was hardly listening, horrified as I was by my own actions. What in Spira's name had possessed me to kiss Gippal like that? I could no longer deny that our first exchange had been a mutual one and now the second … well it had been Gippal who had had little choice in the matter!
What had I been thinking?
"Rikku," Gippal said again, frowning slightly as he looked at me, "you're not gonna run away again are ya?"
I must admit, the thought had crossed my mind but seeing how easy it had been for Gippal to find me last time, I quickly concluded that it wouldn't be worth the effort. Perhaps it would be better to confront these new emotions now, before things went any further.
I studied the floor for several long moments as I attempted to get my thoughts into some kind of rational order. To give him credit, Gippal didn't distract me but simply leant against the wall and watched me.
"I'm supposed to hate you, you know?" I told him finally, wincing at how blunt I sounded.
He didn't seem to mind, in fact he grinned sheepishly and ran a hand through his hair when I looked up at him. "Yeah – I know what you mean."
"You picked on me; I shouted at you. It was a nice, comfortable circle of dislike."
"Yeah."
"And then you had to go and spoil it all by kissing me."
He rolled his single eye. "Haven't we been through this already? It wasn't like I pounced on you or anythin'." He gave me a pointed look.
"Okay, okay! It was a mutual decision," I allowed. "Sheesh. Is it really that important?"
"Course it's important!" Gippal shot back. "You're makin' it sound as if I forced you into it – made you do it against your will. I'm not an ogre Rikku!"
"Oh I suppose every girl you've ever kissed has been willing then?" I retorted, anger rising inside me once more. It was amazing how Gippal could make me switch from one extreme emotion to another in the blink of an eye.
"Ruhacdmo Rikku!(Honestly Rikku!) Why does every conversation I have with you have to turn into a shoutin' match?"
"I don't know – maybe there's something about you that drives me to it!" I snapped, the knowledge that my reaction was irrational only infuriating me further.
He threw his hand up in the air. "I don't understand you at all. First we're kissin', there we're fightin', then you kiss me again and wham, what d'ya know? Yeah, we're fightin' again."
Put so plainly like that I began to wonder if Gippal might not be wrong. He made my response sound so … well, crazy you know?
And for some strange reason, in that moment of relative calm, I felt the need to explain. "I … I'm just confused, alright? All of this …" I waved my hands vaguely to encompass both him and the room, "… it doesn't make any sense to me. Everything's changing so fast. First the bombing, then learning the Al Bhed are involved somehow, then – then this thing with you … well, I don't know what to think, you know?"
He nodded slowly, for once devoid of any teasing comments.
"And to be honest … I can't deal with this right now," I admitted reluctantly, toying with one of my braids.
There was a pause before Gippal spoke again. "What are you sayin' Rikku?" he asked finally.
And there I was again, standing within another one of those life-shaping moments, with two clear paths in front of me. I could tell what I desperately wanted to be the truth … or I could tell the actual truth. It all depended on who I let make my decisions: my head or my heart.
Ultimately I decided that my heart had had domination for far to long. It had gotten me into trouble too many times before - even earlier in this conversation with Gippal. So for once, my head won out.
"I think we should pretend that what happened today didn't … well, I think we should forget about it," I told him, instantly feeling relieved that I had made the sensible decision. After all, I hardly had the time to worry about my love-life when the future of the Al Bhed was at stake, you know?
"What?" Gippal seemed completely taken aback and had I been thinking about it, I would have notched another point to me: Gippal 124, Rikku 2.
"We don't have time for this right now and besides … it was a mistake." My voice was firm but I could feel my hands shaking, so I clasped them behind my back where he wouldn't notice.
"A mistake?" His eyebrows rose incredulously. "Rikku – once is a mistake. Twice is somethin' more."
"Oh and you'd know all about that, wouldn't you?" I couldn't help saying nastily. Why wouldn't he just accept my decision; why did he have to keep pushing me?
"Now who's jealous?"
"Oh please," I scoffed, rolling my eyes. "You really have an over-inflated opinion of yourself, you know? I'm not that desperate."
"Really? You weren't complain' back when you were kissin' me!"
"It was a mistake!" I shouted at him, rising up on my tiptoes so that I could look him squarely in the eye.
For a few moments he simply stared mutely back at me. Then, to my horror, he laughed derisively and reaching out, he caught me by the chin. I tried to ignore how soft his fingers felt against the hollow of my throat and busied myself with glaring as a distraction.
When he spoke, his voice was surprisingly soft and gentle. I had been expecting him to continue our shouting match, which had been so loud I'm sure the whole airship knew of our argument … oh Spira no! That thought made me shudder and I pushed it firmly to the back of my mind.
"What're you afraid of Cid's girl?"
His words were so unexpected that I didn't even notice his use of the hated nickname. "Huh?" I said eloquently, cornering the market on the use of the monosyllable.
"Is it simply this situation or is it me?"
"What are you talking about?" I asked crossly, not liking his insinuations.
"You keep running away from this – from me."
"Hey – I'm here, aren't I?" I spread my hands, indicating my presence in the room. "Is this running away?"
"You don't have to be movin' to be runnin' away," he pointed out.
"What psychology textbook are you quoting from?" I asked him rudely, trying every trick I knew to get him to leave the situation alone.
It didn't work. Gippal was like a dog with a bone. Like most of the men I knew, when he set his mind to something, he didn't give up until he'd got the result that he was looking for – regardless of who he annoyed in the process.
"Rikku – I'm serious!"
"Really? How unusual!"
"I give up!" he released my chin with an air of disgust and I recoiled swiftly.
"Good. Then we're agreed. Nothing happened. Nothing will ever happen again. It was a mistake." I ground the words out repetitively.
"Whatever," Gippal muttered, shaking his head. He moved away towards the door that had been previously locked. Typing in a sequence of numbers that I couldn't see and slapping the door panel, the stubborn door slid open. Gippal made to walk through and then paused on the threshold, glancing back.
"You know Rikku … I don't remember you as bein' such a coward."
I opened my mouth to reply but found that I had nothing to say. Gippal's smile turned bitter – as if he regretted the fact that he was right – and he disappeared into the room, the door sliding shut behind him.
He had called me a coward. Of all the insulting, degrading terms that Gippal had called me over the years … he had never called me a coward before. Not even when we had been children; when I would have had the excuse of age.
For some reason it really upset me. I've always seen myself as a courageous person. Someone who follows the right path and will always fight for what's important, even if it means making personal sacrifices, such as the destruction of Home. So to be called a coward by one of the people who had witnessed my actions first hand …well it really hurt.
And you know what the worse thing was?
I think he might have been right.
Distressed, tired and confused beyond belief by everything that had happened, I wandered out of the room and began walking aimlessly around the ship, allowing my feet to lead me. Gippal's words were turning over and over in my mind and I couldn't block them out …
"Why d'you kiss me back instead of pushing me away?"
I don't know.
"I've never had any complaints about my kissin' technique before."
I wasn't complaining.
"So what did I do?"
Nothing, you did nothing. It's me, I … I'm so confused.
"I can't believe you're buildin' an argument out of this. Why can't you accept it for what it was?"
Because … because I'm …
"What're you afraid of Cid's girl?"
I'm – I'm not sure.
"I don't remember you as bein' such a coward."
I'm not a coward, I'm just … I don't understand any of this – it's too weird. I don't know what to do and … and I'm …
"Lady Rikku?" someone hailed me, disturbing me from my reverie. I looked up to see that Lreav was approaching down the hallway. He looked pleased to see me but I smiled distractedly, wishing he would just leave me alone with my thoughts.
"Yes?"
"We've reached Djose Temple. You'd better prepare to disembark."
"Of course – thanks Lreav."
He smiled. "It's my pleasure. It'll be nice to see Djose again after so much time away."
"You're coming with us?" Would this mean I wouldn't have to be alone with Gippal?
Lreav nodded and glanced furtively up and down the corridor before leaning closer to me. "Don't tell anyone this," he said in a hushed, conspiratorial tone, "but I don't even like flying that much."
From the second-in-command of the world's most technologically advanced airship, this comment did strike me as funny and I laughed according, although my mind was very much elsewhere.
"Why d'you kiss me back instead of pushing me away?"
"What're you afraid of Cid's girl?"
"I don't remember you as bein' such a coward."
"Rikku?"
I had forgotten that Lreav was still standing there, watching me with a faintly confused expression on his face.
"Sorry – did you say something?"
"I asked if I could escort you back to the bridge."
"Oh yes – sure."
Taking my arm, he escorted me back towards the bridge and away from the man who was continually haunting my thoughts ...
"Why d'you kiss me back instead of pushing me away?"
Because I wanted this.
"What're you afraid of Cid's girl?"
What this means for us … all these new emotions … you …
"I don't remember you as bein' such a coward."
I'm not really, it's just … I'm just …
I'm scared.
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So there you go. 'The path of true love never runs smooth' as they say : ) Told you I wasn't going to make things easy for Rikku and Gippal …
As always – HUGE thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far and a big call out to those who read but don't review. Please do review if you have the time – the only way I improve my writing is by receiving criticism so don't hesitate to tell me what you truly think!
Read, review and enjoy : )