Shadow of Darkness
At last! I'm sorry about the wait! The chapter was written, just not typed up. But you're not here to read excuses, are you? On with the story!
Chapter 8:
"So, what are we looking for exactly?" Gippal asked Rikku. He had just emptied a drawer full of paperwork, various tools, and other junk onto the floor.
Rikku poked through the mess with a heavy sigh. What was she looking for? Marin gave her no hints. "Oh… I don't know. Perhaps the instruction manual that explains how I'm supposed to use these stupid new powers of mine. Or a map detailing the location of Seymour- or whoever created this plague," she added when she caught his warning look. "Take your pick. I could use either. Or both, really."
"I don't see anything like that… Would a hairbrush and a memo pad suffice?" He held up the two items with a smirk.
"Oh yes. I can defeat the Plague master with a paper cut! And then give him a new hairstyle." She shook her head. "Have you found anything useful?"
"Uh, no. Why do you think I held up these?" He tossed the brush and tablet aside and rocked back onto his heels with a sigh. "Maybe we should look for a diary?"
Rikku choked back a gasp. "Gippal, I'm appalled at you! A woman's diary is personal and private!"
"No shit, really?" He rolled his eyes and smacked the back of her head. "But she's dead and we need all the help we can get. I think my conscious will survive any guilt. Besides, it's not like I'm looking for all the dirty details of her life- though I'm sure that could be quite a good read-"
"You pervert!" she squawked. "You dirty, dirty… boy!"
"Boy?! I'm all man, baby!"
"Man my ass! I've yet to see anything but a sick little boy!"
"Oh come on! Don't tell me that you expect all guys to be chaste little angels!" Gippal shook his head. "If you think that, kiddo, then you have a lot to learn about the birds and the bees."
"I know all about 'the birds and bees', you moron! You told me all about them, remember!?" Rikku argued.
"Oh yeah." He stroked his chin with a devilish look on his face. He remembered quite well, now that she brought it up. Her reaction to his rather colorful explanation when they were much younger had been priceless.
"You pervert! Honestly! For being the founder of the Machine Faction, you're such an immature little boy."
"Speak for yourself, kiddo," he retorted.
"Me? No, I'm happy being all female, thanks."
"I meant you're immature, utuyd ::idiot::."
"I only act that way so you can understand me," she snapped right back.
"No, you really are just immature. Sorry to break it to you."
"I am not! You're the immature one! You…"
Gippal smirked as she ranted on and on… and on. "You know," he said loudly over her rage, "You're sexy when you're pissed off."
"And then- Excuse me?" Rikku stared up at him as though he had grown an ear straight out of his forehead.
He could only hold a straight face for a few seconds. His serious expression cracked and mirthful tears filled his eyes. He burst into hysterical laughter, doubling over. "Oh man… you should've seen your face!"
Her face screwed up in frustration. He was so irritating! Sick and twisted! That's what he was- a sick and twisted little boy! And she told him so.
He stood and leaned over her, as though he was trying to use his height to intimidate her. "Man. Not boy."
But she would not be intimidated- especially not by him. "Boy!" she retorted easily.
"Man!"
"Boy!"
"Man!"
"Boy!"
"I'm a man and that's final!"
Rikku meant to reply- she really did- but her words came out in a squeak as Gippal's mouth captured hers. Aggressive, yet soft; sweet, yet saucy- that described the kiss. She had kissed a couple of boys in her time, but this was unlike anything she had ever experienced. Part of her was repulsed, but surprisingly, unbelievably, it was only a small part. Gippal made kissing a work of art. Unexpectedly she moaned with pleasure. And this jolted her mind back into reality. Nasty! This was Gippal! No, no, no! She pushed him back and wiped her arm over her mouth.
The silence that followed was unbearably awkward.
"Well…" Gippal said, looking as deeply uncomfortable as Rikku felt.
"So!" she replied, a bit too enthusiastically. It was best to pretend that the kiss never happened. Yes. Best to forget that it made her tingle pleasantly all the way down to her toes. No! No, just forget! "You keep looking through this pile. I'm going to search over there. Way… over there." And she made herself comfortable far, far away from Gippal.
They worked in silence for a long time. The silence was so thick that it seemed as though even a sword could not cut it. It was so intense that a tremendous roar outside caused Rikku to shriek loudly and Gippal dropped the drawer he was refilling directly on his foot.
"Ouch! Dammit! What the hell is that noise!?" he shouted.
She shook her head. "I don't know. It sounds like…"
"The airship!" they exclaimed simultaneously.
They bolted from Marin's hut to see Gippal's 'baby' lifting drunkenly into the air. Clearly, whoever was at the throttle knew nothing of handling an airship.
"What the hell?" Gippal murmured. "Hey! That's my ship!" he yelled, grabbing at the air as if that would bring the ship airship back. "Get back here, you ship-stealing bastard!"
"I'm sorry!" a voice boomed from the ship's intercom.
"I know that voice…" Rikku murmured.
"I have to save… Dona!" that same voice wailed and the ship shot off towards the horizon.
"Barthello!" Rikku shouted. Of course, he didn't hear her.
Gippal made a frustrated noise, jamming his hands into his hair and pulling back hastily- which made his hair stick out like a pincushion. "That little shit kidnapped my ship! I'll kill him!"
She grabbed his arm. " There's nothing we can do about it now."
He struggled against her grip, which, surprisingly, was stronger than he thought. "Yes there is! We find him and kick his ass!"
She slapped him hard across the face. Whoa! What a thrill! She had wanted to do that for such a long time… She shook her head. Never mind that. "Get a grip on yourself!"
He held his cheek in shock.
"So he took it. We have a bit more important things to worry about right now."
He rubbed his cheek. "You know, that really hurt!" He scowled. "All right, Madam Smartass. How do you propose we're going to get off this damned island once we find out how to operate your powers?"
She made a noise of surprised. She hadn't thought of that one! "Barthello, you get back here!" she bellowed at the empty evening sky.
A man stepped out of his hut. "Quiet! There are sick people in this village! You two are disturbing them!"
Though Rikku doubted that they would have disturbed the plague-ridden villagers, she gave her apologies. Grabbing Gippal's arm again, she pulled him back towards Marin's hut.
"What's going on?" Gippal asked, wrenching his arm free.
"I just remembered that I have my commsphere. We could contact someone and perhaps get a ride out of here." They entered the hut and she went to rifle through her bag. Moments later, she produced the watery blue sphere.
"Give me that." Gippal snatched it from her hands and began to fiddle with it.
"Hey! Give it back, meanie!" She made a swipe for it, but he just placed a hand on her face and pushed her away.
"You keep searching for the answers to your questions. I'm going to contact the Faction to see if any of our airships are ready for flight." He turned his back to her. "Hey Mikkeb! Have I got some news for you! Rikku's gonna have my baby!"
"You wish, you dick!" Rikku shrieked. How could he joke like that?!
He laughed and waved at her. "Finish your search my pet." He looked back down at the sphere. "No, really Mikkeb… We have quite a serious dilemma. You see it seems my baby was stolen."
''''
The moon had risen high in the sky and still the search for the answers to Rikku's dilemma proved fruitless. What made matters worse was the fact that none of the Machine Faction airships would be ready to fly for several weeks- most weren't even finished yet.
"If we could get to Luca, we'd be fine," Rikku murmured listlessly. All this searching was so exhausting! She puffed a strand of hair from her face.
Gippal nodded, tossing aside a stack of papers, disinterested. Then he frowned. "Hey, how did you get from Besaid to Djose they first time?" he asked. "Not by airship obviously."
She shook her head. "I traveled by… ship! We could go by ship!" She jumped to her feet, energy renewed. "I'll go check the dock. I'm sure they have a shipping schedule up."
"I'll go too." Gippal stood, stretching stiffly.
She didn't know why he was set on going, but he hadn't upset her in the last few hours so she nodded. "You could use the exercise," she taunted, flouncing out the door.
"Hey! You just called me fat!" Gippal yelped, following her out.
"Me? I never said any such thing."
"You implied it."
"Well… hmm, you got me there." She smirked.
"You- hey, you admitted it."
They walked through the village in relative silence after that. It was a peaceful night in Kilika. The sly was clear and brilliant with glittering stars, the pier was bathed in silvery moonlight, and the only sounds were the lapping of water and the occasional chirp of crickets and croak of frogs. Rikku thought it would have been a truly romantic night, had Gippal not been the man sharing it with her.
Without conscious will, her mind suddenly pulled up the memory of The Kiss. Oh cripes… She was grateful that it was dark. It artfully hid the scarlet blush she felt heating up her face.
They reached the dock shortly after. It was empty and it seemed as though it'd been that way for some time. "What time is it?" Rikku asked Gippal as she plodded for the small dock office on her right.
"I don't know." He looked up at the moon. "Late… well, obviously."
She snorted and peered at the list of scheduled ship arrivals. "There's a ship coming tomorrow morning at dawn. After that, there isn't one for… a week it looks like. Cripes, we have to get moving." She turned to Gippal. "We have to find something before dawn."
He nodded. "Well, kiddo. Let's get cracking. We don't have much time."
''''
An hour had passed when Rikku threw down a book. She had finally resorted to searching Marin's diary and, though she felt horrible for doing so, it provided some interesting information- and not just about her love life. "We need to go to the temple."
Gippal looked up with an expression that clearly read that he thought she was mad. "Now? Right now?"
"No, a year from now. Yes now!" She began to pick up the mess she had made. "In Marin's diary, she mentioned a White Mage master, one who taught her to use her magic. Unfortunately, he's at the temple, so that's where we're going."
"You realize that the temple is infested with New Yevonites. Despite the claim of being 'New', most of them still aren't too keen with Al Bheds running amok like we do now. And I know you don't like being around them either.
"Oh well!" She forced a smile. "I guess I'll have to suck it up. I'm Spira's only hope anyway, remember?" She hooked her daggers onto her belt- just in case- and headed out the door with Gippal on her heels.
In the same general silence that carried them to the docks earlier, they left the village and headed down the path through the woods towards the temple. Rikku was tense. Vicious fiends lived in this forest. Her fingers nervously played over the hilts of her weapons. Though she would never admit it, she was grateful Gippal was with her. She didn't want to go through another episode like the one back in Besaid- running for her life from a few hungry fiends.
Unfortunately, the moonlight only filtered into the forest in a few sparse locations and Rikku and Gippal had to wander the forest blindly.
"We should've stopped to grab a torch or something," Gippal muttered when he tripped over a root and stumbled into Rikku, who, in turn, ran into a tree.
"Well it's too late now. I think we're lost… Wait, is that fire? The temple is up ahead!" And she ran for the burning light.
Gippal followed Rikku for a handful of steps before he stopped short. "Uh… you know, I don't think that is the temple."
"What are you talking about?" she asked, glancing over her shoulder. "Of course it-" She looked forward just in time to jump aside as a fiery pillar burst out of a humongous fanged mouth. Rikku shrieked and fell onto her butt. "Oh cripes, what the hell is that thing!?"
"Something with a death wish, that's what," Gippal said, running up to her. "Come on, get your butt off the ground." He hauled her to her feet.
"What's a thing like that doing here in Kilika?" she moaned as it stared menacingly at the two of them.
"Who knows? Come on- less talk, more fight!" A traditional Al Bhed war cry. And he threw himself into his assault upon the fiend.
Rikku nodded and pulled a small grenade out of her supply pouch. Yanking the pin out with her teeth, she lobbed the grenade at the fiend. "Get out of the way!" she shouted to Gippal.
He did a funny little jig side step just in time, but he couldn't escape the splash of blood that came his way when one of the fiend's four legs was blown away.
"Eww…." Rikku groaned, skittering out of the way of another burst of flame when the fiend roared in agony. Gippal was soaked in sticky red blood.
The fiend bellowed in fury. In response, Rikku sprinted towards it with a dagger in each hand. She took a leap and, using the beast's surprisingly rubbery knee as a springboard, thrust the blades into its leathery chest. It howled, clawing intermittently at the blades in its chest and at her. She leapt off the leg and flailed backwards, avoiding most of the assault. She still suffered a painful gouge in the shoulder.
She backpedaled, uncontrolled, into Gippal.
"You okay?" he asked her, straightening her up.
"Yeah…" She administered a hasty curative spell to the wound.
"Okay, watch my back." Faster than she would've expected, he scrambled up the fiend's spiny back and grabbed the two long horns jutting out over its brow. "Use your strongest ice spell on it!" he shouted over the beast's ear-bursting roars. "Quick, while I have it distracted!"
"But it'll get you too!" Rikku yelped, bouncing frantically on the balls of her feet.
"Oh shut up, that's just a small detail. Just do it, stupid!"
She gritted her teeth as she summoned the ice. "Don't call me stupid!" She threw every ounce of strength and energy she had into the spell and, instead of pummeling the fiend with hail-like balls, ice began to collect thickly around its body. 'What the hell?' she thought, stunned. She didn't know she had such magical capabilities… But she didn't stop- not until the fiend was entirely encased in ice. Unfortunately, Gippal would suffer the same fate. Ice gathered around the fiend as if it was a magnet and the ice was raw iron… Finally, it was over. Save for Rikku's heavy breathing and the faint crackling of ice, the warm Kilika air was filled with silence. The fiend glittered like a diamond statue- an ugly one, but a statue all the same.
Rikku sank to her knee, trembling. Gippal was dead! She'd killed him! Of course she didn't like him very much, but she never actually wanted him dead!
The crackling grew louder. She looked up worriedly. Was the fiend going to break free? She didn't have the strength to blast it with a second ice spell like that… And the crackling continued to grow.
In a blinding flash of blue-white light, the ice exploded. Rikku flung her arms over her face as she was pummeled by chunks of ice in attempts to protect herself and to refuse to see what she knew would be waiting for her. But where she expected to hear the fiend's embittered roars, there was silence. She lowered her arms tentatively. Gippal was in a broken heap on the ground, surrounded by thousands of glittering pyreflies.
She stumbled to her feet and rushed to his side. "Gippal?" She rolled him over; his skin was ice! "Are you…?"
He opened his eyes slightly and managed a smirk. "Didn't think I could do that," eh said through chattering teeth. Though it was dark, Rikku imagined his lips were blue.
She shook her head and swatted him. "And you call me stupid." With Effort she pulled him to a sitting position. "Shall we continue to the temple now?"
"Hold your chocobos… Let me get the feeling back into my legs. You know, we make quite the life-threatening team."
"You said it," she muttered.
''''
"Why do they make the temples look so imposing?" Rikku murmured. She glanced at Gippal. "Er… maybe you should stay outside."
He arched a brow. "Why?"
She plucked his shirt. It was encrusted with drying fiend's blood. "You look like you're a mad killer."
"That might work against them," Gippal pointed out easily. "You could say you'll sic the Mad Assassin on them if they don't cooperate."
Rikku snickered. "Mad Assassin? Well, you're mad all right." She shook her head. "Oh all right. Come on, Mad Assassin. We don't have much time left." She walked up to the temple guards.
"We're here to see the White Mage master," she said in a loud, clear voice, though she really, truly wanted to run away- the guards had their guns trained on her and Gippal. 'Think of Yunie- she needs your help! So does everyone else!'
"What business do you have with the White Mage master?" one of the guards grunted.
"It's an emergency. We have to see him right away." She tried to look one of them in the eyes, but their helmets effectively shadowed their faces.
The guards cocked their weapons. "I'll ask again," the one who spoke first spat. "What business do you Al Bhed have with the master?"
"Marin sent us," Gippal piped in impatiently. "She specifically told us to speak with the master and no one else."
The guards appeared to exchange glances. Rikku was certain that they would be shot.
"The door on your right."
Rikku and Gippal blinked. "Huh?"
"Go through the door on the right," the guard repeated slowly, as though he was talking to a toddler. He pointed. "He will see you there."
"Oh right…the right. Come on, Gippal." She seized his sleeve- because she couldn't reach his collar well enough- and pulled him into the empty room. There she sat down stiffly in a chair. She winced when she looked at Gippal- he looked a hundred times worse in the light.
"You don't think this is a trap, do you?" he wondered aloud, poking through the gadgets stored in the room.
Rikku was about to reply when the door squeaked open. Through it came an ancient man dressed in long blue and white robes, with long white hair braided neatly down his back. His face was lined with deep wrinkles- as if they were carved- and he sized the two Al Bhed up for a long time. Then he nodded.
"I've been expecting you."
………..
cute-kitty2: laughs I'm glad you enjoyed the last fight scene! Despite lack of sphere-changes, I hope you enjoyed this one as well!
Fanfic-Lover: Hmm, the Chosen One has a fancy ring to it. But she was more like the wrong person at the right time. Poor kid!