Redemption for a Weary Soldier
Chapter 4
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy X-2 nor its characters.
Rikku awoke with a start and groggily studied her surroundings. She panicked upon discovering that she had no surroundings; blackness encompassed her whole body. She tried to remember where she was and what she was doing when the memories hit her like a solid wall. She groaned and gingerly felt the back of her head where she had been swatted by that Divebeak's wing.
She still felt disoriented and the total darkness wasn't helping her reach her bearings. She tried to find the ground with her hand because surely she had tumbled to the bottom of the canyon. She swung her arms about her body gingerly at first and then with more vigor as she realized there was no ground of which to speak of around her.
She was floating in thin air.
She tried feeling for the supplies in her bag at her back and wasn't shocked upon finding it missing. It probably fell away from her when she dropped. She felt around her pockets for the spare flash sphere but couldn't find that either. Which direction am I facing? She wondered as her hair seemed to be going every which way and her blood was pretty evenly spread throughout her body as far as she could tell. Or at least, it wasn't rushing to her head.
She pondered her options as she floated and came up short. She moaned under her breath as she faced the helplessness of her situation. She had no idea where she was, she had no food or water, she couldn't see, she was floating in the air as far as she could tell…
"Maybe I'm…dead?" Rikku guessed surprising herself by her own voice.
A dim light suddenly appeared from her right. It flickered slightly before rapidly gaining strength. "H-hello?" Rikku stammered before trying again in a stronger voice. "Is anybody there?"
The light was suddenly directed at her and she heard the most wonderful sound she could ever imagine at that possible moment. "Rikku!"
"Gippal! I'm over here!" she shouted.
"Can you come toward my light?" he asked. She considered how to accomplish this feat and began wagging her arms in awkward swimming-like strokes accomplishing absolutely nothing.
"I can't move!" Rikku yelled back in a panic.
"It's okay!" Gippal tried reassuring her. "I'm close to the wall. I think…if I…"
Rikku watched as the light bounced wildly around before steadily moving closer. Before long, she could see bits of Gippal's body as he pulled himself closer holding onto the rocky surface and forcing himself over inch by inch. When he was close enough to her, he reached out an arm, which she accepted eagerly and he pulled her to the wall, right into a crushing embrace.
Rikku dissolved into tears. "I was so…alone," she sobbed into Gippal's shoulder as he held her tight.
"I…I thought you…" he whispered and Rikku sniffed looking into his face. The world started spinning as she contemplated just how close to death she had come. She buried her head into Gippal's shoulder shivering as the feelings of terror washed through her body.
They stayed that way for several minutes until Rikku gained control of her emotions once again and was able to pull back. Gippal seemed reluctant to release her. "Where are we?" she asked in a timid voice keeping one hand planted firmly on Gippal's shoulder lest he should suddenly disappear.
"I'm pretty sure we fell," was Gippal's reply.
"The last thing I remember was getting hit by that Divebeak and I must've lost consciousness. Then I woke up and I realized I was floating," Rikku filled him in.
"I was awake whenever I fell," Gippal informed her. "I didn't fall very far either. Probably only a few hundred feet. It was like I was gaining speed…and then gradually losing speed until I came to a stop."
"Should we try climbing down to the bottom?" Rikku asked.
"I don't know…what if this…whatever it is only lasts for a few feet and we end up really dropping the rest of the way? I don't know that I'm willing to risk it."
"Then…what do we do?" Rikku asked timidly. Gippal didn't reply.
The flash sphere flickered to life as Paine swooped down descending hundreds of feet in seconds. Nothing unusual stood out in the glow of the orb; there was the rocky surface of the canyon wall to her right and more darkness expanding to her left and down below and above her. As she made her mad dash for the bottom, she kept her eyes glued to the wall, specifically to the rope dangling down its length. Rikku and Gippal's rope. She had touched it a while ago and felt her heart flutter when it easily yielded. There was no anchoring weight of a body down below which meant…
Because she was gliding on her steely feathers, Paine had to descend in a zigzagged pattern giving her a slight headache when coupled with the continuous drop in elevation. Yet still she persisted, forcibly shoving away the pain along with the grief that was multiplying within her heart.
Despite the physical exertion, she felt her mind wander, a feat she had conditioned into herself during her childhood days roaming the streets of Luca. As an orphan, one had to think on one's feet. She let her mind roam through the realm of possibilities as she fell thinking back to the map and the cloud of ever reddening pyreflies. So far, Paine had yet to encounter one fiend meaning that unless there was a whole colony of fiends that all of a sudden decided to migrate to the bottom of the gorge (a probable but not very likely possibility), then something else must be connected to the pyreflies.
Paine went over the facts in her mind as she flew. Pyreflies were connected to the life force, or more specifically, the soul, which migrated to the Farplane once the physical body died. Was there something connected to the souls of both humanity and fiends that could somehow detach itself from the soul?
Hmm…
The answer scratched and itched at the edges of Paine's consciousness and she desperately tried to reach for it, but it eluded her grasp. She sighed into the darkness below as she gave up. Trying to pull the answer from her mind would only make it harder to find, but if she allowed it to come naturally, she knew it would surface faster.
She sighed again in defeat and nearly collided into Rikku's head.
"Okay Rikku, this is what we're going to do," Gippal said after the pair had thought for ten minutes straight of ways out of their predicament. "You climb up the wall, and when we reach the rope, we'll climb up out of this hellhole."
"Uh Gippal? You uh, positive that'll work?" Rikku asked a little nervous about the prospect of climbing without the assurance of a rope to catch her lest she fall.
"Yeah," was his reply and Rikku could almost hear the roguish look on his face when he said, "Besides, it's not like anything'll happen to us if we fall. We've already kind of established that.
Rikku wanted to responded smartly to that comment but kept her mouth closed. The pair inched their way over to the place where Gippal had fallen. Flashing his sphere light overhead Gippal ah ha'ed in triumph as the rope seemed to wave at them with all its swaying.
"Okay," Gippal instructed, "I've gotta turn off the flash sphere now, but if you climb straight up, we should reach the rope without a hitch then we can connect our harnesses and climb out of here."
"A…alright," Rikku replied slightly timid with the idea of climbing in complete darkness. "But Gippal, why do I have to go first?" she asked in a whiny tone.
"So I can have a good view of course," Gippal responded and laughed when Rikku glared at him with flaming cheeks. He took on a more serious tone as he added, "Besides, if you fall I want to be able to catch you this time."
His last comment didn't help extinguish the fire burning below her neck, so Rikku quickly started her climbing to avoid his observance and following comments. The pair steadily climbed higher with Rikku cautiously bringing her hands up to find solid handholds and then directing Gippal with her voice. He would bring his own hand up and feel where her foot rested and would wait until she lifted that foot before using that foothold as a handhold. They continued this slow but effective process for fifteen minutes before Rikku stopped.
"What is it?" Gippal asked in apprehension.
"There's something up there," Rikku responded quietly forgetting about the Al-Bhed man and nearly crashing into him as she tried backing down.
"Woah, easy there," Gippal said as he fumbled with his pocket trying to recover the flash sphere.
Rikku heard a rustling and gasped. She clutched the rapier that she had fastened to her waist before ascending and waited for Gippal to ignite the flash spear so she could see what it was that she was up against. Suddenly, the area surrounding Rikku's head was illuminated and Rikku shrieked at the huge steely shadow hovering inches from her scalp.
The beast jerkily pulled back upon perceiving Rikku's screams and Rikku found herself face-to-face with a slightly perturbed Paine donned in her Full Throttle dress sphere. "Paine!" the small Al-Bhed squealed and practically threw herself at the hovering warrior.
"Woah," Paine had to beat her huge wings twice as fast to try and compensate for the added weight.
"Well, well, look who finally came to lend a hand," Gippal droned from his position beneath Rikku.
Paine pulled back from Rikku's embrace and regarded the dirt-streaked pair. "Why aren't you both dead?" Paine asked with a flat voice and cold eyes.
"There's this…force down there," Gippal replied looking over his shoulder into the blackness below. "When we fell, some kind of…I don't know, I can't explain it. It was like being caught in a spider's web. We couldn't move ourselves on our own power, but when we used the wall, we got around rather easily."
Paine was silent as she listened. Her gaze was focused below her feet. When she looked up, there was a finality to her gaze. "I'm going down there," she declared.
Rikku and Gippal looked at each other uneasily. All Rikku wanted to do was get the hell out of that place. But looking at Gippal's longing expression, she knew she was already defeated in the matter. She sighed and closed her eyes. "Alright, let's go."
The trip back down didn't take as long, mostly because Paine had nestled her flash sphere in between the fold of her right wing and so the trio was constantly bathed in light. Paine had taken to shoving the tips of her steel wings into the rock wall and lowering herself down whenever she made another hole with the opposite wing. Rikku and Gippal felt a lot more comfortable about their descent mainly because they didn't fear the perils of falling and breaking all the bones in their bodies.
When they reached the spot where they had floated, Rikku pulled slightly back away from the wall to demonstrate to Paine what Gippal had been talking about. Paine observed the anomaly silently and then continued in her descent.
Being the bigger of the three, Paine made it to the bottom first. "I've landed," she called up to the other two.
"Alright! Solid ground!" Rikku yelled in enthusiasm. She jumped away from the wall and was quite surprised when no invisible force stopped her fall. She landed squarely on her tailbone. "Owwee," Rikku groaned rubbing her offended backside as she stood.
She joined Paine's side and the two waited for Gippal to finish his climb down. Having more sense than Rikku, Gippal climbed down the appropriate way and only hopped down from the wall when he was an arm's length from the bottom. "So I guess I was right," he commented. "The force only extends so far down before it loses its effect."
"Yeah well, that's great and everything, but where do you suppose it came from?" Rikku asked.
Gippal only shrugged. Paine meanwhile had already started exploring the bottom of the gorge. "Hey! Paine wait up!" Rikku yelped when she noticed the warrior's retreating back.
She and Gippal ran after her. Gippal had recovered his own flash sphere and was observing their surroundings. The bottom of the gorge pretty much looked like the rest of the canyon: rocky, dirty, dark, and dank. The ground was uneven and Rikku and Gippal had to constantly watch their feet to make sure they didn't trip. Paine meanwhile didn't worry about the bumpy earth as she simply glided from spot to spot.
Rikku became uneasy when after half an hour of searching the party found nothing. There was not a fiend to speak of, there were no bones from unfortunate souls who happened to take a wrong step up on the surface, and there was definitely no reason for the immense pyrefly concentration that showed up on the map.
But maybe I spoke too soon… Rikku thought as a glimmer from her right caused the Al-Bhed's head to twist in that direction. She gasped slightly at her discovery. Reaching out, she caught the sleeve of Gippal's shirt and dragged him over to the spot of her discovery manipulating the hand holding the flash sphere so that she could get a better look at her findings.
"Look at this Gippal!" Rikku said in amazement. "Hey! Paine! Stop, we found something!" Rikku called ahead to Paine's oblivious back. The warrior turned to see what Rikku's fussing was all about.
It appeared to be some half buried ancient machina, very complex by the looks of it. Rikku and Gippal were already evaluating its external shell while discussing its possible uses and debating the wiring functions. While the mechanic experts discussed the machina amongst themselves, Paine stood back slightly. She understood how to work a mechanical lift and mastered the complexities of sphere recording, but she was by no means capable of seeing a bit of metal and determining its use as well as how to get it to work.
"Look, here's an outline of something," Rikku pointed out. "Maybe it's a hatch or something."
Gippal nodded and traced the outline. It ended in a layer of dirt. He grabbed Rikku's dagger and chipped away at the packed dirt with it. Soon the whole outline was revealed. Rikku studied it, hand under chin. "There has to be some way to open this," she murmured running her hand over the surface. Her middle finger brushed over an indention and the door opened effortlessly.
Both Rikku and Gippal crouched down and directed the beam inside. Swirls of dust danced through the light that revealed a cramped pilot's seat. Rikku climbed in with a slight objection from Gippal, which she ignored. The prospect of playing with a new piece of machinery excited her. She began pushing buttons and experimenting with the control panels. From his vantage point right outside the door, Gippal gave his own suggestions and input. Together, the two somehow managed to bring the machina to life.
With a rumble, interior and exterior lights flickered on and a low hum generated from within the machina's power source. "Yes!" Rikku pumped a fist into the air and cracked her fist on the low ceiling. "Ow," she complained rubbing her knuckles.
Gippal chuckled as he put away the no longer needed flash sphere. His eyes flicked along the control panel taking in the foreign characters. He watched the way buttons lit up and shimmered on and off. A surge of giddiness swept through his body—he felt like a little kid again. Finally he could take it no longer. "Move over," he announced forcibly shoving his way into the hull alongside a suddenly cramped Rikku.
"Hey, are you stupid or something? There's only room for one person in here!" Rikku tried pushing him out, but to no avail. He merely pinned her arms behind her head and began examining the buttons from his new vantage point. He pushed on odd looking one and felt a tremble run through the floor. Rikku instantly ceased in her struggles and watched as the screens surrounding their heads started to shift and form different patterns. The machina groaned again and another heavier shifting was felt.
From the outside, Paine watched as the machina trembled and the wall surrounding it grew deep cracks. It began to crumble and waver under the pressure of the metal shell underneath it. It's trying to rise, Paine realized and took a few steps backward.
The ground beneath her began to shake violently and Paine suddenly didn't feel very safe. She turned and threw herself down just in time as the wall suddenly gave and shards of rocks flew through the air. A few bounced off the steel feathers of Full Throttle, which effectively protected Paine. When the shaking stopped, she cautiously stood.
A pale Rikku and a disconcerted Gippal poked their own heads from the machina to examine the damage they inflicted. Rikku hopped down from the cabin and scrutinized the freed machina which was perched on six leg-like objects. She ran her hand over the joints and picked at the wiring flowing from the belly of the machina to the ends of it. She called out for Gippal, who was still in the pilot's seat, to push a myriad of buttons while studying their effect. The two Al-Bhed were so engrossed in their task that they didn't even notice the trickle of pyreflies oozing from a crack caused by the machina's shifting.
But Paine noticed it.
She watched in fascination as the stream of pyreflies seemed to drift in one line before heading in another definite direction. Her direction. The colored lights surrounded her and Paine felt an inexplicable sense of dread as the cloud circled her head. Suddenly, the river filled her and she was imbued with the odd sensation of having her mind searched.
Memories surfaced unbidden within her mind: Riding with Yuna and Rikku on the airship, recording Nooj and the others during their training for the Crimsin Squad, pickpocketing the odd foreigner in Luca as a childhood; probably someone come to watch blitzball, a certain conversation with one white-haired praetor of New Yevon…
That memory seemed to become dominant and whatever had intruded her mind seemed to find that picture particularly appealing. She felt it obsess on the details of Baralai's face as if memorizing the contents.
While this invasiveness was going on, Paine had shed her Full Throttle skin and was hunched over, head in hands as she tried to purge the intruder from her mind. She remained silent in her struggle fearing that whatever was in her would approach Gippal and Rikku if they came for her.
Something within Paine changed with a force that left her breathless. She opened her eyes (not even remembering closing them in the first place) and the first thing she saw upon opening them was Rikku crouched down in front of the machina, so involved in her work that she didn't even notice Paine.
A bizarre rage filled Paine and was directed right at poor Rikku who just happened to be in the line of her sight. Feelings of fury and intense hatred overtook her mind making her shake with the sheer might of the feeling. Blood clouded her vision as the world took on a red-tinged appearance. She stood and unsheathed the enormous sword at her side.
Her heart beat wildly in her chest; each pump sent more blood to fuel her wrathful frenzy. There was no cause for this emotion, it just simply was.
Paine couldn't control herself as she strode forward, sword in hand and steadily rising above her head as she aimed her arc right down the center of Rikku's back.
AN: Really, I knew that Paine wasn't always particularly fond of Rikku…but this is just a little extreme! Anyway I would like to give a huge thank you to Angel Taisha who gave me such insightful and positive feedback. This chapter is dedicated to you. I'm deeply honored that you consider my story a "little gem." I believe that there's more to a fic, or anything really, than just plopping down those exhilarating moments. I believe that the story needs to be coaxed, like a shy puppy really, and the character should always be continuously built upon. There are certain things from FFX2 that we already know from the characters and I try to expound upon those. I find it more enjoyable than trying to create a completely unique story with original characters, probably because I'm so lazy and I don't feel up to creating something so complex from scratch.
But anyway, that's enough driveling. I hope I didn't put you all to sleep. Feedback is greatly appreciated and I thank all of you who have taken the time to do so.