Ripped and Torn

by Sephirothxx

A 16 year old girl is ripped away from the life she loves and sent to Spira to aid Yuna along her pillgramage. Wil she be able to overcome an untaimed power that has been lurking within her from birth or will it cause her to destroy her freinds?

10. Broken Alliances, Kidnapping

Chapter Ten: Broken Alliance, Kidnapping

Anasazi Darkmoon: Yep, Seymour's dead; however, he doesn't stay that way, that bastard! You'll find out in this chapter who has Brian's memories. As far as Sintanan goes, he makes an appearance in this chapter about two times and you'll find out exactly who and what he is later on in the story. Glad you thought he was cool, I tried to make him pretty cool. Glad you liked the part where Lauren was possessed, for I got to kill Seymour with her in a more gruesome way that if she were normal. Anyway, onto when she wakes up! Hope you like it!

dark dragon knight1993: Hey, yep I have broken away from the story line, as I intended to, just earlier on in the fic I didn't know what I wanted to do but now I do, so it's all good. Yes, I got a 100 on my English final and my teacher said it was going to be used as the example for classes to follow, too. Hey, thanks for the complement about the fight with Seymour! Don't worry you could write like me if you tried to learn better grammar and looked up better words in the dictionary. Seriously it didn't take me that long to get to this writing level. It took me about six months or less and I wasn't even trying to learn anything, just imagine if you TRIED to learn stuff. Glad you liked the possessed Lauren part, I think all of my other readers did, too, even though I don't have too many readers as it is… Yeah, I put in a cliffhanger and I'm glad to see that you liked it, I'm not usually too good with stuff like that, I don't know why, though. As for reading your fics, I already read that one, which you should know by my review, and I hope that the pointers I gave you were of some help. Hey, if you ever want to like ask me something or something I already gave you my screen names and stuff in the review. I'm on basically all day so I'll probably be on if you want to talk or ask me something. Anyway, onto the chapter! Hope you enjoy it! It's away from the story line, for the most part.

As consciousness returned to her, Lauren fluttered her turquoise eyes open, wincing at an unknown pain, only to see darkness surrounding her. Slowly, and painfully the blonde teen rose to her shaky feet, gazing around at the pitch-black void that surrounded her in every direction. The sixteen year old guardian took one step forward and felt a sharp pain jut up through her legs causing her to let out a meek cry of pain. "Hello? Is there anybody here?" The teen queried into the intense darkness that encircled her, making sure not to move, unless wanting to invoke the stinging pain that lurked within her body. A chill wind picked up out of the darkness to the blonde guardian's right causing her to turn her head toward the source of the bizarre breeze.

"Hello again, Lauren." The fayth greeted the blonde teen as she materialized out of the darkness on the same gust of chilled wind that caught her guest's attention. The sixteen-year-old guardian began to open up her mouth to speak but was silenced by a raised hand from the fayth and her words. "I know you must have questions for me, but some cannot be answered at this point in time." The fayth stated in her usually calm and peaceful voice that harbored no hostility toward anyone that she had met or not have.

"Why didn't you tell me what was going to happen there!" Lauren inquired in a voice that seemed to off set the calming feeling inside the fayth to bring a more astonished look up to her surface.

"I told you that you were going to have to overcome something both physically and emotionally soon and that you should prepare yourself for this event." The fayth said in an attempt to calm down Lauren but it seemed to have only the exact opposite affect on the teen. "However, you did nothing to prepare for your trial so that is why things happened the way they did." The blonde guardian's turquoise eyes were filling up with hatred toward the benevolent being and at the same time sadness as she thought over what exactly had happened to her.

"But why didn't you help me! I thought you were the one that brought me here to fulfill my destiny by helping out Yuna and said that I couldn't die again or I would be dead permanently." Lauren shouted at the silent fayth, tears beginning to form in her eyes as she thought of what she was going to say next. "I… I almost killed Yuna… and… Brian…" The blonde teen began to sob softly as she ripped her eyes off of the fayth and set them on a plot of empty darkness that loomed below her.

"I am terribly sorry for any trepidation or heartbreak you suffered, Lauren, but even if I wanted to help you there was no way in doing it." The fayth apologized for her lack of power to help the blonde teen out when she was fighting for her life. "It seems he has found out about me helping you and had placed a barrier around the temple to prevent me from helping you during that specific event." The fayth elaborated on what she meant by she couldn't have helped the sixteen-year-old guardian out even if she had wanted to.

"Who is this he you keep talking about!" Lauren hollered her bitter question at the unaffected fayth, who did little but stand there with an unemotional look plastered upon her shrouded face. "You told me that he controls Sin and that his teachings are followed throughout Spira, but what is his name!" The blonde teen queried with intrigue apparent in her enraged voice to the fayth who still stood motionless just a few feet in front of her.

"That is one of those questions that are just unanswerable at this point in time." The fayth explained how she wasn't going to reveal the true identity of the keeper of Spira to the questioning blonde teen. "It is one of those things that is better to find out on your own." The fayth's added comment seemed to strike a violent cord within the sixteen-year-old guardian that sent her into a spiral of despair and helplessness.

"Then what is the point in helping you if you aren't even going to tell me anything or give me any help when I need it most!" Lauren yelled at the fayth, tears beginning to overtake her eyes along with fear and helplessness flooding her mind.

"I will show you what the point in doing all this is." The fayth said as she began to fade into the darkness that was once a backdrop for her as she spoke with Lauren. Suddenly a flash of bright white light shot up from where the fayth had just been standing only seconds before causing the blonde teen to cover her turquoise eyes to prevent herself from being blinded by the flash. As the light diminished and the teen lowered her right arm out of her eyes she saw a sight that she thought she would never see in her life.

"What is this?" Lauren inquired as she gazed down upon herself, only she was laid out upon a hospital bed with IV's stuck in her arms and a heart monitor.

"This is what is going on in your own world." The fayth explained, fazing in next to Lauren as she just gazed down at herself in the hospital bed in wide-eyed awe and at the same time horror. "This is the reason why you are doing the things that you are now." At the fayth's words, the blonde teen's parents and one of her friends, Rachel, came into view out of nowhere. "You are fighting so that you can get back to your own world and restore happiness to the ones that love you."

"How long has it been? Three weeks already?" Lauren's mother queried out loud to herself from her spot standing at the left side of the hospital bed next to her husband. "Lauren, honey, you got to wake up soon…" The blonde teen's mother talked to her daughter's unconscious body while also placing and hand on the teen's head.

"Don't worry, dear. Lauren is a strong girl. She will pull through this." The blonde guardian's father placed his arms around his wife in a loving and comforting embrace tears forming in both their eyes. "We just have to wait patiently till she can overcome this and come back to us." The blonde teen's father's words were filled with sorrow and a strange kind of hope that brought even more tears to the teens already moistened turquoise eyes.

"C'mon Lauren, you gotta wake up already! Everybody misses you at school and your family misses you and I miss you." Rachel cried out at her unconscious best friend's side, hiding her tear filled hazel eyes under long strand of wavy black hair.

"Honey, we all love you…" Lauren's mother was back to speaking to her unconscious daughter's body, tears almost choking her words into incoherent mumbles. "Please wake up soon, Lauren…" The blonde teen's turquoise eyes were filled with tear that slid like torrents down her checks and off her chin, dripping onto the tile floor silently.

"Mom!" Lauren hollered through sob-wracked breaths, taking off toward her as fast as her legs would carry her. The blonde teen threw her arms around her mother's shoulders, only to fall right through her and smack her head of the ground below. "Wha-… what!" The sixteen-year-old guardian exclaimed as she got back onto her feet as swiftly as she could and waved her left hand through her mother's face.

"This is only a vision of your world, not the real thing." The fayth clarified to Lauren, who now had tears streaming down her face in torrent like manner, leaving streaks upon her cheeks. "Think of it as you are a ghost and that you cannot interact with anything or anyone, only see and hear them." The fayth tried to calm the blonde teen out of her hysterical state, but it was to no avail. The sixteen year old guardian still stood there, a few inches from the image of her mother, tears pouring out of her turquoise eyes and down her cheeks.

"I… I want to see them all again…" Lauren managed to utter through her sobs that had now turned into loud cries from their silent predecessors. "I want to be with them again…" The blonde teen was now down on her knees with her fists clenched tightly atop her knees, trying to hold back the flood of tears welling up in her eyes.

"And you will be with them again if you go back with new determination in fulfilling your destiny and face and overcome any obstacle that may present itself." The fayth's words seemed to instill a new kind of hope and feeling of determination in Lauren causing her to stop shedding tears and appear as though she had a new lease on life.

"I have to be with them again! I can't give up now!" Lauren proclaimed in a determined voice as she got to her feet and wiped the tears from her turquoise eyes and removed the streaks from her cheeks. "I can't be brought down by anything! I got to move on and find a way to fix it so I can be with everyone I love!" The blonde teen declared, an obvious hint of sorrow glistened in her eyes but was soon replaced with sheer resolve.

"Now that you understand just what the reason is that you have to keep going, you can go back to Yuna and the rest of your new friends." The visions of the hospital room and Lauren's loved ones slowly dispersed, leaving the two standing in the pitch black void that they were only moments before. "It's time for you to wake up, Lauren." The fayth disappeared, leaving only her echoing words in her wake as the blonde teen's vision became hazy and then faded to black once more, a feeling that she was getting used to now after being in Spira for about three weeks.



Lauren felt a gentle tug at her shoulders, and then a familiar voice flooded into her ears causing them to twitch a little at the surprisingly loud noise. "Lauren, wake up, please!" Rikku knelt beside the now awakening blonde teen with her hands placed on the waking girl's shoulders, giving them a little shake to add to the impact of her pleading voice. The sixteen-year-old guardian flicked her turquoise eyes open halfway then closed them and then opened them up all the way, squinting in the bright light that flooded her vision even though there wasn't any unusually bright light surrounding her. "Lauren, you're awake!" The adolescent Al Bhed exclaimed excitedly, leaping onto her feet, almost dragging her drowsy friend along for the ride. "Oh sorry!" The blonde haired Al Bhed apologized to her friend as she finally noted that she had almost launched her friend into the air as she leapt gleefully.

"It's no problem, Rikku. Just next time watch what you're doing around others, 'k?" Lauren stated groggily as she brought herself to get upon her own two feet while getting a crick out of her neck that had been laid in an awkward position for some time and also got hit by Auron's sword.

"How do you feel, Lauren?" Rikku inquired as the sixteen-year-old guardian preformed a few stretches, getting all the other ailments out of her body that could be exorcized from mere stretching.

"I've been better, but I can't really complain." Lauren admitted, ending her series of stretches and looking Rikku in the eye for a brief second that showed the adolescent Al Bhed a hint of sorrow held deep within the pupil. "Where's Yuna! Is she alright!" The blonde teen suddenly shouted rather loudly as a memory of her almost decapitating the young summoner flew into her mind with no others following.

"Oh, it's alright, Lauren. Yunie's fine!" Rikku proclaimed in her usually upbeat voice that could cheer up almost anyone instantly, thus putting an end to the sixteen year old guardian's worst fears. "She's right over… there!" The blonde Al Bhed pointed through some rubble of odd looking blue rocks along with pieces of some sort of building. "But, she's still unconscious…" The young Al Bhed's words stopped the blonde guardian in her tracks fro she was going to go check on her brunette friend.

"Well, at least she's safe…" Lauren muttered, her words becoming soft and grief filled as she began to trail off at the end of her statement. The blonde teen then continued over to where a slab of what appeared to be a substance much like concrete sat two feet deep, her turquoise eyes trained on the marsh like soil underfoot.

"Lauren, can I ask you something?" Rikku's inquiry caused the blonde teen to look up at her Al Bhed friend and give a slight nod, a deep remorse evident in her eyes. "So, was that guy back in the temple your ex-boyfriend, Brian, that you told me died over a year ago?" The adolescent Al Bhed came close to her sixteen-year-old friend and sat down upon the concrete like slab, mere inches away from her.

"Yeah, Rikku. That was him…" Lauren's voice was barely audible over the sound of a distant singing that resided in the backdrop that was half of the Macalania temple. Tears began to leak from within the constructs of the blonde teen's miserable looking turquoise eyes, making their way down her chilled and battered cheeks.

"But why didn't he recognize you?" Rikku queried in a voice of her own that was also barely audible over the hymn of the fayth in the background but significantly louder than Lauren's. "I mean how could he forget you if you two were in love with each other? Even if it has been a little over a year since you two were together." The adolescent Al Bhed's voice became louder and louder as she became more and more outraged that he could just cast aside a love like Lauren and not even remember her.

"Weren't you listening to that whack job Seymour, Rikku!" Lauren hollered at the blonde Al Bhed in a loud voice that harbored a lot of built up hatred that she did not intend to be brought out. "He said that his master, whoever that is, stole Brian's memories and is keeping them wherever he is!" The sixteen-year-old guardian added angrily in the wake of no response from the adolescent Al Bhed that sat no more than four inches away from her.

"I'm sorry, Lauren…" Rikku whispered just loud enough for the suddenly enraged blonde teen to hear her over her own loud furious thoughts. "I'll pay more attention next time…" Upon hearing the sincerity in the adolescent Al Bhed's voice, the sixteen-year-old guardian's thoughts came to a crashing halt and all her hatred and anger toward her friend dissolved within a few seconds.

"It's not your fault, Rikku. It's mine." Lauren had now calmed down and placed a comforting hand on the adolescent Al Bhed's right shoulder as she apologized. "I don't know what came over me to yell at you like that, Rikku. And for that, I'm sorry. I'm just under a lot of emotional stress right now." The sixteen-year-old guardian's words caused her Al Bhed friend to turn and face her with her jade swirl eyes full of understanding and compassion.

"I understand, Lauren." Rikku said in a voice that was both uncertain and, at the same exact time, full of understanding mustered from within the depths of the Al Bhed's mind. "It must be really tough to go through something like what you had to go through with having the one you love right in front of you but not be able to reach him. And then to have someone control you by using your fear to almost kill everyone you care about. That must be the hardest thing anyone could ever have to go through." The young Al Bhed's jade swirl eyes were filled with sympathetic sorrowfulness for her friend that had now grown very close to her since they had met.

"Thanks for understanding, Rikku." Lauren expressed her gratitude toward the blonde haired Al Bhed by embracing her in a compassionate hug that thanked her for everything she had done for her. "I just feel so lost and helpless right now, but that was no reason to get angry with you. I think I need some time alone now, though." The sixteen year old guardian got up from the seat next to her adolescent Al Bhed friend and strolled over to a piece of debris that resembled a leaned back chair that gazed into the sky aimlessly.

"Hey Rikku!" Tidus' cheery voice brought the adolescent Al Bhed out of her pondering about how she could cheer Lauren up. "Yuna's waking up!" The blonde blitz ace hollered as soon as he had the blonde haired Al Bhed's full attention and not a moment sooner. A lighthearted smile soon overtook the Al Bhed's face, casting aside the looks of sorrow and helplessness to make way for her new feelings.

Rikku ran over to where Tidus and Kimahri stood around Yuna as she began to stir a bit in her sleep signaling that she was about to awaken. "Yunie, you okay?" The blonde haired Al Bhed queried to her cousin as soon as she opened up her bi-colored eyes and moved her head around.

"I'm alright, Rikku." Yuna said reassuringly as she began to rise to her feet while rubbing her bi-colored eyes in an attempt to shake some of the sleepiness away. "What about everyone else? Are they alright?" The young summoner inquired after only noticing her cousin, Tidus, and Kimahri standing around her, everyone else hidden from her view.

"Well, Wakka's pretty shaken up by all this but other than that he's fine." Tidus went on to explain how everyone one was since Yuna had been unconscious this whole time just as Lauren had before her. "Lulu's just Lulu and Auron's just Auron. And Lauren is… um… Rikku you were with her, weren't you?" The blonde haired blitz ace queried to the young Al Bhed for her to fill in where he left off about telling Yuna how everyone was.

"Lauren's over there." Rikku pointed a slender finger through a gap in some debris that showed the blonde teen sitting on the chair like concrete just staring off into space lost in her own thought. "She's fine physically but I don't know how she's holding up emotionally now. She said that she just wanted to be alone for a while to think and stuff." The adolescent Al Bhed explained just as Yuna was about to start off for their friend but then stopped at her cousin's last comment.

"Well, if she wants to be alone then we'll do just that." Yuna said with a bit of sadness evident in her voice, as she went over and sat on a slab of debris sitting right next to where Kimahri was standing. "When she's ready to talk, she'll come to us." The honey brown haired summoner stated more to herself than to Rikku or Tidus who were standing just a few feet from her.

"Yunie," Rikku spoke her cousin's name shortly following the few moments of silence created by the young summoner's words. The brunette summoner ripped herself away from her own thoughts and focused her bi-colored eyes on her cousin's jade swirl ones. "Do you think Lauren is going to be alright? I mean she's been suffering a lot of emotional and physical stress lately and I just don't know if she can handle it, you know?" The adolescent Al Bhed's jade eyes were now filled with a deep seeded concern for her friend and how she will cope with everything that has happened to her.

Yuna had to think a minute to gather up the right words to say to her cousin that were both true and supportive at the same time. "I think Lauren can handle herself pretty well, but I do not know how much she can take before she breaks." The honey brown haired summoner expressed her feelings about how well she thought the blonde teen could take care of her own problems. "If she can't handle it by herself we have to be there for her with compassion when she decides to come to us for aid." The young summoner slash white mage's bi-colored eyes filled with a new resolve to keep to her word and wait for Lauren to come to her.

"Yeah but what if she needs us but she doesn't want to come to us because she's like embarrassed or just feels uncomfortable with talking with others about her problems?" Rikku wondered to Yuna in a voice that was now as soft as a whisper and filled with indecision if her friend would actually come to them if she needed them.

"Don't worry, Rikku. She will come to us if she feels like she needs to talk it out with someone." Yuna patted the blonde Al Bhed on her back comfortingly as her words made contact with the blonde's ears, further soothing her but not entirely.

"I guess you're right, Yunie!" Rikku exclaimed whilst draping her right arm around the honey brown haired summoner's shoulders friendly. "I guess I just gotta stop worrying about things and let them happen how they're meant to." The blonde Al Bhed turned away from the young summoner and gazed off into the sky off over where Lauren sat, doing the same, lost in thought.

A few moments later the hymn of the fayth disappeared leaving the only sound left in the area to reign, silence. Suddenly, the ground began to tremble causing everyone to go into a panic except for Lauren, who seemed too lost in her thoughts to notice. "What's going on!" Tidus hollered as the shaking began to grow more and more violent, his blue eyes scanning the area till he found something most unpleasant.

"Sin!" Yuna shouted in horror as her bi-colored eyes met the exact same spot that Tidus was gawking at where the behemoth monstrosity motionless. All of a sudden Sin turned to face the group and then the quivering of the ground reached its peak.

"Lauren! Get out of there!" Rikku shouted to her blonde friend that had just come out of her deep thoughts to the events taking place around her. The sixteen-year-old guardian shot to her feet whilst glancing back and above her to see what was causing all the terror in the adolescent Al Bhed's voice. Her turquoise eyes shot wide open in dread as she saw Sin floating up and behind her only a hundred yards away from her.

"The toxin! Watch out!" Lulu shot her warning through the air in a much louder than her usual voice as she came into view from wherever she was residing before Sin showed up. Lauren attempted to move but darkness overtook her, plunging her into yet another unconscious state that she had gone into plenty of times already since she had gotten to Spira. The blonde teen could feel herself fall into something slightly mild in temperature and heard a few random shouts from her friends that she could not decipher before her mind went entirely blank.



Lauren felt herself, on her back, in some substance that gave her a feeling of buoyancy and also that of drifting in and out from a certain point. After a few seconds of aimless drifting she felt her head slam into something rock hard with a tiny little sharp bump that stung at the top of her head bitterly. She shot up into a sitting position immediately after her head connected with the solid entity to find that she sank down into something that she could only speculate was water. Her turquoise eyes shot wide open as she sprang to her feet, only to smack her head on something that felt as rock hard as the other object except no spiked point driving into her skull. The blonde teen bent over a little to keep her injured head from brushing against whatever was above her whilst rubbing the bruised spot on her head where both of the entities had struck her. Opening up her turquoise eyes once again after being blinded by pain, the sixteen-year-old guardian glance around at what little she could see.

'Where am I?' Lauren wondered in her mind whilst taking in her dark and gloomy surroundings with her bleary turquoise eyes. The blonde teen found herself standing mild temperature water up to just about her waist that was murky and appeared as though it had been in wherever she was for quite some time without any substantial freshwater supply. The walls, as the blonde soon realized when she ran her hand along the wall to her left, were slick with clammy mosses running all across the concrete like blocks forming the walls around her. Suddenly a revolting stench wafted into the blonde guardian's nostrils causing her to wince in disgust, almost striking her head against the moss covered ceiling again. 'ugh! What is that awful smell!' The blonde teen complained mentally as she groped around for something solid and rough to get a grip on as she waded through the murky, waist deep, water.

Out of the corner of her right eye, Lauren noted some sunlight pouring into the darkness of wherever she was through some rather large hole. Carefully, the blonde teen made her way toward the light, partially bent over, and slipping on the moss that she had now found on the bottom of the small canal of dim water she was itinerant through. As she finally reached the beam of sunlight beating down upon the usually murky water, giving it a clearer quality, the blonde gazed up through the gap that it was coming through. The sixteen-year-old guardian squinted her turquoise eyes and placed and arm just above, almost half covering, her eyes to shield them from the intense burn the blinding light was giving off. As her eyes became used to the concentrated sunbeams, the teen looked her surroundings once over, noting a small, fragile looking, ladder propped up against the wall leading up to the circular opening in the ceiling. The blonde began to ascend the rickety old ladder, only to have one of its rungs snap under her weight almost causing her to plummet back down into the gloomy water. Luckily, she held onto one of the upper rungs of the antique ladder with both her hands allowing her to get her footing back on a higher rung and proceed up the unsound ladder to wherever it led.

Upon exiting the slender shaft that she could barely fit through leading up to what she could only hope was the surface, Lauren shielded her turquoise eyes once again from the blinding sunlight beating down upon her. A few moments later, the blonde teen was able to bear the daylight and removed her arm from over her eyes to look out at her surroundings. She was in a dome like structure but it was all ripped asunder with holes punched through the metallic structure all over the place as well as extensive slits in the metal where it looked like something burrowed its massive talons in it and then just ripped the structure and new window. Running down along the center of the metallic structure was an immense tear in the metal where it was cloven into two entirely separate shelters from the blistering heat scorching the earth outside the shield of shade cast down upon the earth by the mutilated ruins. Rays of sunlight slipped through the slashed and punctured metal of the exoskeleton for the one in use structure that appeared to have been dormant for many years to the sixteen year old guardian, lighting up many plots of sand that was all around her.

"It's so hot up here!" Lauren complained out loud to herself whilst slipping her orange and black sweatshirt over her head, revealing her emerald colored T-shirt underneath. The blonde teen peered out through the massive rift in the metallic structure to see nothing but sand, ruins doting the entire expanse, as far as she could see. Lashing her waterlogged orange and black sweatshirt around her waist, the blonde teen noted another, smaller, dome shaped ruin only a few tens of yards away from her and decided, upon glancing around at the one she was currently in, to stroll over there out of sheer boredom. As soon as she stepped out into the direct sunlight, the sixteen-year-old guardian's breath was torn from her lungs as the sweltering heat encircled her and made a tight grip around her, chocking half the oxygen in the air from her lungs. Out of breath and dumbfounded as to how hot it was, the teen finally made it over to the other ruined structure and sat down for a few moments on a large rock jutting out of the golden sand in the refreshing shade cast by the ruins.

Once she had regained her breath and stopped sweating, for the most part, from the stifling heat, Lauren gazed about the plot of land underneath the shade emitting, domed ruins. Something small and wooden protruding from the golden sand a mere five feet from the blonde caught her turquoise eyes causing her to investigate it. Upon closer inspection, the sixteen-year-old guardian realized that it was a wooden desk that was buried mostly beneath the sand except for the one corner that she was scrutinizing, a diminutive door facing out toward the teen. The blonde placed her right hand on the tiny knob fixed to the dark wooden door and gave it a gentle tug that slid all the contents out into the open. Within the container laid a few rusted nuts and bolts, a few various writing utensils and a rather large, leather bound book, a title printed on it in large crimson letters that the blonde guardian could not decipher. Curious about what was inside the dark leather bound manuscript, the blonde teen cracked it open, unleashing a wave of sand and dust upon herself. Chocking down the dust and spitting out the gritty sand, the blonde scanned her turquoise eyes over the frayed ended pages of the beat up manuscript.

After about ten minutes of scanning through the pages, Lauren let out a frustrated sigh and closed the leather bound book in an infuriated manner, slamming it loudly on a rock protruding from the depths of the golden sand next to her. "What is that written in?" The blonde teen wondered aloud to herself in a voice that showed both anger and exasperation, referring to the tattered manuscript that laid next to her. "I couldn't understand a word of it except for that one word… "Sintanan" I think it was. I wonder what that means." The sixteen-year-old guardian let out a bored sigh and glanced back at the container she had previously removed from the generally buried desk. Something caught the blonde's eye as it glinted in the sunlight pouring through one of the many small and large punctures alike in the metallic exoskeleton of the ruins. "What's this?" The teen gripped the minute trinket in the palm of her hand and pulled it completely out of the wooden container it had laid in for who knows how long. "It looks like that sphere thing back in Macalania woods that had Tidus' dad on it. Now how did they turn it on?" The blonde wondered as she flipped the blue and white colored sphere with a golden base around in her hands until one of her fingers accidentally struck the on switch.

The sphere made a few buzzing and crackling noises before it finally faded on and revealed a scene that looked very much like Lauren's current surroundings. A scorching hot desert played out on the spherical monitor, scanning the horizon as if it were looking for some one or something that was supposed to be arriving soon. Then the focus of the sphere changed swiftly to a small settlement of buildings that looked much like that the blonde teen thought the ruins around her would look like if they weren't all destroyed. Voices and laughter could be heard in the distance as the sphere traced around the outline of the small encampment, the sun casting an eerie orange glow through the sky as it neared sundown. Then the sphere's focus turned onto a small hut-like building that had armed people standing in front of, those of which the sixteen year old guardian recognized as Al Bhed garments. Finally, the sphere changed its focus back to the unwavering horizon, a strong gust of wind kicking up golden sand into the air and carrying it away in harmonious flight.

Suddenly one of the guards from before shouted franticly and the sphere focused back on the diminutive hut-like structure to see a clocked figure assailing the five-armed guards outside the building. Within a few seconds the five guards fell to the cloaked man's wicked black blades, one resting in each of his shrouded hands, his head hung down as if chuckling to himself. The keeper of the sphere set it down upon something that Lauren could only guess was a table or something at that height and saw the man take off toward the settlements assailant. With one fell swoosh of the cloaked man's right wicked black blade, the keeper of the sphere's head detached from the rest of his body and plummeted to the golden sand, staining it with its crimson colored blood. More and more armed men charged at the cloaked man but one by one they all fell hastily to the mysterious man's superior weapon skills. One of the guards snuck up behind the cloaked man and trained the barrel of his gun at the back of the mystifying man's head and shouted something in a language that the blonde teen didn't understand.

"Oui fuh'd kad yfyo fedr drec, Sintanan!" Something deep inside the cloaked man seemed to snap at the guard's last word, causing him to flick out his right arm to his side, dark metal blade glistening in the last remnants of the day's sunlight. The cloaked man pivoted on his heels and swiftly brought the wicked blade in his right hand around with his body right at the guard's head level. Nothing happened for a split second before the cloaked man brought out his second wicked blade and began to hack away at the still standing guard with a ferocity that the blonde teen had never witnessed in her life. About thirty seconds later, the mysterious man set his dark metal, wicked blades to their respective sides and turned away from the standing guard, his rifle still trained on the back of the cloaked man's head. The sixteen-year-old guardian watched in utter horror and the guard's head fell off of his body and then fell into ten separate slices, each splattering crimson blood all over the golden sand underfoot. Seconds later, the rest of the guard's still standing body fell into abut thirty thinly sliced slivers, crimson blood soaking the sand underneath down at least two feet.

The cloaked man strode forth toward the cluster of buildings that resided farther back in the encampment, his head bowed evilly, and his dual blood soaked wicked blades hanging at his sides. High pitched screams as that of a woman or little kids rang out through the sunset filled sky as the cloaked man kicked down the wooden door of one of the little buildings of the settlement. Another shrill cry pierced the otherwise silence of the setting but was cut off by a sickening thud as a body sailed through the wall, even though it was metal, of one the structure the cloaked man had entered. Within another moment the building from which the body came from exploded into deep amethyst flames that licked at the sky, leaving the outline of the deep flames in haze. Surprisingly, the cloaked man strode forth from the burning building, unscathed and proceeded to saunter over to the next structure to his right. This structure also burned in amethyst flames, but instead of going into the building, the cloaked man stood outside and unleashed a terrible sphere of the same colored flames at the building. Soon all the structures in the encampment were set ablaze and the devilish, cloaked man strode up toward where the sphere that recorded his whole slaughter lay. From within the depths of the shadows that shrouded the man's face shot two piercing green eyes that sent extreme chills of terror down Lauren's spine.

The blue and white sphere made a few odd noises and then the screen faded to black and nothing more was seen of the incident that was recorded within it. Lauren just sat there, dumbfounded, by all the horror she had just witnessed and wondered if it was just a dream for it seemed just too terrible to be real. The blonde teen's eyes were filled with sheer dread as the image of the cloaked figure's piercing jade eyes staring back at her turquoise ones. "Wha… what was he?" The sixteen year old stuttered, her voice tainted with inexplicit fear as she pondered on what she had just witnessed on the sphere. "That name… Sintanan. That was in this book." The blonde picked the heavy, leather bound manuscript back up into her grasp and flipped through a few of the torn and frayed pages till she located the word 'Sintanan' in italicized Al Bhed letters. "But just who is he and what does this book say about him?" The blonde guardian queried to herself in a voice that was still shaky from the events she had just witnessed on the blue and white sphere, her turquoise eyes scanning the pages of the book again to see if she could stumble on any more words that made sense to her.

"Nothing…" Lauren muttered to herself, closing up the heavy, leather bound manuscript and setting down upon the golden sand that surrounded her in every direction. The blonde teen was about to mutter something to herself when she felt the very ground she sat on quake by a force unknown to her at the time. 'What could this be?' The sixteen-year-old guardian thought as she strolled over to a fissure in the exoskeleton of the domed ruins she was in and peered out over the expanse of golden sand. Out of the corner of her turquoise eye, the blonde caught a glimpse of a massive shadow moving toward the metallic ruins in which she resided at the moment. Her first instinct was to run but she chocked that down with reason and stayed put, concealed by the remnants of the metallic ruins. The shadow finally took shape a few moments later, revealing a colossal slug-like fiend, cloudy white saliva dripping off its flower bud like brown mouth. The rest of its immense body was also that same light brown color as its mouth except for its underside, which was violet in color and left a sticky trail of ooze in its wake. Just below its curled upward head was a few slits in its violet colored flesh that looked almost like gills that the blonde guardian put to memory as a weak spot if she ended up fighting it.

The massive slug-like fiend leisurely tilted its eyeless face toward the ruins where Lauren was hiding and came to a sluggish halt, staring down at the blonde with its eyeless beak. The blonde teen did not make any movements, and the enormous fiend kept staring at her with its eyeless head with an unnerving stare. Finally, the sixteen-year-old guardian made a mistake and shifted her weight causing her katana's finger guard to strike the metallic outer shell of the ruins in which she was hiding in. The immense slug-like fiend lurched towards the teen and the tattered metallic ruins she resided in at the moment and then just stopped a few yards away. All of a sudden the fiend reared its massive head back, its flower bud like beak falling into place, and then snapped it back forward, slamming into the walls of the metallic ruins with a deafening thud. The blonde guardian fell back deeper into the domed, metallic ruins she was in to avoid being struck by a falling scrap of metal that the fiend had knocked lose when it rammed the exoskeleton of the structure. The fiend slammed its colossal head again on the metallic ruins bringing them down with only the second of its mighty blows sending the blonde teen running for her life from the collapsing dome like stricture.

'Okay, I guess I have no choice but to fight that thing now.' Lauren thought as she unsheathed her katana whilst fleeing from the collapsing remains of the building, rounding around them and heading toward the massive slug-like fiend. At first the colossal fiend didn't notice the blonde teen charging from the other side of the now destroyed dome ruins and up along its left side. The sixteen-year-old guardian plunged her katana into the slug like fiend's supple side flesh all the way up to the finger guard with a sickening slosh. A strange fluid began to pour out of the puncture wound that the blonde had inflicted upon it that caused her to lead back away from the fiend in disgust, tearing a gash in the slug-like fiend's supple side flesh as long as her katana's blade. The immense fiend let out a deep throated bellow of pain as the disgusting fluid continued to run like a river out of it side, forming a diminutive pool of it no more that a foot away from the sixteen year old guardian. 'Why do things here have to get more and more disgusting as I continue to travel with Yuna?' The teen thought in repugnance as the colossal slug like fiend rounded toward her, almost knocking her over then almost dripping a huge drop of cloudy white saliva on her.

The massive slug like fiend cocked its colossal head back just as it did before obliterating the domed, metallic structure, almost sending another drop of saliva onto Lauren as it did so. Without a second's delay, the immense slug-like fiend brought its massive flower bud like beak down upon the plot of golden sand where the blonde teen stood. The sixteen-year-old guardian dove out of the way of the fiend's immensely powerful flower bud like beak, allowing it to harmlessly burry itself into the scorching hot sands of the desert. The blonde guardian, taking this opportunity, thrust her katana in both hands into the slug like fiend's flesh where it head should have been if it was any normal creature. The fiend let out a muffled deep-throated bellow of anguish as it unburied is flower bud like beak, lifting the blonde, who still had her katana stuck in its flesh and still gripping to its hilt, into the air. 'This is going to hurt.' The blonde guardian thought as the fiend flicked it massive head like entity to the left in an attempt to remove the troublesome blonde from flesh. Successful in its attempt, the enormous slug like fiend let out a queer sounding bellow whilst the blonde guardian sailed through the air until she came into contact with the golden sand that surrounded her about forty feet way from the immense fiend.

For some reason unknown to Lauren the golden sand that should have cushioned her fall actually felt more like it did more damage to her back than if she had landed on a rock. Trying desperately to get back up, the blonde teen attempted to flip over onto her stomach so she could push herself up just as if she were doing a pushup, but her body wouldn't listen to the commands that her brain sent it. The massive slug like fiend lurched toward the blonde guardian in its normal slow, leisurely pace as she continued frantically in an attempt to get herself up off the sand before the fiend came into range of attack. Still the sixteen year old guardian's body would not cooperate with the orders her brain was sending it at a now hurried pace causing her to start to panic and fear for her life. The enormous fiend now loomed overhead and reared its colossal head back, poising it for a devastating strike that would finish off its quarry in one fatal blow, crushing her bones into dust. The slug like fiend catapulted its flower bud like beak down upon the trembling blonde teen, but suddenly came to a halt in its attack and let out a moan of pain as its head went back to its normal position.

"Lauren!" Rikku and Tidus hollered in unison at their friend, Lulu, Wakka and Kimahri following close behind the two athletic blondes toward the injured teen. The party of five soon reached the sixteen-year-old guardian that was sprawled out on the golden sand basking in the midday sun, paralyzed. Rikku and Tidus took their spots next to their injured blonde friend on either side of her and knelt down to see if she was alright. Lulu, Wakka, and Kimahri stood back a little and did not kneel down a their friend's side, but instead turned their focus from their friends and onto the massive slug like fiend looming in front of them to keep it from attacking the incapacitated blonde. The slug like fiend let out another bellow of anguish as a sound of a puncture wound to the its supple flesh and then a tearing noise sounded with a faint splattering right after. Kimahri plunged a newly acquired lance into the violet colored gill like slits on the slug like fiend's front side causing gagging noises to erupt from the depths of its deep throat. The immense fiend let out one final deep throated bellow of anguish before its colossal bent back head collapsed onto the golden sand in front of it, almost crushing the mighty Ronso guardian, the black mage, and the orange haired blitzer in the process.

As the massive slug like fiend's flesh began to melt away into pyreflies Auron stepped in from behind the spores of multihued lights. The legendary guardian strode into a standing position a few feet way from where Lauren lay sprawled out on the golden sand, still unable to move. "Get up and let's get going." The one eyed guardian commanded to the incapacitated blonde teen sprawled out on the scorching golden sand. The teen shot him an angry look that said 'can't you see I can't get up?' before he moved on to say something to Rikku, who was standing to his right about a foot away from him. "Do you have any anti-paralyzing medicine?" The adolescent Al Bhed nodded in agreement before she rifled through the various pouches strung around her waist, looking for the right vial that would cure the sixteen-year-old guardian of her ailments. A moment later the blonde Al Bhed produced a clear green vial and popped the porous cork resting in the top of the vial. The adolescent Al Bhed lifted up her friend's head up so that she could drink the healing potion and then tipped the green lucid vial upside down, the contents pouring into the injured teen's mouth and trickling down her esophagus.

"Can you move now, Lauren?" Rikku queried as the last drop of the healing elixir passed out of the emerald lucid vial and down the sixteen-year-old guardian's throat. The blonde teen sent a command from her brain to her body to get up onto her feet and this time, unlike moments before, her body obliged with a slight pain creeping up her calves.

"I guess so." Lauren stated as she walked around a bit, stiffly, trying to see if she could get out all the stiffness that she felt while she was standing up. "Thanks, Rikku." The blonde teen stretched out her back by leaning as far back as she could and then stretched her legs by touching her toes with a wince of pain. "Hey, where's Yuna?" The sixteen-year-old guardian inquired as she got a crick out of her neck whilst noticing the honey brown haired summoner's absence.

"We don't know…" Tidus admitted whilst lowering his head in both shame as failing as her guardian and also sorrow for she was becoming more than just a summoner to him. "When I came to I was alone and then Auron and Lulu showed up but they didn't see her anywhere. Then we found Wakka and then moved on to where we found Kimahri trying to walk up a sand dune." The blonde blitz ace explained how they had gotten to this point and was about to go on when Rikku butted into the conversation.

"Then they found me!" Rikku chimed in, in her usual upbeat voice as she practically leapt into the air in excitement that was almost always evident on her face. "Then we went looking for you, Lauren. Good thing we found you now, too, or else you would have been in some real trouble." The sixteen-year-old guardian winced at the thought of what would have happened to her if her friends had not showed up when they did.

"So where are we anyway?" Lauren finally voiced the question that had lurked in her mind ever since she had awoken in the underground river and gotten to the surface. "And how did we get here? I mean we were in the bottom of a lake and now we're in the middle of a desert. It just doesn't make any sense to me." The blonde teen queried as well as elaborated on just how confused she felt at the moment about how her and her friends had gotten here.

"We're on Bikanel Island. There's a place us Al Bhed call Home near here." Rikku explained their location and went on to tell Lauren how exactly she knew where they were. "And I think Yunie might be there! Some other Al Bhed probably rescued her and took her to Home." The adolescent Al Bhed's words brought a slight joy to the sixteen-year-old guardian's face that Yuna is probably safe and sound at what the Al Bhed call Home.

"Okay, then what are we sticking around here for?" Lauren voiced a question that wasn't really meant to be answered before she strode over to Rikku and placed a hand on the adolescent Al Bhed's right shoulder. "Led the way, Rikku!" Before the sixteen-year-old guardian could remove her right hand from her friend's shoulder, the blonde Al Bhed whirled around and took off in a direction that seemed to be random. "Hey! Wait up, Rikku!" The blonde teen shouted to her jogging friend as she took off to follow her closely, leaving their other friends to catch up to the two running blondes at their own pace.

The group of seven guardians continued to follow the seemingly obscure path that Rikku had taken off on for some time now. It had been nearly fifteen minutes since Lauren had joined up with her friends and everyone was getting a bit exhausted and were sweating a considerable amount in the extreme heat of the day. Lauren, being the only one of the group not used to traveling a lot without rest, was lagging behind the rest of the group, her footsteps dragging a bit in the golden sand. 'Why does doing anything here require so much physical endurance?' The blonde teen thought whilst her vision grew a little bit hazy and her head began to throb under the intense sunlight beating down upon her. 'I sure hope Yuna's at the Al Bhed Home place and that she's perfectly fine.' The sixteen-year-old guardian glanced up to see Rikku go running off over the very tip of a sand dune that resided only a few yards from where she stood. 'I really hope she knows where we're going, too, or else we could be in some serious trouble. I also hope this Home place has air conditioning.' The blonde guardian peeked up through a few locks of golden blonde hair with her turquoise eyes to hear the adolescent Al Bhed that had gone of the tip of the sand dune only seconds before cry something out.

Snapping out of her dazed state, Lauren hastily took off over the sand dune just as she heard Rikku's cry of horror from the other side. Upon running over the peak of the dune and next to the adolescent Al Bhed, the sixteen-year-old guardian gazed down at the sight that lay before the two blondes. There was a gigantic city like structure down about four hundred yards away from the blonde guardians sitting in the middle of the desert. Thick black smoke poured out of a bunch of the buildings that made up the city as massive explosions were set off by an unknown adversary assailing the Al Bhed home. Large fiends with colossal wingspans and gargantuan sized yellow eyes circled through the air surrounding the now broken and burning city. Gunshots, as well as cries of bloody murder erupted from the battered Al Bhed city as the rest of the group finally made it up to the sand dune to witness the events taking place.

A massive explosion rocked the battle worn Al Bhed home sending razor sharp pieces of metal sailing through the air in all directions. "I'm so sorry, Rikku." Were all the words that Lauren could say to her Al Bhed friend as her home was being obliterated in front of her jade eyes. The adolescent Al Bhed said nothing in return to the sixteen-year-old statement, but instead took off at a sprinting pace in the direction of her smoldering home. "Wait, Rikku!" Lauren hollered to her Al Bhed friend that was rocketing away from her and down to the battle-enveloped city.

Rikku ran out into the middle of the entrance courtyard of her home where nothing but death and chaos stirred around her. The blonde Al Bhed shot glances filled with terror and distress around the death filled courtyard until a dying Al Bhed man caught her attention out of the corner of her eye. "Keyakku! Who? Who's attacking us? Fru tet drec du oui? (Who did this to you?)" The adolescent Al Bhed pleaded to the dying man to tell her who was destroying the home that she had known since childhood.

"Yevon... Guado..." Keyakku managed to utter before his body went limp on the ground, his right arm folded across a wound in his abdomen.

"Keyakku? Keyakku!" Rikku cried as the Al Bhed man lay still right in front of her while sounds of utter chaos whirled around her. Lauren caught up to the mourning adolescent Al Bhed a few seconds later and placed a comforting hand on her friend's left shoulder but didn't say anything, for the words would not come to her.

Seconds later the rest of the group caught up with Lauren and Rikku and gazed about it awe at the destruction the Al Bhed city had sustained. "A war? Between Yevon and the Al Bhed?" Lulu wondered aloud as she glanced around at the destruction and chaos around her with her garnet colored eyes in astonishment.

"Dryd ec fnuhk! Guado ku vun dra summoner. (That is wrong! Guado go

for the summoner.)" A tall Al Bhed man corrected the black mage as he stalked in from behind the group with a grim expression apparent on his face. He was bald and was clad in a yellow and dark tan colored jumpsuit with goggles resting right under his chin just as Rikku had strung around her neck.

"Vydran... (Father...)" Rikku whispered to the man as he strode over and reached down at Keyakku's dead body and placed his right hand on the man's neck, looking for any signs of a pulse. Upon receiving no signs of the Al Bed man's heartbeat or breathing, the bald Al Bhed shook his head and stood back up and glanced at Rikku and then at her friends.

"You Rikku's friends?" The man glanced around at everyone, stopping a few more seconds in his glancing at Lauren who looked completely out of place to him. Everyone nodded to the bald Al Bhed's inquiry causing him to give a slight nod in acceptance before he spoke again. "Well, just don't stand there, come on! Let's go kick those Guado out of our Home!" He exclaimed, taking off toward the entrance to the battle wracked Al Bhed city without waiting for them to follow him.

"Who was that, Rikku?" Lauren queried after the bald Al Bhed had left to go try to fight back against the Guado that were assailing their home.

"Cid. Leader of the Al Bhed..." Rikku explained who the mysterious bald Al Bhed man was in a soft, depressed voice that was hard to hear of the sounds of intense battle raging around them. "He's my dad." The adolescent Al Bhed admitted, still in the same low voice she had used to explain who the man was causing the sixteen-year-old guardian's turquoise eyes to light up surprise.

"Wow, he's your dad?" Lauren inquired in an astounded voice that could be barely heard over the screams and gunshots encircling her and her friends. Rikku nodded to the sixteen year old guardian's question but still didn't say a word, her usually exuberant jade swirl eyes filled with grief and fear. "Well, then shouldn't we go help him and the rest of your people out?" The blonde guardian unsheathed her katana with a hasty swooshing sound and stood in a position showing that she was ready for just about anything to ahead of her.

"Right!" Rikku agreed, shooting up onto her feet, a friendly and thankful smile painted on her face as she looked over at Lauren. "Thanks, Lauren. We gotta go and help out pops and the rest of my people!" The adolescent Al Bhed drew out her fist blades and took off toward the entrance to the AL Bhed city at an unimaginable speed. Lauren and the rest of the blonde Al Bhed's friends took off after her through the death filled courtyard and through the door leading into the broken city.

Inside the Al Bhed city stood a huge domed chamber that held a concrete path leading up into a rather large circle that broke off into three different paths. One of the paths was severed off by what appeared to have been debris falling down from the roof and landing upon it, cracking it and utterly destroying it. The second and center path led off to a metallic door that was cracked open a few inches at the bottom but the top was still sealed shut with sparks flying from it. The third and final path led to an opening that ran down a flight of stairs deeper into the constructs of the tattered Al Bhed metropolis. Rikku ran right to the center of the large circle that sat in the middle of the domed room and stopped for a few seconds, glancing around at the devastation done to the inside of her home. The ceiling above the blonde Al Bhed made a loud snapping sound causing her to gawk up at the domed ceiling to see that it was coming down upon her as she looked. The adolescent Al Bhed dove to the right of where she was standing as the ceiling caved in on the spot where she had been standing just seconds before. The mass cluster of debris struck the concrete floor with force enough to crush practically anything that stood in its path. The floor gave way under the immense pressure placed upon it by the ceiling rubble causing a small crater to form out of the smoldering ruins.

"Rikku, are you alright?" Lauren hollered over the sounds of gunshots and chaotic explosions to her blonde Al Bhed friend upon noticing the collapsed ceiling and her friend in a crouched position as if she had just narrowly escaped it. For a few seconds the adolescent Al Bhed didn't respond to her friend's concern filled inquiry, just staring at the ruble she had managed to scarcely escape.

"Yeah, Lauren." Rikku finally answered her blonde friend's query whilst getting back up onto her shaky feet and glancing over toward the only path that remained. "This way, guys!" The blonde Al Bhed waved for her friends to follow her right before she took off toward the only undamaged path that led down a small ramp. The adolescent Al Bhed's friends followed suit only seconds after she had ran off through the doorway and onto the ramp.

As she came down the ramp, Lauren noticed Rikku frozen in place at the bottom of the ramp and prepared herself for battle. The sixteen-year-old guardian arrived at her Al Bhed friend's side and gazed ahead to see exactly why her friend had stopped. A massive gray skinned, dual horned fiend stood before the two blondes mutilating an Al Bhed corpse by both devouring it and ripping it asunder with its powerful paws. Crimson colored blood dripped from the dual horned fiend's fangs as well as was splattered all over the walls of the corridor. With a slight tug with its massively powerful paws, the fiend tore the Al Bhed corpse in half casting a plume off crimson blood rocketing toward the two on looking blondes. The two blonde teens forced themselves to either side, letting the spray of crimson colored blood splatter all over the floor and walls behind them. The two teens gazed back at the massive, dual horned fiend, only to see it gobble down the rest of the mutilated corpse in its colossal jaws. The two blondes shuddered in disgust at the sight they had just beheld; however, they were ripped from their states of sheer disgust at a thunderous, deep-throated roar from the fiend.

The dual horned fiend charged at Lauren and Rikku at a surprisingly fast speed that caught the two blonde teens off guard. The two teen guardians leapt back up the small ramp about a foot or two allowing the rather large fiend to slam into the doorway where the ramp entered the lower level. The dual horned fiend let out a deep-throated bellow and removed its head from benign the only thing in the ramp passageway. The fiend glared at the two blondes on the ramp with its murderous yellow eyes as it backed up about five feet from the entrance for the ramp. It let out a low roar that seemed to be like it was challenging the two blonde guardians to come and fight it head on. Lauren glanced over at Rikku causing the adolescent Al Bhed to glance back and then nod in acceptance to whatever the sixteen-year-old guardian had planned. Suddenly, the two blondes rocketed out of the ramp passageway and out into the larger corridor where the dual horned fiend awaited their arrival.

Lauren charged up the right flank of the fiend while Rikku took the left flank and surrounded the dual horned fiend, each of its two demonic yellow eyes fixed on either of the blondes. The sixteen-year-old guardian skidded around behind the rather large fiend whilst the adolescent Al Bhed stuck more to the front of it in an attempt to flank it. Unfortunately for the two blondes, the dual horned fiend lashed out at the blonde Al Bhed with its front right powerful paw as it brought its tail around to whack the sixteen-year-old guardian. Rikku, being the agile teen that she was, escaped the commanding swipes of the fiend's right paw but Lauren wasn't so lucky in her endeavors. The powerful tail of the dual horned fiend slammed into her side as she attempted to leap back to elude the commanding blow. She was sent sailing through the narrow corridor air until she came into contact with the metallic wall just to her left only a few feet away from where she had been standing. Upon striking the hard metallic ground, the blonde teen shot back up onto her feet, only to receive a sharp pain jutting up from her gun causing her to double over in pain.

Rikku, seeing that Lauren wasn't in the condition to fight at the moment, quickly made an attempt to get the dual horned fiend to only focus on her. The blonde Al Bhed swiped the massive fiend across the face with her fist blades, leaving two trails of crimson streaked blood on the beast's face. The fiend let out a deep-throated cry of anguish as it batted at the agile Al Bhed teen with both its colossal paws. The adolescent Al Bhed hastily evaded the tow strikes and rounded back around for another pass at the fiend. As she charged at the fiend, the blonde rifled through one of the diminutive pouches lashed to her waist, trying to find an item that would end this battle quickly. Her fingers fell around something small, oval in shape and chilled metallic and gripped it tightly whilst withdrawing it from its pouch. The dual horned fiend lashed out with its massive, blood soaked jaws just to receive a special gift from the running Al Bhed instead of her flesh. The fiend bit down upon the hard metallic item with the force of great white shark causing whatever it has eaten to detonate.

A deafening explosion erupted from within the dual horned fiend's massive jaws that caused both Rikku and Lauren to cover their ears to avoid any damage to them. Scraps of the fiend's flesh shot out in all directions, drenching the metallic flooring and walls in crimson blood as well as splattering a bit on the two blonde teens. What remained of the fiend's body dropped limp to the ground before it began to fade away into the melodic, multihued lights know as pyreflies. The blonde Al Bhed glanced over at her sixteen-year-old friend with a concerned look in her jade swirl eyes. "Lauren, are you okay?" The adolescent Al Bhed queried to her friend that had been hurled against the hard, metallic wall by the dual horned fiend.

"Yeah, but my stomach does hurt a little." Lauren admitted whilst hold her right arm over her abdomen as if she were trying to hold her stomach intact. A few seconds later the two blondes' friends came down the narrow ramp to find them standing around, waiting for them to arrive. "Okay, let's go. We gotta see if we can help these people out!" The sixteen-year-old guardian declared whilst she placed her right hand on Rikku's left shoulder and nodding to her. The two blondes took off down the corridor and made a turn at the next bend, leaving their friends to catch up with them.

After running around battling various fiends and their Guado masters for a while, a voice crackled over an intercom system built into the Al Bhed city. "Drec pedac! Rikku! Oui nayt sa? Oui ku ihtan, duu! E ys majamehk Home! Yht dra fiend fedh ed! (This bites! Rikku! You read me? You go under too! I am leveling Home! And the fiend with it!)" Cid's voice crackled over the intercom just barely audible over the chaotic sound echoing through the many corridors of the Al Bhed metropolis.

"What did he say, Rikku?" Lauren queried to the adolescent Al Bhed after noticing the upset look on her usually upbeat face.

"We have to get underground!" Rikku blurted out while taking off in a seemingly random direction that apparently led to where Yuan was supposedly being held. After encountering some more fiends and Guado alike, the group came to a stop at the top of a flight of stairs that led down deeper into the constructs of the Al Bhed home.

"This place done for." Wakka shook his head whilst gazing around at the sheer destruction and chaos that the Guado and their fiend pets had done to Rikku's home.

"You're right. You're right, Wakka." Rikku admitted to what the orange haired blitzer had said in a sorrow filled voice, with tears blurring her jade swirl eyes. "We Al Bhed, we...we weren't always like this. Sin destroyed the island where we all used to live. After that, we were scattered to every corner of Spira. But then, my dad brought the Al Bhed together again. We few put our minds to it and worked together, then we could make a new home. Everyone worked hard; we had our Home back again... But now... Why did things have to turn out this way?" The blonde Al Bhed finished up her summary of a little of the history of her people and ending with a frustrated and sad voice.

"Rikku..." Wakka placed a comforting hand of the blonde Al Bhed's right shoulder as he came close to her. "Damn those Guado! What are they thinking?" The orange haired blitzer cried out as he slammed his right fist into the metallic wall to his right, ignoring the pain that coursed through his hand from the act.

"We have to get going, now!" Auron commanded as he strode off down the flight of metal stairs that sat to the left of the group. Everyone filed in behind the legendary guardian except for Lauren and Rikku, who held back for a few moments.

"Rikku… I'm so sorry." Lauren said in a voice that was both sorrowful and sympathetic whilst placing a comforting hand on the blonde Al Bhed's left shoulder. "I know how it feels to lose something that you love." The sixteen-year-old guardian's turquoise eyes welled up with tears that she had to close her eyes and move back away from her Al Bhed friend to suppress. 'And I always will…' The blonde guardian thought sorrowfully as her friend walked past her and began to descend the metal stairs.

Lauren went to follow Rikku when an earsplitting creak erupted from the ceiling caused her to stop dead in her tracks and gaze up at the source of the noise. The ceiling let out another piercing groan shot down just as it gave way-sending tons of debris down at the blonde teen. The blonde guardian leapt back about two feet to elude the collapsing ceiling rubble just as it was about to crush her to a blood pulp. The wreckage from the ceiling smashed into the metal staircase, snapping the metallic framework into shards of metal under the pressure of the debris. The sixteen-year-old guardian gawked at the rubble sitting in front of her after it had smashed through the metal staircase, ruining any chance she had at linking up with her friends quickly. The blonde whirled around to see the doorway that she and her friends had come into the chamber, only to see it also collapse in front of her turquoise eyes. The teen pivoted on her heel and gazed through a small crack that allowed her to peer through to see Rikku's face staring back at her.

"Lauren! You have to follow that path over there!" Rikku called out to her blonde friend whilst signaling to go to her right by pointing her finger in that direction. "If you go that way you can meet up with us on the other side of the Summoner's sanctum." The blonde Al Bhed told the sixteen year old guardian where to go and that she would link up with her and the rest of her friends on the other side of where Yuna was mostly likely being held. "Lauren," The adolescent Al Bhed got her friend's attention right as she was about to walk away from the pile of rubble that separated her from her friends. "Be careful." The blonde teen nodded to the young Al Bhed through the tiny hole in the ruins of the flight of stairs before taking off down the path that her friend had told her to use.

Lauren walked down a narrow corridor for some time before she came across something that caused her heart to sink. "Not another dead end…" The blonde teen came to a halt no more that a few feet in front of a wall of debris that barred her path from getting back to her friends. "How am I supposed to get back to Rikku and the others at this rate?" The sixteen-year-old guardian pondered out loud to herself whilst scanning the chamber around her for another route to get back to all her friends.

"You won't have to worry about that in a few minutes." A strange yet familiar female voice echoed through the tattered chamber causing Lauren to glance around frantically trying to locate the source of the voice. "Don't worry. I will not make you suffer… too badly." Nora dropped out of an air duct, her purple hair flowing up behind her as she plummeted to the ground lightly. As soon as the amethyst haired teen landed on the ground with a soft thud, she whipped out her dual dragon hilted daggers and twirled them in between her fingers.

"You!" Lauren shouted out sheer surprise at Nora as she stood only fifteen feet away from her with her twin daggers thirsting for some blood. "Why didn't you tell me Brian was at Macalania temple with Seymour and had lost all his memories!" The blonde teen screamed at the amethyst haired dagger wielder with more than a little bit of anger apparent in her voice as it echoed through the otherwise silent chamber.

"What are you talking about!" Nora retorted in a voice that held even more anger and confusion than that of Lauren's as she fell into a battle ready position. Her emerald eyes were filled with hatred toward the blonde teen for spreading what she had thought were lies about her brother. "Brian died over a year ago! You should know that more than anyone!" The purpled haired assassin shouted at the sixteen-year-old guardian with such passionate rage that it almost scared the blonde.

"Brian is alive here, on Spira!" Lauren hollered at Nora with tears beginning to well up in her turquoise eyes, noting the still furious look in the amethyst haired teen's eyes. "He's alive here, but that creep Seymour and his master stole away his memories! He didn't even remember me…" The blonde teen's voice trailed off as she attempted to hold back her tears remembering everything that had happened back in the Macalania temple.

"What!" Nora yelled back at Lauren with a voice that both expressed complete and utter confusion as well as anger, recalling just who exactly Seymour's master was. "But… Mika didn't say anything about my brother being alive. That old son of a…!" The amethyst haired teen shook all over with anger that the one she was working under didn't tell her that her brother was alive here.

"You mean you've been working with the guy who did this to Brian!" Lauren's voice was filled with utter astonishment at how Nora could be so unperceptive and have fallen right into the old Maester's hands. "And you didn't even know! Wow, you've got to be really stupid to work with someone like him!" The sixteen-year-old guardian mocked the amethyst haired teen's intelligence causing even more anger to well up in her emerald eyes and on her face.

"That does it!" Nora screamed at the top of her lungs whilst she charged up at Lauren, her twin dragon hilted daggers twirling around in between her fingers at her sides and back behind her back. "I'm not going to stand her and let you mock me!" The amethyst haired teen shouted as she opened up the battle between her and the sixteen-year-old guardian with a few rapid slashes with her twin daggers at the blonde's chest. The blonde guardian fell back, giving her enough time to draw her katana up in front of her to block all the remaining blows from her infuriated assailant.

Lauren brought her katana around in front of her and to the right in a small arch level with Nora's neck in an attempt to behead her assailant. The amethyst haired teen bent back both her head and her back, allowing the blonde teen's katana swipe to go over her head harmlessly. The blonde teen followed up her ineffective blow by bringing her katana down in a diagonal slash that went from right to left across her purple haired adversary's torso. The emerald eyed teen leapt back away from the sixteen-year-old guardian's downward diagonal slash, narrowly escaping its deadly bite. The tip of the blonde teen's katana's blade almost buried itself into the fractured flooring under foot but she stopped it with a quick jerk of her arm and flick of her right wrist. Both the amethyst haired teen and the blonde haired guardian fell back from each other after the blonde's last blade stroke into battle ready stances.

Nora lashed out with her twin dragon hilted daggers at Lauren by jabbing her right one at the blonde's stomach while brining around the dagger in her left hand across her enemies chest. The blonde teen was about to leap back and bend her gut back while leaning forward but stopped when she noted her assailant's second dagger coming across her chest line. The sixteen-year-old guardian brought her katana up from her left side in her right hand, across her upper body in an attempt to knock away both daggers in one move. The blonde guardian shut her turquoise eyes tightly whilst she brought her katana across her upper body until she heard the sound of metal on metal resonating to her right. She opened her turquoise eyes hastily to see that her blocking attempt was a success and had knocked away the amethyst teen's dual curved bladed daggers. The sudden deflection caused the emerald-eyed teen to stumble to her left as her daggers were almost torn from her hands by the force of her adversary's defensive blow.

Regaining her footing, Nora pushed off of the splintered flooring with her right foot sending her rocketing toward Lauren at a speed that the blonde hadn't seen her use in their last clash. Instead of going for two separate targets to catch her enemy off guard, the amethyst haired teen planned an attack as she charged the blonde teen before her that would bring both of her dragon hilted daggers down upon her opponent's head. The teen's emerald eyes fixed themselves upon the sixteen-year-old guardian's blonde lock covered head as she neared her. The amethyst haired assassin brought both of her curved blade daggers down upon the blonde teen's head as she came to a sliding halt a mere foot away from the blonde. The sound of metal on metal resonated from the point on the blonde guardian's katana's blade where the emerald-eyed teen's dual daggers struck. The two teens muscled for control over the momentum of the attack, their footings slipping every second under each other's force.

Seeing that she couldn't just muscle her way through Lauren's defenses, Nora shifted her right leg back, giving her more stability as well as setting her up for her next move. With a slight angered cry, the amethyst haired teen brought her right leg around along the ground trained on her blonde adversary's left calf. Her emerald eyes dropped down from where her dual curved bladed daggers struck her opponent's katana blade down to where her leg was going to connect with the blonde teen's left leg. The attack connected to the sixteen year old guardian's left calf with a softened thud causing her to lose her balance. The blonde guardian felt her right leg get taken out from under her just as her left did by the same strike with the same momentum. The blonde teen collapsed to the floor with a softened thud, her katana rattling off out of her right hand and across the cracked floor to come to rest two feet out of her reach. The amethyst haired assassin loomed overhead of the blonde as she tried to get back upon her feet but was stopped by her adversary's foot pressing her face into the ground violently.

"I must say you haven't gotten any better since the first time I fought you." Nora chuckled a bit to herself as she tried to belittle Lauren as much as humanly possible before finishing her off. "Now, I'm going to finish you off nice and slow so you have time to think things through and suffer emotionally as much as you do physically." The amethyst haired teen placed both of her dragon hilted daggers on either side of her blonde captive's neck, sliding them together against her jugular vein. The chill metal against her flesh as well as pricking at her throat caused the sixteen-year-old guardian to flinch, almost slitting her own throat. "Calm down. You'll kill yourself if you keep doing that. And we wouldn't want you to go without suffering first." The teen's emerald eyes seemed to well up with pleasure as she gazed down upon the captured blonde guardian that was trying as hard as she could to not move, fearing that she would end her own life.

'How am I gonna get out of this?' Lauren thought to herself while continuing trying not to move as much as possible, the twin curved bladed daggers still pressed against her throat. The blonde shifted her turquoise eyes around desperately trying to find a way that she could escape the death lock that her assailant had her in. The blonde guardian tilted her head a little on the side, just enough to see above her out of the corner of her eyes but not so much that she would slit her own throat. The air right above the sixteen-year-old guardian was free of anything that would bar her path if she made an attempt to get off the ground in a hurry. 'I hope this works.' The blonde thought as she placed her open palmed hands out of the ground to her sides, poising her muscles to push her up off the ground hurriedly. Nora glanced down at her captive but did not notice the fact that she was planning an escape from her seemingly inescapable lock with her twin dragon hilted daggers.

Lauren bent her arms slightly at the elbows and then pushed off the ground as if she were doing a push up, catching Nora off guard. The blonde teen shot up through the air and back up onto here feet, striking the amethyst haired teen in the face with her left elbow. The emerald-eyed teen fell back, covering her nose with her right hand whilst still keeping a tight hold on her twin dragon hilted daggers in her left hand. The blonde guardian took the opportunity of her assailant not being able to retaliate and swept her legs out from under her with one fell swoop of her right leg. The amethyst haired teen tumbled down on her right side, smacking her right hip and then the right side of her head on the fractured ground. The sixteen-year-old guardian took off toward her katana that was ripped from her grip only a moment ago and had skidded two feet away from her position. The blonde reached her katana in a matter of seconds and reached down, wrapping her slender fingers around the clothed hilt, continuing her pace as she went. The blonde came to a sliding halt only a foot away from where her katana lay, falling into a battle ready stance, drawing her katana back up next to the right side of her head.

"You will pay of your treachery!" Nora shot furiously at Lauren after recovering from the blond to the nose the blonde teen had dealt to her. The amethyst haired teen took her daggers back into their respective hands, charging at the blonde guardian at lighting fast speeds. The emerald-eyed teen leapt into the air about three feet from the blonde haired teen, extending her right leg into a dropkick position. The blonde guardian was just about to side step her assailant's blow when she changed positions whilst in the air and hurled one of her curve bladed daggers at the blonde. After seeing her assailant's adjust her attack, the sixteen year old guardian dove to her left just in the nick of time to evade the dragon hilted dagger from burrowing itself into her heart. Unfortunately, the curve bladed dagger was traveling at speeds too swift for the blonde to evade entirely causing it to cut her right arm at the elbow. The teen's turquoise eyes shot down at the sharp stinging sensation that was exploded of the tip of her right elbow to see that her adversary's dagger had left a cut. The cut ran the entire length of her right elbow and also went a few inches up her upper arm, dripping crimson blood from the wound onto the ground below.

Lauren held her injured right elbow with her left hand, trying to stop the bleeding whilst still gripping her katana's clothed hilt securely with her right hand. Nora, who had landed just about two feet behind the blonde haired teen, retrieved the dragon hilted dagger that she had thrown. The sixteen-year-old guardian stood up from her crouched position and stood back upon her feet whilst turning to face her assailant. The amethyst haired teen lunged forward, extending both her arms forward, daggers in hand, at the blonde guardian that stood no more than two feet in front of her. The sixteen year old guardian leapt to the left to elude the deadly two pronged thrust and countered by bringing her katana blade down upon her adversary's outstretched arms. The emerald-eyed teen retracted her arms instantaneously, evading the blonde's counter attack whilst also leaping back another foot to get herself out of her enemies' range of attack. The two teens locked eyes for a moment whilst circling around each other silently for about twenty seconds before either one of them made a move.

Lauren charged forward toward Nora hastily, coming to a stop roughly a foot and a half in front of the amethyst haired teen. The blonde teen brought her katana down upon the emerald-eyed assassin's head, trying to cleave her in two with one fell strike. The amethyst haired teen flung her arms up over her head, brining her twin dragon hilted daggers together to form a small 'X' as a shield against the blonde's attack. The sound of metal on metal rang out, echoing off the hollowed walls of the broken down chamber, ringing in the two teen's ears for sometime. The blonde guardian pressed down upon her opponent's defenses with both arms whilst with all the strength she could possibly muster at the moment. The amethyst haired assassin, bending then subsequently straightening her knees, forced back against her attacker's strength with all her strength as well as with the momentum from her bending. The blonde haired teen's katana was flung back through the air over her head causing her to stumble backward from the sudden counter push from her assailant.

Nora, using the time that she had acquired by knocking back her foe, flung out her left leg right at the same level as Lauren's stomach. The blow connected with the blonde teen's abdomen with a softened thud sending her back onto her back a few feet from where she was standing only seconds before. The amethyst haired teen's blow knocked the wind out of the sixteen-year-old guardian causing her to gasp desperately for air. The blonde's lungs burned as her brain screamed for oxygen whilst she groped around for a grip on the shattered flooring on which to get up on. The emerald-eyed teen strode over to where her adversary lay, gasping for air, and juts stood over top of her, staring down with a menacing look imbedded in the center of her eyes. The amethyst haired assassin flung her right foot out, striking the blonde teen on the broken up floor in her gut. The blonde guardian doubled over in pain on the ground from the force of both kicks taken to her stomach.

Standing over her opponent with a blood lust look in her emerald eyes, Nora raised her dual dragon hilted daggers above her incapacitated enemy's head. Realizing that her assailant was standing above her with her twin curve bladed daggers poised over her head, Lauren tried to recompose herself through the burning agony of having no oxygen in her lungs. The amethyst haired teen brought her twin dragon hilted daggers down upon the blonde guardian's head at hyper speeds that were barely visible. The blonde teen clenched her turquoise eyes tightly whilst screaming in her brain for her body to move out of the way of the deadly strike. The dual curve bladed daggers were mere inches away from piercing the blonde guardian's temple when the teen managed to roll out of the way of the lethal strike. Upon hearing the pinging of metal on concrete flooring, the sixteen-year-old guardian cautiously opened up her turquoise, but only just a bit. Realizing that her head wasn't impaled to the floor, the blonde teen shot her turquoise eyes open all the way whilst leaping up on her feet.

Recovering from her dual dragon hilted daggers refracting off the cracked and split flooring, Nora fell back into a battle ready stance. Her emerald eyes fixed themselves upon that of Lauren's turquoise ones, hatred and annoyance apparent in deep in her pupils. The blonde teen stared back into the amethyst haired teen's hate filled emerald eyes with her own turquoise ones, but not harboring the same hatred her adversary had toward her. Instead of hateful eyes, the sixteen year old guardian seemed to have eyes filled with a sort of sadness toward the teen standing a mere five feet in front of her. "We don't have to do this anymore, Nora." The blonde teen stated after a few moments of silence between the two teens, her voice soft and had a pleading element to it. "We don't have to keep fighting like this. I know we have our differences, but are they really something to have a fight to the death over?" The rage burning in the amethyst haired teen's emerald eyes seemed to subside, only a little if not all the way at the blonde's pleading words.

"You just don't get it…" Nora said in a slowly saddening voice as she dropped her twin dragon hilted daggers limp to her side whilst lowering her head. "Before Brian went out with you, we used to always talk on the phone or on the computer. We were like the best of friends even though we were already brother and sister. Then you came around and he stopped answering my calls and or said that he had to go somewhere with you. After that, with him gone with you, I didn't really have anyone else to talk too much. You ruined my life," The amethyst haired teen pulled her head back into its upright position, holding back tears that welled up in her emerald eyes. "and I will never forgive you for that!" The amethyst haired assassin's emerald eyes flared up with even more rage toward the blonde than had been apparent when she was glaring at her every time before.

Nora's binary dragon hilted daggers began to glow with a deep black radiance that enshrouded the entire length of each of the foot long, curved blades. After her twin curve bladed daggers resonated for about thirty seconds, the amethyst haired teen bend forward into a ready to charge pose. Seconds later, the emerald-eyed teen pushed off of the fractured flooring with her sending her rocketing toward Lauren at speeds only fathomable from that of a cheetah. The blonde teen hauled her katana up in front of her, preparing for the imminent lighting fast strikes from her assailant. The amethyst haired teen, charging toward the sixteen-year-old guardian at an inconceivable speed, shifted both her arms from their respective sides to her right side as she neared her adversary. The blonde guardian stood fixed in her defensive position with her katana held out in front of her body tilted to the right where her attacker was coming from.

Lauren braced herself for the oncoming high-speed attack by placing her left leg back and cocking her foot whilst bending her right knee. Nora, as soon as she got a foot in front but to her left of the blonde teen, brought both of her twin dragon hilted daggers up in one big swing, brining them up across her body at chest level from her waist. The black glowing blades slammed against the blonde guardian's katana's blade casting a metallic echoing sound throughout the entire broken down chamber. The sixteen-year-old guardian felt herself be pushed back by the incredible amount of momentum behind the astonishing attack from her assailant. At the same time that she felt being pushed back by the swift blow, the blonde teen felt herself spin around to face the direction that her adversary was heading in. After striking at the blonde guardian once, the amethyst haired teen made a small arched turn leading her on the opposite side of her quarry. Her emerald eyes shot wide in astonishment when she saw the sixteen-year-old guardian standing perfectly fine and had even turned around to face her.

Nora charged up and unleashed even more energy upon Lauren in her defensive position that she had in her first blow. The blonde teen merely spun around whilst getting pushed back by the hasty blow, just as she had by the first one. The amethyst haired teen arched back once again and came in at an even swifter pace and summoned all of her strength into her arms. Her emerald eyes shot wide in terror as she brought up her binary dragon hilted daggers, but caused no damage to her adversary as far as she could tell. 'How can she be blocking all of my attacks when I know I can beat her?' The amethyst haired assassin thought as she rounded about for yet another attempt in shattering the blonde haired guardian's defenses. 'This just makes no sense! It's just like after she came back from being dead… she was a whole new fighter than and it seems like she is now.' Her emerald eyes were now filled with fright more than they were filled with the anger she had harbored in her eyes moments before.

'How am I doing this?' Lauren pondered as she parried yet another hasty, powerful blow from Nora with her twin curve bladed daggers. 'I guess if I can do this I can end this fight now, too.' The blonde teen thought whilst being spun around by another of her assailant's deadly quick strikes. Seeing a window of opportunity whilst the amethyst haired teen was arching back around, the sixteen-year-old guardian took it, positioning her katana more upright than leaning right. As the emerald eyed teen charged in at her, the blonde guardian brought her feet together to give her more balance and a way to back up from what she was about to do next. The amethyst haired assassin brought her twin dragon hilted daggers up in their usual swinging pattern, expecting to hit her quarry's katana blade; however, it did not go how she expected it to.

Lauren swung her katana up right under her assailant's daggers, carrying them upward harmlessly instead of striking her in the abdomen. With that element of her plan a success, the blonde teen followed through with the next portion of her plan to end the fray between her and Nora. The sixteen year old guardian flung her right foot outward into the amethyst haired teen's path, ripping her legs right out from under her as she rushed forward. Whilst bringing her right leg back close to the rest of her body, the blonde guardian hopped back on her left leg, bringing her back to about where it had stood seconds before. The amethyst haired teen plummeted through the small amount of air that posed itself in front of her whilst wordlessly cursing at her opponent. Upon striking the shattered flooring with her face, the emerald-eyed assassin's grip around the dragon hilted dagger in her left hand was wrenched away. The specialized dagger clanged along the ground for a few feet before finally coming to a halt no more than five feet out of her reach.

Walking toward her downed opponent, Lauren shifted her katana into her left hand for the pain erupting from the wound on her right elbow was starting to become unbearable to hold her weapon properly. Nora, gripping her remaining dagger firmly, shifted her head so that she could now stare up at the blonde teen, who was drawing ever closer to her. The amethyst haired teen let a condescending smile slip across her face whilst she gazed at the sixteen-year-old guardian striding toward her. Whilst stretching out her right arm, the emerald-eyed assassin flipped her dagger around so that the curved blade was facing downward in her hand. Once her adversary stood only a foot from her, the downed assassin ripped her right arm off the ground whilst poising it in front of her assailant's right thigh. With a brutal strike, the amethyst haired teen plunged her curve bladed dagger down into the sixteen-year-old guardian's right thigh with a revolting splat.

Gripping her right thigh tightly, Lauren fell back onto her back out of sheer pain more than the momentum of the blow. Nora's curve bladed dagger stuck into the blonde teen's flesh about three inches of the blade, crimson colored blood streaking all over her right leg. The amethyst haired teen withdrew her dragon hilted dagger with another sickening squishing sound and went to rise to her feet when she was caught by something. The blonde haired teen muscled through the immense pain jutting up from the three inch puncture wound in her right thigh, managing to lash out at her assailant with her katana. The chilled metal of the katana's blade bit into the amethyst haired assassin's warm flesh on her abdomen. The razor sharp blade carved a relatively deep gash into the assassin's stomach, reopening the wound that she has sustained in the teens' last confrontation. Both of the teens' eyes filled with black haziness whilst they fell flat on the floor, crimson blood spilling out all over the ripped asunder flooring. Compete and total darkness flooded the blonde teen's turquoise eyes first, the amethyst haired assassin's emerald ones following momentarily.

Both Lauren and Nora lay sprawled out on the shattered flooring, unconscious, as a dark shadow drifted into the chamber through the only doorway leading into the room. "Hmph. These two are completely pathetic." The dark, shadowed figure uttered in a voice low enough that only he could hear himself over the chaotic noises echoing throughout the tattered Al Bhed metropolis. "They can't even handle a long fight against each other. I still don't know why that old man wanted to have her lead the attack on this place. She's too weak to do much of anything. And her… what is the big threat in her? I could easily just have taken her out anytime before this after seeing this pathetic performance. Unfortunately, he wants her alive so I can't do that…" The shadowed figure strode over to where the blonde teen laid unconscious, crimson blood running swiftly out of the dagger wound on her right thigh.

The man bent down over Lauren, a bizarre deep orange aura appearing around his right hand as it appeared out of the shadows. The shadow enshrouded man placed his shadowy hand against the blonde guardian's wound, a bright flash of the deep orange flashed up, illuminating the entire chamber. With that task done, the shadow-cloaked man hauled the unconscious blonde teen upon his right shoulder whilst turning for the door. As he walked past the unconscious form or Nora, the shadow enshrouded man stopped for a split second to hear her moaning slightly. "Sorry little girl, but you are no longer needed. I hope you like dying in big fiery explosions." The cloaked man, showing his true brutality, strode away from the slightly conscious, bleeding the death, amethyst haired teen. The shadow-cloaked man strode through the doorway leading out of the dead end chamber without so much as a second glance back at who he had left behind to die.

A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, and as always, don't forget to read and review!