Kilika Port
As the boat pulled into the dock, Lhinx noted a lot of New Yevon guards roaming around.
(I wonder what's going on...) The Ronso thought as she stepped toward the guardrail. (Must be somethin' serious...Maybe it regards the temple! I have to get there quickly.)
Then a sudden fearful thought came to the Ronso's mind.
(Isn't....Isn't Kilika temple the fire temple...)
Her eyes shrank.
(Oh no...but I gotta go check it out...I better bring some back up...I hate fire...)
The Ronso had a worried look on her gray/blue furred face.
…
Zephyr was stirred from her sleep by a thud near to her head, and awakened mostly dry. She pulled on her socks, shoes, and gloves and slipped downstairs, hoping no one saw her. She had to check up on he dumbass.
She stepped into the room in which Calix slept, and without thinking, began talking to his sleeping form. "When are you going to wake up?" she muttered, sitting on the end of the bed. Her eyes strayed to the flute, still clenched in his fist. "Why's that little piece of metal worth so much to you? . . ." After a moment, Zephyr noted that his breathing was still rather shallow. She really, really didn't feel like giving him CPR again. . .
…
Serenity looked at Silver, opening and then closing her mouth, at a loss for words. I suppose it is expected…he is partly a tiger demon after all. Serenity shivered at the thought of eating a fiend. But it's still disgusting.
"And it's not true, fiends don't taste like chicken," Silver said, breaking the moment of silence again. Serenity smiled lightly. "Well if I'm ever low on food supplies, I'll be sure to not eat a fiend," Serenity said, and laughed. She then saw and felt Silver getting close to her face, and he whispered in her ear. Serenity blushed deeply at what Silver had said, and looked at him as he looked away. She smiled softly. "I'll see what I can do," She said, and saw that the boat had pulled into the dock in Kilika.
"Oh, wow, Kilika's so beautiful!" Serenity exclaimed, not taking note of the abundance of Yevon guards that walked Kilika.
…
(What the-) Lhinx watched Zephyr go, and curiosity flared. (Oh what the heck.)
The Ronso followed, silence in each padded step and her timing to where Zephyr could not see her. She followed the Guado halfling down to the lower area of the boat and to a room.
(This must be where Calix is. Hmm...) Lhinx looked in and saw Zephyr talking to what looked like a near dead body.
Lhinx said nothing as she watched a very distressed looking Zephyr.
…
Calix sputtered out a mouth full of se water, and sat upright quickly. Coughing like a mad man he looked around the room franticly, until he saw Zephyr. Once the appearance of Zephyr caught his eye Calix jumped back from in the bed in which he was sleeping. "Hell...Hello...." Calix said as his cheeks rushed to a bright cherry color.
…
"It sure is," Silver said, smiling. "I'll go put some clothes on, then I'll get changed when we get to my house." He took off, walking downstairs and straight into the bathroom, where he took his wet clothes and put them on. They not longer stunk of dead Sahagin but the blood wasn't easy to wash. When he got out he tied his gunblade to his belt and looking around he saw Tallulah sitting next to the chocobo's machine room.
"We've arrived to Kilika, Tallu," he said brightly, walking towards her and took her bag, offering her his hand to help her stand up. "You wanted to see the temple too, didn't you?"
…
Lhinx wanted to laugh so hard. (I'm gonna be in trouble for being here, but this is too much…) The Ronso thought with a humored look on her face.
…
Tallulah looked up at him and stood up without taking his hand. "I can manage by myself, Silver. I'm not a girl you have to come running to help me." There was a remarkable angry tone in her voice as she took her staff and began walking down the corridor and upstairs, just to see an unusual number of New Yevon guards. She walked down the deck and finally placed foot on Kilika Port for first time in years.
…
"Took you long enough," Zephyr muttered. "Feeling better? I dragged you out of the water after you passed out. . . you've been out for a couple of hours."
Dumbassdumbassdumbassyouravingstupidmoronicdumbass!!! . . . right. Well, Zephyr decided to save that for later. Once he wasn't quite so red in the face. Geez, she was just keeping an eye on him.
…
(I'm just gonna head for the temple.) The Ronso stepped quickly towards the door to the top deck, not before hearing something like warks from chocobos.
(That's the machine room.) Lhinx thought, and opened the door. (I'm just finding all sorts of places today. But you'd think they'd have found a better way to power the boats. Awe well, I guess this is to keep New Yevon customers coming.)
In the room were chocobos, running and powering the boat. And deeper within the room, she heard someone, a woman, speak and then ducked out of the way as Tallulah walked past.
(I need to get outta here. There's way more room on the dock.) The Ronso thought as she made her way out the door.
(Now to gather the others.)
…
"What a couple of hours?" Calix asked as he rushed to stand up and get his face out of sight, or to go away. "Have we arrived at Kilika yet?" He asked enthusiastically.
…
"What's with you all of sudden?" Silver asked in a very low voice as he saw Tallulah climbing upstairs. He shook his head and took her bag, following. Once on deck he found his blitzball and picked it up, looking for both Serenity and Tallulah before getting off of the ship. "I'm home at last."
…
"Yeah, we just got there, I think," Zephyr informed Calix, standing up herself and shaking out her damp hair, tying it up into its bun. Zephyr straightened her glasses and smirked.
"I have a feeling something's up in Kilika," she said. She didn't have a feeling, as much was apparent from her voice. She knew. "Lhinx is afraid of fire, and it seems like Silver and you have roots in town . . . knowing Silver, the other three chicks will stick to him like glue." Zephyr chuckled to herself, patting the gun at her hip. "It may fall upon me to bust into the temple and see what's going on with New Yevon . . ."
…
Lhinx walked up to the first level deck and down the ramp to the dock. There was an unusually large amount of New Yevon guards, much to the Ronso's displeasure, and she found herself receiving many a suspicious glance.
"Watch yourself, Ronso." One of the guards said, looking up at the Ronso youth with a smug look. "You and your people are not on good terms with New Yevon."
(And I should care because...)
"Guard should watch self." Lhinx said and made her way past.
(Now which way was it...) Lhinx looked around almost helplessly at the nearly packed port town. (Darn. Maybe I should just find the others...)
Lhinx turned around and watched the ramp intently, waiting for anyone else who planned to go to the temple as well. Though she was scared of fire, duty called.
…
"Lady Tallulah!" a guard exclaimed as she got off the ship. She didn't even look at him, as she wasn't in good terms with New Yevon. She walked closer to the Ronso girl. "Going to the temple?" she asked with a small smile on her face. "Let's go first to Silver's house, there we can get all settled and plan what to do next."
…
Calix didn't wait for Zephyr to do anything; he just got up and ran, out the room, up the stairs, to the stern where he picked up his collapsible staff and his cloak, leaving behind his pants. As he ran Calix shifted his staff between hands and slowly put on his trench coat. Once Calix got to the bow, he leapt off the rail and landed harshly, but still landed.
The guards were new and Calix didn't like them, so he immediately looked for his mother's home. As he ran down the boardwalk of wood his eyes darted back and fort many times, not noticing any of the houses. Mother where are you?
…
(Awe well, at least she's not nervous around me...but I suppose having a friend like Silver gets one use to non-humans.)
Lhinx smirked and looked around.
"Where are others?" Lhinx asked, a bit concerned with the amount of guards glaring at her. "Lhinx not like New Yevon."
"They are still on the boat," Tallulah said. "Nor do I like Yevon, but it appears to be that they like me, so I don't think we'll have any problem unless the ladiesman up there gets angry. He hates New Yevon like you have no idea, trust me, I know him too well." Tallulah sighed and looked up to wait for the others.
(So she did see him and Serenity...) Lhinx thought. (Love is a fickle thing...and it can wait until later for me for all I care.)
Lhinx remembered a rather irritating and hurtful situation that had happened before she had left Mt. Gagazet then. The Ronso snorted at the thought. (What's done is done...)
"All guards here suspicious." Lhinx said. "Something wrong."
"I know, like if they are planning some great scale operation. Yevon always planning weird things," Tallulah said, not liking one bit to be surrounded by so many 'Yevonites' as Silver called them. "Listen, we'll have to cover Silver, ok? Yevon tends to attack Demons, maybe not by shooting them but with insults and stuff like that. They won't like him to appear. Just, try to prevent him from jumping and biting the neck of some guard."
…
Zephyr stepped onto the deck and off the boat, surveying the scene through cobalt-tinted lenses.
Yevonites everywhere. Bloody morons. She wondered where they figured into Spira's recent crisis, the mystery that drew the Gullwings away from their homes. As she pondered, she approached Lhinx and Tallulah.
"We checking this out or what?" she muttered. The guards gave her odd looks; it took her a moment to realize that, due to the seawater, the effects of her daily hair straightening would be severely diminished. Her hair was absolutely wild, and her Guado descent was obvious; on the contrary, she looked just human enough to make it equally as obvious that she was a half-breed . . .
Just like him.
And, of course, the Yevonites hated the man who had shattered their charade.
…
Calix pushed his way through the half crowded cat walks looking back and forth until he noticed something that he recognized, but nothing came, soon Calix found himself at the edge of the town, where the forest started, and where the paths lead to the temple.
Having nothing better to do, because he didn't really feel like going back through the masses to look for something he most likely won't find, he began to stroll through the semi peaceful paths that cut through the forest....
…
Lhinx nodded.
"Tallulah should negotiate. Yevon not trust Ronso or Guado. We go to temple after we rest at Silver's home. We discuss more later." Lhinx said, eyeing the guards and speaking to both Zephyr and Tallulah.
…
Zephyr blinked and noticed a mop of messy blonde hair bobbing away through the crowd. Oh, brother. The dumbass was running off again.
"Uh . . . I've gotta go grab Calix before he nearly gets himself killed again," she said hurriedly before dashing off behind him. "I'll find you later!" she cried over her shoulder.
Shortly, she emerged on the other side of the crowd, near the forest. "Dumbass . . ." she muttered, and, resigning herself to a very unrelaxing day, shouldered her gun as she entered the forest.
…
"I will," Tallulah said. "But still we'll have to be careful. Non of us is in good terms with the Yevonites, and that may en up in trouble for us. Try to contend yourselves from fighting back if they start insulting you. But if they actually used brute force we'll have to show them who we are."
(And I have a bad habit of getting myself into trouble.) The Ronso thought. "Good idea. Lhinx can hold temper," Lhinx said.
…
Calix continued to travel through the woods still unaware that Zephyr had followed him into the woods, running out of ideas, and getting feelings, mixed feelings of fright, worry, hatred, every thing you could possibly think of. With no other ideas Calix began to run towards the temple. Maybe there will be answers there.
…
Serenity pulled her arms high above her head in a stretch as she slowly walked down the ramp to the dock. She yawned as she did so, and when she reopened her eyes she saw a number of Yevon guards pointing and whispering among themselves, while the others were busy eyeing Lhinx and Zephyr and Tallulah, though the latter for different reasons. Serenity blinked and stopped in her tracks at the foot of the ramp, slowly lowering her arms and covering her mouth, thinking that her yawning so openly offended them in some way. She cast her eyes downward as she past them on her way towards the others.
"Is that…?"
"Lady Yuna's daughter!?"
"She looks just like her during the time of Sin."
"…Brings back such memories."
"Let's go greet her!"
Serenity closed her eyes sighing inwardly at those words. When she opened them she had to stop short for a few had decided to crowd around her, as well as some of the Kilika residents.
"Lady Serenity, right? Very pleased to meet the High Summoner's daughter," one of the guards said. Serenity nodded her head in thanks cautiously. She didn't like New Yevon, though didn't downright hate them, either. Her mother held no serious grudges with them, she just didn't trust them very much—and Serenity grew up to that. Plus the fact that the rest of the group was giving the Yevon people dirty looks wasn't helping.
"Please, Lady Serenity!" Serenity turned her head to look at a grandmother and her grandchildren, who handed her some flowers. "I bid the safe return of your mother and her friends." Serenity smiled graciously, squatting down to be in eye level of the children, taking hold of the flowers.
"Thank you," she said. With that, Serenity nodded, signaling her leave, and made her way past the crowd, making sure not to make eye contact with the Yevon guards. I hope Kai isn't bombarded, too. Serenity thought, finally reaching the rest of the group.
…
Silver laughed as he saw Serenity being surrounded by fans. But for him the story was quite different. When the guards saw a Tiger Demon stained in blood they immediately aimed their guns at him.
"Stop!" One of them called. "You are not welcomed in Kilika!"
"I live in Kilika, you stupid Yevon dog," Silver snapped back, not caring about the guns bee aimed at him.
"You are lying!"
"I don't need to lie, I'm not the one who adores a fake deity." Silver started to lose his patience.
"How dare you... monster!"
That was it. Silver dropped Tallulah's bag and threw his heavy blitzball at the guard, making him fall on the water and the ball returning to its owner. "Put those guns down or I'll have to deal with you..." The Yevon guards were now real angry with him, but most put their guns down. "That's better, now let me go and I won't have any of you for dinner..." he showed his fangs to intimidate them as he took Tallulah's bag again and walked towards his friends. "Stupid Yevonites..."
(He handled that well.) "Let them be. Yevon fools," Lhinx said.
Tallulah sighed and walked to Silver. "You crazy?! Yevon people not like us and you start a fight with them!" She looked away with a grumpy face that was already mixed with her feelings of jealousy about him and Serenity.
…
Serenity looked back at the sounds of a scuffle behind her. She saw that the Yevon guards and Silver had gotten into a little something. As Silver grabbed onto a bag and made his way towards them, Tallulah went and approached him and began talking to him, mostly likely about what he had just done. Crossing her arms, Serenity looked over the part of town she could see. It seemed to tropical, much like Besaid—seemed like the island theme, though more modern, as far as islands can get.
"I wonder why there are so many Yevon guards around? And acting so brashly at anything that looks remotely dangerous. Didn't they learn anything over all those years…" Serenity trailed off, not wanting to believe that everything that her mother and her guardians, and then what the Gullwings group had done, was a waste and falling upon deaf ears, losing itself during the change in generation.
"Where are we heading off to?" Serenity asked to get her mind off things.
"Silver's home?" Lhinx asked.