Stree walked straight through the interior of the ship to the bridge of the airship. He watched silently from the back as Gippal and Rikku ran all over the place, shouting orders at the gunners and pilots to start the ship moving. The ship gigantic engines came to life with an almost deafening roar, and the Ixion started to float into the air. It started to move forward, and Stree let himself start to believe that they might be out of it, when a loud thump cracked through the hull, and the ship started to fall back down.
"What the hell is that?" yelled Gippal.
The pilot looked around wildly.
"There's a gigantic Fiends attached to the deck! It's gonna kill us all!"
Gippal smacked him in the head. "Calm down! It's going to be all right. How big and what is it?"
A man in the tech station pushed a few buttons, then gulped loudly enough that he was hear over the roar of the straining engines. "It's like that thing that attacked the Highwind when we went to Bevelle! The vital signs read exactly the same!"
Stree growled and turned away. "This is getting boring." He grabbed his sword and walked out to the elevator.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, where are you going?" shouted Gippal.
Stree didn't bother to answer him; he simply slapped the button for the deck.
The wind whipped at Stree the moment the heavy steel doors. He turned to face the gigantic fiend, who growled at him when he saw that someone was there. The wind picked up even more, and started pulling at the bandages on Stree's face, prompting him to take them off and drop them onto the metal deck. He walked out into the open, and watched as the fiend lifted itself up from the airship, and flew into the air, settling into a position next to the hovering machine. Ignoring the pain the wind pounding against his wounded face caused, he brought his sword up into fight position. The fiend growled again, and swiped at Stree. Stree stepped back, and the things scraped its claw off the metal.
"Hey! Watch the paintwork!" came Gippal's voice from a speaker next to the door. Stree brought his sword around and swiped it at the beast. The fiend brought its arm up to block the blow, knocking Stree's sword away, then spun around and returned with another swipe at him. Stree was ready for this though, and shot a Firaga at the beast, catching it off guard and pushing it away from the ship a little. The thing growled, then pushed itself away from the ship, and started charging up an attack. Stree did the same thing, and started focusing as much energy as he could. Sparks started flying through the sky and the man and the beast let loose with their attacks at the same time. The thin let loose with a photon wings attack, launching burst of bright lights into the air, which all shot straight for Stree. Stree meanwhile, had launched a flare attack at the monster, causing flames to burst forth from its body. The light pulses pushed Stree to the deck causing the gash on his face to open wider, while the flames leaping from the fiend's body started to devour one of it's arms. It screamed in an angry rage, and flew straight at Stree, catching him with its uninjured arm. The thing kept pushing forward, and Stree found that the only thing stopping him from a very large drop was the thing that held onto him. He smiled tightly, then started stabbing at the beast's hand. The thing screamed again, and threw Stree, tossing him through the air. Thankfully for Stree though, he landed – hard – on the deck of the Ixion. He rolled and jumped back to his feet. He turned around to face the monster and found it floating directly in front of him. Before he had a chance to react, the thing sapped him, knocking him right into the door of the elevator, with enough force to leave a big dent in the metal. He picked himself up again and stabbed straight at the eye of the beast, but it moved with startling speed and dodged it, then pummeled him against the door again. Again, Stree picked himself up, but not before shooting a Fira at where he thought the Fiend was positioned. He was rewarded for his effort with a howl, and stood back up again, only to find that the thing was launching another Photon Wings attack at him. He was still recovering from that when the thing launched its poison vomit at him. Thankfully, Stree had enough time to jump to the side, and the vomit only caught his right arm, quickly numbing it. His jump however, placed him right in the path of the thing's still-burning left arm, launching him up through the air. The beast followed him though, and caught him before he was anywhere near the ground, and started crushing him. Stree grunted in pain, and tried to pry its hands away. When that didn't work, he grabbed his sword.
"See my fight in the tournament?" he shouted as he sliced right through the Fiend's arm. The hand exploded into millions of pyreflies, and Stree felt himself start falling, but he grabbed onto the stump of its arm, and hauled himself onto it. He then started running along it, and jumped onto the thing's back. He wrapped one arm around the monster's neck, and proceeded to slit its throat. The monster burst into pyreflies, and this time, Stree had nothing to stop himself falling to the ground, hundred of feet below. Stree closed his good eye as he fell, and threw his hand out in front of him, so they were pointed at the ground. He started chanting something to himself, and sparks started swirling all over the place, as Stree started the chant to create an ancient spell that he had not had cause to use in a long time. Wind started whirling around him, almost like a tornado, and his descent started to slow, when he was at the falling pace of a piece of paper, Stree relaxed and allowed the Float spell to drop him gently close to the ground. About two meters off the ground, the spell stopped Stree, and he lay there, exhausted, and fell unconscious.
Stree groaned, as he woke up from his peaceful slumber. He tried to open his eyes, but found that both of them stayed close.
"Ah, damn, don't tell me I screwed up both my eyes," he muttered to himself.
"No," came a female voice to his left. "You just opened up the cut on your right eye. The bandage is to keep it shut."
"Who's that?" He asked, groping blindly for something he could use as a defensive weapon.
"It's all right," came the voice. "It's me, Paine."
Stree relaxed a little, and lay back on his bed. "Where am I?"
"Guadosalam. That Fiend crippled the airship's engines, so this is as far as we could get. Gippal called in a favor with Nooj, so we're going to be here while the ship gets repaired."
Stree sat up, and started to take off the bandage. "How long have I been out?" he asked as he took the thing off, and looked at Paine. He was surprised to find he curled up in a chair, with a blanket wrapped around her.
"About five days," she replied. "We've all been taking it in turns to keep watch over you while you healed."
Stree turned and examined his cut in a mirror. He found that the black stuff covering his face had been removed, exposing the full extent of his scarring, and it almost made him throw up. He forced himself to keep watching though, and found that the right side of his face was untouched, except for the cut running down through his eye, which he found was nothing but a scar. "How did it heal so fast?" he asked when he looked away.
Paine allowed herself a small smile. "It's amazing what Leblanc's medical team can do."
"They couldn't get rid of the scars, though," muttered Stree to himself.
"Auron brought you one of his chest plates," said Paine, trying to cover the awkward silence that settled through the small room. "He thought you might want to cover yourself up a little." Stree looked at where she pointed, making sure to only show the right side of his face, to hide the scars, and nodded.
"I need to get changed," he said. Paine nodded. "That means leave," he growled angrily.
Paine stared at him coldly. "You've been slipping in and out for the past couple of days. I'm staying to make sure you don't black out again."
"Fine, just turn around then!" Paine turned around and Stree grabbed the leather armor. He slipped it over his head, and found that the faceplate covered a lot of the scarring on the left side of his face. He looked around, and found a black headband lying on a desk. He picked it up, and slipped it on, placing one side of it to cover his left eye like an eye patch. He turned around and found Paine watching him. "Where is everyone?"
"Out in the main hall right now," replied Paine evenly.
"Lead on." Paine nodded, and walked out the door. Stree followed, and realized he wasn't wearing any footwear, so he grabbed the first pair he saw, a pair of leather boots with metal guards on them that went halfway up his shin. He continued walking, but stopped when he found a suit of armor in the hallway. Paine, not noticing, continued walking, and left Stree all alone. He stared at the armor for a moment, then grabbed the metal shoulder guard off the suit, and attached it to the left shoulder of the leather vest that he wore. He also noticed that the suit had a belt that had armor running down the right leg attached to it, and grabbed that too. He clipped the belt around his waist, and tightened the straps that secured it to his leg, over his pants. Even with all of the armor covering his body, he found that he could still move easily, and, satisfied that most of his disfigurements were covered, turned to walk to the main room. He was overcome with a feeling of nausea for a moment, and held his right arm out to brace himself against the wall. Then he noticed the scars running all across his arm. His mind flashed to an image of the fiend on the airship vomiting all over it, and he realized that it must have done more damage than he though. He looked around for a second, and found a short black cape hanging off the shoulder of another suit of armor, and grabbed it, fastening it to his right shoulder. He looked down, and found that it covered his arm well enough, and could be thrown back over his shoulder when he needed to fight. Now satisfied that no one would throw up upon sight of him, Stree walked into the main hall.
When he entered he found a blonde woman in a very revealing dress talking animatedly to the group of people from the airship, with a man with a cybernetic left arm and leg standing just behind her. He walked over to the group, but was stopped but two men, a fairly short fat man with a huge shield on his back, and a tall, thin man with two long-barreled guns hanging from shoulder holsters.
"You can't come in, this is a private meetin'," announced the fat one.
"Indeed. The boss would be most displeased if you interrupted," added the thin one.
"Move," said Stree, in a quiet but forceful voice.
"You're orderin' us?" the fat one asked incredulously.
"Only that boss has that privilege," said the thin one.
"Boys?" asked the blonde. "It's alright, let him through." The two men immediately broke to either side, and Stree walked on through. He spotted Kam, and moved straight over to her side, where she unstrapped his sword from her back and handed it to him.
"Nice look," she whispered. Stree grunted, and turned to face the rest of the group, placing the sword on his back.
"So here he is, the man of the hour," announced Wakka. "I can't believe it, man. You single-handedly defeated a fiend that took seven of us last time."
"Dying once would have to make it weaker," he said quietly, uncomfortable with all the attention on him.
"Oh, modest too," said the blonde.
"Who are you?" asked Stree bluntly.
The blonde looked like she'd caught a blitzball to the face. "You don't know me? The great Leblanc?"
The man, Nooj, Stree assumed from what Paine had said, laughed, and limped forward to put an arm around Leblanc. She turned around, and looked at his face for a second, then turned back and smiled at Stree. "Thanks, love."
Stree made a questioning noise at this, then found Rikku at his elbow. "Nooj doesn't smile often. She loves it when he does," she said, hanging off his elbow. He growled and pulled his elbow back, and Rikku jumped back over next to the High Summoner.
"So what's going on?" he asked. Yuna turned to face, him, and he saw Tidus stare at his outfit.
"Gippal is seeing if he can fix the engines, so all we can do at the moment is wait." As if hearing his name mentioned, Gippal burst through the door.
"I got news," he announced. "Nice clothes, man," he added upon sight of Stree. "The engines are shot. Looks like we walk from here." Upon hearing this, Rikku let out a great groan.
"Not the Thunder Plains!" she exclaimed.
Paine stared at her for a second. "I thought you go over your fear of lightning."
"I did, but I still don't like the Thunder Plains!" Everyone except Stree laughed at this.
"Look's like we walk then," he said. With that, he turned on his heel and started walking out.
"Hey, you, wait!" ordered Nooj. Stree turned back around as the older man limped over to him, holding something in his hand. "I was examining your weapon and remembered that I had this wristband that had the same symbol as the one on the guard of your sword. I thought you might like to have it."
Stree took his sword off his back, and examined the handle guard, and found a black symbol inside a circle on it. Strangely enough, Stree found that he recognized the symbol, but couldn't remember where from. He looked at the wristband in Nooj's hand, and took it, muttering thanks as he did so. He slipped it on his right hand, then covered his arm up again.
"That wristband supposedly has magical properties, but I can't figure out what they are." Stree nodded at Nooj's words. Nooj turned around and was handed something by Leblanc, then he turned back to Stree. "Hear. Take this bracer. It's enchanted to ward off fire, and I think you can do without anymore burns." Stree wordlessly took the bracer, and strapped it to his left hand. He examined it, and found a metal guard on it similar to the one on his new boots, with multiple metal strips running along it.
"You are ready," rumbled a voice from somewhere behind Stree. He spun around, but couldn't find the owner of the voice.
"What's wrong?" asked Nooj, somewhat startled by Stree move.
"Nothing." He took one final look, then turned to Kam. "We should go. Anyone who's following, try to keep up." With that, he turned and walked out the door.
"Not much of a charmer is he?" remarked Leblanc.