Tainted Souls

Chapter XIV

The Al-Bhed

Once again, I don't own Inuyasha or Final Fantasy, non-profit endeavor, yadda yadda, legal garbage. Insert witty banter. I hate these things : 3. Well anyway it's that time of the year again, time to put that one-winged angel on the tree, LOL. Happy Holidays everyone!

"Where the heck are they?" the blond haired Al-Bhed girl had gotten separated from her companions when they were flying over the ruins know as Agit. They had went to investigate a strange black cloud that had suddenly appeared over the forgotten ruins. When they got close to the cloud a strange bolt of blue lightning struck their airship. After the bolt hit them it turned back at them, hitting them again. The bolt blew a hole straight through the engine room, sending the ship spiraling to the ground, Rikku, who was on the ship's deck was thrown into the snow below after the first blast.

Rikku halted and looked around for anything she could burn. She managed to gather a fallen tree, she pulled out her Garment Grid and transformed into her black mage robes. When the transformation was complete she rose her staff over her head and sent a ball of fire straight at the wood. The fire ball impacted on the wood and blew it to bits.

"Nice going, Rikku! You really screwed up royally this time." She plopped down on a nearby rock, she didn't bother to change back into her thief outfit, the white mage robes were actually a lot warmer.

What's gonna happen to me now? Am I just gonna freeze to death. There was the sound of something growling behind her, she felt hot, humid air against her back, she slowly turned around to see a giant dinosaur starring back at her. It's huge mouth wide open revealing what seemed to be hundreds of glistening razor sharp teeth.

"Great! What the hell are one of these things doing in the cold anyway!" Rikku grabbed her staff and instinctively shoved it in the beasts mouth. The dinosaur struggled for a minute until finally it cracked the staff in half with it's massive jaws. The large raptor like dinosaur was running after Rikku, she fumbled in the pouch at her side for anything she could use as a weapon. Her hand brushed against something round and bumpy. She recognized what it was immediately and pulled it from her bag. She grabbed the pin of the grenade and pulled it. She threw the grenade at the monster, it made contact and detonated blowing the creature to bloody chunks.

Rikku collapsed into the snow, breathing heavily.

"Teaches you to mess with the great Rikku, huh!" just as Rikku was getting relaxed she heard another series of growls. She looked up and noticed a herd of the giant raptors surrounding her. She panicked. One of them charged, mouth wide open.

Their was the sound of a gun shot and the approaching creature fell to the ground dead, half of it's head missing.

"Yunie!" Rikku screamed, expecting to see her cousin somewhere waiting to rescue her. Instead what she saw was a red object flying above her, the red object shot towards the ground. It flew towards Rikku and wrapped itself around her, bullets flew from the inside of the cloak, hitting the dinosaurs squarely between the eyes each time.

What the hell!

She passed out.

"Vincent's back." Red XIII said leaping up excited. Vincent had went out after a recent snow storm had cleared to try and find some food. The storm was sure to push some of the larger creatures out of their hiding spots.

Vincent pushed his way through the opening passage way to the cave they sought shelter in after the storm. He dropped two large dinosaurs near the fire. He was carrying something wrapped in his cloak over his right shoulder. He carefully lowered the bundle and lay it flat on the ground. Red XIII sniffed the bundle curiously and prodded it with his nose. Vincent's removed the cloak and revealed the freezing girl. She was young, maybe seventeen years old. She had green eyes with swirls in them and braided blond hair. She was dressed in a brown skirt, a yellow thong stuck out from the skirt, what looked like a yellow bikini top, and a long yellow and orange scarf.

Sesshomaru took the girl over to the fire and set her nearby to warm up. Vincent began cleaning and preparing the dinosaurs he had slain, in a few minutes both of them were gutted, cleaned, and cooking. Red XIII sat close to the fire taking in the beautiful aroma of the cooking meat. Sesshomaru sat near the girl by the fire, there was something strange about her. He couldn't put his finger on it. Aeris was messing with something in a corner, every once in a while there was a faint light and the sound of glass hitting metal. Vincent was in the corner cleaning his weapon after the fight with the dinosaurs.

There was darkness, the image of a ghost, a soldier, a strange man with long black hair dressed in red, his hand was shining with a gold light, and a dark cloud haunted her. Rikku was running through a dark maze. She knew it was important to get into the light, she felt as if something was following her. There was a flash and everything went white. She saw a giant white dog staring at her. It's red eyes hypnotized her. There was another flash and she was back in the darkness. She saw Yuna, she was trying to tell her something. Rikku tried to call back at her, but she couldn't, her voice was gone. She woke up in a puddle of sweat.

"Yuna!" the blond haired girl shot up, she lunged at Sesshomaru, tackling him. pounded on his chest. "Where's Yuna? Where is everyone?"

"Calm down." Sesshomaru demanded. Instantly Rikku jumped off of him and whipped the tears from her eyes.

Rikku blushed when she realized who she was looking at. She stared at Sesshomaru, her mouth dropped. Her green eyes surveying the angel of death in front of her.

"Are you okay?" Aeris sat down next to the girl and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Yeah, I'm fine," the girl looked down, still blushing. "I'm Rikku who are you guys?"

"I'm Aeris, that guy you tackled was Sesshomaru, the dog sniffing you right now is Red XIII, and that's Vincent."

"You saved me didn't you?" Rikku said looking at Vincent's cloak. "It was that weird cape thing wasn't it."

"Yes." Vincent flung his cloak back.

"Thank you! That was so cool!" she jumped into the air, clapping her hands together.

"You might want to get dressed in something a little warmer." Vincent looked at Rikku's clothing, she should be dead from the cold.

"Here, try this on," Aeris reached into her bag and pulled out one of the cloaks they had used to escape the crowds after the fighting tournament. "It's not much, but we'll get you something better when we get to a town."

Thanking Aeris, Rikku threw to cloak around her body, she felt a great degree warmer.

"The food's burning." Red XIII yelled as one of the pieces caught on fire.

"Shit!" Vincent ran to the large fire where the food was cooking and took the meat away from the fire. "Nothing's burned." he said handing the food to everyone.

Rikku took a huge bite out of the food. It had been days since she last ate. The delicious, red meat was dripped with juice as Rikku bit down into it once more. After they stuffed themselves, there was still a lot of food left, the group rolled out sleeping bags and turned in for the night. Aeris slept by Sesshomaru's side, as usual, and Red XIII was curled up next to Rikku, one of her arms stretching over his body.

Vincent, however, lay wide awake. He sat there near the fire, listening to the calls of the wolves. Something big was going on

Red XIII awoke in the morning to find everyone still asleep. He carefully slid out from under Rikku's arm, trying not to wake her. When he was free she rolled over and mumbled about something. Vincent was already helping himself to the last of the dinosaur, he handed Red XIII a piece of it.

"It's not bad cold, it'd be better with some salt though." Vincent said returning to his meal.

The two of them sat there eating their breakfast discussing various topics, Vincent seemed to open up to Red XIII, maybe he trusted him because they were both held captive and experimented on by Hojo and the Shinra.

Red XIII felt a little different, he looked around at his companions. Sesshomaru, pretending to be asleep so he wouldn't wake up Aeris who was fast asleep, resting her head on his chest. Vincent, a fellow lab-rat of the Shinra, maybe the only person who understood what he went through. Aeris, probably the sweetest and most pure thing that he had ever met; and finally Rikku, she seemed nice enough but Red XII got the feeling that she was hurting inside. Something bad happened to her and he wanted to help.

After he finished gnarling on the bone in front of him, Red XIII rolled over on his stomach and scratched his back on the hard, rocky floor of the cave. His eyes rested on Rikku, she was sweating, despite the freezing temperature of the cave. She tossed and turned in her sleep, mumbling something about thunder. She shit up, sweat dripping from her brow. She looked over at Red XIII and Vincent. They returned the stare with a questioned look. Rikku blushed and frowned, she looked over at Sesshomaru and Aeris.

They were still asleep, Rikku couldn't bare to have those two see her like this. She Got up an dusted herself off. She walked over to Red XIII and Vincent. She plopped down on the ground next to Vincent and looked down at the floor.

"Hey, umm, is there any food left?" she was embarrassed to ask.

"Yes, it's over there." Vincent pointed to a small cooler.

Rikku walked over and grabbed herself some breakfast. She grabbed a long metal cooking fork and pushed it through the meat. She held the chilled food in the fire for a minute, turning it constantly before removing it from the flames and began eating.

Aeris rolled over in her sleep, her head fell from Sesshomaru's shoulder and hit the floor with a thud. Instantly she shot up, holding the spot that had hit the ground.

"OW, that hurt!" Aeris looked over to see if she had awoken Sesshomaru or anyone else. Vincent was staring into the fire curiously, Rikku was already eating, and Red XIII had started on what looked like a second bone. She breathed a sigh of relief and looked back at Sesshomaru, he was wide awake, His yellow eyes locked on her.

"Are you alright?" he asked her sincerely.

"Oh, don't you worry about me, I'm fine. Just little bump. It doesn't even hurt anymore." she blushed. Did I wake him up? He is a really light sleeper.

"Good morning, Sesshomaru!" Rikku waved at him smiling. She giggled and waved hello to Aeris as well. Aeris grabbed some food and walked over to the fire. She sat down next to Rikku who was still eating. Rikku whispered something into Aeris' ear and the two of them giggled and looked at Red XIII, who was now lying on his back waving his paws in the air.

Why do they insist on giggling like that?

Sesshomaru had become rather upset with this habit. It made him feel uncomfortable, like they were laughing at him. He knew that this wasn't true but he couldn't shake the feeling. They two females looked over at him and smiled, Aeris whispered into Rikku's ear this time, Rikku's eye's widened and then they both giggled again.

Sesshomaru walked over to Red XIII, who had stopped playing on the ground and was sitting next to the fire, and sat down next to him. He placed his hand on Red XIII's head and patted him softly between the ears. The two had become quick friends, Sesshomaru trusted him more then his servant Jaken. Red XIII was much more useful, he wasn't a coward, he was an extraordinary fighter, and was incredibly knowledgeable in both magic and about the world. However, the thing that Sesshomaru trust him so much was the fact that he was a dog. The two of them basically knew what the other was thinking at the same time.

"Okay, we're ready to go." Vincent said suddenly. He had packed everything and cleaned up there messes, save for the fire. It was like they weren't even there in the first place.

"But Sesshomaru hasn't had anything to eat yet." Rikku said protesting.

"I'll be fine. We should leave." He said getting up from the ground. He grabbed his swords and slid them under his belt.

"That's okay Sesshomaru, you can have mine. They say it's practically the same thing if you eat the same spot the other person did!" Rikku said in a very flirtatious voice.

"No, he won't! Sesshomaru will not be kissing you germs." Aeris was infuriated.

"Don't be angry, Aeris. After all we all know that I'm the cuter one here." Rikku said as she played with one of her braids.

"Oh really…" Sesshomaru cut Aeris off before she could start.

"I will not have any conflict inside this group. Is that understood?" Everyone nodded in agreement. "Now, make peace. I will not tolerate such childish bickering."

"I'm sorry Aeris." Rikku said blushing.

"No, I'm sorry Rikku. You are the cutest. However, I'm the most beautiful."

Rikku giggled at this comment and the group left the cave. With a quick blast of fire from Red XIII's mouth, the ice wall that he had created earlier to protect them from the storm melted away and left only a puddle behind. They walked out into the sunlight and winced as their eyes adjusted to the light.

Sesshomaru looked North to the Agit. He stared back at the two girls who were giggling and arguing over small unimportant subjects. This was going to be a long trip.