Chapter Three: Towards Mt. Gagazet

Yuna and I finally made it on board the huge airship. And when I say it was huge, it was huge. We were standing on the loading dock, which is clearly where they usually disembark and re-board whenever they land. The walls were all silver, and gleaming, as though freshly polished. Something about this airship seemed very familiar…like I had seen it before. Yuna walked towards a door which opened automatically. We were on the bridge.

The windows were huge. It was like watching a movie on a large flat screen television; only ten times larger! There were three seats in the pilots area; two of them were empty, while the other was occupied. Near the entrance to the bridge was a large computer system, which had many blinking lights and was being run by a small child…or what I thought to be a child.

"You sure looked like you were having fun," said Rikku cheerfully as Yuna and I emerged deeper onto the bridge.

Paine was standing a little was away, on the ramp that lead down to the pilots area. There was another man standing some feet away from her. I knew who he was. It was Brother, one of Yuna and Rikku's relatives from Final Fantasy X. Nothing had changed about him; He was stranger looking in person; the weird make up on his face made me think of a drag queen, but I kept my thoughts and opinions inside my head.

Yuna smiled. "I was. It felt like someone else's excitement just took over me," she said.

The little boy at the computer stood up on his chair, looking over towards us. "That can happen when you use the Garment Grid," he said, sounding ever so nerdy and geeky. He was wearing one of those weird gas masks and heavy clothing, as though he was going to walk on the moon. "The emotions of the person recorded in the sphere pass to the user," he continued.

Rikku scratched her head curiously. "Isn't that dangerous?"

"I can't say," the kid replied simply.

"What? It's your invention!" Rikku snapped.

The kid took a moment to respond then said "I'm just a kid," and turned around in his chair and resumed messing with the computer system. I couldn't help but laugh to myself.

Brother cleared his throat, as Yuna, Rikku and I walked down the ramp towards him.

"Dancing Yuna, I want to see!" he said, his Al Bhed accent thick, but I was shocked to see that he spoke clear English.

Yuna chuckled. "Alright, it'll cost you," she said.

Brother smiled. "Okay,"

He began rummaging through his pockets, as though looking for actual gil. Rikku and I laughed. Brother looked up at us. "What?"

"She was joking," Paine said shaking her head.

Suddenly, alarms began sounding at the same time. I couldn't help but jump slightly.

"Incoming data," said the man sitting in the chair on the far left. I had never seen him before. He was dark skinned, and was wearing the same outfit as brother (Sweat pants and a vest and shades).

"Ehlusehk tydy! Gullwings, du ouin cdydeuhc!" Brother screamed in Al Bhed as he jumped into the middle pilots' chair. I was guessing that was the main chair.

I leaned over towards Yuna. "I'm lacking in the Al Bhed department," I said.

Yuna smiled. "He's just received some data. He was just telling everyone to go to their stations,"

"Oh," I said. "I figured as much,"

"Come on, I'll need to give you a tour so your better prepared on things around here," she continued. She pointed to Brother. "That's—"

"Brother…yeah, I remember him," I said.

"Good," she said. She pointed to the man in the far left pilots' chair. "That's Buddy. I'm not sure if you know, but he was on Cid's airship two years ago when we were fighting Sin,"

Two years? Wow…so two years had gone by from the previous adventure?

"And that's Paine," she said. "I look up to her as a sphere hunter...and also as a friend. I still don't know her very well. She's not exactly the talkative type. I heard she joined the Gullwings shortly before I did... Rikku doesn't know much about her either," Yuna explained. I nodded, indicating I understood. Paine then looked at us.

"What?" she asked aggressively.

"Er…nothing," I said, leading Yuna away from her and back up the ramp. "She's kinda mean," I said in a whisper.

"Don't worry, she's harmless," she said as Rikku came running up behind us nearly scaring the crap out of me.

"Having fun?" she asked excitedly.

Yuna and I both nodded as Rikku walked away towards the computer the little kid was using.

Yuna turned to me. "It all began when I saw this sphere of him. At least, it looked like him," Yuna explained. I listened intently. "I couldn't say for sure. I thought I might find more spheres like it if I joined the Gullwings. So I did,"

A Sphere recording Tidus...It didn't sound out of the ordinary…in fact, it kept me guessing.

"Oh, in case you're wondering, the Gullwings are sphere hunters, and sphere hunters are, well... This! We fly all over Spira, collecting sphere's which can sometimes be recordings of the past, or special items and abilities,"

I nodded. "I'm starting to catch on," I said smiling. I looked at the little kid. "Who is that?"

"Oh, that's Shinra. He's an Al Bhed…he's a real whiz kid," Yuna explained. "He claims he knows everything,"

Shinra stood up in his chair, and looked over at me and Yuna.

"So, he's a new member?"

"Yeah! He's an awesome fighter!" said Rikku cheerfully. "Never seen someone use Black Magic the way he does…he may have Lulu beat," she laughed.

Trust me; I could become better than her if I wanted to…

"I'll have to create a Garment Grid for him. It won't take very long,"

"What's a Garment Grid?"

"It's a special grid I created. Much like the Sphere Grid, it's designed to harness special dress spheres all over Spira. These spheres once belonged to people of the past…it's a cool invention, only thought of with my brilliant mind," Shinra said.

Someone's getting a little ahead of themselves…

"Alright, hold still," Shinra said.

A beam of yellow light engulfed my body. It felt comforting. I began to feel some sort of unknown power running through me. The light disappeared, but the power still remained in me. I looked around at Shinra. "Did it work?"

"See for yourself,"

I looked down at my outfit. "Whoa!"

I was wearing a pair of black and gray pants, which resembled that of a person in the military. My shirt matched it, but there were all sorts of silver chains, and strings hanging from the outfit, that only enhanced how cool it looked. I was wearing black gloves, and my hair had turned spiky. (I saw this through my reflection on the mirror Yuna just held up in front of me). Even my eyes changed color; they were now a flaming red.

"This is so cool!" I said happily.

"That's the Black Mage Dress Sphere," Shinra explained. "Its up to you to enhance the powers you have, but you should get the hang of it very quick…As you guys find more spheres, you can switch off between other Dress Spheres, which let you use different attacks,"

I nodded.

"How do I return to normal?"

"Easy. Just think about Normal,"

I did as he said and thought about my old outfit. And then suddenly, a blue light engulfed me and when it disappeared, I was my old self again, in my normal clothing.

"So you're all set," Yuna said smiling. "You're officially a Gullwing!"

"Sphere wave analysis complete!" said Buddy from the computer he was operating in the pilots area.

"Where was it coming from?" Rikku asked, leaning over the railing.

Someone was going to have to decrease the amount of sugar she consumed…

"Mt Gagazet," Buddy said turning to her. "Yuna?"

Yuna smiled. "Gullwings! Move out!"

Little did I know that after this day, my life was going to change. It was hard for me to believe that I was here, but I was starting to see, like Tidus did, that this was my new reality, and I was stuck. There was no Sin to take me back home…I had to deal with this new reality.