Moon Says: So, another chapter! I know I, technically, was supposed to update WAR first, but I kind of already wrote that chapter (when I started my nightmare play through for DA: I). Anyway, here is another chapter! Next chapter I will definitely get through Bikanel Island as well as Beville. Worry not! I am hoping to get through the Calm Lands/Gagazet the next. I really want to finish this story. So maybe I will skip around a bit. Unimportant parts take up time and my energy, so yeah. I'm really looking forward to FFX-2.

Intervention

~Chapter 9~

We honestly didn't have long before my lover woke up and went back to her crazy shit, so when the others were spending so fucking long doing the reverse trail, it was understandable that I was getting a bit upset.

"It would help if the lot of you would go faster!" I almost growled, but kept my voice even.

Lulu spun around and glared at me. "If you would help, then it would go much faster. Or maybe if you used your special "chosen" powers," she said mockingly, "then we'd get out of here faster."

I looked at her unimpressed and kept on staring at her, hard, until she backed down. "One, don't be such a smart bitch, Lulu," her face was shocked as were the others that I almost laughed. "I am the only thing keeping Yuna alive, so watch it. Two, try to pay attention. The Chosen for this temple, this Aeon, is the woman who wants to kill Yuna. Thirdly," I said as I grabbed the sphere that was in her hand and threw it into the opposite wall, finally completing the bridge, "stop pissing me the fuck off or I may just leave you all to your own. Let's see you try to navigate this area without me as I think I know it better than you lot."

Everyone flinched as they heard exactly what I didn't say: there was also someone else who knew more about this area of Spira than they did, and she was coming after them.

As we exited the temple, I should have guessed that the damn Guado would be coming after us. They killed any that came to us, but the group had a little difficultly with the giant Wendigo that some of them summoned.

Wait...the Guado could summon fiends...that means that living near the Farplane has given them time to develop those kind of powers, and that explains exactly why a shit ton of fiends just popped up at the Blitzball game. And they all followed after that Seymour guy, so it makes sense that they did it on his others.

But why?

As soon as I asked myself the questioned, I remembered the looks he gave Yuna, the whispers in his house, the thing with the sphere memories...he was trying to prove himself to her. To show that he was strong enough. He was a Maester of Yevon, so there was no doubt in my mind he knew about Sin and the special Guardian/Summoner thing going on.

Yeah, he was wanting to become Sin, but why? The desire must have been strong enough for him to have killed his father...his father that couldn't protect him or his mother. This was either about him wanting power to never be hurt again or he wanted to protect other people. If it was the latter, with him being Sin...he was probably going to kill everyone so they could be saved.

He was one of those kind of protectors.

Just what I fucking needed.

I wasn't in the mood to watch those idiots flounder around until they got lucky, so I gripped my sword, channeled my energy and magic into it, and used one of my girl's favorite moves. I sliced the air and angled it so my attack would cut the fucker's head off.

Once he was dead, I ignored the others. Especially when I turned around back to the temple. She had woken up and was coming toward us.

I mentioned them to start making their way back to the forest, but then another power made itself known to me.

"Shit," I cursed as I looked toward the actually water to the west of the main island and back at the temple.

"What is coming?" Auron demanded to know as he took a closer position to Yuna.

"Well, good news is that my Summoner probably won't kill us when she gets here soon. Bad news, Sin probably will," I informed him as I tried to figure out if either was good or bad news.

The others didn't do anything, Wakka cursed though, but every one of them looked to me for guidance.

I was going to kill them. All I ever did when I took charge was made things worse. Bikanel Island, the thing in Bevelle that destroyed us, and every other fuck up in my life all stem from when I'm the one in charge.

It was so much easy to lead others together, to be equal with others, or just let my love take up the leader role (even if left her feeling hollow sometimes).

I was a selfish bastard when it came to that.

I hated it when people look to me to save them.

Because I don't know what to do. It's always been her. It's always her that saves me...

Rikku took me from my thoughts when she tugged on my arm. "Why did Shiki onee-chan try and kill Yuna? I know there were times she didn't like her, but I didn't think she hated her..."

I could only sigh at her innocence.

"It..." fuck I couldn't even find the words to tell this girl who idolized my lover what had actually happened.

What could I say? A thousand years ago the two of us fucked up with her sister, helped destory all of us, and now Yuna seems to be her sister reborn, and my girl struggles to separate the two?

Fuck it, Rikku and the others needed to hear something, and I knew by the time we got to Zanarkand that everything would be revealed. All our dirty secrets would come out.

"There is a lot of history between the two of us and...Shiki's sister. Yuna looks just like her, acts like she did before she became someone we didn't recognize. In the end, her jealousy almost got us all killed. And Spira...and Spira has suffered since, all because we tried to protect her and destroyed her in the process."

They said nothing before Yuna spoke. "Shiki-sama was broken by her sister's betrayal, wasn't she?"

I sighed as I looked back to the temple. "All she wanted to do was protect her sister, and in the end, they tore each other apart. Shiki does what she does, here and now, as a way to..." I couldn't find the words, but Wakka did.

"She failed her sister, and now she's trying to save others to make up for it. But she can't get over what happened, can she? She can't get closure with her sister, and it's eating her away inside."

Wakka was surprising insightful, and it was the look on his face that reminded me what he told me before...he experienced something similar with his brother.

I nodded and sighed again. "It seems that seeing Yuna is causing everything she had, everything that grounded her and kept her sane, to be stripped away. She doesn't know what to do; her world is falling apart, and she's lashing out. She's not completely out of control, though, otherwise Yuna would have died back in the temple. My girl was holding herself back, and if she hadn't, I wouldn't have been able to stop her."

Even Lulu was moved by our explaining of Emma. And, damn, was it hard to call her Shiki.

No one said anything else because my love, apparently, came out of the ice wall near us. We were still where the damn Wendigo had attacked, right near where the path from the temple stopped. And we needed to move, but where would we go? Sin was coming, if he wasn't already here, and there was no way we would make it to the forest before that damn thing attacked.

When she came out, no one breathed. Yuna tried to make herself small, but Emma wasn't even looking at her.

Her eyes were just for me, and they were worried.

When she got to me, I wrapped my arms around her as she whispered, "He's coming."

I gritted my teeth before nodded, "I know. And we can't run."

I held her closer as he buried her head in my chest, shaking so bad.

She was afraid to be near Sin, and I wondered why. The only beings that should fear being near Sin, from being absorbed, were the Fayth—or the Guardians who became the Fayths.

Before I could go beyond that thought the ice beneath us started to shake.

"Sin's here," Auron informed the party while I felt my Emma begin to hardened herself.

When Sin did strike, I had felt the buildup of magic from her. She pushed me toward Rikku, who I grabbed out of instinct (otherwise I would have fallen ontop of her). I felt the protection spell, a barrier of sorts, cover us right before the ice broke, and we all fell.

~Tidus~

When I woke, I took in my surrounds as quickly as my mind would let me.

I had Rikku curled in my arms, my body shielded hers from the fall. As I carefully sat up, I noticed all the others were up and ok.

Yuna was the nearest to us, "Are the two of you okay? Do you need healing?"

Rikku shook her head as she tested out her limbs. "Shiki onee-chan protected us," then she paused and started looking around with me, "Where is she?"

Yuna hesitated, "We haven't seen her."

I was up before I could blink, searching for the link between us. It was faint, which meant she was unconscious, hurt, or both. I followed the thread to a section of the sunken, frozen city behind me—the opposite direction of the others.

I didn't walk long before I saw her, bleeding as a piece of debris was sticking out of her leg and side.

I ran to her and checked her first, she was still breathing, before looking at the pieces of stone and wood sticking out of my love. I tried to remember what she had taught me about ripping stuff out of people—when to do it and when not to.

"She's bleeding! Can I heal her?" I heard Yuna behind me ask hesitantly.

"No," I said flatly, before I said to hell with it, and yanked both things out of her.

Emma's eyes shot open as she silently screamed, but no sound escaped her mouth.

She had been through worse before.

We both had.

Instead, she immediately took a look at herself, but before she could really, I had already started to try and channel magic to heal her. I was shit at it, but I did the job.

She rolled her eyes at me while I did it, and when I was done, she gritted her teeth and stood. It was a makeshift healing, we both knew, so she would have to take it easy until she was strong enough to do the healing herself.

"That's it, baby," I grinned as she stood and worked out to see if there was any damage left. "Admire my skills."

Emma actually paused and blinked a few times before she turned to me, an eyebrow raised. "Was that some sort of sexual...thing?"

I smirked, "I don't know, was it?"

Wakka and Auron tried not to laugh, but a snort escaped them both. The girls were a bit wary, but they looked at her concerned.

Emma tested out her limbs and after a few seconds, declared herself okay. But her okay was never the same as mine. I knew she was still somewhat injured, and it wouldn't take much to reopen her wounds again. But I couldn't do anything about it but watch out for her, so when she was done checking herself out, she started looking around and sighed sadly as she took in where we were.

"So, I'm guessing from the sad look, you know where we are? Why is there a city froze underneath the ice lake?" Wakka asked, and when Emma looked him over, she saw he was serious. "Is it true that the Fayth keeps it frozen?"

Lulu said nothing, but I saw in her eyes that while she was impressed with Wakka for what he just did, she also had that look that said she knew better than everyone else.

I started the conversation though. "Before there was an Ice Temple or a Frozen Aeon, long before Zanarkand fell, this area was not covered in ice. Instead, it was one of the greatest cities in Spira. In fact, it had a great alliance with Kilika, one that would have ended with a marriage between what is now the Fayth of that Island."

Rikku's eyes bugged as she took that in. "Wait, the Fire Fayth and the Ice Fayth were in love?"

I shared a look with Emma, and we both shrugged, "It's a bit complicated. He was in love with her, and she was getting there, but before she could put a name to her feelings," Emma continued, "There was a group that didn't want the two to merge. You have to understand, the Fayth here lived and breathed for her people, and the alliance with Kilika is what was needed. The group that wanted to stop them from uniting their people were bandits in a sense, a weed that no one could kill off completely. They had a strategic position on Bikanel Island and had for the past few decades had made attacks to both cities and a few others long this side of Spira. This alliance would have put a stop to them. The Frozen Fayth had a secret no one knew except her closest friend—though we don't know their exact relationship, but she was betrayed by this person."

"What was the secret that kept her from committing to the alliance?" Lulu asked, and it seemed she was quite into it.

Emma hesitated before she continued on, "She had a child. Even I don't if it was a child by blood or if the child was adopted, but the bandits snuck in with the help of the betrayer and killed the child—who was her entire life. The betrayer was devastated that the child was murdered as that was not the outcome she thought would happen, but not as much as the Fayth. The Fayth may have dedicated her life to her city, but her heart and soul was the child. And when that child died, she couldn't function. It didn't help that she was betrayed either by someone she trusted absolutely. The pain became too much and vengeance struck her soul. The bandits thought it was a good time to take over the city while she was out of it, but when they got there, she attacked them, making them regretting even coming near the city that became their graves."

Emma stopped her story and turned to touch the building ruin beside her, lost in thought.

I continued on, "In case you didn't look at the lake when it was still intact, it was connected to the ocean to the west. Except there was a wall between it. It didn't use to be a lake, instead the city laid inside the basin. The wall," I said as I pointed to my far left—we were in the center of the lake, of where the city used to be, "was quite high and connected to the ocean, but it never went into the basin. Magic—it was magic that kept it the water out, but whatever it was, water never went past the wall. When the invaders were deep in the basin," I paused as I tried to get the memories and my words to match up, "She flooded the basin, and before they could drown, she let lose all of her magic and the entire area froze. She died, her last act saving and destroying her city."

"But her life didn't end there," Emma cut back in. "She spent her entire life dedicated to that city that such devolution of duty was ingrained in her soul. So, just as she saved and destroyed at the same time, she was punished and rewarded with a new purpose in life: she was bound into the servitude life of a Fayth."

With that, Emma turned her back on them and started to make her way to the side of the basin that connected with the Ocean.

"How does one become a Fayth?" Wakka questioned.

"Who makes the Fayth?" Rikku asked.

Honestly, I didn't know so I shrugged. Emma, though, turned around to give them a dark look. "You do not want to know."

~Tidus~

Emma guided us up the stairs that lined the wall, and once we got to the top, we were on top of the wall that divided the ocean from Macalania Basin.

"It's beautiful," Yuna whispered as she looked between the fractured Ice Lake, and the city ruins below, as well as the ocean.

Emma chuckled darkly, "Yes, there is a certain beauty in death, isn't there?" the last part she whispered to herself as her eyes were solely on the ruined lake and city.

As I looked back toward the lake, city, and the temple that was underneath the mountainside, I saw the child again.

A child that looked so familiar, but I couldn't place him.

He looked at me and whispered so, no doubt, Emma couldn't hear him, "He's coming back. We had...have to do something," the tone in his voice was somehow apologizing and begging forgiveness, but it had a tint of "we have no choice" to it as well.

Then he was gone and we heard the sound. I didn't even look to the ocean. The others freaked out, but Emma and I just left our backs to him. I did focus on her, gave her a small bittersweet smile as I reached for her.

Only for that light to hit me again just as I touched her fingers with mine, and the black took me again.

Damn Sin.

Damn my father.

Damn the Fayth.

Damn them all.