Once we were all ready to go, we were on the road again. Just a short drive away from Caem, or a short ride in my case.
"So, you're the one doing all the cooking?" Iris asked as we entered a tunnel.
"More or less," Ignis responded casually.
"Gladio, don't you help?"
Gladio remained silent.
"Noct?" Iris seemed to be getting a bit annoyed.
"On occasion," Noctis responded hesitantly.
"What occasion?" Ignis asked.
"What about you, Gaia?" I shouldn't have jumped when Iris asked me, but it still caught me by surprise.
I laughed. "I have been banned from cooking."
"You burnt everything she tried to make," Noctis responded, "Of course, you're banned from the kitchen!"
"I do my part! I always set the table!" Prompto sounded so proud of himself.
Iris laughed. "That's some arrangement you guys have here."
Once we exited the tunnel, Gladio finally spoke. "This the place?"
"Sure is! Thanks again for the lift, Ignis," Iris responded.
"My pleasure," Ignis responded. He sounded like he was more focused on the road than anything else.
"You're welcome for giving you my seat," I joked.
"Hey, you agreed to it," Iris laughed.
The others pulled into a parking area and we made our way down the path ahead of us. I handed Prompto his phone as we walked. A woman was waiting ahead of us, one I didn't recognize. The others seemed quite familiar with her, however.
Her outfit was quite revealing. Not really my style, but to each their own, as they say. I didn't see a weapon on her. "I knew it was y'all! Recognize the purr of that engine anywhere!" Her accent was distinct, something I didn't recall hearing before.
"Who's this?" I whispered to Prompto.
"That's Cindy, she fixed the Regalia for us just after we left the Crown City," He whispered back.
"Oh, the lady you have a crush on," I teased, playfully elbowing him.
He rolled his eyes before running over to Cindy, "You know your stuff."
Iris ran off ahead, thanking us again for the ride.
"How's the boat?" Noctis asked as we began walking again.
"Paw-paw's tinkering away. Reckon he'll be tinkering for some time," Cindy responded. So her whole family is mechanics? Cool, I thought to myself.
"Trouble at sea?" Ignis asked.
"Seen her share by the looks of her. Some parts we can fix, others need replacin'."
"That doesn't sound good," I laughed awkwardly.
"Don't y'all worry. Paw-paw ain't going nowhere 'til the job's done. Parts won't fetch themselves, though. Was kinda hoping y'all wouldn't mind helping out with that?" She asked.
"We're at your disposal," Ignis responded.
Cindy continued talking about others that were helping out with repairing the boat. Turns out, they already did some of the running around for supplies. "Trouble is," she said, "they ain't had much luck finding a certain somethin' by the name of 'mythril'. Apparently, the stuff's hard to come by around these parts, at least according to the little fella from the city."
"Talcott?" Prompto asked with a smile.
"You betcha! Sharp as a tack, that one. Could tell y'all more about the stuff than I could."
"We'll be sure to ask," Noctis responded.
"Now that that's all cleared up, who's the new girl you got with you?" Cindy asked, motioning toward me.
"Oh! That's Gaia! She joined us in Lestallum," Prompto explained. Gladio just crossed his arms. "Er, she and Gladio had a bit of a falling out recently."
Cindy nodded slightly, smiling at me. "I see. Hopefully these boys aren't causing too much trouble for you otherwise."
"I'd say I'm the one causing trouble for them," I half-joked.
"Now, if y'all excuse me, I'm gonna grab my tools and skedaddle. Got a garage to look after," She said before walking back to the area where we parked the Regalia. We continued to the small house that was just up ahead, where Talcott was eagerly waiting for us. He seemed in much better spirits than the last time we saw him.
"I think Miss Cindy might've told you already, but she needs a special kind of ore called mythril to fix the boat," Talcott explained to Noctis. "Remember the waterfall? I read in Grandpa's notebook there's some ruins near a lake just north of there. It's said you'll find mythril inside!"
There's our next goal, I thought. Not the clearest of instructions, but at least it's something. "About that lake. Pretty sure he was talking about the Vesperpool," Iris chimed in. "I asked Monica to look into it, and she told me the road leading there's under imperial lockdown."
"Lovely," I huffed. "The journey can't be too easy, now can it?"
"Not with our luck," Prompto joked.
"You'll want to be prepared for anything. So how's that coming along?" Iris asked.
"Yeah, just give us a second," Gladio told her.
"Uh, okay? I'll be inside, then."
Gladio turned to Noctis. "Gonna have to ask you to handle this boat business without me," He stated.
"Say what?" Prompto asked.
"Seems kinda rude if you ask me, springing this on us without notice," I said gently.
"Well no one asked you, did they?" Gladio glared at me for a moment before returning his attention to Noctis. "Got some business of my own to deal with."
Noctis looked over at us for a moment before speaking, "Do your thing, not like we could stop you anyway."
"You know me too well," Gladio chuckled. "Well, see you around." With that, he just turned and left on whatever business he had.
"He's been cranky ever since that whole incident at the base," I huffed, sitting down on the stairs in front of the house. "Wish he'd just ease up on me."
Prompto sat down next to me. "I'm sure that's why he's heading out, to try to get some alone time and calm down?" He offered.
"Yeah, that could be it. Come on, we gotta make sure we're ready to head to the Vesperpool."
"Who says we have to rush there? Can't we just hang out for a couple days here and enjoy the view?" Prompto looked over at Noctis for confirmation.
"Yeah, that's not too bad of an idea. We have been doing a lot of running around recently," Noctis chuckled.
"However we still shouldn't ignore what needs to be done," Ignis added.
"Just a few days, Iggy, that's all. Make sure they don't need us to run and get any other materials for the boat on our way."
While Ignis went over what supplies we had, I started to zone out. I found myself focused on someone else in the distance. This time, it was someone only I was way too familiar with...
