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Quick author's note: Let me explain Napaj a little bit. He's not a self insertion, he's not in the game… I just made him up. His name is Japan spelled backwards (my little brother thought of that). The J at the end of his name is pronounced like the J in the word "rajah." Or like when you say the French word, "Fromage (which I think means cheese)." I decided to make him Gippal's younger brother. He's your typical Al Bhed male: spiky blond hair, swirly green eyes, tall, thin, mechanically inclined. Erm… His clothes are… Al Bhed-ish? I have no idea.

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CHAPTER TWO:

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Napaj found that he DID mind. He never thought Rikku and Brother could be so incredibly messy. He especially hated doing Brother's laundry.

First, he had to venture into Brother's room, with was a challenge in itself. So much stuff was strewn all over the room and floor that the junk usually blocked the door. And once inside, he was always walloped with the suffocating smell; the reek of Brother, his room, his belongings, and his cheap cologne mingled in a horrible way, never failing to bring stinging tears to Napaj's eyes.

He shuddered as he picked up the laundry, piece by piece, with some needle-nose pliers. No way he was touching that rancid stuff with his hands. He wondered if he should wear a protective mask and suit next time.

Napaj's eyes fell on a pair of those weird pants Brother wore. Something in the pocket had moved. Napaj didn't even want to know… He shuddered with nausea, hurrying to leave the room.

Rikku wouldn't let Napaj do her laundry. She claimed he'd fondle her undergarments the first chance he got. However, she did make him clean the bathrooms and all of the Celsius' floors and walls. He also had to clean the kitchen. This was a scary task, because Rikku liked to try her hand at cooking. Food splattered everywhere. Every time. Once, he even had to scrape marinara sauce from the ceiling. The ceiling. Was it even possible to be so messy?

Since then, he realized Rikku was purposely making messes for him to clean up. 'She wants me gone,' Napaj thought. 'She wants me outta her life and offa her airship. That brat! I'll show her. I can take anything she dishes out.'

Except for Rikku, Napaj got along with all of the other Gullwings. Especially Yuna. Their friendly conversations they had, sitting at the Celsius' breakfast bar, led to the story of how Yuna and her guardians had rebelled against the Yevon-obsessed society. They had seen the reality of the lie that they had all lived and changed their goals. Not to defeat Sin for a little while, but to eradicate him, to end his existence forever.

Napaj found the firsthand story fasinating. Sure, the Al Bheds had left the doctrines of Yevon like Yuna had, but Yuna and her friends had gone further, actively fighting against Yevon's head himself. Rebelling against Maester Seymour Guado.

When the conversation reached Seymour, Yuna spoke with spirited anger. Never seeing her so fiery before, Napaj was quietly amused. So the High Summoner had a temper! He never would have guessed from looking at her.

"Seymour killed his own father! My guardians and I saw the sphere that showed Seymour's private glee and little confession to himself! He was supposed to be the righteous leader of Yevon! And that's another thing! He used Yevon to manipulate the masses and get them to do anything he said! Those innocent-minded people! He was trusted! Trusted by all different races and by his own people! He used them all, even the Guado. The very ones he shared blood with. He also tried to marry me to raise his own personal status and reputation! Can you believe him!?!"

'So that's why she's so angry,' thought Napaj. 'The marriage thing made it personal.'

Napaj said, "That's crazy."

Yuna wasn't done ranting. Color flushed to her cheeks and a fire was alive in her blue and green eyes.

"And he wouldn't stop there! He wanted all the power in the universe! He wanted to become Sin. He wanted to continue Spira's endless cycle of misery, suffering, and death. He wanted to become Sin so he could kill everybody! All for power! He wanted to be Sin!!" she repeated for emphasis.

"Sick-minded freak."

"And is was going to be married to him! I thank my aeons. It was their powers that helped me leave that… that monster." Yuna gave an angry sigh.

Napaj looked at Yuna a bit harder. He saw that talking about Seymour had put her in a furious mood. She was angry at the memory of Seymour. Well, not anymore. She was angry at Seymour himself now, since, for some reason, he was back from the dead.

"Yuna, how is he back anyway? It's impossible.

"It is possible…For one thing, he is definitely dead. He must be holding some powerful grudge or something, because his soul isn't at rest in the Farplane."

"Would sending him work?"

"I did send him, right after me and my guardians beat him. …But, maybe he's like his father, Lord Jyscal. Jyscal was sent and everything, yet still managed to leave the farplane, twice."

"How did he manage to come back?

"He felt guilt so strong, his soul managed to materialize with pyreflies. He wanted justice for himself and his son."

"Nothing else can bring back a soul?"

"Summoner's magic might. But there aren't summoners anymore."

Napaj grinned and looked at her pointedly.

"I'm not even a summoner anymore. The temples have no power anymore. There are no aeons, no pilgrimages, and no Sin."

The speakers suddenly blared with Brother's voice. "Gullwings, du dra pnetka! Fa ryja vuiht y cbrana!"

Yuna looked at Napaj. "What did he say?"

"They've found a sphere. We gotta go to the bridge."

Yuna giggled. "You'd think I would have picked up some Al Bhed by now, seeing as I travel with four Al Bheds."

"Hey, don't forget about me!"

"Five Al Bheds."

Buy the time the two made it to the bridge, Brother was practically jumping with excitement.

"There's a sphere in Macalania woods!"

Buddy cut in. "Shinra just upgraded the sphere wave detector, and it found this sphere. The waves are different, though. Unlike anything we've ever seen before."

Paine's uninterested voice said, "Well, are we going or not?"

Brother and Buddy sat in their seats to fly the airship.

Yuna smiled excitedly at Napaj. "You're new, so this is how it works. All spheres are fair game!"

"Takers, keepers!" Rikku squealed. Yuna and Rikku hopped around.

Paine gestured at the two. "Here you see the proud Gullwings in action. No better than 5-year olds who've had too much sugar."

"Hey!"

"That's not true!"

Paine shrugged. Napaj smartly kept his mouth shut, but Rikku whapped the back of his head for good measure.

"What was that for?!"

"You were laughing on the inside! I could see it in your eyes, jerk!"

"I didn't know you made a habit of staring into my eyes. Like what you see?" He widened his swirly green eyes at her, staring.

"Ewww, heck no! Stop staring at me! I'm gonna have nightmares!"

And thus they passed their time until they reached Macalania. Which, thankfully for Napaj's patience, only took a few minutes. The speed of the Celsius was amazing.

The Celsius swung low over the edge of the woods, and YRP (plus one) jumped out.

"OW!" Rikku landed on Napaj.

"Get offa me, Freak-ku!"

Napaj stood up and looked at the forest. He was in awe.

Shining blue crystals crowded thickly on the ground under the trees. After looking a while longer, he realized that those towering structures weren't trees, but giant crystals.

A blue butterfly fluttered lazily past his head as they walked into the forest. It landed ahead of them, on the razor-sharp edge of a crystal. It gave the illusion of multiplying into more butterflies, as its image reflected off the shining faces of nearby crystals.

"Ysywehk… (amazing)" he breathed, utterly entranced.

Rikku scoffed, "You're such a newbie."

"Of course I am! I only came to the mainland for summoner-liberation missions. This is the first time I've really been out of Bikanel! What am I supposed to be, a seasoned veteran?"

"Well, closing your mouth would be a good start. You're gonna swallow a fly. … On second thought, keep it open," Rikku snickered.

Napaj sighed, exasperated. "What is your problem, you little brat? What did I ever do to you?"

Rikku pouted. "At breakfast this morning, you ate the last pancake."

"So that gives you free license to torture me or what?! I am so SICK of hearing your whiny voice."

"I hope that last pancake goes straight to your hips! Then you won't be able to fit into your pants anymore!"

"I hope you lose your shoe!"

Rikku gasped. "You did NOT just say that!"

"Did I? Oh yeah, I did."

Paine raised an eyebrow at Yuna. The look said, "Lose a shoe? What the heck is that supposed to mean?"

Yuna shrugged, which said, "I dunno." Actually, in the Al Bhed culture, to tell someone to 'lose a shoe' was a great insult. Walking in the desert, if an Al Bhed lost one or both shoes, their feet would be burned and sore from walking on the hot sand. They wouldn't be able to walk for weeks. Going into the desert without strong shoes was seen as the height of stupidity in the Al Bhed culture.

So basically, Napaj was calling her really stupid and wishing her pain and humiliation.

Napaj and Rikku were beginning to argue in Al Bhed. After about a minute, Yuna and Paine, without a word, turned and began to walk away. There was a sphere to find, after all.

"…Hey, where'd they go? Yunie? Paine?"

Napaj glared at Rikku. "Way to go, brat. Now look – they're gone."

"How is the my fault?"

"You always wanna argue with me."

"It's cuz you're such an idiot, I can't help it." She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Call your brother. He'll tell us where they went."

"No." Rikku crossed her arms and began walking along the path.

Napaj fell into step beside her. "Why not?"

"He'll laugh at me. Big brothers are like that, you know."

Napaj most certainly knew. Being Gippal's younger brother, he knew fully well how older brothers were. While Gippal got to go to the mainland and work on machina, Napaj was stuck with digging duty. And when Napaj had finally got to be on a summoner-liberation mission, it was so unexciting that Napaj never signed up for one again, even though it offered a chance to see the mainland.

Gippal had his Machine Faction fame. "Gippal" was a household name, even. Girls flocked to him, attracted by his fame and personality. Laid back, always smooth, always calm. Serious when the situation called for it.

What did Napaj have? Supervision over a piece of sand. Sand in his socks. Hand-me-down machina. And now, he only had one girl nearby, and she wasn't even "flocking" to him, like girls did to Gippal.

Instead, the girl was ignoring him, walking aimlessly through the twisted paths of the crystal forest. Napaj had to keep close. The light was blue and dim, and reflections on the crystals gave the illusion that you were being followed by duplicates of yourself.

Napaj spoke up. "Hey, you've been here before. Don't you know where to go?"

"…Yes. If we turn around this corner, we should be at the spring."

It was a dead end. A thick wall made of clusters of crystals sparkled at them, teasing them with reflections of their own faces.

"Uh-huh. Looks like a spring to me."

"Shut up."

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Yuna and Paine were just as hopelessly lost. Over the radios, Brother kept telling them "It's North of you," when all that was North was an impassable wall of crystal. Later, when he said, "It's to the West," Yuna had almost stepped off a hidden cliff into a ravine. Paine then turned the radios off after telling Brother to shut up.

After walking a while, they heard a shout for help. Running towards the sound, they saw an old guado on the ground, about to be gored by a giant wasp.

With a quick potshot, the wasp fell to the ground, twitching, then disappearing in a flutter of pyreflies.

Yuna approached the old man on the ground, her kind heart winning over her dislike of Guado.

The man took her hand as she helped him up. His sad, wrinkled eyes met her multicolored ones.

"Lady Yuna, my dearest thanks."

"Tromell!" Yuna stumbled back in shock. She aimed her pistol at his head.

"Pull the trigger," Tromell said softly. "It's the least I deserve for serving a monster like Lord Seymour."

Yuna felt a lot of indecision. A summoner's duty was to protect life, not to kill.

"Last time I saw you, you ordered the Guado soldiers on me. You ordered them to kill me."

"Something I regret deeply."

With shaking hands, Yuna lowered her gun. She knew she could never shoot a person.

"What are you doing here, Tromell?"

"We were driven out," said Tromell, gravely. "The remnants of the Crusaders and the Ronso made sure not a single one of us was left in Guadosalam."

"I'm sorry to say I agree with them," said Paine.

Tromell lowered his head. "We Guado made things so difficult for you, Lady Yuna. I apologize on the behalf of my people. And I sincerely hope you can forgive me."

"Don't try anything like that ever again. I had my guardians before—they protected me. Now, I'm fully capable to take care of myself."

Tromell chuckled, surprising Yuna. "I can tell. My heart nearly stopped when you aimed your weapon at me. You have a fiery spirit in you. If I may be permitted to say, I think that was what attracted Lord Seymour to you."

Yuna glowered at the mention of his name.

"…Forgive me, Lady Yuna. I shouldn't have said anything about him."

Paine sensed that her friend was upset, and growled, "You know what I say, Yuna? I say we leave him here. He's bony, but he'll be a good enough meal for the monsters."

"No," Yuna said firmly. "Tromell, I have some questions for you."

Tromell said earnestly, "I will do all in my power to answer you questions to the best of my ability, Lady Yuna."

"OK." Yuna holstered her pistol, and poked the side of a nearby crystal. "Tell me about the magical properties of this crystal material…"

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Another A/N: Ahh, it feels nice to pick up on an old, un-updated story. Thanks to my two reviewers, Lovely Dork and Linkkinparkk, for getting me off my butt to continue this story. I made an outline of the entire story's main events, to encourage me further. I also changed the name to what it was originally: Unleashed Streams of Recollection, which I think is kind of poetic. While Napaj's name, as I explained at the beginning, has no meaning, the title does.

To my embarrassment, I reread the first chapter. From the descriptions, the escape vehicle seems to morph between a dune buggy, a van with a storage area, and something with a big cockpit that people can stand up in. I have no idea what I was thinking when I wrote about the vehicle. I say now that you should picture it as a small, single level bus with off-road tires. You can stand in a small bus, and it's big enough to have a storage area.