30 Breath of Life
Late in the afternoon the next day, we met up with the two Ronso who Kimahri had the bar fight with back in Luca. The larger bellowed, "Look! Kimahri follows summer on all fours! Hornless goatling!" "Hornless!" The smaller one echoed. Kimahri stood as tall as his frame would allow. "You come to insult Kimahri." "Wrong. We come to warn little Kimahri." The smaller one got in Kimahri's face. "Summoners disappear. Never return. Next will be Kimahri's summoner!"
The larger one laughed. "Poor Kimahri! Lost his horn, next lose his summoner! Pitiful Kimahri!" They laughed and ran away down the path. We all felt a little uncomfortable, I think, and also somewhat concerned about me disappearing. I hoped it wasn't true." "Do those two got something against you?" Tidus asked Kimahri. Kimahri shook his head. "Kimahri deal with them. Kimahri alone." "Can we help?" Tidus asked. Once again, Kimahri shook his head. "We can't interfere in Ronso affairs. It's a rule." Wakka said.
Lulu rested her head on her fist. "I'm worried. About the summoners that disappearing." Auron replied using a low, almost threatening tone. "They aren't just disappearing into thin air." Tidus brushed it off. "It's gonna be fine. As long as we guardians do our job, no problem, right?" Wakka said, "Whoa." Lulu drew her head back. "Confident." Tidus tilted his head up a bit. "Yeah!" He said, as if it was obvious. The corner of my mouth tilted up. He was definitely cocky. I liked that, even though I knew it would be difficult, when the time for him to know the truth about "the end" finally arrived. Until then, we would let his ignorance be as blissful as possible in this fallen world. No one responded to him.
Another week passed. I knew we would soon reach out next milestone when pyreflies became abundant, flying around in the open sky. "There sure are a lot of pyreflies." Tidus said. "Is that bad?" I shook my head. "It's not bad. You'll see where they come from, soon enough." At about noon the next day, we came upon a huge river, nearly a mile wide. It was a rather pretty sight. The water was very clear and near the shore where the water was calm, lilies floated. There were many pyreflies wandering around. Tidus took in a breath. "This is the Moonflow." Said Lulu. "They say that clouds of millions of pyreflies gather here when night falls." Wakka sounded a bit in awed at the thought. I added, "The entire river glows like a sea of stars. I've seen it. It's really beautiful."
A large smile grew on Tidus' face. "Hey, I got an idea!" Auron cut him off. "We're not waiting until nightfall." Tidus' smile dropped off his face and he pouted. Then he brightened again. "Well then, once we beat Sin, we're coming back!" Everyone grew somber. Tidus looked around. "Did...I say something wrong?" Lulu shook her head. "Let's just get going." Tidus gave me a confused glance, and all I could give him was a forced smile. "Yeah. We need to get to the shoopuf." Wakka stated. "Shoopuf? Is that some kind of boat?" Tidus asked, moving on to the next subject without realizing the pain he had brought up.
Wakka pointed ahead. "Whoa..." A shoopuf is an absolutely massive creature with a body like the elephants that were said to live in the more dry part of the Calm Lands. On top of the shoopuf was strapped a cabin for passengers. "Let's ride!" Tidus said enthusiastically. "Well, first, we will stock up on supplies." Auron said, approaching the nearby shop. Tidus followed Auron.
Auron looked back at me. "Ten years ago," I interrupted. "A history lesson?" I complained. Auron ignore me. "Jecht saw his first shoopuf here, like you. He was startled, so he drew his blade and struck it." Why?" I said degradingly. "He was drunk. Thought it was a fiend."
I thought back to all those drunken nights I had to put up with. "Oh, brother." I grumbled. "We offered all the money we had as an apology. Jecht never drank again." I smirked disparagingly. "Figures it would take something like that to get him to quit. Losing all his money. He did always love money." With that, I left Auron to his shopping, and went over to Yuna.
Yuna smiled. "I haven't ridden a shoopuf in so long!" She said happily. "So you've been on one of these?" I asked. "Yes, ten years ago with Kimarhi when he was taking me to Besaid. Remember Kimahri?" Kimahri scowled. "Shoopuf shook, Yuna fall in water. Shoopuf scoop up Yuna with long nose. Yuna jump in three more times for fun. Kimahri worried." Yuna giggled at Kimahri's annoyance. "Sorry, Kimahri." Kimahri gave a tiny attempt at a smile. "Yuna had fun, so Kimahri happy." Yuna said, "I lived in Bevelle until my father defeated Sin. I moved to Besaid with Kimahri after that." "Where is Bevelle?" I asked.
"Bevelle is the biggest city in Spira. The main temple of Yevon is there, as well as the strongest known aeon. Anyway, come on! Let's get on the shoopuf!" Yuna walked off, but Kimahri stopped me. "Biran is troublemaker, but Ronso not lie. Summoner's disappearing, that was not lie." He said gravely.
Lulu and Auron finished their shopping, so we boarded the shoopuf. Yuna was actually excited. Some of that rubbed off on me, and I couldn't help but smile. Weeks had passed since Operation Mi'ihen, and the emotional pain had begun to subside, but I still had nightmares about killing the Al Bhed.
I tried though to enjoy the journey as much as I could. Being with Yuna made it a lot easier.
I had to admit that I was growing really close to her. I really enjoyed talking with her. She was such a strong girl. She really liked that I was a blitzer from Zanarkand, but she was the first girl my age that I had ever met in my life, who didn't swoon over me. Literally. I didn't get a girlfriend back in Zanarkand cause not one girl liked me for who I was, just for what I was, or the way I looked. I smirked to myself. Those girls had made it very, very clear to me that I was anything but hard on the eyes.
We all reclined in the comfortable open air cabin on top of the huge beast. There was a long couch-like bench that went all the way around the cabin, so all of us had room to sit. After we were a ways out into the river, Wakka said to me, "Hey. Take a look in the water." I turned around and gazed into it. I was surprised to see a ruinous city beneath us. "Whoa! A sunken city." "Yeah. A machina city. A thousand years old. They built the city on top of bridges across the river." Wakka said. Lulu broke in. "The weight of the city caused the bridges to collapse, and it all sank to the bottom." "Right. It's a good lesson." Wakka added. I was confused.
"How is it a lesson?" "Why build a city over a river?" Wakka questioned with a bit of scorn in his voice. I fumbled for an answer. "Um...well, it would be convenient with all the water there." Wakka shook his head. "Nope. That's not why. They just wanted to prove that they could defy the laws of nature." I didn't understand such logic. "Uh...I'm not so sure about that..."
"Yevon has taught us. When humans have power, they seek to use it. If you don't stop them, they go too far." Lulu explained to me. I was still confused. I saw people using machina around Spira, not just the crusaders and Al Bhed...in fact, the sphere pool is technically machina. "Don't you use machina, too?"
Lulu continued. "Yevon decides which machina we may use, and which we may not." I felt like this whole Yevon no machina control freak thing was out of hand. "So, which machina may we not use?" I said with just a hint of mockery in my voice. "Watch your tone." Wakka cautioned. "Remember Operation Mi'ihen? That kind." Lulu repeated the warning taught to every person in Spira. "If we use that kind of machina, war will rage again." Yuna finally spoke up. "More than a thousand years ago, mankind waged war using machina to kill." Wakka rudely interrupted his summoner.
"They kept building more and more powerful machina. They were so stupid! They made weapons so powerful that people said they could destroy the whole world." When Wakka paused, Yuna started speaking again. "The people feared that Spira would be destroyed, but they didn't stop the war. Then, Sin came. It destroyed the cities and their machina."
"The war ended. And our reward was Sin." Lulu said in a hushed tone. "So Sin's our punishment for them lettin' things get out of hand." Wakka said bitterly. "Man...that's rough." I whispered.
I just didn't understand why everything was so terrible and complicated in this crazy world. "But it's not like the machina are bad..." I trailed off. "Only as bad as their users." Wakka replied mournfully. "It's all because of people like the Al Bhed, screwin' everything up!" He spat. Suddenly the shoopuf faltered. We all simultaneously stood up to look to see what was going on, except for Auron. "Sit down!" He commanded. Before we could sit, an Al Bhed climbed onto the edge of the cabin and pulled Yuna over the railing. She vanished so quickly that she didn't even have time to scream. I barely missed a beat, diving overboard after her, with Wakka not far behind. I searched around me, now very thankful for the water being so clear. Soon I saw in the depths a large cage-like object.
I watched the Al Bhed shove Yuna into the cage and use a tool to quickly bolt it. The machine holding the cage began to move upward, but suddenly it malfunctioned and a burst of flames exploded from the cabin, but they were instantly extinguished. The machina began to sink, and I swam towards it as fast as I could.
As it sank deeper, I fought with the bolts while we descended into the darker part of the deep river.
I cut my finger on one of the bolts, but I kept working to unscrew it, the pain being practically nothing compared to some of what I had gone through in the last few months.
Wakka worked beside me, but we couldn't go fast enough. Yuna grabbed the bars and looked at me, panicked. She was shaking, her cheeks puffed out as she struggled not to take in the breath that she so desperately needed.
Then she let out a cry, bubbles of air escaping her mouth. She shut it, trying to keep from gasping in water. Almost without thinking, I reached through the bars, grabbed the back of her head with one hand and plugged her nose with the other. I pulled her towards me, smashing our lips together and breathing into her mouth. After checking to make sure she was okay, I returned to the bolts, going even faster than before.
I was a bit embarrassed, seeing as that was the first time my lips had ever met with someone else's. I didn't consider it my first kiss, or even a kiss at all though, because it wasn't romantic. All it was was a guardian protecting his summoner. Despite her extra breath, I knew she wouldn't last much longer, and I didn't have any more air in my lungs to give her. I would be just fine though, I could spend several hours down here without going up for a breath.
When the last bolt finally popped off, the spring-loaded bar section violently swung down catching Wakka beneath its weight. It pinned him to the bottom of the river. I knew it was summoners before guardians, so took Yuna around the waist and dragged her to the surface. Before I reached it, she couldn't fight her natural reflexes any longer. She sucked in a huge amount of water, convulsing in my arms as she coughed and inhaled even more water. Soon, she stopped moving, signaling her looming death.
I knew I could save her, though, so I wan't too concerned. I rushed to pull her aboard the shoopuf. When I got her on floor of the cabin, her guardians surrounded us as I began to pump her chest and then pause for a moment to give her a breath into her mouth. I only started getting really worried after about a minute with no response. Finally, she coughed the water up, gasping in the much needed oxygen.
Lulu leaned down to help her sit up and began to smooth her hair and ask her questions. "Are you okay? Did that Al Bhed hurt you?" Just then Wakka climbed on board, but hardly any attention was paid him, we were all to concerned for Yuna. "Yuna! You okay?" She nodded and let out a small cough. "The Al Bhed didn't hurt me, and yes, I'm okay now. Thank you, Tidus." She gave me a lingering look, smiling faintly. "It was nothing." I said. Then I thought about what I had just said. 'It was nothing.' How could I say that? I had just saved her life. I didn't bother to correct myself, because I thought that if I tried, it might just come out wrong.
"Grrah! Those Al Bhed!" Wakka growled. "Damn them! What do they want from us?! Could it have something to do with Luca? What are they after Yuna for? Wait! Maybe they're mad about operation Mi'ihen!" Wakka went on. I cringed. I hoped that they weren't trying to take revenge for me killing one of them. "Didn't Kimahri's clansmen say something about summoners disappearing?" Lulu spoke thoughtfully.
"Ah!" Wakka shouted. "So the Al Bhed are behind that! Those sand-blasted grease monkeys!" The corners of my mouth turned up slightly at his expression, despite the situation. "Hey, Wakka, it's no use complaining about the Al Bhed now, right? We'll protect Yuna from anyone and anything, anywhere. It's that simple. That's all I need to know."
"Well...I guess so..." Wakka sounded pretty unsure. "You're right." Lulu said conclusively. Yuna mouthed to me, 'Thank you." and gave me a sweet smile.
TidusxYuna Always
