Destiny: Memories of Water Chapter 5

Teaching the Teacher

By IceWolf645

It didn't take long to move everything that hadn't been destroyed from Sanya's old house. I was glad of this, since the day was scorching hot. I could feel little beads of sweat trickling down my forehead, and I longed to take a nice break at the beach. I swept my hand across my face and plopped down next to Sanya, who was carefully picking out the dolls from the other salvaged items. I looked at them warily and decided to only help if I was asked. I didn't feel like getting fried, though it would be nice if one of the little things would let off a 'Water' spell.

I could see the Crusaders bustling around. Some of them were standing around looking tough, obviously guarding the village from any more fiend attacks. Others helped the villagers. Oryon, the Crusader I'd met earlier, was talking to Rikku.

"I'll see what I can do," he said gently. He motioned for one of the other Crusaders and whispered something into their ear.

"Yessir!" the Crusader said proudly before running out of the village. I wondered vaguely what was going on, but I didn't think that it was my business, so I looked away. I looked instead at Wakka and Lulu, who were bemoaning the loss of the picture I'd seen before. The picture of the young, red-haired man that looked like Wakka.

"That was the only one we had," Lulu said quietly. She rested her head against Wakka's shoulder and wrapped her arms around him. "It's irreplaceable."

"I know," Wakka said solemnly, "but Chappu wouldn't want us to cry over it, ya? It's just a picture, I'm sure I've still got an old sphere around here somewhere with him on it. Don't get upset, okay?"

Lulu nodded and pulled back. "You're right," she said. She smiled briefly, but then it was replaced by her normal, emotionless face. "Let's start packing everything up. We'll have to move sooner than we thought we would."

I turned to Sanya. She had been listening too. "Um.. who's Chappu?" I asked, curiosity getting the better of me.

She smiled. "I've never actually met him. He died a couple a years before I was born. He was my uncle, ya? Momma said.. she said that she was gonna marry him before he died."

I twirled my hair around my finger and bit my lip. It was a tragic love story with a semi-happy ending. Lulu had lost Chappu and gained Wakka, his brother. It was sort of ironic.

Sanya frowned and looked back over at her parents. "They said that we'll be moving soon, right? I don't wanna move yet. It'd be like abandoning my team in the middle of a blitz game."

"Do you play blitzball?" I asked.

She grinned widely. "Yup! I play for the Aurochs, just like pops over there did when he was younger. Hah! The team's a lot better now though, ya?"

I giggled. She seemed very proud of being a blitzball player. "I'd like to see a game someday," I said.

"Ya wanna see a few moves now? The adults don't need us right now, I think it'd be okay if we went down to the beach," she said, grabbing one of her father's blitzballs and twirling it on her finger. I nodded. "Okay then, lets g-"

"You weren't thinking of leaving me here with those boring people, were ya?" Ruka asked, sneaking up from behind Sanya and grabbing the ball. "It's not gonna happen!"

I chuckled and rose to my feet. "Well, if everyone's present and accounted for, then let's go," I said.

"Wait just a second and I'll go ask pops," Sanya said, skipping over to her parents. Any sadness that had been in her at the mention of leaving Besaid had vanished. It didn't take much to make her happy, I supposed. I heard her complaining loudly about something, and she returned with an indignant frown. "Pops says that we have to get one of the Crusaders to go with us. He said that there might be other snakes out there and that he doesn't want us to get hurt," she said with a scowl.

"I wouldn't mind a Crusader coming with us," Ruka said, eyeing Oryon. She had a small, mischievous smile that made it easy to tell exactly what she was thinking.

Sanya glared at her. "Well I would! We can take care of ourselves, ya? We don't need no stupid Crusader to baby-sit us!"

Ruka grinned. "Well I'm gonna ask that one anyways," she said. She pointed at Oryon and chuckled.

"Traitor!" Sanya growled, and she stormed away in a huff.

~*~*~*~*~*~

I was surprised when Ruka returned with Oryon. He'd consented to coming with us, and Ruka looked like the happiest girl on Spira. She winked at me behind the man's back and giggled. I rolled my eyes. Oryon had the smallest trace of a smile on his face, and I knew that he was well aware of Ruka's little crush on him. I wasn't quite sure whether he thought it funny, or whether he liked her as well, though. It was hard to read his emotions.

We walked to the beach, chatting about various things nonchalantly. Oryon was mostly silent, but he'd add in a comment every once in awhile. He walked slightly behind us, keeping his eyes locked in front of him and listening for any sign of a disturbance behind him. I could tell that he'd been training to be a Crusader for his whole life. He took it a little too seriously, in my opinion. Sin had been defeated, and fiends were rare, and large fiends like the one that had attacked Besaid the day before (or was it two days before?) were even more uncommon, or so Wakka had told me.

We arrived at the beach in about fifteen minutes, and I immediately ran for the water and went out until it reached my knees. Then I dipped myself under and soaked for a while before returning to the surface. I felt at home in the water. It was a nice feeling to have all of that wonderful clear liquid against my slightly tan skin. I smiled to myself and dived under again, resurfacing farther out.

"Hey! You wanna see some blitz moves or what?" Sanya asked tossing the ball into the air and catching it again.

"Alright, I'm coming!" I yelled to her. I swam back to the sandy beach and walked near her. "Show me what you can do."

She grinned and started doing all kinds of tricks with the ball. I was impressed. She looked like she'd been doing that her whole life. At the end she kicked the ball at me and looked surprised when I caught it. "Eh.. I was tryin' to surprise you. Guess I should work on that, ya?" she said putting her hands on her hips. "Why don't you try to kick it. Lemme see if you're fit to be a blitzer. Maybe I'll teach ya somethin'."

"Okay," I replied. I set the ball on the ground and made the motion to kick it, but before I could finish a strange feeling overcame me. I let my foot fall back to the sand and bent down to pick the ball up.

"What's up?" Sanya asked. I didn't answer. I stared intently at the ball and felt my lips form a frown. I felt like something was bubbling up inside of me, and that it was trying to get out. "Destiny?"

I grinned slightly. I felt sort of funny, but it wasn't a bad feeling. I threw the ball into the air and did a quick back flip. I felt my bare feet connect with the ball and send it flying straight back at Sanya. She hadn't been expecting a kick like that, so while she was still gawking at my strange behavior the ball caught her in the stomach. She doubled over and I snapped out of my little trance almost immediately. "Oh no! I'm so sorry!" I cried apologetically. I rushed over to her and helped her stand up straight again. She groaned and rubbed where I'd hit her.

"Ugh.. it's okay," she grunted. "It's my fault, I wasn't watching." She looked at me and squinted at me, like she was trying to see through me. "I thought I was gonna teach you some things, but it looks like you already know. That was a Sphere Shot."

I blinked. I had no clue what a Sphere Shot was, but obviously I'd just done one. I smiled awkwardly. "I don't know what happened," I said helplessly. I wasn't quite sure what was happening to me.

She frowned. "You were actin' kinda weird. Maybe you was havin' some kinda flashback."

"Maybe," I said uncertainly.

Ruka grinned at me from where she'd been watching (which was, by chance, right next to Oryon, who looked slightly annoyed) and said, "Don't feel bad for hitting her! That was awesome! I bet you were a blitzer, or related to one before ya lost your memory. This'll make it a lot easier to find your folks."

Sanya let her normal joyful smile return to her face and said, "Yeah! We could take ya to Luca this year at tournament time, and your mom and dad will probably be there! They'll see ya, and you can go home with them, ya? It'll be fun to have a trio of us girls in Luca anyways. The more the merrier, and I don't feel like being there with just Ruka and Nathan."

Ruka stuck her tongue out at Sanya in a slightly immature way. The dark haired girl decided to ignore her friend and continued on and on about what we could do when we got there. I interrupted her, because she sounded like she wanted to go on and on forever, and asked, "Uhm.. who's Nathan?"

"Oh! Nathan's my boyfriend," Sanya said with a blush. Ruka, at the mention of boyfriends, edged closer to Oryon, and he looked at her disdainfully. She didn't notice. "He's away in Bevelle visiting his family, but he'll be back in a few weeks."

I smiled at her and said, "Oooh, I see." Her face was beet red, and she threw the ball at me lightly. I caught it and threw it at Ruka, who was talking to Oryon and didn't notice. Oryon chuckled as it hit her in the back of the head, and picked it up from where it had rolled to the ground. Ruka turned around and started shouting at me for hitting her, and Oryon passed the ball back to me. I threw it to Sanya and Sanya in turn threw it at Ruka. It hit her in the shoulder this time.

"SANYA! You know I can't catch!"

"Well, you're gonna have to learn!"

We played a game of monkey-in-the-middle, in which Ruka was the monkey, and even managed to make Oryon laugh and join in with us. I threw the ball into the shallow part of the water, and Ruka hurried towards it giggling madly. She bent down to pick it up, and stood up straight. She was about to force me to be the monkey, but we were slightly distracted by Oryon, who was looking towards the sea.

"Ah. I see Ryuu has finally decided to come."

A boat was sailing towards us. It was extravagant, with bright colors and a prow that was carved in the likeness of a sleek dragon head, with glittering emerald eyes and ivory teeth. Two wings extended from the middle and claws were painted intricately on the sides. The vessel was huge and magnificently grand.

"Ryuu's coming? Wow!" Ruka squealed, practically jumping with excitement.

I looked at Oryon with confusion. "Who's Ryuu?" I asked curiously.

Oryon smiled grimly. "He's the 'leader' of the Crusaders. They call him Hawkeye. You'll see why when his little toy lands. He's the son of a rich noble." He looked scornfully out at the boat and I could tell that he had some sort of grudge against this Ryuu character. "He doesn't deserve his position, the little swindler," he growled so that only I could hear.

"Oh?" I asked quietly.

"Nevermind," he said quickly before turning away and folding his arms across his chest. "Forget it."


Chapter 6

Final Fantasy 10 Fanfic