Disclaimer: I don't own nothing except my OCs. Speaking of which... Maybe I should do a character design thingy on my dA account. Let me know in my reviews, but if I do don't expect a great artwork. While my drawing itself won't be atrocious, I have zero experience in colouring, so it'll either be badly coloured or simply a lineart.

UPDATE: There is a sketch for Kelle. I have done it, and for once I am actually proud of my work.

-heavenly chorus-

Authoress: SHE'S GONE! SHE'S FINALLY GONE AND I HAVE PEACE AND QUIET IN WHICH I CAN FOCUS ON MY WRITING! THANK YOU WORK EXPERIENCE!

Socks: In case any readers are wondering why the Authoress has gone insane (more so than usual, that is...) it's because her mother has work experience, and so she gets the house to herself from nine till five. She's very happy about it.

Authoress: No more getting my ears chewed off while I'm trying to concentrate! No more nagging! The main cause of my migraine is gone for the daylight hours! I can hibernate in peace!

Socks: ...Yes, in case your wondering, the Authoress doesn't really get along with her mother. They're polar opposites. The Authoress is mainly a solitary being who seldom talks out loud due to her preference for quiet (lest her evil migraines come back and make her feel like someone set a mine off in her skull and impair her vision)... and her mother has a very bad case of what we call verbal diarrhoea and enjoys noise and chattering incessantly. How they've managed to not kill each other is still a mystery.

Authoress: Emotional numbness is a godsend. You get used to her vicious word spew after a while. Thank you PTSD. Thank you bad childhood. Thank you terrible and evil family. You actually managed to benefit me in some way.

Socks: Yeah. She's crazy. Her issues are many. She will probably die alone.

Authoress: Quiet you. You're ruining my happy bubble of happy that my kind reviewers have made for me. I love my reviewers, they are awesome and receive the cyber-thingy of their choice. Thank you Shaz, Sara, Rush, Cor Strike FX, Amylou11987, Solyeuse, evieeeee, kh2 fan13, Kagayaku Midori, Fanfic Reader Guy, and way2eayzy. You are all awesome.

Socks: Agreed. They are awesome.

-world ends-

Authoress: Whoops. Um... those of you who survived Armageddon, enjoy the chapter!

The Celestial Weapons (HA YOU THOUGHT I FORGOT) are a Real Pain

"So... basically you're saying this engine upgrade thing will make us go faster." I summarised from all of Cid's techno-babble. The Yevonites all looked so confused, so I decided to help them.

"...Yeah, that's about it. We can now go from one end of Spira to the other in less than an hour." he bragged. I rolled my eyes.

"Okay then. We need to go back to Zanarkand." I stated. I got many WTF-faces for my trouble. Except from Deki, who is smart and knows what I'm talking about. "In order to acquire the aeon Anima, you need to use the Destruction Sphere in every Cloister of Trials in Spira. And we need to get ALL the aeons to really get rid of Sin." I told her. "We need all the help we can get."

"Anima...? Oh, you mean Maester Seymour's aeon? You know where to get it?" Yuna asked me. I grinned at her and nodded. "Where is it?"

"Where I met Tidus and Rikku for the first time. But the temple is guarded by a pretty nasty fiend, so we're best off taking care of this first." I explained. Cid sighed suddenly.

"That was kinda a fluke, actually. The salvage team got blown off course and stumbled on that place by accident; they never recorded the co-ordinates of that place." he said sheepishly. I smiled.

"It's fine, I know the co-ordinates." I told him (once again receiving WTF-looks for my trouble), walking over to the console thing and entering said co-ordinates (X is anywhere between 11 and 16, and Y is between 57 and 63. Z is how high up you are – in other words, Z is totally irrelevant.)

"How do you know that stuff...?" Lulu asked me. I grinned, before entering the co-ordinates for Sanubia Sands (X: 12-16; Y: 41-45. You can get the Ascalon there. Very useful), the Besaid Falls (X: 29-32; Y: 73-76. You know that blue sphere on Waterfall Way you could never access? Congrats, you can now), the Mi'ihen Ruins (X: 33-36; Y: 55-60. You know those ruins you can see out on the water from the hill outside Rin's Travel Agency on the Highroad? You appear on that, waaay off in the distance. You may think it's useless, but run around pressing X and you should find a chest with a really good Sonar for Rikku in it), the Battle Site (X: 39-47; Y: 56-60. In the wreckage of the Operation, you can find a Phantom Bangle. It absorbs three elements.) and finally the Omega Ruins (X: 69-75; Y: 33-38. Aside from some really good free items, you get crazy-tough fiends there – and the Ultima and Omega weapons, the latter of which Kimahri can learn his ultimate overdrive, Nova, from... and the Mimics, as I've mentioned, drop 50K a pop without Gillionaire. But be sure to level up your party before going here, or you'll be massacred. Hastega, Shell and Protect are a godsend against Omega. So are aeons.) I found that the password feature still existed on this ship, so I entered in GODHAND, MURASAME, and VICTORIOUS. I assumed that maybe the ship itself had some obscure, long-dead connection to the Celestial Weapons in the case of the Godhand password. If it's not too subtle a hint, Rikku's Godhand is there and Godhand equals Celestial Weapon.

...My God, I'm being helpful...

"Whoa." Tidus said. I just grinned mysteriously and told Brother to take us back to Zanarkand. He reluctantly complied.

"Why are we here again?" Tidus grumbled, killing yet another zombie.

"So we can obtain Anima. Also, it's in our best interests to capture as many fiends from around Spira as we can for the Arena. That guy gives away some great items for weapon customisation." I said cheerfully. I seem to be getting many weird looks today. More so than usual.

"Okay, then. Best of luck!" Tidus said, pushing me through the door to the Trials hastily before I could forcibly enlist his help. I whined softly and braced myself for brain breaking. I also recall cursing whoever invented these stupid Trials.

"I-I did it..." I croaked, falling out of the door holding my prize (Aside from the special item – which is really crap – yielded by the Destruction Sphere, you get a stone that comes with it. You put them in Anima's temple statue things to break the seal.) with a death grip. After recovering I grinned evilly. "Now we have to go all over Spira and capture lots of fiends." I said. "Or Auron's ultimate weapon won't be able to reach its full capacity without the Mars Sigil."

"Ultimate weapon?"

"Yeah. You know that sword for Tidus with the 'No AP' ability and the similar staff for Yuna I acquired in the Calm Lands? They're two of seven. Tidus' weapon I can power up all the way because we have both the Sun Crest and the Sun Sigil. I already collected all the crests, but we still need to collect most of the sigils to get rid of the 'No AP'." I said, ignoring the sceptical looks I was getting. "Trust me, they are crazy powerful, and we need all the help we can get against Sin. Also, even if you were gonna try and skip Anima, Lulu's weapon is in Baaj. I just couldn't get it before because you need the mirror to open the chest." I held up the Celestial Mirror.

"...And we were being attacked by a giant monster." Tidus added on. "It tried to eat us." He shuddered.

"Yeah, so we owe it an ass whooping anyway." I crossed my arms determinedly. "We must avenge our honour! Because that thing would have eaten us so we had to run away like a couple of weenies!" Tidus joined it.

"The evil being must die!"

"DEATH BY FIREEEEEE!" We both crowed, terrifying the others in the process.

"...Oh, wait... it's underwater."

Many many hours of killing fiend ass later, we were at the fiend arena. (While killing said fiend ass, we had stopped by Mushroom Rock Road and picked up Auron's Masamune from the Mi'ihen statue near the battlefield and Rikku's Godhand from the actual road leading to where the command centre used to be to save time).

"Items..."

"Give us items..." Rikku moaned, also exhausted. Most of the others had refused to join in our killing spree, and we had exhausted ourselves for the sake of collecting the Mars Sigil and a bunch of items. And the Blossom Crown, of course. We wouldn't be able to get the Magus Sisters otherwise.

"Are you okay?" The old man asked, having been snapped out of his mental party at having so many fiends to meddle with and splice and whatever.

"We're exhausted... we worked so hard collecting all those fiends." I explained tiredly. "But we needed to in order to get the Mars Sigil and Blossom Crown so we can kill Sin."

"Ah, I see." the old man smiled. "Well, you'll be happy to know that you've more than satisfied my criteria for those particular items, my dears. Here's your rewards." he handed over many many awesome items. I smiled weakly.

"By the way... I'm not sure about the others, but I know I will at some point be going to the Omega Ruins. I'll be sure to try and capture some of everything for the fun of it, 'kay?" I said. "Just keep the awesome items coming." the old man laughed.

"I'd like that. I've managed to create many superfiends thanks to your efforts. It would be nice to see what more I am capable of before I leave this world." I had come to an understanding of sorts with the old man. He wanted to try and create the genuine ultimate fiend before he died. And he wanted to see someone powerful enough to destroy said ultimate fiend so it wouldn't run amok after he died and kill people and stuff. Hopefully that would be us (I have no illusions about being able to take on an ultimate fiend all by myself) so the old coot could die in peace. Seriously, I have a niggling feeling that he would make a terrifying fiend. He's scary enough now. I wish I was related to this guy. He'd be like the ultimate grandpa. For me, anyway, with my destructive nature and whatnot.

And now I'm rambling.

"Where to next?"

"Um... Luca. After we take a nap, we got tournaments to win." I said, grimacing at the amount of work this would require. But at least I'd managed to help Tidus talk Wakka into playing blitz again so we could win his Overdrive Reels and Jupiter Sigil (The crest I had nabbed from the locker rooms long ago).

"This winning streak for the Aurochs is so bizarre..." Bobba said, handing over his gil. I wasn't playing blitz anymore, so I decided to get sweet revenge on the commentators for any and all derogatory remarks they'd made about the Aurochs in the past. So I was making bets on the Aurochs against the commentator (his counterpart was nowhere to be found – seems like he was the one with the brains in that outfit) and winning every time. He was almost out of gil (but can we say rich? I've fleeced the unlucky bastard of several hundred thousand gil now and he still keeps coming back for more!) by this time. The woman at the counter of the café was most amused and had handed over the chest with the World Champion in it on their tenth win. I grinned maniacally when they finally finished the tournament with the Jupiter Sigil as a prize. We'd been in Luca playing blitz for three days straight – that's how long it took us to find the damn thing.

"Not bizarre, they've just gotten a lot better." I said. "I think they only lost because of the whole confidence thing. Now they know they're capable of winning, they will win." I grinned proudly. That and I had taught Keepa the importance of the psycho-killer glare. Only the bravest dared tangle with him now. Mwahahaha. Bobba simply grumbled under his breath about wily bitches. I ignored him to join up with the others.

"Congrats!" I patted Tidus and Wakka on the backs. They both grinned tiredly, but we had agreed that I shouldn't have to compete relentlessly in tournaments after mine and Rikku's efforts to get fiend catching; Yuna and Lulu had come back from Macalania yesterday on the airship with the Saturn Sigil for Kimahri. They looked fairly irritated, though I had explained what they'd have to do to get it. And I'd given them the Mirror in order to collect the Spirit Lance, having confirmed that the Dark Aeons and Penance were just figments of Squeenix' imagination.

Else I wouldn't be here telling you this story now, would I?

"That was a nightmare." Yuna complained. See, the butterfly game really is that bad. I plucked the Mirror back from Yuna's hands and used it to open the World Champion chest that I had lugged all this way with me.

"Exactly. That's why I had you do it. It's only fair, since Rikku and I damn near killed ourselves capturing fiends for the arena." I told her, wagging a finger for extra effect. She sighed and nodded, knowing she wouldn't win if she tried arguing.

"Point taken."

"And now for our revenge!" I cackled, glaring into the depths of the water in front of us, where the Geosgaeno (I LEARNED ITS NAME! But I have absolutely no idea how you pronounce it. So in case you were wondering about that, I'm just as clueless as you guys are. Sorry...) lay waiting for more prey (I absently wondered how many Sahagins were even left in this place by this point. Thank Bob there's no equivalent to PETA here, or we'd never hear the end of it).

"Indeed." Tidus said, using his now-infamous Mika act. Rikku and Yuna (who's loosened up considerably over the course of our journey) both giggled at our serious faces. Us being serious is a very rare occurrence. Deki looked worried about this.

"Are you okay? I mean, you're only serious if it's bad. Like really bad." he asked, touching my arm gently. I found myself smiling despite myself.

"It's good. I just have to kill the ugly Geo-monster and everything will be okay." I grinned. He rolled his eyes at my usual bloodthirsty nature. "But really, it'll have gotten stronger by now..." I whined, deciding to jump in with the others before I lost my nerve, silently thanking the higher power for anti-stone armour. And Super Ribbon, in my case. I didn't pull out weapons, readying my magic instead, seeing as how it'll work better. Tidus had a Crystal Sword (which is all four elemental strikes) equipped to nuke it in the elemental weakness thing. Rikku was more focused on the 'Evade and Counter' strategy. Which also works. Unless it eats you. But whatever.

REVENGE! IT WILL BE MINE! (Ugh, I sound like Seymour...)

It went for Rikku first, swiping with its big ugly fists of doom. She dodged and tossed an Ice Gem at it, watching it scream (how does it do that underwater, anyway?) in pain, backing up slightly upon the realisation that she wasn't easy pickings. Once she was safely out of the way, I shot her an apologetic look and started casting Thunder spells. It didn't like that, and expressed its displeasure by EATING me. Seriously. It fricken ATE me. I growled, pulling out my knives and scratching up its insides while Tidus tried to hack its belly open and get me out. Ah, well. It beats being melted by stomach acid, which is painful, dark, AND humiliating. In my opinion at least. After I gave it indigestion, it decided it didn't like me anymore and spat me out.

Ow.

I groaned to myself as the Phoenix Down pulled me back into reality. Rikku gave me a thumbs up, pointing at Tidus performing a Blitz Ace on Geosgaeno, thus giving her the opportunity to revive me. I hugged her in thanks and readied another Thundaga and my trusty Excalibur pin. She winced at that, backing up to a 'safe' distance (more like the other end of the ruin-pool). I noticed that by this point it looked pretty weak and wouldn't really take much more before dying. I was right, too. One full charge of my pin, a few Thundagas, a few Fire Gems (HOW DO THEY WORK UNDERWATER LIKE THAT?) and some slashes of Tidus' sword later and it was happily (okay not so much) blasted into pyreflies. The three of us surfaced.

"REVENGE!" Me and Tidus cackled evilly. Everybody looked disturbed. Even more so since Tidus is also cackling. I mean, for me this behaviour is normal. Not so for Tidus. I shook my head, snapping out of it.

"Oh and Lulu, your ultimate weapon is in that chest down there." I said pointing at it before we all jumped back in, Lulu swimming over to collect her Onion Knight. I scowled as we all swam into the temple, and set to work matching the appropriate temple treasure stones to their statues. The symbol blocking the way to Anima's chamber faded, and we all went in.

"You are Maester Seymour's mother." Yuna stated calmly, looking at the transparent woman hovering over the fayth statue. And so their conversation about how Seymour was wronged and his mother's self blame... Yeah, I don't buy it. The woman tried her best, did everything she could considering her incurable illness, and he still turned out messed up. As such, I still have no sympathy for him. I suppose normal mothers will defend their children. I wouldn't really know, my own mother wasn't exactly the shining example of the perfect matriarch.

"I will grant you my aeon, on the condition that you stop my son." she told Yuna after a fairly one-sided conversation, who agreed to said condition.

"And we're done here." I said happily as we walked back out.

"Yes, back into the freezing water." Shell said, glaring at said water disdainfully. Everybody except Kimahri and Auron (who is dead and so cannot feel the cold) shuddered.

"Someone's cheerful today." Deki muttered under his breath. I jumped in and swam as fast as I could hating the freezing cold water. Needless to say the slower swimmers in our group were pretty pissed with the rest of us for rushing out of there at full pelt. But sure, the north is cold, so Tidus didn't really have a problem, but myself and Deki hate cold water with a fiery passion, Rikku's from the desert, and Wakka's from a tropical island. You do the math.

"I am so glad I don't have to go back there ever again, Ri." I told Rikku after having had a long soak. "All we have to do now is go to Bikanel and beat the Cactuar game thing for your sigil and sort out Remiem Temple where the last aeons are." I said cheerfully.

"Really? The cactuars have it? I never would have guessed unless you told me, you know." she said, letting me experiment with her hair. Yes I can be girly when I feel like it. "I mean, they're cactuars..."

"I get your point." I giggled. "They're plants with minds, what a strange concept."

"You... don't have cactuars where you come from?" she asked me. I shook my head.

"We have cacti, but they don't think or move or really do anything 'cept grow. They're just regular desert plants." I explained. She made a 'ohhh' face. You know the one with the dawning of comprehension and whatnot.

"Huh. So is it really hot where you come from, too?" At this I laughed. England has terrible weather. It rains a lot.

"Nah. Actually it's pretty cold compared to Bikanel. I mean, it's no Gagazet, but unless we have a heat wave, it's freezing at worst, cool at best." I told her. She looked confused.

"Then... how do you know so much about cacti?" she asked.

"Internet."

"What's that?"

As you can probably guess, the next few hours involved me being grilled for details about the Internet and how stuff like that actually worked. And I am bad at explaining things to people. I dunno why, I just am. Which is very frustrating for someone like Rikku who only has me (she doesn't know Deki well enough to pester him and she doesn't trust Trent or Shell) to explain these things to her.

"Lulu... can you tell Rikku to stop pestering me now?" I begged after the 147th question. She chuckled and did as I asked. "Thank you, oh great teacher of black magic and saviour..."

"Okay, you can stop now."

"'Kay! Anyway, did you hear what Trent and Deki were saying to each other earlier?" I giggled. And so began our gossip and girl talk for the night.

"I... friggin'... hate... cactuses..." I grumbled, not caring about the fact that it's 'cacti' rather than 'cactuses'. Rikku and I were trekking all over the desert to find the damn cactuars and sneak up on them. We'd only managed to beat two out of the three we'd found so far.

"You mean cactuars..." Rikku said, though she looked like she agreed with me. "Hey, there's one!" she yelled, stopping right as it turned around to face us. It glared before turning its back to us once more, and Rikku pounced on it (getting pricked by a bunch of needles in the process – I'm the one she was complaining to afterwards, remember), thus winning.

"...Four down, six to go." I said, glaring at the sky. How did the Al Bhed survive in this heat?

"And now we go down there." I said, pointing at the previously inaccessible area before us (known in the future as the Cactuar Nation, but I'm not feeling too picky right now) before jumping in and beginning the epic search for Rikku's Mercury Sigil.

Damn cactuses.

"I found iiiit!" Rikku trilled happily, holding up her 'treasure'. I sat up up eagerly, having been laid down on my backside after finishing searching my half of the area.

"No more scorching and evil cactuses wanting to kill me with needles?" I asked eagerly. Rikku sweatdropped, hauling me to my feet and practically carrying me back to the airship. It actually took longer to hunt down the damn cactuars than it did to travel from the Oasis to Home. Seriously. I drank a lot of water when we got back.

"You seem cheerful." Deki said, chuckling and giving me my obligatory cuddle.

"Never again." I moaned. "Never, not in a million years will I ever trek through the desert for such a long time!"

"Aw, come on, it wasn't that bad..." Rikku pouted.

"Says the girl who grew up in that heat. I grew up in a cold, damp, dreary place. Hot and arid are two words I barely knew the meaning of before the whole being-taken-to-Bikanel-by-Sin thing." I complained. I like hot weather, but not trekking through it for hours and hours on end looking for needle monsters. If that makes me a hypocrite, then so be it.

"Cold and damp indeed. I remember when I visited your town that time!" Deki said. "You could have warned me to not wear my good shoes, y'know!"

"You're still peeved about that? Deki, that was ages ago!" I whined. He chuckled.

"Nah, you're just cute when you do that..." Our moment was ruined by Rikku, who stood there pretending to be sick. We both laughed and chased her the rest of the way to the bridge.

"So you got it?" Tidus asked, laughing when Rikku decided to use him for a shield.

"Yep. Now, to the Calm Lands! You have to go to Remiem Temple and beat Belgemine and her aeons there. If you win she might hand over the Flower Sceptre and Moon Sigil in her possession." I told Yuna cheerfully. She stared at me for a long moment before sighing.

"I won't even ask how you know that..." she muttered as she walked over to Cid, who then ordered Brother to "get our sorry asses to the Calm Lands double-time!".

When we got to Remiem Temple, I promptly jumped onto Deki's back and took a nap. The heat was pretty bad in Bikanel. I was bushed. According to Deki, (he recounted all this to me after I woke up), Ixion and Bahamut had their face-off (after Yuna had defeated the first four of Belgemine's aeons, that is), with Ixion coming out victorious once more. He fell to Yojimbo, weakened from the fight with Bahamut. Shiva managed to scrape a victory by the skin of her teeth, and finally it took the combined efforts of our Bahamut and Valefor to take down Belgemine's Anima. Belgemine stepped aside, handing over the Flower Sceptre and preparing for her last fight with the Magus Sisters. (This is when I woke up)

"Morning!" I said happily. "So how many of Belgemine's aeons did Yuna beat so far?" I asked in my usual optimistic manner. Deki proceeded to give me the recap you just read, and I grinned. "See, I knew Yuna could do it! She's like made of awesome." I stated. Rikku grinned and agreed along with me, ignoring the protests of a rather red-faced Yuna. After we calmed down, Yuna went over to the triple fayth of Remiem and prayed.

Congratulations! You have now gained the Magus Sisters as available summons!

I refrained from actually saying that. I had a feeling Auron would clonk me on the head with that big heavy sword. And totally ruin my beautiful skull line. Pfft.

"So, here's our last battle." Belgemine smiled enigmatically. I grinned happily, pulling out the popcorn and sitting down with Rikku, Tidus and Deki to watch. We got some nasty looks from Wakka, Lulu (though I don't think she was being serious), and most especially Auron. He's a scary bastard when he wants to be. Maybe it's 'cause he's dead and all and Tidus and I shuddered so bad 'cause we know he's dead. Rikku seemed to wonder why we feared him so. I guess it's just human nature or something, I thought as I watched Belgemine summon the Sisters and Yuna summoned Anima, first going on the defensive with Protect, Shell and elemental Nuls (It was hell for me and Rikku collecting all those items just so they'd be 'wasted' on an aeon. We like having items we can use for us, you know) and then assaulting the trio with barrages of Pain and various elemental spells, taking a fair amount of damage in between.

Anima's eyes widened, and it healed herself and defended just in time for a Delta Attack. Anima hastily healed herself again and resumed her assault, focusing on the weakened Mindy, who collapsed after a few attacks and dissolved into pyreflies. So no more Delta Attack. Heh heh heh. I didn't realise I laughed out loud until...

"Why are you laughing?" Rikku asked me.

"'Cause they can't use Delta Attack without Mindy." I chuckled. "Even if Cindy and Sandy hit Overdrive, they won't be able to do that again." I explained. Rikku made an 'ohhh' face.

"You have a weird sense of humour, you know that?" she said cheerfully. I laughed and nodded, watching Sandy fall to another of Anima's attacks.

"And then there was one." I said, munching on my popcorn. I almost choked on it when I received both a blitzball and a katana to the head.

"Stop kidding around." Auron and Wakka snapped in unison. I twitched, suddenly majorly spooked.

"Since when did Auron and Wakka work together?" I asked shakily. Deki looked just as spooked.

"I dunno..." he whimpered, hiding behind me.

"H-Hey! Aren't you supposed to be the big strong man in this relationship?" I hissed at him, watching Rikku finish off the popcorn, laughing, just as Anima finished off Cindy.

"Everyone knows you wear the pants here, not me!"

"What, so you wear a skirt?" I snorted. He flushed and glared at me. Rikku and Tidus both snickered.

"Not you guys too!" he whined. Our funny little joke was cut short when Yuna walked over holding the Moon Sigil, having sent Belgemine.

"That's... the last one, right?" she asked. I nodded calmly, leading the way back to Macalania Woods once we left the temple. It took about an hour for all seven Legendary Weapons to become fully charged, though apparently their wielders could all feel their strength.

"Still think it was a waste of time?" I asked Auron, trying my hardest to not sound smug. He scowled at me. I grinned the grin of a troll. And that grin stayed in place for the entire journey back to the airship, until Cid told me I looked creepy, effectively killing my good troll-like mood.

"So, everyone, are we ready?" Yuna asked, turning around to face us. We all gave our affirmative answers.

"Time to go kill Sin."

A/N: I am SO sorry. I never intended for my update to take so long, but between the writer's block and being taken to hospital (Yes I'm sick. Pity me) I haven't had any time to write. I'm sorry, again, and I KNOW it's turned out as a big lump of filler.

But still, the Sin chapters start next! Leave me lots of lovely reviews to cheer me up in my moment of agonising sickness~!