Kingdom Hearts Fan Fiction ❯ Voodoo ❯ One-Shot

[ A - All Readers ]

Before he'd followed Selphie and Wakka through that door in the Secret Place back home, Tidus had not expected to ever do anything really interesting. Sora and Riku, and to some degree Kairi, were the ones who dreamed of adventure, of exploring other worlds and taking on fierce enemies. Sure, he'd played at being pirates or treasure hunters with them when they'd all been younger, but as he'd matured Tidus' focus had been more on Blitzball, and his team, than anything else. His life wasn't boring, but neither was it terribly exciting. He hadn't really expected anything more.

He certainly had never expected to find himself in the middle of an argument between three high-strung faeries and an exotic dark-haired woman with an animated plush doll.

"We have to drop by and visit our big sis, okay?" Rikku had said. "Otherwise she gets grouchy if we don't report in for a while." And it had sounded perfectly normal at the time, but even then Tidus had had a bad feeling about the whole thing. But this--

"I told you that woman was bad news, didn't I?" The lady wasn't yelling at them, precisely, but Tidus thought the venom and sarcastic tone of her voice made it so she didn't have to yell to have your full attention. She certainly had his; he was frozen on the spot, despite the fact that she'd barely even glanced at him.

"You never listen! All three of you! You could have been hurt, even killed! And for what?"

She was very, very imposing, Tidus thought. Even her mog, pacing at her feet in silent mimicry of her ranting, was slightly scary.

"But sis--" Rikku began, zipping around the lady's head agitatedly.

"Maleficent told us we'd find lots of treasure if we worked for her, Lulu." Yuna butt in, hovering calmly in front of the lady's face. "She said we could make a fortune and find tons of ancient artifacts."

"She did," put in Paine agreeably.

"And did you actually find any treasure?" Lulu's voice dropped several degrees.

The three faeries looked downcast in the face of the older woman's anger. "No... but--"

The dark-haired woman was quick to cut them off. "So not only did you not find any treasure, you also put yourself in grave danger! What if Maleficent had turned on you? You can handle a few Heartless fine, but she controls them all. Thousands of them!"

"But she didn't!" Rikku piped up helpfully. "We turned on her."

"That's even worse!"

"We heard Leon had lots of treasure," said Yuna. "But he didn't have any." She pouted.

"Liars." Paine put in darkly.

"He's strong, though." Yuna finished, and smiled, hair-tail swishing gently behind her.

"Yeah, and now we're traveling with them!" Selphie burst out, not able to stay out of the argument another second. "Merlin gave Tidus this cool sword, so he's super-strong, and Wakka and I aren't so bad ourselves."

Wakka grinned, hoping to break the tension. "That's right, mon. The Heartless are nothing, ya?"

Tidus suddenly found himself on the receiving end of Lulu's glare. "Is that so?"

"Yes, ma'am." The blitzball player managed. He hadn't felt this awkward since he'd been twelve and had that crush on Selphie.

"And you are--?"

"T-Tidus, ma'am." He stuttered. Scary. He couldn't be sure, but he thought he saw some of the angry fire in Lulu's eyes settle down.

"Yep!" Rikku landed on Tidus' shoulder and leaned comfortably against his ear. "Tidus is great! And so are Wakka and Selphie."

"We're helping them find their way home." Yuna explained at Lulu's enquiring look. Paine nodded agreement. "And they're helping us look for rare treasure, and defeat the Heartless. Right?" She turned and smiled encouragingly at Tidus.

"Right," he answered, a goofy grin spreading on his face as her sweet smile grew at his response.

"Right!" Selphie and Wakka echoed.

"See, sis? You don't have to worry about us!" Rikku said, leaving Tidus' shoulder to flit about Lulu's head, delighted that they'd proved the dark-haired woman wrong.

"Don't worry about a thing." Put in Paine, calmly.

Lulu, for her part, was looking less furious and more irritated every moment. When she didn't immediately answer the three Gullwings grouped in front of her, hovering at eye level with pleading expressions on their faces.

"Get out." Lulu finally managed. Tidus' heart dropped into his shoes, but apparently her response was a good thing, because Yuna and Rikku cheered while Paine looked smug.

"Get out now, all of you. Before I Ground you." Lulu repeated when they didn't immediately move, and Tidus, Wakka and Selphie were glad to follow the Gullwings as the three pixies flitted out the door of Lulu's house in mock-terror. "And don't come back until you've done something useful!" Followed them out.

"She doesn't mean it." Reassured Yuna when they'd stopped running, appearing near Tidus' left shoulder.

"I think she likes you, Tidus!" Rikku exclaimed, flying over to hover on his right side.

"Ya man, for sure." Added Wakka, smirking at him.

"She totally does!" Selphie agreed.

Tidus wasn't so sure.