Then I'll just have to be the merriest!

Rikku didn't feel 18. 18 sounded like a big, important sort of age. She was just Rikku.

Then again, she had had a pretty productive week. The cell configuration in Mushroom Rock Road was repaired, and Besaid now had its own tower, too. More importantly, the airship was fixed, thanks to her favorite Turk. Even Cid had stopped hating him.

... okay, Pops had just sort of grumbled at him about how he was glad the kid hadn't broken his damn airship, but you had to translate it. Reno was still the guy dating Cid's baby girl, after all.

And now? Now, Rikku was sitting on the beach in Besaid. Petey was ... attempting to eat the waves as they crashed into shore, because Petey was adorable like that. The sun was setting, a bonfire was burning, and this was a pretty sweet birthday party, Rikku decided. Low-key. She approved.

Her cell phone was on, in case anyone wanted to call. She had interesting blackmail footage to share. Wakka liked giving noogies far more than Reno liked getting them ...

(OPEN to anyone on Spira or anyone who wants to call. Reno modded with permission. SP is likely, as I am le sick.)

Rikku did not want to think about how much she missed Reno. She missed the smell of him. She missed the way his neck tasted. She missed -- okay, lately, her thoughts of missing him were kinda ... graphic, and not very polite. She was trying not to fidget. It was getting worse. Dammit. She used to be able to control herself.

She was too twitchy to be much good at anything that involved sitting still or playing nicely with others. Luckily, the cell tower's mainframe had broken. Okay, that part wasn't lucky, except for how it meant that she got to skip out on diplomatic stuff in order to play with her wrench and fight with a computer system.

So she was hot, and sweaty, and had grease-stains on her hands and probably her face, but this was better than sitting on her hands and thinking about .... okay, not going to think about that. She was saving her world. He was saving his world, too. She could be patient.

She could try.

(just for the Turk, please. HOORAY.)

Things that Rikku hated: the temple at Kilika, New Yevonites, old Yevonites, Spira, people who insisted on trying to fight each other instead of maybe trying to get along for once in their stupid lives, and worst, having to hold all of that in while playing stupid freaking diplomat for a bunch of jerks.

Things that Rikku didn't hate: much shorter list. The airship, which was where she was now. She was sitting up on the roof, and nobody had better bother her right now, not until she'd had some time to herself where she didn't have to pretend she was absolutely, totally okay.

That took a couple of hours. And then Rikku realized that the airship had a satellite link-up, so her phone might actually get reception here, and that she'd rather talk to people from Fandom than go fake being okay again for Yunie.

A little zap and the battery was charged up again. Thunder was so useful like that. And now, to see if she could reach anyone.

(OOC: if you want a call, you've got one, so long as you're okay with the Al Bhed girl having a rough day over here. Also open for any Spira peeps who might want to pop up and say hi.

ETA: Thread with Reno gets into some spoilers about Zack Fair's fate. And then, a while after that, it veers to the NWS.)

Info post! Which is very late, and from Rikku's account because I feel like using Rikku's account, dammit.

( The Al Bhed )

( The Unnatural Child )

( The Literary One )

( The Former Nobody )

( The Dog )

( The Lawyer, aka The New One )

( The Me )

She was mostly packed. Okay, she was totally packed, except for Petey, lying on the middle of her floor and burbling happily with one of his toys. But she liked calling it mostly packed, anyway. It sounded less final.

She had to ... take everything out to the Causeway, and meet up with Yunie and Lulu, and ... go home. Even though Fandom was what felt like home, to her.

She had told people to write, since e-mail was going to be a no-go. She'd bought extra batteries for her cell phone, and could beg people to send more. Now she just had to ....

Well. Leave.

Not just yet. First, she was going to sit on the floor and play with Petey and pretend she didn't have to, just yet.

(Rikku's goodbye post. Any and all are welcome.)

Rikku didn't really want to pack. She had to, but she was still a bit mopey on the whole deal. She'd stay in touch with everyone, but it wasn't the same.

So she was half-packing and half-tossing things idly into boxes. That turned into a lazy game of I Wonder If I Can Teach Petey To Fetch, which was closer to I Wonder If Petey Will Dodge If I Throw This Near Him anyway. (Which was why she was sticking to very, very light items. It was good to know your own cat's intelligence level.)

(expecting one; he's last, since he'll probably stay over. open before him chronologically.)

Rikku had handwavily picked up Ruba from Fight Club while Rede was still kicking butt and taking names, because Ruba was wee and had an earlier bedtime. Of course, Ruba was too wound up to actually go to sleep any time soon. Rikku had just resigned herself to that when inspiration struck.

( A Call to Home )

(OOC: Rikku is going to try to make a few phone calls to alums she knows as well as people back home -- if you are off-island and want to chat with the wee one, drop in!)

Rikku didn't want to wake up yet. It was warm and cozy under the covers, and just the sort of morning where you wanted to snuggle and be lazy and stay in bed all day. Or at least until it was early afternoon.

But there was knocking, at the door. Dang it. Rikku tried telling herself that it wasn't important, and whoever-it-was would come back, and she could pretend she hadn't woken up for the knock, but maybe it was important, and maybe they'd just keep knocking until she answered, and maybe just going to the door and answering it would mean they'd go away faster than if she kept laying here arguing with herself, and this whole argument had woken her up anyway.

So. She wriggled out of bed, trying not to wake the sleeping Turk, and tiptoed over to open the door.

(for the wee ones and reno, or if anyone wants to poke their heads in, afterwards)

Okay, so: it wasn't just prom. It was also Reno's nineteenth birthday. Which ... he kinda got weird about celebrating things like that, so she hadn't made a big fuss out of it -- although she was going to give a heads-up to the rest of the posse, just because they'd slap her silly if they didn't. She might ask them to keep it under wraps, though. Do something nice, and don't tell him it's for his birthday.

She had the day off work, thanks to her shift babysitting earlier in the week. She hadn't told Reno she'd asked for it off specifically because of his birthday. What was important was that they got to spend the day together.

She'd told him to show up whenever his classes were finished. And ... she had originally thought she should be waiting in lingerie or handcuffs, but ... but that kinda didn't seem right, after the mess of zombies and gremlins and injuries and everything else they'd been through.

Instead, she was in her PJs, and her bed had extra pillows and bedding and blankets on it, and there was popcorn and ice cream.

It wasn't like she couldn't toss on some lingerie later, if he didn't want to snuggle and watch movies.

(Just for the Turk, please.)

Rikku was in her room, minding her own business, with the door wide open. She was drawing up schematics for more cell towers, to see if she could make the design more efficient, and not paying attention to the fact that Petey seemed to be stalking something small and quick around the room.

Hard teeth dug into her calf. "Ow!" she shouted, jumping up and whirling around to glare. "Petey, no biting! That's --"

Petey? Was halfway across the room. And there was a flash of green ducking under her bed.

"Oh, no," she moaned, sinking down onto her bed and covering her eyes.

(JUST FOR ME, PLZ AND THANKS.)

Anyone passing by room 308 Wednesday evening might have overheard an Al Bhed girl softly singing a lullaby.

No, she wasn't gremlin-bit. Just baby-sitting the most adorable, awesome little one ever. (Not counting any of hers that she had met, of course.)

She wasn't sure if Janice would be staying the night or not, but she kept yaaaaaaaaaaaaawning in the most adorable manner, so Rikku was going to put her down for a nap, which may or may not have been bedtime, depending.

The lullaby seemed to be putting Janice to sleep, with the unfortunate side effect of also putting Rikku to sleep. So Rikku was going to curl up on her own bed, keeping her phone handy in case Cable called, and ... rest her eyes. Totally. Just resting them.

(mostly establishy. awwwwwwww.)

Rikku was organizing. Her room, that was. Everything in the known universe sucked, majorly, and nothing made any sense, and saving the world: that still sucked pretty hardcore. She couldn't organize any of that -- to be honest, she didn't understand half of it. (Like ... why she'd woken up alone at the clinic. Reno left?) And some of it she didn't want to deal with yet, like telling Cable how many guns she'd taken from the store, and how she had no idea where most of them were, now. Oops?

But she couldn't fix any of that. So she was going to organize, instead. Because her room was a freaking mess, and she couldn't just baby her knee forever. She didn't need to be in the clinic. She was okay. She had a bandage-splint-thing on it. That was good, right? It meant she could walk, if she was careful and kinda slooooow. So ... no reason to sit still when she could be pacing. Organizing. Organizing wasn't pacing.

Really.

(just for one, please)

Rikku had a low, nagging headache. Aaaaaaaand there was something licking her nose.

She opened her eyes to see ... right. Petey. Why did her eyes itch? They burned and scratched and didn't want to focus. She scooped him up and carefully trying to pull herself to sitting upright.

She was in an awkward tangle of limbs, blankets, and used tissues. Romeo was still asleep. Right. She had come here after work, and they had spent most of the evening in tears. She didn't remember falling asleep; she must have drifted off from sheer exhaustion. That would explain the crick in her neck.

The phone call. Zombies. Reno. Dojima. Half the posse, gone, just like that. The town under siege.

There was a kitty-faced ring on her finger. She wondered if there was still a tire on Reno's. Maybe he'd already lost that arm. Maybe he was sleeping, in the park, or feeding on another one of her friends.

She had guns. Ones she'd taken from the shop. She should go and protect whoever was left.

Once she could make herself get up. For now, she had a warm, wriggly Petey, and she snuggled her face into his fur. He didn't seem to mind that he was getting damp.

(Romeo modded with permission. Linkdroppy/establishy. Open to the boy from Verona, or any who would knock on the door, which is shut.)

Somewhere between the Djose Temple and the Mushroom Rock Road -- near where the road off to the Moonflow started -- there was now a large, metal tower. It wasn't all that pretty, but Rikku was kind of proud of it anyway. There was a small black box at its base, and they'd ripped out the guts of a few mech droids to get everything functional and powered.

Rikku had brought a lot of tech stuff with her, this time. The tower needed to talk to the satellite. The satellite could already talk to the airship. So then the tower would be able to talk to the airship. And more importantly, the tower would be able to talk to other towers, across Spira. Okay, those weren't built yet, but once they were, it would. And once this worked, they could set up more towers, and then?

And then, you could get long-distance communication without running a bunch of land wires through the crazy physical conditions of Spira.

Which would mean: cell phones. In Spira. Seriously.

If this worked. Not when. Because it was really looking like an 'if' right now, because the set-up was so jerry-rigged, and they'd had to get a few people from the Machine Faction involved, for a central processing something-or-other, to translate the signals, and that was nearby, and Rikku was not going to worry, if absolutely none of this did anything. Because if it didn't, maybe it would break in ways that were useful and let them know where to start looking for things that wouldn't break.

It kinda made sense, if you looked at it sideways. She was just hoping she wasn't going to look like an idiot, here.

"We should lay odds," she told Reno as she wiped her greasy hands off on her shorts. "Handicap some results, take money in, see if we can make a profit on the trip." Personally, she thought 'something catches on fire' was at least 3:1.

(NFB distance. For Reno, Lulu, and possible NPCs from Spira itself.)

Gosh, Rikku was bored. Really. You could tell by the way she was lounging on her bed, wearing something comfortable and reading a magazine.

She had no reason to think anyone would be coming by. Really. Just another boooring day here in Rikku's room.

Oh. Petey seemed to be in the closet, though. It was for his own good. He might have chewed on some of the candles.

And Rikku had that assignment for Management Theory, didn't she? Making someone do something for her? Huh. She'd have to see if someone dropped by, and if said person could be convinced to do something for her. Something complicated or humiliating. She hoped she could manage that.

(it's just for the redhead that's not a chicken any more. the image linked is mildly NWS, the door is shut, and Rikku is going to hell.)

Rikku didn't know what it meant that, whenever she wasn't herself for a weekend, she was usually very cute but kinda dim. That hinted at seriously unpleasant conclusions and she was going to not think about them.

In the mean time, she was writing a chirpy letter home to Yunie. And wishing they had the satellite connection set up already, although really, it was kinda for the best that things weren't in place yet. If she was right about what they could possibly get going, it'd mean cell phone coverage for bits of Spira, which was unbelievable.

But it was only a maybe, and it wasn't set up yet. Which meant she'd probably spared herself an embarrassing phone call home, while a toddler.

(Expecting one, before he transmogrifies, but is very open for any others!)

Okay, so, it had been a crazy couple of weeks, with spring break, and baby-sitting Janice-the-cutest-toddler-in-history (yay! Janice was staying!) but she was seriously behind on updating people on ... stuff. Y'know. That might've happened on the trip and all.

Which is why she was dialing Dawn's number and bouncing to herself.

(Calling the Berkeley key-girl. Way open after the phone call!)

Okay, so, her random stop in at work had led to ... babysitting. Right. For a chubby-cheeked adorable little angel who had mercenaries and hired killers from different timelines and dimensions trying to kill her.

Until Cable and Deadpool got back, she and Temari were on Baby Detail. Which meant glaring at exits and getting her weapons out from the locker and being on her guard. It also meant ...

"I got your toes," she said, grabbing one tiny foot in her hand.

Janice squealed in delight, waving her other foot in the air and reaching out small fingers towards Rikku's face.

"I'm gonna eat 'em! Better watch out! Iiiiiiiiii'm gooooooooonna eat 'em!"

(OOC: OPEN, to any who want to WTF at the new temporary resident of 308 and be dazzled by her overpowering cuteness. Temari is lurking handwavily around the perimeter. Yay babyplot!)

Was it possible for people to be cruise-lagged? Rikku felt kinda cruise-lagged. Same time zone, but she was tan and tired and her thoughts swirled around and around and around. Worrying about Romeo and Dojima. Wondering about herself and Reno. Hoping Yunie was doing okay. Thinking about graduation, and afterwards. Fandom, Gaia, Spira. Wishing she had thought to call Dawn before it was this late. Dammit, was Berkeley in the future or the past? It might not be late, there, or it could be even later. Okay, she'd wait until tomorrow, then.

She pulled out a piece of paper, and started with Dear Yunie, before realizing she had no idea how to keep going.

Okay. She didn't seem to be sleeping just yet, anyway. She could take her time.

(OOC: expecting one, who will probably stay, and thus should be last. completely open before him, if anyone else is up.)

It was mooooooooorning. Morning was all warm and cozy. Even though Rikku was a little sunburned and a little hungover.

Ooooh, and she had a nifty ring on her left hand. From Sven and Marina Fellina Katarina Whoknowsina's superfly wedding. She couldn't believe the attendants hadn't thrown them out. She'd have to ask if anyone got a tape. Fake-weddings were kinda fun.

She had no idea what to do with the ring, though. Maybe she'd ask Romeo what he and his friend were going to do with theirs?

For now, she was going to snuggle closer to her favorite Turk and watch how the light played off the small gem in the ring.

(just for mr. higurrhurrnurrhurrnurrhurrsssson.)