Rikku had known it was hopeless, like crying at the dark. Her breath catches when she sees Yunalesca seem to struggle. Had something really started to get through? The cry that results when the spell strikes is quickly choked off as her body convulses, a precious portion of her remaining lifeforce leaving in a spark. She collapses to one knee, gasping. A ruse, it was all a ruse! In her foolishness, she’d let hope get the best of her and what had happened? Her guard went down.

So many steps closer to death, the grief and adrenaline no longer numbed the pain of her injuries, it laced the words to her comrades, “You’re all wasting your breath!” She clawed at the ground in frustration before pushing herself up to her feet, “Stop thinking you’re talking to a woman, and realize what stands before you – is nothing more than a fiend!” First making a fist, she holds two fingers up to her lips, casting Stealth.

As though cut from film in an editing glitch, the girl is gone. Barley a moment passes when, without a sound, a whirlwind of daggers appears above Yunalesca, hurling down at the creature in razor sharp rain as the ninja casts Throw.