Author's Note: For the "First Fight" challenge at the Gippal/Rikku community on Livejournal! First FFX-2 fic in a long time! This is a Fifteen Minute Fic. Oh and no, this is not the way Gippal lost his eye. Hello, foreshadowing!

Disclaimer: Despite having played FFX-2 like a bazillion times, no, I don't own it. FFX either.

First Fight

Rikku and Gippal had their first fight before they were five. To be specific, Rikku was two and Gippal was three. They had never met before, and they didn't start off on the greatest terms.

If you asked Rikku (and she were capable of more than incoherent baby babble), she would tell you it was Gippal's fault. If you asked Gippal (and he more properly understood the concept of blame and culpability), he would tell you it was all Rikku's fault. When they were both grown adults, Rikku still tended to babble and Gippal was still good at pointing the finger, so their opinions didn't change much. Because of this, when asking about the story at their wedding, there was some trouble finding a version that wasn't biased. Finally, Yuna tracked down Cid by the punch bowl (who was sadly mourning the "loss" of his daughter) and got him to tell the whole story, to the chagrin of the newlyweds.

Of course, that was once they worked past Cid's vehement argument that, really, in all actuality and completely without question… it was all Gippal's mother's fault.

You see, Gippal's mother and Rikku's mother were quite close. As Rikku had yet to make any friends of her own (and things weren't going so well with Brother, who recently had to shave off the majority of his hair due to what was now referred to as The Bubblegum Incident), the two of them decided to arrange a play-date and keep the whole thing hush-hush from Cid – who liked to overreact over things and wasn't the biggest fan of Gippal's father. One afternoon while Cid was out on some sort of business, both women got together, set up a playpen, and stuck Rikku and Gippal in it.

Rikku, at first, refused to acknowledge Gippal's existence. Instead she just sort of rolled this way and that, to the concern of her mother. When Gippal's mother gave her son a toy shovel to play with, however, Rikku took quite an interest. There was silence during the quiet inspection young children seem to conduct so methodically, poking and prodding new friends. In fact, it was all very calm until the moment Rikku's father walked through the door (and this is why Rikku's mother, bless her soul, would tell you that it was all Cid's fault). It was then that Rikku snatched the shovel from Gippal's hand.

Gippal, who did not like to share (and didn't particularly know or care what sharing was at the time), quickly swiped it back. Rikku, inflamed and resourceful in her anger, made a mad grab for it, missed, and poked him in the eye. Cid, upon realizing there was a boy in the playpen with Rikku, a boy who was not Brother, began shouting erratically. This, coupled with the pain of having one's eye poked by a small blonde toddler with the wickedest look in her swirling green eyes, was enough to send Gippal bursting into tears. He then dropped the shovel, which Rikku in her greedy haste picked up and began hitting him with. From there it was a mad scrabble of mothers jumping into the playpen, a pacing father complaining that playing with boys was as good as imprinting at such a young age, a little Al Bhed boy crying, and a little Al Bhed girl amusing herself with a stolen shovel, sowing the seeds that would grow into a long life of expert thievery.

Yuna, at the end of this tale (which also finished with Gippal's mother taking the brunt of the blame, until of course she walked over and told them it really was all Cid's fault, and then since someone finally agreed with someone else – and Rikku's mother would have smiled were she there – the point of arguing was considered moot) could not even politely stifle a chuckle, while Tidus was beside himself with laughter. Rikku and Gippal, both red in the face and reeking of the type of shame one only feels in nightmares wherein one is naked before a large crowd, slunk off to the edge of the party and hid themselves in the shadow of a tree.

"I can't believe Pops did that," said Rikku, voice muffled between her fingers, her hands cradling her face.

Gippal sighed. "His final revenge."

"We should be so lucky." When her cheeks had faded to a subtle pink, she let her hands fall to her side and smiled just slightly. Gippal thought he recognized the playfulness in her eyes, the same kind he had seen a long, long time ago. He wasn't sure when she'd looked at him exactly that way before, but felt a foreboding sense of doom nonetheless. "It was your fault, you know. You should've let me play with your shovel."

"According to my sources, Cid's girl," said Gippal, cocking his hip to the side, easing back into playful banter and his natural environment, "you didn't exactly ask. And I don't think you get to blame me for being rude when you apparently beat me with it."

"I was two!"

He shrugged. "I could have you reported for domestic violence, you know. I could be deeply psychologically scarred."

Rikku crossed her arms and huffed, though clearly fought a smile. Somewhere else at the reception, Cid was reluctantly telling Yuna the story of Rikku's first word. In perfect, unbidden synch, father and daughter both said, "Meanie."