- “I wanna go home! I hate lightning! I hate thunder!“
- —Rikku
Rikku is a lively and kind-hearted Al Bhed girl who is a playable character in both Final Fantasy X, and its direct sequel, Final Fantasy X-2.
Rikku’s father is Cid, the leader of the Al Bhed faction, and she has an older brother, aptly named Brother. Her mother died before the events of Final Fantasy X, having been killed by a faulty machina. Cid’s sister, Rikku’s aunt, married High Summoner Braska, Yuna‘s father, making Rikku and Brother Yuna’s biological cousins.
In Final Fantasy X, Rikku is Tidus‘s first friend in Spira, and returns later in the story, becoming one of Yuna’s guardians. Strong-willed, Rikku makes numerous attempts to disrupt Yuna’s pilgrimage; knowing what Yuna’s fate would be at the end. She eventually joins the pilgrimage in an effort to ensure it wouldn’t happen. In Final Fantasy X-2, Rikku accompanies Yuna on her personal quest to reunite with Tidus.
Appearance and Personality
- “Rikku, at your service!“
- —Rikku
In her debut appearance in Final Fantasy X, Rikku is a young girl of only fifteen, with medium-length blonde hair in a ponytail and braided pigtails with orange feathers attached to them, and the Al Bhed trademark green eyes with swirled pupils. When she is first seen aboard the salvage ship, Rikku is wearing a full Al Bhed combat diving suit with reinforced materials that conceal her identity. Later in the game, she joins Yuna’s pilgrimage and sheds the suit, revealing a pair of flaired green short-shorts with an orange belt, loosely held around her waist, and an orange sleeveless tank-top with side straps and two long blue ribbons hanging from the back.
She wears a pair of goggles around her neck, a pair of boots, a gauntlet and arm guard for her right arm and a large protective forearm mit for her left. Around her right thigh, she keeps a pouch, in which she keeps her alchemy materials and equipment. Rikku’s nails are also painted bright yellow. Despite carrying goggles around her neck and wearing them while salvaging and piloting machina, Rikku never wears her goggles again after she takes them off on the Moonflow.
In Final Fantasy X, due to their familial bond as cousins, Rikku is completely loyal to Yuna – whom she affectionately calls “Yunie” – and the most vocal opponent against the ongoing pilgrimage that will eventually claim Yuna’s life. Over the course of the game, she also forms a close bond with Tidus and looks up to him as a brother (and treats him rather better than her own), perhaps because of their similar personalities and devotion to Yuna; their friendship is so close that Tidus is the first one of Yuna’s guardians to whom Rikku reveals she and Yuna are biologically related. She also turns to him for comfort, as seen in the Thunder Plains, when she collapses on the ground with fright, crawls towards him like a skiddish insect and grabs his leg.
Rikku is kind-hearted, spirited, happy-go-lucky, and energetic, which sometimes clashes with the more stoic group members. She looks up to Lulu as something of a role model, being impressed with her calm level-headed nature. Child-like and playful in many ways, Rikku tries to maintain a positive outlook and often refers to gloomy or annoying people as “big meanies”. Her cheerful outlook often makes a stark contrast, however, when she is sad or upset, and despite her outwardly happy exterior, she seems to carry some insecurities, particularly when it comes to her own future and what she wants to be. When voicing these worries to Yuna, she is reassured that her own adventure would arrive one day.
Rikku is also known to be highly intelligent, being bilingual and skilled in chemistry. She also suffers from astraphobia, the fear of lightning, after a mishap involving Brother and a stray Thunder spell in her youth. She starts to deal with this fear in Final Fantasy X, and has overcome it by Final Fantasy X-2, by camping out in the Thunder Plains for a week. Rikku also reveals a fear of snakes in Final Fantasy X-2, sometimes shouting “Snake! Snake! Snaaake!” when entering battle against a snake-like enemy such as a Recoil.
Final Fantasy X-2 Dresspheres and default appearanceEdit
- “Youth wins again!“
- —Rikku
In the two years between Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy X-2, Rikku’s hair has grown much longer; she wears it loose and braided, tied atop her head, adorned with colorful beads, and held by a blue bandana. Rikku remains the ever upbeat and somewhat reckless individual, occasionally causing trouble for her friends. Remaining loyal to her cousin Yuna, Rikku continues to care about her welfare while encouraging her to have more fun in life.
In Final Fantasy X-2, Rikku has a separate appearance for each of the 13dresspheres used in combat, with details that distinguish her in each dressphere from Paine and Yuna. Rikku’s default look is the Thief dressphere; she wears a yellow string bikini and an olive green mini-skirt, carrying two pouches at her waist and ruffle sleeves over each arm as arm guards. A long yellow and red scarf hangs loosely around her. Wearing the Thief dressphere in combat, she wields two red dagger-like blades designed for motive attacks.
In other dresspheres, she can be seen wielding Yuna’s Tiny Bee guns and summoning staves El Dorado and Spiked Rod as well as Tidus’s Crystal Sword,Auron‘s Katana blade and his Masamune katana. Her deck theme for the Lady Luck dressphere is clubs, and herMascot dressphere is a Cait Sith.