PROLOGUE
I
The house looked eerie.
At least, that was how she saw it. She paced in little circles
out on the driveway pondering whether to step onto the porch
and ring the bell or not. The small, straw-woven basket
swayed under her arm as she walked timidly, chewing her
lower lip in worry and furrowing those lean eyebrows ever so
slightly into her beautiful, pale face.
She did not know how long she had been standing there.
With an indecisive look her eyes wandered and traveled along
the curvy green vines that had crawled up the crumbling paint
and formed giant, greenish cobwebs onto those dusty gray
walls that once were white. She turned to see the other side of
the old mansion and tried hard to tear her gaze away from the
deformed tree - the singular, overly-large branch that plastered
itself against the windows on the second floor, and that
slanted, rotting stem that seemed about to fall and crash into
the house any minute. Even in the midst of a mid-August day
when the sun took its sweet time scorching the ground down
here in the South and turning everything into a melting wax
effigy of a summer, the house in front of her still emitted a
strange feel of cold, damp darkness that she could almost...
taste.
Yup, she said to herself, this is definitely creepy.
But then again, she had no choice. Every single time they did
a sale, she always ended up having the most cookies left in the
end. Although nobody ever said anything about her poor
record, she felt bad nevertheless and therefore was determined
to finish selling her basketful this time around at any cost.
That was actually why she was here now, five miles away
from her own not-too-philanthropic neighborhood and in the
middle of nowhere, trying her damned best at selling these
girl-scout cookies.
Gathering what courage she had, she held her light, angular
chin high, straightening the wrinkles on her sleeves and her
knee-length skirt and dusting off her hair, she marched up to
the porch like a woman on a mission and firmly pressed the
doorbell.
Hopefully someone answers soon, she thought as she lifted her
free hand to her forehead, wiping off a few beads of sweat. I
don't want to miss Sailor Moon this week.
II
To sum up the painfully long into the mercifully short, Vinny
Vampherlive was having a bad day.
Actually, he had been having a bad day everyday since he
retired from the CIA three years ago. Immediately after his
retirement, his wife ran away with some other guy and didn't
even bother filing a divorce. Said something to the effect that
it was a payback for all those years in the service when he's
neglected her because of his work.
In truth, Vinny loved his wife very much. Like many other
dumped men, he often drank himself to a half-comatose state,
seeking to relieve the pain in his heart. It was not until a year
ago that he had found a rekindled love – the NRA.
The National Rifle Association had literally pulled him out of
his two-year shock, and restored in him the ability to function
like a human being once more. Vinny had always been
obsessed with firearms, although he wouldn't admit it and
even consciously suppressed himself from using a gun unless
he absolutely had to, as it would make his professional career
look very unprofessional otherwise. However, with the NRA
he finally found an outlet to release himself and openly stock
and treasure his guns as much as he wished. In fact, he
polished each piece on his rack daily ever since, caressing the
cold, steel barrels like a woman's skin and loving the surge of
raw power that he felt whenever he held a gun in his hands.
For a while, life for Vinny was passably good.
Things turned ugly when the congress, due to a rapid rise in
assault-related crimes all over the country, passed a resolution
that severely limited the NRA and its members from holding
an excessive amount of small-weaponry in their houses. The
slogan they used was very simple, "You have a right to bear
arms," the spokesman of the House intoned in a news
conference, "just not more than what your hands can carry."
In short, this translated to Vinny having to sell off every one
of his beloved collections except for the two trusty shotguns
that he treasured above all. And no, he was not happy about
it. Deprived of his love for the second time in his life, Vinny
resumed his drinking and left everything else, including his
house, in shambles. He himself had long realized what a mess
he's become and, prophesizing an early death for himself, he
even bought some course materials and made a coffin that he
stored down in the basement, very sure that it would come in
handy sometime in the near future.
Then, the unthinkable thing happened today.
His long companion for eleven long years. His trusted friend
who stayed with him and endured all hardships when others
abandoned him. His pet bat, Reeny Rude, died earlier this
morning of old age.
Vinny sat long in his chair after he buried RR in his backyard.
He wasn't angry. He wasn't sad or depressed. He just... was.
Reeny Rude had been the only tie left between him and this
world that had seemingly deserted him, and with this last bond
severed, Vinny Vampherlive felt nothing anymore. It was as
if there was a gaping hole somewhere inside his body, and he
was too tired to try patching it up any longer. It took every
ounce of his energy to restrain himself from picking up one of
the two shotguns he's left with and blow his own brains out
right here and now. The only reason he didn't shoot himself
yet was because he wanted to kill that damned boy who drove
the dumpster truck first for being so damned late every single
week, including today. So he sat in his chair, seething unholy
rage at everything in general and especially at that dumpster-
truck boy whose absence was detaining Vinny from going to
his own maker, silently waiting to bestow this small farewell
gift unto a world that had been cruel to him all his life.
And then, of all the days in the world and for the first time in
more years than Vinny could remember, his doorbell rang.
III
"Would you like to buy some girl-scout cookies?" She was
about to say in the sweetest girl-scout-cookie-selling tone
possible as the door swung open, but stopped short at the word
"buy" and gasped when she found herself talking to the
receiving end of a large, twin-barrel shotgun.
"Yea? What do you want?" The dark-haired man behind the
half-opened door asked, his bloodshot eyes examining the
uniform figure before him.
Her pretty green eyes widened in fear. Vaguely she seemed to
recall to have read in the newspaper a few weeks ago with
some headline that ran like "Girl Scout Shot By Raving
Maniac While Selling Cookies." Even if she hadn't read it
somewhere before, she was positive that it would appear very
soon. "Uh, uh," she stammered in shock, staring at the gun.
"N, Nothing, sir, I'll just be going now. Very sorry to bother
you, yes, really, I'm terribly sorry. I promise you I won't ever
show up again, please, sir, have a very pleasant day," she said
while edging a few steps backwards quickly and almost
tripped herself on the stairs as she did so.
"Wait! I'm not done with you yet! Why did you come here?"
The red pupils that stared at her maliciously glimmered in a
predatory fashion as he spat the words out. Oh no, I'm gonna
die, she thought, I'm gonna get blown into a thousand little
bits and my dress is gonna be all bloody and messy.
"Please don't shoot me! Please!" She pleaded. "I'll give you
everything I have but please just let me go! Look, I can give
you-" she frantically began searching through her pockets and
came up with... nothing here. "some, um-" Nothing here
either, save a few dollars of change. "—girl-scout cookies?"
She offered hopefully. "I'm sorry but I only have two dollars
with me and I need them to take the bus back home... but you
can have all the cookies. They are very tasty, I'm sure you'll
like them if you just give it a try."
"Wait, let me get this straight," the man seemed to lower his
guard for only a few seconds as confusion seeped into his
voice. "You're a girl-scout, and you're here to sell me some
cookies?" She nodded.
"You mean, you're here to sell cookies?" He repeated. She
nodded again.
"And you think that I would be interested in them? You think
that someone whose wife ran away, who was forced to sell out
his guns, someone whose bat just died this morning, Someone
Like Me, WOULD BE INTERESTED IN BUYING YOUR
GOD-DAMNED COOKIES?" The man took a step toward
her, cocking his shotgun in one swift motion.
She trembled.
"Get the hell outta my house now and take your damned
cookies with you and don't COME BACK OR ELSE I'LL
SHOVE THIS GUN AND YOUR COOKIES UP YOUR
**********!" He hollered in uncontrollable rage.
Thankfully, she covered her ears with her palms in fear before
she could make out what the raging madman was actually
yelling about.
The poor girl fled in tears, making a beeline straight across the
lawn toward the street.
"AND STAY OFF THE LAWN!"
She hopped over to the pavement instantly and continued
scrambling down the driveway, spilling cookies everywhere.
Out of the corner of his eyes Vinny saw the familiar green,
juggernaut shape that was the dumpster truck speedily hauling
itself up the slope from the other end of the street some fifty
yards to the right. For a slight moment Vinny hesitated and
wondered why the garbage truck was driving in reverse this
time, but then he pushed the thought away and slowly took
aim at the truck. A tiny voice nagged at his subconscious and
warned him something about that girl who was currently
making a blind dash down the street while constantly turning
her head back to check on him, and about the truck that was
quickly backing up from the other end of the road.
All of a sudden, an unreadable expression flickered across
Vinny's face as the realization of some impending calamity
dawned upon him and temporarily made him forget even his
desire to kill.
"HEY!" Vinny yelled at the top of his lungs at the retreating
figure, "WATCH OUT!"
IV
It wasn't that Seth was lazy or tardy in nature. Quite the
opposite, in fact, would have held true for him: Seth was just
about the most dedicated man ever lived. He would do
absolutely anything to get a job done. And he never
complained.
Which would be one of the many reasons why he was now in
all his glory - complete with the cape and gloves and all the
get-up, flickering aside a stray long strand of silvery-white
hair as his eyes narrowed in anticipation like a soldier about to
charge into the fray.
Then the green light flashed.
Seth promptly stepped on the gas pedal and, feeling the
familiar trembles and the infernal growl of an overtaxed
engine, proceeded to steer the green monstrosity that he
currently sat in down the next block.
Many would wonder how on earth the great Seth Phiro had
fallen to such state as to humble himself by doing menial
labors like collecting trash for a remote town in the middle of
God-knows-where, but the truth was very simple: Seth had
chosen it himself.
Make no mistake in thinking that he hadn't been successful at
any of his other careers. He had been the best bodyguard one
could ever wish for, the most-famed actor in Hollywood, a
most amazing pitcher, and simply the greatest fireman ever
lived. He had saved countless lives while working as a
fireman, and his miraculous efficiency had been much
publicized by the media, who attributed it as a result for
having a "seemingly-fireproof hair and most definitely a
fireproof cape."
In fact, he was at the top of his field in every single one of his
past fifty-some different careers. Business bloomed with
every store he worked for; lawsuits were won in his favor
whenever he argued for a case... there was no doubt that he
would have been voted as the next President should he cared
to run a campaign. It would not be far off the truth if one
claims that the whole nation was on a Seth Phiro high.
Then why in the world did Seth keep switching jobs? Perhaps
one might ask. The answer was obvious; it's called "every pro
has its con." And the con factor that came with his
unparalleled beauty, grace, and fire-immunity was this:
Girls. Lots of them. All packed with starry eyes and usually a
slight drool off one corner of their mouths. They swarmed
about him wherever he went.
At first, Seth didn't mind. It was an attention that he didn't
actively seek for, although it never personally disturbed him
either. However, when they kept breaching security to find
him and knelt in front of him professing their love whenever
they did find him, creating mass human-roadblocks as a result,
Seth was forced to quit being a bodyguard and went into
acting. And he quit that too, when he was simultaneously
awarded the Oscars for Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor,
and Best Director three years in a row when he only did a
cameo as a passer-by in a low-budget documentary film. As
for the fireman bit, it was indisputable that he had single-
handedly saved more lives than any ten squadrons combined,
but the national index for counts of arson had also risen 500%
during the two years when he served on the task force. You
had no idea how many housewives set their own houses on
fire while their husbands were away... well, let's put it this
way. It caused quite a stir when the First Lady, along with
every female staff member in the building, burned down the
White House and sent a note demanding that either Seth Phiro
and Seth Phiro alone flew to Washington this minute and
rescue them out, or they would all die waiting for him. And so
on, and so forth, Seth drifted from one job to another,
relentlessly hounded by packs of ravenous, lovesick females
everywhere. Perhaps the only time when he had personally
been part of the reason for an early retirement was that single
season when he played for the Cardinals: The league could
take his little fixation on coloring his baseballs green, but they
staunchly refused when he insisted on using a twelve-foot-
long bat.
And that was basically why he was stuck now as perhaps the
most beautiful street-janitor in the history of mankind. Need
to find a new job again, Seth noted to himself passively as he
drove up toward Cemetery Drive. Two teenage girls had
already discovered him here about half-an-hour ago and had
tried to jump into the pile of garbage on the back and then
work their way to the front to get to him. He had narrowly
escaped from having his garbage truck hijacked both times by
flooring the gas pedal before they could put their hands on the
truck, but if he had learned anything from the past, he knew
that those girls would not give up so easily. More likely than
not, they would have been right on his tail this whole time.
Just to prove his theory was correct, Seth turned his head and
looked back from the window. Surely, he could vaguely
discern two tiny figures slowly gaining on him from the rear.
Time was running short, Seth realized. He needed to think of
a way to track those two and make sure they wouldn't jump
onto the truck while he was distracted... and suddenly, he had
an idea. The last house in the service area was that old
mansion up at the end of Cemetery Drive, and as far as he
knew, nobody dared to go near the place because they thought
it was haunted... Immediately, Seth shifted the gears and did a
U-turn, then began driving the truck in reverse up Cemetery
Drive, figuring that it would be safe to do so and he could
monitor those two girls at the same time so that they wouldn't
be able to sneak up into the truck.
Seth had so counted on the fact that there wouldn't be
anybody running on the street near where he was going that he
didn't hit the brakes until he heard the feminine scream
coming from the back as he felt the rear bumper hit something
solid and soft, and realized that he shouldn't have done an
emergency break while driving in reverse because it would
cause all the garbage bags to topple back out of the truck.
x x x
She screamed when she suddenly felt a mind-jarring impact on
her body that sent her airborne. She felt her body hit the
ground and almost passed out from the pain. Dimly she
thought she heard a harsh, grating sound like someone
applying an emergency break, but she couldn't be certain
since everything around her became a haze. She struggled to
see what was happening around her, but the only thing she
could make out were strange, huge black bags descending
down from the sky in waves toward her. It must be a dream,
she thought, must be some weird dream like the ones she had a
few weeks ago. She felt sleepy and slowly closed her eyes.
The last thing she could sense was blackness... and a really,
really bad stench.
Fourteen year-old Arisa Greensford had no idea what hit her.
[Standard Disclaimers]
ukulele studios
proudly presents
Live and Let Die
(working title)
- a semi-original fan-fiction
based on Final Fantasy VII
Chapter One: The Dangers of Being A Bubbly Salesgirl
I
The mud-sodden road that girded the so-called market looked
slightly less worn today. Perhaps it had to do with the light
shower that sprinkled the locale with hesitant, almost bashful
raindrops again late last night - but then again, perhaps not.
After all, Market Boulevard had been the only name-worthy
street in town back when Midgaria was still just called
Midgar, and even then it had never come close in scale to a
real boulevard in any sense of the word, no matter how one
might look at it. It was only fitting that the street, now mostly
slushy dirt and muck and hardly a speckle of gravel or tar,
would look the way it did after a night of that ever-so-
annoying, ever-so-persistent drizzling.
Of course, the buildings that leaned against the sides of the
road - or at least what was left of those buildings - had fared
no better either. The pedestrians who were busily scurrying by
through either side of the grime-filled tracks, however, would
never bother to stop in mid-stride to ponder just exactly what
had happened to the once seedy, obscenely prosperous smut-
heaven of Wall Market, as doing so was an act of futility.
There hadn't been a public maintenance department... no,
there hadn't even been a city-planning department in Midgaria
for the last twenty years, and frankly no one was quite worked
up enough to complain for a change from the status quo.
That was essentially why the plaza looked the way it did now.
Half-collapsed structures groaned around the town in echo
through yawning holes that had once been shut off by glass
windows as faded paint slowly peeled themselves off the
crumbling high walls to the ground below like a mass,
organized ritual suicide that had persisted daily over the last
two decades. Rag-sewn canvas dangled, not unlike entrails
from a disemboweled enemy, over the stands and vendor carts
beneath some broken neon tubes that used to form legible
signs. Greased fumes smothered the surroundings from oil
lanterns hung onto streetlights that had never shed light -
according to the memories of the younger inhabitants here,
who have been mimicking against their will the image of
hungry rodents trapped inside a gigantic trash-bin for as long
as they could remember. In a sense, it was almost as if the
entire pathetic, helpless experience at surveying these
miserable establishments could be summed up and flawlessly
represented by a torn sign suspended high between two
ancient, weather-beaten wooden beams at the town's entrance,
quietly announcing:
Welcome To
W A L M A R T
A brown-haired young boy was standing under that sign,
silently watching the beams totter back and forth rhythmically
at a sudden gust of wind. Involuntarily, he drew up the hood
from his small, smudgy overcoat with one hand as he clenched
reflexively at the hand holding him with the other. "Mom?"
Dull hazel eyes darted once to the right from under the hood
as he afforded his mother a timid, questioning glance. "I'm
cold," he pleaded.
"Yes, dear, I know." His mother sighed, still gazing at the
road. In comparison, her simple dress was much more
threadbare than what she donned for the child. "I just have to
drop these batteries at the junk shop and then we'll get back
home. Just stay put for a little longer and if I can haggle a few
more gils from that stingy old man at the store I'll even get
you something, how about that?"
"I guess so... hey, mom! Can I get one of those?" The sudden
enthusiastic lilt in the boy's tone stunned her slightly and
caused her to fix her attention onto where he had pointed. The
very notion that something existed here could ever raise any
noticeable sign of enthusiasm from anyone was simply alien
and absurd to her.
"But... honey, those things... they don't work." The woman
explained patiently after she realized what her son had been
talking about. A tall, young brunette wearing a tidy red and
pink uniform dress loitered by the old clothing store at a
deliberate pace, apparently trying to sell some of those Shinra
fortune-telling cards in a hand-woven basket which she carried
in one arm. It was all just a decrepit, inane idea thought up by
the Shinra revival movement as far as she was concerned, she
thought; no cheap, lame, glow-in-the-dark message card was
ever going to cheer up them survivors in the slums after the
Meteor. "But mom!" the little boy beside her protested,
tugging at her sleeves and wriggling his tiny body where he
stood, much like a gigantic little worm in untold agony. It
seemed to be the favorite physical expression of objection
among children, and an ingenious one at that because the very
act itself was such a pain to watch that their accompanying
adults would usually comply with their demands immediately
in hope to only make them stop twitching like that.
"I'm sorry, honey, but that's out of the question. You don't
buy what you can't eat," she told him flat out. She had built
enough immunity against the notorious Twitch of Compliance
that she was able to resist giving in on the first try.
"Please...? I'll be real good from now, I promise..." The
puppy eyes he gave her were enough to melt iron.
Realizing perfectly well that the boy wouldn't take 'no' as an
answer and would probably bug her for days on end about this
afterwards, she sighed and bit into her lower lip. This was
going to cost her weeks of work. "All right, hon', but only
this once and after we get back from the junk store."
"Thanks mom you're the greatest." The young boy bubbled as
he pulled her arm down to him and quickly kissed her cold
cheeks. "Let's go!" He immediately bounced up and down in
joy and dragged her towards the direction of the fortune card
vendor, suddenly entirely unaffected by the chill in the wind.
"I said, AFTER we get back from the store!" She drew her
arm back along with the boy reluctantly attached to it, and
headed toward the other direction in exasperation.
II
Again.
Sixteen year-old Ariel Garland stared down at herself in slight
dismay. She did her best to clean off her soiled dress with her
hands, but all it accomplished in the end was to smear mud
over the areas of her blouse that were originally untouched.
Watching the puddle of muck by the street, then at the
departing Chocobo wagon, and then the darkening sky, she
concluded that there was nothing to be liked about this
weather whatsoever. Not one bit.
She refrained herself from muttering a string of not-nice-
words with a little effort; her shirt was damp with raindrops
and clung to her skin in a nasty, gooey way and what's worse
was that no one was buying her cards so naturally it wouldn't
hurt to take a look –
Oh no. She'd done it again.
Ariel caught herself glancing downward to her left guiltily
again for the third time, and immediately tore her gaze away.
C'mon, a petulant voice nagged in her mind, you know you
wanted to take a look. What's the problem?
But... it's silly, she chided herself, hoping to gently squash the
thought that had been bothering her for the past few hours
before it got out of hand. Ever since the little incident this
morning, she had been troubled by this pestering voice
somewhere inside her head about sneaking a look at one of
those fortune cards. While immersing in self-debate was as
good a way to pass idle time as anything else, she was
beginning to tire and her firm resolution was gradually worn
down over time.
Aren't you in the least bit curious? The other part of her
insisted. Don't you want to know?
She couldn't help but to take another peek at the basket resting
on her left arm.
It really was silly, she told herself again. In fact, it was
completely ludicrous, especially given the fact that she knew
those things were fake, and she knew that for a fact because
she was currently selling them.
From what she was told, the idea for these Shinra fortune-
telling cards was originally conceived by one of the higher-up
executives after the old Midgar, along with the pizza platter it
was served upon, was sucked into the vortex of destructive
magic when the planet confronted the Meteor. After the entire
Shinra building and the Sister Ray cannon had been torn in the
cyclone in a hideously-splattered-like-a-bug-in-a-blender sort
of way and flung across the Midgar sky in countless tiny
sheets of metal confetti, the surviving Shinra board member
had decided that total reconstruction was in order. The
decision, according to the campaign flyers dropped from the
air by the Highwind, was not so much a reinstatement of a
syndicate government, but rather a deed of necessity to
prevent the world from lapsing further into chaos and anarchy.
In short, what it boiled down to was that someone with former
connections to Shinra was out to rebuild Midgar from ground
zero, and since Shinra's control over the world had been
virtually erased, the cost of rebuilding could only be afforded
through various means of fund-raising activities. And selling
these fortune-telling cards was one of them.
Ariel knew exactly how these cards were made. From what
she was told, they were formed by some sort of recycled metal
scrap that had been infused somehow by leftover Mako
energy. Obviously, the trace of energy was so minute that all
they could do was to emit a small amount of light in the dark,
illuminating pre-written messages of good fortune in the
process. These messages, in turn, more or less went along the
theme of "tomorrow will be a better day" or "things are
looking better and better for you". It was basically part of a
plan by the new Shinra to boost the morale for the survivors in
the slums, and Ariel didn't really object to telling a little
superstitious white lie if it would help people cope with their
lives. After all, she thought, if you keep hearing stuff like
"things are getting better" every single day, and you know
deep down that things couldn't possibly get any worse,
wouldn't it be true either way that things will actually start to
look up?
To a small extent, the morale-boosting trick had worked. As
she slowly wandered through various old sectors, Ariel had
occasionally seen before her very eyes glum looks of children
and adults slowly replaced by hesitant smiles, and lackluster
strides growing slightly more confident as time grew on. And
that made her tremendously happy, when she knew that her
hard work had finally bought a small degree of happiness into
people's lives.
However, for the most part, things didn't change in the way
she hoped they would. More often than not, she would
encounter groups of people drifting about aimlessly, lamenting
as they rummaged through the ruins and the surrounding
grassland areas right outside the old gates looking for food. It
brought tears to her eyes whenever she thought about the
majority of the population who had been devastated to the
point that they no longer cared about anything, that they would
only perform the most rudimentary and necessary tasks in life
for a bare-minimum level of self-subsistence.
Unfortunately, she had hit another one of those towns last
week. She shuddered at the thought that there were still two
sectors that she hadn't visited before, especially when rumors
said that they were a little... unstable. Taking a brief survey at
the scenes before her eyes and reciting from her memory of
the past week, Ariel knew that although this particular sector
had suffered far lighter damage as compared to the others
she'd seen before, the general attitude of the locals was one of
the worst. Maybe it was because the area had not been
demolished to the point where it was no longer inhabitable,
but people here seemed to be content in living their whole
lives out in the junk-filled town without a change while it
could have been so much more. Her shoulders drooped a little
as Ariel let out a small sigh. It was really like trying to fill a
general depression and angst the size of the Northern Crater
with a shovel; times likes this just made her wonder if her
work would ever truly pay off someday and make everyone go
on with their lives. Seven days out on the street with only one
customer was a new record low for her, not to mention a little
embarrassing and out of place. It almost made her feel like
she was selling charcoal in North Corel, or skin-whitening
cream on the beachside of Costa del Sol.
Without meaning to, she tried to recall what happened earlier
today when she finally hit her first customer and more-or-less
brought about the self-questioning and reminiscing that she
had been going through ever since...
x x x
"Would you like to buy a Shinra fortune-telling card? It's
only 100 gils each." With practiced ease, Ariel had addressed
the pair before her in a singsong voice. She could tell that the
lady in front of her was more than disinclined and probably
not at all interested at buying anything she had to offer; the
dull, barely tolerant glare from the woman's eyes spoke
volumes as she stood a few feet away.
"Yes," the middle-aged woman replied, "my son would like to
buy one of these... gadgets... please." The strained tone of her
voice clearly indicated that she, on the other hand, would have
absolutely nothing to do with it.
"Here you go," Ariel cheerfully said to the little boy. He was
the first customer she had seen for the entire week. "Just hold
the card in your hand like this and it'll tell you your fortune."
Without tearing the plastic wrap away, she held the two edges
of the card gingerly in a quick demonstration.
"Cool!" The boy eagerly snatched the card from her fingers,
took one brief look at the front cover with a colorful picture of
Cait Sith, the Shinra mascot and at once started to experiment
with the card like he was taught, not in the least noticing his
mother leading him away.
Ariel let out a tiny smile at the corner of her lips. She could
already guess what the little kid would see on his card.
However, her rueful smile was broken when she heard
someone calling out to her.
"Excuse me, miss?" It was the mother, standing about thirty
feet away from her, who had paused suddenly and turned to
her. "Yes, ma'am, how may I help you?"
"If you don't mind me saying this, don't you think there are
better things for a young lady like you to do than to spread this
scam around all the time?" The question was brutal, direct,
and unexpected to the point where she could only stutter in
response. "Huh?"
"I mean, you and I both know very well that this thing doesn't
really tell your fortune, and although I don't see the point for
you Shinra people to keep on selling this stuff, I personally
hate a hoax when I see one. And if what you're selling isn't a
fake, why don't you try reading your own fortune from one of
those cards yourself sometimes?" Without waiting for a reply,
she turned her head contemptuously and dragged her son off.
For a long time afterwards, Ariel could only stand still and
feel the burning flush in her cheeks rise even higher.
x x x
The words had stung. She could feel the heat on her face
threaten to rise again just by replaying the scene alone in her
mind.
Up until now, Ariel had always believed what she was doing
was for a good cause. It had pained her to see the inhabitants
around Midgaria roaming about listlessly everyday, stripped
of possession, family, or often even the will to persevere. And
she had always wanted to help.
Oh, how she wanted to.
She had listened to countless stories recounted by her mother
before, stories about how the lands and the earth had been
before the Meteor struck. Things weren't perfect then; in fact,
they were far from good. But whatever the conditions had
been, they seemed worse now. Ariel personally would have
chosen the old days when Shinra was in control rather than
having to see the old and young alike roaming about this filthy
dump day in and day out, again and again like scattered
groups of mindless zombies.
That was what she had said to herself when she applied for the
job a little over a year ago. And she had believed in it
wholeheartedly. She had thought that more good would come
to it for everyone to have something to believe in, something
to perhaps brighten their day... even though it might not even
be true.
Now she wasn't so sure anymore.
Was she truly doing something horrible? The lady's words
that morning made her feel like a petty scum, out to swindle
what little money people might have left and give them false
hope in the end. Was this what she had truly been doing for
the past year? That very notion had shaken her to the core.
A lone tear escaped and silently traveled down one side of her
cheeks before she could rein in her emotions, leaving a small,
glistening trail against the soft curves of her face. She was
hurt, and she was confused. Her birthday was coming up in
two months, and she had originally planned on working
overtime just to have enough savings to go celebrate for a day
or so. Now... now she just wanted to run back home and get
away from it all, at least until she could calm down enough to
reason out what she was going to do.
Unable to cope with the onslaught of shame and doubt in her
mind, she clutched the basket tight against her waist and began
to run. Hoping to leave before she could break down even
further and cause a public commotion, Ariel shut her eyes
closed and made a blind dash towards the town gates.
And promptly tripped herself over a small puddle of mud by
her feet on her first step.
III
"DAMNED LIL' MUGGAS! GIT YOUR ASSES BACK
HERE!" Barret Wallace hollered at the fleeing carriage down
the street as he spurred on his own steed, one gun-grafted hand
dangled loosely against his side suddenly flailing wildly in
tune with an unexpected lurch from his saddle.
The response he received was a shot too close to his liking
from a pistol up front, clipping away a few feathers and a
leather strap on a side belt as well. The beast he rode upon
nearly leapt five foot into the air at the sudden twinge of pain.
"Shit."
The massive man spat out a string of curses into the wind,
preparing to charge up another gallop to close the distance.
The chase had raged across the western ruins of Sector 7, and
the collateral damage they caused was more than he would
like to think about. G'thing the place's a shithole already,
Barret smiled a grim, taut smile, beads of sweat dripping down
from his brows; 'coz I dun wanna be ther' t'pay the damn bills
if it ain't.
Painful as it was to admit, this was one time he actually
wouldn't mind having some Shinra soldiers around to help
out. As it were, however, most of the units had been
disbanded within three months after Shinra's collapse, and the
ones that didn't were usually the farthest away from
Midgaria... and were reduced to mercenary thugs controlled by
former squadron leaders, out to terrorize the countryside for
basic commodities. Last time he heard, Vincent and Cid had
just cleaned up a local rebel militia unit near Rocket Town.
"Man, my back's killin' me," Barret muttered out loud,
draping the bridle in a loop over the gun barrel on his right
arm as he freed his left hand to rub off the soreness on his
back. "HEY YA LIL' PIECE OF SHIT, I SAID STOP!"
He was ignored.
It was usually not a very common sight for a fifty-five year-
old man, with his short, flat stub of hair and trimmed beard
graying, to drive a Chocobo steed one-handed and engage on a
mad shoot-and-run chase with some young upstart teenagers;
but this was Barret Wallace. He was used to blowing Mako
reactors to smithereens on a four-man-mission at his prime,
and he was the one to score first blood against Hojo on top of
the Shinra tower twenty years ago. Give him a target and
enough lead; Barret was nigh invincible. Unfortunately, even
he had his limits, and it was beginning to show in the form of
random gasps and huffs after five gruesome hours of street
dogfight, constantly ducking bullets and dodging grenades.
A long chain of colorful expletives escaped his lips on instinct
as the retired war hero swerved his huge body to one side and
almost lost his balance from avoiding a passing volley of fire.
The Chocobo under him squawked loudly in protestation; the
sudden shift in weight had almost brought her down crashing
into the road as well. Reeve's gonna owe me big this time,
Barret thought, cursing all the while. He was going to take
down that stupid "Snow Ball" gang even if it was the last
thing he'd ever do.
A small corner of his mind briefly recalled the meeting last
evening he had with the new Shinra executive. Reeve had
gone out of his way to beg him to come lend his hand to solve
the problem last week, and had even prepared him a top-grade
racing Chocobo with an Avalanche ribbon banner tied onto the
back of her tail for this mission. It was uncustomarily nice for
him, and for one short moment Barret had suspected some sort
of an ulterior motive at work. The creator of Cait the Cat was
nothing but sly, and even though he had proved over the years
that he had indeed turned to the good side, Reeve was still able
to pull some nasty surprises on the rest of the team from time
to time. Cait had only persuaded him to leave his home in
Kalm and come to his office after explaining that Shinra was
very short on patrol and the Snow Ball gang had been a terror
near Sector 8 for the last few months. "Besides," the grinning
stuffed cat (on top of a stuffed moogle) had said while
stroking the large Avalanche banner on the bird's tail, "it'd be
a good chance to make people remember what Avalanche had
been all about. There are still some people out there who still
believe that you were the bad guys, you know, and you might
as well try to clear the whole thing up again if only for Jesse
and everyone else's sake."
Feeling the truth in his words, the veteran leader of Avalanche
had agreed to the job. Nevertheless, when he rested his gaze
on the large, paint-printed "SNOW BALL" on the back of the
Chocobo wagon in front of him and caught several passers-by
staring at the chase with an expression that was partially fear,
and partially something unidentifiable altogether, Barret
couldn't help but think that maybe somehow he was missing a
few details from the big picture.
The trail led him to turn sharply around a corner and he
suddenly realized that he was about to enter a more populated
area once again. He made another attempt to catch up to the
terrorists when he recognized the surrounding area as
somewhere near Wall Market. Letting those two weave their
way into the town was simply unacceptable; the chance of
casualties occurring was too great a risk for him to take.
Barret had held back his fire to a minimum before, as he didn't
want to dirty his hands again after all this time.
But there ain't no choice anymore, he told himself.
Gritting his teeth, Barret Wallace charged his own guns and
began to let loose a hail of ammunition back to the two
terrorists, trading shots in earnest.
IV
"Itai." Ariel softly exclaimed, both hands cupping over the
petite round tip of her nose. Then she slowly propped herself
up from where she sat. Sprawling all over on the ground was
not a position she would like to stay in for too long. Her face
turned an embarrassing shade of red.
Oh no, she thought, suddenly taking note of her condition, my
uniform is ruined! And what's more, Ariel realized, was that
the basketful of fortune telling cards had been spilled all over
the road during her fall... "Oh, what a mess!"
Reflexively, Ariel began dusting off her sleeves, the hem of
her skirt and then her chestnut-brown hair that was tied into a
long braid at the ends. That done, she quickly scampered
about the road to retrieve her goods, doing her best to clean
the mud out from the wrappings of the cards before she
dropped them back into her straw basket.
From somewhere past the town gates the green-eyed salesgirl
could discern some sort of commotion, but she ignored it and
concentrated on finishing her present task first. "Oh, great."
Ariel said to herself, seeing that one of the cards was caught
by the handles of a manhole lid several yards away, its plastic
wrapping had been torn loose and scratched. She immediately
hopped over onto the large metal lid on the ground to pick up
the damaged piece.
The background noise had gotten louder now and some voices
yelling back and forth could be crudely made out, but Ariel
tried not to mind it too much. Instead, she slipped two long,
slender fingers beneath the rusty handle and gingerly fished
the card out. Perhaps she could still salvage it somehow,
maybe selling it at half price or something...
A light tingling sensation coursed through her fingertips when
she touched the small, metallic card and almost made her drop
it in surprise. Mildly shocked, Ariel looked downwards at her
hands and suddenly realized that something on the card she
was holding had begun to flare a deep, materia green.
At once, Ariel realized that this was what she had wanted all
along. There was something ironic in the idea that one wished
to read her fortune even from a device that she knew would
not work, but Ariel couldn't care less. She had needed to
reassure herself that the possibility of those cards actually
working, no matter how slim the odds, was there. She needed
that affirmation badly especially after the conversation this
morning, because if she could know that what she was selling
wasn't completely worthless, then a little bit of the guilt in her
heart would disappear and she would be able to trust in her
hope again. Now was her chance to prove she was right.
Partially shying away from the intense magical flash, she tried
to make out what the message on the card was with
apprehension mixed with a wave of excitement.
It took a short moment for her eyes to adjust to the light, but
when she did she read the green, flickering message to herself.
Shuddering convulsively, with her hands trembling, she paled.
The line was crisp and simple, and in an old English font that
she didn't recognize. But the message was very clear.
"You will not live
to see your seventeenth birthday."
And then, without warning, darkness rose from all sides as the
ground beneath her leapt up to swallow her whole.
[END CHAPTER ONE]
======================================
Coming Some-time in the Future...
======================================
Chapter Two: Of Things to Remember When Revisiting the
Midgar Sewers
Chapter Three: The Unexpected Convenience of Taking
Refuge in Your Own Church
Chapter Four: 101 Ways to Kill an Aeris Gainsborough
Chapter Five: Legacy of the Last Soldier
Chapter Six: Voice of the Planet
Chapter Seven: Strife amidst Clouds
Chapter Eight: The Missing Wing on the Angel
Chapter Nine: Meteor, Part Two
Chapter Ten: The Holy One
Chapter Eleven: Live & Let Die
Epilogue – That Flower Girl...
I
The house looked eerie.
At least, that was how she saw it. She paced in little circles
out on the driveway pondering whether to step onto the porch
and ring the bell or not. The small, straw-woven basket
swayed under her arm as she walked timidly, chewing her
lower lip in worry and furrowing those lean eyebrows ever so
slightly into her beautiful, pale face.
She did not know how long she had been standing there.
With an indecisive look her eyes wandered and traveled along
the curvy green vines that had crawled up the crumbling paint
and formed giant, greenish cobwebs onto those dusty gray
walls that once were white. She turned to see the other side of
the old mansion and tried hard to tear her gaze away from the
deformed tree - the singular, overly-large branch that plastered
itself against the windows on the second floor, and that
slanted, rotting stem that seemed about to fall and crash into
the house any minute. Even in the midst of a mid-August day
when the sun took its sweet time scorching the ground down
here in the South and turning everything into a melting wax
effigy of a summer, the house in front of her still emitted a
strange feel of cold, damp darkness that she could almost...
taste.
Yup, she said to herself, this is definitely creepy.
But then again, she had no choice. Every single time they did
a sale, she always ended up having the most cookies left in the
end. Although nobody ever said anything about her poor
record, she felt bad nevertheless and therefore was determined
to finish selling her basketful this time around at any cost.
That was actually why she was here now, five miles away
from her own not-too-philanthropic neighborhood and in the
middle of nowhere, trying her damned best at selling these
girl-scout cookies.
Gathering what courage she had, she held her light, angular
chin high, straightening the wrinkles on her sleeves and her
knee-length skirt and dusting off her hair, she marched up to
the porch like a woman on a mission and firmly pressed the
doorbell.
Hopefully someone answers soon, she thought as she lifted her
free hand to her forehead, wiping off a few beads of sweat. I
don't want to miss Sailor Moon this week.
II
To sum up the painfully long into the mercifully short, Vinny
Vampherlive was having a bad day.
Actually, he had been having a bad day everyday since he
retired from the CIA three years ago. Immediately after his
retirement, his wife ran away with some other guy and didn't
even bother filing a divorce. Said something to the effect that
it was a payback for all those years in the service when he's
neglected her because of his work.
In truth, Vinny loved his wife very much. Like many other
dumped men, he often drank himself to a half-comatose state,
seeking to relieve the pain in his heart. It was not until a year
ago that he had found a rekindled love – the NRA.
The National Rifle Association had literally pulled him out of
his two-year shock, and restored in him the ability to function
like a human being once more. Vinny had always been
obsessed with firearms, although he wouldn't admit it and
even consciously suppressed himself from using a gun unless
he absolutely had to, as it would make his professional career
look very unprofessional otherwise. However, with the NRA
he finally found an outlet to release himself and openly stock
and treasure his guns as much as he wished. In fact, he
polished each piece on his rack daily ever since, caressing the
cold, steel barrels like a woman's skin and loving the surge of
raw power that he felt whenever he held a gun in his hands.
For a while, life for Vinny was passably good.
Things turned ugly when the congress, due to a rapid rise in
assault-related crimes all over the country, passed a resolution
that severely limited the NRA and its members from holding
an excessive amount of small-weaponry in their houses. The
slogan they used was very simple, "You have a right to bear
arms," the spokesman of the House intoned in a news
conference, "just not more than what your hands can carry."
In short, this translated to Vinny having to sell off every one
of his beloved collections except for the two trusty shotguns
that he treasured above all. And no, he was not happy about
it. Deprived of his love for the second time in his life, Vinny
resumed his drinking and left everything else, including his
house, in shambles. He himself had long realized what a mess
he's become and, prophesizing an early death for himself, he
even bought some course materials and made a coffin that he
stored down in the basement, very sure that it would come in
handy sometime in the near future.
Then, the unthinkable thing happened today.
His long companion for eleven long years. His trusted friend
who stayed with him and endured all hardships when others
abandoned him. His pet bat, Reeny Rude, died earlier this
morning of old age.
Vinny sat long in his chair after he buried RR in his backyard.
He wasn't angry. He wasn't sad or depressed. He just... was.
Reeny Rude had been the only tie left between him and this
world that had seemingly deserted him, and with this last bond
severed, Vinny Vampherlive felt nothing anymore. It was as
if there was a gaping hole somewhere inside his body, and he
was too tired to try patching it up any longer. It took every
ounce of his energy to restrain himself from picking up one of
the two shotguns he's left with and blow his own brains out
right here and now. The only reason he didn't shoot himself
yet was because he wanted to kill that damned boy who drove
the dumpster truck first for being so damned late every single
week, including today. So he sat in his chair, seething unholy
rage at everything in general and especially at that dumpster-
truck boy whose absence was detaining Vinny from going to
his own maker, silently waiting to bestow this small farewell
gift unto a world that had been cruel to him all his life.
And then, of all the days in the world and for the first time in
more years than Vinny could remember, his doorbell rang.
III
"Would you like to buy some girl-scout cookies?" She was
about to say in the sweetest girl-scout-cookie-selling tone
possible as the door swung open, but stopped short at the word
"buy" and gasped when she found herself talking to the
receiving end of a large, twin-barrel shotgun.
"Yea? What do you want?" The dark-haired man behind the
half-opened door asked, his bloodshot eyes examining the
uniform figure before him.
Her pretty green eyes widened in fear. Vaguely she seemed to
recall to have read in the newspaper a few weeks ago with
some headline that ran like "Girl Scout Shot By Raving
Maniac While Selling Cookies." Even if she hadn't read it
somewhere before, she was positive that it would appear very
soon. "Uh, uh," she stammered in shock, staring at the gun.
"N, Nothing, sir, I'll just be going now. Very sorry to bother
you, yes, really, I'm terribly sorry. I promise you I won't ever
show up again, please, sir, have a very pleasant day," she said
while edging a few steps backwards quickly and almost
tripped herself on the stairs as she did so.
"Wait! I'm not done with you yet! Why did you come here?"
The red pupils that stared at her maliciously glimmered in a
predatory fashion as he spat the words out. Oh no, I'm gonna
die, she thought, I'm gonna get blown into a thousand little
bits and my dress is gonna be all bloody and messy.
"Please don't shoot me! Please!" She pleaded. "I'll give you
everything I have but please just let me go! Look, I can give
you-" she frantically began searching through her pockets and
came up with... nothing here. "some, um-" Nothing here
either, save a few dollars of change. "—girl-scout cookies?"
She offered hopefully. "I'm sorry but I only have two dollars
with me and I need them to take the bus back home... but you
can have all the cookies. They are very tasty, I'm sure you'll
like them if you just give it a try."
"Wait, let me get this straight," the man seemed to lower his
guard for only a few seconds as confusion seeped into his
voice. "You're a girl-scout, and you're here to sell me some
cookies?" She nodded.
"You mean, you're here to sell cookies?" He repeated. She
nodded again.
"And you think that I would be interested in them? You think
that someone whose wife ran away, who was forced to sell out
his guns, someone whose bat just died this morning, Someone
Like Me, WOULD BE INTERESTED IN BUYING YOUR
GOD-DAMNED COOKIES?" The man took a step toward
her, cocking his shotgun in one swift motion.
She trembled.
"Get the hell outta my house now and take your damned
cookies with you and don't COME BACK OR ELSE I'LL
SHOVE THIS GUN AND YOUR COOKIES UP YOUR
**********!" He hollered in uncontrollable rage.
Thankfully, she covered her ears with her palms in fear before
she could make out what the raging madman was actually
yelling about.
The poor girl fled in tears, making a beeline straight across the
lawn toward the street.
"AND STAY OFF THE LAWN!"
She hopped over to the pavement instantly and continued
scrambling down the driveway, spilling cookies everywhere.
Out of the corner of his eyes Vinny saw the familiar green,
juggernaut shape that was the dumpster truck speedily hauling
itself up the slope from the other end of the street some fifty
yards to the right. For a slight moment Vinny hesitated and
wondered why the garbage truck was driving in reverse this
time, but then he pushed the thought away and slowly took
aim at the truck. A tiny voice nagged at his subconscious and
warned him something about that girl who was currently
making a blind dash down the street while constantly turning
her head back to check on him, and about the truck that was
quickly backing up from the other end of the road.
All of a sudden, an unreadable expression flickered across
Vinny's face as the realization of some impending calamity
dawned upon him and temporarily made him forget even his
desire to kill.
"HEY!" Vinny yelled at the top of his lungs at the retreating
figure, "WATCH OUT!"
IV
It wasn't that Seth was lazy or tardy in nature. Quite the
opposite, in fact, would have held true for him: Seth was just
about the most dedicated man ever lived. He would do
absolutely anything to get a job done. And he never
complained.
Which would be one of the many reasons why he was now in
all his glory - complete with the cape and gloves and all the
get-up, flickering aside a stray long strand of silvery-white
hair as his eyes narrowed in anticipation like a soldier about to
charge into the fray.
Then the green light flashed.
Seth promptly stepped on the gas pedal and, feeling the
familiar trembles and the infernal growl of an overtaxed
engine, proceeded to steer the green monstrosity that he
currently sat in down the next block.
Many would wonder how on earth the great Seth Phiro had
fallen to such state as to humble himself by doing menial
labors like collecting trash for a remote town in the middle of
God-knows-where, but the truth was very simple: Seth had
chosen it himself.
Make no mistake in thinking that he hadn't been successful at
any of his other careers. He had been the best bodyguard one
could ever wish for, the most-famed actor in Hollywood, a
most amazing pitcher, and simply the greatest fireman ever
lived. He had saved countless lives while working as a
fireman, and his miraculous efficiency had been much
publicized by the media, who attributed it as a result for
having a "seemingly-fireproof hair and most definitely a
fireproof cape."
In fact, he was at the top of his field in every single one of his
past fifty-some different careers. Business bloomed with
every store he worked for; lawsuits were won in his favor
whenever he argued for a case... there was no doubt that he
would have been voted as the next President should he cared
to run a campaign. It would not be far off the truth if one
claims that the whole nation was on a Seth Phiro high.
Then why in the world did Seth keep switching jobs? Perhaps
one might ask. The answer was obvious; it's called "every pro
has its con." And the con factor that came with his
unparalleled beauty, grace, and fire-immunity was this:
Girls. Lots of them. All packed with starry eyes and usually a
slight drool off one corner of their mouths. They swarmed
about him wherever he went.
At first, Seth didn't mind. It was an attention that he didn't
actively seek for, although it never personally disturbed him
either. However, when they kept breaching security to find
him and knelt in front of him professing their love whenever
they did find him, creating mass human-roadblocks as a result,
Seth was forced to quit being a bodyguard and went into
acting. And he quit that too, when he was simultaneously
awarded the Oscars for Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor,
and Best Director three years in a row when he only did a
cameo as a passer-by in a low-budget documentary film. As
for the fireman bit, it was indisputable that he had single-
handedly saved more lives than any ten squadrons combined,
but the national index for counts of arson had also risen 500%
during the two years when he served on the task force. You
had no idea how many housewives set their own houses on
fire while their husbands were away... well, let's put it this
way. It caused quite a stir when the First Lady, along with
every female staff member in the building, burned down the
White House and sent a note demanding that either Seth Phiro
and Seth Phiro alone flew to Washington this minute and
rescue them out, or they would all die waiting for him. And so
on, and so forth, Seth drifted from one job to another,
relentlessly hounded by packs of ravenous, lovesick females
everywhere. Perhaps the only time when he had personally
been part of the reason for an early retirement was that single
season when he played for the Cardinals: The league could
take his little fixation on coloring his baseballs green, but they
staunchly refused when he insisted on using a twelve-foot-
long bat.
And that was basically why he was stuck now as perhaps the
most beautiful street-janitor in the history of mankind. Need
to find a new job again, Seth noted to himself passively as he
drove up toward Cemetery Drive. Two teenage girls had
already discovered him here about half-an-hour ago and had
tried to jump into the pile of garbage on the back and then
work their way to the front to get to him. He had narrowly
escaped from having his garbage truck hijacked both times by
flooring the gas pedal before they could put their hands on the
truck, but if he had learned anything from the past, he knew
that those girls would not give up so easily. More likely than
not, they would have been right on his tail this whole time.
Just to prove his theory was correct, Seth turned his head and
looked back from the window. Surely, he could vaguely
discern two tiny figures slowly gaining on him from the rear.
Time was running short, Seth realized. He needed to think of
a way to track those two and make sure they wouldn't jump
onto the truck while he was distracted... and suddenly, he had
an idea. The last house in the service area was that old
mansion up at the end of Cemetery Drive, and as far as he
knew, nobody dared to go near the place because they thought
it was haunted... Immediately, Seth shifted the gears and did a
U-turn, then began driving the truck in reverse up Cemetery
Drive, figuring that it would be safe to do so and he could
monitor those two girls at the same time so that they wouldn't
be able to sneak up into the truck.
Seth had so counted on the fact that there wouldn't be
anybody running on the street near where he was going that he
didn't hit the brakes until he heard the feminine scream
coming from the back as he felt the rear bumper hit something
solid and soft, and realized that he shouldn't have done an
emergency break while driving in reverse because it would
cause all the garbage bags to topple back out of the truck.
x x x
She screamed when she suddenly felt a mind-jarring impact on
her body that sent her airborne. She felt her body hit the
ground and almost passed out from the pain. Dimly she
thought she heard a harsh, grating sound like someone
applying an emergency break, but she couldn't be certain
since everything around her became a haze. She struggled to
see what was happening around her, but the only thing she
could make out were strange, huge black bags descending
down from the sky in waves toward her. It must be a dream,
she thought, must be some weird dream like the ones she had a
few weeks ago. She felt sleepy and slowly closed her eyes.
The last thing she could sense was blackness... and a really,
really bad stench.
Fourteen year-old Arisa Greensford had no idea what hit her.
[Standard Disclaimers]
ukulele studios
proudly presents
Live and Let Die
(working title)
- a semi-original fan-fiction
based on Final Fantasy VII
Chapter One: The Dangers of Being A Bubbly Salesgirl
I
The mud-sodden road that girded the so-called market looked
slightly less worn today. Perhaps it had to do with the light
shower that sprinkled the locale with hesitant, almost bashful
raindrops again late last night - but then again, perhaps not.
After all, Market Boulevard had been the only name-worthy
street in town back when Midgaria was still just called
Midgar, and even then it had never come close in scale to a
real boulevard in any sense of the word, no matter how one
might look at it. It was only fitting that the street, now mostly
slushy dirt and muck and hardly a speckle of gravel or tar,
would look the way it did after a night of that ever-so-
annoying, ever-so-persistent drizzling.
Of course, the buildings that leaned against the sides of the
road - or at least what was left of those buildings - had fared
no better either. The pedestrians who were busily scurrying by
through either side of the grime-filled tracks, however, would
never bother to stop in mid-stride to ponder just exactly what
had happened to the once seedy, obscenely prosperous smut-
heaven of Wall Market, as doing so was an act of futility.
There hadn't been a public maintenance department... no,
there hadn't even been a city-planning department in Midgaria
for the last twenty years, and frankly no one was quite worked
up enough to complain for a change from the status quo.
That was essentially why the plaza looked the way it did now.
Half-collapsed structures groaned around the town in echo
through yawning holes that had once been shut off by glass
windows as faded paint slowly peeled themselves off the
crumbling high walls to the ground below like a mass,
organized ritual suicide that had persisted daily over the last
two decades. Rag-sewn canvas dangled, not unlike entrails
from a disemboweled enemy, over the stands and vendor carts
beneath some broken neon tubes that used to form legible
signs. Greased fumes smothered the surroundings from oil
lanterns hung onto streetlights that had never shed light -
according to the memories of the younger inhabitants here,
who have been mimicking against their will the image of
hungry rodents trapped inside a gigantic trash-bin for as long
as they could remember. In a sense, it was almost as if the
entire pathetic, helpless experience at surveying these
miserable establishments could be summed up and flawlessly
represented by a torn sign suspended high between two
ancient, weather-beaten wooden beams at the town's entrance,
quietly announcing:
Welcome To
W A L M A R T
A brown-haired young boy was standing under that sign,
silently watching the beams totter back and forth rhythmically
at a sudden gust of wind. Involuntarily, he drew up the hood
from his small, smudgy overcoat with one hand as he clenched
reflexively at the hand holding him with the other. "Mom?"
Dull hazel eyes darted once to the right from under the hood
as he afforded his mother a timid, questioning glance. "I'm
cold," he pleaded.
"Yes, dear, I know." His mother sighed, still gazing at the
road. In comparison, her simple dress was much more
threadbare than what she donned for the child. "I just have to
drop these batteries at the junk shop and then we'll get back
home. Just stay put for a little longer and if I can haggle a few
more gils from that stingy old man at the store I'll even get
you something, how about that?"
"I guess so... hey, mom! Can I get one of those?" The sudden
enthusiastic lilt in the boy's tone stunned her slightly and
caused her to fix her attention onto where he had pointed. The
very notion that something existed here could ever raise any
noticeable sign of enthusiasm from anyone was simply alien
and absurd to her.
"But... honey, those things... they don't work." The woman
explained patiently after she realized what her son had been
talking about. A tall, young brunette wearing a tidy red and
pink uniform dress loitered by the old clothing store at a
deliberate pace, apparently trying to sell some of those Shinra
fortune-telling cards in a hand-woven basket which she carried
in one arm. It was all just a decrepit, inane idea thought up by
the Shinra revival movement as far as she was concerned, she
thought; no cheap, lame, glow-in-the-dark message card was
ever going to cheer up them survivors in the slums after the
Meteor. "But mom!" the little boy beside her protested,
tugging at her sleeves and wriggling his tiny body where he
stood, much like a gigantic little worm in untold agony. It
seemed to be the favorite physical expression of objection
among children, and an ingenious one at that because the very
act itself was such a pain to watch that their accompanying
adults would usually comply with their demands immediately
in hope to only make them stop twitching like that.
"I'm sorry, honey, but that's out of the question. You don't
buy what you can't eat," she told him flat out. She had built
enough immunity against the notorious Twitch of Compliance
that she was able to resist giving in on the first try.
"Please...? I'll be real good from now, I promise..." The
puppy eyes he gave her were enough to melt iron.
Realizing perfectly well that the boy wouldn't take 'no' as an
answer and would probably bug her for days on end about this
afterwards, she sighed and bit into her lower lip. This was
going to cost her weeks of work. "All right, hon', but only
this once and after we get back from the junk store."
"Thanks mom you're the greatest." The young boy bubbled as
he pulled her arm down to him and quickly kissed her cold
cheeks. "Let's go!" He immediately bounced up and down in
joy and dragged her towards the direction of the fortune card
vendor, suddenly entirely unaffected by the chill in the wind.
"I said, AFTER we get back from the store!" She drew her
arm back along with the boy reluctantly attached to it, and
headed toward the other direction in exasperation.
II
Again.
Sixteen year-old Ariel Garland stared down at herself in slight
dismay. She did her best to clean off her soiled dress with her
hands, but all it accomplished in the end was to smear mud
over the areas of her blouse that were originally untouched.
Watching the puddle of muck by the street, then at the
departing Chocobo wagon, and then the darkening sky, she
concluded that there was nothing to be liked about this
weather whatsoever. Not one bit.
She refrained herself from muttering a string of not-nice-
words with a little effort; her shirt was damp with raindrops
and clung to her skin in a nasty, gooey way and what's worse
was that no one was buying her cards so naturally it wouldn't
hurt to take a look –
Oh no. She'd done it again.
Ariel caught herself glancing downward to her left guiltily
again for the third time, and immediately tore her gaze away.
C'mon, a petulant voice nagged in her mind, you know you
wanted to take a look. What's the problem?
But... it's silly, she chided herself, hoping to gently squash the
thought that had been bothering her for the past few hours
before it got out of hand. Ever since the little incident this
morning, she had been troubled by this pestering voice
somewhere inside her head about sneaking a look at one of
those fortune cards. While immersing in self-debate was as
good a way to pass idle time as anything else, she was
beginning to tire and her firm resolution was gradually worn
down over time.
Aren't you in the least bit curious? The other part of her
insisted. Don't you want to know?
She couldn't help but to take another peek at the basket resting
on her left arm.
It really was silly, she told herself again. In fact, it was
completely ludicrous, especially given the fact that she knew
those things were fake, and she knew that for a fact because
she was currently selling them.
From what she was told, the idea for these Shinra fortune-
telling cards was originally conceived by one of the higher-up
executives after the old Midgar, along with the pizza platter it
was served upon, was sucked into the vortex of destructive
magic when the planet confronted the Meteor. After the entire
Shinra building and the Sister Ray cannon had been torn in the
cyclone in a hideously-splattered-like-a-bug-in-a-blender sort
of way and flung across the Midgar sky in countless tiny
sheets of metal confetti, the surviving Shinra board member
had decided that total reconstruction was in order. The
decision, according to the campaign flyers dropped from the
air by the Highwind, was not so much a reinstatement of a
syndicate government, but rather a deed of necessity to
prevent the world from lapsing further into chaos and anarchy.
In short, what it boiled down to was that someone with former
connections to Shinra was out to rebuild Midgar from ground
zero, and since Shinra's control over the world had been
virtually erased, the cost of rebuilding could only be afforded
through various means of fund-raising activities. And selling
these fortune-telling cards was one of them.
Ariel knew exactly how these cards were made. From what
she was told, they were formed by some sort of recycled metal
scrap that had been infused somehow by leftover Mako
energy. Obviously, the trace of energy was so minute that all
they could do was to emit a small amount of light in the dark,
illuminating pre-written messages of good fortune in the
process. These messages, in turn, more or less went along the
theme of "tomorrow will be a better day" or "things are
looking better and better for you". It was basically part of a
plan by the new Shinra to boost the morale for the survivors in
the slums, and Ariel didn't really object to telling a little
superstitious white lie if it would help people cope with their
lives. After all, she thought, if you keep hearing stuff like
"things are getting better" every single day, and you know
deep down that things couldn't possibly get any worse,
wouldn't it be true either way that things will actually start to
look up?
To a small extent, the morale-boosting trick had worked. As
she slowly wandered through various old sectors, Ariel had
occasionally seen before her very eyes glum looks of children
and adults slowly replaced by hesitant smiles, and lackluster
strides growing slightly more confident as time grew on. And
that made her tremendously happy, when she knew that her
hard work had finally bought a small degree of happiness into
people's lives.
However, for the most part, things didn't change in the way
she hoped they would. More often than not, she would
encounter groups of people drifting about aimlessly, lamenting
as they rummaged through the ruins and the surrounding
grassland areas right outside the old gates looking for food. It
brought tears to her eyes whenever she thought about the
majority of the population who had been devastated to the
point that they no longer cared about anything, that they would
only perform the most rudimentary and necessary tasks in life
for a bare-minimum level of self-subsistence.
Unfortunately, she had hit another one of those towns last
week. She shuddered at the thought that there were still two
sectors that she hadn't visited before, especially when rumors
said that they were a little... unstable. Taking a brief survey at
the scenes before her eyes and reciting from her memory of
the past week, Ariel knew that although this particular sector
had suffered far lighter damage as compared to the others
she'd seen before, the general attitude of the locals was one of
the worst. Maybe it was because the area had not been
demolished to the point where it was no longer inhabitable,
but people here seemed to be content in living their whole
lives out in the junk-filled town without a change while it
could have been so much more. Her shoulders drooped a little
as Ariel let out a small sigh. It was really like trying to fill a
general depression and angst the size of the Northern Crater
with a shovel; times likes this just made her wonder if her
work would ever truly pay off someday and make everyone go
on with their lives. Seven days out on the street with only one
customer was a new record low for her, not to mention a little
embarrassing and out of place. It almost made her feel like
she was selling charcoal in North Corel, or skin-whitening
cream on the beachside of Costa del Sol.
Without meaning to, she tried to recall what happened earlier
today when she finally hit her first customer and more-or-less
brought about the self-questioning and reminiscing that she
had been going through ever since...
x x x
"Would you like to buy a Shinra fortune-telling card? It's
only 100 gils each." With practiced ease, Ariel had addressed
the pair before her in a singsong voice. She could tell that the
lady in front of her was more than disinclined and probably
not at all interested at buying anything she had to offer; the
dull, barely tolerant glare from the woman's eyes spoke
volumes as she stood a few feet away.
"Yes," the middle-aged woman replied, "my son would like to
buy one of these... gadgets... please." The strained tone of her
voice clearly indicated that she, on the other hand, would have
absolutely nothing to do with it.
"Here you go," Ariel cheerfully said to the little boy. He was
the first customer she had seen for the entire week. "Just hold
the card in your hand like this and it'll tell you your fortune."
Without tearing the plastic wrap away, she held the two edges
of the card gingerly in a quick demonstration.
"Cool!" The boy eagerly snatched the card from her fingers,
took one brief look at the front cover with a colorful picture of
Cait Sith, the Shinra mascot and at once started to experiment
with the card like he was taught, not in the least noticing his
mother leading him away.
Ariel let out a tiny smile at the corner of her lips. She could
already guess what the little kid would see on his card.
However, her rueful smile was broken when she heard
someone calling out to her.
"Excuse me, miss?" It was the mother, standing about thirty
feet away from her, who had paused suddenly and turned to
her. "Yes, ma'am, how may I help you?"
"If you don't mind me saying this, don't you think there are
better things for a young lady like you to do than to spread this
scam around all the time?" The question was brutal, direct,
and unexpected to the point where she could only stutter in
response. "Huh?"
"I mean, you and I both know very well that this thing doesn't
really tell your fortune, and although I don't see the point for
you Shinra people to keep on selling this stuff, I personally
hate a hoax when I see one. And if what you're selling isn't a
fake, why don't you try reading your own fortune from one of
those cards yourself sometimes?" Without waiting for a reply,
she turned her head contemptuously and dragged her son off.
For a long time afterwards, Ariel could only stand still and
feel the burning flush in her cheeks rise even higher.
x x x
The words had stung. She could feel the heat on her face
threaten to rise again just by replaying the scene alone in her
mind.
Up until now, Ariel had always believed what she was doing
was for a good cause. It had pained her to see the inhabitants
around Midgaria roaming about listlessly everyday, stripped
of possession, family, or often even the will to persevere. And
she had always wanted to help.
Oh, how she wanted to.
She had listened to countless stories recounted by her mother
before, stories about how the lands and the earth had been
before the Meteor struck. Things weren't perfect then; in fact,
they were far from good. But whatever the conditions had
been, they seemed worse now. Ariel personally would have
chosen the old days when Shinra was in control rather than
having to see the old and young alike roaming about this filthy
dump day in and day out, again and again like scattered
groups of mindless zombies.
That was what she had said to herself when she applied for the
job a little over a year ago. And she had believed in it
wholeheartedly. She had thought that more good would come
to it for everyone to have something to believe in, something
to perhaps brighten their day... even though it might not even
be true.
Now she wasn't so sure anymore.
Was she truly doing something horrible? The lady's words
that morning made her feel like a petty scum, out to swindle
what little money people might have left and give them false
hope in the end. Was this what she had truly been doing for
the past year? That very notion had shaken her to the core.
A lone tear escaped and silently traveled down one side of her
cheeks before she could rein in her emotions, leaving a small,
glistening trail against the soft curves of her face. She was
hurt, and she was confused. Her birthday was coming up in
two months, and she had originally planned on working
overtime just to have enough savings to go celebrate for a day
or so. Now... now she just wanted to run back home and get
away from it all, at least until she could calm down enough to
reason out what she was going to do.
Unable to cope with the onslaught of shame and doubt in her
mind, she clutched the basket tight against her waist and began
to run. Hoping to leave before she could break down even
further and cause a public commotion, Ariel shut her eyes
closed and made a blind dash towards the town gates.
And promptly tripped herself over a small puddle of mud by
her feet on her first step.
III
"DAMNED LIL' MUGGAS! GIT YOUR ASSES BACK
HERE!" Barret Wallace hollered at the fleeing carriage down
the street as he spurred on his own steed, one gun-grafted hand
dangled loosely against his side suddenly flailing wildly in
tune with an unexpected lurch from his saddle.
The response he received was a shot too close to his liking
from a pistol up front, clipping away a few feathers and a
leather strap on a side belt as well. The beast he rode upon
nearly leapt five foot into the air at the sudden twinge of pain.
"Shit."
The massive man spat out a string of curses into the wind,
preparing to charge up another gallop to close the distance.
The chase had raged across the western ruins of Sector 7, and
the collateral damage they caused was more than he would
like to think about. G'thing the place's a shithole already,
Barret smiled a grim, taut smile, beads of sweat dripping down
from his brows; 'coz I dun wanna be ther' t'pay the damn bills
if it ain't.
Painful as it was to admit, this was one time he actually
wouldn't mind having some Shinra soldiers around to help
out. As it were, however, most of the units had been
disbanded within three months after Shinra's collapse, and the
ones that didn't were usually the farthest away from
Midgaria... and were reduced to mercenary thugs controlled by
former squadron leaders, out to terrorize the countryside for
basic commodities. Last time he heard, Vincent and Cid had
just cleaned up a local rebel militia unit near Rocket Town.
"Man, my back's killin' me," Barret muttered out loud,
draping the bridle in a loop over the gun barrel on his right
arm as he freed his left hand to rub off the soreness on his
back. "HEY YA LIL' PIECE OF SHIT, I SAID STOP!"
He was ignored.
It was usually not a very common sight for a fifty-five year-
old man, with his short, flat stub of hair and trimmed beard
graying, to drive a Chocobo steed one-handed and engage on a
mad shoot-and-run chase with some young upstart teenagers;
but this was Barret Wallace. He was used to blowing Mako
reactors to smithereens on a four-man-mission at his prime,
and he was the one to score first blood against Hojo on top of
the Shinra tower twenty years ago. Give him a target and
enough lead; Barret was nigh invincible. Unfortunately, even
he had his limits, and it was beginning to show in the form of
random gasps and huffs after five gruesome hours of street
dogfight, constantly ducking bullets and dodging grenades.
A long chain of colorful expletives escaped his lips on instinct
as the retired war hero swerved his huge body to one side and
almost lost his balance from avoiding a passing volley of fire.
The Chocobo under him squawked loudly in protestation; the
sudden shift in weight had almost brought her down crashing
into the road as well. Reeve's gonna owe me big this time,
Barret thought, cursing all the while. He was going to take
down that stupid "Snow Ball" gang even if it was the last
thing he'd ever do.
A small corner of his mind briefly recalled the meeting last
evening he had with the new Shinra executive. Reeve had
gone out of his way to beg him to come lend his hand to solve
the problem last week, and had even prepared him a top-grade
racing Chocobo with an Avalanche ribbon banner tied onto the
back of her tail for this mission. It was uncustomarily nice for
him, and for one short moment Barret had suspected some sort
of an ulterior motive at work. The creator of Cait the Cat was
nothing but sly, and even though he had proved over the years
that he had indeed turned to the good side, Reeve was still able
to pull some nasty surprises on the rest of the team from time
to time. Cait had only persuaded him to leave his home in
Kalm and come to his office after explaining that Shinra was
very short on patrol and the Snow Ball gang had been a terror
near Sector 8 for the last few months. "Besides," the grinning
stuffed cat (on top of a stuffed moogle) had said while
stroking the large Avalanche banner on the bird's tail, "it'd be
a good chance to make people remember what Avalanche had
been all about. There are still some people out there who still
believe that you were the bad guys, you know, and you might
as well try to clear the whole thing up again if only for Jesse
and everyone else's sake."
Feeling the truth in his words, the veteran leader of Avalanche
had agreed to the job. Nevertheless, when he rested his gaze
on the large, paint-printed "SNOW BALL" on the back of the
Chocobo wagon in front of him and caught several passers-by
staring at the chase with an expression that was partially fear,
and partially something unidentifiable altogether, Barret
couldn't help but think that maybe somehow he was missing a
few details from the big picture.
The trail led him to turn sharply around a corner and he
suddenly realized that he was about to enter a more populated
area once again. He made another attempt to catch up to the
terrorists when he recognized the surrounding area as
somewhere near Wall Market. Letting those two weave their
way into the town was simply unacceptable; the chance of
casualties occurring was too great a risk for him to take.
Barret had held back his fire to a minimum before, as he didn't
want to dirty his hands again after all this time.
But there ain't no choice anymore, he told himself.
Gritting his teeth, Barret Wallace charged his own guns and
began to let loose a hail of ammunition back to the two
terrorists, trading shots in earnest.
IV
"Itai." Ariel softly exclaimed, both hands cupping over the
petite round tip of her nose. Then she slowly propped herself
up from where she sat. Sprawling all over on the ground was
not a position she would like to stay in for too long. Her face
turned an embarrassing shade of red.
Oh no, she thought, suddenly taking note of her condition, my
uniform is ruined! And what's more, Ariel realized, was that
the basketful of fortune telling cards had been spilled all over
the road during her fall... "Oh, what a mess!"
Reflexively, Ariel began dusting off her sleeves, the hem of
her skirt and then her chestnut-brown hair that was tied into a
long braid at the ends. That done, she quickly scampered
about the road to retrieve her goods, doing her best to clean
the mud out from the wrappings of the cards before she
dropped them back into her straw basket.
From somewhere past the town gates the green-eyed salesgirl
could discern some sort of commotion, but she ignored it and
concentrated on finishing her present task first. "Oh, great."
Ariel said to herself, seeing that one of the cards was caught
by the handles of a manhole lid several yards away, its plastic
wrapping had been torn loose and scratched. She immediately
hopped over onto the large metal lid on the ground to pick up
the damaged piece.
The background noise had gotten louder now and some voices
yelling back and forth could be crudely made out, but Ariel
tried not to mind it too much. Instead, she slipped two long,
slender fingers beneath the rusty handle and gingerly fished
the card out. Perhaps she could still salvage it somehow,
maybe selling it at half price or something...
A light tingling sensation coursed through her fingertips when
she touched the small, metallic card and almost made her drop
it in surprise. Mildly shocked, Ariel looked downwards at her
hands and suddenly realized that something on the card she
was holding had begun to flare a deep, materia green.
At once, Ariel realized that this was what she had wanted all
along. There was something ironic in the idea that one wished
to read her fortune even from a device that she knew would
not work, but Ariel couldn't care less. She had needed to
reassure herself that the possibility of those cards actually
working, no matter how slim the odds, was there. She needed
that affirmation badly especially after the conversation this
morning, because if she could know that what she was selling
wasn't completely worthless, then a little bit of the guilt in her
heart would disappear and she would be able to trust in her
hope again. Now was her chance to prove she was right.
Partially shying away from the intense magical flash, she tried
to make out what the message on the card was with
apprehension mixed with a wave of excitement.
It took a short moment for her eyes to adjust to the light, but
when she did she read the green, flickering message to herself.
Shuddering convulsively, with her hands trembling, she paled.
The line was crisp and simple, and in an old English font that
she didn't recognize. But the message was very clear.
"You will not live
to see your seventeenth birthday."
And then, without warning, darkness rose from all sides as the
ground beneath her leapt up to swallow her whole.
[END CHAPTER ONE]
======================================
Coming Some-time in the Future...
======================================
Chapter Two: Of Things to Remember When Revisiting the
Midgar Sewers
Chapter Three: The Unexpected Convenience of Taking
Refuge in Your Own Church
Chapter Four: 101 Ways to Kill an Aeris Gainsborough
Chapter Five: Legacy of the Last Soldier
Chapter Six: Voice of the Planet
Chapter Seven: Strife amidst Clouds
Chapter Eight: The Missing Wing on the Angel
Chapter Nine: Meteor, Part Two
Chapter Ten: The Holy One
Chapter Eleven: Live & Let Die
Epilogue – That Flower Girl...