"I'm going to try again," Cloud said, his face grim.
"It might be nice to take a break…?" offered the red-furred wolf-lion thing, Red XIII. He walked forward a little unsteadily, clearly dizzy. Red shook his head, moving into a full body shake.
The blonde man shot him a look, mako eyes narrowed. "I'm going to try again," he said again, crossing his arms.
Red XIII sighed, "All right." But he looked sick at the agreement, as much as a sentient beast could look sick. They walked around the turnstile. For such a popular attraction, it was surprisingly empty, though that might have to do more with the SOLDIER than any lack of interest.
Curious, Cait Sith had bounded out to the Station Connection and saw a whole horde of people milling around, but other than some quiet grumbling he had to enhance the microphone to hear, no one said anything directly.
Reeve Tuesti didn't know what to make of it. This was the leader of the eco-terrorist group AVALANCHE? He watched through Cait Sith's eyes as the man walked up to the attendant and held out a handful of GP. Sighing to himself from the comfort of his office, Reeve directed the robot to the roller coaster, gritting his teeth at the idea of having to go through it again.
Also, he had no idea how the Shooting Coaster harness even fit on Red. Did they often have people taking their pets through? Not that Red was a pet, but the attendant hadn't even blinked an eye, just buckled him in and adjusted the straps.
The ride started up again, and Reeve could feel his stomach churn. He'd wanted to use Cait Sith in order to join their party and get a little information, but he didn't think he could take it much longer.
He hadn't seen Sephiroth either, and wasn't that the whole point of them coming to the Gold Saucer? He'd heard the rumours and sent Cait Sith there to intercept them, but aside from single-mindedly gathering GP in the Wonder Square, Cloud Strife hadn't done anything even the least bit interesting.
And he couldn't even enjoy the coaster, since he was watching it behind Cait Sith's eyes. All it did was make him dizzy. He watched as Cloud fired wildly, each shot almost always a half a second behind the virtual objects. He did a little bit better this time, managing to hit the water wheel and finally killing the UFO.
"Your score is 3470! You win a prize!" said the brightly attired woman behind the counter.
"Damn," Cloud said, pocketing the copy of the Masamune Blade. "Still not enough."
He moved to the attendant by the entrance, but she just shook her head. "I'm sorry, sir. You don't have enough GP."
Cloud frowned but said nothing, and he and Red walked out to the Connection, taking the tunnel to the Wonder Square. Cloud set his mouth in a grim line, and he forked over the gil for a Slam Dunk game.
Reeve put his face in his palm. Who the hell did that so seriously?
His basketball skills were almost as bad as his shooting skills, but not nearly as bad as his motorcycle skills. Reeve could do nothing but watch as the man failed abysmally at every game. This was the vaunted leader of AVALANCHE? Reeve just couldn't see it.
Cloud brightened a bit when a random stranger gave him 30 GP for showing him how to beat the Moogle game, but upon learning that that miraculous incident wouldn't be repeated, he moved back to the Slam Dunk game.
Each shot was either too high or too low. Occasionally, he would hit it, even multiple times, but rarely ever got the double multiplier. How the hell did he manage to cast spells with the accuracy rumoured of him, then?
After about four hours and an absurd amount of money later, Cloud moved back to the Speed Square, hundreds of GP in hand.
Red shot Cait a long-suffering look and just shook his head. This was the fifty-third time. No wonder Cloud Strife was a swordsman. His aim was atrocious. He also had more money than sense. One would think he'd use that kind of money to furnish AVALANCHE (and well, he had spent a rather large amount of gil at the Ghost Hotel) but no.
Another hour and Reeve was starting to suspect they were on to him. There was just no way anyone could be that single minded. He almost wanted to step away from the console, he just couldn't chance anything finally, finally, happening, and if they weren't on to him on the off chance, Cait just turning off might give rise to suspicion.
At this point, though, his head spun and he felt like he knew where every target was. When Cloud failed again, he just couldn't take it anymore.
"All right, laddie, I've 'ad about enough of this, mind you," Reeve said through Cait Sith. He roughly pushed Cloud out of the way, knocking him into the second seat while Red just shrugged—cats could shrug?—and took the third seat.
Behind the console, Reeve cracked his knuckles as they went up the hill. They plunged down, and Reeve began firing with unerring accuracy, hitting every ghost and cactus. He hit the bonus boulder, and almost every star, icicle, and balloon. He missed a few lava rocks, but by the time he made it to the large UFO his score was already over 4000.
Killing the UFO brought it over 5000, and to add insult to injury, he got the secret bonus light. As the roller coaster pulled to a stop, Reeve just couldn't help but turn Cait Sith's head back to Cloud and start smirking.
Cloud scowled.
When Cait Sith handed him the umbrella—all that for a parasol, seriously—Cloud's face turned soft, something Reeve hadn't seen yet.
It made the boy look young, and a little sad, and for the first time, Reeve wondered what had happened to make him turn out like that.
He followed him as Cloud handed it over to the brown-haired woman of their party, who took it laughing, effusive with thanks as she swung it around experimentally before opening it up and resting it on her shoulder, spinning it.
Wait, wasn't that supposed to be bad luck to open one indoors?
"Thank you," Red XIII told Cait Sith with feeling. The lionwolf still looked a little sick. "His determination is a both a virtue and a flaw. I don't know if I could have survived another round. These things aren't built for my people, I don't think."
"Na problem," Reeve said. "Easy as pie," and they went to go find their errant party member.
Of course, that's when they were herded into the Battle Square and accused of murder there was no way Cloud could have done (though the former leader of AVALANCHE, Barret Wallace, was as just as good as guilty from the sounds of it) and dropped into Corel Prison.