Hello folks,
Inspired by Frank Verderosa's Final Fantasy VII Internet Series (though I did not use any of Frank's original characters or settings - wouldn't that have made it a fan-fan-fiction?), this alternate universe story follows the adventures of Avalanche from Midgar to the Northern Crater, but from the viewpoint of an outsider. A young survivor of the Sector Seven collapse manages to sneak his way into the Shinra building (along with his neighbor's feisty cat), where he finds Aeris locked in Hojo's lab about to undergo one of the good professor's experiments.
Avalanche rescues Aeris, but he becomes fascinated with her Cetra heritage. Aided (and often hindered) by unreliable psychic powers, he continues to shadow Avalanche along their journey. When he receives a vision of Aeris dying at the hands - or, sword - of Sephiroth , he decides to prevent her dark fate.
However, fate makes a crafty opponent, and evil forces other than Sephiroth can take notice when you pull at the threads of reality.
The whole Avalanche crew shows up, along with assorted folks from Shinra and the Turks. Originally written in 2004, before Advent Children came out - so the back-story may conflict with the spin-off games . . . but that just puts more "alternate" into the universe.
(You can, in fact, read this without having played the game, though you will likely miss the inside jokes.)
As Yuffie would say, I will "Stop my yappin'" and get on with the story. Thank you so much for reading!
Part I
The Road to Hades
Chapter I
Awakening
"This is not a charity operation." - Shinra
Alone in his apartment in upper Midgar, young John Philip Sorea awoke from his deep slumber to the screech of tearing metal. This was not a sound he appreciated so early in the morning, not that he would have preferred the discordant tunes of bootleg alternative rock his alarm clock normally gave him after a night of too little sleep. This was one of those nights. The hormonally endowed boys next door had gotten drunk and turned their bass up so high it knocked mortar from the walls (not recommended in these buildings of Midgar). Worse yet, they had tried singing along, bawdy out-of-tune ditties about that dark-haired beauty running around with those Avalanche losers. Tifa, that was her name. She would be more attractive if she didn't blow up mako reactors. What happened to dyeing your hair pink as harmless rebellion?
He admitted, he had dreamed about Tifa himself. Give it up, John. She's way too old for you.
And how old are you, John?
More rumbling and shaking jolted him fully awake. Earthquake? Oh God, and he knew this could happen when he first arrived in Midgar a year ago, a bedraggled traveler in wheezing spacecraft, barely able to walk away from one of his better landings. While the locals had scavenged his wreckage for building materials, he had looked up at the floating city and thought, whose bright idea was it to build a city on a floating pizza pan? One good shake and -
"Aieee!"
He leaped from the bed standing shakily amidst the grinding of joists and flaking of plaster. The world was dropping. As screams echoed from surrounding apartments, his eyes searched the room for safety. Ah, the trusty, dented work desk. He jerked the chair away. Sure. That ought to stop tons of falling bricks and girders. And if not, perhaps he could roll with it? He tucked himself into a ball and dove beneath, safe from earthquakes and nuclear war.
He was praying so hard he barely flinched when the whole ceiling collapsed onto his bed.
Nestor Granth looked down with contempt at the fragile, brainless creature before him.
"I'm sorry," the red-haired bimbo said. "I can not give out confidential - "
"I said, I have an appointment." Nestor did not raise his voice, but still the receptionist flinched. "With the good Dr. Hojo. Now, where is he?"
"Uh, uh . . ."
Nestor kept his eyes focused on that cute freckled forehead, wishing he had a more appropriate tool for proving his point, such as a power drill.
"I'm waiting."
The woman grimaced, clutching her temples. Nestor turned it up a notch. Sheila. That was the bimbo's name. There, in front of her mind, past the part about her lunch appointment with friends, past the after-work workout at the health club, past the worries about her white Persian cat named Fluffy in the care of a weird albino neighbor kid at home, past the plans to see Loveless with her girlfriends. My, was this mind filled with trash.
"Sixty-fourth floor," Sheila whispered.
Nestor gave her mind one last squeeze before releasing her. She slumped forward and threw up, prompting Nestor to jump back in disgust. There was no need for that! He had just dry cleaned his suit.
"Try not to drool on your lunch date." Nestor walked to the elevator banks, whistling. Annoyed at the wait for the lift, even at this time of night, he turned his gaze on a potted begonia nearby. Within seconds the bright pink blossoms had faded, the leaves crinkled and brown.
John kept his forearms glued to his ears while he prayed to anyone foolish enough to listen. He was still unsure of the local deities, and he hadn't been attentive to the ones he had known, not even those he had met in person. Still, never too late for a conversion, even with the world literally collapsing around him.
Wham!
Understatement of the year. The floor struck his head with the force of Wutai hot mustard, railroad spike up the nose hot mustard. He opened his eyes to darkness and comparative silence. The roaring, tearing, crashing had ceased, to be replaced by moans and cries all around, softly at first, then growing in urgency. Oh well, at least he wouldn't be dying alone.
First, he inventoried his body parts. Nothing broken; nothing missing. His only lingering pain came from his jaw, apparently after kneeing himself in the chin.
However, encased on all sides, metal deck above and wood floor below, he could do little but wiggle his toes. Ahead, bricks and debris. Behind, well, the wall had been there seconds ago . . .
Grunting and cursing, he forced himself to rotate, easing his egg shaped form in a ninety-point turn until he faced the back wall. He eased his hand out, feeling nothing but smooth drywall.
"No!" This was carrying that born-again thing too far. He pounded on the panel, but to little effect. He braced himself and shoved, against what he knew not, until with a pop the plaster broke. He avoided having a brick fall on his head, though he received a snoot full of dust, a scraped chin and a volley of sneezes for his effort. Some light shone through the hole, flickering as a loose electrical line sparked somewhere above him. Dzzt, dzzt, dzzt. The moans and cries grew in volume out here.
Like a battered butterfly, he emerged from his cocoon. The adjoining room was only partially collapsed, though from the creaking above John was loath to trust his luck. He stood up and - ouch! - perhaps too fast, took a dust and ozone filled breath, and counted his blessings.
He was alive. All because he knew what to do in case of nuclear war.
He was unhurt. Near as he could tell.
He was standing in his neighbor's bedroom. This could explain why the floor was covered with women's underclothes.
In the dim light he glanced at the shattered bureau. Next to it, the bed lay buried in tons of debris, including, it appeared, a fallen refrigerator.
John winced and shook his head. He saw no body under that mess, but the light was bad and he had no desire to feel around. He hurried along the wall to the opposite door. It opened to a hallway with a sagging ceiling. John gritted his teeth and eased along the taller wall. Twice, the mass shifted above, with John envisioning himself impaled on a wall stud.
He shook himself. Seeing the path to the living room blocked, he pushed a barely attached door into a bathroom.
"Meow?" A white ball of fur leapt into John's outstretched arms. Claws kneaded his shoulder as the beast began to purr.
"Fluffy?" Right. This was Sheila's place. The young redhead worked nights at the Shinra building. John sighed with relief. This was one work day she would be happy not to miss. He liked Sheila; she was excited by her job, loved to chat about the weird people she met every day, and never asked what a boy his age was doing living alone. This was Midgar, after all. City of widows and orphans, after the Wutai war. If a twelve-year-old boy could make a living singing in nightclubs, more power to him, she said.
"Okay, Fluff-ball, find a way out?"
"Meow."
After checking Sheila's dining room again, they returned to the bathroom. A hole punched in the ceiling revealed a ragged passage sloping upward.
Fluffy jumped up and waited, blue eyes shining.
"Meow?"
John pulled himself up clumsily, praying he wouldn't pull the top three stories down on himself. The climb was slow, and it was hard to tell how far he went, but eventually he pulled himself through a hole in someone's kitchen floor. Light streamed through a broken window. Outside, the whirling blades of helicopters sliced through the night. Spotlights wandered across the rubble, highlighting people bloodied and frantic on their perches. John pushed out the glass fragments and scrambled into the open. Fluffy crept out behind.
A dozen others huddled on a level part of the roof. John recognized some - mostly people from the upper floors. They had blank, shell - shocked faces and wild eyes. John nodded toward them.
"Third floor," he said, shuddering. "Others are still down there. I could hear them."
Nobody said anything.
John looked out at the devastation. He was surprised most of the city, the other seven floating pizza slices, were still intact. With an earthquake like that, he figured -
"Avalanche did this," someone muttered.
"You mean, they blew up another reactor? And it got out of hand?" John looked toward the city's rim. The two mako reactors still perched there on nearly invisible supports, belching their oily haze into the sky. Before the rim, tatters of the upper plate still dangled toward the jumble of rubble below.
"My God," John said. "Looks like someone ate a piece of Midgar cream pie. Horrible."
"Avalanche."
John jumped to his feet, nearly losing his balance. "The people underneath! In the slums!"
"Unbelievable how low Avalanche can sink. I hear Shinra captured one of them."
"Obviously the wrong one," John said.
"I heard it was a flower girl. My cousin works in the Shinra tower. He told me."
"A flower girl. That's rich. Good to know we have such competent protectors. I wouldn't want to walk these streets thinking someone might try to sell my a daisy."
A spotlight blinded the group as a hovering copter whirled smoke and debris into their faces. Fluffy attached herself to John's shirt like a press-on tattoo.
"Attention! This is the Shinra Urban Rescue Squad. Please remain calm and you will be airlifted to safety, courtesy of Shinra."
"I feel better already," John said dryly.
"Are any of you injured?" the loudspeaker said.
Several of the group moaned and waved bandaged arms.
"You will airlifted to Midgar General. Any of you others need transportation out?"
"No, we all thought this would be a swell place for a midnight tea party."
John's wounded companions glared at him.
The helicopter sank almost to eye level. Those able to do so stepped back, trying to hold onto their hair. A Shinra minion, decked out in blue, leaned out with the megaphone.
"Those who need rides step forward. Five hundred gil per person."
"Five hundred?" Surely this was a sick joke.
"This is not a charity operation," Blue Shinra said.
"Charity?" John ran over and shouted in the soldier's face. "We just got our homes demolished! Where do you get off - "
"A medic copter will arrive shortly. A transport copter will follow. Please have your fare ready, in cash." The man withdrew. The chopper began to rise.
"Wait a minute!" John flung himself into the air, snagging a strut. He pulled himself onto the metal skid.
"Meow?" Fluffy perched on John's back, claws dug in. As John watched, the broken ground receded like a departing train.
John grasped the skid even as Fluffy's claws dug in. "Now tell me," he said, "Fluff-ball, why did I just do this?"