AN: Well, great. Not only have I lost interest in Final Fantasy for the past few months—I also lost my outline for this entire story. (Not that I went too far in the outline—I think I only planned up to like, Cosmo Canyon) Even lost my early-written Chocobo chapter. Also lost whatever work I had for this chapter, too. Much rageface. Who knew flash drives were that flimsy?
Note: I've a feeling that, while this chapter will be longer than the previous one, it will also be very dull. If there are people actually following this: please bear with me; I still want to finish this, but my interest in Final Fantasy over the past several months has waned... and I hardly even remember where this story left off. Not to mention: this entire fic was a guinea pig of sorts; I hadn't done much "human" fanfic writing prior to this one, and I wanted to experiment. If my experimenting leads to overall suckish quality of writing... … I'm sorry ;_; (Oh goodness, I can only imagine how many inconsistencies there might be in this chapter...)
Positives? Not much. The story's still at a stage where it's very much a rehash of FF7 (albeit with different dialogue, of course, given that there are different protagonists). Must. Go. Further.
Anyways, enough of that. Hello again to this humble crossover...
Chapter 7 ~ Elmyra
How could this have happened?
Shinra's television broadcasts were their only source of information until Lightning could return and tell them more. He tried not to let the tears show—they shamed him, in front of Elmyra and the little girl named Marlene—but still they dripped down.
Investigations all point to the terrorist group "AVALANCHE" as the culprits responsible for the bombing earlier today, that brought down an entire Plate on all of Sector 7—
Liars. If Hope hadn't been at Don Corneo's with Lightning and Serah, he wouldn't have argued against the word of Shinra—but he had been at Don Corneo's, and he knew the truth: Shinra had destroyed Sector 7. Shinra had killed Nora.
Remembering that triggered yet another flood of tears. It isn't fair! How was it fair for Nora—kind Nora, who lived a warm and sheltered life on upper Midgar yet regularly visited the slums to provide for Sector 7's orphans—to have been caught in all this? It wasn't fair, it just wasn't. The stupid terrorists should have been the one killed, not Mom—they were the fools who tried challenging Shinra. And Hope knew—you can't challenge Shinra. Not if you didn't want to throw your life away.
And Father. What was he doing, up in that fancy skyscraper that Shinra called their headquarters? You knew Mother was in Sector 7! Hope wanted to scream into his phone. You could have stopped the Plate from falling!
He needed someone to blame. His father was an obvious candidate, and at times he even felt uncontrollable rage towards Lightning and her sister as well—but no, they were not the ones to fault. He couldn't place his finger on it, that pinnacle that would be the recipient of all his grief and rage—until he remembered a name: Snow Villiers. Leader of AVALANCHE. The one responsible for starting this mad rebellion in the first place.
Snow Villiers killed Nora.
He repeated it again and again in his mind, until it lay etched within his very being. For Hope was no longer the shy, quiet boy who stood back to do nothing but watch. No, that boy was dead. He was still Hope, yes—but he was different now. He had a mission to fulfill, a mission that might finally leave his anger-filled heart at peace.
Snow deserved to die. Hope would make sure he did—and soon.
It had been a surprise to see those flowers blooming in the church, tended to by that spiky-haired youth—so imagine her shock at the bright yellow petals that literally covered the entire area in front of the house where Serah had supposedly left Marlene and Hope. Even Fang—who so far in their short time together displayed an upturned noise at the lack of nature and greenery in the slums—was impressed. She picked a nearby flower, breathing in its scent. "Nice place Serah's found," she commented.
Well, no use standing about. Lightning knocked twice on the wooden door; immediately there were footsteps rushing to greet them. The door opened to the face of a middle-aged woman, her face wrinkled with more than just age. "Serah?" She shook her head, blinked twice, and peered closer at Lightning's face. "No—you must be the one she was talking about. Her sister." She opened the door wider; from her eyes Lightning could tell that the woman was hesitant in allowing Fang into her home, but apparently Snow was a familiar figure. "Come on in—you're Snow, right? Your daughter is right upstairs waiting, she's been waiting ever since the news told us what happened—"
"Marlene!" Snow rudely pushed past Lightning, nearly knocking over a vase in his rush to scale the stairs to greet his daughter—but this wasn't the time to get annoyed at him. Not now.
Lightning observed—as any soldier would—and once she had inspected the small living room sufficiently, she turned her attention to the woman who had let them in her home. "Who are you? How do you know my sister?"
"I'm Elmyra. Aerith's mother." Lightning's expression was blank—who? "Oh, I'm sorry—I knew you and Serah were sisters, so I thought you knew..."
Yet another reminder that her sisterly relationship with Serah was... complicated.
"Well..." Elmyra walked into a kitchen, returning with a hot kettle and three dainty tea cups. "It's a long story." Another way to say, Sit down and have some tea—you're not going anywhere anytime soon. "It all started when we discovered that Aerith was an 'Ancient'..."
"So basically," Lightning said slowly after Elmyra finished her tale, "Shinra's kidnapped your adopted daughter—Aerith—so that they can find something that they call the 'Promised Land'." She set down her empty cup. "So why would they kidnap Serah? She's not part of these—Ancients, whoever they are. Was it just because she and Aerith were friends?" It made sense if they were trying to keep her hostage, to keep the survivors of AVALANCHE in check—but none of this business of extinct human races made any sense.
"I don't know," Elmyra confessed. "And I haven't heard anything of Aerith lately—once they took her, and she never came back." Lightning had the grace to look away as a fresh tear revealed itself. "Shinra, the Turks—they never tell us anything."
"Who cares why they took her?" Until now Fang had remained silent ever since they had entered the house. She leaned back against a wall with arms crossed—the perpetual outsider—and continued, "You're going to break them both out of wherever they're bein' held, right?"
"Of course. I made a promise." The voice came from the stairs leading above; Snow was standing there with Marlene perched atop his shoulder. "I don't care what those bastards throw at me. I have to save Serah—and avenge AVALANCHE."
"So you want more fighting?" To Lightning's surprise it was Elmyra, the quiet housewife who had little to do with these events in the first place, who spoke up. "You want to drag that sweet child of yours into another disaster?"
Snow's exterior wilted—but instead of backing down or retaliating angrily, he set Marlene down on the ground and set a large hand on a small shoulder. "I... I know I haven't been the best father for her," he admitted. "Maybe it's best if we just let Shinra alone—I learned that the moment they brought down that Plate. Maybe all this is just impossible."
"So why do you keep insisting on—"
"I told you. They took Serah. I don't know why they took her—but they're probably holding her hostage. It's my fault she's gone—and if I don't clean up my own mess, then who will?" Snow let out an embarrassed half-chuckle, half-groan. "Although you're right—I can't bring Marlene along." The girl pouted but said nothing; Snow tussled her hair playfully. "If—If it's not too much to ask...?"
"You want me to look after her." Elmyra let out a sigh, although the exasperation was feigned. "Alright—as long as you don't get yourself killed." There was a glimmer in the woman's eye; some spark of hope, perhaps? When the Shinra took her daughter, Lightning realized, she lost everything. Like me. Like all of us.
"So what about the boy?"
Oh—Hope! She felt some remorse; she hadn't even remembered that the teen was also in the house—upstairs, perhaps. "We have to leave him here," Lightning said firmly. His magic could be useful, but he had a mother and home to get to; this was no mission to take a fourteen year old boy along. Nora was at the church, not far from Sector 7—but she must have gotten out safely; Hope would be able to contact her easily with his phone. "It's too dangerous—"
"I'm coming."
The silver haired boy slowly descended the stairs, one hand firmly gripping the banister. "They took Serah to Shinra Headquarters. I'm going there with you."
"Out of the question. You'll stay here until your mother can come pick—what?" Lightning was forced to rethink when Elmyra shot her a warning glance at the mention of mother. It couldn't be—or could it? Realization dawned on her; of course Hope would want to come with them—because he didn't have anywhere else to go. Nora—that was her name—Nora is dead?
With that in mind she paused, let silence take hold for a few seconds, and began again. "It'll be dangerous," she said, knowing that her warnings were futile. "This isn't Don Corneo we're dealing with anymore; it's the Shinra, the most powerful group of people on the planet. And you're still sure?"
Hope nodded vigorously. "I have to get some answers. Shinra's just been lying to us over and over again, haven't they?" Lightning couldn't begrudge him that; already Snow was nodding at the boy in approval. "I... I know Nora would have wanted that."
Two down, one to go. "What about you?" She turned to Fang. "Still bent on saving your friend? I've never been to the Headquarters—but it's no secret that it's locked up tighter than the prisons we'll be rotting in, if this mission fails."
"Prison, eh." Fang let out a snort—half contempt, half "bring it on". "Do you have to ask? I'll take whatever you've got in this prison of yours."
Would it kill her to be a little more realistic?
This is crazy. Shinra Headquarters—the base of the entire monopoly, all in one imposing skyscraper. Roboguards, SOLDIER ranking all the way up to the esteemed 1st Class... and here they were, preparing to take them all on with one rogue SOLDIER, a teenaged boy who could pass as a young girl, a hulking terrorist leader with no terrorist band, and an indecent huntress with absolutely no regard for danger.
This, Lightning thought, would go well.
AN: Oh crap, crappy ending, crappy writing, crappy everything.
Again: I swear this has a unique plotline D: Somewhere... later... Heck, I need to skip so many little details (ie. The fight with Air Buster, before Lightning/Cloud dropped through the roof of the church? Or perhaps the entire trek through Train Graveyard, summed up in a measly paragraph or two?). In my defense... you have to admit FF7 and FF13 are pretty darn similar. (NOT JUDGING I SWEAR)
Forgot what I was going to say. So I'll just... submit this. Thank you for reading. ^^
