Chapter 36
Silver
Sorin was sitting cross-legged on the ground when he got the worried report from Samael. Sorin had been preparing himself to converse with the planet, which was no easy task in their current situation, but was distracted by the urgency in his fellow Cetra's voice.
"Sam, what is it?" asked Sorin.
"It doesn't matter, dude, just get on the Shera and get over here to pick us up, we gotta go!" Sam yelled through the earpiece.
Sorin stared on in shock for a moment then moved to get up.
He froze mid way between standing and sitting when a voice spoke to him. It wasn't Sam.
"Hello, Cetra," greeted a hollow-sounding voice. Sorin was unsure as to whether it was male or female.
Sorin looked around cautiously, "Where are you?"
"Close," replied the voice.
"Who are you?" asked Sorin.
"The demise of this planet," replied the voice.
"Is that your first or last name?" asked Sam.
"You were hoping to speak with the planet; unfortunately the planet will be dead within moments. I will take it and move on as I have before," the voice replied.
"Who are you?" Sorin asked again.
"I would assume I'm more of a what in your terms," the voice said, "you know exactly who I am, I'm everyone."
"Everyone," Sorin muttered.
"Sorin for Christ's sake stop talking to it and go!" yelled Sam into Sorin's ear through the earpiece. "Sorin, it's Jenova for God sakes, run!"
"One of my many names," Jenova added.
Sorin's eyes widened, "In space…Jenova."
"Space, the vast nothingness where I was born," Jenova said, "where else would I come from?"
"Sorin, get moving!" Sam yelled.
"The Cetra, even beyond the grave, have continued to be an annoyance," Jenova said, "it appears all my efforts to kill you were only a minor success. It was possible for me to infect living creatures, but the Lifestream itself, much more difficult to infect the Lifestream entirely."
"Well, if it's not Sephiroth it's you, don't you guys have any hobbies?" asked Sam.
"This is my purpose," Jenova replied.
"Your purpose can go screw itself, it doesn't matter what existence you're in, you've been defeated once and it will just keep happening over and over," Sam said defiantly.
"Very optimistic of you, Cetra, but this time I'm not just infecting the people," Jenova said, "I'll be taking the entire planet at once."
"How?" asked Sorin.
There was no response from Jenova.
"How, Jenova?" asked Sorin forcefully.
Silence.
"It's going down right now, get going!" Sam growled.
Sorin did so very quickly.
§§
Sam looked back at Snake, "We gotta go."
Snake nodded to the door labeled Jenova, "What's in there?"
Sam shrugged, "Doesn't matter, the real deal is waiting out in space. We gotta be outta here before it makes a move, let's go."
Sam and Snake exited through the hole in the roof, with a little help from Sam's telekinesis. They headed out from the backstage and through the banquet hall.
"What about the Paradoxers?" asked Snake.
"Whatever information they might have for us isn't worth risking our lives for," Sam replied.
Snake just seemed to accept this, if a bit reluctantly, and moved quickly out of the castle.
Tifa, Mario, and Yoshi met them outside.
"Everyone else is on the Shera, headed this way," Tifa informed.
"Let's meet them half way, we don't have much ti—" the world began to shake around them, the tremors cutting off Sam in mid-sentence.
"What now?" asked Snake.
Sam looked up and saw what he expected. Something that looked like a very menacing silver blob floating down from the sky. It was huge…about the size of the parasite that was floating in space.
Safe bet it was the parasite that was floating in space.
"It's coming," Sam said.
The atmosphere itself seemed to almost sizzle on contact, and the silver parasite pushed through like acid through paper. Now inside, the silver substance dropped like a liquid and hit the grass. The green grass, in turn, became silver and flattened. The silver then began to spread outward, destroying grass and turning everything it touched into the same liquid silver.
Sam was tired of making his point about how urgently they needed to leave, so instead he started running.
"Mama-mia!" Mario cried.
"You said it, brother, let's go!" Sam agreed.
The group ran forward, hoping to see the Shera heading toward them. Sam had to step aside to narrowly miss a stream of the strange silver stuff that was attacking the planet.
"Don't touch the stuff, I'm not sure exactly what it is," Sam warned.
The silver substance was quickly eating up everything, as Sam looked back he took note of the fact that the black castle was left untouched.
"Sam!" yelled Tifa.
Sam looked forward in time to see what appeared to be a small tidal wave of the silver stuff coming at him. He was fast enough to dive to the side and roll out of range.
"It's like the stuff's aiming for us," Snake growled.
"I'd say that's a good bet," Sam replied.
"Another one!" yelled Mario.
Another small tidal wave attacked from the left, everyone jumped in different directions. Once everyone got back on their feet they looked around.
"Damn," Snake said, suddenly, "we're surrounded."
Indeed, the silver substance now seemed to have them circled, and was moving inward.
Mario held out his right hand, a sphere-shaped ball of flame appeared floating a centimeter or two above his palm. He quickly grabbed the fireball and tossed it at the silver stuff. The substance reacted to the fire by splitting apart and breaking away, however it quickly began to move forward again.
"Mario, you gotta clear us a path," Sam said.
Mario nodded and began tossing fireballs at rapid speeds, effectively clearing a path.
"I always thought you could only throw three at a time," Sam commented.
Mario looked back curiously.
"Then again I played a lot of the original NES game," Sam muttered shrugging.
Mario ignored Sam and continued to clear a path through the silver stuff. After a few moments, Sam heard a growl and saw Snake fall to the ground.
The tip of Snake's boot had touched some silver stuff and it felt like his foot was being ripped off. In the desperate situation, the only option he could think of was to pull his gun and start firing. He emptied an entire clip into the silver stuff, it was enough to make it back off, but wasn't nearly as effective as Mario's fire.
"Are you okay?" asked Tifa, helping Snake up.
Snake cursed under his breath and looked up, "Let's get the hell outta here."
"Lovely idea," Sam agreed, "Sorin, where's the goddamn Shera!"
"On the way," replied Sorin.
"Hurry!" Sam yelled.
"Another wave!" yelled Mario.
This silver tidal wave came at them from the front. They didn't have any space to move.
Sam jumped forward and held out his hand, his telekinesis held the tidal wave in place, as if frozen in ice.
"Mario, start chipping away at it with your fire," Sam said.
Mario nodded and cocked his arm back for a throw, and was suddenly swallowed by some silver substance that caught him by the foot. The rate at which the video game character was swallowed was so fast that Sam hadn't noticed for a few seconds.
"Shit," Sam muttered, the silver substance was gaining power. When it had grabbed Snake it only pulled him down, now it was simply just sucking people away.
"What now?" asked Tifa, looking around.
Sam opened his mouth to say something; he saw the silver substance had surrounded them. In fact, the silver substance now dominated everything in his line of sight. Even if he could hover them away, he had no place to land them.
"Sam?" asked Tifa, worriedly.
"I don't know," Sam muttered.
Snake looked around frantically, "Where's your goddamn ship?"
"Sorin!" Sam yelled.
"Coming," Sorin replied.
Sam muttered something under his breath; he used his telekinesis to hold off the silver all around them, but knew he didn't have enough energy to keep it up for long.
"What about your staff?" asked Tifa.
Sam shook his head, "If I try to use it I'll lose my concentration on the telekinesis, I won't be able to hold off the silver stuff."
Then the Shera came into view.
"'Bout damn time," Snake growled.
The Shera headed toward them, only about a meter away.
"Alright," Snake said, pulling two grenades, "let's see if this helps."
He pulled the pins and tossed the grenades, blowing back a lot of silver and giving them a good space to run toward the Shera.
"Tifa, take the staff," Sam said.
"Why?" asked Tifa.
"If I get eaten by this shit then it goes with me, give it to Sorin," Sam said.
Tifa shook her head, "Bring it with you."
"I gotta follow behind to hold off the silver stuff, I'll follow up last, take the staff to be safe," Sam growled.
Tifa took the staff reluctantly, "Don't take too long."
"No longer than usual," Sam replied smiling.
Tifa ran with Yoshi and Snake into the new opening Snake created. The Shera pulled overhead, lowering enough for Sorin to offer a hand down from the outdoor platform.
"Snake, take my hand," Sorin offered.
Snake jumped up and grabbed it, using his other hand, in a grand display of strength, to toss Yoshi over his own head and up on the platform.
"Sorin, tell Cid to pull up, there's a wave coming!" Sam yelled.
Sorin looked, still holding on to Snake, and saw the wave of silver stuff, just high enough to hit the Shera.
"Damn, Cid, pull up, pull up, now!" Sorin yelled.
"Tifa, my hand!" Snake yelled.
Tifa looked back at Sam.
"Go!" Sam yelled.
"No," Tifa yelled, "not without you!"
"Get on the ship, woman, what are you psychotic?" yelled Sam.
Another wave came in from another angle, smaller, headed right for Tifa.
"Tifa, quickly!" Sorin yelled.
Tifa looked at Sam.
"Shit," Snake cursed, seeing the smaller wave coming at her from behind, "behind, behind there's another one!"
Tifa turned and saw the other wave coming at her.
"Damn," Sam growled, suddenly letting go of the wave coming in on him and just managing to get out from under it in time as it hit the ground uselessly. He rolled quickly and hopped over a small stream of the silver stuff to get to Tifa. He landed beside her and used his telekinesis to shoot her upward.
"Wait!" she yelled, as she was shot upward, Snake grabbed her hand.
"Now, Cid, up!" Sorin yelled.
"Sam!" Tifa yelled, still hanging below Snake.
Sam looked at the oncoming smaller wave, he knew if he went now he'd never get above the small one unless the Shera stayed low enough, and if the Shera stayed low enough it would get hit by the larger wave still on its way.
"Cid," Sam said, "everyone's on, let's go!"
"You got it," Cid said. The Shera shot upward.
"No, wait, Sam!" Tifa yelled.
"Damn, wait, Sam's still down there!" Snake yelled, "stop the ship!"
The Shera pulled above the larger wave.
Sam stared into the oncoming smaller wave, "Well, this should be interesting."
The wave fell over him, followed by the much larger one a moment later.
"No!" screamed Tifa.
Snake looked around the platform, trying to find a spot where Sam might have miraculously escaped the wave.
"Sam," Sorin muttered.
"Yooshii!" cried the green creature.
"He could survive that, right?" asked Tifa desperately to Sorin.
"He's like you, right, one of those Cetra people?" asked Snake.
Sorin shook his head, "I don't know."
"What don't you know?" asked Tifa.
"I don't know," Sorin replied sadly.
"Damn!" Snake growled.
Tifa looked over the edge of the platform at the now very silver world below, "Sam…"