FF8 copyright Squaresoft!
CHAPTER THREE
OMEGA
On the outskirts of Deling city, not far from the Car Rental facility is the main power plant which supplies energy to run most of central Galbadia. Many residents work there to support there families. But what they don't know is that underneath is a government facility which the military uses to perform tests on scientific subjects ranging from enemy soldiers caught during war and even several different species of monsters from around the world. Most of the testing is to try and find a way to force the subjects to do whatever they are ordered and to never ask questions.
Down on the lowest level is where they keep the most dangerous of monsters. Especially the newest acquisition that had been captured right after the end of Time Compression. This one is a particularly strong and very dangerous monster. Standing a good twenty-five feet tall and at least fifteen feet long this monster had a skin harder than any armor currently known to man. It has a body of a dragon and a upper torso which resemble a demented looking knight wearing very thick armor and had arms which ended in nasty looking claws which could easily cut a Ruby Dragon in half.
It had been found unconscious and severely beaten not far from the Tomb of the Unknown King. The soldiers had transported it to the Research facility immediately and the scientists began tests to determine what it was.
It is currently held in a sealed containment room to keep it from escaping back out into the world. At least until they find out how to control it.
On most mornings the lab is filled with activity. This morning, however, is very different. Not a single scientist or soldier is moving along the halls or working in the labs. In fact none of them are even alive. Every body in the facility is riddled with bullets or burnt to a crisp by strong fire magic. The only thing stirring was the monster on the bottom level. It had pretended to just be a stupid monster that didn't know anything other than mindless destruction. He had pretended to be unconscious when the men found him and brought him in so that he could heal from his fight with those stupid twerps from the past who had killed his sorceress. And now, he sensed that something was about to happen that would allow him to fulfill Ultimecia's last wish as she had sent him backwards through time.
On the outer door to his chamber a timer was slowly counting down to his freedom.
5…..
4…..
3…..
2…..
1…..
0………………
BOOOOM!!!!!!!!
The bomb did exactly what it was supposed to do. It started by blowing the locks off of the door and then the secondary charges blew the remainder of the door clear across the room allowing the monster known as Omega Weapon to escape to finish his job.
The total annihilation of SeeD.
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"Squ…….ake up……an you…hear…"
Who is that? Where am I? I can't remember what happened?
Wait it's coming back to me. The other Ragnarok flying straight towards me and then slamming into the ground. I grabbed Rinoa to try to protect her.
RINOA!!!!!
"Back up….Rin…" "I'm going ….cast…..uraga on him."
I could feel a cool soothing feeling build up around me and then I felt my body begin to slowly knit itself back together. I could tell I was regaining consciousness because I could hear Zell and Rinoa talking above me.
"Booya, I told ya it would take more than that to hurt Squall!"
Slowly sitting up I looked at my surroundings and realized that they must have carried me out while I was still unconscious from the crash. "Are you guys O.K.?"
"Yeah, we're fine, but you really had us worried there for a while."
"Sorry Rinny, I didn't mean to scare you but I couldn't just sit there while you crashed into the window."
"It's O.K. I'm just glad your better now."
I stood up and looked over to where the Ragnarok was resting against a rock embankment and noticed that it didn't seem all that damaged. "Zell, have you had a chance to check out the ship's condition yet?"
"Yeah she seems to be fine other than some body damage and we might need to recalibrate the main thrusters." said Zell before continuing, "It shouldn't take me more than an hour to get her up and flying again."
Thinking this over in my head I decided to have Zell stay and fix the Ragnarok while me and Rinoa headed into Deling City to see if we could find out anything about the ship that had almost turned us into pancakes.
"Rinoa, let's head into town and see what we can find out while Zell stays and works on the ship." With this said I turned to Zell and told him that we would meet back at this position in one hour.
"Everyone make sure your G.F.'s are equipped and don't let your guard down because chances are there are a lot of people here who probably still don't like us."
Turning away from the ship Rinoa and me started our trip towards town. And of course it didn't take long before the first encounter with a monster. It actually caught us by surprise because it was hiding behind a large outcropping of rock up the trail a little ways ahead of us. I almost laughed when I realized it was a single Grat just like the ones we have in the Training Center back at Balamb Garden. Unsheathing my gunblade I guickly jumped forward and with a single downward swipe managed to remove a good portion of its tentacles. It countered by turning and trying to slamm two more of it tentacles into my side. I managed to dodge one but the other cut into my upper leg and stung like hell. Recovering I dived forward and slammed my blade straight into it upper torso. Realizing that I wasn't an easy meal it tried to pull itself away but before it could I pulled the trigger on my gunblade causing a shell to explode in the chamber and send a massive pulse down the blade straight into the creatures chest. It made one final gurgle and fell over dead.
Turning back to Rinoa I started to move towards her when she suddenly pointed and screamed, "Squall, look out, there's more coming!" Right as I started to spin around to see what she was talking about I was caught right upside the head by the tentacle of another Grat. It threw me back several feet but I managed to keep my footing and as soon as I came to a stop I quickly concentrated on a Blizzaga spell which I threw at the monster. It froze it in it's track and when the magical ice melted away it fell over dead. Looking up I realized that there were at least another 30 Grats charging down the trail at us. I could see that Rinoa was preparing to throw several magic spells of her own at them but I also knew that it wouldn't be enough so I reached into the part of my brain where the G.F.'s reside and thought "Diablos, I'm going to need your help here."
"WITH PLEASURE" I swear Diablos is more blood thirsty than even Seifer because every time I call on his aid it seems as if I can almost hear a deep guttural laugh as he prepares to summon himself into battle.
A few seconds later I felt as if my body was growing and changing shape as it faded away and Diablos came forth and prepared to unleash his 'Dark Messenger' attack. Reaching up into the sky Diablos called forth a large black liquid orb of antimatter which he then reached into and charged it up with his own gravity energy before slamming it down onto the battle field and brutally crushing most of the Grats. He then burst into a swarm of bats and disappeared back into his place inside of my mind.
Regaining control of my body I quickly scanned around to see how Rinoa was doing. She was about twenty feet away using her Wishing Star projectile weapon which attaches to her arm and easily taking out the few Grats that were still standing. Within moments it was over. Grabbing an elixir out of the pouch on my belt I downed part of it to help heal my leg and to regain some of the energy I used calling forth Diablos.
"You okay Rinoa?"
"Yeah, but didn't that seem kind of odd to you Squall, I mean have you ever seen that many Grats together at one time." Come to think of it she did have a good point. "You're right it was almost as if they were running from something. Well there's only one way to find out so lets get going."
I sheathed my gunblade after wiping it off on the grass nearby and then walked over to Rinoa who was already waiting for me a few feet up the trail. We then continued walking up towards the top of the hill where we would get our first view of Deling City. Within minutes we were at the top and what we saw horrified me.
Even from a distance we could see that the city was in turmoil. Several building were burning and others were just completely gone. Even the archway where we had attempted to assassinate Sorceress Edea was damaged. The whole top part of the arch was gone and the walls looked like they would fall down any minute.
We began making our way into town to see if we could figure out what had happened and before long came across a group of people who were in the progress of trying to get tickets for a train out of town. I walked up to one of them and tapped him on the shoulder. He turned and when he did we both did a double take.
"Wedge" It was one of the galbadian soldiers who I had fought with several times over the last several weeks.
"AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!" He then feinted and collapsed to the ground. Oh boy this was definitely turning into one of those days. After several minutes I gave up and used one of my Phoenix Downs on him to wake him up. When he finally woke up he looked up and started screaming, "Don't kill me, Don't kill me."
"We're not going to kill you we just want to know what happened here and then we'll leave you alone." I stated and then waited for him to compose himself.
Wedge finally calmed down enough to explain, "I was walking back to work at the Car Rental Agency when I heard this loud explosion come from the power plant. Since I used to be a soldier I ran over to see if I could be of any help. But before I could get over there, there was a loud boom and all of a sudden the side of power plant blows out and this huge monster comes barreling out and starts tearing buildings apart. Five squads of soldiers tried to fight it but it tore threw them like they weren't even there and then it took off towards the coastline."
"What kind of monster was it?" I asked while trying to figure out what could do this much damage in such a short time and tear through fifty highly trained soldiers as if they were Bite Bugs.
"I don't know, I've never seen anything like it before." He paused before continuing, "But I think they got it on a camera. It should be on television."
"O.K. next question then. Where's the nearest television?"
Rinoa spoke up next and told me there was me there was one right next door in a restaurant. So after letting Wedge run off to the train station again we headed next door to see what we could find out. When we got there the building was packed and I had to force my way through with Rinoa following in my wake. Once close enough to the T.V. I looked up and almost feinted when I saw what it was that had done all this damage.
Omega Weapon!
"Squall, what is it? You look like you just saw a ghost."
I turned to her and tried to think of some way that this was possible. "Rinoa, remember when we were in the future at Ultimecia's castle and Irvine, Zell and me accidently ran into that Weapon that she had in the chapel?"
"Yeah, we thought the three of you were goners but we were to far away to help and by the time we got there you had already killed it with your new limit magic 'Renzokuken Lionheart'"
"Well, that monster is it and now it's here in our time for some reason. It must have been pulled through Time Compression like I was." The whole time we had been talking we had been walking and we now found ourselves in front of Rinoa's fathers house.
"Maybe my father knows something, lets check with him and find out." She said this but I could tell she was nervous due to the fact that her and her father didn't get along to well. " You sure you are up to that?" I asked her.
"Yeah as long as you don't leave me alone in that house with him." With this said we walked up the stairs and opened the door. Once inside it was obvious that something was very wrong. Last time we had been there the house had been spotless but this time everything was torn about and thrown about. I pulled out my gunblade and began to make my way up the stairs to the second floor and Caraways office, which was the most likely place he would be. I could see that the door was cracked slightly and when I looked down I could see a highly polished military boot sticking out of the door partially holding it open. Unfortunately, so did Rinoa.
"DAD!!!!!" she yelled and then shoved by me and ran into the room to where her father was laying on the floor. I kneeled down next to him and checked for a pulse but I didn't have much hope considering he had two bullet wounds to his upper chest. Which is probably why he scared the crap out of me when he started coughing. Rinoa sat next to him and undid his shirt and sure enough he was wearing body armor. Once he had fully regained consciousness and was able to talk he tried to explain what had happened up to and after they shot him. "Once they shot me they didn't even bother to check my pulse those amateurs. I played dead and I was able to overhear them talking about stage two and something about the Esther president. After that I blacked out."
The Esther President!!!!!
Laguna Loire!!!!!
The Moron!!!!
Also the man I just found out was my father.
While this was sinking in Rinoa was filling her dad in on what was going on outside. As soon as she finished I told them what my next plan was. "Rinoa we're going to get your father to the Ragnarok and then I'm going to drop all of you off at Balamb Garden and head to Esther to try and stop them from killing my father! I just found him and I am not about to lose him again!"
"Squall, did you just say what I think you did?"
"Yeah, I just found out a few days ago. Laguna is my dad." With that said I helped Caraway out to his car outside and began our trip back to the Ragnarok. Rinoa who had been digesting this new information finally spoke up just as the Ragnarok came into view, "I'm coming with you!"
I turned to her while trying to watch the road and stated "No, you stay with Zell and your father and make sure he stays safe because once whoever did this finds out he's alive they might make another attempt so its up to you two to make sure he stays safe.
We stopped the car and got on the Ragnarok which Zell had just gotten up and running and within minutes I was at the controls heading towards Balamb Garden. The whole time I was hoping that I could get to Esther before it was too late………