FF7
Heartstrings
Vincent
Unleashed
by
TacomaSquall
Part Four:
A week after the wedding gala, Kalm was
beginning to settle down. The residents had started to return to their normal
day-to-day routine, knowing that within a year, they would begin the process of
settling in the new city, named for AVALANCHE's leader, Barret Wallace.
Wallace City was being built in the
foothills south of Kalm, just before the mountains that separated the Midgar
basin from the woodlands that stretched between El Junon and Condor Fort. One
of the biggest engineering feats in the world, Wallace City would be powered by
the forces that kept the earth warm, geothermal energy. The City had begun
construction shortly after Reeve took over ShinRa, and was in the process of
being completed. The City would not be settled until there was a rail-line
connecting it to Kalm and Condor Fort.
Kalm had grown not only to accommodate the
rush of refugees that came out of fallen Midgar, but also to support the
rail-builders. ShinRa had spent a lot of money to make sure that the equipment
and manpower were in place to build the rail lines and the city in the hills.
All those hungry workers required food, and people to take care of them. As a
result, Kalm had grown into a small city in its own right, and had become the
foremost producer of fruits, vegetables, and meat within the Commonwealth of
City-States.
The Farm Capital of the Commonwealth was
settling back into the routine followed by most farming communities everywhere.
The farms each ran independently. The produce was brought to Kalm and sold, and
supplies bought, and news exchanged. When they needed something, the people
came into town to get it. When they didn't need something, most people seemed
to revel in the fact that they were out from underneath the oppressive plate of
Midgar, and that they were working in harmony with the life of the Planet.
That is not to say that Kalm was a sleepy
town. By no stretch of the imagination would that be accurate. Too many of the
farmers in the area were brand-new to the business of running a farm, and
growing things, and taken care of livestock. This resulted in Kalm being a
bustling little city that still managed to have a less sophisticated feel than
Midgar or El Junon.
The late-afternoon foot traffic wended its
way through the small city's streets, heading toward the original town center.
As the traffic flowed into the central square of the city, passers-by walked
past the Kalm Desert Rose Inn. The Inn was an attraction to those who were not
from Kalm, both as the town's best inn, and as a notable landmark.
The Inn, more than a year before, was the
point from which AVALANCHE set their feet on the road in pursuit of Sephiroth.
More importantly, one of the members of AVALANCHE bought the Inn after Meteor's
destruction. The Desert Rose Inn was the home of the newly wedded Cloud and
Tifa Strife.
This afternoon, Cloud was down at the bar,
polishing the counter with a rag, watching as his wife talked with the only
other member of AVALANCHE still in Kalm, Yuffie Kisaragi. He smiled as he
looked at the two women. Even as pretty as Yuffie has become, she's still
not as pretty as Tifa.
Yuffie Kisaragi had, over the last year,
lost some of her awkward coltishness. No longer did she appear to only be arms
and legs, like some humanoid spider. Her girlish figure had developed some
softer curves, and she was beginning to develop into quite a beautiful young
woman. She was flattered and courted by many at the wedding ball, but she
seemed to have her sights set elsewhere. I wonder who she is waiting for. Cloud mused absently as he finished cleaning off
the bar and pulled out a glass for inspection.
"Tifa, I'm worried about Vincent."
Yuffie spoke quickly, her distress plain in both the way her brow was crinkled
with worry, and in the tone that had crept into her voice. "He vanished
last week, during the wedding, and no one has seen him at all."
"Yuffie, I'm sure he's fine. Vincent
likes being alone, remember?" Tifa tried to comfort her younger friend,
putting her arms around Yuffie's shoulders.
The ninja pulled free of Tifa's embrace.
""I just know that something's wrong! He wouldn't vanish like that on
me!"
Cloud shook his head in sorrow. He had felt
it would be best to not tell anyone else about the note that Vincent had left
in his room in the Inn. It looked now like his judgment was wrong. He stepped
from behind the bar. "Yuffie, I need to tell you something."
The two women turned to stare at Cloud.
Tifa's eyes widened in surprise, and then sudden comprehension of what Cloud
was talking about. The Wutai ninja querulously asked, "What now,
Cloud?"
"Vincent isn't coming back. He left a
note in his room." Cloud sadly sighed. "He still believes that he is
a monster, and he blames himself for everything that happened to Lucresia. He
did not want us coming after him."
"I don't care. I'm going to find him!
He'll listen to me!" Yuffie spun on her heel and started to walk out. She
was brought to a sudden stop by Cloud's voice.
"Yuffie, he's trying to protect you.
He's afraid that he's going to hurt you in a moment of inattention." He
raced forward and put his hands on the young woman's shoulders. "He is
terrified that one of the monsters that he turns into when he gets angry will
gain control of him, and hurt the people he cares for."
"I don't want to hear it! I'll make him
listen to me!"
Yuffie pulled away from Cloud in time for
all three of them to see a sudden rush of foot traffic bolt down the street,
toward the town square. The people were running from something! Yuffie sprinted
to the door, and opened it. From outside, they heard the sound of an explosion,
and mixed cries from the fleeing mob.
"Why is it attacking us?"
"I always said we couldn't trust
him!"
"It's that hell-hound that he can
summon!"
"It's on a rampage! Run for your
lives!"
Yuffie looked back at her two friends. Tifa
had already started upstairs, to the room tht she and her husband shared, and
the guest rooms. Cloud had ran to the back of the Inn, where he took the Ultima
Weapon and God's Hand down from their places on the wall by the fireplace. He
then leapt over the counter and pulled a box from behind a hidden panel in the
floor. Inside was arrayed a gleaming trove of Materia. He pulled a
scintillating handful of Materia out, and began placing them in the sockets of
both weapons. As each Materia was inserted into a socket, there was a click, as
the weapon locked the Materia into place, preventing the stone from dropping
out and being lost in the middle of combat.
As Cloud worked, he hummed to himself. This
was more like it! Nothing against inn-keeping, but I was born to fight! He
inserted the Materia used to summon Hades and a Materia that allowed you to use
the power of a linked stone through your weapon into two linked sockets on the
Ultima Weapon. He then proceeded to add three Deathblow Materia into the
remaining sockets, linking them with Materia that drained enemies of both
physical and spiritual energies, along with a Materia that permitted a
follow-up attack. This should be a nice surprise for someone! He turned
his attention to Tifa's weapon.
He inserted a gleaming Yellow Materia that
permitted Tifa to use the magical abilities of many of the monsters they had
faced in the past, and added to it a gem that allowed her to call on the Ice
Queen, Shiva. In the remaining linked slots, Cloud gave Tifa the Materia
granting mastery over all forms of magic and a gem that allowed four castings
of a magical spell at one time. Tifa loves her Quadra Magic. He grinned.
As he looked up, he saw that his wife had
returned from upstairs, carrying Mystiles for both of them. Tifa had also tossed
Yuffie's Chocobracelet and Conformer to the young woman, who was checking her
Materia and nodding with satisfaction. Tifa handed the Mystile to Cloud and
smiled. "There's the usual protective Materia socketed for you, Cloud. You
have both Restore and Phoenix ready to go. I also brought your Tetra
Elemental."
The three warriors rechecked their Materia
quickly. Satisfied, they ran out of the Inn, and into the mob. They fought
their way against the flow of the crowd, working quickly to the city's
outskirts, where they were treated to a horrific sight. At the edge of town, a
cart carrying fertilizer had been overturned and was burning. Three bodies lay
on the ground, in various stages of dismemberment, having been gnawed on by the
huge purple hound that was currently stalking a young boy. Gouts of burning
fertilizer had separated the boy from his family, who had fled from the
monster, and the hound was walking toward the boy, ignoring the blazing flames
around it. They recognized the Galian Beast, one of Vincent's monster-forms.
Cloud accelerated and charged towards the
boy, heedless of the flames ahead of him. He saw Yuffie and Tifa running
alongside him. As he ran, he screamed, "Vincent! Don't do this!"
The Galian Beast looked back at Cloud. Its
gaze met the blond-haired warrior's for a moment, and then it threw its head
back and howled.
Just as the Beast howled, the burning
fertilizer exploded in a blast that shattered windows throughout Kalm. The
fireball from the explosion swept over the citizens of Kalm that were still
nearby and ended their lives in a micro-second of burning agony. The buildings
near the blast were vaporized like paper in a blazing gust of wind from a
forge.
The members of AVALANCHE, better protected
from the explosion's fury, avoided incineration barely, but were still burned
almost beyond recognition. Tifa was hurled backwards by the shockwave, striking
the stone foundation of a house just after its non-stone parts had been
vaporized. She struck the foundation head-first, cracking her skull like an
eggshell.
Yuffie was knocked down by the blast, which
drove her backwards into the glowing cobblestones of the street. One of those
cobblestones caused the fabric of her clothing to ignite, and her body was
wreathed in flames.
Cloud, due to the uncanny magic of the Tetra
Elemental, was able to resist the shockwave and a portion of the fireball's
fury. However, his face was flash-burned by the blast, and his eyes boiled in
their sockets. Uncomprehending of the darkness that he was surrounded by, the
warrior took a couple of halting steps before the shock of his injuries felled
him.
The Galian Beast, dread monster of fire and
darkness that it was, was completely unharmed by the explosion, having been
knocked backwards by the blast but healed of all damage that the concussion did
to it by the fireball's heat.
As Cloud died, two of the Materia on his
Mystile glowed brilliantly. A reddish-orange sphere appeared in mid-air, and
fell to the ground. When the sphere hit, the ground rippled like the surface of
a pool of water being struck by a single drop of rain. As the ripples subsided,
the ground where the sphere struck began to glow, first orange, then red, and
then finally white-hot.
The mighty Phoenix, puissant firebird of
rebirth, erupted from the ground. It screamed its defiance at the Galian beast,
and an wave of fire washed over the monster. The Galian Beast was unharmed by
the firebird's attack, but it was surprised to see the three members of
AVALANCHE rise to their feet, unharmed, revived by the Phoenix's scream. Wisps
of smoke rose from their clothing, but even their possessions had been restored
by the mighty firebird. With one last scream, the Phoenix vanished back to the
void it came from.
Tifa's lips pulled back in a grimace.
"Vincent, this has to stop." She pointed at the Galian Beast.
"Shiva, take him out."
The members of AVALANCHE vanished, as the
summoning magic of the crimson Materia on Tifa's glove glowed. A gigantic
crystal of ice appeared and shattered, revealing the frigid countenance of
Shiva. She gestured, and a wave of ice flowed from her hand to cover the Galian
Beast. The ice shattered, and the Beast staggered backwards in pain.
Cloud knew they had to put the Beast down.
It was faster than they were, and could easily use its own fire magic to heal,
if given the opportunity. He looked at Yuffie and saw the indecision on her
face. "We need to stop him." Yuffie nodded, tears flowing from her
eyes. "When I reach the end of my Break, hit him with everything you've
got."
Having given Yuffie her directions, Cloud
called upon his Limit Break. He felt his hair standing on end as he felt the
pain from the explosion mingle with the rage he felt watching those innocents
die. With the berserker-fury upon him, he charged forward and starting raining
the deadly flurry of blows known as the Omnislash upon the Galian Beast.
The Beast was buffeted by the blows of the
Omnislash, knocked first one way and then the other. Cloud hurled the Beast
into the air with a sweeping uppercut of his blade and leapt after the monster,
striking once, twice, three times. With a flip, he catapulted himself to the
other side of the beast, just in time to avoid a pulsating beam of scarlet
energy that erupted from Yuffie's Conformer. The Galian Beast was killed
instantly.
The beam threw the Beast high into the sky
before it winked out of existence. The Galian Beast reached the highest point
of its arc and began to fall back towards the Earth. By the time it hit the
ground, the three members of AVALANCHE were running toward it.
As they ran closer, the Galian Beast's body
began to smolder, and then burn. By the time they had reached it, the monster's
heat had consumed its flesh, leaving only a single crystal of vermilion
Materia.
Cloud knelt and picked up the Materia.
"I don't know how the Beast was freed from Vincent, but we need to find
out. I think we had better call our friends."
End of Part Four