A/N: No epilogue after all - it wound up becoming one chapter. I hope this is a satisfactory ending. Comments and thoughts welcomed.
I'll start on the sequel in the New Year. Have a good Christmas and thanks for reading!
The Last of an Elite
Chapter Forty Six: The Fall of Midgar
By InterfaceLeader
-~-~-~-
Panic had spread through the streets of Midgar, scared citizens locking themselves away or running to the one place that had always seemed invincible - the Shinra building. Only one group of people had not panicked. Reeve's announcement had succeeded in getting through to the Shinra Guards. Having already routed Soldier, they had begun on the traditional orgy of destruction all armies engage in at the end of a battle. Now however, they regrouped and assumed a new role as Midgar's police force, concerned only with the safety of the people around them.
Squads of guards went from door to door, calmly smashing them down and ordering the inhabitants out into the street. Potions and ethers were collected and rationed out with military efficiency.
Slowly the trickle of people travelling downwards to Sector Three became a torrent, and then a flood. There were a lot of people to move. A splinter group of guards took over the station, organising the frightened people, getting them aboard the train smoothly and without overloading the carriages. It was a triumph of authority, of a near machine like system.
Sector Three began to fill with bobbing white faces; slummers rubbing shoulders with expensive suited Shinra employees, prostitutes pushing their way past society ladies. Voices rose in a low roar of noise.
Rude and Elena worked their way through the crowd swiftly, dragging the unresponsive Reno behind them. Rude pressed his fingers against the suit jacket, feeling the hard shape of the key to the city inside his pocket. The Sector Three gate was just ahead, a tight mass of people pressed up next to it.
The Turks elbowed their way through, Rude finally reaching it, pushing aside an oversized businessman and a seven year old wearing little but rags.
The ground shook.
Rude paused as he fumbled for the card.
The great mass of people suddenly went quiet. Very quiet.
Above them the plate rattled, sounding much too loud in the silence. The fans set into it span slowly to a halt.
The reactors had, as one, stopped.
Rude shook his head, and swiped the key card through the lock swiftly. He could feel sweat running down his face and behind his sunglasses. The card slid out the slot noiselessly, no beep, no click.
The door remained solidly shut.
"Let me try!" The businessman grabbed the card from Rude's fingers and brought it down heavily. Again the door remained shut, an impassive barrier to the millions of frightened people.
"… mako powered…" Rude stepped away from the gate and started forcing his way back through the crowd. His thoughts spun wildly.
City gates to remain locked at all times… cables to be fully secure from any attempt by the slummers to reach them… no manual lock to be provided in case of tampering. Only manual over-ride to be provided in main Shinra control room…
We're screwed.
-~-~-~-
Tseng sat silently in the garden, legs crossed, back straight. A faint breeze rippled the long black strands of his hair and drifted gently through the leaves. His face was set in stone.
Inside his head, the Planet was screaming. It's pain and fury reverberated around him, and it took every ounce of willpower he had not to clap his hands over his ears and double up in pain of his own. He was the Planet, its pain was his pain, the lifestream and his soul was inextricably bound together. And he was afraid.
He sank, the swirling green liquid mist that flowed through the veins cut into the living rock of the planet breaking apart before him, twisting and contorting in panic, a thousand spirits caught up in fear and agony. He drifted through it, downward, deeper and deeper towards the Planet's heart.
-~-~-~-
Sector Three was a single triangular cross-section of humanity; the densely packed figures differed in everything except their fear. Above them the plate shook as unimaginable forces smashed into it. Dust fell in great showers; the massed ranks of bodies were hot and sweaty, surging against each other in waves desperate to flee but with nowhere to flee too. The guards were powerless once more, they had dammed the flood of panic once but now it was rising again.
Rude and Elena reached Reeve, Elena still dragging Reno. The brown-eyed man was surrounded by a platoon of guards, but they could do nothing to protect him from the horror of Midgar's predicament.
"Reeve!" Elena let go of Reno to grab hold of Reeve's arm. "There has to be a way to get those gates open without Mako!"
Metal against metal, screaming, tearing, crushing.
"There's no way" Reeve turned to the blond woman, his face grief stricken. "The President didn't want any way for the people of the slums to escape."
His father dead… his sister's tears… his Mother's soft murmur; what did we do to deserve this?
"We're all going to die…" Elena whispered, unbelieving.
"… The control room, Reeve." Rude turned sharply to the man. "There's an override circuit…"
Reeve shook his head. "The control room was ripped apart by Weapon. It took me all night to fix up the intercom system, and that was relatively untouched. Besides, even the override was hooked up to the reactors."
Everyone was screaming, always screaming… what did we do to deserve this?
"…………You mean it's impossible?" Rude looked upward to where the plate was vibrating like a sail in a storm.
Tseng turned towards him, a faintly irritated look in his eye; it may be impossible Reno, but Turks specialise in the impossible.
Elena put her head in her hands with a soft moan. Rude was staring up at the plate, knowing it would fall and wondering how much time he had left alive. Around them the guards tightened the grip on their rifles, steady as rocks. Outside them the wave of people alternately cried and screamed, some in hysterics, some laughing shrilly, some slumped stony faced and silent.
Reno began to walk.
-~-~-~-
The heart of the planet was a rock hard ball of solidified Mako, thousands of miles in diameter. Great cracks criss-crossed its surface, filled with gleaming rivers of green light. Aerith knelt by one such river, her body soft and flickering strangely, illuminated by the river. Her hands were pressed together, her eyes focused on the stream.
Tseng followed her gaze, and saw the face of Cloud, exhausted looking, sweat running down it, yet set with grim determination. The view changed suddenly, and the harsh imperial features of Sephiroth appeared, the cold green eyes brighter than the lifestream itself.
"…" Aerith held one hand over the pool. "Cloud…"
Suddenly the stream grew hot, a great flare of fire sweeping across the picture. There were sliding chaotic images, a sword swinging again and again, light, gashes of blood, burning bright green eyes, and then Sephiroth was falling backwards, dissolving into whiteness so bright Tseng was forced to slam his hand across his eyes for fear of going blind.
"Cloud!" Aerith thrust her hand into the pool, crying out in fear. Tseng peered through his fingers and saw her entire body surrounded by white light, white light that shot upwards through the veins of the planet and out.
"It's not enough…" Aerith lifted her eyes to Tseng, beseeching. "It's not enough to stop Meteor!"
-~-~-~-
"Where's Reno?" Elena asked suddenly.
"?" Rude stopped staring upwards and turned to look at where his friend had been standing, and then swept a gaze across the crowd until he spotted the redhead making his way swiftly towards the train station. "… there… what's he doing?" Shaking his head, he started pushing his way after him.
"Where?" Elena bounced up on tiptoe trying to see over the heads of the surrounding people, her small stature making it difficult. Unable to see Reno anywhere she pouted in frustration, and switched her gaze towards the broad back of Rude. As she stared at it she became aware of a small dot of red light that swung awkwardly over him, finally coming to rest in the centre of his back. Elena stared for a moment, and then leapt forward.
"Down Rude!" she shouted as she slammed into his back, sending him flying.
Rude staggered and recovered his balance, turning just in time to see the blood blossom from Elena's chest, the bullet slamming into the ground at his feet. Elena's hand went to the wound, her eyes slowly widening with shock, and then pain. She slumped forward just as the sound of the shot echoed past them.
The crowd screamed and drew back, leaving them in an exposed circle. Rude caught Elena as she fell, sliding her over to one arm as his other brought out his gun. Following the line of the bullet, he found himself staring at Joanna, far in the distance and already lining up another shot.
"Bitch!" he fired, once, twice, three times. Each bullet found a different spot, the first going through her head, the second through her stomach, and the final bullet lodging deep in her heart. Joanna fell backwards, landing in a crumpled gory heap. Rude dropped his gun and clutched Elena tightly, his horror mounting as he realised her blood was soaking into his jacket and flowing over his hands.
"Elena - Elena!"
He dropped to his knees as blood bubbled over her lips. Her face was losing its colour, fading to grey. Rude shook, instinctively knowing this was far beyond a potion's ability to heal but emptying his pockets anyway, throwing the curative liquids over her with desperation.
"No………" behind the dark glasses his eyes blurred with tears, and the crowd moved even further away from the kneeling man and the bleeding woman in his arms.
-~-~-~-
Reno ran out of the station into a scene resembling Hell. The sky was on fire, the bloated and monstrous shape of Meteor filling it almost entirely. The wind screamed across the metal, throwing entire houses into the air, ripping walls to pieces, devouring the city and leaving rubble in it's wake. Lightening stabbed downwards, great electrical swords that smashed into the plate and started fires that raged in bloody mimicry of the sky.
Reno pulled his sunglasses down in front of his eyes and began to dodge and weave his way towards the Shinra building. The gale tore at him hungrily, ripping at his hair and jacket and sending him stumbling from support to support.
He reached the entrance to the building just as a blinding blue-white light swelled around him, smashing up through the building and striking deep into the body of the meteor. Burning fire shot over him and he cried out in agony as his skin charred. The Shinra building was flailing helplessly, chunks of metal being shorn from its sides and disappearing into the maelstrom of energy.
He pushed onwards, climbing unsteadily up the stairs; pain working it's way through his body. The control room barely existed, a torn out roof to what remained of Midgar's tallest building. There was nothing to protect him from the full brunt of the wind, the searing heat, the strange blue-white light that had almost killed his sight.
He crawled across the debris littered floor, pushing aside Rufus' burned up corpse to reach the crux of the cables. They were a tangled mess, burnt out ends torn from their resting places and thrown around to lie like thick dead snakes. Reno scrabbled amongst them with mounting desperation, here a minor circuit for the building itself, here the thick cables which led into Sector Six, here the shorn off ends of the ones that had once provided power for Sector Seven, here the ones which ran through the main pillar, and finally the ones which led to Sector Three.
He closed his hand around the primary cable. He needed power.
Lightening flashed on the edge of his vision.
The wind screeched through the room, tearing Rufus's corpse free and spinning it away. Reno swallowed and gripped his electro-mag rod more firmly. He had no idea how much power was needed to run the entire Sector, and there was no time to follow the main cable to where it started to split into separate circuits for different jobs.
He stood up, clutching the cable in one hand and his electro-mag rod in the other. Slowly he raised his rod above his head.
Lightening stabbed; leaping from the screaming sky to the thin metal shaft pointed so defiantly upwards. It raced through Reno's body, taking the only route it could, through his flesh and into the thick cable.
Reno screamed.
Sector Three lit up.
The door slid open.
The mass of people started to run.
Midgar vomited up its citizens, humanity pushing their way through the narrow door and spilling in a dark crowd away from the city, running and running from their dying home.
Rude looked up as the people raced past, his arms still gripped tight around the blonde woman who was dying so quickly. He didn't want to run, he wanted to howl his hate and rage and misery to the world. He took a deep sobbing breath.
Reeve slid to the ground beside him, grabbed his arm and shouted something, pointing in the direction of the open door. Rude tried to pull away, but Reeve leaned in closer, doing his best to raise his voice over the noise of the panicking fleeing crowd, and the screaming of Midgar.
"There's still time! Save Elena!"
Rude looked at him and comprehension dawned. If there was even the smallest chance…
He stood, carrying the woman in his arms and turned to run with the rest.
-~-~-~-
Tseng looked at Aerith's great green eyes, the tears flowing from them unchecked. His gaze drifted to the great green ball of solidified Mako beneath his feet and then to the stream that ran through it. Meteor was visible in it, torn apart by Holy but still coming.
He bent and put his hand on the crystal beneath them. The other he held out to Aerith.
"You have to help me," he said calmly.
She stared at him, but took his hand. For a moment the two knelt together, silent. Then together they whispered the words that would summon the greatest power of all; the power that all other summons were merely a reflection of.
"Lifestream."
And the Planet, the largest Materia of all, released it.
-~-~-~-
Reno slumped forward, the circuit breaking.
And Midgar fell.
-~-~-~-
Rude made it through the gate just as the central pillar snapped. Behind him there was an unearthly roar as the plate smashed downwards, dust spilling out from it and overtaking him as he ran, turning the world grey so that it seemed everything was lost in the noise of Midgar's death. He ran, Elena clutched tight.
He didn't see the energy that drifted up from the ground, turning and twisting and merging together as it danced its way towards Midgar.
Life, death, creation, destruction.
Even as the city turned to dust, the trees were spreading root.
Even as Meteor burnt, ripped and shredded, the Lifestream healed, soothed and doused.
The Shinra building folded in on itself, collapsing into a cloud of dust. The Shinra logo that had been fastened to the side crashed downwards on top of the pile and the entire structure sank out of sight; the central pillar snapping beneath it and the six parts of the plate sliding inwards with the screech of tortured metal.
Vines started clambering their way up the metal, sending questing tips through smashed windows and pushing their way through rubbled concrete. Roots thrust through pavement and moss spread in damp green patches across roofs. Leaves blossomed and overhung the destruction, creating dappled patterns of light and shade across fallen supports and overturned walls. A car became overgrown, plants spreading across it's harsh lines and making them soft.
The Shinra logo, lying in the centre of it all, began to split as a trunk forced it's way up into the open air. The metal screamed as the tree grew, spreading branches, the trunk getting thicker and thicker until the logo could take no more and fell into two broken halves.
And Holy surrounded it all, containing it and preventing the chaos from spreading further.
-~-~-~-
The Highwind swept across the sky, it's engines roaring. Beneath it the very ground boiled. But already the surge of power was fading, the light dissipating. Rude stopped and looked as the dust settled.
Midgar was gone. In its place was a mountain of rubble, covered over with moss, flowers and trees. The lifestream was falling back into the ground, raining down on the heap gently and causing yet more abundant growth.
Rude watched blankly, and slowly became aware of a figure made of green light slowly growing in front of him. He stared as the features solidified before him, shining brightly.
"……… Tseng?"
The figure nodded and dropped its gaze towards Elena, lying limp in Rude's arms. He touched her forehead gently, there was a faint green glow beneath her skin and she sighed softly.
"You healed her." Rude said slowly.
Tseng turned away from the Turk, and looked towards the fallen Midgar. His words were quiet, but Rude had no problem hearing them.
"Yes. I exchanged my life for hers."
"……… your…life?"
"I wasn't killed by Sephiroth. But I am dying now. She deserves no less."
Rude nodded slowly.
"……… is Reno………?"
"He has gone to the Planet."
Rude looked down at Elena's face. She was slightly flushed, and breathing gently. He wondered how she would have responded to all this.
"…………he…… sacrificed himself…"
"Yes."
"……and you…… you did as well."
"I have found the Promised Land." Tseng turned back and also looked down at Elena. "Look after her."
Rude nodded again.
Tseng closed his eyes, and began to fade. He disappeared silently just as Elena opened her eyes and looked up at Rude in confusion and then fear.
"Rude?"
"…………………" Rude set her down on the ground gently, and sat next to her. There was silence as they looked at the remains of Midgar, Reno's grave, covered in flowers.
The End