AN: Argh! I had one chapter expand like crazy, and then it decided it wanted to be about four chapters. Then I go and notice several continuity errors, manage to bring Selphie and Irvine back for a cameo (not likely to be the last either), reshuffle the timeline of events, give Rinoa a brain (sorry – can't decide whether I like her or not atm o.O), and...and...ARGH! falls over I need coffee... crawls away
Book Two of the Sorcerer Arc Death's Angel Chapter Six Death of a CityThe destruction and chaos that the giant spider had brought to the city of Esthar was almost beyond comprehension. Even the lunar cry had not managed to bring the city to its knees, life, of a kind, had continued. But this was terrible. The spider appeared to have worked its way systematically around the city, first destroying the communications building, then destroying the roads before moving on to the presidential palace.
Civilian buildings had been destroyed almost as an afterthought, as though the machine, failing to find that which it hunted, had taken out its anger on the city. Soldiers were milling around anxiously, shaken by their inability to combat the attacker, shocked by the ferocity and determination of its attack. A few were numbly aiding the rescue crews, who were digging through the smoking ruins, hoping against hope to find survivors.
Squall knew it was a hopeless task. Those who had not heeded the warnings, who had disobeyed their absent president's orders to flee the city, were dead. Those who had fled, well, they had whatever they had carried with them. The clothes they wore, maybe a few of their more cherished possessions. Not much. Fortunately Esthar had expanded in the years since Ultemecia. Still within its protective boundary, but spread out so that there were homes and buildings where the shaken refugees could shelter.
More than half a million souls destroyed in one act of violence. Were they stains on his conscience as well as the sorceress's? He strongly doubted that Kylari had a conscience.
He could feel Seifer standing close behind him, the older man as shocked as he had ever known him. Not even under Ultemecia had such loss of life been caused in so little time with such cold ruthlessness.
"Hyne wept." Seifer muttered softly, surveying the damage. "What about Deling City? Surely there's something that we can do there, if not here?" He asked quietly. Squall sighed.
"Maybe. But I doubt it."
The sight and smell that assaulted his senses made Seifer spin and vomit noisily onto the broken tarmac of the road. He wasn't the first. The rescue teams that had been here, all veterans used to the horror and devastation of both man-made and natural disasters, had found themselves unequal to the task. There could be no one alive in the mess that had once been Galbadia's proud capital city. Silently agreeing, Squall had sent them home when he and Seifer had arrived. The refugees – for thankfully many had heeded the warnings and fled in time – hadn't lingered in the vicinity. No one could blame them.
Still, now, looking at the dead city, Squall forced himself to face the truth, the consequences of his actions. Why didn't he just go up against Kylari and get it over with? Surely what she would do couldn't be any worse than what she had?
But despite the fear, despite the terror of knowing he would be going to his defeat and the horror of knowing what she would do to him, there was a genuine reason for not going to his death.
If he fought, and lost, as he would, then Kylari would be able to force his powers into herself, to combine both strains of sorcerous power into one ultimate power. And with that power, she would destroy the world. It didn't matter if she meant to destroy the world or not, there was simply too much power for any one person to contain.
But maybe that was her aim? It was anything but clear as to what Kylari's ultimate goal was. Maybe she didn't realise that to contain all the sorcerous power in the world was to sentence yourself to death? Maybe she would stop if she learned the truth. Squall could have laughed at the idea, if not for the devastation he was staring at. Deling City was no more. It was a mass of bloody, smoking ruins. Anyone capable of this was too insane, too inhuman to care about the consequences of their actions.
The stench of death rolled off the streets in waves, mingling with the sickeningly sweet smell of charred and burnt flesh. There was an acrid bite to the lingering smoke, where bone had burnt with wood and melting plastic. In places there was a gleam where the fire had been white-hot and glass windows had melted and run, the glass then cooling, shot with streaks of molten metal.
There was nothing alive here.
Nothing to be saved.
Nothing to be salvaged.
Squall guessed that Kylari had been here herself. That when the first machine had failed to find Laguna in Esthar, and she herself had been unable to find either him or Caraway in Deling City, her rage had taken over. And consumed an entire city. The worst of it was, Squall suspected the sorceress had enjoyed it. Had enjoyed hearing the screams and moans, and pleas that she had no intention of answering.
"Why?" Seifer, having recovered himself, voiced the question thick on the air. Squall couldn't answer him, couldn't answer the accusing glares of the dead within the city. There was only one thing he could do for this city. Bury it. The earth rumbled in answer, and slowly, painfully, the city subsided into the ground, fresh earth falling into the hole and filling it.
"So it begins..." Squall whispered, silent tears streaming down his face as the once-grand city vanished forever beneath the clay.
AN: The long night has come... well, it's coming anyway :) laughs manically a measure of how knackered I am – I managed to duplicate this chapter without noticing, blame all the stuff I was blaming at the top grins wryly
REVIEWS FROM VERSION 1
Reviewer: Lady Yuskreven
Date: 07/01/2003
For Chapter: 5
Review: god... So many deaths... Poor people.. I hope that Seifer and Squall will beat the shit out of Kylari!!! Yeah!!!!
Author's Response: sly grin I'd comment, but I'd give things away ;) Thanks for the review!
Reviewer: himiko
Date: 12/01/2003
For Chapter: 5
Review: gee... i get the 9th review on both the prequel and sequel.. coincidence?
bloooooood... mwahahahahahacough sorry, my bloodlust temporarily resurfaced.
as long as either of the two bishounen gets irreparably damaged, i forgive you. or they could die together, and the villan sorceress implode from the surge of power, and take down the universe with her mad crackle
or they could hide into time compression, but time won't exist if the universe doesn't, but in the past it does, but time is circular so the past is the future, so is the past gone or the future re-established? eyes cross me think me leave before me more confused but me can't be more confused than am already so yeah...
Author's Response: eyes cross in sympathy don't worry, I've been giving myself quantum headaches trying to figure all the time stuff out myself The good news is (most of the time) I know how it's going to work. The bad news is that I can't explain it until the end/near the end, because it is packed full of spoilers :( I'm glad people are thinking about it though :) Thanks for reviewing!
Reviewer: Redrum
Date: 29/01/2003
For Chapter: 6
Review: Excellent so far! Can't wait for the next chapter.
Author's Response: High praise from an author whose work encouraged me to put my own online bows I'm honoured. Thank you for taking the time to read and review :)