The Seeker zoomed uninhibitedly through the narrow corridors of the Imperial base, followed closely by two individuals whose only aim was to basically destroy everything in their way.
"Patch, over here!" Kira yelled, along with a quick spell. "Hell fire that blazes deep beneath the earth, come here and obey my command! Deliver your judgement upon those that I desire! DiFire!"
The two remaining guards standing at attention in front of the fireproof steel door marked 'Top Secret - Access Level Beta only' vanished in a swirl of flame as the spell hit them.
"Shit thinking, Kira," Patch muttered sarcastically while pumping another guard full of lead. "Fire spells on a metal door? You should know better. How are we supposed to open the door now?"
The girl replied by kicking the door open in a flurry of sparks and hot metal.
"Like this!" The O7 agent grinned. Patch had no reply, as he followed. And stared. And stared. And stared some more.
"...great goddess..." He heard Kira mutter behind him. "It actually exists..."
She had a right to be surprised. In front of the two, a vertical cylinder of pure light flickered, suspended between two massive power generators linked into the ground and the roof respectively. The whole thing was about five metres tall and about as thick as a redwood around. At the base of the cylinder, enclosed in a tube of pure fiberglass, was a circular platform with a large emblem in the middle - a triangle in a perfect circle.
"The Reality Engine..." Patch murmured, struck with awe.
Kira was just as mystified... their mission had not been certified. They were only told that the O7 must not allow the Imperials to discover the secrets of the Reality Engines, which was partially impossible, since Reality Engines did not exist - they were just a myth.
But this... this thing that stood in front of them now, shivering with barely contained power, could not be denied.
The brown-haired girl strode over to the large steel table next to the row of computer consoles the Imperial Empire had set up to study the Reality Engine. Riffling through large stacks of notes, including energy equations, time-space graphs, and uses for the Engine itself, all marked with the Imperial diamond insignia, Kira's mind worked at hyperspeed, taking it all in.
"They've only discovered this thing for a few weeks," Patch noted the date on one of the pages. "They can't have gotten that far with the research."
"Look here!" Kira exclaimed. "They know how to operate this thing! But there is a security lock that the Ancients built in... They somehow need some sort of key to fully control it, otherwise it'll keep opening up at random."
"What type of key?" Patch couldn't resist from asking.
Kira ran a hand through her hair. "Knowing the Ancients, probably a human sacrifice or something."
A different voice cut the air, cold and chilling.
"Close, but not quite. It's actually a hidden object in one of the parallel universes - the thing known as the Dragon's Tear."
=14 =4745Y 3417Y
f i n a l f a n t a s y : r e a l i t y
FINAL FANTASY REALITY
by chaosrayne
original concept by redshadow
disk 1ne: 2w0: w3lc0me t0 m1 w0rld
The two O7 agents whirled at the sound of the voice.
"Did you really think your illusion could fool us for that long?" The woman asked. She was obviously a scientist, as seen from the long white coat she wore. But, strangely, she did not have the typical Imperial diamond tattooed on her forehead. "Overconfident. Headstrong. Typical Rebellion scum."
Kira nearly let loose a spell at that comment, but then noticed the small red laser sights focused on Patch's body and her own. From the shadows, nearly 40 elite Alpha Imperial troops showed themselves. They were the best and the brightest - the Empire's most powerful ground shocktroopers.
Patch took a deep breath. "We're fucked."
But he gently twitched an eyebrow at Kira as he spoke. Kira caught the gesture and began to mutter gently under her breath.
The big man spoke up, quite casually for someone who had at least 20 high-powered scope rifles aimed at him. "I don't believe we have had the flamin' pleasure of being acquainted. Allow me to introduce myself. I'm Patch, and this young un' here is Kira."
"Charmed." The female scientist smiled with no mirth. "I am Dr. Catherine Shaw. Now if you would just step away from the Reality Engine - there is a large unstable quantity of magical radiation emitting from it that would be fatal to any-"
She never got to finish her sentence.
First, Patch's hand moved, quick as lightning, towards the shotgun behind his back. A quick flick of the wrist, and the gun sprung into his hand as if it had been kicked. Kira, who had been building up magical energy ever since the exchange had begun, let her spell loose, muttering the chant as quickly as she dared.
"Almighty souls, protect your humble servant! Barrier!"
Instantly a shield of blue light formed around the duo as the Imperial elite fired again and again, bullets peppering uselessly against the magical forcefield as the two moved.
Patch was a big man, but he moved quickly when motivated, and a group of bullets peppering right in your face stopped only by a flickering magical shield was obviously sufficient motivation. A few strides and he was in the thick of them.
Spinning on his heel, he blasted one with the shotgun at close range. The Imperial trooper was sent flying by the sheer force of the impact of the explosive shell going clean through his body. Patch racked the pump and blew another one to kingdom come. The man's head exploded, spattering the formerly white wall in an interesting new colour that would have been dubbed hint of brain. The O7 operative winced. Messy.
Shooting twice more, Patch dived for cover behind the Reality Engine as bullets and streams of tracer blasted away sections of the wall behind him. He thanked his lucky stars for the Barrier spell, which was fast wearing off. Taking the time to reload, he winced when a stream of bullets shattered the fiberglass cylinder behind him.
"DON'T SHOOT THE ENGINE, YOU FOOLS!!!" Catherine yelled in frustration, even as she drew her own .44 Magnum and tried to draw a bead on Kira. But the Barrier was still in effect. Even as it faded, the scientist whipped off her lab overcoat and drew a long knife with Materia slots in the handle.
The Imperial scientist began her own spell, keeping her blade parallel to her body. "Aurora, exhale bloody air, call forth your tainted light! Shadow Flare!"
Tiny motes of black eldritch fire began to burn around the Imperialist as she spoke. They concentrated and formed a cluster of pure shadow fire that streaked straight for Kira. She dodged, but only partly, as the flare of dark light caught her on her left side and blasted her straight backwards into the wall.
Kira coughed blood as she extracted herself from the smouldering wall, muttering a short cure spell as she stood.
"Not bad, bitch... My turn. Fierce powers of nature, absolute raw anger of the heavens, unleash destruction upon all infidels! TriBolt!"
A wide beam of electricity flared to life in the O7 operative's hands, catching the scientist in its full glare, pumping raw voltage through every nerve in her body. When it cleared, Catherine was fighting to keep alive. Everything hurt.
Kira smiled. "It's over. Give up the machine, and everything will be alright."
"Never! Wind, come and blow with limitless strength, turn into a hurricane, drive my enemies far away! DiAero!"
Kira was caught unawares. The (relatively) powerful winds buffeted her and carried her all the way into the Reality Engine's platform. The fiberglass barrier should have stopped her, but, thanks to Patch's ongoing battle with the Imperial troops, it was non-existent.
The girl groaned as she felt a few of her ribs snap from the impact of her body on the Reality Engine's platform. Then she realized where she was, and shut up, crawling frantically to get out of the transport area.
SENSOR PAD ACTIVATED. ENERGY SOURCE: 80%. BEGIN CHARGE. WARNING: KEY NOT PRESENT. COORDINATES UNSTABLE. A mechanised voice said coldly.
The Imperial doctor's blood ran cold as she realized what was about to happen. Drawing on her last resources of strength, she chanted a spell, hoping she would be in time.
ENERGY SOURCE: 90%. WARNING: KEY NOT PRESENT. COORDINATES UNSTABLE.
"Send her soul to rest, may it join its brothers in the land of the dead! Cut short its stay, oh Gods, and end her life with mercy! Take her now, for her purpose in this world is finished! Reap this soul, draw her into darkness and let her see light no more! Death!"
The face of Death appeared, a grinning skull holding the spark of life that was Kira's soul in its mouth, but as it closed it's mouth to devour the spirit, the energy built up in the Engine hit maximum charge.
ENERGY SOURCE: 100%. TRANSMITTING.
A veritable supernova exploded in the lower levels of the Imperial building. Magical energy crackled and flared, time and space warping within the triangle emblem. Blue energy exploded upwards into the sky, vaporizing a sizeable chunk of the roof as it went. As the explosion expanded and grew, the troopers who turned to run were destroyed, their shadows burned permanently into the ground.
Patch noticed the explosion and turned to run, ducking for cover in a wide ventilation shaft and only just reaching it in time as the blue light expanded, devouring everything in its path.
I lay on my back and imagined stars.
Okay, maybe not imagined. I dreamed of them, massive orbs of superhot gas swirling through the emptiness.
Hitting the play button on my Walkman, I closed my eyes as a surge of pure sound assaulted my eardrums, threatening to pop them from sheer pressure. Metallica. Ah, excellent.
I look up just in time to see the face of Alex peering into my line of vision. She seems concerned, for some reason. I ignore her and turn the volume up a notch.
"Why did you help me?" She asks. I pretend I can't hear her, even though it is partially true, as strains of heavy metal ring my ears.
Actually, I really don't know why I saved her. Maybe it was some sort of odd hero fantasy? I'm not sure, you know, just walk in, save the girl, and walk off? Naah. It's gotta be, like, they marry, then they live happily ever after. Although it's never really 'happily ever after'. You've got to think about strife, about family arguments, about divorce, about pain, about the house, the kids, the family benefits, and the money...
Not for the first time, I wonder what a terrible age we live in.
She pokes my chest, and I feel it painfully through my thin shirt as I gasp.
"Hey, are you ignoring me?"
Huh. YES! Let me spell it out for you, Y-E-S.
"No."
"Why did you help me? I didn't need your help back there."
Talk about gratitude.
"Um... I dunno."
This is really awkward. It's like, you know, you never know what to say at the right moments. So, instead, I start another topic, thumbing the stop button on my Walkman.
"You ever have dreams?"
"Sometimes."
Cryptic. I like that.
"Any weird ones?"
"A few... most of my dreams are about things I want to happen. Like winning a medal at the Olympics, or something."
Typical girl.
"Dream on."
"That's mean!" Her face twists into a frown.
"No, I mean it. Dream on. You never know, some dreams might actually come true someday."
"Thanks. It's been a long time since I've had a decent compliment."
"No way... You're the academy track star, and you have trouble getting compliments?" I laugh.
"I mean a real compliment. It's always 'Whoa, you're so good at running', or 'You look really attractive'. It's so shallow. It's been ages since I've had a compliment on my thoughts and beliefs."
I smile at her genuinely now. She's so likeable.
"Oh well. Me, I'm not good at anything. All I have are my thoughts and dreams."
"Yeah right." Her tone is disbelieving. "You're a level 5 junior graduate at the SFMA, one of the toughest, knock-down, drag-out military training academies in the world, and you say you don't have a talent? At least you've graduated. I haven't."
"It's not talent. It's practice. Lots of it. And my determination to prove to the bastard headmaster that dreamers are human as well."
She turns to me with a sympathetic look on her face.
"You didn't have to help, you know."
"Are you kidding? Ms. Popular has to get her own hands dirty beating up the neighbourhood scum?" I laugh.
"I'm not joking." Her face is serious.
She continues to talk, and as she chatters, I begin to understand the pressures of life on her, constantly trying to go with the flow and remain popular, not understanding true happiness.
But then the headache splits my skull like a sledgehammer and starts to pound away.
Stopping, she looks at my face, contorted into one of pure agony.
"Are you alright?" She places a hand on my shoulder.
I fling her off, struggle to my feet, and scream, as the ground opens up beneath us to show blackness and lightning and...
A lone man crawls out from among the wreckage and destruction of the Imperial building, seemingly unconcerned with all the flames and smaller explosions. All about him shadows are burned into the ground. Strangely, the Reality Engine is untouched, except for the shards of fiberglass scattered here and there, while the room is destroyed.
Patch reaches the machine's console and slams a fist into the keyboard, denting it slightly. A single tear drops from his face as he holds his head in his hands.
"Oh, god, no... KIRA!!!"
But then his attention is drawn to the small message flashing red on the monitor - SUBJECT TRANSMITTED TO REALITY #HA666 CODENAME HADES.
Remembering, some of her last words rang in his mind. They somehow need some sort of key to fully control it, otherwise it'll keep opening up at random. The memory comes unbidden, floating on a wave of pain and loss.
Desperately, he leafed through notes. There must be a key, there must be... Grabbing an unharmed file labelled 'TOP SECRET' and with a smaller note attached to it; 'For Dr. Shaw'; he opened it and found all the details.
Dr. Catherine Shaw was an accomplished Imperial scientist and mage, which was certain. She was capable of casting high-level spells such as shadow magic, but why would that be a reason to post her to the Reality Engine branch... It didn't make sense until he discovered a faded picture showing a glowing jewel, along with a tiny materia orb.
The pieces of the puzzle all fit together.
The Imperialists needed the Key - that Dragon's Tear Dr. Shaw had been referring to. To get the Key, since it was in an alternate universe, they needed the good doctor to cast a certain spell to pull the Key from that universe. That spell was right there, along with the materia, in the folder.
"Oh..." The last word was unclear, but it was quite unlikely that it was 'fudge'.
Patch sighed. This was the only way to get the Key without using the Engine itself, and you needed the Key to control the Engine correctly. Concentrating hard, he placed the materia the base of his gun, sweat trickling down his brow. It had been a long time since he had cast a spell... and that materia was one of the most draining to cast... plus it was a one-use only... incredibly rare...
It was too late. He had already made his decision - get the Key, and use it to recover Kira from someplace called HA666 or whatever.
"Time, space, bend, flow, and break at my command! Unseal that place between places, unseal the world where they wait in sleep for the Call, unseal here and there and send this one through! Remove!"
The portal opened in another reality.
Pain.
The pain.
Patch later explained it to me, you know, something about space being filled to reconcile the difference of time, or it would imbalance the scale or whatever.
If that doesn't mean anything to you... well, imagine having your mind and body ripped apart. Shattered. Reduced to individual cells. Blasted to subatomic particles. Piped through a magical hole in space-time and then fused back together.
Yes, ow.
All I could see was space warping around me, the infinite blackness bending and twisting. I could see the rest of my body being broken up into atoms as what was left of my head went hurtling through space. Beside me, I could see Alex going through the same treatment. I think she was screaming. Or was that me?
I passed out.
Patch braced himself against the natural rush of weakness that he felt after performing such a draining spell. It hit him in waves, forcing him down on his knees. His gun felt too heavy to lift. Looking at the materia orb in his hand, which crumbled to dust as he peered at it, he collapsed on his back and waited for the results.
He did not have long to wait. Crackling with magical energy, a swirling portal opened, discharging two teenagers forcefully across the destroyed room. They went flying, landing in a jumble of arms and legs.
The boy looked about dazedly. He was a slim, lanky teen in fairly good shape, dressed in a T-shirt proclaiming 'it is better to keep your mouth shut and appear an idiot than to open it and prove beyond all doubt', and a denim jacket. More importantly, around his neck on a silver chain hung a blue stone set in silver - the Key.
The girl was a blonde, fairly attractive from the O7 operative's point of view, and wearing an odd mix of wear that served both a formal and casual purpose- a white blouse and a pair of dark, formfitting slacks.
She was screaming.
"-AAAAAAAHHHH!!!" The harsh yell of the young blonde pierced Patch's eardrums like a bell, unerring in pitch, grating on the very nerves. More importantly, a rush of booted feet was heard stampeding in the corridor, attracted by the sound of the voice.
Patch clamped a sweaty hand over her mouth to stop Alex screaming. She nearly bit him, but tasted a mixture of petrol, grease, blood, and sweat on her lips - not a good combination. The boy groaned, holding one hand to his head painfully, feeling a migraine coming on.
The big man sweated, grasping on to his gun and holding it tightly. He didn't have enough time to tell the kid all... Suddenly, he remembered a line from one of his days in training: his first spy mission. Silence was the key... silence...
Bracing himself once more and hoping he had enough energy left for this, he muttered another chant, this time without materia, calling on the spirits in the building itself. Using a long-lost art of the Ryukin, he spoke.
"Ancient spirits, empower the shield that gives death to sound and sense! Silence Wall!"
A glimmering purple shield flashed into existence over the door, effectively sealing off any sound or light that might escape the room. A second rush of weakness hit Patch almost directly, and he swore loudly. "This is why I hate spells."
Struggling to his feet, he groaned. The Wall would only delay the Imperial guards for a few minutes. He didn't have enough time to explain...
Patch's soldier instincts were blaring red-hot klaxon alarms in his mind, for some particular reason. Acting on pure reflex, he dived for the ground.
Bullets slammed hard, with a sharp crack, into the wall behind him. Looking for his attacker, he spun round only to face Catherine herself, back on her feet and pointing her Magnum at him with serious intent to kill. She was grinning madly.
"And here I thought I was going to have to cast the spell myself! Then you come along, summon the Key, and save me all the trouble! Now all that remains is to kill you all and take the Dragon's Tear!"
Patch pondered his options. Fighting Catherine now, with two helpless teenagers in the room, was a high liability. Plus, casting the Remove spell and the Wall had already weakened him.
His gaze fell on an empty Imperial armored jeep off to the side.
Grunting with the effort, he slung Rain and Alex over his shoulders and ran for the vehicle. Bullets whizzed past his head, coming dangerously close. Wrenching open the car door and flinging the kids inside like so much useless baggage, he paused for a few seconds.
A .44 caliber Devastator lead slug hit him in his left shoulder. Patch grunted, ignoring the pain. Blood trickled in thick rivulets down his arm as he slammed the door.
Plucking a frag grenade from his belt with his good arm, he heaved it in the direction the bullets were coming from. Flinging himself into the car, he crashed through the wall of the building and crunched gravel.
Catherine ran for cover as the grenade exploded, knocking her off her feet. The rush of superheated air and hot metal fragments shot everywhere.
She cursed. "The President is not going to like this."
Outside, Patch swerved as the perimeter guard towers came alive with floodlights and automatic machineguns, chattering wildly and spitting a stream of bullets everywhere. Hot metal slugs buried themselves in the pavement as he desperately sought the exit. Running over a guard who had been stupid enough to get in his way with an audible crunch, he smashed through the reinforced steel gates, driving away to freedom and safety.
I awoke to darkness.
For a second I thought of the blackness of space, dotted with stars, then I forced myself awake.
I was relieved when a familiar voice spoke from the darkness.
"Rain. You're awake!"
Hooboy. Alex was there with me. A headache hit me like a train, unstoppable and painful. My skull throbbed with the pain.
"Where are we?" Alex spoke, sounding remarkably chipper for someone who had been thrown through space and time to land god-knows-where. So I did the obvious.
"How the hell should I know?"
The room was small and dark. A window looked out on the night sky. It would have been decent, if the door hadn't been locked and bolted from the outside. Oh yeah, there were bars on the windows as well. Perfect paradise. Literally a five-star hotel.
Groaning, I reached for my CD player, hoping to find some refuge in the heavy metal.
Alex's eyes shone eerily in the darkness. "They took our stuff. Even your Walkman. My bag's gone as well."
Swearing loudly, I stumbled to my feet, groping blindly for the door.
"Why are we in this room?"
"I don't know." It was Alex's turn to reciprocate. "We were in a field, then, you started screaming..."
"Yeah, I know, the ground opened up, and I saw my body breaking up into bits." I muttered.
"That was SO weird. It hurt, too."
"Oh, yeah, I saw this big dude. He was massive, and looked like he really meant business. He had lots of guns, too."
I started muttering to myself. I really must be going insane, you know... this must be still a dream. A really weird one, yeah, but still a dream. It's got to be. I'm in a dark room with the most popular girl in academy high, held captive by... who knows?
Oh well. I reached for my pendant, feeling the familiar weight of it against my palm. It was strangely comforting. The girl next to me noticed as well.
"What's that?"
"Oh... just the only thing my parents left me."
"Really?" She sounded surprised. "I've got a picture of them somewhere in my bag..."
I interrupted. Call me rude if you may, but I can't stand people relating family history. It hurts too much when I realize I never knew my family.
"Let's get out of here." Finding the door, I gave it an experimental tap with a knuckle. It was a heavy metal door with iron rivulets, but the edges of the wall were slightly crumbly...
I gathered my energy and gave it a strong kick. Some dust fell loose from the sides. A small dent appeared in the door. Sighing, I tried again, but was met with the same result.
"Mind if I try?" Alex again. Seriously, she thinks she's so useless when she's not doing anything.
She spins around into a flawless roundhouse, following it up with a two-punch combo, slamming her fists powerfully into the metal in a flurry of dust. Not much else happens, though.
"How about if we try together? Just one of us isn't going to be enough. And imagine the look on Instructor MacArthur's face if two of his pupils got defeated by a doorframe." I smile lightly.
After a few seconds thought, we slam our feet against the door simultaneously. The door proves to be no match for two pent up teenagers, and slams off its hinges, flying out...
Into the face of a guy wearing battle armor and holding a really big rifle.
"Shit, Alex."
The face of the O7 leader Commander Frost bulged purple with rage. Patch withstood the verbal assault calmly, occasionally wincing slightly as small flecks of spittle flew from Frost's mouth.
Kira used to always make jokes about the commander. According to her, Frost was just a coronary waiting to happen.
Sucking on a particularly noxious cigar and exhaling deeply in a cloud of gray smoke, the commander's face began to return to a more normal 'pissed off' red instead of the 'extremely furious' purple.
"So, Lieutenant Patch Randall, are you trying to tell me that you went on an unauthorized mission into an Imperial area, with squad leader Kira Highwind, failed to destroy the engine itself, and lost one of my best troopers?"
The reply was not slow. "Yes, SIR!"
"And what do you propose I do now?"
"Launch a mission to recover Highwind, SIR!"
"Are you telling me that I should waste more time and resources in order to mount a wild goose chase through time and space to find Ms. Highwind?"
"Sir, yes, SIR!"
"And what makes you believe you can find her?"
"I have the Key to the Engine, SIR!"
A cool, calm voice spoke from the shadows. "Let him go alone. Maybe he will rid us of his recklessness for once."
"Lieutenant Renaku." The commander's voice dropped a notch. "I agree with you, but this man is a good soldier. It would be useless to continue."
"Permission to speak, SIR!" Patch barked. Although they were a rebel group, they still followed strict military protocol.
"Granted." Frost's heated glare turned back to Patch.
"Sir, I believe I have the best chance of succeeding in this mission, SIR!"
"Why, soldier? You are our high explosives expert and one of our best troopers. You nearly destroyed a MEDUSA with your bare hands. Why on earth would you want to throw your life away on a suicide mission?" The voice was condescending.
Patch did not reply.
"I asked you a QUESTION, soldier!"
Patch held his silence.
"Sir, I wish to speak to you alone, SIR!"
Renaku saluted and left quietly.
"We are alone, unless there are spiders hiding in the walls. Now, give your reason."
"Sir, I hold affection for squad leader Highwind, SIR!"
For a moment, Commander Frost's eyes met his own. They were eyes that had seen too much, eyes that held more than a hint of sadness. They were eyes that had seen too much battle and not enough hope.
He spoke slowly and heavily. "Go, then, lieutenant. Go kick some ass, and don't come back until you've found Highwind."
Patch held back a smile. "Sir, yes, SIR!"
But his moment of elation was suppressed when a private dashed into the room, shouting.
Frost, impeccable as always, stopped the trooper in his tracks.
"What is the matter, Private Reill?"
The reply was equally shocking. "The prisoners, Commander! They've escaped!"
Patch gasped. They were just kids! How did they...
I pounded down another corridor, meeting another guard. I jumped around him and kicked him in the back, just as I saw Alex dispatch another with a beautiful rising combo, finishing with a midair suplex.
"Not bad work, for a cadet who hasn't graduated yet." I smiled.
She looked back.
"I trained a long while with the bladed combat instructors. A simple pinch to the nerve clusters at the neck or head can render a man dead or unconscious." She grinned predatorily back.
"They're not shooting." Alex said, interrupting my train of thought and bringing me back to the present.
"What?" Then I noticed the big, big, BIG rifle on one of the unconscious troopers.
"They're not shooting! They've got guns, but they're not plugging us!"
Well, duh.
"That's probably why we're prisoners. They don't want us dead, but they don't want us to escape, either."
"What, like ransom?"
I laughed bitterly. "Yeah, ransom. That's it. They kidnap an orphan for ransom money. They'd probably cough up the cash for you, but I'm hopeless. Maybe they're hoping the SFMA will pay a few million to get us back."
She looked at me coldly.
"Well, I dunno," I replied. "They don't want our money, and these guys have technology like we can't dream of." I gestured to the massive gun - a small, green orb seemed to be plugged where the ammo chamber would normally be. "Let's get our stuff back."
Then the biggest freaking man I had ever seen strode into the adjacent corridor. I swear, at the time he seemed like 8 feet tall. His head scraped the ceiling. And more, at his shoulder was the biggest freaking gun I had ever seen. Liquid coolant bubbled in pipes along its length. He had on, like almost every other guard I had encountered in this place, black body armor with a little 7 in a circle on the left breast.
I recognized him as the guy I saw before I passed out before.
I motioned to Alex to get back.
Then, unexpectedly, he spoke.
"Yo."
That seemed so out of place right then, but I wasn't going to argue with someone who looked like he could take Arnold Schwarzenegger down. He looked like he could take Arnie down, stuff him, and use him for a basketball.
So I answered.
"Hi."
"You dudes sure made one hell of a mess back there." He said, motioning to the prone forms of the guards behind us. "Medic!"
A black haired girl who looked like she was Asian or other stepped out from behind him. She looked incredibly bored. It's like, the look teachers give you sometimes, y'know, the 'why do I even bother' look. Except she was also dressed in battle armor, and had a firearm strapped to her waist.
Then she did something incredible.
She stood, calmly gesturing with one hand. There were a few of the orb thingies attached to her gauntlet; I remember one green and one blue.
She spoke in a clear voice. "Soul of the living world, aid your fallen children! Cure All!"
A misty, sparkly green light appeared from the ground and enveloped the soldiers. Then their bruises faded, and bones fused back together. I remember one guy whose nose I cracked. It snapped back into place with a wet 'squick', and the blood receded back up his nostril. It was so weird.
I heard Alex gasp beside me. Good thing I wasn't the only one who thought something was weird.
The soldiers got up, groaning and whining something about 'blasted magic cures' and 'beaten by a pair of kids'. They trotted off back down the corridor, leaving Alex and me to gape at the Asian 'medic'.
Oh, damn.
"I'm not dreaming, am I?" Alex says. My goddamn thoughts exactly.
The beast of a man gestured to me. "We have to talk."
"No shit." I returned the stare with as much anger and ferocity as I could, which given the circumstances, wasn't much.
The medic spoke up. "Given that your lives are in our hands right now, obeying us would be a good idea."
I laughed again. "Bull. If you had wanted us dead, you wouldn't have taken us prisoner. You would have killed us right there. That tells me something. What the hell do you want from us?"
The man answered quickly. "Not us. You." He pointed at me to emphasise the fact. "I want the Dragon's Tear."
"What?"
"That pendant you wear on your neck like some casual piece of jewellery." The man answered.
"This?" I gestured to the pendant given me by my parents. "I know, it's pretty, but is it worth that much?"
The response was quick. "Hell yeah."
Alex was the one who spoke next. "But it's just a trinket"
The 'medic' cut her off.
"Little girl, there are wars being fought on this planet right now for that little 'trinket'. Men have lived and died for that thing. That is the crystallized tear of Bahamut, the father of dragons. He is a monster, and doesn't cry much, so that's possibly the only one. It has one sole use - to control the gateways between the universes."
I replied. "Wars? Dragons? Man, I don't know what crack you've been smoking, but I want some of that. This is Earth. Terra! The third planet from the star Sol, the solar system, the galaxy Milky Way..."
The medic rubbed her temples, speaking to the man. "This is going to be hard to explain to them, Patch..."
"I know, Yin, just give me a little time." He broke off that conversation and turned to us. "What makes you so sure you are on your Earth?"
I tried to find an answer, but I couldn't.
The one known as 'Patch' spoke. "How about I show you something?"
'Sakura' Yin followed moodily after the children and Patch. The kids seemed totally shocked, but they were taking it better than she thought they would. Some people were so blind that they would not believe what was blatantly in their faces.
People would not believe the truth, if they didn't want to.
They arrived at Porthole A. Patch keyed in the appropriate passcode, and the giant, blast-proof porthole turned opaque, allowing the view outside to be shown.
The boy uttered a curse.
Outside was a wasteland.
The view outside was one of total destruction. Skyscrapers, torn down and destroyed, lay in the dust, their metal frames marking what was left of once a great human civilization. Rubble was everywhere. Rats and jackals were the only visible signs of life around.
It had been like that since the Five Minute War. Yin still found the view disturbing, even after years of living with it.
A metal sign, scratched and burned slightly, hung by a wire that was threatening to snap. 'NEW YORK' was vaguely visible in printed lettering.
It was a dead city. Abandoned by the Ancients, destroyed by their terrible weapons that razed ground and sky and burned flesh away until not even ash was left. Patch had seen only one explosion to equal that power - when the Imperialists had dug up an Ancient weapon from the dust at Vingard. He had been sent to destroy it, and nearly lost his life in the process. Of course, Kira was there to bail him out...
"..." The boy gaped. The girl simply started crying.
Patch spoke. "This is our world. This is the remainder of the world we know. This is our Earth." He spoke firmly, having seen this view many times in the past. "And we need you to help stop the war that is still ravaging the planet today."
The girl was pale, white, and shaking. In contrast, the boy seemed a lot calmer. Patch looked at the boy, and saw a look in his eyes that he knew. It was the look on many O7 troopers' faces when they knew they were about to die. It was the look Patch wore every time he was in a battle situation. And it was the look that Commander Frost had given him a few minutes scarce.
It was the look of someone who had seen too much.
The boy spoke. "I don't care what the hell you want us to do, I still don't know how the hell we got here, I don't know how the hell you healed those guys back there, I don't know where the hell we are, but this place is fucked up."
Patch laughed. He liked the kid better already. "Amen to that. Let me explain a few things. Yin, a few minutes privacy?"
The medic nodded and stepped out.
"Name?"
It took the boy a few seconds to realize he was being addressed. "Me? I'm Rain."
"Is there any more to it?"
"Nope." The boy's face twisted for a second. "Orphan. She's Alex, Alex Winters."
"Alex?"
The girl replied. "...Y..yes..."
Rain sighed. "You'll have to excuse her. I think she's a bit shocked."
The big man nodded. "So was I, the first time I saw this. A hell of a view, huh?"
Rain chuckled. "So. Questions. And I want answers. Not unless you don't want my help. Where. Who. Why. What. And not least, when."
"Ah, the five great questions. And my answers will be just as short. Earth, probably one of the universes you would call 'parallel'. Who? Me and this handy little group of rebels called the O7. Why? Your pendant controls something very freaking special. What? It can control the thing we call a Reality Engine, which can warp people between parallel universes. When? About 40 years after the Five Minute War."
Patch chuckled. So young, and so cynical.
"Look, what the HELL are you talking about?" The boy's voice became more heated. "What the hell is a Reality Engine? And my pendant is just a jewel! It's doesn't do anything, doesn't control anything, it does jack all!"
The girl, who was ignoring the boy's rant and seemed to have recovered from her trance by now, shook her head. "I don't get it. If you need Rain's necklace to control these Reality thingies, how did we get here?"
"Ah. This is where some magic comes in."
The boy interjected. "Magic? But magic isn't real. It's just some poor sop trying to make a living by showing mind tricks."
Patch grinned, showing a mouthful of square teeth. "It's as real as you or me, kid. What you saw just now - that was healing magic. We control magic by using these things we call Materia." He held up a few glowing green orbs. "That's how we can control magic through strength of will. I found a very rare Materia in an enemy base called a 'Remove', it can remove anybody and displace him or her anywhere else. In your case, I directed it to remove you from your universe and send you here."
"Hey, wait." The boy added. "You? Singular? How in the world did Alex end up here as well?"
"I don't know," The big man admitted. "I may have miscast the spell a little - I don't normally cast spells. I rely on good, old, conventional explosive weaponry." He added, tapping the stock of his rifle for emphasis.
Alex still looked curious. "If all you need is the pendant, why not just kill us and take it?"
Rain's eyes widened in shock. "Alex!!!"
Patch laughed out loud. "I wouldn't bring myself to hurt poor defenceless kids such as yourself."
Alex 'hmph'ed. "Defenceless."
The big man laughed, idly flipping his single dreadlock over his shoulder. "Bite me."
The boy arched an eyebrow. "Bullshit. At the end of the day, all you want is the freaking jewel."
The big man replied. "We at O7 believe strongly in free will. Every single trooper in our ranks against the Empire is here by choice. If you don't give us that key, we understand, but a hell of a lot more people are going to die in this war because of it."
"So can you send us back?"
"Nope. That materia is incredibly rare, and is difficult to cast even for accomplished mages. It's one-use only as well. The Imperials must really want to find the Dragon's Tear, if they had to waste one of the world's rarest Materia."
"So you can't send us back." There was more than a hint of disbelief in Rain's voice. "You forcibly remove us from our home world and place us here, in this dump, then you say you can't send us back. Free will my ass."
Patch's eyes narrowed for a second. "The Reality Engine is still here. If you get to it and use the Dragon's Tear, you can be sent back to your universe."
It was the girl's turn to speak. "So you're saying that we have to use the Reality Engine anyway to get home."
The man nodded heavily. "Yep." The final piece. They would be forced to use the Engine anyway.
"No freaking WAY!!!" Rain yelled. "Look, this pendant is NOTHING!!! It was given to me by my PARENTS!!! IT IS NOT A KEY, IT IS NOT A LOTTERY TICKET, IT IS NOT A DRAGON-FREAKING-TEAR!!! IT IS A PENDANT!!! NOTHING MORE!!!"
Patch moved, with the odd fluid rigidity he was known for. In one quick movement, he had grabbed the pendant, the weak chain snapping off Rain's neck, until the massive trooper held the Dragon's Tear in his hand. It seemed tiny in his browned palm. He closed his fist with a crunching sound.
Rain started. "Give it back, you-"
Patch opened his palm. Lying amidst shards of blue stone, completely undamaged, lay a small silver shape, what was left of the pendant. Rain paused. The shape was that of a triangle within a circle - the image in his dreams.
Patch shrugged. "I'm tellin' you it is. If it is, well, you get to go home. If it isn't, well, damn. Life isn't fair, kid. I learned that when nearly all my family was killed and I was left for dead."
Rain sat down on the stone floor and put his head in his hands. "I can't believe this is happening."
Alex motioned to Patch. "Let me talk to him."
She knelt down beside Rain. "I don't understand this. I don't get this magic, this... this ...place..." Her voice shuddered a little as she remembered the view she had seen out the blastproof window. "But I do know this. Remember your training?"
"Why did you help me beat up those punks back there?"
Rain did not look at her.
"Ever since we got admitted into the academy we were fighting for only our graduation. Now we got a chance to fight for something, and I'm not going to give it up. Are you with me? Look, this dragon crap BS could be fake, but here we got a chance to test our skills and beat the hell out of some people! What have you got at home that you treasure?"
The boy sighed.
"Talk to me, Rain."
"Nothing. Just me, this pendant here, and my Walkman." The boy replied, after a lengthy pause.
"You helped me knock those drunks around because you wanted to test your skills in combat. In other words, showing off. But what's beating up some jerks in a park gonna do? Here, you're gonna save a world, Rain, and this is showing off. You just passed SFMA. Good job. Now do what you're trained to do." Alex waited to see the reactions of her words on the angst teen.
Patch looked at her fiery spirit and saw something he admired - an absolute confidence in herself, no fear at all. Kind of like a tiger - a tiger could be surprised, shocked, or even subdued, but they never lost their confidence in themselves and their skills.
He spoke. "The Imperials are trying to use the Engine to rebuild the power that the Ancients had - that of weapons so powerful their explosions go for miles around. Nuclear weapons with incredibly high destructive capability. We have to stop that from happening. They believe they can steal the technology from other parallel universes. Plus, who knows what other items they can loot from other worlds?"
Rain finally looked up. "These 'Imperials', what are they like?"
Suddenly, a massive explosion shook the underground bunker, shaking it like a tin can. Alex noticed the wall of the room they were in sprout a jagged crack all along one side.
Patch groaned. "Perfect timing, kid... I guess they just showed up." Handing Rain the Key (or what was left of it), he pounded out the room, followed closely by Alex and more reluctantly by Rain.