Cid
Highwind spat the cigarette butt out of his mouth and reached into
his pocket for another one. Vincent Valentine leaned against the
wall, arms crossed, eyes closed. Cait Sith was moving from one pile
of rubble to the next, inspecting the pieces of what had been Midgar.
Kinto was out in the field searching for more food.
Cid lit the
cancer stick perched on the corner of his mouth: "Where are
they!"
"Patience," Vincent said mildly, opening one eye to
look at his comrade. "If they said they were coming, then they're
coming."
"Could they come any slower!" the blond pilot
argued.
"I don't like being here; this place gives me a bad
feeling..." Cait Sith meowed from his exploration post.
"Every
place gives you a bad feeling," Cid snapped, inhaling the smoke
quickly.
"Yoo-hoo! Boys!" Yuffie Kisaragi bounded into the
darkened building and smiled brightly at them. Red XIII came tearing
in next, skidded to a stop, and panted heavily.
"We got here as
fast as we could..." he gulped, his tongue lolling out of his
mouth. Barret Wallace stumbled in last, his chest heaving and sweat
pouring down his face and neck.
"Any faster an' I would've
killed myself!" he gasped, wiping his large hand across his
brow.
"We had to stop–Barret collapsed on the way here," Red
climbed atop a pile of crumbling rocks and sat down.
"It took us
about half an hour to convince him to drink an elixir!" Yuffie
shook her head.
"So, your clone was defeated as well?" Vincent
glanced over at Barret.
"Yeah," he grunted.
"So now that
everyone's here, let's get moving!" Cid bellowed, throwing his
half-finished cigarette to the ground and smashing it with the heel
of his boot. Cait Sith meowed happily and dug in a pile of debris as
the others gathered in a circle.
"Look what we picked up in
Wutai," Barret said, pulling out the items they had found. Vincent
quickly took the materia before Yuffie could and inspected it. She
jumped up and down, waving her arms frantically as she tried to reach
the glass sphere.
"Kind of strange..."
"Ngh! Gimmie!"
"I've never seen anything like this..."
"C'mon,
Vince! Give it t'me!"
"Barret, do you think this really is a
materia?"
"Vincent!"
"I dunno," Barret replied,
taking it back and putting it in his pocket. Yuffie huffed and
stomped over to where Cait Sith was fiddling with something beneath
the rocks and dirt.
"Maybe we should hang onto it until we get
Cloud back," Cid suggested.
"And what do you think we should
do with these?" Nanaki motioned to the two pairs of gloves and the
other sphere on the ground. Vincent picked up the Prism
Gauntlets.
"This looks like something Tifa would use."
"Those
look more like thieving gloves," Cid said, indicating the claws and
ball.
Yuffie looked up. "What?"
Cait Sith suddenly opened
the box he had found: "Aha! Here, Cid! Catch!"
He tossed
Cid a red-handled lance. It looked exactly like his Venus Gospel,
except it had another blade at the second end.
"Where'd you
get this?" Cid blinked, studying the weapon.
"Right here,"
the cat walked over to them, followed by Yuffie. "It's called the
Devil's Pitchfork. Like it?"
"Couldn't be happier," the
older man replied, strapping it to his back.
"And what are
these?" Yuffie picked up the black gloves and the golden
orb.
"Those were the Telekinetic Gloves, remember?" Barret
said.
"Oh yeah," Yuffie replied, placing her shurinkan on the
ground and slipping the gloves onto her small hands. She clenched
them, and all of a sudden, three golden claws appeared on each set of
knuckles. The golden ball glowed, levitated up to her hands and
hoovered, as if waiting for a command.
"Looks like they're
yours, Yuffie," Red concluded.
"Cool!" she squealed,
unclenching her fists and tucking the gold ball into her shoulder
armor.
"Okay, so what's the plan?" Cid asked.
"I'll
take two others with me," Vincent suggested. "We'll get to the
City of Ancients on Kinto. The rest of you follow in the
Highwind."
"So, who's going on the suicide mission–I
mean..." Yuffie covered her mouth with her hand.
"For that,
I'll take you," Vincent replied.
"Dang it," she
pouted.
"I'll come too," Nanaki jumped down from the
rock.
"Right," Cid nodded. "We'll come in later and save
your butts."
"That'll probably be the case," Yuffie rolled
her eyes.
"Come on, enough talking. Let's go," Vincent
commanded. The three walked outside and Vincent whistled. Kinto's
head rose up from the tall grasses on their left.
"See you when
we see you," Barret waved.
"If we don't get killed first,"
Yuffie muttered, hopping onto the chocobo's back after
Vincent.
"How pessimistic can you be?" Red XIII growled,
climbing on last.
"Good luck!" Cait Sith waved energetically
and the gold bird took off toward the ocean.
