Disclaimer: Really, who's going to even try to make money off of fanfiction. Whatever, all rights reserved to Square-Enix, whatever the hell they're calling themselves.
Notes:Since I'm uploading this with Chapter 7 as a humble apology for the long hiatus, there's nothing more for me to say.
Final Fantasy 7/8: Lord of Weapon
Chap 8: Weapons
Somewhere on the plains of Winhill
"Crap, here it comes!" yelled Seifer who had been staring at the seismograph, checking if their beacon had awakened the Weapon.
Suddenly, there was a massive rumbling, finalized with a massive fissure that produced a huge creature, approximately topaz in color. It resembled a stegosaurus, resting on all fours with a row of spikes protruding along its spine. However, it was much thinner, and its head was long and pointy, similar to that of a prehistoric flyer. The claws were like human hands, if humans had nine-inch fingers. With all these elements combined, however, the Weapon was indescribable. It also appeared to be invincible, standing at a two yard height, but with a three and a half yard length, not counting a long tail spanning several more yards, completely studded with spikes.
It did look like one thing: a yellow devil.
As Seifer raised the pistol upward to fire, the Weapon began rushing toward him, causing him to duck for cover. As Irvine held the remaining firearm to shoot the Weapon, the seemingly independent tail swung towards him, launching several barbs at the gunslinger, forcing him to duck and losing his target.
The Topaz Weapon roared, forming a yellow glow in its mouth, aiming directly at Seifer. A staff immediately swung downwards on the mouth. Fuijin followed up Raijin's attack with a well-placed wind elemental attack coupled with her zan strike into the Weapon's head. As its tail swung at them, Quistis used her whip to knock the tail backwards. While the beast was rendered unable to remove, Seifer fired a shot into the torso, causing a white liquid to spray out of the hole. The creature howled in pain. Irvine then delivered a slightly off-center shot into the Weapon's upper torso next to the neck, causing it to lose more of the white liquid.
"FLARE!" yelled Selphie, aiming the attack the toward the beast's head as well.
However, this time, the Weapon countered with a topaz colored beam that struck her head-on as well. Irvine fired one more shot while running toward Selphie, only managing to graze the leg. Quistis quickly tried to divert the creature's tail with her whip towards its own body, but she could barely hold the shock from simply detaining it.
"SHIVA, COME FORTH!" commanded Quistis with the little energy she had left.
A pillar of ice immediately appeared in the vicinity, bursting to reveal the bluish Goddess of Ice. Shiva mumbled, though quite assertively, "Diamond dust," and thrust her hands forward sending a wave of particles toward the Weapon. Anything that made contact with the dust was quickly smothered by ice (Quistis removed her whip at the very last movement.)
"Ready, guys?" said Seifer as he prepared to launch a spell. Both Fuijin and Raijin nodded. "In unison."
They each fired a tornado spell simultaneously, causing the three twisters to merge. However, instead of magnifying its size, only the spinning speed seemed to increased; the velocity of the winds appeared to be more violent. All three yelled, "TORNADO TRINITY!" The tornado rushed forward and gripped the Weapon into itself, with the beast still enveloped in ice. But the Weapon did not back down quietly. It continued to roar and shake, causing its spikes and fragments of ice to shoot outward, driven by the intensity of the whirlwind. All of the SeeDs attempted to dodge the projectiles but the posse's attack was a little bit too effective.
At last the tornado dispersed and the ice was exhausted. The Topaz Weapon lay dead and began to disintegrate. The six SeeDs were scratched and torn, but Selphie seemed to be unscathed, having obviously been blocked by Irvine.
"Well now," said Quistis in a forced tone of authority, "let's moved to the next site."
In the mountains south of Wutai
"Let's see now. If I push this button, it should send vibrations into the ground, awakening," said Cid, reading the manual.
"Great. The guy doesn't even know what he's doing," said Barret.
"Hey Vincent, how come we never saw this Weapon? And why is it sleeping?" asked Yuffie.
"Don't know. But to be honest, all of the Weapons were pretty much hidden, except for the Ultimate Weapon. We just ran into them by mistake. I guess after being released from the Northern Limit, most of them still just wanted to rest."
"You act like they're good people or something."
"Maybe they are good, just not acting in the way you humans would prefer them to."
"Uh, okay," said Yuffie nervously.
"Here it is, it's coming!" hollered Cid.
The ground began shaken uncontrollably. "Uh, maybe we should be going now. It's coming straight up at us."
"RUN!" yelled Yuffie. The group had managed to reach the Gravitor when a huge, blue creature burst out of the ground they had just been standing on. The Gravitor began to tip as well, and nearly fell into the chasm when Cid rushed to the control panel to active the thrusters. The ship shot out towards the ocean, but before reaching the shoreline, turned back to the opening of the canyon, just a few miles south of Wutai. It landed once more, as the four walked out uneasily.
The Sapphire Weapon was thrashing the surrounding mountains uncontrollably. It was a massive creature, spanning several stories tall, just as the previous Weapons were. It seemed to be a huge eagle, but its feathers, upon further observation, were replaced by scales. Its talons, small in relationship to the body, still held it balanced. In fact, it seemed to be very flexible in spite of the huge scaly wings that took the place of its forearms. Another distinct difference was its head. The beak was extra large, and there were horns protruding from the sides of the sparkling sapphire-colored head. It was a brilliant sight.
"Get ready, guys. Come on, Vincent, start off."
Vincent walked past the group. He turned his head behind him saying, "Why exactly are we all preparing to fight as we did in the old days. With the these new pistols, it shouldn't be much of a problem."
"What are you blabbering about, man?" said Barret furiously. "We don't know for sure if they're any good."
"Well, I trust them. If they truly do what they're supposed to do, then one shot in the heart or the brain should suffice, as with any creature."
"This is not just any creature. IT'S A WEAPON!" yelled Cid.
Vincent sighed and turned back to the raging beast. He flung his cape away from his front and pointing the pistol upward. Steadying it with his left hand, right eye closed, he fired two successive shots, one in the head, and one in the center of the upper torso. Vincent placed the gun back in his holster and turned around, sweeping his cape out of the way as well. As he walked back towards the Gravitor, the Weapon collapsed, white liquid spraying out of the wounds. As it began to disappear, the other simply stared, then turned back to Vincent, mouths open.
"Well, are you guys coming? We have to face that really hard one now."
At the Northern Limit
"Wait a second, I thought all of the Weapons had escaped last time. Why are we in this frickin cold," said Yuffie as she clutched her coat tightly around her summer-clad body.
"This Weapon is the most powerful. It must have continued sleeping despite Sephiroth's will. The one who spoke in the tablets, the one who controls these entities must be very powerful."
"I don't know, Vincent," said Cid, "They don't seem to be very controlled. Didn't the Cetra used to command them?"
"Yes," answered Nanaki, "But perhaps that was the plan all along."
"Ya know, you and your grandfather always talk in riddles, why?" said Barret exasperatingly.
Yuffie hurried toward the front of the group where Vincent and Cid were standing, hoping to get some shelter from the blistering winds that were freezing her skin. Nanaki was too small and Barret kept waving his gun-arm all over the place. I wonder how Cloud and Tifa are doing.
Above the Esthar Continent, a few miles west of Tears Point.
Cloud, Tifa, Rinoa, and Squall were riding in one of the Ragnaroks, piloted by Zell, towards the mountain ranges in the far east.
"Hey guys," said Rinoa as she entered into the cockpit where everyone was chatting about the previous encounter, "The others just called and said they already killed just finished destroy the Turquoise Weapon. That means they've already killed three Weapons while we've only fought the Opal Weapon."
"Well, they did get a head start," said Zell.
Originally, the group of SeeDs did plan to split up in their mission to stop the Weapons, but they had miscalculated the length of Zell's mission, whose team had been using the remaining available Weapon. Thus, while the other half had journeyed on with Selphie as their pilot, the remaining soldiers had to wait a few more hours for Zell to arrive at the Balamb Garden.
Squall was counting down the Weapons' names on his hand. "Shoot, that only leaves one Weapon left."
"Isn't that a good thing?" asked Tifa.
"Yeah, except that the last one is the Omega Weapon, which was nearly impossible to kill last time.
"Then how do you suppose we fight it?" asked Cloud.
"Simple, we have these items from Gilgamesh called Holy Wars. They must us invincible for an extremely short amount of time. However, if we all attack within the minute or so, we should be victorious. The Omega Weapon is really strong, but it's balanced by its relatively lower defenses. It's a good thing we had two left, one for us and one for…oh shit," said Squall as he looked into his bag.
Rinoa walked over to him and stared into the contents of the pack, "Don't tell me you forgot."
"Worse, I have two here. Damn, I forgot to give one to Cid."
Back at the Northern Limit
Barret, Cid, Vincent, Nanaki, and Yuffie found themselves staring face to face with a massive purple and blue creature. It was also standing on its hind legs, resembling a bear. However, it was of the highly deformed variety. Its face looked hideously mutated. The claws on the Weapon's large paws were as long as the individual paw. Where they should have been fur was a slimy, segmented surface that could only be found on a creature that had been skinned.
Vincent raised his pistol and shot twice as before, towards the heart and the head. This time, an odd thing happened. A gush of green air emanated from the creature's slimy skin, striking the bullets away.
Instinctively, Vincent raised his hand and whispered, "Sense." The command failed, and he had to leap out of the way as the six-story creature slammed one of its claws where Vincent had been standing.
"I guess it's time to fight the old-fashioned way," said Nanaki in a low growl, "I can feel it. This is Omega's alternate, the Alpha Weapon."
Barret circled the Weapon's left side, firing his gun-arm as he went. The Weapon swung his left claw towards Barret and formed a fist. With a large crack, a dozen sequential explosions erupted around Barret as he was running. He managed to dodge all of them, but the impact of some of the final blasts nearly knocked him off his feet. As he attempted to regain his composure as he stood behind the creature, a tail that had not been noticed before lunged at him.
"Take this!" yelled Yuffie who had launched her giant shuriken towards the tail causing it to crash in the ground next to Barret. Nanaki ran towards the mountain past Yuffie, trying to garner the Weapon's attention.
"Ifrit, come forth with Hellfire!" yelled Nanaki. The ground in front of the red dog exploded, revealing a green, dual-horned demon. It opened its mouth and breathed a massive fireball towards the Alpha Weapon. The flare dissipated on impact revealing not a single burn or scratch on the silvery creature.
Cid's cigarette fell out of his mouth. "Damn, this thing is more powerful than the Ruby Weapon. Out of routine he stepped on the cigarette, which had already been extinguished from the snow while it was in his mouth. "Let's see. It's pretty cold out, so maybe this'll work. FREEZE!"
The Weapon was instantly enveloped with ice, but it quickly melted away as the monster clenched its claws again, causing the torso to emanate a heating glow. After releasing its talons, it formed both into a fist yet again. This time, there were two-dozen explosions scattered around the vicinity, aimed at everyone.
Esthar, after a relatively easy battle
"Whew! Where did you get these Holy Wars? It's been so long…I forgot how efficient you can be when you're invincible," remarked Tifa.
"It's from an independent guardian force called Gilgamesh," explained Rinoa, "But how come you can't be invincible anymore?"
"Aeris," answered Cloud solemnly.
"Oh, sorry. Um, anyways, I wonder how Cid and the others are doing. They could have really used this Holy War, which is all Squall's fault," said Rinoa while glaring at him.
"Don't worry, Rinoa," said Tifa. "I know Cid and the others are fine. Especially Cid. He's the only one there that's got sensible emotions in times of emergency. But I wonder if the other Omega is resistant to the guns like ours was?"
Return to the Nortern Limit
"GOD! Somebody call for help! We're all going to die!" yelled Cid at the top of his lungs as he attempted to evade the green stream of fire that sprayed from the Alpha Weapon's mouth. Damn it! Stupid Cloud. He left with his fucking Omnislash, yet he had to take the Knights of the Round materia. YOU SELFISH SON OF A BITCH! And where's my backup!"
"Cid," hollered Yuffie, who had been running parallel with him a few yards away, "I think they're finally here."
Everyone looked up in toward the ocean to see a large plane fly towards them; it was the Highwind. It circled over twice, each time sending a barrage of missiles toward the mutated-looking giant. The second wave caused the lumbering beast to fall over. As the Highwind made its exit, the fighters refocused their attacks. Barret continued pummeling the Weapon with gunfire. Cid stayed behind with his spear and helped Nanaki cast various spells at the creature. Yuffie continually fired her Conformer. As the Weapon looked quite weakened, Vincent put down the Death Penalty, and raised the Ultima-Breaker, firing two more shots. This time, both had a mutual target in the head. However, the same thing as before happened again; the green aura altered the trajectories of the bullets. As though all of the previous and currently inflicted damage was nothing, the Weapon stood up amidst the gunfire, shurikins, and magic spells, and clenched a fist in Vincent's direction. Vincent immediately tried to jump out of the way, barely slammed by one of the blasts. From the corner of his eye, he saw his second UB magazine fall to the ground. As he reached for the clip, another blast found its way there, vaporizing the magazine into a large cloud that also flung Vincent's body backwards. Then the Weapon looked at the others, who had all halted their worthless attacks to breath for a few moments. Without a growl or any sign of warning, the Alpha Weapon dove toward Yuffie as one would dive into a swimming pool. As it slammed into the snow and ice, everyone was knocked off his or her feet, including Yuffie who completely lost the surface on which she had been standing.
"HELP!"
But her screams were silenced as the Weapon slammed its huge paws on top of her.
"YUFFIE!" cried everyone else. For the first time in that battle, Cid picked up his spear, ran up to the monster, and rammed it into the Weapon's back. Alpha responded by using its right arm to backhand Cid, causing him to fly back towards the others headfirst into the snow.
Suddenly, there was a large cry: "ALL CREATION" A massive beam slammed the Weapon causing its entire body mass to zoom through the atmosphere just as Cid had done. When it had finally landed, the vibrations triggered from the crash forced everyone else to fall to their feet.
A red-faced Yuffie emerged from the crushed ice, her body covered with blood.
"Sorry, guys. That's all I got." She collapsed instantly.
"Yuffie!" yelled Vincent who ran towards her immediately.
"Vincent, we're not done yet, damn it!" said Cid. He had been eyeing the fallen Weapon was picking itself back into fighting position, without a single scratch.
"What the hell is this? Even her limit break didn't do anything to it," said Barret.
"We have to keep trying," said Nanaki.
The three approached the Weapon with fear in their eyes, waiting for the second round.
Meanwhile, Vincent was running towards Yuffie. He lifted her onto his arms.
"You alright?" he asked.
But she didn't move.
Vincent reached into one of his pockets, feeling for a feather. When he finally found it, he placed it on Yuffie's forehead.
"This is the last one I saved from the battle with Sephiroth. Phoenix Down."
But it did nothing. Yuffie remained motionless.
"Damn it, she's too far gone."
Vincent gently placed her body on the snow and turned towards the Weapon with a fierce glare in his eyes. Not a single muscle clenched, just his burning, demonic eyes.
Endnotes: If anyone cares: I didn't talk about each Weapon because I figured it would be redundant. So I simply showed the remaining FF8 characters in action, demonstrated Vincent's coolness, and rest of the FF7 group in peril. Also, Vincent fans, the next chapter's for him (it doesn't even add to the plot of this story, I don't know why I put so much into it.)