Chapter 11
Renegade Cetra
The boy ran as fast as his legs would allow, the big man in black was close behind. The boy could almost feel the sword slicing and slashing just behind him. He knew if he stopped for even a second he would be within range of the blade. The pursuer wore plain black clothing and carried a big heavy sword that was almost as big as the man himself. He was probably a bit over six foot five and looked about as tough as a boulder. The guy did some serious working out it appeared.
The man was dark skinned like Barret, but he made Barret look really small.
So, naturally, when the boy shot past a figure in crimson that looked to be about the size of the big man's left leg, the boulder of a man figured he could just blow right through the small man.
This wasn't the case however.
Vincent Valentine sidestepped the charging dark-clad man and fired two shots from his revolver. One into each of the behemoth's knees, and for all the muscle and power the man had he, like any person, couldn't operate without his legs. The big man fell to the ground face first.
The little boy hadn't looked back at all, but knew he was somehow clear of danger.
Vincent walked casually over to the fallen huge man and pointed his gun at him.
"Who are you?" asked Vincent.
"Who are you?" asked the big man in a big deep voice that was stereotypically expected from a man of his stature.
"Vincent," he replied, "okay, your turn."
The big man laughed, "Vincent who?"
"My friend," Professor Gast suddenly said coming up beside Vincent aiming his shotgun down at the big man, "I would stop playing games and start talking very soon."
Vincent noticed the deadly wounds to the big man's knees didn't bother him as much as Vincent would have thought.
"We are the Outcasts," the big man said cryptically.
"Well, we have a title, doesn't really clear up who you are but it'll do I guess," Gast muttered.
"Outcasts," Vincent said thoughtfully, "what are you people doing here?"
"You know of us?" asked the big man seeming genuinely surprised.
"More or less," Vincent said, "renegade Cetra."
"We're the real Cetra, the true Cetra, the ones who are not willing to give up the planet to our traitorous cousins," the big man said.
"What does Midgar have that you people want?" asked Gast, still a bit shaken to learn these people were like him, Ancients.
"You people?" asked the big man indignantly.
"Yes, you…Outcasts or whatever," Gast said.
"You speak of us as if you weren't like us," the big man said smiling, "I can sense another Cetra from miles away; you're the last of us."
"I might be an Ancient but I'm not like you," Gast growled, "the Cetra don't attack children for one thing."
"Everyone here will be dead soon enough, it doesn't matter who we attack," the big man replied.
"What are you talking about?" asked Gast.
Vincent knew, "You're behind the black buildings."
The big man smiled, "You're well-informed for someone I've never seen before, how do you know all this?"
"Vincent, what black buildings?" asked Gast.
"It's very complicated, Professor, just let me speak to the Outcast for a moment," Vincent said, "why do you want to destroy time?"
"Destroy time?" asked the big man laughing. "Not so well-informed I guess, we don't want to destroy time, we just need to destroy certain existences so we can control time."
"You're Cetra, you can already control time," Vincent said.
"Not entirely, there are restrictions, if we own every existence there is…then there's no restrictions, absolute freedom," the big man said.
"Freedom to do what exactly, what's your ultimate goal, the Ancient Black?" asked Vincent.
"The Ancient Black?" asked the big man laughing heartily. "The Ancient Black is more of an inconvenience, no our goal does not involve the Ancient Black."
"So then what does it involve?" asked Vincent.
"You are from Centre Time; you will be of the few to survive long enough to know unlike most worlds," the big man said, "it's far too early for me to tell you such things."
"Centre Time?" asked Vincent shaking his head.
"The Centre of the Star," the big man said smiling, "I'm afraid I'm not permitted to sit around and explain Outcast theories with strangers. The only reason I've stayed as long as I have is because there's something I need here."
"Something you need," Gast said, "the reason you came to Midgar?"
"Well, the Outcasts require two things from this world, and we assumed Midgar would have them both," the big man said smiling. "We were partly correct about one at least."
"Which is?" asked Vincent.
"We need the last surviving Ancient, and as we are unable to resurrect Aeris, we had to find an existence where her brother existed," the big man said smiling and waving his big hands over his knees. Obviously it had been some kind of restoration spell because his knees were back in perfect condition. "Now you have to come with us Professor."
Vincent wasn't entirely clear on what exactly was happening, he had never been very clear since the beginning, but he knew he now had a direction: he had to stop the Outcasts from getting what they wanted from this time.
"I'm afraid I can't let him go quite that easy," Vincent said aiming his gun at the big man.
"I knew you were going to say that," the big man said and waved his left hand, some sort of signal.
Immediately, two more dark clad figures appeared from nowhere.
One was a long haired blonde female in a long black coat; she carried two pistols that appeared to have long clips coming out of the bottom of the grip. This told Vincent that the guns carried a lot of ammunition, they were probably automatics.
The second was a bald man that appeared to be unarmed; he wore similar black clothing to the big man to his right.
The woman turned to the big man, "Who do we kill and who do we capture, Conall?"
The big man nodded to Gast, "He's the only one left alive."
The woman aimed her guns and Vincent immediately jumped behind Gast, nobody…including Gast…was expecting this move and the female Outcast hesitated, she hesitated for the last time in her life as Vincent aimed his revolver over Gast's shoulder and fired. The heavy round was a direct hit to her head and it sent the Outcast flying head over heels leaving her entire head in one bloody mess that, thankfully, had been blown too far away for them to see.
"Kill him!" Conall bellowed, obviously angry now.
Vincent had intended on continuing to use Gast as a shield, but suddenly Gast sailed off to the left. The Professor's feet were suddenly off the ground and he was sailing away against his will.
"What the…?" Gast said.
Vincent was out in the open, he noticed the bald man had a raised hand aimed at where Gast was.
"Telekinesis," Vincent muttered.
"I can't move," Gast growled.
"You won't have too much trouble multitasking I hope," the big man growled, the bald man nodded and raised his other hand to Vincent.
Vincent attempted to find some way to avoid what he knew was coming but couldn't.
"It's almost impossible to evade a power like his, I'm afraid," said Conall smiling. "Do something creative with him."
The bald man then started to close his hand into a fist; Vincent felt his whole body being crushed accordingly. The bald man was using his telekinesis to literally crush Vincent into himself. For about five seconds Vincent was helpless to do anything, but then the bald man stopped, his hand appeared to be stuck half way to a fist.
"What's wrong?" asked Conall.
"There's…something else," the bald man said.
"What?" asked Conall.
"Inside him, if I go any further…he will kill us all," the bald man said.
Vincent's red eyes glared into them.
"So then I suggest you put him down!" yelled Lucrecia as her shotgun blew the bald man away from behind successfully releasing Vincent and Gast.
Conall raised his huge sword to attack Lucrecia but she managed to fire another shot with her shotgun, knocking the big man backward. He, however, stayed on his feet.
"It's going to take more than that for me, my dear," Conall growled and swung his sword again effectively chopping Lucrecia's shotgun in half and sending her tumbling backward. Conall raised his sword to finish her off, but in the process entirely forgot about Vincent and Gast. Vincent suddenly appeared in front of the fallen Lucrecia and used his golden clawed hand to block the sword. The power of the sword made his arm buckle a bit but the armoured arm did its job and the big man was forced to take another swing.
As Conall attempted his second swing with the sword Gast jumped in and fired his shotgun, unlike Lucrecia he aimed for a part of the man he knew was vulnerable. The shot blew out the big man's right knee.
"Again with the legs!" Conall growled lashing out with the sword angrily, and might have hit Gast had Lucrecia's .45 caliber pistol not started firing and effectively blew out the big man's other knee.
Conall dropped his sword and fell on his back with a growl of pain. He then quickly sat up and attempted to use his hands to heal his knees again but Vincent was there. He grabbed the big man's left hand and used Conall's own huge sword to stake it to the ground. The huge blade went easily through the big man's hand and into the ground.
Again, the big man's register of what should have been pain was understated with what seemed to be a bit of a wince, this one had some serious pain tolerance.
Though, Vincent wasn't quite done yet, the man still had one workable hand still.
Vincent stepped down hard with his boot on the big man's last good hand.
"Now," Vincent said holstering his revolver, "why don't you continue with what you were saying about Centre Time?"
Behind Vincent, Gast smiled to Lucrecia, "He's funny in a crazy and sadistic sort of way."
"I saw him using you as a human shield," Lucrecia said looking at Gast.
Gast laughed, "You're always so sensitive of things, my dear, don't jump to conclusions. There was a perfectly good reason; these people wanted me alive, Vincent, obviously knowing they wouldn't kill me, used it against them. What do you have against our new friend?"
"Nothing," Lucrecia said holstering her pistol.
"You're lying, but I'll forgive you, because I'm an Ancient and that's what we do," Gast said smiling to her and walking over to Vincent letting the conversation die there.
"You won't get anything from me," the big man growled to Vincent.
"You were pretty eager to tell me about the Outcast plans before," Vincent stated.
"That was all you needed to know," Conall said.
"You don't know what Centre Time is, do you?" asked Vincent.
"Of course I do," Conall replied.
"No, you don't, you've heard the word from your boss and then you start throwing it around pretending like you know what's going on," Vincent said, "you're of no use to me."
Vincent drew his revolver, "Not appreciative of your two friends trying to kill me either."
Vincent aimed his gun at the big man's head.
"Wait, wait, I can help you, I know things, things of use to you!" Conall cried.
"No you don't," Vincent said with an ominous finality.
Vincent's gun went off mercilessly and the bullet tore away any recognizable feature of the Outcast's face leaving only a gruesome mass of blood.
Vincent looked over his shoulder and saw Gast, not with the expression he expected to see. Vincent expected Gast to be horrified, or at least sickened by the sight.
Instead the Professor seemed very calm, "I'd say something Cetra like, 'he has returned to the Lifestream' but I'm not entirely sure if that's where people like him go."
"I doubt there's any other place for him," Vincent said holstering his revolver.
"You're sure he didn't know anything?" asked Gast.
"No," Vincent said walking away.
"You seemed pretty sure," Gast said following him.
"No, I said 'you're of no use to me' which doesn't necessarily mean he didn't know anything," Vincent said matter-of-factly.
"Yes, of course, silly me for creating a correlation between the two," Gast said sarcastically.
"I assume you would have some questions for me," Vincent said.
Gast shook his head, "I'm a Cetra, I live and breathe mystery and not knowing things…that's why I became a scientist like my father, to figure things out."
"I have some mysteries of my own I've yet to answer as well," Vincent said.
"You're searching for answers out here too?" asked Gast.
Vincent shook his head, "I never search for answers, Professor, because they'll never be anything I want to hear."
"What is it you would like to hear exactly?" asked Gast.
"I don't know," Vincent said, "that's how I know they won't be anything I want to hear."
"Pardon me for assuming here, but you're a very lonely person by nature aren't you?" asked Gast.
Vincent responded with silence.
"It doesn't work, you know, the lone wolf forever thing. It'll only ever lead to more being alone."
"You're just like your sister," Vincent said.
Gast smiled, "I guess it's a Cetra thing."
"No doubt," Vincent muttered.
"Guys, we gotta get inside Midgar!" Lucrecia exclaimed.
"What's wrong?" asked Gast.
"I heard from some soldiers that the attackers are headed toward the President," Lucrecia said.
"The labs," Gast said worriedly.
"They could destroy all the files and everything we've been working on," Lucrecia said.
"I have to get inside Midgar," Gast said urgently.
Vincent nodded, "I'll come along I need to know more about these Outcasts and what they're planning."
"Maybe we'll all find some answers we don't want to hear before today is done," Gast said to Vincent.
Vincent was silent.
"How the hell are we gonna get back in, the place is obviously locked down," Lucrecia said.
"There's gotta be some way in," Gast said.
"They won't open any doors, even for us scientists," Lucrecia said shaking her head, "we're stuck out here."
Vincent looked up to the sky and immediately saw their way in.
"I have an idea," Vincent stated.
The two scientists turned to look at him and he pointed up, above them hovered an airship that seemed to be waiting for something. At one time Vincent was sure it had been firing projectiles inside Midgar to soften the defenses, but now it was silent.
"How do you suggest we get up there?" asked Lucrecia.
"He's not," Gast said, "he's suggesting he brings that down to us."
Vincent nodded, "I could get inside Midgar right now, I could vault the wall, but I couldn't bring you two with me. I can use that same idea to board the airship and bring it down so you can get on."
"Then you fly us into Midgar," Gast said, "you think you can clear the ship? It must be guarded of course."
"I've fought worse battles," Vincent replied.
"Of course you have, I almost forgot who I was talking to, Vincent Valentine, the man who traveled with my sister," Gast said, "I should be asking if there's any ship you can't clear."
Vincent checked that his gun was securely holstered so that it wouldn't accidentally fall out when he jumped through the air.
Vincent looked up to the ship and prepared to make his move, he could use the large wall they used to protect Midgar from the outside. His plan was to gain enough momentum from his jump to the wall to push off from the wall and, if all went as planned, he would end up on the ship. Then all he would have to worry about was the enemies inside.
"Be careful," Lucrecia said to him quietly.
Vincent looked at her momentarily and then looked back up at the ship, "I'll be back with our ride shortly."