Okie…Here's Chapter 6. Sorry it took so long.
The group made it across the field, looking up at the airship. Kaori blinked sweatdropping. "...Holy crap..."
Dena had a similar reaction; she stared at the giant ship with wide eyes and mouth slightly agape. "Wow..." She whispered. She realized that she was staring and stopped.
"Well...come lets go," Yukiro said as he grabbed Connor's hand and starting pulling him toward the airship.
"Brother slow down!" Connor pleaded.
Dena smiled and brushed a piece of stray hair behind her ear. A sudden glimmer in the bushes caught her eye...and her heart almost seemed to stop beating.
A shuriken suddenly whipped through the air, straight at them. Vincent jumped in front of her, raising his left arm as a 'clang' rang out. The shuriken dropped harmlessly to the ground.
Dena gasped when the shuriken fell to the ground. She was initially worried about Vincent but when he showed no sign of pain she was relieved. Everyone seemed to freeze where they were, not knowing whether to run or stay. "What are you doing?" Dena shouted, "Get Connor on to the ship!"
"A metal arm... How un-expected..." a voice said as the dust randomly blew up and then away like it normally does in animes, revealing a tall thin man with black pants and a dark green shirt, as well as something.../something, since it was difficult to identify in its position...black, folded on his back. His eyes were a dark sky blue, and his hair was a light blonde color, spiky towards the top but pulled back into a long, flowing ponytail.
Yukiro frowned and nodded, pulling Connor up the ramp and onto the airship. Kaori blinked and then dramatically pointed at him. "Who are YOU!" She shouted.
The moment ruined for the new stranger, he sweatdropped and pouted. "Hey...you ruined my entrance."
"...Bad guys aren't allowed cool entrances," Kaori replied, sticking her tongue out at the man. "At least, not when I'm around. NOW TALK! Who are you and who are you working for! The FBI, the CIA-or, are you here to drag us all off to Area 51!" ...The conspiracy nut...
The newcomer sweatdropped at the girl. "...Um...Area 51..." he said.
"I knew it!"
Dena grabbed her friend by the arm. "Let's go... Stop egging the man on," she said as she started pulling Kaori toward the air ship. Cloud and Vincent squared off with the newcomer.
"But...but..." Kaori started, flailing a little. "What about the guys..! It's not like they can sprout wings and fly off..!"
"They can fight...we'll only end up getting in the way!" Dena said.
"But...but...!" Kaori sighed. "...Hokay..." She said as the two arrived at the ramp and proceeded to go up it.
"Don't quite think so..." the newcomer said, smiling cheerfully...a little too cheerfully. Especially for a villain... And soon it was seen why. A gust of wind suddenly shot past Kaori, hitting Dena and knocking her back off the ramp, but...almost cradling her in a pocket of air so that she didn't hit the ground and hurt herself.
Dena cried out as she felt the wind hit her and knock her off the ramp, Kaori's hand ripped from her grasp. "Let me go damn it!" She said as she struggled against the mass of air that cushioned her fall. The newcomer suddenly disappeared from his place in front of Vincent and appeared behind Dena, who was finally able to regain her footing. The folded black things had now been outstretched…into /wings/…
"That mouth is very unladylike," he said as he grabbed Dena from behind, effectively pinning her arms against her chest.
She growled and thrashed in his grip. "Bite me." She snarled. Vincent immediately upholstered Cerberus.
"I just might," the newcomer chuckled. Dena's face went red; she exploded.
"I have had enough of men thinking they could touch me any way they please. I AM NOT A GODDAMN DOLL," she said as she thrashed even harder. She even tried to kick the newcomer in the teabags but the angle was all wrong. "Vincent shoot him...shoot HIM," she snarled.
Vincent's eyes narrowed as he lifted his gun, agreeing whole-heartedly with Dena's suggestion. He took several shots up at the newcomer, but...this guy was a lot more agile than even most birds he had seen in the air, and even more agile than vampyric-looking gunman. He seemed even more adapted to the sky than to the land. So naturally...the bullets missed.
Dena growled and managed to sink her teeth into her kidnapper's wrist. The kidnapper yelped and snatched his wounded arm away, allowing one of Dena's arms to get free. "LET ME GO!" She said as she started knocking the kidnapper upside the head.
They dipped for a moment, and then rose again as the kidnapper shook his wrist. "Geez, what the...?.! ...Don't tell me that you have rabies or something!"
Dena growled as her arm was pinned back down to her side, "I just might," she hissed. "Vincent, just shoot his ass. I don't care how!" She shouted. "Just get me down..." She started trying to kick her kidnapper by this point, and she felt her blows connect with the man's shins…not the best place to get kicked.
Air narrowed his eyes, he took his wounded arm and grabbed her shoulder; she went tense as he pinched a nerve and then went slack in his grasp.
"Dena!" Kaori shouted as she saw her unconscious friend being taken away. Vincent tried to line up a shot but they were too far away by this point and he was afraid that he would hit Dena.
"Damn it," Cloud hissed as he plunged the tip of his sword in to the ground. "Why did he take her?" he fumed.
Kaori noticed something on the ground… It was Dena's diary.
"Probably because he was a freakin' pedo..." Kaori commented as she reached down and picked up the diary, studying it for a moment. She then looked back up at the two. "...Alright, guys. From what I understand, you're from this world and...you know your way around this world. What's the most likely place that the bad guys have set up base?" she demanded, as if this was the easiest question in the world.
Cloud and Vincent looked over at the demanding redhead, both of them clueless. "Midgar, maybe...?" Cloud suggested.
Vincent shook his head. "I doubt it..."
Yuffie ran down the ramp. "Guys! What in the hell happened?" She said as she ran up. She had seen the first part of the episode with the kidnapper and had ran to get her weapons; she had not seen Dena being whisked away.
"Um...Dena got kidnapped," Kaori replied simply. "Didn't you see it? It was like a flying monkey off of the Wizard of Oz coming down to take her away..."
Yuffie blinked. "Flying monkey?" There was a pause. Then… "What?.! Dena got kidnapped!" She screamed.
Kaori frowned. "Is there an echo in this place?" She asked.
Yuffie stuck her tongue out at Kaori, then rounded on Vincent, frowning. "How could you let Dena get kidnapped by a flying monkey?.! You have a gun!" Vincent glared in Yuffie's direction and the teenager blinked. "Oh...he's pissed," she stated.
"He looked like a monkey! And he acted like a monkey!" Kaori said, ignoring the conflict between Vincent and Yuffie as she tried to make her point. She crossed her arms. "So by /my/ book...he was a monkey."
"Well...let's get this bird off the ground, then! Maybe there's still a chance that we can find her!" Yuffie demanded.
"Right," Cloud nodded, he and the others raced on board of the airship. The engines roared to life as it raced in the direction the kidnapper was last seen heading.
Dena groaned as she felt herself come to. Her vision swam but she found herself staring up a pale ceiling. "Damn...my head," she said as she attempted to sit up. As she moved her left arm she heard a rattling sound of chains and sweatdropped. "That's not good," she said as she sat up from her place on the ground, she looked down at her arm and sure enough...there was a manacle and a length of chain attaching it to the wall. The chain and manacle looked extremely new compared to the wall and ceiling.
Outside there was yelling, the voice belonging to Star. "Air, you idiot! That girl wasn't one of the twins!"
"She could've been-" the voice of her kidnapper-apparently named Air-started.
"The twins are boys, not girls! I showed you a /picture/ before you even took off!"
"But she-"
"You were thinking with the other head again, weren't you!"
Dena felt her eyes widen. 'My god...I've been kidnapped by a pervert,' she thought. She took a moment and looked at the manacle...maybe she could slip her hand through it-after all she had done it before in the other world but it had been toy police-cuffs.She only succeded in rubbing her wrist raw.
Watching her kidnapper come through the door with a tray of food, Dena glared in his direction as she attempted to slip her hand through once more. The young man pouted. "Hey...that's no good. You're only going to hurt yourself," he said as he sat the tray off to the side. Dena ignored him as he came closer; he came close enough to talk but far enough as not to get hit.
"Why don't you let me go since I'm obviously the wrong person..." she said.
"Oh? How do you know that?" the kidnapper asked, tilting his head and blinking as he nudged the tray slightly, closer and closer as if to poke her with as if it were a stick. He then added, "And the name's Air, by the way."
"I'm smart and you're not," Dena said simply as she stuck out her foot and effectively stopped the tray's trek toward her. "And I'm not hungry."
Air pouted a little. "Hey... I'm smart!" he said. "And it's decent food-nothing's poisoned or anything!"
"Not hungry...simple as that," she said as she continued to inspect the chain. 'I wonder if I can pull it out of the wall...' she wondered...maybe the wall was old enough it would crumble if she gave the chain a good jank. If she did, she would then have a weapon to whack the element controlling pervert in front of her with. She gave it a good yank...but luck was just not on her side today.
Air sweatdropped. "And you're saying that /I'm/ not smart..? You're trying to pull a /chain/ out of a /concrete/ wall..."
"At least I didn't kidnap someone that is no use to their organization," she said as she crossed her arms and folded her legs Indian-style.
"...Do you /want/ to be of use...?" Air asked, raising a suggestive eyebrow.
"Do you want to choke on your family jewels? If you do...keep it up," she hissed as she glared daggers at him.
"Now that's not very nice..." Air said, tilting his head. "Besides, I don't think you'd manage to do anything like that..."
Dena smirked. "Want to test that theory?"
"...You wouldn't be able to defeat me even if I set you free..."
Dena smiled and waved her hand side to side. "Yeah right...the first shot you hit me with was all luck. I had my back turned..." She said, obviously not impressed.
"It wouldn't matter whether you did or not! Because you see...I'm not human," Air shot back, smirking and jerking a thumb at himself.
"Doesn't matter," she said, "I could still beat you...the incident earlier only showed that you were weak...attacking a girl from behind. You're no better then a common mugger."
Air sweatdropped. "No..." he said. "Whether you saw me or not, I still would've done it... You just happened to have your back turned when I did it..."
Dena stuck her tongue out at him. "Why don't you prove it...show me how strong you are... Show me that I'm wrong... Fight me."
Star meanwhile stood outside the door, sweatdropping as she listened to the conversation. "...Seriously? He'd better not fall for her tricks..." she grumbled.
"Scared to lose to a girl?" Dena smirked, almost had him...
"Of course not! No girl can beat me! ...Except possibly our mother," Air said as he fished out a single silver key. Dena held out her arm so he could unlock the manacle. It opened with a soft click and Dena smirked.
'Gotcha now,' she thought, she suddenly grabbed Air's arm and slapped the open manacle around his wrist. He let out a cry and snatched for her as she rolled away with the key. She stood up and twirled the key with her finger. "Never underestimate a woman," she said. Air's face twisted in anger.
"You'll pay for that," he hissed as his eyes glowed. Air exploded from him in a giant wave. The force blew out the window and slammed Dena against the wall on the other side of the room, the key flying from her grasp. Dena lay there stunned for a second before noticing the busted window.
The broken glass cut in to the palm of her hands as she pulled herself through the window. She landed on the ground hard-thankfully they had been on the first floor of the strange shaped building. She heard the door slam open and a female shouting at Air and turned her head to notice a soldier walking from around the corner of the building…he must have come to inspect what had shattered the glass. "Time to go," Dena said as he gave a shout.
She headed down the path, out of the town and through the woods. However, the woods were admittedly confusing-in fact, they seemed endless for some strange reason. Now she was starting to get worried-either she would get caught by the soldiers or lost within the woods. Hearing them behind her, she ducked inside the hollow of a tree, listening as they ran past.
Dena waited for a moment until she thought that it was all clear and slowly poked her head out of the hollow tree. She looked around for a moment before taking a step outside of the tree and suddenly howled as someone grabbed her roughly by her long hair. They yanked her left arm behind her back to a point she thought that it would slip out of joint. "Ow..." She whimpered as the grip tightened on her hair. What was with everybody and grabbing her hair?.!
"Hey! I found her!" the soldier called. "Over here!"
Dena was escorted back to the strange building that she had escaped from not but ten minutes earlier. Inside was a pissed off looking Air and a smirking Star. "Oh, so sorry," Star purred. Dena glared at her as she was lead back in to the room.
"Maybe better luck next time," Star laughed as the manacle was placed on Dena's wrist. They even tightened it, if that was possible. The door slammed shut leaving Dena alone in the room, the cool breeze from outside drifted in through the broken window.
Star then turned back to Air. "You see all the trouble you've caused us?.!" She looked around for a newspaper to roll up to smack him upside the head like a bad puppy dog.
Air pouted. "Sorry..!"
The entrance door suddenly opened, a young boy walking in. But while the boy was young, probably only twelve or so, his eyes were a lot more mature than his appearance made him out to be. "...Am I interrupting something...?"
Star pulled away from the cringing form of Air and lowered the rolled up newspaper. "No...nothing seriously important..." she said as she laid the newspaper on the table.
"...Did you get them?" he asked, looking from one to the other.
Star sweatdropped. "About that..." Air started creeping toward the door. "Genius here...brought us the wrong kid,"
"I'm not a kid, damn it!" a shout was heard from the next room.
Earth sighed, putting a hand on his forehead...and blocking the door. He then looked over at Star. "Star...you can continue beating Air over the head with your newspaper..." he said, shutting the door behind him before walking over to the couch and sitting down.
Star smiled. "With pleasure." She picked up the discarded newspaper, Air cowering in the corner.
"Mercy..." He whimpered.
Dena sighed and drew her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around her shoulders. The sun had begun to set and the temperatures had started to drop; the cool breeze had turned even cooler and Dena started to shiver. She cursed her fantastic luck and rubbed her arms to keep feeling in them.
"Alright, that seems to be the place..." Vincent said, hiding behind a building to look at another lit building nearby.
Yuffie looked around, sitting on the roof of the building. "Hm..." she said, watching as one of the guards turned his back and headed down the street. "Alright, the guard's got his back turned. Go!" she called down quietly to the gunman. Vincent nodded, darting across the road and up into the window of the building.
Dena heard the very faint crunch of feet on the broken glass outside. 'Probably a guard,' she thought. She had her eyes closed as she huddled to keep herself warm. She was very surprised when she opened her eyes and saw a figure slipping threw the broken window.
Vincent raised an eyebrow, glancing out the window, then back over at Dena. "Well..." he said. "Are you ready to go?"
Dena smiled slightly. "One problem," she whispered as she lifted her left arm. The chain jingled slightly as it moved. Vincent's eyes narrowed.
Vincent reached for his gun, taking aim and firing, breaking the chain off the wall, then whipping over to the door to aim the gun at whoever would come in to check on the noise. The second the door moved, Vincent opened fire with his Griffon. Star's eyes widened, the young woman quickly moving out of the way to duck around the wall.
"Let's go," Vincent said as he grabbed Dena. They both escaped through the window and could both hear shouting from the building, male and female alike. "This way," Vincent said as he pulled Dena quickly through the town. Dena was able to catch sight of Yuffie jumping down from one of the buildings and on to the head of a guard that stood in their path.
"Took you long enough," Yuffie said as she dusted her hands off. She opened her mouth to say something more but the sound of a gunshot shut her up, not to mention making her jump several feet in to the air in surprise.
"Lets head through the caves. If we go through the Bone Village, we'll only be putting the residents there in danger..." Vincent suggested.
Dena shrieked when a bullet blew off a chunk of wall beside her head. "Wherever we're going...let's go before we double our weight in lead," Yuffie said.
Vincent nodded, turning and firing a few rounds at the guards before helping the girls up into the cave. From there, they could travel through the mountain and come out in the fields of snow, close to the Icicle Village up on the mountain.
About an hour later
The group emerged from the cave, Yuffie smiling as she stretched. "Ah! Fresh air, fresh sunshine!" she said cheerfully.
Dena sweatdropped. "It's night." She said. Yuffie spun around on her heel and stuck her tongue out at her. "But it does feel good to be out of that cave..." Dena said. She paused for a moment. "Hey...how did you guys find out where I was?" She asked as they stared traveling away from the cave's entrance.
"Educated guess," Vincent replied simply.
Dena sweatdropped. "It worked out so I'm not going to complain..." she said. She suddenly sank up to her knees in snow. "Never mind," she said.
Yuffie smiled and sweatdropped. "Yeah, it is kinda deep here..." she said. "Heh...the only reason that I'm not sinking in is because I know ancient ninja techniques to help me balance on the snow!"
"...Plus it's not very deep there..." Vincent pointed out, sweatdropping.
"Damn you," Dena said as she fished herself out of the tiny snowdrift. By the time she got out she was freezing. "As soon as we get to the nearest village...I'm getting some appropriate clothes," Dena said as she shivered. It was true: a skirt has no place in the snowy mountains. Dena sighed; there was nothing she or anyone else could do until they got to where they were going. Which by the way...she didn't know. "Hey...where are we heading off to?" Dena asked, as she followed in Yuffie's foot steps since after all, the female ninja was using her 'ancient ninja technique' to find a shallow path in the snow to walk on.
"The Icicle Village. The others should be waiting for us there," Yuffie replied with a nod.
"I'm assuming that you've already called them on the cell phone, then..?" Vincent said, glancing over at her.
Yuffie smiled and sweatdropped. "Nope! ...But when they don't see us coming out of the City of the Ancients, then they'll be able to come to the conclusion that something is up..."
Dena slammed her fist down on Yuffie's head. "You're a moron," Dena shouted.
"Owwie...! H-hey...what was that for...?.!" Yuffie whined. At her explanation, she pouted. "I am not!"
"Yes, you are. Please tell me that you have your cell phone with you," Dena asked as she breathed on to her hands, trying to warn them up; god she hated snow now...
"Um...yeah, I think so..." Yuffie replied, reaching into her pocket. She pulled out her /white/ cell phone, only to have it slip from her fingers and land in the snow. "Eheh...oopsie..."
Vincent rolled his eyes and shook his head. He knew it was too good to be true: Yuffie was bound to do something and screw everything up, one way or another.
Yuffie groaned as she shifted through the snow with her bare hands. "Come out, come out where ever you are," Yuffie sang. Dena sighed and started looking too.
She flinched as the snow melted from the heat of her hands and seeped into the cuts on her palms that she had received from the broken glass. She blinked when her fingers brushed against something that was neither snow nor ground-Dena pulled up the snow covered cell phone. "Try not to lose it again."
"Thanks! Now let's just hope it still works..." Yuffie said as she flipped open the cell phone, dialing the number.
Vincent frowned at Dena. "Your hands..." he started.
She blinked and shoved her hands behind her back so he couldn't see. "It's nothing...just a couple of scrapes." She said. Vincent narrowed his eyes.
"...Let me see them..."
Dena struggled with herself for a moment before she sighed and pulled her hands from behind her back. The manacle was no longer on her left arm, all thanks to Yuffie's lock picking skills. The only reason that the others had not seen the cuts on her hands was from the poor light in the caves. "I cut them on the glass from the broken window. It was blown out by Air when I tricked him in to unlocking the chain..." she mumbled as she extended her hands with her palms up so Vincent could inspect the damage.
Vincent frowned, then reached into his pocket, handing her a small vial. "Drink this," he said. "It'll help."
Dena blinked and accepted the vial, she held it close to her face and looked hard at it. "What is this stuff?" She asked.
"A potion..." Vincent replied. He blinked. "They don't sell them back home...?"
Dena shook her head. "We didn't have anything like this...if we ever got hurt then we had to heal naturally. I seriously got hurt in a car accident before I came here...it took a whole four months before I could walk again," Dena said as she gently swirled the vial around, watching the contents swish around. "So...I just drink this stuff? That's it?" she questioned, kind of unsure of how to react to it.
Vincent nodded. "Yes," he replied.
Dena frowned slightly as she popped the top off of the vial-it smelled funny and tasted even worse; it kind of reminded Dena of cough syrup. She quickly swallowed the contents and shook her head. "Well...that's a good incentive not to get hurt," she said as she stuck out her tongue and handed the empty vial to Vincent. Yuffie crept closer to Dena.
"You're serious about the accident?" Yuffie asked. Not walking for four months was almost unheard of in this world, obviously.
Dena nodded. "Yep...I have the scar to prove it," she said as she lifted her skirt to reveal her left knee. There was a thin scar in the front her knee. "They inserted a rod into the bone of my leg so I didn't have to have a cast...if they didn't than I would have taken a lot longer to heal," she said.
Yuffie studied it for a moment, then shrugged as she stood and straightened again. "Well, thankfully that stuff isn't very common here..." she said. "Even though there are some things that potions can't cure..."
"I figured as much," Dena said, a breeze blew past her and raised goose bumps on her skin. "How much farther is it to the village?" she asked as she stifled a shiver. The potion had healed her wounds but it would do no good if they froze to death.
Yuffie pointed up the slope. "Just up that hill," she replied. "Last one up is a rotten Chocobo egg!" Yuffie laughed as she ran toward the hill. She was halfway up when she slipped on some ice and slid all the way back down and landed face first in to a snow drift... All that could be seen was her flailing legs.
Vincent sweatdropped, debating mentally if he should even bother helping her out or not. Finally coming to the conclusion that once she /did/ finally get out (and she would figure out a way, he could be sure of that much), she would chew him out, he walked over to her and grabbed one leg, yanking her out of the snow so that she hung upside-down. "...You really need to be more careful..." he commented.
Yuffie spat out the wad of half-melted snow from her mouth. "I meant to do that! I just wanted to make Dena feel better..." Yuffie said.
Dena blinked. "Did I say that I felt bad?" Dena asked Vincent. The man just dropped the ninja in to the snow bank.
"H-hey!" Yuffie shouted, flailing around a bit. "That's cold! Both socially and physically!"
"...You could get up..." Vincent suggested, watching her with a raised eyebrow.
Yuffie hmphed and stood up from the snow bank. "You're cruel." She said. Dena shook her head.
"Come on...let's get to the village and out of the cold," Dena said as she started to walk up the hill on the look out for ice. After all, she didn't want to end up like Yuffie, upside down in a snowdrift.
As Yuffie followed after the two, she huffed, crossing her arms and pouting slightly at Vincent. "...So what would you have done if Dena had slipped? Huh? Huuuh?"
"...Then I'd help her up..."
"AHA! ...Wait, what...?"
" I said that I'd help her up...Did I stutter?" Vincent asked as they reached the top of the hill.
Dena smiled happily, she could almost feel the warmth of the fires that were nestled in the hearths. She blinked and looked at Yuffie. "Did you ever get in touch with Cloud and the others?"
"Yeah, I did," Yuffie replied.
Dena motioned with her hand to keep talking. "And?"
"They'll be here soon," Yuffie finished. She then grinned. "In the meantime, let's hurry up and get a nice warm hotel room!"
…Remember…Reviews make the world go round…