Final Fantasy VII: The Story 2nd Instalment
Emerald Princess of Vernea
Chapter Eight
The old wooden doors of Shinra Mansion burst open, with such force that they flew back and crashed against the inside walls of the mansion. The sound of the crash echoed throughout the main hall, which was exactly the same as it was five years ago apart from an increase in the amount of dust in the air. In the doorway stood Cloud and the others, the light outside silhouetting their bodies so that their shadows fell on the ground, stretched so they reached deep inside the hall.
The hall was still as dark as ever, reminding Cloud of the first time he had stepped foot in the mansion. The curtains on the back windows were still drawn although they were falling apart, their structure disintegrating from the constant sunlight from outside. It wouldn't be long before they fell apart completely, letting the sunlight shine freely onto the oak floorboards.
Another thing that had not changed was the sense of unease – a sure sign that told him that Sephiroth was indeed somewhere within the mansion. The air was cold, as though something powerful and menacing had stepped through it and chilled the very air itself. And that could only be Sephiroth.
Together the group stepped past the doors and into the mansion. The floorboards creaked loudly underneath five pairs of heavy boots and one pair of stuffed mechanical feet, plus the pattering of Red XIII's paws. They echoed, too, joining the fading echo of the door crash. They were making no effort at being silent. They wanted Sephiroth to know that they were here, and they wanted him to prepare himself.
Once they were all inside the mansion, Barret and Cait worked together to close the old doors. They seemed to creak even louder as they slid slowly shut, creating a small faint bang as they connected and shut out the sunlight, leaving the hall in darkness apart from the single beam of light that shone in through the half-covered windows.
With the doors shut Cloud walked forward, walking to the very centre of the hall. He then stopped and looked around at the hall. There was no sign of Sephiroth, but he knew that he was somewhere within the mansion's ghostly walls. They would have no choice but to search the house room by room, and hope that no monsters had taken refuge within it. He was about to walk forward to the old door leading into the back corridor, when Tifa suddenly said his name.
She was standing in the corner of the hall, at an open doorway leading into a tiny side room. Aeris was beside her, and together they were looking at a small piece of paper that had gone yellow with age and was thick with dust. Tifa held out the paper to Cloud, and he looked down at it.
It certainly was a very old sheet of paper. The writing was scribbled very roughly and he could barely read it because of the dust. He blew on it, blowing carefully so as not to damage the paper, for it was very frail indeed. Thankfully it didn't fall apart in his hands, and with more of the dust gone he could read what was on the sheet.
I must get rid of all those that stand in the way of my research. Even that one from the Turks. I scientifically altered him, and put him to sleep in the basement. If you want to find him, then search the area.
But… this is merely a game I thought of. It is not necessary for you to participate if you don't want to.
Move the dial of the safe carefully, but quickly. You have 20 seconds. You cannot go past the numbers while turning. The four hints for the numbers are…
Dial 1 – The lid of the box with the most oxygen.
Dial 2 – Behind the ivory's short of tea and ray.
Dial 3 – The creak in the floor near the chair on the second floor… then to the left five steps, up nine steps, left two steps and up six steps.
When he had finished reading the contents of the yellowed-out letter, Cloud looked up at Tifa and Aeris and raised an eyebrow blankly. "So…" he said, sounding a little unimpressed by its contents. "What about it? It's just an old letter."
Aeris shook her head fiercely, her green eyes looking at Cloud in earnest. "Didn't you read it properly, Cloud?" she asked him. "There's someone trapped inside this mansion! We have to help them!"
"What yer talkin' 'bout?" Barret snapped angrily, his voice reverberating off the walls and the echo of his pounding feet sounding down the corridors. Not that he cared. "We're goin' after Sephiroth, not playin' a game of hide and seek!"
"I know that," Aeris replied. She turned away for a moment, taking a breath to compose her feelings. After those few moments had passed she turned back and looked around at everyone around her. "I'm sorry. I just can't go on knowing that someone is trapped and needs our help. I know this isn't the time to do this, but…" She looked at Tifa. "Tifa?"
Tifa looked back at her. She seemed as unsure as the others, but when she saw the look on Aeris's face, she realised that she felt the same. "We should help them," she said finally, turning her gaze firmly on Cloud.
One by one, Cloud felt everyone's gazes' turn to him, waiting for a decision. Cloud slowly passed his eyes over each of them, analysing their expressions. Everyone seemed to be in agreement on the idea, nodding slightly as he looked at them. Everyone except Barret, that is, who turned away stubbornly with his arms folded and his foot tapping impatiently on the floor. Even though he wasn't looking he seemed to know the unanimous decision of the others, and growled fiercely.
"Do whatever ya want!" he snapped.
Cloud sighed heavily and shook his head, while Tifa stifled a giggle under her breath. They were both secretly amused by Barret's apparent stubbornness, although they both knew that deep down he was in agreement over their decision. Aeris was right; they couldn't leave someone trapped inside the mansion.
Half an hour later the group were all gathered on the second floor of the mansion, inside one of the side rooms on the left side of the house. It was just opposite the bedrooms, and it was the only room in the entire house that had a safe inside. At that very moment Cloud was on his knees, preparing to input the four codes into the timed lock that kept the safe shut.
It had been no easy trick getting the codes. The clues had been very vague and hard to understand, but eventually they solved the riddles and found the numbers. The first clue had been on the ground floor in the side room opposite where they had found the letter, written on the lid of a box beside a large group of plants.
The second clue had been a little more difficult. The closest thing that came to 'ivory' was the old ivory piano on the ground floor. There was also a table in that particular room, along with a window where sunlight shone in, stopping just near the end of the piano. Sure enough, written on the floor behind the piano in rough figures was the next dial number.
The third turned out to be easier than it first appeared. There were not many chairs on the second floor, and finding one with a creak in the floorboard was easy. It took them a few attempts, but following the directions correctly led them to the third dial number, also scrawled on the floor.
At first they thought that was it, until they returned to the safe room and read the letter again. According to the letter there were four numbers needed to break the safe, but the letter only showed three clues. Upon closer inspection they noticed that there was more writing underneath the third clue, but it was very faint and deliberately worn out so that it was nigh on impossible to see.
They all had a go at trying to read the number written there. It was Red XIII who solved it after Tifa snatched the sheet away from Barret, who had threatened to rip it up out of sheer rage and fury. So now they had their four numbers, and Cloud prepared to put them into the safe.
"I have a bad feeling about this…" he said aloud as he touched the safe. There was a strong hidden power resonating within the thick layers of metal that kept it secure. He could feel it as he touched it – a power of rage and strength.
He glanced back at the others. They were all stood behind him in a single line, their weapons and materia ready for anything that emerged from the safe. They could all sense the power raging within the safe as it resonated around the room as well, so they were all prepared for an instant strike if anything hostile were to emerge. They nodded at Cloud, who nodded back and turned to the safe.
In the deadly silence that followed, Cloud began to input the numbers into the safe. According to the letter they had only 20 seconds in which to input the numbers, so he needed perfect silence in order to get the numbers in.
The dial began to turn, the faint clicks echoing very softly in the room. As Cloud hit the first number – Right 36 – a slightly louder click could be heard. Instantly Cloud began to twist the dial the other way towards the second number. Exact precision was needed to crack the safe, and the pressure made his heart beat rapidly in his chest and in his ears, drowning out the sound of the clicks.
"Left 10…" Click. "Right 59…" Click. There were only a few seconds left on the timer, and Cloud could feel the rage contained within the safe growing as he began to turn the dial towards the last number – the one that would unlock the safe. "Right 97…"
A loud click filled the room as the safe unlocked. Cloud stood up, grabbing the door of the safe and pulling it open, exposing the inside of the safe.
As the safe door opened a loud screeching roar filled the room, followed by a cloud of steam that surrounded the safe and seeped across the floor like a liquid, curling like tendrils across the wood. The rest of the group stood waiting as the steam continued to thicken, waiting for the creature to emerge.
Slowly and steadily, the monster began to emerge from the safe. Its body made a sickened squishing and bone-crunching sound as it squeezed out of the safe. It stamped one thick blue and green foot onto the floor, followed by a squishy red and yellow tentacle that moved of its own will across the floor like antennae searching for food. It then stepped out of the steam and into full view of the group awaiting it.
It was a very misshapen creature, probably forged from a combination of different levels of mako energy. Its body was composed of two parts, split completely in half and joined together by squishy flesh.
The left-hand side of its body was entirely physical, with a firm body made up of a large rock-shaped head and a fierce yellow eye. Its leg and its arm were incredibly muscular and firm, covered in the same tough blue skin and tipped with sharp claws that made it an arsenal of physical destruction.
The right-hand side of the creature was entirely the opposite. Its firm flesh was replaced by soft, almost fiery looking skin, for it was burned a bright red. Many long tentacles like heavy eyebrows shielded most of its face, sweeping to the side like flames. Tentacles made up its arm and leg, each of them wavering around in search of prey, making it a weapon of magical force. Yet despite all these differences the creatures menacing grin was one long smile, tipped with razor-sharp teeth.
"NOW!" Cloud shouted from beside the safe.
On his command, Barret and all the others released the power of their materia in one powerful strike towards the creature. Large blasts of fire and ice stormed through the air and struck the blue half of the creature right in its face. It convulsed and screeched loudly, the magical energies burning through its weak magical defence. It cried out more as two blasts of dark energy merged around it, shrinking its body and then expanding it.
That was enough. As the flames and ice swept around it the creature shuddered, and the blue half exploded with a sudden poof of steam that filled the air. That left only the red half, the magical half, behind.
"Quickly! Before it reforms!" came Cloud's voice from behind as he saw the faint tinges of more red flesh begin to emerge from the creature's side.
The body was already half grown as the second attack came. The new red flesh that made up the rest of the magical half's body was blown to shreds as bullets poured in from ahead, piercing through the newly formed flesh with ease. As the bullets stopped then came the second part of the attack as Yuffie, Tifa and Cait ran forward together. Yuffie sliced with her shuriken while Cait used his megaphone to pound through the wounded flesh, making the impact of Yuffie's slashes much more devastating. Tifa worked alongside him, her punches forcing the wounds to grow.
They stepped back the moment the creature began to shudder. The magical creature's body twisted and convulsed, its tentacles out of control as they whipped around the room. A deep red glow began to burn in the centre of the creature, growing and growing until it enveloped the entire creature. Then, with a loud pop, the creature burst into flames and disintegrated in seconds, the steam from its body rising and dispersing into the air.
With the creature gone, the steam quickly began to clear. The sound died away too, leaving the room in silence again. No one moved until the steam had fully cleared, leaving only the open door of the safe behind it. The creature had been easy to defeat, but only because it had been locked away in the safe for so long. It had weakened after so many years, making it a cinch to defeat.
Cloud moved round from the side of the safe and peered into the dark doorway. At first he thought it was empty, until he caught a glimpse of two objects hidden within the darkness. One was a key; the other was a ball of red summon materia. The materia of Odin, he soon realised, for hidden in its crystalline form was the faint image of a powerful lance that only the legendary Odin could bear.
"We've got it," he said to the others, picking up both the materia and the key he assumed to be the key to the basement. Shutting the safe door again he turned to Tifa and Aeris, both of whom looked very relieved. "Let's go."
With the key in hand they left the safe room, now prepared to head down to the basement to rescue the person that was seemingly trapped inside the mansion. It was a lucky thing that they had to head into the dark basement, for that would be the most likely place where they would find Sephiroth, too.
Cloud led the way through the mansion now, remembering the secret shaft in one of the second floor rooms that led straight down into the basement, which he discovered when looking for Sephiroth the first time.
Sure enough it was still there – the stone shaft with its stonework that didn't quite match, slightly ajar as though someone had passed through and not shut it properly. It had to be Sephiroth, for there should have been no one else inside the mansion. He pulled the hidden door open with ease and peered down into the spiral staircase.
It still made him feel a bit dizzy, looking down at the dark spirals heading deeper into shadows. He could still see the bottom, and a very faint glow of light there. With the others close behind him he stepped into the shaft and began to lead the way down, one hand against the walls to steady himself.
It was so silent in the shaft he could hear everyone's breath as they breathed nervously inside the shaft. There was a cold chill in the air and the faint scent of something living – and that made them nervous. It was a fairly foul scent, not nauseating, but enough to make them hold their noses in disgust as they continued to descend towards the bottom of the shaft.
They found out what the smell came from once they reached the bottom of the staircase, and looked down at the floor. The smell came from various droplets of droppings that lined the floor here and there – something Cloud didn't remember. As they looked up they saw the owners of the droppings: hanging from the walls and the ceiling by their claws, with their leathery wings wrapped firmly around their bodies. A few of the bats looked at Cloud and the others, a peculiar clicking noise coming from their mouths as they tried to see what they were.
"Bats," said Red XIII, his keen eyes able to see the small, furry forms of the bats more clearly. "This place has become a nesting ground for bats."
"Let's move on," said Cloud, who was looking further down the tunnel. "Sephiroth is here somewhere. I can feel him."
With that he headed down the tunnel, carefully dodging the various piles of bat droppings. The door to the hidden laboratory was very visible now, and a bright light was glowing through the edges of the door.
He was about to walk straight up to that door and barge in, but before he could he suddenly stopped, feeling his fist clench around the hard thin form of metal he was holding in his hands. It was the basement key, and it surely wasn't for the laboratory. He suddenly remembered and looked to his left, towards the other door that he had only so briefly looked at five years ago.
Back then it had still been locked, and it still was. The padlock that kept the door firmly shut was old but still strong, although it looked like the key would fit. He took one glance at the laboratory door and then at Tifa and Aeris, before finally going to the other door and sliding the key into the lock. Sephiroth probably wasn't going anywhere right then.
The door unlocked with ease, and opened a little as Cloud pulled the padlock free. He pushed it open and it creaked eerily, the sound of the creek echoing down the corridor. It made Cloud and all the others freeze, glancing back towards the laboratory to see if they had disturbed whoever it was inside, if it was indeed Sephiroth. Luckily there was no shift in the light, so they turned back to the door and headed inside.
Once they were all in the room Cait Sith shut the door behind them, leaving it only slightly ajar so they could hear if someone emerged from the laboratory outside. Then they looked around.
As they looked around the room they immediately thought the letter must have been some kind of horrible joke. There was no one in the small square room, but there were an awful lot of coffins. All of them were open, lying here and there, each one untouched with their lids lying abandoned beside them.
There was only one coffin that was closed. It was not the grandest of coffins and was not properly sealed down like a used coffin should have been, but it was the only one that stood out. In the silence that followed they also realised that there were faint noises coming from inside that coffin.
Everyone immediately froze, their muscles tightening in fear, as the noises grew louder for a second, before subsiding back into faint mumbling again. It reminded Cloud of the clones outside, until he realised that these mumbles did not come from mindless ramblings, but rather the mumblings of someone in discomfort.
It was Aeris who plucked up the courage to move first. While the others stood frozen around her she moved forward and stood at the edge of the coffin, looking down at the nameless lid that kept it down. She pressed her head against the side of the coffin and listened to the faint mumbles inside. They were definitely human and in clear discomfort. Carefully she knocked on the side of the coffin and the mumbles stopped, and she was unaware of the person… or creature… that was slowly opening its eyes inside. She knocked again, and a voice spoke out from inside the coffin.
"…To wake me from the nightmare," came the voice, deep and somewhat monotonous, lacking emotion. The lid of the coffin began to shift slightly, the dust sliding off. "Who is it?"
As the voice spoke angrily the lid of the coffin suddenly shook violently, causing Yuffie to scream and grasp onto Cait's mechanical Mog body for comfort. The coffin continued to shake, the golden clasps that kept the lid down bursting open until the lid was free. It flew off instantly, held by some powerful magical force that lifted it away from the coffin until it rested calmly on the floor. Everyone looked at the open coffin, adrenaline rushing through them as they looked at the figure lying inside.
Slowly the figure began to sit up. He rose steadily from the waist up, his arms not moving, his head craned back in sleep. Once he was upright he began to lift his head and gazed upon the group standing fearfully in front of him, his dark eyes looking at them wearily.
He was certainly a very enigmatic-looking man. He looked to be in his late twenties, although the expression on his face made them think he was somewhat older. His skin was very pale as though it had not seen sunlight for a long period of time, although there were still a few faint traces of colour left. He also had a head of long black hair that was tied back, although he let a few long strips of fringe hang around his face. These were kept up by a red bandana tied around his head.
He was dressed in a black tunic-of-sorts, which was mostly covered up by a long red cape that flowed around his shoulders and down his back. The cape had a large collar that shielded the lower half of his face, such as his mouth and chin. On his feet were a pair of knee-high boots over black trousers.
What was most peculiar about the red-clad man was his left arm. While his right arm was normal and human looking, his left arm was most certainly not. It was as though he had been given a different arm made of golden-brown metal or very firm flesh – they couldn't tell which. It had many joints, especially at the fingers. Instead of normal fingers, this arm had longer, much more pointy fingers, as though they were claws made for attacking.
The others all stared in awe and in fear at the man who had so mysteriously moved the coffin lid and sat up to gaze at them. He was a man locked in the bottom of a deep, dark basement, sleeping in an unmarked coffin away from the sunlight…
They sincerely hoped that vampires were just legend.
Emerald: Yay! New character. More personalities to figure out. I apologise for parts of Vincent's description – I don't actually know what colour his eyes are, or if the arm is an actual monster arm or not. If someone could fill me in it will save me making any mistakes and being flamed by some people, since there are many Vincent fans out there.
Additional: Thanks for pointing out the errors. I have corrected them. This chapter was written at 6 o'clock in the morning so it was no wonder I made the odd error.