(BGM: .hack GU – AIDA)
Spiders.
Giant demonic spiders.
Giant demonic spiders with human female torsos.
Giant demonic spiders with human female torsos and bladed forelegs.
Giant demonic spiders with human female torsos and bladed forelegs that when killed improperly would burst into hundreds of smaller demonic spiders.
And there were a LOT of them.
Dante, son of Sparda, wielding the large broadsword Rebellion, severed another of many Arachne in two…unfortunately that released a wave of smaller spiders that crawled out from its dying body. Dante jumped away, since the smaller ones were nowhere near as much of a threat as the bigger ones, leaving the creatures alone.
Lady, the brunette with many scars, gunned down another one. Rolling under the swing of a second, she popped a small grenade behind her and kicked off the back of yet another, narrowly evading the ball of fire the first erupted into. While in mid-air, she whipped around, swinging her best weapon, the Kalina-ann, to her front, pulling the trigger and launching not just a small rocket, but also herself. The rocket exploded onto the back of the second demon, as she flipped back around, swinging the rocket-launcher behind her, and using its grappling blade as a weapon to pierce the head of yet another demon. Like with Dante, this one began bursting into small spiders, but unlike Dante, she pulled out a semi-automatic weapon and began firing at the cluster before dashing away to deal with one of the bigger ones.
Alicia crossed her arms, the glowing silver gauntlets deflecting the blow. A quick pivot on her left foot and she drove her right into the side of one of the spider demons. A flick of her left wrist and a small sphere of light was launched into it, ripping it to shreds as it suddenly expanded. She sung her weight backwards, popping off the ground and twirling out of the way of another demons' swing. Landing on her right foot, she pushed off and slammed her left fist into the demons' 'face'. It reared back and she followed up by extending her right leg as she twisted her entire body around on her left heel and brought it down in an axe kick, severing the demon in twain. She dashed off to deal with another one…completely missing how the monster disintegrated into smaller spiders…
Zero shuddered. He didn't take part in this battle. He couldn't. It was a little known phobia of his…but he couldn't stand spiders. One or two he could handle, as he'd just kill them in whatever was the fastest way with the least amount of possibility that it'd survive…but when there were more than three…he started shaking. His body would shiver in fear, his hairs would stand on end…his mind would begin playing tricks on him…
Hundreds…no…th-thousands! Closer…they're coming closer! "N-no…" He choked out. "S-stay away!" "Pull yourself together!" They're coming…closer…closer…closer…
He tripped over the curb of the street they were fighting on. Falling flat on his back…he watched in horror as the wave of tiny arachnids scuttled their way to him. What nobody knew…was that if there were too many…his mind would blank…and nobody noticed…
"Burn them! Freeze them! Dammit do SOMETHING!" S-so many…I…I… Shuddering even more, the bearer of chaos scrambled backwards on his hands, kicking out in fear as one jumped a bit too close to him. He gave a shout of horror as he himself scuttled back as fast as he could until he hit a wall.
The shout alerted the other three…and they saw something none of them expected. The mighty Zero, the great warrior who could match and possibly even best Dante himself…was scared.
No…he was terrified.
His heart beat tripled in speed. He could feel the blood rushing through his veins.
His eyes widened.
The pounding of his beating heart blocking all but the sound of clattering pincers.
Unknown to him, his body was giving off a small very disturbingly black glow. It was faint, but it was pulsing slowly.
"G-guh…" Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck!
The glow became stronger.
"What the hell is he doing?!"
"Is he…scared?"
"Zero? ZERO!"
Symbols on his hands began to glow in tune with his body. The mark of Destruction…
Alicia, who was running to Zero's aid…stopped.
Zero saw her movement suddenly halt…and felt it…
Eyes wide in tredeptation…he turned his head. A sticky white film was dripping down his shoulder.
The pulsing stopped.
He followed the line of goo upwards…where he stared into the eyes of an Arachne…slowly crawling down the side of the building.
The symbols on his hands now became present on his forehead, and unseen by anyone, his back, blazing a deep black.
Help…
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!"
A dome of black overtook his body. With blinding speed it expanded, engulfing the entire city. If one were to look from the space above that world…they would see a black sphere suddenly grow from a tiny spot violet lances of electricity flying around its edges as bright white symbols, runes, kanji and otherwise…began emerging all over the dome…and then collapse upon itself…leaving naught more than a giant crater where there once was a bustling city.
(BGM: Final Fantasy X – Hurry!)
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"
A piercing scream ripped through Kairi's mind.
"JESUS SHIT!"
The red haired girl practically leapt out of her skin when the sudden noise invaded her thoughts.
Suddenly, a massive paw tried to slam down upon the girl. The momentary distraction did nothing to dissuade her however, as she threw her weight backwards into a back handspring, narrowly evading the strike. She shook her head to clear it.
What the hell was that?! That almost sounded like…Zero…
The large blue-purple furred monster before her roared in irritation. Kairi's eyes narrowed as she raced for the monster's left leg. It reared back, ready to crush her, only to topple to the side as she brought her keyblade along a black line at its heel. It twisted its body and lashed out with its right foreleg, only to have its claws sliced clean off, followed by half of its arm being severed in a single swing.
King Behemoth. Tidus said that when it dies, it uses its build up energy to cast a powerful spell called Meteor. Of course, he also said that it automatically has a spell cast on it called Mighty Guard that is supposed to seriously reduce all damage dealt…along with automatic recovery…
She hopped away from the thrashing beast, deftly evading a sudden burst of flame where she once stood.
Well, I don't see it recovering from anything I'm doing to it…damn; this power makes things almost too easy.
She then saw it. She'd dealt enough damage to make its hold on life weaken to the point where she could see its end. Ducking under another swing and lobbing off the offending appendage, she raced along next to its body, jumping into the air as it slammed its stub of an arm on the ground where she once stood. She did a few flips and then jammed her keyblade right under its left shoulder, right into a big black dot on its body. Instantly it burst into pyreflies…no sign of any spell being cast.
Must not have had time to gather the energy properly…I've wasted enough time here…I have to get to the others!
SFX: BOOM
The entire group was sent flying backwards. Everyone was battered and breathing heavily. The true enemy, a Cellar taking the form of Seymour Guado, had been beating them backward left and right. Not even Kairi could get close enough to deliver a single blow. Even Naminé's new abilities weren't able to pierce his defenses.
"It is indeed a pity…though beautiful as ever Lady Yuna, you still lack the strength to stand against me…it is sad such beauty and will must go to waste."
He raised a hand and a ball of flame appeared. The pale, blue haired half-breed tossed the sphere casually only to watch in mild annoyance as a crescent wave of air sliced through it. Once again, Kairi and the others stood, defiant to his will.
"I see…very well then…"
He made a series of strange gestures…at least; they were strange to the Keyblade Wielders…to the others…
"A prayer? At a time like this?"
And that's when four green orbs rose from the ground, casting themselves to the heavens.
"A SUMMON?!"
Indeed. A silver hook on a lengthy chain dropped from the sky, crashing into the ground and into a pool of murky browns, reds, and black. From within, the hook dragged what looked like a mummified Venus flytrap with bound arms, and a single exposed eye.
"A-Anima?"
"Now my pet…destroy them…"
"Uhh…guys…that thing is covered in lines. Like, every inch of it. I…don't think that's normal…"
The creature gave a pain filled moan…as a distortion of light began gathering near its eye.
Paine deadpanned. "We're boned aren't we?"
But suddenly…it stopped.
Seymour looked irritated. "Why have you stopped?!"
The ground began to rumble. Anima's lone eye widened in horror.
(BGM: Persona 3 – Shato U)
The air before the group suddenly began to ripple.
"Um…guys…what's going on?"
The ground's rumbling became even more violent. The entire world seemed to flicker and distort. Colors became inverted as parts of the floating buildings around them spontaneously shattered and crumbled.
"What is this trickery?!" Seymour was livid. But not just that…
He was afraid.
Anima was screeching in fear.
That…was not normal.
Suddenly the ripple before them changed. Sparks of violet began racing around the edges. Rings of dark blue began wafting from the center of the rift. The rumbling of the ground grew fiercer as a growing noise similar to the rush of a waterfall became louder and louder with each passing second.
A glyph comprised of three rune encrypted circles arranged in a triangle, overlapping one another, within a larger rune covered circle appeared in front of the group. More symbols, some kanji, some random runes and even some Glyphs of Yevon appeared around the larger circle.
The rushing noise reached a crescendo as the air in front of the glyph; (behind it in the case of the Keyblade/Gullwing Group) seemed to crack…and then shatter.
"What…is that?"
Seymour got his answer as a massive beam of black erupted from the hole in reality, engulfing not just Anima, but himself as well. He didn't even have time to scream as the literal wall of black overtook his body, crushing and ripping it to pieces.
Outside of the giant apparition that was Sin, the horrified Spirans watched as a large black beam seemed to erupt from the massive floating creature's rear, and tear through the sky like a knife. The beam impacted upon the highest point of Bevelle, creating a massive explosion of dark energy, eradicating all existence within a five kilometer radius of the once Holy City. The black beam had the secondary effect of also turning Sin into a massive sphere of goo that burst into pyreflies moments after Bevelle was leveled…
(BGM: Persona 3 – Mistic)
"What in Yu Yevon's name was that ya?!"
Everyone had gathered back at Besaid Island. Alicia was stroking a shuddering but unconscious Zero's arm. Small sparks of dark energy would begin to lance around his body, but Alicia, Kairi and Naminé would all begin to radiate their own energy and settled the sudden spikes.
Dante and Lady were nowhere to be found.
"First Sin shows up again, then some black beam shoots out of its butt and completely levels Bevelle!"
Zero shuddered again, muttering something about spiders.
"Hey Sora…" Tidus inquired. "Who is that guy?"
Kairi answered. "His name is Zero. He's a powerful warrior capable of not only manipulating elements like they were nothing, but also intense speeds and swordplay. But…I don't know how all this happened…"
"We were on another world." Everyone turned to Alicia.
"He took me to the place where he got Beowulf, those gauntlets from a little while ago. I met the original owner of them, a man named Dante…and we were practicing when a bunch of demons showed up. Spider demons. They had the torso of a human woman, but the rest of their body was arachnid. Zero…"
She watched him shudder again.
"Zero…apparently is deathly afraid of spiders. He looked so…helpless…scared…I've never seen a reaction to something like that. He didn't even fight…he just stumbled backward away from them…"
She gently stroked a strand of hair from his face…noting that it was pale white.
"He was terrified. He just kept shaking and mumbling until he tripped. The thing about those demons was if we killed them a certain way, they'd end up spawning a bunch of very small spiders as they died. We killed too many that way…and thousands of the little things were crawling around…he just kept backing away…looking so horrified…and then…one of the big ones climbed down the building he was propped against…and he saw it…"
She held his hand in both of hers.
"I didn't notice…none of us did…not until he'd tripped. But…his hands…his body…he was glowing. The big one…it seemed to…drip…something on him…and he saw it…and then looked up into its beady red eyes…and I swear time itself stopped…"
Kairi finished. "And then he screamed…didn't he?"
Alicia looked to the red-head. "Yes…how did you know?"
Naminé fielded that. "I…she…we…heard it. In our minds. It really threw me off. I was in the middle of inscribing when it happened and I almost got my head ripped off because of it."
Tidus cut in. "What happened next?"
"I…he…exploded. Just…something…a massive wall of energy just erupted from him. It completely decimated the demons though…but it kept going. I pushed past it and just held on to him as best I could…the shock…must have knocked him unconscious. But…next thing I know I'm in front of you all."
Zero moaned. His eyes fluttered open.
"Zero…"
"What…hit me?"
"You did…apparently."
"Kai…ri? Wait…how…"
"You're on Spira. The Cellar has been destroyed, apparently by your hand no less."
"Spira? Wait…I…what?"
"Also in the process you leveled a place…umm what was it called again?"
"Bevelle." Wakka growled out.
"Yeah, Bevelle."
Zero seemed to shrug that aside. "Eh…never liked that place anyway…Fuckin' delusional Yevonites and their bullshit hypocrisy." Unaware of his audience he sat up and continued.
"Machina is bad! They say. Oh wait, only some of it is bad. They say. You can fuck around in giant machina powered bowls of water but you can't have them help fight against a giant fuckoff demon with both dark and gravity manipulation without being branded a heretic! Fuckin Yevon…damn was it satisfying to zombie that fucker and just watch him Curaga himself to death."
Subconsciously he called a glass of water from across the room to his side. Snatching out of the air he gulped it all down in one go, then continued his tirade.
"I mean son of a slut, already had to watch poor Yuna blast her own best fucking friends in the Aeons to shit. Bad enough we had to damn near get our shit wrecked by Fuckin Jecht in the form of some big mother fuck…gotta admit though that was a bitchin song. Stupid Fuckin Yevon…FUCK YUNALESCA!"
That shout made everyone jump.
"Had to take her on three Fuckin times! THREE! I mean yeah the scene before the bitch was awesome, I mean, it's not every day you see Auron get pimp slapped by a friggin Zombie…albeit a sexy as hell zombie but a zombie none the less. But FUCK that bitch. I mean shit what is it with Yevon and zombies?! You say Bevelle is gone? I say good riddance…Fuckin place had too much Fuckin bullshit to stick around. Damn Yevon…music was good, I'll give 'em that. Hymn of the Fayth is one of my personal favorites…always did manage to calm me down…but shit…people runnin things…tch…dickweeds. God…spiders…fuck spiders…"
He shivered again.
"Bloody Fuckin spiders…why'd it have to be spiders? Why not bees? Bees are annoying enough. Why spiders? Fuck…got half a mind to find a bunch of caves and blow the Fuckin places to hell…less spiders in the world the better…" He shuddered. "Fuck spiders…"
He felt a pair of arms wrap around him. "Hey…they're gone ok? You don't have to worry about them anymore."
"Aint gone…tch…Fuckin bastards'll never be gone…they're everywhere…little Fuckin pricks…"
They watched as his eyes began drooping.
"Fuck I'm tired…"
"Relax Zero…you need rest."
"Guess I do…can't stand the little bastards…"
Alicia gently pushed his chest, slowly coercing his body to lie down.
"I hate spiders too. Probably not as much as you, but they still suck."
"Should make…a club…the Anti-Spider Brigade or something…I call president."
"I call vice president."
"You can't be vice president."
Alicia frowned. "Why not?"
"You're the first lady…can't be first lady and Vice President at…the same time."
She blushed slightly. "Does the first lady get to stand by the President's side?"
"First Lady's…president's…wife…"
She blushed harder.
"of course…I'm…not…letting you…go…"
She smiled as he faded back into sleep.
Rikku awed. "That's so cuuuute!" Alicia just flushed deeper.
Tidus was a bit unnerved. "How did he know all those things?"
Kairi shook her head. "We don't know…he just…knows stuff about places…"
"I don't like what he was sayin about Yevon."
Yuna frowned. "But he was right. Everything he said had its points. You may not like it Wakka, but everything he said was true."
Tidus jumped in. "And he did say he liked the Hymn."
"Arright brudda…you got me convinced for now ya? We'll grill 'im later."
"Alicia…"
"I'm staying here. I don't know how stable his mind is…it's almost like he had a psychotic break down back there…I don't…want to lose him."
"Alright…we'll be back in the morning. Get some rest too ok?"
"Kairi…what's it like? Having him in your mind?"
"I…can't really say. I don't notice it very often…because he doesn't go into my head unless it's important…so I tend to forget we can even do that."
"I see…Good Night Kairi."
"Night Alicia…"
"The boy's display of power…"
The sound of chains could be heard.
"Able to pierce dimensions…this…will be useful…"
In front of the woman…
A hole in reality…like a broken window…
This…was begun at four AM.
This reflects myself.
I have a pretty intense fear of spiders. Not so much a fear…but seeing them in close proximity…or at all really…just…shuts my mind down. Before I wrote this, I'd encountered no less than six of them, varying sizes, in close proximity to me in the bathroom.
It was made worse by the fact that I seem to subconsciously call the bathroom a second sanctuary. I spend a lot of time just sitting and musing about things while on the toilet, or letting the water run on me in the shower as I spend time lost in thought.
If I see too many of them in a short amount of time, I just start shivering. Of course I try to kill them as fast as possible without getting too close…but the more of them I see, the more freaked out I get. Sure the ones around here are probably harmless, but…
I just hate the feeling of having shit crawling on me. And my senses are very sharp, so the slightest twitch of a hair will make me flinch…and after seeing a bunch of those things…ugh…
You saw an example of Destruction when unleashed by rage, and in this chapter, you see an example of what happens when it is released by Fear.
My original plans for this chapter was to start with Kairi taking out a King Behemoth, then switching around to Sora, Riku, Roxas and Naminé. Then everyone against Seymour inside Sin, and then Zero and Alicia blasting their way in with a Gummy Ship. It was going to be hilariously wild and awesome.
Obviously that didn't happen.
RCRS: I think that counts as rambling, though not so much absurd, just uncoordinated. We're both lacking motivation…but I hope this gives you a bit of a boost for your next chapter kit.
D&S Master: Well…as strong as Emo-pants and Choco-hair are, Zero focuses not so much on strength (unless he's pissed) as he does speed. Combine his speed with the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception, and you've got a living weapon.
I hope this is liked…my hands hurt now…