Mission 1: Curse of the Bloody Puppets. Open the Cursed Door.
Author's Note: I know it's impossible for a person in a prosthetic body to have an adrenaline rush. I know it's futile to have said rush but it's the thought that counts. Also, I'm using a Devil May Cry walkthrough to help me write this. ( Devil_May_Cry_-_PS2/Walkthrough) I never played the game so I don't know where the doors in the foyer are located EXACTLY. I have seen youtube walkthroughs but I can't remember where the doors are located from those either on acount of the players who made said walkthroughs don't slow down. I know I could have paused the videos but, knowing me, I still wouldn't be able to note the locations of the doors. Sorry for the long note.
[Communicator]
{Demonic voice such as Alastor, Ifrit and Sparda(Sword)'s voices}
"Spoken"
"Booming voice"
'Thought'
(Harrier: Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. 8:33am.)
"Four minutes to drop-off. Stand at the door." Major Kusanagi said as she pointed to a spot in front of the bay door. Lydia stood and walked to the aforementioned spot. "Two minutes to drop-off. Opening bay doors." the Major said as she hit a button on a console to her left. As the bay doors opened, Lydia stepped to the edge and took her retractable Katana, which was nothing more than a hilt when retracted, and put it between her teeth. "Good luck and Godspeed." Motoko said while giving Lydia, who jumped with an excited squeel, a thumbs-up.
[I still wish I had an adrenal gland but people don't always get what they wish for.] Lydia said, via internal communicator, as she began her freefall. Seconds later she heard the familiar laughter of Ishikawa [But you might not need said adrenal gland with half the stunts you pull on a daily basis.] which elicited a chuckle from the cyborg in question [True but to actually FEEL the adrenaline, not imagine it, would be a great thing for me.] was her next response before asking [So, Ishikawa, to what do I owe the pleasure of hearing your voice?] with a touch of sarcasm. Ishikawa also had a tendency to get on her nerves. But she liked him. All field agents like him. He keeps them well informed. That and he has no cybernetic enhancements. Lydia on the other hand...had no choice but to accept the body.
The clacking of keys on a keyboard was heard for a brief moment as Section 9's oldest field operative looked up the satellite imagery of Mallet Island [Well, for one thing, the supernatural and paranormal phenomena that's been occurring on the island.] [Like what?] [Such as crops growing out of season and, apparently, the warping of the Cathedral.] [I guess stuff like that's been happening since feudal times.] [You got that right, Lyd. At least that's all according to legend.] [Wait, you mean to tell me that I may or may not see my favorite winter fruits, which I can only LOOK at, grow in the summer?] Lydia said the last part as she oriented herself to land on her feet, making a small crater on impact.
[Yeah. You might. But it's been dormant for a long time, now. You might not see so much as a weed growing on the island.] Ishikawa answered [Nice landing, by the way. Batou gives you a 7.5, the Major gives you a 9.8 with a suggestion that you work on your form, the Chief gives you a perfect 10 for the dive but a 7 for the landing. You didn't exactly stick it.] he added the last part with a chuckle
After dodging a collapsing sandstone arch she raised her Desert Eagle. After a sweep of the area she lowered the gun but was ready to raise it in a heartbeat. Halfway up the path she noticed a side path where she found a Yellow Orb "Strange yellow stone, I know not what your purpose is, but..." she paused, "...something tells me I'm going to need you." while putting the Orb into an empty pouch on her harness and responds to Ishikawa's score with [What do you give me?] [Perfect 10 for the dive and a 9.5 for the landing. Nice crater.] Ishikawa said the last part with a chuckle [Very funny..] Lyd stated 'Congradulations! You used zero percent snark in your compliment. Or maybe you did and no one noticed.' she thought to herself as she jumped onto a ledge.
[You guys seeing what I'm seeing?] she asked via coms [Ishikawa's got you on satelite.] Major Kusanagi answered [You gonna go towards the light?] Batou joked [Major? Can you remind me to smack Batou over the head with his own exercise equipment when I get back to Niihama? I might forget.] Lydia asked, earning a chuckle from everyone except Batou, who growled [If you want, I can do it for you.] Motoko suggested [Nah. It wouldn't be the same.] Lydia countered as she picked up the Blue Orb Fragment, dusted it off and slipped it into the same pouch as the Yellow Orb.
[Commencing radio silence until the end of my mission.] was the last thing she said before switching her built-in communicator off as she dropped down from the ledge and continued toward the castle [Affirmative. Good luck.] is what Motoko would have said if Lyd hadn't already severed the connection. When Lydia got to the castle's front doors, she tried to pull them open, no luck. Not wanting to try cutting it open, medieval architecture is sturdy stuff, she opted to find an alternate entrance, which came in the form of a hole in the wall.
Shrugging, even adding a "It'll have to do.", she squeezed through the hole, Desert Eagle first and gaped at the castle foyer, catching her Katana as it fell from it's position betwixt her teeth. For a structure that's been standing since feudal times, it's clearly seen better days. The stairs leading to the second floor were destroyed, bronze statues were heavily tarnished and a few tapestries were either covered in layers of dust, hanging by a, as in one, nail, on the floor or tattered to the point of just being the bar from which they hung "What the frak[1] happened here." she asked, still gaping at her surroundings.
Her gaping was brought to a grinding halt as her ice-blue optics landed on a Red Orb roughly the size of her head "I wonder what that is." she said as she walked up to it, ready to pick it up with her left hand. She was unable to pick up the orb as it flew up and disappeared into the left vambrace[2] on her suit. "What the hell?" she asked, flabbergasted at what just happened. "The orb disappeared." she said, "The frakking orb just disappeared." she looked into the pouch she put the Yellow Orb and Blue Orb Fragment and they, too, had disappeared. "Okay, Lydia, don't lose your head over this." she told herself, "They're obviously made of magic and are disappearing into you, to be used some time in the future." she continued, "Yeah. That's probably why they dieappeared." she added with a chuckle.
After her bit of near insanity[3] she continued pickinng up the orbs, using her parkour skillz[4] to get to the orbs on the third floor, even jumped into a cage to find a second blue Orb Fragment. Deciding to relieve a bit of stress from Batou, she decided to smash the suits of armor and was rewarded with more Red Orbs "Damn. They hide these things everywhere, don't they?" she asked no one in particular as the Orbs flew into her left vambrace. She looked at it and found that, on closer inspection, the orbs went into her... "So this must be where the Red Orbs are going." she deduced, looking at the pendant[5] tied round her left wrist[6] and focused on collecting more Red Orbs.
Next she noticed 2 doors. The first door was near the corner and it was glowing red with demonic faces swirling on it's surface. She decided not to go near it until she checked the second door, which was locked. Fuming, she went to the first door and tried it but upon touching it, a hand grabbed her and, rather forcefully, pulled 45 Red Orbs from her and tossed her aside before shattering. "Well! THAT was rude." Lydia stated as she got to her feet and noticed the door "YES!" she shouted, pumping her fist as she said the word, not caring about what had just occurred.
She pulled the handle with all her cybernetically enhanced strength and, to her surprise, the door came open rather easily, causing her to fall on her butt. "Why'd I switch my receptors on after the landing?" she winced as she got up, rubbing her sore backside slightly and walking through the door, which closed on it's own the second she passed through "O…kay?" she awkwardly stated before noticing another Blue Orb Fragment behind some suits of armor, which she moved out of the way before picking up said fragment. She climbed up a flight of stairs and found "Puppets?" she asked upon seeing them.
Indeed they were puppets. Marionettes dressed in various forms, and colours, of the Jester outfit. Some had masks, others had half masks and the ones that didn't have masks looked like their face had decayed away from years of just sitting here. In this room. No tarp. Lydia almost tripped but managed to right herself by putting a hand on the overturned cabinet. She unconsciously looked up and spied where said cabinet came from "Elevator going up." she joked to no one in particular as she jumped through the hole, grabbing onto a wooden beam, from which she hung as she scanned the area, turning her arm so she herself could turn around.
Once her scan was complete she swung from the beam and landed neatly next to a marionette that was holding a Rusty Key. "Curiouser and curiouser..." she said as she examined the key. Not sure what to do with it she slipped it into the pouch she, until recently, used to hold the Yellow Orb and blue Orb Fragment and started for the hole in the floor until a pair of knives zipped past her head. She glanced at the Marionette, now in a post-throwing position, as it straightened and produced more knives.
Lydia, deeming the creature hostile in her Dradis[7], raised her Katana, the blade extending when she pressed a button on the hilt and proceeded to methodically disassemble the marionette, surprised to find that, with every blow she delivered, blood leaked from the wounds. She made a mental note to call the local psychiatric hospital in Niihama and make an appointment. Once she was done with the first, the two downnstairs were beying for her white blood. 'Why not oblige them?' she thought as she retracted the Katana's blade, put the hilt between her teeth once more. She leapt onto the cabinet on the floor below.
(a/n: Hellsing reference. Alucard pulling his gun out and leveling it at whatever he was going to shoot at was ALWAYS awesome. Nay! It's EPIC!)
The flow of time seemed to slow as she reached for the Jackal and, slowly, pulled it from it's holster on her lower back, whipping it up because of the weight and leveling it on the first of the two remaining Marionettes. A click was heard as she pulled the trigger and the inner workings of the gun came to life and the firing pin struck the 13mm cartridge, ejectinng the bullet in a plume of white smoke. The bullet cut through the air like a hot knife through wax before hitting it's mark. The first Marionette's head, which caused it to explode when the bullet hit.
She then aimed the Jackal at the second one, which tried to run but got gunned down by 4 more shots. Lydia ejected the empty magazine, catching it before it fell onto the cabinet. She had a tendency to save her empty magazines. She pocketed the empty magazine, opting to fill it later since she had brought 3 boxes of ammunition for her Desert Eagle and 5 for the Jackal. She should've brought more Jackal rounds because, if her suspicions were correct, these three wee a taste of what was to come. Ramming a fresh magazine into the gun, she proceeded the way she came and tried the key on the locked door to find, to her increasing surprise, that the key fit the lock. She carefully turned it to unlock the door only to have it break upon doing so.
The door unlocked but the key snapped cleanly in half[8]. She pulled the door open and walked through to find a closed hanger with a biplane on a frame. "I guess this plane was up for maintenance." she murmered as she climbed onto the left wing and grabbed the Blue Orb Fragment that rested near it's tip only to have the other three join it to combine, with a flash of blue-white light, into an orb with a face. "Are you screaming at me?" was what Lydia would have asked if the orb hadn't flown into her chest with enough force to knock her off the wing. "Well." she said as she got up, "THAT was strange." she then went to the door at the far end of the hanger and, upon touching the handle, heard a voice in her head. "Until my seventeen masters are gone, your path will remain barred." which made her hold her head for a few seconds.
Sighing, she inspected every inch of the hanger until she found a circle embedded in the wall of an alcove, which she punched once just to see what would happen. A rune lit up. She hit it again and a second one lit up. She casually placed her left hand at the center of the circle and continued punching the wall, hitting the same spot, until all the runes lit up and the small platform behind her began to lower and, much to her chagrin, almost made her fall off the resulting ledge, which she caught with her left hand. "You jumped out of a plane and survived, it's not like you'll die from falling to the bottom of an elevator shaft." and with that she let go.
End notes: I decided to leave you with a cliff hanger. Until next chapter!
[1]Frak: A sanitized version of the word "Fuck" and MY choice of an F-bomb.
[2]vambrace: Think of it as my version of those shields used by the Jackals in the Halo series. It'll be used in later chapters.
[3]near insanity: Like me, Lydia is a bit touched in the head.
[4]skillz: A dumb joke on my part. I don't care if you don't find that one funny.
[5]pendant: It's in the shape of a cone. It's actual appearance is like that of a tornado. The materials that made it are silver and sapphire. An oval shaped piece of sapphire is in the center of the silver tornado, near the small ring that connects it to a thin, decorative silver cord.
[6]wrist: She doesn't wear it round her neck. She prefers it tied to one of her wrists.
[7]Dradis: Battlestar Galactica style radar.
[8]Maybe that's how Dante loses the keys when he uses them? Food for thought.
( watch?v=HfxN25bM-2I) I was looking for a song to play while Lydia was skydiving from the harrier and I thought of this one. Lynch's Mood from the Devil May Cry Anime. I still think the crater was awesome. Her body WAS designed for that sort of thing.