My muse... died... halfway... through this chapter...
Thanks to emeraldonyxdragon and ElTangoDeRoxanne... man... I'm tired...
I own nothing.
"… The what cave palace?" Kyle asked blankly.
"The Sochen Cave Palace, a small, but labyrinthine network of caverns running from Old Archades to the Tchita Uplands. You're not on Earth anymore— the portal went to my world. To Ivalice." Balthier replied, resting the palm of his hand against his heavily bandaged eye.
"You mean we've just let about ten Terminators loose into a new world." John deadpanned.
"Yes," The sky pirate replied, levering himself to his feet using the cave wall as an aid. Water pooled on the crystalline shelves, clean enough to drink, and he dipped his fingers in the cool liquid, sipping from the palm of his hand. It eased the burning in the back of his throat ever so slightly, but he knew what he really needed was not water. "I daresay that, before we start hunting Terminators, we had best take care of ourselves. The Sochen Cave Palace is not where you want to be staying for an extended time."
Balthier led them through a confusing maze of twists and turns, constantly evading huge, toad-like creatures and impish looking creatures. He would have taken them to Old Archades through the Palace, but had the feeling that multitudes of Headless Giants were not what John and the other humans wanted to see right now. Finally, just as they were about to emerge into the Tchita uplands, there was the unavoidable problem of a few Zombie Warriors wandering just short of the exit. However, many of the zombies now resembled torn corpses in various stages of being shattered by gunfire. Something had passed through here before them. One zombie groaned through rotted vocal cords from where it was a little more than a splatter, a sparking, mechanical arm nearby.
"A Terminator came here, no doubt about it." Barnes said picking up the arm, then tossing it aside in disgust. John nodded, but his agreeable face swiftly changed to terror when the zombie creature rose from the ground and lunged for Barnes, its mouth open in a grotesque, toothy howl. Blair knocked him out of the way, grabbing its arm and twisting it to lever it to its knees, but screamed in disgust when its entire arm came off with a horrible squelch. The zombie staggered slightly, but kept going, blood spurting from its shoulder.
"Really, must I do everything around here?" Balthier asked, using Fomalhaut to shoot the undead warrior in the head. The force of the shot exploded its brain, splattering gooey grey matter everywhere. Just for good measure, he plunged his fingers through the decaying mass of ancient flesh under the creature's breastbone and wrenched its shriveled heart out. The zombie collapsed, and this time, did not get up. The smell of rotting brains was disgusting, and John gagged.
"I need air…" he gasped, staggering toward the entrance, and emerged into an almost alien landscape. Strange winged serpents slithered through the grass, where they hunted for food and were hunted by Couerls in turn. Balthier emerged behind him, narrowing his eye against the sunshine. He nearly tripped on the shredded body of a Terminator, deep claw marks gouging its metal breastplate. The machine's arm was missing.
"I think we know what became of that Terminator." Marcus remarked, kicking the thing's head with enough force to dent it. Blair cheered.
"One down, nine to go! And we don't even know where they went!" she said.
"The worst part is, most likely they're learning how to cope to their new environment. The last Terminator is going to be the hardest to kill." Kyle said glumly.
"They will find several unexpected twists coming their way, then. Ivalice is full of strange things that muddle machines like them." Balthier grinned viciously. "However, we won't stand a chance unless we find my wise and faithful partner, Fran."
"Is she like you?" John asked, cocking his head.
"Only in profession. Other than that, we are as different as apples and carrots, my dear Fran and I." the pirate replied.
"I see."
They trekked across the Tchita Uplands, until Balthier found a Gate Crystal. He quickly envisioned Tsenoble, touching a glowing Teleport Stone to the crystal's surface, and (with no small amount of discomfort on the part of the Resistance members) they came tumbling into the streets of Archades.
The place was an uproar, with soldiers running everywhere and shouting orders. None of them even noticed the criminal standing in their midst until Balthier tapped one on his metal shoulder. "What's all this ruckus?"
"None of your business! That's the military's business, and ours alone!" the soldier replied rudely. The pirate snorted, neatly catching the man about the back and slinging his arm about the Imperial's shoulders.
"Boy, do you know who you're talking to?" Balthier purred lazily, a twisted smirk dancing on his face.
"Get your hands off me! Who are you? What makes you think you can—" the soldier meant to shake the sky pirate's arm off, but Balthier's grip was like a vice on his shoulder.
"I'm Balthier bloody Bunansa, you stupid oaf. And I am getting very, very annoyed. I would not like to expel my mean temper upon my comrades now, you see, but you, on the other hand, are a perfect man upon for me to dispose of my wrath. So, you can choose to tell us what is going on, after which I will let you go, or you can keep mum, after which you will most definitely be sorry."
"You— you're the Balthier, the one who stopped Bahamut and fought in the Nethicite Wars? The Pirate King of Ivalice?" the soldier squeaked, his voice rising several octaves. Balthier gave him a chilling smile, a glittering fang poking pass his lip.
"The same."
"I'm so, so, so sorry, my lord!" the soldier barked, immediately snapping to attention. "A small band of strange creatures have broken into the Imperial palace, and we cannot bring them down!"
"Describe them." John commanded.
"Three armored skeletons made of metal, armed with guns of the like we have never seen." The soldier promptly replied. "The guns fire continuously, and they do not need to stop to reload their weapons. While we can deal damage, our gunmen and mages get killed too quickly before we can get enough shots in to do anything lasting."
"There's three of the Terminators right there! I say we get 'em!" Barnes said, but Balthier had one more question.
"Soldier, is Larsa safe?"
"When the monsters entered the Palace, the Emperor was engaged in conference with a Viera in his private office."
Balthier's face, already pale, immediately drained of all its remaining color. There was only one Viera who could get an instant conference with the Emperor of the Archadian Empire: "Fran." He whispered.
"Your partner?" Blair asked, and he nodded.
"We must get into the palace, quickly!" Balthier said, already running toward the sky cab station. A cab was there, but the driver was absent, most likely laying low somewhere until the hubbub subsided. The pirate quickly hotwired the ship, ripping off the system cover with terrifying ease in order to get at the control panel. He opened the door to the cab's interior, motioning for John and his team to get in. Kyle, the last in line, had barely gotten both feet over the threshold before Balthier floored the accelerator, throwing everybody toward the back of the ship. "You might want to buckle up, everybody— this could get quite hair-raising," he said over the intercom.
"You're insane! You're f—" the antiquated engine's guttural roar at that moment drowned out the rest of Kyle's expletive—"insane! You're going to get us all killed, pirate! You're lucky Marcus didn't fall on anyone!"
"Hey, you callin' me fat, Reese?" Marcus could be heard saying over the speaker. Balthier chuckled as he hooked the link to a small side bar so that the line remained open, but almost immediately turned serious again.
"Those mechanical menaces have broken into the palace where not only my irreplaceable partner is, but also the last of my original friends. You guys are experienced at bringing down Terminators, yes?" he asked, taking a corner at high speeds. Several loud thumps were heard in the passenger hold.
The statement was met with a chorus of agreements and groans. "You work on destroying those Terminators— I'll get Fran and Larsa to safety."
"Why can't you destroy them using lightning bolts like you did in LA?" John asked. "It seems that would be the easiest."
"Mist has a habit of changing things not particularly agreeable with it. Who knows what kind of horrible creatures those Terminators have become? Thunder might not work on them anymore." Balthier shrugged. "We're entering the Palace airspace now. The security measures are going to very high— things are going to get dicey!"
At that moment, the outside communications speaker crackled into life. "This is the Loki to unidentified sky cab. Remove yourself from the Palace airspace immediately."
"I bloody well will not!" Balthier took the ship into a steep dive just as a warning shot exploded nearby. "Firing on the leading man? Flaming bad show, eh?"
"Remove yourselves at once, or we will drop you!" a more imperious voice said. Ah, this was a voice he knew quite well.
"Ah, Judge Magister Freyk! I trust you remember me?"
"Balthier Bunansa, you impudent dog! Of course, I would remember who pushed me into that pile of chocobo droppings when you and your Viera consort were fleeing from the Aegis Crystal heist in the tomb of the ancient royalty! You better pray I am merciful enough to give her your bones pried apart from the molten ball of metal I'm going to turn your vessel into!" the Judge, most recently promote to Judge Magister, screamed into the line, venom dripping from his every syllable.
"Yes, I remember how hard it is to clean and repair good armor. I remember your grandfather from my days in the Judiciary. He gave me a bet to ride a Sleipnir. The thing bucked me off into a Dynast Cactus and broke my armor and my arm with its spikes, if I recall. I think I might still have cactus juice in it." Balthier said with faked sympathy, circling the Palace Tower, closer and closer.
"Get away from the Tower, now, Bunansa. I mean it." Freyk said flatly. "I will not hesitate to shoot you out of the sky."
"Oh, I doubt that." The pirate replied, docking the sky cab by a large balcony and opening the doors, allowing five very ill looking Resistance members to stagger out. "Because I don't think you'd let me do this if you were that set on blasting me into little bits."
"Bunansa!" the Judge Magister roared, and Balthier leaped from the cockpit just as the ship exploded into a ball of flame.
"So you do have the guts to do it. Pity, you missed!" he wagged his finger at the giant warship.
"Are you trying to get us killed? He'll blow up the tower next!" Marcus snapped, grabbing Balthier and dragging him inside. There, John was already beginning to navigate the interior corridors, following the sound of gunfire and screams.
What they saw in the throne room was truly terrifying to see. The three terminators had been fused together in such a way that the creature had no legs, simply a multitude of scintillating, undulating coils of wires and metal that supported an upper body that had three heads fused together, two facing to the sides and one facing forward. The heads on the sides had no eyes— smooth, unaltered sheets of metal had replaced where their eyes had been, and their mouths were sewn shut with some kind of wire. The head on the front had one, large glowing red eye, and when it brought this lens to bear upon one of the soldiers, he burst into flames. One arm was a broken mass of whirring blades and gears, already flecked with blood and other things Balthier would rather not think about; the other arm was a fusion of the three machine guns that the Terminators had brought with them, and these mowed down the poor Imperial soldiers in swathes.
Marcus was the first to take action, dodging the whipping tentacles of the Terminator in order to begin scaling its back, digging his mechanical hand into any crevasse he could find. Blair followed soon after, firing at the gears allowing the machine to move. Kyle concentrated on throwing grenades at the robot's weak spots, but they bounced harmlessly off its metal coating.
In the meantime, Balthier dashed toward the far end of the room, where two familiar figures huddled.
"Fran!" he cried, skidding to a halt in front of her. "Are you alright?"
"Ffamran!" the Viera gasped, her eyes wide. In an instant, she was on her feet, striding toward him. He did not expect what happened next— she delivered unto his left cheek a very solid slap.
"What did I do?" he wailed, holding an affronted hand to his reddening cheek.
"Every time that you come back from one of your adventures, you look even worse than when you left me!" Fran said, her voice rising. The woman looked close to hysterics, her fur bristling, ears laid back. Balthier knew it was being so close to the battlefield that set her on edge, and gathered her to him, allowing her to take comfort in his cold arms. Slowly, her ragged breathing calmed as he stroked the back of her ears, trailed his icy fingers along her jaw, brushed his lips over her collarbone. But still, her hands clenched convulsively on the back of his vest, and he could almost feel her eyes riveted on the battle raging behind him. She jumped, almost ripping some chunks out of his flesh with her claws, when Barnes managed to load his rocket launcher and pummeled the Terminator with it, knocking it sideways with a deafening crash. As it was, several black blood stains now marred his white shirt.
"Easy, my dear." He breathed, but Fran began to shake again.
"The Mist seethes about its core." She moaned, raising her head to look at him. "It must be stopped. What made it?"
"Humes of another world did, a long time ago, not knowing what they did until it turned upon them and slaughtered them en masse. And now, the Humes struggle in their world to end the tyranny of the machines." He explained, as much to distract her as himself. He could feel her wildly thumping heart, hear the rush of her blood through her veins, and even smell her pain and fear. At that moment, the middle head of the machine opened its mouth and poured out a stream of Mist, incinerating more soldiers where they stood. They screamed as their armor fused to their bodies, collapsing to the ground and rising again to turn on their living comrades. "Calm, Fran." Balthier murmured again as he felt her heart race. Finally, deciding there was nothing he could do to keep her from going berserk on Mist Rage, he bit her.
It took a moment for his venom to work, but eventually, her pulse began to slow, her eyes to droop, her hands to loosen, and she fell against him, limp.
"Ffamran, I'm sorry." She whispered thickly. "I couldn't save Larsa."
"He's dead, then?"
"Forgive me."
"There is nothing to forgive— if he could not be saved, he could not be saved." Balthier licked a few drops of blood from where they traced down her long, swan-like neck, activating the power rune on his back. As he began to regenerate his eye, Fran raised her hand to his cheek, putting it over the red mark where she'd slapped him.
"Humes are such power needy creatures. They would rape the Mist and the Wood and Ivalice herself to satisfy their lust." She said, her mind clearly wandering. Balthier humored her.
"Good thing I am not Hume, then." He said, unwrapping the bandages from around his eye. Strange, clear liquid gushed out of the socket, making it appear as if he were crying.
"But you were, once, not so long ago. And your father passed the lust of nethicite and magicite on to you. Do you know what that Tiara was?"
"Nethicite?"
"Yes. A tiny part of the Sun-Cryst itself." Fran was so far gone under the influence of the anesthetic spreading through her system that she did not even jump when a soldier landed next to them, his chest sliced open by the monster's blade arm.
"Isn't that fascinating? We could get a fair price out of that."
"I hid it."
"Damn."
"Don't leave me again, Ffamran. I know why you bit me— you're going to make me sleep, and then leave." Fran's eyelids began to droop.
"Do you really have so little faith in me? Really, I'm hurt." Balthier pouted, and Fran laughed once, before falling deep asleep.
Marcus finally found his way into the machine's control center, ripping aside cords and metal plates until he reached a triumvirate of three nuclear power cells. Working his way into the cramped chamber, the cyborg began unplugging them, ever so gently to avoid a fiery explosion. The wires he'd torn aside suddenly came to life, spitting electricity at him that made his fingers jitter and his vision cut in and out.
"Damn it, knock it off!" he roared, swatting at them, but they were like snakes, avoiding his blows with alarming speed. One plunged itself into his arm, and the limb went into uncontrollable spasms, his fingers a desperate blur. Reaching his other hand over, he yanked the thing out, growling in pain as synthetic blood spurted out of the hole.
Abandoning caution, the cyborg grabbed all the wires he could see under the power cells, ignoring the warning flashing before his sensors that doing so might cause extreme damage to his surroundings, and yanked.
The machine collapsed to the ground, tentacles flailing, its single eye rolling madly, melting stone, setting tapestries and banners ablaze. Its gun arm went wild, shooting crazily in every direction, and John dove behind a chunk of fallen marble before he could be filled with holes.
Finally, with a squeal, the machine's glowing red eye faded.
Blair emerged from where she'd taken cover with Barnes behind a chunk of debris, coughing. "Marcus?" she called, making her way toward the fallen giant. There was no reply, no warm, rough voice returning her call.
"Marcus!" she screamed into the deafening silence. "Marcus!"