"Well, at the very least this place is scenic." I said as we continued to walk along, drawing the subject away from Snow.
"Maybe we shouldn't have left him on his own..." Vanille said worriedly.
"Ah, he'll be fine. What's the worst that could happen? It's not like he's gonna get attacked by dozens of soldiers and then a couple of chicks with ice powers that turn into a motorcycle." I said dismissively, looking at the reviews for this story.
People want us to have a harem?! That's a GREAT idea!
[May be tough to organize, though... Lightning distances herself from EVERYONE, Fang seems like a lesbian for Vanille and Vanille is focused on Hope. Could be a challenge, but we WILL make this happen!]
For the fans! And for our own selfish pleasures!
We encountered a few more frog/fish things, but dealt with them pretty easily. We continued to traverse the crystal and metal landscape, dealing with more cougars (and not the good kind), seeing only one way to cross the pit: a long, chasm-spanning, iced tube. "Well, a deadly drop prevented only by a slippery tube." I said optimistically.
Vanille of course went across first with her usual cheery, not-worried-about-anything manner, but Sazh went next, clearly nervous. "Okay, do not shake the slippery tube. Are we clear on this? DO NOT SHAKE THE SLIPPERY TUBE!" He said worriedly.
[Mayhem is everywhere...]
We're a random windstorm!
"Shakey, shakey, shakey~!" I said teasingly, making a loud tapping noise on the tube with my foot, Sazh rushing faster than I knew a human could run to the other side, screaming all sorts of things about me being crazy and a maniac. "Say what you want, I am great at getting people to pick up the pace." I said with a smirk, continuing on.
"you like to scare people, don't you?" Hope asked.
"You have no idea..." I said.
Flashback...
Nero was about to walk in to the office, but suddenly, the most giant, terrifying dragon he'd ever seen dropped down and roared right in his face, he went pale and fell to the ground. I laughed hysterically, but then noticed he wasn't moving. "Nero? ….. NE-RO?" I asked, nudging him with my foot a bit.
Back to now...
We reached the other side and were now attacked by red versions of the fish we were fighting. "Oh, there are red ones now! They must be stronger! And worth more money!" I said eagerly, pulling out more syringes. To my disappointment, they were weaker, but they did have more attack power than the green ones. We went on again when Vanille asked Hope about something.
"Still couldn't talk to him? You're never gonna get past this if you don't say something." She said.
"She's right, man. Sooner or later we're gonna have to have a training montage if you don't man up. That may be better, though... The montage ALMOST worked for Tsukune." I said, thinking about this.
"Huh? What are you talking about?" Hope asked, confused.
"Nothing." I said as if nothing happened or I didn't say something weird.
We then came across a path that was blocked by a wall of crystal, but Vanille noticed some form of flying attack aircraft. "Can we fly that?" She asked.
"Nah, no good, it's crashed and burned." Sazh replied.
"Looks operational." Lightning said, then jumped and hit the gun, causing it to fire and break the crystal wall, which caused a bunch of pissed of frog/fish to get in our way.
"Lightning, I love the way you think." I said, walking in to attack the monsters. I used a Blitz attack to quickly deal with all the little red ones, then hit the green ones hard with Firaga and Thundaga (let's see if any of you can catch the subtle message there...), easily killing them.
"Not bad. We could've used a soldier like you back in the Guardian Corps." Lightning said approvingly as she walked past me.
"Sounds like a good job: 'To serve and protect'... And occasionally whoop ass." I said with a smirk. I continued to walk even after lightning stopped around a corner. "What? What's the matter?" I asked, rounding the corner, getting smashed into a wall by a green one of those giant dog/bear things. "Oh, so that's how we're doing it, huh? BURN!" I shouted, throwing a giant fireball at it... No more giant dog/bear thing.
"Look at that. They're sending in cruisers." Sazh said, pointing them out.
"Oh, nice, a welcoming committee." I said. We then got closer to the cliffs on our hands and knees to get a better view of what was going down. We looked over the edge to see a giant airship with cruisers zooming around everywhere. "That is a nice-ass airship. I gotta remember to steal that." I said.
"That would be suicide, even for you." She said.
"Suicide would probably be the only way I CAN die." I said, uncaringly.
"They must be hunting down purge survivors." Sazh said.
"Jeez, these guys don't like to give up." I said.
"I hope everyone made it out okay." Vanille said worriedly.
"So do I." He said.
"Yeah, that wouldn't be a good thing if they found them or if they didn't make it." I said.
"But nowhere is safe for them now. Dammit! Just because they shared a neighborhood with a Fal'Cie. They get treated like Pulse tainted rats." Sazh said.
"Try being a little optimistic. If there's one thing I know about humans, they're resourceful. They find a way to survive." I said.
"People really hate Pulse, don't they?" Vanille asked.
"Seem like it." I agreed.
"Not hate. More like fear. Tens of millions of people. All scared of Pulse boogeymen." Sazh said, getting onto just his knees and looking at his brand. "They'd be... Shaking in their beds every night if they knew... That L'Cie like us were around." He said.
"But, they purged that entire town..." Vanille said sorrowfully.
"Seriously, what's the big deal? L'Cie are just people with powers. Haven't you ever played inFAMOUS 2? 'Powers don't kill people. It's the people behind the powers that kill people.'" I said, doing my impression of Cole MacGrath.
"It's crazy, I know, but the Sanctum Fal'Cie did nothing to stop it." He said.
"Jeez, nevermind, your Fal'Cie is NOTHING like Jesus. He DIED, NAILED TO A CROSS to prevent an apocalypse, your god or whatever doesn't do shit." I said (by the way, I'm not preaching religion, I'm just retracting a statement I made last chapter).
"Up until now, Eden's always stepped in to correct their errors in judgment." He continued to explain.
"Why am I starting to feel this game is a giant reference to religion?" I asked.
"Guess humans aren't worth the effort. Figured they'd just kill each other off." He said, sighing.
Hope stood up at this moment. "L'Cie are not human." He said.
"Listen, you! That's enough!" Vanille said sternly, getting in his face, grabbing his arm to look at his brand.
"Thank you! Seriously, stop complaining. I'm only seeing the up-side of this so far. We now have kick-ass powers and as far as I can tell, no one has lost their humanity, we should be happy for the most-part and focus on our Focus." I told him, flicking him in the head.
"We're still alive! That's something." Vanille said optimistically.
"Hang on a second. Vanille, I could swear your brand looks different than ours, can you please show me that one more time?" I asked, looking in between mine, Hope's and Sazh's brand and recalling the glimpse of her upper thigh... Admittedly for mutliple reasons.
"Maybe later..." She said sheepishly.
"I'll hold you to that." I said.
"Cool it, cowboy." Sazh said.
"Ninja, actually. TOTALLY different. Both are pretty badass, though. Ninjas are better, though." I said.
[Well, there are cowboy ninjas.]
Yeah, like Lance, or that dude in the picture on Deviantart.
[That's where Lance got it from.]
Suddenly the ground started shaking. "What?" Lightning asked, shocked.
"Where is it?" Sazh asked.
"Hell if I know." I said.
"I don't know." Hope said at basically the same time.
"There!" Lightning said, pointing to a cruiser that came from nowhere and flew right past us, knocking down Hope and Sazh, almost Vanille, too, but I held onto her at that point.
"You're okay, sweet cheeks, I've got you." I said.
Which set of cheeks are you referring to?
[Really? We haven't even seen the bottom set... Yet. We're close, though.]
They zoomed off everywhere and Lightning realized what was going on. "They're sealing the area. Trying to catch stragglers. We gotta move before we're caught in the net!" She said.
"You don't have to tell me twice. I ain't going to prison. The food's awful." I said.
Yeah, there's a reason we started that fire last time we were arrested.
[We were bored and starving because we refused to eat.]
We quickly took off, I kicked a couple soldiers off a cliff and we continued running until we ran into a couple droids. "I could get some money for these." I said, bashing them with crowbars and powering them down, putting them in my coat pockets so when I get back, I could have Lance repair, reprogram and mass-produce them.
You've gotta admit, we may be insane, but...
[We are one hell of a businessman.]
We killed a couple more soldiers and continued on our way, looking for any way out of our increasingly dire situation. In the end, we wound up having to basically climb a mountain. "Whoa. How high is this thing? I don't think I'm gonna make it." Sazh said.
"Your fine old man, I know a dude who's 75 and he can still kick ass." I said.
Pappy Blade?
[Close, but no. He meant Heihachi Mishima. He'll probably be even older when they release Tekken 7.]
We then encountered another robot and a hovercraft/motorcycle thing I instantly set my eyes on. "Oh, the good times just keep coming. Draco, if you thought the blades were rich before this or AFTER I sued everyone who worked at Arkham Asylum, you'll lose your mind the next time you see how rich we are." I said, gold bars in my eyes.
We're gonna make even Bill Gates seem poor!
[Or whoever took over Apple after he died, anyway.]
"Man, you just look for whatever makes you more money, don't you?" Sazh asked.
"Of course. Money is one of the many GREAT and effective ways to keep women happy." I said.
"I can agree with that." Lightning said.
"Yep." I said, nodding.
"I prefer someone with personality." Vanille said.
"Oh, I've got that, too." I said in a sly tone.
"Easy, Romeo, we should be focusing on getting out of here first." Sazh said.
"Whatever you say, Tybalt." I said in a smartass tone, continuing on.
Haha! You guys get the reference?
[Because Tybalt tried to stop the romance between Romeo and Juliet.]
We continued on, but stopped shortly after, looking over the edge of the cliff, observing our surroundings. "Wow! This whole place is crystal!" Vanille said in awe.
"Yeah, I know, isn't it great? I've got more crystals than I know what to do with! Maybe I'll make some nice jewelry for Lady when this is all over." I said.
We noticed some airships in the far distance, but didn't really pay them too much mind. "I wonder what it'd be like. To become a crystal?" Sazh wondered.
"You probably couldn't do as much as you can right now." I said.
"You're gonna complete your focus?" Vanille asked.
He shrugged at this. "Maybe. If I knew what it was. I probably don't wanna know." He said.
"Being a crystal DOES sound a lot better than being a zombie." I said with thought.
"Hey, Lightning? Did Serah say anything to you about her Focus?" Vanille asked the older girl.
She looked down for a moment and put her hand to her chest. "Nothing." She said.
"Sounds like a painful memory. For our safety, we should NOT bring it up again." I said, backing away from the easy-to-anger woman.
"Um.. You know what? She probably didn't want to worry you." Vanille said happily, trying to draw off the subject.
"Or she just... Didn't think she could trust me..." She said, walking onward.
"I'm sensing a flashback about this in the future." I said quietly to myself... Okay, let's see... We continued on again, killed more people and robots and eventually came to some temple-looking place. "Well, this is different." I said, looking around. We reached the top of the rather long stairs and ran into another behemoth. "Everyone relax, Hope's got this one." I said, pulling the younger male in front of the group.
"What?!" He asked, panicked, looking back and forth between it and me.
"Look, we need to man you up one way or another and I can't think of where a montage would fit into this, so there is no better opportunity. Relax, I'll be right over here, telling you what to do, making sure you don't get beat up." I said, pulling out a soda and leaning up against a pillar.
He was actually doing alright, mixing it up with magic and throwing his boomerang to hit him physically and magically, but then the monster rushed in. "Help!" He said, getting ready to run.
"DODGE!" I said, blasting him out of the claw's path with Aero, then healing him.
"Thanks." He said, although with a bit of an attitude, doing his procedure again.
After a little bit longer, he finally took down the beast with almost no damage.
"Congratulations. See, you're pretty good with this stuff. You can't change it, so embrace it." I said.
"Nice pep talk, coach." Sazh said, from the look and tone I could tell he disapproved my tactics.
"Oh, please, that worked perfectly. You know how my brother started training my little sister? He shot her point blank with a pistol in the stomach. Then told her she'd have to learn what to do if she didn't want that to happen again." I said.
"I thought his tactics were pretty good. If a little low, but still." Lightning said, standing next to me.
"Exactly. I'm a ninja. We're masters of playing dirty. You guys seen Luigi's Death Stare on YouTube? THAT'S how a ninja would do it." I said, watching the video myself and laughing. We then continued on and I dealt with every other threat until the next cutscene. "See? I'm not a bad guy, I do plenty of the work." I said.
"Wow..." Vanille said, looking in awe at the crystallized fire and the rest of our surroundings.
"Yeah, that's pretty cool. But for the record, unless it's something REALLY badass, I'm sitting out the next fight, that was a lot of shit I just dealt with." I said, pulling out a fan and a lawn chair. Suddenly, I heard something not too far away and it sounded like it was getting closer. "I sense a disturbance in the force..." I said cautiously.
Vanille however, was too fascinated with what was going on and went ahead of everyone. "Stay close." Lightning warned.
"I wanna look around!" She replied, walking further ahead.
Lightning sighed at this, but I merely shrugged and dismissed it. "Ahh, childhood innocence and curiosity. That's how I found out I could live from being stabbed." I said.
"How?" Sazh and Hope asked at the same time.
"Well, I heard about Samurai doing that Hara-kiri thing and I said to myself 'I wonder what that feels like?' So I tried it. Didn't really feel much like anything, just kinda uncomfortable. You know, like a bug bite. Except less itchy. No less irritating, though." I explained.
As soon as I finished explaining this, however, Vanille screamed and came running back.
"Vanille!" Hope said, concerned.
I kicked the fan away and got ready to use the lawn chair as a weapon. An enormous dragon thing came from around the corner she went around and crashed, but recovered quickly and continued to chase her, but I quickly ran in, jumped and smashed it in the face with the lawn chair, breaking it and a number of the dragon's teeth, sending it to the ground. "No one hurts the girl whose ass I'm trying to tap!" I said, grabbing the monster and repeatedly slamming it into the ground and every wall I could find. But as I was about to slam it into one more wall, it flew up above the ground, so I could no longer throw it around. I looked at the ground for a moment before looking back in his eyes. "I see your point." I said in a serious tone before it whipped its head and sent me flying back into the group.
"Sai! Are you hurt?" Lightning said, kneeling beside me.
"Takes more than that to hurt someone like me." I said.
"Let me heal you just in case." Vanille said, casting cure on me.
"Right, now let's kick his ass." I said, then we all pummeled it with spells and easily defeated it due to the severe damage I had already done to it.
Vanille suddenly got excited (not in that way, pervs) and ran forward, laughing and stopping in front of an airship I have NO IDEA how we missed before. "Check it out!" She said, walking towards it, still giggling.
"Come on. Hop to it, let's go." Sazh said.
"Yeah, I'll drive!" I said.
"What?! You don't even know how those work!" Sazh said worriedly.
"Maybe not, but back in MY world, I am one of THE most kic-ass pilots you will ever see." I said.
Since when?
[Didn't we crash the Blackbird on the way back from Genosha after Deadpool's video game last time we flew something.]
(I have no idea what you're talking about.)
"Yep. Best pilot ever." I said, then looked to see and owl land on a pillar next to the airship. "Hope. I saw a bird. It was pretty. Kick its ass." I ordered.
"This will make things easier!" Vanille said happily.
"Yeah, knowing our luck, it's probably missing an engine." Sazh said.
"You shouldn't be so negative." Vanille said.
"I agree." I said, nodding to her.
"And you shouldn't get your hopes up." He said.
"It's fine, even if it's missing an engine. I'm also a master mechanic. My uncle Senso owns a car shop, he taught me how to fix ANYTHING. You could break a super-computer, give me an hour, it'd work like new. Plus my brother's a genius and helped to improve those skills." I said.
"Senso?" Hope and Vanille asked at the same time.
"It means 'War' in Japanese." I said, then turned to the 4th wall. "According to Google Translate, anyway. If that is wrong, I'm sorry." I said, walking over to the ship along with everyone else. After a quick inspection, I found that the ship was not working... So I kicked it. And then it started working again!