Disclaimer: I do not own anything from Square Enix, just my ideas and stuff like that.
Note: This time it'll be a battle between Tsuki + Derek vs Ira. Ready, FIGHT!!!
Chapter 23
Of Guns & Roses
The heads of the roses suddenly blossomed and it shot out of the stem. The rose suddenly turned into a 10 foot long Venus-Fly trap like Fiend. It's entire body, and obviously its head, was covered in rose petals. A row of jagged teeth made out of thorns was exposed from its mouth. The rose Fiend in the middle snarled at Tsuki and Derek.
"Aren't these roses beautiful? They fill me with happiness every time I look at them," Ira said, raising her arms happily. 2 of the Rose Fiends circled around Ira, whining and purring like some kind of pet animal.
Tsuki gave off a soft sigh, which only Derek could hear. "So, you think you can melee her and those weird roseys?"
"Heh, you betcha....although if I die, its not that I suck at fighting, I just don't have that much battle experience yet."
"You know that whatever you must should right now, is pretty much the same thing...' Tsuki said mentally to himself.
Ira raised her hand towards the 2 guys. "Now then, enough eye candy. My cuties, cut these fools into ribbons and devour them. I give you...permission."The 5 Rose Fiends suddenly roared and charged towards Tsuki and Derek, as if they were gonna dog pile them.
"Well, uh, see yah later?" Tsuki said in a sarcastic tone.
"Right, hehe."
Both of them side rolled away from each other, just nearly getting hit by the 5 Rose Fiends. The Rose Fiends had quick recovery, as they came out of the sand once and 2 of them charged towards Derek while 3 of them followed Tsuki.
Tsuki sprinted away from the impasse and shifted his body to look behind him. Now he had to...gulp.....run backwards. He held up his handgun and fired a few rounds. Many of the petals that covered the Rose Fiend tore off revealing a greenish-looking splotch of...skin? 'Huh, the petals must be some kind of body armor for these things.'
He then aimed his gun towards the splotch of skin and fired. The bullet embedded itself into the squeamish looking substance, and the Rose Fiend reacted by rearing its head up and shrieking into the sky.
"Ah...if I keep on shooting it, then they'll be dead in a matter of seconds." Just as he muttered that to himself, the wound that the Fiend had suddenly covered itself with a more reinforced looking scale of petals. "Damn, never mind."
A Rose Fiend got behind Tsuki and lunged its huge jaws towards him. He did a backflip landing on the Rose Fiend's head and he surveyed what was in front of him, seeing 2 Rose Fiends looking at him with saliva dripping from their mouth. The one Fiend that got injured lunged forward, but Tsuki knew what to do at this point. He jumped off the Rose Fiend's head and landed onto the injured Fiend's head and looked at the 3rd Fiend, who was suddenly right above him.
'What the, what's that?' Tsuki saw some kind of weird, squiggly looking esophagus hanging from the Fiend's throat, but it was tiny. Maybe...
Tsuki took out his bow and twinged his string in a flash, sending out a speedy arrow piercing through the Fiend's throat. It stopped in its tracks and fell to the ground, squirming like it had some kind of seizure. To be serious, it was probably having one right now. "Hey Derek! These Fiends can be killed easily if you go after their esophagus'!"
He then executed a front flip off of the injured Fiend's head. While he was upside down, Tsuki shot 2 arrows at its head. One pierced its petal armor, the 2nd pierced the skin, making the injured Fiend yet again shake its head in pain.
Landing onto the sand, he then stood up and saw Derek warding them with a....little dagger. 'Yeah, I don't think he'll be able to kill any of em' Tsuki thought in disbelief. All of a sudden 2 of the Rose Fiends by him went towards Ira...she was whistling a tune for them.
Derek's opponents were also slithering towards her. Both Tsuki and Derek regrouped, staring at the strange incident.
"What the heck's happening?" Derek had on a curious expression.
"From the looks of things, she's regrouping everyone for some kind of 'major' attack."
Derek arched his eyebrows. "Okay, why'd you quote major for? For all we know, she's probably gonna do some major attack."
Tsuki scoffed at the idea. "Uh huh, sure, she's gonna summon a huge horde of these fiends at us? Yeah, that sounds major..."
Derek was breathing heavily. "Oh geez, that is major." And then his eyes became wide. "What the hell is she doing?"
Tsuki turned around to see a very grotesque sight. Ira's arms and legs were encased in what seemed like a HUGE amount of petals. Actually, they were attached with the tails of those 4 Rose Fiends. Their heads acted as her feet and hands. Ira's eyes were suddenly red, and 2 roses stuck out of her silver hair.
"So, how do I look?" She was actually asking for an honest opinion.
Derek went up close to Tsuki's ear and whispered, "Don't tell her this, but she looks hideous."
Tsuki then looked at her and yelled out, "You look really hideous!" Derek's eyes were narrowed making it seem as if he said 'I hate you'.
Her eyes took a turn for the worst. They gleamed blood-red and she screamed out, "If you don't like how I look, I'll make YOU look horrendous. Hell, I don't even like how you guys look!" She then swung her left armed Fiend towards them.
Her range was superb. Because her arm was part of the Rose Fiend's, she can reach all the way towards them. This sucked.
Tsuki felt ANOTHER nudge on his shoulder. "Hey Tsuki, I got a plan, but its gonna be really risky, you up for it?"
"Sure, but let's regroup then talk about it, eh?" And with that Tsuki side-rolled to the right, which he nearly got bitten by the incoming Fiend. It then returned back to its master.
Derek ran back to Tsuki while he dusted off sand from his pants. "Alright, I'm gonna be used as bait and for you, if you see anything shiny up in the air, shoot it. Understood?"
Tsuki finished with his dusting off and looked up slowly to Derek. "So...you're saying you're gonna run around, being followed by those Rose Fiends? You sure about this?"
Smiling, Derek said, "I'm really sure." But his eyes told something else to Tsuki. But this plan may work, so he'll have to give it a try.
Derek slowly walked forward, twirling his dagger in his finger. 'Heh, this plan may not work. I might die...ah well, as long as we beat these Variants, our goals should be completed. Hope to Yevon that Tsuki will stay alive.' He then raised his arms up and yelled out, "Come on Ira, you ready!?"
"Tch, yeah, I'm ready to shred you to pieces!" She then swung her right Fiend arm towards Derek.
Tsuki watched closely. Once Derek moves, he should shoot something in the sky. Wait...the Fiend was already 5 feet away from Derek and he's not moving an inch...he can't possibly be thinking!
"Derek, start running you lazy green-haired man!" But he finally knew what Derek's plan was about. He was about to sacrifice himself to kill Ira. How profoundly stupid.
He looked back and grinned. "Get ready, alright Tsuki?" And with that, his entire body, save for his feet, was swallowed up by the Fiend's huge jaws. Now above the Fiend's head there was something shiny glinting off from the sun's afternoon rays. Tsuki gasped to see Derek's dagger twirling in the air and when it stopped in mid-air, the blade pointed directly at...Ira.
"Keh, smart move, Derek. I'll take this chance to free you." Tsuki aimed at the dagger and pulled the trigger. In slow motion the bullet whistled through the air and hit the butt end of the dagger. The dagger than quickly propelled itself and plunged into Ira's chest. A burst of blood erupted, sending it drizzling onto the sand below her.
"Pleh! Wha....what the hell!? What did you just DO?!" The Fiends, smelling blood, then lurched towards the small pool of blood and started drinking it. The Fiend who swallowed Derek suddenly spat him out, also smelling a scrumptious meal of blood.
Tsuki ran towards the now salivafied body of Derek. There was all these green gunk all over him. And Tsuki was NOT gonna touch him at this point. "Hey, you alright?"
His eyes then fluttered dismissively and he coughed up some really, disgusting green gunk. 'Ah geez,' Tsuki thought, 'I'm gonna hurl.'
Derek looked around quickly and sat up. "Ts-Tsuki! No.....did you die? Are we in heaven?" A smack on the face from Tsuki woke him up completely. "Whoa, I'm alive? Dang, I thought that thing was gonna chew me up."
Shaking his head, Tsuki replied, "No, but they're chewing up their master." They both looked to see the Fiends starting to feast onto Ira's stomach. Ira groaned and screamed at the same time, blood starting to spurt out. But without the Fiend's knowledge, without their master's blood energy, they couldn't stay summoned for long. So too late, the Fiends started to fall one by one, their petaled body armor scattered onto the floors. The ground shuddered from each of them falling.
"Stay here, alright Derek? I'm just gonna look at our opponent's health and see what's up." Tsuki then walked away to to see Ira crying softly.
"Hey, Tsuki's your name right?"
He nodded silently.
She beckoned him to sit near her. Tsuki looked around the dead bodies of the Fiends. "Don't worry, with me almost dying....they're not gonna rise anymore. So please, I need to ask you a favor."
Sighing, Tsuki sat on his knees next to Ira's dying body. "Um, cough, can you tell....Movaak that I love him? Just because we....cough......divorced doesn't mean we can't love each other, right? Can you please tell him that? And...and that I was hoping to make a family with him.....but now its impossible to do so."
She started to talk really fast, her energy ebbing away from her. Tsuki just watched and listened as her skin started to turn pale and her eyes started to lose life. Her hands was on Tsuki's.
"So....tell him, please? That I love him?"
"Um, yeah, sure."
"Oh, and one more thing. Tell Movaak that if he ever marries anyone else...cough.... I will kill him."
Tsuki laughed mentally. "Alright....I'll tell him."
Smiling, her smile reminded Tsuki of Anuy's. "Alright, thank you. I'm depending on you, Tsuki. And....great.........fight." Her energy was gone completely. Her hands went limp on Tsuki, and he placed them on her chest. But there, he saw a necklace with a heart-like pendant in the middle. He took it in his hands and opened it, revealing a young tanned woman with silver short hair and a spiky, red haired man with coal-like eyes, in their wedding outfits. Movaak actually looked pretty gangster in a suit and Ira's dress was beautiful. 'Damn....I killed someone that was gonna have a beautiful future....
Derek walked over and saw Tsuki slumped over holding onto the pendant. "Looks like another soul will arrive in the Farplane. Shall we pray?" Tsuki nodded and both him and Derek did the routine bow of Yevon.
Now on a rocky cliff there was a mysterious, long white coated figure standing at the edge, with his arms crossed. "Hmph, another win for the Hiends...gah, what am I doing?! I better head to the next battle site...." He looked over at the corpse of Ira and he muttered, "It's sad how Movaak lost his wife..." In a flash he disappeared in a mist of black.
IN THE AIRSHIP/WILL'S POV
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In the pilot's seat, I looked back to see Zakuo and Zelferd already at the window. "So, uh, you gonna press the button?"
I got out of my 'intense' thinking, and nodded. I pressed the button on the dashboard and the window opened up. The wind felt good against my skin.
"Well then, good luck to you both?"
Zakuo hmphed and jumped out. Zelferd on the other hand said, "Alright then, Will. Just be safe with steering this ship, alright? Now see yah.....and good luck with your battle." Zelferd then jumped out with his arms out wide.
I grabbed hold of the stick-shift lever and pushed it forward. Wow, I can't believe there are airships with stick-shift levers. Hehe, its like a car. The airship then shot through the sky, towards MY destination. I'll need all the luck and skills I got.
Zakuo rocketed downwards towards the Calm Lands, the greenish plains spread out very far. Several Chocobo riders were in formation at some kind of outpost. "Tch, hey Zelferd!" He had to yell for Zelferd to hear him. "There're some patrols near that outpost, we might have to get near that entrance where that monster hunter is located!"
He thought he heard him shout an agreement, so they both landed onto the ground, the wind starting to pick up intensity. The mountains that surrounded the plains was huge and looked really nice with the scenery. The Calm Lands was one of the beautiful places to visit. But today, they weren't taking a scenery visit.
"Zelferd, I advise you to step back from this fight. I'll fight Jekt, 1 on 1."
Laughing for a few seconds, Zelferd then stopped laughing and looked at Zakuo seriously. "You're joking me, right? I'm an adult here with an expansive amount of knowledge within my brain. I think I should be fighting him."
Scoffing, Zakuo replied hotly, "Yeah, but you got no skills or nothing. You suck at fighting. I bet you'd get knocked down in 1 hit from Jekt."
"Not true! I've trained Will's group to learn some new moves and such, I think I can handle myself in a fight!"
"Riiiight.."Zakuo turned his head to stare at the mountain some more until a huge explosion sounded from somewhere. When Zakuo turned to Zelferd to ask what it was, he was shocked to see him gone. When he looked back, Zelferd was laying on his back with a sword plunged in his stomach.
"Damn.....I've been....hit!" Zelferd shakily brought his hand to the sword's hilt, but the sword came out by itself and spun like a boomerang all the way towards....Jekt. He was standing on a boulder with a black blitzball under his armpit. He held out his hand and the sword then got into his possession.
"Heh, that was probably the most easiest and disappointing kill I've ever made in my entire life." Twirling his sword, he then plunged it into the boulder. "So, now that the stupid, insane scientist is out of the fray, its only you that's left on the field, Zakuo." He gave off an intimidating sneer.
Zakuo smirked. "Heh, this'll be fun." He looked back and said, "Man Zelferd, I told you to back down."
The only answer he got from Zelferd was a middle finger being stuck out. "Shut up, stupid Hunter."
Zakuo smiled and turned his sight towards Jekt, who now jumped off the boulder and onto the ground. "Well then, looks like you're prepared."
Jekt spin the blitzball on his right index finger like a basketball and had an excited look on his face. "Heh, that's right. And you know who's gonna lose this fight?" He pointed at Zakuo. "You are."
Looking at his katana's sheath, Zakuo then said in a calm voice, "We'll see about that." Zakuo pushed his finger up on the guard of his katana, making it slink out a bit.....
With a gasp, Jekt whispered, "The hell....no blade?"
"Hehe, let's get started."
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A/N: Sniff....I actually felt bad about Ira's death while writing it, dunno why, lol. But now, its Zakuo vs Jekt! Zelferd got hit pretty easily...and Zakuo didn't even care! Well then, let's see what happens on the next chapter, eh? And.....that white long coated figure, how did he know about Movaak?
Hope you guys enjoyed the story and please R&R!!! :D