So so so so so so so so so so sorry! We will get better, promise! This chapter has inspired us to write more (its been our fave to write so far). Also, anyone interested might like to know we will shortly be staring a guild wars fan fiction...now that is gonna be one heck of a challange! Anyways, enjoy chapter four!
Chapter 4- Ignorance is Bliss
It was Friday at last...the week had felt more like a month to both Josh and Alex. There had been some strange incidents occurring all week, and they had been making the two friends feel very uneasy. Besides Josh's amazing reflex's that he had now somehow gained, he had also demonstrated knowledge unlike his in all of his lessons. This was a very unusual thing to happen, as Josh was not exactly the brightest of people.
When it came to Alex, she had demonstrated some kind of strength unknown to her during her last fencing class. It was strange, but ever since that tournament she had become different both physically and mentally. It was true, that she was strong before the tournament and still a force to be reckoned with, but now even the most tough people in the college were afraid of her abilities. During one of her lessons she even managed to beat her teacher, who happened to be ranked with the top in the country. Her teacher of course said that she had gone easy on Alex, but everyone present to the event was convinced she was lying.
"Well...to think I was going to join your class..." Josh said, obviously thinking about this very event.
It was lunchtime now. Josh had finished for the day, yet Alex still had two hours to go. She smiled a very nervous smile when she heard Josh say this. She could not help but feel like she had somehow cheated during the 'fight' against her teacher. The whole thing had started off as a little bet amongst all of the class, as they were eager to see who was the better fighter between the two of them. They had been curious of this ever since Alex had won the tournament.
Alex knew of course that she had not cheated, perhaps she was just being modest...or perhaps she believed that her teacher had gone easy on her. "You still should...I'm eager to see if you are as good as you claim to be!"
Josh knew that Alex had not fully believed him about the incident on Monday, yet decided to ignore her. If she didn't believe him then that was her problem. "You know what...I think I will! But first I am going to go home and relax, whilst you have to stay here for another..."
He checked his watch, but Alex cut him off before he had the chance to finish his sentence. "No need to rub it in that you have more free time than me..." Josh knew that she was joking about this and didn't really have a problem with it.
His problem for the lack of intellect he seems to posses... Alex shook her head, if she did not know better she would have thought she was going schizophrenic. This was another one of those many thoughts she was getting recently that did not seem like her own. Everything seemed to link back to the tournament, as this was when they first started.
"Well...shouldn't you be getting off to your lesson then?" Josh was clearly still savoring the fact that he had an amazing timetable.
"Yep, give me a call later when you know that I have finished...I don't want you to call me in lesson...again!" She started to walk off.
Josh turned and headed towards the college exit to start his short walk home.
You really shouldn't take orders from a girl you know... Josh ignored this thought...he did not know why he would think such a thing about his best friend...besides which he was not sexist. Are you even listening to me!?
Josh shook his head to try and rid himself of this ridiculous thoughts. Without success, they kept on coming, as though expecting him to answer as though to the other side of an argument. You can't ignore me forever you helpless child!
The next thought was a deliberate one of Josh's, deciding that he would play the mad fool and answer to this mysterious voice in his head...although he was sure it was just because he was overworked that he was hearing things. Who the hell are you calling a child!?
Even though he did not say this out loud he felt stupid for even thinking it. It was all becoming too much for him, seeing things, hearing things, nightmares...all too much. To his complete surprise however, the voice answered.
"Finally...you are showing a little bit of defiance..." Josh did not really feel like arguing with himself, it just felt too weird.
He continued to walk, yet the voice did not cease to talk to him. Eventually there was one question in particular that caught his attention. "Are you not frightened of me?"
This question stumped him so much that it actually made him stop dead in his tracks, which must have looked very peculiar to passers by. To make up for this he decided to take out his phone, as if to text someone. Instead however, he just replied to the voice. Why would I be afraid of my own mind?
The voice in his head was obviously very cunning considering its next answer. "Do not answer my question with a question boy...are you frightened of me...!?"
Josh ignored this, he could not be bothered to answer. He walked on, and to his surprise the voice did not continue to pester him anymore. Then, without warning, his hand felt as though it had been taken over. He swung with an unnatural force at a nearby brick wall, crumbling some of the bricks and causing a terrible pain in his right hand.
He did not however let out a cry of pain, it was as though something was constricting his throat so that he could not scream or speak. "Perhaps now you will answer me?"
Josh was pretty sure that one of his fingers had broken, the pain coming from his middle finger was unbearable. Yes.
-
You really do have a weird choice of friends, you know that?
"Shut up, shut up, shut up..." Alex muttered to herself. She was in the middle of a practice paper for an exam that she had coming up, and she really didn't need voices talking to her about her choice of friends while she was trying to concentrate.
Oh, and by the way, you are working out the mean remember, not the mode... Not entirely sure whether or not this was one of her thoughts or not, Alex looked back at the question and saw that it was meant to be the mean.
Maths had to be one of the most dull subjects that her parents forced her into taking at college. She wasn't exactly the best at it, and she did not enjoy it in the slightest. In her opinion all it was doing to her was adding to all of the pressure she was already getting from college.
When finally she had finished the practice paper and the lesson had ended, she went to buy herself a cup of coffee to try and clear her head...and also of course to keep her going on her journey home. She was not sure if she could stay awake much longer. Things were not always like this, it was only since she was hardly getting any sleep due to these unusual dreams she was having.
Recently however, the dreams did not seem to be as bad as they were previously. It was as though her mind was learning to shut them out, as though they were unwanted guests. The voices she was hearing in her head however were unblock able...
She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she walked straight into someone. "Whoa Alex, watch where ya going gal!"
Looking up into the person who she had almost steamed over, she saw that it was someone from her photography class whose name was... "Shaun! Sorry about that...was thinking..."
"Never would have guessed...the way you looked I wouldn't have been surprised if your jacket had caught fire and you didn't notice!" Shaun was one of those people that was not always as cocky as people would think on first meeting. He was rather tall, with spiky dark hair and dark brown eyes to match. Alex considered him a friend, yet for some reason he was either not overly popular recently, or he just preferred his own company.
"Well..." Alex said, clearly struggling to find conversation.
"Yeah..." Shaun replied, "...well I have some work that I've gotta do...catch ya later Alex!" He winked at her, then walked briskly off in the opposite direction to the way that Alex was heading.
Interesting... Alex shook her head, she had not thought this herself, yet she was so tired at the moment she did not really care what it was that the voice found so interesting. Very interesting indeed...
'Unless you are going to tell me what is interesting will you please shut up!?' Alex now decided that trying to ignore the voice in her head was somewhat of an impossible task, so decided to humor herself by talking...or thinking, as it were, back at it more often.
The voice in her head stayed silent, it was clear that whatever it found interesting was something that it did not feel like sharing with Alex.
"Fine then..." Alex sighed to herself...half getting annoyed with herself for even saying it out loud.
Haven't you heard? Ignorance is bliss... in other words why should I answer you when you are so determined to ignore me all of the time? I mean come on I have been inside your head for about a week now, and for god sakes can you just get over it? We are stuck together, end of story, deal with it.
This had to be the most Alex had ever heard the voice 'say' in one go, and even the first time it had technically ranted.
'Stupid voice'...
At least call me by my proper name...please? In case you didn't know, it's Tifa.
'I'm going mad...'
-
Josh could not muster up the courage to show his parents what he had done to his hand...This presented quite an awkward problem. One it meant that he would have to somehow hide his hand from them until it had healed, and two it meant that he could not go to the hospital without his parents finding out through them.
Back home at last, and with both his parents at work, Josh went straight up to his room to examine the damage he had done more carefully.
It did not look good... One of his fingers was broken, and the rest of his knuckles were just a bloody mess. The pain coming from it was unbearable. He had no idea what to do. He supposed that the best idea would be to dress it in some way...but then again he had nothing to disinfect it with.
Oh aren't you the little worrier... how annoying...
"SHUT THE HELL UP" He shouted at the empty room.
There was a silence, which Josh thought was somewhat of a miracle considering the thing that he was talking to had just broken one of his fingers. Not sure whether this had made it go away for the time being, Josh walked over to the mirror...remembering what had happened that day Alex had took him shopping. After all, it couldn't hurt to check and see if it would happen again, that is of course if it did happen and he had not just imagined it all.
It appeared that lighting could strike twice in Josh's case. There, staring back at him was the terrifying face of...
"Sephiroth..." Josh felt stupid for saying the name out loud, after all, all Sephiroth was was a game character...so how he came to be hallucinating him in the mirror was beyond him.
To his great surprise...Sephiroth started to clap very slowly at him. "Well done...you have finally said my name, give yourself a pat on the back before I stab it!"
Josh didn't know whether or not to laugh at this...if the Sephiroth in his head was as terrible as the Sephiroth in Josh's favorite game...chances were he did not have much of a sense of humor, so there was no need to laugh.
"You know I'm not going to be contained in this shell for much longer...don't you?" He sounded very calm, as though he was binding his time.
Josh felt that he was mastering his fear of Sephiroth at a very fast rate. On the contrary, instead of being afraid of him, which a few minutes ago he would have said without a second thought, he was bursting with questions, though not sure whether or not it was a good idea to answer them.
He then noticed something that was very peculiar. Sephiroth's right hand had a broken finger on it... Almost as though...
"Looks like you hurt yourself in that little demonstration of yours..." Josh said, timidly.
Sephiroth glared at him, then without any words created the green aura around his hand that Josh recognised only too well as the 'cure' spell.
He looked down at his hand, and the same green light surrounded it too. His hand felt a pleasant warmth, and a sensation most peculiar, as though warm air were flowing through his veins, radiating some kind of mystical energy. The feeling was somewhat euphoric...even addictive for the short time that it lasted.
Josh then noticed something weird...in order for him to cast that spell, he would have needed materia... Sephiroth, as though reading his mind (which, Josh reminded himself, he probably did) spoke at this point.
"The materia seems to be scattered across your world too...I spotted this one when you had that nice little walk down to the lake with that girl...Alex...I just had to pick it up, no-one can survive without materia..." Sephiroth gestured to Josh's right wrist.
Josh looked down at it...he could see nothing but his sleeve...Then he felt a piercing sensation in his skin...
Pulling back his sleeve, he saw his wrist, looking red raw, with something pushing up through the surface. A small green orb was forcing its way to the surface of his skin. To his surprise, the feeling was not very painful at all, more like a wasp sting that was going on for a long time.
Josh thought he was going to be sick, which made him half wish he knew how to use the materia he saw embedded in his skin. He looked back into the mirror. Sephiroth had a look of evil delight on his face, which contrasted greatly with Josh's expression.
"Oh don't worry..." Sephiroth said, casually, as he observed josh trying to rip it out of his skin, "You won't even know it is there...I mean i had to make it surface before you noticed after all."
"Get this thing out of me!" Josh shouted in desperation. The materia then sank back into his skin, with a horrible freezing feeling. If he had not just seen it pertrude from his skin, he would not have known it was there.
He was now ghostly white... "I thought you used bangles...and armlets...and...and..."
Sephiroth scoffed. "Thats for the weak."
Josh looked confused, how could you blame anyone for not wanting to put orbs in their skin?
"They only get in the way in a fight, and you can never harness a materia's true power if it has to bypass armor before it gets to you...cut out the middle man so to speak."
"Take it out of me!" Josh didn't want to listen to another word.
"Tell you what..." Sephiroth began, and not in his mocking tone either, "...keep it in, and I shall teach you how to use it. Sounds like a better idea, no? And, if you do find the side effects of having the materia 'equipped', I shall teach you how to take it out as well..."
Now Josh was paying attention. The idea of being able to control materia at his will was very tempting, and after all, it was only cure materia, it could not do any harm.
"Do we have a deal?"
Josh could not bring himself to say yes...so instead just nodded at the mirror.
"Brilliant. Now then, lets get started shall we?" Josh could not believe that he said this already. He felt his fingers twitch with excitement. "First of all, I have seen this game that you believe to be our world... let me tell you now, there are some similarity's but there is a lot that is different that you need to know. Materia, you do not use 'MP' as it is called, it is all a matter of will power, if the mind does not want to cast a magic, then you must wait until it is rested and ready to cast.'
Josh did not think it was going to be as simple as seeing if you had enough magic points to cast a spell.
"Think of it as if your mind is the MP if that helps, you grow stronger the more you use it." Josh was intruiged, but nothing he had said so far had told him how to actually use the materia. "You need to tap into a certain area of your mind that you would not have without me. Even with me here however, that section of your mind is underdeveloped, you will need to practise..."
Josh was now very eager, even if it was just a simple spell that he was going to be attempting. "It is all a matter of concentration, not too difficult when only equipped with one materia as you can't accidentally use the wrong spell. However you must assume that you have an arsenal of materia at your command and focus on one spell. In this case cure."
He thought he understood...focus on the spell you want and it just...happened? "Once focused, its basically a flick of the wrist. When you are more used to it the flick will be unnecessary, but for now it will aid in you tapping into the core of the materia... Now give it a try..."
Josh began to practice...
Authors Notes: As usual please leave a review letting us know what you thought. Will update you on the upcoming guild wars story once we have a title. See ya next time folks!
R&A