A/N: Hi, guys! Welcome back! As I mentioned last time, this story is being re-written/overhauled/improved from the beginning. I was originally just going to replace the chapters as I improved them, but in the end I decided to just delete the old ones and post the new ones; they were different enough in tone and quality from the old versions that I felt this was the right course of action, just in case anyone stumbles upon the story while I'm in the process over overhauling; it wouldn't do for them to go from a good quality chapter to a piece of un-edited crud, right? XD Anyway, I do realize that the delete-and-repost method might be annoying for those of you who were reading this story before and have already read the original version of these first few chapters, so sorry about that. But maybe check out the newer versions of the chapters, if you've got some time to kill? They are better-quality writing this time around. ;)
Okay, I'll shut up now. Enjoy the chapter.
Chapter 2
"So, what exactly are we looking for down here?" the perky ninja asked.
Valeria sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose to stave off a headache. "I have no idea. Something that gives out a weird power signature, apparently." She wished she'd thought to swing by headquarters for a scanner of some variety before coming; without any technology to help them, they were left to search the old fashioned way.
Yuffie, of course, seemed excited at the prospect of finding something interesting and didn't seem to share Val's lack of enthusiasm. "Ooh, like maybe a new materia?"
Valeria rolled her eyes. "Always about the materia for you, isn't it?"
"Not always," Yuffie argued, then gave a sly little smile. "But it could be one, right? I mean, there's tons of stuff down here no one knows about."
Valeria just shrugged, an amused grin quirking up the corners of her mouth. "I suppose so."
"Well, let's hurry up and hop to it, then! I can't wait to find it, whatever it is!" Yuffie bounced on her heels excitedly, eyes sparkling.
Unfortunately, finding the source of the energy spikes turned out to be not as simple as they'd hoped.
"This is taking forever," Yuffie complained after they had spent over two hours scouring the slums for any hint of the energy source "How much longer do we have to keep looking?"
"Until we find something," Valeria replied immediately, but there was no denying that she was exasperated as well. This was two hours she could have spent doing something else. Anything else, really. I need to stop agreeing to these random-ass missions, she thought to herself, feeling annoyed that she was out on what was probably a wild goose chase when she could be at home enjoying a nice dinner with her sister.
Then she heard something.
"Yuffie!" she hissed, flailing a hand at the Wutai teen, who was still complaining that they hadn't found anything remotely interesting yet.
Yuffie paused in her ranting and looked over at her with an eyebrow raised, and Valeria gestured for her to be quiet. The girl nodded, expression turning serious.
Then Valeria heard the sound again. After a second, she identified it; the scuffle of boots across the gravel. Valeria looked over at Yuffie, who nodded again; she'd heard it, too.
They quietly trailed after the footsteps, and eventually came upon the source. Valeria ducked behind a pillar while Yuffie crouched underneath a fallen billboard, both of them trying to remain hidden while trying to get a good look at whatever or whoever was making that sound.
Peering around the edge of the pillar, Valeria could see their targets clearly. A group of about eight or nine men, armed with assault rifles. And dressed strangely.
Weird armor, Yuffie mouthed.
Valeria nodded. It looked almost like chain mail. Which was ridiculous. No one wore chain mail anymore, it was too heavy to be practical.
"The signal came from nearby," one of the men was saying. "The energy matches the last samples taken from G."
Valeria frowned. G?What the hell is G?
"Can we be sure of this data, though?" another soldier asked, sounding skeptical.
"It was stolen directly from Deepground," the first man, seemingly a commander, snapped. "It's infallible, understand?"
The younger man flushed. "Yes, sir. Sorry sir."
Well, that answered one of her unspoken questions, at least; whoever these people were, they weren't leftover warriors from Deepground. That was all at once good and worrying. No more Deepground mooks trying to stir up trouble was indisputably good news; she wasn't in the mood to deal with those assholes again. But that of course meant it was some other group of ragtag villains they would need to deal with.
She sighed. I need a raise.
"We have a lock on the energy signal!" one of the men announced, holding a small gadget.
Ooh, must be nice having tech, Valeria mused, still giving herself a mental kick for not having had the forethought to have brought a scanner of their own; she consoled herself with the knowledge that the scientists back at headquarters probably wouldn't have cleared her to take any of their precious equipment with her, since she had a tendency to drop those expensive gadgets at inopportune times and break them.
Shaking her head to dispel her wandering thoughts, she gestured at the men to indicate that they should follow them, and Yuffie nodded.
After a few minutes of skulking in the shadows behind the group of strange soldiers, they arrived at what seemed to be an abandoned factor of some sort.
"This place is falling apart," the mysterious commander said in disgust, curling his lip up at a stack of moldering packing crates that was off to one side of the loading dock.
It's certainly seen better days, Valeria agreed silently as she watched them from her perch atop of an adjacent building, noticing also the peeling paint on the sign and the rotting wooden boards of the factory walls. Of course, this entire area had been abandoned as a whole years ago, so it such disrepair was to be expected, really.
"He's inside," the soldier with the gadget said, pressing several little buttons as if double-checking before glancing over at his commanding officer. "There's no mistaking the reading."
The commander nodded. "Cover the exits" he ordered his men. "We have to capture him."
Capture who? Yuffie mouthed, her facial expression one of confusion.
Valeria shrugged, and pulled out her phone. When in doubt, she thought reasonably, pester the boss. So she quickly typed in a text to Reeve. Know anyone named G? she asked him. He seems to be the source of the signal. Some weird soldiers are trying to catch him. She hit 'send' and redirected her attention back to the soldiers, hoping that Reeve wasn't stuck in a meeting with his phone off.
As she watched, the soldiers paired up and moved to block the entrances, moving in quick practiced movements that spoke of a fair amount of tactical experience. She drummed her fingers impatiently on the edge of the rooftop as she waited for a response to her inquiry. Come on, Reeve. Check your damn phone.
As if in answer to her thoughts, her phone vibrated, alerting her to a new text. Relieved, she flipped her phone open and accessed the message. It was brief, but extremely clear and to the point.
Genesis. Stop them!
Sounds good to me, she thought. I'm tired off just sitting here and watching anyway. Snapping the phone shut, she waved to grab Yuffie's attention. We need to stop them! she mouthed, pointing to the men and adding in a couple gestures of Wutai military sign language just to make sure that the other woman understood what she was saying.
The Wutai girl's face lit up with understanding and she nodded, pulling out her giant shuriken and moving into a better attack position.
Where the hell was she keeping that thing until now? Valeria wondered, pulling her own bladed tonfa out of their sheaths on her back. She gripped the handles, took a brief moment to center herself, and then vaulted off the building.
The fall through the air was fast, but not too fast; she had just enough time to make sure her trajectory took her to where she wanted to go.
As she completed her fall, she slammed her right blade into the back of the soldier she'd nearly landed on, then quickly disengaged and rolled behind a fallen pillar as the other eight directed their fire at her, their weapons shooting bullets at her almost faster than she could track, despite the fact that the guns looked like old-fashioned rifles.
They're using machine-guns disguised as rifles?! she mentally demanded, as the rapid hail of bullets pelted the cement shielding her. Who the hell came up with that?!
Then she heard the slicing sound of Yuffie's massive shuriken arcing through the air, and she smiled. Her dramatic assault on that first soldier had distracted the remained warriors and left them wide open for Yuffie's attacks. Peering around the edge of the pillar, she saw that Yuffie had taken down three more soldiers in just under a minute. And now the soldiers were trying to shoot the ninja instead of Valeria, which was actually fairly amusing to watch since Yuffie bounced and flipped all around and pretty much just made it impossible for the soldiers to actually hit her with their shots.
But as entertaining as it was to watch, Valeria knew that the faster they finished off this fight the better.
Choosing a soldier across the courtyard as her target, she focused her powers. The experiments on Valeria and her twin had left them with a unique ability; they were able to cast on their own the sorts of spells that normally required the use of materia.
It was with great satisfaction that she watched the soldier go down after a hefty fireball to the back. She had to duck back behind her pillar immediately afterward to avoid getting shot to pieces, but it had been fun all the same. Five down, she thought, doing a quick count of the bodies on the ground and the soldiers still standing, four to go.
She ran out from behind the fallen pillar right as Yuffie leapt out of the shadows. Together they took down the rest of the soldiers, except for the commander, who seemed to be more skilled than they'd anticipated. He managed to dodge everything they threw at him, and Valeria couldn't get close enough to slash him with her blades.
But as luck would have it, she was spared the trouble of figuring how to kill the man when someone else did it for her.
Just as she was about to charge forward and try to lop off one of the commander's arms, a red sword pierced the man from behind, killing him instantly as it pierced his heart.
Yuffie raised her shuriken, ready to throw it if this new person turned out to be another enemy.
The person in question was a young man who seemed to be in his late twenties or early thirties, with red-brown hair and pale skin. He had the bright mako eyes of a SOLDIER, and wore a long red coat that looked a little worse for wear.
"You're Genesis?" Valeria guessed, not relaxing the grip on her tonfa just in case he turned out to be a new threat and not the person they were looking for.
The man looked at her, narrowing his eyes in suspicion. "And you are?"
"Valeria Tyler, with the WRO." She angled a blade towards her ninja friend. "This is Yuffie. Now…are you Genesis, or aren't you?"
He nodded, sheathing his sword. "I am."
Then he collapsed.
A/N: So, what did you think? Good, bad? For those of you who might vaguely recall the original version: better than before? Anyway, drop me a review if you've got a second to spare; feedback makes me happy. :)
I should have the revised version of the third chapter up pretty soon, and hopefully Chapter 4 not long after that.
See you next time!