Start Date: January 8, 2023
Windwillow
Final Fantasy VII
Part Three
Destruction or Deliverance
Gaia is faced with two threats at once, but only one force opposing them both. Shinra Inc. and its vampiric Mako Reactors are siphoning the life energy of the world - its Lifestream - and, ever so slowly, the world will quietly bleed to death because of it. Its new president, Rufus Shinra, has taken control over both the company and the world with an iron fist, and now seeks a place of endless Mako: The Promised Land, where they will build a new capital in Neo-Midgar. Unfortunately for them there is a fly in their soup: their own Professor Hojo, whose secret machinations have steadily shifted the state of the world into collapse. His plans, when revealed, will throw the company into chaos and the world into a chaotic hell hole. He is, after all, the driving force behind the other threat to the Planet, a near-omnipotent ex-SOLDIER named Sephiroth, though no one knows this but himself.
Sephiroth is, in fact, the second and most immediate threat to the Planet. After his defeat at the Mako Reactor in Nibelheim, he disappeared for five years only to resurface and exact senseless slaughter against anyone who stood against him. Certainly some were scoundrels, but the sacrifice of innocents proved unacceptable. One sacrifice in particular, the young flower girl Aerith Gainsborough, has galvanized her friends into a force that has vowed to make Sephiroth pay for her murder. However, a mysterious connection with their leader threatens both the party and the Planet itself.
The stage is set and the band prepared, and now the curtain will rise to reveal the final act of our tale: a story of a youth with a titanic sword, Cloud Strife, and his trials to realize his destiny and reclaim his humanity. We now begin the finale of our story, and examine both never ending light and a seemingly unbreakable darkness as they clash beneath an ominous star.
Chapter Forty-One: After the Storm Comes the Calm, and the Journey Resumes
Scene One
It had broken their hearts, but not their spirits. The sudden, horrifying murder of their friend Aerith only solidified the party's resolve to put Sephiroth six feet under the dirt, where he belonged. Though the event itself was sudden, the aftermath took a full day to sink in, and once it had, everyone gathered inside one of the conch shell-like houses, formerly an Inn for the Ancients.
"You know, after all that happened... I... It still doesn't feel real. Then I remember it, so I wanna kick that jerk's ass bad," Barret said resolutely, his good hand grappling his Gun-arm tightly. "But as much as I hate the asshole, where do we find him?"
"Sephiroth's Reunion apparently takes place far to the north, so we go that way," explained Cloud. Still, he had no idea you could go further north, save for the implication of Jenova waiting for them at the end. "There has to be something waiting up ahead..."
"Alright, it's time to kick some ass!" Tifa exclaimed as she slammed her fists together. Still, determined as she was, a nagging doubt left a bad taste in her mouth. "But... Will you hold up this time?" she wondered. "The way you acted last night... It scared the hell out of me."
"When I said I'd protect Aerith, I told myself I'd bite my tongue off to bring me back to sanity, but it didn't work..." said Cloud, to Tifa's horror. He lifted a hand to relieve her, and smiled. "But that isn't enough now. Now, there are implications of something bigger than me," he said slowly. "And that's where you guys come in. If I'm ever a danger to you or the Planet, kill me!" Cloud snapped, horrifying the others.
"What... What kind of bull are you trying to pull on us?!" Tifa snarled, her fist clenching hard enough to wrinkle her glove. "Say that again and I'll slap you!" she choked. That kind of language was unacceptable, for a couple of reasons, the first of course being that she didn't want Cloud to die. The second was the chilling realization that she would have to do it. She was the only one capable and close enough, her speed made her ideal, and to kill Cloud it would take a full force Materia Fusion blow. Even the thought sent a chill down her spine, and as the chill struck a simmering heat began to replace it that her glare at Cloud made clear.
Bastard... Don't even make me think about this...
Although the party continued to argue, Cloud stated flatly that the matter was settled. This (sort of) satisfied the others, who reluctantly accepted his terms, although secretly they all vowed never to follow through with it. Tifa remained shaken, and though Cloud was the first to leave, staring at his back filled her with incredible trepidation. Just looking at his spiky yellow hair from the back, and the idea that she would have to kill him, was unbearable.
I lost you for all these years... I am not giving up on you, even if I have to drag you out of Hell with my own two hands.
With that determined, all that remained was to gear up and head out. They gathered their gear and supplies, including several bottles of water, and departed for the north. The path there was just behind the Inn, so it wasn't difficult to find. Unfortunately, where they ended up was at the bottom of a huge cliff.
"And this is where I step in, folks! My Gaea material controls earth, stone, and rock!" exclaimed Red XIII proudly. He closed his eyes and began to concentrate, and the earth steadily began to lift up to form a series of platforms that the party could use to ascend. Unfortunately, the seismic activity started rattling the cliff and Red XIII was forced to stop his usage of the Gaea materia.
Now the problem became evident: though they had several platforms to climb up, they were greatly unstable and trying to climb them risked bringing the upper rocks down on them in a landslide. Fortunately, however, Yuffie discovered the entrance to a large cave, which they entered. Eventually they passed through the rocky corridors and entered a large, open area, where Red XIII's head drooped in horror.
"Aw, crap! This is deja vu in the worst way!" groaned Red XIII. As he scanned the perimeter he saw nothing but rocks and underground waterways running through a barren cavern, but unfortunately traveling through the cave was no longer the primary problem. "Every time we run into a large, open area, we get attacked!" he snarled. "It's like some greater force wants to use us for some nefarious reason for his own sick purposes, that screwed up bastard! I like the narrow corridors now..."
True to form, five enemies jumped from behind the rocks on either end of the room. They were odd pink imps carrying round, rune-covered shields just as big as they were, and they promptly retreated behind them. Barret opened his hatches and opened fire, only for the bullets to bounce off the walls and ricochet throughout the room. It took a while for him to realize this, but he got the clue when Yuffie clobbered him over the head and forced him to stop. Meanwhile Cid, Cloud, and Tifa charged forward, prepared to clear a path. Tifa hardened her fist and slammed it into one of the shields, but to her amazement it didn't break. Cid followed with a strong jab and Cloud with a horizontal swipe that produced similar - in essence, worthless - results.
"These punks are ticking me off!" growled Cloud, skidding back to his friends. No physical attack had been successful, so that left something else to be done. If nothing physical could pierce the shields, could they be imploded? "Cid, crush these jerks with your Void materia! They can't possibly handle that!" he snarled.
Although irritated at being ordered around, Cid lifted his palm and held it flat. A bubble of condensed space slowly began to form in his palm, but unfortunately they'd forgotten that they were inside a cave. The cavern immediately started to shake and roil, and Cloud shouted out for the party to run past the monsters. He wasted no time in slamming his hand to the ground, and Ifrit appeared in a column of flame. The shield wielding monsters attempted to block the team's path, only to be incinerated by a blast of fire. Their escape followed as Cloud recalled Ifrit to his gauntlet, though Yuffie moved to complain and was knocked unconscious by Cloud for insulting his Eidolon, and just as the cave collapsed they rolled to a stop out in the wilderness.
Scene Two
It was a narrow escape, but it was a successful escape. The party had dashed through the crumbling passageway, and Yuffie was forced to come along by Tifa, who grabbed her and slung her over her shoulder given that Cloud had knocked her out in one hit. By the time everyone had finally cleared the caves - which sealed behind them - they took stock of where they'd ended up. It wasn't much of a view, only sheer white snow that extended from the caves on out in every direction. Try as they might, none of them saw anything resembling civilization.
"Oh, just great! Just. Freaking. Great! You wanna know where north is now?! Do ya?!" Yuffie exclaimed angrily pointing out into the wilderness. "It's that way, that way, that way, that way, and that way!" she snarled, wildly flailing her arms. Indeed, everything they saw consisted of snow and the distant light of the sun, bearing down on the white wasteland. "We just landed in no man's land, 'cept this time it's all white!"
"Yuffie's right. We're essentially blind at this point," confessed Vincent as he crossed his arms over his chest. For all his training, wilderness survival had never been in the curriculum. "Emptiness in every direction, no map... This might be the end of it..." he sighed, which horrified Yuffie.
"I can't believe this bull! Cloud, do you have any ideas?!" Barret snarled, his fist clenching. When Cloud shrugged, Barret slammed his fist into the mountainside, causing a heap of snow to drop onto his head. As it slowly crumbled down, Barret's mood went with it and he stomped his foot hard enough that another clump fell straight down on him as well, which was when Barret cut his losses, brushed himself off, and muttered a few words that can't be printed.
Although everyone wracked their brains, by the end of the session no one had come up with anything, so Tifa told everyone to hoof it. It was a long, arduous journey trekking through the snowy wastelands, and not having any cold weather gear certainly did nothing to help the situation. Eventually dusk loomed as the sun began to set, and the party remained in the middle of nowhere with no shelter or fire. As the situation seemed to worsen by the minute, Red XIII attempted to form a shelter, though the barren and icy land seemed unable to construct a proper shelter; the ground wasn't so much rock as dirt.
"Well, we aren't getting anywhere here... What a hassle!" groaned Tifa as she held her face in her hand. If Red XIII couldn't get a shelter up, they'd be left in the middle of nowhere with no place to sleep, and a fire seemed unlikely as well. Suddenly, however, Tifa had a sudden bit of inspiration. "If we can't get away from the ice, let's use it to our advantage!" she laughed. She slammed her hand to the icy ground and a circle of runes formed that erupted to reveal Shiva in all her glory. "We're in a bit of a bind, Shiva!" Tifa sighed, folding her arms over her chest. "What if you form a structure out of ice so we don't have to sleep under the moon where anything could sneak up on us?"
"A structure... You mean, like an igloo? They make those up north... It's basically a huge dome of ice that you can huddle under," explained Shiva. Tifa's expression briefly brightened, but her face dropped as Shiva delivered the bad news. "True, I can make a shelter for you, but it'll be ice cold! Not only are you surrounded by ice, so it freezes you, you're underneath it so it melts!" she sighed, dropping her head. "And if it melts, everyone gets wet! Meaning, no fire."
"Aw, geez! This keeps getting better and... Wait... If we don't have rock, why not use some ingenuity?" Cloud exclaimed. He turned to Red XIII and smiled. "Hey, shatter the snow around here and see if there's any actual solid ground!" he said excitedly. Though Red XIII was unsure, he blasted the ground with flame, revealing a portion of lifeless soil in the center of the ice, with a small amount of rock. "Gotcha!" laughed Cloud, much to his friends' confusion. "If we make a shelter of ice and coat it with this stuff, it'll insulate it enough for us to make a fire! I think..."
"You think?!" Yuffie screeched, balling her fists and puffing out her chest. "We're in the middle of freaking nowhere and you think it'll work?! Give me something more than that, why don't you!" she snarled. "Our lives are in your hands, remember! You're in charge, so gimme some damn hope!"
"You have a better idea?" Vincent asked testily. Now frozen in fright, Yuffie quietly backed off and skittered away. Laying his head in his hand, Vincent quietly muttered a few expletives and turned back to Cloud. "This is all we have," he said quietly, "so we'd better make it work."
The idea was all they had, so the party went with it. Shiva lifted her hands and white energy surged from her fingers onto the icy ground, and a large dome of ice formed that slowly expanded into a size large enough for everyone to sleep in. Red XIII closed his eyes tight and concentrated, causing the soil beneath the dome to shatter and attach itself to the ceiling of the igloo, and propped it up with several columns of soil and rock to hold the structure together, layering it so that it could withstand the weight of the ice. With the shelter constructed, Cloud formed a tiny ember in between his hands and laid it onto the center of the floor, and Red XIII constructed a crude heater out of mud and rock. The igloo had somehow come together, and so everyone settled in for the night. Though it was a tiny fire, it provided just enough heat to keep everyone from freezing while also being light enough not to melt the ice.
Scene Three
The night went quietly, though uncomfortably. As one would expect, although the igloo held up, laying underneath it was far from ideal. The light from the fire was remarkably dim, so no one could see very far in front of themselves as they settled in. In the morning, the party evacuated the igloo and collapsed it, its purpose having been served. Their journey continued into the daylight hours, and slowly a large, hilly area came into view that eventually led to a series of caverns, where they promptly set up shop. Cloud created another tiny fire for heat and light, but by then their water supplies had largely been depleted, so they were forced to split up in an attempt to find a new water source.
One of the teams was led by Tifa, and included Vincent, Cait Sith, and Red XIII, and the other was led by Cloud. There was, fortunately, enough daylight to navigate the caves. Both groups went in separate directions, but it was Tifa's team that encountered a hitch: feisty, yellow penguin-like monsters called Headbombers, who happened to be using the caves for shelter as well. Everyone prepared for battle and headed to engage the monsters, and by and large they didn't put up much of a fight until one of the last remaining Headbombers launched itself at Cait Sith. Vincent shoved him out of the way and took the attack, one that caused a large explosion that rocketed him into the wall and shattered it to shards.
"Watch out for that one!" Tifa exclaimed as she skidded to a halt, the others joining her in coming to a stop. "If you hit it, you're probably toast!" she snarled. The Headbomber charged at each party member in turn, and though most of its attacks were evaded, the monster finally cornered Tifa. Before the Headbomber could connect, however, Vincent slid between it and Tifa and caught it in between his claws, stopping it cold. "Vincent?! Weren't you wounded?!" Tifa shouted. Indeed, Vincent's body was charred and he was covered in soot, but he was still standing strong.
As the monster continued to struggle and failed to break through Vincent's claw, it seemed to back off, apparently preparing to launch another explosive attack. Before it could do that, however, Vincent took a swing at it and blasted it to bits with a single punch. Its remnants dropped to the floor of the cave, and Vincent promptly ground them to dust with his boot, while Tifa and the others stared on in amazement.
"Replicating the explosion wasn't difficult to pull off with Blue Magic," Vincent grinned as his friends stared in amazement. "Bloody hurt, though..." he sighed. After working a kink out of his neck, Vincent turned towards the end of the route and walked off. The others joined him quickly, and within a few minutes they'd discovered a large source of water in the back of the caverns.
"Oh, thank God! I thought we'd never find water..." sighed a relieved Tifa, brushing her face with the back of her hand. As a strange, green mist filled the cave, Tifa was forced to hold her breath tightly until it subsided. Suddenly, her reflexes kicked in and she dodged a claw swipe from Red XIII that nearly nailed her. Without thinking, she slammed her foot into the creature and blasted him straight into the wall. "What the hell, man?!" she shrieked as Red XIII fell limply to the ground. "Red, what are you-"
"Tifa?! That was you?!" Red XIII screeched. Slowly staggering to his feet, the crimson beast narrowly dodged a strike from Cait Sith's fist, and responded in kind with a kick that caused the moogle to fall to the ground with a thud. "You too?!" he gasped. "What's going on?!"
"I didn't swing at you, I swung at the enemy!" tittered Cait Sith, slowly climbing back on top of his steed. After a brief moment of thought, he slightly tilted his head. "Wait... I forgot what the enemy looked like..."
"Who the hell did you think you were attacking?!" Tifa hissed. Receiving two sheepish grins and accompanying shrugs from her friends, Tifa quietly stomped her foot on the ground in frustration. It was when she turned to her side that she saw Vincent aiming his gun at her that she began to panic.
What in the devil...?!
As Tifa's eyes widened, Vincent lifted his weapon and lunged at Tifa, knocking the two of them a fair distance away. The pair rolled out of the way of a large explosion, one that, when the smoke cleared, revealed a hideous abomination. It was sickly green, easily three times the size of a normal human, with multiple tentacles that extended out of its body and ended in suckers. The monster had dropped from the ceiling and crashed, blowing Red XIII and Cait Sith away as well, though they quickly lifted themselves to their feet and stared dumbly at the creature.
"What the hell is that thing?!" Cait Sith shrieked, holding his furry head in both hands. Following another brief pause, he quietly acknowledged that that had been what he was swinging at. "Oh, right... ugly son of a bitch. No wonder I tried to punch it..." he muttered softly.
"Its breath produces a potent illusion! The effect caused you all to hallucinate!" exclaimed Vincent as he loaded his weapon and clicked it into place. Tifa looked on in amazement as Cait Sith and Red XIII engaged the Malboro, but before they could launch a counterattack the beast took in a deep breath and prepared to exhale.
Quickly, Vincent slid in between the Malboro and his friends, and was struck head-on by the Bad Breath's illusion mist. The mist slowly cleared, revealing Vincent standing numb in the center of the room. It didn't last long, though, before Vincent turned and lifted his gun, slowly aiming it at Tifa, which caused her to freeze in fear. To her horror, he slowly started to pull the trigger, but just as the gun prepared to fire Vincent whirled around and put three bullet holes in the Malboro's face. Another three rounds of bullets riddled the beast with holes, causing it to fall shredded to the ground in a heap of disheveled green snot.
"Y-You... Vincent?! Is everyone okay?!" Tifa shouted, staggering to her feet and wiping the remnants of the monster from her face. She looked around the room at the others, who had begun to recover, and turned to watch Vincent holster his revolver. "Wh-What happened?!" she shrieked. "Why didn't it affect you?!"
"It did affect me... but then whatever materia is inside me nullified the effect," explained Vincent. He began to cough and a sickening green mist emerged from his mouth, but he quickly blew it away with a gust of his own breath. "Now, I guess you could say that my breath is bad..." he said quietly. As Cloud and the others dashed through the caverns and saw the carnage, Vincent lifted a hand and waved them off. "We've eliminated the threat and found water," Vincent sighed. "Mission accomplished!" he said with a smile, though he began to cough again and a scowl replaced it.
Damn thing... I need a breath mint...
Scene Four
Once they'd found a source of water and lit themselves a fire for the night, the team settled into the caves until daylight broke. By the time they exited through the other end of the caves, they quickly found themselves nearing civilization: a large cluster of houses far to the northeast of the caves. Naturally, they rushed there as quickly as they could and entered the city to find a cozy, welcoming village called Icicle Inn. Given that it was isolated from the rest of the world, its inhabitants still relied on coal for heat and received their news via the radio. At one point, Shinra had been settled in the town, but they'd since left.
"Oh, hell yeah! It's about time we found civilization!" Yuffie cheered, her fists balling as she pumped them both fiercely. Looking around the town, which appeared to still be reliant on coal, Yuffie turned back to Barret with a look of excitement. "This is the stuff Corel used?! It beats radioactive Mako poisoning!" she laughed.
"Yeah... It's a lot better than huddling in a monster infested cave," said Cloud plainly. He turned to the others and pointed towards one of the largest buildings. "That might be the Inn... so you guys go get us a room!" he requested. It was as the others left that he heard the click of a gun, and whirled about to see Elena with a pistol aimed straight at his head, flanked by two infantrymen.
The hell?!
"Do you want to know how much effort it took to find you, you jerk?! The Gelnika broke down again and we had to... That doesn't matter!" snapped Elena as she put her hand on her hip. "I want you to tell me what you did at the Temple of the Ancients, punk!" she snarled. "My boss came back, almost in two pieces, and I saw the wound came from a big ass sword! And you have a big freaking sword!" Elena growled. "So tell me now: What the hell did you do to my boss, you jackass?!"
"Aw, crap... Of all the Shinra people to run into, I ran into the company drunk..." Cloud moaned lamely. Though Elena began to tremble with rage, Cloud shrugged and folded his arms over his chest. "Sephiroth did it, not me," he said plainly. "Didn't your boss tell you? I mean, after he took you to dinner like he promised?"
"Y-You... You son of a... How did you know about that?!" Elena snarled, stepping back in shock. Tseng was still in surgery and couldn't testify to it, but Cloud knowing what they'd talked about stunned her. Not only were she and Tseng alone back then, neither Cloud nor Sephiroth could have possibly seen them. Slowly, she lowered her gun and narrowed her eyes at Cloud. "You know stuff you shouldn't. How?" she growled. After a moment of thought, she returned her aim at Cloud's head. "Tell me or I'll put a bullet between your eyes!"
"Funny things tend to happen in ancient magical temples," Cloud shrugged. "We saw you two talking in the room with the murals, and then we watched Sephiroth slash Tseng from shoulder to gut," Cloud explained plainly. As Elena continued to lower her pistol, Cloud sighed and scratched the back of his head. "The last time I saw him, the guy was heading to stop you folks from screwing up things in the temple..." he sighed. "Oddly enough, Aerith was fine with working with him..."
"Y-You saw Tseng... so you did see Tseng and I talking?! The only way that's possible is some sort of funky magic!" Elena exclaimed. The thought of her intimate feelings for Tseng being revealed frightened her, knowing that her fellow Turks would frown on them, and her face immediately flushed red, though it quickly changed from embarrassment to anger. "And you say the Ancient showed you?" she snapped. "Where is she?! I want to talk to her!"
"Aerith..." stammered Cloud, uncertain of what he was about to say. Speaking the words would only make her death more real, but Elena needed to know the truth. "She was murdered by Sephiroth..." he said darkly. "So, we both want to put him six feet under. You aren't the only person Sephiroth has hurt."
"I... I see... So, the flower girl is dead? Really, really dead?" Elena asked slowly, her eyes widening. Tseng's relationship with Aerith was something she knew he treasured, and the idea that she'd be delivering the bad news soured her feelings of vengeance. Slowly, she holstered her pistol and turned to face the infantrymen. "Go back to base, soldiers!" she ordered, startling the troopers, but they quickly followed orders and Elena reluctantly turned back to Cloud with a huff. "Well, that changes things a bit..." she snarled.
"I wasn't expecting you to ditch your backup... Feeling cocky?" asked Cloud, putting a hand on his hip. "I'm sure it's against protocol to do what you just did... What are you going to do now?" he asked, quietly cracking his knuckles. "You still want to take me in? I can give you a fight if you want it."
"Take you in, huh? That idiot Reno defied orders when he let you go!" snapped Elena. At the time, she hadn't understood why her companions had sided with Cloud and Tifa. Finally she'd come to share the same respect for Cloud as they did. Now, however, he came off as frustratingly honest, and there was more than a little embarrassment that he'd seen her ask Tseng out. "But I can't see very well, lately..." she sighed as she put a hand to her face. "Suppose I never saw you, and I pistol whip the others if they try to say otherwise? Tseng would be mad, right? I mean... You know..."
"Somehow, I get the feeling he'd understand. And besides, you can get yelled at over dinner, right?" Cloud said cheerfully, extending his hand to a very shocked Elena. Slowly, hesitantly, she took his hand and shook it.
"B-But this is a one time thing, mind you!" Elena said defiantly, quickly withdrawing her hand and folding her arms over her chest even as her cheeks flushed red. Even if she looked the other way once, she couldn't do it a second time, something she supposed that Tseng would agree with in more than one way. As she turned to leave a thought occurred to her, and Elena tapped her forehead with two fingers. "Got it memorized?" she chuckled. Cloud returned the laugh and headed towards the Inn, leaving Elena to ponder what had just happened.
You know, the guy is pretty cute... I mean, not as cute as Tseng, but... What am I saying?! God!
Scene Five
Although isolated as it was, Icicle Inn was known - by the few who'd been there - as one of the warmest, most welcoming places on Gaia. For travelers who had braved the wilderness they offered food and drink, only asking for labor in the coal mines as repayment when their visitors lacked money. Regardless, after checking into the Inn (called, oddly enough, "Icicle Inn" in Icicle Inn), the party gathered around a large fire in the center of the room that was designed for travelers to warm themselves.
"Finally! We made it out of that stupid freaking snow field and back to civilization!" cheered Yuffie as she dropped back in her rocking chair. The Innkeeper had provided much appreciated blankets, especially welcome to the thinly dressed Tifa and Yuffie. "Come on, guys! Let's have a toast!" she laughed. "I need a drink after all that crap!"
"We can have a drink, and you get hot cocoa," Vincent said coldly as he reclined in his seat. "If you're sixteen, you're underage, and that means you can't drink..." he sighed. Quaking with anger, Yuffie returned to her seat and sipped her hot chocolate while glaring at Vincent, something that didn't seem to bother him much. "But that's a secondary issue. Where do we go from here, Cloud?" wondered Vincent.
"We don't have any information to go on either way... Gathering intel is the most important priority right now," said Cloud, taking a sip of his own hot cocoa, which he'd chosen to drink as he didn't want to risk getting soused like Elena. On that note, he had no intention of telling the others that Shinra already had a presence in the area, so as not to worry them. "Let's decide who goes where, and we're off..."
Everyone split up into teams, with Cloud leading a group with Tifa and Vincent. As the others gathered information across town, Cloud's team checked with the town's weapon shop. They were told that they'd need a Snow craft to proceed north, and that a man named Josef would be able to set them up with one, but noted that the last time anyone had bought one, it was someone from Shinra. Tifa, horrified, asked whether they had a base there, but the shopkeeper reassured her that the only Shinra presence in years was a scientist. Vincent reluctantly prodded and the weapons seller confirmed that the scientist's name was indeed Gast. Though he brooded for a few moments, Vincent asked Cloud and Tifa to join him in Gast's old laboratory, which the merchant directed them to. They did so, though Vincent had to pick the lock with one of his claws. Once inside, they found not only a laboratory but a full residence complete with running water and electricity.
"I don't see any Shinra insignia... So was this really a Shinra base?" wondered Tifa as she wandered the laboratory. It seemed as if the house had been suddenly abandoned, with open books and a computer terminal that was still running. Out of curiosity she clicked a few buttons on the terminal and, to the amazement of everyone present, the hologram of two people materialized in the center of the room. "Whoa! Who the heck are these guys?!" Tifa exclaimed as she stepped backwards in shock.
There were two people, one a man and the other a woman. The woman was dressed in pretty, multicolored robes and wore a ribbon in her hair that greatly resembled Aerith's, while the man wore spectacles and dressed in a white lab coat. When he saw the man with the glasses, Vincent recoiled in shock.
Gast! That's the Professor...
"It descended from the stars two millennia ago and crashed far into the northern wastelands..." explained the well-dressed woman as she reclined in her seat, which was across from Gast. "The sickness consumed all who encountered it, and the Cetra were reduced to a scant handful of migrants and vagabonds..." she said softly. "Using all our strength, we contained it inside the crater it had emerged from. After that, our numbers dwindled and we departed to wander the world..."
"A being two thousand years old?! That is... an audacious speculation... Living beings barely break a century..." sighed Gast. He quietly typed in the information to his computer terminal, while also sipping his coffee. He'd been assigned by Shinra to interrogate this woman, but eventually had fallen in love and ran away with her to Icicle Inn. "And what do you mean contained?" he asked pointedly. "Is there more to this creature than you're telling me, Ifalna?"
"It was too powerful to destroy it, so we sealed it into the chasm from whence it came. The Planet did not sit idly by as the sickness spread, however... It autonomously spawned beings capable of cleansing the creature: WEAPON..." said Ifalna with a sigh. "Though the damage was immense and the entity contained, the Planet put WEAPON into stasis to await a new threat... Namely, if the Calamity from the Skies awoke and resumed its sinister machinations..."
"WEAPON?! The Planet can spawn its own self defense mechanisms?! That's an amazing breakthrough in the field of archaeology!" exclaimed Gast, setting down his coffee with a trembling hand. "A Calamity from the Skies, sealed far to the north..." he mused, an idle thought blossoming into outright horror that causing his trembling hands to spill his drink. "But... there was another name, right? One that was more... proper?" he asked timidly.
"Indeed, the Calamity from the Skies spread its name as it infected us: Jenova..." Ifalna said pointedly. Gast, as well as the three party members gasped in horror as Ifalna quietly rose to her feet. "But... You look like you've seen a ghost!" she exclaimed. Indeed, Gast had begun to tremble and now held his face in his hands.
"Jenova... Dear God... We didn't name it ourselves?" gasped Gast as his complexion quickly drained his face white. "We... found it in a two thousand year old stratum... It was maimed and gnarled, but... We devised a code name: Jenova..." he said darkly. "I never knew that it gave it to us! The Jenova Project was conceived by the very being it was named for!"
"You know the name Jenova?! Then, you've made contact with that demon?!" shrieked Ifalna as her hands went to her mouth. Then again, the only way they could know its name was if Jenova itself had planted it in their heads, a truth that widened her eyes like dinner plates. "Don't tell me you actually interacted with that creature?!" she gasped.
"We did far more than interact with it. Jenova's cells were extracted and used in a variety of projects that were... less than ethical. It sickens me to say that I was involved..." Gast moaned weakly. His trembling seemed to accelerate and he closed his fists in anger. "We created a perfect specimen from its cells... the ultimate conclusion reached from the Jenova Project! I never should have forced Lucrecia to do it!" he exclaimed. "We... We injected Jenova's cells into her unborn child! It was projected to become the most powerful being in existence... And then we ripped the newborn from its mother's hands! Good God..."
Outside the simulation, Vincent's feelings had begun to stir. While he knew that Hojo led the Jenova Project, he'd never been informed of Gast's involvement. And the thought that Jenova itself had planted the seeds for its own project in Hojo's head partially explained his mania. Still, hearing that Lucrecia's child had literally been stolen from her the moment it was born caused his anger to begin burning.
The mother of your own child... You treated her like that? You beast...
"You've changed, my dear husband... Your sins have been absolved by the child I now bear..." Ifalna said calmly, taking Gast's hands in hers and bringing them to her stomach. "Being born the last of the Cetra will be a difficult task for her..." she murmured. "But our Aerith will bridge the gap between the Cetra and humanity..."
Scene Six
The party's stay at Icicle Inn, short as it had been so far, had been very eventful. Not only were they able to rest after their arduous journey through the wilderness, they'd had the chance to learn first hand the secrets of Sephiroth's origins. Professor Gast, former head of Shinra's Science Division, confessed that he had dealt with Jenova in the past and not only that, it had used its sinister influence to manipulate Shinra from within. The discovery, however, was at least matched in amazement by the revelation that Gast was the father of Aerith, formerly the final Cetra to walk the Planet. His wife had been Ifalna, the mother who had entrusted Aerith to Elmyra Gainsborough so many years back.
"And that's enough of that... We don't need to pry into their affairs any further," Vincent said plainly as he clicked a button and the holograms vanished. "Sephiroth was created by injecting Jenova's cells into an unborn fetus in Lucrecia Crescent's womb, partially under the direction of Professor Gast..." he explained. "Sephiroth has two mothers... Lucrecia biologically, and Jenova genetically."
"Oh, my lord... Now we know where that monster came from, at least!" sighed Tifa as she folded her arms over her chest. Still, that left a very pertinent question. "So Sephiroth's got two mothers... What about his father?" she wondered. She received a shock as Vincent angrily drew his gun and blew the nearby television to pieces in a single shot, and she dropped back to her seat in horror. "Sorry! I-I didn't know it'd be such a sore spot..." Tifa groaned.
"No, I should be the one to apologize... It was my fault that I succumbed to my emotions," sighed Vincent. He plopped down in a nearby rocking chair and held a hand to his face, emotions surging from his eyes. "Once Sephiroth was born and the Jenova Project advanced, he was taken from Lucrecia's arms and turned over to Shinra, and from there on I lost contact with her..." he said quietly. "The rest is my own personal vendetta. I won't say any more than that."
"Well, judging by your reaction, I have no intention of prying..." Cloud sighed. He'd never seen Vincent angry before, and finally seeing it was more than a little disturbing. He'd always been apprehensive around Vincent, but he now had started to fear him and whatever he held inside his heart. "But that begs the question: what happened to Gast and Aerith's mother after this recording was made?" he wondered.
"That's an open question, but I think there's a simple enough answer: they went to Midgar!" exclaimed Tifa as she put a hand on her hip. Even so, they'd never heard anything about Aerith's family other than that Elmyra had adopted her to protect her from Hojo. "Gast has to have went with them, so what happened?" she asked.
"No... I doubt Gast left this town alive," Vincent stated coldly. As he spoke, his fingers began to quake, dancing across his face as if he were playing a piano. "No one retires from Shinra... especially not people with information on what they've done that was ethically questionable... meaning, pretty much everything," he said plainly. "The only conclusion is that they murdered him and abducted the two women, taking them to Midgar for Hojo to experiment on..."
"Those damned fools... I have so had it with these people!" snarled Tifa, her fist quaking. But it made sense: Elmyra had found Ifalna close to death with Aerith in her arms, and she doubted that they'd allow their parents to remain together. Finally her rage boiled over and she slammed her fist onto the computer terminal which engaged a new hologram, one where Gast stood in front of Ifalna and Aerith with the three of them being held at gunpoint by two Shinra men in suits.
"Please, I beg of you - don't hurt them!" Gast sobbed, holding his body between the suited men and his family. As the scene unfolded, Vincent looked on silently, until he heard the door open, and he heard the sound of footsteps approaching. "Y-You! You demon!" rasped Gast. "Don't hurt them, Hojo!" he snarled, the mention of Hojo's name causing Vincent's eye to twitch sharply. "They aren't your play things! Don't you dare hurt them!" Gast begged.
Before anyone else could speak, Gast fell back with a bullet hole in the center of his temple, and as his body dropped lifeless to the ground, Ifalna let out a primal shriek. As the seconds ticked by, Vincent began to tremble and his fingers slowly reached down to his belt. Slowly the assailant came into view, and it was a man they knew well. He had a white lab coat and dirty, unkempt hair, wore glasses, and now approached Ifalna and Aerith with a sinister grin. Cloud and Tifa had no time to take in Hojo's appearance, however, as an enraged Vincent furiously lifted his revolver and fired at the computer terminal and caused it - and much of the desk - to explode into bits. In the aftermath Cloud and Tifa dropped to the floor in shock and terror, as they felt the malice oozing from Vincent's being as Hojo's hologram fizzled into nothing.
"That is enough for now... You don't need to see or hear anything from that man. Forget you ever saw the bastard," growled Vincent coldly, slowly lowering his pistol and regulating his breath. Though he continued to tremble, he managed to compose himself enough to holster his gun and turn towards the door. Once he'd stopped shaking, Vincent stepped towards the door and threw it open, hard enough to rattle the hinges. As he left the laboratory, neither Cloud nor Tifa wanted to force the issue. Still, his reaction filled Cloud with something more than fear for Vincent; curiosity.
What happened between Vincent and Hojo?! I always knew that he knew more than he was saying, but this? Whatever his vendetta is with him... I hope I never see those two cross paths...
Scene Seven
The wintry wastelands of the northern continent were perilous, indeed a formidable barrier separating civilization from the worst wound the world had ever received. To get to the Northern Crater, however, it was necessary to take a Snow craft into the wild and ride it through the snowy wilderness. These Snow craft were easily requisitioned from Josef, the keeper of both the coal mines and the wilderness society. Fortunately, the size of the Snow craft would allow everyone to pile into it to travel. Unfortunately, the party now reposed in the middle of nowhere, with no Snowcraft, no supplies, and seemingly no hope.
"You stupid moron! Do you have any idea what kind of situation you've dropped us into?!" Tifa snarled, standing over a semi-conscious Yuffie, whose head now lay buried in snow. It was buried there because Tifa had slammed her into a snow drift. "What the hell were you thinking, grabbing the controls?!" she growled, veins pulsing on her face. "Thanks to you, we ended up in the middle of freaking nowhere!"
"Hey, don't yell at me! Who was stupid enough to let me drive in the first place?! Idiot!" snapped Yuffie as she popped up from her snowy grave and plopped back down onto a mass of snow. She briefly took stock of her body parts, making sure that she hadn't lost a tooth to Tifa's fist, before returning her furious glare. "And I said I was sorry, what, fifty times?!" she shrieked angrily. "And it isn't like I led us out here blind! I stole a map from the Innkeeper! Take a look at where we are!"
Yuffie reached behind her and unfurled a large map, clearly demonstrating where they were now. Upon checking the map, the location they were in became quite clear: the middle of nowhere. The map itself was fairly bare bones, with only a few forests and roads marked and a large, red "X" at the top of the map, none of which was of any use, and it didn't mark any actual locations. Cloud furiously took Yuffie by the throat and began to strangle the poor sap, shaking her back and forth until Tifa ended the debate by knocking them both out cold. Once they'd revived, Cloud and Yuffie apologized to each other and the matter came to a standstill.
"Let's assess the situation, folks! We have no idea where we are, the map is worthless, and we have no transportation or anything that would help us survive! In other words, we're screwed!" Cait Sith growled, folding his furry arms over his chest. "But we'll find a way!" he insisted as he hoisted his fist high. "There's always a glint of light in the darkness of despair!"
"Not that you have to worry about the cold, you jackass," Vincent growled, desperately rubbing his arms together in an attempt to keep warm. The simple fact that Reeve was safe and warm in Midgar was enough to make Vincent want to throttle the cat.
"Okay... So, that more or less sums it up. Thanks to Yuffie, we're in the middle of nowhere, no provisions, and a nearly worthless map... Dammit!" Cloud shouted, punctuating his words by pounding his fist into a snow bank. While none of them had known how to properly pilot the Snow craft, Yuffie taking her turn had rooked them all. "But unless we have another suggestion, all we can do is try to follow what little the map tells us... Any objections or better ideas?" he asked. Receiving none, he angrily nursed his migraine, dropped to his back into the snow and gave a shout of sheer frustration. "I've been saying you're all trying to kill me, but now you might have actually done it! God!" Cloud screamed, his despair overtaking him.
Scene Eight
It hadn't taken long for the darkness to deepen, and for the light to fade away into a dark abyss. In his dreams, Cloud watched as Aerith's smile faded into the abyss. He could feel the heat, and smell the sweat that dripped from his face. Finally, as Aerith's eyes glossed over and Sephiroth's cat-like eyes came into view, Cloud's awareness broke and he sat up straight from where he lay with a sharp gasp. A quick check of the surroundings found that he was inside some sort of wooden structure, and that the heat he'd felt in his dream was the warmth of the fire in the next room. He turned his eyes to his left and watched as Tifa's gentle eyes entered his vision, and a smile crossed his face before dropping back into bed in relief.
Guess we made it... Wait. Where did we make it to?!
"You've been out for two hours... Most of us recovered in one hour, and they're all waiting in the living room for us," Tifa said with a sigh of relief, brushing the hair from her face with a deft swipe. "We all passed out in the cold, and a man named Holzoff found us and rescued us, with Cait Sith's help," she explained. "It's a miracle we're still alive..."
Once Cloud recovered, he and Tifa reconvened with the others in Holzoff's living room, which was, mercifully, well heated by a large fireplace. After everyone had lost conscious due to hypothermia, Cait Sith had gone to search for help and found Holzoff chopping wood at his camp site. With their combined effort they'd brought the team to Holzoff's cabin, where they spent the next two hours recovering and warming up. Holzoff also provided blankets and hot cocoa, which Yuffie accepted as if it were the nectar of the gods and downed in a single gulp, though she quickly screamed because the cocoa was so hot that it scalded her throat. Holzoff was an older man, nearing seventy but still going strong. He dressed in warm, heavy clothing, and his snow white beard looked almost as if he'd plucked it from the ground and plastered it onto his chin. As Cloud and Tifa entered the living room, they found their friends resting under warm blankets and holding hot cocoa, except for Yuffie, who had switched to water to cool her burning throat.
"I haven't had guests in ages, much less the kind I had to retrieve and resusecitate... You folks are lucky that strange fellow's steed is so sturdy!" explained Holzoff, offering hot cocoa and blankets to Tifa and Cloud. As they settled in to warm themselves by the fire, Holzoff dropped down into his rocking chair with a sigh of relief. "My name is Holzoff, and I've been researching and challenging this mountain for the past thirty years."
"We owe you more than money can pay, then! Thank you for all you've done for me and my friends!" Cloud said, bowing gratefully to his savior before he sat back and sipped his cocoa. Once he'd warmed his body, Cloud set the cocoa down on a nearby table and offered his hand to Holzoff. "I know we can't repay you, but... Seriously, sir... I don't know how to thank you..." sighed Cloud as Holzoff shook his hand.
"I've made it my business to help travelers ever since I first tried to climb the mountain with my friend, Yamski... But the cold was so bitter that he cut his rope in despair and surrendered to the freezing mountain below," Holzoff explained sadly. "Ever since, I've settled here and made a few more expeditions, but by and large they haven't been very successful..."
Holzoff spent the next hour explaining the conditions on the mountain, which were so bitterly cold that every challenger who had made it any further gave up, save for himself. To survive in the bitter cold, he explained, they would have to keep themselves consistently warm. He provided everyone with extra layers of clothing and each a thermos of hot chocolate, noting in particular that extra socks were a necessity. These he provided from his personal stock that he'd gathered to assist challengers to the mountain.
"I... I don't know how to thank you, sir... But... what am I supposed to do?!" Red XIII exclaimed, curling his tail around his paws and shivering from the thought of stepping foot outside with bare paws and no coat. "You don't have any socks that my claws wouldn't pop out of!" he whimpered.
"Creativity can usually be rewarded. Maybe if you use your Fire materia to create fire and then use Form to transform it from flames to basic heat, you can warm your body?" suggested Vincent. "Fire itself is essentially heat transformed into flames, and transmuting it into its most basic element might work..."
With no better idea, Red XIII closed his eyes and slowly focused his mana, pictured the fire he could create with his materia fizzling into simple heat, and to his amazement it worked. He could feel the rush of warmth throughout his body, a relieving sensation after having braved the cold. Unfortunately, he heated himself so much that his feet began to scald, and he fell back shrieking in pain. Thinking quickly, Holzoff snatched up a bucket of ice water and threw it on Red XIII to cool his overheated paws. But, the cure being worse than the disease, Red XIII's yowl echoed so sharply that Yuffie nearly passed out and the others were forced to muffle the sound by clapping their ears shut.
Scene Nine
Red XIII's pain aside, everyone in the party found themselves sufficiently suited up and prepared for the mountain. They quietly gathered together outside the cabin and, after a short discussion on how to proceed, they decided on an order to the party to proceed. The journey began and they ascended the path towards the peak, which was just as cold as Holzoff had described. It was a long, hard and winding road that they burned through, but with Holzoff's careful instruction and the supplies he'd provided, the party forged ahead through the biting cold. Slowly but surely, they proceeded up through the mountain, pausing briefly to drink from their thermoses, until at last they discovered a large cavern system. Once inside, they found that the chamber was naturally heated, so they quickly discarded their bulky, heavy gear and set up shop in the cave after creating a small fire to huddle around.
"Hot damn! We made it, you guys! We freaking made it!" Yuffie cheered, pumping her fist in excitement. The whole way up she'd been as insufferable as always, and once they'd found natural heat, she was the first to remove her heavy clothing. It had been horribly restrictive and uncomfortable, and she was glad to lose the weight. "How long was it, again?! In hours?!" she screeched angrily. "I'm so exhausted that I feel like-"
"Quiet. Calm down and relax," growled Vincent forcefully. As he propped himself up against a wall, Yuffie cried out in fright and dropped back to her seat. "This is a good time to stop... There's no rush, so forcing ahead unprepared would only be detrimental..." he sighed.
The party did indeed take a break, gathering around their fire to rest and regroup. Luckily, the chamber they found themselves in was both naturally heated and free of monsters. While everyone enjoyed their break, Cait Sith sat quietly by himself in the corner of the cavern, trembling out of trepidation rather than cold. He knew something the others didn't, something that none of them caught onto except, as usual, Vincent.
"Do you care to share anything with us, friend?" asked Vincent pointedly, speaking in such a menacing tone that Cait Sith's cat dropped from its moogle and fell flat on its face. He was grateful, at least, that he hadn't used his real name. "I get the feeling that Shinra has a few surprises for us, eh?" he wondered quietly. "Want to elaborate?"
"God, almighty! Why do you have to be so intuitive?! I thought I was playing my cards close to my vest..." groaned Cait Sith as he climbed back on top of his moogle. Once he'd settled, he reluctantly crossed his arms and sighed. "There's a good chance that Shinra is already at their destination..." he said glumly.
"Say what?! And were you planning on telling us this at some point in the foreseeable future?" Cloud snarled, again prompting Cait Sith to fall straight onto his face. "If you want us to trust you, at least try to be honest and give us the damn intel!" he snapped.
"Okay, okay! Remember that you can't kill me, but damn, you're terrifying!" shrieked Cait Sith, again settling himself atop his steed. "Okay, the thing is... They've got the Highwind repaired, and they're heading to the crater as we speak. There, I said it. Now, please don't rip my head off," he moaned. "The last one was expensive..."
"They repaired it?! Thank God! If they'd left it to rot, I'd have even more reason to put 'em six feet under!" Cid snarled, folding his arms over his chest. After a brief period of thought, he angrily grabbed Cait Sith by the shoulders and began to shake him back and forth. "They're using it against us?!" he shrieked. "They're wasting my masterpiece and using it to... do whatever?! God!"
"I'd expected they'd have it repaired. But riddle me this: is Hojo aboard?" asked Vincent. When Cait Sith failed to meet his eyes, Vincent narrowed his with enough intensity to make Reeve shake back in Midgar. "You should have said that first," he growled testily.
"Hojo?! That lunatic is back with Shinra?! The last time I saw him, he was groping a woman back in Costa del Sol!" Tifa explained, rising to her feet and angrily flexing her knuckles at Cait Sith. "What the hell is he doing back with Shinra?! Didn't that jackass retire?!" she snarled.
"The only way a Shinra employee leaves service is in a body bag. Gast was the same thing; once he'd outlived his usefulness, they iced him," explained Vincent coldly, drawing his thumb across his neck. As he leaned back from where he sat, he turned his eyes upwards and the memories of Gast's murder seemed to replay on the ceiling. He'd remembered Hojo's cold eyes, eyes that he'd remembered from long ago. "There isn't a chance in hell they'd let his scientific prowess go to waste. An asset like Hojo? They'd drag him back in chains, if that's what it would take..."
Scene Ten
With the situation joined, the party hurriedly broke camp and set out through the caverns. It was a hard journey, as they were attacked by a large creature called a Stilva, a monster resembling the Materia Keeper they'd fought on Mt. Nibel, and to deal with it Vincent simply paralyzed it using the Twin Brain's stare, but once it broke free and attacked with a wave of magical energy breath, Vincent was forced to hold it back using his body as a shield. In the aftermath he was heavily wounded, but after slaying the Stilva, Cloud was able to patch him back up with his Cure materia, although it wasn't as effective as Aerith's. Because it was less effective, it took close to half an hour to mend the damage, and Cloud was left drained for another half an hour before he'd recovered enough mana to proceed.
"Gawd! We've been here for how many hours and we still haven't found the exit?! I call bull!" exclaimed Yuffie, her voice echoing through the cavern. That proved to be a bad idea, as she was nearly skewered by an icicle falling from above. "What the hell, man?! Why do I always get hurt?!" she shrieked. She angrily slammed her fist into the wall, and when she heard an ungodly howl from further ahead, Yuffie promptly screamed and dropped to the ground face first.
After reviving Yuffie, the team hurried forward towards the source of the noise. What they ended up finding was the mutilated corpse of one of Sephiroth's minions, which had been ripped from limb to limb by... something. Though Tifa hurried to its aid, Cloud held her back, knowing that the cause of the attack had to be nearby. Following a brief, intense rumbling, the answer came into view: a titanic, two headed dragon-like chimera, one with a massive snake head and the other a ridged, mutated lizard. It again roared, which shook the entire cavern and dropping another icicle just to Yuffie's right, which caused her to pass out and forced Tifa to slap her awake as the Schizo approached.
"Uh... Not to be the bearer of bad news, guys, but there's nothing we can do that can scratch that sucker!" Cid said nervously, as even though he drew his weapon, he had no idea what he could actually do with it. Even if they attacked one head, the other could cover it from the other side. And the passageway they were in was too narrow to fight in any reasonable formation. They would have to plunge head long into the enemy, who could use both physical and breath attacks to maul the team to death.
"Option One: Cut off the heads one by one and kill it... Option Two: blast the son of a bitch and run..." stammered Cloud, drawing his sword with trembling fingers. The Schizo's two heads and its massive claws made it unlikely that they could bridge the gap for either option. "Do we have an Option Three?" he pondered.
"Option Three is part of Option two: find a weak point, nail it, and then run!" Vincent exclaimed as he withdrew his revolver. While the Schizo steadily approached and began to close the gap between it and the party, Vincent carefully scanned the creature's anatomy, hoping to find something vulnerable. He found his answer in the base of the neck, where the two heads were rooted, the center of its throat. There, where its two windpipes met, had to be a vulnerability waiting to be exploited.
At least that's the idea... I don't even want to think what'll happen if I'm wrong...
The Schizo gave a mighty roar and stopped charging, energy surging up through both heads as if they were traveling through rippling pipes, complete with its scales bulging from the fire. Before the breath attack launched, Vincent narrowed his eyes at its weak point and fired a shot with his revolver. The attack pierced the Schizo's neck and forced the blast breath to explode upwards through the creatures' mouths, nailing the ceiling and triggering the cavern's collapse. They wasted no time in charging forward past the creature, though as Vincent approached its heads recovered and again readied a breath attack. In response Vincent inhaled a deep breath and exhaled a mass of green gas at the Schizo. The Bad Breath struck the two heads, and as they reared back to attack each other, Vincent passed them just as the cave collapsed on top of the Schizo and he rolled to a stop just beyond the cave-in. Once he was out he dropped to one knee and choked out an expletive before breathlessly returning his gun to its holster. Although it was a narrow escape, it was an escape, although Tifa had to drag Yuffie all the way out and deposit her face first onto the ground. Once Yuffie had been both revived and pacified from attacking Tifa, there was only one final cliff to climb, and Yuffie took point in climbing first.
"Whew! That was intense!" breathed Tifa, wiping the sweat from her brow with the back of her hand. With a final gasp she fell back against the mountainside and slowly slid down to the ground. She turned to an equally exhausted Cloud, who was sweating just as much as she was, and pushed out her knuckle.
"Oh. My. Gawd!"
Before Cloud and Tifa could bump fists, they nearly fell over in surprise at Yuffie's exclamation, and scurried up the hill to join the others, and what they found shocked them just as much as it had Yuffie. It was a titanic crater, easily twice the size of Midgar, stretching out over a wide area that was surrounded by a huge wasteland that rimmed the edges and, most notably, there was a column of light shining around it. But that didn't quite describe the scale of that column; It was a spiraling, surging wave of multicolored energy that soared high into the sky, and beneath it was a single, rocky road lined with hills and chasms. The entire sight was at once amazing and appalling in its combination of brilliant color and empty desolation.
"It's so... beautiful! Whoa!" Yuffie shrieked, dropping to her knees in amazement. The light itself was mesmerizing, coiling up into the sky like a massive whirlwind of shimmering stars. "So beautiful... but freaking terrifying!" she screeched, falling to her seat in terror. "What kind of funky mutants are waiting for us in there?! Gawd!"
"Cloud? Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" wondered Tifa, also amazed at the sight before her. "That's an ungodly amount of energy... and in the middle of a huge crater... so... It has to be-"
"The place where the Calamity from the Skies landed two millennia ago... Yeah. This is Jenova's impact site!" exclaimed an incredulous Cloud. "This is the epicenter of the world's worst cataclysm... and the Promised Land that Shinra's been searching for!"
"You don't need any special power to see the light, and it's clear that we're looking at the wound..." Vincent gasped. As even his hand began to tremble, his resolve began to waver. "Two thousand years, and the Planet still hasn't closed its scar!" he exclaimed, finally composing himself and regulating his breath.
There isn't a doubt in my mind... It is in there. And so is he...
"Wherever Jenova is... Sephiroth has to be... Somewhere in there, that bastard is waiting for us!" Cloud yelled, his fingers turning to his sword's grip. "And this is the site of Sephiroth's Reunion..."
"D-Do you think this is it? This is the final battle?!" Barret exclaimed, his entire body shaking. Before anyone could answer him, Barret wiped the sweat from his brow and spat to the side. "Who am I kidding, of course it is! But... Now..."
"At the final moment... Me, too..." murmured Red XIII as his entire body quaked. "At the final moment, the end of it all seems close... and it's terrifying!" he croaked.
"Somewhere... Somewhere in there... Sephiroth's waiting for us!" snarled Cloud, his fingers tightening until he finally drew his blade and brandished it. Just like the others, he felt trepidation, though his was more personal than most. The thought that Sephiroth, at the peak of his power, could control him frightened him. In the final moment, would he turn on the others? He couldn't afford to succumb; he had to stay strong. As he stared at his reflection in the steel before him, Cloud angrily swept the blade in front of himself and returned it to his back.
You're going to pay for Aerith's life with yours... I promise you that!
Author's Notes
Originally, this was technically a chapter and a half. The segment of climbing up to the North Crater was originally in the next chapter in its entirety, but it was so long that I decided to split it up. The original Chapter 42 was almost 50 KB, as opposed to what it is now. I'll touch a little on the notes from each section briefly.
Point One: Getting to Icicle Inn. I have zero idea if any of this is scientifically viable. But it seemed cool, so as usual, I went with it. Calling BS on me is more or less expected by now, so feel free. Same with the Fire/Form thing with Red XIII later on.
Point Two: Icicle Inn. I didn't anticipate Elena growing as much as she did in the actual piece, and the "Got it memorized" was totally improvised. The original notes for the scene in Gast's laboratory were a bit different... Originally, I wanted to stretch it out, but cut it a bit. Now that all three Turks respect the party, it ought to make Midgar a bit more believable...
Point Three: The journey to the crater. I had fun writing the first part, where Yuffie screws up the entire trip, more than the rest of it. The Snow craft and Josef obviously reference FFII, and I included it because obviously everyone couldn't fit on one snowboard. I'm not sure what I originally intended the Schizo fight to be, but whatever was in the notes seems a lot different... It ended up very condensed. I suppose if I'd dragged it out, it'd be a little gratuitous... I couldn't find any justification for fighting a huge chimera with two heads, two breath attacks, and a body that would otherwise maim anyone it came in contact with in a very confined space. For the Bad Breath attack, the mental image I had is of both of Schizo's heads turning on each other and blasting the other with their breath attacks before being killed by the cave-in. Dunno if that got through, but it's just an FYI.