Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy. Attempts to sue will be fed to Bahamut.
Yeah, I'm back. It's been quite a while, but I've not given up on this story yet. I've had a lot of issues to deal with, including accusations of plagiarism, transferring to a different college, and final exams, not to mention other personal issues. But, now, everything is resolved, and I can begin uploading again.
So, as a result of this, I haven't just uploaded one chapter, I've uploaded three for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy.
Book I, Part II: Mortal Conflict - The Zodiac Brave Story
Chapter II: Out Of Phase
[March 18, 2152 | Trabia Garden, First Floor, Infirmary | 4:36 PM]
My vision is assaulted by bright lights as my eyes slowly open, leaving me staring up at two white lights on the ceiling above me. Footsteps cause me to turn my head, and I look sideways at the person approaching me, a young nurse wearing the typical white coat and hat of most medical professionals.
"How do you feel?" she asks, and I blink again, eyes adjusting to the light, before answering.
"...Like I was hit by a car," I reply bluntly.
"It's good to see you awake. You took quite a beating from Revolver," the nurse replies, and I just nod, gritting my teeth and sitting upright on the bed. As I do, I notice that my right forearm, part of my chest, and right leg from the knee down are wrapped in bandages. Apparently, I took more of a beating from his Limit attack than I thought. Silently, I reach down, beginning to unravel the bandages from around my legs. As I do, I notice that they're still red, probably from being burned by the Ether Strike. The nurse frowns as I remove the bandages, but makes no attempt to stop me.
"You should leave them on, you know."
"I know. But they'll drive me crazy if I do."
The nurse just sighs, shaking her head.
"I may have been able to heal you, but you're still going to be sore for a while. Take it easy until you're sure you're fully healed, okay?"
Starting to unravel the bandages from around my chest, I nod.
"I doubt I'll be fighting Revolver again anytime soon, anyway." Slowly, I step off of the bed, throwing the bandages into the trash can next to the door and beginning to unravel the ones around my right arm. "Thanks," I say, before stepping out into the hall.
[March 18, 2152 | Esthar, Location Unknown | 4:36 PM]
"So, you failed to acquire it," the seated figure said, more of a statement than a question.
"...I did," the woman replied, bowing her head. The man simply nodded, spinning in his chair to face her. The man's black hair was neatly cut, one lone piece of hair falling slightly between his eyes. His black suit was immaculate, as well as his matching black shoes. Folding both hands on his desk and looking up at the woman, the man's gaze was solemn, his eyes piercing.
Zeo Conrad was the man's name, the owner and president of Conrad Synthetics and a major leader in the industrial sectors of Esthar, holding immense amounts of business in the region despite several new companies attempting to infringe on the area.
"And why, may I ask, did you fail such a simple mission, Mystique?" Zeo said, his gaze never leaving the woman and nearly causing her to flinch involuntarily.
"There was...another there. Someone, apparently, considerably more powerful than myself. I tried to escape with the Stone, but they were able to keep me from taking it."
"Interesting...and the name of this 'other person'?"
"They didn't give their name."
Zeo Conrad's eyes narrowed dangerously. "Then I trust you can find that information out, can't you?"
Mystique stopped herself from taking a step back out of fear, instead simply nodding. "I can, and I will."
"Good. See to it that you don't fail again, please."
Without another word, Mystique turned, stepping out of Zeo Conrad's office and shutting the door behind her. Zeo simply shook his head, returning to his examination of several documents on his desk. Absently, he pressed a button on his desk before speaking into a built-in microphone on the screen beside him.
"I have a job for you..."
[March 18, 2152 | Trabia, Bika Snowfield | 5:04 PM]
"What a mess..." a young boy absently said, trudging across the snowfield while shielding his eyes from the storm that now whipped around both him and his companion. While Trabia was known to be a docile region, especially during the time of the year that it was now, it still had its faults. Namely, random, violent snowstorms that sometimes blew across the plains, nearly shutting down travel and forcing travelers to seek shelter or face a grim fate in the cold. During the spring months, like now, the early spring winds sometimes prompted large bursts of snow and ice to gather into a rolling storm, similar to a sandstorm.
Such was the predicament that the two travelers were now caught in.
The boy, to his credit, just continued to struggle across the plains, one hand shielding his face and the other gripped tightly around the wrist of the other figure, a young girl.
'We should be getting close to Trabia Garden by now...'
[March 18, 2152 | Celsius, Bridge | 5:05 PM]
"Any sign of him?" Rikku asked, looking over at Yuna.
"Nothing," Yuna replied, shaking her head. "He's either still in Trabia Garden, or..." Yuna cut herself off, not wanting to finish her sentence.
"He can handle himself," Paine cut in, looking between Rikku and Yuna. "I'd think both of you should know that by now."
Before either Yuna or Rikku could get in a word to counter, Buddy turned from his position at the front of the bridge, facing Yuna.
"I think I see someone out there..."
Immediately, Yuna ran to the front of the ship, looking out the window. The storm was making it hard to see, but Yuna could vaguely spot a glimpse of black moving through the white haze.
"They must be crazy to be out in this!" Brother chimed in, also looking out of the window.
"Whoever it is, I'm going to get them," Yuna said, heading towards the bridge door. "Like you said, it's crazy for them to be out in this."
"Hey, wait up!" Rikku shouted, following Yuna out of the bridge and towards the exit to the Celsius.
[March 18, 2152 | Trabia, Bika Snowfield | 5:06 PM]
"How much farther?" the girl asked her companion, teeth chattering as she brushed snow away from her face.
"We should be there any minute now," the boy replied, also shivering from the wind and snow but keeping a positive outlook for the sake of the girl.
'At least, I hope so.'
"Hey! Over here!"
A voice snapped him out of his single-minded thoughts, and he turned to see something large and red just ahead of him through the snow. Two people were standing outside, he noticed, apparently the ones yelling at him to get inside.
"The Ragnarok...?" he muttered, looking up at the object in disbelief. Shaking his head, he turned to the girl. "Let's get over there."
"Are you crazy?" the girl asked, eyes widening in surprise. "We don't even know who these people are!"
"Any port in a storm," the boy replied, beginning to make his way towards the people. The girl simply followed, squinting up at the object in front of them and trying to make out the details
"Think they heard us?" Rikku asked Yuna, watching as the traveling pair stopped momentarily, apparently talking to each other.
"They should have," Yuna said. As if to confirm her words, the pair turned slightly, now beginning to head straight for them. Yuna sighed in slight relief, glad that they'd been heard over the storm, but Rikku just shivered, looking first at the pair and then back at Yuna.
"I wish they'd hurry up! It's freezing out here!"
A minute later, the pair finally arrived at the Celsius, shivering and partially covered in snow. Wiping the snow from his coat, the boy looked at Yuna and Rikku, muttering thanks as they motioned for him to go inside. Not needing any further prompting to take shelter, he headed inside the ship, leading the girl inside as well as Yuna and Rikku followed, the latter closing the door behind her once they were all inside.
[March 18, 2152 | Celsius, Bridge | 5:07 PM]
"Are you two okay?" Yuna asked the two, finally able to get a good look at the pair. The boy nodded, brushing snow from his black hair before taking off his white trenchcoat to reveal what looked like a blue uniform of some sort, the shirt having a single orange stripe directly down the center. Now that the trenchcoat was off, Yuna could also see a single katana sheath belted to his left hip, as well as another of the gun-sword hybrid weapons strapped to his back. His black boots still had some snow on them, but he ignored it, instead looking between Yuna and Rikku for a moment.
"Thanks. It's not exactly fun to try and walk around in that."
"And you wanted to go to Trabia Garden...I think we're lucky we got out of that," the girl beside him says, also taking off her white coat. The girl was dressed in a blue shirt with a flowing pink collar, as well as a loose fitting pair of white pants. A small belt held two katana sheathes, one on each side, and a relatively small-scale broadsword was also slung across her back. Her small blue shoes, by contrast to the boy's, were nearly white with snow, as was the blue bow in her brown hair.
"Mind telling us your names?" Rikku asked, looking the pair over carefully - she still wasn't sure what kind of people would willingly walk around in a storm like that.
"Sure. I'm Tetsuya Kurabasa, and this is my sister, Yuki," the boy said, motioning to the girl beside him.
"Nice to meet you," Yuki said, bowing politely to their rescuers.
"It's good to meet you, too," Yuna said, feeling momentarily as if she were back in Spira because of the girl's action. "My name's Yuna, and these are my friends, Rikku, Paine, Brother, and Buddy."
"You said something about going to Trabia Garden?" Buddy asked, looking over at Tetsuya.
"Yes. You know where it is?"
"We're only a few hundred feet from it right now, as a matter of fact. You just can't see it for the storm," Buddy explained, eliciting a groan from the older male.
"I told you we were getting close!" he protested, causing Yuki to roll her eyes in response.
"You did not."
"Can we save the arguing for later?" Paine interjected. "This storm shouldn't last much longer, from what Buddy's seen about the weather patterns. You can head to Trabia when it clears up."
"Sounds good to me," Tetsuya said, shrugging and causing more bits of snow to fall from his clothing. "We can take a break, if nothing else."
"Come on. I'll show you around the ship," Yuna said cheerily, beginning to walk out of the bridge. Both siblings looked at each other for a second or two before following, deciding to take a look around in case the storm didn't let up for some time.
[March 18, 2152 | Balamb, Rinaul Coast | 5:07 PM]
Kisara stood on the beach at Balamb silently, watching the waves roll across the ocean as she tried to decide what her next move would be. She had already secured one of the Holy Stones, but she had no leads on where the others would be, or their conditions. Reaching into a fold of her robe, she pulled out the Taurus Stone, turning it over in her hand and examining it as she let her mind drift.
"Freya scattered these Stones around the world over a hundred years ago, thinking they would never be rejoined...could they really find their way back together...?"
Shaking her head, Kisara sighed. She knew the answer to that question. The Stones were magically linked; the nature of magic of that sort was to stay joined.
"Thinking?"
Turning, Kisara looked at the one who addressed her...then gasped, before bowing suddenly to the person she saw. The man in front of her was, in all honesty, nothing out of the ordinary, appearance-wise. With short, black hair and brown eyes, a blue, button-up shirt with a white shirt below it, black khaki pants, and a pair of white shoes, he looked like just another casually-dressed native of the area. However, Kisara knew differently.
"Will...I had known that you were making visits here to the mortal realm, but I hadn't expected you to find me here."
The person in front of Kisara was none other than Will, Pillar of the Future and one of the three Ethereal entities tasked with maintaining the stability of the plane.
"To be honest...until I heard a curious bit of information, I wasn't planning on finding you," Will replied, turning to look towards the water. "I heard that you are searching for the Holy Stones. Am I correct?"
"That would be correct."
"I also heard that Freya told you specifically not to interfere here. Am I correct?"
Now a bit unnerved at where the Pillar's words were leading the conversation, Kisara nodded.
"...That would also be correct."
"I see." Will folded his arms, turning towards Kisara with a small smile on his face. "Then I suppose I'll simply have to share some information I've recently come across."
"You...you'd risk your position to help me? If Freya found out-"
"I am willing to take that risk. This may be more important than anyone realizes."
"Then, please, proceed," Kisara said, hardly believing the situation she'd now found herself in.
"I have discovered the location of another of the Holy Stones. The Capricorn Holy Stone, to be exact. It lies deep within a part of the old ruins of the Centra civilization," Will explained calmly.
"This Holy Stone was sealed away from humans?" Kisara asked, unsure of why the Holy Stone would be in such a secluded place. Centra had been a great civilization before the time of the Lunar Cry, but she would've thought that such an artifact would've been found long before now.
"None of the Holy Stones were permanently sealed away. Simply put...this Stone seems to have been discarded several years ago, when a traveler who was exploring the ruins was attacked by something within. Even I don't know all of the details, but the Stone has been left in the ruins for several years now."
"Then I must waste no time," Kisara stated, nodding. "You have my thanks, Will."
"You are welcome, Lady Kisara," Will replied. "I must return to the Ethereal Plane now. Take care."
"Take care, Will," Kisara replied, watching as Will's body turns into crackling blue light which ascended into the sky for a short distance before vanishing altogether.
[March 18, 2152 | Esthar, Grandidi Forest | 5:15 PM]
"We're lost."
"You said that not 3 minutes ago."
"Well, if either of you had bothered to pay attention to how we got into this place, then maybe we wouldn't be lost..."
A chorus of sighs came from two of the three members of the group wandering through the small forest. The first was a teenage girl with long brown hair, dressed in a short black shirt and long black pants, complete with a red jacket as well as red, ankle-length boots. A sword sheath rested on her left side, as well.
The second was an older male with mid-length black hair, dressed in a light blue shirt and pants that were both covered by a long, black robe. His shoes were nothing special, simple black shoes that stopped just above his ankles, while a silver headband with an insignia of some kind circled his forehead.
"Really, Uriko?" the girl asked, turning to the third member of her party, another young girl with long black hair, as well as a short, green shirt and matching skirt. "As I recall, you can't quite keep track of directions yourself. Remember Esthar?"
"Don't say a word, Sumiko," Uriko growled, spinning away from her companion. "That was an honest mistake, and you know it."
"She's just kidding, Uriko. You need to lighten up," the male said, folding his arms. "So what if we're a little lost? We came out here for training. It'll give us time to sharpen our survival skills."
"Some of us don't want to practice 'survival skills,' Naoki," Uriko retorted, rolling her eyes at the boy.
"You really are tense," Sumiko replied, shaking her head. "Come on. Let's stop and have something to eat, hm?"
"Fine by me," Naoki replied, dropping a small pack onto the ground before sitting down. Uriko said nothing, instead simply joining her companion on the ground with Sumiko following a moment later. Carefully, Naoki unwrapped several small pieces of bread and meat from the bag, handing some out to each member before taking a bite from his bread.
"Nice job taking out that T-Rexaur, Naoki," Sumiko complimented, causing the older boy to feign indignance.
"Nice job? That's all you can say? That was a work of art!" he said with a small smile.
"Yeah, it would've been a real work of art to see you inside that thing's stomach. Did you have to torment the thing before you killed it? I think you went a bit overboard by blinding it," Uriko remarked, shaking her head.
"It was going to eat me!"
"That's no excuse. You threw a kunai straight into its pupils!"
"What other choice did I have?"
"Get eaten."
Naoki just buried his face into his hand, small crumbs falling from his mouth. Uriko simply smirked. Sumiko merely sighed.
"Uriko, do you have to pick on Naoki?"
"Well, yeah. He makes it so easy, you know."
"Ha ha. Funny. Eat your bread," Naoki said dryly, but with a look of amusement on his face.
"Oh, I meant to show you something..." Sumiko says, digging through a pouch on her pack for a moment before pulling out a small, exquisitely-cut topaz and holding it up for everyone to see. "I found it while I was picking some berries out here. It was just lying there."
"Something like that looks like it could be worth a whole lot of Gil," Uriko commented, taking the gem from Sumiko and examining it. "Perfectly-cut topaz, not a single mark on it...no flaws at all that I can see."
"Think it belongs to someone in Esthar?" Sumiko asked.
"Probably. I mean, this thing was obviously cut from a larger gem. It can't have occurred this perfectly by natural means," Naoki said.
"Well. I see you went through the trouble of finding the Stone for me. Now, just hand it over, and we'll all leave here peacefully."
All three members of the group stood up quickly, turning to face the direction the voice came from. None of the three saw anything immediately, something which served to put them all further on edge.
"Show yourself," Naoki said simply, hoping to get the figure to speak again in an attempt to discern their location.
"Hm. Very well. It will do you little good," the voice spoke again, a small blue line suddenly appearing in front of the gathered trio. Slowly, the line widened into some sort of doorway before a cloaked figure stepped out, his entire body covered by a thin, dark veil of energy.
"...Who are you?" Naoki asked, watching the figure carefully as he palmed a kunai from his side, Sumiko also drawing a long, thin rapier from her side.
"To tell...or not to tell. I think I'll tell you after I take that Stone off your hands," the figure said, chuckling lightly as he examined the three opposite him.
"Come and get it," Uriko said threateningly, stepping up beside her two companions as fire gathered in her hands.
A few notes about this chapter.
Zeo Conrad and Mystique are original characters belonging to Iron Reaver, used with permission.
You may recognize Tetsuya and Yuki from one of my earlier (and far worse, in my opinion) works. As it stands, when I began writing this story, I decided to use them again in the hopes that it would turn out better. So, for the purposes of this story, FF8: The Shadow Slayer would be an AU to this story. In this story, those events never happened. Tetsuya is based off of Aoshi Shinomori in appearance.
Naoki is an original character of mine, based off of Itachi from Naruto in appearance and skills, but obviously not in personality for those who know Itachi. Sumiko and Uriko are also my own original characters.
Will is an original character, based in appearance on Xander Harris from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Will is the property of Daniel Wesley Rydell and used with permission.
I think that covers all of the new characters. I don't really have a lot else to say about the chapter. As always, please read and review.