Book II, Part I: Outbreak - Vector's Gambit
Chapter XII - Calamity
The depth underground had interfered some with Darius' GLD communication, but as they began to ascend the ladder again with renewed haste he managed to get the line open to Garden, hearing Ein's voice on the other end of the line.
"Garden Commander's office, how may I help you?"
"Ein, it's Darius," he said quickly. "Is Katanas there? This is urgent."
"I'll put you through," Ein said, recognizing the tone in Darius' voice that he didn't often hear from the Lightning Alchemist. A moment passed before Darius heard the familiar voice of his eldest brother on the line.
"Katanas here."
"We've got a situation out here at Vector."
"What kind of situation?" Katanas had rarely heard the sense of urgency and, dare he say it, fear in his younger brother's voice that he was hearing over the GLD connection now.
"It's bad - class S for sure. Get any Planeswalkers around to head to my location and get my team back to Garden. I'll meet with you once I'm back and give you the full rundown, but we've got a world-scale issue on our hands here."
Katanas definitely didn't like the sound of that.
The Garden Network used a simplistic ranking system to identify the threat level of both individuals and events, ranging from E as the lowest to A as a high-threat situation or extremely dangerous individual. Above A rank was S, used only for the most disastrous events and situations or individuals for which a flee-on-sight order wasn't out of the question as a first reaction.
Katanas' mind snapped into alertness, his next words spoken with the crispness and authority that his Garden Commander position often warranted. "Rubedo, Bayloh, and Powell will be inbound within five. Be brief - what are we dealing with?"
"A fish big and strong enough to blow the planet in half."
Katanas DeValle had seen a lot of things in his time. He'd been a Planeswalker for years, traveled to all three of the outer planes within the Eighth Realm, met with planar leaders capable of reducing someone to ash with a mere thought, and dealt with disasters on not just an international level, but an interplanar level as well.
That was, by his estimation, one of the strangest responses he had ever been given to a question.
"Understood. I'll put Garden on high alert and contact Balamb and Galbadia. Once you get back, I'll pull you in for a full debriefing. What about the Presidential Guard members?"
"They're going back to the Palace along with Lindsey," Darius replied. "The President wanted their assessment of this thing so that they can try to figure out what to do about it."
Darius was two for two on shocking statements, Katanas noted as he listened. "You found Lindsey Geneave?"
"Yeah," Darius said. "She's a walking weapons platform called KOS-MOS now, but she's still Lindsey underneath all the programming...it's really her."
"Good work," Katanas said, nodding to himself. "Just get back here - we'll draw up a plan once we know all the details."
"Ask Powell - he'll know everything you need," Darius added. "Him and a few of those cadets he joined with killed this thing once already."
"I'll add him to that part of the debriefing, then." Katanas glanced back at his screen as he saw confirmations of the received orders come back from the people he had contacted. "They're on the way now, Darius."
"Good. I'll fill you in soon - Darius out."
It hungered.
It was alive, but without a soul.
It had a direction, but no purpose.
And that direction guided it towards its destination...people. Sustenance.
Sin, once guided by the soul of a man and the dreams of a spirit, was no longer the same creature it once was. No longer the terror of Spira, a message to an entire world that promised an end to all things...yet still, in some ways, a messenger in a different form.
Its mind was simple, bestial and primal in its thinking. It drove onward with a hunger that was all but insatiable, fixed on the idea of consumption to sustain itself and regain its energy, energy that had been spent to rejuvenate itself. Focused on that sole urge, it sliced through the water ever further in its pursuit, the enormous bulk of its whale-like body reaching speeds that were quite unexpected for its size. The fiends of the water were numerous, but none dared to approach. They recognized not the form that they saw, but simply the power that it possessed...none could match its might here, the creatures of the depth realized with their most basic instincts.
A whisper of a consciousness that was something more tugged on its mind, its multiple eyes perking as it rose above the water slightly to let it see clearly over the blue expanse. The one touching its senses looked through its eyes to see the faint shapes of the coastal city's buildings coming over the horizon and smiled, their pride and mirth alike contained wholly in the simply gesture.
Erasmus had promised Wilhelm a chance to test his Realm, within limits. He surely knew that a being such as the Tenth Realm's Author could hardly pass up an invitation such as that...and Wilhelm had a vastly different interpretation of Erasmus' condition than his fellow Author did.
As the port town of Balamb grew on the horizon, Wilhelm relinquished his link to Sin and let the beast's instincts take over fully once again. It was time to see how a vastly different world would react to the being that had once held Spira in captivity for ages.
Ben was starting - merely beginning, mind you - to suspect that he was bad luck.
He hadn't looked at a clock, but he was willing to wager that he hadn't been back at Garden for fifteen solid minutes before his GLD went off with an urgent message from the Garden Commander at around the same time an announcement went out over the loudspeakers around the complex, placing it on alert and sending all officers to ready status until further notice.
The nature of the message, however, worried him. Whatever was happening, it was big - that much was certain, given by the fact that Angel and Rubedo both were joining him in Esthar, at a company called Vector Industries. Apparently, he was to be extracting a team of SeeD that needed to get back to Garden for debriefing ASAP...and for Katanas to be calling Planeswalkers to do the job, it had to be extremely time-sensitive. He wasn't sure where exactly Vector Industries was, per se, but he knew where the Presidential Palace was, and he was fairly sure he could pick up a familiar energy signature if he was close enough to it.
As he stepped off the Crystal Path, finding himself on a street nearby the Palace, he started to reach out with his senses and see if he could locate either of the other two that had been sent with him. He hadn't wanted to show up directly at the Palace, as randomly appearing in the location of a major seat of government was generally frowned upon, and he was silently glad that Planeswalking wasn't always an exact science even when the destination was known.
A quick flash step took him to the roof of a nearby building as he finally caught wind of Rubedo's energy, some distance across town towards what he vaguely remembered as the business district of the large capital city. He dropped a Haste enchantment over himself before taking off over the rooftops, trying not to waste any energy that he didn't have to as he bounded across the skyline of Esthar.
"It's almost like I'm a real protagonist now," he thought wryly to himself, chuckling lightly as he moved. It didn't take him long to find Rubedo as he continued to track his energy, and he dropped Float magic around himself before leaping off the roof of the building nearest Rubedo to fall gracefully to the ground and resume his sprint, barely breaking stride thanks to the magic.
"Seems you made it," Rubedo said, continuing to run as Ben fell into step beside him, his own Haste enchantment glowing faintly around his body. "Any idea what this is about?"
"They didn't tell me," Ben replied, shaking his head, "I just figure that it's big, what with Planeswalkers being called in and all. They don't use us for trivial things."
"Bayloh isn't with you, then?"
"Nope - haven't seen him, though he's close to us from what I can tell. How far are we from this Vector Industries place?"
"Only a couple of blocks to go now," Rubedo said, turning a corner and pointing up at a tall building in the distance once he had a better view. "That's the main complex, there."
"Got it," Ben replied, keeping an eye on his surroundings as they moved. SeeD had taught him well to always be on alert, even in a generally-peaceful city like Esthar, but there was never a guarantee that things would stay safe. As they crossed another street, Angel materialized into existence a short distance in front of them, causing them to slow as they met up with the older SeeD. He offered only a wave as they regrouped, pausing only for a brief moment before starting to move again towards the main Vector campus.
"Angel, any clue what's going on?" Ben asked, glancing over at the instructor.
"Not really," he admitted. "Just what you saw in the message. We're to get the SeeD team out here back to Garden immediately for a debriefing."
"Gotta love limited intel," Ben lamented, sighing and returning his attention to the task at hand. It only took two or three more minutes for them to arrive at the gated perimeter that marked the perimeter of the Vector Industries complex, and they immediately noticed that the guard post that normally prevented entry to the area was unmanned.
Not that a simple thing like a guard shack would have been able to stop them, mind you, but it was one less obstacle to deal with.
"There," Rubedo suddenly said, pointing off towards one side of the complex where several vehicles and a sleek-looking airship reminiscent of Esthar's Ragnarok aircraft sat, surrounded by numerous figures in white outfits and a few dressed in darker clothing.
"Has to be what we're looking for," Angel agreed, nodding. The trio quickly headed in the direction of the group of people, making sure to slow their pace as they did so to give them time to be identified as friendlies.
"Wait a minute - is that Darius?" Ben asked suddenly, realizing the identity of one of the dark-clad figures. "Now I know this is trouble."
"Darius, Revolver, Andréa, and her squad, minus you," Rubedo corrected. Several of the white-clad figures turned to them as they approached, but none raised weapons as Darius started to wave them over, saying something to the others around him that none of the three could hear as they joined the group.
"Glad you guys made it," Darius said, causing Ben to blink. Darius, genuinely relieved to see help? That was new, and possibly the most unnerving part of this whole situation so far.
"What's the situation?" Angel asked, looking between the gathered SeeD members.
"Don't want to talk about it here - big trouble, class S. We'll debrief back at Garden," Darius said. "Can you guys help 'walk everyone out? I've already let the Guard know what's going on, and they're going to help devise a plan once they finish up here."
Ben was growing increasingly uneasy by the second as he listened to Darius talk. That whatever was happening was an S-rank issue was bad enough, but from the tone of Darius' voice he seemed downright spooked by whatever was happening, and Ben couldn't remember ever seeing the snarky, self-assured SeeD member even offering the pretense of fear before.
"On it," Angel said, nodding and turning to face Rubedo and Ben. "Pick a partner, and let's get back to Garden."
Rubedo simply nodded, starting to move over towards Naoki. Technically, he outranked Angel by a full two ranks, but he didn't have an issue deferring to the elder Planeswalker. Angel was some two hundred years his senior, he reasoned, so the experience more than made up for the rank difference. Ben also nodded as he moved over to stand with Silvia, leaving Andréa with Revolver and Angel with Sumiko.
"Grab a hand and hold on tight," Angel told the rest of the SeeD as they paired up. "You don't want to get left on the Crystal Path without a way out."
"The Crystal Path?" Sumiko asked before shaking her head. "Never mind - you can fill us in later."
A few seconds passed as the Planeswalkers prepared to move, each taking hold of the SeeD going with them as they called up their energy in preparation to shift onto the Path. "On my mark, everyone take a step forward," Angel called, looking to make sure everyone was ready.
"Ready...mark."
Nine SeeD members stepped forward in unison and five flashes of light carried them off to the Crystal Path, away from the campus belonging to the Author of the Tenth Realm.
[July 12, 2152 | Trabia Garden, Front Concourse | 4:39 PM]
Scattered, minute flashes of light heralded the reappearance of the SeeD team back to the front concourse of Trabia Garden, just outside the main complex itself. The few SeeD members around didn't pay much attention to the sudden appearance once they realized the identities of several of the more prominent SeeD present; Instructor Bayloh was rather notable by himself to begin with, and nearly everyone at Garden in some way recognized two of the three DeValle sons. Ben and Andréa slumped slightly as they reappeared, breathing heavily as Angel and Rubedo moved over to check on them. Planeswalking was somewhat difficult for an individual, something which became easier with experience and strength, but a Planeswalker also moving another who wasn't a Planeswalker at the same time was an order of magnitude harder. It took a considerable amount of effort and mental strength to both transport another as well as shield them from the Path's natural aversion to non-Planeswalkers.
"You okay?" Angel asked Ben, who nodded in reply.
"Just need a moment," he said, straightening and shaking his head. "Never done that before."
"You'll get better," Angel said, shrugging. "We need to move, though. Darius?"
"Follow me," he said, turning crisply and starting to move towards the inside of the Garden at a hurried pace.
It took only a few minutes for them to reach the briefing room Darius led them to, each of the nine SeeD members stepping inside before Darius shut and secured the door behind them. Each of Garden's briefing rooms were secured against a variety of intrusion methods, and their privacy was on par with the offices of the highest officials in Garden. Katanas DeValle looked to his brothers as Darius finished securing the room, the SeeD Commander seeming unusually grave to the gathered SeeD members.
"We're secure," Darius said, nodding to Katanas. "What do you want to know first, Katanas?"
"Start with your mission summary first, for the record."
"My team and I were assigned to investigate new information regarding the death of Lindsey Geneave in Galbadia City. Upon arriving, we gathered information and investigated leads which led us to a woman by the name of Fiona Carmichael. I personally confronted miss Carmichael in an abandoned warehouse within the city's business district and defeated her in combat, at which point she received backup from what were found to be members of Esthar's Presidential Guard. The remainder of my team also arrived at that point, and we discovered that Fiona was actually a Presidential Guard member named Hikari Tanaka, who had been undercover investigating Vector Industries for illegal activities possibly connected with Lindsey Geneave's death. Per orders from the Headmaster of Trabia Garden, we were then assigned to assist Commander Tanaka's team with securing and shutting down operations at Vector."
Darius took a moment to pour himself a glass of water from a small pitcher on the table and take a drink as Katanas made notes on his explanation, waiting until he saw Katanas finish writing before he continued. "We proceeded to Vector Industries in Esthar and linked up with a second squad of Presidential Guard members as well as members of the Estharian military to assist with securing the complex. Upon entering, we proceeded to Vector's First R&D Division to secure and copy the files located there, but were attacked by a creature that Commander Tanaka identified as 'Kitaen.'"
"A creature?" Katanas asked. "What sort of creature?"
"It looked human, but had regenerative properties that far outclassed anything I've ever seen," Darius explained. "It was also capable of shapeshifting into both people and inanimate objects. It withstood pretty much everything we threw at it, including high-caliber rifle and shotgun ammunition as well as my own Limit, and almost killed the three of us that were there. At that time, Vector's KP-X project, code-named "KOS-MOS," entered the battle and managed to destroy the creature for good, apparently by finally overtaxing whatever regeneration ability it had."
"So the rumors about Vector's supposed combat android were true, then," Katanas mused thoughtfully, nodding to himself. Darius simply nodded in response, looking back at his older brother.
"Yeah, they were. According to Commander Tanaka's information, the KP-X project was created using a person as the biological base for the experiment. That person, which I can personally confirm, was none other than Lindsey Silmeria Geneave."
A grimace crossed Katanas' face - Darius had just reconfirmed what he had suspected since he'd learned of Darius' mission from his father. "Where is she now?"
"She's with the Guard right now. They were going to take her back to the Palace to have her examined and make sure that she was okay...or as okay as she can be now, given what happened."
Katanas nodded again - Laguna, he knew, would keep the situation well in hand from here on out. Quirky though the President may be, he was still a very capable leader with Kiros and Ward by his side to keep him on task.
"I would say that the matter of Lindsey's well-being will be well taken care of by President Loire," Katanas said, drawing a nod of agreement from both Darius and Revolver. "Now, then. What of the threat that you mentioned before?"
"While we were inside the main labs, Lindsey's attack destroyed part of the room and revealed a shaft that headed down towards an underground section of the building. We went down to check it out while the Commander's team tried to get more information on what we were walking into. What we found was a gigantic room underground that I thought might've been some kind of airship hangar or mining tunnel left behind. We found a computer system that we could access further inside the room, and realized that it wasn't anything like that at all."
Darius paused for a moment, glancing back at Ben before he continued.
"Wilhelm brought back Sin - from the Tenth Realm. He brought it here."
The color drained from Ben's face as he heard Darius speak, and for a moment he felt alone in the room, feeling more like the clumsy and untrained sixteen-year old boy that had once stared down the greatest evil in Spira rather than the seventeen-year old SeeD officer and Planeswalker that he was now. Sin had been destroyed, completely and utterly, the body that once held it reduced to pyreflies and the spirit of Yu Yevon that gave it life returned to its rightful place in the Farplane. To see it here, alive again in a new world was...unthinkable.
Yet, Ben knew Darius was telling the truth. The youngest DeValle son may have had a penchant for savvy and cutthroat business dealings and bending the facts on occasion, but one glance at his face spoke volumes about what Ben knew beyond a shadow of a doubt he had seen underneath Vector Industries. Ben realized after a few seconds that most of the eyes in the room had turned to him, but his mouth felt dry as he tried and failed to find words to say something. He could feel his hands shaking, unsure whether it was fear or rage that was bubbling up from the depths of his soul.
"Wilhelm..."
His own voice almost startled him as he spoke, realizing that he'd said the name out loud.
"I didn't think you knew him," Darius said.
"Mai told me just before I came back," he explained. "Wilhelm's an Author...the Author of Tenth Realm. He brought that...thing here..."
"What is this...Sin?" Sumiko asked, breaking into the conversation.
"It's...destruction," Ben said, looking over towards Sumiko. "Pure, absolute destruction given a form. Sin terrorized the world of Spira for a thousand years, destroying cities and people and preventing the advancement of an entire world civilization before Yuna and her guardians put an end to it."
"You can still feel that power out there, can't you," Angel said, causing Ben to nod.
"Faintly, yeah," he said. "It's like a whisper at the back of my mind, but it's there."
"This explains the power I and Instructor Bayloh have been feeling for some time now," Katanas stated. "If Wilhelm has brought something of such power here, then we must work quickly." He reached for his GLD, opening a line back to Ein's desk.
"Yes, Commander?"
"Ein, please get in touch with the Garden Commanders and Headmasters from Galbadia and Balamb Gardens, the Presidential Palace of Esthar, and Duke Haroldington in Dollet. This situation will demand the attention of the full might of Garden, and likely the world."
"O-Of course, Commander!" Ein said, caught momentarily off-guard by the statement but recovering quickly and setting himself to Katanas' task. Katanas smiled as he dropped the connection. Ein was always eager and highly capable despite his young age, and the SeeD Commander had never regretted picking Andréa's younger brother as his aide.
"Powell, Bayloh, I will want you both in the briefing for this operation once it begins. I'll alert you fifteen minutes before start time, so be ready. Everyone else, take a break for now - I'm sure this will be a time to remember in the history of SeeD, and I want you all at your best when it begins. Dismissed." A chorus of nods and affirmations followed Katanas' statement, and the assembled SeeD members began to file out of the room in different directions.
Ben walked mutely back in the direction of his room, barely aware of his surroundings as his mind whirled. He couldn't fathom why Wilhelm, an Author that should be protecting the safety of the Realms, would bring a monster like Sin to another world willingly. Then again, he realized, he really didn't know...well, anything about the Authors. Whether they were powerful forces for good or world-destroying egomaniacs, he had neither an idea nor a way to find out short of asking Lady Freya, which he didn't want to bother the Creator with.
There was one thing that gave him hope, though. Sin being here was a terrible circumstance, true...but Gaia was much different than Spira. Where Spira floundered technologically for a millennium, unable to advance and even to create cities for fear of total destruction, Gaia flourished under minimal interference from the monsters the world possessed and made great strides in technological prowess. Surely Sin would have a much more difficult time subjugating a populace with such a massive advantage over its last victims, Ben reasoned.
'And what if you're wrong?'
Manes' voice in his mind momentarily snapped him from his thoughts; he'd let his mind wander quite a bit, and the Daiesthai had easily picked up on his fears.
"..."
Ben found he couldn't say anything because on some level, Manes was right. What if he was wrong? What if Sin was just as capable of plunging Gaia into darkness the same way it had done to Spira?
As he opened the door to his room and stepped inside, he realized that he was shaking.
His GLD beeped a few seconds after he shut the door behind him, an incoming message causing him to take the device from his pocket. Surely Katanas wasn't ready to brief already, he thought to himself, and he found he was correct when he saw a message from Angel.
Sin just attacked Balamb.
He almost dropped the GLD in shock as he read the message. They'd only just learned of Sin's appearance a short time ago, and it had already struck Balamb halfway across the world? The logical part of his mind realized an instant later that Darius hadn't actually found Sin, only evidence of it, and that it could've easily been on the way to Balamb by that time. That didn't matter now, though; the damage had already been done. Ben said a silent prayer to himself as he put the GLD back in his pocket, hoping that the people in the town had been able to get out in time. He sat down on the small couch in his room, for the first time in a long time feeling like there was nothing he could do.
All at once, it struck him - he wasn't the same as he was when he went to Spira the first time. He may have been helpless back then, but now...now was different. He had helped kill Sin before, he had become a full-fledged Planeswalker and SeeD, and he had even been trained by Ethereal beings. Maybe now, he thought, he was strong enough to try.
He didn't want to see anyone else have to suffer because of Sin, because of an Author's decision to wreak havoc upon another unsuspecting world. Most of all, however...he didn't want Yuna to have to face the threat of Sin a second time. To him, she had been through enough, and he wanted her to be able to live her life without having to face the trials of her past again.
He'd take that burden onto himself this time, he thought to himself as he stood up again. Not just for Yuna, but for all the others that would be put in harm's way if something wasn't done.
'What are you doing?' Manes asked within his mind, causing him to take a deep breath.
'My duty as a summoner,' he responded. 'Summoners exist to defeat Sin.'
Carefully, he started to focus as he suppressed his own energy, trying to keep anyone from being able to sense what he was doing. It was difficult for him to do, having only been practicing with it for a short time, but he managed to contain the majority of his power as he prepared to move. He could still feel the beacon of Sin's own energy, still faintly noticeable despite being almost halfway across the world, and it gave him direction. By the time anyone noticed what he was doing - if anyone noticed - he would be miles away. He pointed himself in the direction of Sin and took a step, disappearing from his room into a Planeswalk that took him away from Garden and out onto the snowy plains of Trabia, crossing thousands of meters in scant moments. If he was going to do this, he knew he would need to save every bit of power that he could, and Planeswalking over such a massive distance would take more out of him than just using magic to travel. Focusing, he called up Haste magic around himself as strongly as he could muster before wings of energy emerged from behind him, lifting him into the air and propelling him over the plains at blistering speed. It may be a foolish risk to take, Ben thought to himself as he moved, and he wasn't sure if he could actually pull it off, but he was going to see it through nonetheless.
It was, after all, his duty as a summoner.