The Death Penalty
Dark. Dreary. Dull. Such was the state of Nibelheim each and every day. It seemed
like today would be just like every other. Maybe not exactly. From the window of the Shinra
Mansion, I could see Cloud and Tifa down the street. They'd been away on their honeymoon, but it
looked like they were coming back early. I had a feeling that the honeymoon didn't go very
smoothly, as Tifa's uncle was still with them. Da Cha Lockeheart had been searching for Tifa
for a long time, and had finally found her when he heard about the wedding. At least, that's his
story. Since then, he's been trying to "catch up on things." At first, Tifa was constantly
annoyed by him. That man would never give Tifa or Cloud even a second of privacy. He was always
around the corner, or always asking them if they wanted to go to have some fun out on the town.
Seeing as to how she hadn't seen her uncle for over fifteen years, Tifa couldn't refuse. Now
she's actually getting to like him, which is more than I can say for Cloud. Cloud and Tifa were
actually beginning to get into arguments over whether Da Cha was infringing too much on their
lives or not. Cloud suggested that they try to get away from Da Cha and try going to Wutai to
see if they could enjoy what was left of their honeymoon, seeing as to how their trip to the Gold
Saucer, Costa Del Sol, and Cosmo Canyon didn't go exactly as planned. Even I never suspected
that love could take such an odd turn. Their argument was soon interupted by a certain odd
individual wearing a black cape. At first, I thought that Sephiroth had returned. But after
a closer look, I noticed that this young man was too young. Perhaps someone in costume for trick
or treating? But October was a month away. Cloud, however, didn't seem to come to the same
conclusion...
"Uh oh... but it can't be! I killed him in the northern crater!"
Sometimes I wonder why Cloud was such an able leader. He had a tendency to be somewhat
absent minded. And then there was that schizophrenia problem of his...
"Why won't you leave me alone?!? Why can't you stay dead?"
I felt sorry for the young man. But I was too far away to do anything about it. As
Cloud drew out his Ultima Weapon and charged at that man, I knew the Sephiroth imposter didn't
stand a chance. Until I saw him draw out the masamune. Hmm... perhaps this was more than just
a disillusioned soul that enjoyed dressing up like a murderous psychopath. Unless that masamune
was one of the many cheap imitation ones that you could win at the Gold Saucer. All doubts were
quickly washed away when I saw him skillfully parry blow after blow from Cloud's Ultima Weapon.
And then there was his counterattack...
"What the hell is wrong with you?!?"
The man certainly cursed a lot more than Sephiroth, and seemed to be significantly less
mature. He brought his Masamune down hard on Cloud, but Cloud was a skilled fighter too.
"I can't even travel for a moment without some $&#*ING prick attacking me!!!"
Cloud had to block another hard blow with his Ultima Weapon.
"ALL I WANT TO DO IS LIVE A NORMAL LIFE BAKING SOME STUPID FRENCH BREAD!!! IS THAT TOO MUCH TO
ASK?!?"
With a final blow, Cloud's Ultima Weapon was shattered. Cloud stared at his broken
weapon in disbelief.
"Oh great. There goes the Ultima Weapon. Dammit! That was my ultimate weapon! It was one of
a kind! How the hell am I going to get another one?"
"Good going, Cloud," Tifa snapped. "You should have thought of that before you attacked him."
Since no one was paying attention to the fact that the Sephiroth imposter was about to
run his Masamune through Cloud like a knife through butter, I figured it was about time for me
to step in. I was watching from afar, but my gun shot served to distract both of them long
enough for me to flip out the window and step in between the two.
"Vincent, do you mind? I'm trying to kill Sephiroth here!"
"Take a good look at him. Do you think that's the real Sephiroth?"
"Well, um... I guess he does look a bit young..."
"He's only a couple years older than Yuffie's age."
"Ok, but if he isn't Sephiroth, then who is he? Another clone?"
"Hey!" The man in the black cape spoke up. "What are you two talking about? I AM Sephiroth!"
Once again, I actually felt pity for the fool. He actually thought he was really
Sephiroth. We must live in a sad day and age when people can go so insane that they begin to
think they are dead psychic entities...
"Look! I can prove it to you! See? I have the legendary Masamune!"
Cloud commented, "It's probably one of those cheap imitation Gold Saucer Masamunes."
The man was about to go into a long speech about the many reasons as to how he was the
real Sephiroth but Cloud wouldn't hear any of it. He was too tired from being with Tifa's
uncle to deal with a mentally ill man who thought he was Sephiroth. Cloud, Tifa, and Da Cha
left for Wutai, and I was left with the task of what to do with the Sephiroth wannabe.
"So, um... vampire guy, want to buy some french bread? I'm trying to earn a good honest living."
"....."
"Come on! I don't even own a house! I was left with nothing after the war with Wutai!"
The war with Wutai was fifteen years ago! But I figured it would be of no use explaining
it to him.
"Why me? All my life I'm used as a weapon and an experiment. Then I find out that damn eleven
toed freak, Hojo, is my father! And then I discover that I went psycho and tried to destroy the
entire planet with the meteor spell and some ugly alien woman named Jenova. And now I have this
spiky haired Dragon Ball Z rip off trying to kill me!"
I had to hand it to the wierdo. He at least researched the background of the man that he
would end up impersonating. He was about to break into tears. Guess I couldn't blame him. If I
thought Hojo was MY father, I would certainly be somewhat traumatized. Normally, I usually shrug
these things off, but the sight was too pathetic to simply leave it alone. So for once I decided
to intervene with fate.
"Sephiroth, I am your father."
That didn't come out right.
"Huh?"
"I mean, you know who your mother was, right?"
If this Sephiroth knew his father was Hojo, then he probably knew his mother was
Lucrecia. The real Sephiroth never found out that evil man was his father. Hojo laughed at
Sephiroth to the very end about it...
"My mother was Lucrecia. She wasn't so bad from what I heard, although Hojo..."
Seph... I suppose it would be easier for me to refer to him as thus, shuddered.
He couldn't deal with having that mad scientist for a father. I had to lie to him for his own
good.
"I am Vincent, Lucrecia's lover. Lucrecia would never love Hojo, although he wouldn't tell you
that."
That didn't come out right either. I had trouble talking to Sephiroth, because the
situation was so awkward. But the statement was at least half true.
Sephiroth sarcastically replied, "Then I'm a bastard? Oh great. That's soooo much better."
............. This would be harder than I thought.
The Shinra Mansion had a lot of empty rooms since the Shinra moved out long ago. Even
though it was filled with cobwebs, I figured that Sephiroth preferred it to sleeping out in the
gutter. Of course, I didn't mind at all. I slept in a coffin for over twenty years. The next
two days after that were uneventful, although Seph did prove to me that he knew a lot more
about the real Sephiroth than I thought. He even knew that Sephiroth was enrolled in a Shinra
School for gifted fighters since birth. He told me things about that academy that I never knew,
because I was in my sleep when the academy was finally started. I know it existed though,
because as a turk, I was able to meet the one who was going to manage it. It turned out that the
academy was destroyed by Wutai during the war, which is the main reason why he was so motivated
to fight. Revenge is a powerful driving force. It might also be the reason why he became so
unstable later on.
The third night was slightly more interesting though. I awoke when I heard someone
walking through the basement hall. At first, I wondered if it was Seph going downstairs to
do some more late night reading. I wasn't really too worried about him going beserk, since he
already knew that Jenova wasn't really his mother and more (although I have yet to find out how
he knew all that). But I figured I would make sure it wasn't a thief just in case.
It was worse.
It was a lady with a brief case. Probably a Jenova Witness. ARGH! Jenova Witnesses
piss even ME off! Because they're always shoving their stupid pamphlets in my face and trying
to force their religion on me. I figured I would tell this one off by firing my gun into the
air. She wasn't very amused.
"Excuse me? I didn't think anyone lived here anymore."
A simple clap of my hands and all the torches flared up, bringing light to the dark room.
I knew those Clap O Matic torches would come in handy someday. Now I was able to get a closer
look at who she was. She wore a simple blue uniform and skirt... the type that Wutai School
teachers wear nowadays. So now I had a Wutai School teacher coming in to read up on Jenova.
Hmm. She also had long blue hair and glasses. I was beginning to wonder if all intellectuals
had to wear glasses by law. I was also hoping that she wouldn't call me a vampire like everyone
else. That was also only a half truth.
"I am the resident owner of this abode. Vincent Valentine."
"Kafan Chiang. But last I heard, this mansion still belonged to the Shinra."
"The Shinra are gone."
"Reeve Enterprise is actually the Shinra under a new name and management."
"This is still my house."
I was tired and sleepy and not in the mood to debate over my home with a Wutai school
teacher.
"Are those books yours, too?"
"Yes."
Why not?
"Hmm. May I take a look? I'm taking over as the head of Science for the company. I
figured that it would be best to take a look at some background info behind some of Shinra's old
projects. After all, we can't have precious research get lost forever."
"You're not planning to take up the Jenova project, are you?"
"Of course not. We all know what happened to the last guy that tried it."
"And I can trust you because...?"
"If you wish, I could give you what I know about Jenova in exchange for letting me have a look in
the library."
Well, reading that would be better than sleeping all day like usual. I merely nodded.
"Then we have a deal? Good."
She handed me a couple memoirs, proceeded to the library, and stumbled out with a pile
of books.
"I'll return them when I'm done. I'll probably be finished by tomorrow morning. I'm used to
late night work. I also taught night school for one of my students."
Other than that small incident, the night was uneventful like the other two days. I
decided that I would read the notes in the morning.
Dark. Dreary. Dull. Once again. But there was an interesting item in the news.
Rumour was that Wutai had attacked and taken over Rocket Town under the leadership of Yuffie, but
I knew that was absurd. Yesterday's newspaper stated that her father dissappeared and she took
over as leader, but Yuffie would never dare to start another war with the Shinra. Or Reeve
Enterprises. Yuffie was somewhat selfish, but to go so far as attack the hometown of one of her
friends, Cid? The paper was getting worse than those tabloids you find at Midgar Newstands. So
I decided to read Kafan's memoirs instead. They were more interesting. The memoirs first
restated the fact that Jenova was an alien species. They then went so far as to theorize that
Jenova was sent by another race on a distant planet to remove all life forms on our planet. But
the most interesting part was how materia of mass destruction, like the black materia, spawned
from Jenova. Not so much the fact that the materia that almost destroyed the planet came from
Jenova, but the fact that there were more. The memoirs proceeded to list the locations of these
materia, which were referred to as "orbs." Unfortunately, my reading was cut off when a pile of
books on Jenova were slammed down in front of my face.
"As I said, I would be finished by the morning. What do you think?"
"......."
"Skeptical. I don't blame you. The scientific basis for it is shaky, at best. But it does have
some good historical evidence backing it up. I do know of a couple legends revolving around the
orbs. Like one where four fiends used their power to cause havoc on the planet."
"Legends tend to be greatly exagerated."
"Yes, well, the truth is, I'm not sure I believe it anymore, either. I wrote those fifteen years
ago, when I was young and willing to believe anything. However, recent evidence has turned up to
support my notes."
"Oh? How?"
Kafan took a rather large dark blue materia from her briefcase.
"I recently had an old friend bring this back to me. This is a materia that is Jenova spawned.
You don't believe me? I would love to demonstrate it to you, but that would involve killing a
lot of people, because its power is mainly destructive. This one has the power to change the air
around you into a deadly poisonous gas, which can cover an expanding area depending on its state
of power."
"Oh joy."
"One of my first projects will be to gather up all of these orbs. I know of a way to use them as
a source of energy and power for people, just like current normal materia."
"Hmm."
"I can see that you don't really trust me, but that's okay. If you're so worried about the orbs,
then you should go collect them, yourself. You don't seem to have anything else to do in this
run-down mansion, anyway."
She was right. In fact, I felt it was worth investigating, again probably because I had
nothing else to do. Ever since I helped Cloud and the rest of the party stop meteor, my life has
gotten even more boring than that long coma that Hojo put me through. But I didn't want to fall
into that old cliche of heroes saving the world just because they had a sense of Justice.
Unfortunately, that was another reason why I wanted to see those orbs for myself. I quickly
devised another excuse.
"I'll do it for Lucrecia."
"What? What are you talking about? I don't see what Lucrecia has to do with this. Forget it.
I must be off now. But I'll tell you one more thing. The dark brown orb is far underground
somewhere, if that helps."
Before she left, Kafan gave me one last piece of information.
"You know, I believe that the ones truly responsible for the crisis from the sky are actually
the gods worshipped by Wutai. But I suppose one so skeptical as yourself wouldn't believe that."
I had no comment.
I started my search right after she left. I didn't think that Seph would want to
tag along, but I decided to let him since he would have done nothing but bake french bread and
possibly set the mansion on fire in the process. So the first materia had the power to create an
earthquake that would split the planet. Seeing as to how it was underground, I figured that the
best place to go would be the mining town of Corel. I decided to take the new monorail that was
built at Rocket Town instead of walking all the way around the mountains.
It turned out that those rumours were true, after all. Rocket Town was occupied by
Wutai. Several billboards sporting Yuffie's face were around, proclaiming that she was going
to lead Wutai into the next century. I had trouble getting authorization in, but Seph
performed a fighting demonstration that showed that he had mastered the art of the Samurai, so
the impressed guards decided to take his word that he was from Wutai and let us through. Inside,
I came across Cloud, Tifa, and Da Cha. They were just as confused as I was. Cloud spoke first.
"Vincent! And... um..."
"Call him Seph."
"Oooookay, Seph."
Sephiroth coldly remarked, "Hey there, spiky haired loser that wants to kill me."
"Whatever. Do you know what's going on?"
"Nope. You went to Wutai. You should know."
"We were just over at Yuffie's house yesterday! She didn't seem like she wanted to attack the
Shinra then. Come to think of it, Rocket Town was empty two days ago. She must be hiding
something from us."
Tifa's fat uncle smiled. "Hey! If it was already empty, then Wutai never attacked it! They
just simply moved in!"
What kind of stupid reasoning was that? It didn't matter. War, peace, love, I had
something more important to do.
"We still should tell Reeve about this," Tifa remarked.
At least since it was on their way, Cloud had to pay my monorail fee. He was pretty
annoyed with it, but Tifa insisted. When we arrived at Corel, the town seemed to be engaged in
a large mining project. There was an elevator leading down into a deep hole and the people
seemed to be busier than usual. After a little asking around, we found out that some gold was
struck deep underground and Barret was leading a mining expedition down there to see what they
could excavate. Cloud and Tifa figured that they should warn Barret too, in case Yuffie decided
to take over Corel for its treasures. We were all in agreement that Yuffie was neither daring
enough nor even cruel enough to pull something like that off, but Cloud decided to be cautious,
anyway.
The elevator nearly broke under the strain of Tifa's rather large uncle, but we made it
down safely. We ended up in an enormous underground cavern. It was so large that if you looked
up, you couldn't even see the ceiling. It was in fact, another world. Tifa's uncle dragged
Cloud and Tifa off somewhere to enjoy some beer while they waited for Barret while the Sephiroth
clone and I went around asking if anyone ever heard about an earth orb, which was what the
ultimate earthquake materia was referred to as in Kafan's notes. It wasn't until Barret came
back that we were able to get any information about its whereabouts. We didn't even get to see
Barret as he went to talk with Cloud and Tifa before us, but his two cohorts, Biggs and Wedge
were interested. We were quickly led me to a room where we couldn't be heard.
"So, you're trying to prevent the wipe," the rather husky one, Wedge, asked.
"Revival?"
Biggs replied, "The wipe. Without our master Li to contain the power of the Earth Orb, this
whole place will fall to its power."
Well, that couldn't be good. Last thing the planet needed was to be ripped in half
shortly after all our work to save it from meteor.
"Come with us."
The two led Seph and I to a castle far away from Barret's camp. Inside the main hall,
I met with their true leader, Li. A sickly old man that smelled of decomposed flesh.
"Ah, Vincent Valentine. I've heard a lot about you."
Seph commented, "You smell wierd."
"Shut up. What do you know?"
Li gave a long speech on how he and three others were organizing an army strong enough
to destroy the race that created Jenova, so they would never send another crisis from the sky
on the planet. He offered me a position as one of his five generals of the earth. Their job
was to prevent the use of the earth orb at all costs until one of their elite light warriors
came to take the orb to a safer place. I didn't trust the man, but I didn't have much choice.
There was no other way to get close enough to the orb and see if Kafan's theory was correct. I
was introduced to Li's current five generals. They were an odd group. The suicide squad, Biggs
and Wedge. The pumpkin queen, Sprite. The vampire reminiscent of all FF1 vampires, Vladimir.
And Milon, the man eating cow. Needless to say, they did little to improve my trust in Li. I
decided to go under the nickname, Death Penalty, named after my ultimate weapon that Lucrecia
left for me. I didn't take much time to get to know them, but I did find out that I was probably
the third strongest among them.
Hard to know whether it was night or not since the underworld didn't have a sun, so I
had to take Li's word for it. Seph wasn't in a very good mood though. He complained about
how he had no obligation to the planet and didn't care for it, and was missing from his room at
night. Why I bothered with him, I'll never know. But since he was my responsibility, I had to
go after him. I found him talking with Li in one of the rooms. Neither of them noticed me.
"I don't care about gods. I don't care about those stupid orbs. I don't care about the wipe. I
don't care about anything anymore."
"You don't even care about revenge?"
"Revenge on who? Who was to blame? The Shinra are dead anyway."
"You know what I'm talking about, stupid boy."
"There is no proof about gods or anything. It was simply the work of the evil greedy bastards
that were in power and always are. I don't give a damn that the whole world will be destroyed.
I just don't care. Everything I ever cared about was destroyed long ago, and now I even find out
that I became a psycho hated by everyone because it left me too emotionally unstable. But there
is nothing that I can do about it anymore."
"And what if I gave you proof that you were truly slated to that damned fate? What if I could
prove that god exists?"
"...."
"Look, there's an interesting ruin to the west of here. Normally, I take control of any spirits
that couldn't rest in peace. But some are so tormented that even I can't control them. You'll
find many of them and your proof at those ruins."
"Um... what do you mean, control spirits?"
"You didn't know? I'm the god of death and undead.
I decided to make myself known. "Undead? You never told us that! If you're the lord of the
undead, why did you make me one of your five commanders?"
"You're undead, aren't you? You're a vampire."
"No I'm not!"
"Yes you are!"
"No I'm not!"
"Yes you are!"
"N O I ' M N O T ! "
"Sheesh, okay, no need to spaz out so much. Although your description from that Ehrgeiz tourney
specifically says you came back from the dead."
"??? Damn! Those stupid tournament guys screwed me up again!"
"Forget this!" Sephiroth screamed. "I don't have time for this."
Sephiroth stormed out of the room. I decided that I didn't care to talk with Li anymore,
because he was both annoying and stinky. A lethal combination. I joined up with Sephiroth
outside the castle and figured that I would come along to make sure he didn't get into even more
trouble. We soon came across an enormous walled-in ruin...
"Look at this, father..."
"Please don't call me that."
I figured I'd have to break it to him someday that Hojo was really Sephiroth's father.
Or was he...? Like I said, that was only a half truth.
"It's the academy."
Sephiroth took out a remote control and pushed a button on it, and the gate opened up.
By now, I knew that this wasn't just some person who went mad then began to believe he was
Sephiroth. This was something else. And could this be the academy that the Shinra built fifteen
years ago to train gifted fighters?
"I'm going in."
Sephiroth certainly knew his way around the ruins of the academy. But I was surprised
at the amount of undead that got in our way. They were the spirits of students killed in the
war, and were surprisingly powerful. But Seph was able to cut through them with ease. I knew
that I would have to inquire into his history more in depth when this was over. We soon found
ourself in what seemed to be what once was the quarters of the principle. Sephiroth proceeded
to rummage through the video tapes on the shelves, searching for what he referred to as
"the proof." I became aware that we weren't the only ones in the room. Then came the moaning.
It sounded like... the cry of a lost female spirit.
"Sephy...... Sephiroth...."
Sephiroth and I drew our weapons and faced in its general direction. From the shadows,
a sickly looking young female teenager. Her hair was a bright pink darkened by the dust that
had accumulated in the room over the years. Her clothes were somewhat torn and the scrunchies on
the left and right areas of her hair were extremely worn. Despite the dirt and dust, she seemed
to be in surprisingly better shape than the twisted living corpses and spirits we had fought
earlier. But it was still quite obvious that she was one of them. Sephiroth didn't seem to care.
He walked up to her and waved his hand in front of her face, then slowly shaked his head as if he
regretted something about her long ago. At that moment, he attacked. I was surprised because
usually it's the zombie that gets the first move. But the girl had extremely good reflexes, and
managed to invade his slashes and attacks. Of course, I couldn't just sit by and do nothing, but
it was difficult to aim properly and not hit Sephiroth instead because the two were so heavily
engaged in their melee. Considering the fact that she was fighting with just her bare hands and
wasn't using any known martial arts skill, she was fighting pretty well. Sephiroth and her each
knew what the other was doing. They had obviously fought before... or at least knew each other
well in the past. Since trying to get a bead on her with my Death Penalty wasn't working, I
decided that a frontal assault might work better.
Wow, it's been a long time since I tried fighting without my gun. Guess I still had
some of that training from being a turk left in me. Coordinating my claw attacks with
Sephiroth's sword strikes quickly wore her down, then with a well-placed uppercut, I was able
to send her flying against the far wall. She didn't even try to get up. Sephiroth withdrew his
weapon then helped her back onto her feet and sighed.
"What on earth are you trying to do? You didn't even attempt to use your favorite napalm weapon
against us."
"I couldn't. We shouldn't be speaking to each other. They wouldn't allow it. You know that.
That's why you striked first. You knew that I would try to kill you."
The girl's voice was almost a whisper as she spoke.
"Patricia, Why don't you come with us? At least Vincent is trying to fight against them.
But I'm coming with him so I can find the truth."
"They won't allow it. It can't happen. Ressurections don't exist. The world is bound by rules
and manipulators, and we are all the subservients. And it doesn't matter. We'll all be gone
soon enough."
"So that's it? I take it this means you won't be coming with us."
"All the better." I remarked. Last thing I wanted travelling with me was a fellow undead...er,
I mean, another undead person. Especially one that was a complete stranger.
"I'm too tired, Sephiroth. I'd just like to take a rest finally."
She closed her eyes and Sephiroth put her down on the ground.
"Rest in peace then. Maybe you're real family will treat you better than that bitch, Kesley."
That name sounded familiar. Yes, Kesley Cheraye was the one who had started on designing the
academy for gifted people before I unwillingly became a part of the Jenova project.
"No, just a short nap. Just remember, You, her, Lars, and Franchesca were my real family,
Sephiroth...."
Sephiroth shadly shook his head once more while I proceeded to help myself to some of
the video files. Lost documents were extremely valuable and I could always use the gil to fund
my milk and tomato juice addiction.
Sephiroth also showed some interest in the files. I proceeded to plug each of
the video files into the videoplayer. One of the files proceeded to list the students and the
small mobile squads of four that they were broken up into. The four names in the top squad were
Lars, Sephiroth, Patricia, and Franchesca. Another file also caught my interest. It was a
record written by Hojo on how the academy was to be shut down in favor of his soldier project
instead. It stated how Sephiroth was instituted as a gifted instead of a soldier in order to
prove that Hojo's soldiers were stronger than Kesley's gifted by having Sephiroth rise to the
top ranks. Hojo made some personal comments on how he was furious that one of Sephiroth's
team mates was actually greater in skill than Sephiroth, which made a mockery of his soldier
project. During the war with Wutai, Hojo had managed to somehow frame Kesley for treason then
take over the academy, after which he proceeded to send the students on suicide mission after
suicide mission. Putting them up against impossible odds, he hoped that he could finally prove
that Sephiroth was stronger than all of Kesley's born gifted when Sephiroth survived all the
battles but everyone else didn't. In the ensueing massacres, all of the students were killed
except Sephiroth, but they had managed to activate a device that made the academy get buried
deep into the ground so it would never be taken over. A quick glance over my shoulder told me
that Sephiroth wasn't very pleased with what he was finding out. The final files were extremely
dusty and buried under everything else. What it contained was quite... unexpected. Upon
viewing it, there was a young lady on the screen who looked very much like Kesley, although she
was younger than I remembered...
She poked the video screen a couple times to check if the recorder was working. Behind her,
there was this green haired girl who was roughly the same age (around 20 years old), and she was
carrying a baby. They were both smiling, and the scene was a metallic room, which was unlike
the stone academy.
"Hello!!! Edgar! It's me, Celes, the wonderful supercalifragilispispiallidocious empress of
Vector! How are things? Things are soooo great here. Oh, Edgar, I'm sorry but Locke couldn't
come to help me with this video message. Sometimes I think he only married me so he could
become the Emperor! Haha, just kidding. But anyways, aren't these new video letters thrifty?
This is my first time using them so I apologize in advance if it screws up. Ah, we've been doing
well since we saved the planet from destruction. But everything seems so trivial now that the
world isn't in dire jeapordy anymore. Anyway, our baby wants to say hi! Say hello, Locke Jr."
"Goo goo."
"Um, Celes?" The green haired girl behind her was getting agitated. "They charge by the second,
you know."
"Oh! Thanks, Terra. Well, sorry Edgar, but I have to go now! Say hello to Sabin and the rest
of the gang for me, ok? Byebye!"
Who the hell was Celes? I never heard of anyone named Celes. Or any of these people!
Which was odd, because if they truly did save the world from jeapordy, I'd think they'd be in
history books forever. Intrigued, I put in the next file. This time, only Celes was on screen.
"Hello, Edgar. Things are going okay, I guess. Yea, I know I look worried. Well, it's not
my relationship with Locke, if that's what your thinking. No, it's Terra. She's been acting
strangely lately. Ever since those other people with green hair arrived and talked to her, she
seemed to have turned from a nice cheerful gal into an uprighteous bitch. She acts like she's a
god or something. Terra's been constantly giving everyone rude remarks and didn't even look at
all worried when I threatened to have her jailed. Okay, I know that was cruel of me and that if
I'm not careful, I could be another dictator like Gesthaul, but I didn't really jail her. Ah,
maybe she's just PMSing or something. Don't worry about it. Bye!"
Both me and Sephiroth were cringing. Then I put in the last file. I was pretty
surprised when the first thing we saw was Celes, extremely cut up and wounded with blood dripping
down the right side of her face. Cries of death and pain were heard in the background.
"Edgar..." she coughed, "T... Terra... she's gone nuts! She's declared herself to be a god, and
is now killing everyone because we are worthless! But why? What have we done? How did she get
to be so powerful?!? Edgar, take Locke Jr. and hide him! Please! We're all going to die!"
The door burst open behind her and Terra and some other green haired guy in plate mail entered.
"Terra... why?"
"Your time has ended, Celes. It is time for a new disaster to strike a new world, with new
people, new heros, and new villains. I'm sorry, Celes. But now that I know what I truly am,
I must fulfill my duty."
Terra held out an extremely large orb, then there was an enormous earthquake that caused the
whole room to collapse. The last thing I saw before the video blacked out was falling rubble
and stone and an enormous dust cloud. I recognized the orb that she held. It was the earth orb
that Li had.
Sephiroth was shocked. "Kesley was telling the truth."
"Huh?"
"I know what I have to do now. I'll help you to recover the orbs before it's too late."
As we were leaving, Sephiroth noticed that Patricia had started to fade.
"What's going on now?"
She could barely talk at all. "He's gone. Li has been defeated by the next apocalypse bringer,
who now has the doom orb. Sephy, please stop her. Not just everyones' lives are at stake here,
but their souls and very essence, too."
Patricia faded away and the earth rumbled around us. We rushed back to Li's castle only
to find rubble. The underground world was being destroyed by the earth orb's power. Sephiroth
pointed out that whoever defeated Li and got the earth orb would have to exit the underworld,
and the only exit that he knew of was an elevator under Li's castle. So we went there and
waited. Waited for the "gods'" chosen one who was to start the world anew just after it had
been saved from destruction. Sephiroth headed to the elevator while I marked the lone coffin
in the room with the name of my ultimate weapon and hid inside it.
Then I waited.
I heard footsteps approach the coffin. The one had arrived. The coffin slowly opened, and I
found myself staring at the one who was to completely erase EVERYTHING...
"Vincent?!? What the hell are you doing there?" Yuffie exclaimed in surprise.
(
geocities.com/timessquare/battlefield) (
geocities.com/timessquare)