CHAPTER 23
"Let's see. A gun-toting maniac, a ninja with giant tits, a SOLDIER, and a girl who can't stand up at the moment. WHAT a reception, I'm flattered!"
"Can it, scumbag!" Dyne spat. He leveled his gun arm up between the red-headed Turk's glowing green eyes. "I'll give you ONE chance to preserve your worthless existence. Step AWAY from that control panel!"
In the middle of the large circular platform was the computer consol that Dyne was referring to. Reno stood about two feet away from it. With just a bit of effort and luck, he would be able to activate the Emergency Plate Release System by pressing one large, conspicuous red button, which he eyed wearily. His gaze shot back and forth between the barrel of Dyne's gun arm and that large, shiny red button.
"I say we rush him," Zack suggested, as though that thought had somehow eluded his companions. Yet he knew why they had not already done so. One move, and Reno would not hesitate to hit the button.
"You sure you wanna do that?" Reno quizzed with a demented smile. He could just press the button and be off, though he seemed to enjoy pulling his adversaries strings like this. His right arm slowly began to rise, his fingers moving as though tickling the air.
Faster than Reno could blink, Tifa charged. A wave of black was all Reno could see, and so he reacted the only way he could. He shot out with his other arm, which possessed a metal cane of some sort. In one fluid motion, Tifa caught the weapon and swung with her free hand.
But before even -she- could connect, Tifa found her body on the receiving end of an electric jolt! Her body quivered as electricity shot through her person for a moment, before a small spark went off, sending her flying back away from Reno. She hit the ground hard and continued to convulse for a moment as a bit of smoke raised from her being, then lay perfectly still...
"TIFA!" Zack and Dyne yelled at once. Dyne was too dumbfounded to react at first, but not Zack. He charged at the Turk, his sword raised to kill the moment he was within range.
But he would not get there. Zack was surprised to find a translucent golden barrier in his way! Before he could think to move around the mysterious new obstacle, the former SOLDIER found himself encompassed by a large golden pyramid of pure energy, which somehow prevented him from moving!
It was Dyne's turn next. Reno made a beeline towards the AVALANCHE leader, striking out at the AVALANCHE leader's gun arm. Dyne stepped away from the attack and launched a kick at Reno's head. The Turk saw this coming and leaned away, causing the attack to simply glance of his shoulder. Reno backpedaled a few steps and raised his cane, holding it like one would a sword.
The one-armed mad swung his weapon forward, ready to fire. He failed to notice that Reno had activated a small button on his own weapon, as well as the humming noise which resulted from this. As he went to fire, only then did Dyne realize that something was amiss. His concerns were instantly realized as his gun misfired several shots in rapid succession, destroying the attachment and sending shrapnel in every direction! Dyne screamed in pain as a few smaller shards seared just past him, grazing his skin.
"Wh... what the..." Dyne wondered aloud.
"Electro-magnetic dampening field!" Reno explained proudly. "Or something like that..."
Jessie observed all this transpiring, but only watched in awe at how the one Turk had disabled the three fighters. Before she may have been able to do something, but she calculated that Reno's magnetic field may have affected her own weapons. She got on her arms and quickly as she could (though it was still slow going), began to crawl over to Tifa, who had barely moved since she was put down.
"Well played, Turk," Dyne noted bitterly, blood leaking from his jaw where a piece of shrapnel had struck him. He rolled his fist into a ball and swung straight at Reno's face. The blow was dodged with an elegant side-step, allowing Reno an opening to counter with his cane. He swung, and found it blocked by the shredded remains of Dyne's gun arm. But then Reno was in for a slight surprise: His cane became stuck! He was about to just hit the "Electrocute" button again when suddenly he found Dyne's hand clasped around his throat!
"You hit that button, you'll fry both of us," Dyne observed, "Now, -I- have a death-wish. What about you?"
Reno paused as no immediate response came to him, his mind racing for a solution.
Jessie had managed to get to Tifa while the two men fought, and shook her lightly. "Tifa?" she whispered, as to not garner Reno's attention. She wasn't sure if she had gotten there undetected or if the Turk just didn't care; but she still didn't want to risk finding out by causing a scene. Tifa lay still, her eyes barely open. She didn't seem to be breathing.
"Oh, god," Jessie muttered. Putting her fingers to Tifa's neck, the hacker and now temporary triage doctor detected a fairly weak pulse, and knew that the ninja didn't have long to be revived. She hurriedly propped herself onto her knees: It hurt like hell, though. She placed her palms on Tifa's chest and pressed down several times in rapid succession while counting to herself to pace when she should push down. She silently cursed the fact that Tifa's breasts had to be as large as they were, as she was uncomfortable having her hands brushing against them while trying to resuscitate her.
Jessie shook her head and told herself to stop being so immature about it, because if she didn't do what she had to, Tifa might die! Which prompted her to go to the next step of the resuscitation process: The mouth-to-mouth. Then a thought came to her: Wait, was that for just drowning victims and people who were chocking in fast food restraints? Jessie lowered her head towards Tifa's and propped her mouth open...
"Aww, crap, I can't do this!" she whined. "Tifa hold on, I'll try and get Zack, he'll actually enjoy thi.. AAAAAAGH!" Jessie found herself caught by surprise when Tifa's arm swung up and grabbed her own! The young ninja slowly opened her eyes and turned to Jessie.
"Scaring people back to life isn't very nice," Tifa joked weakly, starting to get up. She coughed a bit, and was still weak from the shock.
Reno and Dyne were literally at a stand-still. Dyne's grip around Reno's neck was firm, yet not tight enough to cut off the other man's oxygen, though Dyne could easily snap Reno's neck if he so desired. Reno looked at the buttons on his rod, and weighed his options. He couldn't create a new "Pyramid" while one was already in use. He didn't feel like tasting his own electric jolt attack. He supposed he could just deactivate the magnetic-thingie... and so he did.
Dyne quickly ungrasped Reno's neck and kicked out at the cane, sending it flying out of his hand! The Turk made a fatal reaction: His eyes followed the staff as it flew several feet away, clanged against the floor, and rolled all the way to the edge of the platform. Before he could contemplate going after the weapon though, he heard a round being loaded into some kind of gun. Reno slowly turned his head, and found himself staring down the barrel of a small revolver. He sighed and nonchalantly put his hands up.
Zack was relieved as the Pyramid he was trapped in slowly began to dissipate from the staff rolling away and out of range. He strut up alongside Tifa and Jessie, helping them both to their feet. "Looks like we win! But can you two do your victory dances if you're just sitting around?"
"Very funny," Tifa replied a tad bitterly, "And you were the one just standing around, anyway!"
"Oh, like I had a choice!" Zack whined.
The all too familiar sound of an incoming helicopter presented itself, causing the AVALANCHE members to snap to attention.
"That's my ride," Reno noted, "Can I go now?" he teased.
"Mmm, no," Dyne replied flatly. "What do you think I am, stupid?"
"I know you're a cockless dullard!" Reno retorted.
Zack snickered.
"That's not something I'd say to someone pointing a gun at my face.. And what's so funny, Zack?" Dyne replied, not taking his eyes of off Reno.
"Nuttin, it's just that's something I've been meaning to say myself," Zack replied.
A new sound presented itself in the rapid impact of combat boots against metal stairs. Zack quickly turned, his sword ready for whatever new threat presented itself...
"Oh Johnny, it's just you," Zack lamented, putting his sword back away at the sight of the red-haired punker. "You're a bit late, dude."
"Well hey, SOME of us were fighting half the Shinra fuckin' army, oh great and wonderful SOLDIER!" Johnny replied bitterly.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." Zack replied. He got a hold of Tifa, helping her balance, and eased her over to Johnny. "Well, make yourself useful and help me take the girls down to Dox." He turned around, Jessie still in his arms, "Hey Dyne! Hurry up and shoot the fucker, I haven't had lunch yet!"
Zack then heard a shriek behind him, and a thud. Spinning his head, he could barely see Tifa barreling down the first few stairs. Barely, as a pair of silver nunchucks bearing down on his face obscured his view for a moment. Then there was darkness.
Zack fell, Jessie toppling down with him. She unholstered one of her pistols, but found it kicked away. Johnny's foot then came down on her head, causing it to collide with the harsh metal grating which served as the platform's floor, causing a few sizable wounds and spilling a good amount of blood.
Dyne heard the commotion and turned around, only to be met by Johnny's fist. Dyne's head spun as he found his legs kicked out from under him, sending his ass to the ground. Reno stood dumbfounded as Johnny wasted no further time on the AVALANCHE leader, made a beeline for the control panel, and hit the EPLS button.
Nothing.
"What the fuck?!" Johnny moaned, fiddling with the controls. He observed the read out screen, which was displaying a dialogue box which read "Critical system error: 'Crashbangboom.exe' has caused an invalid page fault in kernel32.dll. The application will be terminated."
"FUCKING DOORS 98!" Johnny shouted out, kicking the computer.
Suddenly, a computerized voice chirped in: [[Command accepted. You have: ten minutes, to get your ass out of here!]]
Johnny shrugged in mild satisfaction and ran to the edge of the platform, and waved his hand at the helicopter circling beneath. He turned to Reno, who was just standing where he had left him. "What the fuck's wrong with you? Get over here!"
Dyne began to stir, and mumbled a silent curse. He looked at Johnny with hateful, fiery eyes, to which Johnny responded by simply flipping Dyne the bird. By this time, Zack and Tifa had regained their bearings and stared in awe as Johnny boarded the Shinra helicopter. Reno took a last look at them all and silently followed suite, but not before retrieving his weapon.
"Huh..." Tifa mused, anger flooding her face as she got up. Her legs were working much better now, and she was able to move on her own.
Zack gave her a knowing glare. "HA! Ten Gil, fork it over!"
Dyne raised an eyebrow at the two as Tifa dug into her gi, and produced ten Gil, and plopped it into Zack's hand, a somewhat miffed expression on her face.
"Uhm, what..." Dyne asked, getting up and dusting himself off.
"We had a bet going on who the mole was," Zack explained, pocketing the ten Gil.
"I don't think that's very appropriate," Dyne reprimanded.
"You're just jealous because we didn't include you," Zack teased.
"Yeah, why is that?"
"Well, no offense, but we had you in the running at 1 in 350 odds, and we didn't think you'd appreciate that too much."
"But I'm the LEADER of AVALANCHE!"
"Yeah, that's why the odds weren't lower," Zack explained.
Tseng stepped out onto the helicopter's platform, staring down at AVALANCHE with a victorious smile on his face. "FINALLY..." he started, as though addressing a crowd, attracting their attention, "I have achieved victory! After years of being a laughing stock, I have finally proved my worth!"
"Hey, shut the fuck up!" Zack spat, running up to the chopper, which floated up and just out of range.
"Oh, but why?" Tseng asked. "Its not every day that my men finally do something right, or that I kill a SOLDIER, or.."
"Kuh- Kill a SOLDIER?!" Tifa asked. She looked around quickly, "Shit, Zack, where the hell has Cloud been?!"
"Cloud, was that his name? Blonde spiky hair?" Tseng asked.
"YOU COCK SUCKER!" Zack spat. He couldn't believe it. Not Cloud... no... but wait... If Cloud was killed, then what happened to...
"Aeris!" Tifa gasped suddenly. The flower girl found herself being pulled up alongside Tseng. She almost looked drugged, what with the lost, hopeless look in her eyes, and the way her body just kind of slumped as if she had lost the will to even move.
"Ha ha ha, another victory! For years, we have searched out for the last remaining ancient, and now we have her! What do you say to THAT, Zack? Hmm?! I got your giiirlfirned, I got your giiiirlfriend!" Tseng teased.
Zack just stood there, so many emotions flooding through his mind. He was angry... he was extremely upset. He was confused and lost... he had no idea what to do, no idea what to say.
"Tseng!" Tifa shouted, "You HAVE to turn this thing off! Don't you know how many people are going to lose their lives?!"
"I can count at least four... unless you can escape in time! The pillar should be self destructing any moment now, So we'll be off, ta ta!" With that, Tseng proceeded to laugh as he re-entered the helicopter, which began to fly away. An explosion shook the area, as the large granite pillar next to them began to deteriorate!
"Oh god, the pillar!" Tifa cried out.
"I'm on it!" Dyne said, producing some kind of remote control. He pressed a button, and looked up at the plate, awaiting a response.
And it happened. Upon the underbelly of the pillar, several large pistons began to slide forward and out, interlocking with pistons sliding in from the adjoining sectors. The pistons met, and reinforced themselves by locking onto the plate. Large magnets slid out of their compartments and grabbed a hold of the sides of Sectors Six and Eight, while magnets from those sectors locked onto Sector Seven.
"What's going on?!" Zack wondered aloud.
"Simple," Dyne replied, walking to the stairs, "I've always foreseen this possibility, so I've made Sector Seven lock onto Sectors Six and Eight. We worked for almost a year on this, and while I never wanted to have to use it, I'm glad it works." Zack could almost swear he detected a bit of smugness in Dyne's voice.
Zack walked over to and picked up Jessie, who was holding a cloth to her head. The bleeding has slightly subsided, and she only looked worse off than she really was. Suddenly, a large explosion rocked the pillar control tower as the granite pillar completely disintegrated into a ball of flame! Debris flew everywhere as the sound of the explosion echoed out for miles. Everyone held their breaths as they waited for something to happen.
Nothing. The plate-interlocking system worked!
Tifa breathed a sigh of relief as Dyne's lips formed into a cocky smile. The four friends started down the stairs...
"First thing we gotta do is find Cloud," Zack said in a despondent tone, not sure if anyone was listening.
"Of course," Tifa said with a sigh. She didn't want to believe that Tseng had killed Cloud... Just when he had come back into her life after being away for so long, fate had whisked him away again. But maybe, just maybe there was some hope that...
Suddenly Tifa was shaken out of her thoughts by a disgusting metallic groan. The four friends looked up, and saw a sight which did not bode well.
The connector pistons had begun to warp, twist, and contort. Some were shaking violently, and if one looked close enough, it almost seemed as though the plate had dipped down a bit.
"SHIT," Dyne commented, "There's not enough support, it's not going to hold!"
The four ran down the stairs (Well, Zack was carrying Jessie, but still), as Dyne picked a radio out from his pocket. "This is Dyne," he spoke, his voice echoing through various PA systems scattered through the sector, "I am ordering a FULL evac of Sector Seven! All personal, all civilians, everything. This is NOT a drill, I repeat; this is NOT a drill! You have..." Dyne looked up and gauged the conditions of the pistons and magnets, "Five minutes, ten tops!"
"Not even!" Zack observed, racing down the steps, trying his best not to lose his balance.
"What do you mean?!" Dyne asked eagerly.
"It's not those things that are breaking, the sector's all ready falling. If somehow they hold, they could bring the other two sectors down, too! You'll have to release them before that happens!"
"Zack, that's nonsense!" Tifa retorted.
"No, he's right, I think," Jessie interjected.
"How so?" Dyne inquired.
"Well, remember that table? The one with the three legs that I knocked down because I pulled out one of the legs? Well, this is the same thing, except instead of a five pound wooden table, we're talking about three sectors which weigh probably thousands of tons each being held up by only two pillars!" Zack explained.
"I HATE it when you make sense!" Dyne spat angrily. However, his anger was not at Zack, but at himself for not seeing this possibility sooner.
The four companions made it to the base of the steps, and saw hundreds of people fleeing Sector Seven, most of them carrying whatever personal affects or equipment that they could. Pick-up trucks and vans filled to capacity with people almost threatened to plow their way through amid the chaos. There was screaming, yelling, and general panic... though through it all people were managing to escape at a fairly rapid pace.
Dyne and co charged into Sector Six as Sector Seven itself began to crack and crumble, sending debris down into the slums, threatening to squash the fleeing refugees. Once he was sure everyone was clear, Dyne took out the remote again and hit the "release" switch.
A loud grinding and a few faint groans from the twisted, unmoving metal above was the only response. Dyne hit the button over and over, but the pistons and magnets refused to retract, already too warped and twisted to be pulled back to their previous positions. Suddenly, in the distance, a loud CRACK was heard. No one could tell what it was at first, until a child who had disobediently climbed up a mountain of junk cried out, "The Sector Six pillar just cracked!".
Suddenly a voice came over Dyne's radio, "Dyne, this is Kinneas," a young man's voice came, "Not to be the bearer of more bad news, but I'm here in Sector Eight..." the voice suddenly became distant, as though the man had put the radio away from his mouth, "Oh god, the pillar.. it's starting to crumble! RUN!"
Dyne turned to the crowd which had congregated behind him, and spoke with an eerie calm. "Okay, keep moving! Get into Sector five, now!"
The crowd of over three hundred people obeyed instantly and trudged forward as fast as they could. Someone on a motor bike had headed into wall market to warn the people there what was happening. It was a mad dash across the broken and fragmented road to Sector Five as Sector Seven began to dip down, dragging Sectors Six and Eight slowly with it.
People were needlessly ushering each other on by informing one another to hurry. The crowd began to panic as parts of the broken road became too high to mantel over or too uneven to drive across. Tifa came across a group of children trying to mount over an up-raised portion of the road with no success. She instantly ran over to the trio, scooped them up, and launched herself up onto the raised road as a piece of debris fell from above, crushing the ground where they had been a moment ago. One girl started crying, prompting the ninja to keep carrying the children while running. The children's panic was dissolved at the odd sight of a house being seen running away from the chaos as well.
That's when Zack noticed a large gathering at the Sector five wall; he surmised that people were trying to crowd through the small opening. Putting Jessie down for a moment, he concentrated his Ice materia at the wall. People began screaming as the large cement barrier turned into ice before their eyes. Someone screamed that hell was freezing over.
Zack then ran up and rammed into the wall, causing it to crack. Gripping his sword tightly, the crowd watched in awe as he slashed at the frozen obstacle with all of his might, destroying a large portion of it, allowing people to flee into Sector Five more efficiently.
"Good work!" Dyne commented, ushering people in. He looked up at the Sector Six plate, and gulped. Sector Six had never been completed, and was in fact only half constructed. It was more likely to break into pieces than follow Sector Seven on its decent.
Which is exactly what it did. In a series of explosions, large parts of Sector Six rapidly rained down on the refugees, crushing many of them in the process. One piece fell in front of a truck, causing the driver to veer off and crash into a group of people. Frightened screams filled the air, but these sounds were overcome by the multiple collisions of metal and cement. Dyne was about to charge into Sector Five when something caught his eye.
Derric was hobbling along, going only as fast as being on a crutch could allow. He maneuvered around a pipe which had fallen earlier, and tripped. Screaming in pain, he fought his fatigue and forced himself to get up... then he noticed the shadow from overhead become much, much darker. Ordinarily, he would have been able to hop up and run, and possibly make it out of the way in time. But he had a bullet hole in his leg. One which Dyne had put there.
So when a gigantic chunk of plate crushed the twenty year old man into a bloody pulp, Dyne could not help but feel completely responsible. It was all too much... the Sectors... Johnny... Cloud... Derric.. everyone on TOP of the plates who had no warning of any of this... it was all too much for him. His head screamed in a blur of confusion and anger, the world around him beginning to grow dark. He put his arms to his head, his right hand covering his ear, his shredded gun arm scratching the side of his head, but he did not care. There were more voices and sounds, getting louder and louder, forcing him to put more pressure on the sides of his head, his gun-arm beginning to pierce his flesh. In the confusion, he began to lose his balance, dropping to one knee as the sounds of death and chaos overwhelmed him.
It's all your fault IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT
Dyne's last moment of cognizance was a tugging sensation on his arm... then nothingness.
***
Compliment and opposite of red, not solid, nor liquid nor air. The empty riverbed of death...
"Well well... Look at THAT. Dyne fancies himself as intelligent and capable of foresight... yet common sense seems to allude him. It wasn't MY idea to keep him alive... that was a retroactive effect of saving Zack... though it seems as though Dyne's presence is rather... detrimental. Seriously, allowing three plates to fall instead of one? Not that Wallace would of thought of that, but if he had, he would of had the brains to avoid such a cataclysmic action. I wonder if reality itself is trying to interfere with... ah, 'our experiment'? Though it's odd... The plate still fell, Aeris is still in Shinra's grasp... Is reality trying to stay streamlined? Then why would it make its own alterations? Observations? Thoughts?"
"astardbay... ouyay illway otnay etgay wayaay ithway isthay..."
"Pig-Cetran? Oh please, I know you all are incognizant at the moment, but now you're just being stupid! And you didn't answer my question..."
"amnday ouyay..."
"Now now, you've no one to blame but yourselves... After all, I'm of you... you're of me, we're one... heh heh heh, Suckers. But enough babble, we have a few thousand souls to induct..."