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Post by skylark on Dec 1, 2019 18:08:18 GMT -5
Oof. Well, at least there's still Machinabridged to get my fix.
Also, BIG OOF on a rough December. Thanksgiving and pre-Christmas prep cleaned us out on funds. We're broke till we get our annual 'Grandma Money'.
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Post by northlander on Dec 8, 2019 9:01:09 GMT -5
Chapter 16: You Got Some Stones To Mess With Me, Manderville. "You can just set it back to how it used to be. I mean... it's not like I paid any attention to how you had it set when I grabbed it off of you." "Well, I wouldn't want to inconvenience you or anything." "Yeah, well... I was almost 'picked' by Don Corneo for... whatever nefarious and probably quite perverted sceme he had in store for me, so do you think you could cut me some slack here?" "...fair enough, I guess. It's not like I don't know what that feels like." "I'm so glad you understand." "......" "Wait, what?!" "Don't ask! Please." "Why?! Because I have so many questions. None of them are good." "Well, your dad normally sleeps and shouts weird words while doing it. At least that's the impression I got." "Has he ever been on TV? He sort of felt like a game show host." "Uuuurgh! I know, right? He's so embarrassing, I often consider using my ninja skills to dig myself deep, deep underground. Like... BOOM! Giant cloud of smoke, and I'm gone! Deep, deep down where no feelings of shame can reach me." "It's so cute to see how these two are bonding over their shared feelings of embarrassment." "Yeah, no. 'Cute' wasn't my first choice of words for this." "I'm getting a feeling of deja vu like you wouldn't believe. Except I don't have to be a huge tsundere about it just to reel you in." "Oh, you naughty little boy. You really know how to play the playa." "Well, we don't have to worry about our materia anymore, right?" "Oh, sure. Now that I got things settled at home, I can wait until all this is over. THEN, I'll steal all your materia." "....." "I'm just kidding. Honestly, stockpiling the stuff is more trouble than it's worth. If I stick with you guys, I can just buy whatever materia I need. And we might even find some totally amazing materia while travelling too, some of which should go to me because I plan on doing my part of the fighting, too. Fair?" "I guess?" "Yes, one of these counts as a blade, maybe two, depending on how you look at a barrette." "And you can't really 'strike' with a blade anyway. A diamond knuckle, however...." "Yes, you can." "I'm sorry, but you slice or cut with a blade. A strike impact is more like a blunt impact, right?" "Not necessarily. I know the mental image of it come across as a bit illogical, but strike is a very open term in that regard." *sigh* "OK, I... never mind. Clearly, I haven't hit enough people with a blade." "Yes, you can use 'hit' about that, too." "Oh, shut up!" "I think Cloud needs to learn how to hit on girls, though." "Uh... a chainsaw hand? That sounds very GROOVY, BABY!" "Shop smart, Barret. Shop S Mart." "That sounds like a shortening of Shinra Mart. No way, Jose." "And there be our plane. It should magically work again now that we've completed this particular diversion." "I ran down and fixed it when you weren't looking, so it should." "Well, aren't you the mechanical tech whiz." "Hey, it's all part and parcel of the whole ninja deal. Besides, I'm a girl of the future. Gotta have more appeals than just looking good." "......." "I must end her." "Let's... not go there, Aeris." "Alrighty, we're going back to the Golden Saucer... for some reason. Boy, I didn't expect having to go back there so suddenly." "How about we ask for directions this time, Mr. Navsat." "Oh ha ha. Yeah, sure, let me just sidle up to that cliff over there and see if there are any random bystanders out there braving the random encounter generation for a chance to help a brotha out with some directions." "To be fair, I'd slap you on your stupid head too if you said that to me." "I know I used to sell flowers for a living, but at least I picked the best ones that I grew myself. You gonna give me that low-effort BS, and I'm going to introduce your cranium to my staff." "10000 gil isn't even that much for that important an item. What cheapskates." "Hmmm. "Dio's Show Room". Why do I get the feeling that I'm about to walk in on him standing on a pedestal, flexing?!" "I don't even know whether I should find that appealing or horrifying." "The guy is rather... intense." "And no half-naked men in sight. Well... aside from the picture on the wall." "But is it a Spartan or Mr. Torgue?" "And which of the two would be the loudest?" "Mr. Torgue without a doubt." "That's an interesting conversation, boys and girls." "And that's why you decided to put it in your prize display? Really?" "It is an important stone, though. Not that any of you numpties would understand that." "Ohoho, what'cha mumbling about over there. You should always stand up straight and get all the things you want off your chest... well, off your chest. Without any hesitation. That is the Manderville way, after all." "I'm not sure I can keep up a lifestyle of 'no social anntennas'. Especially if you couple that with 'no inside voice' on top of that." "It's exhausting." "Uh... I'm afraid to ask, but.... uh...." "Don't hesitate, boy. Good things come to those who grab it with both hands and don't let go of it." "And now I'm even more afraid. Last time I saw a guy with your dress code, I was waking up from unconsciousness and he was sitting on me." "Sounds like a blast, boy, but don'tcha worry. We ain't gonna be wrasslin', if you catch my drift." "OK, that's... mildly reassuring. So.... what am I going to do, then?" "Just me? Solo fighting?" "Yup. Well, you can send in one of the girls if you don't feel up to it. Or the cat. Or Mr. Pistol Hand." *sigh* "So much for a party. OK, fine, I'll go." "Dat's my boy." "But I must take back the 'dat's my boy' part, because seriously... you need to learn how to last longer, boy." "If that's your plan, you might want to cut down on the weird and creepy double entendres." "Pfft, where's the fun in that? You gotta loosen up, boy. Don't get so uptight." "GUH! I can't... PTSD kicking in.... no, DON'T!" "Ohoho, I think I've picked at some war wounds here. Never mind me, boy. Go enjoy your stone." "Noooo, I want to leave this place. Before it's too late." "Uh... yeah, no. Not happening tonight." "What is this feeling of impending doom?" "About that...." "Yep. This is sufficiently doom-y, alright. And weirdly enough, it's making me feel better." "Nice. Then we can hang around a bit here." "......." "Uh.... no pun intended. Really." "......." "Really! I promise! C'mon, guys, give my sense of humor some credit here." "Nope!" "OFF WITH HIS HEAD!" "Which one?" "I dunno. Both?" "I picked up the saw hand in Wutai. Lemme handle this." "Guys, come on. You're.... you're kidding, right?" "Nope. I totally saw what you did there, and now it's time to pay the piper." "...and who's a terrible punster now?" "The end." "What?! That's it?" "Nah, just kidding." "Oh wow, Barret. I don't know if I think that's hilarious or just plain rude." "The disease hath returned to the holy land. That's a pretty neat euphemism for getting venereal diseases. I gotta remember that the next time I go to the local pharmacy, so that I can freak the clerk out." "You got some weird hobbies, lady." "Like you're one to talk. Anyway...." "Hey, I'm sorry, but I wasn't invited to the big important talk while we were there. I only got the abridged campfire version after, where we all talked in each other's mouths all the time." "And boy, doesn't your explanation sound like a lot of codswallop, lady. You just search and travel, huh?" "And this from the lady who demanded I ask for directions." "The ancients are too deep for directions." "Your BS is too deep for directions." "Black capes, black materia, black black black." "Can we deal with all this dark blackness of despair and darkness? And numeral tattoos? Boy, that doesn't have a really sinister undertone at all." "I shall call them SShinra from now on." "Please don't." "Yeah, but you're still Nanaki. Like... before you got that tattoo, you had nothing to do with nobody in there, right?" "I guess." "Besides, the other people we've seen with tattoos like that were insane from the get-go." "That's reassuring. I guess. Yay. Whoop-de-doo." "I like your enthusiasm." "Sephiroth is looking for the promised land so he can destroy the planet. What about that is complicated?" "And we hafta find the keystone to get into the temple so we can find the materia that Sephiroth is going to use for something, and then we have to find the thing we need so we can enter the promised land so we can find HUGHBLURGH!" "And Barret's merry-go-round broke down. So, where do we go from here?" "Down to the ground... as soon as the gondola is fixed." "Oh. Right." "Oh, do tell, Mr. SOLDIER. I bow to your superior life experiences." "I'm glad to hear we've come to an agreement there." "Not sure if sarcastic, or if Barret here has made Cloud underestimate adults in general." "Hey!" "Well... have you been experimented on?" "Not outside of getting the tattoo... and, well, Hojo trying to mate me with Aeris." "Then you should be fine. Really, the maniacs we've met so far has been reeking of mako experimentation. The TV guy we met in Midgar had needlemarks on every naked spot of his body, and probably a few where needles weren't ever supposed to be stuck." "I'd... make some 'Cloud is being a pervert' jokes if I weren't so creeped out over this fact. But I do feel better now... well, in some ways. So, uh... thanks?" "And now he's being all thoughtful and stuff. Kids are weird, man." "So, can someone check the old guy so we can all get a good night's rest?" "I'm on it." "Even weirder." "...of course." "Um... should we carry him to bed?" "No way! He reeks of tobacco, rocket fuel and old man!. I'm not spending the night in the bath scrubbing my skin raw to remove the smell." "And now I feel tired too." "But... but... tired. And why are you grabbing my arm so close like that?" "Persuasion power. Resistance is futile, SOLDIER boy." "Guh! I feel my mind being muddled." "Hate to admit it, but Aeris might be right about some things." "Um... but doesn't all this count as entertainment? Depending on what yanks someone's crank? I know I fight for a living, but in my case, it's more of a job. But Dio's all about the murderdome. One man enters, maybe one man leaves if he's good enough." "Ooh, theater. Let's go, Cloud." "Why me? I just wanted to sleep." "Urgh! I'm regretting this more and more." "Valvados stole all the beds of the world, and for that, he must pay!" "Ohoho, someone's getting into the spirit of things." "Princess Rosa, you say?" "Yes, Princess Rosa." "And this Rosa is a Princess?" "Yes, Princess Rosa is a Princess." "And this Princess Rosa's name is Rosa?" "Ye-... dude, please work with me, legendary hero Alfred." "So, who am I saving Princess Rosa from again?" "We need to make sure that both parties are into these things when we accept couples taking part in our theater setups in the future." "Also, my dear hero, can we please keep this child-friendly?" "You say that, but let her keep wearing the tight top with suspenders over her chest, and a short skirt?" "Um... right. Mental note: have easy-to-wear costumes ready for the occasion for any unforeseen guest roles." "Pahaha, yeah, I'd like to see you try harming her." "Um... Cloud, could you try to get a little into your role, at least?" "I know you wanted me to come rescue you and all, but I didn't imagine it would be like this." "That's not... *sigh* ...I mean..." "I regret everything." "You do not fool me, Mr. Knight. I know you are the one who stole all the sleep in the world. If I am to get any rest, I must defeat you." "He's getting into this for all the wrong reasons." "Ah, sweet rest at last." "Uh oh. Wait, this is just...." "Ow, my tail hurts." "Oof, she's not done yet. Fun?! I thought you hated everything I did back there." "Yeah, well... I... guess I realized that I pulled you into something you didn't want to do for my own entertainment, and I didn't even think to ask you if you like being on stage. Which, come to think of it, you don't... if I remember how you were back when we were kids. So... would you mind if we went for a gondola ride?" "I don't mind. Gondolas are calm." "Great." "It's a bit tacky. Fireworks are nice, though." "Boo. You're not a romantic at all." "I'm romanticapped." "You gotta work on your capacity." "Kick it into high gear." "I'll make sure to keep abreast of the situation." "Well, anyway.... this is vastly more pleasant than the theater shenanigans, even if I kind of enjoyed how it ended." "Ahah, yeah, glad to hear that at least." "I mean... you don't confess when you're both standing knee-deep in chocobo manure unless you got very special interests, right?" "Uh... I guess?" "Or when you're running the chocobo breeding program." "Yes, well... Tifa, you're kind of starting to scare me here." "Yep. Timing sure is everything." "......" "I went to far in my analogies and ruined the moment. Let's... uh, let's get back on this gondola ride later." "Ah, back to my room, my place of rest." "Don't say it like that. You're making me want to... sabotage it." "Is this... revenge from me cracking that 'next to you' joke?" "Mmmmmaybe? Maybe not?" "......" "......" "Uh oh." "That chopper looks familiar." "Yeah, I've seen it before too." "SHINRA!" "Just before the plate fell." "All those people...." "But a lot of things have happened, Mr. Shinra Spy. Quite a lot." "And very few of those things speak well of you, Mr. Shinra Spy." "Kill you, huh? Like Shinra killed all those people in the slums?" "That was a low blow." "Yes. Yes, it was. The lowest." "How exactly are we not? You've been reporting our location to the enemies all this time, and thanks to you, we now don't have the keystone anymore." "And you're the one who says talking isn't going to do anyone any good, but whose fault is that?" "Um... technically, I'm not a spy. That's just how it turned out." "No, normally, you're a fortune teller. Did you foretell that we'd totally forgive everything that's been going on so far?" "....and things got even worse." "Please tell me you really work in PR. Because if your fortune telling is any indication of your overall capabilities, that's the only thing that makes sense right now." "Well, you two aced your sarcasm class, at least. That's the easy part, though." "Rrrgh! So much cowardice." "You didn't want to do it, but you went and did it anyway." "And where did you plan for us to go when you stole our only means of getting in where we planned to enter in the first place, you stupid asshole?" "Erm... whoops. Look, I got my priorities, OK? So let's just go somewhere." "I don't want to do this anymore." "They're really just going to leave the door open, huh?" "Taking away the reason for someone to go there, yet expecting us to take the journey anyway. Is this a Shinra thing? Making everyone not high up on the social ladder do things that makes us feel all empty inside?" "Oh, you have NO idea." "What's wrong, you two? You're glaring daggers at our mascot here." "It's nothing." "Yeah, we were just thinking of the people we left behind when we started on this big journey." "Or how we can't go back to that place anymore." "Man, why'd you bring that up now?" "Well, gee, I wonder why." "Well, are we going or are we going? We haven't got a moment to lose, no?" "You and me both, Yuffie. You and me both." "I don't know why, but you agreeing with me like that is creeping me out a bit." "You're just imagining things." "I just hope the place hasn't been looted to the ground yet." "Why would it? We have the key, remember? Hey, where is it, by the way." "Oh, Cait Sith here's got all that covered. Right?" "I sure do. Now, let's roll." "And so, we moved. That should be the temple too, I think?" "Let's sneak up quietly and knock." "Maybe they'll let us in if we ask really nicely." *cough* "You two sure are being creepy. What's going on?" "Yeah. You haven't smiled once since last night, and you're acting weirdly synchroneously too." "It's nothing." "Stop that!" "And now Aeris is acting all creepy too. That's just great." "We normal people have to stick together." "While I appreciate the sentiment, I'm not sure I like hearing that from you." "That's cold, man." "I'm not a man, so I'm allowed." "No, you're not." "Hush. Don't interrupt my crazy talk." "I don't understand either." "I understand that I'm very confused right now." "Wedgies? Is that really necessary? I know they're being rude and all that, but it's a bit much, right?" "Oh, don't you get started with me." "Knee to the groin? This is getting more and more over the top as we speak." "Oh, stop that!" "Oh great, we're back to that again." "Did we meet up with 'number nine' here in the creepily rebuilt version of Nibelheim?" "I dunno. Maybe he was off to SALTZA!" "But more importantly, why is the front door open?" "Yes, why?" "Is Cait Sith's cover blown for the others as well? Can there be no redemption for those who lie and blackmail? Or even worse: does their fortune telling act? Only the Men in Black know for sure." "Tseng of the Turks has been tricked!" "Oh, the humanity." "What is the world coming to when even the tricksy ones have been tricked? How do you out-trick the out-tricker?" "OK, FINE! I WAS THE ONE WHO DID IT! I blackmailed them with the sound of Marlene, and now they're doing what I want. Just... just stop this incessant hinting." "Yeah, Cloud and Tifa. Stop it. You're just being mean now." "I just... why?!" "There is no justice in this world anymore." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Dec 17, 2019 11:48:11 GMT -5
Chapter 17: Puppet Poweer. "We all have to let go sometime. They grow up so fast." "Heck are you talking about? You're just a kid yourself, you know." "With a mom that had some.... problems letting go. She wanted me to marry a second mom, basically." "Yikes! I'm... *cough* ...sorry -- and somewhat unnerved -- hearing that. But more importantly..." "You'll cry, you're gonna cry, you always cry. See? You're crying!" "Don't... *cough* ...don't compare me to my lesser siblings, fool!" "You're... not listening, are you?" "I am, but we have a job to do, and not enough time to do it. Time and place and all that." "Well, excuuuuuuse me, Princess." "And we're back to the crossdressing again, aren't we?" "Did I... *cough* ...miss something?" "No." "Oh, you have no idea." "Damn it, it spilled, whatever this is." "Purple, glowing gunk? This isn't going to make us sick, right?" "Hey, be more respectful to the awesome power of the ancients, you heretic." "I have a headache." "Uh... OK? Where did that come from." "We've had some rough times lately, but that's no reason to turn back now." "I... never said we had to." "If we pool our strength together, we can overcome this trial." "Yes, that is the general idea here." "I believe in us." "That's nice." "Now I have a headache too." "Erm... why would it?" "I dunno." "Getting nostalgic over a sound of something being sealed. Of all the things to wax poetic about." "It's all in the mind." "The source of all our mindfulness." "I'm glad you all got that off your chest." "Or out of it." "We've cornered the Nyum Nyum guy... person..." "So... now what?" "Whaddya mean 'away from the planet'? They're right here, aren't they?" "No, no, their planet." "Oh. Uh... wow. No wonder they don't speak the language." "So... is there any reason we disturbed this guy, then?" "I need to ask him some questions." "Are you fluent in Nyum Nyum, then?" "Nope, but I can understand his mind." "That's... mildly creepy." "I'm guessing 'something else'." "Like a bunch of armed maniacs chasing him down." "Oh, shut up! It's not like you have to keep your weaponry at the ready." "In this place? Oh, yes, we do." "Oh, fine. Just... stand back and let me do my thing." "Let the mind-probing begin." "I can't do that!" "Yay, more weaponry." "Rocket punch?! I like the sound of that." "It was made for you." "I can use the rifle. And for more than just shooting werewolves." "I find it kind of amusing that a transforming person is talking about shooting other people like them." "Hey, you can't trust werewolves." "Must be a vampire thing." "I'm not a vampire." "But you sure like acting like one." "Um..." "That's what she said." "Oh, no, you di'int. And besides, that's the last thing a woman would want a man to do." "Yikes! Aren't we being all risque and stuff." "And of course it had to be a 'that's what she said' joke on top of it all. Anyway, get your ass over here right now. You just gotta see this." "Oh, we're back to this again." "Quiet, I can't hear the voices." "Uh...." "Did you have us come over just so you could tell us to be quiet?" "I was hoping you'd find this impressive." "Uh... Aeris, we can summon demigods to unleash elemental storms on our enemies. You doing that weird 'talking to yourself' bit isn't really all that remarkable, even if you're standing behind a giant pillar of light, waving your arms dramatically." "You just don't like good storytelling, you philistines." "Show you? How does that help us?" "Uh.... OK." "So... are you impressed yet?" "More like creeped out." "Close enough." "As long as you're enjoying yourself." "Well, no. Because 'becoming one with the planet' sounds like something only insane lunatics would say." "You just lack vision." "Yes, indeed. If I have to listen to your pretentious stupidity any longer, I really will go blind." "And now I want to make sure I go blind with the help of your giant sword." "But that's not fun at all." "You're so right about that." "This has to stop!" "I feel like I heard something I wasn't meant to, and not because Sephiroth either does or does not want us to be a part of all this... in so many ways." "Well, we're on our way to the room with the pictures on the walls." "Well, at least until someone made us watch her speak to a pillar of light." "Well, I'm sorry, but I had to answer that call." "You sure did." "....uh." "Well, thank God we didn't need to go into room nine. We'd have to wait for eleven hours." "Or 25 minutes." "The hour arm should be over at 11 by that time, though." "But if we run to the middle now, we can stand there for 25 minutes and try our hardest not to think about how steep that drop is." "NOW IS THE TIME!" "Princess guard... that's for Cloud." "Gnnnh NO! Never again! Never again never again never again." "OK, now even I'm feeling bad about it, hilarious as it was at first." "No, mama. I don't want to play the trumpet anymore." "Uh....." "Yeah, I'm not delving deeper into this rabbit hole." "Mega what?" "Why does that potion sound like it'll put its tongue down your throat when you try to drink it?" "Good thing it's not a suppository, then." "The Megalixir Buttchug. Should we be blamed for starting a new worrisome trend among the teens of today? Or do you think we can blame the naming committee for this?" "I never take the blame for anything. That's my policy." "You are my new hero." "This atmosphere of... uh, giant dinosaur on the wall." "What's so special about a dinosaur? We've got lots of weird and wonderful creatures on the loose here. Who are also normal, because that's how we roll here on Gaia." "What's our measuring stick for what's normal and what isn't, I wonder? How far do you have to go to be considered strange or unusual?" "I think I'd feel more normal if we returned to our topic of the Megabuttlixir." "Ew, no." "Did you just punch an ancient dragon with a dolphin?" "See, now that is strange and unusual." "We all have to go that extra mile these days." "You two are making no sense whatsoever." "And our reward is a Nail Bat." "Gotta prepare for the zombie apocalypse, I guess." "Let's not give Sephiroth any ideas now. The tattooed weirdoes are weird -- and zombie-like -- enough." "And now we're facing a devil man with a panther for a penis. Perfectly normal." "And the Panther Penis is the one with the legs too." "The walking nutsack with an upper body." "And its name is 'Doorbull'. It's the future of nightclub bouncers." "What did we just say about this?" "Someone had to try their luck, huh?" "It's a materia, though. Who's selling luck materia?! Casinos?" "Yeah, it's not like we were just in a... uh, right." "Wanna take bets on whether this materia won't help us one bit up there?" "Yes, let's save the Nyum Nyum man." "Wouldn't it be better to rest first?" "Oh, just... forget it!" "Well, good thing we got here in time -- uh, relatively speaking." "Yeah, five minutes late, and we'd have to wait almost an hour for our next chance." "Christ, this dungeon is a pain in the ass." "Ominous jinxing aside, I could do with a dungeon with less passitivity. I mean... now we're hunting another Nyum Nyum guy, and that's the most action-filled moment so far. Well, aside from when we fought two tiny ancient dragons and picked up that weirdly nasty weapon." "There we go. Now, do we save the guy we just captured? Or do we take out the rest?" "Oh, just.... just forget it!" "No, you're not. You're a weirdo who just pops up whenever you feel like we're getting too sensible here." "So, what's new, Sephy? Still going to collect all your weirdoes and destroy the world, so you can come lick the wound?" "And if that's the case; boy do we have a potion for you." "It's the kind that you take through the ass." "Well... if any of you thought our conversation so far was sounding a bit crazy..." "Nope." "I didn't." "Right." "Do you mind?" "Yes, we do." "Very." "WE SAID WE MINDED!" "He's becoming one with his mother." "Who thought that would be a good way to go for a villain? How does that even...?" "Well, at least that makes sense, you giant weirdo." "Don't know how your mother would fit into this, unless you meant literally: you wound the planet, and then you shove your mother into the hole so you can take in all that delicious mako energy that will then have nowhere to go outside of your big, pretentious cakehole." "So rude." "And to such a nice guy too." "So sarcastic. I love it." "Aaaaand we're back to the almost boringly trite villain spiel. I will control everyone, and then I will never be bored again, because at least I'll have my mom to talk to." "I'll be a god. I'll never be bored." "So says the guy who changed his tone completely just from reading a few books, and then completely misunderstood the situation and overreacted massively. I'd call your attention span into question, but that's assuming you actually have one." "And you're going for subtlety too. I'm so proud of you." "So is mom." "This is probably the most offputting conversation I've ever had." "Yes. Can we go back to the buttchug potion now, please?" "I'D LIKE TO!" "ME TOO!" "ME THREE!" "Like... I just realized that we're facing someone who might very well talk us to death. That's horrifying, isn't it?" "Well... yes, I see your point." "I feel like we're facing someone who both acts like the villainous turds you'd see in any fairly typical story, and yet also comes across as massively revolting compared to them. How do you even do that?!" "Well... some of it. The parts about always being with me were more creepy than sensible, and I'd rather not think too much about that, if that's alright. And... uh, his mom issues?" "Let's not forget that he plans to combine with his mom." "......." "On second thought, let's just forget all about that." "I concur." "I seconcur." "Well... what does it do if it can't find any small planets nearby?" "I guess it doesn't work, then?" "Magic works in very mysterious and limited ways." "It's not a spell we can spam, in other words." "Well... no." "Are you not a pipe?" "Well, he's a giant tool." "Ha ha ha I'm not a tool." "A momma's boy?" "Ha h-oh, shut up!" "Did you come back to laugh at us just so we could taunt you some more?" "You jerks. I'm throwing a much bigger dragon at you this time." "Well... he apparently did." "That is a big dragon." "Want me to punch some dolphins at it?" "Yes, please." "And you want to find him? Didn't we just exchange a lot of nonsense just now, before the dragon fight?" "Well, I thought we could just get the 'stab him through the chest' thing out of the way while he was nearby. I have a big sword, but it's not that big. And I forbid you all to say 'That's what she said'." "Aw, phooey." "Ask them to be quick about it. We haven't got all day." "What's that? You're going to put me over to the acting manager? OK, I'll wait." "Oh, come on!" "Dum di dum, your call is very important to us, please wait. Dum di dum." "She can't be serious." "We're number what in the queue? Uh..." "What? Is it bad?" "Well... have you watched Beetlejuice, by any chance?" "You're kidding, right?!" "Yes, I am. Now shut up." "You're kidding, right?" "Nope." "You're... kiddding, right?!" "Nope." "How does that even work?!" "We're... saying that a lot, aren't we?" "And we probably aren't going to stop anytime soon." "You're kidding, right?" "Sadly, no." "So, we will get the materia if we solve the puzzle?" "I... sense a huge flaw in that plan. See, some people might be willing and able to sacrifice their lives for the greater good, but other people are more than willing to sacrifice other people's lives for the greater good." "Except 'for their greater good' rather than ' the greater good'." "You gonna stuff the black materia with mechanical parts and fabric?" "And to think, if we had the key from the get-go and weren't delayed a whole day for no reason, we coulda been in here and made it out with the materia before Sephiroth even knew what was going on." "Hindsight ain't fair, and even if we had, you'd just have ended up like Tseng." "Nuh uh." "Yup uh." "Well, like he said, it's just a radio controlled body, right? There's no way this could turn out to be one of the more emotional lows in our long journey to stop a pathetic madman from dropping a serious bomb, right?" "I can do this. Y'all run to the exit now." "CAN DO!" "Well... this isn't ominous at all." "Why didn't they just write 'this is a trap' on that door while they're at it?" "I don't see how this can get any more ridiculous." "Well, I stand corrected." "So, we're fighting the wall?!" "Well, it got me scared to open the door, at least, because I don't want to see what that thing's crotch looks like." "IT'S NIPPLES ARE EYES!" "Don't walk through the door, Cloud. Don't walk through the door." "We must take out all of its bricks, one piece at a time!" "And now I don't know who I'm the most afraid of." "Don't walk through that door, Cloud. RUN! RUN THROUGH IT! I'LL BE RIGHT BEHIND YOU!" "Oh, thank God, we beat down the wall." "The time is gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say." "Well, at least we don't have to see what's behind that door." "I stand corrected. Again." "What?" "Nothing. But at least we can walk through that door without having to bleach my eyes first." "....what?!" "You don't want to know." "Aside from my impending death. OH HO HO, just kidding, but anyway." "Boy, that got awkward really quickly." "Well, I got an idea." "I'm not mad. I'm just... tired." "Well, I'm feeling peppier than ever. I feel good about my future now." "I feel like I'm just being pulled along in a river of not my making." "Shush, Cloud. You're ruining my moment here." "Yes, dear." "Stop that." "Can you please stop this? I thought the wall monster with the crotch doorway was creepy, but now I'm thinking you're trying to get us murdered by way of death flags." "Yeah, even I feel kind of ill at ease now." "...yes, I guess it is." "Kind of like this is a Final Fantasy game, huh?" "Wow, you really hate walls, don't you?" "Oh, you have no idea." "I don't even know which part is my voice or Reeve's anymore. It's meta, right?" "When a Cait falls in the temple and nobody is around to see it, did it really happen?" "Ah, we can dance if we want to, we can leave our friends behind...." "And I'm also a bit crushed. But that's probably just my clairvoyance kicking in again." "Am I being demanding right now?" "And all I ask is; please don't screw up my sacrifice. Well, bye." "Jaysus, I'm glad we're not in there right now." "Boy, it still doesn't make any sense that this whole building was the black materia." "Maybe it's just me, but I'm pretty sure that the underground area we traversed was a lot bigger than this hole." "It's here to symbolize the depth of our adventures and sacrifices." "Just say it doesn't make any sense and leave it at that. We just shrank a building after fighting one of its walls. I think we can safely say that sense left the building long, long before we did." "So... we had to go to this temple, shrink the building at the cost of one life, and now we have to take it to a land not everyone can go into unless they have a harp that you have to dig out of a landfill." "Well... yes?" "OK, I just wanted to make that clear." "I think that's abusing the definition of the word 'clear' just a little bit." "But when you had your giant meltdown, you said you were an ancient and accused us of betraying them." "Yes, well, I wasn't quite myself at the time." "I'll say." "Well, most people don't start off their soul searching by dropping a meteor on the planet." "Yes, but I'm not most people. I'm special." "Knowledge? Maybe. Wisdom? Ha ha ha no." "People with wisdom don't come to the conclusion that the planet needs a meteor crashing into it. You're just making a big splash so you can reap all the benefits of other people's suffering. You're like Shinra times ten." "Ugh! All the pinkness. I'm beside myself. Ack! I have darkness in my hands." "Cloud! Step away from Sephiroth. His pretentious stupidity is very contagious, it seems." "People.. just don't... understand my brilliance. I must... make them all pay." "Oh dear lord." "Aeris, please grab him and pull him away from Sephiroth right away." "And why do you always say 'be strong' when something bad is about to happen? Why was I beside myself? WHYYYYY?!" "Cloud, that's not 'being strong'. Stop it!" "OK." "I'm not the Cait Sith that got crushed to... well, sorta-death just now." "Well, I hope Sephiroth chokes on the fluff inside the materia. How's Cloud doing?" "Erm... I'm not sure, to be honest." "It's all... just...." "Shock! Betrayal! Mind control! Sephiroth got his hands on the black materia after all, because if not, this story would have a bit of a short and anticlimactic end. But all is not right in the state of mind that is Cloud." "Wait, I take that back. If my sudden screwup is a dream, please do wake me up right now. I don't want this to have happened." "Well, if that's how you feel, boy, do I have some bad news for you." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Dec 31, 2019 6:45:16 GMT -5
Chapter 18: The Stab That Shook The World. "Whaddya mean 'don't worry about it'?! You're back at that weird glowy forest we left behind some short while ago." "Yes, but I'm going to go save the world." "And you separated yourself from the main group. Do you even realize what an ill omen that is?" "Eh, it'll be fine. But if it concerns you that much...." "Stop talking like that! If you don't want me to have a breakdown, don't leave without saying a word! Who taught you public relations, lady? Shinra?" "Well... yes, mostly." "....touché." "Well, I'm going to prove you wrong, just you wait." "But you are not special. How could people like you ever accomplish anything?!" "I have no idea. I'm not even sure how it makes any sense that a sleeping forest can keep us from going in a straight line, and only when waking it up with a harp can we walk through it." "That's how the special ones work. We don't have to make sense, because you all will love us anyway." "Grr, curses! Foiled again." "DEATH FLAG! That is definitely a definite death flag. Definitely." "Nah, it'll be fine. Stop being a worrier and start being a warrior." "But I'm a SOLDIER!" "You better soldier on, then." "Urgh! You just had to." "We, you say? Who is this 'we'?" "Oh, you'll see, little man. And it's not going to be much fun for you." "You're enjoying the numerous death flags, aren't you?" "Guilty as charged." "Yeah, I know. I... talked with her in a dream. Well... nightmare." "Uh...." "And you call me a weirdo." "You are. And I'm giving dreams a free pass, because they can get plenty weird." "That's what she said, anyway. And she told me not to worry, then told me to worry, then told me that she had to do this alone, then told me how to get through the forest." "She's... giving off some mixed signals, isn't she?" "Yes, I'm... still digesting." "Just... because I don't necessarily like blowing up stuff...." "But you passed on the black stone that a fuzzy mascot gave its life for. Do you feel no shame?" "I might have, but you had to turn that weird, didn't you?" "Desire to do something reduced." "H-hey, that was supposed to be my moment of cool." "You're a dad. You can never be cool again." "Urgh! Curse you, laws of the universe." "Ah, yes, verbal abuse. It always works." "Yes, it does. Did me a world of good, let me tell ya." "Well, it sure explains a lot. Like how you turn to explosions for your therapy." "Well, for starters, how about you come with us to the Ancient lands?" "And if Sephiroth takes control of me again?" "We'll cheer on you." "Uh....." "Can you please stop talking like that around me, you jerks?!" "Yes, let us all believe in Him." "He shall show us the way." "This... this is not helping." "I mean... X marks the spot, and now I have it in a bottle. Be afraid. Be very afraid." "Are you the chicken man? The Boc Boc Man?!" "So, we're really doing this, huh?" "Booooc boc boc boc." "You have no idea how silly you look when doing the chicken arm movement with your gun hand." "Is that a trick question?" "Only if you want it to be." "This is just payback from that moment after you woke up, isn't it?" "Only the wind knows." "Well, he's back to normal, and that's good enough for me." "I'd question your version of 'normal', but we don't have time." "Well, I guess we're leaving the exploded-out little village, then?" "The town next to the blown-up generator. At least it's near water?" "Yeah, I'm rather surprised they didn't build it up in the Hostile Mountains." "Yeah, they don't call them 'peaks' like normal mountains, but 'gore spikes'." "They looked like Madonna's bra closet. And boy, was it funny to see you use the word 'peaks'." "Are you trying to cover up for Aeris now?" "....maybe." "That's my job. I think." "And to our left we see the most depressing place in the world." "I can't believe I lived there." "Big city lights can be blinding, but you can see where they dug out the lights." "Man, that was deep and almost certainly not pretentious, dude." "Oh, shaddup! If they'd only use coal like the rest of the world were until Shinra came around." "That's... not exactly putting a positive spin on things. I mean... yeah, digging Mako energy up from the ground clearly has a bad effect on the surroundings, but if they'd all been getting their energy from coal, we wouldn't even see the city, I bet." "And we return to Ribcage City, right at the edge of the sleeping forest." "It's not sleeping, it's gotta be dead." "Or very heavily anorexic." "That's no joking matter, chief." "They're not fans of the ribbing?" "Good thing Sephiroth didn't think of having it dug up. I mean... that would make it impossible for us to enter, and nobody could ever foil his plans." "He's probably just really poor at asking for help, and that's why he hasn't been able to do it." "That makes sense, and also makes me very sad." "Probably also the reason why he's more into controlling people than reaching out. He just needs some love." "Well, I can't argue against that, cheesy as it is. I mean... we all remember who his father is, right?" "Press square to make sense." "Press square to hug." "Every game should have a dedicated hug button." "Especially Spec Op's: The Line." "Oh good Lord, yes!" "Science." "Fun and educational. You wouldn't think we are on our way to tragedy." "Nope." "Got it. And when we meet Aeris, you better believe I'm going to harp on and on about her little disappearing act. She'll never hear the end of it if I have anything to say about it. And I will have. Lots and lots and lots." "Yeah, sure. Tell us all about it later. We got a city to reach." "Um... yes and no. Hopefully in that order." "Next, on 'psychic hotline'...." "So, it'll start growing again? How does a tree sleep anyway?" "If a tree snores in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, is it really alive?" "Um... can I use a lifeline?" "....yes. Yes, you can. God knows you can use all the help you can get." "How mean." "I can see the light at the end of this forest." "Make sure it's not the train. Look down; if the tracks are there, step to the side. Quickly!" "That's advice that saves lives." "We have received a water ring. The dreaded dehydration monster is powerless against us." "I hope taking this ring won't have any adverse effects on this place." "Given what it looks like now, I can't see how." "We're fighting what?!" "Malldancers, it seems." "Sounds like an exciting job." "Well, we would have had to fight them if not for this Hungry here, who just sauntered in and ate the hell out of them all, mid-dance step." "I feel like this is a bad comedy act in more ways than one." "But look how happy that thing is." "And probably still hungry too." "Well, I think I can share a knuckle sandwich or two." "Through the teeth and past the gums, look out... whatever the hell this place is supposed to be." "It would have been 'through the teeth' if that thing actually had any. It didn't, and now I'm disappointed." "....yes, of course this would be a weird city on top of whatever that thing was. We coulda gotten here easily if we had... you know, an airship." "And this road is all forked up too. We have to decide and stuff." "The ancients have a very... avant garde style when it comes to housing." "Darling it's better down where it's wetter?" "Put me in a bowl and serve me, if this isn't the prettiest little place I have seen..." "Well, this place is spiraling out of control." "There's a fish at the bottom and a comet materia at the top of this spiral. You can say what you want about the ancients, but they sure know how to throw wicked parties." "Hmm, yeah, the sea motif is rather absurd. Did the ancients prefer to live in dried-out lakes, or did they learn the secret of breathing underwater?" "And did this chest guard the source of... guard?" "But who guards the guarderer? Guardception!" "On the contrary, I do believe there's more than one bed here." "Well, excuuuuuuse me, Sherlock. Maybe you would like the one that's 'just right', too?" "I would like the one with the fluffiest pillows." "....." "Um...." "Yeah, no, I'm not walking into that one. It's almost like you're setting us up here." "Erm... that was... by accident. Really." "Well, I did say he went on and on about her being a nuisance, right? You know, in that weirdass dream I had?" "Yeah, but... dream. You know...." "Wow. 'Are you sick?' That's harsh, kitty." "Well, he's 'feeling it', whatever that means." "Look, I got experimented on, OK?" "And I just found the softest bed too. Sephiroth is going to pay for this." "That fiend. He just doesn't realize how difficult it is to find a dry, soft bed in this dried-out wasteland of a once underwater city. People who think everything is better where it's whetter clearly haven't rested on a nice down pillow." "I love this main hall. It's all 'You took the wrong way in here, and now you have to walk the long way around mouhahahahaha!' " "Eh, I could make the jump." "Yeah, well, you got a leg up on all of us. Or two legs." "I can't help it if I'm not leg-impaired." "But we all have legs that come in pairs." "I've been disarmed in the past, though." "And didn't you choose the most literally direct way of correcting that or what?" "Yes, there. The place where we just were. And the middle road didn't work. One should think that going either left or right would, though, but nope." "When I take over, I'm going to demand straighter roads." "Yes." "......" "Wait, what?!" "Hey, anything 'not Shinra' is fine with me." "How far we have fallen." "Interesting choice of words." "Two seahorses with their backs turned? Perfect opportunity to whip out the big gun." "Uh...." "I think a dolphin punch would be more appropriate, but let's see this." "Did... did a black hole just fart out a giant dragon?" "This is just getting better by the second." "Seconds is probably also the perfect description of how long this is going to last." "Bahamut and his spirit bomb attack." "Brace for impact." "Well, that was needlessly brutal, but at least we seem to have found our route." "Gotta be brutal to be efficient." "Not necessarily, but this is hardly the time to start an argument." "Speak to me, magical clam." "Magical clam, Magical Clam, turn turn turn. Tell us the lesson that we should learn." "And the answer is... 'Aurora armlet'." "Not sure what I should take from that, but OK." "Oh! The magical fish is gone and now there's a stairway here instead." "But of course. We should have realized this right away." "Hold tight, because things are about to get cramped." "Uh... or not." "Don't look down!" "Sheesh, I don't know why rabbit holes get all the attention when it comes to hidden depths. Clearly, nobody has heard of the holographic fish pool." "Aeris, we finally found you... at the bottom of this... whatever the hell it is." "....." "Hey, Aeris. Hey! Hey! Hey! Aeris, hey!" "Quiet! I'm trying to concentrate here." "Well, then, you're going to love this." "Uh.... Cloud?" "I'm sorry. Am I breaking your concentration?" "Yes, and how." "I don't see how, Aeris. You've seen me do this before." "Ugh, is that how you planned on 'stopping' me? I was imagining a more hands-on approach here, you assholes." "No, no. We believe in you, Cloud." "You can do it." "Uuurgh! I don't believe this." "Me neither, to be honest." *sigh* "Once again, if you want something done, you have to do it yourself. I guess it's time I dropped by and took a stab at it." "....please don't tell me..." "Don't look down, chaps!" "No, no, no, no. This is not how this is going to end." "There we go. Drop and stabbing completed." *cough* "It's... the death by pun that... *cough* ...that stings the most." "Urgh! Just... look at that smugness." "I've never wanted anyone as dead as I do right now." "Maybe we should reconsider our 'standing around doing nothing' stance here? And.... you know, attack Sephiroth?" "If it ain't broken..." "SHE IS BROKEN!" "I mean... I've killed plenty of people, but this wasn't supposed to happen." "Oh yeah, who's your daddy?! I did it, mother. I killed a main character, and no amount of phoenix down can save this situation." "Do not worry, says the guy who wants to ram a meteor into the planet." "Well, you are all traitors and deserve it. But don't worry, you'll all be a part of the Planet's energy." "I swear... even if I do get absorbed into the lifestream, I'm still going to punch you in the balls when you try to absorb me. And stop standing around like you're some kind of rock star, because you're not!" "You're just jelly at my superior intellect." "You keep moving your mouthflaps, but it doesn't mean a thing. So shut your mouthflaps." "My mouthflaps are better than your mouthflaps. You don't get to tell me what to do." "No, you!" "No, YOU!" "No, you you you you you!" "No, you times infinity!" "No, you times infinity plus one!" "We're screwed, aren't we?" "....yes. Yes, we are." "I dunno... laugh? Cry? Get bombed?" "I WASN'T LOOKING FOR ADVICE!" "Of course you are. Because I said so." "And just as you think you couldn't possibly hate any more...." "I can make improvements to anyone." "RRRRRRRGH!" "This searing, agonizing feeling of wanting to strangle someone." "Well, I was trying to make you do that, but your stupid friends just had to interrupt, didn't they?" "Can't... contain... hatred. Must... must explode... violently." "I long for death." "But you haven't entertained me enough yet." "Preferably yours." "And for the love of God, SHUT! UP! I never asked anyone to see how far my anger can take me." "In fact, you can just stop acting like any of this is my fault, because clearly you all need help looking after yourselves." "I'm starting to envy Aeris for being dead!" "I'm actually kind of glad you didn't finish that sentence. Because hoo boy." "It's over. Finally." "You can never underestimate psychological warfare. Or trolls." "Or trolls doing psychological warfare." "If only Sephiroth's endless blathering was as easy to deal with as the fleshy chunks of his mom." "....." "Just saying that makes me feel irritated again." "Yes, it would have to end on that note, wouldn't it? And I'd love to just dismiss it as BS, but Sephiroth has controlled me like a puppet, and... just... hrglbh!" "You're more like... a puppy. A cute, adorable puppy. Yes yes." "That... doesn't make me feel any better." "OK, I've stopped being angry. Now I'm just sad." "So... what do we do now?" "Trust Sephiroth to put us in this awkward situation. I'm sad and I have no idea what to do." "We should bury her." "Did we bring any shovels?" "I don't think so. And most of the areas here are made of stone or shells anyway." "Yeah, sure, just leave and... uh, leave... all the heavy lifting to me." "You should be glad Aeris is dead, or she'd wallop you a big one for calling her heavy." "Oh, and what would she do about it? Limit break heal me to death?" "Interesting choice of words. And why are you walking into the water?" "Well, we gotta create our immortal memories somehow." "Or play 'will it float?', maybe?" "I... plead the fifth." "Farewell, mysterious flower girl who made me feel many, many things... that Sephiroth tried drowning out with his meteor-impact-level trolling." "Sink deep, deep into the waist-deep lake." "Aeris's final resting place, Lake Plot Hole." "Alas, who would think that we would have a main character for whom Phoenix Down wouldn't work anymore. But no, she's gone, and you won't get her back. Certainly, this is a moment that people remember, and I'm totally not bitter because this is a happening that has been used in games before Final Fantasy VII. But enough about that; how are our heroes handling all this?" "No idea. I already know all of this." "I wanted to be like... like my hero... my... hero...." *sob* "Oh, Cloud." "I wanted to be... I wanted... I want... to shove my big, bastard sword down his gullet." "Therapy isn't always playing nice." "Oh, you don't know the half of it. Literally." "Um... OK?" "KILL HIM! CUT HIM! CRUSH HIM! BITE HIM IN THE ASS!" "Sure, but I'm not doing that last thing." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Jan 5, 2020 12:46:57 GMT -5
Chapter 19: That's My Kind of Boarding School. "The part that makes me think SALTZA sounds like a good idea. The part that...." "I understand, Cloud." "The part that tells me using swords bigger than myself is a good idea. The part that...." "I get it." "The part that can't stop with the hair gel. The part that...." "Cloud, stop!" "So... you're giving us many understandable reasons why you shouldn't go... before telling us that you're going to go." "Yes." "OK, I just wanted to establish that." "You don't need to go, Cloud. But you totally should." "Yes, let's all hop on the contradiction train." "I didn't finish the sentence." "You didn't have to. You were going to ask us to jam your giant sword up your butthole if you went crazy again, didn't you?" "Yikes! Uh, yes and no. Yes on the 'if I started acting crazy again', but no on the sword." "You wanted us to shove a hedgehog up your bum?" "Ew, no. Also, why would you be that mean to a hedgehog?" "You want us to put our foot up your ass?" "NO! What is it with you and shoving stuff up my butt?" "I plead the fifth." "I blame Hojo." "Well, I'm entertained." "One wanted to see me in a dress, and one wanted to shove stuff up my bum. So... what's your boggle?" "I... plead the fifth." "Suddenly, having an underage, materia-filching future wife doesn't seem so bad." "So, let's roll before my sentences fall even more to pieces." "10-4." "That's a lotta pieces." "Cloud, we've barely taken our first steps, and you're already started taking mental GPS suggestions from Mr. Selfielots." "I can't... resist the... blue text." "Zo, who wantz zhe viper?" "It's a halberd. That's a grandpa weapon right there." "Well, I'd be the first to crow about the awesomeness of polearms, but you do know that polearms in general made it easier for women to choose the path of the warrior, right?" "I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you from how lefty and righty were laughing at you." "Jeez, Tifa, did Aeris bite you in the ass at some point? You seem to have caught her severe case of 'random assholiosis' somehow." "Oh, it's the nut-throwing squirrels." "Well, I know what I'll be punching." "Up their butts?" "There are times where I feel like we should have taken the elevator instead of taking the stairs. Yes, we'd have to fight more, but I bet we could still have saved some time." "Um...." "This house has seen better days." "This must be the slums of the ancient lands." "Wonder what the train station looks like. Maybe like that weird yo-yo station where we saw the little bird nest?" "You know, when I started this journey, I never expected having to do the Van Damme method of climbing, and with y'all on my back too. I though at least you could do your own climbing, Tifa. And Red could probably easily make the jumps whenever he felt like it." "I am not standing spreadeagle like that while wearing a skirt, thank you very much!" "Sure, I could, but this is much more fun." "Well, I'ma use this crown to hypnotize you all to drag your own asses up these cracks." "I'ma drag your underpants up your crack if you don't stop complaining." "Yyyyeah, definitely 'random assholiosis' talking there." "Do we already have one of these?" "Maybe? Should I look back through our history together to check?" "Yes. Would you?" "And now it's an ass-off." "Well, who's got the most to lose?" "........" "What? Why are you looking at me like that?" "What the heck is that?!" "Some salty chocolate balls?" "........" "Whaaaat?!" "I don't ever want to hear you utter the word 'salty chocolate balls' ever again!" ".....uh, oops. My balls...BAD! My bad!" "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" "Erm... I plead the fifth?" "Do you even know what that means?" "Nah! I just heard you guys use it as a 'get out of jail free' card." "Touché, I guess." "Oh, this conch is occupied." "And the resident is angry." "Let's just slowly back away, because I'm not really into what this guy is offering." "Uh...." "I know we just reached the cold region, but do we really have to kill that adorable bunny?" "Nah, we can run away." "......well, I know where I'm going to shove that carrot." "And we're back to the butts again." "So... who's up for walking on the edge?" "To be honest, I'm up for standing in front of a fire for an hour or two." "I know I got a nice coat of fur and all, but yes, this is a bit much." "Smack? He must've had quite the dream." "It's medicinal smack. That makes all the difference." "He's also glad we came." "Clearly, we can get a lot of mileage out of this place." "Yes, clearly it's much better to just keep him locked up inside his room. That way he'll be safe forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and-" "Yes, we get the point." "Oh, what's this? Well... beyond being a map, I mean." "It's a MA-..oh, you spoilsport." "We're going places, so maybe we should get ourselves a copy of this?" "Do you think the people in this town would have any issues with us picking it straight off the wall, though?" "Uh... I guess not." "Yes, we are the STRONG ones." "The STRONGness is inside all of us." "My arm is STRONG!" "......" "WHAT?!" "Are you doing this on purpose? You are SO doing this on purpose." "Not this time!" "....." "Erm... I mean... not at all." "......" "Well, he couldn't possibly have known." "Do these people not know that they have kind of an open cave leading straight to the ancient lands nearby? Yeah, you have to do the spreadeagle to get there, but it can be done." "....say all the people who rode on my back." "I was about to say something about backwater towns, but Shinra has actually been very good at keeping all of this under wraps. I mean... I worked for them for so long, and I didn't know any of this." "Grandpa knew, I think." "Well, he has all of the universe in his loft room." "Yeah, what an idiot, wanting to warm up with a nice bath in this frozen hellhole." "You anti-hotspring philistine!" "OK, so... we are in the home of Dr. Gast? I wonder if he takes his security seriously." "If we're just able to enter like this, I'd say no." "And why does he have a section called 'don't watch'?" "That's gotta be some creepypasta, just you wait." "You're going to watch it, aren't you?" "But of course." "Wow, she looks a lot like Aeris, doesn't she?" "Yeah, except older." "And sexier." "......." "What?!" "Well... actually, I kind of agree." "I'm not sure I understand human standards of sexiness." "It's just... I dunno, she looks like an actual adult, and Aeris never really caught on to the fact that the allure of an adult isn't all about boob size or butt size or whatever." "Oh, sure, give me crap over my comment, but then go and agree with me." "But more importantly, why would a place be named in a way that makes it sound like it's called 'Know Less Pole'?" "Sounds like a strip club." "......" "What?!" "Yeah, that's Aeris's mom, alright." "Were they all high on Michael Jackson's 'Heal the World'?" "'Talking With The Planet' sounds like it'd be an interesting TV show, though. Or a really weird one." "Or a really boring one. Jeez, you kids today...." "A conversation with a planet sounds like a pretty one-sided affair, though." "Talk to the hand, 'cause the planet ain't listening." "Ifalna, planet whisperer." "And now I have a mental image of Aeris and her family dressed up as farmers and using farming equipment on the planet energy streams... however that would look like." "The planet spoke back." "And it said 'We don't take kindly to your kind around here'." "....well, that turned sinister real quick." "Did it also spin its head a full 360 and vomit on you?" ".....uh.." "They all got... THE VIRUS!" "The ancient tribe was hit by a disease... or a computer virus infestation." "Maybe they were more high-tech than we expected, and didn't want to share, because... well, look at Shinra." "What is a weapon? Well, it's very self-explanatory, isn't it?" "But what is weapon?" "It would be kind of interesting if this WEAPON is made not to kill anyone or anything, but that's not the case, is it?" "And Jenova is Sephiroth's mother. Well... to an extent. Oh dear lord, his attitude makes so much sense now." "I'm actually rather surprised he was so nice to begin with." "Well, that was before... THE LIBRARY! I call it 'the Library Incident'." "See? Reading is hazardous." "Uh.... no. No, it isn't." "That's encouraging, at least." "Although it's kind of sinister that we're hearing about this now." "The planet isn't wielding, but it's still packing." "THE PLANET IS WATCHING!" "That is the best argument for enviromentalism I've ever heard. Or the worst one." "I think Midgar is the best argument for enviromentalism, except Shinra kind of wore everyone down so much that they didn't have the will and the energy to do something about it." "Yes, that is quite enough for one day." "Pfft, you kids today. I could listen to all of this and still come back for more." "That's only because your skin is made of treated leather." "Daughter's record. Well... I guess we'll get to see Aeris again." "......" "I am very sorry for saying that." "You should be. She was an asshole just about all the time, but I miss her already." "He's doing what?" "Recording a sleeping baby. All the better to guilt-trip them later when they're being difficult, I guess." "Here, Aeris. This is what good babies sound like." "And that's the least creepy alternative." "Now with video." "Babies are cute, right?" "Only if they're yours. Or mine, because kittens." "Is that why you didn't want to mate with Tifa?" "I don't think this world is ready for catgirls yet." "Wow. Ifalna says Aeris is different from other children, but Hojo kept calling her inferior." "You'd almost think that Hojo's standards are full of crap or something. And yes, I feel weird trying to make the girl who complained about me showing off all the time sound good." "Wow, I never thought I'd ever be glad for an interruption." "Yeah, I wouldn't want to delve into their own private porn collection." "......" "Waaaait a second." "Oh dear lord, he's airquoting 'private time'. And he was gonna film it. How could any interruption make this situation any worse?" "......" "And you got the answer to your question. Are you happy now?" "No! No, I'm not!" "Gast, he brought soldiers. You know he's not going to take no for an answer, even if he's hoping." "Dr. Hojo and Sample Girl. That's a comic I... would not read." "Yes, I would trust anyone who calls someone else a sample with the future of the planet. Wouldn't you?" "No!" "I totally don't care, man." "Of course." "Ah, Dr. Hojo is just a patent thief. Figures." "I guess he's just a pioneer when it comes to private porn collections." "I'm so glad we all got away. Uh... technically." "Yeah, but we kind of have to go into the cold wastelands to find the sacred hotspring." "And we love trouble. In fact, make it double." "THROW ALL THE BALLS!" "......" "Sorry. Our infohunting session did things to me. Terrible, terrible things." "Don't worry, man. I hear ya. Anything with Hojo in it is certain to leave marks." "Do you need a few minutes to catch yourself?" "I DON'T NEED YOUR PITY!" "No, seriously. We don't hate you guys or anything. It's just... I don't even know why we fight." "Yeah. If not for Rufus being a bit of a problem, I would've been more than happy to work with you guys." "STOP BEING NICE!" "Um... why?" "Well, because... um... see, you can't... er.... STOP ASKING DIFFICULT QUESTIONS!" "Because we're Shinra. We can't be nice to ex-Shinra people. That would go against company policy." "Oh, right." "Isn't dealing with Sephiroth more important right now, though?" "I guess?" "But they aren't Shinra." "STOP CONFUSING ME!" "Sorry." "Wasn't me." "Me neither." "Ne meither." "I was busy serving GODDAMNED TEA!" "I don't go after people who don't have materia." "I was in a coffin." "He was covered in sword slices, wasn't he? Does it look like I wield swords?" "Hey!" "Look, I know we entered the place right before you probably found him all sliced up, but really... we didn't do it." "Um..." "Are you sure that's OK?" "Yes, I believe I've made my point." "Did that kid honestly think that his leg would never heal?" "Well, we should give the kid his board back after we are done using it." "Yes, that would be the right thing to do." "Because we are good people and not thieves." "This is gonna be so rad!" "This is so not rad!" "Oh, shaddup!" "What's up with the balloons?" "Maybe they're rad indicators and I have to catch as many of them as I can to maximize my rad rating." "Or what? They will drop the nuke?" "Not that kind of rad." "WHEN CHRISTMAS ATTACKS!" "Can we not pass through this wall of trees?" "Not at 70 km/h. And certainly not at ZERO ANYTHING PER ANY TIME DENOMINATION!" "Well, would a foot in your ass help you get moving?" "It might. Especially yours." "...are you trying to out-creep Hojo?" "Maybe?" "Well, you're doomed to fail, but... nice try." "Love you too." "Is it weird that I'm actually enjoying this, despite the fact that I never expected this to be a part of our journey?" "Nope. I'm enjoying this too." "Well, now I'm imagining you surfing down on this snowboard too, and it is the most adorable thing I have ever imagined." "And through we surf down the valley of choices, I ask: do we take the left turn or the right turn." "Are we getting political now?" "Uh... no. If we don't make a decision very soon, I'll be split down the middle. Very, very literally." "Uh... and now we're in a cave lit by lots of torches. Good lord, the people in the town up there are really spoiling their kids." "They must be really upset now that the kid twisted his ankle and can't play in this ridiculously elaborate snowboard track with a branching course and visual themes. Who has that much time on their hands?" "OH MY GOOOoooo....*" "As our heroes are launched into the white unknown, one question fills everyone's heads." "Yes, I'm alright... mostly. But wow, these people must really hate their kids." "I'm never riding on your back again." "If that's a promise, at least something good came out of this." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Jan 19, 2020 9:07:05 GMT -5
Chapter 20: Hobbit go down da hooooole. "Not that big of a jump? Really?" "Well... yes?" "Not? That? Big?" "Yes!" "Well, let's just reminiscence a bit. Like... just back to the few minutes before we were lying unconscious after our landing." "I CAN'T SEE MY HOUSE FROM HERE!" "Cloud, you don't have a house." "Or the ground it's standing on." "Or a lawn outside to tell the kids to get off." "Bottom line is... we got no bottom line. Or a ground to put it on." "OK, fine. It was a big jump. Happy now?" "Not really." "Well, anyway, let's not stand around here, because it's cold. Also, let's look at the map." "What? While walking?" "Are you mad? We'll walk off a cliff or something, and then we'll fall to our deaths." "Sometimes, I wonder if Cloud's short-term memory is... non-existant." "We're fighting frozen nails." "You can tell me that again. I knew I should have brought some gloves or something, because they're about to jump straight off my fingers." "No, I mean... never mind." "We've met some oddly named enemies up to this point, haven't we?" "Tell me about it. I wonder if this is a problem all potential heroes have to deal with." "You are about to face... The Great Hair Follicle!" "BUT DO THEY?!" "We are fighting Nayls." "Tell me about it. I don't know why you expect me to keep mine long, because I use claws when fighting, and they kind of get in the way, even if they don't break easily." "But womens are prettier with long naaaaails." *sigh* "I need to find a good reason for Wren to give the next generation a chance, because this one is a bust." "Huh huh, you said 'bust'." "But first, I need to convince myself." "Anyway, shall we fight these snails now?" "I shall use my nayls." "Well... back to Hoth. Er... I mean... this place." "The heck kind of board game setup is this?" "I smell a puzzle, Professor Layton." "But more than anything, I think it would be a spectacularly bad idea to jump on any of these floating ice bits." "We're... going to jump on these floating ice pieces, aren't we?" "Yep." "Well, we did the ridiculous thing -- and by the way, do NOT do this at home. Or outside. Or... well, ever -- and we got a 'Safety Bit'." "I feel like I'm having the crap kicked out of me by irony." "So... what is that safety bit? A piece of paper saying 'STOP DOING THIS, YOU STUPID, STUPID PERSON!'?" "And on the bottom of the lake upon which these ice pieces float, there is also a note saying 'See? Told you!'" "Well... I guess we have to jump back too, since that place was an island." "At least we know where we are." "Anyway, we just need to do this again. Should go well, right? Right?!" "...oh, bugger!" "Don't you mean I collapsed on a tiny floating piece of ice and snow on a frozen lake?" "Yeah. Honestly, I considered just leaving you there, because what kind of idiot jumps on tiny pieces of ice on near-frozen water?" "I dunno. I felt like I had to, or I would be missing out." "I swear.... if I ever find out who put that Safety Bit in that cave on that island, I'm going to superglue them to a snowboard and throw them off a mountain." *cough* "Oh, that sounds exciting. I wonder how hard we have to work and search to find this impact zone." "Oh..." "Well... that got dark in a heartbeat." "And we say that despite seeing the brutal aftermath of a Sephiroth rampage, or the story of Dyne and his endless hatred. Or the fact that we're going to have to rely on coal again for our energy needs if we win all of this." "We're screwed either way, aren't we?" "Heck if I know. That's why I moved to this frozen hellhole." "When did this turn into a survival game of a rather literal kind?" "Well, I'm looking forward to it. I'm tired of killing stuff." "What?! Seriously?" "Nah, just kidding." *whew* "I was getting worried there for a second." "Well... allow me to take up that worrywart torch in your place, then." "You just don't want to explain that one more time." "Not when someone is being thick on purpose just to troll, no." "No, I mean 'What? You've been thinking'?" "Oh, shaddup!" "Barret, you've never really been a thinker. That's why you usually solve your problems by blowing them up. And if you can't do that, you ignore it." "Yeah, dat's what happens when you take my coal away from me." "Look, we already established that you're not a thinker. And I'm not saying I am either, but jeez...." "There ain't no stoppin' that train he's on. Even if there are no tracks." "Why are you even working with him, then?" "His daughter is adorable." "I... OK, point taken." "Interesting point, Cid. If we had an airship, we coulda done this easily. Maybe it's hard to see from the air?" "Cait, how is 'Rufus is looking into this' some kind of huge secret, when you know we've heard him gabbing about it? Endlessly. Even his father was all about finding the ancient lands to strip it for all their valuables." "Barret, you're... just repeating stuff you read online, aren't you?" "....maybe." "Well, it will notice if we're leeching out all its energy. Or if we go back to coal, what with how many of us currently exist. Also, you're an adult. Adults will never be cool." "I think I know why Cid is so cranky. He has to deal with kids like you." "HEY! You shaddup." "My daughter is going to be so much fun to deal with in another six to eight years." "Don't ya worry none, Barret my lad. I know how to treat women." "No, you don't!" "What's going on? Who else's got woman troubles?" "Urgh, please don't complicate matters here, Vin. I still don't even know what to think of Lucrecia." "So, uh... do we need a tent?" "We have several, and I'd rather we use one of those than this torn, frozen thing that I wouldn't even wipe my butt with." "You wipe your butts with tents?" "What?! No, I... how did we get to that?" "I dunno. You jumped on that train of thought all on your own." "Well, there ain't no getting offa this train, huh?" "Oh, shaddup!" "So, what are we fighting here, me with my giant fishing knife... thing?" "Darn it all. This enemy has a natural defense to my power of 'punch' or 'kick'." "What? A giant gut?" "And fur." "What the... why is everyone and everything in this place picking a fight with us?" "Filthy hot spring? That's it. Nobody insults hot springs in my presence." "Yes, that is the exact priority we've been looking for." "Not that I'm hugely into them -- my coat of fur doesn't like dipping into water and then moving around in freezing temperatures -- but didn't we come here for that exact purpose?" "...yes! Sephiroth can wait. We've got more important things to worry about." "Like this fight, I guess." "Eat my hot fists, hotspring hater." "Priorities are good." "Alexander? 'Why this' indeed." "The materia that conquers your materia slots." "You don't link this materia to Alexander. You make a piece of materia its conquest and servant." Oh, I remember this one, except it wasn't named after an eldritch horror." "But less of an eldritch horror. Eldritch horror light." "It looks rather pleased with itself too." "Yeah, it's all 'Welcome, Mr. Bond'. While stroking his white cat." *sigh* "What am I doing with my life? Wandering around the frozen wasteland. Fighting weirdly named weird enemies. Collapsing from the cold. Waking up on a giant fur skin. Yep, this is the life." "I sort of imagined Sephiroth suddenly lying here too, and we'd be all 'So, you haven't gotten to your destination yet either, huh?' And he'd be all 'Nope'. And then we'd stab him to death for what he did." "Gotta mind our manners, huh?" "Manners are important." "Wait, so... is it 36 degrees here, or are we down to 36 degrees? THIS IS IMPORTANT!" "Given how goddamned freezing it is outside, I doubt this is the outside temperature indicator." "We are seriously not dressed for this." "And inside this cave of... how the hell is this made?" "Solid block of ice? Blowtorch?" "We have fire magic. Since when did we need blowtorches?" "Well, we don't always need things to explode." "Say that to Barret." "I would, if he was here." "There are boulders inside this weirdly soft and smooth cave." "I shoulda brought my ice skates." "So you could have some fun with this?" "No, so that I could control my movements better WHOAAAAA!" "Um... oops." "Our careless bumbling has opened up a path." "Let us carefully make our way down there -- without falling and being unable to get up -- and see where we can go from here." "Head. Bomber! And it's a head. Shaped like a bomb." "So it's a headcrab with a difference?" "Yes, it's... a bit more brainsplattery." "I'm sorry, I can't hear you two over the toxic barf that the Zolokalter is barfing in our general direction. And given its bombastic ass-shaking while barfing, 'general direction' is more of an 'informal suggestion' with 'no hard feelings' if it chooses not to aim more properly. Either way, Toxic Barf!!!" "I have a rrrribbon." "You can wrrrrap it in a rrrribbon, you can ssssstick it in a ssssock!" "Just don't take it out in public, or they'll put you in the dock." "And you won't! Come! Back!" "You're talking about your penis, aren't you?" "Ssssssh!" "Well, we're left out in the cold again." "As opposed to INSIDE in the cold?" "At least we're still at 36 degrees." "And now: Marble Madness... on acid." "What'choo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Marble Madness was already on acid." "Oh?!" "Oh?" "Ball." "Ball?" "Ball." "Ball ball ball, ball?" "Ball ballballballballball. Ball!" "Ball?" "BALL!" "BALL BALL BALL BALL BALL BALL BALL BALL BALL!" "Oh." "And just as you thought you'd meet the origin of the toxic barf..." "Wasn't the Malboro... Marlboro? Anyway, Malboro.... wait, maybe that's why we get frozen beam instead. It's not a Marlboro, but a Malboro. That makes all the difference." "Spelling and punctuation can mean the difference between life and death." "Or toxic barf versus frozen beam." "FROZEN BEEEEAAAAAM!" "Cuahl. CUAHL?!" "What's next? Molbara? Cocomo?" "They're just lying there. Do we really have to kill them?" "Nah." "Oh." "Well, that was anticlimactic." "Oof, I feel like we're going to be slimed any second now." "I'm all for green energy, but...." "...it comes with two heads." "But which head gets to taste my Blood Fang!" "That sounds more like a gang name than a special attack name." "Well, this thing gets the Bahamut." "And it survived Bahamut. That's just unfair." "I bet they took stack damage with both heads." "But Bahamut doesn't do stack damage, unless you count 'this is stacked against you, sucka!' as 'stack damage'." "Oh, fine! I'll just apply the finishing touch, then." "So, what are you touching when you finish." "........" "That sounded less dirty in my head." "Uh... OK." "Ball!" "Oh, shaddup!" "Ok, the finishing touch starts with a gathering of winds underneath the enemy...." "Yes?" "And then they die." "......" "D'OH!" "Anticlimactic, huh?" "YES!" "Oh, hey, the temperature's off, even though we're outside. You know what that means, right?" "We're at the edge of mysteriousness." "Um... I didn't finish touch Mr. Two Heads that hard." "That's what he said." "...yes." "What the... how is nobody noticing this?! This is indeed a goddamned crater." "It's so cold here that the explosion froze instantly." "Man, that's cold." "No wonder Sephiroth likes this place so much." "Did you two bring a camera? Why are you narrating stuff we all already know?" "I can hear the voice of the planet." "The energy must flow." "....OK, fun's over, boys. We got work to do." "Well... relatively speaking. Again: Christ, this is a huge crater. How far north of the population crisis are we for this not to be noticed by anyone?" "Sephiroth knew." "Sephiroth is the child of Hojo and the woman who didn't think Vincent was good enough. I think that's the pinnacle of 'knows all, yet knows nothing'." "Well, anyway, shall we descend?" "Yes, please." "Like... I lost a whole hometown. In a fire." "So did I." "I still got mine. It comes with one grandpa." "Oh. We have another Bahamut. It's from.... THE MATRIX!" "You are the chosen one." "Do a bullet roll." " We... have an airship." "And we! Are! Fabulous!" "Hey, that's my laugh." "No, it's not. You go 'gyah hah hah'. Totally different." "No, it's not." "Yes, it is." "No, it's not!" "Oh, shut up!" "But I herd u got stab'd. So here I am... in your place." "Um...." "And he complains about how I laugh." "Yes, a family reunion." "I regret coming here." "Oh, damn it. There's a queue." "The Sephiroth fanclub is lining up." "I used to be one of them. The shame I feel...." "What the flying...." "Did we step on it by accident?" "That would explain why it's so mad." "That sounds very end game-ish." "It's also for me. I'm all about the knuckles." "You're just waiting and hoping someone's gonna tell you to 'make me a sammich', huh?" "It's my hope and dream, and boy howdy, will they be getting one if they do." "Uh... Cloud, what's.... what's going on?" "I have no idea. I just... suddenly letter." "But what does it mean?" "I DON'T SPEAK YOUR CRAZY MOON LANGUAGE!" "OK, OK. Jeez!" "Well, this really is the end of this path, but what the hell is that about your body. You better not get creepy on my ass." "....." "Um... figuratively speaking." "And a thousand slashfics were born." "How? Are you gonna write them?" "What?! No, no, no." "Your mouth might say no, but your eyes says 'oh, yes yes yes'." "Oh, shaddup!" "Or he might not. You can never tell." "Oh, I am near. And it is time to apply the magical touch." "Ew!" "Also, I'm starting to think it was a bad idea to foist off the black materia on Cloud. Again." "YA THINK?!" "Wait, did I just call Sephiroth 'master'?!" "You sure did." "Uuuuuuurgh! Why would I even... why did you make me keep the materia?!" "Oh, Jenova DEEEEAAAATH!" "It's name is Muerte... like DEATHHHHHH!" "Well... as you know, there's only one thing to do in a situation like this. Maybe two." "Is Titan lifting it up so Bahamut can get a better aim?" "Maybe?" "But will it float?" "Um.... why would it? "Well, it's dead, so... who cares?" "We just killed death. The joke's on it." "Hah! In your FACE!" "Uh....." "You say this while standing like that?" "I am not touching this." "And how?" "I am not doing a reinterpretation of Brokeback Mountain with him, Tifa." "You're no fun at all." "You know what? I don't want to know." "I feel like we've been thrown into the deep end... both literally and figuratively." "I liked it better when everything made sense. Well... more sense. ....than this, I mean." "What's that? A good idea? Yes, please." "And there's more where that came from." "Well, anyway, who wants the black materia? Who wants the weight of the world on their shoulders?" "The last time I held the black materia, I gave it to Sephiroth within five minutes. You do not want me to hold on to it... like I've been doing so far, so... uh... what was the point I was trying to make again?" "Eeeh, I dunno." "Remember, not anyone!" "Yeah, yeah." "Good thing our magic isn't run by TP. Could you imagine a TP Turbo materia?" "You will never wipe as fast as when you have TP Turbo." "At least it's better than having no TP. Because how then do you wipe?" "And when you have fur all over your butt?" "Urgh, don't remind me." "Yes, let's toss Sephiroth in the killbin." "That's a cube, not a... bin. And it has a face." "Then it's gonna be a faceoff." "And you wonder why we call you... 'THE CLAW'!" "Poison ring? Did anyone have the super chili?" "Isn't that fire ring?" "Oh, right. Well, between a poison ring and toxic barf, which is worse?" "I never want to answer that question." "And you say I'm no fun." "Well, here we are, at the end of all things." "And no dodgy winds going 'YOU SHALL NOT PASS'." "We're near the light at the end of this tunnel." "Will we finally have some answers. Will Cloud and his friends finally be able to take care of Sephiroth and his world-shattering meteor attack? What IS the light at the end of this tunnel?" "But we just... why are we back here?" "It's like we never left. That is just beyond evil!" To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Jan 27, 2020 10:08:24 GMT -5
Chapter 21: The Master Troll and the Sick Burn. "The... uh, illusion. Well, this is, obviously, but...." "...but?" "Oh, nothing." "That's a pretty big nothing." "Let's just... let's just go." "I mean... I wouldn't want to be caught dead with that hairstyle. Who does he think he is? Son Goku the sayiajin?" "You chose to leave it at one spike?" "Yep, poking out at a jaunty angle, as if to say 'I'm hep and with it'." "You're such a gasser." "You promised not to talk about that!" "No, I meant... ew. I mean... oh, never mind." "Stupid Sephiroth and his stupid illusion. It's so stupid." "Stupid fire. Stupid deaths happening all around us. Stupid past." "And there comes stupid Son Goku and his stupid sayiajin powers. Stupid boy and his stupid popularity with girls." "I bet he's already got a girlfriend too." "Stupid!" "This is going so well." "It's just stupid lies from stupid Sephiroth." "It's like a stupid-off. There are no winners here." "Hah, I know, right?!" "......." "Well, you're WRONG! Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. Stupid!" "Yes, yes, but I'm not the one lying to myself." "Shut up, stupid!" "There has to be a reason why this feels the most wrong to me, out of the three of us." "Hey, I'm enjoying myself immensely. How could this feel wrong to me?" "Because you're the troll in this little story, regardless of what's true or not." "And we're back to this again." "But I have been good at making you dance to my tune, haven't I? Pulled your pretty little strings?" "You're still a huge troll." "Well, this job's gotta have some perks. You know, beyond the mind control, the awesome physical powers and the ability to end you all by magical space rock. It takes effort being this awesome, you know." "Cloud, we really should stop listening to him. Seriously. It's not going to do any good." "I'm so going to show him up by revealing that I was there all along, just you wait." "That's... a good idea, Cloud." "I don't even want to think about what you consider 'appropriate behavior', you massive psychopath. I think only you are deluded enough to stand in the middle of a town you set on fire and have the audacity to lecture me about proper behavior." "What? U mad?" *sigh* "No, not anymore. I'll still stab the everloving crap out you when we finally meet, though." "Nuh uh. I can control you whenever I feel like it. I can control your arm, punch you in your stupid face and say 'stop hitting yourself' every time I do it." "Urrrgh, how can someone be this trolly?" "My 'real' self. Right. The person you called a puppet. Which is rich, considering you yourself are full of Jenova cells from birth. Which, according to Dr. Gast's video series, is the calamity from space, and is nothing but a hottub of lies and assholery." "Oh, you have no idea how much antagonisation material I can get from this. No idea." "Oh, come ON! The guy makes animal porn on the side, and his idea of 'making' someone is having them mate with big cats. I don't believe for a second that he can put people together, 'piece by piece', and then come out on the other end looking good... either figuratively and literally." "That's partially why it's going to be so much fun seeing his reaction." "Well, he's your dad." "........." "What? Get under your skin?" "You did. I'm so proud of you, boy." "I swear... every time you open your goddamned mouth, I die a little inside. Even when you don't say anything, I die a little inside." "Seriously, the best way to deal with Sephiroth is to block him out." "And you're not very good at it, are you?" "I'm... rrrgh... working on that." "Deep breaths, Cloud. Deep breaths." "If it's all the same, I'd rather not listen to anything you say." "What are you afraid of? The truth?" "No, just that anything you have to say is going to be bad for us, whether it's the truth or not. Sometimes, the best course of action is to not play the game. Now, begone." "Which would be great if Sephiroth didn't prefer it that way, but he does. Being in his presence is bad news. Listening to him is a bad idea. In fact, anything revolving around Sephiroth is not going to go anywhere good." "I beg to differ." "For anyone else. The world doesn't revolve around you." "Not yet, but it will. Soon now..." "Rrrgh! Why don't I take my own advice. I need to go beyond 'do what I say, not what I do' myself." "It's so much easier not to believe." "And more depressing, to be honest. Do we want to live in a world where everyone acts like they're too cool to care about anything? Is that the trend you want to set?" "......" "Ooh, that's a good one. Nice work, Tifa." "......." "Even if I turn out to be a clone, like that wouldn't be the dumbest plot twist ever...." "Heh. Three brothers who aren't brothers." "Hey! You are not allowed to enjoy yourselves. I forbid it!" "Um... I just said I trusted you, and you're all 'No, that's not true'. That's.... are you you familiar with how personal statements work? Or are you calling me a liar?" "No, I mean, yes. I mean... I know you trust me, but.... maybe you shouldn't. But you should. Oh, what am I saying...." "Well, let's stand around in this burning hellhole a bit more, then. Take your time." "Um... let's not." "Uh... yeah, no. I'm calling BS on that. What am I; a walking slime monster? A doppelganger?" "Well... yes." "And this is why I don't believe anything you say. Why don't you return to the stuff you're good at: being a giant troll." "Good idea." "I have a name. It's Cloud. The name stays." "Well, he's back to being a troll." "Which you requested... for some odd reason." "I regret nothing." "Ah, but you will. Soon, my pretty. Soon." "Of course it is, Cloud. Of course it is. Anything that doesn't support your fragile, little illusion must be fake." "And there is the old Sephiroth we all know and love." "I could almost hear the sarcasm detectors explode from all around." "Yep. Black-haired guy. Sephiroth has learned how to use Photoshop. I'm so proud of you." "Well, I haven't learned how to Photoshop my own memories yet, though, so I still pale in comparison to you." "Oh man, this is going to get so awkward later on." "Well, memories can be vague sometimes, but I definitely remember the things that happened here." "Urrrgh!" "What?!" "Just checking if you were listening." "......" "I was just joking. And... you know, checking." "Uuuuurgh!" "You OK? I mean... am I OK? What's going on?" "The nightmare became reality MOUHAHAHAHA!" "Nobody is alright after a meeting with... 'the Sephiroth'." "Nobody will ever be alright after dealing with a person who introduces themselves with the word 'the' in front of their own name. That takes a certain level of obnoxiousness few people can mirror." "Still dry as a stick, Hojo. Remind me why we keep you in-house." "My magnificent porn collection?" "What?! Ew, no! That... actually put you higher on my list of people I need to fire. Preferably at, with the biggest gun in my possession." "What do you mean 'moving inside a wall'?" "Science has made hollowed-out walls that you can move inside. It's a huge step forward for science." "How... why... oh, man, my trigger finger is itching right now." "Well, it looks like I'm not the only one who has an itchy trigger finger." "You should have some children, Mr. President. It'd change your outlook on a lot of things. I have some subjects in my lab if you need a suitable mate." "Well, given who your son ended up being, maybe what I need now is a good reason why I shouldn't just shoot you right away, you creepy, creepy man." "Because you still need my scientific research and abilities?" *siiiigh* "Damned if I do, damned if I don't. Anyway...." "They're all in my lab for you to see any time you want to." "But to do that, I need to go to your lab, and I can never manage to do that without needing to shower for hours afterwards." "I knew I wanted us to go green, but not this literally." "Well, I'm not happy about any of this. I can't make sense of any of it." "Oh, uh... just a sec." "There we go." "Wait, did you just.... how did that... what just happened? "No time to think, Cloud's in trouble." "Works for me. It's Boom time!" "You stupid, stupid man. The only downside to you is that you're not as fun to mock, as it'd fly right over your head. Well, can't win 'em all, I guess." "I feel so empty. Well, I've always felt empty. That's amnesia for ya, I guess. But a weird kind of amnesia." "What is it with people weirding me out today? I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm almost missing Reeves." "What am I? Chopped liver?" "No, not yet." "Don't you start eyeballing my staff, you huge weirdo." "Au contraire, Mr. Cloud. Things have been beginning for some time now. But boy howdy, you are not acting like I remember you back on the Shinra roof. You OK, there, buddy? I'd hate for anything to... affect you when I put you before my gun." "That sounds swell. But I'm afraid time is out, and now you shall all pay." "I'm sure it'll all be fine from here." "You won't just hand it right over to Sephiroth? You know, like last time?" "Of course not. Do you not trust me?" "Well, we had our big ranty moment in the dreamworld or whatever, but man, you're acting even weirder right now." "Glad I'm not the only one who noticed. Even though I've met him once, and for a short one minute fight at that." "We're almost at the end of the beginning and end thing I mentioned. Soon, it'll all be over." "Well, I'm beginning to have some concerns over this." *sigh* "Yes, I'm afraid we will." "Well... time to move this story along." "And I find this endlessly amusing. In a scientific way, that is." "Please give me your number." "Ew!" "What's going on?" "I wish I knew. Kids today..." "No, you don't." "Why?" "Because there are darker things hiding in these rabbit holes." "But there was a person named Cloud that joined Shinra, and who used to live in that ramshackle town that Sephiroth burned down that I can't be bothered remembering the name of." "Yes." "I'm so glad I completely understand everything that comes out of your mouth." "So... basically, you just jammed a lot of Jenova up his bunghole and called it a day." "If you want to put it simply, yes." ".....Scarlet, why is this man on our payroll?" "Because he's a hilarious pervert." "Right! Just wanted to establish that." "Well... wouldn't it be sensible to assume that the cells would gather where the meteor crashed, which is Jenova's original entry point?" "But that does not science." ".....Scarlet, why is this man on our payroll?" "Because he's hilarious?" "I beg to differ." "My mother never loved me." "Or she loved you too much. Which, I guess, sort of spins it around to negative one million." "She wanted to pick my wives." "Scarlet, why is this man on our payroll?" "Oh, he isn't. Not anymore." "Well, that's good." "He's like a little overeager puppeteer." "Who feels he has to drug people somehow to make them do what he wants. Yeah, that's the way to go. By the way, did he ever considered fear?" "He'd have to outdo his father. I mean... Hojo wanted me to mate with a human. Ew." "Yes, ew." "......" "Wait, what's wrong with humans?" "Nothing. You're just not my type." "Oh. Fair enough." "....." "Wait a second! Aeris wasn't a human. She was a Cetra." "You're missing my point." "She'd still chastize you for calling her a human if she was still around, though." *sigh* "Yes, I'm sure she would. I'm just saying that humanoid figures isn't what makes my heart go boom bang-a-bang all the time, regardless of how many times you stretch your back after each battle." "OK, OK, fair enough. Jeez." "I totally didn't worship him or anything." "And in addition to Jenova, I also injected anime tsundere girl straight into his bloodstream." "You monster! I know I love controlling the masses with fear, but that is just inhuman." "Syphilis." ".........." "Well... all joking aside, that might've been preferable. Like... I left my hometown to impress a girl, and he burned it down anyway." "I'm doing it on purpose this time, so you're not controlling me and making you do it. I'm giving you this black materia on purpose so you can meteor-bomb this planet and bathe in our energies. On purpose. So HAH, you're not controlling me anymore." "......" "I'm a terrible person, aren't I?" "And this guy is sure looking healthy for being dead so long." "......" "Abs of the undead." "......." "Sixpacks from the grave." "......." "Not that I'm envious or anything." "But just think of the science." "That's not science, you crazy asshole. That's just throwing crap at the wall and marvelling at it sliding down. And then calling that science." "Oh, I did that years ago." "I didn't ask." "I'm thinking going with you is the worst idea ever, but OK. Anything to avoid having Hojo stand around explaining his... 'science'." "Don't worry. It won't hurt... for long." "....yeah, still better than listening to Hojo for any length of time." "Yo, Cloud, that's the opposite of not doing it. Stop doing the not doing that you weren't supposed to... wait, I lost my train of thought." "OH NOES!" "The Pokeman has awakeneth!" "What's with the giant eyeball? Are we supposed to take these... 'weapons'... seriously?" "I guess I normally wouldn't -- although we've fought weirder things on our way here -- but after a giant whirlwind explosion, I'd take anything seriously." "And now, Godzilla. With wings." "Is that... teeth? Or even a mouth?" "Boy, do I feel like a relic of my era looking at that." "Dude, leave the fourth wall alone." "Urgh! Is it doing a sonar attack? I can feel it reverberating all the way to my..." "..boobies?" "...I was gonna say 'brain', but you can't see the brain for the boobies, can you?" "A common problems with humans, I've heard." "Oh man, this ain't looking good." "I see dead people." "Dead people juice?" "Ew! Technically correct, I guess, but still... ew!" "Alright, let's go. We have an execution to go to." "Sounds great. Who are we executing?" "About that...." "Well, this went to hell in a handbasket quick enough, didn't it? Despite Cloud warning the others not to let him have the black materia, that's still how it ended up. And of course, said materia ended up in Sephiroth's hands after all. Who could see this coming? Everyone? Of course." "Well... except the karate thing. But still, I wanted to feel what being a damsel felt like. To feel special and stuff. Definitely more of a 'what was I thinking?' situation, but hey... I was young and stupid, wasn't I?" "......" "Cloud, are you listening? Can you hear me? Are you there, somewhere?" "......." "I wonder if I'll have the time to go get some therapy once this weird headtrip is over." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Feb 2, 2020 18:41:01 GMT -5
Chapter 22: Executive Decision..... Failed. "Oh lordy, the drooling vegetable is looking at me." "....." "Wait, how do you know my name? And why do you look so familiar?" "Duuuurh!" "LOOK familiar, that is, emphasis on 'look'. Except the expression with 'dur' written all over it." "I... uh, dunno. Something about 'dur'?" "Cool! Amnesia is so hot." "Well, I do have a little bit of amnesia." "Score!" "Five looooong years. The longest in my life. And you're bigger than I thought." "....um, what?" "You've grown so tall. I'm impressed." "....oh." "Why are you sounding so disappointed?" "...nuth'n." "But no time to go into any of that now." "Aw, why not?" "Even things that you shouldn't and I shouldn't that you did know about. And the stuff I knew about but you didn't that you should know about. And the things neither of us knew about that you didn't know about...." "Um... but wouldn't that last one be very logical, though?" "Yes." "And hug you and hold you and pet you and groom you and..." "Yikes! Please stop." "And... and... why?" "Because ding." "Ding?" "Ding." "But what about the ding?" "Again: huh?" "The ding. You know? The ding?!" "I know you've been out for a couple 'o days, but you're acting weird, even by Tifa standards." "That was... the last word I remember." "I... don't wanna know what the first word was." "Well, this would be a pretty sucky story if he was, right?" "Yyyyyeah." "Then he can do a damn thing about it." "Are you fresh out of damn things?" "Yep. Not as much as a stick of dynamite with my name on it." "....of course you don't." "The Pokeman rampage." "Well, we can laugh, but Cloud has disappeared and things are kind of falling to pieces. Are we all doomed to be helpless without him?" "I dunno." "I'll take that as a 'yes'." "Is he huge?" "......" "Get it? He's huge, so he must have-.." "YES I KNOW LET'S NOT GO THERE!" "You know, you might have a point. Meteor might be able to destroy weapon." "No, that's not what I..." *sigh* "Meteor will destroy everything! Including, yes, Weapon too." "Well, that's that, then. Problem solved." "...I was wondering what was up with the sudden burst of intelligence, but maybe it was just all in my head." "I think we should give up giving up. You know what I'm saying?" "...dunno." "Yeah, I thought you'd say that." "So, you're going to let us go?" "In a way." "You what?" "We're going to execute you to make the ignorant ones happy. Do you have a problem with this?" "Yes. Several." "Can I explode him now?" "Why? You offering your neck for my wringing hand?" "Of course not. Don't be silly." "Hyuk hyuk hyuk." "......" "........" "Heidegger, please go back to your old laughing." "Oh, come on. Let me fire the CANNON just once." "No." "Oh, please." "No!" "Pretty please?" "No!!" "Pretty, pretty please?" "NO!" "Pretty please with a hemorrhoid cherry on top?" "No! Also, ew!" "I know I said reality TV is gonna be the next big thing, but this wasn't what I had in mind." "Well, this isn't TV for the mind either, but I thought I already established that." "And once we have gotten rid of people who don't like our TV shows, we can truly say that everyone loves it." "But wouldn't that just leave you guys?" "If that's what it takes. More for me." "Wow, you must be the brains of this operation." "I am, and I know just how to put you in your place." "This is your special gas chamber, huh? Am I going to die from you sitting in the corner and applying your cheapass perfumes until I choke?" "Yeah, you just keep throwing out the insults. I'm going to look forward to hearing them being replaced by gasps." "Nah, I've long since stopped being surprised at you trying to look like you're about as old as I am." "Stuck up %&"#¤%." "Well, I am stuck with you right now, and someone had the foresight to tie up my legs as well as my arms, so I can't exactly stick my foot up your ass. So you're going to do all the sticking up here." "Why are you not afraid? You should be very afraid?" "Normally, I would be pretty worried, but... it's you. Every time I see you in that dress, wearing that face makeup and those perfumes... well, let's just say I feel much better about my damsel fantasies." "Pfft, you're not half the woman I am." "Well, we're about equal in the chest size department, I guess. That's something, right?" "Urgh! While I am proud of my chest, hearing you say that still makes me angry. Although I know of a thing I can do about that." "Oh, for the love of....." "I never thought I'd be happy to see that thing." "Well, I can still have my fun with this." "I feel... powerful. Oh, it's a glorious feeling. Finally, I have you all here, and you're going to learn how to grovel before your mistress before it all is over." "And will bowing be involved?" "Oh, good idea. I'd love that." "I FEEL LIKE THE JOKE IS ON ME SOMEHOW!" "But you were right, Scarlet. That was fun." "Gnnngh!" "Not too fond of Rufus either, to be honest, and don't get me started on Heidegger or Hojo...." "Then why are you working for them?!" "Well, it was either that, or running around with a bunch of idiots and blowing up power stations. I hear there's openings in the coal mines now, though." "Oh, a smartass, huh?" "Yep. That's why I work in an office rather than in the explosions division. Anyway, aren't we in a hurry? I don't think even Tifa can handle Scarlet's perfumes for much longer." "Screw... you..." "I never want to hear you talking about firing your big cannon ever again." "Prepare the big bullets." "I swear... if I hear the sound of zippers being opened, I'm going to shoot you myself." "You don't have to make this weird!" " I don't have to make this weird? You.... you...." "Just look at the size of that thing. It is glorious!" "I need a vacation. Or a new commander of the forces. But mostly a vacation." "Aim for its face!" "WILL YOU JUST STOP?!" "But we have to, or it'll be all over us. The whole city will be splashed." "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" "It's gonna eat all the seamen." "I'm going to fire you if you don't stop. And I'm going to use the giant gun to do it." "Ooh, that felt so good." "Ruling the world is going to be... harder than I thought." "Well, that was quite something." "I kind of feel like we missed something, though." "Really?" "Yeah. And for some reason, I feel like I'm really lucky today. Weird, right?" "Right." "And speaking of knots, you're going to find yourself in many pretty soon, Heidegger." "Tell all soldiers to fire." "At least you didn't say 'seamen'." "No, the fun part comes afterwards." "Look at those beautiful patterns. I am so glad to be alive right now." "That just makes me wonder why you kept pushing your luck." "BOY, THIS SURE IS EXCITING, ISN'T IT?!" "I'm feeling considerably less lucky now." "Well, just think of the things you didn't get to experience. That makes it all better, right?" "Uh... not really." "Did... did Weapon just headbutt Junon in the cojones? And do we refer to the city's testicles as 'Cojujones'?" "Yes and please don't." "I mean... what do you think I've been doing so far? Don't make me so annoyed, I have to quip at you. That just quickens my doom!" "Then don't." "Don't what? Hold my breath?" "No, I meant... gah!" "Well, I guess Tifa's gonna have to save herself, then." "Yep yep." "You jerks!" "Looking into saving you, you idiots!" "Well, we need to save Tifa." "And to do that, we need to steal an airship." "That sounds like a rescue plan designed by committee. Too many needless filler points designed to impress an audience." "I plead the fifth." "YOU COMING OR WHAT?!" "She's screwed, isn't she?" "No, no, no. This'll be great." "......" "I'll always remember you, big boobs lady." "My name! Is! TIFA!" "The airship isn't here." "No, it isn't." "Tifa's doomed, isn't she?" "Uh... this is the elevator. We take it up to the airship." "Hey, don't blame me. I've never been here before." "How.... how did you guys survive this long?" "I just recently joined, so... no idea." "Well, we're short on time, so let's whip out the big guns." "Why are we standing on a floating platform?" "I don't know. Where did our enemies go?" "I don't know. What will happen now?" "I don't know." "Oh dear lord. We're screwed, aren't we?" "I just want you to know... I've always loved you." "I... don't know what to say." "GOOD BYE, MY FRIEND!" "I LOVE YOU TOOooo-" "Well... I feel terrible about myself now." "Maybe that's the reason we've been brought before the giant gun barrel." "I will always remember you, lovable soldier boys." "Uh... guys, the airship is right there. Weren't we going to take it?" "Look at all those soldiers. We won't be getting out of this alive, I think." "We'll be having our last stand here, at this point." "Guys, the airship is right over here!" "I'm so glad I had the chance to redeem myself before this." "I wonder if people will remember us." "I'll remember you two as the biggest idiots I've ever met. Now get on the airship, or I'll laser you both to death with another round of Giga Flare." "Oof, I need to get out of this dreary and smelly perfume room before I choke. I mean... I know that letting this gas out of this room will probably not be good for the auditorium right next to it, but screw that noise." ".........." "Well, I guess I can't really depend on Barret and Cait Sith, so... whose help can I depend on to get me out of this?" "Whoa, what was that?" "...." "Wait, was I just saved by Weapon?!" "....." "I am so never going to let Barret live that down." "Well... that's an opening. Never mind me, then." *sigh* "Christ, I'm never going to be able to rid me of this serious action girl image. I just wanted to damsel once in my life. I have to know the appeal of this. Aeris was too sassy for this, and Yuffie is too mischievous. It has to be me. Mild-mannered me. Yep yep." "Sister Ray? That's the dumbest name ever. Who came up with that?" "Are you still on about that? What is it with you and your reality TV fetish?" "They're cheap to make and I love them." "Waaaait, you're the one who named this big phallic cannon, aren't you?" "Of course. A big gun needs a big name." "You just keep on surprising me. Just as I think you couldn't possibly be any more stupid...." "No, you stop it!" "No, you stop it!" "You will respect my authoritae." "I will never respect anything you do, ever. You leave me no other choice." "I can't believe she won the bitchslap competition. She must've had so much practice." "Yeah, you just deal with that. Also, it's 'Run to the end of the SISTER RAY'!" "......" "Wait, what? Who said that?" "C'mon over and give your rescuers a big hug." "Does that include Weapon?!" "Man, there's no reason to be like that. How could we possibly beat the potency of Scarlet's tacky perfumes in time without a little luck?" "Never mind. I'd rather not stand on Scarlet's phallic gun longer than I have to." "Hey! 'Sister Ray' is a great name, and you know it." "...what? That sounds stupid." "See? When even Barret thinks your name is stupid, it really, really is." "Oh, shaddup! And kill them all already." "C'mon, Tifa. Chase the end of that rope." "Jump, Tifa. Jump!" *sigh* "There go my damsel dreams. Tifa, action girl forever and ever." "You should be ashamed for the sake of all women everywhere." "That might be correct, but you are seriously the last person I ever want to hear that from. Well, anyway, you failed to kill us. Bye bye, and I hope you have terrible luck in finding someone else to blame for no reason." "And good bye, Junon, home of the Sister Ray and its Cojunones." "...you heard that, didn't you?" "Yep." "But that's such a stupid term." "Hey, I was standing on the Sister Ray just now. Your argument is invalid." "Curses!" "Happy ending, everyone. Tifa escaped. Barret and Cait Sith escaped. Even Yuffie, who really has the best survival skills of everyone here, escaped. But from this reality, there is no escape." "I'll say. You two just kept slapping each other across the gob for ten minutes!" "Wait, you saw the whole thing? And did nothing?" "Well, can you blame us? You just kept slapping each other in the exact same manner. We couldn't take our eyes away from the spectacle." "Yeah! Aren't you a martial artist, Tifa? I mean... I'm a ninja, so I would know. And you really should be able to kick her ass without much trouble." "Maybe normally, but I've been breathing her perfumes for an agonizing amount of time. I'm still kinda high, in fact, so pass me the coal tablets and shut up for a second." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Feb 18, 2020 5:43:06 GMT -5
Chapter 23: Return of the Cucumber and the Hunt for Huge. "If I throw up here, it won't stain the floor. Also, I might hit a Shinra goon on the head." "You.. uh... keep up the good work, then. Make us proud." *urp* "Well, I can't keep it down, so.... one load of good work coming right up. And literally as well as figuratively." "Alrighty, I'll just leave you to it, then. I have a ship to explore that I apparently own now. The world works in mysterious ways sometimes." "Well, sure. I should probably hurry, but what's time if not for exposition. Take it away, mystery man." "Oof, I already blanked out on 'working under Heidegger'. It... does not bring up any pleasant thoughts. I can't imagine those being memories would be much of an improvement." "Uh.... wait, we're talking about Cid, right? Cid? Cranky-ass old man? Verbal abuser of assistants? That Cid?" "Well played, I guess. Fire, huh? I guess there was that giant, laser-spewing Pokeman to contend with, so... good call there." "Erm.... no, I mean... it wasn't a particularly long story, and it did fill me in on some details, so... cool story, bro." "What? That don't make no sense, foo'. I wouldn'a be so stressed if I knew you could fly the damn thing." "Yes, and I needed the others to see you panic and fret, so they'd become careless and underestimate us. And for some reason, you panicking makes you much more effective. A loose cannon, as it were." "You clever bastard." "Well, thank the heavens you aren't, or you would probably have called my bluff the second I blackmailed you with your daughter as a hostage." "......." "Wait a sec. You weren't there when I did that." "......" "Oh dear." "YOU DID WHAT?!" "And I thought you were smart." "I'll say. I heard a story about you being all nice and heartfelt and stuff. I've never heard anyone say something so alien and strange, ever." "I know, right? My workers do fine work, but they're all a bunch of idiots." "....you know, most people would love to hear their underlings talk about you like that. What the hell is wrong with you?" "I'm a cranky old guy, remember?" "Representin', I guess? Keepin' it real?" "You're putting that in a bad way, but.... yes." ".....idiot." "Trains, huh? I wonder if you saying that will become really ironic at some point, and I hope I'll be there to see it." "Weirdo." "I mean... I know I have my damsel dreams and all, but this hits me in a completely different way." "Well... Sephiroth sure knew how to push buttons. It takes... time... recouping from that. You know... without going into a mouth-frothing rage." "And now you're weirding me out." "Hey, I can be nice when I want to." "Then how about you try that with you assistant?!" "What? Do I look like I'm stupid?" "....yes. Yes, you do." "That sounds kinda gross when I put it like that, huh?" "Well... let's go look for some cracks, then." "Some crack dens?" "No, I said..." *sigh* "...never mind." "Alrighty. Let's go find some crack dens." "Yaaaaay." "NOW!" "Gah! Wait, now? But land. But uh... OK." "Oh, that was so worth it." "Yep. Still up there." "I wonder if we can fit it up Sephy's bunghole." "Ramming speed?" "Ramming speed." "This is new." "We can't be ramming that." "Well, of course not." "Who the heck lives here, though? Right smack dab in the middle of a forest?" "Um...." "I've heard of retirement homes, but this is a retirement town." "I'm not sure how I feel about being called a 'beaut'. I know it's a compliment, but it's so old fashioned. At least he's not staring at my knockers." "What they talking 'bout, doggie? You got no big sword at all, much less a pokey head." "Um... I don't think they're talking about the dog." "How did he get all the way over here? Wait, I need to check first. Wait, I need to pet the doggie first. Wait, I need to... I need to...." "You need to calm down, that's what you need." "Calming down is for quitters. Cloud now!" " Not SALTZA?!" "Do you have your bingo card?" "Yes, and now I can cross out 'unintentionally meeting up with the main player'." "Should we remind her that this guy did the air quote hand sign when he said 'clinic'? Isn't that worrisome?" "Nah. I don't want to rain on her parade. Her crazy, kooky parade." "Well, why don't we all go to...." "......." "....the 'clinic'?" "I like the cut of your jib." "Anyway... do we have any sedatives? A sleep spell? Heck, slow would be convenient, too." "No, no and heck, no. Slow would just make this creepy." "Yes, but hilariously creepy." "We're going to drown in text boxes, aren't we?" "Well, he was controlled by Sephiroth, so of course his condition wouldn't be all that great." "Um... well, that would explain things. I think. But...." "Cloud, why are you lolling your head like that? Why are you in a wheelchair? Why.... why are you drooling all over your jacket?" "So, this is your man, then?" "....yes." "Well, uh... I'm sorry to hear that." "I know mind control by Sephiroth isn't much fun, but....." "He just came gushing out of a huge crack, and now he's in the mental state of a baby, if even that." "Yep, he's the 'doctor', alright." "Well, we sorta lost him in the big explosion, so you're probably right, Doc." "You kids sure know how to throw parties." "Well.. the entertainment was kind of terrible. Some people just fail at TV programming on the executive level." "TV may be the death of me some day, but this is not that day." "Yeah, that explanation was ass. Come up with something better. Something more severe-sounding." "He's literally lightyears away from us. Some place at the other end of the universe, where nobody has ever been, not even the eldritch ones. So super duper turbo alone like you have never heard of. Because only the most lonely person could be so utterly cut off from the hearing range of even the heariest of beings." "That's better." "...no. No, it's not." "You ruined the moment. Now get the heck outta here." "We had that coming." "No, we didn't. We did nothing wrong." "And I thought the vegetable formerly known as a guy popping out of the Lifestream was a weird thing to witness." "All the memories. I have so much to say, but I can't speak to myself for that long. Help me, Cloud. Swoop in and help me. And most importantly, please please please stop headbutting your knee." "So I reckon his complete recovery will take a whole week." "Oh. Well, that's good." "The road to recovery is long and grindy." "You're gay?" "Erm... no, but... wait, how did we get to that?" "Well, that's usually what follows when someone goes 'Mom? Dad? I have to tell you something'." "Well... you're not my mom and dad." "You're a terrible daughter." "Um...." "You're... sounding kind of patronizing right now." "Well, it's not like you were nearly executed or anything." "And we are certainly not being attacked by gigantic Pokemans. Yeah, I know one sorta saved you, but still....." "Yeah, but I need this guy to save me, and I'm going to stick around here until he wakes up from this stupor so that I can make him do so." "I've heard of 'desperate', but this really takes the lifestream-soaked biscuit." "We're friends again." "Yep." "That we are." "Well, that will happen regardless, won't it?" "It might take a day. It might take a whole week. It might even take a cataclysmic event. But we WILL get our main character back!" ".....er, I kinda very much don't want to hear anything coming out of their mouths, but.... but we might learn about their plans. But I kinda very much don't want to hear anything coming out of their mouths, but.... we might learn about their plans. But..." "Barret's stuck in a loop again. Give him a whack on the back of his stupid head." "How were you ever an inspiration for people, you cranky old stodger?" "Because the things that turned me into a cranky old stodger is what made people admire me. Or did you miss the giant Leaning Tower of Space Rocket when you visited my home town? You know, the whole 'my dreams' thing?" "Well, anyway... Kya ha ha and Gya ha ha?" "But I don't wanna. But I have to. But I don't wanna. But I have to. But..." "Oh, goddamn it, Barret." "Well, at least they're being proactive." "Sure beats out 'executing people on live TV to make them feel better'." "Them who? The people being executed?" "Well... they would probably have gotten to me too, eventually." "And how. Anyway...." "The! Plan! Is! Already! In! Motion!" "Yes, I heard. That's not what I meant." "We! Are! Collecting! Huge Materia!" "I'm going to have you killed now. And that isn't going to be on TV." "So they're basically going to colonoscopy the meteor to death?" "....yes. Yes, they are." "The comet cornhole is going to receive treatment." "This is how we reduce the meteor threat: with lots of butt jokes." "Hey, don't blame me. It's Shinra's fault. As usual." "Do we have ramming technology?" "I can probably get something mounted to the airship if you give me some time. Ooooor, come to think of it, we have something in my hometown that can do the job." "And now I'm imagining you ramming a rocket into a comet cornhole. Thank you very much." "Can we... can we move away from the ramming thing for a bit?" "They took our coal away from us. They exploded our town and burned it to the ground. BUT THEY WILL NEVER! TAKE! OUR! HUGE! MATERIA!" "....." "Because we will take it before they do." "Our hero." "Um... but wouldn't that imply that all materia would react to each other, and not just the one put into connected slots on our gear?" "Yes." "Oh. But that doesn't make any sense." "No." "Oh. Well... what do we do, then?" "I'm glad you asked." "So, you basically want to get the huge materia first just to show off to Cloud." "And stuff it in the face of Shinra." "Our hero." "But mostly prove to Cloud that I don't really need him before we accept him back into our party." "I feel good about my life now." "As long as I get to blow stuff up, I'm happy." "Maybe I should not have let them listen in on the conversation between Kyah and Gyah." "Nope." "Pain in the ass, you say? What an interesting choice of words." "I couldn't help it. We've been talking about cornholes and ramming and stuff for so long now." "The verdict is... not guilty." "Yay!" "Heh heh. Simpleton." "You never wanted to be a leader, did you?" "Nope." "And you guys blame Sephiroth for acting like a mad puppet master." "And you didn't want to be a leader. I can hear that quite clearly." "I JUST WANT TO EXPLODE SOMETHING! Is that too much to ask?" "....no." "Did you hear that? 'C'mon, Leader-man, let's hurry'?! Did you hear that?" "I'm sorry, because I couldn't hear anyone over my guts heaving out everything in my stomach. And then, when it was empty, it heaved out my stomach." "Well, uh... carry on, then." "Noooo. I want to stoooop." "The answer to that is yes. Fly, my pretty. Fly us to the moon." "Uh... wait, what? Is there anything to blow up there?" "Didn't we just agree that we need to blow it up?" "That was a comet, not the moon. Although I would love to blow up the moon and all, we do have more pressing matters to attend to." "Boy, you're sounding very... not Barret today." "Oh, shaddup, foo'!" "That's more like it." "Well, let's take a tour of all our failures so far, why don't we?" "Hey, don't look at me. I took no part in this, and when we first met, my main goal was to screw you over as much as possible." "......" "Uh.... I mean...." "And speaking of failures...." "Well, I don't really care about that anymore. Let's just get to where we need to be, not where we already failed?" "That's unusually wise for ya, Barret my lad." "Oh, shaddup!" "Um.... weren't you listening? Or did you want to get back at me by taking me back to one of my biggest failures?" "Um... last I heard, all this wasn't really your fault. Yeah, if Shinra hadn't been here, and you'd have been allowed to continue the coal industry, the worsening of your enviroment and the general health of your home would be your fault, but...." "OK, OK, jeez. I get your point." "We're... we're gonna have to get on a train, aren't we?" "Not if we get there in time." "Well, let's make like Sonic the Hedgehog over these rollercoaster-like train tracks, then, and zip over there." "Sheesh, when you said rollercoaster-like tracks, you weren't kidding. Who the hell came up with this?" "Um... these are not the parts we are talking about." "You mean it gets worse than this?" "Yes. Yes, it does." "This train track is just a refurbished rollercoaster, isn't it?" "....I plead the fifth." "...absolutely mad. That was like the goddamned minecart ride in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, except for the complete lack of lava pits." "You make this sound fun." "Kids today...." "...says the man who wants to go to space in a giant rocket." "HALT!" "You shall not pass." "Oh, of course. Well, how shall we deal with these distractions?" "POKE 'EM IN THE PENIS!" "Exac-.. wait, what?!" "Aaaaand there goes the train." "You know what that means, right?" "Is this going to be revenge for the 'poke 'em in the penis' comment? He's going to 'handle' it? A honest to God hands-on approach? Am I going to have a stroke?" "I don't think you have the equipment for that." "I'm not sure that comment brings me any relief." "What does Cid have in mind? What kind of solution does the old man have for the situation with the runaway train? How does one simply chase the train?" "Hop on. We can still catch up with them if we hurry, and I need more coal-shovelers." "I got this!" *sigh* "This is the day when coal saves the world. We'll never hear the end of this, will we?" To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Mar 2, 2020 19:44:45 GMT -5
Chapter 24: Train Puncher and the Giant Bird on Fire Tower Assault. "Wait, where are the pedals?" "Uh...." "Where is the steering wheel?!" "It's a train!" "Are you saying trains can't have steering wheels?" "I... what... well, sure, you can put a steering wheel on the locomotive if that makes you happy, but there's no point in doing that when a train is an on-rails experience! Why do we even have to tell you this?!" "Kids today. You have no vision." "That doesn't excuse anything. You are wrong. Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. And stupid." *sigh* "I thought the steering wheel request was stupid, but we have a locomotive with pump action?" "The train that doubles as an exercise machine." "Bet you won't find this on the TV shop." "Well, before you can use it, you have to build the tracks the train runs on!" "Which is also exercise." "So is slapping you across your stupid gob every time you open it and say something stupid." "I know this train is all rollercoaster-y as heck, but I somehow doubt you can build up the kind of speed that can make this huge block of steel fly." "Of course not. What? Do I look like I'm stupid?" "No, you just sound like you are, which is far more sinister and dangerous, Mr. I Wanna Go To Space." "Shinra made a machine whose sole role is releasing smog?!" "What are they? Captain Planet villains?" "Greased lightning? I thought that was a fistfight thing." "What are you? Double the amount of games forward in time?" "Hey, I ain't starrin' in no stupid online experience." "Yeah, that'd be the day. Maybe you'd be a nice older man in it." "Pfft. As if that would ever happen." "Not in our lifetime, no." "So anyway, what kind of weird mini train are we running on?" "I heard it ran on some pretty rollercoaster-y tracks too, but this is pretty straight, isn't it?" "Maybe we took a turn into sensible valley somewhere, because yes, they were. So very much. So very sinus-wave-y." "Aw. And I wanted to see Mr. Yanks His Sticks doing his thing on the up-and-down." "You have a dirty, filthy mind and I love you all." "While I'd normally appreciate hearing that, any love proclamation from you just sounds like incantations for ending the world." "That does indeed look like a very heavy sword. This is not false advertising." "Well, I am over the moon about this." "Or barely reaching it." "I am the king of overreaching." "And speaking of accuracy in advertising...." "Eagle Gun. It's an Eagle that's also a Gun. What about that is hard to understand?" "Nothing. Nothing about that is hard to understand. We just found it amusing until Mr. Statler Waldorf decided to chime in apropos of nothing anyone ever said." "Hilariously tiny locomotive in view." "And how would you know anything about hilarity? You do not understand the concept of funny, even on an elementary level." "And the Shinra people jumped off. Which sounds kinda tempting right now." "Hey, I'm not having any young whippersnappers jumping ship..." "It's a train." "And it's also an expression. Now, shaddup and listen to my lecture." "Stop train first, then lecture." "Nope! Lecture preceeds everything." "Even in the face of planetary destruction?" "Even in the face of planetary destruction." "How about in the face of planetary distraction?" "I have no clue what you're even talking about." "Well, let's take this moment to stop the train, then." "Oh, fine. I swear... kids today..." "Well... yanking some levers got us here, so yanking some levers should get us out of this as well." "Is it alright if I ask you not to get us all killed?" "No!" "Oh, come on! Be reasonable." "I'm old. I don't have time to be reasonable." "Everyone has time to be reasonable. Even when they're on a speeding, tiny death train." "I guess this works as an anti-theft function for Shinra trains." "What? Mindless, all-destroying pettiness and screw-you's?" "Yep." "Sounds like them, yeah." "Shut up, you're distracting me. Now, which way was up again?" "YOU'RE GOING TO GET US ALL KILLED!" "Oh, right. I was pulling levers, wasn't I?" "Would you please take this seriously?" "Hey, no reason to be rude." "I BEG TO DIFFER!" "We're approaching Corel and we haven't even slowed down a whit. STEP ON THE DAMN BRAKES!" "HOOUAAAAAAARGH!" "You wouldn't have said that, had you been on the little toy train with us." "Yes, he would." "No, he wouldn't." "Hey, no ganging up on me." "We had to. Your old man crankiness would've been the end of us." "Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't these the guys who ostracised Barret because... uh, he approved of the Shinra Power plant, like... oh, everyone else except Dyne?" "They blamed him for the explosion, not the power plant." "But wasn't it the power plant that actually exploded?" "Yes." "But how does that... how does that science?" "I dunno. Why don't we ask the guy who wanted to sell Shinra a regular rock?" "And speaking of rocks...." "The rock is indeed amazing, yes, so thank you for not selling it to Shinra." "Also, scars are something you get when wounds have healed. If we had anything from the battles a few hours ago, it'd be gashes. Or bruises." "I am Scarman." "And I am going to murder you if you ever make me try to imagine your naked body again. And then I'll report you to the nearest humanitarian organisation for inhumane methods of torture." "That is the tackiest building I have ever seem." "Tell me about it." "Well... yeah, it's a bit garish, isn't it?" "A bit garish? It looks like a bootleg Golden Saucer." "So... are we gonna burn that place down?" "No, we're going to enter it." ".......why?" "So... we're not fighting these Shinra soldiers trying to raid this cheapass popstand?" "No, we're hiring troops and deciding where they go and what they do." "......why?!" "I feel like I'm a part of the weirdest sandbox game ever. And I mean like... a real sandbox game. With shovels and kids holding toy cars and going 'brlbrlbrlbrlbrlbrl'." "And cheap toys?" "Yep." "Hey, you won't see me fingerpointing over that." "And his heart grew several sizes that day." "Oh, shaddup!" "So, is there any point to this?" "......." "Hehe. 'Point'? Get it? Because the finger-" "YESWEKNOWSHUTUP!" "Phooey! It's not fun when you two team up on me." "Well, how do you think that feels for me?!" "Yes, how do you thi... HEY!" "What? Did you realize you were wrong?" "Um... I don't think that's it." "Did you hear that?" "The guy going 'aaargh'? Yes I heard that." "THE EGG'S GONNA BLOW!" "OH MY GOD RUN FOR YOUR LI-..what?!" "See? You didn't believe me, and now the night has gone and it's a sunny day." "OK, now I'm just lost. More lost than when I was in my rocket that only had one exit. Lost, lost, lost." "Are you seriously going to just stand there like a lazy Chad?" "HE WAS FROZEN TODAY!" "By who? Phoenix? How does that make any sense?" "If that is a Phoenix, I'm a fat chocobo." "And if that is a fat chocobo, what does that make you?" "Goddamned Cid, that's who!" "Keepin' it real, huh?" "Damn straight!" "HE'S JUST DOWN THOSE STAIRS, YOU LAZY BAS-.." "Cid, let it go. It's not worth it." "That view must be amazing." "Oh, right. That's why we came here and did all of this." "Big McLargeHuge materia." "You call that a condor? I call that the largest rubber ducky in the world, and watching it move was... kinda unsettling." "I think he's being this reasonable just to troll us, because I can't believe what I'm hearing right now." "I know, right? Do you remember when we met him?" "Oh, I do. Most awkward tea party ever. Poor woman." "HEY! Don't you ruin my moment." "Yeah, why would I put in the effort when you can do that so well on your own. I sure learned my lesson today." "Oh, shaddup." "Yes, we must get to the SHINRA BASE before SHINRA does. You got a good head on your shoulders, Red. You do have shoulders, right?" "Now there is the Cid we know and.... know." "Um... OK. We have to hurry, but we should go see Cloud. We need to get to the Shinra base before Shinra, but we have time for this." "I can't help it. We have to abide by the rule of time in our worlds. Thing are never going to happen until we actually get there." "And you're being all nice again. Or were you planning on serving tea when we got there?" "Maybe, but what about you two? Did you both go to a big asshole sale or something?" "Ass on sale? I'd like to see that, come to think of it. Makes for a pretty hilarious mental image. Just think of the shelves." "Well, anyway, let's head over. I shall fear no tea." "I've not heard of a town called 'That Far-off Town'. Do you have the geolocation? Can you show me on Boogle Map? Any Snaprat shots of the town? Are you on Basehook?" "Cid, are you drunk?" "On your own tea?" "Did you put lard in it?" "Pfft, hee hee." "Wait, what? Why did you just raid his coffers and take his stuff?" "I'm a hero. I'm allowed to." "...is this part of the whole mechanic you keep talking about?" "And he's fine with it?!" "See? It's OK." "No, it's not! You just lucked out by encountering someone who is weirdly fine with it!" "Don't be jelly. When you get old, you can do anything you want." "Did we come at a bad time?" "We'll... uh, we'll come back later." "Yeah, we'll be right next door, having some... tea." "With lard?" "I'd rather not that, if you don't mind." "...Monty Python's Fl-.." "Not now!" "The lifestream is... what are we living on? A planet that's basically a water balloon filled with lifestream juice?" "That's kinda gross, but fine. Let's go with that. Now, get back to your tea. With lard." "Ew, that's gross." "YOU WERE THE ONE ASKING! Well... it is gross, I'm not saying it isn't, but...." "Seriously, watch me good, because I have the awesomest running animation." "What kept ya?" "I had to make sure Tifa watched me run over here." "Uh, OK? And also make sure she heard all the filth coming out of your mouth?" "The PG-rated filth?" "The PG-rated fiddlesticks." "Boy, that really is a Flying Circus, isn't it?" "Let's poke it in the groin." "Hey, pawse that thought for a second." "Can we wing this one?" "It ran away." "Goodbye, Sir Robin. May angels lull your head to sleep. Or was it fairies?" *shrug* "I 'unno." "We're all a bunch of romantics, aren't we?" "Yeah, a few more lethal puns, and he would have self-destructed." "Damn you, survival instinct." "Why d'ya have to jinx us? Why not go 'things couldn't possibly get any worse' while you're at it." "......." "What?!" "Do you hear me? Run for your life." "But Cloud is still in a wheelchair." "Well, then run and wheelchair for your life, then. Do I have to tell you everything?" "Yes." ".....uh, I didn't expect that answer." "Unless the lifestream makes the whole planet pop like a rotten grape, though. Then we're all screwed." "Well.... I guess I'll be making some wheelies, then. Later, Doc." "Like... right now. Top speed. Revving up as we speak. Did we release the wheelchair breaks? Because it's slammer time. Set the cruise control for cool. Because we are outta here." "....aaaaaany time now." "OH CRAP I SHOULDA SPENT LESS TIME TALKING, AND MORE TIME RUNNING!" "Duuur." "I REGRET NOTHING!" "...." "Wait, no, I regret everything!" "......" "Cloud, I'm sorry. I knew I shouldn't have stalled so much, but... Cloud? Are you there? Cloud?! Cloud Cloud Cloud Cloud Cloud!" "How could this happen to me?! I made my mistakes, got nowhere to run...." "....." "Literally." "Where is Tifa? As if caught in the easiest game of 'Where's Waldo' ever, Tifa finds herself in a world of blackness. How does one make the Lifestream-challenged wake up? Where does that journey take you? And will Tifa appreciate the experience?" "Boy, Cloud... your subconscious is really something, isn't it? Makes me wonder what mine would look like." ".............." "On second thought, I don't think I want to jump down that particular rabbit hole. I'm not sure I want to know myself that well." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Mar 10, 2020 9:52:09 GMT -5
Chapter 25: It's All in the Mind. "Are you listening, Cloud? I'm trying to help you here, the least you can do is show some signs of.... you know, life." "......" "And now I'm turning into a nagging wife. Great. This surely isn't going to drive me crazy or anything." "Tend-... oh wow, that is something I never thought I'd hear coming out of the mouth of a guy!" "Hey, that's sexist." "Well.... yeah, maybe, but I'm trying to imagine Barret saying something like that -- or even better: Cid -- and my mind immediately starts laughing like a lunatic." "I... can't blame you for that. But I'll do you one better: try to imagine Yuffie saying it." "Um.... yeah, I can't. Sorry." "It's OK. Now then.... are you ready for some tender feeling? Secret wishes?" "You kiddin' me, bro? I live for that sort of thing." "I mean... finding out that your life is a huge lie is never easy. Or that Sephiroth's been rummaging around in it. Or that your life has been one big failure. Or that..." "You lost me after 'I'll be here for you'." "Hey, no need to be rude. Or ungrateful." "Yes. We just went through the real version not that long ago, remember?" "......" "Well, a rebuilt version, granted, after it was burned to the ground, but... you know...." "A young, sexy, hot guy who just.... mmmmmm.... sorry, what were we talking about again?" "........my life?" "Oh. Haha. Uh... sorry." "What? My parents or Sephiroth's? You know that we can't influence any of this, right?" ".....yes." "Well... look on the bright side; at least Sephiroth can't butt in here and be a huge troll." "Yaaaaaay." "That's the least enthusiastic 'yaaaaay' I've ever heard." "Though in hindsight, I do find it amusing that the reason why he didn't mention who his father is was because... well...." "Hojo." "Genetics can be funny sometimes, huh?" "....yeah." "Well... I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm almost missing 'detached, cool Cloud'. You're going to get a crick in your neck if you're going to stand around like that." "You might wonder why we didn't tell you that from the start, but... uh.... yeah, that's a good question, actually." "Why didn't you?" "Timing is everything." "But I could have gone through more of my childhood or adolescence while also being reasonably mentally healthy?" "Timing is everything." "But.... my mental health." "TIMING IS EVERYTHING!" "And two mooks, but who cares about them?" "....." "I mean... what did they do with their lives?" ".....um..." "And I was so disappointed that Cloud didn't return anyway." "....well." "But anyway, where were we? Oh, me helping you through your problems. Isn't that nice of me?" ".....yes." "Yes. Let's... let's drag this experience to the breaking point." "That's the spirit." "Yaaay, psychiatry in baby steps." "Psychiatry is always about baby steps, Cloud." "Oh." "Though this must be the first time I've taken baby steps in the baby steps. However that works." "Remember all those stars? Jeez, that's awfully demanding of you." "No, I meant... *sigh* ...just the sky. Were you also this difficult as a child?" "....yes. I mean.... no." "Sure, she thought I was cute then, but... but...." "Um... don't worry. You're still quite the prettyboy today, Cloud." "Yeah, I'm sure. That's probably why Aeris put me in a dress." "I need to have a talk with her about that." "......" "Wait, I can't do that anymore, can I?" "Which doesn't make any sense, since that would imply that before we met again, you had no story. But then, Sephiroth is full of crap, so..." "But how much has he been my scriptwriter? That is the thing that keeps me up at night. And sitting on a well." "Um... little by little, Cloud. Let's do this slowly." "Tifa, if I need to do this any slower than I already am, I'm going to have to sit down." "And that's a bad idea because...?" "I dunno." "And you know, it's important to remember that.... you gotta beliiieeeeeve! I learned that from a flat, 2D cartoon dog." "Uh..." "Still better than taking advice from Sephiroth." "Oh, we're doing the 'still a better love story than Twilight' thing, huh? I can dig it." "Look, Tifa, I'm already confused enough as it is. Can we please not start arguing about semantics as well?" "Oh, so we are talking about memories. Just... really deep ones. Like... moody deep." "Well, we're having an argument in the lifestream, and I'm not even sure if I'm arguing with you or myself. Or both. Or neither. Anyway, real talk. About real memories." "Hmmm, OK, understandable. Desperate, but understandable. I guess if one thinks there's no such thing as bad publicity, anything that gets you noticed is a good thing." "Why, thank you, dr. Krüger." "And girls think boys are dense about their feelings." "That's a bit below the belt." "You use suspenders." "Um... that's not the point." "I mean... back when we were kids, before you asked me to come to the well, I barely even knew you existed." "......" ".....oh." "Am I going to regret this?" "If you have a heart... maybe?" "That answer makes me more afraid than anything else." "Oh dear lord, it's the 'tender memories' part. This does nothing to make me less afraid." "I thought you were the one who were going to be a pillar of support for me in this endeavour. Should I give you a shoulder to lean on, Tifa?" "I... might take you up on that. I'll add it to my desire to have you come rescue me." "Erm.... all the time?" "Of course not. I'm not crazy or anything, but you were kind of the top of the social chain in this tiny town." "....why?" "Because we were kids, and girls who do... shall we say 'less feminine things'... tend to be more popular with boys than those who don't, even if we never really understood why. Although the explanation might be as simple as 'people with similar interests just play better together'." "So... what about boys with feminine interests?" "Uh.... I wouldn't know. I was a loner, remember?" "Oh, right. You used to come around to my house just to stand around outside." "Aaaaand?" "Well, I honestly found that kind of weird." "Well, what did you do when the kids already inside told you I was there?" "I.... uh, kind of ignored you. I mean.... you didn't even knock on the door. You just stood there and stared!" "We never spoke, and I've never been in your room, but you thought we were close?" "Um.... well, everyone thought I was so nice." "Yeah, I mean... when you dragged us all along on your mountain hike, they all blamed me when everything went wrong, but I'm getting ahead of myself." "I was a weird kid, no question about that." "Boy, this thing turned really awkward, really quickly, didn't it?" "Yeah. Well, that's prepubescence for you." "So, you turned into a chuunibyou, basically?" "Um.... what exactly is that?" "Actually... never mind. Forget I asked." "I had to deal with a guy spending so much of his time standing outside of my room, staring in, and then suddenly that very person asked me to come to the well in the middle of the night." "Why?" "Um... well, you see... uh, nothing. I totally wasn't worried that you'd murder me, dump my body in the well and wear my dress." "Look, I'm not into wearing women's dresses, OK? That was totally Aeris's idea." " That's the assumption you take offense at?" "Huh? Oh! Yeah, I'm totally not into murdering little girls and dumping their corpses either. I promise." "I believe you, but I can also tell why we never learned whether there were any boys with feminine interests in our little sleepy hometown." "Well... before Sephiroth burned it to the ground, that is. And then Shinra rebuilt it and filled it up with actors who were told to live as the last inhabitants of the town did. I mean... it takes a lot to make this bizarre fever dream of my own past seem like the more normal version of events, doesn't it?" "Well, we're not done yet." "Is it kind of weird that, once you were beyond my reach, suddenly I was far more interested in you?" "Well.... yes, but.... we were kids?" "That's a 'get out of jail free' card in most situations, isn't it?" "Yep." *whew* "Good." " Most situations." "Oh, bugger!" "And we're back to that thing I mentioned earlier." "Oh. Well, I don't remember what that might have been because my mom died!" "Oh, don't worry, because I blame the adults for that." "Um... that's not how mountains work. Or death." "Yes, I know that now, but..." "We were once kids." "That's an Oscar bait movie title if I ever heard one." "Do we even have academy awards in this universe?" "Nah." "So... I know this bridge broke down during the flashback with Sephiroth from earlier, but it didn't break this time, right? I mean... you'd think the people living nearby would have just taken it down if it was that untrustworthy." "That would have been the sensible thing to do, yes." "We are sensible people, aren't we?" "Yep, deffo. Anyway, back to death mountain...." "And then they all blamed me for everything." "Well, I was unconscious for seven days, so there wasn't much I could do about that." "And why would they assume I brought you there when... you know, we never socialized much, did we? I'd assume they would blame the other boys instead -- or, you know, you making a rash decision in your grief -- but I guess I was just the easily available weirdo they didn't need to feel bad for blaming, huh?" "Yikes! Good thing I didn't die, then." "Indeed." "And this turned really awkward again." "Wait, so... when I later told you I dreamed about you coming to my rescue...." "No, that didn't have anything to do with this." "That must have done wonders for your public image, huh?" "Yeah, well, all the adults were pretty much 'See? We were right to mistrust him. He's out of control.' Which, as I'm sure you can imagine, did not make things better." "Yes, well... it would probably have helped. But, you know... concussions and fall damage." "In hindsight, 'fall damage' sounds like such a fun way of describing 'someone falling to their potential death, or at least various times of hospital bed-bound...edness'." "Well... no. But I already knew that." "Oh. Well, why the hugely dramatical moment?" "Because I was still controlled by Sephiroth, and I need to find out how that happened. And you know what they say about the past and stuff." "Uh.... I dunno." "Yeah, neither do I. Let's move on." "Um... why?" "Hey, if you're going to drag me back and forth all over the place, I'm going to get in on that fun." "....wut?" "Just kidding. No, something important happened there, I can feel it." "It better." "Oh, listen to Miss 'Let's Take Our Time' here." "I was.... there." "Where there?" "Here." "Where here? There?" "Everywhere." "And here it comes." "Waaaaaaait for it...." "I AM MOOK!" "I remember thinking 'Great! As if I needed one more reason to get nervous and fidgety whenever you got close to me'. Especially since you... uh, grew up. Quite a lot." "Oh, it wasn't you being all shy and stuff. I mean... you might not know this, but a lot of girls love being flirty with shy people and watch them get all fidgety. Well... at least during those formative teenage years." "Which we're still in, by the way." "Well... yeah. So....." "Uh....." "Hee hee. Still entertaining." *cough* "Anyway...." "I was the military version of a high-school dropout." "Now, now. As we established, it's not easy to become a part of SOLDIER! It's more like a very high-end college with some nefarious human experimenting on the side. I mean... you HAVE to WRITE the title in all-caps. It's that IMPORTANT!" "And Sephiroth's sarcasm certainly didn't help." "...yes, we're all very aware of that." "You even got the Princess carry you wanted so much." "I was unconscious. It didn't count." "Oh, come ON!" "But no pressure, hey." "Shush! Don't interrupt our moment." "Sorry." "And of course I got stabbed." "C'mon, Cloud. Believe in yourself." "But I totally ignored the pain, lifted him up by the sword piercing my chest and then threw him off the ledge like Darth Vader threw Palpatine into space." "TOO FAR!" "Which will probably be very shortly. Except for me. Even my lifestream dream self needed time to grow up. Or something." "Hey, don't make this complicated." "And everything you saw down here wasn't?" "Not in the same way, no." "You big failure. You need someone to look after you, don't you. Not that I really care that much about you, but I guess I can do that if you really need me to." "Uh... Tifa, I'm not into tsunderes." "Oh. Well... let's just go, then." "Anyway, how do we do that?" "....um... I dunno." "What?!" "OK, don't worry. I'll figure something out." "Got it! We'll take the magical elevator." "That makes no sense, but whatever. I just want to get the hell out of here now." "But we had such fun times." "Yeah, sure. I just had to endure all my life's failures and embarrassments in an astoundingly short time, and pretty soon, I'll have to relive all that with the rest of our team. They're waiting for us, aren't they? If they haven't all ran away screaming, that is." "I wouldn't know. I've spent most of the last couple of days staring at you, sitting in your little wheelchair; drool running down your adorable face." "Oh, for the love of... did the others see that too?" "Some of them, yeah." "...I think I want to go back down." "Now, now, Cloud. Be brave." "He's right behind me, isn't he?" "Well... yeah. And...?" "Nothing. I've just always wanted to say that." "....you're being weird." "Yeah, well, if that's the worst thing I've even been, I should be fine." "I guess." "Is this the kind of conversation you had inside the lifestream too?" "Yeah! Cool, isn't it?" "No." "Rude." "Well, at least our little SOLDIER boy is back. That's gotta count for something." "Not really." "You still got some life stream on you. Go take a shower." "No, that's not what I meant." "What did she mean? Oh, but we already know all that, don't we? But how can you know yourself? How can anyone? Where do we all go from here?" "Can we ever repent? The things we have done?" "Sure. Ya just gotta get on that train and then blow it up. With bombs." "So there is a way to get offa this train?" "I guess. Explosions fix everything." "Will the two of you shut up! I have the worst headache right now." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Apr 7, 2020 18:19:22 GMT -5
Chapter 27: We're Coco For Chocobos. "....no, you're totally not doing this for the money. Nosiree. I'm sure those 10000 gil per stable is just a symbolic payment." "The economy is going into the toilet, huh?" "Damn that Sephiroth and his anti-capitalist ways." "I think Sephiroth's got bigger issues than just a case of the anti-capitalism. Besides, capitalism is good for the economy. Or something." "It depends on whose economy, but sure." "You gotta be on top of the economy, or the economy is going to be on top of you." "Unless it's not about the money. Then it's just a bit about the economy." "It's a shame we don't have Zack around. He'd set us straight." "I might've been just a drooling vegetable during our escape, but... no. No, he wouldn't." "I'm not planning on taking the chocobo out on dates. And the way you're airquoting 'Chocobo stable' just makes it sound like you're talking about a love hotel." "Country people are weird, man." "Aren't you a country person, though?" "I'm a mountain person. A mountain lion, thank you very much." "Aren't you supposed to have a thick mane of fur around your neck?" "I'm not that kind of lion." "No, you're the kind whose tip of their tail is on fire." "And that makes all the difference." "Well, it does." "How?" "Well, we're like country people, just not weird." "...uh.." "I plead the fifth." *sigh* "Oh, fine. The world is facing imminent meteor doom, but let's go chase some birds. We got all the time in the world, after all." "But first, we need to gather nuts." "And we do this by killing giant dinosaurs?" "Dinosaur nuts are known to be good for chocobo breeding." "You really are a country girl, aren't you?" "Yes, well... I might've lived in a city up until recently, but I guess I will always be a weird country girl at heart." "Well, I learned something new today: when you punch a goblin in the nuts, they fall off." "I... did not need to know that." "Let's pick them up and feed them to the chocobo." "Can we please stop making things weird?" "We're hunting goblins and dinosaurs for their nuts. How is this not weird already?" "Besides, how can it be considered stealing when the goblin is dead? They won't be needing them where they're going." "I have a headache." "Well, time to get some chocobos. We got... scarily gigantic chocobo tracks here, so...." "Are we looking for Chocozilla or something?" "It could probably ride our airship rather than us riding it." "A chocobo!" "Now, let's quietly murder the two spirals guarding it before it runs off." "We are very solution-oriented. Good to have on the CV." "We'll be looking for new jobs when all of this is over, won't we?" "I hope bureaucracy hasn't evolved too far. Paperwork is no fun." "You just want to punch in, punch and then punch out, huh?" "Yep. Life is like a punch. You just have to deal out some good ones, and you'll be set." "Yes, let's just send the chocobo to the stables. I'm sure it'll find itself to its captivity all on its own." "That's how it goes." "One day, giant underwater snake...." "We do not forgive, we do not forget." "Um...." "It forced us to catch a chocobo to get around it, or it'd attack and eat us up." "Well, yes, clearly that's the biggest crime. Forget Sephiroth and Hojo doing weird stuff, the giant underwater snake is the real evil here." "Um... I'm not the one who's going to boink chocobos." "I know. What the hell are you talking about?" "Yes, that's the nut I want. And why are you airquoting 'nut'? What is it with you people and making this sound all wrong?" "Must be a human thing." "Well, I don't want to give it a 'different "nut"' if that's alright." "Alrighty, that's enough dirty talk outta you two." "Hey, I'm not doing this on purpose. Besides, you were the one who started it." "Am not!" "OK, enough already." "Oh, we already got a blue one. Take that, Mr. Chocobo Sage. All your hard work, and we finished ours in a day." "Chocobo gestation periods are short, huh?" "And the egg barely had time to hit the ground before the choco inside cracked it open too." "OK, we have one blue and one green chocobo. What's next on our agenda?" "Black one. But before that, we need to take our two chocos racing." "Erm... I guess because the chance we get a black one is raised when they're well travelled? Makes sense, I guess." "Not really, but let's just roll with it." "Whoa, easy now, tough guy." "There are many ways to deal with impending doom, I guess." "Well, at least they've moved away from blaming someone for all their misfortune when it couldn't possibly have been their fault to begin with." "....yeah, you got a point. Kick that great meteor in the sky, tough guy. I'll be rootin' for ya." "Rootin' and tootin'." "Anyway, here we are. Let's get fast." "So, after this, do we go to Event Ghost Speed Station or Battle Round Wonder Station?" "Places so awesome that they need four entrances each." "Give me the full tour!" "You got it. Try not to throw up." "Nah, I'm fine with poultry riding. This isn't going to be a problem." "No, that's not it. Just... well, you'll see." "Well, I did take the short route when I had to race for my freedom, huh?" "Yes, well, you didn't have the freedom to choose, so...." "......" "Oh ho ho ho ho." "....and I was so proud of our blue chocobo, but just look at this. How do you make a red chocobo? Or heck, how do you make a white chocobo?!" "Man, I'm off to a super lead already, but I feel so down after facing this rainbow cornucopia of colors, knowing I can probably never obtain half of those." "Oh, that's lovely. A pastoral forest scenery that we're speeding past inGAH! Visual overload. But I just took left at...." "The underwater tunnel. I think they're doing it wrong. It's no fun getting a mouthful of water every time I say something." "Well, this is... fairly normal. So far so good. I wonder what that warning was all about. It's hard to throw up when you have a mouth full of water." "WHOA OK THIS IS NOT RIGHT! REALITY IS WARPING AROUND ME... I... *urp*" " "I can... *urp* ...breathe again. Somewhat. Wow, that was mindbendy and stuff. I need some balance readjustments when this race is done." "I won. Yay. Now I just... have to do this many, many times more." "....." "A BUCKET FOR MONSIEUR!" *several races later* "WE HAVE A NINJA CHOCOBO!" "I'm gonna tell Yuffie." "OK." "Uh... OK?" "Yes. What?" "I didn't expect that reaction?" "Well, what is she gonna do about it? Steal all my materia again?" "You could at least pretend to be nervous." "Oh, we're bringing out the big nuts now." "....." "Um... no innuendo intended." "Well, we have a lot of nuts." "Let our nuts put some colors on their cheeks." "......" "OK, that sounded much funnier in my head. So please stop staring." "Yes, let's ride our golden goose." "Why does a golden chocobo look like a regular yellow one with the contrast adjusted all the way down?" "Chocobo Jesus passes the test." "So we can go anywhere on this chocobo. That's quite something." "It even doesn't seem to mind a carnivore sitting on its back." "Probably because it knows if you start acting all carnivorous, well.... the ocean is deep." "Uh.... point taken. I totally could swim back, though." "Welcome to cup island." "Oh. There's a cave, but it's also all foresty and stuff, so we couldn't have landed our airship here." "So.... someone basically hid away a treasure in a cave, where you'd need a golden chocobo to reach. Clever." "You have to delve deep into the subjects of breeding and nuts to reach this most elusive of treasures." "And quite possibly racing too." "It's an insidious system. Probably sponsored by the Golden Saucer." "I wonder if the Chocobo Sage is in on this." "I sense a conspiracy." "Knights of round?" "So... there were twelve knights, right? And King Arthur?" "What kind of lore is that anyway?" "It sounds very British." "What's 'British'?" "I dunno. Must be some alien planet or something." "Well, anyway, I know exactly where to test this bad boy out." "Not motivated by revenge, I'm sure." "It shall feel my thirteen rounds of pain." "Oooh, it's a big one. This is gonna be so good!" "Do I have time to get in a punch before you unleash the beast?" "Hey!" "No, I mean... never mind. Punchy punchy." "Alrighty, enough of that. Let's get this show on the road." "UUUUUULTIMATE EEEEEEEEEEND!" "OK, let's not get too ominous here." "Holy crap, they're all taking turns too." "Bullying the snake." "Bullying it back. Remember when we were all low-level and weak? It showed us no mercy then, so why should I do so now?" "You don't think it was just upset because Sephiroth killed its mate?" "No! Now shut up, here comes the grand finale." "A grand finale? After all this?" "Sssssh." "King Arthur shattered reality." "Told you he was an alien." "Alien schmalien. It had that coming." "If you say so." "And so, our little sidetracking with the chocobo is over, and our band of heroes are back to looking for answers to the big questions in life. With impending doom still looming overhead, it's important to focus on the problem and search for the right answer." "That's... good to know." "Thank you, sleeping man." "Maybe we should leave before we wake him up?" "I wonder if he's going to wake up and think he had the strangest dream ever." "Narcolepsy shall be defeated one day, I'm sure." "The meteor dropping will surely wake him up, though." "Unless we'll put a stop to it. Then he will probably never wake up." "Please don't put a depressing angle on us saving the world, Cloud." To be continued....
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Post by skylark on Apr 7, 2020 18:50:14 GMT -5
Just what I needed. A reminder that Remake is sitting on my console locked for two more days. *kappa* Good stuff as always.
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Post by northlander on Apr 11, 2020 11:41:38 GMT -5
Chapter 28: Yuffie the Tower Toppler.... and Other Loose Ends. "And we have.... another square cave." "What are we? Spelunkers Incorporated now?" "Corporates fix everything." "........." "Too soon?" "Too soon." "Oh hey. We can swap our HP and MP now." "Just in case we'd ever want a permanent three-digit HP." "Well, if we don't mind a whole lot of swapping, we might have an infinite MP pool with that one. Like... heal yourself up completely, swap it and get 9999MP, heal up again so you'll get 999 MP when you swap back. Or close to that. It's cumbersome, yeah, but when you're in a pinch..." "Oh, now that's thinking outside the box." "Anyway, we have another stop to make, and... you might want to sit this one out, Nanaki. It's.... not going to be very fun." "Are you sure? You do know that I wouldn't dream on ditching you for whatever perils we face, right?" "Well, you see... our next stop is... hey, Vincent? This next stop is you dealing with your past." "......I'll be cheering you on from the sidelines." "My hero." "You called?" "And you want me to come along for this?" "Yeah, well... we're dealing with the results of another woman's... bizarre decisions. I'd love your input on that." "Are you going to hold them against me?" "Of course not. Why'd I want to do that?" "I.... still think you're going to get a lot more amusement out of this than I am." "I plead the fifth." "Uuuurgh! Do I have to do this?" "No, you can skip out any time you want." "And if I did, you'd never let me live it down." "I've learned from the best." "Hey, I think I was rather nice during our little dive into your past." "Just evening out the odds." "That's so unfair." "Oh, this is going to be good." "Uuuuurgh!" "Oh, Lucrecia. How could you choose Hojo over me?" "If that had been anyone except Hojo, I could probably come up with a hundred reasons, but.... Hojo. Hojo!" "I just... hee hee... can't compute the absolute absurdity of the situation. It's like when we met Hojo on the beach back in Costa del Sol." "Ooof. Tell me about it. And the worst part is; he had all those beach bimbos attracted to him, but he'd rather see a lion boink a country waif." "And yet, Lucrecia went for that. That's... fishing for some low standards." "I can hear you both, you know." "We are like made for each other." "Our love shall always science." "We shall make the child of the future." "Urrrrrrgh!" "What's the problem? We're only experimenting on our baby." "Yes, Vincent. Our child shall be the perfect marriage of love and science." "She wouldn't go along with the idea of having a threesome with a Tonberry so I could genetically incorporate their grudge ability, though." "Oh, my husband so silly. No, my bed is only for you." "Uuuuuurgh!" "Wow, I'm... actually starting to feel kind of bad for witnessing this." "It's... not entirely unheard of that a woman might care about a potential partner's... standing, but there's a limit to how much creepiness we're willing to endure because of that. And Hojo shot past that, sitting on a rocket and shouting 'YEEE HAW' while waving around his cowboy hat." "Although trying to mentally imagine that....." "I have an easier time with that than imagining Hojo as happily married, but the latter actually happened." "It boggles the mind. And poisons it from the inside." "Uuuuuuuuuuuuurgh!" "And well, we all know how that turned out, didn't we?" "The first time I met him, I never woulda guessed, to be honest. Before... well, the incident... Sephiroth was actually quite well balanced. Admirable, even." "And then, he burned a whole village down." "And now he wants to smash a giant rock into our planet." "I'm... kind of glad I didn't contribute to that, but..." "Lost for words there, buddy?" "....yes. It sucks!" "You... watched them?" "And Lucrecia was fine with that?" ".....yes." "Is that woman the devil?" "The worst part is that she never knew my feelings for her. She just assumed I was happy for them." "Cluelessness really is the most terrifying power in this world. The harm it can do borders on the insane." "Well, once you throw your lot in with Hojo....." "Enough, Cloud. Please. I promise I won't ever compare you to anyone, or hold the actions of... lesser men... against you for gender purposes." "Seriously, Hojo was... like, the head of research of Shinra, and even that... wait, that did work in his favor, didn't it?" "Uuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrgh!" "Well, for one thing, you coulda picked a better father." "Like me?" "Um.... sure." "You don't show much confidence about that." "Well... you would be a better choice than Hojo." " Anyone would be a better choice than Hojo. Right?" "Hmmmm." "Aside from the huge jab to my pride, I have been a bit out of the loop lately. Who else might compete with Hojo for female appeal?" "Or lack thereof." "Rufus aside -- he is kind of handsome despite his... unsettling nihilism -- I guess Heidegger would be kind of offputting to think of as a partner. And Palmer." "You don't want any lard in the relationship, huh?" "Um... what about Cid?" "Oof, that's a tough one. He's a bit ouside of my age range, and he's such a cranky old man on top of it all, but... I have to say him being so into his dream of going into space is... appealing?" "Which is kind of the reason why I sent myself flying in Shinra's direction." "Ha ha yeah, that kinda backfired for the both of us, huh?" "Well, I was the one who did that to impress women." "You're making me feel like I'm complicit in this." "Better than being complacent, I guess." "You two make no sense anymore." "Cloud, can I... punch her in the face? Please?" "Punch?" "Yes." "Wow, punch, huh? Even Scarlet got nothing more than a slap across the cheek." "Scarlet was just annoying. I mean... yeah, she did put me in the gas chamber and wanted to televise our deaths, but this woman... this... this woman.... I have no words for how much she makes me angry. And I can't even say it's for Vincent's sake either, because I find him kinda intolerable too. But this woman here... I must end her before her stupidity spreads." "Haha, wow, Vincent. Short, direct and cruel. Gotten over her, have we?" "I'm... I'm going cold turkey on this. No more pain." "Why you didn't do that before you let Hojo turn you into Dracula's wankier cousin, I have no idea." "I didn't let them. It was... my punishment." "There you go again. You want me to slap you in the back of your head when you start waxing angstological again?" "Please do." "Wowza. With my sword? The flat edge, I promise." "Don't push your luck." "Well, anyway, let's have a change of scenery for a bit." "Um... meteor? Cloud, we wasted so much time breeding chocobos." "That was no waste. We got the awesomest of materia, and we can even copy its effect now." "Alright, so... we're hunting for more stuff to help us in our fight against Sephiroth, then?" "You got it. I think it's safe to say we'll be needing all the help we can get here." "Mushrooms?" "More importantly, what's with the tongue plant? Or the big flytrap thing right below it? Are they competitors or do they cooperate?" "Maybe the tongue plant is a messy eater, so the plant below it will feed on the leftover crumbs." "Yeah, makes sense." "I've just returned to your party, and you're already weirding me out here. Was the 'Vincent's EX' visit that bad?" "She wasn't his EX, since they were never in a relationship, but..... uuuuuurrrrgh!" "Yeah, I thought it was going to be more entertaining than it really was." "This one is for you, Tifa." "OK... one: I'm not big on slashfics. That was Aeris's thing, and two: I don't use a sword. That's not my thing." "OK, if you don't want it, but 'slash-all' is just a name. I'm sure it works just as fine as a 'punch-all', and I was actually kind of looking forward to seeing you punch, and then everyone would reel from it." "Hmmm.... sounds fun, actually." "As for the slash thing you mentioned, that's... on you." "Uh... yeah, forget I ever said that." "Oh, that's lovely." "The pitcher-plant jumping route paid off." "Don't make this sound weird." "Oh, it's a little too late for that." "I don't want to hear that from someone who skipped out on the Lucrecia saga." "Yeah, I was only nearly an entry in Hojo's porn collection. Nothing to speak of." "Grrr. Touché. You win this one, cat!" "Oh, there we go. Typhon materia." "Summon the wind like the wind." "Well, the summons we've seen so far have been pretty cool-looking. I'm sure this one will be even better." "Well, time to grind down some tongue-vine and hit the root of this problem." "And this is somehow less weird than the Lucrecia saga?" "Well... maybe it's not less weird. Just a whole lot less offputting." "Yeah, it's like... Hojo science is when you take all common courtesy out of it, and completely lean on 'results over everything', and then slather 'anything goes' on the 'results' scales." "Why do I get the feeling that Hojo was all about mashing stuff together to see what would happen? Like... his first experiment was probably just mixing together a little bit of everything found in the kitchen and drinking it." "We have received the apocalypse." "Nice. Shall we unleash it right away, or are we saving it for a later occasion." "Uh... have you been infected by Sephirothitis or something?" "Let's unleash it on Sephiroth." "I can live with that." "You always have the limit break active on your vengeance stat, huh?" "Welp, apocalypse is still there, waiting to happen." "Let's hijack it and turn it around." "Tifa, power slam it." "....." "I almost said power SLAP there a second." "Oh, I gave all my power slaps to Scarlet. She probably looks like she's got the worst case of the mumps right now. That stupid woman thought trying to make me use the flat of my hand would save her. She was wrong." "And weirdly enough, despite knowing this, I don't feel the least bit sorry for her." "How could any of you know the meaning of suffering." "Yeah, yeah, that's enough outta you." "Not quite. There's one thing I must do." "Oh? What's that?" "Vincent, why are we back in this place?" "Yeah, we've already established that Lucrecia was kind of a terrible person. See, she even left you 'Death Penalty' and 'Chaos' just because you told her Sephiroth was dead." "........." "I already hate the whole 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' expression enough as it is, so to hear it from a woman who was the one to do the actual scorning and being too big of an idiot to understand it, I just.... uuuuurgh!" "Fair enough. Vincent, grab your Death Penalty and Chaos and let's go." "Death Penalty is a gun, Cloud. She gave me a gun. And my final form." "There you go with your chuni nonsense again." "No, it's an actual gun. See? It's all rifle-like and stuff." "Oh. Well... OK, then." "So... in our last lootin' run, let's make sure we go through as many places as we can. What'cha got for us, Nanaki's home town?" "I'm so glad you thought of us, Cloud." "....he said with a completely deadpan voice." "Full Cure and... Fourth Bracelet?" "But we never found the first, second and third bracelet." "Clearly, we haven't looted hard enough." "We have shamed our generation of RPG adventurers." "Hey, I got a suggestion for how to deal with that shame." "You do?" "Yep. You're gonna love it." "Oh, the tower. I remember something about climbing pagodas or something. We gonna do that?" "Well, we all are. That is to say, your contributions to this will be walking stairs." "Oh. Well, that's... uh, great." "It's a task of great importance." "Yyyeah, you don't have to do the condescending overselling child-talking to me, Yuffie. I'll walk the damn stairs to see where we're going with this." "Yuffie, you know... for this to be a super-duper important quest and challenge to undertake, why are we being greeted as if we're going shopping at a mall?" *sigh* "You remember how I got all angry because they treated this town like a tourist trap? Well... learned responses and all that." "I... see." "So yes, from what I heard, we used to drama up this challenge with loud, bombastic lines, and I was hoping to take part in that fun. But nope, we're going to complete this, and they'll be all 'thank you for climbing our stairs. Please come back.' Stupid, huh?" "Oof." "What's next? Customer feedback? Because they care?" "Nanaki, please don't give them any ideas." "Oh, look. 'Sacred' Gorky now look like a demon. Kinda." "Thou shalt not judge by looks, prettyboy." "Touché, I guess." "Hey, I won over here. How about you being happy for me?" "Oh. Congrats." "Yes, very congratulations." "Many congratulations for you." *sigh* "Could you at least sound like you mean it?" "Uh.... aren't you a girl? Where do you get off telling me I 'fight well for a girl'?" "I'm not a girl. I just know how to look pretty." "So, you're basically just your average garden variety jerk. Got it." "Maybe, but I'm still a jerk you have to defeat. If you think you can." "So, just because you don't get angry, that makes you think you have the right to be a complete jerk?" "But of course." "You're just a little troll, that's what you are. And you are going down." "In your dreams." *sigh* "Let's just start." "Yes yes, still not in a position to judge." "I thought when she stole all our materia was a pretty good troll move, though." "It was." "H-hey! Don't forget that Don Cornholio wanted to make me his bride. That sucked so bad!" "Well, at least you didn't have to crossdress for it." "She's already dressed like a boy, though. And a brat." "Cloud, sometimes it's not worth the trouble going up against someone who has specialized in pushing people's buttons. He has challenged me to a fight, so you better believe I'm going to enjoy the heck out of that instead." "So, you're the kind to beat up people who hurt your widdle feelings?" "Just the ones who challenge me to a fight." "Hey, she hasn't even fought you yet." "Yes, well... you just lost, didn't you? And you know what that means, right?" ".....oh." "You do everything quickly, don't you? Even your screwups and your mental farts." "Oh, shut up, or I'll... um...." "Yeah, you baited me into that, and I paid dividends. So now the ball is in your court, little man." "Man, Yuffie's really enjoying her victory, isn't she?" "As if you wouldn't." "Heh. Well played, tomboy. Now get your ass to those stairs and get a-climbin'." "Look, I know I was kidnapped by a porky doofus who likes their girls a little... young... but I can totally defeat you." "Ho ho ho. Chekhov, I think she's trying to make you underestimate her." "Oh, I knooooow. She's got insurance, and if that's not a sick burn, I don't know what is." "OK, I coulda come up with something better, but I'm here to fight, not crack jokes. Shaddup!" "....um, why would you think tiny radish form would pose a bigger challenge than flying devil man?" "You've clearly never met a Tonberry, or you wouldn't be as high and mighty." "No, I haven't. Why?" "Because they are maybe the most adorable beings you've ever seen when you meet them, but they can shank you in ways only bosses' ultimate attacks can. That's why." "I'll take your word for it. In fact, I shall ponder this as I ascend the stairs once more." "Oh. Wait, I just lost, didn't I?" "And you didn't even notice. WHO'S THE NINJA?! TELL ME AGAIN: WHO IS THE NINJA?!" "So... are there times when you don't use your full power? Like... do you have off days where you don't feel like giving it your all?" "Um... no? I was just trying to intimidate you, you know. Like... 'if you had chosen any other day, I'd be more laisses faire about this, but not today, sistah!' I guess that was kind of redundant, huh?" "Well, I sorta expected you to go 'I have to take this fight seriously' in the middle of the fight or something, and then I'd start losing rather badly." "This isn't a tedious, long-winded shounen fightfest, Yuffie. Or do you want this fight to last for hours and hours and hours?" "I'd rather not if that's OK." "Swingin' your ball there, Stan?" "I got some to spare." "I... that joke backfired on me, didn't it?" "Yes, Yuffie. Yes, it did." "Now, never joke about his balls again." "Gotcha. I'll just kick his ass instead." "......" "I can joke about his ass, right? His ass is safe, right?" "That... remains to be seen." "OK, fine. Kick now, joke later." "Oh hey, the troll is back." "Who cares? You have improved, whatever that means." "I have levelled? Many, many levels? Of course my stats would improve if that happened." "Uh... why do you overemphasize 'HIM' so much? Oh dear lord, please don't tell me...." "Dad, I... can't believe I'm saying this, but this reveal is weirding me out so much, I'm almost wishing you were back to that perpetually half-asleep weirdo who kept shouting random words as he pleased." "COME AT ME GIRL! HOLD NOTHING BACK! KILL, KILL, KILL!" "....and now you're just a weirdo who's very much awake and shouting really awkward, creepy things." "Omni? I can't deal with Omni. Are you going to turn into a giant ball? I ran out of ball jokes already." "Uh... that's OZMA!" "Oh. Well... no ball jokes then." "No need to flip out over it." "Heh, that's a fun image. Well, time to win a fight." "KILL! KILL! KIIIIIILLLLLLL!" "Dad, please... I love you and all, but.... shut up!" "Did they kill each other?" "I can hear them heaving, so... I guess not?" "This is the weirdest standup show I've ever seen." "Tell me about it." "Really? You have this amazing battle materia, and you can only keep it here in the tower? What do you use it for? The yearly spring cleaning? Flushing your favorite toilet?" "Toys are the most fun when they're stored away, huh?" "Well, we shouldn't treat summon materia as a toy, but I see your point. I always have." "Yep. That's why I'm giving it for you to take outside. Waterbomb the world, Yuffie. Leave the mark of Wutai on everyone. Make them all wet." "Uh....." "Um... just ignore that. Dad's a bit.... behind on the innuendo train." "Yes." "Um..... I didn't expect you to be so... singleminded. I have no rebuttal to this." "Thought so." "Except this: eat me. Maybe if you were all to fight me at the same time, right now, you might win." "And one of those tourists kidnappened me and trussed me up as an eye of a statue. Could you even imagine that humiliation?" "Uh... I'd rather not." "But when I drop by to climb the tower, THEN you appear?" "Yep." "Don't ever start making any sense, you old fart." "....can I go now? Please?" "Beating enemies." "Beating enemies." "Definitely beating enemies." "I guess the jury's still out on this one." "OK, fine, I'll beat some more enemies. I thought showing off would lead to less bloodshed, but of course I had to be right about that, and right is boring." "Blah blah blah blah zen talk. People only care about kicking ass. And being on the right side. We just need to make sure to be on the winning side, because only those get to write our history." "It sounds kind of sinister when you put it like that." "Then you get to do it for the rest of your days, or until you have kids yourself." "Damned if I do, damned if I don't, huh?" "Nice callback on the tsundere 'sure, we'll take her along, but only because we've got nothing better to do' thing there, Cloud." "Oh, shaddup." "Ohoho, now you're on my wavelength, dad." "Better late than never." "Um.... I don't see how, but whatever. I just want to go now, so I'll agree with anything you say so you'll let me leave." "Yeah, sure, pray away. I'm going to go out and defeat enemies, for it is the way." "Ninja zen. It involves lots of asskicking." "That's how it has always been and must always be." "Sometimes, the smallest feet can lead to the largest bruises." "OK, we should go before you all catch ninjaitis." "Wait, is this... the mime materia we referred to earlier?" "Yes, I think it is." "We just broke time, didn't we?" "Hey, I'm old. Shut up!" "Yes, well... we all knew how that went, don't we?" "So... to get this message, I had to play a piano -- which I can't, by the way; I never took lessons -- and then somehow, I was supposed to find it in the music sheet." "Erm... so why is there a piano in your room anyway?" "My parents were hoping I'd find something more interesting to do than martial arts. Something more... feminine, I guess." "Well, it's not like girls with more boyish interests are... unappealing to boys. Rather the opposite, in fact." "Thaaaaaat might be part of the reason too." "It's nice to know that boys that are interested in girls are really evil deep inside. That's exactly the kind of demonizing we need." "It sucks for both parties, doesn't it?" "At least you had the chance to know my tender feelings." "Screw everyone else, I guess. I mean... I only had a sword through my chest, so why wouldn't he just put us in tanks and infect us with Jenova. Your master saved you, and that's what's important." "So, you're saying you cared about anyone not me when you returned to throw Sephiroth down a giant hole?" "Uh.... yes, of course." "Uh... so... yes, good to know. I mean... good that he did all that, given that he didn't like the city and he sucked at healing magic." "He was a bit of a strange master. If it didn't revolve around punching or kicking, he wasn't very good at it." "That's... specializing to a rather disturbing degree. Though I'm not in a position to judge, I guess." "Especially not when you're unconscious in a tank." "So... he came back to this town, and hid this letter in a piano that might not actually have existed in your original room?" "Well... honestly, it doesn't really matter whether it did. We only really had to come here again to find it, which is amazing enough as it is, given that most people wouldn't want to return to a place where their lives were basically ruined." "And then hide it behind an obscure melody that we have to play... well, not perfectly, at least." "Yay for small blessings." "......." "What?" "I plead the fifth." "If Aeris was still around, she'd be mad at you for saying that." "Yyyyeah, she'd be mad at me any time I referred to the size of anything with the words 'large' or 'small', so I hope you'll excuse me if I'm none too upset at something that's basically out of my control." "Well, if by saying 'the town reeks of Shinra', they really mean 'the town turned really, really creepy', then... yes, definitely." "Yeah, remember when we came back here and everyone was all nice and 'I've lived here all my life'. Which sounds nice enough to anyone who hasn't spent their childhood here!" "Especially if it's spearheaded by the organisation that created mr. 'Your Life Is A Lie, And I'm Going To Prove It By Trolling You Into Submission'." "I lament his ability to jump. That is very important for a martial artist. Those jumping spin kicks don't just happen by themselves." "I... don't think I've ever seen you jump, though." "Um..... yeah, I did that once in a martial arts tournament, after which it looked like someone had blazed in and glued googly-eyes on every audience member, so... yeah. I'm careful about jumping now." "Oh. Uh... sorry, I shoulda seen that coming." "....." "As you can probably tell, I haven't been around girls much. "Well, I guess it's time to move on." "And that leads us back to the city of bones? Well... more like camp of bones." "I think if we're going to do side stuff, it's probably best to get the most unpleasant one out of the way as soon as we can." "Wh.... what kind of selection of anwers is that?! Am I going to run away? Again? What am I doing? What are you doing? What are we all doing?" "Um... that's the answers you are giving." "I know. And that's why I'm upset. Give me some normal answers, damn it!" "Yeah well, it's not gonna be the end of the planet if I have anything to say about it." "Yeah, you go, girlfr... er, I mean boyfrieeeeend." "....." "I wish." "Urgh, the key to sector 5. This will not be fun. Anyway, were you saying something, Tifa?" "Uh... nothing important." "No, just a declaration of OOF!" "A declaration of 'oof'?" "It was nothing." "Well, you can certainly still jump." "I've probably said it before, but now that I'm on the outside looking in, I can't for the life of me imagine why anyone would want to live there... unless they're filthy stinking rich." "Even then.... wouldn't Shinra just take all their money? Like... through taxes?" "The old president, probably. Rufus seems to be fine with terror, which isn't neccesarily expensive to produce." "Sure, if you look past the human lives it takes. You know, like how they just dropped a whole city block on another city block and probably killed almost everyone in the process. And then also had anyone who knew about the plan killed to make sure they wouldn't squeal." "Nice city block you have here. Would be a shame if anything happened to it. And the one above you." "Oh, way ahead of you, pal. We already went and dug it up." "That's foresight for ya." "So... anyway, what are we doing in here?" "Yeah, I'm curious too." "...oh." "A little remainder of the past, a church in the ruins of overambition and corporate greed, with no mind and thought of consequences. What symbol remains of the purity of the light, the goodness in people? What existential crises are too big for the human heart to handle? But more importantly, can I have my Academy Art statue now?" "She ded." "Cloud!" "Well, they're crying now." "Good job, you insensitive jerk." "I was just trying to not be so down about it." "There is a fine line between bringing someone down gently and being completely goddamned ridiculous about it, and I think I know which side you are on there." "OK, children, listen to me for a little bit. Aeris... well, she isn't with us anymore, and I know that really hurts. It's OK. That's what separation does, and you're not wrong to feel sad about it. But she died trying her best to protect the whole world from an evil, evil man, and now she's become one with the lifestream, where she'll look out for all of us. And Aeris loved flowers, because she always thought our world could use more pretty colors. That's why I hope I can ask you two to keep an eye on the flowers in her absence. The area outside her home was full of flowers, but this place was always her favorite, so can you two do that? Could you do it for her?" "......" "W-what the heck?! That was beautiful! Why was that not your plan A? I just... I don't understand you sometimes." "I'm... I'm not crying. It's just... pollen in my eyes. Yeah, that's it. Just allergies." To be continued....
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Post by northlander on Apr 28, 2020 16:57:53 GMT -5
Chapter 29: Nice Submarine. "Well... I only knew him as the rambling madman who lived in a pipe, but he really went places, didn't he?" "That's an ominous way of putting it, yeah, but he was probably already there when Sephiroth screwed us all over." "And because he left Nibelheim, he never got to SALTZA!" "What an empty life: nothing but blind worship and tube TV." "Well, either we will win, or Sephiroth will drop a meteor on our heads and laugh all the way to the bank." "Seeing Sephiroth gloating is just the most inflammatory thing ever. We have to put a wrench in his face!" "Um... that's in his plans." "Nope. I'm going to glue a wrench to both my gloves, and ram them right through his teeth." "Right. Well... whatever works for you." "If I do that, he's going to look so stupid if he tries to smile." "Yyyyes, well, no need to elaborate." "Um... isn't that kind of beside the point?" "Well, you can't really depend on SOLDIER, so this guy's just gonna have to stop farting and get standing." "....." "Wait, where was I going with this?" "Don't ask me! You were the one who started the whole farting/standing dichotomy." "You can do both at the same time, you know?" "And to think I meant for the farting around thing to be an expression that didn't have anything to do with expelling gas." "This day, Cloud, we are all twelve year olds." "I'm not." "Sssh." "....." "Too soon?" "Too soon." "And you thought this place would be more cheerful because....?" "It's not, but we kind of have to pass through this completely smashed children's playground to get to the area we need to visit." "This better not have anything to do with putting me in a dress again." "Not really, but now that you mention it." "No!" "But... but I didn't get to experience the whole process, and I never got around to having Aeris tell me about it." "No!" "But.... but... would you have done it again if I was captured by Don Cornholio?" "No!" "But.... but....." "No! And give it a rest already." "I am morbidly curious, but I'm also afraid to ask." "But.... but..... but......." "I swear, Tifa, I will slap you on the 'but' if you don't stop nagging me." "That's sexual harrassment, Cloud, and you can only make it up to me if you..." "NO!" "Boooo." "Item, the shop. If you buy more than one thing, you get shot." "Why are we here, Cloud? Are you going to buy a dress?" "No, I'm here to buy you a clue. I hope you'll accept it." "Cid, I failed to get Cloud into a dress. You better not try my patience." *sigh* "Hey, if it's that important to you, I'd put on a dress for ya." "As hilarious as that would be, no thanks." "Are you sure?" "......OK, OK, I'll stop nagging you about the dress. Just... stop." "Anyway, what did we get?" "Premium Heart? That's... an odd name for a pair of boxing gloves." "They've got little hearts on the punchy end. I'd prefer wrenches, though." "Oh, good. We're back to that." "If only there were some strays around, huh? Like... that can't be the case after the wholesale destruction we witnessed close by, right?" "Come to think of it, do cats even exist in this world?" *cough* "Uh... I mean... like... more the regular house cat kind that's... damn it, Nanaki! Don't make this more difficult than it needs to be." "Well, I don't particularly want to be his cat." "I just... ever since we returned to this place, it's been nothing but sad and awkward. And disappointing." "Oh, I'm sure Cid would put on that dress in an instant if you asked him." "I don't want to see Cid in a dress." "And I don't want to see myself in a dress. I guess that makes us even, huh?" "....boooo." "Well, we're done here. And this place almost looks nice from the outside. Well... the close outside, that is." "Well, of course. When you look at it from a distance...." "Are you James Nguyen now?" "Nah, our birds are better-looking." "I'm... respectfully going to bow out of this obvious trap." "So, we're back to this place, huh?" "The home of Mayor Johnson and the Private Parts." "Well, we need to head into that place to grab a huge stone." "Uh... yes. This is what you two can team up over, huh?" "Well, if I can't have what I want the most, then I'll take what I can." "That being penis jokes?" "....yes. Don't judge me." "I'm not offended by this, just... confused." "Well, then we know what we must do." "Shall we blue-text it, just in case?" "Nah, that's a bit on the nose." "My nose is supposed to be cold, but I still think I'd find myself an open fire if it turns blue." "But we're going for the stones, aren't we?" "Let's not get completely nuts here." "This is going to be a long day." "As long as the... enhancement are in this town?" "Let's not lose our grip of the situation here." "You're in this for the long haul, huh?" "OK, now we're just grasping at straws here." "It wasn't exactly a fun ride. When I wasn't a drooling vegetable, I had to rifle through some pretty embarrassing memories." "Uh... vegetable?" "That's right, kids. Remember to eat your vegetables." "Um... embarrassing memories?" "That's right, kids. Remember to eat your embarrassing memories." "....." "Wait, no, that's not right." "Ya think?!" "Um........" "The audience is now confused." "....uh..." "And we have a super effective counter attack by Priscilla here." "And it's that kind of adorably upfront honesty that makes boys equally adorably flustered too." "Ten gil, huh?" "That guy is going places." "Jim, cautiously corrupt guard." "Well, it does say 'caution' right behind us there. Some kind of subliminal message, I guess?" "Like... I dunno, man." "A huge materia? We're working on that, Cloud. That's why we're here." "No, I mean... something deeper. Like... just below the surface." "A submarine?" "No, it's more like... something deep, like... all surrounded by darkness. The only light in the darkness." "The underwater base?" "....could you please stop sabotaging my efforts at making our grand quest sound a bit more grandiose?" "Well, excuuuuuuuuse me, Princess." "Lingering effects from the lifestream, I should hope." "Damn it, did I assemble the tour guide team instead? Shoot! Now I just feel silly." "So.... you sure I don't need to bring some seriousness to this situation?" "...no, that's OK. All... all things considered, I'd rather you didn't." "This whole place has been strange. The guard who demanded a whole ten gil to let us enter, and now this business with this Squad Tour Guide." "And now we have Team Death Wish." "Well... at least that's somewhat normal soldier behavior." "Kind of weird having them being all 'worst case scenario' about it, though." "Sheesh, who would go to such lengths just for a date?" *cough* "Something wrong, Cloud?" "No, nothing." "Hee hee." "Well... I actually kind of feel bad about this." "Why? We didn't kill them or anything. They just ran away, crying." "Right in front of a girl." "....oh. Yeah, that would be kind of embarrassing, wouldn't it?" "I guess they won't be getting anywhere with her now." "....oh." "Well... now I actually feel good about not penetrating them both with my gigantic sword." "Snrk." "Uh... I mean...." "Well, hilarity aside, how about we have this lady take us down." "Uh...." "Don't jinx us, please. For all we know, she's a super secret assassin who could take all of us out with nothing but a hairpin." "I'm... starting to realize why we found you so far from home the first time we met." "I'm rather surprised it took you so long to realize." "Well, I never expected someone of the age of 48 to be into bad pulp fiction and hankerin' for the Big City Life." "I'm just full of surprises, aren't I?" "Are you going back to work too, doggy?" "Doggy is at work preventing us from entering that door. And he ain't doin' it to impress any ladies." "Well, doggy ladies aren't really known for expecting to be rescued, so I imagine he might find it a waste of time." "Touché." "Well, anyway, I don't want to harm a good boy, so I think we'll just leave this room be." "Let's not let Shinra find out about that, however, or their bases are going to resemble dog pounds from this point forth." "Well... this isn't spooky at all. Are we going to be encountering zombies or demons down here?" "Dr. Betrüger to science labs, report to Phobos immediately. We have stray demon souls devouring the workers. It's a Code 666. Scandal ratio is off the charts." "I keep trying to imagine what this Dr. Betrüger would look like, and every time, I see Dr. Hojo." "Me too." "I don't think a Dr. Betrüger would have Hojo's interest in... his special porn, however." "....true." "Oh, my, this is lovely." "Indeed. And not one terrible 3D glasses effect shark in sight." "This is looking up, isn't it? Who knew Shinra would have an eye for uplifting surroundings instead of these dreary constructions that seem to suck the life out of everything around them?" "Right! Never mind." "Yeah, this is more like Shinra's style, alright." "Definitely Shinra, alright, down to the recycled base layouts." "I'm so tired of the whole 'steam pipe' motif, I'm starting to understand why Barret got so hung up on blowing it all to smithereens." "Well... 'Guardian' I can understand, but 'Hard Attacker'? That's... what's with all the subtext?" "Pierce them with your big sword, Cloud." "That was a bit below the belt, no?" "And was that a bit subtextual or not? Only BigHuge McJohnson knows for sure." "Yep, those are some submarines, alright." "Let's take the red one. It looks so nice." "Yes, it's a nuclear submarine, but sure, let's take the one that looks nice." "Well, it does. It's like a splash of color amidst all the brown and gray. Kind of like how they put in colored light bulbs here and there to get something for a light source other than 'clinically bleak'. I mean... I'd prefer a yellow one, given the choice, but this world probably doesn't have the Beatles, so..." "Or Pepperland." "I was wondering how you could become a senior grunt, but then I remembered that we were invading a Shinra base." "Yeah, with people like Scarlet, Heidegger and Hojo on the top floor... Shinra's promotion system seems rather odd, doesn't it?" "You have a heart, you ain't gettin' anywhere, foo'." "They won't even let you complete your words." "We will get the huge materia." "And then we will put the huge materia in a huge bag." "We'll put it in our huge car and ride it to our huge airship." "...that we kinda stole from you." "Well, yes, but that's beside the point." "The huge point." "Well, yes, but... stop that." "Hey, don't blame me. Blame the huge asshole guards." "I... like... huge... BUTTS, and I cannot lie...." "Don't you mean a huge cut?" "Wouldn't that be a long cut?" "Yes, but that doesn't include the word 'huge'." "Why does it need to?!" "I dunno." "For fun?" "I feel like I'm being led into a trap where I say something like 'What about this is fun?', and that resets the whole thing to the very beginning." "Yes, let's get Reno some help, because lord knows he'll need all the help he can get." "I've been itching to try out my new punching gloves. I was hoping for someone a bit more evil, but you'll do in a pinch, Mr. 'Job Is Everything... Except During Happy Hour'." "Pfft, we wouldn't get to become the top of this food chain unless we kept up our level of charisma the way we have." "I don't have time for '....or else'. Now, go and play somewhere else, children." "Oh yes, I can tell I'm going to enjoy this." "I am not going to enjoy this." "Punching a robot is no fun at all, especially when it seems to be made up of 90% limbs." "Awesome! I guess it's Nanaki time, then." "I came to kick ass and chew off metal limbs." "Aw, man, I guess it's Nanaki's time to look all cool and stuff." "Ow ow ow ow ow ow!" "....or not." "The heck was that? Counter attack? That's unfair!" "We need more counter materia." "Well, I guess it's my turn to rain on Shinra's parade, then. As well as a little reminder of what will happen if these idiots don't stop getting in our way of putting an end to Sephiroth's plans." "You just had to upstage me, didn't you?" "Well, I can't punch it, so I don't care." "So... did we beat it?" "......" "Yep, there it goes." "Aw, man, we shoulda turned around and walked away from the explosion. That would have been so badass." "......." "Well... red fadeout. It'd still be cool." "Then we swim!" "You're... kidding, right?" "Yes. We take the other submarine, of course. I mean... duh!" *sigh* "And I fell right into it." "The submarine?" "No, metaphorically. Are you two trying to get on my nerves now?" "Yes." "Battle trumpet? I thought Cait Sith only used megaphones." "The only thing missing now is a set of drums, and we'll have... well, half a band." "Well, we're going to have to make them face the music at some point anyway, so why worry about whatever's instrumental?" "Well, we're still going to go all param pam pam pam on their asses." "......" "Uh... that sounded vastly less homoerotic in my head." "I'm sure it did." "Oh? Are you sure? Because we've got Leviathan Scales and we're not afraid to use them." "And failing that, we will go pam pam pam on your asses." "What?! Oh God, rapists! Protect your rears, everyone? The violators have appeared." *smirk* "Tifa, I already realized how it sounded when you first said it, but honestly, this time you were the one to say it while standing there with balled fists." "......" "Wait, please don't tell me that's what you intended?" "OK, I won't." "And she says that while grinning like a maniac." "That was the day the expression 'watch your ass' takes on a different kind of meaning. A literal meaning." "And it all started with three wise men." "Or two male and one female wiseass." "The woman even threatened to punch us in the ass." "What? Have they no morals?" "She's terrifying. You should have seen the way she smiled when she said it. She's a remorseless killer, I tell you." "What? Wait a second..." "Look at her gloves. They've got hearts on them, as if to hide the horror they're being used to inflict." "Wow, that went in a direction I didn't expect." "Sir, I... I want you to know that I always..." "OK, JEEZ, STOP! I'm not going to violate you anally with my gloves. I mean... if you don't surrender, we'll beat you to death and all, but don't make this out to be worse than it really is." "Uh... Tifa, that's...." "WE SURRENDER!" *whew* "And it's all thanks to param pam pam pam." "Uurgh. I just wanted to tease you. Things just... kinda snowballed." "We have to stop them from dancing." "It's them. The Param Pam Pam Pam gang." "WHAT?!" "Oh no, I'll never dance again! My ass will be permanently sore." "No no no no. What's with the Shinra rumor mill? No rumor mills should work this fast." "I wonder if we'll hear about this the next time we face the Turks. Or Scarlet or Heidegger." "Why... why is this turning out to be my worst nightmare. You were the one who started it." "Well, I didn't threaten any soldiers with it once I realized how stupid and weird it sounded." "Alas, this is how it ends; not with a bang, but with a pam." "Look... can we please stop with the butt jokes now?" "Yes, let's put an end to this." "You're... not helping." "They are apparently ready to put their backs into it." "Putting their asses on the line for Shinra." "Will you two please stop enjoying this?" "Yes, ma'am! Posterior haste!" "It shall be my inspiration to make an album." "......" "These people are weird, aren't they?" "I'm not, I promise!" "I shall make them prisoners of my heart." "I said stop!" "Alright, alright. Fun's over." "Um....." "They're being weird again, aren't they?" "Well... as long as we live to dance another day." "OK, what does this button do?" "OH GOD THAT'S THE SELF-DESTRUCT BUTTON DON'T PUSH IT!" "Why would you even have that in the open with no security measures preventing accidental... well, self-destruction?" "Well... Shinra." "That explains it." "Man, Barret wasted so much money on explosives when he could just have pressed buttons." "This is the weirdest underwater submarine base raid I've ever been on." "......" "Well, it's also the only underwater submarine base raid I've ever been on, but I'd like to see things get weirder in the future." "I don't, so please refrain from jinxing us." "...that's it? Just direction controls and three buttons? That's easy!" "Uh.... no, that's not..." "SPEED UP! TRIANGLE BUTTON!" "The mines inflict great damage, it says. That's what makes it so exciting for spelunkers, no?" "Sounds like a 'read the fine print' thing." "Please read the fine print, Cloud. We don't want another pam situation on our hand." "That would be a pain in the ass, wouldn't it?" "...yes. Yes, it would." "OH NO, ONE MORE BUTTON! WE'RE SCREWED!" "CONCENTRATE, CLOUD! YOU CAN DO THIS!" "I... I am afraid, commander. I don't know where this journey will take us." "So am I." "Oh! I can see everything. Wait, isn't that the red submarine right in front of us?" "Seems so." "Well, then... FIRE ALL GUNS!" "Erm... torpedoes." "OH! YES! FIRE ALL TORPEDOES!" "What was that about mines and spelunkers and whatnot? We seem to be fighting against diamonds in Bar Graph Gorge. This is just silly." "Yes, but warning!" "Get me close enough, and I'll punch that submarine in the... uh...." "OK, joke's over." "NO! You dragged this thing out until it became unbearable, so now that it has finally become fun again, you are going to laugh with me all the way to the ass bank!" "Maybe we can ask them if they'll let us swim to shore." "From here?" "....yes." "And we are done. In less than a minute at that, too. Am I good, or am I good?" "I spent years and years in school and in the field learning to drive a submarine properly, and this asshat comes along and makes it look so easy. Where did we all go wrong?" "Oh, it's no problem. Just treat it like a videogame, and you can't go wrong." "THAT'S WRONG! THIS IS SO WRONG! NOTHING IS RIGHT ABOUT THIS!" "Eh, who cares? I got my huge materia, and that's all I care about." "Oh hey, we got a sub. Let's put it in our stash." "NO NO NO! IT DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT! STOP MAKING MY STRUGGLES SEEM SO STUPID BY COMPARISON!" "Dude, just kidding. If I'm not in it, I have to leave it in a harbor with the keys still in." "IT DOESN'T EVEN USE KEYS! WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!" "Nah, I'm sure it's a trap. It's a test by the resistance to see who will answer." "Yes, thank you, Mr. Sarcastic Elephantastic." "An elephant never forgets." "Yes, we are fine. Everything's OK here, submarine working at nominal... uh, effect. All the lights are blinking and all the levers are operational. And the self-destruct button has definitely not been pushed yet." "Oh dear lord....." "They're definitely going to realize something is up here." "Uh... or not? Why didn't they... that was the worst reporting back ever?!" *siiiigh* "I was told in office school that... that effort meant nothing. I could work myself raw and I'd just be wasting my time, as the fastest way to the top was knowing whose ass to kiss. But I was gonna show 'em! I was gonna show them all how hard work trumped everything, how talent would show up anyone, and as it turned out... they were right. Most of the time, you'll deal with someone who just caught the upper staff's eye, or had a daddy who paid his way. And here I am, no further along, and upstaged by a little kid whose idea of controlling a submarine is like playing a game. I... I just... I quit! Oh, man, I quit. I param pam pam quit!" "Oh, please don't, sir. If you do, who's gonna command us next?" "Yeah, they'll send some doofus around, and he's just gonna mess everything up, and we'll never get to do that victory dance we have developed through months of training." "I.... um... OK, I... I'll stay. For you guys. You're the best crew I ever had. I'll endure all the idiocy for you, so you won't have to suffer the idiocy for people who thinks downsizing is removing everyone else's legs and giving them half pay after the fact." "....and you thought we were weird?" "Well... this adds a new dimension to the whole 'getting off' thing." "Hellooo sailor." "Aren't we glad we picked up the 'Submarines for idiots' handbook?" "Glory to the pushbutton days." *sigh* "Well, anyway, let's actually grab that huge materia. And man, isn't it good they took the red submarine. It's really easy to see down here, which... kind of defeats the purpose of a submarine in the first place, right?" "You can blame Scarlet for that. She thought it could use her touch because it was so important and stuff." "Doesn't surprise me. She really was an idiot who seemed to prefer flash over sensibility." "Well, at least we could still refer to it as a submarine." "Yeah, this was before she started picking up the habit of giving things really stupid names." "You... kinda sounded like Barret there for a second." "Well, that's mildly unsettling. But still kind of hilarious, come to think of it." "I thought the whole 'I HATE EVERYTHING' was more Dyne's thing." "Well, it was, but... how did you know about Dyne? You weren't with us at the time." "No, but... Barret had many stories to tell back when you and the girls were traipsing around in the ancient ruins. Many, many things." "Oh. Yikes! Uh... sorry about that, I guess, but we really needed Aeris for that particular part." "Well, anyway, we have the huge materia, so... what's next?" "Good question. Hmmm, let's see...." "Oh, I know. Let's search the deep blue sea. Well... dark black sea, but you get my drift." "And here's a sunken airplane. With loot, I'm sure." "So... how do we enter it?" "We... enter it." "Yes, but how?! We can't just..." "....walk into it how the hell did you even do that?!" "There was a door on the side of the plane. I don't need to tell you how to operate doors, right? I know you have paws and all, but...." "No, I mean... how did you... you can't just open the submarine like that. You have to take into account things like water pressure and... you know, not flooding the submarine. Never mind this plane. I can maybe buy the submarine having a double-gate entrance to prevent flooding, but this plane doesn't!" "Now you know how I feel." "Heaven's Cloud... what?!" "Some of the weapon names in this world seem rather... odd." "I wonder if Scarlet named this one. In which case, brrrr, Cloud." "Eugh! I mean... I doubt that's the case, but still... the image of that... eugh!" "At least this one is kinda logical. You would find clouds in heaven, wouldn't you?" "Yeah, but.... it's a sword." "What mysteries does the depths hold? What treasures are to be found in what once belonged to man, but now the sea? Who or what could you expect to meet in the darker corners of the world, even when they are illuminated by years of neglect and leftover power?" "You know.... here, at least, in a hard-to-find sunken plane at the bottom of the ocean; far, far away from civilization, I had hoped there would be at least one place where I wouldn't have to deal with you meddling kids and your meddling ways and your Scooby snacks." "Well, we're kind of short one stoner and his dog, so... we can't help you there, I'm afraid." "Finally some fleshy things to punch. The robot was boring and the soldiers all surrendered without a fight. So, rejoice, gentlemen, because you're about to get a large serving of Premium Heart." "Well... better let her work that stress off, huh? Which one of you liked her again?" "....." "Wow! Sorry, man. This is really gonna hurt twice over, isn't it?" To be continued....
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