Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Bahamut & the Guardian Forces ❯ Just Deserts ( Chapter 16 )

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"Go now! Earth Aura!" Terrato launched a shockwave that finally tore the stone wall down.

The group was at the end of a cavern and being assaulted by squads of slime-like shadows. The oozes were easy enough to splatter, but there always seemed to be more pouring into the cavern when Glenn, Bahamut and Palidor fought.

The breath weapons of the dragons combined with Palidor's Fire spells had easily allowed them to stand their ground.

Terrato had been working on making an escape route, which had finally worked.

"Mega Flare!!" Bracing himself on all fours, Bahamut let off a final shot before following his companions through the opening.

The others quickly slammed against the outside, causing a cave-in that closed off the opening. The party took a moment to catch their breaths, resting on a rocky outcropping outside of the now sealed hole.

"Whew..." Glenn panted. "That was rough."

"This is the final stretch." Bahamut spoke. "Just across these mountains, that's where Doomtrain wants to meet us."

"Everyone ready? This flight should be pretty smooth." Terrato nodded.

"How come?"

"It leads out of the Underworld, and a little higher up to Purgatory." Palidor replied. "We came down through here originally."

A slight breeze brewed up as the group took to the skies, soaring above the mountainous regions. The previously black sky gradually changed, turning into an orange glow.

"It's amazing how much this place looks like the outside world." Glenn commented.

"I'll never understand it myself." Terrato replied. "Guess it's not something we're supposed to."

"One thing I know is that I don't even want to come back here." Palidor shrugged. "Not in my afterlife."

"Especially that weird place where we saw those two fighters." Glenn added in.

"Since the Heartless can exist in the darkness of many worlds, perhaps that was the crossing then?" Bahamut suggested. "A zone where time and space have no meaning, where worlds meet."

"Wow that's amazing..." Glenn smiled. "Amazing you actually had the intellect to think of something like that."

"Grrr...why you!!!"

Bahamut made a charge, which Glenn swerved around.

"Hey I'm getting good at this!"

"You're just lucky I'm not in the mood." Bahamut huffed. "Come on, I want to get out of here."

"He's saying you're not bad." Palidor whispered.

As the party moved on, the surrounding mysteriously swirled and changed.

In the blink of an eye, Glenn found himself standing together with his group in a grassy field. More specifically, on the wooden platform of a train station.

"Where in the world..."

A sharp whistle caught everyone's attention as a train moved into view. It seemed like an ordinary red-plated train until Glenn noticed a demon-like face on the front.

"So, Doomtrain I presume?" Bahamut folded his arms.

<We meet at last.> The telepathic voice replied as Doomtrain rolled into the station. <Board and I will explain more.>

"This is where we part ways then." Terrato said. "This is where we belong now. Doomtrain can't take us further."

"Yeah, as much as I want another chance to kick butt, it's not going to be granted." Palidor shook his head. "Hit em' hard for me!"

"Thanks guys, for everything." Glenn smiled.

"We will carry your strength with us into battle." Bahamut added in.

And soon, Doomtrain sped out of the station with Glenn and Bahamut aboard.

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"Ow! Ow! It hurts!"

"Oh don't be such a baby birdbrain!" Scarlet scolded.

"You try having a broken wing and you'll know how it feels...muurrrmmpphhhh..." Quetzacoatl's last sentence was cut off by the healer using a bandage to tie his beak shut.

After his crash, the thunder bird had been brought to the medical center, along with Leviathan, who'd finally been freed from the tiny sphere. It hadn't been a problem for Unicorn to undo the shrinking spell, and Leviathan had reverted, leaving Brad to watch the scene.

"You think he'll be all right?" Aldrea asked, standing next to Brad at the door.

"Well, he's grounded for a while, but he'll recover. Don't think anything he went through was too bad." Brad replied.

<Unlike me!> Leviathan snarled.

"Eh, buddy, the only thing you hurt was your ego."

<Yeah, and that's important to me too.>

"Guys! Guys!" Cecil burst into the room. "It's working! Cid got the sandcraft working!"

"That's great, when can we head out?" Aldrea asked.

"Mogri said that we have to wait for this dust storm to clear up a little first."

"Hmmm....strange how it suddenly brewed in like this. Even for a desert, the weather was relatively clear."

"A sudden sandstorm....Leviathan, you think maybe..."

<Those two idiots that attacked us with Ramuh?> Leviathan finished. <Wait, Titan is earth elemental and Typhoon has some wind elemental powers...>

All of a sudden, the ground shook as a loud 'Boom' came from several blocks down.

"What the?!" Cecil gasped.

<That was the direction of the hangar.> Unicorn realized.

"What's going on?" Scarlet called from the inner room.

"You just put the town on alert." Brad replied. "We'll check it out!"

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"Hargh!" Madeen somersaulted backwards as the Land Worm (FF10) sprayed some acidic juices in his direction. The odd secretion hissed as the stony ground it touched dissolved.

This was no ordinary worm, but instead a much larger, 30 foot beast. Its center portion was huge and bloated, and a gaping mouth opened at the top, dripping with saliva.

<Watch out!> Cid warned.

The enormous beast moved and swung its tail with astonishing speed. Madeen took the blow in the stomach and was sent flying through a hangar wall, leaving a large hole in it.

"Grrr...don't know what its doing here, but no one does that to me and gets away with it!" Madeen stood up and brought out the claws of his tiger hands.

With a cry of fury, the tiger-man charged, evading another tail blow and leaving several slashes across the Land Worm's body. He spun round and rolled, just in time to avoid being smashed beneath its huge bulk, and sliced its bloated belly open. Internal green fluids suddenly sprayed out, catching Madeen in the face.

The acidic sting caused him to scream even as the worm screeched and died, spilling its innards all over the floor.

"Gahrgh! Argh!!" Madeen wiped the disgusting liquid out of his eyes as best as he could, and blinked.

There were suddenly three more Land Worms surrounding him.

"Oh...shit..." He moaned.

"Bright light, shine down on bloody impurity! Holy!" Unicorn's voice rang out.

One of the worms suddenly blew up, sending its guts flying everywhere. Valefor swooped in and pulled Madeen to safety.

Meanwhile, Leviathan engaged another worm with the sharp fins at the end of his tail, being reluctant to bite into the creature.

<Ew, gross. Where did these things come from?> Cecil wondered.

"I think I know..." Leviathan growled, between breaths.

"That's right! Us!" A loud, boisterous voice sounded.

Titan smashed through another wall, accompanied by his smaller companion, Typhoon.

"I was worried about this." Leviathan muttered as he hovered out of the Land Worm's reach. "They found us."

"Of course we found ya! This is the only town around, and ya had to run to some place." Titan laughed. "Well, we have orders to destroy you, and anything that gets in our way! Muahahahaha!"

Two more Land Worms rose in addition to the two the group was already in battle with.

"Not good..." Unicorn muttered.

Typhoon made some odd laughing noises as Titan pointed.

"Get them!"

"Banzai!" Yet another cry joined the battlefield. Only this one was accompanied by one of the two new Land Worms having its head run through with a lance.

"Huh? Wha..." Titan turned around only to see the other worm get its stomach sliced open.

"You wanna take them? You'll have to get through me firsst!" The new figure appeared, now having leapt to stand on top of a nearby sandcraft.

Even with all his armor on, it could be clearly seen that he was some sort of lizardman from his reptilian tail. The armor however, was what really made him stand out. (This is the Dragoon's Artifact Armor from FF11, in case anyone has seen it.)

A pair of purple high leggings led up from his feet all the way to the waist. The upper body and shoulders were covered by a purple breastplate and spiked shoulder pads.

The helmet was designed to look like a dragon's head, with the horns pointing backwards, the slots for the eyes and only the bottom of his lower jaw showing. It fit very nicely around the stranger's lizard-like head.

He brought up a wicked looking silver lance with a trident tip and pointed it forward in a battle stance.

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"Over there! Is that the ruins Boko?" Ashley leaned close to the bird's head and pointed.

Boko gave some affirmative squawks as he began to slow down. He soon skidded to a halt in front of a half buried entrance in the sand.

Ashley dismounted and walked over to it, letting Phoenix take over her body. It was the taller birdman form of Phoenix that entered instead, with one claw on the Caladbolg, strapped by her side. Boko came up behind her, chirping excitedly.

"No, it's too dangerous for you." Phoenix spoke.

"Kweh! Kweh!"

"Erm..."

"Kweh!"

"Oh all right." Phoenix gave in. "Seems he's snuck in here to explore before. He knows a little of the layout."

<I just have a bad feeling about this.> Ashley sighed.

The old stone corridor was nearly pitch black, but Phoenix grabbed a torch off the wall and lighted it with a small burst of flames. From what Ashley saw, it reminded her of what one could expect to see when walking into an ancient Egyptian pyramid. A wide corridor constructed from huge blocks of brownish stone, cracked and worn down at some places with piles of sand having seeped in through the holes.

"We should be expecting some traps around here, shouldn't we?" Phoenix asked after winding through the twisting corridors for a while.

Boko stepped in front of her and made some more squawks.

"Oh this is as far as you've gone on your own, huh?" She nodded. Ahead of them was a staircase leading down and Phoenix took a step forward. "Well, this way looks pretty clea......rrrrrrrr!!!"

The moment her talon landed on the first step, the entire flight collapsed, turning the stairway into a long slide. Both birds skidded down in panic, finally landing in a large pile of sand at the bottom.

"Oww...argh..." Phoenix moaned, puller herself to her feet. "I think I lost a bunch of tail feathers."

<Hey, take it easy. It could've been worse right?>

BAM! The opening above them suddenly slammed shut. That left them at the end of a much smaller corridor, with barely enough room for Phoenix to stand upright. The room however, had somehow gained a magical lighting, though its orangish glow gave off an eerie feeling.

"You just had to jinx it, didn't you?" Phoenix drew her sword and spun around, looking out for any signs of hostility.

"Kweh?"

"Yeah, doesn't seem to be anything here."

<Uh oh, Phoenix, look at the sand!>

"The sand?" The bird warrior glanced towards the floor. There was a lot of sand in the corridor, currently around her talons. But something seemed wrong...the sand felt like it was moving.

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"That's..." Leviathan staggered.

"The ancient armor of Kain?!" Madeen stared.

"Hey lesss sstaring! Fight firsst!" The fully armored Dragoon hissed.

"I want the two bozos." Leviathan growled, moving forward. "A little score I want to settle."

"Don't get over zzealouss." The Dragoon warned.

"You should be taking your own advice buddy. But we appreciate the help."

"Heh, anytime."

"RRRaagghhh!!" Titan slammed the ground with his fists, sending huge chunks of rocks flying.

Leviathan flipped to the side while the Dragoon leapt against the wall. At the same time, both closed in and attacked, the Dragoon with his trademark jumping maneuver and Leviathan with a slam from his tail.

Titan stumbled backwards and knocked his companion down. Typhoon however, quickly sprang up and unleashed its Disintegration skill, consisting of a swirling set of winds and rocks.

Leviathan was forced to close his eyes as he backed away, awaiting the next attack. The rumbling of Titan's footsteps soon became clear, and the brute was suddenly in front of him.

The Dragoon then hurled his lance, piercing into the ground in front of Titan. The sudden attack startled the earth elemental long enough for Leviathan to plough into him. That didn't move Titan much, but the Dragoon appeared from above.

"Salamander Breaker!" He roared. The armored warrior's body glowed and burst into flames, creating a dazzling explosion as he spun into Titan.

Titan stumbled back, clutching his side in pain.

"I'm not done with you yet!" He declared, raising his fists. "Anger of the Earth!"

Slamming his fists onto the ground, Titan caused a mass of rocks to rise from the ground and fly towards the two.

"Tsunami!" Leviathan chanted, magically calling forth spouts of water to repel the speeding rocks.

He didn't succeed in hitting all of them, and ended up being thrown back, along with the Dragoon, after taking several hits. However, he did manage to completely soak Titan and Typhoon with his water jet.

While the two brutes were busy coughing and spluttering, a shadow appeared behind them.

"Judgment Bolt!" Ramuh called, raising his staff.

And it is a know fact that water conducts electricity.

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Phoenix raised her head and stared. To her horror, she found several slits on the ceiling which had sand streaming in through them at a frighteningly rapid rate.

"Oh shit." She gasped, realizing the sand level at her feet was quickly rising. "Boko, run for it, now!"

Immediately, both tore down the corridor, silently praying that there was some exit at the end of the tunnel. Along the way, Phoenix took note of the walls, which were decorated by a running series of circular discs, each one having the carving of an elemental symbol on it.

As the sand level rose, it began to hamper their movements more and more. Finally, the duo rounded a corner and slammed right into a huge stone door. Phoenix threw a shoulder charge at it, only to be tossed back by some magical field.

"I was worried about this." She panted.

<Wait, look there!>

"Yeah, I see them."

Engraved on the door were three circular slots. Phoenix remembered the symbolic discs along the way and figured that those might be part of the puzzle to unlocking the door.

The sand was just at her knee level now and she was struggling just to get back, leaving Boko to wait by the sealed door.

The fire elemental spotted the first disc, with its symbol representing water, and grabbed it. Other than the fact that the sand was still rising, nothing else seemed to be triggered. She then raced for the next disc, representing fire.

But the moment she touched it, a magical shock caused her to scream and drop both discs.

"Oh gimme a break! Don't tell me I can only hold one at a time?!"

<Hey, don't lose them in the sand!> Ashley warned.

Phoenix was forced to hook the fire disc back onto its position on the wall, then drag the water disc and slot it into the door. She then struggled and brought the fire disc back. However, inserting the disc caused the same reaction, throwing both discs out of the slots.

<Maybe you have to get a matching set?> Ashley suggested.

"Kweh, kweh..."

"Not now Boko." Phoenix waved. "Yeah, I'll try that!"

She ended up shoving one disc into the door, the other one with Boko, and racing back to the wall of discs. However, of the 8 remaining discs, none resembled either fire of water.

"What the hell?! There's just ice, wind, earth, thunder, darkness, light, time, gravity..." Phoenix shook her head. "Wait...perhaps..."

Grabbing a darkness disc and a gravity disc, Phoenix found she was able to hold both at once.

"That's it! Elements with similar properties!" She realized, dragging both discs back to the door.

"Kweh..."

"Boko, later all right?" Phoenix grunted, slamming both discs into the door. "Now, what can match with dark and gravity? Time?"

The result unfortunately, was all three discs being blow out of the door. The sand was already at her chest level and Phoenix was beginning to panic.

"Kweh..."

"WHAT?!"

Boko pointed a wing to a series of ancient writings carved on the ceiling, just above the door.

"The light at the end of the tunnel?!" Phoenix translated. "And you're telling me this now?!"

"Kweh!"

<But he...>

"Nevermind!" Phoenix had to practically swim through the sand this time. "The light disc is obvious and lightning gives off light too, so we take thunder. And what else...?!"

Frantically, Phoenix scanned the remaining discs hanging on the wall.

<Fire! It has to be! Where's the fire disc?>

"Aw crap, its somewhere in the sand near Boko! Gargh!!" It was getting hard to even move, but Phoenix had one last resort. "Boko! Here! Put these into the door!"

One by one, the bold Chocobo managed to shove the discs in using his beak, despite the rising sand.

"The fire disc, the red one...gargh!! Get...it!!" Phoenix yelled.

The disc slots were long since beneath the sand, since it was already up to Phoenix's neck. Boko was nodding, and diving beneath the sand.

<Can he make it?> Ashley asked desperately.

"Chocobos are...excellent diggers...." Phoenix gasped, struggling to keep the sand out of her mouth. "He'll...make...argh...gggaarrgghhh...!!!!"

Then, the sand was above her head, completely filling the corridor. To the two, what was several minutes seemed like years. Buried alive in a mount of sand, unable to move, scream or even breathe.

It was all Phoenix could take before submitting to the darkness.

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Meanwhile, Unicorn, Madeen and Valefor didn't encounter too much trouble in disposing any Land Worms that popped up during Leviathan's fight.

"Uha suna tufh!" Valefor called, throwing off an Aero spell. (One more down!)

"Another here!" Madeen called, gesturing towards Unicorn, who was busy dodging the attacks of the last Worm on the battlefield. "Out of the way, I've got this one!"

"All yours!" Unicorn nodded.

Madeen brought his claws together, charging up a ball of white energy.

"Terra Homing!"

The intense Light elemental energy easily blew right through the Land Worm, but unfortunately also towards the object behind it.

"Aw crap! The sandcraft!!"

BOOM!!!!

Madeen's jaw dropped as he stared blankly at the burning remains of the vehicle. The girls gave him furious stares as he scratched his head (with a large sweatdrop).

<Great job.> Cid muttered.

"Oh shut up. I know you're getting back at me for just now."

Leviathan, Ramuh and their new companion then came over, dragging the two unconscious brutes with them.

"Hey, it's you Ramuh." Unicorn gasped.

"Looks like I made it here just in time." The old sorcerer nodded. "The desert isn't a forgiving place for an old man like me."

"Which is why we needed that sandcraft...until someone blew it up."

"Hey, I'm sorry all right?" Madeen waved his hands.

"Hmmm, sseemss you're in a tight sspot." The Dragoon spoke. "Well, I guessss you could use mine then."

"You have one of your own?" Leviathan asked.

"Ssure. Haven't used it in a while, but it'ss alwayss in top condition." He nodded. "My only termss are that I have to be the one to pilot it."

"No problem. Just who are you anyway, might I ask?"

The armored warrior reached up and removed his helmet.

"YOU!!" Unicorn stared. "I should've guessed it from your hissy little accent!"

"Hey there pretty lady." Salamander winked. "I admit, ya caught me a little unprepared back then, but sseemss you need a little favor from me now, eh?"

"Ooohhh....!!!"

<Unicorn, control yourself.> Aldrea urged.

"Well, fine. Break a leg, but don't expect a Cure from me!" Unicorn huffed, walking away.

<I'm sorry about that!> Aldrea called back.

"You have junctioned partnerss?" Salamander asked. "Now that'ss interessting."

"We'll talk a little more on the trip, but we need you to get your sandcraft ready for now." Leviathan decided. "Meanwhile, I want to go poke the two dozing dumbos here for any information they might have."

"I highly doubt grunts like them are given any sort of high level information, but my magic will be able to restrain them." Ramuh offered. "I will stay here to look after things in this town, but your group needs to head out. I assume your father is waiting for you Madeen?"

"Yeah..." Madeen bit his lip.

"What is it?"

"Nothing. Let's just get busy." Madeen quickly turned and left the destroyed hangar as well.

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<Phoenix! Wake up! Hey Phoenix!!!>

"Ugghh...."

<Please wake up!!>

"Ashley...what...huh?!"

When Phoenix opened her eyes, first thing she noticed was that they were out of the sand deathtrap corridor and inside a larger, rectangular room. Next thing she felt was that she was stuck up to her neck in a block of stone, leaning against the wall.

"Argh! What is this?! Grrr...I...I can't move!!"

<Yeah this is bad.> Her partner agreed. <Seems Boko got us out of the sand trap, but look there.>

Boko was locked in a square-shaped cage, suspended in the center of the room. He seemed all right, just panicked as he was squawking like mad.

Then, Phoenix felt the ground shaking. Out of the shadows, a huge, brown colored beast moved into view. It was basically a main body with a large mouth, two gigantic arms and small feet supporting its large mass. Both its eyes stared straight as Phoenix as it let off a low growl.

It was a monster otherwise know as the Chocobo Eater.

<This thing is the Chocobo eating fiend?>

"Hey you disgusting freak!! Let me out of here now or I'll make sure to hurt you bad!"

<Do you really think that's gonna work?>

"No. It's just 'hero' speech."

The Chocobo Eater moved right up to where Phoenix was trapped and let off a long roar right into her face.

"Argh! Disgusting!" Phoenix choked at the smell of its foul breath.

The creature seemed to be sniffing around Phoenix for a while, but it eventually lost interest and moved towards Boko's cage.

<Boko!>

"Oh no! Hey you freak! Leave him alone!" Phoenix yelled, struggling in vain. "I'm the one you want!"

Unfortunately, the breast didn't stop, leaving the two to watch helplessly as it ripped Boko's cage door open. The terrified bird cowered in the rear as the Chocobo Eater reached for its next victim.