Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ sore kara... ❯ nazo o toku ( Chapter 28 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: awwaw 
Non Anime: Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure / Action | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 02.27.2003 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.8K | Visits: 190 | Status: Completed
Non Anime: Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure / Action | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 02.27.2003 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.8K | Visits: 190 | Status: Completed
Standard disclaimers apply.
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sore kara...
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nazo o toku
By the time Kuja finished relating the riddle to the rest of the crew, there were enough question marks flying around to feed an entire herd. Of course, he should have seen it coming. He came to a sad conclusion that the heroes of the show often had to have complicated theories extensively narrated to them by the villain only to see the well prepared presentation completely fly over their heads. Then they would fight. And the hero would win. Yaay.
"Whatever it is," Kuja slammed his hand on the table, cross with his companions but unable to advance their intellect within the short period of time they had for riddle solving, "we'll take things from here one step at a time, understand?" He measured out his words carefully, through gritted teeth. His companions could only nod dumbly.
"Firstly," the silver-haired man then sat down on his chair again, "we'll talk about the children of Hyne."
"I think I remember that part of the riddle," Squall spoke out meekly, "something about them residing where their heart is?"
"That is correct," Kuja nodded, "the children of Hyne - the sorceresses responsible for all this time compression hoohaa. It's because of their whimsical desires that the four of us are in such a fix. That's why we need to find them first, then the riddle says time will be solved."
"In particular it talks about the 'chosen child'..." Cloud finished scribbling on something and brandished his work for all to see, "... tadah! Here's a writing of the riddle - it'll be much easier for us to refer to something tangible than depend on our scratchy memory."
Looks of sheer disbelief were tossed in his direction. Those words coming from the most careless of persons - Cloud Strife, no less, was like a new revelation. Nevertheless they spread the paper with the riddle on the table and continued their discussion.
"Untie the knots in the chosen child... reside where their heart is..." Zidane pondered aloud, "I don't know why, Squall, but this phrase looks like it's related to you."
"......................................" was Squall's powerful reply.
"Perhaps the chosen child is the sorceress Ultimecia?" Cloud piped, "After all, she was the one who inherited the will of Hyne and got what she wanted - time compression."
"And when the coin reacted to you, the word 'heart' appeared," Kuja, and everyone else turned to look at Squall, who was quietly mumbling something to himself. "Either that coin is a clue to the whereabouts of the sorceress, or the coin is trying to point us to Squall, who may know where this sorceress of eternity resides."
At that, Squall shrugged. "How would I know where Ultimecia is?"
Cloud eyed the boy cautiously, knowing that the SeeD knew it and knew what Cloud was trying to question by mere virtue of his glance. "Are you sure about that?"
Silence passed the foursome for a short moment. Squall closed his eyes.
When he opened them he sighed rather resignedly. "I don't know if she'll still be there or anything, but I can tell you where we found her and supposedly defeated her." He scribbled something on a loose piece of rough paper and handed it to Kuja, who blinked once and then fed it to the crimson coloured sphere.
"According to the data about the maps we've found out about Gaia and Terra so far..." Kuja waited until a holographic screen shimmered to life in front of the four of them, "... 'Edea's House' can be reached, on Gaia, via time compression, from the northmost region of the Lost Continent."
"Then what are we waiting for, let's go!" Zidane shook his fist in the air. He was quickly smacked down by an incoming boot. "Hey!" He protested as he fell brusquely to the floor.
"Shut up if you don't have any better idea than 'let's go'!" Kuja growled, magically retrieving his boot, sitting down again to wear it. Zidane remained motionless on the floor, earning him several looks of pity from his other more calm companions. Not willing to be the recipient of yet another boot, they quietly let the meeting continue it's way. "We'll set off for the sorceress in a while, what's next on our agenda now, Mr. Strife?" He nodded at the blond mercenary, who had the paper in his hands and quickly referred to it.
"Four warriors of time will journey to erase the mistakes of Hyne..." he read aloud, then blinked, "... I'm guessing this refers to us."
"Um, like, what's this 'mistake of Hyne'?" Squall was curious. "And how are we supposed to erase it?"
Nobody knew the answer.
"Definitely something to do with the sorceress, anyway I see it," Kuja lowered his eyes and continued, "it's the next part that should be cause for concern."
"Four will fall, three will rise..." Cloud read out again, "..." he kept in silent contemplation about the import of those words, but didn't pause for long as he resumed reading, "... The eternal darkness repressed, the final destiny awaits..."
There was a long silence after that.
"I'm assuming the repetitive garble that comes after all this is part of the riddle of the sorceress' seal," Squall took the paper over from Cloud and briefly glanced through what the rest of the text contained.
"You're probably right." Kuja sighed. "Well, what do you know, we have one heck of an agenda to go through with now." He started counting off his fingers. "1, we travel to the Lost Continent and find the spot of the sorceress seal. 2, we break the seal. 3, we get to where the sorceress is using time compression. Or decompression. Whatever works. 4, we trash her real bad. 5, we decompress time, return to our respective eras, and live happily ever after. Any questions?" He glanced around to see Cloud taking notes, Squall looking utterly flabbergasted, and Zidane finally managing to climb up from the floor.
"Yes sir, question!" The monkey quickly raised his hand upon claiming his seat back.
"Yes Zidane, you may shoot," Kuja pointed at the ever inquisitive student.
"Well..." Zidane started counting off his fingers as well, "... 1, how are we going to find the exact spot of the seal? 2, how can we break it? 3, how in the world do we compress time?! 4, trashing ladies ain't my style! Oof! Ouch! That hurt, Kuja! Anyway, and 5, how in the world do we decompress time??"
Kuja restrained himself from throwing the other boot at Zidane. "Don't worry about the seal, that's what the Invincible is here for."
"We wouldn't know how to break the seal if we just thought about it," Cloud intercepted, "the riddle looks tough, so maybe we can figure more things out if we actually saw the seal. As for compressing and decompressing time..." He put a finger to his chin. "That, I sure as anything do not know."
*I can do that.* A voice boomed in Zidane's subconsciousness, forcing him to recline against himself with a whimper. Fortunately, nobody noticed.
*Shut up, Necron!* Zidane thought back to the entity within him. *Talking to you hurts like mad! Go away!*
In a short while the pain became much more bearable. Perhaps even Necron was trying to figure out what made him even hint at wanting to help the foursome with their trials. After all, his sole purpose in existence was to seek and destroy, wasn't it?
"I've been thinking of something else..." Cloud's voice drew Zidane back to reality. Everybody looked at him as he carried on, "... can the Invincible withstand all this time compress-decompress thing, should we use it as a form of transportation... ?"
Everybody remained considerably silent until Squall offered his view, "I'm sure an airship like this could withstand time compression - the one I was on was able to during my time... I'm just not sure if it'll still be in one piece if we were to travel into the future time..."
"Perhaps we need to find a ship that can traverse time without decaying with age?" Kuja rose to full height and turned around, meaning to approach the globe to navigate the ship while they talked. "I hardly think that there will be a ship that can do that."
"Hmmm..." Zidane was also pondering something, "... what about Ark?" he wondered aloud, realizing that he said something he shouldn't have too late only when Kuja shot a sharp, questioning glance in his direction.
His two other companions, however, did not understand. "Ark?" Squall mused.
Zidane was surprised that the silver-haired genome didn't pursue the issue, choosing instead to return to navigation and explanation, saying, "Ark was a summon as far as I knew it. It was also appointed to guard a Terran artifact in Gaia."
"So it was a ship?" Cloud asked.
"In every sense of the word, yes," Kuja replied, "and being a timeless guardian, as well as an alien summon, must mean that it would be able to transcend the ailing effects of time."
Squall whistled. "Too bad I don't have a guardian force like this."
"Neither do I." Cloud added. "So essentially nobody here can summon that Ark guy isn't it? That officially brings us back to square one." He sighed.
"What about the other summons?" Zidane meekly suggested. "Isn't there any other summon we could call on to act as transportation... ?"
Cloud and Squall eyed him curiously. Kuja was the one who eventually spoke up, saying, "Who or what do you think the summoned creatures are, Zidane? Monsters at your beck and call? Objects you can take a ride on? With the exception of a few, these creature are usually high-leveled beings from another dimension who deign to grant assistance to the one they think worthy." As he stopped, the Invincible roared to life and began it's conclusive journey towards the ends of the planet. "So, no, I don't think just any summon is going to be available as transport."
Sheepishly, the monkey-boy rubbed the back of his head and turned to looking at the floor in discomfort.
The engines of the Invincible kept droning on. Cloud examined the riddle by reading it over and over again, while Squall kept on looking outside the windows of the ship, taking in the whole of the land with mild interest. Zidane was quiet at first, but soon he began to pace - occassionally looking a little unwell, looking like he was battling some inner demon. Kuja kept on egging the Invincible on to it's destination.
The destination that would mark the start of the end of their long journey.
Squall was the first to notice the shimmering blots of dark and light energy tendrils whipping around each other. He was about to point it out when the Invincible rocked in it's foundations, quaking and trembling like it was in fear of the apparition ahead of it. From afar he could hear Kuja mutter something pretty much uncouth. As he watched on he could detect the cause of their inability to proceed. The energy gathered around the spot they were headed for was so massive it sent out it's effervescence in the form of aerial ripples, effectively stopping all incoming traffic.
Left with no choice, they had to make the Invincible retreat. Although the ship was made out of the finest and could stand for all sorts of attacks, they were certainly not going to risk their only ways of getting around to try to barge into a situation they knew they would lose in. As soon as they were stable, all four of them gathered to look at what was going on outside.
"Major magical madness!" Zidane tooted.
"I think the correct term is, the sorceress' seal," Kuja frowned at the younger genome's distortion.
"Whatever the thing is," Zidane grinned up at the uptight older person, "it's something that's stopping us from getting to where we're getting!"
"He's right," Cloud nodded.
"But we have to get into that seal." Squall murmured, loud enough to be heard nevertheless. "That's the only way we can initiate any form of time magick."
"Zidane himself was pretty good with all this time thing... sometimes," Cloud managed to stop himself from unveiling too much that Zidane had already regained his memory, and was probably unable to do all the time thing anymore. But at that moment, he just felt obliged to say a bit about the monkey boy.
The genome in question was hardly about to resist the tease. "Maybe there's a time mage in me waiting to be discovered..." He promptly threw a wink in everybody else's direction.
Kuja gathered everybody and handed coins out. He took the one which already had the words 'the final destiny' engraved on one side and handed the one with 'heart' to Squall. The rest, he dumped into Cloud's outstretched palms and watched as one of the coins glowed with the same shrill aura it did when reacting to one of them, to come up with yet another word engraved on it.
"View?" Cloud was bemused. Kuja took the other empty coin from him and gave it to Zidane, who in turn, reacted with the coin and made it come up with yet another word.
He looked at the coin and blinked. "Feel..." He recited the word on the coin with muted interest. "Heart, view, feel, final destiny... why do they all sound so familiar... ?" He took to looking at the ceiling, hoping it would refresh his memory.
"It's the riddle, blockhead." Kuja reminded. He could literally see lightbulbs flash to life atop everybody else's head. He heaved a sigh. Sometimes, he wondered why he even tried. Ignoring the stupidity of his companions he studied the coin with apt concentration. "........ anyway, there's something about these coins that's been bothering me. We know they're magically imbued, we just don't know how come, and what for."
"Well now's as good a time as any to try!" Zidane yelped like an excited puppy. Without a second thought, he gained control of the red sphere and immediately piloted the ship vertically upwards so they could reach the upper boundaries of the seal without wracking the ship inside out. Of course, in the event, he forgot that there were other people in the same room with him, who did not enjoy the advantages given to the pilot of the airship. They were tossed and turned around as the ship traveled on 90-degree curves until they soared above the seal. Then, without explaining anything whatsoever, he threw the coin he had been given into the heart of the red throbbing globe.
"Zidane!" Kuja was the first to come up to him and throttle him proper. "What in the world did you think you were doing?!"
"Breaking the seal, what else?" Zidane turned to look at his older brother with mock tears in his eyes as he held the fresh lump on his head. By now, the coin he had tossed down had surfaced, floating around limply at the threshold of the globe, glowing with an aura stranger than before. "The riddle, I've clean forgotten what it really was," Zidane began, "but since it talked about the heart, the view, the feel and the final destiny, might as well throw them all into the magic amplifier and then pile an ultima spell down to crush whatever barrier the sorceress has built up, no?" He pointed at the coin swimming around happily in the globe. "See, it's already picking up momentum. I think the coin and that orb love each other."
"What kind of an analysis is that??" Kuja was at a loss. Zidane has such twisted reasoning, sometimes you didn't even know how to start arguing with him. Before he could begin his long speech on why they should sit down and think things out again, Cloud had come by and tossed his own coin into the circle of red. Kuja blinked at him. "Not you too?"
The blond mercenary just shrugged. "Well if it doesn't work, we can think of another way to break that powerful seal. For now, I think that brute force could probably shatter that barrier pretty effectively."
"As do I." Squall chimed in unison, placing the coin he had into the placeholder and standing back.
All of them eyed the more level-headed of the group.
Who then tossed his arms into the air and put his own piece in as well.
The coins swirled and went around each other quickly. They formed a rather remarkable formation when they eventually stopped spinning, capturing the audience's attention.
"Somebody remember this pattern," was the only words Kuja recalled hearing himself say, before, "... and anybody who can shoot an Ultima spell get ready to do it!"
Cloud and Squall immediately drew upon their spellbooks.
"Ready..." Kuja had a spell slowly gaining intensity upon his withdrawn right hand.
"... GO!!"
Zidane watched, wide-eyed as indescribable green sparkles burst out seemingly from another dimension, which laid beyond the hands of his comrades currently casting the spell, and embrace the scarlet coloured orb with the coins. The room was overloaded with brightness, and all the boy could see for a while was the bold outlines of his friends locked in concentration. When things resumed their original colour, he noted with slight confusion that none of them appeared to be looking very happy. And neither did they stop forcing the spell upon the amplifier. He blinked. "What's wrong?" He asked.
"The seal is nearly broken," Kuja explained, "... but the energy isn't enough."
"And Ultima isn't a spell that can be cast for an extended period of time..." Cloud shook his head.
"But if we stop now," Squall spoke up, "the sorceress would be alerted to our presence with this huge energy interference... and she'll probably be taking further measures... we can't let that happen... we have to try to break the seal now... !"
*That sounded like it came right out from a bad movie script.* Zidane averted his eyes and thought to himself out of exasperation. He was powerless to help, and he knew it.
Then a pain hit him in his gut, reminiscent of the time when Necron invaded his vitality to speak to him at length. It effectively jolted his remembrance of the conversation he had with Necron.
*Remember that I will keep finding reason to bring all existence back into none.*
Of course, Zidane wouldn't ever let him find any reason in him to do that. But he thought of what he had heard next from Necron and frowned silently.
*Remember too, the immense power laid within you should you need to draw on it...*
He shut his eyes and let a chilling factor overtake his being for some time. He knew he had to help if they were going to go on. But he also knew that it wasn't possible for him to learn the Ultima spell in two split seconds. However, given the fact that Necron had somewhat permitted him to draw upon the vast reservoir of Darkness within him, he assumed that he would have enough spiritual energy to at least try - with the help of an assistant item. He quickly requested for one, "Hey, anybody has any item that can cast an Ultima spell here?"
Squall was the only one who responded to that by eyeing the genome weirdly. Still, he used his free hand to draw the Ultima stone from the inventory and toss it to Zidane. "Try that." He murmured, too overpowered by his own casting of the spell to be of any real help.
The bright-haired bandit quickly ran up to an available space beside his comrades, concentrating on drawing the essence of the stone out. Kuja stared at him like he was mad. "You?" He asked, incredulous, "Are you sure you're strong enough to cast a spell like that?"
"Won't know until I try!" Zidane opened his eyes and got into a ready position, wild energy exploding and imploding on his right hand. As much as he had power, Zidane certainly wasn't in control of a tough spell as such. What shocked the others most was how close his eyes came to be taken over by the same darkness they had seen before, until Zidane blinked and regained his original eye colour, turning to grin like a hangdog at Kuja.
"Um, you know what, Kuja?" He began, slowly, "... I think I can remember everything about the past now."
The silver-haired man looked at the younger genome from the corner of his eye, raising an eyebrow. "And you know what, Zidane?" He asked, voice outlined with silent evil.
"I knew it all along."
But Zidane's sight was no longer locked with Kuja's. He was staring at the globe with a genuine smile and delight. And the spell in his hand burst forth to swallow the red globe, rendering it green for a moment.
.
The eye of the Invincible widened at the new lease of energy granted it, and sent a stream of incredible power towards the weakening shell. Hairline cracks spread all over the barrier, until it broke with a loud sound, like a gigantic egg being thrown against the hard ground. The barrier flew outwards in imaginary shards, opening up to reveal a realm of foreboding darkness, sucking the airship into it's embrace.
The four of them quickly halted their spells and took some time to regain their spiritual balance. Zidane let go of the Ultima stone and it slid across the floor with a loud noise, still shimmering with the aftereffects of being drawn upon. The bandit could only gape and wonder at how he had even managed to pull that off, considering he knew nuts about magic except that it was shiny. His attention, as well as the others, were soon attracted to an entity outside the window.
"My children..." it definitely sounded female, "... why do you fight time... ?"
They entered whole into the dark dimension, and the entrance they had opened sealed up once again from behind them. The ship approached the decayed golden turret of an ominous palace and found itself witness to a scene of apparent coronation.
A form in dark hoods laid her hand over another, in a light blue outfit.
"Rinoa!" Squall was shocked. But before he could say anymore, the Invincible began to tremble with a great might. The SeeD glanced upwards to see that the ceiling was crumbling, succumbing quickly to age, beyond logical comprehension.
And it was only but a mere start to their perils.
From afar, the once majestic Invincible, in all it's alien blue glory, disintegrated against the full moon in the background and fell into the darkness that was below, never again to see a day of light.
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nazo o toita
20/12/2002
[XD fanfics!] http://www.tougenkyou.net/xd/
[The VnYmaGCC!!] http://groups.yahoo.com/group/VnYmaGCc/
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sore kara...
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nazo o toku
By the time Kuja finished relating the riddle to the rest of the crew, there were enough question marks flying around to feed an entire herd. Of course, he should have seen it coming. He came to a sad conclusion that the heroes of the show often had to have complicated theories extensively narrated to them by the villain only to see the well prepared presentation completely fly over their heads. Then they would fight. And the hero would win. Yaay.
"Whatever it is," Kuja slammed his hand on the table, cross with his companions but unable to advance their intellect within the short period of time they had for riddle solving, "we'll take things from here one step at a time, understand?" He measured out his words carefully, through gritted teeth. His companions could only nod dumbly.
"Firstly," the silver-haired man then sat down on his chair again, "we'll talk about the children of Hyne."
"I think I remember that part of the riddle," Squall spoke out meekly, "something about them residing where their heart is?"
"That is correct," Kuja nodded, "the children of Hyne - the sorceresses responsible for all this time compression hoohaa. It's because of their whimsical desires that the four of us are in such a fix. That's why we need to find them first, then the riddle says time will be solved."
"In particular it talks about the 'chosen child'..." Cloud finished scribbling on something and brandished his work for all to see, "... tadah! Here's a writing of the riddle - it'll be much easier for us to refer to something tangible than depend on our scratchy memory."
Looks of sheer disbelief were tossed in his direction. Those words coming from the most careless of persons - Cloud Strife, no less, was like a new revelation. Nevertheless they spread the paper with the riddle on the table and continued their discussion.
"Untie the knots in the chosen child... reside where their heart is..." Zidane pondered aloud, "I don't know why, Squall, but this phrase looks like it's related to you."
"......................................" was Squall's powerful reply.
"Perhaps the chosen child is the sorceress Ultimecia?" Cloud piped, "After all, she was the one who inherited the will of Hyne and got what she wanted - time compression."
"And when the coin reacted to you, the word 'heart' appeared," Kuja, and everyone else turned to look at Squall, who was quietly mumbling something to himself. "Either that coin is a clue to the whereabouts of the sorceress, or the coin is trying to point us to Squall, who may know where this sorceress of eternity resides."
At that, Squall shrugged. "How would I know where Ultimecia is?"
Cloud eyed the boy cautiously, knowing that the SeeD knew it and knew what Cloud was trying to question by mere virtue of his glance. "Are you sure about that?"
Silence passed the foursome for a short moment. Squall closed his eyes.
When he opened them he sighed rather resignedly. "I don't know if she'll still be there or anything, but I can tell you where we found her and supposedly defeated her." He scribbled something on a loose piece of rough paper and handed it to Kuja, who blinked once and then fed it to the crimson coloured sphere.
"According to the data about the maps we've found out about Gaia and Terra so far..." Kuja waited until a holographic screen shimmered to life in front of the four of them, "... 'Edea's House' can be reached, on Gaia, via time compression, from the northmost region of the Lost Continent."
"Then what are we waiting for, let's go!" Zidane shook his fist in the air. He was quickly smacked down by an incoming boot. "Hey!" He protested as he fell brusquely to the floor.
"Shut up if you don't have any better idea than 'let's go'!" Kuja growled, magically retrieving his boot, sitting down again to wear it. Zidane remained motionless on the floor, earning him several looks of pity from his other more calm companions. Not willing to be the recipient of yet another boot, they quietly let the meeting continue it's way. "We'll set off for the sorceress in a while, what's next on our agenda now, Mr. Strife?" He nodded at the blond mercenary, who had the paper in his hands and quickly referred to it.
"Four warriors of time will journey to erase the mistakes of Hyne..." he read aloud, then blinked, "... I'm guessing this refers to us."
"Um, like, what's this 'mistake of Hyne'?" Squall was curious. "And how are we supposed to erase it?"
Nobody knew the answer.
"Definitely something to do with the sorceress, anyway I see it," Kuja lowered his eyes and continued, "it's the next part that should be cause for concern."
"Four will fall, three will rise..." Cloud read out again, "..." he kept in silent contemplation about the import of those words, but didn't pause for long as he resumed reading, "... The eternal darkness repressed, the final destiny awaits..."
There was a long silence after that.
"I'm assuming the repetitive garble that comes after all this is part of the riddle of the sorceress' seal," Squall took the paper over from Cloud and briefly glanced through what the rest of the text contained.
"You're probably right." Kuja sighed. "Well, what do you know, we have one heck of an agenda to go through with now." He started counting off his fingers. "1, we travel to the Lost Continent and find the spot of the sorceress seal. 2, we break the seal. 3, we get to where the sorceress is using time compression. Or decompression. Whatever works. 4, we trash her real bad. 5, we decompress time, return to our respective eras, and live happily ever after. Any questions?" He glanced around to see Cloud taking notes, Squall looking utterly flabbergasted, and Zidane finally managing to climb up from the floor.
"Yes sir, question!" The monkey quickly raised his hand upon claiming his seat back.
"Yes Zidane, you may shoot," Kuja pointed at the ever inquisitive student.
"Well..." Zidane started counting off his fingers as well, "... 1, how are we going to find the exact spot of the seal? 2, how can we break it? 3, how in the world do we compress time?! 4, trashing ladies ain't my style! Oof! Ouch! That hurt, Kuja! Anyway, and 5, how in the world do we decompress time??"
Kuja restrained himself from throwing the other boot at Zidane. "Don't worry about the seal, that's what the Invincible is here for."
"We wouldn't know how to break the seal if we just thought about it," Cloud intercepted, "the riddle looks tough, so maybe we can figure more things out if we actually saw the seal. As for compressing and decompressing time..." He put a finger to his chin. "That, I sure as anything do not know."
*I can do that.* A voice boomed in Zidane's subconsciousness, forcing him to recline against himself with a whimper. Fortunately, nobody noticed.
*Shut up, Necron!* Zidane thought back to the entity within him. *Talking to you hurts like mad! Go away!*
In a short while the pain became much more bearable. Perhaps even Necron was trying to figure out what made him even hint at wanting to help the foursome with their trials. After all, his sole purpose in existence was to seek and destroy, wasn't it?
"I've been thinking of something else..." Cloud's voice drew Zidane back to reality. Everybody looked at him as he carried on, "... can the Invincible withstand all this time compress-decompress thing, should we use it as a form of transportation... ?"
Everybody remained considerably silent until Squall offered his view, "I'm sure an airship like this could withstand time compression - the one I was on was able to during my time... I'm just not sure if it'll still be in one piece if we were to travel into the future time..."
"Perhaps we need to find a ship that can traverse time without decaying with age?" Kuja rose to full height and turned around, meaning to approach the globe to navigate the ship while they talked. "I hardly think that there will be a ship that can do that."
"Hmmm..." Zidane was also pondering something, "... what about Ark?" he wondered aloud, realizing that he said something he shouldn't have too late only when Kuja shot a sharp, questioning glance in his direction.
His two other companions, however, did not understand. "Ark?" Squall mused.
Zidane was surprised that the silver-haired genome didn't pursue the issue, choosing instead to return to navigation and explanation, saying, "Ark was a summon as far as I knew it. It was also appointed to guard a Terran artifact in Gaia."
"So it was a ship?" Cloud asked.
"In every sense of the word, yes," Kuja replied, "and being a timeless guardian, as well as an alien summon, must mean that it would be able to transcend the ailing effects of time."
Squall whistled. "Too bad I don't have a guardian force like this."
"Neither do I." Cloud added. "So essentially nobody here can summon that Ark guy isn't it? That officially brings us back to square one." He sighed.
"What about the other summons?" Zidane meekly suggested. "Isn't there any other summon we could call on to act as transportation... ?"
Cloud and Squall eyed him curiously. Kuja was the one who eventually spoke up, saying, "Who or what do you think the summoned creatures are, Zidane? Monsters at your beck and call? Objects you can take a ride on? With the exception of a few, these creature are usually high-leveled beings from another dimension who deign to grant assistance to the one they think worthy." As he stopped, the Invincible roared to life and began it's conclusive journey towards the ends of the planet. "So, no, I don't think just any summon is going to be available as transport."
Sheepishly, the monkey-boy rubbed the back of his head and turned to looking at the floor in discomfort.
The engines of the Invincible kept droning on. Cloud examined the riddle by reading it over and over again, while Squall kept on looking outside the windows of the ship, taking in the whole of the land with mild interest. Zidane was quiet at first, but soon he began to pace - occassionally looking a little unwell, looking like he was battling some inner demon. Kuja kept on egging the Invincible on to it's destination.
The destination that would mark the start of the end of their long journey.
Squall was the first to notice the shimmering blots of dark and light energy tendrils whipping around each other. He was about to point it out when the Invincible rocked in it's foundations, quaking and trembling like it was in fear of the apparition ahead of it. From afar he could hear Kuja mutter something pretty much uncouth. As he watched on he could detect the cause of their inability to proceed. The energy gathered around the spot they were headed for was so massive it sent out it's effervescence in the form of aerial ripples, effectively stopping all incoming traffic.
Left with no choice, they had to make the Invincible retreat. Although the ship was made out of the finest and could stand for all sorts of attacks, they were certainly not going to risk their only ways of getting around to try to barge into a situation they knew they would lose in. As soon as they were stable, all four of them gathered to look at what was going on outside.
"Major magical madness!" Zidane tooted.
"I think the correct term is, the sorceress' seal," Kuja frowned at the younger genome's distortion.
"Whatever the thing is," Zidane grinned up at the uptight older person, "it's something that's stopping us from getting to where we're getting!"
"He's right," Cloud nodded.
"But we have to get into that seal." Squall murmured, loud enough to be heard nevertheless. "That's the only way we can initiate any form of time magick."
"Zidane himself was pretty good with all this time thing... sometimes," Cloud managed to stop himself from unveiling too much that Zidane had already regained his memory, and was probably unable to do all the time thing anymore. But at that moment, he just felt obliged to say a bit about the monkey boy.
The genome in question was hardly about to resist the tease. "Maybe there's a time mage in me waiting to be discovered..." He promptly threw a wink in everybody else's direction.
Kuja gathered everybody and handed coins out. He took the one which already had the words 'the final destiny' engraved on one side and handed the one with 'heart' to Squall. The rest, he dumped into Cloud's outstretched palms and watched as one of the coins glowed with the same shrill aura it did when reacting to one of them, to come up with yet another word engraved on it.
"View?" Cloud was bemused. Kuja took the other empty coin from him and gave it to Zidane, who in turn, reacted with the coin and made it come up with yet another word.
He looked at the coin and blinked. "Feel..." He recited the word on the coin with muted interest. "Heart, view, feel, final destiny... why do they all sound so familiar... ?" He took to looking at the ceiling, hoping it would refresh his memory.
"It's the riddle, blockhead." Kuja reminded. He could literally see lightbulbs flash to life atop everybody else's head. He heaved a sigh. Sometimes, he wondered why he even tried. Ignoring the stupidity of his companions he studied the coin with apt concentration. "........ anyway, there's something about these coins that's been bothering me. We know they're magically imbued, we just don't know how come, and what for."
"Well now's as good a time as any to try!" Zidane yelped like an excited puppy. Without a second thought, he gained control of the red sphere and immediately piloted the ship vertically upwards so they could reach the upper boundaries of the seal without wracking the ship inside out. Of course, in the event, he forgot that there were other people in the same room with him, who did not enjoy the advantages given to the pilot of the airship. They were tossed and turned around as the ship traveled on 90-degree curves until they soared above the seal. Then, without explaining anything whatsoever, he threw the coin he had been given into the heart of the red throbbing globe.
"Zidane!" Kuja was the first to come up to him and throttle him proper. "What in the world did you think you were doing?!"
"Breaking the seal, what else?" Zidane turned to look at his older brother with mock tears in his eyes as he held the fresh lump on his head. By now, the coin he had tossed down had surfaced, floating around limply at the threshold of the globe, glowing with an aura stranger than before. "The riddle, I've clean forgotten what it really was," Zidane began, "but since it talked about the heart, the view, the feel and the final destiny, might as well throw them all into the magic amplifier and then pile an ultima spell down to crush whatever barrier the sorceress has built up, no?" He pointed at the coin swimming around happily in the globe. "See, it's already picking up momentum. I think the coin and that orb love each other."
"What kind of an analysis is that??" Kuja was at a loss. Zidane has such twisted reasoning, sometimes you didn't even know how to start arguing with him. Before he could begin his long speech on why they should sit down and think things out again, Cloud had come by and tossed his own coin into the circle of red. Kuja blinked at him. "Not you too?"
The blond mercenary just shrugged. "Well if it doesn't work, we can think of another way to break that powerful seal. For now, I think that brute force could probably shatter that barrier pretty effectively."
"As do I." Squall chimed in unison, placing the coin he had into the placeholder and standing back.
All of them eyed the more level-headed of the group.
Who then tossed his arms into the air and put his own piece in as well.
The coins swirled and went around each other quickly. They formed a rather remarkable formation when they eventually stopped spinning, capturing the audience's attention.
"Somebody remember this pattern," was the only words Kuja recalled hearing himself say, before, "... and anybody who can shoot an Ultima spell get ready to do it!"
Cloud and Squall immediately drew upon their spellbooks.
"Ready..." Kuja had a spell slowly gaining intensity upon his withdrawn right hand.
"... GO!!"
Zidane watched, wide-eyed as indescribable green sparkles burst out seemingly from another dimension, which laid beyond the hands of his comrades currently casting the spell, and embrace the scarlet coloured orb with the coins. The room was overloaded with brightness, and all the boy could see for a while was the bold outlines of his friends locked in concentration. When things resumed their original colour, he noted with slight confusion that none of them appeared to be looking very happy. And neither did they stop forcing the spell upon the amplifier. He blinked. "What's wrong?" He asked.
"The seal is nearly broken," Kuja explained, "... but the energy isn't enough."
"And Ultima isn't a spell that can be cast for an extended period of time..." Cloud shook his head.
"But if we stop now," Squall spoke up, "the sorceress would be alerted to our presence with this huge energy interference... and she'll probably be taking further measures... we can't let that happen... we have to try to break the seal now... !"
*That sounded like it came right out from a bad movie script.* Zidane averted his eyes and thought to himself out of exasperation. He was powerless to help, and he knew it.
Then a pain hit him in his gut, reminiscent of the time when Necron invaded his vitality to speak to him at length. It effectively jolted his remembrance of the conversation he had with Necron.
*Remember that I will keep finding reason to bring all existence back into none.*
Of course, Zidane wouldn't ever let him find any reason in him to do that. But he thought of what he had heard next from Necron and frowned silently.
*Remember too, the immense power laid within you should you need to draw on it...*
He shut his eyes and let a chilling factor overtake his being for some time. He knew he had to help if they were going to go on. But he also knew that it wasn't possible for him to learn the Ultima spell in two split seconds. However, given the fact that Necron had somewhat permitted him to draw upon the vast reservoir of Darkness within him, he assumed that he would have enough spiritual energy to at least try - with the help of an assistant item. He quickly requested for one, "Hey, anybody has any item that can cast an Ultima spell here?"
Squall was the only one who responded to that by eyeing the genome weirdly. Still, he used his free hand to draw the Ultima stone from the inventory and toss it to Zidane. "Try that." He murmured, too overpowered by his own casting of the spell to be of any real help.
The bright-haired bandit quickly ran up to an available space beside his comrades, concentrating on drawing the essence of the stone out. Kuja stared at him like he was mad. "You?" He asked, incredulous, "Are you sure you're strong enough to cast a spell like that?"
"Won't know until I try!" Zidane opened his eyes and got into a ready position, wild energy exploding and imploding on his right hand. As much as he had power, Zidane certainly wasn't in control of a tough spell as such. What shocked the others most was how close his eyes came to be taken over by the same darkness they had seen before, until Zidane blinked and regained his original eye colour, turning to grin like a hangdog at Kuja.
"Um, you know what, Kuja?" He began, slowly, "... I think I can remember everything about the past now."
The silver-haired man looked at the younger genome from the corner of his eye, raising an eyebrow. "And you know what, Zidane?" He asked, voice outlined with silent evil.
"I knew it all along."
But Zidane's sight was no longer locked with Kuja's. He was staring at the globe with a genuine smile and delight. And the spell in his hand burst forth to swallow the red globe, rendering it green for a moment.
.
The eye of the Invincible widened at the new lease of energy granted it, and sent a stream of incredible power towards the weakening shell. Hairline cracks spread all over the barrier, until it broke with a loud sound, like a gigantic egg being thrown against the hard ground. The barrier flew outwards in imaginary shards, opening up to reveal a realm of foreboding darkness, sucking the airship into it's embrace.
The four of them quickly halted their spells and took some time to regain their spiritual balance. Zidane let go of the Ultima stone and it slid across the floor with a loud noise, still shimmering with the aftereffects of being drawn upon. The bandit could only gape and wonder at how he had even managed to pull that off, considering he knew nuts about magic except that it was shiny. His attention, as well as the others, were soon attracted to an entity outside the window.
"My children..." it definitely sounded female, "... why do you fight time... ?"
They entered whole into the dark dimension, and the entrance they had opened sealed up once again from behind them. The ship approached the decayed golden turret of an ominous palace and found itself witness to a scene of apparent coronation.
A form in dark hoods laid her hand over another, in a light blue outfit.
"Rinoa!" Squall was shocked. But before he could say anymore, the Invincible began to tremble with a great might. The SeeD glanced upwards to see that the ceiling was crumbling, succumbing quickly to age, beyond logical comprehension.
And it was only but a mere start to their perils.
From afar, the once majestic Invincible, in all it's alien blue glory, disintegrated against the full moon in the background and fell into the darkness that was below, never again to see a day of light.
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nazo o toita
20/12/2002
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