Part 4: The Brink of Infinity
Beyond the Looking Glass
Part 4: The Brink of Infinity
Three Days Until Landing
Three days... That was all that was left, three days, Tifa thought to herself. So much had happened over the past month and a half. The Turks had done their job flawlessly. An army of 13,000 was massed to greet, or destroy the visitors. SOLDIER was also revived, with an additional 1,500 members to add to the might of this new army. As expected, the public put up a great resistance to this. But, once the president told them of the possible doom that awaited them, almost all resistance died off.
“Tea?” Shera offered.
“No, thanks.” Tifa replied.
“You know,” Shera warned, “you’ll have to eat something sometime. It isn’t healthy to do this to yourself. It’s also worrying your children--and your husband.”
“I know,” Tifa replied. “But I just can’t eat anything as long as that’s out there.” She pointed out the window of Cid’s house to the bright white ball looming up in the sky. “It reminds me so much of meteor.” she finished.
“It scares me too,” Shera agreed. “But that’s no reason not to eat.”
“You’re right,” Tifa said “I’ll have some tea with some buttered rolls please.”
“That’s the ticket!” Shera exclaimed, happy that she had finally gotten Tifa to eat something.
“Tifa!” Barret called out from the door “We’re startin’ the meetin’!”
“I’ll take a rain check on that tea and rolls.” she told Shera.
“All right,” she said “but as soon as that meeting’s done, you get back here and eat something!”
As Tifa walked into the Shanghai Inn she noticed the crew gathered around like old times; with one new addition: Marlene.
“What took you so long?” Cloud asked his wife, with genuine concern in his voice.”
“I’m just getting slow in my old age.” she smiled weakly at him.
“Enough with the chit-chat.” Cid interrupted. “We’ve got to figure out what we’re going to do when the ship lands.”
“My department has managed to pinpoint the exact location where the ship will land,” Marlene said. “It will be between the Gold Saucer and North Corel. But, the problem is, the Turks will have total control of the area. We have no way of getting in.”
“Who says we have to get in?” Yuffie said warily “With 13,000 troops the Turks will have no problem dealing with whatever comes out of there, right?”
“I don’t know,” Marlene said. “Even with that many troops, the aliens have far superior technology. The outcome of that battle is hazy at best.”
“That’s where we come in,” Cloud said . “You all still have your Materia and weapons , right?”
They all nodded, especially Yuffie.
“Then we can at least put up a fight, if necessary.” Cloud said.
“Let us hope not.” Vincent said, speaking up for the first time.
“And if they are violent?” Reeve asked warily, “what are eight old- timers like us going to do?”
“Well...” Cloud said, “I haven’t quite figured that out yet.”
Suddenly Marlene’s phone rang.
“Hello?” she said “Mmmmhhmmmm? Yeah I’ll be right over.”
“Who was that?” RedXIII asked.
“That was the guy from the geology department. He says he has something we should look at right away.”
“But that was like, a 12 hour drive!” Yuffie whined.
“Oh get over it.” RedXIII barked.
“I wish we had the Highwind.” she sniffled.
“You wish we had the Highwind?” Cid asked . “You hated that thing!”
“Well, not anymore.” she replied.
“Tifa,” Shera said, as she walked in the door, “here’s that food I made for you. And please, find something else to eat along the way.”
Two Days Until Landing
“So, what’s this thing you want us to look at?” Marlene asked.
“Yesterday we picked up something strange on our scanners.” The man replied.
“Oh, really?” Marlene asked. “What?”
“This,” he pointed out. “We picked up some high level radiation emanating from the craft as it was about to strike a passing asteroid. Then the asteroid disappeared.”
“So? What does that mean?” Cloud asked.
“It means,” he said with a sigh, “they have weapons capability far beyond what we are even starting to experiment with.”
“Like lasers and stuff? “Barret asked.
“I wish it were only lasers,” he said. “Those we could reflect with mirror shielding or something. It’s more of a fusion of lasers with a sort of space plasma.”
“To make matters worse,” Marlene said, “this greatly increases the chances of it being a warship. Which if it is, it’s one-hundred percent hostile.”
“Aw, isn’t that just great!” Yuffie whined.
“Act your age woman.” Barret said. He was, for good reason, very pissed off.
“So, even with that huge army, it may all be futile?” Tifa asked.
Marlene simply nodded. “All they’re equipped with is some machine guns and trucks. What can those do against weapons of this sort of power?”
“Come on everyone,” said Cloud . “We have a long day tomorrow, so let’s check in at the local inn.”
One Day Until Landing
Cid woke up with a lot of sleep in his eyes. He hadn’t gotten much sleep since he had heard about the aliens, so it was good that he was making up the lost time before they landed.
“Holy crap it’s 10:55?!” he screamed.
Everyone else was eating when he came rushing down to the inn’s dining room. They were enjoying the inn’s complementary continental breakfast.
“Hey, would ya lookit that,” Barret mocked. “Sleeping beauty finally woke up!”
“Why didn’t you guys wake me up?” Cid asked, completely ignoring Barret.
“You looked so peaceful and calm,” Tifa said jokingly, “just like a little baby.”
Barret had to laugh at that one.
“I will get you for this.” he threatened.
“Oh, get over it Cid.” Cloud consoled him. “You know the team’s spirit needs a boost.”
“Well, then they should use some mind sources.” he mumbled.
“Come on Cid grab a donut.” Tifa encouraged him.
“Sorry Cid ,but we have to leave now.” Cloud stated, standing up.
“And I was jes gettin to the bacon!” Barret whined.
At the area between North Corel and the Gold Saucer...
“Okay team,” Cloud said enthusiastically “we need a place to hide while the ship lands. We can’t afford to get spotted by the Turks.”
“You were saying?” Reno inquired sarcastically. The Turks had sneaked up behind them.
Cloud jumped a good foot and a half into the air. “What the hell are you guys doing here?”
“Nice to see you too!” Elena said. “And, we’re placing our army. Although that’s none of your business.”
“You don’t even need to pick a hiding spot.” Rude said, “just good seats.”
“Huh?” Yuffie said.
“This is going to be a public event.” Elena continued “The world shouldn’t be deprived of the chance to see the visitors to our planet... or that’s what the president says...”
Just as Yuffie was going to say something halfway witty to that, Marlene’s phone rang.
“Hello?” she said “Yeah. Uh, huh. We will. Bye.”
“Who was that?” RedXIII asked.
“The office” she responded. “We need to get back right away.
“Again?” Reeve said “But we just got here.”
“Well, then, we’ll just get set up here.” Reno said mockingly.
Yuffie stuck out her tongue at him, ever showing the child in her.
At Marlene’s office
“So, Marlene,” Cloud asked, “what’s the problem this time?”
“It’s not really a problem.” Marlene told him. “It’s a confusion.”
“Huh?” Cloud asked.
“Well, take a look at this.” she told him. “Here’s the ship. Notice any difference?”
“Well, those red thingy’s are gone.” Barret suggested.
“Those ‘red thingy’s’ are the engine emissions of the ship.” she continued. “Do you know what it means if they are gone?”
After a moment RedXIII said. “It means that the ship has stopped.”
“Right.” She told him.
“But why?” Tifa asked.
“This,” she said. Then she zoomed in on a tiny little dot below the ship. After a bit of zooming it turned out to look like a rounded out rectangle. And it had it’s own engine emissions. “It’s a shuttlecraft.” she continued. “It showed up about ten minutes after the ship stopped.”
“But why didn’t it just land?” Reeve questioned.
“We think that the main ship isn’t capable of atmospheric travel. It would be pointless to put that many heat shields on a ship that big. So they use a smaller craft instead.”
“Well, that kind of makes sense...” Yuffie said “But when are they going to land now?”
“At about 8 o’clock tonight.” Marlene told her.
“Man, are the Turks going to be pissed.” Cloud said.
“That’s going to be the least of their problems.” Marlene told him. “We have indications that this ship has a smaller version of the weapons technology that the big ship used.”
“There will be thousands of people there.” Vincent stated, calm as ever. “And no matter what our powers are, they cannot compete with technology as advanced as that.”
“So what’re we gonna do?” Tifa asked. “If they are hostile, even the Shinra army cannot compete with weapons of that power.”
“I have one word for you...” Cid said speaking up for the first time “Highwind.”
Landing day
“Where are those damned aliens?” Elena asked, growing impatient. “They were supposed to be here six hours ago.”
“Patience Elena.” Reno soothed her. “They’re probably just trying to make a good entrance.”
“Sure Reno,” Rude said mockingly, “and you drink booze for it’s sex appeal.”
“Shut up.” Reno said angrily.
“Speaking of which.” Rude said, unaffected by Reno’s tone. “I’m bored and need a shot. Where’s the nearest tavern?”
Elena just shook her head and sighed.
“Rude you dope, the nearest liquor is in North Corel and that’s a five hour drive.”
“I find it hard to believe that neither of you brought any booze.” Elena told them.
“Well...” Reno said.
“Come on Reno, share.” Rude demanded. “I’m not driving to North Corel. “Do you have any idea what a pain it is to go through those mountains?”
Somewhere in the Corel mountains
There was silence, absolute utter silence. You could have heard a pin drop in those mountains. You could have heard anything drop in those desolate mountains. Which includes a spaceship...
As the thrusters disengaged on the axheaded craft, the computer fired up the cryogenic manipulators and started the thawing process. As the large fighter descended it extended its three landing struts. And it slowly came to a rest on the top of the mountain. The computer didn’t count on one thing though. Mountain tops have snow...
As the ship lost it’s traction it crashed trough a good many rocks and sliced up quite a few trees with it’s house sized bulk. As the mountain flattened out it slowed down accordingly until it slid to a stop in front of a huge boulder. The computer finished the thawing process as it powered down. As it finished a man crawled out, brushed off the layer of thaw skin as it was called, and inspected his craft.
“Hmmm...” he thought to himself. “It seems like one of those jolts has cracked the cryo unit. And I don’t have the materials to fix it... Looks like I’m gonna be here a while.”
He moved around his ship, manually detaching the now useless heat shields and removing deep space icicles that had survived the atmospheric flight.
He proceeded into the craft and started flipping levers on the control panel. The clamps on the back unlocked and freed the wing ailerons. Then he got out of the cockpit and observed the damage.
“Doesn’t seem too bad. Pah, she should fly fine.” he thought out loud.
He then fired up the thrusters, disengaged the landing gear, and headed southward, toward the golden saucer...
At the Ghast Museum of Relics in Kalm
“Are you sure this thing’ll fly?’ Yuffie asked warily.
“Well, all we can do is hope.” Cid said while climbing up the ladder.
“Oh, that’s real comforting.” Yuffie said sarcastically, yet still following him up.
“I can’t believe they let you use this Cid.” Tifa said. She had already crawled in. “Isn’t it museum property?”
“Nope,” he said, while checking the many switches and levers on board. “This is borrowed, she’s still all mine.”
“Well, as comforting as that is.” Reeve said ,not being sarcastic for once. “I’ve got one question, though: What do we plan to do with this? It’s a hunk of junk!”
“This is what we plan to do with it.” Cid said, with a smirk. He then pressed a small green button on the control panel. Suddenly there was a whirring noise on both sides of them. As they looked out of the Highwind’s huge bay window they saw a strange sight. Row after row of doors were opening on the Highwind’s wings and. inside, they also saw row after row of long-dormant missiles that were housed inside.
“I always wondered where you kept those.” Reeve said with a smile.
“All right!” Cid said, while somehow also taking a drag on his cig, “Lady Luck’s back in business!”
As the engines fired up, Yuffie rushed to her usual spot to, well, you know... The clamps that had held the massive ship in place for so long unlocked and the Highwind slowly began to creep forward...
Back at the area between North Corel and the Gold Saucer
Reno opened his mouth and yawned. It had been a long day. It was nearly eight in the evening and the aliens still hadn’t shown. He could tell that the spectators were getting restless.
Rude stretched out, “This is a bore, let’s get out of here...”
He was cut short by a loud rumbling. Suddenly the ground started to shake and Elena woke up.
“What the hell?!” She screamed over the noise. Her question was answered when she looked up.
Near the Gold Saucer
The man relaxed as he let the autopilot take him to the landing zone. He had spent 5 years in cryostasis. He needed a good stretch. He noticed a great amount of activity around the landing zone. Then, finally, he cleared the desert and noticed that thousands upon thousands of people ringed the zone. Many of them wore strange uniforms. He still wasn’t close enough for them to notice him, but with the monitors his ship had, he not only could see them, but another fast moving signature as well...
Then he heard it, the low rumbling of an engine. A massive engine, and there was only one thing that could make that kind of noise this close to the ground...
Onboard the Highwind
“I still can’t believe this thing flies.” Yuffie said with disbelief.
“Well, get over it.” Cid told her. “It’ll fly... and get us to where we want to go faster than anything on the planet. And it will be killing some aliens as well.”
“Cid,” Tifa said warningly, “we still don’t know if they’re hostile. And, we don’t want to make them hostile. So don’t be getting trigger happy on us. OK?”
“All right, all right. I won’t shoot first.” Cid said a little disappointedly.
“Cid,” RedXIII said, “we’re nearing the landing site.”
“Well it’s about damn time!” Cid said angrily. “Any sign of our little friends.”
“Not as yet. Wait a second...” RedXIII told them.
Then they could hear it. A very low and increasingly loud rumbling, and it was only getting louder...
“What the hell is that?!” Cid yelled.
In the area between North Corel and the Gold Saucer
Elena squinted as a blue light descended out of the clouds. She saw something big coming down, really big...
“Everyone! Get behind something!” Reno screamed over the noise. The three Turks and a SOLDIER rushed behind a parked truck that had been left at the top of the hill. They could see through the truck windows, that the exhaust from the huge ship’s landing thrusters was literally melting the grass underneath it. The huge ship slowed it’s decent and then it slowly started to turn...
In the cockpit of the fighter
The man sat back comfortably in the cushy chair. Sights like these were no surprise to him. He had seen many ships land like this before. He started to tip his head down and let the autopilot take over again. But then he noticed something. The ship was starting to turn, ships never turned when they were landing. Not only was it turning, but it was turning right for him! Wait... It wasn’t turning for him. He checked his scanner. That fast signature he had detected earlier was now right in front of him! And he knew exactly the reason why it was turning now.
“Oh, sh...”
Onboard the Highwind
“Everyone!” Cid screamed. “grab a hold of something!” Highwind was shaking so violently from the landing of the alien craft, that pieces of debris were flying from all parts of the ship. But what Cid didn’t know was that the worst was yet to come.
“What the hell are they doing?!” yelled Cloud over the noise. He had noticed that the ship was turning towards them. Then it dawned on him what they were doing. “You’d better find something better to hold on to Cid!” He yelled. Then as he looked out of the bay window he saw a blue streak coming right for the ship...
On board the Fighter
He knew. He knew even before the first trace-signatures of the blast had shown up. He knew what they were doing, and now the ship that was in front of him was plummeting to the ground. His ship was large. But not as big as the one in front of him. But the gravity on this planet was slightly lighter. Maybe, just maybe...
“Engines to full power!” He told the console. “Put me directly under that ship!”
Back on the Highwind
This was it, Cid thought. After all they had been through, after defeating Sephiroth, stopping Meteor, and trying to save the world from this new threat. He was going to die just like that, and there was nothing he could do about it. The engines were completely off-line and they were now on a collision course with a large hill directly in front of them. Well, at least he would die in the ship he had been with for so many years. “Everyone, brace for impact!” He yelled. It was a reflex. He knew it was of no use. And so did everyone else. There was no way any of them were going to survive this.
“1500 meters!” Cloud yelled. “1300... 1100... 900...”
WHAM! Cid heard a massive thud on the bottom of the Highwind. The he heard a screeching and a loud ka-pow. Suddenly, the deck was level. Cid rushed out to the bay windows. There he saw the thing that saved him.
“What the hell is that?” He asked to no one in particular. While looking skeptically at the axhead shaped craft.
“It appears to be another spacecraft.” Vincent said, answering his question.
“But why is it helping us?” Tifa said.
“I don’t care!” Barret whooped “We’re still breathin!”
Cid took a look at the damage that was showing up on the internal scanners. Everything was pretty badly messed up. But not beyond repair. He noticed that there was a small heat signature coming from the left wing. He squinted at it as he wondered why there would be so much heat coming from the wing. And then he realized what that ka-bang was...
“Holy...!” But he never got to finish his sentence as the entire left wing burst into flames. The fire had reached the missiles and had caused a huge explosion. Unfortunately for everyone on both ships, this fire was directly on top of the shield generator of the spacecraft that was supporting the unwieldy bulk of the Highwind. And, shield generators put out an unusual amount of energy, even when they’re not in use. Also, for more good reasons than can be named right now, you can’t use those shields when you’re in direct contact with a ship that’s about twice your size.
Just after the left wing exploded. the shield generator went up in flames as well, and the release of all that energy destroyed about half of the other spacecraft. Then they could all feel a violent shaking as the engines of the other ship started to go as well. at that point, they again started to descend.
“We’re too low!” Cloud called out. “We’re going to hit the top of that hill!” Then the ship below them started to level out. But not enough. Cid knew that this was going to be too close. Maybe too close for them even to live.
“Brace for impact!” Cid called out again. And then he blacked out as he heard the terrible scream of metal giving way...
Part 5 (Coming Soon)
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