Final Fantasy [Begins]

[Shadow Wolf]

Jin

It was a job well done!

Jin had a smile in his face as he saw the fireworks illuminate the city. He didn’t care about how much rush he had to go through hours earlier as the crew finished the last details of the festival. He didn’t care either about the pressure felt while having everything related to the festival built with “perfection”. He was just here with nothing in his mind, except the words he heard from his trainer: “Enjoy what you do Jin.”There was a lot of activity around him due to the festival, but he was adapted to be “invisible”, so he just stood there, watching everything around him move while he remained “still”. He was adapted to this ever since he began living alone, and from what it seemed, he could enjoy the festival like this.

…But life had other plans for Jin. If not, then the chaos that would engulf the festival would definitely work on this. His inner thoughts of peace were broken along with the stage now in ruins due to the evil creature now creating havoc in the city. And with a roar louder than thunder, it’s no surprise that even Jin’s poker face would transform into a serious and fearful look.

The city was in chaos and now almost everyone was running for their lives. He would notice a few brave souls fighting the creatures but he was hesitant to join them, so he preferred to help the people get away. At least, his small amount of training with the Defence Core would help him achieve that. Looking out for the Goblins, he helped a few citizens move outside of danger. But things weren’t going to be a piece of cake for anyone. And just as he was helping a few kids reach safety, he felt as a sudden weight made him fall face first into the ground.

Moving out the body out of the way so he wound be able to stand up again, he noticed that a fellow DC officer lied dead in the ground. He was shocked! After all, he had one of the new prototype weapons being tested in among the Core’s elite guards. Not even he was unable to withstand the wrath of the Goblins and of the Gorgonopsids. But what made him lose his mind was to notice that the kids he was trying to help were also lying on the floor… motionless.

His mind went on a complete blank, except for one word: Rage.

Picking up his fallen teammate’s weapons –A pair of mechanized tonfas–, he rushed towards the monsters. He gripped the weapons tighter, thus pressing the button to make them spin automatically, excellent to shield him from the attacks and to take down many of them at the same time. One… two… three… he was taking down each goblin as he endured the hits from their heavy hands. He took out a lot of these and even a Gorgonopsid along the way. But eventually, the hits would take a toll on him; and just as he was staring at the demonic Behemoth and getting ready to rush towards where it was, he was taken down when a Gorgonopsid landed on top of him.

______


Jin woke up feeling ache all over his body. Using a nearby wall as support, he managed to get up. Leaning against the very wall, he explored the surroundings with his eyes. Everything was unfamiliar to him.

That means I’m officially lost

He just let his body slide into the floor, though he regretted that as soon as he did it. His back had been cut by the claws of the Gorgonopsid who knocked it out of the battle.

Ah, right!

He scouted the area with his eves again, but there were no signs of the monster. Releasing a light sound of relief, he decided to remain there, resting a bit.

How reckless of me…

His thoughts were focused on the past battle. And in the train of logic, he looked at his side, noticing that he had the tonfas close to him. It took him a few minutes, but he got the hang of them soon. Rotation and Extension… Defense and Offense. That’s all he needed to know.

Suddenly, a sound made his head turn in the direction of a nearby corridor.

Footsteps… he readied his newly acquired weapons to whatever was coming.
Hiding himself behind a nearby wall and holding one of the weapons close, he quietly awaited whatever was coming. He wasn’t ready to be stabbed from behind again… but he stopped hearing the footsteps. Something wasn’t right…

And out of the blue, a bright sword crossed paths with his stick.

“Who are you?” The woman was standing there with her blade pushing the tonfa closer to Jin. Jin did not answer and used his second tonfa to try and catch her off guard. He missed, though.

She’s good… really good

“Don’t make this hard on yourself” She replied as she landed a second blow in Jin. And just as he was about to move out of her way, a third blow from an unknown source caught him off guard, making him fall in his bottom. “Now answer… who are you?” The woman changed her blade into a rifle and the laser was now pointed at Jin’s forehead.

Jin finally noticed that the third blow came from a young man a bit taller than him. He could’ve sworn he’d seen him before, but that wasn’t important right now.

“Jin” He had no choice but to reply to the woman pointing the gun at him.

“Wait...” The teenager had the same look as Jin now. “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”

“You know him Nova?” The woman asked the young boy.

“Not really... however, I've seen him somewhere.” The boy replied as he tried to recall a fading memory.

Nova… Eden… both names sound so familiar… that’s when Jin remembered something…

“Nova… weren’t you in the Defence Core?” Jin replied as a vague memory of the young man slipped through his mind.

_________

Well, I think it was about time I could finally come up with something. I missed a lot so I hope I can make it up for it soon. Tag Eden (Crystal Tears) and Nova (Chobichibi)

[Crystal Tears]

~5~

Alex was slow to stand. Everything around her was dark, a pure jet-black that it made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She gulped, turning around slowly – listening to the damp footsteps of her shoes on the floor. The room slowly lit up, blue light turning to a soft white, allowing her to see around her.

Despite her vision returning, she completely tripped over a woman lying on the floor – unconscious.

Alex landed on her butt, wincing and giving a grunt as she sat back up. This woman had been one of the real fighters – thick into the combat.

Wasn’t her name Bella? Or something close to that? Alex frowned for a second, before crawling towards the woman on her hands and knees. She paused and looked down when her hand fell on something. The songstress tilted her head, blinking at the device.

The baton that Odile had given her…

I hope she’s alright… Alex turned her attention back to the woman.
“Um… hello?”

No reply.

There was a rumble, drawing the girl’s attention up.

There was a… thing… a humanoid thing about three times the size of Alex, lumbering towards them. That rumble had been a moan, something it emitted again from seemingly nowhere. It didn’t have a mouth; instead it had grotesquely huge arms and a pale, screaming face in its chest. Lines on its body glowed red when it made another call.

Alex’s eyes shot down to the woman – she didn’t look like she was going to wake up soon. Her gaze fell back to the baton.

This was about to suck.

Snatching the baton, Alex examined it and found a small button on the side, making the baton extended to about five feet. She gulped, changing her grip so she had a firm hold on it in the center.

“Ultima please,” Alex carefully stepped over the woman, her heart pounding. “Don’t let me die horribly.”

Bella groaned.

“And don’t let that thing step on her either…”

The creature trudged forward, lifting a giant arm and swung.

It was in that split moment, Alex remembered she had no idea how to fight. There wasn’t a bad bone in her body – she only had good bones one would say. Good bones that definitely did not want to be pulverized.

She yelped and ducked, falling to the floor much like a typical girl would. She looked up, mouth ajar as that massive arm was being thrust down to kill her. The songstress rolled, popping out behind the creature.

Which, didn’t even turn to look at her, it was marching for her friend.

“Oh! No! No, no no no!” She ran back to it, futilely smacking the thing in the back. “No! You don’t want to kill her! You want to kill me!” She kept hitting it – harder and harder but it just kept moving. It was looming over the woman now, forcing Alex to instead, grasp the pole like a bat and swing as hard as she could at crystal protrusion on the monster’s shoulder.

There was a crack, and the crystal formation when flying off into the wall, shattering. The creature howled, its once dull rumble echoing through the halls. It slowly turned; almost looking like it was going to fall over, before it was facing her.

Alex stepped back, accidently shrinking the baton back to normal size. “oh… well…” Its shadow was cast over her. “I suppose, I would be angry if someone lobbed my.. shoulder… guard off too..”

The lines glowed red again, and it raised its arm.

And then she was on the floor.

And gun shots were going off.

And as she opened her eyes, she was staring at a very familiar face. He was smiling down at her, like there was nothing wrong with their current evil-fiend-of-doom predicament.

“Nova?” She questioned, and his smile turned cheeky.

“I’m making a habit of saving you.”

Alex’s eyes flicked to an incoming arm. She wasn’t very strong, but she used all of her strength to roll them out of the way, resulting in her sitting awkwardly on top of him.

He blinked a tiny amount of blush appearing on his face, while Alex’s flooded red.

“Nova,” Eden snapped, trying to get him to focus. “Ignore the cute girl for a second and help Jin.”

“Eden!”

On the opposing side of the cieth, was Markus and Nova’s hammer-wielding fiend. The huntress was slightly supporting herself on the wall a little ways back, trying to clear her head.

“Grab Bellaevis!”

“Go help them,” Markus ordered Kite, as the duo split up. He hurried to the now slowly gaining consciousness Bellaevis, who simply seemed confused. For such a large man, he nimbly made it to the other side, hurrying to the huntress’s side. “There’s more, more then we can fight. They saw me and Kite.”

Eden looked at the team.

“Let’s go!” She ordered them all back. “We have to run – there’s more!”

The group began falling back, putting as much distance between them and the monsters as they could. Admittedly, Eden had no idea where she was going, but every direction she picked seemed to be void of whatever the hell was chasing them. When they came to an old, grummy looking elevator, the group paused.

“Well…” Nova crossed his arms. “That looks promising.”

Eden frowned, staring at the contraption. It was big enough to carry them all, just… would it?

“What were those things?” Markus questioned, still carrying the out-of-it Bellaevis.

“Fiends.” Jin noted.

“No,” Eden opened the elevator doors, checking the interior. “They’re ceith.”

Alex gasped, the rest were silent.

“But no one has been out here for ages…” the songstress quietly noted. “How long have they been wandering around this temple?”

“I don’t think the fal’Cie gave the curse an end.” Markus looked at her, frowning. He looked back at Eden. “You don’t know where that goes.”

“We’re dead if we go back.” The huntress didn’t hesitate as she stepped inside and turned to face them.

“We might die down there.” Kite frowned, his voice showing a hint of displeasure.

Alex joined Eden, Jin was next, followed by Markus – leaving only Nova and Kite.

“I can guarantee you, if you stay up here, you will die when those cieth find you.” Eden crossed her eyes, looking at them both with an icy stare. “Riding the elevator to its destination gives us slightly better odds.”

Nova stepped in next, and issued for Kite to join them.

Kite didn’t say anything as he entered. Eden reached and pressed the panel, activating the lift.

It began its decent, casting them all in pure darkness.

Nova chuckled. “May the odds ever be in our favour.”

“Shut it Nova.” Eden grumbled.

He chuckled. “Yes ma’am…”

~ + Tag EVERYBODY + ~

If you do not respond to this post I will assume you do not wish to continue this RPG anymore. If that’s the case I will work you out of the story (in a violent fashion, given where we are). We’re in an elevator going deeper – one of you guys can move us along.

[Shadow Wolf]

Jin

“I think you should save the ‘catching up’ for later”

Eden’s words made Jin snap back from his mind into the situation at hand. He still didn’t know where he was, so that should be his priority. “So what do we do?”

“Find out where we are?” Eden said as she returned her weapon.

“There are others so we should also look for them.” Nova mentioned this as he offered a hand to help Jin stand up.

“Thanks” He had a bit of pain, but he could still move.

“Let’s go!” Eden was already walking slowly ahead of them. For some reason, Nova gave a quick sprint towards the woman… as if he expected something… And that’s when Jin noticed… the woman lost her balance and Nova was already ready to have her lean on his shoulder. She forced her hand Jin thought as he gave some quick steps to walk close to them. With Nova carrying Eden, the least he could do was to be on guard. With this, they proceeded forward as a lit chamber awaited them at the end of the next hall.

_______

As the trio proceeded forward into the chamber, there silent environment was interrupted with a sound of something crashing against a wall and shattering, followed shortly by an eerie howl. Quickly following the origin of the noise, their eyes widened a bit as they witnessed a massively tall creature turning around slowly to a girl holding a large baton in her hands. Eden was about to say something when she was quickly interrupted by Nova.

“Bell-”…. “Alex!” He didn’t hesitate to let go of Eden to rush to the girl’s aid.

With no choice but to follow the “hero’s” lead, she pulled her sword from her case to make it transform into a rifle. With a slow breath, her eyes were focused on the laser, which was now pointed at the humanoid monster. “Go!” Eden ordered Jin to assist the hero as her finger clicked on the trigger, making the shots hit some of the monster’s weak spots and making it stagger. The monster howled again and in its rage, managed to raise its arm again to strike. Nova had his guard down and Jin knew that he would not arrive on time to block the fiend’s strike. The monster made its swing…

Fortunately, the very girl that he intended to save ended up saving him instead. She managed to roll both of them to the side with enough strength to help both of them evade the huge arm coming at them from above.

Now’s my chance… Holding both weapons by the main shaft, Jin made a dual swing at the monster’s leg. With its arm already on the floor and the leg of the same side taking a blunt hit from Jin’s Tonfas. It wasn’t enough to take it down but at least it was enough to make the monster focus on Jin. Stepping back as the monster proceeded towards him and barely evading a swing from one of its massive arms, he was able to ensure the safety of the three on the floor. During the events, new people joined the team, but also many more enemies… many more than the whole team could handle.

“Let’s go!” Eden’s words echoed through everyone’s ears, including Jin’s. “We have to run – there’s more!”

Eden led the group as they tried to keep as much distance as possible from the giants. The group eventually stumbled upon some kind of ancient elevator. Eden was lost in thoughts for a moment, but she quickly reacted and activated the mechanism.

“What were those things?” Markus questioned.

“Fiends” Jin noted.

“No” Eden opened the elevator doors, checking the interior. “They’re ceith.”

Alex gasped, the rest were silent. There was a short conversation between the rest of the group, but it was quickly interrupted as Eden gave the order to get on the elevator. Eventually, everyone was on and, with the elevator going down, the group was thrown into an environment filled with silence, mystery and darkness.

___________

After a brief period of time, the elevator stopped. Everything was completely dark, but everyone’s eyes were focused at where the door is supposed to be. “Stay alert everyone!” Markus voice reminded everyone of the horde of ceith they left behind, thus they needed to be ready.

With a loud but quick pitch produced by the mechanisms of the elevator, the doors of the lift proceeded to open. The loud sound echoed through the place and with it, the lights of the room began turning on, as if the room was ready to receive the crew; and with the lights on, everyone could see each other again. Eden, Jin and Markus had their grip on their respective weapons, while the woman with her ears covered in earrings seemed to have recovered and was currently analyzing the current situation. Jin recalled the name Bellaevis while he was dealing with the cieth, or whatever the monster was called.

Nova was probably the one facing an unusual situation. On his left side, the girl who apparently was named Alex was attached to his left arm, probably due to a spontaneous reaction. And on his right side, the guy with the hammer was gripping his right shoulder, as if he wanted to make sure that he was still close to him. Both of them released Nova so quickly and nervously that it pretty much made everyone notice how nervous they were as each one tried so hard to hide their faces.

Ignoring the scene, Nova stepped out of the lift and into the room. The steps echoed through the room and with no other sound except that of his teammates, it seemed like there was no enemy near them. He looked around a bit; just to make sure that no threats were close.

“It seems we’re safe for now.” He was now facing the group as he lowered his weapon.

“Ah, I’m glad” Alex was breathing a sigh of relief as everyone proceeded to get out of the lift.

Once again, the sounds of everyone’s footsteps were the only noise in the chamber.

Apparently, they had gone down quite some floors, since they couldn’t even hear the echo of the cieth waiting for them in the floor above them.

“We’re are we?” The woman whose name was Bellaevis asked as her gaze was fixed at the weird statues surrounding the room.

“That’s what we have to find out.” Eden replied as she apparently showed signs of recovery.

“Hehehe, this promises to be interesting.” Nova aired as he showed signs of excitement. Eden seemed like she disapproved his statement, but remained silent to the young one’s response.

“In any case, the only way to go is forward.” Markus conveyed his words as he pointed a path which seemed to have a long stair to an even lower level of this place.

“But there are two paths.” The guy with the hammer exclaimed as he pointed a small hallway east of the path Markus was pointing.

“Yeah, but I don’t think splitting up is a good idea, considering that we have cieth on the hunt for our necks.” Markus mentioned while looking at Eden, as if he was waiting to see if she agreed.

“We should check both paths and return. After that, we can choose the best route to proceed. You two, check the stair path and you two, check the other path.” Eden ordered as she sent Markus with Nova to check one route and Jin with the young one with hazel eyes.

“Alright, time to explore.” Nova exclaimed as he readied his sword.

“And Markus” He turned around to see Eden with a fixed glare at Nova “Don’t let him out of your sight.”

________________

After a few minutes, both parties returned to Eden. From what each group reported, it was confirmed that the route they should take was the one with the stairway.

“Alright, let’s go then.” The group was now moving forward as each one proceeded to take the steps of the dampened stair with caution. As both Markus and Nova stated, what awaited them at the end was an even bigger room with what it seemed to be some kind of chamber filled with ancient technology. Thin pillars with some kind of orange light, projected by small artifacts in some of the handles could be found in the air around the room, making the room even brighter, along with the white lights surrounding it. A few sets of small stairs were placed in each side, leading to a higher platform in the northern part of the room.

And in the end of the big platform, some kind of door which seemd to be powered by the artifacts in the room awaited our group

"Well, we know where to go." Nova replied as he walked in front of the group. However, his confidence was cut short when the room began to shake, as if some kind of earthquake had befallen the place. The floor beneath them was shaken uncontrollably, and almost everyone was paralyzed due to the sudden earthquake.

"MOVE!!!!"
Eden had to shout the order to make everyone react and move into a safe place. However, the young guy with a hammer as a weapon seemed to have ignored Eden's order, as he still remained in shock.

He finally reacted when he felt someone pushing him to the side. Jin managed to push the young one just before part of the floor began to collapse. And as the young one turned to see who the one who saved him was, Jin noticed how the floor beneath him ceased to exist.

He was falling...

______

OK, I think I tagged everyone here. I hope I managed to create both tension and action with this post. I apologize for the grammar errors and if there's anything I need to fix, let me know.

[Samchu]

Markus
~~~~~



“Urgh…what in the name of Shiva happened…?” Markus groaned as he lifted himself to his feet. He had the distinct groggy feeling that he had been unconscious but he had no way of telling how long for. “Eden?” He took a step forward but his legs wobbled, still unfamiliar with the concept of walking, and he fell sideways into the wall. Cursing, he slid to his rear. Awareness seeped slowly into him, bringing with it a throbbing pain in his right leg. He cursed again. “Feels like I got run over by a damn chocobo.” He looked across the floor and discovered the source of his pain. “Or I landed on a sledgehammer. Of all the places to fall into I gotta land on a freaking sledgehammer. Odin damn it!”

There was a moan to the left. Looking across Markus saw another male, about his age. After a few moments he realised it was the guy he’d seen with Nova during the attack. Returning to his feet – with more care this time – Markus wandered over and nudged the man’s shoulder. “Hey, you okay there?”

The man’s head rolled to the side. “What happened?”

“No idea.” He looked around. “Can’t even say where we are. Definitely ain’t the beach.”

There was a moment of silence before the man shouted, “Nova!” and jumped to his feet. A little too quickly it turned out as he stumbled and Markus had to offer a hand of support. “Thanks…”

“Don’t worry, we’ll find Nova. And the others. They all got sucked in. They all gotta be around here somewhere.” He took his hand off of the man’s shoulder and picked a direction, keeping his steps slow. Despite his anxiousness to find Eden he knew nothing about the place in which they found themselves, what dangers might lurk in the shadows. He needed to be prepared for anything and that meant doing his best to keep his mind off of her.

“So you’re in the Defence Core?”

It sounded more like a statement than a question but Markus chose to take it as the latter. “That’s right.” He looked back at his travelling companion and noticed the accursed sledgehammer had come along too. “You’re Nova’s friend, right?”

“Kite. You know Nova?”

“Know him? I trained him – for a while anyway.”

“Was he always so-”

“Reckless?”

Kite nodded.

“Yeah. Not his fault though, one of them genetic things. His sister’s the same.” He slowed his pace enough to let Kite walk beside him. “He’ll give you the run around.”

“Yeah…” Kite looked distant for a moment, then his eyes caught Markus’ gaze and the bigger man thought he saw him blush. “Not that I run around after him or anything. I just – I get what you mean, about Nova.”

Markus chuckled. “If you say so.” He paused to rub the back of his still aching leg. “It’s worth it though. All that running around feels exhausting and you have to fight so hard for so little but it really is worth it.” He started walking again. “Come on, the others have to be around here somewhere.”

*

Somehow they all made it into the immediate safety of the elevator. The doors closed and the army of fiends – make that ceith – disappeared. Markus let out a breath of relief but he knew they weren’t safe. As the elevator descended, a tense silence gripped the group. After seeing those cieth, what horrors could be waiting for them below.

The girl draped over his shoulder stirred and her hands brushed his rear.

“Hey are you-”

“I once knew a man – such a tease
“Who charmed off a girl’s panties with ease
“I walked up to that man
“And readied my hand
“And gave his large cock a good squeeze.”

Fortunately for Markus, the woman wasn’t in any position to grab his manhood but that didn’t stop her from taking advantage of the situation and grabbing a handful of his rear. The soldier yelped and momentarily lost his footing, almost dropping the woman in the process. Somehow he managed to recover and slid the woman to her feet before passing her over to Eden.

“You take care of her.” He slipped into a corner of the elevator to nurse his pride and his backside in peace.

*

There are some things in life that no amount of training could ever prepare you for, things that are so sudden and unexpected that the only thing you can do is hope that your instincts are sharp enough to save you. When the floor started to shake, Markus had immediately braced himself, drawing his body into a crouch and shifting his weight against the movements as best he could. He felt the inevitable collapse of a section of the floor moments before the cracks began to show but it was Eden who ordered them to move. She had always had a way of reading a situation better than he ever could. He wasn’t sure whether he admired or envied for the skill.

Everyone moved away from the dangerous section of the floor, all save for Kite. Jin rushed to the boy’s rescue only for the added weight of a second body to force open the already fragile cracks. As Kite stumbled towards the main body of the group, the ground beneath Jin’s feet vanished. Without pause for thought, Markus made his move. He gained as much momentum as he dared and dropped, scraping across the rough surface. The uniform did little to protect him from the coarse ground and he winced as pointed debris scratched at his skin. He reached the edge of the floor and, ignoring every fibre of his being, let himself fall over the edge. Opening his arms as he rolled over, he managed to grab hold of Jin’s wrist and succeeded in a tentative grip on the crumbling edge of the floor. His chest roared in agony at the sudden stop and he almost lost his grip on both Jin and the floor above.

“You okay, Jin?” He managed to ask through gritted teeth.

“Y-yeah. Thanks.”

“Thank me when we’re on stable ground.” He tried to pull Jin up but the strain was too much. Must’ve landed here harder than I thought. Better see a healer if we ever make it out of here. He felt hands on his wrist and looked up. Eden’s face peered at him from over the ledge.

“Having trouble?”

“Just admiring the lovely scenery. Any chance of a pull up?”

“The floor’s too unstable for more than one person right now. I can probably keep you from dropping but that’s it.”

Markus sighed and tried to ignore the ever-growing strain in his muscles. “Jin, I need you to climb up me.” He waited for some kind of acknowledgement but received none. “Jin?”

“There’s something there.”

Markus froze as he pictured a horde of cieth lumbering beneath them. Or worse… “What is it?”

“I can’t tell. Can you swing me over a bit?”

“Are you crazy?”

“I can almost reach it. I just need you to swing me a little closer.”

“We don’t even know what it is.”

“It might help us.”

“Odin help you if you piss something off.” Gritting his teeth against the pain, Markus began to swing Jin. His muscles were burning but despite the pain and the frustration of the situation he refused to let Jin go. A few moments later, his ached eased a little and he looked down to find Jin had managed to get himself some footing on a protruding piece of flooring. Markus couldn’t tell whether it was another floor or the remnants of a single room but something inside had clearly taken Jin’s interest.

Several silent moments passed and Jin shouted up that he was ready to ascend. Markus braced himself, warning his body of the impending strain, and told his friend to climb. The trip was slow and painful. More than once the soldier thought his arm would come free of his shoulder and drop them both into oblivion but somehow the joint held and as Jin disappeared over the top, he felt relief rush through him. Markus threw up his dangling arm and pulled himself back into the room. Once he was clear of the potentially fatal ground, he took a deep breath and turned to Jin. “So what did you find?”

The younger man rooted out a small object and held it out to the ground. Everyone gathered a little closer to inspect the object nestled in his palms. It was a crystal, barely the length of Markus’ hand. It was blue, with five perfectly cut edges, a pointed top and a rounded bottom. On the surface there was nothing unusual about it and Markus almost felt the urge to punch Jin for risking both their lives for something that didn’t appear to pose any help to them at all. But then he looked closer and he saw what it was that had made Alex’s eyes go wide. In the heart of the crystal, something was stirring. It had no real form or shape; at first he had thought it was smoke or some kind of vapour but there was something unnatural about its movement that made him question that decision.

“It’s beautiful,” the young songstress whispered.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” added Kite.

“We should-” Eden began to speak but her words were cut off by the ear-splitting sound of something heavy grinding across the floor. The group looked over and saw the door on the other side of the room had opened.

From a piece of stone that appeared to resemble a desk came Nova’s voice. “I didn’t do it, I swear!” The machines on the “desk” were turning, humming lightly as they moved. Nova’s head appeared above the contraption. He looked at the group and then over at the door, his face lightening to a smirk as he realised that his curiosity appeared to have actually helped them for once. “Oh hey, I did it.”

Eden sighed. “Let’s get going before something else decides to surprise us.” She took Markus’ assaulter by the arm and started leading her towards the door.

“What do I do with this?” Jin asked, nodding towards the crystal.

“Keep it if you want,” Eden replied, refusing to look back at them. “But so help me, if anything bad comes of that crystal I will personally feed you to Humbaba.”




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tag everyone! Wheeeee~

[Shadow Wolf]

Jin

Jin was staring at Kite with a confused look. He didn’t know if to be surprised, amused, or simply serious about what was going on. Sure, he was the one who noticed the weird stone and made Markus go through a struggle just to pick it up, but he didn’t know that this would already create him so much trouble. Not only does he has a death warrant from Eden in case this item proves to be harmful, but now he also has a guy blurting at him for the very item. Still, what confused him the most was that, although there was a more pressing issue at hand (finding a way out), the guy who didn’t said a word during the previous scouting session is the very guy who is currently arguing with him over such a mild issue.

He was already regretting picking up the crystal…

But as he was lost in his own thoughts, he didn’t notice as the guy tried to take the crystal away from him, tumbling in the process and making both of them fall into the floor. The crystal fell out of Jin’s hand and rolled a bit before touching Alex’s sneaker. She picked it up as the gleam in her eyes began to shine once again.

She was about to ask Jin if she could keep it, but as her eyes shifted from the crystal to Jin’s whereabouts, her gleam transformed into a surprised look as she noticed the consequences of the previous struggle. Not just her, Markus, Nova, and Bellaevis were also surprised at what just happened.

Jin smashed his head quite hard as he fell into the floor; and his mind was thrown into a state of confusion for a few seconds.

What happened? Oh yeah… Kite tried to take the crystal… so troublesome… my head…

It wasn’t until his train of thoughts had finally stopped that he finally noticed the unpleasant aura around him. He could not move his mouth as there was something else blocking his lips from moving. When he found out what was it, his mind was thrown into a state of shock as his body struggled a bit to push Kite out of the way. After both men fell down into the floor, Jin had the misfortune of having Kite’s lips fall right into his own lips. And after finally pushing Kite out of the way and rise as he ignored his headache to clean his mouth, he noticed as pretty much everyone else shared the same shocked look that he had in his face.

As he rose to his feet while holding his head with his right hand, he gave Kite an angry stare before turning around to look for the crystal. Alex felt a bit intimidated as she saw Jin with such a scary look. She was about to say sorry and give him the crystal, but before she could say anything, Jin opened his mouth.

“You can keep it for now. I noticed your eyes shining as you looked at it.” His angry look was already gone. “Plus this has caused me enough trouble for a lifetime.”

“OK” A smile appeared in her face.

"Let's move". Eden did not want to waste anymore time.

"Yeah" Jin began to walk as his mind wanted to forget what just happened, though he knew that this was going to be carved in everyone’s head for a while.

___________

This is not a good day.

Jin managed to rise to his feet after the weird vision that went through his mind. His right arm was now in pain as he felt something burn in it. His main concern, however, was not his own pain, but how everyone else was doing.

Everyone seemed to be pulling themselves together after the fal’Cie made its move. With everything OK, his attention turned into the only thing that was not OK…

“It’s moving!”

And in less than a minute, the fal'Cie was inside everyone's head not once, but twice.

The shock was to be expected. Everyone witnessed as their former teammate was now a terrifying monster and now they had no choice but to defeat it.

Eden charged towards the creature as she readied her blade to deliver the first blow. The monster did not hesitate to launch the first strike towards her. Eden’s experience and prowess as a soldier were easily noticed as she managed to evade the monster’s claw with relative ease. She was about ready to strike the creature... yet the Cie’th somehow managed to evade Eden’s strike. Taking advantage of this, the monster took the chance to swing its other claw towards Eden.

The creature missed its target once again.

The claws of the creature found themselves unable to pass through something. Not only were they blocked, but were also mildly bent and pushed aside. The creature noticed the object used to block its strike: a spinning blunt object at the hands of Jin.

“You’re on my way” Eden gave Jin a look of disapproval.

“You’re not alone” Jin ignored her stare as he stopped the tonfa from spinning.

“He’s right.” Markus was also standing in front of Eden, ready to block the monster’s strikes.

“Look out” Alex voice managed to reach the team on the frontline with enough time for them to make a move. Eden and Markus rolled away from the attack. Jin however, had to suffer the consequences of his inexperience with Cie’th. He managed to use both arms to protect himself, but the force of the monster’s arm was enough to send him flying to the wall. He released a cry of pain as his body crashed against the wall, falling into the ground shortly after.

“Jin!” Nova shouted as he went to his aid.

“Ugh” Jin managed to pull himself together even though he was in pain.

“How are you still alive?” Nova was surprised to see Jin surviving a blow at point-blank range. He had clearly taken a strong blow from the monster and was nicely stopped by a solid wall, yet he managed to rise to his feet.

“I thought this would hurt more.” His eyes were hinting confusion and surprise even though his back reminded him that the wounds of the previous battle were still there.

“Jin!” This time, it was the voice of Markus reaching his ears… “Nova!” followed almost instantly by Alex’s and Kite’s voices respectively.

It took them a bit too long to realize that the Cie’th was not planning to sit idly while they wondered how Jin is still on his feet. As the red eye -now glowing- was focused on Jin’s figure, a shape began to take form just above the creature’s skull. What seemed to be a short blue beam at first was now a spear like object made of ice flying towards them.

Not wanting to make the same mistake again, this time, his body moved on its own to push both him and Nova aside. The Ice projectile, barely scraping Jin’s jacket, continued its way to the wall, creating a crack in it just before crumbling into pieces. As he picked himself up yet again, he realized that he had somehow provoked the monster to attack him. How did he know? That red eye was still focused on him.

“That was close.” Nova saw once again the crack in the wall as he rose to his feet. “Watch out Jin, he may also want to k-“Jin’s eyes stared at Nova with discomfort at what he was about to say.

“You two, focus!” It was clear that Markus was at one time, boss of these two young men, for both of them did not hesitate to concentrate on the more important task.

And as their eyes shifted back to the battle at hand, they both could not help but be impressed at what happened next.

Taking advantage of the distraction of the Cie’th, both Markus and Eden swept in. Knowing that the monster would instantly protect its eye, Eden, with a boost from Markus, jumped towards the creature while her blade collided with the next possible weak spot: its skull.

It was a good choice.

The Cie’th released a cry as Eden’s blade collided through creature’s skull, leaving a visible crack in it and shattering some of the crystals protuberating from the skull in the process.

“Hehehe, it looks like we have a chance.” Nova readied his sword as he propped Jin to help both Eden and Markus.

“Yeah… Let’s go” Jin said as he felt his body ready to withstand another hit.

______


Why do I feel like I suck at writing battle scenes.... tag everyone.