1. The Mercenary
A train had just stopped in a sector of Midgar when a young man came out of it. At the same instant, a girl, wearing a bandana, came out and landed near a guard. The two guards on duty ran toward the two intruders, but they were too fast for the guards. The man grasped one guard's arm and threw him on the floor, knocking him out. The girl ducked as the infuriated second guard dived upon her, and kicked him square in the chest, knocking him out too. A plump man leapt from the top of the train, followed by a husky, dark huge man in his mid thirties. This man was missing his right hand. Instead, there was a six muzzled gatling gun fitted on his arm. He yelled toward the train, "c'mon newcomer. Follow me."
No sooner had he bellowed then a man, in his early twenties, leapt from the train and landed in front of the husky one. He looked more like a boy than a man because of his skinny body. His spiky blond hair and a strange sort of armour covering his left shoulder distinguished him from the other people who had departed from the train. Though an armlet in left arm, strange clothes (violet sleeveless shirt and baggy trousers) and shoes, which looked too big for his feet, were some features he shared withe the man in front of him. However his most peculiar feature were his eyes. Electric blue, they gave the viewer an impression of being scanned. This piercing gaze was enough to prove that he was a man, a tough one at that, and not a boy. His another strange property was his sword, with blade as wide as its master's waist. The three people to first leave the train ran to a distant staircase, climbed it and vanished from view. The husky man followed them.
The spiky haired man glanced at the nearest guard lying face-down on the ground. There were two small conical phials in his vest' pocket, containing a swirling blue liquid. He took out both of the phials and tucked them in his trousers' pocket. "These health regenerating potions might come useful." he muttered to himself. Just as he moved a few metres toward the staircase where his companions had gone, two guards came running toward him. Both of them pulled out their guns while he drew his enormous sword. Both of the guards fired their guns at the intruder, but he deflected all their bullets with the wide blade of his sword. Enraged, he leapt toward on of the guards and slashed his sword through on of the guards, killing him instantly. The moment he backed, the other guard threw a grenade toward him. Again he blocked the grenade explosion with his sword. But this time the impact was more powerful, and he took some damage. Another slash and the other guard was also lying dead. Taking care of the pests, he marched away, up through the stairs.
There, all of the party, except the huge man was standing outside a gate, apparently waiting for the mercenary.
When he approached them, the man who had left the train first said, "Wow! You used to be in Soldier, Shinra's army huh?...Not everyday find one in a group like Avalanche." The girl next to him spoke, "Soldier? Aren't they the enemy? What's he doing with us in Avalanche?" The man replied, "But he quit and is with us now. I didn't catch your name.." The spiky guy replied "Cloud." The man said "Cloud, eh? I'm Biggs." The girl said merrily "Hi, I'm Jessie." The plump man joined in "I'm Wedge!" "I don't care what your names are. Once this job's over...I'm outta here." Cloud said curtly. Biggs gave him a look as if he was something repulsive. Surely there was a tinge of arrogance in Cloud's voice.
Just then, the huge man came toward them and bellowed "The hell you all doin'? I thought I told you to never to move in a group! Our target's the North Mako reactor. We'll meet on the bridge in front of it." Jessie opened the gate and they ran inside, except Cloud. The leader huge man turned toward him and said, "I'm Barret, leader of this group, Avalanche. We're workin' to stop that *&#%@*$ Shinra from devourin' the planet's life. They call us militants! But you're an ex-Soldier. Aren't yeh? I don't trust ya!" Both of them sped through what looked like a maze of tall and unique machines and reached a door. Upon opening it they met a mesmerizing view.
They were on one end of a T shaped bridge. On the end opposite to theirs, Wedge was standing guard. On the third edge was what looked like a gigantic circular tower, emerging from at least fifty metres below and towering to nearly the same height, but was actually a Mako reactor. The apparent bottom of the reactor was surrounded by a lake of swirling and glowing bright green liquid. But none of them looked surprised. Evidently they had already visited such places before. From the far end, Wedge bellowed "I'll secure our escape passage. You concentrate on the mission!" Without giving a second look, Cloud ran toward the reactor. At its end stood Jessie and Briggs. Barret also joined them as he came running with Cloud.
In his booming voice, he asked Cloud, "Yo! This your first time in a reactor?" Cloud answered in a matter of fact tone "No. After all, I did work for Shinra, y'know." Barret continued "The planet's full of Mako energy. People here use it everyday. It's the life blood of this planet. But Shinra keeps suckin' the blood out with these weird machines." Cloud snapped in between "I'm not here for a lecture. Let's just do it." Barret cast him an unfriendly look and said "Al righ' let's go!" Briggs deciphered the code of the security system and the door in front of them opened.
Jessie, Barret and Cloud boarded a lift from the next room and pressed the button to go down to the core of the reactor. Barret broke the silence, "Little by little the reactor'll drain out all the life out of the planet. Then that'll be that." Cloud shrugged his shoulders and said "That's not my problem." Barret tried again to convince Cloud "The planet's dyin' Cloud! How could ye be so indifferent?" Cloud again replied in his cold manner "The only thing I care about is finishing this job before security and roboguards come." Barret was having a hard time controlling his anger. Our of the lift, a long flight of stairs through a gigantic chamber and through a door, and they were just above the core of the reactor. Barret said "Righ' Yo! We have to plant our bomb jus' at the face of the core. So when it blows up the whole reactor should go "BOOM!" " Jessie ran forward to look for more locked doors while Cloud and Barret waited behind.
All of a sudden, three roboguards leapt from a hidden door near them and landed in front of those two. Metallic blue in color, a single ruby red eye, they looked menacing, even for a machine. Barret instantly fired his arm gun toward a roboguard nearest to him. In reply, the machine raised its arm like a weapon and threw a bunch of ice crystals in a beam toward him. Barret shielded his face with his gun arm, but a few crystal succeded in digging a bit in his other arm. Cloud yelled angrily "Use your brain, you fool!" Barret glared at him, but didn't said anything. He should be a bit careful while fighting, he said to himself. Cloud slashed his sword through another machine, but it stayed intact. In reply, he was showered with ice crystals produced out of thin air, which he deflected with his armlet and agility.
It all happened in a fraction of a second. Cloud touched a small green ball fixed in a socket in his sword and murmured something. Magnificent ripples of light appeared around him. Green at bottom and yellow at top, they gradually became larger, moving away from Cloud, and faded away in thin air. As the last of them disappeared, a lightning bolt struck the robot in front of cloud, demolishing it with an earsplitting blast. Barret gaped at Cloud "But...How did you?" Cloud snapped "Later. We're in middle of a battle, remember?" and both of them charged at the remaining roboguards, destroying them in a single hit.
Advancing forward, soon they met Jessie. "Down these ladders, I'll watch out here!" She said in her cheery voice. As fast as their feet could take them, Cloud and Barret climbed down the ladders and landed at the front of the reactor core. Just at the front of the vault, the door to the core, they saw another small light green coloured ball. Barret asked "Hey Cloud, what's this? It looks like those two balls in your sword." Cloud replied "This is a materia ball. This one is a restore materia. These have special powers." "You mean like that bolt, you conjured with that ball? and does this one heal wounds?" asked Barret curiously. "Yeah, let's get to work now. I'll tell you about these later." said Cloud, and pocketed the ball.
Barret said enthusiastically "When we blow this place, it ain't gonna be nothin' more than a hunka junk! Cloud, you set the bomb." "Shouldn't you do it?" said Cloud. For the first time there was panic in his voice. "Jus' do it! I gotta watch to make sure you don' pull nothin!" "Fine I'll do it." Suddenly a voice spoke in his head. "Watch out! This isn't just a reactor!!" He was brought back to consciousness by Barret yelling "What's wrong?" "Huh?" "What's wrong, Cloud? Hurry it up!" "....Yeah, sorry." Cloud fixed the time bomb they had to the reactor core vault and activated it.
Just then they heard a faint clanking sound of metal hitting on metal, growing louder gradually. And then they saw it. A gigantic robot scorpion coming toward them through the only path to the vault, blocking their only route of escape.
The gigantic machine had two large machine guns for its pincers and an overlarge tail with a sting which looked as if it was made of diamond. Its whole body was covered in bright orange armor plating and it moved steadily toward its targets with its tail swaying in the air. Cloud warned Barret "Watch out for its tail, that looks very dangerous."
Without giving heed to what Cloud said, Barret leapt forward and taking aim at the robot's head, fired a volley of bullets. Only a few could pierce the armour, but couldn't affect the robot. Before Cloud could act, the machine fired its machine guns, one at Barret and other at Cloud. Barret lunged sideways and escaped the bullets, but Cloud was not so lucky, and caught one in his thigh. Immediately, he touched the bright green ball on his sword, closed his eyes, murmured something under his breath and pointed his sword at the robot. The bright green ripples Barret had seen before appeared and as last of them faded away, a lightning bolt struck the scorpion, who bent a little on its legs.
"Great! Hit it with more of these!" Barret yelled. But his words were drowned as the scorpion charged at him, hitting him with its tail's end. Barret toppled backwards and stood up with some difficulty. Full of fury, he pointed his weapon toward the scorpion and a small ball of fire started to swell in front of his weapon. Then suddenly the ball shot toward the scorpion and exploded with tremendous power. "Wha' was that?" said Barret, surprised at his own action. "That was your Limit Break. When you become angry enough after suffering heavy damage, you can hit the enemy with a much more powerful move." said Cloud. "What a great shot! I'll call it Bigshot!" yelled Barret. Then he asked, "Hey Cloud, do you also have a limit break?" "Yeah, I call it Braver. As you gain experience, your limit break changes and becomes more powerful." replied Cloud.
Meanwhile, the scorpion which had fallen backwards by the impact of Barret's limit break, staggered on its legs and moved toward them, with its tail held high in air. Cloud bellowed "Be careful! Attack while its tail's up, and it's gonna counter attack with its sting. Here, drink this." and he threw a potion phial towards Barret. Barret caught it and drank the potion in one gulp. As the liquid reached his stomach, he felt a strange warmth in his body and his wounds healing by themselves. "Wow thanks!" he said. "I'm just doing it because I want my pay" said Cloud coldly and struck the robot with a lightning bolt again. Before it could thrust its tail at Cloud , the robot was showered with bullets from Barret's gun. This time, Barret was successful in piercing its armour. The next moment, Cloud leapt toward the scorpion and thrust his sword in the hole Barret had made. He yanked his sword from left to right inside the machine and leapt toward the other side of the passage, which the robot had been blocking, and motioned Barret to do the same. As Barret took a large jump toward the robot, and passed it, sparks began to fly through the gap where Cloud had thrust his sword.
While Cloud and Barret ran as fast as they could, the machine shuddered, and exploded with an earsplitting roar. By that time, Cloud and Barret had reached a safe distance. In triumph, Cloud raised his sword and spun it, while Barret punched the air with fists. He saw something flying out of the wreckage of the scorpion and caught it. With wide eyes, he said "wow! An assault gun! And it's compatible with my arm-socket. Beware ya'll junk boxes!" Suddenly his gaze fell upon his watch, and his triumphant expression faded, to be replaced by fear. "Cloud! We got only ten minutes before this reactor blows up! Let's get outta here!" he bellowed. Both of them ran and climbed as fast as they could. Upon a steel beam, they saw Jessie, with her foot stuck in the floor. Cloud helped her pull it out. Jessie said "Thanks!" but Cloud's expression remained impassive. Together they all ran toward the end of the bridge, where Wedge was waiting for them.
Just as they passed through the hole made to escape the reactor premises, the reactor exploded. But it wasn't an ordinary blast. The earth shook beneath them and the sky was filled with a rapidly swelling mushroom of hot gases, erupting from the reactor. Meanwhile, all the members of Avalanche were huddled in an old tunnel, on whose one end was the hole they had made up to escape from the reactor. Jessie was planting a small bomb to close the hole, so that know on would know their route of escape. Biggs sighed "That should keep the planet going a little longer." Jessie stood up and said "OK! Now everyone get back!" Just as they reached the other end of the tunnel, the bomb blew and all the tunnel was filled with fire.
All of them leapt out of it. Wedge was the last to come out. He was pressing his bottom, running and yelling in pain, as his pants had caught fire. When the fire in his pants died out, Barret spoke "Alright, now lets get out of here. Rendezvous at Sector 8 station! Split up and get on the train!" And they took off, taking different paths.
Cloud ran toward a market place, with very few people there, running in random directions, scared by the reactor explosion. A beautiful young woman, with long mahogany hair in a pony tail, pink robe, a small red jacket and a basket full of flowers was walking there, confused in the din. Someone running away pushed her and she fell down. Cloud offered her a hand to get up, which she accepted, She asked "Can you tell me, what happened?" Cloud answered "Nothing..." He noticed beautiful flowers in the girl's basket. "One doesn't see such flowers in Midgar now." The girl said "You like them? The're only one gil a piece." Cloud gave her ten Gils and brought some fresh flowers. She walked away and he stood there, smelling the flowers that were so rare in regions where Mako reactors had been built.
An elderly man near him said "Earlier these flowers used to grow everywhere. But now...Don't get fooled by Shinra!" He added enthusiastically "Mako doesn't last forever. It is the planet's life source. The end is in sight! Protectors of the planet, Avalanche!!" Cloud remembered that he was supposed to board a train. He hurried toward the platform. Before he could reach it, a dozen soldiers noticed him and tried to corner him. They walked toward him gradually, forming a tight circle. A distant sound of a train was becoming louder. Only then Cloud realized there was a tunnel right beneath him and the train must soon appear at the nearby tracks. He said "I don't have time to mess around with you guys. See you later." and jumped onto the train that had just appeared out of the tunnel.
