I’d go off muttering if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m starting to think the same. I WAS KEEPING A GREAT SCHEDULE <small>just after the last one.</small>
Note (not part of the fic): I hate the next scene SO FREAKING MUCH that I pushed most of it out of my mind. So I’m kinda winging it here. Bear with me.
Squall opened the door into the next room. Like so many rooms, it had sprung quite a nasty leak; an entire foot-and-a-half of water had filled the area. Inside was noting more than a bunch of lockers, indicating that this was a locker room. Squall didn’t see Cara inside, so he went through a locker-to-locker search.
Finally, he found Cara. She looked up at him, fear in her eyes. Her blond hair was quite wet, her glasses were cracked slightly, and a small card hanged from her neck. Like her brother before her, she was quick to soil herself in the face of this new guy with a gun.
“AAAAAHH!” she screamed. “PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DON’T HURT ME!”
“Sheesh,” said Squall. “Are all of you scientists THIS freaked out by every single solitary thing?”
“Oh, sorry,” said Cara. “It’s been a very bad day, what with the terrorist takeover and all.”
Squall picked her up. “Let’s get out of here. We don’t know when they’ll show up again.”
Cara started to walk, but suddenly fell forward. “My…my legs! They feel…so weak…”
At this point, Squall realized that he’d have to help guide Cara along the damn path every single minute he was with her. The thought of Rinoa was the only thing keeping him from blowing his brains out right there.
(to be continued)
Squall led Cara into the room where he fought Vincent. Fortunately, there was no sign of the evil vampire. At this point, Squall dropped Cara and called Cloud.
(begin codec conversasion)
Squall: I got Cara, like you said to.
Butz: Oh, and there’s one thing I forgot to tell you.
Squall: Oh, I can’t wait to hear this…
Butz: She’s afraid of water.
Squall: What the hell?! THE ENTIRE BASEMENT OF THE CORE IS FREAKING FLOODED!!!
Butz: Figure something out. She has it pretty bad, though; she won’t even get into a bathing suit now.
Cloud: Butz, you…are…an…idiot.
Butz: Well…can I at least talk to her?
Squall: How?
Butz: She should have codec. All staff on the Big Shell have it.
Squall: Fine, fine, go ahead.
Butz: Cara!
Cara:…Butz?
Butz: Yeah, sis! It’s me!
Cara: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE?!
Butz: Is that any way to treat your brother?
Cara: You deserve it, considering what you put me and mom through, you soulless bastard!
Cloud: Hey! He may be a bastard, but he DOES have a soul!
Butz: Listen. Push everything about the past behind you for now. Just follow Squall to the Shell 1 Core.
Cara:…
Butz: Oh, and use your codec for a majority of the time now. We can’t risk letting the enemy get ahold of any of our conversations.
Cara:…
Butz: And quit with the silent treatment! I’ll kick your ass when we meet if you don’t!
Cara: Hah! I kicked your ass every time we fought before! What makes it any different now?
Cloud: tries to hold back a laugh You were beat up by your little sister?
Butz: Shut up…
Squall: Let’s go.
(end codec conversasion)
(to be continued)
Neat, Gallo 
Though, didn’t somebody already say that Cara was afraid of water or is that just me?
Someone may have; I’ll have to check and edit the story if this is so.
Squall took Cara to the next room, which was still flooded. Already he could feel Cara beginning to tense up.
“Just close your eyes,” said Squall. “I’ll carry you along through the water. Just close your eyes and count to one hundred. Oh, and before we go, just how does Arsenal work?”
“You remember the Y2K fiasco? How everyone was afraid that all the computers would stop working once the year 2000 came around? Well, the Patriots created a program to prevent the disaster, and sent it worldwide through the world governments. I should know; I helped program it.”
“What?!” screamed Squall. “You helped the Patriots?!”
“Anyway,” continued Cara, “when Arsenal Gear comes online, a trigger in the program will take over each and every computer it’s programmed into, which is about every single one on Earth. They’ll then be able to censor however they see fit.”
Squall sighed. “Let’s just go.”
(ONE PAINFULLY BORING AND DIFFICULT SWIM LATER)
Squall and Cara reached the connecting bridges, only to find that they had nearly all collapsed for some odd reason. While Squall went into a corner to cuss, Cara motioned toward a door.
Squall grabbed her and dragged her to the door. Unfortunately, it was locked with a Level 5 lock. Just when everything seemed hopeless, Cara showed Squall a Level 5 card. After cussing her out for not giving it to him in the first place, he opened the door.
Following some passages, they reached a ladder leading down to the oil fence. Just then, they got a call from Cloud.
(begin codec conversasion)
Cloud: There’s no other way to the Shell 1 Core except through the oil fence. Arsenal’s start-up destroyed all the bridges that weren’t damaged during the Harrier fight.
Squall: Great.
Cara: Don’t worry. I think I can walk a bit.
Squall: Good, because that fence will NOT support more than one person at a time. I’ll have to cover you.
Cloud: There are a few sentries, as well as some Cyphers. I’ll be on the other side to give you some more cover, as well as take over leading Cara once she gets to the other side.
Squall: Got it.
(end codec conversasion)
Crumbling bridges, yay… shivers
I’m having a feeling that there’ll be something like “about a undred continues, heavy cussing and a lot of breakroom sessions later…” in the future
(Note: I’m kinda winging it a bit here again. Sorry.)
Squall and Cara climbed down the ladder. The oil fence was ahead. It was a small, narrow bridge that was held into position by several columns, each with two guards on them. Several cyphers were also flying around, but were too far away from where the two heroes were standing to notice. The bridge itself looped around through the columns in a kind of semi-circle, leading to the bottom of the Shell 1 Core.
Suddenly, Squall got a call from Cloud.
(begin codec conversasion)
Cloud: I’m in position on the Shell 1 Core platform. Keep your scope on Cara; don’t let her out of your sight.
Squall: Got it.
(end codec conversasion)
“Look at the sunset!” said Cara. Squall finally noticed that it was indeed getting quite late. “Isn’t it beautiful?”
The sun itself began to slowly descend in the horizon. Squall thought it looked nice…then the codec went off.
(begin codec conversasion)
Rinoa: Hey, Squall!
Squall: What?
Rinoa: Have you remembered what tommorrow is yet?
Squall: Uh…no.
Rinoa: You…you…you…
Squall: Calm down, okay?
Rinoa: Remember when I went into your room?
Squall: Why now?
Rinoa: It was just so…empty…all there was was a bed, a picture, and a bare wall.
Squall: Shut up, okay?!
Rinoa: Well, if you’re going to be like that, I have no choice but to save your game.
SAVING…Saved.
Squall: Damn!
Rinoa: No more Mr. Hot-Shot for you!
(end codec conversasion)
“Can you get onto the fence?” asked Squall.
“No,” said Cara, “I’ll be fine.” With that, she jumped down onto the fence and began her trek across.
Squall ducked down and raised the sniper rifle. After dispatching of the two guards on the first column, he turned his attention to the Cyphers. However, two more guards went onto the column, so he took those out as Cara climbed onto it.
She stepped onto the next section of the fence. Squall turned his attention to the cyphers yet again, but Cloud had already taken care of a good number of them. A few more came around, but Squall took them out.
Cara climbed onto the second column. She then began to cross the third oil fence. Things were looking good…
Cloud smiled as Cara began to get close to the end. She was halfway across the fence now. Finally, Arsenal could be stopped…
Then a faint gurgling reached his ears. Just as Vincent jumped straight out of the water, knife in hand.
Squall saw what happened with shock. Cloud was paralyzed with shock. Cara was shocked with fear. Only Vincent wasn’t shocked.
Grabing Cara from behind, he raised the knife to her throat.
(boss: Vincent)
Squall just aimed at the bullet wound in Vincent’s head and fired.
(end boss fight)
Vincent lost his grip on Cara and the knife. Dropping them both, he fell back into the water, hopefully for good.
Cara began to stagger forward. At first, they thought it was just because of the shock she had recieved from the experience. Then they saw it.
Blood was slowly coming out of her chest.
(to be continued)
Oh sweet…
And bad Vincent! STAY DEAD! Bad vampire… thing!
Cloud, in an act of complete rage, jumped down off the column and ran to Cara, shooting down several Cyphers along the way using only his SOCOM. Swinging Cara over his shoulder, he dashed back to the column and entered the Shell 1 Core. Squall followed in suit.
After climbing in, he recieved a call from Cloud.
(begin codec conversasion)
Cloud: Cara’s begun to enter the virus. You have to get here. Fortunately, most of Terra’s soldiers are already inside Arsenal, so this place should be rather empty.
Squall: How’s Cara?
Cloud: She’s…Just get your ass over here! We don’t have much time.
(end codec conversasion)
Squall soon found that the few remaining guards were all busy listening to the evil music of Britney Spears, so he was able to easily sneak past them while they masturbated to posters of her. Of course, being somewhat sane, he nearly shot himself just looking at one picture, but that was the end of it.
Finally, Squall reached the B2 of the Shell 1 Core. Cara was nearly unconcious and being held up by Butz, while Cloud was simply watching. He almost immediately noticed Squall.
“He got some organs,” he said, knowing what the question was going to be. “We can’t stop the bleeding. She doesn’t have long.”
Cara and Butz soon began to exchange their final conversasion. Butz finally explained the truth about their father’s death. Apparantly Butz had had an affair with Cara’s mother (his stepmother). When his dad found out, he tried to drown himself in the pool, but Cara got caught up by mistake. Since Butz was too busy rocking out in his room, he didn’t hear the struggle. He then left in shame.
Finally realizing why her brother had left, Cara finally forgave him. Then, as if on cue, she died in his arms.
(After much crying by Butz)
“Butz,” said Cloud, “the chopper’s working. Take the hostages and get out of here. We’ll take care of Sephiroth.”
However, just then, a loud alarm went off on the control panel. The screen that had once shown the progress of the virus simply flashed one word: ERROR.
“Shit!” shouted Cloud. “Arsenal has a damn Antibody system!”
“You mean the virus isn’t going to work?” asked Squall.
“It’ll still work,” said Cloud, “but it’ll take several hours for it to breach enough through the Antibody program to inflict enough damage to bring it down. We’ll have to deal with the rest of Dead Cell and Terra’s group while we wait, or they might still have time to launch the nuke.”
With that, they all left.
Cloud and Squall soon ran into Squall’s old friend, the cyborg ninja. He took his katana and cut off his helmet, revealing…Terra! Terra was the ninja the whole time!
Squall raised his gun in panic, but soon heard Cloud say, “It’s night time, kid.” Then he felt a strong blow to the back of his head, and everything went dark.
(begin codec conversasion)
Rinoa: Squall, can you hear me? I have a very bad feeling here. I’ll save everything that has happened up to this point.
SAVING…Saved.
Rinoa: God, may he be okay…
(end codec conversasion)
(to be continued)
Those soldiers are sicker than one ever could have guessed… :eek:
hangs from a cliff on one finger Damn you Galloooo!!
quickly puts a matress down at the bottom of the cliff
lands with a thud Thank you, Gallo. Those cliffhangers can’t be good for my bu… back.
Eep. hides
Squall found himself strapped to some kind of metal bed. In front of him was none other than Sephiroth himself, only now he had an eye patch and a strange backpack-like thing with Dr. Octopus-esque tentacles. To his side were Irvine and Terra, with the girl now being dressed in her military gear.
“Are you awake, my son?” asked Sephiroth. “Don’t tell me you don’t remember me now…Squall?”
Suddenly, one of Sephiroth’s mechanical tentacles lashed out and began to strangle Squall. Desperately, he struggled against this force, but it was to no avail. Finally, as if by an act of God, the thing fell back.
“Come on now!” shouted Sephiroth. “You could never have possibly forgotten me! I practically raised you, you little brat!”
“Why go through all this?” asked Irvine. “What does the boy possibly know?”
“His past is the key to the Patriots. If he can remember me, I’m sure he’ll help.” He turned back to Squall. “Now face the truth about your past.”
(WARNING: LONG CUTSCENE!)
“The Jungle Continent, the 1980s. You were part of the Youth Infantry Mercenary Division. You were hired by one of the warring factions. Don’t you remember those years? The killing? The slaughter? You loved it! It was your entire life!”
Squall was unmoved…he had known it all along…
“After the wars were over, you were returned to a Foster Home; your parents were long dead by then. You hid this single fact about your past. Now it’s time to join me, your protector, in destroying the Patriots!”
Squall said nothing. However, Irvine finally broke the silence when his arm began to quiver again.
“Damn it!” he shouted. “This arm…it’s like it seeks revenge against Cloud!”
“That means…Cloud’s nearby!” shouted Sephiroth. “Terra, you stay here and keep watch over Squall. Irvine and I will make the final preperations for the Metal Gears. See you later…Squall.”
Sephiroth and Irvine exited out the door while Terra aproached Squall.
(begin codec conversasion)
Squall: So you’re the ninja…
Terra: Yes. I’ve been helping you since the beginning.
Squall: But why?
Terra: I joined the terrorists because I thought it would give me a chance to find Cloud. Together, we set this up so that you could stop Arsenal.
Squall: So you’ve been working with him all along?
Terra: No. We fought in the shell. It turned out that he saved me when that Tanker went down…and that Irvine was the one that killed my father.
Rinoa: Squall!
Terra: Talk to your girlfriend for a minute. I have to finish my cigarretes.
Rinoa: Squall, is that true? What Sephiroth said?
Squall:…yes.
Rinoa: But why didn’t you say anything before?
Squall: That is my past, my secret. I swore I’d never let anyone know that about me again. I would be free from that hell.
Rinoa: Squall…you didn’t…trust me.
Squall: No. I learned long ago never to trust anyone.
Rinoa: hangs up
Terra: You have no idea what a woman wants, do you?
Squall: Shut up!
Terra: Look, I’ll let you out. You’ll have to avoid the guards and meet up with Cloud; he has your equipment.
Squall: Okay.
(end codec conversasion)
Terra walked straight up to Squall. “But first…”
Then she socked him in the stomach. Hard. After Squall was done doubling over, she left and opened the straps.
Squall checked his wrists…then realized that he was naked…
Running out of the room, Squall ducked behind some boxes and recieved a call from Steiner.
(begin codec conversasion)
Steiner: Squall, you have to continue your m-m-mission.
Squall: I have to see Cloud first.
Steiner: Leave him out of this! He wasn’t a part of the s-s-s-s-similation!
Squall: Well I can’t do anything like this!
Steiner: That’s true. You won’t be able to attack or enter the Hanging Mode either.
Squall: Cloud has my gear. I have to find him!
Steiner: Your role- I mean, mission, is to stop Arsenal!
Squall: My role? Why do you keep saying that?
Steiner:…
Squall: Colonel, I just realized something.
Steiner: What?
Squall: That I never actually met you before. Not once.
Steiner:…
Squall: Who are you, anyway?
Steiner: You’d better do your mission. We have Rinoa.
Squall: What?
Steiner: Communication terminated!
(end codec conversasion)
(to be continued)
Oh boy, twisted plots galore :o
… Sephiroth with tentacles… bad mind flashes back to the most horrible fanfic submission. Ever. … AAAAAAARGH!!!
goes even further into hiding after making a snack of some calamari I hate seafood!
Squall ducked, dodged, and hid naked around the guards that were patrolling the lower floor. When he reached the stairs, though, a VERY wierd call came through from Steiner.
(begin codec conversasion)
Steiner: Squall, turn the gaming console off now!
Squall: What?
Steiner: The mission is a failure! Abort immediately!
Squall: What the hell are you saying?!
Rinoa: Playing for too long is bad for your eyes. You’d better stop.
Steiner: I was driving home one night. Suddenly, I saw these strange lights in the sky. When I came to, I was back at home.
Squall: That’s it! This conversasion is over!
(end codec conversasion)
Squall continued his dodging game through Arsenal, while Steiner continued to give strange and inane codec calls. Finally, he reached an unguarded hallway, but the door locked behind him, and the other two were sealed. Just as things seemed at their worst, Rinoa called.
(begin codec conversasion)
Rinoa: Squall…
Squall: Rinoa, what the fucking hell is going on here?
Rinoa: I don’t know. Something is seriously wrong with Steiner.
Squall: No shit.
Rinoa: Squall…I have a confession to make.
Squall: Shoot.
Rinoa: Our meeting…you know? The one big act of coincidence…
Squall: Yeah?
Rinoa:…it wasn’t so coincidental. The Patriots have been watching you for years, Squall. They sent me in as their undercover agent. They changed everything about me, even my eye color, just to suit your preferences.
Squall:…
Rinoa: It was an act, Squall.
Squall: So the times you slept with me was an act, too?
Rinoa: But I eventually grew to love you-
Squall: SHUT UP, BITCH! I’ve been used by everyone, damnit!
Rinoa: Squall, please calm down!
Squall: That’s it! I’m finding Snake and bringing the Patriots down! I can’t stand this anymore!
Rinoa: Listen, I found out something about Terra. She was taken to a Russian hospital after the Tanker incident, where she gave birth. The hospital was controlled by the Patriots. They took her child, and have been using it to blackmail her.
Squall: Oh, great, another trick!
Rinoa: They’ve placed nanomachines inside that child. They’re on the same frequency as yours, and if you die, then so will he! That’s why Terra’s been helping you! You have to stay alive!
Squall: I wasn’t planning otherwise.
Rinoa: I can’t ask you to forgive me…
Squall: Good, because I don’t know if I can.
Rinoa: Squall…I’m…preeeeeegnaaaannnnnntt…wiiiiiiiiitttttttttthhh…your…
Squall: Rinoa! What’s going on!
Cloud: Hey, kid! Snap out of it!
(end codec conversasion)
Cloud emerged from the shadows, holding Squall’s sneaking suit. “You aren’t planning on fighting the guards like that, are you?” he asked, tossing Squall the suit.
After getting dressed, Squall found that his equipment had been completely reloaded! Also, Cloud handed him a sword. “Terra told you to have this,” he said. “I’d rather use a gun at the moment.”
Squall drew the sword from the scabbard, and found that it was the ninja’s sword! After performing a few pratice swings and thrusts, he sheathed the sword. The two heroes walked out through the unlocked door and back into Arsneal’s rectum.
(to be continued)
Originally posted by MegamanX2K
I’m sorry, when did they say Vamp was Bi? I totally missed that line. Was it in one of Campbell’s codec calls?
I got this one my first time through. Just call Snake, er “pliskin” a few times after you first encounter. Hell, it might be after the first fight with SOlidus…then again that was when you were fighting the plane (forgot the name of it). Contact snake a over and over after one of those events. Btw, pretty good D. Now post the next part!