12 - A Childhood Reunion

[SqiKy kLeen]

(OOC: Co-written in real-time role-play style by myself and Zacloud. Have a enjoy! ;D )
(OOC Second Note: Assume that Chapter 11 - The Element of Prosperity takes before Chapter 10 - Enter Jack. This hiccup was due to me making the first post in Chapter 10 before Chapter 11 was started.)



Zack was frozen in place, staring at this man who had intercepted him with quite a unique motorcycle. All at once, his sense of urgency collided with an overpowering familiarity, and he was arrested by the added uncertainty brought on by the young man's words. Claude....? But.... I'm.....

His mind chose to ignore that variable, and he shook his head as if to clear the remnants of it away. His eyes remained wide but a shocked grin worked its way to his features, and arm gestures echoed the energy in his voice. "...Jack... It's you!?! Jeez man, I thought I'd never see you again! How the hell?! This is like... Whoah!!!"

Jack leaned slightly back in his seat, a little stunned by Claude’s overwhelming greeting. “No kidding, I though you were long gone, man. It’s a small world, ain’t it?”

As Jack collected himself from Zack's overload of excitement, he noticed something disturbing about this battered spikey-haired young man. What had happened to this poor kid?, he wondered silently. Zack’s arms were almost entirely covered with scars, bruises and various injuries of other kinds. His thoughts quickly turned to those of concern once again, though his mind was flooded with questions. “What are you doing out here, anyways? Where did you get that sword? And what exactly is going on here?”

Zack blinked hard a few times as his mind returned to the immediate situation. "Oh... Well there's an awful lot to explain... He then grew a bit frantic, waving his arms and jumping around as his voice grew quick and he blurted everything out, "There's this big bad thingamajig with big bad plans, and I need to go tell my friends about it, I wanted to have 'em help me stop him, but another friend says we gotta get outta Midgar so we're prolly gonna go to the Super City except I dunno if we have enough money though I've been a mercenary and got lotsa it so maybe there's enough but I wanna use it so Bax can get back to his home planet but there's other huge stuff going on all at the same time ever since I got here at Midgar and it's all been pretty crazy!!"

“Woah, woah, woah… Lemme get this straight. There was a giant thingamajig, you’re going to the Super City, and you’re sending some guy on a box back his home planet in outer space???” It was worse than I thought… the Senate must have given him Hell for him to be spewing things like this…

Jack’s head was really spinning now. So much had happened in 24 hours, so much that Jack couldn’t even begin to fully accept yet, much less stories of space aliens in cardboard boxes. “I… can’t say I quite follow you here, dude. Maybe we should get outta here and find somewhere safer where you can gimme a recap.”

Zack cocked his head, then nodded hard a few times. "Yeah, that might be best, there's just so much and... I think there's time." He stepped up to accept the earlier offer of getting on the bike. "Take us upon your metal steed," he declared, hopping on with an excited whoop; he had thoroughly enjoyed the ride with Bax and looked forward to another such rush. As he grabbed hold of Jack for safety, he let the initial grip be tight, as an embrace for a childhood friend he had truly thought was gone for good.

Meanwhile, Jack was rendered nearly unable to breathe, Zack’s grip tightening like a vice. He’s become quite the eccentric fella, I’ll say that much... Jack was actually quite surprised at how happy his demeanor was, considering everything he had gone through, or at least what he knew he had gone through anyways. “Alright, you better keep that grip, kid. You're gonna find out real quick that this ain't ordinary motorcycle...” Jack squeezed the throttle and the bikes massive torque shoved them forward leaving a small black mark on the street below.

How is he so strong for being so scrawny?, Jack thought to himself as he cruised through the streets. As they rode, Jack pulled out his phone, effortlessly dialing Shiki’s number with one hand while steering the bike with the other. Wait till Shiki hears about this…

“Hello?...... Yeah it me, Jack. You busy?...... He did? Oh thank God. Listen, I’m bringing friend back with me...... Of course I can trust him...... It’s Claude, remember? From waaaay back?...... No, I’m not bullshittin’ you...... No, I'm not kidding! He’s right here, on the bike!......”

Jack held the phone away from his ear for a second to let Zack hear what was happening on the other end. Nix’s voice could be heard muffled in the background, screaming enthusiastically. “OH SNAP! What's up Claude?”

There was a moment where Zack was puzzled again at the name, but the fact that this person probably knew him and he probably knew him, he said, "Uhhh, hey! Lots is up but, uhh I guess I'll see you soon! Wow, talking on a phone is cool!"

“Hey, it really is him! I recognize that voice anywhere!” Nix shouted excitedly. Jack chuckled a little bit, “Alright, I’ll be there in a little bit…” Jack hung up the phone and turned back to Zack. “Crazy people, I tell ya…”

[SqiKy kLeen]

(OOC: Once again co-written at the crack of dawn by me and Zacloud.



“Welcome to one of our many ‘bases of operation’.” Jack held his arms out to his sides, as he and Zack stood outside of an old run down apartment complex, displaying it as if on some kind of game show. In reality though, it wasn’t anything more than your typical, run-of-the-mill project, bearing the standard flaws many buildings of this type had. Most of the windows were broken out and many of them either boarded or barred up in some way. This particular building, however, was decorated with a variety of colorful graffiti, with many of the tags bearing anti-Senate messages in some form or another.

Zack looked up and around, not at all picky about the state of the buildings and glad that they possessed any in the first place. He tried to make out some of the graffiti but was only minimally successful with his still novice reading level. At least the colors were pretty. "Nice decorations," he commented, smiling. "I'm glad you made it to Midgar at all; used to be nothing but a dream to us."

“Well, It would only have been a dream for me too if it wasn’t for the hard work of the crew, and a little Senate skull-bashing.”, Jack stated as he cracked a small smile. “Let’s get inside.”

Jack and Zack entered the building through it’s door-less entryway, and crept down a dank concrete staircase, dimly lit by a solitary yellow light bulb which looked like it was ready to burn out at any moment. At the bottom was a solid, metal-plated door, an artifact left over from the Great War era. Jack knocked a few times, and a small, square peephole slid open, revealing Shiki’s strange bug-eyed orange mask.

“Housekeeping? You need fresh pillows?” Jack exclaimed in a shrill, high-pitched female sounding voice.

Shiki: “Ha ha. Get in here, fool.”

The door creaked open in an ear-piercingly loud manner, as if the hinge lubricant had completely worn away, revealing to Zack a highly unexpected sight for an expectedly abysmal basement apartment. The moment Zack stepped in the sounds of machines and computers whirring and calculating operations could be heard at an alarmingly loud level. The nearest left corner was entirely consumed for space by racks upon racks of computer equipment. Over ten monitors adorned the various workstations in that corner, their soft light disguising a proverbial jungle of wires, tangled in hopelessly complex knots behind them. In the far left corner were a variety of medical devices, including heart-rate monitors and a large, hospital type bed where Nix lay, pounding away intently at a laptop computer.

The right side of the room was entirely different story. A solitary mattress lay in the far right-hand corner. Flattened and stained, it barely qualified as a place of rest. But the real point of interest was the wall. It was entirely covered in posters, fliers, computer printouts, and graffiti, and not a single square inch of it was left untouched. Some of the posters were of classic, cult films, such as “Land of the Rising Dead” and “The Mob Boss”. Some were remnants left over from the days of the Great War, like campaign posters which advertised for troops to sign up for the war effort. Others papers, such as the various computer printouts displayed population census figures, wealth charts divided by social status, death counts per year, unlawful arrests and prosecutions per quarter, and other statistics normally hidden from the public eye. But on top of the literal pile of posters was a large “anarchy ‘A’” symbol, painted on by excessive amounts of red, dripping spray paint, which had dried long ago.

Zack was torn between several emotions: Surprise at the state of both sides of the place, at seeing Shiki now, and at seeing Nix in obviously guarded condition. Their names came back to his mind, as well as memories, through the filter in his mind. He decided to go from least questions to most, extending an arm toward Shiki for what he remembered as their customary fist-to-fist greeting ritual. "That's you Shiki, isn't it? You've grown, man! Finally ate your veggies?"

“Heh, you always did have a strange sense of humor… come on in. Pull up a chair. Grab some chips. Get comfortable.”, Shiki responded while engaging in the ritualistic handshake. It wasn’t often that Shiki was seen without wearing his entire get-up, but being in the comfort of his own home gave Jack and Zack a glimpse of the young man without all the wraps. He was a particularly young man (in his early teens) with a scrunched face, fairly skinny figure, and pale skin brought on by his days spent with his nose in the computer screen. Normally he dressed as he did to hide his age, as he didn’t want to be seen as easy prey in the eyes of street gangs.

(OOC: Shiki reference pic: i67.photobucket.com/albums/h308/Sukunai_Kitsune/Golialize/Page-006.jpg)

Jack turned to Zack for a moment and whispered something under the noise of the various machinery. “Lemme have a word with Nix alone first…”

Zack nodded to Jack, and plopped down casually on the nearest available seat that wasn't previously in use by the young Shiki. Keeping his eyes on him, and grinning with pride at how much the young scrapper had developed, he remarked, "Man, I knew you'd keep makin' it big with the guys here. You've always been a real badass." He knew not to remark on Shiki's young age; he was never a "kid" as far as he was concerned, and wanted to always keep that respect known to the other.

“Yeah…” Shiki confidently sighed as he leaned back in his computer chair, while putting his hands behind his head and smiling. “It’s tough out there… as you probably guessed, I do most of the dirty work…”, he jokingly boasted.

Eager to show off the groups accomplishments to an interested Zack, Shiki pulled his chair over to one of his computer monitors and began clicking around at various icons. “Pull up your chair, take a look at some of our handy work…”

Zack complied, moving closer to look, mystified by the computers themselves. "...What are these? They look like tv's but there's so many buttons... is this what you made?"

Shiki raised an eyebrow. Must've gone through Hell and back... "Uhhhh, yeah... they're kinda like TV's, but they can do all sorts of other stuff. Here, lemme show you..." Shiki clicked around the screen bringing up several images of newspaper clippings in a slide-show format. Each clipping was unique in that it showcased some event that Jack's group had been involved in, or in most cases, caused entirely. "Check this one out. We made front page that time!" Shiki zoomed into the picture revealing the outlines of a damaged building. "That was a crazy one... See, for months we had been monitoring District Manager Kent Oswell's shady doings over the internet. Turns out he was trying to rape some little girl, so one night we pulled this guy over, took his car, and ran it off the highway overpass directly into the pharmaceutical building! It was awesome!”

As the memory of his explosive excursion faded, he continued to reminisce about other major events in the group’s career. ”We’ve struck out at the Senate in ways we would have never dreamt of. We’ve gotten away with things that most couldn’t even comprehend. We’ve survived all these years… until last night…” Shiki tried to block out the memory of Yuz and Shem. Perhaps it was best if he didn’t know. “So… how about you? It’s been ages, so don’t let me hog the whole conversation! And don’t spare the gory details either, we’ve got all night.”

*******************

At the same time as Shiki and Zack were catching up on things, Jack talked silently with Nix.

Jack: “Ummm…hi…”

Nix: “Hey, what’s up dawg?”

Jack: “…Nix… I’m really sorry…”

Nix: “Aw, don’t be. I’m just happy to be alive. And I’m happy that you and Shiki made it too.”

Jack: “But… your legs…”

Nix: “Pffftt, don’t worry about it. Now that Ereki’s gone, somebody’s gotta become the new computer hacker. Don’t need no legs for that.”

Jack couldn’t believe how optimistic Nix was. Stunned by this, he couldn’t bring himself to speak, as he just couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t sound depressing.

Nix: “Listen Jack, I know what you’re thinking, and I’ve come to accept it. I can’t let some little injury keep me down.”

Jack: “…yeah… Hell yeah! I should have known that they couldn’t keep you down that easily!”

Nix: “And don’t you forget it!”

As he made his last exclamation, he overheard Shiki ask Zack how he had been and decided to chime in from across the room. “Yeah, what’s been goin’ on with ya man?”

Zack looked between them all, and felt a bit uncertain of what to say. He felt like it would somehow be difficult to tell them everything from when they'd last met up to this point. In more than only a few ways. So he gave what he thought was his usual lopsided grin with a chuckle as he scratched the back of his head. "Well, lots but little I guess... Was stuck out in that desert for ages, then joined up with Rolling Thunder to fight the Senate..."

His eyes went distant and his face blank for a moment, before he went right off continuing, "After kicking some ass, decided to give living in Midgar a try. I've met all kinds of interesting people here, got several friends now that I'm needing to run into soon."

Within the blink of an eye, his tone of voice lowered and the color of his now-narrowed eyes darkened. "A lot has happened... There are many dangers lately, not just from the Senate. I don't know much about several of them, but the answers should come soon enough... "

Then he instantly lightened again and folded his arms behind his head, leaning back in the chair. "Well, I guess the long and short is that I've been a mercenary for Edos Lee, and have raked in quite some dough, but it's all going toward getting a friend of mine up to outer space; he's from another planet. I haven't been here that long really, so there's a lot I haven't seen and I've been busy devoting my time to helping Bax, in-between dealing with a whole big slew of weird dangerous stuff going on. Pretty complicated I guess."

Nix: "Aliens, huh? Hmmmmm..."

Shiki: "Well, considering everything that’s been happening recently, I wouldn't put it past him. Seems like the Senate's been really riled up over something lately."

Nix: "True... hey, hold on a sec..." Nix began to scratch his chin as he looked at Zack in an inquisitive manner "Have you, by any remote chance, fought any giant worms lately?"

Zack's eyes widened, and he nodded. "Yeah! Bax fought the first one, and then another came along and I helped him fight it along with another friend. That thing was tough!"

Jack's jaw nearly fell to the floor. "So wait, you're telling us that you were the one leaping around in the air, shooting lightning bolts and swinging from buildings?"

Once more, Zack's hand went to the back of his head and he blushed and chuckled. "Hehehe, yeah, that thing was pretty mean so I couldn't just sit around or anything. I guess I kicked its butt a little."

Jack, Shiki, and Nix, in unison: "Hoooooolllllyyyyyyy crrrrrrrrrap..."

The three looked on in amazement with a newfound level of respect. They had never known Claude to lie in the past, and the more they thought about the broadcast, the more they could tell that there were almost no differences between the character on TV and the young man sitting in front of them. Shiki was the first to recover from the shock of the info they had just heard. "Wow, that puts a lot of validity to those stories we've been hearing lately."

The others nodded in agreement before Nix chimed in again, his curiosity now overpowering him. "Yeah, no kidding... So tell me, what are these many dangers you mentioned?"

Zack looked at him, then at the others as he spoke, "Well, those worms as I mentioned... There was a creature that looked like a gargoyle that attacked Bax at one point... " He paused, and moistened his lips. "It's hard to explain the rest without getting complicated... I'm not sure if you've heard of it or not: The Element of Prosperity. That was the last thing Rolling Thunder got involved in before they were... Anyway, we tried to stop the Senate from getting it, because it supposedly could grant the receiver some kind of immense power. I've remembered that lately because they're after it again, along with people I know who would more likely use it for good purposes. But who knows what other evils are pursuing it... "

He shifted his weight a bit. "And then there's some creature called Valtiel... He like, has no face but a tongue in the back... He has a dark Phoenix spirit in him now. My friend Bax is friends with Keldira, a good Phoenix. Guess you could call them good and evil twins... Valtiel is planning something big, thought he was gonna rip my throat out when I learned about that... That's where I was off to in such a hurry when you found me, Jack, to warn the others. My friend Sephiroth X said we need to get to the Beta Continent, cuz all this is about to come to a head!"

He then sighed, and scratched his head a bit. "...Sounds a bit out-there now that I hear myself say it... I don't blame you if you don't believe me, really... But it's just been crazy."

Shiki: "Strange... are you sure you weren't hit in the head or something?"

"Oh, come on, he'd never lie to us, man. You know that..." Nix gave Zack the benefit of the doubt, but even found it hard to believe himself. "...Wow, all I can say is that I'm glad we got that super-weapon from the Senate... say, when do I get to see that thing in action anyway?"

Jack snapped his attention to Nix, as he had previously been focused entirely on Zack's outrageous story. "Well, we don't really know everything about it yet, it could be dangerous."

Nix: "I took a bullet to the spine for this thing, and you still aren’t going to let me see it?"

Jack felt like a total ass now. He had no choice but to give the suit another try. He figured it was the least he could do for a friend who had nearly given everything for him. "You're right... I'm sorry." Jack pulled the folded Earth Breaker suit from it's cloth carrying bag and slipped it over his shoulders as described on the diagram. When properly fitted, the suits feminine voice rang out and it began the startup procedures. The suit unfolded in a familiar manner; twisting, contorting, reshaping, and eventually wrapping itself around Jack once again.


Zack looked on with eyes and jaw open wide. "Oh... my... GOSH THAT'S AWESOME!!!" He got to his feet, gesturing all over with his arms. "Wow, that makes ya look so cool! I bet it's indestructible and shoots lasers and... " He cocked his head, quoting something he'd heard time and again around here, "Slices, dices, and makes julienne fries?"

Nix: "No kidding. Daaaayyyyyymmmmnnn, that's insane man. Nice trophy."

Jack turned to Zack, acknowledging his comments first, then turning to Nix. "Heh. I don't know about all of that. All I really know is how to move in this thing." Jack rotated his hands around in front of him, checking to ensure the suit still worked. "From what we've been able to figure out, the suit responds to thought. So let's say I think about moving my arm... this way!" Jack clenched his fist and threw it upward into the air, in a "hurrah" type motion. "...then the suit would respond like this."

Zack darn near squealed with delight, running around though at a notably safe distance while examining the suit from different angles. "Wow, that's awesome! I bet that takes a lotta concentration till you get used to it. Just think what you could use this for! Oh! Oh!" He stopped in front of Jack, excited. "What if... What if you can like, think about going super fast or jumping super high! What if the suit can do it all amplified if you can imagine it!?"

"Ummm... I really don't know. Maybe?" It was the best answer he could give at the time, although it did make him think about what the suit was really capable of. "The only other thing I know of for sure though is this visor..." Jack reached up and slipped the visor over his face with an unusual degree of precision. Am I getting more used to this thing? "This visor, from my best understanding, apparently lets you see auras of people..."

Jack had been looking outwards into the city, once again examining the beautiful display of colored souls that shone in the distance. But then, he noticed something strange. He then turned to face Zack... Oh my God...

Zack's aura was incredible. In fact, it was the same blue color that he had noticed before in his previous examination of the suit. Could it be?... Yes, it was without question now. This was indeed the same aura that he had sensed earlier, shining almost blindingly in his face now that Zack was standing right next to him.

Jack: "Claude, I don’t know how to say this exactly, but your aura appears to be incredibly strong. It's a bright blue color, in fact..."

Zack blinked, surprised by two elements; the comment on his aura, and that name again. He opened his mouth to question about the latter, but stopped himself. I know these guys... they know me... There's gotta be a reason they call me Claude. It's weird... But it doesn't feel wrong, really... He decided then and there to leave it be.

And so, when he opened his mouth again it was with a grin as he commented, "Wow, blue? That's awesome. Feels like that makes sense somehow." He blushed a bit, feeling proud that it was significant to boot. "Cool stuff. Guess I have been workin' out, eh?"

Jack: "I’’m thinkin it’s more of a spiritual power than a physical power."

Shiki: "That would explain his flying around and using magic on the news."

"Yeah," Jack nodded in agreement. Perhaps he was onto something there. As Jack continued to look out into the city he noticed a lot of the same colored auras he noticed before. "Say, do you know of anyone who might have a green, orange, or pure black aura?"

Zack cocked his head, then took on a thoughtful pose, complete with hand on his chin. "Hmmm... Well, not that I can see 'em, but the impression I'd get is... Black would almost have to be that Valtiel dude I told you about. Bad news, very bad news... Though a friend of mine's also been dealing with someone I haven't heard much about but is very significant and not cool... Bad mojo either way I'd say... Bax would definitely be orange or red; red's his favorite color and he's got fire for hair and blood. He's really awesome. Green... Sephiroth X. He's also awesome. His eyes are really bright glowing green, so that's the impression I get."

"Hmmm, the guy for that orange aura, Is that the guy on the news who... was...", but Jack was cut off in mid-sentence. The green aura, whatever or whoever it was, was getting larger by the second. Wait. Not larger, but getting nearer. In fact, it was getting closer every second, moving faster, and faster, and faster...