Chapter 4: Climbing to the Top of the Career Chain.
“No, I meant… aren’t we gonna try to save Wedge?”
“Nah, he’s a goner.”
“I’m… *cough* …I’m not quite dead yet.”
“You will be soon.”
“Yikes! And I thought I was a huge jerk for enjoying Cloud’s crossdressing far too much.”
“You still are a huge jerk. But yes, wow.”
“So many death flags, people. Take it easy, or you’re all screwed.”
“But… the planet.”
“The planet could use less things blowing up, to be honest, and definitely fewer people falling several floors, groin first, into the railing below.”
“I think… *cough* …you might be right. It kinda hurts.”
“Well… someone’s an Inspector Gadget fan.”
“Does he have the propellers on his hands? What does he attack with?”
“You… don’t wanna know.”
“Try me.”
“Well… you know how they sometimes joke that big-breasted women have boob missiles?”
“Hoo boy, do I ever. Wait, you don’t mean….”
“Yep.”
“Ewww.”
“You’re probably right.”
“You’re… you’re all heart.”
“Well, at least you didn’t fall several floors and land on your crotch. That probably means you caused fewer deaths?”
“Yes, we came. Anything else intimate you want to know about us?”
“Cloud, you’re going to give him the wrong idea.”
“He’s had the wrong idea all this time. Why should he stop now?”
“Uh… that doesn’t even make any sense.”
“Did he just do the Watchmen thing?”
“Coupled with some Warner Bros for good measure.”
“I am an interesting man.”
“We can have the nerd conversations later. For now, we need to disarm the bomb.”
“Disarm the bomb? Who are you, and what did you do to Barret?”
“Oh ha ha, you’re an explosion of laughter. But I ain’t condonin’ no bombs I ain’t set myself.”
“Aren’t you making my job easier and all?”
“HI FIIIIIVE!”
“Awrite! Gimme some.”
“Barret, it’s a trap. He has a huge stick in his other hand, and that ain’t a greeting stick.”
“And I’m riding the chopper where stupid jerks aren’t allowed.”
“SHUT YER HOLE! AGAIN!”
“Boy, you’re easy to troll, aren’t you?”
“It’s a time bomb. He’s gonna blow up time!”
“What? No, that’s not… you know what? Never mind. Let’s just get outta here.”
“Well, your orders were apparently negotiating with her first. Since when did you start doing it the hardass way instead?”
“Just now.”
“Oh, OK.”
“Don’t just be all accepting of that. We have to save her.”
“But we just got done saving you. I’d like to do something different for a change.”
“Our hero.”
“Oh, come on! You gotta save me.”
“Oh, fine! But you owe me.”
“I think we need to leave. I don’t understand these people.”
“Good thought. We connect this to the main computer, hack the mainframe terminal and stop the bomb and free Aeris at the same time.”
“Erm… that’s not quite what I had in mind.”
“Oh?”
“Well… this works too, I guess.”
“Glad we see eye to eye. Now, please do not let one rip.”
“I make no promises.”
“Another job well done. Now for the propaganda.”
“When I asked you to carry the weight of the world, I did not mean it so literally.”
“Uh….”
“I’ve heard of gallows humor, but jeez.”
“The planet? I mean… that’s what you’ve been harping on all this time.”
“Urgh! Don’t remind me.”
“Why? Do you have monopoly on that?”
“Uuurgh!”
“Cloud, be nice.”
“Well, yes? Kinda? That’s the hostage excuse, though.”
“What’cha mean?”
“The plate dropping? That’s all on Shinra. You only really need to feel guilty about the people who suffered when we blew up the power stations. And the families of the soldiers we killed. Stuff like that.”
“That’s a relief.”
“….”
“We’ve learned nothing, have we?”
“Well, someone reset themselves.”
“And of course there’s no turning back. The whole ‘back’ place has been crushed flat.”
“Sssshinras faaaaault.”
“I said Marlene. I don’t want to see Sephiroth.”
“Oh great. I can tell we all need some of this.”
“It’s the explainy materia.”
“I think you should just move away, but that’s just me. Looking in more than one direction could also work in your favor, but maybe not when an entire city block is falling.”
“I’m not sure why Aeris would consider this a safe place when the Shinra clearly knows she lives here.”
“I told her that damsel fetish would get her into trouble, but would she listen? Nooo.”
“That’s… not off-putting at all, although given how she almost literally forced me to cross-dress, I’m not that surprised either.”
“I’m so sorry. Really.”
“It’s OK. I got my revenge when Don Corneo picked me rather than her.”
“Uh… whatever makes you happy.”
“Oh, the look on her face certainly did.”
“Erm… yes, I think I can see where this is going.”
“Well… in some ways, yes. But there’s more.”
“What? Dying mothers giving their children to complete strangers? That happens a lot? Yikes!”
“No, I meant husbands not returning. That’s what I get for skipping some steps.”
“Well, I’d be worried if a kid of mine told me that, but that’s just me.”
“So would I, normally, but Aeris is super duper special.”
“Still worried.”
“Aeris is quite tactless, isn’t she?”
“Yes, well…”
“This is just getting more sinister by the second. If I didn’t buy the ‘talking with the dead’ thing, I’d almost suspect she was the one who killed people so she could report their deaths.”
“Oh, you should have heard the list of names she would recite from time to time.”
“Erm… what now?”
“The war, remember? She’d go into a trance and just spout out names like the most messed-up phone book ever. It was unsettling in so many ways.”
“Yikes! I don’t think I want to dwell on that mental image for any amount of time if that’s alright.”
“Spoken like a man of SOLDIER!”
“I don’t know which was worse: Aeris rattling off names that would show up in obituaries, or the man in black trying to sweet-talk her into coming with them for… unknown reasons.”
“I guess they were out of ‘free candy’ vans?”
“The Promised Land kind of sounds like a pipe dream, too.”
“Erm… I was with her most of the time.”
“Oh, OK.”
“That was enough to put your mind to rest, huh?”
“I raised miss ‘I Hear Dead People’. I can get used to lots of thing really quickly.”
“I gotta blow stuff up. It’s in my blood.”
“I can see why you got a mug with ‘World’s Greatest Dad’ written on it.”
“Ohoho, I’d have to use Flare to make a sicker burn than that. Do let me know if you are ever ‘in the market’ again.”
“Will do, you weird little man.”
“Whiskers? What have you been telling her?”
*cough* “Um, let’s not ask.”
“Hey, Cloud! Hey, listen. Hey! Hey! Hey, listen!”
“Little girl, she had me crossdress not that long ago, and let’s just say she had some weird tastes to begin with. That she asks you lots of questions about me is more unsettling than anything else — and why would she want to know that much about me when she does that sort of thing anyway? Never mind, why would she expect you to know so much about me?”
“Dummy! Dummy dummy dummy dummy dummy dummy dummy dummy….”
“Sheesh, enough already.”
“OK.”
“Because if you die too, I’ll have to raise another little girl, and I’ve done my share already, I should think.”
“Yeah, speaking of pushing ourselves to the limit….”
“DUMMYYYYY!”
“Have fun travelling, squirt.”
“Wall market, for all your wall needs.”
“Sponsored by Pink Floyd.”
“And the ‘LEAVE THOSE KIDS ALONE’ foundation.”
“High demand for tank shares, huh?”
“Stocks and bombs?”
“Sounds like my kind of market.”
“I know, and I regret making that joke now.”
“I kind of feel like the bomb sometimes too.”
“I’m all wired and ready to go.”
“You don’t understand how I feel at all. Jerks.”
“That’s what she said.”
“……”
“There are versions that don’t need batteries as well, just so you know.”
“Also, did you seriously just climb up and grab those batteries so people would have to pay to get back up there? Because if that’s the case, congratulation for your ambitions.”
“Otherwise, we paid 500 gil for nothing, and then we’ll just have to climb back down again and wring his neck.”
“Good thing we bought all of them, then.”
“Insert it, already, and let’s continue with this absurd climb.”
“This is just really messed up. I thought the train graveyard was messed up, but this is just insane.”
“It’s like the world’s most morbid climbing wall ever.”
“Good thing we had something to land on, then.”
“There ain’t no getting offa this train track we’re on, I guess.”
“Well, we’ve reached the top of the most messed-up climb ever. I don’t even know what to say.”
“I hear ya. I mean… I like blowing stuff up and all, but this is a bit too much.”
“I wonder who’s on top of this food chain.”
“…..”
“No surprise there.”
“Come to think of it, how does a company named ‘Shinra’ get to that top anyway? It literally has the word ‘death’ in its name.”
“Beats me.”
“An’ now that we’re done with the climbing, it’s time to let off some steam. You know what I’m gettin’ at?”
“Oh, do tell.”
“Yep. I got a gun on my arm, and I’m itching to use it.”
“Well, then you’re not going to like my alternate solution.”
“Hah! As if the SOLDIER boy would not want to go hog wild with his weapon of choice. Surely I’m the idiot here.”
“You’re the idiot here.”
“Oh, shu’ up!”
“I can feel its metaphorical weight on me.”
“You’re just out of shape.”
“Am not! I’m just too much into shape.”
“Pfft, yeah right. Maybe you’d like the ‘sense’ materia now?”
“Um… Tifa, we don’t use ‘retard’ any more. It’s rude and kind of demeaning.”
“Pfft, you and your PCness.”
“Yes, screw me and my courtesy and good manners and stuff. There’s no place for that sort of thing when one is too cool for this school.”
“Yep! We’re in Shinra HQ, alright.”
“Pah! I welcome it.”
“Oh, I’m sure you do.”
“HEY! I’m the only one who’s allowed to have a gun for a hand. You think about that when you end up in hell.”
“Uh… I’m not sure that’s how it works.”
“It’s a free world.”
“Well, we got a keycard. Let’s rise in the ranks some.”
“Oh boy oh boy oh boy, it’s a real elevator. Will it go up, will it go down? We may never know.”
“No, I meant… you’re going to be a pain in the ass, aren’t you?”
“Well, there are people who can’t guess the direction of an elevator in two guesses.”
“Oh, come on! If you aren’t shouting ‘KILL DA INTRUDER’, we’re gonna feel bad when we kill you.”
“Uh….”
“You two got your daily dose of Phoenix Down, right?”
“Uh….”
“Corporate cutdowns. They can hit hard.”
“And speaking of which….”
“Yeah, they were running around… until you shot their legs off.”
“Eh, it was just a flesh wound. I managed quite fine without an arm. Even more when I got a gun mounted on it.”
“We’re… uh, we’re the heroes, right? Aeris will appreciate all this when we manage to save her, right?”
“She will, or I will be very… mad… at her.”
“Nope!”
“Well… weird come-on aside, why would someone teach us how to get to the next floor when they don’t even know who we are?”
“Sssh. Let’s not look a gift key card in the slot. That would be… uh, stupid.”
“Excuse me, what?!”
“Cloud isn’t a rival. He has a promise with me!”
“Uh… maybe, but… what?!”
“These peeps seem to know who she is, though. I guess the ancients aren’t as much a secret as Shinra would have liked.”
“Well, we are on the floor of the illuminated ones, I guess.”
“And the rivalry is strong.”
“Well, phooey. Locked chests are no fun. How do we get the sweet, sweet contents other people own if they lock their chests?”
“We can ascend floors, but we can’t get in. What irony.”
“Floor 69. That’s… uh…. yeah, not going there.”
“That’s mighty professional of you. A round of applause for their hard work.”
“Well, at least all the doors work here. Now if they could just unlock all the chests, everything would be just fantastic.”
“Yes, we know you’re just a puppet ruler. Nobody is really surprised about that.”
“They do so love making others feel unimportant and powerless, regardless of position.”
“How they managed to get people to work for them is anybody’s guess. People must just be that… uh, stupid.”
“…..”
“Maybe we shoulda held off the insults a bit, huh?”
“Sorreeee.”
“And now we have a puzzle section to get by. That’s just great.”
“Dat’s my speciality.”
“I doubt that.”
“Well… let’s just get this over with.”
“That was… easier than I expected.”
“No, it wasn’t. It was nothing but libraries. Books are boring.”
*sigh* “As expected.”
“I’m with him on the ‘make them suffer’ part, though.”
“You were on that train even before we arrived here. Don’t act like it’s on his hands that we killed so many soldiers on our way up.”
“Oh, shu’ up!”
“I’m sure Aeris won’t mind if we get a little shut-eye, right?”
“I’m honestly a little surprised that the Shinra house would even have a nap room. That seems rather worker-friendly, doesn’t it? And an exercise room? What’s with the worker benefits here? I heard they only got a Phoenix Down a day.”
“Those fiends! They actually go against our assumptions for the better. They must pay for not living up to our expectations. Or down, as it were.”
“Uh….”
“Did the computer just say ‘beep’? It wasn’t a sound effect at all, just.. they rented a woman to say the word ‘beep’. How does that even….”
“ABORT MISSION! WE’VE ALL BEEN SUBJECTED TO ‘CONFUSION’!”
“I’m not. What’s going on?”
“This floor makes no sense. It’s just hallways with doors, but no rooms nearby. That top hallway is entirely pointless outside of making a confusing mishmash of labyrinthine doors leading places.”
“I wonder what kind of madman commissioned this floor to be built. I mean… it’s just a storage room from the looks of things.”
“A city born? I thought it was built.”
“Not big on metaphors, are you?”
“Hey, I ain’t got time to be metaphorical when it comes to evil corporations that seek to exploit its people.”
“Its gun-toting, mercenary hiring people.”
“Wow. OK, soldiers and robots I can understand, but ‘Sword Dance’? And it looks like a cross between a weird fish and a caterpillar flipped sideways.”
“Sword dance? I’ll show them a sword dance. Because that’s how you do it in Kingsport.”
“You devil, you.”
“Um…. it dropped what?!”
“Yeah, I feel I could use some of that.”
“The hell are you smoking? Jus’ grab it and let’s move on.”
“And I just found my new favorite penis nickname.”
“Well, I’m not going to let any ‘Midgar Parts’ near any of my own parts, if you catch my drift.”
“Aw, you’re no fun.”
“A window of opportunity?”
“There he goes again, all metaphor-y.”
“Maybe he got some Midgar Parts in his vocabulary.”
“Oh, stop ruining my fun.”
“A what blaster?”
“A hammer blaster. Meaning it either blasts hammers or shoots hammers at us. I’m hoping it’s the former, because then we’ll be safe.”
“Good thing it wasn’t a knuckle blaster, then.”
“Hooray for the little positives.”
“Must be all the Midgar parts. If you don’t wash them regularly, they start to smell after a while.”
“EWWWW!”
“Well, it’s true.”
“I know. But still… ewww.”
“Uh… no.”
“Yes, and after I caught the people trying to peep on me, I made sure they couldn’t walk without aid for at least a week.”
“Yikes!”
“Yep, sounds about right.”
“This guy is Shinra material, alright.”
“No particular talents, other than ‘wanting to control people’. You are a credit to that uniform.”
“Several steps and even more floors closer to their goal, our heroes ponder the next choice they have to make to save someone close to them, even after such a short time. What challenges will they face? What hard decisions have to be made? What moral quandaries will stand in their way?”
“I say flush.”
“Nah, son! We need to get the hell out of here.”
“You always flush after you drop a deuce. And just look at the log floating around down there. You flush, and you put the lid down before you do so. That’s common knowledge.”
“….uh, guys, we’re on a mission of infiltration.”
“And murder.”
“OK, yes, that too. But mostly infiltration. Climb up there, you morons!”