Final Fantasy VII: Lifestream - Book 3: Pursuit

FORTY-THREE

"Focus," he ordered. "We'll talk later."

"You okay, Jessie?" I called from atop the dragon.

She smirked as she quickly relit her blaze talons. "Never better! It'll take a lot more than a big lizard to keep me down!"

"That's the spirit, Firebrand!" I laughed.

"Interesting name," Vincent remarked between shots as he quickly reloaded his gun. "Show me how you got it."

Jessie struck the dragon with a flurry of slashes. "Love to!"

When she moved back, holstered her weapons, and took one of her new mega raspberries out of her belt pouch, I knew what was coming. I raced up the dragon's spine and hit it in the back of the neck with one of my true strike punches, then backflipped off amidst a burst of bright red energy and the satisfying snap of bone. As I landed lightly on both feet, Cloud ducked under the monster's last desperate bite and cut into its chest with a spinning backhand stab of Buster then followed that up with a quick focused thrust from Force Stealer.

"Now, Jessie!" he shouted, leaping away to a safe distance.

She threw the raspberry. "Special delivery!"

The explosion shook the whole cave and tore the dragon apart. As Yuffie and I crouched down low with our hands over our heads, Cloud dropped his swords, threw his arms tightly around Jessie, and spun her away from the blast, shielding her from the inferno and the falling rock as best he could. Vincent simply ducked and waited it out, as impassive as ever and an island of calm amidst the chaos.

Once the dust had settled, he stood up. "Impressive."

Jessie gently dislodged herself from Cloud, brushed herself off, and flashed him a grin. "I do make great cocktails, don't I?"

"So it would seem," he agreed.

"Oh, we so rock!" Yuffie cheered, hands on her hips. "Jessie, do you realize what we just did? We slew a dragon! A dragon!"

Jessie gave her a high five. "Hell yeah!"

Yuffie's eyes danced. "Dragonslayer Yuffie! I like the sound of that! Wait 'till the others find out! Sephiroth is so dead!"

"He won't know what hit him!" I agreed.

Although I knew Sephiroth was a lot stronger than a dragon, it still felt good to have taken it down. I was a little excited about it myself. A dragon was no pushover, after all. It hadn't been an easy battle, but we'd won in the end, and that gave me hope. For the first time, I felt like we had a real chance of defeating our true enemy.

Cloud gave Jessie a faint smirk as he retrieved his weapons. "Looks like you were right about that bomb shrapnel."

She pumped her fist. "Told ya! What a blast, huh?"

"You're not kidding," I nodded.

"Thought you were going south with Aerith and the others," Cloud said, turning to Vincent. "Not that I'm complaining."

He holstered his gun. "I changed my mind."

"I'm glad you did," I smiled. "We could really use your help."

Vincent nodded. "That's why I'm here. The rest are on their way to meet the merchant north of Gongaga. They should get there in another day or two, three at the most. As for me, I followed you."

Cloud shouldered his swords. "Know anything about what's ahead? Tifa and I grew up together in Nibelheim, but we've never traveled past Mt. Nibel, so we don't really know what's up there."