Chapter 38
"What's the time?" You asked the group for probably the hundredth time.
"Just one more minute," Cloud replied checking the time on his phone. Earlier in the day, after you had returned to the gummi ship, you came up with a plan based off the information you had overheard from the students on the roof. You had decided to return to the school as a group just before midnight and see what would happen. In the mean time you had taken turns of returning to the school in groups of two but hadn't come across anything new. This was your only lead and you just hoped it would lead to something.
The five of you had been waiting outside the school gate since quarter to twelve and you were just bursting at the seams for something to happen.
"You're not much for patience" Zexion commented, his gaze directed at you.
"It's been a very uneventful day. Forgive me for wanting to get on with the mission." You pouted back.
"All secrets reveal themselves in time. Rushing through life won't necessarily get you anywhere," Zexion spoke, a philosophical air about him.
"Right," You deadpanned. "Next time I want a vague, mystic remark, I'll come see you, grandpa." He merely turned away from you to look back at the school.
"Guys! Guys! It's almost time!" Ventus cheered as he watched the timer he'd set up on his phone. "Five, four..." Tifa and Cloud got up from where they were sitting on the floor. "Three, two..." Zexion and you straightened yourselves as you all gathered together eyes peeled to the building. "One!" Ven exclaimed and with that everything began to change. The moon took on an eerie green glow, casting its unnerving light over the world bellow. A thick red substance oozed from pavement, trees and nearby buildings, to form puddles about the place. Your eyes flicked around the creepy scene before they snapped to the school building which began shifting and moving as if brought to life. It quickly rose into the sky until it shifted into the tower you had seen the night before. One made of varying architecture styles that mingled grotesquely. A few waves of dark energy emanated from the building washing over you in a surge of ecstasy, feeding your dark magic. It somehow filled you with energy and made you feel overcome at the same time. You weren't quite sure how all this was going to pan out.
"Whoa," Tifa breathed out snapping you out of your stunned awe.
"What the- Hey guys, check this out." You turned to Ventus as he tapped at his phone. "It's stopped working." You reached out and took it from him to have a look while Cloud and Tifa took out their own phones.
"They're all dead," Cloud remarked.
"Perhaps technology doesn't work in this space." Zexion Suggested. You shoved the phone back at Ventus who fumbled to grab it as a thought crossed your mind.
"Everyone check your communicators," you ordered as you tried your own. No response.
"I got nothing," Tifa said.
"Same here," Cloud agreed.
"Dammit," You let out an exasperated sigh. So much for Kurosaki's plan.
"Hold on a minute," Ven bought a hand to his chin as if he were thinking. "There must be some way to get technology to work cause we landed the Gummi ship at this time last night. We would have crashed if technology doesn't work here." He pointed out.
"And we did follow that motorbike," Tifa added.
"Right, well why do you think the ship worked?" you asked.
"Maybe the backup system" Cloud offered.
"Right and what's that?" you questioned.
"There's an emergency energy reserve that kicks on if the engine fails. It's a surge of artificial electricity that can keep the ship running for at least five hours if the engine shuts down." He explained.
"Hmm artificial electricity," You tapped a finger to your chin in thought until an idea sparked. "Pass me all the equipment," You told the group and you placed all the items together on the floor. "Now stand back a bit," As your team took a few steps back you blasted the collection of equipment with a shot of thunder magic. "Alright let's try this again." You each picked up your communicator and put it on.
"Testing, testing," Tifa tried hers first.
"You're coming through," Ven cheered.
"Mine's working too," Zexion spoke.
"Excellent," You beamed, "Crisis everted. Let's go in." You told your team as you strode off toward the building. You reached out to the large heavy doors which took all five of you to actually push open. It felt like some sort of invisible force was pushing back against them, not wanting you to enter but you pushed through anyway.
"This is so weird," Ventus commented as you stood in an odd looking room. The room was large and round with a single door positioned at the top of a long staircase. At the bottom of the staircase, just to the right, stood an odd looking contraption of green and gold. You were about to go check it out when in the blink of an eye a blue door materialized in front of you. Without a second to react, the door flew open to reveal a blinding light, your body flying threw as if tugged along by some invisible force.
"What is this?" You called in surprise as the light faded and you heard the door close behind you.
"Welcome to the velvet room, although this is not a very welcomed visit," your eyes shot to the middle of the room where the old, masculine voice came from. An old looking man with a hook like nose sat in the middle of the room, on a blue velvet chair, an eerie grin plastered to his face.
"I am Igor, the master of this room," he explained "and you don't belong here."
"I suggest you leave immediately before you start to tamper with our guests destined fate" A young woman with short, white hair, in an unusual looking blue outfit, pouted from where she stood next to the old man.
"Now, now Elizabeth, everything here happens for a reason." The man Igor spoke. The woman, Elizabeth, shot you a dirty look before she let out a huff and looked away.
"How did you summon me here?" you asked remaining in your spot by the door just in case.
"I simply called you here for a little chat." The man's grin spread.
"I'm not much for chit chat, so why don't you just cut to the chase," You folded your arms in front of yourself not liking the look of this guy as you could sense some strange power about him. All of which, made you wary.
"Very well," He leaned forward lacing his fingers together and placing them under his massively over hanging nose. "This building you have entered is known as Tartarus. It is almost impossible to navigate and filled with dangerous creatures. An intruder is currently residing within Tartarus, causing more havoc than usual. I have a feeling your arrival has something to do with this intruder. I would like you to find them and remove yourself from this place."
"Who is this intruder?" Your interest was piqued. It had to be Vanitas.
"It is not my place to say." He shook his head, eerie grin still in place. "I've said all I wish to share. It's time for you to leave but just remember, your fate should never cross with our guest or events may fall out of place."
"Who's your gue-" you didn't have time to finish your question as the door flew open behind you and your body was propelled out. You landed on your butt with a thud. "Ouch," you moaned.
"------!" Tifa exclaimed throwing her arms around you as the others flocked to your side.
"Are you okay? What happened?" Zexion asked urgently from your side.
"I was sucked through that blue door." You exclaimed rubbing your temple as you felt a little light headed.
"What blue door? Cloud sounded a little confused.
"The one just..." you trailed off as you looked over Tifa's shoulder to where the door should have been but wasn't. "You guys never saw a blue door?" you asked.
"No. You just froze on the spot and were all spaced out. You wouldn't respond to anything and then just fell over. It was really weird." Ventus explained.
"Huh," maybe it was some sort of vision or premonition, although it did feel very real. "Oh well let's keep going." You weren't exactly sure what had just happened but you definitely had a feeling that Vanitas was here so you were going to take the old man's advice and climb the tower. You pushed yourself to your feet and went to walk off when a hand closed around your wrist in a vice grip.
"Shouldn't we check you over first?" Cloud had a look of concern across his face but you didn't have time to dawdle around wasting precious minuets, trying to prove that you were perfectly fine. Which you were.
"I'm fine," you spoke pulling your arm from his grip. "We need to start investigating before time runs out. This building doesn't stay up forever." Cloud just shot you a curious look before you turned your back to him and went to investigate the odd looking green and gold contraption near the base of the stairs.
"What do you think it is?" Tifa came up beside you.
"I have no idea. I've never seen anything like it," you admitted. You tentatively reached out a hand toward it which in turn caused the green part to glow.
"How strange," Zexion commented as he stepped closer too. As the five of you gathered around the object, a rustling noise came from the door followed by the sound of footsteps.
"I think we've got company," Ventus gulped as he took a step back away from the direction of the door, bumping into you. The unexpected force propelled you straight forward, face first, into the contraption. Before you could react you were engulfed by green light. In a flash the light faded and you found yourself stood in front of a similar contraption, only the surrounding walls were very different. Everything was gold. The walls, the roof, the floor. The only thing disrupting the elegant and regal look of the well-trimmed room, were the puddles of red ooze similar to those you had seen on the streets outside. They were thick and dark, crimson, red. Extremely reminiscent of blood. Oh how you hoped it wasn't blood.
The green light of the contraption flashed in your peripheral, prompting you to turn back to face it. You had to shield your eyes from its extreme shine but you could just make out a few figures through the glare.
"What just happened?" Tifa's voice sounded shocked.
"---------!" Ventus exclaimed. "I'm so sorry I knocked you in." He rushed to your side.
"Don't worry, I'm fine." You assured
"Where are we?" Cloud began looking around the empty room.
"I would deduce that we are now somewhere in the tower. That machine we stepped into must be some sort of teleportation device." Zexion mused as he looked over the machine.
"I'm pretty sure someone entered the tower as we were coming here." Tifa mentioned.
"I think so too. I heard voices outside the door." Ventus agreed.
"What should we do? There's no way to tell if anyone's coming after us, and no way to know what's ahead." Cloud broke down the situation.
"I'd say there's not much left to do except investigate," You said. "We'll move cautiously and deal with any trouble as it arises." Your team nodded back at you before the five of you took up formation and began to work your way through the floor. It didn't take long before you came across a staircase leading further up the tower.
"There was absolutely nothing on this floor," Ventus rubbed at the back of his head.
"For this strong dark presence, we haven't seen any enemies," Zexion pondered. You had been trying to locate enemies using your own subtle waves of dark magic but with the dark energy this thick you couldn't pin point anything.
"Should we try the next floor?" Cloud suggested.
"May as well," you nodded. The five of you made your way up the stairs only to find yourself surrounded by the same gold wall with the occasional bloodstain. You let out a heavy sigh thinking about how much work finding Vanitas would entail, if in fact it was actually him that was here.
"Woah -------!" Ventus exclaimed tugging at your sleeve.
"What?" You spun around to look at him as he pointed back in the direction you had come from.
"The stairs are gone," He gawked. Your whole party spun back to look at the solid floor and wall where the stairs you used had previously been. You walked over to the wall and tentatively placed a hand on it. Definitely solid. Not an illusion. No presence of magic. How'd that happen? Tifa stepped up and knocked on the wall.
"Guess we're not getting back that way?" She hummed.
"There has to be some cause," you continued feeling around the wall for a button or latch. There had to be something.
"Maybe the towers alive," Ventus considered, eyes widening. You had just started to shake your head at him and were about to tell him not to be stupid when Cloud interrupted.
"Guys, we've got company," You turned to see him grasping his sword in two hands before following his gaze to what looked like a puddle of black ooze, with a cloudy smoke clinging to the air around it. The thick black substance gathered around what looked to be a blue mask and it gained speed, pulling itself along the ground by two shadowy arms that extended from its middle.
"What's that?" Tifa gasped.
"Bad news," You stepped to the front of the group next to Cloud.
"I've never seen any beast like that before," Zexion's lexicon materialized in his hands.
"We'll just have to see what works then," Cloud spoke before charging for the thing. His sword sliced straight through it. It broke into small puffs of black smoke before evaporating in the air.
"Well that was surprisingly simple," Your body relaxed from its battle stance.
"There's more coming," Tifa pulled on her gloves. You got back into stance.
"Well let's take care of them then," You smirked.
The whole floor of the tower was filled with various monsters of different descriptions, all brandishing some sort of mask. You had been fighting off anything that crossed your path before you'd finally made it to another staircase leading up to the next floor.
"Staircase," Ventus cheered as the five of you rushed toward it.
"Should we move on?" Cloud asked.
"Probably for the best," you replied as you took out one of the many monsters chasing after you.
"Here's hoping they can't follow us up," Tifa breathed as you finally reached the stairs, leaping up them so fast you probably missed half of them. On reaching the top you turned around to see a solid wall behind you and no monsters.
"Safe!" You smiled before inhaling deeply to catch your breath. You began turning around to face the others, "we made it..." you trailed of and your smile dropped as you noticed you were all alone.
"Guys" You called. No response. "Guys!" your voice rang louder. Silence.
Perfect.
A/N: Hey guys! Once again I apologies for the massively overdue update. Super sorry. I did have plans to get the story further in this chapter but it ended up longer than I was expecting so I broke my plans into two chapters. I hope to put the next chapter out soonish. Hopefully. I also hope that you're still enjoying my story J . See ya in the next chapter~