Emerald Crisis--Final Fantasy VII--Disc One, Mission 13

Midgar Region: Mountains\

            After leaving the W.R.O. HQ, Daisy drove them to the mountains to seek refuge.  They abandoned Daisy’s car at the base of the mountain, hidden among the trees, and made camp in a small cave halfway up.  There, Yuffie fell asleep against the cavern wall while Daisy kept a fatigued watch.

            The W.R.O. knew their faces and would follow them.  They would capture them, too, and while Daisy felt sure that Reeve would make some effort to help, she also knew that even he couldn’t protect them from what they did.  All actions have reactions, and she felt certain that this time, it wouldn’t end in their favor.

            After Yuffie woke up, she let Daisy sleep, and she paced the cavern mouth as the sun set.  Stretching her legs and nibbling on the rations they brought, Yuffie sat down at the edge of the cliff and stared out into the distance.  The air was clear there and cool, but they had brought blankets and other survival gear with them.

            She pulled out the thumb drive and put it into her bracer, pulling up the holographic interface and digging through the data.  The files were each encrypted, but Shelke gave them a program of some sort specially designed to break the encryption.  It took time to dig through the code, but once she was in, she had an entirely new world opened up to her.

            Daisy woke up around midnight and found Yuffie still working, pouring over the data.  They had been partners for years, hunting for materia together side-by-side, and she had never seen Yuffie so focused before.  Sometimes, like back at the HQ, Daisy would get glimpses of the woman Yuffie must have been during the Jenova War, though, and in those moments, it was hard to imagine she could be anyone else.

            The cool air left them shivering, so Daisy made a quick fire and led Yuffie over to it.  The younger woman hardly refused to look up from her bracer.  Another hour passed, and Daisy made them food on the fire.  The W.R.O. hadn’t pursued them yet, or at least they hadn’t found them yet.  After they ate, Daisy took to cleaning her gun by the firelight.

            They slept and started early the next morning, and Yuffie hardly spoke.  Daisy went for a hike to stretch her legs and came back to find Yuffie pacing.  They stopped in the cavern mouth together and faced each other.

            “Done?”

            Yuffie gave a nod.  She stood with her hands on her hips, but she didn’t stand for long.  Something compelled her to pace again, to keep moving.

            “And?  Please, tell me you found something.  Tell me we didn’t make an enemy of the world’s government for nothing.”

            “Found a lot of stuff.  A lot of secrets.”  She shook her head.  “These bastards.  There’s so much, Dais, so many secrets, so many lies hidden from view, even from us.  Even from me.  Shinra did experiments, a lot of them, a lot we don’t know about, with Mako, with people, with materia, and they hid it anywhere that had shadows deep enough to keep people from seeing.  And the W.R.O. knows.  All of it.  And they’re hiding it.”

            “What are you talking about?”

            “The files that Reed was looking at were about something called Project D.  We couldn’t get everything before the sentries stopped us, but we did get a location.”  Yuffie tapped a few keys onto her bracer and pulled up a map of the world.  She closed distance between them and pointed to a blank area in the middle of the ocean.  “Here.”

            “What’s there?”

            Yuffie took a deep breath.  “Materia, which is what the Emerald Lotus is after, right?  But not any materia.  Materia made from people, made with human lives.  Grown inside of them, feeding on them.  Killing them.”

            Daisy paused, and then took a deep breath.  She held it inside of her until her thoughts settled and then exhaled.  “Okay.  That’s...Wow. And the W.R.O. knows?”

            “They’re keeping it.  All of it.  Powered and running.”

            “Are they still running the experiments?”

            “That’s what we need to find out.”

            Daisy shook her head and paced a small circle.  She then went to gathering her things.  “We’ll need a boat, then.”

            Yuffie sighed.  “A boat.”

            “Sorry.”

            “No, you’re right.”  Yuffie gathered her things, too.  She slipped her shuriken into place on her back.  “I just wish you weren’t.”

Off-Shore W.R.O. Facility\

            They found a boat and take it out to sea, riding the shifting waters out to nowhere.  On the way, Yuffie held the side of the boat, vomiting whenever the urge would strike her, and she let Daisy lead the charge.  Periodically, she would comment how she can’t wait to make it to dry land or, in lieu of that, something solid.

            The facility appeared in the distance.  To the casual observer, it looked like an old Shinra power plant.  The sea air has oxidized the outer shell, leaving much of the platform dusted with a rusty outer coating.  It was stable, though, holding against large, crashing waves.  No one would suspect it was anything more than a vestige of the past, except there were few birds there and even the fish seemed to stay away.  Boats were docked to one side when the duo arrived.

            They approached without notice, killing the engines once they were close enough and gliding forward.  As soon as they could, they climbed onto the hard asphalt of the facility and sought refuge behind a few large, rusted transport canisters.  Yuffie rested her back against it and took deep breaths as she tried to settle her stomach.  Daisy peeked around the sides.

            “It’s empty.” Daisy said.  She drew her guns and set the safety off on both, just in case, and she leaned back to look at Yuffie.  “Where is everyone?”

            Yuffie shrugged and sat up.  She leaned around.  The facility looked Shinra in origin but there were upgrades made.  They were shoddy at best, but they were enough to keep someone from looking deeper.  It was adapted into an oil platform, like the one Barret worked on, but none of it looked real up close.  The machine was largely inert and, from what Yuffie could tell, potentially hollow.

            “I don’t like this.”

            Yuffie caught sight of something in the distance and squinted, and then she shuffled back into hiding. She drew her shuriken and took a deep breath, and she pulled Daisy with her and held her fingers to her lips.  Then, she pointed around.  Daisy peeked and squinted, too.

            “What am I looking at?”

            “At the blood,” Yuffie said.  “They’re under attack.”

            “Lotus.”

            “Exactly.” Yuffie stood and rounded the steel crate.  “Come on, we have to hurry.”

            Daisy followed close, across the hot asphalt of the facility, and came to a stop behind her.  They peeked around another crate and found three Lotus soldiers standing together with W.R.O. soldiers tied up between them.  The W.R.O. were breathing shallowly, bloodied at the mouth and some unconscious.  Two Lotus, one a stout female and the other a slight male, stood nearby, talking as they kept watch, assault rifles ready.  The third was busy binding the remaining W.R.O. soldiers.

            “Guard duty,” said the female soldier.  She shook her head and adjusted the shoulder strap of her rifle.  “I mean, come on.  What’re we guarding for?  We’ve already cleaned up.”  She looked at the slight male beside her.  “Think what I said got back to the commander?”

            Slight shrugged, one hand on his hip.  “Might have, but that doesn’t explain why I was put here with you.  Anyways, she’s not in charge here.  It’s Hollis and that other guy.  Commander is just following orders, I think.”

            Stout pursed her lips.  “I’m not so sure they’re that hands on.  Hollis doesn’t seem to care about anything but breaking stuff, and the other guy is...always distracted.”

            “Wait a minute,” said the Lotus binding the guard, standing and glaring over at the two.  “Wait a damn minute here! Are you telling me we got this posting cause you were mouthing off about the commander?”

            Stout rolled her eyes.  “I didn’t say anything much, I just said...”

            While they talked, Yuffie stalked a wide circle around them, using various machinery to keep her presence hidden.  Daisy positioned herself behind them, pistols ready, and watched for Yuffie’s movement.  Before the woman could finish her sentence, Yuffie charged, closing distance and landing a kick to Slight’s chest, knocking him to the ground while the other two scrambled to respond.

            Stout reacted quickly, stepping in and taking a wide swing.  Yuffide ducked under, using Stout’s momentum to flip her through the air and bring her down prone, on her back.  Meanwhile, Bindings stood, gun drawn, but she only just had it level by the time Yuffie yanked it from her hands and disassemble it before her.  Then, Yuffie danced around her, twisting her around and throwing her face-first into a nearby wall.

            While Bindings fell, Stout and Slight stood and readied weapons.  Stout had a dagger, while Slight brandished brass knuckles.  They closed in on Yuffie, who met them part way, crouched low and moving quickly.  She kneed Stout in the gut and kicked her away before turning to Slight and elbowing him in the face.

            Then, she turned to Stout and smiled.  “You’re tougher than your friends.  Or, at least, you’re still standing, but that won’t last long.  Because I’m...”

            “The Great Ninja Yuffie.  We know.”

            Yuffie frowned.  “You know, it just sounds silly when you say it.”

            “I’m not afraid of you.”  Stout readied her knife, pointed the gleaming tip toward Yuffie’s heart.  “None of us are.  We know what kind of hero you are.  The one who stands on the sidelines while your friends do all the real work.”

            Yuffie’s frown deepened.  She popped her knuckles, one-by-one.  “You know, I was kind of starting to like you.”

            “Glad I could change your mind.”

            Yuffie closed distance again, moving in close as Stout made quick jabs that didn’t land.  They moved together, Stout retreating into a canister behind her and going stiff as Yuffie moved in to knee her in the gut.  The blow was surprisingly strong and left her kneeling.  She reached down for a small knife, which gleamed as she drew it, and was about to make another assault when she felt cold steel to her crown.  She looked up to find Yuffie, arms crossed, and frowning at Daisy.

            “I had this.”

            “I’m sure,” Daisy said, cocking her gun for dramatic effect.  “But I’m tired of watching you scuffle, and we have a job to do.”

            Yuffie sighed and shrugged, looking at Stout as if to say, “What can you do?”  Then, she kneeled down and looked Stout in the eyes.  She took the knife from her and tossed it aside.  “So, you going to talk now?”  Stout spit into her face, and Yuffie grimaced. She gave a look at Daisy, who was chuckling to herself, and then kicked Stout hard across the face.

            “Yuffie!”  Daisy sighed, put the safety on her gun.  “We’re not going to get information from her now.”

            “Yeah, yeah,” Yuffie said, wiping her face clean.  She kneeled down and started undressing Stout.

            “Um.  What’re you doing?”

            “Getting something better than information from her,” she said, and she looked toward the other two.  “I’m sure one of those will fit you, too.”

            Daisy looked between them.  She frowned.  “No.  We’re not.”

            “We are,” Yuffie said, as she carefully pulled Stout from her pants.  “Infiltration is key in these sorts of situations.  Subterfuge.  It’s all part of being a great ninja.”

            “Yeah, well, I’m not a great ninja.”  Daisy grimaced as she went to the other woman and started undressing her.  She pinched her nose and gagged.  “This thing smells awful.”

            “You think that’s bad.  Just imagine how sticky it’ll be in there.  I don’t think they have much time to bathe between the terrorism and bombings, do you?”  Yuffie stepped into Stout’s pants and found they fit her well, so long as she keeps her own clothes on underneath.  She looked over at Daisy, who was still struggling to get the other woman out of her clothes in tacit disapproval.  “Come on, hurry it up, will you?”

            “I really don’t like this idea.”

            “I know, and I don’t care.  Now, strip.”

-Disc One-

            After changing, Yuffie and Daisy discussed how to proceed.  They regard both the benefit and danger of freeing the W.R.O. soldiers, especially after their own troubles with the organization, and decided to leave them tied up.  Before going, Yuffie stowed her weapon in a nearby crate while Daisy bound the Lotus soldiers left beside the W.R.O. soldiers they had just captured.

            The surface of the facility was mostly empty, save for the soldiers already captured.  It took them nearly thirty minutes to find anymore Lotus and, those they found were entirely at ease.  Yuffie understood.  The facility itself was remote enough so as not to draw much attention it wasn’t already due, and it wasn’t due much attention at all, except by people already distracted interested in it.

            Yuffie and Daisy approached the Lotus from the front, Yuffie making eye contact, waving when necessary, and Daisy staring fixedly at the ground.  These soldiers were clustered around the central elevator, a large, open platform that led into the deeper parts of the facility.  A few others were busy cataloging and organizing materia before loading it onto a few helicopters that sat nearby.  From where they were it difficult to see the sky anymore.  The platform was open, but stacked rectangular shipping containers bordered them on all sides.

            They stepped onto the elevator, and the Lotus guarding it waited as more people piled on.  Then, she hit the switch and floor lurched.  The machine whined to life as they started their descent, and soon Yuffie couldn’t see the sky at all unless she looked directly up, and even that was narrowing to a dot.

            A few minutes of steel and concrete opened up to a thick glass tubing.  Yuffie approached the wall and stared out at the ocean floor, which was lit up by enormous lights.  There was a facility below, domed in glass and set with concrete.  She could see small, green shapes working among glittering rows of materia.

            “Pretty amazing, huh,” said a Lotus from her side.  He was a man, judging from the sound of his voice, and short and thin from the look of him.  He carried an assault rifle under his arm, safety on, and when he caught her staring, she could hear a smile in his voice as he said his name.  “Garrett.”  He held out his hand.

            Yuffie shook his hand and said, “Yu.  You new?”

            “Oh.  Yeah.  Just joined up in the Midgar recruitment.  What he said really got to me, you know?  You?”

            “Same.”  Yuffie looked around and leaned in.  She touched his shoulder for good measure, and she knew for certain he was smiling after.  “Listen, don’t tell anyone, but all of this is kind of a blur for me, you know?  Think you could remind me what the mission is exactly?”

            Garrett laughed and adjusted his rifle strap.  She thought he might also be flexing, too.  “Of course.  It is all a bit hectic, isn’t it?  Right now, we’re here gathering up all the materia.  Once we have it catalogued and everything, we’ll redistribute it where it’s needed.”

            “All of the materia?”

            “Mostly the cure.”

            “And what about the rest?”

            He shrugged.  “I don’t know.  Keep it for the war with the W.R.O. Whatever we do with it, I’m sure it’ll be better than letting the government horde all of it.”

            Yuffie nodded silently and stared out into the water.  The Emerald Lotus, to her, seemed a lot like the W.R.O., just on a different side.  Both of them were so busy reminding everyone how they weren’t the other guy, how they weren’t Shinra, that they didn’t have the time to actually help people.  Perhaps there were good ideas at the start, but anywhere she looks, Yuffie can’t even see them.

            The elevator continued its long crawl.  Somewhere away from her, Daisy was being chatted up by a female Lotus and looked extremely nervous, but Yuffie trusted her not to ruin the charade.  The elevator lurched to a stop, and Yuffie fell into Garrett’s chest, and she made like she was blushing underneath mask.

            “Careful,” he said, helping her to settle herself.  She thanked him.

            “Um, hey, I have another question.”

            “Shoot.”

            “Um, who exactly is in charge of this operation again?”

            This time Garrett paused.  She couldn’t see him behind his mask, but she was sure he wasn’t just checking her out anymore.  Another group of Lotus soldiers were watching, not just her, but Daisy as well.

            “Yu, wasn’t it?  Mind telling me when you joined?”

            “Actually, I do,” she said, and she saw him fingering his gun.  “Man. I was hoping we could do this easy.”

            The elevator groaned to a stop and powered down, and as the door opened there were two Lotus soldiers left standing with five bodies scattered around them.  Daisy checked her guns before holstering them again, and then she followed Yuffie off of the elevator.  The two of them found shelter behind one of the waiting materia carts and stole glances out at the underwater facility.

            On the surface, the facility looked to be just like an oil rig or otherwise a Shinra Mako plant.  Below, it was clearly something else.  Old Shinra machinery, oiled and fitted back into operation, lined a bare concrete floor.  An underground vault was set in the center, where Lotus soldiers were fetching fresh, untested materia.  It all looked like an old Shinra research facility, save for the W.R.O. emblems on the walls.

            The domed ceiling was made of reinforced glass and, from the ocean floor, the lights outside hardly seemed to display anything above the darkened waters.  A whale drifted by, its blue-grey skin shining in the light, and suddenly Yuffie felt very small.  She swallowed and breathed, and she checked her surroundings again, searching the Lotus for faces she recalled, but she found no one.

            Most of the soldiers she could see were busy sorting the materia by type and effect.  They were taking notes and then loading it into carts, which they wheeled close by and left for the people to take up the elevator.  From what she could see, none of them noticed the absence of movement from the elevator.  More were working inside of the vault, which was dug into the center of the floor.

            Two Lotus broke from the rest to roll a cart of materia over.  Yuffie leaned back into hiding and looked at Daisy, who nodded, and then they parted.  Yuffie worked a small arc around the room, keeping to carts and machines for cover, while Daisy retreated back and to the side.  When the two Lotus were in range the duo quickly subdued them.

            Both Lotus were men, one tall and thin and the other of more average height and build.  They went down hard and were quickly dragged over to where the elevator sat, unused.  Average was unconscious but tall and thin managed to stay awake, though judging from the way he moved, he was dazed.  Yuffie took a gun from Daisy and struck him across the cheek before putting the barrel to his skull.

            “I won’t tell you not to scream, but I’m sure you’ve already figured out who I am and you know that it won’t help you.  It’ll just get you dead.”

            “Actually,” Tall said, his voice strained by the pressure Yuffie placed on his throat with her foot, “I have no idea who you are, but I highly doubt you can stop everyone here on your own.”

            “Doesn’t know who I am.”  Yuffie glanced back at Daisy, laughed, and she kicked him across the face hard enough to knock him to the ground.  Then, she pinned his head to the floor and removed her mask.  “Then take a nice, long look, buddy, and tell me if you can figure it out.”

            He stared at her best he could, blood running from his nose and lips and pooling in his mask.  After a long, considerate pause, he said, “No.  Not really.”

            “No?  Not really?  What do you mean,” Yuffie was about to kick him again when Daisy dragged her away and replaced her.  She had her other gun ready and pressed it to his skull in Yuffie’s place.

            “It doesn’t matter if you know us, and it doesn’t matter if we can stop everyone here.  We can stop you, right here, right now, with one bullet.  Do you understand?”

            Tall swallowed the blood in his mouth and nodded slowly.  Behind Daisy, Yuffie sulked.

            “Answer our questions, and we’ll leave you unconscious and go on our way.  Do you understand that?”

            Another nod.

            “Good.  Then, tell us what you’re doing here.”

            “Looking for materia.  We’re always looking for materia.”

            “Why?”

            His eyes darted between them.  Yuffie had stopped pouting and was now leaning forward, staring him in the eyes.  She was more threatening when she was quiet, he decided, and he looked back at Daisy and then at the gun. “I don’t know,” he said, “We want to redistribute it, Lotus says, but we don’t know what he does with it once he gets it.”

            “Then why help him,” Yuffie asked, arms crossed now as she stared down at him.

            “Because it’s better than the W.R.O. hording it.”

            Yuffie groaned, and Daisy held her hand up and pressed the gun more firmly to his forehead.  “And why are you looking for materia here?”

            “Don’t know.  They didn’t say.”

            Yuffie rolled her eyes.  “Of course, they didn’t.”

            “Next, who is in charge of this operation?”

            “There’s three of them, though she seems to be taking orders from the big guy, Hollis, and the traitor.”

            “She,” Yuffie said, but she was drowned out by Daisy now.

            “The traitor?  Who is the traitor?”  She cocked her gun.  “Is it him?”

            “I don’t know his name,” Tall whined quietly, eyes closed and shoulders shaking  “He—he worked undercover until recently and helped Hollis escape.”

            “Oliver,” Daisy said, and she leaned back.  She looked at Yuffie.  “He’s here.”

            “I know.”  Yuffie leaned down and looked Tall in the eyes again.  “Anything else?”

            The man stared at her.  “You’re her, aren’t you?  Yuffie.”

            “About damn time.”

            “Hollis is waiting for you.  It’s all he’s been talking about.”  The man grinned.  “He wants to fight you, to kill...”  And Daisy silenced him with a swift stroke of her pistol.  He fell unconscious in his own blood as the two women stood straight.  Yuffie slipped her mask back on and returned Daisy’s gun to her.

            “Wonder what he was going to say,” Yuffie said, fastening the mask.

            “We both know what he was going to say, and we don’t need to hear it.”  Daisy looked back, across the room, to where the Lotus were working.  “They’re in the vault.  Both of them.”

            “All three of them,” Yuffie said.  “And that’s where we’re going.  Whatever they’re looking for will be in there, if it’s here at all.”

            “Yuffie?”

            “Yeah?”

            “When we find Oliver...Let me handle him.  Please.”

            Yuffie looked at Daisy, found her shaking, full of frailty and venom.  She knew the danger of trusting it to her, the potential failure, or worse, but she also knew the danger Hollis would pose alone.  The options were few, so she nodded, and she said, “Fine, just be careful.”  And then, Yuffie led the charge.

-Disc One-

            After leaving the elevator platform, Yuffie and Daisy hugged the shadows.  Though dressed in Lotus uniforms, neither of them felt confident as they approached.  Oliver alone knew them well enough to point them out in a crowd, dressed even as they were, and the last thing they needed was to be surrounded by enemies with three of the top Lotus warriors there to contend with.

            They moved in close, Yuffie leading and Daisy following.  Lines of machines made neat rows within the facility floor, some used to examine materia, others for experimentation.  It would take a lifetime for Yuffie to understand each little instrument’s exact function, but they were large and bulky, and that made them good for hiding.

            She moved lightly, her footfalls making almost no sound.  At the edge of the vault, they found that they could peak inside.  From their vantage point it was hard to see clearly, but the vault itself was large, with plenty inside.  Hollis stood in the center, pacing around with a bored smirk, towering over everyone around him.  The walls glittered with racks of materia, only a quarter of which had been removed so far.

            Yuffie motioned for Daisy to watch the door and waited for the other woman to nod and draw her weapons before moving on.  A deep breath, and Yuffie did what she did best.  She charged forward, moving silently as she went, and took a handful of materia from the nearby cart on the way.  Then, she leaped into the room, a fire materia in hand, and set it off with a flash of flame and a curtain of smoke surrounding her.  The Lotus grunts inside were incapacitated before she landed.  Those outside were funneled as they approach, and she handled them with a few fingers of lightning left in her wake.

            Oliver turned as the smoke cleared, baton ready and sparking.  He pointed it at her and lunged, and she danced around it, throwing him into a wall, dislodging materia on impact.  He glared across the room at her.  “Yuffie!”

            “Traitor.”  She covered her mouth.  “Sorry, wait, did I get that wrong?  Your name wasn’t traitor...It was…Oh, man, this is so embarrassing.  I can’t remember your name, and traitor just seems to fit you so well.”

            Hollis laughed from the center of the room and watched the two with his arms crossed.  He didn’t look bored any longer.

            Oliver turned his glare on the big man briefly.  “You shouldn’t have followed,” he said, the Lotus soldiers on the ground stirring around them, shaking their heads and nursing their wounds.  They start to draw their weapons as they stand, and Oliver releases the trigger on his baton.  The hum of electricity fades.  “Let us go, Yuffie.  Even you can’t win against all of us.”

            “You don’t know that.”  She looked around the room and removed her mask, and then she smiled.  “Looking at you skinny things, I think I could break a few bones before you even landed a single hit.”

            “Yuffie.”

            “Actually, I think she’s right,” Hollis said.  He moved forward now, pushing his way through the soldiers, knocking two to the ground as he passed.  “She could handle you lot with no problem, but she won’t get the chance.”  He grinned at her.  “We have catching up to do, little girl.”

            Yuffie palmed her materia.

            “You go on ahead and take the kids with you,” Hollis said to Oliver.  “They’ll only get in the way.”

            “We still have work to do,” Oliver said.

            “Maybe, but if she’s here then the W.R.O. ain’t far behind.”

            “Hollis?”

            “Go.  I won’t tell you again.  You and the grunts will get caught up in this, and I ain’t holding back this time.”  His grin broadened, showing more of his sharp, animal-like teeth.  “That’s right, girly.  Even your chesty little friend didn’t win outright.  It was all part of the plan.”

            “Color me impressed,” Yuffie said flatly.  “Oliver, listen to the man.  He’s about twice as tall as you and three times as wide.  Besides, you’ve got an old friend waiting for you outside, and she’s just dying for a reunion.”

            Oliver looked toward the vault entrance.  “Daisy.”

            “That’s the one.  I’ll catch up with you two later, after I’ve kicked sideburns here from one side of the facility to the other.”

            Hollis laughed and popped his big knuckles.  “I’d like to see you try, girly.”

-Disc One-

            Yuffie came hurtling from the vault and hit a nearby table as she landed.  The steel folded underneath her and slid away as she rolled in the opposite direction, sliding to a stop a few feet away.  Daisy stared from her hiding spot behind one of the different steel instruments, guns still trained on the vault entrance.  In a loud whisper, she called, “Yuffie?  You okay?”

            Yuffie groaned in response. “Fine.  Hollis is mine.  Oliver.  Goons.  You.”  She picked herself up off the ground, clutching a cure materia to her chest as she moved.  Once the pain in her back was eased enough to free her movement, she dropped the materia beside her and charged forward, hopping over a materia cart on the way.

            Hollis appeared from the vault, grinning at her approach.  He had his jacket off now, exposing a beefy, tan chest thick with dark hair.  Dropping it beside him, he sunk down into a boxing stance, hands up and feet moving.  Behind him, Oliver led a group of Lotus soldiers out under a hail of gunfire.

            Before reaching Hollis, Yuffie hurled a ball of flame toward his face.  He punched it out of the air, collapsing it into a cloud of smoke and cinders.  Yuffie leaped into this cloud, twirling as she went, and landed what she felt was a solid kick to his chin.  He met this by taking her by the leg and hurling her across the room again.  This time, Yuffie managed to land on her feet, but she dropped her materia in the effort of regaining her balance and then scrambled into the shadow of a nearby machine for cover.

            The gunfire quieted as the elevator came to life across the room.  Yuffie could imagine Daisy following them up, either by stairs or climbing.  Below the roar of the gears, she could hear Hollis’ heavy footsteps, bending the metal with each stomp.  He stalked the aisles, tossing carts and tables as he went.  “Hiding?  And here I thought you were the Great Ninja Yuffie, hero of the Jenova War, Conqueror of the Five Gods of the Pagoda!”  He laughed as he peeked around one corner and then crushed a steel panel in his bare hands.  “Guess you’re like every other Wutai rat there is.  All you can do is run.”

            Yuffie fixed her eyes on the floor and moved from spot-to-spot.  She kept her distance and used his voice and footfalls to track him.  Slowly and carefully, she closed distance on him, always keeping at his back wherever he went.  Each of his movements grew more violent, and each of her movements grew more precise in turn.  She couldn’t beat him in a straight-out fight, and she knew that.

            Soon materia carts were shattering against walls.  Steel panels and electric circuits were parted and exposed, sparking in his hands as he roared in growing frustration.  From the corner of her eye, Yuffie spied his large shadow spread by bare lights across the floor, and she made her approach.  The attack would be swift and, hopefully, finished before he could react.

            She had to leap to reach him and conjured ice to her palm as she did.  It shattered across his neck.  Even through the ice, she could feel the stone-sturdiness of his muscles, but she could also see the damage done.  He fell to a knee and let out a growl while she flipped over him and struck him again, this time kicking him in the chin as she rolled away and back into hiding.

            He followed her in a daze, swinging wildly and clearing the floor with his big hands.  Whole instruments, bolted to the ground, were razed and cast aside.  A haze of electric smoke filled the air. Yuffie darted away from him and came to a stop, breathing shallowly as she did.  Her lungs hurt, and her limbs were going numb, but she couldn’t let him hear her.  One hit from him and it could all be over.

            He was stronger than she remembered or perhaps had been holding back the first time.  Their last battle played out in her head.  Whatever else he was, Hollis had her in raw physical strength and, that last attack proved to her that, while she can hurt him, she didn’t have the time to whittle away his defenses.  Daisy was skilled, but she was also outnumbered, which meant Yuffie had to work fast.

            She thought of Tifa now, thought of how even if Hollis had faked his defeat, Tifa was still the best example she had on how to defeat him.  In combat, Tifa was quick and powerful, and that latter aspect gave her an advantage Yuffie needed.  What Yuffie had now against Hollis was materia, but once the jammer came into play the battle would be lost in an instant.  Which meant she had to take him down before that happened.

            Ultimately, she had to end it with a deathblow—a single, powerful strike.  Before that, she would have to weaken him just enough to fracture his base.  He stopped her by flexing his muscles last time.  She had to keep him from being able to do even that.  She didn’t have time for a battle of attrition, but she felt certain she could drop his defenses just long enough to land a single, fatal strike

            Scooping up a few more materia, she attuned them to her body and pocketed another for later use, and then she returned to the chase.  Hollis had moved halfway around the room, searching the far corners where she had been hiding.  He had done well in clearing everything as he went, reducing her hiding places to folded steel panels and sizzling wires.

            Her approach was a slow, wide spiral.  With the area he had cleared out she would be exposed longer with each passing, which gave him time to counterattack, but she still had the advantage of speed and stealth.  So, she took a deep breath and charged, and he caught her in his periphery.

            Yuffie leaped again and hurled a block of ice toward him.  He punched through it in a spray of frost and followed that initial blow with another punch to her gut.  Yuffie grunted, spittle flying from her lips as the air was knocked from her, and then she was weightless.  The ice materia left her hands, but she held tightly to the other materia she had ready.  Focusing on it, she sent an arc of electricity from her palms and into his big, chisel chested.

            She dropped the materia when she landed and slid to a stop.  Her limbs felt weak and tired.  Her stomach throbbed.  She coughed, hard, and kept coughing until she could breathe again.  Across the room, Hollis was up and stampeding toward her.  She scrambled to her feet and slipped away, darting between machines before he could reach her.

            He came to a stop where she had been and roared.  “Hit and run,” he said, turning slowly and staring out at what was left of the room.  Then, ripping a computer from the ground, he tossed it into the wall as he screamed again.  “You can’t be beat in a fair fight, so you play these little games.  Run and hide and shoot me with materia.  Think you’re clever?”  He paused long enough to reach into his pocket and produced the jammer, which he clicked on.  The materia in her hands went inert.  “Now, what will you do with your tricks stolen from you?”

            Yuffie came to a stop in the corner across the room and held there, breathing slowly through the burning in her stomach.  He was working slowly at clearing the room again, barking insults as he went.  The names he called her would have been enough to bring her right back to him if she wasn’t nearly in tears from their last confrontation.

            With the jammer in play, he was right about one thing: she couldn’t win.  In fact, she wasn’t even a threat.  Above, she imagined Daisy pinned down from enemy fire, taking careful shots and shielding her eyes from the sun as she lined up.  The Lotus would be escaping already or otherwise holding the landing platforms for Hollis’ return.  They might have even taken W.R.O. hostages.  Yuffie had to win, and that meant one thing.

            Yuffie had to steal the jammer.

            Another deep breath, and she pushed herself to kneeling.  The room drifted slowly in her vision and, even without the draw of the materia taxing her, Yuffie was running on fumes.  The blow to her gut had left her winded, and she felt like it would take a week to catch her breath. Whatever she did, the battle was coming to an end, and she still had the surface to deal with.

            She checked her last four materia and the held four materia tightly in her hands and took the deepest, quietest breath she could, and then she closed her eyes and centered herself.  She put herself passed the pain, passed the fear, and she thought only of one thing—the final charge.

            Yuffie approached again, moving cautiously.  He was moving toward her this time, sweeping his way through, dislodging everything in his path.  She kept her eyes fixed on him this time, not trusting her other senses to get her through.  Pain was distracting her, pulling her away whenever she gave it the chance.  Then, he was before her, back turned as he tossed away a table and shouted another obscenity.

            He stomped forward, toward something else, and she moved.  Her legs locked briefly, fingers aching, breath caught in her throat.  She felt sick and afraid, and her stomach ached in phantom pain, but she caught him by surprise, and she got her hands on the jammer and just got it free from his grip before he noticed her.  He turned about and brought his fist down on her, and the flooring dented, screws rising from the foundation as Yuffie leaped away from him.

            Flash!  The air hardened around him, a sheet of ice holding him to the floor.  He grunted and flexed, the frost fracturing around his torso as he pulled himself free, but not in time.  Yuffie had already discarded ice and pressed two materia into his flesh.  The poison burned as it seeped into his skin, dulling his senses and slowing his reactions.  Confusion knocked him off balance as the world swirled around him.

            She dropped those two and clutched her last materia—purple in color—tightly in her hand.  This one didn’t draw on her, but she drew on it, feeling the raw, elemental strength of the ancients flowing through her, imbuing her with the vigor needed.  She planted her feet, bowing the steel as she did, and she put everything she had into this final strike—the deathblow.

            Hollis didn’t have time to meet her; he couldn’t even see her, but he felt her tiny fist drive into his chest and the bones fractures in response.  He didn’t fly but stumbled back a few feet before collapsing into unconsciousness.  Yuffie stood over him, just as breathless as he was, but she considering standing the real victory.

            Frost clung to his face, knotting his sideburns.  Poison left his skin discolored, his veins throbbing and pulsing as it spread through him, and she could only imagines the things he would see if he were conscious, but he wasn’t.  She put her foot on his big, beefy chest, and she smiled, and then she laughed.

            Her legs quaked, and she stumbled back into a nearby cart, holding it for support.  More deep breaths, and she steadied herself.  Then, she looked over at the jammer before pocketing it for later use.  This battle was won, but a war was being waged above.

            She started toward the elevator.