Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Testing Fate ❯ Chapter I ( Chapter 1 )

Testing Fate

 

Chapter I

 

 

Exhausted and soaked, John ran into his dorm room and closed the door behind him, locking it. He had decided to go for a walk a while earlier and it had begun to rain while he was outside. He walked over to his window and looked outside at the storm. The rain was violently pouring and the sky was booming with thunder and he could see lighting bolts in the distance.

 

I really should check the forecast more often, thought John as he shut the blinds and decided to take a shower.

 

It'll be a few hours till the others come back from the city, guess I got some time to kill. Maybe I should have gone with them instead of staying.

 

Then again…John chuckled to himself as he remembered the others hadn't taken umbrellas or raincoats with them and had gone in a convertible, so they'd come back worse than him.

 

I'll never hear the end about the car getting flooded on the way back.

 

John got out of the shower, dried himself off, put on a red T-shirt, a pair of black jeans with a belt, black socks and shoes (not the fancy dress shoes, but not sneakers either, if you know what I mean) and lied down on his bed which was in the corner of the room by the window. He took out his hair dryer and dried his auburn hair, looking around the room to find something to do. Finally, he looked at the top of the closet on the other side of the room and got an idea.

 

The PS2!

 

He and his roommates had decided to put their game consoles away until the Summer and concentrate on their studies a couple of months back, but if any of them were here alone while it was pouring outside, John was sure they'd to the same thing. He got the console out of the closet and hooked it up to the TV.

 

Now then, what game should I play? Maybe I'll go old-school today.

 

John had never thrown away any of his old PSX games and had brought them all here should a day like today arrive. He looked through them until his eyes came upon his old copy of Final Fantasy VII.

 

Heh, I remember this, still one of the best X-mas gifts I've ever gotten, even if it was 2 weeks before the day.

 

John blew the dust off the case (it was THAT old) and opened it. The discs had some scratches on them, but they still looked pretty playable. He got out the first disc and put it in the PS2. He watched as the familiar screen he'd seen so many times with the Buster Sword come up. The memory card was pretty new and he hadn't played FFVII in ages, so he chose to begin a new game but then something unexpected happened. Instead of going to the opening cinema with the Lifestream and Aeris, the screen faded to white.

 

What the hell? I don't remember this being part of the game.

 

John put down his controller, got up and walked over to the TV, looking at the screen. He decided to take his hand and tap the screen, hoping something that would somehow get the game going. Instead, the screen started to glow and the rest of the room faded out of sight along with the TV until John only saw white until everything suddenly went black.

 

 

What happened? Where am I?

 

John opened his hazel eyes and looked around. He was lying on a hard floor and seemed to be outside somewhere, but above him he saw black. He cautiously got up and checked his surroundings. To his left and in front of him he saw piles of old trains, most not functioning, but a few had some lights in them. To his right he saw a clearer path and small steps leading to a platform on the side. The right side looked obviously safer, so he took that route.

 

This place looks familiar, have I been here before or something?

 

He arrived at the steps looked at the sight ahead of him, which was a train with a guard in a red uniform in front of it. This would not have been an unusual sight for most people, but it nearly made John's jaw drop.

 

This is impossible; I'm probably dreaming or something.

 

“E-excuse me, sir?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Can you tell me where I am?”

 

“This is the train station at the Sector Seven Slums”

 

“O-okay, th-thanks,” said John as he nervously walked back down the stairs.”

 

No way, no way.

 

John walked to his right and came out to a more open area. He looked right to see what was there, although he already knew. There, behind a fence, was a massive pillar connected to the plate which was above the slums.

 

This can't be real, but still…

 

He noticed something on the ground and knelt down to pick it up. It was a wallet which held some bills and coins inside. He took out one of the purple bills which said 1000 gil, staring at it in disbelief. He then put it back in the wallet and took out one of the green bills which said 500 gil. Afterwards came a blue bill which said 5000 gil and there were coins which read 1, 5, 10, 20 , 50, 100 and 200 gil and their size increased respectively to their value. Counting them up, John saw that he had one blue bill, two purple bills, three green bills, three 200 gil coins, three 100 gil coins, and four of each of the others, which came to a total of 9744 gil.

 

Well, at least I don't have to worry about cash for now I guess.

 

John took out his own wallet and transferred the money, dropping the old wallet back to the ground afterwards. John's wallet didn't have any documents or dollars in it as he had bought it only two days ago. Afterwards, he sighed and slowly headed in the direction of the slums.

 

Wow, it all looks so much better when you're actually here.

 

He walked forward until he came in front of a building which read “Seventh Heaven,” staring at it for a good two or three minutes trying to understand that it was real.

 

Well, I guess that I should go inside, maybe AVALANCHE is in there.

 

John walked up the stairs and into the bar, seeing that it was full of people and none of the members of AVALANCHE were visible. With nothing else to do, he say an empty seat at the bar and sat down, closing his eyes trying to focus his thoughts.

 

Okay John, calm down. So you're somehow in a game, a game. Things could be worse right? At least you got money, so you don't have to worry about starving for now, if you can find food. Oh geez, whet am I gonna do?

 

A woman's voice broke his train of thought.

 

“Hey, are you okay?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

John looked up and saw a busty woman with long chocolate colored hair and brown eyes looking at him.

 

Wow, it's Tifa, and she looks pretty real to me.

 

“Oh, umm I guess I'm okay,” explained John.

 

If you could call it that.

 

“You look worried,” said Tifa, “come on, tell me, maybe I can help.”

 

“Well, I sorta don't know where to go or what to do, that's my problem I guess.”

 

“Where are you staying?”

 

“I dunno, probably the inn.”

 

That is until my money runs out

 

Wow, I wish I could help the guy; he seems pretty nice, thought Tifa, but what can I do? Unless…Hmm, Barret might get mad, but…

 

“Listen, are you sure you don't have anywhere to go?”

 

“Sure as sure can be, I think”

 

“Um, can you use a weapon?”

 

“Umm, I don't know,” explained John embarrassingly before quickly adding, “but I can learn, I swear!”

 

“Hmm, I think I can get you a job. Listen, oh um what's your name? I forgot to ask.”

 

“It's John”

 

“Well John, it's very nice to meet you. I'm Tifa,” she said with a smile, “Now then, there's a Weapon Shop close to here. Why don't you go there and buy a weapon for yourself and maybe a bangle and possibly some materia at the nearby Item Shop if you can, but don't go overboard. I'll try to work something out in the meantime, how about that?”

 

“Wow, y-you mean it Tifa?” John asked with an excited yet nervous smile.

 

“Yeah,” she replied reassuringly, “now hurry up.”

 

“O-okay,” said John, getting up and walking towards the exit, “Oh, Tifa?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Thanks!” said John before walking out of the bar.

 

Tifa smiled before sighing to herself.

 

Now to find Barret and explain why I recruited that guy, hopefully he's in a good mood…

 

 

John walked into the weapon shop and walked up to the counter, eyeing the different weapons.

 

Wow, what can I use? A machine gun? Yeah right, I'd probably shoot myself before my opponent.

 

“Um, sir?” asked John to the salesman who smiled in return.

 

“Ah, let me guess this is your first weapon which you're buying?”

 

“How did you know?”

 

“I saw it in your eyes; you don't know which one to pick yet”

 

“Yeah, can you suggest something?”

 

“Well, we're out of swords right now, so the only basic type of weapon we have is a staff, how `bout that?” asked the salesman, holding up a simple guard staff.

 

“Um, okay, I guess that would be a good start, how much?”

 

“190 gil”

 

“Okay, I'll take that and can I have one of those Iron Bangle's as well?”

 

“Sure, that comes out to 340 gil.”

 

“Okay, here you go.” Said John, handing over the smallest coins in his wallet besides the 1 gil coins, lightening his load, “thank you.”

 

“You take care now” said the salesman as John walked out.

 

After John was back outside, he put on the Iron Bangle and looked around until he saw the Item Shop nearby.

 

There's the Item shop, let's get some mateira

 

Once inside, John looked at the material and items before making his choice.

 

“Can I have one “Restore” materia, one “Fire” materia, three potions and a phoenix down, please?”

 

“Sure, that'll be 1800 gil”

 

Wow, that was quite a lot, thought John as he took out one of the purple bills, a green bill a 200 gil coin and a 100 gil coin.

 

“Here you go”

 

“Here are your materia and items sir, have a nice day.”

 

“Yeah, you too,” said John as he picked up the materias, examining them up close. The Fire materia had a flame image in it as he looked close and the Restore materia had a tiny blue-ish ball in it.

 

Ah, so this is how they told them apart. Pretty clever.

 

John picked up the three green vials of potions and the orange vial with the phoenix down in it and put them in his pockets, the glass was pretty thick, so they wouldn't break that easily. He then put the Restore materia in his Guard Staff and the Fire materia in his Iron Bangle.

 

There, that takes care of that. I guess I should go back to Seventh Heaven now; hopefully Tifa's done what she wanted to do.

 

 

When John walked back into the bar he saw that there was nobody there except Tifa, a little girl and a tall man with a gun for a right arm: Barret.

 

“Here he is. Did you get a weapon and materia John?” asked Tifa.

 

“Yeah, I did.”

 

“See Barret? He can help us, besides, we need new people.”

 

“Ugh, dammit Tifa, I know that, but still…” began Barret before walking up to John, “okay then I'm going to ask you a question and you BETTER give a good answer if you want to join us.”

 

“O-okay”

 

“What do you think of Shinra?” asked Barret, gritting his teeth as he said the name.

 

John knew what Barret wanted to hear and replied, “What do I think? I think they're monsters. They're destroying this planet from the inside out and won't stop until they wreck everything to satisfy their greed.”

 

Barret smiled and looked at John for a minute before asking another question, “How old are ya anyway?”

 

“I'm twenty”

 

“Heh, same age as Tifa here,” said Barret before extending his good hand, “Well then, welcome to AVALANCHE John.”

 

John took Barret's hand and shook it, smiling “Thank you for taking me on board.”

 

Just then three people rushed in, they were two men, one tall and one short and chubby and a girl.

 

“Ah, Biggs, Wedge, Jessie, we've got a new guy with us. Say hello to John.”

 

“Hi,” the three pretty much said in unison.

 

“It's very nice meeting all of you,” said John, smiling and shaking each one's hands.

 

Wow, I'm in AVALANCHE, but where's Cloud? Isn't he supposed to be here?

 

Barret got on the elevator with Biggs, Wedge and Jessie. As they went down, John could hear Barret shout out, “Everyone get some rest tonight, we have to prepare for the reactor attack tomorrow.”

 

“Reactor attack?” John asked, trying to play along like they expected him to.

 

“Oh yeah, I didn't tell you about that” said Tifa, blushing a bit “In three days, we're going to destroy the Sector One reactor, but you don't have to go if you don't want to. I'm sure Barret won't mind.”

 

“No no, it's okay Tifa. I want to go!”

 

“Well then that settles it then,” said Tifa smiling, “Oh, there's someone I want to introduce you to. Come here Marlene.”

 

The little girl quietly walked over and stood by Tifa.

 

“Marlene, this is John, he's a new friend, you'll get along won't you?”

 

The girl looked at John and shyly nodded.

 

John stuck out his hand and smiled, “Hi there Marlene”

 

The little girl quickly shook his hand and went behind Tifa, who laughed, “Well then, I guess we should get down to the others. Let's go John.”

 

John, Tifa and Marlene got on the elevator which had come back up and went down to the lower floor to join the others.

 

Once they got down, Marlene jumped into Barret's arms and he started to spin her around while she laughed while the others chatted away.

 

“I'm gonna go to sleep, is that okay Tifa?”

 

“Oh sure, I guess you're tired John, should I tell them to quiet down?”

 

“No, it's okay, I'm not bothered. Thanks again by the way for what you did, you really helped me out.”

 

“Don't mention it, it's great having you with us,” smiled Tifa.

 

John smiled back and said, “Well, good night,” as he walked over to the corner and sat down.

 

“'Night John,” said Tifa before walking over to Jessie to talk with her.

 

John closed his eyes and felt himself slowly starting to drift to sleep.

 

Maybe this won't be so bad after all, Tifa's really nice to me and Barret isn't exploding at me which must be good. I guess Cloud will be making his entrance soon as well…