Star Ocean: Till The End Of Time Fan Fiction ❯ Diplo's Love...Quadrilateral? ❯ The Secret's OUT! ( Chapter 2 )

“That took up a lot of our time,” Melanee growled to herself, though audibly enough for the others to hear her. She stood upright and sighed. “Right. Grab Fayt and that girl and let's go.”

 

Steeg and Marietta rolled their eyes at each other in response to Melanee's obvious beef with Maria. Steeg threw Fayt over his shoulder, and Lieber struggled to hold Maria on his back, but insisted on it. Melanee watched Steeg frown at Lieber's determination. Once the team reached Surferio, they were bestowed upon the hospitality of the Huxley family; however, Melanee, Lieber, Steeg, and Marietta didn't stay for long, since the Menodix father started to ramble about stories of his past. To pass the time in a more productive way, the foursome made its way south-east to the trade town of Peterny for parts that they might need to fix the Diplo. Along the way, though, Lieber was incapacitated, and Marietta was petrified, both in a two-Condemner ambush. (I know this is out-of-the-blue, but does anybody else notice that those floating eye things with the penis-looking tentacles look JUST like the Ahrimans from the Final Fantasy franchise?)

 

“What's the plan, Captain?” Steeg asked Melanee.

 

“Grrr… We're stuck…” she grumbled to herself.

 

ZHING! Slice-slice!

 

“Whoa! What were those flying things that just passed between the Condemners?” Steeg asked in surprise.

 

“Fans!” came a voice, “Battle fans!” Melanee recognized the voice as one from an Earthling girl who she knew. Two hands reached out from behind a thick tree and caught the two whirling fans in midair. “Looks like you need help, Mel,” a cute young lady giggled as she emerged from behind the tree. She walked up to the still-standing duo, pushing the enemies out of her way like they were no problem to her. She stopped and scanned Steeg once she stood before the two. “Well, hi there, hottie,” she said flirtatiously, leaning into Steeg's personal space and bringing a sweat drop to Melanee's face, “I'm Shimmer Solunastelle. What's YOUR name?”

 

“Uh… S-S-Steeg?”

 

“Now's not the time for flirting, Shimmer!” Melanee reminded, pointing at the approaching enemies.

 

“Okay, okay, fine!” Shimmer switched her iPod Micro on and assumed her dancing battle stance with fans in hands. (That's a paradox…) “Let's get this party started!”

 

Steeg glanced over at Melanee, who simply shook her head and assumed her battle stance. Steeg got ready, too. The three spread out, and the battle began!

 

Melanee started off with a Fire Bolt symbol, and Steeg fired a Haley's Comet. Both did considerable amounts of damage to one of the Condemners, but didn't kill it.

 

“Time for ME to crank things up!” Shimmer jested, rolling between the two Condemners. She jumped back to her feet and kicked off into a spin, much like Melanee's back in the Light Saber Tag game. “Here's a little something I got from a small friend of mine. Kaboom!” As she spun, Shimmer generated a star that revolved about her in the opposite direction of her spin and bashed into the Condemners repeatedly, knocking them over.

 

“Nice move, Miss Solunastelle,” Steeg cheered. Melanee looked at him funnily for being so formal with a girl who only recently became a legal adult.

 

Shimmer laughed and insisted, “Just stick with `Shimmer,' hun. The formalities can wait until I hit 21 or so.”

 

“All of it can wait until we beat these things!” Melanee corrected, freaking out on them, “We need another fighter!”

 

“Where's Fresh Sage when you need it!?” Steeg asked, worried about his little bro.

 

“Oh, I've got some! You guys keep up with the fight!” Shimmer hurried over to Lieber, while Melanee and Steeg kept on fighting. After tipping the fallen guy's head back to open his mouth, Shimmer opened her medical satchel at her side with two fingers and took out some herb. “Um… It looks like it's not fresh anymore…” she informed the two.

 

“If it's just Sage now, use it on the petrified girl!” Melanee instructed over the sound of Steeg's Photon Lasers.

 

Yeah, but how do I make her swallow it if she's a freakin' rock? Shimmer questioned in her head. A crazy but worthy idea struck her after not too long. She stood and made an “X” with her folded battle fans, then began an invocation. “Iota-Sigma-Epsilon, Nu-Epsilon-Epsilon-Delta-Lambda-Epsilon-Sigma…” She pointed both fans at Marietta's face and cast her symbol, “Ice Needles!” Tiny shards of ice shattered in the girl's solid face, but nothing happened.

 

“Shimmer, what are you DOING!?” Melanee screamed.

 

“Keep fighting!” Shimmer shouted back, shaking the stems of Sage at the blonde. Thankfully, Marietta's mouth was open. Water from the Ice Needles symbol rolled into the statue's mouth. Once there was enough water, Shimmer proceeded with brushing Marietta's teeth with the branches of Sage.

 

WHAT the HELL is she DOING!? Melanee grilled her mentality as she knocked a Condemner upside the head with her microphone.

 

Shimmer smirked when she saw the color returning to Marietta's tongue and teeth. The operator's tongue twitched. Shimmer nodded and started scraping the Sage leaves off of the stem and into Marietta's mouth. She had to help the frozen blonde swallow the plant, but it all finally went down. Shimmer returned to the battle.

 

“Are you retarded!?” Melanee asked her.

 

“You'll thank me later, girlfriend,” the dancer ensured, fanning herself with pride, “Looks like Track 10 will work here.” She pressed the “Next” button on her pink iPod thrice and shifted her dancing rhythm to accommodate the new beat. “Take THIS!” Shimmer flipped her right fan open and flicked it underhandedly at one Condemner. The other two watched the fan vertically spin up to the enemy, slicing through it before returning to the dancer's catch. Next, she made the “X” with her folded fans and invoked, “Mu-Epsilon-Tau-Rho-Omikron-Nu-Omega-Mu…” Pointing her fans at the petrified girl, she conjured up a my-size, wooden metronome next to the statue. “Keep fighting!” she instructed, running to the device's side. Melanee rolled her eyes and shook her head, returning to battle. Shimmer backed away from the side of the metronome, and once she was at a considerable distance from it, she bolted for it, jumping and wall-kicking the needle. She pulled off a mid-air flip to come to a better landing. The metronome was ticking at the rate of