Post #47 [Cecil]

[First note, a bit of a pointless one, as you'll see below, I was member #47 on the fudforums, and I also somehow ended up posting the 47th post of the IF. @_@

Second, this is the first of the "longer" posts I make. Not the longest, but one of the more wordy ones. It happens when you write super-detailed for two ACs on different paths I guess. :P]

Posted by Cecil (Member # 47) on :

Sandra decided to go with her curious instinct, and with a breath of caution, grabbed the door by it's vault like wheel, and attempted to see if she could open the door without ripping it right off. The handle however, couldn't handle the eventual pressure she put on it, and broke off the door.

[Actually, in hindsight with the strength I mention Sandra has, I should've had it the handle popped out almost immediately. :P]

Sandra scowled at the door, and screamed "Blizzaga!!", hammering the door with an icy blast of magic, freezing part of the door.

[Useless Skill-name note: Blizzaga is the Japanese name for "Ice 3" in FF6. >.> I figure the Japanese names sound better to say then just saying "Ice3" outloud or something. :P And yes Baron von Awesome, if you're looking over this post, I was a lot more 'Japanified' by now compared to in "The Gathering". >.>]

Sandra then heard something faintly behind the door, a muffled voice. It sounded much like a cry for help. Sandra, happy to find people not appearantly frozen, quickly took action and screamed, "If you can hear me in there, back away from the door!!! I'm going to kick it down!!!"

[Of course, most people think you'd sound crazy if you said that to them. :P]

After waiting for about 10 seconds, she jumped at the door, and spin kicked it. It didn't have an immediate effect, but then a crack formed in the frozen door, which then expanded until it was all the way across the door from top to bottom, and left to right.

[Yeah, note the reason I didn't have her instantly break the door to pieces was fear of striking whoever was behind the door with sharp ice pellets.]

"Hi-yah!!!" Sandra shrieked and kicked the door once again, shattering it into thousands of small and frozen fragments. Sandra looked into the room beyond, and her mind suddenly give a huge mental gasp at what she saw.

["Jesus, is that you?" :o]

There, along with two other men inside, was none other than James Polestar, Sandra's father.

[So THAT'S where he was! I knew something was off when he wasn't at the preschool! :O

Also, I forgot to mention when I first wrote this annotation, but James is the main reason the lab underneath the meteorite exists. Since Paula is his daughter, who traveled with Ness during Earthbound, who told her about the meteorite (probably in a sense to tell her why he was on his adventure in the first place), and from the Onett news, James eventually decided to reveal what he was told about the meteorite and it's properties. Originally the idea in my head is that James was doing military study on the meteorite to learn about how it was able to move Buzz Buzz through time.]

She could remember his face from anywhere. And he and his two colleges was completely unaffected by the time anomoly, as they sported no auras of anything around them, and they were staring back at her, wide-eyed at her feat, and at the fact they were now free of their time induced prison room.

[Yeah, James and his friends aren't affected at all by the time freeze either. OMG are they ACs too? o_O]

Sandra had no doubt that her father probably wouldn't recognize her at first glance, but it didn't matter to her at the moment. At least one person in her family other than herself was unaffected by the time anomoly.

It... must have been the door they were behind. It's... the only explanation.

[Another important note: This was going to be eventually explained upon as well. The vault door James and his friends were behind is made of an unknown material [potentially it might have been Zeonxyte or some other name], which somehow blocks the effects of the time-stop ray.]

She then decided to speak again, "Are you three alright? Are you totally unfrozen?"

[Duh Sandra, they're MOVING, aren't they? XD]

"We're fine." one of the other men answered her, "But what do you mean by Frozen?"

James had during that time walked by his 2nd daughter, not knowing who she was, and examining the other man in the room that was frozen. "I think she means like Johnson here!" he spoke to his friends, pointing their frozen comrade out. "Johnson? Is he... dead?" asked the other of the unknown unfrozen men.

"No... I don't think he's dead, just... frozen in time." Sandra answered in an almost absentminded tone, as if it was nothing new to her.

[Do note, Sandra's seen freakier things than people frozen in time, hence her "almost absentminded tone".]

James and his two other friends gaped at her like she was crazy. "Frozen in time? Are you crazy or something?" James asked her. "That's what I thought too at first, but if you look outside, there's some kind of red field in the sky, covering the area, and probably the whole planet as well. I believe that's what may be freezing the Earth in time." Sandra replied to his question.

The three recently freed men did just that, walking outside along the cliffside, looking into the sky at the red field. Sandra had decided to follow them out. It was a good thing, at least in her case, that she did. Her eyes went wide as she noticed a familar looking shape in the distance, headed towards a bright red star. She didn't realize it just yet, but it was Nebiroth's beam that he had shot towards it minutes ago.

[Yep, THIS is why I had Nebiroth attack the time-ship a post or two ago. The beam would be visible enough for Sandra to spot it, to realize something was up a good distance away... a beacon of sorts. :P]

It couldn't be... could it?!

Sandra decided to use her aura search to scan the planet for the aura she was thinking of.

[Skill note: Sandra can sense magicial energy auras in a similar to DBZ characters sensing ki signatures. :P]

Sure enough, to her utter shock, she sensed her old enemy's primary minion's energy, coming from the other direction that she came.

[The way I said that sounds oddly redundant for some reason. o.o]

Crud!! How did Nebiroth find a gate to here?! I thought the Bourdon gate closed after I went through it!

She knew Nebiroth was looking for her to try and avenge Sardius' death at her hands, and to recover the cape of his slain friend Austorouto, but it still puzzled her how he found the gate she went though. She also didn't want her father, or anyone else to be found by that thing. She had no idea of his attitude around people.

[Yes, to clear it up, Sandra has no fear of Nebiroth at all. She's not fleeing from him or anything. Her concerns about him are more involving innocent people getting caught up in a battle between them. As said in the last annotation of Losarian's post, she can bench-press Nebiroth if she got her hands on him. >_>]

"We gotta get home now you guys!!" she shouted to James and his two friends. "Wait! We gotta at least bring Johnson back with us!" James's second friend replied. "Yeah, we... we can't leave him here. Something could happen to him." James agreed. Sandra thought for a minute as she followed them back to were Johnson was frozen in time.

That means we have to carry him all that way.

[Maybe. o.o]

Sandra looked at Johnson, still able to see the Stop aura that no one else could. Then it hit her like another slap on the head.

[Stop trying to give yourself Brainshock, Sandra!]

Maybe if I...

She trailed off mentally as she walked up to Johnson, and looked up, chanting a small bit to herself, and then screaming out "DISPEL!!"

Three magical coins suddenly appeared above the head of Johnson, and circled down around him, and then melted onto him for a short time, then fading away. After this was done, the Pink aura of Stop had vanished around Johnson, who had fell down on his back from the aftereffects, but was now unfrozen.

[Yes, the same way I recall Dispel looks in FF3/6 when used. And yes, it does remove "Stop" which is counted as being frozen, away from individual people. Sandra is one of the few characters in the IF who can actually unfreeze other time-frozen characters. Important to note for later. :o]

Sandra soon gained a glimmer of hope.

Dispel can counteract the effects of the anomoly!

But she looked down as she realized one problem.

It's only a short-term answer though. I can't unfreeze the entire planet one-by-one, no matter how much magic I can use on one reserve. There are simply too many people. I'm still gonna have to try and find the source of this.

[Of course Sandra. You're an AC, stopping the source of the beam is a big adventure. It calls to you like a flame calling to a moth. :P]

Meanwhile, James and his other two friends were shocked stiff at the fact this girl had just freed Johnson from his time-incuded capture. "How did you... do that?" James asked Sandra, still unaware of the fact he was talking to his lost daughter from a decade ago. "Magic... no time to explain now! I gotta get you guys outta here before Nebiroth finds us. I can probably handle him, but he might use you as bait for me if he finds us all together!"

['Probably' is an understatement. She would've drilled Nebiroth into the ground if she was facing him with no one to get in the way. :P]

Johnson regained his senses, although he was stunned by the recent events. "What happened? Why was I passed out on the floor?" "No time to explain. This girl says some monster is looking for her, and if it finds us, it might use us as bait against her." James's first friend said to him.

"Alrightly then." James said, "We're gonna take the sewer path to the house." James said.

[Sewer path?! Ewww... D:

Oh and a late 'lawl' at typing "James said" TWICE in the same sentence. XD]

"Sewer path?" Sandra asked. "Just follow us." Johnson advised her. James ducked down, and picked up a large tile from the floor, revealing a sewer grate. He couldn't budge it. "Um, could you..." James couldn't finish as Sandra ducked down and punched the grate, shattering it into small pieces. "No problem!" Sandra said, a bit embarrased with a ^_^; on her face.

[Do NOT ask me WHY in heaven's name I did the "^_^" face in this part. I do it AGAIN at least one other time in this IF too. :P]

They couldn't help smiling back just a bit, especially James for some odd reason, as they all climbed than the ladder beyond, and into the sewers.

Meanwhile, Glenn was still using his rune to follow the foorsteps of Sandra, and managed to find the ladder down to the cliffside. With a sense of urgency to protect her, not even knowing who she was, he slowly climbed down the ladder to the cliffside...

[I wanted to make sure Glenn didn't look track of Sandra's movements. However I didn't too much else with him out of concern I'd make him do something Losarian didn't want me to do. :\]

*****

Back at the battle against Smidgen, Nebiroth no longer cared about food, or the destruction of any living thing in his path. He was angered outgoingly at Smidgen for trying to eat him, but allowed Kyle to have space for his Shadow Beam Gamma, and then Brett and Zac for what he called their "Spiritual Antipodial Beam Attack".

[Even Nebiroth like that name better than "Omega Beam", but bleh. :P]

Smidgen was now in pieces again, but Nebiroth not only knew better than to rely on him being dead, but he had also caught notice of Smidgen beginning to reform.

Ah poo. I was hoping I wouldn't have to use this attack until I found the Pink-Haired brat again. I was originally saving this for her, but this Smidgen creature is going too far. Forget eating and destroying these humans. They tried to help me. Perhaps master Sardius was somewhat wrong about the human race and it's intentions. I still want to fight that brat though at least one more time.

[Again, to remind you, Nebi's mental speak is much more normal than his speech patterns. He also does a decent amount of inner monolouges later. :P]

Nebiroth suddenly formed himself into a pose, crossing his arms and leaning forward, and began to glow a faint bluish-white color. To Brett and Zac, who especially understood energy well, he was charging his power up for a big attack.

Friends! He spoke into their minds with a small hint of telepathy, using his intelligent voice, shocking them to realize he was no longer going to be hostile towards them, When he regenerates, if you could, try to distract them. I'm charging up for my 'Body Laser' attack. It might just be strong enough to wipe him out with no trace of him leftover, but I'm not sure. I've never done this before to any specific target. All I know is that the attack is a continuous laser in the shape of my own body, so if it works, it should completely disintergrate him, and he'll be unable to put himself back together.

[I forget what made me come up with the concept of a BODY-shaped beam attack in the first place, but for a huge being like Nebiroth, it's actually a frighteningly effective attack. >_>]

The other stared at him, wondering if they should trust him.

[LOL, "other". I sucked at grammar at times. >_>]

As his energy began to grow, Nebiroth thought to himself Pink-haired slayer of Sardius. I am still searching for you, so do not think you are totally out of this one yet!...

[Again I lol at my "!..." this time. Man I knew how to bat a thousand, didn't I? :P]

[AC/Post Ratio: 17:47.]