Chirijiraden - Vanishing Memories Chapter 3
An Hour’s Eternity
By CD
The soldiers boarded the great ships and were quickly ushered into large floors comprised of several rows of stables for which to tether the large birds. Moogles filled the air, pointing incoming soldiers to empty areas, or darting this way and that carrying out a multitude of different tasks. Tue Sho entered the ship and immediately an energetic mog pounced on his mount’s reins. The bird’s head lurched forward as the moogle tugged on the leather with surprising strength until the chocobo began to trot to release the tension. Soon the creature drove the bird into an empty stall in one of the many corridors and tied the riding straps to a thick vertical beam. Immediately upon completion it hurried off to find another lost soul to drag around, darting past Tue Sho’s head in it’s exodus.
“Lively one, isn’t he?” The bird closed its eyes and laid down on a patch of hay for bedding set next to a small wooden stool. Tue Sho sat beside his newly appointed friend and began to run a hand through her thick yellow feathers as it drifted off to sleep. Out of oblivion a gunshot pierced any semblance of silence that might have been, followed shortly by a brief screech of pain. Tue Sho looked up towards the sound in time to see two halves of a human corpse come rolling in from down the corridor. Shortly after a tall man with platinum blonde hair about Tue Sho’s age walked slowly into sight while loading a smoking pistol.
“They‘ll let almost anyone enlist nowadays, won‘t they?” the man said with a grin as he bent down to remove an item from the dead man’s grip. He pulled a small black pouch with winding runic script etched in gold from the twisted fingers and tied it to his black leather belt. “Damned thievin’ fool.” A glimpse to his right caught sight of the perplexed expression etched into Tue Sho’s face. “What? Never seen a man sliced in two before?”
“How...?” Tue Sho grasped for words to speak his thoughts but naught came to him.
“How did I do it? Simple.” The strange man lifted his cooling pistol to an upright position, his finger still on the trigger. “Customized ammunition. A friend of mine uses summoning magic to enchant the bullets. They basically just release the eidolon upon firing. All you have to do is aim.”
“But... why did he...?”
“Split in two? The summon released was Odin. Normally I wouldn’t have wasted it on a luckless bastard like him but he caught me unaware. I hadn’t the time to find and load a normal bullet so I just fired what was in the chamber.”
“I see.” Tue Sho stood tall and offered a hand in greeting. “Tue Sho, first assault unit.” The man accepted his hand and gave it a tight squeeze and a firm shake.
“Dayn, support division. Nice to meet you. Look, I gotta get back to my assigned area or I’m gonna get reamed. I hope to meet you again, Tue Sho. Until then, keep your cool and survive til tomorrow, okay?” With that Dayn sprinted off down the hall as a pair of moogles removed the dead man’s corpse from the floor. Tue Sho took his seat on the stool and extracted the shiny white orb from the confines of his armor as he removed his helm. He continued to stare into the soft light-bending optics and began to think of Aeris once more. Thoughts of her drifted to thoughts of their future, of their unborn child. He knelt down and closed his eyes to pray to any who would listen, firmly gripping the white materia as though his soul was in someway chained to it. He spoke softly under his breathe, no more than a whisper in this world. Softly he pleaded for the ear of God so that his prayers may reach it. For his protection in battle, for the safety of his loved ones, for the souls of his friends and foes who were about to die.
He opened his eyes and climbed to his feet. The humid air that filled his lungs told his mind to reminisce elsewhere. He walked down the corridor a ways until he reached the metallic stairs that led to the upper floors. Hurriedly he made his way up the various levels until he came to the deck where a sudden gust of wind relieved his sweating body of the poor ventilation of the storage area. He walked to the edge and rested his elbows on the guardrail as he moved the shining stone around in his hands. His endless thoughts of Aeris would haunt him like a ghoulish nightmare until he held her firmly in his arms once more.