The Sephiroth Interrogation
A Legion of Fantasy Chat/Fight
By ZealPropht
Of all the chatrooms in the world, he had to walk into ours. The Legion was present as always, discussing the hot topic of the evening. In attendance were Icy Brian, Saul, ZealPropht, JWolf, and Minmei. It looked pretty quiet, except for the scum of the universe, Paul Nathans, a shifty-eyed, idiotic ferret of a guy who irritated everyone. It had gotten so bad, Icy Brian, the Leader of the group, had challenged the twerp to a duel. No matter how hard Nathan's fought, he lost hands down. It was in the midsts of the final stages of the fight that the stranger entered...
"Elona creates a new Kaiser Dragon form and is fully healed," Nathans shouted, not noticing that everyone had forgotten him in light of the newcomer.
"Hi, Sephiroth," JWolf, one of the chat regulars, greeted the visitor. Minmei, a newcomer to the group, chimed her friendly welcomes as well. ZealPropht, a recent edition to the Legion, looked up from waving her skull flag in hopes that Nathans would perish during the fight, and gaped open-mouthed.
"Sephiroth?," she gasped, uncertain how to react.
"Time," Icy said, hoping to deal with the stranger and find out what he wanted. Paul, as usual, didn't listen and continued rattling on in his own chaotic way. Being as diplomatic as ever, Icy cried, "Yo idiot, I said TIME!" Sometimes firmness is the only way to get through to dumb animals. Of course, even dumb animals get the hint when someone yells at them. That just goes to show how thick some people can be.
Paul, obviously sensing that his audience was ignoring him, lashed out at Sephiroth, whipping him with verbal stupidity. "Yo, puppet! Begone!"
"Shut up, Nathans!," they all replied. For a while, no one spoke as they puzzled out what to say. Who was this person calling himself Sephiroth? Was he merely an innocent bystander? Or was he a dreaded foe of the Legion?
ZealPropht, being the brave one, (and also the most hyper of the current group), asked, "So, Sephiroth. What brings you slumming?" The silence was tense as the assembly waited for the answer.
"Will you join me?," was the response. The group looked at each other. What did this guy want?
ZealPropht rolled her eyes dramatically. "Love to, babe, but we're kinda busy here."
"Whoa Zeal, aren't you going a little too fast on Sephy?," Saul remarked. ZealPropht shrugged and smirked.
"Well, I can't help liking men dressed in black." She giggled as JWolf remarked that his current nickname, Undertaker, was also dressed in black.
"I have to go now! Let's restart with these stats later. Saul, please record them!," Nathans interrupted, meaning the condition he and Icy Brian were in the moment the fight was put on hold.
"Good idea," Brian retorted, much to everyone's amusement. "Leave with your puny life." Everyone chuckled at that. It was true that he was seriously defeating Paul in every aspect, but the buffoon was too dimwitted to know it.
"Icy's scarred," Paul jeered, supposedly making an attempt at gentle teasing. "I'm seriously wounded yet not enough to fail fighting and Icy is scarred from the last attack. Icy's winning now, so far." At least he was smart enough to see that, though in his mind, he probably saw it as a nice compliment to whom he had dubbed "the loser." That's brain power for you.
"I'm always winning," the illustrious Brian sneered in disdain. "And you can't scar the perfection that is me." ZealPropht temporarily forgot the mysterious stranger and chuckled wickedly.
"Ooooh! Conceited! I LOVE IT!" Howling with mirth, she considered taking the opportunity to pat Icy on the back for coming up with such a clever retort. He grinned at her and remarked that he was just kidding.
"YOU'LL LOSE FOOLISH BOY!!!!!," Paul cackled insanely. If he meant to be intimidating, it had the exact opposite effect.
"Shut your mouth and know your role, Nathans!," Ice shot back, irritated by the infuriating lack of intelligence in the humanoid creature named Paul.
Ignoring the remark, Paul turned to Saul. "Saul, send me the Log, please, right now, so I have the original too," he asked. "Just send it over my IRC Name, please."
"You can't send it until the chat is over." Brian said it in the same way one speaks to a slow child.
"Well, what you have so far, then, please!," Paul whined. It sounded like nails on a chalkboard. Several of the group members felt the urge to tie a very large muzzle to his face and never take it off.
"No, because you can't get into the file until the chat is over." There was a finality to the way Icy Brian said it. He wouldn't help the slime out even if it were possible, which it wasn't. Nathans then proceeded to accuse Icy of lying, stating that it did indeed work. This enraged everyone to no little end. Immediately the room exploded with sound as everyone added their two-cents worth of opinion to exactly what they thought about Paul and where he could stick it. Even the Sephiroth stranger remarked upon the stupidity of Nathans.
"BTW, puppet Sephiroth, your mother wants you back where you belong. BEAT IT!!!!! I MEAN JENOVA DOES WANT YOU TO RETURN, SO BEAT IT!!!!!," Paul said, as if he had any jurisdiction to dictate what someone should do while in the presence of two Opped Legion members.
JWolf muttered an oath while ZealPropht remarked, "Don't think you have any authority here, jerk-face!", to the insect in question.
"Does anyone here have Tales of Destiny?," Sephiroth asked, breaking through the confusion with a cold word of reality that alerted everyone once more to his presence.
"No, but I will soon," Paul replied. "Who are you anyway?," he blinked, as if he hadn't even been aware that the intruder had been there the whole time.
"Get out, Nathans! It's over. Goodbye foolish one," Brian interjected, before Paul could do any more harm.
"We'll resume next session or in two weeks or whenever," the vanquished Paul Nathans dejectedly moaned, sad to be leaving his self-proclaimed "friends" though no one returned the sentiment.
"Heh, let's not, Paul. How about you vanish forever?," ZealPropht exploded, losing her temper at last. While waiting for a reply, she casually checked the background of Sephiroth. The reply came up saying "You don't kneed to know." But she DID kneed to know! They all did!
"Good match, Icy. I say that while you may have gotten the upper hand this time, I'll SHRED you later," Paul laughed.
"Get bent!," ZP, howled. "LEAVE!"
In "a trace of stardust", Paul left the chat, allowing the occupants to heave a sigh of relief. Now they could fully turn their attention to Sephiroth and determine just exactly what was to be done about him.
"Who exactly IS Sephiroth?," Icy demanded. No one really gave him an answer.
"I have no idea," ZP replied, her voice small and dejected. She hated guessing games, especially when it came to her favorite past-time: adoring game villains.
"Who are you, Seph?," Minmei asked as well. Sephiroth merely gazed at her. There was a term of silence before he told her to find out for herself. That, of course, sent us all scrambling once again to find out his profile.
"It said, "YOU DON'T NEED TO KNOW"," Zeal supplied helpfully.
"Who do you think I am?," the stranger asked quietly, smugly. ZP ground her teeth at the arrogant insinuations she read there.
"I think you remind me of Dark Magus," she hedged, looking for a response. "Or, Bill Cosby." Laughing at her own joke, she realized that it wasn't as funny as she had thought because no one was even paying attention. "Or Cloud," she sighed finally, losing track of what she was originally going to say.
"First off, who invited you?," the Legion leader inquired. Why couldn't people get it through their thick skulls that this was a private chat and no one who was not a member or invited to join could come in? "For the last time, who is Sephiroth?!" Now he was starting to get mad.
"Sephiroth is «you don't need to know»," JWolf replied, echoing ZP's earlier statement that no one paid attention to.
"Icy, I don't know. Anyone else know?," ZP answered, then setting the question to the rest of the group. By this time, Marle had joined and was raving about some girl who had stolen her name. The commotion was enough to make conversation about the intruder hard. But since Marle was upset, everyone took the time to listen to her, rather then deal with the issue at hand. But now that things were rolling smoothly again, everyone wanted to know who he was.
"Spill, Sephiroth!," Minmei commanded in a no-nonsense tone. Still the invader remained silent. "GRRRR...." The person calling themselves Sephiroth asked why we wanted to know. Tired with the pussy-footing, ZP changed her nickname into her second favorite tile: ShinraWepn.
Icy was finally losing patience with the visitor. "Who are you? I'm getting tired of asking."
ZealPropht, now known as ShinraWepn, laughed with wicked glee and proclaimed, "Ha! I am now prepared to interrogate you to find out who you are!" Minmei cheered and laughed and JWolf laughed his approval as well. Using a comic form of interrogation, she played to the audience as if it were one of her role-playing sessions on AOL. She pounced on Sephiroth and dragged him over to a chair underneath a large handing lamp like in all the cop and detective movies. "Spill! Who are you?! Where do you come from?! Who is Mickey and why are you following him?!"
Minmei laughed again and sat down on the couch. "Is there any popcorn left?," she asked. "I gotta watch this."
"Who invited you?," Icy demanded again, coming up beside ShinraWepn and glaring down at Sephiroth as he sat in the chair.
JWolf, too, added a question of a more curious nature. "Where were you on the night of July 14, 1987?!" Minmei laughed and popped some of the salty snack into her mouth. ShinraWepn got a very serious look on her face. She drew close and leaned towards Sephiroth's ear to whisper something.
"One more question."
"What?," she was asked by the suspect.
"Do you wear boxers or briefs?"
"ACK!," Minmei protested, nearly choking on her popcorn. "I did NOT need that mental picture! At least, not of Seph!"
"They're Hanes!," JWolf supplied, imitating Sephiroth. "Let's leave it at that." Sighing, ShinraWepn backed away with the soft, and slightly dejected words of, "Your witness." However, no sooner was she done saying that, she rushed to her briefcase and pulled out a cell phone. Flipping it open, she dialed a number and waited patiently through the rings.
"Hello? President Rufus' office please? Yes, I'll hold." Everyone waited to see what she was doing. Finally, after much toe-tapping and finger drumming, she said, "Hello? Mr. President? This is ShinraWepn calling, sir. Yes. It's good to hear from you too. Yes, sir. This is about business." Pause. "I need the Turks here right away." Pause. "Yes it's urgent." Pause. "I don't CARE if they're on break! I need their services pronto!" She listens for a moment, nodding. "Uh, huh. Yes. I didn't mean to yell. No. You're right, sir. Of course. So they're on their way? Ok. Yes, alright. Fine. Thank you very much, Mr. President. The same to you sir. Yes. Bye." Flipping the cell phone shut, she grinned at Sephiroth smugly.
Icy Brian, apparently deciding to act upon the role-play, changed his nickname to Reno and "walked in." "RENO?," Sephiroth gasped in shock.
"Reno?," JWolf repeated in confusion.
"Reno, thank God!," ShinraWepn, sighed in relief. Thank goodness for quick service or your money back!
"Is there a problem here?," Icy Brian, now known as Reno, asked.
"Yes, there is, " ShinraWepn answered. Saul looked between Reno and ShinraWepn, and rolled his eyes.
"Gosh, the Shinra are now in control of the channel," he commented. Reno and ShinraWepn grinned at him and shrugged.
"We always were," ShinraWepn replied with a wink. Saul rolled his eyes again and said that he rather thought not. Reno leaned against the wall coolly, appraising the situation until he was briefed.
"I need some help interrogating this witness who claims to be Sephiroth," ShinraWepn informed him. Reno nodded and, quick as lightning, slammed Sephiroth into the wall and held his gun to Sephy's head.
"Care to talk?," he asked casually. Behind him, SW sighed dreamily and turned to Minmei.
"I love the Turks! So efficient and to the point. Or rather, GUN point," she laughed. Minmei giggled along with her and the two girls moved to the back so Reno had room to work. During their migration, Saul handed SW a really big hammer for no apparent reason, so she set it to the side in case he cared to explain its use later on. All this time, Sephiroth had been babbling nonsense words and phrases that rang of falsehood or made no sense at all. Reno pressed the barrel of the gun into Sephiroth's throat.
"Keep talking," he said calmly, the violence and threatening manner in which he held the gun obviously such a habit now, he didn't even appear slightly winded. Marle, who was watching all of this, decided to toss out a magic bomb which Minmei tossed at Sephiroth. Reno stepped away as it exploded, unfortunately not killing the intruder. In all actuality, the bomb was tossed out the window, exploding right next to JWolf who was blasted into a million pieces. As he tried to pull himself together, everyone laughed apologetically.
"Sorry, Wolfman," Reno smiled.
Minmei was starting to grow bored with the interrogation, as were the rest of them, but she decided to give it a couple more shots before really letting the clone have it. "Okay, NOW...for the last time, man...WHO ARE YOU ALREADY?!?!?!!?!?!?!?!?!"
"And what do you want?!," ShinraWepn added. Seeing that Sephiroth would be slow in answering, she took the opportunity to approach Reno. "So, you busy tonight?" She expected him to say "yes" and that would be the end of things. However, he surprised her by saying that he had no place to go. "Well, then you want to join me for, uh, dinner?"
"That works for me, " he replied, sending SW into a fit of ecstatic giggles.
"I have a DATE with a TURK!!!!!," she screamed. Composing herself, she offered a shy smile that was returned with a broad grin by Reno.
"Well, I guess it comes down to the point where he tells us who is he or he gets kicked and banned," Saul interrupted pointedly, bringing everyone's minds back on track. Several people voiced their agreement. Suddenly, the Sephy clone spoke up.
"OK I WILL ANSWER," he announced. There was dead silence as everyone sat in shock. After all this, he was about to tell them who he was and what he wanted! "ASK FOOL," was all he said. Everyone fell over with a universal groan of irritation. Minmei finally lost it and changed into Ayla.
"Who Sephy? You tell Ayla now!"
"I...am Kino," he replied steadily.
Ayla got a shocked look. "You...Kino?"
"Kino...," Seph repeated with a smirk.
"Could you hold on one sec, doll? I got some business to attend to," Reno told ShinraWepn. She smiled and nodded, still too dreamy eyed to really care what was going on. Reno grabbed the clone by the throat and slammed him into the wall as he twisted the clone's neck to the side. "You ready to talk yet?"
"No, wait! Kino?," Ayla gasped as Reno turned his head over his shoulder and looked at her.
"No, this isn't Kino," he said.
"Yes, Kino," Sephiroth chuckled. The smile soon left his face as he doubled over from Reno's fist in his gut.
"Stop lyin' to the girl. Tell her who you really are!," he shouted right into Sephiroth's face. ShinraWepn sighed and her eyes turned into hearts.
"Oh, I just love forceful men!," she giggled, watching Reno as he worked, admiring the way he was so brutal and yet so professional at the same time. Finally managing to shrug off the overwhelming affects of getting a date with a Turk, she said, "I say shoot him and let his corpse feed the crows." Reno apparently liked the idea because he used his shotgun to choke Sephy up against the wall.
"Talk, NOW!," Reno commanded, his temper near the breaking point. He spun around and hit the clone in the jaw with the back of the gun. Everyone winced and grinned at the sheer violence of it all.
"This is carrying on, and getting rather repetitive and annoying since we're getting absolutely nowhere," JWolf wisely remarked. The Legion nodded agreement. Now was the time for the final confrontation. Reno shot Sephiroth in the chest, closely followed by ShinraWepn with two shots and the Cat Bite from Ayla.
"Talk now or be kicked." Reno was serious this time. He'd had enough playing around with the fool.
"Do you think it could be Paul," SW asked curiously. Her face grew revolted. "I sure hope not. If it is, I think I'll hurl. But it does seem up his retarded alley." It was at that moment that Gasper, under the name of Tycho, entered the chat.
"Hello aspiring theatre major trying to act," Reno smiled, recognizing his friend.
"That's it! Can I ban them?," ShinraWepn exploded. What was with all these people showing up?! She didn't realize right away that Tycho was actually someone she knew and respected.
"Actually...no," Tycho replied, a bit taken back. Arriving in the middle of this strange chat was a trifle unusual, since he had no idea what was going on. Hoping that someone would fill him in, Tycho looked from one friend to the other, saying hello and whatnot. "And who is Sephiroth?"
"Sephy is some little puke who won't talk, and the Iceman is getting tired of it," Reno commented. So saying, he stabbed Sephiroth in the shoulder.
"SEPHIROTH LIVES!," the clone shouted triumphantly. ShinraWep leveled her hand gun at Seph's face and shot three times, barely scratching him. Still he didn't fall! Saul, deciding that it was time to leave, announced that he was going. Everyone bid him a sad farewell, even as Sephiroth threatened that if he left, all his friends would perish.
"Now Seph mean," Ayla accused, with a pouting look.
"Reno is going to kill Sephiroth if he doesn't shut his trap," the Ice Man said, gritting his teeth and counting to ten as the irritation in him mounted. Ayla jumped on Seph again and bit him repeatedly. This seemed to have no effect what-so-ever on the stranger.
"If Reno is Icy and Shinra is ZP, then that would make....Sephy....Nanaki?," Tycho suggested hesitantly, still waiting for someone to tell him what was happening. But from the look of things, he could make a rough guess.
"Sephiroth? NANAKI?!," ShinrWepn repeated incredulously. "Uh, no."
"...Seph...hacker?," Ayla guessed. Ayla ran behind Seph and broke his left arm. Not a pleasant sight, but definitely satisfying! Reno grabbed Sephiroth.
"Take a shot Shinra Wepn," he said, allowing her a free target. ShinraWep loaded and shot. The bullets penetrated Seph's body but he didn't seem to feel them. She watched amazed and cursed as she remembered that she didn't have any materia equipped to her gun. Meanwhile, Ayla waited for Reno to kick Seph's @$$ so she could have a turn.
"Let me morph into a more suitable form to deal with this menace," Tycho said. Slowly, he began to sprout wings, gradually turning into the Archangel.
Shinra Wepn's mouth fell open as she finally recognized Tycho for who he was. "GASPER?!"
"Yes, ma'am," he replied, bowing in his elegant, courtly fashion.
"Didn't you know that?," Reno commented, power-boming Sephy's rotting carcass.
"Hee, hee...well, I am an actor!", Archangel grinned modestly.
Reno jumped off of a ledge and nailed Sephiroth with the Ice Bomb, suceeding in sending arctic waves of killer cold energy into the clone's body, then errupting them outward with razor-sharp blades of ice, litterally ripping the clone apart. Ayla laughed like a maniac. Shinra Wepn finally got over her initial shock and bounded over to give Angel a hug which he returned.
"Come, Reno! Let Ayla have turn!," the cave-woman pleaded. Reno laughed and told her to take a shot. She broke Seph's other arm and smashed his face into the brick wall. There was a sound of crunching bone as his nose broke. The ragged remains of the clone still stood, albiet barely.
"Everyone take a final shot because Sphiroth is saying good-bye now!," SW said, summoning Knights of the Round to slice his already mangled body to kibble. "10, 9, 8, 7...."
"But you can't kill me!," Sephiroth murmmered through a gurgle of blood as he staggered to his knees.
"6, 5, 4, 3..."
"I'M A CLONE!," he shrieked.
"2, 1..."
"Even clones die," Reno answered as he and Shinra aimed thier guns right for Sephiroth's face, nailing him straight between the eyes. The stranger shuddered as the first effects of death took place before falling onto his face and shimmering as his body returned to the Lifestream. Ayla was a second too late as she tried to deck him and so she slapped SW with a large trout several times as if it were her fault for his dissapearance. There was a momentary lull as everyone felt the realization that Sephiroth was dead sink in. Reno banned him from the chat, should another clone return. Shinra Wepn handed him a Mountain Dew for his trouble which he gratefully downed in a few gulps. Together they sat on the company couch as JWolf, acting a little jealous, tried to sit next to Shinra. Teasing him, Reno told him to am-scray and SW laughed that he was her hero yet again.
Yes, out of all the chats in the world, he had to walk into ours. But he hadn't been prepared for the might of the Legion of Fantasy. Fight on!
~The End~