Event || Strategy

[melodiesmods]

Characters: All the Heroes of Light and some NPCs.
Where: Aqures Ixen, Castle.
When: January 25th, Afternoon
Summary: All the Heroes of Light were formally invited to a meeting in the Castle of Aqures Ixen, in the conference room. They will be able to discuss strategy with their peers and the allies amongst the NPCs. This is the final preparation before endgame.
Warning: N/A.

Mingle Thread
The Meeting

Comments

The Meeting

[melodiesnpcs]

[ When everyone is present, Wedge steps forward to speak. ]

Thank you everyone for your presence. I’d particularly like to thank the representatives of Trano Golsaucia, Esdham, Balicea, Mysidia, Hera, Flence and Aerilon who came over—And of course, the Heroes of Light. What we are to talk about here concerns not only all of us, but everyone on this planet as well. If we have summoned you here, this is bec-

[ At this point, Cid interrupted him and walked in front of poor old Wedge. ]

Everyone’s in this room will be dead or worse in two months, take or give a couple weeks.

[ He shrugged and pointed at himself before waving at Wedge and the other representatives in the room. ]

We’re going to die. [He then turned and looked at the Heroes of Light.] You’re going to be mashed into our beautiful planet while your worlds are going to be eviscerated till they turn into batteries. Meanwhile I figure Garland will engineer a repetition of all that and invite Palitutu for tea.

[ And with that he smiled to them all.]

Now that we’ve established the situation is as bad as it can get, we can discuss peacefully and efficiently for ways not to die.

[dammit_flynn]

What a wonderful way to start the meeting, really.

[ The swordsman replied in the corner of the room, with his arms across his chest and his dog at his side. Yuri didn't look in the least bit amused by the blunt statement. At least the comment was more honest than beating around the bush. He wasn't the type to take people's lies well anyway. ]

Any thoughts on your side before I try to propose something?

[ He might as well hear what the other had to say first before making any decisions on his end. The situation got bad to worse.

[sesenta]

[There just doesn't seem to be enough time. Building a sanctuary on the moon might work for the short-term, but that would take months, probably years. And the matter of food is an enormous obstacle that can't be easily overcome.]

[More than that, it won't stop the Calamity from moving on to their own worlds. Akane's been wracking her brain, searching through all of her scientific and paranormal knowledge for anything that might help, but so far she's got nothing. She folds her hands tightly in her lap, furrowing her brow.]

[When Yuri speaks, she lifts her head and looks at him curiously. She doesn't know this man all that well, but if he's got any kind of idea, she's all ears and curiosity.]

[cockblocker]

Where do we even start?

[Hisui was never one to get into the complicated shit, but given the gravity of the situation it seemed better to be here than not at all.]

The entire thing's looking grim, and we're running out of options. Unless there's some sort of miracle we can count on, I think we oughta start looking for one.

[gorgeous_sin]

[Lust's head swivels to regard Yuri with cool curiosity. So he's an ideas man, is he? Her arms are loosely folded, her legs crossed. She hasn't really been a notable presence around town since her shadow confrontation, as it's given her a lot to think about, but she hasn't turned to reclusive hermitude just yet.]

Propose anyway. Even if it isn't a perfect solution, we can still play with it and see if there are any salvageable ideas.

[umslay]

[Ales stands on a table at the edge of the room, giving him a vantage point to see the world leaders. Cid's speech really is something, he likes that guy. With a smile, Ales pushes off the wall.]

If we're ever in the need of a superweapon, I have access to the giant death ray on the Moon. It's currently pointed away from the planet, but if ever comes a need to shoot the Calamity really, really hard, I have something.

[A pause.]

We've agreed that there are two portions of this attack. One is defeating Garland. Rather straightforward so long as we send our most powerful Heroes and those Eidolons he's supposedly afraid of. The other is sending the Calamity away and restoring the heart of this world. [Do they call the lifestream of Crystallis the heart? No matter, it makes sense to Ales.] There's projects being made on refurbishing the Soul Divider to fix the First Crystal, but other than that, we have to communicate with the Calamity.

[His gaze moves to the Avatars, the ones he knows.]

[zodiac_brave]

Was Lady Matsya not able to come? I had hoped to finally meet her...

[Ramza was a little disappointed, but he could not let it distract him from this meeting. It was too important.]

The Calamity is made of the ghosts of other worlds, is it not? We want to put them to rest. Unless the Avatars are of another opinion, I think that is the right thing to do. Trying to kill the Calamity will not give justice to those lost worlds. They deserve better than that.

[im_pancake]

I hate to say this, Ramza, but we really can't do it justice in any sort of manner.

[Twilight spoke up and made herself known, that large airhorn by her side in case things got rowdy.]

Even if they are ghosts, it would be pointless to try to do something less than outright destroying them. We try to bring them to rest, we run the risk of letting the Calamity take hold even further. We can't let our feelings dictate this.

[acceptedoblivion]

[Ira had told himself he wouldn't say anything. That he'd stay quiet, lest he accidentally cause an incident. Again. Yet when Twilight shot down Ramza's idea, he can't help himself.]

Sorry, but I can't believe that.

[He'd spent over a week with the shades of his own timeline's residents, feeling his life slowly ebb away... To hear that there are countless other souls suffering the same torment that they likely still suffered, beyond his ability to sense them.]

If the Calamity truly is made of the phantoms of other worlds, then maybe the song we used to end the "Good King's" rampage would work?

[mindofathief]

[Duster has remained quiet for most of the meeting, as he expected. He isn't a leader, he's used to being ordered around, but the mention of the events that transpired in October catches his mind. Maybe...maybe this is the time for him to take charge.]

The one to put them to rest! [He stands up, rather too quickly, and the chair he was sitting on scoots over loudly.] Maybe...Kalki did say that songs were powerful when it came to this world. If just a few of us can send strong ghosts to the afterlife, if we all worked together...

[He shook his head.] But we'd need more Bards for that.

[theendiswherewestartfrom]

"Not to die would be the focus, there," Jack agrees. "With what we've been shown, even if we stop Garland, if all life on this planet ends, the Cycle would finally end, but at the cost of everyone's worlds. The only way to slow the Calamity's progression left is for as many of the native people of Crystallis to still be standing as possible. It can't get overtaken by the life forces of other worlds if there's still life here."

"So, my official position would have to be to keep your militaries out of the fight against Garland. We complete the Soul Divider, but die to Garland, you can still stop him and end this. If you fall, we cannot save your world without you."

[zodiac_brave]

Ramza shakes his head. "If we could end the Calamity while Garland still lived, his role as the Guardian of the Cycle would cease to be. He might even return to the knight he was before. But while he lives, he will do all that is in his power to ensure the cycle continues."

Both Kalki and Palitutu had seemed convinced that Garland must die because he was an impregnable barrier to their goals.

"So we either must kill Garland, or build up a force strong enough to distract him while the rest take care of the Calamity." He and Bartz had attempted it in the Sage's future, but the vision had ended before Ramza saw the results of that battle. "And I do not know if we can afford to divide ourselves and still exclude the military from lending us their aid."

[dammit_yuri]

"Would you say that as a distraction, the goal is not to win, but to stall and survive?" Flynn mused aloud. "Both are powerful, and cannot be underestimated. Perhaps we could take survivability into account and pick the hardiest among us to try to last against Garland, while the rest of us attempt to take care of the Calamity?"

[shinrasfinest]

The conversation receives a side-slip of a scowl in response to the mention of military and distractions. Still even though Sephiroth didn't really want to hear it there would always be that small part of his mind, that everyone had, that wanted to hear it even if he might not like it or particularly agree with it.

It was important to gain as broad a spectrum of ideas as possible, it might be the last time that all Heroes and various leaders of Crystallis were all within the same room.

"I might refer to the latest of Palitutu's reports." Sephiroth made an effort to relax his stern posture and even drop his folded arms before turning to those that might listen to him.

"You might consider Garland as the harbinger of Crystallis' will, of its will to go on regardless of the fact that its story should have ended thousands of years ago. In that regard, it seems that Crystallis also created the Calamity."

Words often read sat just behind Sephiroth's eyes, where he could see them like a watermark across everything but no one else could. 'Crystallis is like a black hole. It takes everything. And in return it gives nothing.'

"Unless it's completely unavoidable, I will not allocate any military might for the sake of a distraction. Sending denizens of this World against Garland is sending them to certain death. There are other duties that can be allocated within other locations around the World-" Part of him didn't believe he was about to have to say this-

"We win this fight, or there is no coming back at all."

[dammit_flynn]

"I wouldn't suggest using the military as a decoy or anything either. Our goal is to survive and throwing away people's lives meaninglessly is not part of it. It may seem idealistic but I'd rather we survive with minimal losses if possible."

Yuri replied as he crossed his arms, glancing at Sephiroth's scowl. He would too if something about his guild came up.

[boomchucka]

[The minute that the crystals came into the conversation earlier, Selphie knew that there was something that wasn't correct.

Not all the heroes came to Crystallis with red crystals.

She was like a few others that she could name off the top of her head that have white crystals and while she still didn't know if that was a good thing, there had to be some way of figuring out who had a white versus a regular crystal. She eventually stands up again and holds her left wrist up in the air. Anyone who looked close enough would see a blue ribbon wrapped around it with a white crystal expertly wrapped inside it. Her gaze settles on Cid and the others in front of them with an unusually serious look on her face.]

Okay, first things first. To my fellow heroes. Raise your hand if your crystal is white. Secondly, to the group of people in front of us, sorry for not knowing your names but if you can shed any light on these crystals and what they mean, I think a lot of us would really like to know.

[21stcenturyguy]

[Santa raises his crystal up and twirls it between his fingers lazily. It's a translucent, hazy white.]

A bunch of us died or turned to rock, but all the Heroes that that bitch Kalki woke up and dumped into the Crystal Caves had crystals like these. Dunno why. We thought it was normal 'til we met the rest of you.

[toomanymistakes]

[She also raises her hazy-white crystal, nodding.]

Aside from making us useless to Garland's plans, we know little else of the significance.

[red_planet_blues]

[Sparks takes his own from inside of his coat - a crystal clear star-shaped one.]

Uh, mine didn't start off this way. But Kalki saw to change that, whatever it means.

[jadethenecromancer]

Yes... Ours changed when we got close to the Calamity in the Heran Research Center two years ago. That's when it awakened and started spreading.

[Jade takes out his fonstone-shaped crystal.]

All we know is Kalki's claim that a white crystal signifies a connection to the Calamity. What this means, or how it's different from the Black Crystals... I'm afraid I don't know. Trying to scan them at the lab only results in an error message.

[He pauses, mulling over what Lucrecia said.] ...Although, if we're useless to Garland's plans... That would imply we can't be sacrificed for Nova Crystallis.

[grandsummon]

( speaking up in these meetings had never been one of yuna's strong points since arriving in crystallis. there were so many things that she didn't know still, and so, listening quietly until something resonated with her, the summoner finally stepped forward once there was a moment of quiet... )

Dead worlds, unable to die... ( that was what Prajapati had said, wasn't it? )

What if... there was a way to help the spirits of those world move on?

[zodiac_brave]

[Ramza nods.]

Yes, exactly. That is what we must be meant to do. If we could figure out a way to do that...I believe it would solve everything.

[jadethenecromancer]

Yes... The Calamity is driven by the desire to end its own suffering. In theory, granting that wish should stop its advance.

[The question is, how?]

Did you have something in mind, Yuna?

[mindofathief]

[Duster moves his attention to this conversation.] A few weeks ago, in the old Observatory, we were thinking of writing a new song for the Calamity. This...might be the way to do it.

The WEAPONS and Palitutu

[umslay]

Ah, while we're still here... [Ales crosses his arms.] We need to do something about the WEAPONS Palitutu left behind. If we are the fight Garland and whatever else the Calamity throws at us, they might come in handy. Now, I understand the misgivings you may have in regards to those falling into the wrong hands, but they may be out backup plan

Are there any military folks or scientists that can devote time to understanding the WEAP0Ns? And what should we do if Palitutu does wake up?