The Escape Part III

     "Anybody think of a plan yet?" Cloud asked.
     We continued walking through the maze of tortured bodies courtesy of Marlene. The worst part of the walk was the hallway of crucified soldiers. No, I take that back. The Hall of the Mix & Match Soldiers was worse. That was where she took about five soldiers, cut off their limbs, and rearranged them onto other soldiers. She made sure to get soldiers of different ethnicities so that everybody would know just how sick she really is. I just wondered how she had enough time to do this to all the soldiers. I mean, the Mix & Match Soldiers were like, stitched back together even. Barret raised a wonderful child.
     Speaking of which, Marlene was the only person with her hand up, volunteering a solution to the problem. She kept jumping up and down yelling "Ooh ooh! I have an idea." I just hope Yuffie didn't have a brilliant strategy, seeing as how her fingers were in her ears and eyes were still shut.
     "Entrance is up ahead," Reeve said, pointing at a door a few yards ahead of us.
     "So where are we Reeve?" I asked.
     "A tiny island out in the middle of nowhere. The island is called 'Cactuar Island' due to its population of cactuars."
     "The hell's a cactuar?" Barret asked.
     "The absolute most annoying creature on the planet next to Marlene," Dyne said. "There were tons of them down in the Gold Saucer Prison. In fact, I think we should probably make our plans in here. We'll go insane if we stay out there too long."
     We decided to stop right before exiting the building. Yuffie slowly opened her eyes, one at a time, then unplugged her ears. She got up off of Red XIII and scratched his ear.
     "Don't use that condescending form of gratitude," Red said. "I would much more apprrrrr- ooh, never mind, don't stop." Red's leg started twitching as Yuffie continued to scratch his ear.
     "So Reeve," I said. "You know Shin-Ra best. What's our best form of retaliation? Do we like, order them a bunch of pizzas they didn't order or something?"
     "Nah, no amount of pizzas delivered would ever be more than they want. Between President Shinra, Heidegger, and Palmer, they have eaten seventeen pizzas in one meeting before. I had a salad that meeting, and boy that was a long meeting. Nobody had anything to discuss. The only thing President Shinra said to me the whole meeting was 'Hey Reeve. Say something stupid that I'll turn down like always, but drag it out until we're done with our pizzas.' He always turned down my suggestions."
     "What about if you just use your Sith Co. company to put them out of business?" I suggested.
     "Fat chance," Reeve said. "Shin-Ra basically owns the world. My Sith Co. company is well, not so big."
     "Don't get yourself down," Aeris said to Reeve. "I'm sure its a wonderful company."
     "It wasn't, trust me. It was just a hole in the wall office in a strip mall. We sold computer parts and AA batteries. All we ever sold were batteries."
     "Maybe we could help somehow," Tifa suggested. "It seems like you've got a lot of good ideas, and you build the absolute cutest robots!"
     "Thanks, but that'll never take over Shin-Ra. Once we start getting big they'll just shut us out."
     "Then let's just take down Shin-Ra like befo,' Barret said. "Kick some ass in the reactors, ya know?"
     "Not a bad idea," Reeve said. "As long as you don't care that it'll cut off power to the entire city of Midgar."
     "Nah, not a bit. %$^# them," Barret said.
     "Okay, but you realize the reactors are heavily guarded nowadays, right?" Reeve asked. "Also, if we take the reactors out one by one, they'll just get a huge army ready to defend the next one, and I'm not sure if we'd all be able to take a full Shin-Ra army in their homeland. Those Turks are getting super powerful anymore."
     "We'll have to split up," Cloud said. "Eight groups will take out the reactors at the same time to cut power to the city, then one group will get into Shin-Ra and shut those assholes down. We should also run a distraction group. One group to take the Turks out of the picture. So how many people we got for this mission?"
     I looked around the room and started counting heads. Myself, Barret, Dyne, Marlene, Yuffie, Red XIII, Aeris, Tifa, Cloud, Zack, Cid, Shera, Vincent, Lucrecia, and Reeve.
     "There's fifteen of us," I said. "That's a pretty hard number to split up between ten groups."
     "Ya think dis's all we got?" Barret said. "There's more than dis around da world. I could give ma boys a call. Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie would join in a second."
     "And that James guy!" Dyne said.
     "No, let's not include James," I said. "That's just- I mean- No, just- No. But keep those other three on hand. I don't think they can do much for us, but they can be our backup if we need it."
     "You got it Seph," Barret said.
     "I'll get together the Pagoda Warriors!" Yuffie said. "I don't think Dad'd come, but I can at least get the four of them, then me and them will get one reactor!"
     "Okay Yuffie, do it," I said. "You'll lead the team, so once we get some supplies, you'll keep the walkie talkie and keep us up to date, and you can plant the bomb."
     "B-b-b-b-bomb?" Yuffie said. "Maaaybe I should take Barret with us then."
     "Can't," I said. "We'll need him in another reactor. I think it'll have to be Barret, Dyne, and Marlene. They've been doing okay as a team so far."
     "Ha! Sephiroids included me!" Marlene said. "You have to take me now! Take me take me take me!"
     "Damn, I wanted to go with her," Zack said. "She's spunky and awesome. Cutest girl ever."
     "You know the restraining order," Cloud said. "You're not allowed within ten yards of a cute little girl. You're not allowed to put Marlene into kiddy porn."
     "Hooooold up Clod!" Marlene said. "Speak when you're spoken to bitch. I've always considered becoming a porn star. After all, if I do it now, I can claim later that I was just young and stupid and if I could redo it, I would. Besides, porn pays great!"
     "Yo Marlene, you ain't doin' porn," Barret said.
     "Stop holding me back Niggapapa! I'd be great at porn! I can do the splits and lick my own elbow!"
     "Hey, Reactor Team 2, be quiet," Reeve said. "Who's the next group Seph?"
     "Vincent," I said.
     "Fine," Vincent said. He stood in the corner, leaning against a wall, waiting to leave.
     "Just him?" Reeve asked.
     "If I know Vincent, which I don't, I don't think he'll need help," I said. "But he'll take Leukemia- er, Lucrecia with him."
     "I still dunno," Reeve said. "Lemme send this last Cait Sith robot with him," he said, pointing to the small cat robot beside him.
     "No," Vincent said.
     "Fine," I said. "But just be careful not to piss Vincent off. He'll probably blow the cat's mechanical brains all over a wall if he talks to much."
     "Okay," Reeve said. "But Cait Sith will plant the bomb, so he can't be dead too quickly."
     "Hey, somebody wake Cid up," I said. "He'll lead the next team."
     Barret kicked Cid, who was lying on the ground snoring. His cigarette was still in his mouth, but miraculously not falling out.
     "Good morning Mr. Teamleader," Cloud said to him.
     "Aww %^$# not again!" Cid said. "Who's with me? And who's gonna tell me what the %^$# is going on?"
     "Shera will be with you," I said. "She'll fill you in. And we'll also send uhh, Red with you."
     "The %^$#ing dog?"
     "Yep."
     "%^$#."
     "I think that's gonna have to be the reactor teams," Reeve said. "They're gonna have to do two reactors each. It shouldn't be too tough, and we'll need just about everybody else for the distraction and infiltration teams. I'll take distraction team, but I really don't think I'll need much help. Maybe one."
     "I'll go with you," Aeris said. "I've got some connections in the slums. I'll bet I could take the Turks out of play if I just found the right whores- err, I mean people."
     "Good idea," Tifa said. "You know Johnny, right? He knows people who know whores."
     "You know, this is all great and all," Cloud said. "But we're still stuck on this damn island."
     "Yeah, I know," I said. "Let's head outside and see if those soldiers have any like, boats or anything."
     "Okay," Reeve said. "Prepare to plug your ears."
     "What do you plug a rear with?" Marlene asked.
     Everybody ignored her. Except for Zack. He thought it was hilarious. We opened the door and stepped out onto Cactuar Island. It seemed relatively boring out here. A desert with a bunch of cactuses that were so low to the ground that they were undoubtedly the infamous cactuars. I'd never seen a cactuar, but I'd heard they're a deadly foe with needles that could off you in a second, and they were nearly impossible to hit with their high evade. Still, they were standing very still at the moment. Nothing much to fear.
     "The soldiers get a boat around here at a scheduled time each day to trade off shifts," Reeve whispered. "I think it should be here in about five minutes. We should hide somewhere until it gets here, then grab it."
     "Why're you whispering?" I asked quietly.
     "I don't want to wake the cactuars," Reeve whispered. "I hate those guys."
     The group moved quietly to the opposite side of the building so that the boat would think everything is normal until they're fully docked. Some people moved against the wall and sat down. Cid moved a bit further out and found a patch of dirt to sit down on. Then, ten times faster than he sat, he jumped up screaming his head off.
     "HOLY %^$# WHAT THE %^$# THAT %^$#ING HURT!" Cid yelled. I looked over and saw that he'd just sat on top of a cactuar that had been almost entirely underground. It popped up and looked around quietly.
     "Shhhh," Reeve said. "Nobody move. Maybe it'll go away."
     "Like hell I will!" Cid yelled. "That little whore poked me in the ass! I'm gonna kill him!"
     Then, faster than anybody could stop him, Cid kicked at the cactuar. Their evade is truly high, since he dodged a point blank kick so easily. The cactuar suddenly took off into the desert and started making a truly obnoxious noise.
     HEEB EEP EEH HEEP
     Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, the rest of the damned cactuars suddenly popped up and joined in.
     HEEB EEH EEB EEH EEP EEP EEEH EEP NEEDLETIME HEEEB EEH EEP HEEB
     They suddenly stopped making any noise, and every damned one of them turned to face us all. Now, in an ordinary place, a few cactuars would be nothing. This place was different though. There were cactuars as far as the eye could see, and every one of them was looking at us.
     "Marlene? Can you get us out of this?" Tifa asked.
     "Screw that!" she said. "I hate needles."
     "Back inside?" Cloud suggested.
     "The door is uhh, blocked," Reeve said.
     "Wonderful."