TFF Academy - Story Thread

[Epsilon]

When the word Necronomicon reached his ears, Epsilon made a mental note to review Lovecraft's works on the concept. He wasn't sure if there were similar concepts on other worlds so that means he would need to do some digging for all literature created by thousands of other species. See what type of beliefs that they came up with for the dead.

Looks like he'll just have to delegate that task to Ryoko. She's much more efficient at this sort of thing anyway.

He then felt a large rumble and heard Eterna yelp that she wanted this trip to end as she scrambled to get off the ice. 'Well... this is somewhat troublesome.'

CRASH!!!!!

Emerging out of the ice in all of its green glory was the green behemoth itself known as Emerald Weapon. 'Dammit! Why did Zeni have to go dive in there in the first place? We need time to make adequate preparations to take this monster down!'

"... Zdeno Chara, eat your heart out," whispered Legacy.

"Um... comparing a guy like him to a monster like that is hardly fair, man," commented Unknown.

The Flames fan actually found himself agreeing. "Yeah, I guess you do have a point."

Not waiting for Emerald Weapon to go first, Epsilon powered up a simple enchantment. "Dark Art: Paralyze!!" A black orb formed in his right hand and he fired it at the giant. 'That should buy a little time unless it figures out that it can temporarily override the spell at certain intervals by paying mana...'

 

[Unknown-common-827]

"Damnit, this isn't going to be pretty. Thanks for knocking away my spear, Eterna!" yelled Unknown, who then made a sword out of the ice. Eterna only gazed at him with an annoyed expression

"Well then, I guess we need to find out what to do with this... thing. *gulp* Any ideas?" said Unknown as he prepared for a brawl/bloodbath.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Suddenly. from underwater, there was a *whoosh* sound, as a spear shot out of the water and embedded itself in the creatures' chest.

 

[Zenithos]

"Well....that does it then...." Zeni nodded as he looked down at the mass of people scurrying about on the edge of the ice below.

He looked around and noticed Reimaru's rather questioning gaze. "You're wondering, 'what now?', right?" Zeni asked, sitting back against one of EW's protruding hard-points.

"No, I was merely wondering why you would go so far." Reimaru said, shrugging slightly.

Zeni looked thoughtful for a moment. "Well....just because. Now all we have to do is wait for EW to actually cause enough havoc to collapse the closed space around us."

"What if somebody dies in said havoc?"

"...." Zeni looked down again at the small group that was now either scurrying to get away or getting ready for an ass-whoopin of Biblical proportions. "...well...so far, we've lived through an entire street-turned-treadmill, crazy teachers, a fight with black mages, heartless, and some uber-secret organization in black....I think surviving EW wouldn't be that much of a problem, ne?"

"...Aire Tam storm..." Reimaru murmured.

"What?"

"Aire Tam storm." Reimaru repeated, in the exact same quiet tone.

"Oh....well, nobody's carrying any materia right? So no problem." Zeni shrugged.

Reimaru opened her satchel to reveal a motherlode of materia.

"....Don't tell me those are all mastered materia..." Zeni murmured. At the very least, if it wasn't mastered materia, then the fallout shouldn't be too bad....

To his great and utter horror, Reimaru nodded slowly. Then again, Murphy's law governed his life, so why should he be surprised?

"And I thought nobody uses materia anymore these days..." Zeni sighed as the motherlode's worth of materia all started to flash brightly in unison.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

"What's happening up there?" Eterna shouted, pointing up at the EW's top while dodging a number of laser shots as she leapt backwards across the ice.

"It's the Aire Tam Storm!" AMM cried as the air around them started to stir violently. "Quick! Throw aside all your materia!"

"No! Throw them up here if you've got any!" Zeni shouted from above.

"What?! Is that Zeni?!" AMM shouted, looking up. "Zeni!"

"Tch...he's still alive..." Eterna sighed.

"What do you....Oh...no...what on earth is he holding that much materia for?" AMM sagged. "ZENI! DO YOU HAVE A DEATHWISH?!"

 

[Legacy|iB]

Legacy could do nothing but watch as the whole drama unfolded before him. That thing under the ice popped up and everybody else was active in fighting it. All the while, Legacy and Unknown stood and watched.

"Well, we've just been benched, eh?" Legacy said, looking over at the Washington Capitals fan.

 

[Unknown-common-827]

"I don't know about you, but I'm sure a hell not going to be on the bench. Not to mention this is almost like a bench-clearing brawl." said Unknown as he ran toward the foray, Spear in hand.

"HEY WAIT UP, UNKNOWN!" shouted Legacy as he began his trek to the fight.

 

[Epsilon]

As far as he knew, the usage of materia had declined over the years as more powerful magics were discovered and developed. Not to say that nobody carried any more materia but their value in terms of practicality dropped when mages found out about the easement of casting aura enchantments on items, people and landscapes.

So it was safe to say that Epsilon was fairly surprised when his senses started picking up traces of materia. That satchel that Reimaru was carrying probably had a protection aura on it to mask the materia energy output.

Speaking of materia, a few pieces had been thrown up to Zeni by some party members. At least the targets would only be limited to Zeni and Reimaru. The fact is that Emerald Weapon did a set amount of damage for each materia a person carried. That meant multiple damage triggers from the same source.

How annoying...

Well, looks like he'll have to invest quite a bit of mana to prevent as much damage as possible to his temporary allies. "Holy Art: Guardian Angel!!"

The spell left his fingertips just as Emerald Weapon finished struggling past the Paralyze enchantment to make its attack.

 

[Zenithos]

"What? What are you looking at me like that for?" Zeni asked, noticing Reimaru's rather incredulous look. "You're looking at me as if I'm rave starking mad or something..."

"Because I think you are." Reimaru said flatly, nodding at the pile of materia flashing dangerously in his hands.

"This?" Zeni asked, looking down at the pile of materia.

"If you think you could leave it here and allow it to damage EW, then you've got another thing coming." Reimaru said.

"Naw...why would I do that?" Zeni cracked a grin all of a sudden as the raging winds around them whipped at his hair.

Reimaru suddenly had a funny suspicion that this particular vampire wasn't at all right in the head. And perhaps, she wasn't wrong...

Zeni threw all the materia up into the air, crouched, pulled his double-ended blade out of crackling thin air, before leaping up into a graceful swirl in between the flying materia, leaving behind bluish white trails of manna plasma.

The materia glowed all around him as he concentrated as much manna as his limiter seals would allow into them.

"Release..." He finally uttered, causing all the materia to fly off away from him while unleashing all the pent up lifestream energy they carried, simultaneously alongside the Aire Tam Storm's materia blast.

"Ooops..." He sighed, noticing that he was a split second late in sending them away, meaning he was off course caught in the blast radius.

The ground shook violently as the lifestream energy from the multitude of materia were all released simultaneously. The air glowed, crackled, and shimmered as the storm grew in intensity from the force of the blast.

"This guardian Angel stuff is great." AMM shouted as the storm raged on around their protective charms. "Where'd you learn this stuff, Epsilon?!"

"Look at that!" Eterna shouted, pointing up at EW. It was shaking violently, its biometal armor creaking painfully under the force and pressure of the storm. "EW's actually taking damage!"

"Better yet, look! The storm's growing so intense that the closed space is collapsing!" AMM shouted. Sure enough, all around them, the closed space was breaking down into bluish white wisps and dissolving along with the storm. A single point of singularity was growing wider from the eye of the storm right above EW.

"Hey...that's a normality field!" AMM shouted, pointing at said point of singularity.

"A what?!" Eterna screamed over the wail of the storm.

"Suzumiya Haruhi..." Mereo nodded in agreement.

"Wait....Zeni was up there, wasn't he?" AMM asked.

"He's dead now. Definitely." Eterna shrugged nonchalantly.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

There was a soft sloshing sound, as a bedraggled looking Mr Abramczyk hauled himself out of the cold water. His expression was truely frightening as he turned to stare murderously at the water. Even though he was soaked through to the skin, his anger made the water evaporate off his skin, to the point of turning to steam in some places.

"I need... a bomb. A very.... very big bomb." he said through grinding teeth.

 

[Mick]

Michael was walking tiredly through the hallways trying to find his next class. Not that he figured it was worth it. The dark clad youth was looking through his maps and notes in a poor attempt to find his way to the right room. For some reason Michael could not even gather the energy or willpower to really concentrate on reading his notes.

Of course it really didn't help that he lost most of his notes when the students engaged in a massive blitz to get into the building earlier in the morning. Not that Michael thought it would make a difference either way. The young man was sure the whole school day was going to be pointless no matter what he did.

Michael had been wandering the hallways since school started still unable to find the right room. It didn't seem to help that every time he looked to see if the room number matched the ones in his notes he couldn't find a single number to match what he was given by the schools administrators.

None of the other students seemed to notice him walking down the hallways. The few that passed his way earlier seemed more concerned with the sounds of fighting some distance away. Not that Michael cared whether they were there or not.

"No one can help me.. not that they ever try..." Michael muttered to himself as he continued his rather slow pointless trek through the hallways.

 

[Zenithos]

"Thank you!" Abramczyk-sensei wheezed, grabbing the bag full of magical grenades a shell-shocked AMM just happened to be carrying. "Eat this you sodden rust-eaten junk-heap!" He shouted, pulling the pins out of two of the topmost grenades before tossing the entire bag up at EW.

"And what's a bag of A-grade magical grenades supposed to do against that thing?" Eterna asked, shielding her eyes against the intense light from the time/space storm's fallout.

"At least it's something!" Abramczyk-sensei shouted over the wail of the storm.

"It got sucked up into the eye of the storm!" AMM shouted, shielding his face.

"The normality field..." Epsilon nodded. "Well, that's that."

A splash, though almost imperceptible amidst the scream of the storm, somehow reached their ears. They all looked around just in time to see Reimaru hoist herself out of a hole in the ice. She only said one word. "Duck"

Nobody needed telling twice.

The normality field above them exploded outwards, engulfing them all in a bright white light.

"Hmm...a bit cliche, but it works." Eterna noted. "Now I guess there'll be that usual 'whoosh' sound that comes with temporal displacements?"

BLAARRP...

"Unexpected, but it works..." Eterna shrugged.

Complete darkness....

Silence....before...

"....Eterna, shut up. Just shut up." AMM said. "Now, somebody find the light switch."

"Before that, can someone find the floor? We're still in free fall..."

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Finally finding the door to the room he was looking for, Michael, for the first time in months, suddenly decided that perhaps the proverbial piece of toast doesn't always fall on its proverbial buttered side. But fate, as usual, as Michael was about to find, was just being cute. Upon turning the door knob, he found himself...

"Pitch black darkness..." He sighed. "Why am I not surprised?" He looked around, searching for the light switch. But off course, it wasn't anywhere near the door. "Figures...now all I have to wait for is for something to fall on me out of nowhere..."

SMASH...

"Hey, we landed on something soft..." Eterna said.

"I thought we'd return to the ice rink..." AMM commented, upon looking about their landing point.

"How do you know? It's bloody pitch black in here." Abramczyk-sensei's voice echoed through the darkness.

"Well, since we're already overdue for the next plot point, I'm guessing the author decided to just make use of the temporal/spatial displacement and port us straight to the...." Zeni started.

"Zeni?! I thought you were dead!" Eterna shouted.

"No such luck. Now....what was the soft thing we landed on?" Zeni asked. "Though I'm pretty sure we're now at the club sign-ups room, or somewhere nearby, due to the usual narrative imperatives."

"Well, it might be me, for starters..." AMM said. "Not that I'm complaining, mind you. But it would be great if you all would get off me. Sometime today would be nice, no sarcasm intended."

"Indeed..." A voice came from way below.

"Who's that?" Eterna asked.

"Michael, but you wouldn't care who I am."

"...."

A few moments of silence before....

Zeni finally ventured...

"Marvin....is that you?"

 

[Mick]

"Oh yes because Obviously no-one else could possibly be so miserable. I mean, it's not like anyone else could be having such a rotten time." Michael replied bitterly as he lay there amongst the dog pile.

" Um.." Zeni tried to reply before Michael cut her off.

"I've only been wandering this miserable school for hours looking for a class that's probably dreadful anyway. Never mind the fact I'm in a dog pile and no one's bothered to help me up. Not that I'd expect them to anyway, isn't like they care." Michael continued to talk.

"But.." Abramczyk-sensei tried to say only for Michael to interrupt again.

" Not a single student even tried to ask me where I was going. Not that I'm surprised. Why should I expect them to bother anyway? Feeling so depressed... especially with all this terrible pain in all the nerves down my left side." Michael continued to complain.

 

[Epsilon]

'Must not turn Michael... Marvin... whatever into a Sheep...' Epsilon could feel himself twitching as the youth continued to ramble on about how he is the universe's bitch.

Come to think of it, wouldn't people like Shinji Ikari and Ranma Saotome fit that title better? And then there's that wondering coward, Norin the Wary who constantly had bad things happen to him when the multiverse still existed as the multiverse before the fusion of planes occurred.

The pile of bodies eventually untangled themselves and Epsilon quickly dusted himself off. As he started to feel a bit cleaner, he was quickly approached by two young men.

"So what the hell are we going to do about the Grail War anyway?" asked Legacy.

"Grail War? Aw, hell... why do I have to get sucked into such things?" moaned Michael as he paused from his ramblings for a brief moment.

 

[Unknown-common-827]

Unknown never saw the aftermath of the grenades being used. He only felt weightlessness and a sense of falling.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH", he said as he was falling at good speeds towards some idea of a floor.

Unfortunately, the others had moved and he only ended up eating tile. Unbeknownst to him, Legacy was right behind and after 30 seconds of finally adjusting himself and getting the kinks worked through... *CRASH*... He was pinned under the Flamehead.

"He-help" said Unknown as the others just looked on in a semi-comedic fashion as this Michael or Marvin or Mackeral or whatever-the-hell-his-name-is continued his ramblings on how he's the universe's bitch.

Finally, David grabbed Legacy and moved him off of Unknown. Cracking his back, the Capitals Fan got up very gingerly.

"Ouch, that wasn't fun" said the blonde boy.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

"Damn straight..." muttered Mister Abramczyk, as he lifted his wrist.

Oh, perfect! Just ruddy perfect!" he grumbled, shaking his wrist a few times. "My bloomin' watch has stopped!"

 

[Mick]

Michael reads through his Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy on the subject of the Holy Grail. He somehow has a more disgusted look on his face then previously thought possible.

"Holy Grail....just great. Won't be surprised when some idiot drags me in expecting me to fight for this wretched thing for them. As if they'd know what to do with it anyway.." Michael muttered under his breath.

After Michael settled himself he began checking through his papers until he pulled out one paper in particular.

" Not that it's worth asking but...." Michael says as he looks down at his paper, " ..Do any of you know where I can find a...Kakashi Hatake? I'm supposed to be seeing him soon but I can't find the room number."

 

[Unknown-common-827]

"Kakashi Hatake? I think he's left down the hall, hang the required right and his room is 5 doors down from the corner", Said Unknown who was still adjusting his back from the impact with the floor and the subsquential landing of Legacy on his back.

 

[Zenithos]

A shadow suddenly blotted out the single shaft of light streaming in from the open doorway.

"Found You..." A voice, low, yet loud, filled with ill intent, filled the darkness.

AMM shrieked with pure horror.

"Ah...that explains why we were teleported here." Zeni nodded with understanding.

"Indeed. Suzumiya Haruhi." Mereo-sensei said, watching as the young brunette marched into the room, straight for the dog-pile.

"What's wrong, Aaron?" Eterna asked, watching as AMM slowly crawled away while simultaneously doing his best to look inexistent, a feat that he was failing quite extravagantly at, partly because of his size and build, but mostly because his sudden movement caused the entire dog pile to crumble in his direction, stopping any further attempts at escape on his part.

"EEEP...don't let her get me!" AMM screamed, watching as Haruhi quickly closed the distance between them.

"Rest in peace...." Eterna sighed, making a cross.

"Indeed." Zeni nodded, from his position on top of AMM.

 

[Mick]

Michael watched the proceedings as he rubbed his left side slowly all though he knew it wouldn't fix whatever may be causing the pain.

He then continued to try to put his notes in order as he jotted down the directions he was given. Michael then finally got back up again and climbed away from the pile trying not to draw too much attention to himself.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Mr Abramczyk stood, and walked up to stand between Haruhi and the others.

"If you've come to recruit for your club, Miss Haruhi, I'm afraid I've already signed all these people up for various groups." he stated. Knowing that someone was bound to make comment, he put his hands behind his back, and made a series of hand signals that said, Play along.

 

[Epsilon]

One of Zeni's eyes started to twitch as both he and Epsilon shared the same thought for a brief moment. 'Is he mad?!? Once someone like Suzumiya Haruhi makes up her mind, there's virtually nothing that can stop her!'

The surrounding air started to cool in response to the cold stare that the Sleeping Goddess was giving Abramczyk. "I beg your pardon?"

He knew that he was tampering with something dangerous but he also knew that he would need these soldiers to commit their time to useful endeavours that can change the shape of the future. As he briefly exhaled, he could have sworn for a moment that his breath turned into white vapour. "If I may brutally honest, Suzumiya..."

A part of Zeni got down on his knees and started to pray. 'Our father who art in heaven...'

"... you're looking for students who are extraordinary to join your Brigade if I heard correctly. Do any of these students look extraordinary to you?"

The cold atmosphere dissipated as the girl gave it some thought. If you want to get technical, she did recruit a few people in the group such as Epsilon already. It was also at that moment that Eterna did her best to hide her katana to avoid unwanted attention.

 

[Legacy|iB]

"...Do any of these students look extraordinary to you?"

Legacy stepped forward and put a hand on Abramcyzk's shoulder.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold the phone here, how can I not look extraordinary?" the Flames fan said, with a noticable aura of arrogence in his tone.

The others in the hall looked at Legacy in disbelief. Abramcyzk shot a glare at him that instantly struck fear into the Flames fan's heart. For a single moment, Legacy felt like he was on the receiving end of Darryl Sutter's annoyance when he used to coach the Flames - certain hell on Earth, really.

"No...I am not extraordinary..." Legacy corrected in a slow, calculated tone of voice as he backed off.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Mr Abramczyk nodded slowly, and turned, fixing Suzumiya one of his most terrifying gazes. It was whispered by some students that Mr Abramczyk was an avatar of some ancient god of war, that when you looked deep into his eyes, you could hear the sounds of battle ringing in your ears: The roar of cannons, the screams of dying horses, the pitiful sounds of wounded soldiers crying for their mothers.

"Is there anything else, Suzumiya-san?" he asked. Miss Campbell shivered. That single sentence had had the dangerous undertones of a fixed line of machine guns being loaded.

 

[Mick]

" Nothing worth anything here at all." Michael spoke up bitterly. He certainly didn't believe there was anything worthwhile in this room.

All the traveling he spent searching for this particular room and he found nothing. No teachers, no club sign ups, not a bloody thing. Some Person's certainly found him though, painfully in fact. Not that Michael was expecting nothing but a miserable time out of the whole ordeal.

Of course looking at Susumiya after Legacy spoke up, Michael believed she might not share the same point of view.

 

[lethum]

Unseen by most of the students, a tiny sewing needle flew between the people in the room and struck a fly in the room, sticking it to the floor.

Mr Abramczyk's left eye twitched. There was only one person in the whole academy who went around hunting flies, and he knew exactly who it was. He smiled as a plan began to form in his head.

Meanwhile, a masked shadow entered from the airduct...