Rumors of Rebels 6

There were many things three months of intensive training taught a person, one of those things was a person's own limit and in SOLDIER you also learned to hide those limits. The SOLDIER cadets stood at attention on the field for yet another test of their skills this one would be survival training. Angeal looked over the twenty cadets and nodded ot himself.

"Cadets for the next two weeks you will be separated into squads of five. I have already decided your squads and squad leaders for each one. " He separated them out into the four squads. Riku, Sora, Roxas, Axel and Amarant were in the second squad with Riku as captain.

The groups stood together as they had been assigned and followed their commander out to the trucks that would take them out to the area they would be using for this test. The chosen area was close the Midgard swamp.

"Each team must make it back to Midgard within three weeks, the whole squad must make it, even if one of your dies you drag their corpse with you. You have twenty high potions ten phoenix downs, twelve remedies and five antidotes for each Squad. You get points for these items though I won't tell you what. I will see those of you who pass in three weeks." Angeal got back in the truck and drove away leaving them and their supplies.

There were a few grumblers and they looked through the supplies and separated out into their squads.

"Hope you kids can sleep with out your night lights," one of the older squad members joked.

"We'll be fine." Roxas smirked.

"Just get back to the city in one piece kids." another man said as his team walked off into the trees.

"You too." Axel called after them as the five of them headed off on their own.

Riku smirked as the first of the elephant like monsters burned to ash. He liked materia spells, they were useful.

"Riku stop smiling it's scary." Roxas told him as he cast a cure on Sora who had gotten kicked in the stomach by the weird bird thing that had accompanied the elphadunk.

"Sorry I enjoyed that."

"I noticed."

"Hey Axel anything interesting?" Roxas asked.

"Well I'll tell you one thing I don't want to know where the hi-potion or ether came from." the red head answered holding up the two bottles he found in the monster's place.

"No one ever does." Amamrant agreed.

"Looks like we're close to the chocobo ranch guys we could see if picking up a Chocobo counts as survival."

"No we'd do better on foot it should only take another week to reach Kalm and from there only a day or two to Midgard."

"What if we hug the mountains." Sora asked. "Shouldn't that cut a little time off of the journey."

"It might but there are tougher fiends in the mountains that we might not be able to handle we have good skills but there are rumors of behemoths in the mountains."

"Oh."

"What about just the foot hills behemoths prefer colder weather then the foothills would provide."

"Maybe." he looked at the others. "Okay what do you guys want to do?"

"The foothills might cut our time down and help out our experience in battle."

"There is the possibility of fiends we can't deal with but we do have phoenix downs we've picked up from a few monsters."

"We might be better keeping closer to the shore the fiends there are more familiar to what we are used to dealing with and we barley handled the elphadunk we just beat"

"The foothills."

"All right the foothills it is."

They made it to the foothills with only a few more fights and camped out at the base of them. Watches were set and they slept. The next morning they climbed into the foothills. They were covered with scrub brush and a tiny stream meandered along from the peaks.

"If it wasn't for the fact we were out here for training this would be a pleasant walk." Axel commented.

"Yeah." Sora commented and smirked checking the heft on his sword.

They moved quietly Riku leading the way and Axel taking up the rear. Another day week passed and they ran upon a strange sight. A camp In the middle of nowhere, it looked deserted from a distance but Roxas slipped ahead to check it out.

The camp looked old but the tents were not that worn there were also signs of people being there recently. In one tent he found a scrap of cloth similar to the kind used in their uniforms. He crept out of camp and returned to where his team was to find them in the middle of a fight with men dressed familiarly.

"Lighting!" he called and lightning came down striking a few of the men.

One man turned to attack him and was punched in the head by Amarant who's chosen weapons were battle gloves. Riku and Sora were back to back with their swords and Axel was blocking a man with both his fire materia and Chakrams.

The men seemed to be more careful with them like they were trying to capture not kill the group which worked out for them since they would rather kill the man and get them out of their way.

"Roxas keep an eye on your back man."

"Right you too Axel."

None of them expected the flash of green and the sudden groggy feeling as a spell knocked them out.

The sound of loud conversation woke Riku from the spell-induced slumber. He had never been hit with Sleepel before and was still groggy. He tested the ropes holding his hands and feet finding them impossible to undo right then.

"What did the boss want us to do with the brats?"

"Get rid of most of them the only one he wanted was the blond.

"The one brunette looks like the blond kid though."

"Orders are orders throw em to Betsy."

"Yes sir."

Riku frowned and tried to struggle then stilled as he heard their captors come closer. The men grabbed them up except for Riku and Roxas it took two to grab Amarant and they were hauled into a nearby cave and dumped into a tunnel, the men left.

Sora woke up in a very uncomfortable position. He was tied hand and foot and thrown on a hard rocky surface. From the sound of it at least one other person was with him. He tried to move and touch the person accidentally kicking them, though this got a response.

"What?" he could hear Axel.

"We got caught I guess but I have no idea where we are it's too dark and kinda cold."

"That can be fixed." there was a flash and a small flame burned in Axel's palm. Sora could see Amarant in front of him still out like a light. There was a smell like something was burning and Axel sat up having used the fire in his hand to burn his ropes he did the same for Sora. Once he got the feeling back in his legs he moved slowly to slap Amarant and wake him up then burned his ropes.

"Well we are in a cave." He reported.

"Great we could be any where in the mountains at this point."

"It gets worse." Amarant muttered. "We are in a behemoth lair."

"How can you tell?"

"The smell."

"It does kinda smell like your dad." Axel joked.

"What does Amarant's dad have to do with this?"

"You'll have to meet him."

"If we can get out of here before we get eaten."

"Right."

"We need to find the way out first, according to our survival instructor the easiest way out of a cave is to find a breeze."

"Right whose hair will move the most?"

"Everyone looked at Axel."

"Right having the longest and not gravity defying." He groaned and stood still waiting for the telltale breeze. It finally came from the left and they moved to follow it sticking close to Axel's flame. They stopped a few feet down when an odd sound filled the cave. It was a low grunting noise that made the hairs on the back of Sora's neck stand up. It was not a friendly sound and it froze them in their tracks.

"Behemoth." Amarant said simply.

"Behind us." Axel whispered and turned to see a large purple thing behind them snuffling around their last location. Yellow claws seemed to glow in the fire light and it's dark eyes reflected the light. It looked up at them and snuffed once. The three ran as it came toward them.

Riku tried to move hoping that the spell had completely worn off. It had but his hands and legs were still tied together. Rolling over he saw Roxas still out on the floor nearby they knew who he was of course and must have mistaken Riku for his brother. Where had they taken the others though? Had they really fed them to a behemoth? He hoped not Sora was his best friend and the others were his squad his father had told him to take care of them as if they were his own family.

"Roxas wake up." He growled, kicking at him.

"Nuh." Tired blue eyes looked at him and he frowned. "Riku what happened?"

"No clue but this is getting annoying already. You should call me Miki though."

"Why?"

"They don't know Miki has a brother they probably think I'm him."

"Oh." Roxas nodded. "They would the idiots. But what about the others."

"I don't know I think I heard something about feeding them to a Betsy."

"Damn I think our score will drop if we let them eat our squad."

"Yeah I think so."

Their captors finally showed themselves a tall dark man who looked like he had lived through the last war. He sneered at the youths.

"SOLDEIRs, abominations all of you nothing more than genetic experiments by those monsters."

He kicked at Riku who moved out of the way.

"At least we don't try to kill teenagers and people who have nothing to do with an old grudge."

"Nothing?" he barked. "You are the spawn of that man who is nothing more than a lap dog to the shin-ra"

"My father is no lap dog!" Riku yelled "He's the greatest SOLDIER ever to live he has led the army for over twenty years."

"The puppy has quite a bark then." The man walked over and picked Riku up. "The boss said you were a brat we should just get rid of curs like you but the boss has other plans."

Riku spat at the man who dropped him to the ground. "Brat."

"It's better then you deserve." Roxas growled.

"Quiet you before both of you join your friends with the behemoth."

"Behemoths?"

"Yes they should be done eating your squad any time now."

As the man spoke there was a loud roar and screaming the man looked out of the tent and went pale. Outside in the camp was being torn apart by a large behemoth being led by a smaller red behemoth which was bring ridden by a red head and a brunette who both looked green. The smaller one ran strait for the man and knocked him over stepping on him just enough to hold him down, as it's riders slid off. Sora ran for the tent to free his brother and best friend as Axel smirked down at the man.

"Well looks like you guys bit off way more than you could chew."

"Get off me you monsters deserve to die."

"Right sure we're monsters you ambushed us and tried to feed me and the kid to a behemoth." Axel smirked. "If he moves squash him big guy I'm gonna check on the kids."

His only answer was a snort as he went into the tent.

Sora had already untied both of them and was helping his brother get circulation back in his legs.

"Axel you're alive."

"Yeah guess it takes more than a maternal feeling behemoth to kill us."

"Maternal?" Riku asked.

"Yeah apparently she thought Amarant was her kid or something guess Hojo's not that bad in his genetic manipulation."

"Great now to find our weapons and materia and deal with this little problem then get home before our time limit expires."

"Yes sir." Axel left to find them.

"Are you guys okay?" Sora asked.

"Fine but my ribs hurt."

"He kicked Roxas pretty hard and I think he broke my wrist." Riku told Sora.

"Great." The younger teen ripped off part of his uniform shirt and bound Riku's wrist as tight as he could. "This should hold until we can get a Cura on it."

"Thank you Sora."

"Of course." He grinned and helped Roxas to bind his ribs as well.

Axel finally got back carrying their weapons and a few extra things.

"Amarant and Betsy have torn the place apart he has all the people cowering in a tent and the boss in his mouth should we take them in?"

"We should you know it would look really good if we took care of a group of rebels for our fathers." Roxas said with a smirk.

"It would I bet we'd pass."

"There are more important things than passing you know."

"Not really if we can't prove we can do this Dad'll never let us be SOLDEIR"

"Fein let's collect the fools and take them to Midgard." Axel grabbed the rope s and left leading the others to the spot. Amarant was waiting for them the ten men left were trussed up like birds for the spit. Betsy was nowhere in sight.

"She went home and these men are ready to go."

"Where's the leader?" Riku asked.

"Over there Sir."

"Thank you Amarant I'll handle him make them move we need to drag this garbage home. My father will want words with them."

"Yes sir." He saluted and went to help the others prepare as Riku approached the leader of the group.

"So who's the cur now?" he smiled. "I will let my father know of your words and I am sure he'll wish to speak with you." He told the man and turned as Sora and Roxas approached with ropes.

"Lockheart, strife keep an eye on him we'll get them moving shortly."

"Yes sir, Damon found a chocobo cart and we've been loading the men up on that." Sora told him.

"Good we'll get this man there too."

Finally they were on their way the boys riding a few chocobos as Axel drove the cart. They were a few days out and were making very good time with the cart and birds. A few miles out of Midgard they were stopped by a patrol of SOLDIERS led by Zack.

"Hey kids what do you guys have here?" he asked seeing that it was Riku's squad.

"Rebels they captured us but we turned the tables on them." Riku reported.

"Good to hear there has been a lot of trouble from them in the city." He said looking at the men in the cart. "Nice job you guys got home in time and brought rebels one would think you were shooting for your dad's job kid."

"I am." Riku smiled.

The troops escorted the prisoners in as well as the squad itself. They passed through the slums and dragged them to the base. Angeal and one other squad were waiting for them at the practice field along with Riku's father. The two men were talking as the group approached them.

"Father." Riku saluted.

"Very good Riku you not only passed the survival part of the exam but the five of you brought in some dangerous criminals." He looked at the men still roped together. The leader was Sleeped and bound hand and foot.

"Thank you father." He said.

"As for all of you. You have passed this part of the exam and can go get some rest. the rest of this problem will be handled by the SOLDIERs." Angeal said nodding to the boys.

The two squads who had returned so far headed off to clean up and eat something. As soon as they got home Roxas was knocked over by Miki.

"Roxas you're back."

"Hello Miki." The blond smiled and stroked his hair gently.

"Hi guys." He said to Sora and Riku who simply smiled at him and Riku shook his head.

"Maybe you should let Roxas breathe little brother." Riku told him.

"I can breath but I would like to get up Miki."

"Oh sorry Roxas." Miki said sheepishly and got off of his stepbrother. "I made dinner and Azzy's watching Nami so I'm off right now."

"Great."

The four crashed in the livingroom to watch some TV. Calling to see if their friends were available got Hyne and Kairi over to join them and they proceeded to enjoy their evening.