Because I felt like it.

This is a series of not-drabbles, I guess, more like a short story focusing on the important-to-Vincent events of the original game. It's part-novelization, part expansion.

And part-I-just-wrote-it-becasue-I-love-Vincent.

I like Yuffie and Cait, so they get slightly bigger roles, and so does Cid.

Cloud and the rest of the group made their way down the creaking wooden steps of the basement. "Eeeugh….." Yuffie mumbled. "This place is SUPREME gross-ness…" Cloud snorted.

"Deal with it, Yuffie."

Tifa, sensing an impending argument between the ex-SOLDIER and the young ninja, interrupted. "Hey, Cloud? Are we going to find the man mentioned in the letter? You know, from upstairs?"

The blond shrugged. "I guess. We'll see what we find. It's not likely he's still alive, though."

Aeris frowned. "Do we even know where to look…?" Cloud turned and looked at her.

"Yeah, when I was here with Sephiroth, I remember seeing a locked door down here somewhere. That's probably where he is."

Tifa frowned slightly, but no one seemed to notice. After they reached the bottom of the stairs and entered the rocky basement, Cloud began to look for the door.

"Damn...! I know it was here somewhere…"

With its tinny little laugh, Cait pointed at a rotted wooden door. "There it is!" With a curt nod, Cloud headed to the door, Barret joining him. They both began to ram their shoulders into the door until it
simply fell apart. Cloud brushed himself off and walked in, the others following.

Yuffie shivered. "Yeeegh….this place is nastier than the rest of the house! Who'd put someone in here!" She glanced over towards the right-hand side of the room and squealed in shock. "OHMIGAWD! COFFINS!" She cried, and ran behind Barret. "This guy's a- a VAMPIRE! He's gotta be!"

Cloud rolled his eyes. "Yuffie, there's no such thing as vampires. You're old enough to know that."

The girl just gulped.

Aeris walked over to the center coffin; it was the only sealed one. "I think he's in here….." She said quietly. "I hear breathing."

Cloud walked over, and with one fluid motion, ripped the lid of the coffin off, scattering nails across the floor. The others slowly walked over to look inside, Yuffie still clinging to Barret.

Inside was a man, they'd known that already. But they hadn't been expecting a living, breathing one. The figure in the coffin looked like he'd simply fallen asleep a few moments ago, and they could see the rise and fall of his chest. He was sleeping.

Tifa whispered, "What a strange man…."

He was dressed in all black, save for a ragged red cloak and a worn-looking red bandana. His left arm was encased in a golden claw-like gauntlet, and he had a normal glove on his right. His most striking features, however, were his long, tangled black hair and deathly pale skin. Yuffie had just poked her head out from behind Barret, when his eyes opened suddenly.

His crimson eyes.

Yuffie let out a squeak, and pulled her head back.

"To wake me from this nightmare…..Who is it…?" He glanced around sleepily as he pulled himself to a sitting position. "…Never seen you before. You must go, now." His voice was hoarse and scratchy, as if he hadn't used it for years.

Cloud studied him for a moment, and then sighed. "It looked like you were having a nightmare."

Aeris pressed one hand to her mouth in concern. "What happened?"

The man shook his head slowly. "I have….nothing to say to strangers here. Again, please leave. This mansion is only….the beginning of a nightmare." He sighed softly.

Cloud snorted. "Tch. You can say that again."

The man looked up at him, confused. "What do you know…?" He asked hesitantly.

Cloud sighed. "Like you said, this mansion WAS the beginning of a nightmare….but-" He shook his head. "No, it wasn't a nightmare. It was real. Sephiroth…he found the secret here…he went insane."

The man's eyes widened and he shot to his feet, startling the girls. To Cloud's surprise, he was very tall and very thin. "Sephiroth!" He cried hoarsely, and then dissolved into coughs.

Cloud blinked. "You know Sephiroth?", they asked one another, once the man had recovered.

The man looked down. "You begin." Cloud nodded, and all was quiet as he repeated his story of death, fire, and insanity.

When he was finished, he looked at the man and gestured. "It's your turn."

"No." They all looked at the man, startled. "I…..cannot." His voice broke, and he began to lie back down. "I am sorry…."

Barret crossed his arms angrily. "Uh-uh. You ain't gonna just quit out on us like that, ya hear!"

The man took no notice. "Hearing your story…has added upon me yet another sin. More nightmares shall come to me now….more than I previously had. I apologize, but you must leave." With that, he began to close his eyes.

Cloud shrugged. "If that's the way you want it…." He said, and began to walk out. He didn't get very far, however. He hadn't gone two steps when he heard Aeris shout. "Oh no, you don't, mister!" He turned around. The Cetra was standing there with her arms crossed, glaring at the man in the coffin.

"You sit back up now! I don't know what happened to you, but you should be a little nicer! At least tell us your name!"

The man sat up once more, looking at her intently. "….If you insist….." He mumbled. "I….was with the Shinra Manufacturing Department in Administrative Research…..commonly known as the Turks." He sighed and continued. "My name is Vincent Valentine."

Cloud spun to look at him fully. "The Turks?" He cried, looking startled. "…Well, it did say so on the note…" Red grumbled, but no one took notice.

Vincent sighed again. "Formerly." He repeated. "No longer am I affiliated. And you…?" He asked, obviously just to be polite.

"Aeris Gainsborough, a flower girl from the Midgar slums and the last Cetra."

"Tifa Lockhart, bartender."

"Barret Wallace, leader 'a AVALANCHE."

"Nanaki- affectionately called Red- son of Cosmo Canyon warrior Seto."

"Y-Yuffie Kisa- Kisaragi…ninja of Wu-Wutai!"

"Cait Sith, a fortunetelling robot!"

"Cloud Strife. Ex-SOLDIER."

Vincent, who had been nodding mechanically for everyone else, looked at Cloud sharply when he spoke. "SOLDIER….You used to work for Shinra as well…?" When Cloud nodded, he asked hesitantly, "Did you….have you heard of a woman named Lucrecia?"

Cloud shook his head. "No, sorry. Who is she?"

Vincent looked away and then spoke, his voice oddly full of an unknown emotion. "Lucrecia…Sephiroth's mother."

"What!"

Stunned, Cloud asked, "Wait…wasn't JENOVA Sephiroth's mother?"

Vincent chuckled hoarsely, without humor. "No. You've been had, I'm afraid. Sephiroth's mother was a scientist who worked on the JENOVA project….." He looked down, adding softly, "The beautiful
Lucrecia…."

Aeris frowned sadly. "A….human experiment? How awful."

Vincent shook his head, still not looking up. "I…..was unable to stop the experiment. I could only…stand by and watch. That was my sin. I…I let the one I loved most in this world…face the worst alone." His shoulders shook softly. "This is my punishment."

Aeris and Tifa looked at each other sadly, Aeris's eyes filling with tears. "So you're going to stay here forever…?"

Vincent didn't look up. "Please go away." was all he said in a broken rasp, almost unable to be heard. "Leave me." With that, he lay back down.

Aeris sighed. "You won't come…?" No reply. Cloud shook his head. "C'mon, Aeris. He obviously doesn't want to be bothered. Let's go on."

With that, the team left the room.

I listened to the echoes of their footsteps leave down the basement corridor. How…could someone have found me here? How could I have let them wake me from my nightmares? I doubted the answer would come as quickly as sleep. I supposed I would never know.

But sleep did not come, as it usually did. I lay awake, bereft of my fitful slumber, staring at the pitch black room. Why…? I wondered. Why am I unable to sleep?

Unwillingly, my thoughts turned to the strangers. The one that stood out to me most was not the young, brash SOLDIER, nor was it the two intelligent felines. It was the young woman, the self-proclaimed 'flower girl', the Cetra. She….somehow, she…reminded me of Lucrecia. How odd… I frowned. The poor young thing. Shinra must want her. I have heard the same stories they have, and I am certain of it. She must be suffering- I sat up suddenly, shaking my head. Damn it all. Why am I thinking as if it concerns me….when I have nothing to do with it?

But I did, I realized. It was my fault. If I had stopped Hojo that day….saved Lucrecia….none of this would have happened. Shinra wouldn't be involved in this at all. Sephiroth would not be as he is now. And…if it is as they say, he would not be after that little group as well. After Aeris, the last Cetra. Against my will, my mind conjured up the image of the girl, dead by the hands of Sephiroth. No! Not again. I will not be powerless again; I will not stand by and watch again. If there is anything I can do to prevent what I have begun….I will try. I must try.

With that in mind, I stood up once more. At that moment, I had decided to go with them. Hmph. If I can walk, that is.

I stumbled across the room, painfully aware of my long years spent unmoving. As I stepped over the rotted and splintered wood of what had once been a door, a thought struck me. What if they have already departed…? I sighed, angry with myself for foolishly thinking I could join them. I was just about to give up hope and return to my slumber when I heard their voices coming back towards the stairs from the experimentation room.

Good. They are still here.

I took another breath of musty, stale air, and called out to them as they approached….

"Wait!"

They turned to look, surprised. Vincent was standing in the doorway of the coffin room, looking a little surprised as well.

"If I join you…is there a chance I will see Hojo?"

Cloud shrugged. "Probably. He DOES work for Shinra, and they're after us, so….yeah. Most likely."

Yuffie paled. "Whoa whoa whoa! Are we gonna let him join us, Cloud?" She yelped. Cloud gave her a dirty look, and then turned to Vincent. "So…you're coming?"

Vincent nodded. Lucrecia…. "Yes. As I am a former Turk, I may be of some use to you and your group."

Aeris smiled brightly. "Okay then!" She walked over to him and stood on her tiptoes, looking closely at his obscured face. "Nice to meet you, Vincent!" She giggled and took his un-gauntleted hand. "Come on! It should be morning about now, so we can just get going, right?" Cloud nodded.

The group plus one went up the stairs. As they reached the top, Aeris darted to the window. "Ooh, the sun is rising! How pretty!" She turned to look at Vincent. "Oh, I bet you haven't seen the sun rise in-" She tilted her head curiously. "How long have you been down there?"

Vincent's eyes widened, and he sighed. "I had no way of telling the time, Miss Aeris. Judging by the state of the rest of the mansion, however…I should say a decade or two, at the very least."

Aeris gasped. "Oh, my! That is a long time, isn't it…." She took his hand again and began to pull him towards the door. "Well, if you haven't seen the sun rise in THAT long, I'm gonna have to fix that!"

Before Vincent could protest, he had pulled him down the staircase and out the huge oak double doors.

"Ah!" He yelped in pain and closed his eyes tightly against the sudden brightness. After his eyes had adjusted, he opened them again slowly, and gasped at the sight. "It….is beautiful, isn't it? I had forgotten…" He said softly. He closed his eyes again and breathed in the clean mountain air, welcome after the musty, stale basement air he'd grown used to. "It's been so long since I….was outside."

Aeris giggled. "I can tell. You know, before I met Cloud and went on this journey; I'd never seen the sky before. I think I reacted the same as you, when I saw it." She looked over at him. "What made you decide to come?" She asked.

"I…I need to see this through. It was my fault all this happened, in a way, so….I want to help fix it."

Aeris nodded, seeming to know that it wasn't the whole truth, but accepting it anyways. At that point, the others had joined them outside, and Cloud pointed towards the mountains. "We go that way, towards Mt. Nibel."

The others nodded, and they set off.