Disclaimer: I do not own anything. I'm just having some fun with it.

Warnings: I have a feeling this is just going to keep growing so YAOI! The rest you'll find out along the way.

Vincent stirred in his sleep; his skin was tingling as if it was numb. A red eye opened and the tingling stopped, he made a soft sound indistinguishable by any ears. "Chaos, what are you up to?" His body was still under his control and he couldn't feel the press of the demons on his consciousness, there wasn't even a response it was so 'quiet' within the gunner's mind.

He was glad for their luck to find enough rooms available at the Inn because him waking up in the middle of the night to talk to himself would confuse and probably worry his companions. Shifting onto his side, Vincent just let his clawed arm hang off the bed in case he rolled back in his sleep. So long within a coffin had seemed to leave its mark on his body and he had woken up more than once with claw marks from his shifting onto his back in the night.

---

"Oi, Vince! Wake the fuck up! We were s'pose to be out a' here an 'our ago," Vincent's eyes tightened at the gruff voice. Cid threw open the door, inviting himself in without any warning (seeing as how he always thought yelling was enough of one, but that was a captain for you) "Vince, get yer scrawny pale ass up! We're outa here!"

"Give me a minute to get dressed," Vincent grumbled, as he finally opened his eyes. Cid was staring at him with enormous sky blue eyes. "What's wrong? Did Chaos open his wings?" Vincent asked. Cid was use to his sometimes waking up with a few 'aspects' of his demons. It was their way of telling him they could have taken over while he slept, just to make him worry about his companions for the next few days. Demons were such mindfucks sometimes.

"Not unless he grew fluffy ears…" Cid said a smile twitched at his lips. He coughed into his hand, "I'll let you get dressed."

Vincent blinked, Cid never left something alone once he had a grip on it. "Fluffy ears?" Red eyes rolled, Cid had to be jerking him with that line. Galian must have changed his ears or something. Damn dog always did the smallest change, just so he had no idea what it was until Yuffie started throwing some form of fangirl fit and try to pet his highlighted hair or something…

As he headed toward the bathroom he grumbled at the still silent demons, wondering how the hell they could be so quiet and still have changed something of his physical appearance. He got his answer when he looked up at his reflection, they couldn't have… "Uh?" Red eyes kept scanning over the mirror, looking for any clue that it was somehow tricked into showing this odd image.

The red eyes narrowed, if this was a prank, he was going to end up killing the one responsible. The red and black cat ears centered on his head started folding back the harsher his expression became. The red streaks running through his usually pitch black hair matched the ears perfectly. A low growling started in his chest, sounding more like a tiger's than Galian's usual sound. "What the fuck is going on!?!" He honestly couldn't keep the cursing question from flying out of his mouth.

"Vince, everything okay?" Cid suddenly appeared in the bathroom doorway, "Woe." That was all the pilot had said, he was actually speechless when he saw the half dressed Valentine growling at the mirror. Long blood red stripes were running up his naked back, curling around to the front of his body. But what rendered him speechless was the slim pitch colored tail with the same blood strips twitching angrily just above the floor, it trailed up to merge into the gunner's spine. "Uh… Vin, you might wanna look," the struggling pilot could only point down at the twitching tail. When red eyes looked to settle on the suddenly still appendage a scream was masked by the roaring of an angry cat.

"This is absolutely absurd!" Vincent was still ranting, angrily ranting, and Cid was rather surprised at some of the things he'd heard fly out of the officially –call the record books- pissed off beyond all caring gunner's mouth. Cid back peddled himself into a wall as the gunner stalked out of the room, looking ready to shoot anyone who dared even smile at him.

"Vince," Cid risked. Red eyes seemed to glow even brighter as they centered on him. "You might wanna calm down just a little. Your tail," Cid was trying not to laugh, really he was, but damned if the image of that tail pointing at the ceiling with its fur standing on end didn't remind of a scared kitten after it was barked at. "Don't kill me, I can't help," Cid started laughing, not the slip into a chuckle or even a bust out type but an all out, clutching gut, falling to the floor unable to do anything else except laugh uncontrollably.

Vincent snapped out of his Galian-like rage to blink at the still laughing pilot, completely unaware of his tail relaxing to drop down to the floor. He hissed when his furry tail touched the floor for the first time, he blinked when it instantly lifted up to keep itself off the cold surface. "This really is real?"

Cid was trying to shake himself out of his hysteric laughing to brush a tear from his eye, "Seems so… What ya gonna do about it?"

"I don't know…" Vincent said, his tone made Cid smirk softly; he was back to his normal self, at least in mindset.

"Well, I see one thing you can decide on whether or not to wear your cape. I don't think you can with the way you hold your…. tail." Cid started slipping into an odd chuckle/giggle and Vincent knew; one, he was right, two, he was going to get much worse from the rest when they saw him, and three, No he couldn't kill the laughing pilot or anyone else that was going to be laughing about it.

"You're right, I can't," Vincent's ears shifted as he sighed, Cid watched as the space between the ears grew, the gunner was sad. A small smirk was hidden when he put the unlit cig to his lips, at least the stoic gunner would be easier to read now.

"Hey Vincent, you kill Cid or something? We heard Galian, or we think it was Galian," Cloud's voice was heard from the hall; the smart boy was keeping distance until he found out which of Vincent's demons were awake.

"I'm alright ya o' fearless leader! Glad I was worth looking in on so long after ya heard that," Cid grumbled as he moved away from the wall. "Do you want me to warn them or do you just wanna go out there?"

"I'll be fine, let me get my stuff and I'll be out in a minute. Please lock the door when you leave," Vincent was already heading back into the bathroom to retrieve the rest of his forgotten clothes.

"Sure, Vince," Cid lit his cigarette after he was out of the room; habit from sharing rooms with the gunner had him not smoking around him.

"Everything okay?" Cloud asked the unharmed pilot.

"Yeah, Vince's just having a weird morning. He'll be out in a minute."

Vincent stared into the odd reflection's red cat eyes, he couldn't even think of a logical cause for this… change. Galian Beast was canine, Chaos was just a bat-like demon, Hellmasker and Death Gigas were both composed of human parts. Nothing made sense. He blinked when he felt his tail twitch, FELT it twitch. Now that he realized and acknowledged it, it seemed his mind was waking up to the new limb. "I swear if someone grabs it, I'm going to shoot them."

"Vince, ya comin' out?"

Vincent flinched at Cid's voice, "Yeah." He slid his cloak over his arm and gulped before he pushed open the room door.

Cloud was the only one in the hall with Cid, okay that was good. Cloud would be calm about it; the young boy might even give a logic possibility as to why he was like this. The Mako blue eyes were widening as the boy looked him over, "Vincent… What the hell happened?"

Logical question, too bad no one knew the answer. "I woke up like this," was all he said even as he felt his ears shifting, he felt them pulling away from each other as what little hope he allowed himself started fading completely.

"Hey Vince, we'll get ya back to normal. No sweat!" Cid slammed a hand on the sad gunner's shoulder, the dark ears perked up as the man was pulled out of his thoughts. Cloud's eyes narrowed questioningly as Cid led the gunned out of the Inn; he got a 'sh'ing gesture over the gunner's shoulder as an answer.