Hi guys

Hi guys! Its started, finally! Third in my lil' Reno/Aeris trilogy (Unusual couple, but hey, its called "originality") I highly recommend reading the first two books, (The Flow of the Lifestream and Sacrifices of the Heart) or at least the second one. Anyways…new character is introduced…sorry about the lack of name, but that'll come in later…and without further ado (I always wanted to say that!), on to…

Relinquishing the Past

Lila

Prologue

"Oh, breathe not his name! let it

Sleep in the shade,

Where cold and unhonored his relics are laid."

~Thomas Moore

"So this is all that's left," the young man observed. He was a callous-looking sort of person, with icy blue eyes and dull brown hair that fell into them. His face had a bored look to it, like he had seen too much of the world already for any more of it to interest him. But there was something else in those worldly blue eyes; something sly and shrewd and calculating. He knew what he wanted, how to get it, and had no qualms about getting it. That was the kind of person he was.

Now he flicked his hair out of his eyes and turned to a subordinate, one of his guards, standing beside him. "And Hojo's dead?"

They were standing in the middle of a demolished laboratory. Machines, a lab table, and other equipment filled the room, but that wasn't what interested the man. He was interested solely in something else.

The guard nodded. "Yes, sir. They found his body up in the junkyard. Someone shot him."

He pondered. Hojo had been important, but he could get by without him. Not an object for major concern. "Probably AVALANCHE. Dispose of it." He meant the body.

The guard saluted. "At once, sir." He grabbed the rope hanging from above and scaled it.

He went back to what he was doing before; studying a clear vial filled with murky liquid. Submerged inside the liquid was the gruesome, decapitated head of an alien species: Jenova.

"Fascinating," he said softly. "So much power and destruction…all attained with this?" He frowned. "But how do I wake it up? Hojo thought some sort of energy source would do it…" Hojo had also made it clear the energy source would have to be vast. Hojo was never wrong. But he had no materials whatsoever to work with, he had barely been able to get together this pathetic little team of followers…close a year, it had taken, just to get this far. How much longer would he have to wait?

His frown turned into a smile. No matter. He could wait, if need be. If he had nothing else, he had patience. A minor setback, nothing more. Things would work his way. They always had.

It was then the guard returned. "Sir, the rest of the men said they found something."

He scowled in annoyance. He had posted the rest of his minor squad to guard him, not to be looking for buried treasure. "What is it?"

"I have it right here, sir." The uniformed man held out a small, perfectly round white crystal. "It looks like materia, but of a kind I've never seen before."

He grabbed it out of his underling's hand. "It couldn't be," he murmured, turning it over in his fingers. "Is it…the White Materia?"

The pure white of the orb flickered for a moment, changing to black, to white, to black again.

"What's it doing, sir?" The guard asked, forgetting his place.

"Reacting," he breathed. He glanced at the glass beaker that held Jenova's head and smiled mirthlessly. "This may be exactly what I need."

"Sir?"

"Where did you get this?!" he demanded. "Where did you find it?"

"By the helicopter wreck, sir. In the junkyard."

"Of course," he whispered. "The Ancient…" His grimace of a smile grew wider. "Here is my energy source." He stepped closer to the beaker and held the orb immediately in front of it. The materia flickered again, from white to black, and this time stayed black. Inside the tank, the head of Jenova shuddered. The wide open mouth twisted into a grotesque smile.

The guard, scared out of his wits, back away, hitting the lab table. Then, with a cry of terror, he turned and ran down the demolished hallway.

The first man, however, stayed. He waited, his deep blue eyes triumphant.

There was a flash of brilliant white light. Then, high, cold, cruel laughter.