Note: FFVII and characters are copyright Square Soft, Inc.
Reunion
He had to return. There was no way he could avoid that little voice in the back of his mind that reminded him that one day, he would have to return. Regardless of how painful it might be, no matter how much he wanted to just ignore the annoying, nagging little voice in the back of his mind, he knew that his return to the place where his life had literally gone up in smoke was unavoidable.
"Nibelheim..."
Vincent whipered this simple word as he drove his rental car into the small town. The sun was just startiong to set, shedding its last rays of light onto the rooftops of the old, quaint buildings that sat in Nibelheim. Although the day was vanishing into night, the town was none the less bustling as it had been in the daylight hours (due in part to the fact that it was a Friday evening: the most popular time for people to flock to the town's bar or pub). A tiny smile flickered on his face as he beheld this sight, but it completely vanished as his wandering eyes fell apon the the ShinRa mansion. In earlier days, it had been Nibelheim's status symbol. It had also been where so many things had happened, including the alteration of his body as he then knew it.
The other thing... Vincent had dismissed it as a painful memory, and he tried to ignore it at all costs. However, the memory was like that tiny voice in his head that reminded him of his duty to return to Nibelheim: completely restless and unavoidable. That memory... a memory of the days that had been so wonderful, but had become equally fateful at the end.
Lucrecia. The woman that had and still did been in his mind, and had devoted his heart to. She had been the victim of an experiment made totally without concern for the guinea pig herself. That experiment... had made her the mother of Sephiroth himself, and left Lucrecia with what she considered her greatest sin.
With a heavy sigh, Vincent parked his car by the heavy black gates of the ShinRa mansion. He would spend the night in this abandoned haunt of a house even if he had to kill off a few monsters in the process (but he truly hoped that they had all vanished). This... the mansion... was the reason he came here, and he couldn't have it any other way.
As Vincent grabbed his overnight bag from the backseat of his car, he thought further into the subject of great sins. Lucrecia believed hers had been the fact that she had allowed herself to be part of Professor Hojo's experiment un-human experiment, and not being able to be a "mother" to the result of the experiment: Sephiroth. Even as the years passed, Vincent's sin rested heavily on his dark heart: his knowlege that he had let the experiment continue. There were things he could have done about it. He could have taken Lucrecia, killed Hojo... anything to stop the unethical experiment. But no, he hadn't done anything, as he then held the belief that as long as Lucrecia was satisfied with what she was doing, he could not interfere.
"What a mistake," he murmured as he walked up to the massive double doors of the mansion and pushed them open. Through the years of the mansion's vacancy, nobody had bothered to lock it up. Perhaps the city council had been frightened of even going beyond the gates of the "haunted" building.
Vincent wasn't at the least bit frightened as he walked through the mansion, keeping a semi-wary eye out for monsters. This was more of a place full of painful memories than a ghost's haunt. Even the ghosts probably don't like the mood of this place.
He climbed the stairs to the upper floor. Upon meeting the upper door, he took the right hallway to find his way to a group of bedrooms. Taking the door straight in front of him, he entered a large room that contained an armoire, a huge bookcase stuffed to the gills with old, dusty books, an armchair that had stuffing falling out of it, and a large bed. A window to the right of the bed filled the room with early moonlight and an ancient floor lamp occupied the space by the bed. Finally, Vincent's crimson eyes fell upon a heavy door that led to the basement and library below. He shivered briefly at the thought of what lay in the crypt beneath the house, but he made his best effort to shove that thought out of his mind.
After opening the window to let the cool night air to enter the musty room, Vincent took his sleeping bag and put it on the bed. He lay down upon it and stared out the window. From his position, he could see the Nibel Mountains, with their snowy, jagged peaks reaching high up to the deep starlight sky in all of their nighttime glory. With a small smile, Vincent thought about how much the mountains reminded him of Lucrecia: tall, dark, yet at the same time beautiful. At the same time, his heart ached at the very thought of his beloved.
How he wished that he could see her once again. Maybe he could hold her in his arms as he once did and tell her that everyone had, at one time or another, had committed sins and that the sin could be forgiven by the one it affected... that his thoughts of her were in no way affected by his sins. He wished that he could reassure Lucrecia that she still held his heart, and that his love for her was as strong as it had been all those long years ago.
"I could never do that," he whispered to himself as sleep slowly started to fall over him. "Lucrecia was in that cave, and when I was last there, she was nowhere to be found. She was gone, and I will never be able to find her." As he recounted this bitterly upsetting realization, he let out a deep breath and turned onto his side. His eyelids instantly felt heavy, and bit by bit, he fell into a dark void of sleep.
***
An odd noise gently awoke Vincent from his deep slumber. At first, it just barely took him from his sleep; he only heard it. Soon, however, he awoke fully to the sound.
It struck Vincent as ethereal and light first, but gradually, it became heavier and almost insane. After a moment, Vincent realized that the "noise" cam from the grand piano located downstairs. "But who is playing it" he whispered. It didn't take long until he felt thoroughly creeped out be the entire situation.
"I don't want to, but I'm going downstairs to evaluate the situation," Vincent told himself firmly after pondering for a few moments about what to do. He swung his feet over the edge of the bed and walked out of the room. While walking through the hallway and down the stairs, he never gave another thought about what -or who- may be downstairs playing the piano. Any snippet of a thought along those lines was shoved out of Vincent's mind before he could thoroughly consider it.
At last, Vincent reached the entryway of the room where the piano was located. With no hesitation, Vincent entered the room and his eyes fell upon the piano. Sitting before the piano was a woman . Pale moonlight from a nearby window poured over her slim, robe-clad figure. Her long, dark reddish-brown hair fell freely to her waist and her intent dark eyes stared at the piano's keyboard as her fingers flew across the ivory keys. Once in a while, her eyes would wander. When they looked over at the door and took in the sight of the tall man dressed in black, with his odd crimson eyes on her, she hit a wrong note and stopped.
All the while, Vincent believed that his eyes were playing games with his mind.
Before him sat Lucrecia.
"Vincent?" Her voice let Vincent know that the sight before him was reality.
Speechlessly, he walked over to the piano. All the while, he felt Lucrecia's eyes upon him When he came closer, Lucrecia shook her head, half in disbelief. Softly yet hurriedly, she started to speak.
"Why are you here, Vincent? When I came up from the basement, I saw you asleep... and I was utterly shocked. Please tell me why you came."
"Why are you here?" Vincent inquired in return. "Isn't this place enough of a reminder of the things you experienced all those years ago? This is about the last place you would ever want to be, isn't it, Lucrecia? As for why I'm here... I just had this intensely nagging feeling that I had to return here for a while."
"I... I understand. It's a long story in my case." Slowly, Lucrecia got to her feet and pulled her robe even more tightly around her body. Her dark brown eyes on her pale, unaged face once again met those red of Vincent's. "But I really don't want to see you, Vincent," she breathed. "You... and I... know that my sins are too great for either of us to handle. It's a wonderous thing that I have been able to survive this long without completely losing my sanity due to those sins that lie apon my mind to this moment. That's why I yelled at you back at the cave. I didn't think I could handle myself..." Suddenly, she became lost in her words.
The heart-spoken, quiet words struck Vincent directly in the heart. Where he felt so dark before, he felt a bit of the burden lift. With no hesitation, Vincent took one of Lucrecia's cold and trembling hands within his and held it firmly yet gently.
He pulled Lucrecia's body towards him. As Vincent did this, Lucreica remained utterly silent, yet her eyes never left his.
"You know, " Vincent whispered softly into Lucrecia's ear. "Those sins that are so heavy apon you don't have to remain as a burden. You can always forgive yourself for allowing yourself to do the experiment.."When Lucrecia began to protest, Vincent set one of his hands upon her face, therefore silencing her. "Only in your eyes, your sins are so horrible. If it's any consolation to you, I never let those things that you hate yourself for get in the way of my feelings for you. You still have full possession of my heart."
Vincent heard Lucrecia take in a sharp breath. She was silent except for the sound of her letting the breath out slowly. For a moment, nobody moved a bit. The two stood, with Lucrecia in Vincent's tight embrace. The moment of complete and utter stillness ended when Vincent took Lucrecia's left hand and caressed it. His fingers touched the coolness of metal on her ring finger. At the instant of touching the ring, Vincent's heart probably skipped a beat.
"You... you still wear.."
"The engagement ring. Yes. As for why... I never was able to rid myself of anything that reminded me even a bit of you," Lucreica murmured in a voice barely above a whisper. "I could rid myself of fake love... the so-called "love" that Hojo "gave" me. All it was for that freak was a mere issue of work. But I remembered that you are the only one who ever really loved me."
"How would you like it if I said tI loved you with all my heart and soul... just the way I did when I proposed to you?"
"You don't have to. But, let's have it as it was on that very night... remember?"
He did remember. Vincent was sable to recall the night of his proposal to Lucrecia as if it were yesterday and not years ago. Also, he shared in Lucrecia's wish for the moment to be just as it had been on that night.
Sins were forgotten for a moment. Every single unclean memory erased themselves from both Lucrecia and Vincent's minds completely. In fact, all one thought about was the other, finally within their grasp And the couple stood as Vincent bent over slightly to lay a kiss on Lucrecia's lips... just as he had longed to ever since the day he was awakened from his frightful sleep. In turn, Lucrecia relished it; not hesitating as she had when Hojo had once so forcefully made the same moves upon her.
All from the past was relinquished... only to make an empty void for this long-awaited moment and the things yet to occupy its dark reaches.