I decided that I need a Tifa/Vincent fic. I'm not sure how long this was going to be because instead of just jumping to where I needed to be I decided to go back a little. I promise I'll finish this one, unlike my SephTi fics. Anywho read and review. Rated for some language in this chapter. Smut will be here by late chapter two.

Ah the disclaimer: As much as I wish I did, I do not own anything about Final Fantasy. That is all the property of SquareSoft/Enix. I've only put these two characters together for my own degenerate pleasures.

"We must find a mate," screamed a demonic voice. The feral snarl that followed echoed off the insides of his skull, crippling the demon's host. "We've been dormant inside this box for too many decades."

"I must atone for our sins, besides we aren't animals," the man insides the box whispered to the voice inside his head.

"Speak for yourself, I'm getting us out of this fucking box Valentine," the demon promised. Vincent Valentine was the man imprisoned inside the box for nearly thirty years. He had laid his body to rest after countless tortures. Alone he was to repent for his sins, his failures to the woman he loved and her child. At least he thought that he was alone. Early in his confinement he found that he had a group of voices that would whisper through his mind. At first he had thought that he was truly going mad, but the voices explained to him that he was now their host. They had used to be creatures inside of various summon materia and had been transplanted into his body. It had to have been Hojo. At some point, in the midst of all the heinous tortures that the madman had put Vincent through, he had found time to bind the souls of the materia to Valentine as well. Always the four other being that inhabited Vincent's body had raged against him, trying to break free from both other their prisons. They wanted out of Vincent's body and out of the rough made coffin. They wanted freedom to roam the land; but were denied because Vincent's body was still under his control.

"I will stop you, as I have before," Vincent Valentine reminded Chaos, the most powerful of the four. What Vincent did not realize was that Chaos had more power than he had let on. Chaos could send it's consciousness out of Vincent's body to roam the landscape surround Nibelheim. The only shortcoming of this power was that if Vincent was to remain ignorant of it, the demon had to find the mind of a sleeping creature to lurk in. He had tried to influence the strange people that Shinra had planted in the rebuilt Nibelheim, but they feared the Shinra Mansion far too much to venture inside. The demon needed someone fearless, to open the coffin that Vincent had locked them all in for the past three decades. The need for escape was particularly strong now that Chaos' biological clock had begun ticking. The demon needed to procreate, the desire was all consuming. It was so powerful, that on that night, Chaos did not care if Vincent found out about his power to project his consciousness.

As he had many times before, Chaos launched himself from Vincent's mind, quickly searching for someone new in the area. He needed someone to set them free and he found just what he was looking for. A small group of strange people, they were camped just outside of the town. All of the men were awake and talking about something. Their minds were so focused on their discussion that there was no easy way for Chaos to sneak in. A little bit from their camp walked a woman, she was alone and seemed to be growing tired with each sluggish step she took. She was his chance and with any luck, she would be a suitable mate as well. Chaos pressed forward, forcing his way into her mind. He was taken aback by the world that he had jumped into. Everything was covered in flames. Buildings, people, an entire town burning to the ground around her. Then there was a flash and teal eyes, then searing pain and nothing. Sadness and despair ate away at the emptiness. This woman's mind was a mess, but he did not have to make sense of her, just get her to that basement.

"Why do we have to come back here," the woman muttered under her breath. "There's going to be nothing there, we're not going to get any answers. Fucking Sephiroth burned the whole town to the ground. I'm sorry Papa." Chaos listened to her words, trying to find a way. Apparently she was a survivor of the towns destruction. Little did she know that the whole town had been rebuilt as if nothing had ever happened. It appeared that he did not have much convincing to do. She and her group were already on their way to Nibelheim, it would take a little coaxing but he would convince her to stop at the Shinra Mansion.

"We came back for answers and closure," the demon whispered through her mind, doing his best to emulate the tone of her voice. "This is where it might have all began, we might be able to find a way to end it here."

"There's nothing there Tifa, just ashes, not even graves," she snapped to empty night around her, fighting with the voice inside her head. She had assumed that the voice was her own.

"We won't know until we get there. The worst that could happen is that I'm right but what if there IS something there? We can't just skip over it."

"You've gotta stop arguing with yourself, Tifa," she grumbled conceding that the voice inside her head had a point. "Oh well, I guess I'll just head back to camp for the night," she said turning around and heading back to the others. Chaos followed with her for a few moments, noticing that there were others who were asleep. He could have easily chosen from them but apparently he liked something about the short woman named Tifa.

"I thought you said that this place burned to the ground," Yuffie blurted out staring at the very-much-not-burnt-down town of Nibelheim. Tifa had been there for it, she had received burns from the flames as she had tried to helped her Master Zangan rescue people from the flames. She had seen Sephiroth spreading the flames. True, she had been pretty much dead before seeing the entire town reduced to ash, but there was no way to put the fire out. She was the only survivor that she knew about, but before her stood her hometown, unscathed. It was not possible.

" 'Dis don' make no goddamn sense," Barrett bellowed looking around the small town. "One'na ya'lls gotta by lyin' an' try'na take me fo' a fuckin' foo' an' I doubt 'dat it's Tifa cuz she ain't got no reason ta lie ta me. So jus' what in hell's goin' on here?"

"Excuse me," Tifa asked tapping a passerby on the shoulder. The man stopped and smiled at Tifa. "This town burned to the ground seven years ago, what happened?"

"I've lived her my whole life and this town has never had any disaster like that, it's not nice of you to say those things," the man scolded.

"I grew up here too and I don't remember you and I know for a fact that Nibelheim was destroyed; I was here when it happened," Tifa snapped back. As she continued to look around, something struck her as odd. Everything in Nibelheim was exactly as she remembered. The town should have been somewhat different had it been rebuilt. Every detail she remembered about her hometown was there. No one other than she and Cloud were still alive to remember what the town had looked like before it had been burned down. No, what she was looking at was an exact replica of the Nibelheim that had burned down. "This isn't possible," she whispered turning around.

"It's Nibelheim," Cloud responded, sounding confused. He remembered the town burning down just as vividly as Tifa.

"It's not Nibelheim, it's a cheap copy. It was rebuilt exactly the way it used to be. Hell, I bet they even carved all the names on the water tower," Tifa snarled. The only thing that would possibly still be original is the old Shinra mansion. If it was the some, then perhaps it would hold some answers.

"It had to be those fucking Shinra!" Yuffie shouted. She had only recently joined the party in their endeavor to save the world. "Those bastards turned Wutai into a tourist attraction, I'm sure they can rebuild a town to show only what they wanted to be shown."

"I 'member dat' there weren't any stories 'bout Sephiroth goin' fuckin' crazy and killin' a whole town, I jess' always thought you was a runaway, Teef," Barrett said. "But 'dis sounds jess' like them assholes, coverin' up something big, jess' to save their sorry asses."

"Well, let's split up and see what we can find," Cloud said, taking on the responsibility of leader. While he explained the plan, Tifa let her mind wander.

"I should probably take the Shinra Mansion," her mind whispered to her. While Tifa had thought that it was her own original thought, she was wrong. Chaos had spent the night and day wandering in and out of her mind. He needed her to come to the basement of the Shinra Mansion and free Vincent's body. Vincent did not plan on leaving that coffin until he was set free. With any luck, Valentine would stay true to his word.

"I'm going to take the Shinra Mansion. It might be the only original building in this town and my memory is better than yours," Tifa volunteered before wandering away from the group and to the crumbling structure. "There had better be something here or else coming here was just a waste of time." Before she reached the building, she stopped just before the path that led up the mountains. "Don't worry Papa, I'll kill all those Shinra bastards," she whispered to the last spot where she had seen her father, where she had held him as he bled to death in her arms. Without anything else to say, Tifa entered the Shinra Mansion.

The building was not as familiar as she had thought that it was, but she had only been inside once and that was when she and a few of the other kids in town had snuck in late at night. They had all been small children, so her memory was starting to fade. Still she had navigated the dank and dusty corridors, used the messages written in invisible ink, and had made it down to the basement, where the floor plans said the archives were located. There were few mutant bats who had made the basement their home, but they were defeated easily enough. Soon Tifa was faced with the choice of two unmarked doors. One led to the Shinra archives, the other led to an unspecified room. Tifa thought a moment, not that it mattered as she would end up searching through both rooms.

"Going left has never failed before," the voice in her brain informed her. (A bit of videogame advice if ever lost, go forward one screen, right for two, forward, then left. Always save going left for last.)

"Shit, I've gotta stop doing that or else I'm really going to lose it," Tifa verbally scolded herself.

"Wake up Vincent, it's time to f inally greet the brand new day," Chaos whispered through Vincent's mind. Vincent suppressed a small groan while lying utterly still in the darkness. He did not know what Chaos was talking about, but he really did hate the demon for disturbing his slumber. Gilian Beast only rose to demand food, but was quieted easily. Death Gigas and Hell Masker had very few complaints or issues, mainly they wanted freedom to kill; but, they were always quieted easily. Chaos was the only one of the four who seemed to be sentient.

"What are you talking about?" Vincent mumbled.

"Hello?" a female voice called in the room. So apparently Vincent was no longer alone, well there was another human present. Also, she had heard him talking to himself in the coffin. He cursed both the demon and the habit that he had formed while taking his extended respite from reality. Talking to himself was one way Vincent proved his superiority over the demons in his body. They could speak through his mind, but only he could use his mouth for speech. But who could be outside his coffin. No one had been in the Mansion for at least seven years. Something had happened several years ago and then something else soon after, but Vincent had not cared enough to leave his coffin and find out what.

"This isn't the library Tifa, you should probably just go," she muttered to herself. She was sure that she had heard something, someone's voice. Her eyes settled on the coffin that was on the table in the center of the room. Should she open it? What could possible be have been in there? A skeleton? The lib was covered with a thick layer of dust as if it had not been disturbed in years, decades even. What did she have to lose, it was not like she had never seen a dead body or skeleton before. Tifa placed her hands on the lid and pushed with all her might. After a few seconds of struggling the top finally began to shift.

"This is not good," Vincent thought as he screwed his eyes shut to protect them from the light flooding into his prison. Perhaps if he laid perfectly still, this female would believe that he was dead. For all intents and purposes he was dead to the world. Thirty years he had been absent from the world, most of the people he had once known were either dead or too old to remember him. The rest believed that he was dead as the official report said.

"She smell fucking amazing," hissed Chaos. Reminding Vincent that the demon was still swamped by the need to mate. This would be a tricky situation as he had never had to control the demon around others, nor out in the open. "Open your eyes and see what she looks like, we all want to know."

"No, she'll just think that I'm dead and move on."

"You're too well preserved to be dead, that and you're breathing."

"Who are you?" Tifa marveled at the perfectly preserved corpse laying before her. His skin still looked smooth and perfect, lips still full and kissable. The only thing that was wrong with him was that he was too pale to still be alive. His skin was almost translucent in it paleness, which was a stark contrast to the shock of black hair that was tied back with a red headband. If he weren't dead, Tifa would have dared to say that he was fuckable... but …. he was dead? She leaned her face in closer to the man. She would have sworn that she saw his chest rise and fall as if he had taken a breath. After a few seconds of careful examination she could not make a definite call on it so to be totally sure she pulled out a small mirror from her bag.

"This always works on tv," she muttered holding the mirror in front of his slightly parted lips. Sure enough in a few seconds the mirror fogged up. Tifa screamed in shock and backed away towards the door. "Holy shit! He's fucking alive, what the fuck is going on here?"

Vincent had no choice but to give up on his charade of death. Slowly he opened his eyes, but remained laying down. How to calm down the nearly hysterical woman clawing at a door that she could not function enough to open. Even when he had been "alive" he had been a Turk and they were never known for providing comfort, a quick or painful death, yes, but never comfort.

"Who the fuck are you, what the fuck are you?" Tifa continued to shout.

"I can answer one question but the other, I doubt that you'd want to know," Vincent rasped out. Even with the occasion whisper in his coffin his voice was still rough from disuse. "My name is Vincent Valentine."

"So you're in a coffin and you talk. I really, really, really hope I got hit with a sleep spell and this is all some crazy dream. I'm dying for a bat to attack me so I can wake up," she laughed, giving up hope on opening the door.

"I believe that I am the only one who has been having a nightmare. And yes, I am in a coffin and I can talk," Vincent continued, keeping any emotion from his voice. That was not difficult, as years away from humanity, with only his demons and despair as company had eliminated the inflection from his voice.

"So you're Vincent Valentine and you're dead?"

"Apparently not, I had begun to think otherwise. Now if you'll leave me, I'll return to my sleep," he said.

"You're not dead and you're sleeping in a coffin?" Tifa had only been driven even more mad with each small detail she learned about the man Vincent Valentine. "You're name is Vincent Valentine and you're in a fucking coffin, in the basement of the Shinra Mansion and you're sleeping down here. How long have you been sleeping here Vincent Valentine?"

"I do not know, it has all seemed to be one long night," he responded, half truthfully. Vincent knew many years had passed since he was last out of his coffin. "I began my slumber in 1981."

"You're joking me, you've gotta be," Tifa all but shouted, finding no humor. "One of us had gone completely mad. You're trying to tell me that you've been in that fucking box for thirty years? You'd have starved to death."

"It's a long story."

"Wait, I've gotta tell the others about you," she said digging around in her pocket for her PHS. If Vincent was not crazy and really had been in a coffin for thirty years: A, he had to be a vampire which meant she was still in some potential danger and needed back up; or, B, he would have some useful information about what happened to Nibelheim and the others needed to hear that information. Vincent, realizing that this woman was not going to allow him to go back to his nightmares slowly sat up. Using muscles that he had almost forgot that he had. Gingerly he swung his legs over the edge of his coffin and sat up straight, cracking bones that had grown stiff from disuse.

"You never did tell me you name, miss."

"Tifa, Tifa Lockheart," she muttered while waiting for Cloud to pick up his phone.

The others had rushed to the Shinra Mansion, following Tifa's directions. They all met Vincent, who had remained seated in his coffin waiting patiently. Once all the initial questions had been asked and answered the group asked Vincent to explain exactly how and why he was in the coffin. Vincent was chose to tell them the entire story of Lucrecia, Hojo, Sephiroth, and the experimentation that he had endured. It was after those events that he had been left in Nibelheim and when he had crawled into the coffin to mourn his loss and repent for his sins. He refused to allow himself death while the evils he had failed to stop still wandered the planet. Vincent was growing annoyed with the endless torrent of questions and comments. Chaos, on the other hand, found the whole situation amusing but reserved the majority of his attention for Tifa. There were two other women with the group but they did not seem to attract the demon the way that Tifa did.

"How's sleeping in a box, supposed to be repentance," Aries asked gently. "Shouldn't you try to stop it now? Just cause you failed all those years ago is no reason to give up hope."

"Basically, you have the same goal as the rest of us. We want to stop Sephiroth," Cloud added. "So you should come with us."

"Yes, let's go with her," Chaos all but begged. "She's the choice we have for a mate right now. Everything about her screams it: those huge tits, wide hips, and bouncy butt."

"Stop being vulgar, she is a lady," Vincent mentally scolded the demon, but his gaze did fall on Tifa. She was still looking a bit wild eyed, but she had found a corpse and now her friends were trying to get said corpse to join their cause.

"I've never known a lady to dress like that, everything about her screams fuck me." Chaos' sentiment was echoed by a chorus of growls/howls from the three other demons in Vincent's mind. He did his best to quiet them all so that he could answer the blonde boy who had offered him a spot in their group.

"I must decline," Vincent said moving to lay back down. That had been his plan anyway, dismiss the group and return to his slumber.

"You can be a fucking coward and lay in that coffin under the world ends, which it just might," Tifa snapped. "Or you can prove just how sorry you are and how much you want to repent by trying to right the wrongs of the past." Vincent froze at being called a coward. While Vincent the man knew that she was not trying to challenge him to a fight, Vincent the man who shared his mind with demons did not see it that way. He saw Tifa as calling him out, damaging his pride and hurting him. When an animal is hurt it lashes out and fights back.

"You call me the coward, yet you're standing as far away from me as you can get miss Lockheart," he snarled. "What are you afraid of?"

"I'm scared of a lot of things: the dark, bridges, heights, being buried alive, owls, and ladybugs kinda freak me out. I wouldn't add you to that list cause I don't fear cowards, don't have a reason to," she responded taking a step towards him.

"She isn't submissive either, I'm going to have fun making her my mate," Chaos cooed.

"Very well, if you wish me to join you, I shall," Vincent deadpanned, not wanting to be what Tifa accused him of. Chaos laughed, after so many years he would finally be free and he would have a mate.

It had been a week since Vincent had joined Tifa and her entourage and he had all but kept quiet. It unnerved the group a little that their newest addition only said about five words on average. Even in battle Vincent was calm and quiet; monsters found it difficult to touch him before he put a number of well placed shots in their skulls. Vincent was a killer and an efficient one. Tifa knew the difference between people who killed because of survival and people who killed as a profession or hobby. Life in the slums had taught her the difference. Vincent was a professional, which left few options for the life he could have lived before sleeping in a coffin for three decades. Curiosity was killing her, she had to know more about the stereotypical mysterious gunman.

"Hey Vincent, you wanna take late watch with me," she asked him one night when the group was setting up camp. Usually, Tifa was stuck with Yuffie as she was the only one who could put up with the hyperactive teen. This would be her chance to talk with him and find out just how well, if at all, he fit the stereotype. It made her a little nervous, but she still had odd dreams about finding him in that coffin. As was his usual response, Vincent only nodded his consent. What Tifa did not know, was that Vincent was only quiet because he was afraid of blurting out something that would send her running for the hills. Chaos was a constant presence in his mind and the demon refused to leave him alone about Tifa.

The mating call had only gotten stronger with Vincent's new-found freedom and he was afraid what Chaos could force him to do when around Tifa. So why had he agreed to take the late watch with her? Simple, he had not wanted to, but Chaos had one that small battle. While Vincent had been distracted with cleaning his guns and thinking about the past, Tifa had popped her question. Chaos had forced Vincent to nod and he had been stuck. He would just have to suffer and distance himself from her as much as possible. That would be difficult as Tifa was the mother hen of the group always checking up on the others, making sure they were both physically and mentally okay.

"She would take good care of our offspring," Chaos cooed. The demon had become fixated on Tifa, thinking of little else.

"She's a fighter, not a mother, not a mate. She's too strong to want to be anything else," Vincent responded trying dissuade the demon. "She is a woman with a mission and besides she loves Cloud."

"She does not belong to him. She will be mine," Chaos responded with absolute certainty. Vincent had no idea just how the demon could be so sure, but it bothered him. Chaos was not necessarily a dishonest monster. The only other time that the creature had sounded so sure was when he had promised Vincent that he would finally leave his coffin. As Vincent had dreaded night had come and it was time for him to take his watch shift with Tifa. There was not much to it, just sit by the fire and listen to the night. He hoped that he would be able to pass the night in silence, but Tifa had other plans. This was finally her chance to talk to Vincent and see if she could get him to talk back. To say that she only had a few questions for him would have been a gross understatement. From what he had told them, he was a former Turk, Sephiroth was some how his fault, and Hojo had used him as a lab rat.

"Vincent," she began as they sat by the fire, Vincent unmoving and Tifa using a long stick to poke at the flames. "Why were you in that coffin?"

"To repent," was all that he offered as an answer. Vincent was not having a fun time at all. Chaos had been using his senses to drowned him in the scent and sight of Tifa. He did not turn to stare at her, but his peripheral vision was filled with her dark brown hair and expressive red eyes.

"You told us that much, but if you don't want to say more than that it's okay. Also, uummm...," she paused before her next question. There was no correct way to phrase it and she had been wondering about it since he had left the Shinra Mansion with them. "You were down there for thirty years right?" When she received no response, she chose to press on. "So you were there when Sephiroth was there?"

"Yes."

"Well, that's just it. You could have helped, you were there couldn't you have? You could have tried to stop him," Tifa muttered darkly. This had not been the avenue she had planned on traveling. She had wanted to know more about Vincent the person, not about the worst night of her life. (Do they ever address this in the game, it's been years since I last played?)

"Another of my long list of sins," he told her turning to look at her. Vincent took a deep breath, another mistake as it filled his sensitive nostrils with the fresh scent Tifa. He could smell the sweat and dirt on her body, signs of tough day full of walk. But underneath that she could smell the pure scent of woman and it drove him mad. Chaos was not the only one who had gone decades without mating.

"I'm not blaming you," she said sounding defensive. He had not accused her of that, but she had. "I'm just curious. But I guess you wouldn't have known exactly what was going on until it was too late, none of us did. And in it was in your best interest to stay there. I guess that makes you, me, and Cloud the only survivors. Are you from Nibelheim?"

"No." She was not going to let him sit there in peace and try to not ravage her. Sunrise was hours away.

"I might throw a mean punch but-" her sentence was cut short by a sound off in the woods. Vincent rose without a sound and began walking off in the direction of the noise. It had been a simple rustling, but on such a quiet and still night, it was out of place. Tifa had to jog to keep up with his long strides, but she remained at his side, tightening her gloves. The two were ready to fight, but what they came across caused them to pause. Four wolf pups were huddled around their mother, who lay dead on her side. No doubt she had died trying to protect them and now all the little pups could do was huddle close to her. Tifa's heart broke as she moved slowly towards the pups. Vincent moved in front of her, stopping her forward progress.

"Whatever killed this wolf could still be nearby," he said, looking around the clearing.

"Well you look for it, but I just can't leave them here," she said roughly pushing Vincent aside, causing him to stumble just a little. He had not expected her to be that strong, which was ridiculous as he had seen her fight. "I know what it's like. Poor little guys."

"I told you she'd do well to take care of offspring," Chaos taunted. He watched Tifa gather the scared pups in her arms, talking softly to them. Vincent unholstered his gun and checked the area for whatever had killed the she-wolf. When he found nothing he returned to Tifa who was still holding the pups.

"Leave them, we have to get back to camp and can't take them with us," he commanded, a poor choice as Tifa glared daggers at him.

"I'm not leaving them to die, whatever killed their mother will be back for them," she snarled at Vincent.

"It's the way of the wild."

"Well, fuck you and your natural selection laws. I'm not going to let them lay here and die," she continued to hiss at Vincent and speak gently to her pups. "Seven years ago, someone had the choice of letting me die or taking me to get help. I'm here today because of them. Haven't you ever heard of leave no man behind." With the four pups cradled carefully in her arms, Tifa rose and brushed past Vincent on her way back to the camp. She would get the pups some of her rations and water, then she would fashion something to carry them with until they were big enough to walk long distances on their own. It possibly was not a good idea, but seeing the pups lying there beside their dead mother, too young to take care of themselves reminded her of herself. Master Zangan had saved her life and set her up in Midgar, without him caring for her she would have died.

"Fiery," Chaos muttered as Vincent turned to follow Tifa back to the camp site. "We'll let her have her way for now, but that's going to end soon enough."

"I doubt you'll be able to conquer her spirit and you don't seem to be in that big of a hurry to do it," Vincent responded.

"I've waited this long for a mate as good as her, what's a little longer to make sure that there's no escape for her," Chaos laughed.

"You adopted wolves? So what you and Vincent are like their new mommy and daddy," Yuffie chirped grinning from ear to ear as she played with one of the puppies. The rest of the group laughed, they could never imagine Vincent as the loving yet stern father. He groaned internally but kept walking. His place was at the back of the pack, as most of them seemed to forget that he was there if he kept a slow enough pace. That was his logical reason for staying back there, part of knew that there was another reason as well. It put him at the perfect spot to watch Tifa, the way her hips swayed and her butt jiggled. It was the small pleasure that he allowed himself. He could watch her without anyone noticing. Today that was spoiled as Tifa fell further behind the group than usual as she carried all four pups in a sling across her front. The restless creature were constantly trying to climb out or over her shoulder. Vincent had thought that her fighting would be hindered, but he realized that Tifa had fashioned the sling with enough cushioning that she could drop it to the ground without hurting the baby wolves. After a battle it was only a matter of seconds before she scooped up her litter and was on her way.

"Heya, Vincent," her voice brought him out of his mind and back to reality. "I'm sorry for snapping at you last night. I try to not be that mean, but I just couldn't let these little guys out there."

"As she should be," Chaos huffed, using Vincent's sense to revel in the sight and smell of Tifa. The demon wished for more control so that he could reach out and touch the voluptuous female.

"Don't worry about it," Vincent muttered waving a dismissive hand.

"So we never did get back to talking last night," she began with a large smile. "Where are you from?"

"Wutai."

"I've never been there, but Yuffie has and says it's a beautiful place and that we should go there sometime. What do you think? We could see the house that you lived in!" Tifa chirped excited to have gotten Vincent to answer two questions in a row.

"Go if you want," was his only reply. Truth be told his parents were most likely dead and he never had any real friends there. While Vincent was tossed back into his memory, thinking about his childhood, Chaos was free to at least use the gunman's voice.

"I'd much rather hear about you Tifa, tell me something that no one else knows about you," Chaos prodded, leaving Vincent to dwell on the past.

"What? No you wouldn't," she said incredulously, laughing.

"How is it that you came to be in Midgar and involved in all of this," the demon asked.

"It's a long story really," Tifa said looking down and petting a few of the wolf pups who had decided that it was time for a nap. She would have to let the down to use the bathroom soon. "And not really worth telling. You already heard about what happened in Nibelheim and my martial arts teacher was the one who found me at the reactor. He took me to Midgar and tried to use cures on me the whole way. Nothing would work, so he found a doctor to patch me up. I just stayed in Midgar and opened up my bar. It was called Tifa's 7th Heaven."

"Was called?"

"It's gone now," Tifa said frowning. Her bar was gone along Jesse, Biggs, Wedge, and all the others from sector 7. For only being twenty years old, she had lost a great deal. The only people she had left in the world were walking in front of her, everyone else was dead. Well, Zangan might still have been alive but he never stayed in one place for long, so tracking him down would have proven to be impossible. Chaos heard the pain in her voice, the sorrow. He was confused as she quickly shook the depression and smiled up at him. "But that's all in the past."

"Yes, it is," Vincent said, using his own voice after wrestling Chaos to the back of his mind. The demon was taking advantage of Vincent reverie. He had to make sure that he was more careful. Chaos would exploit any holes in the mental wall Vincent had constructed to keep the demon away. Tifa noticed the chance. Vincent's voice had gone back to being cold and aloof. She had to adjust her tactics if she wanted to get anywhere else with him.

"What's your favorite food?" Tifa asked. Vincent was shocked at the strength that Tifa displayed. She had gone from talking about her troubled past, to asking him a mundane question in a matter of seconds. She hid her pain well. Had he and Chaos not witnessed it first hand, he would have sworn that she had never been upset. Not even a hint of sorrow remind in her eyes.

"It has been some time since I last indulged in good food."

"I'd assumed that considering you were stuck in a box for thirty years," she laughed. Before any further conversation could continue a particularly nasty monster appeared before the group. As she had before, Tifa left her pups tucked away in a bush and rushed into battle, Vincent at her heels with his gun drawn. Even in battle he caught himself watching the way she moved and fought. Tifa was slowly becoming a sort of obsession. The monster had called for help and was viciously attacking. With only her fists for weapons, Tifa had to be the closest to the group of monsters, making her the first they would attack. After swinging one giant arm at her, Tifa was caught off guard and sent flying backwards to crash into a nearby tree. Her body crumpled from the impact and shock.

Chaos raged inside Vincent's mind. It wanted the creature dead for harming his mate. The other demons echoed Chaos' wrath. Vincent could not control all of them at once and dropped to his knees screaming. His bones cracked, popped, broke, and reformed. Purple hair flowed from the pores on his skin and he transformed. What rose from the crumpled pile was Gilian Beast, the most animalistic of the four demons. The purple demon roared and charged into the fight, tearing apart the creatures that had harmed Tifa. Gilian wanted to avenge his mate and quickly ended the battle. The rest of the group was at a loss for what to do. They knew that the purple beast had once been Vincent Valentine, but whether the beast knew that or not was a different story. The demon did not seem willing to attack an of them, so they let it wander around confused for a minute before making a bee-line to Tifa. She was struggling to sit up and understand what happened to Vincent. She had seen his transformation, but was unsure of what to make of it. Gilian Beast moved slowly to Tifa, sniffing the air around her.

"V-Vincent," Tifa stammered trying to understand. While the purple creature did not look like it had much of a brain, Tifa could see an intelligent look in its eyes. The look that it was giving her was half Vincent, half concerned parent. Gilian continued to inch closer to Tifa until he was only a tiny distance from her face, sniffing and looking for injury. The others just watched with horror. There was no way they could attack the creature if it decided to hurt Tifa. Gilian let out a low whine as it saw the blood that trickled down Tifa's arm.

"Hey, it's okay, I've had worse," Tifa reassured the creature crouched over her. With a slow tentative hand she brushed her fingers over its purple fur. "What are you?" she asked softly. Apparently the creature was okay with Tifa's condition as it backed away and let out a painful roar. Again the horrid sight of bones break, popping, and reshaping was heard as the purple fur fell away and horns disappeared. Before the group lay Vincent Valentine, looking much as he had before the transformation. His clothing was a little worse for wear, but it was still there. He knelt, taking shallow breaths, trying to recover from something he had never experienced.

"What the fuck was that fucking crazy shit," Cid Highwind hollered lighting up another cigarette.