Evan and his five soldiers hadn't even got out of Wall Market before the PHS rang.

"Yeah?"

"Who's this?" It was Reno's voice. He sounded...worried. Not frightened, but definitely unsettled. Evan gave his serial number and name.

"A Shinra soldier? Where are you?

"The edge of Wall Market."

"The brothel?" Now he sounded amused.

"No, the boutique." Evan answered dryly.

"On duty? Really? Well-never mind. Look, the plate's blocking my signal to HQ, could you forward a message? I've two concussed soldiers here, and it looks like one has broken legs and probably some ribs as well. The weird monsters that live here are getting excited by the smell of blood. I can deal with them, but I can't protect both soldiers, and the unhurt MP is really struggling. I need a-hang on a sec-" There was the distinctive sound of something being fried by a Mag-Rod, and Reno came back on the line.

"If I don't get a Med-Team down here fast, I'm gonna lose them. Can you get a signal from where you are?"

"No, but I will in about thirty seconds. Where are you?"

"A church in the sector five slums. They got barrels of water dropped on their heads from the rafters. The targets escaped through a hole in the roof, apparently made when one of them fell through it beforehand."

Fell through the roof in sector five...huh?

"Spiked blond hair? Mako eyes?"

"You know him?"

"He's AVALANCHE. Hang on, we'll be there."

Evan hung up. The soldiers with him had heard every word, and had started moving before he gave the order. Reno was a fairly popular figure among Shinra troops. He' didn't throw soldiers into meat grinders for no reason, he wasn't over zealous about his work, and had an amazing success rate even so. Enemies of Shinra beware! The day a sober Turk who takes his job seriously joins up, nothing will stand in Shinra's way!

In fact, there once had been such a specimen, but Hojo, in an act of idiocy unusually insane even for him, had apparently seized upon the chance to turn one of Shinra's more gifted employees against them. He'd turned Vincent into a test subject, raped his girlfriend, then injected them both with Jenova cells. Immediately after the birth of Hojo's child by Lucretia, she'd vanished, presumably by Hojo's hand. Vincent recovered, killed dozens of Hojo's best researchers, and shot the man himself fifteen times in the chest, before being overpowered by seven First Class SOLDIERS. He hadn't been seen since. Hojo survived by the skin of his teeth. Funding for the Jenova project had been slashed, so Hojo had financed the Sephiroth and Sephiroth clone projects out of his own pocket.

When Evan and his soldiers reached the old playground, where there was a slight gap in the plate above, Evan forwarded Reno's call to HQ. They then proceeded to the sector five church, where they found Reno almost waist deep in red ash. Several other hedgehog pies were encased in pyramids nearby. Reno had sustained some fairly serious burns, but all three MPs were alive. The monsters retreated after seeing the six relatively fresh soldiers arrive, and there was no trouble. The Med-Team arrived half an hour later with an Aero Combatant escort, and the three MPs were airlifted to Upper Sector Six Medical Centre. The soldiers dispersed, but just as Evan was about to go home, he received an urgent summons from Heidegger.

- - - - - -

I love getting sidetracked by backstory. Expect a lot of meandering with little details like the Vincent story. Please review.