Rena was staring at the man in the coffin.
"How can he possibly find that comfortable? I mean it's about as baffling as why Angeal and Zack can use those oversized butcher knives like normal swords," said Rena confused.
"I know right? I mean are they compensating for something or what with those things?" snickered Genesis.
Cloud decided to take one for the team and reached out to the corpse. Which wasn't a corpse at all apparently, and nearly gave him a heart attack when a less than amused red eye glared at him.
However the man in the coffin took one look at Rena and froze.
"Sephiroth?" he questioned.
Rena's face twitched in annoyance.
"Call me that again and I will shoot you in the ass," she snarled. "I am sickand tired of people making that comparison."
His eyes widened in shock.
"It can't be. You disappeared into the Lifestream."
"Wait, what?" said Genesis in shock, his attention fully on the 'corpse'.
"Lucrecia gave birth to twins, which came as a surprise to everyone. Sephiroth was born first...but his sister disappeared into the Lifestream after three days according to that snake Hojo."
Genesis and Cloud looked at Rena, who didn't try to claim he was lying. Instead she looked thoughtful.
"You know something," said Genesis.
"I'm adopted and my godfather did mention there were some unusual circumstances about my origins. Something about a major ritual being used and how my father found me in the middle of a circle with several people in the room being magically exhausted. It is possible I might be Sephiroth's sister...it would explain the resemblance at least," admitted Rena. "I couldn't have been more than a few days old from what I was told."
"Are you telling me that you think you were summoned?" said Genesis incredulous.
"I've seen weirder things happen. Much weirder," deadpanned Rena. "But I can prove I'm not lying at least."
"How?" asked Cloud, curious.
Rena smirked in an unholy way, and then started speaking in a language that sounded way too much like a snake hissing.
"What the hell?!" said Genesis, freaked out.
"It's called Parseltongue, which is basically the language of snakes. Due to a certain incident, I've developed the ability to speak it. Basilisks react really weirdly around me and keep trying to follow me in town whenever I tell them to shut up and forget to kill them off," admitted Rena. "It was either that or I attempt to call Fawkes. He's the most likely one to reach me considering the way I managed to make it back."
"Who's Fawkes?" asked the one from the coffin. She really needed to get his name.
"Fawkes is a phoenix," she replied. "Magic is a vast and wonderous thing, but heaven help you if you actually think it's going to follow something as structured as science. It easier to think of it as an intent based energy."
Rather than dispute this, Genesis looked thoughtful.
"You know that would explain sooo much."
"How would you summon a phoenix outside of materia?"
Rena concentrated on Fawkes in particular and imagined an 'inquiry' of sorts with her magic. Then she 'willed' it to reach the bird.
Instinct made her hold out her right arm when the fireball appeared, causing both Cloud and Genesis to yelp as phoenix song filled the chamber.
A massive red and gold bird easily landed on her arm, before giving her a Look.
"Don't give me that. I was finally free of that whole nonsense and I wasn't really inclined to go back. Besides, I needed time away from England to grieve over Sirius," she said annoyed.
The phoenix chuffed, conceding that. Then he tilted his head curiously. He pecked at the orb that she kept around her neck, which was actually the first materia she had found.
"Dear Gaia, it actually is a phoenix..." said Genesis in shock.
"I didn't know they could be domesticated," said Cloud, also in shock.
"Maybe on Gaia they can't, but on Earth it's a different story," said Rena absently, stroking Fawkes' breast feathers and causing him to croon in pleasure. "How's Hedwig?"
Fawkes took his wing and made a 'so-so' gesture.
"Could you bring her here?"
He swayed his head from side to side, causing Rena to sigh in disappointment.
"Damn. Can you at least bring my things here? Just the trunk mind you... I can sort through most of it and send the rest back."
Fawkes trilled in agreement...he already had an idea of who to ask for help.
He disappeared in a second fireball, to the collective disbelief of the men.
"...Did you just have a one-sided conversation with a phoenix?" said Genesis incredulous.
"The first present I can ever remember is an owl. Hedwig is scarily smart, and I spent a lot of time taking care of her so I know how to 'listen' to what they're saying. Besides, phoenixes are magical...it only stands to reason they have some degree of intelligence."
"She has a point," conceded the taller man.
"You know we never did get your name."
"Vincent. Vincent Valentine," said the mystery 'vampire' before giving her an odd look. "You said 'on Earth'."
"I don't know how or why, but I think some idiot managed to open up another connection to the Lifestream, which is how I was summoned from my crib despite only being a newborn. All I remember is some weird green mist coming out of an archway, before waking up in a pool of what I now know to be mako. That was rather annoying."
"Wait, wait, wait... did you say you woke up in a pool of mako?" said Genesis horrified. "How are you still alive?!"
She shrugged.
"All I know is that the pool felt like pins and needles against my skin constantly stabbing at me, and that I generally need to add a teaspoon or two into my tea at least once every two or three months or I'll start feeling worse than when my monthly monster hits," she replied. "On an unrelated note I no longer need glasses for some reason."
Dead silence from the men. She didn't get what the big deal was.
All they knew was that they had a massive headache as the lone female seemed to gleefully enjoy breaking what they knew of reality to pieces.
The next evening...
Genesis was forced to concede the entire headache had not been a hallucination or a horrible nightmare from hell when he saw that damn bird again the next morning. Rena was going through what looked like a school trunk and already had a decent pile on the ground. Finally she closed it, and the bird disappeared with the trunk to parts unknown.
"Do I want to know?"
"My return wasn't exactly planned and I had some useful things in there that I wanted back."
"Like what?" he asked.
He really, really wished he hadn't. She took some sort of silvery cloak and wrapped it around her neck. The second she put the hood on she disappeared completely from his senses.
"What. The. Fuck."
"Invisibility cloak," she said by way of explanation. She had a look of evil glee on her face. "Just imagine all the fun to be had with me sneaking up behind Zack or Angeal and making them think a ghost is following them around."
Genesis thought that over for all of two seconds.
"Do it!" he said with wicked glee. "What about the rest?"
"Odds and ends, and useful bits I wish I had before. Mostly I just wanted my cloak back, since my first wand disappeared when I came here."
"A wand, seriously?"
Rena's grin was pure evil.
She pointed at Genesis and he suddenly fell flat on his face as his legs were bound together by an unseen force.
"Son of a..."
"Leg-locker curse," she sing-songed.
Genesis tried to stand up, but kept falling over until she took pity on him.
"I almost pity Sephiroth if you really are his sister," said Genesis scowling.
"Just imagine the fun of that fat pig or the idiots that run the scientists running afoul of a witch capable of making their precious equipment fry with a few spells."
Genesis stared.
"Say what now?"
"I tend to keep my PHS off when I'm doing heavy spell casting without materia, because magic fries electronics. Can you imagine the havoc I could play with the Science department by being a complete menace?"
Genesis looked evil at the moment.
"Please tell me you're willing to make that a reality. Hojo gives me the creeps and I usually deal with Hollander."
"Considering what Vincent told me about Hojo, I would be more than happy to become the gremlin of the Shin-Ra power company... besides, this means I'll be on hand when the DNA test comes back to see if I really am his sister."
"Considering your looks and knack for swords, it's almost a guarantee."
"I prefer to be paranoid about this sort of thing. Line Theft is not something you should take lightly," said Rena.
Rena, when she found out why Vincent had been in that coffin to begin with, had taken the former Turk to task and given him much to think about regarding his guilt. For reasons Vincent preferred not to think about, Chaos adored Rena to the point he openly ruffled her hair the one time he was let out. The evil cackling she had let loose had not helped his mellow.
On an unrelated note, she would have a permanent traveling partner as Vincent planned to join her as a 'bodyguard'. Likely due to the connection to his former lover, but mostly because as a "civilian" (at least by Shin-Ra standards, she was a warrior through and through) she could vanish without a trace and no one would know until it was far too late.
Sephiroth was safe... he was the Company's shining poster boy for SOLDIER and Hojo's own pet project. Rena was vulnerable the second Hojo discovered her existence.
It was a well established fact that higher levels of mako in the body tended to render women infertile, so the fact Rena had all the mako saturation of a First (they had checked, with some of the old equipment in the mansion) yet still had a period was something that would get Hojo's attention too quickly for any of them to like. At the very least he would attempt to use her as breeding material.
"How was the mission?" asked Angeal.
"To put it simply... I need a drink," said Genesis flatly.
Angeal winced.
"That bad?"
"It's like she went out of her way to screw with reality until nothing makes sense anymore!" complained Genesis. "By the way, how long does it take for the labs to run a DNA test comparison?"
"Someone try to claim you knocked them up?" asked Angeal.
"No, but something came up that could through the 'great Sephiroth' for a loop for once," said Genesis dryly. "And brought up a major question of his paternity."
Vincent looked way too much like Sephiroth and Serenity to be a coincidence. And he had seen pictures of Lucrecia (along with a copied video of the twins being born that he planned to give to the general once the test came back). While he could see something of a resemblance, there was no way in hell he would believe for a minute Sephiroth was Hojo's son.
Coincidentally Vincent shared some of his DNA as well for the test, because Rena had pointed out something he hadn't considered regarding Lucrecia's pregnancy. There was a chance he might actually be the father of her twin children because of all the experiments done to the unborn fetus in the womb. It was entirely possible that the Jenova cells or any number of things could have delayed their birth and muddled up the paternity of the children even further.
Sure, things would be muddled with the test due to mako and god knew what else in their systems (experimentation for Vincent and Sephiroth, and the basilisk venom/phoenix tears/rituals on Serenity's side), but the vast majority of it would still be the same.
When Genesis got the letters, he took one look at the results before heading straight to Sephiroth's office. He had the video disk on hand as well. He was going to need it.
"We need to talk. Someplace secure without the chance of anyone save those in the group overhearing," said Genesis bluntly, though he was already texting Rena that the results had come back. She would be in Midgard by morning.
"When?"
He looked at his PHS.
"Tomorrow, at the earliest. There are some things you should know before Hojo tries to bury them."
Sephiroth looked at Genesis seriously for a moment.
"Does this have anything to do with the 'female Sephiroth' that has been plaguing me for the past couple of years?"
"Yes."
"I'll clear my schedule," said Sephiroth.
For this he would go out of his way to get answers. The headaches he got from the female Sephiroth rumor were the things of nightmares.