Blind Soul
By BlueFox

DO NOT COPY MY STORIES!!
If anyone wants to post my stories anywhere else, please just ASK and then give me credit for writing it. PM with any requests.

~INTRO: Hey, guys, I'm really sorry I didn't update last Wednesday… It was Spring Break, I was sleep-deprived, and we found out my Grandma's got lung cancer. *exhales heavily* And everything just kind of snowballed all on Wednesday, and I just wallowed away on Quizilla, taking Death Note quizzes and downloading songs and stuff. My heart really wasn't into writing this chapter then. So, sorry.

And for those of you wondering who was comforting Cloud after he said those chants, sorry, but I can't reveal it to you yet. It will, however, be revealed in later chapters, so don't worry.

~MUSICAL MUSE: Yeah, I've decided to start this, too. If you can't already tell, I'm in a Latin mood for this chapter, and I was listening to various songs, like the Carmina Burana suite by Carl Orff. I was also listening to 'Low of Solipsism' from Death Note and 'Lord of the Rings-Requiem for a Dream Remix'.

~ABOUT FLAMES: If you decide to flame this story because of the few OCs in it, or for some other reason, it will be commented on, and laughed at publicly. You've been warned.

~DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING!!! Keep your lawyers leashed.

Part I
Chapter Six
"Wait, you mean 'we', right? You aren't going in there alone."

The Commander blew his whistle, running up to them. "Heyyy! I thought I said you were dismissed!" he yelled. The other two troopers popped off salutes and ran off. When the Commander had his back turned, Zack turned and ran onto the ship, not stopping to wave high to Red XIII who was hiding behind a bunch of boxes by the entrance.

We'll cross the ocean, to the next continent. …even if we are wearing Shinra's uniforms…

Zack noticed out of the corner of his eye a sailor whose head was bent and he was leaning heavily on a tall pile of boxes, and he was instantly reminded of Cloud. Feeling sympathetic of the person, he went over to give them support, and when the person looked up, he saw with surprise that it was a very green looking Yuffie Kisaragi.

"Urrrgh… This is why…I hate ships. Hey, Zack. You have any 'Tranquilizers'?" she asked him, leaning all of her body weight on the cargo.

Zack smiled in spite of himself and cheerfully told her, "Nope." She tried to glare at him, but with how sick she looked she was unable to make it look good and opted to just sink to the floor and put her head in between her knees. Zack walked to a little corner alone and put all of his materia on Ultima to Basara, and once the last orb was out of Ultima, it faded.

"You're welcome," he heard Angeal tell him and only him, and Zack grinned, before looking around the boxes and spotting a very familiar redhead by the stairs that led to the upper deck. She wasn't in her ordinary clothes, but then again nobody else on AVALANCHE was either, and instead in a pretty tight trooper uniform.

She was staring absently at the opposite wall, and deciding to see whether he could fool her or not, he left Basara with Yuffie, knowing full well that she wouldn't steal his materia as sick as she was, readjusted his helmet, and approached her. "General Adams, ma'am," he told her respectfully, grinning in his mask upon seeing that he had gotten her by surprise. Seeing her bewildered stare at him, Zack threw confetti up in his head-reading up on your teammates when a computer was available to you proved to be very useful. She was a high ranking officer, only one rank lower than Sephiroth in ways of combat, but higher than him in tactics and accomplishing her assignments more quickly and easily.
She blinked for a few moments, before nodding to him. "At ease, soldier," she told him. "Though I'm wondering why you're in a trooper uniform, Zack Fair, when you could just as easily walk around in your uniform."

Zack's high was effectively brought down as he reached up to take off his helmet. "How did you know?"

"Your voice for one, and the fact that troopers have no idea who I am. Special Unit was kept a secret from everybody but the First Classes and the higher ups." She sighed. "What do you want?"

"Well, I wanted to fool you, but that plan of action was shot down," he told her, and saw a smile pull her lips up. "Listen, about earlier…"
She gave him a sharp look. "I told you to forget it," she muttered distastefully.

But Zack shook his head. "I won't. If you want, I want to take you up on your offer. I'd love to be your, er, adoptive brother."

She stared at him for a long time, and Zack fidgeted, thinking she would decline or just walk away. Finally, however, she smiled, some spark of life returning to her eyes. "I'm going to keep my last name as Adams, just so you know."

Zack broke out into a huge grin. "I wouldn't dream of it, Tiff."

Tiffania glanced around. "Where's your sword? We're going to need it."

"With Yuffie. Lemme go get it." He was back in a flash, smug that all of his materia was in the right areas. Tiffania unsheathed her own sword.

"Roll up your sleeve and hold your arm out," she instructed, and he did just that. Quickly, she cut his arm open, ignoring his hiss of pain. She held her hand over it and muttered, "Velata."

The wound stayed open, but did not bleed, though the blood certainly did well up. Tiffania then rolled up the sleeve on her arm and motioned for Zack to cut her arm. He did so, though not as shallowly as she did his, and he almost smiled at seeing her wince and bite her lip. "Velata," she murmured again to her arm, then held it up. Zack got the idea and held his up, too, and then they pressed their cuts together, letting the blood mingle together. He felt some sort of release, something entering his system that threatened to swallow him up and leave him behind, but he gritted his teeth and fought back, shoving it down into a small little ball and storing it in a safe place for later use. "Fortune rota volvitur. Descendo minoratus. Alter in altum tollitur."

Suddenly he felt a burning sensation in his arm and was tempted to rip it away, but he had no control of his body. It stood there, frozen, unable to move anything. He heard her whisper what he hoped were the last lines in whatever she had been chanting. "Rerum tanta novitas in solemni vere et veris auctoritas jubet nos gaudere."

A force shoved him back a few paces and he grabbed his throbbing arm, before looking at it to see that it was completely healed, except for a long pink scar that he knew would be there probably for the rest of his second life. Zack looked up at Tiffania, but then had to look down, noticing that she was sitting against the stairs with a small smile on her face. "Is it over?" he asked her, shocked that his voice was shaking. She looked up at him and nodded.

"Thank you," she told him, and he nodded back.

"I'm going to look for the others, okay?" he told her.

"Okay."

Zack, despite what had just happened, smiled widely, looking at Tiffania with a new fondness that he realized was his brotherly side kicking in. I haven't felt like this since I first met Cloud, he thought to himself. "I'm glad you're happy, Tiff," he told her, and she nodded again.

"Thanks, Zack. For doing that."

"You're welcome." And with that, he picked up Basara from where he had dropped it, then reached out and tugged at one of her braids before heading for the stairs, and retreating out to the deck.

At first, the sunlight blinded him and he shielded his eyes with his hand, then remembered that he needed his helmet that he had left underneath in the cargo hold. Oh well, not very many people had been told he was dead, so he stripped down to his First Class uniform. Looking around, he glanced up and saw a trooper waving down at him. He raised his hand in greeting, wondering who it was, before the trooper took off his, er, her helmet.

"Tifa!" he greeted warmly, racing up to the ladder and to her, hugging her briefly. "I'm glad to see that you made it up here safely."

Tifa shuffled her foot on the floor beneath her, ducking her burning face behind her bangs and giggling a bit. "Yeah." She cleared her throat and put her helmet back on, saluting him. "Everything's quiet sir!" she told him loudly, before dropping her hand. "Though I really do wish all SOLDIERs would just disappear, you know?"

Zack gazed out at see, a little hurt at her words. "Yeah," he told her.

"Oh!" She started to shake her head hard. "Despite what I said in Nibelheim, I don't want you gone, Zack! I don't hate you!"
He gave her a leveled look before patting her shoulder. "Keep working on that watch," he told her.

She nodded. "Yes, sir! Hee hee…"

Zack chuckled a little before vaulting over the banister to the deck beneath him. He wanted to explore more of this ship, but a certain wobbly-legged trooper caught his eye. Looking closer, he saw that the trooper had…a flaming tail? Smiling, he put his hands in his pockets and casually approached the trooper.

"Afternoon, soldier," he greeted, and the trooper turned to him, quiet for a long moment, before speaking in a familiar voice.

"It's me. Red," he told Zack, who laughed a little.

"Oh, I know. I'm just messin' with ya," the ex-SOLDIER told the disguised cat. "No person on this Gaia I know of has a tail of any sort anyway."

Red XIII snorted. "I'm a little woozy, but I shouldn't get caught. Humans only look at appearances anyway. Anyway you look at it, I'd say I make a fine human being."

"Despite the tail?"

Red XIII's only eye flashed. "Especially despite the tail," he told Zack. Zack nodded, and decided to go back under to the cargo bay to see how Yuffie and Tiffania were doing. Upon seeing that Yuffie was no better than before, he went over to Tiffania.

"So, sis," he greeted, testing out the new way of addressing her. She looked at him. "Is that, what you're wearing, an SU uniform?"

She looked down, then back up. "Yep, pretty much. Helps us blend in with the troopers. They see us girls and don't ask questions, assuming that we're troopers, too. In fact, I saw Aeris earlier in one of these," she told Zack. When his eyes lit up, she held up her hand. "No, I didn't get a chance to talk to her, sorry." She felt uneasy about lying to Zack, but she had to, to keep Aeris safe.

Zack sighed sadly, before asking, "Have you seen Barret?"

She crossed her arms in thought. "Barret? Hmm…" She clucked her tongue a bit before shaking her head. "Nope, not since I got on. Sorry." Zack sighed again and held up his hand.

"Ah, don't worry. I just hope he doesn't get into trouble."

And that's when the alarms went off. Tiffania shot to her feet, looking around wide-eyed. "Emergency alert! Reports of suspicious characters found! Those not on detail, search the ship.

Report when found! I repeat. Suspicious characters found on board! Those not on detail, search the ship. Report when found!"

"Damn!" Tiffania swore. "You don't think it's us they're talking about, do you?"

"I don't know. Maybe it was Barret, or it could've been us with the whole 'sibling' thing," Zack told her, but she shook her head.

"No, the first words I spoke, velata would prevent anyone from seeing or detecting what it was we were doing," she told him. "I really hope Barret didn't get himself found." Zack noticed that she glanced at the door to the engine room more than once.

"Is something in there?" He gestured to the engine room. Tiffania turned a little red and shook her head.

"Not that I know of."

Zack shook his head. "Either way, let's get up top." He turned to the piles of boxes. "Yuffie! C'mon!" Then, without waiting for her, Zack and Tiffania ran for and up the stairs. When they came out and ran to the other members of AVALANCHE, Zack found Tifa hugging him fiercely, despite the audience.

"We thought that you had been found and attacked," she told him when she finally stepped away. "I got a little worried." Not long after she said that, Yuffie dragged her sorry butt up from the cargo hold, holding her stomach and moaning. Tifa gave her a worried look. "Are you okay? Better yet, is everyone all right?"

Barret took Tiffania's shoulder. "You all right!?" he asked her, and she gave him a confused look.

"Huh?"

Tifa turned and counted heads. "Everyone's here…right?" she asked.

Barret did his own head count and nodded, before his eyes lit up in recognition. "Hey, wait. You don't think those suspicious characters are… Sephiroth, Cloud, and Aeris!?" he asked them all, and everyone shared looks of what they were each feeling.

Tifa's was of hope. "Really!?" she asked, clasping her hands together hopefully.

Barret's was of consternation. "How the hell am I supposed to know!?" he demanded, and she flinched.

Zack was bouncing around on his feet, his face full of joy. "Let's find out!" he ordered, pumped up.

Red XIII's face was serene. "It's the most logical thing to do." He looked around. "Then, who's going to go?"

Zack put his hand to his chin in thought. "Mmm…Tifa and Tiffania will come with me. Sound all right?"

Yuffie nodded. "So long as it's not me…" she mumbled. "Besid…ugh…" She ran for the edge of the boat and…you know.

Sephiroth…You'd better not have hurt either of them, Zack thought, clenching his fist briefly, before nodding to Tifa and Tiffania, who had taken off their Shinra disguises and were in their normal clothes now. They nodded to him, too. "All right, let's go!" With that, he decided to start from the bottom and work their way up. He led the way down to the cargo area where he had started.

"There's no one standing guard anymore," Tiffania mumbled, heading for the door. Tifa searched around and gasped upon looking behind the large pile of boxes by the large doors. Zack went over to see what had made her react in such a way, and gasped himself upon seeing the dead bodies haphazardly tossed behind them, fresh blood leaking from their wounds. Plugging his nose against the stench, Zack got to one knee to look at the bodies.

"These people were killed after Yuffie, Tiffania, and I went up top. They were alive before then, I saw them," he told Tifa, and they both shuddered, before Tifa pointed.

"What's Tiffania doing?" she asked, and Zack stood and turned. He beckoned to Tifa and they both went over to her.

"Tiff, are you sure nothing's in there?" he asked her.

"Not so much anymore," she told him, stretching her hand out. Zack noticed it was trembling as she put it on the door, and they slid open. From what Zack could see, there was still someone standing inside, and they all ran in and approached him. "Sephiroth?" she mumbled, and then the Commander suddenly toppled over and blood began to pool around his body.

"Damn…not Sephiroth!" Zack swore.

……After a long sleep… …the time…… …time has……come…

Suddenly, the body started to sizzle, before it was burned away from them, only the blood remaining. Zack looked around for the source of what had burned the body, and suddenly Tiffania tapped his shoulder and pointed at the blood. Zack looked, and his eyes widened.

The blood was boiling.

And falling gracefully down to the pool, was none other than Sephiroth himself. There was a sound above them, and they looked up to see Cloud and Aeris, hand in hand, jump from atop the banister surrounded the catwalk around the engine room. Aeris averted her eyes with the trio's, and instead kept them locked on the ground by her shoes. She was in an SU uniform, just like Tiffania had said.

"Sephiroth," Tifa breathed, and Zack heard the leather in Tiffania's glove stretch from her clenching her fist.

Sephiroth looked at each of them, before his gaze fully rested on Tiffania. His eyebrows furrowed. "……Who are you?" He directed this at the redhead, and she swallowed hard, averting his gaze.

"Her name is Tiffania!" Zack very nearly roared, feeling his Limit Break steadily rising.

Cloud bent his head. "Zack…" he whispered sadly, and Zack looked over at the other two. Aeris slowly raised her head and gave Zack a morose look.

"Aeris, don't you know that Sephiroth killed everyone outside of this room?" he asked her. "If you get in his way, he'll probably kill you, too! I…I don't want that to happen."

Aeris thrust her chin out bravely, her Striking Staff appeared in her hand and she clenched it tightly. "I don't know what you're saying," she told him. "Sephiroth was here the whole time."

Zack, Tifa, and Tiffania's eyes widened. How could she so blatantly deny what was so obviously the truth? Hadn't she been there when he had murdered the President of Shinra, Inc.?

Hadn't he killed people as they escaped the Shinra HQ? Hadn't she seen him kill the guard in this very room?

Zack turned dark eyes to Sephiroth, who looked triumphant at Aeris' answer. "Sephiroth! What are you thinking!? What are you doing!?" he demanded, taking a step forward, his hand reaching for Basara's handle.

Sephiroth turned to Aeris and stretched out his hand. "…the time……is now…" he whispered loudly enough for them all to hear. Aeris stared at his hand for a moment, looked toward Zack, then dismissed her Striking Staff and boldly put her hand into his. There was a flash and they shielded their eyes. When the trio of AVALANCHERs looked again, they were faced by the tall Jenova-BIRTH.

Zack unsheathed Basara and Tiffania whipped out Arcana as Tifa lifted her fists. Jenova-BIRTH started off the fight by using a Tail Laser that Zack and Tiffania managed to block for the most part while Tifa got the full brunt of it. As she stepped back from the blast, Tiffania cast the Enemy Skill Flamethrower, and smoke rose from the flames. Tifa and Zack used this for cover.

They jumped together when they cleared the smoke, however Jenova-BIRTH was ready for them and cast Stop on Zack, freezing him in midair while she hit Tifa with another Tail Laser. Tiffania ground her teeth at the way this was turning out. She took her turn and ran forward to cover Tifa who was downing a Hi-Potion. As the redhead lunged, she felt the aura of her Limit Break surround her and she ran straight by Jenova-BIRTH. The thirteen slashes cut open some serious wounds on Jenova-BIRTH, and the enemy turned to her to use a Tail Laser.
Tiffania desperately jumped to get out of the way, but as she did so, what felt like a sledgehammer slammed into her chest and she fell hard onto her knees, coughing so hard she couldn't breathe. She dropped her sword and put her hands on her mouth, horrified as always to feel the blood coming from her mouth.

She heard a slight grunt and looked over to see that the Stop spell had worn off and Zack was pummeling Jenova-BIRTH with a Cross-Slash before Tifa used her own Limit Break. When finally her coughing subsided and she could think straight, Tiffania used a quick Aqualung to wash away all of the blood on her fingers, before standing and going to her teammates.
Tifa looked none the wiser as to what had happened, but Zack was watching his "sister" with a concerned glint in his eyes. Despite the soreness of her chest and her carefully hidden gasping for air, she managed to smile brightly. Zack returned it with a very distorted one and looked down. The girls did, too, and saw what appeared to be a tentacle that was flapping around very much like a fish out of water. Tifa nudged it with her foot uncertainly.

"I've seen this somewhere…before," the fightress murmured.

Zack nodded. "Jenova," he explained simply.

Tiffania gave it a disgusted look. "You mean he's been walking around with that thing?" She shuddered and took in a deep breath to soothe her aching lungs. Zack and Tifa both cast her a worried glance, but she just returned them with an innocent, 'What's up?' one. There was the sound of a jingle and the tentacle suddenly turned into a red materia. Tiffania was the one who bent down and picked it up, examining it closely. "Hey, it's Ifrit," she said gleefully. "He's one of my favorite summons. Can I use him? Please?" She gave Zack the 'Bambi eyes'. He laughed and nodded.

"Go ahead." She let out a light squeal and flipped out her halfway-Mastered Enemy Skill Materia and tossed it to Zack before putting Ifrit in the slot. Almost instantly she could feel his fires burning inside of her and she smiled at the feeling. Zack hummed. "So it WAS Sephiroth," he said to the two women. "And Cloud and Aeris…they WERE with him. And Aeris…claimed he was innocent after killing all of those people."

Tifa shook her head. "Who else could've killed them? Cloud definitely couldn't, and Aeris doesn't like the sight of blood. And we were all up top," she said.

"It had to be Sephiroth. But why would she defend a murderer? I don't understand it…" Zack crossed his arms as he tried to think, noticing how Tiffania nervously shifted on her feet, but he made no comment as the PA system turned on.

"Dock workers-- We will be docking in Costa Del Sol in 5 minutes. Prepare for docking."

Tifa jumped a little. "Whoa! We'd better find somewhere to hide."

Tiffania gave her a 'look.' "Hide from who? Everyone's dead."

"Rufus and Heidegger aren't," Zack told her, "and I'd rather not get into another fight for now." Tiffania knew the underlying command in that sentence and wisely kept her mouth shut.

"Let's get the others and find a good place."

As Tifa and Tiffania headed for the door that led out, Zack stopped at the bottom of the few steps that led them out, before turning. "Sephiroth…is alive…" he told himself firmly. "The Promised Land… Does it really exist…?"

He did not hear Tiffania's whispered question of, "Time…is now?" behind him.

~END: Hey, readers & reviewers, if you're on deviantart, come drop by my page and say hello! I'd like to see you guys there. The link is in my profile. However, if you don't like OC yaoi, or yaoi at all, you'll probably not want to read my stuff. *sweatdrop*

And I'll reiterate what I said previous chapter: I update ever Wednesday, unless the week has just snowballed into a mess and I don't feel up to posting a new chapter. HOWEVER I have decidedly changed my mind about not updating on the 22nd of April. I thought we'd be in the bus going to Anaheim, but it turns out we're not leaving until 11pm of that same night! However, if I update then, it'll totally ruin my plans for updating later, which means I'll have to skip the Wednesday after that. I'll get the next chapter ready for you guys, and I'll let you choose whether you want me to update on the 22nd, or on the 29th.

Okay, now that that's out of the way, the things to look forward to in the next chapter: Costa del Sol for AVALANCHE and SCA (Seph, Cloud, and Aeris) take the hard way to the Gold Saucer. Hee hee. So review you worm babies, you! I'll see you guys next Wednesday!! :D

~Latin Translations:

Velata: veiled
Fortune rota volvitur. Descendo minoratus. Alter in altume tollitur: The wheel of fortune turns. I go down, demeaned. Another is raised up.
Rerum tanta novitas in solemni vere et veris auctorita jubet nos gaudere: All this rebirth in spring's festivity and spring's power bids us to rejoice.