Chapter 9: Fragments
She always felt calmer in Wutai. Something about the gentle babble of running water in the koi ponds, the little vermillion bridges, the language she didn't understand, the fresh mountain air, incense, temples…
Upon that thought, she had built her only stability of recent weeks. If stress be her trigger for jumping, as she had taken to calling the strange phenomena that sent her hurtling through time, then she must find a way to manage it. This, at least, she had some experience in.
Her adolescence, and preceding years had been wracked with traumas that troubled her young mind. She struggled focussing, managing her temper and finding an outlet for her frustrations and energies otherwise. That had been when her father first appointed Zhanghan, the martial arts expert who had taught her many things.
At first how to punch; aching muscles and sapped energy levels restored her desire to sleep at night and wake refreshed in the morning. Then, how to breathe to maximise the energy exerted and the energy impacted by her fists. How to hold her body, to coil her muscles, to conserve focus. With that came a mindfulness and awareness of her body.
She tried to remember that training now.
Vincent had left her relatively alone in the care of his maid, Miko. The house had belonged to his parents, she learned, and stood empty for most of the year with Vincent off continent. Miko, it seemed, was delighted to have someone to fuss over and seemed utterly convinced that she would see the young man she had raised since a little boy married off to this strange, beautiful woman.
Tifa only laughed her off, explaining that she and Vincent were friends and that he had kindly given her use of his home as a space to recover from an illness. Not exactly a lie, she figured.
Miko prepared delicious Wutaiin food for her each day. The first morning she had woken, Miko tried to bow out of the room, though Tifa did not wish to be left alone, eager for the company of a stranger whose interactions carried no hidden meaning.
They took their meals together each day now, and Tifa insisted on placing herself at Miko's disposal when it came to managing household tasks. Busy hands, clear mind.
The first few days were passed in the mindlessness of domestic chores – of rather mindfulness for Tifa, as she allowed each task to consume all of her thought and concentration. Washing the rice bowls out after breakfast. Taking the futons outside to air each morning. Stripping and washing her body in the bathhouse. Feeding the fish in the koi pond. Raking the leaves; For fall had arrived in Wutai, and Tifa had never been so enchanted by the beauty of the transition.
Da Chao mountain glared brightly in the sunset each night. As she considered it from the veranda of Vincent's home, she wondered what the sunrise looked like from the peak.
One morning, she decided today, she would scale the mountain. To pay her respects at the temple, she told Miko. Dispatched with enough food parcels for a small expedition (she supposed some would serve as an offering for the monks), Tifa began her ascent of Da Chao, clothed in a mishmash of borrow pieces and a few garments procured from the local market.
She did not have the heart to tell Miko that she intended to never come down.
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Miko wrote to him, her script rushed and agitated, such that he had difficultly discerning some of the characters. Tifa had left to climb Da Chao, and had not come down. Fear settled in his gut, until he realised that Tifa had in fact not 'travelled' again. Miko had received work from the Abbott that Tifa had taken up residency in the guest halls, making herself useful around the grounds, joining with prayers, mealtimes, the sweeping of the temples, and had proven herself an avid study of the physical arts; Yoga, martial arts and even the sword.
Vincent smiled. It seemed she had gone to seek routine and peace. Sensible, considering.
He puts Miko's letter aside into the letter tray in his Kalm office, tearing his mind back to less pleasant but more vital matters.
He wanted to prepare for his meeting with the miners at Corel. His alternative proposal to the Mako Reactor was surely going to be a tough pill to swallow and his optimism was flagging. If they were able to succeed, if his company, Alternative Energy, was able to win this contract... everything could change for the better.
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Now/
For months he had toiled, idle hands upholding Tifa's abandoned architectural opus. He restricted his remit to repair, in vain hope that she would return to add colour and light to the blank canvas he had prepared. He located damp patches, flushed mice from their holes and filling in the damage with new bricks and mortar. His palms had developed callouses from the use of the plane to shave down wood, from the repetition of hammer and chisel to create joins. He fashioned new door frames and skirting. He had developed a rather irritating crick in his neck from a solid week of sanding down that godforsaken staircase, that only several sessions soaking in the bath seemed to ease.
Plumbing was somewhat above his natural competence, though a professional took but a few days and a little gil to have things gurgling and running freely as it should. The arteries of the mansion flowed freely once more.
Cupboards and closets and shelves required purging of items way beyond repair or charm. He unearthed some treasures, head-deep in the dark and dusk of a stowage space; a Gramaphone (miraculously still in order) and some records, as well as pieces of jewellery that he could only wonder at the value of.
The refrains of classical music from decades past resonated within the walls of the mansion. The house seemed to hold its breath, unsure of what to make of an auditory intrusion of such beauty, breaking silence of a half century. It felt jarring, rude even, to shatter the censor with such frivolity as music, yet Vincent felt something akin to gratitude from the tended walls of the house, enveloping him that night as he lay down to rest.
He took breath in the spring one morning, taking his day's inductory sip of coffee from what had become his customary spot leaning against the kitchen door, crisp spring air now buffeting in.
Historically only used by service staff rather than the residents of the household, the kitchen overlooked a narrow terrace which granted access to an underground stone storage cellar (since adapted as ventilation for the laboratory that was built into the underground cave network, beneath the mansion), a stone stairway up to the gardens (yet untouched by Vincent's busy hands) and a locked side gate that lead back to the village. Maids and servants would have ran errands in these rooms, and once upon a time it would have been the warm, bustling heart of this place.
Yet now, it stood empty, the ovens cold, the floors untrod.
Today was somewhat a landmark day for the house and Vincent's unplanned residence within. Six months had passed since his arrival. Six long months, and perhaps a day at most, since Tifa had vanished from this very house without a trace, save for the shattered remains of the Materia that had sent her where (or when), he knew not.
A milestone task awaited him today; Rehoisting the chandelier in the entrance hall. Some weeks ago, he had lowered the crystal and brass behemoth to rest upon the newly stripped and polished floors to be cleaned and repaired, unloosening the rope from its anchor point upon the wall, located by an entrance antechamber. Vincent supposed that this had been used by the butlers and footmen, for ready access to greet and admit guests.
Decades of dust took a labour of love to lift, polishing each crystal droplet and festoon carefully by hand until it gleamed. The first morning he had descended the stairs following its cleaning, he had taken pause; the morning light punctured the stained glass behind him, beating upon the thousands of crystal fragments, and what seemed like a million tiny rainbow fractals encrusted every surface, the gentle air disturbances sending them dancing and twirling within the confines of the walls.
He had never seen anything so beautiful, not for a long time.
Today, it would be hoisted back in its glorious position, lording down over the entrance hall and its magnificent sweeping staircase.
After that, Vincent was at a loss. Perhaps he could tackle the Orangery? Or the garden given Spring was upon him? Or perhaps, he should put the mansion behind him.
He checks that the tether is firmly fixed to the wall before he even attempts to hoist the chandelier; it would have been a shame to restore it only to have it come crashing down into a million pieces at his feet. The metal is solid, and does not move. Vincent had ensured that the steel was firmly embedded into the brickwork as part of his works in this space.
He wraps the newly waxed rope around his hands a couple of times, to ensure grip, adjusting his stance to give stability. Pulling from the shoulders and anchoring himself by spreading his weight, the slack rope becomes taught. The chandelier, lying upon its side like a spinning top, is tugged into an upright position with a harmony of gentle chiming, the dangling crystal droplets clinking together in spite of the smoothness of motion he tried to maintain through the rope.
The mechanism is smooth he notes, pleased with his repairs to the pulley system. The letting down of the damned thing had taken some assistance from Cid, on one brief visit, barely preventing it from hurtling to the parquet.
He flicks his gaze from the ceiling and back to the Chandelier, now a good six feet or so from the ground. He wants to set it lower than it had been previously, to take the most advantage from the sunlight pouring in in the mornings. He catches himself wondering if Tifa would have done the same, or if she would approve of his tinkering.
From his vantage point, the chandelier obscures most of the staircase beyond it, crowing the central banister. He wants it level with the centre of the windows from here. He calculates that he had a further ten feet or to so go before he can tie it off and perform a visual check from the top most landing.
His shoulders are beginning to ache, complaining at having to support and winch such a weight. Not much farther...
His gaze it fixed upon the ceiling, checking the winch mechanism again for strain, when he catches sight of something from the periphery of his vision. Probably it is the play of light from the swaying crystals, glints of refracted sunlight. With a grunt, the final hoist; the lower landing is revealed from view once more.
The rope slips between his hands, the chandelier jerking and swaying at it drops a few metres, taking advantage of Vincent's laxness. She had been stood right there! Pale fingers gripping the rough sanded bannister, long brown hair free across her shoulders. His heart racing, hands trembling, he fumbled to tie off the rope, abandoning the chandelier in limbo, before stumbling toward the staircase on shaking legs.
He runs from room to room, calling her name, feeling more and more foolish as his calls go unanswered. Perhaps he had been tricked into seeing something that was not there?
No, he argued with himself. He knows what he saw. Just as he knows what he can hear sometimes, in moments of transitional wakefulness. Voices, vibrations, movements; traces of people who are here, but who are not.
He knows he should leave this place, but something anchors him. Something he knows should not. Something he fears.
He returns to finish what he started, hoisting the chandelier into pride of place, centred with the tall windows of the hallway, He admired it from the central landing, in a spot not far from where he had seen her earlier that day, certain that he was not the only one to admire his handywork, after all.
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Then/There
The fire had been easy to start. The hard part had been ensuring the scientist did not make it out alive. Sedatives had seen to that.
Vincent had been careful to remain unseen entering the inn, and was certain that many witnesses saw Lucrecia and himself leaving the mansion, to lend a hand to villagers as they tried to minimise the damage of the flames to the surrounding houses.
Lucrecia had taken a little convincing, though she knew they had no choice. The alternatives to ensuring Hojo never succeeded left too much to chance and circumstance, variable forces Vincent came to place little stock in.
The mansion now stood empty once again, though Vincent's work was far from over. He needed to proceed carefully, for the next steps in ensuring the dystopia Tifa spoke off never came to pass required delicacy, time, and more pressingly, money.
Hojo had been sacrificed, along with all paper copies of what they had deemed his most dangerous research, in order that the world never came to see the horrors of his creations to come.
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Now
Vincent wakes suddenly in the night. Glancing toward the digital display of the clock Tifa had placed at her bedside, he noted the time as a few minutes past three. He listened carefully to the house. It stood silent, the air calm and undisturbed.
Still, he could have sworn he had smelled burning.
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Hey everyone still reading! I'm so happy if you are, and I'd love to know what you thought of this chapter. I'm about to embark on making a spreadsheet to track all the movements, and make the list that Vincent has in his possession! I think I have been worrying about following Tifa in a linear way, which makes the Vincent(s) that we see a bit of a jumble in terms of continuity. I think I might switch it up, so we are constant with Vincent, and the Tifa's we see are at different stages in her journey with us.
Thanks for reading.