Once the rest of the party had been dropped off at Tifa's bar, Vincent was starting to get a little apprehensive about talking with Reeve about his change, although the only way for Cid to notice was the slight droop to his ears or the odd twitch of his tail when they were landing. "Hey, you better get your cloak, we don't need the whole WRO staring at you."
Vincent nodded before going to get his red cloak. "I think I can hold my ears out of sight…" Cid blinked in confusion until the gunner's ears folded back as if he was angered, a hand through his unruly hair hid the equally red streaked black ears. "If I keep my hair in my face they shouldn't see the stripes," Vincent mumbled as he shook his head enough to throw the odd lengthened locks around to hid most of his face.
"You're right," Cid said. "What about your feet?" He watched in mild fascinations as the gunner seemed to shrink back to his normal size when he set what would be his heels back onto the floor.
"I'll have to wear my shoes," Vincent fumbled around for his boots before painfully pulling them back on his odd shaped feet. He looked at his ungloved arms, the red stripes running along them the way they ran up the rest of his body, his nails haven gotten too long to keep them or the gauntlet on for awhile.
"You keep your sleeves drawn back, just pull them down." Cid helped the gunner unbuckle the straps at his elbows to pull the 'rolled' sleeves over the rest of his arms, "See? No problem, your hands always looked clawed anyway." The pilot smiled.
Vincent couldn't help it, even if he was still holding a bit of a grudge from the morning, he kiss the man softly on the lips, "Thank you."
"Hey now, don't be doing that around them. They might get jealous," Cid smirked as he patted the gunner's back, knowing the docking crew hand to be wondering why the hell no one had departed the ship yet. "Come on, let's go get you figured out."
Vincent smiled softly shook his head at the pilot before they got off the ship.
---
"Vincent, long time no see," Reeve welcomed with his usual friendly persona.
Vincent's nose twitched, "Cut the act Cait Sith I know it's you."
"Ah, I thought I'd fool you a little longer," Reeve's double pouted.
"You shouldn't pout Cait, it's not becoming of Reeve."
"Ah well, the boss man asked me to come down here and welcome you so I thought… Oh well. Come this way I'll show you were he is."
"How the hell did ya know that wasn't Reeve?" Cid asked softly.
"Cait Sith smells like fur."
"Ah Vincent," the real Reeve turned from his work to look up at the expected gunner. "Cait, take that off," he said with a hint of authority.
"Of course boss," the Reeve suit turned doll like before the joints disconnected to let the small cybernetic feline jump free. "Ah ha!" No one was amused by the small machine's thrown up hands as he landed on both feet. "Ah, you're no fun anymore." Vincent's slitted eyes dilated as he settled them on the smaller cat, they narrowed again when the other noticed the change in the gunner and stepped back with a small tremor. "Oh dear, what has gone and happened to you know Vincent?"
"Hmm?" Reeve questioned as he returned his attention to the cyber cat and Vincent staring at each other. "What's happened?"
"May we speak somewhere private?" Vincent's eyes flicked over the other WRO soldiers at their posts within the room.
"Of course, could we have a minute please," several responded with a yes sir or of course one even said if he needed something to just call before leaving the room. Vincent had to smile softly, Reeve took very good care of his people, regardless of their status within his organization and they returned the favor. "Alright, now, what do you want to tell me?" Reeve's back was to him, Vincent swallowed as he let his tail relax around his waist and pulled his cloak off as his ears reluctantly rose out of his mussed hair.
"Vincent?" Cait Sith said in a question as Vincent's dark clawed hands slid to push his oddly highlighted hair away to show the stripes running along his neck and cheeks.
"I seem to have another transformation; one I have no control over…"
"Ah, have your demons been taking control," the rest of the question died when Reeve turned around, he dropped the maps he had been gathering up to the floor as his eyes looked over the gunner. "What has happened to you?"
"I don't know, I just woke up like this. It's been over a week and it has gotten worse not better."
"How extensive are the changes?" Reeve asked automatically, he blinked when he suddenly noticed Vincent's tail when it swished in a jerky motion.
"Very," was all the gunner said as his ear twitched slightly.
"Could you be a little more specific?" Reeve asked, his eyes drawn to the swishing black/red striped tail.
"I'm completely covered in red stripes." Vincent regretted that when the man's eyes shot away from his tail to look into his red cat eyes. "My tail twitches when I'm annoyed, my ears fold back when I'm angry I couldn't even stop myself from attacking a cat toy, I was completely entranced by the damn catnip in it!" Reeve was understanding what the gunner meant by annoyed, the tail was jerking strongly with the twitches and his ears kept getting close to the back of his skull as he saw the man's mouth open to see a very deadly looking set of animalistic teeth flashing as he spoke.
"Vince, calm down," Cid set a hand on the man's shoulder, Vincent closed his eyes to calm himself. "It's alright."
"…" Vincent let out a sigh, a clawed hand coming up to rub at his face. "You're right. It's just the damn silence is really getting on my nerves. I want an answer and not a one of them is even trying to laugh at me. I haven't felt their presence in days… Is this another punishment for my sins?" Reeve and Cid both started when Vincent suddenly slumped down on the floor to sit with his back against the table Reeve had been at.
"Damnit Vince, I thought I had you stopped talkin' 'bout that shit!" Cid exclaimed as he knelt down to look at the crumpled gunner. "You have done more than enough to be forgiven for anything you could have possibly done! You've saved the whole fucking Planet for Gaia's sake! Even that asshole Sephiroth would be forgiven for what he's done for that."
Vincent looked up at him, a single line of black was seen in each glowing red eye until he focused on the pilot, then they expanded to only show a small ring off red before he looked away. "Sephiroth was my fault. If I hadn't… He would never have…"
Cid's eyes went wide, "He was yours, wasn't he?"
"I wasn't sure, until I saw my eyes this way. Whatever this is it must have been there even before…"
A memory surfaced, he was lying contently beneath a tree, waiting for the scientist he was set to guard to be finished for the day so he could escort her home.
"Hehehe, Vincent… You remind so much of a cat lying there in the sun."
"Hmm? A cat?" The young Turk opened his clay red eyes to see the smiling scientist looking down at him.
"Well, as quiet as you always are… And you always watch us so intently even when you're so obviously bored with your post. You remind me of a cat sitting on a sill and just watching the people walk by."
"I've never been referred to as a cat, a dog perhaps but never a cat." Vincent responded with a smirk, wondering if she would take his meaning the way he had intended or in another way all together.
"Not all men are dogs," she laughed softly. "You're too graceful to be a mangy old dog. A cat suits you better." She settled down beside him with what could only be called a woman's grace as she smiled and looked at the sunbathed Turk. "'Tiger tiger burning bright', I always loved that poem."
"Blake isn't it?" Vincent asked, his mind a little rusty since his freshman literature class.
"Yes, you know it?" She said hopefully
"I know the man couldn't say symmetry right from the way he rhymed his poem," Vincent smirked, playing the role of the unconcerned guard, even if he remembered the writer's work.
"He couldn't could he?" She laughed as he looked up at her. "I wonder how graceful you would be if you were a cat…"
Vincent couldn't help it, he snorted, "I wouldn't be here guarding you if I was one. I'd probably be batting at the butterflies instead."
"You would make a beautiful cat," Vincent froze when he felt her hand brush his hair out of his face, his eyes opened to see her staring down at him with the same look he had seen when she was looking at her experiments. "Those eyes… I bet you would have red to match those eyes," her voice worried him, she wasn't speaking in a friendly tone but in a pondering one, he'd heard it when she would speak to Hojo about things he wasn't allowed to know about.
"Professor Crescent?"
"Hmm? Oh I'm sorry! Some days I just can't seem to turn my mind off." Her demeanor changed back to the smiling young woman talking to her friend/guard and they never spoke of it again.
"Vincent?" Cid said, wanting to but fearful of giving the gunner a shake to get him back to the present.
"She … she, did this to me?" Those black slits narrowed back to let the gunner see his friends kneeling in front of him. "Why, how…"
"Vince, you back with us?" Cid dared not touch the man without warning him, knowing how dangerous he could be when distracted.
"Yes," it was a half lie but he gripped the pilot's hand when he went to put it on his shoulder, his mind was still replaying every time Lucrecia had offered him a drink or something to eat. He knew that she couldn't have injected him with anything, even when they were… together his training kept him in a state of awareness of the woman next to him even when asleep. She had to have fed him something. But why would it take so long to affect him?! "She, drugged me," the wine. Whenever they had eaten outside or together at whichever residence she had always brought him a bottle of red wine. "How did she do this to me?"
"Vincent?" Reeve's voice caused the gunner to look up at him, "What are you talking about?"
"Lucrecia. Before… She said I reminded her of a cat. She had to have done this to me."
"You're sure she did this? Coulda been that fucking asshole Hojo."
Vincent flinched, shaking his head, "No… Wasn't him. He would have waited… until," his muscles tensed as if ready for an attack, "aspects presented…" Those fearful red cat eyes looked up at Cid and the pilot instantly understood. The sick fuck would have waited, and enjoyed every perverse little fantasy he had ever imagined with the cat boy version of the gunner. "I was a 'failure' but not for that reason."
Cid couldn't take the hurt look in the gunner's eyes, he circled an arm around his shoulder and held him to his chest. "There must have been a reason she did it."
"I would make a beautiful cat… And she was right, my stripes match my eyes." Vincent leaned in to Cid, trying to push back the memories threatening to surface. Both of her and him.
"I'm so sorry."
Vincent shut his eyes, which only made the memories worse, "They won't stop."
"Have you had enough?" Vincent's eyes shot open at hearing Chaos' voice for the first time in so long. "Have you finally learned what type of woman your 'beloved' Lucrecia was?" Vincent swallowed and nodded, he could feel the demon's presences in his mind again. "For all your fawning over her you were nothing but another experiment… Tsk, tsk, Host, I thought you would have noticed that before now."
"Then why am I like this?" Vincent asked for once glad to be able to merely think to communicate with the demon. "How did it take so long to affect me?"
"Let's see. Genetic modification is one thing Valentine. What she did to you was in a whole different spectrum. The rest of us within you are demons, we don't live by the same laws of you humans, well the humans. I'm not sure you're still classified within their species with what she's done to you… She spliced you with a feline you idiot! It would have taken years before anyone would have noticed any physical difference! Add to that what Hojo did with adding us and what she did with trying to keep you alive after death… It just took a lot longer."
"The coffin."
"Bingo, now you're getting it." Vincent's eyes closed as he pulled away from the worried pilot. "I can return the host to his normal form," Chaos spoke to Cid with a sarcastic tone.
Cid blinked, shit Chaos was back and able to control Vincent it seemed. "If that's what Vince wants," it was all he could say. Any other day he would have said hell yeah get him back to the ol' Vince but the demon's absence and the gunner's odd acting was making him want to give the man the comfort of it being his choice and not someone else's.
"Good answer… Chief," Chaos opened golden versions of Vincent's cat eyes. "Very good answer," the orbs blinked back to the red cat ones before Vincent grunted as his body seemed to absorb the cat features. The ears folded back as the pain of the tail being pulled back into just another portion of his spine caused the gunner to whimper softly. The stripes were the last thing to fade from his body, leaving Vincent to open his normal, if not a little inhuman, blood red eyes. "Thanks Cid," was said as the Ex-Turk smiled at the pilot.
"For what?"
"Giving me a choice," Vincent suddenly shot forward and caught the pilot in his grip. "No one's ever done that," Cid jolted when Vincent was suddenly crushing their lips together, making a startled sound when a very human tongue slid between his lips to slide across his. A small part of him missed the texture of the other one but was ignored at the skillful teasing of this one. "Hmm," Vincent hummed in a very human manor as he pulled away, "Sorry, I had to know what that felt like."
Cid blinked then started laughing at the sheepish look the gunner had on his face. "You couldn't just ask?" he somehow got out between intakes of breath.
"No." They both started laughing as Reeve quietly slipped out of the room to give them whatever form of privacy they might need.
---
The Tyger
In what distant deeps or skies And what shoulder, and what art? What the hammer? What the chain? When the stars threw down their spears, Tyger! Tyger! burning bright,
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright,
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
Burnt the fire in thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand, and what dread feet?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb, make thee?
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
William Blake