The sun was not yet up when Sephiroth jerked awake, every nerve tensed and alert. He had forgotten something; something of critical importance.
"Sir?" Cloud's voice sounded small and sleepy in the pre-dawn hours. The previous days' events flooded his mind, a deluge of information rivaling the force of a waterfall. Chaos. Vincent. Jenova. Lucrecia. With a sigh, Sephiroth leaned back against the headboard and rubbed his face with both hands. While no longer tired, he was far from rested.
"Catch another hour or two if you want," Sephiroth told the boy. "I'll finish out."
"Thank you, Sir."
It was a little past 4AM if the bedside clock was to be believed. Normally, soldiers were rousted from bed around 5AM. Given the insanity of the last few days, however, Sephiroth felt his men had earned a bit of a lie-in. Belatedly, it occurred to him that he was still in bed. Cloud, bless him, had gone over and flopped onto the available mattress space next to Zack- who had promptly thrown an arm and a leg over him. Already snoring, Cloud did not seem to care. Sephiroth smiled, chuckling to himself, and shook his head. Glancing over at the other bed, he was met with a view of Vincent's back, the blankets still gathered close around his shoulders.
At some point Vincent had crossed from senseless into sleep, his posture beneath the bedclothes more natural than the flat, laid-out position he'd been left in. Long body curled in a loose "S" he lay on his side, facing the wall. His metal arm was hidden, tucked as it was under the pillow. Only the fist of his right hand was visible, the hem of the blanket still caught in his long fingers and pulled close under his chin. Vincent may have spent the last thirty years in a coffin, but he'd been in makou stasis. This was the first time he'd had a chance to honestly sleep. If he had been plagued by nightmares then, it seemed- outwardly, anyway- that his dreams at present were peaceful. Sephiroth hoped they would stay that way.
He let the boys sleep until 7AM, shooing them downstairs for breakfast before attempting to wake Vincent. Shouting or shaking him by the shoulder was not likely to go over well. Sephiroth was half inclined to let him sleep until he woke up, but could not quite suppress the worry that if left by himself, Vincent would sleep for another thirty years. It was ridiculous, but there it was.
"Vincent?" he asked, keeping his tone as level as he could. "Vincent?"
No response. Carefully, he reached and touched his flesh hand. "Vincent?"
It was about the reaction Sephiroth had expected. The older man inhaled sharply, red eyes snapping open. Fabric tore as he fumbled under the pillow for a weapon that was not there. Realizing he was unarmed, he tried to fight, to kick, claw, bite, struggling frantically against Sephiroth's grip. Grabbing him by the wrists, Sephiroth held him fast.
"Vincent, stop! It's me!" Sephiroth grunted, trying to hold onto him. "It's Sephiroth. Sephiroth!"
The name percolated to the part of his brain where reason still existed. Vincent quieted and shook his head, blinking deliberately a few times.
"It's Sephiroth," he repeated softly. "You're safe. You're not dreaming. It's all right."
Vincent looked at him, red eyes haunted and fearful, clearly unsure if what Sephiroth had told him was true. Soft yellow sunlight filtered through the windows, spreading a checkerboard of warm light across the bed. Vincent stood and stumbled toward the open window, leaning heavily on the sill. Sephiroth followed him, not wanting him to try to climb out the window in just his underclothes. Carefully, he placed a hand on his shoulder. Vincent started only slightly, turning to look at him. Without warning, Vincent raked his claw across his own forearm, leaving four bloody gashes in the pale flesh.
"What are you doing?!" Sephiroth demanded, grabbing the injured arm and hastily casting a low-grade healing spell.
"I had to know…" Vincent said weakly. A warped smile pulled up the corners of his mouth. His shoulders heaved and shook, a deranged chuckle escaping the malformed grin.
"I had to know," he said again, a hysterical edge to the words.
"Know what?" Sephiroth prompted, wondering if he ought to be worried or not?
The shaky laugh collapsed into a sob. "...that I wasn't dreaming. That it was real."
Sephiroth had nothing to say to that. Not knowing what else to do, he put an arm around the other man's shoulders. Vincent fell against him, still trembling. Metal arm hanging heavily at his side, he gripped Sephiroth's shoulder with his flesh hand. Awkwardly, Sephiroth put both arms around him, hoping this was the right thing to do.
"It's alright," he said softly. "You're alright."
After a minute, Vincent took a deep, shuddering breath and swiped at his eyes with his right hand.
"I'm sorry," he said, voice still shaky. "I'm sorry I…"
"It's alright," Sephiroth assured him. "You hadn't slept in two days and had several heavy-duty cure spells used on you in a very short amount of time." Not to mention a gunshot wound to the head. "You're probably just hungry."
"Yes," Vincent agreed, sinking down onto the edge of the bed. "Yes, you're right."
"Go get cleaned up," Sephiroth told him. "I'll meet you downstairs."
Sephiroth kept a deliberate eye on Vincent while he and the others ate. As he had at Cloud's home, he kept his claw in his lap, only using his right hand to eat.
"Orders for the day, Sir?" Zack's voice cut into his thoughts.
"We help the citizens clean up the mess we made. Then we're shipping out before we end up burning the place down."
Zack smirked and went back to his toast.
As it happened, only the Shinra mansion had suffered any significant damage, and none of the locals seemed too fussed that it was gone. Vincent gave the pile of stone a wary glance and then turned his back on it. That was one ghost that would not be haunting him again. With nothing else to do, Sephiroth decided it was time they took their leave.
"I'm coming too!" Their guide, Tifa, stood waiting next to the truck with a backpack on her shoulders wearing the same ridiculous outfit she'd worn when they first arrived. Inwardly, Sephiroth sighed.
"Thinking of joining SOLDIER?" he asked her. Contrary to popular belief, women were not banned from the military, it was simply harder for females to meet the necessary physical standards for admission. One or two had made the attempt, but so far all the SOLDIERs in Shinra's employ were male. Behind him, Zack snickered.
"Maybe," she said loftily, "either way, I'm coming with you. If you expect me to stay here after all that, think again. You don't have to worry about me, I'll find a job. I just need a ride."
She had a point. Tifa had witnessed much, and Sephiroth wasn't sure if he could trust her to keep her mouth shut. With a shrug, he waved her toward the cab.
"Fine. You can sit up front with the driver."
Tifa grinned and went to stow her backpack.
"She's going to get eaten alive," Vincent mumbled, watching her leave.
"She can hold her own," Sephiroth told him, already directing Zack and Cloud to load the rest of the journals.
"I don't doubt it, but what she's wearing…"
Sephiroth shrugged. "I don't know the first thing about fashion. So long as she's covered, I don't much care."
"My point exactly," Vincent grumbled. "Not that she'd be better off in the slacks she had on the other night."
"Slacks?" Zack echoed, grinning in amusement. "Now you do sound like an old man."
With a sigh, Vincent picked up the last box full of notebooks and climbed into the truck.
The crates made seating a bit cramped, especially with an extra person. The engined had barely started when Cloud grimaced, a greenish tinge washing over his face. Sephiroth fingered the materia in the slot of his gauntlet, prepared to knock the boy out if need be. Cloud lurched forward as the truck shifted into gear and began to move.
"Here," Vincent said, pulling Cloud over to sit on one of the many crates. Rather than looking out the back window and watching the landscape recede, he now sat facing the overhead window that looked into the cab; the backs of the driver and Tifa's heads clearly visible. Cloud blinked, already looking less green.
"Wow, okay, that's better," he remarked. Vincent seemed to melt, going from standing to sitting cross-legged on the floor in one fluid motion.
"It's creepy how you do that," Zack remarked. Vincent blinked, looking up at him.
"Do what?"
"Never mind."
Reaching, Vincent took Cloud's hand in his, holding it palm up and pressing his thumb against the inside of his wrist. Cloud seemed a bit perplexed by this, but after a moment, sat up a little straighter.
"I don't feel as sick," he announced, nonplussed. "How'd you do that?"
Vincent offered him a flicker of a smile. "Pressure points."
"Show me," Zack asked, scooting across the boxes to watch.
"Here," Vincent moved to one side, gliding with an unnatural grace. "It works better when you use two hands, anyway."
"I love you man," Zack told him, "but you are one freaky dude."
Sephiroth bit his lip to suppress a chuckle and reached into one of the crates. He'd managed to go through almost all of the notebooks, but there was still a box of them he hadn't yet touched. Flipping it open, he did his best to read the Professor's minute, blocky handwriting while the truck bumped and trundled along. After a few minutes of watching the pages vibrate, Sephiroth began to appreciate what Cloud had experienced on the way up. Hastily, he closed the book before he could become further nauseated.
Cloud had actually nodded off pinching his own wrists and sat slumped against Zack who was also dozing, arms crossed and chin nodding on his chest. At first Sephiroth thought Vincent was asleep as well. One of his long legs tucked up, his flesh elbow rested on his bent knee, and his claw lay curled in a fist in his lap. He'd dressed in the black uniform and red cloak they'd found him in. There hadn't been much left of the guard's uniform and it hadn't fit him very well anyway. There were enough characters in Midgar that he wasn't likely to draw too much attention. However, that raised a rather important question that had not previously had a chance to present itself. Noticing he was being watched, Vincent looked up.
"Yes?"
"I was trying to think of what we're going to do with you," Sephiroth told him, feeling Vincent ought to have a say in this. "We can't bring you back to Shinra headquarters."
"That's probably not a good idea, no," Vincent agreed.
"I also have to figure out what to do with the girl. You're right, she shouldn't be set loose on her own in Midgar."
Vincent nodded. For a moment, they both sat silent.
"...who's running the Turks these days?"
"A man named Tseng."
Vincent blinked blankly.
"You wouldn't know him," Sephiroth assured him. "He's close to me in age. He only took over from Veld about two years ago."
That made him sit up straighter. "Veld?"
"Yes, Veld Verdot. He was head of the Turks for a good twenty years or…" Sephiroth trailed off as realization dawned. "You know him."
Vincent nodded. "We were in training together. 'V' names," he shrugged. "We went on to be partners."
There was clearly more to it than that, but Sephiroth decided not to press the issue.
"...is he still alive?" The words were cautious, guarded. It struck Sephiroth, suddenly, how strange all this must be for Vincent. Everyone he'd known or cared about had either grown old or died. Sephiroth searched his memory, but came up blank.
"I'm sorry, I don't know," he confessed. "I've never interacted with the Turks all that much. We can look him up as soon as we get back."
A ghost of a smile flickered across Vincent's face as he nodded. "I'd like that."
The trip back to Midgar was not a short one. It had taken them almost a week to make the journey to Nibelheim. Why Shinra had sent them to such a remote corner of the world was still a mystery. The question nagged at Sephiroth like an itch that could not be scratched. With little else to do on the endless drive across country and the slow voyage across the sea from Costa Del Sol to Junon, he finished the rest of the journals. He got his answer, but it was far from satisfactory.
At least Cloud had better luck with ships than he did with automobiles. Although he was queasy for the first hour or so, he soon got his sea legs. He and Zack proceeded to make a nuisance of themselves trying to help the naval crew. Sephiroth did not mind. He let them have their fun, his own mind too full to bother about minor disciplinary infractions. Vincent, as ever, kept to himself and said little to anyone even when asked. The crew, perhaps frightened by his uncanny red eyes, gave him a wide bubble of space. This was just as well. Sephiroth had no desire to try to deal with any of Vincent's "friends" while in the middle of the ocean.
Vincent seemed to gravitate to the highest points of the ship; open places where he could see the sky. Unable to pace his cabin any longer, Sephiroth went to look for him, and found him perched above the lookout deck.
"What do you know about the Promised Land?" Sephiroth asked, pulling himself up onto metal outcropping. Vincent tilted his head.
"Academically or spiritually?"
It was Sephiroth's turn to be confused. "Is there a difference?"
Vincent shrugged. "I remember Lucy- Lucrecia, your mother- and the others talking about it. Ifalna and Gast would argue for hours about the translation of the phrase. I don't know if scholars are still fussing about it. I can't imagine much of anyone would care these days."
He paused, fixing Sephiroth with his red stare. "Why? I didn't take you for the religious type."
"It was in the journals," Sephiroth began. "Some of the later ones. Shinra wanted a Cetra to lead them the Promised Land of legend; a land flowing with Makou energy. There were no more Cetra, so they made one. They were going to follow me," he went on, hands curling into angry fists. "They thought that if I met what I thought was my mother, what they thought was a Cetra, that we'd lead them skipping down the garden path to a place where a makou reactor could suck the well forever and never drain it dry."
Every muscle had tensed, every nerve stretched taut. Inside him, anger burned white and hot.
"I was created so that Shinra could make more money," he growled, the words gagging him. "Except I never heard the voice of the Planet. So they made me into a weapon instead, and sent me to conquer nations that did not want or need makou power."
Five years of his life; fifteen to twenty, he'd spent fighting in the Wutai war. Barely Cloud's age, although considerably taller, he'd been shipped off to slaughter the Wutaians who had resisted Shinra's attempts to desecrate their most sacred site by building a makou reactor on top of it. He'd seen Gast's map in one of the notebooks, marking the holy places with little zig-zag stars and labeled with his neat, slanted handwriting. Ramuh had once sat atop Mt. Nibel, Titan's throne had been in the heart of the Gongaga forest, Shiva's home beneath the waves on Junon's shores, and of course the water god Leviathan of war-torn Wutai… On and on and on, every location had been dug up, rebuilt, and had "Property of Shinra" plastered all over it. They'd conquered the whole damn world, and he'd helped them do it without ever knowing.
Things spiritual had not been part of his education growing up. He knew the names of the old gods, but only as power to be summoned in battle through the use of materia. Scientifically, it made sense that the sacred sites across the world would be the best places to put a makou reactor. The deposits there would be unusually high, ideal for extraction. Professor Hojo had told him countless times to dismiss such superstitious nonsense. Sephiroth did not feel especially guilty about what had become of so many local shrines. Surely with the turn of another century approaching, the age when people looked to the earth and skies for divine intervention was over? What truly stung, what fueled the hurt, the fury inside him, was that he had been used.
Old Man Shinra was going to pay.
Reaching, Vincent rested a hand on his shoulder, startling out of of his reverie. The metal of his prosthetic hand clattered awkwardly against Sephiroth's pauldron. No one ever touched him unless it was to administer a makou injection, or some sort of similar medical procedure. Even Zack did not touch him; had never tried to high-five or shake his hand. The only instance of anyone touching him even casually had happened two days ago when Zack had caught him when he collapsed in the reactor. Sephiroth wasn't sure if that really counted since he had not been awake for most of it. He had always thought he did not like people touching him, but the weight of Vincent's claw was comforting somehow. He didn't care if it was scratching the surface of his armor, or that the sharp points of the talons were digging into his coat. The gesture had been made in support, in solidarity, and Sephiroth appreciated that.
For a long moment they sat quietly. Bracing both hands behind him, Sephiroth leaned back and looked up at the sky. It was a clear day, the sky as blue as the sea with hardly a cloud in sight- not that that mattered with a steam ship. It seemed incongruous that he should discover such a wretched truth on such a beautiful day. At length, Vincent broke the silence.
"What are you going to tell Shinra?"
There were any number of things he would like to tell Shinra at this point, and while it would do much to improve his mood, it likely would not improve the situation.
"That the mission was successful."
Vincent looked at him.
"We found and dealt with the issue," Sephiroth went on. "There will be no more trouble from the Nibelheim makou reactor."
"No, but we've still got a hell of a problem to deal with."
It was true. Allowing what they'd thought was the corpse of Jenova to fall into the makou well had indeed been a most egregious tactical oversight.
"Yes," Sephiroth agreed. "We do."
"Won't the board be curious as to why you haven't tried to wander off yet? Won't Hojo?"
"Probably," Sephiroth growled, some of the anger returning. "I don't go up to the science department much anymore, but I imagine he'll have me visiting daily until I start to show signs of wanderlust." He had never liked the Professor, and this latest insult was just one more in a list of grievances so long that he'd given up trying to number them. Allowing himself a frustrated sigh, Sephiroth rubbed his face with both hands.
"You don't like him."
Sephiroth felt this was the very definition of an understatement. "No."
"May I ask why?"
Considering he'd practically cleaved him in two during a similar conversation, Vincent had a right to ask. However, Sephiroth did not want to talk about that. Not now. Preferably not ever.
"Not now," he said shortly. Vincent nodded and went back to looking at the sky. A V-shaped line of seabirds flew past.
"If I may suggest, you might be able to put your cover story to our advantage."
Sephiroth turned to look at him. "How so?"
"The monster escaped- which is not untrue- and you need to track it down."
Sephiroth nodded. It made sense. It was the kind of thing a Turk would think of; not wholly true, nor yet a lie. But how to track down a living fossil? Surely Jenova could not run. She had no legs- at least not that he had seen. Had she dissolved, or held her shape? And should they catch her, what then? Beheading her clearly hadn't worked, nor had setting her on fire. Despite all the information within the notebooks, none of it would be of any use. Gast's fatal assumption was presuming the fossil had been an Ancient. According to Vincent and Chaos- Sephiroth took a moment to boggle that he was taking the word of an actual Force of Nature- Jenova was something that had fallen from the skies eons ago, deceiving and then slaughtering the Cetra. Chaos had seemed certain Jenova would attempt this ploy a second time, and there was no reason not to believe him. (Except, again, he'd had a rather violent discussion with a honest-to-gods Guardian of the planet and Sephiroth had not yet managed to wrap his mind around that.) Surely there were records somewhere documenting the downfall of the Cetra and this- as Chaos had put it- Crisis From The Skies?
They needed to know more about their enemy first. There was only one place likely to house the information they needed, and the keeper of such knowledge was not likely to give it up willingly. Sephiroth allowed himself a frustrated sigh. He would have to venture up to the 67th floor. He would have to speak with Professor Hojo.