A/N: The plot gets really confusing here - seriously even I have trouble with it sometimes - but I've gone through every scenario thoroughly so there are no plot holes but if you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask.
Yuffie was the first to speak this time. "What?! That's impossible!" She shouted.
"Not entirely." Rufus replied, he had a coy smile on his face.
"Tell me. Tell me what happened." Keto's voice was surprisingly steady for a man in his position.
"Only eight years had passed since Shinra was at war Wutai and many extremists were still on a rampage. It was only a matter of time before one rebellious group got it inside their heads to kill a member of Shinra in revenge. Unfortunately it happened to be your father."
Keto's grip on his sword tightened at the man's flippancy.
"This particular group decided to kill the family as well and invaded your family home with intentions to kill anyone inside. Luckily only your mother was killed because you weren't home. They must have had... other plans for Anna."
"How dare you!" Yuffie screamed stomping across the open space between the two groups. Vincent restrained her a meter away from the President. "How dare you speak of Wutai in such a way! No men of my country are that disgusting!"
Rufus turned his eyes to the young woman looking bored. "My dear every society has men like that. No civilisation is without it's faults, look at Reno."
"Hey-" Reno started to complain from the darkness but was stopped short when Yuffie spat at ground next to Rufus' feet and stormed away from him.
"Quite a lady." Rufus murmured to himself.
"Carry on old man." Keto demanded, his mind was spinning from the answers he was receiving but still nothing seemed to make sense. "If the Wutainese took Anna then how come she ended up in your labs?"
"A good question. By luck one of our units happened to come across them at a check point. They killed the soldiers and took the orphan girl in. She was supposed to go to Midgar to an orphanage but papers got mismatched and she ended up in one of the cells used by Hojo for human experimentation. It was a small mistake, but a grave one."
"Are you saying my sister was held captive and experimented on for nearly seven years because someone mixed up the paperwork?!" Keto stammered. His breath was ragged and uneven.
"..It wasn't the most ideal situation..."
"Wait a sec, if this was all a misunderstanding, why did you kidnap her again?" Yuffie clutched her head with one hand and frowned in frustration, most of this was just going over her head.
"As fate would have it, another coincidence." Rufus clicked his fingers and something slumped in the blackness. Just visible in the furthest rays of candle light, the top of a man's head and a grey hand came into view.
Anna stepped behind Keto at the sight of the corpse and shivered.
"And we found this in his pocket" Rufus pulled a piece of battered, soft paper out of his white suit and flicked it towards Keto. It stuttered onto the dirt next to his feet.
Keto's tanned hands grabbed and flimsy paper and unfolded it carefully, frowning at what he found. "What does this mean?" He asked staring and the strange and foreign symbols inked on the yellowing paper.
"Why don't you ask the young Wutain." Rufus replied, gesturing towards Yuffie.
Yuffie looked between the two men and before shifting her way towards the note.
"Unfinished business needs to be settled. Take the girl with pink hair hiding with AVALANCHE and kill her - subtly. Don't let anyone know who or what you are. We shall take the boy later" Yuffie's voice was but a whisper by the end of the letter.
"And who's signature is that at the bottom?" Rufus asked in his sickly smooth voice.
Yuffie's eye were fixed on the page and she swallowed, slowly. "My father's."
There was a moment of stunned silence before Rufus clapped his hands loudly. "Well, now that's settled I think I'll take my leave. So sorry your mission of revenge has come to nothing, but I'm sure you know how fix it." He chuckled to himself and turned against the flickering lights.
Keto's eyes snapped off the page and he strode across the space. The seventeen year old drew up his sword and thrashed downwards towards the ex-president.
A force from the darkness took the blow and shielded Rufus. The rush of movement snuffed out the few candles lit and the group was plunged into darkness.
"Don't underestimate me kid." The sweetness in his voice had disappeared beyond recognition. "I'm more powerful than you could imagine." He took a few uneven steps away before stopping again. "Your father was a good man, I had no reason to kill him." He walked further into the black void and the force holding up Keto's blade released, jogging after him.
Keto's knees buckled and he fell to the floor, a broken mess. Everything he had believed in had been smashed down in the past week, leaving him a shattered and empty man.
"There is no way backwards, only forwards." Vincent murmured.
Yuffie pocketed the letter and ran to Keto's side. "Keto..." She placed a hand lightly on his shoulder.
"Don't touch me!" He yelled, slapping Yuffie's hand away and stumbling backwards. His breathing was heavy and ragged.
"Keto-"
"Stay away from me! You're one of them!" He screamed, pointing at the cold body on the floor with his blade.
Dawn peeked through the cracks of the old wooden barn and shed grey light across the floorboards.
Yuffie tried to speak again but was cut off by a swing of Keto's blade.
"This is what you were planning from the beginning! You didn't want me. You wanted to kill me!" Keto's voice was uneven and crazy, like that of a madman. He looked around manically and shoved his foot through the nearest wall. He kept kicking the wood until it gave way to a small hole which he leapt through and out into the marshes...
--
"Well that was a great idea!" Yuffie ranted as Vincent, Anna and herself made their way slowly though the miles of bogs in front of them. "There is no way backwards only forwards." She yammered in a mimicking voice. "Yeah that was a brilliant thing to say to a guy who's just been told who killed his father and kidnapped his sister! Way to go on the social skills Vince!!"
The sun was steadily crawling upwards and hammering it's heat down viciously on the grassy tufts that lay scattered near and far, like little islands in a mud sea.
Yuffie prepared herself and leaped high across two meters of oozing, bubbling mud, landing in a precarious crouch. "And now I'm stuck with a depressed vampire and a 9 year old Invisible Woman!"
Vincent hopped lithely from one island to the next and waited for the two girls to catch up.
"If I'm such an evil schemer why has he left Anna with us, the whole reason we were out here in the first place was to save her and bring her back!"
"I'm sorry to cause you trouble" Anna mumbled, her form was fuzzing in and out of vision as she avoided the slime.
"It's not your fault kid, but man is your brother getting a punch when I see him!" Yuffie used her frustration to fuel her next jump, landing on the same tuft Vincent was standing on.
He turned unexpectedly and pushed the self proclaimed 'champion of the earth and the sky' off balance.
"Whoa!" She yelled, trying to correct herself by swinging her arms around.
A strong arm reached round her waist and pulled her upright, pushing her into his chest. Her heart beat quickened.
Vincent frowned at the young ninja. "..Why are you covered in bandages?"
"Oh just a little fight with some stalkers, t-they got what was coming to them." She stammered, she felt dizzy and sick, what was happening? She looked up at the ex-turk's concerned face, half hidden by his customary cloak.
"Mm." He grunted. "... I'm glad you're okay."
Yuffie blushed a bright crimson colour and cleared her throat. "Yeah well, nobody can beat me. I'm the greatest ninja in the world!" She stepped away from Vincent to try and clear her head and laughed nervously.
She forgot she was surrounded by mud. "Crap."
"..A ninja who can't seem to keep her balance." Vincent smirked down at the fallen Yuffie and headed on through the marshes.
"Oh for Gawd's sakes! Grossness!" She yelled and she sat in a pool of lumpy brown gloop.
--
One last piece of white blossom hung desperately to it's branch on the magnificent cherry blossom tree to the South of Wutai's pagoda. The last petal of the last branch of the last tree, hanging on for dear life. A sudden wind twisted it's way towards the tree, snaking through the town's houses towards the poor, defenceless petal. But the petal didn't wait, it didn't give the wind the satisfaction, it let go.
Now it wasn't bound by the wind, the petal floated where it wanted, wafting through the air. At last it found it's resting place on the hilt of a red sword, accepting it's fate.
Keto brushed the stray petal off his sword and walked further towards the giant red temple in front of him. He drew the sword.
"Stop!" Yelled a voice from behind.
He ignored it and walked up to a man at the entrance of the pagoda.
A shuriken buzzed past his head and stuck into the wall of the pagoda, moments later it's owner rushed by. She parried Keto's swing with her Conformer, standing her ground.
The shocked man behind her tottered inside.
"Stop it!" She shouted at him. "What's the point?!"
"Where's Anna?" He asked in what seemed like a calm voice.
"With the Strife's, safe from you!" Even though she was holding off Keto's sword, her feet were slowly moving backwards under his force.
"From me? It's your family that kills people!" Yuffie could see the anger flaring to life in his eyes.
"Because we were at war! Look what our town's become because of Shinra, they were protecting themselves! Yes the war might have been over but look at you! Ten years and your still trying to get revenge, same as them!" She couldn't hold him for much longer.
"I'm not afraid of hurting you Yuffie." He whispered, his breath so close she could feel it on her cheek.
Yuffie's foot hit the first step leading up to the pagoda and pushed her off balance. She fell back against the stairs and winded herself. Her ankle was twisted where she had broken through the wooden steps and she couldn't move out of the way.
Keto leered over and brought up his sword. "I'm not afraid of anyone!" He screamed.
"Anyone but me."
Click.
A/N: Who knew there were so many ways to describe mud! Not much more to go now! I hope you're enjoying this story, please review! ^.^
Some character profiles - so the story makes more sense:
Name: Keto
Age: 17
D.O.B: June 6th 1993
Likes: Pranks
Dislikes: Vincent
Info: Parents killed when he was 10, lived by himself for 7 years. Brunette with green eyes like his mother. 5ft 12".
Skills: Sword skills, calming people down (though not himself).
Personality: Let's his heart rule his head, passionate, quite emotional, the total opposite of Vincent.
Name: Anna
Age: 13
D.O.B: August 10th 1997
Likes: Books
Dislikes: Loud noises
Info: Parents killed when she was 6, taken to Hojo for experimenting and didn't escape for 6 1/2 years. Has the power of invisibility, hair and eye colour created by Hojo. She was a brunette like her brother before. 5ft 2"
Skills: Observation, good with bow and arrow
Personality: Quiet, timid, head strong
Name: James
Age: 48 when killed
D.O.B: September 25th 1955
Info: Became a turk under Vincent at 22, got very experienced in his job but never took a promotion because of family, died at 48 at the hands of a Wutain soldier. Had 2 children and a wife. Black hair, green eyes. 5ft 10"
Skills: Gun expert, observation.
Personality: Optimistic, observational, passionate.
LOL Spell check for Hojo comes up with 'Homo' XD
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MinnieMouse8990
TitanicPhan
Yes-4-Yuffentine
ikutoJS
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