Author's Notes: ¹ - 'Capellirossi' means red-head in Italian and in this story it is Reno's real last name since the creators of FFVII never gave him one. I got the term/idea from drakonlily's fic (with her permission of course), Symphony: I Tried. Go read it! It's about Reno and it pwns all!

² - 'Sangue' means blood in Italian, and I use it as a nickname bestowed upon Reno by his mother because of his red hair and uncanny ability to attract appearances of said liquid.

Author's Comments: Yeah, here is the next bit of FALS; enjoy it and don't forget to leave me comments because I love them. The comments will be used to make certain people stay living instead of going back to the Lifestream! Okay, enough of that.

Capellirossi was yoinked, with permission as stated above, from http://www. fanfiction .net/s/1999844/1/Symphony_I_Tried (remove the spaces in your browser). Go read it now! It fucking pwns all Reno fics I've read to date.

http://shinranightrain. deviantart. com/art/FALS-Yuri-Alpha-Shinra-ID-card-113722202 - that's something I did out of boredom lol. Oh, and sorry about the repeated information and stuff; I kinda just copied and pasted the info. from DA's Artist's Comments (Author's Comments here) section after I wrote it in the actual text (the Author's Notes).

Fallen Angels & Lost SOLDIERs, Chapter 10: Resurfacing

The sound of many machines humming softly in the dark was the first sound to greet Lucrecia as she awoke, utterly disoriented. Soon, the rhythmic clacking of someone typing furiously also reached her ears and she blinked her eyes against the painful light that was now attempting to invade the darkness. "…there must be a way…editing Hollander's machine…I should be able to use Hojo's DNA samples…bring them back…" Lucrecia heard these snippets of conversation, though admittedly only one voice was speaking at any given time. "Jenova cells…the reunion theory…applies to all carriers…have Jenova's heart will bring them here…" Stiff and confused, Lucrecia slowly sat up to find herself in a comfortable bed that had been dragged into a large laboratory by sheer force from the looks of things; the lab looked like it had been put together by an expert from a shambled mass of rubbish. She could actually smell the decay of her surroundings: rotting wood, rusting metals, and the distinctive smell of long extinguished fires. Looking further at her environment, Lucrecia was startled by the appearance of a young woman, probably only twenty-five at best, with long bluish-white hair sitting at an old computer console that looked as if it had seen much better days.

"Um…excuse me for interrupting, but how did I get here? Where is here for that matter?" Lucrecia asked politely, though her caution was obvious. The figure of the young woman stilled before she whirled around on the small computer stool; golden eyes laced with the glow of mako met the soft brown ones of Lucrecia, and her heart paused in its normal rhythm for a fraction of a second. She knew that glow, and she knew those eyes from visions she'd had…this was a woman that she should be wary of, for she was like Sephiroth.

"Ah, it is good to see that you've awoken Dr. Crescent; this one has been waiting for you to revive for several hours now. Of course, you probably have no clue as to this one's identity, but perhaps that is for the better. You need only know this one as Alpha, for that is the name that Professor Hojo gave to this one. No other name is of any importance now. You are probably wondering why you have been brought here and awakened, are you not?" The young woman was absolutely stunning now that Lucrecia got a good look at all of her, and her voice was simply hypnotizing; her eyes pierced into the soul, and her hair glistened like starlight no matter how one looked at it. "Please, do not be afraid; allow this one to provide an explanation." Lucrecia watched as the woman who referred to herself as 'this one' and told her to call her Alpha turned back to the computer and quickly pulled up various files and images; some of them were easy to recognize while others were not. "We are currently in Banora, and these are files and dossiers that contain all the information available on the events that have occurred, and the people involved in those events, since you sealed yourself in Crystal Cave; please, feel free to look and to ask this one any questions you may have. Unfortunately, this one has other things that must be done, but you need only press this button-" Alpha indicated a button on the console and then a device attached to her belt. "And this one will be able to speak to you even if this one is no longer on the premises of the facility in which you are currently residing. Please forgive this one for seeming rude, but this one must leave you alone now; the tasks this one must perform should not take more than two days at most, but if you need this one you have only but to press a button and call for 'Alpha'." With that, the young woman whom she was to call Alpha left through a door that quickly resealed itself; an electronic lock requiring a pass code told Lucrecia that she wouldn't be using that door.

"So, I guess all I can do is read these files and examine the data while she's gone…" Lucrecia sighed when her thoughts inadvertently turned to Sephiroth, then to Vincent, and finally to the two secrets she'd tried to keep hidden from Hojo. When she brushed her fingertips over the keyboard of the console, she started at the first file that presented itself for her inspection: "Jenova Project - Project S-1/A". Curiosity piqued, Lucrecia opened the computer file and began to sift through the contents.

Jenova Project - Project S-1/A

Experiment performed by Professor Hojo

Experiment Goal: Create a female compatible with the Jenova cells to be the perfect match and equal of Project S.

Specimen: Sayuri Crescent/Valentine, renamed Alpha for the purpose of the experiment.

Specimen Number: JA-XIII-00; Jenova Project Alpha, Trial Thirteen, Specimen Zero.

Specimen Gender: Female

Date of Birth: July 6

Sire: Unknown, but suspected to be the Turk Vincent Valentine: deceased.

Dam: Dr. Lucrecia Crescent: deceased.

Specifics of Experimentations: Initial experiment - genetically altered with Jenova cells, age one; successful. Secondary experiment - exposed to mako and giving liquid materia injections directly into the bloodstream to enhance fighting capabilities, age seven; successful. Tertiary experiment - surgical implantation of Jenova's heart into the specimen's chest cavity, connecting the foreign organ to the specimen's own heart to test compatibility with Jenova, age twelve; successful. Fourth experiment - breeding with another SOLDIER, age sixteen; failure - Specimen sent to Deepground for six months of rehabilitation. Age eighteen, Specimen continues to exceed all expectations. Age twenty-four, Specimen vanishes and is presumed dead.

Notes: Specimen reached physical maturation of a sixteen-year-old by age eight; recruited into SOLDIER by age six. SOLDIER 2nd Class by age ten, true age kept classified. At age eight, all physical aging ceased until the eve of Specimen's sixteenth birthday, whereupon physical aging resumed. However, from age sixteen forward, the Specimen only aged one year for every two that passed; truly unique and vexing, for the effect has not been duplicated in any other experiments. Promoted to SOLDIER 1st Class at age sixteen; given rank of Lieutenant General at age seventeen, and is considered second only to Sephiroth in strength and ability. Specimen has been reassigned to the Turks after the Nibelheim Incident and Sephiroth's death. Specimen has defected from the Turks, vanishing without a trace four years after reassignment; Shinra blames it on faulty training or perhaps a genetic error in the Jenova cells. Specimen is a failure and this project will be abandoned, for all other female specimens have died within forty-eight hours of the Initial Experiment.

Lucrecia stared at the file in mute horror as a series of images flitted across the screen, all labeled 'Specimen Alpha': each and every picture showed two girls, but it was quickly brought to her attention that the girls were in fact the same person when a video file attached to the dossier began to play. It showed a girl with dark, wavy bloody-black hair and vivid green eyes during a training simulation; after a few moments, a command was issued by Hojo and the girl's appearance changed before Lucrecia's eyes. No longer was the dark haired girl standing there, but the young woman who had greeted Lucrecia when she'd first awoken not but a half an hour ago, Alpha. After reading the whole file and studying it intensely, Lucrecia was convinced that the young woman was her daughter, the baby girl she'd created using her own ovum and a sample of Vincent's DNA; it had been a last attempt at an apology of sorts, but Lucrecia truly had wanted to give Vincent a child. Unexpectedly, Lucrecia had not only a daughter from her little pet project, but a baby boy had been born as well; they had not actually been born before she'd sealed herself in Crystal Cave, but by examining the DNA of the embryos, she'd been able to tell the genders of the two children that she hoped would be born. It seemed that luck had not been on her side, though. Hojo had found them and taken at least her daughter as a specimen for his experiments, just as he had Sephiroth. She knew not if the male embryo had survived or what had become of him if he had, but she pushed away those thoughts as she began going through the files that detailed everything she'd missed while she'd been sealed away.

~Two days later, Banora~

When she'd awakened to find herself in a hospital room in Junon, with a Turk sitting by her bedside, she had instantly drugged the sleeping Turk; she did not want to be pursued until it was unavoidable. After all, she was a SOLDIER and she had no need of the Turks; no, what she needed was to deal with the fact that she was keenly aware of someone searching for her, and that whomever the persons in question were, they wanted something from her that could only result in her death. Intent on avoiding this, she formulated a plan to allow her access to certain people who had either the knowledge or the skills necessary to help her in the coming battle. So far, she had proceeded to awaken and lock them into rooms with computer consoles, one after another, until she had finally gone through all of them: it had been far too easy to modify Hollander's machine to generate a body based solely on DNA samples from deceased persons. It had been a completely different matter, however, to make the appropriate alterations to the blueprints she had for one of Hojo's machines that had allowed the body to mature to the desired age. After all, Hojo's prototypes of the machine had all been utter failures, for he had not seen the fundamental mistakes within the very design: to age a human faster than the natural hormonal and metabolic rates allowed, one first had to achieve balance within the specimen and maintain that level of homeostasis throughout the entire procedure.

Hojo had never been able to do this, since it was by far more than a simple task; however, she had succeeded where Hojo had failed, using some of her own DNA to allow just enough of a tolerance to the process in those whom she was cloning and aging. Now, she had five rooms with computer consoles set up, each sealed with complex electronic locks of her own design and housing one of the five whom she'd technically raised from the dead. Dr. Lucrecia Crescent had merely been the first, since she had not actually been dead and had been the easiest one to access. Now four others were in rooms identical to the one she'd put Lucrecia in, and she was merely waiting for them to all finish perusing the files and dossiers of people and events that had held importance since they'd last been counted as among the living. Of course, she had also recreated Professor Hojo, but that had been more for her own personal desire to fulfill a vendetta against the man; Hojo was heavily sedated and locked in a cold, damp cell in a corner of her little base of operations.

She knew better than to use the technique and the machines to try and recreate Genesis or Sephiroth, for her instincts told her that both of them would be returning on their own all in due time. So, she sat and waited for the buzz of her belt pager to tell her that all of them had finished: Angeal was in one room, Zack another, Cissnei a third, Aerith a fourth, and Lucrecia had since been let out of her room and placed into another to wait. Finally, there was a series of beeps and buzzing sounds from a console, but it was not the one she'd been waiting for; frowning, she rose and walked over to the security console to see that someone had tripped one of the alarms in the apple orchard…and they were heading towards her current location at a rather alarming pace. As a large crash and the sound of shattering glass reached her ears, she realized that the humans on the screens were not her only problem. Scowling, the woman currently known as Alpha pulled up one of the camera feeds from the old factory high above her head. She scanned the video feed only to find that a pair of behemoths had apparently been attracted by the presence of the food that she'd brought in from her escapades into the nearby countryside. Snarling, she ignored the buzzing from her belt that told her at least two of her 'guests' had finished with the consoles as she quickly made her way through the complex pathways that led back up to the apple juice factory of Banora village from her make-shift base. She duly noted that the figures of the people, probably Shinra personnel, were getting dangerously close to the factory now, and quickened her pace before flipping off her PHS, which she had rigged to get direct feed from all of her cameras.

Just as she was entering the factory from the hidden passage that led to her 'base', the behemoths seemed to have pinpointed the strongest source of whatever had attracted them because they were both closing in on her location far too quickly for her liking. She could hear people shouting both behind the behemoths and herself, but ignored it as she snarled threateningly at the beasts. Seemingly caught off-guard, the two monsters hesitated in their advance while she lunged down and under them, a tactic that was never recommended for fighting a behemoth…unless you were Alpha of SOLDIER. As she slid under the first behemoth, she caught it by the lower jaw and used the force with which she'd thrown herself under it to completely toss it off-balance. Behemoth A went skidding into a large stack of barrels that came crashing down on it; while it tried to free itself, Behemoth B snapped its jaws at Alpha, who hissed in return as she deftly grasped the upper jaw in one hand and the lower in the other. Using sheer brute strength, she wrestled the much larger Behemoth to the ground and twisted its neck as hard and swiftly as she could: the sickening crunch as its neck shattered was ignored by its killer as the first Behemoth gave a roar and freed itself from the fallen barrels. Alpha was aware that there were people watching, but her SOLDIER training told her to ignore them in light of the larger and more problematic Behemoth that remained; one did not usually try to fight a Nibel Wolf in front of a Dragon's lair, after all. Despite the obvious fact that the Behemoth was at least twice her own size, Alpha defiantly stared the beast down: it roared at her and she smirked as she copied its movements when it began to try and dodge past her, always remaining between it and any hope of escape. Enraged and surrounded by humans, the Behemoth lunged at the lone human that stood between it and the nearest escape route it could take: back out the hole in the wall that the two monsters had made when they'd broken into the abandoned building.

"Yuri, move yo!" Vaguely, she registered the shout and the owner of the voice, but it was of no consequence as she allowed the Behemoth to pin her to the floor. Smirking up at the huge, dumb beast was probably the last thing any normal, or even sane, person would do in her current situation, but Alpha was not a normal person; she was a SOLDIER First Class, and she was the Lieutenant General.

"Never hesitate, JA-XIII-00; you are a SOLDIER." Hojo! He was the only one who ever called her by her Specimen Number. How had that damned scientist gotten out of the cell she'd thrown him into? Oh, well…no matter; she would deal with him soon enough. Snarling she punched the Behemoth right between the eyes as it made to tear her head off in its jaws, and the result was one very dead Behemoth collapsing on top of her. Cursing under her breath, she used a Master Hell Firaga to incinerate the corpses of the two behemoths before easily springing from her back to her feet in one fluid movement. Stalking dangerously over to Hojo, she was pleased when the slimy bastard flinched at her obvious killing intent, no matter how slight the flinch was.

"One day, you are going to die screaming Professor…and I am going to watch." Her voice was soft, almost seductive actually, but it had such a dangerous edge to it that it may as well have been the deadliest poison known to mankind as far as anyone hearing it was concerned. The presences of Lucrecia, Angeal, Zack, Cissnei, and Aerith were not lost on Alpha, but she had a bigger problem to worry about as she rounded on the group that she had seen approaching on her surveillance cameras: she easily recognized some of them, while others were a bit more hazy. Patiently, she waited for the chaos that was bound to arise to set in as the two groups seemed to notice and recognize each other for the first time. Scoffing lightly, she didn't allow any of them to move before she stalked out of the factory and towards the apple orchard; she took no heed of the red-headed Turk that followed after her, closely tailed by a man she knew as Vincent Valentine, all but strangling Hojo as he drug the man with him, and Dr. Crescent. Scowling as she plucked a Dumbapple from one of the trees as she came in to the orchard, she took up an idle and nonchalant perch on the roots and trunk of the same tree to wait for the three to catch up while taking a bite out of the apple: whatever they wanted to say had better be fucking worth it because she was already in a foul mood.

"Yo, Yuri…what the hell is going on?" She eyed the red-headed Turk critically, frowning when something in the back of her mind whispered that he was someone important… "You just up and fucking vanished out of the hospital in Junon! You can't do doing shit like that now, yo!" Raising one fine, bluish-white eyebrow as she mused over the red-head's apparent self-proclaimed say in her life, she smirked in a manner that spoke volumes of her boredom and impatience.

"And your opinion counts for…what precisely?" Her tone was one of curiosity and boredom, an interesting mix to be sure, as her gaze shifted over to Vincent, Lucrecia, and then settled on Hojo. "Ah, I see you brought the mad scientist with you…good, I'd hate to have to hunt him down again. It gets so very boring when you must chase a moving target that is not only slippery and insane, but a complete coward as well; the dear Professor here gets so very predictable that it is unbearably dull to play 'tag' with him."

"Yes, well…when you speak of 'tag' Alpha, it is the kind that involves you using your claws and shifting into your Jenova form; anyone who does not flee from you in that state is an utter fool." Hojo quipped snidely from his place at Vincent's side. The only thing preventing Hojo from fleeing was the fact that he knew that if Vincent didn't shoot him and Reno didn't catch him, then Alpha most certainly would trap and kill him after letting him have a ten minute head start. A full throated and sultry laugh was her response to Hojo's words, and she saw the confusion in the red-head's eyes as she stood while tossing the core of the Banora apple high above her head. Moving with speed and fluidity that was not only inhuman but terrifying, she brought one hand up in a classic sword stroke without a the sword; the neatly sliced halves of the apple core fell to the ground, one half on either side of her. Bringing her hand back down ever so slowly, her nails glinted with juice from the core: the nails, which had been reasonably long to start with, were now like six inch blades extending from each fingertip that slowly rounded out to fine claw-like points at the tips.

"You mean these claws that you gave to me, Professor? I wasn't aware that you fancied the game so much…perhaps we can play again soon. Unfortunately, I can hear 'Mother' calling for me, and you know how I hate to disappoint." With a smirk that could have made a full grown man and harden war veteran swoon, the woman known as Alpha turned and began to walk away. She snarled when the red-head caught her wrist, twisting it firmly but gently as he pulled her back to face him.

"Yuri…don't do this again, yo." He whispered, his gaze begging something of her that she could not quite grasp. "Don't walk out on me again, not when Adanna's waiting for you to come home."

"Your words are supposed to mean what to me Turk?" Alpha snapped viciously, aware that she was being cruel to this man, and that he apparently cared about her more than she was currently comfortable with. She knew him, yes; but right now she was Alpha and she had a job to do. A SOLDIER follows orders; there is no room for anything else, and she was Alpha, the best SOLDIER that had ever been aside from Sephiroth. The secret to her strength and skill was simple: she could lock everything behind the persona of Alpha that Shinra had forced upon her when they made her a SOLDIER. Alpha had no compassion, no mercy, and no room for affection or love; Alpha was only a being of sadism, cruelty, anger, rage, hate, pain, blood, murder, death, and killing. If she administered mercy, it was not intended as such, but rather as punishment. Deep in her heart of hearts and in the back of her mind, Alpha felt her true self cringe and sink into despair at the look in Reno's eyes: inside the guise of Alpha, Sayuri was dying as she was forced to put on the mask and personality of Alpha out the interest of self-preservation, only to have to push Reno away again. Reno just looked into her eyes for a long moment before dropping her hand as if he'd been holding onto something that scalded everything it touched.

"Alright, I get it yo…" Reno muttered coldly as he took a step back from her while Cloud, with Angeal, Zack and the others, came to stand nearby. "You're the best and this is how you roll, so fucking roll bitch." Reno took out a pack of cigarettes and tossed them with a Zippo at her feet before turning and leaving the rest of the group to stare, dumbstruck by what they had only seen; he had spoken far too lowly for anyone but her to hear him.

"Hey, Capellirossi¹!" Reno froze but did not turn to look at her; Sayuri was the only one who knew his real last name outside of the Turks. "Watcher bitch, cause if I catch the Turks following me, there'll be hell to pay! Got that Sangue²?" Now Reno did turn to stare quite openly, only to find her sauntering away while waving one hand back over her shoulder in dismissal; Sangue was a nickname his mother had used on him a long time ago, and Sayuri was the ONLY one who knew that. That meant that somewhere inside this strange and savage woman, Sayuri was still there and wanted him to know it.

"Reno…?" It was Elena's turn to ask a half-spoken question, and Reno just shrugged as he noted that Alpha had picked up the cigarettes and the Zippo. "Where is Sayuri-senpai going? Is she well enough to be leaving like this?"

"Nah, you got is all wrong Elena. That ain't Yuri; that bitch is Alpha and I now remember why I didn't like her." Reno said as he met Tseng and Rude's gazes: Alpha had been before Elena's time as a Turk, but her sister Sophia would have distinctly remembered Alpha. A moment later found Cissnei advancing on Reno and punching him hard on the arm.

"Reno, how dare you call Alpha a bitch? Admit it, you're just pissed she stiffed you!" Cissnei was already teasing him about his less than monogamous lifestyle habits from the last time she'd seen him, and she'd only just been reunited with her fellow Turks. "I have to admit, though, it's curious about how she just took off like that without warning. Usually she's good for a round of drinks or a smoke with you and Xander; although, I don't suppose Xander's still a Turk."

"Sorry to interrupt this little reunion ladies and gentlemen, but I have some information that is of grave importance." When Grim spoke and appeared next to Vincent, most of the group started; the exceptions were Angeal, Cloud, Vincent, Reno, Rude, and Tseng. Chuckling in mild sadistic humor, Grim continued while he handed something to Reno. "That's a present for you from our dear President; says she won't go to bed until she talks to you." Reno blinked at the cell phone in a mixture of affection and distaste: it was a very dark shade of pinkish red, with a big heart on it the exact shade of his eyes. He had to give Adanna credit because the girl had apparently taken great care in picking out a phone just for her Daddy to carry so she could call him whenever she wanted; Rufus had no doubt gotten a similar phone from the irrepressible seven year old. As if on cue, the phone rang with one of the cutesiest ringers Reno had ever heard; sighing in resignation to the snickers of the others, he answered it while those who Alpha had 'revived' looked on it mild fascination at a Turk using a, for lack of a better word, girly phone.

"Daddy, I miss you!" The shrill, childish voice of Adanna easily carried over the phone and could be heard by everyone. "When are you and Mommy coming home? Papa says you're in Junon, but I don't think you are; if you were in Junon, then I could just come see you whenever I want as long as one of those WRO people went with me… Daddy, is Mommy with you? I wanna talk to her." :Ah, crap…: Reno thought acidly as the little girl asked for Sayuri; steeling himself for the whining and possibly crying that would come with his answer, Reno ignored the looks he was getting of mixed sympathy, confusion, and amusement.

"I'm sorry, baby girl…Mommy isn't with me right now. Maybe you can talk to her later okay? You aren't giving your Papa a whole lot of hell are you?" Reno's entire disposition had changed from Turk to father in the blink of an eye: it was astounding. "I don't want to have to ground you as soon as I get back, you hear? Remember what I told you: ruining the President's office is not allowed unless you know your Papa has spares of everything you trash." Wait, there was a bit of the classic Reno, telling a kid that it was okay to trash Rufus's office as long as she didn't ruin anything irreplaceable.

"You realize Reno that anything she breaks can be docked from your salary…" Came the subtle threat of Rufus.

"Hey, now! Remember who kept you from drowning yourself in booze a week ago, boss? I only recall one person who had the nerve to dunk you in a bathtub filled with frigid water, and his name was Reno of the Turks." Reno retorted in a rather snide tone. "'Sides, Adanna probably would be mad at you if you punish me for something she does. More importantly, Sayuri scares me way more than anything you could ever threaten me with!"

"Daddy, do I have to go to bed?" Adanna's voice overrode Rufus's as he told her it was time to get ready for bed.

"Yeah, you have to go to bed kiddo; remember that your Papa is just like me, which means you have to listen to him, okay?" Adanna mumbled an 'okay' at Reno's playful chiding. "Okay then, now off to bed. Love ya kiddo and I'll bring Mommy home real soon, okay?"

"Love you more Daddy." Adanna paused and then yawned as she spoke again. "Daddy? Tell Mommy I don't mind, okay? She'll understand." Reno didn't understand what the child meant, but nevertheless promised to tell Sayuri. Hanging up, he noticed the looks of the others and shrugged.

"So, what else didja need Grim? You'd never come all the way out here ta the middle o' nowhere just ta bring me a phone from my kid." Grim chuckled at Reno and gave a rather theatrical bow to the red-head.

"You know me well, Reno; I did come here for other business. As you may have noticed, Angeal and Zack are both once again alive. As Firsts, they can help with a small problem we've encountered in the Northern Crater and Midgar; remnants." Grim cut right to the chase, and was rewarded by outbursts from everyone who had fought Kadaj and his gang. "Simmer down and let me finish! Yes, I meant remnants as in like Kadaj, Yazoo, and Loz; however, I also meant that the three of them seem to have resurfaced along with two new remnants that are on a whole other playing field. They call themselves Pheros and Lokias, and believe me when I say they mean business. They are after Alpha because she holds Jenova's heart, and I'm willing to bet that they're not at all against killing her for it. Second problem: we discovered a cavern under the old Shinra HQ that connected to Deepground. I can tell you right now that Weiss's body was never found, but that if a body had been left behind it would have landed in that cavern; more importantly, we found evidence that Genesis might have been being held there. He was transferred to Deepground after the final confrontation with Zack in Banora. There, the Tsviets were injected with his cells and that is why only they were truly dangerous; the others were just mako enhanced flunkies. Now we have the problem of facing remnants hell-bent on a reunion and maybe even Genesis with Weiss." When Grim finished speaking, there was a nearly unanimous round of, "Fuck…".