In the wake of Serenity's return, the 'war' against Voldemort became decidedly one-sided... in their favor.
Sephiroth, Genesis and Angeal put their previous experience in Wutai and acting as the three generals of SOLDIER to good use, and were able to allocate their resources and manpower to do the most damage to the idiots who were causing all the trouble. More importantly they already had an established chain of command, with Rena only interceding if she had insight that could help them.
She was not a general, though she had the instincts for it. This was hardly the best time to fine-tune her natural inclination to lead when they all just wanted this to be over and done with and go home as quickly as possible.
Vincent, Reno and Rude were able to infiltrate several key areas for vital information that would have otherwise taken days to obtain otherwise.
Sending them in to handle the Ministry was only sensible, and it hadn't taken much to prep them for what they were doing. Creative use of materia, which had them registering as 'magical' while at the same time was impossible to detect by Ministry standards made it pathetically easy to get in and out.
The fact Rena could honestly care less if the Turks left behind all sorts of "delightful" surprises to reign havoc on the Ministry when this was over and they left was just bonus... Reno and Genesis could be seen conspiring with the twins to create maximum damage, and it was likely the Ministry would be left in shambles when this was over.
She felt distinctly pleased that the unofficial war that had gone on for the past two years since she disappeared was forcibly ended by her group in less than five months.
It sickened her that the wizards incompetence and general attitude had allowed things to escalate this far, but she recognized most of that was the fault of Albus Dumbledore and his thrice-damned insistence on saving people who didn't deserve it. Honestly there would have been far fewer casualties if he had gotten off his ass and actually challenged Voldemort with equal force.
It would have been fast and brutal, but the overall death toll of those who weren't involved directly would have been considerably lower than it was when she returned.
Between the combined efforts of the group, with help from the DA and those who had the balls to actually act with lethal force and very little hesitation to use it on those who would hurt the innocent (however ineffective their training was), the war ended in very short order.
Sure, Rena made a point to personally murder Voldemort in as brutal and graphic a method as she could devise in such a limited time frame...but the point was that she gave the wizards a very good reason not to drag her back into their problems unless they wanted her to return with her newly discovered family and make them regret it.
Considering the example she made of Voldemort, and the fact that she started throwing fireballs at anyone who even remotely attempted to act like any number of idiots she had to deal with courtesy of the fan clubs, she had some hope they would leave her be.
It was a major relief when they were finally able to return home... with a few extras, of course.
(Rena found it mildly amusing the sheer fascination Luna had with her twin brother, and hoped it sparked something between them.)
Back on Gaia, six months later...
"So let me get this straight... we were gone for a few months, and during that time Cloud suddenly reappeared with all the abilities of a First and acting like a complete zombie?" said Rena in disbelief.
"Yeah, it was really weird. I mean he attacked the company without any warning at all and tried to kill Rufus, except he wasn't in at the time. He didn't even recognize me, for Minerva's sake!" said Zack. "Worse, I could smell the mako on him... he only part of the Infantry when we went to Nibelhiem, but the amount I caught off him was closer to what I would get from Sephiroth!"
Rena frowned.
"It sounds to me that Hojo decided to use Cloud as a replacement for Sephiroth," said Rena.
"Yeah, but why Cloud?"
"Lack of options? I mean he was born in proximity to that parasite and in the same town as us, so maybe he has a special resonance or something to mako or Jenova's cells," said Rena. "With us gutting everything he would have access too and going after his 'hidden' accounts, it's not like he has much to work with unless he wants us coming after his ass."
Zack was beyond upset... if Cloud really was under Hojo's control, it wouldn't take much to make him public enemy number one.
At least he hadn't set anything on fire or burned down any towns yet...and why was that the first thing that came to mind when he thought of Cloud's situation? Very strange.
"So what's Rufus going to do about this?"
"Officially, an unknown assassin tried to attack him and took out a good chunk of the SOLDIER's on base. Unofficially he's pissed as hell and will likely go after Cloud now."
"And the fact Cloud might be able to tell us what the hell Hojo is planning?"
"I wouldn't get my hopes up," said Zack depressed. "From the sound of what I overheard the Turks saying, they're fully prepared to classify Cloud as 'expendable' if they run into him. At most we might be able to argue that he would have information as a reason not to kill him on sight..."
Rena winced. That...did not sound good.
"Look at the bright side...if we can get our hands on him long enough, we should be able to purge the Jenova cells Hojo has almost certainly injected him with."
They still weren't certain why the J-Cells reacted badly to Rena's blood, just that it was the most effective way to safely purge them from the body.
Sephiroth was not happy.
Apparently in lieu of his 'perfect experiment' Hojo had decided to use Zack's friend as his replacement.
It bothered him greatly that Hojo had essentially turned Cloud Strife into a First without bothering to give him much time to recover.
However as terrible as that was, it was not the source of why he was vexed with his twin sister or why certain people now had trouble looking in his direction without having to muffle laughter of some sort.
Especially Zack and Genesis, who found the situation rather hysterical.
What had him rather irate towards his own twin?
The answer was simple.
Rena had decided to utilize the rabid fan clubs of certain SOLDIERs (and a lesser known one for specific Turks, such as Reno and Tseng, oddly enough) to find Cloud and Hojo. The reason Sephiroth was irate with her was because she tricked him into signing something when he was beyond exhausted doing paperwork and was now using them as incentive for his rabid fans to send in actual sightings of the two.
She had even gotten the head of Urban Development into the scheme, Goddess knew how. He found it highly suspicious that Reeve's once paltry department was now being funded by an outside source that was paying for several projects that had stalled because of "budget issues".
Despite heavily down-sizing the science department to something far more reasonable, Tuesti's own was still vastly underpaid because no one considered it "important" enough.
Rufus had taken to auditing the ENTIRE company with extreme ruthlessness upon learning how much Hojo had actually been siphoning off of it with his father's unspoken approval. Certain departments had managed to come out of it mostly unscathed save for a few areas... Such as SOLDIER, Urban Development and the Turks, but the rest of the company suddenly got a massive wake-up call that half-assing expense reports or subtly stealing money from their department wasn't going to be ignored anymore.
On an unrelated note, Rena had gained a life-long supporter in the form of one Cid Highwind because the sudden budget adjustment had finally freed up enough money to revamp the Space division.
After learning other inhabitable worlds did in fact exist, Rufus developed a strong interest in going there without having to rely on dubious and rather headache inducing forms of magic. Besides, Jenova had to have come from somewhere and they would rather avoid any more "surprises" from beyond their limited access of space showing up.
One alien parasite was enough, thank you very much.
Sephiroth did not know where Rena got strands of his hair, or those topless pictures of him that she tricked him into signing. He was highly peeved that she was bribing his fans into doing most of the dirty work in searching for Cloud and Hojo, because it was only encouraging them now that Rena had stopped using them for target practice.
Apparently she had decided upon a "temporary ceasefire" between her and those damn fan clubs.
He had never been more thankful that the blood transfusion also came with the ability to use Rena's brand of magic. It took him all of a week before he had mastered the Notice-me-not charms and everything else that Rena had originally put on that bracelet she gave the three generals. Being able to walk around like a normal person was a goddess-sent gift, especially since Rena's plan to find Cloud and Hojo only made his 'Fans' that much more rabid than normal.
Angeal was lucky...upon learning who he had married and that he was firmly off the market...his particular fan club had wisely backed the hell off for fear of running into his less-than-pleased wife, who had already demonstrated a preference for setting such people on fire for even small provocations. The only ones safe from her attempts to 'discipline' said fans were anyone under the age of fourteen.
After all, fourteen was the minimum requirement to join the Company, which meant society as a whole had deemed them old enough to be considered "adults". At least enough to put their live and limb on the line for a company that was all too happy to throw teenagers into actual warfare.
Sephiroth rather hated Rena's former headmaster. The only real difference between his situation in Wutai and the so called "Blood War" of her former world was the fact that he, at least, had known exactly how to defend himself and that he would be expected to fight others once he could reasonably do so without getting killed in the process.
Whereas Dumbledore had tried to shield his sister from the reality of what was going on while snowing her under with false expectations, next to no information and the fact he blatantly ignored she was being abused by people she had been told were her blood kin.
By the time war came upon her, she was almost completely unprepared and only survived by sheer dumb luck and through the skin of her teeth.
They might never known what caused her to be summoned back to this world, but Sephiroth was thanking every god and goddess that it happened. He dreaded to think of what would have happened to his twin otherwise, under such half-assed and unrealistic leadership.
Third POV
Reeve Tuesti was many things, but an idiot certainly wasn't one of them. When Rena Hewley (formerly Valentine) cornered him one morning after their return from wherever Sephiroth had gotten dragged too, he had wisely kept his mouth shut and stayed in view of everyone else in case Commander Hewley took it the wrong way.
Which wasn't likely, but Shin-Ra politics made him rather paranoid.
He was expecting a lot of things.
He had not expected Rena Hewley to give him a solution to the massive and still ongoing audit, or a way to fund his many, many ideas to improve Midgar without getting a visit from the Turks in the process.
All in exchange for putting his Cait Sith dolls in the direct line of fire when it came to the rabid fan clubs such as the Silver Elite.
One might think having his Caits handing out "special prizes" to people who sent in verified information about Cloud or Hojo was hardly as harrowing as sending them in after, say, a pissed off Behemoth.
They would be wrong. Anyone who had been around Midgar long enough or at least seen the Silver Elite in close range of their obsession knew the unavoidable truth.
Fan clubs were the epitome of evil and it said far too much of Rena's self-preservation instincts that she was willing to fuel their obsession over Sephiroth with actual signed photographs and strand of hair in exchange for information.
If he didn't know for a fact that Rena found Cait Sith cute and treated them the same as any other human being, despite being a robot with an unusual personality, he would think she was trying to kill the poor thing.
Did not stop him from shuddering every time Cait Sith sent in a video of the Silver Elite coming to claim their reward for information. Thank the goddess he never developed any fan clubs.
"I am having the weirdest sensation of deja-vu, brother of mine," said Fred.
"Agreed. Isn't this playing out almost exactly like the storyline of the game Hermione insisted our dear leader was from?" asked George.
"Last I checked it was Sephiroth who went off the deep end, not Cloud," commented Fred.
"Care to explain that comment?" asked a dry, and highly unamused voice.
The twins turned to find Sephiroth behind them. He was not pleased.
"Uh..."
"Ask Luna?" said George.
"Explain. Now."
"We don't know much," said Fred quickly, because Sephiroth could be damn scary.
"Just that Hermione said you were the main villain in some muggle game, which is how she knew about you," said George.
"Mostly because her younger sister was watching a movie that was based off it," said Fred.
"Also, that you're one of the most popular and bad ass villain characters ever created," they finished in unison.
Sephiroth was not an idiot. If there were parallels between this...game...and what they were dealing with now then it only made sense to have his sister go and find out as much information as she possibly could to curtail whatever it was Hojo had planned.
Rena... could only thank every god she knew of that the 'Internet' was such a big deal and that the game in question was old enough to have spawned an untold number of sequels and even a movie to the point that she could just print off the basic summary.
Even if certain facts were altered to the point they were hilariously wrong (such as the fact Sephiroth hadn't gone off the deep end when confronted with Jenova, and that Cloud had apparently taken his place as the main villain thanks to Hojo's meddling) most of what she printed off was more or less correct.
On an unrelated note, it also lead to them accidentally finding a mostly alive Lucrecia.
Vincent wasn't entirely certain how to feel about the fact that a game based off of fiction (and likely an alternate world where Rena was never born) gave them valuable information.
Even if they still had no idea how the hell they were supposed to get her out of the mako crystal. Serenity had very little feelings towards her mother, considering the woman had openly allowed the likes of Hojo to experiment on her unborn children in the womb "for science".
Anyone who cared that little about their own child, long before it was even born, didn't deserve saving.
Sephiroth was torn, but considering Rena's adopted mother had sacrificed her own life for a child that wasn't even her own blood, reluctantly agreed with his sister. He might have felt some empathy for his birth mother if it wasn't for the fact he had read exactly what Hojo had injected into her womb when they were still developing in order to achieve his perfect specimen.