CHAPTER 13:

BREAKING THE MASK

Vert was looking through the large library of Bugenhagen, when Cait Sith waltzed up, without his oversized Moogle mount for once. "I'm surprised you dinnae go wi' Aerith," Cait Sith said. "She's currently talking wi' the elders of Cosmo Canyon."

"I just needed to be alone for the moment. Aerith…she knows less about our heritage than I do. And even with me teaching her, she probably needs someone else. I'm not a good teacher. Anyway, why did you come here, Reeve?"

Cait Sith looked up at him, before the deep, resonant voice of Reeve Tuesti came from his mouth. "Curiosity. I know what it killed…but…well, most of AVALANCHE don't want me near them. I can understand why, given my affiliation with Shinra. Jenova frightens the hell out of me, as does Shelke. Luna is just strange, and your other friends from your world…" Cait Sith shrugged. "I was just curious about you being in Deepground. I only learned about it when you and Shelke escaped, along with Aerith and the others. What the hell did Hojo put you through?"

"Hojo only had some to do with my misery. Blame Heidegger, and Scarlet. How did Rufus Shinra take learning about Deepground?"

"He was shocked. Not at the experiments, but that his father would keep such a secret from him. Then again, his father never fully trusted him." Cait Sith leapt up onto Vert's shoulder, the cat robot remarkably light, before sitting on said shoulder. "I joined Shinra…well, what became Shinra, because I wanted to change the world for the better. And yet, I'm hearing that my reactors are destroying the Planet, that the people I work for, not content with having their own army, have experimented on people to create super-soldiers, mostly without their consent, oh, and we used to have a sentient alien disease in the building that we had a mad scientist vivisecting."

"If it makes you feel any better, Hojo's dead, remember? Jenova ate him."

"Sadly, it makes me feel a little better. I told Rufus about that, and he's frankly relieved, on one level at least. He's cursing the loss of Hojo's knowledge, but the truth is, the man was a liability. I don't want to be so glad of a man's death ever again," Reeve mused from Cait Sith's mouth. "And the thought of Deepground existing frightened me. We managed to get from Heidegger and Scarlet, with a lot of reluctance, anyway, information about Deepground. And you killed them."

"I know. I'm a monster."

"Perhaps…but you went out of your way to save Shelke. You exposed me as a spy, and yet…you see me as part of this motley group."

"Not exactly. I see you as our liaison with Shinra. One thing I am sure Rufus can agree on is that Sephiroth is a threat to the Planet and to Shinra, more so than AVALANCHE," Vert said. "If he helps us deal with Sephiroth, then we have a better chance at winning."

"Heidegger and Scarlet don't see it the same way," Reeve said. "They're ordering the Turks to try and take you out as well as stop Sephiroth. Tseng at least has a good head on his shoulders, and Rufus has basically ordered them to prioritise stopping Sephiroth. And the Turks are more loyal to Rufus than to Heidegger, who nominally runs them."

"Good. Nice to see that Rufus has his priorities straight," Vert said.

After a moment, Reeve said, "Vert…I want you to tell me this. The Shinra suits are obsessed with finding the Promised Land, and they believe you and Aerith, along with any other Cetra, key to finding it. Do you know where it is?"

Vert snorted. "Of course I do. I've spoken to the Planet itself, its guiding consciousness, its goddess, if you will: Minerva. It sounds crazy, but I assure you, it's true. Aerith has spoken to her, and Luna told me that she's spoken to her too. I've also spoken to the few entities who have returned to the Planet, but have retained their individuality. The truth is, the Promised Land of the Cetra is the Lifestream itself. It's not a physical place, just the endless oceans and rivers of Mako Energy. The Cetra were content to return to that, for that was their place once they had helped the Planet."

"I see. I don't think Rufus would believe that, or any of the others, but I can see that. And your abilities?"

"I don't use them much. Besides being taxing…well, I'm afraid of doing the wrong thing. Using my abilities to give Yuffie Materia was the first time I really truly used my most powerful abilities so overtly since wiping out Deepground. If I wanted to, I could reduce the entire population of Midgar into Mako Energy, and channel it back into the Planet. Only Chaos, the herald of Omega Weapon, is said to have more powerful abilities in that regard. That, and Omega itself. What your Mako Reactors do is similar, but in a way that consumes the Mako Energy to turn it into electricity, and it doesn't change back readily into a form the Planet can re-use. You can see the results almost everywhere there is a reactor: the slums beneath Midgar, Kalm, Junon, Corel…I'm sure the reactor at Nibelheim will be similar."

After a moment, Reeve said, "It's hard to hear, you know. That my life's greatest achievement is in fact the downfall of the Planet. Rufus won't listen, and neither will the other suits. But do you think AVALANCHE's actions in Midgar did anything to help?"

"Depends on what you mean. At least the people I killed in Deepground were soldiers, indoctrinated killers, but there were some people caught up in AVALANCHE's bombings who were doubtless innocent. And this was the second, more sane iteration of AVALANCHE, as you and I know. The first version was even worse. In a direct way, short term, it did take the pressure off the Planet. I should know, I was in the Lifestream at the time. But all it did was bring Shinra down on them hard."

"I protested the plan to drop the Sector 7 Plate," Reeve said. "Fat lot of good it did me. Heidegger merely laughed his head off, and President Shinra suggested I take a day of sick leave for my stress. He made it seem like stressing over the fates of hundreds if not thousands of people was an illness. The main reason why I'm even preferring you guys over Shinra is that, for all the deaths this current AVALANCHE caused, it was nothing compared to the death toll Shinra caused when the Sector 7 Plate fell. All to stop AVALANCHE, while framing them. It makes me sick."

"At least you do feel sick. That only proves that you're still sane. Whereas I…" Vert chuckled bitterly. "I'm barely sane anymore. You saw what happened at the Golden Saucer when Hermione made herself known to me. I did that in front of Aerith, probably scared the living daylights out of her. I'm beginning to wonder if I really know who I am."

"You're Harry Potter. And Vert the Emerald."

The soft, gentle voice caused Vert to start, as he turned to find Aerith there. "Remember?" she asked. "When we went to Kalm, and you told Cloud the truth about his memories? You're like he was. Caught between two identities…but you don't have to be. Cloud was merely confused, thanks to the Jenova cells and Zack's well-meaning talks with him. But you…you tried to dissociate yourself from Harry Potter within Deepground because you felt you needed to be stronger." She approached him, and gently slipped off his glove, revealing the familiar scarred hand, showing its message of I MUST NOT TELL LIES. "You told me this was a reminder from someone you hated."

"Unintentionally. Dolores Umbridge was like Scarlet, only ugly," Vert said. "Cruel and cold and callous. I'm glad Hermione killed her. But in a way, I'm glad for these scars too. It just took you talking to me to remind myself. But the thing is…if I try to become Harry Potter again…will that be the lie? Or will that be staying as Vert?"

"Vert…I think you need to accept that you're both," Aerith said, gently removing his glasses. Vert squinted against the light. He was unused to seeing light without his glasses. "I'm happy to call you Harry Potter or Vert, but it's only the name you need to choose, not who or what you are. You are who you have been, not unchanged, but…you don't need the mask. You gave me my Cetra Heritage back, Vert. I want to help you give you your past back."

"You weren't there. How could you?"

"Maybe not…but I can promise to be there for you. I would like to think that I am one of your friends on this world, and you now have friends from your old world." After a moment, she placed a hand on his cheek gently. "I think you've missed part of the Cetra Heritage."

Vert scowled at her impudence, even if she wasn't trying to be malicious. "And what part is that?"

"You have been trying to make yourself an island, alone, even when you help others. And yet…you're part of the Planet, of the Lifestream, of a bigger whole. You're not an island, Vert, but part of an ocean. I knew that, ever since I was first taught by my mother, and ever since the Lifestream spoke to me, even if only quietly. We are born, we live, we die and return to the Lifestream. We are part of something greater."

"I know this."

"Maybe intellectually…but I don't think you truly understand it. You isolate yourself, Vert. When you saw Hermione, your first instinct was to attack her, one of your oldest friends. You may want to help others, but you've tried to keep yourself apart in a way, even when you're being friendly. You're afraid of losing people again, aren't you?"

And there it was. Aerith had seen what even he was trying to deny. Yes, he was afraid of losing people again. And as much as he helped, as much as he reached out, he reached out from behind a wall. He helped AVALANCHE with a somewhat nihilistic, detached air. Oh, the good kind of nihilistic, the one that thought that life doesn't have meaning, save for what one imposed on it…but he was still nihilistic.

He was keeping himself alone because he didn't want to feel that pain again. It was that pain, more so than the physical pain he went through in Deepground, that fuelled his transformation into Vert the Emerald. The pain that had Harry Potter dying screaming wasn't anything so mundane as pain of the body, but of the heart and soul. Of the realisation that he had failed his friends, that they would die because he wasn't there.

And some did die. But others lived. Voldemort had been defeated without him, even if at a terrible cost. And what was more, they came for him. They actually cared about him enough to come to this world and find what was left of Harry Potter, not knowing that the mangled remains were sewn up in a funerary shroud named Vert the Emerald.

You're not an island, Vert, but part of an ocean, Aerith had said. He closed his eyes, trying to fight the tears. He was startled when Aerith wiped them away.

"I want to meet the real you, Vert. Do you understand? I see…glimpses of him. Behind your mask. Please…just let me see you. The real you. Not this Boy Who Lived rubbish that I heard, or the Tsviet Shinra twisted you into becoming…just you."

For the first time in a long time, Vert was scared. Oh, he was frightened in a way when Hermione approached him at the Golden Saucer, but that was more of a panic, an almost animal reaction fuelled by his fractured psyche. But this was something more profound, a deeper, darker fear. Of what lay within him.

Something was going to break.

Something did.

A dam that had been keeping things back broke. More tears trickled from his eyes. It was like his first immersion in Mako, nearly drowning twice, first in the liquid itself, and then in the information it contained. While that wasn't the thing that killed Harry Potter, it was certainly the first true blow. It was what weakened him for the more mortal attacks on his mind and soul.

And now, once more, a flood was washing across his mind.

He nearly missed Aerith asking quietly, "Vert?"

With a great shuddering breath, he said something he hadn't wanted to say for a very long time, his voice husky with emotion. The mask had been shattered, torn away like the scab from a wound. But with five words, he gave Aerith hope that maybe there was something left.

"You can call me Harry."

CHAPTER 13 ANNOTATIONS:

Okay, so this was a quiet bit of interaction, where Vert and Cait Sith discuss morality, and Aerith finally gets through to what is left of Harry Potter…and perhaps there is more left than he thought. The next chapter will concentrate on Aerith and Harry having a quiet moment together while Bugenhagen shows Nanaki the truth about his father.

Review-answering time! Reishin Amara: Hmm…maybe I will do something like that…

No numbered annotations this time.