Chapter Fourteen
A cold blast of wind whipped viciously through the streets of Midgar, and not for the first time, Sephiroth felt the world waver before him. He took a step and paused, peering out over the upper plate and contemplating the deep, building disquiet all around him. Whether the world broke to pieces or not wasn't really a concern of his, but the Cetra seemed to think it should have been. In the entire journey from the crumbled remains of Fort Condor to here they'd given him no more than a few minutes of reprieve. The rest of the time filled with low, incoherent moans and a steady rumbling, the sound of millions of now discordant voices murmuring and disagreeing among themselves.
Beyond the Cetra, another presence lurked. Sephiroth tried not to think about it, not now -- as he walked through the streets of Sector 0, a small cadre of SOLDIERs with him, suspicious and weary eyes followed his every move. It wasn't the time to let his guard down, either in his own head or to the outside world -- with his face plastered all over the papers now, fearful and distrustful gazes followed him wherever he went. That was the first of what was likely to be a multitude of blunders on Rufus' part -- thinking one battle could turn the tide, supplant the rebels and create a new hero. That wasn't the case. Sephiroth barely needed to give the streets of Midgar more than a glance to realize that fear and distrust didn't do a convincing job of hiding revulsion. Shinra, the reactors, SOLDIER, and all of the rest were now oppressors instead of a necessary evil -- and Sephiroth and Rufus were the new faces of a crumbling dictatorship.
Shinra's messes could be left to Rufus. Sephiroth didn't care one way or the other. The mess in his head was another story, though with the new distraction the Cetra didn't seem to be paying much attention to him. Their voices always echoed and intruded on his thoughts, but the crushing heaviness he'd grown accustomed to was gone, replaced by hazy, disjoined fragments. Maybe it should have been a relief, but after he dismissed his unnecessary escort and started on his way through the levels of the Headquarters, Sephiroth realized it was only unnerving.
Not thinking might have been the simplest answer -- no thinking, no more questioning, no more consideration of the situation -- following orders and letting the Cetra and Jenova fight over the pieces of his mind would have been easy, but Sephiroth couldn't be a spectator in his own head, no matter how tempting it was. Mindless puppetry was Cloud's arena, not his.
A building pressure followed by an explosion of pain brought Sephiroth back to reality by the time the elevator hit the fortieth floor. Barely aware he'd even spaced out, he leaned back against the wall for a moment and irritably folded his arms, speaking aloud to the empty space around him and not even caring whether surveillance tapes caught him having a conversation with no one. Most everyone in his surroundings was too terrified to raise the question of his sanity, anyway.
"...It seems like you don't even have a plan, sometimes." He spoke to the Cetra, knowing all the while that Jenova lingered in the recesses of his mind and listened. "If you destroyed my mind, your own indecisiveness would probably kill you."
"Our actions are not for you to judge or question."
"It's a little too late to tell me that."
"They simply don't understand reality, my child."
Sephiroth remained impassive, choosing not to respond to the second voice.
"The virus cannot be trusted."
"Neither can you." The elevator door opened, and Sephiroth straightened up and continued through a dark hallway, listening to the Cetra argue among themselves and Jenova's now mostly incoherent whispers. He was more amused than he appalled at how easily he was sidelined in his own head, watching incoherent madness and fear bubble over and poison everything it touched, twisting around his own thoughts and memories into increasingly more unrecognizable pieces -- a gradual, building process, but he knew he couldn't withstand it for long. There wasn't enough room in his head.
There wasn't enough room on this planet for both Jenova and the Cetra, actually. The strangest aspect of this entire hellish situation was that Sephiroth couldn't pick a side -- both of them were liars, neither had power over anything except him, and both of their goals were senseless insanity that led only towards utter carnage.
"You know the truth, Sephiroth. They are merely using you..."
"...Are you still weak enough to live in the delusion you created? You were never an Ancient. You were never a human. The virus is within you, but it does not control you. You choose to believe in its delusions."
Sephiroth flashed an ID card through a panel on the wall and stepped inside of a humid, darkened room, immediately met by the heavy stench of mako and the sight of twisted machinery, beckoning to old and near-buried memories he consciously chose not to recall. Shadows cast by looming equipment and the glow of consoles guided him through the darkness, around several old pods that housed nothing and into the main experimental laboratory. Given the late hour the lab was empty, all but for one scientist who stood typing something into a console while facing the specimen elevator. A distant revulsion crept over Sephiroth, not unexpectedly -- but coming to this silent laboratory with the benefit of hindsight and the insurance of the Masamune at his side dispelled all but the faintest feelings of apprehension. Again, the Cetra misjudged him -- visions of the past, no matter how vivid they were, weren't enough to break him in the present.
Still, something slithered inside of Sephiroth's mind -- a mix of disgust and discomfort, perhaps, but he didn't want to give it much thought. The single scientist turned and looked at him with those black, beady eyes, the same ones he remembered peering down at him through a thick pair of glasses for so many hundreds of hours and days, while he remained locked in silence and helplessness and his body was carefully constructed into the weapon it was now.
Professor Hojo straightened his glasses and studied him intently, before narrowing his eyes in consideration. "You must be one of the more successful specimens from Project J-2. I suppose it wasn't a waste. What number are you?"
"I have no number," Sephiroth replied, evenly enough. The Cetra were silent now, watching just like Jenova was -- interested in his actions, maybe even unsure where he was headed next.
"No number? You were a failure, then? I'm surprised you weren't disposed. My colleagues have a number of failings, you know, so I can only imagine the pathetic reasons why you were spared." Hojo's voice came out thin, reedy, and a little rushed, exactly like Sephiroth remembered. Just the sound of the man's voice caused something in him to instinctively tense, but Sephiroth remained outwardly poised, cocking his head just a little and studying Hojo with arrogant disdain. After a moment, he realized he was being faced with the same expression -- and one of the more sickening revelations the Cetra had forced him to confront returned to his thoughts. The half of Sephiroth's genetic material that didn't descend from his mother was the Professor's.
"So, tell me. Where did you come from? You aren't one of the escapees from the Nibelheim lab, are you? I can't imagine that either of them would have taken on the appearance of the original specimen, but--"
"--The original specimen died when it was seven, didn't it?" Sephiroth asked, embarking on a sudden sidetrack before really considering it, thinking again of the dual sensation of holding the sword and feeling the sword in his insides. In this world, he'd died at the age of seven -- but there was no way of knowing what had happened afterwards.
"--The original specimen?" Hojo seemed vaguely surprised, then suspicious. "What would you know about that?"
"Rumors travel fast around the company."
"...Of course. There are many petty and foolish creatures working in the lower floors, aren't there?" Hojo asked, before turning back to his console, as if already bored with the conversation. "The original specimen was deconstructed, piece-by-piece, and parts of him were injected into other specimens. I wanted to see if the pieces would make some kind of attempt at reunifying, or if it would have any negative affects on the specimens... surprisingly, it turned out to be quite useful. The specimens in the first batch were drawn towards the other pieces of the original specimen."
"...Did Project C receive any material from the original specimen?"
"Bits and pieces, yes. But Project C was a miserable failure." For the second time, Hojo looked at Sephiroth with a hint of interest, his eyes narrowing. "Numbered or not, you seem to have been the most successful specimen so far. Were you from Kalm?"
Sephiroth said nothing, though Hojo detected a hint of something in his expression.
"...I suppose not. Either way, I'm surprised that you took on the appearance of the original specimen. You've even taken to using his name. The idea is scientifically preposterous, but perhaps there is some form of genetic transference of memories through Jenova Cells... but the fact that you're here disproves my original thesis. I would have thought that they'd be drawn towards the main body of Jenova itself..."
The Cetra, revealing yet again that they were far from omniscient, started to chatter, clearly interested, and Sephiroth studied Hojo a moment before speaking again, choosing his words rather carefully. "...The main body isn't here?"
"No. And because of the foolishness of everyone else here, we've probably lost the main body forever, now. Of course, if the reunification theory proves correct, the many specimens out there with material from the original specimen will be drawn to it anyway." Hojo studied Sephiroth again, even more interested. "I'd like to analyze a sample from you. Step into the specimen elevator."
Sephiroth stopped considering the implications of Hojo's words long enough to give the Professor a dismissive and obviously disdainfully incredulous look. Hojo, who wore the same expression far more often than not, narrowed his eyes in irritation.
"I suppose there's no way to get you to cooperate, is there? That's unfortunate. Why did you come here, anyway? If you want to know, it probably won't be very long before you become criminally insane and unusable. The specimens from Kalm were close, and the experiments from Town B messily self-destructed less than a week after they were originally altered. They make decent weapons for a while, but they're very unstable. You were more successful than most, but I'd imagine you'll lose your self-control and sense of identity within a few days. It happens to all of them," Hojo's ramblings came out matter-of-factly, uncaring to as whether Sephiroth bothered to follow along or not. "You may as well prove useful while you still can. I only need a small sample."
"Fine. Just so long as you analyze it right away." In reality, this was the reason why he was here -- and both the Cetra and Jenova waited in interest, obviously aware of what the results were going to be. He had an idea, too -- and kept a close eye on Hojo all the while as he stuck his hand in one of the many machines, felt a small sharp stab on one of his fingers, and withdrew it a moment later. Hojo typed something into his console and studied it closely while Sephiroth waited, leaning against the wall and trying to hide his irritation with the situation. Finally, Hojo turned towards him, now looking almost excited.
"This is most interesting... I've never seen this occur in any of the specimens. The mako content in your cells seems to have regained the original properties of the Lifestream from which it was derived..."
"What about the Jenova cells?"
"...They're attempting to reject the mako. It's almost as if the J-Cells are posing as a fake immune system... and the rate at which it's happening seems to suggest that the Jenova cells are successfully eliminating the mako..."
"And if that happens, then what?"
"Oh, the cells in your body will most likely rupture and burst, I'd say," Hojo still used the same matter-of-fact tone, though he now looked at Sephiroth with a renewed interest. "The Jenova cells will then stage a takeover of all your bodily systems, but without the mako's added healing properties, the reaction would most likely be fatal. It will be an excruciatingly painful process. After that, the remains would dissipate unless properly sealed and returned to the main body."
"I see." Sephiroth felt it, now -- the Cetra's quiet unease and Jenova's whispers, mingling into a growing disquiet, the calm before the storm. Then the Cetra began laughing, one by one and finally becoming immense cacophony, muted, yet still intense enough to nearly bowl him over. The professor adjusted his glasses, studied the look on Sephiroth's face, and actually seemed unashamedly disappointed.
"I suppose you don't want that process to take place, do you? Petty, insignificant specimens such as yourself always cling to what little sense of identity they have, even if it destroys them..." Hojo scowled. "In order to prevent the Jenova cells from destroying your bodily systems, you'll need regular mako injections. The showers simply won't be enough. Direct, intravenous injection of pure, undiluted mako will do the trick, although you should know that direct injections often have severe side-effects." Disappointment faded quickly. The Professor was clearly delighted by this whole situation -- and in a moment of irony Sephiroth knew he was the only one in the universe to recognize, the Cetra were thrilled, now, too.
The pieces were coming together. Sephiroth actually smiled, hiding anger with amusement as the presences in his head awaited his reaction.
(I was right to reject you this time, Jenova. You don't want to find the Promised Land. You just want your cells back where they belong. I'm only surprised you weren't more subtle about it. Here I was, thinking your power was insufficient... but I suppose I'm one who disappointed you, right?)
The lurking presence in his mind didn't respond, but he felt it now -- building disquiet mingled with something deeper and more sinister, a predator about to make its move and now thwarted at the last instant. The Cetra laughed but their voices were discordant, some murmuring in concern and others silent even among the laughter, contemplating the choice he was about to make. Still, a ringing voice, louder than the rest -- the full might of most of the Cetra behind it -- continued to laugh at him.
"The virus has nothing to offer you except lies. What we seek is the future."
Sephiroth said nothing, already anticipating what came next -- and sure enough, the Cetra's voice collided with his thoughts with nearly enough force to shatter his mind, even with the mako in his body rotting away like it was now.
"But for you, there is no future. You are either ours, or you are nothing. Should your body reject its mako, you will rot. You will never obtain freedom."
"How long will this process take?" Sephiroth asked, interrupting the voices in his head and turning his attention back to Hojo, who watched him with sudden and unguarded enthusiasm, thinking in purely scientific terms and obviously finding Sephiroth to be the most engaging specimen he'd encountered in quite a while -- though still hardly worthy of consideration, because the usual self-confident disdain still remained written all over Hojo's face.
"I'd estimate a month, at most, without intervention. But if you allow me to inject mako directly into your bloodstream--"
"--If it's just an injection that's needed, any scientist on the continent can do it." Sephiroth cut Hojo off before he continued.
"The others will do inferior work, and if you have any kind of severe reaction--"
"--Don't kid yourself." Sephiroth gave Hojo his own best flatly dismissive look, realizing all the while it was something he'd probably inherited from the man even with all of the genetic tinkering. "Even if you created me, you were always an inferior scientist to Gast, anyway."
That gave the Professor pause. He watched the man's eyes narrow through his glasses before turning away, not particularly caring how many questions he left behind him. Sephiroth re-entered the elevator without a word and leaned against the wall, folding his arms and hearing the Cetra chatter away inside of him while Jenova watched, now more amused than ever. Always helpful and eager to send fresh doubts through his head in a constant effort to push Sephiroth towards the breaking point, the Cetra prodded at him.
"You should understand now that there is no choice for you. Free will is entirely an illusion. Should you defy our plans, you will merely rot and die. Your body might attempt to make it back to Jenova... but your consciousness will vanish. But even that will not be the end. Our hold on you will still remain."
Sephiroth cringed and grabbed his forehead, the movement almost entirely subconscious, before choking on more acidic, burning mako surging up from the back of his throat. Jenova, still just a whisper in his head but growing stronger with each passing hour, murmured a response meant for him alone, faking sympathy even as dizziness nearly overwhelmed him again.
"Their words are nothing more than lies... you will live again as part of me."
"I'd rather keep it the other way around," Sephiroth finally allowed just a hint of irritation in his tone, even knowing such self-control was meaningless when both forces inside of his head saw that he was seething with rage. "...Both of you are liars, anyway. You'll say whatever you feel is necessary, but I don't believe any of it."
"...But I will always be your Mother."
Lifestream suddenly appeared out of nowhere, rushing in Sephiroth's field of vision and reaching towards him, circling around his limbs and pulling him into nothingness. The Cetra's voice echoed hollowly in his head, though every word fell like a death knell, almost unbearable enough to shatter his resolve never to let them break him again. Sephiroth gritted his teeth and closed his eyes, feeling the sensation of endless falling again, through a mix of black and Lifestream green, no longer sure whether or not he was still in the HQ Elevator.
"Further alterations in the flow of time are required. It seems we must open your eyes to reality, too. No matter how much you delude yourself, the truth is unchanging."
Sephiroth hit the ground roughly, hard enough to knock his breath away completely. Seconds later he went rolling, slipping right off the edge of a precipice and hitting water in one dizzying rush. Sephiroth kicked towards what he hoped was the surface and broke through the surface, treading water and scowling in irritation before wading towards a rocky shoreline.
He didn't recognize his surroundings at all. He gazed up the tall walls of an immense crater surrounding a silent lake that reflected the night sky above. The air bit into his lungs, cool and crisp, and in the few short minutes he stood looking around a rime of frost appeared on his wet clothes. A short distance away a narrow waterfall fell down from the crater rim, hundreds of feet above.
"Where is this?" The silent night didn't respond, but the Cetra rumbled, now sounding measured and patient again.
"You will fulfill one of our objectives here. You will also find truth."
"You're not any more capable of recognizing truth than I am." His voice echoed hollowly in the silent night, and with no response, he almost felt foolish. Thankfully, Sephiroth was alone. He walked along the shore of the small lake, one hand on the hilt of his sword, irritated and yet darkly curious to as what lied in store for him. Surely, more nonsensical orders and sadism waited somewhere -- He expected no less from the Cetra -- but with Jenova whispering in his mind, too, he had the feeling whatever task he had in store was going to be interesting. Faced with the prospect of his body rotting away and becoming part of whatever dying husk was left of Jenova, or pumping more mako into his body and feeling the presence of the Cetra in every cell, Sephiroth's anger faded into amusement again, and he thought maybe sitting back and simply laughing at the absurdity of it all was the only response he could muster. Little acts of rebellion and pathetic attempts at refusal were meaningless now, not when his body was self-destructing.
The cool air tasted familiar. Sephiroth guessed he was somewhere on the west continent, probably within the Nibel Mountains -- near the ruins of Nibelheim, Strife's responsibility. Cloud may have remembered, but Sephiroth wondered if it had occurred to him yet, that Hojo hadn't just inserted Jenova cells into his body. He didn't know the other man's mindset at all, and didn't really care, but perhaps the knowledge of where the cells now in his body had came from would be enough to drive him towards madness, if he wasn't already there. The man who had destroyed Nibelheim and ripped the reactor from the ground probably didn't quite have the benefit of a fully sane mind. The Cetra, intently focused on Sephiroth's thoughts, started murmuring among themselves again, adding to the growing pressure in Sephiroth's head.
"I'm still wondering what your plan for Cloud is." He remarked, after a few moments of walking along the shore. The falls loomed before him, and he was now close enough to see that a small cavern stretched into the inky black behind the curtain of water. "You want both of us to rip the world in half, I know. But shouldn't you be worried? A part of me is within him... what if I tried to control him again?"
"You are the one being controlled. You do not have the capability to control others. We will not allow it." The Cetra knocked him to the ground so easily he barely had time to think, but Sephiroth lurched to his feet easily, tasting blood in his mouth now and feeling dizzy again. Knowing his body was rotting away put things in perspective. The dizziness, he imagined, would probably reside if he pumped his veins full of undiluted mako. But even if Hojo had lovingly constructed a working and damn near indestructible weapon out of his body, piece-by-piece, Sephiroth knew there were limits -- there were always limits.
"...You're controlling me... but you're also depending on me," Sephiroth leaned against the crater wall for a moment, regaining the breath he'd lost upon hitting the ground as the Cetra rumbled angrily in his head and Jenova watched, like always. "...What if I let my body rot away?"
"Would you really submit to the Virus so easily?"
"...Maybe. If I have a choice between the two--"
"A creature as foolish and stubbornly willful as you isn't capable of submission. You'd rather keep fighting until every cell in your body ruptures. The mere idea of becoming a mindless puppet to any power is revolting to you."
"You still haven't answered my question."
Sephiroth already knew the Cetra answered the same way, every time -- and a sudden intense burst of green in his vision followed by a slow, steady burn ripped through his left arm, lacing from the fingertips to the elbow and intensifying until it distracted him from even continuing to move. Sephiroth paused and clutched his arm with his other hand, trying to banish the image of the skin cracking to pieces from his mind before it nauseated him, then slowly pushed the sleeve upwards and pulled off the glove, his movements jerky. Purpling bruises spread from his fingers, across his palm, and all the way up his forearm, oozing blood that looked black in the dim light from the stars above. The skin itself was cold to the touch, and when he pressed his hand against one of the darker bruises just below his wrist, the skin really did crack, sending a wave of pain blazing through his nerves and blood spilling on the rocky ground beneath him. Sephiroth stared at his arm for a long time in silence, surprised and even a little appalled to find that the pain made breathing difficult.
"Dizziness and nausea are just the beginning. The process will be excruciatingly slow. The pain will be constant. And we will still use you, regardless -- even if your skin is sloughing away from your body and your bones are crumbling inside of you, you are still an effective weapon. You will go insane before your body rots completely. Without any mental barriers, you'd be much easier to control."
"...in the end, you can be reborn through me..."
"But whatever sense of self you have will be lost, and we will reclaim you, anyway."
Sephiroth started dredging up some memory that slowly pieced together right before the Cetra reached in and snatched it away, leaving a white haze in its place. But he understood, now -- there was nothing in his memories capable of saving him, nor was there any escape. Everything in his mind existed only as fragments of a world that no longer existed.
"The only real option I have is destroying both of you," Sephiroth finally ventured.
"But you are powerless."
The pain shot from his elbow to his shoulder and nearly blinded him, causing Sephiroth to stumble. Hojo's estimate of a month was generous -- at this rate, Sephiroth doubted he'd last a week. The Cetra probed into his mind and laughed at him again, some of their voices uncaringly sadistic, others forcing laughter to hide their unease. This time, though, Sephiroth couldn't even gain any satisfaction from knowing the Cetra were unnerved.
"To resist us is to give in to the Virus, and succumb to ruin even more quickly... but this time, we won't force your hand. We will give you a true choice between our future and Jenova's. Keep going."
Sephiroth's gaze fell on the waterfall again, and he continued, shuffling along the narrow shore and making his way towards the cavern behind the falls, trying to clench and unclench his left hand the entire time and feeling the nerves barely respond and the skin continue to crack, staining his hand with blood. He tried to close his fingers around the hilt of his sword and cringed, before forcing his body to keep moving through the darkness, trying not to think. He entered a cavern and passed behind the falls, the water misting his clothes and leaving unpleasant dampness that only worsened the aching in his arm. Halfway through the narrow tunnel he spotted a light ahead and walked faster, still fighting nausea and feeling almost drawn towards whatever waited at the back of the cavern.
Finally, he stumbled into the open, surprised to see the light came merely from moonlight streaming through cracks in the cavern roof reflecting off the surface of mako, inch-deep all over the cavern and bubbling from a rift in the ground in the corner. Sephiroth stepped in it and stopped, clutching his arm and now feeling uncertain. The boiling Lifestream congealing around his boots and burning in his lungs made the Cetra's presence even more oppressive, but Jenova's whispers grew louder, too, an endless litany of soothing lies and veiled threats, more subtle than the Cetra and yet more dangerous all the same, inexorably a part of him he could never eliminate. Sephiroth took a step forwards and saw movement, then realized he was looking at the pathetic form of some ragged woman in a mako-soaked white lab coat, sitting on the only surface not coated by mako and clutching something in her arms, rocking back and forth spasmodically.
Sephiroth stopped a few feet away, and her eyes jerked up -- over bright with the glare of mako, but even more tainted by complete and utter madness. Her voice emerged in a breathless rush, a murmur Sephiroth barely heard even in the eerie silence of the cavern. "Stay away... don't take him from me... stay away from us... I have to hold him..."
Closer now, he saw the thing in the woman's arms and stopped with a jolt, recognizing it immediately. Rocking back and forth, obliviously, the woman clutched it tightly and half-recoiled, the madness in her eyes entering her voice now, too. "Stay away! He... he's my son... I never got to hold him... just let me hold him..."
Jenova's presence was now nothing more than an icy silence in his head. Sephiroth narrowed his eyes, slowly, staring at the woman as she clutched a piece of Jenova to her like a child and stared at him distrustfully, her face growing wilder by the second. Something about that face beckoned to some fragment in his memories, but the ugly black tentacle she seemed to think was a child writhed and Sephiroth came to the sudden realization.
(...Strife... Cloud did it. Jenova was still in Nibelheim, wasn't she? And when Cloud destroyed the reactor, her pieces ended up disseminating through the Lifestream. No wonder he terrifies you... his actions can derail your plans entirely, can't they?)
The Cetra rumbled but didn't give him any kind of response, and Sephiroth looked back at the woman, knowing he hadn't drawn the right conclusion, not yet -- even if it was probably impossible, there was some insight to be gained from the mad woman sitting before him. Aside from the writhing tentacle, something she'd probably gained right from the fountain of Lifestream, there were other things in the cavern. Ignoring her completely Sephiroth knelt and picked up a few sodden papers from the ground, sifting through them and finding notes with the barest semblance of scientific intent, mostly inane ramblings, scattered all around her. Most were unreadable but all were incoherent, leading Sephiroth to study the woman again.
"...do... Do you want to hold him...? He's beautiful, isn't he?" The woman asked, her eyes widening, holding the tentacle out towards him. "...Just... don't hurt him... don't make him cry... he's perfect... he'll grow up and save everyone... we named him Sephiroth."
He took a step back this time, unnerved. (What is this?)
Asking the Cetra usually never yielded a response, but now they were all too eager to explain themselves. "Hojo thinks of you as the original Jenova Project specimen... but that's untrue. The woman who gave birth to you was injected with the cells, too, and once you were born, she was discarded... left to die somewhere in the woods, but the Virus does not succumb so easily. You are aware of this, certainly."
"...I thought..." Sephiroth began, then paused, frowning, surprised by his own sudden hesitation. Jenova's slowly building anger added to his dizziness, but he clutched his rotting arm and reined the feelings back under control before part of him cracked, too. "...You called me Jenova's child once, too. It's strange, how you lie and deceive at will and expect me to believe you're any better than she is."
"Some deceptions are necessary. But do you see what has become of this woman? She, too, is rotting away, slowly. Her sanity is irretrievable. This is the fate of all who succumb to Jenova..."
"Those who lack willpower, maybe. But she never had any control over me. Not like this." Sephiroth stared down at the woman, no longer clear just how to react to any of this and trying to suppress the building pain in his arm.
"Supposedly not. And for that reason, you were once dangerous... but no longer. Our control over you is too complete, and rejecting our control means you will rot."
"Your voice..." The woman's mutterings interrupted both Sephiroth's thoughts and the Cetra. Her eyes were upon him, now, with a kind of focus they'd lacked just moments before. "...I dream sometimes... I hear your voice... are you...? Are you my son...? Are you Sephiroth...?" The tentacle slipped from her arms, forgotten, and the woman was up suddenly, taking a step and swaying, reaching towards him with skeletal fingers. "...I never got to hold you..."
"Don't touch me," Sephiroth recoiled, though the impulse to turn and leave this meaningless insanity behind him faded long enough to actually look at the woman, now unnerved by her features because he did see something of himself in them, reflected back at him even if she was ravaged by illness, mako poisoning, and her own madness. All the while Sephiroth had believed in a lie, but with the face of his pathetic and obviously human mother before him, he realized he had believed only because he had chosen the lie over the truth -- but there hadn't been a choice.
"You had to take this Planet back for your mother, right? Jenova's power to deceive wasn't strong enough, but you were always best at deceiving yourself. You consciously chose to believe a lie... and for all that happened afterwards, your punishment could be eternal and still not suffice." The Cetra's utter contempt for him had never been more apparent, and he felt the stabbing pains lacing through his shoulder now, as the skin bruised and cracked, rapidly, pain worsening as the effort of drawing each breath became a struggle.
"...My son... I'm glad to finally meet you... and I'm sorry... I..." The woman murmured, before madness took hold of her in a rush and Jenova's whispers became blindingly loud, burning through his mind. As if possessed the woman leapt towards him, now no longer human and almost entirely Jenova, speed and strength inhuman in a human shell, belying her frail appearance. Sephiroth didn't move, forcing himself to remain right where he was -- until instinct finally took over amidst a blinding flash of green. Equally skilled with the sword using either hand, he ignored his rotting left arm and drew with the right, feeling the slight give as vulnerable flesh parted easily beneath solid steel. For a moment, the Lifestream roared in his ears and green flooded his vision, before finally, all sensations receded.
The woman had the slightest smile on her face, but it faded, slowly, as the mako in her eyes receded. Sephiroth just stared at her in silence.
"You will be the one that succumbs to the virus, this time. In the end, you will be no different than this woman. She is your real mother -- a mindless puppet to the Jenova cells inside of her. But even if you do end up like your mother, we can always reconstruct you. Simply fading into the Lifestream is not an option. She came here to do the same, and this is the fate she found."
Sephiroth remained silent, but before he could even think of a response the soft patter of purposely light footsteps at the entrance to the cavern alerted him. He whirled around, placing the body on the ground in a single careful move and withdrawing his sword, hearing the discharge of rifle fire and feeling a bullet sink into his left shoulder, ripping away flesh with it and going straight through the limb. A second later Sephiroth moved, letting the speed of his unknown opponent take him by surprise only for a split second before slipping his sword through their shoulder and pinning them to the wall, already eerily aware that the bullet wound wasn't healing at anything close to the usual rate. Pinned to the wall by the Masamune, a strange man with blood red eyes and a pale face stared at him, equally unbothered by the sword in his shoulder but motionless, barely breathing.
Sephiroth dimly recognized him -- another one of Cloud's former companions from a timeline that no longer mattered. He barely knew the man's name, but he had definitely been there at the end, fighting with Cloud and all the rest. For him to be here now made even less sense, but Sephiroth supposed he was connected, somehow, to the dead woman now lying on the floor behind them.
"I suppose you knew her," Sephiroth began, forcing steadiness into his voice even as searing pains in his arm nearly blinded him. "...It's Vincent, isn't it?"
"...That woman is Lucrecia," Vincent's voice came out flatly, but anger flickered through his eyes, so sudden and intense it nearly overwhelmed his otherwise expressionless visage -- something monstrous lurked within -- but then the fiery hint of anger faded and the man's gaze became icy. "...You killed her."
"... I put her out of her misery."
Another flash of anger -- and it subsided a little more slowly this time, though the man could do little. Sephiroth kept his gun-arm pinned to the wall, and planned on killing him if he so much as showed any sign of something unusual. "...You must be Sephiroth, then. Hojo and Lucrecia's son..." For a long time, Vincent remained silent, before suddenly his voice no longer held much of anything except the faintest trace of regret. "Did she recognize you?"
"...She was completely insane."
"...I understand what Cloud meant. She came here to die, in a place where the Jenova cells inside of her couldn't affect anyone else... but I can see the look on her face. I can only hope she was glad to see that her son survived."
Sephiroth considered killing Vincent, for some reason -- a completely unexpected impulse, awakened by some emotion that broke loose of the otherwise tight self-controls over his own feelings. A moment later, he tightened his grip on his sword and withdrew it, leaving Vincent to slump down into a sitting position, one hand -- a metallic claw -- going up to pressure the wound even as it healed swiftly. Vincent was another of Hojo's creations, doubtlessly. That explained why he'd been fast enough to get a shot off, but it didn't explain his eerie calm about the situation.
"She never had the chance to hold you, even though you were her son... seeing your face might have helped. I can only imagine." Vincent's blood-red eyes rose to Sephiroth, studying him intently. "...Cloud said you died when you were younger. Clearly, that's not the case."
"It's the truth," Sephiroth replied, unnerved by the Cetra's silence. "What else did Cloud tell you?"
Vincent only looked at Sephiroth, and narrowed his eyes slightly.
"Either way, you should probably kill Cloud," Sephiroth suggested, finally. "He just might let you do it, especially if he remembers. Otherwise, the Cetra's plan will succeed. They don't even have to lift a finger against him, so long as he's stupid enough to play right into their plans--" Sephiroth said the words even knowing it sounded like madness, and the Cetra began roaring inside of him while the skin on his left arm cracked and blood oozed out, soaking his sleeve. Vincent moved as soon as Sephiroth seemed distracted, lifting his gun with his claw and aiming it right at Sephiroth's forehead, his movements easily as fast as a SOLDIER's. Sephiroth felt the Cetra knock him aside as the bullet grazed his cheek, then slashed Vincent, leaving the other man to tumble to the ground with a gaping wound right before tendrils of Lifestream shot up and took hold of his limbs, dragging him back through the darkness. Sephiroth fell to his knees, choking. On the ground, Vincent looked up at him with gritted teeth and a tightly-controlled look on his face, spitting out blood and managing to speak while the woman -- Lucrecia -- lied dead and with a serene smile on her face.
"Cloud will probably be the one to kill you, if I don't do it first."
"--Fine. So long as it disrupts their plans, Cloud can kill me. I don't think it will work, though." A brief hint of surprise appeared on Vincent's before expressionless face, but everything vanished a moment later, leaving Sephiroth caught up again in the sensation of falling through endless darkness, possibly through time, as well. Flashes of green appeared before his vision. His arm seared. The roar of the Cetra blocked out almost every other sensation, until finally, he slammed into the ground and rolled, breath leaving as his lungs crumbled with the force. A few moments later, the green receded and he straightened up, barely aware of his surroundings.
"You should have a clearer understanding of your punishment, now."
Sephiroth looked around blearily. The Cetra hadn't thrown him backwards or forwards in time, just sideways, somehow using the Lifestream to transplant him from one place to another -- tossing him around like a meaningless pawn, uncaringly, and knowing all the while his ability to resist was fading.
"Now, go. You can cooperate, or you can lie here while the rest of your mind and body rots. It's your decision."
"...It's my decision...?" Sephiroth repeated, incredulously -- and finally, he choked on more mako and laughed as he did, still aware of Jenova's whisperings inside of him and realizing that there was no real decision to make, in the eyes of the Cetra. It was funny -- undeniably funny, even if no one had ever really taught him when the right time to laugh was – and as Sephiroth lay choking and laughing at the absurdity of the situation he wondered if his brain was already rotting, too.
"...It's you..."
A voice interrupted him, breaking in just before his mind broke itself to pieces. The Cetra had savagely tossed him somewhere, a small yard surrounded by the deadened stench of Midgar's upper plate. It was early morning, here. A few feet away at the base of a small mound of deadened flowers, the last living Cetra sat staring at him like he was a ghost, an odd mix of almost-fear and definite curiosity on her face.
The elders of Cosmo Canyon were senseless old geezers, Yuffie decided, some fifteen miles up the road from the town. Geezers were the same the world over. They indecisively sat around advising everyone to be cautious and took eons to make decisions, and they all had the same stupid habit of assuming that they were actually capable of understanding things they had no clue about just because they were old.
Yuffie didn't quite buy that. There were no elders with her now, thankfully, as she crouched in the trees and carefully watched the activities at some old Shinra base below. Fifteen of her ninja were with her, though, clutching their weapons and barely daring to breathe, ready to move as soon as she gave the signal. The problem with the old men was that they really didn't understand -- Wutain Shinobi weren't the sort to sit and wait for the battle to come to them, especially now that Shinra had some kind of terrible new weapon capable of wiping out the idiots at Fort Condor in a single day.
A cold breeze stirred up after some five minutes passed, and Yuffie crouched low, preparing to give the signal, watching the three or four sentries pacing around on the wall with sharp eyes and forced patience. Despite the fact that this outpost was little and backwoods, it was currently the holding place for a decent store of materia, and if they were going to do anything, they needed it. The old geezers back at the canyon thought these little raids were worthless, and it was risky splitting their fighting forces in half just to get their hands on some materia -- but they just didn't get it. Yuffie wasn't stupid, or at least not as stupid as they thought she was. If they even had a dream of holding Cosmo Canyon, they needed every little piece of Materia they could get their hands on.
Of course, she understood the real reason why they thought she was stupid -- the Princess, the figurehead that drew all the Wutains together, wasn't supposed to be out on the front lines, risking her life on a materia raid. But that was only because they didn't understand -- all the caution in the world hadn't saved the old man who had once been Wutai's emperor. Yuffie's grip around her shuriken tightened and she prepared to give the signal to move, seeing that the sentries were now facing the other direction, and --
-- too late. A confusing blur of motion followed by a sudden explosion shocked Yuffie so badly she nearly fell out of the tree. Something darted towards one of the walls. The wall exploded, blasted inwards by some inhuman strength, and the sentries came running and fell dead in another rush, faster than Yuffie's eyes could follow. The other Ninja tensed, watching with flat-out stupidly shocked looks on their faces, and Yuffie only glanced at them before turning back to the base. Another explosion, and one of the inside walls fell inwards. A few shouts, and a few surprised and terrified screams followed by the ugly noise of bones crunching and a flash of insanely powerful materia magic broke the silence of the night before everything went quiet again, leaving the same still, late autumn evening as before.
Self-control had never been Yuffie's strong point. Whatever was going down inside that little Shinra outpost was probably nothing they needed to take part in, but then again, the same lack of self-control that led Yuffie to leap right out of the branches without even signaling to the rest of the Ninja had also gained them their geezer allies back in Cosmo Canyon, and as annoying as they were, they did have a lot of good weapons and Materia. Yuffie vaulted from the trees to the top of the base's crumbling outer wall, then down into the courtyard, drawing her weapon and wondering just what kind of monster she was about to meet. Three of her ninja followed. The rest lingered silently in the trees and waited, watching carefully and ready to move if necessary.
Everyone wearing Shinra colors was dead, now -- the sentries, the troopers, a few SOLDIERs, amounting to about twenty bodies sprawled motionlessly on the ground. One SOLDIER in a first-class uniform laid pinned by a gigantic, gleaming white sword, a weapon wider than Yuffie and doubtlessly about three times as heavy, she imagined, though its owner was nowhere to be seen. Probably inside the fort -- and for the first time in years, Yuffie actually had a moment of doubt while considering what kind of overcompensating inhuman freak was actually capable of using a sword like that. Maybe, just maybe, she didn't actually want to meet said monster.
Before she had second thoughts, though, a man stepped out of the base, walking at a casual pace, seemingly oblivious to the carnage around him. He saw Yuffie right away and paused, and she felt something inside of her snap. She didn't make any proclamations this time -- no time to announce the arrival of the great ninja Yuffie, not when there was killing to be done. Yuffie charged, darting inwards and preparing to sink her shuriken into his skull and end it right away -- but the man didn't even draw a weapon. He side-stepped her attack, almost casually, but Yuffie thought she saw his eyes widen just a bit when she whirled around and flung her shuriken right at his head and almost had him between the eyes for a split second -- before he practically faded from view, and suddenly the gleaming white sword broke the ground to pieces in the place she'd been standing. Yuffie leapt back and fell into a fighting crouch, waiting, gritting her teeth and feeling the blood rush in her head and her heart pounding so hard it almost hurt. The SOLDIER just stood there looking at her, and slowly, the rage receded.
Same glowing eyes -- but the color was different underneath the unreal mako gleam, and this man was different, not the SOLDIER she'd sworn to kill. His uniform was just a standard SOLDIER outfit, and so worn it looked threadbare in some places. He didn't seem bothered at all by the carnage around him, but Yuffie didn't have to do any kind of mental calculations to figure out that he was the one who'd caused it.
"That's the stupidest hair-do I've ever seen," she finally announced, going for false bravado even though she felt sick. To her surprise, though, he just looked at her for a moment, before changing the subject.
"...You're here for the materia. Right, Yuffie?"
"...That's GREAT-NINJA Yuffie to you. And how the hell do you know my name, chocobo-head? I sure as hell don't know you."
He shook his head, just a bit. "I dunno. You're the Princess, right? The one in all the papers?"
"Yeah. That's me. What the hell do you want?"
After an awkward silence spent staring at one another -- Yuffie suspicious, the SOLDIER nonchalant -- he shrugged.
"...I saw you and the others. Looked like you were gonna raid this base, I guess. There's some good materia here."
"Yeah. And it's all mine. If you want it, you're gonna have to fight me for it!"
"...That's fine. I don't need it."
Yuffie just looked at him for a few moments, before scowling. "Well, you're not any fun. What's the big deal, then? You're butting in. We coulda taken this one."
"...Sorry." He didn't sound apologetic. "...I saw you in the trees. I figured you could handle it, but... I could do it quicker."
"What the hell's the deal with you, anyway? Are you some kind of psycho or something? What's with that sword?" Yuffie felt like they were talking without really communicating, somehow. The SOLDIER just looked at her for a moment before turning towards the little base, his expression bored.
"This place isn't important... no one will miss it. Same with Nibelheim, actually... it was just a place for rejects and side projects. If it'd really mattered to any of them, I couldn't have taken it down so easily."
"What are you on about? Slow down, chocobo-head. What's this about Nibelheim? Were you--"
"--I did it." He didn't sound proud of it, either. Yuffie just stared, realizing now that even if they were communicating, it was at a pace much too quick for her brain to comprehend. His words came out like totally inane rambling, but a moment later, she dropped back into a crouch again, suddenly distrustful. You didn't have to be an old geezer to realize chocobo-headed SOLDIERs with weapons bigger than they were called for some actual common sense and caution.
"You say you're the one who took the Nibel Reactor out? Are you kidding? You and what army?"
"That one," he motioned towards his sword. Yuffie stared at him long enough to realize he was being dead serious -- then burst out laughing, actually startling him. When she finished, she shook her head.
"Ha-ha. No way. Are you crazy or something?"
He gave another careless shrug, but a second later he saw something funny about the situation, too. A ghost of a smirk passed over his otherwise bland features, though it didn't do much to soften the unreal creepiness of his glaring blue mako-tainted eyes. "...I probably am...But I've gotta be to fight against them, I guess."
"You mean the Shinra?"
"Wanna help?" He asked, so suddenly it startled her -- and in a moment of unusually deep self-introspection, Yuffie thought that maybe she was a little impetuous, because while she'd sworn multiple times to her father's grave and all the gods she knew that she was going to be the one who killed the silver-haired SOLDIER and every bastard who'd ever set foot in Wutai, this SOLDIER didn't seem quite as offensive as the rest. She wasn't so sure he was a SOLDIER at all, actually. "I heard you've got an army of ninja following you."
"...You heard wrong. There are a bunch of stupid rumors flying around. There are only about three hundred of us, plus the fifteen here. And there's only about fifty guys capable of fighting back at Cosmo Canyon, but they do help a bit with materia and stuff. They hate the Shinra too, ya know. But don't get me wrong! I'm worth at least a thousand ninja, and every ninja's worth about forty Shinra," Yuffie boasted, as confidently as she could manage. It was insanely stupid bravado and she knew it, but the ghost of a smile that passed across his face was neither mocking nor sarcastic. Maybe his eyes said otherwise, but at a glance, he didn't look like a bad guy.
"...I wanted to take something from the Shinra... but I don't think I can do it on my own. Not this time," Chocobo-Head said. "...Help me out with something, and you can probably get really good materia."
Yuffie looked at the Chocobo-Head -- a guy she'd just met, a SOLDIER and a crazy one to boot, the sort of person capable of carrying around a monstrous slab of metal like it was nothing and massacring a medium-sized Shinra outpost in under twenty seconds -- and abruptly tossed caution, common sense and the rest of that garbage right to the wind.
"Tell me more, chocobo-head. What's this about materia?"
Another ghost of a smile flitted across his face. This one seemed a little eerie and unhinged, but it didn't belie the suddenly forceful look in his eyes. "Reactors usually have strong materia."
"Uh, yeah, they do. But, uh, wouldn't you need an army to do that?"
He shrugged again, tapped the hilt of his sword, and she thought his creepy eyes looked just a little brighter than before. "...I've got one right here."
All stupid bravado except her own usually did nothing more than piss Yuffie off, but this time she smiled and decided on an impulse that it made her like him even more.
Author's notes
1. ...Okay, weekly updates are now a thing of the past. I'm going to try for bi-weekly instead. Sorry guys, but I'm swamped with stuff to do for work, and that has to take precedence over this.
2. Anyway, next update: Sephiroth and Aerith, destruction and carnage, Cloud and Yuffie. Look for it in about two weeks.
Like always, thanks for the reviews!