He heard voices around him, and wanted to shoo them away so he could sleep again. They had woken him from a particularly pleasant dream, one in which he and Tifa were together again. They had been on a beach in Costa del Sol, relaxing. Wait... a beach? Weren't we planning on going to Icicle Inn for our honeymoon? he wondered to himself.

You were. But what's so wrong with a dream suggesting otherwise?

Nothing, I suppose. He listened to the voices that had woken him up. "I'd appreciate it," he muttered, "if you could leave me be a while longer."

The two voices stopped talking, and he felt hands rest on his shoulders. "Vince..." he heard one of them say.

His eyes opened slowly. "I recognize that voice," he said, turning to face the speaker. He couldn't believe his eyes, and thought for certain he was dreaming again.

Tifa was smiling at him. "I'm back," she said softly. "Miss me?"

"'Miss you' is an understatement," he replied. "Words fail me to describe just how much I missed you."

Tifa gave a small laugh. "I missed you too." She looked to her left, and Vincent turned his head to see who she was looking at now.

Shelke was looking at Vincent too, a small smile on her own face. "Good afternoon, Vincent," she said. "Sleep well?"

"Shelke? You're here too?" He gave his head a small shake. "Are Cloud, Yuffie, Reeve and Manna here too?"

Her eyes fell, and she slowly, reluctantly shook her head. "Only Manna. Cloud and Yuffie are confirmed... soulless."

"So Lizu did it..." he murmured. "Aeon and I only speculated that's what she was there to do, but for it to actually be the case..."

Tifa hugged him. "But you made it out safely. That makes all the difference in the world to me."

"If only... I tried to help them out, too... But I was too damn focused on getting Aeon out of there as well..."

Shelke frowned. "Why is it you broke Dmitri Aeon out of the WRO cells, anyway? Surely you had good reason, but what?"

"He said he could remove the piece of crystal -- no, piece of materia from Tifa, provided we find her first. He wouldn't tell me how, so it really left no choice. Besides, Raenya will only listen to him. And I think it's safe to say that we need her help fighting Lizu." He sighed. "I told myself it was for the greater good, but was I right to do it...?"

"No, you weren't. However, it was for the greater good, so I think Reeve is willing to forgive it. Of course, that depends on him having survived the assault, and I don't think he did..." Shelke saw the question forming in both of their eyes, and shook her head. "I didn't see him anywhere, but then again, I made a run straight for the exit. I tried fighting Lizu, and I probably would've lost if I kept going."

Vincent looked to the doorway. "Where is Aeon? I think it's time for us to begin planning our next move against Lizu and Sephiroth."

Tifa's eyes fell at the latter name. "So it's true what he told me... Sephiroth's still alive... At first, I thought it was a lot of speculation, but now I see otherwise..."

"He's alive, but he doesn't have a physical body. He lives as a spirit in the staff Lizu uses, and he provides her with a powerful barrier and the occasional offensive spell. He's already hit Vincent and I with Ultima once, and he caught Cloud and Yuffie with that same Ultima spell as well."

"To be technical, he hit the Galian with Ultima; when it fell, I regained control." Vincent gave a nod. "But all the same, he's still fearsome, even as a spirit." He suddenly recalled the first battle he had against Lizu. "That's right too. The first time I fought Lizu, she would've lost if Sephiroth hadn't possessed her body and fought in her place. So he can take over her body as he wishes, and that makes him very dangerous all the same."

Stop stealing my glory, Valentine. You didn't exactly fight her, you know.

"As long as he doesn't go off summoning Meteor again," they heard from the doorway, "we can beat him."

The three of them faced Dmitri, who was leaning against the doorway. "How?" Shelke asked. "Bypassing that barrier of his is impossible; as it is, I had to lure Lizu into the offensive with her staff in order to escape. A good, firm shock applied to the staff, and she was paralyzed. There wasn't nearly enough force to kill her, though."

Dmitri gave a small nod. "Yet now we have a chance. I've had success with Project Slayer, and the first Slayer is visiting with her sister. As soon as they've caught up with one another, we'll begin our strategy meeting and begin our counteroffensive against Lizu and Sephiroth."

He was ready to turn from them and walk down the corridor when Shelke stopped him. "But the removed souls... She said that if I killed her, the souls would never rejoin their original bodies."

He paused. "That would be a problem, wouldn't it?" he sighed. "Well, regardless, it's nothing we can't handle. I've done some research on that very materia, and have tested both properties on simple mice. The possession is easy enough to clear up, the soul theft is quite another matter. However, it can be done, and those mice are acting as though nothing ever happened to them."

"How can we restore their souls?" Vincent asked.

"...Let me handle that when the time comes. We need Lizu's crystal, which houses all the souls she's removed so far. To get that from her, we need to defeat her. And even then, it's a gamble..." His voice trailed, and he shook his head. "Enough of that, though. Let me know when you're ready to begin discussing our strategy." He waved a hand over his shoulder, walking out of their sight as he did.

"What do you think he meant by 'even then, it's a gamble'? Does that mean there's no set chance of success we'll get our friends back?" Tifa asked after a couple minutes of silence.

"Sounds that way, but this whole battle against Lizu is a gamble in and around itself," Vincent said. "She gets help from Sephiroth, and her magical skills aren't to be overlooked either. In effect, she's invincible with Sephiroth." There has to be some way to beat her... Even the strongest foes have a weakness, and that's true even with Lizu. But what's her weakness...?

Why are you asking me? You really expect me to know?

Not really. He wished he had a book, and settled for crossing his arms and leaning back, eyes closed.

"It's impossible to be invincible. Every enemy has a weakness somewhere." Shelke was more or less voicing Vincent's thoughts. "If we can't defeat Lizu, then... Maybe we have to defeat Sephiroth?"

"But how?" Tifa asked. "He's in a staff, right? How are we going to defeat a spirit when its possessing a staff?"

Vincent opened his eyes, a sly grin crossing his face. "We won't," he said simply, standing and uncrossing his arms. "All we have to do is take Lizu's staff away from her. We do that, we take Sephiroth from her."

Tifa smiled. "The Galian's idea, no doubt."

Vincent nodded. "The Galian's fought against Lizu twice, and even fought Sephiroth once. Neither time did it win, but it did pull up some useful information from those experiences."

"So take the staff from Lizu, take away her barrier... Without that barrier, she's vulnerable?"

"If it weren't for Sephiroth's interference the first time the Galian fought Lizu, she'd be dead by now. She's as vulnerable as the next caster type without her staff."

They were psyched that they had a means to defeat Lizu now. Then... "Isn't it going to be insanely difficult to take her staff from her, though?" Tifa asked.

Neither Vincent nor Shelke responded, and that was because they knew it was true. They had no chance of defeating Lizu while she had the staff, and to try taking it from her was the closest thing to suicide they could imagine.

Tifa sighed. "Sorry. I wrecked the mood of that," she said softly.

"Don't worry about it. We needed to get that fact out there as well. But still... it's a development, one we could very well capitalize on if we plan this out right." Vincent nodded to the door. "I'm going to talk to Aeon about it and see what he thinks of it."

--

Dmitri was busy recording the notes on his latest success when he heard the door open behind him. "Knock first," he said dismissively.

"Apologies, Dmitri," he heard Raenya say. "I should know better by now."

"Raenya. You shouldn't be up and about just yet. The three components haven't settled yet, and you of all people should know this."

"Hey, don't talk to my sister like that!" he heard Manna protest. "You should be glad she's able to walk around!"

He stopped typing for a moment and turned his head to face the two sisters. "I should, eh? But if something happens to her while she's 'walking around', then I not only lose the first major success in Project Slayer, I also lose her." He faced the computer screen again and resumed typing. "I'd prefer to keep her, all things considered. As her doctor, it's more or less an order. Help her back to her bed, and make sure she stays there, Manna."

"But she really wanted to see you," Manna sighed. "Oh, fine. If your research means more to you than your personal life, then who am I to try and interfere...?"

Dmitri's fingers froze for a moment, but resumed after a couple seconds. "Glad you see it my way," he replied simply.

He heard the door open again, and thought he was alone again. His hand shot to his shotgun's grip, however, when he heard a deep voice say "Aeon."

"For the greater love of science, doesn't anyone knock anymore?" he grumbled, sliding his hand from his shotgun and bringing it back to the keyboard. "What do you want, Valentine?"

"Tifa, Shelke, the Galian and myself have reached a conclusion on how to defeat Lizu easily, and yet it's a task all in itself."

"Oh? Do tell."

"We've already established that Sephiroth lives on in Lizu's staff."

"Correct."

"We've established that Sephiroth puts up a barrier that, in effect, makes Lizu invincible."

"Correct."

"So, suppose we take Lizu's staff from her and deprive her of Sephiroth's powers? She'd be extremely vulnerable without it."

"In theory."

He heard Vincent sigh. "What do you mean, 'in theory'?"

"If you have to ask, you haven't considered all possibilities. And I do mean all possibilities."

"So you're saying that to take her staff from her won't make her much easier to defeat."

"Correct."

His attention was ripped from the computer screen as he felt a cool claw close around the back of his collar and yank him roughly out of the chair. He chuckled. "I do believe your anger is misplaced, Valentine."

"What do you know about Lizu that we don't?" he growled. "If we're to defeat her, we need all facts on the table."

"Her skills are equal to Sephiroth's, and that's without the staff. You seriously think you'll have an easier time against her just because you take her toy away from her? No, her mastery of magic of all natures is unparalleled by simple humans."

"So you're saying that with the staff..."

Dmitri reached behind him and attempted to pry the claw off his collar. "With the staff, she's actually superior to Sephiroth's magical capabilities. And seeing whereas she's a caster type by nature, that's troublesome. Taking her toy from her will drop her magical abilities to Sephiroth's level, and you'll still have a challenging fight on your hands. Hojo and I were rather particular about the JENOVA Project, Valentine; surely you've realized this by now?"

Vincent dropped Dmitri, and the scientist began straightening his collar. "In the end, your research is the cause of all this trouble," he hissed.

Dmitri smirked, finishing with his collar. "I won't ask you to forgive me for making scientific advances. After all, it's because of the JENOVA Project that Cloud Strife was capable of defeating Sephiroth and averting Meteorfall in the first place, correct?"

He fought the urge to laugh as he saw Vincent's face dawn with realization at how true this news was. "You..." the ex-Turk growled.

"Now then, if you'll excuse me, I have a project to update," he said coolly, picking up his chair and sitting down again.

He heard Vincent walk to the door. "You bastard," Vincent said.

"At what point did you gain the delusion that I was ever on your side?" Dmitri asked, an air of triumph in his voice.

Vincent walked out of the room, slamming the door closed behind him.

"However, taking her staff from her will make her more manageable..." Dmitri mused to himself. "You, my boy, have learned what I like to call 'damage control'." He resumed typing.

--

"You sure about this?"

"Almost positive. She can't have gone up, however; the upper levels are destroyed."

"So where did she go? There's really no 'down' here..."

Sephiroth chuckled. "True. But she is capable of transparency; perhaps she's hiding around us right now?"

Lizu sighed. "Damned uppity bitch. Thinks she's won just because she managed to escape me. I suppose I can take care of the other heroes first, then go looking for her."

"You're back on track, I see."

Lizu glanced at the damaged door near the elevators, and shrugged. "I'll worry about this later." She walked away, outside of Shinra Headquarters.

Whoo, Lizu was close to them. Well, she'll never figure it out on her own. Now, does Sephiroth know...? Heh, I'll keep quiet about that.

Another short rant. I will, at this point, say that I'm back in Azeroth/Outland. That's right, I play WoW and have been away for roughly a couple months. But now I'm back on, so look me up on Velen, Dragonmaw or Elune. Best chance of finding me on Velen is with either Calani or Gazzak (both Horde), on Dragonmaw I'm Ilyasviel, Horde. Elune I'm Errya, Alliance. Maybe I'll see you there?

Next chapter, they decide to act against Lizu, the intention of defeating her lying in stealing her staff. Can they do it, and if so, what repercussions await them for it? -Spiritslayer