As you're all aware, my dear readers, the site was down for a period of several days, causing me to be unable to update on Monday. The schedule will resume as planned, starting now. Thanks for all your reviews and I hope you'll continue to enjoy the story.

"You three are our trump cards," Reeve was saying.

Vincent, Cloud, and Red XIII stood in front of Reeve's throne as the man inspected monitor readings and massaged at his temples. Red XIII had just arrived that morning after journeying through the night. Yuffie was conspicuously absent; when Cloud had conscientiously asked where she was, Reeve had replied that she was not feeling well and didn't want to get out of bed.

"I've deployed all two dozen Combat Cait Siths that we have at New Nibelheim," he continued. "Any one of them can handle several Losts at once, more if they come in ones and twos, but from what you've told me of the Immaculate Swords, they're not going to be much use against the leaders or even uplifted humans. That's where you come in."

"Should we concentrate on defense or offense?" Vincent asked.

"If that army of Losts gets into the city, it really won't matter if you kill their leaders," Reeve said grimly. "However, the army will be much less effective without leadership. Therefore, we'll adopt a two-pronged strategy.

"Red, you will be on defense. I'll supply you with the Data Materia that Vincent found – it's a mastered Destruct – as well as a Comet Materia that we've been saving for just such an occasion. Between those and Cosmo Memory, you should be able to inflict some massive, large-scale damage on their army."

Red XIII nodded. "That sounds like a sound plan. I take it, then, that Vincent and Cloud will be the offense."

"Yes. Vincent and Cloud, you two will also act defensively until you get an uplifted human or an Immaculate Sword in your sights, at which point you'll terminate them. No mercy and no niceties, understand? They're not going to be showing you any of those courtesies, so don't feel as though you have to play nice."

Vincent's lip twitched. "No. Of course not."

"Have you evacuated New Nibelheim?" Cloud asked.

"A few people have left," Reeve said. "But the majority of them either don't want to leave, have nowhere to go, or are stubbornly insisting that nothing's wrong. Other cities aren't going to be accepting refugees, Cloud. It's hard enough to support their own populations, to say nothing of a bunch of castaways. If New Nibelheim falls, then everyone who lives there will be effectively condemned to death."

"We won't be able to help them?"

"If we help a few of them, all of them will expect us to help them, and the Protectorate simply doesn't have the resources for that. We only have one shot at this, Cloud. The three of you and the army manage to fend off the attack on New Nibelheim, or it falls, everyone in it dies, and the Immaculate Swords move on to 'uplift' the rest of the Central Continent." Reeve leaned forward in his chair and asked, "Do you understand?"

"Intimately," Vincent growled. "Let's go." He swept his cloak around him and left the room.

Reeve waited a beat and then said, "All right, Cloud. What did the three of you see inside Vincent's head? I heard shouting last night, and now Yuffie's saying she's not feeling well enough to get up and Vincent is very obviously brooding. The last thing we need is for all of you to be unable to handle working together."

Cloud hesitated and then said, "We saw a lot of stuff that I'm sure Vincent would rather we hadn't. He said our help was essential to beating Galian, so I want to say that it was all worth it in the end, but…" He shrugged. "Vincent pretty much had the truth of all his failings shoved in his face, and Yuffie and I had to watch while it almost destroyed him."

"I see." Reeve stroked his goatee in thought and asked, "Are they going to be unable to work together in the future? Is Vincent's ability as an effective combatant going to be compromised by this whole situation?"

"I think Vincent and Yuffie have their own set of problems that no amount of tact on anyone else's part can fix," Cloud said. "He hurt her pretty badly, and for no good reason. Either they'll be able to come to grips with it and deal, or…" He shrugged. "I wouldn't worry about Vincent's ability to fight, though. He was brooding when we first met him and he was still deadly, remember?"

"You're right." Reeve sighed and leaned back in his seat again. "At any rate, the three of you should be on your way as soon as possible. Don't forget that the lives of everyone in New Nibelheim rest on your shoulders."

"We won't," Cloud said solemnly. "Of course, you'll be directing the Combat Cait Siths, so you'll be there to remind us if you need to."

"Of course," Reeve replied with a faint smile. "Good luck, Cloud, Red. I hope you won't have need of it."

"We are on course for New Nibelheim," Red XIII said. "Estimated time of arrival is an hour and forty-five minutes. I'm afraid we will not be offering in-flight services, but please make yourselves comfortable for the duration of our trip."

"We don't even get a beverage?" Cloud asked, sounding miffed. That earned him a light whap across the face from Red XIII's tail, though the beast thankfully kept the flaming tip curled backward. "Fine, fine. Be that way." He looked over at Vincent, who was staring out the windscreen of the cockpit, eyes fixed on nothing. "So. I heard you and Yuffie had a fight last night."

Vincent blinked slowly, once, and said nothing.

"You want to talk about it?"

"Do I look like I want to talk about it?" Vincent asked through clenched teeth.

"No, but that probably means you really need to."

"There is nothing to discuss."

"Vincent –"

"I don't want to talk about it!" Vincent snarled, snapping his head around to glare at Cloud. As he did so, his eyes turned a feral yellow, his features seemed to blur and returned to focus with white fur on them, and his teeth elongated themselves into deadly-looking fangs. Cloud jerked back instinctively, his heart shooting up into his throat for a second.

Vincent held the glare for a moment and then seemed to realize something was wrong. He tentatively lifted a hand up to his face and ran it along his cheek. "What the hell?" he murmured. He closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment, and his features returned to normal, the fur fading away into nothing, his teeth shrinking back down, and his eyes returning to their normal ruby hue.

"What the hell was that?" Cloud asked.

"I must have incorporated Galian's form into my own when I took his power," Vincent theorized.

"But I thought you already had Galian's form within yourself."

"Not really. There were physical processes that I underwent to start the transformation, but the majority of it was magical. It was like switching between two mutually exclusive states – I was either myself or I was Galian, never both." Vincent looked at his right arm and concentrated, and it began to bulge with muscle, sprouting long, white hair, and his fingers started to develop long, vicious talons. He reversed the changes and returned his arm to normal. "I can't say how it works, only that it does."

"That's good enough for me," Cloud murmured. "Still, Vincent…"

Vincent sighed. "I'm sorry I snapped at you, Cloud. I just…" He hung his head and closed his eyes, his expression full of regret. "It's not easy, being shown how you're a coward and how you've ruined the life of a woman who's done nothing but love you."

Cloud tentatively laid a hand on Vincent's shoulder. "I know. It was hard to watch for me, and it must have been a hell of a lot worse for you. Still, now that you know exactly what happened, you can make sure it doesn't happen again. The next time you feel like you have to run away from something, just tell yourself that it's not happening. Tell yourself that you have to stand your ground in order to be able to look in the mirror and not want to punch the guy you see there. It'll work out, you'll see."

Vincent chuckled. "If you say so, Cloud, then I suppose that's all I need to hear." He straightened up and resumed looking out at the horizon. "Still, this isn't something that can be fixed with a few kind words and a little contrition on my part. This is something I'm going to have to deal with for the rest of my life – especially what I've done to Yuffie. I have to make amends for that somehow."

"Why don't you just ask her to take you back? I mean, you still love one another."

"It wouldn't work like that, Cloud. It'd be far too little, far too late."

"But you have to do something to show her that you're sorry. Otherwise there wouldn't be any point to everything you went through, would there?"

"If I may make a suggestion," Red XIII said. "All that you have to do, Vincent, is apologize to her."

"How will that make everything right again?" Vincent asked incredulously.

"Oh, don't get me wrong," the beast said. "It won't. But the fact will remain that you did, and Yuffie will recognize that. She'll see that you know the incredible depth of your mistake and that you realize how futile it is to try to set it right, but you'll be trying anyway. A common human aphorism is, 'It's the thought that counts.' I've normally heard this in reference to poorly selected birthday gifts, but it's true for so much more than that. What will count is your intent."

After a moment, Cloud leaned forward and patted Red XIII on the shoulder blade. "This is why you're the genius and I'm just the guy who hits things with swords," he laughed.

Red XIII gave a chuffing laugh. "Please. You flatter me too much, Cloud." He looked back at Vincent and asked, "So. Do you understand what I'm saying, Vincent?"

Vincent nodded. "I do, Red, and I suppose you're right. I just – I'm afraid of what will happen if she doesn't see it the way you've said she will. Maybe I'll just be digging myself a deeper hole. A large part of me says that I shouldn't even bother trying, that I've destroyed everything special I ever had with her and she'll never want to see me again."

"But if what you had really was special, you're naturally going to want to salvage what you had and make things right again," Red XIII said. "You recognize how hopeless it may seem, but you're doing it anyway. That's what counts, Vincent. And in the long run, even if she doesn't see things how I've laid out and she tells you to never speak to her again, the important thing will be that you tried. You won't have run away from taking responsibility for your mistake. You'll have stood up and accepted the consequences, whatever they might be."

Vincent slumped a little in his seat. "You're right, of course. I – thank you." He looked over at Cloud and said, "Both of you."

Cloud shook his head. "It was all Red, Vincent. I –" He stopped and leaned forward in his seat, squinting at something over the horizon. "Is that… is that smoke?"

Vincent also snapped to attention and squinted, and he could indeed see smoke. As the attack transport moved closer, he could see that it was a huge, black column of smoke rising up from what used to be a Protectorate outpost located midway between Old Nibelheim and New Nibelheim.

"You think it was an accident?" Red XIII asked.

Cloud shook his head. "With the Immaculate Swords coming, we can't put anything down to chance. How much time will it take to land this thing, look around, and then get back in the air?"

"About half an hour, assuming that you keep the search light," Red XIII replied. "Advance Protectorate scouts have reported that that Immaculate Swords' army is moving en masse, but relatively slowly, and isn't due at New Nibelheim for another four hours or so. We have time."

"Then take us down," Vincent said. "This might have been caused by an advance party. We can't have one of those running loose in Protectorate territory when all our forces are at the front lines."

Red XIII nodded and brought the craft down towards the site of the incident. Vincent swallowed and pushed all thoughts of Yuffie out of his head. It was time to be focused, and, if necessary, to put his new powers to the test.

He hoped they would be enough.

The outpost was the site of a massacre.

All twenty-one people who had been manning the place, a small bunker located atop a bluff, were dead. Their throats had all been slashed in exactly the same manner, and they'd bled out quickly.

Cloud felt his teeth grinding as he looked at the carnage. Whoever was responsible, there was nothing they could do at this point. Red XIII was waiting outside with the attack transport, and the three of them needed to be going quickly. They needed to organize the defense of New Nibelheim, and they only had a few hours to do that.

"Who do you think did it?" Cloud asked Vincent as he walked outside, carrying two of the bodies. The other man was laying down the last two on the pile they were making to burn.

"Probably one of the Angels," Vincent replied. "Which one and why, though, I have no idea. He's obviously not here any longer, else he'd already have attacked us."

"I'm not so sure of that," Cloud said. "After all, the only one whose capabilities we know is Uriel. Even if all the rest of them do is fight barehanded, they're still shape-shifting monsters with unbelievable regenerative powers – and you know that they don't just fight barehanded."

Vincent nodded as he set the pile of bodies aflame, producing a column of smoke that rose to join the one emanating from the shattered remains of the outpost. "Agreed. Still, we've combed the outpost fairly thoroughly. If they were here, they've had any number of opportunities to attack us."

Cloud paused, listening. Something was wrong, and he couldn't quite put his finger on it for a moment. Then he realized that the only sound he could hear was that of the bodies burning, when he should be able to hear the drone of the attack transport's rotors as Red XIII kept it hot for a quick takeoff.

He looked at Vincent, who raised an eyebrow, stopped to listen, and then came to the same conclusion. They both rushed back to where they had left Red XIII and the transport, their weapons drawn.

It was as they'd feared. Somebody had neatly sliced off both the craft's wings. Red XIII was crouched in the cockpit, waiting for another attack, the Materia he'd bonded with himself glowing in his headdress, but nothing was coming.

"What happened?" Vincent called as they rushed up to Red XIII.

"I don't know," Red XIII replied. "I was sitting here, remaining alert, when the craft's wings suddenly were cut straight through. I wasn't harmed; however, I have a feeling that's not by any virtue of my own defenses, but instead a taunt from our enemy." His eyes swept the area around the transport and he continued, "Our enemy, who should still be… NEARBY!"

He leaped straight out of the cockpit, Materia shining, and the sky twisted above them and produced a monumental comet at his command. The comet rocketed down and smashed into a spot perhaps twenty yards from the three of them, rocking the ground and making them stumble.

"That's strange," a familiar, airy voice hissed from right behind them. "I could have sworn that I was better hidden."

Cloud instinctively whirled around and swung the First Tsurugi in the same movement, but Selaphiel, who appeared behind them in a rippling effect similar to a wave of heat, easily ducked the wild strike and threw himself backward. He grinned at them, displaying his razor-sharp teeth, and his eyes seemed to burn into Cloud's soul. "Nice try, Cloud Strife, but I'm not that easy to kill," the Fifth Angel laughed.

"Selaphiel," Vincent growled, leveling Cerberus at the man's head. "What are you doing here?"

"I was directed to proceed ahead of the main army and destroy this outpost in order to lure one or more of you here," Selaphiel replied, brushing a strand of his silky, white hair out of his grey face. "Then I was to contain you here in the manner I deemed most effective."

"I'm afraid you'll find 'containing' all three of us difficult at best," Red XIII said, his hair standing up and his teeth peeled back menacingly from his teeth.

"Don't think I haven't calculated all of your strengths and compared them to my own," Selaphiel said. "I will freely admit that I would not be able to take all of you on at once. I am only, after all, the Fifth Angel. However –" his thin lips curved into a toothy smile – "it's hours from here to New Nibelheim on foot if you hurry. There's no way for you to get to the city and join the defensive line quickly enough to make a difference."

Cloud struck out in a lightning-fast Blade Beam that blasted Selaphiel off of his feet and sent him sprawling, and Vincent fired off several three-round bursts from Cerberus. Halfway to the ground, the Fifth Angel disappeared in another shimmering effect and Vincent's bullets shot through empty air.

"Temper, temper," Selaphiel chided them, still invisible. "Well, there's no hope for you to be effective defendants at this point, so my duty is done. I think I'll be rejoining my comrades now."

Just as abruptly as he had appeared, Selaphiel vanished – he was already invisible, but the three of them could feel his presence evaporate like water, leaving them alone with the useless attack transport.

"Damn," Red XIII growled.

Cloud slammed the First Tsurugi point-first into the ground and collapsed onto the sand next to it, looking intensely frustrated. "He got us. Dammit, we walked right into his trap and took the bait!"

Vincent holstered Cerberus and took a deep breath. "We don't have time to feel sorry for ourselves. We need to get moving towards New Nibelheim, right away."

"But it's going to be far too late when we finally get there," Red XIII pointed out. "And I'm sure Selaphiel wasn't fool enough to leave any working vehicles at the outpost. He's doubtless destroyed them all or otherwise rendered them useless."

"I can get there inside of two hours," Vincent said. "The two of you will just have to follow as fast as you can."

Cloud looked up at his friend incredulously. "How the hell are you going to make it on foot in two hours?" he asked. "It's a fifty-something-minute flight with the attack transport!"

"Trust me," Vincent said. "I know I can make it."

Red XIII nodded. "I understand. You should proceed ahead with all speed. Cloud and I will hurry, but we won't be able to make it for at least six hours."

"That's fine," Vincent said. "I'll try my best to hold the line." He started off in the direction of New Nibelheim, paused, and said, "Hang in there, okay? Both of you need to come out of this alive."

"We were just about to say the same thing to you," Cloud said pointedly.

Vincent allowed himself a small smile. "See you around," he murmured.

In the next instant, he felt himself become completely alien. His muscles bulged beneath his skin, which grew long, white fur. He felt the contours of his face change, a snout sprouting where his nose used to be, and his ears elongated and twitched. His hair changed and became white, and a pair of curling horns rose from his head. His eyes turned yellow, talons protruded from his fingers – he could feel them click neatly into place within the gauntlet on his left arm – and his feet extended and became hind paws, bursting through his combat boots as though they weren't even there. He didn't care; assuming he survived what was coming, he could always get new ones.

He was Galian, but not Galian; he still knew that he was Vincent Valentine, and he still wore his red cloak wrapped about his shoulders, although it was substantially stretched across his broadened shoulders. With a snort, Vincent took off at full speed toward New Nibelheim, running on all fours, bounding along at an incredible speed, his powerful muscles working tirelessly.

Even so, he knew he had a long way to go before he got to the town, and he pushed himself even harder, hoping to shave precious minutes off of the run. Vincent wished that he didn't have to go it alone, but there was no way that even Red XIII would be able to keep up with him in this state.

The Immaculate Swords had underestimated him.

At least, that was the thought he entertained with a sort of grim satisfaction until he ran face-first into an invisible wall of force. It was extremely unpleasant, hitting it at that speed, and he rebounded from it and crashed into the sand on his back, his transformation wavering for a moment.

"And here I was, thinking that my job was neatly wrapped up and done," Selaphiel's voice sighed from behind him. "Who knew you had that kind of speed in you, Vincent – or that you could command Galian's powers at will? According to the report that Uriel made, you seemed either unable or unwilling to unleash the beast when you were fighting him."

"Things have changed," Vincent snarled, throwing himself up onto his feet. "Don't expect me to display the same leniency here." This was not good. He couldn't tell where Selaphiel was or what trick the man had used to conjure that wall of force. He couldn't even see the wall itself – it might be gone by now, or it might have moved closer, farther away, shrank, grown… Clearly, Selaphiel dealt in illusions and invisible forces.

"Leniency?" Selaphiel asked, sounding surprised. "Vincent, please don't insult my intelligence. I am the Fifth Angel; Uriel is the Fourth. Unless you have some complex about only using your full powers when protecting others, you would have transformed into Galian while fighting him if you could have. This leads me to believe that you couldn't at the time, which means that something has changed between then and now. Obviously you've harnessed the beast's power in a way that you weren't able to before. Clearly, you're a much more dangerous opponent now than you were when you were fighting Uriel."

As the man was talking, Vincent was desperately looking around for him, trying to figure out how Red XIII had seen him or detected him. Maybe the beast had just been acting on a hunch, but the placement of the Comet spell had seemed a little too directed for just a shot in the dark. Vincent cursed himself for not taking the ten seconds to ask the beast what his trick had been.

"So, since you were speaking of showing leniency, let me tell you something," Selaphiel continued. "I will not show an ounce of it, Vincent Valentine. I am going to kill you and eliminate you as a threat to Michael's great uplifting of the world. Do you have anything to say before I do that?"

"Yes," Vincent said. "You talk too much."

Selaphiel laughed, and his attack came in a howling blast of sand.