CHAPTER 27:

MONSTER VERSUS MONSTER

"Dammit, Jenova, where were you five minutes ago?" Cid demanded.

"Re-embodying myself. Believe it or not, spending extended periods of time as dissociated clouds of my cells is rather taxing," Jenova said. "After all, the urge to dissolve and spread my Lifestream across the world is very strong. Plus, if I made an appearance too soon, Scar-Face there would have used her new Summon on me." She rose from the chair, and walked casually around from behind the desk.

Scarlet's face twisted into fury. "You…"

With a blur, Jenova was on her, gripping her neck by one hand. "Yes?" she asked, hoisting her into the air. "I…what?" With her other, she gripped Scarlet's braceleted wrist, and squeezed. "What is that?" Jenova hissed. "What's the matter, cat got your tongue?" With a contemptuous sneer, Jenova tossed Scarlet to the side, leaving her to gasp on the ground. "I thought so. Go back to your room to cry, little girl. You're not worth my time, and I have one of my own children to discipline."

They realised that Hojo, in his new armoured form, was watching from the top of the stairs, his bladed arms coated liberally with blood. "Ah, so the disobedient specimen has come back."

"Indeed I have. I did make you a promise, Hojo," Jenova said. The armoured plating began crawling up her body. "I told you, back at the Crater, that you dismembered me, and I would return the favour in time." Her head was then covered by the same featureless helm that Hojo's was now. "The time is now."

"You can try," Hojo sneered, before launching himself forward.

The two monsters clashed in the boardroom, their bladed arms sparking as they hit each other. Jenova turned her 'helmet' to the others. "Get out of here! NOW! I'll deal with this errant brat!"

As the others fled, Scarlet scurrying after them, Hojo snarled as he tried to land blow after blow on Jenova, "Brat? BRAT?! You are old and weak, Jenova! If you're so powerful, why can't you control me?!"

Jenova, admittedly, had been trying. But either Hojo's will was too strong, or it was being supplemented by the will of another. And she could guess who. "Because our son is helping you."

"That's right!" Hojo said, breaking away from her. "The man he holds in the most contempt, his own father! What delicious irony!"

Jenova chuckled. "You want to know something? He's known for a long time. He knew that you were his father. Even before Nibelheim. THAT'S why he showed you contempt."

"…You're lying," Hojo snarled.

"I am Jenova. I know memories. And I know Sephiroth's. He's known for a long time. And he treated you with the contempt you deserve," Jenova sneered. "You're not a god, a monster, or even a good excuse for a man. You're a joke."

Suddenly, Sephiroth's voice seemed to emanate from Jenova, oozing with contempt and scorn. "An inexperienced man assigned to take over the work of a great scientist. He was a walking mass of complexes!" Then, Jenova spoke normally. "That was how he described you at Nibelheim five years ago. And he was restraining himself admirably. Time has only worsened his opinion of you. He is repulsed by the fact he shares genes with you, and probably only considers you marginally useful. And he treated me with only marginally less contempt. Me, who was once a goddess."

Hojo snorted scornfully. "Hyperbole!"

"No. Don't you remember what Lucrezia said about Omega Weapon and Chaos?" Noticing Hojo's unholy interest, Jenova nodded. "That's right. I didn't come here from the stars as invader and destroyer, but as a coloniser, a saviour of my own Planet. Time and isolation drove me to become the monster I was. But luck and circumstance showed me my true past. I may still be a monster. But I now know that I am more than just that. I was once a guardian of my own people. I may have failed them…but maybe I can be a guardian again!" She lunged forward, and battle was joined once more…

Scarlet ran after the others, clambering down the stairwell, hoping that neither of the Jenova creatures would follow her. Over the past few days, it had been humiliation after humiliation, with AVALANCHE and the traitors walking all over her. But SHE was the head of Shinra! SHE was the ruler of the world!

With that in mind, once she was able to, she dived into a lift and pressed the button for her department, Weapons R&D, which took up five whole floors of the Shinra HQ. She had something in mind for those monsters, and for AVALANCHE! She might not be able to use Knights of the Round for a while, at least until she used an Ether, but there was something else she could use. They saw her go in, but they clearly decided that escape was a better option.

Let them run. Once she was back in control, there was no place to hide.

As she stormed in, she saw all of the technicians staring at her. She hoped, for their sake, it was because of her sudden entrance, and not because of the scars on her face. She strode imperiously to one sector of the vast complex. "Ready the Proud-Clad!(1)" she snarled at the technicians.

The technicians knew better than to disobey her, especially as the machine was pretty much ready already. So they scurried about, beginning the final stages of activating the Proud-Clad.

It was beautiful, one of the few collaborations between her and Heidegger, and for once, he was sensible. It could be piloted by either one or two pilots, and while two was optimal, she could pilot the damn thing herself. She knew its systems as intimately as a lover. Hell, it may as well have been a lover. She knew it would never betray her. Betrayal had figured in her childhood too many times.

She thought of all those toys that should have been hers, all of those loser boys, all of them as poor as she used to be. All of those adults looking down at her.

She clawed her way to the top using her intelligence and her cunning and her utter ruthlessness. Morals, after all, were for people who didn't want to get to the top.

This was the hour she would draw the line at. No longer would she be humiliated and looked down upon. She would stand astride the world in her crimson chariot, and make it bow.

She strode into a nearby changing cubicle and stripped off her dress, pulling on the rather figure-hugging pilot suit. Scarlet, like her name, like her dress. And like the blood of her enemies as it spreads across the ground.

Zipping the pilot suit up and clipping the neural interface into her hair, she strode out of the cubicle and glared at the technicians. "Call security at the lobby. They are to keep an eye out for Cid Highwind, the technician Shera, and two Ancients by the names of Harry Potter and Aerith Gainsborough. The two Ancients are to be taken alive at all costs. Cid and Shera are expendable, but if they can be captured alive, do so. Am I understood?"

The technicians all nodded. She felt better already. At least some people understood the meaning of the world 'obedience'. She clambered up the stairs, panting a little. But she could deal with some exercise, unlike Heidegger or Palmer. Or that fat idiot President Shinra.

She made it to the cockpit, and as eagerly as a girl waiting to play with her new toy, she all but leapt into it. She smiled as the familiar cockpit made her feel like she should. In control. She had developed it with Heidegger after that whole mess with Zirconiade and Jade Weapon years ago. While Jade Weapon was no longer a problem, she refused to shelve the project, and President Shinra let her continue.

Although it could be designed to be controlled by regular controls, Scarlet, for single-pilot usage, designed a neural interface similar to the Synaptic Net Dive equipment. But it could be used by anyone, and not just those trained by Deepground. It meant she could control the Proud-Clad as if it were her own body…if her body had four arms and weapons mounted everywhere.

She heard the whine of the generator of the Proud-Clad whirring up. The cockpit sealed itself shut. After strapping herself in, she reached forward and tapped the button marked 'NEURAL INTERFACE'. Then, she sat back, and cleared her mind as best as she could.

Suddenly, her mind felt like it was yanked out of her body, expanding, swelling. And when she opened her eyes again, she knew that it had worked. Now, she felt as she knew she should. As a god.

Jenova and Hojo's fight went outside, fighting around the heliport, their blades flashing and clashing, sparks flying. While Hojo was swifter and stronger, Jenova clearly had the edge in terms of technique and ease with her battle form. And Hojo, who was only new to his battle form, was tiring, whereas Jenova was more used to fighting like this.

Hojo was sent flying, skidding along the heliport, his helm-like head cracked and oozing a vile liquid. "No…why…?" he wailed.

"Why are you losing, or why am I doing this? I told you why I am doing this." Jenova changed back into her 'human' form, blue skin and silvery skin. "You dismembered me. You struggled to understand me, when I didn't even understand myself. As for why you are losing, I can answer that question quite easily." Jenova looked down at something she held in her hand. "But I don't think you'd believe me, so it'd be a waste of my time and yours."

She made a gesture, and Hojo rose into the air, and then stopped directly above her her, his bladed arms spreadeagled by her will. "In any case, now that I've beaten the resistance out of you, I can take control of your body." She gestured, and suddenly, one of the bladed arms snapped off, eliciting a howl from Hojo. "Sephiroth isn't helping you stay alive now," she sneered, before another limb ripped out messily. "It's no wonder, really. But I know he's listening. Remember this, Sephiroth. I'm coming for you next. You think yourself a messiah. You're just a naughty boy(2)."

"You…how can you have this much power?" Hojo said. "You're just a biological specimen, you're not a goddess, no matter what…"

"Bored now." With those two words, said in a lilting tone, Hojo was ripped in two(3). His innards and blood fell right onto Jenova, who bathed in the gore with an almost beatific expression on her face. She reached out with her mind, purging Hojo and Sephiroth's influence from the Jenova cells that had made up Hojo's body as she absorbed them. She still absorbed his memories as she did so.

She smirked, even as she inwardly grimaced at the rotten taste of his thoughts. He had been planning to use the Sister Ray all along, to try and send Sephiroth more Mako, but in the process, overloading the Mako Reactors around Midgar, and potentially destroying the city. But first, the Sister Ray had to get up and running. And when he got word of his specimens escaping, Hojo, who had a ridiculous sense of entitlement, intended to capture them for himself.

Hojo seemed to have a weird worship thing of Sephiroth now, claiming that science was powerless before Sephiroth's god-like power in his own mind. Jenova sniffed. Hojo had forgotten the first principle of a scientist: that everything has an explanation, even the seemingly inexplicable. Even magic could be explained, if studied enough. Jenova believed that, even being effectively the goddess of another world, even if there was no readily available explanation for how she came into being.

She felt the Jenova cells, now purged of Hojo and Sephiroth's dark influence, fill her with even greater strength. And probably just as well. She could sense something coming this way.

Almost silently, something rose over the parapet of the roof, born aloft by special Materia. It was at least four storeys tall, blood red in colour. It was the shape of a man, but with four clawed arms, and weapons everywhere, including a large rail cannon on the back. Both sets of arms were folded, arrogantly.

Jenova watched as the thing hovered over to the heliport, and landed gently, even gracefully. She clapped, with only a small tinge of sarcasm. It was actually quite an impressive feat to make something so large fly and land like that.

External speakers burst into life on the thing. "You may very well applaud, bitch. It won't stop you from dying."

"Scarlet," Jenova said with a sigh. "Seriously, don't you know? I'm hard to kill."

"I noticed. You're like a cockroach who refuses to submit to the heel of a boot. Where's Hojo?"

"I ate him." Jenova grimaced. "I wouldn't recommend him as a dish. Rank and rotten to the core. Nearly gave me indigestion. I'm sure that when I do the same to Sephiroth, it'll be more appetising."

Scarlet's scoff sounded like a small explosion over the external speakers of her mecha. "But there won't BE a time when you do the same to Sephiroth. Shinra Inc will be the ones to save the world! You, however, will be reduced to a footnote at best. Destroyed by the might of the anti-Weapon mobile artillery, the Proud-Clad!"

"Really?" Jenova smiled, showing the blood-red Summon Materia clasped in her hand. The Knights of the Round, ready to be used. "I took it off you when I had you by the throat. Let's see how your weapon stands up to…"

She didn't get to finish her sentence. A hail of gunfire annihilated her hand, sending the Summon Materia over the parapet. With a thought and a mild grimace, she regrew her hand. "That was very rude, you know! You were supposed to let me finish!" And with that, she leapt off the edge of the building, black, raven-like wings spreading from her back.

Scarlet hesitated only briefly, astonished at Jenova showing yet another ability. Then again, her offspring in the Jenova project, save, to date, for Sephiroth, had shown the ability to sprout at least one wing. Engaging the Proud-Clad's own flight mechanism, she followed, driving the Proud-Clad over the edge…

CHAPTER 27 ANNOTATIONS:

Whoa. Jenova versus Hojo, and now, it's time for Jenova versus Scarlet in the Proud-Clad. Hopefully, these will be some pretty awesome chapters. And Scarlet shows enough savvy to shoot the Knights of the Round Materia out of Jenova's hand. She's making a comeback. If you think Hojo dying so early is a bit anticlimactic, deal with it. The guy's a dingus, he deserves it.

Jenova also reveals her growing heroism. She's still a brutal and sadistic person, but she's now found a better raison d'etre than 'infect and control' everything.

For those of you wondering about Cloud and the others, the next chapter is called The Cavalry Arrives. Harry will also be more of a focus in the next chapter, I hope.

1. One issue I decided to change was the name of the Proud Clod. Who was the 'genius' (I use the term very loosely) who thought that name was a remotely appropriate translation? There's an enemy in Final Fantasy XIII called the Proudclad, so I decided to use a variation of that as the correct name. I thought Clad worked well because it's basically a mecha, clad in armour.

2. Couldn't resist a reference to Life of Brian. :P

3. I love Alyson Hunnigan's delivery of this line as Dark Willow in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so I decided to have Jenova deliver it in a similar way before killing Hojo in an equally brutal manner to how DW kills Warren. I'm not a fan of the series, BTW, but I noted its influence on pop-culture, and look up references.

CHAPTER 27 SOUNDTRACK:

Jenova Versus Hojo: J-E-N-O-V-A, from Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, composed by Nobuo Uematsu and the Black Mages.

Behold, The Proud-Clad!: The First Malformation of G, from Resident Evil 2, composed by Masami Ueda et al. Given the four arms Proud-Clad has, and the red colour, it reminded me a little of Birkin's mutated form.