Hi all, thanks for tuning in!

Just want to say the chapter is a day or two later than normal, but not because I haven't been writing but because of quite the opposite, I have started another fic this week called "Children of Shinra"! Super excited for this and I would love for any of you to go take a look at it. I just want to assure my readers here however that this fic is still the strong focus of my attention and will still be getting all of my love and effort :)... Oh and also... 200k words milestone! W00T W00T!

Thanks to my beautiful reviewers Chrono, Yulee and the great Moosh :D

Chrono, I've never played legend of dragoon but I did check it out. I accredit my ignorance of it to the fact I didn't play that much PS1 back in the day. (Which I know is strange considering I'm a FF7 fanatic lolz) Thanks for your comment and I'm glad that Reno came across as I was hoping he would.

Yuleen your review was really awesome, especially your comments on the Zaerith, I really hope to see you here in chapter 38 :D. I also am kind of thrilled you love 'behind the scenes' Sephiroth. You should go check out my Children of Shinra fic, it is exactly that! Though you might probably want to wait until I have a few chapters up first. (If you want to read it at all that is HAHA!)

Turk4Life I don't think I sent you a PM about your latest review! Gosh I feel like a jackass now! Please forgive me and don't stop reviewing! :O My fic lives and breathes on your feedback... lol funny thing is it actually does!

Anyway sorry for the long A/N, its actually late as hell here in England right now so I'm going to flunk out on my lame ass poor joke and just say: I do not own any FF7 material belonging to Square Enix

Enjoy guys!

Chapter 38 Part 1- Consequential separations

"I knew it! I bloody knew it! I'm going to tear that Turk's throat out the next time I see him!"

"Teef calm down"

"NO ZACK! NO I WILL NOT CALM DOWN!"

Zack's mouth snapped shut.

"He's kidnapped her! Doing Gaia knows what to her! I knew it! I knew I shouldn't let her go! I knew!... I knew!... Oh they're probably hurting Jess right now!"

The rapidly pacing martial artist stopped burning holes into the hotel lobby carpet with her heavy combat boots and burst into tears on the spot.

"Hey hey hey, don't cry" Aerith hushed sympathetically, running over and wrapping her arms around the distraught fighter to hug her close. "That's my job remember. Come, you can't think like that, Jessie is just fine."

Tifa's hands holding onto the back of the flowers girls dress tightened, seeming to appreciate and gleam some comfort in Aerith's words.

"Yeah Pinko's totally right Tifa. Don't sweat it, they're date probably just went really really well and she's shacked up at his place as we speak."

Zack sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, Yuffie had started so well, it was the first time he had ever heard the little ninja call Tifa by her real name instead of 'boobs'… then she had to go and say that.

"Shacked up?... with a...a... WE HAVE TO FIND HER NOW! RED! CAN'T YOU SMELL HER OUT OR SOMETHING!?"

Poor Red looked positively petrified with his ears and tail pinned down low and Zack couldn't blame him, hysterical angry woman even scared him and he was far more accustomed to the species.

"Uhhh... I uuuh... I'm sorry I cannot... you see there are too many human smells around and they are all overlapping..."

"THEN WHAT BLOODY GOOD ARE YOU!?" Tifa screeched throwing her arms in the air and storming a few paces away to face the light mahogany wall behind her.

The martial artist was breathing heavily and brushed a tired shaking hand through her hair while everything went silent, all of them watching her speechlessly.

"... I'm sorry Red" Tifa twirled around, tears falling even faster for what she had said. "I didn't mean that, I really really didn't, I'm sorry!"

She dashed over to kneel down and lay her hands and the side of her face against Red's neck in apology.

"It is quite alright. I understand that you have not had sleep that is sufficient for your kind to function well."

This gleamed a small but still sorrowful smile from Tifa.

"Thankyou... I just can't let anything happen to her... not her, not Jessie… this is the worst possible time that Kunsel and Cissnei could have left."

Zack had to nod to that, leaving with nothing more than a note and the key to a potentially planet destroying materia, it baffled him what 'important business' could be so urgent that they would leave like that.

"Well I think their total jerks for leaving! Not even a 'bye Yuff', or 'thanks for all you've done for us Yuff'… which is a lot by the way! Oooooh when they get back I'm gonna give them such a piece'a my mind!"

"I don't think they would leave if they didn't have a good reason to" Aerith interjected anxiously. "Plus it wasn't like either of them knew Jessie had gone missing."

"Have you tried calling them?" Tifa exhaled, rubbing her considerably dimmed eyes and standing up. "We could really use their help right now."

"I have. About four or five times each" Zack groaned, feeling the temples in his head throb from an oncoming headache. "They've both switched their PHS's off. We need to get…"

Zack was cut off when suddenly the large doors to the ghost hotel were thrown open with a crash making Zack flip around and nearly reach for his sword.

"WHAT YA' DAMN WELL MEAN ME GIRL JESS IS GONE!?"

Barret stomped in, covered in dirt and sweat with his heavy traveling pack slung across the opposite arm to the one with the prosthetic gun. He stormed over to them and soon the bag was thrown carelessly to the red carpeted floor.

"Barret!" , "B!"

Yuffie and Tifa called simultaneously, the latter of who ran over to the big man for her third much needed hug.

"They've got her Barret! They've got Jessie!" Tifa mourned while she struggled to even reach her arms halfway around the man's shoulders.

Barret returned the greeting then placed his hand on the martial artists arm to hold her out at arm's length and look at her.

"Who? Who's got Jessie? Tell me exactly wha' 'happened?"

"The Turks. Reno. He kidnapped her! Kidnapped her while they were out on a..."

Tifa paused mid-sentence and Zack swallowed, this was not going to go down well.

"Out on'a wha'?"

Everyone fidgeted uncomfortably as Barret glared about until Yuffie took it upon herself to blurt everything out in one long breath.

"So as it turns out we actually found out about that black materia stuff from the Turkey's and not actually from Dio like boobs told you but you see they would only tell us if bright eye's who has now gone missing with Cissnei told them everything he knew about this giant meteor that was going to crash into the planet and squish us all in seven days" Yuffie sucked in more air. "But not just that the red-head one Reno who is actually kinda cute also said that Jessie had to go on a date with him so she did and that's why boobs lied to you cos' she figured you would probably flip out and now she's gone missing so it makes sense to assume the Turks have kidnapped her and you look really really angry so I'm just gonna go stand over here behind Zack."

The princess scuttled behind him and Zack looked away to stare at the ground and scratch the back of his head when Barret's indeed very angry eyes fixed themselves upon him.

"Ya' knew 'bout this!?"

Zack nodded.

"Ya' agreed ta' ship ma' girl off ta' Shinra?... to tha' fuckin' Turk punk for a piece'a shitty info!?"

Zack winced, he really had messed up big time.

"He said it was just gonna be a date, I used to know Reno... kinda, well more his sister... I didn't think that even he would stoop to such a cheap underhand tactic as this."

The big man looked around in disbelief, "Its'a Turk! Cheap an' underhand is their fuckin' company motto! Christ I'm gone fer two damn minutes an' ya'll lose ya' fuckin' minds."

Put like that Zack couldn't argue with him there.

"Ahh jeez I know... you're right, I screwed up."

"Hey come on, it wasn't anyone's fault" Aerith protested his comment, "we can't start blaming each other, not now, not with everything that is happening. We need to stick together and just focus on finding her."

"I may be able to help you with that."

Zack did a quick one-eighty on the spot in alarm, of all the voices that could have come from the doorway, he was expecting that one the least.

"What's a Turkey doing here!?" Yuffie cried.

Rude stepped one sleek black shoe in through the open entrance and while everyone became suspiciously alert at the appearance of the tall, dark and immaculately suited Turk, it was Tifa who reacted instantly and balled her gloved hand into a tight fist to storm at the intruder.

"Why you lowsy sons of bitches!"

The Turk casually straightened the front of his jacket with leather gloved hands of his own and then rolled out his neck in relaxed ease as the female martial artist approached him angrily.

"Where have you taken her!?"

Tifa didn't wait for a response and threw a heavy punch straight for Rude's shades which the man skilfully caught, turned in one smooth movement and twisted the martial artists arm behind her back. Swinging her boot behind her Tifa kicked out the side of the man's ankle and drop twisted out of his hold, taking care to avoid breaking her own arm. Flipping onto her feet she took in a quick sharp breath, braced herself and turned back in to lay a string of punches at him with only a small hit to the stomach landing against the well trained Turk. It was clear that Tifa was tired, she hadn't slept in over sixty hours and she was emotional, committing to each blow with too much force which Rude was tactfully deflecting but Zack could also see he was not taking full advantage of.

They spared away with AVALANCHE watching on, unsure about how to intervene between two hand to hand fighters and while they were a pretty equal match, Tifa's exhaustion was getting to her and soon her arms were locked up by the Turk and Rude drove his shoulder into her center of gravity. The female fighter was thrown backwards and Tifa landed on her back with a forceful thump making Red growl and Yuffie raise her four-point Shuriken, both ready to attack but Zack put his hand up to stop them from intervening. It was clear the Turk was alone and while he was using real effort to fend Tifa off, he was also passing up every opportunity to attack her back. Something else was going on here.

Zack walked forward and the dark-haired female hopped to her feet again.

"Tell me where she is you bastard! Tell me right now!"

Tifa tried to sprint in to attack again but Zack quickly placed a hand on her shoulder, firmly holding her back and making her turn to him, her dark brown eyes swirling with confusion.

"No more Teef" Zack commented as she looked at him in shock but before she could object he turned his attention over to the Turk, "you don't have her do you?"

Rude barely shook his head but it moved just enough for him to see the man's answer.

"But you know where she is?"

He nodded.

"They're down below. Corel prison. Reno and that girl of yours Jessie."

Tifa growled, clearly mistrusting the statement outright and not liking the young engineers name being used by the assassin.

"Hey! D'ya think we were born yesta'day foo'!? I'll tear ya'..."

"How do you know this?" Zack forcefully interrupted much to Barret's aggravation, feeling his stomach twist with terror at the mention of that god forsaken place.

Rude fixed his shades, something he seemed to do a lot even though they never seemed to come off center, "A Turk can always track another Turk" came the simple unenlightening answer.

"Don't tell me you're believing this!" Tifa looked at him wide-eyed.

"If he's right and she's in the desert prison then this is serious."

"It's serious anyway!"

"No Teef, not like this, a woman in a place like that is something you really don't want to imagine. They'll do things to her that would make the Turks seem… kind."

Aerith gasped behind him and Tifa's mouth opened in wordless horror as she caught his meaning. Zack hadn't wanted to scare the women and truth be told he was terrified himself, but they needed to know the truth.

Red was next to speak, directing his attention to Rude.

"Excuse me, but if we are to trust what you say, you must first explain why it is that you are telling us all this."

Rude didn't respond at first but then pointed to Barret who took a step back in surprise, "You. Someone has a target on your head. The girl is simply a way to force you out."

The Turk folded his arms and scanned over the group until his gaze was looking back in Barret's general direction.

"My interests are for Reno alone and taking the bait is the only way of finding them in time, that means you're coming with me."

"Ta' hell I am!" Barret roared.

"They have no need to keep him alive for long, he has less than a day. So I am afraid you do."

Rude spoke in a threatening 'i'll drag you there if I have to' tone and the leather of the Turks gloves audibly strained as they were stretched into discreet fists but Barret didn't care.

"So wha'cha sayin' is, if I just sit back on me ass, I have'a chance ta' let a Turk die? Well shit that ain't any kinda choice."

Barret lazily threw himself into a nearby lobby chair and folded his arm and gunarm behind his head, smirking mockingly at the Turk to express his obvious hatred for the fraternity.

Rude simply shrugged and walked off towards the door, "Fine. Far worse things will have happened to the girl by then."

The smile was wiped off Barret's face.

"WAIT! Ok wait!" Aerith called and Rude stopped. "What do these men want? What do they want Barret for?"

Those were good questions, but Zack knew the Turk wasn't going to answer them in full. After all, if Rude relinquished everything he knew, what bargaining chip did he have left to force them into saving not just Jessie's life but his partner's life as well?

The Turk turned back to them.

"I caught one of them while they were making their way back down to the prison", Rude's hand disappeared into the side of his black jacket to retrieve a brown cloth which he started to unwrap. "He told me everything I need to know. Then tried to get brave."

He threw the item he had unpackaged to the ground in front of Zack's feet. It was a thin but six inch long switch knife that was still faintly damp with the sticky layer of blood that was coating it.

"I'm done talking about this, him and one other come with me. Now."

"One other!? Listen 'ere foo', we come as a team ya' hear!"

"B he's right" Zack jumped in, "we can't be taking a group this big along, not down there."

Corel prison was not the kind of place where it was a case of 'the more the merrier', most who went there never resurfaced from that cess pit and that meant that with each extra person they took along, the danger of one of them not returning only increased. Plus there was also the fact that there was no way in hell he was letting Tifa, Yuffie or Aerith anywhere near the kind of men that dwelled in the Corel desert prison.

Zack turned to Barret, "just me and you are going."

"HEY! I want to save Jess to ya know! She is MY wing-girl after all" Yuffie cried indignantly.

"She might be hurt and in need of healing, I think I should go" Aerith insisted, visibly upset.

Even Red had an objection to voice. "I could track her, the open area will be much more to my advantage. I do not wish to sit around up here while one of my ally's is in danger."

Zack didn't like doing this but he had to stand his ground on this one, "if you really see me as your leader, then you'll do as I say. Me and Barret only."

Barret nodded to this and the others, while they still looked extremely unhappy about it, they didn't argue about it any further, that is except for Tifa but Zack knew there was no chance he was stopping that one. The fiercely and stubbornly protective women was going to come along whether he said so or not and he knew it.

"You already know how I feel about having you as my leader Zack, but you're not using that card on me."

Tifa grabbed her pack off the floor where it was piled with everyone else's and marched adamantly towards the door to leave, only stopping briefly as she was about to pass Rude. "The three of us are coming. Deal with it Turk."

She took off out the door and Rude looked around then shrugged, the faintest hint of a grin flickering at the corner of his mouth as even he knew there was no way to dissuade one of their most skilled fighters from going.

Zack and Barret looked at each other and shrugged as well then went to get their packs. It seemed nothing was going to stop that mother hen from getting one of her chicks back.

Chapter 38 Part 2- Consequential separations

The first two things that crossed Jessie's mind when she came to, was how painfully sore her throat felt and how stiflingly hot it was, a heat that made the very act of breathing feel like a marathon effort. Beads of sweat poured from her face to hit the dusty and sandy ground her drearily opening eyes were staring down at. Consciousness edging its way in slowly, more pain and discomfort began to show itself, most potently of which were her fiercely burning wrists which she now realized were tied tightly behind her back with rope to some kind of beam or pole, forcing her to remain upright on painfully bruised knees.

It was at this point that the panic would have set in but the overwhelming heat made something as energetic as panicking far too much effort to actually do so she simply groaned.

Jessie looked down at herself groggily, thankful and relieved to see that she still had her red dress on her and it was still intact. Gaia she hoped Reno liked this dress... and those kisses and touches earlier, those were amaz... god what was she thinking! The delirious heat was really starting to get to her, making her head feel light and fuzzy.

Then it hit Jessie like a ton of bricks and sparked a jolting movement in her limbs.

RENO!

Sobering up Jessie looked frantically around at her surroundings, she was in some kind of large dirty metal container that was being poorly illuminated by bright rays of hot sun that pierced through rusted holes in the walls. It was essentially a huge tin can in the middle of a dessert environment, that would explain the heat.

Jessie's breathing was coming in short ragged pants now, it was so so hot! So hot she was positive that if whoever her mysterious were captors didn't let out of here in the next few hours she was sure to die or have some kind of heat stroke. Now panicking wasn't quite the impossible task she had thought it was a moment ago and the eighteen-year old girl's breathing started getting out of control which only made matters worse. Jessie tried to focus on breathing and keeping a level head to calm down and stop herself from burning up, it was then that hear ears picked up that it wasn't just her breathing she could hear that was struggling to regulate and her attention was drawn to the person to the left of her.

It cut Jessie deep and words could not express just how relieved she felt to see it was Reno, but just like her he was tied up a few feet away in the same upright position except he was still out of it. Jessie was also relieved to see his face was only covered in the occasional bruise or cut but nothing too extreme which was incredible considering how viciously they had tried to beat him. While it was surprising it also made her feel sad that he was able to take such a beating so well, just how much did one have to go through in his life to acquire such a skill?

"Reno... Reno wake up" she croaked thirstily, grimacing when using her voice for the first time made her throat sting horrendously.

The gorgeously attractive and soft-skinned male didn't respond and remained slumped forward in his unconscious position, the bangs of his shock red hair hanging damply in front of his face.

"Reno please!... Get up!... Talk to me!" she cried weakly again, this time with more tearful desperation.

He still didn't respond and the teenage engineer started to shake, she was scared.

"Anyone ever tell ya' you got a pretty voice?"

"Reno!" she never felt more relieved to hear another person's voice in her life. "Reno are you hurt!? Talk to..."

"Ya' know baby... for a second back there… it almost sounded like ya' really cared."

Jessie's short breathless panting stopped for a moment and her sweat soaked chest paused in its strenuous rapid movements as his comment made her lungs tighten.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I expect this is tha' part where ya' regrettin' that kiss jus' like the time before and we go back to bein' enemies."

It took great effort but she continued to stare at Reno sidelong and although he talked he still hadn't opened his eyes.

"Reno... look at me."

"Nah it's cool yo, I get it, I'mma good for nothin' Turk scum that you'd rather..."

"Baby look at me."

Now it was Reno's turn to stop heaving for air and this time he did open his eyes, vivid sea green meeting with light hazelnut brown.

"I do care... and I… I don't regret it. I don't regret the kiss and I don't regret any of those moments or the date we went on."

Even Jessie's head was buzzing with the revelation that what she was saying was genuine and true.

"I… don't regret the way you make me feel."

He continued to hold her gaze for a length of time, taking in every word she spoke and drawing her in with such an indescribable stare that Jessie wished now more than ever she wasn't bound to this post.

"That's all I needed to know yo."

Suddenly Reno started shifting and tugging at the bonds holding his arms captive behind his back.

"What are you doing?"

"Gettin' us..." he strained with effort, "…the fuck outta here."

"I don't think we can… gosh it's so hot."

Her defender continued thrashing and twisting to no avail.

"Stop, you're going to burn up if you carry on" Jessie heaved tiredly just watching him.

He gave it five more minutes of intense effort then relinquished breathlessly making her spirit sink.

"Reno... I'm sorry... the only reason you're here is because of me."

"What… you… talkin'… 'bout?"

"Like those guys said, it's me they want, it's me they're after. You didn't need to end up here at all, you could have left me but you didn't" she strained her neck around to look at him again. "Thankyou… I'd be so scared if you wasn't here."

"Hey cut the give up talk doll, nothin's gonna happen to ya' ok? These jackasses are all mouth an' no action. Trust me."

Jessie knew he was bluffing to try and give her false comfort but she nodded anyway and decided to pull herself together and tug at her own bonds to test the strength of them out.

"Besides, I've been in thousands'a tighter situations than this, this is a walk in the park."

"Now… is not the time to joke" she clenched through grit teeth, the skin on her wrists feeling red raw.

"I wasn't " he replied evenly.

Suddenly there was a loud clang of metal on the front of the container that unnerved her and made the profusely sweating girl flinch and cease her attempts at escaping her bonds. Shortly after the door to the container was pulled open, spilling a wall of scorching bright light into the make-shift prison that blinded her and Reno painfully. When the door was closed again Jessie blinked numerous times, seeing dizzying stars but then her vision focused to see that a man had entered into the dirty rust weathered room with them.

"Looks like this so called 'boss' of theirs has finally showed up. Get ready for the little bitches tough guy act" Reno called out mockingly.

Jessie's face zoned out in shock at the sight of the medium height, strongly built man with lifeless steely eyes, cast a tired unamused glance at Reno as he limped over towards a pile of rubbish that was stacked in the far corner. The stunned and slightly heat delirious engineer blinked multiple times again to see if she was seeing this right or whether the man was just holding a gun in a strange way she wasn't quite seeing right. No, she was definitely seeing this right, this man had a gun for an arm! A gun where his arm should be! He had a gunarm! Exactly like Barret's except this guy had attached a longer assault rifle to his as opposed to the thick heavy machine gun her AVALANCHE father used.

"Where did you get that!?"

The man paid her no notice and grabbed a crate from the pile of junk with his real hand then limped back over slowly with a haunted look about him that made him seem more like a ghost than a man. He set the box down a way away in front of them and sat down, resting his weapon against the end of his knee while Jessie wracked her brain for the name of the doctor Barret had said had created his prosthetic.

"Shalua Rui! Did she give that to you!?"

The weathered and worn shell of a man flicked his bored glance in her direction and then his gun making Jessie press her back up against the pole behind her in fear.

"Hey! You wanna point that thing anywhere slick you point it over here ya' hear! I'm the one who's gonna be killin' you and ya' pals before dinner tonight, not her!"

The gun pivoted on the man's knee and switched targets to the Turk and a loud bang went off.

"RENO!"

Reno didn't make any noise as he looked down at the ground and bit back the pain with bared teeth as a bullet sunk itself into his left shoulder. Then sucking in a slow hissing intake of air the red-haired male looked up and smirked.

"Come on you dick head, been shot there twice already, at least hit me somewhere original."

The gun pivoted again.

"NO DON'T! STOP! RENO STOP TALKING! JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT!?" Jessie pleaded in fright.

"What I want" The gunarm turned to her and fired a shot so close to her face she could feel the wind as it splintered into the wood behind her making Jessie yelp in terror. "Is to watch you die. And him die. To watch everyone in this prison and in that golden saucer die. To watch entire towns and cities of people die. But most of all… most of all I want to watch Barret Wallace die."

"And I want to watch you die but you don't see me fuckin' crying 'bout it!" Reno spat, his shoulder bleeding heavily.

"Wait... Barret?... Why do you want to watch Barret die!? Who are you!?"

The man used his real hand to take something out of his pocket which Jessie soon recognized was her own PHS, he flicked around with it for a bit and then turned to show her that it was dialing Barret's new number since his old one had been lost to the Midgar Zolom. Putting it on loud speaker he tossed the phone down to Jessie's knees.

"Tell him you're in Corel prison and he has one hour to get here before I start using what he gave me to better use", the man held up his gunarm. "Tell him Dyne called. Tell him I said that one of us are going to be visiting our wives today."

Chapter 38 Part 3- Consequential separations

Diving through the warm grass kissed by the hot midday sun, she dodged the horn attack of an adult Bagnadrana that charged at her with the deadly curved spike. Rolling straight up onto her haunches she assessed her targets next move from her crouched position then sprung high into the air and twisted herself around the spew of poison breath it sent her way while launching Rekka at the height of her jump towards the giant six legged reptilian creature. The spinning blades sang through the air and cut deep along the Bagnadrana's front chest plate causing the beast to screech wildly in its usual deep hissing and venomous tone. Landing effortlessly on her feet Cissnei charged in, with Rekka returning to her outstretched hand mid sprint to slash away at the monster in dangerously close quarters to try and make the fight more challenging for herself. Claws, fangs and spikes lunged for her but the attacks were so annoyingly slow from the bleeding creature that she could have dodged them blindfolded. It infuriated her and with one simple swing she caught the creatures throat on the first attack and a torrent of blood shot out, barely missing her and causing the monster to keel over and join its four other fallen comrades.

Cissnei bared her teeth as it fell lifelessly at her feet while pushing a lock of hot hair from the side of her face and breathing heavily but not nearly as heavily as she would have liked. Looking down at her fallen prey she was fuming, an anger that escalated inside of her until Cissnei saw red. Raising Rekka above her head she hacked down at its corpse angrily, imbedding the blade into the monsters turquoise hide as hard as she could but it wasn't enough so she did it again… and again and again and again. Cissnei slashed away over and over in fury and frustration at the inanimate corpse, angry that it had fallen so easily and that the feeling she was trying to run away from was beginning to return again.

It was the feeling of guilt... of pain, of hurt. It was the feeling of shame that she had spent the best part of half a day either crying or desperately searching for bloodthirsty fights with vicious monsters to take her mind off of him. Off of that handsome SOLDIER with gorgeous glowing multi-colored eyes who she had become so deeply infatuated with that everything she had done or felt before him now seemed meaningless and empty.

It was the feeling of her heart-breaking that she had upped and left Kunsel in the dark early hours of this morning after watching him sleep and whispering her goodbye onto deaf ears. It was the feeling of self-loathing that she had left him and all her friends at a time of crisis when they had just learned about meteor and the black materia and needed to figure out how to stop Sephiroth, Genesis and Jenova from trying to destroy the planet. Cissnei wanted to tell herself that they would manage fine without her and that where she was going she would be of more use to them and find more answers, but despite that she still couldn't shake this crushing feeling of grief from her heart.

So many times she had been tempted to go back already, so many times she had reached for her switched off PHS and thought about ringing him but whenever that temptation came or the tears started to form in her aching amber eyes, she scouted out another fight or wandered purposefully into another den of wild monsters. She couldn't go back, not after what Hojo had told her, not after everything her now dead family had gone through for this. No, something like this simply couldn't wait.

Buried in her thoughts and turmoil she continued hacking away at the dead Bagnadrana until only a DNA test would be capable of verifying that that was in fact what the creature had once been. The brutal act made her rivering eyes flow with tears even faster, which in turn made her hack away faster but by this point she was on her knees and cutting chunks out of nothing more than blood soaked earth and soil in a frenzy.

"I think it's dead now Rekka."

Hearing that voice Cissnei flew back onto her rear so hard that her weapon went flying out of her hand into the air to land out in the tall grass behind her.

"KUNSEL!?"

She couldn't believe what she was seeing, she could not believe it was him but there he really was, standing in the open field with his traveling pack on his back, his Claymore at his hip and the north Corel mountains she had passed through on the backdrop behind him. Glued firmly to the ground on her backside staring up at him, Cissnei was inhaling and exhaling deeply from her flip out on the Bagnadrana, wondering if she had worked herself up into such a hysteria that she was now hallucinating the SOLDIER into existence.

With his head tilted to the side, Kunsel observed her back wordlessly with a compassionate expression that made Cissnei want to hide, knowing she must look a right state with puffy red eyes and hands that were covered up to the elbows in blood, but she couldn't bring herself to take her shocked eyes off of his. He slung his pack off his shoulder to the floor then rummaged around inside of it and took out a water bottle. Then he looked at her again and as he high stepped through the longish grass towards her, she didn't know what he was going to do but the female Turk's emotions started dancing around turbulently. Seeing him here she wanted to cry again, she wanted to laugh and scream angrily at him for following her, she wanted to get up off the floor and demand to know what he was doing here and order him to leave and yet at the same time she wanted to kiss him and say she was sorry, sorry for leaving him and tell him how incredibly relieved she felt to see him again.

Most of all the emotions Cissnei felt however, the shame she had for herself was the strongest of them all. She felt embarrassed for her actions, not just for her outburst on the Bagnadrana but for the way she had left and now she couldn't look at him anymore and had to turn her eyes away to look down at the ground beside her. She had made him a promise, a promise she would never leave again that she had purposely and intentionally broken. He had every right to be mad at her for that.

"I'm sorry Kunsel... I'm so sorry... I just want you to believe me that leaving like that was the hardest thing I've ever had to do... and breaking that..." her voice was cracking up terribly. "... and breaking that promise I made you... it really hurt me to do that."

Cissnei pinched her eyes shut and sobbed as Kunsel's shadow washed over her but she opened them again when he knelt down in front of her to take her blood covered hands in his, a deed which made her brain fade down to a slow motion trot and her heart sped up to a fast gallop.

"Remember what I said about apologies."

He undid the cap of his bottle and tenderly turning her hands he started pouring water over them, gently washing the blood away from halfway up her arms and working all the way down to the tips of her fingers. The Turk melted from the action, whoever said diamonds were the way to a woman's heart were wrong because it was this right here, nothing could compare to this. She watched his affection closely and as he cleaned the guilt off of her hands she could physically feel herself falling further in love with the man and she was tempted to go hunt another Bagnadrana just so he didn't have to stop. It felt like the best message ever, having his fingers and thumb rolling and rubbing over and between hers as luke-warm water ran over both their hands, water that would be unpleasant for drinking but right now was feeling like heaven.

The last trace of blood was cleaned away and she lifted her fuzzy water-logged vision to his face, unable to understand why he looked at her with no trace of hate or even disappointment. Why wasn't he angry at her? Why was he still looking at her that way? What had she ever done in her sinful life to deserve affection this pure and unconditional?

Kunsel let go of her palms and lifted both of his warm damp hands to place them to her cheeks as they remained knelt down in front of one another, brushing his thumbs across her face in such a delicate way it made her eyelashes flutter.

"Do I have blood on my face?" she shuddered pleasantly.

Kunsel shook his head lightly and smiled, "No."

That made her shuddering worse... or better, she wasn't sure. Gaia she just needed to...

"JOS KISS HIM ALREADY LAS! I cannay take it anymoor!"

Cissnei and Kunsel's expressions dropped and they turned simultaneously to see Cait Sith poking out of the top of Kunsel's bag, his little hand clutched emotionally to his chest while he sniffed and wiped at his eye with the other. It well and truly killed the moment.

"Damn it Cait!" Kunsel cursed and threw the nearly empty bottle of water which hit the cat and sent him tumbling out of the pack with an 'ooph'.

"You brought the cat along?" Cissnei raised her brow a few inches from his and the SOLDIER shrugged sheepishly.

"What can I say, I liked Cait Sith."

"Cheers lad!" the feline machine called out from wherever it was he was sprawled unmoving in the grass.

"I said liked! LIKED!" Kunsel barked back, bitter for the interruption.

"Kunsel what are you doing here?"

He sighed and took her hands again, guiding Cissnei to her feet as they stood up.

"Look Ciss, you may have things that you're not ready to tell me or things you're not ready to share with me yet and that's fine. You may not want to tell me where it is you feel you have to go or what exactly this is you're running away to do. But whatever it is, I'm going with you, I'm going to be there for you whether you need my help or not. You saved my life once remember, now you have to give me the chance to save yours."

"But what about the others? They need you. They need your help to stop Sephiroth from getting the black materia."

"They'll cope for now, I've given them the runestone and told them everything they need to know. Plus I'd be no good to them if I stayed anyway, not all the while that I was thinking about you."

Cissnei could hardly breathe, even if she searched Gaia a thousand times over, could she possibly find a sweeter guy than this one? How could someone like him be interested in a person like her?

"But I... I... I don't even know if I'll even find what I'm looking for! It's still possible that Hojo might have been lying to me in that cellar and I'm wasting my time chasing shadows."

"Well then, there's only one way to find out" Kunsel affirmed and went over to retrieve his discarded bag.

"Don't you even want to know what it is or where I'm going?" Cissnei asked as Cait Sith hopped onto the SOLDIER's pack and together the pair marched on passed her.

"Nope. You'll tell me if and when you're ready."

Cissnei shook her head in disbelief, this man was willing to follow her halfway across the world blindly without even asking why or where they were going and it seemed that nothing she said or did was going to stop him. Left with no other choice Cissnei picked her own pack off the ground, moved to catch up to them and although she still had her doubts and reservations, she couldn't deny the feeling of joy and relief that was growing inside of her that Kunsel was coming along with her.

"Well just make sure your PHS is switched off" Cissnei remarked, trying to regain some of her usual composure. "You know Jessie, she'll track us down quicker than Red on a scent trail."

"Already one step ahead of you" Kunsel chirped, holding up his blank PHS as Cait Sith swiveled around to face her from where he was sat on top of the SOLDIER's pack.

"Ey Cissylas."

"... yes Cait?"

"Dannay s'pose it would make'a difference if I asked yer where we're goin'?"