A/N: Sorry, the first part of this HAS to happen—it's already waited a bit long to be addressed. The other issue in need of addressing will be in a couple more chapters, but not much longer in in-story time.

Essence Flaw

Reno was sitting tiredly at one of the tables near the edge of the clearing, eyes closed and head tipped skyward, where the sun was high overhead—everyone had just eaten lunch. There were dark circles under his eyes, showing how tired he was, but he had no reaction to Eden sitting beside him with a sigh. The blond only knew the older Turk was aware of him because Reno asked, "Whaddaya want, Eden?"

After a moment, Eden asked, "How are you doing? You were closer to Judet—and the others—than I was...I don't think you've really had time to mourn, have you?"

With a sigh, Reno leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees and drop his head into his hands. "I'd thought it was bad just after the monsters..." There was a pause, then Reno went on, "When Alvis 'n' Maur both died. But back then, Tseng was the one who had ta carry the burden. This time, I gotta do it, an'...now I know why I just—knew I had ta go back ta help him later that day. It's hard when ya know the one who died, yo...But it's way harder when you gotta keep it all together all the time 'cause everyone's countin' on you ta make sure they're okay..."

"...Do you have someone who can take over for you?" Eden asked quietly. "Even just for a few hours?"

"Nope," the red haired man sighed heavily. "That...woulda been Alvis, or even Judet, but..."

"...You're the last commander of the Turks who can take over while Tseng is unconscious," the blond finished the sentence. When Reno gave a small nod into his hands, Eden shocked him—and himself—by reaching out to hug the older man. Despite how surprised he was by the action, Eden also realized he had a very strong feeling it was needed. "Have you even cried for her yet? If not, you should."

"But everyone—" Reno began, starting to pull away. Eden's grip tightened, and while Reno 'could' have broken it, some part of him was grateful that someone cared enough to offer him support.

"Reno," Eden cut him off quietly. "You're human. You need to let out those feelings. I don't cry easily—actually, ending up on Gaia and having my whole world view re-written has gotten me to cry more than I would have ever thought to before. You know about my childhood, right?" Reno relaxed against him and nodded into his shoulder, so he went on, "I know how it feels to be left responsible for someone else. I also know it put me in a very bad headspace because I really felt I had no one I could turn to who would understand what I was going through. Reno, no one will fault you for letting out your feelings—we've all lost people we care about, and that's without even having the full death toll from when the President blew up the Planet."

"He's right," Rude agreed softly as he joined them and sat to Reno's other side, resting a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "We won't fault you."

It seemed that, with both Eden and Rude—the rather odd 'father and son' pair—giving him the same encouragement, Reno was able to let the dam break to cry softly on Eden's shoulder for nearly an hour. He'd known Judet for longer than he'd known Alvis; he had been as close to her as he had been to Alvis, just in a different way. The chaos of rebuilding Midgar had left him little time to mourn Alvis and Maur, and their deaths hadn't really been very long ago in active memory. While 'time' in stasis had put some distance between him and Alvis' and Maur's deaths, Judet's had been made a harder blow by his unfinished mourning for the two men, and to add to that the other deaths in the Turks and the students who had fought alongside them...

As Rude and Eden sat with Reno, the other Turks gradually began gathering around them, not saying anything, just being there. That included the Turks from other offices and the wanderers, all ones Eden barely knew anything about, and many of the students the Turks had been watching out for during the battle. All of them seemed to know, to realize, what was happening.

Finally, the student Judet had saved (still with minor injuries, as the Cetra had been tired by that point) joined them, kneeling in front of Reno as he rested a hand on the Turk's shoulder. Reno, tear-streaked and miserable, tilted his head enough to look at the fifteen-year-old—and saw tears in his eyes.

"I'm the one she saved," the fifteen-year-old said softly, voice breaking with pain.

There was a pause, then Reno sat up enough to reach out and pull the student into a tight hug. Both wept on one another's shoulders, and while Reno was no longer crying on Eden's shoulder, the blond Turk didn't move away. With the student's inclusion in the group, the rest began to close ranks around them, many leaning on one another for support as well.

FoW

Everyone from Gaia gave the gathering of Turks—and future Turks—a wide berth, prompting Yuna to ask Genesis, "What are they doing that everyone is avoiding them?"

Genesis was quiet for a moment before he said, "Turks are family to one another. They aren't just friends...Often, they also don't have any family outside the Turks. When a Turk dies, it's a heavy blow for them all, and they mourn quietly, but with a frightening intensity. You're seeing them gather protectively around the ones worst hurt by the deaths of the Turks—and the potential Turks—they just lost."

After a pause, Yuna asked, "Do they need someone to help guide them to send the dead on?"

"No," Genesis answered, giving her a faintly amused, tiny smile. "They aren't trying to wish the dead back to life, to create a beckoned. They're releasing them fully. That's probably part of the reason for the intensity, so they can let them go."

The woman gazed at the group thoughtfully for a long moment before asking, "Then why the avoidance?"

A voice behind her caused her to start as she turned to face Reeve, who said in a soft tone, "Mourning is practically sacred to the Turks, because blessed few outside their number would ever mourn them. President Shinra and most of his executives felt nothing for them beyond that they were useful and dangerous tools—"

"People," Yuna immediately cut in with her correction.

Reeve met her gaze with a surprising depth of sorrow as he said, "To me, and to you, yes. To their former employers, they were tools, not people. And they were treated exactly like tools—to be used until they broke, then tossed in the trash so they could go find another tool to do the same thing to. I felt their losses, and possibly Rufus did as well, but I can't say anyone else in Shinra Company, besides some of the SOLDIERs and Infantry they'd gotten familiar with, ever mourned a Turk."

The woman's eyes widened and she said quietly, "That's horrible..."

"Yes," Reeve agreed. "And it's exactly for that reason that Turks don't take kindly to 'outsiders' interrupting their few sacred events—bringing in new Turks, sending them on, choosing a new Director or Second. Sometimes there are missions which can count in the number of sacred events, but this—even Genesis, who is friendly with several of the Turks, can't safely approach them to offer condolences right now. Until that circle breaks, you're risking your life by getting too close to them. That's what their virtual isolation did to them."

Yuna turned back to look at them sadly as she realized what kind of people the Turks were. For the fact that there were so many of them, normally it would have frightened her to realize one single 'Summoner' had so many absolutely loyal 'Guardians', but there was no question in her mind that everything they were was on the level of what she'd had with her Guardians. Maybe the Summoner and Guardians didn't begin as people so close, but it was rare for the Summoner and Guardians to not have formed such a deep bond by the end of their journey. For so many to have been forced into such a tight bond was painful, frightening, and heart-warming, all at once.

Finally, she turned back to Reeve and asked, "Do the Turks..." She paused mid-question, breaking off to ask instead, "Are they actually dangerous to society?"

Genesis had to snort at the question as Reeve gave her a faintly amused look, but he said, "In terms of what they're capable of, the number we've got here could destroy the world if they so chose to." Yuna's eyes widened in alarm, but he gave his head a shake and went on, "By what they've been doing since Eden came into all our lives, they're firmly on the side of doing whatever it takes to save both the planet and the people on it. I know—I've been working with them towards that end. The President was the one failing point in the situation. But you also need to realize that the Turks are loyal to one another before anything or anyone else. If you don't want to earn their ire, don't go out of your way to threaten or harm one of them."

"What of the students?" Yuna asked tentatively.

"About half of the students who'd been trying for the Turks—of the ones who are still alive—are standing with them now," Genesis said. "So those ones are going to become Turks in short order. The ones who aren't there with them won't be allowed to join the Turks after refusing to pay their respects, assuming those ones still have some desire to be Turks. I think they didn't join the group because they realized being a Turk wasn't all it was cracked up to be when they were looking at the 'fun' parts of the job. They may have the skills, but they now realize they don't have the will. And we'd better hold off on any more meetings until they've—calmed down."

"Shouldn't they have done that last night?" a woman's voice asked from behind Reeve, and the other three turned to face Hana and Karru, the younger attached to the older's arm again. It was Hana who had asked the question.

Reeve and Genesis traded looks, but as they were about to answer, an annoyed voice said from behind the younger girls, "Some of them began mourning last night, for the ones who had enough energy after the search-and-rescue operation. However, one of them most definitely did not, because he's been shoved into the role of Director while Tseng is down for the count. This—it's Reno finally going through the process. Now, if you don't mind, I haven't had any time to mourn, either, and Judet was a good woman, one I knew personally, so I'm going to join them." They all stared in surprise as Rufus marched past them and right to the Turks.

Everyone waited with baited breath as they felt sure the Turks would lash out at him—but instead, to everyone's amazement, the circle parted just enough to let him in, and he quickly disappeared into the circle as it closed again behind him.

"Did that really just happen?" Genesis asked in pouting bemusement.

Reeve suddenly gave a small chuckle. "Rufus is a Turk."

"What?" the red haired man asked with a small frown, turning a sharp gaze on the older man.

"Genesis, you traveled with Rufus. As he fought, as he became stronger, what began to happen between him and the Turks?" Reeve asked in reply.

The red haired man turned back to eye the gathering of Turks thoughtfully for a moment before his expression became a full pout and he said, "So they eventually accepted him as one of them, but I'm still an outsider..."

"Well, if you think about it, he's been exposed to the Turks since he was born, and was practically raised by them—did you even know Lady Shinra is the one who formed the Turks? I sort of think it would have been inevitable, once he actually matured. Eden just...sped up the process, I think," the older man explained, sounding faintly amused.

With a sigh, the younger man gave the circle one last look before turning to the younger girls and asking, "What did the two of you need?"

"There's a girl at the foot of Omega Rock, and I'm sure she wasn't there before," Hana said. "Aunt Rikku is with her, but we weren't sure if she was hurt, so we didn't want to move her, and my healing isn't—fully under my control yet."

"A girl?" the others all blinked.

"We'll show you!" Karru eagerly agreed, detaching from Hana's arm to grab Genesis' hand and pull him after her. "Come to think of it, she looks a lot like you!"

"Looks a—" Genesis began in confusion as he let the girl pull him—but then he drew in a sharp breath and gasped, "Shelke?"

"Who?" Karru asked, glancing back at him. She then turned forward again as she made her way around the side of the Rock, to the edge of the pool of clean water.

Genesis didn't answer, peering ahead of them intently in worry, and as they neared the pool, he saw blond Rikku sitting cross-legged on the far side of a small form. A few steps more, and Genesis could make out the girl's features—it was Shelke. He ran forward, pale as he prayed his sister was okay, switching off Materia so he could first cast Sense on her, then cast healing—why was she injured? They weren't serious injuries, but they were internal, and stood to cause a lot of harm if left unattended. He fell to his knees beside her, scooped her into his arms, and released his wings so he could carry her back to the Turks.

He only barely had the sense not to land in the middle of the circle, but as soon as his feet had touched the ground, he shouted urgently, "Kariya!"

Many of the Turks jumped and reached for weapons, but someone in the crowd called sharply, "Calm down!"

A few moments later, the crowd parted to let Kariya out—and his eyes widened as he ran to Genesis to check Shelke for injuries. "What happened?" he asked tensely.

"Apparently, Karru, Hana, and Rikku found her near the pool of water on the far side of Omega Rock," Genesis explained. "She was unconscious, so Rikku stayed with her while Karru and Hana came to find some of us, and likely Yuna, knowing she's a healer. I used Sense on Shelke when I got there, and her body was riddled with—with holes, like some warped kind of cancer. I fixed that, but she still isn't showing any signs of waking, and we don't know what caused it! She—"

At that point, Kariya reached up to wrap a hand around the back of his son's neck and said, "Stop it. Calm down. You've done what you can for her, and right now, we need to figure out what happened. I'd first be inclined to try the Cetra or Felicia."

Genesis' mouth opened, then closed, then opened again—but Kariya lifted Shelke out of the younger man's arms and said, "Go find them while I keep an eye on her."

For a moment, Genesis looked down at his empty hands, somehow feeling bereft without Shelke there, but he knew their father would take care of her, so he slowly nodded. He then flew up into the air so he had a good view of the area, but he couldn't actively see any of the Cetra or Felicia nearby. Biting his lip for a moment while he thought about how to proceed, he quickly decided to try the shore, so flew out to it. As it turned out, Felicia and Shears weren't hard to find, sitting as they were on one of the large rocks shifted by the tidal wave. He flew down and landed in front of them, causing Shears to glare and Felicia to blink in surprise.

"What's the matter, Genesis?" Felicia asked before Shears could speak.

"Something happened to Shelke, but we have no way of knowing what unless someone can ask Minerva how she became—injured? Or ill?—while inside the Omega body," Genesis explained tensely.

"Shelke? Your youngest sister?" the woman blinked in surprise. When Genesis nodded, she said, "Hang on. I'll see if I can ask her—if she knows." Again, the man nodded, and Felicia's gaze moved into the distance, looking glassy and absent. She remained like that for several minutes, though her facial expressions changed a few times, largely to become puzzled, upset, or sad.

Finally, her gaze cleared and focused on Genesis, who asked, "What did you find out?"

"Apparently, there was an unexpected side-effect to Minerva housing herself in Shelke's body for some time during the monster attack in Midgar," the woman sighed.

"What?" the red haired man asked in confusion.

"During the attack, Minerva needed to get to Sephiroth and his clone to prevent a worse situation, and the only way she could do that was by choosing someone with Cetra blood in the vicinity to move some of her direct essence to and have that person carry her to the two men. The person she chose was Shelke." Felicia paused, then sighed and said, "If she'd stayed on Gaia, it wouldn't have been a problem because she'd only have exposure to Minerva's essence, but just being here exposes her to the other entity's essence, and her body can't physically handle the...I guess it's a variance between the two entities? Her body began deteriorating just from minimal influence, and she basically needs to be surrounded by a very tight bubble of Lifestream until Minerva and the entity are finished working out what they're going to do with this world now."

Genesis felt like he'd been hit in the gut with a hammer. "How are we supposed to do that?" he asked in a pained voice so full of grief, fear, and something approaching hopelessness, that even Shears gave him a pitying look.

Felicia gave her head a small shake and replied, "There's a young Cetra Healer, a man about—well, Minerva doesn't know age the same way we do, so she says he's similar in age to 'her Beloved Child'. Do you know who that is?"

After blinking, he said, "That's what Minerva always calls Aeris."

"So, this boy is similar in age to her, maybe a little younger. But he inherited the rare ability last held by Aeris' mother, the ability to channel Lifestream energy into a physical body. He should be able to create the bubble Shelke needs, but she needed to be out here for him to help her. You'll find most of the Cetra near the Mako pool, and he and one of the other younger Cetra are—stuck in a hole not far from there. A few of the others should be trying to get the two out, but maybe you'll be able to help them?"

"If that's Shelke's best bet, I'll do it," Genesis announced fiercely. "Thanks for sharing what you could, Felicia." She gave him a nod, and he took back to the air to head for the Mako pool which was further past the pool of clear water.

It didn't take long for him to find them—and from there, he could also see where a few were a ways into the less dense forest in the area, gathered together as they tried to do something. He landed by them and asked, "What's the matter?"

They started and looked up at him, then one woman said, "Two of our young Healers were exploring and seem to have fallen into an awkward hole. We would need one with skills such as Eden's to safely open the hole enough for them to exit it."

He moved over to the hole to peer at it—and immediately realized why they couldn't even use a drawn array. The soil there was somehow so dry it was crumbling and loose, so there were no foot- or hand-holds, and no ready place which would hold a drawn array with the crumbling. With a small frown at what could have caused the drying effect, Genesis recalled what he knew of the earth arrays Eden manipulated so often. While it was possible, even likely, he could make the same kinds of permanent changes, he was too new to casting with an array imprinted on his own energy to feel quite safe using that method when lives were at stake.

Facing the three with him, he said, "In this case, I know the kind of casting you mean, but I'm not nearly as skilled at that as Eden. However, I have another option which should last long enough to get them out—I can modify a Quake spell to give them a path out. However, I'm going to have to use a lot of energy to hold it until they're out, so you'd better be ready to move them away from the hole quickly."

They nodded, so he extended his hand as he cast through the Earth Materia while modifying the arrays to solidify the land and form steps on the side nearest the three with him. It didn't take long for a slender hand to reach out of the hole, and one man caught the hand, pulling a woman of about fourteen or fifteen free. A few moments later, another, less delicate hand reached out, and the other man pulled a man of about the same age free. They quickly moved away from the hole, and Genesis released the casting—which had the startling side-effect of causing the hole to collapse in on itself as it spewed a cloud of dust into the air.

When the dust settled, Genesis turned to look at the five, and the youngest man met his gaze to say, "Minerva said you need my help for a girl's health?"

"From what I've been told, she housed some of Minerva's essence directly in her body for some time, resulting in this world's energy damaging her. The only real option right now is to surround her in a 'very tight Lifestream bubble'—whatever that means," Genesis quickly explained.

"A...bubble...?" the boy mused, gaze thoughtful and absent. Genesis just waited for the few minutes it took for the man to look at him again and say, "Then take me to her, and I shall see what I may do. There is more than one possible method, but I would need to test them to discover the most effective. In the meantime, you may need to heal her several times."

"I don't know that I have enough energy for that, especially now," Genesis answered tensely. "Could a natural healer like Yuna help?"

"No. Yuna uses this world's essence in healing," the young man replied. "We Cetra are all too exhausted, leaving only any others you feel have enough skill, will, and energy to heal her with. I am only able to assist because this skill operates on a different energy system than our standard healing skills do."

Genesis gave a sharp nod and said tensely, "I'll hope the Turks, SOLDIERs, and-or Wutains will fill that gap, then."

"An Eidolon may be able to assist you, assuming you are able to find a free-roaming healer," one of the older men offered. He then faced the younger and said, "Selvin, remember to rest when you have finished. Your mother shall find you later."

"Of course. Thank you," the younger man, who the SOLDIER now knew was named Selvin, agreed, then turned to Genesis. "Shall we, then?"

With a nod, Genesis said, "Thank you for agreeing to help." He then moved over to lift the slender teen and took to the air to carry him back to the Turks and Shelke.

That time, when he landed and set Selvin down, he could see that the circle formed by the Turks had loosened, though there was still a wall between him and some key Turks—Reno and Rufus were notably absent from the outer circle. Kariya had sat down cross-legged nearby, with Shelke in his lap and an arm supporting her shoulders and head, and many of the Turks who had met the girl had gathered around her, their worry clear. Several SOLDIERs had also moved to join them—Anthony, Cloud, Zack, even Angeal and Sephiroth.

Genesis quickly explained the situation, then said, "The only thing we're still short on is finding people who can heal her when we have to exclude the people of Spira by default and the Cetra are almost entirely exhausted. I haven't got much left, either."

"I believe there are enough of us here to heal her as needed," Sephiroth said.

"And we can always get Kunzel and some of the other SOLDIER-Mages to do some healing, 'cause I doubt they'd leave a little girl to suffer if they can help, you know?" Zack jumped in to offer.

"We'll help, too," Riona said, and Emma—right beside her—nodded her agreement. "We—mostly—got half-decent sleeps last night, so we were able to replenish our energy—casting some healing spread across all of us should work out fine. Besides, Turks can't just leave a little girl to suffer, either, and Shelke's my friend."

"Thank you, everyone," both Genesis and Kariya breathed in relief.

Selvin moved over to Kariya and Shelke, kneeling beside them and placing a hand on her forehead. Everyone gathered there watched in fascination as bands of energy which resembled Lifestream began swirling down his arm and vanishing into the girl's head. After a few minutes of that, he sat back a bit with a small sigh, mind clearly working on the problem intently. Another couple minutes later, he'd made some sort of decision and rested his hand on her forehead again, repeating the energy process. That time, when he lifted his hand, he was frowning faintly.

"As I feared, this will take some time," he said, looking up at Kariya. "She will need healing periodically until I am able to correctly form a barrier of sorts for her, though attempting to separate the energies of this entity and Minerva from one another is—rather difficult."

"Why?" Kariya blinked.

"I could hazard a guess and say it's because most of the people on Gaia are actually blood-related to the people here, which means Shelke has some genes which tie directly into this world's sentience," Eden said suddenly, and all eyes moved to him.

"As that seems to be the case, the situation requires me to somehow separate part of her basic genetics from the remainder of her body, without causing her bodily functions to simply—cease," Selvin explained to the others.

"Do the best you can, then," Kariya told him simply.

He nodded and went back to work.