Everglow - Chapter Forty-Four

Somewhere behind him Vincent heard an alarm that had survived Kadaj and Verian's attack go off, beeping shrilly to warn of another intruder. A powerful thud of heavy boots, a kick, he guessed, and the alarm whined and sparked to a stop, probably broken beyond repair.

Vincent couldn't spare the energy to open his eyes, it was an excruciating struggle to breathe as it was. He couldn't tell who it was, but the footsteps approached slowly, purposefully, majestically.

Then a hand gloved in leather firmly gripped his shoulder and flipped him onto his back. Vincent couldn't suppress a small cry.

"What have you gotten yourself into now, Valentine?"

He didn't dare believe it, but it somehow was. He couldn't mistake that voice.

"You came?" Vincent breathed.

"I owed you a favor or two," Sephiroth said. "After what you did for Aralyn."

His strong hands slipped under his shoulders and began to lift him. "No!" Vincent gasped strongly. Then, more drained, he added, "Get…get her first…"

The hands did not release him, but neither did they lift him further. "Who is this?" he asked.

Vincent didn't answer, but breathed a sigh of relief as Sephiroth eased him gently to the ground. Vivian let out a soft moan; he guessed that he had rolled her over as well to better assess the damage. Sephiroth made no sound to indicate the gravity of what he saw, and worry constricted Vincent's chest.

"She needs an ambulance. This is beyond my ability."

Vincent tried to shake his head. "We are…not safe there…that's the whole…reason we came…here…"

Vincent could feel Sephiroth's frown. "I don't think I can safely move her," Sephiroth said at last. "It's a lose-lose situation."

"Whatever…it takes…do it here. I…trust you."

A long, soft sigh. "Do you have a small knife, Vincent?"

That sparked the energy to open his eyes in shock. Through blurred vision, he could see Sephiroth bent over Vivian, his hands pressing on the wound in her side. He raised himself to his elbows somehow. "No…I won't let you do that to her…"

"It's to cut bandages, Valentine," Sephiroth reprimanded softly. "Be reasonable. I was not going to touch her with it." His voice lowered a little bit. "But, if you have a needle and thread, I could stitch the wound closed. I can numb it to the best of my ability, but I won't lie to you and say that it won't pain her. I think her chances are greater that way. It is your choice. I won't do it without your consent."

Vincent fell back onto the ground, wincing as he jolted the pain anew. "There is a knife…in the kitchen. Needle and thread…upstairs…in Na—in the girl's room."

Sephiroth nodded his approval and left to get the items.

He had heard the freezer door open in the kitchen, but he hadn't expected Sephiroth to dump three trays worth of ice on the burns on his stomach. His back arched and he hissed through his gritted teeth, the cold was unexpected, and it stung fiercely.

"That will get the heat out while you wait," Sephiroth said as he returned to Vivian's side with towels cut into strips in one hand and a threaded needle in the other. "Try not to move."

He first laid more ice onto a towel, then added salt to the bundle before tying it closed. Testing the bag with the back of his hand, he nodded and put the cold pack on Vivian's wound. Vincent approved. If Sephiroth could get it cold enough, she wouldn't be able to feel a thing.

He still had to look away as Sephiroth carefully began to stitch.

Vivian was either entirely numb or too far into unconsciousness to know what was being done. She did not move or make the slightest sound. It was unnerving. Vincent forced himself to believe that, if she was dead, Sephiroth would have told him.

"It is done," Sephiroth said at last. He was now applying some type of salve to the wound and then began wrapping her torso firmly in the clean, soft towels. "I think that as long as there wasn't too much damage to her organs, she will live." He tied the loose ends together and slid a hand gently under her head, slipping a pillow that he had taken from Nadiya's bed under her before lying her down again. He draped Nadiya's quilt over her, checked her pulse one last time, and then stood.

Vincent wondered if, as he had entered Nadiya's room, he had seen the blanket Aralyn had made. He tried to remember where Nadiya had placed it. He wondered if Sephiroth could ever guess that they had sheltered his children for the past month or so.

Now wasn't the time to tell him, but he knew that it wasn't far off.

By now all the ice on Vincent's stomach was water, some of it seeming to have evaporated. Sephiroth shook his head as he applied yet another round of ice. This time, Vincent had ample warning, so it wasn't as hard to bear. "These are bad burns," Sephiroth said. His hands hovered a whisper above the wounds, tracing them pensively. "And I recognize the weapon that did this to you. You have a lot of explaining to do."

You don't know the half of it, Vincent thought.

"You will need a lot of time to heal from this, you understand. Consider yourself out of commission."

"I heal quickly," Vincent rebuked, half to Sephiroth, half to himself. He didn't have time to sit around and heal! The children could be back in Hojo's custody by then! With all the time that had passed, who was to say they weren't already?

Sephiroth scoffed, dumping another tray of ice on even though the current batch was only half melted. Vincent couldn't feel a thing anymore; he couldn't even decipher the point in time when the cubes struck his severed flesh. It was a bit uncomfortable, he felt like his middle didn't exist anymore, but he wasn't about to complain.

Sephiroth didn't reapply ice. "I'm giving you a break. It would be ironic for you to be burned so badly and then die of hypothermia." He smiled without humor, putting a towel to the side of Vincent, and then rolling him over onto his stomach so he laid on it. Besides that, he took no heed of the soaked carpet.

There was a long, hesitant pause as Sephiroth observed his back. "What is it?" Vincent asked, sensing that something was amiss.

"Your clothing. Your stomach was bare but on your back…"

He knew where this was going long before Sephiroth said anything. His eyes widened.

"It is fused to your skin."

Vincent let himself go limp, stifling a groan. This was going to hurt.

A lot.


A/N: News. My summer is over, starting Monday.

Okay, my summer's not actually over, but band camp (YAY!) is going to eat ALL my time from nine to five. Updates are going to be slowing, but I will type when I can. I haven't given up, I'm just swamped until band season is over. Sorry guys, I'm going to miss it too, but I'm marching my way to the championships!! Wish me luck!

I'll try to get in a few more chapters before Monday. I'm not going to get any sleep tonight anyway. My sister is having el-humongo sleepover. Which is fun. Until the caffiene comes out.