A/N: Same day as last chapter, people!
Phoenix: Thank you for the review! You'll just have to see how things play out with Hojo's 'test subjects'. :P
Choice
Sephiroth had been called at about three in the morning to deal with an emergency situation (the new secretary who had replaced the one Genesis had fired was obviously competent and not quite so hero-bound), so he had obediently woken Kal and the two had quickly gotten ready to go. At first, he'd thought it would be that he'd been called because he was 'the best', then found Angeal (and Zack) and a rather large team of Seconds and Thirds waiting, even as a few more arrived. He and Angeal were given the data on the situation, and once they'd looked it over, the whole group had gone out to stop a rather odd monster invasion into the Slums.
And he was sure it was odd, because while some monsters got along and would attack prey together, most only got along well enough with their own kind to do such a thing. Instead, the monsters they were seeing were normally ones found as far from one another as they could be—and all of those types were working together to attack the Sector 7 Slums. The battle took a few hours, but then he left Kal, Angeal and Zack to clean it up as he wandered away, feeling unsettled for reasons he couldn't place.
He wasn't sure where he ended up before picking a random object to sit on (sending his clothes for cleaning never bothered him), staring at his linked hands and the ground below them. Vaguely, he was aware of the light ratio increasing, but by how much or for how long, he didn't know—the way he felt just then was enough to make him actually feel ill. He'd never been sick in his life, so he had no idea how to deal with what was effectively an upset stomach.
Then, someone sat beside him as a female, familiar voice asked, "What's wrong?" Glancing up, he saw the Flower Girl—Aeris—sitting there. She looked like she was worried about him...And it hit him suddenly that he was reacting very poorly to what Cloud had told him about the kind of person the other him had become. It had just taken a bit for it to really hit him what that all meant for him.
Looking back at his hands, he quietly replied, "It appears what I thought I knew of myself is not so certain as I had believed. Dealing with that has been difficult."
"Hmm..." the girl murmured, then rested a hand on his arm. For some reason, he became hyper-aware of how delicate and small that hand was. "You know, anyone who's sentient can choose how they'll behave and how they'll live their life. And if I'm completely honest, there was a time when I really thought I could never kill another human. Now, I know better. I think the point is that we're all capable of any action, and the only reason we do or don't is because we make a choice to, whichever way we choose. If you did something different from normal, you had to've had a reason when you did it, but if you didn't like doing it, then just don't do it again—you can make that choice, too."
"Is that still true if what I once made the attempt to do is destroy the world?" he asked with a sigh.
She lifted her hand and leaned back as she commented, "Oh, this has to do with that Blessing." After a moment, she got up, moved in front of him, and tipped his face up with her hands on his cheeks so he had to look at her, meet her gaze. Her own was steady as she asked, "Sephiroth, are you the person who did that right now?" His eyes widened in shock and she nodded. "You're not. Don't carry the burden when it isn't yours. That happened in another lifetime where things happened differently, and now that you're aware of what you 'could become', you also know how to choose not to become that person. Since you didn't like what you found out, the next step is to work out the best way to avoid it. You never have to become that person—you have the free will to choose not to."
"But if Jenova could take control of me—" he began.
And he found himself shocked when she cut him off with, "The Lifestream wouldn't have wanted me to save you if it, and Minerva, actually thought there was any chance right now of you being like that. You've already chosen Minerva as your adoptive mother, not Jenova, and you need to stop creating a problem where there isn't one, before Jenova thinks she might be able to get ahold of you and tries it."
For a long moment, he just gaped at her, then blinked slowly and asked, "You are certain of that?"
"Of course," she agreed, giving him a wry smile. "Remember, when Reno got attacked and that bomb went off, you technically would have died. You didn't because the Lifestream insisted it was going to flood me to give me enough power to make sure you and Angeal didn't die. It never would have surprised me if it had been Genesis or Reno, or even Kunzel and Zack—but that wasn't for them, it was for you. Never think anyone has so much power over you that they can force you to do something you don't want to. Not even Jenova has that much power. And since you're Minerva's now, there's no problem in the first place. Don't make one, okay?"
Suddenly, he felt a lot better, and a lot lighter, so he smiled faintly and agreed, "I will stop worrying about it. Thank you, Aeris."
She smiled back and gave him a quick hug before sitting beside him again. "If it helps, think of the 'you' who did those things as a different person, because you technically are, anyway. He was a Nightmare—yes, with a capital 'N'—and you are a Protector. Yes, with a capital 'P'."
Chuckling, he asked, "So why would a 'Protector' be important enough to capitalize?"
"Because right now, you're like Genesis is to me, even if you aren't actually a Mage. Well, I think they used to be called a different name, but Minerva hasn't been able to tell me yet and make it make sense. But, you're still one of my protectors, and more importantly, you're one of the world's protectors. And a Protector on that level can do a lot of really impressive things if you start looking for those new skills you have."
"Do you know what those skills may be?" he asked in surprise, gaze on her thoughtfully.
"Um...What I've gotten through the Lifestream is that it and the Planet will try to help you if you ask for it. So, like...If you needed a shield but didn't have a Shield Materia, the Planet could give you one. There's also sort-of a 'pocket space' Minerva has where you could store items you don't want anyone else to get their hands on, or where you could put things you want access to anywhere, like your sword." She motioned to the long blade leaning on the pile of random parts and trash beside him. "I don't know how to access it, but if you know about it, maybe you can figure it out?
"The Planet might even divert or create a natural disaster at your will if it can sense the need, but you'd probably have to pull on the Lifestream to do that. And it would be almost impossible for someone to kill you because of falling...Um—I think you have Minerva's blessings to fly? Whatever that means, you won't hit the ground and die like anyone else. Apparently, Genesis can do it, too, but he hasn't yet, since he's been back here. And maybe Angeal can, too."
He blinked at her in surprise, but before he could say anything, a familiar voice called cheerfully, "Hey, Seph! Ang sent me to tell you the rest of the group is heading back now! Who's—Aeris?" A moment later, the girl squeaked in surprise as a laughing Zack picked her up, spun her around, and set her down again with a quick hug.
Sephiroth eyed them in bemusement, wondering when they'd gotten so close—and they had, or he doubted the girl would have started laughing and hugged him back as soon as she knew it was him—as Kal joined him.
"So...Who's the girl, or do you know?" Kal asked, watching Akira pad over to the girl to sniff at her hands.
Aeris faced the fox in mild surprise, then grinned and crouched to pet him as she said, "Well, hello! And who are you?"
"That's Akira, my pet and fighting companion," Kal said in amusement. "And he liked you enough to want your attention of his own accord, so I guess you're the sort who's trust-worthy."
She looked up with a grin and a giggle, still petting the fox. "Akira's a lovely name. And I don't think I've met an animal that didn't like me, so I can't really say if they have an actual reason or if they just like my energy. I'm Aeris, by the way. You?"
"Kal. I'm Sephiroth's mentee in SOLDIER," the young woman replied, looking amused by Aeris' answer.
"When did you two become so close, though?" Sephiroth asked of Zack in a dry tone.
"Wha—?" the young man blinked, then grinned and laughed. "You guys only come here maybe once every two weeks, and you don't stay long when you do. I come whenever I have a free moment, usually with Kunzel or Reno, or both, or even by myself. And Aeris is a lot of fun to hang around with, so why shouldn't I?" That made the girl giggle again.
Kal just shook her head in amusement, then looked at Sephiroth to ask, "So, are you staying here or catching up with the rest of the group?"
Sephiroth eyed the girl for a moment, then sighed and rose, grabbing his sword as he did, as he said, "We had best return to do our reports." He then looked at Aeris to say, "Thank you for your time in explaining that to me."
She smiled and nodded to him, even as Zack asked her, "What does he mean?"
"You don't need to know, Zack," she told him dryly. "It was personal, so it's up to him to tell you if he feels like it."
That made him blink in mild surprise, then grin and agree, "Fair enough." Sephiroth and Kal were already walking away as he said his goodbyes to her and ran to catch up with them. The silver haired man had a lot to think on now, and he knew he didn't want to really put it off—he needed to be sure he'd resolved it so Jenova wouldn't be able to control him. Even then, he felt much better having her reiterate Cloud's words without saying the same thing.
He could choose. And that mattered.
MB
Cloud just felt tired by the time he got to the office that morning—only to see Reno there with a raccoon on his shoulder and a Materia in his hand as he offered it to Lakis. The older, brown haired man took it—then his eyes widened for a moment before he glared and asked, "Why in the world did you steal my—"
"I didn't steal it, this guy did," Reno replied in annoyance, pointing to the raccoon on his shoulder. "He gave it ta me this mornin' like it was a gift, but I realized it was yours, so I gave it back to ya. Don't blame me for a critter bein' sticky-fingered."
The blond boy just pinched the bridge of his nose as he realized that, even without Yufi, they were going to have a thief in their midst, then went to his desk to get some of his work—and found his pen missing. Turning back to Reno, who was still glaring at Lakis (who was returning the favor), he went over to the red haired Turk on the side the raccoon was on and plucked it from his shoulder. The raccoon squealed in surprise and started struggling to get away, but he caught a flash of color by one of its hind feet and seized the item—which resulted in him dropping the raccoon at the same time.
Cloud then held his pen up so the raccoon (which had taken refuge behind Reno's legs) could see it and told the creature, "Don't steal from Turks—or at least from me—or you're going to regret it." He'd done it with Yufi often enough, so it was nothing new. Sadly.
The boy then went back to his desk, collected the rest of his things, and headed for Scarlet's labs, even as Lakis laughed whole-heartedly and Reno commented bemusedly, "Damn, he's shrewd, yo."
Putting that out of his mind, he decided to think on the two weapons he now knew he could modify—Leana's and Derin's. Once he was at the labs, he started on the specs for Derin's weapon first, because frankly, the man was carrying way more weight than anyone should have been able to, and it needed to be reduced. It wouldn't have surprised him if a SOLDIER was using a boomerang like Derin's, but a normal human—he was sure the man wasn't one. After all, his boomerang was almost his height at full size and made of metal currently, making it even heavier than a buster sword, and Derin was a slender man of average height.
As he worked, he felt Scarlet leaning over his shoulder to look at his schematics, then heard her sigh faintly in amusement. "So, how did your own weapon work out?" she asked, her tone amused enough that he scowled faintly.
"It was actually great," he told her, gaze on his work. "But mine was a trial for others' weapons as much as it was to give me a weapon I could use properly, so now that it's proved itself, I have to work on these."
"Okay," she agreed. "But how do you intend to make Adamantaimai shell retract and extend the way his metal one does?"
"It can't be completely shell. Though, by the weight of the one he carries around now, it would probably be easier for him to carry around a full-size shell boomerang all the time. I'm looking at having the shell split down the middle and hollow inside, maybe reinforced by metal, which would also anchor gears to make it smaller or larger. The most difficult part is actually those gears and how to anchor them. It needs to be durable and sharp, so it can't be completely without metal. Some of the gears might be able to be made of shell, though..." As he'd been talking, he'd systematically gotten more and more absent in his tone until he drifted off into silence, still working intently.
Her laughter—a milder 'kya ha ha' than he was used to hearing—startled him into looking up at her in surprise, and she said, "Somehow, seeing you work so intently is adorable." He glared at her, and she ruffled his hair. "But, I need you to take a quick break to look at this," she said, handing him a schematic.
Taking it, he blinked, realizing he was looking at a prototype for what would later be called the 'Proud Clod', and wondered what would be wrong at this stage. "So what am I looking at it for?" he asked.
"In general, how feasible do you think it is to create something like that?" she asked.
Eying it again as he realized she wanted to know if she should keep working on it, he thought maybe he should dissuade her. Then, he realized if she took it a bit of a different route, it might actually be feasible as a device in the first place—and also, she usually didn't take being told 'no' very well, so he was better off not going that route if he wanted her cooperation.
"Okay, well..." he began thoughtfully as he assessed the prototype. "I'm not sure if having more than one pilot is feasible, unless you want to make it powerful enough that it would be a danger unless that was a basic requirement to make it function. If it's like most of the rest of your machines, you might want to go for reduced size and increased mobility—your available functions in its uses would then depend on what the machine could carry and still work. If you wanted it to be high-powered and largely stable, it would be a more defensive machine and you might want to make it heavier with less mobility so it could take hits. If you did it right, this type of thing—either way you made it—could also probably easily be used for things like building of various sorts, city repairs, search and rescue, and disaster relief, too, as directed by its pilot."
As he looked up at her, he realized she was staring at him in amazement, but before he could say anything, she asked, "So this prototype isn't a loss, but it needs more refining for what it's actually going to be used for, is that what you mean?"
"Pretty much," Cloud agreed. Had her first try been shot down by someone else already? "It's more like...Making weapons for the Turks, I already know what it needs to be able to do and how it'll be used, so it's easier to make a viable schematic with correct specs. This is something you started from scratch with no real defined use for it, so you didn't really know how to build detailed specs. I think putting more thought into how you want it to be used and re-designing based on that would fix most of what's wrong in this prototype design."
"...How I want it to be used..." she murmured thoughtfully, taking the schematic back to eye it for a long moment.
"There's one thing you could try, too, if you decide it could do double duty in combat and in rescue and things," he commented as a sudden thought occurred to him.
"What's that?" she asked in surprise.
"I've heard the head of Urban Development is really good with technology, engineering, and programming. Maybe asking for some of his input on how it could help in things like disaster zones or city repairs would help you work out how to design it for both purposes," he said, gaze curious.
"We don't usually get along..." she began, looking from him to the schematic for a long moment. She then met his gaze and said, "I'll refine it a bit more myself before I decide if asking Reeve for some input would be useful here. Thank you for your insight, though—it's really given me some good points to ponder."
"Good luck, then," he agreed, then returned to his work as she went back to her office.
MB
Vincent wasn't sure if he should be annoyed or not by Reeve calling him directly to interrupt his work. While Tseng had been able to work out a lot of their cases for them, his experience and insight into the insanity of the criminal world and how it applied to the Turks was actually giving them solutions to problems they'd never solved last time. Or, at least, to problems Tseng hadn't been able to give them answers to. He'd also been working out a trend to notes Tseng had left on many of the cases—ones they wanted to play out the way they were and ones they wanted to change. Some of the latter he'd realized would have ended in deaths they didn't want to have happen or in serving as a trigger for something worse if they weren't changed.
Regardless, the man was calling him, so he answered and asked, "Did you need something, Reeve?"
"Hello to you, too, Vincent," the man said dryly in response, and Vincent just sighed. "I do actually need something, but I need you to come up here to do it."
"Something about my arm, then?" the undead Turk asked blandly.
"It is, yes. I hope it won't take overly long—maybe half an hour? Admittedly, it might go longer, to about an hour. I don't want to put it off, though, otherwise I'll have to do twice as much work and take that much longer to finish making your new arm," the man told him.
That made him raise a brow and ask, "Are you saying you forgot something when you got the measurements from me before?"
"Um...I got those measurements just fine," Reeve answered a bit slowly. "The problem is more that I didn't realize I needed another set of measurements until I started working on the wiring and the power flow."
Frowning in confusion, the undead man asked, "What do you mean?"
"Cybernetic implants have a power source which mostly depends on your own body and energy output. Not entirely, but mostly. Apparently, they don't work very well without being attuned to the actual energy transmission running from your body to the limb to tell it to move. It's like a version of the synaptic impulses in the brain which send signals to your body to tell it to move. If I set it to allow too much or too little transmission, the results won't be good, so I need to check what you're actually transmitting right now. That would double as a check to be sure of the transmission through the nervous system of those synaptic impulses I mentioned before, too, though I had already accounted for those," the younger man explained.
Finally, at that explanation, Vincent sighed and said, "All right, I'll head up."
"Good! Thank you. I'll have Reva wait for you at the door again," Reeve agreed happily, then hung up.
Hanging up his own PHS, Vincent rose and went to tell Verdot what the situation was, then headed up to Urban Development. Sure enough, the woman from his last visit let him in and led him to—not Reeve's office. It was a room on that floor which was clearly used for engineering and for taking energy readings, and Reeve was working on a console there when the two walked in. "He's here, Reeve," the woman said, looking at her boss in amusement.
Reeve turned to look at them, then gave a smile and said, "Thank you, Reva. I guess we'd better get started on the readings—I was just getting the program ready." He then rose and faced Vincent to say, "You won't have to do much, but we'll definitely be asking you to flex your arm a few different ways a few times." Once he'd said that, he moved over to a chair by a machine which was plugged into the computer he'd been sitting at and added, "Please come sit over here, Vincent."
As Vincent did so, Reeve picked up a device which reminded him of a shoulder brace with a bunch of electric panels on both the inside and the outside of it and got him to put it on. Once it was set, Reeve returned to the computer while Reva picked up a clipboard with some paper and a pen on it, and began writing some notes as she observed the thing on his shoulder and his arm. At various intervals, she or Reeve told him to move his arm in some way, and she often made notes then, as well. It was approaching forty minutes later when the testing apparently stopped and Reva left the room as Reeve moved over to help take the device off his shoulder.
"In a way, this arm was surprisingly well-made, if it had been put on a larger body," Reeve commented as he worked.
"Are you praising Hojo's work?" Vincent asked in annoyance.
"No, not in that sense. I'm actually pretty sure he didn't make this arm, he just took it from someone else and stuck it on you when, by its measurements, it was intended for a larger man. We may never know who made it or who it was originally intended for, but the arm itself is good quality. Of course, it's now also useless for anyone else, but the original maker was truly a genius. That's worth praising, I think," Reeve explained.
Blinking in surprise, Vincent asked, "You don't think he made this arm?"
Sighing, the younger man answered quietly, "The labs he had access to at the time he did this didn't have the equipment to have made it. By extension, he would have either needed to make the arm himself before even going to Nibelheim or someone else made it before then and he just took it along. If he only got the idea while he was out there, the first option makes no sense, leaving the second—someone else made it and he took it out there for some random reason. Or someone else took it out there and he found it and used it. Also, there's none of the traces on it which would have marked it as something he made. Maybe an early prototype would have lacked those, but I think he'd already established his by the time this would have been made."
Vincent stared up at Reeve for a long moment before asking, "Have you been to Shinra Manor in Nibelheim before?"
"No. Why?" the man asked in curious surprise.
"How do you know what the labs there are like, Reeve?" the Turk asked quietly as the device around his shoulder finally slid off.
For a moment, Reeve froze in surprise, the shoulder device dangling from one hand precariously, then the younger man looked up at him in helpless surprise and said, "I don't know. It's like I just—know what's there, and I'm sure of it. But I've never been there to know, so how...?"
Pausing for a long moment, Vincent said softly, "Reeve, I think you and I need to have a very long discussion about a very sensitive topic in a place which is actually safe to talk freely in. When your actual work hours are done for today, I'm going to come back and take you to the safest place I know of in this building right now. And you aren't allowed to say 'no'."
Swallowing hard, Reeve nodded agreement, then set the device he carried on the desk beside the computer and said quietly, "I guess you're free to go...And I'll see you later..."
Rising, Vincent gripped his shoulder with his flesh hand—and felt the man flinch under it. "You're not in trouble, Reeve. But there's something you need to know about so you don't accidentally say something like that to someone who would take it badly. And I'll tell you right now, you're not the only one. We're trying to protect people like you so you won't get into trouble you can't get out of. Also...If you've got a Cait Sith made already, please bring him along with you."
That made the younger man spin to face him suddenly in shock—then with dawning realization. Slowly, he relaxed and gave the Turk a small smile. "All right. This evening, then. Thank you, Vincent." He then gave a small chuckle and added, "But if it was anyone here besides you or—well, that little blond Turk of yours—I'd be ready to high-tail it right now. For some reason...I feel like I can trust you if you say I'm not in trouble."
Nodding, Vincent informed him, "And you can. The feeling is also mutual or I wouldn't be letting you work on my arm. I'll show myself out for now." At Reeve's nod, Vincent left quietly.
