Two days later, I trundled into a regular, non-sterile testing room, where yet another Yuuki was waiting for me.

I backed out of the room and tugged Hojo aside insistently by the sleeve of his lab coat.

"How many Yuuki clones did you make?" I whispered to Hojo, peering suspiciously through the viewing panel on the door. He had regular human limbs and everything, and was clutching the disgusting hair doll. "Surely Professor Tachibana can't have given birth to them all?"

Hojo looked down at me with something perilously close to pity.

"Sephiroth," he said, barely containing his glee. "The first one was a clone too. Tachibana only carried it so that her body would be ready to nurse you. All of them were made for you."

I felt all the blood draining from my face.

"Oh, I see," I said. "So Project Y is…"

"Cloning Subject S and trying to replicate its effectiveness, yes," Hojo said. "That's why Tachibana moved on to Subject X and Project Dusk after the first one failed. He had been raised identically to you, but failed anyway. She has no genetic relation to any of the clones."

"But - But she still treated the second Yuuki like Yuuki," I protested. I could feel my head spinning dizzily. That couldn't be right. Tachibana still resented me for the first Yuuki exploding. She had to. Nothing made sense. The whole world seemed to be rotating too fast.

"Sephiroth. Don't be dense. The bodies are interchangeable. There has only ever been one of Subject Y. He moves onto the next body after his current one fails. You've handled his spares before."

"W- What?" I stuttered. Everything seemed very far away.

"The spare parts for the mako attunement tests for you and Subject Y came from his clone parts," Hojo said. Why was he being so patient? Why was he smiling? What was wrong with him? "He is a great scientific resource. I suspect he will also be the key to solving the problem of ego-death that occurs after injecting live J-cells in subjects older than eight weeks."

"Yuuki is…me?" I said, barely listening to him. Like a Remnant? But that didn't seem correct. "Why is his- why are his eyes red? And his hair? He doesn't resemble me." The Remnants had resembled Sephiroth in hair and eye colour.

"His genes were…edited," Hojo said grudgingly. "One of the researchers in an earlier part of the project spliced S-genes with another subject. It provided the stability we needed. Embryos grown directly from your cells are without fail totally nonviable."

Hmm, so that was why Hojo would eventually turn to converting other people into Sephiroth "clones". Because actual Sephiroth clones weren't viable on their own. That made more sense than Hojo not knowing what regular cloning was.

"I- I understand, Doctor Hojo," I said, through a bone-dry throat. The call of Reunion flared up like a plucked harp string between Yuuki and I. I wondered if I could tug on it. If Yuuki was a Sephiroth clone, then surely it would not be difficult to make him my puppet.

I felt my gorge rise, and swallowed.

Pasting on a strained smile, I opened the door back up.

"Yuuki!" I cried, bouncing into the room. I produced the lollipop I had received for having a perfect score on a spelling test. I shoved the gaudy thing into Yuuki's hand. "Look! I got you a present!" I had been meaning to give it to Hojo, who despised sweets and would be irritated by the gesture. Oh well. "Now that you're in a fun body again, you should come to school with me!"

Hojo made a noise of irritation in the background.

The tests scheduled for that afternoon went off without a hitch, and no one grew any wings or tentacles. Yuuki and I had a nice spar afterwards, the first in several months, and I defeated him soundly after a brief tussle. Hojo was pleased, and so was Master Liu, my hand to hand instructor. Why, I couldn't fathom. The kid had been occupying a body with tentacle legs and a chicken-wing arm until two days ago.

I parted ways with Yuuki, brawled with hapless Shinra troopers and a particularly unlucky SOLDIER Third Class, and went home covered in massive bruises. I had only won a third of my matches that afternoon, and received a reprimand for my inattentiveness. How I was supposed to continue after Hojo dropped a bomb like that on me, I wasn't sure. If I were Sephiroth, I would have shanked Hojo instead of President Shinra. Well. I am Sephiroth, but you know what I mean. I thoughtt longingly of Masamune and the ability to straight up murder a man without much repercussion.

Something knocked loose inside my airheaded skull that day. I was smiley and bubbly as ever, but I was finally able to stop seeing Hojo and all of the Science Department as simply people that I loathed who were in control of me and my situation. In fact, I stopped seeing them as people altogether. That was perhaps not a good sign.

I was a nightmare to babysit for the next few weeks. I thought it was justified, all things considered. Veld started showing up to his Saturday babysitting hours stinking of cigarette smoke, probably because he was too noble and wouldn't smoke around a kid, even if I was driving him up the wall.

I decided to work on my stupid meditation room. Now that I knew there was a vat deep in Shinra with purpose grown puppets for me, I felt like it was perhaps a sign from above to get started on developing my psychic abilities. However, given that I had no idea what I was doing, and that actually, no one on earth except the gooey blue alien lady rotting away in a mako tank in Nibelheim really knew what they were doing, I was going to play it by ear. And playing it by ear meant skipping off the train and towards Wall Market with my hand in Veld's, whistling an offkey rendition of One Winged Angel. I kept repeating the first couple of bars, which made me sound like I was a kettle that was running out of steam.

Veld's temples throbbed visibly as I dragged him towards the first promising store I saw. It was a small storefront full of Wutai knick-knacks. It also looked like a mafia front, with dusty wares and an inattentive shopkeeper and mysterious individuals with full sleeves of astonishing tattoos going in and out the side entrance. I pretended that this wasn't the exact reason I picked it.

"This place looks nice!" I bounced over to the shop window, peering at the dusty display of decorative objects. "Hey! That's a nice vase!"

"You don't need a vase, Sephiroth," Veld said patiently. "There aren't any flowers in Midgar."

"Hmmph, you don't know that," I argued. I tugged him by the hand towards the shop's entrance. "I could have access to top secret agricultural secrets from the Science Department."

"Science…doesn't cover agricultural research," Veld said slowly, probably still trying to wrap his head around "secret agricultural secrets". "And the interior decorators left you a vase with some fake flowers in your kitchen. I've seen it."

"Yeah! But look at that vase! It's orange! Orange is my favourite colour!"

Veld sighed. "Weren't you looking for things for your…meditation room? Shouldn't you be looking for things in more soothing colours?"

"Uhhh," I hedged. "Maybe? But what if I get bored of looking at all the boring decor and it makes me worse at meditating? I'm trying to develop brain laser powers, not chant sutras or do the weird monk humming thing and try to attain enlightenment or whatever."

"I am not privy to most of Science's research," Veld said, "but I don't believe that even Professor Hojo would be trying to develop "brain laser powers", Sephiroth."

I gave him a disdainful look. Shows what he knew. Sure, Hojo wasn't looking for spoon bending or brain lasers, but he was working on making me ascend to godhood, and I personally considered having two haloes to be an order of magnitude more wacky than brain lasers. "It's highly classified," I sniffed. I caught sight of a big ugly stuffed Moogle that looked incredibly close to the one Iris gives you in FFXV, and immediately made a beeline for it. "Veld!" I cried. "Veld! Look at it! It's so cute!"

"Sephiroth," Veld said, "You already have your chocobo, don't you?" He very valiantly did not comment on how hideous it was.

"Kupo!" I squeaked, waving it in front of my face and pretending I was speaking for it. "Kupo! Look at my cuteness, kupo! Aren't I the cutest widdle Moogle, kupo?"

Veld grimaced.

"It's your allowance, Sephiroth," he said diplomatically. "But you still haven't gotten what we came here for yet, have you."

I squashed the Moogle under my armpit. I could get my stinky sticks with next month's allowance if I had to, I needed this Moogle more than I needed air. I squeezed the big red thing danging from its head, perhaps a bit too tightly.

Veld probably detected the unhinged energy filling me up like an overstretched balloon. I felt like I was going to pop and explode at any second, which meant that either I blew off the manic energy being petty and childish, or I would make a scene and make everyone regret it. He had probably been briefed on the incident with the wererat, which had landed me in speciment holding for a week as punishment, while the Shinra Mansion staff worked on cleaning and repairing an exploded lab. I was usually a fun, bright, tractable, obedient kid, but when I was a nightmare, I was a nightmare. And Veld had wised up to the fact that I felt the most comfortable directing all my nightmare impulses at him.

"There!" Veld said desperately, pointing at an object on another shelf. I looked over and suppressed the urge to giggle.

"Don't be silly, Mr Veld, that's a teapot!"

The shopkeeper snickered. Veld cleared his throat.

"Sir," he addressed the rough looking man behind the counter. "My charge here is looking for an incense holder of some kind, as well as incense. Do you carry anything like that in your fine establishment?"

"I don't sell to Shinra," the man said, "but I'll make an exception since this little man here is so cute." The man came out from behind the counter and squatted down so he was at eye level with me. "So kid, what are you looking for?"

"Uh," I said intelligently. "A holder for stick incense, mainly. I'm taking up meditation and it seems like…something you should have when you meditate. Monks use it…? Maybe?"

The man laughed. "That's absolute nonsense," he informed me. "Incense is meant to be smelled, not ignored while you day dream!"

I shrugged. "Well, it's better than an aromatherapy candle," I said. "I don't want to have to order one of those from the company catalogue. Something nice and proper. Sandalwood or agarwood, you know. And a proper holder for it too, for ritual purposes."

He looked down at me, then at Veld. "Ritual purposes, eh?" he said. "Who you praying to. Leviathan? Or one of the minor deities? Your own family in the Lifestream?"

"Sakaguchi Hironobu and Nomura Tetsuya. And my family."

"I don't know who any those people are, but if they're not Leviathan, then they can do with one of these," the guy said, producing a number of incense burners. One was a rough earthenware bowl, in the shape of a lotus. One was a crisp green porcelain jar that looked like a segment of bamboo. One was a little bronze pot with three legs and a handle on either side. I stopped looking at the other ones he brought out when I saw the bronze number.

"That one, please," I said, pointing to it. "Do you sell incense as well? Or should I find it elsewhere?"

"Cross the street and keep going west, and you'll come across Madame Lee's Materia Emporium. If you buy a materia from her, she may be tempted to sell you some of her personal blend. Otherwise, you can go to Ueda's minimart and get the mass produced stuff there."

"Oh. Thank you!" I said. I peered up at him. "Say, do you have any wooden fish? Or those funky round cushions that monks meditate on?"

The guy laughed uproariously. "You're a funny kid," he said, when he quietened down to just a restrained chuckle. "No I don't sell zafu or wooden fish, this is an antique shop, not a religious supplies store. Just use a metronome and a regular cushion. Say, what do you even need those for, huh? You gonna be chanting sutras? What, is Shinra training up a new generation of kid monks so they can monopolise religion too?"

I grimaced and attempted to gesture warningly in the direction of Veld with eye movement alone. The guy remembered that there was a Turk in the room. "Hmm. Anyway," the man continued, subdued by the reminder. "You're better off getting a teacher than a fancy cushion, kid. There's probably some bald guy willing to hit you with a stick and chant sutras at you for a couple hundred gils an hour, if you looked hard enough. There's all types, in Wall Market."

"Er, thanks, I think?" I said. "I'll just take the incense burner then. Are you sure you don't have wooden fish? The monks in movies all seem so intent when they hit the wooden fish."

"I mean, it's your money, but no, I haven't got any."

"Oh," I said sadly. I'd been looking forward to tormenting my babysitters with a wooden fish. I had thought about bringing it in to Science and seeing how long it would take before Hojo snapped and slammed my hypothetical wooden fish in the hazardous waste bin. I guess I'd just have to DIY my own percussion, then. Maybe it was time to take up the drums. Maybe it was time to take up the electric guitar. Maybe it was time for a screamo phase. I thought about it quite seriously for a moment, before I remembered where I was. "Then just the bronze incense burner, please," I said politely. "How much do I owe you?"

The man looked at Veld, who met his gaze then deliberately turned away and began studying the ugly orange vase in the window display.

The man looked down at me. "Have you got…money?" he said slowly.

"I saved up my allowance!" I beamed up at him. Technically, as I had not spent the majority of the two weekly stipend payouts I've received so far, I had saved up.

He massaged the bridge of his nose. "A thousand gils," he said. "You're a cute kid, but this isn't a charity shop. Ask your daddy at Shinra if you haven't got the cash."

"Okay!" I chirped. "Also, I don't legally have parents. I'm a Shinra intern!" I took out a thousand gils from my pocket and deposited it on the countertop. I paused. "Wait," I said. "H-how much for this Moogle?"

The man looked at Veld again. Veld had moved on to studying his fingernails.

"Three hundred gils," the man said. He seemed to want to feel sorry for me, for being legally an orphan and also presumably for being caught up in funky Shinra business, but also he looked like he had long ago learned to mind his own beeswax when a Turk was around. I deposited three hundred more gils on the counter and beamed up at him. I put the incense holder in my chocobo packback and tucked Mr Moogle more firmly under my arm.

"Gee, thanks mister!" I bounced on the spot, beaming at the man. "I'm going to take such good care of Mister Moogle! All the specimens are going to love him!"

Leaving with that parting shot, I dragged Veld out the store by the hand and flounce off down the street in the direction of the lady who made incense.

"Sephiroth," Veld said through gritted teeth, letting himself be tugged along. "What have you been told about keeping classified information to yourself? If that man puts two and two together and realise you're a specimen, you will be in a lot of trouble."

I paused, stopping in the middle of the road and causing people to crash into us. A man swore at Veld and stumbled past.

"S-sorry," I said lightly. "Uh. I mean. I'm a science intern! I just meant that I was, you know going to show Mister Moogle to the science specimens that I'm hired to look after, because it is my job as an intern in the science department to feed the animals. And stuff."

Veld grimaced. "Sephiroth," he said. "What's gotten into you? You normally don't push against anything that could actually get you into trouble even when you're determined to take your frustrations out on me. You avoid the real boundaries you cannot test better than anyone else I know, outside of Internal Affairs and the secretary pool."

I looked up at him, expressionless for a long, silent moment. Then I broke into a smile again.

"Mr Veld!" I chided. "I have no idea what you're talking about! Surely you aren't asking me to divulge classified company secrets in the middle of Wall Market! And even if I wanted to tell you, surely you didn't think you had the clearance to hear about it!"

Veld laid a big heavy hand on top of my head, and ruffled my hair silently. I squawked and leapt away from him, tugging on my bangs and frantically straightening my hair.

"Maybe when you're director," I added absently, in a less saccharine voice. "But even then, you still wouldn't have the clearance."

Veld looked down at me out of the corner of his eye.

"You want some ice cream waffles?" he asked, pointing at a stand selling ice cream, waffles, and ice cream waffles. "My treat."

"Thanks, but no thanks, Mr Veld," I said. "I don't wanna spill anything on Mr Moogle. I just got him!"

The corner of Veld's perpetual frown tugged even lower. "I'll hold Mr Moogle, if you like," he offered.

I decided to throw the poor guy a bone. "Okay!" I said. "You hold him, I'll order. You want anything?"

Veld shook his head. "I can't, not while I'm on duty," he said. "You know that, Sephiroth."

I shrugged and skipped off to get myself an ice cream waffle. Cookies and cream ice cream, to be precise, on a chocolate waffle, with chocolate drizzle and a chocolate chip cookie stuck on top as garnish. I paid for it myself though. It was bad enough that I was using Shinra money, I didn't want anything I enjoyed to have been paid for by the labour of a Turk.