1.
They were led up the stairs, Tseng following behind them as they were led into the largest office in the building. She saw President Shinra sitting behind his desk, playing around with one of the security monitor feeds. "Ah Mr. Strife, Miss. Gainsbrough, welcome to my little office. Please, take a seat." He pointed to the two seats in front of him, Aeris took the offer and sat down, however she noticed that Cloud didn't. She turned towards him looking for a sign of disapproval at her sitting down but the look in his eyes told her that he didn't.
"Don't mind me." Cloud replied, bitterness showing from his tone. "I prefer to be standing."
"Very well Lieutenant-Commander." Shinra replied.
"You still call me by my rank!" She watched as Cloud looked straight into the eyes of the man who had once paid his wages. "I think the fact I joined an anti-Shinra organisation would had hinted that I was never planning to come back to SOLDIER."
"Hum." The President replied as Tseng put the Executioner onto the desk. "I have to say." He ran his hand over the crystal blade of Cloud's weapon. "This is really a work of a master."
Cloud never replied, looking down at his blade. She could tell he was thinking but the question was, about what?
"Ah, I see you brought both of them." They both turned to see Hojo coming closer. "Better to get this finished in one go."
"Get what finished?" Cloud asked as Hojo moved over to his side and produced an empty syringe from his coat pocket.
"Now I'm just going to take a blood sample." He placed the syringe into Cloud's arm and took a sample of blood. "There." He smiled as he put the sample into a small bottle.
It was then the President stood up. "I have a proposition for you both."
"Oh joy." Cloud muttered under his breath, Aeris the only one close enough to pick it up.
"As you know your friends are all in custody. If you cooperate with the Professor here, I guarantee to you that they will be spared from execution and will only face life imprisonment."
"Pardon me, but, why are you preparing to do this for our cooperation?" Aeris asked.
The president showed joy in the question as he headed over to the window. "As you know Miss. Gainsbrough, your mother was an Ancient, or as they like to call themselves the Cetra. The Cetra will be the ones to lead us to the Promised Land..."
Cloud cut him off. "The Promised Land is only a myth and that last context is from an old legend."
"That may be but it is still worth looking into. They say that the Promised Land is very fertile." He turned back to Cloud.
Cloud's eyes suddenly showed understanding and contempt for the man in font of him. "Mako. This is what this is all about, isn't it."
"Why should we need our money making reactors when the Mako will flow out all by itself! That is where Neo-Midgar will be created." Shinra waved his hands around to show the point. "Shinra's new pride and joy."
"This still doesn't explain why you need Cloud." Aeris pointed out.
"Ah yes. Mr. Strife. Hojo I think it would be better for you to explain." He signalled to the scientist.
"Mr. Strife has had a complication during his enhancement operation when he entered SOLDIER by all respects, he should have been inferior to the other members. However as you can see he isn't." Hojo turned away from them to look out of the window. "I want to know why? I want to know how I can improve the warriors of SOLDIER and the answer is with you, Strife."
Aeris and Cloud looked at each other, both contemplating their answer. Cloud then sighed before replying. "I don't think we have a choice." He said to Aeris before looking at Shinra. "We'll cooperate."
"Good. I've already had a talk to your friends, so I guess this has come to an end." He nodded at Tseng, who led them away. Once they had gone he turned to Hojo. "You really think he's an Ancient?"
"I believe so. It explains a lot of things that have happened." Hojo replied before saying. "The answer is in this veil."
"Get it tested at once. This may be our chance to breed another Cetra without thinning the bloodline." He replied sitting back in his chair again.
Hojo left without another work, going into another round of murmuring and laughing to himself. Sometimes the President wondered if his head of Scientific Research was sane.
2. Oh Dear God! He Killed Shinra!
'Wake up'
The voice.
He awoke quickly looking around the cell he and Aeris had been given to share, having the theory that the double bed here wasn't an accident. He looked over at Aeris who was sleeping peacefully on the bed. He switched back on his PHS, remembering that Shinra had no way to eavesdrop and put on his headset. It was then he noticed it.
The door was open.
He moved towards it peering outside to see a scene of absolute carnage outside. He looked the other way to seeing something laying by the door. The Executioner lay on the floor, all the Materia still intact, with the Mythril Staff lying next to it. He grabbed his weapon, placing it back in its sheath before taking Aeris staff and heading back into the cell, over to Aeris.
"Aeris wake up." He spoke softly as she murmured something incomprehendible and slowly opened her eyes. "Come on." He said as he passed her a spare PHS and her staff.
"What's going on Cloud?" She asked still not fully awake. "Where did you get our weapons."
"Look outside." He told her before quickly adding "By the way it wasn't me."
Aeris eyes widened as she saw the sight before her. "By the Planet, what happened?"
"I'm not sure." Cloud answered honestly. "But whoever did this isn't human."
Aeris turned away from the sight before her. "Maybe we can get the others." A sign of hope in her eyes.
Cloud nodded. "You're right. We should find them." He tapped the PHS before saying. "This is Cloud to Jessie. Come in."
"Cloud! Where are you." Jessie's voice replied.
"We've just entered the main lab area on floor 68. It's a scene of carnage Jess." He said into his headset.
"Stay where you are. I'll get the others to come to you."
"You mean the others are out." Aeris asked.
"Good to hear you Aeris. Yes they are out, they woke up to find the cell doors open and their weapons laying by them."
"Just like us." Cloud murmured loud enough for them to hear it.
'Jenova'
Cloud looked at the trail of destruction. "Jessie it looks like whatever did this went up to the next level. Tell the others to meet Aeris here and then go up after me."
Aeris piped in with concern. "Cloud is that safe?"
"I'm not sure, but I have to go ahead." He took her hands in his before saying. "Trust me."
"I will." Aeris replied before they both leaned in.
"Isn't this romantic." Jessie murmured over the PHS ruining the moment.
"Er.. Yes. Whatever you say Jessie. Cloud out." He pushed a button on the PHS cutting the communication. "I'll be careful." Cloud told Aeris before he let go of her other hand and ran towards the stairwell.
---
He moved up the stairs to the President's office, the Executioner in his hands. The trail of blood still leading him onwards to the desk where he saw something that put a touch of fear briefly into his eyes.
The President of Shinra Inc lay dead, sitting at his desk with the infamous weapon slammed into his back. "Murasame. But..."
"He's dead?" The eerily calm voice asked the mercenary. "I'm sorry to disappoint you Cloud."
Cloud Strife, SOLDIER First-Class-Star, turned to the voice to see someone he never thought or wanted to see again. He watched the figure go up to the dead President and remove the Murasame from his back. Wiping the blade clean, the figured waited for a reply.
"I thought you were, dead." Cloud simply said.
"I should be. But I'm not effected by Mako like those pathetic people out there Cloud." He waved his hand indicating the people of Midgar maybe even the planet.
"I can't say I'm please to see you back, Sephiroth."
"I never expected you to be." The silver haired warrior put the Murasame back in its sheath.
"I'll never let you take over this world." Cloud replied the venom in his voice beginning to show.
"Ah Cloud, that's the point. I don't want to rule this world... At least not as a mortal."
"What..." Cloud never finished as the rest of Avalanche came up the stairs at this point to see this stand off.
"Cloud!" Tifa shouted, making him look away from his nemesis. When he looked back he was gone. "What the hell?"
However that wasn't the noted thing on Barret's. "The President's dead!" It was then that palmer came out from behind this pillar.
"Hey!" Barret called out the fat man.
Palmer tried to run for it but Cloud caught him. "You saw him do this didn't you?"
Palmer nodded his reply, before adding. "He told the president that he wouldn't let him have the Promised Land."
"So you're saying that this Sephiroth is a good guy?" Barret asked.
"And he's protecting the Promised Land?" Aeris added.
"Good guy, protecting the Promised Land. I don't think so. His plan is different." Cloud stated out of knowledge.
There was a sound of a helicopter landing on the balcony, Cloud let Palmer go to see him run towards it. "S#&t forgot about 'im."
"Who?" Tifa asked as she saw the figure in a white suit come out of the helicopter onto the balcony.
"Rufus, Shinra's son and the vice-President of Shinra Inc." Cloud replied seeing the disappointment on Barret's face.
"This doesn't look good." Red stated. "I think it would be wise to check our equipment."
"Good idea, Red." He pulled out his item satchel and started to go through the accessories he had in there. He passed them all a Star Pendant and in addition he handed: Aeris a Circlet like his own, Barret a Protect Vest and Tifa and Red a Power Wrist. He checked his own Star Pendant, Circlet and SOLDIER Belt. Before going onto Materia.
After they had equipped their Materia and were ready Cloud led them out onto the balcony.
3. Meet The New President
Cloud looked over the man in front of them. He had blonde hair and a white suit and was roughly the same height as Aeris. AVALANCHE watched as Rufus dismissed Palmer before talking to them. "So Sephiroth was really here? By the way who are you all?" He asked.
"I'm Cloud Strife, previous Lieutenant-Commander of SOLDIER." Cloud started.
"I'm from AVALANCHE!" Barret said next.
Tifa was next. "Me too."
"I'm a flower girl from the slums." Aeris introduced.
"I'm a research specimen." Red finished off.
Rufus looked amused. "What a group. Well I'm Rufus Shinra. President of Shinra Inc." He introduced himself.
"Only because your old man died." Barret cut in.
"Well.. Yes... I may as well give you my initiation speech." He cleared his throat before continuing. "My father ran Shinra very well, a perfect cover. Work for Shinra, get your pay, if terrorists attack Shinra's military forces will deal with it. It was perfect cover, at least from the outside. However I do things differently, I use fear to keep the people in line. It's too hard to do what my old man did." While he did this he walked through the group looking at each person individually but concentrating the speech on Cloud.
"Just like his father. He liked making speeches too." Tifa noted.
Rufus went back to looking at Cloud. "Cloud Strife I remember you. Weren't you missing?" He said.
Cloud nodded a reply before turning to Barret. "Barret get Aeris out the building."
"What!" Barret replied.
"I can't explain now, but this is a real crisis for the planet." Cloud said.
Barret still looked like he didn't under stand but still said. "Right."
The other four ran off the balcony for the glass elevator while Cloud turned back to Rufus.
"Why do you want to fight me?" Rufus asked him.
"You want the Promised Land and you want Aeris." He stated.
"The flower girl... She is beautiful, isn't she?" Cloud didn't answer that little comment.
"I can't let you or Sephiroth have either."
"You do know Sephiroth is an Ancient."
'His 'mother' isn't even human.'
"No he isn't." Cloud replied showing no sign of the outer influence.
"I guess this means we won't be allies."
End of Chapter 10