1-4. Breakthrough

Lucrecia held her breath as she slid the first of the newest set of plates under the microscope. She picked up a pen, pushed her glasses up, and focused the view.

Nothing. She sighed and dutifully entered a note in the chart.

10% solution of Project cells
No visible effect on host cells

Next plate. Out of curiosity, she switched to the other end of the series.

70% solution of Project cells
Total destruction of host cells

"Total destruction" was a polite way to put it. Bathed in a thick solution of Project cells, the cultured cells--nothing special, just an innocent layer of tissue from an anonymous donor--mutated into twisted blobs, abnormally mobile, that crept along the surface of the dish, sucking in bits of each other, devouring the nutrient gel on the plate, and dividing at a frightening rate. As accustomed as she was to the strange phenomena of Mako exposure and cellular mutation, the sight still chilled her. She pushed the plate carefully aside and started to count down the list.

60% solution of Project cells
Widespread mutation, cells still basically functional
50% solution of Project cells
Widespread mutation, cells still basically functional

Interesting, though not necessarily useful. These cells were still recognizable as human, though they had bloated in size and adhered to each other strangely, in patterns she hadn't seen in human cells. They still drained the nutrients from the plates at an advanced rate, though they no longer destroyed each other so voraciously. This might prove interesting in the long run, but it did not behave like the kind of stable system they sought. She drew a small star in the margin of each of these rows and noted: "May be useful in other applications..."

40% of Project cells

The door creaked open. Lucrecia looked up from her notes. A blond head poked in the door, and a hand waved. "Shelan!" she exclaimed. "Why are you here? Don't let Hojo catch you..."

Shelan shrugged. "Nah. Just came back for my stuff. Gast's got Hojo in a meeting upstairs, I'm home free."

"I'm so sorry what he did to you," Lucrecia exclaimed, rising from her chair to dig into her backpack. She pulled out Shelan's lab notebook and handed it to him. "I thought Hojo was going to burn it or something, so I grabbed it," she explained.

"Thanks. Screw Hojo, the brass back in Midgar is going to want a copy of this."

"Midgar? You're going back?"

Shelan nodded. "Yeah, I also braved the depths of Mad Mansion here to tell you that. I saw Gast the day after the weasel fired me. He was really great about it. Said I was being a bit 'unprofessional'--what a tragedy--but he sympathized about having to deal with the Hoj-beast. He said it probably wasn't worth giving me my assignment back, between having to shut Hojo up about it and my having to put up with the harassment, blah blah. So...I'm out of the Project. But Gast got me a new assignment. They're developing a plan to power all of Midgar on nothing but Mako reactors, and they want to see whether the pollution will kill us all." He grinned toothily. "Need mostly physiologists, but a team of biochem's too. So I have a decent assignment after all."

"That sounds like a great project, Shelan. Congratulations."

"Yeah...well...I guess it is good." Shelan looked down at his notebook, crossed his arms over it. "I mean...it's not the breakthrough of our generation, but..."

Lucrecia felt awful for her coworker; she'd been dismissed from an assignment before, and knew the crushing disappointment at having to give up a promising project. She thought she should probably go to him, offer some support--but she didn't know quite what to do. So she stood still, a little awkwardly. "It's still monumental, don't fool yourself. It could change everything in twenty years' time."

Shelan looked up; a lopsided trace of a smile returned to his face. "I guess you're right."

"'Course I am," she teased.

The smile widened. "Suuuure, that's right. I forgot I was talking to the Queen of the Universe."

Lucrecia bowed graciously. "You got it."

Shelan held his hand out. Lucrecia took it, and they shook firmly, warmly. He was a good worker, and smarter than he looked; she regretted seeing him go. "See ya around, Luce. Hey, for all I know, you might piss off Hojo and end up getting fired too. We can both figure out how not to poison the Midgar populace then."

"Sounds like a blast." They parted; Shelan looked around the room, as if trying to fix it in his memory.

"Good luck on the Project," he said. "And trust me, if you can manage to put up with that bastard Hojo, you're a better woman than I am." He paused. "Wait, that didn't come out right."

Lucrecia smiled. "I know what you mean."

"Good. So...I'll see ya."

"Goodbye," Lucrecia said quietly. Shelan waved and closed the door behind him.

Lucrecia sighed and returned to the microscope. 40% of Project cells was already written in her notes. She looked into the microscope and brought the view into focus.

She stared into the lens for a minute, carefully scanning across the entire plate, but a nervous excitement had simmered up.

40% of Project cells
Mild mutation, apparently fully functional

The cells still lay like normal human cells, though they appeared to adhere together more tightly. The nutrient gel was not destroyed, the cells did not suck each other in... but they grew more vigorously than the original cells, and their shape was subtly altered.

Lucrecia neatly circled that row of the chart, allowing a small smile to play over her face. She pressed a button on the microscope, recording the view for future reference. That looked promising...but there were still a few more plates to check.

30% of Project cells
Mild mutation in most cells, apparently fully functional
20% of Project cells
Mild mutation in some cells, apparently fully functional

The last line of the chart, ten percent, had already been filled in. She reviewed the thirty percent plate again, and made a note: "May also be useful; test regeneration properties."

This was it, she knew this was it. The most important find of her career so far. The real beginning of the Project.

Lucrecia stacked up the plates on the tray and returned them to the incubator, then washed her hands at the sink. Only then did she allow herself to punch her fists in the air and shout, "Yes!!"




The local pub in Nibelheim was no Upper Midgar ballroom, but it was good enough to celebrate in. The wooden tables were clean, the lanterns on the walls were a bright, friendly yellow, and the bartender--the only employee in sight--cheerfully served up a surprisingly wide array of beverages. It was crowded when Dr. Gast and Lucrecia entered; the bar was full of townspeople, workers from the mines for the most part, and many of the tables were occupied as well. Lucrecia followed her supervisor to an empty table against the wall.

"Now that we have the atmosphere," Dr. Gast said, "let me congratulate you again on your fine work on the Project."

"Thank you," answered Lucrecia, blushing a little. "Thank you for letting me work on it. It's a great honor."

"That it is, I must say. Though, to be honest, I'd thought about passing you by at first, Ms. Gainsborough. I didn't want to steal one of Shinra's most promising young scientists just to lock her in a basement for a year." Lucrecia could tell that he was joking about the basement part, but she realized the great compliment as well.

"Thank you, sir," she said softly, not sure what else to say. Most promising...? Surely she didn't deserve that kind of praise...

Dr. Gast waved off the formality. "No need for the sir, for a while. This is a celebration party!"

"A party?" Lucrecia looked around the small table, laughing.

"Well...we are most of the JENOVA Project research team..." Dr. Gast leaned over the table confidentially and lowered his voice. "Somehow I doubted the party would be helped by completing the team."

Lucrecia instinctively covered a giggle with her hand. "No argument there."

Dr. Gast waved to the bartender, who rounded the bar and headed their way. "So, what would you like, Ms. Gainsborough? Compliments of the Project's petty cash fund. Do you have any champagne?" he asked the bartender.

"Sure," the bartender answered. "Celebrating tonight? You're the Shinra scientists, huh? Found some way to clone people or somethin'?"

Dr. Gast laughed. "Not yet."

"Right, man. So that'll be one bottle of champagne--sorry, we only have one brand. Hey, miss, you are old enough, right?"

Lucrecia felt her face flush for a moment. "Yes, sir."

The bartender nodded and turned to Dr. Gast. "How 'bout you?" He laughed heartily at his own joke. "Ahhh, I tell ya. I'll be right back, folks." He left the table and headed back for the bar.

Lucrecia idly watched the man go, then looked down the line of people seated at the bar. They looked like mine workers, mostly, in for a beer after work. Except...when her gaze reached the end of the bar, she realized that two Turks were sitting there: a large bald man with a tattoo on the back of his neck, and...the one from the Mansion. The bald Turk had a beer like most of the other patrons, but the dark-haired one held a glass of red wine. He didn't appear to be drinking much, sipping once in a while, half-listening to the bald Turk's animated tirade, half gazing disinterestedly at the other bar patrons. Off duty like this, with one foot propped up on a stool rung, he looked much more relaxed, almost...graceful. Watching him, Lucrecia had the sudden thought that he had the makings of a languishing poet--or a vampire in a novel. Lucrecia bit her lip to keep from grinning at the ridiculous thought of that stylish, handsome young Turk as a ghoul.

Gast paused and looked at her quizzically. "What's the matter?" He turned halfway to follow the direction of her gaze.

Lucrecia looked down quickly and fidgeted with a cocktail napkin, tearing small pieces from the edge. She could feel her cheeks burning. "Nothing."

Gast smiled. "Turks, eh?" He chuckled, shaking his head. "Even level-headed Ms. Gainsborough can't resist that Turk magnetism?"

Lucrecia giggled in spite of herself. "It's silly, I know."

"Maybe so. But it doesn't hurt, as long as you don't get too involved with them. They're dangerous men, Ms. Gainsborough. It's in their nature."

Lucrecia looked back up at the man at the end of the bar. Dangerous...? Yes, she could see him as dangerous; she could see a cold glint behind his calm eyes. But that was irrelevant to her, unless he actually spoke to her.

And she couldn't see that happening any time soon...

At that moment, the dark-haired Turk's eyes landed on her. Lucrecia froze, half-expecting him to glance on by, but he did not. She looked away for a moment, embarrassed to be caught staring at him--and peeked back up to find him still watching her. He seemed about to speak to his companion, but then spoke over the counter to the bartender, who was just returning from a back room with a bottle of champagne. Lucrecia found herself wishing she could hear the young man's voice, and wondered what he was saying. The bartender peered toward their table, toward Lucrecia, and nodded. He said something to the Turk, who nodded silently. He looked back at the top of the bar for a few seconds, but his gaze strayed back to Lucrecia...

"Here we are!" the bartender cried. Lucrecia startled, her concentration broken. "Two glasses of champagne for our uptown visitors. Here's hopin' you don't blow us all up." He poured two glasses for Lucrecia and Dr. Gast. "Enjoy."

Lucrecia took her glass and clinked it against Dr. Gast's, hoping the shaking of her hands wouldn't show. Her heart was still racing.

She could think of nothing but the Turk.