Chapter
Two
Dark
Warrior
Vincent
Valentine, trapped forever in the body of a twenty-seven year old due to
scientific tinkering upon his body, lurked alone in the grotto of his former
love. While Cloud and Tifa had both moved as far away from Nibelheim as they
could go, Vincent remained nearby. What those two regarded as memories waiting
to strike like a poisonous snake, Vincent embraced, keeping himself alone and living
his memories every single day of his life. Although Lucrecia's ghost had long
since abandoned her grotto to finally rest in the Lifestream and move onto her
next life, Vincent continued to occupy it in shadowy solitude. The villagers of
Nibelheim, still hiding their secrets, remained oblivious to the fact that they
had a neighbor living literally right over the mountains.
And Vincent
remained wreathed in the shadows of the past.
When he first
heard the pitiful cry just barely over the dull roar of the waterfall, Vincent
thought that he had been imagining things. But it came again, pricking at his
sharp hearing like a needle constantly jabbing through taut cloth. He stood and
pulled out his Death Penalty gun, padding towards the grotto's entrance like a
shadow. With a quick sideways movement, he slid through the curtain of water
and pointed his gun at the object outside.
It floated nearby
the edge of the lake, a watertight rush basket with a white-wrapped bundle
nestled in it. Checking around for anything else, Vincent slung his Death
Penalty back into its holster and stepped into the shallow part of the water.
He extended his right arm, reaching out and taking hold of the edge of the
basket, tugging it slowly towards him. As soon as it was in front of him, he
pulled his gun out again, pointed it at the bundle, and cautiously drew back
the cloth with his mechanical left arm delicately pinching the fabric.
Had he not lived
most of his life asleep in a coffin, Vincent would have dropped his jaw down in
shock. As it was, he had forgotten how to show expressions on his face and kept
it in its cool, contained mask of no emotion. Snuggling into the depths of the
basket was a tiny child—a baby girl. One thumb was stuck at an odd angle in her
mouth while her other hand curled up at her side. Her hair was barely
noticeable, and at the moment was a light blonde. She was asleep and oblivious
to her surroundings as well as her savior.
Vincent sighed
mentally and put his gun away, knowing from past experience and years of
self-training that this infant was of no threat to him. He carefully gathered
up the child, basket and all, and raised it, dripping, from the water. When he
turned and began to slosh out of the cool lake, the baby wrinkled her nose and
immediately woke up as a spray of water hit her cheek.
The man froze
instantly, unsure of what to do. The little girl opened her pale green eyes and
stared up at Vincent, barely managing to focus on his slender face. When a lock
of Vincent's long black hair fell from over his shoulders and swung in the
baby's face, she giggled out loud and reached up, batting at it playfully like
a kitten with a ball of yarn. Her tiny brow knit with concentration as she put
out both hands, grabbing at the lock of hair and burbling with glee. Vincent
winced as her surprisingly strong hands tugged hard and shifted the basket to
his left arm, trying to separate his hair from the girl's grasp with his other
hand.
Once his hair had
been freed, Vincent continued slogging out of the water, pants and a good
bottom portion of his blood red cape soaked and dripping. The girl kept trying
to snatch up the elusive strands of hair that flew temptingly over her head,
each hair rising and falling as Vincent's head nodded in rhythm with his steps.
She only stopped when he, too, stopped, standing nearby the waterfall that hid
the entrance to Lucrecia's grotto.
"How did you get
here?" Vincent muttered, almost surprising himself with the sound of his own
voice. He had lived in isolation for almost half a year and hadn't spoken out
loud throughout the whole duration. After all, what was there for someone to
speak to within an abandoned grotto?
The girl cooed
and blinked sleepily up at Vincent in reply, chubby arms and hands waving
sluggishly in the air.
"…And what do I
do with you?" he continued, watching as the baby yawned hugely and dropped her
eyelids over her strange eyes—the same pale green as the Lifestream, he noted
in surprise, with its ever-shifting light green to aqua shades. Vincent resumed
moving, keeping a steady pace so as not to wake the child. As he walked through
the waterfall, he raised his cape and made a cave over the infant's head with
it to shield her from the rushing water. His own head got the full brunt of the
cold water, but he was used to it, whereas a tiny girl like this one wouldn't
be. Moving to the stone steps in the back of the rounded grotto, he set down on
them and set the basket with the baby still inside it on the ground, intent on
wringing out his hair and cape.
Immediately, the
child's eyes flew open in surprise. She let out the loudest, highest-pitched
wail Vincent had ever heard in his entire life. Surprised, Vincent swept the
basket back up on his lap and peered down at the squalling girl, trying to
figure out what was wrong.
As if he had just
unplugged her power cord, the loud scream cut short and Vincent was faced with
the sleepy-eyed, albeit tear-streaked baby once more. Curious, Vincent made as
if to set the basket back down on the ground, freezing when her face screwed
itself up in fair warning.
"Point taken," he
murmured, settling on his side with the baby still tucked in her basket beside
him. He propped his head up on an elbow and dangled his mechanical claw of a
left hand over the basket's edge, keeping the sharp tips that had seen more
than their fair share of blood turned away from the neonate's grabby fingers.
Fascinated by the shiny new object, the girl stared at it entrancingly until
she fell asleep. With her head tilted to the side and her hands tucked under
her chin, she looked like a tiny angel.
"You remind me of
someone," Vincent mused out loud as he watched the babe pull in deep breaths of
air. "But who it is…I don't know. Someone I knew before…" He withdrew his claw
and lay completely on his side, keeping the basket tilted partially towards him
so that he could keep an eye on its contents. "Who are you and where did you
come from, anyway?"
The baby gave no
reply.
* * *
When he woke up,
Vincent opened one eye first out of pure habit in order to survey his
surroundings for attackers.
Don't be stupid, Vincent Valentine, he chided himself. How can anyone attack you in here?
The first thing he saw out of that
crimson eye was an empty rush-woven basket, save for a tangle of white cloth
that spilled out of it. Other than that, everything was perfectly normal—
What the…the kid!
Jolting upright,
Vincent looked around frantically to find the girl sitting nearby, examining
his Death Penalty with curious interest. Stifling a harsh comment, he rose and
plucked the firearm out of the baby's hands, tucking it back into its holster.
Then he gingerly picked the child up, holding her cautiously in his arms.
"Look, kid, that is a big no-no," he told her
firmly, feeling silly in every aspect. This was how he had seen parents
disciplining their children back when he had still been a Turk, though, and
they were the only role models he had. His own parents he couldn't even
remember, due to the many years he had remained suspended in the basement of
the Shinra Mansion in Nibelheim. "Never, ever touch this" he waved the gun in
her face for a brief moment before putting it away, "again. No." Vincent shook
his head at her and followed it up by a negative motion of his finger.
The girl made her
bubbly little baby noise, cocking her head to one side.
"No. No. Bad.
No," Vincent repeated.
Her face fell and
she cast her eyes to the ground, the very image of a truly repentant child.
Do most children act like this at such an
early age? Vincent wondered. She's
pretty smart…
The girl glanced cautiously up at him from beneath her
eyelashes as if trying to see if there was any pity in his red eyes. Unable to
see very well in her position, she tilted her head all the way up, then
apparently changed her mind and grabbed at his hair instead, tugging it
happily.
"Don't start that
again," Vincent groaned, finding himself once more locked in a tug-of-war that
involved his own hair as a rope. "Kid, when you grow enough hair, you can pull
it all you want. And believe me, I—and my scalp—will be completely relieved
when that happens." He finally undid her grip and held her cradled to his side,
keeping her arms out of reach of his hair. "I think I have to give you a name
if I'm going to keep you, which I most probably am going to do," he continued
as the girl gazed up at him. "The problem is, I don't know what to name you."
She smiled
angelically, a motion that immediately brought Vincent to the past once again.
Her eyes deepened to a laughing emerald green, long, brown hair tumbled from
her scalp, and her face smoothed out into that of an innocent whose life was
cut tragically short.
"Aeris," he
breathed gently. "That's who you remind me of, for some reason. Aeris."
Vincent had never
bothered to even try to get to know Aeris very well and had not even mourned
her death. And yet he could still remember the bright, innocent spark within
her that was heightened with her sparkling green eyes. It was the same kind of
spirit that the child he held in his arms possessed deep within her fragile
body.
"So…I suppose
your name is going to be Aeris from now on."
Aeris smiled
gently, a slow spread of her lips that once more reminded Vincent of the baby's
namesake, and then she fell asleep once again.
