Contrary to Cloud's expectations, Reno turned out to be a tolerable houseguest. Just as he had the ability to fill an entire room with his presence, it seemed he also had the knack of fading quietly into the background and not drawing any attention to himself. Had things been any other way it was doubtful that Cloud could have been persuaded to postpone the trip to Junon for a few days. On the surface of things Reno's reason of wanting to keep his head down for a while seemed sound, but Cloud couldn't help being suspicious of the man. He had kept himself to himself mostly, and as he'd never struck Cloud as the unsociable type it just added to his uncomfortable impression that Reno had something to hide.
Then again, he did have something to hide. Himself. Kielestis Inc. seemed to be on an all-out campaign to find Reno, or more likely, their stolen files. There was no mention of them in the various press releases, of course, but they certainly weren't after him for the good of society. That was the spin they were putting on it, along with a long list of charges strangely lacking in "industrial sabotage". When Cloud had asked Reno about the truth of this, he'd just laughed and said that there wasn't much they could accuse him of that he hadn't done at some point. It was hard, no, impossible to trip Reno up and get any actual information out of him. He was one of those people who could talk at length without giving anything away. When he was talking you always felt that at last, this was it, here was something you could pin down about him. But when he finished, and you tried to sift through what you'd heard, it just ran straight through your fingers and you realised there hadn't ever been anything there at all. So by the end of three days Cloud felt he knew even less about him than ever. That thought didn't fill him with confidence. He'd been hoping to find out a bit more about their new ally, if that was indeed what he was. Especially one, probably inconsequential little thing that had been niggling at him - Reno was a name from the Costa del Sol area, but Reno certainly wasn't Costan, nor did he look like either of his parents could have been.
Reno wasn't the only worry on Cloud's mind though. In the past days he'd found that he was looking at Kielestis Inc. with new eyes, and he wasn't liking what he saw.
Because it was Shin-ra.
He couldn't believe he hadn't noticed the similarities before, that they had been able to gain people's trust, that the world was going back to how it had been before. How had people been duped? Better the devil you know - perhaps that was true. It was a small mercy that they weren't using mako, but if they were re-starting the Jenova project they soon would be, if not on a Shin-ra scale. And why re-start the Jenova project anyway? What did they think they could gain?
Cloud had a nasty suspicion he knew. History moved in circles, after all.
And that meant that, even if Jenova was dead, there was going be trouble.
It hadn't been hard to get a crossing to Junon. Cloud and Tifa had brought a passage on one of the ferries, whilst Reno had snuck on board. They would be meeting up with him soon, but for the moment the couple were taking advantage of the opportunity to discuss the situation alone.
"I don't trust him," Cloud murmured, gazing down over the side of the ship and watching the waves below. Tifa nodded.
"I know how you feel... but what has he got to gain?"
"That's what I've been thinking about. Something in that report's been getting at me. Escaped specimens...action taken as necessary." He sighed. "That means me, Tifa. We know Reno was working for Kielestis. What if he still is?"
"It's possible... but they seem pretty keen on finding him. Why would they risk his being caught before he'd got us to Junon?"
"I dunno... I just can't figure the guy out. And until I do, I don't think I can trust him. Or anyone connected to Kielestis. The Jenova project... they must be insane..."
Tifa nodded, and bit her lip. She'd had something on her mind ever since she'd hear about the Jenova project being restarted, and though she had never spoken to Cloud about it, she knew he must have been thinking along the same lines.
"Cloud... if Jenova is alive..."
"...she may not be the only one," her husband finished for her, his grip on the railings tightening. They looked at each other.
"...you think so..?"
Cloud looked away. "We beat him once..." he said. "Come on, let's find that rat Reno. I don't want him sneaking off now."
Reno was in the cargo hold, having a cigarette. This entire situation was grating against his strong instincts of self-preservation, instincts that had been honed to razor-point through a youth in the Midgar slums and six years in the Turks. He should be getting as far away from Junon as possible, not going back there. Certainly not going back the Kielestis building, of all places. All in all, he was regretting his brief attack of morality.
"Reno? You here?"
"Over here," Reno replied lazily, recognising Tifa's voice. Soon the three of them were sitting amongst the luggage, Cloud and Reno both avoiding each other's eye.
"So, what's the plan?" Reno said eventually, to no one in particular but giving Cloud a sidelong glance.
"Well, first thing has to be getting into the Kielestis building," Cloud said, finding to his slight surprise that he was comfortably slipping back into leader mode. "Reno, what's the security like there?"
"Pretty high, but nothing I can't handle. Once you're inside, you don't need to worry about the people, they just assume you've got a right to be there. But the place is full of surveillance equipment and automatic security checks, especially on the higher floors, and I'm guessing that's where you want to be."
"Will that be a problem?"
"Not if we're careful. But I wouldn't want to hang around too long."
"We just need some idea of exactly what they're up to. We need to know what we're dealing with."
"Just that? We'll probably need to go over the whole damn building!" Reno spat, glowering at Cloud. Cloud narrowed his eyes.
"If that's what it takes..."
"You two!" Tifa intervened.
"Sorry, babe," Reno said, back in his lazy tone, half turning and giving her mischievous smile. Cloud gave him a dark look, but said nothing. As well as going easily back into leader mode, he was also finding for the first time in a long while the desire to take a sword to someone. He'd never liked Reno but in the past they'd managed to come to an unspoken agreement of mutual non-interference, through respect of each other's fighting ability, but Cloud wasn't sure how long he could put up with Reno on a day-to-day basis.
"You must know some places not to look," Tifa said to Reno, "That has to narrow it down a little."
Reno ran a hand through his dishevelled hair.
"Well, I doubt we'll find anything on the general access floors. So that's one to fifty-nine out..."
"How many floors are there?"
"Seventy."
Just like the Shin-ra building... mused Cloud.
"So... eleven floors to check out...we can do that."
Junon was a dump. It looked as though it had never been rebuilt after the WEAPON attacks, just boarded over. Near the docks the buildings looked positively dangerous. Only closer to the Kielestis building on the outskirts of the town did anything look like it had been properly repaired. And the village beneath the town had expanded into something not unlike the Midgar slums. After all, most of the people had moved in from Midgar, needing homes and work. And Kielestis had taken advantage of that.
Cloud, Tifa and Reno were now just outside the huge, brand new Kielestis building. Despite its location near the outskirts of town it still dominated the whole place, with its immense size, mirrored windows and the phoenix logo prominently displayed on its west-facing side. Cloud had to concede it was impressive, but that didn't help them get in. Going in through the front would be unwise at the best of times and was impossible with Reno with them. So they'd been skirting around the building looking for an alternative route in. Cloud just hoped it didn't involve endless stairs. Then Reno stopped so suddenly he nearly ran into him.
"Right..." Reno muttered to himself, as Cloud bit back an angry comment, "The reception's that way, so..." He bowed his head for a moment, apparently in deep thought, then went over and squinted into one of the nearby windows. "Damn one-way glass...aha!"
"What?" said Cloud and Tifa simultaneously.
"Toilet block," Reno said simply, not turning around.
"So?" snapped Cloud. Reno rolled his eyes.
"Firstly, there probably won't be any surveillance equipment around, unless these guys are really paranoid. And secondly, if I remember rightly, there's a lift just a short way down the corridor from this particular one. That means we won't be hanging around in the open for too long. So, through this window might just be the best way in."
"Can it be opened?" Tifa asked dubiously. Reno ran his fingers over the frame.
"I think there's a catch on the other side. A good push might break it, though it'll probably take all three of us." He braced himself against the window. "You two just going to stand there?"
At first, nothing seemed to be happening. Then there was the sound of protesting metal on the other side of the glass, and moments later the window gave way so suddenly they all nearly fell through.
Luckily the toilet was unoccupied and Reno had been right. They easily managed to make it unnoticed to the lift, and took the trip up to the fifty-ninth floor to plan their next move. They would need keycards to get to floors sixty and above, so the general consensus was to "acquire" some on the floor below. What to do after that was presenting the difficulty. It would cut down on the time they would have to spend in the building if they split up, but Cloud both wanted to keep an eye on Reno and knew he would only worry leaving Tifa on her own. Then again, moving in a group they would be far more obvious.
The keycard hunt was almost too easy. They ended up with two cards, one clearing them up to the sixty-seventh floor, the other right the way up to floor seventy. Eventually, despite Cloud's misgivings, it was decided that he and Tifa would start at floor seventy and work down, whilst Reno worked from floor sixty up.
That had been an hour ago.
"This is hopeless," Cloud said, his voice filled with exasperation. "Nothing. This just doesn't make sense, Tifa."
"I know. No labs. No equipment."
"Yeah." Cloud shook his head. "I'm gonna call Reno. If he's checked out all the floors below us, we'd better get out of here." He pulled out his PHS, and was just about to dial when it went off in his hand. "What the..."
"Cloud, you found anything?"
"No."
"Figures. Look, I think I know why. What floor are you on?"
"Sixty-five."
"Okay. Get to the lifts, I'm coming up."
"Just tell me...Reno? Dammit!"
"What was it?" Tifa asked. "Has he found something?"
"I have no idea," Cloud muttered, closing his eyes. "He just said to meet him at the lifts. Let's go."
Reno was already there, lent nonchalantly against a wall, when they arrived.
"Hey," he said.
"What is it, Reno?"
Reno smiled smugly, and handed Cloud a keycard.
"Take a look at that."
Cloud did. It wasn't like the other cards. They were numbered, the number indicating the highest floor the bearer had access to. But not this one. It was very plain, and had a single symbol boldly printed on it. Theta.
"That's a keycard for the lower levels," Reno continued. "That's where the labs are."
"But...they would have to have tunnelled into the hill to get any lower," Tifa said, a shade disbelievingly. Reno shrugged.
"Then that's probably what they've done."
"That means this whole place was designed with the Jenova project in mind," Cloud said darkly. "How did you find this out?"
"A little bird told me."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. The same little bird that so kindly handed that card over."
Cloud decided he didn't want to know the details. He'd heard the rumours about what the Turks were trained to do to wind information out of people, and if he knew anything about the Turks it was that the rumours were never half as bad as the truth.
"Right. Well, we'd better check this out."
"I was afraid you'd say that."
They crowded around the control panel in the lift, and Cloud used the keycard. All the numbered floor options lit up, as with the standard cards, and a new column of letters was added to their options. But it wasn't just alpha to theta.
"Alpha to rho... holy shit, that's eighteen floors!"
"Wow. That must have been some investment."
Cloud found himself nodding numbly. Eighteen hidden floors. Where they all dedicated to the Jenova project? What was Kielestis up to? Whatever it was, he suddenly needed to know more than ever. He reached out and selected floor alpha. The lift started to plummet.
But almost as soon as it had started to gather speed, it slowed again, and stopped. The lights in the lift flashed, just once, and the three looked between each other, the same unspoken fear running through each of their minds. Then there was a voice.
"This is a security announcement. A precautionary evacuation of the building is being carried out, due to a minor fire on floor sixty-two. Please use the stairs, as in accordance with safety guidelines the lifts have been stopped. Thank you."
The lift had indeed grounded itself at the nearest floor, and its doors were now wide open and looked as though they were going to stay that way. Cloud checked to see what floor they had stopped on. Floor sixty.
"Come on. We're going to find out what's really going on," he said decisively, rushing out of the lift towards the stairs. Tifa followed, and, after a little hesitation, so did Reno. They were largely ignored by the employees obediently making their way in the opposite direction, who petered out as they climbed higher.
Cloud paused in front of the door to the sixty-second floor, to catch his breath and wait for the other two to catch up. Then, not knowing why he felt so nervous, slowly pushed the door open.
A chilling familiar scene met his eyes.
Getting interesting... or at least I hope so. That chapter probably took me a little more time than it should have done, as it got rather long, and I've begun setting up my FF website, Sephira Yesod. And I was ill. And the cat was sick. And... OK, enough excuses. Hopefully I won't be so long on the next one - Anguipes Seraph