What's In A Name

What's In A Name?

By: Footnote

Act I:

The Turk Named Valentine

Part IV: Beliefs in Magic

          "I knew you'd come," she said when the song was over, not turning around to face him.  "You're different from the others."

Vincent didn't know what to do here, so he stood in the open behind her, waiting for some clue.

"You don't need to feel awkward, Mr. Valentine.  I only want to tell you something, then I will allow you to rest your weary head," she still did not turn to face him and Vincent could see an angled profile of the scientist's face from where he stood.

Lucrecia? was the obvious thing that first popped into his mind.  He was about to ask Dante if this meeting had anything to do with his beloved.

"No, sir, I am afraid I do not bring news of Ms. D'Angelo."

Vincent's bright eyes widened, "How did you know?"

Dante sighed and turned to face him finally.  Something in her warm emerald eyes had changed from the sparkling girl earlier.  "I am about to entrust you with a secret I hold, and while I do so I'll make you a promise.  Will you listen?"

Vincent didn't know what was going on, but gave a curt, uncertain nod in her direction.

Dante looked down slightly, glaring at the shingle between Vincent's feet.  "What I'm about to tell you is going to be something you won't like and you won't understand.  I am a being beyond you humans and even the Cetra.  I am a Sage, an Oracle.  Call me what you may, and that's what I be."  Dante paused for a moment from her speech that sounded like she was reading from a well-read book, and then continued, "I have a proposal to make.  You know now that I've already read your thoughts once or twice.  My promise is that if you keep my secret then I will not mess with your mind, fair enough?"

Vincent reeled from the information after quirking an eyebrow at her.  Oracle?  What the hell?  He could only blink at her somewhere in between a stupor and suspicion for a moment.  When he regained his senses somewhat, he asked a very standard question, "What else can you do?"  He realized that his voice was higher than usual, but he managed to keep his dignity.

"A few other things…I don't want to get you in too deep with this."  Her voice was low and Vincent detected a slight hint of sorrow in it.

"On the contrary, ma'am, you have gotten me involved, so I might as well see how deep it gets.  I don't want to be standing on the shore if you are drowning.  I'm supposed to protect you, remember?" some part of Vincent told him how foolish he was to say this, but he quickly pushed that thought away.  It was his duty and obligation to protect these scientists, it did not matter if one of them was a supernatural being or not.  At any other time he would have smiled cynically at that strange thought.

Dante, in the meanwhile, sighed and looked away from him again.  Vincent now noticed that she was looking at the stars.  "If you must know, time travel, to some extent, changing what I look like if it comes down to it."

Now Vincent's eyes narrowed; he had heard of mind readers before, but he'd never heard of a human werewolf.  This conversation was getting less believable as it went on, but the Turk in him told him that she was not lying.

"I know it's hard to accept and probably a wee bit dumb of me to, out of no where, go 'Hey, guess what!  I'm an Oracle!' but we're on a need-to-know basis here," Dante was looking deep into his bright cinnamon-amber eyes, searching for answers that she refused to pick from his brain.  "So do we have a deal?"

Vincent stopped spinning for a moment and looked at her, doubt and disbelief clouding his pretty eyes.  "Are sure you're an Oracle?"

"I stand before you.  What proof do you want?" she was not pleased that he wasn't accepting her and it was written all over her face.

"I won't deny that you can hear what I think.  You've showed me that," he ran a nervous hand through his raven hair.

She mimicked his movement while he was thinking over the proposal.  When he looked back up to her, she had black hair.  Not to the point where it was her long hair turned black, but it was his wedge-cut as well.  He blinked in surprise and took a cautious step backwards.  What have I gotten myself into? he thought, knowing that he had tested the waters and was now drowning in them. 

"What are you doing?" he yelped.  She blinked calmly and when her eyes opened, they were a bright honey-amber.  His own eyes stared back at him coolly.  Vincent for some unknown reason was reminded of making eye contact with a mirror.  The Turk would have laughed if the situation weren't going so unusually at the moment. 

"Is this enough proof for you?" her voice wasn't hers anymore.  It was deeper and cold as ice.  Vincent suddenly realized that she had taken his voice as well.  In his shock, he stumbled backwards and slammed into an adjacent window to cease his retreat.  Finding his senses in his dull haze of astonishment, he realized that he had to keep calm to get to the point.

"Okay!  Okay!  Stop it!  I believe you!" Vincent's world was askew enough at this moment for him to actually admit these words.

Dante evenly closed her eyes and shook her head vigorously.  Before Vincent's eyes, her hair grew out and changed gradually from smooth raven to airy caramel apple.  Her head was still in motion and he thought of a lion, shaking its mane out as if to get rid of something caught in the fur.  When she turned to him again, her eyes were not the calculating hazelnut but her own granny apple green.  They still held a slight Turk coolness to them, but it was quickly fading as Dante looked at him expectantly.

"Okay, how do I know when you are clairvoyantly messing with me and when you're not if we are going to keep our bargain?" Mr. Valentine's mind was racing to keep his cool under the circumstances, so he smoothly chose to revert back to the original topic. He also knew how to strike a deal.  He'd spent many-an-hour escorting President ShinRa to business meetings and had learned a great deal there.

"You have my word.  I won't read your thoughts if you don't reveal to my nature to anyone.  Those are the standards," she was glaring at him now though she had a mischievousness to her grin.  Dante was enjoying herself.

"I don't trust your word.  Call it paranoia, but that's just me," Vincent was smirking as well now.  Dante was making this fun and she was making it easier to forget that she had nearly become him.

The scientist sighed, looking away from the man for a moment as if making up her mind, then turned back to him.  "What if I told you that I know something that is going to happen that affects you directly?  Now I can give you the choice to take the hard way or the impossible way when the time comes.  I could screw everything up by telling you this alone.  Not only am I risking yours and my life, but the lives of others as well.  Now if you want me to help you make the right decisions in the future, then it's better to be my friend and not an acquaintance at those times because like you don't trust my word, I don't trust acquaintances.  Now do we have a deal?"

Vincent considered this proposition.  Yes, the benefits of this deal defiantly outweighed the bad.  All he had to do was keep a secret, right?  Fair enough, he liked it.  "Alright, done!"  The scientist and the Turk shook on it, each one with a satisfied grin on the their face.  Vincent's thoughts reverted involuntarily to the look on President ShinRa's face when he struck a deal and had to stop himself from cringing.  He looked like a hungry hyena carefully watching another predator bring down its own meal while devising a plan to steal the hard-earned food.

"You should do that more often," Dante said now back to her usual sparkling self that was sweet as a ripe summer peach with strawberry wine.

"What, strike a deal?" Vincent asked as he returned her look.

Dante glanced at him, her eyes still shimmering like emeralds through the dim light, "Smile."