Chapter Two
The next day everyone paired off and searched the island for enemies to battle, refreshed and revived from their sleep. Cloud with Tifa – the two highest levelled members of the group both over level 85, Barret with Cid – both only four levels below Tifa - and Vincent was with Yuffie. Vincent was at level 72. Yuffie at level 70. he was not feeling particularly well the next morning, his HP was still low, only at 2000 and his magic had all but gone. Yuffie didn't seem to notice his reluctance to battle as enthusiastically as her.
"Come on Vinny!" 'Vinny'? No one has ever called me that.
"I'd rather let you gain the experience, you need it more than me."
"Oh thank you very much, how gracious you are to me Vinny." She mocked.
"The young are always so eager to prove themselves. I don't feel the need so much at my age." Yuffie tilted her head.
"How old are you?" She enquired sincerely.
"Twenty-seven." He said quickly, he wasn't sure if he should start revealing the truth, after all they had come all this way together hadn't they?
"Oh, I'd've thought you'd be older, you being a grown man back when Sephiroth was born. How old was Sephiroth anyway?" Vincent paused. Sephiroth had been born just before he was put in that coffin, he was woken thirty years later and Cloud did reveal after that five years before that he did in fact kill Sephiroth.
"Twenty-five when he died, about that age. All this time, it was his spirit we were fighting, I think… This whole story is so confusing…"
"You got that right." They walked on a few more paces in silence. This was really the first time they had ever been together like this, Yuffie wasn't sure what to say. She was a loud-mouthed little girl who liked to make her point and have fun, Vincent was so opposite though, she was worried that anything she might say would trigger off something, like a hidden rage perhaps. Maybe she had been a bit foolish to call him Vinny…
"I have to return back to camp…" Vincent said suddenly feeling a bolt shoot up his left arm, he struggled to hide the pain in his voice that Yuffie heard. She nodded, seemingly more relaxed than ever.
"Okay, I'll keep on after all I am a Ninja and survived in the world perfectly well before Cloud found me." She grinned. "See ya Vinny!" Then she leapt away into the bushes, wondering why the hell she was suddenly bright red in the face. Vincent clenched his teeth and grunted, he tried to bend his fingers on his left hand but they were stiff and painful. He turned and quickly swooped through the trees back to the camp.
~Final Fantasy VII~
That night everyone once again sat around the fire and laid out their winnings. Twenty-seven potions, 14 ethers, a lot of Molotovs and one piece of magic materia that Yuffie found – supposedly – lying about underneath a log.
"I did I swear!"
"Then why'd you decide to go rooting around under logs?"
"That's where you find stuff silly! People always drop stuff under bushes and logs, I should know man."
"Has anyone actually seen another person on this island? Do we even know where we are?!" Cloud panicked. "We have no transport off this island and we haven't got a clue where abouts in the world we are!" Cid leaned forward.
"Calm down man! Last I knew we were heading northeast, the quickest way back to Wutai. I don't think this place is on the map." Everyone leaned forward, except for Vincent who had not gathered with them and Cait Sith who was still immobile.
"What do you mean?" Tifa asked. "We're on an undiscovered island…?"
"With no transport…?" Cloud added.
"No map…" Red said.
"An' no damn way of gettin' offa it?" Barret growled. Cid leaned back holding his hands up starting to feel a little worried.
"Now now guys, I never said we were COMPLETELY in the gutter did I…?" They didn't seem to agree and soon enough they pushed the subject to the back of their minds and got into the subject at hand; Supper – all thanks to the brilliant Yuffie who seemed to have a knack for finding things.
~Final Fantasy VII~
Vincent wasn't at the fire with the others; he was sitting down by the gaping hole of what was left of the Highwind, his long cloak wrapped around him holding his left arm to his stomach.
Each member of AVALANCHE, and anyone who travelled a lot or were always ready to fight, wore a wristband that showed your level of HP and MP, when your limit gage was full, it was one of Shinra's greatest creations and one of the only creations Vincent didn't mind using. It was very handy and right now it showed that his health despite the fact that he hadn't been in any fights since the end battle at Northern Crater, was lower than it was earlier. Much lower.
It was the poison. Obviously he was not immune to it as he had presumed, just because he couldn't feel it eating away at him it was still there slowly taking down his health. Vincent wasn't carrying any healing materia or potions, even if he did he didn't have enough MP to use it.
Sleep… he had to sleep and heal… but sleep risked more nightmares, they would come back to him and then maybe he wouldn't be able to come back. Right now though, his left arm was throbbing, he could feel the blood pumping round it and gingerly decided to take off the metal armour.
Despite what the others thought, Hojo had not completely turned his arm into a robotic one, underneath the metal was…he did not really know; he hadn't ever wanted to look.
~Final Fantasy VII~
Yuffie was carrying some cooked meat on a makeshift tray – whatever it had been before she didn't know but it tasted good. She was taking it to Vincent, who she was sure would be somewhere around the ruins of the Highwind. She walked around a tree and pushed through some weeds into a clearing, the Highwind lay in a scrap heap, bits of wire, cable and metal hung down from branches all twisted up, Yuffie walked on treading carefully through shards of glass and other unrecognisable bits of metal on tip-toes. She made it to a corner, where part of the wing had bent inwards blocking her path, the yellow sense materia – mastered – suddenly started vibrating in her pocket and she knew that someone was just around the corner. She peeked round and smiled realising it was Vincent and that she was being very naughty by spying on him, then her expression changed to that of complete surprise and curiousness because he was just starting to, what it looked like to her, take off his metal arm. Yuffie watched. Fascinated…
~Final Fantasy VII~
Slowly he felt around at the thing until his fingers came to a groove, he held on and gently pulled at it until it opened up like a case. The cold chill of the evening air rushed in and he felt something touching his arm once again after being locked up for thirty years, it wasn't really that bad. Vincent looked up quickly and saw no one, adjusting how he sat he lifted the rest of the metal off and stared hard at his naked left arm, his eyes widening in…not fear, but wonder, in a way it fascinated him because even though the rest of his body had stayed young, his arm had grown old and sallow with age, it felt tender at his touch and the ends of his fingers…
…Like a beast's claws, they were thin and unnaturally long, bent slightly at the end with short sharp claws instead of fingernails, various blotches of purple or blue dots were patterned all the way up his arm like a strange new disease or like a mass of bruises, bits of metal were dotted up the arm, poking through his skin like the heads of nails. He brushed his arm with his right index finger and shivered at the touch, tiny white hairs rose automatically to hold the warmth of his body in. It was perfectly clear to him now what Hojo had done; he had injected Jenova cells directly into his arm and encased it in the metal armour to protect it from harm, then the cells had travelled through his body via the blood and changed him to be eternally young until the day he would die. The arm was practically useless now, all it was, was a deformed limb growing old in time and weaker as the Jenova cells inside him grew stronger turning him into a monster.
He looked at the wristband – it was called a Status Meter – and saw that he was getting weaker; he would have to sleep to save himself. But did he want to save himself? All these years he just wanted to die, now though… he wanted to live, death frightened him as much as it did to everyone else. Vincent put the case back on again and strangely it reassured him of his safety, without it he was hideous and repulsive, with it he was just a strange young looking man with a dark and secret past. He lay back with everything seemingly normal and closed his eyes.
It was so easy to drift away… he was so tired…
~Final Fantasy VII~
Yuffie stood back and let out her breath. So that was what Vincent held underneath…scary. She decided not to try and give him some food, he probably wouldn't have wanted it anyway, no one had ever seen Vincent remove his mask so no one had seen him eat… she wasn't even sure if Vincent did eat… the whole storyline was a complete messed up idea... she turned away slowly, hesitating at first but then striding off confidently back to the fire to settle down for the night.