Disclaimer? Indeed! Would it surprise anyone if I said that Final Fantasy VII was created by Square, and Travyn was created by me? I thought not.

Classes? Scarlet blinked blankly, uncomprehending. When the edge of the keycard began biting into her palm, she shook herself from her reverie and searched out the lock it matched. Anything was better than standing in the hall looking like...well...looking like she'd just crawled out of the slums.

10-H, 10-I, 10-K. The number was nailed to the door as a golden plaque, the sort she remembered from Travyn's building. From the lush shag carpeting the halls, however, she suspected that these apartments might be more lavish than the one that had housed her prior to her exile from the plate. Cautiously, she crossed to the correct side of the corridor.

Her hand paused above the keyswipe, trembling. She was dirty, half-naked, and standing in the hall of an affluent apartment complex on the surface of Midgar without her weapons. If for some reason the lock didn't accept her keycard, she was going to be screwed; and not in an enjoyable way such as the night had started with. There was little to be done about it now; but she couldn't help feeling like the events were those of some strange - possibly drug-induced - dream.

Scarlet lowered the card, only to close her eyes at the last second as it was swiped. There was a particularly satisfying hiss as the lock released, and she spent a few seconds staring at the door unbelievingly before finally reaching for the knob. It turned with little effort on her part, and she swung into the room.

If there was a Heaven...Scarlet believed she was there. The apartment was so far removed from the flats of Sector 4 that it stunned her. Silently, she crept inside; crimson carpeting crushing beneath her toes as she moved away from the door. It was thick enough for them to leave imprints. Hell, even Trav's rugs hadn't been able to keep a footprint.

It did, perhaps, look like the dwelling of a high-class whore; with the velvet and satin furnishings that dotted the interior; or the setting of some skin flick that would have been shown in the wee hours of night in the scratchy TV reception that made it into the Sectors. But it was a damn comfortable brothel, and that was what she cared about. Setting the doll on the dressing table, Scarlet approached the bed.

There was an envelope on the down-filled duvet, and though it bore the names of neither sender nor recipient, she knew without a doubt it was intended for her - Who else would it have been, if this was her apartment? She certainly wouldn't have left personal things lying about where anyone that wandered by could take them. - just as she was certain who had left it. Gently, she curled onto the side of the plush mattress and slit the thin paper open.

The letter inside was a simple sheet of ivory stationery, penned in dark blue ink and folded in a precise manner. When she opened it, another small card fell into her lap, prompting her to take a look at it first.

Scarlet Kirana
MiTech Auth
563-A7

Aha. She understood what the man had meant before he left, then. It was one of the laminated ID cards such as those issued by universities and businesses to their students and employees - in this case, Midgar Technical. Whoever had gone to the trouble of overseeing matters had been thorough, indeed...chillingly so.

Dark eyes, dark hair...a relative of Trav, perhaps? Scarlet was beginning to lose hope of ever knowing for certain who the man was, or how he knew of her...and she was wondering if she would care, if things remained as good as they seemed to be at that moment. Curiosity would fade, in time, as long as she had something to otherwise occupy her thoughts. Already, she suspected that what was written on the enclosed note would be of little help, as far as the matter of her benefactor's identity was concerned.

She was correct; the paper was simply a handwritten schedule of courses. Everything had been planned without her knowledge or opinion, and yet, it was exactly the sort of situation she would have arranged for herself, had she been able to do so.

Quietly, she returned the paper and the card that went with it to the envelope, and laid it on the desk beside the doll. For a while, she did little more than sit on the bed and stare at her hands, suddenly exhausted. The weight of the night had abruptly come crashing down on her, and all she wanted to do was sleep...and she couldn't, for fear that she would wake and find that it had been a dream.

As the idea seized her mind, she rose from the bed and began pacing the room, tearing the drawers from their slots and flinging open the doors to the closets and cabinets. There, as promised, were the clothes; half of them in her favoured shade of sanguine red and more than a few cut to show off every asset of her femininity. The same ivory stationery that the schedule had been penned upon. In one incident, a box of wire and bits of metal. Things, more things than she'd ever seen in one place in her life. Scarlet-things.

She stood in the center of the room, in the midst of the mess, panting. For the first time since she'd left her flat at the start of the evening, Scarlet caught sight of herself in the mirror; and dissolved once more into that helpless, hysterical laughter. Unthinking, she brought a hand to her face and tore at her cheeks, desperate to remove the streaks of cosmetics that feathered from her mouth; already as red as the blood that welled from the scratches left in the wake of her nails.

A bath. She remembered wanting one, then; and stumbled toward the shower. Before the water even had a chance to run hot, she stripped the remains of her dress away and stepped shivering into the stream; only to flinch and shriek as it abruptly became far too hot for comfort. She left it there, however; until the water ran clear once more.

In the warmth of the towel that awaited her when she exited the shower, she managed to forget what had distressed her so terribly in the first place, if only briefly. The instant her toes sank again into the deep carpeting of the main room, her lips twisted, and she sighed. What a mess. She thought she'd left mess behind when she stepped off the train. Well, after tonight, she'd make a point of remembering not to allow it to happen again. She wasn't a slumdweller anymore, and she never had been - it had just been a passage between the important points in her life.

With the litany of left-behind firmly embedded in her mind, she sank to her knees and tugged one of the drawers over. It would be a long process to be sure, as tired as she was, but she'd have the place back in order by the time the sun rose. Then, and only then could she sleep.

Halfway through the chore, she paused to inspect the contents of the bar beneath the kitchen counter, and the refrigerator beside it. She could spare a moment to eat, certainly. The last time she had, now that she thought of it, had been well before she'd ventured out to find her mark for the night. She hadn't realized that she was actually hungry until her distractions had lessened.

Rather than waste time trudging between rooms, she simply plunked herself down on the kitchen floor until she was done.

Put your glass in the sink when you're done. Yes, Scarlet.

She listened, though, letting the crumbs soak away while she concentrated on getting her bedroom back into a semblance of order.

As the first rays of light began to creep over the horizon, Scarlet collapsed onto the bed, barely able to grab the doll from the dressing table and pull it to rest on the pillow beside her before succumbing to true dreams.