Disclaimer: I may own your soul, but Squaresoft owns all FFVII characters, places, etc.

A/N: Ok, so here's my ploy to get people to review. I'll tell you now that sometime in this fic, a romance will develop betwixt Vincent an another character. Unfortunately, even I don't know who that character will be. Tifa? Yuffie? Barret? An OC? So far, I've had one person telling me that they smelled a Yuffentine coming along, and I've had another tell me they hated Yuffie/Vincent pairings, so… Why don't you all come on and review and throw in who you want to see Vinnie end up with? It'll gimme something to read and keep me from going stir crazy. You know you want to.

Chapter 4: Tensions Rising

Tifa woke up quite early the morning after AVALANCHE's trip to Midgar, though it didn't seem all that early to her. 6 o'clock was sleeping in for the owner/manager of an inn. The moment any of her guests woke up, she already had to be ready to attend to their needs. Once standing at the bottom of the staircase leading into the bar, she took a moment to admire the scenery outside. It was quite a relief to see that the hard rain from the night before had ceased. Rain would help their search for Reeve.

Tifa was so used to being the first up everyday for the past year that, as her eyes moved from the window back to the contents of her bar, the surprise from a set of crimson eyes in the darkness nearly knocked her on her hind parts.

Vincent had been awake for a good while - at least an hour, but probably more. He had leaned himself against a wall in a corner of the bar and commenced an early morning ritual of cleaning the three guns he kept on him at all times: the Quicksilver, the Peacemaker, and the Death Penalty. Tifa could see light reflecting off two of the guns at his feet, resting neatly upon an opened rag. No light would ever dare reflect off the dark metal of the Death Penalty held tightly in its owner's nimble fingers. The combined darkness of Vincent and his most prized possession was enough to scare any light in all the word away.

But, unfortunately for him, it wasn't enough to scare Tifa away. He hated being disturbed when he was maintaining his weapons, and from the direction of Tifa's stroll, it certainly looked like a disturbance is what he was going to get. This was his time to think, that was why he did it so godforsaken early. Plus, he never really liked interaction all that much anyway. Meddling humans…

Turning his attention fully to his Death Penalty, Vincent hoped his determination might tell Tifa that he didn't want to be bothered. "Good morning, Vincent." Either she didn't hear his unspoken message, or she chose to ignore it.

A few minutes passed by them silently. Tifa pulled up a chair to sit by him, but didn't speak. He could handle her watching him if she remained silent. Maybe this won't be that bad, after all. "When did you get here?" It was as if she was reading his mind and doing the exact opposite of what he wanted.

Silence followed for a moment or two longer. Finally, Vincent raised his gaze to Tifa's face. She wore a happy smile, but her eyes betrayed something akin to worry. As much as he didn't want to acknowledge her presence, Vincent always prided himself on being polite to women, one of the few traits he kept from his days as a normal human. It would've been rather rude to blatantly ignore her simple, seemingly harmless question.

"Last night."

"So that's what all that noise was?" Once again, silence was the crimson-eyed man's reply. I don't know why I bother…It had been over a year since the last time Vincent and she had spoken freely, what made her think he would just jump right back in with her? Her mind fought to hold back the bittersweet memories of times she and Vincent shared. They probably weren't a big deal to him though… But they were to her. For as long as she could remember, she had been the listener. After Tifa's mother died, there was never really anyone to listen to her. Aeris might've been a good option, but that option no longer existed for Tifa. Yuffie was always there, but she could only rarely talk to her about something serious. Vincent had always been all-ears to her babbling, no matter how trivial or how serious…

"Hey, Vince! Wasn't that some great food tonight?"

"Yes, Tifa. It was quite satisfying…"

"Vincent, do you ever miss Aeris?"

"Maybe, I never really put much thought into it, but I can see how you would…"

"Vinnie, do you think Cloud will ever love me?"

"It is possible. I once loved someone. If I can love someone, I'm sure Cloud can…"

No matter what kind of question Tifa had lined up for him, Vincent always had an answer. He never used a cop-out answer like "I don't know" like most of the other guys used with her. He probably wasn't even really listening…

Vincent tried to ignore the look in Tifa's eyes. The worry that held them before had gradually twisted into sadness. Honestly, at the moment, he didn't care for Tifa or her feelings, but he felt obligated to do something. After all, he was staying in her bar free of charge. He was very grateful for that, seeing how all the Gil he had made over the past year had always gone to buying Lucrecia medicinal items.

"Lucrecia is missing…" He may never have been good at comforting others, but Vincent always knew how to throw a curve ball that, hopefully, would take someone's mind off their pain for at least a moment.

Vincent's tactic had worked. Tifa was so thrown off by the out-of-the-blue statement uttered by the normally silent man that it took her a few minutes to find enough words to formulate a cohesive response. "Oh my, Vincent. Are you ok? When did it happen?"

Vincent ignored her first question (he was never ok and Tifa knew it, so it would've been a waste of breath). "She was taken about a week ago."

"Taken?!" Tifa's mind didn't hesitate to connect Vincent's statement to Reeve disappearance. "How do you know she was taken?"

Vincent searched for logical words to explain what he knew. There were many things he was aware of, but he did not know why he knew them. A normal person would've considered themselves to be a clairvoyant, but Vincent was too logical for that. He discovered his "ability" sometime during his adventures with AVALANCHE. Over time, he decided to attribute the skill to Chaos. He could "feel" these things in the same way he could feel Chaos coming over him.

But he couldn't tell this to Tifa. No human would be able to accept the fact that there was a demon living inside of him that told him things. "There were only a few marks left inside the cave, but none of them hinted to a struggle. Lucrecia had fallen ill. She was in no condition to walk out of the cave let alone hike over the mountain range or swim over the waterfall. She could've gone willingly, but she couldn't have left without assistance." Every word he spoke was true, but he knew, in a sense, he was lying. He could lie better than anyone. He could lie like a demon.

Tifa was about to speak, but suddenly stopped herself. This was a situation for Cloud to handle. It wasn't her place to vocalize ideas about connections that she had made. This is why Cloud was the leader. "You should talk to Cloud when he wakes up. He'd like to hear this."

Another long stretch of silence found itself between the two. Vincent turned his attention back to cleaning the barrel of his Death Penalty. Tifa gave up her attempts at starting a conversation - they obviously weren't working. It wasn't until she noticed the tattered condition of Vincent's pant legs that Tifa decided to speak again. "God, Vince. What happened to you?"

Vincent's eyes traveled down to find what she was staring at so intently. Their gazes were both on one of many holes that provided a window for the dry blood covering Vincent's already healed wound. "It's nothing."

"You want me to grab some of Cloud's clothes for you?" She didn't know why she asked. Tifa knew he would refuse, and if he didn't, he should. Cloud's clothes couldn't hope to fit Vincent. Other than both having stunning eyes, they two men shared no physical qualities. Although both were rather thin, Vincent's arms and chest both held a bit more muscle than Cloud's, making any of Cloud's shirts uncomfortably tight on Vincent. Vincent was also substantially taller than Cloud; the blond-hared man's pants would probably only come halfway down Vincent's calf.

"No. Just go about your business – I'll mend my appearance." Vincent had been giving Tifa subtle, unspoken hints to leave him be all morning, but he finally opted for a vocal method. This was the nicest way he could think of saying "Go away."

This time around, Tifa took the hint and tended to her bar. She wiped off her counter first, like she did every morning. Upon discovering several bottles on the counter and a used glass in the sink, her suspicions began. Vincent was never the drinking type, so it wasn't him. The combination didn't seem like either Cid or Barret's likings. Cloud headed off to bed before she did, Red couldn't make himself a drink and she doubted the Turks would take it upon themselves to whip themselves up a drink without permission, no matter how vile she thought them to be. Damnit! Yuffie better not have a hangover – we have work to do today…

Yuffie awoke with hopes that real life would be better on her head than her dream, but to no avail. Yuffie's head hurt just as bad awake as it did when she dreamt Barret was standing on her it. GAWD, my head hurts… Hey, where are my boots? I NEVER sleep without my boots! I smell some foul play… If anyone had been in the room with her, they certainly would've been forced into a laughing fit to find Yuffie actually sniffing around for some "foul play."

After finding her beloved boots (and reacquiring her suspenders), Yuffie made her way out of her room and out into the main part of the bar, where everyone was already awake and talking about the day's plans. Wasn't I supposed to kick someone's ass today? Her face contorted as she searched her mind for a face to match the ass in need of a kicking, but by the time she reached her chair, she gave up. Oh well, I'll just kick Reno's ass later for the hell of it… It was beside Reno that she found herself. There was some tension in the air between Reno and Cloud, so Yuffie wisely picked the empty seat in between them to sit. If there was going to be a fight, she wanted to get an up close and personal view.

Reno and Cloud couldn't seem to agree on a game plan for the day. The argument this morning wasn't so much about what the plan was, but who would be involved. In short, Cloud invited himself along after hearing that the Turks were heading back to the Shinra building, and Reno was none too happy about it.

"Listen here, bud, this is a job for the Turks, not a bunch of low life terrorists!"

"Look who's talking, murderer! And if we're terrorists than so is Reeve!"

"You're damn right Reeve's a terrorist – a terrorist that is OUR responsibility! And who the fuck are you calling a murderer? Don't act like you've never killed, Spike. Do you have any idea how many Shinra guards you've chopped up?"

"They deserved it!"

"They were doing their jobs! Did they deserve death because they were trying to stop you from blowing up reactors filled with innocent people? The people that worked there weren't Turks or some asshole executivse – they lived down in the slums right next to you! Most of them probably went to that bar your bitch owned!"

"Watch your mouth, you bastard!"

"Look who's talking!"

The discussion continued on like this from the moment Reno sat down until only a few minutes before Yuffie walked out. With each passing minute, the two men lost a bit of maturity until all rational "discussion" broke down into name-calling. The past year had not seemed to calm the hatred these two had for each other. Cloud owed Rude thanks for keeping Reno from electrocuting him; Reno owed Tifa thanks for keep Cloud from slicing off a limb or two.

A stiff silence loomed over everyone. Though Yuffie was grateful for it (her hangover plus concussion couldn't handle much sound at the moment), she broke the silence nonetheless. If she acted too out of character, someone might get suspicious. To her knowledge, only Vincent knew of her drinking experiment the night before, and she wanted to keep it that way.

"So, what's on today's schedule? Did we figure out how to bust our boy Reeve out yet?" A silence so strong followed that Yuffie could've sworn she heard crickets in the background chirping away [1]. "Or not, whatever…"

"We're heading to Midgar." Of all people, Vincent broke the silence. As much as he detested speaking in front of such a large number of people, he felt a need to get a move on. Cloud and Reno had both angered him with their childlike behavior. Two people were missing and arguing was just a waste of valuable time. From the information given to him, it seemed as if Reeve had already served his purpose. If his kidnappers knew what they were doing, they'd be getting rid of Reeve as soon as possible, and not by peacefully sending him on his way either.

"Why are we going back to that dirty place?" GAWD it took forever to shake all that dirt of my boots…

This time, Reno didn't hesitate to answer. "We're doing an inventory of Hojo's lab to see what that creep took. I have no clue what the hell you nincompoops will be up to." He folded his arms and resumed glaring at Cloud again. Seeing the tension beginning to form again, Rude rolled up a sleeve and pointed to his watch.

"Hmph. In fact, I think we'll be heading out now. See you guys later." The three Turks exited the bar in what seemed to be a single file line. Reno was the last to leave and, as expected, didn't pass up the opportunity to make another comment before leaving. "Oh, and don't stay up – we might be home kinda late, kiddies."

Yuffie's body shook with forced anger. "Oooo, I hate that guy!" Too bad he's so freaking hot!

"We all do." Cloud's voice certainly didn't give a hint that he was joking.

"Mo'fucker!" Barret didn't bother to hold his tounge – he had already left Marlene in the care of Elizabeth – and elderly lady who had recently moved to Kalm from Corel. "Goddamn Shinra walkin' 'round thinkin' dey all big 'n' bad!"

"Calm down, Barret." Tifa decided to speak in that certain No-One-Can-Stay-Mad-When-I-Talk-Like-This voice, as she could feel the hatred for the Turks emanating off of nearly everyone in the room. Of course, she wasn't exactly a big fan of the group that crushed her bar along with the whole sector around it, but she knew they had to cooperate for the time being. "Anyway, Cloud, what are we going to do today?"

Cloud sat thoughtfully for a moment. In all honesty, he didn't really know. He had planned on winning the argument with Reno and going along with them, but now that the noise from the Turks' helicopter had faded into the distance, he knew that wasn't an option. "Well, Reno said that he was nearly 100% positive that no one left Midgar though any normal passageway between now and the time of Reeve's disappearance. I don't trust Reno on many things, but I know Turks are far too thorough to get incorrect information on something as vital as that. Unfortunately that's all we have to go by. We could search the Shinra building again, but I doubt that would be useful. So, we split up and search the city. Either that guy left through some underground passage or something that Reno and the guards didn't know about, or he's still in the city. If he's in the city, we'll find him – if he left, we'll find out how."

Cloud looked nervously around the room. He had really just free-balled that entire plan and was waiting for someone to interject with a problem. Unfortunately, before anyone could speak his or her displeasure, he found a flaw of his own. Midgar was a bit of a long was from Kalm – far too long for seven people to walk. The Highwind was out of the question for two reasons. First, there was no spot in old Midgar to land. Second, old Midgar was off limit to regular citizens. The only reason they got in last time is because Elena had given the permission and no guard could refuse the word of a Turk (if they knew what was good for them). So, the Highwind would cause too much of a racket for them to sneak in after landing close enough to Midgar. It would take almost all day for them to round up enough Chocobos for them all to travel on. "Ok, any suggestions on how to get there?"

[1] – Do crickets chirp?

A/N: Sorry if this one sucked. It was all just kinda off the top of my head, so it probably doesn't make that much sense. All I wanted to do was move them from Kalm to Midgar, so I guess this chapter served its purpose. Hopefully chapter 5 won't suck so much ass. Oh, and remember to review and suggest a partner for Vince. Was it just me, or did he turn out a lot meaner than normal? Maybe he's just having a bad day…