"Transcending Reality"  by: Emerald Eyes

"Crawling in my skin, these wounds they will not heal. Fear is how I fall, confusing what is real." –Linkin Park

^_^_^

Chapter Thirteen: The Madness

Irvine watched absently as the strange people from the light gathered around Reeve's computer. They had apparently known him somehow…. or, at least the black-haired one did. He reacted with surprise at finding him at the inn in Junon. He had been even more surprised at finding mako gleaming in his eyes.

One of the others quickly explained the situation for him—Irvine didn't feel like doing the talking.

Irvine had discovered that the black-haired boy—Alex—could do a lot with that peculiar device that brought him here. According to the boy, Reeve's computer was hooked up to the internet—apparently the internet from his dimension, wherever that was. Reeve had hacked into the government's top-secret files and was searching for a way to put Reno's name in the database.

"Heh," Reeve bragged, "Piece of cake." Irvine had guessed the man hadn't expected it to be as easy as it was. "After ShinRa's tight security, this was next to nothing."

ShinRa. Shinra? Wasn't that the name of the guy they were going to rescue? Irvine didn't know a lot about this new world, but he intended to find out one way or another…

^_^_^

Reno sat next to Alex, looking over the information on the screen. Reeve exaggerated when he said the security wasn't tight. These guys were almost as bad as ShinRa, possibly even worse. He didn't know if he could do it. He never had to infiltrate anything at this scale before. The Turks worked for ShinRa, and nothing was better than that. It was going to be hard.

Looking up from the screen, he noticed everyone looking at him, including the weird Sephiroth-clone, Irvine. "What?" He said, throwing suspicious glances around the room.

"Dude, you look like shit," Alex said wryly.

"So?!" the redhead replied reproachfully.

"So," Reeve explained, "no one's going to believe you're one of these 'Men in Black' if you waltz in there dressed like a slum-drunk."

They were grinning at him voraciously, a wicked glint in both of their eyes. "What the hell are you two suggesting?"

^_^_^

In a quiet place, in a backwater farm town several miles from Blackwood, there was an old abandoned house. The house was a typical run-of-the-mill giant dilapidated country farmhouse, complete with rotting shingles and a porch on all four sides. There was one thing, however, that WASN'T typical of the place…

Lying on the top floor in the hallway made of rotting wood was a man. He looked to be in his late 20s or early 30s. Short locks of silver hair fell into his aquamarine eyes, currently squeezed tight against the pain.

Agony marred his handsome face, distorting it beyond recognition. He was weak. It happened every time Jenova used her powers through him. Her control over him had let up for the moment: that happened occasionally, at times when Jenova was busying herself with something else.

For the first time in a long time, he was actually aware of his actions, emotions, and surroundings. The last thing he remembered…

//…it was somewhere cold. The glow of mako was all around him. The presence in his mind was gone! Or was it? He felt it in his mind like a sickly death, lying dormant… but not gone.

He didn't care if it was gone or not. A man was coming at him with a sword, malice and contempt flashing in his eyes. Recognition quickly came into those aquamarine mako eyes as he stared into bright blue ones. It was the boy from the trip to Nibelheim… his last memory before the ones in progress now. The boy had been so young and naïve. What had he done on that trip to turn this boy against him?

He cringed at the thought. He didn't want to know what evils the monster inside of him had committed.

The boy slashed at him, blood poured from his wounds, and he just stood there. Dying was better than anything he deserved. At least in death he would be free of the malevolent force that had wrecked havoc on his psyche.

Slash after slash came until he fell, so near to death that he would be considered dead by most already… beyond the healing powers of any Phoenix Down. And the spiky-haired boy just left him there while the place came crashing down all around.

And then there was a light… and then there was only darkness…//

A noise brought him out of his reverie. Footsteps could be heard rhythmically ascending the stairs. Someone was coming. //Holy, no. Not now!// It wasn't supposed to work like this. No one was supposed to find him. He didn't want to harm anyone anymore.

A girl appeared at the top of the steps: a teenaged girl, probably about 17 or 18 years of age. She had a wild array of spiky purple hair and the strangest outfit he had ever seen: a tight fitting green hoodie over a black t-shirt and short plaid skirt. The outfit was complete with combat boots. The girl had a variety of things pierced on her and she wore an excessive amount of dark makeup, accenting her pale skin. From the way some of it streaked down her face, it looked as if she was crying. She reminded him of one of those punks he used to see hanging around the Midgar slums.

The girl paused midway into the hallway, studying him with something in between shock and fear. She dropped the brown paper bag she was holding. It clattered to the floor, the substance inside the bottle that was concealed within leaked onto the rotting floor. Alcohol, no doubt. The girl looked like the kind of person that would be in to that stuff.

"You…" she said barely above a whisper, her voice like saccharin spoiled with antipathy, "You're that guy from the news, that dude who totaled that entire town!"

"Yes," he managed to reply in a strained voice, trying to concentrate on anything tangible. So this was what he did this time… destroy a town. What next? "Now please leave me…"

The girl's fear vanished and she frowned, tilting her head curiously at him. "You're hurt, aren't you?"

He glared at her. Why was she still here? Did she WANT to die? "Yes, I am hurt," he whispered, "But there is nothing you can do. My pain comes from the mind."

She studied him some more with intelligent eyes, examining his soul, it seemed. Finally, after what seemed like hours, she took a cigarette out of her hoodie's pocket and lit up. "You didn't want to do it, did you?"

He blinked at her. How did she know? "I would have prevented it if I could have," he said. Tears were in his eyes now. The pain was too great to bear. //A whole town? God…//

She smiled at him—smiled! "You don't look like the kind of person who would kill an innocent person—let alone a whole town."

He did something he could never remember doing before—he laughed. The mirth faded immediately as he thought of Jenova. If she took over his body again, the girl would surely die. "Listen… you can't stay here… I'll kill you. I don't want to, but it will happen."

Instead of heeding his advice, she sat down on the ground next to him. "I'm Samantha," she greeted, "You can go ahead and talk to me. I know what it's like to have problems. I have plenty of my own. We both need help—maybe we can help each other?"

"Samantha, please listen to me…"

"What's on your mind?" she cut him off. She stared at him intently with those intelligent blue eyes. She brushed black-lacquered nails through her purple hair, blonde at the roots where her natural color was growing back in.

For some reason he found himself giving in to her, telling her everything, starting with his name…

^_^_^

"Shit, shit, SHIT!" Reno complained, "I'm going to fuckin' kill you!"

They were all cracking up—the whole lot of them! Alex was lying on the floor, his eyes wet from all the humor. Reeve was only faring a little bit better, the cat on his shoulder nearly falling off. Yuffie was teasing him in between giggles, and Irvine wore a small mocking smile. Cid… now Cid was the worst.

"This is fucking great!" the surly pilot mocked, "Where's a camera when you need one."

Reno glowered.

"You look like a fucking pretty-boy. Hell, if I didn't know it was you I'd mistake you for Rufus!"

The redhead didn't want to do it, but he knew it was necessary if he wanted to pull this off. His rumpled blue Turks suit was replaced by a neater black one. The jacket was neatly pressed, the shirt tucked in, and a tie was around his neck. It took him several times to tie it perfectly. He hadn't worn a tie in so long. His old boots were also replaced with the proper shoes to be worn with the suit, but that wasn't the worst of it. His unkempt long hair was now cut much shorter, and combed neat into place. An unruly fiery lock of hair fell into his vision from behind his sunglasses. This was ridiculous.

"I hope you're happy," Reno addressed the party. If his electro-rod wasn't on the nightstand across the room, he would have used it by now. Unusual weapons like that were more than likely prohibited on the compound, and if they weren't, the nightstick would probably make him look suspicious. The last thing he needed was to stand out. Instead, if anything should happen, he had to rely on his gun. He hoped it wouldn't have to come to that. Reno and guns didn't mix too well.

"Oh, trust me," Yuffie burst out, "This is VERY amusing. I'm getting a kick out of it!"

//Why bother,// he thought. "So… are we going to go or not?"

Alex raised an eyebrow at him before tossing him the 'dimension-hopper,' as Reno had dubbed it. "YOU'RE going… I'm not."

Reno stared at him blankly. "What?"

"I'm staying here. I want to find out exactly what's up with Hojo." With that he tossed Reno the device and briefly showed him how to use it.

^_^_^

Samantha studied the man curiously. He //was// the man from the news, but judging by the way he was acting, there was no way they could possibly be the same person. She and Sephiroth (what a strange name!) could relate to each other in almost every way.

"I never knew my mother—my //real// mother," Sephiroth said, a bit of emotion touching his voice, "She died right after my birth. But I heard that she was very beautiful."

Samantha grunted amusedly. "At least you knew who your parents were—even if your dad //was// an asshole. I don't even know who I am. I was adopted when I was little. I don't remember a thing about where I came from."

"You don't like your foster parents?" Sephiroth inquired.

"What!? No. I LOVE my parents, it's just that…. I don't know." She shrugged. "I just get curious.

"I have a brother," she said with a smile, "His name is Alex—Alexander Thomas Sloan. He's off at college this year. He's like a my best friend. We might as well be siblings—we're certainly close enough."

"You seem pretty happy," Sephiroth said, "So why are you out in the middle of nowhere with a bottle of—what was it called? Jack Daniels?—and a pack of cigarettes?"

Her smile faded. "I haven't heard from my brother in over two weeks."

Sephiroth frowned confusedly. "Maybe he's just tied up with school. Does he have exams soon? That could be enough to make him forget. It's certainly easy enough."

"No! You don't understand," Samantha explained, "NO ONE'S heard from him! Not my parents or relatives, and not even his friends—they say he hasn't been showing up for classes. The only person who knew anything was his roommate in his apartment near the campus. Now, I could have //sworn// he said that guy was going of a trip to Japan for one for one of his classes, but I guess I was mistaken."

"And what did he say?"

"He said that Alex was gone and it would probably be a while until he got back." She shot an ambiguous look at Sephiroth. "He said he was supposed to let the phone ring and the machine pick it up, but he said there wasn't any fun in THAT."

Sephiroth stared at her with glassy eyes, not really comprehending what she was saying. He had a sick insane look in his eyes that reminded her of the person that destroyed Blackwood. "Go… away!" He screeched in a pained voice, and Samantha obeyed. Whatever had mad him destroy that town was coming back.

Before she had a chance to reach the steps a commanding, cold voice said, "Stop." She froze, not because she was ordered to, but because a sword was pressed to her throat. The man had moved with lightning speed, and he was upon her before she had even realized he'd moved.

Sephiroth was smirking down at her mockingly, his beautiful aquamarine eyes twinkling in the eerie light. "Mother says she knows your brother," he spoke in a strange detatched manner. This wasn't the //real// Sephiroth, not the one she knew. "Apparently he's trying to hinder mother's plans. I was going to kill you, but Mother has something else in mind…"

^_^_^

Jenova had let Sephiroth's mind wander for too long, and as a result he had befriended an ignorant girl, too innocent to realize the magnitude of the situation she had gotten herself into.

Jenova had what she wanted from her other lackey in Treno. Hojo had made her task much easier with his creation of the "clones." Although the boy from Galbadia couldn't ever fully be controlled, no one even suspected the one in Treno. In fact, everyone thought he was dead…

END CH. 13 AT 12.01.01.

Okay…. finally got a plot for the peeps in the FF9 world… and a good one at that! Stay tuned for the next chapter, "What Happened in Treno…"