Fountain of Memories
Chapter 2: Old Foe, New Face
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the FF7 characters, I am not making any money from this, Squaresoft probably are though…*grumbles*
The blonde haired boy stared out of the window at the grey city below. The eight Mako reactors around the edge filled the already polluted air with a strange green luminence.
He went crashing to the floor suddenly as a blur of silver and blue rammed into him. The two boys rolled across the carpeted floor, until finally the blonde one gave in.
The boy with silver hair sat back laughing, to release the other boy who glared at him.
'I wish you wouldn't do that Seph, it hurt!' He said, sitting up.
The younger boy laughed, 'Hojo just let me out from the lab, he's got some really weird stuff down there now you know, like the monster-man.'
'Did he do anything bad this time?' The blonde boy asked.
The other boy shrugged, 'Only some injections, and some strange tests to do with reflexes I think he said.'
There was a timid knock at the door of the small ShinRa apartment. And the older boy stood up to get it.
A group of children of varying ages stood crowded there, a small girl was pushed to the front.
'Can you and Seph come out to play today Linus?' She said shyly, flicking one of her plaits back over her shoulder.
Linus nodded, and called for the silver-haired boy who was sat staring out of the window. He turned and grinned running out of the room into the gaggle of chattering children. Linus carefully shut the door, and joined them.
The sound of laughing children could be heard, echoing through the dreary halls of the Shinra building for the rest of the day.
* * *
Cloud sat up with jolt, and the face, which had been peering at him, skittered away like a frightened animal. He frowned, and realised his mistake. There were a few differences between this person and Sephiroth. The most notable difference was that this person, was a girl.
Her face was oval like his, with a pair of angular green eyes so like the ones that had haunted Clouds dreams for 5 years. Her hair was pale, but unlike Sephiroth's silver sheen, her hair had a golden colouration when the sunshine hit it. Cloud realised why it had been so obvious she was a girl, and began to blush. She wasn't wearing much, and what she was wearing had been so weathered by the salty air, that it was practically see through. At the moment she was crouched beside a large tropical bush, watching him fearfully.
He felt that comment was called for, 'Umm...Thank you for saving me…'
She looked at him puzzled, and then smiled slightly, 'You're welcome.' She spoke hesitantly, like she hadn't spoken for a long time, and was trying to remember how it was done.
'Sorry if I startled you, I thought you were someone else.' He stood and looked around. 'Have you seen any of my friends, perhaps they washed up here…'
The girl nodded her head emphatically and took his hand, 'Come with me, I saved them too.' She beamed at him.
Cloud nodded uncertainly, and smiled back as he was pulled across the golden sand.
* * *
Tifa opened her eyes to intense golden light. Ah, so she was dead. Perhaps it meant she would see Aeris again. It wasn't until a seagull veered across her vision that Tifa realised that what she was in fact looking at was the sky.
The sun was so bright that it seemed to make the whole sky glow yellow, although the blue on the horizon was a beautiful cornflower colour.
She sat up to see two figures sitting nearby talking to each other.
Cloud and….Sephiroth? Except…except it obviously wasn't Sephiroth when you looked closer.
Tifa stood unsteadily, and made her way over to them, plonking herself down beside Cloud. She looked curiously at the girl.
Cloud smiled slighlty, 'This is Aurora, she saved us. This is her island, she's the only one here.'
'Oh…that's good is it?' Realising how ungrateful she must sound, she hastily smiled at Aurora and said, 'Thank you for saving us, we'd have drowned otherwise.'
The girl smiled, and nodded.
Cloud turned to her, 'Reeve had his PHS with him, but it's totally screwed thanks to its swim. He thinks that his people will hear about the accident and come looking for him. He just wishes that he could contact them to say he was alive.'
Aurora frowned puzzled, 'Reeve's 'people'? Reeve is nice man, does he have people work for him?'
Cloud nodded, 'Reeve is President of NeoShinRa Incorporated. I'm sure his people will find us.'
Aurora looked frightened at the mention of the word 'ShinRa'. 'Do you mean President Shinra?'
Tifa smiled at the girl, 'No, President Shinra died nearly 6 years ago. Reeve was elected by the people after he helped save Midgar.'
'I remember Midgar…..I used to live there with Mom and Papa.' The girl said sadly, her green eyes staring wistfully over the ocean.
Cloud glanced at Tifa before looking back at Aurora, 'You lived in Midgar? Did you live in the slums?'
Aurora shook her head, 'No, we lived in a big tall building. It was dull, but I used to play with the other children while mom and papa worked.' She looked sad again.
A loud curse from nearby, and a strange crackle of electricity made them jump.
Cloud grinned, 'Sounds like Cid's having fun with the PHS.'
Tifa tried to cover her smile as Cid stumped out of the trees, and glared at them. His light hair seemed to be trying to stand on end, and he was holding a screwdriver with a blackened tip.
She looked at Cloud, 'So am I the last to wake up?'
'Nope. Yuffie's still out cold …' He was cut off by Tifa's gasp of surprise.
'Yuffie survived? I thought she would have drowned when she fell into that water. Those waves….' Tifa shuddered involuntarily at the memory of the huge green wall of water closing over her.
Cloud nodded, 'Yeah, she survived. Vincent's keeping an eye on her.'
Tifa raised an eyebrow, 'Vincent? Well I didn't see that coming…'
* * *
Vincent sat on a rock, and stared out over the blue sea. He sighed and glanced back at where Yuffie was lying, eyes closed and breathing deeply.
He realised how serene she looked in sleep, and how peaceful. A single strand of hair had wormed its way from the bun at the back of her head, and was flopped across her face, blowing ever so gently in the slight breeze.
Vincent watched her for some moments before leaning forwards and carefully brushing the strand of hair away with his hand. She opened her eyes just as he tucked it behind her ear.
They stared at each other for a moment. Neither moving at all, and suddenly the spell broke and Vincent jumped back, apologising for startling her, while she sat up with a curse, and tried to apologise for upsetting him.
Yuffie jumped at a loud crackle and a yell. From the language it sounded like Cid had just become really pissed off with something. Vincent helped her up, and they headed towards the others.
Cid was standing near the trees, brandishing a blacked screwdriver at Cloud and Tifa who were laughing at his new hairdo, while another girl, who looked a lot like someone Yuffie couldn't place right now, was seated nearby smiling slightly confusedly.
Tifa spotted Yuffie and Vincent and called them over, and hugged Yuffie fiercly and gave Vincent a knowing wink which, to Yuffie's secret delight, made him blush and look away.
Barret and Reeve appeared at sunset with armfuls of dry wood, and any other equipment they'd managed to salvage from the water. Red came out of the trees a short while later carrying a medium sized deer-like creature in his jaws.
A triumphant yell from Cid, made them stop their talk and turn to look at him expectantly as he walked out from the trees with the PHS in his hand..
Reeve came over and took it from him, dialling a number. A crackly voice came over the reciever,
'
'Mikel! It's me Reeve……'
There was an astonished silence on the end, '
'Listen Mike, this is important. Cid managed to get the PHS working, but it's still on its last legs. We're stranded on a tropical island, you'll have to get people out here soon.'
'
'C'mon Reeve, they'll be searchin for us tonight. No need to worry about that.' Said Tifa, 'We'll all be home by tomorrow.'
'You're going?' Said the white-haired girl, 'You leave Aurora here by herself again?'
Cloud shook his head, 'No of course we wouldn't leave you Aurora. You saved us all. We want to take you back to Midgar with us.'
Aurora looked uneasy again, 'You won't take me back to the scary tall building will you? The lady who killed my papa is there.'
Vincent frowned, 'What's this 'scary tall building' you're talking about?'
'It's on top of Midgar. It belong to ShinRa. I lived there with my mom and papa until me and mom left, because my papa was dead,' The girl frowned, 'Except he wasn't, because he came and told my mom to leave, to run away so he couldn't harm her…'
The group looked around at each other, and Cloud sighed, 'Lets get some sleep and you can tell us your story in the morning Aurora.'
The girl nodded and lay back, ' I like telling stories. Goodnight everyone.'
The moon rose over the sleeping heroes, and lit up the landscape with a pale glow. The girl with the white hair stood up quietly, and walked off a way. A beautiful patch of flowers with a plaque of stone, smoothed by the motions of the sea, placed in the center. The name on the tablet read, 'Namaya Keisatsu'.
The girl knelt and bowed her head, 'Mother…' If someone listening, had strained their ears they might have heard the sound of someone sobbing very quietly…
Authors Notes: Aaargh! I've just noticed a major timewarp in FF7 which is really gonna mess up the story unless I explain. In the game, we see Vincent as a grown Turk pleading Lucrecia not to have Sephiroth right? In the game manual it says that Vincent is 27 years old during the events of FF7. Since we must assume that Vincy was at least 16 when arguing with Lucrecia, Sephy is at least 16 years younger than Vincy. Anyone else notice the slight age problem here? (Work out how old Sephy would be during FF7 if Vincy was 27):
Ok, so this is my theory which kinda works, and I can also play around with their ages a bit. I decided that Vincy was 27 when Hojo stuck him in the coffin and that he didn't age during his time in there, the same goes for when Sephy was in the glacier, ok? Right…with that said I will continue and try and explain the timeline as I go (I spent ages trying to sort this out myself, sad eh?).
Thanx to everyone who r&r the first chapter. See I'm being nice and posting the second chapter only a couple of days later! But I'm gonna be evil and do the same thing…muahahahaaa….I won't post the next bit till I get some luverly reviews!
LOL