Healing
Chapter 4
After reading through Hojo's files on Vincent a few more times, Rei asked him to come in to her office to discuss what to do about the claw. The small room to the right on the main floor was still somewhat dusty and littered with various objects. The wallpapers was peeling off the walls pieced with holes where rats and mice had decided to live. Needless to say, the renovations hadn't reached that room yet. Rei had basically just thrown in a desk, a lamp and a file cabinet.
Vincent nearly sneezed in the dry, dusty air when he entered the room. Rei, still reading a file, waved vaguely at a chair, gesturing for him to sit down. She continued to read for a few minutes before slamming the file down on the desk and looking the dark gunman straight in the eyes. She knew she was acting like a drama queen, but she couldn't help herself. It was almost time for her period, and she could act somewhat melodramatic when suffering from PMS.
"Well, here's the deal. I know you hated Hojo, and I guess that you'd want to erase everything he did to you. Am I right?"
Vincent, silent as ever, just nodded.
"However…" Rei continued."…that arm is a stroke of genius, even though cruel. I could sever it completely, but there's no way in hell that I can do something that'll function as good as that."
"Are you saying that you will not do anything about it?"
"No, no, not at all. Like I said, I could cut it off for you if you want me to. But that seems like a waste of a good construction, at least according to me. So what I'm suggesting is that I give it a hell of a makeover."
"…please elaborate on that."
"Well, you know all that material I got from Junon? A large part of that is, to simply put it, artificial flesh, nerves and skin… stuff like that. So I was thinking that I could remove the outer metal shell and replace it with that. So after a while, when it's healed up, you'll have a normal looking arm. And the really good thing is that it will merge with your real flesh after a while. After about five years or so, your body will have taken over the artificial stuff completely."
The ex-turk was looking at her like he thought it was to good to be true.
"So where is the catch?"
"Well… for my part it's that it'll be kinda tricky to create a blood flow and to attach the artificial nerves. For your part… before your body has taken over the lab made stuff, it'll be very sensitive to injuries. It'll take long to heal if you do injure it and the risk for infections are kinda big."
Vincent seemed to be thinking about it. His face was void of emotions and his eyes was staring out at nothing.
"I will be able to feel with it again?"
"Yeah. And it'll most likely hurt a lot in the beginning."
He snapped his eyes up to her face.
"Do it."
The redhead leaned back in her chair.
"I wont lie you, it'll look like shit for starters, so be prepared for that. And you wont have any nails either for now. That's a later project. And seriously, it's gonna hurt."
"I do not care. Anything is better than this."
They agreed that the surgery would be done after they were done rebuilding the mansion, which were two weeks later. During that time they got another elevator next to the stairs in the main hall for those patients who for some reason couldn't walk up the stairs, and turned the round room in the east wing into a bathroom.
The surgery went as planned, save for one incident. Once Vincent was sedated, Rei cracked open the outer shell and set to work. But when she put the scalpel to his skin to peel of the skin where the mechanics were grafted into his arm, something happened. At first there was only a slight shifting in his skin color, so small that she wasn't sure that she had seen anything but made her pause nevertheless. When she continued and made the first cut, the shifting increased, turning his skin more and more purple. The redheaded surgeon grew quite anxious when patched of purple fur started to appear along his arm and chest. A minute later the fur was gone and his skin tone was back to normal. Rei couldn't help but to sigh with relief when she carefully made another cut and nothing happened. The rest of the surgery went without incidents.
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When Vincent woke up from the narcosis, the first thing he noticed was a dull ache where there earlier had been nothing. He moved his left fingers a bit, but that only made the pain worse. When he looked down, all he could see was bandages.
His head felt heavy after the narcosis, almost like a hangover.
//I can not believe I still remember what that feels like. I have not been drunk since my days at ShinRa.//
A few minutes later, Rei walked in. With her she had a box covered with a cloth. She sat down on the side of the bed and placed the box on the floor. There was a sound like metal against metal.
"So how ya feelin'?"
"Drowsy. How did it go?"
"Good. You look good in purple by the way."
Vincent frowned, trying to get that comment trough his still drugged mind.
"What?"
"You started go grow fur." She gave him a quick smile. "So which one wanted to say hi?"
"Uh.. Galian I guess… Nothing else happened?"
"Relax Vincent, everything went fine. Nothing evil jumped out and bit me."
That calmed him down a little, but he still had a frown etched on his face. For some reason, he didn't feel like life was very good to him at the moment.
"Anyway, here are your orders until tomorrow." She continued. "You will not do anything with the arm. When you get out of bed, you'll have it in a sling. I'll change the bandages tomorrow so we'll se how it looks then, ok?"
"Yes."
"Good. And I was wondering, what do you want to do with this?" she picked up the box and uncovered it. Inside lay the shell of the claw. It was somewhat dented and scratched, but otherwise in one piece.
"I was kinda bored so I put it back together. Hope you don't mind."
Vincent just stared at it. The hated claw. It was finally separate from him, but he still couldn't stand to look at it.
"Destroy it. Burn it. I do not care, as long as you get it out of my sight!"
Rei froze for a moment, not expecting his rage.
"I'm… sorry. I didn't think…" she stammered, feeling quite stupid.
Seeing this calmed the dark gunman down a little.
"Please, just get it away from me. I am not angry, I just cannot bare to look at it."
"I'm sorry. I just thought you'd might want to see it. Like a proof…" she said while covering it up again.
This made Vincent snap. He didn't know why, and for the moment he didn't care to find out either.
"Do not think you know what I feel! It has not been apart of you for thirty years! You can never even begin to understand." He hissed the last, his eyes narrowing.
Rei nodded and got to her feet.
"I'll… come back later." She muttered and made her way out of his room.
A/N
Yay! I'm getting reviews! And good one's to. *Filthy's as happy as can be*
There's a good reason why Vincent snapped when waking up from the narcosis, but you'll have to wait for that until the next chapter.
Continue to review… please. I'll give you a cookie.
