Cloud, Barret and Tifa had quickly made their way along the ruined road, and to the path back to the playground, and then to the path beside that, until they arrived at Wall Market in Sector 6. While they were there, they each brought two Fire Materia, two Ice Materia, two Bolt Materia and two Restore Materia from the Materia shop, knowing that they should stock up on supplies to prepare for the struggle that would take place inside the Shinra Headquarters itself.
They also brought some improved wristbands with more slots of Materia fitted into it, from the weapons shop at the Wall Market. After they had each finished on stocking up for supplies that they would later need, they proceeded to try and find a way up to the Plate from the Slums, without the use of a train, and they were stumped as to how this might be possible.
"Well, goddamn it! How the hell are we supposed to be getting up to there anyways!? There ain't no damn available transportation to get up the Plate, and I don't see how else we can get up there at a distance of fifty metres above! We can't fly up there, and I don't think we can climb up there either. I don't buy that we could just climb a whole fifty metres up to the Plate without really wearing ourselves out. And with one hand, I could never manage a climb like that," snarled Barret, furiously.
"But we've still got to try and find a way, its no use just giving up now, is there? If there really is another way to get up to the Plate, then we'll find it, whatever it is. But where do we go in order to find out something like this, first?" wondered Cloud, thinking heavily to himself for a moment, and Barret and Tifa also thought more on the subject, until Tifa seemed to have an idea, as she led them to Don Corneo's mansion.
"(Yes, of course! The Don of the Slums would have had a secret way of getting up the Plate to Shinra Headquarters so he and Shinra could do business. And maybe we can use this secret transportation of the Don's to get up to the top of the Plate as well. I think it's the only chance we have of getting up there now, like Barret said, there's no way we'd be able to climb up as high as the Plate without killing ourselves and spending a lot of time doing it, in the process,)" thought Tifa, as she spoke up.
"Perhaps Corneo would know about other ways of getting up to the top of the Plate, if anyone in the Slums would know something like that, it would be him of all people, right? Corneo knew lots of secretive information about Shinra and Midgar that few other people know about. Maybe if we bust in the mansion and interrogate him again, he can tell us another way to get to the top of the Plate. And since all his cronies have already been dealt with, it will no trouble getting in this time," suggested Tifa, and Cloud nodded in agreement at the idea.
"Yeah, that sounds like a logical plan of action to carry out, so let's pay the Don another visit. And this time, we have to beware of any traps or tricks that he might spring on us like the last time. So keep that in mind while we find out the information we need from him. Let's get inside then," said Cloud, and he rushed over to the front doors of the Don's mansion, and threw them open with a loud thud, while Tifa and Barret both followed him inside.
Entering the main downstairs hall of the mansion, Cloud rushed up the stairs at once, and went inside the room in the middle of the upstairs floor, and from the room he entered, he rushed into the Don's bedroom, and burst into there, his sword ready for any commotion that might occur. But none came, and the room was completely quiet and empty other than the now ruined form of the bed that the Don had so often used for his own purposes. Don Corneo seemed to be long since gone, and without any trace to find.
"(Shinra must have already found out about him leaking information to me and Tifa when we were last in here with Aeris. If so, then they must have already taken him back to the Shinra Headquarters, arresting him for giving away their plan like that. Well if the Don isn't here to tell us anything, then maybe there's still a chance that at least one of his cronies is alive and can tell us instead,)" thought Cloud, as he rushed back out the room to the upstairs floor where Barret and Tifa both stood waiting for him.
"Corneo's gone, and there's just no sign of him around here at all, I think Shinra have taken him away for revealing that Sector 7 information to us, so we'll have to question one of his cronies in here instead, if there is one around here that's still alive," informed Cloud.
Barret and Tifa both nodded in agreement, but at that moment, they suddenly heard the sound of groaning and frantic shouts coming from the dungeon room, to the left of the Don's room. Cloud and the other immediately rushed down the long stone staircase of the dungeon to investigate the source of noise, and as they arrived in the room, they saw Kotch laying on the stone table in the middle of the room, shackled down to it, and frantically calling for help of release.
His shouts abruptly stopped as he noticed Cloud and the others, and his eyes widened in recognition and fear. Barret also recognized Kotch from the time he came in Tifa's bar at Sector 7, and he snarled menacingly at the frightened and helpless man as he stood over him.
"Well, if it ain't the dirty little shit who came into the bar a few days ago, knowing that the Sector he was visiting would be crushed later, and he didn't gave a damn about it. I warned you to stay out of my way in case I might run into ya someday and finish ya for good, and now I think I'll take that opportunity now," said Barret, harshly, as he aimed his gun-arm at the now screaming form of Kotch, and prepared to open fire.
"No, Barret, don't shoot him! Don't you see, this guy here can give us the information we need about how to get to the top of the Plate!" protested Tifa, quickly stepping out in front of Barret's gun-arm once again, before he could fire, and his hand slipped off the trigger at once, and he cursed angrily in sheer frustration.
"Damn it, Tifa, will you stop doing that all the time!? Keep at it, and some day I might not be able to stop this gun from firing in time, you know!?" shouted Barret, furiously, but Tifa merely shook her head and shrugged.
"Sure, I'll stop doing it as long as you stop being so hasty to shoot down people like this without a second thought to other consequences. Try behaving like that, and I don't see any reason why I should stop you like this again, do you?" said Tifa, coolly, and Barret cursed furiously to himself again.
"(Why she gotta be so stubborn anyways? Lowlifes like this guy, that Shinra manager, and most of all that rotten damn bastard of a President ain't worth nearly getting shot down for, but she's stopped me all the same,)" thought Barret.
"Damn it, Tifa…" began Barret, but Cloud sharply motioned for him to be quiet, as he stepped forwards and stood over Kotch, who had now stopped screaming and stared fearfully up at him, as Cloud then spoke.
"You, whoever you are, I want you to tell me how me and my friends here can get up to the top of the Plate, to get over to the Shinra Headquarters. Tell us how we can get up there, and I'll spare your life and maybe even let you escape here, but if you don't tell us anything, then I'll just have to put a big bloody hole right through your chest," said Cloud, menacingly, as he withdrew his sword from its metal locks at his back.
He readied his massive sword, and held it tightly in his hands, ready to plunge it right down into Kotch's chest if he refused to reveal anything to them at all. Kotch's eyes widened in terror, and he screamed in protest before Cloud could carry his threat out.
"Okay, okay, okay, I'll tell you how! I'll tell you how to get to the top of the Plate from here, other than using any trains to get up! The Don always kept a secret elevator behind this mansion built right into the side of the main centre Pillar of Midgar itself that would take him up to the top of the Plate where Shinra's Headquarters was. The elevator's got very limited access of course, so only the Don and some of his higher subordinates could use it. I was one of them though, so if I give you this security access card of mine, you should be able to get into that elevator with no problems at all," said Kotch, as he mentioned down at one of the pockets in his jeans.
Noticing this, Tifa searched through Kotch's pockets, and found the access card that gave them the use of this secret elevator that was built into the centre Pillar behind the mansion, and she tossed the card over to Cloud, who caught it and nodded, satisfied that they had now found their ticket to getting up to the top of the Plate.
"Alright, now that I've told you all how to get up there to the Shinra Headquarters, and given you a way to do it too, can you guys please just get me out of these chains and allow me to escape like we had agreed!" screamed Kotch, frantically. Cloud nodded in agreement, and freed him from the chains.
"Okay there, I've kept to our agreement too, so now I've helped you out here in exchange for you helping us. Sounds fair, right? Well then, you're free to go…" said Cloud, glancing pointedly at Tifa, who understood at once, and she swung her fist and slammed it hard into the back of Kotch's head, as he stood back up on his feet. Kotch let out a cry of surprise before he fell motionless to the floor of the dungeon with a thud. He'd been knocked out by Tifa's blow.
"…As soon as you regain consciousness," finished Cloud, and Tifa grinned over at him as she stepped over Kotch. Leaving the unconscious form of Kotch there on the floor, Cloud, Tifa and Barret quickly rushed out of the room, and then they soon left the Don's mansion.
Remembering what Kotch had said, Cloud and the others went around the mansion to the back of it, and once they were behind it, they walked over to the large centre Pillar support structure that held up all of Midgar in the very centre of it all, and they knew the Headquarters was directly above this main centre Pillar.
At once, the group spotted the elevator that Kotch had told them about, and it was indeed built into the side of the centre Pillar itself. Cloud walked over to it, and he slotted the security access card into a slot in the side of the elevator. The doors of it opened up at once, and Cloud pocketed the card before they stepped into the elevator, and the doors closed behind them.
Immediately, it began to rise up along the centre Pillar on its way to the very top of the Plate at where the Shinra Headquarters was, with Cloud and the others all safely inside it and preparing for the big struggle that was to come.
Meanwhile at that moment elsewhere, inside the Shinra Headquarters itself, on the 66th floor of the building, Tseng was leading Aeris over to the Science Department, as he had been ordered to do.
Aeris was still tightly handcuffed and Tseng was aiming his shotgun right at her, so she couldn't escape, and didn't bother to try, knowing she couldn't possibly get out of the Shinra building alone safely, with all the intense security around the whole place.
But although she felt extremely nervous indeed, and even perhaps afraid, Aeris still kept herself calm and not panicking, as she turned to face Tseng while they continued to walk their way along the 66th floor of the building.
"Even if I myself am in a very bad situation here at the moment, and even though I'm being effectively held captive here against my will at last, I am at least glad that you kept your word, Tseng. Despite all that's happened between us, and to our friendship over the years since we first met so long ago now, it's a comfort to know that your work with Shinra and your grudges against me haven't yet caused you to go against me entirely. I'm glad that you stuck to our agreement and kept Marlene safe from harm," said Aeris, quietly.
"A lot of troubling things may have happened between us during the years we've known each other, and I may have some dirty work still to do in my job as the leader of the Turks, Aeris, but I will always stick to my word when I have made an final agreement with someone, even with a foe or someone like you, who simply shut me out when I had tried to help comfort you," replied Tseng, coldly. Aeris bowed her head in shame, knowing what he meant, and sighed wearily.
"I know you only tried to help me get over my feelings for Zack when he was gone, but that night five years ago when you tried to comfort me, what happened that night was a mistake, Tseng. I regretted it afterwards, and I said so then. I know that you had feelings for me, but you have to understand that it just never would have worked out. First of all, you're about ten or fifteen years older than me, and more importantly, you're the leader of the Turks, you were leading the mission to capture me for Shinra in the first place. If you always kept allowing me to escape like you did, then your job and even your life would have been under severe threat from them, and I couldn't allow that, not at any cost. The day after that night, I'd realized what might happen, and I did the only thing I felt was right for the both of us. But I could tell at once that you really didn't agree with me, you never accepted my decision. Our friendship began to break and drift further and further apart, and that along with Zack still not coming back just made that time difficult and heartbreaking for me. I never meant to hurt you," said Aeris, solemnly.
"But nevertheless, you still did. And as I recall, Zack was also with Shinra, was he not? Yes, he was a first-class SOLDIER working for Shinra, and you never seemed to find the fact that he was risking his own life for you by using tricks against the Shinra to make sure they found it much harder to catch you, without them even realizing it. Yet you never once told him that you and he had to go separate ways, for him to avoid trouble with them," said Tseng, sourly.
"That's because I loved Zack, Tseng, and I just didn't want to part ways from him at all, regardless of Shinra, we both were willing to take that risk. Maybe it was selfish on my part, I admit that now, but it hardly matters, does it? He still left by himself anyway, without a word…" said Aeris, with a sad sigh of sorrow and regret.
"Your decision that day did teach me one thing, Aeris, one fact that I learned, never forgot, and always followed all the time since then. And that was never to let any kind of feelings get in the way of my line of work ever again, to efficiently carry out my missions from now on without ever letting my thoughts or opinions stop me, like they did with you. I will always stick to this lesson, and never allow myself to get hurt again by the likes of you. And finally, I have caught you at least, and laid those past demons to rest," said Tseng, with a dark smirk. Aeris was rather downcast at his words, she fully blamed herself for the way he was now, and instead she changed the subject.
"And now because of all that, just because of that grudge you've had against me since then, you're going to just hand me back to him as a means a revenge against me, aren't you? This isn't really about finally completing your job, Tseng, and you know it. You just want to prove to me and to yourself that you're able to capture me without letting your feelings get in the way, right? You want to prove that you really can follow this method of yours once and for all, even if it means giving me back to the likes of Professor Hojo. So you're still taking me over to him no matter what I say, aren't you?" said Aeris, nervously.
"Yes, I'm afraid I am going to indeed, Aeris, but that's just the way that these things work out when you're a Turk," said Tseng, shortly, and he meant it too, but he kept walking to the Shinra Science Department along with her nevertheless, not once questioning his mission as a Turk.
Shortly afterwards, they had both arrived at the Science Department itself, the main laboratories of the Shinra building, where Professor Hojo himself, the head of Shinra's Science Department, and perhaps the most evil, feared, twisted and hateful person in Shinra to all those who knew him, was waiting there for them.
It was him in particular who had sent constant and strict orders to the Turks to capture Aeris, for fifteen whole years, he was responsible for all the fear and suffering that she had endured from it. He smiled cruelly when he saw Aeris, as she and Tseng came into sight and stood before him.
Aeris shivered slightly as she saw him for the first time such she had first escaped the building with her real mother, long ago. She was not afraid of Hojo himself, but of what Hojo might just do to her in his strange, horrible experiments, which would have frightened anyone to insanity, given their traumatic reputation alone.
As both an important job and a rather nasty hobby, Hojo regularly experimented on animals and even on humans that were often enemies that had been taken in Shinra's capture and given to Hojo as punishment, and the Professor took delight in torturing them all with hideous cruelty, and he even took an interest in changing them into hideous monsters by mucking around with their DNA and cells, and giving them a rather large overdose of Mako energy and something called Jenova cells.
Hojo wore a white lab coat, grey lab jeans, black shoes, and silver sunglasses. He had black hair with a ponytail, and he had worked for Shinra for around thirty years, and was almost reaching old age, since his face had many wrinkled lines in it, and his physical strength was extremely puny and weak now.
Hojo was the head of the Shinra Science Department. As a result of this, he was one of the higher upper-class executives at Shinra Incorporated, and he did a lot of very strange, gruesome experiments for them as well, which he was only too happy to carry out.
Professor Hojo himself was a very strange and very creepy man that unnerved and frightened his inferiors just by the evil look in his eyes despite his rather weak body, but he was also very intelligent and sharp-minded, heartlessly so, and his clear insanity seemed to make a lot of people nervous. Basically, the only things that Hojo appeared to care about on the whole Planet were to do with his experiments and science, everything else was completely meaningless to him, even other lives and their consequences.
"Here is the last Ancient, Professor Hojo, in your custody for your experiments at last, just as you had requested. Now if you'll excuse me, I have other matters to attend to," said Tseng, with a rather curt nod at Hojo, and after glancing at Aeris for a moment or two, he then walked out of the science labs without waiting for any answer from the Professor, who had barely took notice of him anyway. Hojo merely just stared hard and creepily at Aeris, before finally answering.
"It is nice to finally see you back here in my procession again after all this time that you spent thinking that you could fool yourself into ever escaping us…Ancient. It was only a matter of time before you would finally return here, my precious specimen," said Hojo.
Aeris frowned sharply at his words, but she avoided his unnerving gaze, it made her feel even more uncomfortable than being stared at by Don Corneo, and Hojo had a far more vicious and more sinister thing in mind than Corneo had done.
"My name is Aeris, not Ancient. And most of all, I am NOT your specimen or your procession in any sort of way at all," replied Aeris, sharply.
Hojo took no notice of her words whatsoever though, and completely ignored her, as though he thought Aeris was some kind of stupid mindless creature, and not a fellow human being (which was also what the Professor seemed to have thought of almost everyone else as well).
"Judging by reports that Shinra have received about you recently, Ancient, I can tell that you have met Cloud Strife in person, the terrorist rebel now dead and buried beneath all of Sector 7. I once knew him too, years ago now, when he was still with us. But that is none of your concern now. Just shut up and follow me, Ancient. The past and troubles of your dead little boyfriend are going to be the very least of your worries soon enough," said Hojo, nastily.
"(Ah, it is a pity that Cloud Strife had to get himself heavily involved with the likes of AVALANCHE and get crushed to death as a result, but no matter, the puppet shall not be needed by its master, the reunion will go on as planned, yes it shall all begin very soon, I can sense it. And so Cloud Strife is dead…this would certainly have been a big disappointment to 'Hailstone' Strife, if that poor fool were still alive now, that is. Like father, like son, both get themselves killed out of rebellion. Or is that really so…I wonder if this is the fate that 'Hailstone' saw for his son…?)" wondered Hojo, before he shook his head clear of his thoughts, and concentrated on the experiment at hand.
Aeris was even more annoyed by this words, but she said nothing, knowing that it would do her no good at all since Hojo would never really listen, as Hojo then shoved her into one of the experimental cages in the laboratory, and slammed the door behind her, locking it shut, and was now ready at last.
"Begin with the experiment at once," ordered Hojo, coldly.
His lab assistants all nodded in response, and got to work at once as they began to start the experiment, while Hojo laughed cruelly, and with absolutely no remorse at the sight of Aeris shaking nervously on the cage floor, lost and alone.
Having went back downstairs, Tseng had reached the 60th floor of the Shinra building, and entered his office, satisfied that the mission with Aeris had finally been completely dealt with, and was merely waiting for the report on it from the superiors, as well as waiting for more business to do, when Reeve burst into his office, looking rather furious.
"I thought that the President had requested for you to take a vacation, Reeve. And now more than ever, it certainly seems like you need it," said Tseng, raising his eyebrows.
"Never mind that, do you really think that I could just relax and take a rest with what was happening to Sector 7!? But I'm not here to complain with you about that, I'm here to seriously question one of your own judgements in that plan," said Reeve, rather harshly.
"Oh, and what's that?" questioned Tseng, calmly.
"Elena, of course! She's just came in my office constantly breaking down and looking sick, and that's because she's in a lot of distress due to that mission you forced her out on! How the hell could you force a mere rookie to take on so important a mission as the one at Sector 7!? How could you honestly have expected she would cope with something like this!?" snapped Reeve, angrily. Tseng sighed and shook his head wearily.
"Out of all the candidates that were gathered to be chosen for the Turks, she was the one of all of them who had showed the greater bravery and spirit, so naturally I merely felt that it was right to hire someone who would always give their all when working for Shinra. And her own personal vendetta against the rebel group AVALANCHE meant that she would come in a lot of use for the Sector 7 plan, and of course, she would always have agreed to it, since it gave her the opportunity of vengeance that she so desired to have," said Tseng, casually.
"That doesn't matter! She still wasn't ready for a mission of that high importance, and you know it! She's new to the Turks, very inexperienced, and if it must be said, rather naïve as well, so it was a huge mistake to send her to Sector 7. She told me that she had killed one of the rebels, a young girl, and that when it actually came down to her killing for the first time, she completely lost her composure! Also, before she was killed, it seems that this rebel attempted to convince her of Shinra's own wrongs and evils, and Elena's now completely confused and mixed up between her own hatred towards AVALANCHE, and by the distrusting things about Shinra that the rebel girl had told her, and who knows what that will lead to! She might even turn against us!" snapped Reeve, sharply.
"No, she will not, Reeve. I can assure that I will speak with her as soon as possible, and merely persuade and convince her that it is Shinra who are to be trusted, not the words of a filthy terrorist, and that what she did on the Pillar was justice, not any wrong deed. By the time I have spoken to her, she will be fully focused on her tasks as a Turk from now on, and will not suffer any such doubts again. And she will hold Shinra in high regard like the rest of the Turks, since it was we who gave her the chance of her own vengeance. She will co-operate, with proper persuasion from me, I know she will," said Tseng, confidently.
"Alright fine then, I'll leave it to you. Just make sure you convince her about this entirely, I don't want to see these sorts of mistakes made from you again, Tseng, or I will…" began Reeve, in a hard tone of voice, but Tseng interrupted him.
"You'll do what, Reeve? Report me to the President for making these sorts of decisions for Shinra's plans? Well, while you are undoubtedly one of my superiors, the order to send all of the Turks to Sector 7 was also ordered by Heidegger and the President too, so they will agree with my orders without any sort of complaint. And I know you can't do anything about it, or you'll face trouble from them yourself," said Tseng, coldly, and Reeve now looked flustered and sighed heavily.
"As much as I hate to admit it, you're right about that, so I've got no choice but to just let that issue drop. But you know something, Tseng, I'd personally say that your own line of work lately, particularly catching the last Ancient, has really gotten to you a lot, you're taking it all much so seriously and maybe even obsessively. It's you who needs a vacation, not me," said Reeve, as he walked out of Tseng's office.
"Just go and send Elena over here at once!" called Tseng, and he sat back at his desk calmly, not paying much attention to what Reeve had told him before leaving the office.
"(A Turk must take his work seriously, it's always the main rule of being one, especially when faced with the responsibility of leading all the other Turks. I must focus on it all entirely at all times, particularly at matters of importance such as AVALANCHE and Aeris. And as I spoke with those rebels a minute before the Plate fell down, there's no way they could have gotten out in time, so taking the work seriously has paid off well so far in the first place, like capturing Aeris too,)" thought Tseng, as he sat back calmly in his office, awaiting Elena's arrival there, and very confident that he could convince her to think well of Shinra. And yet Tseng felt a rather strange suspicion in his mind…that perhaps AVALANCHE may not be as dead as it seems…