Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VII, Advent Children, or any of their characters.
Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Loz awoke from his unconsciousness, and rolled over onto his stomach. He groaned as he felt pain in his entire body, and wasn't surprised to find even more pain as he used his arms to pick himself up. Now on his knees, he surveyed the area.
Strife and his companions had since disappeared. He was unsure of whether or not to assume them dead or assumed they had fled from death. He quickly made his judgement as being the latter when he saw what he had once thought of as a brother laying on the ground before him. Loz felt his strength slowly returning to his body, and he stood, walking over to the younger man.
Looking around once more, he saw that his vehicle was gone, and that JENOVA's head lay on the ground where it had once stood. He slowly limped over there, his Dual Hound glowing with an aqua light.
' JENOVA, you bitch... You're the cause of all this...' He thought bitterly, gathering more power in his weapon. "You bloody parasite! DIE!" Loz drove his metallic arm with extreme force into the head. The force from the explosion not only left a crater in the ground below, but also sent him flying backwards.
"Fool... You have only made your problems worse..." The calamity's voice limply poured from the unconscious Kadaj's lips. "By destroying the head with such an explosion, you have managed to unleash GeoStigma into the air! Soon, many humans will be taken from the face of this planet, combining with the precious Life Stream that will soon be mine!" A wicked laugh escaped the younger creation's mouth, and Loz decided it was definitely a creepy sight.
He turned his head to face the crater he had just scarred the Planet's surface with. A small dent, but it was going to a lot of damage in the long run. He watched as a misty, blue light emerged and spread itself into the air, fading out and becoming one with it. Loz realized what he had just done, and a horrified look passed over his face as he thought of so many people losing their lives because of an outburst he had. He tried to shake off this feeling, but he couldn't help but feel concern for these pitiful creatures that had been called humans. The oldest of the three creations didn't quite understand why he had been having these strange emotions lately, ever since he had been told by Kadaj of his true beginnings.
Many memories he had never had before surfaced in his mind. For the time being, Loz sat there on the dirt ground to think about these things. Out of the three experiments, he had always been emotionally weak and susceptible to outbursts; whether they be of anger, sadness, happiness, or anything he was feeling. Right now confusion radiated from him, and a deep sadness at the thought of destroying so many lives. It had never before bothered him to kill, so why now?
His thoughts were abruptly end as the other figure began to stir for real this time. Kadaj opened his once emerald eyes to expose the ugly hollowness they had become. It was then that Loz noticed how ghostly pale his companion was.
More thoughts raced through his mind. ' How is JENOVA inside of him? He, like Yazoo and myself, all have JENOVA cells in our bodies, thus giving us our healing ability, but how is he channelling her? How long have you been hearing her voice? Kadaj, have you truly been lost to her?' He questioned in his mind. From the beginning, Loz hadn't agreed with Kadaj's sudden want for this 'Cloud Strife's' death. He had wondered what it was that had possessed him to become so violent all of a sudden. Of course that was then, and now he had realised that the young man was being controlled by the parasite itself.
Kadaj began to slowly walk his way, picking up his bloodthirsty Souba as he progressed towards Loz. The older man barely had a chance to think any further before the double bladed sword was pointed at his throat.
"We should kill you know..." The possessed man hissed. "But... You did a good thing... You've spread the virus for us..." Kadaj sliced the right blade down Loz's chest, smirking as a trickle of crimson flowed out of the cut. "We will let you live, for now."
Loz looked up from his position on the ground at his so-called 'Master', whom was slowly walking away. As he clutched his chest waiting for his minor wound to close up, he rose to his feet again.
"Come. We will wait a few days and watch them. It should be intriguing to see them struggle with GeoStigma..." The double voice of the young man said wickedly, and he let out a low laugh; on that sent chills down the spine of the shorter haired man.
Loz followed, knowing full well that if he didn't obey, he would be killed. The thing he noticed to be the most strange, was how he suddenly felt unwell. Figuring it was nothing; he shrugged it off and caught up to his slow moving 'Master'.
"Are they gonna be alright?" Marlene asked in frantically. She as well as everyone else were becoming worried.
That morning, they had awoken to find a good portion of the children, as well as Tifa, Cid, and Barrett succumbing to a strange illness. The affected children were mainly unconscious, but when they did awaken were hit with a wave of nausea. Normally this would not have been so alarming, but the strange part was none of them could move from their neck down.
The adults that had been affected showed the same signs as the children, only they hadn't fallen unconscious. Cloud and Yuffie had tried to help their friends with cure materia, but none of it seemed to help. Nanaki pondered on what was wrong with everyone, as Vincent suddenly felt the need to interrogate the silver haired man who stood in the corner.
Yazoo stood in a corner of the main room in the airship. His long silver hair was covering his eyes, but the glow from them shining through revealed to anyone who bothered to look that his now purple orbs were focused on Tifa.
"They have been inflicted with GeoStigma. And no, I do not know what to do for them." The man answered before Vincent had a chance to speak.
"Did you do this to them?" Vincent's ruby red eyes narrowed at him in suspicion.
"How could I have? I do not have any thing with which to inflict it upon them. Even if I did, do you think I would?"
"You seemed to have an easy enough time jabbing your little 'trick' into ME."
Yazoo gave an arrogant snort. "I knew you were part of the JENOVA project fool, I already knew full well you would not be harmed by it."
"So you're saying we could trust you?" The former Turk asked monotonously.
"Of course. If I wanted to kill anyone here, I would have undoubtedly done that already."
"I think we've carried on a conversation long enough. We should probably help the sick." Vincent turned his head to see the rest of his friends trying to help all of the affected people. Any children that were well were told to stay away from anyone who was affected by this illness, so they stayed on the other side of the room. "One more thing; you have a thing for her don't you?"
"For who?" Yazoo was taken back by the question.
" Lockheart. You seem attached to her."
"I..." The man hung his head, refusing to say any more. "I do not feel anything for humanity. I am incapable of love or emotions."
"Keep telling yourself that." Vincent said morbidly. "Keep it up and you'll regret it. I once loved and still do love a woman by the name of Lucrecia. Even though I could never have her, I do not regret ever telling her how I felt. A part of me feels sorrow, but another feels well just knowing that she knows how I feel. You shouldn't hide your feelings for someone."
Yazoo nodded at him, giving him a look of sympathy. "But I still have no feelings to hide. I was created, anything I feel is fake. I could never offer someone my false affections."
"But they aren't fake!" He looked down to see Marlene looking up at him. "If you love someone, it's for real! Tifa likes you a lot, and you like her right? So tell her!"
The silver haired man was bewildered that a child could even state something like that. As if she knew anything about love... Or did she? He felt warmth in his face, and he realised he was blushing.
The little girl giggled as Vincent walked away to aid Cloud and Yuffie. " You're blushing, Yazoo!"
"Come on." He sighed, picking the girl up.
"Hey! Put me down!" She laughed and threw a false struggle in his arms.
"I will aid Tifa, but you need to stay clear of anyone whom is affected." He set her down with the other children whom were well to play.
Everyone, including Yazoo turned abruptly as Yuffie cried out suddenly. She slumped to the floor, the illness taking over her, knocking the ninja out. She had become deathly pale like every other sick being in the room. More and more of the children were beginning to grow pale, and cough.
The only people who seemed unaffected by this were Yazoo, Cloud, and Vincent, all of which were presumably injected with JENOVA cells. This meant that they were immune and the three of them worked at getting any unaffected children to a different area of the ship.
Vincent and Nanaki watched over the children in the other room, while Yazoo and Cloud helped everyone else to the best to their abilities.
"Don't you two go damn well worrying 'bout me..." Cid forced a weak smile at them. "What... are you going to do, make me some fuckin' chicken soup? Make sure the children are ok..."
Cloud nodded as the pilot drifted into unconsciousness.
"Make sure Marlene is alright..." Barrett managed to say before falling unconscious with Cid, Yuffie, and Tifa.
Yazoo was at Tifa's side, one of her now pale hands in his. His other hand was caressing her forehead gently. She had a high fever, like the rest of them, and the temperature of her flesh shocked him when he had first touched one of his ghostly hands to her. He had taken his gloves off earlier, which meant he occasionally had to stare at the tattoo that had been scarred into his flesh as an ugly reminder of what he was.
With a small groan, the dark haired woman stirred. Her brown eyes had a glaze to them, an effect created by the virus. Tifa stared at him, and smiled weakly.
"Are you... feeling any better?" Yazoo asked softly, moving his hand from her forehead to wrap around the hand he was already holding.
"A little... Yazoo... Is everyone else... ok?"
Yazoo hesitated for a moment, and then nodded, knowing it was best not to alarm her of their sickness. He knew full well that putting her into worry would only further her chances of not being able to survive this.
"I'm glad... they're ok..." She stopped, dampening her lips slightly with her tongue. "Yazoo..." Her lips were shaking, and tears were forming in her eyes.
"What is it?" He cocked his head to the side slightly.
"I'm... Scared..." And with that she drifted into her sub-consciousness once again.
He couldn't think of what to do now, but noticed her shiver even with the fever she had come up with. The silver haired man went from his sitting position to stretching out alongside her, pulling her into his arms. Yazoo closed his eyes and drifted off slightly with her.
Cloud had long given up hope on being able to help anyone recover with curative materia, and turned to trying to keep them blanketed and covered up. He gave a quick glance to Yazoo and Tifa, but kept most of his attention focused on the children and his other friends. Once in while, Vincent would come up and aid him with making sure there was no loss of life.
At the moment he was alone, and talking in his mind to Sephiroth, who had been quiet for quite a while now. The ex-general seemed irritated with him for earlier still, but was willing to give him a soul to talk to.
' What are we going to do? These people are all sick!' He cried frantically in his mind.
' Do not worry. Loss of life amongst you will be minimal. And if you think this is the only affected population, think again. Anyone within the ruins of Midgar and a hundred mile radius around it will start to succumb. You need to stop JENOVA as soon as possible.' Sephiroth was fairly calm, but Cloud sensed an anxious feeling in him.
The blonde noticed an absence of noise beside him. He looked over to see a child next to him had stopped breathing. He took one of his gloves off and placed his hand on the small boy's neck. There wasn't even a slight pulse from the vein.
' He's dead." The man in his head stated simply, and Cloud felt a sudden grief and nauseous feeling in him.
It was then that he knew they were dealing with a lot more than they had bargained for.
A/N: There! I updated as fast as possible! Once again, thank you for all of the reviews! I'm glad people are actually enjoying this Hope this chapter was ok... R&R!