Here we are with another section of this long fic. Only one flashback in this, I promise. I should also point out that there is a lot in this part that comes directly from the game itself, and two instances in which what I wrote here could have gone differently, depending on how I'd played the game. So it's likely that anyone else out there will have played differently, and these two instances in this fic would not have applied to your game. That's part of what I love so much about FFVII, all the choices you had. The choices teh player made also slightly changed the character of Cloud, don't you think? Does he let Elena punch him? Does he let the Turks off the hook at the end? (For that matter, does he get into the hot tub with the naked guys in the beginning, does he wear the silk underwear and almost kiss Don Corneo? )
And, I've always been partial to the scene with Reeve and the Turks, myself. :)
-
Sephiroth
-
It came as no surprise to Sephiroth that the Turk had run from him. Most people, from what he remembered, had always run from him in one form or another. It was fine with him. The Turk was easy enough to follow, and was someone he remembered.
He sat down and leaned against the wall of the bridge right outside of Costa Del Sol. There were people looking for him, more than likely. If he could manage to piece together what he remembered, he would know which way to go to keep away from them. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, thinking back to when he had awoken, weeks, or maybe even months before.
-
"...phenomenally accelerated growth rate..."
"...inhabited..."
"...twenty seven is alive..."
"...twenty seven is conscious..."
"...twenty seven..."
They had been calling him "twenty seven," but he knew his name was Sephiroth.
"Sephiroth..." he had tried to say, and was furious when all that came out was a whisper.
Everyone had stopped talking suddenly. He felt their eyes all over him, and he felt their fear and their own weakness.
"Did he say..." someone had muttered.
He opened his eyes. A woman was staring into his face, and he saw her eyes widen in terror as he looked at her. She jumped back and he tried to sit up-quickly, to surprise and intimidate-but found that he was restrained.
The woman took a moment to cower in the corner, whimpering, while someone else observed, "It's inhabited."
The woman in the lab coat resolutely straightened herself up, and Sephiroth sighed quietly. They were all alike when they were afraid, but it was somehow even more pathetic when they tried to conquer it. He had understood for a long time that there was no use in trying to conquer fear. You either did or didn't.
She approached him slowly and steadily. "Did you say your name is Sephiroth?" she asked quietly.
He nodded. Of course his name was Sephiroth, and if these people didn't recognize him immediately, then he must have somehow ended up at the farthest, most primitive reaches of the Planet. And yet, as he looked around he saw that their laboratory-for that was where he was-was far from primitive.
"We should have known you would be the one, when you began to look just like him. Or rather just like...yourself," she said. "Down to the last detail." She picked up a strand of his long hair and looked at it in wonder. "Amazing."
Either she was purposely trying to confuse him and get him to let his guard down, or she was insane and babbling stupidly at him.
"What's the last thing you remember?" she asked him.
The question jolted him and he tried to hide it. Nothing. He remembered nothing except his own name, and Hojo.
And then it had come to him slowly. He could remember a deeply cold feeling in his chest, heaviness, ice, and finally surrender.
And the warm cocoon of the Lifestream.
He realized that he had been dead, and somehow brought back.
"Say something, Sephiroth," the woman said.
He glanced at her lazily. Someone had ripped him out of the Lifestream and now he was being asked to have a conversation.
In the days that followed, people had come to talk to him, while he said as little as he could, aside from asking, reasonably he thought, if they would let him up. Not yet, they all said. "Not until you're better."
They spent a lot of time talking to him about ShinRa, about the Turks, and about SOLDIER. Most of all they asked about the man who had killed him, asked him if he remembered being killed, if he remembered the man who was responsible, if he remembered the pain, if he remembered the name Cloud Strife.
They seemed to have forgotten whom exactly they were dealing with, and hadn't realized that he could see right through them. They were trying to poison him against this Cloud Strife (a boy, a mouthy, surly teenager trying to be SOLDIER material...) for their own purposes, and they wouldn't let him up until they were sure he was on their side, as if he could be tricked or talked into taking any side but his own.
He didn't remember much about his past, but he did have the persistent sense memory of people all through his life trying to control him, and failing miserably. He wondered what made this particular group of scientists think they were any different at all. He had certainly been hurt, as everyone had, but as far as he could remember, nothing-nothing-had ever gotten control of his mind. It had always been the one sacred section of his entire being that was all his.
And these scientists had done nothing to make sure that he was "better," for that matter. There was no food or water, only a steady Mako drip.
They must also have thought that physical strength came from physical activity, which to an extent, it did. But the other thing that Sephiroth remembered was that, in reality, the power to manifest physical strength had very little to do with whether you trained every day, or lay strapped to a table every day. And when he had finally manifested enough strength, he simply pulled both his arms together briskly and snapped the bonds like string.
He had slipped out of the lab, killed the first man he'd seen, and taken his clothes and traveling cloak out of necessity. You had to do that when you were at war, and these people had started a war with him.
He'd also realized that when they found the dead man missing his clothing, they would know exactly what to look for. (The man had been tall and fat, and his shirt hung off of Sephiroth's shoulders like a stupid nightshirt, while he had to cinch the pants tight with the belt.) But that was no great matter and he trusted he could get around them easily, even without a weapon. A group of startled people was more easily distracted than a group of startled lab rats.
When they had finally sounded the security breach alarm and locked all the doors, they had locked themselves in. But they had also locked the doors behind him.
And the alarms, Sephiroth thought, as he sat against the bridge by Costa Del Sol. The alarms in the lab, the sound of the slamming doors, the flashing lights... They had reminded him of something as well, but it was a memory that wouldn't come at the time, and he didn't have time to concentrate on it just then. He glanced at the tattoo on the back of his hand: XXVII. He supposed sooner or later all the memories would come back.
But first he had to find Strife in this maze, so he would follow the few people whom he remembered, who knew their way around it.
-
The Turks
-
"We can't go looking for Strife," Reno said quietly, as he huddled over his drink in the basement of what used to be Rufus ShinRa's villa. He felt trapped. No: he was trapped, as were the rest of the Turks. It had taken very nearly the last of his gil to get a lift to Junon and then stowaway on the boat to Costa Del Sol. He had barely enough to feed himself, and his guess was that the other two Turks were in the same situation. After all, none of them could afford to stay in the Inn for another night.
"I say we just give Sephiroth what he wants," Elena said suddenly. "What the hell is Cloud Strife to us anyway?"
Reno looked up at her, not hiding the surprise on his face. Then he dropped his head into his hand and rubbed his temples. God, he thought, getting your brain toasted gives you such a headache.
"Look, Elena," he said, and sighed wearily before going on, taking the time to figure out how to best phrase what he had to say. "I know that you loved Tseng."
Elena looked stricken and opened her mouth to speak.
"We all did," Reno went on, before she could say anything. "But-and believe me, this is really hard for me to say, even after all these years-but put yourself in Strife's place. We were the bad guys. I guess he had a thing for Aerith, but either way, she was his friend, and Tseng took her away from them and gave her to Hojo. We all know the kinds of things Hojo did. We all know from experience."
"Right," Elena said," and wasn't that right before you so euphorically killed thousands of people?" Right after she said the words, she put both hands over her mouth. She looked pained for a moment, then dropped her hands to the table.
Reno stared at her, his mouth parting slightly in surprise. "I know that," he whispered in a shocked voice. "I know why that all happened, Elena. I didn't forget. God, believe me, I know what Tseng was going through."
Elena looked down at her drink. "I'm sorry," she said, and Reno knew that she meant it. "I'm just saying that..."
"Look," he said, cutting her off again, "you have to look at it this way. What if Strife had come along and taken Tseng away from us? Then, down the road, you found him in need of help. What would you have done? Wasted your good Restore materia on him?"
Elena shook her head slowly, numbly. "No," she murmured.
"And don't forget, Elena, that by helping Sephiroth, you'd be helping the one who killed Tseng in the first place."
Elena nodded, but wouldn't look at either of the two Turks.
Reno gazed down into the bottom of his glass. He didn't particularly care for Cloud, but had nothing against him. Hell, how could he, he reminded himself once more. Cloud was the hero who had saved the Planet. Reno didn't necessarily want anything to do with him, but he couldn't bring harm upon him either when there didn't seem to be a need to.
"There has to be a way to get word out that Sephiroth is back," Rude said.
"Yeah, but even so," Reno pointed out, "we don't even have the gil to look for Strife, or to get to him if we learned where he was."
"So what are we going to do, Reno?" Elena snapped. "Just lock the door to this basement and hope that Sephiroth doesn't come knocking again? That he's just going to go away? He came to you for a reason, and I could be wrong, but he doesn't strike me as the type of guy to say, 'Well, they don't want me around so I'll just leave them alone.'"
Reno stared at her for a moment before dropping his gaze again. "Then you think of something, Elena. I'm out of ideas."
Not only of ideas, he thought, but apparently of all reasoning and retaining capabilities too. For, as hard as he tried, he could simply not remember how he'd ended up lying on the floor, fried by his own weapon. This scared him maybe even more than Sephiroth did, because Reno had always had nearly perfect memory.
Elena and Rude had told him about Sephiroth coming in to heal him. He obviously knew where they were. What was stopping him from barging in that very second? Elena was right, Sephiroth wasn't one to give up and go away. Reno wondered morbidly if he had found something else to occupy his time while he waited for them to make their move. But what the hell could have made Sephiroth want to help him? Did he really need to keep him around that badly? Reno found the very idea ridiculous.
Elena and Rude had told him it was obviously a clone, but they felt that somehow, it was the true Sephiroth as well. Reno hadn't even been aware that cloning was still going on these days. But he'd looked into those bright eyes, and he agreed with Elena's and Rude's assessment: somehow, clone or no, Sephiroth had come back from the Lifestream.
They all jumped when they heard the door to the villa open. It barely made a sound, and Reno knew that an ordinary, non-enhanced person probably would not have heard it.
Rude already had his hand on his gun, for all that was worth, and was getting up. Reno set his nightstick on a low level, enough to stun even an enhanced person. He knew it might be Sephiroth, but in case it wasn't, he didn't want to risk accidentally killing someone. And if it was Sephiroth, it wouldn't matter anyway. If he did finally want to hurt them, Reno and his nightstick would have nothing to say about it.
"The stairs creak," Elena whispered, "I'm the lightest, so I'll go up first."
"Elena," Reno whispered, holding her back by the arm, "I don't think..."
"Get your hand off me," she whispered, and pulled away. "I can take care of myself."
Reno held both hands up. "Fine," he said, and backed off. But he followed her up the stairs.
Elena cracked the door open the tiniest bit and peered through. She looked back, from Reno to Rude, with a frown on her face. Then she peered out again.
"What?" Reno said.
Elena turned to face them. "It's Reeve," she said, still frowning in confusion.
-
Rude stared at Reeve from behind his sunglasses. Rude was just as unsettling as ever. He didn't say a word, but then, Reeve hadn't expected him to.
Reeve had expected Reno and Elena to start talking immediately, but neither of them did. He was disconcerted by the fact that both Reno and Elena were more unsettling than they'd ever been.
He honestly hoped that things were okay with them. It was always touchy dealing with ex-ShinRa people, and most that were still ShinRa loyals wouldn't have anything to do with him unless it involved thumbscrews or spiked chairs. Still other ShinRa loyals didn't want to waste time with revenge and just wanted him dead. But he had always respected the Turks, and he liked them on a personal level as well. He'd felt that they'd been played by ShinRa, just as he had been.
"Cloning facility?" Rude finally said.
Reeve blinked in mild surprise that Rude had spoken up. "Yes," he said.
"This has something to do with a cloning facility," Rude stated, as if he was trying to make absolutely sure that that was what Reeve was telling him.
"Yes," Reeve said again.
Reno finally spoke up. "Any civilians?"
"I don't know, Reno. As far as I know, you're to look into this cloning facility on an island just south of the Northern Continent. At least that's what this guy told me. As for what the actual mission is, he wouldn't tell me that."
"This guy...Bradburn?" Elena said.
"Right, that's what he said his name was."
"And did he say the names of the people he worked for? The actual names?"
"He called them 'Hunters,' and aside from that, he didn't give me any details. He wants to meet with you for the rest of it."
No one said anything. Rude kept staring at him. Elena looked deep in thought. Reno looked disturbed by the whole idea.
"He really didn't tell me much, so I'm not sure..." Reeve began, but he was cut off by Rude.
"Why?" Rude asked.
"...Why?"
"Why all of a sudden does someone want it checked out?"
"Because they just found it, I think. At the rate they've been turning out clones, I only wonder why they weren't found sooner."
All of the Turks were strangely silent. He'd expected at least Reno, and especially Elena, to be throwing questions and comments at him by this time. They both seemed different from the people he remembered. Rude had always been quiet and reserved, Reeve knew that, but he didn't remember Elena ever looking so...so aggressively bitter. And he would never have thought to see Reno looking so tiredly defeated.
"So," Reeve said, sitting back on the musty old sofa that hadn't been used by anyone in years, with the exception of the few beach-goers who had broken in once in a while. "Why don't you all tell me what's going on? Why did I find you all here together?"
Elena was the first to speak up. "That's right," she said. "Why-or rather HOW did you find us here anyway?"
"Well, I knew to check Costa Del Sol first, at least for Rude. If Rude hadn't turned up, I would have checked Junon for Reno, but Elena, I must admit, I had no idea where you would have gone. I asked the Tavern owner if she had seen anyone who'd fit any of your descriptions, and she told me you'd been at the Inn, but you had left. ShinRa Villa seemed like the obvious place for ex-ShinRa personnel who were probably out of gil. I just didn't expect to find the three of you together."
"Why should we trust you, Reeve?" she asked. She sounded strangely gentle as she asked the question, as if she were just curious rather than suspicious.
"I'm not saying you should," Reeve said. "I'm just telling you what this guy told me. Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing you all work together again. But aside from that, why wouldn't you trust me?" he asked. "Is it still because I was an Avalanche...sympathizer?"
"Sympathizer? Reeve!" she snapped, her eyes widening in disbelief, "I think you were a little more than a sympathizer!"
"So I was an ally then, against ShinRa. But Elena, you know, we all know that ShinRa was... You know, it amazes me that even after all these years I have a hard time admitting that ShinRa was wrong. The whole corporation. It would have been easier, I'm positive-less of a panicking close call-if we'd all just stepped back and let Avalanche handle everything with Sephiroth and Meteor. ShinRa only got in their way. Elena," he went on softly, "do you still have loyalty to ShinRa?"
"No," she said. "I don't, of course I don't. I know that ShinRa played us just like they played everyone else. But I'm still a Turk. And I want to know why we should believe that this isn't all a trap set up by Strife and his people."
Reeve was honestly surprised; he hadn't expected that anyone would think Cloud had anything to do with this. Cloud, from what he understood, had long since stopped thinking about the Turks. He regarded Elena carefully for a moment, trying to discern if she really believed that or if she was still just angry that Cloud hadn't stopped to help Tseng. Her eyes were impossible to read. She'd developed a hell of a poker face over the years.
"I know Strife pretty well, or at least I did back then," Reeve said. "He was a lot of things. He was pretty nearly psychotic at one point, a seriously messed up kid. But he wasn't ever...petty. I think that's the word I'm looking for. Remember, Elena, right before Avalanche 'settled up with Sephiroth' as they used to say? You, Reno and Rude met up with them on their way. They let you walk."
Anger and hurt pride flared in Elena's eyes. "They didn't LET..."
"Yes, they did," Reno said quietly. "They let us off the hook that night, totally. It would have been stupid to fight, I guess, knowing what they were about to face, but even so. They were so powerful as a group at the time, they would have creamed us." He smiled weakly at her. "Turk Filet. I was always sort of cool with that. I know that I did some crappy things to Strife and his people. I guess we all did. And didn't you meet up with him at the Icicle Inn at one point, Elena?"
She nodded slowly.
"Do you remember what happened between you and Strife?" Reno asked.
"Yeah," she whispered. She cleared her throat and then spoke. "I...I thought he had killed Tseng. I took a swing at him." She laughed, a hard, cold laugh. "A really hard swing, too; I was so pissed. And so hurt."
"What did he do?" Reno asked her softly.
"He let me," she said, just as quietly.
Reeve smiled and sighed. Strife could be such an idiot sometimes. "Doesn't sound like a guy with a vendetta," he commented.
Elena raised her eyebrows and shrugged in mild consent as she accepted his argument.
Then the Turks all looked at each other, suddenly very nervous, Reeve was dismayed to note. It was as if they were silently communicating with each other. Perhaps they would tell him why they had all been in the cellar of ShinRa's old villa. When they seemed to come to an unspoken decision, it was Rude who finally spoke up.
"Sephiroth is back," he said.
Reeve felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him, and found that he was shaking his head in denial before his mouth even got to working. "That can't be," he said, feeling stupid the minute it was out of his mouth.
"Well, it is," Reno said irritably.
"I'm sure it's a clone," Elena said. "But it's inhabited. And I feel...well, we all do...that it's definitely, you know. Sephiroth."
Reno explained to Reeve what had happened, and how they ended up in the basement at Costa Del Sol.
Reeve listened in stunned silence, fear making him feel cold, making his limbs tingle with adrenaline. There were other aspects of the story that bothered him as well, such as Reno getting attacked and not remembering it. It was odd enough that someone had been able to sneak up on a former Turk, but for Reno to have no recollection of it made him think that someone had used some sort of time or status materia on him first. And materia wasn't easy to come by these days. Yet, Sephiroth seemed to have some. And he also couldn't figure out why, if Sephiroth had materia, he was using Restore or Revive. (Elena had pointed out, as Reno looked away, that neither she nor Rude had been sure which materia he had used.)
"I have a question for you," Reno spoke up finally. "What the hell is all this talk about clones being 'inhabited' or not?"
Reeve looked at him, not sure exactly what he was asking. "How do you mean, Reno?"
"I mean," Reno said, "what the hell does it mean, exactly. I've never heard about it before. For that matter, I wasn't even aware that cloning was still going on these days."
Reeve leaned forward slightly, as if trying to get a better look at Reno. "Where have you been?" he asked.
Reno smiled for the first time that evening, but it wasn't a cheerful smile. It was more ironic and self deprecating. "NeoMidgar," he said.
"Well..." Reeve said, trying not to show his astonishment, "well basically it means that there is a...I hesitate to use the word 'soul'..."
"Why?" Reno asked.
"Why what?"
"Why do you hesitate to use the word 'soul'?"
Reeve looked at him carefully, making sure Reno wasn't just being a pain in the ass. He wasn't. "Because, when you start to think of it in those terms, you get into spirituality, and everyone has a different belief. It complicates things. It brings into the subject the idea of what makes a person a person. So, as it is, no one is really sure of anything other than the fact that some clones are obviously people, and some are just living bodies."
"And one of them is Sephiroth," Reno said softly.
Elena sighed and sat down on the floor. "How much?" she asked.
"How much what, Elena?" Reeve said.
"How much gil, Reeve?"
Reeve smiled. That was more like it. "Thirty thousand. Each. Plus materia. That much I do know."
Reno whistled softly in amazement. "Serious about it, huh?"
"Up front," Elena said, before Reeve could answer.
"Of course."
"It's not as much as Reno seems to think," Elena pointed out. "These sunglasses that none of us seem to have been able to part with cost about five thousand gil. But I guess going so long without any gil makes it seem like a lot more."
"It is a lot," Rude said. "Just not a lot for a Turk."
There was a drawn out silence as the Turks seemed to let it all settle in.
"All right," Reno finally said, slowly. He smiled, and for an instant Reeve saw the Reno he had known when ShinRa and company were at the height of their power. "I'm in. At least to meet the guy."
"Well...Good!" Reeve said. He was surprised by how happy he was to see them all together again. "These people, they call themselves Hunters; apparently the group is made up of former ShinRa employees who weren't happy with the way things were run, as well as some new recruits. Not as underground as Avalanche was, and it does seem like they have more gil and manpower. As with all large, powerful groups, you'll have to watch your backs with these people. This Bradburn guy was hinting that they wanted you, Reno, to be the new leader of the Turks."
Instead of looking smug or happy, Reno looked startled to hear his name. "Why?" he asked suspiciously. Then he became the old Reno once more. "I mean, aside from that I'm awesome and everything," he added, smiling.
"Well, he tried to hint at it, but he wasn't very subtle," Reeve told him. "He didn't say why."
Reno sighed and looked serious again. "I can't."
Everyone in the room looked at him, stunned that he would turn down the offer.
"What?" he asked them all. "I'm being honest, it's too serious for me to screw around with. A couple of years ago I could have done it. But now I'm getting my ass toasted and not remembering it. That's just not cool, Reeve."
"Well," Reeve said, "you do have a point, Reno. Though, I had always thought you'd end up being the leader. Before Rufus died and ShinRa fell."
"Rufus was a prick," Reno said. "We were all going to leave him anyway. Otherwise I would have been the leader of the Turks back then, after Tseng, you know... But now I think it should be Elena."
Elena didn't seem to have understood him at first. Then she turned her head slowly and looked at him. And for a tiny, almost hidden moment, Reeve also saw the old Elena: eager and optimistic.
"I mean, I always thought she'd make a really good Turk, given the chance," Reno went on, talking more to Elena than anyone else. "She's a little hyper, and she still lets her emotions get in the way of her reasoning." He grinned, trying to soften what he was saying. "She needs a little more control. But she's smart enough to handle it."
"She should be field commander, too," Rude stated. "Since Reno's not up to it."
Elena looked at Rude, as if to ask him if he meant exactly what it sounded like he meant. He nodded to her. He had indeed just handed Reno's old job over to her. She quickly turned her look into a coolly surprised smile. "I'll do it," she said.
Reeve smiled back. "Good. So you'll be calling shots on the missions. Keep in mind though, Elena," Reeve went on, "that if we do ever locate the remaining Turk, and he does want his job back, you might have to relinquish the position. You might still be field commander, however, if that's what everyone wants. Is that all right with you? If it's not, say so now so you can work it out."
The three Turks frowned at him, but none of them said anything. Rude lowered his sunglasses and peered over the top of them. Elena had gone pale.
"What was that?" Reno finally said, leaning slightly toward Reeve as if he had misheard him.
"Valentine?" Rude asked.
"Val- no," Reeve said, as it occurred to him that it was possible none of them knew. Entirely possible. "Not Vincent Valentine. Tseng."
Rude placed a steadying hand on Elena's shoulder as she swayed.
"That's not funny, Reeve," Reno said. "Why the hell would you say something like that?"
"Reno," Reeve said, "all of you, I know I never got a chance to talk about this with you since everything went to hell right after we went to the Temple of the Ancients, with Weapon, Meteor and Sephiroth and everything. But then I assumed you would have figured it out."
"Figured what out?" Elena asked, a little shrilly.
Reeve almost felt like crying. Ten years and none of them had known. "Figured out that Tseng wasn't killed that night." He looked around at their stunned faces. Elena was beginning to cry. "I was in the Temple too, remember, but not in my own body. Don't you realize that I was there as Cait Sith? That I had my own materia? Think back! I went in after you did. I was with Avalanche as Cait Sith; they didn't know who I was, they only saw me as a traitor, but I had them by the balls and I came with them anyway. You had to know I'd be there! How could you not? Avalanche arrived after the Turks did. Strife and his gang went in first. They left Tseng by the altar near the entrance and I came in after them. I had my own Revive materia, and I got Tseng out. It was right before I relinquished that body so I could solve the puzzle, and downsized the Temple so we could keep the black materia from Sephiroth. I was the last one in. Did you really think I'd leave Tseng dead? Think about it! I figured that none of you had any materia left when you found him, otherwise you would have done it."
Reno nodded numbly. He glanced at Elena, who was shaking. Rude still had his hand on her shoulder. "We didn't have Revive, we had Restore, but we were too late. I didn't know...We thought that it was too late for Revive, too, even if we did have some. After a certain amount of time..."
"I know, I know," Reeve said. "But as Cait Sith I had a tremendous amount of materia slots, more than anyone in Avalanche at the time. I had worked with the materia a lot, the values in my Revive and Restore were very high by then, some to their full capacity."
"But," Elena said, "where did he...I mean, why didn't he come back? Did he say...?"
Reeve was silent for a moment. "He said he was going to the Forgotten Capital. I don't know, Elena. I've thought of the Sleeping Forest, and that he might be there. He almost definitely went to find Aerith. I don't even know for sure if he's alive now. I only know that he was when he left the Temple of the Ancients."
-
Elena lay awake in her bed at the Inn at Costa Del Sol. The lights were off, but she could still see everything in the room by the dim lights coming in from her window. They were harbor lights by the beach, and lights from the sidewalk below. Rude was right, Costa Del Sol was beautiful.
Elena mentally cursed herself. She cursed Tseng. She hadn't thought about him in a long time. She'd been free of him until this mission. She held herself from the edge of panic, the panic of wondering where in the hell her life was going. She was thirty, still the youngest of the Turks, but she simply felt so old. She drove back the panic of knowing that she had wasted so many years on Tseng, and she would never get those years back.
To hell with it. She'd been a stupid kid, naive for her age, especially for the job that she did, and she'd pinned all her hopes on him. Poor Tseng, so unknowing that it was his responsibility to save her from loneliness. He'd only asked her to dinner. How could he have known how intensely she'd felt about him? It probably would have scared him away from her forever, anyway.
To hell with it, and to hell with Tseng. He was probably dead anyway. He might as well have been too, for what it was worth. He hadn't come back. He'd known she existed, and that the other Turks existed, and he hadn't bothered to come back to them. He'd had ten years to do so. She couldn't honestly convince herself that he'd been searching for his old companions for those years and found nothing. For pity's sake, they'd all found each other in the space of two nights, with minimal effort. It wasn't hard to find the Turks, provided that you knew them.
No, Tseng was either dead and romping in the Lifestream with Aerith, where he most wanted to be (though she couldn't exactly imagine Tseng romping,) or he wanted nothing to do with them, or with her.
"So let him go," she told herself.
Yes. Let him go. To hell with him.
But Elena still couldn't sleep. She couldn't get her brain around the fact that she was the new leader. The Turks were hers. Not Tseng's, not Heidegger's, not even ShinRa's. Technically they would all belong to this mysterious group that had hired them, but only in action, and that was only if she decided to that they should work with them. In reality, when it came down to final decisions, the group was hers. It was theirs.
She was suddenly afraid. She had never exactly wanted to lead the Turks, only because it never occurred to her to imagine that she would. It seemed that Reno was always the obvious choice after Tseng, since he'd always been field commander.
But there was something strangely wrong with Reno, and she felt it had less to do with someone sneaking up on him than the others seemed to think. Her instinct told her this. True, there had always been something wrong with Reno, but in a different way.
Resignedly, she swung her legs out of the bed and threw the covers back. She had to get up early-obscenely early, as Reno would say-but there was no point lying in the bed restlessly if she wasn't able to sleep. In the dark, she walked to the terrace doors, opened them, and stepped out.
The night air was warm and humid, and smelled of the ocean and sand. The lights from buoys played on the water, and they looked pretty enough, but the greenish ones still made her feel a little sick to her stomach. Light, glowing green.
Elena became aware of a soft, familiar hum or buzzing sound to her left. She turned to see Reno standing on the terrace of his room next to hers. She was about to say something to him, but stopped herself when she saw that he wasn't in any way aware of her presence.
She'd seen him toy with the EMr countless times before. She'd seen him absently, almost neurotically flick it on and off, or twirl it expertly on his fingertips with almost impossible balance, as if he didn't actually believe in gravity. She'd seen him hold it next to an unsuspecting person's head with the power on the lowest setting, and make their hair fly towards it. She'd even seen him scratch his back with it once in a while.
He was toying with the EMr again, but as she quietly stepped closer, the scene didn't seem right. He wasn't actually doing it absently. He was concentrating on it very hard, it seemed, with a semi dazed look on his face. His eyes were glassy and unblinking. His whole body swayed with his breathing, which would have seemed meditative had he not had a somewhat sad or worried look. He was watching the nightstick as he ran it up and down his arm, so close that it must have been painful. And she could hear from the volume of its humming that it was not at a low setting.
He ran it down his arm once more, to his fingertips. He was creeping her out very badly.
"Reno," she said.
He dropped the nightstick and leapt back as if something had jumped out at him. His sudden movement startled Elena badly enough that she jumped, too. His back was to the wall and his hand was over his heart as he stared at her, wide eyed.
"Goddamnit Reno!" she said, angry, not so much that he had startled her, but that he had scared her with his actions. "You scared the piss out of me, and what are you doing out here? What are you doing with that!" She pointed to the nightstick which lay buzzing on the terrace floor.
She was instantly reminded of the way it had been buzzing on the floor when she and Rude found Reno lying next to it the night before. The image, and what she had just seen, gave her a jolt of nervous sickness, the implications of which she wasn't ready to think about just yet.
Reno just stared at her, trying to figure out what to tell her. "I don't know," he finally whispered, and Elena heard a world of fear in his voice.
-
