"Arigato!" Katy gushed as her clothes, minus her coat, were dumped on the floor by the SOLDIER manning the door. She missed seeing his startled expression, simply because she was about legally blind without her glasses. He stood silently and watched as she quickly pulled on the stiff and muddy clothes, then retreated back to the cot, stuffing her fingers into the pits of her knees once more.
On a strange whim, the soldier spoke, "You speak Wutain?" she stared at him blankly. He sighed and left. Apparently her sudden outburst did not mean she knew the language. Perhaps it was best to leave it to Sephiroth. Or Scarlet. Whichever got this one first, or last. Turning, he left, locking the door once again. Though, he doubted she could see clearly enough to find the door. Sephiroth was right. She WAS blind. The fact was quite obvious when she had to peer closely at her clothes before pulling them on correctly.
Hojo adjusted his microscope once again. "Cat hair," he grumped. His current item of study happened to be the clothes the two strangers were wearing. Except the one girl was wearing hers, so they had said. Sephiroth had ordered it. So, he had her jacket. Upon first inspection, he'd noticed lots of short hairs. Inspection of those hairs turned up only a lot of animal fur. This girl apparently had a thing for cats. There was hair from about five different cats embedded in the fabric. At least there was some of her hair on it as well, which proved more interesting to look at. The color was amazing... except when he tried some chemicals on it, there was a bad reaction. Turned out the color wasn't natural.
The other clothes were Naomi's. He looked at the various hairs on her clothes as well, finding mostly that of dogs. Two in particular, but it was nothing of real interest. "I hate pets," he muttered.
At least the two were useful to him- as turned out from a few other tests on Naomi and the other girl's blood. Tests concerning the actual DNA structure. On a whim, he'd tried comparing their DNA to that of his other Ancient subject. With minor differences, the core of their structure was identical to the part of Aerith's DNA he had identified as her Cetra heritage. Except, the two young women did not have the distinctly HUMAN DNA pattern. Which meant in no uncertain terms... they were pure Cetra. This only made his work more exciting. Where HAD they come from, Aerith was not the last Cetra, and now, he had all the more opportunities to create the perfect being.
Turning off the light of his microscope, he turned toward a cage that one would put a large dog in. This held one of his other on and off test subjects. If he hadn't started his experiments using this young woman, he wouldn't have bothered having her retrieved.
Aerith shifted nervously in her cage as he came closer, peering at her though the grid that was padlocked shut. Her beautiful eyes glowered at Hojo from as far back as she could get, but this weapon could not hurt him. Especially if he did not care what she thought of him.
Turning again, he was just in time to see Sephiroth stalk into the room. He did not even glance toward the poor Cetra. "Have you anything yet?" Hojo asked.
"Yesterday, I interrogated the other one. She did not understand me." Sephiroth reported, standing rather stiffly and eyeing Hojo with much the same hateful expression in his eyes as Aerith wore openly. "I am given to believe she only knows a few words in Wutain. Such as 'thank you', and 'sorry'. I have gotten her to speak the sounds of her Kanji. Within the month, I will know the language."
The scientist's frown grew, "How?" he growled, "If she doesn't understand you, how did you get her to do this?" his anger flared in his eyes. The thought of Sephiroth lying to him didn't sit well.
A faint sigh escaped Sephiroth's lips and he brought forth the papers from his pocket. The printout with corrections and more hand written on the back as well as the lined paper. He did not say how he'd gotten the feeling that she knew him. Hojo wouldn't understand.
Snatching the papers from Sephiroth's gloved hand, Hojo opened them, looking them over slowly. Finally, he turned toward Aerith's cage again, holding the paper out in front of it. "Can you read this?"
Slowly, she crept forward, looking the words over before shaking her head. Hojo smirked. "Because you're impure," he told her. "I've finally gotten pure Cetra to work with, soon I won't need you anymore. You will be disposed of." Aerith sunk back in her cage, staring in horror at Hojo.
Katy couldn't believe it. The guard had left the door unlocked. The light above it was green. She stifled her snigger. He probably thought her too blind to notice. She'd just been given her meal, and Katy supposed it was breakfast... or dinner. Or something, she still wasn't sure of the time. Not like there were any windows in this area of the building. She ate swiftly though, not wanting to taste it much. She'd found that some things really were worse than school lunch.
In any case, she hoped the meal was dinner. That would make things much easier. She had to find Michelle, and more wasted time was only more waiting to see what happened, and at the current rate, Sephiroth wasn't going to be much help. He'd hadn't shown up since kidnapping one of her fanfics and her beloved 0.5 lead mechanical pencil and clik eraser.
She sat in the middle of the floor, staring up at the green light above the door... How easy it would be to break for it now, her body was tense and heart pounding. But she had to be careful, she had to make the guard think she really wasn't able to see the color of the light. Instead, she thought about what to do.
Closing her eyes, she thought about the game. IF she was in the cell area that Cloud had been imprisoned in- or would eventually be imprisoned in- she would step out and be in a hall running right and left, a dead end at the right side, a corner at the left. Depending on what cell she was in, she'd have a varied length of hall to dash down. She paused and opened her eyes, taking a deep breath. "Plan..." she muttered to herself. "If I come out and there's no guard there... back up. Getting the door open..." she muttered to herself, forming the plan in her mind, trying to find all the angles, hoping that she didn't miss anything important.
Finally, she got up, forcing herself to pace slowly around the room, starting from the corner in which the toilet was installed. Willpower, however, wasn't the only thing keeping her from running straight for the door. Fear was a large factor as well. Katy's heart pounded harder as she neared the door and walked close enough for it to swish opened.
She stopped and stood there, forcing her face to a look of confusion.
Nothing happened. No one came. She slowly stepped forward and peeked out, finding no blue-clad people-shaped blobs that were SOLDIERs. She DID hear voices coming from just around the corner one door down from where she was currently. Right. Perfect, actually. She stepped out fully and let the door close behind her, then slipped into the room to the left of the one she'd been in.
Tables of stuff were in the room. "Hey... my burger king cup from last month..." Katy picked up the item and eyed it. "Wow... they really cleaned out my car. Everything removable is in here." Setting the cup down, she moved towards the blobs that looked like hers and Michelle's backpacks. Picking up her heftiest book, she weighed it in her hands. "Ah... math hath never served me as it will today." A wicked smirk crossed her features and she tucked the book under her arm. "Now... for step two. Judging by the voices out there, there were two people just around the corner, so I need to get them NOT around the corner... Waiting here makes things dangerous simply because I'd be discovered easily."
Katy took a stabilizing breath and made her way toward the door. Stepping out into the hall, she heard a pause in the conversation, then it continued, she hadn't moved far enough from the door for it to close yet. That would have brought on suspicion. Now... to make them go into her cell looking for her.
Again, she took a breath, but this time, it was to yell. "BAKARA!" she howled, "KOWAI BAKARA!" That was... as bad an insult as she knew of, so, it had to do.
Silence met her from around the corner. "Kowai Bakara?" she heard one voice, male, state. Something else was said, then Katy deemed it time to step back into the room and take cover.
She couldn't hear anything else and she could only hope that they were as stupid as guards usually were. The door opened. Damn. Their voices were curious, but they were cautious, one guard stayed at the door as the other moved in and immediately looked under the tables. Scowling, Katy stood. Her cover was blown anyway, one should make the best of it. A smirk suddenly crossed her features. Lifting a hand, she kissed her fingers, then pointed at her chest, then turned and smacked her ass suggestively. She wished she could see their faces!
"Butt fuckers!" she told them, "Catch me if you can!" She picked up something expendable from the piles of stuff from her car- a floaty noodle, a pool toy she had forgotten to take out of her car and had been in it for at least a year now. Flailing it, she tried to hit the guard who was on the other side of the table she was currently standing behind.
He took the first hit as if he were afraid it would hurt, then grabbed it as she tried to hit him again and pulled it from her grasp. Katy didn't fight him, she knew he wouldn't fall for it more than once. Instead, she grabbed the underside of the table and went down as if she were going to dive under it. The guard went down as well, but she suddenly heaved upwards, dumping the contents on top of him. As he struggled to free himself from the mound of garbage and books that had fallen atop him, Katy dashed for the door, charging the second guard.
Swinging her math book wide, she hit him in the face, her shoulder slammed against the area in the upward arch of his ribs, right in the center of his stomach, knocking his breath out and he toppled back out of the room. Katy's shoulder ached from the impact, but she was determined to be free. Running around the corner at high speed, she slammed face first into something that might as well have been a wall.
Staggering back, she looked up... and up... to find silver bangs and glowing green eyes. "Shit..." she muttered and let the book drop to the floor. Why bother fighting him? She knew he was stronger, faster, and certainly not going to let his reputation suffer by having her slip from his grasp like sand.
As for his hands, one lifted and slammed into her sternum, sending her flying back and smacking into the wall. For a moment the world went white and she blinked, finding that she was staring at a tall black boot. It hurt to breathe, her face hurt now that the shock of running into Sephiroth like that had worn off and the back of her head felt like she'd busted a dent in the wall with it. She probably had.
Sephiroth gracefully swept her up by the back of her shirt, dragging her back toward her cell, only to pause near the guards she had easily overcome. He spoke with them, but Katy didn't understand, and even if she knew the language, she probably wouldn't have been able to concentrate on what they were saying anyway...
The guard who'd had the table dropped on him staggered out over his gasping comrade just in time to see the young woman go around the corner, then come flying back to slam into the wall with a hard and somewhat squishy thump. She slumped to the floor and Sephiroth paced forward, swooping down and grabbing the back of the girl's shirt and easily lifting her up, dragging her back down the hall toward him.
For the longest moment, Sephiroth simply stood there, gripping the limp girl's shirt in one hand and his other hand a fist, though his face showed no emotion. "How?" he asked once Liam had staggered to his feet from the floor, one hand still clutching his solar plexus.
His companion, Ivan gulped and saluted, "It was... my fault sir," he said finally, knowing that his owning up immediately might PERHAPS lighten Sephiroth's punishment. "I didn't think she could tell if the door was left unlocked, sir, I'm sorry," he bowed and stayed that way, glad for the chance to not see Sephiroth's scowl. He could still feel it though.
Liam dared to look down. "And you?" Sephiroth's voice was cold as he turned his stare towards the other man. "As I recall, your shift here isn't until tomorrow."
Slowly, Liam looked up, "I-" he stopped his lie as soon as it started, realizing that he would only dig himself deeper if he did lie. "I was seeing if Ivan was free this weekend, sir," he said finally, "to watch the game with me... sir..."
"How did she get so far?" Sephiroth's next question just happened to be.
Ivan slowly straightened from his bow and gulped again. "We were just around the corner sir, and we heard ... her shout 'jackass, scary jackass'. We came around the corner and checked her cell first, but she wasn't in there, so we went into that room-" he pointed, "Liam stayed at the door and I went in to see if she was there. She said something and did a hand signal that seemed derogatory then made to go under the tables, so I moved to block her path, instead, she pushed the table up and dumped everything on top of me, then went for the door... I didn't see how she knocked Liam down, sir."
Liam was about to speak his part, but Sephiroth spoke instead, "What did she say?"
"Mimimimi mimimi" Ivan attempted to say, but he didn't quite remember the exact accentuation on the syllables, nor did he know what the words meant. "Do... you know what that means, sir?" he dared to ask.
Sephiroth did not answer, "What hand signal?" he asked instead, and Liam was looked towards. The man blushed somewhat and did the signal. A slight movement in his left hand brought Sephiroth's gaze, faintly, he could hear a soft wheezing snigger. "I assume that would probably mean she wished you to place your lips upon her ass," he stated completely seriously. "She probably has it correct, for if she was able to overpower you so easily, then you do not deserve to even kiss the ground she walks on." With that, he brushed past the two, dragging the prisoner back to her sell and dropping her inside unceremoniously.
After he'd left, Ivan looked down at the floor, "Damn it... I think we're going to get demoted."
Katy sat in her corner in her cell, singing. What song wasn't hard to guess. "Estuans interius ira vehementi! Sephiroth!" She continued singing loudly in her corner, second-soprano voice echoing off the walls and probably audible in the hall. She didn't care. She liked the acoustics of the room. "La la- lalalaa!" she sang out the instrumental parts as well, probably driving the guard crazy. Finally, she got tired of that song and jumped to one of the songs she was learning in chorus. The Liebeslieder Waltzes, a beautiful set of German songs by Brahms.
No, she didn't blame him for hitting her. She DID try to escape after all, and it probably WAS his job to keep her where she was for the time being... So far, he had been acting much the way she'd always thought he would. Somewhat cold toward people, efficient... Hojo's fault of course. She would change him- she was determined to! Though, she wondered if she was really making much of an impression on him other than just a foolish little girl who knows his name.
Soon, however... she got tired of the German songs and tried to think of something else to sing. A grin spread across her face and she was silent for a moment, thinking about things for a moment, then launched into her new song.
She sang... like an angel, despite the fact that she was apparently singing about Sephiroth, but thankfully that song only lasted for a minute or two before she went into another song that seemed... different than the one she was singing before which was different from her normal words. Liam wasn't quite sure if it was a different language or not, it was still pretty.
He leaned against the wall listening to her voice echoing through her cell and briefly closed his eyes... only to suddenly wake up when he started to fall over to the side. Shaking his head to clear the drowsiness from his brain, the guard realized that she had stopped singing. Liam sighed and pushed off the wall to keep from falling asleep again, this was the most boring job in the world... except for the excitement the other day. His stomach and face were still somewhat sore.
Then she started singing again... in Wutain.
"The girl who is in love, the love binds her... It is so bright that I cannot see, mimi mimimi! I wear sparkling rouge, to be like a mimi mimimi, give me what I wish for in my maiden's prayers!"
It was a rather upbeat song and some of the words were rather slurred, some he couldn't even understand, but he got the idea of what she was singing about. It was so cute... it was almost frightening. At least he had someone to share the frightening experience with, Sephiroth had just stepped around the corner and stopped, an odd look on his face.
"The night sky floats and is silver, I hate being tied up and shake to tear the robes, if you even mention my small chest and that I'm short, let your mind fly back to where you came from!"
Liam straightened and saluted the General, who in turn slowly came forward. "How long has she been singing that?"
Gulping, Liam answered quickly, "Only just before you came around the corner, sir. Something about girls being in love, sir."
"Please grant the wish that the Maiden prays for! Everything raises because I am so pretty!"5 And she went on to repeat some of her earlier lines and then continued on with the song, which was much the same in that it seemed to be about love. Finally, she stopped and went on to some other song, one of the songs she'd been singing earlier.
Shaking himself slightly, Sephiroth continued on toward the door of the cell and unlocked it, stepping in.
He walked in just as she was starting up another song, but she didn't stop singing as he moved forward and sat down on the bed... she seemed to be singing FOR him. In her language at least, a very soft song that Sephiroth almost felt sorry when it ended. He firmly reminded himself that he had come for a reason, not to listen to her sing. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled forth the two papers he'd gotten a few days ago as well as something else wrapped in a bit of cloth, which he unwrapped and held out to her.
The girl stared at his hand, then squinted and leaned forward... Shocked would be a mild word for what he felt. She'd moved so fast, even his warrior instincts hadn't reacted in time to block her and he only ended up wrapping his arms around her as she clung to him tightly. "Arigato! Arigato! Arigato!" she said rapidly and drew back to take what he'd presented to her finally.
Placing her glasses upon her face, she adjusted them slightly, took them off and bent the frames a bit, then put them back on. With eyes no longer squinting, she reclaimed the papers she'd knocked to the floor and opened them. Looking up at his face, she smiled, dimples showing somewhat on her bruised cheeks. Then she proceeded to point at things and say a word.
Sephiroth almost missed the first few words, but at least they weren't anything important... only things like 'shoes' and 'pants'. It was a start though. Again, he got the eerie feeling that she knew him and what he was capable of, simply because she didn't bother repeating anything she'd said, bouncing from one thing to the next, naming everything in the room. Instead of thinking about it, he simply listened and watched, absorbing the information for later usage.
Finally, she stopped, looked around at the room, then looked at him. Her hand lifted and poked his chest, "Sephiroth," she stated, then pointed to herself, "Katy."
5 Otome no Inori: a song on my Slayer's CD, sung by Lina and Amelia in Slayers Next.
