Vincent lay awake in his coffin, knowing that it was almost time. For five years, he had relived his past mistakes, watching himself make them over and over again and unable to stop himself. Now that it was nearly time, the nightmares had released him, and he lay here letting his thoughts wander. It was a pointless endeavor; his thoughts always travelled back to Lucrecia, whether in nightmares or in the waking world. He could not tear his mind from her.
She had told him that none of this was his fault, but he could not accept that. He had known that Lucrecia would only get hurt if she went through with the Jenova Project, and he had done nothing. He had told himself that if she was happy with Hojo and the project, then he would not interfere, even knowing that something terrible would come of it. He had only argued once on the matter, and afterwards he had done nothing to save her.
He should have protected her.
He should have watched over her as the project continued and found a way to save her. Instead he had abandoned her, telling himself that she did not need him. He should have protected her from Hojo. Instead he had left her in the scientist's care, trusting Professor Gast to look after her. And she had died. Gast had left for Midgar, and Hojo had let Lucrecia die because he no longer needed her.
He should have stopped it from the start. He should have been able to save her from Hojo and persuade her not to go through with the project. How could he have let her do that to herself? How could he have let Hojo and Professor Gast inject Jenova cells into her body when he had known how dangerous it could prove?
He had abandoned her to die. The Jenova cells had brought her back, only to die again. She had lived in a ruined state of mind save for that brief moment of lucidity before her death.
And she had told him that it was not his fault.
She could not really mean that, could she? He had abandoned her, and consequently she had lost all possible chance of being happy. She had never even gotten the chance to hold her son. She was the only person who had ever cared for Sephiroth, and yet she had barely even seen him. After all that, how could she forgive him, let alone tell him it was not his fault?
Vincent sighed, wishing that these thoughts of Lucrecia would cease to plague his mind, but knowing they never would. He loved her too strongly for her to fade from his mind, and he had failed her too miserably for him to cease suffering over it. He closed his eyes, hoping for at least some respite. Even a nightmare would be better than these thoughts, provided she was absent from it.
Vincent awakened, but dared not move. His whole body screamed in pain, and he felt as though he could not move. What had happened? He had tried to get help for Lucrecia, and Hojo had shot him. Shot him...? How was he still alive? The wound must not have been fatal. But it hurt so much...
He opened his eyes and found himself staring up at a stone ceiling. He blinked a few times, then slowly, painfully turned his head to the right. Everything hurt. He felt as though he no longer fit inside his skin, as though it was stretched tight across his flesh and about ready to rip, and...
His gaze met rows of books, and he struggled to recognize the place. He was lying on Hojo's lab bench in the basement, he realized, and a sudden fear gripped him. What had the scientist done to him?
Vincent sat up quickly, wincing as he did so. His head spun, and he took a breath to steady himself. It did not help. He tried to ignore the feeling, swinging his legs over the side of the table, and had to close his eyes tightly for a moment.
His left shoulder hurt more than the rest of him, but the arm itself felt numb. He opened his eyes, holding the hand in front of him, unable to feel the movement at all. He froze, looking at the arm in horror. Metal. It was metal, wickedly sharp fingers of metal, a shining arm going up to join his flesh at his shoulder. Vincent lifted his right hand, quivering, to touch the cold metal, half-hoping that it was not real, that this was a dream. But it was not. He could feel the sharp reality of it.
Suddenly he felt something stir inside of him, some other presence that he had never felt before. It felt feral, violent... almost evil. Oh, hell no, he thought. What had Hojo done to him? He felt his cells shift, the stretched feeling intensifying to an unbearable pain as his entire body began to change. He lifted his twisted head and let out a cry of pain in a voice that was not his own, but a deep animal howl.
The creature that had been Vincent moments ago jumped off of the table, crouching low, head swiveling, long serpentine tail slashing the air. Its fangs gleamed in the dim light from the desk lamp, and its fierce eyes shown with bloodlust. It turned its eyes upon a figure entering the basement and readied itself to pounce, but several loud gunshots sounded and its awareness quickly retreated back into its human host.
When Vincent awoke again, he found that he could not see. He blinked several times, but his vision did not clear. He lifted his flesh hand and found himself touching a wooden ceiling... No, not a ceiling. He searched around further with his hand, felt the velvet lining. A coffin. He was in a coffin.
And... he could not breathe. His eyes widened in panic, and he tried to push the lid off, but it was too heavy. Had Hojo buried him alive? No; there was a room outside the coffin, he could tell that much. He realized suddenly that he had already stopped breathing. He felt at his neck and found no pulse.
Was he dead? No, he could not be dead. What was he? What had Hojo turned him into?
He yelled for help, but no one heard him. When his voice gave out, he banged his metal claw against the lid of the coffin, only stopping when he realized with a sinking feeling that no one would ever hear him. These efforts were futile.
Vincent thought of Lucrecia, and prayed that she had not died--or worse, been used for another experiment as he had. Gast, please help her. Someone, please...
It struck him that he was alone, so utterly and completely alone. A moment later that he wished this were true; he could hear belligerent, inhuman voices growling in the back of his mind. He tried to push them away, unsuccessfully.
How could this be happening to him? What other horrors would Hojo commit? Lucrecia, forgive me.
Then a wave of sleep overtook him, and he sank into nightmares.
The snow swirled around him, too thick for him to see anything through its haze. He took a step forward, the wind pushing against him, the icy air defying his every motion. But he made his way through it anyway, the snowflakes stinging his skin and his silver hair, tangled with tiny crystals, slapping at his face. He hefted the long sword at his side, and held up a black-gloved hand to push the hair and snow from his eyes.
Through a lull in the storm, he thought he saw a town, but the moment passed, and the wind picked up once more, screaming in his ears and thickening the air with white.
He made his way towards the village, latching on to it as a goal. For days, he had known no purpose in his wanderings, and only felt that he had to go somewhere, to see someone, to do something. He tried to keep a straight course, fighting against the wind.
After what seemed like an eternity, the wind died down, the snow fell more lightly, and the town came into sight again, a little to his right. He turned in that direction, looking down to make sure that his numb fingers still clasped the hilt of his sword. It was still there, and he nodded to himself.
It was perhaps the only link he had to his past now. He had awoken far to the north of here with only the clothes on his back and this sword. He could not recall who he was; he had tried to remember, but the memories that flickered just at the edge of his awareness unnerved him, and so he had ceased trying.
He entered the town, walking past two children in thick jackets who had paused from their play to gawk at the swordsman. He stopped momentarily to study them in curiosity, but they turned and fled into a nearby house, dropping their snowballs, and slammed the door shut tight behind them.
The man frowned slightly and continued down the path, stopping in front of a large building with a sign reading 'Icicle Inn.' He opened the door and walked inside, tracking snow onto the wooden floor. The innkeeper turned to him, about to say something, but just stood there, mouth agape, eyes staring.
The black-cloaked man frowned in confusion. "Is there something wrong?"
"A-are you..." The innkeeper gulped and took a breath. "S-Sephiroth...?"
He shook his head minutely. "Who is Sephiroth?"
The shorter man's eyes slid to his sword, then looked back up at his face. He quickly looked away from the swordsman's green-blue gaze and stared at the floorboards instead.
"Who is Sephiroth?" he repeated.
The innkeeper did not look up. "He... he looked just like you..."
The black-cloaked man frowned and shook his head. "That explains nothing. Why are you so frightened of me?"
The man gestured to to the long sword at his side.
He looked at it with unease. "This? Did... did this 'Sephiroth' kill people?"
"Yes, but... only Sephiroth could wield the Masamune--that sword," the frightened man told him. "You must be... You..." He trailed off anxiously.
The swordsman stroked the hilt of the blade with his thumb. Masamune. He lifted his gaze again. "What happened to Sephiroth?"
"He..." The innkeeper gulped, his eyes wandering to the sword once more. "He supposedly died. Five years ago. But..."
"But now I am here. You think I am this 'Sephiroth'? How could he come back from the dead?"
The frightened man wrung his hands nervously and shook his head. "I-I don't know. But... but he did it before."
The swordsman frowned. "I was going to ask if you could give me a room, but it seems that I am not welcome here."
"I don't want you scaring away my customers," the innkeeper said almost firmly, shaking his head.
He sighed, nodded, and turned to leave. He opened the door, flinching slightly as he was greeted once more with icy air and a thin flurry of snow. He walked back out into the cold, looking over at another pair of children sledding down a nearby hill, apparently oblivious to him as yet. How carefree they looked.
He shook his head and started up the hill. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the two children run, the sled falling to lie forgotten at the bottom of the hill.
The swordsman left the town, heading in a direction which he estimated to be south. He could see mountains to the south and east, drawing a fraction nearer with each step. The snow in the air thinned, then stopped altogether, and he felt even more alone in the broad expanse of white with the town behind him and the mountains his only landmark. He concentrated on his footfalls, trying not to pay attention to this isolation. He grasped the Masamune tighter, trying, and failing, to glean some sort of comfort from the weapon. As an instrument of murder, it could provide no solace, but it was the only thing with which he felt familiar.
At length the sun began to break through the clouds above, and as he went farther south, the cloud cover began to disperse entirely. Still the mountains inched slowly closer.
The setting sun found him still striding towards the mountains with the same relentless pace. During the night he reached them and started up the rocky slopes, but by the time morning came, he had not found his way to the other side. His pace did not slow even on the rough terrain, though the thought crossed his mind to stop for rest. But he had been walking for days like this without rest; surely one more would make no difference.
As the sun made its slow journey through the sky, he descended the slopes and left all traces of snow behind him. By noon, the ground beneath his feet was grassy and level. It made for a much easier trek.
Sometime in the afternoon, he caught sight of the ocean, a glimmer of deep blue on the horizon. He walked towards that glimmer, and soon enough arrived at the beach where the sand choked the grass. He walked along side of it, headed eastward, appreciating this change in scenery only for a short while. Behind him the sun began to sink steadily lower, and he watched as his shadow stretched out before him, an imposing figure with a wicked blade.
He knew that beyond this plain there lay a forest, in which lay his destination. There was a town there--he remembered that much--but he could not recall what it was called, much less any reason for him to head towards it. His memory failed him, though his face gave no outward sign of his frustration.
Perhaps it was preferable to be without his memory. The villagers' fear of him and the blade he carried seemed to indicate as much. And yet, all he knew from before was cold and darkness, and surely there was something in his mind worth remembering.
Opening his eyes, Vincent stared up at nothingness. Here in his coffin it seemed that he could only see anything with his eyes closed; it was better to keep them open, but that way he atoned for nothing.
A noise caught his attention, and he listened for a moment, surprised to hear voices. The mansion rarely had visitors nowadays. Teens would dare each other to go inside, but only a handful had ever entered, and none had made it to the basement. The heavy door creaked open; Vincent had left it unlocked in case one of the old Avalanche members had needed him.
"Woah..." The voice belonged to an adolescent boy. He had no doubt come with his friends to explore the old Shinra mansion and see if there was any truth to the rumors that the place was haunted.
"What is it, Mark?" asked a girl from the hallway.
"There's like, a coffin in here," the boy replied. "A lot of coffins."
The door groaned as it opened farther, and three sets of footsteps cautiously approached his coffin.
"Guys, this is really creepy," said a third voice, another girl. "Let's go."
"Oh, come on, Meg," said the first girl. "Don't you wanna see what's inside this one?"
"No."
"The lid looks heavy, Kel," said the boy. "You gonna help me out here?"
Vincent decided that he had waited long enough. Five years had past, and now it was time. He lifted his arms and pushed the lid up and to the side, slow enough to give warning to the three teenagers. A shriek accompanied the movement. With the lid out of the way, he sat up, surveying the three who had come to disturb him.
The boy and the braver of the girls stood near his coffin, but they were beginning to back away. The timid girl stood frozen farther back, holding a lantern.
Climbing easily out of the coffin, Vincent started for the door. He had no intention of wasting his time on a group of children.
But the girl holding the lantern was standing in his way, and she did not move aside. He stopped in front of her, and she stared back at him.
"H-hey," the boy spoke up. "You leave Meg alone."
Vincent glanced at him. "She is in my way," he stated, "and the three of you should not be down here in the first place."
"Says who?" the braver girl demanded.
"Logic," he answered simply. "I am not the only monster you may find down here, you understand." He pushed the motionless girl gently aside with his flesh hand and pulled the door open.
"Hey, wait a second!" the boy yelled. "Who the hell do you think you are?"
"My name is Vincent. That is all I will tell you, but the library down the hall has more information should you care to look. I do not, however, advise it."
Vincent stepped out into the hallway and let the door fall shut behind him. The teens did not follow him, and he instantly forgot about them. As he climbed the stairs out of the basement, he wondered how much had changed while he had slept. Five years was a shorter period of time than thirty, to be sure, but the fall of Shinra may have led to some drastic changes.
But he supposed it did not matter; no matter how much changed, some things would always remain the same.
He exited the mansion, squinting briefly at the bright afternoon sunlight. When his eyes adjusted, he glanced around. Nibelheim looked much the same as it always had, but now he saw villagers in the streets, their eyes fixed anxiously on him. When Vincent had known the town, the streets had always been empty, but the fear was nothing new.
He turned his gaze northward. Would Sephiroth be resurrected near where he had died? Near the Northern Crater? Or had he fallen into the Lifestream and been carried away to gods-knew-where? Northern Crater seemed the most likely option, and if Vincent could not find him there... Well, Cloud had wound up in Mideel, and he supposed that would be the second place to look.
The quickest way to get to the northern continent would be to fly, but he did not want to involve anyone else in this, especially not Cid; the man would not understand. Besides, this was Vincent's task, and his alone. He would simply have to use his own methods of going north, however distasteful they might be.
Katrina managed to make it up the stairs to her room without running, though she very much wanted to. She nearly slammed her door shut, but checked herself and only closed it loudly. She locked it quickly and leaned against it, swallowing to push back tears.
Her parents wanted to send her to live with her uncle in Junon. They had even written about it to him already, saying that she'd be there within the week. How could they have done such a thing without asking her? She and her uncle had never gotten along; in fact, she practically hated him, although at the moment her parents ranked right up there with him. What were they thinking?
She supposed they wanted her to get a job in Junon, since there were more opportunities in the city than in an out-of-the-way place like Bone Village. At eighteen, she was the right age for that sort of thing, but still. They should have asked her. Did they think she couldn't make her own decisions?
A knock sounded at the door, and she heard her mother ask, "Honey, are you feeling all right?"
"Yeah," Katrina replied, trying to sound like she meant it.
Her mother lingered near the door for a moment, and then Katrina heard her footsteps going back downstairs.
She took a deep breath and forced herself to think coherently.
True, she disliked her uncle very much, but that wasn't the only reason she didn't want to go. She didn't like the city either. She still remembered what life had been like in Midgar--it had only been five years since they had moved here; of course she still remembered--and the memories were not pleasant. She had visited Junon once or twice, too, and the people there were just as cruelly complacent.
She did not want to go to a place that still reeked of that kind of corruption.
So she would sneak away, Katrina decided suddenly. She would leave that night, sometime after midnight, after her parents had gone to bed. They would never suspect it of her because she never spoke with that kind of independence. Sometimes she probably even came across as meek. But Delphine always said she was the one to take action. Her parents just didn't know her as well as her best friend.
The only question was, where would she go? She had always wanted to visit Cosmo Canyon, but although there was a small port to the south of Bone Village, she doubted she could afford the fare. She couldn't linger there until she had enough either; that was the first place her parents would look for her.
It looked like her only other option was Snow Village. It was a long, freezing trek north and west, but no one would search for her there.
She packed quickly and sat waiting on her bed as the sky grew dark. At length she got up and put her ear up against the door, listening. Nothing. Slowly, she turned the knob and stepped out into the hall, softly closing the door behind her again. She crept down the stairs, grabbed her heaviest coat from the front closet, and slipped out of the house.
Luckily, there was no one around that night. Sometimes the excavators would continue working through the night, seemingly unaware of the time. The town had grown a bit after Meteor had destroyed most of Midgar and left thousands homeless, but it didn't get as many tourists as it once had.
Katrina hastened out of the town and set off westward through the forest, her coat draped over one arm and her bag slung over the other shoulder. After half an hour or so she cleared the trees and craned her neck to look at the sky as she walked, admiring the full moon and the spattering of stars. She was glad to be walking under such a sky; it lightened her mood and made her feel delightfully free. She smiled, wondering who else was looking up at the same sky.
She had been walking for several hours, she figured, when a sound in a thicket to her right caught her attention. Looking that way, a twinge of fear ran through her. A pair of gleaming yellow eyes shone in the darkness, and a wolf-like creature stepped towards her. Katrina took a step back, wondering desperately what she was supposed to do. She wasn't a fighter, and she hadn't thought to bring any sort of weapon.
Several other pairs of eyes appeared behind the first. The leader growled and made to pounce for her, and she turned away, shutting her eyes tightly. She may have screamed; she wasn't sure.
She heard something sing through the air that didn't sound much like a wolf, and felt nothing.
Cautiously, she opened her eyes and turned to look. The wolf-creature lay on the ground a few feet away from her, its innards spilling out through a deep gash in its stomach. Katrina swallowed and cast about for her savior, seeing only more still dark forms lying on the ground.
And then she saw of a pair of glowing blue-green eyes, and a silver-haired man melted out of the shadows.
Katrina's breath caught in her throat when she she caught sight of his wicked-looking blade. When he started towards her, she gasped and stumbled backwards. First wolves and now Sephiroth? But how could he possibly be alive? Hadn't Cloud what's-his-name killed him five years ago?
He stopped, and something mournful entered his eyes. "You are afraid of me, too?" he asked.
She nodded dumbly, her eyes flickering to the sword.
"I am not going to hurt you," he said gently. "I just saved your life; do you think I would contradict myself?"
Katrina guessed he had a point, but... "But aren't you Sephiroth?"
The swordsman shook his head. "I don't remember. A man in Snow Village said as much, but I can neither confirm nor deny it."
"Oh." She pondered this for a moment. If he had no memory, did it really matter if he was Sephiroth or not? (Though he certainly looked like him, right down to the impossibly handsome part.) What mattered was that he had just protected her. If it hadn't been for him, she'd have been dead by now. "Well, that's good, I guess."
"Why do you say that?" he asked.
"Well, you see, if you were Sephiroth, and knew it, you wouldn't have bothered saving me," she explained, her gaze wandering to the Masamune again. The same unmistakable sword that had slaughtered thousands had been used to save her life. "But instead you stopped to help me. Um... thank you."
He seemed unsure of how to react. At length he said, "You are the first person I have met who has not tried to run from me. The others were all terrified."
"Well, I am, too," Katrina admitted. "Sorta."
"What were you doing out here?" he queried, finally taking his piercing gaze off of her and looking around. "It is dangerous for someone like you."
She dropped her gaze to the ground. "I was... um, running away from home."
"Where did you intend to go?"
She looked back up, surprised that he didn't think she should go back, but she realized that if he didn't know who he was, then there were probably some other things that he didn't know. It was just as well. "I want to go to Cosmo Canyon," she said, "but I can't really afford to make the trip. So I figured I'd head for Snow Village in the meantime."
"I've just come from there," he stated with some measure of reluctance.
"What's your point?"
He gave a curt shake of his head. "I cannot simply let you travel alone. You are vulnerable."
Katrina smiled sheepishly. "I guess you're right."
"Well, there is no use standing idly about. Let's go." The swordsman turned and began walking westward.
She trotted after him. "Yeah, um, I'm Katrina," she said awkwardly. Maybe he wasn't a murderer or anything, but he certainly didn't make himself seem approachable. "I guess I can't ask your name, huh?"
He glanced at her and shook his head.
"It must be frustrating," she continued, "not remembering who you are. Especially when you look exactly like Sephiroth. I mean, whether or not you really are him, people are going to be afraid of you."
"Indeed it does not seem to matter either way," he agreed. He hesitated. "What do you believe?"
Katrina faltered. "Well... It seems pretty unlikely that Sephiroth had a twin brother or something, you know? But then again, it seems just as crazy for him to come back from the dead, even if he was pretty powerful. I guess... I'm not sure what to think," she admitted finally.
"Do you think that there is anyone who could tell me for certain?"
"I dunno. Maybe the people who killed Sephiroth would know something." She paused, glancing at him. "I feel like I'm talking about you like you're not here. You probably don't want me calling you Sephiroth though, until we're sure."
He nodded. "From what little I have heard of him, I do not want to be him."
Katrina said nothing in reply.
For another few hours they walked together in relative silence. She was growing more tired with each passing moment, and she only kept going because her legs seemed set in the monotonous motion of putting one foot in front of the other. Her companion did not seem fatigued in the slightest.
"Um," she said as they passed an inviting clump of trees.
He glanced at her questioningly.
"Can we rest for a while?" she asked, managing to stop herself. With her feet still, she felt unsteady. "I'm kinda tired."
The swordsman looked her over and seemed to decide that this was a valid claim. He nodded wordlessly and followed her to the trees. There, Katrina lay down at the base of a pine, using her pack as a pillow, and soon fell asleep.
Author's Notes
Enter Sephiroth. Who, um... walks a lot. I suppose it's not very intriguing, but it was an interesting experience writing him without referring to him by name. We also get more Vincent in this chapter. Man, was there a lot of Vincent angst in the original. Back then he was my favorite character. Also I was still in middle school and angsting was something I fancied myself good at. (Note the sarcasm here.) Also, middle school? Wow, was that a long time ago.
Katrina also makes her first appearance in this chapter. I got mixed reactions about her. Some people liked her, others thought she was pretty pointless. Which I guess makes sense because all she really does in the beginning is follow Seph around, but I felt it was important to have someone there trying to be his friend. I also knew from the beginning that she'd have an important role later on, but I didn't realize it would be so long in coming. In this version, we won't get to that scene until chapter 27! With how meandering the plot was for this story, I'm amazed to recall that any planning went into it at all.