Vincent never questioned as he dragged Aulia over the rough stone floor of the mansions' subterranean tomb to one of the gaping death boxes near his own. Placing her ungracefully in a pool of cold vomit (which he puzzled over its origination for a moment), he replaced the lid over her and the coffin's already crumbling occupant beneath her, the latter didn't seem to mind. He moved silently back to his own resting place and stared down at the strange portrait on the coffin lid, which he hadn't noticed before.
It's you. The silver eyed man spoke silently drifting over to Vincent's side on bare feet a few inches off the floor.
I've noticed. Vincent replied in his darkened mind, images of someone else, someone he longed for long ago pulsing back to life in his finally wide awake mind. You need not speak the obvious. What do you plan to do with the one in the doorway? Vincent stared at the taller man. Beneath the mat of greenish-black hair was a face set in lines of stern expression and worry, lines that marked a relatively young and handsome face. Dark mist obscured the man's otherwise naked body, causing him to look at all times a man of different body structure, tall and thin, then short and fat, yet by far, he was no where under seven feet.
I plan to lead her off of your trail. Once we leave, you and Aulia must leave. Do not touch your portrait, it is a ritual designed to bind my power to you for a short while. The man smiled at Vincent, yet his silver eyes shown sorrow, a sorrow Vincent could relate to. I didn't know you cared for someone. If you wish to see the one you long for so, go with Aulia to the North Lady, she can bring broken connections back together, you can trust me on that. Again, immeasurable sorrow entered the ghostly silver eyes of the specter, he looked towards the thing waiting in the doorway.
I go. Vincent nodded as the man floated to the doorway. He climbed into the coffin and reaching over the side, pulled the lid back into place. The stone ball burned savagely at his heart and he could feel an unspeakable dread pulse from its misty depths. The construct of the man that the stone once had been spoke again to his shadowy mind.
You will know when we leave. The ghostly man drifted to a halt before the doorway and stared unblinkingly into the eyeless sockets of the Dread Child.
Aulia never answered me. Who are you? Vincent wondered silently in the darkness of the coffin. The silver eyed man smiled to himself at the question.
Riven. The air burst apart with eardrum shattering screams, screams that sounded like seven different voices screeching all at once.
The silver glow left the stone ball, fading to gray, then to total black.
Darkness bled through his closed eyes and penetrated his brain. He couldn't remember anything, but he did know something had awoken him. He opened his eyes and stared up into the blackness. Soft muffled sobs rushed through the crushing darkness to his ears. On a whim, he raised his hands and they brushed something soft and velvety. He pushed up and a crack of weak light nearly blinded him. Something cautioned him subconsciously to place the object carefully beside whatever it was that he was laying in. He sat up and was assaulted by a seen of carnage, a small man bled to death in one corner, a young blonde haired woman laid sprawled out near what he was laying in, a coffin. The woman's head had struck the coffins' edge and had laid her out with some of her brains spilled out onto the rocky floor in this place of bones. Something rolled from his black shirt, a small plain black stone ball which seemed to his blank mind completely unimportant. He noticed that dropped at the edge of the coffin near him was a bloodied knife which seemed to pull at some hidden memory. The other coffin near him creaked open and the lid fell to the floor with a deafening crash. A white haired woman sat up in it rubbing at what looked like a gash like sore on her neck as she stared back at Vincent, unbridled tears running freely down her pale cheeks. She sobbed something unclear and tore savagely at the sore on her neck making it bleed anew.
"He's gone. Don't you feel it? He's FUCKING GONE! DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND THAT? HE'S GONE AND YOUR ALIVE! HE DID THE TRADE! His life for yours. You had better be happy to be among the living you sonnuvabitch!" she screamed, the tears running faster down her cheeks. In a rush, he could feel the mocking laughter of a demon in the back of his head. The memories bore down on him, everything, he recalled all, the woman he gave his soul for, the woman Lucrecia, the experiments, the first intruders he had seen in years, Cloud and his company, Sephiroth, this new intruder named Aulia and the mysterious Riven, the fight with the man named Drake. The memories flooded on, and as Vincent watched and relived each memory, Chaos laughed.