Hojo leans over his microscope, jotting notes, in a makeshift laboratory at the Shinra Tower. He's been chasing a particular phenomenon since Nibelheim. A new strain of Jenova cells had emerged from the rejection of necrotizing tissue. It mimics human structure, but when exposed to certain stimuli, the cells revert. Reset to their initial state at inception, like a clean slate.

It's been difficult to pin down exactly how to reproduce this effect. He's been unsuccessful replicating it in other bodies, particularly the Mako saturation and cell injection at the precise moment of death. Hojo has had little pull since the incident, and by the time any deceased personnel are carted to his domain, the Jenova cells do nothing. Zero interaction. Mako-enhancements be damned.

He watches the Asset's cells beneath the lens; a beautiful semblance of human molecules that shift and reform as he introduces various stressors. Though, it's unclear why some cells never revert. He scribbles and ruminates. If only he could achieve consistent results.

In the past five years, the specimen has awoken in anywhere from fits of trauma to total catatonia. It was only recently that Hojo felt he'd achieved an effective restoration which included, as a happy byproduct, a memory wipe, which was encouraging enough. It meant progress. And sometimes progress was slow.

But Heidegger had pushed the Asset into field duty too soon, and Hojo wasn't in a position to argue at the time. The science division had no budget, and the President made it clear there'd need to be results soon.

Now Heidegger was dead, and the results had led Shinra straight to the Promised Land and to Sephiroth. Hojo knows this research could restore his son's body and expunge the madness that claimed Sephiroth's life. It could lead to the eternal soldier, free from the traumas of war.

He scoops the material from the microscope into a syringe and turns to the Asset. Sitting calm and content, the Asset watches Hojo with a cautious weighty stare. Nothing vacant about it. This thing is thoughtful and present.

Hojo presses the needle into the Asset's skin. There's bruising curled around its arm from prior injection sites.

When complete, the Asset doesn't leave. It walks to the windows of the converted executive suite and looks out at the sprawling steel of Midgar. The Mako Reactors pump greenish haze into a burnt red sky. The object of the Asset's interest is, as always, the meteor hanging like a blot.

Without fear or revulsion, the Asset spends every spare moment staring up at it. Almost as though the sight has a calming effect. It's strange. Hojo jots more notes. Interesting side effects.

There's a knock at the door.

Hojo hates interruptions. He's allocated all waking hours with precision, and deviations only delay accomplishment. He grumbles and adjusts his spectacles.

Rufus Shinra enters without permission. His long white coat is immaculate, buttoned, and his blonde hair is slick. The chief executive looks out of place in the disarray of cluttered equipment. He behaves that way, too.

"Ah, Simon," Rufus says, giving the surroundings a reproachful glance. "Is the Asset ready for another deployment?"

Hojo hadn't wanted it deployed in Junon to begin with. It had been there for military assessment, not live combat against a Weapon. Shinra had no information on these new threats. Observations would be prudent, instead of rushing into battle. But that was always Shinra's way. Brute force against adversity.

Rufus continues, "We're tracking seismic activity caused by another Weapon. I need the Asset ready to go when it surfaces."

Those Weapons should be second, even third, priority. Hojo stands and points outside at the meteor.

"And what are the company's plans for that?" he says, unable to hide his disdain.

Rufus exhales, a hint of frustration in his eyes. He's had to tell this story quite a few times today.

"We're relaunching the space program. We plan to fire a rocket to set the meteor off its trajectory or destroy it."

Hojo senses hesitancy. "...But?"

Rufus squirms and then smooths his coat, a nervous twitch. "But our head engineer has gone missing, presumed dead in Junon."

Ah yes, Hojo had heard the entire upper tier collapsed. That new airship, the Highwind, is likely at the bottom of the sea by now. A shame.

"A minor setback," Rufus says. "So, is the Asset ready?"

Hojo has a sudden unrelated thought about the next phase of his experiments. He grabs a pad and writes before the idea can float away.

Rufus notices the Asset standing alone at the window. "What is it doing?" he asks Hojo.

The professor doesn't acknowledge this tedious question.

The Asset was unstable, at one point, so Rufus doesn't want to engage with it, but he's too arrogant to admit fear. He approaches the window, boots clicking on the tile. The Asset doesn't move, except its eyes go to his in the reflection of the glass.

Rufus leans in. "Can it...speak?"

"I can," the Asset replies. The voice is exactly what Rufus remembers. It's chilling, the way Hojo's reduced this renegade SOLDIER to a sharpened tool. His father was wrong to strip the science division of resources.

Rufus clears his throat and assumes a commanding tone. "You will engage with the next Weapon once we forecast its attack site. Your mission is to disable or destroy that creature, at any cost."

"Understood."

"Second priority is the termination of those terrorists hostile to Shinra."

The Asset nods, but Rufus wants confirmation.

"The terrorists are Tifa Lockhart, Barret Wallace, Yuffie Kisaragi."

No recognition. Not even a flutter.

The Asset says, "I know their names. I received the alert from Director Scarlet at Junon."

"And do you know your name?"

"Cloud Strife." A quick response, perturbed. The Asset behaves quite human. This soothes Rufus somewhat.

"Third objective," Rufus says, then considering the meteor outside. "If you locate Cid Highwind, apprehend him. Without harm."

"Understood."

This short visit pleases Rufus. He tells the Asset to report to the mission briefing, and then he departs. Hojo watches him go, relieved that the irksome ivory suit won't be interfering further. For now.

"I don't like that man," the Asset says, resuming its gaze to the sky.

Hojo snickers. "Nobody does," he replies, head buried in his papers.

The Asset goes silent and motionless as a statue. Hojo finds its presence comforting almost. It is proof that his toil and sacrifice has produced tangible, meaningful results.

"That woman in Junon," the Asset says, as if picking up a conversation Hojo hadn't known was happening. "The terrorist. She acted like she knew me." He looks over at Hojo. "Is that possible?"

The professor finishes memorializing his current thought, taking several moments to respond. The Asset waits, and Hojo can feel it staring into him.

"I told you," Hojo says, rubbing his temples. "The Jenova cells may have known certain people in the past, but that's not you anymore. It can be confusing, and the research I'm doing now should help correct that." He hopes.

The Asset considers this. It tilts its head towards the meteor, like a dog at a whistle. Then it walks to the door.

"I'll report to the briefing. Guess I'll see you later."

Hojo mutters a dismissal. He has yet to solve why these particular Jenova cells remain bonded to the form of that dead MP from Nibelheim. It would be beneficial to learn how to create more of these Assets, independent of this single source.

"Wait," Hojo says. Then he lowers his voice. "If you do see her again—this terrorist woman— disable and bring her to me. Intact."

There could be something in that Nibelheim blood which Jenova finds appealing. Something Hojo hadn't investigated before. And this woman is the only other known survivor.

"Yes, sir."

Although, with the end of the world crashing down, the opportunity for testing may never come. He's been hunting for the perfect soldier, but this Asset may very well be the last soldier.

He's also aware that Jenova, his lifetime of research and devotion, is responsible. Gast's discovery, split apart, has congregated at the north crater and summoned devastation.

He's running out of time. Thoughts swirl, ideas amassing from streams of consciousness, and Hojo writes. He speculates and calculates. He plans.

Before he knows it, the sky is dark. The hour is late. He often loses track of time when a project consumes him. It isn't until he's refreshed his coffee for the fourth time that he notices the quiet.

The Tower is desolate, only a skeleton crew of staff and security remain in the wake of the Junon attacks. Rows of fluorescent bulbs hum in the corridors, and a lone office worker taps away at a blue-lit screen in a glass cubicle as Hojo strides by, returning to his lab from the break room.

He surveys the city from this height, sipping his mug. Sector Seven is a mass of scaffolding, cranes, bulldozers, and enormous piles of rubble. Large support beams puncture the remaining plates like staves, surrounding the Tower, built to support a new solid platform. Empty for now. The Mako-cannon from Junon should arrive tomorrow, and Shinra believes the amplification of energy provided by Midgar's functional Reactors will be enough to crack the barrier at the northern crater. Then, Shinra can claim the Promised Land.

Hojo shakes his head. What good is a bountiful supply of Mako when that damn meteor will annihilate them all? He doubts any sort of rocket program can be scaled fast enough to have any impact. Sephiroth is the key. They'd all seen the way the Black Materia had reacted to his son's body—preserved, pristine in that ice. There is much Hojo wants to understand about that reaction, so many variables. Unknowns. It tickles his mind.

Once the barrier is down, Hojo intends to extract Sephiroth and utilize the anomalous cells in Cloud Strife to invigorate the body. Surely his son's consciousness is alive, somewhere in that wellspring of energy.

He turns away from the steel and black of the city, dotted with lights like a spray of stars. Once the Mako-cannon is charging, Midgar will experience blackouts, to be sure.

Something pings soft at his computer terminal. A proximity alert in the lower labs.

Hojo frowns, examining the read-out. Nobody has been working in those labs since the President's murder, and the entire area is sealed. Yet clearly someone is down there now.

He files a security report, a useless gesture since there are no active security personnel in the building right now, but he follows protocols to keep the records clean. Junon's recovery has sucked all resources from the Department of Public Safety. The company is on thin ice, all around.

The ping remains. Now it's on the lower levels of the sub-basement. He sighs. He'll have to investigate this himself. The idea of someone else touching his things, milling around near his empty stations, even if all confidential materials are gone, is intolerable. He finishes his coffee and proceeds to the elevators.

The hall lights are dim to preserve energy, and all is quiet this far past midnight. The Tower is a giant husk, and the absence of activity haunts the space like a juxtaposed dream. The impending calamity taints everything with the strange hue of unimportance and impermanence.

Hojo swipes his white keycard, and the elevator doors open into pin-drop stillness and fluorescent humming. The basement labs, once familiar, now retain a sheen of violence. The blood trail is gone and the broken glass swept, but traces of Jenova's escape showcase deep claw marks in the concrete, scratches along the flooring. It's incredible how much damage that inert creature had been capable of.

Not so inert, as Hojo learned. Dividing its cells further, attempting the eighth transfusion trial in his Asset, and then experimenting on that Cetra must be what drove Jenova to awaken. If only he had more information about Sephiroth, who also could have been the impetus of such a reaction. All these unknowns.

Hojo checks a security terminal in his old private lab on the main sub-floor. The proximity indicator is still going off. It's within the inner labs.

Curious, as nobody even has access aside from Hojo. He's taken away the Asset's credentials, for obvious reasons.

The inner labs are cold and dark. He flips on the lights, which flicker and sputter. Some are destroyed and hang from sparking wires. The corridor leading to Jenova's chamber is a wreck. It will take months to repair the damage, time which nobody has. The other specimens in containment were eradicated during Hojo's short absence. Shinra's knee-jerk reaction to the massacre was idiotic. If anything, Jenova's outbreak was proof that the science division requires more funding, not less.

Footsteps echo ahead, faint and fast. Hojo pauses.

"Cloud?" he calls. It doesn't seem possible, but the Asset has done a number of unpredictable things. "Is that you?"

No answer.

Hojo continues forward, triangulating the source with every shuffle of footsteps, every rustle of clothing. There is someone else down here. A human. It angers Hojo that his sanctuary is breached by anyone unclean.

"Hello?"

The lights fizzle. The footsteps are behind him now.

Hojo grimaces. "You can't frighten me. Just show yourself and get the hell out of my labs."

He is the sculptor of flesh, the master of eugenics, and no stranger to the twisted outcome of experimentation. Nothing about a vacant laboratory scares him, even one that housed a great monstrosity. It is all his work, his children.

A wave of red cloak spins at the corner of his eyes. He turns on his heels to face the threat.

Behind him, in the pulsing shadows of struggling lights, is Vincent Valentine.

The old Turk uniform is buttoned, black, and somewhat faded. A long crimson cloak coils to the floor. Ah yes, he'd seen this man at the north crater. He hadn't been able to place him with the cloak pulled up around the lower part of his face before. The disheveled hair almost conceals the burning hatred in those eyes.

"So," Hojo says, suppressing a grin. "You're alive."

"After what you did to me, I'm not so sure," Vincent replies.

Hojo notices the golden claw, the firearm holstered at Vincent's side. The man still stands like a Turk, proud and watchful. His skin and physique remain in peak condition.

"Fascinating," Hojo says and rubs his chin. "You haven't aged."

"I am deathless."

Such a somber tone. He should be thankful Hojo didn't outright kill him when he interfered with the Project decades ago.

"Get over it," Hojo says. "You are greater because of me."

Vincent's gaze is intense. He's blocking the route out. Hojo sighs.

"What do you want?" he asks the ex-Turk.

"Where is Lucrecia?"

Of course. The woman who stole his heart. That whole thing.

"I don't know," Hojo admits. "She left Shinra shortly after Sephiroth was born." She left me, he wants to say, but it feels too pathetic to say aloud. That wound, though always fresh, must stay buried.

Vincent steps forward. Hojo notices the bullet holes in the fabric of the black uniform. A prickle of intrigue chases down his spine.

"What did you do to her?" Vincent says.

"Nothing she didn't want to be done," Hojo replies. "She was devoted to the Project. Everyone knew that. I would never have put her in danger without her consent."

"Liar."

Hojo looks away with a wave. "Believe whatever you want, Valentine. Lucrecia and I understood things far more complex than you could ever imagine. We shared a bond that—"

Vincent charges forward. In a flash, the gold claw is at Hojo's neck. The sharp points of it slice into his flesh. The Turk is strong, malevolent.

"G-Get off me!"

An inhuman growl comes from Vincent's chest, and Hojo realizes his experiment was a success. The implant worked. The crimson of Vincent's eyes is shifting bolder, more vivid. Hojo begins laughing.

"Incredible!" he says.

Vincent doesn't laugh. He doesn't acknowledge the professor's words, only squeezes his throat. Tighter.

"You think killing me will bring her back to you?" Hojo squeaks out. "You're a fool. She never loved you. Don't you get it?"

To think that Vincent's been seething over this flutter of romantic interest for so many years is ridiculous. Lucrecia made it clear to him things were over, or so she'd told Hojo. An ex-lover spawning from the past has no right to claim dominance over the relationship that Hojo cultivated and adored.

"I love her," Hojo says. Present-tense, yes, because he never stopped. Even when she disappeared, shrouded in sorrow and guilt. Even when she abandoned their son. Even when she refused to take his calls. It didn't matter. He would always love her. "And you're the mistake."

The anger levels off in Vincent, but the claw does not relax. The body continues to shudder.

"What did you do to Cloud Strife?" Valentine asks. "Where is he?"

"How should I know? He's tasked with fighting a Weapon, wherever that is."

"What did you do to him?" the growl returns.

Hojo spits out a chuckle. "I made him perfect."

The answer is displeasing. Vincent throws the professor to the ground. Claw marks at Hojo's neck weep blood. His spectacles are askew.

"I brought life to the dead," Hojo continues. "Just like I did you."

But something is happening to Vincent. Those deep red eyes are fixed on Hojo while the body transforms. It's subtle at first, growing taller, shoulders broader. Muscles stretch the straps of the clothing. Then two dark wings sprout from Valentine's back. Horns grow from his temples.

Hojo watches in fascination. This is beyond his wildest expectations.

"The Chaos element!" he identifies as the entity manifests out of Vincent's form.

The creature takes up the entire corridor, wingspan chasing to the walls, claws long and sharp. The leathery material of its skin shines with an inhuman purple luster.

He's giddy, watching his creation emerge. It's magnificent. He wishes, for a second, that Lucrecia were here to witness this.

"You won't harm anyone anymore, professor," a throaty growl rumbles from Chaos.

Ah, it can speak! Hojo stands but finds a wall at his back. Chaos floats in the breezeless corridor.

Too late Hojo realizes Chaos will kill him. There's no pistol at his side, no MPs to arrive in defense. He's alone in the basement with his creation, a specimen of perfection. The Chaos bond is whole and complete. Amazing.

Amazing as it rips his throat to pieces. Amazing as it claws out his eyes and silences his screams. It whips streaks of his blood across the white tile. Globs of hair and fleshy chunks are torn apart. Eviscerated. The professor is no more, and with him vanishes the apex of Shinra's biological research.

Yet to be consumed by his own creation strikes Hojo as blissful, meaningful, in his final moment. He's given the world such beauty, even at this ultimate expense.

When it's done, Chaos stands down. Vincent finds it harder to control the beast with each transformation, but he subdues the entity into the wrappings of his consciousness. When he wakes up, he finds himself in a pool of gore that was once Professor Hojo.

Vincent adjusts the straps on his uniform, ties the cloak tighter, and catches the breath in his chest. The monster inside stirs, unhappy at this request for submission but it recedes until it's nothing but a burning hole in Vincent's heart.

He lets out a long exhale. Hojo is dead.

After all these years, that monster is eradicated. He cannot taint the world further with his so-called research.

The halls are silent as death. Vincent turns from the corpse and exits the labs.

There's nothing left for him in Midgar. He taps a security terminal using Hojo's keycard to see where Cloud has been deployed. He would like to reconvene with the others and keep a close watch on Hojo's final specimen. The last of a twisted mind's accomplishments.

With minimal security in the Tower, it's easy to evade detection and escape into the streets. Outside, a breeze brings a wash of Mako into the vibrancy of night.

He doesn't know if Hojo was telling the truth, about loving Lucrecia. It doesn't matter now, but Vincent bows his head anyway, wishing that wherever she is, she can forgive him.

Then he hurries on.