Vincent Cameo in this one! yeey!

ODSTGirl058 - Hahaha. You aren't Elena, and you should be happy. I always remember Elena from the game as being too hyperactive and overdramatic, and Tseng and Reno going "...Elena, just shut up." She should have toned down, but still she would be hyperventilating. Heh heh.

Raspberry Polar Bear - yup, Rufus can waltz (I so wanna see that), so can Elena and so can Arien, but not Reno. Maybe Rude, yes. Sephie hasn't really made his goodbye yet, because he really is my favorite character along with Reno. Heh heh. There'll be more canon characters...

How I Am - Eh, I haven't really decided. Any ideas? (lol) I'm pretty sure Reno won't be saying "oh, that's really too bad. What's for dinner?" Though that'd be rather comical. Reno seems to be the type to act all tough and uncaring but will break down with a hard-enough hit.

NarcissisticRiceBall - Most of the conversations are snippets from actual conversations and my imaginations strung together. I really can't write dialogues just by myself, because it sounds reallt artificial. Reno and Arien aren't the lovey-dovey team. But it seems to work.

Devil-Angel - Now THAT's an idea. (evil grin) but we can't have EVERYONE fall in love with our heroine, because she isn't beautiful enough and she really has a temper, and she's not a mary-sue. But maybe I'll add it as a deleted scene. Rufus VS Reno over a girl. Haha.

Princess-Starr - So do I, because I'm bored of Reno being angsty and thinking of well... death and drinking himself into drowning and crying and cutting himself and turning himself gay. I like Reno, I want him to be happy (smile). We shall see how it turns out.


Chapter 11: The Living Legend

It turned out that the job was a bigger shit than what she had expected. A week later, Arien was tired and more than annoyed. She had run around the world – from Costa del Sol to Junon to Mideel to Rocket Town – and no sign of the two Turks were to be found. She secretly wondered if Elena and Tseng were hiding from her. As for Reno, he was no help. He had no idea who or what had carried the two off – all he knew was that he heard gunshots, which lead nowhere. Unless she had a bullet from the gun, she could not even begin with the firearms.

On the way to Gold Saucer Area, she stopped at Mining Town. Walking around yielded no information; her last stop was the bar. She stepped into the dingiest, dirtiest place she found, retreated into a dark corner, and sat down at a table after making sure that the chair was clean enough. Lowering her sunglasses a little, she flipped her phone open, and dialed. The tone sounded, then a click. "Hey, Arie."

"Look, Reno, I don't have a fucking clue where to start."

"Told you Rufus landed you in a deep shit." Reno sounded amused. "What do you want, babe? I'm a recup, remember?"

"The word's recuperation, in case you can't pronounce it," she replied, annoyed. She was eyeing the people who were cornering her in. They were all males, poorly dressed, and looking quite hostile. They were obviously trying to corner her in without being too obvious. Bar thugs. She could reason why they targeted her; dressed richly, a female with not much muscles meant an easy target. Unless they were Turks, of course.

"Amateurs," she muttered. "Obvious, solid, glaring amateurs." She slid her hands into the slacks pockets and pulled out fingerless gloves. All the Turks had them, just in case; the knuckles had metal plates in them, making the punches very painful.

"Who's an amateur, yo?" Reno asked curiously.

"Hey, Reno, I have to go. I'll call you later."

"O…kay, yo. Just don't sleep around."

"Right back at you." She snapped the phone shut and slid it in her jacket pocket. Then, she stood up, stretched, and said, "Can I help you, gentlemen?"

The males flinched. Obviously they were counting on the element of surprise, of catching her unawares. That advantage was easily defeated. Her only problem was number. She could easily take out all of them, but one versus many had her at a slight disadvantage.

Oh well. It looked like she couldn't flee.

"Yeah, we need to chat a little, Princess," one of the thugs said.

"Can we chat outside? I'd rather not wreck the bar."

"You snotty little bitch…!" One of the thugs stepped forward, but the one in the lead stopped him. Hm. So he was the leader.

The thugs turned and walked out of the bar, one by one. She followed leisurely, her shades now up. Anonymity was the key to being a Turk; only Reno was brash and good enough to walk around with shades on his forehead, his flaming red hair everywhere. She wasn't. She stepped out the door, her heels clicking, hands behind her.

"Alright, gentlemen." She made no facial expression, her eyes invisible behind the shades. "Well?"

"We just need some gils, that's all," the leader growled. "And so you leave now leavin' everythin' behind, or..."

"Or?"

"You die."

"I'm sorry, boys. I can't leave right now. I'm on my job." She tied her hair in a ponytail, then took off her jacket, then laid it on the ground. The thugs flinched again as they saw her array of weapons; gunblades under her arms, clips belted everywhere, and a long belt of cartilages wrapped around her body. "I'll go fair. Who's first?"

The thugs darted all at once, which, to Arien's opinion, was rather a stupid idea. She just jumped, and three of them crashed into each other, full momentum. She landed ahead of them, then delivered an aerial kick to the two.

"Shit! A Turk!" One of them cried, and her mouth curved into a sneer.

"The realization was a little too late, I'm afraid," she said. "Do we want to stop the discussion? It's indeed a good lively one, won't you say?" The thug went down without a reply, as she delivered a solid punch into the abdomen. Blood trickled down his mouth. She looked around; there were still at least a dozen to go, some of them sporting knives, clubs, and a few of them ammunitions. Time to throw away fighting rules and get Cataclysm and Apocalypse out.

"Alright. Game over." She pulled out her gunblades in one fluid motion, then pulled the trigger.

The older versions of her gunblades had shorter barrels and shorter nozzles, a typical pistol; these were new, upgraded, with more deadly machinations. Each, when in full auto mode, spat out 1200 mako-tipped rounds a minute. Of course, she did not put it in full auto; that was just a waste of bullets. So instead, she put it in sub-mode, which spat out 600 rounds per minute. She pulled on the trigger for a few seconds in one man, until the man's body looked more like a honeycomb than a human. She then stopped and said, "Who wants to be next? I have enough for everyone."

The rest fled.

"How boring," she said, replacing the firearms back into her holster. Adjusting the straps of her knives concealed up her sleeves and her slacks, she picked up the jacket, dusted it off, and put it back on.

"This really is boring," she said, and walked away.


"Yes, sir. Northern Crater is inaccessible ground." Arien listened and then said, "Roger that, sir. I'm on my way."

Tseng and Elena were nowhere, and Arien was running out of options. There was, however, another place she needed to look - the Northern Continent.

Personally, she liked the old ruins of the Forgotten City the best. She had been there before, only once, when Reno and she were flying in a fighter jet looking for the Huge Materia. They had landed and walked around for a few hours together, saying nothing but taking comfort in each others' presence. The beauty and the serenity of the old city was marveling for her; perhaps it had helped that she and Reno were still in the early stages of relationship where romantic kisses and gentle caresses were involved. Anyways, the memories of the place were good ones, and she was fond of them.

She had trekked back to Costa del Sol to get to the Northern Continent, then flew. This time, she was alone, and she had occasional attacks of loneliness, but what could she do? She just called Reno, and took comfort in his… well, voice. Not his words. They were scalding, as usual.

She first stopped at the Bone Village, and discovered that Tseng and Elena were never there. Icicle Inn yielded similar results. She drove to the Forgotten City leisurely, reminiscing on the "old days" when Shinra was still up and running and when Reno and she were just starting to go out. The days of comfort, pampered in Shinra's glory and wealth. The forest was golden at this season here, welcoming her with soft whispers and gentle touches of the breeze. The wind toyed with her hair, just like when Reno stuck his hand in her hair and played with it. She took her shades off while she drove, and breathed in deeply. It was rare for her to breathe in the forest air; the Edge smelled of rust and salt from pollution, the old Midgar was nowhere close to a forest and it reeked of metropolitan odor, and Wutai had no forests around. She secretly wished that she was here with a certain redhead and was not on an assignment.

It was night when she stopped the car at the outskirts of the City of the Ancients, stepped out, and un-holstered Cataclysm; loading it with bullets and putting it in unlock, she breathed in once to calm herself. Then she went deeper into the city. The city was light blue and ivory against the dark of the night, with the bare branches playing soft music to her ears. Puddles were everywhere, with low shrubberies against the pale white trees that protected the city. It was peaceful here, quiet. She nearly lowered her guard when she saw a footprint.

A footprint?

It wasn't a regular footprint. For one thing, it was quite large. For another, it was pointed. She had never seen these before, and in an instant she was back on alert. Bending down and slowing, she quietly took out Apocalypse as well. If it was a monster, it was going to be large. The footprints were clear indication of its size. Was this the thing that had taken Tseng and Elena? If so, were they still alive? Her brain had already told the answer. Probably not.

Shit.

She crept on further, stepping lightly and quietly. The wet ground made no sound, and she made it a special point to avoid the dry leaves. She bent down even lower as the trees started to become sparse, replaced by the low shrubs. Concealing herself was becoming difficult. Why couldn't she train to be a ninja being true to her heritage? She mourned the lack of education for a second, then crept forward again. She was moving the balance from one foot to the other when she saw a flash of crimson. In surprise, she accidentally brushed her sleeve against one of the branches sticking out. It seemed to make an awful noise to her.

However, the red thing made no motion, so she crept on forward until a man's voice said, "Identify yourself."

She immediately threw herself onto the wet ground, holding her breath. So it was capable of human speech. And some intelligence. This was going to complicate things a bit.

"I said, identify yourself. Or otherwise I will attack." A little more stern this time. She kept quiet. No point giving an enemy the advantage of any kind.

"I am not going to repeat this again. Identify yourself."

Silence. She ran to the nearby shrub as bullets streamed above her head. She crouched behind the shrub, switched the modes to sub, hooked her index fingers on the trigger, then fired. 600 mako-tipped bullets scattered themselves into the air, but she was not moving fast enough. One of the bullets from the opponent embedded itself into her arm. She nearly screamed in surprise.

"I have no wish to kill you. Identify yourself."

She gave up. Apparently whoever it was did not wish to kill her yet. She stood up, her face illuminated by the moonlight.

It was a man – or it looked like a man, at least. He was pale, but the moonlight was hitting her depriving her of her nightvision, and silhouetting the man, so she could not see very well. However, the reaction she received was unexpected. She heard a soft gasp, a gasp of recognition.

"Lucrecia!"

"Lucrecia?" she absently echoed, wondering what that name was doing here. Last time she checked, Professor Lucrecia Crescent was nowhere. She was legally announced dead by the Shinra Company. Unless there were other Lucrecias walking around…

"Lucrecia…"

"My name is not Lucrecia," she said crossly.

"Then who are you?"

Was it wise to disclose her name to this thing, whatever it was, when she didn't know if it wasn't hostile to her? Turks' names weren't really public, but those who knew their names were usually extremely hostile to them.

But then, what was the chance of this one knowing her name?

"Arien DeVir," she said finally.

"Of?"

"Of?" she echoed again. "What do you mean?"Of? Of what? Of which? Of whom?

"What do you belong to? You look like a Shinra."

Uh oh. So he had an idea who she was, or what group she was from. Then it was more than likely that he already knew her name from print; and her uniform was a dead giveaway to those who knew Shinra Company. She decided there was no point to excessive secrecy now. "The Turks," she replied slowly. "Administrative Research, the Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department."

"Turks!" The owner of the voice sounded surprised. She felt oddly comical; here she was crouching in the mud, reciting the official name of the Turks that hardly anyone remembered. She would have laughed if the opponent was not capable of killing her.

"It's customary to identify yourself after the opponent has," she called out. She was not going to give the opponent the advantage of knowledge. Obviously this thing knew about the Turks, and she had no idea if they were in the bad light. They probably were. No matter what Heidegger did to put them in a good PR – selecting Arien and Tseng, both Wutaians, to be in the Turks was one of the moves – they were Turks, and that meant no matter what anyone did, they were always in a bad PR. She silently switched the mode to auto. She was not going down here. It was either they both die or she walks away.

"Vincent Valentine."

She nearly dropped her firearms. Whoever it was probably thought it'd be a grand joke to bring up the name of the legendary Turk in front of her. Well, whoever it was, he had it wrong.

She pulled the trigger. The enemy responded with bullets as well. Another bullet embedded itself into her other arm. Damn. Now she was injured in both arms.

Wait a minute. Who else could use firearms that well?

Certainly not her. And certainly not Tseng, who was the best with guns she had ever seen.

Her logic told her that there was a chance that this was Vincent Valentine. Besides, Reno had seen him alive and kicking before the Meteor fell. It was possible.

Her skeptic side told her to trash the logic and pull the trigger again. But the chance was, she'll have another bullet in her body if she pulled the trigger again, probably in the head.

She listened to her logic. She stood up, thankful that her uniform was dirt-resistant. She was bleeding from both her arms. And she saw…

The one and the only Vincent Valentine.

She nearly fainted.

He did not look like what she had seen in the photographs. For one thing, she knew that his eyes were definitely not supposed to be glowing red. For another, Vincent had a semi-neat haircut when he was a Turk. This man obviously did not care about his hair. He was much paler – or was it because of the lighting? – and he had a… what was it? A golden claw? as his left hand. Upon further observation, his feet were no longer humanoid but was encased in golden shoe-like thing with a very pointed tip. That explained the footprints. Clad in black with a red, tattered cape and a bandanna around his forehead, he definitely did not look like Vincent Valentine that she knew of.

But she believed him anyways. With that expert use of the firearm, she was ready to believe it.

"I'm… I'm sorry," she said earnestly, "I fired on you. I didn't know who you were."

Vincent Valentine raised his eyebrow. "Odd," he said quietly, "I've never heard a Turk apologize before."

She did not reply. She had no idea what to say.

"Why are you here?"

"I'm looking for someone," she said shortly, examining her wounds. They weren't too bad, but they hurt like crazy. Vincent looked like he was about to ask more questions, but a rustle froze both of them. They both automatically slowed their breaths down, and got their guns ready. It was almost identical moves, the Turk Reflex, as Tseng had called it.

"Keep to the trees," Vincent mouthed. She nodded, and clicked the mode to auto. They both lowered themselves to the ground, hiding behind a bush. Arien had better eyesight than Vincent, and so she could see clearly what was going on. She saw vague whisps of silver hair, a very tall man, a man with medium height, and a boy, perhaps barely older than 18, who was shorter than others. They were carrying…

Tseng and Elena.

It was impossible, but it had to be. That raven hair was a trademark of Tseng, and that flippant blonde was particular to Elena. But they definitely looked unconscious, if not dead. Not to mention that they were matted and gory with blood. Elena's hands were visible – they were missing the nails, and the fingertips were bleeding painfully. Tseng's face was bruised into a fanfare of black and blue. The uniforms – the dark uniform that Tseng had taken pride and time to take care of – were torn into tattered rags, and Elena's face had a definite burn-mark. From the looks of it, it was a third-degree; her entire side of her face was disastrously burned, and Tseng's bare arms were littered with circular burns. Elena's mouth was cut severely, and Tseng's face looked like it was repeatedly attacked with a stun gun.

"Tseng… Elena…" she mouthed, but no voice or air came out. Vincent looked at her.

"Are they who you were looking for?"

A nod was sufficient.

"Do you want to save them?" Vincent asked softly, and for some reason Arien thought that it didn't sound very uh… Turk-ish? Was that even a word? She nodded.

"Alright then. Wait back here."

"Wait…!" she mouthed, but Vincent – or pseudo-Vincent? – was already gone. She stood, not sure what to do. Or where to go. She jerked to attention when there were gunshots ringing through the serene forest; what was going on? She leaned to the left slightly and stared in amazement. Vincent was now a red cloak, and bullets were streaming everywhere in all kinds of directions. From the looks of it, cloak-Vincent was not in much pain when one of the bullets from the silver-haired boys hit him. But the longest haired one was already bleeding from the leg. Then he turned to her direction, and she stilled her breaths and hid behind a tree.

There were grunts and some muffled voices going on for a few minutes, then more gunshots. Arien was beginning to smell the acrid odor of explosives, and wondered what was going on. And then the ringing of the bullets coming out from the nozzle ceased.

"They left," said Vincent's deep voice. She holstered her gunblades and looked at the red-cloaked man, standing in front of her.

"Thank you," she said quietly. Vincent just shrugged and jerked his long-maned head to where two bodies were lying as if they were in comatose. She walked over to the two, materia ready to cast healing.

Vincent watched as the Turk walked away.

"Lucrecia…" he whispered.

Only the wind replied to the soft whisper, but that was enough for him. No one and no being was supposed to hear it.