Chapter 31: The world ain't slowing down.
Mirri was indignant over the whole situation. "I can't believe you're sending James and not me." Sephiroth kept his distance from Mirri, she was in one of those moods were she could do a fine impression of a wet cat in a bag. She had practically hissed her last words. Of course the hiss as one generally thinks of it is paired with serpents, who used it as their normal mode of a communication, a cat's hiss on the other hand was a signal of war.
"Mirri, James is the only one I need in Midgar since Vincent and Niro are already there. I need you here." It was hard to tell if Mirri was more upset about being separated from James, or missing out on the sheer amount of mayhem she could have created in Midgar. "You need me here to do what exactly sir? Plan strategy? I think a blind man off in Rocket Town, or maybe even Rufus Shinra could guess your strategy at this point. You're shifting your forces into Midgar, and preparing to have us slam the Shinra HQ again, but this time with more support."
"I need you here to train Aeris with Alex while I plan on how to get us into Midgar." He could have just pulled rank, but then, Mirri knew where he slept. Which was why Sephiroth was so glad that he had thought of something ahead of time to offer her. Sephiroth made sure not to smile when Mirri silently nodded showing that she had taken to his bait like Reno to looting a recently closed bar.
Then Sephiroth turned to the topic of this conversation who had been silently watching it transpire. "James, we're dropping you a safe distance from Midgar. You need to get inside the city, and link up with Vincent and Niro, understand?" James nodded, and unlike Mirri he saluted (still with the left hand) at Sephiroth's orders. Before departing for their respective duties Mirri leaned over and gave James some sage advice. "Knock em dead, James."
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The stealthy secret (reconnaissance) agent Firecat approached the wall slowly creeping up on four legs. Though it close enough to midnight, James' impressive night vision was completely unnecessary. Midgar was the city that never slept, most likely because it kept shinning lights in the eyes of its own occupants. Even gates were lit up like neon signs.
Of course there was no one on this side of the wall, they were only on the other side. Still, James carefully crept up on the wall, though its opaque design limited the likelihood that anyone would be able to see him through it. He put one hand to the wall, and then he acted. One quick jump took him to the top of the supposedly impassible wall, and he paused for a moment after he "stuck his landing" as Mirri would say.
Of course lollygagging on top of the wall might not have been the best plan, but he didn't care. He even took a moment to pull out his wires and slices up some of barb wire that encircled the top of the wall. In retrospect despite how enjoyable this was due to the inherent symbolism of the action, it was not conducive to the living of a long life.
This was made evident by the fact that suddenly from all sides he was assailed by even brighter lights and piercingly loud noises. James could only guess that it was caused by some kind of break in the wire, which on second though may have also had an electric current running through it so that a break in the current would trigger alarms, though even he found this knowledge a touch on the useless side in this situation.
James quickly slid from his position on the wall to hit the ground running because the guards had already started firing in his general direction. Sadly after that first tactical mistake of slicing up the wire, James committed a second, he didn't know the territory. This was particularly unforgivable because he was a reconnaissance officer, and knowing the territory was his job.
Either way as he ran down the streets of Upper Midgar he realized something: there were no convenient alleys to duck into. Nor were there any sewer systems, because sewage was pumped downwards into Lower Midgar. Deprived of the two universal constants he had so thought defined Midgar, he fell back on his standard plan, improvise something. In this case, James was able to find refuge in one of his traditional hiding spots, a place where no one else would look for him.
He managed to compact his entire body enough to comfortably fit inside a mostly empty trashcan, and simply waited. The sound of the guards' footsteps came closer, and then grew farther away. Once James had difficulty hearing them at all, (which indicated quite a distance from him considering how sensitive his ears were) James pushed the lid off and got out of the trashcan. Another brilliant tactical move by James Firecat, and all he had to do was part with his nonexistent dignity in the process of executing it.
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Aeris sat in her "small" (which meant it was only designed for two people instead of four) room on the Valar and repeated to herself what she had become aware of while she was waiting for the Valar to arrive and pick them up along with the Huge Materia they now possessed from their submarine in the middle of the ocean. "My name is Aeris Gaste, I am a soldier." It hadn't shocked as much as it should have, to suddenly discover that she was something she had thought she always hated.
"I am a soldier in Gaia's army, but I am not a weapon." That was the linchpin of the whole thing she now realized. The difference between the two was not measurable by any means, it was too vast. "I am a soldier who will kill for peace, if I have to." There was no reason to deny that she had killed that guard, even if it had been subconsciously done, she had wanted to kill him. "I am a soldier, and that means I will not leave the battlefield except in victory or in death."
That was a condition which all of humanity would share with a meteor in the sky and Jenova gaining in power. "But that does not mean I will make corpses of everyone who stands against me." She was a soldier and that meant she was a thinking breathing being first. "For those who stand against me out of ignorance or fear, I will break their arms..."
Both meanings of the phrase, weapons, and those made of bone. Both would impair someone from fighting against her, but neither of them would kill on their own. She was a Child of Gaia, killing was the exception, not the rule. "I am not a weapon, I am a soldier and my body is my weapon, but I am a soldier. I understand objectives, I understand how to capture without obliterating, to incapacitate without killing."
She was powerful, and it was wonderful. She was powerful, and that meant that she didn't need to fight claw and jaw to win battles with ordinary human beings, or even SOLDIERS. She was powerful, and that meant that she didn't need to aim each blow as a killing one, her foes posed little threat to her. She was Garou, but that didn't make her like the WEAPONS. Her mind was not consumed with pain or rage to the point that she could not distinguish friend from foe.
There was no reason for that WEAPON to have attacked Mideel, but it did anyway. She didn't have to be afraid that she would end up like that WEAPON. "I am a soldier, and that means that at the end of the day, of the war, when I take off my uniform, I am still the same person I was when I first put it on." That one was the farthest from being true. To be fair the moment she had put on her "uniform", (a coating of reddish brown fur) she knew she wasn't the same person as before.
But any time she wanted, she could take off or put on that uniform, she was the one who controlled herself. There was no snarling feral beast sharing her mind with her, there was only herself. The WEAPONS had been mistakes, they were monsters, they had been desperate creations made by a desperate Gaia, but they were rendered obsolete even before they had been finished.
"I am a soldier, and that makes me infinitely more then a weapon." She repeated that last line again and then stood up. /Child of Gaia, are you ready?\ She opened the door and smiled at Alex and Mirri, smiling the way she used to, or as close as she would ever come to it. The only difference was that she knew that there were now sharp teeth backing up that smile, and she didn't truly mind that knowledge.
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Aeris and Alex were both blurs, one green one pink. Neither of them had any weapons on them, neither of them needed them. They had been training for most of the day now, but Alex and Aeris' regeneration was at least as good as Mirri's, so none of them had yet to be fully tired out by it. Of course, they had also had been swapping out now and again so that each of them got a chance to rest occasionally.
Alex was much more used to combat, but they were fighting as humans which gave Aeris an edge. Also they were trying not to kill each other, and that was something which Alex had some experience at, but wasn't a thing that Get of Fenris made a habit of doing.
Both of them danced back and forth after Aeris managed to dodge Alex's kick. She was a little too slow to evade the followup punch that sent her sprawling, but she rolled to her feet with little trouble. They circled each other, Aeris dodged another blow and drew close enough to land a blow between Alex's legs. The lycanthrope dropped to the floor, even regeneration could only do so much for some kinds of "wounds" regardless of what caused them.
On the ground Alex managed to get out coherent words much sooner then most men would have, although his words were as much snarled as spoken. "This body has so many obvious weaknesses. You could hardly strike me in such a manner if I was in my true form." It was a fair argument, wolves had their private parts located in a much more private place than humans or Cetra did. Alex then cast an extremely irritated glower at Mirri.
"Of course this does do something to explain why Black Furies always seemed to find converts among those who are born as Cetra rather then wolves. Not to mention why they go to such length to avoid fighting each other, their greatest technique doesn't work against themselves." Mirri glared back at Alex on the floor and turned to Aeris.
"He does have a point of course Aeris. The crotch kick is extremely effective, not to mention satisfying, but only so long as your foe is a human male, so it shouldn't be the only move you have. I prefer to use it as a finisher for informal combat against idiots. No matter how satisfying it is, you should learn to use moves that work as well on females or things with more exotic anatomy. As for you Alex, you need to be more aware of your body. Besides forgetting the 'obvious weakness', half of your punches looked like you thought you had claws. Aeris you can sit this one out, Alex: you and me."
No sooner had Aeris stood aside then a heavy hand came down on her shoulder. "I'd like to have a few words with you privately if you don't mind?" Aeris allowed Sephiroth to lead her a reasonable distance away from Mirri and Alex, and then he waited for a few moments till he heard something Aeris didn't. "Those two started fighting, so they'll be too busy to overhear us. I just wanted to talk with you alone because, I know just how you felt.
At first I thought it was hate, because hate was all I knew. It built my world, imprisoned me, taught me how to eat, how to drink, how to breath, I thought I'd die with all the hate in my veins. But then something happened, just as it happened to you. They took everything they could from me, everything but my life, and that was of diminishing value every day. And then I found something else to believe that not even Doctor Gaste, that no one else could have taught me. I found Golconda, the calm in the eye of the storm, and that just maybe our love for others is even stronger than our hate."
Aeris had never expected to hear her current companion say those words in a thousand years. "Who are you and what have you done with Sephiroth?" The General took it in good stride however, amazingly good stride for him. "I see you've caught me. I'm really Zephiroth his more evil clone and I currently have Sephiroth tied up in his room with ordinary rope so that he'll easily be able to escape and come for me when I'm trying to have my way with you."
Aeris didn't have to wait long for the real Sephiroth to shine through. "Sorry, I'm just feeling slightly better than normal because I recently found something out that took several loads off my shoulders. I'm sure by now you've been able to understand my principles when it comes to destiny, faith, or any other means of divining the future?" Aeris had. Sephiroth had all the love for them that he did for Shinra. "I don't think they're worth a one-legged chocobo. But I do actually believe in the principle that genes breed true. You can see it in animals, and you can see it in humans, even if to a slightly lesser extent, which is why you're going to laugh when I tell this to you, my name isn't Sephiroth Hojo, it's Sephiroth Valentine!"
Aeris had no trouble understanding the simple logic or the implication behind it. After all, Vincent had told her about her similarities to Sephiroth's mother. "You mean?" Sephiroth's eyes were currently widened to a degree that Aeris usually associated with James. On Sephiroth it looked noticeably more maniacal. "Yes! Do you know what that means? I'm not going to turn into a psychopath who kills people for no reason! I'm going to kill people for money, it'll be my job, it always has been!"
Sephiroth suddenly snapped back to his normal persona. "Of course a certain someone is going to regret not telling me sooner." From the sound of his voice, whoever it was probably going to be able to publish a best seller companion to James' work "Help, General Sephiroth has torn off my leg and is beating me to death with it" and Aeris was glad it wasn't her.
"Oh, and Aeris, don't tell the others. Alex already knows, and Mirri would have a field day with the Freudian implications. Now, get back to training; it would make me terribly upset if you died, and you wouldn't want to do that would you?"
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Somewhere beneath the waters of the northern ocean, something stirred. It had traced the scar the length of the Planet, and now it knew what to do. There was wound that kept the scar from healing, another wound to the south. The WEAPON would destroy it with fire to cauterize the wound and finally seal it shut!
End chapter 31
FN: Yes usually short but don't worry that's just cause you got to build the tension. Which I suppose means that you should actually be worrying, well whatever. Ohh and this chapter would have been easier to write if V hadn't decided to get all metaphysicalpsychological and just finished his monologue.