Summary: To put it in a nutshell... Yazoo and Kadaj are searching the old lab complex in the ruined ShinRa building because Kadaj has been told by Mother that there is something of great use to them hidden therein when they come across a woman hibernating in a drug-induced sleep, genetically modified with Jenova cells by Hojo himself in a private experiment. They download all the information on her to their minicomputer, wake her up, and take both her and the file back to their hideout in the Forgotten City. There they discover some very interesting information concerning this woman, Zhaira, and a possible way to bring about another Meteorfall. Can Zhaira actually create another Meteorfall and take them all on a trip to the heavens above as Sephiroth tried to do two years ago? And what is Kadaj's interest in her, an intrest that goes beyond a working relationship?

Disclaimer: I don't own FFVII. All I have is a copy of Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus (desperately searching Ebay to remedy that problem, but the prices for Buy-it-Now are OUTRAGEOUS).

Recollection

"Why do you think Mother took such an intrest in her?" Kadaj wondered, moving closer to the tank, to the inanimate woman therein. There was something about her... So familiar, almost the vestiges of a long-forgotten dream...

Yazoo didn't notice his younger brother's transfixtion. He had gone over to the largest computer and was typing away at the keyboard, examining the data on the screen with curious eyes. "These computers should be able to tell us." The ghost of a smile twisted his thin lips. "You'd think a scientist of Hojo's calibur would be able to come up with a better password than 'password'..."

The youngest Remenant lifted one hand and placed the gloved tips softly against the cool glass, staring at the lovely, serene countenance of the sleeping woman. "Any luck yet?"

"No."

Long minutes passed. Kadaj kept staring at the female and Yazoo manipulated the computer to show him anything of interest.

"Hey Kadaj."

"Yeah?"

"Take a look at this." He clicked on a file while beckoning to his brother and leader.

Kadaj managed to tear himself away from the woman and joined his brother at the computer. Scanning the contents of the file, his mako-green eyes widened. "Double mako injections... Notable compatibility with mako treatments and Jenova cells... Subconscious biological manipulation of the treatments..."

"It seems that Hojo was experimenting on her, trying to make her superhuman, but her body did something to the mako, a reaction he had never seen before." Yazoo pulled a connecting wire from his minicomputer and connected it to the larger one. "I'm going to copy the files to my computer. You keep reading."

Kadaj took orders only from Mother, but in this case he was too enthralled to comment on Yazoo's command. He kept reading, his increduality growing with each new entry. The subject's physical condition is excellent, she is in perfect health with no mutation to speak of thus far... The latest tests have shown that the subject can now run at twice the speed of a normal human being (34 mph as opposed to 17 mph), and her lung capacity has increased. Her stamina, by comparison, should also be double that of a normal human. Further tests are required to prove this theory... Physical strength has increased threefold... Reflexes are near-instantaneous... The subject has displayed a new proficiency with certain types of materia... Her ability to use those swords of hers has improved nearly a hundredfold, almost on a level of swordmastery equal to that of the General... The only physical mutations have appeared within the hair and eyes. There is now a streak of silver hair just above the right ear, extending from the scalp along the entire length of the strands. In addition to that her eyes, previously a shade of black, have developed streaks of green within the irises, a reaction I have never seen before in other test subjects... She has lasted much longer than any of the previous subjects, nearly a year as opposed to the period of two to three weeks of survival my failed subjects averaged...

After the physical file came another one, Hojo's plans for the woman.

The subject has been sedated and more of her eggs have been extracted for experimentation. The last batch proved to be failures, dying a few days after insemination. This, I discovered through closer examination, was due to a nutritional deficiency in the artificial wombs I have constructed. It seems that in this case, it would be better to inseminate the eggs and then implant them back into the subject's own uterus for growth. But with the mako treatments, I see no reason why she cannot be given to General Sephiroth for breeding purposes as originally intended. If she breeds with him, perhaps we can finally have natural-born SOLDIERs rather than men treated with mako. If this woman will accept the treatments and the inseminated eggs, carrying a fetus to full term, perhaps we can treat other women in the same fashion. After all, one woman can only give us so many babies before reaching menopause. This woman, Subject 243, is the test; if she can carry a child sired by the General to full term and survive the process, then perhaps we can duplicate the process in another female for the same purposes, a breeding program, as the President desires. As for her other uses... I shall come to that later, once the experiment has proven successful and she has given me my first natural-born SOLDIER...

"She was supposed to have been Sephiroth's breeding partner?" Kadaj was stunned. He was jealous of a man he had never even met! And that warranted further questioning: what reason did he have to be jealous?

"Seems that way. But apparently there are other abilities she has that Hojo didn't touch on in those files. Maybe with further examination, I can discern exactly what those abilities are." Yazoo removed the connecting wire; his downloading was complete. "Mother couldn't have brought her to our attention for anything other than those abilites, whatever they are. She wouldn't expect us to breed with her, would she?"

"I highly doubt it." But perhaps...

Kadaj shook his head. What on earth was he thinking? "Let's just wake her up and get her back to the Forgotten City. We can question her later, and anyway, she has Mother's cells inside her. She can help us look for Mother." A thought came to him then, a dim memory... "Did you catch her name, by any chance?"

"Yeah. The files say that her name is Zhaira. Can you come here and help me get her out of here?"

"Zhaira..." He knew that name. Before the manor had been destroyed and he and his brothers escaped when their cell block's outer wall collapsed, there had been a girl about his age in the cell next-door for a few days. They had been able to see a little bit of each other through a crack in the wall between their cells, but mostly all they had done was talk to each other. She had said her name was Zhaira, and that she was on her way to the ShinRa building for something. She wouldn't tell him exactly what, no matter how he phrased the question, but he got the idea that she wasn't exactly looking forward to it. But the Zhaira he remembered had had pure black hair and eyes, and she had been shorter than the woman in the tank. She had been a sweet thing, afraid of the ShinRa SOLDIERs Professor Hojo had had guarding the holding cells that held him, Yazoo, and Loz separate from each other and their other siblings, the Jenova cell-injected children of female volunteers, each of them artificially inseminated and planted in various women to carry to full term. The kids that had survived the pregnancy and birth had been brought to ShinRa Manor for close examination; only seven of the original twenty children had survived to reach adolescence. He, Yazoo, and Loz were the only ones still alive today; they had managed to escape before the fires had reached the cells, leaving their less-fortunate siblings to die in the flames.

Zhaira had been a curiosity, because she was not a child of Jenova. She was just a normal kid, fully human but with no parents. She had told Kadaj that her mother had died when she was very young, and her father had taken her to the ShinRa building when they had put out a call for needy children, preferably girls. He had been told that they would take good care of her, but in truth, they had done...

That was when she had always broken off the story. On the last night she had been there, they had managed to wriggle some fingers through the crack and touch each other, linking their fingers together in a kind of promise. A promise that they would not forget each other, that they were friends. Kadaj had only seen her fully one time, when the SOLDIERs had come to take her away the next morning. She had fought the men, screaming that she didn't want to go, for someone to help her, but nobody had come to her aid. The men had finally knocked her out and taken her away like a sack of wet laundry, limp over one of their shoulders. He hadn't seen her since. Now that he had heard her name, he remembered her.

But would she remember him?

Kadaj went to his brother's side. In unspoken agreement, he stood ready to catch the woman when the glass slid away while Yazoo turned off the tank. Power hummed as the wires transmitted his command, the green life-suspension fluid draining away into the floor. The glass cylinder disappeared into the floor just as Zhaira fell forward, still senseless, into Kadaj's arms.

"What do we do now?" he asked, looking at his brother.

"We wait for her to wake up." Yazoo went to the side of the room and sat down, leaning his back against the wall and shutting his eyes. "You might want to take some rest. There's no telling how long it will be before she wakes up."

Queen: So Hojo and President ShinRa were planning on creating a SOLDIER breeding program, using Zhaira and Sephiroth as the first pair. Oh yes, Zhaira does have other uses - the combonation of Jenova cells and mako in her system ensured this - but so far that's all I'm spilling. Perhaps the General remembers her, and that's why Kadaj is attracted to her, hmm?

Kadaj: How the hell am I supposed to know? Ask him!

Queen: Ah, but Sephiroth is not here at the moment, now is he?

Kadaj: Well I'm not some kind of all-seeing oracle. I can't answer that question.

Yazoo: Aww, and here I thought you had all the answers, oh Fearless Leader.

Queen: Kadaj, don't! (forcibly removes Souba from his grip) Look, just leave a review! It's never a good thing when either Kadaj or Sephiroth get too slice-happy with their swords, and I can't afford new furniture at the moment! Reviews might just calm him down a little! (still wrestling with Kadaj over Souba, get a little too close to the computer)

(transmission interrupted)