Warning: there is a reason I changed this to rated M. There will be torture involved. Read at your own risk.

The One They Call Beautiful

Chapter 15

Walking through the dark stringent basement of the mansion was not what I wanted to do when Sephiroth and I just arrived from the Forgotten City. Unfortunately, the President of Shinra requested me personally to help "loosen" up this mans' tongue. It's not anything new that I'm used to, but it disgusts me even after all of these years of living.

"How were you able to get that man? There were a lot of AVALANCHE soldiers and even if you did manage to grab the one I knocked unconscious, there's no way that you could've gotten out of there alive."

"There is a reason we are Turks, we do the jobs that must be done whatever the sacrifices may be." The talking stopped as Veld and I reached the door. Veld slipped his card through the scanner and was admitted passage to a small room with Hojo, the President of Shinra and his son, Rufus. The room contained other Turks that I did not know about standing at each end of a large tinted window. In the other room I could see a broken man strapped to a chair under a small hanging light, behind a table with a chair on the other side.

"Why am I here?" I snapped at Shinra.

Shinra ignored my question and stared at me, "You're Dawn? I was hoping for someone more…older."

"You take what you can get Shinra." I cocked my head to the side in a mocking manner, which seemed to piss off the Turks in the room. The president raised his hand to keep them from attacking me and crossed his legs. His son just stared at me with interest but said nothing.

"I ask again. Why am I here?"

"I heard that you are good at breaking people...very quickly. I need to know who this Avalanche is and I need them to be destroyed. They're going to eliminate everything that I've done for this world."

"What 'you've done for the world?'" My hands slammed on the table and got into Shinra's face, "All you've 'done for the world' is stay rich, make peoples' lives miserable, and get fatter by the fucking minute by sitting in your desk eating fucking Burger King!" Veld grabbed my arm and yanked me behind him, but not before catching a smirk on Rufus' smirk.

"Forgive her President Shinra, she's just a bit cranky from not getting rest after coming back from the attack." Veld looked back at me, daring with his eyes to go against him.

"You should know your place Ms. Dawn. You are lucky that I need your area of expertise."

"Expertise? What are you talking about?"

"Torture." He said flatly as he took out a cigarette and put it into his mouth and proceeded to light it.

"…" I said nothing and looked at Veld as he also had paused for a moment. Memories began to come into my mind as Hojo "accidentally" overdosed me on mako injections which led me to go crazy and slowly tortured many scientists to death. Of course, Hojo locked them inside with me to observe how I reacted for the "sake of science".

My head whipped to the right and noticed that Hojo did not have a syringe filled with large amounts of mako, but instead a metal collar with a strip of green. "What the hell is that?" My hands became clammy and started to clench and unclench my fists in a nervous manner. I began to back-up on the sealed door and tried to open it with my password but it was overridden. I turned around slowly to see that the four Turks were coming towards me with the exception of Veld who just stood with his back facing me. "No! I fucking refuse to be a tool." I know that my red eyes flashed brighter as the occupants of the room flinched slightly except of Hojo and Veld.

Unfortunately another Turk had entered the room and electrocuted my back with a stun gun which caught me off guard as I stumbled forward. The other two Turks came at me to hold me down on my knees as Hojo came to put the collar around my neck. There were shouts of protests and could feel the sizzling of my skin as the one behind me kept electrocuting the back of my neck consistently. I could feel the irregular beating of my heart as it stopped and restarted once, twice. The collar was clicked in place and could feel small spikes inside the collar, but out enough to know that it was there. The Turks threw me down onto the floor and landed on my right cheek with a slam. The people in the room exited the area and went outside. I began to cough up blood and saliva as I could no longer contain the urge to cough. I noticed that there was still one person in the room.

There, only Rufus Shinra was seated at the table looking down on me with a bored expression on his face as if he's seen this plenty of times. "You should've just gone along with it, and then we wouldn't have had to waste time with such theatrics."

I let out a hollow chuckle and pushed myself up to look at Rufus. He had a remote control to her collar. "Then let me get this shit off and put it on you, let's see how you feel like being tied down like a dog." I shakily stood up using the table as support for my weakened body and maintained eye contact with the future heir of Shinra. "What do you want?"

"Hmm? What makes you think I want anything?"

"You're a Shinra, you always want something or else you would have left with everyone else." Blood began to dribble down the corner of my lip.

"True, so very true." He shook his head slowly while chuckling and lifted the control in front of me in a haughty way. "One push of a button and poof." His voice went silkily, "You're gone. However, I can take this collar off in the future on one condition." His voice turned into one that was dripped with a sugary voice as though he was trying to get a child's attention. I was about to comment with a sarcastic tone only to start coughing blood. My legs buckled but Rufus caught me around my waist and took out a handkerchief and started to dab my lips clean. "My, if only you were 5 years older."

My response was to spit more blood into his face. He wiped off the blood from his face and let me fall backwards onto the cold hard floor. "I'm going to ignore that, but only because I have a proposition that is going to benefit the both of us in the future." He came around to my side and crouched down to the appropriate level to hold my chin tightly in his grip. "Listen to what I have to say because I'm only going to say this once."

15151515

I stood in front of the door that held one of the Avalanche recruits. I opened the door and saw two Turks waiting at the man's side. In my left hand I carried a manila folder that carried his information. Vicktor Kruschev. A Russian from the other side of the world, an immigrant that came with his family to start a new life but unfortunately there was an incident. About five years ago a mako reactor exploded and wiped out half of the small town next to it. There were no survivors amongst the ones who were unfortunate to live near the reactor. Of course it would be Shinra's fault; we were responsible for messing around with what we don't understand.

I took a better look at him and noticed that he had two black eyes with his lip busted open and swollen. His shirt was caked in blotches of blood as his chest went up and down from his shallow breathing. Bruises were forming on his cheek and his arms, already turning into a gross yellow and purple color.

"Hello Kruschev." I said nicely and motioned for the Turks to leave us and threw the folder on the table.

Kruschev did not reply and simply stared at me without emotion. I did however get a reaction from him when I sat down in front of him, on the other side of the table. He kept staring at my eyes shamelessly with his mouth open. I guess the light enhances my color of eyes.

"How did you know Shinra's science department was in the Forgotten City?"

"Fuck you bitch."

He did not say anything to me after that, nor did he move a single muscle but could distinctly see small amounts of sweat dripping down his throat, along with deep breathing as his chest moved up and down. "Look Victor, in this room I can either be your best friend and make your stay here feel like heaven, or I can make your worst nightmares come to reality." I folded my arms and tilted back on the chair with my legs on the table. Once again he stayed silent and saw his hands scrape at the chair's arm rests. He was afraid, I could practically smell it radiating off of him.

"Got to hell. Your kind are monsters and I am not going to give in to Shinra. I swear that I will bring you down."

I ignored him and kept questioning him. "Just give me something to work with, a name? The hideout area? Something?" He did not say anything, still. Alright, the hard way it is. "It looks like I'm going to have to make you sing Viktor."

I stood up from my chair and went behind him to open a door and disappeared behind it. I emerged back inside the room pushing a rolling cart with a piece of blue cloth over it and put it next to him. His heart began to speed up even faster; I could hear his blood flowing through his veins as he tried to control it. "Last chance Viktor." I pulled off the blue cloth from the cart and revealed many surgeon tools. Each stainless steel tool ranged from a harmless little plier to a hand held chainsaw used to cut through flesh and bone.

I looked back at him and his eyes began to tear up in frustration and panic. "Let's do something small first, and then increase the amount of pain, little by little." I pulled on a blue apron sheet over my head along with a blue surgical mask and a pair of thin rubber gloves.

I first picked out a small pair of small pliers and put it in the light, letting the metal shine down on it and lightly poked Viktor with it on his cheek. "Let's see if we can have the tooth fairy leave us some goodies when you lose some teeth. What do you think?" I took out a syringe and pricked it into his arm leaving him paralyzed and awake. "You're not going to be able to move but you can still talk and what not. Just sit back and let me work my magic." I could already feel my sadistic side come out and used a mouth prop to keep his mouth open to let me use my tool. He kept trying to close his mouth and screamed but it was futile. I focused on his wisdom teeth and began to pull one out. His screams increased to the point that there was a ringing in my ear and were bouncing off the walls. I managed to yank it out but not without a squirt of blood getting on myself.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Oh shut it Viktor. I'm not done, let's just do two more." I pulled out them out one at a time and his screaming did not stop for what felt like hours but it was really, only, a few minutes. I set down the bloody instrument and three teethes on the cart. I removed the mouth prop and he began to drool as his tears began to go inside his open mouth from the pain. "So, do we have a name yet? Or do I have to jog your memory a bit more?"

He stared at me with those red puffy eyes from crying, "Y-you m-mons-ster."

"I know." I said solemnly, "But I don't have a choice."

"Y-you a-always h-have…a ch-choice." He couldn't pronounce things as he was in pain and shock. I truly did feel sorry for him, but compared to what I've been through with Hojo, this entire session…this is nothing.

"What do you feel about salt going into your mouth?"

Viktor's eyes widened as I grabbed a handful of salt and before he could do anything I shoved it into his mouth and kept my hand over his mouth keeping the salt in his mouth. He tried to move and could see his pupils dilating but the injection I gave him would not allow him to. His screaming was muffled by the salt as his eyes rolled back wards for a few moments and I let him go. He spit out the salt and croaked from his parched throat, coughing out blood from the amount of salt inserted into his body. He was panting heavily as his shoulders went up and down.

"A name. Give me a name."

"E." He whispered.

"E? Well I suppose it's a start." I walked over to the door again and came out with fire materia.

"No. Please no!" Viktor cried as his voice cracked in pain.

"I hope that you don't mind having a burned leg." I tilted my head in an innocent gesture and casted the spell silently.

I watched as the flames consumed his clothed right leg for about ten seconds. Those were the longest ten seconds in my life as I could hear his shouts of agony and this time for sure even though we just started this session…I thought I had killed him. I stopped the fire from spreading and extinguished it from his burned leg. "You're lucky I only did minimum damage, had it stayed longer, we would have had to amputate it." I turned my attention to the charred flesh and saw the top layer sizzling with smoke. My head whipped to Viktors eyes and could see him crying with a fountain of tears coming down his anguished face. His lip was bleeding from biting down on it to keep from screaming loudly…not that it helped. "Are you ready to be my friend or will you still continue to be my enemy? I'm starting to become bored of you and when I'm bored, I up the ante. I don't think that you will survive any more of what I have in store for you if you've already broken down now."

"What more…do you…h-have planned…f-for me?"

"Planned? Oh no, you misunderstand. I don't plan, I just use what I have available. Such as this beauty here." I picked up a metal sledge hammer from the cart and waved it under his nose as his eyes followed the shiny and clean nervously with wide eyes. "But let's see…there are 206 bones in the body," I pulled the hammer away from his face and lifted it up in the air and struck it down on his knee with a crack through the air.

"OH GOOOOD! AHHHHHHH!"

"Relax, you still have two-hundred and five bones left," I lifted the hammer from his busted knee and saw as the lower portion of his leg was standing up and could see the broken bone jutting out of his skin from the bottom of his knee cap. Blood began to leak out slowly down his leg and some remained on the hammer. His cries of pain turned into wails of desperation and the injection began to wear off as he was able to partially move his hands.

"Who sent you!" I roared and broke his other leg with a swing of the hammer.

CRACK!

"PLEASE! PLEASE STOP! I BEG OF YOU!" His eyes were hysterical and saw a strip of his hair turn white.

"Two-hundred and four bones, now tell me…who is the leader?" My voice went back to its usual calm manner.

"E-elfe."

"What about the hideout? Plans, weapons, anything that could be of use to us?"

"…"

I rolled my eyes and punched him in stomach, resulting in him coughing out more blood as he did not answer me. His body slumped against the chair and slowly looked up at me through his purple, partially shut eyes as I kept my fist driving into his stomach and cracked a few ribs. "I- I don't know. I only just…started, they would not…t-tell me much of th-their p-plans. Only that…Elfe…was the master—mind."

I removed my hand from him as Turks came into the room and transported him onto a stretcher. I just stood there looking at the ground as they left with him. I took off my blue apron and mask. My glove covered hands were coated in his blood and took them off with disgust as I threw it onto the ground and exited the room. I did not know where I was going, my mind was hollow, and my body shut down and let myself go onto autopilot— not knowing where my legs were taking me to. It felt as though I've been wandering around aimlessly for miles and miles.

That's what I thought, at least, until I saw a coffin laid on the floor. I reached out toward it and lightly traced the top with the tips of my fingers. "Vincent…I…I've done something horrible." My knees dropped on the ground and put both of my hands onto the coffin where Vincent was sleeping. "I'm so scared." My red eyes began to cry as my left hand touched the collar. "What am I, Vincent?" I asked him knowing he could not hear me. "Am I…am I a monster? It would make sense…right?" I questioned myself more than him. "Who would love a monster? Deep down, inside of me, I enjoyed his cries of pain. I was enamored with his screams. I loved to see him hurt. I couldn't tell if it was because of what would happen to me if I didn't follow orders…or…if I actually wanted to do it…and it scares me!" I banged my head on his coffin. A small trail of blood began to flow down my forehead and onto his coffin. "Help me. Please."

I heard a shuffle inside the coffin but as soon as I heard it, it had stopped. I got off the coffin and wanted to open it, but I heard someone calling out my name. It was Veld. I stood up quickly and was about to run upstairs until I heard him speak from inside the black box.

"Daisy."

I turned my head with a smile as I paused to look at the coffin. I brought the palm of my hand up to my mouth and kissed it as I blew it to him. I did not want him to wake up just yet…he still needs time to grieve for her…for Lucrecia.

15151515

"What happened to Viktor?"

"He is in the infirmary currently being healed and his memories will be erased. We don't need anyone figuring out that we killed him. He will be released in a month, so far he does not know what occurred, only that he was in an accident." He paused and looked at me. "You did quite the number on him, but I'm surprised that you did not cut him open just as you did to the other scientists."

I swallowed bile from almost throwing up and said nothing to him. "What does Shinra want with me this time? I've done as they've asked."

"He's heard enough of Elfe and AVALANCHE. He wants Sephiroth to go into SOLDIER immediately and of course will need you. You're one of the few people who can control Sephiroth. Once you help Shinra personally, you can't get out."

"So that's what the collar was for. It's pretty pathetic though, right?" I looked up at Veld. "I can hold myself against Sephiroth…and yet I couldn't keep you Turks off of me from applying that damned collar."

"Indeed." That was his only response as we continued to trek through the mansion towards Shinra. There were no noises around us, just the footsteps of our shoes echoing through the halls.

"If Shinra controls me, he can control Sephiroth…controlling Sephiroth in turn means…" I paused as I remembered Lucrecia talking about visions of her child, "that Shinra can control not just the Wutai war…but also the world."

Veld said nothing as we arrived at the door. "I'm right, aren't I, Veld?"

No response again. I sighed and stepped inside the door and faced Hojo with the two other Shinra's. The president was sitting in a large comfy chair behind a large oak desk and his son was standing next to him. Hojo was standing in front of the desk with a vial of a pink substance in his hand.

The fat man tilted his head as he took out his cigar from his mouth and began speaking. "I'm sure Veld has already given you the summary of what is going to transpire."

"Yes."

"Then you know that you shall also join SOLDIER…however, you will not go out into the battlefield. You will remain inside headquarters away from the public eye. You will not be sent out unless absolutely necessary. There are usually no women in SOLDIER, so it's best if the media don't know too much about you." He took another puff of smoke as Hojo began walking towards me with the pink substance. The President resumed talking, "The vial that Hojo has prepared, will make you age more to make you appear at the least twenty years old or so. I don't want the media on my ass if they ever figure out about a fifteen year old girl in SOLDIER and start protesting on why she would be out fighting. ..And no Dawn, it won't make you human again. Just age you enough to get you to look older. After that, you will no longer age again." I took the vial from Hojo and walked began to walk out the door.

"All I have to do is keep him in check, right? Nothing more."

"If something happens…you are required to terminate him—immediately."

I walked out of the door and shut it behind me and began to walk to the mansion's library at a slow pace. "Dawn, are you alright?"

My head turned to see Sephiroth walking behind me. "Yes, why wouldn't I be?"

"You looked pale." He stated bluntly.

"I guess you could say that…Have you heard?"

"About SOLDIER? Yes, I was informed about an hour ago." He noticed I had a pink vial in my hand. "What is Hojo experimenting on you this time?" His voice had an edge to it as he took my arm to observe the substance in my hand.

"This is my ticket to come with you. They don't want me to cause a ruckus because I'm underage to join SOLDIER as a female. So this thing is going to make me slightly older." I took my arm back and began to walk to my room…if you could call it that.

I walked to face a long mirror and through my reflection I stared at the pink vial…I was ecstatic because it meant I could grow more…but I was afraid of the side effects. I went back to looking at my metal collar and I hated it. I was nothing more than a dog…a puppet. The one thing that I strived to not become and sacrificed much to stay away from such a title…I still became a slave to fighting. I can still save Sephiroth though…not me…no. I was already in too deep to save myself.

I uncorked the vial and drank its contents. The reaction was almost immediate as I felt as though a fever was developing quickly. Pain shot through my body as I dropped to the floor, spazzing, with my eyes twitching and rolling to the back of my head.

All I knew—was black.

Hello my fellow readers! I AM BACK!

With a lot more ideas of course.

So I hoped that you enjoyed this chapter and we will finally move onto Crisis Core!

…kinda. I won't follow the videogame exactly but it will have the gist of it.

Don't forget to comment!

Tell me your thoughts, opinions, anything really.