A/N: Hello readers, I am TheDarkSpirit. This isn't the first time I've written a story, but it's a first time for me to post it on . I never post my works online due to various reasons, but here I am now. I accept all reviews as they are. Compliments or flames are both encouraged, but be reasonable when you review and don't be an ass.

This takes place 1 year after Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus, 3-4 months prior to "The Witch's Maw" in the Claymore anime/manga, and a made-up storyline for Final Fantasy VERSUS XIII (No I'm not following the actual plot, but for some reason I have a fascination about what I see). I manage to take most of the plots and mingle them into a single massive plot concerning all the categories here. But more or less it is more likely Final Fantasy VII themed than Versus XIII, since it is only a character and idea I will be using.

This is a trilogy-based fiction (of the anime/manga Claymore and the games Final Fantasy VII/Versus XIII crossing) called Shards of Confluence. I hold no ownership on the characters from Claymore or the Final Fantasy I am using except for the original characters I made.

Prologue

A single event can send a tidal wave of uncontrollable variables. Genesis continued to live, and he owed his life. He mustered the remains of his forces and SOLDIERs to serve him. Staying on this Planet any longer will expose them, he learnt to use Omega (without disturbing Planet's Lifestream) as a vessel to travel to the nearest suitable planet. And there, it all began. It's been some years since his life was spared, and a year had gone since the Omega incident orchestrated by Deepground. The time was nearing as they will return from the shadows and beckon back into the light.

Chapter One: Chaos and Claymore

The night sighed with ease at the coolness of the land. The energetic people of this small city slumbered with dreadful fatigue at the day's end. Silence erupted into the night as the villagers drifted off to their beds, and the lights across the town dimmed into the night. They faded into darkness until only one final glimmer of light shone on.

Tonight, the local inn received visitors from the day's work, and they asked to occupy a room for a day or so. A man and woman: they were yet to become lovers, or even friends, for that matter. They were the final ones to linger late into the night. The man was named Vincent – name for a demon in red and black, and the woman was named Flora – the name of an angelic figure.

Vincent wore a red cape (that seems like it has a mind of its own) over his black leather attire with belt straps over his clothes hinting a sort of style, everything was black leather from his gloves to his boots with a customized claw for his left hand and armor plating for his boots (all made with gold alloy), and his black hair pooled down his back to his shoulder blades with a red bandana to hold his hair from flowing frontward. He leaned on the wall near the windows for countless hours with his eyes closed. But he did not sleep; after all, he had slept too much in his past life. Across the room, Flora sat upon a chair situated next to the windows.

The garb she wore was a Claymore outfit consisting of a pale grey, tightly fitting, two-piece uniform. Over this, she wore shin high metal boots with slight heels, large wrist guards, large pauldrons and a partial skirt. Finally, Flora wore a cape and a choker marked with the individual Claymore's specific certification symbol embedded in it. Each Claymore's symbol was unique and served as an identification marker. It also appeared on their sword and black card. But tonight, her outfit was torn everywhere, her shoulder pads showed its scars of battle. Judging by the looks, she should have died, but then he came.

She dwelled in her thoughts, she had believed she was going to die when death only stood moments away from her. The Awakened Being she fought was immensely stronger than her powers by far. But orders were orders, and she needed to slaughter this monster or it would kill more humans. That was why Claymores existed, to be able to combat these beasts, greater monsters than themselves. But how did he do it? How could he fight and defeat an Awakened Being?

Vincent's voice interrupted the many thoughts churning within her mind. "I have never asked you yet; may you tell me your name?"

Flora turned her head, exposing her blond hair onto the moonlight as it glowed in the evening. "Flora, number 8 from the Organization's warriors, Claymores, as humans call us by that name. And yours?"

"Vincent Valentine. I have no allegiance to anyone except to my friends and myself."

Flora acknowledged the information given to her but decided to continue asking him the questions that still troubled her. "How did you do it?"

"Hm?" he replied softly.

"How did you kill the Awakened Being? I cannot detect any sort of Yoki energy from you."

"I only killed a monster. A monster is just a monster, nothing more and nothing less to me. And I have yet to learn of this 'Yoki' energy you speak of."

"Yoki is a life energy that flows through the bodies of Claymores and monsters that we call Yoma and Awakened Brings. But I detect none whatsoever from you, and yet you were able to kill it with a single attack."

"So it is called Yoki in this world…" Vincent said to himself, "But she said bodies of Claymores, Yoma, and Awakened Beings as if it's only for these selected living beings."

"'In this world; what do you mean?"

Vincent walked towards her and took out his cell phone. Flora blinked curiously. What a strange object! Vincent saw she was not aware of this type of technology; she was ignorant of technology of this caliber. He flipped opened his phone, and the screen appeared showing a recorded message. Seeing that she was still confused by the object, Vincent laid the phone on the tablet beside her and pressed the "OK" button. The message began to play.

"Vincent… I have a mission for you." The object spoke.

Flora gasped and backed away from this mysterious device, grabbing her sword instinctively. Vincent chuckled to himself but on the outside, he remained impassive. He pressed the pause button to halt the message.

"As I said, I am not of this world; I've come from a distant world known as, as some call it, Gaia. In my world, we have fused our civilization with magic and technology; as you can see, we have a variety of things that this world has yet to see or create. I am part of an organization, or so they say, that I am part of, known to be WRO: the World's Restoration Organization. The WRO serves as an organization with military power to maintain the equilibrium of our world (as the name states). Humans have caused much devastation to it, now we must preserve what little life our planet has. Until then, my world will heal itself in time."

"I see." Flora listened as hard as she could. Claymore or not, beings from a distant world were of interest.

"Thirteen days ago, I arrived here to commence my mission. This recording is the mission I was given; it was recorded fifteen days ago." He looked over her tense profile. "Do not be frightened, it is a practically harmless device. This is called a phone, it is a tool for communicating people from a distant, has the ability to capture a message spoken by a person as well." To prove his point, he resumed the recording.

"Several days ago, Bahamut Zero was summoned by an unknown user. Bahamut went berserk and attacked a near by village from its summoning point; there were no survivors. From what we have gathered, this unknown 'user' is not of this Planet. We have intelligence report on a patrol party engaging an opponent near the village Bahamut attacked. They were critically injured but they will live, but they were able to wound the enemy. He was not bleeding of ordinary blood though. It was looked into our archives and so far it has come up with no matches to any blood types from humans to fiends. With Lucrecia Crescent's database of other worlds and its species, we finally gather that its origin was from the world next to ours. This world is not as advanced as we thought, yet the civilization that lies here is threatened by a group of monstrous beings called Yoma. We were able to conclude that one of these "Yoma" somewhat found a way to control Bahamut. We need you to retrieve the Bahamut summon materia, see what plot this user has, find out before 'he' or 'she' or even 'it' does something reckless, and eliminate the user. This is unknown to the others except a few individuals; secrecy is its primal initiative."

The recording stopped. He decided that since he was in this world, he had to tell someone the information to get accurate results to get some sort of lead on his case.

"I have yet to make any leads upon this user or its plans for Bahamut and I require someone's aid from this world. You were within my reach. Your cooperation is… appreciated."

Flora looked into Vincent's eyes, to see the value of this "mission" of his. After finding what she was looking for, she closed her eyes and sighed. In the corner of Vincent's eyes he could make out a small, faint smile coming from her.

"Tomorrow, I will be traveling north of here; there are cities in the north where they require me to find and destroy Yomas along the way. There are rumors in the north that I am not even certain of, but if you like, well, you can accompany me to the north," she said, looking away from Vincent.

"Hm... there's no real alternative, but, it is a start," Vincent replied. He backed off the wall and headed to the door.

Flora spoke friendly to him, "I will assist you best I can, after all you did save me. I owe- Wait! Where are you going?" Flora's smile instantly changed to question as he began to holster his weapon and prepared to leave the room.

"Stay here and rest well tonight, I will return before dawn. There is something I need to do for the time being," Vincent said picking up his phone as he departed from the room.

Flora tried to get up, but winced in pain as she looked down on her injured body. It was yet to be fully healed. "I better rest to fully heal my wounds," she muttered to herself.

Closing her eyes, she removed her pauldrons, plunged her sword into the wooden ground and leaned upon her steel blade, allowing her own body to repair the damage done to her.

Her dreams were of Vincent's voice, and the strange little contraption called a phone.

*****

Morning came and Flora woke to the light glimmering into her room Sunlight filtered from the window and brightened the room quite a lot. In the far reaches of the sunbeam, a shadowy figure stood in the corner.

"You have incredible healing abilities," it said.

Flora quickly recognized it as her companion from the previous day. "It's one of the many abilities that we possess."

"Still, to be able to heal such wounds as fatal as yours in one night would be ridiculous for an ordinary human," said Vincent, stepping out of the shadow.

Flora rose from the ground. Regardless of the comfortable beds that were in the room, neither occupant had the comfort to lie on it.

"The innkeeper brought us breakfast, but I told him to take one back since I do not require any supplement."

Flora looked at him oddly; even a Claymore had to eat small amounts of food to be able to sustain full use of their bodies. But no sustenance from provisions would render next to impossible one's fighting condition. "You surprise me. Even I have to take in supplement once in awhile. We, who differ from humans, are unlucky of what we are but also lucky for what we have. With our abilities meant for the destruction of Yomas, we sworn to protect humans from Yomas. Yet to humans, they still treat us like Yomas. After all, monsters are still monsters regardless of their intentions."

"I would say the same, Flora. I was once human as well until I died."

Flora looked at him shocked, many people have said they have died, but meant such words metaphorically. Vincent said it quite literally. Did he mean he had been resurrected?

"I was killed by someone who controlled a person that I cared deeply for in my past life. I died trying to protect her; such was my incompetence. She had learned the man who presumably killed me, was experimented on my lifeless body, before I was considered a failed specimen. She thought that everything was her fault alone; she believed she caused my father's death and now mine. She wanted to revert back time, but it was impossible to do. Choices were limited, the only option she had was merge a being that she was studying, it is not human, but a powerful entity known as Chaos into me it had the power to save me." Vincent gaze out the window and stared at the lonely moon. Flora couldn't help but envy the woman who saved him.

He took a breather then looked down at his hands remembering the first thing he saw, "When I came to I saw what I've become, I was no longer human, it changed me. She was no longer there when I came to. I have driven and condemned her to her untimely guilt leading her to disappear. I didn't blame her for any of this, so I blamed myself calling this my sin. So I fell in deep sleep for thirty years never believing I will ever wake one day. But I did 30 years later, when my sleep was interrupted and now I am here," he concluded, observing like he had just given her his life's end story.

"I don't usually talk much of my past to others. I do not know why I'm sharing this with you. Perhaps it's because I can only feel what you have felt. When I became a warrior, I isolated my past with myself. But every warrior has the same past as I once had. We were protected by those who cared for us deeply and sacrificed themselves to keep us hidden from the slaughter that we ourselves committed."

"I apologize" he suddenly said. She looked at him, confused. "I did not mean for you to confess any tragedies like I have. If it troubles you at all, please do not continue. You merely looked shocked when I mentioned I had died (literally)."

"No, it's not that." Flora hid her face from him. It was not shame, but shyness that had compelled her to retreat. "I… I never have been able to express myself before."

"It's normal for a female like you to blush," Vincent replied.

"It's not that!" She snapped her head back up, showing her reddening cheeks. Vincent only closed his eyes, certain in his victory. She was indeed blushing. Flora looked away, embarrassed.

"As to be expected from a female companion." He approached her, who was too embarrassed to even meet his eyes.

She tried to continue, "But-"

Before she even said two words, he grasped hold of her left jaw line and turn her to face him, causing her to gasp at his touch. He gently move his thumb over her lips keeping them from saying another word.

Vincent tipped her chin up to align her face with his. With no warning or even a gesture, he lean in close to her as her eyes trembled at his crimson eyes. She widened her eyes in shock at his sudden move, was he going to kiss her? His mouth readied to take her at any time, and all she did was waited. Then he finally…

"I told you didn't I? You don't need to say it," he said one final time to her in a way she couldn't describe. It wasn't a kiss, but his words were refreshing while his warm breath stayed close to her as Vincent pulled away. She was breathing heavily; despite all the battles with Yomas and Awakening Beings, and yet this was the hardest time for her to breathe.

"Hmm, I hope I calmed you down a bit," Vincent said.

"In a way," she replied, but in her mind her thoughts ran wild: "I don't know if it was your words, but you've touched my senses in ways I cannot even describe." Her blush did not die down yet. The feeling felt electrifying to her. It was a sensation like never before. Claymores were taught human experience and how to "fake" them, but faking and experiencing them were different. Flora had just experienced it first hand.

"Hm… nourish your body and ready yourself. I will wait for you downstairs," Vincent said, closing the door behind him once again.

She only stood there, stunned at what he had done. She brought her right hand to her lips, skimming for any traces of Vincent's scent. She felt nothing other than that gentle touch from his hand. Though he wore gloves, it was her first contact with another person closely that could've kissed her, by someone who had saved her life. The sensation that flowed through her body was almost frightening. Pushing aside what she was feeling, he was waiting for her. She quickly donned her armor and ate a small portion of her breakfast before joining Vincent…

Where their journey together would begin.