Tifa sighed and stared out the dark rainy window behind the bar. Time had passed in the worst way possible. Marlene and Denzel were practically all grown up, in their mid-teens, and she was a lonely thirty-year-old bar owner in the West corner of Edge, scraping off a living from the tips left behind by the fat patrons. She'd seen from across the counter how their faces aged year-by-year, the loyal ones, at least, that kept coming. Inwardly, she wondered if she had changed that much too... if they had noticed fine wrinkles work their way slowly across formerly perfect skin.
Insomnia had plagued her for the past few nights. Morbid thoughts of the future and of the past. There had been a wave of serial killings that had suddenly struck the town. She heard about it mostly in exaggerated rumor-form from the drunken mouths of customers, but tried to gather as much of truth as she could from that, and the meager amount of news she watched or read.
The victims were all women, and followed a pattern: inner-city girls that no-one knew or cared to remember, hearts torn brutally right out of their chests and collected. That word, collected struck Tifa to the core. Collected and never found. What kind of monster could have done this...? She dearly hoped Denzel was keeping Marlene safe. Despite her martial arts prowess, the female fighter was quite glad that where she lived was the same as where she worked. Travel time between home and job involved just walking down the stairs.
Still, though, she couldn't help but feel trapped by that.
A bell jingled, and Tifa was woken with a start and a flinch from her daydreaming. In an instant she was on her feet by the window. Despite pajamas, she took a fighting stance facing the dark mid-night visitor. The door had been locked! Who was it, and how had they gotten in?
"Hey, Tifs. Sorry, I had to pick the lock..." said a familiar feminine voice, and the lights flicked on. Yuffie was standing with her hand on the switch, staring blankly at the other woman.
"Yuffie?" Tifa called disbelievingly, squinting in the harsh and sudden light.
"Yeah, the one and only." she said, her voice lackluster and unenthusiastic as she walked over to the bar and took a seat on a stool, slamming a belt-strapped briefcase on the counter in front of her.
Her childlike demeanor, and sweet grey eyes had grown solemn and steely in recent years. The former Wutaian ninja had settled down in Midgar with a husband, none other than Reno, after the Second Advent. She'd even put her unique skills to work and joined the Turks, much to Elena's elation. Only the second female ever to be part of the team. The two were fast friends, but...
Being a Turk was a dangerous job. People often died in the line of work... and Reno had been the first to go. Tifa never heard the details. ShinRa was reluctant to release them, and Yuffie never wanted to talk about it. The fighter didn't want to put her friend through the pressure necessary to find out, so she just let the issue hang. Elena went next, though, and recently. A victim of those recent unsolved murders. Yuffie used to stop in often once she lived so close by… but the visits had dwindled off since Reno's death, come sporadically and unannounced, but never this late. Tifa hadn't seen her once since Elena passed.
"What are you doing here, Yuffie?" she asked tiredly, walking over to her familiar place behind the counter, leaning up against it to converse with her friend. She idly pulled the white collar of her nightshirt back up from where it had slipped down her shoulders. "Do you know what time it is?"
"Three in the morning." Yuffie replied without hesitation, then paused. "Wait..." she pulled the sleeve of her navy suit up, exposing her thin arm, and checked the watch. "...three-twelve."
Tifa sighed. Yuffie was the job... it had been consuming the poor girl's life for so long, and she was determined to live it now, and only it. She could see the former ninja's determination in her dull eyes. There was no use talking her out of it.
"Can I make you something?" she asked, beginning to shuffle through the bottles behind her counter.
"I'm on the job." the girl dryly replied, unbelting the suitcase and pulling it open, removing some papers from inside.
"You're always on the job." Tifa grumbled, preparing her cocktail nonetheless. "Come on, it'll calm you down. Plus, it's an old favorite." she gave a gentle smile. The glass was set down with a clunk in front of the girl, but she didn't seem to notice.
Tifa just stood there and stared, waiting for Yuffie to respond. The former ninja just kept scribbling down something on a form until she reached the bottom of the page, and only then glanced forward. "A Shirley Temple, Tifs?" she asked incredulously, a clumsy smirk pulling up a corner of her lips, "You shouldn't have."
"Yeah, well..." Tifa began courteously, but was cut off...
"...an over-sweet mixture of sense-dulling, mind-numbing, slightly toxic alcohol, artificially flavored chemicals, and red food coloring. No thanks, Tifs, you really shouldn't have." she pushed the drink away and returned to her papers.
Tifa sighed in exasperation, and lightly rubbed her sleep-deprived eyes. She could already feel thin folds of flesh and swollen bags forming beneath them. "Well fine, then. Suit yourself. If you ever do decide to turn in, there's a free bed upstairs in Cloud's old room for you. And if you get hungry, you know where to find the fridge." Yuffie responded with nothing but a silent, subtle nod, and so the fighter just turned around and stumbled toward the stairwell. It really was useless... it was near impossible to cheer the former ninja up. Hell must have frozen over, because Yuffie had become just like Vincent.
And speaking of hell and the devil, the door opened again with that familiar jingling...
Fighter instincts never lost their edge, both Tifa and Yuffie were on their feet in an instant, fists raised, or hand slipping into the pocket of the blue suit, no doubt closing around a throwing star of some kind.
"Vincent!" Tifa gasped, and bypassed the clueless-looking Yuffie in a rush to the door.
The man wobbled in, claw-hand supporting him against the doorframe while the rain and wind whipped about his cloak outside. The red garment was even further tattered than either woman had last remembered it, his face was thin and grave, ash-pale. He looked sickly. Matted dark hair stuck to his skin, and there was a strange quality to his red eyes. In short, he looked like hell.
"Vincent, are you allright?" the nightshirt-clad woman asked worriedly. All of a sudden, she wished she'd worn more clothing to bed... the loose button-up shirt only covered down to her mid-thighs, her feet were bare, and the air rushing in the door was deathly cold. She grabbed ahold of the man's human arm and tried to pull him in.
This was when he looked up at her... eyes dancing over her face and body as if he were seeing her for the first time. His pale lips parted for just a moment, and a tonal breath flickered out, as if he was trying to say something, but just didn't have quite the strength to.
Without a word more, his grip on the splintering doorframe gave, and the claw was wrenched out as Vincent came crashing, unconscious to the ground.
"Oh, Cetra..." Tifa swore, "Yuffie, gimme a hand!" she said, voice stern and commanding. There was no time for games now. She supposed she'd be met with opposition to her order, but contrarily the girl stood up, used to receiving instruction in such a way, and ran over.
While she dragged the gunman carefully inside, the former ninja snapped shut the door, and locked it again so as to no longer be disturbed.
It was a bit of an ordeal getting him over to and on the couch, stripping off his dripping cloak as well. Beneath that, all the leather he wore was actually relatively dry, protected by the outer layer of red fabric, and its own waterproof qualities. Tifa sat, now with a pair of sweatpants, on the arm of the sofa, gently combing out the knots in the sleeping man's raven hair.
"What do you think happened?" she asked her companion, who was staring down from the place where she stood nearby.
"I don't know." Yuffie's voice was emotionless as she walked forward, thick boots heavily clunking on the wood floor. She stretched a hand out to him as she came within reach, fingers uncurling from their fist to stroke the side of his face, "But it can't be that bad. After all..." she said, looking at Tifa bitterly, "...he still has his heart."
xxx
Author's Ending Note Thingy: Morbid. XD Fweehehe. Moreso than I usually get in my FF7 fics. I have a very clear mind for where this is going to go. Three chapters is out of the question already. New goal is to get it in five. I know generally what the next chapter is going to encompass, and the one after that... that'll bring me to four, and I need an epilogue. As of having finished writing this, I still have no story title, though I have named all the chapters already. Yay.