Wow, i wasn't expecting such a great response with this story.

Thanks everyone who is reading and reviewing and due to popular demand, here is some more.

Notes on the language thing: Italics are generally the ancient common language of the Planet when in the presence of others of the present time, but it is normal when people in the present time are talking, or the guys are on their own (I'm confused too, but it does make sense if you read it...i hope)

Chapter 2

Darkness. There is nothing but darkness. It is everywhere. The darkness is eternal. As is my existence. There is no time to the darkness. Have I been trapped in here for months? Centuries? Days? Weeks? I don't know. I am here. I have always been here. In the darkness where no one will look. Hidden away. No one will find me.

There is no sound in the darkness. There has been no sound for a long time. Have I been alone? How much time has passed? Darkness knows no time.

Am I even still alive? Was I ever alive? Just a thought form in someone else's mind perhaps. Someone who no longer wanted to play with me. Just shut me away in the corner of their mind.

Wait…noise…sound…movement outside…outside where? Voices. I hear talking. Who is it? What language are they using? I do not understand. So muffled. The sudden loudness of the coffin lid being moved deafens me. Don't they realise? I have to close my eyes as a bright light attacks me. I am deafened and blinded. There is no longer darkness.

a short time earlier

"The structures are really unstable, I think we should leave."

"Aw come on Steve, where's your sense of adventure?"

"Where's your sense?" Steve shot back easily, shining his torch in every direction, trying to get a good look around, "This ancient technology…" he murmured as he touched what looked to be a long row of lights that once brightened the pitch black tunnels, "It's almost futuristic…" He carefully stepped over a broken pipe, "Dan?" he called, suddenly noticing that his partner had gone off again.

"I'm here," Dan replied, shining his torch for Steve to follow, "Shit," he muttered under his breath, "Come here quick and see what I've found…" he searched the walls and found what appeared to be a light switch so he flicked it and as the faint hum of a back up power system kicked in to light the room, he gawped at what he saw.

All too quickly, Steve found the series of rooms that Dan had gone into and shielded his eyes momentarily as the light flooded the room and he dropped his torch, "Shit…" he echoed his partner.

They had stumbled in a huge room that was unmistakably a laboratory; Dan looked around, taking in the metal table, what looked like a torture chair and on the side there looked to be surgical implements, all covered in heavy layers of dust and dirt, but it was obvious that someone once took great pride in using them.

"Dan," Steve was already exploring the adjoining room, staring at the large glass tubes and he faltered, "Fuck, this is some weird shit man," he muttered under his breath as Dan joined him, both staring at the two tubes that housed bodies, in a murky looking liquid.

Dan looked into the one tube and stared at the small blonde figure that was floating within; there was a label but it was in a long forgotten language and the monitors looked to be working…but it had to be a mistake.

"I think we should call in the expert," Dan said and nodded to himself, "Yeah, Vince knows a lot about shit like this…" he trailed off, "Let's just…"

Steve nodded, "Yeah, we'll go back out…there's one more room I want to check out on the way though," he headed out first, leaving Dan to turn off the light, resuming the tour of the ancient building in torchlight. "This one," He moved over to a door which had been broken off its hinges long ago.

"It's a graveyard," Dan commented as his torch flicked over the array of coffins, "This one's closed," he moved over to the only lidded box, "Give me a hand."

"We should leave it…" Steve muttered, but at Dan's look he agreed to help and he pulled off the lid with the other man, both dropping it as they stared inside and a pair of pale green eyes closed against the torchlight. Seconds passed in silent shock and the torches lowered and the green eyes opened once again, but appeared to be seeing nothing.

"Fuck this shit," Dan muttered and grabbed Steve's arm pulling the other man out of the room fast, "The fuck is this place man? We've seen some weird shit but fuck…people…real living people…shit…" he spoke to himself more than Steve as they clambered up the rope and through the tunnels, back to the excavation site.

"Vince?" Dan yelled as they walked through the site, seeing every team member apart from the one heading it up, "Hey Scot, seen Vince around?" Dan asked grabbing one of the guys; Scot merely shook his head in response and walked off to continue what he was doing.

Months ago, there had been a great find near the mountains, purely accidental of course; someone who was planning on building something and taking heavy machinery over the area caused a complete cave in, revealing the remains of an extremely old settlement. The whole area was now buzzing with life; scholars and archaeologists from all over the world had flooded to the new site, but everyone knew who was really running the show.

Dan saw Vince a short distance away from the grassy bank; the head of the team looked to be lost in thought as the wind pulled at his untied long black hair. "Vince?" His eyes moved to the black glove that always covered his left hand, as far as he had seen, it went to his shoulder, and every time he asked Vince, the other man became silent and distant.

Vincent sighed, he had given up ages ago on correcting Dan, the boy that he had mentored was enthusiastic about the history that was all but erased a very long time ago, but he often missed things in the present; turning to regard his charge a small frown marred his features, both Dan and his partner for this job Steve looked like they had seen monsters of old.

"There were bodies…real life living bodies…" Dan told him, "And the stuff…wow…there are live people…in coffins…tubes…but alive…"

Vincent's frowned deepened as Dan kept chattering on but he ignored it; Steve was standing a little behind, silent and pale, still in shock of what he had seen. Without a word, Vincent headed back to the main site, his steps slowing as he reached the entrance to the remains of his nightmare, almost hesitating to descend the rope ladders that led into the darkness; he closed his eyes and took a breath, those things were long past, the monster's physical remains were no more than dust in the wind, but the mental scars that he had left still haunted Vincent.

Slowly, he stepped off the side, landing a few hundred metres down unharmed and he stood, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. It didn't take long before his vision shifted and he could see everything as if it was in the light of day, one of the only useful things that had come from the scientist's meddling with his body, and he forced his legs to move down the corridors he still remembered so well.

Distantly, Vincent could hear someone, probably Dan descending the ladder, calling for him, but he ignored it and carried on, pausing outside a room he had sworn never to go into again, but he had to check it out. His eyes fixed on an open coffin, the lid was on the floor beside it, close to his own prison for a time and he peered in.

"Lucrecia?" he whispered softly, staring down at the figure, no, she was dead…then this was her son…their son, Sephiroth, he'd got Hojo to admit that much before blowing him into oblivion.

"Vince?" Dan flashed the torch around the room.

"Stay out there a moment," Vincent spoke softly and he knelt over the silver haired man, who watched him with unmistakably mako enhanced eyes, "Can you move?" he asked but received no response and caught himself, being trapped down here, Sephiroth wouldn't have been able to follow the new languages, "Can you speak?" he asked.

Sephiroth stared up at him, seeing the stranger perfectly in the darkness, speaking in a language he could understand; his mouth opened several times but after being unused for so long, he couldn't quite form more than a few sounds.

"Can you move?" was the next question and seconds passed, then there was a very slight movement of his head, "I am Vincent, I will help you," he gently picked Sephiroth up out of the coffin, after laying there for as long as he had, it would be a while before he was able to move properly again. He had no doubt whatever Hojo had used was long worn off, but it might not have occurred to Sephiroth to try and escape after being in there for so long.

"Vince?" Dan watched as he picked up the man from the coffin like it was nothing strange; Vincent didn't reply, he just carefully carried the man out, but as he reached the ladder, he took out a long red band and wrapped it around the silver haired man's eyes before taking him up and into the light of day.

Vincent took Sephiroth back to his tent and sat him on the small seat, unbinding his eyes; the tent was more shaded, it wouldn't take long for his eyes to adjust to the lower levels of light, "Your body still has remnants of mako, it should help your recovery to be swifter." He told the younger man and started slowly moving and flexing his limbs to get them working again.

"Vince?" Steve was in the tent, staring at the silver haired man, "He…he was…but…" he stammered.

"He was in the coffin in a state of stasis, his name is Sephiroth," Vincent said, "Keep a close watch on him and tell no one where he was found, Dan said there were others?"

Steve nodded, "A blonde boy and some guy with dark long spiky hair."

Vincent sighed and looked at Sephiroth again, "I am going to leave you, Hojo has more victims down there," he noticed Sephiroth's eyes flicker; "You knew them? A blonde boy and a darker haired young man."

Sephiroth gave a small nod, "…ck…" he whispered trying to speak.

"I will go to them and bring them to you, but I am unsure what state they will be in, you have all been down there for an extremely long time."

Sephiroth's eyes lowered a moment, were Zack and Cloud still alive? Could he dare to hope that this wasn't another hallucination brought on by interminable darkness? He looked at the man that had saved him, talking in a strange language to another man. He had been there for a long time? How long? He saw a bottle of water and looked at it a moment, his arm moving slowly to reach for it.

Vincent saw the movement and gave the open bottle to him, "Small sips, now Steve will keep an eye on you while I go back down," He turned back to Steve, "I'll send Dan back up as well."

"Yo Vince," Steve stopped him, "The hell am I gonna do with him?"

"Just keep an eye on him, he won't understand what you say though, I will tell you more if I see fit," With that he left back down to the bowels of the former mansion.

"Dan," Vincent called his assistant, who was looking through things in the lab, "Go back up to Steve, he's with a guest in my tent." He watched the younger leave before entering the lab to find the light switch still fully functional. It still had the same irritating buzzing sound that he remembered.

He moved around the lab; suppressing small shudders that the memories brought, nothing had changed since he had been killed in there; moving over to the tanks he looked, the monitors were still in full working order, and he pressed a few buttons, watching the murky liquid drain from both tubes and he released the blonde first, catching and laying the boy down carefully before freeing the other boy.

The dark haired one groaned soft and opened his violet eyes, "Se…" his hoarse voice whispered.

"Sephiroth?" Vincent watched as the young man looked at him with a nod, slowly moving to sit up, but faltering a little and Vincent helped him, "Take it easy, you have been locked up in there for thousands of years, it will take time for you to regain mobility fully." He looked around a moment, something to identify the two with, 'Sample C' read over the tube that the blonde was in, 'Sample Z' over the darker haired boy's and he saw an old dust covered notepad, and picked it up to read the earlier pages, "You are Zack?" he asked, receiving a nod, "And this is Cloud?" Another nod from Zack confirmed it.

"S-Seph?" Zack looked at him, "Where…?"

"I shall take you to him," Vincent promised and picked up the blonde who hadn't even blinked, he was alive but in a comatose state, "Do you think you can walk?" he asked and pulled Zack to his feet and steadied him, keeping Cloud in one arm, and he helped Zack out of their dark prison.

There's another chapter done, hope you enjoy it