Hello to my readers! An update, right on time. I have several things on my mind about this series... I'm debating whether to do a major rehaul on the previous two (should I? Your input would help), write a prequel to C'est La Vie. I'm going to start on "Father, Why Hath Thou Forsaken Me", which is a Sephiroth fic, when this series is over.

I do have the final chapter and the epilogue written out now. Let's just say that there are going to be bikinis around, heh heh heh...

Raspberry Polar Bear - I think Arien'd just love to ditch the family reunion. Personally, any family with Sephiroth in it is just dysfunctional and less contact the better. (I wonder if Sephiroth went to a family reunion in his life... that might be funny). Oh wait. Any family with any of Shinra people in it (except Elena, probably) is going to be dysfunctional. Anyway, Tseng is a very conservative dude... and Elena's a little more liberated, and that can cause problems. I personally liked "No I'm not, I'm Reno"...

Echo the Ethereal Swordmast... - Erm, I'm not sure. I haven't really decided yet :-P so it's for a surprise. I'm getting a little tired of Sephiroth being the master bad guy everytime, though. So maybe not. But any more divulging and it'd be spoilers so I won't :-) I do have the last chapter and the epilogue written out, but I had the inspiration when I was playing some random "I Spy" game on my computer... yes, I'm that bored... A bit of theosophy in this chapter.

Moonshine's Guide - I had three OC's, and all of them will be playing a role in this story, large or small. So yes, Michele will be making an appearance in three chapters or so. Clarissa's brother isn't a nice guy... he has his reasons for visiting his constantly ill sister. I'm not sure why she's sick, though - tuberculosis, maybe? Do those even exist on Gaia? Anyway, Rufus also has reasons for hanging around the auburn haired beauty, but Clarissa's bro's a little more sinister.

Crazy Bubbling Blonde - It may or may not be Sephiroth making a return... if it was Sephiroth, though, I'd have to make calls to Cloud and Tifa, and I don't like writing Cloud, because he worries too much and I'm the exact opposite :-S I found it interesting that the One Winged Angel's theme originally came from Jimi Hendrix's Purple Haze, though. And the words are from Orff's Carmina Burana. I never knew they were in Latin until I read the lyrics :-P

itachi349 - Yup, you guessed it right! I ripped that last line off from Sephiroth's last line in AC. Sephiroth's lines kinda gets on my nerves, but I guess I can forgive all the "I'm cool" junk because Sephiroth is cool. But if some random not-so-pretty guy said those, I'd probably punch him in the face... Sephy's unreal to me, though. I can't imagine Sephiroth eating, or sleeping. He's... ethereal. And that is why we all love Sephiroth.

Chapter 12: Fates and Chances

The fate speeds on.

Ah, so it seems, brother.

Why pick these two? They seem unlikely candidates. Hardly responsible and not moral at all.

I thought it'd be interesting, dear brother. The light wavered.

It is a large risk. We can't have them die, sister. He sates my hunger.

As does she. We all take risks to earn more.

The gods, Arien thought wearily, definitely did not like them.

Arien was not exactly religious. She did not have a particular god that she liked or felt attached to, although if she had to pick one she would probably pick one that was dedicated to eating, since she liked to eat. The matter of faith was that trivial for her. But she prayed to whatever god was convenient at the time; before battle, she prayed to the god of battle, before voyage, to the god of the sea. It was more of a self-reassurance, rechecking her mental stability, rather than actually trusting any deity.

But now, lying in bed, next to the redhead who was fast asleep, not exactly wide awake but not completely exhausted either, she really had to wonder who was laughing at her twisted fate. Even Cloud and the gang didn't have to go through all this, did they? It felt like someone was having fun picking on her. Or maybe it was just a bad karma. Hell, she probably had shit coming if karma actually existed. She'd destroyed lives and happiness to bathe herself in tears and blood.

She knew exactly what Reno thought of the gods. If he was forced to pick one, he would probably pick the god of lust, partly because he himself moved for pleasure and entertainment, but partly as a joke. For Reno gods may exist, but they didn't really play a role in his life. The gods could care about their own business and not meddle in his. For him, there were yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and that was it.

Did the gods really hate you for not worshipping them? Was faith a mandatory part of life?

As far as Arien could see, some people were moving along fine and dandy without giving a hoot about gods. Andora the airhead, for instance.

Why them? What had they done?

Arien decided to forget about the gods, since thinking about them made her feel nauseous.

It was Reno's turn to have a bad dream that night. He was in a dark alley. It was raining. Rude was not there. He was alone, he could not see well. He heard footsteps, soft, light footsteps. Secretive footsteps, not wanting to be heard.

He switched his EMR on. He had to wait to get the person closer. The footsteps were getting louder, and he could vaguely see a shadow up ahead. He could not tell if it was a man or a woman.

He did not know who it was, but for some reason he knew he had to kill the walker. The shadow was getting closer. Now within arm's reach. Closer, closer…

The EMR crackled and flared electric blue as he took a full swing. The nightstick made a solid contact with the shadow that suddenly became solid and real. There was a loud crack.

The shadow fell, slowly, like it was sinking through the gelatin. With a wet splash the shadow landed in a puddle. Black hair fanned in the dirty water.

Black hair?

A car passed by, and illuminated the dark alley. To his horror, Arien was lying in the puddle, a streak of blood trickling down her forehead. Her uniform was slowly turning brown from the mud. Her blue-green eyes were open but glassy. Her mouth was slightly parted, as if she was surprised.

He could not speak. He kneeled in the dirty water, feeling the rain…

When he woke up the next morning, Arien was still asleep. He was drenched in sweat. He stared at her. The dream was so real to him that he was staring at her sleeping face for a few seconds, trying to believe that she was real and alive. She was cradling her face with her right am, her hair fanned out. She looked so innocent and so child-like that she looked like she was still in her teens, not a mother of a three-year-old.

Lying sideways, he kept staring. Her eyes opened. She reached over and touched his face.

"Good morning," she said drowsily.

"Mornin'."

"Did I do something?" she asked.

"Huh?"

"You dreamed about me last night, didn't you?" she asked.

"How the HELL do you know, yo?" he asked, frowning. He rolled over onto her, caging the slender body beneath him. "Do you read minds?"

Arien smiled, a faint reminder of the former smile she used to wear on her face. "You called my name."

"I did?"

"Yes, you did."

"You're warm," Reno whispered into the top of her head. She made a muffled reply. "Shiva, this feels good, yo." He felt her arms snake around his shoulders, then yank down.

"Want me to move down?" He wiggled down until he was face-level with her. There was no burning desire in her face, no yearnings, but she looked truly happy for the first time since Vince had disappeared. She raised her left hand, touched a strand of his stray hair that was sticking up. "Oh, Reno," she whispered. They felt comfortable with each other's presence. He wanted her, right there and then. Her feathery touch was like ice-cold fire, sending shock through him. He sucked on her lips, his hands roaming. She closed her eyes, back slightly bent, her mouth a little open.

"Arien…"

She opened her eyes, kissed him. "I wish we could take this further, Re, but we have to get up." She sat up without removing the body on top of her first. Reno was unceremoniously dropped onto the mattress, which shrieked in protest from such manhandling.

"Damn!"

"Sorry. I really want to let you, but if we do it I don't know if we'll be on time. I promise, when we get back." She pulled on a white shirt, then knife and pistol holsters around her thighs and shins, then her usual blue-black slacks.

"We're in uniform today?"

"Unfortunately, we'd have to go in as Shinra employees. Random tourists asking to visit a shut-down elevator is going to look fishy." Arien stood up, tucked in her shirt into the slacks, and started to do her tie.

"I don't like uniforms, yo," Reno informed the air. Arien ignored it. She wore her underarm holster, and carefully slid her twin firearms into it. She pulled up her slacks legs and slid in knives and small pistols, then reached up and began to brush her hair.

"Arrrgh," Reno yawned, then got up, scratching his head. He sat on the bed, legs dangling, then stretched. Then opened the closet door. Pulled out a white shirt.

After getting dressed, fully armed and ready, the two stepped out of the room after making sure the coast was clear. After walking to the rented car and finding some people staring, Reno looked around. "We're too high-profile."

"No, you're too high-profile. With the red hair and the red marks? You're like a living danger sign." Arien laughed.

"Bullshit. No Wutaian is that tall, and your hair's too long to be normal, yo."

"Guess the only normal looking one is Elena." Elena happened to be the one who stood out the most among the Turks with her blonde hair and her innocent face. The others… well, the others either had too much dirt, blood, or mako on their hands.

Elena arrived slightly late, armed with a slightly large bag. "Sorry," she said. "I got a call from Rude."

"No worries," Arien replied. "What did he say?"

"The usual update. Four trainees got killed last night. Bomb explosion."

"I didn't hear anything about it," Arien said, making a face. "All I saw on the news was how Costa's sun is awfully strong this year."

"They say that every year," Reno said glumly, who, contrary to popular beliefs, was very prone to sunburns.

"That's right. It was a dismantling practice."

'Wait just a fucking minute," Reno said, looking absolutely confused. "How the hell do four trainees, no matter how shitty and stupid fucking dumb they are, end up dying in a practice?"

"Andora," Elena said simply. Arien groaned.

"Please don't tell me…"

"Yes."

"Did she sleep her way into the ranks?" Arien asked, shaking her head. Reno looked bewildered; he was the one who made the final decision on who was to join the ranks. Arien was giving him extremely dirty looks.

"I don't think I saw her file…"

"What!" Elena choked out. "You just signed your name without looking?"

"I think I did." He grinned sheepishly.

"She must have slept with the proctor," Arien said, looking utterly disgusted. "There's no other way she could have made it."

"Oh well. No big loss, yo," he said cheerily, not realizing the exasperated expressions etched onto Elena's face. As Reno opened the front door, Elena wore such a frightened expression that she more than vaguely resembled a frightened chocobo.

"Reno, you aren't driving."

"Why not? I'm the best driver, yo."

Arien decided to keep her mouth shut. She rather liked watching Reno and Elena argue. After all, she and the redhead argued often enough, and it was refreshing to see another female argue with him instead of fawning over him. She wondered what almost every single woman who crossed Reno's path saw in him, then was reminded that she was the one who had taken the hardest hit. Damn.

"…I am not going into that car as far as you're in the driver's seat!" Elena was shouting.

"I'll drive," Arien said quietly.

"Arie? Are you sure you can move this baby?" Reno looked at her, jeering. Arien looked back at him.

"I'm not good, but I don't purposefully try to take the most dangerous road. At least I drive safely."

"But…" Reno started to argue, then saw Arien glaring. Can we please get going? Her eyes said.

"Urrgh." Reno let go, and Arien slid into the driver seat. He went around the front of the car, and sat down distastefully into the passenger side.

The car ride to the elevator shaft was as smooth and uneventful as it could be. Reno thought that Arien's driving was boring. A car was like a woman. Ride her hard and she'll respond just as faithfully.

Except Arien didn't think driving was an art. For her, it was just a convenient method of transportation.

And that was why men and women never understood each other.

"We're here."

The old elevator that used to be fully functional during the Meteor fiasco was now rusted and apparently not moving. It was covered in dust, grime, some weird slimy substance, and mold. Elena did not look comfortable; she kept adjusting the bag on her shoulder. Reno whistled. Arien swiped her keycard. The elevator roared to life, lights flashed, and the door opened. The three backed, almost as if waiting for some monster to jump out.

Nothing was in the cubicle.

"Ah hell," Reno muttered, "we're scared of our own shadows." He stepped in without hesitation, pressed "B5" on the panel. "What?" He said, seeing the two women standing at the threshold. "Too scared?"

It turned out that the two women were fully right to be scared.

It was Reno, with his enhanced hearing abilities, who heard it first. Just as the elevator was beginning to move, the cable supporting the cubicle snapped. First they heard a loud ping, then a bang, then a very loud creak, and then a snap.

"What the…" The male did not get to finish the sentence, as there was a clang, then another deafening bang, and suddenly the three found themselves in free-fall.

"Hold onto something!" Elena shouted. The lights flicked out, plunging the small space into an unnatural darkness; it added to the fear. Reno jumped and held onto the bars on the ceiling; Arien and Elena held onto the railings. Then there was a loud bang, a scream, series of shouts, then silence.

"Is anyone hurt?" asked Elena, not moving.

"I'm okay," Reno said, letting go of the ceiling bars and landing onto… something that was not the floor.

"Ow! Reno! That was my foot!"

"Sorry, yo. I can't see anything, though."

"Neither can I," Elena said helplessly. "I can't even reach for the flashlight. It's in my bag, but it's too dark."

"I can see," Arien's voice sounded unnaturally loud in the darkness. "Here. Give me the bag."

Arien's nightvision was more of a curse than a gift to her, but for once Reno was thankful that she had it. He heard some shuffling – it sounded awfully loud to him, now that it was dark and his mako-enhanced ears were trying to catch any slight sounds – then, she flashed a beam of light into the space right next to his face.

"Where are we?" Elena asked.

"I think the cable broke," Arien said, looking up. "I heard a snap before we went down. If that's what's happened, we're where we want to be."

"But do we know if the cable snapped off?" Reno asked.

"No."

"Somebody should go check, yo."

Elena was the smallest, but Arien was the lightest of the group. Since Elena refused to let Reno touch her, the job automatically came to the Wutaian spy.

"Reno? Can you lift me?" Reno crouched, and Arien took off her shoes, revealing her nylon-clad toes. She climbed onto his back, then onto his shoulders. He stood up, wobbling slightly. Arien reached up, unlatched the grate, pushed it open, then disappeared. Reno sat down. There were some shuffling noises, a loud scraping noise. Then she appeared again, jumping lightly onto the floor with a pat.

"Well?"

"The cable's rusted," Arien explained. "We're on the bottom floor."

"That's good, yo."

"Yes," Elena said quietly, "But how exactly are we supposed to get out?"

Reno looked at Arien. Arien looked back.

"Um…"

Reno stood up, ever the one to act. Without a pause, he flicked his EMR on, and whacked the elevator door.

The electricity surged throughout the metal doors. The door slid open.

"Reno, how did you do that?" Elena asked. The redhead shrugged.

"Does this happen a lot?" Elena now asked Arien.

"Reno trusting his instinct and everything working out? Yes."

The room was dark and unforgiving. Arien did not need the flashlight, but Elena turned it on anyway. The three crowded around Arien's map.

"We're here," she said, pointing at a square on the paper, "and we need to get to there," she said, pointing to another square.

"So basically get out of this place and go around till we get to the fifth room, then take a left?"

Arien nodded.

"Compass?"

Arien silently pointed at Reno.

"Urr…"

"Don't worry," Arien said lightly. "Reno has a good sense of direction, that's about the only thing he's reliable about."

"Only?" He started to walk.

It was not supposed to be long, but for Reno it felt like it last for eternity. They did not encounter any monsters; the only sound that Reno could hear was three pairs of shoes shuffling against the concrete floor. He turned right, walked on, then stood in front of a door.

"This one?" Arien whispered. Reno nodded, gestured that he could hear something behind the door. Arien slid out her gunblade from the holster under her arm, unlatched the safety. Elena pulled out a pistol. Reno gripped the EMR, and switched it on with his thumb.

"Locked?" Elena asked. Reno tried the doorknob quietly, and shook his head. He gestured Arien to hand over her pistol from her shin holster. After receiving the pistol and making sure that it was loaded and ready to shoot, he motioned the women to step back, then kicked open the door with a loud bang.

There was nothing. No movement. Elena peered in, flashlight in hand. A beam of light hit the corner. Then…

It was so fast that Reno felt the pain after blood started to trickle down his cheek. Instinctively he swung his EMR, and felt the jarring impact as the rod made a solid stroke. Before he could make sure that the thing was down, Arien and Elena were in the room. Arien had both gunblades in hand, Elena with her pistol aimed. Something – something like a fin – sliced the air in front of Elena's eyes. Elena automatically shot without thinking.

"I can't fight! I can't see!" Elena shouted.

"Keep your backs against the walls!" came Arien's reply from the left. "Stay put. Elena, Reno, I need your spare clips."

"Arie, you ain't going solo."

"I have to, no time to argue. I'm the only one who can see!" Reno was about to retort that Arien had just openly disobeyed her superior's orders when another attack came. Arien ducked just in time to avoid getting her head cut off.

"Get out of the room and shut the door!" Arien shouted as she shot twice.

"No!"

Without a word, Arien cocked her left gunblade at Reno's head. "Now."

The redhead was sensitive to danger, and saw that Arien knew that she had disobeyed his orders openly and knew the consequences if Reno cared to administer it. He also saw that the woman did not give a damn about it. Her priority was to get to the temple alive, and laws and formalities were shattered in the face of danger. Reno yanked Elena out of the room then kicked the door shut.

Arien could see well in the dark, and so she saw what the attackers were; they looked like fish, but they were flying in the air, as if they could swim. Occasionally she saw the fins move, and saw that they were about as sharp as a knife strapped onto her thigh. She quickly counted more than twenty of these creatures. If all of them came at once, she'd be ribbons before she could say ah.

She carefully backed into the door after taking a quick glance to make sure that there were no fish creatures plastered onto the door panel. At least her back was safe. Now, all she needed to do was to take care of these bothersome creatures.

But they were fast. Extremely fast. They were about as fast as Reno. She was not that fast.

She decided to take care of the stationery ones at first. Some were perched onto the walls like starfish. She raised her arm and aimed her gunblade, then fired.

Apparently they weren't faster than sound, for she had shot nine times successively and she saw nine fall, now little more than bags of fish meat and bones. But those were the only ones plastered to the wall. And others were moving.

The easiest way out was to cast Fire, but then she'd be burned. Lightening was the safe choice, since ice would probably just help their case. Then she realized that the Lightening materia – master materia too – was firmly lodged in her pistol. Which was now in Reno's hand.

"Shit!" she hissed. From the corner of the eye, she saw two coming straight at her. She fired.

Two down. But there were still… twelve more to go.

Arien decided to go for trickery. Something must be telling them to move in a certain direction. It had to be sound, since the room was dark, and it was unlikely that they could see without light. Nightvision-enhanced eyes glowed slightly in the dark, but since neither Reno nor Elena had known that there were creatures in this room, that option was not valid.

Sound. Arien pulled off the ring from her right ring finger; it was the ring Reno had given her for her birthday some years ago. She knew Reno had a matching ring, attached to a chain that was around his neck. The clear blue stone that was set on the ring looked nearly white to her, almost glowing with a light of its own. Carefully aiming, knowing that if this failed she was dead, she threw her ring into the corner. It hit the wall with a clang.

The fish darted to the corner.

Arien fired rapidly, her finger squeezing the trigger over and over again. She released the empty cartridge with a swift squeeze of a button, then reloaded from the cartridges lined up on her belt. Swiftly reloading, she continued to shoot. Although she had not moved, she was breathing hard. She was nearly out of ammo for this one, and the next cartridges were now on the back of the belt. If she didn't make it…

She did.

There was a loud splat and then there was silence. Arien looked around, looking for the scaly creatures. There weren't any, at least not in the air. They were all on the floor. She looked at the wall; it resembled a honeycomb more than a wall.

She slumped against the door, releasing the tension in her body. She sighed, then turned the doorknob, still facing into the room, just in case. She leaned onto the door.

"Reno."

Reno turned. "Cleared?"

"Yes sir."

"What the hell were they?" he asked as he handed back the pistol. She rolled up the slacks and replaced the gun into the holster.

"I have no idea," she replied. "It looked like fish but the fins were about as sharp as knives. I've never seen them before."

The Turks were well informed about the nature of hostile beasts in the world, their weaknesses, and how to defeat them. To have a Turk admit that she had no idea what the creature was raised new and awful possibilities. All three were thinking the same thing; someone, or something, was doing a very illegal experiment with the local marine biology, and they were going to have to clean that up as well. With the current trouble on hands, the Turks were very reluctant to clean another mess up.

"This wasn't in the job contract," Reno muttered under his breath.

"Are they guarding something?" Elena asked. Arien shook her head.

"Don't think so. I think they were just living there. I think they're vulnerable to fire or lightening."

"Okay, if we meet any more of those fishes in the darkness, you two leave the room," Elena said. "I'll take care of it."

The three returned to the room, now silent once more. From the doorway, Elena threw a glow-bar into the center of the room. It flashed then began to radiate light. She set the bag down. Arien went to the corner and picked the ring up. Thankfully, it was not covered in fish guts, but Arien checked to see if it was clean anyway. Then she replaced it on her finger. Reno saw the entire course of action at the threshold, but said nothing.

"Okay, fish," Reno said as he entered the dark chamber, seeing an ample display of dead fish on the floor. He picked one up, taking care not to touch the fins. They had silvery scales like regular fish just out in the harbor, but the gills were gone and the fins, as Arien had said, were most definitely blade-sharp.

"I need to reload," Arien reminded the two. "I'm not going into the temple without being fully armed."

As Arien reloaded, Reno checked the walls. "You made a mess," he observed.

"Sorry. I couldn't really care about the interior décor," she retorted. She pointed at the farthest wall.

"That one?"

"Yes."

Reno's face turned into a grin. It was not a pleasant grin but rather like a Cheshire Cat, ready to pounce upon some fun. "Right," he said, unzipping the bag that Elena had been carrying all along. "Let's start."