Chapter 4

The main headquarters for the WRO was a massive facility that covered over four square miles of land twenty miles to the South-East of Edge. The facility contained massive hangars for airships, airplanes, and helicopters; large warehouses that contained everything from emergency food rations to state of the art weapons; training facilities for WRO troopers; research and development facilities; and numerous personnel buildings that varied from simple housing to office buildings. The largest of these office buildings contained the main office of every branch, including the personal office of Commissioner Tuesti.

The security guard that ran the checkpoint smiled widely as Cloud drove past, briefly waving at the blonde haired man. Many of the WRO personnel knew who Cloud was and rarely if ever asked him any questions.

Cloud pulled Fenrir up right next to the building and parked next to the long black and chromed sedan that he knew was Reeve's. As Cloud removed his sunglasses, he looked up at the large fifteen-story building. The main edifice of the building was predominantly glass, which was now reflecting the mid morning sun with a ferocious glare. Cloud briefly thought about keeping his sunglasses on, but shrugged the idea off as he began to walk in. For reasons that Cloud couldn't understand, he always had a strange feeling when entering this building. Perhaps it was the fact that everyone always seemed to stare at him, murmuring that he was the one who had defeated Sephiroth and ended the Jenova War. Or, perhaps it was because this building vaguely reminded him of the Shinra building, with its large atrium and glass walled elevators.

It was into one of these elevators that Cloud now entered, hit the button for the 15th floor, and briefly turned around to watch the marble tiled floor shrink further and further away. When the elevator pinged with a light, sharp bell, the brass doors opened and Cloud exited and headed to the farthest door on the right hand side in the Eastern Wing. The doorframe was made out of what looked like Gonganan Redwood with a frosted privacy glass window. On the window in thick black lettering was "Commissioner Reeve Tuesti" with the WRO emblem below it.

Cloud opened the door and entered the outer office where the secretary was busy typing on her computer. He couldn't help but notice that she was wearing a low cut blouse that revealed her rather well endowed breasts. He quickly looked away and scanned the rest of the outer office. There were a few pictures hanging on the walls, mainly of Reeve showing the different feats that the WRO had accomplished in the past four years. Several potted plants reached towards the ceiling, but whether they were real or not he couldn't tell. There was a large leather sofa along the farthest wall from the secretary that was there for guests to sit on and wait to be called into the Commissioner's inner office, which was through another door at the far end of the room.

The blonde secretary pushed her round gold rimmed glasses up her nose and removed the lollipop that she was sucking in an inappropriate manner. She batted her eyes and smiled at Cloud before she hit a switch on her intercom.

"Sir? Mr. Strife is here."

"Good, send him in."

"You can go in," she said with a smile. Cloud lightly nodded and tried to smile at her but he could only raise the corner of his mouth in a weak attempt. As he entered the inner office, the secretary ran her tongue over her lollipop as she watched Cloud's backside disappear.

The inner office was much smaller than the one Cloud just left. The far wall was all windows, with dark blue drapes pulled to the sides. There were two plush chairs in front of the main desk, which was covered in red leather. Sitting in the large red leather chair on the opposite side was Reeve Tuesti, who was wearing a blue suit in a Wutai style. Reeve quickly stood from his desk and motioned for Cloud to take a seat.

"Good of you to make it, Cloud. How's business been?" Reeve asked in a manner that said he didn't really care how Cloud's business was doing. Cloud caught this but knew that Reeve was only making small talk before he got down to the reason he wanted Cloud to be here.

"You said that there was something important you wanted to tell me?" Cloud said as he sat down. Reeve nodded and cleared his throat. Cloud knew this was Reeve's gesture before he went into one of his big speeches.

"Cloud, I'm sure that you're aware of the many riots that have been breaking out in cities around the world." Cloud knew about the ones in Junon, but he had heard nothing about there being riots in other cities around the world.

"I thought they were only in Junon," Cloud said more or less to himself. Reeve cocked an eyebrow and gave Cloud an inquisitive look.

"It's been all over the news channels. Surely you've seen them on the T.V.?"

"I don't watch it much," Cloud said. It was true; Cloud's line of work kept him away and on the road much of the time. When he was home, he rarely spent it watching television.

"Oh, well. The news channels have had a few stories showcasing the protests, but they only report on about a third of them. There've been protests in nearly every major city, town, village, and hamlet around the world. And every single one of them wants the same thing. They want the WRO to stop "interfering", as they say, in their local politics and step back from our global position. I know that a lot of people are fearing that the WRO might become something like the old Shinra Corporation, but we simply can't do what they want. That would be a major step backwards in politics." Cloud blinked a few times while trying to stay focused. Reeve always loved to talk politics but it wasn't Cloud's area of expertise.

"I'm not really into politics, Reeve," Cloud said as he shook his head. Reeve let out a long breath and nodded his head slowly.

"Well, regardless. You've seen what the situation is like in Junon. Now that's the worst case of protesting by far, and we've been lucky that no other cities are experiencing that level of unrest." Reeve paused briefly and looked Cloud in the eyes as he leaned forward onto his leather-covered desk.

"While you were in Junon, did you see any of these people who call themselves Returners?" Cloud smirked as he remembered the three hoodlums that he had ran into.

"Yeah, three of them tried to fight me." Reeve smiled at Cloud's choice of "tried".

"Well, it's these Returners that started the whole business. About six months ago, after the Deep Ground affair cooled off, members of this group started to appear in towns, slowly building support for their cause. At first, we wrote it off as just being normal opposition to authority, but then they started to become more organized. Before we knew it, they had established groups of militant recruitment and training camps all over where they seemed to be preparing for some sort of war. We were able to shut down the majority of them without bringing focus onto ourselves, but the group in Junon caught wind of what was happening and they went underground." Cloud shifted in his chair and raised an eyebrow in question.

"Did you use the WRO soldiers to bring the groups down?" Cloud knew that the WRO troopers were effective when they needed to be, but the majority of its members lacked the type of discipline it needed to keep something like this under wraps. Plus, the press was always looking for something to pin on the WRO, and paid well for anything they could use. Cloud wasn't saying that it was impossible for the troops to keep it a secret, but it was highly unlikely when dealing with the fact that so many people would have been in on it.

Reeve lightly smiled, though it seemed forced, and shifted uneasily in his chair. "No, the Army was kept out of it. We used a more, professional, department to take care of it." Cloud gave Reeve a skeptical look, and Reeve lightly shrugged.

"What department would that be?"

"The Department of Intelligence and Investigations, or D.I.I. as we call them," Reeve said as he picked up a pen and began tapping it on the desk. Cloud lightly smiled at Reeve's nervous tick.

"Department of Intelligence and Investigations? You mean the Turks?" Reeve sighed and put the pen down.

"Yes, but they aren't called the Turks anymore. I know that they're synonymous with the old Shinra Regime, but they have their uses. Besides, my financer wanted them to have an official position within the WRO, and they've come in handy." Cloud lightly nodded and knew that Reeve was meaning Rufus Shinra, who last time he checked was changing the names on several of his products to make people distance the stuff from the old regime.

"Anyway, the D.I.I. have been conducting an investigation into the Returners and think that they may be cooking up something big, something that could detrimentally effect our efforts at sustaining peace in the world; something that may potentially all ready be in the works. That's where I need you, Cloud." Cloud narrowed his brow and looked Reeve in the eye. Whatever this was, it must be important enough to tell Cloud all about the Returners and their now defunct training camps.

Reeve could tell that Cloud was now giving him his undivided attention, and let out a sigh as he tried to figure out how best to say it. He stood from his chair, and with his hands behind his back, he looked out of the window at the ground below.

"As you know, Cloud, the WRO has bases all over the world. Almost all of them are for our peacekeeping forces; housing, supply deposits, medical facilities, things like that."

"Almost all of them?" Cloud asked.

"Yes, most of them," Reeve said as he turned back around to face Cloud. "But there are a few that are classified as being top secret. Mainly these are facilities that develop and research both new weapons and medicines. But we do have one facility that is kept secret because what it contains is of a very sensitive nature and it's best that it's kept under a strict lock and key."

"What is it?" Cloud asked, much like a child who sees something strange for the first time.

"Data," Reeve said as he again took his seat. Cloud narrowed his brow as he wondered just what sort of data could be deemed so important that a top-secret facility would be built to keep it. When he realized what it could be, he looked up and Reeve confirmed his guess.

"That's right. Every file ever committed on the Jenova Experiment, the SOLDIER Program, and the recently discovered Deep Ground Initiative. In this one facility, we keep all of these files, literally thousands, under a heavily guarded server with the intentions of never accessing them. And it would have remained that way if not for an incident that occurred two days ago."

"What happened?" Cloud asked, not sure if he really wanted to know the answer.

"Two nights ago at exactly 21:45, a transmission came in saying that they were under attack. Before we could get a confirmation from them, the transmission cut off. The last thing we heard was a bunch of gunfire and people screaming. Since then we've been trying to contact them but there hasn't been anything. We had two hundred and thirty three people stationed there, and yet we haven't heard anything from any of them."

"You think the Returners had something to do with this?" Reeve took in a deep breath and nodded his head tiredly.

"I believe so. All our intelligence says that they're planning something big, and this certainly fits the requirements. Cloud, I want you to go and see just what happened there." Cloud thought about what Reeve had just said and let his gaze fall to an object on Reeve's desk as he debated whether he wanted to go or not.

"Why not send Reno and Rude?" Cloud asked.

"I would if I could, but they along with Elena and Tseng are busy trying to keep any resurgent Returner elements from returning. I'd send a full contingent of troopers to do it, but that would definitely compromise the secrecy of the facility." Cloud thought about it, but shook his head.

"I dunno, I' be out a lot of gil by not making deliveries…"

"Ha, Cloud, I never took you for being such a shrewd business man," Reeve said as he smiled widely, which was a stark contrast to the seriousness of his previous demeanor. "All right. My financer has okayed the sum of 25,000; but that's only if you see the investigation all the way through to the end, whatever that might be. So will you do it Cloud?" Cloud blinked in surprise at the monetary figure. 25,000 gil was a lot of money; enough to pay for both Marlene's and Denzel's education for a good long while and let him take on fewer jobs to make ends meet. This job could very well be dangerous, Cloud knew, but to him that wasn't a deterrent. Cloud looked Reeve in the eyes and nodded firmly.

"So where is this facility?" Reeve smiled and then reached into one of the drawers in the desk to pull out a map. He then quickly turned it to face Cloud and pointed out the area on the long archipelago.

"The facility's here, roughly twenty miles east of where Mideel used to be. We called it the Mideel Data Facility." Cloud nodded and then stood from his chair. Reeve smiled and asked when Cloud was going to depart.

"Later today, after lunch." Reeve gave Cloud a confused look.

"Lunch?"

"Yeah," Cloud said as he turned and headed towards the door. "I promised Tifa I'd be home for lunch." He gave Reeve a final wave before he closed the door to the inner office. Reeve sat back down in his chair and shook his head as he let out a light laugh. Cloud really had changed. Reeve leaned back in his chair and was about to rest his eyes when his intercom rang again.

"Sir? You wanted me to remind you of your twelve O'clock press meeting." Reeve quickly jumped up from his chair and checked his watch. His serious conversation with Cloud had totally made him forget his important announcement to the press.

"Thank you, Mary," Reeve said as he ran his hand over his hair to make sure it was still slicked back and made his way down to the press room.