The drive was quiet, uneventful. Reno seemed to be getting bored with the blue car count by the end, though he had employed Cait Sith to read his fortune a number of times along the way, sharing his results aloud each time and often dedicating them to the other passengers. Lyla was mostly quiet as she drove, listening to the chatter in the backseat and occasionally glancing curiously towards her silent passenger. Something had been bothering her since earlier that morning; his name was oddly familiar, though she could not seem to place it. Reeve had mentioned it in passing, she knew, but there was something else, something pressing.
They reached the lab without incident, and most of them were quick to exit the vehicle, whether to stretch their legs or get on with business or escape Cait Sith's conversation was anyone's guess. The previous facility they had visited had at least looked functional. This one appeared burned out from the exterior, windows dark and the console at the front door slow to start up. "Bad sign," Lyla muttered as she attempted to coax it into working properly. It took some doing, but finally it was running well enough to accept her entry code, causing the front door to unlock with a faint hiss and slide open.
"Your intel." Vincent said, stepping up beside her. "What is it, for this place?"
Cait Sith sprung from the ground to the man's shoulder in two swift movements, clinging to the red cape as he turned to eye the small creature. Who offered him a wide smile back.
Rude cracked his shoulder, flexing his fingers to a small chorus of criks. This place, at least, seemed as though it would be a workout.
"Last record of authorized entry is dated two years ago," Lyla responded, checking her organizer to confirm the date. "Which marks this place as being abandoned since the Meteor Crisis. Level of security is unknown, though the computers already appear to be in serious need of maintainance." She stepped through the door after giving the console at the front a hard thunk from the side, causing the lights in the first corridor to flicker on, humming softly.
"Even if the sentries aren't operational, there could be abandoned projects wandering about, though they are likely weak and malnourished due to two years of neglect."
Reno stepped up behind them, peering in. "So I might get to hit something," he said bluntly.
"Yes."
"Provided they don't teleport away from me this time."
"Have you ever considered not giving your victims a warning ahead of time? There is something to be said for subtlety."
Vincent glanced at them, cocking his gun as he walked into the building.
Cait Sith rummaged on his person again, coming up with a wide-brimmed microphone that he held in his lap tranquilly.
"Don't use that by my ear." the man in red muttered.
"Aye aye, Captain!" The cat saluted.
"Let's see," Lyla mused aloud, moving forward to take point even as she looked over the floorplan for the place on her PDA. "The main research center is two floors down. There's an elevator down this hallway, if we want to risk it. The stairs are a bit further but there's no chance to be stuck," she explained as they walked. The hallway beyond was dimmer, the lights there flickering as they threatened to go out completely.
"Stairs." Vincent said, leaving no room for argument, glancing back at Lyla for a beat. "You fight." it was almost impossible to tell if it was a statement or a question, but he had paused, eyes on her.
Cait Sith cocked his head, waiting for her answer, as well.
She continued to walk without missing a beat, with what seemed to be very little concern for what might await them in the darkness. "Yes," she said simply. "Quite well, in fact."
"Hits hard," Reno grumbled from somewhere behind them.
Vincent fell back into step without questioning this, though from a certain angle the cat thought he might see the edge of a smirk.
"Watch where you're going then." the ex-Turk advised, pausing to check a corner before proceeding in the direction of the stairs.
"Of course," Lyla assured him without looking back. The light was growing dimmer, but there was still enough to get by with as they neared what looked like the door to the stairwell. "Seems as though all is quiet up here. Shall we see what lurks below?" Her tone was utterly mirthless as she pushed the door open, waiting until the next person had caught hold of it before letting go and beginning the descent.
"Creepy," Reno observed as they began their trek down the stairs. As though on cue, a loud thump sounded from somewhere beneath them, something that sounded nothing like the expected metallic clang of a light fixture or the crash of a fallen door. A grin spread across his features then, eager, pleased. "That's more like it."
Rude stepped into the hall behind Reno, leaving the AVALANCHE members to take up the rear. Vincent looked at Cait Sith coolly before following behind.
"Cannae someone see in the dark?" The cat asked, leaning over the top of Vincent's head. "Cannae tell paw from wall in 'ere!"
There was a faint rustling as Lyla produced something from her bag, then a soft click, causing a wide beam of light to spill before them. She paused long enough to offer it to the cat, keeping it pointed ahead. "Cait, hold this, if you will. I'll need both hands, likely."
"Sure thing," he agreed, taking the light.
Vincent, however, slipped one hand under the cat and set him atop Reno's head, dodging three steps into the darkness before he dissapeared entirely.
"Vin?" Cait Sith called after him. "Heey!"
Reno shot a hand up to steady the cat as he began to take the stairs down two at a time, slipping his nightstick from its place at his belt as his descent fell into a steady, quick rhythm. "Hold on, Cait," he advised. Ahead of him, Lyla picked up pace and disappeared into the darkness behind Vincent, lost to the light that Cait Sith kept pointed forward.
Another thud sounded, followed by a softer, wetter noise. Something slick. Slime? It seemed to be growing nearer, somewhere beyond the next landing. Lyla paused behind Vincent, reaching to draw something out from beneath her shirt at the small of her back. "Trying to beat me to it?" she asked calmly.
"Trying not to be blinded." He replied evenly, taking aim.
Rude frowned at Reno when he came abreast of him, sunglasses still fixed in place despite the almost pitch black of the room at their depth. In the flashlight his face was a mass of angular shadows and flashes of white.
How in hell could they see at all?
"Fair enough," she replied, thrusting her right arm out suddenly; the motion was followed by the metallic sound of something being unsheathed, an item the size of a standard flashlight having expanded into a full-length staff, the faint light from the flight of stairs above and around the bend briefly glinting off the blade at one end. She moved forward without another word, striking out at the thing in the darkness without missing a step, even as the light from above became brighter as Reno, Rude and Cait rounded the corner.
"Alright, what's with you two running off all- fuck, what is that?" Reno asked of noone in particular, sneering as the light fell across the creature that had clearly dragged itself along the length of its corridor to reach them, the dark, sticky-looking trail on the floor behind it standing as proof. It was almost serpent-like in shape, though a pair of arms protruded from its midsection in a way that arms most certainly should not, bent at odd angles, dragging the rest of the body along as they pushed against the floor to press forward. It's head had been human once, perhaps. The shape of a human skull could be seen at the top, though the jaw had elongated itself. As soon as Reno opened his mouth to comment, the thing unhinged it's jaw, baring fangs the length and width of good carving knives.
"Why could Hojo never make any pretty monsters, huh?"
"He did!" Cait Sith supplied, the light shifting as he readied his megaphone. "Ready, Vin?"
Vincent darted to one side, shooting a line of bullets aimed at the glint of those teeth. His quiet grunt of response was lost in the echo of gunshots.
Rude glanced at Reno before he dropped into position.
Lyla moved quickly, darting to the side of the beast in order to take a wide swing at it's middle, blade slicing into the serpentine body and drawing both a howl and a thick purple substance from the thing. It screamed and hissed as Vincent's bullets connected with its left fang, shooting the lower half of it clean off. It thrashed, swinging its heavy tail towards Lyla, easily wider than she herself was, but she cleared it almost effortlessly before moving to the other side and slicing again.
Reno was deliberate in his movements as he closed in on the beast. It snapped at him, cobra-like, somehow eerier for the lack of a snake's hood, attempting to scrape at and pierce him with the fang that was still in one piece, near enough to a sword protruding from its head. He parried with his nightstick, striking hard before wedging it into the creature's mouth and spreading the fingers of his left hand wide, sending a sharp electric current through his weapon and, consequently, their assailant.
Rude dashed after his partner, landing a solid punch to the side of the thing's head as it went momentarily still from the shock, following up with another before he danced back, unwilling to linger too close to the fangs.
Cait Sith reached onto his furry person for something, startled upright when the thing howled again. He yelped, holding up the microphone and blaring a loud keen into the mouthpiece.
Across the room Vincent shuddered at the pitch, tracing a finger over the materia in his bracer before firing another shot.
It twisted back and forth as it found itself attacked from all sides, shrieking again in reply to Cait Sith's own keening, a high-pitched wail of a sound now, followed by a pained hiss. Reno struck it's dislodged jaw from beneath, sending another wave of electricity through the creature while Lyla descended on it from behind, driving one end of her bladed staff into the cylinder of its body, aiming for where she thought the spine should be. More of the thick fluid began to ooze out, staining her weapon and boots as it continued its trek to the floor.
Vincent frowned, fingers brushing over what he had been seeking.
Ice.
He murmured an invoke under his breath, sending a wave of shards from his flung hand, freezing a trail of its goo solid.
The monster's pained wails were more pitiful than frightening, and the dark man was gripped by what felt almost like misplaced pity. He scowled, stepping back to steady himself.
Its body began to seize as the ice crumbled around it, movement beginning to slow just moments afterward, slower and slower until it became perfectly still, frozen in mid-air until it began to lean, slowly at first, then hitting the floor so hard that the impact caused a wave to run down the length of its body and tail. Lyla moved to stand with one foot on either side of the serpent and brought her blade down swiftly, cutting through the spine and severing its head from the rest of its body.
"Shit," Reno breathed, though his expression was pleasant, appreciative somehow. "It's been awhile since I've seen his work up close."
"Two years." Cait Sith said uncomfortably, peering over Reno's head as the megaphone vanished somewhere. God knew where. "How did i' survive that long?"
Vincent brushed a shard of frost from his cloak. "You'd be surprised." He said simply.
At least it was out of its misery now.
"Some of the equipment may still be functional, it may be a recent breakout," Lyla reasoned, carefully stepping over the remains. "But maybe not. There are records of experiments that went a lot longer than two years without food, water, or anything else reasonably considered necessary to support life." She paused, glancing down at the severed corpse. "... it's terrible. We rehabilitate the ones we can, but some are too far gone. Putting them down seems a greater kindness."
Reno side-stepped the bloodied serpent, careful to avoid stepping in the goo-trail it had left behind. "The moral quandary of the exterminator," he remarked.
Vincent turned from the wreck of a thing without another word, returning his gun to its holster with a soft click.
Rude followed a few steps before he stopped, glancing back into the pitch dark of the hallway.
She was unable to completely ignore Reno's comment, shooting him a sharp glare in reply, but remaining wordless as she continued forward. There was work to be done, and she was growing tired of bickering and having arguments that noone would win.
Rude, however, did not move.
At the mouth of the room, Vincent paused, looking back.
"What's goin' on, Rude?" Reno turned to look back as well when he heard Rude's footsteps pause, careful to mind the extra weight atop his head.
"Hmm?" Lyla echoed, glancing back in turn.
Silhouetted by the light in Cait Sith's hands, Rude held up his hand, five fingers spread in a motion to stop. Or in the number of footsteps he heard.
Vincent frowned, looking past him into the shadows.
Lyla squinted as she peered at the far end of the hallway, leaning to her left in order to see around Rude. "Movement."
Rude shifted his weight, flexing the leather of his gloves again.
In the pitch black, the figure bent over the monster's remains scuffed the ground as it stood. A fluid, easy rise that ended with a very obvious flip of the bird.
Vincent smirked behind his cowl.
"What? What is it?" Reno asked irately, looking in that same direction and seeing nothing but pitch-black, even with Cait Sith holding the light forward.
"A person, I think," Lyla said softly. "Not a monster."
Rude frowned, lifting his glasses enough to squint into the darkness. He didn't see a damn thing, but he had to agree that it had sounded more like it was their shape than the last thing's.
"Ey! C'm outta there, laddie!" Cait Sith called, angling the light to better search for their companion.
There was a hesitation in the creature. A moment of still in the hallway as the faint red light flickered in the black, illuminating the long figure like a ghost story, glinting off the sleek, frozen scales of the monstrosity.
The man smiled as his face faded with the light, a wide, pale mouth and blunt, white teeth.
Lyla narrowed her eyes as the shape made itself more apparent, though the dim red glow surrounding the figure was new, unfamiliar. "You," she said flatly. "Hello again."
"Couldn't stay away, eh buddy?" Reno asked with a smirk, ghosting his hand over the grip of his weapon before letting it fall to his side.
"Your escapee." Vincent surmised, lifting his gun serenely.
"Escapee from where?" Cait Sith asked, peeking over Reno's head for a better look.
Lyla gave a minute nod in reply, taking a few careful steps forward so that, heaven forbid, Reno was not the first of their group that this person reached. She glanced upward as she broke even with him. "Want to ask if he has super strength this time, Reno? Or maybe swords that come out of his arms. I don't know, any way you're itching to see the group suffer?"
Reno frowned. "Asking if he could walk through walls was a legitimate question. ... as are those."
"Don't rightly know." The figure said from the pitch black, shifting his weight as she moved. More into a position for retreat than attack. "Never thought to give it a shot."
Lyla pursed her lips slightly, silently wondering what she could possibly do or say to prevent the subject from running. He had no identification, but he had to exist somewhere. He must have been normal at some point - he spoke and moved like a person accustomed to the outside world, yet seemed surprised by the fact that he now had the ability to do - well, to be honest, she still wasn't exactly sure what he had done. She finally settled for, "Who are you? ... how can we help you?"
It was better than letting Reno menace him.
He paused, looking at her over the top of his black-lensed glasses. They were wrap-around, the large kind it should have been impossible to miss the first time they crossed paths. On the other hand, here he was in a completely different facility, so one might suppose he'd had the time to buy them.
If not the know-how.
"Me?" He said, lifting his hand to shake the last of the red glow from his fingers. "I'm just trying to figure out what's going on."
Vincent paused in step with the rest of the party, his presence creating a single line of bodies between the subject and the open hallway. He frowned, looking the remains of the creature over. It was already beginning to decompensate.
"I believe you were in the custody of Professor Hojo for some time," Lyla explained carefully, her tone patient, even. Reno let out a sigh. He wanted to hit this guy. He was pretty sure it would be fun, actually, but if he sent the man running a second time, he was fairly certain he might acquire some lasting bruises.
"However, that begs the question of exactly what it is you're doing here," she went on.
"Oh that?" He blinked at her. "I followed you."
Lyla raised a brow. "Excuse me?"
"That sounds a little. You know. Nefarious," Reno interjected in a leading sort of way. "Maybe like a 'bad guy,' Ly?"
"Said I followed you." He repeated almost cheerfully, stepping over the wreck of an experiment as if it didn't squelch when he brushed it. "Looked to have a handle on what's happening around here, y'know? These Shinra people run the world, you're on their payroll. Seemed like a good place to start. Hey." He crooked a finger at Vincent. "S'not nice to point."
The dark man arched a brow, leaving his gun steadied.
Lyla edged just half a step back, reaching behind her to close her fingers around the shaft of her weapon, though she left it at her back for the time being. "Do you have a name?" she asked, calm.
"Kaiun." He tugged the glasses down to look at her again. "Gotta admit. I'm not sure why you people seem to think I'm dangerous."
"Habit." Rude supplied.
Reno nodded, a slight tilt of the head in Rude's direction. "You understand. That's the world we live in."
"Actually." He smiled, looking them over. "That seems to be most of the problem I'm having."
"He's disoriented," Lyla shot at Reno, bracing her free hand against her hip.
"He is dangerous." Vincent added, the barrel of Cerberus never wavering from its set on the man's chest.
At their feet the monster finally succumbed to whatever entropy had been eating it away, vanishing in the last faint shimmers of red.
Lyla's gaze had moved from the stranger to the remains of the serpent on the floor, watching as it appeared to disintegrate, crumbling until there was nothing left. She looked back to the dark-haired man and studied him a moment, a frown pulling at her lips. "And not human. Oh. You are... something not okay."
"Well, neither are you." He said, tone feigning some hurt.
Her frown deepened. "Pardon?"
His frown pulled apart into an instant grin, following the casual line of his shrug. "Are any of us okay?" He asked. "It's an existential question, really."
"That's very interesting and all, but we're trying to do a job here," Lyla informed him, exasperation thinly veiled. "Are you a part of it or not?"
"Valentine agrees he's dangerous. 'Neutralize' him," Reno suggested.
Vincent's gaze narrowed.
The gun went off with a snap that rattled the loose bolts in the overhead light. Across the hall, Kaiun dropped like a rock into water.
"THAT'S what I'm talking about," Reno declared vehemently. "Though you should have shared, Drac."
"Vin!" Cait Sith startled, turning an accusitory, feline gaze on his friend. "You shot him!"
Lyla's frown had turned puzzled, pulled thin as she looked to the caped man. "Mr. Valentine?" she questioned.
He said nothing for a moment, eyes fixed ahead as he lowered his weapon. "Look."
On the ground, the shirtless man groaned softly, sitting up. "Ow." he murmured.
Lyla went very still as she watched the man on the ground, clapping a hand over her mouth as he pushed himself up off the floor. "Oh."
"Was that necessary?" He asked, fingers clasped over the wound as it bled sluggishly.
"What are you." Vincent said simply, watching the red as it pattered to the ground, turning a slick, thick black.
"Funny you should ask." He snapped, leaning back against the wall. "I wanted to know the same thing about you."
"Great," Reno cut in, sliding one foot forward and resting his hand over his weapon, letting it linger there this time. "This is the kind of standoff that could go on for hours."
"I'm serious, here." Kaiun grunted, hauling himself upright again. "I haven't thrown a single punch. You guys are awful quick on the draw, arencha?" He hissed, coughing wetly.
"What do you want to know." Vincent's voice was slow and even, the edge of his words rasping as he raised the gun again.
"Alright. Alright! Jesus."
Lyla sent Vincent a curious glance before turning her attention back to Kaiun, watching him expectantly.
The wounded man took a steadying breath, whipping his hand to clear it of the blood. Behind the dark smears, it was already closed up, only a dent in his pale flesh, marring the strange tattoo.
"I meant it. I don't know where I am, okay? Or what the hell is going on. No reason to get so damn shooty."
"Then where is it that you're from?" Lyla asked, once again adopting a very even, controlled calmness.
Reno released his hold on his nightstick, turning to face Kaiun so that their end of the hallway was now completely blocked by the width of their own bodies. "And how'd you get into that lab in Edge?"
"Same way I got in here." He snorted, wiping the remains of his blood against the back of his pants. "Equipment's a wreck. You think it was tough to get in without the codes? S'not like anything in there could do worse than whatever the fuck -that- was just now." There he paused, muttering something else with the intonation of a curse as he rubbed the remains of his injury. "Let's say I've been living under a rock, how's that? Seems to me a longer explanation would bore everyone."
Lyla's mouth pulled thin, irate. "Whatever you're doing, you're holding us up."
He made a shooing gesture. "Don't mind me. Got no mind to interrupt you."
For a moment, Lyla looked at a loss for words. Thankfully, Reno always had plenty of those on hand. "Look," the redhead began, offering Kaiun a most condescending smile, "I'm not too comfortable giving you my back. Seems the lady here isn't, either. And I think Vincent would just love to shoot you again."
The dark man flashed him a grin that made his teeth seem sharper than they had before. "So whatcha sayin' man? You wanna fight?"
"It's usually my way. But I get the feeling that might be frowned upon today," Reno continued to explain, even as Lyla shot him a glance and grabbed his upper arm to emphasize the "Not here." she somehow avoided hissing. Reno smirked and rolled his shoulder back a few times until she released him, shaking his newly-freed arm out once.
"I don't suppose you could be convinced to come along with us, could you. You've got no reason to, except for, oh yeah, finding out where you are and what's going on around you. So come along and learn, or stay, but in either case, I think a truce is more than reasonable. Sorry we jumped the gun, buddy. It's these troublin' times."
"My heart bleeds for ya. Really does." He snorted, tossing the loose hair over his shoulder. "Sure. Why not. Might even be fun."
"Well. Cannae believe that worked." Cait Sith cocked his head.
"What can I say. Real people person." Kaiun grinned at him.
"Hm." Vincent said, slipping the gun away.
Reno smiled broadly even as Lyla gave him a critical look, eying him as though something were amiss. After a moment, she stepped away and turned her back, starting in the direction they had originally been headed in. "Let's go. I promised I would make a report to Professor Ingram before this evening."
"We'll need to stop in the holding room." Vincent murmured, falling into step beside her. "Which way do your maps say."
"I was planning to," she replied, pulling her organizer out of her pocket and giving it another glance. "It's this way, as well. Next to the data center."
"Ey!" Cait Sith called from behind, waving the flashlight for emphasis. "How ye be readin' that, lassie?"
"Good eyes," she explained without looking back. "And the screen is backlit."
"Hm." Vincent said again, pausing as they came to an intersection. "Not much here."
"Think it's safe to say your friend was alpha predator." Kaiun offered from behind.
"I had gathered as much. This place has been abandoned for two years, I imagine it ate... other projects to stay alive, when it needed to." She frowned in the dimness, checking her floorplans again before nodding to the hallway on their right. "The end of this hallway is the holding room. We'll do that first."
Vincent nodded, cocking the rifle before striding in the direction she'd indicated.
They reached the end of the hallway without incident, a few flickering lights keeping their way mostly free of mystery. The door there had been torn open and bent off it's hinges in such a way that it would no longer slide, but the hole that had been ripped through it was enough to fit even the largest of them. Lyla gave herself permission to go first, grabbing the door and it's frame with either hand and hoisting herself through. Walking to the center of the room, she surveyed their surroundings and sighed heavily. Reno stumbled slightly as he followed through, unable to keep from frowning as he followed suit, looking at what had been left.
The largest capsule was broken open and empty, its glass walls jagged and edged with the same dark purple goop that had oozed out of their friend in the corridor. The other capsules that lined the circular room were not quite so vacant. Some were broken, with only meager remains of their inhabitants inside. Others were whole, but the creatures inside were bent over, perfectly still. Some looked human. Most did not. A few were caught somewhere in-between. All were touched by the cold gray and blue of asphyxiation.
"Already dead. Every one of them," Lyla said softly.
"That's the better end for them." Vincent's voice was low as he spoke. Perfectly controlled.
Cait Sith shook his head. "Poor blighters." He sadly, reaching up to steady his crown as he glanced around.
Behind them, Kaiun broke away from the line of Rude and Reno, inspecting the closest tank's ruin with a thin-lipped frown. "S'all the same." He said, a note of surprise in his voice. "How can that be..?"
Lyla nodded just once in agreement, slowly making her way over to one of the tubes that was still in a single piece, peering in at what looked remarkably like a perfectly whole and normal human being. "Yes. And that's the end we were sent to bring them if they hadn't met it already - most of them, at least. ... just never gets easier to see. So many people suffered for his madness."
Reno covered his frown by feigning a yawn, reaching up to scratch Cait Sith behind the ears. "Yeah. Sucks to be them."
The robot actually purred, momentarily distracted from the surrounding horror.
Kaiun glanced up. "So you were making them." He said, straightening. "...but out of what."
Lyla frowned. "I do hope that's a general 'you.' We had nothing to do with this project. We're just on cleanup."
"Someone's touchy." He observed, glancing around the room again. "Interested to know how you intend to clean it up, though. Gotta admit."
"Put them out of their misery," Lyla explained, moving on to the next tube, leaning to peer at its contents. "Euthanise them. Sometimes a little more violent if they attack like the one in the hallway. Those that are still human are taken in to be rehabilitated. We take what information we can from the computers. We leave, and Professor Ingram places a call to have the place incinerated. It's the only way we've found that's final enough."
He arched a brow, pushing down the glasses again in what could only be called incredulous disbelief.
The brunette frowned. "Are you judging our procedure?"
He smirked, pushing them up again. "Sure. Let's call it that." Kaiun said, spreading out a hand to encompass the span of the room. "This one. The last one. It's everywhere. Never felt it like this before."
The lithe man closed his eyes, cocking his head like an animal listening for a telltale sound. "Breathing. Laughing. Christ, it's like an epidemic."
Reno turned a curious eye on the dark-haired man. "Not so out of your element as you thought, looks like."
"Wouldn't say that." Kaiun shook his head. "But I had a calculation error. An' it looks like I'm going to be paying for that awhile."
Vincent frowned. "You're talking about Jenova. Aren't you." He said, watching the stranger.
"Jenova?" He blinked, looking them over. "Yeah. Okay. That this?" He asked, holding up one hand, fingers wriggling as they glowed a bright red.
"Damn," Reno exhaled. "That never stops being creepy, no matter who's wearing it."
Lyla took a few steps forward, curious as she neared Kaiun. "Yes. That's a typical representation of Jenova's energy."
"Took it out of your buddy outside." He said.
Rude shook his head. The world was full of spooks and weirdos these days.
"How?" Lyla asked, brow creasing.
"...Entropy." Kaiun said after a moment, as if not entirely sure what else to say. The glow faded as he dropped his hand, rubbing it absently against his thigh, as though he'd touched something he wished he hadn't. "S'what I came here to see. And it's why I was in your little clubhouse a few knots back. Guess you could say we've met."
"Why is that not surprising?" Reno voiced, moving towards the door to put some distance between himself and the capsules, though there wasn't much refuge to be had as long as they remained in the room.
"You don't call it Jenova." Vincent noted.
"I don't call it anything." He looked at his figners for a moment. "Well. Creepy, maybe. I've seen what it can do before, but I've never seen it do this. Get into things like a sickness, yeah. But really into 'em? Like, their makeup? Did you guys do this?"
Lyla shook her head. "Cleaning up someone else's mess. The man who thought this was a good idea is dead." She shifted slightly, uncomfortable. "Killed by terrorists, I heard. ... it sounded like a fitting end for someone like him."
"It was." Vincent assured her, his manner unchanged.
Kaiun looked between the two of them for a beat, giving off a low whistle. "I've got some kinda luck."
Vincent's tone was enough to draw Lyla's attention. "You?"
The man in red didn't answer, only turned to inspect the remains of the tubes surrounding the console centered in the room.
Kaiun watched him, head tilted. "So my question is." He said, "What you're going to do when it starts pulling itself back together."
"We don't know yet," the brunette answered without pause. Reno recoiled slightly, wrinkling his nose at the thought of Jenova reassembling herself. "But if we can delay it, it allows more time to work the problem."
"Ooh. I get it. So you decided to put it in as many different places and people as possible."
"Look," Lyla snapped, "This wasn't our doing. How many times do I have to repeat myself? We're trying to undo what was done."
Reno winced. "She is going to punch you in the face."
"Sorry. I'll have to ask you to aim for the gut." He held up a hand. "The face punch has a special place in my heart, these days."
Cait Sith snapped his fingers. "Tha's it!" He said, leaping to his feet.
Vincent turned to give him a curious look.
A low growl began to rise in her throat as she clenched her hands into white-knuckled fists, fighting to keep them at her side. Reno rolled his eyes upwards to look at the dangling feet of the cat atop his head. "What's it?"
"Oi, Vin! Tha's what Reeve sen'me tae ask ye! Said there was some kinnae energy disturbance jes outsidea th'ol slums'a Midgar! 'E wanted ye tae check it out for 'im. Said there mighta been a crash."
"Probably me." Kaiun folded his arms. "For such a tiny planet you guys have a hell of a gravitational pull."
"The hell are you talkin' about?" Reno demanded, discreetly wiggling his index finger to tickle the robot's belly.
"Him, or me?" Kaiun asked with a blink.
Cait Sith purred, losing his train of thought for a moment. Vincent sighed.
Cats.
"The both of you. You friggin' crashed here?" Reno went on to ask, looking Kaiun over dubiously. Lyla sighed, raking her fingers through her hair, torn between slipping off to finish the job by downloading the in-tact files. On the one hand, Kaiun's presence was about to be explained and this, according to Reeve, was important information to have. On the other hand, she wanted to strangle him.
"Damn straight I did. Fucking flattened my baby." He sighed, shaking his head. "Be surprised if I can find enough pieces to put 'er back together after all this."
"Baby. As in a space-ship baby," Reno echoed, disbelieving. He raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Yeeeeah."
"Lemmee get this straight. You've got a world-corrupting space-whore inserted into the genetic makeup of like, a city's worth of people and places, and the idea that I busted my ship is weird to you?"
Reno paused for a moment, then shrugged, turning his free hand up. "Our space program got abandoned awhile back. Not something we see a lot of."
"You're not missing much." Kaiun grinned. "Well, in a manner of speaking."
"Kind of figured a lot of empty space and some glowing gas. Nothing flashy," Reno agreed flippantly.
Vincent sighed, tapping two clawed fingers to his forhead before reaching to shove a fallen ceiling panel from the computer. It slid free in a shower of glass and debris, clattering to the ground almost musically.
"Dr. Caraway." He said.
"Where?" Lyla asked, turning suddenly in Vincent's direction, wide-eyed. "... oh. Oh, you meant me." Reno let out a snort of laughter somewhere behind her.
He leveled his gaze on her, and for a beat, it seemed confused. Then the even calm returned. He gestured to the cleared port.
"Oh. Of course, thank you," she said absently, quickly crossing the room to the console and turning her attention to the screen. "Dr. Caraway is my father. I don't have my doctorate yet."
He stepped back to allow her access, lips turning down thoughtfully as he searched his memories for the exact identity of Dr. Caraway.
Reno had made his way over to Rude in the meantime, leaning in and dropping his voice to just above a whisper. "Did you see me shock the hell out of that thing in the hall?"
"There we go," Lyla murmured to herself as she finished setting up the data transfer, tapping a few more points on the screen to bring up a file to browse through. She would have more time to read them later, but skimming through it now meant she would be distracted from how irate she was, though her rage was slowly beginning to dissolve.
Rude nodded, smirking as he held a brief thumbs up.
Cait Sith scooted up Reno's neck to keep from toppling off as he moved, glancing curiously over his shoulder at Kaiun.
The alien apparent offered an openhanded wave.
"We're finished here," Lyla announced as the transfer ended, reclaiming the portable drive and sticking it back inside her bag. "And I need so many drinks, I'm pretty sure."
"Y'seem a little highstrung." Kaiun agreed, letting Rude and Reno pass before turning to follow them out.
Vincent glanced around the room once more before turning to follow, waiting a beat for Lyla to catch up.
"Seriously," she grumbled under her breath as Reno's backside disappeared through the hole in the door, followed by the alien's. "Like thirty."