Summary: Laura was just your average woman, until a freak accident involving her television set, the Advent Children dvd, and lightning strike transported her to Gaia. And that's only the beginning of the story!

Disclaimer: Nope, still don't own FFVII or Advent Children. Just a single copy of the movie. Now put the pitchforks and torches away.

Queen's Quornor: I'm actually tying three of my fics together in this chapter. This one, "Evidence of Sephiroth's Humanity," and "Return of the Green Sludge." Readers of all three will recognize it, but it you aren't and don't, might want to go read them. Or at least the chapters mentioned. Don't worry about the lack of action; this is just the calm before the storm. We'll be resuming the regularly-scheduled fic at hand once this chapter is out of the way. And I can never get the names of the materia holders right. Was it bangle or armlet? Aw, whatever. Enjoy, for next chapter the shit hits the fan!

Answers and Motivations

Why did this have to happen?

The thought kept crossing Laura's mind, refusing to let her get some sleep as the truck trundled ever close to Nibelheim. She shifted so her back was to the door and glanced out the back window; Kadaj had climbed into the back with his brothers after the last rest stop/bathroom break, and currently the three silver-haired men were sleeping in a big puppy-pile against the cab.

Zack was still driving. When Laura had asked him why he wasn't tired, he had told her that sleep deprivation was something SOLDIERs were trained to fight off while they were still cadets. Most could go for about a week on only three hours of sleep per day before fatigue started catching up with them. He was good to go for awhile longer, and Kadaj would drive once he woke up so Zack could catch his three hours.

Unable to sleep, the woman decided she could at least talk to him. Maybe it would help soothe her over-active mind. "Do either you or Aerith know why Bryan kidnapped our daughter?"

Zack shook his head. "We know why Hojo wants her, and why he forced a coexistence between himself and Bryan. You know why, too. But we don't know why he agreed to it." He glanced over at her. "We do know why you can't have children, Laura."

She sat up, surprised at the change of subject but hungry for information. "What? How? Why?"

"Like I said before, all answers come with death. I kinda figured you'd want to know, since you and Kadaj wanted kids so badly."

Still do, even if I can't give them to him. "So why can't I have children?"

"Because you had Olivia."

Laura cocked her head in puzzlement. That made no sense whatsoever. "What does that have to do with my uterus?"

Zack sighed. "Olivia has Jenova cells inside her, remember? They weren't injected into her like they were with Seph, but they're still there. The problem is, they didn't stay only in her. Blood gets exchanged between mother and child via the umbilical cord."

You don't mean...

"I do, unfortunately. There are Jenova cells inside you, Laura, because you carried Kadaj's daughter. There's not enough to affect your thought processes or to allow her to gain a foothold in your mind and soul, but they still affected you."

Laura was suddenly very cold, almost numb. "The cells...No..."

"Yes." Zack looked sad now. Tired. "They contaminated your uterus, making you incapable of carrying a child to full term. Only a child with Jenova cells already in it could survive. That's why Olivia was never aborted; she was already of Jenova's bloodline. The cells recognize and accept their own; if Kadaj still had his share of them and impregnated you now, you would have another baby."

"But he was cleansed..." The roles were reversed! He's fully human now, but I'm the one with the cells inside me!

"Exactly." The ex-SOLDIER looked at her. "I'm sorry, Laura."

Don't be. This isn't your problem.

Zack laughed ruefully. "No, but I think I know how you feel. About losing kids you never even knew you had, that is. Did you know I have a daughter?"

Laura looked up at him, drawing her knees up against her chest and wrapping her arms around her thighs. "No, I didn't know you were a father. Who's the mother? Aerith?"

"I never said I was the father, Laura."

"But you just said..."

"I said I have a daughter. But I'm not the father." He looked downright sheepish right now, a faint blush creeping up the back of his neck and along his cheeks. "I'm actually the mother."

What?!

"Yeah, that was my reaction too." Zack chuckled. "When I was still in SOLDIER, I had this secretary, Kandi. She used to be a Honeybee girl, until I offered her a better job. Mostly so I could fuck her whenever I wanted."

Quite the playa, Zack.

"I know." He adjusted the rearview mirror. "Anyway, shortly before I met her, there was a mixup between the labs and the cafeteria. The end result was that this nasty green sludge got eaten by about half of Shinra's on-site workforce, including me and Sephiroth, and it turned us all into the opposite sex until Hojo fed us the antidote. Kandi loved kinky sex, so guess what she proposed to me after she heard about that?"

Laura's hands flew to her mouth, stifling a laugh. "She didn't!"

"She did. Long story short, she got me pregnant."

The mental image of Zack with a nine-month-bump was too much for her. Laura burst out laughing, leaning her head back against the window and howling with mirth until tears streamed from her eyes and her stomach hurt. Zack had stopped the truck to glare at her, and one look at his face had her in stitches all over again.

The ex-SOLDIER took his foot off the brake and got them back on their way. "I don't get no respect," he grumbled.

"Don't start acting like Jabberjaw! I hated that cartoon when I was little," Laura giggled, wiping a tear from her eye. "Sorry. You were saying?"

"Yeah." Zack changed gears as the road turned to mud; it had been raining hard here recently. "Anyway, this happened only about two weeks before the Nibelheim Incident. So, first of all, I had no clue that I was pregnant. Second of all, how would I have known? I am a man; men don't get pregnant.

"I was damned lucky my fight with Seph didn't kill her. Don't really know how she survived, but she did. Hojo was ecstatic when he found out. He experimented on me and Cloud, but I was basically spared the 'treatments' for nine months, kept comatose until my daughter was sliced out of me. I only found out about her when Angeal told me after I died."

Laura leaned forward and laid a hand on Zack's arm; she could see the sorrow in his eyes. He looked at her with a grateful smile, and continued with his story.

"Hojo sent her to the labs at Midgar, and she was put in the Deepground project. Experimented on like an animal, and trained for battle almost from the time she could walk. She's still down there, but she's remained hidden from the rest of Deepground since Weiss released them from their tanks and cells. That's part of why I was so willing to come back; I can't help Spike and the others with the main Deepground force, but if I can take out even one Tsviet, that'll be one less person who can hurt my little girl."

We really aren't so different, after all.

He nodded. "For our children, we'll do anything. Even kill, if it means protecting them."

"Bryan betrayed my trust and Kadaj's, and kidnapped our daughter. He's going to die the next time either of us see him, make no mistake about that," Laura said grimly.

"And Azami won't walk away from me alive." Zack gripped the steering wheel, his fingers sinking into the metal beneath the strength of his fury. "She's one of the ones that hurt my daughter. You and the others can take out whoever you want, but she dies by my blade."

Laura nodded and lifted one of her arms, tracing the faint white scars with her other hand. "I have enough scars, anyway. You can take out the bitch with the blades."

Zack chuckled. "You want scars, you should see some of mine. Seph gave me more than a few, and I have plenty from when my sparring partners or plug-ugly monsters got lucky."

She smiled, and returned her attention to the road ahead. "How long until we get to Nibelheim?"

"Only a few hours." He glanced over at her. "You should get some sleep, Laura. You'll need all your strength when we catch up with them."

"I know. I'm absolutely exhausted, but I just can't get to sleep." She had a sudden thought. "Do you have any materia that could put me to sleep?"

A grin spread across his face, and he slipped a hand into one of the pockets on his left pantleg. A moment later he pulled out a glowing green sphere. Laura made herself comfortable against the door and the seat while he popped it into place in his armlet. Hm. Crystal Bangle. Nice.

A moment later, a gentle, soothing wave of magic washed over her, and Laura willingly allowed it to overtake her and guide her into sleep.