Chapter One

Just Children

The first thing she could feel was water. She couldn't think or feel anything at first. She felt like she was just floating there in the water, waiting. Suffocating. The first thing she knew was that she needed air. She need to breath but the water was in her way. She had to do something and not just stand there, waiting for…whatever it was to come. The water stung her eyes so she closed them again and instead reached out with her hands. They traveled forward a bit before pressing against something hard that was blocking her way. For some reason the thought of being caged enraged her and a force of power seemed to respond to that, shattering whatever it was that was in her way. It was then that she felt herself being pulled out and she crashed to the hard floor, sputtering and coughing, sucking as much air in as she could.

She hit the back of her head on something, and something hard. She gripped the back of it and rolled into a ball, squeezing her eyes shut as the pain died down. When she opened them, a bright flooded her sight. It burned at first but it seemed the welcome her. The tile beneath her was cool and skin was wet; it sent a shiver down her back. Her body seemed to know what that meant before her mind could because just moments later she pushed herself up off the floor and reached for that white lab coat and pulled it over her naked skin as she took in the room she was in.

She didn't know how she knew what it was, but it was a lab. The computers were flashing with bright screens and what she had been trapped within seemed to be a giant glass tube. There were several other tubes but they were all empty. An open book caught her eyes and so she picked it up from the desk.

January 12

Seven years. Seven years I have been working on Project S2. She will show some forms of response but nothing else. Has all my work been for nothing? Have I wasted the last seven years of my life on a worthless specimen? Sephiroth is everything that I planned on S2 to be but it seems that Hojo obtained the head on this project. It burns me to say this, but I'm afraid that Project S2 is absolutely nothing…Perhaps the child from Junon wasn't strong enough to take the cells. Or perhaps the cells from Grimoire Valentine's son, Vincent, weren't the right ones to use…

I'm afraid that I'm just going to have to give all this work up. Hojo won this, no doubt about that. I angers me to admit it but he did. Perhaps if only Vincent hadn't disappeared. He might have been of use a bit more. Perhaps the Project just needs some more of his blood. Or maybe even more cells from-

She shoved the book from her. She didn't know why but she was sure that this…this Project S2 was…was her and for some reason, being called weak made her angry. What was going on here? And this other one…Sephiroth…was he just like her? For some reason that name…it felt so…

"It's awake."

"Hush." The voices made her turn around. The first one was a young man with short orange hair, wearing a white lab jacket. The second was an elder man with greying black hair. The older man knelt in front of her, a large smile as he stared at her. "Are you feeling all right?" She just stared at him and he smiled at her. "It's all right. You'll get used to everything soon enough." Who was this man? What was he talking about? Where were they? And who…who was she? "Can you talk?" She raised her brow. He pointed at his mouth. "Speak." Her eyes narrowed. What did this man think she was? Stupid? She nodded.

"But how?" The younger man asked. "She hasn't been taught anything. She shouldn't even be walking on her own! She should be crawling!" Her eyes must have done something because the moment she turned her gaze to him the young man cleared his throat and turned away with a look of fear on his face.

The elder man just laughed as he straightened to his full height. "Come with me, my dear. Let's get you some clothes and some food." Gast reached down to grab her hand but the child pulled away as she continued to glare at him. She didn't know why but she had a feeling that this was the man that had written what she had read. He had called her weak. Called her a failure! She would show him who the true failure was.

"Sephiroth…" A sweet, angelic tone hissed from between her lips. "I want…Sephiroth."

Both men looked to be full of shock. "How does she know-" The elder man cut the younger one off.

"All right. Let's go get you some clothes and I'll take you to Sephiroth, deal."

The child stared at the elder man for a bit longer before walking towards the door. He followed her before taking the lead in the hall. She gazed around the building she was in with un-guilty awe. The halls were tall and long with more and more people walking through it. More in lab coats. Some in head to foot in black with sword of guns on them. There were a few in black suits and even white suits and then dresses. Chatter filled and echoed around the hall and she watched as they all looked at her; some in shock and others in confusion, like she wasn't supposed to be here. If she wasn't then why was she here to begin with?

The child froze as they passed a window. Beneath them was a huge city beneath a golden light. Cars and people traveled the streets between thousands and thousands of buildings. She didn't know how to react to all of this bet she wanted to go down there and travel through all of it, taking everything in close and personally instead of from a tall building.

"I'm sure that it's quite a sight for someone who's never seen a city before." The old man told her with another of his smiles. "Come, let's go get those clothes." He led her to a small room somewhere on this floor. It didn't hold much, just a gray bed, a small window, and a desk and chair and a closet. He pulled some things out of the closet and tossed them on the bed before baking out again and leaving her to her privacy.

Without having to think about it, the child dropped the white lab coat to the floor before grabbing the clothes and pulling them on before turning to the window. It was faint, but she could see her reflection, giving her an idea of who she was.

She was a child. A child with long black hair and cat-like green eyes. Her skin was a pale white and seemed to glow against the black pants and shoes with the white tank-top that the old man had given her to wear. She hadn't seen anyone else with eyes like hers. Were her eyes…strange?

The knock on the door made her turn. "Are you ready? Do you need some help?" Keeping a straight face she moved to the door and opened it. The old man was still there with that stupid, giddy smile on his face. "Shall we?" He asked at the sight of her. She didn't say a word as she shut her door firmly. He chuckled and led her down the hall again. It wasn't too far to their destination, this time.

The next room held the desks and computers, like the Tube-Room but instead of the tubes there was a small room inside of it. The light above the large metal doors were red, telling the child that there was someone inside the other room and from the group of lab coats standing around the screens on the desk, it told the girl that they were watching whoever was inside.

"Gast, is that-" The girl turned to see that the men were now looking at her for the moment, all wearing surprised looks on their faces at the sight of her.

The elder man wore a large smile as he led the way up to the desk. "Yes, it is. Found on the floor about half an hour ago. She had burst through the tube herself."

"Was she wounded?"

"Not a damn scratch."

"Ha. Hojo's not gonna like hearing you brag about that."

The girl ignored them all and pushed her way up to the desk to see the screen they were all watching. It was another child there. He seemed to be fighting off a group of monsters in the middle of the city that she had seen out the window, but this time the sunlight wasn't there. It was dark with street lights and the moon to light the way. Why was he doing this alone? Why were they letting him do this alone?

Her gaze was caught on the object in the other child's hands. It was a thin sword that's blade reached well over six-feet on its own. At the sight of it an image of an elder man, in his twenties or so, with long silver hair flashed across her face as he and another man with red hair fought upon what looked like a long cannon before that long sword sliced through it like paper. The image was gone soon though before she could get a better look. She shook her head a bit, trying to get it out of her mind.

"He's getting better day by day," One of the men in the lab coats smiled happily. "When he decides to fight, anyway. We're lucky that he agreed to today. He's been rather…cold lately."

"He probably agreed to go through with the training because Hojo isn't here to stare at him like a pedophile through the glass like he normally does." One of the other men commented and the group laughed.

There, as she watched the child on the screen zipping through the monsters with that sword of his, she found strange words escaping her mouth. She didn't know where they came from; they were just there.

"Noli manere," She began. Gast looked down at her as the small little tune passed from her mouth. "Manere in Memoria," She lifted her head and glared at the screen. "Sephiroth!"

The child on the screen jumped, as if hearing her growl, and paused in his movements, turning to glare at the camera that was watching him. A smirk then spread across her lips as the other child dropped the sword from his hand as the monsters attacked him and turned his back to them. One of the men at the desks cursed and pressed a button to end the simulation. She turned from the screen and hurried to the door of the other room and watched as the doors opened and the other child walked out. He paused in front of her.

~So, this is…Sephiroth~

They both stood there, staring at the other in silence. Sephiroth was only a year older than her with long silver hair and dressed in a pair of black shorts and shirt. Hit it was his eyes that had caught her attention. They were the same as hers, those green, cat-like eyes.

"Sephiroth, I would like you to meet the young girl that's about to join you with your training." Gast smiled.

The boy was silent for a moment as the two of them just continued to stare at the other. He looked like he was about to step forward but he closed his eyes for a moment, stopping himself. The girl frowned but quickly wiped it from her face. "What's her name?" Sephiroth asked, looking at her again.

Gast thought for a moment before a smile spread across his face. "Sienna." She turned and lifted her head to look at him. "Her name is Sienna."