The rest of the trek to the nearest town-Nibelheim, Vincent had called it-continued without incident. Well, almost. I had stubbed my big toe on a massive, solid rock that I somehow did not see. I bounced around on my other foot for a moment, holding the injured toe and murmuring profanities. The nail had partially broken off, leaving a small trickle of blood coming from the skin underneath. My toe throbbed.

When we reached the small village, I took in the pleasantly simple surroundings. The buildings were aged and experienced, just as the people standing outside were. I met their gazes occasionally as they looked about Vincent Valentine and I in wonder. They would quickly glance away. Probably shy, I thought just as a young child grinned a toothless smile at me. He fluttered his fingers sheepishly at me, his chubby cheeks reddening. I smiled back at him and his cute blush deepened. Then he darted away into a ramshackle home.

I glanced sideward to Vincent and saw a faint curve in his lips. A hint of a smile. I admitted to myself that it looked good on him; he should probably half-smile more often. I wasn't going to say that aloud, though.

On the other side of the village, there was a simple truck waiting for us, silver and more than slightly rusted. It was obvious the thing was ancient. Every other inch was pebbled with minute dents. Vincent had said it was his and apologized for its roughness. I had said that it was better what I had: nothing. He pulled the keys from some pocket of his black leather outfit and, before unlocking the door, he glanced over the top at me.

"How do you know you can trust me?" he suddenly asked. He met my gaze sturdily, obviously expecting a reasonable answer. One that I didn't have.

"I just know I can," I answered. Behind the cover of the truck, my hands fidgeted with each other. I lifted my own gaze to his face. My eyes didn't meet his as steadily, but they did meet. He refused to back down, though. The expression on his pale face told me I'd have to do better than that. I chewed my soft lower lip momentarily, thinking of an answer. An honest one.

I really didn't know why I trusted Vincent. I just did. I felt a troubled but trustworthy aura radiate from him. I saw it in his eyes, I guess. I saw the depth of his sincerity and his hospitality in his eyes. I saw that he might have had a past I had no clue about, but that's just it. His past. Right now, he was completely harmless, only wanting to be utterly helpful.

Again, I wasn't going to say that aloud. I merely shrugged my shoulders.

His eyes still focused on me. On my face. Admittedly, it was unsettling. I presume it's always unsettling when someone just stares at you. Eventually, his gaze broke off and he jabbed his key into the lock and turned. He climbed in, reached over and unlocked my door. I sighed with relief and opened my door.

Shortly after climbing into the senile truck's leather-bound front seat, I had made myself comfortable enough to realize how extremely exhausted I was. Every fiber of my being was begging to me for some sleep. So, I waited until Vincent kicked up the ignition and pulled out onto the blacktop. Few seconds later, I had promptly passed out, my head leaning against the window. In that position, I stayed close to unconsciousness for the majority of the ride. Minus the time Vincent drove over the large pothole in the road.

I guess he had been driving at a high speed, I wasn't sure. But when he hit the cavity, my right temple made an impressive collision with the glass window. Despite the impact, the glass did not break. Nonetheless, I stayed awake long enough to glance over at Vincent as he again apologized for the truck's not so smooth ride. I murmured something incoherent and settled again, falling back into the enticing blackness sleep offered.

A good hour or so later-too soon in my opinion-Vincent Valentine woke me up, gently and almost hesitantly shaking my shoulder. "We're here." His gruff voice pulled me from my personal oblivion. I turned my head towards him and blinked my eyes open, seeing multiples of him at first. One by one, though, the others disappeared, and I was left staring into the crimson irises of the man. I gazed at him in confusion for a moment.

For a small juncture of time, I couldn't remember who this reticent stranger was or why I was in a truck with him. I stared at him open-mouthed as the memory of the day slowly seeped into my reluctant mind.

Ah, yes. He was taking me somewhere safe.

"Okay," I yawned as he retracted and climbed out the drivers' side door, his abundant cloak sliding out behind him. I rotated my head to glare at the handle on my own door after the knob came completely off in my hand. It was a simple, pale blue oval taking up half my palm. It was quite unattached to the rest of the vehicle. I frowned as my half-asleep mind tried to take in the fact that I just broke part of Vincent Valentine's truck.

The door opened from the outside. My eyes widened and shot up to Vincent's face, his mouth partially opened to say something. Then, his eyes were on the handle. "Um..." I said awkwardly, letting my own gaze fall to the simple object.

"It's nothing," he said. He took the knob from my open palm and tossed it back into the truck's cabin, then stepped away to make room for me to get out.

My feet settled against the faintly warm, pebbled cement and Vincent shut the door behind me. I glanced skyward, noting the brilliant sunset in the western edge of the sky. On the eastern edge, a large building rose, matching the color of incoming night behind it. Off in the distance behind the building, was a gathering of organized ice crystals in the sky... obviously remnants of something. Watching it curiously with my eyes, I asked Vincent aside, "Vincent, what-"

"Vinnie!" I was cut off by a voice coming from the building. Running towards us was a young woman waving her hand frantically in the air.

Beside me, Vincent sighed and his shoulders drooped. Perhaps it was my imagination, but it seemed he even leaned closer to me, as if trying to hide himself. "Yuffie," he said, solemnly greeting her.

Yuffie slowed as she drew near, her face covered with an ear to ear grin. "Heard you'd be here," she beamed.

Vincent glanced down to his phone as he pulled the ancient looking thing from his pocket. "How'd you learn that, Yuffie?" The way he asked, I figured he already knew the answer.

"Oh, a ninja has her secrets!" For a ninja, I could already tell she talked way too much. Finally, she addressed me. "Hello! Who are you, chika?" Before I could even take in a breath to answer that I didn't know, she gave me a big spill about her being something called a 'White Rose'. She talked too fast for me to catch the full introduction, but I'm sure I was able to get the gist.

She twirled once, then twice, then sped off again in the direction she came. I exchanged a glance with Vincent, mine with confusion and his with exasperation. "We follow her," he said, sounding like a tortured dog. She couldn't really be that bad...

Before he took a step to follow, he shifted his phone to his armored hand. Curiously, I watched as he gave it one mighty squeeze. It fell to crumpled bits at his feet. I gaped at him.

"She's hacking into my phone calls," he explained, monotone. "Now I have to get a new phone, a new number." He stepped over the squished pieces easily and continued after the young ninja.
I peered down oddly at the pile of oncewas phone.

As I looked ahead again- I had to make sure I didn't stub my toe- I saw a flash of silver in the corner of my eye. A gleaming lock of flowing, silver hair. I jolted my head towards its direction, suddenly filled with the sense that I was being watched. But I saw nothing.

I blinked with subtle confusion. I could have sworn I saw something. But nothing was there. No glorious hair, nothing. With a shrug, I dismissed it. Today was eventful, after all. Maybe my mind just needed a good rest.

"She's good, Commissioner," the doctor said with a plastered-on smile as he pulled away from me. He glanced over his shoulder to Reeve, the bearded man who had greeted us at the entrance of what he had said was the "WRO Headquarters."

"Thank you, Doctor," Reeve returned the smile with his own fake one. He patted the man's shoulder, apparently dismissing him from the infirmary room. As the white-robed man disappeared through the door way, Reeve turned his assessing brown eyes to me. From the moment Reeve laid his gaze upon me, they have been studying me, as if I was an extraterrestrial being. It was unnerving.

I shifted around on the cot they assigned me to, the crisp white sheet crinkling underneath me. A moment of awkward silence passed between us, the only two people in the room. Finally, the Commissioner spoke, his voice holding gentle authority.

"Vincent said he found you in the manor, with no memory?" he asked. I nodded confirmation. He crossed his arms over his blue alchemist's-looking robe, one hand petting the stubble hairs on his mustache. "Interesting… and there's still nothing about yourself you can remember?"

I wished I could tell him there was, I wanted so bad to remember something. My panic had settled since the tears I shed at the mansion, but my desire to know my identity was still quite alive. "No, sir."

Reeve sighed as another man, towering over the both of us, stepped through the door. I almost had not recognized him, had it not been for his striking crimson eyes, which I noticed were avoiding me. He merely nodded a greeting in my direction, but his gaze was placed upon the Commissioner.

I dully noted how Vincent Valentine was not wearing the same clothes he had worn when he found me, before. Now, he was wearing a simple black, satin button-up shirt with a tail that hung down over his dark blue jeans. His left arm, previously armored, was now free of its golden gauntlet. His sabatons had been replaced with simple boots.

I then realized I had been looking him from head to toe. I quickly averted my gaze to the window. I then appreciated the view of the closed blinds.

"We'll have to call you something," said Reeve after my moment of awkwardness had passed. I flicked my gaze to his thoughtful face. "What name would fit you, is the question." I waited for him to come up with a fitting name, to see what suggestions he would have. To my surprise, it was Vincent who spoke up.

"She looks like an Adena."

My eyes swiveled to him. He was looking at me with the most unreadable expression, as if I was staring into a book with blank pages. His arms laced over his chest as he leaned against the door frame, he continued to watch me, his scarlet eyes boring into me as he explained, "Adena means fire."

Instinctively I glanced down to my open hands. My thoughts went back to the fire that burst from these very palms. "Adena," I murmured the name. With a shrug, I glanced to Reeve. "That works for me, I guess." I wondered if Vincent had told Reeve of my capability. I hadn't thought they were unique, but the look Vincent had given me when I blasted the bird from my hair…. I wasn't sure.

"Your eyes kind of do look fiery," Reeve nodded. Then he spread a genuine looking smile across his thin lips. "Well, Adena, it is a pleasure to meet you. I have a shower ready for you in the west wing. I'll have Yuffie bring up some clothes for you. Vincent, can you show her the way?"

Vincent slowly shifted his eyes to the other man. Almost reluctantly, he accepted the request. "Okay." He pushed himself from the door frame and lowered his arms from his chest with a roll of his shoulders.

"Very well!" The Commissioner padded light-footedly past Vincent into the hallway. "When you drop her off, I'd like to talk to you in my office, please. We have to discuss the data files."

Vincent didn't respond, but I guess he didn't have to. He glanced over to me, seeming impatient. I slid from the nursery cot to my still bare feet and rushed behind him. He nodded his parting to Reeve, then led me away.

He was quite the entire walk up to the west wing. Figuring he was lost in thought, I didn't stop to ask him questions, though I was forming more and more after each step. Like, where exactly is the WRO Headquarters? What is the WRO? And what was that thing I had seen in the sky? Or had that been an hallucination, too?

Eventually, I was so full of inquiries that I had to bite my lip from bursting.

When we arrived at the shower room, we slowed down to a halt. Vincent gestured to the metal silver door. "In there. Each shower has its own stall, so you'll have your privacy. Plus, I don't think anyone else is in there. Yuffie will set your clothes on the bench outside the stall you use. I'll be sure to make sure that includes a pair of shoes."

He didn't wait for me to respond, he just turned and left back the way we had came. My eyes followed him as he walked away, until I couldn't see him anymore. I inwardly wondered if I had done something wrong, or if he always acted that way.

I pushed open the door and quickly found a shower in the back of the spacious, waterproof room. It was tiled, everywhere. Floor, walls, ceiling. Waterproof. I closed the stall to my shower and gradually stepped from my clothes. My muscles were still a little stiff, but I could manage. They were definitely a lot better than before.

Folding my clothes and piling them neatly, I set them somewhere they wouldn't get wet. Then I glided under the showerhead, turned on its faucet, and relaxed. I felt my muscles loosen as the steaming water flowed continuously over my body. My curly hair weighed heavily as it drenched, the water tugging it down to its full length at my derriere. I let my eyelids flutter closed and released my breath in a lax sigh.

Kill them.

The sudden voice was unmistakably masculine. My eyes darted open and I spun around looking for its source. I could have easily recognized the voices of Reeve and Vincent, even the doctor that had checked on my wounds. This was not any of the three. It was utterly unidentifiable to me.

You will kill them all.

I realized then that the voice was reverberating throughout me. I felt it in my bones, in my mind. I dropped to my knees helplessly, pressing my palms to my ears at the volume of the unknown voice increased. It repeated the sentences over and over, louder and louder.

"Stop," I breathed out in pain, tears mixing in with the water that streamed down my cheeks. "Who…are you?" My hair was pulled from my back over my shoulders by the weight of the water.

But it was not mine. It was silver, glistening in the overhead light. I gasped at the hair and pulled at it. Numerous strands came out, snaking around my fingers. I gaped openmouthed at the foreign, silvery locks. I wanted to cry and scream out, but no sound escaped my mouth.

Instead, the voice dropped down to a malicious whisper in my mind. Hello, Adena.