Ternary Fission
Chaos soared easily on the fast-moving air currents high in the planet's atmosphere, riding the edge of the jet stream that wriggled its way around the Planet so as to reach the smelly and ridiculous city of Midgar faster than any mortal contraption could ever achieve. Both his own indignity and the suffering of his sweet paradox had been avenged by the little wolf, who would soon become his son in more than just name. However vengeance was only the beginning of Chaos' scheming and now that the shatterpoint had passed the Herald of OMEGA was starting to see once more how the patterns of the future would unravel. They were still highly unstable of course, twisting and changing in the wake of what had occurred in Nibelheim, a pathetic little town built on the long-forgotten remains of what had once been his daughter's home.
He could however see enough of what-would-be to know that his avatar needed to be the first person to take advantage of the little madman's death and raid the delusional mortal's private laboratory in the ShinRa building. Chaos couldn't yet make out why it was so important –too much interference floating about– but the most entertaining and diverse long-term projections spiralled out of the repercussions of her doing so, so who was he to make life less interesting than might otherwise be the case?
Of course his little paradox was with child, which meant he had to be more careful than was his wont due to her increasing fragility, but she was becoming delightfully volatile and ever more proactive in defending herself as an instinctive counter to that vulnerability which Chaos found simply delightful. The Herald of OMEGA was utterly delighted with his good fortune in being bound to such an accommodating vessel: she was just so charmingly and inventively destructive!
Hojo's private laboratories were an annex of the ShinRa Headquarters suspended high above the plate, clamped onto the side of the building like a particularly malevolent leech and only accessible through the 68th floor. Or, of course, the windows, but most architects and security professionals didn't consider windows on the 68th floor to be a significant security risk. These people clearly had very little experience with either SOLDIERs or summons, which Vincent found incredibly ironic considering. The easiest route through Headquarters into Hojo's secret lab was to be a test subject; the second easiest route was to climb down the outside of the building from the helipad on the roof. Chaos, having wings and not needing to deal with the limitations created by being limited to travel over solid surfaces, simply landed lightly on the roof of the annex.
Once grounded the Herald of OMEGA immediately ceded control to his avatar, his much larger form fading away into nothing, drifting apart like a shredded cocoon of smoke and mako droplets to reveal her own much smaller body standing where he had been. Since her pregnancy had come to her attention Chaos had taken to assuming his own physical form in a totally new manner, wrapping himself around her like a cloak rather than stretching her from the inside to accommodate his much greater mass. It was all the proof she was going to get that he cared about her and her unborn child more than he was ever likely to admit –Vincent had long since given up speaking in absolutes; where Chaos was involved nothing was impossible– but it was more than enough. The WEAPON which dwelt within her had never failed to express his fondness for her destructive tendencies but this new behaviour indicated a much more profound caring. It was slightly reassuring. It would have been more reassuring were it not for the profoundly inhuman ways in which Chaos generally expressed his attachment.
Getting into the laboratory was almost stupidly easy, probably because everybody was too terrified of the recently-late doctor to ever try and invade his private playground. All Vincent had to do was exert a little pressure on the steel frame of the window to the very dead madman's private office and the pane of reinforced glass popped right out, falling inwards onto the carpet without even cracking. Sliding into the room without so much as a whisper of rustling fabric –her garments were not actually made of cloth no matter what they looked like– Vincent set about thoroughly ransacking the first stop on her little sabotage tour. Experience had taught her that it was impossible to steal too much data on the recently-deceased lunatic's projects, especially when you intended to deal with them personally in the not-too-distant future. Vincent wanted all the data she could get on what had been done to Cloud and what was being done to the other twelve subjects that were all that remained of the original twenty-eight that had made up Hojo's 'project pool' nearly two years previously. The Turk was not surprised by the attrition rate: the mad scientist had made a habit of testing his various victims to destruction. What she was wary of was the use of language in some of the reports she'd read while chasing up what had been done to Cloud as much as was possible considering Hojo's main computer –the computer she was now ruthlessly stripping bare of any and all data– was not connected to the main ShinRa network. Said terminology had suggested that the so-called 'cell cultures' might not in fact be what a normal, sane person would call cell cultures. They might have started out that way, but Vincent knew better than most that Hojo had no qualms about cross-species genetic manipulation. Among other things.
Having completely drained the computer of its contents, cracked the hidden safe and pilfered its contents, raided the bookshelves and flicked through every single page of material in search of notes and references, pocketed all the loose paperwork and emptied the four hidden caches she had found –if there were more she couldn't locate them– Vincent decided to leave the office and venture into the main laboratory, making a beeline for the Specimen Containment Units. Hojo's nost recent notes claimed he had sorted his subjects according to their reactions to his most recent bout of tests, with an addendum stating how fascinating it was that there were specimens of each of the three 'ranks' in each group.
Cracking the electronic lock with casual ease, Vincent stepped into the corridor that ran the length of the containment block and stopped dead, horror and fury rooting her to the spot.
I swear I did not know of this, little paradox, Chaos snarled within her mind, or I would have urged you to investigate sooner. How dare he!
The 'cell cultures' were children. Her children. She could see herself –though it would be more accurate to say she could see Sephiroth since they were technically born of genetic samples taken from her son– in every single face, devastatingly vacant or brutally twisted though most of them were.
Vincent breathed deeply, letting her own anger wash through her and the fury of tenant flow out of her. She could not act rashly no matter how enraged she was. Chaos' fury at the violation of her kin was accompanied by a thin trickle of self-recrimination, as though the Herald of OMEGA felt he should have anticipated this wholly unexpected occurrence. Setting that mystery aside for later, Vincent confronted the bleak situation before her, letting her eyes and other senses flit from cell to cell and study those contained within.
The first cell on her left contained three children, two male and one female, their physical appearance making them appear to be aged five, eight and twelve. All three were completely catatonic, vacant eyes staring unblinkingly into space. Her less human senses told her all three were no more than empty shells; their souls had long since fled into the Lifestream, never to return.
The second cell held three more children, aged similarly to the first. However in this cell the older boy and girl were acting much as the feral Deepgrounders had and cowering in the corner away from the third child, the four-year-old. Vincent shivered as wide, virulent green eyes studied her with the same thoughtful sociopathy that characterised Hellmasker; killing that little boy would be more for the benefit of the many than the child's own, though the Turk knew that of all her inmates Hellmasker was the loneliest. Death Gigas was too stupid to be lonely and Galian Beast considered her and her family to be pack. Hellmasker on the other hand was so utterly isolated he didn't even realise he was lonely. Saving this child that experience would be merciful, but Vincent knew that even if it were not she still would not unleash this particular little boy on the world.
The third cell held the obviously insane: two girls and a boy, all very clearly broken so far beyond repair that sanity was no more than a fever dream. The two girls, one older and one younger, where huddled in separate corners and muttering in voices that constantly shifted in pitch and psychic feel: multiple personality disorders several orders of magnitude beyond Vincent's own. The rogue Turk doubted any single personality facet was dominant for more than a few seconds at a time. The eight-year-old boy sat in the very centre of the cell, giggling and sobbing by turns as he waved his hands around, tracing patterns in the air only he could see. For these three death would be a welcome release.
The fourth cell held the sane and aware. Well, mostly sane and aware; Vincent had no doubt that they had been permanently damaged by their experiences here regardless. Three boys, appearing to be aged seven, nine and twelve. All three watched her warily through old, jaded eyes of purest mako green. The data sheet attached to their cell door proclaimed them to be specimens L, K and Y of the first, second and third ranks respectively. The first rank had aged the fasted, the second the slowest and the third rank contained most of the females. There had been only two female in the first rank and none at all in the second, but the third rank had produced only three males, of whom Y was the only survivor.
Vincent surveyed the corridor again, this time reaching out to the ever so subtle fluttering of unstable Chaos energy within every child present, the cause of their rapid aging and source of the variety of genders and appearances in what were technically clones of her eldest son. The children who she intended to take with her would need that energy stabilising or else they would continue to age at an accelerated rate and die prematurely; every child present was only a few months past two years old no matter what they looked like.
Hopefully the three survivors at the end would be willing to come with her even after seeing her put their unsalvageable siblings out of their misery.
Yes it really has been ages but this was a very, very difficult chapter. There will be two, possibly three more then this story will end. Hopefully my muse will allow me to create a sequel, but no promises however much I'd like to make them.
