This chapter isn't very long but I felt like I had to give you something after I went and reread all the wonderful reviews from my wonderful readers. I want to extend a special thanks to the reviewer I only know as i so thanks for being there every step of the way and pestering me to update. (I said this now because I don't want to ruin the mood at the end of the chapter)
"Face it, Snow, you're lost," The blue haired, Assault Rifle wielding, young man said to the large blond man leading the group.
"I am not!" Snow jokingly yelled back "This is the... uh... Scenic route?"
"Some scenic route, the others are probably already at Cosmo Canyon," the dark haired woman, and former-cafe owner, in the group sarcastically remarked.
"I'm thinking Lebreau should be the leader. At least she knows which way is north," Maqui stated. Serah laughed at the banter in the group.
After leaving the Gold Saucer, NORA and AVALANCHE had regrouped at the small village of Gongaga. Upon arriving in the Reactor village, they found only ruins and acres of fallen trees, likely from the explosion that had turned the Mako Reactor to a pile of broken, twisted, and blackened steel. After agreeing upon moving onto Cosmo Canyon, the groups left and went in different directions, AVALANCHE decided to try their luck on crossing through the mountains and NORA decided to try the forest. Unfortunately, the NORA half of the Shinra fugitive group had been lost in the forest west of Gongaga for a few hours now. Their leader, Snow, was fully aware of that fact and was perfectly willing to make jokes at himself.
Staying near the back of the group, Serah had tried to send a message to Tseng but her specially designed phone was not receiving a signal. After seeing the town of Corel around the base of the Gold Saucer and what remained of Gongaga, she was not entirely sure she wanted to update Tseng on where they were. Seeing what had become of Zack's hometown, and how all Shinra had done to help them was clean up the explosion site, Serah began having difficulty believing Shinra was improving the lives of those that lived in far off areas.
"Hey, Serah?" Yuj, the blue haired member of NORA, asked the pinkette "Where's your weapon?"
"What?" Serah asked in return, reaching back to grab the specially designed weapon only to find out that it was missing "W-where is it?" Serah spun around and started scanning the ground behind her.
"Wha's the matter?" Gadot asked, almost panicked and seeming to have appeared out of thin air next to Yuj.
"My weapon is-" Serah began to explain but was interrupted by a loud-
"Sonuva bitch!" a young feminine voice shouted in pain from nearby.
Team NORA tore through bushes and large plants to lend assistance to the pained voice and were surprised by what they found. A teenage girl, no older than eighteen, wearing a green turtleneck vest that exposed her midriff, white short-shorts, orange runners, high socks, a steel pauldron and an arm guard on her left arm. Her dark hair and rapid cursing in another language told the NORA group the young girl was from Wutai.
"You're from Wutai," Serah blurted out but she couldn't help it. Wutaian people were not a common sight in Shinra lands, the only other person of that heritage Serah had interacted with was Tseng.
"And you seem to have eyeballs," the girl snapped back at Serah. The group collectively just noticed Serah's weapon laying in front of the girl and the fact that the girl was cradling her right hand.
"What happened to your hand?" Lebreau asked in her sweet and friendly tone, the one she usually used on her more unruly customers back in Midgar. The girl looked at each member of the group, the weapons they held, and the weapon on the ground before answering.
"I found that thing," she nodded towards Serah's Turk weapon "Just, you know, laying there on the ground, so I picked it up, played with it a bit, then the damn thing shocked me!"
"Just laying there?" Yuj asked, obviously suspicious of the girl.
"I'm glad you found it," Serah said cheerfully as she grabbed her weapon "I hope you're okay though, do you need anything for your hand?" she made a move to help the raven haired girl but she moved away from Serah slightly and eye the outstretched hand as if it were a snake. Then inexplicably, the girl smiled and got to her feet, and sauntered over to a bush and pulled out a massive four pointed shuriken.
"So who're you guys?" the girl asked loudly.
"Team NORA," Snow announced "I'm Snow, that's Gadot, Maqui, Lebreau, Yuj, and Serah," he listed, pointing to each person respectively "And you are?" Snow put on his best smile as he asked.
"Yuffie Kisaragi! Master Ninja of Wutai!" the raven haired girl announced proudly.
"You know the way to Cosmo Canyon?" Gadot suddenly asked, making Yuffie look at him with an irritated look.
"Of course I do!" she nearly shouted at the large man "What kind of ninja would I be if I got lost at every corner?"
"Good, our fearless leader got us lost," Gadot replied with a playful punch to Snow's shoulder, the blond just let out an embarrassed chuckle.
"We'll pay you if you show us the way," Lebreau spoke up to the young ninja.
"Really?" Yuffie said slowly, as if skeptical but liking the sound of the deal "Okay! Just follow me and I'll get ya where you want to go!"
The next moment, Yuffie shot off at a full sprint and quickly vanished into the thick vegetation of the forest. Team NORA ran as fast as they could to catch up to the ninja but soon realized that she had vanished. But before Gadot could start throwing curses into the air about the girl, she dropped from a tree near them, gave them an amused smile then lead them at a more relaxed pace. As they walked, Serah examined Yuffie.
She had no idea how old the ninja actually was but that was unimportant. The girl did not have a sway in her hips as she walked, she barely moved as she walked over, around, and between the sticks on the ground. Yuffie almost glided through the brush and twigs, compared to the rest of team NORA and most likely on her own, she did not make a sound as she went. The young Wutaian also had a firm grip on her weapon and the way she had it resting on her shoulder was an obvious ready position to the trained eye.
The pink haired Turk was unsure what to think about the young ninja. She could not determine Yuffie's aura or personality and that unnerved Serah. What was more worrisome was Yuffie's obvious allegiance to Wutai which made it impossible to estimate what she may do in the future.
Her steps echoed through the abyss as if she were walking down a cobblestone street. No light had any chance of penetrating this darkness. It was pure, unnatural, impossible. Claire's feet continued to move forward even though she was commanding them to stop, turn around, and run away. Trembling with fear, Claire walked further into the darkness, striding until her foot landed on something which snapped loudly under her weight.
"Don't be afraid," A gentle feminine voice echoed. Claire looked down and saw a skeleton, glowing white in contrast to the abyss.
Claire wanted to scream and run, but skeletons did not scare her. She had seen many things much worse than bleached white bones but she wanted to know why they frightened her now. Something drifted across her gaze and she focused on it. A large black feather, much to big to be from any bird including chocobos. Claire watched the feather drift lazily to the ground and turn into mist the moment it touched the ground. The pink haired soldier looked back up and was met with the sight of two glowing red eyes.
The eyes held the same glow as any average SOLDIER member, but had an unnerving kindness. Kindness only present when it is being used to hide an ulterior motive. A hand slowly came out of the darkness, Claire assumed the hand belonged to the red eyes. The hand had flawless gray skin and nails painted black, it was palm up and open, as if asking Claire to take it. She started to reach out towards it, without telling her hand to do so and her eyes widened in fear.
"Don't be afraid, Claire," the same feminine voice echoed "Reunion is upon us," Claire slowly placed her hand in the gray fleshed hand.
Something small grazed her leg making her snap her gaze downward. A black tendril was slowly wrapping itself around her right leg and coiling upwards. It was then Claire realized for the first time she was not wearing boots. Another tendril began reaching for her left leg, a third towards her hand that was joined with the gray hand, and one more was reaching towards her other hand.
Even though Claire was absolutely terrified, wanting to scream, and every instinct was shouting at her to flee, she felt compelled to stay and her terror was slowly being silenced. An alien feeling of comfort and serenity invaded her senses as the tendrils worked their way along her limbs. Claire felt her eyes closing but snapped them back open and shouted at the darkness.
"Shh, child. It will be alright," the feminine voice cooed "Find peace in the reunion."
A glowing white feather pierced the darkness as it fell in between Claire and the glowing crimson gaze. They both watched the feather fall silently and slowly. When it came to a rest on the cobbled ground, it shone multiple times brighter, to a retina searing level and a high pitched bestial eardrum shattering cry came from the darkness as the light obliterated the tendrils.
Her eyes shot open and she sat up quickly, fast enough to make her head ache from the sudden jarring movement for a few seconds. Claire's breath was shallow and rapid, her hair slick with a cold sweat, her cheeks were burning, and her stomach heaved threatening to expel its contents. With several deep controlled breaths forced into her lungs, Claire regained her composure and decided the campfire was both far too bright and hot. Deciding to take a walk, the pinkette started pushing herself to her feet.
Upon standing, however, she spotted the raven haired former SOLDIER sitting in the shadows past the edge of the firelight. For a reason unknown to her, she walked over and sat next to him. He smiled at her but she could easily see that the smile had miles to go before it reached his eyes. Without a word they both sat and watched the stars, keeping their ears trained on the area around them, and silently calculating how to start a conversation with the opposite SOLDIER.
"Been a while-" Zack started to say.
"I heard you-" Claire also started at the same time. They both chuckled awkwardly before Zack nodded at Claire to speak "It has been a while, hasn't it?"
"Four or five years, I think." Zack reply "I wonder what Aerith is doing now."
"Aerith?" Claire asked, the name was familiar to her but she had no face to attach it too.
"My girlfriend from my SOLDIER days."
"Oh, right. I vaguely remember you going on and on about her," Claire said with a hint of amusement.
"Yeah, Angeal always said I was always yapping just like-"
"Just like a puppy," Claire's tone turned very somber at the reminder of Angeal. She had known Angeal for as long as she had known Sephiroth, even admitted to having a crush on Angeal when she was younger, and dearly missed the man with a heart of gold.
"So you're still with Shinra?" Zack asked, mostly to keep himself out of memories about his mentor.
"Yes I am," Claire stated without hesitation, she was raised within the company and was not going to jump ship just because an old friend was on the other side but a thought quickly arose "They said you died."
"They also say Genesis, Angeal, and Sephiroth are dead. Angeal is the only one I know for a fact is dead," Zack's tone was both bitter and remorseful.
"Sephiroth's not dead," Claire reply simply.
"You sure?"
"He killed all those people at the PSICOM outpost."
"You saw him?" Zack's pattern of questions would normally be written off to increasing skepticism but his flat tone was impossible to decipher.
"Asked him what happened. All he said was Nibelheim," Claire's casual tone made it obvious to Zack that she did not remember what had happened at the village at the foot of the Nibel Moutains.
"You don't remember what happened there?" Zack stated more than asked "I only remember bits and pieces of that mission," It killed him to lie to Claire but he could not bear the thought of telling her that her adoptive father had flipped.
"I was comatose until recently after that. What happened to you?"
Zack took a deep breath before starting to explain the events between him waking up and ending up in a Cocoon military. He was mostly bracing himself for Claire's reaction to his decision to let Genesis live after their encounter in Banora. It had always been obvious to the other SOLDIER First's that there had been nothing but friction between Genesis and Claire, though no one really knew why, so Zack chose to leave out the Banora encouter. The pinkette surprised Zack by remaining silent during the entire telling of his story.
"Shinra sent a battalion of infantry?" She finally asked.
"Yep," Zack unzipped his top and showed his chest to Claire, she was presented with the sight of countless scars severely deforming Zack's torso "For once they did their job."
"How did you survive?" Claire could not keep the amazement out of her voice.
"I didn't. I was clinically dead for several minutes, from what I was told," He watched Claire's jaw rise and fall several times as he zipped his uniform "I was in the SOLDIER lounge with Angeal. We just talked about nothing important," Claire just grunted in response "It may have just been minutes but it felt like hours and then I just kind of snapped back. The doctors said that I'm not a vegetable because of the SOLDIER enhancements. Nothing short of a miracle."
"Why would Shinra want you dead though? You were a First like the rest of us."
"From what I was able to find, Hojo gave the order. Now let me ask you something, why the Cocoon folks?"
"The boy is supposedly Cocoon's Sephiroth. The older guy is a victim of circumstance, and the girls are my guides," Claire reply without hesitation.
"Cocoon's Sephiroth?" Zack looked over his shoulder at the sleeping quartet "Kid barely looks like he can fight. The again," he laughed softly "Angeal said the same thing about me when we met," Zack's gave lifted to the stars as he thought about his former mentor and friend. He had drifted so far into thought he almost did not notice Claire lean onto him and wrap her arms around his shoulders. On reflex, his arm found its way around her middle.
The two sat there for several minutes, not one word passing between them. In that silent time, Claire decided she was done with Shinra. She could ignore most, if not all, of the blatantly evil acts they comitted but letting Zack get gunned down by their soldiers was one step too far. Zack had been a major role model and morale booster in SOLDIER, even though there had been rumors of Zack's questionable loyalty after Angeal left. Claire decided she was going to find Serah and apologize for what she had done back in the Shinra building. The pink haired SOLDIER was going to find AVALANCHE and join their fight against Shinra and help the Cocoon rebels against the Sanctum.
"Zack?" Claire spoke up, not moving her arms him, making the raven haired warrior look down at her "I'm glad you're alive."
"Me too," Zack said with a chuckle, making Claire chuckle as well.
"I don't feel so alone anymore."
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