31. Crystal Sleep

Vincent thought that the air tasted of hope and dread, equally mixed. It was hard to tell which people were hopeful and which depressed; they seemed to be doing both at the same time.

The town was called Aerba. The stack of food from Mideel was getting thinner, and Cloud had suggested a stop to gather more food, maybe see what Shinra was up to. Rumor was spreading of a terrorist group – Cid told him ruefully – better not travel all together.

Chaos was not entirely stable yet. Vincent couldn't trust himself with anyone else, couldn't trust himself to be alone in the ship.

"I know the feeling." Cloud said, easily, as they made their way deeper into the town. Their job was to gather information on Shinra. Or at least Vincent thought he said it easily, couldn't really tell with Cloud. He didn't seem too distressed, in any case; picked up a ball that came rolling to his feet and threw it to the young boys nearby, who yelled thanks. Vincent waited until the laughter of the boys turned the corner.

"You sound like you know what you're talking about," he said to Cloud; didn't really know why, but he said it anyway. Cloud raised his eyebrows like he'd heard something funny.

"Well, that's good."

Not a lot of words passed between them. Cloud was not talkative, and Vincent had never trusted words anyway. Even back when he was mortal, and things like love and words mattered.

The pub was full of people, even though the day was still young. People must have abandoned work – but then, Vincent supposed, things like work didn't matter much at the end of the world. Words did. The small television in the center of the pub was fixed on the news channel. People were staring at it like it was their life flashing before their eyes. Few glanced their way when Cloud and Vincent walked through the door. They had come for the television. They were just in time to catch the end of a speech, Rufus appearing confidently and at ease. He was different from his father. People liked him because he had sleek blonde hair and immaculate white suits, blue eyes that were not hidden by layers of chubby flesh. Like a prince, that they might have had.

" … I want the people to rest assured. The Shinra is doing its best to take care of this problem."

"Mr. President, the plan to bomb the Meteor with Huge Materia. Some people say it's that terrorist group, AVALANCHE, who wrecked it. Is that true?"

"Well, nothing's confirmed."

Rufus shrugged off the question smoothly. Vincent wondered why he wasn't blaming everything on AVALANCHE and be done with it. It was hard to tell what the young President was thinking – not that Vincent was good at reading people in the first place. The reporter kept talking.

"What's your next plan of action, then? Are there more Huge Materia?"

"No, and in any case, that Rocket was the only one we had. What's our next plan… well, suffice to say, we're going straight for the heart of the problem."

"Sephiroth? Do you mean Sephiroth, sir?"

There was a murmur in the pub, at the excitement in the faceless reporter's voice. More than excitement. Something that Vincent was familiar with – bloodthirst. He felt the inside of his arm tingle.

"He is the cause of this whole problem. If we eliminate him, it might just solve everything."

"Does that mean you're dispatching the SOLDIERS?"

"Quite right. We're declaring a war, one man against the entire Planet. SOLDIERS are gathering forces in Midgar as we speak… And they will blast the ridiculous barrier that Sephiroth has been protecting himself with, at the Northern Crater."

Here Rufus took a breath and looked squarely at the camera, so that he gave the impression of looking at the people in the eyes. The pub hushed in silence and awe.

"Believe in us. We will win this war."

The transmission ended there and the screen turned to a soft drink advertisement. The barman poured them a drink each.

"On the house," he told them. Vincent had never been enthusiastic about alcohol, but he took a sip anyway. It was a clear liquid that might have been golden in a better light. It tasted bitter, strong and simple. Cloud was looking at it strangely.

"Nibel Dews?" He asked. The barman nodded, something like a reminiscent smile at his lips. "Or something close, anyway. The real stuff got burned with that town."

"Yeah." Cloud drank the glass in one gulp. His brows creased. Vincent imagined it might have felt like gulping down a ball of fire. The man was now eyeing him curiously.

"Say, you're not from Nibelheim?"

"No," Cloud lied. Vincent didn't ask why. He took another sip from his glass, suddenly wishing that he'd known the taste back when it could still affect him. He had a vague curiosity about being drunk – the oblivion people sought. It might be nice.

"Oh." The barman looked disappointed. "So, what're you boys supposed to be, then? Not from around here, are you?"

"No, we're…" Cloud glanced at Vincent. "We're mercenaries."

"Yeah?" The barman startled, a look of slight admiration in his eyes. Vincent took another sip. It tasted less bitter now, more fluid. "So you guys working now?"

"It depends. Why?"

"Well, there's this cave, just at the edge of the town. It's… strange. Once in a while there is a weird glow from the inside, and these noises… Sometimes people go missing. It's been a real pain."

Vincent would have thought that strange caves would cease to matter when a Meteor was about to fall; maybe this man just didn't believe that the world might actually end.

"You want us to go check it out?" Cloud asked. The barman nodded, pouring him another glass of that strong, clear liquid, maybe to bribe him.

"I mean, I don't really know the exchange rate for mercenaries and all. And this is a town problem, so you really ought to go to the mayor for the pay…"

"Well," Cloud paused only to empty the second glass, just as quickly. Vincent wondered if Cloud actually enjoyed drinking or if he was looking for oblivion as well. He would have to look very long, then. The Mako in their blood made it very hard for SOLDIERS to get drunk. "Okay. We'll look into it."

The barman poured him a third glass. Cloud emptied that as well. It occurred to Vincent that he might be drinking memories.

- L.

"Why did you say we were mercenaries?" Vincent asked. Outside, the sun had slipped a little bit more to the west. It was still light and the air was very dry.

"I don't know. Spur of the moment thing. I just remembered a friend saying that." Cloud shrugged. Vincent considered the word friend.

"Why'd you say we would look into it?" He asked a bit later. Cloud shrugged again.

"I guess… I don't know, I thought it was kind of funny he was worrying about a glowing cave during the apocalypse." He wasn't exactly drunk – it would take a lot more than three glasses – but Vincent noted that he did walk a little bit faster than usual, like it slipped his mind to slow down like he usually did, for the benefit of others.

"I was thinking that, too." Vincent muttered. They had time, anyway. Vincent didn't have a lot of faith in Nanaki's grandfather; in magic, generally.

Vincent did not believe in magic, so it came as a shock when it hit him – right in front of the cave. It looked like a normal cave. Nothing unnatural was glowing. Yet the feeling – something very familiar, something that Vincent didn't know the name to. Maybe it was premonition.

"What?" Cloud turned around when he noticed Vincent had stopped a step or two from the entrance. The forest surrounding the cave was eerily silent. No animals wandered about.

"Just this feeling." Vincent murmured. He swept past Cloud before he could answer. There was something inside. Something that might be calling to him. It was unpleasant to recognize that, and Vincent almost turned around but made himself walk on. Maybe it was the tiny trace of alcohol in his system. He heard Cloud follow behind him only distantly, and walked through the bumpy darkness almost as if he were entranced. The narrow path curved and curved until he felt like he must be in the place he started, then – a wide opening, and he was suddenly standing in an oval-shaped space.

In the middle was a large crystal, almost as large as himself. It was there unnaturally, embedded in the stone wall but seeming to fight against it. Vincent took a hesitant step forward. That was when it started glowing, the crystal, an eerie light that had scared the townspeople. It was so strong that Vincent had to shield his eyes. When he forced them open again he saw – there was a person inside that crystal, and she saw him too – he knew who had been calling.

"Lucrecia."

The past came crashing down like a force from hell.

- L.

The first time he meets her.

- L.

The first time he meets her she introduces herself as Lucrecia Crescent, and is surprised when he tells her his name. She does not tell him why, though. She only smiles and distracts Vincent with it – like some kind of a weapon. Vincent thinks her eyelashes are especially long, dropping shadows on her cheeks in the bright light of the laboratory, where she works day and night. Vincent mostly just watches. That is his job. He has been sent by the head of the Turks to supervise the three scientists on a top-secret, important mission that they won't tell him about. He is supposed to watch all three of them, but he mostly watches Lucrecia. She has her long brown hair tied in a ponytail. Sometimes she wears a yellow hair band, and over time Vincent can accurately predict when she'll turn up wearing it. Those are the days that she gets off early and stops in the hallway to chat with him. He knows because he's memorized the schedules – he is required to – and because he only wears his best tie on those days too (the crimson one that is soft like silk. One day Lucrecia tells him it brings out a reddish tint in his dark brown eyes, and he saves it only for those days with the yellow hair band). One day Lucrecia asks him if he has plans for the weekend.

No, not really.

Well, it's the first weekend off in a million years. Aren't you going somewhere? Back to Midgar, maybe?

Why would I go back to Midgar?

Maybe you left something there. Someone.

No. Vincent says simply. Lucrecia breaks into a laughter that rings across the hallway, bounces and dances in the light.

See, that's what I like about you, she smiles. Before he can ask her what she means, she is glowing again. Do you want to, I don't know, go out to the town with me?

And they do. She wears her hair down, and it flows like a cascade – the floral scent is intoxicating, almost. The town is very small and there isn't much to do. The people are nice, though, and they sit in the sun drinking wines that the villagers have given them. Well, Lucrecia drinks and he doesn't. He watches her sip a clear, gold liquid and feels content.

I feel happy, Vincent tells her. Lucrecia looks at him with surprised eyes. After a while she smiles, but there is something sad about it too. Like maybe she knows the ending to this story.

Me too, she says. The sun makes them both dizzy and the day stays golden in his memory a long, long time.

- L.

The first time he loses her. It comes with a secret bunch of paper, a late night shift and a forgotten phone.

Vincent goes back for his phone and all the offices are locked but one. He wanders into Lucrecia's room without really thinking, without really looking for anything but instead he finds the truth. He wishes he'd never known. Lucrecia comes in at that moment because it's her night shift, and freezes at the sight of those papers in Vincent's hands.

It's okay, Vincent tries to tell her. It's okay.

How can it be okay? She cries. I might as well have killed your father.

Why didn't you tell me you'd been his assistant?

Because I might as well have killed him. Tears run down her face and Vincent reaches out to soothe her, but she jerks away. There is terror in her eyes. Vincent tries to say, it's okay, but her guilt won't listen. Vincent doesn't know the details of his father's death. It might have been a lab accident, maybe an innocent mistake of his assistant. He can't bring himself to care about it right now. Tears cling to her eyelashes and draw pretty patterns on her cheeks. He approaches and she lets him. At first. Then she says,

He said to tell you that he's sorry.

In a whisper, and Vincent freezes. She looks at him as if to soak him also with her guilt, so they are dripping wet together, and runs off. Maybe that is how it starts, why Vincent can never really shake off the guilt for a long, long time. A part of it wasn't even his to begin with. But he bears it, like he bears many other things in life and death, but that's the night she first goes to Hojo and he loses her the first time.

- L.

She looks happy with Hojo for a while. Vincent consoles himself that it is all he wants, if she is happy then so is he. He sees her with him sometimes, through the transparent wall of the laboratory, laughing at some jokes or new-born memories. She doesn't wear the yellow hair band anymore. She treats him cordially, but avoids looking at his eyes. He realizes then it's been guilt all along – the way she looked at him, the way she smiled like he mattered. He stumbles, falls, can't get up. He gets up in the morning and goes to work. One day, he loses her the second time.

He doesn't know if Hojo has planned it all along. But when he offers her – Lucrecia – and the unborn baby as test subjects to something called the Jenova Project, there isn't a trace of guilt on his face. Lucrecia first begs him not to, and Vincent overhears. He wishes he could stop – stop everything, stop the world from happening. He is powerless. She gives in eventually, and Vincent learns this too late. He stumbles in like he is drunk, accuses Hojo of sins, of the darkest sins. Hojo doesn't even blink. He looks at Vincent like he can't remember where he's come from, like a stray fly – did he leave the window open? – and pulls out a gun. Before Vincent can say anything, Hojo shoots him and he's dead. Vincent hopes Lucrecia doesn't see his dead body, as he falls. It would only worsen her guilt and make it unbearable.

- L.

When he wakes up from death, it's on an operating table. The walls are hazy, grayer and redder then he remembers. The air smells metallic, like blood. Something glistens on the table next to him and Vincent shields his eyes, frowning. He can't figure out what's going on – and then he sees. First he doesn't recognize it, but there it is – the left hand that he's used to shield the harsh, crimson light from the ceiling. It isn't a hand anymore but an ugly mess of claws and mutations. Everything that Vincent is crashes uncontrollably, but he doesn't scream. He can't speak. He also doesn't scream when he makes to get up and finds himself on the other side of the room before he can blink. Someone has taken his clothes and replaced it with something that looks beaten, straps of leather and buckles rusty and brown. A red cloak flutters behind him. Almost, almost as if it is an organic being, but he bites down the scream that is wriggling at his throat.

It is when he finally looks at himself in the mirror that he lets it out. His scream pierce the air and shatters the mirror into a hundred pieces. A hundred sets of crimson eyes are staring at him now, bloodthirst and abomination and evil. His eyes.

- L.

Now she stares at him, she stared at him. Her eyes looked glossed through the almost-transparent crystal. Like a mirror, like a dream. Vincent stared back at her speechlessly. He did not know what to say. It was all his time in an instant. Vincent remembered watching her from afar, even after he'd changed. He'd never shown his face. There was guilt, of not being able to stop her or Hojo. And then there was another guilt, that it wasn't guilt that stopped him from seeing her.

She'd looked unhappy, in pain. Still he couldn't say anything. He couldn't even comfort her. He remembered praying to a God he'd forgotten long ago, but either He didn't listen, or he didn't deserve it. Lucrecia gave birth to a boy – infused with Mako from the womb. Hojo gave him the name Sephiroth.

"I was dying," she whispered.

I know, he didn't say, because he could not tell her that he'd been watching. Not out of guilt.

"Hojo put me in this… stasis. To sustain me. Ended up not killing me." Her voice had a hollow quality, almost like a shadow, and Vincent stared at her transfixed. It wasn't exactly as he remembered. Maybe it was the crystal cutting the air between them – it was funny, how he'd often imagined an invisible wall in the space between their words and polite avoidance – or maybe it was just his memory. Dignifying what it had, struggling to make meaning. Vincent nodded. She looked sad.

"Funny, I'd have preferred dying. Now I can't even,"

She'd always had a way of not finishing the sentence, letting it hang. Fake smiles.

"He came to visit a couple of times, then didn't. Didn't tell me about…" Her smile abruptly changed. It reminded him of golden hay, autumn days. She touched the edge of the crystal like it was just a glass door and not Mako-enhanced crystal. "You haven't changed a bit, Vincent."

The way she said her name caught at his throat. He realized he hadn't said anything except her name. He opened his mouth and forced out words.

"I've been asleep for a long time. Like you."

"Your voice." She closed her eyes, sighed. "Is just like his. Just the same."

"Whose?" Vincent tensed, feeling sad and tired all of a sudden.

"Vincent."

"But I am. I'm Vincent."

"He's the Turk who took care of us. He was Grimore Valentine's son, though, and I killed the doctor. Might as well have."

"Lucrecia, I'm Vincent."

But she wasn't listening. Her hands slipped from the crystal wall until only the tips of her fingers were touching it.

"I let him die, like I let my son…" Her eyes flew open. "What happened to him? Sephiroth?"

Vincent heard Cloud draw in a sharp breath and only remembered his presence then. Lucrecia's hazy eyes shifted to him. "What happened?" She asked again.

"He…" Cloud stuttered, his eyes wide.

"He's dead." Vincent said. How could he tell her that her son had turned into a – Vincent turned back to Lucrecia. She looked peaceful, like she'd already forgotten the conversation. She was watching Vincent silently like observing the sky for rain.

"Can't we do something about the crystal? Couldn't we get her out?" Vincent muttered without looking back. He didn't want to see Cloud's face. He heard him shifting his feet. Then a smooth slide of metal, a small screech. The whole time, Lucrecia was watching him and he couldn't break out of her gaze.

"It's too powerful. My sword didn't leave a scratch. Can't you do something with your…" He didn't finish his sentence. Vincent shook his head slowly.

"Crystal is the manifestation of Cosmos." Vincent said. "I can't touch it." His eyes travelled up the length of the crystal, which reached the ceiling and sat embedded there.

"It's better this way." Lucrecia said suddenly. Vincent noticed that her voice sounded dimmer, a flicker of a dying candle. "Sephiroth is dangerous. He was born out of hate, not love. It's better that he's dead."

Vincent nodded stiffly. He supposed it was true. He understood why she chose to stay.

"I just wanted to say, if I ever saw him again," Lucrecia murmured. Her voice grew soft. Faded slowly into a crystallized silence. Vincent supposed she would sleep now, until she woke again. "That I loved him very much."

"Who?" Vincent asked, but she didn't answer.