Sorting

Cloud was bored out of his mind, but he knew there was nothing he could do about it while he was still recovering from Mako poisoning. Sickness was just the start, and while he had 'woken' much sooner than normal, he still needed time to recover from the other symptoms—weakness of body until the adaptation finished, dizziness, blurred vision at times...moments of—modified strength. The last had caused him to tear his sheets and blankets, and others had put a 'dent' in his bedroom wall and rip a few of his books in half by accident. At least his mother could fix everything...except the wall. He was very glad he hadn't broken it completely.

Since the only thing he really could do was sort out his new-old Materia collection, he decided to at least work out what he'd be able to equip, how many of them he'd be able to handle, and in what format for the slots he thought he'd be able to find. Re-creating First Tsurugi would be next to impossible until he was older, better coordinated, and had the resources to put towards his seven-bladed 'fusion' sword. On the other hand, it wouldn't be unreasonable to say he could dual wield thanks to First Tsurugi, or use one of the heavy, wide-bladed broadswords like the Buster Sword or a SOLDIER-issue blade. Mako enhancements would allow him to carry the weight, even at all of twelve years old, too.

Besides the fact that many armors had six or eight slots, many weapons also did, but they were generally costly, so he'd probably have to start going through Shinra Manor's storage to see if they had anything of any value he'd be able to use. And Vincent probably would have to do the same. After all, it was highly unlikely he and his mother would ever be able to afford twenty or fifty thousand gil for a single bracer or sword...But then again, he had never thoroughly searched the Manor because being there had been too painful and brought back too many bad memories...Even after the town had been rebuilt by Shinra as part of their cover-up of the massacre.

As far as his red Summon Materia went, he had Zack—Fenrir, that was—and Master Summon, which had no cost to equip. Master Summon also had on it everything from Choco/Mog (the weakest Summon) to Knights of the Round (the strongest Summon to exist). Alexander, Bahamut, Neo Bahamut, Bahamut ZERO, Odin, Typhon, Kujata, Hades, Shiva, Ifrit, Titan, Ramuh, Phoenix, and Leviathan were all on it as well. The only ones it didn't have were the new ones which hadn't existed when he'd built up Master Summon the first time. The Summons ranged from elementals and multi-elementals (Shiva, Ifrit, Titan, Ramuh, Leviathan, Alexander, Phoenix, Kujata, and Typhon) to non-elemental and effect types (Choco/Mog, Odin, all three versions of Bahamut, Knights of the Round, and Hades).

If he built a new Master Summon now, would it also have to include the nine new types they'd met in that space with Minerva?

Probably.

For yellow Command Materia, he had four of them, all Mastered versions—even if he used one, it could grow no further. On the other hand, three of the four had decent potential for use when Mastered—Aerial Attack especially was useful when Mastered, as using its Commands while in free-fall from any height would prevent death by falling. The first of the abilities it granted was Jump, the second Dive, both of which allowed a person to dodge attacks and controlled their descent. Jump only allowed a stronger blow to an enemy by increasing the height and force of it, but Dive—that was more like dropping a cannonball on an opponent's head from miles above them.

Throw was the next most useful Command as it turned nearly every item a person had on them into a high-powered projectile, and Deathblow was the third Command he may use. He would never rely on Deathblow, though, because it was either a boosted hit or a complete miss, and even Mastered, it still only had eighty percent accuracy. The last Command type he had was W Summon, or Double Summon, which would literally allow him to call two of the Summons at once, supporting and maintaining them both at the same time, rather than one at a time as would normally be the case. As much as it 'could' be useful, it used more energy to cast two at once, and trying to multi-task with Summons was dangerous because they were especially sensitive to their summoner's thoughts and emotions.

Purple Independent Materia caused no deficiencies in ability, and what they granted was always worthwhile. He had Underwater, Speed Plus, Guard Plus, Chocobo Lure, Enemy Away, Stealth, and Long Range Attack, all Mastered except for Chocobo Lure—then again, he and Vincent were the ones most likely to put the Lure to use, as they would have to travel. Those giant chickens people had quickly learned to tame for riding certainly had their uses, and he'd have to start breeding them all over again to get the extremely versatile and near-legendary Gold Chocobo...

Regardless, other than Long Range Attack, every other Materia he had in purple seemed geared to keeping him alive (not unlike the Mastered Aerial Attack). Enemy Away would repel most monsters, Underwater meant he couldn't drown, Stealth would let him sneak around, Speed Plus would increase his ability to dodge (amongst other things), and Guard Plus would prevent some damage he would take if he got hit. Long Range Attack would allow his sword to strike at the same distance as a gun, so he'd be able to keep back from the enemy and still do them the maximum damage possible.

...On second thought, it was probably geared towards keeping him alive, too.

In short, he was the one of the five who was in the most danger of being mortally wounded, unless someone else had a collection of protective Materia like his—just with the un-Mastered versions.

His blue Support Materia included five Alls, two un-Mastered and three Mastered, a Final Attack—that was a definite user, so he set it aside—Added Effect, Elemental, and Health Absorb. Every Support Materia would be completely useless unless paired with another Materia under the categories of Magic, Command, and Summon. All allowed a single-target attack or spell to hit multiple targets (spell power was marginally reduced, but cast energy stayed the same), Final Attack would activate the linked Materia automatically if he died, and Health Absorb would turn the damage he did to attackers with the linked Materia into health for himself. Those were all very straight-forward Support Materia, unlike Added Effect and Elemental.

Both Added Effect and Elemental behaved in the same way at least, the former for effects like sleep and poison and the latter for elemental effects. When paired with a viable Materia in a weapon, a basic attack with that weapon would include the effect of the Materia—a Poison Materia would cause the weapon to become a Bio Blade, and a Lightning Materia would create a Bolt Blade. When in an armor (the bracers were types of armor, sometimes with protective abilities against magical damage), the effect would defend a person against the linked Materia—Poison would prevent poisoning and Lightning would protect against lightning and electric spells or effects.

The single largest quantity of Materia he had was Magic Materia, which he had one of most of. Most of them were also un-Mastered, though some were Mastered (Comet, Transform, Mystify, Seal, Float, Exit, and Full Cure). He had the full set of elements—Fire, Ice, Water, Lightning, Aero, Earth, Contain (the fourth level elemental spells), and Gravity, all healing types, and (as far as he could tell) all the status modification types. He even had Shield and Ultima, which were legendary Materia in their own right. The thought about Shield told him one of the ones which was missing was Barrier—others must have gotten the two copies of it. He also didn't have Destruct, now that he thought about it, and it allowed the removal of beneficial status effects and cast instant death when Mastered. Other than Barrier and Destruct, though...he had every Magic type...

His elements, being un-Mastered, didn't have their third level spells yet, only the first and second levels for Fire, Ice, Water, Bolt, Aero, Quake, and Demi (Gravity), and Contain had Freeze and Break (Earth), but needed to level so he'd be able to use Tornado and Flare. Poison would also cast its first two levels of Bio, but not the third, and his Restore would cast Cure and Cure 2, but not Regen or Cure 3—that made him glad the Full Cure he'd been given was Mastered, because it had to be half-way to Mastered just to cast its one spell. Shield and Ultima (a high-powered holy elemental attack) were barely useable, and the Revive Materia he had was just short of allowing him to use Life 2. Heal had Poisona and Esuna so he could remove all status effects, but it didn't have Resist yet—Resist would prevent status effects from taking hold if cast in advance, but if an effect was already in place, Resist would lock it in.

There were a myriad of status effects as well, and he had all of the Materia for them—Transform, Time, Mystify, Seal, Exit, Float, and Mirage all fit under that category. Transform had the spells Mini and Toad, Time could cast Haste and Slow but not Stop, Mystify had Confuse and Berserk, Seal had Sleep and Silence (barely), and Exit had Escape (from battle) and Remove (an enemy from battle). Most of those were self-explanatory. Float had only one level of its two, Float, which maintained a distance of approximately two feet between a target and a solid object below them, but it had to have Buoy in order to allow the hover effect over liquid substances. Mirage had been a surprising find and its first spell was Multi, which created multiple images of a target. Its second spell was Change, which was used to create disguises, and the final spell on it (which the un-Mastered one didn't have) was Invisible, which made the target unseen for approximately two minutes before having to be refreshed. (1)

It was blatantly obvious he couldn't use them all, so he had to choose what things he'd be best to use, especially in the linked pairs—though logically, Final Attack was best paired with Revive so he'd have a free chance to return to life unless there wasn't enough of a body to Revive. Well, with Final Attack being Mastered, it would work five times before needing a break, so definitely useful, more if he could get Revive to Life 2 before he ended up dying. Ideally, he'd never end up in a position where he'd actually die, but things didn't always turn out so well.

Fenrir and Master Summon would definitely be users, and he'd take advantage of the Long Range Attack, Underwater, and two Plus Materia. None of those needed to be paired, unlike Final Attack and Revive. However, as he'd used in most of his battles once discovering them, he was going to use both Added Effect with Poison and Elemental with Gravity on his weapon, because a Demi-Bio Blade made quite an impact on the enemy. Aerial Attack was also a good idea to have on him. With a small chuckle, he thought it would be useful to have Comet paired with an All, but the thought of the All made him turn to the five as he debated which ones to use—Mastered or un-Mastered.

By Minerva's own rules, the Materia which had seen the end of the world couldn't be used by anyone but the five people who had seen it as well, so it was probably best for him to Master the un-Mastered ones so he'd be able to give them to others if needed. That decided, he paired Comet with an un-Mastered All, as he didn't anticipate needing to use it much. He also paired Time with an un-Mastered All for the same reason, but used a Mastered All with his Restore—Cures were always the most-used spells in combat, because those were what would keep you alive if you were up against strong opponents. The only other Materia he might use were Mirage and Stealth.

Finally, with all of those set aside until he could get his hands on bracers and/or weapons to put them in, he cleaned up the rest he wasn't going to potentially slot—and promptly yawned. It was time for another rest, apparently. He settled down and went to sleep not long after, mind exhausted from all the assessing and planning he'd just done.

MB

Vincent needed a break from reading the reports and newspapers in the room, so decided to work out what Materia he would equip. While he had a Shinra Alpha and his Turk gun on (why had Hojo left his basic Turk gear with him?), he knew there were stores somewhere in Shinra Manor where they had other gear. What kind, he wasn't sure, but he knew one of the pieces was a seven-slot gun, so chances were there was a range of poor to good quality gear there. As such, he would plan for the maximum number of Materia he felt he'd be able to equip—a total of sixteen, eight on a bracer and eight on a gun.

Of the Materia he'd been left with, a fair number were Mastered. His Summons were largely un-Mastered, with only Neo Bahamut and Bahamut ZERO being Mastered. His other Summons were Choco/Mog, Hades, Ifrit, Titan, Leviathan, Odin, Typhon, Ark, and Kirin, the two new and unknown ones, one which did shadow damage and the other which gave over-time healing like the Regen spell. Bahamut ZERO and Kirin were ones he'd keep on him, regardless. By looking through his Support Materia—five Alls, Elemental, Added Effect, two Final Attacks, Counter, Quadra Magic, and Steal as Well—he immediately knew a few combinations he wanted on his weapon and bracer.

The most unique part about Summons was that they not only hit all enemies, but reacted to Added Effect and Elemental the same way as Magic Materia did. For him, this was very useful, as Hades caused nearly every negative status effect to enemies and Typhon comprised four of 'five' elemental properties. By pairing Hades with Added Effect and Typhon with Elemental, he could create either a defense of nearly everything or an attack of nearly everything—he went for the latter as his primary stance, as he was nearly immune to everything as an undead, immortal being, anyway. In addition, when he found a Mastered Revive in his Materia, he knew he would pair it with one Final Attack (he could still be killed, it was just very hard) and paired Odin with the other. In short, if someone managed to kill him, not only would they trigger an automatic revival but also an instant-kill-attack Summon to strike them down while he recovered.

His only Independent Materia was Luck Plus—a definite keeper for a largely solo fighter—but he also had several Command types (W Summon, W Item, Deathblow, Mime, Enemy Skill, Multi-Cut, Sense, and Manipulate), and while they were only marginally useful to him, one in particular caught his eye, the un-Mastered Enemy Skill. It needed the rarer and harder-to-get skills, like the ones from the Northern Crater, and of the five sent back, he was singularly the best-equipped to go complete it. As such, it was a keeper, and his only regret was that Enemy Skill was the only known Materia which didn't reproduce at Mastering besides the Master Materia themselves—which were already special cases.

The Magic Materia he had were a decent variety, but he didn't think he'd use too many of them, mainly because he was usually on his own. He'd been left with Fire, Ice, Lightning, Water, Gravity, and Contain, so used the last as it was Mastered, and with Destruct, Restore, Barrier, and Ultima—the last three were Mastered, and he decided he'd use them. Finally, he had Exit, Seal, and Mystify, which he didn't think he would use unless it was to build them up to create another Master Magic.

That sorted, he gave a small sigh and went back to reading. At least the interlude had given his headache a chance to recede...

MB

In the morning, Tseng woke up at the same time he usually would, only to remember being essentially put on house arrest and flopping back down in his bed. He had nothing to do, nowhere to go, and wasn't really inclined to random socializing, so he just lounged in bed for...about half an hour before huffing in irritation and getting up anyway. He may have had nothing to do and nowhere to go, but he wasn't used to staying in bed for any length of time, either, and he had too much excess energy to warrant doing nothing. The question was, what was he going to do?

Getting dressed in his casual clothes, he found places for the Materia he'd been left with (Airmed in his hair tie again, five of them in his waistband, and two more, one in each sock), and took his temporary ID so he could go eat in the cafeteria. Aer—med was humming contentedly into the back of his mind while he thought about what he could do, but didn't offer him any options. He'd already thought about training and the VR scenarios, even about Cissnei, but they all seemed to fall short.

:Why don't you do all of them at once?: Aer—med asked curiously. He sent her a confused sense, so she clarified, :Go get Cissnei and choose some weapons you would like to test your skills with, go to the VR room, and run through one of those new scenarios with her.:

Tseng paused to think about the idea seriously for a minute, then realized it was probably the best option, as one of Cissnei's short-comings when she'd first joined had been the adaptation to working with other Turks. If he got her started on partner missions now, she'd have better chances at melding with the group faster when she officially joined. Since he was nearly done his meal by then, he quickly finished and headed for the Academy training rooms—there was one reserved for special students, like known future Turks and future SOLDIERs.

In that room, thirteen-year-old Cissnei—or Neirine Cissero, as her birth name was—and sixteen-year-old Rufus Shinra were doing some sort of target practice. He sat down on a bench in the back of the room to watch them for a bit, noting how the to-be Turk was handling her combat shuriken, which she'd named Rekka. By then, she'd attached a thread to it in a sort of trial for her to retrieve it, but the thread was obviously a new addition and she wasn't used to maneuvering it or modifying the length of the thread, yet. Still, at thirteen, she was better with it than most adults he'd seen, and she also had some Materia she'd been given over her years of training, so were Mastered.

Hadn't he heard somewhere that Materia which grew with their owners without hand-offs to others had traits unique to the Materia and their owner? He didn't know if her Materia had any particular traits, though, because he'd never asked if they were in any way different from normal ones of that type. He'd never seen particular traits from Cloud's Materia, but those had been shared between eight people, and they had been switched off multiple times. Genesis, on the other hand, definitely had unusual Materia, but he'd attributed the oddities to Genesis being a Mage. All Mages did things with spells which weren't in the normal array of uses.

As the two teens took a break (lacking an instructor as they currently were meant they could stop any time they wanted), they turned around and saw him sitting there, so traded puzzled looks before joining him. Both seemed tentative in approaching him, like they were nervous, and their behavior actually amused him, but he didn't show it directly. It had been a very long time since either had been nervous around him.

"I have never seen you out of uniform, Tseng," blond Rufus commented. The sixteen-year-old had short, blond hair nearly golden in color, blue eyes, and tended to dress in a white suit with a black shirt—the exact opposite of the Turks. It was a very deliberate stance, a defiance of them after having discovered that it had been one of the Turks who had murdered his mother when he'd been eleven. Since the Turks were also his primary guards under normal circumstances, they were all well aware of his feelings on the matter—he didn't like or trust them. With his hair in its current style, though, he looked very different from his older self, the one Tseng had last known, whose hair had been slicked back. Instead, he looked more juvenile with his hair falling rather softly straight down, cut close around his head and with bangs.

"Why would I be in uniform when I'm not on duty?" Tseng replied in a dry tone. The blond seemed unsettled by the news, so the Wutain looked at Cissnei—at Neirine—to ask, "You've modified Rekka again?"

"Yes, Sir," the girl with red-auburn hair agreed. As a thirteen-year-old, she kept it fairly short, cut to about her chin with not-quite-even bangs and had pale brown eyes. She was in the Academy's (female) student uniform of a black, knee-length skirt, a white, sailor-type shirt with black hems, black shoes, white socks, and a red sweater with the Shinra logo on it. The girl was also—smaller than he was used to her being, and hadn't developed much of a body shape yet, though it was obvious she had begun her changes to womanhood. Did she have anyone to talk with her about any of that, a woman who could give her 'the Talk' and help her with feminine problems?

"What are you trying for?" he asked, even though he knew the answer already.

"I want to have a thread for Rekka to be able to control where it goes better and pull it back to my hand easier," she answered. "Right now, if I throw it, I have no choice but to go get it, and that's really not great for a battlefield. Mostly, though, the string is just in the way and it doesn't stay together well because it's just—cloth, really. And I can't control the distance because the thread is only so long, and I can't just make it shorter or longer."

"Did you think to use a thin, metal wire of some sort?" the Wutain asked.

She blinked, her gaze thoughtful, and after a moment, she mused, "That might work better. Thanks, Sir."

"You don't have to call me 'Sir' when I'm not on duty," he told her, gaze amused. When she blinked, he offered, "I was just wondering what to do with my free time and thought it would be fun to test some of the new VR scenarios for the Turks, but I'd like some company if you'd like to get some more real training, Neirine?"

"Could I join you, too?" Rufus asked suddenly.

With a surprised blink, Tseng eyed him for a moment before asking, "Can you hold your own against Neirine yet, young Mr. Shinra?"

The sixteen-year-old blinked, then gave his head a small shake as he admitted, "Unfortunately, not yet."

"In which case, I have to say no, because the training scenarios are actually dangerous and you need a certain minimum amount of skill to challenge them," Tseng answered. "If you truly want the opportunity to test scenarios in the VR rooms, work to improve your skills rather than just repeating what you already know."

Rufus was silent for a minute before glaring faintly and saying, "I understand."

"I don't think you do," the Wutain answered sharply. "If you did, you wouldn't be glaring at me. Check the records for the VR room for training injuries—even though most of the scenarios can't kill, they can certainly hurt anyone who sets foot in the room. Work harder on your skills, Mr. Shinra, if you really want to be able to join the Turks in the VR scenarios."

The boy looked taken aback, but huffed and turned to stomp away—he was really still in the 'brat' phase. Now, if only there was a way to get him out of it sooner...but it had taken Meteorfall for him to start growing up, and Geostigma for him to realize how much of an ass he'd been. Basically, he'd been twenty-five before he began to change. Would they be able to push him to the realization sooner this time?

Once the boy had gone back to shooting targets, he looked back at a thoughtful Neirine as he asked, "Well, would you like to join me on a partner scenario?"

"How will you do one without weapons, S—Tseng?" the girl asked curiously.

"I can use most weapons, so I thought I'd stop by our training room to pick a weapon or two I'd like to practice with for the scenario," he answered her, giving her a small nod of approval at her having noticed he had no 'weapons'. "But first, look more closely and see if you can tell what I do have, even without my armor and gun."

She looked momentarily confused before scanning him again, her eyes moving quickly over his form. With him clad in a normal, dark green shirt (not a button-up one) and brown pants, there weren't many places he could hide something, and she was having trouble figuring it out. However, the third time her eyes scanned him, they stopped at one of the spots at his waist where he had put a Materia and she frowned in confusion as her eyes moved back to his.

"Do you...have Materia on you? Without any slots?" she asked tentatively.

"I do," he smiled. "Good, you're learning."

"It's possible to have Materia on without slots?" Neirine blinked in surprise.

"It is, but it's harder to use them raw, so it's not something to be done carelessly," Tseng told her, then rose. "Shall we head to the VR room, or will I be going alone?"

"No, I'll go with you!" she agreed readily that time, then followed him as he led the way from the room.

Notes:

(1) About Materia and spells in this paragraph, and a few others previous: I think I mentioned already how new Summons came to be (in the first chapter), but some of these non-Summon Materia/spells/abilities didn't exist in the original FFVII main game. However, because they DO exist in nearly every other one in some form, I added them in, and they would have been part of the cast's original Materia. Part of the reason for this chapter was to define and explain them so readers would know what they are and have a pretty good idea what they do. Not all mentioned Materia work exactly the same way as they tend to in video games, because they wouldn't be able to work that way in real life; as changes to functionality come up, I'll explain them.