Chapter 9: Things Fall Apart II
Vincent and Lucrecia stepped outside the back door to an open courtyard. There, they saw a woman with red hair, wearing red armor that exposed her midriff, and sporting a very deadly-looking blade.
"Is she a hooker or a sentinel?" Lucrecia asked aloud.
"You know, this is the first time I've ever felt the rain on my skin," the woman began. "But then again, I hadn't even seen the sky until a few days ago."
"Vincent," Lucrecia began. "Who is this broad without any clothes on? I was expecting Captain Mast."
"Rosso," he replied.
"So you're Vincent Valentine," Rosso greeted. "Keeper of the Protomateria. And Lucrecia Crescent. The monster's mother."
"Protomateria?" Vincent inquired.
"Yes," Rosso answered. "The key to controlling Omega. We know you have it. Hand it over now, and I'll kill you quickly."
Vincent simply stared at her.
Lucrecia extended her middle finger.
"Not one to bargain, are we?" Rosso taunted. "Then I'll make sure you suffer."
Suddenly, she moved at lightning speed to behind Vincent's position.
"Time to die."
She grabbed her blade and began to slash at him, with Vincent dodging every attack.
"Chert, on bystryy," she said to herself.
Lucrecia, meanwhile, pulled out the Hanging Judge, and and tried to aim it at Rosso, but the target kept moving.
Soon, the redhead had had enough.
She fired out of her blade, striking Vincent in the chest and knocking him into a wall with such force that said wall was destroyed.
"No!" cried Lucrecia.
"Malenkiy rebanok," she laughed.
Vincent was now doubled on his knee, bleeding from his wounded shoulder. It seemed as if he was waiting.
Waiting for something to happen.
But nothing did.
"What's wrong?" he muttered. "It's….not….happening!"
"Haven't you learned your lesson?" Rosso continued.
With that, she fired her blade, hitting Vincent in the shin.
He Howled in pain.
"And now, my pathetic friend," she announced, "it is your time to die."
She aimed the center of her blade at Vincent's temple, and pulled the trigger.
A clicking sound greeted her ears.
"Empty," she muttered. "Dermo."
And then, a gunshot fired.
Blood erupted from Vincent's chest.
He fell face-forward.
Captain Mast was standing there, gun-in-hand.
"I'll take this the rest of the way," she announced.
"Forget it, suka!" Rosso taunted. "I found them first. I am the more powerful one."
In response, Captain Mast aimed her gun at Rosso's head.
"Sure about that?" she taunted back.
The defeated Rosso put down her sword and quietly slipped away.
"You should have left this well enough alone," she sarcastically lamented as she aimed her gun at Lucrecia. "As of my understanding, you shouldn't be here anyway."
She then took a look at Vincent, who was still breathing, but bleeding out.
"He has a few hours," Captain Mast observed as she put her gun away. "He'll suffer. I actually like this better."
With that, she turned, and walked out the door.
"Just suffer," she sighed. "Then die."
Lucrecia was left alone with the dying Vincent. She collapsed to her knees, and began to cry.
"I want to go into the Lifestream," she sobbed. "I want to go into the Lifestream!"
LATER….
Vincent was stripped naked and placed in a stasis tank in the sub-basement of the WRO base. It was now three hours later; the Shadowfox had been repaired, with Reeve being alerted and arriving to the scene just in time.
"Will he live?" Shalua asked.
"He'll live," Reeve assured her. "Though, if I had been delayed by a mere five minutes, that wouldn't have been the case."
"When should he recover?"
"A week or so," Reeve answered. "He'll need to stay in the tube until then."
The two exited the chamber into the next room. Lucrecia stood there. She was shaking, and seemed somewhat disoriented.
Reeve slowly approached her.
Lucrecia threw her arms around him and buried her head in his chest.
"I don't know if I can take this," she sobbed.
"It's okay," Reeve assured her. "He'll make a full recovery within a week."
"Can…can…I stay with him?" Lucrecia tearfully pleaded.
"Of course," Shalua replied. "We'll move a bed so you can."
"You're a couple of angels!" Lucrecia sobbed. "I'm sorry. I know I shouldn't be hovering over someone else's husband…"
"It's okay," Reeve assured her. "I know there's an excellent reason."
"I love him," Lucrecia replied.
A few minutes later, Shalua and Lucrecia moved a twin bed into the chamber with Vincent.
"What sucks is that the good stuff is covered," Lucrecia said, of course referring to his genitals being concealed.
"So when are you getting married?" Shalua asked.
"Never," Lucrecia replied.
"Never?!" Shalua asked.
"I was married before," Lucrecia explained.
"I know," Shalua said. "But my dad just got married yet again, and…"
"Never again for me," Lucrecia interjected. "I'll remarry when hell freezes over."
"You seem to really love him," Shalua observed.
"Oh, I do," Lucrecia said. "To the moon and back. But why do we have to get married to prove that?"
"Good point," said Shalua, even though she silently disagreed.
MINUTES LATER….
"I'm sorry if I sound like a bitch," Shalua began, "but I have to ask."
"Yes," Reeve replied. "Lucrecia does have a couple of screws loose in the head. I don't know her diagnosis, but she can go nuts if rubbed the wrong way. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, does it?"
"How did you know that was what I was going to ask?" inquired Shalua.
"I had a feeling," Reeve answered. "She punched both her knees three times on the way back here from Midgar. I saw you cringe."
"She needs him, doesn't she?"
"It looks like it."
"And she went nuts because she married Hojo and gave birth to his experiment?" Shalua asked.
"Apparently," Reeve answered. "Although that was kind of a crazy thing to do in the first place. It's kind of a chicken-egg thing."
"Wow," Shalua muttered. "Just wow."
"I wonder how things are going on the Western Continent," Reeve said to himself.
"Not Deepground, obviously," Shalua replied. "What could possibly go wrong over there?"
"Sephiroth is back," Reeve explained. "And he robbed Cid and his fiancée, Shera."
"What did he steal?" Shalua asked.
"Shera's regenerator," Reeve answered. "What she uses to keep her crops from rotting."
"Why would Sephiroth want that?" Shalua asked skeptically.
"God only knows," Reeve answered. "But that's not even our prime concern. One of the six card-key holders needs to be arrested. We have a traitor among them. One of them freed Sephiroth nearly two years ago."
"And which one was that?" Shalua asked.
"I don't know for sure," Reeve answered. "Cissnei is checking to make sure it was one of the six. I'll only get suspicious when it's confirmed it was."