The Conscience of the King
			Chapter Nineteen: Death Whispered a Lullabye

"Into the orchard I walk peering way past the gate 
Wilted scenes for us who couldn't wait 
Drained by the coldest caress, stalking shadows ahead 
Halo of death, all I see is departure 
Mourner's lament but it's me who's the martyr..."
	-- Opeth


	"Do you have a minute?"

	Rufus looked up at the voice. "I told Beatrice not to let anyone 
bother me."

	Tseng lounged against the side of the oversized desk. "Yes, well, 
we both know how well that line of defense works against me. I'm only back 
in the city until tonight; Reeve sent me word that AVALANCHE is headed for 
Gongaga."

	Rufus frowned. "He didn't say anything to me." He dragged a hand 
over his eyes; the headache was throbbing dully behind his left eye.

	"He also said that you haven't been listening to much of anything 
lately." 

	Rufus looked up at that tone, and frowned; Tseng was actually 
angry. "What's wrong?"

	Tseng's expression was cool. "When was the last time you left this 
office for more than about ten minutes?"

	Rufus dragged a hand through his hair and sighed. "I go back home 
every night." He paused, and then honesty forced him to admit, "Most 
nights. Sometimes I just doze off here."

	Tseng nodded. "So Reeve mentioned. When was the last time you left 
the building?"

	Rufus frowned further. "I was in Costa del Sol two weeks ago. As 
you well know. Why the third degree? Did you come to report news?"

	"I'm giving you the third degree, /Mr. President/, because some of 
the only friends you have in this world are concerned that you're running 
yourself into the ground. And you don't seem to give a damn about it when 
the person you're /sleeping/ with points it out, so maybe it takes the 
professional asshole to call your attention to it." Yes, Tseng was annoyed 
all right; Rufus sat back in his chair and sighed. "And while I'm at it, 
perhaps I should mention that the world will not end if we don't pick up a 
few mangey slum-rats immediately. We're after Sephiroth, and that's the 
important part. Will you just let go of this obsession you have with 
AVALANCHE?"

	"Tseng." Rufus's voice was quiet. "There are two things going on 
here, and I don't think that they're entirely separate. We've got 
Sephiroth back from the dead -- and nobody's managed to give me a good 
explanation of /that/ so far, not that I haven't been asking at every 
single opportunity I can find -- and we have a bunch of slum rebels who 
are /also/ looking for Sephiroth." He paused, and his eyes were caught by 
the windows behind his desk. This office didn't have as good a view of 
Midgar; the helicopter pad blocked most of it, leaving him with nothing 
more than a few slabs of concrete and some lights behind it. He missed the 
view from his old office. "And the last time we were near to catching 
them, Hojo was there too, and every time we hear word of Sephiroth being 
somewhere, they're not all that far behind. That makes me suspicious. And 
when I get suspicious, there's usually a good reason for me to be."

	"Or you're just being a paranoid fuck again." The accusation had 
less heat than it could have; Tseng seemed to have let his anger go about 
as quickly as he picked it up. "Rufus. Listen to me. You can't do 
everything in the world all by yourself. There are things going on, and 
you have people to deal with them. I should know; I've been running over 
half of the damn planet chasing after one of your pipe dreams or another." 
Tseng shook his head and sighed. "Look, I know this is important. But you 
need to learn how to /let go/."

	"The last time I let go," Rufus said quietly, "Sephiroth died." 

	Tseng rolled his eyes. "You play the martyr so beautifully, 
Rufus," he said, sharply. "But the whole world doesn't revolve around 
Rufus. J. Shinra, you know. You had nothing to do with Sephiroth's death."

	"You don't know that." Rufus closed his eyes. He could still 
remember, even five years later, that feeling of guilt when the news came 
back. Could still remember wondering if what he'd asked Sephiroth to 
investigate had led to his friend's death. 

	"Lay /off/ of it, already, Rufus," Tseng snapped. "Look. I've been 
your friend for longer than anyone else left alive in this company, and I 
think that in all those years of putting up with your shit I've earned the 
right to smack you in the face when you're being an asshole. And for 
Leviathan's sake, man, you are being an asshole." Rufus's eyes narrowed, 
and he started to say something, but Tseng held up a hand. "Don't 
interrupt me. You've been holing up in this office for the past two 
months, ignoring anything and everything that gets in your way, in some 
sort of fanatical pursuit of answers. Any answers. Have you stopped to 
consider that maybe this is some sort of pipe dream, and all that you're 
doing is obsessing over something that isn't really there?"

	"It's there," Rufus said, his tone icy. "I've found enough leading 
up to things. Jenova. Hojo. Sephiroth. AVALANCHE. They're all connected, 
somehow. And there are things that we need to know. Now. Before it's too 
late."

	Tseng looked at Rufus for a long minute, and then nodded, slowly. 
"Your father thought that, too," he said. "About the Promised Land. So 
tell me, Rufus. Are you going to be like your father? Or are you going to 
actually save yourself before it's too damn late?"

	Before Rufus could say anything to that, Tseng had turned, and was 
out of the office. Rufus only closed his eyes, took deep breaths, and lit 
another cigarette. The ashtray on his desk was overflowing again. He 
should probably get someone up here to clean that out. 

			-- * --

	From the Gold Saucer to Corel Prison; from Corel Prison to Cosmo 
Canyon, using the car that Dio had given them. It had broken down just 
outside of Cosmo Canyon; they'd had to hike the last few miles. Tifa 
looked over her shoulder as they crossed over the highest point of the 
canyon's walls. Behind her -- just as there had been when they'd been at 
the Gold Saucer -- the mountains of Nibelheim waited.

	Tifa sighed. Somehow, she knew that they'd wind up there. 
Eventually. Whatever was going on had started there; she knew that they'd 
have to return before it was over.

	"Up ahead," Red XIII said, and lept and bounded ahead of them. 
They crossed the last plateau to see a town, tucked into the canyon; Red 
XIII was talking to the gate-guard. "--helped me when I was on the road," 
he was saying. "Please let them in."

	"What is this place?" Tifa asked Aerith, softly. "Do you know?"

	"My mother told me," Aerith said, quietly. She'd been quiet ever 
since they'd gotten out of that Corel prison, Tifa realized. More quiet 
than usual for her. Tifa made a note to talk to her later -- once they 
were out of this bloody heat -- and see what was wrong. "It's a place 
where people can study the Planet, and find out about its secrets. The 
people of Cosmo Canyon are wise men and women. I didn't know that Red XIII 
was from here."

	"You helped our Nanaki?" The guard's eyes were friendly as they 
approached. "Any friend of Nanaki is a friend of ours."

	"Nanaki?" Cloud looked puzzled. "Who's Nanaki?"

	The guard looked just as puzzled. "Nanaki is Nanaki. That's his 
name. You didn't know that?"

	"Come on," Red XIII -- Nanaki -- said to them, bounding up the 
stairs to the cliff-buildings. "I want you to meet Grandfather. Oh, it's 
so good to be home."

	Tifa raised an eyebrow at Aerith -- grandfather? -- and Aerith 
shrugged in return. They followed after Nanaki, ready to sit down. 

	Nanaki's grandfather turned out to be a small human man, stooped 
and wizened. Tifa thought, briefly, of questioning, but then she realized 
that "Grandfather" must have been a term of respect, and not of kinship. 
The old man made a considerable fuss over the prodigal before turning his 
eyes -- still sharp, though set in an old face -- to the others. "Thank 
you for bringing Nanaki home. We were all worried, when he was captured."

	"Captured?" Barret blinked. "Is that how you wound up in Midgar, 
furry?"

	"Ah, Midgar." The old man -- Bugenhagen, he'd given his name as -- 
closed his eyes and shook his head. "So that's where you were. The great 
city of Midgar, reaching up to the heavens as though to snatch the very 
stars from the sky. When it comes time for this planet to die, they'll 
realize."

	Cloud frowned. "The planet dying?"

	Bugenhagen laughed. "Oh, yes. It may be tomorrow, or it may be a 
hundred years from now. It's not too far off, though. I've been warning 
them about it for the past fifty years. It's why I left Shinra in the 
first place, because they wouldn't listen to me." He shook his head, 
sorrowfully. "But I'm only one man, and an old man at that. There isn't 
much that I can do."

	"Grandfather." Nanaki sat down on his haunches, his tail curling 
around his hindquarters. "They're trying to save the Planet. That's why 
we're here. You should show them."

	"Show them?" Bugenhagen shrugged. "It can't hurt. Here." He 
turned, and hit a few buttons. The lights of the room dimmed, and a 
projection of stars replaced the ceiling of the room. 

	"It's been a while since I've lectured to students," Bugenhagen 
began, "but I should still be able to get my points across. Eventually, 
everything dies. What happens to humans after they are gone?" Next to 
Tifa, Aerith had her head tipped back, watching the stars as they swum 
across the ceiling. "The body decomposes, and returns to the Planet. That 
much, everyone knows. What about your consciousness -- your heart and your 
soul? The soul, too, returns to the Planet." 

	The stars above them swarmed, and Bugenhagen reached out a hand to 
touch a control; the view tipped, panned, and the planet came into focus. 
Tifa gripped the table behind her; the perspective made her dizzy. "And 
not only those of humans," Bugenhagen continued, "but everything on this 
Planet. In fact, all living things in the universe are the same. The 
spirits that return to the Planet, merge with one another and roam the 
Planet. They roam, converge, and divide, becoming a swell, called the 
Lifestream. A path of energy of the souls roaming the Planet." 

	Aerith made a soft noise; he turned to look at her. "You've heard 
the term, I see."

	"Yes." Aerith's voice was very quiet. "My mother used to tell me 
stories. About hearing the Planet, and about what the Planet had to say."

	Bugenhagen nodded. "You are a Cetra, then. I had thought so. 
You've your mother's looks about you."

	Aerith looked at him, her eyes wide. "You knew my mother?"

	Bugenhagen let his eyes drop. "I knew her briefly, yes. She and 
her husband came to me to see if I would shelter them from the Shinra, 
when they finally escaped Shinra's clutches. I said no." His tone was full 
of sorrow. "I've always regretted that. Perhaps if I had -- But I'm 
getting off the topic."

	He turned back to look upwards, where the camera had swung 
downwards again. As they watched, the camera focused on the surface of the 
planet, where things were dying; thin tendrils of energy spun from the 
decaying bodies, to pour into a river of brightness, flowing across the 
world. From that river came tendrils flowing forth again, as a flower, a 
baby, a bird were born from it.  "Spirit energy makes all things possible, 
trees, birds, and humans. What would happen if that energy were to 
disappear?"

	"No more life." Cloud's voice was quiet.

	"Precisely!" Bugenhagen beamed at Cloud, in the way of a teacher 
to a favored student. "And that's what Shinra is doing."

	"Mako energy!" Barret's voice was brusque. "We always knew they 
was killin' the plant with those reactors -- you're tellin' us that 
they're stealin' the planet's lifeblood to power their microwaves?"

	"That, my large friend, is precisely what I am telling you." 
Bugenhagen reached out and pushed another button, and the overhead show 
dimmed and then faded. "Shinra is reaching into that well of spirit 
energy, reaching into it and drawing it out. They use it up and throw it 
away. When enough of it is gone ..." He spread his hands. "When enough of 
it is gone, there will be none left to power this planet."

	"No," Cloud said softly. "We won't let them."

	"Sadly, my young friend, you may be entirely too late." Bugenhagen 
bowed his head. "Twenty years ago, ten years ago -- then, it might have 
been possible. But now? I don't know. We've been monitoring the rate of 
decay here, of course. It's close. If all of the reactors were turned off 
tomorrow -- then perhaps. But it might not be possible at all."

	"Very profound," Cait Sith said suddenly. "Do you know about 
mathematics would make you very upset." 

	Bugenhagen blinked and looked down at the moogle. "Excuse me?"

	"It's our mascot," Tifa said, with a sigh. "Or something. It says 
a lot of nonsense like that every now and then. We think it's programmed 
to talk every half an hour, or something." She reached down and turned the 
toy around, so that it wasn't looking at Bugenhagen; as she did, she 
frowned. It seemed for half an instant that there was a form of 
intelligence lurking behind those glassy eyes. She straightened up and 
discarded the thought; she was obviously more tired than she thought she 
had been.

	"My mother told me to come here someday," Aerith said, softly. She 
was looking at something off in the distance, as though at something that 
only she could see. "She told me to come and meet the chief wise man, and 
ask him what I could do to stop this."

	Bugenhagen leaned over and placed one gnarled hand on Aerith's. 
"If you are Ifalna's daughter, you'll know when the time comes. I know 
that you will. /She/ knows that you will."

	There was silence for a long minute, and then Tifa nodded. 
"Nibelheim," she said, and her voice felt far-away in her own ears. 

	Everyone turned to look at her; she felt the sudden urge to hide 
under a table, to step back and out of the spotlight. "That's where we 
need to go next. That's where this all started. If there are any answers, 
if there's any idea about what actually happened back then, it will be in 
Nibelheim."

	And the gods help her, she was going to have to finally face it. 

			-- * --

	"What in the name of the nine billion names of -- Cloud." Tifa 
couldn't believe her eyes; she couldn't force herself to look away.

	"I see it too." Cloud's voice was just as quiet.

	"Wait. Both of you -- what's wrong? Wasn't this supposed to have 
been burned down --" Aerith frowned, looking around her. Nibelheim, 
pristine and beautiful, met her gaze unflinchingly.

	"It was." Tifa could feel something rising in her throat as she 
looked over at the house where she'd grown up. "It /was/, dammit. I 
remember. I was here --"

	"So was I." Cloud shook his head. "Something's -- not right. I 
remember --"

	Tifa looked over at him, and could barely choke back the 
hysterical laughter. She'd spent so long trying to figure out if what 
Cloud remembered was the truth, if what Cloud remembered could have 
possibly happened, and now he was the only one who was there to back up 
the story that she remembered. Even if she didn't remember it properly at 
all. 

	"Let's go ask," Barret rumbled, and strode forward. 

	"Genes are hereditary information material arranged in a city 
ruled by foreign martial law," Cait Sith informed them all. Tifa turned 
around and aimed a kick at the toy; it danced out of the way just in time.

	"Shut up, you stupid thing!" she shouted. "I was /here/. I saw it 
burn. And you can just keep your damn electronic mouth /shut/!"

	"What do you have to agree with you there, too.  So, what do you 
want to know you're not giving me any credit for being smart," Cait Sith 
mumbled, and then clicked, once. "You should probably go and see the 
mansion."

	Tifa took another step forward, as though getting ready to kick it 
again, and then stopped. "What did you say? Dammit, I hate it when you 
/almost/ make sense."

	"The mansion is a programmable electronic device." Once again, 
Tifa got the unsettling feeling, looking at the stuffed toy, that there 
was some form of intelligence lurking behind its wires and gears.

	Cloud, meanwhile, had stopped a pedestrian. "Excuse me. I'm 
looking for some information. Didn't this town burn down five years ago?"

	The man he'd stopped looked affronted. "Don't say such awful 
things, sir. I've lived in this town my entire life, and such a thing 
never happened."

	"You lie," Tifa said, curling her hands into fists. "We were born 
and raised here. Both of us. And I've never seen you before in my life."

	The man raised an eyebrow. "Young lady, I assure you, I have never 
seen you before either, and I've lived here for thirty-six years now." He 
glanced them over one more time, and then sniffed. "Perhaps you're 
mistaken. Good day."

	They watched him depart. "Cloud," Tifa said again, and she could 
feel the scar between her breasts throbbing. She raised the heel of one 
hand to press it, roughly, and took deep breaths. "Cloud, we're not 
imagining things. It really happened. Dammit, I was /here/. It happened. I 
have the scars to prove it."

	"I know," Cloud said, grimly. "We're not the ones who are lying." 
He looked over the town square, his face blank. "The last time I saw this, 
it was on fire."

	~And /you/ weren't here /either/!~ Tifa could feel the sob 
starting to rise in her throat, and Aerith curled one of her hands around 
one of Tifa's, holding on tightly. "All right," she managed, quietly. "We 
need to find out what's going on here. And we're not going to do that by 
standing here." She most carefully did not look at the house that had once 
been hers, the house that she'd grown up in, the house that had been on 
fire just like the rest of them the last time that she'd seen this town. 
"We should -- look over the town --"

	"We'll do that," Aerith said, quietly, squeezing Tifa's hand. 
"Barret and Nanaki and I. You don't need to subject yourself to that. Go 
and look through that mansion that you've told us about. That shouldn't be 
too bad, will it? You were never in there, right?"

	"I was," Cloud said, shortly. "But she's right. Someone needs to 
go and look through the mansion, and someone needs to talk to people here 
in the town. I don't like splitting the party, but we're behind, I think. 
Let's get this done quickly."

	Tifa closed her eyes, blocking out the sight of her childhood home 
-- thought long gone, now staring back at her as though mocking the five 
years she'd spent mourning her dead -- and nodded. "All right," she said, 
after a long minute. "All right. Let's go."

	As they turned to go down the path to the Shinra mansion -- for so 
they had always called it, when they had been children -- Cait Sith 
toddled along after them, apparently intending to follow. Tifa stopped. 
"Barret," she said, exasperated. "Will you take that thing?"

	"Dammit, yeah. C'mere, you hunk of bolts." Barret kicked at the 
toy, which turned around and reluctantly -- reluctantly? ~And just how can 
a bundle of bolts be reluctant about anything?~ -- followed. 

	The mansion -- dusty and redolent with the stink of years, when 
they finally opened the door -- had been off-limits to children for years, 
she remembered. As she stepped through the door behind Cloud, she nearly 
cried, as the voice of her father sounded in her head through the years: 
/"It's dangerous in there. The place is probably falling down around 
everyone's ears. I don't want you kids playing in there. Leave the Shinra 
alone, and they'll leave us alone."/

	~Dad,~ she thought, fighting back the tears. ~I didn't imagine it. 
I didn't. I /didn't./~

	"I know you didn't," Cloud said, softly, and she started; had she 
spoken those last words aloud? She could have sworn she hadn't. 
Disquieted, she remembered the first day or so she'd encountered Cloud 
again, when he seemed to be answering the things that she had only been 
thinking. 

	"Where do you think we'll find information?" Tifa asked, trying 
not to cry. Or sneeze. 

	Cloud paused in the entryway, seeming to be lost in thought. 
"Downstairs," he finally said. "In the basement. That's where they had 
their laboratories." Something moved in his face, and Tifa thought about 
asking about it, for a split second before it passed. "Come on."

	He led her up a set of stairs and into what seemed to have been a 
spare bedroom, before leading her down another set of seemingly-endless 
stairs. The place was quiet -- so quiet, she thought, that she could 
almost hear the last set of footsteps to go down this hall, the history of 
people who had once lived and worked and played within these walls. The 
thought made her shiver, and she pulled her mind away from it. "You'll be 
seeing ghosts next," she muttered under her breath, and Cloud tossed a 
look at her over his shoulder, but didn't respond. 

	They wound up in a long hallway, half cavern and half corridor. 
Tifa shivered in the chill. "Which door?" she asked, looking around them.

	Cloud's eyes were fixed on the door in the end of the hallway. 
"That one," he said, and his voice was far away. "That's where the lab 
was." 

	It was also, apparently, where Sephiroth was.

	Tifa managed to hold back the squeak that threatened to rise from 
her throat with the barest force of will. She was frozen, standing there 
staring at the man who had almost killed her. It was him; there was no 
doubt about it. That silver hair, those glowing eyes -- there couldn't be 
two people like him. Oh, they'd seen him on that troop-ship back on the 
way from Junon, but it had been different there. She'd been able to 
convince herself that had been an illusion.

	This, standing there and staring at Cloud with that distant, 
haughty gaze, was no illusion. It couldn't be. She could remember, staring 
at him with her blood rushing in her ears, what it had felt like to die.

	"Cloud," Sephiroth said, and she hadn't heard his voice like that 
before -- cool, cultured, almost conversational. Like they were having a 
conversation over a drawing-room table. "Have you come here for the 
Reunion?"

	Tifa couldn't take her eyes off of Sephiroth, though he hadn't 
once yet looked at her. Cloud seemed to have no such problems. He took a 
step forward, his shoulders squaring in a way that could have been threat, 
or could have been determination. "I don't even know what the Reunion is."

	"I see." Sephiroth looked down to the book he'd been holding in 
his hands, and flipped it shut with a soft noise. "Well, then, I suppose 
you aren't qualified to attend." 

	"Tell me what's going on here, Sephiroth," Cloud said, and Tifa 
nearly wept to hear the firmness in his voice; she clung to that, that 
strength, in the face of the man who had haunted her nightmares for five 
years.

	Sephiroth simply chuckled. "'For Jenova will rise from the earth 
and fall from the heavens, becoming the calamity from the skies, and her 
armies shall march over the earth in a rain of fire and blood.'" His voice 
altered, became deeper and hollower, and then snapped back to that cool 
urbane tone. "I came here to find out more about where I came from. But I 
think I know enough about where I came from to do what I shall do." He 
looked down at the book in his hands again, and carefully -- almost 
reverently -- placed it back on the shelf. "We travel north," he said, 
almost casually. "Past Mt. Nibel. If you have the strength to follow, I 
shall see you there."

	And Sephiroth took another step forward, and disappeared between 
one foot and the other striking the ground.

	With him gone, Tifa could almost think again. Almost. She sat down 
on the cold slate floor before her knees could give out on her. "Cloud --"

	"North." Cloud frowned. "Rocket Town, or the ice plateaus. Which 
could he mean?" Tifa's voice seemed to break him out of his reverie, and 
he looked back at her. "Tifa. Are you all right?"

	The question was casual, unconcerned. Out of place. She looked up 
at him, feeling the urge to burst into tears returning in full force, and 
cursed herself for her moment of weakness. "All right -- am I all /right/? 
You just stood here and had a casual conversation with Sephiroth -- who 
/disappeared/ when you were done /talking/ to him -- and you ask me if I'm 
all right?" She could hear the hysteria rising in her tone, and grabbed at 
the reins of her control, taking deep breaths.

	"Come on," Cloud said, looking over his shoulder. And that was 
wrong, too, wrong that he should be so casual about things. He'd been 
there. He'd seen what had happened. Or had he? He held a hand down to her 
to help her up. "We need to move quickly. I don't want to let him get too 
far ahead of us." 

	She just blinked up at him for a long minute before she reached up 
and put her hand in his. His skin was cold. She didn't want to know what 
that could mean. 


			-- * --

	"Oh, /dammit/." Reeve tore the headset microphone off of his head 
and tossed it down on his desk in frustration. "Dammit, dammit, dammit. I 
was so /close/ --"

	"What's wrong?" The voice startled him, and he looked up to see 
Rufus standing there; the sudden presence made him jump.

	"How long have you been there?" Reeve glanced at the video monitor 
that he'd set up on his desk, where his robotic alter-ego was trundling 
along behind Barret, Aerith, and Nanaki. The picture was scratchy and 
low-bandwidth, jerky and poorly-drawn, but he could see what was going on.

	"A few minutes." Rufus moved around the side of the desk to look 
at the monitor too, and Reeve felt a surge of protectiveness. He'd learned 
to almost like the rebels in the two weeks that Cait Sith had been 
traveling with them; he'd listened to what felt like hundreds of hours of 
their conversations, gotten to know what it was that motivated them. 
Gotten to know who they were. They didn't seem as dangerous as Rufus 
thought they were, once you got to know them. Once you got to see what 
they were really like. "Is that them?"

	"Yeah." Reeve looked up at Rufus, really /seeing/ him for the 
first time in a few days, and blinked. "Rufus, you look horrible. When was 
the last time you slept?" He should have known the answer to that -- 
they'd been sharing a bed, after all -- but bed was all they were sharing, 
and Rufus was awake when Reeve fell over the edge into sleep and awake 
when Reeve first opened his eyes in the morning.

	Rufus shrugged, unconcerned. "A few days. Who's that one?" He 
pointed to the screen, where Aerith was talking to a townsperson.

	Reeve stepped on the urge to tell Rufus to go away, to tell Rufus 
that he didn't want to share any of the information that he'd been 
getting. Maybe if Rufus got to know them a little, he'd understand. "Her 
name's Aerith. Aerith Gainsborough. She's the one that Hojo had caught up 
in his labs for a while -- her and the furry thing. /His/ name is Nanaki." 

	Rufus barely glanced back at Reeve. "And the big guy?"

	"Barret Wallace. He's from Corel. Or /was/ from Corel, before 
Scarlet shot the place to shit." A bit of the bitterness crept into his 
tone; /he'd/ argued that Scarlet should be fired, or at least moved into a 
position of less importance, but Rufus had answered that she was needed 
where she was, and that Rufus was keeping an eye on her.

	"Where are they by now?" Rufus frowned as, on the screen, Aerith 
turned away in what looked like despair and Barret placed his good hand on 
her shoulder. "Looks like somewhere in the mountains."

	"Nibelheim," Reeve said, shortly. "And Tifa and Cloud -- that's 
the SOLDIER and the barmaid -- just went up into the mansion. I almost 
managed to follow them, but I think Tifa thinks that something's up with 
Cait Sith. She won't have any serious conversation with me -- with Cait 
around." 

	"Hmm." Rufus frowned, studying the screen. "We've got the Turks in 
Wutai, don't we? We could get them up to Nibelheim to pick up AVALANCHE in 
a few hours, if they hustled. If we could just get them out of the way --"

	"No." Reeve surprised himself with how firm his voice was, and had 
to reach for justification for that first strident syllable. "They're not 
worth worrying about right now, Rufus. Let them chase after Sephiroth too. 
That way we have another bunch of people looking -- the Turks can't be 
everywhere. And if AVALANCHE happens to be the first people to find him -- 
well --" He gestured to the video monitor and the headset on the desk. 
"I'll know about it as soon as they do."

	~And I don't know whether or not I'll tell you immediately, and 
that thought worries me.~

	"I suppose," Rufus agreed, after a long moment of deliberation. On 
the monitor, Aerith soundlessly said something to Barret, who shrugged and 
then turned; Cait Sith's tracking monitors turned the robot as well, and 
they saw Tifa and Cloud coming down the path from the mansion, followed by 
a large man in a red cape. The man's arm seemed to end at the elbow, 
replaced by a golden claw. From studying them, Reeve could tell that Tifa 
had been shaken by something; he wondered what it could have been. He'd 
watched her grow more and more unsteady over the past two weeks, and 
wondered why each time. "Do you think that they're close?"

	But Reeve wasn't listening; he'd reached out one hand to snag the 
headset from the desk, fitting it over his head again and pushing up the 
microphone. "Shh," he said, and held up a hand for silence. "They were 
just in the mansion. I need to know --" He fell silent, his attention 
thousands of miles away.

	"--Vincent," Tifa was saying, her voice sounding even weak and 
thready than the interference from the mountains could account for. "He 
said that Hojo put him down there."

	"From what she says, it was thirty years ago," the man said, and 
his voice was deep and cavernous. "And he tells me that you seek 
Sephiroth."

	Something about the man was distressing Aerith horribly; Reeve 
could tell, and cursed for the thousandth time the fact that he couldn't 
make out details on the low-bandwidth video connection, that he couldn't 
see eyes and faces very well. She took a step forward. "You know 
Sephiroth?"

	"I knew his mother. And his father." 

	And that was all that Reeve could hear before Rufus -- his eyes 
angry -- reached over and plucked the headset from Reeve's head, tossing 
it down on the desk. "When you're done watching your little show," Rufus 
said, his voice cool, "I'll be in my office. If you'd care to join me. If 
not, you should know where to find me when you're ready to talk to me, 
instead of watching something that's going on thousands of miles away."

	"You were the one who sent me to watch them," Reeve hissed back, 
but Rufus had already turned on his heel and left Reeve's office. Reeve 
watched him go, his heart in his throat, and for half a second thought 
about following. The signal from the mountains was, of course, recording 
for later perusal. He could follow after Rufus -- they could talk --

	But if there was one thing he'd learned in all the years behind 
them, it was that there was no talking to Rufus when he was this angry. 
Better to let it go, and pick it back up later, when Rufus was calmer. 
When they could talk about it, instead of throwing angry words at each 
other. Better to wait.

	He ignored the voice in the back of his head that told him that 
Rufus hadn't been calmer for the past two months, ignored the voice that 
told him that Rufus would never /be/ calmer, and picked up the headset 
again, turning his attention back to Nibelheim once more.

			-- * --

	Tifa could feel the mountain air reaching down her throat and 
clutching at her lungs. It was settling in the depths of her chest, making 
her breathing thin and reedy, and her scars ached more than she could 
remember them aching for years. /Pneumonia as bad as you had it will mean 
that your lungs will always be delicate,/ she could hear Dr. Ellis's voice 
in her memory. /You won't be able to push yourself as far, and you might 
always have problems with high altitudes./

	~And now I'm twice-exiled from home,~ she thought, into the 
darkness of the tent she was sharing with Aerith. ~Even if -- even if 
whatever is going on made sense, I wouldn't be able to go back. I wouldn't 
be able to stay here.~ She bit her lip against the tears that were always 
threatening to choke her, these days, and took a deep breath. There was no 
point in waking Aerith up.

	"I'm awake," came the soft voice from the other sleeping bag, and 
in the moonlight filtering through the transluscent tent sides, Tifa could 
see Aerith push herself up on one elbow. "Would you -- do you want to talk 
about what's bothering you?"

	"It's all bothering me," Tifa said. "I -- I swear to you, Aerith. 
The town burned. I don't know what happened, or how it's there now and not 
destroyed, but I was there -- I /saw/ it, dammit."

	"I know." In the darkness, Aerith seemed like an apparition, and 
Tifa fought back the shiver. "I believe you. I know that you and Cloud 
wouldn't lie to us."

	"I --" The last of the hold over the secrets she'd been keeping 
snapped, and Tifa suddenly heard her own voice speaking. "Aerith, one of 
us /is/ lying to you. And I'm scared that it might be me."

	A rustle in the dark, and Aerith sat up fully, reaching over to 
take Tifa's hand in her own. The girl's skin, cool in the mountain air, 
felt soothing. "Why do you say that?"

	Tifa shook her head. It was time -- the burden had been weighing 
on her, and someone had to know. Someone had to know, in case something 
happened to her. "Look -- I was there. Here. I took the party from Shinra 
up to the reactor that we passed in the mountains. The bridge to the 
reactor broke, and we went through all sorts of crap, and then we got up 
there and they wouldn't let me in -- it's all just like Cloud said, back 
in Kalm." She took another deep breath. "I was there. Cloud wasn't."

	Aerith frowned. "Cloud -- wasn't?"

	The words came rushing out of Tifa like a flood, as though the 
mere act of finally speaking what had been weighing on her for months was 
enough to set her free. "I remember. I spent a whole day standing in the 
center of town, waiting for the Shinra soldiers to get there -- hoping 
that one of them would be Cloud. And when they got there, I remember being 
so disappointed, because Cloud wasn't there."

	"Are you /sure/?" Aerith's eyes half-glowed in the dark, like a 
cat's pupils reflecting light, and for one brief heart-stopping second it 
seemed as though they were glowing Mako-green. "He told the story as 
though he was there --"

	"I /know/ he did." Tifa brought her other hand over, caught  
Aerith's hand in both her own, and immediately felt a little better; the 
girl did have a way of making you soothed, almost as though she radiated 
peace. "And the way he told it was almost the way I remember it happening. 
But I don't think that I could have imagined being so disappointed that 
Cloud wasn't there, if he had been there."

	Aerith's face was troubled. "Why didn't you say something?" 

	Tifa shook her head. "Because I'm not /positive/. You remember -- 
he told you about how I was hurt --" Aerith nodded. "Well, I was hurt 
really badly. If it hadn't been for my teacher, I wouldn't have survived. 
The whole thing is a haze -- I don't remember a lot of what led up to it, 
and I don't remember a lot of what happened when I was hurt. But I do 
remember seeing him, when I was dying. And being glad that he had come 
back to me in time."

	"You said that he wasn't there, though." Aerith squeezed Tifa's 
hand. "Tifa, whatever it is, we can figure it out. Just please, calm down. 
Tell me what happened. Tell me what you remember."

	Tifa took a deep breath and tried to follow Aerith's advice, tried 
to calm down. "That's the problem. I don't know what I remember. I don't 
know what I believe. I remember Cloud not being there. I remember being 
disappointed that Cloud wasn't there. But I remember seeing him when I was 
dying, and I remember he tried to make me comfortable, and I remember that 
he promised to come back and try and help me when he finished what he 
needed to do." 

	Aerith seemed to be concentrating on something that only she could 
hear. "You do remember both," she finally said. "And -- they're both 
right. Or they're both wrong. I can't tell." She shook her head. "Tifa, 
you have to talk to him about it. You have to see why he tells a different 
story than you do."

	"I don't /want/ to!" Tifa's voice was a little too loud, a little 
too strident; she modulated it quickly, before Vincent, on watch, could 
hear and investigate. She dropped her eyes to their paired hands. "I don't 
want to bring it up with him. I don't want to talk about it with him. 
You've seen how unstable he is -- you didn't see him when he first showed 
up at my bar, you didn't see how close he seemed to being crazy. I just 
worry -- he's built this -- this something up in his head, this something 
to cling to, this /purpose/, and what if I'm /wrong/? What if everything 
that I think I remember is all tied up in what happened to me, and when I 
was dying I built this -- this /thing/ up in my mind, and what if I'm 
/wrong/? I don't know what it would do to him. And I don't want ... I 
don't want to take the chance," she finished, weakly.

	Aerith sighed. "You're probably right," she said, reluctantly. 
"About not telling him. At least for now. Not until we figure out what's 
going on with Sephiroth -- but Tifa, when it's over, promise me. Promise 
me that you'll find out what really happened."

	Tifa hestiated for a long moment. "All right," she finally said. 
"When it's all over. But not until then."

	Her eyes troubled, Aerith nodded. "All right. Now -- You should 
sleep. I can hear you're having trouble breathing in the air, and 
tomorrow's going to be bad -- tomorrow, we summit the mountain." As Tifa 
nodded and pulled her hands away, Aerith squeezed them one last time. "And 
thank you for telling me."

	"I had to tell someone." 

			-- * --

	The one problem with watching something that was going on on the 
other side of the world was that timezones conspired to provide as little 
sleep as possible. Reeve felt as though he was living on coffee and donuts 
delivered from downstairs, sleeping only when his body was ready to shut 
him down for five hours of dreamless sleep before the urgent thought that 
something was happening somewhere else, something that he needed to see 
and pay attention to, drove him out of bed again.

	He'd missed the discussion with the newcomer to the group, and had 
pulled the video records to skim over as much of them as he could. The man 
hadn't said much. There'd been a woman named Lucrecia, and this Vincent 
had been in love with her a little, Reeve thought. Hojo had done this to 
him, whatever it had been. And he had once been of the Turks. 

	That had startled him, and he'd gone looking through the old 
records. Sure enough, there had once been a V. Valentine listed on the 
rolls, shortly before the department had been shut down for ten years. 
Tseng had been the one to bring it back to life, when he'd left Wutai and 
joined the Shinra side. Reeve filed that piece of information aside, to 
think about it later. He had the strangest feeling that it would be 
significant.

	He stifled a yawn -- it felt like all he did, these days, felt 
like he hadn't had a good night's sleep in months, even though it had only 
been a matter of weeks that he'd been living his double life. He'd caught 
himself, once or twice, forgetting where he was -- using the thick 
Gongagan drawl of Cait Sith's voice in conversation with his subordinates, 
or on the phone. They'd given him odd looks, and he'd passed it off as 
simple exhaustion. The excuse wouldn't last for long. He needed to be 
careful. 

	He needed to talk to Rufus.

	He shied away from the thought; it hurt too badly. They'd been 
studiously ignoring each other since that conversation in his office that 
one evening. Reeve still slept in Rufus's bed, but Rufus didn't join him. 
Reeve didn't think that Rufus had slept, really slept, in a week. Rufus 
was stretched so thinly that sometimes Reeve thought that he should be 
able to see the weak Midgar sunlight shining through his body, see the 
ghostly outlines of shapes and forms through him. 

	And Rufus wouldn't talk to him. Reeve had tried, once, when Rufus 
had come back from the Grand Tour of Junon to the Gold Saucer. He'd 
expected that when Rufus came home, he would be tanned and laughing, ready 
to settle in and have dinner and spend the night playful and intense, 
feeding each other morsels from the takeout Wutaian place in the food 
court downstairs and talking about what had happend while Rufus was on his 
tour --

	The mental image rose before his eyes, and he almost put his head 
down on the desk, before he caught himself. It had been like that, once. 
Reeve clung to that knowledge like a life-line. Once, there had been 
laughter. Once, they'd spent time together because they wanted to, because 
there was a connection -- not because of whatever inertia seemed to have 
crept into their relationship since Rufus had come back from Junon only to 
find his father murdered.

	He still remembered that night, still remembered stepping out onto 
the helicopter pad on the roof to find Rufus, bruised and burned and 
bleeding. Still remembered the terror that had lept into his throat and 
mouth, still remembered the urge to throw his arms around Rufus and lead 
him away and just shelter him until everything stopped being upside-down 
and crazy and /wrong/. Had that been when it changed? Had that been when 
Rufus had turned away from him, turned into that distant golden stranger 
with the eyes of ice and the shadows marching across his face?

	Or had that happened in Junon, in that year and a half when they 
had been apart, and Reeve just hadn't noticed?

	On the screen, the video shifted and jerked its way through 
AVALANCHE talking to Cid Highwind about the old plane that the pilot had 
managed to scavenge for the space program out there in distant Rocket 
Town. It somehow didn't surprise Reeve at all when he saw Rufus there too. 
Rufus hadn't mentioned to Reeve at all that he was planning on leaving 
Midgar. Once upon a time, that fact might have upset Reeve. Now, it was 
only what he expected.

	Reeve watched the video, waiting to see if there was something he 
could do to help. To help either side. For half a minute, he was tempted 
to call Rufus on his cell phone, say something inane like "This is the 
most I've seen you in the past week and a half." The feeling passed before 
he could do more than take another gulp from his ever-present mug of 
coffee.

			-- * --

	It was beginning to feel like the headset was permanently grafted 
into his skull. Reeve thought for half a moment that perhaps he should 
implant it; it would make it easier to /find/ the damn thing when he sat 
down at his desk. The piles of paper were getting higher and higher, and 
he was starting to get better at triaging them while listening to the 
discussions that were going on elsewhere.

	He was halfway through the stack of annual performance reviews 
when his subconscious told him to listen again, and he refocused his 
attention just in time to hear, "The Keystone is the key that unlocks the 
gate to a very old temple somewhere. I heard it was the Temple of the 
Ancients."

	Reeve looked up -- the group was back at the Gold Saucer for some 
reason. He'd ignored the discussions that had led up to that destination, 
but he remembered hearing about the Keystone. Somewhere. He rubbed his 
hands over his eyes and took a deep breath. Had it been while he was 
listening in as Cait Sith, or had it been while he'd been discussing 
things in Midgar? Or had he just imagined it sounding familiar? 

	Four days prior, he had begun keeping notes, as defense against 
the treacheries of memory. Now, he flipped through them, and found what he 
was looking for after a few minutes. "Keystone - leads to Black Materia? 
Seph. needs Black Materia to put plan in motion."

	That was enough; he picked up his cell phone and dialed a number. 
Tseng answered after a few minutes, sounding grumpy. "This had better be 
good, or I /will/ shoot you."

	"It's Reeve. Can you come up to my office for a minute? I think I 
might have something for you." Reeve listened with one ear to the 
discussions going on at the Gold Saucer. They'd found the Keystone, all 
right; Dio had had it all along, at the Gold Saucer. He watched as Cloud 
-- looking put-out and irritated -- agreed to battle for the Keystone as a 
prize. 

	"I hope you know that you're one of perhaps two people in the 
world who could haul me back out of my apartment right now. I'll be there 
in a few minutes." The phone clicked off, and Reeve drummed his fingers on 
the desk. If AVALANCHE got the Keystone -- if AVALANCHE went after the 
Black Materia, they'd find Sephiroth. Should he let them go tumbling like 
innocent kittens after someone who was more powerful than they could 
imagine? Or should he risk taking it away from them, and giving it into 
the hands of Shinra? A year ago, his choice would have been plain -- but a 
year ago, Shinra was the good guys, or at least there had been good guys 
working for Shinra, and now, he wasn't as sure.

	Damn it, he /liked/ AVALANCHE. He shouldn't; he knew he shouldn't. 
But he did. And they were about to go running off after Sephiroth, and 
stand in the way of whatever Sephiroth wanted, and probably get themselves 
killed on the journey. He'd take a risk on Tseng and the Turks before he'd 
let that happen. 

	"You rang?" Tseng's voice was dry, his expression sardonic, as he 
strolled into Reeve's office. He looked as unruffled as ever, but Reeve 
got the impression that Tseng had been ready to retire for the evening; he 
looked at the clock and wasn't surprised to see that it was nearly one in 
the morning, Midgar time. 

	"Yeah. I have something for you. Hold on for one second, I need to 
call over to Dio at the Gold Saucer." He waited for Tseng's nod and placed 
the call; it was answered after a few rings. "Dio? Reeve Brannon, from 
Shinra. Look, I have a favor to ask you; can you hit a few buttons and 
keep the tram out of service for the next six hours or so? There are some 
people over there that we need to /keep/ there, and it's easier for 
everyone if they think that the tram's just out."

	On the other end of the line, Dio snorted. "Do you have any /idea/ 
how much cash I'd lose if people couldn't get over here?"

	Reeve closed his eyes. "Look, we'll cover the lost revenue, okay? 
Bill us for six hours of downtime. Or, hell, I'll just lose your power 
bill for the month and we'll call it even. I /need/ those people to stay 
where they are, Dio. It's urgent."

	"Fine, fine. I'm getting kind of sick of you people interfering 
with my business, you know. You've got six hours, and that's /it/." Dio 
hung up the phone without waiting for an answer.

	Reeve looked back at Tseng. "Do you think that you and Rude can 
get out to the Gold Saucer in six hours?"

	Tseng's interest had been piqued. "Six hours? Yeah, probably. 
We'll have to take one of the choppers and push it to absolute speed 
limit, but it should be possible. What's going down?"

	"AVALANCHE has found something called the Keystone. I don't know 
exactly what it does, but it's supposed to open the doors of something 
called the Temple of the Ancients, which is where we will allegedly find 
something called the Black Materia -- oh, this whole thing is starting to 
sound like a giant game of hide-and-go-seek combined with a fairy tale, 
but that's what Sephiroth is after." Reeve sat back in his chair and 
fished out a cigarette. "I'm still not sure where the Temple of the 
Ancients /is/, but this is probably our best chance to get our hands on 
this Keystone. Can you get out there? I'll radio out to you and tell you 
what we'll do when you get there."

	Tseng was watching Reeve carefully. "You want us to bring in 
AVALANCHE?"

	"No!" The syllable was close to a yelp, and Reeve had to fight to 
cover up the reaction. "I mean -- We should let them do the legwork of 
chasing after Sephiroth. It's saving time, and I have Cait Sith there to 
keep an eye on them. There's no sense in us wasting our time running over 
half the world when they're willing to do it for us." It sounded weak even 
to his ears.

	A little smirk was playing around the edges of Tseng's lips. "Been 
watching them a little too long, have you?"

	~Shit. Busted.~ "Been watching them until I feel like my brains 
are going to leak out of my ears, but that doesn't change the fact that 
they're willing to do the legwork and we can't spare the people to do it 
ourselves." He nearly held his breath, hoping that Tseng would accept his 
excuse. It wasn't a good idea to let /anyone/ know that you were starting 
to sympathize with the enemy, much less the head of the Turks.

	Tseng seemed to let it slide, and stood up. "I'll take the whole 
crew. We can probably be in the air within fifteen minutes or so. We'll 
take chopper two, so radio on over when you've got some sort of plan for 
us. And Reeve?"

	Reeve looked up from the ashtray as he flicked ashes off the end 
of his cigarette. "Yeah?"

	Tseng only smiled. "You're not the only one who happens to think 
that they're not entirely the bad guys. If you talk to Rufus, tell him 
we're out chasing down a lead."

	Reeve was left blinking as Tseng walked out of his office, already 
on the phone to the Turks.

			-- * --

	Tifa stifled a yawn against the back of her hand. One o'clock in 
the morning was a little too late for her to be up, but Cloud and Aerith 
hadn't come back from their exploration of the Gold Saucer yet, and she 
was beginning to get worried. (Aerith had brought up the idea to Tifa that 
evening: "I'll tell him that he still owes me that date from seeing me 
home, back in Midgar. I'll get him away from you for a while, let you have 
time to think. And maybe he'll tell me something that will help." Aerith 
had seemed to have adopted Tifa's cause as her own to champion; it was as 
thought the girl couldn't stand seeing people in pain, in confusion, 
without wanting to help.)

	The night without Cloud around to watch her every move -- or for 
her to watch his -- had been nice, Tifa was forced to admit. She'd had 
Barret to deal with, and the two newcomers, Cid and Vincent. But Barret 
could be told to go away, and Vincent didn't seem to say two words in a 
row if he could help it, and Cid, once matters had been explained to him, 
had seemed to shrug it off and take a nap. She'd wound up sitting in the 
lobby of the hotel, Red/Nanaki curled up around her feet, scritching 
behind those crimson ears and staring off into the distance, thinking. 
Nanaki had recognized both her need for solitude, and her desire not to be 
alone. 

	She smiled a little, remembering the exchange; he'd turned around 
once, twined himself between her feet, and plopped his head down on those 
massive paws. "You may scratch behind my ears," he'd said, "and I will 
pretend that it isn't beneath my dignity to purr." And they'd stayed like 
that for what felt like hours, until the rumbling purr beneath her fingers 
had drifted away to nothing more than a soft whisper.

	So; the tram was out, and hopefully it would be fixed by morning. 
They had gained something, at least, in finding the Keystone. No one had 
much of an idea where the legendary Temple of the Ancients actually was, 
but with Aerith to help, they'd find it soon enough. And once they got 
there, they would find Sephiroth (Tifa ignored the chill that ran through 
her blood at that thought) and settle the whole thing. And then she could 
go back home, and get back to her --

	The thought came up short, and she felt like swearing. ~Oh, sure, 
go back to your bar. Back to your bar that's under more metal than you can 
really conceive of. Good plan, there, Tifa. You've been running so long 
that you haven't been able to stop and think of what you're going to do 
when you can finally /stop/ running.~ She closed her eyes, taking a deep 
breath. ~Well, now's not the time to think about it. About any of it. When 
this is all over, you can go and -- I don't know, take a week in Costa del 
Sol or something. Soak up some rays, sort out your head, and figure out 
what you're going to do next. There's always something to do next. You've 
just got to find it.~

	Somewhere along the line, Midgar had become home to her; more home 
than that ghost of Nibelheim, and she didn't want to think about /that/, 
either. ~If you want a place to go back to, you should go back /there/. 
Figure out what the hell happened, figure out who those people are, figure 
out what went down and why you remember one thing and Cloud remembers 
another --~

	She drew her thoughts away from that topic, sharply. Not now. Not 
yet. One advantage of running non-stop was that you could leave the things 
you didn't want to think about far behind you, and only go back and pick 
them up when you were ready to deal with them. And she wasn't ready. Not 
yet. Maybe not ever.

	Lost in thought, she didn't notice the soft mechanical creaking of 
Cait Sith leaving the hotel until the door had already opened and it was 
out in the hallway. She opened her eyes at a sound, caught the last sight 
of the stuffed moogle making its way down the hall, and swore. As she 
struggled out of the chair she was in, Nanaki opened his one good eye. 
"What's going on?" he asked quickly.

	"I just saw Cait Sith heading out the hallway. Something's wrong. 
Come on, we need to follow it. /Quickly/." 

	It took them a few minutes to sort out tail and legs, but they 
were out in the hallway after the robot as quickly as they could be. Even 
at one in the morning, the hallways of the Gold Saucer were far from 
deserted; they caught up with Cloud and Aerith, running one way down the 
hall. "Did you see it too?" Aerith gasped, out of breath; she'd been 
holding up under the stress of their journey admirably, but sudden bursts 
of energy still taxed her. Cloud, of course, wasn't even breathing 
heavily.

	"Yes. It left the hotel a few minutes ago. Which way?" Tifa looked 
around, and cursed. "Damn, it could have taken any one of these tubes. 
Where the hell is it going?"

	"It had the Keystone," Cloud said, grimly. "Aerith, Red, you take 
the Station Square and the Event Square. Tifa, come on. We'll check the 
Round Square, the Chocobo Square, and the lobby. Meet back in the hotel in 
twenty minutes, even if you haven't found it."

	Aerith nodded grimly. "Okay. Be careful." She looked down at 
Nanaki, who looked back up at her; they made their way to the tube that 
led to the Station Square as Tifa fell into pace next to Cloud. 

	"It had the Keystone?" she asked, feeling her lungs catch; she'd 
made it over the mountains and back down to something resembling level 
ground, but running like this made her wheeze after only a few minutes.

	"Yeah," Cloud said, his eyes flicking around them, looking for 
signs. "Come on. We need to hurry."

	The Chocobo Square was deserted at this time of night; the Round 
Square had only the usual assortment of late-night fun-seekers, who looked 
up as Tifa and Cloud burst in running, and then looked back to their 
games. "Lobby," Tifa panted, grimly. "Haven't checked the lobby yet."

	When they got to the lobby, they heard the blades of the 
helicopter whirring outside, and both of them hit the doors to the outside 
at the exact same time, just in time to see Tseng leaning out the doors of 
the helicopter to catch the small green orb that the stuffed moogle tossed 
up at him. Tseng met Tifa's eyes as he tucked it into his pants pocket, 
and mouthed only a few words before the helicopter turned -- /Trust us. 
Trust him,/ she thought she read, and slid down to her knees on the front 
steps, her throat working double-time to try and supply her enough air to 
breathe.

	Cloud stalked down the stairs and grabbed the robot body in both 
his hands, pulling it up to eye-level. "What the /hell/ is going on?" he 
snapped, as the Gold Saucer security came running through the doors. Tifa 
held up a hand to them, and oddly enough, they stopped, waiting at the top 
of the stairs to see whether or not they'd be needed.

	The voice that came from the stuffed toy had nothing of the usual 
aphasic speech they'd come to recognize. "You can put me down. I'm not 
going to run off or anything."

	"Who the hell /are/ you?" Tifa asked. "You're Shinra, aren't you."

	"Yes." Even through the accent, even through the synthesized sound 
to the voice, she got the feeling that she heard actual regret. "Yes, I'm 
working for Shinra. But --" There was a long pause, and then a clicking 
noise came from the stuffed animal. When the voice came back, it no longer 
sounded synthesized, no longer sounded as though whoever was on the other 
end was feeding his words through a speech processor and allowing them to 
come out sounding however they'd like. "Look, I can't tell you who I 
really am, but it's not what you think it is. I've been keeping /them/ off 
of /your/ backs for the last three weeks, and there are a few of us on 
this end of the connection who are trying to figure out the best way to 
handle this for /all/ parties concerned. Not just Shinra."

	"And you expect us to believe that?" Cloud snorted. "You've got a 
lot of nerve, you know? What do think we're going to do, tell you all is 
forgiven and let you keep tagging along at our heels?"

	"That's exactly what you're going to do." Tifa got the unnerving 
feeling that the cat's glassy eyes were looking directly at her and Cloud 
in turn. "Because when I first encountered you people, I didn't think all 
that much of you, just like you don't think much of us. But I've watched 
you over the past few weeks, and -- It's not like that anymore. Look. I 
think that we can work together in this. Right about now, I could be 
threatening you with dire consequences if you don't do what I say, but I 
don't think that would be very helpful. Let's just say that I've been up 
all night with the records, and I know where we're going, and I know what 
we're going to have to do, and I'll tell you what I know if you tell me 
what you know."

	"What's your name?" Tifa asked, quietly. She could hear something 
in the voice, hear something that made her think -- But no. It couldn't be 
Tseng; she'd seen Tseng in the helicopter, seen Rude at the controls, Reno 
in the chopper behind Tseng. It wasn't one of the Turks. But whoever it 
was on the other end of the radio had the same sound to his voice, the 
sound of someone who really might have been a decent human being 
underneath all of the bullshit, somewhere.

	She could have sworn she heard the toy sigh. "I can't tell you 
that right now. I will, before this is all over. Look, this is dangerous 
for me, too. /You're/ holding a stuffed toy body over there, and if 
anything happens to that -- well, I'm safe back at the Shinra building, no 
harm caused. But there are things going on on /this/ end of the connection 
that could put me in more danger than you're in right now, and I /don't 
know what those things are/. I can't risk it." A pause, and then, "Damn 
it, you idiots, you picked up someone who'd been asleep in a basement for 
thirty years with no questions asked, will you believe for ten seconds 
that someone from Shinra might be telling you the truth?"

	Disgusted, Cloud dropped the toy; it bounced as it hit the stairs, 
and then righted itself. "You've got one more chance," he informed it, his 
tone cool. "And if you're lying to us, don't think that I won't find out 
who you are and go back to Midgar and put a sword in your head."

	"If this doesn't work," Tifa heard the toy say in an undertone -- 
as though whoever was on the other side of the connection had forgotten to 
turn off the microphone -- "someone else will probably save you the 
trouble." 

			-- * --

	"All right," Tseng said, over the headset. Reno had taken over for 
Rude at the controls of the chopper; Rude was sitting in the cargo hold, 
methodically checking over his ammunition and re-loading his guns. Elena, 
wide-eyed and pale, watched Tseng like a hawk. "We've got a location. The 
mission is to get in, get Sephiroth, get whatever Sephiroth is after, and 
get /out/. As quickly as possible. The suspect is to be considered heavily 
armed and extremely dangerous. Rude, I'll take Elena with me after 
Sephiroth, and you go after this materia. Reno, you'll stay at the 
controls of the chopper to get us /out/ of there when we get back."

	"What're you gonna be doing, boss?" Reno's voice from the cockpit, 
over the radio, sounded concerned. "You ain't gonna be a hero, are you?"

	Tseng snorted. "I haven't lived to my ripe old age by going for 
the gun-blazing heroics, Reno. Elena and I are well-armed enough to take 
Sephiroth out."

	"Um." Elena raised one shaking hand at that. "Sir --"

	Tseng suppressed the urge to groan. "Yes, Elena?"

	"I had to get dressed in a hurry when the call came -- I forgot my 
gun, sir."

	From the cockpit, Reno launched into a volley of invective on 
everything from Elena's ancestry to her hygeine. Tseng snapped, "/Belay/ 
that, Reno." 

	"You can have one of mine," Rude said. 

	Tseng shook his head. "No, you only have one backup. And you're 
probably going to need it." He reached in his holster and pulled out his 
.44, handing it to Elena. "Here. Take this, dammit. And if I ever catch 
you out of your apartment without carrying yours, I'll bust you all the 
way back to making the fucking /coffee/."

	Elena stumbled with the roll of the helicopter as she took the 
gun. "But sir -- won't that leave you without --"

	"I have the .22, and I brought these." Tseng reached down and 
picked up the twin katana that were lying on the seat, strapping himself 
into their harness. 

	"Against Sephiroth?" Rude's quiet voice wasn't a rebuke, just a 
request for reasoning. Tseng glanced at him.

	"I was the one who taught him swordplay. We might be fighting in 
close quarters, and you know as well as I do what the odds are against a 
shot that will kill, instead of simply wound. And I don't think that just 
wounding him will do a damn sight of good." Tseng looked at the two who 
were riding in the back of the helicopter with him, and knew that Reno was 
listening in. "Those are orders, people; try to take him alive if you can, 
but if you can't, /don't hesitate to strike to kill/." 

	"Boss, he's already dead."

	"I said /enough/, Reno." Tseng pointed at Elena. "This is your 
last chance, Elena. In or out? If you're in, you're all the way in. If you 
fuck up, you may well cost someone's life, and it won't necessarily be 
yours."

	Elena swallowed heavily. "I'm -- In, sir. I can do it."

	Tseng nodded. "All right. Reno, how much further?"

	Reno's voice was unhappy. "Coming in for landing now, boss. You 
sure you don't want to take me in with you?"

	Tseng tested the fit of the sword-harness. "I need your hands on 
the controls out here, Reno." He didn't say, because he knew that at least 
two of the three who were listening already knew it, that he wanted to 
make sure that at least one person got out of the place alive. "Once we're 
in that place, the radios are going to be dead -- the walls are too thick, 
and we don't have strong enough equipment. You all know your orders, you 
know the timeline -- get in, get out, and get /home/."

	The Turks moved together like a well-oiled machine; even Elena fit 
into that pattern perfectly. Tseng wouldn't have hired her if she hadn't, 
but watching her press herself against the side of the wall and signal to 
Rude to take point, he nodded to himself. A little more seasoning, and 
she'd do the job just fine. He'd brought her with him to test her, out in 
the field, where it counted. He was beginning to believe that she might 
fit the job after all. He didn't speak until they were halfway through the 
maze inside the temple. "Elena."

	She looked back over at him, quickly. "Sir?"

	Tseng made a quick and wry mental note not to startle her when she 
had her weapons drawn. He himself had left his backup gun in its holster, 
his swords sheathed; walking through the corridors without the false sense 
of safety afforded by a drawn weapon sharpened his senses. He felt as 
though he could hear the very walls themselves breathing. "You're doing 
all right so far, you know. It's normal to be nervous."

	Elena took a deep breath and let it out on a sigh. "Yes, sir -- I 
/am/ nervous. I mean -- Sephiroth --"

	"You never knew him, did you." Tseng most carefully did not append 
"before he died".

	She shook her head. "No, sir -- we never interacted, I never met 
him -- I'd heard stories, of course. I mean, everyone did. But I didn't 
know him." She whirled around at a noise; Tseng noted with satisfaction 
that her hands were steady, her aim true, as she whipped up her gun. No 
matter that she was only aiming at a mouse; her instincts were sound. 

	"The stories that you heard were most probably true," Tseng said, 
softly. "And then some. We don't know what's going on here, why Sephiroth 
is apparently back from the dead. But however dangerous you think he is, 
he's most likely twice as deadly." He noted, with a vague sense of 
amusement, the last of her color drain from her face. "Does that scare 
you?"

	Elena took one hand at a time off of her gun, wiping her palms on 
the pants of her suit. "More than you can know, sir."

	"Good." He was already looking ahead of them. "Fear will keep you 
alive." He gestured with his chin. "Over there. I think that's a door."

	The door led onto a long corridor, the corridor onto a pool of 
light in the middle of the floor. They looked at it carefully. "I think 
it's some sort of power source, sir," Elena finally said, her voice 
hushed.

	Tseng wondered at that. Couldn't she feel it? It was like sunlight 
against skin that had been too long in the city. "You could call it that," 
he said, dryly, and nodded to the other side of the pathway. 
"Spirit-energy. Life-energy. Don't get too close to it; you won't like 
what it does to you."

	Elena spared a glance back at him as they moved on. "You've felt 
it before?"

	"I'm from Wutai," Tseng said, shortly. He was used to people 
already knowing the story, used to being able to pass off his most bizarre 
pronouncements with that simple sentence, but she only looked more 
puzzled. He sighed and took pity on her. "There's a great deal of mystic 
tradition in the Wutaian martial arts. I was a student of those arts for 
years. It sensitizes you to some of the more -- esoteric disciplines."

	He could tell that she didn't understand, but she nodded anyway. 
They made their way deeper into the temple, door by door. It was when they 
opened the last door that Tseng could feel it, a weight pressing behind 
his eyes. 

	"The walls," Elena breathed, and forgot the gun in her hands long 
enough to take two steps towards them, craning her neck backwards to drink 
in the murals painted before them. "Is this -- are these from the 
Ancients?"

	The hair on the back of Tseng's neck was crawling. "It's a diagram 
of how to find the Promised Land," he said, and wondered for half a moment 
whether or not she could hear the creeping knowledge in his voice. "Go 
back to the helicopter and radio your report back to Midgar. Rufus is 
going to want to know what's down here. I'll get the Black Materia and be 
right behind you." 

	Elena looked back at him, startled, and he nodded. "Quickly. 
Carefully. Watch your back, and watch to your left -- you're still too 
easy to sneak up on from that side. Get up there quickly, and then get 
back down here and meet me. AVALANCHE is going to be along soon enough, 
and I want to be out of here before they get here."

	She looked as though she was debating something for a minute, and 
then nodded. "Yes, sir. Be careful." With only those words, she was back 
out the door, headed for the surface. 

	Tseng watched her go, and then turned his head to study the walls. 
The script was half-familiar, teasing at the side of his brain that had 
often wondered whether or not -- if one went back far enough -- the 
languages of Midgar and that of Wutai had a common ancestor. He moved down 
the corridor, taking in each new panel carefully, trying to piece together 
what they were saying, and finally came to a ziggurat on a table at the 
far end.

	"This has to be it," he said, softly, and reached out a hand to 
touch it.

	The temple itself shook; Tseng pulled his hand back, frowning, and 
then touched it again. Another earthquake. Trapped, obviously; he leaned 
over, without touching it again, and studied the table it was sitting on. 
The model was a near-perfect representation of the temple itself. 
Frowning, he realized why the room stank so redolently of magic; there was 
an old spell here, one that he didn't think that could be broken to get 
the Black Materia whole and sound.

	~Might as well let AVALANCHE try and figure it out, and then take 
it from them later,~ he thought, and then snorted. Much as he hated to 
admit it, they probably /could/ figure it out; they had the most eclectic 
assortment of people -- /creatures/ -- ever to fit into one group, and he 
wouldn't put it past them to come up with something. 

	He turned, ready to leave the room and wait for the arrival of the 
other group, and his gun was in his hand before he even realized he was 
drawing it, because Sephiroth was standing on the other side of the 
corridor with his sword in his hand. In between him and the door.

	"Thank you for opening the door," Sephiroth said, politely, and 
the hair on the back of Tseng's neck stood on end at the sound of it. It 
should have been hissing and clicking like a bad film recording. It 
sounded perfectly normal. It was his first time this close to the 
apparition, and it had been years since Tseng had known the meaning of the 
word "fear" before now. 

	His first, instinctive shot took Sephiroth right in the center of 
the forehead; the bullet tore through skin and bone, in a shot that should 
have left Sephiroth flat out on the floor with his brains leaking out 
through the hole in his skull. /If you're going to shoot, shoot to kill./ 
The .22 wasn't heavy enough to go clean through bone on the other side, 
but it should have been enough, dammit. 

	It should have been enough.

	Sephiroth jerked back at the impact, and his left hand twitched. 
Tseng fired again before he even saw the first bullet hit, and that bullet 
shattered Sephiroth's cheekbone. It didn't seem to even slow Sephiroth 
down. "I am becoming one with the Planet," Sephiroth said, distinctly. 
/The left side of the brain is specialized for language./ 

	Tseng's world narrowed down to the ten feet between them, the 
thing that he was facing. His mind was crystal-clear with the zanshin of 
fact, action, counter-action. Reddish-purple blood flowed down Sephiroth's 
left cheek, and still he took another step forward. "The way is here. The 
path is before me."

	Tseng could see shards of bone beneath the blood, shattered 
grey-white chips flecking and parting. Fighting the nausea, he fired 
again, and again; his fourth bullet caught the thing at the temple, 
freeing a spill of brains and fluid to cascade down that formerly handsome 
face. /When you only have six bullets, be sure to make them count./ "Don't 
fear," the Sephiroth-thing said, and its voice was a grotesque purr. "You 
will live on, through me. Together, we will free Mother, and she will 
reward you for your service."

	The fifth bullet clanged uselessly against Sephiroth's sword. 
Tseng could feel his breath sounding in his ears. The world had narrowed 
down to just the few feet between them. Dimly, he realized that he should 
probably be scared, but it was too late for fear. 

	The sixth bullet went through Sephiroth's left eye. /The eye is 
composed of vitreous humor and aquaeous humor. When the ocular nerve is 
damaged, the target loses sight./ Tseng didn't expect the sixth bullet to 
have any more effect than the first five. "Hidogami," he said, dropping 
the gun and pulling his swords in a single smooth motion. "Whatever you 
are, you're not the man I knew."

	He tried to ignore the voice in the back of his head, independent 
of training and strategy, that told him that something that could ignore 
six bullets to the head probably wouldn't be bothered by his swords. The 
skin that was hanging down over the ruins of Sephiroth's face began to 
squirm, as though it were trying to repair itself, to stretch back over 
the wounds, and Tseng knew himself for a dead man.

	"All right," he said, and faced down the thing that was walking 
towards him. "Let's dance."






[Thanks to Arielle and W2 for making the scene that became the end of this 
chapter as creepy as humanly possible. It's always good to have friends 
who spend time researching gunshot wounds to the head.]