Archive of Our Own

Claudia Strife dipped the teaspoon into the pan that is bubbling on her stove and blew on the mixture to cool it before tasting it. Hmmm… maybe a little more thyme was needed? The dried herbs hang to the side of the old-fashioned range cooker in her little house, so it takes but a moment to reach up, find the right leaves and crumble some into the pot. Another taste and it’s already much better.

Beef stew may not be exciting, but it’s hearty and filling. She’s even got some potatoes ready to accompany it, and a few fresh carrots from the garden. It may be the last day of September but the garden is still producing – it’ll be another few weeks until the frosts truly start and the land falls barren over winter.

Today’s meal is far too much for one. Honestly, it’s probably enough to feed eight people, but that’s not a problem. She’ll be able to use leftovers for the next few days. And besides, Claudia has ulterior motives tonight. She’s determined to get Cloud home for a proper meal, and she needs the stew as leverage.

Nibelheim is a small and insignificant town in a part of the Western continent that barely sees other travellers and, as such, it is very insular and small minded. The inhabitants broadly had the mentality of cave trolls, namely that the men had to be the breadwinners while the women stayed at home and tended the house. Women were also not expected to think or have opinions, at least not according to the men folk.

Chocobo-shit, in Claudia’s opinion. She had eyes and she had a brain and she was going to use them both. And her eyes and her brain were telling her that something was going on with the town’s latest visitors, so she planned to first get Cloud over for dinner and then grill him to get to the bottom of what on Gaia was happening with the SOLDIERs.

The stew just needed to simmer for a little longer, so she washed her hands and looked out the window. Holding the towel lightly in her hands, Claudia peered forwards and looked at the skies above. There was something heavy in the air today, a sense of foreboding settling over the whole village like a suffocating blanket. Claudia shivered despite the warmth emanating from the stove.

She was jolted out of her reverie by a knock on the door in a very familiar pattern. Thankful that she wouldn’t have to try to find her son in the village, Claudia strode over and wrenched it open.

“Cloud!”

She stumbled to a halt, staring in surprise at the small group that were congregated on her doorstep. Cloud, and it could only be Cloud despite the fact he was still wearing that ridiculous Shinra uniform with a helmet that covered most of his face, was at the front with his hand raised as he prepared to knock again. But behind him were two figures that she really didn’t expect to grace her doorstep today. The two SOLDIERs.

Both were faces she recognised, one from the news articles that Cloud used to devour when he still lived at home and the other as he had been running around the village like a headless chicken for the last week. All three men were unusually tense. Cloud shuffled in place, the dark haired one wore a worried expression and Sephiroth had his arms folded across his chest and his openly hostile green eyes were staring straight at her. She took a moment to properly scrutinise the face of her son’s idol, noting the lank hair, pale skin and his oddly blank expression.

“Mom…” Cloud started to say, but Claudia shook her head to interrupt him. Opening the door wider, she stepped to the side to let them through. “I think you’d better all come in.”

Cloud paused just in front of her, the SOLDIERs forced to push past both of them to get further into the house. Claudia never took her eyes from Sephiroth, who stopped at the end of the hall and looked around with dead eyes.

“This is a waste of my time. I shall return to the manor.”

“No, wait!” The other SOLDIER spread his arms wide, physically stopping him from leaving. “We only just got here, we can’t go yet!” He shot a pleading glance over his shoulder at Cloud, who just shrugged helplessly. Claudia took a deep breath. She didn’t know what was going on, but it was time she took charge of the situation.

“You boys have excellent timing,” she said breezily as she brushed past them all into her living area. “The stew is nearly ready. Can you go and get some more potatoes from the cold store, Cloud?”

“…sure.” Cloud took off his helmet and shook his blond hair back into its customary spikes before disappearing out the back door of the house. Claudia walked over to the table and pulled out a seat for Sephiroth. Reluctantly and almost robotically he walked over and sat himself down.

“Now,” Claudia said, turning to the other SOLDIER. “I know I’ve seen you in the village but I’m not sure what your name is.”

“Zack, ma’am,” the boy replied, with almost a roguish grin.

“And I’m Claudia. Can you find the bowls in the left-hand side of that cupboard and lay the table please?” She gestured to an old wooden sideboard that had been in her family for as long as she could remember. Giving a lazy salute, the SOLDIER complied.

Sephiroth made to stand, but Claudia wasn’t having that. The boy looked dead on his feet. No matter what he thought he needed to do for Shinra, it could wait.

“You aren’t going anywhere until you get some food inside you.” She told him sternly. “Sit down.”

She expected him to argue with her, but instead he settled back in his chair obediently whilst looking surprised. He remained silent while Claudia finished the stew and set Cloud peeling the potatoes he’d brought in.

“Here,” she spooned some of the stew into the bowls Zack had managed to find. “Get started on this, there is plenty more when it came from.” After putting the rest of the potatoes on to boil, she took her own seat and watched carefully as the boys started eating.

Cloud and Zack tucked straight in, the latter making appreciative noises while Cloud gave her the small smile that meant he was enjoying it. Sephiroth dipped his spoon in cautiously and retrieved a hunk of beef, sniffing it carefully before slowly putting it into his mouth. He wore a thoughtful expression as he chewed, but he went back for a second spoonful so she counted it as a win and could turn her attention to her own meal.

The clatter of a spoon in an empty bowl came soon after. Sephiroth almost looked surprised at how quickly he’d emptied the bowl, but before he could say anything she’d served him a second helping, this time with potatoes. “There’s plenty to go around,” Claudia told him with a smile, returning to her own bowl.

It was after Sephiroth’s third bowl that he started to sway. Alarmed, Claudia rose from her seat but Zack beat her to it, catching the taller SOLDIER as he slowly slipped sideways. “What’s wrong?” Zack asked, giving Sephiroth a small shake.

Claudia put her hand on his arm to stop him. “When was the last time he slept?” She asked calmly.

“I don’t know… the night before we went to the reactor? Six days ago?”

Claudia was taken aback at that, any normal human would be hallucinating by now. Still, she tried to keep the alarm from her face so the boys didn’t get any more worried. “Then he’s probably just exhausted. He’ll need to go on my bed as he’s too tall for yours, Cloud. I’ll sleep in your room and you boys can sleep on the sofas out here.”

With Cloud coming forward to shoulder Sephiroth’s other arm, they managed to manhandle the tall SOLDIER into her room. With practised fingers Zack removed his sword harness and coat while Cloud struggled with the boots before Claudia covered him with her favourite blanket. She paused, brushing a lock of silver hair out of his eyes. Asleep like this he looked so much younger than he had earlier. It reminded her that even the great Sephiroth was barely more than a child. She felt a surge of anger for those who had allowed him to witness such horrors in his short life that the weight he carried caused him to look a decade older.

Zack and Cloud were in the kitchen, Cloud dutifully filling the kettle to place on the stove. Zack was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest. When he saw Claudia, he straightened and ran a hand nervously through his slicked back hair.

“Mrs Strife, ma’am, I can explain-”

Claudia held up a hand to stop him. “Tea first.” She busied herself pulling out mugs while the water heated. The boys hovered uselessly, not sure what to do with themselves.

Once the tea was made, she brought it out to the main room and placed it on the low table that sat between two sofas. She poured herself a cup first and then two more, placing them pointedly in front of the opposite sofa so that Zack and Cloud would come and sit facing her. Slinking almost guiltily into their seats, they kept their eyes averted while she picked up her own cup and took a sip. Placing it back carefully on the table, she sat up straight and folded her hands into her lap.

“Now, I think that you should tell me exactly what has been going on.”

Cloud looked expectantly at Zack, who swallowed nervously but met her eyes. Then, haltingly at the start but growing more fluid as he went on, he did.

And what a tale he had to tell. Of people turned into experiments and falling apart, of clones made of former comrades in a desperate bid to find a way to survive, of having to kill his own mentor whose mind and body were failing. Of her son, caught up throughno fault of his own on the periphery of the whole saga but now a part of it. Of the man in the other room, abandoned by his closest confidants and left stranded amongst the cesspit that was Shinra and slowly losing himself in the process.

When Zack finished his story, a silent fell upon them. Claudia thought of all she had heard and came up with two main conclusions. The first was that Shinra’s depravity was deeper than she could ever have guessed and that the people of Nibelheim had been fools to ever believe in their hollow promises. The second was that all three of these young men desperately needed guidance right now, and it looked as though she was the only one in a position to provide it.

“Right.” She said, after taking another fortifying sip of tea. “This is what we are going to do. The two of you are going to go back and get all the books from the mansion basement and bring them back here. Then we are all going to read through them and find out exactly what has caused Sephiroth to get so lost in his own for the last six days that he has neither eaten nor slept.”

“Yes ma’am!” Zack said confidently, jumping up.

“Um… there are a lot of books down there.” Cloud, ever the cautious one, pointed out.

“Then you’d best get moving.” Claudia told him firmly. “By my reckoning we probably have until mid-morning tomorrow to understand at least the gist of it. Start with whatever books he was reading last and work back from there.”

“Got it,” Zack said confidently. “C’mon Cloud, let’s move.”

As she watched them both furtively slink across the square towards the road to the mansion, Claudia sighed deeply and wondered, not for the first time that evening, exactly what she had got herself into.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

In another life, the morning of October first would be the morning that Sephiroth set out from Shinra mansion with a mission to eradicate humanity’s stain on the planet. Fuelled by anger over their disregard for the world that had been gifted to them and the sacrifice made by the Ancients, he would have started with the town he found beyond the mansion's walls. He would have cut down all who stood in front of him, regardless of whether they were men or women, young or old.

He might have spared a fleeting thought for the blonde woman who dared to raise a shotgun in his direction as he razed her village. Even though the pellets bounced harmlessly off him, he recognised something of a kindred spirit in her - the ferocity of a cœurl defending her home.

And perhaps, when an otherwise insignificant infantryman set upon him in the Nibel reactor like a wildcat and cut into him deeper than anyone had ever managed before, he might look at the fierce blue eyes and the set of the jaw and think ‘but of course.’

In this life, in the early hours of first of October εγλ0002, when Sephiroth could have been out slaughtering the inhabitants of a small mountain village, he slept. Even when Claudia got up to light the large stove and the livestock called loudly for their breakfasts, he slept. With a contented and full stomach for the first time in months, his body catching up on days of sleeplessness, he continued to sleep well beyond daybreak.

When he had finally rested enough, Sephiroth found himself waking up from a long and deep sleep in a bed that should not logically have been as comfortable as it was. Despite being arranged diagonally across the bed his feet were still hanging off the end of it. There was a worn, brown blanket thrown over him that was surprisingly soft despite its haggard appearance. Sitting up, he realised his torso was bare but that he was still wearing his trousers. Looking around the small room he found his harness hung on the back of a chair with his long leather coat folded neatly on the seat. On top of the pile was a faded polo shirt with a muted striped design. Hesitantly, Sephiroth pulled it on. The stitches creaked ominously as it stretched over his chest but just about held.

He looked out the window, blinking in surprise at how light it was outside. The sun was high in the sky, suggesting it was nearing midday. He took a moment to orientate himself, realising that he was in one of the small houses that faced the inn from the other side of the village square.

The memories of the night before took a little longer to come back, despite his mind being clearer than it had been in days. Sephiroth vaguely remembered Zack irritating him whilst he was working, refusing to leave. It got to the point where Sephiroth had agreed to follow the other SOLDIER just to get him to go away. Then the short walk across the town and… a blonde boy? Or was it a woman? He rubbed at his temple just above his left eye. At least his headache seemed to finally be receding. But there was a persistent, nagging itch underneath his skin to get moving. Sephiroth considered his next move. If he wasn’t getting answers in the mansion then perhaps it was time to go back to the reactor and find out what was there.

He picked up his harness and coat and left the room. The soft sound of murmuring voices pulled him through the single storey house and towards the living room, where he froze in surprise at the sight in front of him.

The room was full of books, stacked in several piles in a seemingly random way. Nestled amongst them were three people, diligently flicking through the books and skimming passages. Zack was sitting on a sofa, hunched over a coffee table where he was making notes on a sheaf of paper with one hand whilst holding an open book with another. A blonde woman was at a dining table, flipping quickly through a notebook that he recognised as one he had been poring over the previous day in the mansion basement. The third person, another blonde, was sprawled on his stomach on a rug with several books propped in front of him.

“But this contradicts what you just said, Zack. This Gast bloke says that he thinks they were wrong, that the Jenova thing wasn’t an Ancient but something else. The ‘calamity’, whatever that is.” The young man scrunched his nose up as he read through the unfamiliar words. Sephiroth recognised him now as one of the troopers from his voice, but he was speaking confidently and nothing like the nervous stutters and grunts he’d given on the way into Nibelheim.

“That seems a turnaround from his earlier notes,” the woman said, picking out a passage in the journal with her index finger.

“Yeah… something about finding a true Ancient provided him with the empirical evidence that contradicted the hypothesis. What does that even mean?” He glanced up, impossibly blue eyes widening when they saw Sephiroth standing in the doorway. “Sir!” He scrambled upright, somehow managing to salute without either falling or knocking over a tower of books. Sephiroth raised an eyebrow at the low-slung jogging bottoms and old t-shirt the blonde was wearing, which had ridden up due to the salute to provide a glimpse of a toned abdomen.

“Sephiroth!” Zack bounded over, distracting him from his perusal of the blonde. “You’re up!” He clasped Sephiroth on his upper arm, causing Sephiroth’s eyes to widen as he looked down at the offending limb. “Oh yeah, sorry.” Zack pulled his arm back and rubbed the back of his head awkwardly.

“There is tea in the pot on the side,” the blonde women, whose name Sephiroth now thought he remembered as Claudia, murmured softly as she barely looked up from her reading. “Cloud, can you find him something to eat please?”

“Sure, mom.” The younger man climbed to his feet, still holding on to the text he was reading. He walked over to a small kitchen area and pulled out a bowl, some cereals and a loaf of bread. “I don’t know what you like,” he said quietly in a shy voice, a reversal of his confident tone from a moment before. His eyes cast downwards and his face flushed. Sephiroth idly wondered if the heightened colour would cause his cheeks to be hot if Sephiroth were to reach out and touch them.

Pulling his eyes away, Sephiroth’s gaze fell instead on the book in his hands. It immediately grabbed his attention.

“I have not seen that one.”

Cloud looked down, his eyes widening. “Oh. I, um, found it hidden under the floor. In the basement. Sir.”

“May I?” Sephiroth held out his hand expectantly and Cloud dutifully handed the book over. Immediately Sephiroth flicked the cover open, recognising Professor Gast’s distinctive handwriting.

He walked over to take a seat at the rustic dining table, becoming engrossed in the words on the pages in front of him. This was an unusual book, in that the information seemed to contradict some of the other texts that Gast had written.

“Were there more where you found this?”

“Yeah… the ones on the rug there.” A hunk of bread and honey was placed in front of him and Sephiroth blindly reached for it, his eyes still scrolling through the words on the page in front of him.

“Wait, I’ve seen this one before.” Claudia strode over to the rug and picked a volume up. “It even has the same name. That’s odd.” She returned to the table and her original seat diagonally across from Sephiroth. He placed his book down and watched as she grabbed a slim journal that matched the one she'd just picked up and quickly ran through the pages. “It’s the same in places, but not others.”

“In what way?”

“Well most of it does seem to be a copy, but some sentences have been changed. For example, this section here. It talks about Project S which we’ve gathered is, well, you. This book that was on the library table says ‘A child was successfully created, heralding a new era of scientific advancements. Born of Jenova herself and developed through the combined knowledge of those working on the Jenova project, he will be destined to lead Shinra to greatness.’ ”

Zack snorted. “No offence, Sephiroth, but those are big words to live up to.”

Sephiroth frowned. “I had read that. Jenova is my mother’s name, and Genesis confirmed that I was indeed born as part of an experiment.”

Claudia was frowning at the second book, the one she’d taken from the pile Cloud had amassed. “But this one doesn’t say that at all. It actually talks about two women. Listen. ‘The partners of two of the project’s principle scientists offered themselves up to take part in the experiment. Gillian and Lucretia-’ ”

Zack leapt up and almost vaulted over the sofa to get to her. “Gillian? But that was Angeal’s mom’s name!”

Claudia glared at him and he settled for peering over her shoulder with an apologetic expression. “As I was saying. ‘Gillian and Lucretia were honoured to have two strands of the Jenova project named after them. From this time, they became known as Project G for Gillian and Project S for Sephiroth, the name Lucretia had already chosen for her future child.’ ”

Sephiroth stared blankly at her, trying to process what he had heard. Lucretia, a human   woman, had offered to take part in the Jenova project. In her honour, the branch of the project was called Project S because she already knew she would call her child Sephiroth.

Could it be…?

“Hey, you ok?” Blue eyes peered worriedly into his and Sephiroth blinked, once. “Your eyes were kinda going funny then.” Cloud said, the blush rising on his face again as he stepped backwards.

“Glowy!” Zack added helpfully.

“This must be a shock, dear,” Claudia said sympathetically, patting his arm before standing from the table. “I’ll make us some tea.”

“I just don’t understand,” Sephiroth said eventually. “All my life Hojo has been telling me that my mother was named Jenova, and I come here and find that I was born as part of an experiment using an Ancient that went by that name. But then… there was apparently a woman called Lucretia who was also involved and indeed chose my name. Who am I really?”

“I know I don’t know much,” Zack started, rubbing the back of his neck. “But something stinks about this. First Genesis, then Angeal – now you? All tied into together with cells and ancients and I don’t like it one bit.”

“Some of this is a bit beyond my understanding,” Claudia admitted as she returned with a steaming mug that she placed in front of Sephiroth. “But these discrepancies – someone is trying to alter history. We can’t trust anything that we read here, I don’t think.”

“Except maybe these.” Cloud waved the book he’d found around. “Because, sorry sir, but it’s far more likely that a normal woman was actually your mom than a two thousand year old corpse.”

Sephiroth raised a brow at the tone but didn’t disagree.

“I don’t get it.” Zack said, shaking his head. “Why go to all this effort?”

“This is Hojo’s doing.” A sick feeling stole over Sephiroth. “This whole mission was manufactured to have me come into contact with these documents.”

“That seems rather elaborate.” Claudia told him, nudging his cup of tea ever closer until Sephiroth eventually picked it up. “And we certainly have had problems with dragons encroaching from the mountains. We did need someone to come and sort them out.”

“It’s the only logical explanation. The president requested that I look into the matter personally, notionally to appease Heidegger, but that should have been the first sign that something was amiss. It was unprecedented. At the time, I was too pleased to be away from my desk and Midgar to concern myself overmuch with it. But specifically investigating the reactor, with Jenova’s name plastered all over it, to finding these falsified records… it all points to Hojo. But why? Is it just his hubris and ongoing need to prove his superiority over a dead man? Or something else?”

No one had an answer to that, and a silence crept over the room. Sephiroth eventually started to drink his cooling cup of tea, thanking Claudia softly as he did so. Collecting one of the other journals found in the hidden compartment beneath the floor, Sephiroth opened it and began to read Professor Gast’s distinctive handwriting.

The further he got through the book, the more the bile started to rise in his throat. It detailed the results of Project G, the first of the two projects to be borne to fruition. He had read about the experiments that led to his own creation over the last few days in the mansion basement, but to see others subjected to a similar procedure… he felt a sick horror as he read about how Gillian was injected with Jenova cells, her blood then given to an unknown pregnant woman so that her unborn child would inherit some of Jenova’s traits. How Gillian – Hollander’s partner – then became pregnant herself. But how neither child displayed any obvious traits of the Ancients and so the experiment was deemed to be a failure and they were just cast aside. At least, once Sephiroth himself was born a year or two later. Then Genesis was shuffled off to be raised by influential Shinra donors and Gillian took Angeal to be raised in the same small village so she could keep an eye on both boys she felt responsible for.

Sephiroth closed the book and took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. If he had been created with Jenova’s cells in a similar way – though not identical – to Genesis and Angeal, did that make them brothers? Were they the family he had been searching for all along? And yet now one was dead and the other had been slowly driven mad – he had failed them both in every way.

His self-recrimination was cut short by Zack exclaiming loudly. “Hey, look at this one!” The other SOLDIER flicked through the back of the journal he’d just picked out, showing that most of it was blank. “I wonder what happened?”

“Professor Gast died when I was about six years old.” Sephiroth told him. “It must be the last journal he wrote.”

“If he died, then who put the books under the floor?” Cloud asked, looking over at them with a slight frown.

“This Gast guy was seriously having doubts,” Zack said as he read on. “Apparently he tried to shut the experiments down? Something about evidence showing that Jenova was not an Ancient after all. But… apparently President Shinra wasn’t happy about it, gave control to Hojo instead because he promised him super soldiers. Ouch…”

“I am beginning to see why Shinra might have tried to hide this.” Claudia said grimly, tapping the front of the journal that she had closed. “There are things in here that could ruin its reputation if it was to get out.”

“So instead they have supplanted it with lies, and then sent me to find them. Almost as though… it is a continuation of the experiment.” Sephiroth set his own book aside and stared down at the worn wooden grain on the table.

He jerked in surprise when a hand wrapped gently around his clenched fist. His eyes traced up the attached arm to look into warm blue eyes. “You are not an experiment.” Claudia told him gently. “And you don’t have to do what they want you to, if it isn’t what you also want. You have free will.”

Sephiroth shook his head in denial. “To them, I am just an asset.”

“But to us you are far, far more.” The hand squeezed him once before she let go. “And as my ma once told me, if you don’t like the rules then it’s time to stop playing the game.”

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Claudia gave her pot a stir, the simple vegetable soup simmering gently. It was simple fare but hearty, it should fill the stomachs of the three men still sitting in her house. Judging by how much they’d eaten the day before they all had big appetites. Even her Cloud, who was much taller and broader than he’d been when he left home. He would never reach Sephiroth’s height, true, but he was still young yet and probably had a bit of growing to go.

She glanced in the breadbin before conceding defeat. She’d have to go and see if Gladys still had some left down at the store, there wasn’t enough left to feed all of them. She could even ask Gladys if she remembered a pregnant woman up at the mansion – Gladys always boasted of her ability to remember faces. It might be nice to give Sephiroth a more human view of his mother, given that he’d only learnt her name today.

Claudia put the lid on her casserole and wiped her hands before taking her apron off and hanging it on a peg near the door. She cast her eyes over the trio sitting in her house. Zack was still sprawled over one of her sofas, books littering the floor around him. Sephiroth sat primly at the table, back ramrod straight. A reflection of his upbringing, one she was uncomfortably familiar with after perusing Gast’s journals. The man wrote of his desire to see Sephiroth living a normal life, but also of the continual battle to push back against Hojo’s desires. A fighter in Sephiroth’s corner, until his passing. But after that time there would have been nothing to rein in Hojo and his ambitions. From the little Sephiroth had spoken of, she knew that his childhood had not been easy.

Cloud had decided to actual sit at the table now, sitting at the end furthest from Sephiroth. He thought he was being subtle with his frequent glances at the SOLDIER, but his cheeks had taken on a constant red hue. Luckily, Sephiroth and Zack were too absorbed to notice Cloud’s behaviour, which would probably spare her son some embarrassment.

Zack made a sudden squeaking sound and nearly fell off the sofa he was sprawled on. Sephiroth twisted slightly in his seat and raised a silver eyebrow at the other man.

“You have found something of interest?”

Zack looked troubled, staring at the book in front of him. “Not really, I guess. I mean… I found out why Gast left? He didn’t die, not right away. He was having a baby. Um… not him, obviously, but the Ancient, Ifalna. How… how common is the name Aerith? It’s a common name, right?”

Claudia frowned as she thought about it. “It’s a very pretty name, but unlike any name I’ve heard before. That isn’t saying much though, we tend to pass names down in families here. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” But Zack’s voice had become quite high pitched, and his eyes looked a bit wild. Claudia made a quick judgement.

“Right, I need to go and get some bread. Zack, would you be able to accompany me? I think going for a short walk might do you good. You too as well, boys. You need some fresh air – there is some firewood that needs splitting and stacking in the old barn. You’ll find it in the shelter. Cloud, you can show Sephiroth where the axe is, yes?” Cloud ducked his head, his blush rising again, but he started to get up from the table to do as she asked. Satisfied that they were all doing as she suggested, she herded Zack out of the front door whilst grabbing her bag from the hook in the hall.

The autumnal afternoon still held traces of warmth as they started to walk across the square. Claudia felt as though they must make for an unusual pairing, the tall SOLDIER with a sword on his back that was bigger than she was, accompanied by a small blonde women. The few villagers that were out and about were giving her strange glances as they passed by, which Zack ignored completely as he slowed his pace to match Claudia’s shorter stride.

He stopped in the middle of the square, by the old wooden water tower. He put his hands on his hips and stretched his head back to stare at the sky.

“Are you ok?” Claudia asked him softly. Zack blew out a deep breath and shook his head from side to side with a wry smile.

“I’m with SOLDIER, fighting is what we do. All you think is, where is the enemy? Who should I fight? But now it turns out the real enemy is someone that you thought had your back. I just don’t know what to do any more.”

“I think that’s called growing up,” Claudia told him dryly as she resumed her walk to the small shop. She heard Zack chuckle behind her before he jogged up to her side again.

“Man, no wonder Cloud is tough with you as his mom. Not that it’s a bad thing! I mean-”

“I would stop while you’re ahead,” Claudia advised him. “Besides, we’re here now.” She gestured towards a small two storey building that had a large window displaying wares next to the door. Nestled alongside faded Nibelheim mementos sat basic groceries; a woman just about visible inside the dark store bustling around behind the display.

Zack opened the door with a jingle, holding it to allow Claudia inside first.

“We’re closed.” The woman called out, without turning around.

“He’s with me, Gladys.” Claudia called back. Gladys turned around and looked Zack up and down slowly. He squirmed under the scrutiny of the old lady’s sharp eyes.

“Now what are you doing with them SOLDIERs, Claudia?”

“They’re friends of Cloud’s.”

“Hmm.” Gladys sniffed and Claudia had to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. She knew what the town thought of her boy, that most of the people had never really forgiven him for Tifa Lockhart’s injuries so many years before. Claudia knew, from piecing together what Cloud both did and didn’t say, that if he hadn’t been there the girl probably wouldn’t have survived at all. But it was fighting a losing cause to change minds in a place like Nibelheim and with Cloud determined to leave anyway they’d decided to just let it rest. “That boy’s gone up in the world, then. Who’d have thought it.”

Sensing Zack bristling next to her, Claudia hurried into the point of their visit. “With extra mouths to feed I find myself needing more bread. Have you any loaves left?”

“You’re in luck today. Want both of them?” Claudia nodded and Gladys started to wrap them. It gave Claudia a chance to think about how she was going to broach the topic of Lucretia.

The bell jingling again drew her attention to the door, where a young woman with dark hair and wearing a cropped jacket and boots had just come in. Her eyes darted nervously between Claudia, Gladys and Zack.

“Is there something you needed, Tifa?” Gladys asked, her tone gentling.

“I… there were some strange people in the village earlier asking for the SOLDIERs.” Tifa blurted out. “I don’t know what they wanted, but I told them you’d gone up to the reactor.”

Zack frowned and brought his hand to his chin. “Strange people? What were they like?”

“There were three of them, two men and a woman. All wearing black suits and carrying weapons. They landed a helicopter behind that mansion and headed up into the mountains on foot after asking for directions. I followed them for a bit to make sure they left… they scared me.”

Zack looked over at Claudia, his expression serious. “Sounds like Turks. I don’t know what they’d want here but it can’t be anything good. We’d better go and tell Sephiroth and Cloud.”

“Cloud?” Tifa straightened, her eyes widening. “He’s here?”

Claudia sighed. “You’d better come over, Tifa. Cloud’s at mine, you can catch up after you’ve told us more about these Turks. Thank you, Gladys.”

The storekeeper was watching on with avid interest. “Oh, anytime at all Claudia. You just come and let me know if you need anything.”

The boys weren’t in the house when the three of them arrived back, but voices in the back yard told Claudia that they were probably still bringing in firewood. Tifa had stopped in the doorway, her eyes wide as she took in the piles of books strewn all over Claudia’s normally tidy front room.

“Find a seat dear, anywhere you can. I’ll just dish up dinner and then we can talk. Zack, be a love and go fetch the others, would you?”

“Yes ma’am!” He gave a mock salute and disappeared out of the back door. Tifa tentatively sat at the dining table, choosing the seat with the smallest piles of books around it. Claudia bustled around setting the table and trying not to make the poor girl feel more uncomfortable.

“…Didn’t mean the entire barn.” Cloud was saying loudly as he came back into the room. “What if she needs to bring the cow in?”

“The instructions were clear,” Sephiroth argued back at a similar volume, arms crossed over his chest. “I was merely following the directive. And now there is plenty of wood for the winter.”

“But no room for anything else in there!”

Claudia coughed to draw their attention, privately amused by the matching petulant expressions that the boys were wearing. Zack, bringing up the rear, looked highly amused.

Cloud’s face paled dramatically when he saw Tifa sitting at the table. “T-Tifa!”

Sephiroth immediately stepped in front of Cloud and glared down at the girl. Claudia held back the urge to smack him with the wooden spoon and instead held out the pan of soup, the handles covered with tea towels.

“Here, pop this on the table will you? Cloud, can you get us drinks please. Water will be fine, or there’s a pot of tea on the side. Then let’s all sit down and eat before we do anything else.”

Softening his stance slightly, Sephiroth accepted the offered pan and placed it in the centre of the table, his eyes never leaving Tifa. The poor girl gulped when he slipped into the seat next to her. Zack took the end seat, sandwiching Tifa between the two SOLDIERs. Cloud, still trying to duck away from Tifa’s notice, sat across from Sephiroth. Moving some books to the floor, Claudia took the free seat across from Tifa and ladled some of the soup into a bowl.

“Here dear, you look a bit peaky. You boys can serve yourselves, right?”

With a nod Zack grabbed the ladle off her and obeyed, but not before filling her a bowl that she accepted with a smile. The tension over the table was thick, the only sound coming from the occasional clink of cutlery. Claudia resisted rolling her eyes at them all, acting like children.

“Tifa here was telling us of some interesting visitors to the village.” Claudia said to get the conversation flowing. “Some people in black suits arrived in a helicopter earlier today.”

Sephiroth paused, his spoon halfway to his mouth. “Turks?”

Tifa looked up from her bowl for the first time since they’d all sat down. “I don’t know for sure. They were from Shinra though, the helicopter had a logo on it.”

“Where did they go?”

“Up to the reactor. I… may not have made my instructions particularly clear on how to get there. They’ll probably be stuck in the caves until tomorrow now.”

“Won’t they just use their PHS to find a route?” Zack asked, leaning forwards. The reply came not from Tifa, but from Cloud. Up until this point, he looked as though he had been trying to disappear behind the table.

“A PHS won’t work in the mountains. There is a booster in the village but the minute you leave it…” he shrugged as he tailed off.

“Indeed,” Sephiroth agreed, turning his green eyes on Cloud. “It is the reason why we requested a guide for our own excursion. Even though one of our own party had enough local knowledge to have been sufficient.”

Cloud shrugged and ducked his eyes again. “The mountain routes can change based on conditions. You need to have gone up there recently to be sure.”

“What I don’t get,” Zack slumped back in his chair, his soup finished due to him practically inhaling it. “Is what were the Turks doing here anyway? I haven’t seen them on a mission since Junon.”

“Where they were trying to put down a rogue SOLDIER.” Sephiroth’s spoon clattered into the bowl. “The implications are clear.”

“You think that they expected you to defect like… Genesis, was it?” Claudia asked him.

“I am almost certain of it.”

“I just don’t get why!” Zack exploded, throwing his hands in the air. “I don’t get any of it!”

“Is there any possibility of understanding the mind of a madman?” Sephiroth asked dryly. “A desperate quest for further glory, perhaps. A final, defining moment now that the war is over and his experiments are becoming obsolete.”

“Right.” Zack sighed and shook his head. “Obsolete, huh? That hurts, man, even if it is kinda true.”

Claudia stood and began removing the bowls from the table, more as a distraction than anything else. “What will you do now?” She asked as she retrieved the tea pot and started to fill it.

Zack took his hands away from his face and fixed his eyes on Sephiroth. “That depends on you, right? Are you still gonna… you know.”

Sephiroth blinked his green eyes at Zack. “No, I do not know.”

Zack lowered his voice until it was little more than a whisper. “You said you might leave Shinra.”

“Ah.” Sephiroth gracefully accepted a mug from Claudia and caged it within his hands on the table. “I believe, at this point, that there is no other option available to me even if I desired it to be so. Which I do not.”

Cloud’s eyes were wide as he looked at his idol, then back at the books still surrounding them on the table. Claudia could almost see his thought process, as his eyes hardened and his jaw set resolutely. “I am too.”

“B-but you were going to be a SOLDIER.” Tifa spoke up for the first time, hands clenched tightly on the table I front of her. “What will you do instead?”

Cloud opened his mouth to answer but was beaten to it by Zack. “I know! Mercenaries, we can be mercenaries. There have been reports of more monsters, right? We can be… professional monster hunters or something. What do you think, Spike?”

His face softening, Cloud sent half a shy smile to Zack. “That sounds… good. Thanks, Zack.”

“Shinra won’t let you go so easily,” Claudia warned, wanting them to focus on the reality of the situation. “You’ll be fugitives. And some of you are fairly recognisable.” She managed not to glance pointedly at Sephiroth when she said this.

“Shinra will be otherwise preoccupied with the loss of their SOLDIER programme.” Sephiroth stately serenely. “As the source material for the J-cells will be destroyed imminently.”

“You’re gonna… what? Blow up the reactor?”

Sephiroth inclined his head slightly towards Zack.

But Cloud’s eyes went wide with alarm. “You can’t!”

The green gaze was turned on him in full, but for once Cloud didn’t shrink away. “And why not?”

“The whole mountain range is unstable due to the high concentration of mako.” Claudia answered for her son. “If there was an explosion up at the reactor, it’s likely that it could trigger quakes and potentially landslides. It could take out the whole village.”

“That would not be good!” Zack buried his head in his hands once more. Tifa, sitting next to him, had gone pale.

“I… I’m really not sure I should be listening to-”

“Maybe you don’t need to blow it up though.” Cloud said suddenly. “Why don’t you just seal it up instead? We can’t blow it up without risking quakes or a landslide, but no one in the village would really care if it just stopped working. Disconnect it all, shut it down and then seal it up. The professor can’t run any more experiments then.”

Sephiroth considered for a moment, before acknowledging Cloud’s idea with a slow blink. “That plan is… acceptable.”

“Right.” Zack stood up, stretching his arms out above his head and twisting his torso from side to side as he limbered up. “So what are we waiting for?”

“You can return these books to the mansion.” Sephiroth ordered. “Keep the real journals that Cloud found, but only them. The girl can help you. Cloud and I will see to the reactor.”

“What? You get to demolish stuff with Spike and I can’t even have a go? That’s not fair!”

“Life isn’t fair,” Sephiroth told him with a straight face. “But you will get to ‘have a go’ at arson, so that should satisfy you.”

“For real?” Zack almost bounced on the spot in his eagerness.

“Arson?” Claudia asked, not following Sephiroth’s line of thought. He gestured at the books lying around the room.

“The things that occurred in that mansion must never again come to light.”

“You want to burn it down.” Claudia realised. She thought for a moment, of the hulking building at the edge of the village that was a decrepit eyesore. Of the things she had read in the past few hours, the horrors that had taken place there. It would be a fitting end. She nodded slowly, catching the smallest smile that fleetingly touched Sephiroth’s lips.

“We are in agreement then.”

“Yes sir!” Zack snapped a salute and began to gather books. With help from a nervous Tifa, they managed to get the books into some sort of order to take them back to the mansion. In the meantime Cloud was preparing to head back up to the reactor. Claudia followed him into his old bedroom, going through the motions of packing him a bag but really wanting to know how he was handling the events of the day.

“Are you ok?” She asked him quietly. Cloud looked up at her with blue eyes that had aged overnight. He’d changed out of his Shinra uniform into an old outfit of his father’s that would make it easier for him to stay out of sight on the mountain, but she couldn’t help but think that the move was also symbolic. That he had made the decision to cast Shinra aside completely.

“I think so?” His soft voice was uncertain, something she didn’t like to hear. Cloud had always been stubborn but very sure of his path, even when it defied all logic or reason. This lost expression wasn’t one she wanted to see on him. Reaching forwards, she enveloped him in a hug.

“It will all work out in the end,” she told him, ignoring his half-hearted attempts to push her off. Leaning back again, she cupped his cheeks with her hands. No longer the young boy that had left for the big city, but not quite yet the strong man he would become. “Sephiroth and Zack will look after you, and you can always come home.”

“Mom…” Cloud dropped his eyes. “I won’t be able to come home after this. It would put you and Tifa and everyone else in this village at risk.”

“We are at risk already, purely because we exist in a world where Shinra is in control.” Claudia dropped her hands form his cheeks to his shoulders. “I understand your concerns, but you must find some way of sending messages back.”

“I will, mom.” In a rare demonstration of affection, Cloud leaned forwards and pecked her cheek. A moment later he blushed and averted his eyes again. Knowingly, Claudia turned around to see Sephiroth waiting in the doorway.

“It is time.” The SOLDIER said quietly, obviously unwilling to interrupt them.

“I’m all set.” Cloud shouldered his backpack and hunting rifle. He made his way out of the room, sidling past Sephiroth who stayed in the doorway. His eyes tracked Cloud the entire time.

“Look after him for me, please.” Claudia couldn’t quite keep the catch out of her voice.

“I promise.” Sephiroth’s words settled something within her. She knew that he would not idly make promises that he couldn’t keep.

“And look after yourself too.” She told him firmly. “I want to see all three of you boys keeping safe, ok?”

He nodded curtly just before he turned and followed Cloud from the room. Claudia tapped one finger against her mouth in thought. That wasn’t as reassuring. She needed to find a way of making sure all of her boys were looked after properly.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The flames leapt high, turning the sky red and black where the smoke billowed thickly in the night sky. Popping sounds could be heard coming from the very bottom of the inferno, flashes of green and purple fire weaving amongst the flames. Every now and then a section of the building would shudder before falling in on itself, sending out a shower of bright sparks. Zack stood with his arms crossed, head tilted to one side as he admired his handiwork.

“Guess there was a lot of hot air in there after all.” He joked.

A dark figure in a tattered red cloak huffed out something that might have been a laugh, although Zack couldn’t be sure.

“You should not rely on a career as a comedian.”

“Geez, who would even choose a career as a comedian nowadays?” The dark figured glowered and Zack threw up his hands in surrender. “Not that there’s anything wrong with it, or anything…” he trailed off as the other man (vampire? zombie?) turned his attention back to the mansion.

“Who are you talking to?” Tifa asked as she strode up. Zack raised a hand to greet her.

“Oh just…” he looked around, but the shadowy figure had disappeared. “Myself, I guess?” He frowned and rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably, wondering if the man actually was a vampire. He had been sleeping in a coffin, after all, and it was only fluke that Zack had managed to find him and thought to let him know he was about to be incinerated.

“Right.” Tifa was looking at him doubtfully, all her earlier shyness gone. He guessed that committing crime together really did break down barriers. “Sooo,” she lowered her gaze and clasped her hands behind her back, drawing a circle with one foot on the ground in front of her. “I wondered if I could come with you when you leave?”

“You… what?” This was unexpected. Why would she want to… oh wait, Cloud. “You wanna come with Cloud?” He rubbed his jaw. “I dunno, we’ll need to travel quick…”

“I’m not afraid.” Tifa said fiercely, her red eyes reflecting the red glow from the flames. “And I can fight! Master Zangan has been teaching me.”

Zack opened and closed his mouth a few times, not sure how to tell her that she couldn’t come. The sound of a bag hitting the floor behind him had them both turning around to see that Claudia had arrived. She was wearing a travelling cloak over her dress and was standing next to a worn leather holdall.

“Mrs Strife ma’am!” Zack greeted her, clutching at the lifeline. “Can you tell Tifa she can’t come with us?”

Cloud’s mom blinked, then looked closely at Tifa. “Why do you want to?”

“I can’t stay in Nibelheim anymore!” Tifa threw her hands up into the air. “It’s so… suffocating!”

“I see.” Claudia pursed her lips and gave Tifa an assessing gaze. “You know your father is going to worry?”

“I left him a note!”

“Wait, what?” Cloud’s mom wasn’t just gonna send the girl home? What was happening?

“Well, I guess it will be good to have some female company. You’d better call your father when we get to the next village though, we wouldn’t want him to panic too much.”

“Thank you!” Tifa grabbed Claudia’s hands and held them up in front of her, squeezing them tightly. “Thank you.”

Zack frowned, still not understanding what was going on but assuming it was a women thing. He wished Cloud and Sephiroth were back. Hmm… maybe Sephiroth would answer to Seph? His whole name was quite long winded, and if they were all gonna be mercs together then Zack needed something shorter to call him by.

“Are Cloud and Sephiroth not back yet?” Claudia asked, looking towards the path to the Nibel mountains and the reactor above them. “It’s going to start getting light soon, and I don’t think we want to be found here when the sun comes up.”

“Did you say Sephiroth?” Oh great, the creepy guy was back. Zack hadn’t even heard him arrive, and neither had Claudia from the way she jumped slightly.

“I’m sorry, but who exactly are you?”

“He’s the vampire man.” Zack informed her. “I found him in a coffin.”

The vampire coughed slightly. “My name is Vincent Valentine. I knew Sephiroth’s mother.”

Claudia’s eyes sharpened. “Lucretia?”

“Yes.”

“And how exactly did you know her?”

The vampire shifted a little, almost as though he was guilty of something. “I was assigned to be her bodyguard when they worked on the Jenova project. We became… close. She was frustrated because things weren’t progressing as quickly as she liked. But then she started to distance herself from me when I disapproved of their experiments, and Hojo took measures to ensure that I could not interfere further in the project. The result is the coffin that you found me in.”

Claudia rubbed at her forehead. “Let me get this straight… by ‘not progressing quickly’ you mean that Lucretia didn’t fall pregnant, something that she vented to you about. Then, when she did fall pregnant, she started to distance herself from you?”

“…simply put, yes.”

“I see.” Claudia blinked at him, then rubbed her forehead again as though she was developing a headache. “And it never occurred to you at any point that... you know what, never mind. You should come with us too. I think Sephiroth will be interested in your story.”

“In whose story?” Sephiroth’s deep voice carried across the clearing, easily heard over the crackling fire. Cloud was walking just behind him, eyes warily looking around. Zack was struck by how striking they looked together, the tall SOLDIER with the flowing silver hair turned gold in the flames, and the bright -haired and -eyed youth stood next to him. He shook his head, chuckling to himself at his fanciful notion.

“Apparently Vincent here knew your mom,” Zack called back, jerking his thumb over towards the man standing and watching them approach, his red cloak billowing in the breeze caused by the fire.

“You took your time.” Claudia stated, picking up her bag again. “Did you manage to seal the reactor?”

Sephiroth nodded, but Cloud gave a feral grin. “No one is getting anything out of there ever again.” He said with relish. Claudia nodded in approval.

“We had to avoid the Turks on the way back,” Sephiroth added. “We didn’t want them to be able to follow us back down to the village.” He exchanged a glance with Cloud, who sniggered at the memory. Zack decided he probably didn’t want to know – after all, Cissnei was his friend and could well be one of the Turk still floundering around in the caves.

“Then we had best be going before it gets light.”

“We?” Cloud’s gaze darted around the group, his eyes widening. “We’re all going?”

Zack was about to refute the statement when he looked again at Claudia’s outfit. Very practical, very sturdy, with a pair of long, curved daggers holstered at her waist. He suddenly realised what he’d been missing earlier.

“You’re coming too?”

“Well of course I am.” Claudia sniffed slightly. “How else am I going to be sure that you are looking after yourselves? Come on boys.” With that, Claudia turned at strode away from the burning mansion. Zack exchanged a wide eyed glance with Cloud who just shrugged and followed his mom. Sephiroth tailed Cloud and Tifa scrambled after them both. The vampire had disappeared again, so Zack was left to bring up the rear. Rubbing the back of his neck and wondering how he got into this situation in the first place.

In another life, Nibelheim burned. This time, as the last supporting beam collapsed amongst a sea of ash and fractured remains, the embers died out without touching the village at all.