"Give it up, elder brother," Politesse said. Behind her sunglasses, Runner was close enough to see her rolling her eyes.

"You believe me, don't you, old general?" Erratic turned pleading eyes to Sephiroth.

Sephiroth shook his silver head as he lifted his cup of juice to his lips. "Sorry, Erratic. But I don't. I do find it amusing, but on the whole rather unbelieveable."

Erratic heaved a sigh and his shoulders dropped, his red bangs falling down his face. Sephiroth found himself starkly reminded of Reno. But Erratic didn't have the scars on Reno's cheeks, which made the resemblance less disturbing.

The past... it surrounds you wherever you go... They are there inside these children, but they are not, as well.

"That does it!" Simon yelled. "I'm not a dumping ground, Maggie!!"

"But you have such a large appetite," Magdalena said sweetly as she put another piece of her steak onto Simon's plate. "And I have a figure to maintain. Are you saying you don't like it?" she asked, pouting.

"Oh, hell, if it keeps you looking gorgeous," Blazer said, holding out his plate and grinning. "I'd be ever so glad to help."

Magdalena smiled brilliantly and passed a large portion over. "Remind me to kiss you, Blaze darling."

"My memory remains fresh."

"Okay! I'm done!" Simon pushed his plate away. A couple of seconds later, he took the plates of the others as well and carried it to the kitchen. "Who's got wash duty today?" he asked.

"Me," Storm answered, standing up. "I'll do the washing up."

"I'll join you," Lucrecia said, also standing up.

"Quite obviously," Blazer muttered to Erratic, sitting beside him. "Behave!"

Storm threw him a dirty look before holding out his hand to take Lucrecia's. The two of them walked hand-in-hand to the kitchen, where Simon was already coming out with what looked like a plastic box in his hands. "Going to wash?" he inquired the couple. "Too bad. You missed out!"

"Now this is the best part!" Magdalena declared. She turned to Sephiroth, who was watching with one eyebrow cocked questioningly. "Ice-cream."

"Are you #*$(ing kids eating the ice-cream without benefit of ()*#ing bowls again??" came a shout.

"Goddammit," Magdalena growled. "NO DAD! We're eating it with #$*(ing civilized manners!!"

"So this is what you call civilized manners," Sephiroth murmured. They simply opened the box, each took a spoon which Simon had brought out and began scooping the ice-cream straight from the box. Runner heard him, so he turned, grinned and nodded vigourously.

Sephiroth really did not feel like joining them. It was certainly amusing to watch, however. Magdalena gave Blazer his kiss as promised with her lips covered in ice-cream, while Politesse smiled with affection as Runner handed her a large spoonful of ice-cream which she couldn't reach. Simon, Erratic and Blazer were attacking the plastic box, scooping the chocolate confection out like there was no tomorrow.

Children... ever so impatient... ever so charming...

"Who are you?" Sephiroth asked mentally. The voice seemed like it came from the inner recesses of his mind, yet he knew it was not really a part of his thoughts. He couldn't place the identity of its owner, though it seemed familiar enough. It had no sound to it, but there was a strange sort of melody to its diction and tone. The voice kept silent. "I know you, don't I?"

Perhaps you do. I am a part of you, after all.

"What are you doing here?"

You asked for inner guidance...

He didn't know what it was talking about. He had never asked for advice of any sort... except when he had been in his teens, wishing to be a part of the world that had refused to accept him. Yet the answer seemed to be perfect, althought he didn't quite recall when he ever asked for... Inner guidance.

"When?"

Again, silence. By that time, the youngsters - that was all he could call them - had polished off the ice-cream, licking their lips like kittens finishing off plates of cream. "Now that's what I call good!" Erratic almost yelled, rubbing his stomach. Politesse absently picked at a piece of lint on his shirt.

"What do we do now?" Sephiroth asked.

"Maggie, do you think you and I-"

"I have singing practice."

"Would you like to follow me to the tailor's?" Simon asked Sephiroth. "Storm and I want to pick out some suits for tonight." He turned to the Turks. "You guys wanna come along?"

"Sorry man," Runner told him. "Promised our boss we'd go with him to check out the old labs underneath Shin-ra. We'll be coming by later in the evening to catch the later part of the perfomance, though."

"Lita?" Magdalena turned to Politesse.

"I already told Boss that I'm not going along," she replied. "C'mon, Maggie. Let's go practise."

"I'll get Lucrecia."

The girls left the cafeteria, leaving the rowdy young men discussing the Shin-ra building, or, more specifically, the labs.

"That damned place is so spooky," Blazer was saying, shaking his head. "Why the hell do we have to go down there?? I mean, after all those stories Boss told us about Hojo, I wish I never had to step foot in here!"

"I wished the same," Sephiroth sighed.

The others fell silent. "Oh... yeah," Simon said quietly. "We heard about that one, too."

Erratic shuddered. "Horrendous Hojo!"

Runner had been frowning all the while, though. "I don't get it. There're some key components which we haven't got, you know."

"Huh?" the others asked.

"Think, man. We've blasted out some safes, and even found some monsters lurking about down there... But... I can't quite put my finger on it... Why haven't we found anything on Hojo's experiments?"

Sephiroth unconsciously rubbed his tattoo on his shoulder. "Hojo.. referred to me as Specimen One," he said softly, wincing as he recalled that name. "I would be inclined to think that the files pertaining to... the experiments on me would be under a similar name."

"We know that," Runner said. "But the funny thing is... the records we've found so far is so minimal. Is it just that scientists are terrible record keepers? Or..." he left that thought trailing away.

"Someone either destroyed or took them away," Sephiroth finished for him.

"Stop that, man! You're freaking me out!" Blazer hid his face in mock fear.

"Lucrecia is an excellent record keeper," Simon said brusquely. "And most of what our parents found out came from records... outside Shin-ra. Except, of course, for that little tidbit about Sephiroth being Hojo's son. That we got from the old man's mouth him... itself." Simon winced. "Can't see how that came about."

"But we did find records of Hojo's marriage to Professor Lucrecia Heatherly," Erratic went on quietly. "And by what we saw, they were pretty happily married. We also found out Gast's records... a few records about the Jenova project."

"Too few," Runner retorted. "There must have been more. From what we know, Gast was a much more conscientious man than Hojo. Certainly there would be more to find!"

"Perhaps they were destroyed," Sephiroth said quietly. "The records of the Jenova project I found at the Shin-ra mansion were not accurate either, if what you tell me about my history is true."

"Checked," Runner said. "I found it so full of flaws, it's laughable how Hojo thought he could fool anyone with records as lousy as those!"

"Run-ner!!" three other young men half-yelled at him.

Runner immediately realized his mistake. "Oops. Sorry. No offence, sir."

"None taken. I was not in a coherent state of mind at that time, after all."

"Wait a minute, wait a minute," Erratic interjected. "I read through those records, and if I hadn't known all this crap, I would have gone away with that impression too. How on earth would you be able to see what quality records they are?"

Runner touched the side of his nose slyly. "There's a slight difference between completely false reports, half-truths and a honest-to-ye-gods report. There was an inconsistency between the record books I read. All of them. Some of the other security log-books had some really different stories to the ones from the science labs, and they were both referring to the same project."

"You went through the entire damned library, Runner? Blazer asked.

"Yeap," Runner replied smugly. "Sure, I found the records which would leave anyone thinking what Sephiroth thought, but that's only if you skim through for certain keywords like, say, Jenova. If you read the entire thing, you would find some really interesting so-called facts."

"Such as?"

"Professor Lucrecia's name is mentioned in most of the administrative log-books as one of the more esteemed scientists, but in the science log-books, obviously someone had been tampering with them and her name is nowhere to be found... except for one oblique reference as Hojo's wife. In one of the safes we blasted out, I saw a report about her pregnancy, detailing that injections administrated on her, and other what-nots which are perfectly repulsive as not to deserve a mention in good circles. One particular report on Jenova, however, utterly, totally, really freaked me out." He leant forward. "It was alive!"

"Of course it was alive," Simon said.

"But attempted copulation with a security guard???"

"Oh, shit," Erratic groaned. "Don't... DON'T #$)*ing damn well TELL US!!!"

Blazer was gagging, Simon choking. Sephiroth looked visibly disgusted.

"Oh, and a few times, too. That was why they put her into a mechanical body and some sort of stasis," Runner went on.

"Who put what into where?" Storm asked, coming up to them.

"Shit, Runner, you better damn well not repeat it!!" Erratic sat up, his fist curling up just in case Runner didn't listen to him. The younger man didn't, of course, but he was circumspect enough to tell it to Storm right into the other man's ear so the rest wouldn't have to listen to it all over again. Storm loked at first intrigued, then shocked, his blue eyes widening to comical proportions.

"Really??"

Runner nodded. "Really."

"Dammit, Runner, if you're pulling my leg..."

"It's true," Runner insisted. "I gave the reports to Lucrecia personally. You can ask her if you like. She's read them herself. I read them with her to make sure she'd have someone close by to help in case she puked."

"HEY!!!"

"Well, it was a favour! She took it a hell lot better than I did, anyway. Man, I swear, I don't think anything else can freak me out as badly as that!!"

"I wonder why Hojo didn't just screw the alien when he decided to do those experiments," Simon managed to drawl.

Runner looked a bit ill. "I found a report... in his terrible handwriting, considering that possibility."

"RUN-NER!!!"

"The others would thank you to stop, Runner," Sephiroth said calmly.

"Yes, sir."

"I need some aspirin..." Blazer said weakly. "Anybody got one?"

"I think we better go to the tailor's now," Storm announced.

"Seconding that..." Simon got up.

Erratic groaned again, clutching his stomach. "I'm not sure if I can make it to the bathroom on time..."

Go with them.

"You again?" Sephiroth asked the voice.

What else do you have to do?

"Which one of them?"

Whichever idea sounds more feasible.

Sephiroth considered, and decided he didn't want to follow the young Turks after what he had heard. They were already going off, Blazer and Erratic looking decidedly ill. Simon still looked a bit green in the face.

"Would you care to join us, Sephiroth?" Storm asked.

"If you don't mind." It sounded better than staying by himself for the day.

Simon and Storm took a short detour to the bathroom first, where they met the other young Turks. Sephiroth tried to block out the sounds of retching from the toilets. Leaning against the wall outside, he reached in for that voice. "Are you there?"

Yes.

"What is your name?"

There was a silence. Why would you want to know?

"So I can call you something?"

Why call when I'll always be here?

Sephiroth really wished he or she would stop being so cryptic. "What can I call you? To give you a name, something identifiable."

Anything. Anything you like at all. But the voice seemed to hold some reservations.

Sephiroth didn't have the time to think up a name because the youngsters came out looking much better. Simon had his PHS in his hand, calling for his chauffeur. "All right! Now to Mac's!"

"Mac?"

"Simon's tailor," Storm explained. "Mac dresses only the highest circles of the elitists, and being son of the President of Shin-ra, that's about as high as one can get. Would you like something to wear tonight?"

"I... have never worn anything remotely un-military."

Both young men were blinking at that. "Never?" Simon asked.

"Never. I was pushed into the military, never encouraged to socialize. And considering my life, you must understand why I do not feel comfortable in social situations. The few times I attended formal functions..." Sephiroth shrugged.

Storm and Simon exchanged glances. "So we must be really making you uncomfortable, huh?" Simon said, his voice a little sheepish.

"You are trying to help." Sephiroth held up a hand to stop Storm from saying anything before he finished. "I understand that well. I do appreciate your attempts to... help me, and I do thank you. You are the only people... besides Zack, who ever thought about helping me."

"Zack?" Simon echoed.

"Zack," Storm replied. "He was the one who helped my father escape Hojo's lab."

Sephiroth raised an eyebrow. "He did?" At Storm's nod, he heaved a heavy sigh. "I wish I had the chance to make amends to him... I have betrayed our friendship... and now that he is dead..." The green eyes became distant as the general became lost in his thoughts. "He loved Aeris Gainsborough, I do realize now. And helping your father is exactly what he would have done... for anyone."

"He and Aeris...?" Simon blinked.

"Yes. He told me her name only during the Nibelheim mission, and that because he expressed his desire to propose to her. Otherwise, I don't believe he would have told me. She didn't want Shin-ra to know of her whereabouts."

"Heck, well, at least they're together now," Simon sounded cheerful once more. Sephiroth wished he could be like that... forgiving and seeing the bright side of things quickly.

"So most of your life was spent training and drills?" Storm asked, trying to get off the subject of Zack. "No wonder your fighting skills are excellent."

"Look who's talking," Simon muttered. "The same guy who wipes the floor with everyone else's ass except for his girlfriend's."

"Lucrecia is a good fighter," Storm argued.

"I couldn't help but notice the way you all fought this morning," Sephiroth put in. "You are all quite good, but I understand you probably have had years under your belt. Children - like you - were forced to grow up very quiickly."

"Storm, we're kids!" Simon exclaimed.

"I wuv woo, woo wuv me," Storm dryly said, and he and Simon chuckled. "We can't help it, Sephiroth. We like acting this way. We'll grow up, oh, say in ten years or so."

Sephiroth nodded again. It seemed to be becoming a habit.

"How about we strike you a deal, old general?" Simon suggested. He smiled crookedly when a silver eyebrow rose questioningly. "You help us hone our skills... and we'll show you the world."

The world that never accepted him? Wait... Was he being too narrow-minded? Perhaps there was hope? Was he being too wistful? He wanted to jump at it, but after so many times of being burned, he didn't want to move so quickly anymore. It would hurt too much to find it all a farce.

"All the world's a stage," Storm sang out of the blue.

Like Zack... the voice said wistfully from the back of Sephiroth's head. And it was. The charm, easy smiles... all reminded him of his friend... his window to the world. He realized this was an open doorway. This wasn't just anything glass window he could see through, never to be able to touch the other side.

The answer was slow to come, but at least, a true smile managed to appear on Sephiroth's face. "It's a deal."

Authour's Note : Is that freaky or is that freaky? "Attempted copulation"!! Yuck!! Now I'm beginning to doubt my sanity. I'm glad this thing is moving along peckery fine, though. Stay tuned for the next Chapter!