Who:  Sephiroth, Lucrecia Mathews, Vincent Valentine
Where:  The ShinRa mansion.
Why:  Lucrecia and Sephiroth finally free Vincent from his thirty year nap in a coffin.
Date of Log:  September 11, 2000.


To make thing simpler, and to save on time, Lu and Seph start their search of the ShinRa mansion one morning. Why searching? Because they assume that Hojo left some sort of information there on Vincent. It's where he kept a lot of his notes, right? Well, the library is searched with no luck, and then they move outwards from there. ...hours later with no luck, the searching gets to the upper floor and through the rooms there. Sephiroth is getting a touch bored with looking, but in being as patient as he is hasn't given up yet. Look, look, look.. the SOLDIER is very much dust covered and looking a little scraggly when the front of the mansion is finally reached. His black clothing is streaked with dirt and that dust, and even bits of it cling to his long hair. The pair has been working at this so long he's even sweating, which says a lot for the effort that has been put into this. Hey, it's his mother, so of course he wants to find Vincent for her.
When all seems to be at its end and nothing found Lu would get to come across a gathering of papers just laying on the floor in the last room the pair of you look. Of course it's the last room, right? The papers have one letter written in Hojo's hand and tell without naming the man, just where Vincent is. About the man Hojo experimented on and left in the basement. Where the key is to the room... Sephiroth meanwhile continues looking through the clutter of things here, leaving Lu to read as she will. Hopefully she'll let him know she found something.

Dirty. Completely and utterly filthy. But the place hasn't been cleaned in decades, left to rot after Jenova had been taken back to Midgar after the experiments. After.... Vincent had been shot. And it is that man that Lucrecia searches for, some hint or clue that might bring her some resolution to whether the man is somehow miraculously alive, or if she merely has her hopes up. Either way, wisps of brown hair are pushed back against a sweaty brow -- her face and hair have recieved the same dusty treatment as her, while only the midnight bodysuit shows traces of the same. But there was nothing in the lab. Nor in the room she and Hojo shared in this place. The man is usually so meticulous about such things. The fact that he would have made such a searching a game didn't quite come into play within her mind. At least, not yet. He wouldn't do that. For all his faults, he was a serious scientist, wasn't he?
That doesn't seem to be the case, however, as her wanderings eventually bring her to the front of the mansion, to one of the windows that she loved to look out every now and again when this place was cleaner. Used. And she almost makes it there, save a creaky board catches her boot, and sends her sprawling with a cry. "Ow! I... hm?" A peice of paper? Scooting forward, she grasps it, pulling it out of the floorboards, and peering. It's his handwriting, alright. And the message -- luminous eyes go wide, almost incomprehending at first, before she glances down to all the factors. The safe.... upstairs? Well, unlike most... she knows the combination to the thing. But when she gets to the phrase 'the experiment I left behind', she knows. Right then and there, it's evident, even as the woman calls out, "Sephiroth!! Sephiroth.... I found it...." Voice fades, even as she waits for him to come over, still sitting on the floor. "The clue is in the upstairs safe."

The thump brings a pale head on the other side of the room to lift and a pair of glowing eyes to search for a certain dark head. "Mother?" He asks, brows furrowing ever so slightly as the woman in question doesn't seem to be visible. Rubbing his filthy hands on his steadyily growing worse pants, the man moves around the mass he was sifting through to find Lu there on the floor staring in amazement at a piece of paper. He moves around the piles of junk and crouches down before her, hair spilling over shoulders to brush against both forearms and thighs. "Hmmm." He voices as she tells about the safe, and without another word reaches out to help her to her feet even as he himself stands. Turning partially, Sephiroth pauses a moment to give his mother a small smile, "Then we should go." The safe upstairs, eh? So upstairs the pair go to deal with the thing. Now, if Lu's combination doesn't work, Sephiroth will quiet simply tear off the door, so you get in either way... and since this isn't a game can we please say there isn't a silly monster living inside of the safe? @.@;
"Mother, calm down." Is said a time or two as Lu works the safe lock. Eager fingers don't normally make for easy opening of things. "Do you know what room this opens?" Once the key is in their possession, it's down to the basement. Down the spiral of walkway, and through the halls cut out of the stone itself, down to a lone door that the two of them tried and then passed over during the innitial search. One of those things Sephiroth planned on trying after they had searched everywhere else. How could he have known the search would have been a lot easier if they'd not passed it by?

Lucrecia doesn't make a move to get up, at first, only letting her son read over the not, before he offers his hands. At least the clothes are only ingrained with dirt. The body is only drenched with sweat, as they eventually head up to the safe. Yes, she's nervous, partially because she only thinks she remembers the combination, and secondly she's got to wonder what's in here. "I know, I know.... it's just...." What sort of clue Hojo would have left behind to find Vincent, in this place, of all things. The place he never wanted her in.... not with /that/ man. Just as well, as the third attempt is brought with success, the door clicking open with a rusty clang. Eyes widen, even as she glances over paper after paper, before the last results in a key hanging upon it. "This must be it.... the clue." No, no monsters, no odd materia... just a key.
Just where it opens is something that Lucrecia continues to ponder, before she finally gives, "Well.... there's only one door that it /can/ open. Remember the hallway to the lab? Hidden off to one side is a room... but we never used it." Well, she didn't use it. It's obvious our fiendish little mad scientist Hojo did. And well, if Vincent is in there for almost three decades. Eventually, they do head back down the stairs, over to that door that could be missed but had been seen by the pair, before she places the key in the lock. "I can't believe it. I've been past this room dozens of times...." The key needs a bit of help being turned, mako-enhanced strength giving the woman some oomph, before it turns, and opens. And immediately, the stale air whooshes out... as well as a few critters.

Not good at comfort, Sephiroth mostly just watches with his inhuman patience and allows Lu to fumble with the safe. Since she gets it in three tries he doesn't offer to try it for her, but he does duck his head a little, long hair somehow managing not to get in the way, so that he can peer into the safe as well. Kind of disapointing really. The thing only has some papers and a key. Hmm. He does agree with her about that door downstairs and so merely nods and goes. Silence continues as Lu babbles about the room and it's locked door, but since Sephiroth finds he has nothing to say about the matter he doesn't say anything at all. Then the dor is opened and the man wrinkles his nose at the smell, totally ignoring the critters that scurry for the dark corners and out into the hall. They are beneath his notice after all.
The room beyond has more than one coffin in it, four in all, but only one is shut, and the others are showing extreme signs of decay. Moving quietly inside, Sephiroth briefly checks those others and can only assume that the sealed one is what you are looking for. He brushes off a thick layer of dust, showing the dark beneath, rubbing the stuff then between his fingers. Since he's already filthy there isn't any point in trying to keep clean, eh? "Do we have a lever of some sort?" Sephiroth is more than strong enough, but there are times you just need a tool. All the same he feels around for a good spot to get a grip and gives the lid a good tug all the same. Maybe you won't need a crowbar... although he is expecting to just the same.
      
A round of coughing is brought on by the stale air; while Sephiroth is barely bothered by it, she needs good air to breathe. And getting a faceful of stagnant fumes is enough to get her choking. But it's brief, as she steps inside, eyes widen and glancing here and there. She'd never been in here... and now she sees why. The coffins had always been here, in reality -- only the center had gained a recent occupant back then, before she and the others left for Midgar. The occupants... or the bones and dried powder in the open coffins seem to denote that, and the fragile scientist that she once was would not be able to accept this. But it is the fourth and closed one that also catches her attention, lips pulled into a small frown. Even the critters that escaped, and the thought of some of their kin being left within this abode don't deter her, eyes narrowing at the only coffin that isn't displaying its contents to the open. "This has to be the one." And he's been stuck in it? For all this time? Shoulders slump, and she almost misses her son's question.
Almost, that is, until he pulls at the coffin's lid, Lucrecia's eyes brought back up to the slight creaking that the item makes. "A lever? Yes... hang on." And out she goes, toward the lab, coming back with, of all things, a crowbar.  Before, lifting it would have a touch difficulty... certainly not now. Instead, it is jammed into space that her son provides with his lifting, eyes having an unearthly glow that have nothing to do with experimentation. He's in there. All these years, he's been there, and she's never known. That good tug is given by another, and the thing snaps open, sending the woman stumbling back, the crowbar landing on the ground with a dust-covered klink. Still, she moves forward, just on the edge of seeing inside... but not quite. ".... Vincent?"

Upon first appearances, Vincent may as well be dead. Skin ashen, body seemingly unmoving, he is covered by a crimson colored cape, which even goes so far as to drift over half his face, just covering his lips. He does not at first move as the coffin is opened. However... if one looks closely enough, there is a barely perceptive rise and fall of his chest, barely breathing, minus human, but alive.
Within the murky depths of the subconscious world Vincent Valentine has been sentenced to for the last thirty years, there comes a light at the end of the tunnel, shining with all the wavering motion of a lamp suddenly turned on in the distance of the ocean's dim undersea. He is wary, however, for it could just as easily be a freight train coming his way rather then merely the end of said tunnel. Hojo locked him away in here, and it could easily be Hojo returning to finish the Frankenstein-ish experiments he began. There are voices, distorted, their words twisted so he cannot understand them. As if the language they spoke were some garbled, mishmash of incongruent thoughts strung together to confuse his sleepy mind. Voices, which meant more then one. Stretching forward sluggishly to force himself toward the light, toward the surface, the former Turk struggles to draw himself from the statis his genetically altered body left him in. However, there is a rage slowly dawning on him, an animalistic anger born of years and years of the nightmarish horror of his confinement, maddening a beast never allowed to claim the body of the Turk, not even once, having to content itself within his dreamscapes. And now, it's coming up for...

                                ... air.

Outwardly this only manifests itself in a few ways, his breathing begins to increase, drawing nearer to something natural. Color returns to his otherwise ashen features, though he remains pale and will forevermore. His body twitches, right arm moving, the cape falling aside to reveal the Turkish mockery of clothing Hojo left Vincent in upon sealing him within this satin prison. More notable then this, however, is his left arm... it's gone, replaced by some brassy colored metallic substitute with claws for fingers. What Hojo hoped to turn his rival into is not known, only that he did not quite complete his project. Vincent finally awakens with a sudden intake of breathe, eyes popping open to reveal their inhuman, unnatural crimson glow, as if someone made blood a flourescent color. His arms jut outward, the right jamming against the edge of the satin, not budging it. The left smashes through the side, splintering wood and chrome before he draws metal and flesh back in, sitting up with a demonic cry of rage and hatred echoing through the small room. Without even looking at those present, without even attempting to assess who has been so kind as to finally free him from his thiry year long internment, he proceeds to tear apart the coffin in a blind, animalistic anger, sparing nothing, not a single scrap of satin.

Helping Lu with the crowbar, lending it his strength, Sephiroth too is sent staggering back, but mostly for the fact that his mother's weight throws him terribly off balance for a little while. Purposely moving more slowly than she, he watches as she scampers back to peer into the coffin even as he rises to his feet. The mire of the room now on his clothing is ignored as he closes the distance between himself and his parents. Looking down over Lu's head he frowns faintly as he notes the pale features and the metal of the arm. Vincent's sudden intake of breath brings a tensing of Sephiroth's muscles although he really doesn't know why. Too many years of being combat trained is what it really means. More than a decade and a half of time speant on the battlefield, killing and fighting, and otherwise being paranoid. It brings your instincts to to a fine edge and all of that is triggered in moments.
The moment Vincent starts moving, muscles shifting beneath crimson and black clothe, Sephiroth reacts with inhuman speed. He doesn't know what the man is going to do, but something bad is about to happen. The SOLDIER immediately grabs for his mother and seeks to lift her off the floor, away from that coffin, and carry her back towards the wall. At the moment the coffin is between her and the door or he would have gone for that. Lu would get to hear a hiss of breath, like some huge predatory cat had entered the room, and she's swept away from the man she loves.. even as he begins to tear apart his thirty year prison.

"Vincent? .... Vincent." The first was a worried, frantic edge, but it is the second that comes quietly, taking in his condition. He... doesn't look alive. Not to her. A hand almost touches, before that hiss is heard, that inhaling of air. Air? He's breathing. But Lucrecia doesn't get to see the rest, since as soon as the man within the coffin tenses, the other within the room pulls her away. A hand reaches for Vincent, instinctively, but the cry for him is lost within her lips as the left side of that coffin, the side that she was on, is shattered to bits. Eyes widen, and the woman stills behind her son, one hand going to his arm, peering around him with something akin to awe, terror, and shock. It doesn't last long, as the reasons why that reaction came begin to falter, and one fact finally sinks in.
Vincent's alive. All these years, all these thoughts of living in perugatory have vanished for the moment, the insanity pushed back for the one person... the one man... she longed to see. She did, over years of contemplation, of years of thinking him dead, and not knowing that he had survived, of not knowing that the one child she had, the one that protects her now, is Vincent's. Lips quiver, only slightly, though she doesn't move from where she is at present. But she does watch, and see. His hair is longer, much longer than the style he once had it in. The eyes.... she knows. She does. It's only when his rage seems to calm that she finally speaks, one word, heard by both men, even as her grip tightens on Sephiroth's arm. "Vincent."

As the object of his rage is finally smashed beyond any sort of recognition, Vincent calms. It is almost too quickly, leaving him momentarily stunned, his body not quite ready to obey his commands, still given in thrall to the beast within. As the demon-esque presence is satiated, it relinquishes control, leaving the man to slump to the dust laden floor of the little room. Claws scrape against the grime, leaving trace marks carved into the floor itself, not merely tracks within the dust. He is unable to hold himself up with his human arm. Thirty years in a state of hybernation does little to aid the strength of one's limbs, even with Jenova cells and genetic tampering to keep him from being completely unable to move or hold himself up due to atrophy. It almost feels as if he must learn how to use his body again, all the things he took for granted suddenly lost. But, the nightmares are at an end. He is truly -free- this time, the weariness of his body, the ache of muscles not used in decades, the joyous pain all indicators that this is not another myriad dream or nightmare. He raises his head, blood red eyes falling on Sephiroth, who he is thusly unaware is actually his own son, and Lucrecia, the woman he has loved all this time, and dreamed of finding. It is she who he concentrates on, only vaguely remembering the other from one of his varying dreams. "Lucrecia." His voice is quiet, even enthralled.

~Don't move, Mother.~ Sephiroth warns silently through the link all of you share thanks to Jenova and mako. What he doesn't know is that Vincent too can hear it. In time all of you will be able to learn to speak to only one or another, but it's too soon for that. Standing before the woman, Sephiroth fully intends to guard and protect her at all costs.. even if it means doing a great deal of harm to the man there in the coffin. Thanks to the sleeveless shirt the tenseness of his muscles is easy to see. Muscle and tendon stand out against the pale skin, swimming from time to time as he shifts and makes ready to fight. It brings that numberal on his shoulder to writhe for a moment. And since fighting is something he very much loves it also brings a brightness to the glow in his eyes. Eagerness almost. Bright enough to cast shadows on his own features. No matter that eagerness he warns Lu all the same, ~Let him vent his rage.~ You know.. on something that isn't either of you.
As the rage is finally spent, leaving Vincent there on the floor weak and confused, Sephiroth glances down to his mother. ~Wait a moment... He can't kill me...~ Meaning that he doesn't want Lu rushing in and possibly getting herself hurt. Slowly moving away from you, the SOLDIER meets those red eyes even as he crosses the distance that seperates you three and crouches down near the prone man. "Yes, Lucrecia." He murmurs, hair sliding over shoulders like some strange pale liquid, for Sephiroth leans forward and actually makes an attempt to help Vincent sit himself up. Should the man not protest, or fight, he calls silently, ~ I believe it's safe.~ The man's touch is surprisingly gentle for all he wanted to get into a fight mere moments before, but this is the man his mother is in love with. Why be rough?

It's only that inner voice that keeps Lucrecia stilled, the rage not enough to keep her back. No, instead, she understands it, even if she could not do so herself. It brings back images of blades and needles, of slicing of skin and tissue to study, even when no anethesesia was given to help her cope with the pain. Pain was part of the process afterall, or so she was told. If Hojo did that to her, what did he do to the man that continues to destroy his wooden prison. She wants -- longs -- to rush to him, but the words given were simple enough, the tension in the air palatable. Her breathing almost stills, to the point that she forgets to, before a soft whoosh escapes. She can't slow her processes down, nor forget about them. She has been too long alive, not within a physical prision.
A mental prison, however, is another story. One that clings, even though Sephiroth finally moves away to help Vincent up. Son. A man, should she had gone on perhaps instinct, instead of loyalty, would be lover. But she can't move, feet almost leaden, as she watches her son help the former Turk up, unable to even speak. If she'd known that Vincent could hear their thoughts, she might not speak through them. But it is seeing the metal arm that leaves him unable to move that finally gets that soft mental voice to pipe up. ~Wha... what has he done to him....? Sephiroth, how could he?~ It is only the asking of that question that finally allows her to move, her physical voice to unleash itself, as she takes those steps forward. "Vincent.... it is you." Not a question, of course. She knows in her very being it's him... there's no doubt. But... what has been done to him... it almost made him unrecognizable. Joy will finally flood in, once disbelief runs it's course.

He hears the voice in his head, and it brings Vincent further into confusion. Who's voice was that? Since he saw no one's lips move, he feels his sanity creep further to the left. He does not understand what's been done to him, for Hojo never explained any of it to him, merely poking and prodding him, 'Does this hurt when I do this? Oh? Good. I'll do it again.', and forcing him to test his alterations so he could tweak this and remodify that. Sephiroth approaches, and like an animal caged too long, the former Turk shies from him, wary of him even as he obviously is trying to help Vincent and not harm, giving him aid in standing. He forces himself to his feet with said aid, staggering to the side to escape the other man's touch again. There is a sense of deja vu invading his senses as well. He knows the white haired man, though he can't quite remember how.
Lucrecia's voice, however, stills him, gaze slipping toward the woman who's mere memory was one of the few things that kept him from slipping into animalistic insanity or a vegetative state of being in thirty years. Is he truly himself though? Yes, this is the body of the man she once knew as a lover, the father of her only child, but his mind still reels from his imprisonment, a whirl of sensations. Even the stale air of the little chamber is something overwhelming. "Lucrecia," he repeats, as if her name were all he could think to say. Then, surprisingly, he begins to compose himself. Difficult, but necessary, somewhere the Turk side of him has begun to slide back into place, along with the dispassionate nature he'd had to embrace back then. So many things to ask, however, so much he's missed, so much he's been left to wonder. Where should he begin? "How long...?" A question he once asked Sephiroth, in a dream state, but has since forgotten.

Not remembering that dream at all thanks to it having been a dream, Sephiroth holds his actions as Vincent pulls away and makes no further attempts to touch or give aid. If Vincent wants to stagger around on his own, he's allowed to do it to his heart's content. Perhaps only Lu will notice as the two are so close just how many features they share. Sephiroth shares features from both parents, but not enough to have people say something along the lines of 'You look like your mother'. No, instead there is no doubting who his parents are if you compare, but that's all. Well, if you don't count the color of his eyes. Both mother and son have the same eye color. Sephiroth stands slowly as Vincent pulls away and takes the time to look to Lu as she asks. ~Mother, you should know I have no answer to that.~ All of you have far too many memories of pain and fear thanks to Hojo. Things that pull you into nightmare and make you wake dripping in sweat. All of you have suffered, so how is he to explain something he doesn't understand himself?
Ignoring Vincent's question of how long, Sephiroth rubs his hands on his thighs again, seeking to clear them a little and sighs out a breath. ~We should take him back to your cave. We've already been here all day. He'll relax more if not in this place and I very much want a bath.~ So practical minded your son. Ignoring the dirt streaked down his arms thanks to work and sweating, the man moves to the hall and looks out to make sure nothing is going to jump out at you. Not like anything has today, but one should always be sure when it come to ShinRa. ~Can your chocobo carry two? If not he's going to have to deal with me carrying him.~ For he plans to fly up to the cave.

She knew there was no answer, really. The only person that can answer that is the one that did this to them all, and she doesn't particularly want to talk to him anymore. Lucrecia is useless to him now, anyway. At least, that's how she's thought. Hojo can create as many SOLDIER clones as he wishes, without something as inefficent as birth and waiting for a child to grow in the way. Still, she pauses just before the pair of them, before glancing up at Sephiroth for just a moment. ~I know, but... this...~ Is it so terrible to fathom? At least, if Vincent is listening, he knows the relationship between Lucrecia and the man that helped him to his feet. But the woman still looks concerned, despite the dust that covers her frame, smudging face and neck, leaving her in a near cloak of filth.
And for a while, Lucrecia still doesn't know what to say to Vincent, watching him with wide eyes, brows furrowed just a touch over his condition. She knows what had to been done to have the man within a coffin for thirty years and still be alive. It seems shocking that there is any Jenova left, with so many cells used. But it's only when the man straightens, to gain a demeanor so serious that it's stifling that the woman glances from one man to another. Now, while it might be hard to tell Sephiroth's parentage by looks along, the mental traits, that inner toughness that is almost frightening, is easy to see. It's almost a mirror image, colored in opposite, save for that pale skin. It's that image that prompts her to speak, nearly reaching up to touch the former Turk's face. "You... you disappeared... thirty years ago, Vincent. I hadn't known....." Sephiroth's comment catches her offguard for a moment, and she nods once. ~The cave will be better. And Tashin can carry him." /If/ the chocobo can will be something else, for the beast within might spook the bird, but.... we'll see. "We should get out of here," is said aloud, for everyone's benefit.

"You are not carrying me anywhere," Vincent says toward Sephiroth. He doesn't know this man, at all, beside some oddball deja vu feeling. Of course, this reveals his own ability to hear this 'link' between mother and son, sharing a part of it thanks to the Jenova cells Hojo injected into his body. A frankenstein-ish experiment that either Hojo lost interest in, or merely grew frustrated enough over that he put his toy away to concentrate on other projects, namely Sephiroth. He has begun to finally peice together their relationship, hearing the term 'mother'. This brings to light new questions. But these are all better answered later, for Vincent has grown more then tired of residing within the depths of this mansion.
Thirty years. Thirty years of his life gone, even if he hasn't quite realized that he's not -old- by any stretch of the imagination. He gazes toward Lucrecia with the unmasked adoration he's always felt for her, though it disappears as he nods to her comment. "Thank you... both of you." It is said without emotion, dispassionate as ever when not prompted otherwise by Lucrecia. Nor does he expect either to say 'you're welcome'.
And so the scene fades, the family 'reunited' at last, even if all this truly does is raise more questions, add more tensions, and bring to mind more reasons to hunt down the infamous Dr. Hojo and show him that the nightmares he created have not forgotten him, not one bit.