Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Price for a Memory ❯ Getting Attached ( Chapter 27 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
27.

Cloud flung open the door to the dorms and stormed over to his bunk.

Glares were sent in his direction from the rest of the Cadet’s in the room. He ignored them and dropped himself haphazardly atop his bed.

“Didn’t go well eh?” Zack almost whispered from his bunk.

Cloud just shook his head and stared out the tiny grated window.

“I start work in the labs tomorrow. I’m not training with everyone for now. Fucking shit.”

Zack thought it best not to press further into the situation, thus anger further the already irate blond.

Rolling onto his back, Zack stared vacantly at the ceiling. He knew he had supposed to meet someone a few days ago. Someone important. Wasn’t that where he was going before he was accosted outside the gates of the ShinRa building?

Raising a hand to his clammy forehead, Zack rubbed the sweat away. He was freezing and his body was shaking but the sweat poured from him. Right now, he wanted nothing more but to leave and go home to Gongaga.

Stealing one last look at the blond male not too far away, still sulking, Zack rolled onto his other side and tried to block out the shakes and the nagging voices in his head.

Damn ShinRa. Damn mako.

------

Hojo waited impatiently for his new lab rat to show. Fair enough, the boy was more skilled at swordsmanship but reading through all of his school tests, his IQ tests and indeed his grades in the field of science, Hojo thought the boy would be more use in a laboratory surrounding.

Also, he needed a capable bodyguard for his two embryo children. He needed someone who could fix any problems or stop anyone who tried to go near them if he was out the lab.

The lab doors sliding open revealed his late little rat. Sephiroth’s blasted pet and property….even though he couldn’t remember the boy.

“About time boy. I do not like to be kept waiting.”

“My apologies Sir. I had a….run in last night.”

Hojo turned his back on the blond boy and walked away. He had no interest in hearing sorry excuses. Work had to be done.

With a flick of the wrist, Hojo beckoned Cloud to follow him. Both males walked over to the cramped workstation filled with sheets of paper and novels worth of notes.

The raven haired male took a bundle and thrust them into Cloud’s arms.

“Get up to speed. I don’t have time to be teaching and babying you in here. Get those notes on Project R.1.K.U. and 5.O.R.A. read, then you can start with the conservation of the two beings.”

Cloud’s eyes widened slightly. “Beings? What the hell is he up to?”

“Well? I have important matters to attend to and will be out of the lab for about an hour. I expect you to be fully up to speed by then.”

Cloud growled at the older man as he sauntered from the lab, before sighing in distain at the mountain of paperwork with scribbles all over it in his hands. “Oh man….”

------

“Enter!” Sephiroth called from the window of his office. He used to love watching Cadet’s from this window. He was sure he used to watch one in particular.

“Sephiroth?!”

Sephiroth winced when he heard the blatant disregard for his position of power.

“What do you want Zackary?”

Zack recoiled. Sephiroth had used his full name. He was in trouble.

“Sorry Sir. I wanted to ask you a question….if I may.”

Being polite just wasn’t him.

“You may.”

“What happened last night?”

“I don’t know what you are talking about Zack.”

“I know Cloud went up to your quarters.”

“Oh him. That whelp who broke into my room and attacked me. He was rambling something about mako injections being a cover up. He said something about me and him….”

“That whelp? He has a name Sephiroth. I think there may be some truth in his ramblings. At first I thought it was only myself and you that received those injections. Cloud believes that he was also there and that what happened to us was much more than a routine mako test.”

“He did comment on the fact that I had broken limbs.”

“You did? Well, see? Surely that means that he was there?”

“Please Zack. My mind is troubled enough. Both you and I are going to Nibelheim in two weeks to investigate problems with their reactor. I have to take Reno with us also. His sharp shooting skills may come in handy….or so I was told.”

“Nibelheim huh? Haven’t been there in years.”

“I also. We have to also raid the basements of the old ShinRa mansion. It has been brought to my attention that hack scientists are trying to create human life through both artificial and highly illegal means.”

Zack nodded slowly. He had never heard of such a thing happening in Nibelheim. But, who was he to question Sephiroth’s orders.

Zack saluted the silver haired male before turning to head out of the room.

“Zack?”

“Yes Sir?”

“Be well prepared for this mission. I have a bad feeling about it. I need to delve deeply into researching this place.”

------

“Ok, lets see….

Both subjects have completed the first stages of their development. Both have been given regular daily doses of diluted mako.
Their progress has been mapped out given the limited material published about artificial human development and on the files and reports of the donor specimens.
Final results on the success of the project is still pending.

Cloud glared at the final paragraph in the junk report.

“It’s told me nothing about what these are….Hojo is an idiot as far as I’m concerned.”

Cloud abandoned the chicken scratch reports and made his way over to the bubbling canisters.

Raising a hand to the side of Project 5.O.R.A., he ran his finger tips down the side of the glass casing. The tiny being inside looked like an alien. Through the bubbling mako, Cloud could make out small indentations of what would be arms and legs.

“Ugh, creepy.”

He shivered slightly at the sight of both of the embryo’s. How on earth was this possible? How could a person be grown like this? He had always thought that babies had to be nurtured inside a woman, a real womb. Not like this.

His eyes kept falling on 5.O.R.A.. He couldn’t explain it. He just felt a pull to the teeny being. He could feel great power inside the vessel.

“Perhaps this wont be so hard. Give them mako doses at the appropriate times. Record all of their vital signs at given intervals. Kick anyone’s ass who comes near them. Nah, wont be too hard….”

Cloud’s stomach sank as an image of Sephiroth came to the forefront. He could see both himself and the General in a bitter struggle. His hands held fast onto Masamune as he pushed forwards to pull it from Sephiroth’s iron grip.

“Where the hell did that come from? What brought that on?”

Cloud winced as a shooting pain spread across his shoulder blades and settled on his left. Another slight ache at the base of his spine caused Cloud to groan slightly.

He still refused to believe all that Reno had said. It just didn’t seem plausible.

Still, he had to act dumb and vegetate in the labs for the next fortnight. Wait until Sephiroth came for him.

------

After 11 days of boredom in the labs, Cloud had reached the end of his rope.

Still, the rate at which the two beings were growing at was astounding.

Small bodies were finally forming. Cloud could see the development of the beings as clear as day.

Small facial features took shape on both of the projects. Noses. Closed over eyes. Ears. Mouths.

Still, he felt strongly drawn to 5.O.R.A.

At his most bored, he even talked to the little person. Today was no different.

“Hey little guy. How are you today? Good? I thought so. Now, lets check your stats.”

Cloud quickly jotted down both embryo’s heart rates and swiftly gave them their increased potency dose of mako.

“So little guy’s, you miss me last night? I thought so. I cant wait to see the two of you when your old enough to be released from here….”

A sharp pain stretched across Cloud’s chest as he stared at 5.O.R.A.

“I….I want the two of you to do better than this place. I pray the two of you will not end up like Sephiroth….or myself. I feel like I don’t know who I am anymore. Just a couple of weeks ago I was training hard. Training to be the best. Now? I’m stuck in a lab with nothing but foggy and distorted memories. I wanted so much more. To be some place much better….”

“Cloud?!”

Said blond jumped away from the canisters as he whirled round to see Hojo right behind him.

“Yes Sir?”

“A request from General Sephiroth. He wishes to see you in his office. Now.”

Cloud bowed to the scientist before heading out to find Sephiroth’s office.

------

“You know what to do Reno.”

“Of course.”

Said red head swiftly followed after the blond.

“Oh Cloud, you want to end up in a better place? I will make sure of it.”