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- Cait Sith is Reeve, but also not Reeve. They see flashes of each other. Reeve can peer into Cait's mind and through Cait's eyes in a quick shifting - like when the eye doctor flipped the lenses, one, two, Reeve, Cait.
He used to make simple flying machines and send them soaring over Midgar. They'd help him know where to build, how to build, how to make the plate stronger. All they could do was fly and watch.
(when he was still very young, he'd build the most basic of machines, all gears, and send them crawling through the house. His parents thought it was cute. His classmates thought it was creepy. It’s easier to just depend on himself, the many himselves he has become.)
Shinra sends Cait Sith out to spy on Avalanche, and Reeve watches them through Cait's eyes.
- Having a spy is a curiosity, at first.
"So what did they do today?" Scarlet asks, over today's meeting.
Reeve snorts. "Well, we figured out why the man in charge of Avalanche has it out for us."
"Oh?" Rufus says.
"Well, someone shot his hand off while trying to stop his friend from falling off a cliff," Reeve deadpans. "Why the hell would you shoot up a city that had accepted Mako Power?"
"Maybe they weren't cooperative enough," Scarlet says primly. She buffs her nails on a knife. "I don't know, Reeve. I put down insurrections all the time. It's not my fault if a few peons get mad about it."
"Naturally. Can I get back to work?"
On the other side of the world, Cait wobbles from side to side as Barret finishes his story.
It's different, seeing him in person. He's all human outside of the cameras, not a sculptured threat to his city.
"So I gotta go stop Dyne before I kick it, so I can rest in peace. The rest of you don't have to come along," Barret concludes.
Cloud snorts. "If I let you get killed, I'm gonna have nightmares. I'm coming with you."
"My fortune says coming along is good," Cait says.
"Fine," Barret says, with a weak smile.
- it isn't fine, in the end. It's late at night, and Reeve's nursing a mug of tea and a headache from spying through Cait for so long, and watching Barret trying to talk his friend away from the edge of a cliff.
"Marlene's in Midgar. Come on, let's go see her again - "
She's in Midgar. She'll be fine, Reeve thinks.
"These hands are too stained to hold Marlene," Barret's friend says. "Don't...don't make her cry, Barret.
It happens too fast for any of them to react, except for Barret. HE's already over the edge, trying to catch the man's hand before he plummets -
Back in Shinra HQ, Reeve winces at the meaty THWACK of flesh hitting rock.
"Dyne!! We were the same... My hands aren't any cleaner - I shouldn't carry Marlene either - "
You shouldn't, Reeve thinks, as Cait runs to Barret. You let all those people die when the reactor blew. What right do you have?
But he knows better than to say that. So he doesn't.
And they all settle down for the night in a cramped tent.
Reeve calls his parents in the morning.
"Mom? No, nothing's wrong, I just wanted to hear your voice. You know I love you, right?"
- Sometimes Cait's thoughts bubble up in his head. If it's during a boring meeting, or if it's late at night, he'll close his eyes and let himself listen in.
Cait, Reeve. Reeve, Cait.
The bustling love triangle is always funny to watch. Who'd have thought terrorists could get so bubbly? And sometimes the Cetra woman comes over and asks Cait about fortune telling, and they get into a rollicking conversation together. (Though Reeve rarely gets to listen in on those. Cait likes keeping things to himself. He is Reeve, but he also isn't’ Reeve, and sometimes he has experiences he keeps for himself.)
Then there are the new people. The lab rat, the child, the pilot, the ex-Turk. He is a toy to Yuffie, and a curiosity to Cid and Nanaki, and he avoids Vincent. It's not exactly hard.
(The Turks still unnerve him, even after years of working with them. He joined Shinra to create,n ot destroy. That same feeling of danger clings to Vincent like his bloody cloak.)
But he likes it best when the switch flips and he's there with Barrett. The man looms over Cait, like he did over the cameras in the Shinra Building. His voice is a rumble that resonates in Cait's metal chest.
And he can, at least, ask him about the reactor. About Avalanche. About the things he’s curious about but can’t get answers for from Shinra.
"Even with all three of them dying, and the aftermath of the reactor bombing, and everyone else at risk, you still wanna keep at it?" Cait asks.
"If I stop now, what would they say?" Barret says. The two of them are squeezed together on a narrow motel bed, mostly man with one small robot. "They all died trying to stop the plate, trying to save this planet."
Platefall. His stomach twists, remembering. He'd tried convincing the President to stop, he'd tried sending Cait out, but the turks -but the security -
He'd have died along with them if he'd fought too hard. How could he save people if he died?
"I think it's awfully brave of ya," Cait says. "I dunno if I'd have the guts to do that stuff. It's easier being along for the ride."
"You're here helping, aren't you? That's still pretty brave."
"Not enough," Reeve says, Cait says. "I'm always riding someone else's coat tails."
- Reeve might get an hour or two in, these days, of trying to do something in Midgar. It's all reports to the Turks, spying, putting a word in the right ear.
Or being an ear for someone else.
"It's not like a robot can have kittens," Cait says. "Never thought about it!"
"Well, if you promise to behave, you can show off your tricks for my daughter."
"I'll show her all my stuff!" Cait says, and Reeve can feel that pulse of golden excitement in his other self. "I'll tell her her fortunes - can she read yet? Oh, oh, I can make pictures!"
"Nah, she's only four. And 's not like she's old enough for school yet. Got time to save up for elementary school"
Reeve thinks of the preschool his parents scraped and saved up for. What would Barret have had, in the slums, where the suns didn't reach despite his efforts?
"I bet when this is all done, we can take the money we get from beating Sephiroth and use it for Marlene!!"
A smile flits on Barret's face. At his small home, Reeve smiles watching him -
And the doorbell rings.
The connection breaks.
Reeve curses under his breath and gets the door.
it's fucking Tseng. There's a middle aged woman with him, looking stressed, and a child asleep in her arms.
"What," Reeve says flatly, curtailing the 'the fuck' in the presence of a civilian.
"We need more leverage on Avalanche. They're too far ahead," Tseng says. He walks inside, and the woman follows with a cold dignity.
Reeve shuts the door and hisses, "Hostages? Really?"
"It's worked before. It will work again," Tseng says.
"What are you expecting me to do? I'm not armed - "
"You'll have another Turk added to your guards," Tseng says.
Reeve deflates. "Fine. Do I get the dignity of an introduction?"
The woman is Elmyra, Aerith's foster mother. And the child is -
"Marlene," Elmyra says. "They were going to take just her, but I said I wouldn't let her come alone. I Sleep'd her so she didn't have to deal with the stress of all this."
"Of course. Hell. I'm sorry," Reeve says, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "I'm spying on your daughter. She's fine, by the way, healthy as a chocobo. Just beat a Nibel dragon to death."
"Of course she is.. Aerith's my daughter," Elmyra says, fiercely proud.
Aerith's mother. Barret's daughter. Fuck him.
"The Turks will definitely shoot you if you try to run," Reeve says, getting straight to the point. "I realize being a hostage is not great, but being a hostage who got their legs shot off is worse. Work with me and I'll try not to make this an ordeal, and I'll try and get you out of here safely when Avalanche is stopped."
"They won't be," Elmyra says.
Marlene stirs. The two of them break eye contact to look at her.
"...Let's save that for later, Mrs. Elmyra. For now, how about Uncle Reeve orders in some dinner?"
- "Today's fortune is that your family is in good health!" Cait squeaks out.
Aerith considers this. "I hope so. It's not easy to get a phone line into Midgar, after all. I hope my letters are reaching my mom."
They are. Cait makes sures of it. They've only gotten one so far, but it's enough for Elmyra. It's Enough.
"Any word on the fortune about my garden?" Aerith says, bumping his shoulder playfully.
"Not yet," Cait says. "Wait for tomorrow!!"
And then someone bumps Reeve's shoulder and the connection breaks. His eyes fly open.
"Uncle Reeve, look!!"
Marlene has shoved a picture in his face. It takes Reeve a moment to refocus his eyes and see the picture, a mess of scribbles that might be a person with MARLEEN written under it.
"Oh, a self portrait?"
"Mhm. Granny Elmyra says I grew an inch! So I drew it to show Daddy!" Marlene says.
"I bet he'll love it," Reeve says. "What's this here?"
"it's a spoon! Because we tried the beets yesterday and ate them with a spoon, and then we had ice cream," Marlene says, eyes glittering.
"You did so well trying out a new vegetable! I think that definitely gets a reward."
For the fourth week in a row. But it's not like they had great nutrition in the slums, right? He'd drafted a plan to make sure the slums had adequate sun and clean water, for a student project, and then Shinra had come and made him an offer...
A chance to set things right, at the low cost of his soul. Metaphorically.
But that meant he could afford lettuce, and beets, and ice cream, and enough toys and paper to entertain a four year old while her guardian paced at the window like a caged tiger.
- "Do you want to speak to your Daddy tonight?" Reeve asks.
"Mhm," a sleepy Marlene says. It's past midnight here. He's kept her up for this, so she doesn't know what he's done. Just in case he gets caught doing this.
Cait runs, with the keystone to the temple of the ancients, while Reeve rocks with Marlene on his hip. She's growing fast with new nutrition, getting heavier, and it's good.
it's good. it should be good. a parent would want his child safe and eating well. it's good -
They catch Cait Sith. Avalanche does. As he hands off the keystone.
"I won't run or hide," Reeve says, Caith says. "Yes, I"m a spy. I was hired by Shinra."
Barret growls a storm of epithets thick enough to turn the air blue.
"I couldn't help it," Cait says with a shrug. It was how he was made, after all. "How about we continue like nothing ever happened."
"No way, cat," Cloud growls, the tip of his sword to Cait's metal neck. "You've got a lot of guts acting like a friend but being a spy."
"Then, what will you do? Kill me? You'd be wasting your time if you tried." Cait raised his head, exposing his neck. Metal groaned. "This body's just a toy anyway. My real body's back at Shinra HQ in Midgar."
"What the hell are you," Barret hisses. "What's your real name?!"
"I can't tell you."
Barret steps forward, teeth bared, and Cloud puts a hand up. "We're not getting anywhere."
"See?" Reeve says. "I told you that talking won't do any good. Let's just continue our journey."
"Do you think this is a joke?" Cloud growls..
Reeve sighs, and pushes the sword away, The fur covering his metal hand is cut open to reveal metal.
"Alright, yes. I'm a Shinra employee. But we're not entirely enemies."
He looked up to them. To Cloud, eyes as bright and mad as materia. To Barret, whose handsome face was twisted with disgust.
"But we're not entirely enemies. Something bothers me. I think it's your way of thinking." He points up to Barret. "You don't get paid. You don't get praised. Yet, you still risk your lives and continue on your journey. Seeing that makes me...."
He shifts, in his other body, Marlene (hostage) (child) weighing on his chest.
"It just makes me think about my life. I don't think I'd feel too good if things ended the way they are now."
Barret levels his gun at Reeve. "You aren't fooling us this time."
"Once a spy, always a spy," Cloud agrees. "We can't go on with someone like you."
"Just as I thought. Talking won't make a bit of difference. But I prepared something in case this happened. Why don't you listen to this?"
Reeve nudges Marlene, and forces the connection to Cait wider. Wide enough for two. "Talk to your father."
"Daddy!!" Marlene cries, sleepy, elated -
- and through Cait's mouth.
"Ma. Marlene?" Barret says, the emotion draining from his voice, the color from his face.
"Daddy, it's me, Marlene," she says, and smothers a yawn. "Keep on saving the planet, ok? I love you."
"I love you too," Barret rasps.
Marlene lolls on his chest, ragdoll, falling back asleep. But something icy nests deep inside him.
"I didn't want to do this... Using dirty tricks and hostages. But this is how it is - no compromises. So let's keep on going as we did."
Cait went on talking without him. It was like Reeve was drying up, too. Watching Barret. Watching what he'd done to him.
- The next day is the temple of the ancients, and its' a shitstorm the second they land.
They find Tseng dying on the front steps. While Aerith talks to him, Cait finds the briefcase with his extra body in it and drags outside of the temple,just in case.
Reeve's locked himself in one of the two bathrooms in the house. Even from a continent away, this place is giving him the creeps. He can't let his concentration be interrupted.
He can't let Elmyra and Marlene see this.
Sephiroth shows up, and even though he looks like Sephiroth, and sounds like Sephiroth, the man's cadance, the way he stands, the very words he says - it's all wrong. He'd only known Sephiroth from a distance for a few years but it's all wrong, all wrong.
The paintings on the wall. The way the floor feels under Cait's feet. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Until they find the black materia. Which can only be obtained with a sacrifice.
"Sephiroth has plenty of flunkies to throw at this," Cloud grumbles.
"So what will we do?" Aerith asks.
Cait speaks before Reeve can. "Don't forget about me! You can use my stuffed body for the future of the Planet."
"We can't let Sephiroth get his hands on the Black Materia, but we can't let Shinra get it either."
"So that means you don't trust me?" Cait says. Reeve listens. Everything he wants to say (about shinra, about hostages, about ends and means), Cait won't let him. "Cloud, there's really nothing else you can do. Please trust me."
Cloud and Aerith look to each other, and Cloud sighs. "I guess we have no choice."
"Aright! Leave it all to me!" Cait cheers.
Reeve watches numbly as Aerith asks for one last fortune, as Cait predicts happiness and love and perfection and that he won't give the materia to Shinra -
We have to, Reeve thinks.
Aerith kisses the top of Cait's head. "Be strong, Cait Sith."
Cait Sith walks in. He won't respond to Reeve. He feels all warm, like Aerith's lips left a crown on his head. Reeve saw so little of her through him, and that was on purpose, Cait thinks. You may have gotten Barret and Cloud and the rest, but Aerith was my friend.
"She told me to be strong," Cait tells Reeve. "I feel so happy!!"
Don't do this, Reeve thinks, and tries to freeze him in place. He can't explain why he's trying to stop him, what he’s afraid of.. But he has to. He has to -
Cait falls. "Oof." He gets back up. "I can still move around."
The altar is before him.
"The Ancients sure did a great job making this."
Reeve remembers making Cait. How he'd set up his frame. How he'd carefully screwed in his gears.
"I can protect the Planet too," Cait says to Reeve as he pulls himself onto the altar. "There's plenty of stuffed toys like my body around, but there's only one me!"
"I know," Reeve says.
"Don't forget me even if another Cait Sith comes along."
"I won't," Reeve whispers.
"Good bye, then! I guess I'm off to save the Planet..."
Cait's nimble hands spin and play the puzzles needed to retrieve the Black Materia, even as the temple shrinks around him. Closer, closer. Until it's stone against metal, stone against gear, the crunch and scrape and scream until there is nothing -
He's already next to the toilet. It's nothing to curl over it and vomit as, in the last moments, their minds and bodies mingle, then pull apart.
He was ready for this.
(no, he wasn't.)
But the new body is waiting. He made it, with his own hands. Feels the body already joining with his mind, gears turning and twisting as the new Cait wakes up.
He's waking up as Aerith runs past him. As they drag an unconscious Cloud to the ship.
Neither of them realizes how badly things have gone until hours later, a hotel room.
(Elmyra broke open the door. Made him drink some water, have some soup. She's too kind. He doesn't deserve this.)
"Did you mean what you said, about wanting to save the planet?" Barret asks, after he's checked on Cloud. Once Cait and Reeve are awake enough to talk.
"That wasn't me. That was the other Cait," says Cait. He's only been alive for a few hours, but he can feel the impression of his other self. Feel it in Reeve who feels him, an oroboros of soul and origin. "But he's part of the person who's animating us, back in Midgar, just like we're part of him. He's been taking really good care of Marlene for you. She can write her name, now, and she's grown an inch, and she tells me how much her daddy loves her every night, and we're going to let her go even if Shinra gets mad about it. I don't think I can save any of you, but I can save her."
"That so?" Barret asks.
"That's so," Cait says. "I don't think I'll be doing much in the next few days, here. You're racing Shinra and Sephiroth. That means that, for better or for worse, the end is coming soon."
Reeve clears his throat. "That means, I have to make sure I can get her out fast when everything happens. It's almost done."
Barret is quiet. He's been quiet a lot, since he learned Cait was a spy. Reeve had expected more brimstone and fury, but things have been happening so fast since then. Maybe he hasn’t had time for it.
"Can you promise me that she’ll be safe?" Barret asks.
"I can," Reeve says. "Your daughter is going to be fine, planet help me."
Barret's shoulders sag. "Thank God," he mumbles, and puts a hand to his eyes, and shakes.
Cait puts a hand on his back, and Reeve sits with him.
- The temple of the ancients was bad. The city of the ancients is worse.
He can feel it all the way from here. Like a claw in his stomach. Cait is fine, but Reeve - is a coward, and not used to magic, and Elmyra sits with him and a bucket and a blanket, and Marlene plays quietly.
"Sometimes Daddy got sick. That's when we play quiet games," she says, and he's so thankful for it.
The magic is bad.
But then.
But then.
Even a robot can't run fast enough, when Cloud starts acting strange, when they find Aerith and then there is a flash of silver and there's blood, more blood than there should be, there's so much blood -
"No, no, no," Reeve mumbles between retches, watching. Cait moves on without him.
"What's wrong?" Elmyra asks.
He can't tell her. He can't. The words are there but his mouth won't move. He can't. He can't.
Of course he's seen people dying. People killed by turks. People crushed by the plate. assassins he had to fend off. soldiers in a war. dead people. dying people.
He's a coward. He sends his toys to fight for him. it should be cait getting crushed up. It should be him. not her. not her. not her.
- The magic is so thick that he loses track of Cait Sith somewhere in the mountains.
By then, Marlene is asleep. By then, his head has cleared enough for him to tell Elmyra.
It shouldn't be from him.
It shouldn't have happened at all.
"No," Elmyra says. "No - "
"I'm so sorry," Reeve says. "She's gone."
The noise Elmyra makes is barely human.
It is almost a relief, the next day, to hear that Avalanche has been captured. That the Black Materia has been activated and Meteor will fall.
To feel Cait come back into range and think, in unison, we cannot allow this to go any further.
- "Tseng is in the hospital, his favorite charge is dead and you want to shoot her mother to make a point? What's the point in it?"
"He's got a point," Reno says to the Shinra officer Heidegger sent.
"He really does," Rude agrees.
The officer cows under the twin stares of the Turks. "I didn't come here. I didn't get orders. Nothing happened.
"Good," Reno says, before turning to Reeve. "You really turning in all your chips on this?"
"What else am I going to spend them on at this point? The world's ending," Reeve deadpans.
He hasn't changed his clothes in three days. His hair's getting oily. He looks a mess, and he's stopped caring.
"Right you are. Just remember to get back in three days or the Prez will get suspicious," Reno says. "You don't take vacays that much."
"I know," Reeve sighs.
It's a shitty drive to Kalm. Marlene knows something is wrong but no one's told her what, yet. Elmyra's nearly shut down under the weight of the bad news. And Reeve is - he doesn't know what he is, yet.
We're going to save the planet, Cait thinks in his head.
And first, Reeve thinks as he sings the chocobo song for Marlene for the fiftieth time, as Cait dives into the guts of an airship waiting to be stolen with Cid, we have to save our friends.
11 . Honestly, it's too easy to sneak into Junon. Rufus is doing a dozen things to deal with Meteor, and Avalanche's public execution is awfully sloppy.
Is he expecting a Sephiroth enhanced Cloud to show up? Sephiroth himself?
A siren wails. A Weapon is coming.
Whatever he's expecting,it's not that, and it's not us, Cait thinks, and lobs a sleep gas grenade at Scarlet and bolts.
"I'm here to help," He squeaks, clawing apart the ropes tying Barret's arms behind his back.
"What - aren't you still part of Shinra?" Barret asks.
"Let's just ay I'm against capital punishment," Cait says, and Reeve sneers through him - "Besides, I hate this broad. Come on, we gotta help Tifa."
But Scarlett's beaten them to it. How did she know to bring a gas mask, Reeve thinks furiously as Cait and Barret wheel down the corridors. He's holed up in his bathroom. Shinra just expects him to spy, these days -
Not all of them know it's Cait he controls. Just his metal birds, just his eyes in the sky. It'll have to be enough to do this until he's caught.
"We can't get to Tifa," Cait wheezes, despite not having lungs. "We have to get to the airport, come on."
"What, and leave Tifa??" Barret asks.
"Trust me, trust me, we have to take a chance - "
He remembers how to get to the airport in Junon, the shortcuts, lets Cait run there with the snapshots in his mind, Reeve to Cait -
"Are you sure this is the right way?"
"Did I make a wrong turn?" Reeve mutters.
"Dammit, what the hell are we going to do...."
Footsteps of approaching Shinra gunmen echo in the empty airport.
"What the hell. You better watch my back til the end, partner," Barret says.
Reeve feels like he's just drank an elixir, with the exhilaration he feels. "I will - but this isn't the end!"
Footsteps echo. Cid shows up. "Come on ,the ship's ready! Let's go get Tifa, come on, come on - "
"Coming," the three of them echo, and they run.
And It's a blur, then, getting on the ship, and flying, and Reeve and Cid are at the wheel as they duck and dive and tifa does a flying leap off the Junon cannon -
Reeve's mind is emptied out, by the end, as Cait falls to the floor and gasps with non-existent lungs, as Tifa and Barret wheeze with him.
"Dammit, Cait. Why didn't you tell me you could fly a plane? I thought Tifa would be gone for good," Barret asks, eventually.
"Sorry. I had to do something to trick Shinra," Reeve says. Cait sits up. "you should go on into the ship. Everyone else is here."
Tifa walks on down, first. Cait waits until Barret's caught his breath to hop on up.
"Partner?" Cait asks. "I think you almost gave the guy on the other end a heart attack."
"You two just attacked Shinra and stopped the execution of terrorists. I'm pretty sure you're one of us now."
"I can't be," Reeve says.
"But I am," Cait adds.
Barret's eyebrows rise.
"Never mind that," Reeve says. "I took your daughter to Kalm, along with Aerith's mother. Called in all my favors to keep them safe. I don't know if we'll have time, but I can take you there. Or we can go when it's all over."
"I think," Barret says softly, "that'd be real nice."
"It will," Reeve says. He shivers, the adrenaline starting to wear off. "I can't do much from here, I'm not a fighter, but I can keep an eye on what's going on inside Shinra. Until they catch me, I'll be your mole on the inside."
"That's more than enough," Barret says. He ruffles Cait's head, and the cat makes a startled noise of enjoyment. "C'mon. You should tell everyone that. Get some team spirit going."
- "Hey. Man behind Cat."
"Yeah, Barret?"
He doesn't know what's happening with Avalanche. He's not really sure what time it is in Midgar or wherever Avalanche is. Cait's working on his own as Reeve hustles, trying to organize an evacuation plan for an event he isn't even sure is coming.
"You taking care of yourself?"
"Course I am. Can't be two people at once otherwise," Reeve says, then clarifies - "Cait is his own person. He's a part of me, but he's also himself. Or you could say I'm part of him but also me. But that means I'm eating for two right now, among other things."
"Sounds rough."
"I'm not a fighter. It's easier than going out, doing this," Reeve says. "I just have to hold the fort until I run out of bodies."
"Dunno. that seems stressful to me," Barret says.
"It's not, not compared to what you're doing. I've had enough time to myself to think of roasts for the entire Shinra upper board."
"That so? Lemme hear it," Barret says.
"Palmer's already a pat of butter after you ran him over with that plane," Reeve says. "Rufus still looks like a fifteen year old in his father's suits. Reeve doesn't do anything except cry in his office all day. Heidegger's got one brain cell and it's a gun. Scarlet once said she eats pieces of shit like us for breakfast and someone said, you eat shit? And she shot him but I don't think she's ever going to live that down."
Barret snortlaughs. It's a terribly nice sound, Reeve thinks, but maybe that's because he's been awake for so long.
And then Barret quiets, thoughtfully, and asks, "Y' know,the rest of them have all been all trying to kill us, but where's Reeve been?"
"he's an architect. What do you think he'll do, build a wall at you?" Reeve deadpans.
Barret snortlaughs again. "Got me there," he says, and Reeve misses the thoughtful glance Barret shoots him as Cait leans on him.
- Reeve lets Cait take it from there. They need a fighter, not a bureaucrat with no stomach for blood. There's people to save, and places to save, and people to see.
He gets glimpse of what they do - they find Cloud, and he is safe, and there's a rocket,and a train -
Rufus is up to something. He has to figure out what. He can't leave Shinra - if Shinra goes down with no one on board, no one can get the rest of the crew off- but he can minimize the casualties - He signed on when he was seventeen for a reason. He wanted to help people. He wanted to save lives. He wanted to make sure his parents would never worry about money.
He visits Elmyra and Marlene. Marlene runs and hugs his knees as soon as he opens the door to their little house -
"Is it true? Is it true that Miss Aerith is dead?? Daddy was going to protect her - "
Elmyra appears behind her, nearly a ghost, and gives him a wan smile.
"I'm sorry," Reeve says, and picks her up. Hugs her. "Aerith isn't coming back. But you're being good for Granny Elmyra, aren't you?"
"Mhm, but...but what if Daddy dies too? And Tifa?"
"They won't," Reeve says, and holds her close. "The Planet's going to protect them. Your father promised he'd come home to you, and he will."
Later that night, he and Elmyra look at their plans for if the worst happens. If Meteor falls, if Shinra self-destructs, if he dies.
"I don't think there's much we can do," Reeve says, wiping his tired eyes.
"We can hope," Elmyra says. "Aerith died trying to save this world. I have to believe it meant something."
- He finds out what Rufus is planning.
He finds out just what that plan has awakened. What it could make happen, if it goes wrong.
He's still in the meeting.
But.
That's it.
He concentrates, until his eyes are closed and Cait's are open, and lets his body be puppeted as he Cait Reeve sucks in a breath he doesn't need.
"There's a strange signal coming off you, cat," Cid says.
"Ugh, I guess the controls went crazy." Reeve shakes his head. "Things have gone bad. Remember the Junon Cannon and how it disappeared? Rufus moved it."
"How??" Cid asks, as Cloud asks "Where?"
"Rufus wants to destroy Sephiroth with it, but Weapon came out of the sea and is heading for Midgar. You all saved the Huge Materia, so it can't use them as fuel, so Rufus is taking it somewhere with enough Mako to fire properly."
"Where," Barret asks, in a voice that says he already knows.
"It's your job," Rufus says to Reeve's body, "to adjust the output of the remaining reactors."
Reeve's body nods numbly. Scarlet and Heidegger are talking, but he's barely registering them.
"Midgar," Reeve says. "But somehow, the Weapons know. One of them is heading for Midgar."
"The new weapons should stop him, right?" Cloud asks.
"Probably," Reeve says. "Maybe. But Marlene and Elmyra are safe in Kalm, so it's not - you have Sephiroth to defeat. If this works, we'll lose less people than we did in the Reactor One bombings. We can handle this."
It's supposed to be reassuring. But everyone just stares at him.
"You think we'd accept people dying like that?" Barret asks, stepping forward, a challenge and a plea at once.
"You did for Avalanche," Reeve says. He's been hollowed out. He's two people in two places at once and he's listening to Rufus lecture Heidegger through water. "What does it matter who lives and who dies in Midgar, if your people are safe?"
"...that's why you can't quit yet, isn't it?" Barret asks. "You're trying to protect the people in Midgar."
Reeve falters.
"If this plan fails, we'll lose the city. I've tried to start an evacuation but it's been made low priority so people don't panic."
Cloud nods. "Cid, can you fly us to Weapon? We can try and stop it."
"Already on it," Cid says.
Barret gets on one knee and puts his good hand on Cait's shoulder. "Try and get your evacuation plan through again. We'll handle the Weapon."
And in the moment before he stops letting himself ride Cait, Reeve lets himself hug Barret, and hug him tightly, and loses himself in warmth.
- He's in the control room for the reactors, his fingers flying, balancing the outputs to give Sister Ray enough juice to take out Weapon, to take out Sephiroth.
He can't let his city get destroyed. He can't let this happen.
"Stop fighting and get out of the way, he says to himself, to Barret, as the screen lights up. All systems are ready. "We're about to fire."
He can't stay and watch to see Avalanche get out of the way. He has to make sure the reactors don't burst, keep them safe, his city, his city-
Sister Ray fires, and the boom is enough to make his bones vibrate. He holds onto the keyboard to keep himself steady.
He hears something, with his other ears. Weapon is firing a magical attack. Are you still in Midgar? Cait, speak to us -
The ensuing crash sends him to the floor. His whole body is vibrating.
Reeve drags himself to his feet using his computer for support. He can barely hear what's going on, but the screen doesn't lie.
Reactor output is increasing. No matter how he types or tries passwords, nothing changes.
(cait sith! what's going on! talk to me!)
The door bursts open behind him. His two least favorite people burst in.
"Scarlet! Heidegger! What the hell is going on," he snarls.
Heidegger says, "We can't' reach the president -"
"I don't care about the president! What the hell is Sister Ray doing!"
"What's wrong, Reeve? You're acting strangely," Scarlet says, and tries to cup his face. He bats her away.
"None of that matters! The reactor outputs are increasing all by themselves!"
"Wait a minute." Scarlet looks up to the computer readings and starts typing, and her attempts at shutdown work just as well as Reeve's do. "This is bad. Sister Ray has to cool for three hours or she can't make another shot."
"I've tried. It's inoperable. Someone's taken over the machine so we can't operate it from here - it must be at the mainframe - "
He turns and grabs Heidegger by the collar. "Call the mainframe!"
"Hey, why are you giving me orders?" Heidegger says, but Reeve's already got a hand in his pocket, pulling out his bricklike cell phone.
"I don't give a damn about hierarchy - "
Already calling the number to Sister Ray's physical controls.
" ...give you all the mako you want, Sephiroth," is what he gets on the other line, when the call goes through, from the one part of the staff he didn't really want to hear from.
"Hojo, what the hell are you doing? Sister Ray - no, the entire city of Midgar is in danger!"
"Ha. What's one or two Midgars? A small price to pay."
"Hojo," Reeve snaps, trying to- he doesnt know, get his attention? Get him to come to his senses?. "HOJO - !"
"Sephiroth....show me you rpower.... Before you, science is powerless. I hate that,but I'll concede if you let me see it......
"Hey!! Do something!!"
"We're sunk," Reeve mutters, a hand to his forehead. "Hojo's gone rogue. He's going to use Sister Ray to help Sephiroth."
A hand on his, huge ,warm. He opens his eyes and sees Barret.
He sees Heidegger. He sees Cloud. He sees Tifa. He sees Scarlet. Four eyes, two visions, overlapping. "Oh, I don't like this."
"You're busted, Reeve," Barret says gently. "Don't try and hide it now."
"Can't you stop the reactor?" Cloud asks, face pale.
"We can't," Reeve says. He backs away from Cloudegger, turns to the screen. His paws touch nothing as his hands type in the authorization for the evacuation plan.
It's too little too late. It won't get people away in time. But it has to do something. It has to.
"You're from Shinra, aren't you? Why is it impossible to stop Hojo?"
A hand on his wrist. He can't tell which body is being held. He bats it away.
"We came a long way, cat. Don't double cross us now," Cid says.
"I can't make you trust me," Reeve says.
"You damn fool! I don't care about Shinra - don't you want to save the planet?"
The words curdle Reeve's stomach. He wants to, and yet-
"We can't just shut down the reactor."
"And why not? Is it not built that way?" Cid asks.
"No, it's easy enough. But the reactor makes a path for the mako to come up from below. Once the reactor stops controlling the valves for the mako - they'll burst out without stopping, and with nothing able to stop them."
"An explosion?" Barret asks.
Reeve nods . "A dozen times stronger than when Reactor One blew - than when the plate fell - the entire city will be a crater - "
"Then we have to stop Hojo, now, before things can get worse," Cloud says.
"We're coming, Reeve, you hear me?" Barret says, a hand on his shoulder. "Wait for us! Don't lose hope!"
Cait closes his eyes. Reeve opens them.
Scarlet has a gun to his head. He's been typing in the air, where Heidegger's dragged his hand away.
"Barret and the rest of Avalanche are coming," Reeve says. "Stay out of their way."
Heidegger yanks him away from the computer. There'll be bruising where that grip is, Reeve thinks hysterically. Heidegger's twice his size, all muscle, but he never really thought about it until now.
He's a coward. He doesn't fight his own battles.
"Don't be ludacris," Heidegger hisses, and pulls Reeve in for a punch to the gut. Reeve wheezes, almost falling to his knees before Scarlet pulls him up by the hair, an easy target for another punch.
"We'll make the enemy retreat," Heidegger says. "They'll pay for stealing my ship - "
"Seriously? The city's about to blow and that's what you're thinking about?" Reeve asks, only to be rewarded with an open handed slap to the face.
"The President is dead. We're doing things our way," Heidegger says.
"Let's test out our new toys,” Scarlet says, and twists Reeve's other arm behind his back. He can feel the muzzle of the gun pressing at the nape of his neck. "But first, let's set this traitor up to greet Avalanche."
- He thinks of a map of the city for them. They parachuted in. He built these streets. He knows the fastest way in and out of them.
Easier than thinking about this body. He thinks Heidegger's kicks must have broken one of his ribs. Maybe more. It hurts to breathe.
Heidegger's waiting for you, he thinks to Cait. Be careful. Tell them I'm sorry I didn't stop this sooner.
Metal, against his hands. The hook of a crane. They're in Proud Cloud's hanger. If the Turks don't stop Avalanche, they'll have to fight the mecha.
Heideggger's admiring the machine, checking the guns. Scarlet's the one tying his hands over his head, to the crane hook. She takes his hands and wraps them around the chain.
"I don't know how long the ropes will hold," she says. "So once you're in the air, you'll have to hold on and hope Avalanche gets here in time to get you down."
Or, he knows what will happen.He remembers. Barret's friend, in Corel. The people on the plate, when it fell. Flesh against concrete.
He's going to die. He's not a fighter. He doesn't have much in the way of arm strength. But Cait will live, and Cait knows everything he knows, and they'll stop Hojo in time.
He has to. They have to.
"Any last words?" Scarlet says.
"Barret's going to use your corpse as mulch for the first flowers in Midgar," Reeve rasps through a split lip.
"Very funny," Scarlet says. She forces his mouth open and shoves a Heal materia in there, then tapes it over.
"Here. As long as you can keep casting with that, maybe your arms won't get pulled out of their sockets. You might last long enough to watch me crush your little Barret and friends."
Fuck you, he thinks, as she walks away.
I'm sorry, Barret, he thinks as she reaches the crane controls.
And then he doesn't think anything, as the crane controls pull him up off his knees, off his feet, and into the air, and the only thing he can feel is pain.
He was half there when his first Cait died, the feeling of being crushed alive. At least that was over in an instant. He can feel gravity dragging his arms out of their sockets, and every mumbled Cure through the gag only gives him an instant of relief before it returns, fresh and awful.
He thinks maps, and sentries, and cameras. He thinks of ways around, up here, to Proud Cloud's testing grounds.
it's just a body. It's easy to give it up for the planet, he thinks, and he feels an echo of his last Cait laughing.
He could let go. He can't see the ropes. He doesn't know if they're still holding him up. But he clutches at the chains, because even if his hands are stained with crimes of negligence, of letting a hundred die so he could save ten -
Barret is coming to save him.
Marlene and Elmyra are waiting for him.
- He sees the fight in front of him, but he doesn't process it. He counts to five and then heals himself.
I don’t want to die.
His MP is running short. He's not a fighter. He didn’t have much to begin with.
I don't want to die.
Proud Cloud falls to pieces, fire bursting in it's cockpit before the inhabitants can get out. He can feel the heat. He barely processes it.
I don't want to die.
Doesn't process as the world shifts, as he's slowly ratcheted down, and down, and down, as Cait plans how to get up to Sister Ray with all of the thoughts he has left, until he’s enveloped in warmth, and he finally lets his eyes close.
- "I've got him," Barret says, and as the crane lowers, he catches Reeve in his arms, bridal style, and sits with him once there's enough slack in the chain.
The ropes have held fast. But his hands grip the chain so tightly that blood has run down them to dapple his sleeves with red.
Reeve Tuisti looks like he's aged ten years in the time between the platefall and now, when he'd first caught a glimpse of him from the vents above Shinra's boardroom, arguing about how to save lives after the plate fell.
I'd kill him last, Barret had thought them, still burning with rage over what happened. But now -
"Cait, he's not responding," Barret says, as Reeve's head lols against his chest. He carefully untapes his mouth, and with one finger gingerly pops the materia out of it. "Is he alright?"
"Uh, depends on what you're gonna call alright," Cait says, standing on his pawtips to peer at his other self. "All the thinking he's got left is in me right now. This body's in too much pain for him to stand it. He got it to a place where he'd survive and then peaced out."
"So if I heal all these injuries, he'll peace back in?" Barret says.
"Probably, but not a whole lot. He was already running on fumes when you went to attack Weapon - hey, hey, don't use an elixir!"
"Why not?"Barret asks.
"Because I don't deserve it," someone says with Cait's mouth, and Cait has the decency to look sheepish about it.
"Yeah, fuck deserve," Barret says. He bites the cork off the elixir and presses it to Reeve's lips.
A few drops at a time, at first. Then more, as Reeve starts to swallow on his own, as his body moves to pull the bottle to his mouth, as light returns to his eyes.
Bruises fade away. Broken bones realign.. Reeve is still covered in dried blood and sweat, but Barret can feel him taking deep breaths as he opens his mouth and starts to sob.
"It's a lot, isn't it?" Barret says, holding him there in his lap. "First fight you ever pick, and it's a doozy like this. 's alright if it's too much for you right now. You survived it. We're going to go pound Hojo into the dust, next."
"M. Midgar," Reeve manages.
"Everyone who's not here to kick some ass is helping with the evacuation. We even got the Turks helping, somehow," Barret says. "Even if things blow, people will live. The city's not going to die here, Reeve."
Reeve curls up in his arms, hiding his face in his jacket as he sobs helplessly.
"Thank you," Cait says for him, pulling himself up to sit in Reeve's lap. "When this is all over, let's go see Marlene together."
Reeve doesn't remember the rest of the night. Cait tells him later that the two of them waited next to the crane while Cloud and Barret and Vincent kicked the shit out of Hojo. That Barret carried him out of Midgar and back to the airship, and they landed in Kalm.
He wakes up the next day, 18 hours of dead sleep, with Elmyra on the couch while Barret and Marlene draw together on the floor.
"Mhm, Uncle Reeve taught me the alphabet so now I can write," Marlene says.
"He sure did. Now, what do you want to write and draw next?" Barret asks.
Reeve can't find it in him to leave the bed , (Elmyra's, given up for him for the time being), with how he aches. But.
But he's alive. But it was worth it.
"We're gonna go fight Sephiroth tomorrow," Cait says, sitting on the bed with him. "But today, we're making sure we don't have any regrets."
Reeve reaches out and Cait flops on top of him, so that Reeve can hug him. Feels his other self's heart beating with his.
They're alive. They're all alive, and they'll live, and it's going to be ok.
- Reeve lives in bed for the next two weeks.
The Planet is saved. Shinra is done for, probably. Cait Sith saves the day, but the magic in the Northern Crater is so intense that he can't feel his other self.
He manages a phone call, to continue the evacuation. He's the highest ranking member of Shinra left, and he's not going to let any more people die on his watch
(Hell, the surviving Turks call in to vouch for him, and keep on getting people out of the wreckage of Midgar. He’s sure Rufus’s ghost is laughing at him, somewhere, though he can’t explain why.)
Marlene comes in and tells him rambling stories about her drawings, and he lets her bully him into eating soup for dinner. Elmyra helps him walk to the bathroom and back, when he's too sore to manage it alone. Even if everything is healed, effects linger from what he's gone through.
Barret comes back, eventually. For Marlene, his daughter. For Elmyra, who he promised Aerith he'd help.
For him,somehow.
"I said this before, but, I'm sorry I deceived you," Reeve says. Barret's sitting on the bed with him, helping him walk around the room. First time healing from a bad injury is the worst, so it's time to practice dealing with it, he'd said.
"It worked out in the end," Barret says with a shrug. "I think what you need to apologize for is how Uncle Reeve made Ice Cream Dinner's a weekly event."
"She's four! I was trying to make sure she stayed happy,``Reeve protests, but he's smiling. "I didn't want her being traumatized from being a hostage."
"It worked. That time is now unofficially Marlene's great party time," Barret jokes. "Ice cream for dinner, cookies for lunch."
"That happened once!"
They lean against each other. Barret's much shorter in person, when you're not a three foot tall cat robot. Reeve's head slots nicely against his shoulder.
"...d'you want to stay here?" Barret asks. "I know your folks are in Junon, but Kalm's as close as you can get to Midgar and I know you're trying to figure out this whole refugee thing yourself."
"Shinra's still Shinra, even if it's a shell of itself," Reeve says. "Someone's got to run it. If I shut it down, it'll cause a power vacuum. Better to use it now," and then stops himself.
Breathes.
That's not what Barret asked.
"...thank you. I want to stay here," he says. "I want to help Marlene finish learning the alphabet. And there's this man, here, who has some ideas on how to stay with Shinra while saving the planet. He has good advice."
"Oh? Are you getting coy on me now?" Barret teases.
"It's probably not legal to have an ecoterrorist on my board of directors, but I'm sure we can work something out," Reeve says. "What're they gonna do, kill me?"
Barret holds him closer. "...yeah. I think that'd be good. Shinra and save the planet don't have to be opposites anymore.”
"Yes. I want that to be true," Reeve says. "I want to keep on saving this world, if you'll have me."
"You've had me since that stupid airport stunt," Barret says.
"I like you too," Reeve says quietly, and their hands stay entwined.