Final Fantasy VII: Children of Jenova

Chapter 27

Cid just couldn't take it anymore.

He'd sat in Reeve's room making nice for about 
an hour, then did the same in Reno's room for 
about the same length of time while he waited 
for Doc Murphy to get done looking Junior over. 
And that was all he could stand. He finally 
excused himself from Reno's presence, made a 
beeline for the one patio on the premises where 
smokers were not looked at like the scum of the 
earth, and happily lit up. He went through well 
nigh an entire pack before Doc Murphy finally 
found him.

"There you are," the doc said. "Been looking all 
over for you. Your friends suggested I look 
here."

Cid made a sort of agreeable grunting noise as 
he lit up another cigarette on the smoldering 
butt of his previous one. "What's the news?"

The doctor shrugged and flipped through several 
pages of notes and charts and such on his 
clipboard. "Well, we ran C.J. through a complete 
lineup of physical and psychological exams." He 
continued to scan his notes, pausing to scratch 
his head. "Never seen anything like this in my 
whole medical career."

"What?"

"Well, the first thing we did was check for 
Jenova cells. Didn't find a single one, living 
or dead."

Cid nodded and gave a little sigh of relief. 
"That's good."

Doc Murphy shrugged and continued. "She has the 
lowest cholesterol level I've ever seen, her EKG 
and her brain scans look like they were copied 
out of a textbook, and she has the hearing, 
vision, and reflexes of a fighter pilot. Of 
course, that might just be from you. In short, 
she's a perfectly healthy young woman." And he 
seemed to stress those last two words just a bit.

"Go on," Cid said a little warily, sensing there 
was more to it than that.

"Okay. I'm going to level with you. Just for 
shits and giggles, I sent her down to the psych 
guys to see what's going on in her head. She 
talked to three different shrinks, and they all 
came up with the same results...all of her 
mental processes are functioning at a level 
comparable to an eighteen- to twenty-year-old 
woman. So it's not just her body that was 
affected; her mind grew up too, and that's what 
really has me stumped."

Cid puffed silently on his cigarette for a few 
moments, seemingly lost in thought. Then he 
spoke again, slowly. "Doc...you think there's 
any way to...y'know, get her back to normal?"

"Cid..." The doc was picking and choosing his 
words now, in the time-old fashion of doctors 
getting ready to lay down heavy news and trying 
to soften the blow as much as possible. "We know 
almost nothing about the effects of Mako 
exposure on children, and the little we /do/ 
know we learned from checking your daughter out. 
It would take a /lot/ of time and research." He 
sat down on the bench next to Cid. 
"Theoretically, speeding up the aging process is 
easy. It's like baking a cake. You can turn the 
oven up hotter and it'll bake faster. But once 
it's baked, that's it. You can't un-bake it. Are 
you following me?"

Cid just sat there, letting the words sink in. 
"You're saying there ain't a chance in Hell."

"Basically, yeah." Doc Murphy nodded. "I think 
it would be best for both of you if you just 
accept the fact that she's not a little girl 
anymore, and she most likely will never be 
again." He glanced over at Cid, then stood up. 
"Listen, I have a few patients I need to check 
on, and I've got to do the paperwork to release 
Reno and Reeve, since they're both now well-
rooted in the land of the living. I'll keep you 
posted if we find out anything new."

Cid nodded and stabbed his cigarette into the 
ashtray as the doctor walked off. 

/We'll see about that,/ he thought darkly.

*			*			*

C.J. had to make a pit stop before going in to 
see Reeve. She was sick of the damn uniform. She 
ducked into a strip mall across the street from 
the hospital and bought herself a T-shirt, some 
jeans, and yet another leather jacket which she 
put on in the fitting room, leaving the blue 
suit crumpled on the floor when she left. The 
gloves she kept, as well as the boots, but the 
rest of it she was glad to be rid of.

After a moment's thought, she decided to pick up 
some clean clothes for Reeve too...white button-
down shirt, pair of jeans, pair of sneakers. She 
guessed at the sizes, trying the stuff on 
herself since she figured they were pretty close 
to the same.

When it came down to underwear, though, she 
found herself in a bit of a bind.

For one thing, she had no idea whether Reeve was 
a boxer man or a brief man.

For another, she simply could not look at a pair 
of either and imagine Reeve wearing them without 
turning several shades of red, much less pick 
some out and plunk them on the counter.

So she skipped the unmentionables and went back 
to the hospital, laden with bags. 

On the way to Reeve's room, she passed and waved 
to one of the people the doctor had sent her to 
talk to. Dr. Baker was a kindly, slightly pudgy 
white-haired old guy that reminded C.J. of Santa 
Claus to some degree, and he had spent some 
thirty minutes just making nice small talk with 
her and writing stuff down on a note pad. This 
came as a great relief to C.J., who had spent 
two hours prior being poked with needles and X-
rayed from head to toe and listened to with a 
stethoscope that was probably stored in an 
industrial freezer, and who was /not/ thrilled 
at the prospect of being passed off to yet 
another doctor. 

And the doctors had all been looking between her 
and the clipboard she guessed held her medical 
records with facial expressions that 
approximated a monkey trying to solve a 
quadratic equation.

C.J. did /not/ like that. At all. What was the 
big deal, anyway? She was still C.J., maybe a 
little bigger, but jeez...it wasn't like she'd 
grown a third eye or an extra head or anything.

Other than talking to the psychiatrists, the 
only fun she had was running on the treadmill 
thingy until the computer program that was 
monitoring her progress crashed. Apparently its 
programmers had not taken into account that 
there just might be someone in the world that 
could endure a stress test for more than half an 
hour.

*			*			*

Scarlet rolled her eyes. "Vail!" she snapped. As 
usual, no response. "Vail! Would you wait--the 
fuck--up!?"

Vail sighed and turned around to see what the 
problem was this time.

The ground they were traversing had grown 
steadily more rocky as they neared the desert 
surrounding the Gold Saucer, and of course 
Scarlet was still in high heels. Not a good 
combination. 

"Why," Vail said slowly, as if talking to a four-
year-old, "don't you just take those infernal 
shoes off?"

"Because," Scarlet shot back in an equally 
condescending tone, "these rocks would shred my 
feet if I did..." She thought about it a second. 
"Oh...right."

Vail nodded and rolled /her/ eyes. "Right."

Scarlet kicked off the offending footwear, 
baring her tender tootsies to the sharp rocks 
beneath them. She concentrated a bit, willing 
the flesh on the soles of her feet to harden 
like a pachyderm's hide. As she did, that 
incessant buzzing in her head tried to solidify 
into a coherent thought once more

/xxxreunionxxx/

but as it always did, it slipped back into 
static the moment that small transformation was 
complete.

After a moment's thought, Scarlet bent down and 
picked up her shoes. Bad enough that she would 
be walking into the Gold Saucer clad in a 
charred and filthy red dress; she'd be damned if 
she'd show up barefoot as well. 

*			*			*

Doc Murphy had come soon after Cid left to 
remove the ghastly needle from Reeve's arm. Not 
a moment too soon, either. The happy sleepy 
medicine from the previous night had finally 
worn off completely, leaving a shuddering, pale, 
and yes, sweating-bullets Reeve lying there 
hooked to the nasty needle. Five more minutes, 
and Reeve would have pulled the damn thing out 
himself.

With the needle gone, Reeve felt fine. A little 
tired, maybe, but fine. Someone had even been 
nice enough to bring him a pair of pajamas to 
replace the lame hospital gown he'd been dressed 
up in when he'd arrived. Reeve was certain that 
it had been designed by someone named Seymour 
Butts. He got up slowly, wincing a little at the 
stiffness in his muscles, and plodded to the 
tiny washroom in his room to take a shower.

The next fifteen minutes were the most heavenly 
fifteen minutes of his entire life.

Reeve stood almost motionless under the spray 
for about half that length of time, letting the 
warm water rinse away--three? Four? He wasn't 
sure--days' worth of sweat and dirt and other 
unlovely debris. And it did not escape his 
notice that the water swirling down the drain 
took on a disturbing reddish-brown hue when he 
rinsed his hair out. Archer must have beaned him 
a really good one...that asshole. He hoped 
either C.J. or Reno had given that son of a 
bitch what he had comi--

"YIKES!!"

The water, with no warning whatsoever, turned 
from pleasantly warm to arctic, giving Reeve a 
very sudden and chilly wake-up call. He fumbled 
with the tap and shut it off, then he leapt out 
of the little shower stall and wrapped himself 
in a towel. Teeth chattering, he dried off 
quickly and pulled on the pajama bottoms. Well, 
he was certainly awake now.

As he was towelling his hair dry, he heard a 
knock on the door of his room. He decided that 
he was decent enough to be seen, and he answered 
the door, towel still draped around his 
shoulders.

"Hi!" C.J. chirped, arms laden with clothes. "I 
got you some--"

And she just /stopped,/ staring at Reeve, who 
was clad in a pair of pajama bottoms and a towel 
and nothing else. "I--uh--" Her eyes were wide, 
her jaw just a bit slack. Despite her somewhat 
catatonic appearance, her mind was chugging at 
full steam, comparing Reeve to the cute guys on 
the high school swim team and finding the high 
school guys sorely outclassed.

"C.J.?" Reeve blinked and took the stack of 
clothes off her hands. "You okay?"

C.J. blinked back. "Huh?"

Reeve would never know what possessed him to do 
what he did next, and a little voice in the back 
of his mind would call him an evil bastard over 
it for the rest of his life.

He cautiously reached out and gave C.J. a little 
poke right between the eyes...and watched her 
fall over backwards like a tree.

He poked his head into the hall and looked 
around quickly to make sure nobody had witnessed 
this bizarre little incident, and then he picked 
C.J. up and deposited her in a chair. That done, 
he closed the door, gathered up his clothes, and 
ducked back into the little bathroom to make 
himself presentable.

The shirt was a little loose; the jeans a little 
tight, but they would do. The shoes, at least, 
were perfect. No underwear, though, and Reeve 
had a good idea why. He made a mental note to 
pick up a pair next chance he had as he brushed 
his teeth and combed his hair.

Thankfully, when he came out decently dressed, 
C.J. had returned to the land of the living. He 
sat down on the foot of the bed and rolled his 
sleeves up to his elbows. "Thanks for the 
clothes," he said. "I think they burned my other 
ones."

"I shoulda had 'em burn mine while they were at 
it," C.J. replied. "I just left 'em in the 
dressing room at the store. I like the gloves, 
though."

Reeve nodded. "That uniform didn't do anything 
for you. I like that biker lady look on you," he 
said with a smile.

"You do?" C.J.'s eyes lit up, and Reeve cleared 
his throat.

/Argh...no no no stop that C.J. six years old 
Cid'll kill me/ "I--uh--well--"

"Well, well, well! Look who's alive!"

Reeve rolled his eyes as the way-too-chipper 
voice of Reno greeted him from the doorway. "You 
ready to blow this joint yet, or what?"

"Don't you know how to knock, Reno?" Reeve 
sighed, staring daggers at him.

"Course not. We're free men, Boss. You wanna 
hang around here and stuck like a pincushion 
some more, or you wanna get the hell outta here?"

"I vote for 'get the hell outta here,'" Reeve 
replied, standing up. "What's the game plan now?"

"Daddy said something about meetin' Cloud at the 
Gold Saucer," C.J. piped up. "I think Zack's 
there too. This is gonna be /cool!/"

Reno's eyes met Reeve's, and a single thought 
flashed between them...that if Zack was indeed 
at the Gold Saucer, their outing there would 
most likely turn out to be anything /but/ "cool."

*			*			*

Most of the upper floors of Shinra Tower were 
deserted right now...with Scarlet and Vail gone, 
Raven in charge, and the Wonder Weenie off 
trying to get some manpower together, the 
building was pretty much unoccupied.

Perfect.

The door to a storage room up on the 68th floor 
creaked open, and...something...came bouncing 
out into the hall. It was an odd sort of 
something. Actually, truth be told, it was made 
up of two somethings, one riding on the other's 
back. 

The top something frowned a little and ducked 
back into the storage room. No weapons. There 
hadn't been enough time before the Bad Stuff 
happened at home. That was okay. They would just 
have to make do with what they could find. The 
something hopped off its mount and rummaged 
around the room, at length finding a Zippo 
lighter in the pocket of some overalls on the 
floor and several aerosol cans of air freshener. 
That would do.

Satisfied, the somethings bounced out into the 
empty hall again, toward the elevator that would 
take them up to the top floor and from there, to 
the office Raven was currently occupying. But as 
they passed a door marked with the nameplate 
"Bob Palmer, Aerospace Research," they stopped 
and thought for a moment. 

There was something their previous incarnations 
had always wanted to do.

They pushed the door open a little, and were 
pleased to find a fat little man in a too-small 
beige suit sitting behind a desk, drinking what 
appeared to be a mug of coffee. 

"Hi," the top something said, and Palmer looked 
up sharply. "Nice chins."

"Wha--where'd you come from!?" Palmer blubbered, 
fumbling to push his chair back enough to stand 
up, and not having much luck thanks to the fold 
of rug one of its casters was stuck on. "What do 
you want? I didn't do anything!"

"We have some unfinished business with ya, my 
chubby little pal," the top something said in a 
dark and menacing tone as it reached up to 
adjust the crown perched on its head. It gave 
its mount a little kick, and the two of them 
began to advance on Palmer, as menacingly as a 
cat and a stuffed Moogle could possibly advance.

"Oh no--" Palmer blubbered and babbled some 
more, gave a mighty shove...and fell over 
backwards, chair and all, as the stuffed beast 
came closer...closer...

Then it just /stopped,/ right next to the 
sprawled-out ponderous bulk of Palmer. "We've 
been waitin' to do this for a looooooong time, 
chubby," the cat hissed with a wicked chuckle...

And with no warning whatsoever, the cat leapt 
from its mount, bounced up and down on Palmer's 
belly a few times (complete with squeals of 
"Boingy! Boingy! Boingy!"), leapt back on its 
mount, and took off cackling. "See ya, lardass!"

Palmer just lay there for a few moments catching 
his breath.

Then, when he was quite sure he was alone...he 
hauled himself off the floor, poured the 
contents of his coffee mug into the nearest 
potted plant, and did likewise with the bottle 
of bourbon from which he'd been filling the mug. 
"Gotta stop drinking that stuff," he wheezed. 
"I'm seeing things..."

*			*			*

Stuart had still not moved from his sofa.

He was probably the first to realize that the 
last days of Shinra were at hand. Scarlet had 
gone insane. Vail had /been/ insane. While those 
two were off chasing their supertroop, the 
regular members of SOLDIER were slowly losing 
their grip as well as whatever Vail had done to 
them began to take hold. Fifteen of them AWOL 
this morning, and two more gone over the course 
of the afternoon. Nobody had seen them go, of 
course.

Stuart was beginning to get some vague idea 
where they were headed, though. He could hear 
the call too, a summons he had hoped never to 
hear again. He hadn't been able to follow it the 
first time...perhaps Hojo had known what was 
going to happen, and the members of SOLDIER had 
been thrown into quarantine to keep them handy 
until Sephiroth ceased to call for them. But 
this time, there were no such measures in place. 

/xxxrexxxunxxxionxxx/

Yes...that was why Vail and Scarlet had gone to 
the Gold Saucer...Sephiroth was there. They were 
not pursuing him, they were being summoned by 
him. What would happen when they found him was 
anyone's guess, but Stuart seriously doubted 
that it would be pleasant.

/xxxrexxxunionxxx/

/Is this all I am?/ he thought, still staring at 
that photo on his coffee table. /His puppet?/

Under Sephiroth's control, he had killed the 
only real friend he had. What other sins could 
he be made to commit when that--/thing/ pulled 
his strings and said "dance?" 

/xxxreunionxxx/

Now, as he continued to stare at the photo of 
himself and Kain and Archer on the coffee table, 
the answer to the question he'd asked himself 
the previous night came to him.

His heart was heavy, like a stone in his chest, 
but he stood up anyway. He plodded up the stairs 
to his bedroom and opened his nightstand drawer, 
extracting from it a pistol which had been fired 
exactly two times since he'd had it.

/reunion/

He checked the clip. Three rounds. Two more than 
he needed.

/reunion/

He pressed the muzzle of the gun to his temple.

/REUNION/

"Fuck that," he croaked, and pulled the trigger.

*			*			*

The Highwind took to the air once more, fully 
loaded as before. Of course, C.J. had to come 
along too. She insisted on it. She wanted to see 
Zack, so by Ramuh she was /going/ to see Zack, 
and Cid really didn't feel like trying to talk 
her out of it at this point. On top of that, 
Reeve had decided to come along as well. He 
didn't really have anywhere to call home at the 
moment, and he didn't want to be a burden to 
Shera or Elmyra or anyone; in addition, he was 
/pissed/ now that his happy drugs had worn off. 
He wanted to find Scarlet and give her what she 
had coming. 

That in and of itself wasn't much of a surprise.

What /was/ a surprise was that Reeve was now 
armed with a nasty little whip. He'd gone and 
bought the thing just before he boarded the 
Highwind, and it looked vicious, to say the 
least. Its length was spiked with wicked little 
barbs pointing in both directions, and attached 
to the end was a small spiked ball, sort of like 
a morning star. 

"The hell you gonna do with that?" Barret 
snorted upon seeing the weapon. "Shit, Reeve, 
y'coulda got a gun or somethin'..."

Reeve shrugged. "I had one of these--well, minus 
the spikes and stuff--when I was a kid," he said 
simply, uncoiling the thing and cracking it 
experimentally as the others looked on. It 
responded with a satisfyingly loud report, and 
Reeve gave a pleased little nod.

"Oh, GAWD," Yuffie snickered. "Do you have ANY 
idea how silly you look with th--"

Her words were lost in a little gasp and a yelp 
of "Hey!" as something hissed through the air, 
wrapped itself around her own weapon, and yanked 
it quite forcefully out of her hand. "What the f-
-"

Reeve just stood there, smiling quite 
innocently, the whip coiled neatly in one 
hand...and Yuffie's cross in the other. "Now 
just imagine if that'd been your neck," he 
offered, still smiling.

Vincent raised an eyebrow. "Impressive," he 
muttered, which meant he was probably /really/ 
impressed.

"Wh--w--h--HOW'D YOU DO THAT!?" Yuffie wailed, 
staring open-mouthed at Reeve, who just shrugged 
again.

"I told you," he said, handing Yuffie her weapon 
back. "I had one when I was a kid." He glanced 
around to see if anyone else cared to comment on 
his choice of weaponry, and was more than a 
little amused to note that nobody did; other 
than a grumble of "goddamn showoff" from Barret 
and scattered applause from Reno, Rude, and 
C.J., the bridge of the Highwind was silent. 
Satisfied, he clipped the coiled-up whip to his 
belt. 

*			*			*

Sephiroth Obscura sat up suddenly. He'd fallen 
asleep at some point, but even in his sleep, he 
felt the life of one of the puppets blink out.

No matter. He had more.

In fact, he realized as he reached out with his 
mind and felt around a bit, two of them were 
getting very, very close.

But before he could determine /who/ the puppets 
were, the door to the hotel room he and Cloud 
were sharing swung open noisily, and Cloud 
bounced in through it. "Good news, buddy," he 
chirped. "Guess what?"

Obscura rolled his eyes. "What?" he asked, 
flatly.

Cloud perched himself on the edge of the bed and 
and grinned vacantly. "I just got off the phone 
with Shera, and Cid and Mom and everyone else 
are on their way! I bet you can't wait to see 
everyone!"

"The anticipation is killing me," Obscura 
replied with a forced smile. 

Either Cloud didn't hear the sarcasm, or it just 
didn't register in his mind-controlled state. 
"Shera said C.J. can't wait to see you."

"Hmm?" Obscura looked up then, quite curious. 
"She's coming too? Strange...I thought..." He 
shook his head, as if to clear it. "Never mind. 
When will they be here?"

"Any minute now," Cloud replied, still grinning 
like an idiot. "C'mon, let's go wait at the 
station for 'em."

With a half-weary, half-annoyed sigh, Sephiroth 
Obscura stood, stretched, and followed the 
disturbingly chipper Cloud out of the room.

*			*			*

Somwehere between Rocket Town and Corel, Reeve's 
cotton mouth from Hell decided to return. He 
excused himself from the bridge and padded down 
to the galley, waving cheerfully at Yuffie as he 
passed her; she was, of course, in her usual 
perch, doing her usual thing (hurling).

Reeve shut the galley door behind him, and 
turned around to find C.J. rummaging through the 
box of MRE's trying to find something edible. 
"Oh, hi," she said, looking up at the soft 
"click" of the galley door shutting. "Are you 
okay?"

"Yeah, just thirsty," Reeve replied, grabbing 
himself a cup of water and finding a chair. 
"Still a little tired...and stiff...but I'm 
okay."

C.J. nodded, and then snapped her head to one 
side. A sound followed that motion that was not 
unlike a string of firecrackers exploding; she 
repeated the motion in the opposite direction, 
and a similar sound  came forth. "Ow, god!" she 
grimaced, rubbing the back of her neck, then she 
laughed a little. "Sorry, that was gross...I 
know how you feel. I've never been so sore in my 
life."

/No way,/ Reeve tried to admonish himself. 
/Don't do it. Don't you dare.../ But it was too 
late. "Come over here and have a seat," he 
offered, even as most of his brain continued to 
protest that this was a Bad Idea in the extreme.

C.J. sat in the offered chair, next to Reeve. He 
cracked his knuckles and went to work on her 
poor sore neck, gently rubbing out the knots he 
found there. From time to time, a little "mmm" 
or "ah" or "ow!" would escape her lips, but he 
didn't think much of it.

*			*			*

The little "mmms" and "ahs" and "ows" drifted 
through the closed galley door, through the 
engine room, and into Yuffie's ears. "What the 
hell..." 

Motion sickness forgotten for the time being, 
she tiptoed over to the closed door and laid her 
ear upon it just in time to hear another "mmm" 
followed by Reeve's voice saying "You can take 
that jacket off if you want to."

Yuffie's brain began to chug, and it came up 
with an answer that made her eyes fly wide open 
and her jaw drop. "Oh. My. GAWD..."

Quickly, quietly, she tiptoed up to the bridge 
and slipped through the door to tug at Elena's 
sleeve.

"What?" Elena sighed, turning a rather pained 
eye upon her.

"Come here," Yuffie replied simply, in a whisper 
so that Cid would not hear as he did his usual 
pilot things. "I need someone to verify that I'm 
hearing what I think I'm hearing." With that, 
she got a grip on Elena's sleeve and began to 
drag her down toward the galley.

Red XIII and Vincent, whose ears were quite a 
bit keener than those of the others, perked up a 
bit as well, and after a moment they followed.

Yuffie and Elena stood in front of the closed 
door listening to the odd noises that still 
issued forth from behind it. And in response to 
them, a similar expression to the one that had 
appeared on Yuffie's face moments before now 
showed itself on Elena's. "Is that...Reeve and 
C.J.!?" she whispered, and Yuffie nodded. 

"Are they doing what I think they're doing?" 
Yuffie asked simply, and Elena nodded.

"I think so--"

>From behind the closed door, another soft "ah" 
drifted to their ears. This was followed by 
Reeve's voice asking "How's that?"

C.J.'s voice replied, "It's great...but--ow--it 
kinda hurts a little..."

And this was followed by Reeve's voice again, 
preceded by a soft chuckle. "Yeah, I should have 
warned you...it might hurt a little at 
first...okay, is that better?"

"Mmmhmm."

Elena clapped a hand over her mouth as Vincent 
joined them, with Red XIII padding along behind 
him. "What is it?" Red asked curiously.

Neither Elena nor Yuffie were in much of a 
condition to answer that. The former still had 
her hand clamped tight over her mouth to keep 
from making too much noise; the latter had her 
hand over her mouth in a similar gesture, but 
she was turning several interesting shades of 
violet and her entire body shook with supressed 
giggles. So Red just pressed his ear to the door 
and listened; Vincent did likewise.

"It might be a little easier if you lie down," 
Reeve's voice was heard to suggest, followed by 
"Okay," from C.J.

"Oh my." Red XIII backed away from the door, as 
did Vincent, who appeared paler than usual. "Oh 
dear."

By now, various other passengers of the Highwind 
had noticed that their comrades had gone 
missing, and they came down to 
investigate...Tifa was coming up to the door, 
followed by Reno and Rude, and then by Barret.

"What's up?" Barret asked, looking around 
quizzically. "Why's everyone--"

"Shh!" Yuffie and Elena hissed, and pointed to 
the closed door.

Reno and Rude pressed their ears to the door in 
time to hear C.J. groan loudly and exclaim 
"Ohmigawd!" Rude just backed away; Reno burst 
out laughing. 

"Is that Reeve in there with her!? Holy shit. I 
didn't think he had it in him."

Red XIII and Vincent had heard something, 
however, that had escaped Reno's 
hearing...something that sounded like...popping 
vertebrae.

"This isn't funny!" Elena pleaded. "Someone's 
got to go up there and keep Cid occupied until--
until they're--done. If he hears this, they're 
/both/ dead!"

Now it was Tifa's turn to listen in...and she 
heard C.J.'s voice commenting, "Wow, that was 
great...I bet you're pretty tense too." 

This was followed by Reeve replying, "Nah, it's 
okay...you don't have to do anything..."

And then C.J. again: "No, really...it's okay, I 
don't mind..."

There was a little sigh, and then "Well, okay," 
from Reeve.

Tifa just backed away from the door. "Oh my 
GOD..."

There were a few shuffling sounds as, Yuffie 
guessed, C.J. got up. After that, she heard C.J. 
suggest to Reeve that he might want to lie down 
as well...and a few seconds later, a /very/ loud 
groan from Reeve floated through the door.

Vincent and Red XIII frowned. More of those 
weird popping noises. "What IS that?" Red asked, 
and Vincent shrugged.

"Ramuh on a raft," Reeve's voice came soon 
after, "where'd you learn THAT!?"

"I saw Mama doing it to Daddy once," C.J.'s 
voice replied, and a few of the assembled folks 
outside the door shuddered visibly. 

"Okay," Reno sighed, rubbing his forehead. "I 
did NOT need to know that." Barret just nodded 
his agreement.

"Too much information," Rude concurred. "WAY too 
much."

*			*			*

Cid turned around to ask Vincent a question, and 
found that aside from  the aircrew, he was alone 
on the bridge. "What the hell...where'd they go?"

More annoyed than curious, he stepped off the 
bridge and took a quick look around the engine 
room...and found everyone except Reeve and C.J. 
congregated around the closed door to the 
galley. With a sighed oath, he crossed the 
engine room, stopping behind everyone else. He 
noted that they all seemed to be listening 
through the closed door, and he also again noted 
Reeve and C.J.'s absence.

"What's up?" he asked simply, and everyone 
whirled around to face him. Yuffie and Elena 
were sweatdropping.

"Uh, nothing," Reno replied. Cid squinted at him.

"You're a lousy liar, Reno," he sighed. "What 
the hell's goin' on here?"

Before anyone could answer, the voices behind 
the door came through it once more, answering 
for them...Reeve's in a loud groan of "Oh 
/god!/" and C.J.'s in a giggle followed by "You 
like that?"

Cid turned blue...then white...then vivid red. 
He barged through the assembled mass of people 
in front of the door, threw it open, and roared 
over the din, "WHAT THE /HELL/ IS GOING ON IN 
HERE!?"

Reeve--fully clothed, lying on his stomach--
looked up and blinked. "Beg pardon?" he asked.

C.J.--equally fully clothed aside from her 
jacket and shoes, standing on Reeve's back in 
her stocking feet--blinked as well. "Hi, 
Daddy...what's wrong?" She shifted her weight 
from one foot to the other, and Reeve's spine 
answered with a loud pop. Reeve himself answered 
with another loud groan.

Vincent and Red XIII looked at each other, and 
an unspoken "Aha," passed between them. So 
/that's/ what those popping noises had been.

C.J. stepped down from Reeve's back, and Reeve 
stood up slowly and stretched. "Oh, man," he 
groaned. "I feel about four inches taller now. 
Thanks, C.J. I needed that."

Cid looked between the two of them, jaw hanging. 
"You're not...you weren't...oh, man." He flopped 
weakly in a chair with a gale of relieved 
laughter and lit up a cigarette.

C.J. raised an eyebrow. "What'd you THINK we 
were doing?" she asked, then shook her head and 
raised one hand...the universal sign language 
for "don't go there." "No. Forget it. I get the 
feeling I don't wanna know."

/If I have anything to say about it, you won't 
know till you're fifty,/ the voice of the 
overprotective father in Cid's head piped up. 
"Oh...nothin'..."

Reeve seemed to suddenly catch on to something, 
and he turned an interesting shade of red at the 
thought of whatever it was.

---

Author's Notes: I have been saving that last 
scene up for a long, long time. It turned out 
better--and funnier--than even I had hoped it 
would...and Cait Sith going "boingy boingy 
boingy" on Palmer's belly was inspired by a 
friend's cartoon of the Warner Brothers and 
Warner Sister doing likewise...three new Turks 
down, one to go. Ugh. I was actually starting to 
like Stu the Wonder Weenie. I kinda hated to 
kill him off, but...ah well. 
--Sailor Solathei holychao@swbell.net
======================================
"Why not take one step forward, one step to the right, one step to the right, one step to the right, and one step forward into 
a vat of boiling oil?" --MegaHAL
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yap yap yap yap yap yap yap BANG!&*(^@^&%!(*&^(^$#!@#NO TERRIER