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Empress & Concubine, Part II	By : tinkerheck Category: Final Fantasy VII > Het - Male/Female Views: 1723 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VII from the Final Fantasy Universe, or any of its forms or related media. I do not own these characters. I spent money to learn about this series, and I make no money in borrowing it.

Chapter List
- 1
- 2
++++++++ disclaimer ++++++++
I do not own Final Fantasy VII from the Final Fantasy Universe, or any of its forms or related media. I do not own these characters. I spent money to learn about this series, and I make no money in borrowing it.
++++++++ story notes ++++++++
Below is (mostly) what I said at the beginning of part one, but, as I am posting part two up as its own fic, I need to follow the rules and reiterate this stuff. FYI, if you haven’t read part one, part two will not make much sense to you.
Post DoC. Plot references from BC, CC, FFVII, Advent, DoC, and some of the On the Way to a Smile novellas.
I made every attempt to remain faithful to FFVII canon as close as possible, but I am certainly not an expert on that universe. I got help when I needed it (thank you miho!) and I stretched canon where I saw fit for my plot.
But, please, for simplicity’s sake, treat this fic as an AU, or… If that term doesn’t make sense (and I still don’t think it applies), when you consider how much of this is now being made up, I’d rather call it a ‘future fic’.
If you have any questions about the decisions I made regarding canon, feel free to contact me.
The tags & warnings I selected way back in Part 1, Chapter 1, cover the entire fic, parts one & two, from beginning to end. As such, you will not find all of these situations in every chapter.
This fic features language and violence and sex. It is rated M, or MA, or NC-17 – and that all depends on your POV. Consider it adults-only, and that you have been warned.
++++++++ chapter notes ++++++++
My thanks to mihoyonagi for her generous consultation(s) (very seriously plural) on all things FFVII.
GaiaNet is miho’s creative term for the internet in her Yuffentine fic All Creation; I borrow it here with her permission.
Although… she can’t remember if she came up with it either.
Fish, miho, eat more fish. And do Sudoku on a daily basis. Yeeesh……
The final fantasy wikia timeline for VII lists Vince’s birth date as October 13,1950, and Yuffie’s as November 20, 1991… and that’s what I used to establish my timeline for this fic. By the way, this is excellent resource, you should visit if interested.
Part 2 begins pretty much right after the end of Part 1, so it’s October of 2015. Please do happily assume that our leading lady & gentleman have been making with the nice-nice like bunnies in springtime since we last saw them.
I’m going to try really super hard to get my dyslexic fingers to stop misspelling Tuesti and Lucrecia. Heh. I don’t even want to talk about how many times I’ve typed ginslinger.
I fly beta-less. Please forgive the typos.

+
Empress & Concubine II
Chapter One
The Honeymoon is Over
+

Vincent Valentine did not think, at his age, that he was capable of being fooled.
The ironic thing about it was that he had been the one fooling himself, and for decades, it seemed. He wished, occasionally, that he still had Galian to talk to, if only to have it over with and tell the beast that he had been right all along.
Vincent knew that Galian, who now seemed to be in some sort of a deep meditative state, would have ridiculed him endlessly over his emotional state regarding Yuffie. Ridiculed him, yes, but not without feeling some jealously as well. Vincent had never dealt well with jealously, neither his own nor what he’d felt from his demons, so perhaps Galian’s absence was for the best.
He had fallen so hard for Yuffie it was almost unreal. He seriously doubted it was because he was truly just a romantic sap at heart, so… maybe it was just her.
Whatever the reason, it was as though they had switched roles. In the past she had always been the one being forward – making offers, wanting to give it a go, lusting after him, loving him without judgment or hesitation – and for years. All that time they managed to work together and stay very close, but he hadn’t given her any reason to believe he’d wanted her in return. And then that fight on Tifa’s porch… Vincent still recoiled at the memory. He’d almost lost what they now had; he almost lost Yuffie, completely.
When she cooled her jets on him after that argument, they both knew it had mostly been out of necessity. She had work to do, the most enormous responsibility to a country that anyone could have, and when the long-dreaded task was placed in front of her, she didn’t run or back down, or even wallow. She took the reigns from her father’s hands, and said let’s go.
That it never dawned on Vincent or the rest of Avalanche how drastically her life would change, or how the throne would take her away from them – this was yet another item on the gunslinger’s mental list of ‘things that are my own fault’.
A long list, that. Likely etched in acid on a piece of marble.
A thousand missteps, so many stupid decisions, and his cursed inaction… and yet, somehow, someway, something had finally come out of the mess that had been his life, and it was good.
No, not good. That was not the right word. It was fantastic.
He was gainfully employed. He was living in Wutai, a beautiful continent with good people and a culturally rich history, in a royal palace of all places. A freely taken oath of fealty bound him there, true, but as Yuffie’s bodyguard, he was finally able to do something about the nagging worry that she was stuck in a situation too difficult for her to handle on her own. It had also given him the chance to reconcile with her. The oath hadn’t just saved their friendship, it had brought them closer together.
Then, he recognized his last opportunity to take the thing he wanted for himself. After careful consideration, a habit he would never outgrow, he swallowed his pride and finally set a personal goal: claiming Yuffie’s heart.
It may have been luck, or timing, or fate, but whatever it was he didn’t fucking care. It had worked. He’d won. Yuffie still loved him, she had fallen back in love with him… and now she was letting him play naked with her, too.
Life was finally worth living. Vincent hated to admit it, but he was deeply indebted to Reno.
+
Yuffie was happy, at times incredibly so, but her perspective was different from Vincent’s.
They’d both assumed that with Vincent being much older and from a more formal generation, he’d be the one schooling her – that she’d be all crazy-in-love, and he’d be the calming influence. What they didn’t bargain for, however, was Yuffie being the one more equipped to deal with their romance. She was in love with Vincent, no doubt; she just wasn’t ‘crazy’ in love.
He was.
It wasn’t because she had suddenly matured overnight; it was because of something that existed in her core, a thing that he simply didn’t possess.
No one, Yuffie included, was surprised at the way he clung to his past. That was Vincent Valentine by definition. He had always struggled with ‘letting go’, to the point it had put him in a coffin for three decades.
But on top of his difficult past, Yuffie’s ability to detach was just so foreign from his own culture. The belief that life was impermanent was an ingrained concept for anyone born and raised Wutai. It was easy for Yuffie to feel the way she did – she had simply moved beyond any grudge she may have had, and settled into feeling simple, solid, permanent love for him, well before their fist kiss.
Her newly acquired coolness may have perplexed him a bit, but it was the level of his devotion that almost frightened her. She had always known that Vincent was an all-or-nothing sort of man, but this… this she simply hadn’t expected. She knew he cared about her, and she wasn’t surprised that their friendship had managed to blossom into whatever it was that they now had, considering lust had always been lurking between them under the surface.
He had moved his things, and his life, into her chambers, and behind the closed doors of her private rooms, the shift in his behavior was remarkable. She might have seen him as an obsessed boyfriend or an overly attentive husband, were it not for the fact that she loved the way he took care of her. Vincent had been in need of a reason not to simply go on with his life, but to flourish in it. She had given him that. Why wouldn’t he be eager?
She was happy with the change in him, and her head told her it was best to just enjoy his sweet, compulsive behavior, but that was easier said than done.
What if he was simply making up for many lost and unfortunate years? It was possible he was just besotted, a stage she had long since left behind when it came to him. The possibility that these intense feelings would prove temporary had eventually given her pause. Which was the reason why Yuffie was less… eager than he was.
Swallowing her fears about bringing it up, she managed to ask him about it one morning while they were getting ready to face another challenging day in Wutai.
“You’re, um… kinda lovesick, dude,” she finally said, leaning on the door to the bathroom as he shaved for the day. “Oh – not in public, mind you,” she corrected herself quickly.
Vincent had gotten so used to the ninja silks that he spent most mornings wearing little more than a fundoushi after his shower. She wanted to have this conversation, perhaps she even needed to, but Yuffie couldn’t stop staring at the way his exposed, pale flesh conformed to those perfectly trim hips.
She closed her eyes briefly, getting a leash on her train of thought. “But, I think you’re infatuated with me, Vince – I mean… well, with us… at least right now.”
“Infatuated?” he said, sounding surprised that she’d notice such a thing. He had to admit she was right, though. Turning back to the mirror, he continued shaving. “I suppose I am.”
He paused, smiling at her, as he finished with the last strip of shaving cream and then wiped his face off with a hot, wet cloth. When she only watched him and didn’t speak, he had the nerve to chuckle.
“All right. Yes, I am infatuated – with us, and with you. And yes, it probably will diminish.” He flipped off the switch to the overhead light in the bathroom and smirked at her concerned face as he walked past her towards his part of the closet. Grabbing a fresh pair of hakama, he spoke to her from the inside of the closet.
“Yuffie, for one thing, it’s only been seventeen days since we entered this relationship. Can you blame me?” She didn’t respond, other than to feel even more confirmation for her worries because he was actually counting the days.
Popping his head out of their closet, Vincent found she hadn’t moved from where she had been leaning. Her head was bowed and her back was to him, and she was now, apparently, sulking. Out of her sight, he smiled indulgently and continued dressing.
“Titan’s teeth, woman. Let me enjoy it.”
She turned, looking down at her bare feet as they stuck out from the hem of her lavender pajama pants. Voice little more than a mutter, she asked, “But will you still want to be with me, you know… when it wears off?”
“Who says it will wear off?”
“Vincent.”
He shook his head, grabbing the last of his clothes and tossing them on the chair next to the fire.
He walked up to her slowly. With no sandal straps to tuck them into yet, the legs of his hakama billowed loose about his ankles, making him look relaxed and alluring. And, of course, there were those hips, moving, flexing beneath the silk, a strip of skin still exposed at the side of the old-fashioned garment…
My stoic gunslinger has become all lovey-dovey… and now I’m actin’ like a sex maniac. Reno, you bastard Turk, you have rubbed off on me.
Yuffie had trouble taking her eyes off of his legs, but eventually her gaze traveled up to his face, and that only made things worse. Vincent gave her a look that was at first menacing, then it melted into something with more affection. She stood her ground as he took her face in his hands and kissed her thoroughly.
“You have nothing to worry about,” he whispered, brushing the words across her lips before kissing her again.
Vincent released her and sighed, then went back to getting dressed. “Try to look at things this way… next Spring, you may be the one that is smitten. Such feelings come and go over the course of a relationship. Through some miracle we managed to get where we are, and all that matters now… is that we are staying here, Empress.”
She smiled. “Okay, Vinnie.”
“This morning we are meeting with Madam Chekov to discuss the security of the public celebration for your upcoming birthday. Get dressed, you little moron, or we’ll be late.”
Yuffie bit her lip and smiled. She wondered at times if Lucrecia truly realized just how much she had given up when she’d chosen Hojo over Vincent.
+
“Did you enjoy your party?” Vincent’s voice was quiet and unhurried.
“Oh yeah,” Yuffie replied, too relaxed to move.
Her twenty-fourth had been a mostly private affair, with the exception of the inevitable public festivities. She and Vincent would have loved to have seen their old friends, but a few members of the council were still not convinced that letting outsiders past the borders too often was in Wutai’s best interests. Between Yuffie’s first Jubilee, Vincent’s recent birthday party and the food and biofuel contracts with Shinra, there had been more foreign comings and goings in the last three months than Wutai had seen during the entire year previous. Inviting their friends in again for another party, however small, seemed to be pushing it, so they decided to keep any personal celebrations local.
Very local, as in dinner and dessert in the banquet room on the second floor of the palace with only the closest of their Wutai friends.
They retired to her chambers after the private party. Lounging by a quiet fire on a mound of oversized pillows, they talked together well into the evening as a cold November rain poured outside, beating against the wavy handmade glass of the large window. The occasional flash of lightening scattered across the room to illuminate their bare skin.
“Vincent… Did you steal these pillows?”
“Absolutely not. I procured them. The guest rooms that I took them from are rarely used, as such, the pillows weren’t being used either.” He shifted, placing more of his weight on top of her, his intent becoming more obvious. “I recycled them. And that goes well with your stance on the environment, Empress.”
“My, my, don’t you sound proud of yourself. I swear, Vincent, you’ve gone from Captain Emo to Captain Ego in less than a month.”
She gasped, trying to tamp down the tickling sensations his tongue was creating as he whispered against her ear. “Are you complaining?”
“No… Gaia, Vinnie! Quit that, I can’t breathe!” Yuffie giggled. He pulled back, looking down at her with a smug, hungry expression.
“So are you expecting a reward for your diligence regarding my environmental policies?” she asked, trailing the back of one hand up his chest, barely touching him, forcing him to suppress a shiver.
“…Yes.”
She bit her lip as she took Vincent’s face in her hands, then kissed him slowly. Yuffie didn’t release him until she was satisfied. When she was done, he sighed deeply, laying his head in the space between her shoulder and neck. Half of his body was on top of hers now, and he cradled her close like a greedy child.
“Don’t fall asleep there, dude… I’ll never be able to move you offa me.”
“I do not see the problem.”
“You’re not the one who is trapped underneath somebody twice her weight.”
“I still don’t see the problem… but that reminds me, my dear girl,” he sighed, pulling his head away slightly to look up into her eyes.
Yuffie blushed at his words.
Reno had called her everything in the book from doll to sweetcheeks to candy-ass – that last had earned the redhead a punch in the gut. She hadn’t at all appreciated what he thought was a very clever double-meaning.
Yuffie hadn’t expected a pet name of any sort from Vincent until several years down the road. But it had only taken him a day or two to settle on one, if you could even define ‘my dear girl’ as a pet name.
She blinked at him, a bit too sweetly. “Yes, my stud muffin?”
Vincent grimaced. He took what comfort he could in the fact that she hadn’t settled on any pet name, yet. Given her tendencies, hopefully she never would.
“Disgusting, Yuffie… Please, just go back to ‘Vinnie’… or even ‘dude’. I actually like that by comparison.”
She grinned, and decorated his cheek with many small kisses before speaking again.
“What is it you want to tell me, Vincent?”
“Thank you. Now, you get a bit ribald when you are tipsy, and you need to watch that in public. Even at just a small get together with trusted friends, Hiro remains nothing but courtly towards you. When you gave him that full-body hug at the party tonight I thought he might faint.”
“Nadja thought it was funny. She nearly choked on her martini laughing.”
“Yes, but Nadja is a concubine, and she is within our circle.”
“Even Chekov laughed.”
“One does not tell Madam Chekov how to react, in any situation. And stop changing the subject. You need to be cautious. Perhaps get drunk only when we are alone, yes? So I can keep an eye on you.”
“Take advantage of me, you mean.”
“Try to fend off your more aggressive sexual tendencies, you mean.”
“Oh my gawd, are you saying I have a filthy mind?
“Most certainly.”
“And are you complaining?” she whispered in his ear, mirroring his affectionate gesture.
“Most certainly not.”
“Vincent… I really do love you.”
He stared down at her serious, sweet face for a moment and let the meaning of her words sink in, just like he always did.
How can such little words carry so much weight?
Even though he was currently the smitten one, he’d only ever said those words once. Just one time over the past month, and it hadn’t even been while they were in a clinch.
She was in the bathroom brushing her teeth before bed when she heard him.
‘I love you, Yuffie.’
Turning to stare at him with her mouth hanging open and toothpaste dribbling down her chin, her cheeks had blushed furiously, and she frowned as tears formed at the corners of her eyes. Between her toothpaste goatee, pink cheeks, glistening eyes and the gold-colored pajamas, Vincent had burned the unforgettable image into his brain.
Chatty as ever, Yuffie pretty much told him she loved him, or some form of it, on a daily basis. But his restraint with speaking those particular words aloud did nothing to change the fact that they both knew what was in his heart.
Still waters ran very, very deep with the gunslinger.
She yelped slightly when his only response was to flip her over onto her stomach, then she giggled as he shoved a huge pillow under her tummy and had his way with her.
+
Several subjects had been discussed at her party, but one of them seemed to keep cropping up: that she and Vincent were obviously more than just an item, and that the relationship would have to be dealt with in terms of public perception. Yuffie was still very confident that someday the rules would change, and if she had anything to do with it, it would happen in her lifetime. Father Oleg agreed with her, as did Nadja, but Chekov, Hiroyuki and Vincent had their doubts.
Shake was on the fence. Frankly, he was having a hard enough time digesting how much Yuffie had grown up in the last year.
Divorcing Hiroyuki seemed silly. It would almost have been too hard to explain – especially since she and Hiro had made too many public appearances by that point.
Over drinks, they considered the scenario from a public point of view: Yuffie ends her seemingly happy four-month marriage to a loyal, popular, full-blooded Wutai ninja, so that she can take her bodyguard as a lover. Then, after breaking Hiro’s heart, she can’t even have babies with the bodyguard let alone marry him, due to the fact that he is known not to be Wutai?
It was sticky at best.
In Wutai, if a royal marriage was performed only for convenience, concubines and consorts were not frowned upon, but there was a distinct difference between the two.
Concubines, domestic or foreign, were simply for pleasure, which is why no one objected too much regarding Reno and his bright blues eyes. Consorts, on the other hand, were a commitment. They were for love… and babies, because with a consort, an Empress is choosing the father of her children outside of her marriage.
As such, consorts also had to be Wutai, which meant Vincent as father to Yuffie’s children was out of the question – publically. Yuffie still had every intention of giving Vincent children, especially since he’d made it clear back on Tifa’s porch that he wanted them.
All this left them with one choice. She stayed ‘happily’ married to Hiroyuki. As far as the public was concerned, they were intending to produce an heir, through whatever means. For anyone else who cared or grew suspicious, Nadja could be considered Hiro’s concubine, and Vincent was…
Vincent was Yuffie’s bodyguard.
Having been raised in a royal household, having known what the rules were and how to break them since she was a young girl, Yuffie was not unsettled by all of this. In her mind, any scenario that had her with Vincent Valentine was good enough.
But it was just too complicated for the gunslinger, and he often found his head spinning with all the implications and consequences that falling in love with royalty had brought him. They were still arguing as to whether or not he could ever accept being referred to as a concubine, even if it was kept secret. It wasn’t that he was embarrassed – it had more to do with the fact that out of all the roles available to him, he now wanted the one he could no longer have: to be her husband.
Unfortunately, he was still a man that accepted blame very easily, and having lost the opportunity to marry Yuffie was… yet another thing etched on that damn stone tablet in his head. Vincent was trying to not feel guilty at the drop of a hat, but ‘moving on’ was one of the most difficult things he had ever tackled.
He was moving on, more than he ever had before in his life… but that led to other concerns as well.
One day at a meeting, one of the council members had the gall to inquire after Yuffie and Hiroyuki’s reproductive capabilities. Later, Vincent worked up the nerve to discuss the subject of children with her.
“And what do we do if our baby has my red eyes? Everyone will know it is mine. There will be angry villagers, Yuffie… Literally,” Vincent mentioned one night.
“They’re not that bad. And by then… Well, you know what? Fuck ‘em, I say,” she barked.
Yuffie was apparently not concerned about it. He wasn’t as convinced, but, he let it rest.
For now, at least, most of it wasn’t really an issue. Yuffie had made it down Leviathan’s altar before her twenty-fifth year, so the council could just shut the hell up as far as she was concerned. And babies were definitely planned – with Vincent, fiery red eyes or not, thank you very much – but they were still pretty far off.
Years ago, knowing that her life on the road needed a more reliable form of protection than ‘just say no’, she’d asked Reeve to cook up some birth control for her. It was the same kind that all the female Turks used; hormonally adjusted to the woman it was made for, making it very accurate, and it required no more than the implant of a small device that needed updating just once a year.
Reeve had been regularly administering and replacing the tiny device himself, injecting it into the underside of her upper arm about two inches above her elbow. He’d graciously seen to her peace of mind for the last seven years, and he’d updated it for her again – privately, in his office, right before she went back to Wutai – when her hymen had been rebuilt. By the time she and Vincent had become intimate, she was still good for another six months.
The WRO president had been the only one that knew about it, because at the time, he was the only one who needed to, but Yuffie told Vincent the entire story after their first night together. He took it surprisingly well when he realized that he couldn’t get her pregnant then, but would still have the opportunity to, one day.
He’d still had a few questions, however.
Reluctant to leave the comfort of her big bed that morning, they just lounged, talking, teasing each other, relaxing for once. After Yuffie told him about the contraceptive, he pushed her arm up over her head. Taking a closer look, he caressed the tiny bump where the implant rested just under her skin.
“I thought this was a healed-over scar from a puncture wound, or some sort of shrapnel, perhaps.”
“Nope. Uh… so how long have you known it was there?”
“Shortly after Omega. You fell asleep on the cold ground one night when we were on a mission together. You were exhausted, and out cold, and I didn’t want you to get sick, so I carried you to the tent. I felt it when I picked you up.”
He’d paused, then, and she knew he was fighting with himself as to whether or not he had any right to ask the next question… so she simply barreled forward and answered it for him instead.
“I asked Reeve to get it for me just before I turned seventeen, after Meteor.”
Vincent’s eyebrows jumped slightly at that one. “That long ago?”
“Are you mad?” she asked, wincing.
“No. No, not at all.”
“Disappointed, then.”
He gave her soft smile before answering. “Yuffie. No. I’m just surprised, and maybe… a bit jealous.” She grinned softly. “So you lost your virginity at sixteen?”
“Ah… Actually, I was almost eighteen. But I came really close a few times before that, so it’s a good thing I went to Reeve when I did.”
“Eighteen…” He frowned again, thinking back. “I didn’t even know you were seeing anyone.”
“Well, I wasn’t, really. I mean, I thought I might be, at the time, but…”
“He didn’t treat you properly?”
She winced. “The guy didn’t hurt me, if that’s what you are asking, but… Beyond that, let’s just say that I didn’t have any expectations to begin with.” Vincent didn’t like hearing that one bit, and his face did nothing to hide his feelings. “Oh, come on, Vince… it’s not that big a deal.”
“Yes, it is. It’s a very ‘big deal’.”
She shook her head. “All that flowery shit they write about your first time ever… hearing angels singing, it being so painful then suddenly so wonderful, and then afterwards, thinking Gaia fucking moved… That’s all chocobo crap. A girl’s lucky if she even has an orgasm her first time – which, I did not, thank you. I gave myself the first one of those.”
He ignored how interested he was to hear more about that last part – get a grip, Valentine – and went back to making his point. A very important one, in his mind at least.
“Yuffie. I refuse to subscribe to the over-saturated and rude idea that losing one’s virginity, especially for a young girl, is not an important event in a person’s life.”
“Okay, okay! I’ll admit that I’ve gotten jaded right along with the rest of Gaia! But, Vinnie, even if the guy tries really hard, it almost never ends up all perfect and mind-blowing.”
“That’s because young men these days are not instructed by their fathers how to properly go about such things.”
“And yours did?”
He paused before responding. “He may have been a bit cold, but he raised me right. And it is not ‘crap’, as you say. If all those things you mentioned didn’t happen, then whoever this idiot was he definitely did not treat you properly.”
She stared at his face then, and felt yet another warm fuzzy forming in her stomach. His jealousy was growing on her very quickly.
“Then you should be happy.”
“Why?”
“Because,” she laughed lightly, “Artificial or not, I had another hymen up until last night. So you kinda gave me all that great stuff… or don’t you remember?” All he could manage in response was a quiet laugh. “I guess I grew up a lot faster than you or the rest of the gang ever knew.”
“You are full of secrets, Yuffie,” he whispered. Done talking, he kissed her neck.
“Just don’t… don’t tell Cid. He’ll fucking kill me.” Vincent nipped at her skin, and she gasped. “The jealousy thing is nice, though…”
They didn’t manage to reappear from her room that day until very late in the afternoon.
+
Yuffie was not as indifferent to the delicacy of their situation as she appeared. That same evening, she went immediately to Chekov and told her what had changed. The councilwoman was only as conservative as she needed to be on the job, but in real life she was thrilled that the two of them had finally given in to their feelings. Yuffie was going to be devoured alive by her post of she didn’t have something in her life that was solely for her own happiness. As far as Chekov could tell of Vincent, he had been in the same boat.
Yet she could sense something bothering the young woman, and pressed her for the truth.
As Vincent had already moved his things into her room that afternoon, Yuffie was worried about the maids. They were young, and they’d obviously been paying attention to his personal things. She had no doubt the migrated couch of last September had caused some discussion, and she didn’t want that to go any further.
But, she didn’t want to offend them or make them suspicious by sending them away when they had, in fact, been doing a very good job. Chekov took care of it with her usual aplomb, by telling the two girls that they were doing such a good job that the Empress had personally requested they be transferred to the public rooms on the first floor, where impressions were of utmost importance and their skills could be put to better use.
The council elder then contacted two women, old friends of hers, to come work as Yuffie’s maids. Their own children were long grown and gone, and they knew the ins and outs of housekeeping as well as the complications of royal life, with Yuffie as the third Empress to take the throne in their lifetimes.
They were trustworthy, unflappable, and sensitive to her need for confidentiality. Once again, Chekov had come to her rescue. Yuffie started to tear up while hugging the woman in her private office.
“You just keep saving me and saving me. I feel like an idiot.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Yuffie. I told you, as long as I still draw breath I will be here to help you. Why should you feel like that?”
“Because I should be grown up enough to handle this shit on my own. Shouldn’t I?”
“Is that what you think?” she asked, pushing Yuffie back just enough so she could gently dab at the tears on the girl’s cheek. “You think that Godo, and your mother, and all the Empresses before her, had handled everything on their own?”
“Um… yeah?”
She scoffed. “Your father. I swear to Leviathan, Yuffie, I loved the moron but sometimes I wanted to kick the shit out of him.”
Yuffie laughed out loud. “Well I know that feeling. But what was your beef with him?”
Chekov sighed. “He gave you the impression that it was all just so important and difficult when you were still so little! I know he did it because he was concerned for you and he wanted you to take it seriously and succeed. But all he managed to do in the process was put you off taking the throne. He made you hate the idea!” She shook her head. “And now here you are, thinking that the fate of an entire nation rests solely on your shoulders.”
She frowned. “But, Chekov… Wutai is my responsibility, isn’t it?”
“Yes! It’s on your shoulders… and my shoulders… and Shake’s and Oleg’s, and now Hiro’s, and your Mr. Valentine’s as well. All of Wutai has a part to play. Do you get my meaning, Yuffie?”
The young woman wiped the rest of the tears from her face with the back of her hand. “Yeah, I think so. Next time don’t be afraid to ask for help the moment I need it.”
“Yes. Good. Now, onto more important things.” Chekov took Yuffie’s hands in her own and squeezed them. Her sharp eyes crinkled sweetly as she smiled at the young woman. “Well? Are you happy with him? Is he attentive? Does he want children?”
+
Over the next seven months, Vincent and Yuffie’s relationship was not the only thing growing in Wutai.
The arms and legs were in full working mode, trying to keep up with all the contracts they had formed with outsiders the year before. Gaia was indeed hungry for decent, whole foods. By early summer, the ranchers and farmers had tripled production and were going to make a small fortune at harvest, further adding to the comeback status of Wutai as a major power on the Planet. They weren’t leaders in technology, nor did they care – but they were no longer being dismissed as a mere tourist trap. Yuffie was thrilled to get rid of those words as a description for her country.
Everything was still in the growing pains stage. Agreements were left open to modifications. Rufus and Yuffie oversaw the negotiators. They spearheaded contracts and set things in motion in the beginning, then they helped figure out what worked and what didn’t, which kept things moving forward on a smooth course.
Vincent agreed to partially manage the biofuel contracts, as the idea had initially been his own, until someone more suited to the position could be assigned.
Wutai’s farmers had no intention of overusing their rich soil for such a thing as switchgrass, which was considered barely more than a weed, but they kept as many crops as necessary to keep themselves in generator fuel, as per the agreement with Shinra.
Because of their success and knowhow, however, they were hired out to train foreigners all over Gaia on how to start their own biofuel crops, and were paid very well to do it. The previously faked Grasslands Farming Co-Ops had actually turned into a reality. Reeve came up with the cheesy tagline ‘Growing Grass on the Grasslands’, and Yuffie and Rufus had a good laugh over that one.
The upper third of Wutai continent had all that fantastic soil, and the arms and legs continued to put it to better use. The Southern-most end of Wutai was still off limits, though, with the rocky caves and their strange inhabitants best left alone. Not much was actually known about the monsters there, save they were very big and very shy, mostly nocturnal, and actually quite docile if encountered in the wild, which was rare. As long as you didn’t try to make contact with one, or start screaming and waving a weapon at them, they pretty much just stood still and stared at you for a bit before disappearing from view.
Their fierce appearance, however, suggested that if they decided to put you in your place, you’d be lucky to get away with your life.
The middle of Wutai was another story… one that Ginto Shinshuro was extremely interested in. Yuffie found out just how interested the General was in Wutai’s mid-section by way of an old friend.
Late one sunny afternoon in early June, she and Vincent were reading in the library on the second floor when a ninja appeared with a note. Vincent rose from his chair and took the offered note, and then huffed when he’d read it.
“What is it?” Yuffie asked. “Somebody have another baby?” Her sarcastic remark was not too far from the truth. Tifa had just given birth to her and Cloud’s second child, another girl named Ariel, and Shera was pregnant again – with twins. “They’re squirtin’ puppies out like water already,” she muttered to herself.
“No pregnancy announcements, unless Barret Wallace is here to sequester Marlene because she’s in trouble.”
“Oh man… shut up, Vinnie. She may be headstrong and boy-crazy, but she’s only fifteen!”
“Nevertheless, Yuffie, Barret is here to see you.”
She squeaked, then darted out of the library to greet her guest, with Vincent hot on her heels.
“Barret Wallace, as I live and breathe!” She jumped into the huge man’s arms and hugged him tight, their display safe from prying eyes.
“Hey, little girl!” He grinned at Yuffie, setting her back on her feet. “Man, your hair got all long again.”
“Well, that’s what happens when ya don’t cut it for a whole year,” she flirted, fingering her dark locks, now past her shoulder blades. “I didn’t expect to see you again until next month!”
“So, you two are planning to come this year’s Gathering? Vincent missed last year, an’ you missed two in a row, so that’ll make Tifa happy. Vincent,” he said, nodding with a smile as the gunslinger came up next to them. “Good to see you. You takin’ good care of the brat?”
“Rest assured. How are you, Barret? I trust all is well?”
“Mostly. Got some news for ya, though.”
“Hey, just a minute before news, bad or good! First let’s go to the banquet room, we’ll have some grub brought up!”
Over a lunch of stir-fry with grass-fed Wutai beef, their guest first made a request of Yuffie.
Shortly before the Geostigma crisis, Barret Wallace been desperate to find a way to make amends, and make a living, both at the same time. That hadn’t been easy, and Kadaj’s little reunion had put it all on hold. Afterwards, however, he found that little had changed to help his dilemma.
He and Cid had managed to get the oil well they had been looking into running again, and from that they had formed their own fairly lucrative business, Wallace & Highwind Oil.
Their biggest rival? Shinra, of course.
Barret had helped many people on Gaia continue to use their fuel-based technology, a thing that most of them were having trouble letting go of. In Barret’s mind, why should they? Life’s little conveniences were not just nice – in the modern world they were helpful.
But over time the same nagging question popped back in his head: how can you consider yourself a man while you continue to take advantage of the Planet like this?
The pollution factor of oil-based fuels was nasty enough, but the greediness aspect was worse. Even though oil production was not as immediately threatening to Gaia as Mako use had been, it was still, simply put, taking away and not giving back.
He and Cid both had issues with what they were doing. They could see the writing on the wall; in the long run, oil would prove to be a not so great solution. They were simply not that hungry for profit, either, and after all they had been through to save Gaia, it was making the two men feel like hypocrites.
The pioneering duo wanted to stay in the energy business, however, because they were good at it. They didn’t know if biofuel was the final answer to Gaia’s energy crisis, but it was certainly a step in the right direction.
The problem was, they weren’t sure how to convert their business from drilling for oil to… growing stuff.
Yuffie pretty much spit out her iced tea with laughing.
“Haha! I love it! You and Cid wanna be farmers! Fuck, please take pictures of that!”
Vincent winced disgustedly and grabbed a linen napkin. He smacked it – gently, but still, it was slapped – against Yuffie’s mouth, encouraging her to wipe the tea from her royal face. She giggled at him, and he huffed, rolling his eyes.
Barret did not miss the byplay and he grinned at them both. “Heh. That’s cute. You two – yeah, I get it. Congrats. ‘Bout time, Vince.”
The gunslinger blinked at him. He may have felt free expressing his love for Yuffie when he was alone with her, but he was still on the fence with everyone else. Yuffie paused, her eyes going from Vincent to Barret and back again, then she snickered loudly behind the napkin. Vincent glared at her.
She cleared her throat and continued. “I’m sorry, Barret. Tell me what it is that you want.”
“Okay. Well, we jes’ heard it through the grapevine that Wutai was offering services that could help us in gettin’ things goin’.”
“We do indeed have such services Barret. All you need do is ask,” Vincent replied.
“An’ we can pay you upfront, ‘cuz you know, I got the gil set aside for it right now–”
“Shut your mouth, old man. You’ll pay for nothing,” Yuffie said then, her voice serious. “No member of Avalanche pays for anything in Wutai.”
“Well… we’ll see, Yuffs. I got to consider my own pride on that one. Maybe… Maybe I can make a donation or something. Yer priests need some cash?”
“I told you, don’t wo-”
“That would be acceptable, Barret,” Vincent interjected, giving Yuffie a look. To Barret’s amazement she paused and then nodded at Vincent, smiling, and he continued. “I will get you in touch with Father Oleg.”
In the past, Yuffie would have been all over any of the men of Avalanche for having interrupted her like that, but she was beginning to understand that Vincent’s perspective, his male perspective, sometimes saw important things that hers did not.
“In fact, if that’s what you came here for, we can have one of our instructors leave with you, today.”
Yuffie smiled, adding, “Yup. No problem.”
“Yeah, that’s one thing. But as I said I also got some news, and it may not be good.” The big man shifted uncomfortably in the fancy stuffed chair, which was a tad too small for his frame. “I found something weird on GaiaNet.”
He proceeded to tell them that he was still a member on a website that hosted listings for job opportunities specific to experienced oil drillers, just in case the well dried up. While he usually didn’t pay it much mind, he had been too lazy to unsubscribe his address and was still receiving notices. He’d been deleting a bunch of them when he saw one that caught his eye, and not in a good way.
“Some guy was looking for a driller who was good at getting around rock bed, which is not totally unheard of, but the address made me question it, ‘cuz it was nowhere near any rock bed on Gaia I know of. So, I plugged the guy’s IP into a search engine, and that led to another ad on another website, and in that one he, or she, hell, I don’t know, was lookin’ for an experienced materia user. That got my hackles raised, so I sent the info to Cid, who decided to trace it further.”
Vincent’s eyes narrowed. “And?”
“That address traces back to another, and then another, and then a third. Cid says that’s classic leapfroggin’ when someone is trying to hide an identity. That’s as far as he could get, so he sent everything on to that Shelke girl,” he said, looking at Yuffie. “And she said the origin address came from somewhere in Wutai.”
Yuffie’s face went blank, and she raised her chin slightly. She looked at Vincent, who frowned thoughtfully.
“Yeah… I thought you might react that way.”
“Rock bed, huh?” Yuffie asked, thinking about the very middle of Wutai continent.
Vincent sighed. “Thank you, Barret. There is little we can do about such a thing, but for security’s sake I am grateful that you told us.”
In the end, Barret did not take the offered help back to Rocket Town with him. When Vincent suggested that he contact Rufus Shinra instead, he was shocked at first, but he saw reason quickly.
Vincent knew that Rufus was searching for a site closer to Wutai that was suitable for building a production plant specifically for his biofuel operation, and Rocket Town was a good choice. Within a few weeks, the two men formed an agreement with Shinra, and Wallace & Highwind Oil became Wallace & Highwind Energy. Rufus helped them convert their operation, and Cid and Barret never once had to put on overalls or drive a tractor. It turned out well for everyone but Yuffie, who was hoping to post pictures to all of their friends featuring the giant gun-armed man and the crusty old pilot trying to “farm and shit”.
The suspicious GaiaNet activity was still a problem, though. As far as Yuffie, Vincent, and their Wutai circle was concerned, it had the mark of Ginto Shinshuro all over it, but there simply wasn’t enough to go on. All they could do was to keep a close watch on things.
+
After a while, Vincent began to notice the main reason why most Wutai were happy, satisfied people. Their lives were a string of endless celebrations – holidays, anniversaries and parties, one after the other after the other.
The first anniversary of Yuffie’s marriage to Hiroyuki was coming up, and it was being celebrated with a summer festival, after Yuffie insisted it be informal and open to the public. She was still fighting with some of the council on the more stuffy protocol rules that she detested, especially the ones that involved elite dinners for rich patrons at the pagoda, requiring lavish clothing and prim behavior. She knew that Vincent secretly enjoyed it when she wore formalwear now and again, but Yuffie truly hated dressing up, almost as much as Hiro did.
Instead of her stoic bodyguard, it was her husband who accompanied her to the council meeting that morning. Hiro’s own stare was actually more menacing as Vincent’s, so it didn’t take much for her to get her way. For this celebration, she declared that as it was their anniversary, they would decide. The council demanded closed borders, but Yuffie stuck to her guns on keeping it informal.
Vincent was slightly disappointed, but since there was to be no formalwear at the actual festival, she modeled some of it for him the night before. Alone.
The day began with food, of course, then entertainment – bird of prey exhibitions, games, acrobats, and ninja skills as expected. Afterwards, the Empress and her Prince were expected to make the rounds among the many tents and stands featuring local goods and services that were for sale.
Vincent was on duty that day, trailing behind the Empress and the Prince at exactly three feet, as well as more ninja that both blended in with the crowd and acted as satellites to his own position. Neeri was thrilled to have her first-ever real bodyguard assignment – not only did she get to protect Yuffie, but she got to do so undercover. Wearing her costume from the tumbling exhibition earlier in the day, she took her orders from Vincent and pretended to be a street entertainer. On duty as one of the ninjas in the crowd, she followed Hiro and Yuffie as they moved from stand to stand.
As thrilled as Neeri was, Vincent was on edge. He’d felt that way since he’d woken up early that morning, much earlier than Yuffie, and he still didn’t feel quite right. When she pressed him for details, he cited that he’d had odd dreams the night before, and he could have sworn he’d seen Lucrecia in them.
That Lucrecia had been in his dreams didn’t seem to phase her one bit, but Yuffie was trying not to let his unease affect her attitude – anytime the villagers put that much effort into one of her personal celebrations, she wanted them to know how honored she was. But she’d also been around Vincent Valentine and his super-senses too long to just blow it off when he felt tense about something he couldn’t put a name to.
Shortly before lunch was to be served, Yuffie had already racked up a nice bill collecting statues, tapestries and other locally created items to decorate the pagoda with. She insisted on visiting one more stand before lunch, even though all their mouths were watering and their stomachs were growling. The aroma of fried chicken and other delicious fare was already wafting through the grounds, making everyone dizzy with hunger and lax to pay attention.
“Just one more, please Hiro?” she dragged him by the hand into the front end of an open tent, where there were handmade baby items for sale. “My friend Shera would appreciate some of this stuff, I just know it.”
“As you wish,” he sighed, playing the part of the patient and indulgent husband. She ooh’d and aah’d at several blankets before picking up a silky crocheted one with yellow and white stripes and handing it to the artisan as her first purchase.
Standing behind his charges, Vincent heard a faint whine and he snapped his head to the right of them, just in time to see the arrow. He shoved Yuffie under the table filled with blankets before it could hit her. He grunted when it pierced him clean through the bicep of his right arm, sticking out from both sides of his muscle like a bizarre ornament. He turned his body to cover Yuffie’s more effectively, and in that same moment a second arrow whined through the air. With a sickening thunk, it hit him in the back, piercing his right lung until the arrowhead was poking out of the front of his chest. He grunted again, this time painfully, and Yuffie paled at the sight of two arrows in his body. He gave her a look that all but said don’t fucking move, and she managed to catch herself in time before she screamed out his name.
“Cover her,” Vincent rasped angrily as he stood up, and then all hell broke loose. The two ninjas that were flanking the gunslinger immediately jumped on top of Yuffie, shielding her body with their own. Patrons were screaming and running and sinking to the ground all around them.
The second arrow had come from a totally different direction, but they had both come from on high. Vincent and Hiro looked to the trees surrounding them.
Neeri ran up to them, terrified and amazed at the same time.
“Shouldn’t you lay down?” she asked Vincent, slightly in shock as she stared at the arrows sticking out of his body. Irritated, Hiro yanked on the girl’s arm and pulled her behind him, shielding her.
Vincent narrowed his eyes as he located the assassin who had shot the second arrow when they jumped from a high branch in a distant tree line.
“Dammit,” he cursed, “The other…”
But Hiro located that one, seeing the branches of a closer tree swaying when the person began to flee. “I will get that one, you take the second,” Hiro muttered quickly.
“I’ll get ‘em!” Neeri announced, taking off in the direction of the first shooter. Hiroyuki reached out to stop her but the lithe girl was just too fast.
“Neeri!” shouted Hiro. “Get back here!”
Vincent moved to intercept, now fearing for Neeri’s safety, but Hiro stopped him.
“No! You are the only one who can catch the other. Go!”
The remaining Ninjas in the crowd added more shielding to Yuffie, even though she was desperate to see how badly Vincent was hurt and fought to free herself. But balled up on the ground as she was and covered with the steely bodies of her ninja, there was no way she could break through their forces.
Vincent eyed Neeri’s retreating form for just a moment longer, then took off after the second shooter.
+
Neeri caught up to the assassin first, with the Prince close behind her, but not close enough to stop her from engaging the target without his aide.
“Bastard!” the girl screamed, moving before thinking as she jumped on the person’s back. She grabbed them in a half nelson and wrapped her legs around their waist. Her ninja training kicked in, and she immediately assessed the person’s attributes – male, about five foot ten inches and one hundred and sixty pounds. Muscular, stronger than her, but definitely not as fast.
Her eagerness outweighed her skills, though, as the man dropped to the ground and pivoted, easily getting out of her hold. He yanked on her torso roughly with one hand and grabbed her by one ankle with the other. Twisting it violently, she cried out in pain as he wrenched her ankle so hard he nearly broke it.
Distracted, she lay beneath him and was too late to move away before he had strong fingers laced around her throat and began to squeeze the life out of her.
One hira-shuriken imbedded itself in the man’s collarbone, then two more followed, one in his arm and another in his thigh. He didn’t seem to notice, though, as he was intent on killing the wisp of a girl trapped between his legs. Hiro slammed into him so hard he lost his hold on the girl’s throat and flew backwards, slamming into the grass and mud, face down.
Hiro jumped on his back immediately, giving the man no time to think, and snapped his neck, then everything got quiet.
All he could hear was the sound of Neeri gasping and coughing behind him, and that was all he needed to hear. Checking to make sure the assassin was dead beneath him, the rage cleared from his mind quickly, and he stood to face his little girl. Walking over to where she was trying to stand, Hiro grabbed Neeri’s arm and got her on her feet.
She coughed a few more times then gave him a sheepish look, but looked down instantly when she saw him pinning her with hot eyes. There was anger in them – anger directed at her.
“Leviathan’s fangs, girl! We needed him alive!”
In the eight years that Neeri had watched Hiroyuki court her mother, she had come to love and accept him as her own father. In all that time, she never heard him raise his voice, not even when he disciplined her… and she knew she could be a handful.
But he had never once looked at her that way.
“I’m… I’m sorry, I-”
“Shut up. Go get two more ninjas and tell them to come to me here.” The girl just looked at him, tears threatening. “Neeri! Now, dammit!”
She bolted, albeit with a nasty limp but, she followed his instructions. When she was fully out of his sight, Hiro closed his eyes and tried not to picture the ligature marks on her thin neck. He said a silent prayer to Leviathan that he’d gotten there in time to save his daughter’s life.
+
Vincent took off after the second shooter, jumping and leaping over stands and around tree trunks, just like the old days. Neither the villagers nor the ninja had ever seen him do such a thing since he arrived in Wutai. The villagers were petrified as he soared and darted past them, inhumanly, while the ninja were astonished and impressed.
They couldn’t keep up though, even with his injuries, and he could not wait for them. Vincent could feel his wounds eating away at his strength, in ways that they never used to before Chaos had left him.
He only had so much time to catch the assassin before he collapsed, and he knew it.
He made it to the tree line and halted, listening. The shooters steps were light but they could not escape his hearing. It only took a split second before he was sure of the location.
Vincent leapt onto the nearest tree trunk, pushing himself off of it quickly and repeated the move. He ignored the pain as the arrows brushed and tangled in errant branches, and bounced from trunk to trunk until he was almost on top of the person.
He saw it was a woman, but that did nothing to deter his intent to tackle her.
What he wanted to do was kill her, whoever she was, very badly, but he had to check his aggression – he knew interrogation was the smarter move at this point. If they could tie the actions of these two back to Shinshuro, the council would have enough to legally court-martial him.
He smiled darkly at the thought. The General would be forced to leave Wutai in shame, and then Vincent would be free to hunt him down and twist his head off.
The woman pivoted quickly when she knew he was about to land on top of her, but it was too late. He grabbed her by one leg with his human hand as he descended, and they landed on the forest floor with a loud thud, branches and leaves crunching beneath them.
She was fast, though, and agile, and she grunted as she rolled away him. Laying on her side, she kicked him in the arm where the arrow was still lodged half in, half out of the bicep.
The pain shot through him like glass shards and he actually saw spots before his eyes. It didn’t help matters any when her thick boot collided with the side of his jaw next, leaving him dazed.
Vincent had sustained other serious injuries since losing Chaos and the other two entities, so one would think he’d have learned by now. But he just couldn’t get it through his head that he was not able to withstand as much damage as before, evidenced by the fact that he stubbornly continued throwing himself into these situations.
The woman got to her knees and spat out some curse in Wutai, then pulled a lethal-looking blade from her belt. She raised her arms high above his body, intending to slam the knife into his heart. Shaking off the dizziness, and knowing he would probably not survive such a strike, Vincent managed to shift out the way just enough to avoid it.
Not far enough out of the way, though. She missed his heart but plunged the knife into his gut instead. It sank in, all the way to the hilt, and he felt the blade slicing through his intestines.
The pain was not as intense as he had expected it to be, but he attributed that to the fact that he was going into shock. He was losing a lot of blood, however, and more than he could probably afford. As he lay on the ground contemplating his weaknesses, she stood up quickly. Her shadow moved over him as she took off running.
He was losing consciousness, and Yuffie’s would-be assassin was getting away.
Transforming was out of the question, so he pulled Cerberus out of its holster. “Fuck this,” he muttered, sitting up only as much as he needed to get the shot. “See how you like it.”
He fired once, directly at her retreating form. He intended to hit her leg, but… he ended up blowing a hole in the side of her waist the size of a grapefruit. The woman stumbled, screaming out just once, then dropped to the forest floor and stopped moving.
She was dead, or would be soon, and the last thing Vincent thought before he passed out was that hopefully Hiroyuki had been more successful in taking the other shooter alive.
+
When he woke up, Vincent was startled to find himself laying on soft grass, surrounded by many people talking urgently. Unsure of his surroundings, he flinched and tried to move away until he recognized Nadja leaning over him.
“Its all right, Vincent. You’re in Wutai. We’ve got you.”
“Yuf… The Empress?” He winced, realizing he almost broke protocol in public.
“Safe.”
“Neeri?” he grunted.
“Stupid, but alive.”
“The assassins…”
“You got one, Hiro got the other. Dead as doornails.”
“Both dead. That is… unfortunate.” His eyes rolled back into his head slightly. “The blade… arrows… get them out.”
“We will, just as soon as I get you back to the clinic.”
“Nadja, now.” Vincent said tightly. He was sweating and more pale than usual, if that was even possible.
The nurse didn’t know the grisly details about his past, but she knew enough. He had been tortured and experimented on, and no one who goes through something like that is fond of being vulnerable after an injury. He was on the verge of passing out, but he was fighting it to make sure she did as he told her to, so if there was some reason he needed the foreign objects removed that quickly, she wasn’t going to argue with him.
She motioned for one of her technicians to give her a pair of surgical pliers. Between the two of them, they clipped the arrowheads from the metal shafts and then pulled the shafts from his body.
He grimaced again. “Knife.”
“I don’t want to do anymore damage until we’re–”
“Nadja, take the knife out,” came Yuffie’s quiet voice. “Just trust him.”
Vincent clenched his teeth and tried not to cry out as she slid the blade from his stomach, but it was clear he was having difficulty. Blood seeped out, at first abundant and fast, but then it began to slow. Yuffie tightened her hold on Hiroyuki’s arm, having no other acceptable public outlet for her fear.
“We’re gonna get you to the clinic, now, Vincent. A surgeon is on his way.” Nadja leaned over and whispered the next words in his ear. “Yuffie is unharmed. She is surrounded by her ninja. Please don’t worry.”
As the team of medics carefully lifted her bodyguard onto the gurney, Yuffie was still trying to get her heart rate down, a fact that was embarrassing her to no end. But her more immediate concern was for Vincent.
She could tell, right before he passed out again, that her gunslinger’s mind was already busy coming up with every possible angle that would put the blame for what had just happened directly on his shoulders.
+
“What…?”
Vincent woke up in what he knew to be the clinic in the pagoda, simply based on the odors and the worthless pain medication in his system. But he did not expect to find a sleeping Yuffie on top of him, sprawled across the blanket covering his hips.
“She should be upstairs in bed… getting a decent night’s sleep.”
“As if she could, with you down here.” Nadja’s voice was sarcastic as she came closer to him and started taking his vitals.
“Still…” he started, then closed his eyes and tried not to imagine what might have happened.
“Look, she pulled rank. I told her to get the hell out of here, and she just barked at me to go fuck off.” Nadja adjusted his drip, grinning down at him. “In a friendly way, of course.”
Vincent’s lips quirked. Nadja and Yuffie had become close over the last year. He was glad she had found a woman to befriend that was somewhat nearer to her own age. Chekov loved her, but she was definitely the mothering sort.
Vincent was even more grateful that Nadja, like Yuffie, was a tough cookie. She held no reservations about speaking her mind to the Empress whenever she damn well felt like it. They were cut from the same cloth, and it’d made for a strong friendship, something Yuffie needed desperately now that she couldn’t have a slumber party with Tifa at the drop of a hat.
“And your daughter?”
The nurse didn’t even wince at the mention of her only daughter’s name, completely hiding her anxiety – save the fact that Vincent could smell it on her plain as day. “She’s fine… after an intense lecture from Hiro, and a thorough yelling at from her Sensei, of course. She has a badly sprained ankle and a tender neck. But I think the verbal discipline that followed hurt more.”
Nadja pulled back the gauze on Vincent’s injuries to check them over. One by one, she saw that all three wounds were puckered with bright red skin at the entry – very angry-looking but without a doubt, closed. The little snips of black surgical thread that had formed the knots of his stitches were now just laying there, useless, sticking to the surface his skin. She plucked them away easily.
“Your skin has pretty much healed over… and the stitches have been pushed out of the incisions.”
“I know.”
“We opened you up, you know, to repair the damage to your lung and intestine, but by the time we got you back here your insides were already, um… back together.”
“It happens.”
“Are you still in pain?”
“Some.”
“Do you want anything for it?”
“It won’t have any effect.”
They probably didn’t need it, but procedures were procedures, so she cleaned and covered the wounds with fresh gauze anyway. Nadja frowned, shaking her head at how fast he was healing. Sighing at the mystery that was Vincent Valentine, she pulled the hospital blanket back up over his chest.
As she re-shelved a few supplies, she said, “Neeri learned a hard lesson about the dangers of spontaneous behavior today. She’s still reeling, of course, and thankfully Hiro didn’t turn her away when she needed to cry on his strong shoulders. I think she was more upset that he was so angry with her, but truthfully he was just as shook up as she was… even though he refuses to let it show.” Nadja covered Yuffie up with a blanket and gathered her hair away from her face. “I expect she will harden up very soon, now,” the nurse admitted with a tired gaze.
“That is not a lesson I’d want my daughter to learn,” Vincent said.
“Me neither, Vincent. But, she’s has chosen the life of a ninja. She won’t survive it if she doesn’t face the harsh realities of violence. I don’t want to see my daughter jaded, but… if it means she will be better prepared to survive such encounters, so be it.”
“Yuffie has nicknamed you the ‘picture of practicality’,” he answered quietly, absently stroking her hair. “It fits.”
“Oh yeah? Well, when she wakes up you can tell her my nickname for her.”
Vincent smiled softly. “Hn. Do I even have to guess?”
“I adore Yuffie, not just because we’re friends, but for everything she’s sacrificed for Wutai, and for all the ways that she has helped me and my family… but I’m fairly sure I’m not the first person to call her a stubborn brat.”
+
“Are you positive you’re all right?”
“Vincent, I’m fine,” she said for what seemed like the twentieth time that night. He wasn’t putting forth his best effort at pillow talk. “Will you please stop? That was not my first assassination-attempt rodeo.”
At Nadja’s insistence, he spent one night and the next afternoon in the clinic. But after Vincent’s wounds magically healed over and he was up and moving without too much pain, the nurse had no good reason not to set him free.
Yuffie, however, made him spend the rest of the day in their room, resting and eating soup. He was annoyed because he wanted to confront Shinshuro about the previous day’s events, but she told him that Chekov was already preparing to do just that. The general would be summoned to the next council meeting for questioning; Vincent could glare at the man all he liked tomorrow.
For now, they were cuddled up in bed together. She knew he was still in some pain even though he was hiding it well, and all she wanted him to do was to get more sleep.
“Yes, you know the risks, Yuffie… but this was very close. There were warning signs and I should have been more aware–”
She put her fingertips against his lips, stopping him from finishing.
“What? Those dreams you had? Enough already. You aren’t to blame. No one could have seen this coming.” Her words were stern, but still he exhaled, frowning and clearly dissatisfied. “Surviving life as a royal is one part calculated risk, one part luck. It was just bad luck, that’s all.” When he finally looked directly into her eyes, she still saw the love and concern there, but the rest of what was there was making her upset.
There it was, like it had never left: Patented Vincent Valentine Self-Loathing.
You stubborn bastard.
Yuffie’s hands moved from his neck, the palm of one caressing the back of his upper arm while the other ghosted over his chest opposite his heart. She felt him stiffen slightly at the touch of her fingertips as her hand drifted down to his stomach where he’d been stabbed.
All three of the wounds had been jagged and nasty, but now she could barely tell he’d been hurt. If Chaos had still been inside of him, he never would have passed out. He’d have yanked out the arrows and knife while walking back to the festival, and would have healed up before he even got halfway there.
As it stood now he had healed much faster than if anyone else had sustained those injuries. The newly-knitted bicep, ribs and innards were just a bit tender. The skin was still pink, and there would be a slight scar where the arrowhead had protruded out of his chest, but what really bothered him was the fact that it had slowed him down.
“Seems to me you came closer to dying than I did.”
He closed his eyes. The trajectory of that first arrow… had he been just one fraction of a second too late that afternoon, it would have wound up buried in Yuffie’s temple instead of his arm.
The image was making him ill and he couldn’t even bring himself to tell her how wrong she was. Oblivious to his thoughts, Yuffie shook her head and smiled softly. “There won’t be any changing your mind with this one, will there?”
One dark eyebrow cocked, as if to say what do you think? Vincent raised his claw to Yuffie’s hairline and carefully brushed away a few dark strands that were plastered to her damp forehead.
“You almost…” he tried, then decided better of it. “You mean too much to me that I cannot just… let things like this go,” he whispered. The words were heartfelt, and they filled her with butterflies, but then he practically killed the moment with what he said next.
“My first concern must always be my oath to you.”
She frowned, clearly hearing all the other things that he hadn’t said out loud:
I’ve fallen in love with you, and now my emotions have gotten the better of me. My indulgence has made me negligent. No more games. No more relaxation. Time to get serious. Time to be… forever on alert.
Yuffie sighed, truly tired. Vincent had come so far in just a short time, and the last thing she wanted was for him to go back to being wound up like a coil all day and all night… but he was obviously already there. She also knew, at least right then, that she was not going to convince him otherwise.
Which is why she didn’t say a word as he kissed her cheek then got out of bed. Feeling the chill instantly, Yuffie grabbed Vincent’s pillow and clutched it against her bare torso while giving him a reproachful look.
“Get some sleep, Yuffie,” he said, ignoring her bitter expression and stroking the side of her cheek. He slipped his yukata on, moved ‘his’ chair into position in front of the bed, and stayed there for the rest of the night – awake, alert, and angry.
But not nearly as angry as she was.
+
They’d spent the better part of the next day not talking, and when they finally did, she yelled at him until he finally admitted that the assassination attempt hadn’t happened because he’d ‘allowed’ it to.
After that, she did her best to get him to realize that he didn’t need to be on guard for the rest of their lives, either. This, as his arms were crossed and he frowned, keeping himself three feet away from her even though they were alone in her chambers at the time. So, she pulled out the big guns, and told him that if he didn’t stay in bed with her the following night, all night, he could damn well stay out of her bed for good.
She almost got him to give in… but that proved to be an empty threat; it was obvious to him that she’d gotten used to their closeness and enjoyed the sex just as much as he did. When he called her on it, she stomped her foot and told him where he could put certain parts of his anatomy, and it wasn’t a pleasant suggestion.
In truth, he’d regretted it. Vincent had already decided that not being in bed with her at night, whether he was sleeping or not, just wasn’t going to work for him. Watching her like that, sitting in that damn chair all night… it had frustrated him enormously. It was bad enough that he wanted to feel her next to him and stubbornly refused to give in to that want.
The worst part was that it’d felt like they were going backwards, and he wasn’t having any of that.
They were still being prickly towards each other, though.
Now they were stalling, waiting in the back room of council chambers together. Yuffie was spying the same way she always did before a council meeting, peeping through the crack in the door while the council members slowly filed in. Ginto Shinshuro was going to be questioned today, and she was not really looking forward to it.
She sighed as she backed away from the door. Vincent turned his head to look at her when she remained silent, noting the nervousness in her face. Yuffie caught his penetrating eyes and smiled sadly, then she walked over to the small table where she had tossed her casual clothes after changing for the meeting.
“Are we still fighting?” she asked quietly, giving the trailing part of her elegant upsweep a final brushing.
“I’d rather it stopped.”
“Good, because fighting with you makes my stomach upset.”
They hadn’t touched each other all day, and he couldn’t take the anxiousness on her face any longer, not when he could so easily alleviate it. They were still in the private room, so no one could see them as of yet.
Vincent took the brush from her hands, and gently gathered her to him. She stiffened at first, which made him feel bad for having been cold to her, but then she relaxed to the point she was practically slumped against his chest.
“This isn’t going to go well,” she muttered, fisting his kosode in her cold hands.
“Probably not. No.”
Yuffie sighed. “I want to run away.”
“But you won’t,” he whispered, kissing the top of her head. “And you don’t have to. You have more supporters on the council… far more support in all of Wutai, in fact, than he ever will.”
“That may be, but,” she said, then inhaled sharply. “The only person I really need at my back is you.”
He tilted her head back and searched her face. She looked nervous, but the Kisaragi determination was there as well.
“I will be there, my dear girl,” he said softly. “Always.”
She reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck, and he straightened, lifting her feet from the floor. Yuffie rested her chin on his shoulder, hugging him tight.
“So no more of this crap where you watch me sleep in a chair. You hear me?”
He huffed, closing his eyes and smiling. “Yes, Empress.”
“Good.”
She kissed his cheek, and he turned his head quickly, suddenly wanting more than just a peck. Gently, he kissed her on the mouth, but she pulled back after a moment. She looked… hesitant.
He couldn’t really blame her after the day they’d had. But he wasn’t going to give up that easily. Those words were rolling around in his muzzy brain as he stared at her sweet, alive face; it might not have been fair to say it in that exact moment, but at least it was honest.
“I love you.”
She whimpered, and then he kissed her again, this time with more obvious intent. She clung to him, clearly wanting the moment to go on forever.
Vincent didn’t care if they strolled in late to this meeting with wrinkled clothing, suspiciously disheveled hair and flushed faces, and he was trying not to give a damn about the stakes, either.
They had both been right. He did need to be more diligent in his service to her, but he couldn’t just go pretend like he wasn’t in love with her when they were alone. He’d been foolish to assume otherwise.
The kiss deepened and things started to warm up, but Vincent remembered that now was not the time. When he released her, he set her to her feet and tried to get his mind back on his job instead of her mouth.
Yuffie blushed and stepped back. Still holding his human hand in hers, they looked at each other for a long time.
“So,” she finally said, wiping her tingling lips with her fingertips and clearing her throat. “That contingency plan of yours… that no longer an option?”
“Yes… I meant it when I told you that I will not let this job destroy you. But you will not need a contingency plan today. Today, you stand and fight.”
She nodded and squeezed his hand, just as Chekov entered from the hallway.
“Oh, grand. You’ve finally stopped arguing,” she quipped, walking up to Yuffie and adjusting the girl’s kimono. Yuffie let go of Vincent’s hand and rolled her eyes over the woman’s fussing.
Vincent narrowed his eyes at Chekov. “Do you know of everything that goes on in Wutai?”
“Yes, I do. It’s time to go, Yuffie. Let’s not keep the goddamn guest of honor waiting.” The Council elder opened the door, and pointedly left it open as she strode into the main room.
“Give it up, Vincent. Chekov has eyes in places unnatural,” she hissed, facing away from him.
“I’m beginning to see that,” he muttered.
+
“I had absolutely nothing to do with the recent assassination attempt on the Empress’ life. I am sure she is not so small-minded as to believe that she has so few opponents in Wutai that the finger of blame can only be pointed at me.”
Ginto Shinshuro smiled his oily, lizard-like smile.
“I am sure that there are many in Wutai that desire to see the monarchy relinquish its ancient and outdated need for power.”
Yuffie bristled at his words. They sounded strikingly similar to the ones used by the woman that recently tried to poison her a year ago… after successfully poisoning her father.
“As opposed to what – your modern and technologically advanced need for power, General?” Surprisingly, the voice was Natalie Ulyanova’s, minute-manager and the quietest member of the council. She was sitting in her usual place, with nothing but five feet of air separating her body from the General’s deadly hands.
Courage comes from surprising places, Yuffie thought.
“I fail to see the improvement. But then again, I have no problem with the way the Empress is running my country,” Natalie added.
“Rest assured, Miss Ulyanova, not everyone agrees with you.” He glared directly at the quiet woman in a way that let her know expressing her opinion so freely might not be good for her future.
Yuffie frowned as Natalie paled visibly.
“All right, that’s enough. We called you here just to question if you had any knowledge about the crime committed a few days ago, but you keep insisting we all face up to the fact that I supposedly have many, many opponents in Wutai… so just what the hell are you trying to get at?”
“Your Highness, I am here today as nothing more than a representative of The Movement.”
Several gasps were heard, followed by a long silence.
“You are admitting to being a supporter of that… group?” Chekov asked, her eyes narrow with contempt.
“I am more than a supporter, Madam Chekov, I am a member.”
Yuffie took a long, quiet breath. It was a shocking statement to make, even if everyone knew it had to be true, but she felt strangely relieved that the truth had finally come out.
Thank Gaia.
“And we demand our rightful place among the powers that run this country.”
And away we go…
She didn’t even have to turn around to know that Vincent had broken the three-foot rule and moved closer to her side.
Taking her time with a response, Yuffie refused to let Shinshuro think he was getting under her skin. She cleared her throat delicately, then stared at him as she spoke, slowly and calmly. “What exactly are you suggesting, General?”
He paused, gazing at Yuffie with a completely serious face.
“We think it’s about time that Wutai had a government, a real government, capable of holding its own with our modern neighbors.” Shinshuro lifted his chin slightly. “A government that does not ultimately turn to an inexperienced monarch for major decisions.”
Yuffie felt the heat in her chest simmering up to her brain. Not once had she ever stormed out of a council meeting, either in defeat or victory, and she was not about to start today. But his words had unleashed something inside of her, and she wouldn’t have been able to suppress her response even if he’d pointed a loaded gun to her head.
She stood up. Slapping her palms flat on the heavy table, she dropped her gaze and shot an icy glare at Shinshuro, completely unashamed that her behavior was channeling not only her father, but also every Empress that had come before her.
“Now you hear me, and you hear me good, you little prick. You started pushing me around before I even took the throne. You’ve been forceful, impudent, dishonest, manipulative and sneaky. And now, today, you’ve all but admitted to running the goddamn Movement right here, in front of myself and several other witnesses. I don’t think I need to tell you that in some of our minds that was also seen as a confession to the murder Godo Kisaragi. But, we have no proof…” she said, a disgusted tone in her voice, “and we have no recourse. Yet. You are smart enough to only push me so far, and you hide your tracks using your lackeys when you need to. But, as to your request, I’m gonna tell you this just one time…”
Vincent stood stock-still behind her as she stared her enemy down. He was silent and solid, like a trusty, familiar weapon at her back, ready to be unleashed at her command.
She felt heartened with his presence, and completely justified in her actions.
“If you think I am willingly going to give up the crown and watch Wutai suffer at the hands of a megalomaniac… you are sadly mistaken.”

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tbc
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Empress & Concubine, Part II