The 64th floor of Shinra Headquarters was currently a hazardous environment.
Not because of Mako leaks. Because of Scarlet.
"He sent a Bloodhound." Scarlet's voice was dangerously quiet. She stood by the massive mahogany desk, her knuckles white as she gripped a crystalline coffee cup. "Hojo sent a Class-A biological weapon into Sector 7. Where my brother was eating."
CRACK.
The coffee cup shattered in her grip. Hot liquid spilled across the floor. She didn't notice. Her eyes, usually cold and calculating, were burning with a psychotic, overprotective rage.
Tseng of the Turks stood at attention near the door. He didn't flinch. "The beast was completely atomized, Director. Ryu suffered no injuries. The local establishment sustained structural damage, but the target is entirely unharmed."
"That isn't the point, Tseng!" Scarlet shrieked, slamming her bleeding hand onto the desk. "Hojo is probing! He's testing my asset! I want extra guards on this floor. I want the Turks monitoring Hojo's labs around the clock. If that greasy scientist so much as looks at a syringe, you cut his hands off."
Tseng bowed slightly. "Understood, Director."
Ryu, meanwhile, was ignoring the corporate espionage completely.
He sat on the plush sofa, wearing his dark blue weighted gi. He had a stack of twenty pancakes balanced on a silver platter in front of him. He was pouring a gallon of synthetic Midgar syrup over the top.
"You worry too much, Scarlet," Ryu mumbled around a mouthful of dough. "That dog thing was weak. I didn't even have to use Kaioken."
Scarlet's fury evaporated the second he spoke. She rushed over, pulling a silk handkerchief from her pocket to dab the syrup off his cheek.
"I know you're strong, Ryu," she cooed, her voice shifting back into that terrifying, velvet purr. "But this world is full of dirty tricks. Hojo doesn't fight fair. He uses poison, gas, needles. I just want you safe. Here. With me."
She ran her fingers through his spiky hair, leaning in close. "You don't need to go down to those filthy slums anymore. I'll have the chef make you burgers."
"The chef's burgers are too clean," Ryu argued, swallowing the last of the pancakes. He stood up, stretching. His spine popped with the sound of a small firecracker. "Tifa's burgers have, like, soul in them! Plus, I promised Aerith I'd visit her garden."
Scarlet froze. Her hand stopped mid-air. "Who... is Aerith?"
Ryu blinks, completely oblivious to the sudden drop in room temperature. The aura of pure jealousy radiating from Scarlet is actually visible as a dark purple miasma.
"Just a girl in Sector 5," Ryu smiled. "She grows vegetables! I'm gonna go get some!"
Before Scarlet could summon the guards, order a lockdown, or launch a missile at Sector 5, Ryu tapped his fingers to his forehead. He didn't have Instant Transmission down perfectly yet, but he could move fast enough to simulate it.
FWOOSH.
The air displaced. The window didn't even break this time. Ryu was simply gone.
Scarlet stood alone in the lounge. Her eye twitched.
"Tseng," she whispered.
"Yes, Director?"
"Send Reno and Rude to Sector 5. Tell them to find a girl named Aerith. And tell them to make sure she doesn't get any... ideas."
Sector 5 Slums - The Church
Sunlight pierced the ruined roof of the old church, illuminating the bed of yellow flowers.
Aerith hummed a soft melody, watering the soil. The voices of the Lifestream were quiet today. Or rather, they were hushed, waiting for something.
A heavy thud echoed from the rafters.
Aerith smiled, not even looking up. "You're late. I thought Shinra executives ate breakfast early."
Ryu dropped from the wooden beams, landing lightly on the floorboards. "Pancakes take a long time to chew! And Scarlet was yelling again."
He walked over to the flowerbed. He looked healthy, vibrant, and completely out of place in the dying slums. Aerith felt her heart do that familiar, fluttering dance. She set the watering can down and reached into a woven basket.
"I kept my promise," Aerith said, holding out a massive, perfectly orange carrot. "I managed to grow this in the back patch. The soil here is terrible, but the water is clean enough."
Ryu's eyes lit up. He took the carrot and bit half of it off in one go.
Crunch.
"Whoa!" Ryu cheered. "It's super sweet! This is way better than the synthetic stuff on the Upper Plate! You're a genius, Aerith!"
Aerith giggled, a bright blush dusting her cheeks. "It's just a carrot, Ryu."
"No, it's training fuel!"
CRASH.
The front doors of the church violently burst open.
"We made it!" a voice wheezed.
Zack Fair stumbled into the sanctuary. He was wearing the two-hundred-pound shirt. He looked like he had been dragged behind a train. Behind him, Yuffie crawled on her hands and knees, dragging her fifty-pound wristbands through the dirt.
"Thirty... miles..." Yuffie sobbed. "I tracked your Ki... for thirty miles... I demand a vacation."
Ryu laughed, tossing the rest of the carrot into his mouth. "Good job, guys! Your stamina is increasing! You'll be ready for gravity training soon!"
Zack pushed himself up, wiping sweat from his eyes. He looked toward Ryu, but his gaze drifted slightly to the right.
He saw the flowers. And then, he saw the girl.
Zack's pupils dilate. The world seems to slow down. An imaginary choir of angels begins to sing. She's... beautiful.
Zack instantly stood up straight, completely ignoring the crushing weight on his spine. He puffed out his chest and flashed a million-watt smile.
"Well, hello there," Zack said, his voice dropping into a smooth, practiced tone. "I'm Zack. SOLDIER Third Class. And what might an angel be doing in a place like this?"
Aerith blinked. She looked at the sweaty, spiky-haired boy trying to flex his muscles. Then she looked at Ryu, who was currently picking his ear and looking at a hole in the roof.
"Hi, Zack," Aerith smiled politely, completely immune to his charm. "I'm Aerith. I'm Ryu's friend."
Zack felt an imaginary arrow pierce his heart. Friend-zoned in five seconds! And by Ryu?! The guy only thinks about food!
"She grows the best carrots," Ryu added helpfully.
Suddenly, Ryu stopped. His finger froze in his ear.
He turned his head, looking straight up through the hole in the roof. Past the smog. Past the floating plates of Midgar. Into the endless blue sky.
His tail bristled.
"Ryu?" Aerith asked, sensing the sudden shift in his energy. "What is it?"
"Someone is up there," Ryu murmured, his voice deadly serious.
Zack frowned, looking at the ceiling. "Up where? In the Shinra building?"
"No. Higher," Ryu pointed straight up. "Way, way higher. Above the clouds. It feels... weird. It doesn't feel like the Mako. It feels ancient. Like a guardian. A... Kami."
His Saiyan instincts, buried deep in his DNA, recognized the signature of planetary oversight. He could feel it—a presence sitting atop a towering structure, watching the world below.
"A Kami?" Yuffie scoffed from the floor. "There are no gods in the sky. Just Shinra satellites."
"No, he's right," Ryu's eyes narrowed in excitement. A massive grin broke across his face. "He's strong. Really strong. I'm gonna go fight him one day! We're gonna climb up there and train!"
Before Zack could point out that you couldn't just climb the sky, the church windows shattered.
Black gas canisters rolled across the wooden floorboards, hissing violently.
"Sleep gas!" Zack yelled, pulling his broadsword despite the weight holding him down. "Cover your mouths!"
Aerith gasped, stumbling backward.
Ryu didn't cover his mouth. He took a deep breath and blew.
FWOOSH.
A localized hurricane erupted from Ryu's lungs, blowing the sleep gas right back out the shattered windows.
From the shadows of the church entrance, five figures stepped forward. They didn't wear Shinra uniforms. They wore heavy, seamless hazard suits with reinforced black armor. Their visors glowed with a sickly green light.
Deepground prototypes. Hojo's personal extraction squad.
"Target confirmed," the lead unit rasped, his voice synthesized and robotic. "The anomaly. Secure a tissue sample. Lethal force authorized on bystanders."
"Bystanders?" Zack growled, his Ki flaring. The white aura sparked around his body, fighting the weight of the shirt. "I'm a SOLDIER. You're trespassing."
"Lesson four," Ryu said cheerfully, cracking his knuckles. "Protecting the VIP! Zack, Yuffie, keep them away from Aerith. I want to see your defensive forms!"
"I am too tired to be a ninja!" Yuffie whined, but she managed to stand up, her own Ki flickering to life around her heavy wrists.
The Deepground units didn't hesitate. They moved with terrifying, unnatural speed, drawing high-frequency vibration blades.
Two of them lunged at Aerith.
"Get away from her!" Zack roared. He channeled his energy into his legs, blurring across the church. He swung the broadsword in a massive horizontal arc.
CLANG.
The heavy steel met the vibration blades, sparking wildly. Zack grunted, feeling the immense strength of the cyborgs pushing him back.
Yuffie threw a smoke bomb, blinding the third unit. She vaulted off a pew, delivering a weighted, spinning heel kick to the back of the cyborg's knee, forcing it to stagger.
Ryu stood perfectly still.
The lead unit and the fourth cyborg charged him. The lead unit drew a specialized sidearm, firing a volley of armor-piercing rounds.
Ryu caught them.
He didn't dodge. His hands moved in a blur, plucking the bullets out of the air like flies. He dropped the crushed lead onto the floor.
"Too slow," Ryu evaluated.
The cyborg didn't stop. It closed the distance, drawing a specialized, diamond-tipped syringe connected to a hydraulic gauntlet. The order was to get blood.
The cyborg thrust the needle directly at Ryu's neck.
SNAP.
The diamond-tipped needle struck Ryu's skin. It didn't pierce. It bent, snapped, and shattered into a dozen pieces.
The Deepground unit's green visor glitches. It looks at the broken needle, then at Ryu's completely unblemished neck. Error. Density exceeds theoretical maximums.
"Needles," Ryu sighed, his expression turning annoyed. "I really, really hate needles."
Ryu moved.
He didn't use a martial arts technique. He simply flicked his finger against the center of the cyborg's armored chest plate.
BOOM.
The kinetic force transferred flawlessly. The chest plate caved inward. The cyborg was launched backward, flying entirely out of the church, skipping across the dirt of Sector 5 until it smashed into a rusted water tower.
The remaining cyborg, seeing its leader instantly neutralized, recalculated. It turned its weapon toward the easiest target. Aerith.
"Die, Ancient," the cyborg processed, leveling its rifle.
Aerith froze. Zack was locked in a blade-bind with two others. Yuffie was on the ground.
Ryu wasn't having it.
He vanished.
He reappeared directly in front of the cyborg, his back to the gun barrel. He didn't even look at the machine. He looked at Aerith.
"You okay, Aerith?" Ryu asked gently.
The cyborg pulled the trigger.
The armor-piercing round hit Ryu point-blank in the back of the head.
Ping.
The bullet flattened like a pancake and fell to the floor. Ryu didn't even flinch. He just scratched the back of his head. "Mosquitoes."
He spun around, driving an uppercut into the cyborg's jaw. The machine's head snapped back, internal wiring sparking as it lifted off its feet and crashed onto the pews, permanently offline.
Seeing the sheer, impossible gap in power, the last two cyborgs fighting Zack immediately disengaged. They threw flashbangs, blinding the room for a split second, and vanished into the shadows of the slums.
"Cowards!" Zack yelled, coughing from the smoke. He lowered his sword, panting heavily.
Ryu waved the smoke away, his tail swishing. "They ran away. Oh well. You guys did okay! Zack, you left your right side completely open. If they were faster, you'd be missing a kidney."
Zack slumped against a pillar, sliding down to the floor. "I'm fighting... killer cyborgs... in a 200-pound shirt. Give me a break, Ryu."
Aerith stepped forward. Her legs were shaking, but she walked right up to Ryu. She looked at the back of his head, where the bullet had hit. There wasn't a scratch. Not even a missing hair.
"You're... bulletproof," Aerith breathed, her green eyes wide with awe.
"Saiyan," Ryu grinned, pointing to himself. "We have really thick skin."
He turned back to the hole in the roof, looking up at the sky.
"Those guys with the needles were annoying," Ryu noted, his tone shifting back to that serious, battle-hungry warrior. "And Midgar is getting too crowded. Zack, Yuffie."
"Yeah?" they both groaned from the floor.
"We need a better place to train. A place with fewer distractions. And I think I know where." Ryu pointed straight up. "We're going to find that tower. We're going to find the Kami."
Zack and Yuffie looked at each other. They looked at the sky.
"He's crazy," Yuffie whispered.
"Completely," Zack agreed.
"Can I come?" Aerith asked, stepping up next to Ryu, a determined smile on her face.
Ryu looked at her and laughed. "Sure! You can bring the carrots!"
Miles away, deep underground, Professor Hojo slammed his fists onto his console, shattering the keyboard.
"Impossible! The needle shattered! His dermal layer is impenetrable!" Hojo raved, his eyes wild. "I must have him! I must dissect him!"
The scientist turned to the massive, glowing green tube in the center of the lab. A silver-haired figure floated inside, resting in a deep Mako sleep.
"Sephiroth," Hojo whispered. "It is time to test your limits. The anomaly must be broken."
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CH30+ in pat.ero.n -- Ryu reach Namek with Zack and Sephiroth??
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