Final Fantasy VII: Lifestream - Book 2: Aftermath

TWENTY-EIGHT

"Well, I used to be spoiled little rich girl," Jessie began. "Living the good life while Shinra's reactors were killing the planet and people here in the slums suffered. I didn't know back then..."

Sitting next to me at the table, she swallowed and told us how she'd grown up in her father's mansion on the plate and how hard things had been for her and her mom. Heidegger, her father, had mistreated them both, and I started to understand just how deep Jessie's issues with him really ran and why she hated him so bitterly. But she also admitted how much she wished things had been different, how he'd changed from the way he'd been when she was just a kid.

From there, Jessie shared how she'd begun working at Shinra when she was sixteen, in part to try and find a way to restore the connection she'd once had with her father by spending time in his world, where he was. But, although she'd excelled at her work in Systems Operation, she hadn't been able to make any headway with Heidegger. And then there was Scarlet, who'd given her a second job in the Weapons Development Division, one she'd eventually come to regret.

Jessie didn't go into detail, but she said that certain things had gone down in her time there that had made her start to question herself and Shinra. And then came the Reactor 3 massacre. Marissa blinked away a tear as Jessie talked about it, and I remembered then that she'd lost her husband in that incident. He'd led a large group of workers who'd been protesting about the terrible working conditions in the place. But then, several of the roboguards had supposedly gone berserk and killed him and everyone else before self-destructing.

In the aftermath, Jessie had begun her own investigation with help from Reeve and had found out that Heidegger had been behind it. He'd remotely activated the mechs and had used them to destroy the protest only moments after it had started. Shinra had covered the whole thing up by claiming it was an accident, but Jessie had found the truth. They had wanted to retain control at any cost and had been willing to kill to do it rather than help their own employees.

Marissa had left not very long after that, but not before promoting Jessie to Director of Systems Operation in spite of her young age—she'd only been nineteen at the time. But, as Marissa was quick to point out, Jessie'd been something of a prodigy, and with her skill, dedication, and natural talent, she'd been a good fit for the job.

But she wouldn't be there for long. Jessie went on, not quite able to hide the pain in her eyes and voice as she told us about her mom, how she'd slowly gathered evidence over the years of Heidegger's complicity in the Reactor 3 incident and other underhanded things that he'd been involved in at Shinra and had intended to use it as leverage to convince him to let her and Jessie go. But that hadn't worked out. The train she'd been taking to Sector 7 to get her information verified never got there. It had derailed, killing her and everyone aboard.

Jessie had almost died herself as well—the train hadn't been far out from the platform, and the blast had nearly consumed it. But thanks to Reeve, who'd gone there that day to see her mom off, she had survived. He'd saved her, although she'd been badly wounded. After two weeks in the hospital, Jessie had begun digging for the truth, suspecting it wasn't the accident that Shinra had made it out to be.

That was also when she had discovered Scarlet's betrayal, how she'd twisted and misused the weapons and mechs Jessie had designed. She'd turned them from tools of defense meant to protect people into killing machines responsible for hundreds, maybe even thousands, of injuries and deaths. As soon as Jessie had found out, she had confronted Scarlet and had quit her job, giving her a good slap on the face as well. But she hadn't gotten outta there unscathed.

After being shot in the arm by Scarlet, Jessie had run downstairs to Reeve's office, where he had treated her and helped her escape from the building. And that's how her time at Shinra had ended. In the midst of all that, she had also discovered that her father had been the one who'd caused the train wreck that had killed her mom. He'd ordered Tseng to have several soldiers rig the track with explosives and had set them off himself remotely. Jessie had been furious.