Blood & Sympathy (FFVII: Vincent x OC)

Ch22 - Demons

Jocasta stared out of the window of the small house they’d settled in for the night. The entire Forgotten City was abandoned ever since the extinction of the Ancients, and night had arrived not long after it happened. She let out another sigh. Her temple pressed against the window as she barely listened to Barret’s and Cid’s loud snoring that came from the other rooms. All of her attention was focused outside. On the darkness of the night that spread over the entire forest. The white trees glistered in the dark bringing enough light. The moon and the stars were hidden beneath a thick layer of dark clouds.

They had made sure they had settled in a house that had enough rooms for all. Jocasta tried to ignore her exhaustion. The pain on her limbs that came from dealing with monsters on the way back to the city. Not to mention the insistent ache that came on her muscles from the tiredness. She hadn’t slept in so many days, she’d lost count. But all that didn’t matter.

The team was a mess, and so was she. After Aerith’s death, none would be able to go back to normal. Cloud seemed that all he cared about was the mission. Dealing with Sephiroth. But Jocasta knew that this was just a mechanism people used to keep themselves distracted from the infinite loss that came when a loved one died. She’d once used science as her own distraction, and things went downhill anyway.

Jocasta turned around at the sound of metallic sabatons clacking on the wooden floor. The lantern placed on top of a bench in the room didn’t bring enough light to be able and see clearly, but both of them didn’t have that problem. Vincent’s crimson eyes were bright in the darkness as he eyed her for a moment before he settled on one of the two beds in the room.

She settled on hers. The beds were old, but they should be enough to get them through the night. She lied down supinely. Her one hand rested on top of her stomach as she stared at the ceiling. Jocasta wasn’t going to sleep. She didn’t want to. But she might have to eventually.

Jocasta turned on one side, her body faced Vincent’s bed. He was resting his back against the old wooden bed frame. One foot was bent up while the clawed hand rested on top. His head rested back against the bed frame.

She knew that none of them were really up for sleeping. It was, all the same, every single night. One would sleep while the other would look after the other. Vincent was the only one who could sympathize with her for their condition. But he still didn’t know what demon she had. He hadn’t asked her any more questions concerning her past. He knew she wouldn’t want to talk about it, and maybe he shouldn’t ask her in the first place.

But he remembered how much of a loss Aerith was to her when the young girl died. Of course, depression was something they were both pretty much used to it, but he hated watching her cry. So much more must’ve happened that she wasn’t telling him.

“You knew Aerith?” Vincent’s voice snapped her gaze up at him.

Her head rested on top of her hand’s palm before she lifted it up and sat on a sitting position on her bed so that she could look at him fully. She sighed “Yeah. She was only a baby when I met her but… still,”

“Met her?”

Her eyes drifted on the fists of her hands that pressed against the bed. She pursed her lips and shook her head. She knew that one way or another she’d have to complete her story.

“When I was done handing him my discoveries on JENOVA’s genome, Hojo took them in and killed Gast. Ifalna and Aerith who was still a few months old baby were brought to Shinra HQ to be experimented on. I tried to break them out but I…” her voice broke for a moment. She gritted her teeth suppressing the need to cry as she recalled the long-lost memories that she was trying so hard to forget. “…I failed. Somebody gave me in. SOLDIERs chased me back to the Shinra Manor in Nibelheim. I went there to destroy my files and whatever was left of my project on JENOVA’s genome. There was just no time. I injected myself with whatever I had created so that Hojo wouldn’t get his hands on them,”

Jocasta stopped when she felt a tear rolling down her cheek and she noticed Vincent was sitting beside her. She wiped the tear away from her cheek and she let out another heavy sigh.

“Of course, he did get his hands on me and, whatever I’ve been trying so hard to hide, was his,” She turned her head to look at him. Vincent had his gaze locked on the floor; fists clenched. “He’d talk about the terrible things he did to you and…” she bit her tongue “…do you… do you hear voices inside your head too?” she asked.

Vincent took a moment before he answered “I do,”

Jocasta nodded “Me too,” she said.

She knew that Vincent had Chaos, but she had no idea what Hojo had put into her. She had heard Hojo’s mumbling stuff related to Lucrecia’s thesis while he was conducting his experiments on her. But she knew Vincent had no idea that Lucrecia had put that demon inside of him. It’s best if he never finds out.

“The only time I didn’t hear them was… well,” He hesitated, not really sure how to put it into words without making things awkward. But Jocasta finished for him.

“When we slept together! At the Gold Saucer, right?” Jocasta asked as she turned at him. Her hand found her chin as she tried to fumble through her knowledge on science. “What if… what if our demons do not co-exist when they’re close. Maybe yours is afraid of mine, or mine’s afraid of yours, that’s why they both stay silent, to avoid conflict,” She said “Of course, this is just a hypothesis. Nothing can be for sure,”

He had a feeling that she was right. There was no other explanation. Maybe there was a conflict between the two entities that were forced inside of them.

“If your presence silences Chaos, then it’s best if we stay close. I don’t want to harm you or anybody in this team,” Vincent admitted.

Jocasta nodded “Agreed. I don’t wanna harm anybody either,” she said before she let a small moment of silence fall between them. Her hand hesitantly found his that was still fisted against his knee while sitting beside her on her bed. The touch of her hand against his made him unclench his fists and look at her with a confused look, but with a look that told her leave me alone. But she wasn’t going to leave him alone, she never would. Never again.

“We should sleep and test that theory,” Jocasta said as she lied down on her bed. She made space on the other side, patting against the blank mattress beside her on the space she’d left for him.

Vincent sighed, knowing that he’d probably regret this. But a night’s rest was the best thing that could happen to him now. He was exhausted. He could feel the tense insistent ache on his limbs with each move he made.

He lied beside her on the spot she’d left for him. His wine-red eyes could be discriminated from the darkness that surrounded them as the light in the lantern was slowly starting to die out. The bed was small, fit for one person only, so it wasn’t much comfortable. But for two people that weren’t used to sleeping on a bed, it was like sleeping on a fluffy cloud.

Jocasta wanted to move closer. Rest her head by his shoulder while he’d wrap his arms around her. But she didn’t. It’d make things too awkward, knowing that his mind was still focused on Lucrecia. Knowing that she’d promised herself she’d never get that close to someone ever again. She knew he’d never get his mind off of Lucrecia. Even though she’d turned him into the monster he now was, and his life became a torment because of the demon she’d put inside of him.

Lucrecia should’ve just let him rest like Jocasta had told her back in the day. But when Lucrecia asked for her help to bring him back, Jocasta couldn’t deny it. She couldn’t let her friend die while he still had a chance, even though she knew she should. She should spare him of that life.

But right now, she was relieved that he was there. Both relieved and terrified. She knew that somebody so much genetically modified as Vincent, was too hard to die, but if anything were to happen to him… She shuddered. Eyes closed briefly and she shook her head.

“Everything alright?” Vincent asked as he watched her.

“I’m just…” She lifted her gaze, meeting his for a long moment “…I’m glad you’re here, Vincent. I really am,”

If it wasn’t for the darkness that surrounded them, she could’ve sworn, he had smiled “I’m glad you’re here too… Jocasta,”