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[FFVII] [Cid, Vincent] [Rated T] Terror of the Skies (1/?)
Title: Terror of the Skies
Fandom/Pairing: Final Fantasy VII; Cid, Vincent
Rating: ESRB Rating of T for Teen < violence, convoluted plot, bloodplay >
Summary: Cid Highwind, infamous sky pirate and ex-Shinra engineer, never expected to find five runaways stowing away on a ship he plundered. Even worse, they have Plans for a certain famous general and his deserter best friend. [AU]
Notes: FLYING VAMPIRATES ARE GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
With a crew of drunken pilots, we're the only airship pirates
We're full of hot air and we're starting to rise
We're the terror of the skies and a danger to ourselves
—Abney Park, "Airship Pirate"
* * *
Chapter One: A Fine Mess We're In
* * *
The Highwind
The wood of the deck and the ropes in the rigging creaked, even as the deck rocked beneath his feet. He could smell the ocean's salt in the air, despite how high up they were.
Clouds misted onto the deck. Captain Cid Highwind swatted at them, irritated that they were in his way.
A cloudy night. That was just what he needed.
Beneath his ship, pale lights drifted through the sky. There was a faint yellow tinge to them, the only sign his slightest, stealthiest sailor had done her damn job. The airship beneath them was running on emergency power. She could stay afloat, but that was about all.
No sudden turns. No fast getaways. Their prey was trapped.
Below decks, Barret Wallace was readying the sailors who would swarm the ship beneath them, while Vincent Valentine, the ship's field medic, double-checked the tethers.
Cid leaned against the rail and looked out over the sea of clouds, waiting.
Beneath them, somebody fired a pistol. The shot bloomed into green fire in the space between the ships.
Alarm bells rang on both ships.
Whether the jump-lines would hold or no, it was go time. Time for the fierce crew of the infamous Highwind to remind the world of its mettle.
Sailors came streaming out from below, swords unsheathed, rifles and muskets loaded, goggles pushed low on their faces. They buckled tethers to the ubiquitous bomber jackets, and failing fashion sense or money, harnesses.
Cid turned away from his ragged crew, traitors and cutpurses and deserters all, troublemakers to the last one of them, and grasped the steering wheel firmly in his hands. With a shouted order—Bring 'er low, lads, bring 'her low—he orchestrated the Highwind's descent.
Beneath them, the Shinra trade ship was helpless, trapped like a gull in a snare, desperate and blaspheming. And in the uppermost reaches of its rigging, a barely visible figure, small and violently green, was growing larger by the second.
After several hair-raising minutes, during which alarms tolled and wood and soldiers and cannons shrieked, Cid gauged the altitude to his liking.
"Enough," he roared, even as Barret fired the red flare and sailor after sailor jumped to the ship beneath them.
The Aeolia, poor, trapped bird she was, was looking even poorer from above than she had an hour past. Twenty sailors easily swarmed the ship in a trice, and another twenty not long after, but barely a dozen men mustered to the deck in defence of Shinra's provisions.
The canny man who had been hailed as single-handedly creating the problem of sky pirates smelled a trap.
The speck in the Aeolia's rigging became larger and larger, and then it was a scrawny, too-thin, whipcord of a body, scrambling amidst abandoned tethers and the rigging on the side of all ships. Cid caught sight of a neon green glow bracelet and breathed a little easier for it. The figure wasn't just some shipmonkey wearing her jacket.
With an edged, unpleasant grin, Yuffie clambered onto the ship.
"Anythin' useful?"
She shook her head. "No staples that I could see. Stationery and perfume and a big crate full a crap I don't know much about."
He kicked the rail and swore.
"Fuel?"
She shook her head. "Some, but not much."
He swore again, longer and louder, with an air sailor's competence. "All right. Go find Wallace for me, will you?"
The grimy teen nodded and was gone in a tangle of limbs.
"And fetch me their manifest!" He called after her.
A cheerful 'fuck you, captain,' drifted back.
He stood and looked over the side, into the emergency lights that gently winked to reveal an array of corpses and kneeling soldiers. The lean little figure dropped onto the deck, circulating amongst sailors and pirates, finally grabbing the attention of one of the taller, darker-skinned pirates. She pointed up.
Cid, his feral grin gone, waved a hand once.
None of this had turned out the way he'd expected. It had been too easy, sure, but he'd have preferred to be outnumbered rather than cheapassed.
It wasn't long before a black man only slightly cleaner than the teen and wearing entirely too much denim was standing before him.
"Barret," Cid rasped, his hands finding their ways behind his back. "Any news?"
"Shitty-ass sailors," Barret Wallace replied, rolling his eyes. "That's all I got to say 'bout it."
"Yuff says they got a big crate in their hold."
The other man turned to give the Aeolia a calculating look, then turned back to face him. "That's probably true, but I only got the top deck totally under control."
"The boys need you?" Cid scratched his jaw while he thought. The stubble was beginning to itch. It always started itching eventually, thanks to wind chafing. He didn't much like sparing the water to shave, but beards were simply intolerable this far up.
Barret shook his head. "Not really. You got somethin' else you want?"
"I want you to take Vince and a couple boys into the ship's hold and drag that crate up."
It was at that moment that Yuffie found her way back to the Highwind's top deck. Several pieces of thick paper stuck out from her green jacket.
"The manifest?" Cid asked, holding out a hand.
She pulled the paper out and handed it to him. "That crate's listed, cap'n, but it was—"
"—signed on at the last minute, by a Lord Scholteheim Reinbach III," the captain finished for her.
Suspicious indeed. With a name like that, and a fancy landed title, he'd have expected a fancy, elaborate signature. But there were only a couple of flourishes in an angular, shaky hand.
Even more telling was the notation by the master of hold: contents unspecified.
"Reinbach?" Barret's eyebrows lowered as he found a thought he didn't much like. "Ain't that the name of a slaver?"
He was right, of course, but Cid fixed him with a Look anyway. "We're not jumpin' to conclusions up here, got it? And Yuffie, I changed m' mind."
She perked. "Cap'n?"
"How big is that crate?" He paused, asked the big question. The real question. "Big enough for slaves?"
He watched her think. She screwed up her face and tapped a finger on her chin. At length, she gave him a doubter's grimace. "Could be, capn', but it'd be a damn tight fit. Not more'n a few, and only with a Sleepel Stone."
Not like slavers worried about the comfort of their merchandise. And Reinbach, who had never once been caught red-handed with his wares, was known for the use of Sleepel Stones. They kept the slaves quiet. From a distance, the stones could produce actual sleep; but as close to the slaves as the Sleepel would be, it'd produce a sort of hibernation. They'd barely even breathe, much less make noise or need a chamberpot. Or food.
Cid ached for a cigarette. But the luxuries like that were the first thing that went when you were strapped for gil. He heaved a sigh and jerked his head at Yuffie. "You go with Vince and Barret here, get a couple a sailors, haul that crate up to the deck."
"We'd need like five chocobos," she muttered.
"Go!" At the sharp word, both Barret and Yuffie jumped into a salute.
They were gone in a flash, clambering down rigging.
Cid watched them go and refused to worry. If the cargo was slaves—and that was a big damn if, there, because surely Reinbach wouldn't be dumb enough to sign his own name on a ship's manifest—then he wasn't sure what to do. Shinra trade ships didn't usually carry slaves.
He wouldn't call himself the most principled of people. He stole goods from other ships, he killed other sailors, he chased after the Materia that supposedly manifested in the middle of thunderstorms. But selling slaves didn't sit right with him.
Not that he could just set them free, either.
"Worry about that problem when you have to," Cid told himself, gripping the cloud-slick steering wheel. As always, the knowledge that he was in control of his ship calmed him down a little.
* * *
The Aeolia
Vincent Valentine stared at the pair of sailors in front of him. He tugged at the red scarf that blocked off most of his face and looked to Barret for confirmation.
"Did he actually say that?"
Wallace nodded once. "He really did. For once, the girl ain't lyin'."
"Hey!" piped the tiny figure. Whether she was objecting to being called a girl or a liar was anybody's guess.
With a sigh, Vincent unslung the rifle from over his shoulder. He loaded it expertly and nodded his head toward the stairs.
Predictably, Yuffie took the lead. He wasn't sure if she enjoyed being on point or simply liked the trappings of leadership. For all that she was remarkably straightforward and even loudmouthed, she managed to remain a bit of a mystery. Perhaps her best advantage—at least in his sight—was her blood type.
The way to the ship's hold was dark, almost cavernous. He felt as if he were wandering a rabbit's warren. The ship didn't even have names of places chalked on.
How Yuffie had navigated this place, he didn't know.
She stopped at a pair of huge double doors, jerked her thumb toward it. "Hold's in there."
Vincent took a step forward and pulled at the wide doors. They didn't budge. His brows furrowing, he grabbed one of the heavy door pulls in both hands and gave a slow, hard heave. The hinges groaned. His unusually strong muscles protested as well, but he managed to open the door.
Barret let out a faintly impressed whistle. "How'd you get in there with yo' scrawny stick-arms?"
She clasped both hands behind her head and grinned widely. Her teeth looked especially white in her tanned, sooty face. "I blew a hole in its roof."
Vincent glared at her. "And you chose to bring us here because?"
The grimy pirate just gave them a steady look, one lip curled in disgust at how slow Easterners were. "Gonna have to drag the crate up there ourselves, unless you think the Captain's got a crane he just never showed us about."
Vincent tugged at the scarf that covered his face, fixing the other two sky pirates with a hard stare. They all knew who was going to do most of the hauling.
* * *
The Highwind
Cid Highwind stared at the giant crate that was now on his deck. They'd already cut the Aeolia loose, letting it keep enough fuel cells to limp back to Kalm. The rest, they'd taken for themselves.
Yuff rested a crowbar on her shoulders and swayed a little. "How you want it opened, cap'n?"
Dumb damn question, in his opinion. He gave her a look that said so and told her, flatly, "Open."
She and another sailor, Remy, clambered atop the crate. Tanned fingers and slim hands stroked all around the top of the box, searching for a catch. Remy found one, shouted out. As soon as Yuffie had dismounted from the crate—in a flashy backflip, naturally; sometimes Cid wondered why he hadn't had Vince toss her overboard yet—Remy worked the catch.
The crate hissed open. The hidden hinges and the hiss of too much oxygen escaping too small a space made it all very, very clear. There were slaves inside.
Everywhere, sailors looked at each other. This was a problem they'd never encountered in the Highwind's six years of piracy. Most slavers ran their own ships, and Cid had always made a point of avoiding them.
The box fell all the way open. The sensation of drowsiness rushed out. It caught Cid square in the ribs. He had to hold onto the rigging to keep his knees from buckling under; he caught sight of Yuffie on her knees, her head bowed. Remy had been too close and was now asleep atop the crate.
Of all of them, only Barret and Vincent seemed to suffer few ill effects. Barret was the largest sailor on board, and even he rocked back on his heels. Vincent, however, gave no sign that he'd even encountered the Sleepel.
"Vince," Cid said sharply, tightening his fist on the rope until his palms itched and his knuckles whitened. He could feel the rough-braided rope digging into his skin.
Vincent looked over at him, then waded into the crate. Moments later, that inrush of air into his ears, the weights attached to his eyelids, went away. Moments after that, Vincent emerged from the crate with a small box in one hand and some sort of envelope in the other.
"Well?" Cid asked.
"Five," Vincent said. "Three adults, one teen, one child. The correspondence is addressed to Zack Fair."
Cid held out his hand for the letter.
* * *
The Highwind
Vincent watched and said nothing as his captain ripped open the envelope and read its contents. The truth was, he simply wanted sleep in the same way he would soon desire a drink. Thanks to his nature, the Sleepel could not affect him outright. That didn't mean it couldn't work its hideous magic on him.
"Not slaves," Cid grunted.
Yuffie pulled herself up off the ground, bent backwards for no apparent reason, touching her hands to her ankles, and then straightened. "What do you mean, not slaves?"
"What I said. They ain't slaves."
That was a relief. What the ship would have done had the contents of the crate been slaves was an unknown. Vincent had little desire to find out.
Funny, how he could now look at the world and be mostly unsurprised at what humans did to each other. The war in Wutai—and the subsequent Wutaian diaspora—wasn't even half of it. To think he'd once been a part of it, had once been horrified. Now, he simply felt resigned.
"Damn fools had to smuggle themselves out of Midgar." Cid shook his head and sighed. "They were headed for Gongaga."
A noise came from inside the crate. Vincent tilted his head and identified the voice of the teen murmuring names he could not make sense of. But there was desperation in his tone.
Wake up, wake up, please.
"The teen is awake," Vincent said.
Barret heard him. And Barret, who loathed inaction nearly as much as Yuffie did, immediately shouldered his way into the holding cell.
The cry he gave moments later was unmistakable. They all jumped.
He took a deep breath, but smelled no blood in the air. He relaxed; whatever had happened, Barret had not been under attack.
But then what had happened? Vincent narrowed his eyes. Things were moving in circles too wide for him to understand. There should have been a visible pattern, something story shaped, something to make sense of. But there wasn't. It frustrated him. More, it scared him.
Was he simply losing his ability to see the shapes of things? Or was this the harbinger of some more ominous loss?
Barret emerged with a tiny girl in his arms. The child, Vincent knew. Her brown hair was braided with a thick white ribbon. She hung limp. As the two moved into the lantern light, Vincent heard Cid give a short, low cry.
"The girl's Marlene, ain't she?" The captain's spear thumped on the wooden deck. "Damn! And that means two o' the adults are the two you left her with?"
"Cloud and Tifa," Barret supplied. He swore, kicked one foot against the side of the ship. There was a heavy thud. "I goddamn told 'em to keep their asses out of trouble."
Vincent tilted his head as he heard scrabblings inside the crate. The teen had pulled himself to his feet. There came the soft sounds of someone running quietly.
Vincent moved to intercept even as something long and furry and red came leaping out of the slaver's cell. It was heavy as it pounced onto his chest. Its claws dug in deep, very deep.
Vincent grabbed it by the shoulders, dug in his fingers, and jerked as hard as he could.
The flame-coloured cat went flying. It contorted in midair, landing on its feet as cats, even large ones, were wont to do. Golden eyes glowed in the lamplight. Its maw opened and it let out an angry roar.
It apparently did not like being kept from its prey.
Vincent's mind went smooth and white. This was a challenge, a direct confrontation. He would not allow it. He bared his teeth and hissed back.
"Shut the hell up, you damn fools!" Cid hissed, thumping his spear against the deck again.
Vincent backed down, but did not release eye contact.
The cat hissed back at him, but crouched defensively. It would not spring to attack anyone else while he was still in front of it.
He crossed his arms. This was as satisfactory as the situation was likely to become.
Barret stared at the thing and swore.
It was at that moment that one of the occupants stumbled out of the crate. A woman, hair dark and skin pale.
"Tifa?" Barret asked, voice numb.
"Barret? What are you doing here? We were going to find Zack."
Barret looked away, his expression intense. "Couldn't keep yourselves out of trouble, could you?"
The woman, Tifa, gave a weak smile. It was an attempt at placating an angry father. Naturally, it failed. Nothing could ever sway Barret from a mood like this.
"It seems we couldn't."
Barret swore with a sailor's determination and an air sailor's invention. "Knew I shouldn't have left her with you."
Tifa reeled back. She was probably too exhausted to handle the emotional shock. Vincent didn't want to step in, but his oath as a medic meant that he was obligated to do so.
He took a step toward the two. "Barret. She needs medical attention. The girl, too."
Barret looked up, then looked away again. After a moment, he crossed the space between them.
"Her name's Marlene," Barret said as he deposited the child in Vincent's arms.
She was light. Even out cold, she was far lighter than Yuffie. He hadn't thought it was possible for someone to weigh less than that. Then again, she was also shorter.
"Tifa, is it? Please follow me."
He led her through the ship, carrying the child, Marlene. Her slight weight in his arms wasn't difficult to transfer so that he could open doors. The ship wasn't terribly confusing, and he'd had five years to learn its layout.
The ship's infirmary was small, just barely big enough to hold three patients and an office. Vincent knocked once on the door.
It swung open, revealing Shalua Rui, the ship's actual doctor. She took one look at the child in his arms and the woman following behind him, shook her head, and swung the door open wide.
"Let me guess," she said, adjusting the spectacles on her nose. "Sleepel?"
Vincent gave her a nod.
She shook her head and sighed. "All right. How many are there?"
"Five." He paused. "I'll move the cots in."
When he returned with a cot under each arm, the woman, Tifa, was already asleep.
Fandom/Pairing: Final Fantasy VII; Cid, Vincent
Rating: ESRB Rating of T for Teen < violence, convoluted plot, bloodplay >
Summary: Cid Highwind, infamous sky pirate and ex-Shinra engineer, never expected to find five runaways stowing away on a ship he plundered. Even worse, they have Plans for a certain famous general and his deserter best friend. [AU]
Notes: FLYING VAMPIRATES ARE GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
With a crew of drunken pilots, we're the only airship pirates
We're full of hot air and we're starting to rise
We're the terror of the skies and a danger to ourselves
—Abney Park, "Airship Pirate"
* * *
Chapter One: A Fine Mess We're In
* * *
The Highwind
The wood of the deck and the ropes in the rigging creaked, even as the deck rocked beneath his feet. He could smell the ocean's salt in the air, despite how high up they were.
Clouds misted onto the deck. Captain Cid Highwind swatted at them, irritated that they were in his way.
A cloudy night. That was just what he needed.
Beneath his ship, pale lights drifted through the sky. There was a faint yellow tinge to them, the only sign his slightest, stealthiest sailor had done her damn job. The airship beneath them was running on emergency power. She could stay afloat, but that was about all.
No sudden turns. No fast getaways. Their prey was trapped.
Below decks, Barret Wallace was readying the sailors who would swarm the ship beneath them, while Vincent Valentine, the ship's field medic, double-checked the tethers.
Cid leaned against the rail and looked out over the sea of clouds, waiting.
Beneath them, somebody fired a pistol. The shot bloomed into green fire in the space between the ships.
Alarm bells rang on both ships.
Whether the jump-lines would hold or no, it was go time. Time for the fierce crew of the infamous Highwind to remind the world of its mettle.
Sailors came streaming out from below, swords unsheathed, rifles and muskets loaded, goggles pushed low on their faces. They buckled tethers to the ubiquitous bomber jackets, and failing fashion sense or money, harnesses.
Cid turned away from his ragged crew, traitors and cutpurses and deserters all, troublemakers to the last one of them, and grasped the steering wheel firmly in his hands. With a shouted order—Bring 'er low, lads, bring 'her low—he orchestrated the Highwind's descent.
Beneath them, the Shinra trade ship was helpless, trapped like a gull in a snare, desperate and blaspheming. And in the uppermost reaches of its rigging, a barely visible figure, small and violently green, was growing larger by the second.
After several hair-raising minutes, during which alarms tolled and wood and soldiers and cannons shrieked, Cid gauged the altitude to his liking.
"Enough," he roared, even as Barret fired the red flare and sailor after sailor jumped to the ship beneath them.
The Aeolia, poor, trapped bird she was, was looking even poorer from above than she had an hour past. Twenty sailors easily swarmed the ship in a trice, and another twenty not long after, but barely a dozen men mustered to the deck in defence of Shinra's provisions.
The canny man who had been hailed as single-handedly creating the problem of sky pirates smelled a trap.
The speck in the Aeolia's rigging became larger and larger, and then it was a scrawny, too-thin, whipcord of a body, scrambling amidst abandoned tethers and the rigging on the side of all ships. Cid caught sight of a neon green glow bracelet and breathed a little easier for it. The figure wasn't just some shipmonkey wearing her jacket.
With an edged, unpleasant grin, Yuffie clambered onto the ship.
"Anythin' useful?"
She shook her head. "No staples that I could see. Stationery and perfume and a big crate full a crap I don't know much about."
He kicked the rail and swore.
"Fuel?"
She shook her head. "Some, but not much."
He swore again, longer and louder, with an air sailor's competence. "All right. Go find Wallace for me, will you?"
The grimy teen nodded and was gone in a tangle of limbs.
"And fetch me their manifest!" He called after her.
A cheerful 'fuck you, captain,' drifted back.
He stood and looked over the side, into the emergency lights that gently winked to reveal an array of corpses and kneeling soldiers. The lean little figure dropped onto the deck, circulating amongst sailors and pirates, finally grabbing the attention of one of the taller, darker-skinned pirates. She pointed up.
Cid, his feral grin gone, waved a hand once.
None of this had turned out the way he'd expected. It had been too easy, sure, but he'd have preferred to be outnumbered rather than cheapassed.
It wasn't long before a black man only slightly cleaner than the teen and wearing entirely too much denim was standing before him.
"Barret," Cid rasped, his hands finding their ways behind his back. "Any news?"
"Shitty-ass sailors," Barret Wallace replied, rolling his eyes. "That's all I got to say 'bout it."
"Yuff says they got a big crate in their hold."
The other man turned to give the Aeolia a calculating look, then turned back to face him. "That's probably true, but I only got the top deck totally under control."
"The boys need you?" Cid scratched his jaw while he thought. The stubble was beginning to itch. It always started itching eventually, thanks to wind chafing. He didn't much like sparing the water to shave, but beards were simply intolerable this far up.
Barret shook his head. "Not really. You got somethin' else you want?"
"I want you to take Vince and a couple boys into the ship's hold and drag that crate up."
It was at that moment that Yuffie found her way back to the Highwind's top deck. Several pieces of thick paper stuck out from her green jacket.
"The manifest?" Cid asked, holding out a hand.
She pulled the paper out and handed it to him. "That crate's listed, cap'n, but it was—"
"—signed on at the last minute, by a Lord Scholteheim Reinbach III," the captain finished for her.
Suspicious indeed. With a name like that, and a fancy landed title, he'd have expected a fancy, elaborate signature. But there were only a couple of flourishes in an angular, shaky hand.
Even more telling was the notation by the master of hold: contents unspecified.
"Reinbach?" Barret's eyebrows lowered as he found a thought he didn't much like. "Ain't that the name of a slaver?"
He was right, of course, but Cid fixed him with a Look anyway. "We're not jumpin' to conclusions up here, got it? And Yuffie, I changed m' mind."
She perked. "Cap'n?"
"How big is that crate?" He paused, asked the big question. The real question. "Big enough for slaves?"
He watched her think. She screwed up her face and tapped a finger on her chin. At length, she gave him a doubter's grimace. "Could be, capn', but it'd be a damn tight fit. Not more'n a few, and only with a Sleepel Stone."
Not like slavers worried about the comfort of their merchandise. And Reinbach, who had never once been caught red-handed with his wares, was known for the use of Sleepel Stones. They kept the slaves quiet. From a distance, the stones could produce actual sleep; but as close to the slaves as the Sleepel would be, it'd produce a sort of hibernation. They'd barely even breathe, much less make noise or need a chamberpot. Or food.
Cid ached for a cigarette. But the luxuries like that were the first thing that went when you were strapped for gil. He heaved a sigh and jerked his head at Yuffie. "You go with Vince and Barret here, get a couple a sailors, haul that crate up to the deck."
"We'd need like five chocobos," she muttered.
"Go!" At the sharp word, both Barret and Yuffie jumped into a salute.
They were gone in a flash, clambering down rigging.
Cid watched them go and refused to worry. If the cargo was slaves—and that was a big damn if, there, because surely Reinbach wouldn't be dumb enough to sign his own name on a ship's manifest—then he wasn't sure what to do. Shinra trade ships didn't usually carry slaves.
He wouldn't call himself the most principled of people. He stole goods from other ships, he killed other sailors, he chased after the Materia that supposedly manifested in the middle of thunderstorms. But selling slaves didn't sit right with him.
Not that he could just set them free, either.
"Worry about that problem when you have to," Cid told himself, gripping the cloud-slick steering wheel. As always, the knowledge that he was in control of his ship calmed him down a little.
* * *
The Aeolia
Vincent Valentine stared at the pair of sailors in front of him. He tugged at the red scarf that blocked off most of his face and looked to Barret for confirmation.
"Did he actually say that?"
Wallace nodded once. "He really did. For once, the girl ain't lyin'."
"Hey!" piped the tiny figure. Whether she was objecting to being called a girl or a liar was anybody's guess.
With a sigh, Vincent unslung the rifle from over his shoulder. He loaded it expertly and nodded his head toward the stairs.
Predictably, Yuffie took the lead. He wasn't sure if she enjoyed being on point or simply liked the trappings of leadership. For all that she was remarkably straightforward and even loudmouthed, she managed to remain a bit of a mystery. Perhaps her best advantage—at least in his sight—was her blood type.
The way to the ship's hold was dark, almost cavernous. He felt as if he were wandering a rabbit's warren. The ship didn't even have names of places chalked on.
How Yuffie had navigated this place, he didn't know.
She stopped at a pair of huge double doors, jerked her thumb toward it. "Hold's in there."
Vincent took a step forward and pulled at the wide doors. They didn't budge. His brows furrowing, he grabbed one of the heavy door pulls in both hands and gave a slow, hard heave. The hinges groaned. His unusually strong muscles protested as well, but he managed to open the door.
Barret let out a faintly impressed whistle. "How'd you get in there with yo' scrawny stick-arms?"
She clasped both hands behind her head and grinned widely. Her teeth looked especially white in her tanned, sooty face. "I blew a hole in its roof."
Vincent glared at her. "And you chose to bring us here because?"
The grimy pirate just gave them a steady look, one lip curled in disgust at how slow Easterners were. "Gonna have to drag the crate up there ourselves, unless you think the Captain's got a crane he just never showed us about."
Vincent tugged at the scarf that covered his face, fixing the other two sky pirates with a hard stare. They all knew who was going to do most of the hauling.
* * *
The Highwind
Cid Highwind stared at the giant crate that was now on his deck. They'd already cut the Aeolia loose, letting it keep enough fuel cells to limp back to Kalm. The rest, they'd taken for themselves.
Yuff rested a crowbar on her shoulders and swayed a little. "How you want it opened, cap'n?"
Dumb damn question, in his opinion. He gave her a look that said so and told her, flatly, "Open."
She and another sailor, Remy, clambered atop the crate. Tanned fingers and slim hands stroked all around the top of the box, searching for a catch. Remy found one, shouted out. As soon as Yuffie had dismounted from the crate—in a flashy backflip, naturally; sometimes Cid wondered why he hadn't had Vince toss her overboard yet—Remy worked the catch.
The crate hissed open. The hidden hinges and the hiss of too much oxygen escaping too small a space made it all very, very clear. There were slaves inside.
Everywhere, sailors looked at each other. This was a problem they'd never encountered in the Highwind's six years of piracy. Most slavers ran their own ships, and Cid had always made a point of avoiding them.
The box fell all the way open. The sensation of drowsiness rushed out. It caught Cid square in the ribs. He had to hold onto the rigging to keep his knees from buckling under; he caught sight of Yuffie on her knees, her head bowed. Remy had been too close and was now asleep atop the crate.
Of all of them, only Barret and Vincent seemed to suffer few ill effects. Barret was the largest sailor on board, and even he rocked back on his heels. Vincent, however, gave no sign that he'd even encountered the Sleepel.
"Vince," Cid said sharply, tightening his fist on the rope until his palms itched and his knuckles whitened. He could feel the rough-braided rope digging into his skin.
Vincent looked over at him, then waded into the crate. Moments later, that inrush of air into his ears, the weights attached to his eyelids, went away. Moments after that, Vincent emerged from the crate with a small box in one hand and some sort of envelope in the other.
"Well?" Cid asked.
"Five," Vincent said. "Three adults, one teen, one child. The correspondence is addressed to Zack Fair."
Cid held out his hand for the letter.
* * *
The Highwind
Vincent watched and said nothing as his captain ripped open the envelope and read its contents. The truth was, he simply wanted sleep in the same way he would soon desire a drink. Thanks to his nature, the Sleepel could not affect him outright. That didn't mean it couldn't work its hideous magic on him.
"Not slaves," Cid grunted.
Yuffie pulled herself up off the ground, bent backwards for no apparent reason, touching her hands to her ankles, and then straightened. "What do you mean, not slaves?"
"What I said. They ain't slaves."
That was a relief. What the ship would have done had the contents of the crate been slaves was an unknown. Vincent had little desire to find out.
Funny, how he could now look at the world and be mostly unsurprised at what humans did to each other. The war in Wutai—and the subsequent Wutaian diaspora—wasn't even half of it. To think he'd once been a part of it, had once been horrified. Now, he simply felt resigned.
"Damn fools had to smuggle themselves out of Midgar." Cid shook his head and sighed. "They were headed for Gongaga."
A noise came from inside the crate. Vincent tilted his head and identified the voice of the teen murmuring names he could not make sense of. But there was desperation in his tone.
Wake up, wake up, please.
"The teen is awake," Vincent said.
Barret heard him. And Barret, who loathed inaction nearly as much as Yuffie did, immediately shouldered his way into the holding cell.
The cry he gave moments later was unmistakable. They all jumped.
He took a deep breath, but smelled no blood in the air. He relaxed; whatever had happened, Barret had not been under attack.
But then what had happened? Vincent narrowed his eyes. Things were moving in circles too wide for him to understand. There should have been a visible pattern, something story shaped, something to make sense of. But there wasn't. It frustrated him. More, it scared him.
Was he simply losing his ability to see the shapes of things? Or was this the harbinger of some more ominous loss?
Barret emerged with a tiny girl in his arms. The child, Vincent knew. Her brown hair was braided with a thick white ribbon. She hung limp. As the two moved into the lantern light, Vincent heard Cid give a short, low cry.
"The girl's Marlene, ain't she?" The captain's spear thumped on the wooden deck. "Damn! And that means two o' the adults are the two you left her with?"
"Cloud and Tifa," Barret supplied. He swore, kicked one foot against the side of the ship. There was a heavy thud. "I goddamn told 'em to keep their asses out of trouble."
Vincent tilted his head as he heard scrabblings inside the crate. The teen had pulled himself to his feet. There came the soft sounds of someone running quietly.
Vincent moved to intercept even as something long and furry and red came leaping out of the slaver's cell. It was heavy as it pounced onto his chest. Its claws dug in deep, very deep.
Vincent grabbed it by the shoulders, dug in his fingers, and jerked as hard as he could.
The flame-coloured cat went flying. It contorted in midair, landing on its feet as cats, even large ones, were wont to do. Golden eyes glowed in the lamplight. Its maw opened and it let out an angry roar.
It apparently did not like being kept from its prey.
Vincent's mind went smooth and white. This was a challenge, a direct confrontation. He would not allow it. He bared his teeth and hissed back.
"Shut the hell up, you damn fools!" Cid hissed, thumping his spear against the deck again.
Vincent backed down, but did not release eye contact.
The cat hissed back at him, but crouched defensively. It would not spring to attack anyone else while he was still in front of it.
He crossed his arms. This was as satisfactory as the situation was likely to become.
Barret stared at the thing and swore.
It was at that moment that one of the occupants stumbled out of the crate. A woman, hair dark and skin pale.
"Tifa?" Barret asked, voice numb.
"Barret? What are you doing here? We were going to find Zack."
Barret looked away, his expression intense. "Couldn't keep yourselves out of trouble, could you?"
The woman, Tifa, gave a weak smile. It was an attempt at placating an angry father. Naturally, it failed. Nothing could ever sway Barret from a mood like this.
"It seems we couldn't."
Barret swore with a sailor's determination and an air sailor's invention. "Knew I shouldn't have left her with you."
Tifa reeled back. She was probably too exhausted to handle the emotional shock. Vincent didn't want to step in, but his oath as a medic meant that he was obligated to do so.
He took a step toward the two. "Barret. She needs medical attention. The girl, too."
Barret looked up, then looked away again. After a moment, he crossed the space between them.
"Her name's Marlene," Barret said as he deposited the child in Vincent's arms.
She was light. Even out cold, she was far lighter than Yuffie. He hadn't thought it was possible for someone to weigh less than that. Then again, she was also shorter.
"Tifa, is it? Please follow me."
He led her through the ship, carrying the child, Marlene. Her slight weight in his arms wasn't difficult to transfer so that he could open doors. The ship wasn't terribly confusing, and he'd had five years to learn its layout.
The ship's infirmary was small, just barely big enough to hold three patients and an office. Vincent knocked once on the door.
It swung open, revealing Shalua Rui, the ship's actual doctor. She took one look at the child in his arms and the woman following behind him, shook her head, and swung the door open wide.
"Let me guess," she said, adjusting the spectacles on her nose. "Sleepel?"
Vincent gave her a nod.
She shook her head and sighed. "All right. How many are there?"
"Five." He paused. "I'll move the cots in."
When he returned with a cot under each arm, the woman, Tifa, was already asleep.