Chapter Text
Vash turned sharply as the red smoke cleared. His eyes widened, and his chest hitched as he fought his climbing heart rate to breathe and stay calm.
When Aerith had said this was a trial, Vash had assumed she’d meant a fight of some kind. A one-on-one battle against a monster to be overcome so they could move on.
He hadn’t expected the shrine, the looming statue of a woman, or…this.
“There’s no way that shrine can recreate this. I must’ve…am I drugged?”
The white, clean, well-lit hall didn’t offer any clear answers. If anything, they only made Vash want to find the nearest exit and get out before something happened.
Even if it meant that exit booted him out an airlock and into the cold void of space.
“That red smoke had to be some kind of hallucinogen,” Vash muttered. It was the only explanation that made sense, magic or otherwise. “But…why here? Is this going to turn into a nightmare or something? They did say this was some kind of trial….”
But a trial of what was the question.
A ceiling light at the far end of the white hall flickered, getting Vash’s attention. For a moment, it appeared as though there was someone in the shadow, but they vanished a moment later.
“…if this turns into a horror movie scenario, I’m not gonna be happy about it,” Vash said slowly. “I’m not fond of those….” Especially if he had to live through them.
The light flickered again. The shadowed figure was short, small. Like a child.
Vash caught a brief movement of a hand motioning forward before they vanished again.
He glanced behind him and saw nothing but a blank wall. Dead-end, then. Whatever this thing wanted him to see, he wasn’t going to be able to slip down another way to get out of it.
“…all right. But if you turn this into a horror movie I’m going to be very unhappy about it.”
Vash started down the hall, letting his hand drift over where he kept his firearm. He wasn’t planning on drawing it, but making sure it was still there was a small form of comfort.
Even if he was walking somewhat familiar, white, clean halls, that he only ever saw now in his dreams of memories.
Memories that made this place look much bigger than it actually was, if only because he’d been a child when the place was still in one piece, and not a mangled mess being eroded by the desert and the friction of atmospheric entry.
He was almost tempted to run his hands over the cold metal walls, to remember what it was like when the place was still functioning, still whole.
But no. It would be better if he let those memories be memories. He didn’t want to reach out and find himself touching nothing but air. It would make jumping out the airlock a lot less frightening, and Vash didn’t want that.
The SEEDs ship was already becoming frightening enough, with the flickering lights and the strange figure beckoning him forwards.
“H-hey, I hate to ask, but what part of the ship are we going towards?” Vash asked. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been…well, here, and the everywhere’s starting to look the same. We’ve taken three turns and I’m almost starting to think you want to lead me in circles!”
He laughed, but the sound was unsteady. Nervous. Vash knew he could do better than that, but there was a lot he didn’t know about what was going on. This was a trial, sure, but a trial of what? And why did it feel like he was being led somewhere he wasn’t going to want to see?
The lights ahead flickered again, and the hallway changed to another blank wall. No, not a blank wall – a closed door.
With a vase with a single flower sitting nearby on the floor. A white flower – a lily – that Vash hadn’t seen anywhere on this new world yet.
Vash felt his breath catch in his throat. He closed his eyes and breathed in slowly, then out. “Now I wish I’d heard what Aerith said about this trial we were supposed to be doing. You really want me to relieve these memories?” He opened his eyes again. “You’re tearing at scars for wounds I would rather have healed.”
The lights flickered again. Two yellow-haired children wearing too-large shirts that almost looked like nightgowns poked and prodded at the console, whispering two each other. Despite how identical they looked, one of them had hair that was fighting to defy gravity, and the other kept pulling at his hair with one hand like it was too long to be comfortable.
Vash wanted to look away, turn around and walk back the way he came, but his legs wouldn’t respond. It felt like his feet were glued to the floor.
“Don’t make me see this again. Please. This doesn’t need to be – it’s not involved in what’s happening here! Tesla’s dead, and the humans who had a hand in it aren’t from here!”
The vision glitched. The children froze in front of the console, one of them ready to hit the final button that would force the doors open.
-So, you have already moved on from this?-
The voice was a whisper. A woman’s, flickering at the edge of his mind like faint lights. It sounded powerful, authoritative, distant. Like a ghost of something someone left behind.
“I forgave Rem for what she did back then.” Vash couldn’t keep the shake out of his voice. He didn’t want to see what was behind the door again – not when it haunted his dreams and every decision he had made since then. “She had so much remorse for what happened. She told me so herself. Whatever it is you wanted to show me, I already forgave her for. She – they’re not involved in any of this. Please. Don’t break open wounds I don’t need fresh again. It’s not involved in Shinra.”
The scenery glitched. The children moved closer to hitting that final key, but still could not reach it. An infinite but infinitesimal distance.
-…you have no malice or focus gained from the loss you would see. Only grief, and acceptance-
Vash sighed and let his shoulders drop a little. Good, they got it.
-What of the other?-
That was a strange question. “The ‘other?’”
-You are not the only one being tested with this memory-
Oh, no.
Vash’s shoulders stiffened as his gaze shot from the child with gravity-defying hair to the other boy. He was looking at the door, even as his fingers reached closer to the final key, together with his brother.
-You are not the only one being subjected to this memory. It will continue-
“But—”
The scene glitched. The children hit the final key.
And the wall of a door slid open to reveal the sight that cursed Vash in his oldest nightmares.
Cylindrical tubes stood in the center of a room with medical equipment and consoles up against the walls. Suspended in each cylinder were masses of tissue – pieces of the little girl who had been born before them from a Plant on this SEEDs ship.
Dismembered arms.
A brain.
A body, covered in cancerous growths in an attempt to heal itself gone horribly, horribly wrong.
Vash started crying as the children stared in shock and horror. “I’m sorry you didn’t get to live life the way we did. Tesla, I…I’m sorry.”
The children – Vash’s and Knives’ child selves – stared at their mutilated, before-unknown sister on trembling legs, wide-eyed and pale. One of them bumped something on the console, bringing to life the recordings of scientists who had long since gone back to sleep after being called awake to investigate this strange new life.
::Shows rapid mental growth and intelligence for one of comparative human age--::
::--rapid healing capabilities and human anatomy--::
::--growth has turned cancerous; body starting to rapidly decay from stress--::
::--questions of morality and ethical proceedings have become far more vocal in staff members--::
::--Subject Tesla has died from cancerous growths; placing body in preservation instead of ejecting into space::
Vash forced himself to look. Tesla deserved a witness; she deserved to be remembered. Rem had been the one to do that, while they were looking for a new home far from Earth.
Now it was his turn to carry that burden.
He was resolved to keep watching as Knives’ younger self wavered and collapsed, leaving Vash’s child memories to scream and break down alone.
The betrayal – the anger – the horror at knowing there was a sister they would never know—
Vash closed his eyes and felt it cascade over him. Old as the memories were, the emotions still felt raw and strong. As a child, he was overwhelmed, and reacted on instinct.
But now, he could pull them move under control. Understand them. Rem had wanted to keep this secret for her own reasons, but she never accounted for curious children who knew how to program and break in to places on the ship they were never meant to be.
“This…is how it happened?”
Vash jolted at the voice next to his ear. He turned sharply.
Since when was Knives right next to him? Had he always been there??
Knives didn’t seem to notice he was standing side-by-side with Vash. He was staring at the remains of Tesla, the sight of him collapsed against Vash, unseeing eyes staring at the ceiling.
…right. There was a reason Knives had reacted the way he had.
Vash’s child self reached for his brother, then started dragging him along. He needed to find a place to be safe, and take care of them.
If Rem knew about this place, there was no way it would end well for them. More experiments, more people being torn apart –
“I’m not letting that happen to us,” Vash’s child self muttered. “C’mon, Nai. Let’s get out of here.”
Nai. A name Vash hadn’t heard spoken in a long time. A name his brother had stopped going by the instant the ships had crashed.
The memory shifted around them. A dim room, Vash’s child self on the floor, heavy bags under his eyes. Knives lying on a nearby bed, still unconscious.
Someone was banging against the door. “Vash, Knives! Are you in there?! Open the door! Please, open the door!”
Vash could almost picture her. A woman with long, dark hair, desperate to reach them. The woman who had raised them for that first year of their lives, despite how the two of them now looked about five years old.
“Rem,” Vash murmured.
Now Knives jolted, turning to stare at his brother with wide eyes as time shifted forward, showing Vash collapsed on the floor as Rem broke the door down with welding tools. It didn’t take her long for her to assess the situation, bundle Vash into bed, leave, and come back with food.
“Vash.”
Vash looked at his brother. There was something in the wide-eyed look of his twin that made Vash’s breath jump again. It had been a long time since Vash had seen Knives so startled.
“I don’t remember this.” Knives’ voice was shaky. It was clearly fighting to keep his emotions even and failing. “Was this—”
Vash sighed and nodded slowly. “You…we were curious. Hopeful. We wanted to know that the humans would be willing and happy to get along with us. Finding Tesla, like that? I think it’s safe to say it broke the both of us.”
Knives frowned. “Both…?”
…right. Knives hadn’t – he hadn’t been awake for this part.
“…I think I know why this trial thing somehow managed to pair us up,” Vash said. He nodded towards his child self. “Just…just watch. And don’t lash out or anything – please. This happened a long time ago; we can’t go back and change any of it. And besides.” The smile didn’t reach his eyes. It was bitter. Sarcastic. “You already killed Rem and almost every single person on the SEEDs ships, whether or not they were involved with what happened to Tesla. Not like you can kill them again.”
Knives actually flinched away from his brother, making Vash blink rapidly in surprise. That was…not what he was expecting.
Or maybe he had been – some part of Vash felt darkly vindictive about Knives’ response, seeing the way he reacted to realizing his potential guilt over what he’d done to the SEEDs ships. To Rem.
To Vash.
Rem gave the child Vash a tray of food, only to have it thrown back in her face. The look of murderous, betrayed rage on the child’s face made Vash almost flinch.
But he couldn’t let himself look away from this. Or from Knives. Not now.
Rem knelt to pick up the tossed food, then paused as the child muttered something. She looked up. “What was that?”
“You deceived us,” Vash’s child hissed.
Rem stiffened.
“It’s been exactly one year, right?” Vash fell back, unable to keep himself upright. Clearly, it had been some time since he’d sealed himself away in his room, much less eaten. “Perfect…for continuing what you started with her on us!”
Knives breathed in sharply. He looked at his brother, who didn’t look back.
Rem paled immediately. “I’d never dream of—"
“YOU WOULDN’T?! CAN YOU PROVE IT?! CAN YOU PROVE YOU WOULDN’T DO THE SAME TO US? YOU PEOPLE, WHO DID THAT TO HER?!”
The child’s roar of rage made Vash stiffen and wince. Knives stood still, unable to look away.
Rem gritted her teeth and looked away, on the verge of tears and angry. Whether she was angry with herself or Vash, it was hard to say. “I will never make that mistake again.”
“Are you sure?!” Vash shot back.
“Of course I’m sure! Don’t mock what I went through!”
The two of them stared at each other, raggedly breathing after the shouting match.
“I never want to feel powerless like that again,” Rem said. “I should have stopped it by any means necessary. There isn’t a single day I don’t regret. That’s why, when you two were born—”
“Kill me,” the child muttered, cutting Rem off.
Rem stiffened. “What?”
“Vash,” Knives said sternly.
“Wait,” Vash replied.
Rem leaned forward suddenly. “What are you saying?”
“Kill me…this place…there’s no one but humans here!”
The hatred and despair in Vash’s voice as a child had Vash wincing, and Knives stiffening.
“Vash,” Knives said.
“Keep watching,” Vash replied. He understood why this was still going.
Rem stared at Vash’s child self, then nodded slowly. “That’s right. That’s the way it is now, and the way it’s going to be, too.”
Time moved again. And again. And again.
Rem brought food. Vash left it untouched, and grew weaker and weaker. Knives’ child self didn’t wake.
Then Rem tried something different. “Today, you are going to eat! I’ve brought something rare today!” She held up a fruit that Vash didn’t recognize – not from his time on No Man’s Land, at least. It must have been something from Earth.
Maybe this world had something like it? He’d have to ask.
Rem sat next to Vash’s child self, who glowered at her angrily from the bed as she set to work peeling the fruit with a sharp knife. He said nothing, just watching as Rem finished peeling the fruit.
The instant Rem set the knife aside, Vash snatched it up and moved to stab himself in the neck, where he could do the most damage.
Knives whirled on his brother, startled. “You—"
Rem lunged forward and grabbed the knife in her hand before Vash could connect. Blood poured from her grip, dripping onto the sheets, their clothes.
Vash winced reflexively at the sight. Knives didn’t look away.
The child stared at the hand holding the knife with wide eyes. At the blood dripping from Rem’s fingers.
“Is that your answer?” Rem’s gaze was steely. “You’re going to let go of everything so easily? You take yourself too lightly.”
Vash flinched away and gripped his prosthetic arm. Knives stared at him.
The child’s eyes widened. His breathing became more ragged.
And then he ripped the knife out of Rem’s grip and stabbed her with it.
Knives jolted. “Vash—”
I felt relief.
Knives cut himself off.
Vash watched his brother, looking away from the child’s face.
Like all that pressure had melted away. That damned strong woman – I wouldn’t shed a single tear for her.
There was a moment of quiet. A moment of silence.
Vash’s child self started screaming in panic as he realized what it was he had just done.
“Your heart is too soft,” Knives said. But it didn’t feel like an insult.
The scene shifted around them again. The ship’s infirmary, with Rem lying on one of the beds.
Vash’s child self sat on the floor, drinking something from a juice bag.
“You remember how we were when we were kids, right?” Vash asked. He watched the scene, watched how his younger self quietly watched Rem recovering from the stab wound using the medical equipment kept on the ship. “You were the one who wanted to believe everything would go well with humans. Not me.”
Knives stared at Vash. “…even if that was true, they proved they could not take care of us. If Tesla had—”
“Then why did Rem try so hard for us?”
Knives shut up.
Rem turned her head, met Vash’s gaze, and smiled at the child. She started to sit up, then winced at the pain in her side and fell back.
Vash stayed where he was, watching quietly, but his brow was furrowed, clearly concerned.
“You know…on Earth….” Rem rolled on her back. “After Alex died in the accident, when I was so depressed, I had this dream. I was on an old-fashioned train. There was a terrible storm outside, and it felt like someone had just placed me there.”
Rem kept talking, explaining how she’d had a ticket that didn’t have a destination, but the train officer punched the ticket anyway.
“I was relieved, to tell you the truth. I thought, ‘that’s right. I can go anywhere. When I get out of this driving rain, I think I’ll go see the sunlit ocean. And then I can decide my next destination from anywhere.’” Rem smiled. “People who want to go where no one has gone before…I always admired people who challenged themselves like that. So I became a crew member on this migration ship. You can go anywhere, Vash. Even if you’re in darkness now, the ticket in your hand is just waiting to be filled in. So…” Rem’s smile wavered. “S-so—”
Rem burst into tears.
Vash felt his eyes go wet.
“Don’t ever let go! Don’t say you’ll die!”
The child stared, wide-eyed.
Knives stared at his brother. Vash ignored his gaze.
“Let’s see all kinds of things together. Let’s walk together. Because people, the world – I swear they’re not worthless.”
The child stared. A small smile came his face. “Okay. I don’t completely understand, though. I mean, I’ve never seen a train.”
Rem laughed, broken with hiccups of the end of her crying.
“But geez…if you hadn’t stopped me then…I never would have known that when you cry, Rem, you look just like you’re laughing.”
Rem blinked a couple times, then scowled and tried to lunge out of bed. “Be quiet, you little brat!” She hissed through her teeth in pain a moment later, falling back.
And then the two looked across the room and saw Knives’ child form staring back at them.
“Nai!” Vash scrambled over. “Rem, Nai is awake!”
Knives’ child self started sitting up, rubbing his head. “Where…what happened?”
The scene glitched. Froze. Then faded back to the room Vash had stepped into before the smoke had overtaken him.
But he could still feel his brother, despite his physical absence.
-Do you get it now? Why I fight for people to live?-
-…I understand better how flawed Rem was as a human- Knives paused, his blades holding in place. -But we are flawed as well. Rem and Conrad fought for Tesla. Rem fought for us-
-They did-
-…I have much to think about. And you have something to swear to me-
-Oh?-
-Don’t die-
Vash snorted. -Between you and Wolfwood….- He shook his head. -I’ll try-
-You’d better. If not for my sake, then for Cloud’s-
That was right. They had promised something for Cloud, after all.
-Right. I hope his trial isn’t tearing him apart-
-I doubt it will. He is stronger than he seems to be, for a human-
Vash snorted again. Coming from Knives, that actually felt like a compliment.