Chapter 3: Rage and Retribution

Firstly, thanks to Shade the Raven for my first ever review.

I'm going to sate my own thirst for flashbacks with this chapter.

The beautiful skies, once so black, now so blue they threatened to pierce the eye of even one of Red's kind with their beauty. For the first time, the skies refused to be tainted by the ehb of a used-Mako energy. It was something that might have warmed the heart of Nanaki, had he cared.

Leaping from the prow of the airship as acrobatically as any feline or canine. He trotted away from the airship towards Edge City. His steps were slim and quick.

Cid shook his head. Red wasn't there anymore. It was like he had snapped. No, broken.

Nanaki brought down his claw in a scything motion, shattering the man's arm in a single blow. He looked up, his one good eye singling out another opponent. The bandit under him writhed in pain. Another swipe at his head took away his life. All around, he could see the caravan trying to fight back the former-Shinra soldiers. It wasn't working. Many of their adversaries were armed and all were trained. The philosophers and meteorologists who had set out from Costa Del Sol were meant to observe the sky and life, not suffer like this. The very thought of such people suffering his way of life brought a slight anger to Red.

He leapt from the body to slam into his next opponent, using his shoulders and the velocity to take the man of his feet. A flick of his seraph-clad tail send a lightning bolt streaking towards the man. A leap and twist sent another shinran clad in blue-tinted armour back to the Life stream.

'Damnit to hell.'

4 Men with insensibly large swords now faced the Wolf. It looked as if they had discovered he was the only one who stood a challenge. In Red's eye ,he was a devil from the wilds, a strike of fire that blinded the eyes and boiled the soul.

Red ducked back into a fighting crouch. He knew those eyes. Former SOLDIER. It made no difference. A flash of scarlet and 2 fell to the ground, claw marks marring their faces horribly. The other two backed into a circle, but Red struck from nowhere, using the confusion of a large-scale raid to pounce from where previously there had been two men in a struggle over a gun.

Before his last two opponents struck the ground, he was already digging his tail into the eye of another man, incinerating the inside of his head.

Now, it seemed, the caravan of 62 Learned man had been subdued. They were all now circling Red. A slight chuckle crossed the face of Nanaki. 40 maybe 50 men against him. He was a Guardian of Cosmo Canyon. They were merely Shinran Grunts and only 3rd Class SOLDIERS.

They came at him like a plague of locust, about 4 or 5 at once. He side-stepped the first downward blow of a sword, before rearing up on his hind legs and bringing his razor-sharp claw upward across the face of his attacker. Two more blades. His tail, quick as death, parried both in one smooth movement, before sending itself spiking into an enemy's face with the speed of quick silver.

A few more similar attacks and incidents, and the shinrans had realised that it was probably easier to take their spoils and run. But as Red let down his steely guard, he took an unlikely shot to his shoulder. It was almost unnoticeable, the Wolf simply shrugging it off, leaping across the ground to check on the few survivors of the attack.

But, then, like a shock realisation, his limbs were not his at all. They fell, lifeless…Red could not feel a thing. The fear was plain in his eyes as darkness descended.

Nanaki was immobilised for 2 months. The poison seeped through him, a neurotoxin, and tore at everything. Knives stabbed him, needles pressed against his head, and he constantly felt as if he consumed rotten meat.

He looked up at the sky everyday, Grandfather doing all a dying man could to ease the suffering of a creature completely immobile.

The most keenly remembered image of that torturous period was a month in. The toxin had reached the prime of it's effect, rendering most motor functions dead, and making Red spasm with pain every few minutes, be it daggers to his skull, or needles to his back.

He was lying on the top of Grandfather's observatory, with Cid and Tifa tending to him…

It was the day he finally decided to stop being weak. He looked at himself. This was all because he had none of his father's honour, his stoic sensibility, his indescribable battle-rage. The ability to hold up an entire tribe alone.

"Cid. Tifa."

"Yea'?"

"What do you need, Red?"

The Son of Seto lifted his paw for the first time in 2 weeks.

"Get me a planet-damned pork chop."

He changed after that. He became bitter, angry and rarely light. He rarely laughed and constantly responded with bitter, albeit witty, comments. But he was still there, in essence. He still brought wise council and enthusiastic help when needed. Yes, the visits to Cosmo Canyon became rarer, but Cloud often asked him to help out with deliveries to Nibel or Corel, Barret made him check up on any oil sources., and he often helped out generally. He was not sad ,he was just far more proud. His greatest pleasure was bringing down Grand Horns out in the wastelands.

Then Seto disappeared. And anger overwhelmed him. As he strolled from the newly-build Aeroport, something he had helped design, a snarl was stamped on his face. Cid ran to catch up to him in his incredibly comical run, and suddenly even that now annoyed Red.

"Damnit, Cid, if you don't stop running like that I'm gonna put you in a wheelchair!" He didn't ever turn around to say it. He knew that his snappy, cynical tone would stop Cid dead in his tracks. Red didn't care.

Up ahead, he saw Reeve. The tall man was once again dressed in a basalt-black suit, that shined with the hundreds of times it had been pressed. Elena stood next to him, her golden, silky hair flowing behind her like a wedding train. Her magnificent marble dress was supremely cut to fit her figure. The only thing passing through Red's mind was that if they didn't wipe the patronising smiles off their faces he was going to do to them what he had done to Hojo.

"Red, how nice to see you. How have you been?"

"Cut the crap, Reeve. I'm not here to congratulate you on your wedding that you missed my Grandfather's funeral 'preparing' for. I'm here to ask questions. If you don't give me my answers I'll shove my paw so far up your ass you'll have my claws for teeth."

Reeve widened his eyes in shocks, while Elena drew her hand to her mouth as it flopped open.

Cid, once again arriving at the worst time, with Shera not far behind, could only shrug at their quizzical glances to him.

"Damnit, I ain't got all day, you bureaucratic, spying prat!" Seeing a beast, bristling with rage, with a blinded eye, teeth the size of your fingers and claws bigger then your spread hand, with a very sharp instrument at the end of his tail, isn't something most men look forward too. Couple that with threats and a look in the beast's eye that says it fully intends to carry them out, and you've got a very nervous man.

"Of course, Red." He gulped.

"Right this way."

They exited out of the aeroport through a small building, who's job it was to register all flights and spaces. There was 3 people, 2 of which sat at desk with small piles of paper, signing and counter-signing, behind a large counter, where stood a pretty young red-headed lady with a register and pen in front of her.

"Good afternoon, please sig-"

"It's your fucking ship, Cid. You stay here and sign in. Then go find Cloud and Tifa, tell them I'll be paying them a visit." Red's voice was thick with authority that few knew he had. His heart may have broken, but his steel was still there.

"And Reeve, you best have a car or something because I'm not walking all the way to your pathetic imitation of Shinra HQ."

Reeve boiled over at this. Calling the WRO another Shinra was just too far, Elena, took a step back, taking hold of her Husband's arm.

"RED! If you think you can walk in here, insult and threaten me and my Wife, then humiliate my organisation, then you are seriously deranged."

Have you ever caught that look in another man's, or in this case, beast's eye that says if you say another goddamned word he's going to do everything in his, or her, power to kill you. Now imagine that a thousand times worse.

"Your life or your pride, Reeve." Red snarled, with more ferocity then a hundred of the old Red could've mustered.

They continued to stride out onto the street, where a rather spiffy car was waiting. Reeve motioned to the driver.

"Elena, get in the front seat." Reeve said quickly. Red didn't bat an eyelid.

"I can take your friend. He's nothing more then an angry pup." Elena's pride was sometimes impossible to diminish.

"Elena, my love. That Red is the Red that killed an Undead Warlord, Gi Nittak, that was 6 times his size and 4 times stronger. He would not hesitate to hurt us both if we get in his way." The former-Turk turned red at her husband's firm rebuke, but got into the passenger seat at the front.

Reeve grudgingly got into the backseat. Red was poised at the far right, staring out the window. The Head of the WRO took a deep sigh as he got into his own car, that suddenly seemed not his at all.

Had a bit of fun with Red this time. Expect far more snappy comments and a very nasty encounter in the next chapter.