The Persistence of Memory

Author: uniFsky

Author's note/disclaimer: There will be lots of introspection in this piece of fanfiction. As I know lots of people like to get this bit over with as soon as possible, all I'll say right now is that I don't own Final Fantasy VII, though it would be nice if I did. The rest of the Author's Note, for those who are interested, will be at the end of this fanfiction. Enjoy!

He leans against the wall, watching the raindrops slide down the glass like shooting stars. It is a slow, arduous process to count the seconds in time to the trickling of rain and the occasional howling of the cold north wind sweeping into Nibelheim. Each drop that disappears, seeps into the crack at the bottom of the window, he sees and thinks of a sin he has committed. But he is patient, and time is the one thing he can truly say he will never lack. Hojo has made sure of that, making his body into this immortal monstrosity, even while he cursed behind the thick glass separating him from the living, human world.

Vincent remembers. He remembers the sad, wise face of the father he never saw die; the first gun he ever saw shining deadly silver; the field of flowers where he spent time with Lucrecia; the silent, unshed tears in her eyes as she turned away from him; and the blood and screams of the those he has killed, echoing in concert with the harsh laughter of the demons residing in the dark corners of his mind.

Vincent remembers, and cannot forget.

.~.0.~.

"Heya, Vincent!"

There is only one person among all of his acquaintances that he knows who calls him so flippantly, and at such great volume. He turns to face her with no small degree of reluctance, carefully holding his glass of red wine so as not to spill it. Yuffie grins brilliantly at him, and he inclines his head slightly to her in acknowledgement. Apparently the nod is enough of a greeting for her this time, for she walks briskly towards Tifa without giving him a scolding on the proper mannerisms of a gentleman (vampire notwithstanding). Vincent watches her work with Tifa behind the bar, trading small talk and pleasantries while the clear glasses catch the occasional ray of sun and flash bright white between their fingers.

Yuffie can only be characterized as a bright soul. From the early days of AVALANCHE, that has been apparent. She cries and wheedles and shouts with a sheer exuberance that Vincent finds utterly perplexing on more than one occasion. She is alive. And maybe, that is why he finds himself afraid of her and attracted to her all at the same time. Because despite having found forgiveness, despite redemption, he has yet to truly live again. He sees what he cannot do, and sees what he wants to do; he simultaneously shrinks and yearns for that light of life that Yuffie seems to bask in without effort. All that he has done lingers still and his memories, like the demons in his head, clamor for attention and leave him no rest even while he desperately reaches towards the evanescent light.

"VINNIE!"

He starts, nearly drops his wineglass before his reflexes come into play and save Tifa from losing one of her newly shipped glasses. When he turns around to the owner of the voice, he finds Yuffie's face disconcertingly close to his.

"What."

She stares at him, shocked. "Gawd, Vincent Valentine, I know being stuck inside that stuffy coffin for so long must have messed up your brains, but your HEARING?! I have been CALLING YOUR NAMEfor half an hour, I swear." She gesticulates angrily, furiously, then unexpectedly calms down.

Vincent blinks bemusedly.

"Ah, I get it," she muses sadly, tapping her finger against her cheek with all the aplomb of an ancient philosopher. "You must have been dropped on your head when you were a baby! I bet you have one of those whatchamacallit syndromes, the one where you spontaneously become deaf years after some childhood accident, when you-"

"Yuffie."

"Hey!" She wilts a little under The Look, the one she claims is specially patented, courtesy of Vincent Valentine. Abrubtly, Yuffie's expression sobers. "Seriously though, Vincent, what's wrong? You looked really weird back there. So spill," she threatened.

Yuffie is his friend. However, he does not relinquish any of his personal matters to his friends willingly, has indeed sought to conceal it from them. The burdens he carries are his alone to bear, for the many wrongs he has committed. They need not concern themselves with his own weaknesses and faults. However, he has long since given up dissuading Yuffie from prying his secrets from him, though not for lack of trying. She has relentlessly pursued him across entire continents and, he thinks darkly, even across the seas that she so abhors. And Yuffie, Vincent knows with a strange foreboding born of years of experience, will give him no peace until he submits. Perhaps it is this strange form of friendship that prompts him to respond to her query.

He cradles the glass in his hand and gently swirls the wine, gathering himself together before answering. The wine ripples and flashes a deep garnet that for an instant, shines the same shade as his eyes in the morning light. He does not notice, but Yuffie does.

"Thinking," he finally replies. Yuffie begins to protest, but he silences her with another look. She settles down and waits instead. "I..." He hesitates, uncertain of how to proceed. "I am not certain that I can live."

Yuffie stands there, and blinks. Then her mouth moves soundlessly and her utterly flabbergasted expression would have been amusing, if not for the subject matter at hand. Vincent sips his wine silently, and wonders why he ever considered answering Yuffie in the first place.

She bursts out in a stream of angry words. "Y-you, Vincent, you big idiot!"

Vincent stares, bewildered.

"How can you not live?! I'm not gonna drag your sorry ass from a coffin again! Don't you think about dying, or I'm going to shove so many Phoenix Downs into you even Omega won't be able to kill you!"

So that was what she thought he had said. "Yuffie."

She continues raging, "... and how can you, you jerk?! Marlene really likes you, it'd be like making an orphan out of her! An orphan! Tell me you won't do that to a kid like Marlene, you irresponsible--!"

"That was not what I meant," he cuts in, sharply.

Yuffie huffs a little, out of breath, before she deflates. "Then what do you mean! Don't scare me like that!"

He looks down at his glass again, watching the glimmer of faint sunlight on the dark wine, trying to put words to what he feels.

"I... I don't know how to live."

He hesitates, before continuing.

"I... remember. Too much." And he thought of the countless nights when his deepest dreams were of screaming. He thought of all the times that he couldn't eat without recalling the taste of a dish that no longer existed, couldn't drink without the echo of some other flavor, couldn't sleep without remembering the sins of his past. He thought of the hold his past had on him still.

Yuffie looked at him, all shadows and desperation wrapped up in one man with crimson eyes and a past too dark to have seen much of light.

"Stop thinking so much." He raises an eyebrow, incredulous. She scowls, "I'm serious. Sometimes it doesn't help the problem at all. You'll just end up going in circles. Instead, you should just decide what you want, then go and get it." Yuffie grins suddenly, and he blinks at the surprising brilliance of it. "Shelke had the same problem you did yesterday. We left her with a blender to make a smoothie, and she couldn't figure out which buttons to use. When Teef and I came back with the groceries, she was trying to perform a synaptic dive on it." She snickers suddenly. "Gawd, Vincent. You have the mental baggage of a thirteen-year-old. It's not even funny."

He looks at her. "I believe Shelke is twenty, not thirteen," he replies drily.

"Details, details," she says airily, and waves her hand dismissively.

Yuffie looks back at him, brows wrinkling with the effort of her thinking. "Some memories are bad. I remember throwing up my insides on Cid's vomit-comet puke-airship, and it's something I could really do without. Some memories are bad, but..." She paused, knitting her brows even more as she tries to put her thoughts into words, "they're important, ya know?" Yuffie looks at Vincent. He seems vaguely confused. She searches for an example that his old-fashioned vampire brain can understand.

"Like Sephiroth," she says, inspired. "He's one mucked-up guy with more baggage than even you, Vince." Yuffie grins at his offended face. "And I really, really don't wanna remember all those times he muttered about his mom or tried to cut, slice, or filet us all." She shudders at the memory.

"He was psycho. But... if we hadn't met him, or if he hadn't done what he'd done, I never would have gotten Wutai better. I'd probably still be stealing materia off people, nyuck nyuck! No doubt about it!" She grins, as if she doesn't still steal materia from others. "Most of all, if Sephiroth hadn't come along with his Masamune chopping things up..." She pauses, "I'd never have met you guys.

"I'd never get to tease our oh-so-mighty leader about his complete lameness, yell at Cid for taking all the tea, prank on Barret, whack Cait Sith, talk with Nanaki, do girly things with Tifa, or..." a brief shadow crosses her face at the memory, "known Aerith." They are both silent for beat of time, until Yuffie shakes her head, clearing her mind before continuing more cheerfully, "I wouldn't have been able to groan about my measly, I tell you, measly income to Reeve, or teach Shelke the joys of blenders, which by the way, she still doesn't like."

Yuffie looks at him, grey eyes straight and clear and honest. "I remember him, because he's why I met you guys."

And his breath hitches in his throat as the light floods through the windows of the bar to illuminate her face.

"And he's the reason why I got to be friends with you, Vincent."

He sits, still stunned, as he digests her words, feeling them slide inside him like warm nectar, filling in the empty places in his soul.

She looks at him, and sees the slow, slow acceptance make its way onto his face. Yuffie rises and walks to the stairs before turning to face him again.

"Vincent."

He turns his head to look at her.

"Vincent. Just loosen up, okay?"

And her smile is like sunshine.

.~.0.~.

Yuffie stands in front of him, gray eyes soft silver under the moonlight. The sleeves of her elaborate kimono flutter lightly in the breeze, like a bird's wings and her gaze is warm. All around them, the darkness surrounds them, blankets them even as the bustle and laughter of the festival filters through the trees. At this moment, it seems as thought time has stopped completely.

She had dragged him away from the revelry of their friends earlier, because "They're so noisy I can't hear myself think. Plus, I don't want to see Spikes moping in the corner or Tifa making gooey eyes at him or Cid chain-smoking and yelling at Barret for spilling liquor all over the new shirt Shera bought for him." So they had come out here, to the tranquility of the garden.

But now, now she stands before him and looks at him, sees him and only him, looks at him that way, and all he can find in himself to do is a ridiculously strong desire to kiss her.

And Vincent is scared, to the very depth of his soul, that he cares this much for Yuffie. He knows, right then, that she will be the last love he will ever have, not because he cannot love anymore, but because she has possessed his heart so completely. He loved Lucrecia enough to die for her, but for Yuffie, he would live. And Vincent also knows that when Yuffie dies, as all mortal beings return to the Planet, he would still live for her, to the ending of the world and to his own death. He will love her beyond time, even as the Lifestream traverses the endless sea of stars in the vast cosmos.

Yet, he can still resist. Vincent knows himself to be no gentleman, but for this once, he could be. Yuffie has long dreamed of becoming her country's Empress, but no country as independent as Wutai would ever accept a ruler with an immortal husband. He could resist, and she would not waste her life on him, give up her wishes and dreams to stay with him. She would be the beautiful, resplendent bride of Wutai, the treasured Empress of her people. She would live without him, and lead her people into a glorious golden age.

He wonders, if he is strong enough to live after she has passed to the next life with nothing but memories of brilliant smiles and fleeting joy.

He wonders, if he is strong enough to live with knowing what could have been had he reached out in this moment for her.

But most of all, he wonders if he is strong enough to let her go.

As Yuffie looks at him expectantly, trustingly, he drinks in the sight of her and commits her to memory. Yuffie standing in the moonlight, with her silver eyes and blue kimono, like Leviathan in the night. This moment will be lost forever, and Vincent knows he can only hope to have the strength to endure the consequences of his decision.

He bends down to kiss her.

Author's note (continued): Vincent is a great bucket of angst. Really. I tried to make him as close to canon as possible, but I'm not quite sure if I succeeded. In my opinion, he's the sort of guy to think that the one he loves should be kept as far away from him as possible (especially after that mentally scarring experience had from Hojo). It's a very lonely way to live, not to mention not exactly good. Yuffie's supposed to represent the better path, the one to live life to the fullest and remember the good times along with the bad times. So by choosing her, Vincent's finally breaking the mold into which he has been cast and learning the "happy" way again. Dunno if that made sense.

Well, I hope you all enjoyed this ficcie (despite the awful length), and let me know what you think! Constructive criticism (even constructive flaming) will be much appreciated!

~uniFsky