Daggers and Flowers

Chapter 12- Gravity

The soldier found it while hiking through the mountains near Nibelheim, searching through the cave systems for the anomalies that were reported by other soldiers that had been stationed nearby. It was slightly glowing green, mostly black. She almost didn't see it in the dark as she shone her flashlight over the rocks and boulders it had been snugly crammed between. Moving the light away, a faint green glow had caught her eye.

The cave was dark and cold and wet and the Materia was slimy with mud. It seemed to have been pushed through the earthen floor. She showed it to her supervisor who in turn called the team out. They flew back to headquarters and the whole time she felt as if a magnet was in her pocket instead of the strange Materia. The cloth from her uniform's pocket seemed to stick to her chair and she passed it around, hoping to escape the weird feeling it gave her the further away it got.

Finally, they landed on the roof of the WRO headquarters. Her supervisor had her escorted to the labs, where the head scientist Shalua was stumped. No one had ever seen Materia like this. It wasn't manmade like most Materia, and things seemed to gravitate towards it. Pens, pencils, paper, letters from keyboards, everything moved towards it.

"Maybe the Planet made it," a scientist offered. Everyone looked at each other with uneasy looks on their faces.

"No, it takes centuries for Materia to form. And it wasn't found in a Mako Spring," Shalua said, narrowing her eyes at the Materia as it sat faintly glowing in the thick plastic case they eventually had to confine it in. After a while of sitting on a table while everyone speculated what it did, a computer and a chair rocketed towards it, nearly hitting a scientist and their service dog. Avah had some issues from the war as well as a prosthetic leg and her dog helped her move around her workspace with ease. No one wanted to be hurt by other flying appliances, so they found the plastic casing, hoping that the thick clear plastic would keep it calm for a while.

"Someone call Max," Shalua finally said. "He'll know what to do."

"Why?" The soldier asked. The scientists looked at each other and then at her.

"Max worked for Shinra, with Materia, classifying them and making sure the manmade ones weren't defective," Shalua answered.

The hospital ward's halls were cold. The AC was blasting to beat the horrible heat outside. Thankfully, Rosso kept her room comfortably cold, so that it was at least warmer than the halls. At least that's what Lyra was told.

Lyra tried to be excited to finally meet Rosso without worrying about getting a metal arm in slashed in her face, but she couldn't shake her anger and the feeling of betrayal. Her smile came off as uneasy as Lyra and Tifa approached her room. Tifa noticed.

"You don't have to do this if you don't want to," Tifa said. Lyra wanted to ignore her, only acknowledging her with a nod. Rosso was talking with a nurse when they got to her door. They seemed to be a bit flirtatious, and Lyra didn't blame Rosso. The nurse was cute. He had dark hair and dark eyes. But he was nothing compared to-

Lyra pinched the inside of her arm. Kadaj had jumped into her mind to finish that thought and she hoped that she wouldn't run into him for once. She wouldn't be able to keep a straight face. What was she thinking anyway, comparing how cute Rosso's nurse was to how cute Kadaj was?

Okay, pinching her arm wasn't working.

"Hey Rosso. How're doing?" Tifa asked as she knocked on the doorway. Rosso shot her a smirk and waved for them to come in.

"I'm doing fine. Owen here was just giving me my breakfast," she answered. She gave him a quick wink and he winked back. He told her that he would be back later with her lunch and left. Rosso watched him leave and spotted Lyra as she moved out of the way.