Lassie719

And now, Vincent Valentine is laid flat on the living room couch, still out cold. You can barely even tell if he's breathing, his chest hardly moves, but you'd felt it while you were carrying him so you're reasonably sure he's just passed out. To be fair, he was probably not expecting to get flung into a whole other universe at mach fuck and slam face first into the ground… dammit, this still feels so unreal.

“You're sure this guy isn't an alien or something?” Layla has made herself feel a little less worried about the stranger in the house by equipping herself with her Louisville slugger, usually reserved for the threatening of drunken exes.

“I'm sure, Layla. He doesn't even have grey skin, c'mon.” Only with Chaos out. You're still debating whether it's a good idea to explain who he actually is, or if it's better to play dumb. You desperately want to avoid overwhelming Vincent with Layla's pestering and your own overabundance of knowledge—it's the last thing he needs when he's already so far from home.

You haven't made up your mind yet when he starts to stir though, taking in a deep breath as his eyes start to slide open. Shit, they really are blood red, but it surprises you to see the amber ring in his left eye. He's wearing his Dirge outfit, but that's a Rebirth trait… weird. He starts to sit up but falls back with a grunt of pain - hard to tell which voice he might have with so little to go off.

“Go get some water,” you hiss at Layla, and his gaze immediately flicks from the ceiling to lock onto you. He looks so confused.

Layla purses her lips, her own gaze darting between you, Vincent, and Cerberus where you'd both agreed to place it on the far end of the coffee table from him. It's a ridiculously big gun, and she'd made a fuss about not leaving it on his person in case he was hostile.

“Uh. Hi. Are you. Um, okay?”

You feel dumb as soon as the words leave your mouth. His brow furrows slightly—shit, the games are originally Japanese, does he only speak Japanese? You glance at Layla, glaring until she heaves a dramatic sigh and heads to the kitchen, still glancing at Vincent warily as she goes. His eyes flicker to her briefly, but are back on you in moments, and his stare is so intense you wish you could crawl under your bed to escape it.

He tries to sit up again and succeeds this time, the claws of his gauntlet digging into the couch pleather just enough to prove their sharp points. You swallow, thinking about just how much of a weapon he is without even needing a gun. Your mouth starts opening of its own accord to repeat your question, but he finally speaks.

“Where am I?”

Deep, a little rough, but it's the best traits of both voices. If you weren’t freaking out about him being here to begin with, you'd be swooning instead. And he speaks English, great.

“Uh, the couch in my living room. Our living room, I mean, me and Layla.” You take a moment before hastily tacking on your name as well, feeling your brain cells dying by the second. Can't you just be normal for five minutes? He doesn't exactly need this sort of nonsense.

His brow quirks slightly at your answer, eyes finally shifting around to take in the room and landing on his gun—a slight frown tugs at his lips, likely displeased with others touching his weapon.

“Uh, sorry, we um—just didn't want you to freak out or something. You kind of crashed into our backyard…”

There's the confused look again, and you stifle a groan. This is a mess, how can you possibly explain that you think somehow beating a videogame you've played before magically flung him into a whole other world? That you know so many painful secrets of his because he's just a character here? And there's still a smoking crater in the backyard—which means the neighbors probably called the police or the fire department, which means there's going to be more strangers to confuse Vincent with soon, and you are definitely overthinking this now.

Layla returns with a glass of water, still carrying her baseball bat of course. Vincent looks at her as she offers the glass, and then inclines his head slightly, reaching with his right hand and seeming to carefully avoid touching anything other than the glass. For the moment he just holds it, the two of them staring at each other before Layla decides to be straightforward as always. “Are you an alien?”

This time you do groan. “Layla!”

“What! People don't just fall out of the sky and leave giant craters! That's some Superman bullshit!”

Vincent looks like he's never heard any of these words in his life, and if Layla weren’t giving you a headache you'd find his head tilt absolutely adorable.

“I am not.”

Technically he is though. Gaia being a different planet in a different universe… it's making your headache worse. You're unluckily distracted by the sound of sirens in the distance, the fire department on their way from the sound of it. Vincent’s head tilts again, head turning in the direction of the sound while Layla looks at you, prompting you to give her an annoyed frown before gesturing towards the stairs with a brief pointing at Vincent. You really don't want to try your luck with anyone recognizing him and having questions about such a “perfect cosplay”.

“Hey, dude, can you walk? You probably don't wanna deal with the firefighters, illegal alien and all.”

“Layla!” Your scolding goes in one ear and out the other, though Vincent glances at you with a raised brow. You give him a helpless shrug and an apologetic grimace.

He hums, then slowly shifts to set his feet on the floor. His sabatons somehow manage to find the overlap between ridiculous and badass now that you've seen the genuine things in real life. While his movements are cautious and belie his weakened state, he still manages to stand without wobbling or falling—it reminds you how tall he is now that he's upright, standing there just a few feet away. The messy spikes atop his head defy gravity not unlike a stubborn cowlick would, his cloak falls perfectly around him… he's otherworldly and you can't help staring right up until his eyes catch yours, that little quirk of his brow telling you he's all too aware of the staring.

“Uh—right, upstairs. Until they leave at least.” You turn on your heels abruptly, trying to ignore the embarrassed heat in your cheeks. Vincent gives one of his standard little hums of acknowledgement as he retrieves his gun and holsters it quickly, the metallic click of his shoes on the floor assuring you that he's following, albeit slowly. To be fair, the guy was crashed out in a crater not even ten minutes ago, he probably feels like shit still. You don't even have potions or Cure materia to offer, things that would be natural to offer in his world. Somehow, bandaids and ibuprofen probably won't have the same meaningful outcome for him you think.

The stairs creak under your weight like always, but aside from the tap of his shoes they're otherwise silent under Vincent. He must barely weigh anything, damn—the only thing in canon he's been seen consuming was wine, so that unfortunately tracks. Can he actually even tolerate food? Ugh, you're getting lost in tangents again.

As you lead him to your room you come to the alarming conclusion that you'd left the case for Dirge sitting out—shit, you really don't want to try explaining that right now. You pick up your pace just a little while trying not to telegraph your alarm, glancing back while you reach the door. He looks tired and not quite steady on his feet, which means you have just enough time to step into the room before him and snatch the game case up off your bed to shove it underneath instead. There's still junk all over the floor from the earlier impact but you're ignoring it for now.

He makes it through the threshold as you make a show of tidying up the bed. “Uh, here, you can sit, or lie down. You look tired.”

A bit of an understatement really, with the shadows under his eyes. You realize how pale his skin is now, almost unnaturally so, and it makes the intense red of his eyes even more jarring. He merely grunts quietly at the offer, taking a few more clinking steps before perching at the very corner of the bed—his weight is barely enough to wrinkle the covers. He still has the cup in his hand, but it's untouched. You make another realization: if you’re going to play dumb then you should ask him for his name. You clear your throat awkwardly, and his gaze pierces you again. For a moment the words are lost on you.

“I. Um. Didn’t get your name.”

He tilts his head slightly, then lets out a low sigh. “Vincent Valentine.”

Downstairs comes the muffled sound of knocking, Layla’s voice, and then the thudding of boots stomping through the house. You both pause to listen, and then in the same moment look back to each other and make eye contact again. Fuck, he’s pretty. You forget your words for a second time.

Vincent is first to look away and his gaze shifts around your room before settling on the cup in his hand. His gauntleted hand lifts, just enough to draw his cowl out of the way, and he summarily drains the glass of its water, eloquence abandoned. To be fair, he did just crash in your backyard after defeating Omega… he’s probably starving too. If he actually needs to eat, anyway. The games were always incredibly vague about the specifics of his everything.

“How far from Edge are we?”

His query is quiet but no less important as a decision point that you have to handle. How dumb are you playing again? Shit. Fuck.

“Edge? I’ve never heard of a place called Edge. Where is it supposed to be?”