Heading back to Seventh Heaven, Alex listened with a smirk as Aerith murmured to herself with feigned offense about how he had acted unfairly by biting her lip during the kiss. Listening to her amusing tirade about her own unpreparedness, Alex only affectionately nodded and promised that next time he would definitely restrain himself.
In that same second Aerith slightly narrowed her eyes and stubbornly shook her head, declaring that in reality she had liked it very much — she had simply been caught by surprise. Delighted by her sincerity, Alex jokingly replied that next time he would warn her about it in advance. Hearing his words, Aerith gave Alex the most cunning look possible, immediately leaned in and lightly bit his hand, letting him know: no one ever warns about such things during a kiss!
Clenching her teeth on his hand just enough to leave a neat mark, Aerith perkily snorted and energetically dragged him toward the bar. Chuckling at how cute she was in such moments, Alex allowed Aerith to lead him along with a joyful expression. Approaching the doors of Seventh Heaven, Alex took elegant pocket watches from the pocket of his coat and on the go estimated how much time it would take him to assemble the reactor.
Making sure they were well within schedule, Alex put the watches back and pushed the heavy door. Entering inside, Alex and Aerith noticed that Jessie had already returned — fresh after a shower, Jessie was sitting at one table together with Biggs and Wedge and was enjoying some alcoholic cocktail.
"What took you so long?! Weren't you just going to pick up your laptop?" Biggs inquired with a smirk, immediately spotting the return of Alex and Aerith.
"I couldn't find my glasses for a long time, so we got delayed," Alex answered in an absolutely carefree tone, slightly shrugging and approaching the bar counter together with Aerith.
"You wear glasses?!" Tifa inquired, clearly surprised by such unexpected information.
"Only during complicated work. Fine, give me literally five minutes to prepare, and then we can calmly discuss everything," Alex said, calmly placing the backpack with the laptop on the bar counter.
Hearing that Alex wore glasses, absolutely everyone present stared at him with enormous surprise. Especially stunned were Jessie and Biggs — they had seen with their own eyes how Alex without the slightest problem had spotted members of Avalanche among the huge crowd in the Seventh Sector when the whole group was hastily leaving the Shinra warehouse. Slightly shrugging, Alex unzipped the backpack, took out the working laptop and neat glasses in a thin gold frame.
Putting on the glasses, Alex with a habitual motion adjusted his hair and turned to the others. Seeing him in this form, those present gasped: in glasses he resembled a completely different person — strict and intellectual. And while everyone was assessing this solid image, Alex with a completely stone face took a bright-pink headband with rabbit ears from the depths of the backpack and put the headband on his head so that the hair wouldn't get in his eyes.
The moment this fluffy charm found itself on the top of his head, the entire strict intellectual appearance instantly collapsed without a trace! Biggs and Wedge immediately burst into unrestrained laughter, pointing fingers at Alex for his incredibly ridiculous look. Aerith and Yuffie, on the contrary, came into complete delight and burned with the desire to try on something similar. Claudia, sitting a little farther at the bar counter, nearly choked on the cocktail that Tifa had just treated her to.
Quickly wiping her lips, Claudia stared at Alex with a stunned gaze, frantically trying to comprehend what she had seen. Even Barret nearly toppled off his chair, laughing for the whole bar at the sight of a two-meter stern guy with pink rabbit ears. Tifa and Jessie, on the contrary, considered that Alex looked damnably cute.
Jessie even sincerely regretted that she hadn't brought a camera from her parents' house to take a couple of priceless shots for memory. Alex himself with a completely imperturbable look lit a thin cigar and smoothly raised the laptop lid. But the moment he looked at the lit screen, he immediately slammed it shut with a crack.
"Dude! I asked you not to touch my work laptop!" Alex threw with the deepest irritation in his voice, sharply turning on the stool toward Dean.
"It wasn't me! It was all Steve! All claims to this green pot-bellied fellow, I'm completely uninvolved here," Dean responded with a wide insolent smirk, pointing a finger at his Tonberry, who completely did not understand the essence of the conflict and simply continued to enthusiastically move cards in Queen's Blood.
"You bastard!" Alex spat irritably and in that same second took a juicy apple from the backpack and with all his might flung the apple at Dean.
"Oh, thanks! And you're a bastard yourself!" Dean cheerfully winked, deftly catching the flying apple right in the air.
"Asshole," Alex hissed, already reaching into the backpack for the next "projectile."
"Goat… Ugh, damn, what sourness! Stop already eating these damned sour apples!" Dean chuckled, having bitten off a huge piece and immediately grimacing from the fierce taste.
"Don't like it — give it back!" Alex hissed in an even more irritated tone, authoritatively extending a hand toward Dean to take the bitten fruit.
In response to Alex's demands Dean demonstratively bit off another huge piece of the apple and immediately grimaced as if he had swallowed a whole lemon. He sincerely did not understand why the fruits from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil had turned out so extremely sour. And at the same time Alex together with his brother Adam loved chewing these fruits, continuously complaining about their eye-watering sourness! Dean sincerely considered Alex and Adam complete oddballs for this strange love alone.
Watching how Dean grimaced, Alex only shook his head and carefully turned the laptop so that none of those present would see the contents of the screen. Least of all right now did Alex want to explain out loud to everyone else why on earth Dean had decided to look at porn from his laptop. Noticing such mysterious maneuvers, absolutely everyone present in the bar burned with childish curiosity — why had this verbal dispute with throwing sour projectiles and mutual insults flared up?
Considering herself the most cunning and inconspicuous, Yuffie tried to silently creep up from behind and peek over Alex's shoulder. But before Yuffie could take even a step toward the screen, Alex simply blindly slapped a palm right into her face and gently pushed her back, calmly throwing that this was not at all what Yuffie should be looking at. From these words Yuffie's excitement flared up with new force!
Yuffie began stubbornly struggling, trying to catch the monitor even with the corner of her eye, and in the end hung dead on Alex's arm, wrapping her legs around his forearm like a clingy little monkey. With a sigh shaking his head, Alex with one free hand quickly clicked away all the dirty links and released Yuffie. Realizing that she had managed to peek at nothing, Yuffie pouted offendedly and in annoyance kicked the leg of the stool on which Alex was sitting.
"And what was there that we all categorically mustn't see? Surely some top-secret data?" Biggs inquired with a cunning smile, insolently leaning on the bar counter right next to Alex.
"No. There was what you're right now so carefully hiding under your T-shirt," Alex noted in an absolutely calm tone and with a light motion lifted the edge of his clothing, exposing the explicit porn magazine sticking out from the waistband of his pants.
"Biggs… don't you want to talk a little right now?" Jessie said in a very sweet tone, giving Biggs a soul-chilling look.
"I… I have absolutely no idea how it got there!" Biggs exclaimed in a surprised tone, with all his might depicting absolute bewilderment on his face.
"Oh really? And for some reason it seems to me that you know everything perfectly well!" Aerith picked up in a singing voice, gracefully peeking out from behind Alex's broad shoulder and giving Biggs an extremely cheerful gaze.
"Biggs, buddy… Honestly, I didn't expect such an act from you. Ah, how are you not ashamed!" Wedge said, shaking his head sorrowfully, demonstrating with his whole appearance how deeply disappointed he was in his friend.
"You bastard!.. You yourself just begged me to give you this magazine for the evening!" Biggs shouted in a crushing tone, in furious anger pointing a finger right into Wedge's face.
Having thrown Biggs under the rapidly rushing train, Alex joyfully nodded with the most satisfied look. And the fact that Biggs in desperation had decided to drag Wedge down with him to the bottom brought him pure aesthetic pleasure! Watching how two idiot friends frantically shifted blame onto each other under the soul-chilling gazes of the girls was the best entertainment of the entire evening for Alex.
Even Dean temporarily set aside his game of Queen's Blood with his pot-bellied Steve to observe the inevitable denouement with sincere relish. Barret also did not remain on the sidelines and in his habitual rough tone barked that such indecent trash had no place at all next to his little angel Marlene, who was already peacefully sleeping on the second floor in her room!
While the two unfortunate friends continued hysterically tossing accusations at each other, Jessie measured them with the coldest and most expressive gaze. Tired of enduring this senseless noise, Jessie turned to the counter and understandingly nodded to Tifa, who answered her with a soft but rather dangerous smile and unnoticed extracted a deep iron bucket from under the bar counter.
Grabbing the tin, Jessie approached Biggs and Wedge with the sweetest smile in the world — and immediately resoundingly smacked both on the backs of their heads with this bucket! Receiving a solid blow, Biggs and Wedge instantly fell silent and stared at her in fright. Without changing her charming smile, Jessie with a crash threw the metal bucket right at their feet and with a strict look made it clear what needed to be done.
Perfectly realizing the silent threat, Biggs with the deepest regret took the unfortunate porn magazine from the waistband of his pants and with a sad gaze threw it to the bottom. And the moment the paper touched the metal, Yuffie instantly formed hand seals — and the magazine flared up with a bright greedy flame! Looking at the burning "treasure," Biggs and Wedge felt genuine sorrow, because obtaining such an exclusive in the slums was an almost impossible task. Claudia, who had been sitting a little to the side until then, also decided to contribute to the act of justice and cold-bloodedly poured the remains of strong alcohol from her glass right into the bucket — from which the flame shot up even brighter.
Watching this cruel public execution, Alex and Dean cheerfully laughed, in two voices calling Biggs and Wedge stupid amateurs for not even being able to properly hide such a delight. Having laughed, Alex turned to the laptop and began quickly typing on the keyboard, opening the needed Shinra registries. Hearing the rapid tapping on the keys, Aerith stopped looking enchanted into the bucket with fire and turned to him.
"Jessie, if you've finished burning the heresy — maybe we'll finally deal with your parents' affairs?" Alex inquired, continuing to type confidently and not even turning his head.
"Oh, right! We need to somehow decide how they can leave Midgar unnoticed before mom wakes up," Jessie immediately perked up, completely switching her attention to Alex.
"And why do they even need to leave from here? Didn't your dad just wake up from a coma and all that?" Yuffie inquired, sincerely not understanding why on earth Jessie's parents needed to urgently flee the city.
"Because by tomorrow afternoon Jessie's father will end up on the dissecting table in Shinra's secret laboratories," Claudia said in an absolutely calm and even tone, frowning from a short attack of sharp headache.
"And that's the pure truth! These bastards will never miss the opportunity to cut open someone who's come back to life! And they won't give a damn about all the consequences if they can snatch even more money from it," Barret intervened with deep irritation, powerfully slamming his heavy palm on the tabletop.
Hearing such an exhaustive explanation, Yuffie only nodded thoughtfully, although she did not fully understand what secret laboratories were being referred to. Noticing the slight bewilderment on Yuffie's face, Alex affectionately patted her on the head, letting her know that she shouldn't clutter her head with this — they currently had plenty of more important matters. Shrugging, Yuffie without long thought nimbly jumped right onto Alex's back and began with interest watching how he deftly typed lines on the keyboard of his laptop.
Sitting nearby, Aerith absolutely and completely trusted Alex, sincerely believing that he would definitely find the most elegant way to take Jessie's parents out of the city. And while the rest of the company noisily argued at the table, sorting through crazy escape options, Alex was already freely roaming through Shinra's internal system. Having found Gilbert Raspberry's official personal dossier, Alex quickly scrolled the document to the section with the current state of health.
Without long thought, he changed the fatal "severe Mako poisoning" to a banal "industrial injury as a result of a fall and a prolonged period of rehabilitation." Noticing exactly what Alex was typing, Aerith sweetly laughed — because he, without twitching a muscle, had also arranged an automatic monetary compensation for Gilbert at the corporation's expense!
Trying to hide her ringing amusement, Aerith buried her nose in Alex's shoulder, sincerely enjoying how he once again mischievously harmed Shinra with impunity. Yuffie hanging on his back understood nothing of what was happening at all — for her on the monitor simply flashed a boring stream of incomprehensible documents. Having finished typing on the laptop, Alex briefly distracted himself, took the lit thin cigar from the ashtray and, taking a deep drag, smoothly exhaled thick gray smoke through his nose.
Tapping a finger on the filter, he frantically thought about where exactly to send Jessie's parents farther from Shinra's predatory eyes — and so that everything would look maximally natural. Taking another drag, Alex transferred his gaze to Aerith. Aerith gave him the most charming smile, slightly leaned forward and quietly whispered the ready answer right into his ear. Having finished speaking, she tenderly kissed Alex on the tip of his ear and coquettishly pulled away.
"Oi, Jessie! Have your parents been to any good resort at all for a long time?" Alex inquired, turning on the stool toward Jessie and the others while they were still competing in drawing up an evacuation plan.
"To a resort? They almost never left Midgar! And because of father's eternal work they didn't even have the opportunity to get out to my past performances…" Jessie answered, sorrowfully shaking her head, with bitter regret realizing that her parents had all their lives only worked hard.
"Alex, and why are you suddenly asking about this?" Tifa immediately inquired, noticing that he had asked this question with an incredibly cunning and intriguing squint.
In response to Tifa's question Alex smiled widely and turned the screen of his laptop toward the others so that everyone could examine his idea in detail. Right on the bright display was displayed a colorful advertising banner of the Costa del Sol resort with its snow-white sunny beaches, eternal parties and exciting recreation for all visitors. Seeing this banner, Jessie immediately recognized it, because in the past she had performed on the stage of the famous Gold Saucer theater located on the same continent.
Biggs and Wedge completely did not understand why Alex was showing them a resort whose tickets cost fabulous money. Even Tifa and Barret gave Alex strange, questioning gazes, sincerely not understanding his plan. Noticing that no one around was getting his proposal, Alex clicked the mouse and switched the tab, opening the direct hotel booking site and even more openly hinting at his intentions. And the moment the others saw this, it finally dawned on the comrades exactly what he was aiming for.
"Kid, your plan is of course a complete blast… Only where do you think we'll get the money for this? And your gil stolen from the dead Corneo definitely won't work here to buy tickets to the upper deck without problems!" Barret snorted, poking a massive finger toward the flickering screen.
"And didn't I tell you?" Alex inquired with a cunning look, in passing lightly scratching Yuffie's chin with a finger while she was still hanging on his shoulders.
"What exactly didn't you tell?" Tifa asked, once again sincerely amazed at how carefree and light-minded Alex could behave in such moments.
"Well, when a couple of days ago I arranged a luxurious seafood banquet for you… I bought all that right on the plate," Alex said in a cheerful tone, slightly shaking his head from side to side.
"Indeed… Buying expensive seafood and alcohol. Then your morning trip to the Plate. Buying a mountain of boxes of Queen's Blood card boosters and other trifles… How did you even manage to buy a bunch of stuff on the plate if you don't even have an official account in the Shinra bank?" Biggs nodded, crossing his arms on his chest and intently staring at Alex.
"And who told you that I don't have an account in the Shinra bank? It exists quite well! It's just that there wasn't a single gil there… right up until the moment I completely cleaned out the Turks' accounts," Alex answered with a laugh and with feigned importance slightly twirled a finger in the air.
"Repeat that… What did you do?!" Barret asked again in a stunned tone, sincerely believing that from fatigue he had started having auditory hallucinations.
"I'm saying that I cleaned out the Turks' personal accounts. And now I've become even richer! Isn't that obvious?" Alex drawled with exaggerated surprise, slightly jerking his head as if this mad scam was a self-evident thing.
Hearing direct confirmation from Alex, Barret even for certainty scratched his ear with his new cyber-arm — he was holy sure that because of the noise in the bar he had simply misheard. But when it finally dawned on him that Alex had indeed managed to clean out the Turks' personal accounts, Barret simply could not restrain himself and burst into deafening laughter, thoroughly clapping his huge palm on the tabletop!
Barret could not stop the amusement, amazed at how many mad and amazing things had happened since the appearance of Alex, Dean and Aerith in their group. First they had with incredible chic destroyed an entire Mako reactor without subjecting the peaceful residents of the slums to the slightest danger.
Closing the chain of miracles, he himself had received a high-tech cyber-arm with which he could not only tenderly hug his little Marlene but also at any moment use this prosthesis as a habitual machine gun. Biggs and Wedge also dissolved into desperate laughter, vividly imagining the twisted faces of the Turks at that very moment when they discovered absolutely empty bank accounts.
Even the usually restrained Tifa found it hard to hide a joyful smirk, looking at how Biggs and Wedge thoroughly grimaced, parodying the frozen shock of the Shinra agents. Claudia, watching Alex, smiled slightly — the bold trick of stealing huge money from the corporation seemed quite amusing to her.
While all the comrades laughed in unison over another line in the list of Alex's feats, Dean unhurriedly approached the bar counter with his green pot-bellied Steve on his shoulder. Looking over Alex's shoulder, Dean saw the flickering advertising banner of Costa del Sol. Lightly scratching his chin, Dean with feeling patted Alex on the shoulder and suggested later definitely heading to this place and properly relaxing.
Alex silently raised a thumb upward, letting him know that they would indeed soon go there. But the moment Dean received such an answer, it in that same second dawned on him: they would end up at the resort for a completely different reason that would be up to the ears tied to all that crap they had managed to get into.
"Well… we'll still rest!" Aerith encouraged in a sweet tone, winking, looking at Dean's face that had instantly twisted from irritation.
"Yeah-yeah, whatever you say, flower girl. Damn, I even rested more in hell than in the last year with this guy!" Dean waved it off and roughly patted her on the head, tousling her hair.
"Oy! Why are you so rude?!" Aerith said offendedly, hurriedly adjusting her disheveled hairstyle.
"Because Dean is a grumpy old man who's already itching to go to the resort," Alex teased with a smile, slightly stretching and rubbing his stiff neck.
"Right on the money, dude… And now where's my beer?! Because all these sweet talks about resorts are already starting to piss me off like crazy," Dean said with a smirk, unceremoniously leaning over the bar counter and reaching for a cool bottle.
Grabbing two bottles of cool beer — for himself and for his little pot-bellied Steve, Dean unhurriedly returned to the table to continue the enthusiastic game of Queen's Blood. After all, Wedge and Biggs had already managed to blab to him that a large official tournament was held for this card game, and Dean was not at all averse to taking the main prize if such an opportunity presented itself.
Looking after the departing Dean, Alex shook his head and transferred his gaze to Jessie, who was still cheerfully laughing together with the others. Meeting her gaze, Alex conspiratorially winked, letting her know that right now he was booking tickets for her parents — and in such a way that everything would look as if she herself had bought them. Jessie at first fervently tried to refuse, perfectly understanding that a trip to such a fashionable resort cost completely insane money.
However, Alex only waved off her objections and right before her eyes in a couple of clicks registered two tickets, instantly paid for them, and in addition booked a luxurious room in the hotel for a whole month at once! Seeing exactly what Alex had done, she literally opened her mouth from shock — on the screen a sum with such a number of zeros lit up from which any resident of the Slums would have gotten dizzy.
Alex only lazily yawned in response to her stunned gaze: by his standards, such a price tag was mere pennies that he could easily replenish at any moment. Completely moved and struck by such incredible generosity, the happy Jessie joyfully laughed and immediately ran up to Alex, intending to tightly hug him.
Impulsively wrapping her arms around his neck, Jessie tenderly rubbed her cheek against his cheek. Considering that for such a gift it was worth once again imprinting a kiss of gratitude on Alex's face, Jessie leaned forward. But before her lips could touch his skin, right in front of Jessie's face Yuffie's little palm unceremoniously appeared, which sharply pushed her back!
Feeling the push, Jessie with a squint stared at Yuffie, who continued to hang on Alex's broad back like an insolent wild cat. In response to this angry look from Jessie, Yuffie only funny wrinkled her nose, letting her know that she did not intend to tolerate such tenderness right under her nose. Beginning to boil from such insolence, Jessie grabbed Yuffie and began with all her might to drag her off his shoulders.
"Let him go right now!" Jessie shouted, continuing to fiercely pull Yuffie by the shoulders.
"No! This is now my rightful place!" Yuffie shouted perkily, clinging to Alex with all four limbs for dear life.
"Since when did it become yours?!" Jessie asked in an irritated tone, not for a moment stopping attempts to tear the insolent Yuffie from Alex.
"Since this morning when I officially became part of the team! This is my place, so find yourself another!" Yuffie shouted in response, jerking so hard that she practically dragged Alex off the stool.
"That's not how it works! And anyway, I was in line before you, so get to the end!" Jessie spat irritably and, finding no other way out, began desperately tickling Yuffie under the arms so that she would finally release her clingy embraces.
"First come, first served! Those are the rules!" Yuffie answered squealing, beginning to desperately writhe and laugh from the terrible tickling, but still not releasing Alex from the lock.
Feeling how he was again zealously being pulled in different directions, Alex reacted to this in no way at all. Some of his wives regularly did exactly the same thing, so he had grown so used to such battles that he had learned to calmly work right in the epicenter of chaos. Bracing his feet against the lower part of the bar counter for stability, Alex returned with his head to what he had started all this for. Even despite the fact that tomorrow night in the Seventh Sector of the slums an extremely unpleasant event was supposed to occur, this did not mean at all that the assembled arc reactor would turn out to be a useless piece of iron.
Opening the most complex blueprints of the device, Alex began outputting calculations with a scope for the distant future. For a moment stopping typing, he stroked his chin and realized: when constructing the reactor he would still have to resort to his old proven trick — namely to creating a compressed star with the help of magic. In the end, his little mad assistants GIR and MIMI had already for a sufficiently long time been using exactly such an incredible energy source.
Shaking his head, Alex accidentally noticed that Aerith was intently peering at his monitor with an extremely smart expression on her face, sincerely trying to decipher the most ancient writings. Smiling at this picture, Alex affectionately stroked the tip of her little nose with a finger, letting her know that she shouldn't clutter her little head with these higher calculations.
Feeling his tender touch, Aerith smiled embarrassedly and shook her head — even though she really understood nothing in these schemes, she was still insanely interested in observing the process of creating things capable of turning the whole world upside down.
"I… I have absolutely no idea what these space calculations are?!" Wedge's embarrassed voice unexpectedly rang out right behind Alex's back.
"When did you even manage to approach here?!" Alex sincerely surprised, looking around and discovering that literally everyone present had grouped behind his stool, with the exception of perhaps Claudia and Dean.
"Approximately from the very moment when Jessie and Yuffie nearly staged a full-fledged duel for the right to occupy your back," Tifa answered with a light chuckle, expressively pointing a finger at the two girls who had instantly quieted down.
"Is that so… Clear. And don't you have other more important things to do? Or what?" Alex nodded, with sincere curiosity inquiring why such an unprecedented stir had arisen around his modest person.
"We've already completely planned everything for tomorrow, so we can perfectly help you with this high-tech thing of yours — whatever it turns out to be!" Barret responded cheerfully, with feeling patting Alex on the shoulder.
"And that's even better! The help of loyal minions is never superfluous," Alex noted with a satisfied grin, confidently raising a thumb upward.
Hearing the word "minions" from Alex's lips, Dean immediately snorted loudly with laughter — he knew perfectly well that on the orbital space station Alex really had a whole army of real yellow pot-bellied fellows in denim overalls living! Shaking his head at Dean's chuckles, Alex immediately got to work. In his plans was to completely finish constructing the energy source right by sunrise so as to immediately see what it would all result in and how the Planet itself would react to the appearance of the new device.
Getting down to business, Alex clearly distributed tasks among everyone who had volunteered to help. He decided to begin with using magic to unnoticed strengthen absolutely all the electrical wiring in the Seventh Sector of the slums, since precisely the Seventh Heaven bar was supposed to become the main distribution hub. To Alex's great fortune, Jessie and Biggs understood technical blueprints sufficiently well to understand without extra words what was required of them.
In the boiling work no one even noticed how rapidly several hours flew by — and now the apparatus was already ready more than halfway. In the process of assembly Alex from time to time unnoticed resorted to magic, right before their eyes changing the structure of the parts and giving them incredible strength.
Arranging a small smoke break, Alex lazily leaned against the edge of the table, thinking that the idea of making the device extremely compact had turned out to be an absolutely correct decision. In the case of any emergency situation it could be without the slightest problem transferred to a completely different sector of the slums under the guise of the most ordinary trash can.
"And what is this terribly heavy box?" the approaching Yuffie inquired, with difficulty holding in her hands a tightly sealed metal crate.
"These are palladium ingots. Precisely they will become our main energy source," Alex answered in a calm tone, with a habitual motion flicking gray ash from the cigar into the ashtray.
"Oh how… Cool!" Yuffie responded in an absolutely carefree tone and with a dull thud set the box with the ingots back in place.
Alex looked at Yuffie with a warm gaze — he understood perfectly well that behind her carefree teenage behavior was hidden deep anxiety for the future of her native country. With her seemingly absolutely innocent questions about the principles of the devices' work Yuffie was in reality trying to learn as many details as possible about how the arc reactor functioned.
Bringing the thin cigar to his lips, Alex took a light drag and smoothly exhaled gray smoke through his nose, continuing to observe Yuffie. He was completely not against it if she in the end directly asked him for the blueprints. However, even if the schemes ended up in her hands, their independent realization would take Wutai not one decade. Moreover, such a technology could easily provoke yet another bloody war between Wutai and Shinra.
Or — what was even worse — Wutai would repeat Shinra's aggressive actions and itself unleash a large-scale conquest. Having lived more than half a year in Night City, Alex knew perfectly well how corporate wars usually begin and end and what a terrible price ordinary people pay for them. Once again heavily sighing from the endless egoistic greed of people, Alex slightly ruffled Yuffie's hair, who with a smile was deftly juggling locksmith tools.
Feeling the warm touch on her head, Yuffie tore away from her occupation, looked at Alex and questioningly tilted her head to the side. Slightly smirking, Alex only shook his head, letting her know that he had done this simply so. Shrugging, Yuffie as if nothing had happened continued to juggle.
Hiding a smirk, Alex transferred his gaze and met eyes with Aerith, who immediately smiled sweetly at him and inspiringly clenched her fists in front of herself, showing with her whole appearance that she boundlessly believed in him. Quietly chuckling at this sincere gesture of support, Alex extinguished the cigar and together with the rested comrades returned to work with new strength.
To be continued...
(So we continue to move forward, and I continue to make further plans for the plot. Well, if you do the math, there are only three days left until the events in Midgar end. Wow, that's really not enough, if you look at it that way. We're certainly skipping that nonsense with Don Corneo being dead, or... Hmm. I'm still debating whether to throw this card away at this point or save it for later. I won't tell you what card it is. For now, let's move on. Leave any other questions about the plot to my secretary. I'll go make myself some food. Peace, love, and escape are inevitable.)
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