Guilt’s Cost: Part CVII

Repairs

Tseng brought Vincent a simple black jumpsuit and stood back as the nurse got to the task of getting him dressed. Once that was done, Tseng wheeled Vincent down to the cafeteria wanting desperately to watch his brother finally eat. Sitting at a table were Reno, Angel, Rayna, D, and Porter. Tseng parked Vincent with them and went to go get the food.

Angel at once ran over to her father and threw her arms around him. "You’re better!"

He smiled at her reaction. "Yes, I am."

She eventually went back to her seat, her cheeks marked with tears of happiness. "You had us all so worried!"

"I know, I’m sorry." Vincent said, feeling a little self-conscious that everyone was looking at him.

"Aw the fuck, I knew he’d be fine." Reno nudged Angel in the side. "Didn’t I?"

She gave him very little regard. "So Tifa went to Rocket, I hear."

"Yes." Vincent nodded slightly, pained to relate the information. "Cid’s wife didn’t survive childbirth and Tifa is going to stay to help him with the baby for a while."

There was a low mumble of condolences around the table, even from Rayna and Porter who didn’t know the people in question.

Vincent looked over to Porter, noticing that the former Turk was sitting at an awkward angle due to the pain his wound still caused him. "How are you?"

Porter shrugged. "Fine. They got me put back together pretty good."

Tseng returned with a tray of food and sat next to Vincent. As everyone looked on, Tseng began to feed his brother like an infant. Vincent put his dignity aside for the moment and ate knowing that he needed it.

Porter leaned forward on his elbows and narrowed his eyes. "You’re still not able to move?"

"No." Vincent managed between mouthfuls.

"I bet Hojo programmed your control circuits to scramble if you were taken out of the building." Porter said, becoming quite intrigued. "That’s what he’s done before."

"That’s more or less what Hojo said to me." Vincent replied.

"Yeah, Hojo pulls that a lot, thinking that no one will be able to use anything that he throws away or that escapes. I had the same problem with D at first, but I fixed that."

Tseng caught the implication of what the Turk had just said and rose to his feet. "What? You know how to repair Hojo’s electronics?"

Porter raised his eyebrows. "Yeah, that’s nothing. I’ve spent enough time messing around with Hojo’s devices to know how they work."

Tseng was amazed. This man must be extraordinarily intelligent to be self-taught in Hojo’s twisted version of electronics. "Can you fix my brother?"

The young man shrugged. "Sure, when do you want me to do it?"

"Now!" Tseng almost shouted, excited at the prospect of having his brother functional again.

Porter looked over at Rayna. "Shall we?"

She smiled and got up. "I think we own it to Mr. Valentine."

Tseng wheeled Vincent back to his room followed by Porter hobbling along on his crutches, Rayna, Angel, and Reno with the dog D taking up the rear. They all filed inside and Reno helped Tseng get Vincent back out of the wheelchair and laid out on the bed. D went over to the couch and immediately laid down upon it making himself quite at home.

As Vincent was placed onto the bed, his natural fear of being worked on arose but it was overcome by his need to escape the humiliation his paralysis was causing him. "Okay, I’m ready."

Porter looked at his intended project and realized that he was going to have to get Vincent out of the jumpsuit he had just so recently donned. Knowing that Vincent would probably appreciate some privacy for this, Porter turned to the others. "Uh, this is going to take a while. Angel, can you maybe take Rayna out for a while?"

Angel at once knew what was up and smiled in return. "Sure. I need to go topside shopping; maybe we can get her some things while we’re at it. Come on Reno, you’re coming too."

"Aw fuck can’t I stay here?" Reno protested placing his hands on his hips.

"No, come on." Angel said grabbing his hand and heading toward the door.

Soon Tseng, Porter, and Vincent found themselves alone, with the exception of the dog that was by now snoring loudly on the couch. Tseng helped Porter get Vincent stripped. Vincent closed his eyes to shut out all that which was happening around him.

It wasn’t long before Porter had a panel on the upper portion of Vincent’s left thigh flipped open. Knowingly he plucked out some unknown component and eyed it. "Yeah, just like I figured. The bio-converters are fried. I’m gonna probably need four of these things."

"Quigley…" Tseng said.

"What?" Porter turned to look at him.

"Quigley." Tseng repeated. "He was working on converters while at Shin Ra. He’ll know what to do."

"Oh." Porter smiled, not yet aware that Quigley was here. "That’s right…"

Tseng quickly ran out of the room without needing to think of where he was headed. He fled down the hall as fast as he thought his heart could handle. When he reached the door he knocked excitedly.

The door cracked open and the blond peered out at him. "Yes?"

"We need you." Tseng ordered. "Porter is trying to fix Vincent and he needs help with the bio-converters."

His face quickly brightened and he let the door open the rest of the way. "Just a second. Let me get some things."

Tseng waited anxiously until Quigley reemerged with a small box in his hands. He had amassed several different components over his two years at Shin Ra and had possessed the foresight to take some of them with him upon fleeing Midgar. "Okay, let’s go."

Tseng practically dragged the slow moving man back to Vincent’s room. Upon returning they found that Porter had popped open several other panels on Vincent’s extremities and had many ruined components lain out on the floor.

This was the first time that Porter and Quigley had seen each other since the latter had left Midgar with Reno.

Porter smiled broadly at seeing his old friend. "Quigley! I knew you were too nice a guy to really be a researcher for Hojo."

Quigley gave his own lazy smile. "And I always thought you were too nice to be a Turk."

Porter laughed but then noticed what Quigley was holding. "Please tell me you have converters in that box."

Quigley walked over to the bed and opened the box then dumping its contents onto the bed. "How’s that?"

Porter’s eyes went wide as he inspected all that the box had contained. There were dozens of converters of various sizes along with several control chips and other things. "Quig, you’re fucking amazing…"

"Yup." Quigley immediately bent down and looked into the opened hatch on Vincent’s right arm. He at once knew what to do and grabbed a converter and placed it into the slot vacated by the faulty one. Seeing that it powered up correctly, he began to tinker with other components inside Vincent’s arm.

On the other side of Vincent’s body Porter was doing much the same. They both worked intensely tuning out the world around them. Both Quigley and Porter were in their element and it showed in the way they worked in perfect unison.

Tseng watched quite impressed that the Turk was proceeding just as quickly and effectively as the researcher who had spent years in school learning this very subject. There was clearly much more to Porter than met the eye.

After a few hours Porter and Quigley both backed off knowing that they had done all they could. They stood with Tseng and looked on hopefully, waiting for Vincent’s body to power up enough to move on its own.

Several minutes later, Vincent slowly raised up his right arm and smiled. "You did it."