Cell Division

I respectfully credit all Original Creators, namely Squaresoft, which became SquareEnix,for these characters. In this way, I pay homage to my Fandom's Original Creator, and illustrate my Community's belief that Fan Fiction is "fair use". I do not claim to own these characters. I do not make money or gil from using these protected characters, nor do I wish to make money or gil from them. In other words, I am borrowing these characters to entertain the adult fanfiction community, but I am doing so with the highest degree of respect to the engineers, game designers, music makers, voice actors.



He made Johnson run the treadmill, just like he promised, but he made him do it while holding an eighty-five pound oxygen tank.

“If you get breathless, just open the tank a bit,” he advised. “If you drop it, however, pray that your family has insurance on you. There are a lot of open flames around here.” As he spoke he lit a cigarette and reached for the brightly painted red valve on top of the tank. He released it for a half-second. “Yes, it’s full. Good.”

Hojo gestured to one of his staff. “Diggory, make sure Johnson here stays on the treadmill for two hours.”

“Yes, sir,” Diggory said, smiling and pulling a stopwatch from his coat.

We left a very stricken looking Johnson.

Hojo sat the other man down and proceeded to do everything to him that he’d done to me last night, except he did it roughly. “Word of advice to you, Daniels,” he said, taking a very long time with the blood pressure reading. “Don’t defend fools.”

“Yes, sir, Professor Hojo,” Daniels said in a subdued voice. “Do what you like, but I have to say I don’t see how a little whistle harmed anything.” His eyes went to me. “She’s pretty. Johnson just showed her he thought so.”

“I’m sure she could have lived through her life without the knowledge,” Hojo replied. “What makes you think a woman wants to hear whistling wherever she goes? What makes you think they want your approval?” He took a syringe full of bright green, glowing liquid and jabbed it into Daniels’ neck, depressing the plunger. “This is why you young bucks don’t get laid as often as the older ones. You have no class.”

I smiled. He hit that nail on the head.

“Think about it, stupid,” Hojo went on, jabbing him in the arm with a different syringe full of yellow fluid. “I know you’d just love it if a pretty girl walked up to you and showed her appreciation for your big muscles, big sword and big crotch-bulge. Still, women don’t usually appreciate observations, even in the form of a little whistle.”

“I never looked at it like that,” Daniels said, eyeing me again while rubbing his arm. “Sorry, Miss Grey.”

Hojo nodded. “Very good. Just for that I’ll skip the prostate exam. Get lost.”

“Thank you, sir,” Daniels said, rocketing off the stool. He disappeared out the door as fast as I’d ever seen someone move.

Hojo looked at me. “You seem a bit fatigued,” he noted. “Go rest awhile.”

I left him immediately for fear my collar might do something to me.

**********************************************************************************


I awoke to the sound of gentle rain.

Surprised, I opened my eyes. I shouldn’t be able to hear rain in this section of the building. We were underground.

I turned my head to look out my half-open door. I’d left it that way because Hojo arranged it so last night, and I suspected he wanted a view of me. I saw him sitting at his desk, smoking and typing with equal swiftness. The keyboard sounds actually united with the rain pleasingly. Drowsy but interested, I just watched him awhile.

He moved very efficiently.

Unbidden, I entertained the question of what sort of lover he’d prove. He struck me as a man who would take his time with a woman. Only once had I ever kept a boyfriend like that, but he’d made himself that way because he had a little penis.

Somehow, I didn’t think Hojo had genitalia challenges. Little men usually betrayed themselves in big ways, ironically. They walked big and talked big and drove big cars. Hojo neither exaggerated nor underplayed his body language.

He had gentle, warm hands. I hadn’t wrapped my mind around that at first. Really, I’d gone to thinking of him as cold and remote to…I didn’t know, something else. And, I’d changed my opinion overnight. That worried me. He had a lot of charisma when he chose to apply himself to that end.

I knew what Captor’s Syndrome was. I didn’t think I had it. Being a marriage counselor for many years made me something of a better-than-average shrink. I wasn’t ignoring Hojo’s unpleasant qualities, nor would I turn down my freedom if he offered it. However, despite being essentially his slave, I was starting to admire him.

He got up from his desk and tuned his radio to another station. Just before he sat, a knock came at his door. He sighed loudly. “Yes?”

“Lunch, sir,” a woman’s voice said.

“Bring it in, Tracy,” he replied. His eyes went to me. “You can join me, Miss Grey.”

Caught staring again. Damn it.

I got up and padded barefoot into the office. A tall, beautiful woman with long, shining auburn hair came in the room, her arms full of Wutai takeout. Her beauty took my breath away. Her brilliant blue eyes fixed upon me. “Hello,” she said, smiling.

I almost tried to answer her, forgetting my throat due to her unreal loveliness.

“Miss Grey can’t answer you Tracy, so stop flirting,” Hojo ordered, taking the food from her. He looked at her short, red dress and high heels. “Are you on your way to a party or are you taking a wardrobe lesson from Scarlet the Harlot?”

Tracy laughed, showing off one of her perfect legs with a little, unladylike kick of amusement. “I’m attending the opera with George tonight.”

“Lucky George,” Hojo said neutrally, opening a rice box and picking up chopsticks.

“Speaking of lucky, Professor, have you gotten anywhere on my little infertility problem?” Tracy posed herself on Hojo’s desk, leaning toward him slightly. “I spent an awful lot of time on your table.” Her voice grew husky. “An awful, awful lot of time, doctor,” she stressed again, thrusting her breasts out.

Hojo started eating, not batting an eye. “You know that shit doesn’t work on me, Tracy,” he said. “Why do you even try?”

Tracy stuck her lip out. “I keep hoping you’ll change your mind.”

“Besides, I made you,” Hojo continued before taking a sip of his drink. His eyes went to me. “Don’t be bashful, Miss Grey. Grab a box.”

“And, I’m eternally thankful for that,” Tracy told him, sliding off the desk. “Sometimes I wish I worked in your department.”

“I’m thankful you don’t, my dear,” Hojo replied. “No one would get anything done. I can’t see how your supervisor puts up with you.”

“He’s doing me, too,” Tracy said smugly.

Hojo gave a short little laugh that I now recognized as true amusement. “I didn’t think he had it in him.”

“He has it in me, for sure.” Tracy sauntered back to the door. “Want me to send Carson or Michael out for your dinner? No one should eat in the cafeteria twice in one day.”

“Yes, tell Michael to get me two steak dinners from Locomotion at six and bring them here to my office.” Hojo waved Tracy on. “There’s a good girl. I’m still working on your little fertility issue. I’ll inform you the moment I have a breakthrough. You walk in heels beautifully, by the way.”

“My sister taught me.”

The door closed. Hojo breathed a sigh. His eyes cut to me. “Yes?”

I shrugged. I couldn’t very well ask him about anything. The last time I wrote a question down he ignored it. Besides, asking would break doctor-patient confidentiality.

“Don’t take her seriously, Miss Grey,” he said. “She’s a terrible flirt, and, like Rufus Shinra, she likes blondes.”

I hadn’t been that upset by Tracy flirting with me. Still, I nodded. I wondered what Hojo meant when he said he’d made her.

“You must find the bed uncomfortable,” he said, changing the topic. “You don’t sleep for very long, and I know you’re physically run down.” He put his food down to roll my eyelid up and look at my sclera. “Simmons’ little band of thugs didn’t abuse you, did they?”

Aside from accidentally injuring my voice box, no. I mouthed the word, remembering to tag on the honorific.

“They didn’t sexually assault you?”

Again, no. Sir.

“Do you have any blank spots in your memory?”

No, sir.

“I’m curious as to why they targeted you in the first place,” he mused. “Simmons’ band is usually the straight robbery sort. Shin-Ra keeps them around to distract the locals from a new drilling site.”

I gave up. Taking a piece of paper from his desk, I grabbed a pencil.

They got me at the drilling site. I was walking to the airstrip for a flight and cut through the place to save time. I was a security risk, I suppose.

Hojo read. He eyed me. “You were successful in your field if you could afford airfare,” he pointed out.

I wrote again.

I had great success counseling in Wutai. The clients generally paid me in materia, which is worth more here.

Hojo pulled his desk chair out and put it beside me. He then sat, trading his lunch for a clipboard. I started to put mine down, but he stopped me. “Eat,” he said firmly. “While you eat, listen.”

I nodded.

“Suppose you reached the top of your career and you met someone who not only shared your interests, but shared your passion for the work.” Hojo put his fingers together and looked up at the ceiling. “Now, suppose you married this person after a decent enough romance and lived happily with them for several years.”

I knew instantly he was talking about himself. I’d had marriage issues couched to me in every different manner over the years, both subtle and blunt.

“Your mate begins to pull away from you gradually, but you don’t notice it too much because you work together and still communicate quite well in that aspect.”

I could see him doing that. He seemed to take his work very seriously.

“Eventually, your mate is proven adulterous. You shoot their playmate.”

I blinked. I heard my food drop back in the box as my hand flexed. He what?

Hojo looked at me askance. “Is it erroneous to adjudge this will be the end of the problem?”

I swallowed hard. Slowly, I put my rice and chicken down and held out my hand for the clipboard. He gave it over.

Holy Ifrit. What to tell him? Did he honestly expect shooting a spouse’s lover to be the end of the affair?

I noted he used the word mate instead of spouse or wife. Mate stood as a more primal term, suggesting more attachment, more ownership. Easy to believe he had dominance issues; I was his unpaid slave, after all. And, he ruled his lab strictly. He must have taken severe umbrage to the insult of infidelity.

I wondered if his wife was still alive. Somehow, I didn’t think so.

I’ve seen a lot of adultery in my office, I wrote. There doesn’t seem to be any set action to end the bitter feelings between two people when cheating happened. Everyone has things they’ll live with or they won’t. The problem comes when the two are co-dependant; they have resentment but are unwilling to let go.

Hojo looked at my answer. Frowning thoughtfully, he tapped the paper a few times. I ate a few more bites of food, watching him openly.

“What do you start with?” he asked. “Both people at once or separately?”

I held up my forefinger.

“One at a time, at first?”

Yes, sir, I mouthed.

“The man or the woman?”

It truly depended on who approached me first, but usually the woman. I made a curvy outline in the air.

Hojo smiled. “You do well without words,” he commented. “I can usually see what you’re thinking, but then you throw these delightful little charades into the mix.”

His phone rang.

“Fuck,” he said succinctly. He got up and punched a button before sinking back down. “Yes?”

A male voice sounded. “Professor, sir, the med school just called. They want to know if you’ll guest lecture tomorrow. Dr. Andrews cancelled on a speech.”

“Is my schedule free?” Hojo picked up another box of takeout and opened it.

I heard papers shuffling. “Yes, if you intend to make it a two-hour instruction, sir. The lecture was scheduled for one in the afternoon.”

“I can’t teach anyone how to do anything in two hours,” Hojo said irritably.

“Begging your pardon, sir, but you taught me how to use the gene splicer in twenty-eight point five minutes.” The voice said.

“Put the calculator away, Michael,” Hojo snapped. “Alright, fine. Tell them I’ll come. If I miss anything else, too bad. The med school pays well.”

“They promised ten thousand gil, sir,” Michael said.

Hojo smirked. “You’re damn right they did.” He reached over and punched the phone off.

Ten thousand gil for a two hour lecture. I stuffed food in my face to keep from reacting to that.

I felt surprised when he immediately dialed out. “Michael?” he asked.

“Yes, sir?”

“Requisition a new bed for my office outlet. Miss Grey cannot sleep on this one.”

“Any specifics, sir?”

Hojo glanced at me. “Make it a size larger and fairly soft,” he said, judging my tastes absolutely. “Order outside the firm for the sheets.”

I heard typing. “Percale?”

“Go extravagant. Put the expense down for my sleep lab.” He hung up again.

“There’s no law that says your cage can’t be gilded,” he told me, once again taking up his food.