Here's a weird archival find - An alternate ending to Chapter 12 turned up in some old old old old OLD files from hojo.org back in the day:

Vincent himself was wondering how he allowed himself to become so soft. It wasn't good for him, and he had known it. Stupid Lucrecia. Why had she come back to haunt him now that he had himself firmly secure in his rut? He could have led a happy frivolous, uneventful life if she hadn't resurfaced. She had sliced open a dreadful wound that had nearly killed him once.

Why now?

He was thoroughly enjoying himself the way he was now.

Lucrecia materialized through the mirror, slightly blotting out Vincent's favorite image. She had not come at the right time. He contorted his face into an unbecoming frown and, without a word, stomped out of the bathroom.

Lucrecia was hurt. ~What's wrong, my soul?~

Vincent was sitting on his bed, pouting like a little boy. "Go away."

Lucrecia floated to be in front of the face she had loved so well...a face that now had a few dark circles, but was still handsome as ever. Vincent turned away every time she got in front of him. ~Vin--~

"Are you deaf? I don't want to talk to you!"

Lucrecia blinked back tears. ~Wh-why not?~

"I got over you. Like you asked me to. And now you're just tromping your way back in? Dammit, Lucrecia, don't you know what you want?!"

~I...thought I could talk to you for comfort. I guess I was wrong,~ she said, starting to cry.

Vincent closed his eyes. He used to spring up and want to kill the reason why she was crying. He guessed she was still used to this. He rolled his eyes. "Wait."

Lucrecia's ghost turned around hopefully, smartly, brightly, beautifully. The only things that had really mattered back then. What did they mean to him? ~Yes?~

"Am I Sephiroth's father?" he asked gloomily.

~Hojo rais--~

"Am I Sephiroth's sire?" he asked, a tinge of exhaustedness in his voice.

No loophole. ~Yes...~

"GOD DAMMIT! Then everything I mourned about, everything I felt sorry for causing during that time was TRUE! I DID deserve to be in that fucking coffin!"

Lucrecia faltered. ~I'm sorry...~ she said at length.

Vincent was angry. Very, very angry.

Scientists, for all their smarts, were the stupidest people he ever met.

"Why did he TELL me he was his father?"

~Because he brought him up. He always wished the child was his. He was drunk. He was pathetic.~

"Then why didn't you set him straight? Me straight? Haven't you been watching me become..." at his current loss for words, he pointed an accusing finger at a teenie bopper poster of himself he had ripped out and posted on the wall, "...this?!"

Lucrecia looked at the floor. ~I had never known you to be wrong. I thought you knew what you were doing.~

Vincent grabbed his hair and suppressed a scream. "LUCRECIA!! Dammit, I'm not a god!! I'm not perfect! What made you think I ever was?! I'm a human, God dammit! HUMAN!!"

If he could have, he would have shaken her by the shoulders. Lucrecia blinked. ~God? That's something for simple people to explain the rain and why their dogs die to their children. True perfection can be achieved on earth, and you are it! Be proud!~

Vincent let his good hand slide down his face in exhaustion and sighed. Tears started to well up behind his eyes. Fans of his surely believed what she had said about him being perfect. That was all right by him. He would never see them again. They made no profound impact on his life. But his first fan, one whom he thought better than himself once...she thought that about him that way? Was content to watch him turn into a popular icon? Someone, whose class of people looked down on anything pop culture in favor of their microscopes.

He had done some thinking the other day and decided that the Media was a monster. And a liar. He was the face of that monster now. How could she love that monster? That monster was worse than Hojo's terminal case of unenlightenment. Unenlightenment? He remembered some of the letters his fans wrote, their screaming faces...Vincent was the flagship of the army that spread unenlightenment!

~What did I say?~

"TOO MUCH! Perfection on earth?! How do you think that makes me FEEL? How am I expected to keep this up?! I'm HUMAN, God dammit, God damn YOU, I make mistakes!!"

~But--~

Vincent slashed his claw at her. The ghost evaporated slightly, but didn't move. "Just leave me alone! I couldn't be yours if I wanted to live, I can't be the people's if I want to be myself, and I can't be myself with your damn fool clipboard hovering over me documenting me like some sort of perfect lab animal! God, I hate you and your STUPID religion!!"

~Religion? No. Science isn't a--~

"All of you idiots seem to act like it is. Taking things apart and gluing them back together...thinking there is no power greater than yourselves...how can you live like that? Arrogant strutting muddy self-loathing, cowering snivelling PEACOCKS! Anyone who uses their own imagination to explain anything is automatically a cave man to you people! What happened to stuff being magical? Had to dismantle it, explain it, package it, sell it to the masses like some kind of thaumic candy!"

~What are you talking about?~

"I don't know!" Vincent cried, putting his claw on his forehead. "I don't know anything anymore! Just leave me alone! That's all you've ever done. You're good at it. Stay that way."

~Are you trying to force your religion on me?~

"Are you trying to force your lack of religion on me?~

~NO!~

"There you have it. I bet you tried to when you died, didn't you...but no. It didn't last. It was a fad. I was a fad. I am a fad. And how does this fad feel? Damn fucking horrible! Do you know how that makes me feel?"

~No...~

"Do you know what I should do next?"

~Don't you?~

"NO, because I'm not God! You're not helping me at all, Lucrecia Hojo!"~Don't! Never call me that! Never!~ she cried.

"Hide from your past, but it's still there. That's no way to live. Face your past...accept it...then you might be able to live with yourself. And you are still alive. Jenova's still got you hooked up somewhere to something."

~Jenova is dead. Hojo's taken her place.~

"Then why don't you ask him to let you go? I'm sure he's dying to!"

~No! I still want to help you!~

"You're not helping me! You fawn, you praise, you tell me he's alive, but you can't tell me where he is. You're not helping! You're making me worse!"

~I would if I could! I'm trying to! Hojo is !~ Lucrecia's ghost mouthed the word 'Stripes.'

"He mutes you every time you try to say it. Heh. If this wasn't so grisly, I'd think it would be amusing. Or maybe he's not conciously muting it. Maybe you can't bring yourself to tell me...because underneath everything horrible he's ever done to you, there is a fine, shining gold wire of faithfulness still in you."

~NO!~

"I admire it."

Lucrecia turned to face him, frightened out of her wits. What was he thinking? ~What?~

"'Til death do we part, I believe is the vow."

(What do I do?) she thought. This violated the laws of existance, which in her head, were:
1-Vincent is always right.
2-She hates Hojo.
~Why is this happening? I hate Hojo. You're always right. You say I don't hate him. But that's got to be wrong, but you're never wrong! How can this be?!~

"I can be wrong, but I am not wrong about this," Vincent told her, supressing a smirk. If only Asimov could see her now.

~First law of Lucrecia is rendered useless...which means the second law, founded from the first law, equally useless? I lose all I hold adamant? Why?~

This was the first time Vincent Valentine had ever watched someone go insane. It wasn't pretty.

Hojo sat up in his bed. He heard Lucrecia. (Ah. So she's finally flipped, has she? Good for her. She'll be at this for hours, I guess. Poor little Turk. Witnessing this first-row center. Guess it's my turn to do the voice in the head thing...) he thought, laying back down and rolling his eyes up into his head.

Vincent.

Vincent's ears perked up. "Who's there?"

Cut the crap.
You know who I am.

"Hojo?! So! You finally show yourself, huh? You sound younger, more relaxed..."

Reinstate the first law of Lucrecia.

"What?"

VINCENT IS ALWAYS RIGHT.

"But that's a lie! I'm not--"

Do you want her screaming like a banshee, going insane?
I'm trying to help you.
Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, boy.

"Why don't you just let her go, then?"

Given up on your little lovebird are we?

"Look...if keeping her as a ghost is your way of getting your stupid, pointless revenge, then give it up! You're trying to reform, right? Let her go. Let her die, for Christ's sake!"

Ohhh...all right. Fine. Have it your way.

"Thank you!"

Wait.

"What?"

Deep down inside, you still love her, don't you?

Vincent closed his eyes for a while and thought a long while. Eventually, he nodded his head.

Good. Otherwise, it'd have been an awful waste of time.

Lucrecia started to flicker, then float to the floor. There was a burst of light and Lucrecia, who had regained all her former opacity, instead of shreiking at a banshidh frequency, lay quietly sobbing to herself on the floor. Vincent blinked, astonished. "Is this--"

She would live a hundred years if I could show her how.

Vincent smiled sadly. "Freak. You, too, huh?"

Heh. Astute. But she's gotten so used to being dead that she really wants to go. You have...one minute. It's cruel, but please make the most of--spoke too soon.

Vincent used up fifteen seconds on his kiss. It was as if she never aged. They both apologized and she died with no rancor or confusion in her heart. After he was done crying, Vincent closed his eyes. "Hojo...are you still there?"

She can't have you, the people can't have you...what are you going to do now?

"All I have now is my job."

Hmm...so the law, is it? Fine choice.

"You know if I see you anywhere, I'm going to kill you. Publicly."

Yes, I know.

"You're not safe. Where ever you are, where ever you hide away..."

You swear to me you will be there.

Vincent smirked. "Do not forget my name. Do not forget me, 24601."

Don't flatter me. I was never half the man Thenardier was.

"Don't berate yourself. There's no way you can survive with an attitude like that. What good is there in having an archenemy if I don't consider you a worthy opponent? And you are one, Hojo. I shall see you shortly."

Don't you wish? Heh heh heh.

"Men like you can never change...can you?"

That is none of your concern if I can. You can waste time trying to think of whether I'm really your enemy or not. Or you can charge forward, knowing your noble cause and what you are about to do is completely what I deserve.

"I take it you'd rather I hate you blindly, is that what you're asking?"

You could take it that way.

"I'm not sure if I want to play Javert to your ValJean. You'd come off so much better than I would, as usual."

Oh, come on. You don't have to die. We can still talk like civilized people. If you let me go, there's no crime in it. I've served a bit of time in Hell. I'm trying to give you a little bit of something to live for.

"All right. I'll humor you. For the sake of rivalry, I suppose," Vincent said, picking up Lucrecia's dead body. "What do you want me to do with this?"

Put her back down on the floor, lie down in your bed with your back to her, and go to sleep.

"What?"
You heard me, Valentine.

Vincent put her body on the floor and did what he was told. Meanwhile, Hojo came out of his trance and closed his eyes normally.
Everything that has ever been made came from the soil.
Underneath the soil flows the Lifestream.
Jenova flowed against the current of the Lifestream, causing the planet great damage.
This also had taken its toll on Jenova.
Hojo knew this now, and was not about to make the same mistake.
(Everything that was ever made came from the soil...came from the Lifestream. Therefore, all matter is in some way connected. Therefore, this bed is connected to Vincent's apartment floor...)

This thought process, combined with Stripes' Jenova-powers, allowed him to sink into the very matter of his bed, through half the city, ending up with his upper body kind of melting up from Vincent's floor. He wrapped his arms around Lucrecia's lifeless shell and melted his way back to his house.

He set her down on his bed and played with her bangs sadly, remembering the way things used to be. How she never got to hold her child. It was unfair. It had been cruel. There was no way to undo it. He bent down and whispered into his wife's ear: "If I could...I would."

Lucrecia's mouth twitched into a smile as Stripes laid his hand on her heart. Silently, she began to melt back into the bed. Hojo was sending her back to Midgar. Her birthplace. The exact spot she had he had met over fifty years ago.

"This chapter of my life is done with, my love. I forgive you. Please forgive me. Rest in peace, Mr, and Mrs. Arg Hojo."