Perhaps one of the strangest turn of events in Vincent’s flashback was when Hojo, a scientist presumably untrained in firearms, kills Vincent, a professional shooter, in one shot. One would assume Vincent’s training as a Turk gave him the upper hand, but how then did Hojo get the first shot off? With Vincent’s reflexes, he should have been able to fire on Hojo the moment Hojo began to raise his gun. So why didn’t Vincent kill Hojo?
Carefully watching the flashback scene reveals some of Vincent’s intent. The first thing that stands out is that Vincent was not intent on killing Hojo.
Vincent confronted Hojo after finding Lucrecia’s body on the floor of the inn, believing her dead or dying. When Vincent runs to the basement, his first course of action was to argue with Hojo. During the argument, Vincent looks to be shouting at Hojo and gestures quite a bit with his arms, but at no point did Vincent draw his gun. If Vincent’s intent was to kill Hojo, Vincent should have had a weapon in his hands long before he reached the laboratory basement.
One can speculate on why Vincent did not intend to kill Hojo. Perhaps it was out of respect for Lucrecia, who did not want Hojo killed. Perhaps Vincent wanted Hojo to live with the burden of being responsible for Lucrecia’s death. Whatever the reason, it is clear Vincent did not want to kill Hojo during the confrontation. If Vincent wanted to kill Hojo, he would not have rushed into the lab unprepared.
The next strange occurrence is when Hojo finally points a gun at Vincent. After Vincent says what he came to say, Vincent just stands unmoving in front of Hojo. Vincent does not move as Hojo shakes his head and pulls out a gun. Vincent does not even raise an arm as Hojo points and fires the weapon. Only after the bullet has hit do we see Vincent move again, this time in pain as he weakly raises his arm out towards Hojo before crumpling to the floor, mortally wounded from the shot.
The scene moved quickly, but even a normal person would have reacted in some way to having a gun pulled on them. Vincent was a Turk so his reflexes in this situation should have been much faster than any normal person. If he wanted to avoid the shot, Vincent would have done something, whether it be drawing his gun or attempting to dodge. But Vincent stands perfectly still, giving Hojo an easy target. It looks as if Vincent wanted Hojo to kill him.
I have watched the flashback scene many times, trying to decipher why Hojo was able to shoot Vincent, and I have changed my opinion on the matter several times. But in all the possible explanations, the simplest is that Vincent let Hojo shoot him.
But why would Vincent let Hojo kill him? Shouldn’t Vincent have wanted revenge on Hojo?
Thinking about these questions, I realized that if Vincent was determined to get revenge from the beginning, he wouldn’t have waited until Cloud and the others found him in the coffin to go after Hojo. Some time during Vincent’s long sleep in the coffin, he started to believe Hojo needed to pay for his part in Lucrecia’s death. Before this, Hojo was not the main person Vincent held responsible for Lucrecia’s death.
Vincent held himself responsible for what had happened to Lucrecia. Vincent was unable to stop the experiment that led to her death; all he was able to do was watch as she died. Vincent views this as his sin, even though Hojo or Lucrecia most likely could have stopped the experiment if they wanted to.
Vincent may have believed that he deserved to die as punishment for his sin, and when Hojo pulled the gun on him, Vincent allowed himself to be shot. Perhaps even if Vincent did not feel he deserved to die, he desired death for another reason.
Even after Vincent’s long sleep in the coffin, it is clear that he is still consumed with the pain of Lucrecia’s death. If his feelings for Lucrecia in the present border on obsession, his pain at the time of her death must have felt unbearable.
Perhaps the only thing Vincent did desire was to die rather than live without his love. Confronting Hojo with this mindset, Vincent would have wanted Hojo to kill him. That way Vincent could be free of his pain, and perhaps be with Lucrecia again, if only in death.
It must have been horrifying for Vincent to wake up on Hojo’s operating table alive when he wanted to be dead and free of his pain. Perhaps Hojo’s greatest cruelty to Vincent was saving his life.