A/N: Special thanks to Unseen Watcher, whose comments often inspire me. Fic named by Yorugu. Written for the 30quills community on LiveJournal. Slightly AU. No pairings. Ph34r teh corn N cheese.
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Sojourners
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Chapter One
No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.
When Vincent found Cloud, he was seated upon his usual bench. There was a gentle breeze, and fallen leaves decked the grassy fields beneath.
He was struck by a sudden revelation at how nothing had changed. How a few thousand years had passed since Meteor almost struck the Planet, and yet nothing had changed. Cloud still sported blond, spikey hair, favoured large broadswords and donned drab, lifeless clothing. And Vincent, he still stuck to his long, tousled mane with little to next alteration in his choice of colour and clothing.
Cloud once said that it was because neither of them were ready to let go of the memories of that era in time. The era in time which marked and defined their being.
Vincent was not sure if he agreed.
He stood behind the bench, a good distance away. Quiet enough to be unobtrusive, conspicuous enough to be noticed. With his silence, Cloud neither acknowledged nor discredit Vincent's presence. He seemed to be thinking about something. There was a small book wedged comfortably between his two hands. Vincent did not attempt to make a guess at what Cloud was reading, knowing that if the blond deemed it necessary, he would reveal the details to him in due time.
Which he did.
"Once upon a time," read Cloud outloud, in a quiet, monotonous voice, "there lived a Prince. He was very beautiful, with a perfect face and long, silver hair. The Prince lived in the Kingdom of Shinra. The Kingdom of Shinra was a rich and prosperous country. The Prince had everything he wanted - people, land and money. This made him very cold and proud. He did not speak to people he did not like. His heart became hard and unkind. One day, a travelling witch visited the castle. She asked for a room to stay for the night. The Prince, who was cold and unkind, turned her down harshly. Angry at the way she was treated, the witch spat upon the gates of the castle and cursed the Prince and his Kingdom. 'In seven moons, if you are not be able to get a fair Princess to marry you of her own free will, a calamity from the sky shall rain down upon your Kingdom, and you can do nothing to save those in your Kingdom.'..."
"'Ipsen's Abridged Edition of Popular Fairytales' again?" Vincent decided to cut Cloud's recital off at that point. After all, he was fairly familiar with the outcome of the story. Cloud said nothing. He closed the book in his hands and tucked it under an arm. Standing up, he turned around and nodded at Vincent, who had to hide his chuckle. Vincent continued, "You never did tell me if you wrote that story, or if someone else did."
Cloud smiled softly, almost teasingly. "What if I did, and what if I didn't?"
Vincent was silent. As if he knew the answer was obvious enough to remain unrequited.
"I like to read about the old times," Cloud carried on with a shrug. He rounded the bench in purposeful strides and walked calmly towards Vincent, the book still under his arm. "It's interesting to know how the future people view major events of ancient times. Our time."
"I do not see how a few thousand years can make people forget what really happened and change someone as evil as Sephiroth into a Prince going on a search for his one true love to prevent the Calamity that had already happened prior to his birth," Vincent shook his head in disbelief. Cloud laughed out loud.
"People like to romanticise things." The blond waved the book he held in his hands slightly. "That's why we have fairytales." In a wistful voice, he continued, "...besides, no man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks..."
Vincent neither agreed nor disagreed with that. "Cloud," the man's tone became slightly more serious, "...the Cetra Seers want us to deliver something to the Icicle Area."
Cloud blinked, his musings about romanticism and fairytales all but forgotten. "They must be kidding."
A nod of agreement. "My sentiments exactly. Although they do not seem to share our hesitation."
"Do they /know/ what's going on in the Planet now, outside of their safe refuge in the Ancient Temple?" Cloud frowned. He started walking, past Vincent, towards a dilapidated cottage in the background.
Vincent turned as Cloud brushed by him, and followed the blond. "The Seers never tell us anything we want to know."
"That doesn't mean they should send us on a suicide mission to the North," Cloud retorted.
"Perhaps they feel we are the only ones strong enough to fight off the Bazookas."
This made Cloud halt abruptly. He turned to look at Vincent. There was a deep frown knitted across his eyebrows. And if Vincent stared hard enough, he thought he could see a childish pout of defiance as well. The blond then sighed softly. He put a hand over his forehead and closed his eyes, likely trying to think of a way out of the mission which he perceived would lead to certain disaster.
There was none.
A few hours later, Cloud found himself in the exact same pose of resigned reluctance, when he stood before the Council of Seers in the bowels of the Ancient Temple. It had been a long time since the Seers had requested for their services. Now that there were no longer true Cetra on the Planet, there was no way the inhabitants in the world could hear the voices of the Planet, to know how the Planet felt about certain things. The Seers were a group of pseudo Cetra who were given limited powers by the Planet itself to talk to it. Through these people, the Planet communicated its feelings. Sometimes, what the Planet wanted would benefit the people living on it. Most of the time, however, it benefitted only itself. A long time ago, Vincent had called the Planet childish and selfish. Cloud was inclined to agree.
Yet he could never say no to this childish and selfish Planet.
He thought long and hard about what the Seers had just told him. There was no good conclusion to draw. "...are you sure?" He could only ask, hoping against hope that he had heard the instructions wrong. "A delivery to the North? At a time like this?"
The leader of the Seers, a stoned-looking old man known to the world as The Great Seer, nodded.
"I disapprove!" Cloud immediately objected.
"You're not part of the Seer Council, Cloud," Vincent remarked monotonously from beside his friend. He sounded amused at Cloud's outburst.
Cloud turned and look at Vincent. "But--"
"Of all the hired men we have dealt with," the deep voice of another Seer interrupted the duo's conversation, "you have known us for the longest time. You know that what we ask you to do is what the Planet wants. You need no further explanation."
The blond mercenary slammed his hands down on the stone table that was before him. He looked upwards at the Seers, who were each in their own lofty positions of rised, rocky platforms, high above him. "None of you have Cetra blood in you. You don't /know/ for sure what the Planet is saying."
"We were the chosen channel," The Great Seer compounded, his Mako green eyes burning with a strange, luminesce glow. "We convey what the Planet wishes to convey to its inhabitants. No matter if we are not Cetra by birth. We are Cetra by choice and inauguration."
There was a pause.
"Why would the Planet," Cloud asked, his eyes narrowing questioningly, "...want two random mercenaries to deliver a box of rare Ancient artifacts to the Northern Crater to two random men, and then to fetch said two random men back from the North to the Ancient Temple while we're at it? Can't those two men come here by themselves?"
"You are not random mercenaries, Cloud," another of the Seer spoke up, her voice resounding throughout the entire stone chamber. The bright, scintillating lights behind their rocky seats, coupled with their high vantage made it extremely difficult to tell who was speaking, and from where. "Qedem immortalis," the same voice continued to utter. "The Planet needs your help to protect itself. All will be revealed at the end of your destination."
Cloud and Vincent turned to look at each other. The Seer had just called them immortals in the Ancient Tongue. No one but the Planet could possibly have known that they had been immortalised by the alien cells within them; that they had actually lived for thousands of years. This generation of Seers were but eighty years at most, and Cloud and Vincent only started accepting assignments from them five years ago. Cloud sighed. He would never win this argument. Not especially if the Planet was being so stubborn.
"All right," the blond finally mumbled. "We'll take the job." There was slight murmurings of pleasure and agreement from among the Seers, so Cloud quickly added, "...but I want you all to know that the Bazookas won't be letting this go so easily. They've intensified their efforts to eliminate all and anything associated with the Seers lately. Several towns under 'suspicion' have already been toasted to bits. I don't mind being toasted to bits, but what if they steal this important thing we're supposed to deliver to the North?" He shook his head. "They'll grow more powerful, and you're all likely going to be destroyed. Who will talk to the Planet on the people's behalf thereafter?"
"Someone else will rise up to the task," The Great Seer replied easily. "The Planet will continue to send representatives to speak with its people."
"You don't care about your lives, do you?" Cloud asked, quietly.
"We merely convey what the Planet wants us to convey," was the emotionless reply.
For a split second, Cloud's eyes became downcast. He smiled the tiniest of smiles and shrugged. "What do we have to do this time?"
The Council took a couple of seconds to speak among themselves. Something then glowed and materialised on top of the stone table Cloud and Vincent were standing behind. Upon closer examination, the duo saw that it was a plain looking wooden box. They turned to look at each other, then at the Council.
"You are to bring the box to the Northern Crater," The Great Seer explained, gesturing slightly as he did. "...to the two men there. They will be waiting for you. Pass it on, and instruct them to keep strict guard over it if they ever wish to return to where they came from. They are unable to come to us without aid because they do not have the Lunar Harp to traverse the Sleeping Forest. As for any other questions you may have for this mission," the old man held a hand up to stop Cloud from speaking, for there were already questions forming on the blond's lips, "...they will be answered after your return."
Cloud's lips were still slightly parted, his question almost spoken. He frowned, before closing his mouth. "Great Seer," when he next spoke, it was with formality, "you're hiding something from us."
The Great Seer did not reply.
"Nevermind," the blond shrugged, taking the box and keeping it in a safe compartment of his worn travel cloak. He tilted his head at Vincent, who nodded and turned to exit the room. Cloud was right behind him. "We'll discuss the payment for this mission after we come back." He turned slightly to regard the Council over his shoulders. "I'm warning you," his voice was loud and firm, "...if the Bazookas give me more problems that a mere showdown or two, this mission is going to /cost/."
He did not wait for a reply. The stone door to the chamber rolled upwards to allow him exit. Cloud stepped outside, and the door rolled back down, leaving the Council to their disquieting thoughts and lingering regrets.
"Great Seer," a lady from the Left Council spoke up, turning to look at her leader, "...the boy was right. There was no need to hide the identity of the two men they are to be bringing here from them. It will only cause more problems for the mission than it already is beset with."
"We should not have sent them in the first place," a man from the Right Council remarked.
"But there is no one more versed with the ways of Materia than they are," another argued.
"The Bazookas fight with ancient Materia and strategies," The Great Seer finally spoke. "They resist the Seers because they think we misrepresent the Planet. They think that their being able to use Materia - magic from the Planet - gives them the right to decide for it. The methods they use are old, and the magic, unfathomable. We are powerless against them - we can only hear the Planet, but we cannot fight for it." He pointed, and a flow of Mako started to pool together in mid-air, reflecting the room clearly on its surface. A short while later, though, the images on it changed into that of something else. That of two men, bent over an apparatus that was something like a control panel, seemingly puzzled over something on it. "And so if the Planet decrees that two ancient war heroes must be summoned to deal with the resisters at hand..."
The Great Seer clenched his outstretched hand into a fist. The pool of Mako dispersed into nothingness.
"...then so be it. So... be it." -------------- a/n and unseen watcher, i'll have you know that this fic is entirely your fault. a/n to quillsmods
17.oct.2005
in case you're wondering if this is a sequel of my previous ffvii fic,
the answer is no, it is not. it is a separate story altogether,
although you may find the premise similar. cloud and vincent are unable
to return to the lifestream due to the abnormal amount of alien cells
within them, so they continue to work as mercenaries for the planet.
it's been a few thousand years now, so there are changes in the
structure, culture and technology in the setting. the names of most
places will be the same, though. each chapter of this fic will be based
on the themes in 30quills, therefore there will be 30 chapters in all.
qedum is 'eternal' in hebrew and immortalis is 'immortal' in latin. i
know it makes no sense to string two words from two languages together,
but i needed something exotic and cetra-ish so... XDDD i'm still not
too sure how the stuff in advent children will be shown in here.
anyway, that said, i hope the first chapter wasn't too confusing.
thanks for reading!
i didn't breach the rules! sephiroth is in there /somewhere! XD look
hard enough and you'll see him! XDD in fact i had to switch his role
with cloud in the fairytale just so that he can be there. hooh boy. XD