DISCLAIMER: None of the Square Enix characters belong to me sniff but this story does so nooooo copying!!!
SHOT ME DOWN
One off songfic, written while listening to Nancy Sinatra's 'Bang Bang' on repeat for two hours... the song's on the KILL BILL soundtrack! This is the improved version, and the other two chapters are the short version and the original. Enjoy! (Read and Review!)
Nooj- a hero, a legendary warrior among the ranks of the crusaders, proud and brave, but also cold and uncaring. This was how people knew him. I'd known him since childhood, when we would play in front of the Mi'ihen Highroad travel agency, pretending to be opponents in the Machina War of a thousand years past. He was always one of the darkly dressed soldiers of Bevelle, marching around with a broken down machina weapon that his dead father- a warrior monk- had left him. I always pretended to be a defender of Zanarkand, wearing a white uniform that my crusader mother had apparently made for me before she died fighting Sin. He would chase me along the road, playing a game of cat and mouse, and though I would outsmart him for as long as I could, hiding in this place and that, he would always corner me, drive me back into the little curve of land that jutted out into the sea, just in front of the agency.
I was five and he was six
We rode on horses made of sticks
He wore black and I wore white
He would always win the fight
We grew up this way, always playing together, growing up side by side as close friends for ten years. And all that time, he was strong, brave, a true friend to me, never letting anything hurt me. At sixteen, he joined the crusaders. I thought this would be good for him, it would give him a purpose in life, to fight for Spira's safety.
For a three months, he was perfectly happy, but then... he was half crushed one day, fighting Sin. Instead of letting him die, the crusader captains elected to have machina implanted in his body, in order that a brave and strong fighter not be wasted. I thought he would be happy that they thought so highly of him, that he would be glad at having a second chance, where other crusaders had been killed by Sin in that fateful operation.
When he was healed, he rejoined the fighting corps of the crusaders. He seemed to have a new zest for battle, always jumping in to the fray, attacking the fiends head on, never running no matter how dangerous the fighting seemed. He was seen as reckless by some... but courageous and noble by everyone else. I, too, admired him for this courage, and in time, my feelings of friendship turned to something else, something more than just admiration... it took a while, but in the end I realised that I loved him. I needed to be close to him. I took up a job as a training recorder for the crusaders, just so I could stay in the same camp as Nooj. I knew that he was being trained for something special... so I hoped the captains would ask me to record him for it.
My wish was answered. One evening, Captain Lucil asked me to record Nooj's actions on a night when he was patrolling the Mi'ihen Highroad. I knew that I had to tell him how I felt. I couldn't bear to go on loving him in secret, it was painful to keep wondering whether he felt the same about me, and never actually know. So I waited until the other crusaders had taken their own pathways down the highroad, and we were left alone, in front of the agency. I switched off my spherecorder, and turned to him.
"Nooj," I said in a hushed voice.
"Yeah?" he replied, distracted.
"I... I don't how to say this, but..."
He looked at me, and the soft look in his eyes told me that he already know what I was going to say. I struggled to say the words, but I managed to say, in a tiny whisper;
"I... love... you..."
His reply wasn't given in words. He took my left hand and kissed me gently. I felt lifted, contented suddenly as he held me so strongly. When he released me, he smiled and said:
"You know we can't tell anyone."
"I know," I replied, "recorders and crusaders aren't supposed to fraternise..."
"We can keep it a secret," he whispered, holding me close, "we can meet here, when I'm off duty, or when I'm patrolling..."
I nodded enthusiastically. From that moment on, our secret romance would be tempestuous, a raging storm of passion and anger, always solved with a kiss or a threat from one of us to finish with the other. We would escape to the agency as often as possible, take a room there so we could be alone. In this room, we hated, loved, and hated each other again and again. He would never let me get close to him, never let me know who or what he truly was. I was weak, and though I shouted and screamed, I would never say what I truly thought, I was so afraid of losing him.
We stayed together like this for one and a half years, until Nooj was told that he was to be tested for admission to the soon-to-be-created Crimson Squad, an elite fighting force made up of the best fighters in crusaders. After receiving that news, he became even colder and more self obsessed that ever.
We had one final argument in our secret room at the agency, and it ended with him marching out and me chasing after him. It was sunset, and the sinking sun seemed to tell me that the sun had set for us, as well.
I grabbed him by the arm as he stood in front of the agency, obviously waiting for the apology that I usually gave- strictly for fear of losing him. As I grabbed him, he turned and hissed- violent as the shot of a gun:
"Get away from me, Paine! I never want to see your pathetic face again!" and he walked away, leaving me cold and alone, lying on the rain-soaked grass...
Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down
The next day, new recruits were brought in for training for the Crimson Squad. The two that were to be recorded by me were called Baralai and Gippal. To my dismay, Nooj was also on the team. During the training missions, he and I acted as if we had never met, as if we had never even heard each other's names, let alone been together for one and half years. All that time, I still couldn't get over him. I still loved him, I couldn't deny that. But the other two could never know, and so, when they became friends with me and Nooj, I had to pretend to get along with Nooj, too. It was awkward, and it was made worse by the way I worried over him. I still couldn't figure out what was keeping him so cold, so distant from me and everyone else. For five months, I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him. But a conversation I overhead one night in the camp one night solved that puzzle for me...
It was a night when the guys were out patrolling, and I was left to wander the camp on my own. I sat down near the chocobo shack, listening to the big yellow birds as they chirped happily, munching through bags of gysahl greens. Suddenly, two voices came in strong and clear from the tent next to me, and what I heard sent a bullet through my heart.
"Nooj is rather eccentric... but he has a reason to be," one voice said. I recognised the person as Elma, a chocobo knight in charge of protocol at the camp.
"But what's wrong with him?" the a man asked. His name was Yaibal, as I recalled.
"I thought you woulda' known by now," Elma replied, "haven't you heard the nickname he's been given?"
"No."
"The other candidates are calling him 'Deathseeker.' Apparently the reason he's so reckless in battle is because he wants to die. He has done for a while, but no one realised until now."
"Oh..." Yaibal seemed shocked. So was I. Nooj...a Deathseeker? I didn't want to believe it. Not Nooj, no, not my Nooj. Yes, he was still my Nooj, and my Nooj didn't want to die. He was brave, strong, a warrior, a fighter, always using his strength to stay alive...
No. I couldn't deny it. Everything- his morbid attitude, his preoccupation with himself, his cold shell that he put around himself to keep me away from his heart... it all slipped into place. He had wanted to die... and perhaps he hadn't wanted me to get close, so that he wouldn't be too afraid of hurting me to kill himself. Why didn't he just tell me... I decided to confront him with it, I had to, I had to help him find another way to be happy.
I got my chance the next day, when the teams were being recorded on a training mission. Powerful fiends were sent in to test the candidates strength, but they were much to hard to defeat. Nooj and the other two were soon out of ammo and surrounded by the monsters. It was then that I realised that Elma had been telling the truth. As a large Dual Horn edged closer to the group, Nooj calmly walked up to it, leaving his weapon behind.
I knew then that he was truly suicidal, and I could see that he wanted to give himself up to the fiend and allow it to finish him. I, on the other hand, couldn't let that happen. I still loved him, and the thought of him dying was too much to bear. Just as the fiend stormed in for an attack, I blasted it with an ice spell, and it burst into a storm of pyreflies. Nooj turned to me, rage stamped on his face.
"How dare you!" he shouted at me.
"Nooj..." I said, unsure of myself, "rumour has it... that you're looking for a place to die. You were ready to give up back there, ready to die?"
"You serious?" Gippal suddenly interrupted.
"It's harder than it looks," was all Nooj said.
"Why?" Baralai asked. They obviously couldn't believe what they were hearing... but realising, like I did, that it made perfect sense. It was uncomfortable for us to see him like this, weak in the aftermath of a failed suicide. He turned away from us, avoiding any and all eye contact with me, especially.
"It's my life to throw away," he said, then he turned to walk back to camp.
"Hey!" Gippal shouted after him, but he was already gone.
A few days later, I was walking by the Mi'ihen agency, when I him standing in front of it, in the place where we had finally parted. He glared at me as I walked near him, and I hid my face from his eyes. Just as I was about to enter the agency, he shouted;
"You had NO RIGHT!"
I turned. His eyes were fiery with anger, a dark storm growing in his features. I hung my head, not wanting to have the fight I knew was coming. But I knew he wouldn't let it go, so I walked to him.
"I was just trying to help," I said quietly.
"Help who, exactly?" Nooj shouted at me. His fist was clenched so tight, and I feared that it might come into contact with my face any minute.
"You!" I replied.
"Don't lie to me!" he shouted, "I know you! You're still so weak, like you were when we together, so afraid to 'lose me' as you put it, because you're too weak to stand on your own. Just like when we were kids, and you could never run for very long, I'd always catch up on you in the end, because you were weak. Weak, weak WEAK!"
"Nooj, please..." I whispered weakly.
"WEAK," he repeated. He stared at me coldly as I lifted my eyes to his, and he smirked, seeming to enjoy my tears and misery. He must have been enjoying, because he laughed in my face. His smile was evil, and not the smile that used to light up whenever I met him here, five months ago...
"Yes, weak," he said again, "and I beat you down so easily because of that. So easily. You could never stand up to me, I could always shoot you down like a crusader fighting a baby chocobo..."
I collapsed in tears on the floor as he walked away. The sun sank as I lay there, and once again I was left, cold and alone, on the grass in front of the agency.
Seasons came and changed the time
When I grew up I called him mine
He would always laugh and say
Remember when we used to play
Bang bang, I shot you down
Bang bang, you hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, I used to shoot you down
Three weeks later, the Crimson Squad was destroyed. Betrayed by Maester Kinoc, the candidates killed each other in fits of madness, caused, as far as we could tell, by the pyreflies that swirled in thick clouds in the cave where the selection exercise was held. Only Nooj, Baralai, Gippal and I escaped the cave... and then we had to outrun the guns of the warrior monks. The monks turned their guns on me when I warned the guys of their intent, and I had to run, run like the wind across the site of Operation Mi'ihen, where bodies littered the ground, crushed and mutilated by Sin's horrific power. I was terrified that I would find people I knew lying on the wet sand. I ran and ran, past the dancing summoner, past more clouds of pyreflies that rose out of the dead crusaders lying around her.
I ran and ran, along the Mushroom Rock Road, able to avoid the few monks that stayed behind after the operation. I ran along the Highroad, until I saw, to my relief, the guys standing in front of the agency, bruised, batter and bloodstained, but alive.
"Guys!" I shouted happily as I ran up to them. I saw Nooj, and I stopped, feeling guilty as I looked into his eyes.
"I'm glad you're okay," he said brusquely.
"You're not mad?" I asked.
"Why would I be?"
"I stopped you from dying."
He laughed.
"You can owe me one," he said.
"Why did you follow us?" Baralai asked.
"I want to know... what it was you saw back there," I answered him.
"Problem is, we don't know," Gippal spoke up, "but we'll find out one of these days, then we'll tell you."
"Well, the Maester not going to be pleased when he finds out we're still alive," Nooj said suddenly, in a gruff, commanding tone.
"Think we should split up?" Gippal asked. Baralai nodded. Nooj turned to me and pointed to my spherecorder, which I'd turned on so I could record whatever they said about their experience in the cave.
"Your work's done," he said, reaching over to the power button, "why are you still recording?" I gasped as his hand brushed my skin. It felt so... cold, as if it wasn't really Nooj, but a metallic shell of him. I shivered as he took his hand away.
"Let's rest for an hour at the agency," Baralai suggested, and we all went to lie down for a while. I noticed with a pang that the room we ended up sharing was the one that had always been reserved for Nooj and I. Memories flooded back to me as I lay on the bed, and I closed my eyes so I couldn't see the sleeping figure of Nooj on the chair nearby. I knew that soon he would be lost to me, hidden in a huge world, and I could never see his face, or hear his voice, ever again, or for as long as Yevon held a grudge.
Now he's gone and I don't know why
Until this day, sometimes I cry
He didn't even say goodbye
He didn't take the time to lie
An hour later, I was filming the guys again, determined to get a last memento of my friends. I watched as Nooj and the other two decided which directions to take, and I recorded them as they waved goodbye in the golden light of the highroad sunset. Unable to see him go, I turned my camera to follow Gippal and Baralai.
A gunshot rattled the air, Baralai fell forward, blood pouring from his back. Gippal spun round to find the attacker, only to have a bullet embedded in his stomach. Horrified, I dropped the camera and turned to find the assailant. I saw... Nooj, standing there with his gun pointed at the twitching body of Baralai.
"Nooj!" I gasped.
"I said your work's done!" he shouted.
He turned, pointed his gun in a fatal aim at my chest... squeezed the trigger... and...
Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down...
Once again, he left me, cold and alone, on the wet grass in front of the agency, walking away from my torn and bleeding heart... as the sun sank below the horizon for the last time.