It was early in the monsoon season, but the morning was a scorcher. That was no surprise to the locales. The day after a Fair died always was, even if it was the rainiest time of the year. That's what they said anyway, that the day a Fair died it was sure to shine the next morning, and that's how the family had come to be known as Fair's generations back.
Insects sang from the light forestry surrounding the cemetery, the leaves of his wilting crown tickled his nose, and the coffin was heavy on Zax's shoulder as he, his father Rau, and his older cousin Balto acting as pallbearers made there way forward between gathered family. All of who had dressed in white for the occasion, making the gathering bright in the strong sunlight.
The coffin was brought before the resting stone where it was set down with a gentleness Zax's father only ever showed the dead. They then retreated Zax to his mother's side were he sat cross-legged by her on the mats set out for the guests, Balto taking up his place beside his close friend near the back of the congregation.
In watching Balto find his seat, he caught his auntie Pollensalta's eye. Pollensalta was a staunch woman, but she looked tired, this exasperated by lack of sleep and food according to the custom prescribed to the household of the dead.
Zax's father remand standing arms folded over his barrel chest graying salt and pepper head bowed, a frown on his brown and deeply lined face beneath the wreath of fronds he wore on his head.
Zax didn't listen with any attentiveness to his father's giving the first eulogy. He caught snippets of funny stories, talk about how his uncle had loved music and had a talent for the guitar, about how they would all miss his special zeio sauce, and how he had thought Zax's uncle was joking when he said he was taking the recipe to the grave. He talked about the cycle of violence and how it needed to end among their people. Zax resisted rolling his eyes closing them instead and wishing he could so easily block out the lecture he had heard to many times.
Others were given an opportunity to speak, then they sung his uncle's favorite hymns. Pollensalta stood and quietly left part way through the proceedings, Zax's mother assuring him. "I'll be back." Before hurrying after the other woman.
Zax's father who was presiding over the funeral, then spoke to bring things to a close. About family he said. "We weren't blood him and I, but may as well have been." And long windedly about the stock deals he had wanted to rope Zax's uncle in to, reporting. "Never met a guy who knew his stuff better than our brother, he could have made himself a rich man." He always talked about business even when it was least appropriate, Zax hated it. His father was all talk anyway, as far back as Zax could recall, Rau had promised a standard of living above that of poverty, and expendable income even. But Zax had never seen a single gill that didn't ether go on gambling, or that he hadn't made himself and that needed to be stretched to make ends meet. He knew his mother hated it too when his father would talk like this, Zax was glad she was with her sister and didn't have to hear her husband go on like he was doing. Because it seemed to Zax that his father just wanted to publicly take credit for something he couldn't in their familys private reality produce. And both his mother and he where demoralized by the expectation that they would be grateful for making second priority, and for empty promises.
Those gathered were then invited by Rau to place flowers on the coffin, Zax's father doing so himself as he left the podium. Zax was expected to be next, he wasn't related by blood to the dead man, but in Gongaga that hardly mattered, and in Gongaga the name Fair meant a degree of respect in some circles.
Getting to his feet Zax came forward to select a fern from the bucket of flowers, but hesitated and plucked up a large sunflower in addition. He knew his auntie would regret not having been able to place a flower, so he would do it for her in her absence. This decided he once again approached the coffin. It was a plywood thing with a decorative corrugated iron art panel on top into which he tucked the stems of the fern and flower so that they stuck out from one of the cutout shapes in the metal. This done he returned to his place on the mat, while others now shuffled into something of a line to place their flowers and pay their last respects to the dead man.
The guests began to filter over to the clearing next to the cemetery where the wake was often held, and where beneath a sunshade the refreshments had been arranged on tables brought from the houses of neighbors. They heaved under the food with which they where laden. The food was really the most important part of a funeral in Gongaga, that's the part people would talk about, and a good wake was in some ways the greatest honor the living could do the dead.
Zax spotted his father socializing with the crowd gathering around the tables, But Pollensalta had yet to reappear and Zax knew she would be waiting for him to meet her.
Getting to his feet Zax along with Balto and Balto's friend made to follow after auntie Polle, It was not done in secret, but it was done with subtlety, a degree of respect for the morning maybe.
But Zax was waylaid by a look from his father, the man coming right for him and Zax stopped, pacifist as his father was the man would not neglect to give him the slipper if he knew Zax had deliberately ignored him.
"Boy, you need to be staying here, And where is your mother? She needs to be here with the guests. Oi And that woman, where are you thinking of going with that woman your auntie." He held on to Zax's bicep the grip painful as he tried to physically maneuver Zax back towards the wake.
Zax twisted away trying to make as little show of it as he could.
But his father made to grab for him again saying "You're not getting into any more fights on her behalf hear me? She can fight her own wars if she wants to be wicked, but you can bloody well settle down."
Zax backed up and away from the grasping hand, frowning at his father he said nothing and turning hurried on, his father calling after him in a shout-wispier.
Zax caught up with the other two, and Pollensalta on the sun dappled path that led from the cemetery to the dirt road in to Gongaga village. It was only when they had put distance between themselves and the funeral proceedings that words were exchanged, Zax's auntie leading them in a walk her tone hushed.
"Tonight..." She began. "...the blood will rise from your sword with the morning's mist Balto." She told Zax's cuisine who had newly inherited his brothers heirloom sword the Murasame.
"They won't see us coming this soon. Be ready." She instructed further. "And Zax, I have to go now, your ma's at my place, but come by a bit later, I have something for you." Without stalling she waved herself off cutting through the thin forestry that surrounded the place making directly up the slope toward home rather than following the path around.
There was something set about her manner, more so than usual Zax noted.
Balto waved himself and his friend off saying. "Going back to get a feed, how about you?"
"Nah." Zax returned with a shrug and waved in kind. He liked the idea of a walk on this sunny day, and didn't fancy spending it crowded beneath a tent with his father who would be talking unflattering about Zax's mother, and about Pollensalta with the other men he associated with.
On clearing the forestry, and stepping back out on to the dirt road that lead to his village, Zax walked in the bright light that warmed his shoulders. Enjoying the break from the solemnity and the tension of the day.
Two of the three ShinRa soldiers stationed in the airier where also walking the same road, and they caught sight of Zax at about the same instant Zax spotted them on following the path of an insect in flight over his shoulder. One of them waved as they approached, before tucking his hand back into his pocket.
Zax liked them well but especially these two, Jewl and Tobi. Though it was with the knowledge that his parents had protested ShinRa development in Gongaga during the seventies in the back of his mind. Still that was the past ShinRa was the standard now, and these two had nothing to do with whatever history ShinRa had in Gongaga, and that was just the way it was Zax had decided. His parents had just been reluctant to accept change, they were like that. He was convinced that if they had their way Gongaga would be trapped in the stone age forever.
"Zax hey!" Jewl greeted as the three of them fell into step heading towards Zax's village "Good to see you out today, first sunshine we've seen since we've been here." Jewl noted idly.
"Its great, I bet this is what it's like all the rest of the year right? Just our luck getting stationed here during monsoon." Tobi said.
"Yeah, in fact it's even more sunny than usual." Zax told them deciding against mentioning it just might be because his uncle in-law had passed away last night.
However it seemed they already knew of the local superstition, Tobi saying in a gentle voice "Your uncle's service just finish?"
Zax wasn't overly surprised they knew, Gongaga was the closest village to the reactor, so the ShinRa personal were staying at the inn there. Word of a violent gang related death was missed by none in the small community, not even outsiders
"Sorry for your loss buddy." Jewl added.
Zax lifted a brow at the nickname but shrugged "I just feel bad for auntie. I'm actually on my way to hers right now." It wasn't that he didn't feel a personal lose, his family was tight-knit and his uncle was always more fun, and easier to admire then Zax's own father. He had no kids of his own, so he'd always had Zax come over and he and Polle had taught Zax Gongagan martial-arts personally, saying they needed someone strong to be his legacy. He had read Zax stories on his front step, while Polle had worked on her weaving making the traditional blankets with their geometric patterns that furnished every home in Gonggaga. All while his father would have had him planting or picking veggies, as if he would have any land if auntie and uncle had not lead their village in resisting land controlling gangs. Without his uncle Zax wasn't sure what his auntie would do now, and without her Zax wasn't sure he could stand it here in the wop wops.
"Pollensalta? Your aunt's such a nice lady, it's unfortunate." Unfortunate is what Tobi said, probably trying to be tactful, but Zax didn't think so. His uncle's death hadn't been an accident, it wasn't a simple misfortune, just like how Balto's brother winding up in hospital last year hadn't been an accident.
These things weren't often something Zax would give thought to but the presence of outsiders always provoked the introspection in the contrast they offered, the reminder that there were more possibilities in the world, that was always a seductive idea, that this here in Gongaga wasn't all there was.
"Why don't we head over to your aunt's place together and pay our respects? Or would that be to forward?" Jewl asked.
"Umm..." Zax began easily. Pollensalta wasn't like Zax's mother or father, she had never outright voiced any pro ShinRa opinions but Zax had always had the idea that she quietly approved whenever he would confide in her his ambition to join the SOLDIER ranks, to become like these two.
Maybe Zax considered, it wasn't so much ShinRa but the subset of the company that was SOLDIER that she approved of.
"Yeah alright let's head on over." Zax made a beckoning motion with his hand for the two soldiers to follow.
It was no secret that ShinRa loved to recruit from the country, and that Mideel and Gongaga especially where considered prime recruiting areas. And so it was implied whenever a young Gongagan left town, that they would wind up working for ShinRa's military. Zax's parents called it railroading, SOLDIER farming, racism and other nasty sounding things. Zax called it not going hungry at the end of the week, hot water, and maybe even a house that wasn't so embarrassingly dilapidated. His mum would be able to dress nicely like the aid workers that came here to teach the kids to write read and talk Midgar-common, and provide medicine, and who had liked to take photos with Zax when he was younger. They could be like the other families who had sons working for ShinRa. At least Zax though it would mean making real gil doing something he was good at and that he was doing anyway. It would benefit his parents financially even if they didn't approve, if he was far from here they wouldn't be able to do a thing about it. They'd get used to the idea, and it was legitimate work even celebrated work. It was better than digging holes in the ground and gathering what was eatable after the monsoon season. Better than growing old and wasting his years here.
Zax frowned at the state of his home as they passed it by having broached the trees. No one owned a car here, though some families had scooters or old oil powered motorbikes rusting in their yards since the fuel source had been phased out. Not many people had kitchens ether, they passed by one yard were a few greens were roasting on a makeshift spit over a fire, one end of the spit held aloft by the yard's sagging chain-link fence the other balanced on a cracked earthenware rain collector that had grass growing out the top of it. The meal smelled good but the sight still peeked some self consciousness in Zax, he hadn't been so aware of the circumstances of the village as a kid.
Mercifully Jewl and Tobi hadn't commented or even appeared to notice.
When they arrived at his auntie's home typical of south Gongaga with it's smoky colored roof tiles, corrugated iron awning, stone doorstep, and unruly garden dotted with rain collectors, they found Zax's mother talking with her sister on said doorstep.
When she sighted Zax and his companions she stood up rather to quickly for it to be passed off as casual, she seemed to struggle with herself a moment before hastily saying something to Polle whom she passed her cup of cordial to before clearing the garden path and leaving towards home without a word to Zax or a second glance in his direction. It was apparent she'd made an exception and held off making a scene on account of her sisters grieving. Otherwise Zax knew he'd have been in trouble, though at least his father hadn't seen him keeping the company of SOLDIER, he would have been less considerate.
"Hello you lot." Polle greeted them.
"Hello auntie." Jewl and Tobi chorused, addressing her in the local fashion.
Zax's greeting of "Auntie." Was more minimal. "We came to check up on you." Zax explained.
"And." Tobi said.
"To offer our condolences." Jewl finished for his friend seamlessly. Tobi passed to her the flowers the two of them had been picking on their way over.
"Thank you, all three of you." She told them coming down the garden path to receive the offering. Her voice was still colored with exhaustion, but she sounded genuinely pleased by the show of caring.