I faced the window of the Nibelheim inn, rolling a piece of candy around on my mouth. It was delicious in a way I remembered from only once before, back before professor Gast died. I was very small then, a child who had known nothing but stark labs and military routine. Gast was the only one who seemed human there. He was the only one who referred to me as a name and not a number when my back was turned.
"Hey, Seph. Do you know what this is?"
"Nuh-uh."
"It's candy. Strawberry flavored. Try it."
"Mmm…. Thanks!"
"Don't bite down now. Savor it."
Even in that memory, I was in the corridors of Midgar's labs. I rolled the sweet lozenge around in my mouth once more. I had since birth known only the Shinra building. Then, why did this place feel so familiar? Why a town I did not know the name of until a few weeks ago ring more like "home" to me than the barracks and labs I had known for over twenty years?
"Oh-One. What's that in your mouth?"
"Professor Gast gave it to me."
"Spit it out, now."
"But Professor- "
"No buts!"
sniff
My reverie soured just as I swallowed down the last of the candy's flavor. I had savored this candy, like Gast said to. I treasured every moment of its artificial grape flavor. It was the first time in my life I had been allowed to. I knew that fruit was healthier. I knew the true flavor of grapes and strawberries, but the candies were singular. They were sweet as candy could only be.
The wide brim of a hat entered my view from the window, but no hat could hide the beauty of the face and body attached to it. She was a petite vision, adept at playing with the borders of childhood innocence and womanly beauty, though I could scarcely begin to believe that she was conscious of her mastery.
I doubt she saw me before she closed the door to her home behind her. The most fidgety of the new recruits had left just a short time before to visit the house next door, with a triangle of white cotton clenched in his fist. I wanted to tell the woman, but embarrassment held me back. Embarrassment. Why? I could talk to the female soldiers I commanded easily. Yet, the thought of speaking to her drove electricity down my spine. I closed my eyes, trying to wipe the disconcerting thought of that woman from my mind with the memory of artificial grape.
"What are you looking at?" The fidgety recruit asked from almost out of nowhere. I saw a tiny tip of white cotton poking out of his pocket.
"…This scenery." I replied, though I felt the lie in my mouth, "I feel like I know this place." I paused for a bit, trying to regain my semblance of leadership. "We have an early start tomorrow. You should get some sleep soon."
I doubt the recruit had even bothered to hear my words. From him I saw only the frenzied tap of his right thumb against his fist, a sure sign he was nervous. His Mako stained eyes looked at me impatiently once more, and then he was gone down the hall, ready to flop onto one of the beds. I stayed by the window for a while more, hoping for one more glimpse, but eventually retired to bed.
"It's too dangerous! I can't involve you in something like this!" One of my party protested. His words irritated me. I had somehow managed to sleep through an inn full of snoring, only to learn this morning that our guide was only fifteen years old. She was also the woman I saw yesterday afternoon. That last thought was the one that irritated me the most. I, attracted to a girl over a decade my junior? I felt dirty for the idea of it. And yet, the bittersweet attraction remained.
"Then there's no problem if you respect her. Let's go." I commanded. I turned to walk away.
"Ummm..." An unfamiliar voice trailed after me, "Mr. Sephiroth! Please let me take one picture for a memento!"
"Tifa, can you ask him for me too...?" One of the soldiers chimed in. I disliked him, though I disliked most members of SOLDIER. They were vain, stubborn, and overall childish. This one, Zack, was no exception. I exempted myself for not having a childhood.
"Cheeeeese!"
I rolled my eyes as soon as the photo opportunity was over. Business had to be dealt with, for the good of Nibelheim. Of course, ultimately it was all for Shinra.
"Great, thank you! I'll give each of you a copy once I get it developed!" The photographer dashed off, his cheeks rosy from his brush with fame. At last, we were free to continue up Mt. Nibel and put an end to the problems at the reactor there.
No one could say that the journey through the tortuous paths of the mountain was uneventful. Monsters, products of the malfunctioning reactor, cropped up at every turn. I slew them with little help from the rest of my squad. My eyes never left our guide. Even when the bridge collapsed beneath us, sending one of the soldiers to an unknown fate and the rest to the rocky ground below, I looked to make sure she was safe first.
We pressed on, traveling from the deathly grayness of the outside through caves of myriad shades of Mako. I made excuses to myself to stay close to our guide. Proximity made me feel… I could not describe it. I had felt something similar for other women my age, both plainer and more attractive. This feeling, though… it was unique. I had never felt it towards any woman or girl before, and yet I could not name it. Still, I could still name the warmth it brought. It was sweet as candy.
"...And what's this?" One of the soldiers stopped in the middle of the trail.
"A Mako fountain. It's a miracle of nature." I had only seen such things in textbooks, and even then they were photos from decades ago.
"It's so beautiful..." our guide said, walking up to the fountain, "If the Mako Reactor continues to suck up the energy, this fountain will dry up too..."
Such childlike sorrow in her voice. I felt for every nuance of her spirit. Her boldness, her naïveté, her curiosity, they all called me forward to be by her side.
"Materia." I told her, thinking that my knowledge might sate her curiosity, "When you condense Mako energy, materia is produced. It's very rare to be able to see materia in its natural state."
"By the way..." one of the others interrupted. I cursed him for ruining our moment. "Why is it that when you use materia you can also use magic too?"
"You were in SOLDIER and didn't even know that?" Irritation sharpened my tongue, "...the knowledge and wisdom of the Ancients is held in the materia. Anyone with this knowledge can freely use the powers of the Land and the Planet. That knowledge interacts between ourselves and the planet calling up magic... or so they say."
"Magic... a mysterious power."
My irritation that he bothered to call something I had just fully explained "mysterious" was quelled only by watching our guide bend over the Mako fountain and swirl her fingers through its waters. Her delicate hands left a shining trail in the liquid.
"I was supposed to call?"
"Yes, Oh-one."
"I am Sephiroth. General Sephiroth. And you do not even have a degree, Professor Hojo."
"I need more blood samples."
"So you can make more people with mysterious powers?"
"I didn't teach you to talk such rot! It's unscientific!"
"What, 'mysterious power'? What else would you call magic?-"
"Don't say magic either, Oh-one!"
"I see how everyone looks me. I see that I use the same materia and do twice the damage. I see that people die from blows that make me stumble! I am the youngest person out in this hellhole they call Wutai and I am sick of it. I don't care if I command people twice my age. Get me back to the lab."
"… Not until you are fully tested."
"I don't want this myst-"
"Oh-one, do not use that term!"
"Mysterious power! Mysterious power! M-"
Hojo hung up.
"Ha, ha, ha!" I chuckled. That had happened ten years ago in the war that brought both SOLDIER and I fame.
"Did I say somethin' funny?" the SOLDIER asked.
"A man once told me never to use an unscientific term such as
mysterious power! It shouldn't even be called magic! I still remember how angry he was."
"Who was that?"
"Hojo of Shinra, Inc. An inexperienced man assigned to take over the work of a great scientist. He was a walking mass of complexes."
Our guide looked up from the fountain, "A Mako fountain... So this is where the knowledge of the Ancients is."
My joy of vindictiveness towards Hojo bloomed into the sweet satisfaction that one person was listening.
We soon reached the reactor. The Mako hung heavy in the air, smelling like mold congealed with syrup. I entered the reactor with the SOLDIER member, leaving our guide and surviving grunt to stay outside. Though I said they must stay behind to protect Shinra's secrets from them, I wanted more to protect them from Shinra's secrets. The reactors were all hazardous to begin with, and it could only get more dangerous in a malfunctioning one.
"Wh... what is this!?" the soldier said, falling back from the window into one of the reactor pods in disgust. I had suggested he look in, to see the things Hojo had worked so hard to develop. The things that he had immersed in Mako until they could no longer breathe air, the things that had lost nearly all semblance of mortality. I drew in a deep breath, ready to explain the workings of the world yet again.
"Normal members of SOLDIER are humans that have been showered with Mako. You're different from the others, but still human. But what are they? They've been exposed to a high degree of Mako, far more than you."
"...Is this some kind of monster?"
Yes. Congratulations, Private Obvious. "Exactly. And it's Hojo if Shinra that produced these monsters. Mutated living organisms produced by Mako energy. That's what these monsters really are."
"Normal members of SOLDIER? You mean you're different?"
No. I was a general before I saw my twentieth birthday because I drank my milk. I…
"You are a monster." A voice from neither above nor around me reverberated in my head. A seductive voice that sounded like the Mako in the reactor smelled. I dug my fingernails into my scalp. Anything to drive that nightmarish voice away.
"H... hey, Sephiroth!"
"What do you think makes you different? The man that created them made you as well."
"N... no... Was I?" I drew my sword and attacked the pods. I cared no longer for fixing the reactor. These creatures had nothing to do with me. They were not my brothers. They couldn't be. "...Was I created this way too?" my voice sobbed, though my eyes were scorched dry by anger and fear. "Am I the same as all these monsters…?"
"...Sephiroth."
I stopped. I was not physically fatigued, but mentally I felt like I had been battling for hours. My chest heaved. "You saw it! All of them... were humans..."
"Human!? No way!"
"...I've always felt since I was small...", I swallowed hard. What girl would love a monster? What at all could love a monster? "That I was different from the others. Special, in some way."
"I see that people die from blows that make me stumble!"
"But... not like this..."
"Spit it out!"
Darkness clouded my vision, mingled with the stench of Mako and endless repeating memories. I struggled for my humanity, but lost it more and more to new labyrinths in my mind. Drowning in madness, I made one final vow.
I had lost the taste of something as sweet as candy. I vowed to find it again, whether I had to bide my time or destroy everything I knew in order to get it.
Author's note: Phew. That was fun. I realize I never really gave many of the characters (Zach, Cloud, Tifa) there names. I wanted to get across that Sephiroth thought Zach and Cloud were insignificant, and Tifa was more of an idea. Hojo refers to Sephiroth as Oh-One (01) for his number tattoo which he was supposed to have. There's nothing like making someone hateable than having him reduce others to numbers. All the dialogue and characters I took from the game, though all flashbacks and thoughts are my invention.