wow! it's been so long! this is going to be a follow on from 'in the flesh' it's going to be a multi-chapter story, so who knows how long this baby is gonna get!

let me know what you think of the first chapter, and in the end it's going to be a kadajxlozxyazoo fic. so, it'll get steamy.

i don't own FFVII or make any money from this

DIRT:

In a world such as this, with a life like mine, time alone was a rare and precious thing. You learnt to appreciate every second that you weren't out, fighting for a cause, that deep down you knew was lost. You would never admit it though. You learnt that every day you weren't moving from city to city, Hotel to hotel, was an exceptional and almost settling experience, and should be fully enjoyed. Sometimes, we were even in the same place for a few weeks. Places like this came very near to feeling like home. The place would become to smell like us, not bad, just like us, our scent. Our leathers and weapons would bespread all over the place, which, although shocking to some people who were lucky enough to live sheltered lives, indicated a state of content.

We had been in the same hotel now for almost a week. Kadaj was not well. We all had our weaknesses. His weakness was heat. It took a lot to get him in this state, so he didn't come down very often, but when he did, he would get really bad. Loz was at the hotel with him. We had been taking it in turns to sit with him, to watch over him in his feverish sleep in case he stirred or worsened. He had been like this for almost the whole duration of our stay. I was worried about him, but sitting withhim, watching him sleep, suffer, choke on his own breath, was too much for me. It felt claustrophobic.

So while loz was making sure the most precious person in our world was ok, I was out, sat in the dust of a desert. Dust had long replaced grass. I couldn't even remember the feeling of grass. Such avid and obvious life didn't exist here anymore. Thre was a light breeze, not enough to disturb the dry dirt I was sitting on, but just enough to lift my hair from my back. I sat near a lake, wishing secretly the water was clean and clear enough to support life. Our world was so fractured and broken that it was far beyond repair. Our climate had changed so many times that nothing was normal now. The animals of ancient times were all gone, they had been either made extinct or had crss bred to produce the adapted hybrids that sparingly littered the landscape. The fish were not really fish anymore. Whales had legs again. Things were going backwards. I let out a strangled and cynical laugh. I'm always one to look on the bright side.

We had found Kadaj the night he fell ill, in a strange state. Collapsed against the bath, naked, and covered in semen. It seemed someone had had their way with him and had damaged him. Both me and loz had looked at each other. We were at once hit with a blind anger and then a strange kind of jealousy. He had run a bath. Lifting him gently, we washed him clean. I washed his hair, face and shoulders. Loz took care of his lower half. There was nothing erotic or seedy about this. We had a duty to take care of him. And we did it without thinking. Gathering him in atowell loz put him to bed. Hishead flopped unceremoniously to the side and we could make out his lips beginning to tremble.

"he's cold" I didn't even think about saying it, it just came out. We both struggled to get him under the duvet. I was surprised and more than slightly concerned that he didn't wake through our moving him so much. We covered him up to his shoulders, I lifted his head so he wouldn't get neck ache, and cleared the hair from his face, he was still shaking, and his breaths were coming out in short bursts too quickly. Whoever did this to him was going to pay.

I sat on the edge of the bed, running my finger affectionately down the side of his face. Loz sat on the chair opposite me, and was looking at our Kadaj worriedly.

"he'll be ok…won't he?" he half grumbled, half sobbed.

I looked at him and nodded.

"don't cry Loz" I looked at him, trying to smirk the best I could.

I got a sorry smile back.

As I sat by what used to be a lake, thriving with life, I sighed. I couldn't get whoever had done that to Kadaj out of my mind. every time I thought of it I became silently livid. Kadaj was of course his own person, but in a way we were all the same person, and not in the sense of all of us carrying a bit of Sephiroth inside us. If one of us was injured we all felt somewhat damaged.

Now, I felt asphyxiated. I leant against my bike, as a griffon flew overhead and I pondered the genes that created it. The genes that created things like us, I wondered about the failings in our genetic make-up that gave us our weaknesses.

It was my turn to go and take care of Kadaj. The brother we both adored.

Upon returning, my skin was dirty with dust from the road, it had sunk into the very faint lines on my face, deepening them, at times like this I looked truly human. I liked that. Nevertheless, it was uncomfortable in the heat. Opening the hotel door with the swipe card key, I found loz sat in exactly the same place he was when I left, still watching Kadaj in case he stirred or woke up. Or stopped breathing. Loz was a panicker. I suppose that we both are though, when it comes to Kadaj.

"anything?" I tried to enter the room loudly as not to make loz jump, he often got lost in his own world.

He didn't reply, just shook his head no. I walked over, placing my hand on his shoulder and squeezing gently, letting him know I was there and that I was worried too. He reached up and squeezed my hand, holding it there. We both looked at Kadaj, is delicate form splayed out wide, is chest rising and falling. If anything, his conditioned had improved a little. He was finally sleeping peacefully, with no sobs, no loss of breath and no restless fidgeting.

I leant down and kissed loz on the temple. His eyes closed and he gripped my hand tighter.

"sit with me Yazoo" he bought me round to sit on is lap. As I sat, I curled up to him, resting my forehead on his shoulder, breathing in his scent. We were becoming drained too, even though we were resting, all the energy we were saving was being expended on trying to get him well, or at least get him to wake up. For all we knew, he could actually be draining our energy to make himself better. Stranger things have happened.

He kissed my temple, gathering me in his arms. He went back to looking at Kadaj, for a moment I felt like we were concerned parents.

"why won't he wake up yazoo?" he sounded like a child.

"he will loz, he will. We just need to wait."

"but how long? He's never been this bad before."

"I know. But he'll be ok. You know how strong he is." I looked loz in the eye, running my fingers through his hair, slowly leaning in to kiss him in reassurance.

His lips brushed mine in a chaste and tender kiss. Just a mere pressing of the lips. I pressed his forehead to mine and held him by his neck.

"just take care of yourelf, you need to be well for when he does wake up. You know how demanding he is when he's ill."

He smiled at me, nodding. At moments loz was as much a child as I was. It wasn't anything deliberate. It was just the way his mind worked sometimes.

"go and have a break loz"

"your face is dirty"

"I'll be ok, you just need to go and have a rest. Why don't you try and get some sleep?"

He shook his head no, Loz would not sleep tonight, he would stay awake again, he would walk around mindlessly outside of our hotel, near enough in case something happened to the precious but lifeless body we were worrying over.

"the dirt -" his voice interrupted my thoughts "it doesn't suit you yazoo, go and wash it off"

There was no harsh tone in his voice, no sense of scolding, he was telling the simple truth, like only loz could. I leant closer to him, pressing my forehead to his.

"ok, ok loz"

I got up, walking around the bed to the bathroom, I tried to be quiet for some reason, as If I didn't want to wake kadaj, which was actually the thing I wanted to do most.

When I got to the bathroom, I looked in the mirror above the basin. I looked worn, like I hadn't slept in weeks, and like I was on the verge of exhaustion. The latter was terrifyingly true.

Turning on the tap, the water ran with a luminescence I had not noticed before, it almost seemed a shame to waste it on my face, but nevertheless I washed in it. As drips of dirty water dripped from my hands into the clean liquid coming from the tap, I felt like I had taken a mask off. I wanted to bathe in it, but I would have to wait until later, until then all I could do is take my clothes off.

I am not as open with my brothers about my body. They will walk around naked in front of anyone if the mood takes them, whereas I am slightly more apprehensive. Looking around, I saw a throw in the chair behind loz, An ivory woollen one, that would be perfect.

I began to unbuckle and unzip my leathers as I walked to get it. As soon as he caught sight of what I was doing, I felt his eyes on me. There were no sexual intentions behind my actions, I merely felt constricted in my attire, I wanted to be comfortable ready for my next shift of watching kadaj sleep, while not getting any myself. But loz was watching me. And although I could still see the concern in his eyes for our brother, his eyes were on fire.

He didn't turn round as I strode past him, but his posture stiffened, he was uncomfortable and itching to look at me. It seemed that my clothes were unusually difficult and noisy to take off, and with every chafe of the fabric he twitched and shifted in his seat a bit more. Once free of the leathers, which I secretly cursed Kadaj for choosing, I at once took up the soft and inviting throw, which was large and warm. Wrapping it around my shoulders and holding it closed at my waist, I made my way back to the chair.

"you can leave now loz, if you want to"

As his eyes came to meet mine, I noticed his cheeks had blushed.

"n-no, I'll stay with you for a while, I need company"

Not even thinking, and accepting because I didn't have the energy to talk, I sat back on his lap. His arms felt stronger though the throw, his embrace warmer and more human. Loz is such a beautiful person and I felt it most with him then.

"you should take yours off too brother, it feels better, maybe we can get some sleep"