A Science Apart
. o .
(I was just guessing at numbers and figures; pulling the puzzles apart
questions of science, science and progress do not speak as loud as my heart
Tell me you love me; come back and haunt me…oh, and I rush to the start
Running in circles, chasing our tails, coming back as we are…)
. o .
I came to visit you, you know… Gods, there were times where I felt as if something inside me was being torn apart, looking down at you as you lay in slumber… stasis… something… being transformed from the man who I loved into this… thing. I could almost sense your pain sometimes, and so when his breath slowed in slumber beside me, I snuck down the creaking stairways and past the metal door to see you…
I wasn't blind to the syringes, and vials, and test tubes that littered the basement, nor to the chemicals and test subjects that they held; you must know that it nearly killed me to see you in their midst. You… you who had been vibrant, and caring, and stoically chivalrous… you whom I loved; no matter what I told you, in attempts to turn you away from me. I had foolishly tried to send you away, deluding myself that I sensed trouble that you did not. But you were a Turk; you were trained to sense the tensions that one could almost taste in the later days of that Planet-forsaken project. You knew the risks; you stayed, although it cost you very dearly… And some selfish part of me loved you all the more for it…
Perhaps he knew, but you had taught me how to traverse those stairs quietly, intimating dryly that it was part of your 'top secret' training, and chuckling with me over the thought. You were funny then – you had this dry sense of humor that was a little skewed, but it always made me laugh, back when moonlight shone through the Mansion windows and we crept, hand in hand, up the stairs and into our respective rooms. Even then, appearances counted for so much… we could not afford to be careless.
Back then the house was intriguing, grand, even beautiful in its Gothic splendor. Each corner nook, every plush window seat would remind me of how we sat and read together at first; science journals and mystery novels, and then, slowly, turned into each other's fumblingly perfect embrace. This melted into rebellious, sultry afternoons spent doing as little as possible - discarded eyeglasses and navy suit jackets; dark chocolate and white wine in half-empty goblets; tangled sheets and hesitantly fiery embraces - the maelstrom of two minds, two spirits, united.
But there was this undeniable feeling of safety with you as well, most noticeably when one of your arms was tucked carefully around my waist, and the other hand was entangled in my hair in luxuriant afterglow. I hated my hair, a drab combination of tawny yellows, reds, and browns; I wished that it would just decide to be one color… but oh, you loved it. Do you remember? On one of those sweltering afternoons when it was almost too humid to get out of bed at all, you told me that it was like blended gold and copper, and it was a pity I wore it up all the time. I looked for laughter in your eyes as you twirled a lock between your fingers, but you looked almost… reverent.
I wore my hair down for a week after that day.
It was all a lovely daydream, but the problem with daydreams is that one eventually wakes up, and the dream is shattered…
Or maybe my problem was that I could not dream two dreams at once. For even then, the Project continued, and things became difficult between us. It was the one thing we could not share, and it was the one thing that divided us enough to destroy us… You made me choose between my love for you, and my thirst for knowledge; in retrospect, I can say that I chose wrongly, but the desire to know, to make a change that would alter human existence for the better, to make my mark on the fickle sands of time won over, and for all that I know, I cannot yet turn back the hourglass of time.
Ironic, isn't it, that we will be immortalized, but for reasons far from those that we wanted to be known for.
I still wish I could take back what I had said to you, but you were threatening to destroy what I had worked towards for years. And so I lashed out, calling you conservative, and backwards, and cold… I know you could have shrugged those things off; my temper was volatile those days, and yet you bore it with a quirked eyebrow, and a cautious hand at my shoulder.
But then I told you that you didn't love me.
You drew back from me, deep brown eyes widening with shock, pain, and no little amount of suspicion – I could tell that I had wounded you, and some part of me delighted in it, despite my horror at the look on your face – and you told me simply that I had no right… no right to say such things.
You didn't even raise your voice, not in the slightest. I wanted you to scream, to yell, to tell me how stupid I was being, but you did none of that. I suppose I should not have expected any different, either. Nodding slightly – professionally – in the manner that befits a Turk obeying an order, you left the room without raising your eyes to mine again, mask firmly in place once more. Ever the gentleman, you allowed me my space, my time… I knew that you did not approve of what I was about to do, but that bitterness made things easier, somehow.
And so I turned to him; he was the only other option for what the Project required. But he was not a monster, either… at least not all the time. It's too easy to say that he displayed his monstrosities throughout, whereas you kept yours locked within yourself, but in all fairness, it is not true. We shared this dream, he and I… perhaps a misguided, deranged fragment dream of beauty that could exist; but even so, the thought of it was enough to bind us together, in body, if not in mind, as you and I had done so easily. I was cold fire with him; but to his credit, I think there were times that he loved me…
The days grew shorter, and before long – much sooner than I expected – my body began to signal that I was bearing a child. His, perhaps. Yours, I prayed. Perhaps I could not have you; pride on both our parts had made sure of that. But surely, surely he would let me keep our child…
And so, we descended into Hell, the three of us; I could not keep the news from you… and one night, deep in midwinter, I met you outside. Snow dusted the garden, creating a dazzling counterpoint to the deep velvet of the sky, stars sparkling down on the two of us for what was to be the last time. Unable to maintain our distance, we melted together… I can still remember how you held me; no longer reverently, but in a delicate matter, like I was a wisp that was bound to slip through your fingers… fingers that dusted the nearly-prominent swell of my stomach almost sadly. Benediction and farewell… I should have recognized the Wutainese marks that you traced on my stomach, over our child… but the tears that danced at the corner of my eyes clouded my thoughts. Black hair blended with golden as our heads bent together, foreheads touching cautiously, testing each other's boundaries.
Love's a funny thing, isn't it? You can seal it away behind a mask, or lock it up tight in the dusty, dark corners of your mind, and convince yourself with everything you've got that it's not there anymore, but even so, love continues to exist, flickering behind one's eyes or subtly lighting those dark corners. Love knows things that we can't even begin to comprehend… perhaps that's why, when you pulled me roughly to the soft snow beneath our feet, I did not resist.
Of course, the absolutely unmistakable sound of gunfire a heartbeat later made me incredibly glad that I had followed you to the ground.
Him.
He must have woke up; and admittedly, been in the right to be dismayed about my absence. He had shown tenderness, almost, towards me ever since my pregnancy became noticeable, and seemed almost excited about the child. Naturally, you scoff. It was all for the Project, you may say, one step closer to his goal, one step nearer to greatness. I agree, but there were moments – not very many of them, but I cannot deny them just because they were rare – where I would catch him looking at me with his own mask dropped, and with a wistful look softening his features.
But he wore that look no longer, standing outside in the freshly-fallen snow, clad in his deep blue bathrobe and the slippers I had bought him for Christmas… the high-powered rifle leveled at where you and I had collapsed completely destroying the otherwise domestic image.
And oh… his eyes would have frozen lava in mid-July. He was furious, certainly, something that you distinguished immediately, jumping up to stand protectively between he and I with a feline grace. But there was pain written all over his face as well. He may have always been eccentric, but I cannot deny that it was this last act that turned him to madness…
"You've turned Turk, my dear… I must admit I'm hardly surprised."
His voice was sheer ice. I wanted to run as fast as I could - away from him, even away from you - but I knew that neither you nor he would let me so much as lift a foot before stopping me.
"It's not…" I protested quickly, knowing even then that my words were useless.
"Don't touch her."
"Excuse me… I believe, of the two of us, I am the one who should be dictating such things, Turk."
You shook your head, your dark eyes determined. "That's not what I meant. Do what you will with me; Planet knows what you think of me already. Just leave her alone."
He nodded, and as he did so, I could have sworn that his last vestiges of sanity – humanity – were swept away. "As you wish… I'm not going to say that you'll regret this, Turk," he spat viciously, "… but you will… oh, you will."
His eyes darted to mine, their calculations almost palpable. "My dear? You are coming, are you not?" Turning at this, he walked back towards the mansion, which for the first time seemed almost alien, its turrets hidden by shadows and misted by the falling snow. I had no choice but to follow; but as I walked by you, I whispered what was to be my part of our farewell.
"Goodnight, Vincent… I lo-"
"I know." A sad smile tipped the edges of your mouth, and your eyes were carefully hooded from mine. "I know… and I, you. Now, turn around and don't look back. You will not be seeing me again."
I didn't know what you meant by that as you reached out your arms, and physically turned my body away from yours, pushing me gently away from you, but I know now.
If anything, the following months taught me that despite the fact that you could dodge bullets, and survive Turk training, and climb stairwells without making so much as one rung creak, you were not immortal. You could bleed, and you could cry, and you most certainly could feel pain…
I don't think you ever knew I visited you in the night; perhaps you suspected, perhaps you sensed me… perhaps you simply feigned sleep, because you did not want to see me again. But I was there all the same… I thought, in my darker moments, that it was fitting; you had been physically destroyed because of me; my emotional turmoil was merely what recompense, however insufficient, that I could offer you.
I can't blame any one of us for what happened; he destroyed you because of me, but you stayed because I was there, and my betrayal, however innocent, drove him mad. Perhaps history will make you and I into martyrs, but we both knew what we were doing. You know this. I know this. But as I sit here, alone, it certainly doesn't make the knowing any easier…
. o .
(nobody said it was easy, no one ever said it would be this hard)
. o .
finis…
. o .
DISCLAIMER: I don't own any of our lovable (!) Square folks – that'd be Vincent, Lucretia, and Hojo – or any of the settings mentioned within the story; basically, only the plotline is mine. Additionally, 'The Scientist' belongs to Coldplay and all other appropriate associates… If you're a fan of the V/L/H subplot, or even any of the aforementioned characters, look up this song; it fits what happens almost scarily. (Well, that, and it's an amazing song…)
SABRIEL'S SCRIBBLES: Yet another 'this song was stuck in my head' fic… I originally was going to derive a Yuffentine out of it, but one day, I sat down at the computer, and in a matter of hours, this emerged. Interestingly, Hojo's line about 'turning Turk' is a bit of a double entendre; not only did she turn towards Vincent, but to 'turn Turk' is an old expression for a traitorous act… Lucretia's an interesting switch from a Tifa or Yuffie POV, but I think I did a plausible job of it. Then, that's what reviews are for, right?