My first Final Fantasy story, be gentle. On the side note, took me 4 attempts to actually figure out how to publish this...
Disclamers: I dont own Final Fantasy, the all mighty Square Enix does. If I did i'd keep Sephiroth and Reno in my basement.
He knows it's not right. That is not fair to them, but he cant help himself.
Even after all these years they are still with him sometimes, in the moments when his own mind and heart betray him and he sees them everywhere. And that is probably why he never really stays away for long. He knows he will eventually come back. Just for those few painfull glimpses.
Sometimes, he sees Zack in Tifa. In the gentle smile, and soothing words. Zack never lost faith in him and never stoped fighting for him. Always reading him like an open book and showing he was there with a mere scruffle on the head, or breath-taking hugs or whimpering kisses. Always smiling, always beliving, warm and vivid and alive like a hearthfire. Tifa is like that too now. Always somewhere next to him, holding him high and picking him up before he ever manages to fall.
Other times, he sees Zack in Yuffie. Childish and loud and prying. Snooping and meddling in things that are none of her business. But in the end, she makes them her business, just like Zack did. Because you could never really say 'no' to Zack either.
But most often, he sees Zack in Reno. With that damn grin, and the knowing blue eyes. It's his job to know things, he's a Turk. Just like it was Zack's job to know things about him because he was his friend. At times, he catches Reno looking at him behind lowered lashes and his fist ends up clenching around thin air. Because he remembers the times when he caught Zack looking at him the very same way. And then Reno leans against a wall, hands in pockets and a loopsided smirk on his face.
„We're friends... right?"
Though, the times that Reno reminds him of Zack the most is when he's pulled some prank and he has that damned apologetic puppy face. And it always works on Tseng, no matter how many choppers he crashed or how high the repair bill for office furniture is. Just like the puppy look always worked on Sephiroth or Angeal or himself, although none of them would ever willingly admit it.
And at those times, in Tseng he sees Sephiroth. Not the monster he forced himself to kill, but the Sephiroth that he once knew. Sephiroth that sometimes allowed himself to laugh and could never really bring himself to be trully angry at Zack. Tseng is just like that. He glares at Reno with the same stoic icy stare, but behind that cold business-like fasade there is devotion, and acceptance and friendship. And when Elena is around them, it's like he's watching the three of them all over again. Because in Elena he sees himself. The insecure rookie constantly at the receiving end of one of Reno's jokes or pranks, and always looking at Tseng with her eyes wide, in awe. He is her hero, the Turk she wants to be one day. Like he looked at Sephiroth, though his hero had fallen.
But it hurts the most when he looks at Vincent. He's not sure if anyone else notices it, but he does. How much they really look alike, Sephiroth and him. Almost like brothers, or a father and a son. Sometimes he has to shake it off before he mixes up the names and they all realise that he's not really looking at them anymore. Sometimes, when he looks at Vincent his mind flips the images reverse and dark hair becomes the color of pale ash, and red eyes turn mako green. Those are the times when Vincent notices him staring and talks to him. But that doesn't shatter the illusion, it only emphasizes it. Because his voice, the deep velvety baritone sounds too much like the man he devoted his life to. Salvation or destruction, which ever he succeeds in.
He does turn away then and walks out. Tifa accuses him of running away from his past, but she doesn't even begin to understand how right she is.
He will come back though. He always does.
Because in the end, even glimpses of the past are better than loneliness.