A/N: First off, I really really really want to change my pen name on here. Unless I get a whole bunch of people complaining, I probably will. Consider this a heads up.

Secondly, this piece is somewhat experimental. There are two different scenarios, if you will, that bleed together. One happens in a distorted real world, the other in a dream world. Except for the prologue, one will usually follow the other, and they will always be marked by different tenses and styles. But for clarity, the real world will be in italics, and the dream will be in normal font. I have also separated the scenes into chapters. My intention with this piece is to be somewhat vague and disorienting, but I hope this clears up undue confusion. Also, there will be plenty of dialogue in this story; it just wasn't appropriate for me to put a whole bunch in this set of chapters.

At least for a while, I will probably post a few chapters at a time (don't want to, but I will). I actually have the first 14 (or 16) done, but overwhelming subscribers' inboxes seems cruel, especially when I'm absolutely obsessive about keeping the number of emails in mine down to a minimum.

As usual, I do not own FFVII, or the title, which comes from a most excellent Nightwish song. The rating may go up in the future, but for now, I'm leaving it as it is. I'm reluctant to give an 'M' rating to something merely because of language the average high-schooler uses. But if I add more LSV in future chapters (as is planned), then I'll up it.

Thanks for reading.

'To be born again,' sang Gibreel Farishta tumbling from the heavens, 'first you have to die. Ho ji! Ho ji! To land upon the bosomy earth, first one needs to fly.'

-Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses

XXXX

Flying.

He flies: legs still, arms stretched out; his neck twitches to the left, and he bears right, counterbalancing the smoky currents like a pro. But only in amateurs does force crush the lungs. It cuts him straight through, makes it hard to breathe. Perhaps he hasn't adjusted to the altitude yet.

Something soft and springy props him up. A cloud, maybe? A soft white cotton-blend cloud whisking him away like a sultan of the skies, away from this palace at Nibelheim, to soar up, up, and away from magic green rivers. His hands flail in the breeze, then grip lightning rods. Runners that steer the cloud, they jut incongruously from the buoyant foam. They feel like metal, he thinks: cold, hard, a hollow silver ring to them when he tests them, tapping first with a boot, then with a flapping hand. Perhaps he's on a plane, a glider that will carry him into the night.

He doesn't get far in that dim twilight before he encounters turbulence. Thump. His plane jostles him in its maneuvers. Thump. The ten thousand psi on his chest refuse to relent. Thump thump. Warning lights must be flashing because his cloud is stained red. Thumpity-thump-bump.

Take him down below, the air traffic controller says. In a professional white coat with wiry glasses that glint menacingly in the tongues of light, he speaks with a nasal twang; he must be sick.

Yessir, says the pilot. Consider it done.

Oh good, the ride is almost over. He would hate to get motion sickness and ruin the cloud-plane. Someone else might need it someday.

His namesake aircraft veers off, nose downward. They're losing altitude fast. Too fast, maybe. He doesn't trust this pilot. He thinks he's in for a rough landing. So does everyone else apparently, when dangerous beings howl for his flesh.

His body flails in an arc that rips more life from his veins as he remembers to scream. All the innocence of his hometown up in smoke. Mom! Tifa! he cried. But his house was burning, he'd never get inside, he was too late. Through the suffocating haze, a man emerged, hauling limp, singed lumps of something sort of human. Neighbors. Tifa's teacher. Where was she? Where the fuck was she?! He moved with frantic footfalls. The Reactor! Sephiroth was there. She chased him. He ran. Faster. Hustle, Strife. You can't let her die. He was sorry, though, so goddamn sorry. He was too late. Her abandoned, broken, bleeding body sagged in his arms, but her blood still pulsed under his fingertips and her cheeks sweated with salty heat. But he came for her, and in his desperate delusion, he thought she smiled at him like a lady to her hero and for a moment it was nice. But the sounds of death still bellowed from within the reactor. They got his best friend, too, and he was a SOLDIER. Finish him, Cloud. He nodded. That son of a bitch was going to pay. You hear me, Sephiroth? You're going to pay. Step, step, step step step: the hiss of blade through skin, and the broken wail of glass. My hometown. My mother. Tifa. Mine. You took it away from me. Die already. Why won't you fucking die? Something important just exploded inside him. Shrapnel stuck from his chest. Suspended him over the green. It was his first time flying. He groped along the knife edge for sure footing. He shoved his weight to the left, and flung his enemies into the glowing abyss. A burst of pain busted through him. He was missing half his heart, wondered if it's still outside the reactor. Was it a lub, or a dub? It's still gone. And he knows he needs it to live. The other half grows fainter.

Mayday! Mayday! Can't somebody hear him? He's too young to die!

Lines are crossed. Communication is down.

He crashes.