Chapter 1- Prelude

It was hotter than hell out in that desert but it was all in a day's work. It was almost unseasonably warm out in the wasteland, Cid couldn't ever remember the temperature being this high. Yet here he was stuck with some damned amateur thet crashed a prototype airship they had no idea how to fly. Nothing new in his line of work. Known to be the greatest airship mechanic across the continents had its perks, he was never out of work and could charge outrageous prices in order to keep up with a continually rising cost of living. New era and a shining future my ass, the captain grumbled, this new president was no fucking different from their old one except he was younger and probably got laid more.

"Hey, Highwind." the cocky punk kid looked over to him puffing on a cigarette. "You been watching the news lately?"

"What about it?" Cid swore as his finger got caught in some machinery, "Ain't nothin' ever of interest anyway."

"They've been talkin' about some demon that got away from the Shinra science department." the punk was probably just desperate for conversation. It wasn't like things didn't escape from the Shinra building on a daily basis anyway.

Cid pulled off his shirt, sweat beading off the toned torso as he leaned back in to fiddle with some broken gadgetry. "What's the big news s'pposed ta be about now?"

"Something about the Ancients. Some destructive force that could end the world. Same old doomsday." Cid couldn't help but chuckle.

"Ain't that the truth. Alright punk," he stepped back from the airship, "she's fixed, now don' go fuckin' her up again, got yerself a nice piece of machinery here."

"Yeah, sure thing." the kid just tossed Cid his payment and took off in his ship again. The captain rolled his eyes and grabbed his greasy shrit off the ground, throwing it and his toolkit into the passenger side of his ancient pick-up truck. He climbed in and fiddled with the radio, finding some decent tunes before kicking the old jallopy for life and starting on towards home. The mechanic leaned back against the old worn leather, whistling along to the lively country tune as Midgar slowly rolled closer into view and the sun became swallowed in mako-infused air. Hell of a place to call home but it worked.

Cid thought back to the kid's question. Demon.. some demon? Well in their world that could be just about anything. He tried to think back to where he'd heard it, back to the days when he flipped through the old fairytale books his parents would get him as a child. To the memory of the one tale that always fascinated him more than anything. The story of the power feared by even the mighty Ancients. The story of the dark lord Chaos. The gruff man just shook his head, pulling up into the lot of Seventh Heaven and tugging on the greasy remains of his shirt. Tifa had a fit if he came in shirtless, something about upholding the image she wanted her customers to have. Whatever.

"Longer than I thought it would take." the handsomely endowed bartender poured Cid a drink and pushed it over to him. The captain shrugged and gulped the drink down parched by the summer heat.

"Some damned amateur." he accepted the next drink offered kicking dirty legs up on the bar. Tifa frowned, shoving them away almost knocking Cid off the stool.

"Do you mind!?" She shook her head, "You can be such a pig." Cid looked up as Cloud descended from the back staircase, the forlorn youth wearing the same pouty expression permanently cemented into his face. Cid offered him a dirnk but the blonde declined, sliding up into a stool beside his friend.

"Damn Cloud." Cid finished the drink and struck a cigarette. "Ya gotta unwind a little."

"I'm concerned about this stuff at Shinra..." he replied simply. "I can't imagine what they're planning now."

"Who fuckin' knows." Cid leaned back against the bar toying with his dog tags. "They're always doin' some confounded, half-brained experiments and fuckin' them up I mean, c'mon Cloud it's the same damn shit."

Cloud sighed. "Maybe I'm just paranoid."

"Well I think he has a right to be concerned." Tifa leaned onto the bar between them. "I mean, he knows Shinra better than anyone else right? Honestly, I think something's going on too. Something just doesn't seem right anymore." Cid fell silent, watching the wisps of smoke curl and twist in the air. He couldn't deny there was definately oddities about the city lately. Tension seemed to grow like mold in cracks, people darted about looking over their shoulders as if expecting some monster to leap out from every direction. The entire environment had changed right down to the abnormally warm temperatures slowly baking the lower half of the floating city.

"Maybe it's just a depression..." Cid tried to justify their fears but neither of his companions seemed willing to accept them.

"It's always a depression, Cid, we live in the slums." Cloud reminded him, "And besides, what does that have to do with the drought? You can't tell me working out in that wasteland you don't sense it either?" By now the blonde youth had shed his own shirt fanning himself with a flier announcing some local dance club's grand opening.

"I never denied I didn'..." To Tifa's disdain Cid now shedded his shirt which prompted numerous men and even some women to remove theirs. "But what's th' use of worryin' about it? There ain't nothin' we can fuckin' do, right?" Defeated, Tifa undid her own shirt and splashed herself with cold dishwater. There was nothing they could do, not yet at least. All they could do was sit and wait.

Sit and wait and hope...

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"A long time ago there were two mighty entities revered by the Ancients..."

That was how the story began..

"The one winged angel of the morn and the dark lord of the night..."

Faster, don't stop...

"Dissatisfied with his realm, the dark lord began gathering followers..."

It hurts... burning.. stop.. please.. enough! Stop this!

"He challenged the bringer of morn and the two fought valiantly...."

So close... closer... falling.. down.. down...

"In the end the dark lord was weakened..."

Blood on the glass.. Was that his blood?.. He was bleeding?

"And sealed away by the Ancients and their angel..."

"I'm gonna die.. help me.."

"But not before his blood seeped into the lifestream and crystallized..."

"Help.. me..."

"The dark lord waits for the day he will be released from his materia prison to get his revenge on the world that sealed him away..."

And that was how the story ended...