NIBELHEIM
5 Years Ago
Zack
By the time I'd gotten away from Violet, it was twilight. Nibelheim was still and silent, as it always was during the dark of the night. I admitted to myself that I missed this place. It felt as though I'd gone from childhood directly to manhood, and that bothered and excited me at the same time. I wondered idly if Sephiroth had even had a childhood at all. As bad as it sounded, I thought of him a lot. I'd never met someone I admired so much before. When we'd first met, I was literally a boy, and he was a teenager. I remember him, like a silver spectre, his presence laced throughout the SOLDIER program.
When I was fifteen, he caught me writing a letter to Violet. Instead of making fun of me like the other guys would have, he watched with mild interest, his ethreal aqua eyes attentive, flitting across every line as I wrote. It was incredibly awkward to have him hovering over me as I did such a private task, but at the same time, it made me wonder even then how many little meaningful moments (the meaningless ones, because those were the most important) he'd missed. He'd been inducted into this program... it was rumoured from birth. I didn't even know how that was possible. Still, the day he caught me writing the letter, something changed between us. It was as though it humanized me to him.
He'd asked about her then, and I'd told him everything I could think of – that her hair was the colour of sunshine, that her eyes were the colour of honey, and that her voice was as sweet as a songbird. Of course, he'd laughed, but when I showed him the newest photo of her I'd gotten (with Tifa, no less, taken with that old Polaroid camera), he only nodded his head. "She is as you say," was all he'd venture on the topic. Still, I wasn't to be deterred – when we'd gotten to Nibelheim and we'd gotten settled, the first thing I'd done was introduced them.
"Violet, I've got someone I want you to meet," I told her. It was difficult to pry her arms from around me, and in truth, I didn't want to. I wanted to hold her forever. She squirmed within my grasp, fighting me fighting her, and finally she let go – but not before a fierce kiss.
"Zachary Fair, I've seen you in nothing but poor penmanship for five years. You mean to tell me you want to run me through the gauntlet before you even give me a solid hour of your time?" she demanded.
"I intend to give you more than an hour," I advised her. "Just do this one thing for me. Have dinner with us. Listen to us talk about things you don't care about. Let your grandfather believe I'm not going to spirit you away in the night." I was trying to reason with her, but I didn't know if it would work.
She pressed her full lips together and narrowed her eyes at me. We were in her room, which I was going to stay in, which her grandfather did not know about. If we were to continue for him to not know about it, I needed to try not to sneak around with her when he did see us together. We were sixteen, it was only to be expected.
"Fine. Gosh, you've been around these guys forever. You'd think you'd had enough of them," she taunted. She entwined her fingers in my own, drawing herself into my arms for an embrace that was gentle.
I felt a flutter in my chest. It was the same every time I even thought her name. I felt as though because so much of my life was being skipped, rushed through and beaten out of me by Shinra, that emotions like these would come on strong like an avalanche. Sometimes I didn't know how to explain them – intense rage, deep sorrow, and a strong yearning for... something. I rested my chin atop her head and smiled, the scent of her shampoo filling my nostrils. "You'll see what I mean."
Later that afternoon, Violet had gone to find Tifa. Tifa, who was utterly heartbroken that Cloud hadn't come home – despite the fact that he had. He was hiding in the room he shared with the other man, and I didn't really understand why. We hadn't spoken a lot – usually my conversation was reserved for Sephiroth, but only because he tended to have a darker sense of humour that made the others uncomfortable. I found Sephiroth outside, sitting on the old steps that lead up to the Shinra Mansion, and to the gates that lead to Mount Nibel. The town was unusually quiet, which left me with a sense of foreboding that I didn't quite understand. I chalked it up to nerves for the mission ahead, and didn't think about it again.
"Hey, you missed Violet," I said, coming alongside him. "She's with a girlfriend right now, but she's coming to dinner tonight." I dropped down next to him, palms flat behind me. I glanced back in the direction he was looking, at the mansion. "Hey – you in there?" I asked.
He was so still for a moment he seemed inhuman. Well, he always seemed inhuman, but it was more of a crafted, perfect nature – now he seemed like a statue, or, no – like a gargoyle. Suddenly, he came back from wherever he went in his head and snapped his head around to me. His entire body tensed, as though he had been surprised, and he seemed for a second that he was about to throw a spell.
"Zack!" he barked. Recognition washed over his face and he visibly relaxed. His eyes widened with his brows lofting for a moment, and he gave his head a little shake before looking ahead, towards the water tower. "What?" he asked, letting me know that he knew I'd spoken but he hadn't heard what I'd said.
"Good thing I'm on your side," I said in jest. He made a throaty noise of disapproval at my joke, and I pressed on with a roll of my eyes. "I said, you missed Violet, but she'll be at dinner later. If you're still feeling up to it?"
"Oh, did I?" his voice sounded empty. "Sorry. Yes, I'll be there. Doesn't appear there would be any other option besides sleep anyways, and I'm not feeling tired." There was a long delay, and then he flicked his bright eyes over at me, as though he were going to say something further and didn't.
I stood up and brushed myself off. The dirt clung to my black uniform pants like chalk, but it came off with a few pops from my palms, thank Odin. I definitely didn't want to walk around with a dirty butt all day. When Sephiroth didn't prompt himself, I walked to the bottom of the stairs and moved into his line of sight. Since he was at the top, and tall, it put me about eye-level with him.
"Is everything okay?" I asked. My voice had a hint of warning to it.
He gave me a strange look. "The reactor's going haywire and it's drawing horrible creatures to it, and there's a deep possibility that it's actually spawning them. I'd say something is very wrong," he said, his brow lofted. His tone was puzzled, as though I should have known why he was so pensive.
I burst out into laughter in spite of the severity of his statements. Everything he said was true, and in fact, I had to admit it terrified the shit out of me that these things were coming off of the mountain and into my hometown. But at the same time, his utterly blunt nature just sidelined all of my fears and made me feel like everything was as cut and dry as he made it.
He smirked a little, and then rose. "What time is it?" he asked, shielding his eyes against the sun. We'd gotten there in the afternoon, but since it was fall, it was getting dark earlier. The mountain didn't help; it created the illusion of being much later than it was.
I glanced down at my watch. "It's only four-thirty. Listen, dinner is at six. I'm going to go try and convince Cloud to come out of his room." I rattled off a few of the stores in town in case he needed anything, which I doubted he did. I had seen the materia he chose to bring the night before, and damned if it wasn't all mastered. I had no idea how his skill level with magic always stayed so high, but I hoped I got there soon. Or ever.
"He's not going to come out," he said. He said it with such certainty that I hesitated.
"Wait, why?" I asked, nearly stumbling as I stopped mid-turn. "You're kidding, right? Violet's told me Tifa's done nothing but talk about him since Violet told her we were coming. That's just cruel if he hides for the entire time we're here."
To these statements, Sephiroth offered only a shrug. "He's insecure. Not my problem. I will tell you this, though, if he keep up the act, I'm going to become less than understanding." He paused, and something dark flashed across his face. It was the same darkness I'd been seeing a lot recently, and I didn't like it.
I almost told him to go easy on Cloud, but I stopped short. Things like that didn't fly, no matter how "friendly" we were. He didn't "go easy" on anyone, and in fact, none of us really did. If we did, then there would be no point to the program. "I'll see you at six," I prompted, ready to get away from him for a while. He waved me off as his phone rang, and I watched him turn and walk towards the gate that lead to the mountain path.
Sephiroth had always had the warmth of an icicle, but the last few days he'd become... I hesitated to use a word, because I couldn't really describe it. It wasn't as though he were obviously behaving differently, but given the fact that I looked to him as the man I wanted to be when I "grew up", it was easier for me to spot the differences than it was for those who interacted with him for only minutes at a time. He was always cold and calculating – they said that was the program. The SOLDIERs all eventually got wiped down to a simmering nothing when it came to emotions. It wasn't that they took them from us, but we were able to control them almost to a point where they were like flipping a switch. It seemed like his had been in the dim area, and recently it was hovering somewhere between almost off and 'never there to begin with'. He hadn't really done anything to make me bring it up, it was just something I could feel.
I decided to ignore it, if only because it was easier for me to at the moment.
