The Glass Façade
Chapter 13
Tripod prt 1
The camera's image was of mediocure quality. Grainy, restricted to two shades (grey and paler grey), the pictures were of poor quality, still he watched them, once, twice, and for each veiwing he felt that cold, hard, wieght, fold over his heart. The moment came, having seen it at least twice he was prepared, it came and went and he shutddered. Camera C541A0 was the provider of a scene that would prove to be the crux of his nightmares for so many nights after. He had cursed as the moment had fadded into history, but then he always cursed when shook. Now the profanities dribbled, they weren't barked out with the force of thunderous hate, no... they fell from benumbed lips. His hands shook, something that hadn't happened in nearly a decade. Realization came then, a cold grim certinty that stole all the fire of his ambition and shoved ash into his mouth.
He was getting too old for this.
Reaching up for the remote he leveled it at the screen. A twitch of his thick thumb and history whirled back on itself. Impossible feats went in reverse, and only when the screen's image was a steady block of grey did he release his grip. And it all started again.
Backing him was glory. Shown by symbol, by pictures, and medals inbedded on shining steel plates, the trials of a life time in SOLDIER, and the more mundane threars surmounted as an executive backed him. Glory was so close on hand he could reach behind him and let it hold him up.
Before him though, the images from the Mako reactor started all over again. The moment would come, as it always came.
And he would remember his cry, the muffled battle cry that dribbled frim his lips with a red run of blood.
"Intruders' got materia, sound the alert."
They'd serounded him, black clad, lifeless eyes, looked down him, past him... One of them was familiar, he faceted his gaze on that pale face, idly wondering why the pain from his gut was dying down. Steel grey eyes fasceted on him, seeing the SOLDIER from behind an alien's mask. He knew this black suit, knew him well, and even had respected the man.
There gazes had met, then steel eyes flicked off of him, then back on, as if realizing the potential mortal slant of the wound.
"Veld..." He mumbled the words, hacking up another wad of red.
The Turk hadn't blinked, only watched in mute contemplation over the aging SOLDIER"s suffering. Finally, the words came, the candance of a coward, all but muted by weariness "Pull back, things are out of control, we need time to regroup."
He howled in protest, or rather he had tried. Hands reached for him then, claled by his cry. Black gloved, silk sheathed, they had pulled him from laying to sitting and his cry had graduated from protest to agony at the sudden motion. The red from his side that had been coming out in a sticky dribbled gushed out in a torrent of red. Orders were barked, reprimants... But he was beyond that then, for his world had faded from an agony starred grey to an unfeeling black.
Rolling the remote in his calloused fingers, Heidegger grunted as the remebered agony of the gut wound translated itself into a dull ache at this late date. As the images began and the impossibilities played out the Head of Security hummed and hawed about his role in all this. SOLDIER was all but his now, and thier failure -and the subsequesntial destruction of the reactor- could easily be ascribed as his fault. But information was Tseng's job, knowing when these little lapses in security were going to hapen was the Turk's jurisdiction.
Decision made, Heidegger hit the power switch off and the ghostly images of grey faded into black.