Chapter XXI: Stumbling steps
Disclaimer: Not mine and I make no profit.
What is it like to be a Weapon? The monster Valkyries who battle the Igniter of Forest Fires, Mother of Frost and Famine, the Extinguisher of Stars. They are the deadly gems of Gaia crystallized in Mako, sleeping under hot sands, frozen within the ocean in deeps where blue turns to black, embedded to the bedrock, sleeping in thick, humid jungle and in the Crater where everything begun. And the one, the last, desperate measure, the revelation at the end of age hidden away in the heart of the Planet. To be a Weapon is to be a sword and a gun. It is to be a monster and who can tell what monsters are except other monsters? So tells the lore.
Science tells another tale. To be a Weapon is to be cunning, but not aware, to sleep and to awaken when identified by interplanetary pattern recognition receptors. What is it like to defend your living body from a parasite? For Gaia there are no doctors to issue medicines. This is why Gaia can only suppress them for so long; the protection is not voluntarily and in the end she doesn't even try more than that for Gaia's function is Gaia and she has produced and dispatched the Weapons to cleanse threats to her continued existence. Both are true or neither are. The Weapons don't care.
But these are not the only type of Weapons.
There is one foreign Weapon, one forged by one of Gaia's to be wielded against her by Calamity. But even he was Gaia's first, in the womb he was hers, and so Nova Jenova is not the only mother to call for their child. But it will be in vain, and so Gaia has called for the third type.
Hojo had waved distractedly at the worn chair before his desk, giving the majority of his attention to the thick file in front of him; the rest of the science department had switched to using computer files as their media ages ago, but Hojo was stubbornly clinging to his papers and fountain pens. Sentimentality didn't become him, Shin-Ra's priced general and guinea pig had thought. Sephiroth had glanced at the pages as he settled onto the uncomfortable chair, but as he was no chemist, let alone a Mako chemist, they hadn't told him much. Project S at the top of the front page was what had let him know they were about him.
"I'll be back in a moment," Hojo had said as he walked out of the room and Sephiroth had had to gnash his teeth to keep from reminding Hojo that he had been the one who'd called this meeting and that he had an actual mission, courtesy of Hojo also no doubt, to carry out instead of watching the professor attempt to play head games.
But he had wanted to get the interview over with as soon as possible and get ready for the long road to the coast, so he hadn't made an issue that would have only further delayed them. So he had waited, and Hojo had given him the injection. Now, as the lightning periodically flashed the cabin clear and sharp with bright, white light and the ship was rocking haphazardly, he wondered if the strange, burning churning that seemed to radiate from his stomach to his chest and all around his body was simply seasickness or after effects of yet another Mako-hormone cocktail that might improve his performance some hundredth parts of a percent. His migraine had returned with a vengeance too.
"You know how they believe in Wutai that the god of thunder may steal a person's belly button?" Zack asked him, sitting on his bed as he swung his legs haphazardly in the small space between the bed and the nightstand.
"No," Sephiroth said, hoping his aide would take the hint and let him suffer in peace.
"Well, now you know. But what happens afterwards? Will the skin close or will there be a hole? I could live without my belly button, but if there was a hole in my stomach I could die!" No such luck. Sephiroth pinched the bridge of his nose and wished for patience or a shipwreck that would shut Zack up; he wasn't sure which he wished for more.
"You have such terrible worries," he muttered acidly, and wished normal painkillers would work on him. There was so much Mako in his system, his body neutralized most drugs right away and the situation didn't quite call for codeine.
"Why haven't you used your Cure?" was the next question and Sephiroth felt his restraint snapping.
"You think I haven't thought of that? Cure did nothing, even at the highest level! Now shut up, your voice is grating on my nerves!" Cure had never dulled his headaches. Black sawtooth lines were dancing through his field of sight—now he had to battle nausea too. This reminded him terribly of that one headache in Wutai, when all had been hazed by red and he had fought an army single-handedly and won. The ship rocking them like a centrifuge gone crazy didn't help any.
Zack said something and stood up, walking to his bed and crawling behind him. Sephiroth didn't like it when people touched him from behind, but Zack's big, rough hands felt wonderfully warm when they enveloped his temples and began their gentle kneading, so he let it be and let his anger slowly slip away. At times, he feared that Zack might simply get tired of struggling to endure him and walk away. He had often taken out his bad temper on his friend for reasons that weren't his fault, because he couldn't strike at those who really were to blame. Zack had never done the same to him and logically he should grow weary of Sephiroth sooner or later. It was his good luck, he thought, that Zack and logic were merely passing acquaintances at best.
"That is good," he said as a way of apologizing. He had come to find out that apologizing might send Zack into an irate tizzy, especially when he apologized for something that Zack decided he shouldn't; apparently, it was even worse than not apologizing for something he should have, if Zack's volume was an indicator. The pattern of things to not apologize for was complicated and often unpredictable, so it was easier to not say it. He wasn't up to the guessing game now, nor the dreaded Dammit, Sephiroth,, if you ever apologize for (the slight) again I'll kick your sorry ass into the next week, do you understand? That one was rare, luckily, as it made him feel very ill at ease.
He knew that Zack wondered why he stayed in Shin-Ra and he really hoped the man would never actually ask. There was no way he had a correct answer to that one.
"Why did they send us over the sea by boat anyway? Airship would be much faster," his friend grumbled and Sephiroth silently agreed. They would waste days; they already had just gotten to the harbour. He was sure there was much about this mission that he hadn't been told; why send five Soldiers from Midgar, one of them General Sephiroth himself, to search for missing personnel when there were capable men much closer to Firefrost One? President Shin-Ra had avoided both the question and his eyes, so Sephiroth knew that it had something to do with Hojo. Why the president gave the scientist so much leeway was as big mystery to him as the way Hojo's mind worked.
But he was too tired to look underneath the underneath right now, and while Zack didn't quite manage to knead the headache away, he would keep the tension from seeping into his neck and shoulders. Feeling the tug at his lips, Sephiroth's realized much to his surprise that he was smiling, though faintly. There was the low rumbling of thunder as lightning illuminated the small, but almost fanatically neat cabin, the crisp, blue blankets, spotless wooden surfaces and the metal parts shining so much, he could see his distorted image in them. The orderly room was kind of calming. Maybe this trip wouldn't be a complete catastrophe after all. He had more important things to do than that of course: a stack of personnel files waited to be waded through before they chose the next set of candidates for the Soldier program. But he didn't like paperwork—he didn't think any sane person could—and despite his random train of thought, Zack was good company.
"Speaking of Wutai, are pandas black and white, or white and black?" Zack asked out of blue.
"I have no idea and no pressing need to know either." They were speaking of Wutai?
"I heard once that zebras are black and white, because if you shave them their skin is black underneath. Do you think it's the same thing with pandas?" Then again, if the storm kept him from escaping to the deck for the whole journey, he just might come to reconsider.
Scarlet had only been intimate with Reeve for three days, but she had already come to notice that the bad side of being with someone ecologically minded and working for Urban Renovation was that people were likely to talk about what interested them, and Reeve had recited his worries and doomsday prophesies (complete with statistics of the decrease in yearly rainfall and the average surface temperature and harvests) to her like at confessional. The man was lucky, she thought as she kneeled on the dirty steel scaffold to tighten the screws that attached the protective casing over the motherboard of her newest treasure, that he had such a sexy voice and that he understood the pressure she was living under. She wouldn't put up with just anyone so gloomy.
She wasn't completely shallow as a puddle, contrary to many people's opinion. It wasn't shallowness that made her guiltily wonder what she had done to whom when she saw the picture of the brownish red writing on the wall before she squished that train of thought. It wasn't shallowness that made her close her eyes from the desolate plains around Midgar as much as it was yielding to her employer and fighting depression. The years in Shin-Ra had beaten all idealism out of her ages ago, but it still bothered her, what she was in fact aiding and abetting; the fact she allowed Reeve to remind her of that told a great deal.
Maybe she wouldn't even put up with Reeve for long if he hadn't been so unsurprised to see her, the usually feminine and fashionable department head, working the other day in dirty coveralls, getting her own hands dirty with her big project. She hadn't wanted her lover to see her like that, her golden hair tied in a knot at her neck and in clothes that didn't flatter her ever-lithe body, but he had looked respectful if anything and asked her questions about her project. Intelligent questions too, instead of the usual "can it blow this up"; he had even looked truly interested in her Mako Cannon. Scarlet had been shocked. Heidegger had once seen the same thing a few years ago and the arrogant, pig-headed man still held it over her.
A static shock bit her fingers and calmed her ire a little. Neutralization of the buildup of electric charge, she thought and caressed the smooth metal surface. She loved the jargon.
"Ms Scarlet, we got the new actuator you wanted!" Jensen shouted to her from the floor below her. She was a chubby, dull-looking woman with mousy brown hair and sadly, her personality matched her looks, but when it came to her field of expertise her mind was as sharp as a razor. Scarlet was kind of proud that she had given women the chance to advance other than the way women usually had to make it in Shin-Ra.
She rather resented them for having what she hadn't been given, but life wasn't fair, and she wasn't going to take it out on them. Well, unless she was having a really bad, gods-awful day, but even then she only shouted at them.
"You know what to do with it. I want to be able to monitor the motor oil temperature tomorrow," she told the younger woman and stood up. Now, when the protective measures were all in place, she decided to call it a day. While Reeve might like this side of her, it didn't mean she wasn't going to wash her hair, clean the dirt from under her nails, or otherwise make herself presentable. In a slinky red dress of course, the one with sequins sewn in the bodice. She was a woman and a sensual creature, and Odin help him if Reeve dared to see her as one of the guys one day.
Everyone wanted her for her body and most everyone wanted her for the power she had secured for herself, fighting tooth and nail over every scrap of professional respect and every coin of the annual budget of her department. One didn't want her at all, but she wasn't thinking of Sephiroth now. Was it so bad to fall for someone that wanted her brains and sharp tongue and still want him to see her as a desirable lady?
She was in Junon because that was where her work was at the moment. Reeve was in Junon because she was and because he could work from there just fine. Neither had a clue how lucky they were.
Cloud had looked down the saddest city lane in Midgar and passed by a Soldier on his beat. In Cosmo Canyon he had dropped his eyes in front of Zack Fair, unwilling to explain. He thought that should the Soldier, any Soldier, somehow appear here he would hit him over the head, tell him to look around him and then demand an explanation for his idiocy.
Piekna truly looked like a seasoned activist in her green and brown gym clothes, though she had been holding the ornate cinquedea rather unsurely. The name of the type of sword, meaning five fingers, was apt as it described the width of the blade next to the guard and Cloud would really have preferred she choose a weapon with greater reach. Still, he had a feeling that Elfé would introduce his friend to katanas soon enough, so he didn't want to criticize her choice; it would make a good second weapon. Piekna had a few bruises on her, but those weren't from the sword practice. Elfé had decided to begin with katas so the purple spots marring the pale skin were probably from hand-to-hand training. Cloud hadn't been there to see, he had gotten his first mission as a full time member and had been packing his winter gear. Of all the possible places for Hojo to set up a camp, he'd had to choose the Icicle Area. The professor was a true sadist, there was no questioning that.
They were sitting side by side beneath an apple tree full of unripe but red-tinted fruits, encased in yearning for the sun; the two of them were sitting close enough to be boyfriend and girlfriend. The high noon sun was gentle and warm like an embrace; the playful wind was making the long grass dance around them while a green and a dazzling yellow chocobo were walking the side of the fence towards them. Piekna had cut her nails ruthlessly short, and now there was filth caked under the cuticles; her palms were a little red and it wouldn't take many days before the calluses began to form. Cloud wasn't sure if he would fall for her; it was a very romantic situation as far as he could judge and he wasn't sure if he felt attraction or just friendship. She was just getting her breath back when her head shot up, eyes smiling even wider than her mouth.
"That was some heavy jogging. But I guess my stamina will go up, especially since I'm gonna get Mako shots too. It's nice, becoming a resistance Fighter with you." Barrett and Sears had gotten drunk in the welcome party to the three new members and decided that their program needed a cool name too. After a lot of cussing and arm wrestling they had decided on resistance Fighter, much to Piekna's delight and Verhandi's rueful amusement. He really liked mother's laughter, Cloud thought. She laughed much too little as far as he was concerned.
"So your grandmother remarried?" It was a rhetoric question as she had already told him that much.
"Yes, and it was quick too. They only met few months ago, but grandma said that life's short and shorter to old people so they didn't want to waste time." Then she gave a little laugh and stretched her back.
"I was there when the seamstress was changing her old wedding gown. She was twitching the whole time as the poor woman was trying to adjust the waist." A silence fell, but it was a comfortable one, as neither of them felt the need to say anything. Hildr came to beg treats from them while Sunny, still unused to them, waited a few meters behind her new friend.
"I need to go soon. We're having a briefing," Cloud said reluctantly. The thought of his father and Veld on the same mission was still mildly scary, but they were the best infiltrators Avalanche had and it was guaranteed to be educational at least.
"Build a snowman for me, okay? And lets go out when you come back," Piekna asked teasingly and now Cloud was sure she was flirting with him, the way her eyes strayed to his lips and how she leaned towards him proof enough. He was flirting right back, but he wasn't going to hide the changes in him. In Cosmo Canyon where all his closest friends, his age-mates, had been girls he had often been treated as one of the girls by them, but Rain Lockhart aside, he wasn't interested in cultivating a more feminine reputation now. Nothing would come of this if they didn't get to know each other again; the time apart had taken its toll.
"Hákon already called dibs on the first night. He says I have to get drunk at least once, even if I have to buy the bar empty to do it." One of the downsides of Mako, the man had told him, and slapped his back. For a second, he wondered if she would disapprove, but her thoughtful smile reminded him that she was also a newly minted adult and about to take the same treatment. Sun was kissing their eyes and the lazy wind made them lazy too. He should have been going already.
And yes, anyone who saw both Midgar and place like Fabales or Cosmo Canyon and then thought that Shin-Ra was right was an idiot of great magnitude.
"I've never been drunk either. Maybe we could go to a bar together?" He liked her, and not just because she was a lot more confident now. And so it was decided. Cloud was feeling pretty secure already with how things were going, but when he later went to the mission briefing and the subject of General Sephiroth leaving Midgar for some reason came up, a side mention when the possibility of intercepting more of Hojo's crates came up, his belly did a traitorous flip-flop. It wasn't like he was even going to see the man. He really had to work on that more.
He was going to Firefrost One because he was their "Turk except a lot nicer" in training. He had the kind of luck only the very cursed or very blessed have.
What is it like to be a Weapon? Some Weapons, some cells aren't created as such, but simply picked up and put at work if they are at the right place at the right time, if they have the right capabilities. Something different is going to happen and Cloud is to be the catalyst, unknowingly. Another of him is going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and suffer for it, but maybe this one can make it right.
If the designated Weapons are like high yield bombs, he is like a sharpshooter's rifle, much less likely to do collateral damage. He is also a person, so he has no idea what else he was. People tend to be like that.
So what is it like to be Cloud? At times difficult, but he liked himself and his circumstances. It was exciting, he was respected, and he had a mission; he was in love, or maybe not. It wasn't a conclusive answer, but he couldn't really have given a comparison if asked for one.
