The second week was no different than the first. And after the end of the third week Claire Farron was ready to break.

Her bruises were taking over, her skin more purple than cream, and the rest of her body felt achy and tired, exhausted.

The few hours she had for sleep each night passed so fast that Lightning wondered whether she had slept at all and dragging herself out of bed each morning had become more and more demanding, an almost impossible feat.

It was a marathon in discipline and self control. For if the pink haired third class in training hadn't had both she would have had just stayed in bed each morning, wouldn't have bothered to get up. Wouldn't have bothered with the brusies, the training, the pain.

Wouldn't have bothered with SOLDIER.

Her last meeting with General Sephiroth Crescent had been especially painful and humiliating.

His sole intention, she thought, seemed to be to prove how unworthy and weak she was.

He was training her now on some of the weekdays too and over the past few sessions he had started to teach her some close combat techniques. The last time they had met in the vastness of the training room he had been showing her how to defend herself against simple attacks. But coming from the silver haired legend no attack was to be taken lightly or categorized as simple.

Not only incredibly fast, the decorated first class was also unbelievably strong. His arms about as firm and deadly as the blade of his katana Masamune, although she knew he had to be holding back immensely, Lightning couldn´t dream to stand a chance against him.

That man could have erased a whole army with both his hands bound behind his back.

It was a miracle she hadn´t broken any limbs yet. Though sometimes she wished she had. That way she could at least have spent some time in the hospital, would have finally been able to take a break. The break she so desperately needed.


'Defend yourself.'

He was attacking her again, with his hands only, for what felt like the hundredth time.

The dark clad General had never used any kind of weapon against her ever since she had arrived. He never had too, his body being the ultimate weapon already.

The pink haired third class, she barely dodged his first blow.

Having a hard time blocking his second, she was much too slow for his third.

She didn´t even think to dodge again, just couldn´t, and a fraction of a second later her sensei's leather clad fist connected hard with her cheekbone and her world errupted in pain.

Again.

This time she landed on her knees. A position she found herself in a lot lately. And this time she wasn´t able to summon the power to defy him anymore, to not humiliate herself even further, as she was so mercilessly beaten up again.

She felt a tiny tear escaping from behind her long pink lashes.

Who was she to defy him anyway?

'You are too slow.' came her sensei's ready remark.

Claire Farron didn´t dare to look up to meet his mako eyes.

She kept her gaze trained on the floor instead, trying very hard not to pass out, as blood trickling from the corner of her mouth and onto the tiles, she found her vision blurry and her breath a shaky rasp.

It took her a few minutes to regain control over her body again, just to realize that her trainer was gone.

That night after her private beating up with Sephiroth, Lightning couldn´t hold it anymore.

Fleeing the third class training room to rejoice in the safety of her private quarters, she threw herself onto her bunk and let the tears flow freely.

Hugging her small white pillow to her chest she cried and cried and cried until there were no more tears to be shed.

There was noone there to wipe them away.

Noone there to calm her down. Noone there to lift her up. Noone there to care.

Never had she felt so lonely.

Not even when her parents had died.

She had still had Serah then. She had still had all her friends.

But here she had no one. Not a single soul to talk to.

Burrying her face in the depths of her company provided pillow, Lightning took some deep calm breaths, let the plain rough cotton soak up her tears.

Then, when she had decided that she was done, she went over to the bathroom, took off her blood stained clothes and inspected her injuries, all the bruises and sores she had gathered those previous weeks.

Deciding to ignore them, she went into the shower und stepped under a stream of icy cold water.

It stung her skin like thousand needles and helped her clear her tortured mind.

What the fuck had she been thinking, joining Shin-Ra? Accepting Sephiroth's offer to train her as his apprentice?

She must have been delusional. Must have been insane.

When she felt she couldn´t bear the icy currents any longer, Lightning stayed in there a few minutes longer before finally, the blood and sweat rinsed off, she got out to observe her quivering form in the mirror.

Sephiroth was right.

She was pathetic indeed.

Leaning forward to take a closer look at herself, to take in all her tiny imperfections, Lightning´s cool blue eyes subconsciously travelled to the small photograph she had pinned to the corner of her mirror again.

Serah.

Tears stinging her eyes again, she couldn´t help but replay the memory of their farewell inside her mind. The last memory she had of Serah. The last memory she had shared with her sole remaining family.

She remembered her sister´s eyes watering as she pleaded with her older sibling, pleaded her to stay.

Lightning knew it had to be hard for her too.

Having lost all her family except for her older sister and then loosing her too.

Poor Serah...

How she didn´t want to go to boarding school.

It had pained the pink haired soldier to see her little sister like that.

Oh, how much she wished there were another way.

But really, there weren´t exactly a lot of other options.

They had nowhere else to go.

No distant relatives to take them in.

Noone else to care for them.

No.

They had to look after themselves now.

She had to look after Serah. Had to make sure she was safe.

Distancing herself from her memories and her emotions, Lightning made to focus on her reflection again.

She was in SOLDIER now.

She couldn't carry on like this.

She had to toughen up.

She needed to be strong.

She needed to be strong for Serah.

'I am SOLDIER third class Lightning and I am strong.' she stubbornly told her reflection.

She spent the remainder of the afternoon repeating those words to herself again and again like a mantra, until her voice sounded steady and determined. Until she began to believe them herself.

Then she walked back into her room and took out some ink and paper.

With slightly shaking fingers she started to write her first letter to Serah. Something she had been planning to do upon her arrival but had put off for reasons she didn´t even understand herself.

It was the first of many letters to come.

'Dear Serah,' it said.

'I want to let you know that I safely arrived in Midgar and that I was lucky enough to be accepted into SOLDIER. In just one week´s time, I will have completed my third class basic training and I will receive my very first salary.

I hope you are alright.

Whatever you´re doing right now, please know that I am thinking of you.

I really miss you here.

Don´t worry about me. I am fine. I love you.

- Claire.'

She folded the paper with her sore callused fingers and stuffed it into it´s envelope, ready to be shipped.

She really hoped that Serah was doing fine.

She was all she had left after all.

Getting up from her bunk the pink haired female dressed again and the clock announcing dinner time already, she decided to post the letter on her way down to the dining hall.


Dinner time was always the worst of tortures for her, much worse than any beating from Sephiroth could ever be. It was the time when all the others ate together, talking animatedly to each other over their filled plates, while she, Claire Farron, went to stab at her food in a distant corner of the room alone, reminding herself just how much she didn´t fit in.

At least the staring and pointing and wolf whistling from the first few days had completely ceased. With her being the only female ever accepted into SOLDIER the others had been ogling her like a wild beast at the zoo. However, for all the attention she had received, nobody had ever asked to sit with her or anything.

Although those antics had been annoying, she didn´t know which was worse. Being the dining hall´s main attraction or being ignored completely.

The loneliness had been eating away at her from the beginning.

The sole people acknowledging her existence were her instructors at basic training and her sensei Sephiroth.

Despite their torturous nature, she somehow even found herself looking forward to her meetings with the first class General these days. Besides being a complete asshole, he was at least looking her in the eyes, focused his attention on her while training, interacted with her, even if he was constantly mocking and humiliating her.

Yes. She really did feel lonely.

Swallowing her tears once more, the pink haired woman carefully sat down at her empty table in the backmost corner of the dining hall were there was a majestic weeping willow caged behind a barrier of finger thick glass.

She found she kind of liked the presence of the tree.

Even if she couldn't touch it, smell it, hear the rustling of it's leaves in an imaginary summer's breeze, still it at least reminded her a little of the woods cradling the sunny beaches of Bodhum, where she'd spent endless walks with her family and friends, of the palm trees surrounding her parents beach house back in a past that weighted heavely now on her lonely heart.

If only she could go home...

If only she could meet up with Maqui, Yuj or Gadot, or sweet kind Lebreau, spend one afternoon with them at the beach again, just lying in the summer sun and talking, if only she could see Serah's smiling face for just a few moments. If only she could hug her, take her in her arms...

But there simply was no way.

There was no such thing as a holyday for a soldier third class in training and even if there were, the journey to Bodhum alone would have taken days. Days she didn't have.

No.

She was stranded here.

Stranded in this terrible city all by herself, starving for a friendly face, for a day of rest, caged into the dark corridors of Shin-Ra HQ, the dirty streets of Midgar, smothered by polluted air.

Trying to shut out the rumble of voices of her fellow soldiers she religiously repeated `I am soldier third class Lightning and I am strong.´inside her head.

Forcing her expression into an emotionless mask, she hoped she looked just like her mentor did. Intimidating and strong. Not weak and pathetic as she felt inside.

A soldier like her couldn´t let show evidence of weakness.

She needed to be strong.

From the outside and from the inside.

Both.

She had barely started on her meal, a lame excuse for a chicken curry, when suddenly another tray was set down on the table next to her's.

' - join you?' a friendly sounding male voice ripped her out of her bleary musings.

'Huh?!'

She hadn´t paid attention to her surroundings again and she heard Sephiroth´s voice scolding her for her lack of vigilance from somewhere in the depths of her imagination.

Not only had her mind failed to register that someone had approached her, she had also missed more than half of the question that had been directed at her.

Somehow stuff like this seemed to happen a lot lately.

She definitely needed a break!

Her cream cheeks blushing slightly, Claire Farron looked up to meet the kind bright eyes of Zack Fair for the very first time.

Silently Lightning let her gaze take in her fellow soldier's appearance from his spiky black bangs that framed his friendly face over to his trained arms and to the dark purplish uniform that covered his well defined thorso, marking him a SOLDIER second class.

He was closely followed by Blondie from the tailor's, to Claire's great dismay.

'I just wondered wether you´d mind if we joined you...?!' the black-haired guy repeated himself in a cheerful voice.

Lightning only stared.

What did a SOLDIER second class want with her? With them?

Cloud and her were only recruits after all.

Seeming to have accepted her stunned silence as some kind of consent, her fellow soldier let his body fall into the chair opposite her own, eagerly gesturing for Blondie to follow his example.

'My name is Zack, Zack Fair.' the young man said as he extended his right hand in greeting.

'And this is Cloud – I think you two have already met?'

The skinny blond boy only threw him an accusing glance.

Regaining her composure Lightning reached out to shake Zack´s hand.

She couldn´t help but smile.

The warm tingling sensation the casual touch created somewhere deep inside of her, it briefly helped to soothe the pain of her sore muscles and the throbbing in her purple cheek.

She had felt lonely yes, but Clair Farron hadn´t realized just how much she had been craving normal interpersonal contact.

Her gaze lingering on Zack Fair´s beautiful blue eyes for a few moments longer, she quickly introduced herself.

'Claire Farron. But you can call me Lightning.'

His eyes.

They weren´t the cold icy hue of her´s. But warm and welcoming. Azure blue like the sky.

She only halfheartedly greeted Cloud.

Instead of shaking his hand as she had done with Zack's, she simply acknowledged his presence with a half-hearted tilt of her head.

That evening Lightning learned that Zack was being trained by first class SOLDIER Angeal Hewley, making the three of them, Cloud, Zack and her, the only three apprentices the renowed first class heroes had ever taken, marking them some kind of recruit elite.

Angeal had apparently hired Zack as apprentice some six months ago and although in the beginning he had had no combat experience whatsoever he had already been promoted to second class.

It gave Lightning hope.

New hope for her future in SOLDIER.

And new hope for the present.

It was a nice feeling having someone to talk to over dinner for once, even about mundane stuff and in the end it was even worth having Cloud Strife at the table.

The evening went by incredibly fast with the three of them sitting and talking for hours about training sessions and missions and what would await Cloud and her once they had made it out of basic training, so that when finally Claire Farron left to go to sleep, after three long weeks of torture, finally she had the feeling that maybe, just maybe, everything was going to turn out alright.


The next week passed by quickly and before Lightning knew it she´d passed her third class basic training and received her first wages too.

She had sat with Cloud and Zack at dinner ever since they had first joined her at her table and the three of them had already made plans about what their life would look like once they'd made it into first class. For Zack and Cloud it seemed to involve mainly lots of dangerous missions and excessive parties.

Well. Lightning wasn't so sure about the parties.

Either way...

That sunday´s meeting with Sephiroth had been only a brief one.

Instead of training, or, in Lightning´s case, being beaten to pieces, on that special day her sensei had only told her to take the day off and gather her strength as the next day she was assigned to receive her first ever mako treatment.

A ritual that every member of SOLDIER had to undergo, Zack had told her, it would brand Claire Farron a Shin-Ra property for the rest of her life.

'Don´t underestimate the mako treatment. It is very strong.' Sephiroth had told her.

'You need to be fit in order to take it or it might as well kill you.'

Encouraging words spoken with complete lack of emotion.

Lightning knew her sensei's indifferent tone of voice so well by now.

Knew he didn´t care wether she would live or die.

For all she knew he might as well be happy for her to be gone. She felt like a nuisance he´d be glad to be rid of.

But the woman with the soft pink hair, she didn´t care what her sensei thought of her.

She decided to make it and live on. And if it was just out of pure ignorance. Just to spite him. She would keep breathing.

Heeding her sensei's advice Claire Farron spent the remainder of the day tending to her wounds and many bruises and tried to catch up on her lack of sleep, finally able to restore some of her energy.


It was Monday morning, the morning of her mako treatment, that third class Claire Farron woke up with her clothes drenched in sweat and the nauseating taste of foreboding on the back of her tongue.

The tiny clock on the sterile white wall telling her that she had about five minutes until her alarm would go off, Lightning couldn´t help but feel wide awake.

Having felt so sure of herself the night before, suddenly she was dreading the upcoming appointment as if it were her death sentence.

She promptly made to get up and ready and left her quarters to go straight to the science department where she knew the procedure was to take place, without consuming any food or water, just as she had been instructed.

A Shin-Ra operative dressed in a plain white lab suit greeted her at the glass elevators. One couldn't simply enter the science department or any of the upper stories without the appropriate keycard. Well, not a meager third class such as herself at least.

Stepping into the air conditioned cool of the glass elevator, Lightning couldn´t help but feel sweaty and nervous.

Was she having a temperature? Suddenly she wasn't sure.

Something wasn´t right with her.

Upon her arrival she was directed to take a seat in a white painted waiting room, where some of the other third classes were already gathered. She spied Cloud and Zack at the other end of the room, the latter gesticulating for her to join them, and it was on whobbly knees that she went over to sink into a seat right next to them.

'What are you doing here? You must have already had your mako treatment.' Lightning asked Zack by a way of greeting.

The latter welcomed her with a dazzling smile.

'Yeah... Well... I thought I'd come as your mental support.' he explained, taking in his comrades' bleak expression.

Cloud Strife only rolled his eyes, but Lightning couldn't help but feel a wave of greatfulness washing over her.

Zack was there. He must have had a dozen mako injections already and there he was. Still in one peace.

Piece of cake, as he would say.

'Don´t worry guys. It´s really just a small shot. Tingles a bit. That´s about it.' the black haired youth assured, a futile attempt at lifting his fellow soldiers' moods.

'I heard that people die from it all the time.' Cloud threw in somewhat dejectedly.

'It´ll be over before you even know it.' Zack assured, as if he hadn't heard.

Lightning couldn´t help but shiver.

It'll be over before you even know it.

A harsh choice of words Lightning thought.

It was then that a woman in a lab coat started calling out names from a long list and then one after the other the pink haired girl´s fellow third class´s filed away through the door at the other side of the room.

Claire Farron could feel her anxiety grow worse by the minute.

She didn´t even understand why.

According to Zack the whole procedure was harmless.

Nothing more than receiving a normal vaccine, was it?

Why then was she panicking like this?

Maybe it were her mentor´s words.

'Don´t underestimate the mako treatment. It is very strong. You need to be fit in order to take it or it might as well kill you.'

Wasn´t that what he had said?

Coming from him it hadn´t sounded harmless at all.

Had he been mocking her again? Taunting her?

Somehow she wasn´t sure.

Her palms growing sweatier and sweatier by the minute, her empty stomach churning uncomfortably, finally it was Ligthning's turn to be called.

She felt Zack's reassuring pat on her shoulder.

'It'll be fine.' he assured her.

'Thank you, Zack.'

Slowly the pink haired female got up and followed the woman in the lab coat out through the door into a white painted corridor and to another door which lead into a much smaller room tiled in equally white stone.

There was a sink and a moveable table that held a frightening assorment of needles and a number of other fear inducing instruments Lightning didn´t even want to know the use of, and a narrow stainless steeled operation table topped with a razor thin paper towel, the spot where she was destined to take place.

Climbing on top of the shiny cold table, Lightning self-consciously realized the bad condition her body was in.

All her muscles aching and sore, her hands shaking and her legs trembling slightly underneath her weight, she couldn´t help but feel weak. Weak and vulnerable. And it were her mentor´s words that kept repeating themselves again and again in her head, like a broken record.

'Don´t underestimate the mako treatment. It is very strong. You need to be fit in order to take it or it might as well kill you.'

Suddenly she felt ready to throw up.

'I´m not ready!' Lightning blurted the second the cool faced woman touched her shoulder to gently but determinedly make her lay down on the cold surface.

'Don´t worry. It will all be over in a moment.' the woman said, her voice like ice.

She pushed harder on the third class´s shoulder and before she even knew it, Lightning felt the hard surface of the cold metal table pressing through the soft fabric of her shirt, the thin paper towel beneath her doing nothing to comfort her.

'No you don´t understand. I´m not ready. I cannot take that shot.' the third class stammered panicky.

'Just realx my Dear. The doctor will be with you in a second.'

She gave her a pretentious smile and turned to exit.

A moment later the door opened again to admit three heavy built men and Lightning knew something was terribly wrong when they came to position themselves around the table.

'What... What is going on?!' she asked confusedly as suddenly wary, she made to sit up.

She was restrained by two of the men the second that she dared to move and it was then that a terrible fear took over her senses, her body flooded with adrenaline.

Her heart seemed to stop beating in her chest alltogether when suddenly she heard a hair-raising high pitched voice carrying over to her from the direction of the door.

'Ah... What do we have here...'

It seemed to be talking more to itself than to anyone else.

'Finally... I´ve been looking forward to meeting you.'

There was an eerie crazy giggle and a moment later a gaunt looking bespectabled face appeared in Lightning's field of vision.

The man who had spoken had long pulled-back dark hair, and a maniac glint in his weirdly colourless eyes.

Lightning couldn´t help but cringe when his cold spidery hand touched her skin to examine her forearm and she felt the sudden inexplicable urge to push it away. The moment her muscles flexed for movement though, she was restrained by six huge hands again. Their grips like shackles, bruising her soft white skin.

She heard the man cackle again.

A crazy sinister sound she knew would haunt her for the remainder of her life.

'HA-HA-HA – what an outstanding specimen. Such vigor.' the eerie voice admired.

'You would make quite the interesting project... Wouldn´t you? Quite the piece in my collection.'

Claire Farron wasn´t sure she´d heard correctly.

What was going on?!

Was this some kind of weird dream?!

Was she hallucinating?!

Maybe she´d already received her mako shot and those were some adverse effects she was experiencing?

Yes.

That was exactly what was going on.

It had to be!

She closed her eyes very tightly.

She counted to ten.

She opened them again and there was the mad doctor again, a huge scary syringe with a sickly green liquid glasped in his latex gloved hand.

'Let´s see how well you take this.' he said in his creepy voice. And suddenly Lightning felt the twinge of a needle being inserted into the vein at the crook of her exposed right arm.

'NO!' her cry, a cry of pain and fear and despair, Lightning couldn´t seem to hold it back.

Her limbs shaking she thrashed around violently, a desperate attempt at trying to get herself free. But held down by those three huge men, the pink haired female couldn´t do anything but watch as the gleaming green liquid was forced into her body.

It took her a few moments to accept that fact.

To register what was done to her.

And then.

Suddenly.

So very unexpectedly it happened.

The pink haired soldier, she couldn´t stifle an audible gasp escaping her lips, as suddenly she realized that something was off.

That something was terribly, terribly wrong.

The mako shot was nothing like what Zack had promised.

This injection, it hurt way more than a simple vaccine should have!

A searing pain spreading from the puncture, travelling through her veins and into her entire body, it made Claire Farron forget how to breathe, how to think.

Her eyes darting to the weird doctor´s ugly face in panic, she found his lips twisting into a malicious grin.

It was the last thing she registered before her pupils dilated and suddenly her world erupted in pain.

A searing white pain.

Blinding her.

Deafening her.

Devouring her.

Until finally her tortured body couldn´t take no more and the pink haired soldier third class went limp under those six strong restraining hands.


Professor Hojo couldn´t help but smile as silently he let his sadistic tiny eyes drink in the suffering of his pretty little specimen.

How just a second ago she had tried to defy him, and now she was writhing in pain, screaming from the excruciation at the top of her lungs, his lackeys barely able to restrain her twitching form.

He enjoyed every second of it.

Reveled in it.

Marveled at the cruelty of it.

Yes. This moment definitely was the best part of his work.

The first mako shot always hurt worst, he of everbody should know best, he had tried the treatment on himself on several occasions.

But this one was not quite the usual mako shot, was it?

No. It wasn't. One could bet on that.

Though Shin-Ra wouldn't let him do much experimenting these days, they at least let him have the honor of creating this very special shot for her.

Displeased by the course of events - they had a female inside SOLDIER now after all - HAHAHA - they had planned on disposing of the girl as soon as discreetly possible. And the mandatory SOLDIER mako treatment had been the perfect opportunity. A soldier dying from a simple mako injection was nothing unheard of after all.

But they hadn´t been planning on taking any risks in her case and so he, Professor Hojo, head of the Shin-Ra science department himself, to his great enthusiasm, had been instructed to design a lethal mako shot for this very special occasion.

'HAHAHAHAHA!' the dark haired man, he couldn´t help but emit one of his crazy cackles.

'Fools... As if I would let slip such a perfect opportunity.' he muttered to himself.

The mako shot he had created, it was special indeed.

Very special.

But it was also very strong.

He wasn´t sure wether his new subject could take it.

She might as well die. In which case they´d get exactly what they wanted.

But if... Yes... If indeed she survived...

Yes there was a tiny chance...

'HAHAHAHAHA!'

Well... They would have to think of something good to get rid of her then.

Professor Hojo couldn´t help but marvel at his own ingenuity.

This way or the other.

His experiment would be a success.

Giving one of his eerie chuckles yet again, he leant down to check his latest project's pulse.

He found it racing like crazy under the tips of his latex clothed fingers.

Good.

'Quite the tough one aren't you?' he murmured to himself.

The three men around him only exchanged funny glances.

'I can see now why my most precious creation has taken a liking for that girl.' the head of the science department mused.

'I admit, I had been somewhat taken aback when I heard that he had chosen a female as his apprentice but – Ohhhh – the possibilities...' he couldn´t stifle another delighted cackle as taking off his gloves he moved over to the sink to wash his hands before exiting the room he looked over at his new specimen for one last time.

No.

Shin-Ra wasn´t happy about this.

A female in SOLDIER.

He knew they were going to give her a hard time. But what could they do about her now that General Sephiroth Crescent had chosen her.

'Nothing!' he spat into the room.

'HAHAHA!'

He would make sure his precious experiment would get the apprentice he deserved and it wasn´t for the first time that he wished that he were free to do what he pleased.

Free to do some further experimenting.

But sadly his hands were bound.

For now.


Zack Fair had been deep in conversation with Cloud Strife when suddenly the blond boy's name was called, only shortly after Lightning had left.

He knew what was about to await the both of them and wished that he could somehow make it easier for them. Take some of their pain away to make it somewhat manageable. Because what Zack Fair knew was that the mako shot was no regular shot at all. That was just something he had made up to take some of his colleagues´ fear away.

But he knew he couldn´t help them now.

What happened behind those doors in the examination rooms was their's alone to bear.

He was starting to get up to make his way back to the commons, as he knew it would take the two of them some hours of rest before they´d finally get themselves back together, when suddenly Lightning´s tortured screams echoed from the rooms that lay beyond that blasted door.

Stopping dead in his tracks, Zack Fair found he couldn´t bear it.

Those screams of her's, they went through bone and marrow.

Giving a defeated sigh, the black haired third class turned around and, ignoring the protesting lady in her lab coat, he hurriedly pushed past her to reach the room where Lightning was in.

She wasn´t exactly hard to find.

Those screams...

Surely the whole department must have heard. If not the whole building.

He entered promptly, just to find three Shin-Ra lapdogs trying to secure his friend, whom he witnessed to be trashing around wildly, screaming in agony, blinded by the seemingly unbearable amount of pain.

The startled young man, he stood there rooted to the spot.

Knowing there was nothing he could actually do he just stayed there where he was, watched, until finally, mercifully, his comrade's body went silent and limp. And he couldn´t help but feel relieved. So infinitely relieved that he would´t have to watch her torment any longer. So infinitely relieved that at last her suffering had ended and she might be able to find some peace before waking up to a modified body that would take her some time to get accostumed to.

The doctor and the lapdogs left. Supposedly making their way over to their next victim.

Maybe Cloud.

Slowly Zack walked over to his comrade´s side to gently cup her face.

Her cheek was burning.

'Light?' he tentatively called her name. But to no avail.

The poor girl.

Never had he heard of anyone taking their first mako shot this badly.

But then again. There were people who had died from it, weren´t there?

It was just he hadn't known them personally.

Was that what was happening to her?

Surely the doctor wouldn't have left if he thought that possible, or would he?!

Zack Fair was about to check her pulse when suddenly the door opened again and he was shooed out of the room by some displeased looking nurse.

Involuntarily, the black haired second class left, only to find General Sephiroth Crescent leaning against the wall outside.

The renowed war hero raising a brow at him inquisitively, feeling his cheeks flush crimson, Zack Fair threw him a quick salute and turned to leave before he could be scolded for being where he knew he had no right to be.


General Sephiroth Crescent slowly exhaled a long held breath as leaning there against the cold white wall adjoining examination room number 2, he found his left hand almost crushing the handle of his katana Masamune, while he listened to his third class apprentice scream in agony.

Oh, how much he hated that son of a bitch.

Hojo.

The silver haired hero couldn´t help but remember the countless times he had found himself at the receiving end of one of Hojo´s more brilliant creations and a nauseating clammy feeling settled in the pit of his stomach as he thought of the terrible pain his apprentice had to endure right then.

What for?!

WHAT FUCKING FOR?!

She might as well die in there. He was aware.

Damn Genesis for his shitty ideas!

He shouldn´t have let himself get manipulated by the blasted redhead so easily.

He shouldn´t have accepted to train her in the first place.

If it weren´t for him she would have never been allowed to join SOLDIER.

If it weren´t for him she wouldn´t be there now.

Wouldn´t have to endure all this torture.

Instead of there he´d rather have her somewhere far away.

Somewhere safe.

He´d rather he´d never have met her than to know her in Hojo´s hands.

That much was for sure.

Maybe he should never have accepted her.

But then again...

There it was. The memory of that blasted day when he had first seen her, perched there on a spindly stool at the head of the SOLDIER briefing room.

He had seen the desperation in her big blue eyes.

Like she had nowhere else to go.

Like joining SOLDIER was her very last resort.

She hadn´t come to Midgar because she wanted to become a hero, to fulfill her dreams, as so many applicants wished.

Claire Farron had come because she hadn´t had a choice.

And even though the circumstances might have differed, might have differed a lot, the silver haired General had remembered then, that he hadn´t had a choice either.

And there was something else he'd seen there in her eyes that day.

In those pretty ice blue eyes.

Something he couldn´t quite describe. Couldn't quite grasp himself.

Something inside her.

Something unbreakable.

Militancy maybe.

She had defied him from the very first second her eyes had fallen upon him and no matter what he did to her, no matter how much he tortured or humiliated her in training, never once had she asked him to stop.

And although she was weak and ignorant and pathetic and dumb, General Sephiroth Crescent had to admit that he did respect her for that.