Chapter 1
I drifted through the pain and floated through the currents of sorrow. All about me loomed a shadow darker than night, it flowed and breathed as it sucked me to its bosom. For an eternity I hung there in desperation and despair, awaiting an end that would not come. There was no escape from this prison, from the whirlpool of suffering, so I endured only because there was nothing else I could do.
However, the blackness would close in at times, and from across the void I could hear a strange voice calling me. I say it was strange only because it happened to avoid sound all together by appearing inside my head, an inaudible command that sought obedience from within my tortured soul.
It welcomed me in and clothed me in comfort. I would sink into a place where the darkness no longer frightened me, and the shadows were no longer menacing. It was always then that the blackness would curl up on itself like mist or fog, and through would shine a light more brilliant than anything I can remember laying eyes on. It shone with the intensity of the sun, and with the warm glow of a cheery log fire. The light moved like a living creature, and it always seemed to me that my very soul was open to its omniscient solar eye.
Through the heavenly portal would appear the angel…
It had to be an angel, I knew that much even though I was no longer sure what the word meant. She was a young woman in a shimmering rose-colored dress. Her hair was a golden brown and hung about her in wonderful curls and braids, held in place by a band of brilliant pink and white which wreathed her head in a halo of cherry flame. She would come to me and speak to me, though I could never remember the words afterwards. When she finally departed back through the circle of radiance I was left with a feeling of complete comfort, beyond what even the voice could offer. Also, there was a knowledge that I could and would strive on through my torture, that I would defeat the perpetual and unending pain. The night would rise about me again, subjecting my mind to its punishments, as if to scorn me for my insolent refusal of its kind offer of peace. Peace was all I wanted, and nowhere could I find it. It eluded my grasp as effectively as oil might slip through a strainer. It was as foolish a goal as attempting to grip water in your hand.
Yet, as long as the angel visited me I knew that I could continue fighting. I was sure that there must be something beyond the void of sorrow or else what might she be telling me to fight for? Yes…she wanted only what was best for me. I knew this with a conviction that was stronger than iron. If the angel wanted me to return to the other world, then I would fight till I got there…I would fight until I found peace.
It was this drive that kept me going as long as I did.
But all things must come to an end.
For some time the voice had been speaking to me, it was constantly intruding into my thoughts. The call was incessant now, a growing trouble that gnawed away at the back of my mind like a dog scraping on the back door, waiting to be let in. I blocked out these thoughts, and plugged up my soul to the voice. However, it was getting to be more vigorous in its invitation to let go, and as the pain and suffering increased by the second I knew I would eventually give in.
It was a foregone conclusion really, for too long I had battled with myself and the voice. I was weak and the darkness was strong. My will was wavering and the eternal night delighted in my suffering so that I wanted to scream at it, to release the anger and frustration that had been building up within me for so very long indeed.
But no sound would come; no matter how hard I tried there was only the pervasive silence that answered back…and the summons.
There was no angel this time, no gateway of hope to pull me from the brink of the abyss, and somehow I knew there wouldn't be. Somewhere I felt in the very pit of my soul a knowledge that this time, I was alone. This struck like a bowling ball, and suddenly I knew not only that the terrible suffering would never end, and that I would meet this fate totally and utterly alone. The desolation of this feeling of loss was so absolute that it pervaded whatever was left of my sanity like a virus, and tore my resolve to shreds. I was overwhelmed with bitterness and resentment, at what I cannot be sure, only that more than anything else I wanted to lash out at something with all my might.
But there was nothing there to attack, and as the loneliness wore off I was left with a hollowness of the spirit and mind that let in the voice and gave it full reign. There was no more tenacity left within me, no feeling at all, except for that last wish for peace and rest.
And the voice offered this to me in thick, sweet, honey dipped tones. Its words were reassuring and in every way seemed to me the purest wisdom. Why SHOULD I continue on like this, when all it took to reach oblivion was letting go…I found letting go to be all too easy.
Once again I sunk down to that world where black turned to gray and sorrow became nothing more than a bad dream. This time there was nothing to stop me, and with a sigh of relief I let myself be pulled silently down into the great beyond.
The black became gray and then black once more and I had the sensation of falling very quickly, and yet I was not afraid. The darkness began to slither around me like a burrow of snakes. The slithering waves were tainted green and soon I was flying down through a glowing emerald sea of light. Strange thoughts and emotions burst in my head like the sounding of trumpets around my ears, only to be replaced by new ones. A thousand bells were ringing in my head, and the world around me became more and more jumbled and chaotic as my descent neared its end.
Oh blessed relief washed over me like a cool mountain spring as the green tendrils let me slip through their grasp, down into a land of total and complete bliss. How can I describe the ambiance that caressed my soul and set my heart at ease? I had finally reached the place where I might finally be at peace, and surely no outside world could be as right as this place. 'Yes,' the voice said, 'rest awhile, sleep awhile…you'll soon feel much better…just a small nap…you deserve it…just a nap…' The void around me grew hazy as I began to drift off. The green light was returning, wrapping about me like a warm blanket, calming me like a mother comforts a small child. I felt so very warm and secure, like I could sleep there forever, and then, all of a sudden, the world went cold.
My eyes fluttered open wide in shock and terror as I was surrounded not by the comforting light of the emerald sea, but darkness. As I thrashed about in a mindless rage, a white light grew in the distance. This was not like the light from heaven, the harbinger of the angel. It was instead more like a small point of luminosity, radiating in all directions like a tiny white sun, there was nothing warm about it. What's more is that it was getting closer and closer to me, and as it grew bigger, I stopped my futile battering of shadow and went still with surprise. It was now very near indeed, close enough for me to reach out and touch it, but this was one thing I didn't dare attempt. It stopped and hovered in silence, object and man waiting to see who blinked first. Mist began to pour from the orb like crystal water, floating out and expanding with delicate tendrils and fingers of light. It was then that I noticed it was forming a general shape…an almost human shape. The white mist continued to form and solidify until the object before me was most certainly a human, and a woman at that. The color was added and final features set. I had to catch my breath.
"The angel?!" I whispered in a hoarse voice…it had been a long time since I'd used it. Her face creased in a wonderfully warm smile.
"I've been called many things," she said, "but I think you're the first to call me an angel." Her voice was as like listening to a symphony of silken sounds all at once, and the stroke of a single syllable was like listening to the sweetest flute playing a solo inside your head. Yet, there was always a soft undertone to it, so that it was a voice that commanded, but comforted all at once.
"What…," I said, "What are you doing…here?" I was having trouble finding the words, speech itself seemed so strange to me, like something that had been forgotten long ago.
Her smile dimmed a little, "I'm dead, like you." 'Yes,' I told myself, 'that makes sense, what could I be besides dead?'
I looked around, "what is this place?"
"This," she replied, "I suppose you could call it limbo, although it's much more complex than that."
"So…," I replied, "I'm not completely dead then?"
She looked at me strangely, "you cut right to the heart of the matter actually. Technically we're both dead, or we should be. I felt you when you entered this place, you would have died, but I pulled you out."
"Then why are you here?" I asked, words finally flying back to place in my head, becoming readily available for use by my lips.
"Me…," she said, "I was…" She shook her head, "I really don't like to talk about it. By the way Zack, my name is Aeris, in case you don't remember me." The name sounded some note deep within the depths of my cloudy memory. Aeris…I knew this name, but there were more pressing questions at hand.
"How do you know my name?" I asked curiously.
"We…know each other from the past," she replied. "We parted ways for a long time, but I found you again." She stopped and waited a moment before continuing, "You were very sick…although at the time I never recognized you…you've changed a lot you know. I didn't want anyone getting scared of you so I hid your things; now that I can look back I think I probably did the right thing. In any case I took care of you and tried to nurse you back to health, but my efforts failed." She hesitated again, "Now I'm here, I guess you could say that my spirit is trapped in this ethereal plane, unable to die and unable to completely take physical form…like you. I didn't want to leave you Zack," she said, her crystal blue eyes begging me to believe her sincerity. "It was just that nothing I did could bring you out of that coma. I thought that if you were ever going to get better you'd have to find your way yourself."
I waved my hands in front of me, "don't worry. I don't blame you…I was a mess, and as things look it would appear that I did find a way of sorts." I looked around, and turned my attention back to Aeris, it was then that I saw just how haggard her appearance was and how tired her eyes really were.
"Are you ok?" I asked as cautiously as I could.
"Oh," she replied, "I'm just so tired…so very very tired. Sometimes I wonder if anything that I've set into place will work…it seems like everything is failing on me…even you Zack. I had hoped that you would somehow be able to wake yourself up, but instead you only tried to die."
It was only then that I realized just how high stressed she really was. You wouldn't have needed a knife to cut the tension building up in her; you could have touched it with a que-tip and the backlash would have been enough to kill.
She gasped and brought her hand up to her face as several tears ran down her cheeks. I went to help her but she held up her other hand, stopping me in my tracks.
"No," she said, "I'm fine; I've just been under a lot of stress lately."
"Aeris," I said, "how did you die?" I felt horrible asking her this question a second time when she was so upset, but somehow I knew that it was intimately connected with her current condition (I mean her stress level, not the fact that she was dead).
She looked straight at me, then turned her head towards the ground, or where the ground might have been if there had been any sort of reference point in that world to work on other than your own position in it.
"I was…" she hesitated, "murdered."
Something unfathomable inside me, beyond the foggy moors of my memory, past rational thought, a left turn at sanity, and somewhere down primal instinct lane, snapped.
You see, I couldn't remember anything from my past, yet here was a friend from it. I had been sick, and this girl in front of me had nursed me. In my madness she had cared for me. She had dulled the pain and offered a light to me in the endless dark. When I fell into the abyss of death, she had been there to catch me. In this void she had found me and comforted me. This was done when she obviously had unspeakably more important things to do…she'd put it all aside for me…just to save me. Somewhere I knew that I had never known many people willing to do what this girl had done. It was then that I decided that if there was another human being on the face of the planet more openly caring and loving than this girl…I would probably never meet them.
The rage and frustration that had built up inside of me before was nothing compared to this. That anger had been spawned out of personal suffering; it was selfish in nature and was naturally futile. This new wrath was a righteous indignation to make the lifestream shudder. I knew that I was shaking, but I could no longer control it. You see I was still very insane; the long months…perhaps even years, spent in my own personal hell had assured that, and now I was very, very 'upset'. My thoughts at this point were screaming through my head, but one focus point was what I was going to do to the person who killed Aeris...the ideas that were developed in my twisted imagination were in no way pleasant.
There was no doubt that I would take vengeance on her killer, I knew it as the man knows he can inhale, and his lungs will fill with nitrogen and oxygen.
With this knowledge woke up something very close to primeval instinct lane, in fact I think it had been buried directly underneath. What it was exactly is hard to say, it was like a shadow, and the instant it woke it began to soak up energy like a sponge on steroids. The darkness around me grew dim, if that's even possible, and all edges and detail began to blend together in a twisted screen, like when you look into a distorted mirror, only this was three-dimensional. Aeris' eyes opened wide in shocked revelation.
"You're breaking through the planar boundaries," she gasped. "This is impossible…you're…you're doing it all by yourself!"
"How am I doing it all by myself?" I rasped as my body was racked by another wave of energy, "and what am I doing?!"
"You're bringing yourself back to life," she said as my body began to glow, "and I have no idea how you're doing it…perhaps you had some hidden energy reserve or…"
A screech that would have raised the hair on the back of a harpy's neck wrenched itself from my throat at that moment, and my nice little conversation came to an end with an explosion of pure light, the kind that leaves your shadow blasted onto the wall behind you. The words "go to the church" were left reverberating through my skull.
My eyes opened slowly, their glazed vision not offering much initially. I sat up slowly and rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. I let my hands drop back into my lap and took a casual glance around my room. My 'room' as I called it, was actually a very large steel pipe that was just big enough for a man to stand in. Behind me the pipe had been cut off with debris, a small wooden table stood in front of the mess, balancing precariously on four legs, none of which were the same length. On top someone had put an old T.V.; the monitor was fizzing quietly and putting off a ghostly glow about the dim chamber. I got up on weak, but steady legs.
To my left someone had nailed up a couple of shelves, a group of cheap trophies of unknown genre littered the skinny wooden frames along with a couple other misplaced items…mostly indiscriminate junk.
One thing that did catch my attention was a tiny mirror. It had a thin crack running down the side of it, but besides that it looked to be in good condition. I fell back down on the mat I had lain on during my mysterious ailment, and examined myself in the mirror.
What I saw was a man thin and gaunt from weeks of disease. My cheeks were sunken and lines that should not have appeared for another thirty years now criss-crossed my face. My beard had been stunted by the sickness, whatever it had been. However, stubble had since turned into a short, but ragged, beard. My hair had been shaven off, its growth slowed as well by the disease. Taking off the moth eaten cap that covered my scalp I ran my hand through the black bristly growth, and felt that my hair should be much longer than this. My eyes were what really caught my attention though. They were more than just blue; they seemed to actually glow with blue. They were eyes that unsettled, they were eyes that made strangers slow in the street after passing you and wonder why they'd stopped. It was quite strange, and yet I realized I wasn't as upset as I should be. I knew that normal humans did not have eyes that could glow, but for some reason I knew that this was right, that this was how I was meant to be.
I got to my feet again, this time was much easier than the first, and walked outside.
Above me there was a gloom that loomed ominously over all in the form a gigantic metal plate. Around the sky it loomed, dauntless and merciless, blocking all sun from the pitiful world below. And holding up the ceiling of iron was a monolithic pillar that appeared to not only support the giant iron pizza above, but the entire city itself.
It was indeed a city, although a more pathetic and filthy place I found hard to imagine. Heaps of trash and scrap metal rose like tiny mountain ranges above the decrepit shanties that served as shelter for the slum's forlorn inhabitants. The roads were dusty and lined with junk, neglected neon signs flashed their indecipherable messages through grubby window panes. About me children played in the dirt and grime while the older youths loitered about in an uncaring daze. I could hear a dog barking and music was being played from inside one of the shacks that these people called a house, but other that that, only the sound of children's laughter touched the everlasting destitution of that place. I sat down on an abandoned curb and tried to make sense of what had just happened to me.
I clutched my head in my fists.
I was free now, but what should I do?
'Simple,' I told myself, 'you find and kill Aeris' murderer…simple as that.'
'But how do I accomplish that,' I wondered, 'when I can't so much as remember my own past.'
I had no idea were I was or where I could go…in short I was lost at a sea with a paddle, propeller, boat, life-raft, or small piece of wood to cling to for dear life.
As I wallowed in my total and complete inaptitude, I sensed a presence approach. A shadow fell across the ground in front of me, and I looked up to find a young boy standing before me. I would place his age at somewhere around seven to eight. He was skinny and had tussled mouse-brown hair, his eyes were brown as well.
"You ok mister?" he asked shyly.
"Hmmm?" I replied, still groggy.
"I asked if you were ok?" asked the boy again.
"Oh…," I started uncertainly, was I ok? I couldn't tell, but the boy looked like he might be genuinely concerned and I didn't want to trouble him so I lied a little. "Yah," I said, "I'm fine…" The boy nodded like that was the answer he'd been waiting for, and turned to run away.
"Wait," I said, reaching out towards the boy, "could you help me a second?"
He turned around slowly, for the first time a worried look crossed his face. I am sure he was wondering just what this strange man could want from him…I didn't blame him for being careful, somehow I knew it had taken quite a bit of courage on the boy's part to even approach me. Something told me that young children here learned very quickly not to talk, or even be around strangers.
"How…," he began, "how could I help you?"
"I started to get up, but the look of terror that flashed across his face made me think better of it.
Sitting back down I said, "Could you tell me just where I am?" For some reason the boy instantly relaxed, perhaps he thought me a drunk or drug addict asking for directions.
"Well sir, you're in Sector 5."
My brow creased, "what an…interesting name for a city."
He laughed, "Man you're really wasted aren't you?" I resented that remark. "The city is Midgar…you're in Midgar ok."
"OK, ok…," I said. Alright, I now knew where I was, I knew what I needed to do, but I still didn't know how I was going to do it. Then the words came back to me in the form of an echo, in the way they had first appeared.
"Is there a church around here?" I asked suddenly, before the boy had a chance to leave.
"Yah," he replied, "its down in that direction." He pointed off down a street.
"Thanks," I said, "that's all I needed." The boy, suddenly very happy to be released, bounded off to rejoin his friends who were playing in a nearby alley, shouting something about it being his turn.
There was nothing for it so I started walking. Just a bit out of town the housing came to a very sudden halt, and was replaced by what I can only describe as a Rome among dumps, so magnificent was it in its stinky all-encompassing might. I'd thought the garbage problem back in town had been bad, but this was absolutely amazing. The wonder of its megalithic filthiness brought a gasp of awe to my lips, and tears of pain to my eyes. Trying not to breathe too deeply, I began my way down the dust covered path.
It didn't take long before my steps brought me to the front door of a church, just where the kid had said it would be. In truth, the word church was a bit of an overstatement. It was half buried in an avalanche of debris, and most of the windows had been broken long ago, and yet, far above in the steel sky there poked a single ray of sunlight through some abandoned shaft or supply chute, and this lone beam of hope fell on the church and illuminated it with its warmth. I stood outside for a time, simply drinking in this remembrance to the sun, yet I knew that eventually I'd need to go inside.
My curiosity finally overcame my nostalgia, and with a bit of caution, I walked up to the two great oaken doors and pushed them in.
They opened with a faint creak, and soon revealed an interior bathed in the same golden sunlight that washed over the outside of the house of worship. The roof above had been smashed in by some falling object, broken boards lay strewn across the wooden floor. Pews lined the aisle before me, and there, before the altar, soaked in the fugitive rays of a sun so far away it might have been in an entirely different world altogether, were the flowers. Floor boards had been pulled up and a plot of earth carefully prepared. The seeds had been planted and lovingly tended. Now, they had sprouted up into a myriad of wonderful colors, shapes, and sizes. In that land of dust, here was a place where I might rest…where I might find peace. I approached the garden and sat down in the front pew, staring off into space as I lingered in that holy place. 'Why was I brought here?' I wondered to myself. It was a question that seemed to plague me…why was any of this happening to me? What had I been before the void had swallowed me up? Why had I been released? Why couldn't I remember anything? When would I start to remember? What was I going to do? I hoped to learn the answer to this last question here, in the church, among the flowers.
As I sat there, the air around me began to stiffen. The scent of roses grew almost overpowering as the air over the flower bed started to solidify. Dust motes and particles of pollen began to swirl about in a vortex of air that didn't even seem to exist, for in its place, a figure had formed. At first the vision was hazy, not entirely there. Now it was more complete, and it was becoming increasingly easy to pick out the curved lines and smooth shape that marked the shadowy stranger to be a woman. The strange visage motioned for me to approach…I'd been wanting answers…now it appeared that I might get more than I bargained for. I complied with the stranger's unvoiced order, and moved in closer, but stayed out of the circle of light pouring through the ceiling.
"Zack…" I heard a weak, but recognizable voice whisper. It was Aeris; I knew it from the moment I heard my name being spoken.
"I'm here Aeris," I replied, hope for the first time welling up in me.
"I'm sorry Zack," she replied, "It is very difficult for me to maintain physical form for very long…so please just listen…I can only hope you hear what I have to say."
"Don't worry Aeris," I said, "I can hear you…" but she continued on as if she couldn't hear me…and I realized that indeed she couldn't.
"Your mind is lost," she said, "you do not know who you are…and this only weakens you. You said you wished to avenge me…I give you the chance to aid me. First you must discover yourself…must…find out who you are. You are more powerful than you know Zack…you must find……headquarters…go to the Shinra HQ. It is there where you can open your past…there you can unlock your memories….if you can do this…then I will tell you more…later….later…….good luck……………."
The voice faded away and the figure drifted apart like mist on a pond when the sun first hits the glassy waters, dispelling the murk with the first rays of day, and I was left standing there, dumbfounded and even more confused than before.
By the time I got back to the town night had started to fall, or I should say that everything got dimmer than it had been before. The people were gone from the streets by now, or at least most of the people…those who had nowhere else had remained in the alley or ditch which they called home, and most were starting small fires in metal barrels to keep themselves warm as the chill of night set in.
Shinra, Shinra, Shinra, Shinra, the word was running through my head by now. Although the name seemed familiar to me, I had no idea what it was, or how I might ever reach it. Aeris had spoken of it as if it were a thing…or place. If it had a headquarters than it had to be in place didn't it? Happy with myself for solving at least one piece of the riddle, I set my already severely disabled mind to work on the other million bits and pieces of a jig-saw puzzle so vast and complex that I doubted I'd understand it even if I ever managed to but it all back together again.
Lights were glowing from behind closed and shuttered windows, adding their pale light to the blaze of neon signs glaring from shop windows, declaring their unique wares. And to undercut them all were the pitiful blazes of the homeless, started by the destitute in a land of darkness. In a way it brought everyone down onto the same level…equal trash and grim and stench and gloom for all, a cynical but effective form of democracy.
It was then that I realized that one of those fires might be nice, since I didn't have anyplace to stay, and I certainly didn't want to curl up at the side of the curb, or what might have been a curb by Sector 5 standards…meaning it wasn't much to look at. I stopped in the middle of the road, forgetting my problems with Shinra and its supposed headquarters, and focusing on more immediate problems, like where I was going sleep. I thought about going back to the church, but something told me that that road was probably not very safe during the day, and at night it would probably be suicidal to try and travel on it. Then, even if I got to the church, where was I going to sleep? on a hard wooden pew? Dropping that idea, I moved off down the list: I doubted anyone was going to invite me into their house, and the homeless didn't look like the friendly sort of people who'd invite you in to share half-a-bottle of cheap beer with.
Choices were drying up fast, and before long I simply decided to head back to my tunnel…if I was lucky none of the less fortunate had taken up refuge in it yet. By now it was getting to be downright dark, the hundreds…even thousands of tiny lights in the plate above had begun to turn themselves off, making me realize just how much I'd appreciated their company. Even so, I was still able to stumble and bumble my way to the tunnel, and heaven be praised it was empty. Yawning heavily, I crawled in and found the familiar thin mattress on the floor. Throwing myself on its lumpy, smelly, and moth-eaten surface, I was asleep in seconds.
I drifted through the pain and floated through the currents of sorrow. All about me loomed a shadow darker than night, it flowed and breathed as it sucked me to its bosom. For an eternity I hung there in desperation and despair, awaiting an end that would not come. There was no escape from this prison, from the whirlpool of suffering, so I endured only because there was nothing else I could do.
However, the blackness would close in at times, and from across the void I could hear a strange voice calling me. I say it was strange only because it happened to avoid sound all together by appearing inside my head, an inaudible command that sought obedience from within my tortured soul.
It welcomed me in and clothed me in comfort. I would sink into a place where the darkness no longer frightened me, and the shadows were no longer menacing. It was always then that the blackness would curl up on itself like mist or fog, and through would shine a light more brilliant than anything I can remember laying eyes on. It shone with the intensity of the sun, and with the warm glow of a cheery log fire. The light moved like a living creature, and it always seemed to me that my very soul was open to its omniscient solar eye.
Through the heavenly portal would appear the angel…
It had to be an angel, I knew that much even though I was no longer sure what the word meant. She was a young woman in a shimmering rose-colored dress. Her hair was a golden brown and hung about her in wonderful curls and braids, held in place by a band of brilliant pink and white which wreathed her head in a halo of cherry flame. She would come to me and speak to me, though I could never remember the words afterwards. When she finally departed back through the circle of radiance I was left with a feeling of complete comfort, beyond what even the voice could offer. Also, there was a knowledge that I could and would strive on through my torture, that I would defeat the perpetual and unending pain. The night would rise about me again, subjecting my mind to its punishments, as if to scorn me for my insolent refusal of its kind offer of peace. Peace was all I wanted, and nowhere could I find it. It eluded my grasp as effectively as oil might slip through a strainer. It was as foolish a goal as attempting to grip water in your hand.
Yet, as long as the angel visited me I knew that I could continue fighting. I was sure that there must be something beyond the void of sorrow or else what might she be telling me to fight for? Yes…she wanted only what was best for me. I knew this with a conviction that was stronger than iron. If the angel wanted me to return to the other world, then I would fight till I got there…I would fight until I found peace.
It was this drive that kept me going as long as I did.
But all things must come to an end.
For some time the voice had been speaking to me, it was constantly intruding into my thoughts. The call was incessant now, a growing trouble that gnawed away at the back of my mind like a dog scraping on the back door, waiting to be let in. I blocked out these thoughts, and plugged up my soul to the voice. However, it was getting to be more vigorous in its invitation to let go, and as the pain and suffering increased by the second I knew I would eventually give in.
It was a foregone conclusion really, for too long I had battled with myself and the voice. I was weak and the darkness was strong. My will was wavering and the eternal night delighted in my suffering so that I wanted to scream at it, to release the anger and frustration that had been building up within me for so very long indeed.
But no sound would come; no matter how hard I tried there was only the pervasive silence that answered back…and the summons.
There was no angel this time, no gateway of hope to pull me from the brink of the abyss, and somehow I knew there wouldn't be. Somewhere I felt in the very pit of my soul a knowledge that this time, I was alone. This struck like a bowling ball, and suddenly I knew not only that the terrible suffering would never end, and that I would meet this fate totally and utterly alone. The desolation of this feeling of loss was so absolute that it pervaded whatever was left of my sanity like a virus, and tore my resolve to shreds. I was overwhelmed with bitterness and resentment, at what I cannot be sure, only that more than anything else I wanted to lash out at something with all my might.
But there was nothing there to attack, and as the loneliness wore off I was left with a hollowness of the spirit and mind that let in the voice and gave it full reign. There was no more tenacity left within me, no feeling at all, except for that last wish for peace and rest.
And the voice offered this to me in thick, sweet, honey dipped tones. Its words were reassuring and in every way seemed to me the purest wisdom. Why SHOULD I continue on like this, when all it took to reach oblivion was letting go…I found letting go to be all too easy.
Once again I sunk down to that world where black turned to gray and sorrow became nothing more than a bad dream. This time there was nothing to stop me, and with a sigh of relief I let myself be pulled silently down into the great beyond.
The black became gray and then black once more and I had the sensation of falling very quickly, and yet I was not afraid. The darkness began to slither around me like a burrow of snakes. The slithering waves were tainted green and soon I was flying down through a glowing emerald sea of light. Strange thoughts and emotions burst in my head like the sounding of trumpets around my ears, only to be replaced by new ones. A thousand bells were ringing in my head, and the world around me became more and more jumbled and chaotic as my descent neared its end.
Oh blessed relief washed over me like a cool mountain spring as the green tendrils let me slip through their grasp, down into a land of total and complete bliss. How can I describe the ambiance that caressed my soul and set my heart at ease? I had finally reached the place where I might finally be at peace, and surely no outside world could be as right as this place. 'Yes,' the voice said, 'rest awhile, sleep awhile…you'll soon feel much better…just a small nap…you deserve it…just a nap…' The void around me grew hazy as I began to drift off. The green light was returning, wrapping about me like a warm blanket, calming me like a mother comforts a small child. I felt so very warm and secure, like I could sleep there forever, and then, all of a sudden, the world went cold.
My eyes fluttered open wide in shock and terror as I was surrounded not by the comforting light of the emerald sea, but darkness. As I thrashed about in a mindless rage, a white light grew in the distance. This was not like the light from heaven, the harbinger of the angel. It was instead more like a small point of luminosity, radiating in all directions like a tiny white sun, there was nothing warm about it. What's more is that it was getting closer and closer to me, and as it grew bigger, I stopped my futile battering of shadow and went still with surprise. It was now very near indeed, close enough for me to reach out and touch it, but this was one thing I didn't dare attempt. It stopped and hovered in silence, object and man waiting to see who blinked first. Mist began to pour from the orb like crystal water, floating out and expanding with delicate tendrils and fingers of light. It was then that I noticed it was forming a general shape…an almost human shape. The white mist continued to form and solidify until the object before me was most certainly a human, and a woman at that. The color was added and final features set. I had to catch my breath.
"The angel?!" I whispered in a hoarse voice…it had been a long time since I'd used it. Her face creased in a wonderfully warm smile.
"I've been called many things," she said, "but I think you're the first to call me an angel." Her voice was as like listening to a symphony of silken sounds all at once, and the stroke of a single syllable was like listening to the sweetest flute playing a solo inside your head. Yet, there was always a soft undertone to it, so that it was a voice that commanded, but comforted all at once.
"What…," I said, "What are you doing…here?" I was having trouble finding the words, speech itself seemed so strange to me, like something that had been forgotten long ago.
Her smile dimmed a little, "I'm dead, like you." 'Yes,' I told myself, 'that makes sense, what could I be besides dead?'
I looked around, "what is this place?"
"This," she replied, "I suppose you could call it limbo, although it's much more complex than that."
"So…," I replied, "I'm not completely dead then?"
She looked at me strangely, "you cut right to the heart of the matter actually. Technically we're both dead, or we should be. I felt you when you entered this place, you would have died, but I pulled you out."
"Then why are you here?" I asked, words finally flying back to place in my head, becoming readily available for use by my lips.
"Me…," she said, "I was…" She shook her head, "I really don't like to talk about it. By the way Zack, my name is Aeris, in case you don't remember me." The name sounded some note deep within the depths of my cloudy memory. Aeris…I knew this name, but there were more pressing questions at hand.
"How do you know my name?" I asked curiously.
"We…know each other from the past," she replied. "We parted ways for a long time, but I found you again." She stopped and waited a moment before continuing, "You were very sick…although at the time I never recognized you…you've changed a lot you know. I didn't want anyone getting scared of you so I hid your things; now that I can look back I think I probably did the right thing. In any case I took care of you and tried to nurse you back to health, but my efforts failed." She hesitated again, "Now I'm here, I guess you could say that my spirit is trapped in this ethereal plane, unable to die and unable to completely take physical form…like you. I didn't want to leave you Zack," she said, her crystal blue eyes begging me to believe her sincerity. "It was just that nothing I did could bring you out of that coma. I thought that if you were ever going to get better you'd have to find your way yourself."
I waved my hands in front of me, "don't worry. I don't blame you…I was a mess, and as things look it would appear that I did find a way of sorts." I looked around, and turned my attention back to Aeris, it was then that I saw just how haggard her appearance was and how tired her eyes really were.
"Are you ok?" I asked as cautiously as I could.
"Oh," she replied, "I'm just so tired…so very very tired. Sometimes I wonder if anything that I've set into place will work…it seems like everything is failing on me…even you Zack. I had hoped that you would somehow be able to wake yourself up, but instead you only tried to die."
It was only then that I realized just how high stressed she really was. You wouldn't have needed a knife to cut the tension building up in her; you could have touched it with a que-tip and the backlash would have been enough to kill.
She gasped and brought her hand up to her face as several tears ran down her cheeks. I went to help her but she held up her other hand, stopping me in my tracks.
"No," she said, "I'm fine; I've just been under a lot of stress lately."
"Aeris," I said, "how did you die?" I felt horrible asking her this question a second time when she was so upset, but somehow I knew that it was intimately connected with her current condition (I mean her stress level, not the fact that she was dead).
She looked straight at me, then turned her head towards the ground, or where the ground might have been if there had been any sort of reference point in that world to work on other than your own position in it.
"I was…" she hesitated, "murdered."
Something unfathomable inside me, beyond the foggy moors of my memory, past rational thought, a left turn at sanity, and somewhere down primal instinct lane, snapped.
You see, I couldn't remember anything from my past, yet here was a friend from it. I had been sick, and this girl in front of me had nursed me. In my madness she had cared for me. She had dulled the pain and offered a light to me in the endless dark. When I fell into the abyss of death, she had been there to catch me. In this void she had found me and comforted me. This was done when she obviously had unspeakably more important things to do…she'd put it all aside for me…just to save me. Somewhere I knew that I had never known many people willing to do what this girl had done. It was then that I decided that if there was another human being on the face of the planet more openly caring and loving than this girl…I would probably never meet them.
The rage and frustration that had built up inside of me before was nothing compared to this. That anger had been spawned out of personal suffering; it was selfish in nature and was naturally futile. This new wrath was a righteous indignation to make the lifestream shudder. I knew that I was shaking, but I could no longer control it. You see I was still very insane; the long months…perhaps even years, spent in my own personal hell had assured that, and now I was very, very 'upset'. My thoughts at this point were screaming through my head, but one focus point was what I was going to do to the person who killed Aeris...the ideas that were developed in my twisted imagination were in no way pleasant.
There was no doubt that I would take vengeance on her killer, I knew it as the man knows he can inhale, and his lungs will fill with nitrogen and oxygen.
With this knowledge woke up something very close to primeval instinct lane, in fact I think it had been buried directly underneath. What it was exactly is hard to say, it was like a shadow, and the instant it woke it began to soak up energy like a sponge on steroids. The darkness around me grew dim, if that's even possible, and all edges and detail began to blend together in a twisted screen, like when you look into a distorted mirror, only this was three-dimensional. Aeris' eyes opened wide in shocked revelation.
"You're breaking through the planar boundaries," she gasped. "This is impossible…you're…you're doing it all by yourself!"
"How am I doing it all by myself?" I rasped as my body was racked by another wave of energy, "and what am I doing?!"
"You're bringing yourself back to life," she said as my body began to glow, "and I have no idea how you're doing it…perhaps you had some hidden energy reserve or…"
A screech that would have raised the hair on the back of a harpy's neck wrenched itself from my throat at that moment, and my nice little conversation came to an end with an explosion of pure light, the kind that leaves your shadow blasted onto the wall behind you. The words "go to the church" were left reverberating through my skull.
My eyes opened slowly, their glazed vision not offering much initially. I sat up slowly and rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. I let my hands drop back into my lap and took a casual glance around my room. My 'room' as I called it, was actually a very large steel pipe that was just big enough for a man to stand in. Behind me the pipe had been cut off with debris, a small wooden table stood in front of the mess, balancing precariously on four legs, none of which were the same length. On top someone had put an old T.V.; the monitor was fizzing quietly and putting off a ghostly glow about the dim chamber. I got up on weak, but steady legs.
To my left someone had nailed up a couple of shelves, a group of cheap trophies of unknown genre littered the skinny wooden frames along with a couple other misplaced items…mostly indiscriminate junk.
One thing that did catch my attention was a tiny mirror. It had a thin crack running down the side of it, but besides that it looked to be in good condition. I fell back down on the mat I had lain on during my mysterious ailment, and examined myself in the mirror.
What I saw was a man thin and gaunt from weeks of disease. My cheeks were sunken and lines that should not have appeared for another thirty years now criss-crossed my face. My beard had been stunted by the sickness, whatever it had been. However, stubble had since turned into a short, but ragged, beard. My hair had been shaven off, its growth slowed as well by the disease. Taking off the moth eaten cap that covered my scalp I ran my hand through the black bristly growth, and felt that my hair should be much longer than this. My eyes were what really caught my attention though. They were more than just blue; they seemed to actually glow with blue. They were eyes that unsettled, they were eyes that made strangers slow in the street after passing you and wonder why they'd stopped. It was quite strange, and yet I realized I wasn't as upset as I should be. I knew that normal humans did not have eyes that could glow, but for some reason I knew that this was right, that this was how I was meant to be.
I got to my feet again, this time was much easier than the first, and walked outside.
Above me there was a gloom that loomed ominously over all in the form a gigantic metal plate. Around the sky it loomed, dauntless and merciless, blocking all sun from the pitiful world below. And holding up the ceiling of iron was a monolithic pillar that appeared to not only support the giant iron pizza above, but the entire city itself.
It was indeed a city, although a more pathetic and filthy place I found hard to imagine. Heaps of trash and scrap metal rose like tiny mountain ranges above the decrepit shanties that served as shelter for the slum's forlorn inhabitants. The roads were dusty and lined with junk, neglected neon signs flashed their indecipherable messages through grubby window panes. About me children played in the dirt and grime while the older youths loitered about in an uncaring daze. I could hear a dog barking and music was being played from inside one of the shacks that these people called a house, but other that that, only the sound of children's laughter touched the everlasting destitution of that place. I sat down on an abandoned curb and tried to make sense of what had just happened to me.
I clutched my head in my fists.
I was free now, but what should I do?
'Simple,' I told myself, 'you find and kill Aeris' murderer…simple as that.'
'But how do I accomplish that,' I wondered, 'when I can't so much as remember my own past.'
I had no idea were I was or where I could go…in short I was lost at a sea with a paddle, propeller, boat, life-raft, or small piece of wood to cling to for dear life.
As I wallowed in my total and complete inaptitude, I sensed a presence approach. A shadow fell across the ground in front of me, and I looked up to find a young boy standing before me. I would place his age at somewhere around seven to eight. He was skinny and had tussled mouse-brown hair, his eyes were brown as well.
"You ok mister?" he asked shyly.
"Hmmm?" I replied, still groggy.
"I asked if you were ok?" asked the boy again.
"Oh…," I started uncertainly, was I ok? I couldn't tell, but the boy looked like he might be genuinely concerned and I didn't want to trouble him so I lied a little. "Yah," I said, "I'm fine…" The boy nodded like that was the answer he'd been waiting for, and turned to run away.
"Wait," I said, reaching out towards the boy, "could you help me a second?"
He turned around slowly, for the first time a worried look crossed his face. I am sure he was wondering just what this strange man could want from him…I didn't blame him for being careful, somehow I knew it had taken quite a bit of courage on the boy's part to even approach me. Something told me that young children here learned very quickly not to talk, or even be around strangers.
"How…," he began, "how could I help you?"
"I started to get up, but the look of terror that flashed across his face made me think better of it.
Sitting back down I said, "Could you tell me just where I am?" For some reason the boy instantly relaxed, perhaps he thought me a drunk or drug addict asking for directions.
"Well sir, you're in Sector 5."
My brow creased, "what an…interesting name for a city."
He laughed, "Man you're really wasted aren't you?" I resented that remark. "The city is Midgar…you're in Midgar ok."
"OK, ok…," I said. Alright, I now knew where I was, I knew what I needed to do, but I still didn't know how I was going to do it. Then the words came back to me in the form of an echo, in the way they had first appeared.
"Is there a church around here?" I asked suddenly, before the boy had a chance to leave.
"Yah," he replied, "its down in that direction." He pointed off down a street.
"Thanks," I said, "that's all I needed." The boy, suddenly very happy to be released, bounded off to rejoin his friends who were playing in a nearby alley, shouting something about it being his turn.
There was nothing for it so I started walking. Just a bit out of town the housing came to a very sudden halt, and was replaced by what I can only describe as a Rome among dumps, so magnificent was it in its stinky all-encompassing might. I'd thought the garbage problem back in town had been bad, but this was absolutely amazing. The wonder of its megalithic filthiness brought a gasp of awe to my lips, and tears of pain to my eyes. Trying not to breathe too deeply, I began my way down the dust covered path.
It didn't take long before my steps brought me to the front door of a church, just where the kid had said it would be. In truth, the word church was a bit of an overstatement. It was half buried in an avalanche of debris, and most of the windows had been broken long ago, and yet, far above in the steel sky there poked a single ray of sunlight through some abandoned shaft or supply chute, and this lone beam of hope fell on the church and illuminated it with its warmth. I stood outside for a time, simply drinking in this remembrance to the sun, yet I knew that eventually I'd need to go inside.
My curiosity finally overcame my nostalgia, and with a bit of caution, I walked up to the two great oaken doors and pushed them in.
They opened with a faint creak, and soon revealed an interior bathed in the same golden sunlight that washed over the outside of the house of worship. The roof above had been smashed in by some falling object, broken boards lay strewn across the wooden floor. Pews lined the aisle before me, and there, before the altar, soaked in the fugitive rays of a sun so far away it might have been in an entirely different world altogether, were the flowers. Floor boards had been pulled up and a plot of earth carefully prepared. The seeds had been planted and lovingly tended. Now, they had sprouted up into a myriad of wonderful colors, shapes, and sizes. In that land of dust, here was a place where I might rest…where I might find peace. I approached the garden and sat down in the front pew, staring off into space as I lingered in that holy place. 'Why was I brought here?' I wondered to myself. It was a question that seemed to plague me…why was any of this happening to me? What had I been before the void had swallowed me up? Why had I been released? Why couldn't I remember anything? When would I start to remember? What was I going to do? I hoped to learn the answer to this last question here, in the church, among the flowers.
As I sat there, the air around me began to stiffen. The scent of roses grew almost overpowering as the air over the flower bed started to solidify. Dust motes and particles of pollen began to swirl about in a vortex of air that didn't even seem to exist, for in its place, a figure had formed. At first the vision was hazy, not entirely there. Now it was more complete, and it was becoming increasingly easy to pick out the curved lines and smooth shape that marked the shadowy stranger to be a woman. The strange visage motioned for me to approach…I'd been wanting answers…now it appeared that I might get more than I bargained for. I complied with the stranger's unvoiced order, and moved in closer, but stayed out of the circle of light pouring through the ceiling.
"Zack…" I heard a weak, but recognizable voice whisper. It was Aeris; I knew it from the moment I heard my name being spoken.
"I'm here Aeris," I replied, hope for the first time welling up in me.
"I'm sorry Zack," she replied, "It is very difficult for me to maintain physical form for very long…so please just listen…I can only hope you hear what I have to say."
"Don't worry Aeris," I said, "I can hear you…" but she continued on as if she couldn't hear me…and I realized that indeed she couldn't.
"Your mind is lost," she said, "you do not know who you are…and this only weakens you. You said you wished to avenge me…I give you the chance to aid me. First you must discover yourself…must…find out who you are. You are more powerful than you know Zack…you must find……headquarters…go to the Shinra HQ. It is there where you can open your past…there you can unlock your memories….if you can do this…then I will tell you more…later….later…….good luck……………."
The voice faded away and the figure drifted apart like mist on a pond when the sun first hits the glassy waters, dispelling the murk with the first rays of day, and I was left standing there, dumbfounded and even more confused than before.
By the time I got back to the town night had started to fall, or I should say that everything got dimmer than it had been before. The people were gone from the streets by now, or at least most of the people…those who had nowhere else had remained in the alley or ditch which they called home, and most were starting small fires in metal barrels to keep themselves warm as the chill of night set in.
Shinra, Shinra, Shinra, Shinra, the word was running through my head by now. Although the name seemed familiar to me, I had no idea what it was, or how I might ever reach it. Aeris had spoken of it as if it were a thing…or place. If it had a headquarters than it had to be in place didn't it? Happy with myself for solving at least one piece of the riddle, I set my already severely disabled mind to work on the other million bits and pieces of a jig-saw puzzle so vast and complex that I doubted I'd understand it even if I ever managed to but it all back together again.
Lights were glowing from behind closed and shuttered windows, adding their pale light to the blaze of neon signs glaring from shop windows, declaring their unique wares. And to undercut them all were the pitiful blazes of the homeless, started by the destitute in a land of darkness. In a way it brought everyone down onto the same level…equal trash and grim and stench and gloom for all, a cynical but effective form of democracy.
It was then that I realized that one of those fires might be nice, since I didn't have anyplace to stay, and I certainly didn't want to curl up at the side of the curb, or what might have been a curb by Sector 5 standards…meaning it wasn't much to look at. I stopped in the middle of the road, forgetting my problems with Shinra and its supposed headquarters, and focusing on more immediate problems, like where I was going sleep. I thought about going back to the church, but something told me that that road was probably not very safe during the day, and at night it would probably be suicidal to try and travel on it. Then, even if I got to the church, where was I going to sleep? on a hard wooden pew? Dropping that idea, I moved off down the list: I doubted anyone was going to invite me into their house, and the homeless didn't look like the friendly sort of people who'd invite you in to share half-a-bottle of cheap beer with.
Choices were drying up fast, and before long I simply decided to head back to my tunnel…if I was lucky none of the less fortunate had taken up refuge in it yet. By now it was getting to be downright dark, the hundreds…even thousands of tiny lights in the plate above had begun to turn themselves off, making me realize just how much I'd appreciated their company. Even so, I was still able to stumble and bumble my way to the tunnel, and heaven be praised it was empty. Yawning heavily, I crawled in and found the familiar thin mattress on the floor. Throwing myself on its lumpy, smelly, and moth-eaten surface, I was asleep in seconds.
