Dust and Bones | Chapter 2
A FFVII Fanfiction by Majokai Yukiko
This is an amateur effort and does not intend to infringe on the rights of Squaresoft.
This story is set a week after Sephiroth was defeated, though some events in the past are altered due to the fact that Sephiroth had survived the Omnislash and Zack is still alive.
Pairing: Zack X Sephiroth
Warnings: Shounen-ai, angst. Very short chapter. Apologies about that. I'm preparing for my BIG FAT Cambridge exams so it'll probably take me some time to update. I promise to plunge my head straight into writing this after the 8th of November, 'kay?
15 reviews!! Finally! Okay, peeps, five reviews for a chapter. Deal?
Present
Sephiroth could feel himself crumbling from inside as Tifa presented him with the gory details of incidents after incidents, about his reputation to the rest of the world as The General, about the mission to Nibelheim, about the five hellish years Zack and Cloud had spent in Hojo's laboratory. Words after words, sentences after sentences, slowly, as his memories returned to him, he was losing his touch on reality.
"Then Cloud killed you, or at least, we thought he did. The war was over, the world was safe, but you just had to return!"
The blindfold slipped off his eyes, revealing to him a sunlit civilian living room, domestically decorated. Their photos were set almost everywhere: on the bar counter, the phone table, the walls…it was a place just for the two of them. Even if it was only a two-week vacation, Sephiroth knew it was more of a home than his suite in the Shinra HQ, where he had spent nineteen years in.
"How do you like it?" Strong arms encircled his waist. Unconsciously, Sephiroth leaned into the embrace and smiled.
"Thanks, Zack. I love it."
Flashes of the past made their way before his eyes. He could almost smell the metallic scent of blood in the air when he annihilated everything in his way to the top level of the Shinra building. Jenova's cruel whispers in his mind were gently but firmly sinking their claws into his sanity and his sword, the Masamune, beckoning at him, pleading for fresh blood.
"I love you, Seph."
Beautiful words spoken right from the heart, Sephiroth knew. Sephiroth knew that Zack had meant it every time he said it to him, but he never returned those words.
I've never told you I love you. God, Zack, is it too late for us now? Had…had I destroyed everything that we ever shared?
***
Sephiroth staggered out of the bar weakly, leaving the girl at the counter, staring suspiciously at him from behind. He was not about to go insane, give in to Jenova's ramblings and set about destroying the world again. He had already done that before. But the world he had destroyed was the one he loved.
What was the point in being the Master of the Earth if the one he loved was no longer with him? He made a mistake, one big fat stupid mistake!
Death was the only way out to save himself from this misery. But in the both times that he had thrown himself at Death, he was being wrenched back into this web of deceit and pain called life.
Not even Death wanted him.
***
"I'm really sorry, Cloud. I didn't mean for that to happen!" Tifa defended herself quickly. She had only wanted to see for herself if Sephiroth were really sane, or if he were simply pretending and waiting for a good time to strike. How would she have known that the white haired ex-General would lose conscious from grief?
"GET OUT!" Cloud shouted, fists clenched at his side, not wanting to create a scene outside Sephiroth's room lest he disturbed the man's rest.
But he had broken his promise again. He promised Zack to keep Sephiroth sane for him…but now…
"Cloud…"
"Tifa, I really don't want to talk to you now. I'll find you in Kalms when I've the mood to, 'kay?"
Tifa looked as if she was about to make a protest to that, and probably would have done so if the door to Sephiroth's room had not opened just in time.
Bright green eyes that once held emotions so deep were now void of everything. The Sephiroth that had walked out of the room was a shell of the original.
"Sephiroth?" Cloud asked tentatively, afraid to reach out to touch him. Was he still sane? Or had Tifa's words destroyed all that Cloud tried to do in the past few months?
"Zack…he is…calling for me…" Tifa widened her eyes in shock and fear. Zachary was dead! He had died when he helped Cloud escape Hojo's laboratory. Had Sephiroth snapped again?
The pair of childhood friends could only stare in anticipated fear as Sephiroth slowly made his way done the steps and towards the direction of the library.
They looked at each other for a moment, deciding on their next course of action. It was obvious, they thought, as they hurried and followed Sephiroth towards the library.
***
He could feel Zack's fear and pain. His lover was slowly being driven mad with loneliness, pain and memories. And it was entirely his fault.
If Sephiroth had not fallen for Jenova's pretty lies, they would still have been together, spending their hard-earned holidays in that lovely little house Zack had bought for him—their own private love nest.
Sephiroth!
The white haired man blinked away the tears that were blurring his vision. He had to find Zack first. Only he could save Zack from his misery. Sephiroth clenched his fists tighter as he made his way to the far corner of the library.
Sephiroth let go of a sigh of relief when his hand came into contact with the dark polished stone on the oak table. There was a wall in the library that was made completely out of one-way glass. Those behind the glass could see into the library, but those in the library could not do the same.
"Sephiroth! What are you doing? Stop!" Cloud shouted, watching in sadistic fascination as Sephiroth held the stone firmly in his hands and aimed it at him.
Missing his head by mere inches and shattering what Cloud used to think was a painting on the wall behind him.
A sad smile graced Sephiroth's lips briefly, as the shattered glass revealed a hidden laboratory behind it. And the man inside the cylinder in the middle of the laboratory.
Beside him, Tifa gasped in horror. The man they saw was a dead man. Or at least, he was one that should have been dead but was brought back alive by the devil.
There he was, the Colonel, The General's right hand man and lover from the Shinra army, alive and definitely conscious in his green murky liquid prison.
But not exactly human anymore.
***
Zack looked up in shock as he saw the glass in front of him shattering. The first person he saw was the man he had never thought he would see for the rest of his life, the man who he had loved, and the same man who had killed him without any qualms.
I'm sorry, love. Sephiroth mouthed, struggling not to faint before he released his lover from hell. Sephiroth placed his hand shakily on the console next to the cylinder. He knew this system well.
For a mad scientist, Hojo was never very intelligent or creative. He had always had the illusion that Sephiroth would never want to go anywhere near his laboratory, if given the choice. Therefore, the ultimate password to release his experiments, if without Hojo's own codeword, never changed. It was always Sephiroth's palm print.
And for the first time in his life, Sephiroth was actually glad for this.
Zack looked at Sephiroth with understanding. Those green eyes were silently asking for forgiveness, and searching for the traces of love the two of them once shared. Zack was glad to have Sephiroth back, if the other man would have it.
The black haired man smiled and reached out for his lover as soon as the glass barrier between the two of them were gone. Then he stopped, staring at his arm in horror.
There, replacing the once muscular taut flesh was now an artificial metal arm.
***