Dust and Bones | Chapter 5
A Final Fantasy VII Fanfiction by Majokai Yukiko
Pairing: Zack + Sephiroth, Cloud + Sephiroth
This is an amateur effort and does not intend to infringe on the rights of Squaresoft and its associates.
Warnings: Blood and gore. Yaoi.
A/N: Sorry for making you guys wait so long, even after the fifth review was out. Oh well, I had lots of things on my mind these days. My ex just committed suicide because his last girlfriend (the one after me) dumped him or something like that. I was rather disturbed by it for a while, so...I apologize for the delay. *Bows* Anyway, here it is! Hope it is up to your expectations!
For this story and some others that I have been spending much time on, (Rain and Music Boxes from the Weiß Kreuz fandom, The Hope Diamond from the Angel Sanctuary fandom and Matrix: Restarted from the Matrix fandom), I have created a mailing list for updates, also known as raw drafts and plot bunnies that I randomly throw out. So if you want spoilers or anything like that, go ahead and join! You can give me some comments that you'd rather the rest of the world not see up there as well!
The URL is:
Nadia: whoa! Didn't know I was so popular. But well, tell your friend that your review made five! So guess what, the next chapter's out~
Lamia1300: oh no, you can always comfort them...^^ *hands unhappy cuties plushies to lamia* and no, it's not a crime. At least I managed to take a nice few month long break?
Kathryn: storyline? What storyline? I'm just happily angsting these characters away. *Evil cackles* ok, I do have somewhat of a story line...just not very interested in indulging it other than the fact that I get more bloodshed. Can I shove Hojo's face in with a sledgehammer?
Mistressofterror: you have been a wonderful supporter so far! I hope my long hiatus had not taken your interest away from the fic. Yah, I agree that the palmer thing was bad...but I still think they deserve each other. *Snickers*
Grand Lethal: Jake and cloud? *Cringes* I'll think about it. I was still wondering what other use I have for the bartended before I kill him off or something like that...
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Sephiroth made his way to the couch without much effort and sat down on the soft leather calmly. He was blind, but that did not make him anywhere close to helpless. Months of living in the Shinra mansion after his recovery from Mako poisoning and, not to forget, the hellish decades he had spent there had given him enough knowledge of the place to move around without much difficulty.
Unless somebody sneaked in to rearrange the furniture, Sephiroth would not tip and fall gracelessly on his face. Not that it had any chance of happening. His already keen sense of hearing, thanks to Hojo and his perverse experiments, attuned by his loss of sight had made it virtually impossible for him to sleep in dead silence anymore. The sounds of a bug chirping in the tree, or the flapping of a bird's wings in the sky could be heard. What more would a man's footsteps be? It would take a wraith to approach him unaware.
Cloud was out that day. Cait Sith and Cid had arrived that day before the Highwind to demand his immediate presence at Midgar. Sephiroth wondered what had been so urgent for Cloud to leave immediately. But whatever it was, it was not good news.
What could be worse than the fact that I'm still alive? The ex-General thought sardonically. Other than the reappearance of Jenova (which Sephiroth sincerely hope it would not be), the silver haired man could not come up with anything else.
The man felt for the remote and turned on the television when he finally located it. It was the news, Sephiroth realized as he recognized the monotonous reading of the broadcaster. He leant back against the cushions, only to leap back onto his feet when a loud noise from his backyard startled him.
Grabbing the Masamune off its rack, Sephiroth rushed out of the house, missing the terrible news that the broadcaster had just announced to the rest of the Planet.
The WEAPONs were back.
***
"The WEAPONs are what?" Cloud had all but yelled when he heard the news. He glared at each and every one present in the Shinra meeting room, almost daring someone to say it was a very bad joke. But all of them, ex-AVALANCHE members or not, had refused to meet his blue Mako eyes. They were either mentally measuring the distance between the cracks in the wooden table, or suddenly finding much interest in their fingernails.
"Tell me again," Cloud took a deep breath. "Very slowly this time: the WEAPONs are…?"
"Back." Reeves finished, wishing for the nth time that it were Cait Sith here instead of him. At least Cloud, powerful as he might be, could not kill an electronic cat or moogle. If only Reeves could say the same for his "immortality".
Cloud looked around the table once again, this time desperate for someone, anyone to refute whatever the President had said. But nobody spoke up at all.
"Tifa…" But the girl kept silent, raising her head only long enough for the blonde man to see unshed tears of fear in her eyes.
"But how…?" He slumped back into his chair, closing his eyes in resignation. "The WEAPONs are generated by the Planet to protect herself against extreme threats." Cloud muttered, as if remembering something from a grad school history textbook, void and unfeeling. "Extreme threats such as…the awakening of Jenova…"
There was no time for the table to respond. Almost immediately after Cloud's revelation, a Shinra executive burst into the meeting room, a panicked expression on his face.
"Mister President! The news! It's on the news!"
Grim look on his face, Vincent Valentine grabbed the remote off the desk and turned on the television. Greeting their eyes were the images they did not want the public to see under possible circumstances.
The news was indeed out.
***
Sephiroth controlled the impulse to run to the nearest bush and retched out his lunch. The foul stench in the air was overwhelming. It smelled like decomposing flesh, and painfully like one of Hojo's experiments gone wrong. Even without looking, Sephiroth knew whatever monster it was that had landed in his backyard; it was not anything pleasant to the eyes.
A faint tickle was felt at the back of his mind. A soft voice that sounded so gentle, so endearing and so familiar. It was a mother's touch. But it was also a mother that Sephiroth would love to disown.
My son…you must return to me…to snatch the Planet back from those who took it from us! Jenova hissed.
Sephiroth unsheathed the Masamune and held it out to the direction where the stench was coming from.
"I will not return!" He yelled.
Then suffer my wrath…cursed the child who turns from his mother…"You are not my mother!" The tickle in his mind had escalated into a hard throbbing pain. Jenova's wrath was indeed on him. It would be easy, so easy for him to return back to where he came from. He could choose to fight on his mother's side again in this war, but he would not.
What had this so-called mother given him other than heartaches and misery? For her he had turned against Mankind, for her he had gave up whatever he had, and it was also for her that he had brought the sword down on his lover. She had destroyed everything in his life. Now just as he was trying to put the pieces back together again and spend the rest of his days in peace, she had returned with the intent for more devastation.
His battle plan for this war was to sit it out until it was all over, or until he was dead. Whichever that would happen first. But if he had to fight, this time, he would make sure that he was on the right side of the battlefield.
Finally, the pain was too much to bear. He dropped his sword and fell to the ground beside it. Hands clutching tight at the sides of his head while the nauseating stench surrounded him. He could feel his resolve breaking. Every cell in him wanted to embrace the monster before him and pledge his eternal loyalty to her.
He was falling under a mother's spell.
"SEPH!" The white haired man instinctively turned towards the voice. The air around him quickened slightly as an Ice 3 spell was cast. Sephiroth smiled.
In this madness, you are my only guiding light, Colonel Zachary.
"Be gone, Jenova. He is not yours!" More footsteps and a soft gasp. Sephiroth frowned. There was somebody else with Zack, somebody that he did not know. Or at least, he did not remember knowing.
"What the hell is that?!"
"Stay back, Jake." Zack spat at the creature before him. Cold green slime slipped off the lump of bloodied flesh and onto the floor. It was the most ugly thing that Zack had ever seen in his entire life. It was a composition of centuries of hatred, suppression and anger.
It was Jenova, the cause for Sephiroth's pain.
Zack made a quick check of the Materia he had with him. Taking out a summon Materia, he slotted the crystal into an empty slot on his broad sword. It might not be strong enough to destroy Jenova totally. But it should be more than enough to make her retreat.
Beside him, Sephiroth picked up his sword from off the grass and readied himself for battle. Zack grinned. It was just like the old times when they were still in SOLDIER. Fighting side by side, watching out for each other before this thing came and tore their love apart.
"You have Odin?" Sephiroth whispered.
"Yeah."
"Good." That was all the signal Zack needed to summon the Guardian while Sephiroth charged at the slime ball, dishing out attack after attack to give his partner the time he needed to complete the summon.
A bright light was released and Odin appeared. A loud shrill screech filled the air as Jenova burst into many pieces. But she would return.
Jake nearly screamed as part of the green slime fell on his bare skin and burnt into it, only keeping silent to reduce attention to him. He gritted his teeth to examine the burnt mark carefully, glad to see that it was fading slowly. What harm could slime do?
The brown-eyed bartender smiled wistfully to turn his attention to the scene before him: the reunion of two lovers.
"You are back." Sephiroth took out a handkerchief from his coat pocket and casually wiped his sword with it, slowly so as not to cut himself.
"That I am." Zack replied. Guilt filled his eyes as he took in the appearance of his lover. The other man had lost much weight. The dark eye rings under those beautiful glazed eyes told of many nightmares pervading the General's sleep at night. Even blind, Sephiroth could not hide from the images that his heart provided.
What nightmares did you have, Sephiroth? The same as mine? Then again, I have many of them to choose from.
"Are you going to stay this time?" To others, Sephiroth was the perfect role model of calm. Only someone as close to him as Zack had could see the mask gradually crumbling into pieces.
"I certainly hope so. I will if you want me to." The dark haired man took Sephiroth's hand and placed it on his right cheek. "I am no longer a human, Seph. Are you willing to accept the less than perfect me?"
To Zack's surprise, a light laugh erupted from the silver angel's lips. Sephiroth allowed a wide grin to spread across his face as he buried himself into his lover's arms. He did not even notice the sweet tear of joy that had trickled down his cheekbone.
"I love you." He said simply.
***
Deep inside his cold dungeon laboratory, Hojo tightened his grip around a beaker until cracks began to form on the glass. His creation, his pet was destroyed by his son and his cyborg lover.
But it was okay. The mad scientist glanced around his laboratory, grinning at his prized creations, lying dormant in their glass cylinders.
He had more than enough to play with.
You want to play hardball, Sephiroth? May the better man win.
+End of Chapter 5+
+Continue to Chapter 6+