Alright, here's chapter 2! I'm SO sorry it took so long to get out, but it was the end of the school year, so I was bogged down with billions of finals, projects, and other various educational evils. Accursed IB program… but now it's summer vacation, and I can write till I explode (at least when I'm not at evil career classes, which keep me gone for 12 hours a day)! Hooray!
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Heartscape
Chapter 2: Bolero of Phantoms
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The sun clambered onto the horizon and stretched its shining rays over the smoggy, jagged landscape of the city. Its golden-red arms warmed the cracked concrete of the streets and the gleaming windows of the high-rises. Light wriggled its way into every crevice of the damp, alleviating the steamy fog that crept nightly over the ground. Heat and light pounced and devoured the shadow and cold, eventually shining past steel bars and into the blood-encrusted hair of the splayed form on the prison floor.
The dance of the sun on forced Yuffie's eyelids open, and for a moment she wondered where she was, lying on a stone floor and watching the sunrays reach for her between the bars of a window far, far above. The memories of the night before hit her…
The botched mission…
Riku's and Sora's frightened eyes…
The scar-faced man…
Darkness…
An overly bright room, with leering faces of men she did not recognize, their questions and interrogations as sharp as fangs…
The whip, the fists, the…
… and then the pain returned, hitting her harder than a swing to the head with a metal baseball bat. Yuffie hardly had the sense to reign in a scream as her agony arched up her limbs. Instinctively, like a young child for its mother, she reached for the raw, cold mind of the wolf, knowing its animalistic mind could help shield her from the pain. Yuffie uttered a soft prayer as she felt the wolf instinct join her, a familiar friend – though she could not change into her other, injured form, to be with the familiar senses of the wolf was better than nothing.
She focused on her body, which ached with a dull, disconnected pain. Yuffie twitched each limb, growling with dissatisfaction when she felt her leg reward her with throbs instead of movements. The ninja could feel the scabs solidifying along her back and shoulders, and the burning welts on her neck and face. Her shuriken and kunai pouches were gone. If only I'd been able to kill that lieutenant, the smirking little bastard, I wouldn't be in this mess… When I catch that stupid guy, I'm gonna pull of every one of his limbs and eat them…
The walls consisted of stone, three-feet thick and impossible to break without weapons. Above, a high window set with steel bars and plexiglass winked in the early morning light. No chance of escape. Her heightened hearing caught the sound of boots clacking on stone, heading towards her cell. Body stiffened, she deciphered the noises: a light, casual footstep, followed by two heavy, thicker ones.
The steel door swung open, and Yuffie was not at all happy to see the object of her despise striding into the room, anger darting across his face. He was followed by a young lady wearing a white nurses' uniform and a smile, a large, pink ribbon tying her auburn hair, and an expressionless spiky-haired blond who kicked the door shut with his heel upon entering. Yuffie shifted her heavy shackled wrists so that she could lace her fingers together in her lap. Every muscle cried out in agony at even the smallest movements, but she couldn't appear weak in front of the enemy.
"Good morning," said the nurse, full of calm politeness. The ninja stretched her awareness to feel the woman's aura, a sea of green tranquility. The wolf instinct trusted this woman immediately, but Yuffie did not. This person was a born healer, but part of Shinra, though if Yuffie hadn't known better, she would have thought that this lady was…
"There's no time for pleasantries, Aerith," commanded the lieutenant. He appeared restless, as though he didn't want to be in the cell with the prisoner. Squall leaned back against the rugged wall, lowering his head so that his long bangs covered his vision.
Caution in her brown eyes, the shinobi examined Aerith as she cupped her hands above Yuffie's head. An ethereal green light leaked from her palms, washing healing luminance over the younger girl's wounds.
"You can do magic?" blurted the ninja, staring wide-eyed at the smiling woman.
"Yes," she replied, calmly drawing away from the surprised girl. The sunlight dribbling through the plexiglass lit her auburn hair aflame. "But as you must know, Shinra is not an organization that believes in the use of such abilities. I'd be grateful if you didn't mention this to any of the officers."
Yuffie's eyebrows went up at such honesty, and she jerked a thumb at the brunette who was still leaning against the wall, a mask of frigid indifference nestled on his handsome face. "What about that guy? He's a lieutenant; can't he get you fired for this?"
"The only reason I tolerate this… this abnormality of hers," growled the man, his fierce azure eyes suddenly fixed on Yuffie, "is because this idiot here asked me to." He shot a glance at the blond man, who ignored the comment. The nurse and her yellow-haired friend made their exit, the steel door snapping firmly shut behind them.
She turned to the man, eyeing him cautiously as she flexed her healed fingers and wrists against the metal shackles. He was still staring at her, as though he couldn't quite figure out what she was. Yuffie scrutinized him. The fine cloth of his uniform did nothing to hide his well built frame, his bitter eyes, or his bad attitude.
"Did ya chicken out of the big fight today?" she nonchalantly asked.
"No," she snarled. "I was reassigned to babysitting a brat like you to get information about future campaigns of Avalanche."
Yuffie blew her bangs away from her face, the way she always did when she was irritated with someone. "How charming of you. Sadly, I'm not really interested in telling you diddly-squat."
"That's a shame. Then I guess I'm not really interested in sparing you some pain." He eased away from the wall, one hand stroking his gleaming sword/gun. "Not that it matters what you say. We know your forces are weak. You're running low on people and supplies. I believe I hear a fat lady singing."
She bit back a sharp retort. She almost blabbed about the bombs, tucked under the foundation of the city, almost leaked about how Avalanche was going to lead Shinra into believing they had won the battle today, and let them return to their wired city to celebrate… Just change the topic, Yuffie hissed to herself. The longer you talk about nothing, the less information he gets. "Why are you in such a dumb organization like Shinra anyways? It's run by a bunch of crazy old guys who want Ansem to be the emperor 'cause he's giving them money. You know that, don't you?"
"Who doesn't?"
She shrugged, raising her hands a bit in a gesture of surrender. "I guess everyone does. The real question is: why would you work for people like that? It's obvious you're just their pawns. Do you just like getting played or something?"
His eyes narrowed fiercely, their stormy blue depths spitting lighting. "And what should I do instead? Leave civilization and join a bunch of crackpot idiots wandering around in the woods playing magicians?"
"Why you--" for a few moments she seethed with rage at the smirking man before her. How dare he insult her, her friends, her ancestors who had clawed and labored prosperous villages out of the wild mountains? She ground her teeth, counted to ten, and looked up at him with fire in her dark eyes.
"I bet you're getting something out of this too, huh?" she sneered. "What's your cut? Some cash, or a nice condo? Do you think it's right that everyone you injured on the Avalanche side bleeds and dies and suffers so that you can ride around in a shiny new convertible?"
Stone crumbled as his fist hit the wall right above her head. She quivered slightly. His face was only inches away from hers, she could feel the soft puffs of his breath, smell his spicy cologne, and see the rage glowing in his sapphire eyes. "Don't you ever," he growled, "ever pretend like you know what I went through." With that, he turned on his heel and stormed out, the door crashing shut behind him.
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Anyone who saw them would think they were dogs. Pacing through the dismal alleys, under the protection of the shadows, noses pressed against the ground or pointed at the sky, sniffing with the delicacy of a wine connoisseur. From afar they looked like hungry canines on the lookout for a meal, but at close range, one would realize that they weren't street mutts at all.
They were wolves.
Oil and smoke is like water and air here, shivered the younger brown wolf. He padded quietly after his friend, intimidated by the crashing disharmony of the city. I can't pick up a scent at all.
Riku was silent. Sora observed his silver companion as he pushed his nose against the dirty sidewalk, then tilted his head back as if to howl at the sun. Following suit, they saw the window, high above the ground.
She's here?
She's here.
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He fed a dollar into the drink machine and fetched his cold red Coke from the dispenser. Brushing his long bangs from his eyes, Squall strolled down the corridor, taking a sip, absorbing the sights of busy people rushing around the military building. Essence City had been built solely to house the politicians and military personnel who supported Shinra's newly implemented government. Originally, Essence was being built as a shelter city for orphans, the homeless, and the like, but money had been dropped and exchanged behind closed doors and suddenly the strategic location near Avalanche's base was bustling with generals and senators. It made him sick.
Lieutenant Leonhart stalked down the halls, dodging harried secretaries with greasy bags of French fries and deli sandwiches. He was heading towards the elevator that would take him back down to the prisoners' quarters. He wouldn't let that girl push him around.
He leaned back into the steel wall of the elevator and crammed fists against his tired eyelids. Of course he knew that backing a corrupt government was wrong. He knew that slaughtering people just because their way of life was different was also wrong. Everything about the whole damned war was wrong, and he knew it.
But he couldn't betray the ghosts of his past. It was because of Avalanche that his family had been butchered. And he'd promised himself -- as he watched his mother take her last, dying breath – that he would find whoever was responsible. And until that day, when he could bring his blade smashing through the skull of the Avalanche bastard responsible for slaughtering his entire town – he would let no one call him Squall. Squall was a weak, scared little boy who could do nothing to save his family from their murderer. Leon, however, could and would do exactly that.
A soft noise distracted him from his mental self-loathing. Something was scratching furiously at the plexiglass of the Avalanche girl's cell. Clenching his Gunblade tightly, he confronted the two animals who'd been whittling away at the walls. They were huge and sleek, easily the size of perhaps a lion or jaguar.
The wolves circled him, moving in his peripheral vision. Drool slid from between their bared teeth like slippery eels before splattering onto the cement floor. Squall raised the Gunblade to defend, its metal edge glinting under the flickering fluorescent lights.
With the force of a gale, the white wolf pounced at his left arm. The Gunblade soared through the air, forcing the creature to twist in midair to dodge. Pain shot up his other arm as he felt the brown wolf's fangs sink deep into his flesh. It jerked its massive head back and forth, yanking his body to the ground as blood spurted out of the wound with sprays of mortal red. Squall staggered, his stormy blue eyes sharp as the white wolf filled his vision, jaws opens as it aimed for his jugular. Snarling, he kicked out at the beast, flinching as he felt teeth tear through his leather boots and into his foot. He rolled clumsily, trying to shoot, but his torn tendons and crushed bones wouldn't pull the trigger. Fur bristling, they took places opposite of him, glaring at him with eyes like embers. His blood created a sloppy mess on the stone floor.
Without warning, an eruption of sound and fire annihilated the standoff's silence and a chunk of the wall. Shards of debris punched through the plexiglass, hurtled by flame and air. On nimble paws the wolves skittered toward their companion, ignoring the man completely. With a sweep of his body and a snap of his teeth, the silver wolf broke the shackles and lifted Yuffie to his back as she gripped firmly at his white ruff. Another explosion screamed through the air nearby, and the smoke pouring in from the ruined walls thickened and blackened. Waves of coughs gripped his lungs, and Squall sunk to the floor once more, the combined blood loss and heavy air tilting him towards the realm of unconsciousness.
His ears vaguely grasped a voice yelling through the smog, "We can't leave him here."
Why the heck not? He would've killed us. He would've killed you too! shouted another voice, laden with broiling anger.
"He knows too much," hacked Yuffie, pulling her silver bandana over her mouth to block out the noxious fumes. She prayed that Riku wouldn't be able to hear the desperation in her voice as she pleaded for the life of a person she'd known for hardly a day.
A pause in the noise, filled by the sound of crackling heat and crumbling concrete, before Squall felt himself lifted onto the back of something large and furry.
Hold on, said the voice of a young man in his head. He heard nothing else as he slid into a injury-induced sleep.
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His vision warbled for a moment like a disturbed reflection in a pool, before coming into sharp and painful focus. Body throbbing, Squall lifted his head slightly off the wolf's back to survey the landscape.
Mist blanketed everything, dragging at a legato pace. A pungent smell hovered over the entire area, something sweet that smelled of death and dew; the rhythmic slink of the animal underneath him furthered his agony. For a confused moment, he wondered why the grass looked red. Raising his head further, he stared at the hideous aftermath of the battle.
Bodies lay in the tall grass, limbs missing, oozing trickles of blood. A nearby corpse caught his eye, and he stared into the sad blank eyes of a wolf, its legs sticking up, the paws tearing at the bleak grey sky. The mountains loomed in the distance, seeming to lean in and gawk at the macabre scene.
Squall closed his eyes, and let his face fall against the mire of warm wolf fur. There had only been Avalanche bodies. Only the enemy lay still in the battlefield. He should have felt relief, maybe even triumph.
Instead, all he could feel was disquiet silence in his heart, an elegy to the dead.
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Next chapter: Squall's life at the Avalanche village begins – plenty of Squffie ahead! Yes!
And now that you've read… review!
