Er, well, this one is strange. You might read it any way you wish, but know that "she" is General Beatrix. The identity of the rest of them are up to you.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or the placenames depicted herein; they are the property of Square-Enix, and I am taking to financial gain from this work of fiction.
Stability.
Safety.
Durability.
Equilibrium.
What she wanted more than anything in this world was to be safe, to be standing with both feet on the ground and no head in the clouds. What she wanted was to wake up in the morning and remember her name, wake up and know that outside the window the world kept running as normal because she was stable.
Her knight in armour (neither shining nor white, though it might once have been) was stability, a rock to cling to as the storms raged outside her window. There was no beauty, no grace in him, but he was safe, as harmless to her as a grain of sand. She had had enough of beauty to last her a lifetime, but the knight would never know for some things are better kept secret.
She had saved herself, crawling away from a wreckage in the making, and her knight in his rusted-shut armour had been there to catch her when she stumbled. It was all better now – he was rusted armour, nervous loyalty and the smell of cheap polish – but she still remembered the feathers and the madness and the nights when the sun would never rise.
That was instability, unsafe and uncertain, days running out of time when the nights would never end; she treasured them still, sharp pangs of bitter-sweet pain, splinter-shadows of memory and guilt. It was unhealthy, she knew that much, but she could not help herself. Like an addict she replayed the snapshots in her mind, recalling over and over just how desperately beautiful it had all been, not a love but a mutual dependence.
What she had now was not what she had then; this present was safety, a dull sort of adoration, born not out of desire but out of gratitude, which might be worse than the stumbling, half-blind promises made to madness. She was in love with love, not with her knight, in love with the contrast of safety instead of uncertainty, selfish beyond belief but craving it.
It was her life now, a routine that was not to be broken, she had saved herself and survived though she was no longer sure if she was living.
Life had been a hectic, an endless stream of vital moments, love had been a whisper in the dark, a falling feather from slim fingers, but that was past. What she had now was safe, secure and never-changing. She did not want the feverish nights and the raging blood back.
She did not want it at all; she would keep the memories, embed them like shards of broken glass in herself, to remind her of all the times she had gone wrong, but she did not want it back.
She did not want the feathers, the madness or the echo of metal boots.