I'm Already There
Teaser: When you lose someone, never forget that they're always with you.
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He clenched his firsts angrily, biting back the tears as he looked away from the tombstone in front of him. "I can't believe it. Why didn't he tell us what was wrong?"
Elena sobbed softly to herself, her eyes squeezed shut against the pain as she clung to Tseng's chest. This had been terrible on them all, but it was really hard to say which one was suffering the most. At Reno's words, she stiffened and turned angry eyes on him. "Why would he? He knew that we were too protective of him. He was probably sick of it and wanted his death to be some kind of punishment or something!" She broke down and fell to her knees in the muddy ground, not caring if her suit was stained.
Standing silently, Tseng held on tightly to the last thing that would connect the four of them, not willing to let it go just yet. He didn't want to admit that disease had won and that Shin-Ra was over as they knew it.
"Does anyone have any last words?"
Tseng raised his hand and stepped forward, stumbling in his distress. He lay the photograph of the four Turks and their President face-up on the oak coffin, the polished wood shimmering in the dull sunlight. Tseng placed his hand on the lid where he assumed Rufus's cold hand rested on his chest, resisting the painful urge to tear open the lid and see his face one last time.
Elena managed to get to her feet and walked over to Tseng, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. It seemed to give Tseng some strength as he nodded and swallowed, looking up at the faces of those who gathered, all dressed in black. Avalanche and ShinRa, together as one. It would probably never happen again, but the death of a friend and coworker did that to people. It brought them together in strange ways.
"Everyone here knew Rufus Shinra," he began. "Some only knew him by name, others saw him a sa greedy man. I saw him differently." It was already getting difficult to speak and he had barely started his speech yet.
"Ever since Rufus was little, I've been his bodyguard. He used to tell me just about everything – what he planned to do to fix what it father did, how badly he felt that Midgar was suffering…" He swallowed. "How much he wanted to make it all right again. Rufus wasn't a heartless man.
"His father treated him poorly after his mother died. Because of his father's schedule, Rufus lost sight of his childhood dreams and became a cold man towards everyone else he didn't know. He never let himself be beaten by anyone over anything, and people began to see him as special. However, he was only a normal man…
"When he died, it caused such an uproar. Most people were… happy to see him dead. Others wept. Still others couldn't do much more than sit there in shock." Tseng gritted his teeth and clenched his fist by his side. "Rufus' death was nevertheless disastrous. Its caused so many problems and much more are sure to come. There's nothing more I can say…"
Tseng didn't trust himself to speak at the moment. He stepped back from the casket and bowed his head in respectful silence to the departed President, grateful when everyone gathered immediately followed suit.
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It had been about 2 months since the funeral, and still they visited his grave. None of them could seem to ignore the fact that shin-Ra was gone. All it had taken was just one bullet….
Tseng opened his eyes to avoid seeing the scene again, but it still came. He had been powerless to stop that man from pulling the trigger, and he would never let himself forget it. Rufus had died because of HIM. He could still see the look in Rufus' cold eyes before the gun went off. It had said three words: 'I trusted you.'
Nothing would ever make that memory go away. It would always be there, tearing at him.
Elena stepped back from the grave, having placed her flowers beside the others'. She taped him on the shoulder cautiously, trying to wake him up from his constant nightmare. "Tseng? It's your turn." Her voice was dry, like she had been crying all night.
As he knelt down, he realized that she probably had been. All four of them ha been hurt deeply by this, and now there was nothing that could ease the pain.
Closing his eyes against the tearful scene, he turned stiffly and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Come on. We had best leave."
The darkening clouds seemed to spill their tears as they left, causing the left flowers to bend under the water droplets.
I'm already there.
Take a look around.
Each ex-Turk had their own life now, but it still left weird to be alone at night without saying good-night to the other 4 in their rag-tag family. Reno sighed and rubbed the back of his neck as he looked around his apartment, a white towel draped half-hazardly around his waist. A little bit of TV and then off to bed.
He grimaced at the thought. Anymore, nighttime had been terrible. Without something to lose himself in, all he could think about was the President. He felt like it was sort of his fault, even though it wasn't. There were so many things he could have done instead of scuttled around corners because of fear of losing his job. He could have sparred with Rufus when he was still alive, he could have torn the guy PARTIES on special occasions, just to see him get angry. His job wasn't worth losing a friend over, he realized that now.
But now it was too late to do anything with the man. There was nothing that could be done except bring flowers to a grey headstone that read:
Rufus Shinra
1987-2013
You changed the world until someone changed you
He had always though that a mockery. It wasn't Rufus's fault he was dead. Reno felt his hand clench and tried to push the President from his mind. He grabbed for the remote and flopped on the couch, flipping through the channels until he settled on good old cartoons.
After a good three hours of snickering at Wile E. Coyote and the Road-runner, Reno was snoring loudly on the couch, the TV still playing. Things seemed normal until the power flickered, causing the volume to rise until it woke up the red-head with a startled snort.
Gazing around in utter confusion, he couldn't help but notice how the flashing light from the TV didn't affect one spot against the wall. It just stayed in darkness, even though it was right in the middle of the wall.
I'm already there.
Take a look around.
I'm the sunshine in your hair.
I'm the shadow on the ground.
I'm the whisper in the wind.
I'm your imaginary friend.
And I know I'm in your prayers.
Oh, I'm already there.
Squinting his eyes at the spot, Reno recoiled in shock, feeling his heart begin to pound as a flash of lightning from the storm outside illuminated the 'shadow.' "…Rufus?" he asked hopefully.
The 'shadow' nodded, and he could have sworn he saw it smile. It walked forward and held out its arm, beckoning Reno to reach out too. Reno tried, practically throwing himself at the 'shadow' in order to just see the President again. He'd finally get the chance to tell Rufus everything he never did before. He was back to stay.
Another flash of lightning, and everything was back to normal. Reno was still in the same position; hand outstretched to meet Rufus' pale fingers, but there was no Rufus. It was just his same old apartment.
A dull 'poof' sound came from the TV, a dead sign that Wile E. had fallen off one of the red cliffs, but Reno didn't turn back to the TV. He was still looking at the wall where Rufus – no. Rufus' spirit – had been standing, confused. A few minutes of deafening silence passed, then he just slumped down on the couch, burying his face in his arms as he cried.
Rufus wasn't coming back.
I'm already there.
Take a look around.
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"'Bye, Elena! You be careful!"
"I will, thanks!"
The fake smile she had forced disappeared as soon as she opened the door to her home on the outskirts of Edge. Elena refused to look at the mirror as she walked through the hallway, finally settling down in the living room with a mug of hot chocolate. Of course, this whole thing had probably hit her hardest. She had been the newest Turk and wasn't so accustomed to watching death like that. But… it had been Rufus who died.
"…All he had tried to do was fix what he did wrong…" she sniffled. "Was that really enough to kill him?" She really didn't want to know, but she couldn't help but wonder what Rufus did wrong. As far as she could understand, fixing your mistakes was a GOOD thing. But apparently, it wasn't.
She buried her face in her arms and almost instantly fell into a fitful sleep, tossing and turning with her nightmares and the monsters in them.
The great crystalline walls rose up endlessly, but there was still that small needlepoint of light, thousands of miles above her. She was back in the Northern Crater. Swallowing, she stepped forward, her gun raised and at-the-ready. Every footfall echoed painfully around her.
The crystals suddenly seemed to fade back into nothingness, and loud murmurs took their place, making her grimace and fall to her knees with her hands clasped around her ears in order to try and block out the noise. By the time the noise was becoming so unbearable it was practically rattling her teeth, it all stopped. Just like it never happened.
She opened her eyes and got to her feet, looking around and trying to see through the blackness that was left. At first, she didn't see anything, but on another look, a speck of bright white light caught her gaze.
Her eyes widened and she ran towards it, desperate to escape this place once again.
She stopped suddenly, her boots frozen to the ground. The white light wasn't an exit. It was one of her friends. The one she lost just a few months ago, though it still felt like it happened yesterday.
I'm already there.
Don't make a sound.
I'm the beat in your heart.
I'm the moonlight shining down.
I'm the whisper in the wind.
And I'll be there 'til the end.
Can you feel the love that we share?
Oh, I'm already there.
"Rufus!" she gasped, running forwards towards him, closing her eyes as she wrapped her arms around his slim frame. Her eyes snapped open when her arms didn't close on the solid warmth of the president, but rather on cold, empty air. She looked around in surprise, once again seeing nothing but blackness.
She woke up with a start, covering her mouth to resist a scream as she looked wide-eyed around the room. She wasn't sure what had just happened to her, but she was more than positive that she needed to contact her other friends. Seeing Rufus again after he had been dead for two months…. It just wasn't natural.
Trembling, she looked around the room one more time in fearful silence before curling back up under the blanket she had draped across the back of the couch. She'd contact them tomorrow…
I'm already there.
Don't make a sound.
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Rude raised his eyebrows in silent contemplation, hardly daring to believe that he was still awake. Actually, he shouldn't have been awake. It was almost 4:00 in the morning, and he had been woken up by his phone ringing. It was a total scare, to say the least. However, it was just Reno calling up to rant about something.
From what Rude could understand, there had been a shadow that looked like Rufus in Reno's apartment and had wanted to take him somewhere.
"Reno, Reno! Calm down and speak English! What happened?" he asked calmly.
"Man, I'm SERIOUS! Rufus was standing IN MY APARTMENT and he wanted to take me with him!" Reno squawked into the phone line, causing Rude to wince and move the phone away from his bruised ear.
He frowned. "Right, Reno. Stop joking around. That's not funny."
"But Rude! I'm se—" Reno's voice was cut off when the bald Turk hung up the phone. Shaking his head, Rude turned away from the hallway and went back to his bedroom, hoping to catch at least another 3 hours' sleep.
However, that sleep had to wait for a little while.
He raised a brow again, this time in utter confusion. There was something that looked like a mist in the hallway between his bedroom and where he stood. That hadn't been there two minutes ago…
He grabbed a vase of flowers from a small shelf in the hallway and arched his arm back, ready to throw it at whomever or whatever was causing the mist. His fist clenched around the delicate porcelain when the mist seemed to fill the hallway, fogging up his sunglasses.
As a Turk, Rude had experience with frightening situations, but there was an aura about this one that made him uneasy. "All right. Who's there?" he growled, suppressing a quaver in his voice as best he could. As he looked, a certain spot in the mist to his left seemed to become more solid.
Well, more like a liquid. It shimmered like silver, but still had the transparency of glass. Rude squinted his eyes at the hole-in-the-mist and recoiled. Maybe Reno hadn't been joking around after all…
I'm already there.
Take a look around.
I'm the sunshine in your hair.
I'm the shadow on the ground.
I'm the whisper in the wind.
I'm your imaginary friend.
And I know I'm in your prayers.
Oh, I'm already there.
"Sir? Is that really you?"
The silvery Rufus grinned and held out his hand to Rude, looking expectantly from dead, pupiless eyes. Rude didn't move a muscle, remembering what Reno had said about Rufus offering to take him somewhere. He didn't know what Reno was talking about with that. It simply looked like Rufus wanted to shake hands.
Rude nodded and held out his hand to humor the spirit, but then the lighting from the still-going storm illuminated the whole room, temporarily blinding the Turk. He reached up to rub at his eyes, seeing spots of all colors. When his vision cleared, so did the mist and Rufus.
He looked confusedly around the room, trying to make sense out of what he just saw. Unable to come up with anything, he shook his head sadly and turned back to the phone, forcing himself out of the stupor that the events left him in.
"Reno? I believe you now."
I'm already there.
Don't make a sound.
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Time seemed to have stopped for Tseng after the funeral. He considered himself trapped in the day of the assassination, the memories replaying nonstop for him. He didn't want them to come - he wanted to let it go – but it just couldn't happen. That look in Rufus' eyes would forever haunt him. 'I trusted you,' it said. 'You were supposed to protect me.'
He had failed. He didn't protect Rufus when he needed it most, and he had paid dearly for it. Reno had said that he was losing his mind over the President, and he probably was, but they were all suffering from it.
Tseng looked at the ground, shaking his head in deepest sorrow as he stood up from the gravesite, the flowers placed delicately in front of the black tombstone. The chiseled name was still visible, but he wouldn't allow himself to read the words. After all, he had long since memorized it.
"Things should have been different, sir. I should have done something…" he muttered, clenching his fists at his sides. "I could have saved you."
He turned around to leave, willing the pain to go away. He jumped back when he saw the President standing gently under the willow tree, smiling gratefully at him.
I'm already there.
Don't make a sound.
I'm the beat in your heart.
I'm the moonlight shining down.
I'm the whisper in the wind.
And I'll be there 'til the end.
Can you feel the love that we share?
Oh, I'm already there.
"Sir!" Tseng immediately went to salute, but thought better of it and let his half-raised arm fall limply to his side. He stepped back in a hurry after a moment, suddenly realizing what was going on. "…Sir? What—"
Rufus shook his head slowly, and Tseng could have sworn he saw a silvery tear slide down his cheek. He raised his head again and nodded to the Turk, holding out his hand one last time.
Tseng, not sure what he wanted, immediately followed suit, blinking as he found something in his hand. He turned his attention to it, and noted that it was a small picture. He recognized the photograph – it had been taken soon after Rufus healed from the Geostigma. All five of them were there. A small smile found its way to Tseng's lips, but was almost immediately wiped away when the picture glowed. He frowned deeply at the changes that had been made. It was the same picture, but Rufus was no longer there. Instead, the four Turks were smiling by themselves. It looked right without the President between them, but left an empty hole in his heart when he remembered what the original looked like.
He turned it over to put it in his pocket and saw something written in Rufus's neat script:
We may be a thousand miles apart
But I'll be with you wherever you are.
Tseng bit his lip and smiled. Those were lyrics from his favorite song. He had listened to it nonstop after Rufus died. He looked up quickly to where Rufus was standing and asked "How did you—" But he stopped.
He was gone. There was no trace of the President anywhere.
Frowning deeply, Tseng refused to show any more emotion. The back of the picture was fresh in his mind, and the two lines of the song eased the pain somewhat.
"…I'll be with you, too…" he mumbled, turning from the grave and walking on. Rufus' message had been clear, and he would take it to heart. The picture in his hand glowed once again, and he instinctively turned to look at it, smiling softly at the words that were left where Rufus would have been standing.
I'm already there.
"Take care, sir," Tseng whispered, closing his eyes and letting the wind take the small picture from his hand. He watched it float over his head and narrowed his eyes lovingly as it just disappeared. He had a feeling he knew what happened… Rufus had never liked other people seeing his personal possessions.
I know now. You'll always be with us.
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I'm already there.
Don't make a sound.
I'm the beat in your heart.
I'm the moonlight shining down.
I'm the whisper in the wind.
And I'll be there 'til the end.
Can you feel the love that we share?
Oh, I'm already…
There.
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A/N: This took forever, but I'm really proud of it. I reread it a few times, and some stuff needs to be said that readers might not get.
1.) I know this song is about a truck driver and a phone call he makes to his family, but the chorus is what I was really focusing on. I listened to this song all the time when someone I cared for went away for any length of time (yes, that includes death). I thought it fitting for this fiction, too.
2.) 'There' in this fiction, DOES refer to home, but a different type. You got it: It refers directly to Heaven; though I'm pretty sure you all got that by that one line near the end. I hope you did, anyway.
3.) This is NOT a yaoi fic. I always assumed that Tseng was Rufus' bodyguard since he was very little, so they're closer than family. How would you feel if you lost your best friend? Or a sibling? Probably not too damn good.
4.) All the times when Rufus offered his hand. That was mainly space-filler. But I suppose it could mean something. Like it might symbolize his ties to the Turks. Y'know, not wanting to let go of family and all that. If you've got a better suggestion, let me hear it.
Either way, I hope you people like this. 9 pages all typed up and my fingers HURT. O.- Enjoy.