Prompt: Star Crossed Lovers
Shinra sent Sephiroth on enforced leave.
He didn't think it was necessary, but the director disagreed, giving him a concerned look. His most recent chain of missions had been dangerous ones, but all of his missions were dangerous. They hadn't given him pity holidays when he was twelve and his hands still shook after every battle. He hadn't been sleeping well recently, but no SOLDIER on the fleet slept well. Not when a merfolk battalion could tear open the hull of the ship, sabotage the motors, cut the anchor chains or even launch a boarding party at any moment.
He would never forget the brief change in air pressure when they pierced the walls of a submarine, the only warning he had before pressurized water exploded everywhere and the vessel tore itself apart. He had been the only survivor. It wasn't an outlying event. The war had always been like that.
He jerked, startling himself. A seagull had flown in front of the map on the side of a building he was studying.
...How long had he been staring at it?
Perhaps he did need a break.
They had sent him to some obscure coastal town, too far from the main ports and shipping lanes for him to possibly get called up again until his mandated holiday was over. He turned from the sun bleached map to start down the uneven road, towards the cry of seabirds and the blue horizon.
He had refused to go anywhere inland. He wouldn't get any sleep at all if he couldn't hear or feel the ocean. It's absence haunted him as much as its presence did.
The road wound back and forth down a steep hill, away from the township situated on the other side of the narrow peninsula, in the sheltered bay with gentle breezes and reliable fishing. He had specifically asked for the exposed side.
At the base of the hill he found a humble cottage surrounded by spiky grass and towering flax bushes. A salty wind battered it, making the weatherboards creak. Inside was well sealed at least. From the kitchen window he caught sight of a strip of sand and rock, and the hungry mouth of the ocean smashing against it. White caps dotted the dark blue water and bursts of spray flew up from waves crashing against rock.
He dropped his kit on the table and headed for the beach. It was a tiny cove wedged between crumbling cliffs of jagged black rock, lined of rusty iron ore running through it. The beach, if it could even be called that, was mostly rock with patches of sand covering some of it up, and a thin rickety pier. Violent choppy wind assaulted him with sand and salt.
He sat on a rock and watched.
He had orders to relax. Hours past, just watching the rhythmic crash of the waves, the swell rising in the distance, and the churning of foam through the rock pools. Was this what peace felt like? It was the closest he ever came to it.
A black fin cut through the waves.
He snapped back into focus and stood up. There was no sign of it, but the water was too choppy to tell at this distance. He shook himself and went back inside.
The days passed slowly. He went diving for shellfish mostly to fill the time and because he could. It would have been madness for someone unenhanced, and frankly was unwise even for him. But he could hold his breath for hours at a time, and found something relaxing in the battering of the ocean. There were old lobster pots at the bottom of the cove, but they were all empty.
Strange. There were broken lobster and crab shells scattered around the rockpools.
He could feel the ocean currents around him, the changes in temperature and pressure. It probably shouldn't have been comforting, but it was his preferred battlefield.
There was something large nearby. A shoal of fish was sweeping around the cliffs by the bay's entrance. He felt the swoops of a manta ray's wings by the surface. There was something else. He looked, his SOLDIERs double eyelids blinking through the churning water, but he couldn't see it.
Maybe he was just on edge.
He surfaced without incident, except for losing his abalone knife when an unexpected wave threatened to smash his face against the rocks.
He dreamed of SOLDIERs who had drowned that night.
The next day he found his abalone knife sitting on the end of the pier. He considered it with a frown.
He fetched some rope and laid out a basic trap with it. Just to see.
The next day the rope was sitting on the pier, wound into a neat coil.
He scoffed at it. No wonder the lobster pots were all empty. He decided to ignore his neighbour, whoever they were, and returned to the cottage.
Dark, low clouds blew in, and the wind picked up speed. It howled as the sun sank, and was storming in full by the time night really set in. Rain thundered against the tin roof and the walls creaked under the abuse of the twisting winds. He was barefoot in the kitchen, wearing nothing but his night pants as he made himself a cup of tea. The old fashioned kettle was stubbornly refusing to whistle on the stove top.
A voice cried on the wind.
He looked up. He squinted out the window but the glare of the kitchen was too much on the glass. The wind howled like it was in harmony, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.
He turned off the light and peered into the dark.
A woman sat on the end of the pier, looking out into the water. Not a woman, a mermaid, with her tail arcing down over the edge and a thick fin on her back, monochrome in the dark.
He couldn't make out what kind she was in the pelting rain, but she didn't have the silhouette of the sinewy barracuda types he spent his whole life fighting. Probably one of the wild countryside merfolk who had no part in the war except its fallout. Or someone who had followed him? No, a spy wouldn't have been so blatant.
Her voice rose in strength, carried on the wind. She sang her siren song with her back exposed, as though the world wasn't on fire and her people weren't killed on sight by humans.
She sounded so mournful.
The kettle started to whistle. He turned off the heat to make it stop, and bowed his head, listening.
SOLDIERS were immune to the effects of a siren call. It was no more enchanting than a human singer would be to him, and yet… it tugged at something inside of him. He leaned against the bench, and found himself sliding down until he was sitting on the cold tile of the floor, his back to the cabinets.
Her voice matched the storm, wild and broken, and uncaring for who heard. As powerful as the driving rain, as the ocean that crashed in time with her.
It made him think of Angeal, of all people.
Angeal, who drowned himself. Genesis, who tried, but Shinra had merged him with too much merfolk DNA for him to be capable of it.
The company pretended he had drowned. They said it honoured his memory more than the truth. The mermaid wailed like a mourner.
Sephiroth wanted to break something. Maybe himself.
He got up. He wrenched the door open and stepped out into the storm. He walked down to the pier, drenched through before he was even halfway there, his hair sticking to his back and sand on his feet. He didn't care.
He set a single foot on the pier and the song stopped.
He didn't advance. She didn't look back. He didn't know what he intended, only he couldn't sit in the dark on the floor by himself anymore. He knew this was incredibly dangerous. He wasn't armed.
"I didn't mean to enchant you. I'm sorry," the mermaid said, her shoulders sagging. She spoke loudly to be heard over the storm. "Go home. Get back into bed and dream of sweeter things."
"You didn't enchant me," he said, quietly. She would have strong enough hearing to catch it. "You shouldn't be out here."
She turned her head but didn't really look.
"Neither should you," she said, then muttered to herself, "I just wanted to sing without hurting anyone."
He stepped onto the pier. "It's not my safety you should worry about."
She scoffed. "Why not? Someone should, before you go diving in a storm."
She finally looked up at him, and he saw the exact moment she registered his glowing, double lidded eyes and realised what he was.
She stiffened and raised herself up higher, her tail tensing around the wooden support.
He waited for an attack. It didn't come. She just watched him, red eyes in a black and white face, framed by thick black hair whipping madly in the wind. The rain blasting in from the ocean caught on her tall body, sheltering him for the moment. She didn't do anything else.
She must not have known who he was, beyond being a SOLDIER, or she would have likely tried to throw the whole pier at him. When he didn't advance on her she lowered herself back down to the wooden slats.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
"I don't know," he admitted. "Who were you singing about?"
She seemed to sink lower. "No one," she said, sadly. She watched him for a moment then she gave him her back again and sat on the edge, her tail disappearing into the angry high waters.
She didn't look like she was going anywhere anytime soon.
He approached slowly, unsure of what he should do. A litany of Shinra approved actions droned in the back of his mind, dull and distasteful.
He stood next to her at the very edge. The water was black at his feet, a churning hungry mass indistinguishable from the horizon. Like the whole world was ocean, roaring and convulsing around him and the sodden plank of wood he stood on. The storm assailed him without mercy. It felt like it was washing him clean. Washing everything away.
"If you jump in, I'll fish you back out," she said.
"Why?"
"It's my cove. I don't want you dying in it."
He looked down at her. "It's my pier."
"Kick me off then."
The rain started to slow, splattering in irregular drops against his face. He looked down at her and saw her clearer now. She wasn't black and white because of the low light, but because she was a killer whale mermaid. The symmetrical colours ran down the full length of her body in large patches.
They were a rare kind. There was supposedly one in that eco-terrorist group in the southern seas, but he had never seen one before. Her skin was glossy like the pitch black water before them. She was smaller than the animal her species took its form from, but not by much. Her frame suggested more power than he had thought at a distance.
She would be able to bring down a small ship on her own if she knew how. His eyes caught a scar running down her middle, like she'd survived a gutting. It was the sort of injury SOLDIERs were trained to deliver. There were more scars on her pale arms.
Perhaps she had brought down ships.
A dangerous and beautiful creature. He should have felt so comfortable near her. He had never been so close to one of the merfolk outside of a combat situation or prison camp before. She didn't look perturbed.
He sat on the pier next to her, his feet disappearing into the water.
"Will you sing again?" he asked.
"If you join me, seeing as you're immune." She looked down at her hands. "It's not meant to be done alone."
He didn't know that. But he shook his head. "My vocal cords are damaged." They had been for as long as he could remember. It was one of the oldest annotations on his file. "I can't speak your language." Not that SOLDIERS were meant to be able to. He wasn't a fool. He'd connected the dots.
She looked mournfully at him.
"You'll have to sing for me," he said quietly.
She faced the driving wind and breathed in deeply. She opened her mouth and a siren's song poured out of her, caught in the wind and travelling out over the water.
They said it was bliss to be enchanted by the song, like experiencing peace in its purest form.
There was no peace in her voice. She sang like she'd had her heart ripped out, and his own ached to hear it. But it was calmer than before, no longer the open wound he felt bleeding in his own chest, but the soft, tender flesh of something vainly trying to heal. Painful, bitter, but not dead. It was as though she forgot he was there, closing her eyes and channelling something from deep within her.
He watched her openly. He lost himself in her grief. Tears he had never wept for Angeal and Genesis filled his eyes and dripped down his cheeks. The hours blurred and she didn't stop until the wind dropped and the quality of the dark changed. It was very late, or rather very early.
She let a note wander and die out, then at least fell silent. She sagged where she sat and wiped at her cheek. He felt the inane urge to take her hand.
"The fishing boats will set out soon," he said. His voice felt rusty after holding his silence so long. They would hunt her if they caught sight of her. He had stayed too long.
"They won't see me here."
He shook his head. "Swim away. Don't come back to these waters."
She tried a weak smile. "We've already established that it's my cove."
He was no longer in the mood to joke about it. The dawn would soon come, bringing with it duty and the petty concerns of the human world. He stood up. The rain had stopped.
"You are in danger," he said.
She looked up at him for a long time. In this position he towered over her. Finally she nodded, and slipped down into the waters with barely a splash.
He breathed out with relief, and inexplicably, disappointment.
He was alone on the pier.
"Goodnight, Sephiroth," a quiet voice called.
A black fin cut through the waves, and the ocean swallowed her up.
Next Time: Sephiroth-in-Avalanche AU. (Yes its all AUs).