LEMON OR NOT?
Read the author's notes at the bottom to find out..
Behind Black Curtains
An AU, Sephiroth and Tifa fanfiction
-by Amaranthos-
Chapter 41: War Stories
"We would make it bigger. We would make it tougher. We would design it with newer engineering, newer technology and certainly, bigger bang" I whispered…
The machine planned, was devised to be a super weapon like none other, something that not even my dear friend, Arthur would see coming.
War like a bruised up child, had its days in the sun – to flit and play, to run and roll…whatever the words of lucid imagination, my day too would come.
With the machine 40 percent underway, most of my energy was spent in pending the war, well - for the war. I knew Arthur well enough to surmise exactly how damn astute he was to the agenda – a loose term I supposed many would appropriate as the war plan; yet I cultivated the best interests of Black Crescents and kept his daughter who was more than a pretty trinket on a glass shelf, to guise my cunning and thrived insanity to tender the perfect moment of war. What lay like a labour on my bones was the Mech, which granted I only recently acquired, seem to bring with it great concern by many. The council particularly grew weary of this – machine; I supposed, it couldn't be helped. We knew nothing of the Mech other than Arthur himself had so savagely lost it to the battle of Mack Knights, and while I do retrospect and see the great losses we have suffered, I am no vain fool in the overwhelming boldness and discovery of our latest weapon.
The secrecy of the machine was agreed by the council to be kept private and off-site. Very few shared the secrets of our ominous weapon. And so it would stay – locked away and preserved until that fated day.
Every month I flew to the off-site location to calculate the progress made.
I stood beside the metal facility staring back at my incomplete 12-foot Mech. It was a monstrous sight, something only the true war pilots could appreciate.
I inspected the large machine, touching it's cold surface and I knew with a profound certainty, it was strong… it felt like it would cultivate such justice.
I smirked at the thought, 'dear Arthur.. do I have a surprise for you'
We were already 3 months into building the newly prototyped Mech and already I could see the results.
"Mr. Shinra" a soldier called out.
"Reeves…" I acknowledged one of my old friends.
"She's a real beauty, isn't she?" the man joined my side as we shared in the splendor of the machine.
"Indeed, couldn't put it any better myself" I smiled.
The man laboured for a second, drawing out a cigarette. He offered me one, but with a chaste nod, I declined.
"Getting soft I see" he smirked, popping the cigar between his lips.
"I fancy other things my friend." I stated.
He enlarged his smirk, "do tell" he exhaled a puff of smoke. "Do tell the inner workings of the Lockhart girl" he winked
I paid no attention to his statement.
"So tell me, how long will it take to finish the Mech?" I asked curiously.
He drew a breath and eyed the machine thoughtfully.
"I'd say a month" he paused to point at the leg of the machine. "The legs need some work. Considering you've brought me this machine just months ago, I'd say the hardest part was the programming involved. Cracking it was a nightmare, but you know I'm good for it" he chuckled lightly - I suppose, to bask in his accomplishment.
"But the legs are constantly rigging on themselves. As you know, every part of the machine carries it's own independent programming language. We perceive everything works together using a central control system – much like a hub…which conveniently is found in the cockpit. I've had several analysts inspect the legs, but after a two second interval the system's programming kicks back in. We have an automatic system, testing the code day and night trying to crack the code. It's tedious but I suspect it won't be long before our systems find a way. If the legs work Shinra, consider it your birthday." he smiled.
"So let me get this straight. It's a password preventing the system from functioning?" I asked, not completely certain about this computer jargon he was speaking of.
"Exactly! What you don't see Shinra, is that the Mech is a computer. If we can't guess the password… the machine is absolutely useless." he scoffed, "you gotta hand it to Lockhart for reinventing programming…"
I absorbed the knowledge Reeves spared me, noting the machine had the resemblance of a neuron system, much like a brain. Each part of the Mech's body was operable under the direct control of the central system – how fascinating was that?
I felt for a second awed by the mighty construction and yet I felt angered and envious that Lockhart had hired the right people to make the right product. Past my insecurity I felt I too, had grown lucky in discovering such a machine.
"So tell me, what amendments have been made?" I asked.
"The entire external body was redesigned, refitted and as a gift from me to you I've armed her up with some Gatling guns - you know, for fun" he laughed.
I joined in his laughter, "seriously… " I paused, "get my machine done"
The war had taken shape into a new manifestation. As I predicted, Rufus Shinra would thrive off of my daughter's capture as leverage, to keep the war at a pivotal arrangement. Little did he know - the pieces of this game were wide and many, and my play had begun a long time ago.
Rufus Shinra was a boy playing in the shoes of his father and though I suspect from his handiwork- he was not a perfect dummy, I saw the blunders of a newbie. Time would remind Rufus, through painful thought and sufferance that the loss of this war would mean everything.
My life's work is spent to the atrocious art called chaos and war. It haunted me, in and out of my living being and sometimes I thought - what has this great war defined me? I've lost more than I say, yet I continue in absolution that things will be resolved for the better. My conscience - what faint of it is left has constantly questioned me like an out-worn ballet my decisions, actions and integrity.
I've lost my child… my only child to war. Immensely troubled to the wrongs and mistakes of my own hands - I cursed the life I've lived, to live knowing I've done nothing for Tifa. No father had planted hopes to lose his child, and though I have her warm memories bottled in my heart, I every now and then, clench my chest feeling something else - something dark convulsing inside of me. To lose Tifa to the war - to my war, would be a damned thing. Something I've tried with all desperation to avoid thinking.
I looked up, staring into the East concerned that my mistakes made in life would not take away the only, most important person I've loved. I've lost so much, and though I've arrested the blame on myself - I am in my singular state of sin and ruin, to ask one last time of the fates …to not take my precious child away. The burden should be mine to bear, and its ruin to rot and soil my life; but to take the life of my sweet child, to take her life instead of mine… then damned be the fates.
The days felt expensed – quicker and the uneasiness of the slow afternoon slumps on my shoulders heavier burdens still yet to come.
I looked out into the green pastures fearing such afternoons were meant to be my last peaceful moments before the great war. The silence is calling and so simple it is a splendor, was undeserved of me. The rays of sunlight fell on the green pastures as children ran through the fields, full of innocent delight. Their smiling faces, cheerful laughter resounded in me and like a stark echo, I felt hollow.
The world no matter how black it was, sometimes appeared so bright and good. It was the small things we never knew that existed, that remained with us. From experience, I've cultivated from life only silly stories, and fancy soldier dreams, not knowing what was really important.
As the edge of day slipped by, I knew my life had much purpose left…
As the leader of a great empire, my eyes never swayed from focus, nor have I crumbled or whimpered. I'm designed to stand straight and face forward with towering strength and determination. I'm supposed to be bold and resilient and a fighter.
It was not my people who coerced me into actions of war and duress. Rather, from the beginning, I knew that in order to be the strong leader the people knew now, I had to depart from my mundane lifestyle and become militant and strong. For how much these two things have robbed me, I cannot say. I am in the artifact of flesh and blood, mind and spirit just a man yet sometimes I felt inadequate of knowing the human genesis: the tale of a mother who's lost her child to war. Of a wife who lost her husband. All I became was the orchestrator to a choir of mercenaries.
There were few moments in my life, I felt proud of my human existence; but am I compensated too little for my actions?
For war has stained my soul in such heavy ways, I sometimes ask the heaven is that the ultimate sacrifice to pay?
But they should know, if it was my life they wanted in the trade for peace… I would gladly give it.
If someone had ever told me what it truly meant to live I would tell them, they haven't been very close to death, have they? In all my wittiness - as I'm sometimes inept of showing, I am a veteran of war, decided to a fate by my hands.
Long ago, when I was a boy I thought about what it meant to be a vassal to one's empire - exactly what in hells name does that mean at sixteen? Effectively, what is it that bounded and roped us to the epidemic called war? My life - genuinely speaking, had no purpose or reason to fight in the war but now I know otherwise...
I've trained under the many war heroes and though their teachings have equipped me for life, I see so vividly, for what we truly are - the fallen race of men - condemned for our tenacious involvement in the war.
I was once a poor farmer's boy who planted in the fields, who grew crops and relished water, and yet something about that lifestyle was honest and good. But it wasn't for me. I had promised to be better than my ancestors and though I am a prestigious Commander of the Red Hearts army, I'm not at all sure if it's any better.
Perhaps if I'm allowed my vain confession, I pledged myself to a worthy cause; much like growing crops and providing for needy customers, I too have found myself in a similar position. I fought to protect my great empire and nothing about my purpose seems false and dishonourable, yet weariness – so stale and colourless found me, filled and consumed me to a point of lost hysteria. But the sufferance of war reminded me there was no quit, no bow of shame…but death. There is no way to cleanse or soften the occupation I have owned.
The names, the teases…the evil deviled names they've called me…
Growing up in a world like that, where I am tested for my integrity by a self-defined career, is often so afflicting.
Yet I continued in my ways of absolution, because I know now different from sixteen that my position isn't as revered and celebrated as some, but regardless the names they've called me- 'murderer' 'defiler', they don't know I'm their hope.
I have carried heavy sins and burdens - afflictions of the soul too dark to wear and knowing the state of the war - all soldiers wore them too.
Life for a haggard soldier is not a simple one, the young soldiers often said. Simple folks claimed they knew our kind, and often shot us with the venomous statement what we did, was no job worthy of G-d. What they failed to see was what was routine and brought us an honest dollar was as wholesome as what they did. They failed to realize the importance of men akin in my design. To suddenly opt out at a time like this showed cowardice of our illustration, so gladly we've learned to defend our hearts from the people who we fought tirelessly to protect. It was never easy to wake up and realize who we were, in the mirror, on the field, in the enemies' eyes. Yet amidst purgatory on Earth and fires born in the West, we found hope in our great leader - General Lockhart.
"Die with red glory"
General Lockhart's words haunted me up till this day, for how could such a man as great as he engineer such a statement of bold, glorious and morbid delivery?
It sent shivers to my core..
I didn't know how I wanted to die in this world, and certainly at 16 when I joined the war I hadn't the faintest idea about death. Now, when I've tendered my thoughts and considered how to die, or if I should die, I hoped to die in the red glory of my fallen brothers and sisters, to honor what I was built to do - a service so deep, so unappreciated. My only last request if granted, was for kami (G-d) himself to open the eyes of blind men and have them know what heroes truly fought for them.
No longer would I – Cloud Strife have fear clamored like a shield to my chest and condone to the mundane recitals of death. For I knew, if I had to die …such is the frailty of life.
For now, when my heart was bright and beating loud I hoped to enjoy who I am, even if… I could not.
"Good morning" Velrog softly spoke, "any word from Admiral Gainsborough?" he looked up at the platinum haired man.
Sephiroth drew a solemn face, "I am not responsible for commanders."
Velrog smirked.
"Perhaps, you should employ a nanny if you're worried" Sephiroth was agitated about the subject.
Velrog took no insult, after all it was two weeks since Aerith's death, and Admiral Gainsborough continued his melodramatic crescendo, or was it his ploy for sympathy. Whatever the reason, his antics were now overbearing, and the sympathy once congealed for the man had now died down.
Sephiroth, who was a formidable man offered his sympathies to the grieving man, but couldn't keep to the false illusion that he cared. Clearly the tendering of affection was not born to General Sephiroth, Velrog noted.
"We must be patient," Velrog said anew.
Sephiroth spared the man a taciturn look, "perhaps you have forgotten for a brief moment there is a war outside these walls, and not long would it be before this place is attacked"
Sephiroth returned to his reading, completely unpaged.
Velrog examined the man. Could a man like Sephiroth, truly own no heart? The war was a depressing agenda, one that simply didn't go away, he noted. Yet he knew someone as special as Aerith shouldn't have been forgotten, especially by the man… she loved.
"Do you own no feelings for her?" Velrog drew near the window.
Sephiroth didn't budge … rather he sat still looking back at the man.
"What we keep of her now… are memories " Sephiroth whispered.
The room echoed his stark words. To Velrog, his admiration only grew for someone as eccentric as Sephiroth, but scared him that a man like that - a man like him could hardly be real.
"She use to look up to you, and now you've left her waiting for a good-bye…" Velrog spoke.
Sephiroth stood abruptly, "remember me when I say to you.." he started in a cold voice, "I do not speak to the dead nor do I fancy loose conversations with them. Letting go, is so much simpler… when you're someone like me" a faint smirk appeared to his features.
"I respect that" Velrog sighed…
"May we proceed?" Sephiroth eyed the man thoughtfully.
The old man nodded, "please" he gestured to Sephiroth
"According to the reports, Red Hearts should be here in the next two months. Arthur has proposed his daughter as a trade to end the war, but of course" he looked up, "only a fool would believe that"
"What does Arthur take me for - a fool?" Velrog scowled, "this a damn war for goodness sakes" he shook his head.
"On the plus side, our new shipments from the West have arrived. Our ammo, guns, tanks and land mobiles have all been accounted for with the inclusion of a few… technical specialists?" Sephiroth paused, "have I missed something, but the last time I checked I was mandated with the charge of security, exactly what does that son of yours plan to do with such specialists?" Sephiroth asked.
The old man sighed, "you know my son, he's always up to something"
"Indeed" Sephiroth narrowed his eyes.
"What news from Mack Knights? Have they died down?" Velrog asked..
"Died down?" Sephiroth repeated thoughtfully. "As in clamor to the safety of Red Hearts or been terminated?" Sephiroth asked..
"Amuse me"
Sephiroth drew a sigh, "they're like a parasite. They refuse to die" he faded.
"It wont be long before their whole fleet suffers our wrath" Velrog grinned sardonically.
Sephiroth strangely smirked at the man, 'indeed the whole fleet'
Author's Notes:
I asked you guys if I should write a lemon and had a tremendous turnout with just about everyone supporting the idea. You guys will be happy to know, I am going to write one BUT there's one BUT.
I felt like I wanted to make the BBC lemon as interactive as possible so for this lemon, I want you guys to tell me what to write about.
Leave me your ideas for lemony moments, and the best ones I will include into the story. I would also like to thank and mention the individuals who shared their ideas in that chapter. If you wish not to have your name attached, just say so, but anyone who is blank I will classify it as the right to post. If you are not comfortable writing ideas in the reply, please message me. I'll be eagerly and humbly waiting…
Up for it?