Unspoken
By mihoyonagi
Chapter 16: Kindness
Sephiroth watched as Aerith gleefully waved her hands above her head, shouting her farewells to the crew of the ship as it sailed further into the distance. "You be good now, Remy, and take care of those chocobos!"
Sephiroth fought the urge to sigh heavily. Passage by ship wasn't his all time favorite way to travel, but under the circumstances he had been thrust into, he had little other choice than to suck up his sea weariness and deal with it, save for throwing himself overboard, of course, and that simply wouldn't do. It wasn't that the sea bored him; the wine-dark waves crashing upon the bow and stern of the ship were magnificent, especially at dusk and dawn. What wore his nerves, however, was the constant tossing and turning of the boat. And, after three days of seeing the same gruff faces, hearing the clinging and churning of the engine below, and listening to the same cry of the sea birds overhead, he wanted nothing more than to be rid of it. Life back in Mideel in their tiny little cottage had been relaxing; life at sea, even for only three days, was repulsive.
Sephiroth watched as Aerith turned to face him. Bright smile still present on her visage, she let out a short, content sigh. "Do you think we can get to Midgar before sunset?"
At least she didn't waste much time. Placing a hand over his eyes to shade out the sun, Sephiroth looked up and down the coast. The sun, though shining brightly, offered little warmth. While the southern hemisphere of the globe was pleasant in the month of February, the same month in the northern half of the earth was anything but. Sephiroth watched as the breath that escaped his lips turned to steam before him. Turing on his heel, he faced the wide open expanse of meadow that stretched out before him. A small dark spot could be seen on the horizon.
With his other hand, he pointed forward, toward the south east, toward what he knew to be the polluted city of Midgar. Pulling his notebook out of his pocket, he scribbled a message for his companion to read.
'Are you certain it is Midgar you wish to travel to?'
Without hesitation, she nodded. "I want to stop by my house and see if my mom is home."
Sephiroth took a step back in surprise. He sure hadn't seen that coming.
'Your mother?' he scribbled.
"Yes," she replied smiling at him as if she hadn't taken note of his obvious surprise. "I wish to see my church as well, and see if Fiel and Zella have kept it nice for me while I've been gone, like they promised they would."
Sephiroth furrowed his brow. Who were Fiel and Zella, and what did they have to do with a church?
Apparently having read his facial expression, Aerith let out a small laugh. "If you'd like, I can tell you all about where I grew up, but how about on the way to Midgar? It's cold out here and I don't want to be in the open once night hits."
At least she was practical. Dark would mean cold, and neither of the pair was dressed particularly warm, having only just sailed from the subtropics. So, in response, he nodded and began to walk.
For being so slight in stature, Aerith was quite the trooper. Or at least Sephiroth thought so. She wouldn't have done well in soldier for her lack of physical strength was obvious, hence why monsters kept attacking her in battle first, but she didn't complain. Instead, she talked to him, teaching him of the life she had led before she had set out with Cloud to save the planet.
"Fiel and Zella are brother and sister, Fiel being the boy and Zella being the girl, whom I used to baby sit on the weekends for extra Gil. Their mother was a cook in a small restaurant in Wall Market, and her husband had to work on the weekends as well, so I would bring Fiel and Zella over to my place to play in the garden, or to the church to help me take care of my flowers."
The last statement caught Sephiroth's interest; they said you couldn't grow plants in Midgar.
Aerith continued. "I don't know what it is, but the flowers always grew for me. My house is probably the only clean place in Midgar, really, so I used to invite all of the neighborhood kids over to play in the garden when I was little."
She paused, sighing heavily. "But none of them ever came over. They all thought I was weird. I don't know why Fi and Zel took such a liking to me, though. I think the only reason their mother used to let me baby sit was because I was the only teenaged girl in Sector 5 not to have kids of my own."
Sephiroth cleared his throat, highly uncomfortable over the direction the conversation was taking. Conversely, Aerith kept talking as if she had heard nothing.
"I didn't have many friends growing up," she continued, stumbling over a small pile of stones in the grass. She righted herself and brushed a stray strand of grass from her leg. "Because of the fact that everyone thought I was weird, I never dated much, either. I did have one boyfriend a few years back though. Maybe you knew him; he was, after all, in soldier." She paused and smiled up at him. "His name was Zax."
Sephiroth froze, rooted to the ground.
He guessed she must have read the expression on her face, for her eyes lit up slightly. "I take it you do know him, then."
For no particular reason, Sephiroth had taken a fond liking to the loud-mouthed and ever dreaming boy he had trained and battled with those many yeas ago. Where other soldiers considered their leading officer to be coldhearted and, for lack of a better term, an all-around bastard, Zax tried his best to melt the sheet of ice that Sephiroth had placed around his person. One night, on shore leave, Zax had taken his superior officer to the bar, and glass after glass was upended and the rest, though a little fuzzy in Sephiroth's mind, was history. After that, Zax had become as close to a friend as Sephiroth would like to admit.
'Yes, I knew him.'
He wrote as he walked, trying not to look at the flower girl whom walked beside him.
"Was he always such a big goof ball?"
A small smile tugged at Sephiroth lips.
'Yes.'
Zax had always been a joker. Playing pranks on other soldiers, like hiding their uniforms, or even replacing the ones in another soldier's locker with female uniforms, was what he did best. In the end, though, Zax had always given himself away; after each prank he would wear a large grin he seemed incapable of hiding, informing the world it was he who committed whatever prank had been pulled.
"Were you two friends?"
Sephiroth pondered this. He knew the young boy was a good soldier and always listened to orders, but when at ease, Zax seemed to transform from a top notch soldier to relaxed, easy-going young man.
'I am not sure, really.'
Truthfully, it was the best answer Sephiroth could offer. Zax, while successful in warming Sephiroth's cold outer shell, though just a bit, was friendly to everyone. He was the type of man who had many acquaintances and very few close friends. He had considered Zax the closest thing to a friend he had, but hadn't the slightest idea what he was to the fellow soldier.
Sephiroth couldn't find it in himself to tell Aerith that Zax was most likely dead. Though his memories were fuzzy, Sephiroth couldn't forget the face of his once-friend as he raised his sword and slashed him when Zax wouldn't get out of the way in the reactor. Jenova had compelled him to do it, for when he was closest her magic worked the strongest, but, regardless of who had made him, it was Sephiroth's hands that had held the sword.
Something heavy fell to the pit of Sephiroth's stomach. He tried to swallow, but found his throat to dry to even attempt to. He didn't much like the feeling, whatever it was.
Out of the corner of his eye, Sephiroth watched Aerith bring her tiny hands in front of her mouth, cup them over the rosy lips, then blow. She suppressed a shiver, but the general could see the goose bumps that ran rampant up and down her arms. She was cold.
Sephiroth did the only thing he could thing of; he placed his notebook and his pen inside of his pocket, pulled his shirt over the top of his head, and tossed it to the young girl next to him.
Aerith, apparently taken by surprise, stumbled backwards a few steps. She looked to the article of clothing she had been given, then to the general. "I can't take this- you'll freeze!"
Her protests were in vain, for the general was quite stubborn. He pulled his only means of communication from his pocket one more and scribbled a message for her.
'I have been in places far colder than this with much less to keep me warm. This is nothing, albeit a little chilly.'
Aerith looked again to the wad of cloth in her hand. A shy smile slowly spread across her face, and she looked up to meet the eyes of the man whom she traveled with. "Thank you. It's very kind of you." She pulled the shirt over her head.
It was, Sephiroth noticed, extremely large on her. He knew himself to not be all that large of a man, but was Aerith truly so tiny? He marveled how something so tiny could carry such a gigantic spirit, not to mention heart.
She had called him kind. Sephiroth was glad her back was turned to him as they continued to walk toward the setting sun, least she would see the hint of a smile that graced his face.