Unspoken

By mihoyonagi

Chapter 36: Truth

The tension in the air between Sephiroth and his pretty flower maiden was so thick he was certain he was bound to choke upon it. It wasn't that Aerith wasn't talking to or ignoring him- it was that Sephiroth was able to detect the slightest hint of some strange emotion carefully tucked away under her voice. He spent many hours contemplating what the tone insinuated while they walked under they shadowy peaks of the small mountain range that divided the continent. Was she angry with him, or merely annoyed? It didn't quite sound like pity, but Sephiroth would be damned before he ruled anything out completely; he had learned that it was a rare occasion in which he could pinpoint exactly what was going through Aerith's mind. Perhaps, he pondered, that was one reason why he was so enthralled with her.

During their long hike through the mountains, Sephiroth had noticed Aerith shiver slightly and begin to rub her arms. He immediately took note of how cold it was (for though his body was human it was still used to the rigorous Soldier training and conditioning, thusly cold had little effect on him) and promptly removed a jacket from his bag and handed it to Aerith. As if a momentary lapse of judgment had befuddled her sense, she reached her hand out and took the jacket from her companion, smiling all the while. Then, it seemed to Sephiroth, that she had suddenly remembered that she was trying to be pouty and somewhat flustered still, and her face fell instantaneously. The general, not perturbed by her frown in the least, smiled inwardly to himself. Her smile, though however brief, was always warm and welcome upon her rosy visage and it had been, he contemplated, a long while since he had witnessed her smile so brightly. A small smile, he observed quietly to himself, was better than nothing and it certainly showed that while she was upset with him still, Sephiroth's chances at retribution were great.

Despite the fact that he had been thinking of ways to win the flower girl's affections all day, Sephiroth was empty handed and without a single idea of how to do so. He wanted Aerith to be happy, of course, but it seemed to him that the only way for her to be truly happy would be to reunite with her friends. It wasn't that Sephiroth had any ill-wishes against her long-ago comrades, though for Cloud he would gladly make an exception. It was merely the fact that Aerith was leading a completely different life with him. For the most part, the general noted, Aerith seemed happy and rather content in his presence. Recent developments, namely her slight emotional explosion aimed straight for him, begged to differ.

She had two options- she could stay with him, or she could be with her friends.

It hurt Sephiroth to think such at first, but as the sun began to set behind the mountains he realized that Aerith was stuck between a rock and a hard place. She missed her friends greatly and wanted to be with them again, which was a level of companionship Sephiroth had not understood until he pondered the idea. He would be sad if he left Aerith, and would try everything in his power to be with her again. Aerith had given up her friends to stay with him, to be his guiding light and his faithful companion, without, at first, a second thought.

But circumstances had changed and her friends were getting by without her, having children and leading their lives without her (though Sephiroth was completely sure they must think of her on a regular basis for even he was positive that he would miss her terribly were she to leave). If she stayed with him, she would be depriving herself of being with her friends and loved ones. If she stayed with him, she would be forced to continue her isolation with him until the end of their days.

Sephiroth was just fine with the idea of being stuck with Aerith until his dying days, but knew in an instant that Aerith wasn't someone who could be kept in such a cage. She was free, and Sephiroth had come to respect her for it. She did as she pleased, even when she wasn't happy.

So far, that was all the general could hope for. Perhaps, given time, he could win her affections and some kind of compromise could be found between them. Sephiroth knew, without having to give it thought, that Cloud would never look at their arrangement and be happy, but maybe her other comrades wouldn't feel so hostile to him.

He still had yet to prove himself to Aerith, however- a feat that seemed all the more impossible the longer Sephiroth thought of it. Though it was true he hadn't killed a single person since his resurrection, and had stayed faithfully by Aerith's side, a few good deeds did not clear his record of any of the terrible crimes he had committed. He had saved Aerith's life from the slavers in Wutai, but that didn't mean he felt his debt to her was repaid; he had stolen her life, and everything she had, just to fulfill his greedy, psychotic wish of world domination, and a few well wishes on the side weren't enough to convince anyone else that he was taking on life with different prospects and ideas.

It was almost comical, he began to think, how actually insane his plan had been. Their planet was a miserable one, and even if he had destroyed everything and resurrected it with his own ideas and intentions, spirits were willful things and did as they pleased.

One can easily control a being's actions given the circumstances. It is not, however, often that one can control the thoughts of that being, intelligent or otherwise. A man can bring a monster into a stable to be a pet, but that in no way means the beast will not continue to think like it had in the wild, even if its will is broken.

Sephiroth wanted Aerith to think he was right for her. He wanted to be with her, even if only in her company and not in her arms.

It was with a heavy heart that the general decided that whatever Aerith did would be alright with him, so long as she was truly happy.

That didn't mean, in any way, that he wasn't going to try and win her affection anyway.

Dusk hit the mountains like a cold blanket. Though the sky above the two travelers was still warm and pink, the sun's rays had long since stopped hitting the rocky ground they traversed upon. It was becoming very cold very quickly, and Sephiroth didn't want Aerith to be uncomfortable. She still wore the jacket he had fished out of his pack, but that didn't mean she had stopped rubbing her arms in an up and down motion to stay warm.

Feeling slightly on the lazy side, Sephiroth ignored the notebook and pen in his pocket and instead tapped Aerith on the shoulder. When she turned to look at him, he made a motion toward the tent strapped to his bag, then to the ground. She smiled weakly when she looked up at him, the cold already taking an effect on her strength. "I thought you'd never ask."

As they began to make camp for the for the night, Sephiroth pitching the tent and Aerith gathering what little firewood that could be found on the barren mountainside, the general noticed something that posed a small problem; they hadn't purchased another tent when they were re-supplying in Rocket Town. When he thought of it, Sephiroth knew they had left Aerith's tent back in Junon, before she had been kidnapped. Sephiroth traveled with most of their belongings in his bag- Aerith was to carry the food and medicine. Back in Junon, Sephiroth hadn't bothered to go back to the hotel and retrieve anything from their room, for he had been too fixated on saving Aerith to think of much else. It was pure luck on his part that anything important as far as personal matters was tucked neatly inside of his own backpack.

When Aerith returned from her small trek of gathering firewood (she had managed to get quite a bit, in spite of the fact that there was little to no vegetation on the mountainside), Sephiroth showed her the note he had spent several minutes pondering how exactly to word.

'We left your tent in Junon, in the hotel. What should we do?'

Aerith's visage became scrunched for a moment before she let out an abrupt giggle. "You know, when we were in Rocket Town, the thought didn't even cross my mind. I guess we are just going to have to share."

The thought sounded fantastic to Sephiroth, but he wasn't about to admit it out loud. The real problem on Sephiroth's mind was whether or not he would be able to sleep next to Aerith and, much like they had ended up in the boat, wake up in another awkward position. Though he was certain he wouldn't much mind waking up snuggled against her again, attempting to explain why, exactly, he would be sporting an ear-to-ear grin while holding her close would prove to be a rather large problem. Sephiroth wanted to win her affections, not scare her away because he couldn't contain himself. With such a mindset dwindling over his conscious train of thought, he decided that to attempt to win Aerith over too fast wouldn't be in either of their interests. They were, after all, still stuck traveling together, whether or not Aerith returned his affections. Taking it slow was the only possible way for Sephiroth to figure out if Aerith felt anything for him in return without making the rest of their journey together awkward. If he merely told her he loved her and she didn't feel the same way in return: oh, how complex their living conditions might come to be.

It was only after supper had been eaten and the fire had been put out for the night did the two venture into the tent. Aerith scuttled in first to change into her pajamas which, much to Sephiroth's surprise, consisted of a pair of snug-fitting sweatpants and a form-fitting sweater. When she had changed, she popped her head out of the tent and inquired as to what Sephiroth was to wear for bed. Shrugging, he merely pointed to his pants, indicating that he didn't need to change into anything, and followed her inside the tent.

Sephiroth waited for Aerith to snuggle up into her sleeping bag before he removed his shoes and sat on the opposing side of the tent upon his own sleeping bag. The small battery-powered lantern they had managed to hang from the support pole of the tent swung lightly as Sephiroth zipped the tent from his sleeping bag. As he turned, he watched Aerith take the ribbon from her hair. Her caramel-colored tresses cascaded down her shoulders and hid her face under a slight curtain. Sephiroth looked on while she quietly brushed her hair, careful to untangle any knots, and pulled it up into a neat bun that rested on the back of her neck. By the time she had finished pinning the bun in her hair, Sephiroth had removed the black turtleneck-like sweater from over his simple blue t-shirt, then the t-shirt itself, folded everything neatly, and placed the clothing near the end of his sleeping bag.

When he felt Aerith tap on his shoulder, he turned and was promptly presented with a toothbrush. He held out his hand and glanced up at Aerith, questioningly. She merely shrugged in response. "Just because we are camping doesn't mean we can't take care of ourselves." Again, she shrugged, this time looking more sheepish. "I forgot toothpaste, though, so it's just for rinsing I guess."

Nodding his head, Sephiroth took out their canteen from his backpack and handed it to Aerith. Promptly sticking the toothbrush in his mouth, he swishes the dry bristles about. When it was his turn to use the canteen for a quick rinse, Sephiroth gleefully noticed that Aerith was looking at his bare chest out of the corner of her eyes while she brushed, all the while looking absent-minded. If there was one thing Sephiroth was proud of, it was his well-toned body. His abs always managed to grab the wandering eyes of on-looking women, and he was greatly pleased by the fact that Aerith had demonstrated such a human trait as noticing appearance when it came to the opposing gender. Sephiroth wasn't one to boast, but his body was in top physical condition and he knew it. Aerith might not have had much contact with men who didn't wear wife-beater shirts or have beer bellies that hung out so far it looked as if they were pregnant outside of the slum (Cloud and Zax, and perhaps the occasional Turk, he was sure, were the exceptions), and Sephiroth decided backpedaling might be a good step. The last thing he wanted to do was scare her off. After taking a small gulp of water to rinse down the taste of stale toothbrush, he rummaged through his pack and donned one of the few clean shirts he had left. It was a simple, v-necked dark crimson-colored long-sleeved shirt, but its simplicity was why Sephiroth liked it. He had been purposefully avoiding wearing it until he had an occasion to dress in something nice, but once he put a little thought into the idea he realized how silly saving the shirt for such an occasion was. They were running away from Cloud, and camping. Being picky about what he was wearing wasn't something Sephiroth should concern himself with under the given circumstances.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he noticed that Aerith was still staring at him under her dark lashes. He watched as she attempted to busy herself by picking the dirt from under her nails, but Sephiroth knew better.

He glanced at the small watch that was cleverly attached to their lantern. It spewed digital numbers, informing the general that it was only a quarter past nine. Sephiroth then turned and faced Aerith, knowing full well that she was just as awake as he was. There was no use hiding it- had either of them been sleepy, instead of tired and cold from their hike, one of them would have laid down, zipped up their sleeping bag, and dozed off already.

"Well," Aerith looked around the tent. It was obvious that she didn't know what to say.

Though he admittedly didn't want to ask Aerith the question that was plaguing him, he truly had no choice. What if they weren't able to get time alone like this again? He took out his notebook and carefully wrote Aerith a small series of questions in which he could no longer hold back. Handing her his notebook, Sephiroth took a deep breath and prepared for the worse.

'I need to know if you are unhappy traveling with me. If that is the case, we can go our separate ways and I won't bother you any longer. Your reaction today demonstrated a level of emotional turmoil you seem to be forcing yourself through for me. I'm not worth the trouble, truly, and I know how you miss your friends.'

Sephiroth watched Aerith read the note several times over. It felt like a millennium had passed in the time it took her to respond.

"What would you do, where would you go, were I to leave you?"

It was not the answer Sephiroth was prepared for. He hadn't assumed Aerith would throw herself at him like some love-sick harlot, but he hardly assumed she would answer his own series of questions with one of her own, much less in such a cold tone.

Taking the notebook back, he took several moments preparing his answer.

'Staying in one place is not for me, unless I have something that makes me want to stay. Back in Mideel, I stayed because you asked me to, because I felt the need to take care of you. I now see that you are more than capable of taking care of yourself and you, in fact, don't need me. I would most likely continue traveling the world. There are many places that I still wish to visit that I was never able to enjoy previously.'

Aerith looked puzzled after reading his response to her question. "I don't hate you, if that's what you think. I'm sorry I yelled at you."

He shook his head and passed another message.

'I know that you merely let your emotions get the better of you. I, however, meant what I said about you not needing me. You can take care of yourself; I can see that far better than anyone previously, I am sure. If it is in your interest to leave, I will not stop you. You miss your friends and loved ones, and I am neither.'

She began shaking her head before she finished reading the message. "You are my friend. Why would you think otherwise? I do care about you; if I didn't, I would have left you high and dry back in Mideel." She stopped for a moment and laughed. Then, she smiled. "Please don't think that I hate you, because I really don't. Things are just so strange. Everything is always so complicated between you and me. I don't know what to think sometimes."

Sephiroth sent another scribbled message her way.

'What, then, am I to you, Aerith?'

Unexpected though it may have been for both of them, Sephiroth was very proud of himself for finally digging up enough courage to simply ask her. Beating around the bush was never going to get him what he wanted. If she said something in the positive, he would continue to try his best at winning her affections. If she said something in the negative, he would continue to try and win her affections anyway, though all the more slowly and with all the patience and persistence he could muster.

The question was there, out in the open, thrown to the wind unkindly and without remorse. Sephiroth eagerly studied Aerith as she fiddled with the corner of his little green notebook, refusing to meet his eyes.

"What are you to me?" Finally, she met his eyes. Sparkling emotion glittered in her irises like the moon shines on the sea. "What are you to me?" She repeated herself. "Sephiroth, I don't think that's the right question. It doesn't matter what you are to me. What am I to you?"

A million different answers swirled through Sephiroth's consciousness. What was she to him? How about all that was good in the world; everything he needed and nothing he didn't; perfection in flesh. Oh sweet Shiva, her worth couldn't be personified by words alone.

His hand hesitated. Was it truly the moment to tell her how he felt? Taking a deep breath, he began to write.

'You mean much more to me, Aerith, than you seem to know.'

Sephiroth could feel his heart skip several beats as he held his breath and waited for a response from his flower girl. He could feel his throat go dry while he eagerly awaited some sort of reaction.

The moment Aerith reached out to him, Sephiroth found his body responding without command; he immediately leaned toward her. What he was hoping for, what he was thinking, was suddenly lost as she placed her hands on either side of his face. He closed his eyes when he felt her rosy lips press against his forehead, not bothering to open them when she pulled away. Her hands left his cheeks feeling warm and pleasant.

"I forgive you, Sephiroth, but I need some time to think."

His eyes snapped open. Whatever emotion he let slip across his face must have, he was sure, looked pathetic, for Aerith gently stroked his cheek once more.

"I'm confused about a few things, and I need to sort them out before I can be honest with you. I need to be honest with myself before I can be truthful to anyone else, let alone you. I'm sorry."

Sephiroth hadn't imagined that Aerith would react in such a way, but somewhere in the back of his mind he was contemplating how he could have made everything easier for her. Perhaps he shouldn't have said anything at all. He gently took her hand in his own and patted the back of it, forcing a small smile to his lips. He nodded several times in silent understanding.

She smiled in return. "Thank you. I'm sorry."

When Sephiroth met Aerith's apology with a shake of his head, her smile grew. Slowly, she retracted her hand and clicked off the lantern. Though the tent was filled with darkness thereafter, as well as Aerith's meek "good night," Sephiroth didn't bother to scuttle under his own sleeping bag. He sat up and remained still until he heard Aerith's body relax and her breathing slow with the steady in and out of sleep. Managing to move without so much as the slightest of sounds, it was mere moments after Aerith had fallen asleep that Sephiroth was outside of the tent, striding down the mountainside as fast as his legs could carry him.

As soon as he was out of sight of the tent, he picked up a pine cone and threw it with all of his might into the distance. He balled his fists and shook them several times in the air, wishing with all of his being that he had a voice to scream with and something to break.

Running a hand through his hair, Sephiroth forced himself to calm down. He took a moment to inhale deeply and decided the best course of action was to pace slowly until his emotions settled. It scared him slightly, as he calmed himself, to realize just what kind of outbursts he was still capable of. Sorting through his memory, he could honestly say that it had been years since his last outburst. Emotion, even anger, wasn't something that came easily to him or was easy for him to express.

Forcing himself to take several more deep breaths, he began to contemplate just how childish he was truly acting. Aerith hadn't, after all, rejected him; she merely needed time to think and to sort her heart out. Such a reaction was hardly worthy of the temper tantrum Sephiroth demonstrated.

Sephiroth came to realize that Aerith sorting out her heart, as well as her mind he was sure, hardly meant that she still had feelings for Cloud. While she had reminded Sephiroth of the life he had stolen from her, she and Cloud were hardly involved romantically. Cloud, after all, was a little too thick headed to understand women and how they worked. Sephiroth remembered how, when he used to spy on the blonde and his friends, Aerith would often seem interested in things that most women wouldn't give a second thought to; she had her own, naïve way of flirting, it seemed. To note, however, that Cloud never caught on to her advances was an understatement; not only did he not advance upon her subtle passes, he hadn't noticed she was making them. At all.

Though he wished he could get the possibility of Aerith missing Cloud out of his head, the thought clung to his consciousness and refused to let get the hell off of his train of thought. Sephiroth had decided that whatever Aerith wished to do would be fine with him, even if her chosen future didn't involve him. Cloud, however, had never been factored into the problem, and Sephiroth was not able to find a single solution to his dilemma. If Aerith found someone she could be happy with, then all was well for Sephiroth; and if she was happy with him, all the better. But Cloud? Sweet Shiva, someone had it out for the poor general.

His pacing slowed, though his mind raced with new possibilities, most of which were drowning in the negative end of the idea pool. Killing Cloud, though most satisfying Sephiroth was to be sure, was out of the question. Aerith would be most cross with him for breaking his promise. Add Aerith's anger to the idea that it, in and of itself, was not a good idea completely ruled out Sephiroth killing the blonde (though however satisfying it might turn out to be, he needed to prove that he was a changed person, a good man, and good men do not kill people). Running away forever didn't seem like that good of an idea, either. Sephiroth could survive off of hunted monster and wild berries without a care in the world. Aerith, however, seemed more attached to worldly comforts than he. With Cloud most likely wanting to kill him and take his flower girl away, Sephiroth was more than positive that to stop traveling would mean some sort of end for him.

He didn't want to leave Aerith's side. Sephiroth knew right away that if Aerith were to become unhappy in some way, he wanted to be the one to fix it either as a friend, or perhaps something more- it didn't matter, so long as he could be around her.

The one thing he was certain of, however, was that Aerith needed her time. Rushing her would only lead to rushed decisions, and Sephiroth wanted to be absolutely sure that whatever Aerith did was exactly what she wanted, regardless of how he felt. More than anything, he wanted to be sure that whatever choice she made would be entirely of her own accord, not influenced by guilt or her constant need to please others.

He spent the entire night pacing and thinking. It was well past dawn when he returned to camp. Though he had attempted to stay quiet while building a fire, the crack of the burning wood must have finally woken up his sleepy flower maiden.

Sephiroth watched as she rubbed her eyes and looked around. She smiled when her gaze met his. "I'm sorry about last night."

It was an awkward thing to say in the place of 'good morning,' but Sephiroth knew Aerith was never one to beat around the bush much. He merely shrugged and placed another branch on the fire.

"I mean it. I'm sorry. I miss my friends and want to see them, that's all."

Sephiroth looked to the fire, slightly confused. Had she truly not been secretly pining over Cloud while in his presence? Had he wasted an entire night of sleep fretting over nothing?

Zipping the tent behind her, though not bothering to lace up her large, clunky boots, Sephiroth watched while she made her way to the opposing side of the fire.

"I don't think that anyone is really going to ever be ready to see me again, though. I mean, with us having been dead and all…"

A small smiled managed to surface upon Sephiroth's tight-lipped visage for a mere second. He could feel her eyes on him, and so he looked up to meet her gaze, not sure what he should expect.

She smiled at him, and tilted her head. "Please don't think that I would ever leave you. I like your company, and I'm sorry I freaked outside of Rocket Town." Suddenly, she made a face. "I mean, you know what it's like to miss a friend, right? It just hurts a little."

It took a moment for Sephiroth to think of someone he missed who wasn't Aerith. Zax had been the closest thing he had to a friend. It was true; at times Sephiroth did think of him and a little twinge of sadness would pull at his heart strings, but nothing violent enough to compare to how Aerith seemed to feel about her friends. Perhaps it was because she was far closer to Cloud and his friends than Sephiroth had been to Zax. He had seen Zax as a comrade, a fellow Soldier, but not much else. They talked of women, of politics, of money and literature, but nothing that two strangers wouldn't talk about had they just met and were merely passing the time.

"I think, though," Aerith interrupted, "that I would miss you much more were we to separate."

Again, Sephiroth looked up to meet Aerith's eyes, but her gaze was intensely set toward the rocky ground. Had she truly said what he thought she had said?

Did he honest to goodness have a chance to win her affections; her heart; her love?

A feeling so profound that, even if he had the ability to speak, Sephiroth doubted that he would have been able to explain it in mere words filled his chest with warmth and the sheer feeling of floating. He wanted to tell her how he felt.

He wanted to tell her that he loved her.

But it wasn't the time, nor the place, and neither of them were truly ready for the ramifications those three little words could do quite yet.

Sephiroth smiled to himself and stood up. He began to rifle through their backpack in order to find something to cook for breakfast.

If he left, she would miss him; that was enough for the moment.