ZACK – SKY
"Under the burning sun, I take a look around. Imagine if this all came down. I'm waiting for the day to come." Oblivion – 30 Seconds to Mars
He hadn't expected to be seeing ghosts roaming Midgar.
First that girl he believed dead, hating eyes and cries still ringing in his ears…
"I hate it! I hate Shin-Ra! I hate it all!"
The raven haired man wasn't even quite sure why they sent him here. The last First of the era, the last legacy of the old heroes. The Buster Sword was cold in his grasp, his pride and dreams and honour as a SOLDIER.
But the ghosts glared at him, him, the traitor who had sided with those who watched the destruction and caused the destruction and closed his eyes, letting the images fade with time.
But then bounding in great, mako enhanced leaps, blonde spikes tussled in the wind and a cool look of indifference on his face, despite the plate that was dropping, falling from the sky, bound to kill hundreds and this man couldn't seem to care.
For a moment he thought he saw a flash of the young, sixteen year old boy he had befriended as the blonde moved towards the large gunman and martial artist. Then though… then the red hair damn Reno, I swear he dyes his hair that colour on purpose and then those mako green blue sky eyes snapped from their stare off to spot him, eyes locked on the figure of himself, Buster Sword in one hand and bangs falling in his face.
Fear ran through him as those calm, indifferent sky blue eyes erupted into flame with anger and hate and pain and betrayal his death written clearly in them.
He choked on the emotion directed towards him, even as he gasped out one name. "Cloud?"
Those lips curled back in a snarl and then one side twitched, in a deathly smirk. "Fair."
Last names now? What had happened to their friendship that he had built painstakingly with the blonde? What had caused it to crumble so?
"You're meant to be dead."
"Yeah. I get that a lot."
"C-Cloud? What-Where? Cloud!"
A sword was drawn from a sheath from his back, then another and the slotted together with ease. Tifa was calling to the blonde, but he ignored her as he walked slowly and steadily towards the raven.
His expression had morphed into a deathly calm glare, the eyes still burning why wasn't he burnt? with emotion. A smirk played its way across the swordsman's lips as he drew another blade, one in each hand now. "How long has it been, Fair, since you left me to die in that godforsaken reactor?"
Left him to die? No… they said he was dead, not that there was any life…any sign…No No No No No No!
Yet his voice still croaked out, "Five years."
"Five years. Has it been that long?" He blinked, eyes regarding him as a predator would his prey. "Five years I spent in a hell, far deeper that any you could imagine. My only regret was that I held on, so long to the foolish thought that someone would save me."
He shook his head, denying it. No. His grip tightened on the Buster Sword. "Who…where…" he still couldn't form coherent sentences as he stared the ghost in front of him.
Cloud tilted his head on one side, almost mockingly. "Hojo." The single word bore more malice and hate that the raven thought possible. The swordsman's lips flickered downwards. "Unfortunately Vincent gets first blood on the bastard. Still… I get to finish you off…"
Finish you off… No… he shook his head… no…
A shiver ran up his spine as he realised… his friend…enemy…unexplainably…wanted him dead.
Those wings were looking very nice right now.
Behind him Reno was cursing, the timer ticking down and time running out. Above him Tseng stared, Aerith was pushed out of view again, the helicopter shifting slightly in the strong winds.
And those eyes, sky blue, air blue, water blue, they burnt with ice and fire and flames and they danced. The emotions rolling in those sky blue depths, burning ice and burning earth and burning air and burning sky.
Burning eyes.
He flinched, away from the hatred and anger and betrayal because he didn't know! Hadn't known? His fault. His fault. The accusations rang in his ears and he witnessed the weapon of his creation, sworn to never rest until that blade, the four bladed single blade had tasted his blood. The weapon of his creating would never rest until he had burnt too, plummeted from the sky.
"Those wings. I want them too."
He would never get them. Instead he was destined to fall, crash from the sky, feel the air leave his lungs as the flames of the blonde and the metal consumed him.
He got a terrible feeling that he was on the wrong side, and it only grew when he saw Tseng manhandling his girlfriend. Minerva, had it been that long?
She had been terrified, terrified of the sky that burnt in his eyes, but he had coaxed the flower girl out from the shadows of the plate. She sold her flowers and she smiled and she looked at him with those green eyes. He hadn't been down to see her for… months now… When Angeal had died he had sat in the pews and cried, and she had comforted him, but somehow…for some reason…when he got back from that stupid little reactor town in the middle of nowhere…when he cried for Cloud and Sephiroth and the villagers that he never knew she had flinched back, reeling away from him.
"Do you think they're happy? SOLDIERS… they fight and they love it…"
And for a moment, he had thought he saw a flicker of fear in her eyes as she gazed into his, sky violet pair.
Then the blonde moved and he barely had time to draw the Buster Sword, metal clashing against metal loudly and sparks flew. And suddenly the raven wasn't fighting for Shin-Ra, he wasn't fighting for his honour, he was fighting for his life.
They flew together in dodges and twists, weaving and clashing. Cloud's sword split and suddenly he had to twist to avoid the second blade rolling out of the way.
"Fair dammit leave the asshole yo!"
"Cloud! Cloud don't!"
"Zack – Do not engage!"
"Spiky – leave the guy alone! You hear me Spike?"
"The Plate!"
AVALANCHE was calling to Cloud, and the Turks were calling to him, but as they clashed in battle it was all forgotten. The blonde's face was twisted in a silent, feral snarl as he kept on coming.
There was a rumble as Cloud lazily ducked a piece of metal, large piece of metal, as the pillar began to buckle. A slab of concrete was decimated by a lazy flick of the blonde's sword but still he came, sky blue eyes burning and mouth twisted into a cruel smile.
"What happened to you?" the SOLDIER whispered.
For a brief moment he saw something of the young boy Cloud had been flicker in his eyes, but then it was gone, eaten up in ashes and fire.
The SOLDIER rolled to the side to dodge a spell, struggling with a Barrier as the ground beneath his feet shifted.
He glanced up, and Cloud was gone, jumping out of the way as the ground cracked beneath his feet. Zack followed a moment later, finding a new foothold on the crumbling ground, the burning chunks of concrete.
The hair on the back of his neck prickling was the only warning he got in time to spin around and block the assembled sword. Those sky blue eyes burned fire, telling of his own imminent death. A rush of frustration and anger at his utter helplessness ran through him.
"I'm sorry okay!" he shouted, knocking the blade aside and throwing a blow of his own. "How was I supposed to know where you were? They told me you were dead! Stop blaming me for something that's not even my fault! Guilt tripping me into fighting and apologising isn't going to make me kill you!"
It was Angeal all over again, and he wasn't going to do this to a former friend.
Cloud's eyes widened and as their blades met in a deadlock he stepped back slightly before overcoming it, pushing away the Buster. Eyes mocked him, "I hardly think you could manage that. Don't you think I've tried?"
The First Class fought back rising bile and tears. The air and ground was crashing down around him, and they were forced to leap up to a new platform to continue their duel. A piece of concrete was once again broken in half by the opponent's sword and he was forced to knock it aside with the Buster.
"Use brings about wear, tear and rust."
"You always wanted to be some big and grand hero. Are you happy now? You still don't see how pathetic you are, puppy. Just a Shin-Ra lapdog."
"They had always betrayed me, from the very beginning. What do you know? Shinra lapdogs!"
More dodging and he was breathing dust now. Dust and rubble from the fallen plate. Aerith wasn't there, but there were others, people and children who were dying, being crushed killed by the Shin-Ra.
Then Zack couldn't see and he was rolling, dodging, leaping out of the way, until his fingers caught hold of something, keeping him stationed as the plate collapsed around him. The blonde had vanished, and Zack found himself hoping the ghost wasn't dead, wasn't lost in the plate's destruction, even as he found himself dreading those burning blue green sky eyes that burned with hatred directed at him.
And even when the plate fell from the sky, the raven wasn't on it, and he wanted to scream, for why wasn't he falling yet? Why was he still in the sky, high above the earth where only birds and avenging angels flew?
He crawled up on top, violet eyes peering through the dust, searching and looking, but there was no flash of silver, no light on blonde hair. Resigned, he staggered away from the missing eighth of the city, and back to Shin-Ra headquarters.
He'd never seen it look so monstrous, looming over the ruined city.
He'd never thought it seemed so wrong.
Tseng wouldn't let him see Aerith. Why had the Turk even brought her in now of all times. They'd been guarding her for years, but now they chose to bring her in?
Tseng had done something with his hair, and Zack briefly remembered that Veld wasn't around anymore, assassinated after recent department troubles.
Oh.
Right.
The raven hadn't realised how precarious a position the Turks were in if Tseng had to finally resort to bringing in Aerith, a mission long delayed.
He wondered whether that was a plea in the Director's brown eyes, even as the bland emotionless voice told him about his girlfriend. He wondered whether it was time he followed in his predecessor footsteps.
Maybe Angeal and Genesis and Sephiroth were right.
Maybe Shin-Ra was the wrong side.
"You can't live on that side, any more."
"Zack?" He looked up at the Turk who was looking concerned. "Are you all right?"
Somehow he managed to crack a smile but it broke, "My friend do you fly away now? To a world that abhors you and I?" Well chasing Genesis around the country had drilled at least some of the poem into his head. He scoffed, turning and walking away, feeling horribly Genesis-like. "All that awaits you is a sombre morrow, no matter where the winds may blow."
The Turk caught the message, and to his credit didn't do anything at all, even if he was considering counselling for the raven haired first.
Although the SOLDIER did have a horrible black eye when the Turks thrust him into the prison cells next to AVALANCHE and the flower girl – Tseng was a real bastard. He'd pretty much told the Turk what he was planning and the stupid dot-man had to ignore him until he was almost out of Shin-Ra, then arrest him and throw him in with the terrorists.
Who, as Tseng had told him in that cold detached tone of his, had a mixed aim of trying to save Aerith - they reached the science department at the same time as him - and trying to kill him - Cloud looked like the cat who had lost the canary when they placed him into the adjacent cell.
The blonde had fixed him instead with his icy, sky blue gaze, like a predator watching its prey. He squirmed uneasily, trying to get away from the gaze, before finally rounding on Cloud with annoyance.
The brunette beat him too it.
"Cloud? What is up with you? Ever since I found you and that weird vampire guy in Midgar I don't recognise you anymore!"
The blonde turned sharply to her, one side of his mouth kicking up in an angled, feral grin. "Why don't you ask Fair over there?"
Aerith, in the cell with him put her hands on her hips, frowning, "Cloud?" Since when did she meet the blonde? "What's your problem with my boyfriend?"
That received shocked silence.
"Boyfriend? Ya' mean 'er boyfriend is a Shin-Ra soldier?"
"Why's he locked in jail then?"
The raven ran a hand through his hair, leaning back on the bunk. "Okay, I'll talk. I work for Shin-Ra. Five years ago I was assigned a mission at Nibel-"
"Oh! You're that guy!" Tifa exclaimed, pointing at him. She received several exasperated looks and quietened down.
"Me, two troopers and the General Sephiroth were sent up to the reactor to investigate disappearances up there. We met up with this rogue first, Genesis who was part of this Project that experimented on human embryos. He revealed that Sephiroth was part of another, similar project."
There was a bitter laugh from Cloud but he ignored it.
"Sephiroth holed himself up in the Shin-Ra manor for a week reading Hojo's Journals. Whatever was in there…whatever was in that reactor… twisted his mind. He… he was insane. He burnt the village to the ground and killed the townspeople."
"Jenova."
"What?"
Cloud cast him a hateful and scornful, burning blue gaze. "The Calamity from the Skies. They called her Jenova. She was stored in Nibel Mountain Reactor. Her cells were used to birth the one they Sephiroth. In Genesis and Angeal where the cells are not natural, mingling with their mother, Gillian's cells, it caused their bodies to try and fight it off. As a consequence they degraded."
His tone was low and bitter but everyone was enraptured.
The SOLDIER - Was he an ex-SOLDIER now? - cleared his throat. "Yeah, well… Sephiroth went up to the reactor. He was mad, talking about 'mother' and 'the Promised Land'. I…I tried to stop him. He ripped the bloody bitch's head off. Then…" his voice faltered and the burning gaze rested on him again. He was falling so far right now, he wondered how much hitting the earth would hurt.
"Then you sent me, the inexperienced trooper after the General of the Shin-Ra army." His voice was mocking. "I got ran through by that thrice cursed blade. I got tossed aside as easy as knocking away a fly and then that bastard threw himself into the reactor."
"He killed himself?" the raven was disbelieving.
Cloud's head snapped up to glare at him. "And then you were paraded back to Midgar, the Hero, the saviour… and I…" he choked, the green mako crystalising in his gaze and the sky flashing with shadows. His gaze swung round, fixing itself upon the bland whitewash wall. "Hojo likes to use humans as his experiments. SOLDIER was just one giant human experiment. At least he didn't send me to Deepground."
"Deepground?" Tifa asked.
Cloud cast her askew glance. "Vincent's pretty good at hacking and Hojo doesn't usually care much for his failures." He answered, without really answering at all.
The raven wasn't sure how he managed to fall asleep with the fact that a man who wanted to kill him was sleeping…uh at least he thought he was sleeping in the next cell over.
It was sheer dumb luck that Aerith was the first to wake, and the first to discover the open doors and slain gods. As it was Zack barely had time to retrieve his weapons from the store cupboard before the blonde appeared, burning ice cold eyes.
The flower girl clung to his arm, talking to him and with a muted snarl he turned away, shaking her off. But his words hung in the air, ice cold.
"Whether I kill you now or wait, it doesn't change your fate. You will burn."
"Whether your words are lies created to deceive me... or the truth, that I have sought all my life... it makes no difference. You will rot."
"I see...perfect monster, indeed."
And then the General had knocked the apple from the auburn haired First's hand ("You will rot"), and the Banora white had fallen to the floor, its soft and tender fruit bruised and broken. ("You will burn.")
Genesis had insisted on carting around the fruit, labouring on about his gift of the goddess. All he really wanted was a cure… and if that wasn't possible he wanted to be recognised as true SOLDIER. One who held equal esteem to the Silver Demon, even if he never could, truly, eclipse the Sephiroth's shadow…
Then he had tossed the fruit to Zack, his beloved Banora White, and every time he took off, black feathers swirling to the ground Zack took it out and stared at it.
Honour huh?
But in the end all they were left with was dust and ashes.
"Working for Hollander now? What is it you're after?"
"World domination."
"That's not even funny, man."
"How about... revenge?"
Angeal had fought. Angeal had fought and given up, his honour lost, dreams stripped away with his own dark past. Angeal had been the real hero, despite taking the coward's way out. At least he knew what he was.
Genesis had fought. Genesis had fought and fought and lost it fighting, his own personal hell. He didn't even think the red headed man was dead, instead condemned to wander the land, revelling in the loss of his friends.
And Sephiroth had lost it all. Pride is lost. Wings stripped away. The end is nigh. The General had tried to take the rest of the world with him but in the end all the silver haired man ever was… was a victim, a vessel, a prisoner to the Calamity.
"Three friends go into battle. One is captured, one flies away, the one that is left becomes a hero."
He could see why Genesis was so obsessed with the poem when there were so many damn meanings behind the words. He wondered whether the LOVELESS obsession was contagious.
The ex-SOLDIER spun around after the blonde who was walking away, following Red XIII who had raced away following the blood trail. "Killing me isn't going to make the pain go away."
Cloud froze, almost imperceptibly, before he turned, eyes mocking. "No." he admitted. "But it does help."
And he was falling, lost in those sky blue eyes that burnt with his destruction, and Zack couldn't help but feel that maybe…
Maybe wings weren't for him.
Zack has more quotes because of Crisis Core. And yes somewhere up in there is an inverted Shelke quote. I'd imagine that both Cloud and Shelke feel much the same when they said it.
The last chapter and this can be read in either order, they are just posted in the order I wrote it but the time and scene does jump around. It's meant to and it's meant to be confusing for the reader. I apologise it its too confusing.
~ Eclipse