fic: eir's tomorrow (ff7) - ch.14, part 1/2

[jukeboxhound_backup]

Slightly revised version.  Short explanation here.

Eir's Tomorrow
Chapter 14 (part 1/2)

Author: jukeboxhound 
Co-conspirator/beta: artimusdin 

FF7 || R || Sephiroth/Cloud || chapter: 10, 600 words
The Planet isn't willing to let death take away its greatest weapon. If Cloud can't save the past, then he'll be damned to watch history repeat itself.

14.

This is how Missus Elfreda Strife told the story:

Before ShinRa conquered the world, before science replaced the gods with mako energy, Nibelheim and its mountains were home to clans of great warriors. Life wasn't easy in a land of ice and snow, but these men and women, the Nebel-volk, were strong, and fierce, and as tough as the granite beneath their feet. They stood as firm as the mountains in the face of hunger and death, and the gods were proud.

The names of the gods, the Æsir, were just as strong as the land, and while each clan revered them all as was proper, each clan was also promised to its own patron. One carried Baldr as its standard; another favored Odin; yet another Freya.

But only one family was able to face death as openly as life, and for this Hel favored that clan with the name Strife. The light will darken, knowledge will be forgotten, life will fade. You will never know peace, but you will endure when all else is dust, for death is the beginning and the end of all things.

But the harsh elements and constant battle – with foreign invaders, with each other – whittled away at the clans until their numbers were few. Then other people began colonizing the mountains, and the old ways were slowly lost, and when ShinRa sent its SOLDIERs and materia the clans were scattered to the winds. Only the Strifes remained.

Legend said that there was another god, an unnatural god that slept beneath the mountains, and only the power of the Æsir kept it chained. When the clans died and no one was left to make the sacrifices, the Æsir were left powerless. ShinRa came, and it stirred the slumbering evil, which began whispering its name to the ones that could hear such things.

Jenova.

…

Monitors hummed in the otherwise quiet laboratory. Hojo had left, the torture that he tried to claim was done in the name of science finished for the day. There was no more screaming or bones breaking or flesh being torn or the awful whirring of strange tools.

Nanaki was very tired.

The cold of the cement beneath his body seeped through his fur, leaving him with the constant edge of a chill, and the cage was just small enough that he couldn't lie down without his paws bracing against the even colder metal bars. Bars made of steel, maybe, though he didn't think so, not when his teeth and claws and the weight of his muscled body were useless on them.

He didn't know how long he'd been here. Not under Hojo's control, and not in this new lab, after he'd been moved from Midgar to somewhere high in the mountains. There was another specimen that he'd arrived with, a human, or something very like one. Hard to tell, really, as there was an undertone of Lifestream in the other's scent that humans didn't normally have, but maybe that was just his senses getting tricked by the constant exposure to mako. Nanaki hated himself for the feeling of vague relief at no longer being the center of Hojo's attention.

"Pity both specimens are male, it would've been fascinating to see what could have been bred from them. Nevertheless, perhaps one will serve some purpose to the other."

The human specimen, Cloud, was slumped naked on his knees, padded leather restraints pulling his arms out to either side, leaving him at an awkward angle. Two white-feathered wings protruded from his back, a series of wires keeping them upright and spread out for easier examination. The wings had bled, and bled scarlet, which had initially surprised Nanaki; usually such mutations were more mako than flesh, or tended to ooze a yellow-green ichor. But Cloud was turned towards him so Nanaki couldn't see how the wings were attached to his body, if they were natural or grafted on.

"I truly wish you wouldn't struggle. It makes my measurements uncertain."

"Fuck you." Bloodied teeth bared in a rictus of a grin.

"Hold still."

"You know why you can't make any more SOLDIERs, Hojo? Ever wondered why Jenova suddenly went silent all those years ago?"

Quiet. Then the screaming started.

Cloud had been conscious in the beginning, snarling and spitting and, once, severing a guard's finger with his teeth. He'd fought like a wildcat, with the strength of a trained fighter and the desperation of a cornered animal. When Hojo and his assistants left and it was just the two of them, they would whisper to one another, and Nanaki realized that he was in the presence of someone far older than he looked with knowledge that no regular human should have.

"Your father died a hero, Nanaki."

But then had come the syringes with chemicals that dulled the senses and slowed the body. Bones broken to test healing speed, muscles cut away to observe depth of regeneration, raw mako pumped into sensitive organic flesh.

Now, now Cloud had the body of a grown man, as though Hojo had somehow found a way to fast-forward a teenager's growth. Hardly taller, still thin, but somehow fitting better into this older body than the younger one. Eyes like materia. And now, Cloud was still and silent, half-lidded gaze so far away from the white-and-grey starkness of the laboratory.

Nanaki's heart in turn bled for him.

He was so tired.

…

sephiroth i need you mineminemine

it hurts

hurts

like it always does

i need you here

…

Zack couldn't help a wry smile as the Highwind landed on a long stretch of snow-dotted meadow outside of Nibelheim. The village was tiny, as tiny as Gongaga, as though people had passed through and forgotten a few of their own in the journey.

("We country boys have gotta stick together!")

A warm, dry hand slid into his own and he turned to look down at Aeris. "You all right, babe?" he asked, only just loud enough to be heard over the airship's engines and Cid yelling out orders to his poor crew.

Her smile was underlined with sadness, but it was sincere. "No," she said gently, "and I know you aren't either. This isn't going to be easy, but it'll work out eventually."

"Wish I could believe that," he muttered, wondering without resentment how she could be so certain when Genesis was dying slowly and Angeal was going out of his mind with worry and Cloud. Oh, gods, Cloud. What were they going to find when they got there?

"Remember, Zack, the Planet itself wants so badly to protect him. You can't ask for more than that."

"If it wants to protect him so badly, then why the hell is it waking up these WEAPONs?" he asked helplessly. "Sephiroth couldn't even be here because there's one trying like to hell to destroy the southern continent, and did you know there're rumors of another one rising under the oceans? Rufus has got the entire R&D department on monitoring detail and we'd better hope that it's just another earthquake, because otherwise we're so screwed."

Zack wanted to bite his tongue as soon as the words were out of his mouth because it wasn't fair to take it out on Aeris. But Aeris just squeezed his hand. "We'll find him, Zack, and he'll have you and me and Sephiroth to help him out of whatever condition Hojo's put him in. Did I ever tell you how he found my church?"

"No," he blinked, startled.

"He was so drunk," she said with a growing grin. "Like, falling-down drunk. I think he was at Elfé's bar. Reno found him first."

"I'm surprised Reno didn't shake him down while he had the chance."

Aeris' eyes crinkled at the corners in amusement. "Reno's not that bad, Zack, he's really very nice to me."

"Babe, I don't think anyone could be mean to you and not kill themselves with guilt afterwards."

"Probably not."

After a short pause, Zack squeezed her hand back.

"We're here, now everyone get off my ship!" Cid yelled from the cockpit with a cigarette dangling precariously from between his lips. "If you're not back by lunch I'm damn well leaving your asses behind!"

A searching look around the deck revealed that Angeal and Genesis had already disappeared, leaving behind nothing but a few black and white feathers, and hurt that was becoming far too familiar gripped the inside of Zack's chest. He cried, "Let's mosey!"

"Get your spiky ass off my ship!"

So only Zack, Aeris, Vincent, Elena, and Tifa left the ship (and hadn't that been a surprise, when Cloud's childhood buddy walked out next to Elena with her face set in stubborn determination that just dared anyone to make her stay behind). That weird contraption of Reeve's, Cait Sith, bounded after them.

"Hoo boy, this is gonna take some tricky work," the cat quipped, hopping about on its Mog.

"I will go to the mansion while you meet with Cissnei," Vincent said softly, blood-red eyes already looking towards the far side of the village where the single road began twisting into the mountains. "I want to make certain we're in the right place before we proceed."

"All right." Zack glanced at the others. "Cissnei said there's an Inn. We'll wait for you there. And Vincent?"

"Yes, Lieutenant?"

Eyes narrowing, he said, "I want to know the name of every person that's had a hand in hurting Cloud."

Vincent just looked at him from beneath his hair. "Of course."

Zack nodded sharply and turned to enter the gate into the village, not looking back as Vincent disappeared with a whisper of his cloak. He had Aeris at his side, allies behind him, and Cloud within reach; if his mentor was no longer around, well, that didn't seem so important anymore.

…

who am i

weapon

or angel

i don't remember

what does it mean to be 'i'

singular personal pronoun

i am planet

…

In a village so small with a single square around a water-tower, it wasn't difficult to find the Inn. People gawked at the group that included a SOLDIER and a Turk and, yes, one of their own.

"Tifa?"

"Aldric?" Tifa blinked, and it suddenly occurred to Zack that he hadn't really thought about this being Tifa and Cloud's hometown. Were these people aware of what was going on in their backyard?

"I thought you went to Midgar," said the boy, glancing at Zack's mako eyes and Elena's distinctive suit every few seconds. He was seventeen, maybe eighteen, and from the way he was looking at Tifa it seemed a few months of her living on another continent hadn't been enough for him to forget her.

Beside Tifa, Elena was growling a little under her breath.

"I did. Aldric, have you seen another Turk around her? Her name's Cissnei, she's got reddish-brown hair?"

"Yeah, but she, uh. Well, she hangs out with Missus Strife a lot, y'know. Ain't proper, that."

Ah, small-town gossip, Zack thought dryly to himself.

"Well, still, we need to speak with her."

"I'm here," called a feminine voice. Cissnei was striding quickly towards the water tower with two older women in her wake, one blonde and the other dark-haired. Zack nearly choked when he recognized Angeal's mother, and then again when he saw the sword being carried by a man that looked Wutaian, who was bringing up the rear. And a third time at the enormous wolf trotting along behind.

"Mrs Hewley?" he managed, suddenly absurdly grateful for Aeris' earthy presence at his side. Gillian smiled at him and cupped a hand on his cheek.

"Hello again, Zack. I'm glad to see you're well."

"I. What."

"Cloud was kind enough to offer me refuge here in Nibelheim. I've been helping Cissnei here keep an eye on ShinRa."

"I just got the call from Reeve saying you guys had arrived," the Turk added. Aldric's presence had already been dismissed and, getting the hint, he backed off. The wolf that sat down at the blonde woman's feet might've had something to do with that too. "I have a room in the Inn, we should go there."

"Before you do, Zack, I want you to have this. Zangan, please?" Gillian glanced at the Wutaian man and he held out the Buster Sword, albeit with some difficulty. Zack stared, thinking wildly, Angeal's nearby somewhere, he should have it right now.

But maybe Gillian was psychic because she added, "This sword was meant to represent our family's honor. You're the best person to have it now."

He wanted to argue, Don't say that, it isn't like Angeal's dead or something, but Angeal wasn't there. Hadn't been there for months, too consumed by Genesis and his own guilt to remember the distinction between true loyalty and blind obedience. So he reached out, took it by the hilt, wondered if it would ever feel natural in his hands.

"Thank you, Zack," she murmured. As though Zack had given her something.

"Aeris, I think you should stay with Elfreda," Cissnei said, obviously trying to be respectful of Zack's silence. "Hojo would be only too happy to get his hands on you again, and we need you sound in case Cl – well, in case someone needs your help." She cast a nervous glance at the blonde woman, who hadn't seemed to notice the Turk's slip.

"I'm telling you, dear, you could use my help." Elfreda (and this was Cloud's mother? Impossible to mistake that hair, those eyes) looked a little huffy. "If you're going anywhere into the mountains, you could very well wake up a jötunn, and then where would we be?"

She was a tiny woman in skirts and necklaces that were obviously handmade. The country accent she shared with Tifa and that Aldric kid had an extra twist to it, something Zack had only heard from Cloud. She matched up pretty well with the mental image he'd gotten from Cloud's stories, but there hadn't been mention of a wolf, let alone a Nibel wolf. They were rather larger in person than the small photograph in ShinRa's bestiary had led him to believe.

"It's all right, Elfreda," said Zangan, putting a kindly hand on her shoulder. "They have a SOLDIER with them, and Tifa was one of my best students. They can take care of themselves."

"What's a jötunn?" Zack whispered to Gillian, who replied, "I think it's some kind of giant."

He remembered Cloud once saying something about his mother not being the best judge of reality and now thought that the kid might've been right.

"Where's Cloud? Where's my Nebel? Cissnei said you all knew him."

"That's what we're trying to find out, ma'am."

"Elena," Cissnei hissed, and the younger Turk reflexively slapped a hand over her own mouth. But the damage had been done and Elfreda was drawing herself up to her full height, a good six inches shorter than Zack himself.

"What's going on?"

Zack said gently but firmly, "Missus Strife, Cloud's gone missing, but we know where to find him and there's no need to worry."

But the woman was muttering to herself in that guttural language Zack had occasionally heard from Cloud. The wolf got his feet, ears tilted back slightly as he sensed her agitation, and her hand buried itself in his scruff.

"Elfreda," said Aeris suddenly, "I need your help. While the others are going to get Cloud, I need a place that's ready for them in case anything happens."

"If my son is missing, then I will find him," she said fiercely, and Zack could immediately see where Cloud had inherited his stubborn and protective nature. "I know these mountains better than anyone."

Aeris laid a hand on Elfreda's arm. "Please, Elfreda. You're the best person to help me."

Zack didn't know how Aeris did it, but eventually she managed to convince Elfreda to let the others search for Cloud while she herself remained in the town. Gillian and Zangan led the two women away, and Aeris glanced back over her shoulder only once, green eyes worried but determined.

Come back to me, Zack Fair, or I'll find some way to scold you in the Lifestream.

Zack tightened his grip on the Buster Sword.

…

Though it was nearing late morning, the overcast sky made it look like grey-tinged evening. Angeal was tired and felt far older than he really was, as though he were the one that was dying. Toothmarks still scored his shoulder from the last time he and Genesis had had sex; bruising, near violent, more an act of saying, I'm here, I'm alive, than anything to do with love. Hard enough that the marks didn't heal so quickly.

He remained just behind Genesis' shoulder as he had for years, observing the men that were rebuilding the mansion. They moved between the mansion itself and what looked like a convoy of trucks that had carried the supplies up the mountains, timber and steel protruding from the open ends of the truck beds. A pilot with some serious skill had managed to land a helicopter on the estate grounds. Among the yellow-vested construction workers was a fair smattering of blue-uniformed Regular troops and a few white-coated scientists, and even from a distance it looked like the scientists were flailing in frustrated anxiety over the workers' laid-back attitude about the lab supplies.

When Angeal sensed Genesis beginning to draw on a materia, he slid a hand along the single black wing that protruded from Genesis' left shoulder, just where the wing curved into a shoulder blade under the coat. "It won't do anything but warn Hojo that we're here," he whispered.

The insanity that had been growing this last year warred with the man's common sense. Angeal held very still, knowing that he would still follow even if Genesis gave in to the black fury poisoning his mind and body, but then Genesis relaxed his hold on the materia. "You're right," Genesis said idly. "It can wait until we've spoken with Hojo. 'My soul, corrupted by vengeance, hath endured torment, to find the end of the journey.'"

These people haven't done anything to hurt you, Angeal wanted to say. He didn't. Those men wore ShinRa's uniforms and so were as guilty as if they'd been the ones who wanted to inject children with mako and unnatural cells, and Genesis would never believe otherwise. Without conscious thought his own white wing curled over Genesis' right shoulder, brushing the ends of hair gone nearly as white.

Sephiroth could have stood here with us, he thought. And one day, Zack could have, too.

"You're getting maudlin in your old age, my friend," Genesis murmured, moving away from him. Angeal's wing withdrew. The redhead gave him an inscrutable look before there was a thoughttwist and he disappeared in a rush of dark feathers, and after a breath Angeal followed him.

The world reasserted itself in the form of a laboratory observation room, dimly light by a computer console that lined the wall under a one-way window and the faded light that came through the glass. Leaning over the console was Hojo, his eyes fixed on something in the other room below.

"Hello, Professor," said Genesis. A sharp blow sent the scientist reeling against the console.

"Genesis," came the pained hiss, "I see you still haven't resolved the issue of your degradation."

Another blow had Hojo sprawling on the floor. "I'm working on it."

As Genesis prowled around the scientist like a cat, Angeal paced the perimeter of the room to the window to look down. He stiffened.

"Genesis."

The redhead was too busy breaking one of Hojo's fingers underfoot to hear at first.

"Genesis!"

"I'm a little occupied, Angeal." But Genesis walked over anyway, following the brunet's line of sight with a disinterested glance. Then he stopped, and looked again, and couldn't find any words.

Lying on the floor behind them, Hojo wheezed in laughter. "It's truly amazing, it really is. He manifests similarities to Jenova without possessing any of her cells – fascinating! It's as though he took the place of her will all those years ago!"

Which would make Jenova cells useless to Genesis.

"What are you talking about, old man?" Genesis snarled, grabbing the front of Hojo's lab coat and hauling him upright to dangle several inches above the ground. Hojo kept laughing, sounding more triumphant and unhinged than either general had ever heard.

"The boy, except he's not a boy anymore, is he?" the scientist choked out. "Those idiots in the medical department thought they were dealing with a case of mako overexposure, but they were wrong, they don't have the technology or the intelligence to see – the boy's very genetics are riddled with mako, with Lifestream!"

Genesis slammed Hojo against a wall, his face twisted with fury. Angeal would've intervened but he couldn't take his eyes off the laboratory on the other side of the window.

"What did you do?"

"I didn't do anything, the sheer amount of mako must have mutated him. Imagine, being able to speed up the growth of children to produce SOLDIERs!"

Even when Genesis dug his fingers into the scientist's clavicle and ground the bone down until it fractured, Hojo never lost his crazed smile or sick satisfaction. Angeal stared at Strife, at the wires holding two shredded white wings outspread, at the man's body that had replaced the child's as though he'd lived a decade within a matter of weeks. On the console in front of Angeal was a video feed that filmed continuously from several different angles: from the front, from behind, from the side, to capture the smallest change in this extraordinary specimen. Every so often a shudder would run through the blond's body, making the wires and tubes quiver.

It took Angeal a long moment to realize that the whispers he'd been hearing for the last two weeks were growing in volume. Genesis said softly, "If I'm going to die, then it will be on my own terms."

He drew Rapier and drove it through Hojo's chest, pinning him to the console and causing a shower of sparks. (In some ways you and Sephiroth are more alike than either of you would like to admit, Angeal thought without humor.) Hojo's cry was high and thin, like the screams of some of his specimens just before their voices cracked.

Neither saw Hojo's right hand shifting towards one of the console's keyboards.

…

Elfreda stopped in her tracks, saying, "Wait a moment," before slipping out of Aeris' gentle hand. Aeris, Gillian, and Zangan watched her dash back to the water tower and quickly climb up the ladder to the reservoir, leaning over the edge.

"What on earth is she doing?" Gillian muttered. Elfreda seemed to find whatever she was looking for, however, because she reached into the water and pulled out a small red sphere.

"Materia?"

"How did she know it was there?" Aeris asked in surprise, but no one had an answer. Elfreda climbed back down and jogged back, hiding the materia somewhere in her clothes.

Power, Aeris heard from the materia, and shivered. Storms. Instant death. Elements.

When they got to the Strife cottage, she couldn't help stealing a look around. This was Cloud's home, and it looked utterly normal, just a two-room affair with a mess of blankets near the hearth that the wolf immediately flopped onto with a loud sigh.

"Cloud brought him home," Elfreda said out of the blue, gesturing towards the wolf. "Fenrir, that is. He still has the scar on his hand. Cloud does, I mean."

Normally Elfreda would be a proper hostess and offer ale or cakes to her guests, but her son was missing and she needed to find him. The pretty girl, Aeris, wore a reassuring smile and said, "Do you have any extra blankets? Bandages?"

"What's bad enough that they'll need bandages?" Elfreda demanded, trying to bite down on her impatience because none of this was Aeris' fault, most likely, but the girl just said, "It's just to be prepared, Missus Strife."

There was a bin of fabric under her bed, scraps that were too oddly colored to be used in the things she sold, and she passed it over to Aeris. Aeris settled on the floor and started sorting them according to width and length while Zangan went to fetch scissors and Gillian sat near Fenrir, stroking his head.

"Hel promised that when the world began to die, our family would continue to live," Elfreda told her helplessly. Aeris took her hands and gently pulled her down to sit, and Elfreda couldn't help noticing the pale, very slightly green-tinged, materia in the girl's hair ribbon. "Cloudcan't die. He just. He can't. He's Týr, he was chosen. Hel promised."

The girl's eyes were very green, like newly unfurled leaves in spring, like the polished jade that the traders from Rocket Town sometimes brought to Nibelheim. "It'll be all right," she said. "If anyone can bring Cloud back, it's Zack. Zack cares about him, you know, and so do I. You have an amazing son."

Elfreda was getting the sense that someone was standing just behind her shoulder, a presence that was heavy and old as time. The Planet, she realized with awe, and behind it was something that could only be Cloud. She stared at the girl.

Freya.

…

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