Zack froze like a cornered animal, frozen to the spot by the mere sound of her voice. His eyes darted to the maybe-assassin and then back to her as though the accusations were a blade to his throat. Then he raised his hands in surrender.

Celes' eyes narrowed. 'Good. He's smarter than he looks.'

“Hey, hey, no need to go making hostility where there is none." His eyes darted again and then he wiped blood on the back of his filthy, ash-streaked glove. "Rude has no reason to be after me anymore. I mean, as far as he’s concerned, I’m not even supposed to be … to be alive.”

Zack stiffened at that. There was something behind his eyes now, something dark that Celes had seen too many times on the faces of the lost and disenfranchised. Refugees. War orphans. Battle-tattered soldiers. Celes had even seen that darkness behind her own eyes recently. 

Seeing it again stirred something inside of her. Celes wanted to reach out and touch the lost soldier before her, but she couldn't. If she reached out, it would be an admission of weakness. It would open her to a kind of human connection that she couldn't handle. So instead of touching his arm, Celes only nodded and tried not to let on that she'd seen anything.

She doubted that Zack needed her pity.

“I was an experiment for the company we both worked for. I broke out and ran off, and it was his job to take me back."

Celes found herself staring. 'Experiment. Broke out. Ran off.'

"They never caught me, though," Zack added, but Celes wasn't listening anymore. The words blurred her vision like mist.

The sickly green glow of magic. Walls of gunmetal gray. Glass cylinders bubbling as clawed hands struggled, grasped, and gasped at a liquid that wasn't air. 

The cold shot of magic through her veins. Needles. The whir of machinery as her nails dug into steel and she grit her teeth together against the cold burning like fire-

Zack laughed. It was a strained laughter -- unconvincing. Celes hadn't caught why. Her forehead had beaded with sweat. 

The dark-clothed man nodded his agreement. "He's correct. The Turks I'm with was suppose to bring him back alive. That never happened. It's been years since the event took place."

Celes didn't ask what 'the event' meant. She didn't ask because she didn't want to hear any more of this. More than anything, she wanted to round on them and yell until she saw fear in their eyes again. 'Why do you trust him? Why aren't you running? Why are you just standing here talking to a man who might want to drag you to your death?'

Why had she once done the same? Her stomach twisted painfully. 

Leaves cracked beside her. A footstep bridged the distance between them. Celes looked up at Zack expectantly, but then froze as he touched her shoulder, directly below the pauldron. "Ah..." She felt heat rising to her face. He sighed and then his hand moved.

Her eyes widened as it touched her back and slid sideways across her cape. She stood there, petrified, too stiff to move. If it wandered again...

Her hand tightened on her sword, but Zack quickly let his arm drop. Celes watched him with a look that was half reproachful and half mortified. Her cheeks still burned.

If it was anyone or anywhere else, Celes would have turned on him. She would have asked him exactly what gave him the right to touch her and told him that she wasn't exactly some scared little girl looking for reassurances. But of course, she couldn't. Not now. She wasn't the general in a camp full of alpha males ready to prove themselves. She wasn't a resistance fighter fending off the longing passes of men who would rather use their positions to satisfy their own lust than to help the world. She wasn't tied to a chair wearing a frilly white dress with nothing but her tongue and her wits to protect her. 

No, Celes was lost in a forest with a well-meaning soldier and his attacker. Now wasn't the time to be distracted by her own indignity.

At least, not unless it happened again. Then she would be spewing fire. 

“The past is the past. I think we can all leave here on good terms, yeah?” Zack sounded more cheerful than Celes had ever heard him. He smiled at the attacker and then edged closer to Celes.

Celes edged away. The man had saved lives. He'd even saved her life when it had mattered. But that did not give him a right to anything more than her concern. Permission to enter her personal space was a long way coming.

Not that he seemed to enjoy his intrusion. In fact, he wasn't looking at her at all. His eyes darted across the forest like a cat's -- neck craning, eyebrows furrowing. Finally he scratched his head and looked back at them with a single raised eyebrow.

"So, uh..." Zack gestured between them and then pointed a thumb at the trees. "Either of you guys … Remember how you got in here?”

Celes blinked once, twice, and then she felt her mouth open. "You don't remember?" She didn't try to keep the disbelief from her expression. It pitched her voice up a quarter of an octave. "What were you planning to do here? Starve?"

Then she remembered the state he'd been in only a few minutes prior. The red eyes. That look of desperation. Perhaps her instincts hadn't been entirely off. Perhaps he hadn't wanted to find his way out at all.

“I really hope the rumors to this forest aren't true,” the darker man added. Celes gave him a strange look.

"Rumors? I haven't heard anything. It's just a forest, isn't it?" But even as she said it, an eerie fog had risen over the trees. Celes blinked at the sudden change. Yes, she'd noticed the fog before, but now she could barely see four feet in front of her. A breeze prickled her shoulders and the mist drifted past as though something alive. She could almost feel the brush of it like wet tendrils on the back of her neck. She shivered.

"I lived here for what had to have been over a month. I should be able to guide us out once the fog clears. And I assure you, there are no rumors worth hearing." The men before her faded to hazy blurs in the mist. She could still hear them though, standing and shifting and breathing. Celes never loosened the grip of her sword. If someone were to attack, now would be the opportune time. If the man had lured Zack into an ambush...

“I say we get out of here as fast as we can." The attacker's voice was like a gruff recording, almost disembodied. "Then we can discuss things further. I'll answer every question both of you have once we're to safety."

"I don't have questions," Celes answered. "And I don't think Zack should be talking to you. If you want to leave -- fine. Blundering into the fog will only get us all lost, and probably eaten by wolves or a minotaur or something. I say that we wait until it clears. I'd rather not stumble blindly into a ravine, thanks."

But her words came hollow -- sarcasm for sarcasm's sake. Celes felt the adrenaline in her system as her body tensed against something she wasn't even aware of. Against her better logic, Celes felt as though something lurked in that fog. A monster, maybe, but that didn't feel right. Whatever was out there, she felt as though it was watching her. Celes couldn't explain why, but deep down in the most primal part of her brain, she knew that something was wrong. Even her biting cynicism couldn't protect her from her own instincts, and her instincts told her that this was no ordinary forest.

But that was ridiculous. Celes had lived here, after all, and nothing terrible had come of it but monsters and bad memories.

Still, Celes couldn't help but raise her sword and eye the fog warily. She stepped closer to Zack now, close enough that she could almost feel the heat rising from his body in waves. "I don't want to lose you," she explained so he wouldn't get the wrong idea. Then she turned to face his blind spot. Just to be safe.

ulla

“Don’t worry, I’ll stay close. This fog should clear out in no time, yeah?”

Zack's voice came almost disembodied through the fog. Celes could feel his back behind her, she could hear the soft intake of his breath, and yet she could gain almost nothing from a sideways glance. There was a roughly masculine figure, there was dark hair nearly touching hers, but she couldn't see his eyes. She could, quite literally, not see a foot in front of her.

"Of course," Celes answered, "It's just fog." Surely Zack couldn't see how her eyes glanced warily from tree to obscured tree, how her lips had thinned into colorless lines, or how her knuckles had whitened on her sword? Celes told herself the same words over and over again, 'It's just fog. It's just fog. It's just fog,' yet even so, she couldn't deny the dangers of it. Standing here talking, they were blind targets just waiting for some monster to stumble across them. All around them, the forest creaked and moaned with movement. Leaves rustled. Wood cracked. Celes shrank back against Zack until their pauldrons touched. 

Celes brought her magic closer to her skin. It prickled with cold, but she held her free hand ready, waiting. Was she imagining it, or had the sunlight dimmed? Celes blinked hard to clear her vision, but even the fog looked different now -- not white, but gray and getting darker by the second. The rustling quickened. The trees groaned as though bent by some ungodly hand. Outside their dark sphere, she heard something like a storm ripping at the forest around them. But there was no wind.

Zack tensed beside her. "Something isn't right here. We should-."

Celes glanced at the black space where his head would be. "What?"

For over two seconds, she heard nothing but the creaking, wind-swept forests. Then Zack muttered, "What the hell is that?”

Celes didn't see it coming. There was a crack, a loud rustling, and then Zack gasped. Celes whipped around to face him, but saw almost nothing as he let out a horrified shriek.

"Ah!" Hard flesh collapsed against her and, for the second time, Celes felt her knees give under Zack's weight. She hit the ground elbows first, gasping in pain as Zack's shoulder drove into her stomach. "Zack! What're you-?" she spat before his body was yanked away as though on a string. Celes blinked into the fog and touched where his shoulder had been only half a second before. Her eyes widened. "Zack!" She heard his shouting from far away, getting farther by the second. Something had him. Something had taken him and she was completely blind.

"Zack..." Her voice came quieter now, almost whispered between her own pounding heartbeats. Slowly, she rose to her feet. Her eyes darted from blur to senseless blur. Her ears pinpointed every scratch, rattle, and gust of wind, but there were simply too many to track. Celes crept away until her back hit a solid tree trunk. She leaned against it and listened as her breaths came quicker and her boots ground into tangled vines.

She could no longer hear Zack's voice. The forest had enveloped him.

Something moved to her left. Celes turned on it, but it wasn't a man -- not even a monster. She saw an eight foot torso with flailing arms like whips. There was a slow, grinding moan as those arms reached out towards something she couldn't see. Celes stepped forward, squinting through the fog, and then stopped. It was a tree. Nothing more than a tree caught in the wind. The fog shifted in front of her. It drifted like water between her and the tree, circling in eddies around her hands. There was something there only four feet ahead of her -- a dark, hulking shadow of a man she'd forgotten.

The assassin. Rude.

Celes didn't see what happened. One moment the shadow stood strong in the haze, and in the next it had been thrown to the ground. Celes gave an involuntarily yelp of surprise as his head cracked against the hard earth. Then he slid away, flat on his back, his hands clutching wildly at leaves and old tree roots. Celes' eyes widened. "No!" She raised her sword and rushed after him, but something caught her ankle. Celes gave a sharp yell as she crashed into the forest floor.  She yanked her leg out of the grasp of old vines and scrambled back to her feet. The man's cries had faded behind a sudden, howling wind.

Celes was alone.

Celes' eyes darted wildly from cracking underbrush to groaning wood, searching desperately for the monster -- whatever it was -- that had attacked. She could see nothing -- absolutely nothing -- through the fog. In a swell of panic, she heard herself shouting incantations. Her hands folded together, and then came the burst of magic. 

"Blizzaga!" Ice erupted from her blood. For a moment, even the fog stilled in suspended animation as its tiny water droplets crystallized. "Blizzaga!" The force of it sent her stumbling backwards as the trees in front of her froze. Frost-covered leaves broke from their branches and shattered to the ground. "Blizzaga!" Celes heard nothing but her own heartbeat as she whipped around and blasted the woodlands behind her with ice. Her skin prickled with cold. Her breath hung in front of her like mist.

The forest fell silent again, and she was alone.

"Zack..." She whispered his name. The strong, dark soldier she knew nothing about. The smiling, confident man with heroic impulses and poor judgement. He was gone now, dragged deep into the forest, possibly dead. Celes felt her fingers tremble on her sword. There was no reason to care except that he was a good man who didn't deserve this. There was no reason for the clenching of her throat and her own jagged breaths. There was no reason at all except...

Except that for just a few hours, she'd felt safe at his side. 

Why had she stopped in her tracks at the sight of him, broken and fleeing down the streets of Torensten? Why had she abandoned her only chance to find Terra again? Why had she chased after him like a woman obsessed, tracking him for miles past two cities and into this forsaken forest? Celes had written it off as pure irrational impulse, but now she couldn't help but wonder. Why had she been so desperate to catch him? Why hadn't she wanted to see him go?

Everything had been taken from her. Her position. Her home. The Returners. Edgar. Sabin. Setzer. Even Locke...

"Don't leave me." Celes touched at her mouth and felt her jaw tighten. "Don't..."

'There's nothing left.'

The forest went dark.

Celes' eyes widened at the gloom. The fog strengthened around her, starting at her feet and then growing thicker and taller until it blocked out the sun. Celes gasped as it filled her lungs, reaching in icy tendrils down her throat. All around her, there was movement. Scratching, dragging, screeching. The ground beneath her trembled like an earthquake and she screamed as she lost her balance and fell to her knees. Something whipped across her chest and then again at her arm. A thousand sharp fingers scratched at her legs and face and hands. She shouted spells into the darkness, but the onslaught wouldn't stop. All around her came that sound. A horrible bellowing like the depths of the earth. Celes felt her sword fall from her fingertips. She wrapped her head in her hands and waited.

As quickly as it began, the forest fell silent. Celes listened as the seconds passed, but there was nothing. No wind. No rustle of leaves. No birds chirping or cicadas humming. Slowly, Celes placed a hand to the ground. 

The earth was cracked and barren.

All around her, the fog glowed with a subtle tint of blood. It lifted until that red light cast upon blackened tree trunks and hollowed skulls. The forest was gone, replaced by a wasteland that spread until it touched the horizon. Slowly, Celes rose to her feet, turning and staring, until every ruined inch of it had ingrained itself behind her eyes. Her breaths came ragged. Her heart fluttered with ice.

"What? How...?" All around her came the smell of burnt flesh and dust. There was no sound but the quiet bubbling of a pond full of thick, yellow sludge.

"No..." The forest had vanished. All around her, there were only bones and charred stone. Celes felt herself stumbling away from it, but there was nowhere to run.

'What if this is all an illusion, and we are lying out on the plains, exposed to the elements of our dying world?'

Terra's words echoed back to her. Words of fear and delusion. Terra's eyes had wavered with the dying light of their campfire. Her fingers had trembled.

'Celes, I'm afraid that this is some type of punishment for us -- for being the only ones to stand against Kefka. For embracing the hope that we could win.'

The words had sent her reeling. Celes had felt the ground fall from beneath her, she had seen the flames again, and yet she still hadn't really believed it. How could she when the leaves had smelled so rich and when the flowers had swayed so softly in the wind? How could she believe that Terra's soft eyes had been a lie? How could anyone accept that the flames of Torensten had been an illusion? How could she have imagined Zack's impulsive grin or the feel of his arms?

Yet here it was. Reality as she knew it. Gone were the illusions of comfort and life. Everything she'd come to accept and love had evaporated in the fog. Now there was only the loneliness, the helplessness, and that same crippling guilt. Celes heard it in the bubbling of waste water. She felt it in the cracks of the earth. All of this was real in a way that the forest never had been. This was reality. She'd been foolish to ever think otherwise.

The ground trembled beneath her. The thorny trees rattled with an unholy power. Celes raised a hand to defend herself with magic, but nothing came from the mist. Nothing but a voice. 

His voice.

“Haha! … Ruined … Destroy … All gone … Forever … Arrogant, brat… Brat!”

Celes couldn't move. Her body washed over with cold as that voice held her in a grip like iron. 

Kefka.

“Lowly little lousey unlikeable, PUNY brat … All dead, thanks to you .. heeheeHEHEHAHAHA!”

The laughter came like thunder. The ground trembled with it. The trees cracked like glass. Celes slammed her hands over her ears. She clenched her eyes shut and pleaded for it to stop. It was the sound that had haunted her nightmares for over a year. That laugh. That hideous, gleeful laugh! Celes stumbled again and fell to her knees. Her skin split against the hardened clay, but she didn't feel it. Not with that laughter, closing in all around her. She heard another sound rising -- high-pitched and helpless.

It came from her.

'He's going to kill me.' She could already feel the heat of his judgement searing from the sky. She could hear the crack of ungodly energy and the scorching of the earth. 'He's going to kill me.' Her heart beat furiously to the rhythm of that laugh. It beat until she thought that her chest might burst. 'Stop it stop it stop it!'

"Kefka..." Celes grit her teeth and lifted her head to the cloudy sky. "Kefka! What are you waiting for? Just do it already!" Nothing came from the sky. No light. No magic. "What do you want from me? Why did you do this?!" She thought of the forest and of the world of Zephon. She saw Zack's grinning face and Ruby's slow scoffs. She saw the calloused hands of Douken and the cleanly ironed dress of the red mage Lucy. "You've had me for months! Why didn't you just kill me?!"

A renewed chorus of laughter answered her. Celes' eyes wandered across the scorched wasteland to the hilt of her sword. She reached for it.

Her hand felt steady on the handle of her blade. She stood slowly and squared her stance against him. 

"You wanted to break me, is that it? I didn't have anything left, so you gave me something to lose?" Celes' jaw clenched. She raised a hand to the wasteland around her. "You have the world! You have everything, but you can't make people bend to you! Nothing can do that!" The laughter stopped. Above her, the clouds had parted to make way for a gathering mass of red. The air had stilled and all around came the tense crackling of heat. Celes' breath froze. She looked up into that red light and knew what was coming. 

Her eyes closed.

First came the crack and then the roar. Something hit her with the force of a train and she felt herself flying. The light came red through her eyelids. The heat blistered at her skin and seared hotter than any fire. Her body hit the ground hard and then rolled twice into a thorny tree. Her head hung heavy. She couldn't move. 

'Have you found something worth protecting in this broken little world that won’t die?'

His voice came clear over the screaming light. Celes thought of Locke with his messy gray hair and his colorful bandannas. She thought of his good-natured smiles and his rogue grins, and they stirred something inside her. Another man had given her that same expression -- another man in another reality, and if only for a moment, she'd been happy.

"I've met someone who can accept me for what I am." Her voice came weak against her burnt and damaged throat. The light faded from behind her eyes. The roaring power slowed and dimmed. Her head spun and her arms fell slack.

Just before she lost consciousness, Celes heard the distant chirping of songbirds.

ulla

[attr="class","dec1"]

[attr="class","dec2"]
FINALLY

“Stop!”

Zack shouted against his constraints, gasping, grunting, and yelping as his body collided repeatedly with the forest floor, with roots, with trees, with stems and leaves. Bark scraped his arms raw, and hard dirt ripped through his skin with ease. His ankle felt as if it was going to tear off at any moment, as the strange vine around it coiled as tightly as it could against bone, threatening to crush and cripple. His arms flailed about, hands trying to grab onto anything that could stop his backwards momentum to the dark, overgrown trees. Limbs snapped in his hands, grass ripped up, and he never had enough time to grab onto something larger.

Thrown against the forest floor one last time, the Soldier finally willed his arms behind his back to grab his sword. He barely had a few moments to react, lest the weapon be knocked from his hand by a passing tree or brush, and he swung the blade deep into the ground as quickly as he could.

The Buster sword planted into the ground with ease, going deep from Zack’s plunging strike, and the vine tugged so hard it caused his eyes to water and a moderately pained groan to fly from his throat. Though the tool of the forest could have easily heaved the swordsman and his weapon up and free from the earth, it relented, releasing Zack’s ankle from its cold, harsh grasp. Finally, his body fell on solid ground, and he had a moment to catch a deep, pained breath against his bruised ribs.

It took a few moments for Fair to catch his breath, to stop his vision from shaking in the aftermath of his attempted-kidnapping. His hands remained wrapped tightly around the hilt of his precious blade, and slowly, he willed his aching muscles forward, wincing as the moist air stung his open, bleeding scrapes. One hand dared to brush against his torso, to press into his skin, which elicited a hiss through his teeth. Poking out underneath his skin was surely a busted rib or two. Thankfully, his SOLDIER enhancements would have that fixed fairly quickly, however, in the meantime it left him more injured than he’d like to be.

After collecting himself, Zack quickly took to collecting his surroundings. Each sense was as important as the last, connecting to what was immediately around him, painting a picture in the dark. Even with his modified senses, the Soldier could barely see a few feet in front of him through the pure, black darkness. His ears picked up little sound, not even the whisper of wind through the leaves, no sounds of chirping birds or shuffling animals underfoot. It smelled like wood rot, water, things that had been decaying naturally for quite some time. Even the air was heavy with moisture, sticking to his skin, a feeling as if he were sweating, for being rained upon.

Surrounded by darkness, by death, with no light at the end of the tunnel.
Surrounded by nothing.

Zack’s teeth worried on his bottom, swollen lip. With one swift, albeit painful, motion, he pulled the Buster sword from the ground, keeping it tightly gripped in his gloved hand. Inside his chest, his heart beat, harder and harder, providing the only sound in his ears along with his hurried, worried heaving breaths. He strained his ears, listening for anything, any signs of life from his companions that he’d just been ripped away from.

But, nothing ever came.

The Soldier had been keeping his mouth shut, to keep from stirring whoever, or whatever, had been in control around him. He opened his mouth to speak, yet nothing but a pained yelp came out as he shifted on his feet, twisting broken ribs in his torso, the bright, hot pain bringing him back to his knees. Sweating, letting the pain of his injuries drive him, Zack began to rise once more.

He had to find Celes, and Rude. He had to get back to them.

They … had to get out alive.

---

(As written by Sephiroth )

The forest offered silence as Zack started to rise. A hiss of finely crafted steel sang out, seemingly echoing in the silence. Just enough so the tip rested along his cheek. A soft, amused voice sounding gently from behind him. "Showing your back to the enemy....overconfidence will destroy you." A voice from the distant past. Barely above a whisper and yet carried with it a startling power that reverberated softly through the forest.

The blade would not prevent the man from turning around. Standing behind him, the long blade of Masamune glinting deadly and slender pointed at his chest, was a man from all of their pasts. Head bowed and eyes closed. A hint of a smile touching the corners of his lips.

Head raising slowly and Mako green eyes seem to pierce where the blade yet did not. Irisis narrowed with the power of the distilled Lifestream that ran through his veins. Sephiroth did nothing at the very light breeze tugging at the long strands of silvered hair.

Those eyes narrowed and a gentle 'hmph' sounded as he thrust forward suddenly. Seeking to impale Zack, forcing him to either parry or die. The song of steel slicing the air in such a rapid succession was only broken by the horrid clashing of steel on steel. Each stroke of the blade proof why Sephiroth stood above all others of SOLDIER First Class. Power would resonate like thunder after lightning's strike. Almost too fast to follow with the naked eye.

"Is this it? Are you all of Angeal's dreams? His honor? Tell me, Zack Fair...what was it like to kill the man who you idolized? My brother...dead and blood dripping from the very blade he bade you to legacy? You'll never live up to the sacrifice he laid down at your feet. You disgrace his memory."

---

A familiar song, sudden and quiet, sang through the air.

Zack’s eyes widened with near panic. Against his cheek, against his old, scarred skin, a cold, dangerously sharp blade barely pressed in. His grip tightened on the Buster sword, so tightly that each of his fingers cracked. His heart beat faster and faster, his mind flying into a frenzy, as a familiar voice, so soft, so tantalizing, and yet so frightening, reached his ears.

With that voice, the forest seemed to awaken around him.

Cautiously, like prey that was caught in the eyes of its predator, Zack turned. His wide eyes flickered up the long, shining blade, up and up, to a gloved hand he vaguely remembered shaking, to a leather coat that pressed at his mind – why could he hear it flapping wildly in the wind? – further up still, to a pair of cat-like, glowing green eyes. The man was barely smirking at him, the long blade drifting down to point into his chest, as calm as the moon in the sky. Zack’s heart jumped into his throat, and his stomach sunk down, down, seemingly into his boots.

“Sephiroth…,” he barely uttered the name, voice catching, sticking in his throat.

Reflex was all that saved the once-dead Soldier for what came next. Sephiroth plunged forward, Masamune already far ahead of him, and muscle memory, pulling the Buster sword close to parry a deadly strike, was all that stood between Zack Fair and certain death. The sound of clashing steel rang out like the strike of a bell tower, like the sound of a gong; loud, reverberating, the noise dancing in the air. Strike after strike was attempted, Zack completely stuck on the defensive, moving with a speed and agility that he had once forgotten he was capable of. Talent that had moved him up to his position within Soldier – as a First, as a leader.

To help him stand close, near, almost toe to toe with a man he’d admired for many years.

As their swords clanged, the memories dared to flow back into his mind. Filled with static and muddled, but there. Between the flashes of steel, he could see Sephiroth. A man he once thought of as a potential mentor, a man he had considered a friend. The face of SOLDIER, the face of ShinRa. He was what inspired many, like Zack, to leave home and join the program. He could almost hear it, almost hear Angeal’s words about Sephiroth, about his friend, but they were too quiet to understand.

And then, the First Class Legacy spoke; his words cutting sharper and more painful than his blade ever could.

A desperate, dying blame burst in Zack Fair’s heart at those words, words about his mentor. Angeal, the man he looked up to more than any other, his brother in arms, a man he’d loved dearly. Another blurry memory, barely hanging in the back of his mind; Angeal Hewley, covered in blood, gashes, skin tore open and apart, his body cold, his eyes lifeless. Zack’s eyes felt hot, his throat constricted. His blows became more desperate, shaky, as he blinked tears down his dirty cheeks.

“You – You’re wrong!” He shouted to silver-haired swordsman opposite of himself, “I never … I never wanted to—to—He made me--!”

Each strike with the Buster sword, the very sword he’d used to kill Angeal Hewley, became heavier. Heavier with desperation. Heavier with regret. With sadness and unspoken horrors. His blows became less focused, his feet became less agile. Distantly, he could have sworn he heard the roar of a monster; part man, part beast, threatening to rip him apart. Tearing out his heart.

---

(As written by Sephiroth )

Sephiroth parried the desperate blows. The smile forming on his lips before he shifted the blade. Angling the deadly sharp end upwards to the sky before he suddenly struck. The sound of steel shattered echoed through the forest and forced Zack back onto the loamy earth.

"This is no simulation, boy." Stepping forward, the blade carving through the air only to stop a hair's breadth from his chest. Pieces of the Buster Sword lay around them. Some dug deep into the leaf litter and some simply lain like discarded memories.

"He gave you the only thing he had. Now it lies like his broken dreams. Shattered because you are not enough to carry it on. You tell yourself that you died well, that it took an entire army to bring you to your knees." The blade touching the material as Sephiroth slowly circled the fallen form. "Shadows of men with guns. You let them destroy Angeal's dreams. His dreams running along the sandy earth with your blood."

Finally coming full circle and standing at Zack's feet. Slowly, the black wing unfurled from his back. Stretching up and outward as if to block out the very sky. Casting it's shadow over him. "You are not worthy of my fallen brother, boy. You never will be. You're a shadow of him...hiding from the light that he tried to give to you."

The blade ghosted along the material, delicate as a butterfly's wing beat before it, and Sephiroth suddenly surged over him. Pain ripping through his chest and giving him to only see darkness. Darkness and those cat-like eyes glowing with Mako. "Protect your honor...always..."

---

Blow after blow was struck, unfocused and frenzied, praying that the next strike would be the last and he would be released from this horror. He wanted to ask why, beg for it to stop. Zack could barely keep up his pace while his brain spun with unanswered questions and blurry memories, voices of friends long-past barely whispering through the clouded visions. In one quick moment, everything seemed to freeze, and Masamune rose towards heaven.

Only to come crashing down.

Zack brought the Buster sword close to protect himself, but the blow was so powerful, the force behind it so strong, that the blade shattered. The Soldier was thrown harshly against the ground, crying out in pain, his hands empty of a blade to defend himself. Around him, pieces of the Buster sword fell, and as they glinted in the light, Zack could see him. He could see memories of Angeal; grinning, giving him rare praise, shaking his head and disciplining, reaching a hand out to help Zack up. Yet, in a moment just as quick, each piece of the metal blade fell into the ground. Untouchable. Broken.

Shattered, like a dream.

Before Zack could rise from the hard earth, the point of Masamune was upon him. Above, Sephiroth circled him, those glowing, green eyes haunting, piercing into him more than the sword ever could. Fair stared, his eyes wide, his body aching, tired, bleeding. The tears had stopped as his body was sapped of its strength, drained of its will. Without that sword, he had nothing. He’d lost the only piece of Angeal he had left.

And Sephiroth berated him. His words cut deep. It was as if he held Zack’s heart, containing all of his fears, all of his worries, and stabbed it, again and again. Reminding him of his failures. Bringing forth the overwhelming emotions that brought him to this awful place; the forest he’d run to because he was weak, because he was scared.

Not worthy. Disgrace. Hiding. Afraid.

As Sephiroth finished speaking, it was if a switch suddenly switched in Zack’s mind. Realization dawned in his face. He finally looked up once more, to Sephiroth’s naturally cool and calm face, looking deep into those mako eyes he’d seen, sometimes daily, in the halls, on missions.

The silver haired Soldier plunged forward, sinking his blade into Zack’s chest. As Fair gasped from the searing pain, as darkness enveloped his senses once more, as Sephiroth’s eyes lingered on him as he felt everything begin to fade, fade, fade away, he felt truly awake for the first time.

You’re right.

”Protect your honor, always.”

I … I haven’t been doing such a hot job of that, have I?

”Protect your honor, always.”

I’m sorry. You guys must be really disappointed, huh? This … I never had this problem before, did I?

” At times I feel as if my mind is mired in fog. But Zack, no matter what happens, I have to protect my honor. As long as I hold the Buster sword.”

Dammit. You’re right. You were always right. I’m sorry.

Finally, air pushed its way into his lungs once more. Zack sat up, coughing, holding his arms against his stomach and chest. Though his chest still burned, as he brought a gloved hand to his heart, he felt no wound. As his arm fell back to his side, it landed where he needed it most, on the light of his life. His motivation to always keep moving forward, to always do the right thing.

Slowly, his gloved hand wrapped around the Buster sword once more.

Zack gingerly brought himself to his feet. Whatever strange nightmare he experienced may not have hurt him physically, but it had definitely taken its toll on him. Sephiroth’s eyes still lurked in the back of his mind; watching, judging. Yet, at the thought of Sephiroth – strong willed, spoiled, powerful Sephiroth – Fair found himself smiling. Something in his mind told him, warned him that there were terrible memories lurking around involving the green-eyed Soldier, however, for now, all he had was thanks.

Thanks, and a thousand questions. What was with that wing?

The Soldier shook his head. Around him, the Forest seemed … oddly, much more clear. It was much lighter, sunshine peeking through the leaves. The trees were in full bloom; they looked healthy, happy. The sounds of a running, small creek nearby piqued his ears, as did the chirping of song birds. For a moment, all Zack could do was laugh with disbelief. Did he suddenly blink himself to a different place?

Zack finally rose to his feet. His body was beginning to ache less, his Soldier-enhanced healing abilities beginning to kick in. He stretched his neck, rubbed the back of his head, hand nearly getting caught in all the tangles of his long, spikey hair. He took a deep, calming breath, and let it out slowly. Then, he tightened his grip on the Buster sword and brought it up, holding it out in front of him, so that he could stare into the steel of the gifted blade.

Angeal’s legacy. His legacy. Dreams and honor, soaked into steel.

And, for a moment, he could have sworn he’d seen two pairs of eyes, one blue, wise and knowing, the other green, sly, powerful, and quiet, staring back at him.

Zack smiled, the first real smile he could remember ever cracking since he’d woken up in this strange land. All that remained was his own reflection in the sword, and he laughed at himself, covered in dirt and blood and sweat. He looked a mess, and he felt it too. Yet, his heart was burning bright; strong, happy. For the first time in quite a long while.

“I’ll protect my honor,” he solemnly told the sword, nodding to himself, before laughing and knocking his pinky finger against the massive blade, “Pinky promise!”

Zack wiped a grimy glove across his face, wiping away the tears that had forced their way through his strange nightmare-ish experience. That whole ordeal had felt real, as real as the breathes he took. However, he’d have to review the experience in his mind later on. A gentle reminder came knocking, as Fair finally got his senses together.

He needed to find Celes and Rude.

However, he was lost. Glancing around, the Soldier began to pull all of the information he could remember from the previous hour or so. The area where he’d stopped, where Celes had found him, it hadn’t been far from where they’d found Rude, as well. He remembered hearing, albeit very faintly, running water, while he’d been pressed against that tree, hiding from the world. His glowing, blue eyes found the clear stream, trickling along. Perhaps, if he followed it, he could find them.

And, hopefully, they’d be alright.

Zack started off, boots easily pressing against the soft earth next to the stream. The forest seemed entirely different to him now; less cold, less dreary, less dark. There was no fog to confuse him, there was no darkness to frighten him. The inside of his heart had become strong, filled with a light, passion, drive. Maybe the forest reflected that. Or, perhaps, it only preyed on the weak.

It took some time, maybe eating up half an hour or so, before Zack finally saw a figure slumped on the ground. He easily recognized the blonde hair, and worry fluttered into his mind. “Celes!” he called out, running towards her, dropping by her side in an instant. His hand went to her face, checking her over for injuries, eyes scanning, heart pounding.

She seemed alright. Celes was breathing, calmly, and she appeared just as she had before Zack had been dragged away. However, she was unconscious, and Rude wasn’t around. What had happened to her, to him? To any of them? Zack swallowed, trying to clear his dry throat. He tapped her cheek gently a few times, and lightly squeezed her shoulder, but, she seemed dead asleep. Whatever had happened, Zack reasoned to himself, it must have been terrible.

Frowning, he stood once more, kneeling down to gather Celes into his arms. It was a familiar feeling, and if he hadn’t been wrought with worry, perhaps he would have laughed at how he was, once again, carrying an unconscious Celes away to safety. He stood, bringing her close to his chest, and for a moment, pressed his chin against her hair. She had been his light in the dark of Torensten.

This time, he would be hers.

Thankfully, it didn’t take long to find Rude. The Turk was unconscious as well, splayed out in the grass. Much like Celes he had no apparent injuries, but seemed to be out like a light. The sun still shone in the sky above them, bright and warm, and for the moment, Zack felt safe staying in the area. He had nothing to heal either of them with (other than some heartwarming jokes, which would fall on deaf ears), and so, he’d have to wait for them to wake up on their own. Find out what happened to them.

Then, they could all find their way out, together.

Zack pressed his back against a warm tree, still cradling Celes in his arms. He kept his head against his chest, against his heart where he could have sworn he felt Masamune pierce. The fire in his heart still burned brightly, his eyes containing so much more life than they had before. His mind was racing to process everything he’d done, seen, learned on this new world with his refreshed outlook on life. He thought of Cloud, and how to save him. He thought of the strange priest, Seymour, and the beast Anima. He thought of Celes, as he held her warm body close to his. Brave, strong Celes.

For that moment, Zack felt a long forgotten peace, as he waited for his friends to come to.

"From now on, I'll protect you. I'll protect everyone. I swear, on my honor."