[Milliways] Traveling
Midgar felt like home, even though he hadn't lived there for many years. He did for a short time during training, back when he first joined the Turks. In those days everything was on a need-to-know basis and he was no more or less noted or important than any of his colleagues, and his eyes weren't red and he didn't sport a red mantled cloak or body armor. He'd never heard of an insignificant Shin-Ra biotechnologist named Lucrecia Crescent. Professors Gast and Hojo were abstractions, mere names on paper. Sector 7 hadn't been destroyed; Sephiroth hadn't been conceived; Chaos was firmly entrenched... wherever it was, without a host, without seeing the light of day for centuries.
Funny how one seemingly small and entirely insignificant shift can change a whole story. He's certainly not egotistical enough to even begin to think the tale revolves around him; he's just a bit player, an extra.
Still, saying goodbye -- something at which he's absolutey atrocious and always has been -- to Cloud and Barret was difficult enough: they're the bigger part of the story as far as he's concerned. Leaving Marlene behind tore at his heart a little bit: she'd become attached to him in a very short period of time. But leaving Tifa was...
Well. She's the closest thing he has to a confidante and knows more about him than anybody. It's not something they came by readily, and it's nothing he's ever taken for granted. But he knew full well when he left that he might not see any of them again. The chance encounter that brought Tifa to his side at the end of the universe is something he'd cautiously classified as an anomaly, since it didn't seem particularly eager to recur. And one doesn't need to be whisked off the planet's surface to disappear. He knows there are those who would as soon see him destroyed as let him walk about freely, even here in his home town of Junon.
Whether or not he sees Tifa and the others again is not something he dwells on at the moment. He has managed to retrieve enough gil to cover his travel expenses; the cave behind the waterfall is next but that's an expensive ocean away. His attempt at reclaiming his father's belongings has met with nothing but frustration, as he strongly suspected it would. The phrase your request is denied, Mr. Valentine is something he could live happily without hearing again but... well... it's what he has left to fight for. Lucrecia is... little more than a remnant, for all intents and purposes but... as long as she remains in some form, he'll do whatever he can for her and spend as much time as he can with her.
If she lets him.
Droplets of ocean water spray against his skin; the wind is cold and knife-like but he doesn't step back from the cargo ship's prow. Sailing west means following the sun; the lengthening shadows suit him. Curiously, his core body temperature remains steadfastly neutral no matter how much wind and water cover him. That's a side-effect of playing host to Chaos, perhaps, or the result of the once dead and decayed skin stretching over his torso. Wishing for balance, however, hasn't made balance simply appear and there are days when he thinks at least I'm alive. Those are evened out by the days when he thinks I wish I were dead but that... seems to be unattainable at the moment: he's tried.
And so he stands on the prow with arms folded like some semi-living figurehead, eager for the first sighting of the western continent. That... will presage a trip across its surface to Nibelheim and from there to Mt. Nibel and his beloved Lucrecia. However long it takes -- however difficult the journey and whatever the cost -- he'll do it. To see her, to be with her: remembering Lucrecia was the only thing that got him through thirty years locked in a coffin and he's not ready to let go of her yet.
He may never be ready to let go of her.
Only the setting of the sun and the air's resulting frigidity force him down from the prow at long last. With a longing glance westward, he retires below deck. By this time tomorrow he'll be on land, making his way across the continent somehow. There will be no rest until he sees his beloved again... and even if this is one of those times she refuses to speak to him, he won't mind.
At least they'll be together.
Funny how one seemingly small and entirely insignificant shift can change a whole story. He's certainly not egotistical enough to even begin to think the tale revolves around him; he's just a bit player, an extra.
Still, saying goodbye -- something at which he's absolutey atrocious and always has been -- to Cloud and Barret was difficult enough: they're the bigger part of the story as far as he's concerned. Leaving Marlene behind tore at his heart a little bit: she'd become attached to him in a very short period of time. But leaving Tifa was...
Well. She's the closest thing he has to a confidante and knows more about him than anybody. It's not something they came by readily, and it's nothing he's ever taken for granted. But he knew full well when he left that he might not see any of them again. The chance encounter that brought Tifa to his side at the end of the universe is something he'd cautiously classified as an anomaly, since it didn't seem particularly eager to recur. And one doesn't need to be whisked off the planet's surface to disappear. He knows there are those who would as soon see him destroyed as let him walk about freely, even here in his home town of Junon.
Whether or not he sees Tifa and the others again is not something he dwells on at the moment. He has managed to retrieve enough gil to cover his travel expenses; the cave behind the waterfall is next but that's an expensive ocean away. His attempt at reclaiming his father's belongings has met with nothing but frustration, as he strongly suspected it would. The phrase your request is denied, Mr. Valentine is something he could live happily without hearing again but... well... it's what he has left to fight for. Lucrecia is... little more than a remnant, for all intents and purposes but... as long as she remains in some form, he'll do whatever he can for her and spend as much time as he can with her.
If she lets him.
Droplets of ocean water spray against his skin; the wind is cold and knife-like but he doesn't step back from the cargo ship's prow. Sailing west means following the sun; the lengthening shadows suit him. Curiously, his core body temperature remains steadfastly neutral no matter how much wind and water cover him. That's a side-effect of playing host to Chaos, perhaps, or the result of the once dead and decayed skin stretching over his torso. Wishing for balance, however, hasn't made balance simply appear and there are days when he thinks at least I'm alive. Those are evened out by the days when he thinks I wish I were dead but that... seems to be unattainable at the moment: he's tried.
And so he stands on the prow with arms folded like some semi-living figurehead, eager for the first sighting of the western continent. That... will presage a trip across its surface to Nibelheim and from there to Mt. Nibel and his beloved Lucrecia. However long it takes -- however difficult the journey and whatever the cost -- he'll do it. To see her, to be with her: remembering Lucrecia was the only thing that got him through thirty years locked in a coffin and he's not ready to let go of her yet.
He may never be ready to let go of her.
Only the setting of the sun and the air's resulting frigidity force him down from the prow at long last. With a longing glance westward, he retires below deck. By this time tomorrow he'll be on land, making his way across the continent somehow. There will be no rest until he sees his beloved again... and even if this is one of those times she refuses to speak to him, he won't mind.
At least they'll be together.