Disclaimer: Final Fantasy 7 and all the characters of FF7 are copyright to Squaresoft Ltd. I do not own them and am just borrowing them for the sake of a moment of insanity.
This is my first ever fan fiction and I want to thank my younger sister Michelle for beta reading it to the best of her ability for me.
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It finally happened. I knew that it was inevitable, but I can hardly say that I'm prepared to go. The forest seems very peaceful here, something that you really don't notice when you just come storming through. They are right when they say that your life replays itself before your eyes when you are dying. They all just neglect to tell you that it doesn't run in any kind of order.
Sephiroth was charging at me. I was at the entrance of the Temple of Ancients and I had brought the keystone. I was to get the Black Materia before AVALANCHE. Given this simple task by the orders of President Rufus ShinRa. I don't know if he was laying in wait or just got luck, but he was there. I didnt even realize it until I saw the Masamune slide out from between my ribs. The next couple of seconds were spent in shock, I didn't feel anything. The Masamune was in and out rather quickly. I know that I managed to turn around, I had wanted to ask him why. But, suddenly, I couldn't breathe. Sephiroth's liquid green eyes coldly looked down into my soul. Before Nibelheim his eyes had been almost human, these eyes were glazed in Mako glory and filled with an unstoppable lust for the thrill that death brought him. My vision blurred, I must have fallen to the floor unconsious.
The next thing that I remembered was waking up slowly to the sounds of voices from outside of the Temple. I pulled myself slowly off the floor and grabbed the Keystone from where Sephiroth had left it on the alter. Turning, I saw AVALANCHE entering the Temple, they had come here for the same reason that both Sephiroth and I had, the Black Materia. I knew I couldn't stay in the Temple, I'd be to easy a catch for Cloud and his friends, but I also couldn't leave the materia in Sephiroth's hands. I could get the materia from Cloud later, easier then from Sephiroth. So doing the only thing that I could think of at the moment, I tossed the Keystone to Cloud and ran from the Temple of Ancients as fast as I could. Even thought I know that I only traveled a short distance it felt like miles and it took forever. I stumbled in the near dark until I could walk no more, it was then that the visions of the past started.
My youth, lord I can't even remember being that young. Mostly it came in vague recollections, a lake, my grandmother, the only family I had until I didn't even have her anymore. I can remember as a city kid getting lost in the woods once. Maybe that is where the bone chilling feeling that I get from being a forested area come from.
I can, however, see clearly my first night out where drinking was involved. I just started to work for Shin-Ra at the time, I was about 16 then. The boys in my training group took me out from my birthday with the intentions of us all drinking ourselves sick. I know that I got so drunk that I couldn't even carry myself out of the bar. The killer hangover I had in the morning made me cast myself in the role of the moderate drinker. Between Reno, Rude, and I one of really needed to stay sober in case duty called. I always restrained from drinking. Now that I think about it I wonder how much my light drinking habits allowed Reno and Rude to develope their heavy drinking habits. I wonder what will stop them from over drinking themselves if I can't pull through this. Funny the thoughts that go through your head when you realize you are dying.
Other visions of those cadet times creep in my mind, but I really remember my first day on the job as a Turk-In-Training. That blue suit, I had Reno's messy look without the need to adorn myself with shades. I was even every bit as irresponsible as he is; I was strapped with that rookie attitude as I took on the world as a Turk for the first time. The training was intense and focused, people got hurt. People got hurt, that was how they kept the membership numbers down for the organization. Any dropouts from the program met with accidents soon after leaving so that the secrets divulged could be kept secret.
When I joined the organization there were multiple teams of Turks, but I guess there was such a thing as too much of a good thing. Members slow but steadly met with accidents or were sent on impossible missions until only our group remained. Our activities were carefully monitored by Shin-Ra and tabs were kept on everything from our number of kills to the tab on the drinking bills most members had. Again times have changed, now as long as we come when called and don't do anything President Rufus Shinra wouldn't we have free run of our lives.
Another memory that sufaces clearly... When I was about 26 I got the assignment they said could put me above the other Turks. I was either to apprehend or if and only if unable to apprehend, to kill a child. Her mother was in some way associated with Hojo and he wanted the child for a specimen in one of his unique experiments. The child had been taken in by a surrogate mother in the Sector 5 slums. It took them years of searching to find her but they finally found her in one of the lowest places in Midgar. Her name, vision, and spirit will haunt me even in my coming death. She was a tiny thing with the vibrance of life and a joy of living shining around her. She had long mouse brown hair, was about 10 years old, and her eyes, they were as green as any emerald. Looking back I can see in those eyes what I saw in Sephiroth's before, the pain of the world.
I found her playing in her new mother's garden. I was stunned to learn something could grow here, and I just stood in the shadows watching her enjoying the quiet day. She was overly curious when she found me, just standing there watching her. This young girl, completely unafraid, walked right up to me. I could have grabbed her then, but I couldn't bring myself to take her away from her paradise. Aries she said her name was, she had just introduced herself to a complete stranger who was lurking in the shadows of her garden. What was stranger still was that when she asked me who I was I just opened my mouth and said, "Tseng". She looked at me a moment blinking her large green eyes slowly and asked me what I was doing in the garden. I told her that I was going to take her away to another home. I can still remember her response to me exactly; "I am home Mr. Tseng. See the garden for me to play in and I have a mother who loves me every bit as much as my really mother did." I can almost see the mischievous light in her eyes as she added, "Now you can come to my house and I wont have to come with you, you will have to play with me now! Please Mr. Tseng!". I looked at her stunned, as she spoke in all her innocence. She grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the house saying her mother said Aries should bring all of her friends to meet mom and to have tea.
Elmyra, her stepmother, recognized my code of dress. I got a look that told me she was only indulging Aries and that if I tried anything I would be dead meat. When Aries whet upstairs to get a small potted plant from her room, Elmyra looked at me hard, gazing into my soul. I held my hand up to stop her from speaking and I told her why I was here, what I had seen when I looked at Aries, and finally that I could never bring myself to hurt her in any way. Elmyra accepted this, she said she could see that I was telling the truth by the look in my eyes. This was how this plant's only Angel became part of my life. I came up with tales to tell my superiors about how I couldn't catch her. Hojo said he had time and that I shouldn't try to often less I arouse suspicions. I enjoyed my time off while in Midgar with tea parties, gardening, and just plain drinking in Aries's love of life. She worried when I left and always rushed to meet me when I returned from missions.
Times changed, in the next few years I became the leader of the Turks, new members joined, including Rude. The only thing that remained timeless was Aries. For her 14th birthday I brought home flower seeds from a vacation in Cosmo Canyon. By this time she was growing in the church and the new flowers thrilled her. I soon took a backseat position in her life when she meet a young SOLDIER in training named Zak. Aries said that it was a love meant to be. She was so happy. I tried to comfort her in her devastation when he failed to return from the same mission in Nibelheim that we all thought had killed Sephiroth. Then work picked up and we grew slowly apart because I never had a chance to visit her. There were considerably fewer of us at that time and Reno had to be trained. I must say I was extremely glad to hear that she had escaped Shin-Ra. Reno and Rude had grabbed her after the pillar incident and AVALANCHE had come to her rescue. I know that they will keep her safe from harm.
I keep seeing all the changes that I have had to endure in my short time thus far on the planet. Elana was the biggest change that I had for a long time. When I joined Turks was an all male organization, we functioned as men, worked as men, and killed as men. That safe, secure world got turned upside down the day that Rufus introduced us to this girl...to say girl would be wrong, Elana was every bit a woman. Strong and independent with a temper to match her beauty. She had shoulder length blond hair that she always kept pulled up in neat and clean hair style. Elana was always dressed impeccable in her blue suit, a suit that matched her eyes nearly perfectly, they were a stunning blue. It was a real big change to have a softer side so to say. We quit making our infamous accidents so slow and painful because it made her cringe. I made Reno and Rude quit drink earlier so that she couldn't find fault in their habits, we even got lighter on the language.
Elana had guts and was willing to go anytime, even when she was on vacation. I can honestly say that I became irate when Rude and Reno called to tell me that she had been snatched by Don Corneo in Watui along with that ninja brat. I was then relieved later when they called to say that although they have to teamup with AVALANCHE, they had gotten her back safe and unharmed. I see now that was when I had begun to think of her as maybe more then a teammate. I think that maybe she saw something more in me too. I did promise to take her out to dinner when I got back to Midgar. With all this blood loss I don't think I am going to make it back there....ever.
My life has completed a second circle. I was born alone,but enjoyed a young life with the love of my grandmother. I joined Shin-Ra alone, formed bonds of trust and friendship with Turks, and now I lie in the woods dying...alone, again. Elana, Aries, Rude, Reno forgive me, I don't think that I can be there for you anymore....
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