Setting: If you played the game, you know the drill and when this is happening. If not. Um. Look it up on the intertron? =3 Note: For arguements sake, their both legal. A large amount of info about the characters in this game is under dispute, especially their ages. Tifa is 21. Cloud is 22. Zack is 22. Sephiroth is at least 28. Etc. Enjoy! Warning: SIZE!
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The cool air of the Nibelheim Mountains filled my lungs with each step I took, my hiking boots crunching down on the loose gravel as I lead the small company of Shin-Ra's finest up the mountainside's winding pathways. It was all happening so suddenly: the messenger from Shin-Ra telling us to prepare for a detachment of Shin-Ra's military, the townspeople readying Nibelheim to be receiving a whole squad of SOLDIER's finest, and my own feverish pursuit for news if Cloud would be one of the First Class SOLDIER's. Yet here I was a few weeks later, hired as a guide for the group on their mission to the mako reactor nestled deep in the mountain. Disaster had already struck and we were down a member from our original number of four; one the the infantrymen had tumbled out of site when one of the higher rope bridges had snapped, sending all of us plummeting down the mountainside. The sun was setting, the brilliant luminare partially obscured by the jagged peaks of the mountain and it set the sky ablaze, the mako in the air toward the peaks made it a deep purple. I paused for a moment, leaning my hands down on one knee as I stared up at it, smiling softly.
"Gorgeous, isn't it?"
I glanced to my left and found myself staring up a the closet thing to a celebrity our small town had ever seen. Sephiroth was a First Class SOLDIER operative, a war hero, and poster boy for the Shin-Ra military effort. Propaganda reports from Midgar claimed he had ended to Wutai uprising single-handedly, though there were murmurs from town that suggested otherwise. He continued to stare at the setting sun, his blue eyes eerily bright and partially obscured by his long, flowing silver hair. I couldn't help myself and my eyes began wandering down his well-chiseled form, wanting to thank whomever had talked Sephiroth into donning a uniform that left nothing to the imagination. The crunching of gravel caused me to casually rise and turn around, taking in the other two members of our party. The other First Class, Zack, was conversing with one of the two Shin-ra infantrymen. Zack was everything I'd expect from a young man in the military: loud, bold, endlessly energetic, and always eager to prove himself as a man. He certainly looked like a man anyways. He was a little thin but incredibly well-defined; I admit, I'd snuck a glance once or twice at his upper torso, critiquing. The final man was extremely quiet and didn't have much to say to me or his superiors; everything was a quiet affirmative or negative and he cradled his rifle as if it was his first-born.
I saw Sephiroth turning out of the corner of my eye, folding his arms over his chest as he began to spew military jargon at the other two. Rolling my eyes, I turned and started toward a small cave, cupping my hands around my eyes and peering inside of it.
"Everything in Mt. Nibel is so cold and wet...I really hope we don't have to go in there..."
"Could be worse, we could have to stay in there."
I spared a critical glance over my shoulder at the grinning face of Zack, his hands folded over his chest. He raised his eyebrows and rocked back and forth on his heels, rolling his eyes slowly.
"Of coooooourse we'd have to share sleeping bags." He leaned in close and smirked. "Don't worry. I sleep like a rock."
I huffed a response and took a few steps into the cave, the sound of dripping water echoing from deep inside it's confines, an eeiry mixture of greens and blues illuminating the cave walls farther in. Zack casually strolled past me, hands folded behind his head.
"Mako energy...it's what makes the patterns on the walls and gives the cave illumination."
I nodded an affirmative and hurried in his wake, scared to be left alone in here but not wanting to look helpless either. "Makes sense, since they built the reactor here to harness it. I'm just surprised it's turning out...monsters." I gave him a suspicious look and stopped walking, placing my hands on my hips. "Know anything about that, Mr. SOLDIER?"
He spun around slowly and raised his eyebrows, his face adopting a look of betrayal mixed liberally with confusion. He slowly raised his hands to his chest, pointing his index fingers at his face.
"Me? Withholding information? Pshhhh..." He waved non-nonchalantly at me and turned back around, leading us toward the glowing lights. I looked over my shoulder at the small circle of light from the outside then scurried along behind him, wringing my hands anxiously.
"Shouldn't we be waiting for the others?" Zack didn't even bother turning around to look at me, ambling along confidently into the mountain, not even bothering to unsheathe his sword off his back.
"Sephiroth told us to split up...so we did." He looked back at me...then looked down my body and back up, offering me a lopsided grin. "Luckily I chose to wander the same way you did."
