Author's Note: A bigger update this time: challenges 24 (#3), 29 (#4), 44 (#1) and 50 (#2). After thinking about it a little, I decided to post these all together since they have the common connection of occuring during the first disc of the original game and focusing on the absence or loss of Zack.
"Love, I get so lost, sometimes;
days pass, and this emptiness fills my heart."
- "In Your Eyes", by Peter Gabriel
With every unanswered letter, the groove in her heart deepens.
She's still smiling, though, and every cut makes her feel safer in that smile. It's a little less for him and a little more for her. She can be happy alone because she was always alone before him, and she has lived through far worse than a broken heart.
But when Cloud stops by her near the canyon's eternal fire and sets his hand on her shoulder, the emptiness turns traitor; her chest aches with yearning that the hand touching her were just a little bigger, a little more familiar.
"It doesn't mean much;
it doesn't mean anything at all."
- "Sweet Surrender", by Sarah McLachlan
"Your ribbon—" Still in her hair, pink and soft and careworn, at odds with the shimmering dress that is too red, too dark, too new for it.
"Oh, this old thing?" she says, fingering it.
"Yeah," and then, "Not gonna take it off?" She makes no move to, and she said 'old', so he guesses: "Sentimental value?"
"It doesn't mean much," she tells him. "It doesn't mean anything at all."
But after Mideel, after his memories have been scattered and gathered up again, he won't ever remember she said so, because he never saw a day she was without it.
"Sound the bugle now - play it just for me;
as the seasons change - remember how I used to be."
- "Sound the Bugle", by Bryan Adams
When Zack dies, he rests in the Lifestream. He's no Ancient, doesn't know how to hold his consciousness together like a Cetra can. He tries, though; he's got two people he wanted to take care of, and the worry tugs on him every so often, but it's conflicting because they're separated in the city where Lifestream is sucked out of the ground, and it's weak because after five years of nightmares, even a hero needs some shut-eye. Reluctantly he rests. The Lifestream rushes over him and sloughs off the worst of the worst memories; he does all he can to hoard the important ones, memories of Cloud and Aerith.
Later, when Cloud meets Aerith and the pull's in one direction, Zack checks on them as much as he can. And if anything could kill him again, it'd be that their recollections of him have been distorted. The obvious one is Cloud, with his hodge-podge gestures and tics, the patched-up account of Nibelheim and SOLDIER. Zack has been written out, surgically excised, and it feels like he's lost his friend and his friend's lost himself. Zack can't keep from prodding Cloud to remember the truth through their tenuous connection, but he's got to take it slow. Cloud's mind is still weak; it's a miracle he's even talking, and Zack regrets not getting him out of that hellhole sooner.
The warps of Aerith's memories are subtler, held close to her heart by pink cloth and weft by time and separation. She talks about him, rarely, like he's a flirt and a player, and it makes Zack wish he could kiss her and hug her and tell her how happy he was with her and like hell he'd just ditch her. And when he gets fed up and starts shouting in the vain hope she'll hear, she tilts her head just so, as if listening—but then she smiles condescendingly, like a chesire cat turning down soured milk. "Is that really you?" she murmurs once. "I'm probably just fooling myself again." But she's still wearing pink and never says a bad word about him, even though he deserves it, making her wait five years for nothing. Like she's got two remembrances of him to even out Spike's zero. The thought blackens every other passing by.
Zack's got a living legacy—two of them, in fact; Cloud's a hero in his own way, and over time Zack realizes he's part of the reason Aerith's stronger now, able to stand against enemies in battle. He's proud of them, proud to have known them, glad if he's helped them even a little, and most of the time that's all he thinks about.
But.
But.
Sometimes, watching over them feels like the hardest thing he's done; legacies mean fuck-all when the person behind them is forgotten.
"Just give me one more moment, another walk out in the sun;
one more day to find some justice with your shadow by my side."
-"As One" by Dropkick Murphys
Underneath the mako haze, he recognized the city in the distance. It took him the long crawl of a half-hour to mull over, but he'd lived there two years. The sun crawled with the time and reflected sharply off the plate, nearly blinding him, and he remembered—the glint of infantry helmets, the sheen of their rifles that killed—and his breath hitched in his throat as sweat dripped off his forehead. Midgar was Shinra. Shinra was evil, Shinra was death, don't go to Midgar, run run run.
…He was tired. Too tired to even think of heading for Kalm instead. Why had Zack brought them both here?
Legacy. Dreams, honor. Hero. …Heroes…saved people. Was he supposed to save someone?
You let Zack die, Mom die, Tifa die, can't save anyone they're all gone and he stumbled to a halt, stomach and throat convulsing. Nothing came out. He was empty in more ways than one. Only mako kept him upright, propelling his muscles past the point of collapse. Funny thing, mako. It was the only thing keeping him alive now, but it'd made him sick first. He wasn't supposed to have it. Fragmented dreams of green seas and the darkness beyond the glass rose and he trembled, shook, nearly knelt to the heat of memory and reality. Didn't. Instinct told him: if he rested now he'd never rise. Even mako had limits. Even SOLDIERs died.
"I can't. Zack. I don't know." He didn't even know what he was talking about, there were so many things. His mind was still mired with the poison, thoughts drifting when they should race. His mouth hung open as he panted. "Need you. Please."
Zack wasn't coming back, and Cloud was losing more precious water through his eyes. He wanted to lie down. He would die either way; Midgar was Shinra and Shinra was death. Why here? Why was he here? What was the point?
"Gonna be mercenaries," he heard Zack say. "Gotta set up shop somewhere…we'll be partners once you're feeling better. I know you'll be good, I've seen you handle this sword. Not just anyone can use it."
The warm words got a hoarse laugh and a tightening in the chest. "Yeah…yeah. Got the sword," he reassured Zack, his knuckles gripping the hilt closer to reassure himself.
"…Before that, there's someone I need to see," the memory continued, and the yearning of his voice was impressed on Cloud's mind more than individual words. "Sweet girl…kept her waiting too long. I'll get a lecture, but I have to make sure she's okay."
The city swam in Cloud's vision until he blinked his eyes clear; then it lay in front of him, still shimmering like a mirage in the sunlight. "I'll make sure she's okay," he promised, and the fact that he didn't know her name or what she looked like was as insignificant as his fatigue. He was Zack's legacy, and Zack wanted this girl all right, so he'd find her and look after her like Zack would've. He'd be a hero for her. For Zack.
This new purpose was all he had, and he squeezed every drop of strength from it: enough to get him under the shadow of the plate, enough to get him to the first source of semi-clean water for his parched mouth. But the hope dimmed as he trudged deeper in the city and remembered for the first time in five years how numerous humanity was, half of it female; by the time he'd reached the train station, his will had been eaten through by doubt and he sagged, thoughts scattering once more. Tifa found him a near-blank slate that rewrote itself to impress her, and Aerith triggered no hidden memories because he had none of her, and any mention of her old flame merited only a dismissive shrug. But when the blood blossomed on her stomach and she fell into his arms—when he turned her over and realized she was already dead—the chamber was half-flooded with water, but his mouth dry as Midgar's wasteland.
"Aerith is gone. Aerith will no longer talk, no longer laugh, cry...or get angry...
"What about us...what are we supposed to do? What about my pain? My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning!"
Afterward, after he stood waist-deep in water and watched her fall to darker depths, he had time to agonize over how he'd tell Elmyra the news. Aerith had no other relations, family or otherwise.
His mind cast around for anyone she'd ever mentioned, dredged up that boyfriend who'd ditched her (just another arrogant jackass SOLDIER, now-fruitless protectiveness snarled), and he whispered without catching himself.
"I'm sorry."