Disclaimer: Same as the first chapter, I don't want to waste my time repeating it.

Help Me Fly Away

Chapter Two

Heading To That Special Place Of Mine

All these thoughts need to get out of my head. That's why I always drive the longer route down through Midgar, heading up to my special place. You know, clear my head so that I can think straight and take in all that has happened when I calm down.

The city of Midgar looked so desolate in this sector as well as lonely now that in is covered with the early November frost. It somehow manages to cover up and wrap itself round all the structures and ruins. Because of this glimmering glassy frost, the crystal-like snow which continued to fall from the grey, fake sky slid down onto the road thus making the journey even longer.

This is one of the other endless reasons that I hated the so-called 'beautiful' snow.

The roaring sound of Fenrirs engine was almost the only thing I could hear among the abandoned scraps of metal in the Sector number seven. After taking a deep breath, driving down an endless straight road, a snowdrop landed itself on top of my pinkish nose, instantly I had tried to swat it off my skin but fearing I would lose my balance on the bike I left it there to melt away. In the end though, it caused a numb sensation to surface on my nose, which I didn't like at all seeing as it is very distracting.

Everything looked so broken in this sector because of what they'd done, that stupid ShinRa Company and there little lap dogs the Turks. Some of the Turks though they aren't that bad, or so I'd though, at the time when Zack had introduced me to his friend Reno Sinclair I'd immediately though that he wouldn't be that bad of a guy considering he was a Turk. And well, at the time he wasn't that bad of a guy.

A part of me was thankful that he saved me that day, who knows what the other cadets at the time would have done to me...

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Running through the locker room, breathing heavily, I only hoped that the other cadets weren't still chasing after me. I paused for a brief moment to make sure that I'd lost all of the violent cadets and slumped straight down against a locker closest to the wall. I know that if they found me I'd be completely cornered and beaten mercilessly but in a strange way I felt safer crammed against the dirty blue painted wall.

Light muttering perked the attention of my ears and I almost let a small yelping sound slip between the trembling pink, cut open lips. Shivering slightly I instinctively curled up into a ball shoving my head straight into my shaky kneecaps.

I had totally forgotten that today was the day that Luke and his gang of delinquent thugs would beat me into a helpless pulp after our materia fusion class, and as I usually did afterwards I would rush out of the class back to the barracks. This was only because under the supervision of the 3rd Class Sergeant they wouldn't lay a finger on me unless they wanted to be cleaning the latrines until their promotion.

I never understood why people picked on me of all people, was it because I had a small delicate bodily frame, because I had long blonde hair with baby blue eyes (granted this fact is why I looked like a girl). Or maybe it was the fact that I was the youngest in the selection of cadets since I was fourteen at the time and my fellow un-supporting peers were around their late teens or young adult hood. The light muttering of the sadistic gang of cadets turned into threatening yells:

"Come here Blondie, I wanna see that pretty face of yours!"

"You can't hide from us you little fuck, were going to find ya eventually so just take it like the man you don't look like."

My breath became ragged and I could feel all of the crystal encased tears gather in my blue eyes as their sadistic chuckles filled into the empty locker room. The air around me became denser as one of the cadets found me cradling myself and trying to stop the fear of getting beaten overcome me although it became apparent it was since my frail body refused to stop shaking. This of course made the sick cadet smile and my anguish.

Don't they just let the nicest people join ShinRa.

He slowly strolled towards me, taking a twisted pride in the fact that his presence made me shake and breath heavily. "Hey guys I found the little pussy over here in the dark corner where he belongs!" The cadet with his infantry helmet hollered to his gang, delivering an unmerciful kick to my shin. The impact hit me painfully and I let the cry of agony break itself free from my lips which consequently fuelled the boy to do more damage.

"Oh what have we here huh?" The youngest and most perversely violent boys, Luke, spoke softly yet at the same time eerily as he walked down towards me. "Its little Strifey trying to run away from us like the coward he is, well girly boy we've got a surprise for you today, something you may not... enjoy as much as we will."

All four of the cadets circling the corner I had stupidly trapped myself into laughing manically as Luke grabbed a fist full of my golden hair to raise me up. He saw that I was stubbornly looking down at the ground and placed his left hand onto my chin and forced my eyes to meet with his. As he prepared to do the unavoidable to me, he released his grasp of my hair to roughly stroke my tear-stained cheek. All I could do was let the tears fall freely down my face as they laughed at me and called me a loser and a pathetic mess of a cadet.

Luke slowly slid his hand from my tender cheek and navigated it toward the buckle of my belt.

"I always knew you were a pretty boy Strife, do you know what happens to pretty boys like you in the army ay?" I shook my head violently, wanting to believe this wasn't going to happen, but the look on his face proved it all. The sick twisted grin of his turning to a blank expression as he was handed a small blade from a tall cadet besides him. He immiedetly switched the position of his hand and small blade; his hand pushing the right side of my face into the locker, exposing my pale neck and the blade dangling between the waist band of my uniform trousers and the leather belt. He began to kiss and lick my neck, gaining the small uneasy chatter between the three cadets who were witnessing what he was doing. He silenced them with a threatening glare before cutting through the leather material of my belt.

I was trying to resist him with all of the strength I could muster but it just wasn't enough. Squirming under his weight did not help me get free at all; it only made him tighten his grip against my face. "Don't struggle Strife" he threatened, "Nobody wants to help somebody like you anyway."

He started to slowly pulled down my trousers, laughing as he saw that I was both scared and completely humiliated by his own actions. He trailed his fingers up my legs, making me thrash underneath his hold, which of course did not go down well with him. His fingers clenched into a fist fast and struck hard against my stomach. The sound of the impact was enough to make me sick, but the strike itself made me cough up splatters of blood which made the insanely violent teenager in front of me feel the need to hit me again for ruining his uniform with my own 'worthless' blood.

Again the cadets behind Luke murmured nervously about hearing faint footsteps approach them. "Shut it you idiots! Nobody comes around to these lockers after classes you're getting paranoid you twats." His words became uneasy halfway through as his ears also picked up the small sound of slick black shoes walking passed the cracked tiled wall and through the grey door into the locker room. My eyes widened in both relief and embarrassment as the wild fiery haired man in a scruffy black suit strolled through the changing room door.

"What the fuck is going on, yo! Get off of Strife NOW!" Reno bellowed at the mortified cadet whilst the others had dashed towards the exit besides them. Reno managed to grab one of the escaping cadets by his pale neck and slammed him to the floor (rendering him incapacitated for a while) before pulling Luke away from me as he violently 'pushed' his face into the locker. In my own twisted sense of relief, the noise it made was quite satisfying to hear.

"Come on Kid, Lieutenant Fair's getting worried you know." Just like that I had followed him as he stepped out of the old broken down changing rooms. The cadet was still out cold but Reno said he'd get someone to deal with him later and that was the last I ever saw of him. I hurried in front of him when we where nearby Zack's place so I could ask him a quick question.

"Does Zack ever speak about me?" I asked, the redness that surfaced on my cheeks spreading wide across my face as Reno looked at me with one of Zack's trademark puppy grins.

"All the time, now let's not keep ol' lover boy waiting shall we? He's already nervous enough as it is without you making 'im freak out like you have."

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Here I am, finally. The air is thick with the smell of dust, sand and the fumes from the city that I am overlooking with harsh deepened blue eyes. The cracks on the ground separate the dirt from a previous battle a while ago. Although the markings are still there even if people can't see them, I can. I can see him still, laying on the ground bloodstained skin and bruised and broken figure writhing on the floor before getting back up only to be knocked down again.

A sudden anger overcame me suddenly, it may seem petty but this matters to me. Zack's sword, his rusty tarnish buster blade lay flat on the ground rather than stood up slotted into its rightful place as his grave marker, a hero's grave marker.

Letting Fenrir slam to the floor I ran to his sword, quickly pushing it back into the ground before hugging it tightly letting the iron that was cold from the harsh breeze freeze my face. "I'm so sorry..." I whispered to the object I was cradling like a newborn child that needed care.

I let my forehead rest against the rusty metal of the blade, closing my eyes, I thought who could of done such a thing as defile a hero's grave. Never again I thought. I would never let this happen again. "Never again... If you're watching me from the heavens Zack, I promise it's not going to happen again, I'm so sorry." That was all I could say at the time.

What if he was watching me? What would he think? Would he be proud of the fact I put Sephiroth to rest and that vile Professor Hojo that pushed him over the edge or would he love the fact I still held onto my remaining memories of him. Or would he be... ashamed... that I've neglect many of my friends because of all the grief and heartbreak the loss of his short lived albeit happy life (until the end of course).

As I stayed there curled up in the shadow of his sword my mobile phone rang uncontrollably. Every second that passed didn't hold anything close to the silence that I craved. Tifa had rang god knows how many times, the voice messages she left on my phone showing that she was sorry that she snapped at me but got progressively harsh because I wouldn't picked up. She knew I never picked up my phone, why does she have to be so awkward all of the time.

Besides from Tifa, I had other calls to return as well. There were a few customers that I needed to attend to or speak with for work related reasons, so I'd probably leave those calls until last. Cid had also rang me, something along the lines of catching a beer together at his new girlfriends folks bar, in all honesty It felt like something I could use but as always I'm probably going to say I'm busy with work. Lastly, just when I thought it was finally over, I heard the voice of a red headed egomaniacal Turk blare through the phone that I'd chucked on the ground of frustration.

"Yo Cloudy boy, why don't ya ever answer you god damn fuckin' phone for once in your life, geez man you know how irritating it is to hear for the thousandth time a shitty little computer generated fake voice saying that you're not available? Listen let's talk serious for a moment yo, the presidents got something in his possession that might peak your curiosity, in fact I know it will, so ya better have your scrawny little ass over at the Healen Lodge at noon tomorrow. It's the place nearby Kalm and that ol' chocobo farm 'kay?"

The phone beeped for the final time; thankfully this noted that Reno's message was the final one I had to listen to. In my opinion, it was a fairly strange message for him, he actually sounded serious for once and anybody could see that he naturally wasn't a serious person. He was more like the kinnda person who would rather send text messages his friends instead of carrying out his highly important assignment. It was just in his nature, his extremely childish, immature nature.

Another few minutes passed before everything went eerily quiet, normally the howls of the nearby wolves can be heard or the hastily smooth sound of the wind flowing through the valley. But there wasn't anything, not a single sound could be heard. That's when it started, that's when the voice talked to me.

Now now Cloud cheer up a bit alright? He probably got some good news; I know you think otherwise though. You can't hide from me Cloud, I know everything. Now pick up my buster blade for me and carry it with you always. It was nice to have someone place a grave marker for poor old me, but we'll make another one when we get the time to too but for now, I'm sure you should go and see Reno Rude and Rufus.

This voice, it sounds familiar, way too familiar for my liking.

Just do me one favour Cloud, please don't trust them too much...

I won't, I promise.

And don't get into too much trouble on the way there Blondie.

"Zack, is that you?" I cried out to him, out stretching my arms out towards the grey sky, frantically stretching to reach for his hands. I yell out for him more and more and I still didn't get an answer for him. Slumping onto the ground, coating my knees which hit the floor with dust and dirt, I forced my arms upward. I wanted to find him, I wanted to see him again. But something did happen, something that made me undoubtedly know he was looking out for me.

There in my gloved hands was a pure white feather with a distinct angelic appearance resting softly in the palms of my leather coated hands. After quickly scanning the sky surrounding me, it became apparent that it didn't come for a wing of a bird because there was no a single one I could see. It came from the life stream, from the heavens, from his very own spirit and everlasting soul.

"Don't worry Zack, I just need a bit of rest first, that's all."

A/N: Well, It's been a while hasn't it? Trust me I'm ever so sorry I haven't updated in a while its been a busy few weeks so far. But I plan to post the next chapter soon as an apology to all those who've had to wait so long. Oh and one last thing, please please review and give feed back, I do send messages to those who don't so don't think I wont bother to because I will and in fact, I have XD please read, rate and review. Much love for those who do, and the first three people to review get a sneak peek at the third chapter, sound fair? Hope it does Bye x