Xmas fic for the Vincent fans ^^

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 11:36:23 GMT

Biya, Saki, this is more for myself than for you, and for that, I'm sorry. XD Though if you want to request anything specific, shoot now or forever hold your peace after reading this (Saki, still working on that lampshade business, don't worry). Confusion is imminent, though hopefully minimal. You tell me your interpretation. ^-^

Margy, work your magic please.

Yes, I am well aware that today's the first of Feb.

Fandom: Final Fantasy VII
Rating: PG
Characters: Vincent, Yuffie.

"Vincent?"

"Yuffie."

"Look at me when I'm talking to you, Vincent."

He did, and she regretted the request. He was sitting on the floor and she was standing on a pile of books, but even from this vantage point his eyes dragged her in and swallowed her whole.

So that, to feel safe, she backed instinctively out of harm's way. A cascade of papers rained down on her - not at all quietly - but his soul had turned inwards. Again.

"How long are you planning to stay down here, Vinny?"

There were cobwebs in his hair. She could almost see spiders between his eyelashes and rats making home of his clothes. Or maybe they were only a trick of the light.

He was becoming a trick of the light.

"What are you looking for anyway?"

He was being eaten alive by the dusty light and woolen silences.

"Vincent?"

"Salvation."

"Sal...vation...?"

"Yuffie, leave me alone."

She did, because night was falling. But his dark obsession had become hers also, and he was her own Pandora's Box.

--

The second time, she found him leaning against an empty bookshelf, asleep, apparently. So he did sleep, at least, and the thought comforted her.

The comfort didn't last for long, however. When she got close enough she realised his eyes were only half-closed, that his misty gaze was directed to the other side of the room. She followed that gaze and found a small notebook, sitting by its lonesome, the last on the numerous shelves that stretched to the basement ceiling.

"The last book."

An arrow could not have pierced her more than that quiet mutter.

"What-"

"The. Last. Book."

She ate his words, one by one, and they tasted of acid.

"It has to be in there. It. Has. To. Be."

"Vincent...are you okay?"

When he didn't answer, she was almost grateful. After the small, yellowing book had released her eyes and she cast them back on Vincent, she found the man really was asleep.

--

She slept too, on some occasions, and dreamt always of books.

Pages swirling in patterns, fast, and words peeling from the pages, uniting in one black mass against a yellow background. Her secret was standing in its midst, his mouth open, receiving some words as they came, snapping at others as they flew past. Hungry. Eager.

She tried to read, but the symbols were strange. Or else the handwriting was cramped and unruly - like that of a doctor, a scientist, a being possessed with a furious passion. The words had form - a hideous form with horns and wings and claws. A form that enveloped Vincent as he tried still to bite, to defend himself, but gagged him as he tried to swallow.

Wutainese, she saw, but still could not interpret. And in her frustration she tore at empty pages, but the words escaped, and they wound tighter around Vincent, dragging him into a moving ocean of black, where someone - something - was waiting.

--

The last time, he was awake before she was.

Sunlight burned her eyes, but was crystallised in his. After days (weeks, maybe) of deliberation, the last book was open at his feet, and, she was not surprised to discover, it was written in her native language. A large, untidy scrawl.

Vincent looked at her - it could've been the first time he had done so - and Yuffie understood.

"Vince, I can't." She could have cried; the helplessness in his eyes hurt her so much; shook her faith in everything stoic and unchanging. "I can't read it. I can't. I won't. What if I found what you were looking for before you did?"

And what if she found nothing at all?

"Yuffie."

Her body shook, because his voice had. As a consequence the book shook as she picked it up, and the building shook as her eyes battled with the malformed symbols.

"Vincent, it's...a diary." The pages protested as she skimmed through, crinkling and decaying under her very fingers. "I can't make heads or tails of the content...he was a...crazed lunatic and...great Leviathan, he wrote poems! Vincent, it's a diary. It's nothing but a diary. Nothing."

And the tears really did come then, in pain, perhaps, but perhaps also in relief.

--

The fire burned, chewed, and licked its delicious sacrifice. The book, already dry with age and evil, blackened and died in an instant, producing little smoke but lots of ash.

She fancied she saw the writing sink into the ground, eaten by the Lifestream because the writing itself had failed to devour its prey. Vincent stood silently beside her, safe, if for the moment.

"I'm sorry for forcing this on you," was what he said finally. But she knew he would use her again if she came in handy, and again, she would allow him.

"It's okay, Vinny." She had to square herself up for the next question: "What are you going to do now?"

Because salvation had ceased to be even a possibility. At least, this form of salvation has.

He didn't answer. But she had learnt to feed off his silences as well as his seldom-spoken words.

Yuffietine was how I got into writing FFVII fanfiction. While this fic was not strictly a Yuffietine, I did have fun recalling the old days. ^^

What if...?

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 00:24:15 GMT

That road back there; you wish you had taken it while you still had the chance, but now you can't turn back. Do the regrets eat at you? Perhaps when you're young, the anger at a lost opportunity can consume you, but as you grow older, as you find out there's always a better course of action, that the right path is always there but for some reason you can never walk down it...

You learn to stop wishing.

Fandom: Final Fantasy VII
Rating: PG
Characters: Hojo, Gast, Sephiroth, Aerith

Be calm, he told himself. Breathe in. Breathe out.

Behind him, the children huddled on the topmost step of the stairs, observing him with quiet curiosity. Two pairs of green eyes burned into the back of his neck.

On the coffee table in front of him were two mugs of hot tea. There was a little puddle of tea on the table itself too, spilt by the shaking hands of the woman who laid the mugs down.

And on the other side of the table, Gast sat in a squashy armchair, contemplating him with a level gaze. Behind the man's glasses were frustration and confusion, but that awful amount of understanding and tolerance still remained. The old scientist was waiting, his hands clasped together between his knees, still wearing the snow-pants in which he had first greeted his unexpected visitor on the doorstep to his Icicle home.

The fire in the fireplace crackled. The ticking of the clock was maddeningly rhythmic.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Hojo cleared his throat, reached for the mug, found it too hot, and returned his hand to his lap.

He bit his lip.

After a while, Gast sighed.

"Aerith? Sephiroth? Come down here for a second," he called. Tiny footsteps pitter-pattered down the stairs in twos and fours. Two pairs of green eyes stared up at Hojo unabashed from their new position behind the coffee table. Gast put a hand on one shoulder of each of the two youngsters.

"This is an old friend of daddy's," he said softly, smiling down at them. "His name is Simon. You can say hi to uncle Simon, instead of gawking so rudely at him like that. Go on, say hi."

"Hi uncle Simon," they chorused.

Hojo made an odd noise at the back of his throat. Breathing had suddenly become very difficult.

"Sephiroth here just turned five about a week ago," Gast continued, ruffling the silver hair of the older child. "He's about to attend the local school, but he can already read like a big boy, so we're very proud of him."

"Really..." Hojo attempted a smile too, but it came out more like a grimace. "So you like to read, Sephiroth?"

"Yeah." Eyes shone with unnatural intelligence. Shone the way his mother's eyes used to shine.

"And...do you like it here...with you mom and dad?"

"Yeah," he answered again, then poked out a tongue at the toddler with the amber curls next to him. "Could do without Aerith, though."

The little girl mimicked him and hugged Gast's knee, pouting. Her father put a tender, protective hand on her head, and Hojo watched her grin unfold like a flower.

"Now, now. Do that often and one day your tongues will freeze outside your mouths," Gast gently scolded. "Why don't you two go outside and finish that snowman army you were making? Daddy and uncle Simon have a lot of catching up to do."

The kids went obediently. From outside came the sound of their laughter and shouts, evidence they were enjoying more of a snow battle than a cooperative building game.

Hojo reached for the mug that had cooled, and took a gulp of tea that was still too hot. The clock ticked, and Gast's eyes were locked onto his again.

"So." The older man said. "What is it you've come to say?"

H.

Xmas fic for the Vincent fans ^^

What if...?