These Three Days

By Luminaire

      The night air fairly slid around him like the folds of a dark cloak. It covered him, tossing his silver hair, making it dance and dazzle in the moonlight. He stood on the stoop of the old Shinra Mansion, never feeling the wind as it continued to push against him.

      Zack would be terrified about now, he thought. Yes. He was probably still standing in the basement of the mansion, trembling, trying to gather his bearings and understand everything that had just been told to him.

      A wry smile worked its way onto his face. The smile was almost sad. So much had been discovered in the last three days. These previous, torturous three days. So much learned. So much that should have been given back to him suddenly came only to steal away more. Memories all rushed back to him in a waterfall style that felt as if they were cruel enough to break him. Life had not been at all what it seemed.

      The smile immediately turned wan. He was not a person. He was . . . a specimen. He, the Great One, the hero of the Meaningless War, the greatest general of the entire Shinra army . . . a mere specimen. A figure wan in the blinding light of reality. It was in this light he swayed as it suddenly exploded into his life of darkness. It was into this light that he fell and fell and fell until he smashed into the hard, cruel-cutting surface of truth. Of what had happened. Of what could never, ever be changed, no matter how hard he wished it to leave him be.

      All his life he had asked questions. At this thought his mako green eyes burned with severe hostility. He had asked questions that were answered with lies, and he had believed every one of them. He had never suspected that he was not fully human.

      His thoughts lingered back to his childhood . . .

      The loneliness flooded back to him and struck him like a blow to the face. It had been a dark, severing loneliness that could never be filled. He had always been surrounded by adults--scientists, soldiers, Shinra executives--but never, ever allowed to leave Midgar. He had had no childhood friends, but what did such things mean to him? He had no experiences with friends. Better to think of the task at hand. Better to think of the upcoming punishment for those who had stolen away his entire life . . .

      “Let go of me!! That hurts!!”

      “Now, now, little Sephiroth, quiet down. You’ll wake up everyone in the building. Here, just take this.”

      “No, I don’t want another needle! What’s it for?!”

      “Oh, it’s just something to calm you. See? That didn’t hurt.”

      “Oh . . . oh . . . b-but . . . my arm . . . it really hurts! Wh-what did that needle do?! Ow--!”

      “Shh. You’re just going to feel a little bit sleepy. Okay? Nothing to worry about. Tomorrow, when you wake up, you’ll feel fine.”

      “But . . .!”

      “Quiet down. You’ll need all your strength tomorrow. You’re going to try out a weapon that our team has developed. It’s called the Masamune, and you’ll need that arm. See? You’ll get to sword fight. Won’t that be fun?”

      “I don’t wanna . . . my arm . . . it hurts . . . ow . . . ow . . .”

      The scientists always pushed him to do what they wanted to be done. He had suffered through experiments, tests, chemicals, strange injections, untested supplements . . . and had accepted all of it as his lifestyle. The scientists stopped testing on him as soon as he had grown to his early teens. Sephiroth’s expression darkened with hostility. Now that he had come to know the truth, the cruelty of what had been done to him as a little child seemed so clear. So clear.

      Those bastards . . .

      Sephiroth clutched his sword tighter, then threw back his head in a scream of rage. His silver hair tossed itself up towards the sky at this sudden movement, then tumbled back down, glittering . . .

      . . . glittering from the light of the torch that he held in his hand . . .

      Three million emotions tore through him in an instant. They shrieked for revenge, shrieked for action, shrieked for blood. Everyone, everyone around him . . . they had to PAY! EVERYONE AROUND HIM HAD TO PAY!!! THE SINS OF THE SCIENTISTS WHO HAD STOLEN HIS LIFE WOULD BE PAID BACK FOR ON THIS NIGHT!!

      After these three days . . . these torturous, three days . . .

      All would be paid back for . . . all of it . . .

      With blood . . . with lives . . . with people who had lived their lives . . .

      HOW DARE THEY HAVE FREE LIVES WHEN HIS HAD BEEN FILLED WITH SO MUCH PAIN . . . HOW DARE THEY . . . HOW . . . DARE . . . THEY . . .

      THREE MILLION GALLONS OF BLOOD COULD NEVER APPEASE THE HATRED THAT GREW WITHIN HIM, BUT KILL HE WOULD . . . KILL HE MUST . . . KILL . . . KILL . . . KILL--KILL--KILL--KILLKILLKILLKILLKILL!!

      With those words screaming through his brain, he took off running down the footpath that lead to the Shinra Mansion’s iron gates . . . raising the lighted torch high above his head like a beacon . . .

      . . . or perhaps like a weapon . . .

      After these three days and an entire lifetime of suffering, I will avenge the life that had been stolen from me . . .

      . . . after these three days . . .

      . . . these three days . . .

      . . . of my HELL . . .