supersoldier | ( aefenglom inbox. )

[Should he be concerned?]

Nothing like that came with me to this planet. My only means of healing now is a useless restore materia; not a means of healing at all, now.

Is someone injured?

[Damn.]

More like sick. I figured something from our planet would speed up the recovery.

[Sick? Sick could mean a lot of things: from a random bout of food poisoning to the Cwyld spiderwebbing across someone's insides. Of course he's going to ask for clarification.]

How sick? Anyone that I know?

[Right, he should have figured.]

Don't know if you know 'em. A friend's bondmate. Her name's Zelda.

[He thinks.]

And I don't know. It's not the Cwyld, but whatever it is, it's enough for the coven to be taking care of her.

[Zelda. The name rings familiar, if only because his interactions with the Mirrorbound have been limited, given the sort of man he is — and those that he met upon his first arrival are sketched more permanently into mind by way of being strange and new.]

I met a young woman named Zelda when I first arrived. It could be the same one.

[Not that this helps the issue at hand.]

If it’s a sickness born of this world, there’s no guarantee that anything from ours would help. Undoubtedly the Coven has more the means to research and diagnose a native ailment than us.

[He hates how that sounds like something out of the mouth of a researcher, but. It is what it is.]

I know that isn't comforting.

Maybe.

[He wouldn't judge. He's barely clear on her name himself. ...It's the kind of person he is. They haven't met, she probably doesn't know his name, and he's only invested in this because it's salt in a long unhealed wound for Nier. If she worsens, he will. Not even because they're bonded.

It's something else, something worse. Something he's seen in him, through his memories, a madness that rivals any Sephiroth's future may or may not afflict him with.

That's his investment in this.]

It's fine. And I know. It's just this world's medicine seems all about weird herbs and animal horns and stuff.

[To him, it screams absolute bullshit. What can be said? He's not an expert. He's anything but an expert. But he's a man of his time. He's more given to trust factory-sealed, mass-produced items rather than any essence of nightshade-sounding alchemical stuff. To him, all that's missing from Nier's own list of things to mix up to make her better is three cackling old hags.]

Edited 2020-08-16 17:41 (UTC)

That's true.

[And it is strange, for those from worlds that rely on manufacturing, on science and technological achievement dictating the strides of progress back on Midgar. As often dictated by Shinra, of course.]

But their medicine has worked for them up until this point. I wouldn't call it into question.

Even so, there are others here from Gaia. [And he doesn't mean Zack.] You can ask them, if you can stomach it.

[It's funny indeed, that arrogance. But hell, even backwaters like Nibelheim long turned their backs on old-school hocus pocus. It's... just something he's used to. And it's a hard habit to break.

But. That last point...]

Others? [He had no idea.] Company guys?

Turks. Rude and Reno.

So again, if you can stomach it.

[Someone’s a little salty at anything representative of Shinra, but at least he’s given them wide berth.]

Pass.

[Can he? To say it's a complicated relationship between his faction and the Turks is... putting it mildly. That's not even mentioning his own personal sentiment which... yeah. Isn't great.

So yeah. The salt Sephiroth might be inadvertently projecting? It's met with salt.]

Thanks. For the heads up. But I'll find something else.

Understandable.

[Hey, he feels you there.]

I assume you've had a run-in with them before?

Kinda, yeah.

[Faint hesitation. But...]

Remember me telling you about Shinra dropping the sector 7 plate? They were the guys the company got to pull the trigger.

Had a couple other run-ins with 'em too. Nothing /that/ bad, [Some of it actually useful...] but I don't want anything to do with them here. For the meds, for anything. There's got to be another way.

Edited 2020-08-21 18:01 (UTC)

[That was them? This will be a revelation that'll weigh directly on Rude and Reno's shoulders should he see them again -- as though they are to bear the weight of Shinra's sins made manifest. In other words, not very flattering information to learn.

Not that Sephiroth cares. It makes them all the more deserving of it, to blindly follow the company's will despite the detriment it might bring to others.]

I know that they will not be openly approaching me. [For obvious reasons. Also maybe Sephiroth had not been all that kind in his communique with them.] Maybe the same courtesy will be extended to you, if they're even aware of your presence.

Which they will be, in time. [A Turk is a Turk, after all.] Just make your distaste known.

Yup.

[Didn't have to tell him twice. Even with Wutai considered, they're not friends. Not even allies. And that distaste? It's not gone.

...But right. Of course, Sephiroth wouldn't be approached. He's got the intimidating as all hell thing going for him even without the both of them thinking he's something he isn't.

...Speaking of which...]

You should know. That thing using your body laid out their boss. [They're not going to try for revenge though. He's certain. Still...]

Do they know? That you're you.

Edited 2020-08-24 20:39 (UTC)

[It's hard to know what to say to that. One more reason to hate his supposed future; one more reason to place the blame of origin on Shinra's figurative shoulders.]

Did it? Why?

[A question wrung out of emotional response. He does want to know the facts, and the dread uncertainty reverberating through their bond doesn't need to be pointed out.

And also-]

I didn't tell them directly. I made my interactions with them purposefully vague. Maybe that was cruel of me, but it guarantees their distance.

[zero regrets.]

He was in the way.

[Blunt, sure. But that's all there was to it, right?

It wasn't as if that creature gave a shit about anything but what it was programmed to do. It obeyed its programming. It was a virus. Certainly not a consciousness. Initially, it had looked at him in the cargo hold of that ferry, and not known enough about Sephiroth himself to know Cloud as the man that killed him- to access that anger, that arrogance that was him, to recognize him.

Did it even know what it was saying as it talked about the Promised Land? As it manipulated the mouths of the bodies of those who had been transplanted with Sephiroth's cells to spew out the last echoes of his madness? Or was it just reciting old thought processes, old feeling, lingering sentiments that came with its link to him?

Did it even know the real Sephiroth was in the Northern Crater? Or did it only see him as another piece of itself to rejoin?

...Questions.
So many still exist.

But. He snaps out of his thoughts, only to realize a few minutes have passed since his last message.

So.]

It's not cruel.

[ He doubted the Turks would be sore over hurt feelings even if it was.]

It's just a hunch, but they probably already know. Not like network searches and stuff like that is hard, and like you said. They're turks.

[But.]

It's not like they can call it in. Even if they could, No-one's gonna come after you. Anyone'd prefer Heidegger's boot at their neck to having to bring you in.

[Even before the whole. Nibelheim. Thing.]

[Should he pursue that line of information? There's still so much to discuss, so much more he could add after his own conversation with Aerith before she departed. But Sephiroth isn't sure the last few have truly settled in his mind; he isn't sure if he's ready to drag those thoughts out into the open again, leave them hanging raw to be discussed, and then pack them neatly away a second time.

Not quite yet, at least.

And so-]

But they'll be curious. Sometimes that's motivation enough.

[That's true...

But there's also Wutai. Not the whole working together thing. That's been and gone in his head. It's more what they were doing before that...]

Is there a woman with them? Blonde. Kind of short. High strung. Talks a lot, too.

[A high strung woman?]

Not that I’m aware of.

Should there be?

There's that at least.]

She's Tseng's replacement. Reason why I brought her up is the other two take their work seriously. But, they also take their free time seriously. Getting taken away to another world might count as free time to them. Which means, they'll be passing time like everyone else in here and leaving you the hell alone.

[Read: On their asses somewhere getting drunk. Probably.]

Not her though. She's big on overtime.

[And, despite a few ...comical encounters, she does know her shit. She'd have found him, just like Reno and Rude have. But the fact that she hasn't made herself known...]

Doubt she's here. You'd know.

[And that's fine by him. By way of his reputation and what his future self has done, he cannot imagine a Turk that would want to approach him, even if they are something of a workaholic.]

That doesn't mean she may not arrive someday.

[But, maybe more curiously-]

Tseng's replacement? What happened to him?

[That sure is a Question.]

[That makes sense. He probably hasn't met any Turks like Elena...]

Maybe. If she does, you'll probably hear some stuff.

[Last time he saw her, she did try and slug him. But...]

He ain't dead. That thing using your appearance injured him pretty bad. Still is, far as I know. She was brought in to make up the numbers, I guess.

[More news of that thing, shaped like him, wreaking havoc. Sometimes it's hard for him to draw the line between them; sometimes, it's hard not to feel the gnawing malaise of knowing that his future consists of so much violence, so much blood. Even if he has no love of those loyalty to Shinra these days.]

I see.

So then she's competent enough.

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