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Zack is eating lunch in the cafeteria when his PHS rings. He glances down at the phone on the table to find a message from Tseng, his eyes widening at the URGENT label over the text.
He gives his half-eaten sandwich a forlorn look before getting up, dumping it in the trash bin, and taking the elevator down.
Partway there, the elevator stops and opens on Kunsel’s smirking face. "You heading to an assignment?" the Second asks without entering.
Zack blinks at his friend’s sudden appearance, but soon grins. "How'd you know?"
Kunsel’s smirk broadens. "There’s a lot I know that I shouldn’t,” he says like one telling a ghost story. "Don't let the monsters get you.” The elevator starts to close. “I hear they especially like SOLDIERs who eat teriyaki chicken sandwiches!”
The doors shut on Zack’s wide-eyed face, his jaw going slack. Seriously, how did Kunsel know what he’d been eating? Or where he’s heading?
He’s starting to think Kunsel hacks Shinra’s security cameras just so he can mess with his head, but his thoughts are interrupted by the elevator chiming. The lift stops, the doors open, and Zack's lips twist with apprehension as his eyes sweep across the dimly lit hallway.
He steps out onto the steel grated ground, boots clanging against the metal while his gaze catches on the large windows where mako glows and dims behind the glass. Curiosity takes the edge off his unease as he goes up to one and finds a pink materia orb being suspended by a mechanical arm, strange black stains splattered on the floor beneath it.
His eyes light up because he’s never visited Science HQ before, the tour all new Shinra employees are given skipped over it and Zack has never questioned why. Kunsel jokes it's where Shinra hides its monsters—the experiments gone wrong they don't want anyone to see—but Zack isn't bothered by such rumors since he’s certain they’re just rumors.
“Zack.”
The First jumps half a foot and whirls around to see Tseng beckoning him from around the corner. "This way."
The Turk disappears into the shadowed corridor, and Zack sputters, “Hey!”
Yet his call isn’t answered, so he scrambles around piles of haphazardly stacked crates and catches up to Tseng. He’s going to feign annoyance about the lack of pleasantries as they cross a catwalk, but he notices a faint frown on Tseng’s face and tension hiking up his shoulders.
Zack’s mouth shuts, and he keeps it close while eyeing the brightly lit laboratory behind a window they’re passing. There’s a gurney in its center and a table covered in sharp surgical tools behind it. However, Zack can’t identify what the rust red stains on the tools are before they’re crossing a large platform where he swears something growls at him from beneath the floor grating.
And okay, Zack is starting to get a tiny bit freaked out by the Science floor’s weirdness coupled with Tseng’s silence when the Turk stops and inserts his keycard into a door. Zack raises a brow as his enhanced hearing picks up on at least six different security systems unlocking. Whatever is behind this door must be very important.
Or very dangerous.
Zack frowns, wishing his mentor were still around to reassure him he's ready for such an important task as the door opens and he's ushered into a corridor lined with cells.
Tseng gestures to the second cell on the right. "Keep her safe and don't let her escape. A Turk will relieve you in one hour."
The SOLDIER blinks while the man turns and hurries away. Tseng's never been the sunniest guy around, but that had been curt even for him. Though he had been tense, noticeable discomfort flashing on his face as he left like he'd rather be anywhere but on this floor.
Zack regards the cell containing the prisoner. His eyes narrow. Maybe it has to do with her, maybe Kunsel is right and she's a freak of nature, freaky enough to scare off a Turk.
Curiosity getting the better of him, Zack goes up to the cell and peers through its small barred window.
Pink swishes on the ground. It takes him a second to realize the pink is a dress, and slender vanilla arms are sticking out of it. A pink bow compliments the outfit atop a waterfall of wavy, cinnamon hair twirled into a long braid. The window is too small for him to be sure, but the girl seems to be kneeling and adjusting something on the floor. He squints until the dirt crumbs on the girl's fingertips come into focus and he confirms she's playing in a garden when her hand strokes a yellow petal.
Wait...is that a real flower?
The girl starts, and he realizes he spoke aloud when she swivels towards him and stands. Her wide emerald eyes, shining like stained glass caught in the sunlight, lock on his sky blue.
They stare at each other, and Zack’s lips part, but no words come out—a mercy considering he’s tongue-tied.
Slowly, the girl’s brow lowers and curiosity crosses her face. "You're new."
Her voice is a wind chime, serene yet fleeting. It's also youthful, no way she's a day older than his seventeen years.
"I'm Zack," he sloppily introduces, as if she asked.
Her lips twist like she's amused and he rubs the back of his hair, embarrassed until she mutters, "So pretty."
Zack smirks, leaping at the opportunity to salvage his reputation. "The face?" He points at his cheek and sends her a wink.
For the first time, a tiny smile adorns the girl while she shakes her head. "No, the eyes!" She peers so deeply into his irises it's a wonder she doesn't fall into them.
He laughs to encourage her fawning, finally in his element. "Color of the sky, right?"
Her face falls. "I wouldn't know." She turns to the ceiling. "I've never seen the sky."
He pauses. "O-oh."
He's got nothing elegant to say, so looks down as the silence builds between them.
Zack is just about ready to kick himself when she says, "It's real." His eyes rise from the floor to catch sight of her rosy lips curving into a grin.
It takes several seconds to understand she’s answering his question, and by then yellow petals are squeezing through the bars, tickling his nose. "Here, for you!"
Zack accepts the flower without a thought, wishing he wasn't wearing gloves as her fingers brush against his while she pulls back. "Thanks," is on the tip of his tongue when a honey aroma wafts from the lily and stuns him. It really is a living flower in Midgar, something he thought impossible aside from the imported ones.
"It's not possible," she agrees because the filter between Zack's thoughts and mouth apparently took a vacation today. "I'm the only one who can grow them."
He cocks his head. "Why's that?"
"Hmm,” she taps her chin with a secretive smile, "That's a good question."
Zack grins at the challenge. "Lemme guess, you won't tell me your name either."
She giggles, hands clasping behind her back. "No need, you already know my name, Zack."
He's so starstruck by the melody, which is his name on her tongue, that he doesn't register the oddness of what she uttered until later that night while he's in bed. He can't sleep, but tosses and turns as he mulls over the mysterious girl—the flower girl—and struggles to recall her name. Have they met before? They must have if she thinks he knows her name. There is something familiar about her, so it's possible.
However, his pondering ends up fruitless, and he falls asleep without a clue to who she is.
In his dreams, he sees the girl standing in a white world amid a vibrant garden. Her eyes glimmer with unshed tears as she leans in close. "You'll find me, won't you?"
He wakes up muttering, "I always do."
Zack doesn't see the flower girl for weeks.
In that time, he realizes they have met before. It's the bow that gives her away, her worn, pink bow. The lily too gives him a sense of familiarity, but it dies within days, so it's the bow he goes back to.
He's so eager to solve the mystery of her that he jumps for joy when Tseng shows up at his doorstep in the dead of night, telling him he has guard duty again. Tseng raises a brow at the eager grin on his face, but says nothing while he escorts him to Science Headquarters.
"Due to a severe injury, the Turk manning this station won't be on active duty for months. You will be filling in until he recovers. Report here every Tuesday and Thursday at 9PM unless you're on assignment outside of Midgar."
Zack never saluted so quickly in his life, and he's pretty sure Tseng is waiting to be out of earshot to laugh at him, but he shrugs it off. Nothing else matters except the flower girl when his face nears her cell’s barred window.
As expected, the girl is playing in her garden. Her back is to him, so he startles when she chirps. "Nice to see you again, Zack." She turns and smiles warmly, getting to her feet.
Zack doesn't ask how she recognized him without looking, he just categorizes it as another thing that makes her special.
He smirks and leans into the bars. "Nice to see you too, angel."
She giggles behind her hand. "Silly." Her hands link behind her back and she rocks on the balls of her feet. "That's not my name."
Zack's grin turns wolfish. "Up for a round of twenty questions?"
Flower girl flashes her teeth. "You won't win."
The fire in her eyes makes Zack’s mouth run dry, but he shakes off her allure before she can notice and says, “Uh, first question...have we met before?"
"Yes, you were here a few weeks ago."
"...”
"...”
"...Can we not count that one?"
"Hmm, alright, but only because you're cute."
"You think I'm cute?"
"...”
"I just wasted another question, didn't I?"
"Are you about my age?"
"Yes and no."
"Heeey, it's one or the other!"
"If I elaborate, can it count?"
"Well, okay."
"I'm 169 years old."
"...!?”
"Mentally anyway. Physically, I'm sixteen."
"...!?"
"Relax, before your pretty face gets stuck like that."
"Oooh, so you think I'm pretty too?"
"..."
"..."
"..."
"...I did it again, didn't I?"
By the end of the game, Zack is no closer to figuring out her name and he doesn't mind one bit. Flower girl’s smile is just so radiant, her bubbly giggles echoing throughout the hall and warming Zack from head to toe. She's happy so he's happy, but a Turk comes to relieve him and she must see his frown, for she says, "I'll give you a hint."
Her gaze is serious, though her expression is coy. "The first time we met, you gave me this." She points at her pink bow and Zack's heart soars to the sky because he was right, the bow is important!
He strikes a heroic pose, head up and fist raised. "I'll remember your name soon. Just you wait!"
She smiles. "I'll be here."
"It's driving me crazy!” Zack grips his hair, eyes squeezing shut. “I thought for sure the list would help, but I swear I wrote down every girl I've said more than two words to, but I don't remember giving any of them a bow! Roses, chocolates, perfume, yes! Bow, no." His face flops into his hands and he tries not to scream.
Across the round table, Kunsel sets his fork in his salad bowl and asks, "Did you consider she might be lying?"
Zack's head shoots up. "What?"
Kunsel shrugs. "Well, she is a prisoner, right? Criminals aren't exactly known for being truthful," he says it mildly like an adult telling a child their stick figure drawing is a masterpiece.
Zack scowls and crosses his arms. "She's not a liar."
"How would you know?" Kunsel resumes stuffing lettuce in his mouth. "You said it yourself, you don't even know her name."
Zack doesn't have a comeback for the logic Kunsel just threw down, so like the mature SOLDIER he is, he storms out the cafeteria like an angry toddler.
Fortunately, tonight is his shift, and although he arrives twenty minutes early, Reno is all too happy to skip out ahead of time.
As Zack goes up to the door window, he notices it's barred. Sure, he's always seen the bars, but this is the first time it registers they're part of a cell and he's flirting with a criminal.
Zack hesitates to peek in because what if the bars aren't the only thing he views differently? What if he's been staring through rose-colored glasses this whole time and will now see Flower girl is really a manipulative monster?
He forces himself to gaze through the window before he can chicken out and—
The cell is empty.
His heart stops, but then Flower girl springs up right in front of the door. "Boo!"
Zack’s heart restarts pumping at full force and he grasps his chest, breathing heavily while she laughs.
"Are you trying to kill me!?”
Flower girl stops, face smoothing out into dead seriousness. "Well, I am in here for murder."
Zack promptly has another heart attack much to the girl's amusement. "Meanie!" he cries, pouting.
“Sorry,” she says insincerely, but he's too busy focusing on what little distance lies between them to care. She's never stood so close to the door before and maybe that should concern him, except all he sees are those plush pink lips a couple inches from his own and he could just lean in for a kiss—
"Remember my name yet?"
Zack shakes off the daydream, but is still dazed when he replies. "No, not yet."
Flower girl hums, turns and pads over to her garden. "It will come to you eventually."
She kneels to play with her flowers, and maybe it's because he no longer has to see her face that he can ask, "Why did Shinra lock you up?"
She doesn't stop playing in her garden as she says, "I don't know. I've been here for sixteen years."
Zack gapes. "No way...you've been here since you were born."
"Just about." She turns the soil with a little hand shovel, dirt crunching under the metal.
Zack wonders why they gave a prisoner a shovel—a potential weapon—when a better question strikes him. "If you've been here all your life, how could we have met?"
She pauses, and Zack dreads her next words will be a lie, just like Kunsel said, she'll turn out to be a dirty liar with a pretty face.
"That's easy."
She turns back with a gentle smile. "We met in another life."
Zack concludes Flower girl is a thief.
For stealing the beating heart right out of his chest.
It's a struggle not to think about her every waking moment. To the point he can't even pretend to focus on anything besides the flower girl running through the garden in his brain, and the distraction lands him in trouble three times this week.
First, he gets nicked by a Tonberry's knife attack. Flower girl fusses over the gash on his arm and gets so upset she launches a herbal plant at his eye, ordering him to mash it into paste and treat the wound then and there.
The second time, he's midway through a training session for SOLDIER cadets when a young blond manages to swipe his feet out from under him. It turns out okay when he realizes it's Cloud standing over him, training sword slack in his hand and mouth hanging open while the other cadets break into applause.
The third time is now as General Sephiroth clears his throat and Zack has no idea what he’s said. He barely even remembers walking into the man's office and taking a seat at the desk.
Seph knows it too, lifting a single brow while saying, "Congratulations on beating your record."
"Huh?"
Sephiroth's tone is bland as he continues. "Normally you do not start daydreaming until I have been speaking for at least three minutes, but today you ceased hearing me thirty seconds in."
"You've timed me!?"
"Fair."
"Sorry, sir." Zack sighs, running a hand through his front bang. "I just can't stop thinking about her."
The general's eyes narrow. "If your assignment to guard her is becoming a distraction I could have you removed—"
Zack jumps up, hands clapping together. "No! Nononono, please don't!"
Sephiroth is taken aback by his fervor, but quickly squares his shoulders. "Do you truly think it wise to date a prisoner?"
Zack flops back in his chair, chin falling on his fist. "Well, not wise exactly, but it's what I want and what she wants...isn't that enough?"
It must be because Sephiroth merely rubs his temple to stave off a headache before dismissing Zack.
Later that night, Zack runs to Science HQ, his feet thudding up the staircase since his enhancements make him faster than the elevator. Soon he’s skidding into the hall, mouth opening to greet his flower girl when he notices Tseng in front of the cells and just barely stops himself from mowing the man over.
"She isn't here."
Zack freezes, horror washing over his face.
"She's upstairs."
The First sighs in relief. “Oh.” He lays his hand over his heart and Tseng performs the Turk equivalent of an eyeroll while he guides Zack to the steps.
On the new floor, they head into a room much larger than anything he’s seen in the department so far, lined with dozens of wide glass cylindrical tanks.
Tseng stops and the SOLDIER's eyes latch onto the brightest object around, which is the sole tank that has lights on inside.
Within the container lies pink, and already his hands are pressing into the glass as his flower girl stirs from her dozing on the ground.
"Zack?" Her voice is slightly muffled as she rises and walks over to him, placing her hands on his from the other side of the glass.
Tseng might say something while he leaves, but Zack doesn't hear a thing. He's never seen Flower girl like this, never seen her whole until this moment. Suddenly all the glimpses he's gathered of her piece themselves together—emerald eyes, luscious lips, cinnamon braid, and pink bow matching her dress.
Now brown boots too, which peek out from under her outfit and replace the white sandals he’d always imagined her wearing. His eyes trail up, sailing over curves he's never noticed, and ending on her divine smile.
A hot flush crawls up his neck because she is gorgeous, an otherworldly beauty.
"Are you sure you're not an angel?" he slurs.
Her rosy blush is worth every second of embarrassment.
Kunsel apologizes weeks later, but Zack waves him off. Still, Kunsel goes on from his place on his living room couch. "I wouldn't have said anything if I knew you were in love."
"It's fine,” Zack huffs as he bobs up and down, finishing his squats. "It brought us closer together anyway."
"Really, how so?"
Zack tells him what he's learned about Flower girl since they last talked, finishing with, "Still don't know her name though." He stops squatting, face falling. "I hope she's not angry, it's been months."
Kunsel is oddly silent before saying, "So Tseng said you'd only be guarding her for a few months, right?"
"Yeah."
"Well, it's been five, so isn't that injured Turk overdue?"
Zack smirks. "I'm not complaining."
Kunsel huffs and leans back into the cushion, arms crossing. "I'm just saying, enjoy it while it lasts."
Zack frowns, and the frown sticks with him up till he leaves for guard duty. His time with Flower girl has never felt limited, but Kunsel is right, that injured Turk is bound to return eventually, and once he does Zack won't have any excuse to see her anymore. Maybe Tseng will let him visit, but he doubts the man will let Zack in as often as he likes. Also Tseng isn't always in Midgar, and without him, there will be no one willing to let Zack visit his girlfriend.
"Angel?" Zack leans into the barred window, desperate to see her, but it's dark inside the cell. He squints and makes out his flower girl's shape prone on the cot, her chest rising and falling under the sheets.
He watches for a bit, a fond little smile on his face. She has seemed tired lately and it is late—it's always late when Zack comes. Only now does it occur to him that Flower girl might have been forcing herself awake just to see him all these months, and he's as sad as he's moved by how much she cares.
"Sleep tight, angel."
Maybe it's his imagination, but her lips curl up at the sound of his voice.
"How did we meet in the other life?"
Flower girl dips her fingers into the dark soil while she uproots a daisy. "You fell out the sky,” a grin chimes in her voice, “Gave me quite the scare."
Zack chuckles, arms folding over his chest. "Oh, so I was the angel in that life?"
"No.” Aerith's smile sharpens as she gently massages tangles from the daisy’s roots. “I don't think you're pretty enough to be an angel in any life."
"Hey!"
"You were a SOLDIER in the other life too."
Zack's eyes widen as her tone becomes serious. "You kinda scared me.” Her hand stills around the flower. “Back then, I thought all SOLDIERs were scary because SOLDIERs fight and they love it."
His face crumbles when she adds, "But you were different, you're always different." She turns back and looks grave, though she’s smiling. "You don't fight because you love it...you fight to protect people." Her smile turns radiant. "Don't ever change, Zack."
They're in the rec room when Kunsel asks, "You know how your girlfriend is an Ancient?"
Zack nods, eyes on the tabletop football as he turns the handle to kick the ball to Kunsel's side. "Yeah, she told me all about it. That and the whole bringing Shinra to the Promised Land gig."
"What if she fails?"
"Huh?" Zack looks up and misses the ball coming towards his goal, Kunsel scoring the winning point.
"I mean," Kunsel straightens up from the tabletop, "Shinra has been waiting seventeen years—even longer if you count the time they worked with her mom—and they've got nothing to show for it."
"I know!" Zack beams. "That's why I told her Shinra has gotta let her leave soon. What's the point in keeping her locked up if she can't give them what they want?"
Kunsel stares at him for a long moment. "Are you aware of what happened to her mom?"
Zack’s face falls. "She died."
Kunsel hesitates, then delicately says, "It was Shinra that killed her." Zack's blood turns to ice. "The experiments were meant to help her locate the Promised Land, but they ended up destroying her from the inside." Softly he adds, "I'm not trying to scare you, but shouldn't you be a little concerned the same thing might happen to your girl?"
Zack can honestly say he isn't worried.
Not until his flower girl walks up to the barred window and collapses. Zack tears the door off its hinges and throws it back, falling to his knees as alarms blare, and cradling her unconscious body.
Tseng runs in days later, but in reality arrives within minutes, and Zack has to fight himself to let go of her so the paramedics can check her vitals.
They wheel her away on a gurney and Zack remains motionless long after they’re gone, unaware anyone else is still around until Tseng asks, "Are you okay?"
He doesn't bother lying, just shakes his head while white noise drums in his ears. Tseng doesn't leave his side until he's seen Zack home and the SOLDIER should thank him, but his angel's crumpled body keeps popping up in his head. Her glassy eyes, skin pale as snow, and heartbeat an erratic thrum shuddering beneath his fingers. It's the first time they've truly touched and Zack can't properly appreciate her powder soft skin when all he can think is how fragile like glass she felt in his arms.
This is the first time Zack understands it's not how much time together they have left he should worry about, it's what little time she has.
Something tells him she doesn't have long.
"I really scared you, didn't I?" Flower girl sounds guilty and tiny through the glass, but Zack can't face her. He just hunches over his crossed legs, back to the glass cylinder, head bowed and eyes moist.
He hears the tap and squeak of her hands pressing into the glass behind him and imagines her warm arms curving around his neck, drawing him into a tight embrace. It's like a mother's hug, a nonverbal promise that nothing can hurt him as long as he stays in her arms.
Zack’s breath hitches while the tears start to fall and the imaginary hold squeezes him tighter.
"I love you."
She says, he says, doesn't matter.
It's true either way.
Zack goes to Sephiroth because he's his superior and his friend, which means Seph has corporate power and likes Zack enough to perhaps use it for him.
"Could you convince President Shinra to let my girlfriend go?"
If Sephiroth is shocked, it doesn't show as he stares levelly across the desk. "There's no need."
Zack thinks there very much is a need since Shinra is killing his girlfriend, but Sephiroth assures. "She is being released in three days." Zack gasps and Seph's lips quirk up. "I spoke with the executive board and it was unanimously decided she is no longer of use to the Company, thus she will be released once we've procured her an apartment and proper compensation for her service to Shinra."
Zack bear hugs the general and doesn't get a Masamune through the throat only because he dodges in time.
Zack runs to Science Headquarters despite it not being his shift for another hour, body burning with excitement because Flower girl is free and he can’t wait to tell her!
The hallway door unlocks and Zack skips in, but stops at seeing her cell is open and barren. In front of it stands Professor Hojo, a smile smeared across his face that sends shivers down Zack's spine.
"Looking for the specimen, yes?" Hojo adjusts his glasses, teeth gleaming under the overhead lights as he slinks towards the staircase. "Fascinating, so fascinating to see my experiment surpass expectations."
"Experiment?" Zack frowns, following Hojo warily.
"You being a crucial element to the project," Hojo’s expression warps with cruel anticipation, "I must explain this to you now so the experiment can reach full fruition."
Zack doesn't respond. He doesn’t want an explanation, he wants his flower girl.
Yet Hojo takes his time going up the stairs while he mutters more to himself than to Zack. "I recently discovered an error in my plan to conceive a new generation of Cetra, for I mistakenly treated the specimen's biology like that of the average mammal's. However, unlike a human female, the specimen was not born with unfertilized eggs.”
Hojo glowers, hissing in annoyance. “Since implanting fertilized eggs into the specimen did not produce the desired results, I reviewed my old research notes until I noticed a pattern I originally deemed irrelevant."
He shakes his head, greasy hair swaying as he slides his keycard in a door and it opens with a click. The man walks into the room, going up to the circular containment unit, and Zack stares fixedly at the girl trapped inside the glass. He’s still as a statue while Hojo's grin sharpens.
"Cetra are in fact natural breeders, they reproduce the same way they make flowers grow. By willing life into existence!" He cackles like the madman he is. "So remarkable, these Cetra. All they need is the will and the desire for life to flourish, then flourish it does!”
Hojo sneers. "However, unlike humans, Cetra require an emotional as well as a physical connection in order to conceive. Now that you have forged that emotional bond, the specimen has developed an unfertilized egg. All that's left to complete the procreation process is for you two to physically join. Then Shinra will have a new, more reliable breed of Cetra to lead them into the Promised Land."
The glass container slides open in clear invitation, and Zack steps into the doorway, expressionless as he tonelessly asks, "Why was I chosen for this experiment?"
"You were recommended by the Turks." Hojo shrugs dismissively.
Zack lets that sink in. "I see."
"In fact, a Turk will be observing your session to make sure things do not get out of hand." Hojo stalks off down the aisle, flippantly tacking on, "If the specimen is uncooperative, try not to damage her too badly."
Zack waits for him to disappear around the corner before fully entering the containment unit. The door slides close behind him as he approaches the angel sitting against the glass, face buried between her knees while she hugs her legs to her chest. His angel wears nothing save a white nightie that's too short to hide the red bruises on her ankles and wrists. No doubt she put up a fight against the removal of her bow.
The SOLDIER takes a knee and gently reaches out to caress her bare hair. "Angel?"
The girl’s head jerks up and her eyes are huge.
Zack tries to smile. "It's going to be okay." He leans down, but her eyes don't get any smaller as their faces near each other. "Trust me.” He takes a deep breath and exhales, ”Aerith."
She gasps while he tugs her into an embrace and buries his face in her neck. The smell of springtime and sugar plums floods his nose, and he inhales her divine scent until the surveillance camera in the top corner of the container stops blinking red, Tseng turning it off no doubt.
"Y-you remembered?"
Zack pulls back and grins like a champ. "I always do."
Aerith’s eyes glisten, realizing he really does remember, and his eyes narrow as he stands and rips out his sword. "Let's get out of here."
The glass shatters and hand-in-hand they run.
Sephiroth finds them hiding in the staircase after Aerith redresses in pink, bow crowning her head once more while sirens go off throughout the building.
“Care to explain why you’re committing treason?” the general asks, staring them down with crossed arms like he caught Zack stealing from a cookie jar.
Yet Zack smirks, noticing the genuine concern lining the man’s voice, and he’s all too happy to tell his friend the truth.
"In summary," Sephiroth says once he’s explained, eyes closing in thought. “We are currently in an alternate reality or timeline Aerith created when she transported herself back in time and took over her seven-year old self's body, and if I do not allow you to escape neither you, she, or I will survive beyond our mid-twenties."
Aerith nods, hand over her heart and expression stern. "This isn't the first time I've tried to save you, Zack, and the others. The last seven times I couldn't even prevent the Nibelheim Incident."
Sephiroth's eyes widen slightly, then narrow. "Either you managed to hack into Shinra databases from your cell or you are telling the truth." Seeing Zack's confusion, he elaborates. "I received a priority mission sending me to Nibelheim today."
The general pauses, thinking. "It's earlier than I planned,” he eventually says. “But I intended to abandon Shinra soon regardless."
Zack's brows leap to his hairline as Sephiroth pulls out Masamune on a group of infantrymen rushing down the staircase. The group takes one look at the general and his blade before fleeing the way they came.
That's pretty much how it goes the next couple of times Shinra tries stopping them.
Tseng is leaning against the wall of the deserted lobby, arms crossed, while Zack's group strides towards the front doors. Kunsel is waiting for them on the freeway in a stolen truck with a shell-shocked Cloud as his passenger. Zack doesn't remember much about his life in the other timelines, but Aerith insisted Cloud should leave with them so Zack called Kunsel and the Second promised to take care of it. "Taking care of it" apparently meaning kidnap the poor cadet, steal a truck from the Exhibition Room, and drive said truck through a window, landing on the freeway below.
Sephiroth and Aerith go on ahead at Zack’s urging, the teen doubting anyone will dare to give them trouble. Tseng must notice him there, but doesn't look up as Zack approaches, asking, "This was your plan all along, wasn't it?"
The Turk raises his head and turns to stare at the dark world outside the glass doors. "No, I merely set things in motion.” He smirks a little. “You did all the heavy-lifting."
Zack grins, recalling how uncomfortable Tseng had looked the day he assigned Zack guard duty. Tseng hadn't been scared, he’d been disturbed by Hojo's plan to dispose of Aerith once she produced offspring in the hopes that the newly-born Cetra could show Shinra the way to the Promised Land.
"I didn't know what you would do." Tseng finally meets his gaze, dark eyes locking on his sky blue. "You're simply the only SOLDIER I trusted not to hurt her."
Zack's face softens. "Not in this lifetime, not in any life."
Tseng huffs at his earnestness, but Zack smiles as he exits through the glass door and leaves Shinra behind. Aerith is standing outside staring up at the night sky when Zack joins her. Starlight shimmers in her emerald eyes while his arm curls around her waist.
"Must be nice to see the sky for the first time, in this life anyway."
"Yes." Aerith smiles. "But I'd give it all away if it would save you this time."
Zack knows she means it, the girl did spend ten years under lock and key for his sake after all.
He pecks her forehead. "I'm not planning on dying anytime soon, but even if you do end up having to restart the timeline," he leans into her face and vows, "I'll always find my angel."
They kiss, run into the streets, and leave the glass tower behind.