empathetic sentence starters
@lockedfighter sent: â you're so strong for everything you've been through. â
NORMALLY, HE MIGHT appreciate the words of admiration and accept them as being utterly true. zack has been through a lot, so much more than most, and far more than anyone would've expected him to ( least of all himself ). but as the speech reaches him in tifa's own soft voice, it almost garners a wince in response, despite the sad smile that accompanies it.
     â at least i chose this. joining SOLDIER, working my way up to the top â i had to know it was gonna be dangerous. not that it would end up this complicated, but... â
     if he'd expected to grieve his coworkers, it would have been that they'd died at the hands of the enemy; not that angeal would fall by his very own blade. not a sword swung by unrestrained madness, either â zack had been in full control of himself, just not the context.
     if he'd expected to be hunted down for months in the middle of nowhere, he'd have reasonably assumed that it would been at the hands of conspirators, of rebel groups, of wutai spies and rogue machines â not that he'd be pursued till near death by his own employer, the people he'd fought for and beside for so many years of his life. the ones he'd committed himself to at the naive age of thirteen ( too young to have signed so many lengthy contracts, the legal jargon making his head spin ).
     it turns out that the context makes all the difference, and that the unpredictable outcomes were the most difficult to prepare for.
     but tifa... she'd been dragged into this, kicking and screaming. none of the residents of nibelheim had signed up for what had happened that night at the reactor; tifa's father hadn't signed any waivers to consent being slaughtered by sephiroth. it's easy for zack to become depressed when dwelling on how his life has unfolded thus far, but compared to the true innocents whose lives had been torn apart through no input of their own, he doesn't hesitate to quit his moping.
     that smile, albeit somewhat forced, becomes wider and touches his eyes. time to crawl out of his self-pity.
     â did you forget? SOLDIERs are supposed to be strong. i guess all that training has been put to good use â that's one thing to thank shinra for, at least. â
     if it weren't for shinra, he'd never have met cloud, tifa, aerith, kunsel. but would it have been better that way, for everyone? useless to imagine; shinra had been set in motion years before they were even born, and the world would almost certainly be a better place had they not shown up with their insatiable greed and relentless propaganda. and if he hadn't joined SOLDIER, if it hadn't been him standing there watching it unravel, it would've been some other sap lured in by the promise of glory. another poor soul, living his life. maybe someone more corrupt. suppose this way is for the best outcome they could've hoped for, in the end.
discoholicmusic
yousharknotpass
origamiaround
kaledo-art
janainaart
stormborns
