Midgar was nearly a forest after the Lifestream let Zack back out. He was reborn in a rebuilt Junon. His dad traveled a lot to and from Edge and Zack took a liking to going along. His dad always reminded him not to wander, but Zack always did. One day he wandered into a ruined old building. Looked like it flooded too. Outside it though, there was a flourishing flowerbed. A young woman was sitting there. He talked to her for a long while. She seemed pretty happy and did say the flowers, and the well (as she called it) were her creations. Zack complimented them. When his dad finally found him, and chastised him Zack just said he was talking to the nice lady here. His dad blinked and glanced around. “There’s no one here Zack.” The lady winked and in a blink she was gone.
Zack’s parents got into a project where materials from the decrepit Midgar would be cleared out and a protected park allowed to grow in it’s place. Zack got dragged along, but he didn’t mind. There were a lot of the “invisible people” there and most were happy to talk to Zack, including the flower lady Aeris. She was a pretty good guide too. Led Zack to a lot of cool old bits of some old tower. He hadn’t heard of the company before though. He met a stern looking man one time in a room full of shattered glass panes. He kept asking what Zack was doing here, even though Zack thought it was obvious he was putting down flags to mark where the clean up trucks needed to go. The man seemed satisfied, but he still pulled Zack aside. “You wanna be a hero, you need to have some honor.” Zack nodded and then said, “You know I’m like…twelve…right.” The man finally smiled and fizzled out.
Aerith showed him where the plates used to be. Zack couldn’t imagine them setting up in the sky. How were the people below supposed to live. On one of them a theater seemed to be in decent shape…for how old it was. Zack sat in a chair. He blinked and a redhead in a fancy coat was sitting a few spots over. He started quoting from a play. He asked Zack what it was from and Zack said it was Loveless. “Thank gods some culture still survived.” “You people have issues,” Zack said.
“Tell me about it.”
Zack’s parents had to go home for Zack to go back to school. On the way out of Midgar their car broke down. Zack was kicking rocks by a cliffside with a weird metal monument thing, when a man appeared. He had some funky blonde hair. He seemed glad to see Zack. “I knew you before,” the man said, “In your first life. This one seems a lot happier.” “Except I see ghosts of people,” Zack pointed out. The blonde shrugged, “That was your sword once,” he said pointing at the metal thing. Zack couldn’t see it, but guessed it must have been massive to have lasted this long. “Why don’t you leave, get put out again?” Zack asked, “why don’t any of you.”
“Can’t speak for everyone,” the blonde said, “But me…I’m just scared he’ll come back.” He never explained who he was, but instead walked with Zack back over to the car and gave him some good instructions on how to fix the car again.
Zack found “him” almost a year later. Nothing was growing in this part of Midgar. “He” mostly stood still, muttering to himself. Zack didn’t like it, but kept going anyway. He couldn’t touch him, could never touch any of the ghosts. He got close enough that “He” turned. He looked half insane. He told Zack to get out a few times, then started a long speech about destroying the world. Zack mostly tuned it out. Then when “He” seemed done Zack said his bit. “I’ve seen a lot of dead people, but you…are the most unhappy about it. I mean…I haven’t seen the whole world, but I’ve seen enough to like it well enough. Why don’t you come along…see the world, instead of sitting here in a creepy rotting building while stuff changes around it.” He’d never had a ghost person follow him, but it was nice to have company on the long car ride home. Even if the wing thing made it look kind of awkward.
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