o6 | Dictated

[bustered]

[Angeal Hewley]

Cloud's gone.

[/Angeal Hewley]

[About an hour after that filtered message, Zack addresses the journal without a filter this time. His voice is that mix of neutral and tired that marks familiarity of having to bring the 'not coming back' message to people waiting for their friends and loved ones to come home. Such can be life in SOLDIER.]

For those who knew him, Cloud Strife has gone home.

Comments

[bustered]

[Lucrezia, you wild child. What would your brother think?

Fortunately, Zack doesn't know about the over-protectiveness of some of the people with whom Lucrezia surrounds herself. And fortunately his attention is kept by the journal, else he'd have been likely to spend that hour pacing. As it is, he's just starting to be aware of time passed when the soft knock sounds. Closing the journal and crossing the room, he opens the door for her.]

Lucrezia. [The smile is a little worn, but it's not like he's the energy to hide that fact anyway. He steps back so that she can enter.] Please, come in. Make yourself comfortable.

[His quarters are simple, as Lucrezia will see when she steps inside. It's not unlike the apartment he had back as a SOLDIER in ShinRa, actually. The main room is small, with a couch and a low table the main feature; a more traditional table and two chairs sit off to the side. Through a doorway-without-a-door is the bedroom, with a wardrobe also visible and the door to a bathroom. All in all it's simple, reflecting the tastes of a man who doesn't need much because he's not used to much.]

[heloise]

[ Lucrezia's smile is intact, as if this is a mere social call and nothing more. She hasn't had to experience a close friend leaving yet and perhaps she doesn't quite understand. It isn't final, after all. Unless one's dead.

She brushes such thoughts away from her mind and saunters in toward that traditional table, stopping there to cast her gaze around. It is jarring to see a room so bare, with not even embroidered fabrics to decorate the walls.

She traces the side of the table and chuckles with amusement at some memory or other. ]

My brother was granted a palace once, and then he went and gave all the furnishings and fineries to my mother. He had only walls and some chairs to sit on. A bed. Shall one say, sparing in taste?

[bustered]

[The door is closed quietly behind Lucrezia's entrance, and Zack watches her take command of the room with simply her presence. Like the surroundings he's dressed down, the uniform traded for a snug tee and dark cargo pants. Civvies, he'd call them: comfortable clothes that still allow enough movements, but a break from the physical reminder of being a SOLDIER.

She, of course, looks every inch the queen he lets her be to him. It throws some of the simplicity into stark contrast.]

Maybe we'd get along. I'm not used to having much, honestly. Quarters were assigned when you joined the army; you didn't get private ones until you got promoted like I was. But even then, you could be sent on a mission at any time. [Stop making excuses Zack; your room is really bare.] but maybe when I'm feeling more into it I'll ask your advice on decorating.

[heloise]

[ Lucrezia realizes how starkly her red dress must stand against the room, all gold embroidery and bright crimson sheen. She quite likes drawing all the attention.

Stepping away from the table, she begins to pace slowly around the room, peering through that doorway leading to his room. She turns back to him after a moment, as if only just remembering that he spoke to her. ]

Perhaps you will. My brother does not wear armor. [ Yet. There is another one who does. She has many brothers but she always means Cesare. ]

Does it feel simpler, lighter if you will, to have so few belongings?

[bustered]

[Would she ever not draw the attention, compared to a man who dresses in darker tones most of the time? Lucrezia is a woman meant to shine; Zack gave that up a long time ago.

But he doesn't restrict her from moving around as she will. The bedroom at least looks a little more lived-in, dark blue bedclothes and a table next to the bed holding things of small consequence; currently it has a pair of gloves and the token he'd won from Elizabeth, from Lucrezia at Christmas. Sword and armor are there as well, stored neatly and safely for the morrow, when he'll be himself once more.]

Armor doesn't have to make the man. [Nor does it unmake him, this Zack knows well. But his interest is not captured in this moment by the armor or the brother; the attention is for Lucrezia alone.]

In a way, yes. For a man who put his life in danger every time he goes on a mission, is it not simpler to leave little behind for the cleanup?

[heloise]

That is a morbid thought. [ Though it isn't meant as a reprimand. Remembering one's mortality is a virtue in her mind. ]

Another might choose to leave much behind that he would not be forgotten. Remembrance, some say, can be a form of immortality.

[ Lucrezia stops by the doorway, placing one hand on the frame as she peers in. Sparse even there, but she sees at least one trinket, a useless decorative thing. She turns to him with a giddy smile. ]

How did you like her?

[bustered]

It is, but an honest one. I shouldn't soil your ears with tales of the times I'd almost died, or scar your eyes with my own scars.

And my legacy, it's not in things. It's in a person.

[Lucrezia is a nosy type, he'd expected no less, and he's honestly starting to wonder at what the room would look like decorated to her tastes. Probably it would be more sumptuous than he'd need, or know what to do with.

But seeing her smile, knowing what she'd had to have spied to cause such an expression, the thought is almost worth serious consideration.]

She's stately. Very regal. [A pause, followed by a slightly more genuine smile than earlier.] But your position as my queen is secure.

[heloise]

Do you think my eyes and ears so pure?

[ Lucrezia turns around so she can lean against that doorway instead, so she can watch him with a smile dancing in her eyes. Like a challenge. ]

And am I to be yours now for you to keep thus?