|
One year before Final Fantasy VII begins, former SOLDIER 1st Class, Zack, is able to break free of his confinement within Shin-Ra Company, Zack accompanied Sephiroth, Shin-Ra's elite SOLDIER, in the investigation of a malfunctioning mako reactor. During that mission, he bore witness to Sephiroth's descent into madness and the merciless slaughter of the village at Sephiroth's hands.
Though he survived that massacre, he and his friend, Cloud Strife — Final Fantasy VII's main protagonist and a native of Nibelheim — were taken captive when Shin-Ra officials arrived to round up the few survivors and cover up the tragedy to prevent their name from being sullied. Professor Hojo, the Head of Shin-Ra's Scientific Research Division, decided to use Zack, Cloud and the other apprehended survivors in an experiment to test his Jenova Reunion Theory, but after four years of stolen freedom, Zack has escaped from Hojo's lab and taken Cloud with him.
They quickly slip away from Nibelheim, with the intent being to return to Midgar, the heart of Shin-Ra's empire and home of Zack's girlfriend, Aerith Gainsborough. However, Shin-Ra orders their elite espionage and assassination division, the Turks, as well as regular military units to find, and, if necessary, eliminate the two escapees. Yet Tseng, the leader of the Turks, is hesitant to take Zack and Cloud's freedom from them a second time. Conscience-leaden and wracked with conflicting emotions, he orders his subordinates to capture them alive if at all possible.
With Zack and Cloud approaching the end of their year-long trek back to Midgar and the pursuit of the two escapees building to its head, Tseng reflects back on the events that have led to this situation before departing with his subordinates to intercept Cloud and Zack along the last leg of their journey. It is here, on a bluff within sight of Midgar, that fate will take a tragic, unexpected turn, and the events of Final Fantasy VII will begin.
Shin-Ra soldiers—acting on their own, despite orders to await the Turks' arrival—kill Zack, who falls in battle due to a wound he took in Cloud's defense. However, they spare Cloud's life, noting him to already be in a heavily-impaired state and expecting that he will shortly expire anyway. They lie about the outcome of this situation, stating that Cloud escaped while Zack was killed in his resistance.
Cloud manages to regain consciousness shortly thereafter, though still highly disoriented. He reaches Midgar, taking Zack's Buster Sword and the SOLDIER uniform he gave him. There, he's reunited with Tifa Lockhart, and—after his recovery—she convinces him to take a job for AVALANCHE, the underground resistance movement fighting to topple the Shin-Ra Company. Final Fantasy VII then begins.
|
Spiras Destiny
Yunalesca
Final Fantasy World
Final Fantasy Synthesis
Enix Squared
Forgotten Memories
Final Fantasy Republic
