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A/N: And lookie, a chapter to go with the prologue!
Disclaimer: I fail to own FF7 or the characters. Damn youuuu!!
--: Illusion of Fate :--
Time is a physician which heals every grief.
Diphilus
-01-
Timeless
Her fingers twined almost expertly around the shoelace, as he watched from the corner of his eye. She didn’t look at him, not once, and even when she leaned back, she raised her eyes to the stars.
“I’m going to leave this village and join Soldier,” he said, but was unsure more than ever if she was even bothering to listen to him. Not that it would have surprised him if she wasn’t. She swung her legs a little, and then replied quietly in that serious manner she liked to adopt, liking to pretend she was beyond her years.
“All the young men are leaving the village.”
What did she want, an award? A ribbon: well done for paying attention? He felt irritated by her almost flippant and generalised response, and hanging onto that frustration, he turned his shoulder a little. But she swept on, a little breathless, still looking up at those far-flung stars, still not paying a single whit of attention to what he was doing.
“Make a promise, if I’m ever in a bind, you’ll come a rescue me. Like a hero… every girl wants to experience that at least once.”
“…sure.” He felt a little sour saying it. She didn’t want Cloud; she wanted –someone- to be a hero for her. So he really was nothing.
But that was her choice… and that was how things went…
Tifa Lockhart had long since frozen and the first cracks in her defence appeared.
Years earlier, her mother had died in Nibelheim and it was that death which had burned her so deeply, and now, the very company which should be protecting the village and the villagers, was turning on them and doing this? It was all too much for her to comprehend and with a running dash to her steps; she came into the town and grabbed at the arm of Zangan, her martial arts trainer.
“Master, what should I do!?”
“Tifa, good, quickly, help me.”
“Tifa?”
The choking cough drew her attention and her hand slipped from Zangan’s arm, her eyes falling onto the burned and bleeding form of a woman, once beautiful, her golden hair soot clad. Her eyes were a pale blue and looked up at her steadily from the mass of agony she was. “Mrs Strife!” Tifa cried out and fell to her knees by her. “Are you alright?!”
“Tifa, I’m dying… your father… he ran to the reactor!”
“The reactor, but why?”
“He follows Sephiroth… he follows death…” There was coughing, and inevitably, blood. “I won’t… I… tell Cloud… to… be strong… Tifa… Cloud…”
That was it, the last breath in the woman was for her beloved son and Tifa found herself weeping uncontrollably, hand gripping the badly burned and mangled one of Cloud’s mother. This was all so senseless! Where was Cloud, why wasn’t he here, helping them all in a time like this?
Then a single thought clarified in her woe that her father was going to the Reactor. The Reactor was maintained by Shin-Ra but the journey there took them over the cruel and jagged Nibelheim Mountains. She knew the way better than anyone else alive, and yet…
“Master,” she cried out, spying him pass, “Master, I’m going to the Reactor!”
“Tifa, what?!”
“My father, he’s gone there…”
A hand shot out and clapped heavily about her wrist, just as she was setting to spring into action, “Tifa wait, Zack has already gone too.”
“Zack, the other Soldier?!”
“He was helping us with the fires, and then chased after Sephiroth to stop him.”
Tifa’s gaze swung wildly in the flames, from the kindly, gruff face of her master, to the people milling around, the blue helmet of the lone Shin-Ra foot soldier who had been left behind and was trying to help – it moved to look at her and she stared bloody murder in turn. Shin-Ra… she hated them.
“I don’t care!” She screamed and wrenched her hand free, “He’s my father, I’ll help him!”
“Tifa! Tifa, wait, Tifa!”
The cry fell on deaf ears, her long legs were working quickly as she ran up the path past the Shin-Ra mansion that would lead out onto the mountain path, passing the body of the dead photographer and churning up the picture taken a day or so previously, of Tifa, Zack and the dark, oppressive Sephiroth. It fluttered in her speedy wake only to be stopped by the foot of the blue uniformed foot-soldier.
He leaned down slowly and picked it up, gazing at it for a long moment, then to her almost vanished figure.
“…Tifa,” he breathed.
She lay there, barely moving, barely twitching. The blood pooled underneath her and with frozen lips, Tifa Lockhart bitterly cursed. Her eyes were dying, the world fading from view, a shimmer of tears the slick glass she looked through, distorting everything. Tifa Lockhart was dying.
It was all so fast; she had made it inside only moments before Zack, her knowledge of the mountain pathways aiding her pursuit of Sephiroth. But she had also been too late, for on the wide grate before the inner reactor sanctum laid the crumpled and broken body of her father. His skin was ashen pale and in one hand, gripped by the blade, he held Sephiroth’s sword, the Masamune.
Shin-Ra… Soldiers… War… Mako… she hated them all.
She hated them for taking away everything she had ever loved. She hated them for burning the town, for destroying lives, for sacrificing things which should have meant something, tossing people like dirty rags to the corner. She hated them; she hated them so very much.
Laid here, a weak and useless hand to her middle, she wondered exactly what she had expected to achieve, running up the stairs after Sephiroth, trying to… hit him with his own unwieldy blade. It was so foolhardy, that she would have smiled had she any strength left to mocking rue her own inane actions long after the fact. The fact of course being, that he had stabbed her. She was slow, she was weak, and she was dying.
She hated him just as much as all the other things.
Zack had fled past her, trying to stop him, but he too had been thrown backwards and knocked unconscious, the massive buster sword he kept clean and sharp skittering away under the pods. She dimly saw the glint of light on the edge of it, like a thousand diamonds, like a starry night sky and not for the first time, she felt futile tears welling up.
Where had all the young men gone? It was left to a town of aging residents and young women without partners, children and babies, to face this terror alone? What had they done by leaving the town, if not condemned it to death.
The face of her father, the peaceful, charred expression on Mrs Strife’s face – they burned her to the quick.
The tears came and trickled, cold on her heated cheeks. There was little warmth left inside her, she was almost entirely bled out. The blood was rapidly losing any warmth it had once had too and she lay there in a crumpled design at the bottom of the stairs until through the glimmer of stars and tears, there was someone there, dark faced. His hands were not strong, but they were kind and cautious. They picked her up, and a voice said softly, “Tifa.”
It was a hero, a hero come to rescue her, but too late now, far too late. She sobbed without energy, “You came.”
“…I…” There was a distant crash, and then she was lowered again to the lattice steel floor, the gentle touch vanishing.
“Go, stop him… before it… my father…” she murmured, close to the edge of passing out.
“I will.” The voice was far away, she heard dim snatches of other sounds, but everything was growing dark but for the sparkles of light.
She watched them, dancing together, dancing alone or solo as they might prefer to term it. Just the darkness and the light, together, forever as one, it was beautiful. Her eyes almost closed, Tifa Lockhart was dying…
He floated aimlessly, not knowing, not seeing, just breathing into the tube, suspended.
He sometimes felt as though people were looking in as he dreamed aimlessly. His dreams were made of fire and blood and sometimes, he would almost open his eyes before overwhelming lassitude overtook him once again and he would drift back into unresponsive dreaming.
There were screams in his dreams, dying screams, terrified screams, screams directed at him, screams of hollow loss that echoed on and on. The vision of his lovely mother, crumpled and dead, her golden hair the broken aurora of light and her blue eyes, half open and looking far away, to places he could not follow yet.
He floated there, until a rapping noise woke him briefly and with confused eyes he saw the blurred image of a young man with dark hair, caught in a similar type of tube, filled with green liquid. He was gesticulating at something, but he could no longer remember the coded hand signs for Shin-Ra employees.
So Cloud closed his eyes, and dreamed again of his mother, the fire and the dying…
…and of Sephiroth’s jealous, hateful eyes…
Dear Zack,
Hey, are you even getting these? You better be okay. You’re going to laugh so much but I feel like even though you’re far away and I’ve heard nothing, I know you’re still alive at least and hey, that’s something right?
I’ve been thinking, even though I’m afraid to come out of hiding because they’ll find me, I wouldn’t mind it if sometime, you took me riding on that bike of yours and showed the fields of flowers to me. We could take a picnic, a chequered blanket, just you and me, it’d be fun you know?
I saw a review of the play Loveless, the one you told me about before you left, with your inside connections? It looks interesting, there’s this girl who falls in love with a guy, but she dies towards the end of the play. It’s really sad and somehow the main male lead has to find a way to continue after. I think that’s how it should be, learning to carry on. People don’t deserve to be alone, or sad, or … well you know!
There’s been a lot of commotion recently since you left, Zack. I don’t know the truth of it but Shin-Ra has started to act even more strangely. Ever since Avalanche started leaving me alone and the Turks backed off a little, I hardly get to hear stuff like I used to. But when I’m in the church, and you’re gonna call me crazy again, I just know you’re thinking it, but when I’m there, the planet tells me “change.” That’s all, that’s the only word. There’s a big change coming Zack, and I think it involves me, seriously, this time.
I wonder… will you be here for it?
So write me back, alright? I’m starting to think you’ve found another best female friend to hang out with, that would be seriously ‘not cool’ as you say.
…’not cool’ – your command of the language appals me sometimes!
Anyway, lots of love and flowers!
Aerith xox
It had been years since she had awoken in the small medical clinic, her horrific wounds bandaged and healing and only the letter from her master left to her upon awakening to comfort her. The bruises took even longer to fade, but swathed in cotton and spirits to help soothe her rattled nerves, Tifa had devoured the letter and digested every last scrap of information.
Shin-Ra had put a ‘clause’ into action, being that they denied all knowledge of the Nibelheim incident. It wasn’t even denial per-se but a complete revamp of the town so it looked as if no fire had ever occurred, as if Sephiroth had never rampaged there and tore everything down within days. People were buried in the graveyard, the mansion locked and forgotten and tales had begun to die out. All that was left to Tifa now was the considerable sum of money her father had willed to her, and the business assets. Of course, Zangan asserted, Tifa was still his greatest student and gifted with a unique flair for the martial arts.
She rested then, unable to think of anything to do, especially as Zangan had paid upfront for her entire medical bill, perhaps born from guilt of not saving her, because of those wounds. When the bandages came off, two weeks later from the date she had awoken on, there was a vicious and terrible scar.
Tifa had wept.
But, as her mother had always whispered painfully, at least she was still alive.
So picking the pieces up, buying passage on the boat to the other continent, Tifa got herself new clothes, a replacement passport and took a ticket from her past towards the one place she was sure she would be able to at least find a couple of people who had previously left Nibelheim.
Midgar.
It was, in a word, gross.
She hated the city, she hated how it looked, and she hated the smells, the people, the snide attitudes, the underhand dealings. She hated the filth, the high and the low divide, the plate and the trains, the way people suffered. She loathed it deeply. How she came to find herself in sector seven of the lower plate, she wasn’t entirely sure. Tifa Lockhart was a girl with some serious cash, a good upbringing, excellent scholastic accolades, not to mention a well trained fighter capable of opening her own fighting school or ‘dojo’ as they were also known.
However it was here, by the front of an arcade that had seen better days that she held the card up and re-read the address given to her by Johnny, a childhood friend. It was here that the doors burst open and two people, arguing, filed out from the building. A few more trailed after, looking vaguely interested in the fighting and she stared.
One was a man, easily six feet or more, with dark skin, buzz-cut hair and a jaw that could crack granite. He was very solidly built, in a miss-mash of army gear and a tight metal abdomen covering. But it was not this that held her eye, it was the gun grafted to his arm that did.
The other was a young woman with toffee coloured hair, large brown eyes and a similar ‘guerrilla’ style way of dressing as the man did, her expressive, long fingered hands wore short fingered gloves, a dirtied bandana was rolled across her brow and a streak of mechanist oil besmirched her cheek.
“Then get the damn schematics from him before he decides to do a runner!” The woman was snapping.
“Yo, Jessie, ain’t gonna take that kind o’ shit from ya!”
“What? What’s that supposed to mean!?”
“I’m the leader here!”
“You’re the guy who lost the schematics, I’m pretty sure people in a coma could do a better job that you.” She snorted, “and if you don’t get them back, you’re gonna find my fist in your face! You’re new here, you know? I’m asking nicely cause of your little girl. I don’t wanna see anything bad happen to you, y’know?”
“Leave Marlene outta this!”
“Too late Barrett, she’s in this as much as yo-“ It was then that Jessie appeared to notice her, stood to the side in unassuming clothes. “Huh?”
“Hey,” she muttered, “Johnny told me to check in with you.”
“Johnny? Why? Look, we don’t need anyone else bothering our plans up.”
“Plans?”
“Yeah, we’re Avalanche and we’s gonna take down Shin-Ra, simple as that!” The loud man asserted, giving her a hard look, even as Jessie sighed and looked to the side. “Whut?”
“Nothing, but I’m sure if you shouted it a little less loudly, Wutai might hear.”
Tifa blinked, lowering her hand and the card, her suitcases by her feet. “Avalanche the terrorist group?”
“Freedom fighters,” Barrett shot back, “We’re lookin’ fer a way to get out from under Shin-Ra’s thumb, fer the truth, fer some justice in this stinkin’ rotten craphole they call a city, life even. Freedom, girlie, what we all want so dearly.”
“He’s right,” Jessie said calmly, “…and we don’t have time to babysit a ‘nobody’ right now.”
“I might be a ‘nobody’,” Tifa said quietly, looking down, “But I want a slice of that revenge as much as you.” What was she saying?! In horror she felt her voice carry on, “I want to get back what was taken from me. I’m a survivor, from Nibelheim.”
“Nibelheim?” Jessie did a double take, “The place they denied the reactor incident at all those years back?”
“I guess. It wasn’t the reactor though… it was a man, just one man, and Shin-Ra let my town burn, my friends and family die, and they deny everything. It’s not right, it’s not fair.” She gritted her teeth, “I hate them, I hate it all.”
“…Join the club,” Barrett rumbled, but after a moment of her staring at her booted feet angrily against tears that felt hot, burning with the terror fuelled fire inside her, a hand was thrust into her vision and she jerked back, looking up in surprise. “I’m Barrett Wallace.”
“T-Tifa Lockhart,” she murmured, putting her hand into his.
“Welcome to the club, Tifa. You an’ me, we’s gonna get on jus’ fine.” His smile was large, and white, and she believed it, she believed so desperately.
It took a while to settle in of course, and along the way, she came up with an ingenious idea of how to hide their activities from prying eyes. Tifa, with the wealth left to her, bought out the lease for the old ramshackle arcade and got it converted, so she could open a public house on that very spot. Underground, via use of an arcade pinball machine, was their high tech hideout, but above ground was hers alone and with success to come from her good cooking and excellent way with spirits, Tifa became the proud owner of the flourishing Seventh Heaven…
…a new home…
Those eyes looked from the sky, to him and he creased his brow. “…Zack.” The word was strange and familiar; the tang of something he felt was bittersweet.
“On... my behalf,” Zack breathed softly.
“Your behalf?” Cloud repeatedly numbly in the floor of rain.
Zack was crying, Cloud realised, crying as he reached over with one arm, ungainly, “That’s right, you will…”
“…you will…”
“Continue living,” the was a grate and suddenly the beautiful and ancient seemingly buster sword was thrust into his hands, the edge keen still, the blade nicked with wounds from hard battle, and then, even as he held it tightly, another hand came up and gripped the back of his head, pushing him into Zack’s chest. Blood from the bullet wounds painted his face, and he slowly sat upright, looking in wonder at the fallen Soldier as he whispered, “You are…proof that I existed. My dreams and my pride, I give them all, to you…” There was another slight shove on the blade’s handle, and an expectant silence, as if there was but one thing he was waiting for.
Cloud murmured, “I am proof you existed.”
Zack smiled, the hand falling away from his head to the ground… and only the rain fell now, the chest of the warrior still. Cloud drew a breath, wishing so hard he could make the fog in his brain move, wishing he knew what was hidden from him and then, choking on a sob, he screamed his sorrow to the skies.
Perhaps half an hour later, when the rain had abated, he looked down at the still and peaceful body and said like a mantra, “Thank you, I won’t forget. Good night… Zack…”
Zack. Friend… Zack…
With the blade in hand and the sun brightening his way, he began the long trek towards Midgar as behind him, there was a shimmering and dissolving…
Her eyes widened.
“That girl, she said she was afraid of the natural sky. But, it feels so great, right? Those wings of yours, won’t you lend them to me? …and what’s this? This feels so great as well… …I’m a hero now, right?”
“Zack,” she said softly, the flowers falling from her hand, carefully picked for the wagon that day, to the floor.
…and she cried then, for Aerith knew Zack was gone…
In his hands was the blade of Zack Fair, the polished blade, intricate handle and materia slots. It was held awkwardly in the hands of Cloud and he seemed to lean upon it carelessly for support, cradling the weapon like a love long lost, but found once more. He murmured, over and over to himself, “I am proof… I am proof.”
So she came to him and knelt by his side, a hand to his chin to keep his head upright, looking him directly in the eye, vacant, abandoned. “Cloud.”
“..T…Tifa?”
“Cloud… what are you…?”
“Long time no see,” he mumbled, “It’s been what… uh…” he gritted his teeth against some kind of pain, his eyes wincing shut, then they opened, a thin trickle of blood running from his nose to lip, “…Five years.”
Five years?
That would have placed it at the Nibelheim incident, but there had been no Cloud, there had only been destruction. Seven years would be closer. But on inspection of his state, Tifa couldn’t bring herself to wreck his world with that.
So, forming the words correctly, she lied.
It was an art form she had always been skilled with, only this time she was lying for greater stakes than a pretty dress or some extra attention. This time, the truth was a foul thing that could probably destroy what was left of Cloud’s sanity.
“Yeah… five years…”
So it went from there, she eventually managed to get him back to Seventh Heaven and in spite of all of Barrett’s moaning, she was doggedly determined to nurse him back to health. At first she wasn’t sure why she was doing it, it took weeks for his rehabilitation back to the point where he was capable of speaking clearly, moving efficiently and even fighting.
It was Barrett who took her aside one evening, standing on the porch of Seventh Heaven, drinks in hand as inside, Cloud listened carefully to Jessie’s explanation of bombs and drew pretty pictures with Marlene (who showed considerably more artistic talent than Cloud possessed).
“So, what’s the deal?” He rumbled.
“Deal?”
“You in love with the spike?”
“At first, I wondered that. But I don’t think that’s it. I’m not his childhood friend, I’m not his childhood anything. We didn’t get along as kids, we barely spoke, I was in a cut above him… and we both knew it. When he left the town, I wasn’t all that interested. As time went on though, I sometimes wondered if he’d made it into Soldier. He didn’t write home much, his mom suffered a lot because of this I think. I resented his freedom, I wanted it too though.” She sighed and took a long drink. “It’s not love, no.”
“Then what is it? Yer not friends, nor are y’mooning over his spiky ass, I dun’ get it.”
“Imagine, though its not hard to for people like us, that everything you ever knew or loved, was destroyed so singularly… everything you had anchors to was gone. Because Shin-Ra ‘said so’. Cloud’s a part of my past… and if I can save him from Shin-Ra, maybe I can somehow get some small part of it back.”
“He says you saw each other five years ago.”
“…I know.”
“You gunna tell him?”
“When I’m ready,” she swirled the drink around in the glass, “When he’s ready. There’ll be a time… and when that time happens, I think it’ll come out right, in the end. He’s that last link to something I once cherished… and I’m not ready to give it up, not yet.”
She lifted her eyes to the plate-filled sky. Were there stars out tonight?
She missed stars… they were constant, they were bright, they lit her way.
Tifa Lockhart finished her drink.
The ice rattled empty on the glass, twinkling in the dark…