“And fighting time so much I ask,
I will this moment last forever.
Though seasons change and things come to pass,
Remain inside of me.”

— VNV Nation, Standing.

Phase I. Standing

He looks into the sky covered with wide, misty white clouds, all of it beautifully bright. The sun still tries to press in despite the gathering gloom as if it’s determined to shine, obstacles be damned. His tinted lenses allow him to stare at the glowing patches of brightness, an impossible task if he had been unadorned, watching as they burst and fade all too quickly. Standing motionless in the barren expanse of land, a sentinel of this forgotten, miserable place, Cloud watches as a beam of light bursts through the overcast sky like a spotlight, like a hand held out in blessing, ready to save or secure.

Cloud holds out his hand with his palm towards the sky, his gloved fingers curling in as the light touches him, instantly warming the skin beneath.

“… Sunlight,” he mutters, surprised.

It felt like he was dreaming. It was two years since the relocation to Edge, and still Cloud wasn’t used to recognizing sunlight anywhere near Midgar, the once shadow scar on the face of the Planet. He didn’t understand why he should have such a problem sometimes: the differences between Edge and Midgar were obvious, the issue of sunlight being one of the most obvious. Only one spot in Midgar proper ever seemed to get any sun, and that was—

—a dangerous train of thought to board, but one he returns to constantly, like a pilgrimage the mind takes to its darkest corners, as if by repeating this process it might gain something valuable, information most necessary and desired…

Or lose.

What was left of him to lose? He would have laughed if it were at all funny (and even then maybe not It had been so long since he’d laughed). It wasn’t as if he had anything else to give up besides the most basic, pared down essentials of life, life itself. As if it’d be worth giving. Weak and powerless… that’s all the promise he could ever offer anyone, without fail or hesitation.

His body was his own betrayer, enemy and opposition joined deeper than bone, in a place beyond flesh. A manipulated life, that’s all he was—distorted, a flawed specimen, capable of enduring so much but producing nothing in return. He took and he took and he took—but what could he ever give that was worth anything?

He absorbed it all—the injections, the tests and extractions, his body made into a home for the tip of a syringe, the tainted blood, HIS cells, HER blood by extension, the Mako… but these weren’t the only things that composed the man he recognized as himself. The memories, others’ memories, lived on inside him. What good would it do them to be trapped inside such a pathetic body? Let that burden be his and his alone. A stronger person would let them go, cast them as far from his body as far as he could. A better person would do this without hesitation, would do it for them.

Of course this was what he should do. Of course this was what he would do—if he were a better person.

Cloud wasn’t sure how memories could properly make up for a missing life, but he clung to them all the same, a feeble man lost in the dark without this one precious, fragile flame. Memories were just… memories, things to comfort you on the long and winding path in the forests of the night, holding back the shadows that crept where familiar figures once stood. Memories were the fuel he used to advance, to get anywhere, to run further and further from—

What? Or could he be running to something? He doubts this very much. If memories can’t replace a lost life, the desperation to find it again would be just as hopeless.

A better man would be penitent. A stronger man would find a way to be forgiven.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to be forgiven, but he didn’t know how to be, if he even deserved it. There was nothing he’d wanted more these past two years than to be forgiven, to find absolution and the promise embedded in such a pardon, but without guidance or a starting point he was lost. Helpless, hopeless—he’d run forever in circles, cycles of penitence that were ultimately useless. It wouldn’t end until he found a way to end it, until he grew strong enough and overcame or continued letting the contagion of grief take its course. He would endure it not for curiosity’s sake but necessity. It was what he deserved, and it was the least he could do for them.

For her.

---

If his mind has a pilgrimage then so does his body: dutifully he returns to her church, which remains as abandoned and desolate as the sector in which it resides. Even so, it offers as much comfort as he could ever hope to feel these days. The jagged oculus in the ceiling permits streams of light to fall on the broken boards, the slanted and crumbling pews, and the queer little garden in the center where the dais should be. He never dares to kneel or walk amongst the flowers; all the risk he can afford is standing watch nearby or else at their edge, breathing in their mingled scent as deeply as he can. Their perfume is heady and their combination often makes him dizzy, his mind reeling like a top spun over and over again without end, but the more he breathes, the higher the chance he has to catch a fleeting, lingering trace of her.

She had smelled of this place—the earth, the floorboards long untouched by hands or man, the breath of each flower taking life and shape inside her skin.

At her church it was easier to imagine her—anywhere else and he was too distracted, cut off from the core of the memories and sensations… All he feels when he’s away from the broken walls and columns is sadness and fear, a lethal combination that’s so heavy as to actually pain his heart. His hands grow cold and numb and desperate, feeble like a child, as he presses them to his chest, imagining a groove forms in their shape for how often he’s held them there. He returns to pay his respects, to sit and reminisce—and to wonder.

The Promised Land… he thought he understood it. ShinRa and Hojo, of course they had it wrong from the start. It wasn’t a place you could go to, not physically anyway. He didn’t think there was any such place existing on the Planet. So how could one get there?

How can I see her again?

As Cloud wonders, he dreams. These visions are welcome, being compassionate reprieves from the world at large and the world outside his head which forever threatens to destroy the calm these dreams create. How fragile is the web of hope they weave: all Cloud has to do is think an errant thought of doubt and they disappear like sand through parted fingers.

Barren. Lifeless. Empty. That’s the world—that is Edge, and that is Midgar, or whatever’s left of the husk of the once-detested city. That is the world now; no chance of a Promised Land here.

But this church… his protests are feeble, pathetic. He hates that he’d even think them. Where else could it be?

His dreams brim with promise and peace—he grows anxious without them.

What once were routine visits soon became longer stays, until a time comes when Cloud realizes just how long he’d been imposing on the sanctity and hospitality of the church. He kept tabs on the days by scratching tallies in the dirt furthest from where he crouched or, if he was too exhausted, slept. When he goes to mark this day he hesitates, his eyebrows lifting slightly.

Eight days. It’s been eight days since he came here, and he hasn’t left the church once. Not for food, not for water or any other function the body might require.

He likes to hope that she doesn’t mind, that the dreams he has nightly, sometimes even during the day in a weary haze, were her ways of comforting him. Or maybe she’s thanking him for taking the time to remember her, to return to this special place. In each of these dreams, he aches to talk to her, to look upon her face and ask—

Can you ever forgive me?

Though it hurt to remember, he couldn’t bear the thought of forcing himself to forget. His sins were far too great already; what hope would there be for him if he committed another? How could he ever forget her, condemn her to shadow, then dust? There’s never any way he can forget her. Cloud knows it’s impossible, that there’s not be a day that goes by where his thoughts don’t return to her. The memory of her, the parts of her that remain inside him, is the pivot upon which his world rotates, the whole reason it continues to rush forward. If he wanted to he could distract himself, find ways and means to delay the memories, but it would never be for long. He wouldn’t want it to be.

---

He’s dreaming again. Once he knows this, immediately his mind races to the thought that always seizes him—

The warmth you left behind is fading… what will be left when it’s all gone? The question perches itself on Cloud’s tongue throughout each dream, and each time he stands there feeling the warmth of her presence, her slender back grazing against his, the nudge of her elbows as she shifts her weight, daring to touch him, the tickle of her plait as it moves from side to side, one of the many dividing lines between them. Each time he feels her how he could swear it was real—these precious few moments, theywere the true reality. They were the world, the real world, a world of sensation and feeling and life and light. There could he live, truly live, nothing like illusion he paraded around on the surface.

He is a man possessed but for once not only by guilt. The promise woven in each dream… he would give anything to seize onto it, to hold it gently between trembling, loving hands and keep it close to him. Yet like the flowers that grow to endless array in his dream, and like the small patch of them still thriving in the church, his hope is fragile and quick to wilt when plucked. Skilled hands are needed to tend to it, to keep it flourishing and alive, and though he tries he lacks the ability.

I thought you said you did a little bit of everything? He feels her elbows again, the gentle sensation of her bare skin moving against is, a stray touch that brings with it a monumental tide of comfort. She’s teasing him again.

“I did,” Cloud says, leaning his head back to stare into the white sky. It’s no longer hazy and blurred but clear, every inch of it so painfully bright and clear. “But I can’t do this.”

“Well… at least you’re still standing. You’ve made it this far, and you can only go further. That’s enough for now, isn’t it?” Cloud feels the pull of her shoulders, their small ascent and then a longer, gradual descent as she exhales slowly, expelling the calm so ingrained within her. He breathes it in and closes her eyes as she speaks, savoring the familiar cadence and lilt. She knows exactly what to say in these dreams to comfort him. Cloud marvels at the compassion she gives him, even as he hates himself for being blessed as such. He deserves nothing close to this; he deserves none of her kindness.

“It’s enough,” he says.

For now.