The Distance of a Breath
Aerith tries to reach Cloud by any means necessary. PG-13-ish. Involves character death and darkness. I've probably screwed up the timeline somewhere, but I tried.
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Death.
It is said that upon death, those left behind realize all of the things they wanted to do and say. However, it is only very rarely that the dead and dying are included in this concept.
The thought of, "Cloud," passes through Aerith's mind between "I'm dying," and "Forgive me, everyone, I tried so hard," guilt over all of the words unsaid between her and Cloud hanging heavy upon her. Even as she lies in his arms, trying desperately to speak but feeling no words bubbling up from her mouth, only blood, she can only think of the distance yet to be crossed.
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0 days since Death.
She first tries to reach him immediately after she reaches the Lifestream, swimming back against the harsh current, her hand outreached towards his own. He is walking away at that moment, back to where they had last set camp and to all of the memories attached to it. She wants to return to his arms, of course, wants to stop his pain and his hurt and to be alive again.
She is no match for the sheer force of death. Not yet at least, she learns, as the specters of generations past and farther past alike drift by her in ribbons of a variety of green. She will quickly learn how to differentiate between the colors, how to see the people within these bands of life, and ultimately, how to move beyond it all. Aerith puts away her own personal goals however, for the moment, and reaches out towards the more universal goal of saving the world. She has work yet to do, and there is no rest for the weary or the dead.
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82 days since Death.
Aerith has learned much between the first try and second try having spent a good deal of time floating among her ancestors by then. She next tries to reach him in her church at Midgar and for a moment, a look of recognition and almost fear dawns upon Cloud's face. She smiles at him, reaches out towards him trying to reassure him that yes, she's here, but as he walks forward, a look of joy upon his face having replaced the trepidation, his face instantly wipes blank and he clutches his head in what can only be taken as pain. He runs out of the church. He does not look back.
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173 days since Death.
She still does not quite understand what happened in the church at Midgar, but she chalks it up to surprise over seeing her again (after all, she had died) and leaves it at that. The third time she reaches for him, it is as physically as she can possibly do so being, well, disembodied, and for a moment, she believes in it just as much as he looks like he believes in it—his arm outstretched towards her own. The feeling of meteor crushing down upon the world presses in her mind, however, and Aerith is whisked away by necessity just as their hands are about to grasp.
She does not see Cloud's confusion at the sudden disappearance of his beloved and only hears a glimpse of the words he says—the words, "an answer from the planet," but Aerith is happy. She knows for certain now, that he has seen her and that is enough for Aerith, just as she hopes it's enough for Cloud.
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1 year, 3 days since Death.
Reconstruction has taken most of everyone's time and energy upon Gaia, and Aerith watches benignly, traveling through the lifestream and attempting to help in any way she possibly can. When Cloud drives to the lake with Elmyra's flowers in tow, she is not there.
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2 years, 54 days since Death.
She is first able to touch him some two years past-life, her hand on his arm. He had been deteriorating for a while, that she could tell, and she wondered if it was because he had thought she had disappeared "for good," so to speak. So she tries to ask him why he's here, what he's doing, and tries to cover all of their distance in space and time, as well as his persistent silence, with a steady stream of words.
Neither Aerith nor Cloud, will ever realize their words could not travel the distance.
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2 years, 55 days since Death.
She grasps his hand to save him from death, to protect him from harm, but in his eyes, she sees not just gratitude, but something else—something deeper inside him. A certain resolve, that Aerith takes as the want to live. She smiles at him and boosts him on his way, the final link in a long chain.
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2 years, 56 days since Death.
They see each other for what should have been the last time in her church, as she walks away, asking him if he'll be alright. Cloud smiles back at her image and, Aerith leaves convinced that, indeed, he'll be alright.
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3 years, x days since Death
Everyone has seemed to move on rather successfully from the list to seemingly never-ending disasters of Gaia. They have defeated all of the enemies that have emerged and life in peace, as unusual as it seems at times, continues. Aerith watches over Cloud and enjoys the fact that he remembers her through flowers. She appears before him, briefly at times, while lies in flower fields, eyes ever upwards towards some distant point in the sky and his mouth tight in thought, but never says a word, only smiles at him briefly and then disappears once more. Aerith has figured that all of the words she has said to him over the past few years have explained to him how much she cares for him and how happy she is to see him living and breathing and working.
She never realizes the distance her breath cannot cover until--
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4 years since Death.
She is resting by what she now affectionately refers to as "her pond" when he comes to see her, forcing his way into her presence. She is confused by it, of course, as she had always been the link between the two of them, but she does not realize that he means his presence to be for good until it is just that.
For good.
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2 hours since Death.
Tifa opens up Cloud's office space in Seventh Heaven when she finds a pink ribbon on the floor before his door that looks eerily similar to the one that Aerith herself once wore, rather than the ones they still wear in memoriam. She finds the room abnormally neat and everything in its place—the floor is clear, the surfaces of all the counters and tables are empty. That is, except his desk where there sits two things. One is familiar, a photo of a golden flower field that Tifa never recognized. The other is a letter. She skims the letter before crushing it in her fist and calling up Cid to mobilize.
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Death.
I'm sorry everyone, but especially you Tifa, you tried to look out for me for so long, but this has been a long time coming. I've been seeing her for a while now and at first, I thought it was because she wanted to see us. I had tried to forget, to keep on moving like you guys had asked me to, but I just couldn't. Every time I thought I was past all of this, she would appear again, as if to ask me, "Why Cloud? Why are you trying to forget me?" and then disappear, just like that. She kept appearing before me, so I took it as if she wanted me to do something, so I tried. I tried to bring her back. I tried to find where she was and take her back with me here—I thought she'd be waiting for me at the lake, but when I delivered the flowers for Elmyra, she wasn't there. Everywhere else, though, she just kept appearing. By now I've realized that it's not her who's supposed to come back, but me who's supposed to go. I'm not necessarily sure I understand why, but perhaps, it's for the best. I've tried to put this off for as long as I could, but she keeps appearing and she keeps begging me to do something and—I can't handle this anymore. I'm sorry, I hope all of you—Aerith included—can forgive me.
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A/N: Unbeta'd, written in about an hour for CxA Forums writing contest. Basically, Aerith thinks she's reaching Cloud, but he's actually completely misunderstanding her signs and can't actually hear a word she says in the lifestream, just as she can't actually hear him.