Sephiroth's shadow loomed over me and I was running in fear through a labyrinthine forest. I could feel him close behind me and hear his laughter as every turn I took led me back to him.
"You are weak, puppet," his lips curled in disgust and his Masamune cut through the air inches from my face.
I couldn't speak. All I could do was run. But wherever I ran, he would already be there, Masamune raised, ready to strike me down. I would turn again and run some more, but he was always a step ahead of me.
"You are a failure..." his words sliced through the tension in the air.
I was out of breath and my sides ached from running, but I had to go on, or he would catch me and kill me. I forced myself to go on running until my legs collapsed beneath me and my face hit the cool earth, sweat covering my face in the cold air.
I heard his footsteps, heavy and slow. I heard his laughter grow louder and louder and I turned weakly to face him. I wouldn't die in shame. I hadn't any strength left and he could tell.
"A puppet until the end. You cannot run from me. But you already knew that, didn't you?" He sneered at me and flicked his silver hair behind him before raising his Masamune again.
This time I couldn't run. I could barely breathe, and in the glitter of dim light that shimmered on his blade, I could see my reflection- I looked horrible- fearful, lost, afraid of death, a boy who had no control over anything that's happening to him. My spiky blond hair was limp and my shining Mako eyes reflected my fear as my worst nightmare was came to life.
He slashed down with the blade, cutting through my flesh and bone. I let out a silent scream in my final second. -
I sprang from my sleep, my entire body shaking from the nightmare. It was the same nightmare again that's been haunting me every night since Sephiroth's name was mentioned in my life again.
In the dark inn room, I could make out the others sleeping peacefully in their own beds- Barrett was snoring loudly, and the flame from Red's tale was flickering softly. Tifa was in the bed next to mine, smiling happily in her sleep. Yuffie was mumbling something and Cid had somehow managed to turn around in his sleep so his feet were on his pillow. Cait Sith was resting in the corner, next to Vincent who lay with a sad frown.
I noticed I had been crying and quickly wiped the tears away with the back of my hand. How many times had I had the same nightmare? And it always ends the same way... I couldn't possibly fall back asleep now. I didn't even want to go back to sleep for fear of that nightmare returning.
I rose from my bed, careful not to wake the others, and put on my gear and sword. Then I left the Kalm Inn quietly. The entire town was asleep, not a single light was on and the darkness was rather foreboding. But I walked on, out of the town, hoping to stay out until sunrise so I wouldn't have to go back to sleep tonight.
I walked along the plains until I began to near the never-sleeping city of Midgar. I stood at the entrance gate, not wanting to enter, not wanted to go back. What was I doing out here in the middle of the night anyway?
"Cloud." A chill voice whispered down my back. I turned swiftly. Nothing.
"Cloud!" Again my name... called by who?
"Hello?" I shouted, grasping the handle of my sword, looking around.
An enchantingly evil laugh erupted from the walls of the gate as the ground suddenly melted away. The entire plain began to move and shake and finally deteriorate into nothingness before my very eyes!
I stood in the center of a bright galaxy of stars! The city of Midgar crumbled away into the wind in the dead of night.
"What! Where...?" I could barely speak my own thoughts, when the chilly voice once more silenced me.
"Cloud!" It calls out...
I looked around and still saw no one.
Then a scene faded into focus.
It's... Zack! He's standing with me! No, wait... more of the scene is blurring into my vision. No ... Zack is on the floor bleeding. "Cloud." The words hardly escape his lips before his body goes limp. I hold back my own tears of rage as I pick up his buster sword...
The chilling voice cut through my memory.
"Cloud. You live in your past, haunted by your past! Your own nightmare is your life! And why do you continue to fight? You have no idea what worse nightmares await you in the Northern Crater!" The voice was horribly unsteady, shaking and trembling, the tone fluctuating rapidly.
Another scene faded into play. Oh no! Please not this one... Aeris, standing so perfectly atop an altar... I already know what's gonna happen... My body slowly walks up the stairs, not under my control.
A horrible feeling of possession takes over my mind and I can feel Sephiroth inside of my thoughts, controlling my body. I draw my sword and walk nearer to Aeris, still bent in prayer. She looks up and smiles. I smile back, but it is not my own smile. No, she won't forgive me! Does she know it isn't me controlling this all? I realize I will never be in control, and I weep inside... I want to curl up on the marble floor of the altar and let Sephiroth laugh above me, let me fade away, let me die! I would rather die than go through all that again!
"What do you want!" I suddenly yelled.
The unsteady laughter erupted around me once more, sending a chill down my spine.
"Cloud. A greater nightmare will occur, worse than any of these that you have been though. But I am merely trying to warn you...my friend...from here in hell..."
The wavering insane fluctuations steadied off and the voice suddenly became recognizable.
"Z...Zack?" I whispered into the darkness around me.
"Once you could've called me that. Zack was killed by ShinRa soldiers as you so vividly remember, hehehe."
Another scene popped into view.
"No. NO!" I shouted at Zack's voice, knowing all too well what I was about to see next.
The scene of Zack's death, that rainy night. We were almost in Midgar, but the ShinRa Soldiers had caught us. I was nearly unconscious and bleeding. But Zack had been surrounded and then shot like a dog. A death I cared not to witness again... I shut my eyes, refusing to acknowledge the memory.
"Please stop this, Zack. What do you want? Where am I?" I whispered now, staring away from the image of Zack's broken body, lying in the crimson grass.
"Alright. Cloud. I am here in hell, and I warn you, you will go through much worse thin...gs...w...orse...thing...s..s..."
Suddenly Zack's voice was intercepted by static and disappeared.
I stood alone in the starlight landscape watching Zack's death over and over.
"ZACK!" I yelled out, but to no answer.
What did he mean? What was he talking about? Warning for a greater nightmare than all this? He left me with so many questions! How was I supposed to get outta here!!
I'm just a lost soul. Trying to be tough, but I'm not. Trying and... I'm failing. That's all I was after all... A failure...
The moment I thought this, another scene flashed around me, like a projection I could walk through, but never change.
This time it was Hojo talking... telling me about the numbers... about how I was never given a number...about how I was a failure.
"STOP..." I shouted into the stars... "I don't need this!" but the scene kept dancing before my eyes.
I turned my face away and sat on the transparent floor while stars shot by above me.
I curled my legs up in front of me and crossed my arms over them. I put my head down and blocked out all the awful images.
"Stop...p..please.." I whispered to myself. Where had Zack gone, was this all just my imagination... is there no way out?
'A boy named Cloud might have existed in Tifa's memory, but you were never the real Cloud...' Sephiroth's cruel voice snarled in sinister explanation in my memory as a scene began to replay from my thoughts.
I didn't dare look up though. I curled up further and squeezed my eyes closed. I sat and listened as each tortuous scene took over the next and the next and the next.
Tifa's father dying, my own failure, Aeris dying, Zack dying, my mother dying, my town burning, EVERYTHING! ...everything...
I tried to block out the images, trying to comfort myself, but the pain was too great... it was all adding upon itself!
I was trapped in my own mind, tortured by my own thoughts... I couldn't take it any more!
I made up my mind quickly and in one swift motion, I stood up, unsheathed my sword and (with some difficulty) held it above my abdomen. With no final tears, and no regrets, I thrust my own weapon, stained with the blood of my own murders, deep into my stomach.
Warm liquid flowed from the deep gash. And I felt slippery intestines spill around me. I didn't look down, but my face hit the floor. I didn't even open my eyes, the blade still piercing my body. Sudden cool metal against my tear-stained cheeks, but I kept my eyes closed against the pain.
Each breath I took brought a surge of fresh pain and I felt the blood ripple out onto the floor. This was the most physical pain I had ever felt in my life as I lay dying on the floor. I could feel every beating of my heart straining to keep me alive.
I began coughing painfully, blood caught in my throat.
But I had no regrets, as much pain as I was in now as my heart beat it's last tremor, as my lung breathed it's last breath, I knew that as much physical pain I was in now, it was nothing compared to the pain in my heart... the pain that I could end now. ...
Eternal slumber, embrace me. This infinite nothingness will heal me. No worries, no nightmares, no past, no future, no present, nothing. Was this my heaven? Would I see Aeris in the Promised Land?
I drifted downward. The severe pain I felt several minutes ago had subsided and my vision had blacked out. I felt at peace for once... I was free. Free to float lazily downward, float wherever I wanted, like a feather.
Suddenly, I hit something hard, like concrete. Ow... My entire body weight pressed down into the floor. I awoke to the smell of rotting flesh.
No, I...I survived? NO! No... I was dead, I was sure of it. I opened my eyes. Was I in heaven? Where was I?
A gray cave... All around me. Gray... The smell of decaying animals was thick in the air. I pulled myself off the ground and began to walk.
The gray cave was moving... People! Thousands of people were here, looking drab and uncomfortable. Some of them yelled out in pain and others stood quietly crying.
No, this wasn't what I thought it was. I had escaped my hell...
I walked forward. Children's bodies lay near weeping mothers and father... the scene of death repeating itself, the mother yelling in desperate protest.
I walked onward...
A man nearby ran over to me, grasping my arm tightly, running from an unseen object. He spoke in gibberish and I backed up wordlessly. He looked at me in fear and yelled something out before running away, pointing behind him at nothing.
I saw the other people, laying on the floor, crying... I knew where this was.
This was hell... I had gone to hell, paying for all my deeds... my failures... Depression was sinking in as I walked onward.
I noticed a woman crying in the corner, long sobs that shuddered through my very soul. I approached her.
"What is it?" she said harshly, not looking over to me.
I stared, not exactly knowing what to say.
"What is it! Can't you leave me in peace!?" she screamed and turned around to look at me. Her hair was gray and stressed, and her face was worn with tear stained cheeks. She let out a gasp when she saw me. "Who... or what are you! You are still alive!"
"What? No, no that's impossible, I ...I killed myself. I'm sure of it..." I remembered the pain fresh in my mind.
She turned back around and said, "Look at yourself, you are not a spirit. You mind is dead, but apparently your body is not! You say you killed yourself? Maybe you only killed your mind. Ha. Mental suicide..."
I looked down at my appearance... I looked normal. I looked at the other damned souls around me. They were very translucent, like ghosts, and yet I was solid.
Just then I heard a familiar voice talk behind me.
"Cloud, so I see... you've made it to hell..."
I turned quickly to see Zack, inches from my face. I didn't even know he was there until he spoke!
"H... Hi Zack... Um, am I dead?" my voice shook.
"No... not quite. Despite your pathetic attempt of suicide, you are very much still alive. The planet still needs your body to protect it..." he said, walking along a path leading into darkness. I followed.
"Cloud, everyday I have to relive my own nightmares and fears in this...this hell! But..." he continued talking, with a smile of insanity..."But I'm not bitter about it... Strange how my communication means with you was severed by..."
"By what?" I stared at him in disbelief.
"By your own mind, Cloud. You were the one who blocked me out of your mind! But...But I guess that doesn't matter...nonono!" he stared back at me, giggling maniacally.
"Zack, what is wrong with you?" I backed up a step.
"What's wrong with ME, Cloud? HAHAHA! I've never felt happier in my life..." He smiled childishly.
I thought perhaps all these years in hell would drive anyone insane. Zack seemed very different from how I remembered him.
"Zack, how do I get out of hell to return to my world, if my body is not here..." I managed to say weakly.
"Well, your body just has to wake up!" he said it so simply.
"How am I supposed to wake my body up!?" I yelled at him. It seemed impossible.
"I don't know. Maybe you'll wake up eventually. Pray that you wake up... You stay here too long and you'll go MAD!" He spoke in unsteady tones.
Suddenly he jerked his head to the right and began to cry hysterically, "No! Cloud, my nightmares are starting again! I..I...No!"
He curled up on the ground and began crying and screaming, gazing at something I couldn't' see.
"Zack... ZACK!" I yelled, but he didn't respond, just kept his eyes fixed in one spot. I didn't know what he was seeing, but it scared the hell outta him and he sat there crying, not hearing me at all.
Scared, I wasn't sure what else to do but slowly walk away and find some small corner where no spirit was screaming and crying near.
I was trapped in hell...and nobody knew I was here... I had committed mental suicide, so my body was still alive, but my mind had gone to hell. I would've have believed it if I heard it, but it was painfully real.
I would've started crying myself, the place was so damn depressing, but I leaned over against a brick wall and tried to fall asleep the best I could... but the screams of the damned awoke me every hour. ...
Next: Chapter 2: Cloud's Corpse is Found... What will the others do without Cloud? From Tifa's POV...