Final Fantasy 7
Requiem.
Final Version.
Prologue.
Flowing through the boundaries between life and death, the Lifestream coursed though the planet, full of memory and potential, the river of life penetrating every atom of being. The bright wisps of energy bringing the spark of new existence to every corner of the world, powered by the eternal memories of all who came before.
Within the very core of the Lifestream, she listened intently. The last of the Ancients. The voice of the planet a mere buzzing in her ears, full of fear and darkness, almost childlike. There were no details, only emotion. She could make no sense of it all. She tried to focus, closing her eyes to listen closely, hoping to garner some more information.
It had never been like this before. Never such fear that the planet itself was frozen in terror. What could a planet fear? She spoke calmly, trying to soothe this nameless fear, but to no avail. All the Lifestream rippled with emotion, the memories of countless lives cowering together.
A bright red spark of energy flashed by her eyes and she was thrown back to her senses. The whispers in her ears reached a deafening crescendo of cold dread as the spark flew out of sight, hurtling towards the gateway to the living world. A shiver crept up her spine, and suddenly she understood.
Something must be done.
Chapter One
His eyes burned as the first light of dawn burst through the paper thin curtains, tearing away the veil of night to reveal the new day. The sudden flash of light stirred him into motion, waking him from peaceful sleep as his eyes opened very slowly, gradually becoming accustomed to the blazing sun. Rubbing the last fragments of sleep from his eyes, he rolled out of bed, drawing his dressing gown around him.
With a yawn, Cloud drew the curtains apart to marvel at the glorious sight of sunrise across the bay, the calm sea aglow in the light of the morning. Birds began to chirp outside his window as the whole town sprang to life, ready to face another day. He stood and watched the sun rise, admiring the myriad of colours in the distant clouds, listening to the waves breaking gently across the rocks on the beach below, thinking about how far he had come to get to this point, thankful that he could face the day without fear of yet another battle.
It was almost a year since he had come here to Costa Del Sol. He had been out on a delivery when an estate agent had called asking for him, explaining that an offer had been put in for his villa here. Cloud had been perplexed at first. He had purchased the villa for a colossal three hundred thousand gil during the events of what had now become known as Meteorfall four years ago, then promptly forgotten about it during the fighting. He had grown weary of his life as a delivery boy. It seemed a little tame after saving the world. He had decided that it was time for a permanent vacation, and had asked Tifa and Denzel to come with him. It hadn't taken long to convince Tifa to leave the hustle and bustle of city life. In fact she had almost finished packing by the time he had pulled up on his black motorcycle Fenrir not half an hour later.
It had taken some getting used to in the first few months. After their lives of constant action and danger, peaceful life on the beach was a whole new idea for them all. Tifa had struggled to let go of running the bar, Seventh Heaven, and had once been found compulsively cleaning the glasses in the kitchen. Finding ways to occupy their time had been a challenge at the start. Tifa had taken a position at the local school teaching the younger students, and spent much of her free time running a lot of the after school clubs or offering a helping hand in the nursery. Cloud had continued to run his delivery business for a while, but he grew tired of being on the road for so long away from his new home and decided to put an end to the business. He spent most of his time helping people out around town with whatever they required. The random nature of his new line of work kept him on his toes. One week he had been helping to repair the roof of the local bar, and the next he had been helping deal with a nest of fiends discovered in the local hills. He thought back to Zack's idea of becoming a mercenary, and chuckled lightly to himself, realising that was exactly what he had become.
The local people had been very friendly towards them, recognising that they had come here to escape the pressures of being world renowned heroes. Most simply left Cloud and Tifa alone, allowing them some peace and quiet. Not everybody had been so considerate in the early months and eventually Tifa had lost her temper at a group of tourists who refused to leave her in peace. Everybody had been very understanding and nobody mentioned the event any more. The only adverse effect Cloud had suffered was much of the town nicknaming him 'Spiky' after Barret had visited with Marlene and shouted out his old nickname at every opportunity.
Cloud checked his watch and saw that it was about time to start the business of the day, stunned by how long he had been stood staring out of the window, lost in his thoughts. He looked back towards his bed and allowed himself a smile. Tifa looked like an angel, sleeping so peacefully. Her head rested gently on her arm, her blanket drawn up around her shoulders, her smile revealing the peaceful nature of her dreams. He almost didn't want to wake her, but if he didn't she would stay this way long into the afternoon. He could already hear Denzel getting ready for school downstairs.
Cloud reached down and gently shook Tifa's shoulder, trying in vain to wake her up. She simply groaned and rolled over, going back to sleep instantly. He tried again and she rolled back over to face him, struggling to open her eyes. The sunlight caught her as she struggled to focus and her eyes slammed shut again as she rolled over onto her front to escape the burning rays. He moved between her and the window and shook her a little harder. She turned to face him, slowly waking up now that he was blocking out the blazing sunlight. She smiled up at him as their eyes met.
"Good morning." he said softly, smiling back at her. "Time to get up. Work to do."
She groaned and tried to roll back over. "I'm ill. Need more sleep."
He shook his head a little. It struck him as rather odd that she was this hard to wake up in the mornings when she had spent most of her life running around and being physically active. Perhaps the years of conflict had finally taken their toll. Or perhaps she had always been secretly lazy. Perhaps he would never know.
"Tell you what. If you get up now, I'll take care of breakfast. What can I get for you?"
Tifa rolled back over to look up at him again. She gave him a puzzled look. Cloud didn't cook very often, it nearly always went wrong, since he had never cooked much as a child. But when it went right, it went very right indeed. And he did have some sort of lucky streak when it came to making breakfast.
"Bacon and eggs and you've got a deal.' She murmured, still struggling to find the strength to wake up properly. Cloud decided that was about the best he could expect from her this early in the morning and wandered off in the direction of the kitchen. She was best left to wake up on her own. He could always come back and check on her if she was taking too long.
Denzel was already sat at the table when Cloud came downstairs. He had already been up for a while, taken a shower and was ready for school. Cloud was proud of Denzel for taking care of himself in the mornings with no reminders. He waved as Cloud ambled down the stairs, and then got back to the book he was reading for his school project. Cloud looked over and saw that he was only about half way through the book, hoping to himself that the project wasn't due in today.
Tifa came down about twenty minutes later, still trying to dry her hip length black hair after her shower, tiny droplets of water dripping onto her white blouse and skirt. She smiled as she saw Cloud dishing up her breakfast, glad to see that he had managed to keep it from burning again. She sat down next to Denzel and Cloud passed the food around. It didn't escape anybody's notice that he had given himself an extra slice of bacon, as was his custom when he managed to keep his culinary experiments edible.
"I have your class this morning, right Denzel?" asked Tifa through a mouthful of scrambled egg.
"Yeah, sports class. What are we gonna be doing today?" said Denzel, finishing off his bacon.
"I'm not too sure. I was thinking we could have a game of football since it's such a beautiful day out there. Everybody loves football.'
Denzel nodded in agreement. He had always been a football fan and had developed something of an aptitude for the game. He often spent his free time on the beach kicking a ball about with his friends. He looked over at Cloud to see a rather strange look on his face.
"What's wrong, Cloud?" he asked, bemused as to what was amusing Cloud so much.
"Oh, it's nothing. Just wondering if everybody really loves football. I'm sure Nanaki doesn't." He said. He remembered his first visit to the town four years ago. Nanaki had fallen asleep in the shade and Cloud had accidentally kicked a football directly into his nose. Nanaki was quite popular with the local children, since he was effectively a talking red dog. Rumour had it that after their ill-fated football incident, many of the local children had wanted dogs for their birthdays that year. Cloud suspected that many children had been left heartbroken when their dogs were not red and couldn't say anything aside from 'woof'.
"What do you mean?" asked Denzel. It suddenly dawned on Cloud that Denzel was not there four years ago and therefore had no idea what he was talking about. He contemplated telling him, but remembered that every time he had told the story in the past, he somehow wound up looking like the bad guy.
"Forget it. I'll be back late today, by the way. Nanaki called me yesterday. Says he needs to see me about something important. Is that OK?"
Tifa was quite taken aback by this. She had no idea that Cloud had been planning on going out for the day. She only had Denzel's class today and after that she had been planning to spend the afternoon with Cloud, lounging around on the beach in the sun, just enjoying each other's company.
"Actually I've not seen Nanaki in a long time. Mind if I tag along? I only have Denzel's lesson today anyway."
"I suppose I could wait an hour or two. OK, I'll pick you up from the school. Denzel, will you be ok if we get home late?"
"Sure. I'll probably just be out on the beach anyway. I'll see you later. Thanks for breakfast, Cloud." said Denzel as he took the empty plates over to the sink. Grabbing his rucksack, he waved goodbye as he went to find his friends before school started.
Tifa grabbed her shoes and started to get ready for work while Cloud washed up the breakfast plates, chatting about what Nanaki might want. It was rare for Nanaki to call. He ran Cosmo Canyon these days and rarely found the time to socialize. Truth be told, most of the group had gone their separate ways ever since the defeat of Deepground and Omega last year. Barret was running his oilfield and now had Marlene living with him full time. Vincent had basically vanished after the fight and hadn't been heard from since. Yuffie had taken over as leader of the people of Wutai and rarely made contact at all unless she needed something. Cid was now running the newly reactivated space program in Rocket Town and managing the defensive air fleet, and Reeve was still working hard with the World Restoration Organisation in their efforts to repair the damage done to Kalm during Deepground's attack. Everybody was busy with their own lives these days.
Tifa finally finished getting ready and stood by the door, checking her hair one last time in the mirror. They stood together for a moment, seemingly lost in each other's eyes. For a moment Tifa thought he might have leaned in and given her a kiss goodbye, but to her dismay he simply told her that he couldn't wait too long since Nanaki had said it was urgent.
"Have a good lesson, OK? I'd say don't overexert yourself, but after Sephiroth I doubt a game of football will be much of a challenge for you." He said, passing her keys over as she flicked the hair out of her eyes. As she took her keys their hands brushed together and sent a tingle of excitement through her. She thought how strange it was that they lived together and looked after Denzel together, but they were not a couple. Seeing how it might just be her lack of courage that was the problem, she leaned in and kissed him gently on the cheek, giving him a sweet smile before walking through the door, leaving Cloud alone in the kitchen, utterly bemused by what just happened.
Tifa's lesson with Denzel could not possibly have gone any slower. She was lost in thought over everything that had gone on that morning, fearing that she had made a mistake and scared Cloud off. Thinking about everything they had been through together, having never caught a break. From her friends alienating Cloud as a child to Aeris' death haunting Cloud for years, something had always stood in the way. Perhaps now that they finally had peace they could open up to each other at last. Tifa was so hopelessly lost in her thoughts that she was paying no attention to the game of football she was supposed to be supervising and had to be snapped back to her senses by a very irritated Denzel when she missed what was apparently a blatant and disgusting piece of hand ball. She resolved the situation well enough but soon drifted back into her little dream world, eventually tripping over a stone to bring her back to reality.
She couldn't help but think how good it would be to spend more time with Cloud, just the two of them. It was a good hour or so to Cosmo Canyon on Fenrir, plus no doubt they would stay there a while to catch up with Nanaki. It would be foolish to drive all the way there only to turn back as soon as they got there. Cloud would need a break after riding through the mountains as well. Hopefully there would be no fiend attacks, but then since sightings had gone down recently it seemed unlikely they would run into any trouble, much less anything the two of them couldn't handle.
Soon enough the lesson ended and Tifa walked nervously towards the main gates with her class in tow, petrified that Cloud would not show up after her actions at home. She kept a close eye on the town hall clock, noticing that Cloud was running late. The students began to grow restless and began chatting among themselves about why they were stood outside the school for no apparent reason. As time went on, Tifa began to grow more and more nervous, her face becoming red. Denzel looked at her with a puzzled expression but decided it wasn't the best time to be questioning her.
Just as she was about to give up hope, Tifa suddenly heard the mighty roar of Fenrir's engine, loud enough to be heard a whole street away. The children all whirled around to see Cloud's one of a kind jet black motorcycle scream around the corner, its gold trim catching the light as it came skidding to a halt in front of the school. Cloud peeled away the goggles he wore while driving and brushed his spiky blonde hair back into its normal style. It was obvious that he had spent most of the morning polishing Fenrir as it had been buffed to a sparkling finish. He smiled at Tifa, who was blushing uncontrollably, stepping off Fenrir and looking through the crowd of students to find Denzel.
"Hi kids. How was your lesson?" he asked. The kids used to look shocked when Cloud showed up, but these days they had grown more acclimatised to his presence, especially after he had helped to fix the school's roof after a storm a few months ago. They still idolised him, but at least they kept their adoration to a quiet murmur.
"We won, but it was a close call for a minute." said Denzel, still in the midst of the crowd of students.
"Well done. You didn't cause Tifa any trouble, did you?"
Tifa began to look a little embarrassed, and Denzel quietly explained that he was responsible for the hand ball, but that Tifa hadn't even noticed because she was off in her own little world. Cloud looked over at her, and she blushed at their eyes met and turned away. He smirked a little. He thought she might be like this after what had happened earlier. He put his hand on her arm and gave it a gentle squeeze to calm her down, but this only seemed to make her blush more. Denzel and his classmates sniggered at Tifa's expense but she simply smiled and tried to cover up her embarrassment.
"You ready to go?" Cloud asked, and Tifa simply nodded. Telling her class to go back in for their next lessons, she climbed onto Fenrir behind Cloud, and he kicked the engine into life. As they sped down the street towards the city limits, Tifa held on tight behind him, thinking about everything that had happened. What did it all mean? She was so confused. Did Cloud want something more between them or not? As the wind whistled past her, she thought she heard a voice in her head telling her to just try something and find out, but as soon as she had heard it, it was gone.