"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one. Wherever you go, however you choose your path, all roads will lead you back to it. So while you're here...welcome home." - my nephew ad-libbing Jane Howard.
"Here we are, boss! Home sweet home!"
"Hm..."
"... Master Ansem? Yo, leader, we're back."
"Hm..."
"... Nice knowing you, boss. The ship is on fire, and I'm ditching you."
"Hm...wait, what?" When Ansem at last looked up from his papers, he saw no more than Braig grinning smugly back at him in a relatively unharmed cockpit.
"Called you out, didn't I?"
At the man's well-meaning remark - all uncouth wit aside - the leader of Radiant Garden could only sigh and submit to his defeat with what little grace he had left. "Yes, yes, I know - I'm getting too caught up in this again."
"Quit worrying so much, boss," Braig drawled back. "So we got interstellar travel now with weird-ass critters from outer space, so what? Don't mean nothing-!"
"Disney Castle is not another planet, Braig," Ansem corrected solemnly, "but a world - a world that we should not have been able to find, let alone enter. Their King is worried as well."
"You mean the talking rat?"
"King Mickey is a mouse, Braig."
"Ey, same difference. Can we go now?" Not the least bit subtle with his show of impatience, Braig jabbed a thumb pointedly back at the ramp he had already lowered. "I wanna get stoned before Aeleus finds my booze stash and wastes it again."
"You really should not drink on the job."
"One doesn't count!" As the protest left the man, he paused and shrugged. "...well, one dozen, anyway."
Ansem decided to fold while there was still some sanity left to spare. Rising from his seat, he followed his assistant - the first to be called as such since he became "Master" - out into the hangar, where the machinist Highwind was there to greet them.
As Braig and the older man cussed each other out as per their routine, Ansem smiled warmly at the young boy with black spikes that hurried on through. Zack grinned back cheerily, his lanky arms steady as they held in place his own small charge - a toddler with a blond tuft on his head. And as Ansem stared into those wide blue eyes, he remembered something.
"Cid?" The banter halted as the mechanic turned toward him in response. "Where's-?"
"Waitin' for ya," the man answered immediately, cutting the other off with a wave. "Now get outta here, you lot - I got shit to smack off this hunk of junk."
None of them needed a second dismissal. Not from the same war veteran that could make Bahamut flush with a "light" comment about the setting sun.
After taking the time to walk Zack down to the Strife homestead - and then back to his own house - Ansem and Braig resumed their track toward their destination. Braig was quick to disappear into the basement, all the while decorating the halls with a few choice hollers at his fellow assistants about where they placed his alcohol. Shaking his head in chagrin - albeit amused chagrin - Ansem continued on his way incognito.
As the doors to the study swung open, he found himself looking upon an almost familiar bareness. Someone had taken the liberty of cleaning up his desk - filing away all the reports in their proper places for his reading later - and all that was upon the wooden surface was a folded red scarf; the scarf he had left behind, washed with such care that it looked good as new.
Ansem was making a mental note to thank his assistants and Shera for what they had done in his absence, when he felt an insistent repetition of tugging at his slacks. He looked down, and a pair of wide gray eyes stared back up at him. Gray...with just that muted bit of blue in their center, as though they had once been the dominant color.
The child that carried those strange eyes continued to stare quietly up at the older man, his small tight fist creasing fine black material that would need ironing all over again. At last, he spoke - his voice soft and barely audible.
"Welcome back, Ansem."
Making yet another note to thank whoever it was that convinced the three-year-old to talk, Ansem reached down and gently picked up the small child. Small arms were quick to wrap around his neck in a tight hold, and the little boy nuzzled his shoulder blade with little restraint.
"Sorry I took so long," Ansem finally replied, a hand patting auburn locks reassuringly. Receiving a hushed whine of annoyance, he at last returned the hug in full.
"I'm home, Squall."
This day was the milestone - for him as well as for the three kids he hauled after him into the flat world he now worked in. As of this day, Cid Highwind had officially become part of Traverse Town for a year.
A whole, damned year of raising traumatized youngsters, putting food on the table, and trying his hardest and damnedest to not cuss everything out...except considering how Yuffie's more recent vocabulary was enough to make a sailor weep, he had failed in that last regard.
Speaking of the kids...
"Oy. Plush toy." The moogle he called out turned, bobbing a little as he - or she - obliged him readily. With a curt nod, he shoved the rest of his paperwork a bare inch away from the large red nose.
"Your turn - I got three kids to feed."
If the moogle had replied, he had not heard it - he was already on his feet and out the door, headed straight for the small house they had claimed as "home". As he opened the door, the toothpick he had between incisors snapped in echo of his irate mood. The bare splinter holding both ends together nearly cried for mercy as his eyes narrowed dangerously.
A single black Heartless stared right back, perfect orbs of gold flickering as it blinked at him.
"...I. Effin'. Hate you."
The Heartless squeaked but once as it was promptly incinerated into non-existence with a flaming wave.
Sparing himself a disgruntled mutter about how his personal censoring was habitual now, Cid spit the abused stick of wood into the cobblestones, put his newly built Cid Cannon away, and waved a final time at the slightly wary moogle before trudging down the streets.
The rest of the way proved of little else excitement, and he reached the door with everything intact - crankiness included. That was when he opened the door and entered the homestead.
"..what in the name of Gilgamesh is this...?"
At his surprised utterance, Yuffie spun around at once with an excited cry. In an instant, she crossed the distance between herself and the man, jumping onto him and latching there like a tick on a dog.
"Welcome home, Cid!"
"... yeah. Sure. What's goin' on?"
Before the spot that had been so recently vacated was the coffee table, and upon it was a small cake - Aerith's doing, from the looks of it - and about it were laid out four plates, four forks, and a small box in the corner. Still beside the table, the remaining pair that were the young fighter and flower girl were looking his way.
"Well..." Aerith began carefully. "All four of us have been together for a year, so we decided to celebrate."
Cid did not stop the quirk in his brow as he eyed that cake on its platter skeptically. "...what, a frickin' anniversary?"
"A family reunion," she was quick to clarify.
"I was only gone for five bloody hours."
"The thought counts!"
"Fine, fine..." growling irritably at the self-proclaimed ninja - who was still attached to him - he at last scratched idly at his neck, adding, "And whose idea was it?"
"Leon's."
All pretenses dropped like rocks, and Cid's expression was one of unguarded surprise as he turned on the boy before him. Leon stared back, serious and solemn as ever.
"...you wanted this cocktail party?"
"I wanted a memory," was the quiet reply, tone void of any negativity. "What it's like to have family - I don't want to forget it, and this is the closest we can get."
...so that was it.
The kid was homesick. Hyne and Gaia alike knew, they all were.
"...fine," Cid spat out at last. "Sit your ass down in that chair, and let's eat this damned cake."
For a moment, gray orbs shimmered with a hint of blue light, the singular clue of gratitude that cracked through brittle walls of muted feelings held back for too long. He took a little longer before reaching over and rumpling dark hair in a gruff manner.
Just for that day, Leon let him.
Foggy memories were plaguing him as he took each step over an old broken street with too many cracks to watch out for. Memories of being young and innocent, of being held by strong arms that were sworn to never leaving go. Memories of familiar laughter as much as childish banter, although he could barely place names on any of those voices he heard.
As he passed many aged things cloaked in shadow, Cloud could barely make out silhouettes of what they had once been. Nine years seemed so far away...too far away, and he felt so detached from all that he beheld.
For a moment, he wondered - what did he intend to find here?
Still, he walked, each step careful over a road that was nowhere near travel-safe. It took him a while longer - much longer - to get to each place he sought out.
The first was what had once been a cottage, from the looks of its foundations - then again, foundations were all that remained of this sorry building. Looking toward the center, he imagined there was once a rug there, where a little boy grew up with a mother that loved and nurtured him, playing with other kids that had grown up beside him - kids that had stuck with him through thick and thin.
He imagined this was perhaps his home, once.
His next stop was yet another cottage, in a more miserable state than the first. All that remained were a few eroded wood posts, and as he took in the abused surfaces, he saw once more a pair of good-natured folk - a couple...parents - that smiled and were warm with their greetings. In the haze of silhouettes, he made out once more that familiar young voice that coaxed him into things like no other could.
The voice of...someone. He could barely remember who that had to be.
Those were the nicer spots - what came later was more depressing with each hour that came to past. He came to where a flower garden had ceased to exist, where a dojo had once thrived with students of all ages, where a bushy shrub had sat against a fence, surrounding a home connected to a large garage of sorts. In this last spot, he impulsively swept this hand through the wilted branches, wondering against the impossible of finding something long gone. Something that was no longer there.
Nothing came of it, and he moved on.
At last, he reached his final stop - the castle. The one place that remained solid and standing despite all that had happened to the world. It was an inky shadow against the horizon, but he knew it anywhere. And now, he knew where to find the door that granted him access.
The interior proved that bit more homely than anything else he had beheld beforehand, and his tread through the halls was muted by the old dusty carpet that continued to stretch as far as the eye could see. He followed the path, working his toward a destination he remembered but could not name.
He surprised himself when he stopped before the library entrance - of all things he forgot and semi-recollected, he was at least certain he had not been one for books. And yet, something was here. Something drew him in, and with nothing to lose he took the next step that brought him in.
"There you are."
There they were.
Faces that had matured and altered in the nine years that passed, voices that had grown out their childish lilts. Four of them, right there in the very center of the place, framed by two long shelves.
"We were wondering when you'd show up."
He was wondering where they had gone to.
Before he could say anything, he found the girl he knew was Yuffie assaulting him in the center of his chest, hugging him with enough force to briefly cut off his circulation and air supply. Even before he was able to pry her off, he found a calloused hand clapping him warmly on the shoulder - the hand of gruff old Cid, looking no worse than he had in days prior.
A soft, musical laugh, and he found the source to be none other than Aerith, looking upon him with the same fondness as she always had. There, beside her, he found the one who found him first. The one that had changed his name for reasons he did not wish to understand.
That one came to him now, and dropped something into his hand.
"You left this guy behind."
Cloud looked down curiously, and found himself staring at a rock - a small object of mottled black and dark gray, snug in the center of his palm. As he stared at it, his eyes crinkled softly as he at last recognized it.
"...hello, Zeke."
The rock had nothing to say, admittedly, but the man that had brought him here did.
"Welcome home."
It had been near alarming to find a letter from the King in a bottle, but now...he could not have received a better gift. None of them could.
Radiant Garden had really thrived since he last left it some time ago, and looked toward a good future, a promise of reaching its former glory and even further. The homes were back. The peace was back. The very beauty of the place that gave the world her name was back.
And the people were back.
There were so many of them now, that they barely fit into a house - it took a bit of a headache and a mild heart attack before Merlin managed to enchant two adjacent houses to merge into one, thus effectively giving everyone room in what was now the equivalent of a condominium.
He was back, and this time, he had Riku and Kairi with him. They all sat together now, playing with peers in a loud ruckus, just like a teenager should.
...though, he wondered if every teen had three backseat drivers hollering at him as he attempted to work a game console's joystick like he never had before - smacking Heartless with a Keyblade seemed so much easier than this.
"Head right!"
"The other right!"
"Your right!"
With a loud "SON OF A-!!" the session once again halted to yield the familiar green text of "Game Over". Beside him, the dark-skinned boy that was a handful of years younger than him released a tirade of words that sounded exasperated, to which he easily defended himself.
"Hey, I'm a newbie at this! Cut me some slack!" More words - this time cheeky in tone - were sent his way, and his next response was delivered with a confident grin. "Call it whatever you like, but next time, I'll be the one to punt your rear end!"
On the couch directly behind the incoherent lad, young Jim Hawkins turned to Riku as he asked, "Is it a Keyblader thing that the three of you understand exactly what he's saying?"
"You could say that..." was the older boy's response, and still was Riku watching his friend banter playfully with his playmate as they started from their last save point.
"...why did they rename one of the main characters with half of his last name, anyway?"
To the question that had occurred to all of them as gamers, still no one was all that capable of answering.
"Enough with the game, you lot!" Tifa called suddenly. "Food's ready!"
Unanimously deciding that food sounded really good right there and then, the game was quick to be abandoned as the whole pack of adolescents flew from the assortment of settees and couches toward the awaiting feast. Sidling up next to Leon - the stoic leader in the midst of passing a platter across the magically-lengthened bench - Sora watched as Riku and Kairi tumbled into the conversation as though they had always belonged there.
"... I'm glad."
Leon was just taking back a different tray as he caught the comment; his answer came next:
"That you found them?"
"Sure," Sora replied, his eyes never leaving the pair that he had searched for in the span of two years. "But that's just part of it."
"Hn."
"Coming back here, knowing everyone's doing okay, knowing that nothing's changed between us... I'm glad we could have this reunion."
And though the man that had taught him much in his first time as Keyblader said nothing, Sora knew that - in his own silent, stoic way - Leon agreed with him.
The last line of ink etched into the paper with a somber finality, and as Leon stared down at the text, he found himself still lost in a strange sense of denial.
All that he had wanted to achieve here - restoring, reclaiming, keeping...all that he had given these years of his life into...
He was finished. At long last, Radiant Garden was back to how he had remembered it as a child, and he had seen to it. His work was done, and he suddenly realized that he had never felt more tired in his life.
"I thought I'd find you here."
Cloud was joining him at the table now, a gloved hand reaching forward to rest upon his shoulder. Eyes of blue and green found the paper upon the desk - a piece of paper that had been folded, unfolded, and folded again time after time, and barely held together at its creases. It was Leon's personal list of what had to be rebuilt - every landmark and every street, crammed into that slip of paper. Black ink covered every bit of once-white surface, that words seemed indecipherable to all save the writer.
But there were two words he could make out - two words that were the most recent additions - scrawled in a lazy slur to the end of a corner:
What now?
"...I think it's obvious."
Interest piqued, Leon turned to regard the blond warrior before him. He waited, seeking an answer to the question he had turned over in his head for hours now. And as Cloud squeezed the shoulder under his grip, he gave Leon that answer:
"You've finished building the house. Time to stop holding the door open and step inside."
For the longest time, the brunet gave no answer, still staring down morosely at the crumpled piece of paper he had held onto for years. The piece of paper that had been his motivation into each day, to see things until the very end, no matter how daunting.
Its job was done. The world was back.
...what now?
Finally, he reached for the paper again, picking it up and looking upon it. In a swift move, he crumpled it into a messy wad in the center of his palm. With a soft chant, his entire hand was lit in the glow of Fire. He stared at his hand, at the glove that protected him, and at the paper that was consumed in the blaze. To his side, Cloud watched him.
Soon, all that was left was a blackened glove and a pile of ash. The hand that had opened so briefly was quick to close once more, and Leon got to his feet, Cloud's hand slipping off in allowance. In an instant, he had crossed the distance to where the window was. He drew back, and deftly flung the ash out the window, watching as it dissipated, scattering over the kingdom that had seen its fall and rise with the generations.
He looked into the distance, looked upon the houses below, and saw the children that ran carelessly in the streets. His mind wondered to a time long ago, when he had been a child like that, and ran so carelessly in the company of his friends, laughing as though tomorrow's troubles would never come.
His head tilted back, and he sighed deeply before speaking once more.
"So... I'm home."
The hand was back, quick to be joined by its partner, and Cloud was behind him again. Hot breath touched the exposed skin on his neck as he heard the other say words he had not heard in a while.
"Welcome home, Squall."