FFVII property of Square Enix.
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The Last Train
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I can't wait to see her.
It's been such a long journey back. It feels like years, not weeks. I didn't get to answer her last letter before I left—I hope she isn't too angry with me.
It's late, and it's very quiet on the train. There aren't many passengers; the few that there are seem tired. They don't speak, or even look up. I don't really mind. I feel tired myself. Such a long time fighting…I lost so many friends. I don't really feel like talking to anyone. I just want to get home.
I crane my neck to look out the window as the train spirals around the inner column of the city. The familiarity ought to make me feel better, but somehow it doesn't. Midgar seems so gloomy after my months out under the sun. Was it really this dark before? Maybe being with her made it seem brighter.
I hear the train horn, so strangely haunting, and yet somehow it makes me feel better in a way the sight of Midgar doesn't. We must be getting close to the station. The sound of the train was always my favorite thing about living in Midgar—waking at night and hearing the distant rumbling and the call of the horn, as if it were beckoning me off to some adventure; when I enlisted, I finally answered it.
But I've had my share of adventures now, more than a lifetime's worth. I'm finished with them. When I get home, I'll promise her that I'm never leaving her again.
The slight jolt of the train settling into its final stop nudges me back to awareness. I look around, but I'm confused. Where are the other passengers? I seem to be the only one left. I get up in a hurry, in spite of how exhausted I feel, and walk quickly to the doors of the train.
But the station is deserted. She isn't waiting for me. A light, drizzling rain falls, a chilly wind blows, and no one is there.
For a moment, I feel dizzy. I couldn't have gotten off at the wrong place. This is the right station. I used to pass it every day on my way to work before I enlisted. This is the last stop.
Frightened, I begin to walk toward the house. I pass a few people, but like those on the train, they take no notice of me, shoulders hunched against the gusty rain. What if something is wrong with her? She was always shy, and didn't make a lot of friends—if she were sick, who would know to go and help her? Surely someone would, wouldn't they?
I walk even faster, but somehow, instead of reaching the house, I find myself at the old abandoned church. She and I used to play hide-and-seek here as children. I met her here, the new girl in the sector, sitting in the flowers and crying simply because she was lonely.
We did our homework here, and she read to me from her books. I first kissed her here…and although we got married in court in the city, she carried a bouquet of the flowers that grew nowhere but here.
I walk up to the open doorway…and I see her.
She sits in one of the pews, her face crumpled in pain, tears streaking her cheeks. Alarmed, I try to rush forward…but as if there is a glass wall between us, I can get no closer. I try to cry out to her…and I have no voice.
A child stands beside her, trying to comfort her, stroking her hair. She turns to embrace the child, her shoulders shaking. The girl lays a cheek against her hair…and suddenly the girl is looking directly at me.
The girl's grieved eyes know too much, and suddenly I understand. I sink down on the steps, sapped of strength. Deadly cold seeps into me, and I close my eyes.
I've come back to her too late.
After a long time, I hear a soft voice calling to me gently. I look up, and a woman stands in the rain, smiling at me. I don't know her, but she calls me by name and holds out her hands. I look back into the church; she and the girl are gone.
I feel too tired and cold to do anything except sit here and let myself drift, but the woman's voice promises rest and comfort, and right now I need both like I once needed breath.
Somehow I get up from the steps. I stumble forward, and then her hands clasp mine, and the desolate chill vanishes. I feel warm again. I hear other voices calling me, voices I thought I would never hear again. But still I look back at the empty church, the flowers waving lightly in the draft.
I look at the woman, and when I realize that her eyes are just like the girl's, I realize that the girl will take care of her for me.
I follow the woman into quiet and light, and the last sound I seem to hear is the train horn, promising me that someday, when her own journey is finished, she will find me.
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The End
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