Fire and Gasoline
By Rhino7
Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, its characters or storyline. This oneshot is mine. This is my first real attempt at CloTi. The title was taken from the lyrics of the song "Tomorrow" by Chris Young, which was the sole inspiration for this piece. No ownership or affiliation. The lyrics just fit how I see their relationship.
..:-X-:..
The air of Radiant Garden felt balmy and thin. The breeze was cool despite the heat wave that had baked the world for the past two weeks. Warm enough to sweat yet cool enough to raise goose flesh. Humid enough to form beads of condensation on glasses of iced water, but several townsfolk were wearing light jackets in the early evening chill. It was the in-between as far as weather went.
Cloud had made it all the way to the Postern before Tifa caught up to him. They hadn't spoken since his altercation with Sephiroth over a week prior. If you could call that a conversation before he and the one winged angel disappeared from Radiant Garden in that flash of light. She would have questions, and she definitely deserved answers—
But he couldn't…not right now…not like this…
His inner war with his darkness was complicated, and as strong as Tifa was, Cloud could not bring her into it. Getting Tifa involved was giving Sephiroth more targets to play with just to corner Cloud. And he refused to let his friends be put in that kind of danger.
He was facing away from the Restoration Site, trying to make his way to Ansem's old office before he could be seen. If that old computer had the information that he needed to conquer Sephiroth and his darkness once and for all, then he could be out of Radiant Garden and off to finally end this by tonight.
Her footfalls were the only things that gave away her approach. No heavy breathing from the run, no immediate outcry to get him to stop, no conscious sound at all, really. She was behind him, but he knew it was Tifa who had tracked him down. Any of the others would have spoken up by now, and Aerith wasn't fighting his need to leave.
To Aerith, this was a psychological battle…a war of will…Cloud versus Cloud. And he had never corrected her: to let her know that he was fighting real flesh and blood evil, that could very easily kill half of the population of Radiant Garden if Cloud wasn't careful. He didn't like lying to her, even by omission, but she would never allow him to go 'find himself' without a fight if she knew that it was at the edge of a sword.
He had stopped walking as soon as he heard her footsteps, and he battled with the thought of not turning around. Of continuing to walk away. Of sparing her another disappointing conversation. But she deserved better than that. So he remained where he was.
The sky of Radiant Garden was overcast, just enough to flirt with the idea of a storm. It would be fitting. He had always appreciated the rain; it was like an eraser, a cleansing agent that diminished all of the ugly, dirty, and unappealing grime that collected…on the streets, on the stones, on the body. Like a clean slate.
"You're leaving."
It was a statement, not a question. Her tone was unassuming, if slightly disappointed, and her voice was soft, tired. She was getting tired of this. His window of opportunity to keep walking had disappeared.
Cloud turned back to face her. Tifa was still halfway across the Postern, not coming any closer, as though he would run away if she got too close too fast. This deliberate distance wasn't lost on him, and he frowned.
"I have to." He responded.
She looked upset and confused. They had known each other from an early age and had been very close friends for just as long. It was impossible for him to hide things from her. It was just as impossible for her to keep secrets from him. There was no one else he would rather have at his back in a fight, and she trusted him with her life…That trust had been tested extensively since the Heartless.
Tifa had given him more than enough light to battle the darkness…but he couldn't keep doing that. If she was water, then he was a sponge, taking everything that she offered and leaving nothing behind. She kept a brave face, but eventually the well would run dry and she would have to move on. Cloud had realized this not long after returning to Radiant Garden from Olympus.
"Why?" She crossed the rest of the Postern to reach him.
He had tried explaining, but the world was black and white to Tifa. Darkness and light. And he was a gray area. That was why he HAD to defeat Sephiroth and rid himself of the darkness permanently. The Restoration Committee and the people of Radiant Garden, they lived surrounded by the darkness. They came in contact with it every day. But they overcame it. They persevered. They could deal with any of the evil that touched their hearts.
Time after time, Cloud had proven that he couldn't do that.
"I can't keep putting you and the others in danger." He replied quietly.
"I can take care of myself." She stated. "Don't be a martyr. Let's fight this together. You don't want to do this by yourself any more than I want you to fight this by yourself."
"It's not about what I want." He explained, looking at her.
Tifa was a woman who could break a man in more ways than one. Mind, body, and spirit. The only defense was to completely wall oneself off, not let her in, not let her see what you are. Well, it was too late for that for Cloud. The only option was to leave now while he still had the willpower. Before that childhood crush and those years of fighting alongside each other snowballed into an avalanche that would swallow him whole.
"Cloud…please…" She stood directly in front of him now, within arms' length. "Don't shut me out."
He averted his eyes to the bleak view over the lip of the Postern rail. She was probably the only person whom he could never completely shut out…not that he had tried very hard.
"You should stay here." He cleared his throat, unsure if he'd actually spoken or not. "The Restoration Committee is safe. You should stay with them."
"I don't know any of them." She sounded clipped now. "The only one I've ever spoken to was Aerith, and she—" She cut herself off, glancing away and then back. "I don't want 'safe'." She gazed up at him. "I want you."
Cloud closed his eyes briefly as his chest ached at her words. She wasn't making this easy. She was making this more difficult by the second. His Gummi Ship was perched on the wall of the Great Maw, just outside the Castle Gates. He should be there, now, or at least scrolling through Ansem's computer for information.
Instead, he was standing out here, getting drunk on Tifa's wine-colored eyes, and letting her cut into his soul like a butcher.
"I want you here." She took that final step closer, putting her hands on his chest. "With me. Safe. No more running."
He looked down at her, looking back up at him, pleading with him with her eyes. Those feelings that he'd carefully bottled and shelved struggled to reach the surface and Cloud swallowed against it. It was because of those feelings that he was waging this war. Only after the darkness was gone would he be able to tell Tifa how he felt.
Until Sephiroth had been vanquished and the darkness banished, any affection and any tenderness that he tried to give Tifa would be tainted and wrong. She deserved more than he could give her at this moment. But she was here…right now…and she was basically screaming at him that this was all she wanted. She only wanted him.
She could have anything, anyone, that she wanted, and she wanted to settle for someone as broken and unclean as him. It was almost…too much.
"Tifa…I don't want to hurt you." He said quietly. "And if I stay here, that's what's going to happen…And I can't face that."
She canted her head to the side and gave him one of those knowing looks. "This isn't about chasing your darkness."
She said it so matter-of-factly that for a wild second, Cloud was tempted to believe her. She lowered her gaze to his shoulder briefly, withdrawing her hands from his ribs.
"You're not afraid of the darkness or the Heartless or Sephiroth." She went on.
He held her eyes when she looked back up at him. That was all he could do, really. Part of him wanted to hear her theory…and a bigger part of him wanted that theory to make sense. He wanted her logic to supersede his own and put a brighter spin on this terrible hand of cards that he'd been dealt.
"You're afraid of me." She remarked, "Of this." She gestured between them.
A rueful groan of a laugh escaped him. "Tifa, that's not—"
"Cloud." She silenced him. "We're not children anymore. We've both made mistakes and we both have regrets. I don't want this to be one."
"I don't either." He replied, "That's why I have to go."
She blinked, "I don't understand."
"Tifa, I—" He glanced briefly around the Postern and back to her. "I care about you. Deeply. But I can't…Not with Sephiroth still out there."
There was a distant rumble of thunder. The overcast sky was growing darker, heavier with rain.
Tifa looked just as conflicted as he did. She was fighting something of her own just as much as he was fighting his darkness. Maybe she was fighting the light. They were like positives and negatives. Oil and water. Or maybe fire and gasoline.
"Sephiroth will always be out there." She said softly. "And I will always be here."
She moved closer slowly, tentatively, as though asking for permission to enter his comfort zone. It was laughable, considering that she'd moved into his heart and made herself comfortable years ago. Before the Heartless came. Before Sephiroth appeared. Before Cloud met Aerith.
He offered no resistance and she leaned in, tilting her head just so as she touched her lips to his. Softly at first, just a simple kiss, but they had never kissed before. That was a lie. They had been seven years old and it had been a dare. They had never kissed like this before. Her lips were soft and her breath was warm. He let his eyes close as he returned the kiss.
Being this close to her was painful, because they fit together so well. A look, a touch, a tilt of the head: it was an entire conversation that he couldn't have with another person. The idea of abandoning this quest to destroy his darkness and instead never being apart from her again was becoming more tempting by the minute.
Her hands had found his neck, and Cloud kissed her back hungrily, running his hands up her back and holding her closer. She let him pull her to him, and their chests pressed together. She tasted like citrus and her hair smelled like freshly cut grass.
A few dots of rain began to sprinkle the Postern.
The kiss ended and they just looked in each other's eyes. Suddenly, all those years of staying at arms' length, of being careful not to let on how much he cared about her, felt wasted. All this time, maybe he had been afraid that someone like her would never really be happy with someone like him.
The rain began to fall in earnest.
Unable to take it anymore, Cloud kissed her again. More deeply than the first. She returned it, but stepped backward. He followed and the rain stopped. They had made their way into the entry hall to Ansem's office. The hallway was lit by yellow lamps, and recent renovations had expanded several side rooms and closets into the maze-like corridors.
Tifa's back was against the wall, and her hands were on his chest again as she bit his lower lip lightly. His shoulder guard loosed from his collar as her nimble fingers unlatched it. As though it symbolized all that was holding him back, Cloud kissed down her neck, tasting her skin. She was breathing heavily, and it drew his attention to her chest.
As easily as she had discarded his shoulder guard, he reached up and unzipped the front of her black vest. She rolled her shoulders, shrugging out of it easily and leaving her only in the white tank top underneath. She looked up at him with a devilish look and lifted her arms above her head.
Pausing only a second, Cloud slid his fingers under the hem of her blouse and tugged it upward. The material slid away from her stomach and then her breasts. Sweeping it away from her shoulders and off her arms, he dropped the blouse and roamed his hands across her upper body. She felt warm and perfect.
A moan escaped Tifa at the touch and she resumed kissing him. Their movements became more erratic as next his shirt joined hers on the floor, and then more clothing as she pulled him into one of the vacant rooms.
"Wait." He finally managed as they both landed on the full length couch in the room.
Tifa reclined on the cushions, looking up at him, breathless. "What is it?"
"Are you…sure about this?" He asked, searching her eyes. "I don't want to force you—"
Tifa interrupted him by covering his mouth with her own, and then pressing her lips to his jaw, his neck, and then his bare chest.
"I want this." She answered, looking up at him. "I've wanted this for a long time."
"It's just…" He hesitated, "This is moving kind of fast."
She traced her fingers around his shoulder. "Are you sure? Do you want this?"
Looking down at her smooth skin and the curves of her body, Cloud was sure he hadn't wanted anything else as much in his life. He answered with one hand around her thigh, following her leg all the way to her hip, across her ribs, and up to cup one breast as he kissed her again.
Soon their bodies moved together in the dim lamp light of the room. It was awkward for only a few seconds as he entered her, but after she assured him that he wasn't hurting her, they quickly established a rhythm.
Longing and desperation fueled them. Her arms wrapped around his back as he moved over her, her back arching slightly. A heated moan escaped in the quiet atmosphere of the room, and neither of them knew which of them had voiced it. It didn't matter.
Time marched on without them for a while. Sweat broke out over their skin as the thunder rumbled nearby, the sound of rain dancing across the concrete outside. Both panting now, Cloud let his head rest above her shoulder as they rocked. Wordlessly, he began to move against her faster, and her hot breath on his neck only encouraged him.
He lifted his face and she looked up into his eyes. Their lips and noses hovered a few inches apart as they passed the point of no return. Her face was flushed and her brows knit together as she began to reach her breaking point.
The pressure was almost too much to handle and a shudder rolled down his spine as he reached his climax. A low, guttural groan clawed out of his throat, and he nearly collapsed on top of her. A moment later she cried out as her own orgasm flooded her body.
Even though his mind was completely numb with ecstasy, his body continued to move against her, and her hips involuntarily continued to move with him, stretching out the moment for as long as they could.
Finally and completely spent, Cloud relaxed and shifted slightly away from her. Tifa wriggled out from under him so that they were lying next to each other on the couch. Her body curled up against his, both slick and sticky with sweat. He put his arm around her and she kissed his shoulder tenderly with exhaustion.
Another peal of thunder growled through the walls, and it lulled Cloud to the most restful sleep he'd had in months.
..:-X-:..
Ansem's computer had nada on Sephiroth. Well, nothing beyond the generic universal information. The dull blue glow from the monitor was all that lit the computer room of the office. Cloud had gotten up—careful not to disturb Tifa—and put his clothes back on before making his way to the center office.
As much as he had tried not to put any hope in the Radiant Garden computer system, Cloud was considerably disappointed to find no new information. He was officially back at square one in his hunt for Sephiroth. He changed the tags on the search engine and tried again. Tron carried out the message without a word. Cloud had only spoken to the quippy computer program in grunts and glares, so Tron didn't bother being chatty and just pulled up the files.
He scrolled through the results, eyes darting back and forth across the columns of text and images. Nothing new. Old news. Bad grammar. He scowled and put his hands back on the keyboard to try again when he sensed someone standing behind him.
"Same old Cloud." Tifa sighed.
He didn't bother trying to hurriedly close the computer windows; she had already seen the screen and she already knew all about his obsession to defeat Sephiroth. But he could still hear the disappointment in her voice; as though she had expected him to forget entirely about his battle against the darkness after the night's earlier events.
"I thought you were asleep." He offered, half turning to look at her.
She'd gotten dressed as well, but her hair was still a mess, even as she combed her fingers through it. She looked disheveled. She folded her arms as he faced her.
"I was until I realized I had the couch all to myself." She tucked her hair behind one ear. "Were you even going to say good bye?"
He exhaled and closed his eyes briefly. He had disappeared on her so many times; it was only natural that she would expect him to just disappear again. But not this time. He was still leaving, of course, but even he knew that running out on her after making love was wrong. Acceptable for a one night stand, maybe, but not for Tifa.
She deserved better than that. And as much as he wanted to stay here with her, he knew that he had to leave…He could only hope that Tifa could still understand that.
"You don't have to run anymore." She spoke up when he didn't respond. "Stay here. Let me fight with you. Let your friends fight with you."
"I can't."
"You said the Restoration Committee was safe for me. It could be safe for both of us. We could be a part of something…instead of facing everything alone." She crossed over to him, placing her hands on his shoulders.
"It's not the same." Cloud said. "Sephiroth isn't after you like he's after me."
"If he's after you, then he's after me too." Tifa said firmly.
Cloud swallowed and closed the windows on the computer. This had been a mistake. No, not a mistake…Just a lapse in judgment. The spark of Tifa's will to help him had been fanned into a fire now. There would be no leaving her behind without a fight now. He had made this situation infinitely worse by allowing himself to be with her like this.
Now his leaving would be personal and it would hurt her…Dammit, this was why he tried to keep everyone at a distance, to avoid this moment. That betrayed look in her eyes. He couldn't even tell her that he'd fallen in love with her, that he had been in love with her for years…He couldn't put her in Sephiroth's crosshairs like that. Not again.
He stood and slipped past her into the main room of the office. "It's not that simple."
"Cloud." She sounded exasperated, following him down the hallway.
The only way to keep her safe at this point was to hurt her…God give him strength.
"Can we talk about this?" She pressed, "Or just look at me? What's gotten into you?"
"Every day that I spend in Radiant Garden is another day that Sephiroth is infecting the air." Cloud said, making sure that he had everything. "I have to leave."
Tifa didn't try to stop him, but her frame had gone rigid. She glared.
"Cloud…why are you running? Tell me the truth." She put her hands on her hips, "Are you running to defeat your darkness, or are you running away from me?"
Cloud drew a breath and looked at her. "Both."
She balked, "Well, I didn't see you trying to run away when my legs were wrapped around you. You obviously had no problem with that."
He grimaced, "Tifa, please."
She choked back whatever she had been readying to yell at him. Remaining forcibly calm, she touched her neck briefly and then looked at him, pleadingly.
"What are we?" She asked, pain evident on her face. "Because we just had pretty much the best sex I've ever had, and now you're being totally distant." She swallowed, "So I need to know…what are we?"
Cloud looked at her, and it took every fiber of his being to remain expressionless. He couldn't tell her. It was too dangerous. Of course he was scared. He was fucking terrified of getting close to her, only to have her made a victim of Sephiroth. Tifa could break most men; she had broken him. But she couldn't stand up against Sephiroth—He would hurt her. He would kill her.
And Cloud would rather hurt Tifa right now than let Sephiroth hurt her much worse later. And if that made him a coward in her eyes…then so be it.
So he steeled himself and walked away.
She didn't follow.
He cursed himself with every step he took away from her, toward the exit to the Postern. Her silence pushed in on him from every angle, as though the hallway was collapsing around him, smothering him, strangling him. And he deserved it. She wouldn't forgive him for this. She would hate him for this. But she would stay alive for this.
And that thought was all that kept him from running back to her and begging for her forgiveness. He reached the end of the hall and opened the door to step outside.
"Damn you, Cloud."
Her voice was soft, but it cut through him like a bayonet. He forgot to breathe as he stepped out of the hallway and out into the open Postern. He forced himself not to look back, and it was like trying to force a car in drive to go backwards. The Postern was soaked with the efforts of the rainstorm some hours earlier, enough so that his boots mauled through several puddles as he made his way to the Great Maw.
His Gummi Ship was waiting, shiny with the rain, on the lip of the canyon, and he kept his eyes on it like a homing beacon or a life preserver. It wasn't until he had climbed up into the cockpit that his brain demanded oxygen. He choked, gripping the control panel in front of him.
He had lost her. With this one, boneheaded move, he had all but guaranteed her wrath forever. He had trespassed on her trust and her leniency long enough. This would push her away for good. And he hated himself for that. He disgusted himself with this obsession. It was worse than drugs, worse than any kind of self destructive addiction.
Was it so revolting to want to be normal? To not be haunted by this looming darkness? To be able to be with the woman he loved and not worry that just physically being with her put a target on her head? Did that make him a monster?
In her eyes, it might.
Cloud cursed and closed his eyes, his fist smashing into the side wall of the Gummi. The steel wall retaliated and pain recoiled across busted knuckles. He welcomed it. Opening his eyes again, he saw blood leaking through the lacerations in his gloves. He drew a slow breath and lifted his other hand over his eyes.
Exhaling raggedly, he lifted his face out of his hand and straightened in the pilot seat. He violently jammed the key into the ignition and turned over the engine. The ship chugged to life and he threw the gear, glaring through the windshield at the Radiant Garden skyline.
The ship ascended from the ground and he guided it higher through the atmosphere. The Postern disappeared behind the Bailey and he got a split second glimpse of the Borough before the upper level of the atmosphere misted across the windshield.
Tifa could do so much better helping this broken world than she could do chasing after him. Aerith, that loudmouth ninja, the chain smoking mechanic, the moody swordsman, and the tottery old sorcerer were better for her than he was. She could take care of herself, he knew she could. She was strong in every way.
Maybe he wasn't doing this to protect her. She had never needed his protection.
Maybe he really was just a coward, chasing darkness just to escape his feelings.
Cloud swallowed bile as he navigated the ship into open space.
If all of that was true, then he was doing her a favor. She deserved the best.
Or, at the very least, better than him.
..:-X-:..
A/N: Argh, Cloud is a tough nut to crack. I'm trying to give him more slack because I really roasted him in my Lefa stories. I don't really ship CloTi; I prefer to huddle in my little Lefa corner and snark, but it was a fun challenge to write them together. If it was too cheesy, I apologize to the lactose intolerant. I was in a weird mood when I wrote this.
As always, constructive criticism is welcome and appreciated!