Title: Memories

Series: Final Fantasy VII

Characters: Vincent Valentine; Cid Highwind

Author: Aquila Blue

Disclaimer: These characters belong to Square Enix and I am not making any sort of profit from this.

The night before the final battle with Sephiroth offers a bit of time for quiet reflection.

(Note: I know that in the game the night before everyone splits up to find their own motivation to go to battle. The way I played the game however, allowed for many nights in inns before actually heading for the northern crater, so that's how I've written this story)

--------------------------------

A large, pale moon hung starkly against the night sky, its round form carefully scrutinized by a pair of crimson coloured eyes. In fact, Vincent found it hard to decide exactly what to look at, there seemed to be so many things cluttering up the sky.

At the edge of his vision loomed the meteor that was slowly but surely being pulled closer and closer to the planet. Tomorrow they would face Sephiroth, the son of that beloved woman, in a last attempt to save the planet.

Vincent sighed slightly and closed his eyes, letting darkness engulf him momentarily. It was a different sort of darkness than that which had plagued him for those long years; that had been a time of nightmares and terror as he tried to absolve his guilt.

This darkness felt calming, and he let his thoughts wander for a moment. Although he had made up his mind in regards to the course of his action he couldn't be sure that defeating Sephiroth would help to forgive his sins or merely add to them.

Vincent breathed in deeply once more and slowly opened his eyes as he exhaled. This time his gaze rested on the dark silhouette of the airship that was parked silently outside of the town. It served as a reminder that he wasn't alone and he turned slightly to catch a glimpse of the ship's captain dozing off at the table in the room they shared in the inn.

The dark haired man smiled slightly, Cid's bad habit of napping anywhere at anytime had gotten him in trouble before, but he doubted that the man would change his ways anytime soon. As Vincent turned back towards the window he saw a figure run from the inn. His sharp eyes were able to deduce that the shadow belonged to Cloud; perhaps the young man had his own doubts and demons to absolve as well.

He idly pondered following him, but thought it better to leave him be. The lean man stared out the window a bit longer, absentmindedly fiddling with the ends of his long black hair. He couldn't remember when it had gotten so long, it must have happened in that time of darkness. A few minutes later he spied Tifa exit the inn and head in the same direction that Cloud had.

"Ah, young love," came a gravely voice from just to the left and slightly behind him.

Vincent was barely able to keep himself from jumping, although he was betrayed by his eyes widening slightly which managed to draw a chuckle from Cid. Vincent wasn't use to people being able to sneak up behind him, and the other man had been sleeping so soundly just a few minutes earlier.

Cid smiled broadly in response and clasped Vincent's arm warmly, "Come on, it's too late to be having second thoughts, join me for a drink before bed," the pilot said as he headed back towards the table and its accompanying whisky bottle.

He settled himself into the chair that he only recently vacated and poured generous portions of the amber liquid into two tumblers. Cid held out a glass and waved Vincent towards the empty chair beside him, "Come here, I guarantee this is the best booze this place has to offer," he said with the same wide grin.

Vincent couldn't help but feel the edges of his mouth turn upwards slightly as he took the glass from Cid's hand and sat down. He was just raising the glass to his lips when Cid interrupted him. "We should have a toast, after all, who knows, this could be our last drink ever."

"A good idea," Vincent replied, "but what should we toast to?"

"Well, 'To our health' seems a bit contrived since we're practically walking into a deathtrap tomorrow, so after seeing those two run off, how about to 'young love'?"

The two men clicked their tumblers together, "To young love" they said in unison before tossing back the drinks.

-----------

An amiable atmosphere descended on the men as they drained their glasses. Perhaps it was the drink, or perhaps it was the full moon, but Vincent actually felt like talking tonight, rather than being his usual stoic self.

The pair conversed mostly about nonsense which was punctuated by stretches of comfortable silence. After the third round Cid chuckled as he refilled Vincent's glass once again, "So you can take your drink after all, thought with that baby face of yours I might have to mix some milk in."

Vincent pouted slightly and said sullenly, "I am older than you, you know."

This prompted Cid to laugh loudly as he leaned back in his chair. He put his feet up on the table as he lit a cigarette and took a long drag from it, "Ah, we're just a couple of old farts, aren't we? Getting too old for this saving the world thing, but what can you say, can't trust those young guys to do it on their own."

"Youth is wasted on the young, they say," Vincent smiled as he took another swing of his whisky.

"Darn right!" Cid said indignantly, blowing smoke from between his pursed lips, "but then, I guess we can say we've got years of experience on them."

"If you count being unable to save the one you love, being turned into a monster, and sleeping for three decades in a state of terror then I guess that counts as experience," Vincent said sadly, almost to himself, suddenly staring very hard into his whisky.

When he looked up again, he saw that Cid was sitting up in the chair looking at him very intensely, Vincent felt a bit of colour rising in his pale cheeks and looked away again quickly, "Sorry, I didn't mean to ruin things."

"Don't be silly," the pilot said gruffly, as he filled up Vincent's glass once more.

"I guess…" Vincent started hesitantly, "I guess I just don't feel that I've done anything good in this life, I try to atone for my sins, but I'm not sure that I can forgive myself that easily."

"Lemme tell you a story," Cid lit another cigarette, and settled back in his chair again, "on one condition, you don't say a peep 'til I'm done, 'cause I think if I get interrupted I won't be able to finish."

The blond looked a bit uneasy, but Vincent was curious now, did Cid have something in his past that he also couldn't forgive himself for? Vincent nodded, absently taking another drink from his glass.

"Well, it all started many, many years ago. I was a young slip of a boy then, must have been only about 4 years old, and its sort of surprising that I remember it this well, but it really sticks out in my mind.

"Even back then I already loved the sky. I was envious of the birds, how easily they could glide through the heavens. My favorite toy was a little model airplane, I use to be able to run around for hours with it, just gazing up at it against the wide blue expanse and white clouds, pretending that I wasn't just running along the ground, but up there flying through the sky. Hell, I even wore little goggles too."

"I remember there was one particular day, when the Shinra Corporation came to our town. They didn't mean anything to me back then, I just remember my mother chucking me out of the house particularly early that morning and warning me not to get into trouble."

"Well maybe it was fate, maybe it was 'cause my ma told me not to get into trouble, or maybe I was just being a clumsy kid, but I hadn't been running around for long when I managed to trip over a rock. Guess it's 'cause I was always looking up at the sky, I didn't see it sticking out of the ground. I took a nasty tumble and ended up scraping my knees and twisting my ankle. Hurt like hell, but that wasn't the worst thing, I broke my plane as well. I know it seems silly to think of now, crying my eyes out over a broken toy but back then it was so important to me."

"So there I was on the ground, all scrapped and covered with dust, my face dirtied with tears, the smallest, most pathetic thing in the world, crying over my broken plane when suddenly a pair of legs appeared in front of me. I looked up and there was a tall man in front of me. He was wearing a navy blue suit, with white shirt and blue tie. He had black hair; it was short in the back, but a bit longer in the front. At first I was scared, he looked deadly serious and I thought I was going to be in trouble for sure."

"He surprised me though, he sat down next to me and talked with me, asked me if I was alright, and I remember his voice, it was so soft and gentle, seemed a bit out of place on a guy like that but when he got closer I could see his face was serious but gentle as well. I remember he used his handkerchief to dry my tears and he also cleaned up my knees, but the most important thing was that he fixed my plane. I guess it wasn't busted as badly as I thought it had been, but still it meant the world to me."

"The guy even carried me back to my house since I couldn't walk too well on account of my ankle. During that time, he actually talked to me, not just the usual adult-kid kind of talk, but he actually listened and was genuinely interested in what I said."

"I told him all about my dreams of flying, blabbering on as kids do, and as we got to my house, he put me down and he said something that sort of changed my life forever. I was standing there, my little airplane in my hands, my goggles around my neck, thanking him again for what he did, and he leaned down and ruffled my hair and he said to me,"

"With as much ambition and spirit as yours, I'm sure you won't just fly through the sky, but you'll be able to reach the stars themselves."

"As soon as he said that, he was gone again, mysteriously as he appeared. My ma told me later that he must have been one of the Turks, a Mr. Valentine, that came along with the Shinra, but that didn't really matter. At the time I was just stunned; the thought had never even crossed my mind before, to go to the stars! But now that the thought was there, it became my most precious dream, the dream that I lived my life for."

-----------

Cid sat up quickly when he finished, roughly stubbing out his cigarette even though it was only half finished, as if he just needed some sort of familiar motion to settle him.

Vincent thought that he could see the pilot flushing slightly; he wasn't really sure what he should say, so he didn't say anything.

"Now I've never told anyone that story before, so don't you go repeating it all over the place, I've got my image to keep up you know," Cid said gruffly as he got up from the table and paced around the room a bit,

"I guess," he continued, "I guess I just wanted to let you know that you have done good, and you shouldn't be so damn hard on yourself all the time."

Vincent couldn't help but blush slightly and smile himself now, half burying his face in the high collar of his cloak to hide it; somehow it felt that a load had been lifted off his shoulders. He knew it must not have been easy for Cid to tell him that, to be honest he had almost forgotten that day but as he remembered back, past the nightmares, his heart grew warmer.

By now Cid had stopped pacing and taken up the place by the window that Vincent had earlier vacated, staring in an uncharacteristically melancholy manner out into the night. Vincent walked over with the glasses that Cid had left on the table, plunking them down on the windowsill in front of the blond man.

As Cid turned to look towards the other, Vincent reached out and ruffled his hair, just like he had done so many years ago. Cid half opened his mouth to object when he saw a very rare sight indeed, a genuine warm smile on Vincent's face, and the pilot's indignity dissolved into his normal bemusement.

"Come on Cid, lets get some rest," said Vincent, "After all we have to stay alive tomorrow if we're going to make more memories in the future."

"Yeah soon, but no point in letting the last of the whisky go to waste," Cid replied as he raised his glass with a grin again, back to his normal self. Vincent smiled and did the same.

----------------

A/N Thanks for reading. I wrote this short fic a long time ago, I hope you enjoyed it. Please leave a review to let me know what you thought of it