Sora felt as if he was being lifted in the air, just floating in a large area that was bright, which he could tell even though his eyes were closed. Sora then slowly began to open his eyes to see he was in a bright white area. He turned his head slightly to see that Cloud was floating next to him, but he ever so slowly began to drift away.
"Cloud…" Sora said weakly as he took his hand and tried to catch Cloud so he wouldn't leave, but he was too weak to get to him in time. Sora then was too weak to keep his eyes open any longer, and they once again closed.
After an unknown period of time went by, Sora suddenly felt a presence over him, nearly touching his head but it stopped. "…Mother…? Sora asked whatever it was.
"Far from it kid," the voice said. Sora knew he had heard the voice before, but he was so weak that he could barely hear a thing. "I would be going against the master's orders by a long shot, but since when did I ever listen to anyone?"
Sora then felt like he was falling into something, and before the keyblade master knew it, he felt something on his body from his shoulder to half way down his back. Sora then opened his eyes and felt water around him, and what was touching him before where the hands of children.
(Cloud Smiles – Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete) As soon as Sora was standing, he looked around to see he was in the church, and looked down to see he was standing in a pool of water. He then looked behind him to see Cloud standing back to back with him, and smiled upon seeing this, since he did think they were dead after all. He then looked at one of the children, who was none other than the Moogle girl.
"It's like the voice said, wait here and Cloud and Sora will come back." She said.
"Welcome back." A voice said that Sora knew better than anyone. He then looked over and saw everyone: Kairi, Riku, Namine, Xion, Tifa, Barrett, Vincent, Yuffie, Red, Cait, Cid, Yuffie, Aerith, Zack, Marlene (who was standing next to her father), Denzel, Rufus, Reno, Rude, Roxas, Tseng, Elena, and Lea, who was every close to Elena at this moment.
Sora only smiled at them. "We're back," he said.
"And we are here to stay this time." Cloud said.
Red then stepped forward. "There are still children with the stigma." He said, speaking for the first time.
"Yeah," Cloud said as he then looked at Denzel, who looked nervous, but Tifa was there to comfort him.
"Hey, let's get you fixed up." Tifa said as Denzel then nodded. Sora then moved to the edge of the pool of water as Cloud stepped forward and held out his hand.
"Come on, I'm here." Cloud said as Denzel smiled.
"It's okay." Tifa said as Denzel nodded and stepped forward. Cloud picked him up and placed him in the water, carrying him not to far away. Cloud then took his hands and cupped a handful of the water in his hands. He then took his hands and put it over Denzel's head, letting go of the water and letting it poor on his head.
Denzel placed his hands on his head in shock, but when he felt all the pain from his head leave his body and vanish into green lights, he laughed and turned too looked at everyone happily. And in the blink of an eye, all the children with the geostigma jumped into the water and ran to Cloud, begging him to cure then as well.
Riku then stood on the land outside of the pool of water. "So are you going to be like Cloud and ever so gentility help me cure my stigma?" Riku asked Sora.
Sora laughed as he held his hand out to Riku, who only snickered at this. But as soon as he felt Riku's hand in his, Sora pulled Riku into the water, causing him to fall in face first. Sora only laughed at this so hard that his stomach hurt, but Riku wasn't laughing.
"Hey not cool!" He said as he shook his head, making all the water from his hair fly out. But Riku then looked down to see his stigma, which was all the way up to his shoulder now, vanish from his arm and turn into green lights that vanished instantly.
"I beat you it's cool now huh?" Sora laughed, and as much as Riku was trying to hide his smile, he began to laugh as well. Sora and Riku then stood in the water, looking over at the children surrounding Cloud, all laughing and glad to be cured from their stigma. Cloud then turned around however, and saw something on the wall at the end of the church.
"Sora, look." Cloud said. Sora looked at him confused, but then walked over to Cloud, avoiding the children surrounding Cloud. He looked over to where Cloud was looking at and saw a small keyhole on the wall.
"The keyhole to this world…" Sora said, drifting off.
"You said that if you lock a world's keyhole, the world would be safe from the darkness right? Would you please protect this world by doing so?" Cloud asked. Sora only laughed at this, which confused Cloud.
"I don't need to lock it for you." Sora said. Cloud looked at him confused, but he then remembered what happened right before the explosion. "You can do it, I know you can."
Cloud nodded at Sora and then held out his hand, trying to focus all his attention on his hand. At first, Cloud thought it would never come, but when he opened his eyes and saw the flash of light in his hands, he knew he had summoned his keyblade.
"WHAT?!" "WOAH!" Everyone exclaimed at the same time as they saw the Fenrir keyblade appear in Cloud's hand. Their eyes where all widened as Cloud then pointed his keyblade at the keyhole and a beam of light then shot out of it, heading towards the keyhole. And in another flash of light, the keyhole vanished and the world was safe from the darkness.
Cloud then unsummoned his keyblade and turned to face the group. "Cloud… how?" Tifa asked.
Cloud snickered. "I guess the keyblade isn't as picky as they say it is." Cloud joked, "I mean if it picked Lea I think it's pretty obvious."
Everyone laughed, including Lea who did not yet catch on to the joke but then caught on. "HEY!" He said angrily, which only made everyone laugh harder.
"Oh, sorry Cloud had to embarrass you in front of your girlfriend Lea." Roxas said which made both Elena and Lea's face turn the darkness red.
"We are dating… yet." Elena said playfully as she stood next to Lea, who only snickered at this.
"Instead of arguing about this, how about we cure these kids of the disease they have had long enough?" Cloud suggested.
Almost on instinct, Tifa jumped in the water. "Sounds like a great idea!" She said. Shortly after that, everyone, except for Rufus, Tseng, Red and Cait respectively, jumped in the water. They then traveled to as many children as they could, curing them happily. Sora only smiled at the sight; he was glad that the horrible events that had taken place over these three months brought this whole world together. Sora only looked at everyone, moving his eyes as he stood in the center of the pool of water.
But his eyes stopped at the entrance to the church when he saw an all too familiar figure walking towards the doorway.
He was still wearing his red robe, his arm was still in a sling, his hair was still jet black. But what really proved to Sora that it was him was that he still had his sword over his shoulder. It was Auron.
Sora watched shocked as he saw Auron make it to the end of the doorway. He was dead, that is what Phil said, that he went back to the underworld. He wasn't alive, but he was still there. And that meant the world to Sora.
Auron walked to the edge of the doorway where another figure was waiting for him. This time, Sora did not recognize the person, but he did seem familiar to him. He was wearing a SOLIDER uniform similar to his and Zack's, and he had black hair that went down to his shoulders. Sora then looked at him again and had to take a second look since he swore he saw the person had a huge white wing on his back, but then saw that he actually did have a wing on his back.
Sora knew who that person was to when he saw the wing. Zack had told him countless stories about him, his name was Angeal Hewley, and he was supposed to be dead too.
Sora looked at the two in the doorway in disbelief. He then saw Auron turn around to face him. "See? Everything is alright as long as you have you're guardian angel with you." Auron said.
He then began to walk way, heading toward the light that was on the outside of the doorway. Sora looked over at Angeal, who waved his hand at Sora. "Make sure you say hey to Zack for me kid." Angeal said as he and Auron then walked through the doorway, gone in the flash of light.
Sora only looked at the doorway shocked. He did not believe that just happened, but he was glad he did. Sora then let out the lightest smile, happy that he was able to see his friends once again.
(End Cloud Smiles) But then Sora's smile turned into a black expression. They didn't bring the rain… Sora realized. He knew they didn't bring the rain, he would have known they brought the rain when he saw them, but he didn't. They weren't the ones that brought Cloud and I back either… Sora realized once again as he drifted into thought with the question that would stick in his mind forever…
But if they didn't bring the rain or bring us back… Who did?
…
Sora, Riku, Kairi, Roxas, Lea, Namine and Xion where getting ready to leave Edge, summoning their keyblade riders and armor (except for Xion respectively). All the children where finally healed of their stigma and the darkness could not harm the world anymore, so the keyblade masters had finally did what they came here for: restore the world.
Mostly everyone was talking with each other, saying their goodbyes: Namine and Xion were saying goodbye to Cid, Yuffie, Red and Cait, Marlene and Barrett, Sora, Riku, and Kairi where saying goodbye to Zack, Aerith, Cloud, Denzel, Tifa, and Vincent, Roxas was saying goodbye to the Turks and their leader, while Lea was saying goodbye to Elena.
"Will I ever see you again?" Elena asked.
"Why would you ask something like that? Of course we will." Lea replied.
"You promise?" Elena asked.
"Yeah, I know that if it is really meant to be, our hearts will bring us together again." Lea replied as he let out a smile. Elena only giggled at this as she then stood on her toes and kissed Lea lightly on the cheek, which made him blush.
Sora only rolled his eyes as the two, since he was watching them out of the corner of his eyes. But he then focused his attention back on the people he was saying goodbye to. "Well, that was an adventure huh?" Riku said.
"You got that right." Aerith said.
"I think that was enough adventuring for week though." Zack joked.
"One week? More like one year." Kairi added.
"Sora," Cloud said as the spiky haired keyblade master turned his head. "Thank you."
"It's fine." Sora said.
"No, I owe you everything; you helped me find myself again. If it weren't for you, we wouldn't have defeated Sephiroth, these children wouldn't ha e survived the geostigma, and most importantly, I would have never have discovered what amazing friends and family members I have." Cloud said.
"Does this mean you aren't going to leave again?" Tifa asked.
"Of course I'm not going to leave, ever again." Cloud said, "Besides, I have a girlfriend and son I need to look after."
Denzel only perked up at this. "If you want me to of course." Cloud said to the boy.
"Yeah I want you to!" Denzel said happily as Cloud directed his attention back to Sora.
"Really, thank you." Cloud said.
Sora opened his mouth, as if he was about to say he didn't need to be thanked again, but Vincent stopped him. "You know how rare 'Cloud thank yous' are? Just be thankful for it." Vincent said, causing the group to laugh.
"Sora, it looks like we are ready to go." Xion said.
"Well, I guess this is goodbye." Sora said.
"Yeah, for now." Cloud said as Sora nodded and all the keyblade wielders jumped on their riders, with Xion riding on the back of Roxas's. Sora and the rest of the gang then gave one last wave to the Edge residents before riding off into the sky, happy to go home.
Sometime later, the picture frame containing the photo of Cloud, Tifa, Denzel, and Marlene was replaced by something much greater. Somehow, Sora, Riku, Kairi, Namine, Xion, Roxas, Lea, Elena, Reno, Rude, Tseng, Rufus, Barrett, Cait, Red, Yuffie, Cid, Vincent, Aerith and Zack have all made it into the new picture sitting on Cloud's desk. And unlike the first, Cloud, Marlene, Denzel and Tifa where in it, but this time all wearing smiles.
AND DONE! WOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOO OO!
I found this last chapter very touching, dont you think so? I mean with Auron and Angeal in it, that touching momnet when Cloud called Denzel his son, and that last few lines really got me right in the feels :)
And I know a lot of people are going to be complaining since I left you all a cliffhanger on the last chapter. Will you ever find out who that voice was that saved Cloud and Sora and brought the rain? Maybe, maybe not... (insert evil laugh here)
So please R&R, lets see if we can make it to 100 reviews! But dont stop reading there, you know i cant finish a story without having a SECRET ENDING! So look out for that sometime in the near future!