Recollection xxiv

'That's damn well crazy and you know it!'

The illustrious Captain Cid had joined our present meeting. He was not happy when he heard what we wanted to do.

'We're not-' I started.

'Your askin' me to fly over THAT pit-hole so you can jump into it. In case you hadn't fucken' noticed, this ship is carryin' refugees!! I am NOT gonna compromise their safety so you lot can go suicidal! Look, you want to end it that bad, we've got friggen' sleepin' pills in the medical unit you can over dose on, or if-'

'This is not a suicide mission. We are going to finish what he started.'

Cid's ranting was ended abruptly by Cloud's flat, dead pan voice. The Captain turned to stare at him, swiping the cigarette out of his mouth in a swift movement.

Something had turned to stone in Cloud, I was sure of it.

'Of course, your expectin' to come out of this alive, well excuse me for saying otherwise, but there's no damn way your getting' there on this ship! We're on a one way course to Radiant Gardens, and you're on it!'

We were in a small side room that Cid had reluctantly let us into when Barret had told him that we had plans. We didn't want the other survivors to hear us. Naturally, Cid had invited himself in, to discourage us, if anything.

Barret was silently fuming beside me. He hated someone telling him he couldn't do something almost as much as he hated the General.

Cid scowled again and rubbed his neck when he saw the determined look that mirrored on all of our faces.

'Damn…' he muttered, looking distractedly out the window.

Red shifted and raised his head.'We understand your concerns about the civilians, but we cannot come back with you to Radiant Garden. If needs be, we shall return to Midgar by foot.'

'Tha's right!' Barret slammed his fist onto the table for emphasis.

The city of Midgar could be seen on the landscape from the airships current position. Its course flew in a low wide arc to avoid the city, but we could still see it on the horizon. We did not need to be any closer to notice the dark nebulous that was forming around it.

'It has to be soon, though, we already may be too late.' Continued Red.

Cid muttered darkly to himself. Standing, he stalked off into an adjoining room, slamming the door behind him. We let out a collective sigh.

'It will be harder to get to the center by foot.' Vincent murmured.

I bit my lip.

'We'll manage it.'

He glanced briefly at me and shook his head.'

''Sephiroth will be at the center of the vortex. All his Heartless will surround him. The people of Midgar have most likely all been consumed by now-'

'Ye wrong there, Valentine.' Barret shook his head slowly 'He hasn' set them cursed Reactors off yet. Even them folk in Radiant Garden woulda felt it if he had. Their not completed yet's my guess, and he needs human's to do it.'

'Why would he refrain from activating all the Reactors once they were built? You would think once the last one is built, everything would be gone' After a pause I added '…like Wutai.'

'Why, indeed?'

We all mulled over this thought.

'He must have a bunch o' them hostage, to work on his last Reactor…' Barret began 'which means we have ta get the bastard before he completes it.'

'We don't have much time…'

It was only the second thing Cloud had said the entire meeting. I'm not even sure if he meant to say it out loud.

A door flew open and Cid stomped back into the room. Throwing a pile of papers onto the table in front of us, he lit up another smoke.

'There.' He proclaimed 'find the cursed spot where you wanna land and I'll drop you off there. It'll take me a week max to get to a rendezvous area for the civilians 'ere to be transferred to another ship. After that, I'll take another week to get back. You clowns still here, I'll drop you over the damn city.'

He leaned onto the wall, concentrating terribly hard on his cigarette. Everybody either looked stunned or slightly abashed.

'Thank you Cid.' I finally said softly, elbowing Barret to do the same.

'Ur…right, damn…thanks, I s'pose.'

Cid scowled again fiercely. 'Don't thank me, I'll be taking you to your deaths, numbskulls.'

Vincent had gone through the maps Cid had provided, eventually selecting a semi-mountainous area that supposedly contained old city ruins. When asked about it, he said that we'd best go there if we wanted to see where it all began.

As I have said, the man was an enigma.

That night, I could not sleep. I reasoned that I had done enough sleeping when my body was still healing.

I sat in our corner of the cargo hold, watching the tired figures of Junon's survivors lose them selves in slumber. I saw more then one toss and turn restlessly, moaning as some forbidden horror relived itself behind closed eyelids.

I had them too, which was why I had not felt very inclined towards the thought of sleep. At least, not just yet.

I heard Barret breath noisily as he shifted. Glancing at him, I had been startled to realize that he too was awake.

Scratching his arm absentmindedly, he nodded in response to my small smile. I was not the only one reluctant to embrace the dream world. We sat there in companionable silence for a while, listening in the dark to those around us.

'Y'know…you…don't have ta come with us…'

What?

The big man shifted again. His eyes where watching the slow, flicking movements Red's tail made while the big cat slept.

I made no answer. I was too shocked.

'No…no one'll hold it 'gainst you if ye choose to go on ta Radiant Garden…' His voice was soft, serious. That was the only reason I didn't burst out laughing as if it were a joke.

'Ex-cuse me?'

Barret, brow etched in a furrow, turned to face me.

'It…it'd be a weight off me mind, ta know ye were safe…' His eyes lowered and he softly stroked Marlene's hair, who lay oblivious beside him.

The indignation fell from me, and I let my body relax.

We had already lost so many; Barret only wanted my safety. He was like family to me, just as close without the blood bit. I suppose a weird cross between a worried father, an impatient uncle and a fond brother. He had adopted me, in a way, and now he wanted to protect me.

'Barret…' I spoke in the same soft voice as he had 'I am coming with you no matter what.'

A pause, and I felt the need to continue.

'Did you think…did you think that, after all this time…that I could simply walk away from it all?' I shook my head. 'I'm in this 'til the end…the very end, just like you and Vincent and Red and Cloud are…so…so don't you worry 'bout me keeping up, ok?'

Barret's smile was one of acceptance and resignation. I felt a lump in my throat threatened to rise as I thought about how much Barret meant to me and how much he had done for me, and my life. He had given me purpose and direction where Zagane had given me the strength to fulfill it. He was a leader, my friend and my comrade in arms. If I owe anyone in Avalanche, it is he.

'Git some sleep, Tifa…' he said, before rolling over.

Hugging my knees, I looked around at our rag tag group of rebels. An impatient gunman who tried to balance rebellion in one hand and fatherhood with the other, an unsociable, tormented mercenary with heavy hooded eyes, a wise ex-guardian beast-lion whose loss did not hinder his purpose, an assassin with an unknown past and me. Myself. I was just as out of place as any of them, a martial artist from the mountains that regretted the loss of her dreams, and yet still kept them hidden away in her heart.

I'm sorry, does that seem a much too cliché way of describing myself? I am not sure, myself.

But there you are. I gazed at them and wondered, and hoped, that together we would have enough light to defeat Sephiroth and his Darkness. For, I had long believed that one could not destroy Darkness completely.

It was in my fading moments of consciousness I had a sudden moment of clarity. Not one of my other companions were asleep either.

But by then, I was not particularly bothered.

Two days later we landed amongst rubble and ruin, so much so that sometimes it was to differentiate between mountain rock and temple stone.

It was a desolate place.

There was something so depressing about watching that air ship fly away into the distance. We didn't move as the perpetual humming of moving machinery faded into the distance.

Barret's jaw was so clenched; I was surprised he did not lose any teeth.

But then, he was watching his little girl disappear into unknown territory. Cid had promised to see that she would be cared for, and we did not doubt him. But her departure signaled the final point of no return. Our path was set.

'Hey now baby, don' cry. Papa'll come ta see righ' soon now. He jus' gotta finish this one last job, ok hon?'

The tears unabashedly coursed down her round cheeks. She tried to speak to him between her heaving sobs.

'Ye…ye…you pr-omise? The la-st one?'

'I swear on it, honey.'

'An…an' you'll come back, once i…its done?'

'O' course I will, Marly' He wrapped her up in a massive hug, before staring intently into his daughter's face 'Aint nothin' in this world that will stop me seeing mah little girl.'

An empty wind howled through the cavernous walls of rock behind us. I pretended not to notice the damp patches around Barret's eyes as we finally moved away.

Our camp that night was silent. Nobody bothered to try and break it as it hung like thread between us. The only noise came from the clutter of the cooking pot as I boiled water for our 'preserved soup'. Cid had been kind enough to give us enough rations whilst we waited for him. I took some comfort from the fact that we had adequate supplies of both food and water.

And potions, for we no longer had our white mage.

I sighed quietly as I poured out the contents of the small, leather pouch. Already I was feeling desolate.

Stirring the mixture, I remember the smell of that ration soup. It had a thick, beefy smell; for all that it tasted bland. It was some invention from Radiant Garden, and one that we welcomed willingly.

We were camped between the crumbling walls of the temple that rose up towards a leaning cliff overhang. It meant that we were mostly protected from the elements, however we could still here the howling gale of the wind as it thrashed against the rocky cliffs. We could see where the temple extended into the mountain rock behind us. Supposedly it would have many secret passageways and corridors deep below ground, but none of us had any care to find them.

Barret stared bleakly into the fire across from me. I imagine his thoughts rested on his little girl. Red XIII rested comfortably beside me, head on his paws as he watched me with his single eye.

Inspecting the brew one final time, I turned to the packs beside me and reached for the five crude bowels we had with us. They clunked heavily together as I placed them by my side.

Picking up the ladle I had left in the pot, I began serving up.

Red raised his head and nodded his that's to me as I set a larger bowel down next to his. I smiled. Carefully, I rose to take two bowels to Barret and Vincent respectively. Barret grunted his thanks, balancing the bowel between his knees as he clutched the spoon with his one hand to eat. Vincent set down his gun, which he was cleaning, as I handed him his share. He held my gaze for a moment before taking the bowel, and I walked away.

Cloud stood apart from us, just escaping the small glow of the fire. It appeared as if he was seeking solace in the darkness. I had frowned at that thought, as I approached to where he was staring at the foreboding mountains.

I cleared my throat to make my presence known. He jerked his head around, as if I had pulled him away from some place of deep thought.

I tried to smile as I held out his bowel.

'Dinner.'

'I'm not hungry.'

'You have to eat, Cloud.'

He stared at me for a moment, and I abandoned my unconvincing cheerful charade. '…whatever. You starve if it makes you feel better.'

I turned to go.

'Wait…'

I stopped, breathed out slowly and turned to face him again.

'I…' He had looked uncertain, unsure. As if he were trying to say something that even he did not understand. My irritation faded. He was still grieving, after all.

I stepped up, took one of his hands, and wrapped it around the soup bowel.

'There' I had said wryly 'Eat it. It's not that bad.'

His eye's seemed glazed, for a moment. Then he blinked and they returned to their normal, guarded look. He nodded at me, and I took it as my dismissal.

The next day we had planned to establish the layout of the broken landscape around us. Vincent had said that he did not expect many Heartless to find us up here, but one can never be too careful.

There was surprisingly little wind on that morning, however the ominous dark clouds of Sephiroth's power still plagued the sky.

The 'men' had nominated that I keep camp whilst they scouted. Needless to say, I had been rather put off that they still viewed me as the homemaker. Had I not proved that I could hold my own ground?

I did not protest though, apart from scowling at the lot of them before turning back to the fire with a disgruntled 'hmph'. I heard Barret give out a nervous sort of laugh and a distinct chuckle from Red.

They began to move off. Biting my lip, turned and rose to watch their retreating backs.

'Hey!' I had yelled out. Each one of them paused, and only Cloud did not look back 'Be careful now, don't make me have to come out to save you!'

Barret smiled and raised his hand. Red flicked his tail and gave out a small wumph, as Vincent nodded. Then, I was left alone in an empty camp, with only the howling wind as my companion.

I felt very alone on that morning. There was no one with me to distract my worried mind, and there was little for me to do around the campsite. We were light travelers, after all.

I found myself exploring the ruins close by, including the crumbling walls that surrounded our camp. They were old, they appeared as if from another world. They must have been magnificent in their prime. Now they were fading remnants of an old time that was almost completely forgotten.

I shivered when I realized that, after us, no one else would ever walk along these silent streets.

The wind blew, and I had to shield my eyes from the flying dust and sand.

Twelve o'clock, and the thin, feeble light of what used to be our sun, strained through the dark cloud directly above me. I had already started on my way back to the camp. Cloud and Nanaki awaited me there. They both turned sharply to face me when I approached.

'Your back.' I stated simply, smiling a little. I knelt down next to the smoldering fire and reached out to take off the pot of now bubbling water I had left to boil.

'Where were you?' I had been surprised to hear a tinge of annoyance in Cloud's voice. It almost sounded as if he wanted to reprimand me for not being here to greet them upon their return. I frowned at this, not that he would have noticed, my back was facing him.

'I went for a walk, to see our surroundings.' I had paused then, before twisting my head to peer at the two of them 'What did you find? Anything of note?'

Nanaki shook his head and began to pace.

'Heartless, on the horizon, coming east from Junon.' I swallowed the hard lump that had risen in my throat. My eyes itched. Nanaki continued 'They will not come here, not yet. Not while their master calls them to Midgar.'

I nodded, pouring the hot water into our bowels.

'Uh…Tifa?'

The beast had padded next to me.

'Yeah?' The beast cleared his throat '…is there… meant to be… soup stock in with that hot water?'

'Huh?-oh…' I had been confused, and then embarrassed. What a stupid mistake to have made.

We would of laughed at it, had we the time. The sound of gunfire echoed faintly, yet it knifed its way to our ears with frightening clarity. The same word would have echoed simultaneously in all our mind.

Heartless.

Authors note: Here's another one! I've somehow got it into my head that I want the recollections over by Chapter 30. Will I make it? I certainly will try. This means longer chapters, hope you guys don't mind.

Once again, thanks for for the reviews :)