Deliveries

Delivery 29: Nightmares and Carrots

Studies have revealed that people dream every time they sleep. Dreaming is part of the REM stage, which stands for rapid eye movement, and it is a necessary part of the sleep cycle in order to feel rested upon awakening. But even if people dream when ever they sleep, they don't always remember their dreams. That is because the brain interprets the images as unimportant false gibberish and disregards them, not bothering to commit them to memory.

However, if one wakes up during the REM stage and the conscious thought process kicks in, those images will not be automatically disregarded, and the subject will remember the dream. Such was the case of Cloud Strife this morning, even if he certainly wished it wasn't. He had to get up early to make some deliveries and set his alarm clock to wake him up, now wishing that he hasn't, no delivery was worth this.

By mere chance or cruel fate, Cloud was awakened in the middle of a rather gory dream in which Sephiroth had taken control of his mind and was causing him to attack everyone with Omnislash. The images became embedded in his mind and when he woke up, Cloud screamed at the top of his lungs, threw his alarm clock against a wall and proceeded to cry like a baby.

"Cloud!" Tifa rushed upstairs to rescue her hero. "What happened? Are you hunt? Say something!"

"Nightmare," Cloud chocked out while Tifa hugged him and tried to console him. "Sephiroth... the nightmare..."

"Shh, it's okay Cloud, it was only a nightmare, Sephiroth isn't coming back." Tifa continued trying to calm Cloud, holding him close and caressing him gently.

Meanwhile Reno stood at the door looking annoyed, "how come nobody cares that I had a nightmare about being magically turned into carrot?" The other Turks were there as well, they came to have breakfast before heading to Shinra. Marlene and Denzel had been woken up by the scream and stood there sleepily in their pajamas.

Tifa glared at Reno, "shut up carrot-top!" Couldn't he see that she was busy with a hysterical Cloud?

Reno gasped and pointed at Tifa, "you didn't just call me that!"

Elena giggled, then it evolved into a full laugh, which was joined by Tseng, Marlene, Denzel and even Rude. In fact, Cloud also laughed a little. "Carrot-top..." the delivery boy let out silly sounding giggle, "carrot-top..."

"Stop it Strife!" Reno yelled. "I'll take strawberry, that's okay because strawberries are kind of cool, but I won't accept any carrots! Actually don't call me strawberry either, that's just weird coming from you."

Cloud let go of his Sephiroth-trauma for a moment and smiled at Reno's annoyed expression. "Carrot," the blond grinned mischievously, "from now on, you're Carrot!"

Tifa nodded in agreement, "right, don't forget everyone, Reno is Carrot, got it memorized?"

"Are you going to come play videogames with us after work today, uncle Carrot?" Denzel asked and Reno twitched.

"Say yes uncle Carrot, it'll be fun!" Marlene added, and Reno twitched some more.

"You're all pure evil!" Reno pouted and stomped away while the rest of the group continued to laugh.

End of Delivery 29

Disclaimer, I don't own Final Fantasy VII. Delivery 29 was inspired by a review from Houkaru Kisaragi. There is also a reference to Axel's famous quote from Kingdom Hearts, "got it memorized?" We all know Reno and Axel look alike, but I thought it would be funny if someone other than Reno was the one to use the quote.