Journey
/
Four months later
"Hey! Get yer ass a fuckin' move on! This baby's not gonna build herself!"
The scolded townsman gave a comical look and trotted off quickly to his job, abandoning his empty lunchbox in the sun to step in the shadow of a huge, bulking structure. Most of the other townspeople were hammering away at the incomplete plating, which sat on its support bay patiently awaiting its completion. It took up the majority of the clearing on the edge of Rocket Town, so huge it required equipment to reach. It cast a great shadow down on them all.
Cid propped his filthy hands on his equally filthy hips and squinted against the bright sunlight, gazing up at her.
His new airship.
She was without much of her hull, all exposed innards and intricate workings, but she was already a beauty; a fraction larger than the Highwind. Hi-way staging flanked her right side allowing the engineers of the town to weld segments of the hull twenty feet above ground level. The man whom Cid had chided climbed back up the tower to aid them. The entire town was contributing in some way or another, pooling their efforts to create a ship worthy to replace Cid's baby. However, it wasn't entirely their handiwork.
"Still can't believe you and Sher discovered this," Berto appeared by Cid's side, wiping a greasy hand over his sweaty forehead, his arm long since mended and cast-free. "Just who in the hell had created these pieces? They've gotta be a century old at least."
"Who gives a shit?" Cid replied breezily. "What matters to me is puttin' her together."
"And finding a viable fuel source."
"That, too," Cid agreed. "Me, Shera and Barret might be onto somethin'. But don't hold yer breath."
"I never do," Berto smiled, walking away. "You always tell me when it's time."
Cid watched him leave, to join another Highwind crewman at the construction. They shared a laugh before turning to their welding work. Cid cast his eyes around them all, from those on the staging tower to the men and women fussing over something on the lowest plating. They were happy, pleased to be involved in a new project, a new excitement. Rocket Town was rising from its monotonous gloom. But things were never black and white. Good was always accompanied by bad.
/
Some hours later, the sun was creeping down, signaling the end of their working day. The townspeople bid their Captain a goodnight as they left one by one, and eventually the site that had been noisy and full of tinkering, banging and machinery was now quiet and oddly still.
Wiping his hands on a once-white-now-black cloth, Cid walked slowly around the airship, observing the small but notable work done today. He was excited to see it coming together, even more excited to think of her finished result. Cid had constructed a 2D base design on what her overall appearance might look like considering the parts found at the discovery site and scanning technology they had available; she would look magnificent. Half of her body would require a complete rework, and much of the outer shell created from scratch, but based on the shape the original creators were going for, they had a sophisticated vision. She would be more streamlined than the Highwind, and from what they had managed to interpret of the engine, she could possibly be much faster. But she was not built to run on mako. Whatever she guzzled, it had yet to be implemented.
Cid tossed the cloth onto a workbench and pulled out a packet of cigarettes.
"Should you be smokin' around here?" A deep voice asked.
"There ain't no fumes in the air," Cid answered, flicking his lighter open. He eyed Barret's approach. The dark man was shining with a thin film of sweat. Cid had put him to work doing menial labor that he couldn't spare anyone else for. "Yer done?"
"Yeah. Shera said to get yer ass home," Barret said, picking up the cloth to contribute his own stains. "She's cookin' dinner."
Cid hmph'ed, taking a drag of his smoke. "She don't know when to quit for the day. Told her to take it easy."
"You know she won't," Barret smirked. "Even with that infection, she's just as stubborn as you."
"Yeah, that she is. C'mon, I'm fuckin' starvin'."
The two made their way back into town, discussing the possible origins of the new airship and how a civilization managed to construct a partial vessel of such size and advancement for its era. Despite his lack of interest earlier, Cid was in fact curious, but initial research had brought nothing in terms of information, and he wasn't going to waste time looking deeper. The airship had already taken months to construct to its current condition, it would require many more and his utmost attention.
The kitchen door swung open and the two men stepped into Cid's house.
"Shera, sit yer ass down," Cid told her, shucking off his boots beside Barret's. "I'll do the, uh, cookin' and shit."
Barret let out a bark of a laugh. "This I gotta see."
"Don't get so cocky, yer fuckin' helpin' me," Cid pointed an index finger resolutely.
The smile faltered.
Several minutes later, with Shera's verbal instructions from across the table, they had successfully prepared a pot of tender Velcher meat stew. Cid gave the wooden spoon a stir through the thick concoction and prayed to whatever culinary god that it would taste better than it looked. He left it on the heat as Barret washed his hands. Shera was smiling widely, thoroughly entertained. She had rid herself of the white jacket she loved so much, and now lounged in a comfy wooly sweater. It was only a size too big for her, but Cid couldn't help thinking she looked so small in it. The long sleeves hid the marks on her hand.
"So, Barret," Shera started as he sat down at the kitchen table next to her, pushing up her glasses. "How is the rest of Avalanche? I didn't get to ask you yesterday. What are they all up to?"
Barret hooked a finger around the dainty tea cup handle that Cid dumped before him. "Doin' okay," he shrugged. "Red and Yuffie went to their homes. I helped Tifa build her new bar. Seventh Heaven. It ain't half bad. Got a home above it. Cloud's there. I left Marlene with 'em while I…" He gave another half shrug. "I tried to find something to get my life together."
"Did you find it?" Shera asked softly.
"I think so, now, yeah," he nodded. "If I can help you guys find more oil reserves, and we revolutionize the world's fuel sources, I'll be a step closer…"
Cid slumped back casually in own his seat. "To what?"
Barret watched his tea, silent for a second. "To making up for what I did in Midgar. Ya know, when I was leading Avalanche." Something haunting passed across his dark eyes, and his tough, rugged exterior disappeared. "I did horrible things in the name of justice. Wrong things. People lost their lives…"
Cid had been sipping his tea. He put it down. "We all got dead people on our hands."
Barret looked at him. "I'm not talkin' about the Shinra guards we went through. Cid, you ain't ever killed anyone to make a point. You ain't… done something that got innocent people killed because you didn't damn well think." He glared at his drink again, emotions shining in his eyes. "I thought it was all for the cause, for bringing attention to the planet's destruction. But I wasn't doing any good. And people suffered. I gotta… I gotta find a way to make up for it. To atone."
To atone. Cid watched the dark man silently. That sounded familiar.
Shera reached across and placed a comforting hand over Barret's larger one. "It's in the past, now. You redeemed yourself when you saved the planet, and defeated Sephiroth." She smiled, squeezing her fingers slightly. "You were willing to sacrifice yourself. There is no greater redemption than that."
He gave an unsure, but grateful smile, which vanished almost as quickly as it came. "I have to keep trying, though. I'm gonna find you guys oil fields, and we're gonna change the way our generation lives. You just keep workin' on your airship."
"Don't need to tell me that," Cid snorted.
"But I do need to tell you to stir the stew," Shera said shrewdly, gesturing to the bubbling pot behind Cid.
He looked at it over his shoulder, frowning peevishly as though the pot had said something unpleasant. This kind of cooking lark was already annoying him.
"I've seen you make waffles and fry-ups with the ease of a chef," Shera was smiling. "And those flat dishes –"
"Pancakes."
"Pancakes," she continued, "so this should be no problem to you."
Barret swung a skeptical, yet impressed, expression on him. "You can cook?"
"No, I can make stuff," Cid argued, getting up to stir the casserole pot.
Barret's mouth opened and closed twice, amusement dancing in his eyes. "Isn't that just the same thing?"
"I'm a fuckin' mechanic, I make stuff!"
Grinning, Barret knew he'd found a button to push. "What's the problem? So you can cook. What's wrong with that?"
"I'm not a fuckin' cook!"
Barret gave a deliberate nonchalant shrug. "You're cookin' now."
Shera was trying hard not to laugh.
/
Dinner was eaten as the sun dispersed its last band of light across the horizon, pitching the town into a moonlit night. It was Barret's last night in Rocket Town, he would be leaving to pursue his new mission, his task to find more oil. It had given him a goal, a hopeful chance to redeem himself. He felt that he had much more to do before he could return to his little girl. He would stay one more night in the Highwind house.
Cid stepped outside into his back garden. It was his unofficial storage yard, still littered with the engine parts and machinery that had been there when Avalanche had walked into his life. The full moon illuminated them softly, white light bouncing from their surfaces. He had a lot of unfinished projects here, plenty to keep him occupied if he ever needed their distraction.
He wandered through them, picking up an exhaust manifold from its careless position on the grass. He had left Barret to shower first before they retire for the night, but had found he wanted a breath of night air. He missed their travels, he missed the sound of rain on their makeshift tents and the smell of meat cooking over a campfire. He missed the walking, the villages, the sense of purpose... the team. Vincent.
Cid leaned against the empty shell of an abandoned project, a gray plane that he had been working on (or not) for several years. It had been neglected for newer, more exciting work during its life. He fumbled the manifold in his hands as he looked out across the boundaries of Rocket Town to the mountains, thinking. Vincent had left him four months ago, without so much as a note on his pillow. But a man like that… yeah, Cid had known he wouldn't be there. He just hadn't wanted to believe it. His own sub consciousness had tried to tell him. It was just who Vincent was.
The manifold stilled. A small breeze drifted across Cid's arms. He wondered where Vincent had gone. Probably back to that cave. To see the woman he loved. He hated that the thought made him jealous. But, what if Vincent had gone to… to join her? What if he had locked himself in crystal, as well, to avoid the tediousness of life? What if he had lied to Cid?
No, Cid told himself. Vincent was not a liar. He had no reason to lie, either.
Something howled in the far distance, at the base of one of the mountains. Cid lifted his gaze and imagined what the life of that creature must be like. The hunt for food, the fight for survival, the sense of freedom and the carnal needs…
Cid stood from the plane and gave the mountains a wistful stare. For the next few minutes he picked his way through his garden, collecting small items from the ground to dump them in a storage crate against his house wall. The night was warm, it was pleasant to be outside. The clouds drifted across the moon, blotting out the soft light. Cid turned.
There was a figure stood in his garden; a shadowed form watching him from between the shapes of his engines. Caught by surprise, Cid stared. The clouds cleared the way of the moon, and the figure was revealed. But even without it, he would recognize those twin dots of ruby anywhere.
They stared at each other, in the quiet of the night with not a sound to interrupt them. Cid was the first to break the air.
"So," he said, calm, blank. "Yer remembered me then."
Vincent gave away nothing, either. "I would never forget you."
Cid felt… angry. But a tame angry. "Did yer try?" A note of antagonism bled into his last syllable.
"No."
Blond eyebrows jumped hostilely, lining into a frown. "Just 'no'? Yer wanna tell me why yer fucked off? Left me hangin' for four months?"
Vincent's eyes were eerily steady, locked upon Cid's without an ounce of telling. "I had to."
The tame anger was spilling a little. "Didn't they invent notes in yer time? I know a fuckin' pen and paper might be a bit outta yer league, but hey, here's a thought: Yer could'a' fuckin' told me."
Without changing, somehow Vincent's features looked regretful. "It was for the best." And as Cid opened his mouth to retort, the gunman added, "for me."
Cid's words fizzled away and he stared yet again. He had questions, great Shiva did he have questions. But the one that fought its way from his lips was, "why did yer come back?"
It hadn't meant to sound contemptuous; in Cid's head it had even been uncharacteristically hopeful. But the tone inflicted an expression across Vincent's eyes that hurt more than he had expected. Cid opened his mouth to rectify this.
"For you," Vincent spoke quietly.
Cid's mouth closed, and a stabbing sensation gripped his chest. His feet were carrying him across the garden, and anyone outside of his head might have perceived his pace as an angry, storming stride. Vincent tensed, but Cid slid his hands around his face and crushed their lips together, angrily, needy, without much consideration for bruising. He didn't let up until he gasped for a lungful.
"Then it's a fuckin' good job I waited," he breathed against Vincent's lips.
Something softened in those red eyes, and the hands that had hovered uncertainly gripped his arm, his neck, and pressed close once again. The want and pent up frustration poured between them, and somehow Cid's bitter, brittle wall that had grown inside for four months shattered. He couldn't describe the feelings now coursing through him. He hadn't even been aware of their existence.
When they had thoroughly kissed each other into a senseless mess they drew back to pant gently in the silence.
"Yer hungry?" Cid asked, cocking an inquisitive eyebrow. "I can make pancakes now."
Vincent blinked. "You can cook?"
Cid opened his mouth to vehemently dispute that, but then closed it. It didn't sound so bad when Vincent said it. "I can make breakfasts, at least."
Letting the insinuation linger for a pleasant second, Vincent looked past at the house. "It seems as though your guest room is already booked."
"Who the hell said yer'd be in the guest room?"
A gentle, fond expression came across Vincent's face. "You snore terribly." He teased.
"I snore pleasantly," Cid argued indignantly. "Now get yer ass movin', I didn't plan to spend the night out here."
It was uncanny how things happen; thoughts on someone bring that very individual within range, or maybe they call on the phone, like Reeve had done a few weeks back. Whatever the phenomenon, Cid knew that his life would be different from now on. He looked forward to it. And he knew this: That whenever – and it would be a whenever – Vincent took off and left him again, he would know without a shadow of a doubt that the man would be back.
And Cid would be waiting.
THE END
/
AN: Journey is over, I finally got there. 4 years, 50 chapters, 518 pages. And all of you 8 ) Thanks so much to everyone for reading, especially those who had stuck with this from the beginning and had to go through my slow progress and experimental grammar – I was learning a lot during this, I used this story to develop my writing, but even though I have a long way to go, I think I got better. I now plan to go back and correct typos, grammatical mistakes and anything that sounds wrong. Hopefully, very soon, I'll be uploading it onto AO3 with illustrations for each chapter – I need to force myself out of an art block so I think this'll be the way.
As for the ending, I'm sorry if you were expecting more smut or something more dramatic, but they played this scene out in my head and wouldn't let me change it. It seemed to fit, despite me hovering uncertainly over the keyboard for a week. But I would love to write more of their lives after FFVII following this story, so expect more from me ; ) And if you guys have any prompts or ideas I would love to try writing those. Anything to get more Valenwind out there. Even a fic trade would be cool.
Also, regarding this chapter, I included Barret's part from the novel 'On the Way to a Smile: Case of Barret'. I never actually considered them official canon storylines, I don't know if they are, but I did like the idea of Barret and Cid working together to find oil for fuel. With Shera : )
So, thanks again for reading, you guys have been so helpful and encouraging. 'Til next time : D
