- Prologue -

His cup of coffee kept him warm even if the mornings never did. All of his deliveries are done and paid for, so Cloud thought today would be a good day to stay at home with Tifa and the kids for once. Rolling his head on his shoulders, he could hear his bones crack from sleeping on such an uncomfortable bed and feel the numbing sensation crawl through the joints of his entire body. It was a reasonable and foreseeable outcome of staying at such a rundown and old motel along one of the dusty roads he happened to drive past so he had no complaints. Having nothing to checkout, Cloud rose from his seat with his coffee half-finished and dropped a few gil onto the table before leaving. His heavy boots clunked against the old creaky wooden floors, and he met the look of mild suspicion from the cashier lazily seated at the booth in the corner of the motel diner before he left. The cashier didn't stop him to see if he paid or not, and Cloud wasn't sure if the other simply didn't care for the gil or if the large blade strapped to his back was too intimidating for anyone to question him.

He straddled his bike parked outside, slipped on his goggles and peered down the long dusty road ahead of him. Arriving in Edge would probably take him two to three hours, so that meant he'd be home before afternoon. He could go grocery shopping with Tifa and pick up the kids from school. He was sure they'd be excited. Cloud knew that he wasn't home as much as he should be, but after dividing up his time between the deliveries, which varied immensely; staying at the old church in Sector 5 for that twinge of nostalgia that he simply couldn't let go of; and taking those off-the-books 'deliveries and pick-ups' for Raines left him strapped for time. The leather of his gloves cracked when he molded his hands to the handles of his bike, but before he could hear the sweet purr of his engine, his phone buzzed.

Slipping it out of his pocket, Cloud frowned upon seeing Raines' name on the caller display and instantly knew that his time at home would have to be sacrificed once again. "What is it?" Cloud asked immediately after picking up, having long forgone the formalities and pleasantries that their work relationship didn't require.

"I have a package for pick-up." Raines answered, "I'll send you the details." Then the line went dead. Others would consider their conversation rude, but that was how Raines and Cloud preferred to operate. There was no spared room for pointless chatter, and they consciously chose to keep their association purely and curtly professional. Holding the phone in front of him, he waited until it buzzed again to indicate receivership of whatever documents or photos Raines sent him. Cloud opened the files and found himself staring at a picture of a red-haired man, one that looked vaguely familiar until he saw the small description Raines had typed neatly at the bottom. A Turk. Name: Reno. Last seen: Edge; City Center. Then a date and time followed. His phone rang again and Cloud held it to his ear as Raines elaborated, "He should still be in the city. My sources say he's meeting another accomplice. Wait and apprehend both, but if he notices you just take him in then. I'll have my men look for the other."

"As long as they don't mess up." Cloud said, "Not like last time."

"My men are trained."

"Not like Lightning was."

"You know just as well as I do that Lightning was a special case. Rufus won't escape after we catch all of his Turks. We brought in two already, and I know we can do it again. Then I won't bother you with these pick-ups." Cloud hung up without any indication. The bike engine hummed, and with his thoughts swirling in the past, his bike darted towards Edge in dangerous speeds. He had lost a certain sense of propriety the moment Aerith had disappeared, just as Tifa had lost that spark in her eyes that he called life. He didn't pray, believing in no Gods or Goddesses. All that he had gained, all that he had lost, had been done by his own hands. These unrecorded jobs he would take for Raines was his way of contributing to the waning search effort for Aerith and Lightning, and done so behind Tifa's and Barret's back. He didn't want to drag them back into the murky past filled with grief.

He started a delivery service in the past three years, and Tifa returned to her bartending roots as the owner of her own bar. Being with Tifa and the kids and living under the same roof as a family was a blessing under disguise; the disguise of what could've been. If things had been different, if he had been stronger, more capable, then maybe he would've opened the door of his room to see Aerith lounging in Tifa's bar, or Lightning casually strolling through the place as if she owned it because he was sure Tifa would let her do that. Neither Aerith nor Lightning were there though, and even though the hallways were filled with Denzel's and Marlene's laughter, both Tifa and himself had felt the gaping emptiness in their house.

Three years have passed since Lightning and Aerith had disappeared, and he admits that these three years have been easier on him then on Tifa. Although the fighter never said it, there were times she needed privacy. While Tifa hid herself in her room, mourning over a necklace Lightning had gifted her, he went to the church with Aerith's ribbon grasped in his hand. He made an oath back then, and he even threatened Lightning in attempts to fulfill it. His oath was that he wouldn't let Tifa hurt again, and he was going to protect her no matter what. He failed though; Tifa had been hurt like never before, and she didn't recover. The fighter's still all patience and kindness, but he knows her well enough to know when the smiles are forced. Aerith hadn't been hurt badly on that fateful night, but the damage Lightning had sustained were fatal. Glass shards pierced her all over, she was bleeding profusely, and even if she hadn't ran off into the woods with her killer chasing her, she would've died from blood loss before any help would arrive. Thinking back to that night in hindsight gave him a certain clarity of mind, rather than to blindly believe that there would've been a happily-ever-after. They lost Lightning that night, and Tifa understood this as well.

That's why Cloud took it upon himself to finish what they had started. Somehow, someway, Rufus survived. He's going to take down what little remains of SHINRA and fulfill what they had set out to do from the very beginning. It was Lightning's principle to leave no job unfinished and he honored that. He honored her, but it wasn't always like that. He had always found it hard to trust people, and Lightning had been a hard case from the very beginning.

When he had been a child, he was bullied, and so it was just a part of him to be naturally paranoid. All the toys he liked were taken away from him. All the games he liked to play, he was excluded from. Even the people he liked were fed stories about him and pressured into hating him as well. A part of him hated Nibelheim but the one thing he loved about it was Tifa. She made everything bearable and he loved her for it. He was the pathetic loner, she was the popular girl that everyone wanted to be friends with, yet she never participated in mocking him. She genuinely tried to stop it. That was why it was his turn to protect Tifa. Then… there was Aerith. She was beautiful, kind, gentle, but much more forward and brave than both Tifa and Cloud combined. Before he knew it, she had him wrapped around her finger and he realized that he also loved her. He flocked to her like bee to honey due to his sudden infatuation, not realizing that he was driving Tifa away and suddenly, things were awkward between the two of them.

Trusting Tifa was a given due to their shared past, but Aerith had effortlessly slipped past his barriers and he simply trusted her without hesitation. He loved both of them, the both of them loved him as well, but he didn't know who he loved more. He had thought it had been Tifa, and it made sense to him. She knew him longer, loved him longer… but he couldn't find it in himself to push Aerith away. The way her eyes glimmered with nostalgia when she looked at him made it seem as if she'd knew him long before. Or maybe it was because he simply reminded her of someone. He didn't know who, never bothered to ask, but it had to be the man who built Aerith her flower cart.

Lightning had changed that delicate balance he thought he had attained as he tried to keep both Tifa and Aerith as close as possible. Truthfully, he realized that he hated Lightning because she had somehow attained everything that he wanted. No matter how hard he tried as a kid, people hated him for no apparent reason. Lightning acted like an ass to everyone, yet they all flocked to her. She was a brilliant soldier; calm, composed, smart, and she had a name. He was a mercenary, having joined AVALANCHE to mooch off of them. He was a no one. However, he could've dealt with that. He could've worked with her if it had just been that, but he noticed things about Tifa that the others wouldn't even think twice about. Lightning could suddenly miraculously read Tifa just as well as he could. In fact, she could read all of them as if they were open books. Even Aerith, who to him had always remained as some fascinating and teasing embodiment of secrets. He hated how Lightning acted as if she knew everything, and how she thought that everyone was beneath her. That had been his first impression of Lightning, and everything that went down afterwards did little to help that.

Initially he called Lightning crazy just to mock her, but after finding out about her past, he truly thought that she was crazy. Who wouldn't be after experiencing the horrors of something like the Purge? Then to learn that the woman who wouldn't even deign to acknowledge her own peers, her own boss, would bend over and back for some PSICOM that was working for SHINRA. In his mind, he had every reason to doubt Lightning. He couldn't understand why everyone would place their upmost trust in someone like her, he couldn't explain why Aerith had taken such an immediate liking to her, and what bothered him most was how close Tifa had gotten to her. All he knew was that Lightning was dangerous, and he felt he had to expose that to everyone just so they'd realize that as well.

He felt uneasy. He felt threatened. He felt protective of his friends and loved ones. Until Lightning could display the same level of honesty and truthfulness that everyone else was offering, Cloud would continue doubting her. The only thing he knew for certain was that Lightning handled death callously. Considering how she had sent that helicopter crashing down on them, how she had simply stepped back and allowed Tifa act as some guinea pig in Corneo's brothel, how she had shot him mercilessly in that mock battle all because Jihl had told her to, how she had thrown him off to the side and took the blow from the summon in the Vile Peaks, and how she had nearly killed him afterwards, gave him little reason to think better of her.

As if to add salt to the wound, the fact that Tifa's attention never once left Lightning in favor of him irked him in every way possible, especially after the fact that his and Tifa's relationship had blossomed into romance.

Although he couldn't understand the others, somewhere along the way, Cloud realized that he probably understood how Lightning thought. He only had to imagine her in the most twisted ways possible, because he was sure that's what Lightning truly thought of herself. A killer. A murderer. A monster. Being bullied as a child had taught him one lesson; you are who you think you are, and it had nothing about how others viewed you. He didn't want to put the lives of his friends in the hands of a murderer. Tifa was a fighter, and he didn't doubt her skill in battle. However, with all the hype about Lightning's supposed talent, he knew to expect the worse when Tifa had challenged Lightning to a fight. As he watched the battle unfold before him, he had quickly reached the conclusion that Tifa would win. He swelled with pride, and he automatically discounted the fact that Tifa had three months to prepare for this single battle. Tifa had spent night after night analyzing Lightning's fighting style just so she would know what to expect. The fighter had all the say. She chose where the battle would take place, designed the settings so that she could use it to her greatest advantage all the while to Lightning's disadvantage. Lightning had no input, as if she hadn't a care in the world.

He doubted Lightning even put in one hundredth of the effort Tifa had put in.

Yet, Tifa still vied for her attention. Tifa had won, and at that moment, all he wanted to hear was for Lightning to acknowledge her. There was bad blood between then, he knew that, but watching Lightning stalk off without another word with that look on her face wasn't something that should be allowed. He recognized the way Lightning had retreated, and he knew that instant that Tifa had accomplished exactly the opposite of what she had intended to do. He didn't want to see Tifa crushed, and it wasn't healthy for Lightning to walk away, and so Cloud did the only thing he knew. He started on his angry tirade again, but when that had failed to illicit a response, hell had to be paid. He challenged Lightning then, and then he paid. And Lightning paid too.

For the first time since he's known Lightning, she'd been the most honest in that moment of uncontrolled madness as she described the Purge. He finally got a glimpse of her, and saw exactly how broken she was. Tifa had always been too trusting. She was naïve, and always thought the best in people. She would rather look for the good and ignore the bad. He had never found the right words, but what good in Lightning could be found when Lightning could only see the bad in herself? How much longer would her brittle pride keep her from falling? That's when he assumed the worse in the Vile Peaks when their attackers had merely alluded to the fact that they worked for Lightning. In hindsight it was a ludicrous claim, but he had fallen for it all the same. He had questioned Lightning at every turn until then, and in bitterness, he still remembered the words he had hesitantly spoke to Tifa to earn her righteous fury. "Tifa, we can't trust them." After all, Fang and the others had kept the secret from them as well, and fearing for Aerith's safety, he had somehow reached that conclusion. "Maybe… maybe we should've let Lightning die."

Not that Lightning's death would've solved their problems. The fact that Lightning had been found on the brink of death just moments ago before the attack on their transport should've been enough for Cloud to reconsider his own train of thought so to stop it from derailing so epically. High on adrenalin with his nerves frazzled in the aftermath of their narrow escape of the crashing transport, and upon seeing Odin, the enemy's summon save Lightning, he cracked.

Lightning not only cracked though, she snapped. Literally broke into pieces. Her usual stoic mask shattered, and exploded in an intense panic attack. He made her live through the horrors of the Purge again. He made her remember what she thought of herself; a murderer. He pushed, and pushed, and pushed her until she couldn't take it anymore. If it weren't for Fang, he knew that Lightning would've killed him that day. A bullet to the head, just like all those people she executed. How was he any different from his bullies then? Was it even possible to bully someone like Lightning? And then, he realized that what he had done to Lightning was unimaginably more horrendous and cruel than what he had to suffer through as a child. He was pathetic. He had been bullied, and the people who bullied him burnt alongside Nibelheim. Lightning desecrated her own city, killed everyone that had once been important to her with her own two hands because of some PSICOM psychopath. Why did he ever feel the need to compete with her? Why did he even think that he could or that he would even want to? It definitely wasn't for the pity points or the feeling of self-entitlement because the world somehow owed him.

It was distrust. He could never trust anyone who couldn't put their trust in him. Yet, most ironically, he had done nothing to earn Lightning's trust to begin with. In the past, he would give and give, but it was never enough. People were never happy, never even satisfied with him. He wanted to change. In order to do that, he waited until the other party had given him the benefit of the doubt first before he returned the favor. It was done to protect himself, and it worked with Barret, Jessie, Biggs and Wedge. With Lightning though, that woman was as expressive as a brick wall and just as effective in keeping her secrets hidden.

When Lightning offered to train him after the Guardian Corps had abandoned them for slaughter, that's when he first entertained the idea that they could be… not-enemies. After everything he's done to her, which wasn't anything that would warrant such a small act of altruism, she still wanted to help him survive even if he thinks that she should be happily counting down the days until his death. He was thankful for her help, and truly regretted what he had said to Tifa in the Vile Peaks. It was unforgiveable, and that's why he never asked Tifa for her forgiveness. He couldn't even look the fighter in the eye properly anymore after that, and just like fading steam from when all the heat and passion dies, their relationship just disappeared.

Dying wasn't what he was scared of, but he was absolutely terrified of losing those important to him. When Sephiroth threatened Aerith's life, he threw his entire being on the line to defend her and when Tifa nearly died, he finally accepted the fact that he just wasn't good enough. Lightning had been right about him from the start. He was a nobody. A no name. A fool who liked to play the hero. He was useless. But when Lightning came crashing in, he looked to her and saw what he wanted to be. Even if they had been defeated and thousands of people lost their lives as a result, she still fought through it. She fought through the Purge and she was still fighting even though she had nothing to live for anymore.

Or… maybe she did find something to live for, and Cloud wasn't so blind to miss the concern storming behind her usual stoic eyes as she diligently cared for Tifa. He had never seen Tifa as broken as she had been during the first weeks in Oerba, and it was like a dagger sadistically twisting in his chest when he knew he could do nothing to alleviate her suffering. Again, he was useless. The fighter wouldn't let him in to her pain, and not even Aerith could save her. Lightning could help her though, and Cloud loved Tifa. He loved her so much. There was nothing he wasn't willing to sacrifice just to see Tifa happy again. He would find a way to love Tifa without being in love with her.

The time he had spent in Academia afterwards was one of his happiest. He didn't smile much though, but things between him and Lightning were alright. They talked, they trained, and it was strange but he felt a burst of protectiveness over her for some reason. Tifa was happy, Aerith was happy, and it felt like they were finally making progress.

Then Hope had to betray them.

Then Fang and Sazh had to die before his very eyes.

Then Lightning and Aerith disappeared.

And the world felt like it could just end and he wouldn't care. The pink ribbon he received during the funeral procession was the only glimmer of hope he could see at the end of the dark tunnel, flickering just like how fragile he had learned everything to be. He wanted to treasure what he had with Tifa and the kids now, but he refused to let go of the past and move on. Taking down SHINRA once and for all was his top priority, then he was prepared to spend the rest of his life looking for Aerith and if Lightning somehow survived then he'd drag her back to Tifa.

With Edge in view, Cloud slowed his speed as he entered city limits and dialed up Raines again. "Update?"

"Hasn't moved." Raines answered squarely, "I can only assume he's waiting for someone there. A rather… apparent rendezvous point."

"What's apparent though isn't always obvious." Cloud mumbled as he zipped through the city streets straight towards the City Center.

"My men have closed in on the other suspected Turk. She keeps her hood up so we can't identify her and make a direct arrest."

"Alright." Cutting the line, Cloud slowed his bike and parked it a block away from the City Center. Securing the blade onto his back again, he walked briskly onwards. He didn't bother hiding because the City Center was compromised of a large meteor statue built at the center of a large circular open area surrounded by taller buildings. Walking into the open area, his clear blue eyes scanned his surroundings and narrowed on the same red-haired man as the one on the picture Raines sent him. Dressed in black trousers with a matching suit jacket and a white ruffled dress shirt underneath, the Turk appeared as if he hadn't a single worry. He was leaning against the meteor statue whistling while tossing what looked like a metal baton in the most obnoxious transparency that made Cloud wonder how they could have ever missed noticing someone like him.

Cloud's fists balled at his side. He'll give this Turk something to worry about.

A/N: I LIVE! Okay, so... wow... It's been a while...

This is the rewritten Animam Lucem, now called Lucem Dei, and I use the term 'rewritten' loosely. I don't know if I should remove the old Animam Lucem... what do you think? This one will share one or two plot points but other than that, it's all new material!

Sorry for disappearing all the sudden and for so long... :(