Aeris tossed in her bed, unable to doze off. Despite her exhaustion and despite how welcoming a soft bed was after so long in the wilderness, she remained stubbornly awake.
Here in the aftermath of Avalanche's meeting, Aeris was at a loose end. She went to bed for want of something else to do and now the same question played out over and over again. What would they find in the old Cetra ruins? Perhaps something to give her hope and indicate she was not the last of the Cetra?
Now she might have answers. But the same clues leading her to answers might easily lead Sephiroth there too. The conundrum, the other, more peculiar incarnation of her kind. Uncomfortable questions swirled around him; where was the distinction between them?
Her normal night-time thoughts for the hazy time between going to bed and falling asleep proved futile and incapable of distraction. Nothing worked. Not revisiting the steps of their journey, the sights she saw, the ones she missed, and those she wanted to revisit. Nor contemplation of the new fauna she could add to her garden back home. Home; the church. She should have asked Mom to water her flowers.
Sleep was not coming and her thoughts continued to return to an unwanted conclusion. A sense on inevitability. The fear of nothing they found in the old temple would contradict the elders of Cosmo Canyon. A conclusion she did not want to accept but could not dismiss.
Aeris sat up and swung her legs out of the bed.
She shook her head and dressed. Tonight was Enchantment Night; all rides, all attractions free. A wealth of entertainment and Avalanche unable to leave. Spending the evening alone was unacceptable and she needed the distraction.
Dates were fun and a better use of her time than endless hypotheticals. Aeris had promised one date some months back. Cloud only needed a bit of pushing to get him out of his room.
"Never expected to be back here so soon," she said once he was in the hall.
Cloud grunted in response.
"You really want to sit in your room rather than have a date with me?" Aeris said with a glance over her shoulder.
"No." Cloud sighed.
"We have nowhere else to be right now. We can take our time and appreciate things." Focus on what was here instead of anticipating the pursuit of Sephiroth or dealing with the aftermath of a mass shooting. She shivered; Battle Square had been unavoidable before the meeting. Better to give it a wider berth this evening.
The slightly narrowed list of choices lead them first to Wonder Square. Aeris hopped onto the heavy plastic bike replica of G-bike. If she had known there was a choice back in the Shinra building, Aeris might have sought out a bike of her own. Or asked if she could sit behind Cloud while he roared along the highway. Obviously not the best time when fleeing for their lives, but more desirable than stuck in the cramped interior of the truck.
Here, with G-Bike, she had a chance to pretend if nothing else. But here there was no wind though her hair; no fan or anything like it in the arcade. A shame. The bike replica she sat astride seemed as if it could take both of their bodies at once. Maybe later she could convince Cloud to swallow his initial complaints and play the game with her.
After a few rounds it was clear her tendency to slam into the barriers at full-speed was not an ideal strategy. After a few more game-over screens, Aeris left it and found Cloud playing Mog House. His eyes had welled up with tears now the moogles were so close to finding true love.
Aeris tousled his hair and left him to it to try the Slam Dunk instead. She abandoned the game when Cloud sought her out, and together they moved onto something they could both participate in; Chocobo racing.
Had Cloud looked like those other jockeys on the track too? His purple uniform contrasting vividly with the yellow of the Chocobo as he bought Avalanche's freedom? Maybe Chocobo racing was the way forward for her aspiration to speed. Nothing close to as fast as a bike, but presumably Chocobos knew better than to run into a wall.
As they left the arcade, a guy flung a can at a recycling bin and missed. He paid it no mind as the can fell to the ground and kept on walking. The idea of admonishment came too late; old habits die hard. Aeris darted forward and plucked up the can, unnerved by the unexpectedly sticky exterior. It would need washing and one can was not going to get her much, but it was still something.
The situation caught up with her; she was in the Gold Saucer on a date, not still trapped in the old days of picking through Sector Five's refuse looking for anything sellable.
She shot the man's back a glare to cover and dropped the can into the recycling bin. "I can't stand people who litter."
"Barret would have loved to recruit you back in Midgar. Pretty sure that was one of their slogans," said Cloud.
She rolled her eyes at him and bit back a sharp comment. Not the reaction he expected; this habit was tough for him to break, but the disinterested SOLDIER act was not doing it for her. She walked on, Cloud following at her heels.
Reaching Chocobo Square revealed their choice of destination was ill-timed; they reached the track some time after the latest race and with a long wait for the next. The sole saving grace was the freedom it afforded the couple to pick out the best viewing spot and compete with no one else in the queue for refreshments.
They took their place beside the track and waited, no one else made a rush to spectate. And was it better to wait it out or wind up with a worse spot? The chocobo track was open to the night air and a chill breeze swiftly washed the heat from Aeris's skin.
"If the race is much longer, we should probably head back soon; want to get an early start," Cloud said, crunching through unpopped kernels without the slightest hesitation.
Aeris poured the rest of her unwanted popcorn into Cloud's. Too late; he put the carton on the ground and made a start on his cotton candy.
"I think we can stay out a bit longer. Still some areas we've never seen." She pushed up from the railing. "Suppose we should explore those first." Keep the date going, not let it end so soon.
Cloud glanced around. "So, next is?"
"We'll look at the directory on the way."
They wandered away from the track and past the bright neon signs. She blinked and peered closer at the Chocobo Square decal on the door. A tiny Shinra logo was printed at the bottom. Another unwanted reminder.
"I kind of wish they had more areas made up like the Ghost Hotel." Her calves were already starting to ache again; not as rested from their long trek as she thought. "I wonder if we could come back here at All Hallows. That'd be fun!"
Beside her Cloud chomped right through the paper cone at the centre of his cotton candy and smiled.
"Uh, Cloud?"
He did not seem to hear her and took another bite of the cone, the sight of him eating the paper somehow hypnotic. He swallowed and said something more.
Aeris blinked. "Sorry. What was that?"
"My birthmark looks like it."
"A birthmark?" From some of their absolutely not looking at each other moments back in Costa del Sol, Cloud had no birthmark on his chest. "It?"
"I have a birthmark that looks just like a pumpkin in my room."
"A pumpkin?" She looked him up and down. "Okay, I'm intrigued. Where is it?"
He flushed immediately, mouth opening and closing silently. "It's, ah. On my thigh?"
She had not noticed a birthmark when she peeked in on him changing at Wall Market, and she had seen so much skin at the time. To see it now, Cloud would need to strip. The thought of Cloud undressing in front of her inevitably led to other intimate thoughts. Oh.
A pleasurable shiver ran the length of her spine. "I think I need to see both pumpkins."
"What?" He blinked at her in confusion.
"I can make it worth your while." She leant forward, her gaze locked with his.
"Oh. Uh. Sure?"
"How about you show me back at the hotel?"
They met no one on the way back. Everyone else must be out making the most of the evening and the suspension of the prices for the rides and attractions. Few risks of interruption. Aeris followed Cloud up the red-carpeted stairs biting back a smile; ahead of her his backside shifted beneath his pants in such an appealing way.
She took the stairs two at a time to keep up with Cloud; no tired dragging her feet to her room to sleep this time.
Cloud retraced his steps as if on auto-pilot and paused at the door to his room.
"In here okay?"
"Wherever you're comfortable."
Aeris fought back another grin, anticipation getting the better of her. She followed him into a similar room to hers; a mock medieval, gothic room with red carpet and ivory sheets on the tombstone-styled beds. She settled onto the edge of the nearest.
The bed-springs creaked and Aeris tugged her neckline a little lower. She undid another button and her dress fell open higher on her legs. Too high; too soon. She scooped both parts of her dress together and pinned them in place with an elbow resting on her knee, chin in one hand.
Cloud blinked at her. "So. Uh. Pumpkin." He pointed up to the rafters. Too hunched over to follow his gaze. She shifted, her dress falling open again. She crossed her legs. Bad move; boots too heavy for this. She uncrossed her legs and swept her dress onto her lap. Above the bed, right where Cloud pointed was a cartoonish pumpkin.
"Indeed that is a pumpkin. And the other?" She dropped her gaze to his hips.
Only now did Cloud seem to realise what he had agreed to. He flushed further, hands twitching at his sides.
"You want me to?" He gestured vaguely with his hands at his crotch.
Aeris leant back on her hands on the red duvet and her skirt fell open again. Not the effect she intended but too late to cover. "Well. You can't roll your pants up can you?" She smiled. If only he would look away so she could rearrange again.
"Yeah. True. Um." Cloud's fingers fumbled with his fly and he resolutely did not meet her gaze.
She pulled her skirt up onto her lap.
His face flushed as the fabric caught when he pushed his pants down his legs to his knees. "There."
"I don't see it?" Aeris leant forward and peered closer at the expanse of exposed skin and the bulge in his black underwear.
"Ah, sorry it's. Hang on." He shoved his pants lower, raised his leg higher still avoiding her gaze. He twisted his leg around to expose his upper thigh, right below his crotch. "Right there."
Surprisingly there was indeed a darkened patch of skin in the clear outline of a pumpkin. Aeris shuffled closer. How curious. "Well, you were right."
The door rattled, a key sliding loudly into the lock. Aeris stopped dead, fear prickling across her skin, her stomach lurching. She glanced around for a hiding spot.
Cloud stumbled backward and frantically pulled his pants up. "Bathroom," he offered in an urgent whisper.
Aeris fled across the room. Not good to have this – whatever it became – found out and change how the group related to her, to Cloud, to them both. She winced at the echo as her boots hit the dull yellow tiled floor of the bathroom and she stumbled to a halt as the main room's door opened.
"Oh hey." It was Cid. "Didn't think you'd be here, interrupting anything?"
Aeris took shallow breaths, cold sweat prickling across her neck and face. She moved her feet with slow exaggerated calm. Not much of a choice of hiding spots aside from the shower. Kinda putting all her flowers in one basket but no other choice.
"Uh, no?" Cloud's voice was a higher pitch than normal. He coughed and continued at a lower octave. "You need something?"
"Looking for the camera. What're you standing around for? Yuffie's blagged her way into the Chocobo races. This shit's going to be hilarious."
"I, uh." Cloud stumbled over his words.
Cid's story was the exact kind of thing Yuffie got into regularly and often Cloud would follow.
"Live a little will ya," Cid said in a chiding tone. "We got the night and everything's free. I mean-."
"Alright, alright." Clear exasperation in Cloud's voice. "Let's see what Yuffie's done."
The door slammed shut behind them. Aeris counted to ten twice, walked over to the bathroom door and peered out. There was still a faint chance Cloud or Cid had not left the room. Minor chance Cloud managed to double-back; decent odds if he did they might manage a quick fuck and still could catch up with the rest and leave no one the wiser.
No one else in the room. Aeris lingered in the bathroom doorway and Cloud continued to fail to sneak back into the room.
Nothing for her to do but head back to Chocobo Square. She clicked on the bathroom light and paused by the mirror above the sink. Her make-up was still good. Nothing stuck in her teeth. She tightened the bow of her ribbon and set off after her date.
It was odd how fast people could move when she was trying to catch up. When Aeris reached Chocobo Square, the crowd had swelled in size and volume, but the race announcements cut through the noise with ear-splitting loudness.
Aeris growled in frustration prompting some confused looks from passers-by. She ignored them and carried on navigating through the crowd, a familiar movement when dealing with rush hour trains or after-show sales in Sector Eight.
Another glance across the room and she abruptly locked gazes with Cloud. He was again standing in a long and winding queue for refreshments with a sullen expression. He brightened at the sight of her and she motioned him over to her.
Cloud almost made it to her until a new influx of people spilled in through the entrance and cut them off. She mouthed the word 'stairs!' to him; Cloud nodded and headed for the doors.
She squeezed between groups of people and circled around a wave of punters and racing enthusiasts to get back out of the attraction.
Outside Cloud caught her gaze; he dithered part way down the staircase to one side of a transport tube. His loitering put him slightly in the way; he kept shuffling back and forth to avoid a whole host of people entering and leaving this section of the park.
The tube to the Ghost Hotel was so close.
"Hi." She smiled when she drew level with him, trying to maintain some social decorum despite her eagerness to get them both to her room and ignore anyone knocking on the door.
"Hi." Cloud blinked and stared up past her, his smile fading.
Who or what this time? Without another thought she shoved Cloud back into the transport tube and leapt in after him to escape. He shot through the airways, barely an arm's length away from her.
She landed awkwardly on top of him in an intimate sprawl, though the exit pipe was not any kind of spot for canoodling. Outside was one thing, but this was a little too public for her tastes.
Where were they? They had not entered the Ghost Hotel transport tube; their fall had deposited them somewhere quiet, subdued, little-trafficked and with seemingly no one around.
A dark red curtain screened off something. Too risky to head back to the hotel now the others might run into them. This would do; Aeris took Cloud's hand and guided him to the gap in the curtain.
"Congratulations!"
The voice right beside her nearly made Aeris jump out of her skin and she gripped Cloud's hand hard.
"You are our one hundredth couple today – and as such get to be leads in our play," a park attendant continued.
"Wait, what?" Cloud said and blinked in confusion.
"Our world-renowned play!" the man said with a dramatic flourish. "And you two are to be our Thespians for the night!"
Aeris' eyes adjusted to the dim light. The curtain had disguised the deep bowl of an amphitheatre, a gaudily decorated – if shabby – stage at the far end.
"Please, sir, madam. Right this way." The man gestured along the rim of the amphitheatre towards a door.
"Sounds like fun. Let's do it Cloud." She followed the man to the stage door, Cloud close behind.
A chance to be on-stage. A dream since Mom saved up for her eighteenth birthday and bought them tickets to a play up in Sector Eight. A stylised and heavily metaphorical play full of roses, swords and strange songs.
Aeris tried to recite dialogue from memory in the church some days. A broom-handle was her improvised sword, and she had a handful of roses already. Less keen on plucking them to provide petals for dramatic effect and her production did without.
An actual production should have less risk of her attempted recreation of some of the more spectacular stunts. A not-quite-strong-enough rope attached to the roof beams of the church and her clinging to one end.
Maybe not her best plan; she and her sword soon plummeted to the wooden floor. The fall knocked the wind out of her and broke her left arm. Some inventive lies needed to cover for the stunt.
She rubbed her left arm as they plunged into the Gold Saucer backstage.
The play was a complete farce; nothing like the professional production she saw on her birthday. But the farce was also entirely the point. Cloud and Aeris had a brief opportunity to wipe the greasepaint from their faces and were then firmly pushed back out to the audience side. Time for another hundredth couple to take to the stage.
Alone together again unexpectedly. No trying to find each other, no avoiding other people. Cloud might not have taken the chance to kiss her on-stage, but the comic results of his bad decisions were more fun to watch.
Aeris took Cloud's hand and they walked to the transport tubes. A poster depicted a couple drifting over the whole complex under a sky full of fireworks.
Returning to the Ghost Hotel could wait a little longer.
The gondola in Round Square was too cramped for the couple to sit side by side; Aeris took the seat facing forward, Cloud looking back the way they came. The ride rumbled into action and ascended into the darkened sky, the entirety of the Gold Saucer spread out below them like a tree, each glowing branch linked by threads of lights.
They passed over the Chocobo track as a new race started and the birds rushed underneath them. "I never got the chance to ask about Yuffie," said Aeris.
"Yuffie?" Cloud blinked. "Oh, the race thing. Yuffie decided to play the diplomatic card to get a place in the race." He smiled.
"Diplomatic-" Aeris's eyes widened. "You mean she used her Wutai status?"
"She did. Demanded representation of her country in the races and convinced them to let her participate. Not the best rider though. At the rate things were going, I think she was about to annex the entire complex."
Aeris laughed and a burst of nearby colour and noise drew her attention to the window. The sky was darker than anticipated, the flashes of light from the fireworks, the glow from each square of the Gold Saucer almost dazzling. Sailing across a sea of light with her date.
Cloud shifted in his seat, his boot scraping across the rough plastic floor. It was quiet in here despite the fireworks, all the other noise was distant.
Aeris fidgeted. "I had fun in the play."
"Me too."
Cloud made no further move to speak. She had to say something. Anything. "Do you think the fireworks are just for Enchantment Night?"
He shrugged.
"Wonder how long the ride will last."
Cloud shifted to peer out the window. "Maybe another five minutes?"
What to say? Everything springing to mind felt more like a repeat of some prior occasion, as if she had somehow now run dry on conversation with Cloud. No. There was plenty they could talk about, so many subjects after so many travels and experiences. But nothing felt right.
Cloud met her gaze and she diverted her attention to his uniform. Not a surprise he still wore it; he had worn it constantly since she met him, with brief breaks in Wall Market, Junon and Costa del Sol. He had not changed for the date, though not like she gave him time to prepare this time.
She wanted a next time. A repeat of something like this evening, despite the complications and the inability to manage something as simple as sleeping with Cloud. Her time with Zack was never like this.
"At first, it was a little awkward," she said.
A shiver ran along her spine and her stomach lurched; she fidgeted, uncomfortable. "Spending time with you. I thought, I mean at first, you looked like him." The blur of purple as the roof exploded inward. The heavy tread of a military boot, the purple uniform of a first class SOLDIER.
Her heart skipped a beat at the possibility in the church; of Zack somehow returning after so long without a word, having found her garden somehow by accident or some informant in Shinra. Disappointment when the dust cleared to reveal blond spikes instead of black. A pleasant surprise of recognition: the SOLDIER she met in the aftermath of the reactor explosion lay unconscious in among her flowers.
"And how much you acted like him." The way he flipped up onto his feet from his prone position, the familiar trace of an unintentionally adopted Junon accent and a number of familiar mispronunciations. But in addition to those were the quirks of a different accent – one Cloud shared with Tifa.
"I think, at first, I saw him again in you."
For perhaps the span of a fleeting thought. As if Cloud were Zack with some form of amnesia and bleached hair. And via some undefined process - some strange other SOLDIER thing in those lost five years - changed his eye-colour, height, build, the scar, general attitude. He had never been Zack.
Cloud shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "Who?"
Aeris shook her head. Not the point. The person with her was Cloud. "But you're different." Cloud had run and jumped across the rooftops of Sector Five with her. He laughed at her jokes. Cloud not only agreed to her plan for infiltrating Don Corneo's mansion but ran with the idea and worked so hard to make his disguise better.
He came to her rescue in the Shinra building, adding to the debt she owed him before she could grant him the one date. His alleged mercenary tendencies failed to stand up to scrutiny; no amount of payment was ever truly required when there was someone in need.
Cloud smiled at her excitement upon seeing the airship in Junon and needed little coaxing to promise a future flight with her. She could fluster him too; the mere mention of purchasing swimwear and getting a tan made his face flush red.
He could have reached out to any of them on their first visit to the Gold Saucer, but to her delight he asked her to accompany him. Cloud would listen to any plan she suggested. He seriously considered her suggestion of gaining the Tiny Bronco via theft.
"I'm searching for you. And I want to meet you." If nothing else, someone needed to stop him chomping straight through the wax envelope of the snack cheese Avalanche favoured.
He frowned, confused. "But, you have met me? I-" He scratched at his head.
"I know." She smiled and reached out to touch his arm. "What I mean is, I want to meet you."
She needed him to understand, but her words kept tangling, the point not coming across. She could clarify, but Cloud had not reacted too well to the subject of Zack back in Gongaga, and the mood tonight was too good to lose.
The world around the gondola darkened, a succession of vibrations rattling them both in their seats. They were back in the station; the ride was over.
The trip through the sky had lasted longer than expected; no one remained on the queue for the attraction. Aeris brushed a strand of hair over her ear. "Next time we come here, we should maybe start earlier and try more rides."
Cloud nodded, no hint of protest at a return and specifically a return with her. Maybe he, like her, struggled to express what he felt? There was still night ahead of them, and the morning was tomorrow Aeris' problem. Perhaps she and Cloud would not have to part ways immediately.
A shame they ran across Cait Sith in the process of making off with the hard-won Keystone.
The treacherous robot returned to the hotel with them and stood guard; he remained inert in the lobby. A sufficient threat to keep them all in place for this evening; how could anyone be sure no one was looking through the cat's eyes now? Aeris went to her room – and Cloud to his; the one he shared with Barret and Nanaki. Neither had much of an idea how to break the news the next morning; nor how to keep Barret calm enough he would not damage the robot.
A disappointing end to the evening. Aeris changed for bed, electing to wear the oversized blue shirt she got from Costa del Sol. Exhaustion threatened to overwhelm her when she sat on her bed. Not surprising given the long hike earlier in the day, the sneaking around, the play, the pursuit of Cait Sith. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
She lay back on the soft bedding and pulled the blankets around her. Warm and comfortable inside with the rain pouring outside. After much experimentation since leaving Midgar, this was often the best experience when it rained.
Still; a shame she was not sharing the bed with someone else. A chance to curl together with Cloud; something to help her face tomorrow. At least she had confessed, and Cloud seemed to want something more too.
Aeris blinked her eyes open when the windows flashed white; a rumble of thunder arrived a beat later. The room's atmospheric effects were still running and lightning was not exactly conducive to sleeping. She fumbled with the controller beside the bed and peered at the buttons.
Lightning and thunder switched off, but the rain could remain. Aeris closed her eyes.
A knock on her door jolted her upright.
"Aeris?" Cloud called. "Are you still up?"
Her pulse sped up and she sprang from the bed. She opened the door and squinted against the brightly lit hallway. "Hi."
Cloud had changed into his nightwear; grey shirt, red shorts and the black robe with the gold trim the hotel provided. He checked around him in the corridor with a nervous expression. "Hi. I uh-"
Aeris took his hand and tugged him into the room. "I'm glad you came." She slipped her arms around him and his hands settled onto her waist. Warm and secure.
And now, of course, the date could end anyway they wanted. Aeris tugged Cloud towards the bed.