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CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN - DREAMERS
'Imagine there's no heaven … It's easy if you try … No hell below us … Above us only sky … Imagine all the people … Living for today … Imagine there's no countries… It isn't hard to do … Nothing to kill or die for … And no religion too … Imagine all the people … Living life in peace … You may say I'm a dreamer … But I'm not the only one … I hope someday you'll join us … And the world will be as one … Imagine no possessions … I wonder if you can … No need for greed or hunger … A brotherhood of man … Imagine all the people … Sharing all the world … You may say I'm a dreamer … But I'm not the only one … I hope someday you'll join us … And the world will live as one … (John Lennon: 'Imagine')'
Corel Reactor. Afternoon.
A string of muffled curses came from inside a piece of machinery in what had been the reactor's core. A minute later the source of the curses emerged, covered in grease and soot.
"Cid?!" Tifa exclaimed as the pilot made an attempt to wipe the grime from his face with a rag that was already overloaded with dirt and grease.
Cid smiled at Tifa as he realized who was calling his name. "I'd hug you, but I'm filthy!" He exclaimed, greeting his old friend warmly. "Shera!" He bellowed. "We've got company!" He remembered before he continued yelling that they were in the middle of the reactor and that making tea for their guests would be ridiculous.
'Great.' Reno thought as he realized whom else they'd just encountered. 'Another Avalanche member.' His expression remained sullen and detached as he watched yet another happy reunion between Tifa and her Avalanche friends. First there had been the instant kinship between Tifa and Jessie again, and while he was grateful that the two of them had been able to work things out, it still left him feeling empty inside. She'd also been greeted warmly by Wallace and his kid and even Strife upon their reunions. Sure, Strife had been trying to rekindle something, and she'd used him to make the spiky-haired punk jealous, but she hadn't been accusing Cloud of killing her friends either. After all these happy moments he'd been witness to recently, he didn't think he could handle yet another Avalanche reunion.
"Fuck." He muttered and slipped back outside to have a smoke. He wished Rude were there. At least then there would be someone to sit in the bar and have a drink with.
Jessie saw her brother leave the reactor and followed him, not really knowing what need there was for her to be here for the negotiations that were sure to follow. While she would've liked to have seen how the mako reactor had been converted to coal output, the expression on her brother's face was more important than the mechanics of a cold, heartless power plant.
Shera joined the group, holding out a clean rag to Cid, which he gratefully took and used to wipe off his hands and face.
"So what brings you to our humble Reactor?" Cid asked Reeve, a strangely jovial expression on his face. "Come to see how things are done?"
"Well, yes." Reeve answered, surprised to find the pilot in the North Corel Reactor, but all that Barrett had said was beginning to fall into place. There was no one on the Planet that he knew of better suited to the mechanics of the Reactor conversion. At least not anymore. As insane as the man was, Hojo's brilliance had created the fundamental design of the Mako Reactor. Numerous others had known the workings of the Reactors inside and out, but he wasn't sure that all of Midgar's former Reactor experts put together could handle the conversion. But Cid Highwind was a mechanical genius.
Cid and Barrett both noticed the surprised look on the city planner's face as he looked at the interior of the Reactor. Nothing much had changed, but instead of the massive drainage pools for Mako, there was coal stored there, ready to be burned to generate the much needed power.
"The Mako?" Reeve asked, speaking in partial sentences out of awe. "How did you drain the Mako pools?"
Cid shrugged. "We didn't. When we opened up the Reactor to start the conversion, the damned stuff was gone."
Reeve looked thoughtful as he looked around at all the tubing and wires, impressed at the remarkable job the former Shinra pilot had accomplished. "Can you do this in Midgar?"
Cid beamed and draped his arm around Shera's shoulders, a move that didn't go unnoticed by Tifa, who stifled the smile that sprang to her lips before Cid could see it. "Of course we can."
But Cid had seen Tifa's smile as his arm draped casually over Shera's shoulder. He shot a half-hearted growl in her direction, more out of pride than out of any real embarrassment. He'd left the skies after Meteor, intending instead to settle down and remain Planet-bound. Cid had experienced his dream of going into space, and after realizing out there that Shera hadn't been wrong, lazy, or any of the other things he'd called her for years, he'd been determined to make it up to her any way that he could. It had been Shera that had talked him into helping out Barrett with the conversion of the Corel Reactor from Mako energy to coal.
Reeve chuckled. "I can't promise you riches for it, but I can give you recognition for your hard work. I have eight of these-" Reeve paused, gesturing at the Reactor that surrounded them. "In various stages of repair and working order. If you're looking for a challenge, Midgar's the place."
"We'll take it." Shera answered before Cid had a chance to protest or reply. She hadn't been back to Midgar in years, and while Meteor had hit the largest city on the Planet the hardest, she had been looking for a decent challenge. Serving Cid tea was fun, but it didn't require a whole lot of effort. "Of course," She glanced at Barrett, "We'll have to finish getting things running at capacity here first."
Cid nodded in agreement, shocked that Shera had agreed to go back to Midgar. He wasn't sure if she'd ever been back to her hometown since coming to Rocket Town to help build the rocket during Shinra's short-lived race to the stars.
"I'm not killing the damned monsters and guard robots that inhabit these things." Cid commented to Reeve. "Make sure they're all gone before we arrive."
"I'll handle that." Cloud spoke up for the first time since entering the Reactor. He'd been quietly studying the interaction between Reno and Tifa since returning from the Gold Saucer, and things didn't add up. Their actions and body language towards one another spoke of enemies, not lovers. Returning to Midgar with the rest of the group would give him a better chance to find an opening back into Tifa's life.
Tifa looked shocked as Cloud volunteered to clear out the Reactors before the arrival of Cid and Shera. Granted, she was relieved that she wouldn't be assigned to more "monster extermination" duty, but she wasn't sure she wanted Cloud around. If he was, she was certain he would be watching her and Reno, looking for signs of the relationship that she had told him existed.
She sighed inwardly at the prospect of keeping up the charade. She felt awful for teasing Reno at breakfast that morning, but couldn't help herself. His lack of anger over the kiss the night before had made her wonder, and the fact that he had yet to say anything against her advances piqued her curiosity as to what was going through his mind even more. She feared that he was holding back because the others were around, and that if she cornered him alone, the powder keg of his temper would explode. Maybe there was a way to smooth things over before that happened. What she did know for certain was that she wanted to kiss him again.
Reeve smiled broadly as the pilot and Shera agreed to come to Midgar once they finished up in North Corel. Midgar would soon have power again. Soon after that there would be running water and building again. The dream of a new Midgar was still alive. Elena would be proud.