EIGHT: "Where Life and Death Meet"

"I'm Ruined! I don't believe it! I never thought this day would come!!!" Dio shrieked as he entered the bridge of Reeve's commandeered vessel. "I don't know how, but I know it's all that Cloud Strife's fault! Trouble follows that man!!!"

Reeve turned around the meet him. "I assure you, today has been a great loss for a lot of people, you will be reimbursed as best as I can possibly muster. You and I are partners after all."

"How can you be so calm!? If you hadn't shown up I bet that 'Jemima' woman would never have shown her face!" Dio took a breath, but realized he had made his point when Reeve ordered a sentry to silence him if he did not stop.

"You've made your point I see." Reeve stated. "I've told you you'd be paid back."

The sentry lowered his weapon as Dio spoke more calmly. "Well thank you, Reeve. So what is on the agenda next? I hope you plan on mounting a counter measure."

"No. I'm not sending anyone else after that monster." Reeve stated immediately. "As far as I am concerned, Shinra is pulling out of this ordeal. My predecessors were notorious for seeking revenge and look where they are now. I won't have it."

"Then what are you planning?" Dio seemed a little let down.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?!"

"Nothing. That's right." Reeve turned around to look out of the bridge view screen. "I'm leaving the next move to someone who knows what they are doing."

"Oh no... your not leaving this in that Mercenary's hands are you?"

"He's been down this road before." Reeve said.

Dio walked over to an empty console and sat down in the chair and swiveled around, leaning on the back. "Where is that Avalanche anyway?"

"They didn't inform me, but the Highwind changed course about five minutes ago. There's no telling where they are now." Reeve answered.

"And where are we going?"

"We are going to Midgar. We're going to be laying low for awhile. I have other means currently keeping an eye on our pressing business."

Meanwhile aboard the Highwind II, everyone has gathered in the meeting room by the request of Cloud so he could explain what happened to him while he was away.

"She opened up to me, when she was inside my head. She told me some disturbing things about herself and she even accused me of being like her." Cloud ended the first half of his retelling allowing for questions to be raised.

Tifa took the opportunity. "She was saying something about your sight, before you blacked out.... Maybe she's referring to the Jenova viral cells in your body?"

"I wouldn't doubt it. She spoke quite a bit about a fire burning inside." Cloud added.

"Heh, that 'splains her creepy eyes." Barret said with an over emphasized shiver.

"So what are WE gonna do 'bout this weird bitch?!" Cid exclaimed from the opposite end of the table.

"I don't know, but I think the answer is under Crater Lake."

"What makes you think the answer is down there??" Yuffie asked. "I mean we don't even know what that place IS, let alone whether or not there is anything there."

Cloud stood up and began to circle the table slowly. As he made his way past the first chair to his left, where Tifa sat he took a deep breath of relaxation, before he began the second half of his dream. "After Jenova had accused me of being one with her, something strange happened. In my dream I had another visitor."

"Lemme guess..." Barret cut him off, but Cloud cut him to the chase.

"Aeris."

Barret was a little confused. "Huh.... I was gonna say Sephiroth."

Cloud continued his walk around the table, past Barret and Yuffie and Cid until he finally reached Red XIII who sat beside Cloud's original seat. "It was definitely Aeris. She told me to find the Cetra..... 'Lazarus'."

"The Cetra Lazarus?" Red questioned.

"That's right." Cloud reassured him. "Aeris said I had to go back to the Water."

Tifa was openly worried. "Are you sure it's not a trap? What if Jenova just used her to get a point across?"

Cloud again made his way back to his seat and leaned over the table towards Tifa. "I'm willing to take that chance."

"Seems a bit risky, going down there right now, right?" Cid voiced his concern. "I mean hell, We don't know where that Crisis Girl is at and what state she's in either."

"I'm not asking you all to come with me. But I need to go, and I need your help to get there." Cloud sat back in his chair, ending the debate.

"Well we're not at Crater Lake yet, so we have some time to think about this." Cid said.

"I've already made up my mind, but if any of you want to come you'd better decide before we get there. I'm leaving right away." Cloud said as he left the room.

A little while later Tifa found herself in her room onboard the Highwind. She had thrown herself onto her bed, facing the bare metal ceiling of the tiny chamber. She turned her head to the small night stand where she had left the odd Mako-scented flower and noticed it had fallen to the floor. She rolled over onto her side and felt around for the bloom, she picked it up and held it between her forefingers.

'Still here, I see.' She thought to herself, but she looked down at the tiny flower and noticed a difference right away. The flower had begun to wilt. Only a little bit but as she beheld the dying thing, it rapidly began to degrade and withered up in her hands until it was a brown fizzled up stem. "What does this mean.?" she said softly to herself as she closed her hand gently around the now dead blossom.

She got up and took it immediately to Cloud's room next door. She knocked on the door and after a moment, Cloud asked her to come in. She hesitated a little, but after a moment she entered to find Cloud laying in bed as well, his eyes fixed on her Following her as she made her way inside. "Cloud?"

"Tifa?" Cloud asked, noticing she was carrying something in her hand. "What's that?"

She opened her palm, and revealed the decayed flower to him. "The flower from Aeris is dead now. It just fell apart in my hands."

"It is a sign." Cloud reassured her. "She's still around, we just can't see her."

"I'm beginning to think so....." Tifa admitted. "What do you think this Lazarus thing is?"

"I don't know." Cloud also admitted. "But I'm going to find out."

"We're going to find out."

Cloud sat up. "Tifa?"

"I'm coming with you. Remember in Kalm I told you I would feel horrible if I let you do something stupid and I didn't do anything to help you?"

"Yeah... You don't have to explain yourself Tifa." Cloud reassured her.

'Maybe I do...' Tifa thought as she lightly patted Cloud's hand that sat nearest to her, reassuring him of her devotion to his well being.

Some time later, Cloud Cid and Tifa climbed into the hatch of the sub as it floated just underneath the low-flying Highwind. As they settled in that familiar red hue lit the compartment. Cloud tightened the hatch before he sat in the same place he had last time. Tifa took the bench across from him and Cid was manning the controls. The same levers and switches were set again and this time Cid knew what was to be expected and had came prepared. He flicked an overhead switch and the obscure darkness was illuminated by bright floodlights, much more revealing than the Submarines own tracking beams. As the ship passed through the small entryway into the ancient structure once more, the new light revealed much more.

Beyond the confines of the web structure that directed their course to the docking bay, Cid, Tifa and Cloud marveled at the immense towers of crystalline materia. Giant crags of each colour sprang raw and unrefined out from the walls, twisting and connecting with each other, in some places combining to create new colours, oranges, pinks and golds.

Cloud stared out the portside porthole, awestruck with the raw magnificence of what they were all beholding. "Yuffie's gonna hate herself for not coming this time...." He mumbled.

Tifa was too busy trying to burn everything she saw into her memory to say anything, instead she made a sort of "unhh-huhhh-huh" sound instead. Cid almost lost control of the sub trying to really get a hold on what he was looking at but managed to correct himself before any trouble aroused.

When finally they had surfaced in the sub-terrain docking bay. Cloud spun the hatch and released it with a push. Immediately the smell of centuries old stale air rushed them. Cloud breathed in a lungful of the musty substance and coughed a few times as he poked his blonde locks out of the doorway. Even the sound of their footsteps on the rungs climbing down the side of the submarine reverberated multiple times through the round area.

Cloud held his sword in hand as he stood and looked up at the massive architecture of the long lost Cetra. "This is some docking bay...." He commented to himself, his words bouncing off every surface.

"You were saying something about this being like Cetra Midgar?" Tifa mused.

Cloud turned his attention to her. "I stand corrected."

Cid took out a cigarette, but after taking a long look around from atop the sub, he put it behind his ear, deciding that now was not the time or place. "Well, you two go on ahead... I'm staying here for a bit. It's overwhelmin' me."

Cloud and Tifa looked around the room one last time as they made their way towards the archway leading into the next chamber. As they left the room Cid sighed "Awww man...." To himself in awe as he took in everything the room had to offer. Tifa pulled her gloves tight as she made her way from one room to the next as Cloud held the Buster Sword tightly; ready for any sign of danger about them, but as they progressed through the almost dreamlike halls of the Lazarus structure they found nothing.

They saw nothing out of the ordinary, yet everything they beheld was out of the ordinary. Although no danger slept within the confines of the Lazarus, Cloud and Tifa both could feel a haunting presence, watching from beyond the walls, trapped within moments passed.

"Do you feel that?" Tifa asked. "Like the feeling I get in Shell City."

"I'm sure these walls are talking; We just can't hear it." Cloud replied as he wiped his hand along the surface revealing an intricate etched pattern, the language of the Cetra that was carved into everything.

"It feels sad here." She added.

"I'm sure many people spent their final hours here." He looked to the corners of the hallway in which they stood and took note of the small pile of scattered bones blanketed underneath a millennium of particulate dust. "But I don't feel sad here. It's a feeling of hope."

Tifa smirked a bit. "What do possibly think is down here?"

"Dunno. Maybe nothing, but she did tell me this is where I needed to be."

"Cloud..." Tifa sighed. "Do you believe Jenova?"

He stopped in his tracks. "I don't know what to believe. Maybe when I told you earlier she said I was like her, I made it seem.... like a pale comparison."

Tifa turned around to meet Cloud. "And it isn't?"

"It's possible that maybe I am.... like her."

"No it isn't! Just because you have her virus in your blood doesn't change who you are."

Cloud drew closer to Tifa, letting his guard down from the current circumstances. "Do you even remember last year?"

Tifa stood against him. "Of course I do! Who do you think I am?" She exclaimed with a furled brow.

Cloud became intense. "Who do I think you are? Who do you think I am? A year ago I was an Ex-member of SOLDIER named Zack!! Jenova messes with your mind. If you don't believe it can happen to me then just look at Sephiroth!"

"Sephiroth is different." Tifa argued.

"No he's not. True his past was a little messed up, but before he was a Soldier he was just your average person. The he went nuts. There's no telling what Jenova was feeding him."

"What are you saying? You think your gonna become Sephiroth now?"

"No... I'm just saying that Jenova can really screw with you."

"IS she screwing with you Cloud, huh?" Tifa asked Cloud point blank.

"A lot of what she was saying made a lot of sense to me. Some of it was even true." Cloud admitted. "Maybe she is."

"Goddammit, what are you two arguing over now?" Cid yelled as he came around the corner. "I can here you two all through this place. Settle down! You sound worse than Shera and me on a good day!!"

Cloud and Tifa realized they had gotten a little careless, drawn into their disagreement.

"Listen, I'm sorry Tifa. I didn't mean to get so mad." Cloud apologized

Tifa shook his shoulder. "I'm sorry too. Geez.... this place really brings the emotion out."

Cid shook his head and despite his previous attempt at respect, he lit up another cigarette forgetting about the one left behind his ear. "Well, let's get on with this folks, shall we?" He cut through them and entered into the next room.

Finally then through all of the wonders of the undersea structure, they came upon the core of it's very purpose. The room in the center of it's mass housed a peculiar device. The device itself was a raised platform, an outline of a body, almost like a sacrifice was etched into the top. From this platform shot several different streams of coloured Materia, smelted into the floor. These came out like rays and they climbed the walls and extended out through small passages cut into the roof.

The room itself was aligned perfectly with the magnetic poles of the planet, and four liquid streams of pure lifestream ran from the outer walls and each flowed underneath the platform.

Cloud entered first and stood before the raised section. "I guess this is the Lazarus. Whatever it is."

Tifa made her way carefully around to the other side of the rectangular altar. "Aeris didn't happen to drop any clues about what to do, did she?"

Cloud shrugged. "I was hoping it'd be some kind of weapon we could use against Jenova, but I don't see how this could be used."

Cid spoke his mind jovially. "Heh, we could strap'er down to that tabletop there and cut her open... huh?" he joked with a puff and the over exaggerated motion of repeated knife slashes.

"Right.... I'd be glad to tear her a new one." Tifa said, slightly amused.

They were caught off guard by a new voice, detached from the world, and which spoke from the walls. "I've waited a long time for this day." The voice spoke. Cloud drew his sword but found no one as the voice continued. "This is the Cetra Lazarus. The most important discovery of our people."

Tifa beckoned to the other voice. "What is it?!"

"The Lazarus is the connection." It replied.

"Huh? Connection to what?" Cid threw his arms out to his sides. "I really wish all these damned ancient people'd stop talkin' in riddles."

"This is the place where life and death meet." The fourth presence clarified.

Cid ran his hand over his hair. "Oh, that makes sense." He replied with a sarcastic shake of his head.

"What does that mean? We can connect to the other side here?" Tifa tried to make sense of things.

Cloud hand his hand over the flat platform, brushing off a surprisingly little amount of settled dirt. "How?" He asked, without taking his eyes from the etchings on the surface he had uncovered.

The voice continued. "One must give themselves to the void in order to subsist with the fallen."

"So in other words, your telling us the only way to get in touch with the dead, is to kill ourselves using this 'Lazarus', right?" Cloud was growing impatient.

The other presence did not answer right away, it seemed to leave the room, however a moment later it could be felt, present within the walls again. "One must give themselves to the void. A leap of faith one must take."

Cloud sighed. "I still don't like the sound of that."

There was no answer.

Tifa stepped forward. "maybe you're asking the wrong question..." she said softly, before asking one herself. "How does the Lazarus work?"

The voice began to speak in another language. "Stin Jil-kun vesinsta fristew, kilontra Lazarus vex conatta-duun. Fristew tor-haijia laore kun gelen sealera."

"Whoa.... whoa, can you translate that?" She asked a little confused.

"First one must prepare the mind. The Lazarus begins the process of slowing one's life rate down to a very slow speed, allowing the body to release the spirit to the promised land."

"So you fool your body into thinking your dead." Tifa spoke aloud as the idea was drawn out for her by the host.

"How'd you expect to get back?? I mean hell, once your ghost leaves ya, it's time to say good-night, am I right?" Cid questioned.

"The Lazarus keeps the body alive." Came the words.

"How do you get back?" Cloud asked.

"That is up to the self."

There was a feeling of uneasiness in Tifa as Cloud finally spoke: "I'm going to do it." She didn't like the chances, considering he was risking his own ghost, on the word of another ghost. Traveling into the Lifestream itself was a puzzling experience, and actually going in to seek out one specific soul willingly seemed to be an impossibility. "Cloud are you sure you know what your doing? This Lazarus thing has been sitting down here for a long time.... what if something doesn't work right?"

"The guide said itself, 'A leap of faith must be taken'." Cloud said as he pulled himself up onto the hand crafter platform. "You've gotta put your trust into me. If I leave, I may not want to come back otherwise." He joked.

"Don't joke about that.... I...." Tifa warned him hesitantly.

"What? You... what?" Cloud asked, but inside he already knew what she was going to say.

"Nothing. It's nothing." Tifa lied.

Cid took a long puff on his cigarette before he made up his mind on the whole thing. "Listen, Cloud... Do what you have to, you've got my full support."

"Thanks." Cloud said. "Now Tifa.... I came all this way for this reason. I'm not leaving yet. I need an answer. You do understand, right Tifa? It's my last chance. and our only chance."

Although ever ounce of her was screaming not to let him go, she swallowed her pride finally and accepted that this is what Cloud wanted. To have this one last slim chance to meet with his truly beloved. "Go, Cloud Strife." She looked a little sick. "Go see her."

Cloud took Tifa's hand in his own and cracked a smile. "Don't worry Tifa.... I promise I'll come back. You hear me? You know I'm good to my word." He said as he laid down on his back, aligning his body into the position marked upon the surface.

Tifa squeezed his hand hard as Cloud announced to the disembodied Cetra host that he would be entering the Promised land. She put her other hand over his and kneeled down close to his face. Cloud turned his head to look at her one last time before the procedure began and she looked back into his eyes, suddenly portraying a warm, inviting gaze in her own as she thought to herself. 'Come back to us Cloud, come back... to me."

Cloud silently nodded as the sparkle in his eyes, moments before locked into her soul, emptied, becoming nothing more than a mirror. She bowed her head, a few tears welling up silently in her reflection.