By The G-POP Guru
Cloud's Dream
Cloud woke up suddenly. He'd had the dream again. It had been nearly two weeks now, and he wondered when it would stop. He got himself out of bed, put on some clothes and headed downstairs. As he walked down the steps, the smell of sizzling bacon and eggs filled his senses, and he smiled. "Morning, sleepyhead." Tifa laughed and took the eggs off the stove. Cloud sat down at the table, while Tifa served him some breakfast. "Sleep well?"
Cloud's smile faded when he thought again of his dream. He didn't want to worry Tifa, but he didn't want to pretend everything was all right, either. He wondered if he should tell her. "I been having this dream for a couple weeks now," he began slowly. "It's really starting to bother me."
"Oh, honey." Tifa pulled up a chair and sat beside him, putting her hand on his. "Why didn't you tell me before?"
"I didn't want to worry you. I thought it was just a dream, and it would go away eventually."
"I see." She paused, and hesitated a bit before saying: "Maybe we should consider getting you help."
"You mean a shrink? No way." Cloud did not want to see a doctor. Only crazy people went to therapy.
"Why? If it bothers you so much, you need to get help about it."
"It's just," he had never been good at talking about his feelings. "It feels so real, like it's happened to us. I don't know what it could mean."
"I don't understand. Do you want to talk about it? I want to know what exactly it is disturbing you." She leaned closer to him. "Tell me what happened.."
Cloud was reluctant, but knew that if anyone, Tifa would understand. Even if she thought he was insane, he would feel better talking about it. "It takes place in another world, or sometime in the future. I can't tell which. Anyway, I'm a member of this rebel faction called AVALANCHE, and oddly enough, Barret, our neighbor, is the leader. He wants to take down this powerful corporation called Shin-ra, which I used to work for. We blow up some kind of power plant or something, and then we head back to our hideout, a bar that you own. It's in the slums of a city called Midgar."
"A bar?" Tifa raised an eyebrow, and Cloud simply nodded. "All right, go on."
"The rest is a little hazy, but there's something called materia, little marbles with magic spells and stuff in them."
"Magic?" Tifa asked, intrigued. "Did I use magic?"
"Yeah, we all did. Anyway, we eventually met up with all our friends, Yuffie Kisaragi, Aeris Gainsboro, Vincent Valentine, and my old pal Cid. Even our dog, Red, was in it. Except for some reason, Red was bigger, and he could talk."
"Wow," Tifa chuckled. "I can only imagine the things he would say."
"He was very serious, not very talkative. He fought with us, though, and used magic, too."
"Fought with you? About what?"
"Well, we were all fighting for the life of the planet, because this guy named Sephiroth wanted to summon a meteor to destroy it."
"Why would he want to do that?" Tifa asked, now completely taken in by Cloud's tale. "And how could he 'summon' a meteor?"
"He had some kind of super materia that would summon the meteor. Aeris also played a big part. She was some kind of hippie or something, I think, because she was always 'talking' with the planet. It was sad, though, because Sephiroth killed her."
"That's awful."
"I know. I can't remember much more, but I'm pretty sure that Sephiroth and I had something in common, and I was the key to saving the world."
"Is that all?" Tifa looked at Cloud, a bit disappointed. "I want to hear more."
"I'm sorry, I can't remember how it ended; I always wake up before the end."
"I wonder what it all means."
"Me, too."