Shera took Cid up his usual cup of tea the next morning, grateful that he hadn't left yet like the previous morning. She walked in to a sight that upset her.

Cid was up already, and he was kneeling at a chest of drawers, pulling out of them all of Vincent's clothes that were still in them and not in boxes, smiling to himself and inhaling their scent every now and then. He started shaking them out and putting them in the ironing basket.

"Cid..." She said quietly, a lump in her throat. "What are you doing?" She put the cup down on the dresser.

"I'm gonna iron all of Vin's clothes." He said cheerily.

"But... why?" She asked, upset.

"I can't tell you yet." He said, simply.

"Oh Cid..." She laid her hand on his shoulder before running from the room, almost in tears. He had lost his mind... the grief had become too much. What should she do? Should she call a doctor or a counsellor? She should definitely inform his friends.

So, later on as Cid had begun ironing out all of the clothes in Vincent's old drawer, she started to phone Cloud, Barret and the rest of the old team, telling them that Cid had finally buckled under the strain.

Cid knew what she thought, but he didn't care, not now. He had more important things to do. So, once he'd finished ironing all the clothes (even the ones he'd put in boxes a few weeks ago) and put the entire lot back into their drawers and thrown the empty boxes into the junk shed, be began putting fresh sheets on the bed and changing the heavy drapes to lighter curtains.

When he'd finished sprucing up the room and tidying it at last, he took a step back to admire his hard work. It was special for Vincent for when he came back.

Now all he had to do was search for him.

So Cid would go out in the Highwind every day for hours on end, searching all the places he thought it likely that  the Lifestream would flow.

The North Crater, near Mideel, Midgar, near all the old reactors, even Nibelheim and Cosmo Canyon.

But there was no trace of Vincent Valentine at any of them.

Days turned into weeks, and still Cid could not find him. He never gave up hope, often searching the same place over and over in short spaces of time, in case he'd missed anything.

He'd searched Nibelheim Mansion a few times, knowing that was where Vincent had been found the first time. Upon exploring it, he found the basement room where Vincent had been trapped for thirty years. It was the first time he had ever seen it, and he was touched by a sense of horror as he touched the satin lining of the coffin that Vincent had once slept in. It was horrible, somehow.

But even though he searched there and in the library as well, there was still no trace of him.

Eventually he even tried the City of the Ancients again, but he could never again get inside the large central structure; some unknown force held the doors shut and they were never to be opened again.

Sometimes he visited the old church in Midgar, hoping Aeris would appear again and guide him further, but she did not. The church seemed empty now, except for the flowers of course.

He would come home to Shera every night, exhausted from searching so extensively. She did not understand why he did, or where he went, but she was just glad that he came home. She stopped asking him questions after a while, because he never answered them anyway and she felt the questions irritated him.

Months passed since the events at the City of the Ancients with Lucrecia, and the bitter cold of winter gave way to the new hope of spring. Seedlings that were sleeping under the ground burst from the soil to greet the growing sunlight, and leaves stretched out from the new green shoots on trees to give their salutations to the welcome sun. The days lengthened and the chill left the air to be replaced with gentle warmth and brightness.

The warmer days came, and Shera was glad of the change. The colder months had chilled them all and she was looking forward to the young spring giving them all back some hope for the future. It had been a bad winter for everyone.

Cid eventually started to lose hope of ever finding Vincent.

It had been months now, and not even a trace... he started to go out searching less and less, and eventually he stopped going altogether, his hope shredded.

Shera noticed the change in him, but she did not know why. He hardly ever opened up to her now like he had when Vincent had first passed away all those months ago, but he had now regained most of the sadness that he had back then. She didn't understand. Why all that effort to keep the house nice when he finally came back that day he had gone missing? He'd ironed out and folded all of Vincent's clothes and put them back in the drawers, when it had taken a huge effort to bring himself to put some of them in boxes just a few weeks previous to it.

She just wished Cid could start to put it behind him and ...

And what? Move on? How could he move on after only six months ago losing the love of his life to a slow and unstoppable death? Who could know what turmoil his mind must be going through, she thought.

"I won't question him anymore," She decided one day whilst alone in the kitchen. "He just needs me here, and I'll be there for him, no matter what. That's all that matters now."

It was a week since Cid had given up searching for Vincent, and he was feeling so low and forlorn.

It had been months since Aeris had told him to search... months! And nothing! Cid was certain that he'd scoured every corner of the planet, searching desperately for the one he loved.

He'd travelled alone through valleys, over snow-covered mountains, calling his name over and over... once he'd been gone a whole week without coming home.

'Shera must be worried sick about me, and she doesn't even ask me why I do it. It's so unfair on her, but I can't help it...'

So eventually, though it broke his heart to realise it, he decided that Vincent wasn't coming back.

'It was stupid of me to go along with it anyway...' he thought, lying in bed, depressed out of all control.

'You can't come back from the dead.' A small voice in the back of Cid's head told him that Vincent had done it before...  'That's different,' he argued back in his mind. 'It was the Jenova cells. And they don't exist anymore...' his eyes filled up. 'And neither does he.'

He curled up on the bed, and drifted off to sleep with tears in his eyes.

Cid woke up with a start. He did that a lot, to wake up thinking the whole long ordeal was a dream, reaching out to hold Vincent only to find he wasn't there.

He sat up, rubbing his stubbled face with his hands. He looked at the window and it was still fairly bright... he looked at his watch and saw that it was six pm.

He swung his legs over the bed and sat for a moment, his feet on the floor and his head in his hands. The only sound was the clock ticking on the wall. He'd listened to that a lot over the months; the monotonous clicking as the seconds fell precisely and unstoppably after one another. He'd wished countless times that the clock had magic powers and he could turn back time like the hands of a clock.

He thought after a while that he had neglected putting flowers out to sea these past months, as he'd been fooled into thinking Vincent wasn't dead. He felt sadness and shame at the thought of neglecting Vincent's lonely spirit to chase after some stupid childish hope.

He stood and dressed, leaving the room in a less than tidy state.

Shera was watching the news as Cid clumped down the stairs, his very footfalls revealing his mood. She sighed.

"Shera, I'm goin' to the beach. I'll see ya later." With that, he left the house, shutting the door behind him with almost a slam.

'Well, good...' Shera thought. 'He hasn't taken Vincent flowers for months... maybe this means he's coming to terms with it?'

She shook her head and flipped the channels.

**