Cloud, Tifa and Barret each continued their way across the ruined road, walking over to the Sector 5 Slums, walking along the path there as they quickly arrived at the Slums, and then walked through and past it to Aeris's house. They soon arrived at the house, and Cloud saw that it and the garden were still as beautiful as ever, but now he found that he didn't really care much about it, after all that had happened since the last time he had seen it.
Without a word, he went straight into the house through the front door, and Barret and Tifa hastily followed him inside there after a rather startled and amazed glance at the beautiful garden, neither of them having seen such a place in Midgar before, nor having expected there to be, but they remembered that there were far more important issues in hand, so they went inside at once, with some slight reluctance.
Elmyra Gainsborough was standing there alone in the middle of the living room that occupied almost the whole downstairs floor, her back to Cloud and the others, and her head bowed in a expression of what seemed to be sorrow. She had heard them come in, but she didn't have to turn around to know that it was Cloud standing behind her, as she spoke.
"Ah yes, it's the bodyguard who was supposed to protect my daughter, as I recall. Cloud Strife was your name, wasn't it, Mr 'Bodyguard'? You've come here to talk about Aeris, right?" asked Elmyra, in a rather cold tone of voice. Cloud was a little surprised to be expecting this sort of reaction so soon, but he did not retort, he felt he deserved it, as he had failed Aeris, and spoke up after a weary sigh, and a shake of his head.
"You've got every right to be mad for what's happened, but I just want you to understand that I am really sorry about what I'm about to tell you…Shinra Incorporated currently have her in their custody now. They captured her while I was busy fighting to save a Sector that was doomed all along. I couldn't do anything to protect her, not while I was so busy…" replied Cloud, his head bowed in sorrow. Elmyra's mood seemed to soften slightly, and she finally turned to face them.
"I already know that Shinra have finally got Aeris at last, Cloud…for you see, they took her from here. They took her right outside this house, and I could do nothing but watch her being taken," explained Elmyra, sorrowfully.
"They were HERE when they took her? They captured Aeris over here?" asked Cloud, surprised and rather taken aback by this, but now that he thought about it, it made a lot of sense that Shinra would be waiting for her here, outside her house, as it was one of the places she would obviously go to.
"Yes indeed, they took her from here, and they left here with Aeris without causing any fights or commotion in the process, she just went with them quietly instead. That's what Aeris wanted, and what she agreed with Shinra in return for going back to the Headquarters," replied Elmyra.
"But why are they doing this? I have noticed that Aeris has been capable of doing many strange and seemingly impossible things, but I still don't understand the exact reason why Shinra would want her in their procession so much, for all the years that she's been here. So just why is Shinra Incorporated after Aeris?" asked Cloud, curiously, puzzled.
"Before she reluctantly agreed to leave with Shinra, Aeris told me to explain to you about just what Aeris really is, about her full heritage, why she can do such amazing things, and about why Shinra are after her so much. So here goes…you see, the answer to all of this is because Aeris…is no mere human, but is instead an Ancient, which is also known as the race of the Cetra. She is the sole survivor, the very last," explained Elmyra.
Cloud, Barret and Tifa each stepped back from her slightly in sheer amazement, their eyes wide with shock and disbelief at what they had just heard a mere moment ago. Although highly shocked and stunned by what he was just told, Cloud finally understood everything. Aeris had all those unique powers and talents that he'd seen her do, because she was an Ancient, and one of the Cetra themselves.
The Ancients, or the Cetra, were a magical, unique race of beings who lived on the Planet many thousands and thousands of years ago, since the very birth of the Planet itself at the very beginning of time, and they had all watched over the Planet, dedicating their entire lives to preserving the Planet's health in all areas of the world, travelling and migrating in areas across the world to see to the Planet in each place, each of them spending their lives on a long endless journey for the sake of keeping the Planet live and healthy.
But after so many years of occupying and preserving the whole Planet, the Ancients had all tragically died out at least two thousand years ago, when an extremely powerful, evil alien being whom they managed to later defeat, attacked and aimed to wipe them all out to take the Planet for it's own, but only very few of the Ancients survived after the enemy's defeat.
But over time, the overall number of Ancients decreased rather than multiplied while the human race would become the dominant race in the meantime, and now it seemed that Aeris was the only Ancient that was still left in existence.
Cloud, along with the whole general public, had always thought and believed that the Ancients were long since extinct, that all of them were gone, which was why, along with their incredible history, that it was such a shock to hear that Aeris was an Ancient, despite all the things that he'd seen her do while travelling with her. Barret looked rather stumped.
"(This Aeris girl is one of those Ancients? What a damn shock…I can relate to how the Ancients fight for the Planet. But wait…how can Aeris be the last?)" thought Barret, as he spoke.
"Excuse me, ma'am, but exactly what the heck did you say just then? Aeris is really the last of the Ancients themselves, you told us, right? But how can that be right? I mean, ain't you…her mother or something? How can Aeris be the last if her mother is still alive?" asked Barret, surprised. Elmyra now looked troubled, but she answered them anyway, shaking her head.
"No, she is the very last one left, because her mother is now long since dead. You see…I'm not actually her real mother at all, it's a secret known only to Aeris and Shinra, and even the people around here have no idea about it. I'm just her adoptive mother, that's all, ever since the time I discovered Aeris alone in the train station," explained Elmyra, solemnly.
"Can you tell me about the time you found her? How you came to look after her?" asked Cloud, curiously, and both Barret and Tifa were also listening very intently, as Elmyra nodded in agreement, and began to tell them.
"It must have been about fifteen years ago when I first met Aeris now, and it had all started when my husband left for war. During the war between Wutai and Shinra, my husband was sent willingly to that far away place called Wutai, half way across the Planet from here. One day, I had went to the train station because I got a letter saying that he was coming home on leave. But my husband never came back. I had wondered if something had happened to him? No, I was sure that his leave was just cancelled, that's all. In constant hope of seeing him come, I always went to the train station, every day since. Then one day, instead of seeing my husband, I saw something quite unexpected indeed…something that was to change my entire life forever. At the station that day, I found a wounded and dying woman on the ground with a little girl beside her who was just seven years old, and who had to be this dying woman's own daughter. The little girl was none other than Aeris, and it was the very first time I met her," explained Elmyra, then she paused for a moment, and then continued.
"No one else but me took any notice of the woman that was dying there with her daughter beside her. This was because you used to see this sort of thing a lot during the war, but I was there for the woman as she began to pass on. She called herself Ifalna, and her last words had followed soon after that, which were, 'Please take my dear daughter, Aeris, somewhere safe, and keep her away from the evil ones, and care for her as I her mother would'. Then at that moment she died, and I had to comfort the little girl crying beside her, and that was when I started to seriously consider Ifalna's last words. The facts of it all were that my husband had never came back, and I had no child to keep my company. And Aeris had no mother now, and no one else to look after her at all, I knew she would need to be cared for. I could not deny to myself that I was lonely, so I decided to follow the woman's last request, and I took Aeris home with me, and adopted her as my own daughter," explained Elmyra, remembering the whole situation in her mind as she told it to Cloud and the others, who were all still intently listening as she continued.
"Aeris and I soon became very close, very quickly. She soon became the source of the greatest happiness that I had in life, and I almost at once grew to love her as though she were my own daughter. Aeris had always loved talking to others, both as a little girl and when she grew older too, she was always a fascinating and endearing child. She always used to talk to me about everything she could think of, and that was a good deal of things indeed, despite her age. And it was always a joy to talk to her as well, I had never met anyone whose company I had truly enjoyed more than hers. She had told me that she and her mother had managed to escape from some kind of Shinra research laboratory in their Headquarters, before they made it down to the Slums, though her mother had been shot in the process of the escape. But she said to me that her mother had returned to the Planet so she wasn't lonely or sad about her death at all, and told many other things," explained Elmyra.
"Her mother…returned to the Planet? She returned to the Planet after her death? Just what the hell did Aeris mean by that, ma'am?" asked Barret, looking rather confused and bewildered, a feeling that Cloud and Tifa also shared on the subject. Even Elmyra looked puzzled as she continued.
"I really didn't know what she meant about that either, not even to this day. Back then, I had asked her if she meant a star in the sky, or some faraway Planet that the dead might go to in a possible afterlife. But she insisted to me that it was this very Planet that her mother's spirit and soul had returned to after her death, and I could tell that Aeris truly did know what she was talking about. She was a very mysterious and peculiar child in many ways, but I never made any issue of it to her, not wanting to worry Aeris about it, though I always kept wondering about it to myself. Then one day, she said to me…" began Elmyra.
"Mom…please don't cry once I tell you this, but I feel as though I must. Someone very dear to your heart has just died a moment ago. He had been trying so hard to return home, and after his death, his spirit was coming to see you, but he has already returned to the Planet by now," said Aeris, in a moment years ago, her head bowed rather sadly.
"At that time, I just didn't believe her. I knew whom Aeris was talking about, but I refused to pay her words any mind. But then only a few days later, we received a notice saying that my husband had died in battle, and that's how it was, there were no other details to it than that. I was very devastated at first, but then I had eventually gotten over it, realising that Aeris had gotten on fine without her mother, and she was just a child, so I decided that I should get on without my husband too for her sake, and the both of us agreed to look out for each other from now on, to keep ourselves company to cope with the pain of those we had lost. Afterwards, me and Aeris were happy with our lives, until one day, when Shinra Incorporated, the evil ones as Ifalna had called them, finally arrived for her, to take her back in their capture," explained Elmyra.
Elmyra's mind flashed back to a memory in the past while she continued to explain it to Cloud and the others. The memory had taken place inside her house, and Tseng, in only his teenage years by this time, had just entered to speak to her and Aeris, who stood before him…
"Mrs Gainsborough, we would like Aeris to return to us, and would fully appreciate it if you allowed us to take her back to our Headquarters. You see, we have been searching for her, for a very long time, and now that we have found her location, we would ask now for her return," said Tseng, in a polite and pleasant tone of voice, but Aeris glared hard at him.
"No, I won't come along with anyone of you bad Shinra people, I'm not letting you do the same thing you did to me and my mother again! I'll never come back with any of you, no matter what you say, I refuse to go!" shouted Aeris, shrilly, but Tseng kept calm, and smiled kindly down at her.
"Aeris, you and I know both that you are a very special and unique child. After all, you are the very last Ancient left in existence now, and are quite valuable to Shinra as a result. You are of special blood, Aeris…the very blood of the Cetra courses through your veins. As we know, your real mother was an Ancient, which means you are also an Ancient by bloodline. Any living person from the race of the Cetra, the Ancients, will be able to lead us all to a great land of supreme happiness and everlasting life. Because of being able to find this land, Aeris will bring happiness to all the people in the Slums, and in the whole of Midgar, and even the entire Planet itself. That is why Shinra Incorporated would like to have Aeris's co-operation in having her return to us, so we can help her find this land, the Promised Land, of all our legends, that Shinra believe really truly does exist on this Planet," explained Tseng, calmly.
And at that moment, Elmyra finally knew the full reasons about why Aeris could do all the things that she could do, about how she seemed to have a strange way with the Planet, and the firm knowledge of its cycles of nature, and how exactly it all worked. She also understood now about why Shinra were so interested in having her, and knew that Aeris would indeed be in great danger if Shinra got her, and knew she had to prevent it, no matter what the cost. Elmyra stood shocked and stunned on the spot, while Aeris continued to protest at Tseng.
"Don't listen to him, Mom, he's wrong about all of that! I'm not an Ancient at all! I'm not, and I can't do any of the things he says I could do!" shouted Aeris. But Elmyra knew at once that his was a big lie; Aeris was an Ancient, and Aeris only lied about her heritage now because it was clear that she never wanted to go back with Shinra, no matter what the reason.
But to Elmyra's surprise though, Tseng didn't get angry or annoyed with Aeris at all; in fact he had still seemed surprisingly friendly with her, as though he was taking a fond liking to her in some way, as he spoke softly to Aeris.
"But Aeris, you can't honestly tell me that you believe all of that, you know that you are an Ancient, and that you alone can find the Promised Land. You are an Ancient, after all, you surely must be able to hear voices in the air sometimes when you're by yourself? You alone can hear the very voice of the Planet, don't you?" asked Tseng, gently and patiently. Aeris wildly shook her head in response.
"No, I don't hear anything like that, not at all!" snapped Aeris, and she quickly rushed upstairs and out of the room in a hurry, slamming the door of her bedroom hard behind her. Very concerned by Aeris' reaction to this whole situation, she turned back to face Tseng, knowing what answer she had.
"Judging by the way my daughter seems to act around you and Shinra, it would seem that the very last thing she wants to do is to get involved with any of you. So my answer to you is NO, you will never have Aeris," said Elmyra, sternly.
"You both will learn to regret this refusal to co-operate with us, I assure you of that…" said Tseng, with a dark scowl, and without another word he stormed out the front door, slamming it shut behind him.
Tseng didn't go after Aeris this time, and he simply went back to Shinra Headquarters empty-handed, while Aeris hid in her room, shaking fearfully while Elmyra comforted her as best she could. Her mind flashed back to the present, as she finished explaining to Cloud and the others.
"But I knew all about her mysterious powers and abilities that she was capable of, so I knew without any doubt that Tseng had been telling the truth, that she really was an Ancient, and that was why she could do it all. Though she couldn't help but fail, she still tried so hard to hide her powers, so I just acted as if I had never noticed for her sake. But from that moment on, I began secretly researching through books when Aeris didn't notice, books about the Ancients, the Cetra. I learned that the Ancients were once the dominant race of the Planet thousands of years ago, and that they spent their lives keeping the Planet in good health, and they used very unique and strange powers to accomplish this, that they had obtained right from their very birth, before all of them eventually died out. But I knew there was still one left, and that was Aeris. I fully understood now everything that she could do, and sometimes I would overhear her speaking aloud in her room, as though to a voice that I couldn't hear myself, but maybe only she could. Maybe she was speaking to the Planet then, it would have been possible given that she is an Ancient. And the Ancients would always speak to the Planet in order to help it. With those sort of capabilities, I knew Shinra would always hunt her for them, and that such a special girl had to be kept safe from them," explained Elmyra.
"It's simply beyond amazing how on earth she's somehow managed to avoid being captured by Shinra Incorporated and the Turks for all these years, since they first came for her when she was a child," said Cloud, thoughtfully, but he was also filled with pity and respect for Aeris at the same time, as he now finally understood everything about her.
"(Now it all makes sense. The strange and bizarre things that Aeris could do, like plant flowers in the Slums of Midgar, heal people from the brink of death, seal people's movements, levitate objects, and perform magic with a high amount of skill and power…it's all because she's an Ancient. And since she is an Ancient, she has a way of communicating to the Planet itself as well, which must be why she knows all about how the cycle of nature is working. Being an Ancient, she must also know how to find this 'Promised Land' that Shinra is searching for, whatever it is, and for whatever reason. That's why they're after her so badly…to make her help them find it…)" thought Cloud, while Elmyra nodded and spoke up.
"Shinra Incorporated needed her alive and well for their plans of finding the Promised Land to work out. So I guess that when the Turks kept trying to get her, they couldn't harm her at any cost at all. And Aeris wouldn't ever co-operate with them whenever they came, even if it meant getting herself hurt in the process of escaping them, again and again. That made Shinra's job a lot harder to carry out, and if things had gone on like this, Aeris would have kept evading their capture. But a lot of things seemed to have happened and changed recently, in these dark and troubling times," explained Elmyra.
"But just why did it happen now, then? Why did she have to get captured right now, of all times? What went wrong that caused Shinra Incorporated to finally take her in at last?" asked Tifa, curiously, though she suspected she already knew the cause of why it had happened, and she felt a sinking feeling of guilt in her stomach as the thought of it occurred to her.
"The reason why Shinra Incorporated finally captured her at last is because she brought a little girl over here with her, saying that she'd been asked to take her out of Sector 7. They were on their way here but when they were just outside this house, Tseng found and ambushed them here, and there was nothing that Aeris could do to get the little girl away fast enough along with her to escape, since Tseng quickly grabbed the little girl, and Aeris had no choice but to stop trying to run away. So Aeris made an agreement with Tseng, deciding that she would go over to the Shinra Headquarters quietly, in exchange for the little girl's safety," explained Elmyra. Tifa looked aghast.
"(It's just as I feared…this means it's all my fault that this finally happened, I should have been the one to take Marlene to safety, not Aeris, then she wouldn't have been taken by Shinra at all. And I agreed for her to get involved in the situation with Corneo, which means I got her caught up in all this mess…and now Aeris is held in Shinra's custody because I was too foolish to think for her safety,)" thought Tifa, guiltily.
"It must have been Marlene who Aeris had brought along over to here, it couldn't have been anyone else…" said Cloud, thoughtfully. Barret's eyes widened in stunned surprise, and an expression of sorrow and unmistakeable guilt appeared on his black-skinned face.
"MARLENE…!? Aeris was finally caught by those damn Shinra after all these years just because Marlene was there with her!? Shit, this is all my fault, Marlene's meant to be my whole responsibility, not nobody else's…I just dunno what to say. I'm sorry about all this…Marlene is my daughter, and I apologize for her being the cause of Aeris' capture. I'm really, really sorry…" said Barret, feeling guilty and miserable. Elmyra looked stunned as she heard this, before a stern frown appeared on her face.
"YOU are the father of that little girl, who Aeris had to take to safety!? How in the world could you ever leave a child alone like that, when you knew she was in danger there!?" snapped Elmyra, angrily. Barret only sighed wearily, shaking his head.
"Please don't start with all that, don't go on thinking that I don't care about Marlene, because I do more than anything else combined. I think about Marlene all the time, there ain't a minute that goes by that I wonder what would happen to Marlene if I was gone. But you gotta understand something here, and that's the fact that I just don't have a choice. I always want to be with Marlene to take good care of her, but I have to take up the fight against Shinra. Because if I don't do it, then the whole Planet's gonna die, and Shinra's gonna destroy all what remains of it, and then Marlene won't have any future for herself at all. So with that in mind, I'm gonna go keep on fighting against Shinra, for both the Planet and Marlene's future, even if it means sacrificing my own. But really, if there was a wish I could make, then it would be that I just want to be with Marlene in a healthier environment than this…always. So you see what I'm saying yet? I think I'm just going in circles now by saying this, but in order to get Marlene out of danger, I'm fighting to stop the danger itself, that's the way I handle it," explained Barret. Elmyra nodded as he finished, and her hard expression softened as she heard his heartfelt explanation.
"Yes, I do think that I understand what you're trying to say, and I'm sorry if I seemed so unjust and hasty earlier. I'm sure you would like to know that your daughter, Marlene, is upstairs asleep, safe and sound. Why don't you go up there, and see her? I'm sure the both of you would like that above all else at this moment," said Elmyra.
Barret nodded firmly in agreement, clearly eager to see Marlene but also feeling guilty and sorrowful for what had happened with Aeris, as he apologized once more to Elmyra, and then he quickly rushed upstairs to see Marlene. After a few moments of deep thought, Cloud followed him up.
Cloud went slowly upstairs, and walked into one of the two bedrooms there, as he saw Barret crouched down in the middle of the room and hugging Marlene happily, tears of joy sliding down his face, and he seemed extremely relieved indeed.
"Oh Marlene, I'm just so, so glad that you're alright now, I really feared you were gone when that Plate went down, but you're alright, you're really alright…" said Barret, while he hugged Marlene, who chucked a little.
"Papa, please don't rub my face like that, your face hairs are tickling me," said Marlene, giggling.
In response to this, Barret grinned and only tickled her more playfully, and Marlene laughed gleefully as Barret tickled at her sides. His mind fully decided, Cloud decided to get going over to the Shinra Headquarters right now, to rescue Aeris from there once and for all. As he turned to leave the room and go down stairs though, Barret stood up and called out to him.
"Hey, Cloud, just wait up there for a moment! You're gonna go after Aeris to rescue her from the very Headquarters building itself, ain't ya now, huh?" asked Barret, curiously. Cloud nodded in response, and shrugged.
"Yeah, that's right, Barret. I'm going to go save her from Shinra now, after all the help that she's given me since the two of us met in the church, and I feel I owe it to her if I save her from that building," replied Cloud. Barret nodded grimly, and stepped forwards, looking determined.
"Then in that case, you've got my full help and assistance here, that's for damn sure. Aeris saved my precious daughter's life nobility, at the cost of her own freedom that she'd been fighting to keep for so long, and I owe her my life for that, for giving that up to keep Marlene safe, that was a great and brave thing she did just for my daughter, saving her life from both Sector 7's fall, and from the Turks. She's already done so much for me because of it, and the very least I owe her now is to get her out of those damn Shinra's clutches. So I'm going along with you too, to help rescue her from the Shinra Headquarters, no matter what I gotta do to achieve that," said Barret, with clear determination and resolve burning in his eyes. At that moment, Cloud was then rather surprised and startled to see Marlene walking up to him, her shyness seemingly forgotten.
"Hey Cloud, I thought you might like to know that on the way over to here, Aeris was asking me a lot of interested questions about you. You know, things like, what do you think Cloud's like? I bet she sure likes you, Cloud…" said Marlene, gleefully, giggling in amusement at the thought of it all.
Startled, Cloud jumped backwards in surprise and tension, avoiding her gaze as she continued to giggle uncontrollably. Just how on the Planet could a four year-old little girl be so bright and observant like Marlene Wallace was…?
"Well, uh, let's hope so, I-I mean no, I don't, or yes I do, no wait…" stammered Cloud, nervously, swallowing hard, feeling a strange feeling inside his chest at her words. Marlene burst out laughing at his awkward reaction.
"Oh don't get all so embarrassed about it now, Cloud, it's still obviously there. Oh, and by the way, I won't tell Tifa anything about this," whispered Marlene, with a grin.
"W-What about Tifa…?" asked Cloud, bewildered. Marlene merely sighed and shook her head.
"(Ah, poor Cloud, he still can't see the triangle going on with him, Tifa and Aeris. Even I can see it, but maybe he won't want to accept it, he's in denial,)" thought Marlene, amused and entertained at the thought of the triangle.
Marlene giggled to herself, and then sat back down on the bed, and she quickly lay down and fell asleep, with Barret watching over her quietly. Having regained his composure and shook the thoughts from his head, Cloud walked out of the room and went back downstairs. Tifa and Elmyra were both still standing there in the living room downstairs, both looking rather solemn and sorrowful.
"It's all my fault that this happened…it's my fault that Aeris has been captured by Shinra after she took so much time and effort to avoid them. I was the one who got Aeris involved in all this, I persuaded her to help me and Cloud in Don Corneo's mansion, and I asked her to bring Marlene back, it should have been me who did it," said Tifa, depressed, her head bowed.
"Please don't say that miss, it really isn't true at all, so try and ease your mind about this. I'm sure that Aeris doesn't think you're responsible for anything that's happened here at all. She just feels that it was her own decision, and that it was what she had to do. She's always been like that, being both stubborn and always helping others at the same time," said Elmyra, gently, and Tifa slowly nodded, and looked at Cloud as she noticed him walk towards the front door of the house.
"You're going to go after Aeris and save her from Shinra Incorporated, whatever it is that they have planned out for her, isn't that right, Cloud?" asked Tifa, curiously.
"Yeah, I'm going to go save her…" replied Cloud, shortly.
"Then I'm coming along with you too, and that's all there is to it. She's my friend, and I want to make sure that nothing bad happens to her because of me getting her involved in being captured by Shinra in the first place," said Tifa, firmly.
Cloud didn't object to what she was saying at all, he knew that he was really going to need all the help he could get when they broke into the very building of their great enemies, and he also knew that Tifa would not take 'no' for an answer, she would be coming along no matter what.
"Tifa, we're going right up to the top of the Plate to go directly inside the Shinra Headquarters itself, into the heart of our most deadly enemies, to save Aeris. So if you come along, then you had better just be prepared for the worst once we're inside the tower, there's a high chance that we might not ever make it back out of that place alive," warned Cloud, clearly very serious. Tifa nodded in agreement, looking determined.
"I know that we might not come back out there alive, but I want to go too nevertheless. I've only known Aeris for a short while now, but during that time, she has become a good friend of mine, and I want to help her to be free, as she deserves to be. Right now, I feel like I have to push myself to the edge of my limits, and far beyond. If I stayed here, I would just go crazy with anxiety and worry for Aeris…and for you," said Tifa.
Barret suddenly ran down the stairs in a quick and bounding rush of movement, and he walked towards them. He turned to face Elmyra, the sorry, guilty expression still on his face as he spoke to her.
"I'm real sorry about all this, but can you please take care of Marlene for a bit longer, while I'm off away to help Aeris and the Planet too?" asked Barret. Understanding his reasons, Elmyra nodded and smiled reassuringly.
"Yes, I don't mind taking care of her for now, she'll be no problem to look after at all, and since Aeris, I've been used to looking after another parent's daughter. I'll keep her with me, and make sure she's safe until you get back," replied Elmyra, gently. Barret smiled gratefully, but the look turned into one of concern and the utmost seriousness.
"All of Midgar has become dangerous after what happened to Sector 7. Shinra did it to one sector, they may do it to another to stop us, who knows. The both of you should go somewhere else now, somewhere where you're both safe from being crushed or wiped out. Get out of Midgar if possible, go to the town of Kalm nearby here," said Barret, grimly. Elmyra sighed and nodded, she was reluctant to leave her nice home, but she knew he was right, and would be getting ready to leave with Marlene to Kalm at once.
"However much I love my home, I must admit that you're absolutely right, Midgar has become dangerous now because of Shinra, and I should leave just in case. I'll move to an available house in the town of Kalm with Marlene soon, but no matter what happens, promise me now that you WILL come back to her some day. Don't get yourself killed, I mean it. Your daughter needs and longs for you to be safe," said Elmyra.
"(As much as I enjoyed and loved looking after Aeris and caring for her as if she were my own daughter, I could still tell that a part of her missed her real mother. And I don't want the same thing to happen to Marlene, I don't want her face the pain of losing her father,)" thought Elmyra, worriedly.
Barret nodded grimly in response to Elmyra's words, promising that he would return someday to see Marlene and her too, no matter what might happen against Shinra Incorporated, and then after vowing to come back safely, he turned to face Cloud and Tifa.
"Aeris has already done so much for me, you know. I really owe a lot to her, even if we haven't really met just yet. She saved Marlene's life at the cost of her own freedom. And if it's those Shinra assholes that you're dealing with, then I can't just sit back here while they think they've got the better of us! I'm coming too, I'll never give up the fight for the Planet's survival against them! But most importantly of all, I've got to go and save Aeris in return for her saving Marlene, no matter what the cost…except maybe the promise I just made. Wouldn't want Marlene and Elmyra to get upset about it. But I'll do whatever I can to help her," said Barret.
Cloud, Barret and Tifa all nodded to each other in agreement, their minds fully made up, and they quickly walked out Aeris' house, with Barret giving Elmyra a hasty wave, which Elmyra returned with a wide smile, before the front doors then closed, and Cloud and the others now stood outside the house before the beautiful garden.
"Now that we've found out everything we needed to know, and now that we're preparing go and save Aeris, I have just one question that's been bothering me. How on the Planet do we get inside the Shinra Headquarters itself? How are we planning to get into there in the first place?" asked Tifa, curiously, once they were outside and out of earshot.
"Well, thanks to the destruction of Sector 7, there ain't no more trains that go up there to the top of the Plate anymore, since all the train lines have been cut," said Barret, grimly.
"(With the damn Shinra destroying Sector 7, the part of the Plate that came down wrecked the train lines going up from the Slums to the Plate, so there's no way we can use the trains no more. What else we gonna do then…?)" wondered Barret.
"…Well if there's no trains to use anymore to get up to the top of the Plate where the Headquarters is, then in that case, let's head over to Wall Market first of all. It's supposed to be the one place in all the Slums where it's possible to find anything that you're looking for, so it would be the best place for us to start. If we're lucky, we might be able to find something over there that will take us to the top of the Plate," said Tifa.
Cloud nodded in agreement to this suggestion, seeing at once that it was the most logical method to use, and he then hurried quickly towards Wall Market in the Slums of Sector 6, with Barret and Tifa both hastily following him.
Their dangerous rescue mission to save Aeris had begun…