It's been awhile since I've updated either of my stories but I'm back now
and with a new chapter. Thanks to those who reviewed, I will try to update
faster (even though I think I said that last time) Anyway here it is.
Chapter 4 - I could get any girl here if I wanted - Cid
"Hey Cid, what you doing here?"
Zack was leaned against the castle wall next to the basement stairs door as Cid walked through.
"That annoying £$%& Ansem dragged me here to take a look at some new type of vehicle," He rubbed his arm. "Although that's not the only thing down there."
"Huh?"
"Forget it." Cid glanced round. "So where's Cloud and Aerith, thought they were gonna be here too."
Zack nodded his head towards the balcony where Cloud and Aerith were stood. "Those two are trying to ask each other out, being stood there for about 20 minutes now."
"Figures, in my day it was simple, you walked up to a girl and asked her, nothing difficult about it."
Zack raised an eyebrow and grinned. "In my day? Geez you really are a thousand years old."
"Hey shut it, 43 ain't that old." He pouted and took out a cigarette. "I could get any girl here if I wanted."
"Uh huh, I think those things are going to your head."
Cid leaned against the wall next to Zack and took a deep breath.
"Yeah, yeah. So what are you two really here for? I'm sure it's not for the great guard duty job you got going."
The band in the center of the courtyard began to play and most of the guests began to dance in pairs.
"True, rumors spread around that Sephiroth had been sighted in this area." Zack shook his head and laughed. "And of course that meant Cloud had to come and check it out for himself."
"I just hope he manages to find something else to do instead of chasing that winged freak around."
"I think he already has." He pointed over to the two, Aerith was pulling him on to the dance floor with much protest from Cloud.
Cid laughed and held his sides as Cloud stumbled over every two steps of the dance. "Now this is entertainment."
___________________________
"Come on your not trying!" Aerith took hold of Cloud's hand and placed one around her waist and held the other in the air.
"I told you I couldn't do this." Cloud kept his eyes on the floor trying to mimic Aerith's steps.
She raised an eyebrow and gave him an unconvinced look. "Uh huh, so you can wield that huge sword around with no problem but you can't dance at all?"
Cloud tripped over his feet again and stumbled to the floor, a few other dancers around them looked down and smirked. "I told you." He stood up again and brushed him self off.
"Don't worry about it." Aerith took his hands again and tried to dance slower, every so often Cloud would look down at his feet to check they were copying Aerith's correctly, after a while he seemed to improve, well, at least he stopped falling over. "See, it's not so hard."
Cloud rolled his eyes. "Even sword training wasn't this hard."
"Hmm well maybe we can do that tomorrow." She said smiling.
Cloud raised an eyebrow. "Sword fight with a girl?"
"A girl?" Aerith half shouted and then squeezed his hands a little. "Well I was going to go easy on you but now you have no chance."
"Hm, Sounds like a challenge." He grinned.
"I'll show you what just a girl can do." The music slowed down and Aerith stopped dancing.
"Now what?"
"This is called a slow song."
Cloud looked around and saw everyone dancing much slower and closer together. "Well at least this one looks easier."
"There's nothing to it." She stepped closer to him and put her arms around his neck.
Cloud glanced round to see what the other guys were doing. He looked at Aerith again and hesitated before putting his hands around her waist. "Is- is this right?"
"Got it in one." She smiled and rested her head on Clouds chest while swaying to the music, she felt Cloud swallow hard and also how his heartbeat had speeded up. "This is the first time you've done this, isn't it?"
"Uhh yeah. How did you know?"
"Its not hard to tell." Aerith smiled closing her eyes. "But it's hard to believe."
"Well I just never, its just something I never thought of doing."
"Never? What have you been doing all your life?"
At this point the sun had left its place in the sky, the torches around the walls providing the only light, Cloud looked up at the sky and saw the first stars beginning to appear. "I grew up in the slums of Midgar, every night I would look up at the sky just to see black, metal, the world above that I new I was not allowed to enter. Every night I wished that I would be able to look up and instead of that disc, I would be able to see the stars."
Aerith kept quite and let him finish, it was the most Cloud had said all night and she didn't want to interrupt now.
"After a while I began to train as hard as I could, to become a Soldier first class. If I could accomplish that then I would be able to live up on the higher plate, soon after I met Cid and Tifa and they helped me out, Zack also began to train with me, after I started it was all I would do." Cloud then realized how much he was talking and grew nervous again. "S- sorry, I shouldn't be boring you with this."
"No don't stop." Aerith opened her eyes and looked at him. "I'd like to know."
Cloud nodded and continued. "It became everything to me, just to achieve that goal. Everything that wasn't training became irrelevant, including things like this."
"How long did you do that for? It doesn't seem like a happy way to live."
"3 years, then I finally got my first Soldier mission. Someone had been sending transmissions to the rebel factions outside Midgar, it was our job to find him or her and arrest them."
"This was the Sephiroth incident, that 'was' you then."
"Yeah, the rebels had been experimenting with Mako research and Sephiroth had taken advantage of this, one of the side effects was been given wings."
"But I heard he only has one." Aerith said a little confused.
"That's because during out fight after he struck down Tifa and Zack, I managed to catch him off guard and one of the blows I delt him cut off one of the wings. After that reinforcements arrived and took him away."
"And then there was his escape, I read about it in the papers. So... I guess that's why your here, your chasing him."
Cloud nodded. "Me and Zack agreed to work undercover to find him, we split up at the docks check the area out and that's when I first saw you."
She smiled and tightened her grip around him. "Makes you think doesn't it?"
"What does?"
"If any of those events hadn't happened then you wouldn't have been there on that day."
"No, I guess not. Doesn't make it seem so bad when you put it that way."
The song ended and the music stopped, after a few moments the crowd started to move off to other areas of the festival.
"Congratulations, you actually managed to dance." Aerith put her hands behind her back and leaned over. "Was it really so hard."
Cloud shrugged and scratched the back of his head. "I still think sword training was easier."
"Still? Well... I bet you don't get this after sword training though." She slowly leaned closer towards Cloud's lips.
Cloud swallowed hard and leaned forward to meet her, his hands were shaking and lips began to tremble.
"What the hell is that!"
"Huh?" The moment was broken as someone cried out, the two hesitated and then backed off.
"What's going on?" Aerith looked in the direction of the scream.
In the center of the dance floor was small black creature, the eyes glowed and on top of its head was two small antenna. It ran up to one person and jumped up into the air colliding with the victim's chest knocking him to the ground. The man laid on the floor clutching his chest as if he was unable to find breath.
One of the guards in the area ran up to the creature and attacked it with is sword, the blade cut through the air but then that is all that it damaged as the shadow creature dodged it easily. The creature jumped at him and knocked the guard down.
"Wait here!" Cloud ran in front of Aerith and headed towards the shadow, without his weapon he had no choice but to attack by hand. He reached the creature and brought his leg up into its face kicking it as hard as he could, caught off guard the shadow was sent flying into the wall, after hitting the floor it jumped back on to its feet and then ran off into the shadows disappearing.
"What the hell just happened?" Zack ran up to Cloud and examined the spot where the creature vanished.
"Aghhh," Cloud winced in pain and fell to his knees.
"Are you ok?" Aerith was next to join them.
"My, my leg... it feels like its on ice." He tried to stand up only to fall once again. "I can't move it."
Aerith kneeled down and placed her hands around Cloud's leg. "It's cold, this happened just from touching it?"
"Hey!" Cid shouted. "That happened to me, just now when I was down in the basement." He pointed to the stairs that lead down to the castle basement.
A few people began to talk to each other amongst the crowd, a few telling of similar incidents earlier in the day.
Aerith concentrated her attention on Cloud and soon a green light glowed from her hands and onto his leg, after a few seconds he was able to stand up again as the pain left.
"Thanks."
"So what's going to happen now?" Asked Zack.
"It looks like they're going to clear the place out." Cid pointed over to some of the castle guards how had arrived and began to send people home.
"Think we should get out of here?" Zack turned to Cloud who then turned to Aerith.
"Yeah, I guess we should just in case." Cloud thought about what was going to happen a few minutes ago before the scream but then decided that the moment was gone and there was no chance to salvage it now.
Aerith nodded slightly saddened but she new it would be best. A few moments later the man who was with Aerith when she first arrived at the festival appeared running around the corner.
"Squall!" She shouted.
"Are you guys ok?" Squall said slightly out of breath.
"Yeah, Cloud took care of whatever it was." Cid stated.
He nodded at Cloud catching the rest of his breath. "There was another incident on the other side of the castle in the SeeD area."
"Is anyone hurt?" Asked Aerith.
"A few people have been injured but nothing serious, SeeD has been sent round the castle to check for more and the guards have been called in to clear the area."
Aerith stood next to Cloud and held his hand. "Then we should go then."
Cloud nodded and agreed. "Ok," He turned back to Zack. "I'll see you later, no doubt we'll be called in to check this out later."
"Good point."
Slowly the crowd in the courtyard left to return home, Cloud walked Aerith back to hers slightly disappointed at how things had happened.
_________________________
"Do you ever have dull normal days?"
"Huh?" He looked confused.
They stopped just outside Aerith's home, the street was empty and apart from the commotion over at the castle there was total silence.
"Every day I've been with you something seems to happen, is it like this all the time?"
"I'm sorry, I know how much you wanted to enjoy this night."
"Sorry? Why should you be?" She leaned against the wall a looked him in the eye. "I had a great time."
"Me too." Cloud fidgeted, the suit he was wearing was starting to annoy him. "So, I guess I'll see you around."
Aerith smiled. "Do you think I'm going to let you off that easy?"
"Huh?"
"I believe you accepted my challenge earlier." She gave him a cocky smile. "You want to back out?"
"You mean the sword training?" Cloud put his hand behind his head and shrugged. "Well, ok then if you think you're up to it."
"Up to it? Oh I'm really going to let you have it Soldier boy.
"Soldier boy?" Cloud stood in his usual cocky position. "Well, we'll just have to see then."
"Great! I'll meet you here tomorrow then. We can go use Cid's place, it has a large enough garden and I'm sure he won't mind."
"Ok then." Cloud smiled, it wasn't the second date he was hoping for but at least it was something. "Well, see you tomorrow then."
"Trying to get away again?"
'???' Cloud looked confused. "Ummm I didn't challenge you to anything else did I?"
"Nope." Aerith smiled and stepped up to him, this time there were no interruptions as her lips met his. Cloud's eyes widened as he was caught off guard but soon he was happy that he let this attack get through.
A few seconds later Aerith broke the kiss and stepped back. "I believe you should always finish what you started."
"Y-yeah."
"Well until tomorrow then." With that she turned and opened the door turning back to waved at him before closing it.
Cloud stood there for a few moments before walking away, various moments of the night ran through his mind. What he thought had ended in total disaster actually ended really well.
He walked down the street in deep thought when he stopped, in front of him was a feather, kneeling down he picked it up studied it. 'Your here... I knew it. But I don't care, play your stupid games, I have better things to do now.' ___________________
Chapter 4 - I could get any girl here if I wanted - Cid
"Hey Cid, what you doing here?"
Zack was leaned against the castle wall next to the basement stairs door as Cid walked through.
"That annoying £$%& Ansem dragged me here to take a look at some new type of vehicle," He rubbed his arm. "Although that's not the only thing down there."
"Huh?"
"Forget it." Cid glanced round. "So where's Cloud and Aerith, thought they were gonna be here too."
Zack nodded his head towards the balcony where Cloud and Aerith were stood. "Those two are trying to ask each other out, being stood there for about 20 minutes now."
"Figures, in my day it was simple, you walked up to a girl and asked her, nothing difficult about it."
Zack raised an eyebrow and grinned. "In my day? Geez you really are a thousand years old."
"Hey shut it, 43 ain't that old." He pouted and took out a cigarette. "I could get any girl here if I wanted."
"Uh huh, I think those things are going to your head."
Cid leaned against the wall next to Zack and took a deep breath.
"Yeah, yeah. So what are you two really here for? I'm sure it's not for the great guard duty job you got going."
The band in the center of the courtyard began to play and most of the guests began to dance in pairs.
"True, rumors spread around that Sephiroth had been sighted in this area." Zack shook his head and laughed. "And of course that meant Cloud had to come and check it out for himself."
"I just hope he manages to find something else to do instead of chasing that winged freak around."
"I think he already has." He pointed over to the two, Aerith was pulling him on to the dance floor with much protest from Cloud.
Cid laughed and held his sides as Cloud stumbled over every two steps of the dance. "Now this is entertainment."
___________________________
"Come on your not trying!" Aerith took hold of Cloud's hand and placed one around her waist and held the other in the air.
"I told you I couldn't do this." Cloud kept his eyes on the floor trying to mimic Aerith's steps.
She raised an eyebrow and gave him an unconvinced look. "Uh huh, so you can wield that huge sword around with no problem but you can't dance at all?"
Cloud tripped over his feet again and stumbled to the floor, a few other dancers around them looked down and smirked. "I told you." He stood up again and brushed him self off.
"Don't worry about it." Aerith took his hands again and tried to dance slower, every so often Cloud would look down at his feet to check they were copying Aerith's correctly, after a while he seemed to improve, well, at least he stopped falling over. "See, it's not so hard."
Cloud rolled his eyes. "Even sword training wasn't this hard."
"Hmm well maybe we can do that tomorrow." She said smiling.
Cloud raised an eyebrow. "Sword fight with a girl?"
"A girl?" Aerith half shouted and then squeezed his hands a little. "Well I was going to go easy on you but now you have no chance."
"Hm, Sounds like a challenge." He grinned.
"I'll show you what just a girl can do." The music slowed down and Aerith stopped dancing.
"Now what?"
"This is called a slow song."
Cloud looked around and saw everyone dancing much slower and closer together. "Well at least this one looks easier."
"There's nothing to it." She stepped closer to him and put her arms around his neck.
Cloud glanced round to see what the other guys were doing. He looked at Aerith again and hesitated before putting his hands around her waist. "Is- is this right?"
"Got it in one." She smiled and rested her head on Clouds chest while swaying to the music, she felt Cloud swallow hard and also how his heartbeat had speeded up. "This is the first time you've done this, isn't it?"
"Uhh yeah. How did you know?"
"Its not hard to tell." Aerith smiled closing her eyes. "But it's hard to believe."
"Well I just never, its just something I never thought of doing."
"Never? What have you been doing all your life?"
At this point the sun had left its place in the sky, the torches around the walls providing the only light, Cloud looked up at the sky and saw the first stars beginning to appear. "I grew up in the slums of Midgar, every night I would look up at the sky just to see black, metal, the world above that I new I was not allowed to enter. Every night I wished that I would be able to look up and instead of that disc, I would be able to see the stars."
Aerith kept quite and let him finish, it was the most Cloud had said all night and she didn't want to interrupt now.
"After a while I began to train as hard as I could, to become a Soldier first class. If I could accomplish that then I would be able to live up on the higher plate, soon after I met Cid and Tifa and they helped me out, Zack also began to train with me, after I started it was all I would do." Cloud then realized how much he was talking and grew nervous again. "S- sorry, I shouldn't be boring you with this."
"No don't stop." Aerith opened her eyes and looked at him. "I'd like to know."
Cloud nodded and continued. "It became everything to me, just to achieve that goal. Everything that wasn't training became irrelevant, including things like this."
"How long did you do that for? It doesn't seem like a happy way to live."
"3 years, then I finally got my first Soldier mission. Someone had been sending transmissions to the rebel factions outside Midgar, it was our job to find him or her and arrest them."
"This was the Sephiroth incident, that 'was' you then."
"Yeah, the rebels had been experimenting with Mako research and Sephiroth had taken advantage of this, one of the side effects was been given wings."
"But I heard he only has one." Aerith said a little confused.
"That's because during out fight after he struck down Tifa and Zack, I managed to catch him off guard and one of the blows I delt him cut off one of the wings. After that reinforcements arrived and took him away."
"And then there was his escape, I read about it in the papers. So... I guess that's why your here, your chasing him."
Cloud nodded. "Me and Zack agreed to work undercover to find him, we split up at the docks check the area out and that's when I first saw you."
She smiled and tightened her grip around him. "Makes you think doesn't it?"
"What does?"
"If any of those events hadn't happened then you wouldn't have been there on that day."
"No, I guess not. Doesn't make it seem so bad when you put it that way."
The song ended and the music stopped, after a few moments the crowd started to move off to other areas of the festival.
"Congratulations, you actually managed to dance." Aerith put her hands behind her back and leaned over. "Was it really so hard."
Cloud shrugged and scratched the back of his head. "I still think sword training was easier."
"Still? Well... I bet you don't get this after sword training though." She slowly leaned closer towards Cloud's lips.
Cloud swallowed hard and leaned forward to meet her, his hands were shaking and lips began to tremble.
"What the hell is that!"
"Huh?" The moment was broken as someone cried out, the two hesitated and then backed off.
"What's going on?" Aerith looked in the direction of the scream.
In the center of the dance floor was small black creature, the eyes glowed and on top of its head was two small antenna. It ran up to one person and jumped up into the air colliding with the victim's chest knocking him to the ground. The man laid on the floor clutching his chest as if he was unable to find breath.
One of the guards in the area ran up to the creature and attacked it with is sword, the blade cut through the air but then that is all that it damaged as the shadow creature dodged it easily. The creature jumped at him and knocked the guard down.
"Wait here!" Cloud ran in front of Aerith and headed towards the shadow, without his weapon he had no choice but to attack by hand. He reached the creature and brought his leg up into its face kicking it as hard as he could, caught off guard the shadow was sent flying into the wall, after hitting the floor it jumped back on to its feet and then ran off into the shadows disappearing.
"What the hell just happened?" Zack ran up to Cloud and examined the spot where the creature vanished.
"Aghhh," Cloud winced in pain and fell to his knees.
"Are you ok?" Aerith was next to join them.
"My, my leg... it feels like its on ice." He tried to stand up only to fall once again. "I can't move it."
Aerith kneeled down and placed her hands around Cloud's leg. "It's cold, this happened just from touching it?"
"Hey!" Cid shouted. "That happened to me, just now when I was down in the basement." He pointed to the stairs that lead down to the castle basement.
A few people began to talk to each other amongst the crowd, a few telling of similar incidents earlier in the day.
Aerith concentrated her attention on Cloud and soon a green light glowed from her hands and onto his leg, after a few seconds he was able to stand up again as the pain left.
"Thanks."
"So what's going to happen now?" Asked Zack.
"It looks like they're going to clear the place out." Cid pointed over to some of the castle guards how had arrived and began to send people home.
"Think we should get out of here?" Zack turned to Cloud who then turned to Aerith.
"Yeah, I guess we should just in case." Cloud thought about what was going to happen a few minutes ago before the scream but then decided that the moment was gone and there was no chance to salvage it now.
Aerith nodded slightly saddened but she new it would be best. A few moments later the man who was with Aerith when she first arrived at the festival appeared running around the corner.
"Squall!" She shouted.
"Are you guys ok?" Squall said slightly out of breath.
"Yeah, Cloud took care of whatever it was." Cid stated.
He nodded at Cloud catching the rest of his breath. "There was another incident on the other side of the castle in the SeeD area."
"Is anyone hurt?" Asked Aerith.
"A few people have been injured but nothing serious, SeeD has been sent round the castle to check for more and the guards have been called in to clear the area."
Aerith stood next to Cloud and held his hand. "Then we should go then."
Cloud nodded and agreed. "Ok," He turned back to Zack. "I'll see you later, no doubt we'll be called in to check this out later."
"Good point."
Slowly the crowd in the courtyard left to return home, Cloud walked Aerith back to hers slightly disappointed at how things had happened.
_________________________
"Do you ever have dull normal days?"
"Huh?" He looked confused.
They stopped just outside Aerith's home, the street was empty and apart from the commotion over at the castle there was total silence.
"Every day I've been with you something seems to happen, is it like this all the time?"
"I'm sorry, I know how much you wanted to enjoy this night."
"Sorry? Why should you be?" She leaned against the wall a looked him in the eye. "I had a great time."
"Me too." Cloud fidgeted, the suit he was wearing was starting to annoy him. "So, I guess I'll see you around."
Aerith smiled. "Do you think I'm going to let you off that easy?"
"Huh?"
"I believe you accepted my challenge earlier." She gave him a cocky smile. "You want to back out?"
"You mean the sword training?" Cloud put his hand behind his head and shrugged. "Well, ok then if you think you're up to it."
"Up to it? Oh I'm really going to let you have it Soldier boy.
"Soldier boy?" Cloud stood in his usual cocky position. "Well, we'll just have to see then."
"Great! I'll meet you here tomorrow then. We can go use Cid's place, it has a large enough garden and I'm sure he won't mind."
"Ok then." Cloud smiled, it wasn't the second date he was hoping for but at least it was something. "Well, see you tomorrow then."
"Trying to get away again?"
'???' Cloud looked confused. "Ummm I didn't challenge you to anything else did I?"
"Nope." Aerith smiled and stepped up to him, this time there were no interruptions as her lips met his. Cloud's eyes widened as he was caught off guard but soon he was happy that he let this attack get through.
A few seconds later Aerith broke the kiss and stepped back. "I believe you should always finish what you started."
"Y-yeah."
"Well until tomorrow then." With that she turned and opened the door turning back to waved at him before closing it.
Cloud stood there for a few moments before walking away, various moments of the night ran through his mind. What he thought had ended in total disaster actually ended really well.
He walked down the street in deep thought when he stopped, in front of him was a feather, kneeling down he picked it up studied it. 'Your here... I knew it. But I don't care, play your stupid games, I have better things to do now.' ___________________