Part 3 : What Cid Did

"I'm no £&ing coward!"

"Tifa!"

Her eyes felt flickery again. "...uh...?"

"Tifa! Come on, I saw that, I know you're awake! Wake up!"

"Yuffie... not you again..." said Tifa, eyes still closed, seeming to feel Aeris' happy smile open on her own face.

"Hey! I resent that! Here I am, sitting by your bedside and everything, for three days and you say 'not you again'?"

Tifa's eyes opened properly. "Three days!" Well, it seemed about right for the melodramatic ridiculous drama-queen – NOT the effect Tifa was going for.

"Uh-huh! Guess you were wrong about leaving in the morning," Yuffie grinned.

"Er, yeah... And you've been here the whole time?"

Yuffie hesitated, then admitted. "Welll... no. I don't reeeeally get why people are supposed to do that... Seems a bit pointless, you know? It wasn't like you were exactly engaging conversion! But I was here a good bit of the time!"

"Whoa..." Tifa looked around. 'Her' room, dominated by Yuffie's mess was almost giving her the patent-pending Kisaragi Glare right back. "So is this how Cloud felt all those times he had mystic premonitions...?" she asked vaguely.

"You had a mystic premonition?" asked Yuffie, eyes shining.

Tifa sat up. It wasn't really much of an effort. She actually felt - refreshed. OK. Good, even. "Not... er, not exactly. Pretty mystic though... Pretty weird..."

"What happened?"

Tifa wasn't sure she wanted to talk about it yet, not till she'd thought about it herself a bit more.

And she didn't have to.

"£ing hell!" someone yelled from downstairs as a door slammed. No prizes for guessing who it was. "Isn't anyone awake in this ££&ing place?"

"Saved by the '£ing hell',"muttered Tifa, as she and Yuffie hurried down to Cid to see what was the matter this time.

They saw.

Tifa gasped. Yuffie yelled. Vincent, coming in through the back door, just stared. Cid was practically covered in blood. His shirt was torn right across the back and he was having difficulty standing properly.

After their stunned little moment, Shera rushed in, took a split-second glance at them, at Cid, and started giving orders. "Tifa, get some hot water. Vincent, bandages and cloths. Yuffie - get all your stuff off the sofa! And put an old sheet on it or something."

The three of them just continued to stare, but at Shera this time.

"Well?" she shouted. "Get on with it!"

They did so.

"Wow," whispered Yuffie as she pushed popcorn packets, magazines and a load of half-finished pencil sketches off the sofa and onto the floor. She sprinted up the stairs to get a sheet.

"Cid, what happened?" asked Vincent, almost managing to keep his voice calm. He quite didn't quite succeed.

"What's it - look like?" growled Cid, supported by Shera. She seemed to be ignoring the blood that was soaking in all over her clothes too. "I went for a walk - and some stupid £&ing monster got me."

"Coming throooough!" Yuffie bounded down the stairs and threw a yellowish sheet over the sofa.

"Can I ...lie down now?" Cid gasped for breath. "Or - would that be... too much trouble?"

Shera helped him towards the sofa. "I just don't want you ruining the furniture too," she told him.

"Damn..." Cid muttered, shaking his head.

Yuffie crouched down next to him, gingerly pulling the edges of the sheet out from under him. "Didn't you have a Restore with you?" she asked.

He shook his head again, and had the decency to look shamefaced. "Ain't needed one for ages. Thought there wasn't nothing that could give me real trouble these days."

"It looks like you've just found something," said Shera stonily, accepting the kettle, bowl and cloths from Tifa and Vincent. "Someone go refill the kettle."

They all started at once for the door, then Tifa and Vincent dropped back. Why not leave it to the ever-eager Yuffie...?

"Turn over," Shera instructed. "Let me see your back."

It looked to be the worst. Shera's mouth was a tight line as she wrung out a wet cloth and started to clean the wound.

"££&! What're you - damn! - doing to me, woman?"

"Stay still."

"OOWWW!"

"Cid, stop it."

"Bloody hell, do you realise how much this - AAah!- hurts?"

"Cid, stop it! You're acting so childishly! Stop screaming like - like a teenage girl!"

"Hey!" yelled Cid.

"EXCUSE ME!" yelled Yuffie from the kitchen.

"I'm no £ing coward!" Cid growled.

"Neither am I!" Yuffie shouted.

Shera grimaced. "OK, OK. Sorry Yuffie!"

"Sorry Yuffie? What about me?" asked Cid.

"Behave."

"Oh, fine..." Cid grumbled. "Me, a coward? I'm not a coward. Huh, this doesn't even hurt that muc- OW OW OOOOWW!"

Yuffie carried in the next kettle of water and emptied it into the bowl.

"Why don't you use materia?" she asked curiously.

"Wouldn't do much good for this anymore," Shera said flatly. "Besides, I'm a mechanic. I work with real things, not magic."

"She's right," groaned Cid. "Never underestimate the power of a real pair of hands - OW! GOD, SHERA ARE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME?"

"No, I'm trying to keep you alive."

"Ha ha, very – ow – funny."

"But he's gonna be OK, right?" Yuffie asked, a little panicked, as she crouched down by the sofa again to watch the proceedings.

"I feel like a bloody museum exhibit here..." Cid complained. "Stupid monsters..."

"As long as he can talk like that," Shera confirmed, "he's absolutely fine."

"What actually attacked you?" asked Tifa.

Cid just shook his head. "No idea," he said at last. "I swear I never seen one before."

"What'd it look like?" asked Yuffie eagerly.

Tifa shot a warning glance at her and Vincent used his patented Look. "I doubt very much it was pelting him with materia," he said.

"Only thing it looked - aaah! - a bit like was one of those £&ing Jenova things."

"Jenova!" said Vincent sharply. "Are you sure?"

"Nah," Cid admitted nonchalantly. "May be completely wrong, but there was something about it... sorta reminded me..."

"Jenova..." Vincent bit his lip. "If it is..."

"But - we killed Jenova, didn't we?" interuptted Yuffie. "We killed it like six times!" Realisation set in. "Oh... right..."

"Exactly," said Tifa grimly. "What if there's another one, or lots, just hiding out there... How would we know?"

There was silence, broken only by Cid occasionally gasping and swearing under his breath.

"But..." began Yuffie. "Jenova never attacked like that, did it? It just used magic, right?"

Tifa sighed. "It's a mystery," she said. "I guess - we'll just keep a lookout and wait till it makes some sense."

"There doesn't seem to be any sense," said Vincent, visibly frustrated, "If it is Jenova, why here, why now? If not, then... well, what is it? It's all so unclear..."

They waited.

"And...?" prompted Yuffie.

"What?" Vincent blinked, confused.

"Oh. Sorry, we were all just waiting for you to continue and bring some incomprehensible metaphor in," Yuffie explained. "Like comparing the unclarity or whatever to the cloudy sky." She nodded. "Yup. And then you'd say something about how the storm is coming." She looked around. "See? See? I can do Vincent even better than he can!"

Vincent Glared.


Cid refused to be moved from the sofa. All the next day he lay there, shouting at anyone who annoyed him and monopolizing the TV remote.

"Can't a sick man get any £&ing service around here?" he yelled. "Where's that tea already?"

Tifa brought it to him, smiling determinedly. "You seem in good spirits," she said.

"Yeah, I'm just peachy, me," he said sarcastically. "Hardly notice it after a while, y'know the pain all sorta molds together into a big juicy whole. Lovely, ain't it?"

"Are you sure we shouldn't get a medic or something? I mean - it is pretty serious..."

"Nah, I'm OK now. 'Sides," he muttered fiercely, avoiding Tifa's eyes, "you couldn't get no bloody medic better than Shera."

"Did I just hear right?" Tifa teased. "You said something nice about Shera?"

He shrugged, winced, and painfully put his shoulders back where they were before. "It's just the truth," he said simply. "She did a couple years medical back sometime. She's just the best there is around here. Best at most things, actually."

Tifa stared in amused silence.

Cid sighed. "Sure she does everything slow and £&ing painful, but she gets it done right."

"Yeah, guess that's the important thing."

"Yeah." Cid reached for the remote. "Oh -" he added. "Don't tell her I said any of that."


Ah! There be plot!

Hehe. Gotta love Cid & Shera... Well, I love 'em anyway.

(insert usual petition for reviews here) Thank you!