Disclaimer: I own nothing, nor have I anything witty to say.
The children had left, Avalanche had left. Left him to himself. Left him to his church, to his flowers. His dead gardens to tend. His story was over. Hadn't it been over two years ago? The flowers that he'd kept as memory of their previous owner were dead. Buried under water just like she was, those years ago, hadn't it been he who let her go, let her float gently downwards? Left to bring his thoughts to the living. Left to remain with those he'd saved. Left to tend his now dead gardens. From the wooden beams a drop of water fell, hitting him on the top of his head. Aerith had been there. Aerith had saved him, not once, but twice. If not for Aerith, he wouldn't have defeated Bahamut, might not have been able to defeat Sephiroth if everything before that hadn't been as it was. Had she not cured Jenova's taint on his body, he could not have faced Sephiroth and walked away.
Aerith had saved the children, not he. Once again, he wasn't the real hero here. But you're okay with that, aren't you? He'd never been the real hero. Zack was, Aerith was. It came as no surprise to Cloud that he wasn't a real hero. He'd pretended to be, once, aspired to be, once. No longer did he wish so. There was no part of playing the hero that appealed to him any longer. Zack was dead, as was Aerith. When Cloud had tried to play hero, he'd gotten dragged across four continents, molested, harrassed, stabbed, mindfucked, and nearly killed more times than he could count. The life of a hero lost its shine sometime around Nibelheim when the Masamune ran him through in the reactor, he figured. Why he'd continued the charade five years later, he'd never understood.
He didn't need to be a hero, though. Not in this world where the children had laughed happily in the water, their feet standing in the remains of the white and yellow blossoms. Not in the world where sunlight percolated down into the church over the soaring balustrades, no upper plate to restrict the glow that bounced off the healing waters. The soft sounds of people in the city outside didn't come in through the old stone walls, and there Cloud stood, surrounded by the sunlight and the water, and the remains of his her flowers. What sort of world was this, with Jenova destroyed, with her Remaining parts destroyed. With Sephiroth gone. But not just a memory. Not a memory. But what?
His shadow would not live on, not darken the Planet. Wouldn't it? Jenova was gone. So sure? Humans could finally rebuild without fear of Meteor, could be certain that the ground they walked on wouldn't be destroyed by anything other than another human or a monster. They could breathe again. Maybe. Everything would be all right. In the church of Midgar's slums stood the Planet's saviour. The world would continue, the people would live. What place was there in this post-apocalyptic world for a not-hero? Sephiroth would have done it better.
Too bad The General hadn't been the hero. Cloud let his eyes drift over the wreckage of the already ruined church. In his eyes lay a world where Aerith wasn't dead, where Geostigma hadn't killed children. Where Zack hadn't needed to die so close to freedom. He closed his eyes, letting the concept run through his mind, tasting it, running it over with his thoughts like tasting a fine wine. Perhaps a world where Sephiroth had never been perverted by Jenova. Maybe even a world where he would never have the chance to experience her lies, where it all ended long before it started. A world that had not tasted the sharp acrid fear of Meteor looming painfully in the sky. What a world, a world where Sephiroth had not lived. Jenova would have been powerless in her tank, Hojo merely one man, albeit an insane one. Such a world, where the greatest evil was ShinRa. The greatest evil was man's own creation. A world that wasn't still picking itself back up from the crisis.
Cloud didn't know how long he'd stood there, except that the slow banking warmth of his own daydream played through a tired, battered body. Perhaps it was cruel to think such thoughts, cruel to dwell on a present that might never be, an altered past, an impossible future. Cruel to himself, cruel to the world as it was. He could live with this world, he thought, perhaps. What place was there in this post-apocalyptic world for a not-hero? Perhaps he could find peace at heart. But still the idea of his impossible daydream called a siren's voice in his wounded heart. Aerith and Zack need not be ghosts. So many people need not have died. My family! My hometown! How could you do this to them? All the pain and suffering of the world right now that had been brought about by the crisis, all the suffering that had not yet come to the surface from this latest trouble. So many dead, so many wounded. So many tired, so many hurt. All it would take is the death of one man. No, not one man. One boy.
Would the death of one child mean so much? The thought of killing an innocent was abhorrent, but did Sephiroth really count as an innocent at any age? ShinRa raised him to be their killing machine. Even if their intent was for him to kill only in war, it still stood. Better erased than destroying so many lives. Or is that how ShinRa would think? So ruthless. Not a hero at all, was he? But he'd never been a hero. Maybe a hero wasn't what was needed, for that matter. An act that would let Aerith continue to smile, that would let Zack continue to joke, any little act as simple as one downward thrust with a blade in his hand... he'd made the motion often enough, certainly.
Mindless indulgence in a fantasy world. There would never be the chance, never be the opportunity. Perhaps No, never the chance. Maybe Ridiculous to think about what might have been, what could have happened in a different world, in a different set of possibilities.
Not impossible at all.
Blue eyes snapped open quickly. That was not the usual quiet whisper from the back of his mind. That was not the sarcastic voice that congratulated him on acts of supreme stupidity. With a turn of his head, Cloud's gaze swept around the deserted church. His body lowered into a more defensible position, senses heightened by Jenova and Makou infusion sought in vain for the source of the intrusion to his quiet reverie.
The Planet is alive, Cloud, thanks to you.
The voice was familiar in little ways, but wrong in so many others. The tone, the words, they were not correct to be coming from the pure, lilting voice they did. Not from that voice.
The power of the Planet is great, great enough to be able to change space and energy. With enough, it could alter time.
No. That voice should not utter words that led to the killing of a child. That voice should have giggled, should have spoken in a female manner, should have come from a small, rosebud mouth. A mouth that would never smile at him again. One child, who would grow up to kill her.
In truth, we have considered such before. We felt to show you would be easiest.
She would never have intruded upon his thoughts so, would never have opened up his mind and implanted the seed of such a terrible idea. She would not have killed another man. No, she would have killed Sephiroth, though, wouldn't she? Wouldn't she? Wasn't that what Holy was about? Or perhaps not. About stopping Meteor, about destroying Jenova. But not killing Sephiroth, not killing the man he might have been, destroying the boy that could be so many other things. The boy that could only be one thing. He'd killed a child today. A boy no older than Cloud had been when he'd left Nibelheim those seven years ago. He was crazy. He was innocent. He'd been but a pawn of Jenova. But so had Cloud. No one had killed him.
Without Sephiroth, today would never have happened. Those children were so happy at being cured, weren't they? But... they needn't have suffered so in the first place. Children shouldn't be made to suffer so.
Big words from a person - people - telling him to kill a child. Could the Cetra really advise the life of many over the life of one? No, of course they could. That was their philosophy, the whole over the individual. A philosophy that had led Aerith to die. A philosophy that had saved the world.
You'd be saving him, though. You know how miserable he was as a child. You know first hand what Hojo did to him, how much it hurt.
Makou baths that seethed and burned from inside his veins came to mind. Needles that would have left tell-tale tracks if not for the recuperative powers of the Makou and Jenova combined flashed before his eyes. He wasn't sure if the Cetra called them to mind, or if his own mind did that well enough on it's own. Hojo's disgusting leer taunted him. No, no child deserved that, not even his worst enemy. Especially not his worst enemy.
You remember the man he was.
Boy, did he. Every day.
You would not wish Jenova's control upon anyone, would you? Not even him.
Certainly not him. Never him. Not the graceful, beautiful man that had been his hero. Cloud could still recall a secret box of newspaper clippings and photographs of The General.
Just think, Cloud.
He'd hidden it under his bed.
All that need not come to be.
Just one downward stab of a blade. He'd done it often enough, hadn't he?
You'd save Aerith. You'd save Zack. You'd save HIM.
It was madness. It was brilliance. It was a blind shot in the dark that couldn't possibly do more harm than it could fix, sadly. There was nothing left for him here, despite what the others might think. Nothing to lose that wouldn't be in the other possibility too. And the thought of Aerith and Zack...
Please, Cloud.
Her voice, though not her words, he told himself. But it was not enough. Not with that voice asking that. Asking him to save her. He had the power, they said. Please.
"How does it work?"