Author's Note: Disclaimer found below.

(Six)

The trees - grey, by daylight - ended, and there was a narrow space with rocky slopes rising on either side. After a moment, that, too, vanished, and forests stretched out below, with the glimmer of ocean far to the south.

Tifa slowed, watching for the curve that Yazoo had warned her about. Kadaj had already pulled ahead, recklessly tearing down the slope toward the trees. Loz shot around the truck, jumping much of the slope with a feral cry. He nearly lost control of the motorcycle as he landed, but managed to catch up to his brother, who pulled to a halt at the tree line, next to a ravine.

She carefully took the slope, following the barely-discernable trail that might have been a road in the time of the Ancients. Without the wide space between trees, it was nearly invisible.

She remembered coming this way before, so hopeful, desperate to catch up to Aeris, still thinking that Cloud was leading them in chasing Sephiroth instead of being summoned by him.

She pulled up to the edge of the woods and shut down the truck. These trees seemed dim and stunted in comparison to those back in the valley, brown-barked and green-leafed rather than tall slender silver.

She felt out-of-synch with the world. For her, everything had changed, but these forests were the same as they'd always been.

It smelled lush and damp here, more... alive than the forest at the Forgotten Capital had been. The air was still cool, though. The sunlight came through the leaves in patches and speckles, beams shining in the misty air. There was a stillness to the scene such as only deep nature could provide, the silence broken only by birdsong and the whisper of water flowing in the ravine, and even those sounds seemed to be muffled.

Hands still on the steering wheel, Tifa turned to Denzel beside her. It would have been wonderful to share these beautiful places with him, and Marlene too, under different circumstances. One of the last true, comfortable conversations she'd had with Cloud, he'd suggested that they journey again, with the children this time. After things settled down more, he said, and there were fewer monsters. He'd wanted them to be happy, to know some of the beautiful things in the world, not just what was left of Midgar.

That had been at least a year ago.

As it was, she didn't think that Denzel was really... there... at this point - even if she could get him out of this somehow, he probably wouldn't remember a bit of this, if he even recovered.

And she knew she didn't have a chance of fighting and protecting Denzel, much less the rest of the children, at the same time. She doubted that Kadaj or Yazoo would think twice before killing one of the kids just to get her attention. If she could simply run, though - if she wasn't there to see - they might leave the kids alone...

Loz opened the door, extending his hand to help her out of the cab. Yazoo was already climbing out the other side, stretching like a cat. Kadaj was passing a couple of water canteens to the children in the back of the truck, who drank and passed them on, moving like nothing so much as puppets on strings.

Tifa shuddered and looked away, ignoring the offered hand as she slid out of the truck. She refused to look Loz in the face at all. He slowly lowered his hand, frowning with confusion. The ground felt oddly still beneath her feet after driving for so long; it took her a moment to find her land-legs again.

Yazoo and Kadaj were on the far side of the truck. The kids would probably be all right - she wasn't the determining factor in what happened to them, she realized. Loz had said that they hadn't intended to kidnap her at all, which meant that to some extent, those children were of more importance than she was. Even hurting Denzel would be pointless if she weren't there to witness it, so he'd probably be all right too. All she needed was for Loz to be distracted, and she could try to run. She might be able to reach the Bone Village on her own, contact someone from there...

The hope that the possibility of escape roused in her barely seemed worth the pain of wondering if she deserved it. But old habits were hard to break. If she could get away, she could at least warn Cloud...

Warn him of what? That his current enemies were on the move? He probably knew that, and it was debatable whether or not he'd do anything about it at this point. Whether he could do anything about it. What did it matter, what she did?

But then Loz turned his back on her, handing his own canteen to Denzel. The window of opportunity was too small for further consideration - either she ran now, or she didn't.

Tifa bolted. She leapt into the ravine, stumbling down the steep slope as fast as she could, feet slipping on the mossy stone. Between the incline and the foliage and the time it would take Yazoo to draw his weapon and get around the truck, she had a chance. She splashed into the rocky stream at the bottom, began to run downstream-

She caught a blur of light and motion from the corner of her eye just before Loz appeared in front of her, half-crouching, arms flung wide for her. She'd forgotten about his use of Haste.

That was enough. "Cut that out!" She shouted, throwing her weight onto one leg just before she ran into him and pivoting, landing a blow to the side of his head with her steel-toed boot. If he'd thought that she might attack him, he shouldn't have given her boots back.

He staggered aside, stunned, and she leapt to a boulder jutting from the ravine wall, pushing off of it to fling herself back and catch his neck in the crook of her arm. The shallow water exploded as she threw him down.

She barely got two steps away before he was up again, legs spinning as he pushed into a handstand before flipping upright. She avoided his legs, but he was still spinning as he came up, a fist coming at her. She partially blocked, twisting to the side so that the blow only glanced from her shoulder, even as she brought one arm up to guard against his other fist and throw her own punch with the other.

She needed distance. At the first opportunity, she flipped backward twice, opening space between them. He ran at her, lunged; she danced aside, bringing her leg up stomp down hard on him when he stumbled instead of hitting her. But he didn't stumble - he turned in the air, catching her raised foot and throwing her into the side of the ravine as he skidded shoulders-first into the water.

Tifa caught herself with her hands, rolled almost vertically upward on the steep slope, and catapulted backward. Her hands caught his shoulders as he stood, and she brought her legs down, kicking off of his back hard enough to send him sprawling again as she back-flipped to land several feet away. The water sprayed, hung in the sunbeam-streaked air like diamonds. Time itself seemed to be suspended, her mind working faster than physical reaction.

She realized, as he stood, that he could easily end this. He had Haste, he had his gauntlet, he had his gunblade. It would be over quickly, if he so chose - just as quickly as when he'd stopped playing in the church.

But it seemed that he wouldn't, this time. He pulled himself up, grinning broadly, eyes locked on hers. He unfastened the gunblade in its holster and tossed it onto the slope, followed by the gauntlet, as though he read her thoughts. He was enjoying this too much.

She waited, breathing hard, fists raised and ready. It didn't matter that she had but to run past him to escape. That was no longer the point - he'd just use his Materia again if she ran. If she fought him, she had the chance to wipe that smug smile off of his face. For good.

The moment he moved toward her, she rushed at him, ducking low and punching him in the stomach. He grunted, surprised, but grabbed at her as she dodged around behind him, catching her arm and dragging her back before she could jab her other elbow into his lower back. Unbalanced, she stumbled forward, thrown face-down into the water in front of him.

She gasped and raised her head, hair clinging to her face, as he tried to pull her up by her arm again. She rolled to her back, bracing her shoulders on the creek bed - her face underwater - and kicked blindly with both feet, overbalancing him and throwing him over her head before coming up for air.

She scrambled to her feet, quickly pushing her hair from her face, breathing hard. She couldn't run, not yet. Not until he was down and not going to get up. She'd done it before, and he seemed perfectly foolish enough to let it happen again.

She wanted him down more than she wanted to run now, anyway.

She ran at him again as he stood, screaming as she struck. For each blow he blocked, she hit harder with the next. She didn't even realize how fierce her cries became with each punch.

Her world narrowed to one thought alone: her opponent would fall.

He was on the defensive, falling back, barely able to keep his footing on the smooth stones of the streambed. He was still grinning, teeth bared like a wild animal, but then -

The world... changed, for just a moment. Flashed. Colors were suddenly more vibrant than they should be, scents overpowering and intoxicating, the sound of the flowing water a roar drowned out by their breath. The gentle sunbeams illuminating the ravine were searing shafts of energy. One thunderous heartbeat, two -

He made eye contact, and... something changed. The smile faded, his eyes widened - something in her face caught him off guard, shocked him.

And then the moment passed, leaving behind only... rage.

Self-control, blocking his attacks, keeping strength reserved so as to outlast her opponent - these were things that she was trained to do, so ingrained in her fighting style that she took them for granted. Things that she'd do if she cared to live. Things that just didn't seem to matter now. The only thing that mattered was hurting Loz as much as she could until one of them stopped breathing, regardless of consequences.

She forced him back, downstream, well out of sight of the others... until he was down. He fell hard against the flat top of a boulder bigger than the truck, unable to do more than grunt as his head struck the stone. But he stayed conscious, arms up, still protecting himself -

She leapt on him, forcing his arms open and flat against the stone, straddling him. She had him. All she had to do was bring her knee down hard on his chest, hear his ribs crack beneath the blow, watch him struggle as his lungs collapsed...

He knew. He had to. He looked up at her, panting through gritted teeth. She thought that she could see the shade of fear in his luminous eyes.

"Your eyes... beautiful," he growled, lips twisting at the corners again.

She released one of his arms and brought her knee down on it to hold it again. And then she drew her fist back and punched him in the face.

His entire body twitched with the blow, his head jerking aside. It took him a moment to gasp again, but in that moment, she caught it - with his face in shadow, this close, she saw the slight green glow that briefly played over his skin.

He was using Regen. No matter how much she hit him, it would only take him a moment to recover from each blow.

No. He wasn't going to get out of this. She hit him again, and again - she was sure that she could hurt him faster than the spell could heal him, if she tried hard enough. Her other hand gripped his upper arm tightly, fingernails digging into his leather jacket. He kicked, trying to find purchase on the stone to lift himself and throw her off, but failing.

She was slowing down; she knew it and she couldn't stop it, exhaustion creeping up on her. But she couldn't stop. Not now. She wanted him to stop moving beneath her, stop the sounds he made with each strike, stop breathing, stop letting her hit him. She wanted him dead. She wanted him-

She wasn't sure how it happened. Somehow, she'd ducked her head down, and pressed her lips against his.

She broke away as soon as she realized what she'd done, still out of breath, just barely coming down from her rage enough to be horrified by her action. How the hell did that happen?

His body was slack beneath her, only his breath moving him against her now. He stared up at her, lips parted slightly, brow furrowed.

For a long moment, they only stared at each other.

And then she was kissing him again, crouched over him, her knee slipping from his arm. Her hands moved of their own accord, pulling his jacket open to rest against his bare chest, his heart beating fast beneath her fingers. She pushed her tongue into his mouth, accepting his in response, his freed hands moving to unzip her vest, then slide up underneath her shirt. He heaved beneath her again, and she shifted lower, centering herself against him.

And then their hands were moving frantically, tearing at each others' waistbands, and she was kicking her shorts free with her apron lying over the both of them, and he was pushing into her, and nothing else in the world mattered.

"Well?" Kadaj sat at the edge of the ravine, arms wrapped around his knees, one of the canteens hanging listlessly from his hand.

Yazoo made his way back up the slope, turning to sit next to his brother when he reached the top. His expression was unreadable. "Give them twenty minutes."

Kadaj passed him the canteen, then shifted closer and tilted his head, laying it against his elder brother's arm and closing his eyes.

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