Author's Note: Disclaimer found below.

(Seven)

There were a few minutes, just after, when it had been the right thing to do. She was still then, and he likewise beneath her. Her body trembled as the adrenalin drained away.

Tifa slowly brought her breath under control again, focusing on her hands on his chest, afraid to look elsewhere. The sun coming through the forest canopy seemed burning hot, punctuated by the freezing leaf-shadows; the wind blew high above, causing the patterns of hot and cold to ebb and flow as a tide. The birds sang softly, the sound of the water flowing by the boulder perfect and peaceful. She felt as though she were underwater, drifting away, drifting down like Aeris' body when Cloud let her go...

This Could Not Be Happening.

The fire was gone, and she was merely cold and dripping wet and sore and uncomfortable. She pushed away from him, almost dizzy as she got her feet beneath her and stood. She grabbed up her shorts and stumbled away to sit on the edge of the boulder to try to get them back on without removing her boots. She wasn't entirely sure how she'd gotten them off in the first place.

She tried as hard as she could to simply act, and not think at all. Thinking meant accepting what she'd just done - completely of her own accord...

Loz lay still behind her a little longer, but finally pulled himself up, adjusting his clothing as his own breathing eased. She stiffened, becoming more disgusted with herself by the second, certain that he'd try to embrace her. What the hell had she done...

But he didn't. He moved near, coming up behind her, but only leaned forward and rested his forehead at the back of her shoulder.

She made no move, her arms propped at her sides. She only stared down at the stones and water at her feet. The water broke at the toes of her boots, moving around her and leaving her behind. Nothing she did would stop the world from breaking and flowing away from her as she drifted down...

"It hurts," Loz whispered.

Tifa's eyes widened, and she turned her head slightly, enough to see his body slouched behind and beside her. She found herself holding her breath, uncertain.

"Being torn in two," he went on, his breath catching and thoughts broken, as though he wasn't even aware that he was putting them into words. "We have to find Mother, we can't be apart, it hurts to be apart. But the Reunion... We'll become one... We won't exist any more... I don't want to end, I like being..."

"Are you crying, Brother?"

Tifa gasped. Yazoo was standing in the wide and shallow stream, as still as though he were a tree that had grown there, a black slash crowned with silver in the sun-misted air. From her position, it appeared that the water flowed through his feet, unbroken and unrippling, as though he wasn't there. She was sure that it was just an unnerving illusion.

Loz pulled away from her and straightened, rubbing at his eyes with one hand. He didn't answer.

Yazoo crossed the distance between them quickly, so graceful that the water barely rippled at his passing. Loz pushed himself forward as Yazoo stopped in front of the boulder, and Yazoo held his brother's head against his chest, laying his arms over his back and running his fingers through his short hair. Loz wrapped his arms around his brother's slender waist, hiding his face.

Tifa only stared, confused - feeling as though she were witnessing something that wasn't meant for her to see at all. She shrank back; Yazoo seemed to sense the motion, lifting his eyes to meet hers.

His eyes were terrifying. The way he glared at her made it even more obvious - he wanted her dead.

She looked away, swallowing nervously. For the sake of something to distract, she fastened her top, then pulled at her hair, running her fingers through and wringing as much water from it as she could. Getting up and moving away would only make Yazoo watch her, and she didn't want to chance meeting those eyes again if she could help it.

She should've killed Loz. She'd had his life in her hands, had even thought for a moment that she was going to kill him. Instead, she had...

When he'd forced himself on her, it hadn't been the same. There had been no fire consuming her mind, only cold detachment. She'd been able to tell herself that it didn't matter. It was only her body, right?

This time... had been entirely different, and she couldn't figure out why it had happened at all. It shouldn't have happened. He should be dead. It made no sense. She shouldn't have enjoyed it, and she sure as hell shouldn't have started it.

But Loz had been happy to comply. And Yazoo hated her for it.

At least, she thought, she was succeeding in dividing them, right?

Why did she feel bad about that now?

And then the moment was over. Loz stood, pushing himself off of the boulder as Yazoo stood aside. He hooked his arms around her waist and lifted her up, smiling up at her before setting her on her feet again. "Come on," he said, taking her hand. "You can ride with me."

She could only try to keep up.

The saving grace of riding on the motorcycle behind Loz, Tifa reflected, was that there was no attempt at conversation. There was no way to hear each other over the rush of wind, so neither of them tried. All she had to do was hang on to him, and she was left alone with her thoughts.

At first, before he'd started up the bike, she'd laid her hands on his shoulders. He'd said nothing, only took her hands in his and moved them lower, pulling her arms around his waist. She'd given up, leaned into him, lay her head against his back. There was no longer any point in resisting. She'd destroyed even that dignity.

As he'd walked to his own bike, Kadaj had stared at her, too. Whereas Yazoo's gaze had been full of the promise of pain, Kadaj only seemed... troubled.

She hadn't been able to meet his eyes for long, either.

She laid her cheek against the black leather of Loz's jacket, watching as the trees whipped by. The post of her earring jabbed into her as the bike jolted over the uneven ground, but she didn't care. She hoped that the small pain would keep her from sinking too far into thought.

The road they followed might have only been a space between trees that their repeated travels through had cleared of undergrowth. She'd no idea of where they were going, other than south; the Bone Village was far to the west, so far as she could tell.

She didn't know what to do. She could accept that there was neither escape nor rescue for her; the single chance she'd had, she'd squandered on a petty attempt at vengeance - or perhaps mere self-gratification - which only further indicated her worthlessness.

Her mind kept wandering back to what she'd done, no matter how hard she tried not to think about it. It had felt good. Better than the act had any right to feel, in these circumstances. It had been like freedom, as though it was something that she'd chosen to do...

...Even if she was certain that the choice hadn't been hers.

She turned her head, pressing her forehead into his shoulders; he shifted a little, making it easier for her to lean on him.

She squeezed her eyes shut. It was like riding with Cloud, right down to his responsiveness.

She wondered if that was what Loz wanted. If it was jealousy that spurred his interest in her. If he'd seen her riding with his "older brother" one of those few times last year when she'd still been close enough to Cloud for him to want to take her riding with him. If he'd seen and wanted that closeness for himself...

That illusion of closeness...

Cloud must've sensed all along that she wasn't meant to be part of his happily-ever-after. Whatever ever-after he had left at this point... She'd only been a distraction, keeping him from the peace he deserved...

He didn't love her. He might have, once, but even after Meteor, she'd only been a poor substitute for what he couldn't have - Aeris. He'd tired of her, tired of pretending, even tired of their make-believe family, and had drifted away - gone to where he could be closer to the memory of the girl he loved.

And poor Marlene and Denzel were left trying to make a family out of them all. At least they'd still have Barret and the others to take them in... Assuming that Marlene was even still alive, and that Denzel would survive...

Nothing had turned out the way it was supposed to, and it was because of her. If she'd just told Cloud about his memories, things would have gone differently. Aeris mightn't have died. Cloud would have become stronger more quickly, and he'd be happy now. Maybe, with Aeris to help, they could've contained Sephiroth instead of freeing him in the Lifestream; it had been the only way that the Ancients had been able to neutralize Jenova, after all. And then there would be no Geostigma slowly killing off everyone who'd survived Meteor. Cloud wouldn't be broken and dying.

It was all her fault.

Everything was ending.

But maybe she could at least try to stop it from ending with Jenova.

She slid her arms tighter around Loz, turning her head to the side again. She would give him this illusion, if that was what he wanted. She would make him hers. If she kept him distracted, kept him from joining this Reunion... it would be incomplete, weaker, easier to defeat.

Rejected by the planet, this was all she could do to help.

Loz briefly laid his arm over hers, folding his gloved hand around her fingers for a moment before he needed both hands to steer again.

The wind dried her tears.

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