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-Chapter Sixteen-
Gummi Flights and Hopeless Plights
۵۵۵۵۵
Aerith was not pleased.
She was waiting for them in the hangar when their gummi touched down, and with every step down the boarding ramp, Leon could see her expression taking a downward path as well – from anticipation to confusion to concern – all in the space of a dozen steps. Too impatient to wait for Leon to disembark the old-fashioned way – one step at a time – Yuffie somersaulted the distance from the door of the gummi to the floor of the hangar and landed in front of the flower girl.
"Where's Cloud?" The edge of suspicion in Aerith's eyes betrayed a touch of irritation nestled just beneath the concern.
"Ol' Chocobutt stayed at the coliseum." Yuffie snorted. "He thinks Sephy's there." She thrust Cloud's gift into Aerith's hands as if that might make an acceptable substitute for the man himself. "Here. He sent this for you."
Aerith's eyes warmed with affection as they lingered on the beautiful shawl in her hands, fingers absently kneading the soft material, but at Leon's approach, she turned her gaze, now glittering with accusation, on him. "And you just left him there?"
Leon's eyes flashed with mercury in response. "He's a grown man, Aerith."
"And Sephiroth's a monster. Don't you even care what happens to Cloud?"
Like a spark of fire reflecting off an icy sheen, anger flared in Leon's eyes and then flickered across his face, twisting his mouth into a frown. He could understand that Aerith was upset, but what was he supposed to do – knock Cloud out and drag him to the gummi by his spiky blond hair?
If looking for Sephiroth was more important to Cloud than returning to Traverse Town, well, that was his choice; it sure as hell wasn't Leon's place to tell him what to do. It wasn't Leon's fault that a madman meant more to him than his friends.
No, there wasn't one damn thing that Leon could have done about it – of that, he was certain. He'd had the whole way home to think it over – and over – and the only thing he had to show for his inexcusable preoccupation was a very large dent in the brand new shield that Cloud and Cid had just installed. Leon's frown deepened into a scowl.
Who would have thought that such a small asteroid could do so much damage?
Cid wasn't going to be pleased with him either.
Caught between an obstinate rock and a very hard place, Leon hesitated for only a moment before shifting the weight of the bag hanging from his shoulder and shoving past the two annoying women. He'd rather face Cid's curses than the censure in Aerith's eyes.
"I thought he was your friend," she called out to his departing back. Spoken softly, but right on the munny, her words unerringly found their mark like one of Seifer's spitballs back at Garden, striking a particularly sensitive nerve in the back of Leon's head.
Forcing his face into a mask of indifference, Leon stepped through the hangar door into the temperate Traverse Town night and turned towards the accessory shop. Might as well get it over with and let Cid take his best shot too.
۵۵۵۵۵
In the days that followed their return from the coliseum, Leon threw himself into his duties with a single-minded determination that surprised even those who were familiar with his usual level of dedication, attending to those things that normally required his personal attention, as well as many things that didn't, with a perseverance and tenacity of purpose that nudged the line from conscientious to compulsive – not that the residents were complaining. There wasn't a single leaky faucet left in town, nor leaky roof; no squeaky doors, no loose steps, nor hardly any Heartless. No task was too trivial, no job too demeaning, no mission too menial; he even ran some errands for the mayor.
He finally got around to fixing the broken clock in the Gizmo Shop and the busted electrical conduit in Third District. He replaced a section of rusty plumbing in the cafe and repaired some faulty wiring at the hotel; fixed a split rung on the Moogle's ladder, a frozen lock at the Dalmatians' House, and a cracked window at the item shop for Huey and Dewey and Louie.
He built a bookshelf for Merlin and arranged his messy stacks of magical tomes in alphabetical order (although Merlin insisted indignantly that he knew exactly where each and every one of them was!). And he recovered the magical candles that had mysteriously gone missing from the cafe, as well as apprehending the culprit (and no, for once, it wasn't Yuffie!).
He helped Cid draw up contracts for the sale of the accessory shop and the purchase of the gummi garage, then helped him move his inventory of gummi blocks to his new shop, arranging them by size, shape and color, after sorting them according to function, on the new steel racks he had installed for Cid in the back. While they were busy setting things up, the ship that Leon had sent out in search of Sora's missing Monstro friends returned – with Sora's missing friends, much to Leon's surprise. Even more to Leon's surprise, Cid and Geppetto hit it off like long-lost best friends and spent the rest of the afternoon engrossed in the finer points of gummi ship design.
So rather than shipping Geppetto and his disturbing wooden puppet off to some other world as originally planned, Leon squeezed them into a room barely bigger than a closet in the already overcrowded tenement house and made arrangements to transport a dozen or so of the other temporary residents awaiting placement on other worlds.
Yuffie was champing at the bit to move into their new house in First District and made it her number-two mission in life – her number-one mission in life being driving Leon crazy until mission number two was accomplished – sort of like killing two nocturnes with one shuriken, she supposed... Still, he continued to put her off, no matter how annoying she got, insisting that he was far too busy with more important things and that she would just have to wait until Cloud got back.
"Yeah, right." Yuffie scoffed and rolled her eyes. "More important things. Like refinishing all the benches in Second District?" she wanted to know, following him into the kitchen. "Or painting all the doors at the hotel?" Having had no success with merely hounding him throughout the conscious hours of the day, she thought she'd give bugging him before breakfast a try. Surely, pestering him before his private coffee time would yield results, right?
Wrong. Leon calmly counted out the scoops as he measured them into the coffeemaker.
Good tactic that – pretending to ignore her as if she wasn't even there – but Yuffie hadn't earned her nuisance stripes for nothing...
"Or how about arranging Merlin's books in alphabetical order?" she tried next. "Or sorting Cid's gummi blocks by size, shape and color?" She followed him to the bathroom and would have followed him into the bathroom had he not closed the door in her face. Undaunted, she kept right on talking to him anyway – louder, to make sure he could hear her through the closed door. "You know, you haven't washed all the windows in the Gizmo yet... Or refinished all of the district doors... And while you're at it," she added as he was brushing his teeth, "why don't you scrub all the cobblestones with one of your gazillion bazillion toothbrushes!
"I mean, honestly, Leon," she continued, "I bet you must have at least a billion toothbrushes stuffed away in that drawer – red ones and blue ones and green ones – and don't think I didn't notice that pink one with the pretty little pony on it!" She guffawed. "Are you afraid there's going to be an intergalactic toothbrush shortage or something and thought you'd better stock up? Or did you just get a really good deal on a million cases or something?
"Ooh, ooh – I know – you made it your mission to promote world-wide dental hygiene by handing out a new toothbrush to every new refugee!" Yuffie struck a stick-up-her-ass pose and mimicked in her best Leon voice, "Welcome to Traverse Town, Madame. Here's a new toothbrush. Hope you enjoy your stay, Sir. Have a new toothbrush!
"Yeah, that must be it, huh Leon?, because really, how many spare toothbrushes could one person possibly need? I've never seen anybody with as many spare toothbrushes as you – soft bristles and hard bristles – wide heads and angled heads and – ooh, ooh, I know – you use them for something kinky, don't you? Oh yeah, that's it, isn't it, Squall."
The bathroom door opened and out stepped a freshly groomed Leon. "It's Leon."
Aerith just shook her head and told Yuffie to stop pestering the man. Her Cetran instincts were telling her that, outward appearances to the contrary, Leon didn't want to be alone right now. "And besides," she reminded the younger girl, "it's just until the next tournament, and then Cloud will be back."
"Yeah, right." Yuffie scoffed and rolled her eyes.
۵۵۵۵۵
Armed with another fresh batch of Cloud's favorite cookies, as well as explicit instructions not to come back without him again, both courtesy of Aerith, Leon and Yuffie prepared to board the gummi ship. It had been a long two weeks since their first trip to the coliseum, and they were eager to compete in another tournament and anxious to check on their friend. Aerith wasn't the only one worried about him.
Still embarrassed by his failure to bring Cid's ship back in one piece from their last trip – well, one undamaged piece – Leon hung his head as he approached the older man. Though he had already made amends by helping Cid repair the damage to the shield, it hadn't done a thing to repair the damage to his pride: It wasn't like him to make such a stupid mistake, especially one that was the result of not paying attention. Leon shook his head at himself and mumbled something about taking better care this time.
Cid clapped him on the back and said, "Just make sure to keep your mind on the dense clods out in space, son, and not the one at the coliseum!"
Leon's stomach did a do-si-do. How in the hell did Cid know he had been thinking about Cloud?
He glanced at the pilot, preparing to reassure him that his attention would be focused exclusively on flying the ship, as always, but before he could even open his mouth, Cid winked.
Leon's stomach performed a perfectly executed back flip.
He decided that it might be better to just hurry on straight to the cockpit and forgo any further interaction with Cid. Sometimes that man could be scarier than Aerith and Merlin combined.
Once he was strapped securely into the pilot's seat, surrounded by levers and buttons and gauges and dials, giving him something physical to focus on rather than Cid's unexpected insight, Leon's stomach began to settle, though the nervous excitement he had awoken with that morning was still stirring. By the time he had finished his safety checks, he was feeling much more composed and eager to be off. Yuffie was buckled up beside him and eager to be off as well.
Leon fired up the engines and eased the gummi out of the garage and into the Traverse Town airspace, setting a course for the coliseum once they had entered outer space. Though he was more determined than ever to remain vigilant for asteroids and enemies, the flight proved to be relatively uneventful, and without a lot of enemies to keep his attention engaged, Leon soon found it turning to their previous flight to the coliseum...
No sooner had he set the co-ordinates for the coliseum, than Cloud had unbuckled himself from his seat in the back and wormed his way into the cockpit, crouching in the cramped space between him and Yuffie. He looked like a little kid, staring out the windshield with a look of wonder on his face. Though Cid had given Cloud a crash course in flying gummis before they left, they hadn't ventured past the inner space surrounding Traverse Town, which contained only a few other incoming and outgoing ships at most. This was nothing like that.
There were hundreds, maybe even thousands of other ships, as well as various gummi blocks and other random debris of all shapes and sizes – a riot of color flying past them and diving at them and whirling all around them. Nor was it anything like Cloud's first and only other previous trip into space, also with Cid, aboard a Shinra rocket. No, this was nothing like that.
Well... except maybe for that huge, fiery red meteor headed straight for them... that– that was frighteningly familiar...
Cloud was already starting to turn a little green around the gills from motion sickness, and the huge meteor hurtling toward them wasn't helping his stomach at all. Adding even further to his rapidly growing distress was the fact that Leon and Yuffie seemed completely unperturbed – possibly even unawa– no, no one could be unaware of that huge meteor, getting closer and closer with every passing moment.
"Um... uh, Leon?"...
Remembering the alarm in Cloud's voice and the look of panic on his face caused the corner of Leon's mouth to curl in amusement, and a small chuckle slipped past his lips, drawing a curious look from Yuffie, which was unfortunate since it meant that she was staring straight at him when he blushed at the memory of what had happened next...
"You might want to get back in your seat and buckle up," Leon had mentioned casually, but before Cloud had time to even consider doing as requested, Leon swerved sharply to the left to circle the meteor clockwise, giving Yuffie a clear shot at the target. With a steady aim and a steady barrage from their powerful new laser, she made quick mincemeat out of the meteor, but the shock wave from the explosion sent their small ship careening through space, and the still-unsecured blond crashing into Leon's lap.
"Woo-hoo!" Yuffie yelled, instantly transporting Leon's thoughts to another time and place with a red dragon ship and another petite girl with an inordinate fondness for explosions and the color yellow. But this was no time to be distracted by memories, he reminded himself – not with his hands full trying to stabilize their ship, and his arms full of Cloud – which immediately brought to mind another time on the Ragnarok...
But this really was no time for reflection, he reminded himself again, sharply this time, and forced his mind to focus on righting the ship rather than memories of Rinoa, which really wasn't hard to do. Wrenching his attention away from the person currently occupying his lap, however, proved much more difficult and took every ounce of Leon's self-discipline. The fact that he had to wrap both arms around the blond in order to reach the controls didn't make it any easier to concentrate, nor did it help when Cloud leaned back against him so as not to obstruct Leon's line of sight.
Still, Leon hadn't earned the title of "Commander" at seventeen for nothing, and command his wayward emotions, he did, even with Cloud's soft, blond spikes tickling his nose and his firm, warm body pressed against his crotch. Flipping switches and adjusting levers, Leon opened the port-side engines full throttle while simultaneously decreasing starboard thrust and pulling up sharply on the nose, and soon he had the ship back under control. With a sheepish grin, Cloud slipped off his lap and crawled over to Yuffie instead.
"Incoming at two o'clock," Leon informed her, taking out a small squadron of ships to his left.
"Already on it, Boss," Yuffie answered, but before she could open fire, Cloud grabbed the laser controls from her hands.
"Let me try," he said, practically climbing into the seat with her.
"This isn't some silly ol' game at the Gold Saucer!" Yuffie snorted, wrestling the controls back into her own hands. "You mess up here, Bub, and it's game over for reals."
"I know that, Yufs." Cloud rolled his eyes. "But as long as we're talking about the Gold Saucer ... who kicked major ass at the Speed Arena, huh? I think I can handle a few little enemy gummis. Now, let me have a turn."
"More incoming ..." Leon growled, maneuvering the ship through a field of debris while taking out the enemy ships that neither Yuffie nor Cloud had yet done anything about. "... at three, four and six o'clock – if you two children could stop bickering long enough to lend a hand."
"Sorry," they mumbled in unison, but continued to wrestle over the controls, leaving Leon to single-handedly fly the ship and man the guns.
"Yuffie," he barked, finally realizing that if anyone was going to be the grown-up in the group, it was going to have to be him. "Let Cloud take a turn at the lasers, and you can have them on the way back."
Thinking back on it now, Leon realized that he could just as easily have delegated the duty the other way around – probably should have even, since Yuffie had already been in the co-pilot's seat. Had he had a subconscious premonition even then that Cloud wouldn't be making the return trip with them?
Leon abruptly dismissed his thoughts of their previous flight as the coliseum currently came into view, annoyed with himself when he realized that he had once again spent the entire flight thinking about Cloud. Well, at least he hadn't damaged Cid's ship this time, he told himself, but his conscience wasn't about to let him off the hook that easily and helpfully pointed out that the lack of damage to Cid's ship was purely due to good luck rather than any diligence on his part.
"Whatever," he said to himself, realizing that he had actually muttered it out loud when it drew another curious look from Yuffie, which only increased his annoyance with himself. The radio crackled to life, interrupting his losing debate with himself, so he took it out on the air traffic controller instead. "Tango Tango two one niner," he snapped when asked to identify himself.
It isn't her fault, his conscience scolded him.
Leon rubbed the bridge of his nose. His conscience was right; it wasn't that poor girl's fault that he had been so preoccupied that he had forgotten to contact the tower upon entering the coliseum's airspace. It wasn't her fault that his nerves were on edge and his stomach a mess. "Requesting clearance to dock," he added in what he hoped was a more civil tone.
"Welcome to Olympus Coliseum from Traverse Town, two one niner," she answered." Permission to dock, two two right."
Maybe he should cut back to only one cup of coffee a day instead of two, he told himself, as if that were the problem. It was the only explanation for the nervousness that returned to his stomach full force as they prepared to land.
۵۵۵۵۵
Once on the ground, they went straight to Cloud's room, but there was no sign of the blond, nor any sign that he had recently been there. Failing to find their friend, they returned topside to look for Phil, whom they found right away, though much to their dismay, though not their surprise, he hadn't seen Cloud either. He was tickled pink, however – or ruddy orange, rather – to see his two favorite new heroes.
"I even saved you guys a spot in the tourny!" he declared, shoving a piece of paper at Leon. "Just sign on the dotted line." Pegasus Cup again, Leon noted, though they were slated as first seed this time. He signed the contract and handed it to Yuffie, who also signed it and then handed it back to Phil. With tournament business thus out of the way, the two companions resumed their search for Cloud.
They decided to start with a quick run through the marketplace since they were already close by – not that they expected to find him there, which they didn't – then decided to check his room again in case he had returned while they were out. It proved to be unnecessary, however, as they ran into him halfway there. Yuffie greeted him with her usual tackle and squeal.
With the girl still wrapped around his neck, Cloud looked over her shoulder and met Leon's eyes. With matching nods that gave away nothing, the two men acknowledged each other. Leon took a step forward to get a better look at the other man and didn't like what he found.
There was a coldness in Cloud's eyes that hadn't been there before, a vacancy that made Leon want to punch something. It was like looking at Cloud, only not; like someone had made a perfect replica of the man but forgotten to fill it with Cloud. Like a mold cast in marble, Cloud's face was perfect in every detail, but lacking in warmth, and the only flaw that gave away his humanity were the dark circles under his eyes.
But as soon as Cloud focused on Leon's face, the warmth returned to his eyes, flushing the cold statue of his face with life. "Leon," he mumbled, detaching Yuffie and setting her down. "Did you guys already sign in?" Leon nodded, and then both men fell into an awkward silence. Luckily, Yuffie was there to fill it.
"God, I'm starving!" she announced. "I could eat a whole chocobo all by myself!
"Er... not that I would eat a chocobo, mind you," she added, remembering Cloud's incomprehensible affection for the stinky, temperamental creatures; he had spent a lot of time and gil raising and racing the foul beasts – pun intended, she snickered to herself. "But I might eat a behemoth, though!"
Side by side, the two men fell into step a dozen or so paces behind Yuffie, automatically falling into place without so much as a thought as they returned topside to take the edge off the young ninja's insatiable appetite; it came as naturally to them as nurturing came to Aerith, or bouncing came to Yuffie. Or cussing to Cid. After a short distance, Leon cocked his head towards Cloud and raised a brow. "Well?" he asked. Sephiroth?
Cloud shook his head in response.
"Then come back to Traverse Town with us," Leon said quietly, not that it was necessary in order to keep their conversation private. Yuffie was already way up ahead, evidently practicing to be a drum majorette in a one-man band, singing 'Dum-dum-de-da-dum! Dum-dum-de-da-dum!' while using her shuriken as a baton.
Cloud shook his head again. "Not until I find Sephiroth and take him out."
"But I still don't see why you have to do it alone," Leon argued. "We can all come back together for the tournaments, and sooner or later, he's bound to show up."
"I can't do that, Leon. You just don't understand."
"You're right," Leon answered. "I don't understand." But he let it be and didn't press the issue further. He was just glad to see his friend again – maybe not entirely sound, but safe, at least for now – and he didn't want to start off their reunion with a fight.
۵۵۵۵۵
Cloud was quiet during the rest of their short stay and kept mostly to himself, abruptly disappearing at random intervals and then reappearing just as suddenly, that vacant look once again haunting his eyes.
He was nowhere to be seen during the Pegasus Cup, which Yuffie and Leon again won handily, but showed up shortly after they had finished showering. He sat with them while they ate dinner, merely picking at his own plate, which Leon had insisted on buying in spite of Cloud's insistence that he wasn't hungry, and fidgeting on the edge of his chair as if he was uncomfortable sitting still for too long.
After they finished eating, he accompanied them back to his room, but slipped out soon after making sure they were settled in for the night. He didn't return until shortly before what Leon assumed must be dawn, and then opted for a few hours of sleep rather than joining them for breakfast. Undecided as to which the man needed more – sleep or food – Leon reluctantly agreed to make sure he was up in time for the tournament and left him in his room. It was obvious that Cloud wasn't eating well again, but the telltale circles under his eyes made it obvious that he wasn't sleeping enough either.
When they returned to the room several hours later, Cloud was already up and ready for the Hercules Cup. After even the small amount of sleep, he seemed a bit more animated than before, but once in the arena, the aura of hopelessness hanging over him returned. He seemed utterly bored by the meaningless battles; his movements were mechanical, and the only emotion that occasionally crossed his face looked like impatient annoyance at such a trivial waste of his time. Still, the competition was no match for his sword, and the tournament was over quickly. He disappeared again immediately after, not even sticking around long enough to say good-bye.
At Leon's insistence, he and Yuffie didn't stick around either. As soon as he realized that Cloud wasn't coming back anytime soon – probably avoiding a confrontation over returning to Traverse Town, Leon suspected – they returned to Cloud's room for their things. Leon waited impatiently while Yuffie painstakingly prepared a note to leave for Cloud, covering it with hearts and happy faces with the message 'See you in two weeks, Cloudster!' Once she was finally finished, she place it on his bed along with the cookies from Aerith, and the two of them headed straight to the gummi. After a long, wearisome flight home, they touched down in Traverse Town at last, once again returning without Cloud.
Aerith was not pleased.
Author's Note:
Well don't I just royally suck. A whole year... I don't know where it went. :(
I am well aware that this chapter doesn't even come close to being worth the long wait, and I apologize profusely. Every word of it was like pulling teeth. Urrgh! I'm still not happy with it, but frankly, I'm sick to death of looking at it, and at this point, just wanted to post the damn thing and move on. Someday, I may come back and fix it, but probably not.
Lastly, I don't normally like to respond to reviews in story, but I feel the need to address the anonymous reviewer on 09/18/13:
I'm not sure which fic from 2009 you're referring to – there are many fics where Cloud lands in Traverse Town – but as far as my inspiration for this story, it didn't come from any other fic in particular, though I'm sure it is littered throughout with ideas gleaned from many other stories over the years and from fandom in general. The idea for this story began to take shape as far back as 2006 as a result of my obsession with the compulsion to fit FF7 and FF8 into the world of KH, and from my frustration with the lack of any other story that did so to my own satisfaction – to explain all the anomalies (such as Aerith being alive) in a way that made sense while keeping it all canon for all three games. Obviously, at some point, I threw up my hands and said, "Oh, screw that!" :D
Edited 4/28/15. I'm still not particularly happy with it, but it's a little better, at least. Hopefully.
