Oopsies! I thought I had uploaded this chapter already. I'm sorry!
Please note that I am twisting the time a bit around because I need more time for my story and you all want Cloud and Tifa in the story. So :P
Chapter 9
This was bad. This was really bad.
I was pretty much running with the crowd. My head hurt and I always felt lost when I was cut off from Light. I tried to see if I could find either of them, but every time I paused, the crowd started stampeding over me, and seeing as I was so tiny, I had to keep running.
Suddenly I came to a town square. It wasn't quite as big as the previous one, but it was big enough. People were coming out of nowhere. I heard my ragged breathing. I was hyperventilating. Where was Light?!
I pushed my way through the crowd and found the center. I started spinning around, my eyes searching for Light.
"Hey, little girl!" a man called at me. I turned towards him. "You lost?"
"Yes!" I cried before I screamed.
A monster dove out of nowhere and grabbed him by his leg, dragging him off. People screamed as more monsters appeared and started eating them. There were monsters everywhere.
What now? I had to get away from here, even if I couldn't find Light. But I didn't want to be alone! Tears formed in my eyes. Through my blurred vision, I saw a monster catch sight of me. I stumbled backwards, then turned around and ran into an alleyway. I heard its feet pattering on the ground. I cast a hurried glance behind me and kept running. My breathing was becoming ragged. Why was I such a weakling?!
It was a dead end. I spun around. The monster was coming right at me. Saliva foamed out of his mouth, his tongue dangling back and forth. I looked around and seized a long, sharp stick. With a yell, I wielded it toward the monster. It jumped towards me. I jabbed its eye as it pinned me to the ground. It screamed and tried to grab my head with its jaws. I tried to throw it off of me with the stick. It seized the stick in its jaws and snapped it in half. Using my legs, I thrust it off of me. It fell backwards. I quickly stood up, but tripped and my ankle gave way.
"Ow!" I yelled and I fell. Gripping my ankle, I watched the monster stand up. I cringed and shut my eyes at the monster lunged at me.
Suddenly, there was a slicing noise and the monster screamed again. I waited a few seconds, then I carefully opened my eyes. Before me stood a man with blond spiky hair and beautiful eyes like Light. He gripped a large, bloody sword, dripping red, nearly making me sick.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
"You!" I yelled breathlessly. "You're that man!"
"What man?" he said, clearly confused.
"That…that man on TV! You're the one who looks like my brother!"
"And where would your brother be?" he asked, frowning in disapproval.
"He's…! He's…" I hesitated. If I told him the truth, it would make it seem that Light didn't care about me at all. But he did. I know he did.
I stood up and bowed several times rather quickly.
"Thank you very much, sir! My name is Sen Nakamura! Please accept my humble gratitude!"
"You're very polite," he noted.
"That's what Light says, too!" I exclaimed. "He says I shouldn't try so hard for strangers!"
"Light?"
"My brother! Well, he's not really my brother, my mother adopted him two years ago…"
The man let out a small snort.
"Well, 'Sen Nakamura,' I'm Cloud Strife. I accept your 'humble gratitude.'"
"Thank you!" Then I realized he was mocking me. "Hey!"
"Can you stand? The streets of Edge are no longer safe, it appears."
I stood up.
"Yep! My ankle hurts just a little now." I tried to seem happy. "I'll go home now."
"Hey! Where do you live?"
"Uhm… Sector 4."
"Are your parents home?"
He was being difficult now. I wasn't good at lying one bit.
"Well… no… my mom is… my mom is…" Where was she? I didn't know. I squeezed my eyes shut. "I don't know where my mom is."
There was an uncomfortable silence.
"I see. How 'bout I take you home with me?"
"What?" I looked up.
"Don't worry. I don't live alone." Cloud didn't look like a pervert or anything. But a similar situation had gotten me in trouble earlier. "I live with my friend Tifa and with Marlene and Denzel. She'll get you washed up and we'll find your brother."
"O-okay." It sounded good enough. He didn't look like he was going to hurt me. He seemed like an honest person.
"C'mon. Let's go." He turned around and led the way out of the alley. I looked at the monster's bloody body.
Don't look, Sen.
I turned my head away and ran a bit to catch up with Cloud.
"Hey!"
"What?"
"You're
short too!"
"…"
"I'm only five two! Light's about five ten and he always likes to make a point out of it. He'll steal something from me and… well, he won't really steal it, more like borrowing it. And he'll hold it up really high--"
"Don't make me regret saving you."
I shut my mouth while secretly fuming inside.
"Hmph."
Cloud's house was a bar in Edge. "7th Heaven" it was called. I remembered that Dad used to love this bar. I vaguely started wondering whether it was because of the beautiful bartender.
"Tifa. This is Sen." Cloud pushed me towards her. Tifa was about three inches taller than me. She had black hair that came half-way down her back. Her eyes were a pretty shade of brown. She was gorgeous. Was she really just a 'friend' to Cloud? My eyes flickered back and forth. They looked like they'd be a couple.
She looked at me and gave me a warm smile.
"Is it okay if she stays with you for a few days?"
"Why? Where are you going, Cloud?" She had a friendly voice too.
"In a minute," Cloud said.
Tifa seemed to take the hint. Even I got the hint. They wanted me gone.
"Come with me, Sen…" She took me with her and showed me the shower and gave me a towel. She even lent me some of her clothes to wear. I could hear their muffled voices. I slipped out the door and downstairs.
"…special, Tifa."
"Special? What do mean by special?"
Cloud answered her question in a low murmur.
"That boy is?! How is that possible?!"
"I don't know, but I intend to find out. I'm going to go find him."
"What do we do then?"
There was a sigh.
"I don't know. I don't trust Shinra any more than you do, but he's probably better at keeping people safe than I am."
"That little girl can't go to that son-of-a-bitch Shinra! And that boy probably can't either!"
"If it keeps them safe, it's what has to be done."
"Cloud, they'll use him for their own needs and God knows what they'll do to the girl, using her as a hostage or… ensuring he'll listen to them or--"
"I know that. Look, we'll figure something out, okay? I'm going to ask some questions and try and find her 'brother.' I don't know when I'll be back."
"She doesn't have any other family?"
"She said her father was killed during the explosion of Sector 7. She doesn't know where her mom is. Probably dead and gone. She's not very important to the boy, obviously."
"What? He doesn't--"
"I mean, he does care about her. But she's not the most important thing in the world, I guess."
"Ssh! Not too loud."
Their
voices continued in whispers and I was unable to hear the rest. I
felt dizzy. I went inside the bathroom and locked the door. I slid to
sit down and panted. I started crying softly. Mom was dead. They had
killed her. And it was my fault. What if Light was dead too?
I
started crying louder.
Cloud thought Light was special. Sounded like fun. Especially seeing as everyone wanted to use me and to get to him.
I tried to stop crying without much luck. I turned the shower on and took a long hot one, scrubbing away the blood and dirt on me. I used Tifa's shampoo and washed my hair. When I was finished, I got out and put on Tifa's pajamas.
Tifa's pajamas were too long, seeing as my legs were so short and the shirt almost looked like a dress, it was so long. But they were comfortable and it was very nice of her to lend me them, or even let me stay.
I came downstairs and Tifa smiled at me.
"Here, honey, let me fix your hair." She got a comb and a towel and started to carefully comb out all of my tangles like Mom used to. It felt good.
"How old are you?"
"I just turned fourteen," I said.
"Oh. You don't look fourteen."
"That's only because my voice is so high and I'm so short and I have a juvenile face and I have no butt or chest."
Tifa chuckled.
"Denzel and Marlene are twelve and six. You might get along with them pretty well."
"Okay."
"Marlene's with Barret and Denzel went to bed about an hour ago. But you can see them in the morning. So what happened to you?"
I started to tell my story from beginning to end as she calmly combed my hair and dried it.
"That's quite a story." She laughed. She had a very nice laugh.
After that, she braided my hair and then I went to bed.
As you can tell, instead of immediately going after Kadaj after Bahamut SIN attacked Edge, I twisted it around a bit and made the events span over several days/weeks rather then 48 hours.
Review please?