Shera's Diary

Chapter 16

Tension

By Kristen Gupton-Williams

(I'm glad that you all are enjoying this! Gives me the warm fuzzies!)

Dear Diary,

Captain Highwind has been gone for three weeks. He's called or radioed, as the case may be, everyday. Still, I feel so alone with him gone. The things I'm hearing on the news are starting to honestly scare me. Media control or not, Shin Ra can't keep hidden the fact that things are getting bad on a global scale.

The news reports, though, blame it all on a group called AVALANCHE. Even though Captain Highwind hasn't disclosed any information about what he's gotten himself into, I fear that he's now one of the AVALANCHE fugitives that Shin Ra is after.

When he does call, he deflects all of my questions about what it is he's doing. Instead, he turns the conversation back toward me, asking if I'm all right and if the people of the town are being kind.

I wonder if he's as scared as I am?

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Dear Diary,

When you open the newspaper on a given morning and see that the man that you love is on a list of prisoners slated to be executed…

Shin Ra caught the members of AVALANCHE and as I dearly feared, Captain Highwind is amongst them. The report says that the prisoners are all to be executed individually and that it will be televised.

A woman, named Tifa Lockhart, is scheduled to be the first one.

I'm sick… I can't function at all… If he truly ends up being killed…

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Dear Diary,

Sometimes, life, or maybe it's fate, pushes you as far as it possibly can. Sometimes, it does it and then snaps you back at the last moment, to go the other way and you're thrown into some sort of wonderful, incomprehensible relief. That relief, though, is all too often short lived.

The first execution was slated for three days ago, but right before it happened, the signal to the television was cut off and a 'please stand by message' popped up.

I sat there for hours, seeing that stupid test pattern, too afraid to move, for fear that if I did, the last possible glimpse I would ever get of the captain alive would flash by. Then, around midnight, the television came back on and went back to it's normal programming.

Still, I sat there, waiting, wondering…

Then, there was a faint roar outside.

At first, I dismissed it, but it got louder, increasingly louder, and the whole house began to shake. A shadow fell over the house and the ground rocked as something… something big alit outside.

I was pulled from my vigil before the television and went outside, dreading what it could be.

Out on the airstrip sat something that I couldn't quite get my mind around. It was an airship. One that I recognized from my engineering courses as being the Highwind, the first ship that the captain had ever designed. Although I was well versed, even now, in the dimensions of the ship, to see it in person was absolutely awe inspiring.

I was shaken out of my reverie, though, when a hatch on the side of the ship opened up and out came Captain Highwind!!!

I couldn't help it and I shrieked in my shock and joy. As he emerged and started to walk toward me, I was unable to hold myself back and I ran to him as fast as I could.

He'd escaped. Somehow, they'd all escaped.

The captain swept me up into his arms. "Glad to see me?"

"Captain…" I couldn't help it and I broke into tears, clinging to him for all I was worth.

We stood there for what felt like several minutes before finally we pulled away from one another. I had to take off my glasses and wipe my eyes. Soon, he took my hand and led me toward the house.

Upon entering, he sat at the kitchen table and I immediately got the water heating on the stove. I knew, if nothing else, that he would want a little tea.

I placed his cup before him in short order, and sat across from him with a cup of my own. "Captain… I'd heard that you and the others had been captured and you were going to be executed… I've been so scared."

He nodded and took a sip. "That's how it was supposed to go but we broke the fuck out and then stole that." Captain Highwind motioned back over his shoulder, indicating the airship. "Fuckin' absurd that I had to steal somethin' I built, ain't it?"

"I don't care what you had to do to get out of there, I'm just glad you did," I said back, staring down at my tea.

"Well, I guess y'all know by now that those folks I'm with are AVALANCHE…" he said in a quiet tone.

"Yes, Sir, I know."

"Well, they're tryin' to save the world."

I looked up at him. All I had been hearing on the news was that they were a terrorist organization. However, having suspected that the captain had joined up with them, I knew that couldn't be the real truth. It seemed like he was ready to give me the answers that I had been craving for so long. "Save the world, Captain?"

He nodded and sighed tiredly. "Shera… I've learned and see shit over the last few weeks that… I uh…"

I watched as he hung his head and closed his eyes. If I didn't know him better, I would have thought he was on the verge of tears. "Captain?"

"There was a girl with our group… she was just a Goddamned kid… Sephiroth…" his words trailed off.

Sephiorth? I knew that name. He was back from the alleged dead, terrorizing the planet.

I reached across the table and took hold of his hand. "Sir..?"

"I saw her get killed. Right in front of Cloud and the rest of us. Slaughtered like a fuckin' animal." His eyes opened and looked up at mine.

I examined him then. He seemed… older. The last few weeks had clearly added years to him and I felt a pain in my chest. I may not have been told exactly what he had been through since leaving, but I understood it all on a much deeper level. "I'm so sorry…"

"Yeah, now, Cloud ended up gettin' fucked after that, and he fell into the Goddamned Lifestream. He's in a hospital in Mideel at the moment, bein' tended to by that Tifa girl. The others and I left them be for the time bein' and I decided that we needed to stop here. Since I'm the one flyin' that bird, I get to do what I want." He turned his hand beneath mine, grabbing my wrist. "I wanted to just check up on things, ya know?"

I nodded. "Everything has been fine, Captain. The town is--"

He shook his head, cutting me off. "I don't give a fuck about the town."

I simply stared at him, feeling a blush on my cheeks.

"We're gonna all spend the night here. The others'll all bunk on the ship, but I wanted one damn night in my own home." His fingers tightened around my wrist a little more. "In the mornin', we'll head out to keep tryin' to thwart Shin Ra and Sephiroth. For right now, though, I…"

"What's that?" I asked quietly.

"I don't want to think about any of that shit for now. I know it ain't close to my birthday, but… do y'all think there's any chance you could make one of them prime rib roasts?" A hopeful smile came to his lips.

"Anything you want, Captain." I knew, that in light of the circumstances, that this might be the last time the captain and I would have together and if he wanted prime rib, by God, he was going to get it.

"Thanks, Shera. I'm gonna hit the shower." With that, he got up and walked back toward his room.

I took that chance to go out and get what he wanted for dinner. It's now in the oven and the captain, who seems just so tired, is asleep in his chair before the television. So, here I sit, on the couch, hoping that the rest of today and tonight lasts longer than I know it will.

My captain is determined to save the world, but he came home for dinner.

Sometimes, I wonder about him, as much as I love him.

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Dear Diary,

After watching the captain nearly eat himself sick last night, we retired out into the family room. We ended up on the couch together, his arm draped around my shoulders. It was perfect, as far as I was concerned.

A long silence had passed between us while the captain had burned through three cigarettes. Although I hadn't been able to get any of that Condor Gold that he likes on such short notice, Mike had hooked me up with a bottle of Jameson when I stopped by the bar on the way back from the store. We'd finished a good third of that bottle with dinner and, as was so often the case when we'd both been drinking, our conversation took a swerve from the norm.

"You ever think 'bout havin' kids?" he asked, his eyes closed and his head against the back of the couch.

I nodded slightly. "If… if I ever found myself married, I would love to."

"I think you'd make a real damn good momma."

I sat back from him slightly. The very idea that he would have ever thought about such a thing was strange. "You do?"

"Well yeah," he opened his eyes and looked at me. "You got the patience of a damn tortoise. Y'all are real good about tendin' to shit. Surely, I'm as hard to deal with as a kid, right?"

The levity in his voice made me smile. I was flattered, deeply. "I appreciate the vote of confidence."

"I just call shit like I see it, Shera." A smile lingered on his lips.

"And you? Do you think you'd ever like to have children?" I asked, settling back into his side.

"Well…" he paused for a moment. "I got the easy part, bein' Daddy if I did."

"So, you'd let your kids call you Daddy and not make them call you Captain?" I openly wondered.

He laughed. "I ain't as much of a hard ass as the admiral. I think I'd like kids, though. Teach 'em to fly and all that. I just don't know if… I mean… like ya said, there's that whole havin' to get married to a woman I think would be nice to have 'em with."

"You just said you thought I would make a good mother," I couldn't help but laugh back.

"You would. You wouldn't ever marry me, though," he replied with a sigh.

"Why do you say that?"

He shifted next to me slightly. "Because, y'all know me real well. You know what sort've a damn jerk I am, Shera."

"…and, you don't think of me like that anyway." I felt a little disappointment within.

He was strangely silent for a moment.

"Captain?"

"I don't know if… uh… Shera, I drank too much with dinner and I don't wanna say anythin' in this state that might make us feel weird, ya know?" His head lulled too the side a little and I looked up, seeing him looking down at me.

I wondered what he meant by that. There were only a few possibilities:

He may actually have thought of me in those terms, but was afraid I didn't feel that way.

He may not have thought of me like that but feared that maybe I was interested in him and he didn't want to hurt my feelings.

He was drunk and willing to say that he didn't think it was a bad idea at all but he knew he would sober out of such a notion come tomorrow.

Whatever the case, I didn't wish to make him uncomfortable at all. "Well, I can respect that, Captain."

Several more minutes of silence then passed.

Then, the captain said the strangest thing to me I've ever heard him say.

And I've heard him say some fairly strange things.

"Shera, sleep with me."

I sat bolt upright and looked at him. I'm sure my expression was representative of my shock. "C…Captain?"

"I just want ya to stay with me in my room tonight. I ain't gonna try nothin' at all, it's just…" his voice wavered and trailed off.

I moved closer to him, placing a hand on his shoulder. I wanted him to tell me whatever he had to. "Sir?"

"What I've gotten into with these guys… Shera, the world… It's really in danger and I don't know if what we're tryin' to do is gonna mean shit." His eyes reflected fear, honest to God fear. "I don't know if I'm gonna ever get back here and… I really just don't want to be alone tonight. That ain't the alcohol speakin', it's how I'm really feelin'. Will ya?"

There was no way I could have ever refused him. Certainly not with this sort of request. If there was a chance that he could die in the ensuing events, I wasn't going to be away from him that night. "Absolutely."

He kissed my cheek and then got up, offering me his hand. I took it and was pulled to my feet and he led me down the hall. I was trembling badly at that point, even though he'd said he wasn't going to try anything.

Actually, deep down, I think I was honestly hoping that he would…

Once in his room, he turned on the lamp beside his head and stripped down to his boxers before sitting on the edge of the bed. He looked over to where I was still standing close to the door. "Shera, you gonna sleep in all your clothes or what?"

I had to laugh at myself. "Just a moment."

I turned and went into my own room, getting out of my day clothes and into a set of pajamas. I returned to the captain's room.

He was still sitting on the edge of his bed and he offered me an expression of… gratitude? "I was thinkin' y'all were gonna just go into your room and vanish for the night."

I shook my head and sat on the other side of his bed. "No, I'll stay with you. I'd do anything."

The captain reached over and turned off the light, then moving to get beneath the sheets. I slipped under them as well, making sure to stay on the side of the bed I'd chosen.

He rolled onto his side to face me. "Shera?"

"Yes?" I asked, my voice quiet, but showing my anxiety.

"C'mere." I felt him pat the mattress right beside him.

I did as requested and slid closer to him. Soon, his left arm closed down over my waist and he pulled me in further, until my back was against him. The heat radiating off of him was amazing and felt so incredibly good compared to the cold sheets.

He moved a little behind me and sat up slightly, kissing the back of my neck once before he settled in. "G'night, Shera."

Resolving that we were, in fact, just going to sleep, I smiled to myself and closed my eyes. "Goodnight, Captain."

He left this morning before I awoke. I was startled out of my sleep when the rumble of the airship started outside. I hated waking up alone but… part of me wonders if he slipped out because he just didn't want to say goodbye?

I would have cried if he had. I guess I wouldn't have really wanted to have him see me do that.

I happened to notice that he took the rest of the remaining cake that I'd made, though.