Chapter 5: Cloud's Dream

Tifa awoke to a familiar voice singing. As her vision cleared she saw Aeris in front of a mirror fixing her hair while singing to herself.

"Aeris, I didn't know you could sing so well!" exclaimed Tifa as she got out of bed.

"Well when you spend 8 years in a place like this you discover talents that you never knew you had." replied Aeris with a smile. "By the way I had your clothes washed, dried and ironed. They are on the end of your bed." she told Tifa.

She grabbed her clothes and went into the bathroom. After a long, hot shower she quickly got dressed, fixed up her hair and went downstairs. She found Aeris in the lobby in a chair reading a paper.

"What are you reading Aeris?" inquired Tifa.

"It is a list of all the people that arrived yesterday. When I saw your name on the list it surprised me. I thought you would get to live out your life, not get it cut short like mine." replied Aeris with a slight frown.

"Well anyway we are going to visit one of Clouds dreams today. I can't wait!" said Aeris now with a huge grin on her face.

"I can't wait either!" exclaimed Tifa. "Let's go, follow me!" said Aeris excitedly.

Aeris led Tifa to a large room with lots of different machinery surrounding a huge portal like thing. "That's the Dream Portal. It is what lets us visit people's dreams. It is very important because we dead people can only communicate with the living through their dreams." stated Aeris.

Aeris went over and talked to the guy at the controls and a moment later the portal suddenly started glowing a bright purple color then faded to pale blue hue. Aeris walked over to Tifa again and said "Cloud is already asleep so we can go now. We have until this alarm starts to go off to get out of the dream. Once it goes off we have 1 minute to hit this button to make the portal appear to get back otherwise we are stuck until he falls asleep again." said Aeris as she strapped the watch looking device to her wrist. They walked over to the portal and stepped through.

They found themselves in what appeared to be a rundown church. "I recognize this place." said Aeris as she looked around. "This is the church in the sector 5 slums where I first met Cloud. I wonder where he is?" she said while taking in her surroundings.

After looking for a while they found Cloud standing next to the patch of flowers growing in the church.
At first he didn't notice them but when he looked up and saw Tifa and Aeris standing there his face lit up and he got the biggest smile on his face that either of the girls had ever seen.

"It is so great to see you two again! I have missed you both very much." said an overjoyed Cloud.

They just stood there and talked for what seemed like forever then the alarm to get heading back went off.

"Well see you Cloud." said Tifa.

"Don't forget about us Cloud." added Aeris with a smile as she hit the button for the portal.

"When will I get to see you two again?" asked Cloud.

"We will try to visit as often as we can but remember it will only be while you're asleep." said Aeris as both her and Tifa stepped through the portal and disappeared.

When they got back Aeris took Tifa on a tour of the building then they spent the rest of the day chatting in Aeris's room.

As Tifa went to sleep she thought "It would be great if there was a way for Cloud to bring us back to life so we could see him all the time." She was quickly asleep.