Final Fantasy VII: The Story 2nd Instalment

Emerald Princess of Vernea

Part Nine: The Birth of Weapon

Chapter Thirty-Five

Four days after leaving the Forgotten City, Cloud and his friends finally arrived at the remote ice village known as Icicle Inn. The journey ended up being twice as long as it needed to be, thanks to the abrupt appearance of snow as they left the Coral Valley and entered the Snow Fields. Blistering cold winds and almost thigh-high drifts of snow had slowed them considerably. Frequently they had to stop and warm themselves up, else they would have frozen and died in the bitter cold.

The Icicle Inn was built at the peak of a long, snowy slope in the middle of the Snow Fields. The village began its life many years ago as a single inn, built for travellers who were heading further north for expeditions into the Great Glacier and the unknown mountains beyond. Over time travellers who gave up their trek settled down in the icy plain and built homes around the inn, turning it into a village.

Cloud and his friends were filled with relief as they entered the village. They spotted the inn almost immediately—nestled between a small house and a large house on the east side of the village. Most of the group headed straight there, except for Cloud, who went to the weapon store on the west side to exchange his Murasame for another new sword. Under no circumstances did he wish to handle any weapon that even vaguely resembled the sword that killed Aeris.

It was strange travelling without her, Cloud thought as he purchased the new sword, Organics. Strange… and empty. Every time someone complained about the cold, he expected to hear Aeris's voice slip through the blustery winds and calm them all down. When the Bandersnatch wolves attacked in the Snow Fields, Cloud imagined her fighting beside them. She still had that determined look in her eyes as she fought with her staff, glancing back once in a while to show that she was okay.

But she was not there. He would not see Aeris's cheerful smile anymore. That smile was forever lost to the dark depths of the water. And it was all because of Sephiroth!

No, Cloud said silently. Sephiroth was not entirely to blame. The fault was mostly his own. He let Aeris die. He should have sensed Sephiroth's presence nearby—sensed the danger that was coming. Instead he just stood and watched as Sephiroth fell from the heavens and ran her through, ending her life. Watched as she was so senselessly killed.

The image of Aeris's eyes, wide in shock and fear as she the masamune coming out of her waist would never leave his memory. Nor the way her eyes slowly closed as she fell into death. Cloud wondered. Was she in the Lifestream now?

The others were waiting in the inn when Cloud arrived. They all huddled around the large fire near the entrance, absorbing its warmth. Seeing the fire made Cloud shudder with cold. The bright red and orange flames were black to his eyes. No warmth touched his skin. The fire was as cold as the snow outside.

Seeing Cloud arrive, the others reluctantly pulled themselves away from the fire. The purchasing of the new sword and an unfortunate accident during the fight against the Bandersnatches the day before had left them a little short on funds—they could not afford to stay at the inn this day. Still Yuffie glanced back at the fire a few seconds longer, a hopeful gaze in her eyes, before she finally dragged herself out the door and back into the cold.

The village's only exit lay to the north at the top of a slope leading into the northern mountains. A man stood guard at the top of the slope, walking briskly back and forth to keep warm. He looked up as Cloud and the gang approached, wondering what they were up to. When he saw them begin to walk past and head into the snow, he ran over and stopped them.

"No, don't!" he shouted, his voice muffled through the thick woolly scarf around his neck. "It's a steep downgrade, past here. It's dangerous, please don't go!"

Cloud stopped in his tracks and glared at the man. "I'm still going!" he snapped, the cold wind making his temper short.

The man flinched. "Damn, I was just being nice…" he said, somewhat disgruntled by the harsh response. Taking a step back, he looked over Cloud's shoulder toward the village entrance. "What the? Who are those people over there? Looks like trouble!"

As the man spun and dived into the trees for safety, Cloud and the others turned to face the entrance as a number of figures approached the village. Shinra soldiers, clad in their blue and silver uniforms, marched through the snow toward the village. At the head of the company was Elena, her blue suit dark and damp with the snow. Her short blonde hair was clammy and strewn across her pale face and red cheeks.

Elena entered the village first. She sighed in relief as she saw the warm glow of fires coming from the houses. The look of relief turned to one of surprise as she saw the group standing in the middle of the village, watching her. Turning to face her soldiers, she shouted "There they are, hurry!!" in her most commanding voice.

"Yes, ma'am!!"

The soldiers stuck close to Elena as she ran toward Cloud. Cloud and the group made no attempt to run out of the way—there were only a small handful of soldiers after all, and although Elena was a member of the Turks, they did not see her as a major threat. When Elena finally stopped she put her hands on her wet knees and panted heavily, out of breath even after a short run.

"Cloud… huff… wheeze…" she breathed, her voice hoarse from the cold, "I won't let you go any further!"

Cloud shrugged. Not for the first time he wondered how Elena had managed to get into a group such as the Turks, for all the use she was. Brash, impulsive, foolish… she did not show any of the skills that Rude and Reno had. Did Elena even have any skills? Turning away from her, Cloud pointed toward the slope.

"What's down there?" he asked.

Elena pushed herself up and looked at Cloud with a haughty smile. "It's a SE-CR-ET," she said smugly. She truly revelled in the fact that she knew something that Cloud and his friends didn't. Waving her hand dismissively, she continued, "It really doesn't matter! But you really got guts doin' my boss in like that!"

It took Cloud a few seconds to realise who she meant. "You mean Boss…… Tseng?" Memories of the Temple of the Ancients flooded into his mind. The Turk Boss, Tseng, whom Elena greatly admired and looked up to, lay injured at the entrance of the Temple after Sephiroth attacked him. Why did Elena think…? "That wasn't us," Cloud interjected hurriedly. "Sephiroth did it."

"No!" Elena barked, shaking her head. Her fists were clenched, knuckles snow white, and she spoke through gritted teeth. "Don't think you can fool me, liar!"

"I'm not lying…" Cloud said with a sigh. "It was Sephiroth."

"Don't try to act innocent. I'll never forget it!!"

Elena was shouting now, her body shaking with rage. Her eyes looked at Cloud with sheer fury. Her anger made her warm, and all that anger was directed solely on Cloud. She had found Tseng unconscious in the Temple's entrance, a bloodstained bandage around a gaping wound. Though Tseng was now recovering safely back at Shinra HQ, she vowed she would get revenge on the ones who caused him to suffer so. Elena had firmly convinced herself that Cloud, or someone in his party, had dealt Tseng that stroke that almost killed him. There would be no dissuading her.

Realising that Elena would not back down, Cloud sighed again. "Oh, man…" he groaned. Elena crossed her arms and tapped her foot thoughtfully in the snow.

"Looks like talking alone won't cut it," she said. Nodding to herself as she made up her mind, she clenched the fists once more and raised them in a clumsy martial fighting stance. "You're going to have feel some pain!"

One of the soldiers behind her stepped forward. "Just you… and me!!"

"No," Elena interrupted, thrusting out one hand to block the soldier, "I can handle him!" She locked gazes with Cloud. "There's no way he can avoid my punch."

The soldier looked at her dubiously. "What? Yeah…" Though his face was invisible, Cloud got the impression that he was inwardly laughing at her. After sharing a mocking glance with his fellow soldiers he stepped back, giving Elena leeway to punch Cloud. Elena smirked and raised her fists.

Cloud watched as the young Turk prepared to strike. Though he was no martial artist like Tifa, even he could see which direction the woman was preparing to strike from. Her weight was heavily pressed on her right foot, which was behind her. Her right fist was slowly being pulled back, and a flicker from her eyes told him instantly that she was planning a frontal attack on his face.

Cloud waited until the moment when Elena shifted her weight onto her left foot before acting. Just as Elena's fist came swinging forward, Cloud hurriedly dodged to the side, sliding smoothly out of the way. In her inexperience Elena had placed too much weight on her back foot and could not stop herself as Cloud dodged out of the way. Her thinly soled boots slid on the snow and she jerked forward.

Elena waved her arms frantically, fighting to keep from falling over. She tried to reach for Cid, who was nearest to her, but he stepped aside. She lost the fight for balance and tumbled over into the snow. Falling head over heels, she was caught by the gradual decline of the hill and began to roll. She continued to roll over and over until finally she disappeared over the edge of the slope leading out of the village.

The soldiers, bewildered, continued to stare even after Elena had disappeared. "Ele… Elena!?" one soldier finally cried, and the company charged right past Cloud and his group and vanished into the trees, chasing after their tumbling commander.

With Elena gone, Cloud considered what they had to do next. Though Elena had been guarded with her information, she had involuntarily let slip the fact that they were heading in the right direction. The Great Glacier… that was surely where Sephiroth and Shinra were headed. Why, he did not know, or care. All that mattered was finding Sephiroth and ending it once and for all. For Nibelheim. And for Aeris.

First there were a few preparations to make. As the man guarding the slope had so rightly warned them: it was a steep decline into the mountains. With any luck Elena's soldiers would catch her before she fell too far. But down that slope was their only route. They had to get down somehow.

A young boy in the village found a way to solve this problem. The boy had recently bought a snowboard, but lost interest in the hobby after injuring his knee riding down one of the small slopes in the village. He was thankful to get rid of the board, along with his fretful mother, who threw in the goggles as an extra thank you.

The others found their own solutions to the travelling dilemma. Barret, after promptly refusing to ride a snowboard of any kind, settled with a middle-sized sledge he found propped against the weapon shop. The girl inside the store told him it belonged to her grandfather, who was too old to sledge now, and as she had no interest in sledging she gave it too him. It was a little too small for his bulky frame, but after some manoeuvring he managed to get into a sitting position.

Cid and Vincent, after some searching, found some more snowboards that were willing to be given away. Tifa and Vincent claimed those. Yuffie 'borrowed' a pair of skis from the large house on the east side, as well as producing a map of the Great Glacier, which she also 'borrowed'. Cid found another sledge, which he shared with Cait Sith after a debate over whether the stuffed Mog body should be left behind.

The debate was settled after Barret called the Mog 'useless baggage', which provoked Cait to hurl his megaphone in Barret's direction and then force himself on Cid's sledge. Red XIII, reluctant to ride on any contraption, eventually settled himself awkwardly on Barret's sledge, his back paws dug into the wood and his front clinging to Barret's back. The hound refused to slacken his grip even as Barret yelled in pain.

When everything had been obtained the group gathered at the top of the slope. The man who had been guarding the slope had returned from his hiding place among the trees and was watching them prepare for their departure with a sheepish expression on his face. Once he offered to help them prepare, but was politely turned down.

Cloud bent over and checked the straps that were fastened around his front foot. The straps, designed to fit larger snow boots, left quite a gap under his smaller ones. It took some amount of readjusting to get the straps to fit over them, and even then Cloud felt they were a little slack. He couldn't remember the last time he'd snowboarded. Probably back in Nibelheim, when he was a child, when winter's snow fell over the hills around the town.

When he was sure the straps were tight enough, Cloud stood up and looked around at his friends. Red XIII still clung to Barret's back, his sharp claws digging into the big man's skin and lightly tearing at his shirt. Cid was trying to ignore Cait and Yuffie's excited babble. Vincent was silent, as usual.

"Ready?" Cloud said to Tifa.

Tifa nodded nervously. She was wearing Cid's jacket and gloves, which he had offered as protection from the bitter cold. The twenty-year-old fighter looked very peculiar in the air jacket, her slender frame dwarfed by the bulky leather. During the last few minutes she and Yuffie had swapped items, with Tifa now grasping the handles of the skies with an anxious look in her eyes. She had never skied nor boarded, but she felt a little safer on skis.

"I'm ready," she replied, trying to hide the tremor in her voice. She turned the skis hesitantly to face the slope. The steep decline loomed before her. She swallowed nervously. It was a long way down. Even so, she just gripped the skis tighter and frowned, refusing to let her fear overcome her.

Cloud smiled faintly. It was just like Tifa to be brave when she was faced with the unknown. Thinking of that very nearly recalled a distant memory from their childhood, but it slipped just out of Cloud's reach before he could grasp it. Whatever. It wasn't important anyway. Besides, they had more important things to do. Like catching up with Sephiroth.

Cloud turned back to the slope. Pulling the snow goggles over his eyes, he cautiously slid forward, his back foot pushing the board forward. He stopped at the tip of the slope and looked down, his heart almost catching in his throat. The slopewas steep, though not as steep as he had first expected. There were flagged checkpoints marking the path down, but they would not matter once they started moving.

"Be careful!" the man behind them called, just as Cloud pushed himself away from the edge. The board tipped over and in a second Cloud vanished from view.

The wind was the first thing to hit Cloud as he began to slide down the slope. The arctic air hit him like a slap across the face, only this was all over his body. Within seconds his arms and face were stinging as the wind and harsh flakes of snow stabbed into his skin. It hit him so hard and so suddenly that Cloud almost fell back off his board. At the last moment when he would have fallen backward into the snow Cloud leaned forward, pushing his bodyweight forward to keep him balanced and moving forward.

Before him the slope was a sea of white. The sky, the ground, everything was white to his vision. He could only just discern the ground from the sky, and could only just see the brightly coloured flags that guided his path. Bright bullets of red, blue, yellow and green zipped on either side of his vision, barely visible. Hurriedly Cloud leaned back a little on his board, trying to slow his descent. It helped, but not by much.

The first turn appeared before Cloud knew it was coming. He suddenly saw the blue and red blurs turn sharply to the right, and Cloud only just shifted his weight to the right in time. The board delved into the snow as it turned steadily, only just missing the rocky grey-white wall of a cliff. The wall of rock appeared in Cloud's vision so abruptly that he cried out, although his voice was lost to the snow and wind.

Opening his mouth to yell was a big mistake. The cold air flew into his throat and lungs, startling his senses so much that he coughed. The involuntary movement caused his body to shudder, and thus made the board jerk and shift to one side. A sharp stab of pain hit Cloud's right elbow. Swiftly Cloud leaned to his left and pulled away from the cliff wall. A trickle of something warm slid down his arm.

A blur of colour zipped past him, and Cloud saw Yuffie's blurred form suddenly glide past him. The young ninja was having the time of her life, gliding down the slope with ease and leaning forward to gain extra speed. She cried out in joy as she passed Cloud, cheering how she was in the lead. Cloud did not hear her words—the sound of the wind rushing past his ears drowned out any perceptible words she may have been shouting.

"Yahoo!" Yuffie shouted as she sailed forward. "This race is mine!"

Yuffie leaned forward some more, and the board sped up. She knew this was not a race, but she was so caught up in the thrill of snowboarding that she forgot what they were supposed to be doing. She moved almost expertly down the hill, tilting her body against the rushing wind and feeling it scrape across her skin as she took turn after turn in her stride. She left Cloud and the others far behind her, lost in her race.

"Yuffie!" called Cloud. The ninja could no longer hear him, however, and she disappeared beyond one of the Y-turns. Cursing under his breath, Cloud tried to tilt his board toward the left turn. He turned too late and had to swerve back to the right to avoid hitting the cliff face. He sailed down the right path, separated from Yuffie.

Behind him the others were having similar problems. The sudden Y-turn caught them off guard, and each turned different ways to avoid the collision. Barret and Red XIII swerved to the right, along with Cid and Cait. Tifa, closest to Cloud, turned to the right to keep Cloud in sight. Vincent followed her, making his mind and turning right at the last second.

Warily Cloud risked a glance backward to the slope behind him. Through the hurtling snow he saw Tifa and Vincent behind him. He could not see the others, which meant they had turned left instead of right. Cloud cursed again and focused his attention back on the path in front of him.

The slope was levelling out, though Cloud had no time to be thankful. The path opened up into an open plain filled with sudden rising slopes designed for jumping. The first jump Cloud could not avoid, and before he knew it he was ten feet in the air, the ground zipping past beneath him. He braced himself for the landing, tilting his board slightly backward to slow his descent.

The snowboard hit the snow with a thud, sending a painful shockwave up his right arm, which was going numb. Cloud wobbled from side to side, spreading his arms to keep from falling over. The wind pressed against his arms and still Cloud struggled to keep his balance. Somehow he managed it, just in time to avoid the next jump.

Tifa, still close behind Cloud, was finally getting used to the feel of skiing. On the slender skis she had first fought to stay upright, especially at the first turn where she tilted too far and almost fell over into the snow. Now she had gained most of her momentum she tucked the handles under her arms and was gliding forward with ease, her knees slightly bent and head forward to face the wind.

She was feeling so courageous now that she decided to try one of the jumps. Swerving to the left, she headed up one of the middle-sized slopes. When she leapt off the edge, she kept her feet together and kept the skis at a secure angle, arms fixed by her sides as she glided through the air. When she landed, she landed with ease, her skis landing almost smoothly back into the snow.

Elsewhere on the mountain slope, Yuffie was continuing to have the time of her life. She had left the snowy slope now and was boarding rapidly through a tunnel made entirely of ice. She cheered loudly as she sailed across the icy floor, her voice echoing off the rugged ice walls.

Somewhere behind her, the parties on the sledges were having a difficult time directing themselves through the mountain slope. More than once they grazed the cliff walls, and more than once Red XIII howled in fright and clung to Barret's back, making him almost lost his grip on the sledge. Cid and Cait eventually took the lead, with Cait shouting back directions through his megaphone.

By the time Cloud reached the end of the slope, he had no idea where he was or what was happening. He felt as though he had been snowboarding forever. His skin was so cold he could barely feel his fingers, and he could not feel his right arm at all.

At the foot of the slope, the path became thin and sloped suddenly upward, heading up into the air above a long drop. It was one of many drops, each ending in different places across the mountainside. Cloud spotted the jump at the last second, and braced himself for the jump.

The board reached the edge and sloped upwards, sliding off the edge and sending Cloud up into the air. Cloud looked down through his snow-covered goggles and was startled to see the height of the drop beneath him. Directly beneath him was a large clump of trees, surrounded by snow.

Cloud hit the top of the trees first, his board skimming across the tip of the canopy. He sailed past the tree and dipped beneath the leaves, landing on the ground with a thump. The force of the landing caused him to finally lose his balance and he toppled backward, nearly catching his ankle underneath the edge of the flailing board.

Turning onto his side, Cloud skidded and rolled across the snow. He could not see anything as he rolled over and over apart from flashes of white and brown, which meant nothing to him. He was eventually stopped when he slammed into the side of a cliff, forcing the air from his body and making something crack and snap loudly.

For a few minutes Cloud did not move, lying half-buried in a drift of snow piled up against the cliff. Cloud rolled onto his back. His body ached all over from the landing, though thankfully the cold numbed his body enough that he did not feel the pain much. The snowboard lay broken at his feet, cracked clean in half during the crash. Cloud looked up at the sky in silence, breathing deeply.

When he caught his breath Cloud slowly sat up, reaching down to unclip the broken snowboard. Once the board was off he stood, groaning as his body ached. The cold hadn't numbed him totally. Near to where he landed, Tifa and Vincent were also climbing to their feet, covered in snow but appearing otherwise unharmed.

"Ugh…" Cloud moaned. He staggered away from the cliff wall, brushing the snow from his arms and clothes. "I guess we're still in one piece. Everyone all right?"

"Yeah, somehow," Tifa replied. Her skis lay in a shattered heap by one of the trees, Tifa having unclipped them seconds before she crashed into the trees.

"So where did we land?" Cloud asked, looking around at their surroundings. They appeared to be at the edge of a small forest. There was no path as such, other than one made from natural grooves in the ground where the falling snow dipped slightly. Cloud could see more patches of snow beyond the forest. Looking above, he could not see the slop they had jumped from. "Looks like we've jumped pretty far…" he surmised, shielding his eyes from the glaring sun.

"Oh yeah, we got the map right?" asked Tifa. "Let's look at the map."

Cloud nodded and pulled out the map, which he had liberated from Yuffie's possession before setting off, an act for which he was thankful for now. When he pulled it out he rubbed his arms vigorously. The air was colder down here.

"It sure is cold," he said. "We'll freeze if we stay here any longer."

Tifa and Vincent nodded. Even in Cid's jacket, Tifa could feel the cold nibbling at her skin. Vincent's face was impassive, though even he must be feeling the awful cold. Cloud opened up the map and looked down before beginning to lead the way through the forest and, hopefully, to somewhere warmer than where they were now.

The three did not get very far before the cold became too much for them. Soon after they left the sheltered forest and stepped out into the windy open plains of ice and snow the temperature decreased rapidly.

Tifa was the first one to fall victim to the cutting cold. They were halfway across the first icy plain when she suddenly collapsed, falling onto the hard ice floor. Cloud tried hard to rouse her, shaking her and rubbing her face and legs to warm them up. But Tifa would not wake. Eventually Vincent wrapped his cloak around her for extra warmth and lifted her up, carrying her across his back through the snow.

Cloud was the next to fall. His injured arm, covered in dried, frozen blood, slowed him considerably. He and Vincent had just crossed a large pool of heated water when a sudden wave of dizziness and nausea overcame him. His vision faltered and he staggered with each step. The next thing he knew the ground was rushing up toward him and he could see Vincent's feet running toward him.

Then his vision went black.

Emerald: Okay, so I won't finish this instalment by New Years. T.T I'm sorry, but writer's block returned for a two-week period. But I got this chapter finished at least. I can't remember much of the path of Gaea's Cliff, so I'm using a basic walkthrough and some originality to fill that bit. At the moment my playable file is at Cosmo Canyon, and I haven't touched that since I got KH2. Speaking of games… I got Dirge of Cerberus for Christmas! And I completed it already! Although, heh, that's on the Normal level… What, I'm not playing it on hard! T.T