If Misery Loves Company

Chapter 19

Reprieve

By Kris Gupton-Williams

That kiss… that one kiss that had taken so many damn years for me to place on Shera's lips…

Forget saving the world!

I kissed Shera!

Of course, I was a thousand miles away before long. Still… I couldn't get my mind off of that damn woman.

I know you don't wanna hear a bunch of mushy shit about that, though.

I'm pretty sure they do…

No, no. See…

We got back into the swing of things. We found out that we needed to chase Sephiroth down into the North Crater. Thing was, he had some sort of force field over the place. We farted around and then Shin Ra inadvertently destroyed that field with that big ass Sister Ray thing they had. During the course of that, the Shin Ra building in Midgar was destroyed and as far as we knew, Rufus was taken along with it.

Not that you shed a tear.

Still, we sought a little guidance through all the madnesss we were facing. We talked to Bugenhagen and he explained that Aeris hadn't run off and died in vain. The truth was that she needed to die in order to beg the planet to release Holy in an attempt to ward off Meteor and Sephiroth.

We all know you love that religious garbage.

Still… the way it was put, it even sort of made sense to me, including the part where we were told the reason Holy wasn't working was because Sephiroth was holding it back.

It was decided that the only way to get Holy to do what it needed to do was to kill Sephiroth once and for all. Now, we knew he was in the Crater, and we had the barrier down to where we could finally get inside.

We didn't just rush in, though. No…

Right about that time, everyone was starting to have their doubts. Some just felt we couldn't win, and others had forgotten exactly what it was we were fighting for.

I myself said some things that I wasn't particularly proud of. It had just been a short while before with Shera that I'd realized I HAD a reason for fighting. Being away from her again, and not knowing when I was going to get home made me run my mouth. I hadn't even been able to radio her for several nights due to all the interference in the atmosphere from Meteor. There was a moment when I actually suggested in one of my notorious bitch fits that we just fucking give up and die.

…that didn't win me a lot of points with anyone.

How do you figure? Everyone loves a quitter.

However, it did inspire Cloud to come up with the best idea he'd had in weeks. We figured that we had seven days before Meteor hit, and Cloud was willing to give us all two of those days to take off and figure out our motivation.

That changed my attitude right around.

I stationed the ship just south of the crater and we all left. I saddled up one of those God forsaken chocobos and set out on the long ride to Rocket. I left the ship around four in the afternoon. It was a solid twelve hours of ass busting riding to get all the way home.

When I got to the house, I didn't go in immediately. Instead, I got off that stupid bird and just mulled around outside for a bit. I was incredibly sore and just wanted to get the feeling back in my legs and ass. Besides, given that it was the wee hours of the morning, I knew good and well that Shera would be asleep. I didn't really want to go giving her a heart attack.

After a bit, I just leaned back against the side of the house and pulled out my lighter and cigarettes. It'd been several hours since I'd had one and…

And I don't need a reason to smoke, I just do it.

It surprised the hell out of me, though, when the front door flew open and Shera ran out in her pajamas, my grandfather's spear in her hands. For the record, she did so with a really weird sort of screechy battle cry. It killed me not to laugh my ass off, but I remained quiet.

The chocobo I'd ridden home on just stood there before the porch, oblivious to the fact this crazy spear wielding woman had almost killed it. They aren't incredibly bright.

Upon seeing the bird, Shera relaxed and lowered the weapon, then going to pet the bird. "I thought you were something that came along to eat me…"

I lit up the cigarette that was waiting between my lips and spoke, my voice reflecting my exhaustion. "Y'all ain't got nothin' to be scared of. I ain't known 'em to eat people so far."

Shera dropped the spear completely and turned around to face me. I swear she jumped a few times like a damn school girl. "Cid!"

I forced my aching body to comply and get me over to that woman. "Howdy, Shera."

She looked me up and down a few times, seeming confused as hell. "What are you doing here?"

I gave a shrug and flicked some ashes. "We all decided to take… a lil' break."

That didn't seem to appease her none. "But Meteor! It's so close! I mean…"

I needed to bring her back down to the ground before her damn head exploded. My left hand came down on her shoulder. "I know, but we've got seven days before impact. It was… generally agreed last night that we would take two days off."

Her pretty little head cocked to the side, her tired mind not really following. "Why?"

"We talked about it, and there were those on the ship that felt like they had things they needed to do before we went in to face off with Sephiroth. One guy wanted to see his daughter, another wished to go back to Wutai. I mean, just in case we failed, we all wanted to see family and what not one more time. Mostly, though, it was for all of us to take a minute to remember what it is we all are fightin' for." I let go of her shoulder and held onto her arm, hoping that she'd understand my meaning without me having to outright say it.

I guess she did understand, because she spared me the embarrassment of continuing with that line of conversation. "Where's the airship?"

Letting go of her completely, I walked to the steps of the porch and discarded what was left of my smoke. "North of here. Sorta parked it central to where all've us needed to go. I rode that damn bird from there."

And God were you not lookin' forward to ridin' it back in two days.

Shera, ever the pragmatic one, spoke after a second. "Oh… well, you should probably get his saddle off of him."

I really just wanted to go inside, but she had a point. After a few minutes of struggle, I got the tack from the bird, tossing it on the porch. I was good and cold from the predawn air by then. "Think there's any chance I can get a little tea? It's damn cold out."

"That sounds like a fine idea… let's go in," she said moving to pick up the spear she'd dropped.

I laughed a little and snagged it from the porch before she could manage, laughing at the image still in my mind. "You were really gonna pike the bird with this?"

She let us in, looking a little embarrassed. "Well… I thought it was a monster or some such. I didn't know what else I could have used."

All those years in the house with me and she'd never snooped enough to realize what else I had? Unbelievable. I went in after her, putting the spear in a corner for the time being. "Goddamned, Shera. There's a shotgun in my closet, for future reference."

She looked over her shoulder at me as she made us some tea. I went and sat in my usual place at the table and waited in silence. I was just happy to be home, and happier still to be looking at Shera again.

After she brought the cups to the table, my proverbial flood gates broke. I don't mean that I started crying like a little bitch or anything, I just started to tell her absolutely everything I'd withheld about my time with AVALANCHE. I hadn't been real forthcoming prior because I never wanted to give Shin Ra a reason to interrogate her about our doings. Now, though…

Meteor either was or wasn't going to hit the planet in seven days. Ergo, who cared what she knew by then? Either we were going to succeed and be big fucking heros in a week and Shin Ra wouldn't give a rat's ass about Shera, or we were all going to be dead in a week, and once again, Shin Ra wouldn't give a rat's ass about Shera.

As far as I could see, she was Scott free.

The whole time I went on, detailing the story probably far more intricately than she needed to hear, Shera remained silent, just listening. My throat would get dry, I'd pour back more tea and ramble some more. I had never talked so much all at once in my life, but I think the stress had gotten to me. I had to vent it all to someone, and as always, that someone ended up being Shera.

And you know what? There was something in the way she'd nod, and occasionally smile that told me that she was glad I'd saved it all up for her. I could see that she knew, she really knew that I wouldn't have talked like this to anyone else.

The sun finally hauled its ass over the horizon around seven or so. I'd run my mouth for a good three hours, and reached the part of the story where I was sitting in the kitchen with Shera.

Her tiny little hand came across the table toward one of mine. "Cid… why don't you go rest for a while?"

I was spent, and as much as I didn't want to miss one moment of what may have been my last time at home, I couldn't rightly refuse. "Yeah… a few hours in my own bed would be real damn nice right about now. You jus' make sure to not let me sleep too long. If this is the last time I'm gonna get to be home, I don't wanna sleep through the whole fuckin' thing."

"Cid…" she choked.

I didn't think there was anything particularly damning in what I'd just said, but Shera instantly started to cry. Maybe she was just tired, I didn't know. Still, I felt horrible to see her lose it like that. I got up from my seat and went to her, pulling her up into my arms. I realized inside how much all this had hurt her. As stressed as I had been off running around, she'd been through worse, stuck behind, never knowing what was going on. It would have driven me insane, that much I knew. Here I was, going to go again the following day to get right back into it. Once again, she'd be there, in the house, not only unaware of whether I was alive or not, but having to wonder about her own survival as well. Though I wasn't really good at such things, I tried to be comforting. "Shera… I'm gonna give this every fuckin' thing I got. I wanna get outta this alive, with the planet saved. That's truly what I intend to do. I don't want you to think otherwise, okay?"

I couldn't understand for the life of me what she said in response, since she was pressing her face into my chest. Still, she cried.

All the stress, being up since four… I knew damn good and well that she had to be just as tired as I was. I took her hand and went back to my room, wanting to just sleep with her at my side. That had been, after all, one of the memories other than that kiss I'd held dearest.

I let go of her and closed the curtains. "I've had y'all up since an ungodly hour. Why don't ya jus' take a nap with me?"

Without any hesitation on her part, Shera went and crawled onto my bed.

That did my heart good right there. I gave her a smile and pulled off my shirt.

Shera's eyes went wide and she covered her mouth with one hand. "Cid… my God…"

I followed her stare down to my exposed torso. I'd had the ever living shit beaten out of me over the weeks, and I wasn't looking all that hot. I was cut up, bruised, scraped, and every other manner of 'being fucked up' there was. Still, I hadn't felt as good as I did right then in weeks. "It looks worse than it is. I'm all right, Shera."

She sent her eyes elsewhere as I pulled off my fatigues, ending up in my boxers. That done, I got into bed next to her, laying on my side to face her. "Don't be afraid, you know I ain't gonna get weird."

Bless her heart if she didn't get a little squirrelly over that. Soon, though, she moved to back up against me. I put an arm around her waist and nuzzled against the back of her neck lightly. It felt good, damn good, and though it crossed my mind to do more with her, my tiredness won out and I was gone within seconds.