Author's Note – I've received some bad news at work, so I may not be updating as often as I have been. Sorry for breaking my promise to have a chapter posted every other day. It all depends on how things go at work. But I do promise that I will not abandon this story. We must have closure here!

Chapter 18 – Nothing But Facts

Something soft touched my lips. Was I dreaming?

"Cloud, wake up, wake up, wake up." It was Tifa. She sounded a little frustrated.

I felt my bottom lip being tugged and pulled and sucked in the most amazing way. "Mmm, you better hurry up and have your way with me before my girlfriend comes back. She's very jealous."

She playfully smacked my face.

I opened my eyes and smiled at her. "Oh, hey, it's you."

"I'll kick your ass." But she wasn't mad. She turned her head and assaulted my mouth without any regard to whether or not I even wanted to be kissed. She tasted like pancake syrup and I couldn't help but hum in enjoyment at that little surprise.

When she came up for air and tried again, I turned my face away. "Come on, Tifa, I probably have bad morning breath. Let me go brush my teeth."

She turned my face and kissed me again. "Tastes fine to me."

I ignored her. "What time is it?"

"9:30."

I was wide awake now and pulled myself up.

Tifa rolled off with a pout.

I noticed she was wearing her teeshirt and pajama bottoms. Before we fell asleep last night, I was pretty sure she was as naked as I was. "Where'd you go?"

"Downstairs. You were sleeping so soundly, I didn't wanna wake you up."

I sat up and bent forward to rub the back of my neck. "Did everyone have breakfast already?"

Tifa squeezed in behind me and began massaging my neck and shoulders. "Yes, and they all left."

I turned to look over my shoulder at her. "Left? Where'd they go?"

"To the pool. Aeris asked if I wanted to go. I told her I'd wait for you to wake up first and then we'd meet them in alittle bit."

"So there's no one in the apartment?"

"No."

"You're sure?"

"Positive."

I launched myself off the bed and went to the door, flinging it open. "Alone at last. I feel like running naked up and down the halls." When I turned around to face Tifa, she was sitting cross-legged on the bed, her hands covering her mouth as she laughed. "What?"

She shook her head and continued to laugh.

I looked down at myself. "It's alittle cold in here." Yeah, I was alittle bit shriveled, not as impressive as last night. But it was nothing to laugh about. "Oh, you are just asking for it."

When I stalked toward the bed, she squealed and drew her legs up to ward off my hands.

I tickled her mercilessly and she laughed hysterically, while trying to push my hands away.

"Cloud, stop! Stop it!"

"Never!" I grabbed her wrists and pinned them above her head as I moved on top of her. "Shhh, sit still."

Tifa stopped struggling and when she raised her head to kiss me, I drew back my face out of her reach.

I smiled when she gave me an angry frown. "Whatta you say, Tifa?"

"Kiss my ass," she snarled with an evil grin.

"Don't worry, I'll be doing that soon enough, but no, that's not the appropriate response."

Her smile became more pleasant, but she was still baring her teeth. "Please?"

"Was that so hard?" I captured her lips and sucked on them. As I slipped her my tongue, I turned my head for a better angle.

The second I released her wrists, her fingers went into my hair. My hand went to her breast and I squeezed it with purpose.

I released her lower lip with a sharp tug of my teeth. "I want you right now, Tifa."

"You think you're in a position to demand sex from me?"

"Yeah." I was acting alittle overconfident, but I knew she wouldn't say no.

"Well, get off me so I can get out of my clothes."

I couldn't argue with that logic. I pulled away and sat up to help her out of her pajamas.

Gone was the timid girl from last night. Tifa spread her legs without hesitation and beckoned me with her arms.

I crawled back on top of her, holding myself up with my arms so I could look down at her.

She reached up and touched my face, the humor gone from hers.

I lowered myself to her lips, kissing her slowly, lovingly…no hurries. I dipped my tongue into her mouth, stroking hers.

She came up for air and moaned as I entered her slowly. It was a lot easier going in now.

I started rocking against her, moving in and out. Her face was relaxed and glowing. I pressed several soft kisses on her cheeks and watched them become more flushed as I drove in alittle harder and faster.

She moaned ecstatically and wrapped her arms around my head, pulling me down for more lip sucking.

We moved together for a few minutes. I was sweating from the exertion of trying to hold it until she climaxed first.

When she finally did, she bit her lip and held back.

"Let it out, Tifa. There's nobody home."

She opened her mouth and let out a startlingly loud and long cry.

As soon as I knew she was done, I started to pull out, but she wouldn't let me go.

"No, Cloud, don't…"

And then it was too late. I spilled inside her with a grunt, followed by a long groan. It felt great, but all I could think about was the fact that I wasn't wearing a condom and I didn't want to get her pregnant.

When it was over, I rolled off her and stared up at the ceiling. I had always been careful, always used a condom. Tifa was the first girl I had been with where I didn't use some kind of protection. I had pulled out in time the day before, but not this time. Maybe nothing would happen. What were the chances anyway?

Tifa rolled on her stomach and rested her chin up on my chest. "Is something wrong?"

"No."

"Then why're you so quiet all of a sudden?"

I looked at her. "Tifa, don't do that again."

"Do what?"

"I don't wanna cum inside you."

"Cloud, I know you're not going to give me some kind of disease."

"It's not that. My life wouldn't be worth 2 gil if I got you pregnant. Rufus would kill me and piss on my grave."

She rolled on her back and started laughing.

I turned and stared at her with my mouth open. Apparently she didn't give a rat's ass about my survival. I sat up and ran all ten of my fingers through my hair in frustration.

Tifa stopped laughing and came up behind me, wrapping her arms around my neck. "You don't have to worry, Cloud. I've been on birth control since I was sixteen."

"Really?" Well, that bit of news changed everything. "Why didn't you tell me?"

She kissed the back of my neck. "Well, I was worried you'd think I was a tramp like Priscilla, especially after you found those condoms in my medicine cabinet. Which by the way belonged to Sara. They weren't mine."

"Fuckin' A. I hate condoms anyway."

She squeezed her arms tighter. "Cloud, I want to tell Rufus about us."

I groaned. "No, Tifa. There's plenty of hostility between me and your brother enough as it is."

"I don't want to sneak around anymore. Please?"

"Well, can't we just…" I stopped the thought with a heavy sigh. I had already been caught too many times because of either my dishonesty or not saying anything when I should have. "Okay, but let me tell him. If he gets mad then let him get mad at me, not you."

She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. Then she pulled away and crawled off the bed.

"Where're you going?" I asked.

"To take a shower."

I got off the bed. "Not without me," I said as I picked her up, bridal style, and carried her out of the room, down the hall and into the bathroom.

While I sent Tifa to the pool to join Aeris, Marlene and Denzel, I went looking for Rufus Shinra. There were two things I wanted to discuss with him. One was to get more information on who was after him and the other was my relationship with Tifa.

There wasn't much I was afraid of…except maybe being trapped inside a cylinder tank full of Mako…but I was seriously terrified about telling Rufus that Tifa and I were together.

I found Reno at the bar in the billiard room. It seemed to be his usual hang out. "Reno, where's Rufus?"

"Hell, if I know. Why're you looking for him?"

"Cuz I wanna make out with him." Even though it had only been a joke, I probably shouldn't have said it because there were others in the room and they didn't know about my callous sarcasm.

"Hang on," said Reno as he pulled out his phone. He punched in a number and waited for a response. "Yeah, where's the big guy?...Ahuh…Ahuh…Ahuh…" He ended the call and turned to me. "He's on the Log."

"The what?"

"The Log." He finished the rest of his drink in one gulp and slammed the glass down before getting up. "Come on, numb nuts, I'll show you."

The Log was a rectangular platform that stuck out of the highest structure in Healin. I'd seen it from the ground a few times but never realized it was used as a lookout post.

The entire countryside was visible for miles in every direction. I could see the developing structures of Edge, just outside the demolished pie-like sections of Midgar and the ocean beyond. Between Midgar and Healin was a vast wasteland, which I had been told used to be covered with forests and fields of flowers. But that was way before my time.

Rufus was standing at the wooden reiling surrounding the platform, a light breeze blowing his hair around.

Reno stayed behind at the door while I walked forward.

The wooden planks creaked with every step I took. Hopefully this thing was solid enough to hold my weight and wouldn't collapse. I didn't want to end up in that stupid medical ward again.

Rufus didn't say anything as I came up next to him.

I pointed toward Edge. "Hey, I can see my house from here."

He chuckled briefly. "I had this platform built just so I could see the progress being made on the construction in Edge." He turned his attention to Midgar.

I followed his gaze toward Midgar.

At the center of what used to be the greatest metropolis in the world, was Shinra Corp Headquarters. The top of the 70 story glass tower was gone, destroyed by the blast launched from Diamond Weapon nearly a year ago.

The Healin Lodge had been developed to treat the Geostigma disease when it first made its appearance a year ago. After the Geostigma threat ended, people that had once been infected stopped coming, so Shinra and his men took over the facility.

But I wasn't there to talk to him about Shinra Headquarters or any other building. "Who's after you, Rufus?"

"It doesn't concern you, Cloud."

"The hell it doesn't. They tried to kill me."

"Tifa's safe here. They won't come after you any longer."

"You owe me a name."

Rufus sighed heavily, as if he was really debating with himself on whether to give me more information or not. "I suppose I owe you that much." He kept his gaze toward Midgar. "When I first started receiving the death threat calls, I thought it was just some disgruntled employee who wasn't rehired when we moved our operations to Healin."

I noticed him absently tapping his knuckles on the wood reiling, making me wonder if there was a nervous man inside the hard, stoic exterior. He always seemed cold and uncaring, but I knew different. If he was as uncaring as people made him out to be, then why would he have spent millions, maybe billions of gil to rebuild everything his father destroyed?

"But then he started making specific demands," he went on. "He wanted schematics for the Midgar cannon and the one in Junon."

"Why would someone want them?"

"I'm pretty sure it's bogus, just to throw me off. I didn't give him any information, of course."

"Do you know who it is?"

"His name's Floyd Dalton. An old associate of my father's and…" He gave me a side glance. "…an ex-SOLDIER."

I figured he was silently asking if the name was familiar to me. "Never heard of him."

"He trained Sephiroth."

Huh, I thought Sephiroth taught himself. If that wasn't the case, I wondered why Zack never mentioned this Dalton guy. He talked about Sephiroth a lot back when I was in the academy.

"Still doesn't ring a bell?"

I shrugged. "No."

"I'm not surprised. Dalton liked to stay low key."

"So what does this guy want?"

"The Promised Land."

I rolled my eyes. Not the Promised Land again. "There is no Promised Land, Rufus. We both know that."

The search for the Promised Land was what lead Sephiroth on his killing spree the second time he made his appearance. It turned out he wanted to damage the planet with the help of a meteor in order to draw out the powers of the Lifestream. All it served to do was nearly destroy the planet. The Promised Land was not a place. It was the Lifestream itself. The only way to get there was to die. So I assumed this Dalton guy was a complete lunatic, which made him all the more dangerous.

"What does he specifically want from you?" I asked.

"He thinks I've been there and he wants me to show him the way."

I started laughing. "Well, shit, Rufus. You could have ended this before it even started. Take him to the Temple of the Ancients and push him into the abyss. End of story."

He didn't laugh. He didn't even smile. "Unfortunately Dalton is not an imbecile. Besides, I'm at the mercy of his occasional phone calls."

"You've traced them, right?"

"Many times. The calls originally started coming from the old headquarters building." He motioned in that direction with his head. "I sent some men to check it out. After that he started calling from a cell and the signal was untraceable."

"So what was the point of making calls from there?" I gestured toward the Shinra building at the center of Midgar. "Unless he wanted you to find out who he was and left you some clues."

Shinra folded his arms and smiled. "There were two things Sephiroth and Dalton had in common."

I thought about Sephiroth for a minute. If Dalton trained Sephiroth, what could they have in common? Then it hit me. "Masamune." It was Sephiroth's weapon of choice.

"Very good, Cloud."

"I have my moments."

"Dalton or perhaps one of his henchmen, managed to kill one of my men when I sent them to search the building. They left the weapon lodged in the man's chest."

I remembered finding President Shinra, Rufus's father, a year ago. He was still sitting in his chair in his enormous office, a Masamune lodged in his chest. It was how we knew it was Sephiroth. "What makes you think it's not Sephiroth again?"

"He initially tried to make me believe he was Sephiroth…returned for the fourth time."

But then it dawned on me. If it was Sephiroth, he wouldn't be asking for the location of the Promised Land. "Sephiroth knows it doesn't exist."

"Exactly." Shinra sighed and placed his hands on the reiling again. "So that's it."

I frowned at him. "Incidentally, where are the plans for those cannons?" What if Dalton really was after them and he was just making Rufus think it was bogus?

Rufus tapped the side of his head with a finger. "It's all in here."

"Yeah, right." I knew Rufus Shinra was an intelligent man, but he didn't do things for himself. He had people, who had other people doing things.

He shook his head as he surveyed the landscape. "You know, I used to think controlling the world with fear was better than wasting money like my old man did."

"And now?"

He smiled. "I gain enormous satisfaction out of helping others."

What a load of shit. "Hm, must be pretty cold in hell right now." I turned around to leave and got about four steps.

"There's something else, isn't there?" he asked, stopping me in my tracks.

Damn…how did this guy do it? How did he know I had something else on my mind?

"Is it about Tifa?"

I didn't turn around. "Yeah."

"She's old enough to make her own decision…as long as you're not influencing it, of course."

I wondered why he wasn't mad about it if he had already known. But then again, Rufus Shinra never threw a fit. He just quietly sent his people in to take care of matters for him. So when would he send someone to take care of me? "I've been in love with Tifa all my life. I'd do anything for her."

"Have the two of you…?" he trailed off.

I knew what he was asking and I decided I wasn't going to lie. "Yes."

Rufus remained silent.

I turned alittle in his direction, wondering if he was going to say anything else. Or maybe he was thinking about how he was going to have me skinned alive and lay it on the floor in front of his fireplace. In his eyes, Tifa wasn't nineteen. She was his little sister and his only living relative. I had to respect him for wanting to protect her.

"You live too dangerously, Cloud," he finally said. "I prefer a more stable life for Tifa."

"So you're telling me to end it with her?"

He turned to look at me. "If I said yes, would that stop you?"

"No."

"I didn't think so." He turned away again.

I wasn't sure how to take it. Was he going to move Tifa out of the apartment now? Was he going to prevent me from seeing her? He knew I'd fight to the death if I had to.

Figuring the discussion was over, I started to walk toward the door where Reno was patiently waiting.

"She'd hate me if I kept the two of you apart," he called out. "So I don't have much of a choice, do I?"

I turned around and walked backward. "You said so yourself, Rufus. She's old enough to make her own decisions."

"You're both extremely stubborn and neurotic." He turned to look over his shoulder at me, giving me a crooked smile. "How do you ever manage to get along?"

I returned the smile and shrugged, thinking maybe he wasn't so opposed to me and Tifa being together. "We don't."

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