-Breathe-
03: Fireworks Blooming
"In a telescope lens,
When all you want is friends
I'll see you soon…"
-Coldplay-
(Quick A/N - the memories filtering through to Cloud's mind from his previous life
(as correctly guessed!) will have "-" before and after them.
Thanks for reading and hopefully, you'll r'n'r! -B xxx )
He felt like the dogs chew toy.
Sourly, whilst trying hard not to knock his temple on the poor design of the ship which had taken him to that hellish place, Dollet, he glared sullenly at the back of Zack's head and tried to tell himself that he wouldn't be held responsible for their 'leaders' completely idiotic take on exactly what it was to be the leader of any mission at all. So he wasn't all that surprised when his little group of fawning fanatics came running up to the Balamb Town docks. The livelier of the two waving his arms about and yelling. No, he wisely kept his mouth shut as Tifa and Yuffie came to stand with him, all of them staring down at the little disciplinary committee having their reunion.
"Yo," Cried the louder of the two men approaching. He had bright red hair and was grinning from ear to ear, wearing a slightly outdated waistcoat and very loose trousers that he was forced to pause every other step and haul them back up with a vague grunt and re-tightening of the blue sash about his waist. Reno.
The other was bald, tall and otherwise usually silent apart from giving stern, firm commands that never took occupation of more than one word, was Rude, replete in a blue double breasted jacket and dark fitted trousers. He wore an eye patch. Cloud had never had occasion to ask why the eye patch was there, but Rude could be pretty intimidating, especially when he chose to use what Cloud dubbed 'the creepy stalker silent stare'.
"How'd it go?" Continued Reno, once they were all stood close by.
Zack glared over his shoulder at them and Cloud felt Tifa tense at his next words, "Man, all they did was get in my way. What a bunch of good for nothing screw ups."
"How about I give you something to talk about, like your missing teeth!" Yelled Tifa.
Right in my ear, now I'm partially deaf too.
He cupped a hand to his ear and glanced sidelong at the fist fighter who was trying to work the straps to the gauntlets so they fit onto her hands better, the look on her face stern, angry and ... angry. Really, really angry. Cloud sighed; she really did have some emotion-control problems!
"Safe?" Rude said. Nope, nothing had changed. Still using one word, he noted.
"Yeah, don't I look it? No thanks to chicken wuss," Zack laughed and the three started walking off towards the main road back to Balamb garden.
"Don't take it so personally," he cautioned the girl once they'd moved from earshot. She glowered up at him then looked to the side with a pout on her lips, trying hard to look like she wasn't sulking. This only served to highlight the strange tattoo on her face. "They're morons anyway."
"Why, Cloudie, you think everyone is a moron," Yuffie chirped brightly.
It took every ounce of his strength not to hurl her to her death on the broken rocks below the pier of Balamb - that and his tutors Jessie and Vincent were coming out now too and he didn't want to mess this last hurdle up. She could wait for later. He'd add her to his - whoa, wait. He didn't have a list. Yes, too much time with Zack...
"It's just Cloud," he growled at her.
"What-ev-ar!" She smiled and turned around. His hands twitched...
"Good job everyone," Vincent said, in that drab tone he seemed afflicted with, and then he peered about with a light tilt of his head, "Uh... where is Zack? ...humph, alright, good job, as I said, you have until sundown to yourselves. Be back at Garden by then."
"Yeah." Cloud muttered and together, as a group, they meandered down to the docks. He purposefully tried walking just a little faster than the girls in order to get some time to himself, but they appeared to think that they no longer existed as singular entities beyond a group. So he was stuck with them; it was much like having insanity, he supposed. You know you're insane but can't do a damned thing about it. ...was that what he meant? There was a strange hole where he should have remembered what fitted there.
As they got closer to the car park, the car wasn't there. He stared at the empty lot for a moment, and then turned to the two girls with a sigh. "..."
"D-did they take the car? Oh, what meanies!" muttered Yuffie, folding her arms and then looking to them both, "Well, I'm not from round here, what do we do?"
"Garden isn't too far," Tifa said, brushing hair from her eyes and grinning, "Unless your legs have fallen off, let's get walking."
"Walk!"
"Yep! Move it, come on... feel the burn!"
Fire spells burn, he thought darkly as he followed the two energetic girls up the spiral path towards the town...
They gathered in the foyer to receive what was a hearty pat on the head for behaving themselves (for the most part) from the Headmaster. Tifa stretched as she wandered in, grinning as per usual so it stretched that tribal design, "Finally made it back," she mocked, glancing to Yuffie who stumbled behind wearily, using the side of the garden to stay upright.
"Seriously," she murmured as they entered the reception.
Cloud folded his arms, thumbing the scar briefly as he followed them in and peered around at the faces. Vincent waved to him, but received only waves back from Dincht and Tilmitt, who had come back without a single misplaced fire spell, a miracle in the face of how annoyed he had been getting in the interim. Cloud Leonhart didn't wave.
He never waved.
"Mission complete," Jessie was saying, "I think you all did a pretty damn good job. You're all back safely with only minor cuts and abrasions, congratulations!"
"Although," Vincent said softly atop this, his tone apologetic, "We didn't have any knowledge of Galbadia seeking the communications tower at all, so we're sorry if any of that came across as being unprepared."
"We did receive word from the Dollet Dukedom, - Galbadia is to pull out as long as the tower remains operational. Curious stuff," the headmaster added finally. The Headmaster was a man who looked entirely out of place in his tank top, shirt, tie and slacks. His hair was as blond as Cloud's own and messy. To compliment this, he sported five o'clock stubble and supported a smoking habit that was strongly disapproved of by Dr Hojo. He was tall, if looking a little on the portly side, and when not forced to be in polite situations such as these, Cloud also knew that Headmaster Cid had a mouth that made the dorm toilets after 'Canteen Special' day look clean.
The fact he hadn't sworn yet was amusing to him, so he kept listening as the students dispersed a little, going to the rooms where they'd await notification of entry to SeeD or failure. He passed them, hearing Jessie chatter; "Well, as long as they're out of there..."
He moved towards the dorms, fully intending to get changed from these stupid uniforms when he saw Zack, leaning on the wall with his head tilted back. At his footsteps, he lowered his head and lifted black eyebrows with some surprise, "Leonhart."
"Almasy," he said coolly.
"Did you hear about the communication tower in Dollet? We would have been heroes if it weren't for that withdrawal order."
"You're wrong," It was Vincent and yet again, Cloud clamped his mouth over a scream. How did that creepy guy keep sneaking up behind him! Like some... vampire...
-"...creepy...goddamned vampire... talking about sin this and sin..."-
He shook his head, trying to listen in as his thoughts fragmented and wavered on the edge of some heart wrenching, shocking epiphany, and the kind of realisation that would re-align his thinking. Trepe was still talking smoothly, "You were only looking for a fight."
"I'm hurt, my dear instructor," Zack grinned, straightening up, "Those are rather cruel words for an aspiring student. A mediocre instructor like you could never understand-"
"Don't be so stuck on yourself," now Jessie came closer, hearing the ruckus and no doubt, catching the look of pain that crossed Vincent's pale face when Zack spoke, "You'll take all responsibility for leaving the designated area." She shared a small smile with Vincent, who then looked to Cloud.
Creepy, creepy staring... take a picture, it lasts longer.
"Isn't it the Captain's duty to take the best possible action?" Almasy continued, turning red with his rising frustration, the words riding up the volume scale.
"Zack," The soft spoken female tutor said firmly, "You'll never be a SeeD. Calling yourself a Captain is a joke."
Cloud blanched at the words as Jessie left; words he'd half hoped to hear because of that stinging rivalry always directed at him, for once giving him some upper hand, but the look of intense hatred that melted across Zack's face was unbearable too, in it's own way. Headmaster Cid approached from the foyer spoke briefly with Trepe who left after Jessie and came to stand close by Cloud and Zack, shaking his head. Cloud could hear the cursing under his breath from this distance and he half-smirked. Okay, perhaps he couldn't go certain amounts of time without blistering the air with curses.
"Zack, you will be disciplined for your irresponsible action," he said finally. Almasy hung his head, shaking from head to foot. Was he... crying? "You must follow orders during combat. But..." The voice of the elder blond softened, "I'm not entirely without sympathy. I don't want you all to become machines. I want you all to be able to think and act for yourselves. I am..."
"Headmaster."
Cloud peered over his shoulder, expression souring further if it were possible. A red robe clad man hovered behind them, covered in the robes so not an inch of skin was being flashed; he waved a hand in a rather officious way at the headmaster.
"You have some business in your office." A pause, then grudgingly he added, "...sir."
"There are so many issues at hand here," he sighed, leaving.
Then the tannoy blared into life: "Will all participants of today's Field exam please go to the second floor hallway... I repeat..."
He looked back from the headmaster and the crony who had dared to order him around, to Almasy who was staring aimlessly now into the vast trenches of water that flowed throughout Balamb. He was unsure what he should say.
Anything I say will be taken the wrong way anyway.
"..." he managed then shrugged and started walking to the lift, a bit surprised that Almasy roused himself and followed. The lift was already up, Dincht waiting there with an excited smile on her heart shaped face as she bounced from foot to foot in delight. Cloud wondered if she secretly injected herself with sugar...
Thankfully, preventing any conversation, the lift came back down and they filed inside. Tifa thumbed the up button and in silence, uncomfortable silence it might be noted, they waited for the lift to arrive at the second floor. As one, they moved for the door, Tifa getting through first with a backward 'nyah' pull of her eye, leaving him and Almasy stuck between the doors together, neither one wanting to budge an inch. He glared at her, and then winced, as Dincht who had failed to watch where she was going, drove herself straight into a potted plant. A swift elbow in front of Zack's face and he wriggled free, getting ahead of both of them and into the hallway. He suppressed the most childish urge to repeat Tifa's action back at her.
He never did childish things.
The hallway was surprisingly full and with some trepidation, he settled in a nervous posture by the fern as the other two slowly came in; Zack rubbing his cheekbone and Tifa spitting out leaves. Zack, of course, went directly to his little group of cronies, Reno and Rude, who both gave Cloud the evil eye.
He ignored them.
Like always.
Yuffie was there, looking uncharacteristically nervous as she trotted up and down the hallway, sometimes in synch with Tifa; sometimes she stopped and tried to straighten her hair. Other times, she even tried tallying up what points she may have accrued to that point, ending with a tug on her curled up hair and a moan in some northern dialect about messing up.
Ten minutes passed (luckily, he'd always been very good at waiting - the solitude of his own thoughts was enough entertainment) and finally, a red robe came wandering down the walkway to them all. As one, all SeeD hopefuls stood up straighter. Bunch of lapdogs, honestly.
Not like he was any better, though.
"Dincht, Tifa Dincht," he called.
"Oh, YEAH!" hollered the girl with the tribal tattoo and then with a joyful step, hurried towards the lift. Cloud sighed and waited.
"Tilmitt, Yuffie Tilmitt."
"Woohoo, count my lucky stars," chirped the young girl and fled after Tifa, who he could hear greet the smaller girl with a giggle of delight. For once, he was actually sort of hoping he'd messed up enough to evade their nonsensical whooping and giggles...
"Cloud... Cloud Leonhart from Squad B, please step forward."
Yeah. Lucky.
He sighed and followed the others, hearing the groans of disappointment behind him, eclipsed by the sudden grasping of his hand and the delighted smiles of the girls who helped him so kindly into the lift, followed by the red robe who assumed a cool, dignified air of frosty silence, doing nothing to dampen down either Tifa or Yuffie. He envied the man, how could he ignore them?
"I hope you are ready," is all he said, pressing the up button.
Ready?
-"Are you ready, Cloud?" there was a hand...-
"...Yeah," he said softly, but unsure to which voice he replied...
She was there. After the embarrassing reception by their previous classmates all clapping and the like for them, he'd hoped his dorm room would have been some solace for him - maybe spend time moving his stuff over to his new room or something that easy. But now... no such luck - the energiser bunny had him trapped.
Yuffie twirled, dressed in the official uniform of a SeeD, black with a vague blush of red in a necktie at their throats. Only her skirt seemed to need seriously feeding, it was malnourished and almost non existent under that jacket she wore. "Well, how do I look! Your uniform is in there, get changed!"
"...Why?"
"Inauguration Ball, silly," she chided, "They hold one each year when students graduate to SeeD! It's great, drink, dancing... and something you can't get out of by frowning and muttering 'whatever'," she mocked gently. He opened his mouth to say otherwise, and then scowled as he caught the familiar 'w' trying to escape.
"Fine," he muttered darkly and hurried inside to get changed.
"Hurry, hurry," she yelled in octaves that all seemed to scale higher and higher than the last. He hurried, if only to shut that banshee screeching up...
The ballroom was beautiful.
If he had a single artistic bone in his body, he might have been able to appreciate the hours spent arranging the flowers with tireless care, the weeks spent making sure each and every food was widely available to all guests of varying dietary requirements, let alone the finesse with which the wines had been chosen to accompany the palate of the eater who dined graciously at the expense of the Garden. The ceiling was high and arched in a dome, glittering gold supports with decorations hanging tastefully from them: seemingly carelessly strewn about with stars and moon designs, but a practised eye could tell that hours and hours of work had gone into making sure the effect was perfect. If he had been possessed of a practised eye, that is. The ballroom was furnished with tables, for the food in a long buffet style line, and smaller circular tables where chairs and benches were placed by for the dancing guests, delegates and royalty to soak their aching feet in respite from the whirl of music that fell lacklustre on his tone-deaf ear. The floor was marble, glittering with some hidden aura of delight that responded with a beautiful blush of the faintest gold whenever someone stepped upon it, leaving it looking as though beauty itself was captured in the grain of the granite, which he would have found words for. But, Cloud Leonhart was not a poet.
Cloud was none of these and glad of it, watching the awed smiles on the faces of those new SeeDs and friends admitted to this most prestigious of occasions. His eyes moved beyond the pretty art of the decorators to those attending: the Duke of Dollet, the Countess of Balamb, Galbadia, Trabia, smaller communities too countless to name, all whirling and enjoying the evening that celebrated him passing from beyond his fractured childhood into maturity.
He almost smiled.
Almost.
Cloud Leonhart was not a man for smiling either, so he hid it hastily into his wine, glancing to the side and up as footsteps approached him. It was Tifa, decked out in a similar uniform to the one Yuffie had, but with a slightly less embarrassing skirt, yet still flashing enough leg. Unlike Yuffie, she didn't wear the tradition knee boots of the SeeD members, but modified version with an extra plating of black down the shin that glittered. She wore her hair up tonight, probably (and most ruefully true of all) to prevent herself from head butting the buffet in a mad clumsy rush of insanity that she seemed prone to.
She thrust her hand at him, beaming that effortless, cheerful smile from ear to ear; energetic and rash as always. He, in turn, stared at the hand. Just stared at it, nothing more, the calloused fingertips from long hours of training, the knuckles that had small white band-aids on them to cover the blisters and grazes she'd received in the many fights in Dollet. Slowly, realising that he wasn't going to grasp her hand in turn and try to wrench her shoulder from the socket with energetic hand shaking, Tifa lowered her hand with a rather embarrassed blush, opting for: "Yo, Cloud!"
"..."
"Er," she scowled a little, clearly a little nonplussed by his quiet attitude. "Having a good time? Gotta be lonely stood by yourself, warming the column with your back."
"It's quiet, I appreciate that."
"Oh wow, a whole sentence, almost, sort of," she failed to take the heavy hint and swept on, "So, just a heads up. I escaped Yuffie earlier, she's going on about the Garden committee thing - you know?"
"Yeah."
"Seems she's thinking about taking it back up. Wants people to help and give up their time for concerts and crap like that, I dunno man... why can't she just ask the old fashioned way. Is the wine any good?"
The sudden shift in topic made him lift an eyebrow to peer at Tifa as she suddenly paled and backed off. A warm glow spread through him, she'd finally taken his hint and left him alone, rushing off with a stammered apology. Smirking, a vague tug at his lips, he took a swallow of his white wine.
"Cloooud-ie!"
And choked on it.
"Oh, you shouldn't try and inhale wine; it's not good for you."
He wiped his chin and glared balefully at the short transfer girl who'd made a SeeD, smiling at him, with... was that a clipboard in his hand? Even his one special night couldn't be hassle free, what a drag! "Thanks," he muttered.
"So, I'm looking for people to join the Garden committee, want to help out some time?"
"...Maybe."
Yuffie seemed to take this as a yes and began to scratch words down: did no one listen to him anymore? "Good, good. Say, you haven't seen Tifa have you, Cloudie?"
"It's Cloud." he growled and pointed in a fit of aggravation to where the fist-fighter had fled, "...and over there."
"Thanks, later," she chimed and skipped after Tifa. The sudden squawk of surprise from his right confirmed that he had been right to send her after the taller girl. He smirked into his wine; that was double revenge for not shutting up and calling him that stupid 'Cloudie'. It sounded like a girls name when the young seeming Trabian said it. Honestly!
He was so lost in thought that his eyes moved up towards the dance floor, glancing over the people gathered there. Then they seemed to fall, without conscious volition, onto the petite, slender figure of a girl in a white dress, with golden brown hair scooped back into a perfect French twist. She turned from looking up, down to meet his curious gaze with bright green eyes and he felt his stomach give a strange lurch, but instead she just smiled and held up a finger. What was that supposed to mean? 'I have a finger, nyehehe!'?
Vexed by this quandary, he turned his head a little and lifted his brows, and then to his alarm she was crossing the dance floor to stand before him, hands behind her back in a gesture that was painfully familiar all at once. She was still smiling so he flushed faintly and rubbed the back of his head, somewhat at a loss.
"Dance with me," She said, or commanded, he wasn't sure.
"I don't like dancing."
"I thought all SeeDs were trained how to dance," she muttered, a small line appearing between perfectly straight brows.
"...we do. I just don't like it."
"What, why? Is it because you don't like me?" To his surprise, she laughed and leaned forward so he was forced to press into the column - which effectively blocked his escape route, and waved a hand before his eyes, "Oooh spooky, you will like me, you -will- like me..." She pulled her hand down, "Did it work?"
"..."
"Guess not. Oh well."
Before his reactions could kick into gear (he blamed the wine) she was grasping his hand and leading him to the dance floor where he pulled yet another Dincht and half stumbled into her. She laughed and helped him put her hands onto her figure. He felt his neck growing hot, as if someone were breathing down there and knew he was blushing faintly.
Then they danced.
No: she danced, he pulled a series of manoeuvres that Tifa would be proud of... to his shame.
Once they bumped into a couple and he tried to apologise, but instead the mysterious girl was there, sticking her tongue out in protection of him. He looked at her, curiously and she just laughed and smiled back, wrinkling her nose up to the point of adorability that made his stomach feel heavier than ever.
But they danced on, and finally he caught onto her sweet and soft steps, moving with her in the dance this time instead of lagging woefully behind her like a clumsy shadow who didn't know the music at all. The world suddenly grew beautiful and he was surprised he hadn't seen the decorations, the glow of the floor or the music, sweet and delightful in his ears and his heart as they drew close to one another after an elegant spin, so close that he could hear her heart beating gently. She looked up to him, then up further as a series of bangs went off.
Fireworks, blooming in the sky.
"How pretty, like flowers," she murmured.
-"How pretty, like flowers," the girl said softly...-
He blinked at them, watching the fire on the night sky, lost with the voices that echoed, unable to separate one from the other. It was beautiful. It was... something distant that he knew, wasn't it? He felt her touch his shoulder and looked down.
"I'm sorry; I have to go speak to someone."
"But..."
"Congratulations," her voice was soft as the lights in the sky faded, darkening the room, she was pulling away from his arms, "On getting what you wanted."
He watched her go, unable to sort his emotions from the others, watching the sway of her hair and how she stepped and the glow that trailed after her. His heart seemed to hurt and he didn't know why. If he were a man who knew how to express himself, he would have called it something else than simply 'pain' or something unnamed, unneeded and completely unexpected. But it bloomed there like the fireworks nonetheless and stayed there, burning softly. If he were a man of prayer, he would have asked for guidance on this.
However...
Cloud Leonhart was a man without an angel to pray to.
He fell into bed, weary and needing a quick nap before meeting Vincent in the training area for Gods and demons only know what. The dreams were stronger now and he found himself confused by the people in them, the scenes that were so close to his reality but so different...
-"The ship, she's the Shera."
"Shera, eh?"
The pilot, Cid, grinned, blond hair, stubble, cigarette in his maw and goggles atop his head, "Of course, you know, she would have loved to have seen this baby!"
"I know."
A hand touched his shoulder and Tifa slid to his side, smiling compassionately, "So why don't we go flying in it then, eh? We'll see it all for her, everything. She would want that."
She shattered.
A mirror unseen, the truth unbroken, the words unspoken and the wings unfurled - all of it shattered into pieces with the heart, with the moment as she fell down into his arms with a soft murmur of his name. She was beautiful, but he consigned her to the water, the very thing she'd suffered nightmares of for weeks. Ashamed of himself, he couldn't let her go...
Because, wasn't she his angel?
...wasn't she... the one to save him?
With help unasked for, love untainted, a bond unconverted and a yearning unnamed.
He shattered.
...he shattered, because she went and he couldn't go with her.
"Ae...r...ith..."
Her voice answering, with the promise of all that was summer and warm, all that was life, "Cloud."