ps - I forgot to once again, thank Peek-chan for her awesome editing job. The horror of my comma usage or lack thereof... ;)
Chapter 71: Top of the Mountain
Tifa followed the path all the way to the top of the mountain and the exercise felt good after she'd been immobile for however long it had been. By the time she got to the top she was feeling cheerful – well, frankly, it was repressed giddiness. Somehow, all those crazy soaring emotions of her teenage years that she'd missed entirely in exchange for her father's sickness worsening and finding herself the only parent for both herself and her siblings had all come home to her now and were running amuck inside her heart. With them though came the uncertainty.
Cloud hadn't been there when she'd woken up. What if last night had just been… for last night? Or what if it was only when he was with her alone? He wasn't a demonstrative man and she usually appreciated that but how was she supposed to know how to act around him today? In the daylight? In front of their friends? How was she supposed to know if last night had been just for then or if he'd meant more?
The trip up the last bit of the mountain was as rugged on the inside of her heart as it was on the mountain path she had to pick her way up. Finally she locked her head down over her heart and gave it a firm shake. Why didn't she just mutilate a flower with her 'he loves me, he loves me not' worries? It would be faster. With a low sound at herself, she focused on what was ahead of her. She'd deal with Cloud – and whatever that meant – when she got to him.
There was an odd, round little house half set in the mountain's very top and its roof was a round dome of what Tifa could only guess was an observatory of some sort. She knocked on the door of the adobe house and heard a call from inside to let herself in. Stepping in to the pleasant cool of the house, her eyes adjusted to the dimmer interior after the blatant sunshine of outside and she pulled the door shut behind her. Her eyes moved over the room in quick brush, seeing others – but all that registered was Cloud. He was standing in the earthy curve of an archway into another room past the sitting room she was standing in. Sunshine hair and dark clothes and his eyes were the bluest blue a sky could hold and fixed on her.
Despite her best intentions, her lips curved for him shyly and she felt heat spread over her cheeks and hoped that the climb had already flushed them so it wouldn't be obvious. The edges of his own lips twitched as if he were fighting a full smile and she saw how young his eyes were before they softened. Thought – perhaps – she saw the same nerves in his eyes that she'd felt in her own stomach the walk up here.
It made her smile even wider and for just a moment, his own teeth showed in a goofy grin.
"oh – oh wow!" Aerith's voice broke the moment. "Oh – you guys finally – oh wow! Oh – Wow!" Tifa was just turning her head to look when her friend tackled her in a hug. "Oh, you two finally figured it out! Oh, wow! Yeah!" she cheered as she hugged Tifa hard again. "Zack said you never would but I knew it, I knew it," she was practically singing and Tifa hugged her back, feeling her cheeks flaming.
"Aerith," she begged and her friend just grinned and then flounced back over to the armchair she was surprisingly sharing with Zack. Or rather, Zack was sitting in the seat grinning like an idiot himself and Aerith went back to perch on the arm of it.
"'Bout freaking time!" Zack put in his two gil's worth of opinion. Tifa spread her fingers over her face.
"Please stop," she begged, torn between laughing and simply melting in embarrassment. Then she felt a hand close over her other one and knew, even before she lifted her head, that it was Cloud. His cheeks were the slightest bit pink as well but his eyes were full of light and blue.
"Ignore them," he tugged her back over to the corner he'd been in as she'd come in the door. "They're idiots."
Settling back against the wall he drew her close so that she could shelter against his side and his arm slipped gently around her waist though she felt the way his thumb slid over her hip before his hand settled loosely over her stomach. He nodded at someone Tifa hadn't even had time to notice and be embarrassed by yet and said:
"Go on."
"Oh, but this is much more interesting," the tiny round man said with a friendly smile. "My grandson told me all about your group. You must be the woman that rescued him along with Cloud here from Shinra. Hoo hoo hoo, I can't thank you enough or tell you what he means to the entire Canyon. He may very well be the last of his kind and more than that, I love him deeply."
"Tifa, this is Bugenhagen. He's in charge of the observatory here. He helped us keep you alive," only Tifa felt the way Cloud's hand tightened on her as he said it. "And he's the one I told you could hear the planet."
Tifa looked over into the pleased, wrinkled face and gave him a smile.
"I... 'thank you' sounds like such a small word."
"Well, we've both said it now so it will have to do," the old man smiled back and then turned his attention on everyone. "And I can't truly hear the planet. Not the way our Cetra here can." He gave Aerith a gentle smile. "But I can hear its pain and its joy. And, perhaps, I can help our Cetra hear its voice. If you'll come with me, I'll take you up to the observatory."
Everyone stood up and followed the old man deeper into his house, through the arch Cloud had been standing under, and Aerith made happy, cheerful noises as she passed Cloud and Tifa on the way out, green eyes alive with light. Zack just shook his head and followed her out. Tifa started to and Cloud's arm tightened around her to stop her.
"Wait," his voice was soft and she turned her head to look up at him in question. Zack went through the arch and then Cloud turned and swiftly lowered his head. His lips brushed Tifa's and he made a soft, throaty sound of relief and pleasure. It made her smile against his mouth and as if that were the breaking point for him, his mouth sealed more completely over hers. Tifa found herself pressed between his warmth and the sandstone wall behind her, his hands and forearms flat against its rough surface as he kissed her. A sound escaped her and she locked her hands behind her back to keep from wrapping them around him. It didn't work exactly however because as soon as the sound left her lips he stepped closer, lips still on hers. Kissing her as if he never had any intention of stopping and Tifa thought that sounded like a really good idea.
"Hey, kids!" It was Zack's voice as he stuck his head back into the room. "You're holding up the tour group. Psft," he blew out a breath as Cloud pulled his head back from Tifa, both of them breathing unsteady – and smiling like idiots at each other. "Teenagers, I swear," Zack announced as he disappeared through the arch again. Cloud tucked his lower lip into his mouth for a moment and then, one edge of his lips up and crooked, blue eyes alive with life and laughter, took Tifa's hand and led her into the other room.
Tifa could swear that Aerith was cackling.
It made her cheeks pink and yet she couldn't regret what had made her embarrassed at all. Bugenhagen was smiling cheerfully.
"My grandson did mention that the two of you tended to need time alone together after you'd been apart," he commented, eyes twinkling behind the wrinkles of his face. "Perhaps I should just show the Cetra and her friend now and come back for the two of you later?"
"No," Cloud shook his head and refused to let go of Tifa's hand despite the attention. He turned his head and looked at Tifa. Apparently deciding to take the fuel out of their friends' fire. "We've got the rest of the day to be alone together. We'll see your observatory now."
"Told you," Zack triumphed to Aerith and she gave his shoulder a push as she rolled her eyes at him. Tifa blinked. Was Aerith… flirting? With Zack?
"Hoo, hoo, hoo, this way then," Bugenhagen trundled out of the kitchen/dining room they'd found themselves in and through a much more solid and secure looking door. Aerith followed him and the rest of them fell in line behind her.
The room turned out to be little more than a round platform and once everyone was on it, it rose smoothly upward into the room with a round roof that was completely dark. Cloud's fingers wound comfortingly through hers and she gave him a smile in the dark she knew he could see.
"Stand still for a moment while I call things up," Bugenhagen's voice came in the dark.
"No sneaking kisses," Zack teased and Aerith piped up with a cheerful:
"Ignore him. Go ahead and kiss!"
Cloud apparently took that as permission because Tifa found herself pulled into his arms and his mouth was over hers again before she could decide whether to blush or try to hit one of her supposed 'friends'. And then both options, and the rest of her thought process, melted into nothing as Cloud's lips moved over hers. She melted too, hands tangling in the fabric of his shirt, body relaxing completely into his.
"That was a kissing sigh, wasn't it?" Zack asked and Aerith giggled.
'…oh…' Tifa thought. Cloud was a good kisser. A really good kisser. Especially since he seemed to be learning as he went and he was learning what turned her knees into jelly pretty quickly. With a last brush, Cloud's mouth left hers and a moment later she was aware that there was a dim light starting to slowly come up around them. As if Cloud's kisses hadn't been enough to take her breath away, what she saw spreading out around her would have been.
It was the night sky. The very same one she'd found so much pleasure and comfort in during their travels. Except there was no earth below her. It was all stars, all around her, as if she were a star herself. Planets whirled past her, comets and asteroids and Tifa curled her hands against Cloud's chest and simply stared wide-eyed at it all.
"It's beautiful," she finally managed, voice hushed and awed.
Bugenhagen nodded.
"That it is, my dear. That it most certainly is." He did something with his fingers in the empty air in front of him and slowly one of the planets left its orbit around a golden sun and came closer, growing as it neared.
"Gaia…" Aerith whispered and there was so much love in her voice that it made Tifa smile and she rested her head on Cloud's shoulder so she could watch her friend. Aerith stepped closer to the green and blue planet and reached out with one of her beautiful hands to brush lightly against its surface. Green tendrils curled out of it to brush over her fingers in strands.
"Yes," Bugenhagen agreed. "Gaia. Our world. Precious and special among all other planets because under its skin flows the Lifestream. Our planet has a soul and so it has a voice. Like the parts of our own body, each one is different and serves its own purpose and yet all of them, together, make one great creation." He drifted closer to the planet and gazed up at it as well as the strands of green began to slip out from the interior and expand to flow like rivers over the surface of the planet. Tifa watched in amazement, tucked safe in Cloud's arms.
"Once upon a time, long, long ago, everyone could hear the voice of the planet," Bugenhagen shook his head sadly, "but that time is gone. Now we stumble across its surface all of our lives, not even aware of its whispers. Except for you," he turned his head to look at Aerith, who was still standing entranced as the currents of green flowed over her palm. "You have heard it your whole life, haven't you?"
Aerith nodded.
"As long as I can remember. My mother always said it was a gift and that one day she'd teach me how to speak back. But she died before she could."
Tifa gave Cloud a gentle squeeze and then slipped out of his arms to walk over to stand behind Aerith. She put her arms around her friend, resting her chin over Aerith's shoulder. Aerith leaned back into her a little with a soft smile.
"It's okay," the brunette whispered. "It's just – it's always just on the edge of my ears. As if someone's calling me but they're too far away from me to really hear them. It's so – frustrating. I know it wants to tell me things but I can't understand it."
"Cosmo Canyon is a special place for Gaia," Bugenhagen stated calmly. "Legend has it that it is the center of the world and that here was the first place the Ancients touched the soul of the planet and heard its voice. Long before me, this observatory was built to watch the sky above but also to listen to the planet below. A giant funnel to concentrate the sounds of the planet and amplify them. Amplify them enough so that even someone like me can hear what the planet says." He turned toward Aerith.
"I can open that funnel's end, if you like. Let you hear what I hear when I come here but with your much more sensitive Cetra ears." He paused and his wrinkled face was serious. "I don't know what it will sound like to you though. In my life, there has never been an Ancient here to do this before." He drifted over to look at Aerith. "I'm not sure it's entirely safe for you, my dear."
Aerith smiled.
"Everyone else is so busy fighting monsters and Shinra and even Jenova and I've felt so useless because I can't really do any of that." She reached down and gently squeezed Tifa's hand and Tifa opened her fingers so they could link up that way. "This is finally something I can do to help." She nodded. "I want to hear what's been whispered and cried to me all of my life. I want to finally understand what it's saying." She pulled in a deep breath. "I want to know what my mother heard. Please," she looked at the old man. "Open it."
With a nod, Bugenhagen gestured with his hand again. And the green and gold and blue planet expanded until it seemed to swallow them all into its core.
