Warnings: It's getting violent, but it's not gory yet.
Chapter 37 : Fight the Power
Cloud didn't bother asking Vincent why the chronically insomniac gunman hadn't seen a two-metre warrior with long, silver hair leave their camp. Zack did. Vincent had been prowling the city. Something in the air had made his resident demon restless. He hadn't found anything but Chaos was still restless.
Cloud didn't care. Whatever Chaos did or didn't sense, it didn't change the fact that they needed to get moving. Now.
Under the Corporal's relentless urging—Zack called it nagging—they left the bulk of their supplies in the broken-down building. When Tseng's suggested they go up the hill to the temple-like structure above them, the SOLDIER backed Cloud when he insisted on going straight through the town into the dense, dimly luminous forest. What he didn't say, because Cloud already knew and nobody else needed to, was that Jenova's cells were calling to each other, pulling them to where their General had gone. It helped convince everyone when Vincent's gaze fixed on the path through the woods and barely flicked to the cliff face.
As they followed the steep trail, Cloud could barely resist the urge to pick the others up and fly with them to the top, or even to leave them behind but, whatever threat was tugging at him, it wasn't at panic level yet.
They broke through the overgrown path only to be confronted with a wide, sweet-smelling lake. In the dim lighting of the gloomy dell, its depth was impossible to gauge. It could've been ten centimetres or ten kilometres deep. Luckily, the path circled around the water and didn't try to go through it. It was easy to see their destination; it was another shell-shaped house of the Ancients, although this one was larger and taller than any they'd seen so far, with spines and long curly shoots.
"Village head's house?" Tseng asked, only slightly out of breath.
"It could be the temple, or the holy person's house," Tifa suggested.
Cloud stopped himself from shouting 'who gives a shit!' but it was close. There'd be time for them to explore the weird house later, now–now they had to save the General from whatever sacrifice he had in mind. Sacrifice. Zack's girlfriend, a real, live Cetra had harped on and on about sacrifice. About who could sacrifice although she never explained why they'd need to. Plus, this whole thing about sacrificing sounded so unlike the tales of the 'enlightened and mystical Ancients' that he had a hard time reconciling them. It just didn't seem to fit so he'd been half-inclined to forget about them. Now those cryptic conversations were replaying ominously in his mind and he wanted to hurry, hurry, hurry…
They entered the structure. From the others' reaction it was much better preserved than any they'd encountered the day before. There was no dust and no holes. It was in perfect condition, Tseng announced sounding surprised.
It also diffused Sephiroth's call so that it seemed to be coming from all over. Cloud wanted to scream.
"I'll go up, you go down," Zack instructed.
"Are you sure this is the right place," Tseng called up after the SOLDIER.
"Fuck yeah," he answered back. His voice reverberated in the rounded structure, making it sound deeper more powerful.
Cloud couldn't be bothered responding. Sephiroth wasn't here, but he was close—he had to be. "Look for a hidden door or secret passageway," he called up. The others yelled affirmatives.
Tifa and Tseng stayed close to the entrance but Vincent prowled through the halls, following the Corporal to the lower levels. "It's here," he announced, spooky eyes seeking, searching. Cloud looked at him in surprise—he hadn't heard the ex-Turk approach. Vincent didn't notice, or didn't care; he just kept searching for the passageway he knew existed. When he found it, he didn't even say 'a-ha' or anything, he just reached out a clawed fingertip and pressed a non-descript lump on the inner wall. An irregular section of the curved surface slid back and to the side.
"Zack!" Cloud shouted, "We found it." He stepped into the dark, the platform lit only by the soft light from the house. He peered over the edge He could dimly see a collection of structures, all glowing from some an unknown source. It was eerie and weird and just added to the gloom of the rest of it. He went to the other edge and found circular stairs twirling around and down into the gloomy depths.
Zack clattered up beside him, "I'm getting a real sense of déjà vu here," the blond muttered to his friend.
The First smiled in response. "It turned out okay that time, didn't it?" he joked absently as he peered over the edge. He whistled, "It's a long fucking way down."
"I don't like this, Zack. Something's going to happen, and soon," the Corporal swung his gaze to the group that had crowded onto the small platform.
Zack's gaze followed his. "Hey, Vinnie," he yelled, "can you fly?"
"It's Vincent, and no," he responded smoothly, "I can, however, run down those stairs as fast as you can fly down."
"Cool. Then this is what we'll do. I'll take Tseng. Cloud will take Tifa and we'll meet you down there."
"Agreed." They felt the tingle of a Haste materia casting. With a swirl of red, the spooky gunman was gone; a streak of dark colour against the dim light of the stairs.
"Shit," Zack said in awe. "That's pretty cool."
Cloud had no patience for his friend's quirks, not now. They needed to hurry, hurry, hurry... "Admire him later." With a thought his wings came out. "You good with this, Tifa?" he asked a little belatedly.
"No problem," she walked over to him and took hold, "I trust you."
Trust. Why hadn't the General trusted him enough to tell him what he'd planned?
He forced the thought away. Like Zack and his admiration of Vincent's speed, now wasn't the time. A couple running steps, a small jump and they were airborne. He didn't bother to follow the stairs but dived toward the glimmering structures he could see at the base. He fluffed his wings, or stretched them, or whatever it was called, to slow them down and make it more of a controlled descent rather than a suicidal fall. Despite the brakes, he could still hear Tifa whispering, 'OhmygodsOhmygodsOhmygods' in an endless litany of prayer. Her grip was so tight around his torso that Cloud had a little difficulty breathing. It was good thing the Nibelheimer wasn't fully enhanced or she might have broken something.
As they grew closer to the bottom, he could see that what he'd taken for shiny tile was actually glowing water; glowing because it was contaminated with the Lifestream. Over the centuries this place had existed the water vapour must have coated all the buildings and the stairs with mako-tainted moisture and that's why they glowed the way they did. It rose in an invisible mist he could feel against his skin. It called to him with a thousand voices, telling him of his mother, his father, and how he could be with the ones he had lost.
He silently told the voices to fuck off. Today, he was more concerned with the living than the dead.
Zack beat him to the platform or dock, whatever it was that lifted the buildings up out of the water. They landed close to the stairs and, as promised, Vincent was only steps behind them. He was a blur in motion, then still as a statue with only the billowing of his cloak to prove he'd been moving at all. The First opened his mouth to comment but Cloud was already leading the way around the waterfront and the group was forced to follow.
Where was the General?
He searched with his eyes but he couldn't see him. He searched with his body but the link that all Firsts felt with their General was hazy and blurred, as if the air was filled with static. The Lifestream was interfering with their connection, he thought suddenly, and knew he was right.
They were talking behind him. He didn't care; it wasn't important. He had to find Sephiroth.
He was half-tempted to fly up and search from the air when they turned the final curve of the pier and more structures appeared. It was like there'd been a hidden wall, a veil, keeping them from seeing what was right in front of them. Where there had been endless, glowing water rippling softly in some unfelt breeze, now there were columns and stepping stones that could take them over the water to a raised platform.
It was holy place, that platform; Cloud could feel the resonance of it in his bones. The way Zack pulled in his breath, the SOLDIER felt it too.
And there, in the middle of it, lit from beneath by the glow, was Sephiroth. His dark uniform gleamed silvery-grey, and his silver hair glowed icy green. He was praying; on his knees, hands clasped in front of him, head bowed. The General was praying and the air was alive with the power of it.
The Lifestream's purpose needs to be fixed. "Sir!" Cloud called out and he was running, flying, jumping; leaving the others behind, ignoring the dainty stones. He had to get to Sephiroth now!
"Spike!" Zack called out in protest, but the soldier was beyond hearing him. "Fuck. When'd he get so fast?" he muttered. He put his hands on his hips and glared after his friend.
"Don't worry," Tifa said putting a comforting hand on his arm as she jogged by him, "We'll catch up."
"I'm afraid that's not going to happen," said a new voice. "Mother wants to talk to her eldest sons."
A slim young man appeared from between the last few buildings. He had silver hair and green, cat-pupil eyes, very obviously one of the S-clones they'd talked about at the briefing. Zack pulled in a stunned breath. He'd been told the resemblance was uncanny but he could be looking at Sephiroth as a young man.
"It's a private conversation," the boy dipped his head and smiled at them, "and you're not invited." It was a taunting smile filled with promise and Zack thought that now he resembled Niisan. Except where Niisan had been sexy and spoiled, this clone looked sexy and insane. The image wasn't helped by the fancy, two-bladed sword that he carried. It looked shiny and very, very sharp.
Zack could hear the others shifting, getting into fighting position.
As close combat fighters, Tifa and Zack naturally stood in front. Tseng and Vincent stayed a couple metres behind and Zack could hear guns being withdrawn from holsters as the gunmen prepared their weapons.
"Quick frankly, kid, I don't give a shit what your mother wants," Zack said, still standing with his hands on his hips. Tseng had cocked his gun. Tifa had pulled on her combat gloves. He couldn't hear anything from Vincent, but then, he rarely could. He had to assume they were ready. "We'd like to get by," he smiled in a friendly fashion and bounced a little, getting ready to move.
The boy sneered and giggled, a disturbing combination, "You aren't listening. Mother wishes to speak to her sons. Alone."
Two more silver-haired youths appeared before them, seeming to coalesce out of the darkness. They were similar to the first, but not quite. One was stocky and muscled, with short hair, a chiselled face and an ugly sneer. The last one was slim, ethereal, and moved liked a ripple of water. They looked just as crazy as the first one.
The slim one smiled at them in a sleepily sensual—and insane—fashion. "You heard him; you don't get to go."
The large one grinned and crouched into a fighting posture, "Wanna play?" he asked Tifa, the only other unarmed fighter in the cavern. Tifa didn't say anything but everything about her said she was ready.
"Then let's play," said the small one with an oddly inviting dip of the head.
And then they charged.
Quick as thought, Zack had his Buster out and was blocking the boy's first blow. He swung in return and was parried. Steel rang on steel and the First grunted. The boy was fast, but Seph had been faster, and Zack had grown claws since then. He swung, controlled and fast, driving the boy back toward the water. The boy wasn't smiling now. He dropped to one knee to halt his backward movement. Zack readied Blast Wave and prepared to knock the kid right off the pier. Then he was hit from the side by Muscle Man and went flying.
The big guy smiled until he saw that Zack wasn't going to fall into the water. Zack's wings had come out and were pumping, keeping the First in the air. The big clone snarled in frustrated anger, eyes never leaving Zack's face. Without a word, Willow Boy turned and fired at Zack who was forced to dodge and block in the air.
Fuck, Zack thought, he was hurt. Nothing serious, just some bruising on his ribs, but enough to make his aerial manoeuvring rather painful. Time to come down, he decided—especially as The Kid was taking after Tifa with his sword. She was good, and she was getting in some decent hits, but the blade extended the clone's reach too much, and it was too fast, to allow her to do much more than retreat.
Vincent, ever aware of his lady, evened the odds. He shot the little shit with the Fire materia he'd attached to his gun. It didn't kill the boy—hardly damaged him in fact—but it did force the silver-haired menace back and away. With him standing still, both Vincent and Tseng could take aim at him. They started to unload their magazines and The Kid weaved his sword like a banner in the air, creating a shield that knocked most of their bullets aside.
Most… but not all.
The boy cried out and jerked. Liquid appeared on his shoulder; a thick silvery-blue that Zack thought might be their version of blood. He tossed down the Gravity his wings had prepared.
It might've been effective except Muscle Man punched the pier. A moving wall of stone and wood rippled out at unnatural speed. The Kid just smirked and jumped up and back, over the wave and beyond the reach of Zack's spell. The Gravity hit the flowing wood and water and flattened it to less than a quarter what it had started out as. It was now a wave, rather than a tsunami.
As it rippled through the dock, Tifa braced herself and kept her feet. Tseng braced himself but staggered and fell to one knee. Vincent also flipped out of the way of the wave but without the sneering bravado of the young clone. The gunman kept firing steadily, as if the interruption hadn't existed in his world. Muscle Man jerked as some of the bullets reached their target.
Zack came down on the youngest with all the power of Death Blow. It would've been perfect—The Kid's focus was on the red-cloaked gunman. It should have been perfect—except Willow Boy shot him in the gut and broke his concentration.
As he fell to the dock, his perception seemed to expand and stretch. They'd done something with their bullets he realized, treated them with something, because it did far more damage and took way longer to heal than it should have. He felt sluggish and slow. His reaction time was off and, instead of smoothly absorbing the impact—a motion built into a SOLDIER's muscle memory—he landed nearly straight-legged and jarred his bones all the way up to his teeth. It completed messed up his finishing move which became just a heavy slice: damaging, but recoverable. With a snarl worthy of Sephiroth, the boy forced Zack's blade up and away. Once again the sound of steel meeting steel echoed in the large space. This time Zack had to work to keep the upper hand.
Tifa had moved back in to engage Muscle Man. They exchanged rapid fire kicks and punches, using the surrounding buildings to bounce off of and build up power. She kicked him up in the air, jumped up, caught him then slammed him back down on the ground. A red flower bloomed on her arm. Willow Boy had shot her. She staggered back, dazed and off-balance and vulnerable. The largest of the silver-haired trio grinned in anticipation of his kill.
Vincent ran in and aimed a flurry of kicks at the big clone. Spinning kicks that were so fast they practically blurred. Tifa backed out of the fight zone and cast Cure on herself and Zack was thankful they'd decided to double up on that particular materia. A little shake and she was ready to go.
No longer content to stand back and shoot at them Willow Boy had also moved in. Tseng moved to counter.
Zack wasn't surprised to learn the Turk was trained in unarmed combat. He also wasn't surprised when the clone turned out to be better. Tseng went flying and hit the side of the building with a crunch before falling to the ground with a thud. Willow Boy pulled out his weapon and prepared to shoot the injured gunman. Vincent was faster. He spun and shot, knocking the gun from the slim clone's hand. He continued his spin and caught Muscle Man in the chest.
Tifa was back in the fight. While the big one was still staggered from Vincent's kick, she moved in with a series of lightning fast blows, fast enough for a SOLDIER Third Class. The big guy was forced back, away from the crowd. She was winning. Muscle Man was spending all his time defending, blood—that odd silvery-blue—was running from his nose and his mouth. There was no hint of triumph in Tifa's face, just grim determination. She was going to finish this, finish him, now.
Except Zack's opponent, the little menace, chose that moment to throw a blast of air, like a tornado, across the dock. He did it as casually as if he were throwing a ball. Not reassuring, Zack thought, materia was supposed to require concentration, a moment's thought at least. Another concern was how, in Ifrit's Hells, had the boy known his fellow clone was in trouble? That action was occurring behind him. Zack could see it, but he shouldn't've been able to. Unless he had eyes in the back of his head... given the other mutations Jenova cells had caused, it wasn't totally out of the question.
"You," the boy enunciated slowly, "Are an imbecile."
Shit!
He'd been doing so well, too. Zack smiled widely to cover his embarrassment then he twirled his huge sword in a flashy moved he'd been practicing for a decade and said, "Yeah, but I'm good looking so it's okay."
From the corner of his eye, he saw the tornado pick up the small fighter and fling her out and up. She hit the side of a building with enough force to stir up dust but, unlike Tseng, she was able to get her feet under her so that she essentially stood on the wall. She used her perch as a launching pad for a series of fancy, power moves that she used against her larger opponent. The air rang with the sound of her focussing shouts and his grunts when she impacted. She tossed him through a wall, wood went flying, the dock shivered. She paused to see if he was going to be getting back up. He did. Then he blurred to near invisibility, and punched her, punched through her, with the fancy rig he had strapped to his arm. Zack could see the electricity run through her body—fuck, he could practically feel it. She stiffened and jerked as the energy ran through her body, crying out helplessly.
Vincent was close enough that the charge jumped from her to him. It didn't cause near the damage to him as it had to her, but it did stun him enough that the slim, pretty clone was able to knock him back on his ass.
Zack caught all this in patches. His fight with the youngest one had taken a weird turn. The boy was surrounded with a nimbus that flickered around his body like a flame... except for being black. Zack would swing. His blade would be moving fast enough to cause a hissing sound in the air, and then it would encounter the black cloud. It wasn't like hitting a brick wall—Angeal's Buster could cut through most stonework—but, whatever it was, the stuff slowed down his swing until he could practically see the molecules moving backwards.
If that wasn't bad enough, The Kid had as many moves on him as Tifa, so Zack, who'd never been very good at hand-to-hand, spent a lot of time dodging the boy's feet. Or not quite managing to dodge, as the case may be.
And he was being shot again.
At least Tseng was back on his feet, weaving a bit, but still firing with precision. Unfortunately, he was wasting his bullets trying to get through The Kid's black cloud. Once they hit it, the SOLDIER would swear that he could see the shiny metal pellets moving through the smoke. Since the silver-haired youth just grinned, Zack doubted they were hurting him any.
All in all, they'd done some damage to the silver-haired nutcases but he was bleeding, Tifa was bleeding, and Tseng was hurt bad. Vincent was probably hurt as well but it was hard to tell with the ultra-stoic gunman.
In other words, they were losing.
He flicked a glance at the platform where Cloud and Seph were facing their own battle. Jenova had come, in all her monstrous glory. Whatever 'discussion' they'd had it hadn't turned out well. They were fighting, well, Cloud was, Seph was praying. He didn't know what the plan was but he trusted Sephiroth. And now he had to trust his little blond friend to keep them both alive.
"C'mon, Cloud," he whispered fiercely, "You can do it."
He arrived at the platform, sword out, ready to defend his lover, but Sephiroth was praying... or something. He was curled around a milky white ball of materia he had clutched in his hand. He was rocking slightly, but he made no sound. He didn't even look up when Cloud set down on the platform. He looked okay and it seemed safe—safe and quiet. Where was the danger, he wondered, and then he'd felt it. A pressure on his mind, a haze on his thoughts, a pull on his body.
...son...obey me...join me... It hurt! He dropped Heaven's Cloud and clutched his head. Shudders wracked his body, strong enough to nearly force him off his feet.
...join me...we will become... 'Who are you?' he shouted back at the voice in his head. It was neither male nor female, not soft but not harsh, slurred but clear... enticing and revolting.
...I am your mother, you are my son, together…meld with the planet, we will…new life form, a new existence...join... He was being crushed, squeezed. He couldn't draw breath, he couldn't... he couldn't...
...Do not fight me, my son, join me, be reborn with me...together we can rule... The voice was still faint, like he was hearing it through water, but it pushed at him, pressing and squeezing. He could feel... something bubbling inside him. It was Jenova, trying to activate the cells of hers that he carried, trying to make them replicate. That's why he felt like he had centipedes crawling inside his veins.
...kill the eldest, our betrayer, prove your loyalty...my son...slay the traitor... The instruction to kill her 'son', to kill Sephiroth, made the decision easy. "Fuck, no!" he screamed and he 'pushed' back. He was a Nibelheimer, a stubborn mountain boy, a soldier and a SOLDIER. He was Sephiroth's lover and his friend and he wasn't hurting him just when they'd found each other again. He'd come here to rescue him, and he'd be damned if he failed at this stage. He could block Jenova, he could. In fact, he probably was and that's why her voice sounded like it was coming from half the planet away.
...no, my son...think...we can be together... join me... She was panicking now. That was probably a good thing, he vaguely thought, but it was hard, so hard, to care because his veins felt like fire and his muscles like putty as his body fought back against the alien invader. But she wasn't his mother. She was just some alien virus that wanted to destroy the planet and he wouldn't listen to her.
...NO, you cannot resist! She was shouting at him, her rage caused by failure. He'd won!
He raised his head—when had he fallen to his knees?—to tell Sephiroth the news and saw the shadow encircling the General's trembling figure. It was getting bigger which meant... he looked up and saw a monstrosity descending from the inky darkness. It was Jenova but not as he'd pictured her from Zack's descriptions. She was big and thick for one thing... and dark red, with black stripes on the back of the writhing tentacles that she had instead of legs. The undersides were an ugly, virulent pink. Each tentacle ended in a thick black claw and she had them out. She had them aimed at Sephiroth. She was going to kill the General!
Pain forgotten, Cloud snatched up Heaven's Cloud and jumped straight at the creature. A line from an old space alien movie ran through his head and, since it was appropriate, he shouted it at her: "Get away from him, you BITCH!"
To give him the speed and force he'd need, he used his wings, not even aware of doing it, because his focus, his only purpose right now, was to push her away from the General's vulnerable form. She saw him coming of course. Tentacles lashed out at him and he slashed at them when it didn't interfere with his trajectory. She lifted elongated arms in front of her to act as a shield and Cloud crashed into her, driving her back, pushing her away. He was too close to use his sword so he punched her, trying to find a tender region, something like a diaphragm or the kidneys.
She hissed but it was from annoyance rather than injury.
She brought up a couple of her tentacles, squeezing them in between herself and Cloud. She flung him away like she was flicking off a bug. The sharp talons sliced into his thick belly guard, cutting through it and into him. He tumbled once before his wings brought him back under control. He hovered, a few metres from where Jenova, with rippling tentacles, was bringing herself back in line with the platform. She wouldn't land on Sephiroth—he'd managed that much—but Cloud quickly moved to place himself between her and his lover.
Sephiroth had uncurled from his hunched ball. Maybe, Cloud thought, he hadn't been the only one Jenova had been yelling at. Maybe his attack had forced her to take her attention off Sephiroth, to let him go. If that was the case, he had to keep her busy so that the General had time to complete whatever it was he was doing.
"Cloud," the voice was horrified and the Corporal turned to look over his shoulder at the General.
"You keep doing what you need to, Sir," he said, "I'll take care of Jenova." Deciding to take the offensive he threw Bolt at her. It wasn't Mastered but it was enough to cause her muscles to seize up. She screeched, inhuman and piercing, and dropped the remaining distance with a heavy thump he could feel through the solid stone of the platform. She spread ragged wings, whether in defiance or to keep her balance he couldn't tell. At least she was the width of the platform away from the General.
"It is foolish for you to resist me, my son. Together we could be so much more."
He'd expected some kind of hissing, snake-like voice, the kind all alien bad guys spoke in all the movies he'd seen. Jenova didn't talk like that. She had an accent—her vowels practically took over the words—but her voice was full and warm.
The rest of her looked just like an evil space creature should look. Zack had described a woman with alien overtones, now she looked like an alien with female overtones—and scars, she had lots of scars. Her long hair, of the same silver tone of Sephiroth's but thinner, covered many of them but he could see where tubes had been, where pieces were missing, where... things used to be. Her face was the most disturbing. It was definitely not what Zack had described. She had the pink-red eyes, but they were enormous in her thin face. They were shaped like a reptile's and had the same slit pupils as the man who been forced to carry her genes, but they lacked his humanity and his dry humour. Alien and cold. Her bottom jaw jutted out quite a bit and it wouldn't surprise Cloud if, when she opened her mouth, he saw snake-like fangs.
All this he took in as he stepped away and cast Cure on himself. If she did a lot of grandstanding he'd try to cast Barrier too. She didn't look like she'd be easy to defeat, not by himself, but he would if he had to.
"You can still become my favoured one," she suggested, her voice mild and kind, "Just kill the betrayer, let him rejoin his precious Lifestream, and we—you and I—will travel to the Promised Land." She extended one long arm, oddly articulated, and with fingers that were more claw than flesh. If she meant the gesture to be inviting, it failed.
"I don't care about the Promised Land. This world is precious to me and I'm not going to let you destroy it," he practically shouted. He rushed forward, sword raised to attack. In response she cast a wave of blue flame. He wasn't even close and he could feel its heat—it was unnaturally cold. It was also over a metre high and travelling over the platform at enormous speed. It was shrinking, but it wasn't shrinking fast enough.
He jumped into the air and hovered while the deadly magic hit the spot he'd been. At the rate it was travelling it would easily hit the General. Desperately, he cast Barrier around his lover. He was slow, too slow; he needed time to make it solid...
He'd just barely finished the cast when the blue flame, just under half as high as when she'd thrown it, licked up and around the invisible wall like hungry spirits; but Sephiroth was untouched. Cloud resisted the impulse to close his eyes in grateful thanks. Instead, the Corporal cast another Bolt at the alien creature, hoping to stun her again so he could get close. It worked and he charged in.
The Status Strike materia in his sword finally picked up on the Poisona he wore in his bracer and the blade dripped a noxious red-brown ichor. When he cut a long slashing line up one of her arms, the poison clung to the wound and entered her system.
Her screech of rage was deafening.
"Why?" she wailed, "I will give you the world—the stars. We will sail the darkness of the cosmos with this planet as our vessel and be as Gods once again!"
"And what about this planet?" he yelled back, using his wings without thought to circle around her, cutting her, infecting her. He was intent on defending the General, on killing the alien creature. He was barely listening to what she said. All the talking was just a way to distract her, keep her busy, while the toxins did their work. It was too fucking slow! He silently raged. Now he knew why Zack said he never used Poisona if he could help it.
Her tentacles rippled and she turned to face him. "Sacrifices must be made," she said reasonably before lashing out with her large, misshapen wing. Cloud was forced to retreat. Not just from her attack but because what she'd said had snagged in his mind.
Sacrifices? He frowned. Sacrifices... Suddenly he understood the cryptic message Zack's girlfriend had given him. He knew what Sephiroth had planned to do, and he knew what he had to do to save him.
Now he just had to do it...