Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, its characters or storyline. This story is mine, as are the OCs. Delayed chapter is delayed because school hates me. Ah well. Here we are. Some language in this chapter, because Cid and Banks. Enjoy!
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140 – Right There
"This is my fault." Cloud mumbled. "I should have stopped you."
Aerith didn't respond, hadn't responded since he'd come to see her. She continued to lay there, comatose, the heart monitor beeping steadily in the quiet hospital room.
Cloud inhaled sharply and lifted a hand, pushing his thumb and index finger against his eyelids. "I couldn't have stopped you. You knew…you knew it was dangerous…"
He clasped his hands together against his lips, looking over his knuckles at her. She was pale, and her pallor made the burns on her hands and arms stand out more prominently. The doctors weren't sure what to call it. It was like she had suffered a minor stroke or a heart attack; the symptoms were there, but she was too young for that, too healthy for that. She was currently stable, but they weren't sure when she would wake up, or if she would wake up.
"What were you doing?" He asked quietly, watching her unconscious face. "Please…open your eyes and tell me…because I don't—"
His voice gave out, and he cleared his throat, elbows on his knees as he leaned forward in his seat. He felt helpless. He felt useless. He didn't know how to fix this. If he had spoken to her more earnestly about how he felt about her research…It had never felt right to him…Maybe he could have convinced her to drop her undercurrent theory.
Even as that thought occurred to him, he almost laughed it away. Once Aerith put her mind to something, there was no talking her out of it. If anyone was going to get to the bottom of the undercurrent in Radiant Garden, it was his Aerith. Yet, instead of revelation, her experiment had blown a hole in the inner chamber of the old castle ruins, blasted a crack that reached through the floor to a section of the foundation that no one could safely reach to analyze, and resulted in giving her internal injuries and a serious enough head trauma that she had been unconscious for over a week. If he had been there…If she had been comfortable enough to ask him to go with her…If he had trusted her enough…
"Please…" He murmured. "Please wake up."
"Hey."
The voice made him snap his head up, but Aerith hadn't stirred. Instead, he turned his head to see Tifa standing in the doorway to the hospital room, a soft look on her face. Cloud released the breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding and glanced away from her, back to Aerith.
Tifa moved inside, closing the door after herself, and slowly stepped over to where Cloud was sitting, on the small couch against the wall. She didn't say anything beyond her one-word greeting, and Cloud was grateful for that. He didn't trust his voice to survive a conversation. He'd had enough conversations with the doctors. Since the accident, he hadn't spoken to anybody who wasn't a medical professional aside from Leon, who only called him to let him know that he was taking over Cloud's departmental duties so he could be with Aerith and that Yuffie was handling Aerith's department.
Tifa stood for a moment, looking at Aerith, before sinking down to sit next to Cloud. Her warmth at his right side broke through the walls of cold composure that he'd carefully built up since taking up this vigil at Aerith's bedside. He'd lost track of how long he'd been sitting in this room. He hadn't slept or eaten since…when? It didn't matter. None of it mattered. How could he bother with trivial things like that when the only person that mattered was in a coma in front of him? But Tifa's presence had knocked him back, and his body was starting to remind him why those things weren't so trivial.
Her right hand reached over to where his right hand was over his knee. She grasped his hand and gave it a light squeeze, while her left arm hooked around his back, pulling him gently close. He grimaced, squeezing her hand in return, though he couldn't look at her, didn't dare.
"Shh." Tifa murmured, leaning closer to him.
Cloud thought about moving away from her. He didn't need to be coddled. She was shushing him for no reason. He wasn't doing anything. He thought about withdrawing from her touch, but the idea of being alone again was painful, so he remained where he was.
"Shh." She murmured again, her thumb rubbing against his. "It's okay. This wasn't your fault. Don't you dare think it was." Her voice was tender and carried a sincere maternal tone.
It broke those cold walls of composure.
Cloud dropped his head, his shoulders hunching, as though to ward off how much everything hurt in that moment, how nauseatingly helpless he felt. His chest constricted and his throat involuntarily spasmed, causing him to choke once for air. He inhaled with a shudder.
"Okay." Tifa whispered, a gentle acknowledgement, and moved her hand from his to wrap around his chest, drawing him to her. "Okay."
Cloud could do little at that point but ragdoll into her embrace. His face found the crook of her neck, and Tifa held him tightly with both arms. No tears came; Cloud wasn't sure his body was capable of tears anymore. He had never tried to regain that, either, until that moment. It would have been a relief. Instead, all of that fear and pain was left caged in his chest, raging and burning until his ribs ached and it hurt to breathe.
He was exhausted, but fear was keeping him distracted. He wasn't used to this, to waiting. He wasn't built for patience and chance. Unfortunately, all he could do right then was be patient, wait, and hope chance was on Aerith's side.
"I can't—" He choked.
"Yes you can." Tifa sounded like steel and silk. "You're okay. She'll be okay."
He lost track of time again, but this time, there was comfort in his friend's arms.
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141 – Shriek
"I don't know if it's fucking dark outside, sir. This is Traverse Town. It's always fucking dark." Major Valerie Banks's voice barked out of the communicator.
Cid gritted his teeth. "Check the fucking stars, Banks. Are you sure?"
The large screen in the underground monitoring room showed the First District of Traverse Town from the vantage point of the small camera mounted on the soldier's microphone headpiece. It was jostling slightly as she walked down the central steps and glanced toward the doors to the Third District. She abruptly looked upward, and the pixels blurred for a moment before clearing into a bog of bland darkness.
"Nothing." Her voice came again. "No stars, no clouds, nothing."
Cid clenched his jaw. An hour earlier, on their way back from the investigation of the blackout event in the Sun Kingdom, Banks's team had been diverted from their return to Radiant Garden by a distress call that the Alliance had received from Traverse Town. It was the same set of incidents: worldwide loss of consciousness, no memory of what had happened, and now a darkness had settled over the world, blotting out the sky.
On either side of him, Merlin and Leon were both staring at the video feed also, both frowning. Merlin was stroking his beard, and Leon had his arms folded over his chest.
"Any injuries?" Leon asked into the communicator built into the control panel.
"A few bruises and sprains from the collapse, but nothing serious." Banks replied. "Everybody is accounted for and there hasn't been a panic yet, though it isn't exactly nice sitting on our hands here. What the fuck is going on, sir?"
"Damned if I know." Cid grunted.
Merlin piped up, "And no one remembers how or why they suddenly fainted?"
Banks turned and walked toward the tavern in the First District, Beverly's bar; Cid grimaced. There was a large crowd gathered there, nursing drinks and looking puzzled as they tried to comprehend what had just happened to them.
"Nobody that I've talked to." Banks said. "Beverly is looking through her security camera feed now, but it doesn't look promising."
She was maneuvering through the people and navigating toward the back room, where the bar's office was. Slipping into the office, Banks's camera showed the cluttered interior of the room, along with Beverly standing over the rickety metal desk, leaning over her computer to access the video files. Cid was relieved to see that she was okay, aside from a rising bruise on her forehead and a hastily bandaged cut on her forearm: probably from collapsing behind the bar and landing on broken glass.
Beverly looked up as Banks entered, her gaze shifting slightly to look directly into the camera on Banks's headset. "It's completely fried."
"What?" Banks got closer. "Define fried."
She circled around to look at the computer, and Cid and the others got a good look at the video feed. It was completely static, save for a few blips of jagged black that would ripple across the screen.
"Well shit." Banks muttered.
"There's something else." Beverly remarked, again looking at Banks and then directly into the camera. "Who am I talking to—"
"Radiant Garden recon base." Banks answered curtly. "What something else?"
Beverly blinked and shifted. "The video is useless, but the audio picked up on something…strange. Listen."
She tugged the headphone cord out of the jack on the computer and turned up the volume. As the static played across the screen, the audio kicked in.
A low, guttural groan was clawing out of the speakers. It was inorganic and feral, and on either side of Cid, Leon and Merlin stiffened. Cid narrowed his eyes, recognizing that noise as the same one that had come from the missing satellite feed. The groan ballooned across the air of the underground chamber, and the other soldiers working at their stations glanced up.
"What the—" Banks started.
She fell silent as the groan abruptly shot up several octaves. Like nails on a chalkboard, the noise screeched out of the feed and everyone flinched. Cid felt Leon glance at him, but Cid continued to stare at the main monitor. The static on the screen rippled to blackness as the screech bluntly ended.
On the screen, Beverly looked wide eyed to Banks. "What was that?"
Banks hesitated before asking, "Sir?"
Cid straightened, "I'm coming to Traverse Town to investigate this myself."
He moved away from the panel, and Leon took his place, asking Banks and Beverly additional questions. Merlin followed after Cid.
"It's getting closer." The old sorcerer chimed.
"First the satellite on the perimeter goes missing, then the Sun Kingdom on the outer edge of the Alliance, and now Traverse Town…" Cid snorted ruefully as they both left the chamber. "Whatever this thing is, it's moving. These aren't isolated incidents anymore. It's moving closer to the heart of the Alliance."
And they still had no idea what 'it' even was.
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142 – First Fight
Tabaeus opened the door to leave Merlin's house just as Jake was lifting his hand to knock. She started slightly in surprise, but Jake had known that she was there, and he reacted immediately, lowering his hand from knocking and instead pointing directly at her.
"You never called me." He said plainly. "You freaked me out, and you basically shoved me out the door, and you said that you'd call after you calmed down, but you didn't."
Tabaeus winced, her expression guilty. "I know…I'm sorry."
"No." Jake waved his pointing finger. "I was worried about you, but I couldn't call you myself, because you flip out every time I try to show you concern. I'm not good at playing distant, Tabaeus, and when you freak out, I freak out. So…you don't get to be angry with me for hunting you down to talk about this. I get to be angry that you blew me off. So this is me," He deliberately raised his voice, but his heart wasn't in it. "BEING ANGRY."
Tabaeus regarded him with a deadpan expression. "Are you done?"
"NO." Jake continued to talk loudly, but there was no heat behind it. "I'M GOING TO KEEP TALKING LIKE THIS, BECAUSE I'M UPSET WITH YOU. I MIGHT EVEN WAVE MY ARMS A LITTLE." He made a few vague gestures that would look furious from afar, but the movements were lackluster and his expression remained flat.
Tabaeus swallowed. "All right, come in. Let's talk."
Merlin's house was empty when Jake followed her inside. He had spent all day psyching himself for this. Anger wasn't in his nature; it was really hard for him to hold grudges and stay mad, especially at Tabaeus. But she couldn't keep bolting every time they took a step forward in their relationship. Or if she wanted to slow things down, she had to tell him that, not just run away and hope he'd forget about it.
He turned to face her as she closed the door, but neither of them spoke. She was waiting for him to start. He inhaled, paused, exhaled, and took another breath to start.
"I'm awesome." He said angrily. "Maybe not Leonhart Awesome, but I'm a catch, okay?" His shoulders slumped. "But I can't keep trying to prove myself to you, Tabs. Either you want to be with me by now or you don't."
Her eyes widened, "Of course I want to be with you—"
"News to me." Jake warbled. "Every time we start to get closer, or we start to move into more intimate territory, you flip out and push me away. I just want to know why." She looked defensive, but he continued. "You're fighting in a war against Darkness. You battle Heartless on the weekends, and you shoot guns and use knives and stuff…You're not telling me that this—" he gestured to the air between the two of them, "—scares you?"
"Of course it scares me." She said haughtily. "I'm good at fighting and guns and knives. I'm not good with feelings. And you are ALL feelings, Jake. And that's great, that's awesome, really, but the last time I let myself get close to someone—"
"—was in Stasis, right?" Jake cut in.
"—it didn't end well." She spoke over him.
Silence hung thick in the room after that, and Tabaeus's resigned shrug confirmed it.
Jake wasn't a member of the Alliance, he wasn't a soldier; he was a civilian in Radiant Garden, the military epicenter of the Alliance. That meant he was more aware of Allied matters than civilians on other worlds, but there were certain matters that the Alliance kept very discreet. The Project Stasis incident was one of them; any and all information about the incident three years ago was on complete lockdown. The press had gotten a hold of some basic information, but the Alliance had provided little explanation. After the bombing of Allied headquarters three years ago, Tabaeus, Leon, Tifa, Sora, and Kairi had been comatose for roughly a week.
The bombing had been masterminded by a scientist who had been obsessed with the effect of darkness on the human heart. Apparently the five of them had been part of some wacko experiment of his as a side effect of the bombing. Jake wasn't sure of the details, but things had gotten hairy; something about them experiencing an alternate reality simulation while in their comas, some kind of shared hysteria. All he knew for sure was that before the bombing, Leon and Tifa had been casual friends, Sora had been elbow deep in the war effort, Kairi had been at the forefront of the Seven Princesses of Heart's efforts to sustain peace, and Tabaeus had been a new recruit to Leon's department.
After coming out of Stasis, Leon and Tifa were inseparable, Sora and Kairi had both been immediately relieved of duties and sent home to Destiny Islands, and Tabaeus had become Leon's right hand soldier. Jake drew a slow breath and realized she was staring at him. Why did she always look like she was waiting to be rejected? He grimaced.
"Do you trust me?" He asked carefully.
She blinked, her response slow, "Yes."
He slowly lifted his hands, cupping them around her shoulders. "Then talk to me. I'm not going anywhere. Don't shut me out. I trusted you with the Cinnamon Roll Story. Nothing you ever tell me could be worse than that."
She snorted and glanced at her feet before meeting his eyes again, her expression less burdened. "That's true."
"Hey." He folded his arms around her, pulling her in for a hug. "We're okay."
She returned the embrace, saying lightly. "You're not very good at being angry."
"Well, you're not very good at being happy." He replied. "We balance each other out."
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Preview for next week: "Nowhere, cage, chasm, bomb: do those words mean anything to you?"