Chapter XXII
Take My Reality
"And miss the explosion? No way." - Barret
The magic shrieked from John like a lightning spawned prairie fire. He prayed his head would stay on straight. The whole world had become a sea of white: white hot magic that sought out materia in a forest of arcing energy. Carmine's cursing rose to a shriek before cutting off, as if severed by a knife.
He himself fell flat on his back. Alive though, dammit. The smoke cleared to reveal Carmine, Stu, and Portek lying in a tangled heap, Juria's materia orbs spilling across the ground like lost marbles.
"Ha!" He started to rise but his muscles became jelly.
Cloud sullenly retrieved Yuffie's weapon, sheathing his own. Juria scooped loose orbs into a sack. John pointed at Carmine.
"Get that - whoa!" Her armlet detached and whipped at him like a drunken Frisbee. John actually caught it.
"Telekinesis finally worked!"
The Highwind's ladder drifted toward them. Cloud healed Nanaki and sent him scampering up the rope. Vincent drifted back down. Concern flooded his usually unreadable face. All went quiet; only the snapping towers echoed across the fog drenched night. Aeris hurried down after Vincent, tears streaming down her face. John's heart burned hot. Aeris walked over and said something to Cloud. He grabbed her in a frantic embrace.
"Looks bad," Zinnia softly said.
"If only - "
"Don't start that, John. Please. It's pointless."
Cloud reached down, picked up Carmine's body by the legs and, hammer-throw style, hurled it at the truck. She struck hard and lay with a limp thud. Drawing his sword, Cloud walked to Stu and decapitated the body.
Aeris screamed. Juria darted in to grab Cloud's sword arm. Whoa - that nun had some nerve.
"Please, Cloud. Would Tifa want you to act like that?"
The blond warrior sagged like a burlap sack. He clasped his head with his free hand and leaned against the nun.
"I never," he said, "I never got the chance to tell her," John overheard. "I always lost my nerve."
Up above, a trio of Nanaki, Barret and Yuffie peered stone-faced over the side of the lower deck. Cait Sith joined them, holding his wobbling to a minimum. Aeris glanced in John's direction, pleading in her eyes.
"Can you do anything to help?"
John walked to her. Suddenly, Cid's voice called out on a loudspeaker.
"Folks, we have more trouble."
Across the clearing stood Raine, swathed in her cloak of mist, staring at them with blankness on her face. No anger, no sorrow, no pain: all life departed, her eyes like twin holes drilled through frozen space. John regarded the drifting mists. She must have watched them for some time, perhaps the whole battle. She stood, not even blinking. John took a step toward her. She stepped toward him. He stepped again. So did she.
John's mind raced. Cloud and Vincent, the least battle weary, arrayed themselves in a defensive front. John heard Vincent mutter something about Lucrecia.
"You going to fight her with materia?" John asked.
"Of course we use materia," Cloud said.
"Remember that Aire Tam Storm trick I used on Carmine? Guess where I picked it up?"
Cloud looked him, color draining from his face.
"All of you," John said. "Up the ladder. Now."
"But - "
"Hurry!"
"Rumor has it," Vincent said, "Professor Gast developed an armlet that would protect the wearer against an Aire Tam Storm attack."
"Good for him. Scram!"
"Sadly, its last known location was on Shinra's Gelnika plane before it sank in the great ocean.
"Pity," Juria said. "The Gelnika also carried the remote attack codes for the Highwind missile pods, as well as Wutai's ceremonial artifact, the Conformer."
"For God's sake people!"
The group finally started up the ladder. Except for Vincent, who floated.
Juria, clinging to the bottom rung, said, "We have a saying in Wutai. If we had some prunes, we could have prunes and rice if we had some rice."
"We Jenova also have a saying. Do you want Tifa to live or not?"
"So you do have a plan."
"If he does," Zinnia said, "You had best be out of range."
John looked at Raine, at the cool blue eyes, windows into her soulless body. Raine took another step forward. John could feel the cold sucking about her, an arctic vacuum in search of heat. Juria finally scaled the ladder. John hopped on and climbed a few rungs, motioning for Raine to close in. She did. He climbed more rungs, feeling the rope's tension as Raine seized the bottom. The towers began to whistle, and not like a friendly choo-choo.
"Hope she follows." John raced up the final length. Barret hauled him aboard.
"Cid," Barret called. "All aboard."
Almost. Glancing over the edge, John could see the swirl of white half way up the ladder, even when it swung out of view as the Highwind banked hard to flee the scene. He clung to the rail. The ladder swung back out as Cid turned to port; Raine had moved to within four rungs of the top.
"I'm gonna move us away," Cid's voice said. "Take cover."
"And miss the explosion?" Barret said. "No way."
"You can see it from the bridge, knot-head. Get up here. All of you."
John considered lashing himself to the railing but fell in line behind Barret, who held the door for the rest of the group.
"Look kid. I'm sorry for . . ."
"I know. Feel guilty later. When you blame me for not saving Tifa."
Raine grasped the railing and pulled herself over.
"Not much time. We need to get to the bridge before Vinnie shoots me with one of his bloody darts."
They stood in a circle on the bridge as Cid kept the towers in view off the port side. A pall hung over the group. Tifa lay on a blanket on the floor, Aeris crouched over her, tears running down her face. Cloud lay down his sword and knelt at her other side. "Tifa." He gathered the young woman to his chest and shuddered. "My Tifa. My, my Tifa."
John remained at the top of the deck stairs, noting the drifting tendrils of fog. Soon Raine appeared at the bottom, where she stood, unmoving.
Cloud remained oblivious, rocking Tifa and crying.
"How far he's come," Aeris said softly. "Yet, look what it has cost him. And us." She looked at John, her eyes sad yet questioning.
John glanced at Raine. "Cloud?" he said, raising a finger as if forcing hope. "Perhaps - "
"No!" Zinnia cut him off.
"Let me talk."
"I already told you, John. If you try to donate your life force to Tifa, you will deposit me in her body. Cloud doesn't want the love of his life infested with the soul of a banshee."
Cloud blinked. Aeris almost smiled.
"She is the love of your life, is she not?"
John caught the hint of a nod. He suspected Aeris did, too.
"Zinnia, I don't mean Tifa. I mean, her."
"Raine? The shade?"
"Why not? She's a revenant who follows me around looking for a soul. Guess what, I have one to spare. Yours. Once you are out I can try to help Tifa."
"But your life force will be so weak. The attempt could kill you."
"Same can be said for falling off an airplane." John cut his eyes to Barret. "Look. Tifa saved my life by taking on Carmine. I didn't hear her complain."
"I'm warning you - "
"Cloud has some Jenova in him. Perhaps he can help."
"Yes." Cloud stood, Tifa in arms. "Tell me what to do. I don't understand how this works but I'll try anything. You did bring back Bugenhagen. And Aeris."
"One thing at a time. Vincent has a lot of Jenova. Although we might get back a Tifa who flaps around like a bat."
"While I would advise against it," Vincent said, "I will help."
"Let's do it. Just, hold onto Tifa until I am ready. And pray. You never know who might be listening."
Juria and Aeris moved to his sides. Vincent nearby, close enough to snatch Aeris away if the plan went wheels up. He also kept his trank gun visible.
"Cloud, one reunion coming up. All of you, if I explode, duck. You don't want to be picking my intestines out of your hair." John hugged Aeris. "Wish me luck."
She kissed him on the forehead. He felt himself blush. Good, he thought. The more alive he felt, the better their chances.
Approaching Raine, he triggered his Mist materia. The white cloak of fog shut out the clanking distractions, as well as drawing Raine to him. She moved like the ghost she had become, stepping without sound. Cold bored in, air snapping with ice. Reaching out, he felt Zinnia's panic but pressed on, planting his feet on the bottom step. "Mistake!" his mind screamed. He flinched, balking at a vision of Zinnia ripping from his body in screaming shreds. Somewhere back in reality he felt Aeris holding him. He also saw the lifeless form of Tifa floating in Cloud's arms, her long black hair drifting in the swirling mist as if she had begun sinking in a frosty lagoon. As Aeris had . . . Back on mission. Zinnia had ceased her struggle. As one they reached out and grasped Raine by the arms.
No dazzling flash, no leaden plunge into Hell. Instead, he felt a vague shaking, a fall into a box a bit too small. A tug, as if between two magnets, stretched his spirit like taffy. Reality thinned around him. Sounds retreated. Zinnia's spirit entwined with his, two spindles of glowing strands woven into beautiful patterns, layers within layers of John and Zinnia threads, but the patterns began to distort, to strain, their combined soul draping over a metal wedge. The pain came like an anvil dropping on his stomach. Flesh tore. Skin and bones ripped apart, agony flaming in every cell -
Zinnia's scream. "My God, what is happening to us!"
"John, you're burning up!" Aeris, her cool hands gripped his neck. The pain dulled. John clutched at her. He needed an anchor. Anything to escape the dump truck driving across his kidneys.
"Slow down. You two are tangled in a knot. I can feel it."
A knot. John pondered. He felt Zinnia do the same. Well, yea. They had occupied the same body long enough that their souls had begun to merge. One couldn't simply rip them apart any more than one could pull apart conjoined twins. Relax? How? Amidst this deluge of pain? As for time, they had so little of it. Let go; loosen the grip. How hopeless. What a fool he had become, inventing his clever plan. Did he think he could drop Zinnia into Raine like slipping a rent check into a mail slot? Better to have remembered about that damned Aire Tam Storm before Carmine had bludgeoned Tifa in the first place.
"Look at me."
A girlish form, an outline at least.
John thought he saw Aeris or even Ifalna, his spirit pen pal. Then he saw the long silky hair, the warm copper eyes, the bright friendly smile. Tifa, even this silent afterimage, provided the touchstone to center his mind.
"That's right. Untwist. Unwind. Unmerge."
Eyes on the goal. John/Zinnia finally relaxed. Like a cramped handshake with thousands of fingers, they unclenched their grip, one finger at a time. Slide free like loose flesh on a - no, watch those images - slick with oil, slide free, bright strands, all unlinking from their partners, like chromosomes pulling away in a dividing cell. Soul mitosis? Did it have the same stages? Prophase, metaphase, anaphase, telophase? He never could remember them all.
He slid out, slid aside, watching the Zinnia part of him also slide loose. Sudden loss stuck him, though he told himself their shared memories should remain, probably with many parts of each one in the other. That thought pleased him. Zinnia, cranky and bossy, yes. But he really liked her. Still, like an exhausted host after the holidays, he wanted his body once more to oneself. With a final sigh, they slipped fully apart, two wet locks with all tumblers finally clicking open.
John dropped into his body like a stone into Jello. He stood, swayed, vowing to stay on his feet. He still had a job to do, and he realized with a dash of smugness that his first instinct had proven correct. Had he tried to revive Tifa the way he did Bugenhagen, he would have had no danger of depositing Zinnia in Tifa's body. No way could that painful hell on wheels ordeal happen by accident. In fact, a new danger would have emerged: their two souls would have fully melded into one. But he would have risked it to save Tifa. Now, weak as a feather, he had no clue how to pull it off.
Steadied by Aeris, he shuffled back to where Cloud cradled Tifa in his arms. The journey, meters and meters, felt like a ten-K run. His vision blurred but he forced himself onward. He had done this "Born Again" trick before. Why not now? Tifa. Focus. Tifa had given her life for their mission. He would do the same. Simple as that. Though with any luck, he might live through it. Jenova, after all, never went down easily.
Vincent walked past, Raine's limp form over his back.
"Did she, pull through alive?"
Aeris touched his face. Had he blacked out? Still on the Highwind's bridge, Cloud gripped his arm. Tifa lay on the blanket again, eyes open but unblinking.
Tifa. He had to find enough within him to give her back to Avalanche. So what if he dashed himself into a coma? He reached out and took Tifa's still warm hands in his own. Now he realized how her body had healed. When she had fallen, she had landed on the X-potion he had tossed to her. Her body, alive at the time, absorbed the magic through the glass cuts. Heck of a way to quaff a potion but it made his job easier. He moved his hands up to her bare shoulders and stared into her serene face, opening his mental flood gates.
Pffft.
He blinked. His last trickle of life force dribbled out and stalled, a dead battery. Not enough power to animate a dust bunny. He coughed. He called on his store of rage, his willpower, his, what, skill as a stubborn little bugger? Nothing.
All swept away in that damned soul untangling ordeal. Or maybe the bareback skydiving. Heck of a way to relax.
"Come on, come on . . ."
He gripped Tifa tighter.
"Come on. It's not childbirth, for crying out loud. Punch it, John!"
Nothing.
"Born Again," he whispered, in tears now. Until those dried up too.
He felt his world rotate. No, just the beginning of a faint.
"How do I help? Tell me," Cloud said.
"Just be there," Zinnia's weak voice said, still recognizable in her new body. She reached in and clasped her hands over John's, giving him her two trickles of energy. Two drops meandered down a dry riverbed.
Zinnia had, after all, received a fragment of him.
Others approached. Cloud bloomed the brightest, eager and violent, scorching with his azure eyes. Vincent added his strength, dark red and mysterious. Aeris and Juria, though not Jenova, lent a gentle green vigor, enough to soften the riverbed. Others joined. The youthful energy of Yuffie. The angry yet compassionate drive of Barret. The intellectual nostalgia of Nanaki. The confident drive of Cid. (John winced at the whiff of stale tobacco.) Even Cait Sith, an animated stuffed cat standing on a robotic marshmallow, threw in enormous crackles of energy. "I owe that stuffed cat a year's supply of stuffed catnip." At last, at long freaking last, John felt a lock begin to turn, just as he had felt it in the Ancient Capital weeks before.
The turning sensation continued, a door in the Planet clicking open.
"John? Is that you?" voices sounded faint in this sea of green but he knew this voice. Her voice. Tifa.
"Aye, and the whole gang. We have come for you."
"Cloud? You brought Cloud with you?"
"You think I could keep him away? He really cares for you.
"He does?"
"Well, duh. He's a broken spindle without you. Though if he saw you here, at peace like this, he might be less sad."
"I know. Aeris told me."
"Does she speak with the dead now too?"
"No, she's already dead."
"Wait, what?"
The jolt nearly broke his trance. But the image of Tifa molded into Aeris, pink dress and all. Just the sight of her put his heart at ease.
"Of course, silly. Sephiroth killed me when I summoned Holy, remember? Only thanks to you, I exist in your world as well - where Sephiroth never summoned Meteor."
"Because we stopped him."
"In your world you did. Not in all worlds."
"Which world am I in now?"
"All worlds."
"You mean I did all this for nothing?"
"No, silly. I mean, from here, I can see all the ways things are."
"But, I don't, wait. You can see, yourself out there?"
"Worlds where I live and - " She morphed back to Tifa. "Worlds where she dies. As for me - " Back to Aeris. "Worlds where Tifa dies. Worlds where nearly everyone dies."
Aeris vanished, only to reappear over on his left, where Cloud walked up, his face haggard and his body scarred.
"I seek," he said, "I seek only forgiveness. Above all I seek forgiveness."
"Forgiveness from whom?" Aeris said as they both vanished.
John felt his mind start to bubble. "Tifa? Are you still here?"
"I am. I would come home with you. But I can't."
"Say what?"
"She will remain here," Aeris said, reappearing. "This is where all things are."
Bugenhagen appeared to John's right. "Ho-ho-hoo, where all things can be seen."
"Even your friend Zinnia is here," Aeris said, "in the reality where she did not choose to embrace her pain."
"But why can't Tifa come with me, if you did and Bugenhagen did."
"But we didn't. Do you see? We see how all things are; you, as a Jenova, choose how your things are."
"Ho-ho-hoo, you meddle with probability, much as others sculpt with clay."
"Do you see?" Aeris morphed back into Tifa. "All that could have happened." Back to Aeris. "All that might have happened, even if by accident, is possible."
"Except, saving Tifa? Wait. You're not going to tell me the other Aeris has to die to free her. I will not be a party to that. I will offer myself in her place."
Aeris smiled. "See why my mother likes you?"
"She did show me how to save you. The other you I mean."
"I'm glad her hunch paid off."
John felt like flopping onto something.
Bugenhagen said, "Rest assured, you have no need of human sacrifice. Ho-ho-hoo! But be careful. The Crisis, the original Jenova, could not handle the infinite. No one can. It drove her mad."
"Huh."
"You, though. I have faith in you. You are too stubborn to go mad."
"Some would say - "
"Fully mad, he means," Aeris said with a smirk.
"Tifa? How do I get you back? I can't redirect your Holy summon again, nor animate you with my life force because I haven't got any. I barely had enough to get here."
"Ho-ho-hoo! I realize my mistake."
"What?" Then realization dawned. "Your ritual - that whole song and dance. (Literally.) You rascal. You donated your life force to get me back on my feet, didn't you?"
"Yes," said Tifa, having again replaced Aeris. "He knew he was dying. So he wanted to help."
"And then I, hahahaha!" John felt tears rise with his laughter. "I knocked myself back out pulling him back. Haha, I love it." He laughed again. "He was so pissed when he woke up. I, words fail me."
"He couldn't possibly stay mad at you for your sacrifice. But do you see why you can't take me back by force?"
"I don't want to force - "
"John. As a Jenova, you bend reality. What do you think telekinesis is?"
"A bloody pain, that's what! If it had worked back there on you, we wouldn't be here now."
"Ho-ho-hoo! You borrowed momentum from another reality, but unfortunately, you aimed it backwards."
"But you did get it right with Yuffie," Tifa said.
"Too little too late." John gazed downward.
"Hey." Aeris reappeared. "No time for breakdowns, okay?"
"Ho-ho-hoo, we see probability, you change it. Do you see?"
"You could, say, take the reality where Tifa dodged just enough to miss the lethal blow."
"Just as you took the reality where I live on for another twenty years or so. Ho-ho-hoo!"
"Just as you took the reality where Raine tried to return to her animated shell of a body."
"Hey, wait. You blame me for that?"
"Accidents have consequences." Tifa again. "Hojo once took a part of you. In an attempt to mind warp Cloud, he injected it into his Raine's body. That part of you, in Raine, tried to join with the greater part."
"And she now has Zinnia. I'll never shake them now."
Aeris again. "We point out unforeseen consequences. Not all are bad. Most are simply annoying. Still, the more you pull at reality, the more likely you create a paradox."
Raine appeared, replacing Aeris. "When reality tries to resolve a paradox, especially one caused by a single entity, it's always easier to remove the causing entity. Keep this in mind. And tell Cloud I will always love him."
"Gulp."
"Bugenhagen said, "You see now. I can see. Ho-ho-hoo!" He twirled out of sight away in a laughing whirl.
"I think I need a break from reality myself."
Aeris again. "Then return. Give Tifa my wishes. I love her, my best friend."
Tifa again. "But remember, it will cost you. And me."
"Well, you don't have a lot to lose."
Aeris again. "Every time you alter reality to save someone, you impart a piece of yourself. It could spread. Like a virus."
"Gyaahh!" He opened his eyes and found himself back in the crowd on the Highwind. The three towers still glowed red through the ceiling. The floor tipped as the airship banked to port, gaining altitude.
"Tifa Tifa Tifa." He scuttled over to Cloud, who cradled her in his arms.
"Awake now, kid? That place is about to go up," Cid said. "Want to watch?"
"Tifa?"
Cloud shook his head. Someone had connected her to a diagnostic machine but the readout showed all flat lines.
"You need to change the batteries in that thing."
"What?" Nanaki gave him a quizzical look.
"Just roll with it, huh fur ball? Check it if you don't believe me. Besides. You don't have the connection right on this one." Indeed, one lead had pulled loose and lay tangled in Tifa's hair.
"What are you saying?" Cloud asked.
In reply, Tifa coughed. Cloud almost dropped her.
John felt her wrist for a pulse. "Old school sometimes works better. Yuffie's aunt. A bit too fond of bombs. Ugh, and I'm running on fumes." He unfastened the other wires.
Cid puffed out a few fumes his own.
"Those'll kill you, you know," John said.
"John, I'd put you on your bench but Yuffie's there. Damn bridge has become a sickbay."
"Tifa," Cloud said. "Tifa!"
The martial artist cracked a smile, gave the crew a look, and said, "Feels like I've been run through a shredder."
"Tifa. Oh, Tifa."
"Cloud, you're getting me wet."
"Tifa. Tifa." He rose to her feet and carried her, long hair flowing, over to his window seat. "Tifa."
"Well, he's got that word down all right," John said.
"Tifa." He sat cradling her in his lap, and closed his eyes.