23. To Go On
"You said that I'd be fine
But first I wore you with hurts
It takes a little hell
To know what heaven is worth"
From A Little Hell by Radical Face
"You looked like you was havin' a nightmare, man."
Cloud blinked a few times to adjust to the sudden light. He hadn't realized he was in the dark. Soon the swirling ceiling came to a standstill. The stains, the faded floral patterns on the edges of the wall, the rag of a curtain. They were all familiar. An inn – there were so many of them – in Gongaga? Cloud hung onto this like it was the most important thing to find out, right now. How long ago was it that they stayed here? Only a few days…
"Well, say somethin'," a voice said, the same one as before. Cloud turned his head, feeling his neck move stiffly, and found Barret leaning against the wall and peering into his face like he was observing some mildly disturbing but fascinating phenomenon.
"I don't know what to say," he finally said.
"Well – how do you feel?"
"I don't know," Cloud said, realizing that it was the truth. He had no feelings; he was all out of feelings; it wasn't exactly a novel symptom (as he had a tendency to run, always), but it disturbed him a little, nonetheless. There, that was a feeling. "Disturbed," he said.
"I'd say," Barret seemed to want to chuckle, but gave up the effort.
"You know, Cloud," Tifa said, from the other side of the bed. Cloud turned his head with some difficulty, feeling like a worthless invalid. "Aerith is gone."
"Gone?" This seemed to spark something in his chest. He tried to hold onto it.
"Yeah, everyone's out lookin' for her," Barret said.
Cloud sat up, slowly. He wasn't under a blanket, or anything like it, but it felt like the whole of time and history and what was left of his sanity (he remembered Hell) was pressing down on him. Still he sat up, fighting the urge to flop back down again. It was very important that he sat up. It was very important – he couldn't remember – Aerith – gone – something…
"City of the Ancients," he said, suddenly remembering. "Aerith is headed there."
"How do you know that?" Barret asked.
"In my…" Cloud paused, realizing how it would sound. "In my dream. Aerith told me."
"Why did she go alone? Damn those hero-type people…"
Cloud watched Barret ranting about stupid heroism, and felt a vague wonder and disgust at how easily they seemed to believe him. This was wrong. Everything was so wrong.
"We should go, now. It's dangerous for her alone," Tifa said, holding out a hand to him. Cloud stared at it, uncomprehending. "Come on, Cloud. We don't have time. What if Sephiroth finds her first?"
"Sephiroth… already knows," Cloud heard himself say. He waited for them to ask how he knew that (the answer to which was yet another disturbing telepathic feeling in his gut), but they didn't. He wished he could tell them that he knew, because he was connected to Sephiroth in some way. You are a puppet. But they didn't.
"Yeah, c'mon, move yer ass!" Barret grabbed Cloud right arm, but let go of it quickly. Cloud watched his own limp arm distantly, drawing an arc in the air and falling onto the bed sheet. "Man, you're burnin' up! You sick or somethin'?"
Cloud started to shake his head, but paused. "I… maybe. I don't know. I can't go."
His head was throbbing again.
"You rest. We'll go – we'll find Sephiroth," Tifa said. "You catch up to us later."
"No," Cloud shook his head. His breath was hot, burning, dry.
"Whaddya mean…"
"I can't go. I might… I will lose it again. If Sephiroth comes near me," Cloud said, trying to blink away the heat. He didn't understand it. The fire ended five years ago. Some years ago he had – there was – "I don't have a choice. I didn't have a choice. I had to – it was so hot." He said, almost to himself.
"Goddammit, Cloud," Barret grumbled. Cloud watched him grab a chair, push it next to the bed and collapse down onto it, the floorboard screaming. It was too loud; cut into his head. Barret gritted his teeth. "Right. It's 'cause of you that Sephiroth got the Black Materia in the first place. It's your damn fault!"
Cloud nodded, his head was heavy, and somewhere in his peripheral vision Tifa looked like she might begin to cry; but she didn't. She wouldn't.
"Yeah, it's your damn fault," Barret said it again, forcefully. "Is that what you wanna her? 'Cause I can stand here an' say 'em all day."
"Barret, that's enough," Tifa said, but Barret shook his head. His face was red; his voice boomed in Cloud's ears and seemed to shake them to pieces. He wasn't even sure if he was really here, wasn't sure if Barret was (because his young self died long ago, couldn't have been there, he talked to him, said goodbye, but it was someone else –). Still, Barret continued yelling.
"I know you got problems – hell, we all do!" He leaned in closer to Cloud, and Cloud could almost feel the air vibrating with the force of his voice. "But you gotta understand that there ain't no gettin' off a train we're on, till we get to the end of the line!"
That was poetic for Barret, Cloud thought absently.
"Cloud, we came this far. He's right. You can't give up now." Tifa said, almost mechanically.
"But Tifa," his voice came sounding weak, broken, which wasn't surprising, but he hated it nonetheless. "He can control me. How can he control me? Why me and no one else? What… what did he do to me?" He felt, with a rising panic, that he was going to lose it. He was going to say something irrevocable. But he couldn't stop it now, like that metaphorical train Barret was talking about. His voice came tumbling out. "I feel like I've forgotten something very important, Tifa. Something… because I wanted to forget. Someone did something to me. He…"
"But you just don't know, do ya?" Barret interrupted, still in his barking voice, pushing back his chair angrily. "An' whatcha gonna do, anyway? Just lie here for all eternity?"
"You'll come with us, I know you will." Tifa said. She looked like she was shivering from the cold, and grabbed his burning hand as if for warmth.
"C'mon, Tifa, let's wait outside," Barret said.
"But…"
"He'll come out." He said, spat, the words, with a strange glint in his eyes. Cloud didn't understand where the conviction came from. Tifa dropped his hand, looked back at him again and walked through the door after Barret. She closed the door but it didn't stay closed, the old door, and creaked open again a little bit. Cloud listened to the fading footsteps and saw the empty hallway.
He couldn't remember how long he'd stayed that way. The heat was disappearing, slowly at first and then abruptly it was gone. If he had ever had a fever, it had been trampled on by his Mako-strengthened immune system.
"What will you do?" A low voice asked from behind him. Cloud didn't know how he'd come into the room, but it didn't matter. He answered without looking back.
"Do I have a choice?"
"Technically," Vincent said. "One assumes one has a choice in every given situation."
"So, no."
Vincent didn't say anything. Cloud dragged his legs across the bed sheet, listening for additional voices in his head. He knew now that the boy had been speaking to him all this time, trying to help him, remind him, but he was gone. He'd said goodbye. Now Cloud was alone.
He stepped down on the floor, stood up with legs that were shaking a little but not for long.
"Was it wise to leave him alone?" Yuffie asked, as soon as Tifa told her what happened. About him. His refusal. His fear.
"What could we have done?" Barret growled. "Drag him by the collar? Nah, he's either gon' come out, or he ain't."
"What if he doesn't?" Tifa asked, without really meaning to. There was a beat of silence. Tifa waited for Barret to say, but he will, but he didn't say anything. Tifa remembered how Cloud had looked, barely sitting up, pale and broken and – and scared, and she could understand, and she couldn't help but feel like she was carrying a dead rock in her chest.
"What if…" Yuffie started, but interrupted herself, shaking her head. Tifa knew what she had meant to say; they were all thinking it; they had all seen him, with a blank look on his face, walking calmly towards Sephiroth and dropping the Black Materia on his outstretched hands. This had happened all too fast for any of them to stop him, even Vincent. And then – before they could really comprehend what had happened – Sephiroth was gone, Cloud slumped down on the ground as if he had been burning at the stakes for eternity, and Aerith dropped to her knees beside him. Held his hand. They spoke – Tifa was too far away to hear. She remembered all of this, vividly.
"Just give the lad some more time," Cid said, with a wise air and a puff on his cigarette. Yuffie glared as the cigarette smoke got into her eyes.
"How much time?" Barret said, narrowing his eyes.
And then;
"Not much."
Tifa turned, already knowing his voice, already knowing his expression; quiet determination, a hint of desperation, the face he'd worn when he told her, I'm going to Midgar. Gonna become a SOLDIER. Tifa watched, as Cloud moved (his legs shaking a little) across the lobby of the inn and to the door. Everybody watched. He pushed open the door and sunlight crept through, making a bursting halo around his head.
"You are coming with us?" Nanaki asked.
"Yes," Cloud answered, without turning his head. Tifa had to squint against the sunlight. His voice continued; it sounded disconnected, his face being obscured by the backlight of the sun. "But I think I should tell you, I'm afraid to find out the truth."
"The truth? About what?" Yuffie asked.
"I don't know exactly. But I know – I know there's something."
"That's not vague at all, mate," Cid said, raising his eyebrows. He was laughing silently, though; Tifa could see the relief in his eyes and knew that it reflected everyone else's. They had wanted him to come. Despite the danger, they had wanted him with them. Or maybe they just didn't know what to do, without him.
"I know there's something I'm not remembering," Cloud said. "But I'll go."
"Hey, even if you do go nuts again," Barret said, rather cheerfully. "If it happens, it happens. I'll go upside down on yer spiky blond head and bring you back to normal."
"Oh, I'll hit you so hard that you'll – you'll be so normal –"
"Yuffie, that doesn't even make sense."
"Whatever, Tifa."
Then Tifa saw, Cloud took a deep breath, and stepped outside, into the light.