CHAPTER 28: GOOD LUCK CHARM

The train car lurched to the side as it rounded a bend. The sound of the cars clacking as they rode over the tracks had long faded into background noise as Cloud struggled to sit upright in the seat. He had never been more miserable in his life. The ride down the mountain on the cobbler's wagon was uneventful and calm, and the building anticipation in his chest had brightened his eyes and drew giddy smiles to his lips. The train station had been bustling with activity and Cloud thought that he had never before seen so many people, even at the yearly harvest festivals in Nibelheim. It was all so exciting! He had to take a train clear across the continent, and then board a boat heading west. It seemed simple enough when he looked at the instructions Master Zangan had written for him. He had never been on a train or moving vehicle of any sort, aside from a horse drawn cart.

It was with great excitement that Cloud had stepped onto into one of the passenger cars on the train, but now he would give anything to get off. Luckily for him, there was only a handful of other passengers in the car to witness his discomfort. For the first six hours of his two day train ride, Cloud had schlepped to the car's small washroom twice an hour to be sick. Now, he had nothing left in his stomach to be rid of, though once in a while he succumbed to fits of dry heaving. Dizzy and exhausted, he slumped against the cushion of his seat. He had taken a seat in the vacant last row of the car and away from the curious gaze of adult passengers who eyed his large leather bag and wayward blonde spikes.

The lilting chug of the train made Cloud submit to the heaviness of his eyelids. Although he was heading forward to a new life and new opportunities, his heart remained with a certain beauty with ruby eyes and a gentle voice. He knew Tifa was upset and unsettled by his abrupt departure and prayed that it wouldn't put a wedge in their relationship. The hurt and shock in her eyes that night made the guilt hover around him like a thick fog. The last thing he wanted was for her to think that he had abandoned her, but his promise to return seemed to be of little comfort to his beloved friend. There were so many things he wanted to tell her before he left: that she was the best thing in his life, that he loved her, that he wanted to marry her and rescue her from the things that hurt her. But the words had all caught in his throat when he saw shadows swallow the hope in her eyes. But it would be for her own good, wouldn't it? He'd need money and a secure place to bring her if he was going to get her away from her father. Leaving Nibelheim was a necessity. He'd be sure to write to her the first chance he could.

Mom had given his talks about adulthood and finding his place in the world before running her hands through his hair and pressing a kiss to his forehead. Cloud knew that the woman was also distressed by his plan to go to Midgar, but she had told him that he was growing up and needed to experience the world for himself. Chasing one's dreams was important. The time on his own would mature him, she said, instilling a sense of pride and excitement in his heart. But already, unforeseen difficulties of his journey had shaken his fragile confidence. Was he meant to be a SOLDIER if he couldn't even ride a train without being ill? He shuttered when he thought of how his stomach would handle being on a boat.

Getting to Midgar once the boat docked on the eastern continent would be the hard part, because it was the only part of his journey that wasn't laid out for him. But he was grown up now, right? He could figure it out. Cloud opened his eyes and fingered the smooth strap of his leather pack. Mom had been brave enough to find a home in Nibelheim all on her own when he was very small. If she could do that, surely he could manage taking care of just himself. The world flew by him in a whirr of blue skies and the pale sands of the desert, but he did his best to keep his eyes averted for his stomach's sake. Cloud faded in an out of sleep for what seemed like an eternity.

Dawn was breaking when the train finally came to a halt at a small seaside harbor on the eastern coast. Cloud nearly missed his stop. He jolted awake when the conductor called and quickly grabbed his pack before jogging to the nearest exit. Stepping out onto the platform, he sucked in a breath of the humid air. Electric street lights illuminated the empty train station and the little town beyond it—so different from the hanging gas powered lanterns back in the village square of his home. Once the train rolled forward and away, a strong wind blew at his back, drawing to him the smell of salt and brine laced with something indescribable. Cloud turned around. Over the tracks and past the wooden boardwalk railing, beyond a moderate expanse of sand, was an endless breadth of water. Cloud drew in a slow, awed breath.

"The ocean!" he sighed wistfully, blue eyes shining with wonder.

The rising sun painted the water in heavenly hues of orange and pink and the sight chased the fatigue from his bones. Cloud ran to the edge of the board walk and hopped the railing, then took off towards the sea when his boots hit the sand. With every bouncing step, the jingle bell tinkled merrily in his bag. Although the first leg of his journey had shaken his confidence, the little charm served him as a reminder of Tifa and his goal to help her find happiness, as well as his own. This is what Mrs. Lockhart had told them about all those years ago—the magic of a body of water so big you couldn't see the other side! One by one, he abandoned his boots, tossing his backpack to the sand as he pushed forward. Tifa had once told him that it was her dream to see the ocean, even if it was just once. When he came back for her to take her away, that's the first place he would bring her.

Cloud waded into the waves, absorbing the thrill of the push and pull of the cold, salty water. He had never seen anything so majestic in all his life! Blonde hair whipping in the wind, the boy didn't realize how wide he was smiling until his cheeks began to hurt. He'd make Tifa's dream come true, no matter what.

… … …

Tifa was exhausted. It had been a busy day with lessons, tending the garden and pulling the weeds out of the cracks in the pavement of their front walk. Wanting to stay out of the gloomy house, she escaped to stroll in the woods, enjoying the rich smell of pine and the beauty of the orange leaves of scattered deciduous trees. Tifa wasn't accustomed to walking the forest paths without the company of another. Years ago, Papa had taught her to navigate the paths and identify the types of trees and the calls of the birds. Days ago, she and Cloud had shyly held hands as they meandered under the canopy. Now, she walked the quiet trails alone.

By the time she got supper on the table, she barely had the strength to hold her head up. Propping her chin on her fist, she slowly brought the spoonful of roasted vegetables and potato slices to her mouth. Now that Ms. Strife had explained what was going on in her body, Tifa could understand why she felt so sluggish. A few days had passed and the pain had mostly subsided as the bleeding grew lighter. The initial fear had been replaced by a newborn fascination with her body's ability to grow a life. The girl had never thought much about the process of how babies were brought into the world. For as long as she could remember, she was aware that a baby grew inside a mama's belly; but it was more complicated than that. The girl was full of questions that Ms. Strife had been happy to answer. With new knowledge and a new perspective on what goes on between a husband and wife to result in a baby, Tifa felt very grown up indeed. She wanted to be able to have a baby someday, but she'd never want to let a boy do that to her, even if she was married to him. Tifa wished she could've asked her own mother about all this, but her kindly neighbor would have to do.

Papa sat across from her, quietly reading the day's newspaper and reacting to the content with a grunt or audible exhale through his nostrils. His daughter stole a surreptitious glance at his features. There were deep creases at the corners of his eyes and lines in his forehead. His pretty chestnut brown hair had greyed in some spots and many his mustache was peppered with coarse, white hairs. Though she tried her best to put together nutritious meals, the man had grown thin and wiry. Tifa thought her Papa's body was too young to look the way it did. He was only forty-four, but the lines of age on his face rivaled those of Master Zangan, who was over a decade older. Maybe grief did that to people. Papa just couldn't say goodbye to the comforts of days gone by; he dragged the pain of loss and the memories of his late wife around like a bag of wet sand. In the past, Tifa had tried to block out her sadness before deciding to confront it and move on with her life. When she thought of her mother, Tifa envisioned her warm smile and could almost feel the softness of her embrace. Mama would want her family to go forward—to smile and laugh and seek out the richness life had to offer. But Papa was too still in his sadness and it weighed her down like an anchor in the depths of their isolation.

His brown eyes met her crimson ones before she shied away.

"So he's gone, huh?" Brian sighed as he folded the newspaper and neatly laid it down on the table. "Good riddance."

Tifa stuffed a spoonful of food in her mouth to keep from retorting. She knew without asking that he was talking about Cloud and it was hard to suppress the need to defend her friend. When Papa expressed further curiosity on the subject of the blonde boy, she was surprised.

"Where's he gone off to? He hasn't got enough money to pay the stipend for an apprenticeship."

"He told me that he was going to become a member of SOLDIER to be a hero," she obediently answered in almost monotone to hide her feelings on the matter from her father's judgement. Papa hadn't hated ShinRA as her mother had but Tifa was still nervous to bring up the name of the mega corporation in front of him—just in case.

"Ha! That scrawny misfit will be turned out on the street. Have you any idea what they do to idealistic young fools who sign up for the SOLDIER program?" Brian looked at her head on, gripping his fork in his fist on the table.

Tifa shrunk in on herself but tried to remain carefully neutral. Learning to never wear her emotions on her sleeve protected her from criticism over her feelings: a little hiding place of her own.

"No, Papa. I don't."

"They inject them with raw mako. That same green stuff they pump out of the ground with that reactor on Mt. Nibel. It enhances their senses and strength but they say it makes 'em crazy. If they survive the treatments, ShinRA makes them do all their dirty work."

Tifa played with the edge of her frayed napkin. Papa only needed alcohol to make him crazy, not mako. She hoped Cloud knew what he was getting himself into. It surprised the girl that her father even bothered to ask about Cloud and wondered what that meant. He seemed to possess a deep disdain for her best friend while at the same time looking to find out more about him.

"He'll probably end up in a gutter begging for gil once ShinRA turns him away." Brian stood, stacking her empty plate on top of his and depositing them in the sink. "Besides, the war is over. ShinRA's world conquest is complete—what do they need super human SOLDIERs for anymore?"

Tifa watched him disappear to sit out on the back porch where he'd sway on that old wooden rocking chair and smoke his pipe, most likely. She turned her attention to the folded newspaper on the table top and picked it up. Undoing the neat folds, she read the headline.

'WUTAI SURRENDERS AFTER CAPTURE OF FORT TAMBLIN'

No more war? It had been going on for so long that the never ending conflict between ShinRA and Wutai had just become a part of everyday life. Tifa frowned as she skimmed over the article. Because she had been taken out of school at only eight years old, reading was never one of her strengths. Struggling to sound out some of the more advanced words, she whispered as she read out loud.

εγλ 0000, October 2
Wutai's last standing resistance had finally fallen. Angeal Hewley, SOLDIER 1st class
and Zack Fair, SOLDIER 2nd class devastated the only remaining stronghold of Wutai
troops. Using a combination of their swords and assorted materia, together the super
soldier and his protégé defeated a large number of what is left of the army of Wutai. Due to
the elite SOLDIER division, no further ShinRA troops were put in harm's way. The fortress
was captured at half past midnight and Wutai officially surrendered by daybreak.

Tifa's fingers tightened around the pages; Mama must be rolling in her grave. ShinRA had finally won. And for what? It felt like the deaths of her grandparents and the grieving of her mother's heart meant nothing. The article went on to talk of celebration and metals and such, and it made Tifa sick to her stomach. Damned ShinRA and their damned heartless, power hungry hands. The same greedy hands had plucked Cloud from her life. But if this was true and Papa was right about the need for SOLDIERs being obsolete, would Cloud realize this and come home? Her gut told her she wouldn't be that lucky.

… … …

Every step forward had been more difficult than the last. If Cloud had thought the train ride was tough, the two day journey across the sea had been positively merciless. The boarding pass he purchased had included the use of a bunk in a small stateroom two levels below deck, but he had spent so much time nauseous with his head over the railing that he didn't get the chance to utilize it for a good night's rest. He had nodded off sitting against a wall on the deck of the ship, folded over the leather backpack in his lap. It felt like he had been dizzy and delirious for a week by the time the ship finally docked at the port. Cloud resisted the urge to kiss the ground when he stepped off the wooden boards of the dock with shaky legs. The harbor rested on the coast of a large seaside town, and the blonde teenager did his best to stifle the fear that came with realizing that he was an entire ocean away from the only people who knew his name.

It had taken a few hours for the headache to fade away and his stomach to calm. In that time, he had wandered about, politely asking villagers if they knew of a way he could get to Midgar. Most times, Cloud received strange looks before people would shrug or shake their heads. There was so much to look at all around him. He saw carts pulled by chocobos instead of horses, and he couldn't help but stare at the large yellow birds he had seen in picture books but never in person. Automobiles puttered past. Vendors called out to passersby, selling food, pottery, tapestries and just about anything he could think of. The market place was over a dozen times the size of Nibelheim's tiny town square and Cloud had immediately felt like he knew nothing about the world.

The blonde had just about lost hope when he entered a small eatery as the sun began to set. Now hungry and tired, he sat himself down at the counter and the gruff looking man behind it immediately plopped a menu in front of him.

"Thank you," Cloud said, dropping his heavy bag to the floor beside his stool.

He narrowed his eyes at the menu—he didn't even know what half of the food items were! Coconut curry, fried plantains, shrimp bisque…the unfamiliar food items may have well been written in a different language. He looked around at the other patrons to peek at what they had ordered and became more distracted by the people than by anything on their plates. In Nibelheim, he and his mother had been the only blondes, leading him to feel like more of an outcast than he already was. Here, there were people with hair as dark as Tifa's, people with fair hair like him, and even people with red hair! There were lots of babies and children to accompany the adults. He was fascinated by their manner dress, especially the women. Many wore pants like the men, or clingy skirts that showed off their curves or cut off above the knees. If a woman dressed like that at home, it certainly wouldn't be seen as proper or polite. Things were certainly strange here on the eastern continent…or was it Nibelheim that was strange?

He decided to settle one of the few choices on the menu that he knew.

"What'll it be, kid?" the man asked after Cloud laid his menu flat.

The boy looked up to look at the server. The man's manner of speech was so strange that he almost hadn't understood what he said.

"Uh, I'll take the chicken and rice soup, please."

The waiter took his menu before turning to ladel the soup out of a large iron pot on the stovetop. He served it to Cloud with a large hunk of bread. The boy immediately began wolfing down his meal.

"That's one hell of an accent you've got. Where ya from, blondie?"

Accent? Cloud suddenly realized why the people he had asked for help had looked at him so strangely. They weren't the ones who sounded odd, it was him. He was a foreigner and he gave it away every time he opened his mouth. Now self-conscious, he swallowed before replying.

"I'm from a mountain village on the western continent," Cloud said between spoonfuls. "I just hopped off a boat and I'm trying to get to Midgar. Do you know how I can get there? I don't have a lot of gil."

"Midgar, eh? My buddy and I pick up my liquor supply from the Sector Four slums on Fridays. If you want, you can bum a ride." Blue eyes filled with hope. It was Wednesday evening; he wouldn't have to wait too long.

"Thank you very much." Cloud bowed his head in gratitude. "I am so grateful for your kindness, sir."

His host let out a booming laugh, "What's with the stiff formalities? Name's Gareth!"

The boy raised his head as the man stretched out a hand to shake. How was it that here, in such a foreign place, a complete stranger would be willing to help him? Most of the villagers who had watched him grow up in the mountains didn't bat an eyelash when he and his mother were in need. He supposed it was because he had no idea about the questionable circumstances surrounding his birth. Gareth must've thought he was a normal boy who deserved kindness and charity. If leaving his home meant leaving behind his stigma, maybe it wouldn't be as hard as he thought it would be. He reached out to grip Gareth's hand with a firm shake and a smile.

"I'm Cloud. Nice to meet you." The little bell on the door sounded when two more patrons came in.

"If ya help me clean dishes and bus tables, I'll let ya stick around here until we leave." Gareth grinned before turning to help his new customers.

"Yessir!"

… … …

They had driven through the countryside for hours and the sun was now hot and high in the sky. The kind owner of the little diner and his friend occupied the cab, so Cloud was forced to sit in the bed of the pickup truck. He didn't mind. The constant rippling of the wind against his face and through his hair helped keep his motion sickness at bay. The climate was much more dry and warm than his blustery home where the mountain breeze and lower temperatures of a high elevation minimized the worst of summer's oppression. When the lush grasses of the plains morphed into dry, rocky desert turf, Cloud shifted to turn and survey the path ahead. A large, dark structure loomed in the distance and he knew at once that it was Midgar. He was almost there! With every bounce of the vehicle over the rock and sand came the muffled sounding of the jingle bell. Despite his nausea, Cloud grinned from ear to ear. There were so many people back home who had never believed in him. They had always called him weak, and small—the cursed product of a sinful indulgence. But it didn't matter anymore. They had said he'd never get there alone; but he had proven his resourcefulness, tenacity and determination. Cloud had found the courage to take steps to reach his goals that had only been daydreams in years past. A newfound feeling of pride bloomed in his chest as he turned back around to sit with his back against the cab.

I can do this!

Closing his eyes helped to suppress the disorientation and unease of his stomach, so he rested his chin on the backpack tucked between his legs to wait patiently for the end of the ride. Time passed and Cloud had been so focused on taking deep breaths to battle his nausea that he didn't realize that they had passed through the gate to Sector Four until he felt the truck rolling on even pavement and the warmth and light of the sun disappeared. The plate loomed far overhead, a hulking mass of steel, pipes and wires with a diameter that stretched almost as far as he eyes could see. A wave of anxiety washed over him. The sight of endless walls of grey and the shocking absence of anything green or organic instilled a sense of fear and emptiness into his heart. Not one thing about Midgar was familiar to any of his senses.

The broad avenues were many times the size of any dirt roads back at home and covered with thick layers of hard macadam. Everywhere he looked was packed with people scurrying to and fro and it reminded Cloud of how insects would scatter at a frenzied pace when one lifted the rock that they hid under. The teen had never thought so many people could exist crowded together like this and he swallowed any feelings of claustrophobia before they could eat as his nerves. Tucking himself closer against the back of the cab, Cloud buried his nose and mouth into the collar of his jacket. The unfamiliar smells were overwhelming; the foul odor of rubber and filth made his lungs burn and he immediately began to long for the crisp scent of pine and mountain rain.

The pickup truck continued forward through the streets filled with gruff looking people and Cloud began to feel exposed and vulnerable to the uncomfortable surroundings. He could see the grand pillar at the center of the city in great detail once they turned onto a wide avenue. There were multiple levels that spiraled upwards towards the looming plate. The sights to his right and left distracted him and Cloud's eyes went wide at the overwhelming presence of city lights and the big, flashing electronic signs. It was as if they had driven through some kind of portal to another world. The bland, washed out colors of the buildings that were crowded closely together made him feel lost already—everything looked the same!

Gareth finally pulled the truck near a small loading dock outside a warehouse of some sort. The driver's side door opened and closed and the sound prompted Cloud's shaking knees to try to stand on the flat surface of the bed.

"Congratulations, kid. You've made it to Midgar!" Gareth said as he stretched his arms and back.

The door on the passenger side opened and the other man groaned with relief when he escaped the cramped quarters of the cab. With a word of thanks, Cloud carefully slid off the tailgate and resisted the urge to let out his own tired sigh after their long journey to this strange place. He swung his backpack over his shoulder, he studied his surroundings. Master Zangan had told him to find a train station close to the pillar at Midgar's center to get to the upper plate where the ShinRA building was located. Cloud took the crumpled SOLDIER pamphlet out of his jacket pocket and studied that small map on the back. The pillar wasn't that far—a half mile at most—he'd get there in no time. Buying a ticket to take him to the top seemed simple enough. After that, the only thing he had to do was submit his application and join the ranks of ShinRA's elite!

"Thank you, Gareth," Cloud said, reaching in his pocket to produce a small handful of gil. Holding his fist toward the dark haired man, the teen bowed his head respectfully. "Here's payment for the ride and your kindness."

Gareth took in the sight of the disheveled foreign boy with his worn bag and frayed jacket before turning back toward the entrance to the warehouse.

"Keep it. You'll need it a lot more than I will, I'm sure."

... ... ... ... ...

A/N: Sorry for the delay-life gets in the way sometimes!

How have you all been? It's so nice to hear from all of you! Welcome back, Sunflowerspot. :) Our favorite pair will be separated for a while, but it's when you're stripped of your comforts that you grow the most, right?

Thank you all for your feedback! It's really inspiring to me!