Eyy look at that, another update.
Big thank you to silver-doe287 for beta'ing this chapter 💙
Enjoy!
It took five days to reach Corel. Five days of plodding over baked earth, the ground cracked and weathered from the sun. Five days of Tifa squinting at the sky, wondering how much further they needed to go and wishing they could get there faster, but the horses were already tired and Aerith couldn't ride hard given her condition. Yet the five days were a blessing, no matter how much Tifa balked against them. They gave her a chance to think, plan, and prepare.
Yet, no amount of thinking or planning could have prepared her for what awaited them in Corel.
After they reached the small town and stabled their horses, the sheriff, Barret Wallace, ushered them towards a small house on the edge of town— his house, Tifa later realized. Barret was a large man with a hard expression she didn't care for, but when she noticed that he only glanced at her with a piteous look, she decided she actually preferred his glower. That she knew what to do with. But pity? Pity was the one thing she couldn't stand.
The walk to the house was a short one, and once they arrived, Barret opened the front door for them and gestured them all inside. The door groaned open with a sound similar to a moan of pain, and when Tifa stepped into the entrance hall, she startled when the floorboards loudly creaked beneath her leather boots.
Barret huffed at her reaction. "Jumpy one, ain't you?"
Tifa glared at the floor and didn't deign to respond. Cid chatted behind her about their ride here, while Yuffie loudly complimented the cabinet of fine china by the door; or rather, she said that it would likely make a pretty sound if it fell over and plates shattered, which was as close to a compliment as she could get. Aerith was quiet— had been quiet the entire ride over, in fact— but she shot Tifa a wane grin when she caught the other woman looking at her.
"We made it," Aerith whispered.
Something within Tifa crumbled, more so than when they had entered the stables and she saw Rain in one of the stalls. Maybe Aerith had made it, but she hadn't just yet, not without Cloud— but she managed a thin, agreeable smile regardless. Her problems were her own, and Aerith had enough on her mind. She didn't need Tifa's worries, too.
Once their boots were shucked off and their coats hung, Barret brought them to a small room in the back. He curtly knocked on the door, said, "Brought you some of yer friends," and then without further preamble, swung the door wide open.
The first thing Tifa noticed was the sunlight streaming in through a hazy window. It spilled gold onto the floor, the messily-drawn pictures scattered across the walls, and then to the bed— a children's bed, she realized belatedly. And in that bed was—
"Zack," Aerith gasped, going white. Tifa made for her elbow just in case she swooned, but there was no need; in the time it took Tifa to reach out, Aerith had crossed the room in four long steps and had kneeled beside what was obviously Zack's sick bed. The man himself was swathed in bandages. His cheeks were flushed with what could be a fever, and there was a faint sheen of sweat on his brow, but when he noticed Aerith he smiled, wide and bright and so very Zack.
"Hi there." His voice was a low murmur as he brushed his thumb across Aerith's cheek. Aerith, with a hiccuping laugh, clutched his hand to keep it there. "Missed you. I'm glad you're… I'm glad you're okay. I almost thought…"
Whatever it was he almost thought, he clearly couldn't bring himself to say. His voice cut off with a faint gasp and his eyes filled with tears; with his next ragged inhale, he bent over, his shoulders sagging as his head drooped onto Aerith's chest, and then Tifa heard the first faint, choked sob. It sounded as if he was trying to swallow them down, but was failing miserably. It was painful to listen to.
Tifa watched them for a moment, with Aerith cradling Zack in her arms and Zack clutching her sides like he was afraid to lose her, and was inordinately happy for them. But at the same time, she was also inexplicably, undeniably jealous. Her heart ached for Cloud… but the dull throb in her chest only reminded her that there was still plenty for her to do. They might have finally reached Corel, but that did not mean she had time to rest.
She left the room and gently closed the door behind her, giving the couple some modicum of privacy, then returned to the living room. Cid, Yuffie, and Barret were situated around a small table, murmuring low amongst themselves, while a red-clad man leaned against the wall with a scarlet wolf lying at his feet. Vincent and Red, Tifa placed after a heavy pause. Cid had spoken of them on the way here. Old friends, he had called them. The sort of folk that could be relied on.
She hoped that was true, now.
"So," Tifa began as she approached. All conversation halted as the group turned towards her as one, all with varying degrees of hesitance and pity— again, pity. Anxiety fluttered within her, but she mercilessly stamped it down. "We made it, but there's one of us missing. Where's Cloud? What happened?"
Barret glanced towards Vincent, who was watching her with an odd expression. "You must be Cloud's wife."
"I am," Tifa stated matter-of-factly, meeting his gaze, "but that's not answering my question. Where's Cloud?"
Vincent continued to stare at her, but eventually he closed his eyes in clear resignation. "It is a long story," Vincent finally said, "but I'll tell you everything I know."
Later, after Vincent shared Cloud's past with her and Barret relayed what Cloud had done in Corel— the stealing, the shooting, and then more importantly, why he might have done all that— Tifa had gone to the stables. She said she was going to check on the horses, but she had seen the solemn look in their eyes when she left and knew that they could see right through her. She wasn't going to the stables for all the horses.
She was going for only one.
"Hi, Rain," she whispered as she ran her hand down Rain's sleek flank. The horse— Cloud's horse— knew her touch and nuzzled into her, a comforting gesture that made Tifa's heart hurt. Then Rain nickered in an obvious question.
Tifa felt tears prick her eyes. She turned her head into Rain's sleek coat, hiding there. "I don't know where he is," she murmured. Her throat tightened painfully with the admission. "I don't know. I… I don't… I can't—"
The first sob clawed out of her throat, and she threw a hand over her mouth to muffle the saw-blade sound. But it was futile. Grief was a feral animal caged behind her ribs, and she doubled over herself and let it free.
She wasn't sure how long she had stayed in the stables, crying for everything that had happened, crying for fear of what would happen to Cloud. By the time she managed to quiet, the morning sun had fallen to the late evening and stained the sky burnt gold. The stable walls were hard against her back, and her eyes felt swollen and hot. Her head ached from the intensity of her tears.
Rain nudged her shoulder with a wet nose, snorting in concern, and Tifa managed a faint smile and ran her hand along Rain's jaw. As hollowed-out as she was, she also felt strangely cleansed. She could think more clearly than she could before. Yes, Cloud was not here, and yes, Cloud was likely with Sephiroth, and Sephiroth… Sephiroth was probably not treating him very kindly. But that wasn't the end of the story. Cloud still had her after all, and she would find him. She had to find him. Failure was not an option.
"How does that sound?" Tifa asked Rain, who was standing over her like her personal, watchful guardian. "Want to help me find Cloud?"
Rain's soulful eyes met Tifa's own. Yes, Rain's look seemed to say, yes, no matter where the trail may lead, I will be there too.
Tifa managed another thin smile and, wiping a stray tear from her cheek, stumbled to her feet. "Good girl," she told Rain, giving the horse a last pat, and Rain nickered softly as Tifa left the stable. It was a short walk back to Barret's home, but it gave her a little more time to ponder what came next.
Yet when she opened the door, all of her thoughts scattered like birds arrested mid-flight, because the house was steeped in chaos. Marlene, Barret's little girl, who seemed to have arrived back from her playdate with a friend, and was crying in the living room while Cid was bustling back and forth from the kitchen, his expression panicked and wild, pales of water and warm rags laden in his arms. Yuffie looked faintly ill. Zack and Aerith, Tifa noted, were still in the back bedroom.
Tifa moved towards Marlene, intending to comfort the girl somehow. Picking her up, and nearly wincing at the girl's sudden grip around her neck, she turned to Yuffie and asked, "What's going on?"
Yuffie's head whipped towards her. Her braided hair was in disarray, as if she had been pulling at it. "Don't ask me! Barret went to get the doctor or somethin', and I— I don't want to know, I don't—"
Without warning Aerith suddenly cried out, though the sound was muffled through the layers of walls and doors between them. Yuffie went chalk-white and covered her ears with her hands, while Marlene's wailing reached a new intensity.
Tifa, bouncing the small girl in her arms, stared at the back room with mounting horror. She knew that Aerith was due soon, but… Now? Here?
Aerith suddenly cried out again, and the pain-laced sound shocked something inside her. She set Marlene down beside Yuffie, and the two clutched each other while Tifa scrambled for the bedroom, her hands trembling, her worries falling to the back of her mind. She threw open the door and flew into the room.
Sure enough, Aerith was going into labor. Tifa sagged against the doorframe while Zack turned towards her, his hands enveloping Aerith's slimmer ones, his eyes wide and terrified. He looked like he was about to throw up. Tifa was sure her own expression wasn't much different.
"The baby's coming," he told her, helplessly. "Barret went to get a doctor, but—"
Aerith suddenly cried out again, causing the two of them to startle.
Tifa made an immediate decision. "It'll be okay," she interrupted and, sucking in a sharp breath, she moved towards the end of the bed. Living as rural as she did, she had learned how to deliver baby cows and goats. How much different could a human baby be, really? "It'll be okay," she said again, though she wasn't sure who she was trying to reassure anymore: him, or herself. "Aerith, are you ready?"
Aerith groaned, and Tifa took it for what it was: an emphatic yes.
"All right." The thought of what was coming made Tifa go cold with horror, but she shoved that aside to steel her spine and say, "Whenever you feel ready, push."
Aerith arched her back with a scream, and it was near dawn when her screaming was interrupted by a shrill, warbling cry. The doctor, who had eventually arrived hours after the process began, entered the tense living room to make the announcement:
The baby was a healthy baby girl. Tifa was named as the godmother, which made her cry tears she thought she already shed. Cloud would be the godfather.
"We'll tell him the next time we see him," Zack told Tifa. He was lounging on the cleaned bed beside Aerith, who was fast asleep with her baby nestled in her tired arms. He looked exhausted, but proud. Like a father, Tifa thought. "Then we'll drag him kickin' and screamin' back home."
Tifa, similarly exhausted yet far too drunk on adrenaline and nerves to sleep, leaned up off the couch so he could see her dubious expression. "We?"
"Well, of course." Zack gave her a crooked grin. "You didn't think you were going by yourself, did you?"
She had, but— "Don't be daft. You can't come. I mean, look at yourself, all bandaged up to hell and back. And with a new baby too, no less."
Zack made a face. Those were the facts, and he knew them as well as she did. "When I'm better, then."
"When you're better," she agreed, but she had seen Zack's wounds and knew that it would be a long time before he got back in the saddle. That, and she had already spoken to Cid about it— or rather, they had argued about it, but Tifa had convinced him in the end.
"When do you leave?" Zack asked, jolting her out of her thoughts.
Tifa leaned back on the couch and cast her gaze to the ceiling. "Next week," she said after a pause. That's when Cid and the crew were leaving anyway, out to once again hunt down Sephiroth. She would join them, and would live the life of a bounty hunter until she found her husband again. It would be a difficult life, and she might not see home in a long while, but she knew it would be worth it. For Cloud, it always was.
The sun had sunk behind the horizon long ago, a drop of gold in a sea of black, and in its wake spread a blanket of stars. They twinkled merrily in the midnight landscape, and Sephiroth tilted his head back to watch them when one suddenly dropped out of the sky. His eyes followed it down until it disintegrated, and he felt… nothing. Since Midgar, the stars no longer moved him like they used to. The wonder of his childhood had withered. His awe, rotted. The stars were only faint, meaningless specks, and he would never wish on them again.
Recalling Midgar put him in a foul mood, so he instead shifted his attention behind him, to the camp. Though, camp was an elaborate word for what the cave really was: a temporary shelter, and a poor one at that. The horses were tied just outside the cave's mouth, and they jolted with every stray pop from the sole campfire. Strewn about the fire was an empty flask, a discarded belt, and a singed coin purse, its coins scattered across the dirt.
That was the extent of their homely comforts.
"I ought to kill you," Kadaj spat, furious. Cloud's collar was locked in his white-knuckled grip. "I ought to kill you dead. 'Cause of your thrice-damned people, my brothers are dead. Dead! I felt them, I felt them die, I felt them—"
Kadaj's voice ascended into a loud roar and pulled his fist back, his intent clear. Cloud's gaze flicked to the movement, indifferent.
Sephiroth stepped forward and, in a blur of movement, his hand grabbed Kadaj's wrist. He could feel Kadaj's bones creak beneath his iron grip. "Now, Kadaj," he began, "Cloud is family, and family must take care of each other. Isn't that right… Cloud?"
Cloud didn't respond, but Sephiroth had been expecting that. Cloud had said very little on their ride to the desert. If Sephiroth hadn't known any better, he'd say the boy was mute; but as he did know better, he knew that Cloud was actually in the middle of a sulking fit. But it was no matter— he would get over it, eventually.
Kadaj's arm trembled beneath Sephiroth's grip, and finally with a harsh, frustrated, sound, he let Cloud drop. Cloud fell back in the dust as Kadaj whirled on Sephiroth. "This family," he hissed, "has one brother too many."
Sephiroth was unimpressed. "Perhaps your anger would be better spent on those who actually did your two brothers harm, rather than on Cloud, who was not there."
"He might as well have been there," Kadaj ground out. "My brothers were killed by his people. His!" But he knew he was fighting a losing battle, so he spat on the ground and skulked back to the campfire, cursing under his breath the entire way. Sephiroth watched him go, his gaze narrowed against the firelight. Kadaj had gotten more temperamental in these recent months; perhaps now that Yazoo and Loz had died, Kadaj had outlived his usefulness. Perhaps the gift of joining his family was too great for him to bear.
And speaking of gifts…
He turned his gaze back to Cloud, who had drawn himself back against the wall of the cave. He was glaring at the ground beneath him, his slitted eyes luminous in the dark. Truly, their shine was far more beautiful than any common star.
Sephiroth turned away, pleased. Cloud might not realize now how great of a gift he had received, but one day he would. When he did, they could once again roam the countryside together, living as they pleased and damning the consequences. Just like old times.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter! This is the end of the first arc, and now we're moving onto the second (shorter) arc.
If you're enjoying the story, I post all of my writing previews & chapter updates on my twitter Rand0mSmil3z! Plus whatever else makes me happy 💐
Until next time 🌻
