Chapter 28. December 12, εуλ0007 (AM)

"Yuck," Tifa said, pulling some…. she didn't even want to know what off her hand. Luckily, the filthy water hadn't spilled over the tops of her boots, though her stockings had been splashed slightly.

A few feet away, Cloud was helping Aerith to her feet. The other girl had somehow managed to soil not even so much as the hem of her skirt in the drop down from Corneo's, adding to her aura of effortless femininity. It made Tifa a bit envious, truthfully - as much as anything else for what that represented. A peaceful, tragedy-free life, not always ready for battle, poised for disaster, the way her life had become as a part of AVALANCHE.

Femininity was a luxury lost to her long ago.

But Tifa had to agree with Cloud, there was steel and strength underneath the pink - as they toughed their way through slimy muck and the crushed masonry of ancient aqueduct paths, the impediments of the conditions heightening her fear as they rushed back as fast as they could. Guilty, she knew she should be fearful for ALL the citizens of Sector Seven, but she couldn't help it – she worried first and foremost for her friends, those closest to her. Was that selfish of her? "Marlene," Tifa half-moaned, thoughts unavoidably drifting to the girl, practically her daughter. "Barret… all of them…"

Aerith schlepped over, boots squishing in the goop underneath. She touched one hand to Tifa's arm, green eyes full of concern and compassion. "Don't give up yet, Tifa," she encouraged. "It's not like the pillar can come down so easily, right? All we can do is keep going. Don't give up until it's over." Much to Tifa's surprise, something in Aerith's aura, her touch, soothed her despite it all, restoring a miniscule bit of the hope she was trying so hard to hold onto.

"I just can't stop thinking about it," Tifa admitted, relieved to have someone to voice her worry to. The pillar… she couldn't believe it, didn't want to believe it, but deep down she knew it was true.

It was an interesting dynamic the three of them shared. The sheer length of time she had known Cloud sometimes lent itself to awkwardness, to a heaviness of topics a bit too hot to touch; when she wanted so badly to breach his walls but something stopped both from crossing.

Aerith brought a fresh sparkle of liveliness to the trio despite their urgent circumstances. With the need for AVALANCHE's secrecy and safety foremost in her mind, Tifa had been at first a bit suspicious about Aerith's inclusion – concerned as well for Aerith herself, now entrenched in a fight that wasn't her own. But Aerith seemed unaffected, gleefully throwing herself to their cause with little more than a few words explaining WHAT she was getting herself into, the first to urge them let's go, forward, keep moving, topped by her own exuberant attitude, a welcome distraction from the panic threatening to rise uncontrolled in her throat.

She found herself examining Cloud through Aerith's eyes as well. While she'd been handling Cloud like glass to some degree, careful not to crack his poorly-built façade; Aerith seemed none too concerned, gaily punching holes in his too-cool demeanor. Self-doubt plagued her; was she doing the right thing? She'd wanted to protect Cloud, care for him; she'd stopped trying to pressure him to remember, and now just observed, patiently. But really, did she want him to stay for himself – or for HER?

She'd come this far on her own – why did she now want so desperately to have him to lean on?

Aerith followed Tifa's eyes over to Cloud, the man trying so hard to fill the role of hero/leader, the way he saw it. It made her giggle inside. Someone ought to tell that guy everyone can see right through him. But a salty sort of charm to him, something all his own, at the same time that now and then something else would just catch her, a word, a motion, leaving her flustered and wondering and unsure of just how to make sense of anything she was thinking and feeling; and then she'd look back at Tifa and wonder about that too, what was meant to be, what would be, and if those were even the same thing.

She'd been swept up into all this so suddenly, if not unwillingly; for now, all she could do was take her own advice. Keep going forward.

Ahead of them loomed the threat of Shinra, the pillar's destruction, the plate drop. How many lives would be changed irrevocably if they failed? She could picture it, loosely at the borders of consciousness, not knowing this time if it was the Planet's voice or her own morbid imagination creating this worst-case future and every permutation in between – each possible result changing ever so gently the course of destiny.

The future is not set in stone.

They were close, so close to the way out, a floating bridge of wobbling platforms; Cloud, now all gentleman, crossed first, testing the stability, his reflexes conscious of every shift. The stagnant water flowed around, lapping at the edges, not just disgusting filth but mako-contaminated toxicity, corrosive, deadly. A last step across, mollified that it would hold, he motioned to the ladies.

Tifa crossed first, a splash of fear showing but trained martial arts senses helping her keep her balance as she made it across with little difficulty; with a small hop, she landed, Cloud's arm already out to steady her if it was called for. "Come on, Aerith," she called encouragement to the other side; Aerith stood staring at first, eyes nearly popping out of her head.

With trepidation, she stepped out onto the first block, nearly slipping but regaining her footing on the unstable platform. Firm-jawed, she made her way across inch by painstaking inch, as Cloud and Tifa urged her on. She had nearly made it across when a shift was the only warning she received, realizing the platform was about to capsize into the poison water.

She didn't know who yelled at her jump, but her body reacted even before her mind could catch up, and suddenly Tifa's slender arms snapped around her; securing her balance with surprising strength, and as they looked back and down together, the platform she had just escaped upended and finally sank below the surface.

Aerith shivered. She turned to Tifa, and the two women shared a nervous giggle as their only acknowledgement of the near miss.

His heartbeat returned to normal as quickly as it had shot up, and Cloud charged forward, already intent on the next goal. Tifa and Aerith were giggling and laughing like old friends, and Cloud wondered what they were talking about. He heard his name, briefly, but asking them about it only gave him a laugh and a knowing smile.

Saving each other, round and round. That seemed to be the way it was going, wasn't it? Tifa had been surprising enough – he was still amazed at what she'd built herself into over the years – but Aerith took to their mission nearly as easily. Why so eager to throw in her lot with a bunch of terrorists? Who blew up the reactor in her sector just yesterday?

Then again, she hadn't precisely explained her involvement with the Turks, either. Perhaps she held her own grudge against Shinra. That, more than anything else, made sense.

His eyes flickered instinctively from one woman to the other. Both his responsibilities. Both his to protect, to be theirs to count on. He couldn't let himself fail either one.

As if on cue, he saw them both stumble, flailing for balance, and as he leapt forward to catch them, his boots met with nothing but air beneath, and he barely had time to realize he was falling to the poison below -

- and he grabbed for the flash of metal before him, gloves wrapping around Aerith's staff. Jerking his head up, he saw the faces of both women contorted as they strained to pull him up, working in tandem as they tugged with their combined force. Suddenly, he was flung onto the platform, both reeling backwards with the force, the clatter of Aerith's staff as it skittered across the concrete for emphasis.

The three of them traded looks, breathing hard from the exertion. Cloud looked from one to the other, sheepish. I'm supposed to be the hero here, and look how they ended up saving his ass instead. "Sorry," he half-mumbled.

They were all over themselves reassuring him it's okay, but that feeling of failure stung nevertheless, never mind it came only from within. "Let's just keep going," he urged once again.

Climbing UP rather than further down came as a welcome relief. Even the short time they'd spent in the sewers – an hour? Two, at most? – the atmosphere was far from anything that could be considered pleasant, and Cloud knew he'd be grateful for the relatively freshness of slum pollution above. Beside him, Aerith wrinkled her nose prissily, and he didn't doubt Tifa mirrored her on his other side.

Almost there... He turned to Tifa, her worry amping the closer they got to the exit. He couldn't doubt he tensed as well, corralling the fear into action as he ran down the possible plans in his mind. A rumble from behind…

Sahagins. A whole pack. Growling in their guttural language, but the translation was clear, and they were out for blood – or food. A tasty meal of three humans. He sensed both women poised and ready to either side, no shortage of bravery, but faced with these odds... they'd be more distraction than asset. No fault of theirs. "Go," he curtly ordered Aerith.

"Now," Tifa's voice followed.

Determined, but she nodded and acquiesced. "Okay," she replied, turning to flee.

Tifa, fists raised. As proud as he was of her… now was not the time. This was a moment to keep that promise. "You too," he commanded.

"But there's too many – " she began, but he cut her off. "Not for me. GO –" and she did, pausing only a moment before making a break. "Hurry," she called half-behind her.

Cloud stood his ground. He knew he could take on all the monsters – but it was fast becoming a waste of time. No shame in retreat. Knocking two, then three, off balance with a grand swipe of his sword, he saw his opening and he turned and ran…

Single file, the watch charged up the pillar. Barret didn't know how or where the rumors had started, but he certainly wasn't about to question why.

It was fucking Shinra. He'd believe anything, when it came to them. And dropping the plate... as surreal as the idea seemed, even after they met the first Shinra troops on the pillar, he had to plan for the worst. They had to stop them.

Marlene, baby girl, Daddy's gonna fight the bad people. Daddy's gonna take care of you.

Tifa hadn't returned; he could only hope she'd make it through on her own. The news had come into Seventh Heaven, the watchman on duty yelling frantically, waving his hands, getting the bar's undivided attention in seconds. Weapons, placed to the side for a few spare moments to relax, were shouldered, and Wymer was commanding men and women already in motion out the door, slum dwellers used to being shit on by Shinra above but ready to fight to the end for their land and each other.

A younger man – Barret didn't even know his name, he noted with regret – stepped out of file to secure the landing, waving the rest on forward. Jessie hugged his rear, gun cocked and ready, gunfire ricochets coming deafening from above. Shouted orders from the enemy helicopter, and Barret didn't hesitate before pouring another volley of bullets in the bird's direction.

Behind him, men were already falling. Dying, or – He heard a scream and saw a man, riddled by the copter's guns, go over the edge. Plunging over the side.

Five stories. A chance he might make it, unless more ammo took him out before he hit the ground. But for Barret, he could only head for the top -

Loneliness, rampant. Like a film of dust settling on her skin, burrowing below the surface. Tifa could feel those souls lost in the train graveyard, disappeared and joined now to the other side.

She was scared of the ghosts. She had vague memories of wanting to search for her mother's ghost – leading to that fall, the memories of which she had none.

Aerith, inquisitive, talking to those same specters as if they were old friends; Tifa wondered what Aerith could see that she herself could not. Memories, she seemed to reach. Captive feelings of diaphanous specters, by turns mischievous and dangerous.

The ghosts were fucking with them.

Cloud tumbled both women to the ground an instant before a train car came crashing to the ground, the crash of metal echoing that much louder in the unnerving silence, the only other noise being the whistling wind that rose and quelled, carrying childlike laughter through the gloom.

Aerith didn't fear the ghosts. She feared more being alone without them. Cut off from any sense of others, whatever state they might be in? Bare flashes from childhood came back to her, mere instants where she had felt totally, completely alone – the most frightening moments of her life.

Besides that, this was nothing.

Even Cloud feared more than her, as much as he tried to play it off. She could sense it as she clung to his left arm, subtle cues a giveaway, even without the fear radiating from Tifa, clinging to his right arm as if for dear life. Aerith offered the silent reassurance she could, maintaining her own composure to keep Tifa focused. It was the least – and best – she could do for her.

She sent a thought to the spirits, hoping it would reach them in the Lifestream where they now resided. Help us, she told them. Lead us to the way out. She could have sworn she heard a response… Hurry.

Suddenly, Tifa twitched in surprise. "Marlene?" she gasped, for the first time since they'd entered splintering free of the group, towards something Aerith couldn't sense – and she wondered. Marlene? Her daughter, it must be. Evoked in the way Tifa said the syllables of the name.

Marlene, crying. Even the child's transparent image struck her with fear and longing; the little girl who meant so much to her, who had reminded her of what love really was, when she thought she had forgotten. And what she was fighting for. Other people. The future. It wasn't the ghosts she feared, Tifa realized - it was what ghosts represented. Loss. She'd had more than enough of that - and she didn't want any more, not if she could do anything about it.

Aerith looked on in sympathy, unable to see what Tifa hallucinated, but more than able to read Tifa's feelings. That was what the three of them needed, she realized. What the ghosts were giving them to help. A reminder of what was important.

The image of the pillar came to Tifa once again. Conscious once again of her goal, she swallowed her fear and pressed on, working through the maze with every step a victory closer to their goal. Marlene's tearful apparition faded, and Tifa turned to her companions. "Let's go. We can't waste any more time."

"We made it!"

She could hear Aerith and Cloud behind her as she ran, but all Tifa could think of was ahead, the pillar, still standing.

Around her was chaos. People both familiar and strangers, screaming, running, fleeing. They found themselves forcing their way through against a tide of humanity, pushing their way towards the pillar, standing tall, reaching for the plate above, who knows for how long. Flashes of light and explosions like firecrackers lit up the night, telling them that some were fighting, standing their ground. AVALANCHE, the watch, just regular people, all defending their home together.

"What's happening?" Tifa cried over the din, but all she could catch were snippets to fill in the story; rumors of the plate drop thankfully preceding them, leaked who knows how, evacuation taking shape – but the danger was still there. People, desperate, not knowing what was going to happen, were fleeing with only the most valuable of their possessions – children, money, some as little as the clothes on their backs. But even in the short while it took them to reach the center of the conflict, organization was taking hold, turning the mass of people into a more controlled flight.

The Turks, some said. The Turks had told them to leave. The Turks were going to drop the plate. Maybe both – she couldn't get the straight of it, didn't know what or even HOW to think…

Marlene…

She wanted to run to Seventh Heaven, but… already split between responsibilities when she blasted to the base of the pillar, she was deaf to the sounds of gunfire above… even Barret's screaming audible from the top… as before her eyes, she saw Wedge fall and crash to the ground.

She and Aerith rushed over, Wedge holding his stomach, alive, but breaths harsh and thin. Aerith leaned over him, a frown of consideration creasing her face.

"Tifa…" she faced the other woman. "I'll do what I can." But Aerith's expression was uncertain, and Tifa could already feel the tears starting to build.

"Don't worry about me," Wedge gasped. "No time… Biggs… Jessie… Barret… they all went up…"

Barret… "He left Marlene? What was he thinking?"

"He... thought we could stop it in time. We all did." Barret, so liable to rush in full of bravado and make a foolish mistake… and this time, that mistake could have fatal consequences, ones she knew the man would never forgive himself for. "That's why I'm glad you're here… Tifa… Cloud…"

Cloud nodded, mind already focused on the next objective. "Stay here," he urged Wedge. He locked eyes with Tifa; she nodded in agreement. As Wedge tried to rise, she placed a hand on his shoulder, soothing, as regretfully she watched Cloud barrel forward towards the pillar and up.

Some of her fellow sector citizens milled around the pillar based, and some of those came forward, lifting Wedge to support him as Tifa and Aerith helped him up. As he waddled away with either arm around another man's shoulder, she wondered if she'd ever see him again, if any of them would survive this night. Wedge, you always thought you were a coward, but you're braver than you know. He'd already been half up the tower while she was still waiting below…

Aerith caught Tifa's inadvertent glance upward. Towards Cloud. "You're a fighter," she told the dark-haired woman gently. "You need to do what you do best"

Yes, but… that heart was torn and helpless right now. Two choices... both the best… there was a solution, but… could she really ask this of someone she had just met? "Aerith…?" she began hesitantly, trying to keep pleading out of her voice. "My bar… Seventh Heaven… it's in this neighborhood…" At least, it was. She realized she'd already given it up in her heart. So sad to be wishing goodbye to her makeshift home, but there was nothing there that couldn't be replaced. "Barret's daughter, Marlene, is there…" PEOPLE. The one thing truly valuable, irreplaceable.

Aerith nodded. Marlene. That child... "Say no more. I'll get her out," and Tifa's heart surged with thanks and relief, emotions there were no time to speak. "You go ahead now. Follow your heart." She took Tifa's hands in both of hers, and both women's eyes met in an understanding of hearts and courage. With a quick squeeze, Aerith was already wheeling away, gone into the warren of Sector Seven -

- and with her departure, Tifa was tearing up the pillar herself, legs moving almost before she knew, racing up endless stairs, thinking only to catch up to Cloud – Countless stairs upwards, but she felt nothing in her legs as her mind went ahead, running, running…

Biggs, barely able to force out the one word "go" instead of "goodbye" as he should have. Bodies hanging over railings, sprawled on landings, her need to rush her only insulation, no time to find out for sure if it was anyone she once had know.

Searchlights swept over the pillar. Gunfire splattering to her left and then right, Tifa wondering how she had lucked out that all the bullets were missing her. But in a removed part of her mind, as she climbed up she noticed not all those bodies were residents of the slums. Troops of Shinra, laid out unconscious but as good as a death sentence unless Shinra chose to bail them out. Shattered mech parts, broken wreckage of destruction rolling through, and she knew…

Cloud… he was still ahead…

Without warning, her foot slipped from under her, the barraged stairs collapsing into bits. Terrified, she launched off the crumbling steps, reaching forward for a handhold that was there no longer and she heard herself screaming the one word, one name…

"CLOUD!"

Cissnei hustled through Sector Seven, people fleeing all around her. The leaks had reached the people they needed; leaving the Turks' conscience as clean as it could be. Not everyone would get out; this was the best they could do. Cloud and Tifa were safe at the pillar, but only as long as Aerith was with them; she hoped, disloyally, that they'd make it out, that Cloud could keep that promise he'd spoken of so long ago.

Cloud. Now the SOLDIER he never was… what had happened? Zack, she thought with shame. The day the Turks had failed.

But the clock was ticking, and there was one more small thing to attend to… She snuck through alleys and shadows, past fires already starting in the madness, pushing the way to Seventh Heaven. A flash of pink, might have slipped even her notice, had it not been going the wrong way. She pressed flat against the wall – Aerith?!

Why was she here?

She watched where the girl was going.

She picked up her phone.

"Urgent, sir," she launched into her report immediately. "The target is no longer at the location. She's…" In the distance, the sounds of battle; it might be minutes, it might be hours of gunfire lighting up the dark night sky, but she knew, choices would be made in instants this night.

*******

- and like magic, his face was before her, palm grasping hers, SOLDIER strength whipping her upwards, hand snaking around her waist as he whisked her behind a metal support, in the same instant a hail of bullets splattered the space where she just had been.

"Nice catch," she smiled, still half-out of breath but eyes shining.

He wheeled her angrily to face him. "You're crazy," he shouted over the din, but even through the glove still resting on her back, she could feel the way his heart was pounding. Eyes full of rage – at HER – and she had never thought them so beautiful as she did then.

My hero…

Only now, she wasn't just here to be saved. She was ready, to fight by his side. It was what he, their promise, had led her to become; it was time. "So are you," she told him, defiantly. "And I'm not going anywhere, so suck it up."

He glared – but behind the anger there was something like – pride? It held her heart for just a moment as he dropped her arms, lurching forward and with one sweep of his arm, motioning to her to follow him, upwards, further to the top…

The girl next door. Cloud didn't need to look to know she was there, with him, holding her own beside him. How far we've both come… and with the threat immediate, the thought following disappeared, waiting to reappear another time, another place.

…how far we might go…

Letting the flow of people carry her into the heart of Sector Seven, Aerith now found herself swimming against the river. They didn't need her shouted encouragement to abandon the sector, and she was only able to get one or two words from frightened citizens, barely more than the general direction to Seventh Heaven.

Tifa was right, it's too late… there's no way everyone will get out in time… the soothing exterior was getting harder to maintain, her inner core freaking out underneath the façade. Surrounded by imminent tragedy, how could it be otherwise?

But she'd willingly gotten into this, and she'd see it through.

Fortunately Seventh Heaven was hard to miss – the largest building around, and Tifa was right to be proud. It would only make mourning the loss that much harder, Aerith thought as she entered a warm, homey interior. As she looked closer, she saw signs of something abrupt, panicked were everywhere – chairs overturned, half-empty beers on the table, as if drinkers had fled in a hurry.

There were no signs of life visible, but hesitating a moment, she heard the soft whimpers of a cry. A child. She saw no signs of life, but after a moment she heard the soft whimpers of a cry. A child. Coming from behind the counter…

Aerith approached quietly, carefully, swinging the half-door to the other side of the bar top, scanning Tifa's neat array of bottles and supplies. To her right, a small but serviceable kitchenette, dishes in the sink the ghostly leftovers of the inhabitants. She followed her ears around and down, finding the object of her search curled up under the counter, arms around her knees, head resting fearfully on her hands as she scrunched further back into the space.

Hearing Aerith's steps, the girl lifted her head –

- and Aerith looked into her wide young eyes –

- and her heart came to a screeching halt.

Oh, no, no, it couldn't be…