The Stop For FF7 Freaks - Dread Harbingers Part2 - Video Games - http://maxpages.com/theff7stop/Dread_Harbingers

"Oh, yuck."

"Come on, guys. Time's a wastin'"

------------------------------------

Tifa frowned thoughtfully at the rain drenched scenery surrounding
Kalm. Actually, she didn't have too much to complain about. After
Meteor had been destroyed and all the immediate chaos had settled down,
both she and Cloud had taken up residence in Kalm Town -- unfortunately,
not with each other. That didn't mean that they had gone their separate
ways. Far from it. They frequently traveled together either to visit
friends or to hunt down the occasional troublesome monster. Kalm was
really more a base of operations than a home.

Despite the constant travel and activity, Cloud actually seemed
content. She had been pleasantly surprised at the change in him after
Sephiroth's destruction. Tifa had never quite realized just how
oppressive the bastard's mere existence had been to Cloud. But with
that dark, haunting presence gone, he had lost much of the edgy
broodiness that had bothered her so much during their first meeting in
Midgar, when she had found him sitting outside the train station. For
the first time in years, Cloud had fully emerged from Sephiroth's shadow
and Tifa liked what she saw.

But it also puzzled her a great deal.

Cloud had been right. Her experiences in the Lifestream made her
realize that she had never really known him, never really played with
him, never really spoken to him.... Their meeting at the water tower
just before his departure for Midgar had been her first and only chance
to really speak to him one-on-one. Although she had been nice enough to
him -- that was to say, not actively cruel -- she had basically ignored
him. He had simply been the kid on the fringes, alone and unwanted.
The kid that the adults always yelled at. The kid that the other kids
always picked on.

So when had he changed from a loner to a leader? Where had Cloud
acquired that quiet confidence and assertiveness? Where did he get the
inner strength to overcome Sephiroth's brutal domination and
manipulation? Somehow, she couldn't quite see him developing up those
abilities while working for Shinra. They were hardly the sort of traits
that Shinra would want to encourage, at least in their regular troops.
He freely admitted that he had been nothing more than a common trooper
-- in his own words, just another grunt in the field. It wasn't as if
he had been some hotshot officer on the fast track to the top.

What was even more amazing was her recent realization that much of
his transformation had occurred right before her very eyes. She could
still remember the sullen, mercenary young man she had met at the train
station just under a year ago -- a man who cared about money first and
everything else a distant second.

One year.... It felt like a lifetime.

But only a few short weeks later, with Meteor hovering overhead and
Sephiroth lurking beneath their feet at the Northern Crater, Cloud had
become the trusted leader of their odd little group -- the man whose
encouragement and leadership successfully guided them into and out of
battle with the most evil and powerful being on the Planet.

What had happened in those seven years since their secret meeting at
the water tower? She was intensely curious but was equally reluctant to
pry. What few details he let slip hinted at dark and terrible things.
With the shaky state of his memory, it was probably better to let
sleeping dogs lie. Cloud had managed to reach a tenuous peace with
himself. Destroying that fragile inner peace was the last thing she
wanted to do.

Tifa sighed. Things were okay but life was far from perfect.
Perhaps the most important problem was that her relationship with Cloud
seemed stalled at the 'close platonic friend' stage. And it wasn't
Cloud's fault. Well, not exactly his fault.

There were times where she would catch him staring out into the
distance with a wistful look on his face. It was a look of sadness,
regret, loneliness.... It wasn't too hard to figure what -- or rather
who -- he was thinking about.

Aeris.

When the Lifestream had emerged to save the Planet from Meteor, she
had thought that Cloud had reconciled himself to Aeris' fate. But now
it appeared that he still grieved deeply for the flower girl.

It wasn't that she hated Aeris. Far from it. She had developed a
strong liking and respect for the girl during their brief time together.
Tifa had mourned her cruel death at Sephiroth's hands as much as the
others. But she couldn't deny that she resented Aeris at times, just as
she also resented that instant, mysterious bond that the flower girl had
with Cloud. It was a bond that apparently still existed for him.

Tifa loved Cloud. And she was pretty sure that he cared about her.
However, Cloud's lingering feelings for Aeris made it impossible for her
to discuss her true feelings with him.

Maybe she was just being greedy, but in the contest for Cloud's
heart, she didn't want to be the winner by default, simply because she
was the one still alive. Tifa hated being second-best.

"The Highwind's here." She started as Red XIII's low rumble
interrupted her thoughts.

Climbing aboard, Tifa was pleasantly surprised to find Vincent
already on board. He acknowledged her and Red's presence with a slight
nod, then retired to his usual secluded spot toward the back of the
bridge. Yuffie had actually staggered out of the Highwind's hold to
greet her. As the ninja girl made her appearance, Cid took a deep puff
on his smoke and cheerfully said, "Exciting ride, hm? I always wanted
to see how the Highwind II would handle without the motion dampers on."

Yuffie gave him a malevolent stare and snarled, "I'll get you for
this, Cid!" With those words, she fled the bridge.

As usual, Vincent said nothing about that exchange. However, he did
raise his eyebrows slightly. Cid shrugged carelessly and put on an
innocent look that fooled no one as he headed the Highwind toward
Midgar.

---------------------------

As he rode north, Cloud pondered the fairly comfortable life he had
managed to make for himself -- and the two things that disturbed that
new life.

The first was the quiet, subdued sensation of sorrow and loss that
had haunted him ever since the destruction of Meteor. It wasn't
anything like the fierce, heart-wrenching grief he had felt as he
helplessly watched Aeris die at Sephiroth's hands. Instead, it was like
a mild, persistent ache in his soul -- a wound that lingered and would
never quite heal properly.

It wasn't a crippling sort of pain. It could be endured. And he
would endure it. No more running away. No more denials of an
unpleasant reality. He had lost himself inside an illusionary world of
lies and fantasies once before -- and look how Sephiroth had used that
weakness to break him.

Never again.

Aeris had returned to the Planet. He should be glad. She had
reached her Promised Land, a place where no one could frighten or hurt
her. He would simply have to accept that she was forever lost to him.

But it was the dreams that bothered Cloud most of all -- dreams that
came with increasing frequency. Considering the types of experiences
he'd been through in the last several years, he would have expected
plenty of nightmares. But most of his dreams were nothing of the kind.

His conscious mind could not -- or would not -- recall any specific
details. But Cloud could clearly remember the feelings and emotions
linked to those dreams -- feelings of laughter, of camaraderie, of
friendship and trust....

They were GOOD dreams, almost to the point of seductiveness. Cloud
found that deeply troubling. The dreams were the only time he felt
truly whole. He hungered after that feeling so badly. But he had
learned to fear what he desired. So many times before, he either lost
what he had desired most or the desirable thing had turned out to be a
bait for a trap.

And there was another aspect about the dreams that bothered him. By
their very nature, they hinted at a terrible loss.

There had been someone that he had known. Someone he had been very
close to. Someone who almost certainly had been his very best
friend....

....and someone he had utterly forgotten.

-----------------------------------

An hour later, Cloud glared out from under his rainhood and swore.
This was utterly ridiculous. He and his friends had crisscrossed the
world untold number of times in their quest to save the Planet from
Sephiroth. They had hacked their way through trackless jungle, crossed
burning deserts, sailed over unmapped oceans, hiked into the very bowels
of the earth....

So how the hell did he manage to get lost riding from Fort Condor to
Midgar? On a gold chocobo, no less. He prayed that Cid won't find out,
otherwise he'd never hear the end of it.

"Where on earth am I now!?" he shouted at no one in particular.

Nikki, his gold chocobo, stamped its foot in annoyance, as if to
deny any involvement in their current predicament.

Cloud grinned and stroked the chocobo's neck. "Sorry, didn't mean
to imply that it was your fault."

He and his mount soon found themselves on a rocky outcrop. To his
relief, he saw the great city of Midgar spread out below him.

(Well, better late than never.)

Dismounting, he stepped closer to the edge to get a better view of
the city.

(Weird. Without the Mako reactors running, Midgar looks a lot
dimmer than it did back then....)

[ flash ]

Cloud looked around in confusion before slowly looking down at his
hands. For some strange reason, he had been expecting -- and dreading
-- the sight of blood. But there was nothing on his hands except plain,
ordinary rainwater.

He shivered. He had to get away from here. Something deep inside
was screaming that there was something horribly wrong with this place.
He took a quick step toward his chocobo and heard a loud crack under his
feet. Startled, Cloud glanced down.

At first, he thought that it was just a branch, then he abruptly
realized that he stepped on a bone. A human bone. He quickly located
found the rest of the body nearby. The scraps of flesh on the bones and
the strands of black hair still clinging to the skull told him that the
corpse had probably been lying there for a year, maybe less.

Curiosity made him take a closer look. Many of the bones were
broken and not by accident. The breaks were far too clean. The skull
told a similar tale. Apparently not content with practically cleaving
the person's head in half -- probably with a sword or an ax -- someone
had literally hacked the poor bastard apart.

....but the eyes just... wouldn't... stop... staring... at him....

/ Get out of my head! /

The skull slipped from Cloud's suddenly numb fingers as an agonizing
pain exploded in his brain. He staggered to his feet, then the
rain-softened soil suddenly gave away. He toppled off the steep
outcrop, bounced once, and landed heavily on a tiny ledge fifty feet
below.

-----------------------------------

In Reeve's office, Cid grumbled, "Where the hell's Cloud? A couple
of hours, he says. If I'd had any idea it was going to take him this
long...."

Tifa paced anxiously. "It doesn't take 'this long' to get here from
Fort Condor."

Reeve said mildly, "Maybe the weather's the problem?"

Cid flung himself down in a comfortable chair. "Come on! Those
gold chocobos can run across the bleedin' ocean! You think a little
rain and mud's going to bother them?"

Tifa pulled out her phone and tried calling Cloud. Tension mounted
as the phone rang and rang. No answer. Finally, there was a click on
the other end.

"Cloud, where on earth are you!?" Tifa shouted.

At first there was no answer, then Tifa heard a familiar warble.
She stared at the phone in shock.

"Nikki?"

Cid jumped up and yelled, "Who the hell's Nikki?"

Tifa made a quick, shushing gesture and distractedly muttered,
"Cloud's chocobo. Cloud!? Cloud!"

There was another fretful warble, followed by a distressed cooing
sound... then they heard a very faint groan.

"Oh god! Something's happened to him! Cid...."

"Come on, we can track him from the Highwind." He, Tifa, and the
others stormed out of Reeve's office. By the time they had reboarded
the Highwind, Cait Sith was waiting for them on the bridge, anxiously
rocking back and forth.

-----------------------------------

"The signal's coming from around here. The kid can't be too far
away," Cid muttered.

Tifa and the others anxiously peered through the gathering darkness
and mist. The temperature was dropping quickly and the rain was getting
heavier.

"If we don't find him soon, he could die of exposure." Tifa paced
anxiously from one side of the Highwind to the other.

Yuffie tried her best to be reassuring. "Cloud's tough. He won't
croak just because of a little bad weather, Tifa."

Tifa smiled weakly but the unspoken thought running though
everyone's head was, (But what if he's badly hurt....?).

It was Vincent, as usual, who first sighted their quarry.

"Down there, on the ledge."

Perched on a tiny ledge fifty feet or so below a rocky outcrop was a
golden chocobo who was huddled protectively over a still human body.
There was a sheer drop of well over a hundred feet on the other side of
the ledge.

Tifa whispered, "If he moves...."

Cid pounded her lightly on the shoulder. "Quit thinking about it
and let's go get him!"

Unable to land the Highwind in the rocky terrain, everyone went over
the side on a rope ladder. Once down on the outcrop, Cid, Tifa, and
several crewmembers held a rope as Vincent rappelled down the cliff. It
wasn't an easy task. The mud made footing uncertain while the constant
rain made the cliff dangerously unstable, with bits of it crumbling off
without warning. The chocobo objected loudly as stones and dirt rained
down on its head and back in spite of Vincent's best efforts to be
careful during his climb.

Fortunately, getting down the cliff was the hardest part of the
rescue. Once on the ledge, Vincent simply tossed Cloud on Nikki's back
and rode the gold chocobo back up to the top.

They quickly hauled Cloud onboard the Highwind and into the sickbay.
After Tifa finished healing him with her materia, Cid offered Tifa a
hot cup of coffee and asked, "How's he doing?"

"He had a few cracked ribs, some nasty cuts and bruises. The Full
Cure materia's taken care of any physical injuries that he's got. But
he's still out cold."

"Must have taken a bad knock on the head going down the cliff."

"That's why I think we should hurry back to Midgar. I want a doctor
to take a look at him, just in case."

"We're already underway. Tifa, could you tell me whether all his
injuries came from the fall?"

For a moment, she didn't quite understand the question, then she
said, "You don't think it was just an accident? You think that he might
have been attacked or shoved off the cliff?"

"Come on. The kid's damn quick on his feet. Even with all that mud
and junk, it's hard to imagine him just falling off without someone --
or something -- helping him along."

She shook her head. "Stupid.... I should have thought about that
myself. But no, I didn't find anything unusual." She paused a moment.
"If he was attacked, it must have happened so fast that he didn't have a
chance to draw his weapon. It's right there in its sheath." She
pointed at the Ultima Weapon, lying on a nearby table.

"Hmph."

Making his way back to the Highwind's bridge, Cid stopped to talk to
Vincent. "I saw you looking around at the ground back there. Find
anything?"

"No suspicious tracks. But it could have been an aerial creature."

"So did you find anything at all?"

"A corpse."

Cid nearly choked on his coffee. "Why didn't you say...."

Vincent shrugged. "It'd been there for at least a year, maybe
more."

"Oh well, in that case...." Cid snorted and shoved Vincent's
finding to the back of his mind. He had more important things to worry
about.

-----------------------------------

While the doctor at Mideel had been calm and reassuring, Dr. Stephen
was smug, arrogant, and incredibly irritating. However, Tifa couldn't
argue with the man's medical expertise.

"Interesting." He prodded Cloud's stomach. "Marvelous muscle tone,
but typical of SOLDIER personnel. And the eyes.... hmmm.... yes...."

Tifa cleared her throat and said pointedly, "Doctor, you're supposed
to checking out his injuries. Quit treating him like he was a bird at a
chocobo sale! He's your PATIENT!"

He snorted, "I am well aware of that. However, as I've just noted,
he's in superb physical shape. He only has a mild concussion -- it's
nothing a little rest won't take care of."

Tifa sighed with relief. The doctor continued, "You, however, are
another story. I refuse to be responsible for your condition if you
continue to stand around in those wet, ridiculously skimpy clothes."

She flushed angrily. "'Ridiculously skimpy....' Just where do you
get off telling me...!"

Standing in the doorway, Cait Sith said, "He's right."

When Tifa glared furiously at it, the Moogle took a wary bounce
backward as the cat hastily elaborated. "I wasn't talking about your
clothes! I mean, you're exhausted, wet, and dirty. Why don't you grab
a quick shower and change? It'll only take a few minutes and he's not
going anywhere in his present condition. You're not going to do him any
good if you catch pneumonia."

Tifa looked a bit reluctant, then suddenly sneezed twice. She
sniffled and said, "Actually, that's starting to sound like a really
good idea. I'll think I'll do that." She turned to Dr. Stephen and
gave him a warning stare. "I'll be right back."

Pointing at Cait Sith, the doctor said, "That THING's perfectly
correct. Your friend's not going anywhere at the moment. Might as well
take your time."

Tifa sniffled again and stalked out of the infirmary with Cait Sith
bouncing at her heels.

-----------------------------------

Wavering in and out of consciousness, Cloud slowly opened his eyes.
He was lying on an examination table....

/ NO! /

...and someone dressed in a white labcoat was standing over him....

/ NO! /

A smug, nasal voice cheerfully said, "As I live and breath. It's
'Code C' from the Nibelheim project! Dr. Roissy will be thrilled to
find out that you're still alive and kicking." There was a
nerve-grating chuckle accompanied by a sharp prod in his ribs. "You
know, she was absolutely devastated when she heard that you and the
other guy were killed after your escape."

/ Oh, god... not that voice..../

Fear and loathing churned his stomach. That goddamn voice was the
stuff of nightmares. Hearing it always signaled another 'session'... or
worse. More 'treatments'.... More pain.... He was drowning in that
pain....

"Now that we're alone, let's take a quick look at you."

And then the labcoated figure touched him with those cold, clammy
hands of his....

/ Not this time, you pig! /

A low, terrifying snarl of rage filled the room as Cloud suddenly
grabbed the startled doctor by the throat and heaved him into a wall.
Cloud slid off the examination table with predatory ease, then stalked
toward the stunned scientist lying on the floor.

With a vicious little purr in his voice, he said, "Well, this time
I'm not tied up, strapped down, or doped to the gills. Not quite so
easy to handle now, am I, my man?"

Dr. Stephen scuttled backward. "NO! Stay away! Don't

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