It's his clothes that are different, she realizes belatedly. His sword, too. But otherwise, he seems normal, right? The silent, brief nod of acknowledgement... it's just like him.
And then the goggles come off, and her eyes widen at the warmth in his. Lips part, but the words of confusion won't surface no matter what she tries, and she finds herself frozen in her shock as his fingers slide up her arm to inspect the wound. There's no chance to even begin to form the wrong impression; by the time she processes that he's touching her, and that he doesn't appear averse to doing so, his hand is already falling away.
It's part instinct that her own hand moves as if to follow, part years of longing, but her brain kicks back into gear in that same moment and she snatches it back, cradling it in her other hand as if his touch burned her somehow. She meets his gaze, unflinching, but there's a vulnerability there that she'd never confess to feeling. Not to mention the confusion.
"I don't understand," she says, and her voice is low, although some miracle keeps it from trembling. "You're... different."
And not in the way she had noted in the Slums: the change of years and hardship and training that made her almost afraid of him. She saw him just a few hours ago, and yet this change seems just as complete. How...?
"What?" Cloud blinks, taking a slight step back. His boot scraps along the ground and there's a moment where he looks briefly hurt. Now that she mentions it, something does feel off about the area that they're in.
Something in the air, perhaps? He's about to press Tifa on what she could mean when he turns and catches sight of--"Midgar?" His attention, attitude, and stance changes completely, the blond turning to fully face it. The city looms as large as it ever did, even from this distance.
"It's..in one piece?" He's taking a step back from all of this--several steps back. He should be done seeing things. It was finished! Over!
The look in his eyes makes her heart hurt, and there's a moment where, despite her misgivings, she almost reaches for him. But then a few short things happen in quick succession, and suddenly Cloud is standing several steps further back from where he was, and uttering words that make her eyes narrow, her fists clench.
How can he say that Midgar is in one piece when Sector 7 is no more, when their friends are still lying buried in the combined rubble of plate and slums? When just a few short days ago he held her as she sobbed her pain into his shoulder? She whirls to face him, tears burning fresh in angry eyes... but then she sees the look in his, something almost wild, almost panicked.
"...Cloud?" Her fingers relax again, and Tifa takes a few hesitant steps towards him. "Talk to me. Whatever it is... I'm listening."
He let's out a little huff and motions in the direction of the massive city.
"Last time I saw this place, it was in ruins. All of it." More to the point, Tifa should know this. Then again, it did look like the party was splitting up when he was driving through all of that weird light...
"Hey." He turns to face Tifa once more, nodding in her direction. "I like the outfit, but you usually dress different. Were you out here training, or are you going somewhere?" He glances briefly just past Tifa towards Kalm before looking back to her.
Cloud seems like he already knows the answer, he just wants to make sure.
Ruins? She shakes her head, the distress clear on her face. He's not making any sense. It's bad enough that Sector 7 is gone; the thought of the entirety of the city being destroyed... all those lives... It makes her sick. But what does he mean, the last time he saw Midgar? They only just left Midgar, and it's been in view the entire time...
Her lips part, a question on the tip of her tongue, but then he speaks again, and...
Wait, her... her outfit...? For a few long, quiet seconds, her eyes search his. Is it possible...?
"We just left Midgar," she says, her voice soft. "We're going to Kalm. Sephiroth is alive; he killed President Shinra. We're going to find him."
If it is what she thinks, somehow, then that should be enough information... right?
Then..all those things he saw on his way through that portal of light, they were--he was--?
Tifa can see him piecing it all together before he offers a soft, "Oh." in response. He doesn't say anything specific, but what he does follow up with really says it all.
"You're just starting out." As in not just Midgar being barely even the tipping point, but that Cloud himself is from the future. Question is: why did this happen at all?
It's so weird to think of it that way. With how much they've been through, they're only "starting out"? And yet, just looking at him, how different he is... Tifa knows it has to be true.
And isn't there something about that whole thing that she finds a relief? To know that even in the future, he's alive and well... She finds a smile coming to her lips, and this time it's she who reaches for his hand, taking it in both of her own.
"You came a long way to rescue me," she says, her voice soft. "Thank you."
There are other things to worry about, of course. Why is he here? Is it something to do with their fight with the Whispers?
"Of course, I--" Cloud pauses just as his foot starts to drag forward. He almost pulled Tifa into his arms--almost. Instead he places his free hand on top of theirs and settles for taking a single step towards her. He needed to remember that this wasn't necessarily his Tifa.
"--Looks like it, yeah. You seem to have some idea of what's going on." May as well hear her side of all of this first.
A couple of days ago, she sobbed into his shoulder, and he hesitated to comfort her, to bring his arms up to hold her as she practically clung to him. But in this moment? All it takes is for her to take his hand before he's stepping forward and willingly placing his hand on hers too. Whatever he's been through, it's been a lot. She almost wants to ask, but--
That probably wouldn't be a good idea, right?
Instead, she just nods. "It might be our fault you're here." Her voice is quiet. "We fought the arbiters of fate. We... we don't have a destiny anymore."
Their fault? Arbiters of fate? No destiny? Tifa's words kept echoing in his head, bouncing around before settling on a proper and final thought.
"Things might be different back home?" This Cloud has been through quite a bit; and after he was done, there was the aftereffects of said things to deal with on top of that.
Everything that Tifa helped him with. What if--? "Does that mean we aren't--" He stops there and shakes his head, leaving Tifa with one juicy morsel of information to mull over as Cloud slowly pulls his hands away and heads over to Fenrir, his motorcycle.
"Come on. We gotta get you to Kalm first. We can pick up where we left off once everyone else leaves." He waits for Tifa to get good and settled behind him, and then they're off to Kalm!
She hadn't even thought of that. Is it possible that they've changed his world around with their actions? There's something in the way he questions it that has her feeling something twisting in her gut. Guilt, maybe. What if they've just ruined everything for him? She doesn't want to be beholden to destiny, but she didn't think about what that could mean. Until now.
Especially when Cloud starts to say something about what she can only assume is the two of them. Her lips part to ask, despite her decision not to do that only moments before, but he's already moving back to the motorcycle.
Wait, is going to Kalm a good idea? The others are there... Cloud is there...
Still, he seems to know what he's doing. So she settles herself behind him, arms wrapping around his waist. But she can't stop herself from reminding him as they speed over the fields: "We're meeting in the Inn... you're gonna have to wait somewhere, okay? I think you might be too much to explain right now."
Although by the time she emerges from the Inn a few hours later, once again alone - this time at her own insistence - she no doubt needs some explanation of her own. There's a concerned, confused frown on her face. She's had worried questions about her Cloud (is that even the right term for him?) for a while now, but this is something else entirely.
"I don't know how much is safe to ask you," she says when she reaches this new Cloud's side again. "But I have questions." Tifa pauses then, and tries a smile on for size, with a small shake of her head. She needs to be strong for him, too. "I know you have questions too. Maybe we should go somewhere quieter? I told the others I'd catch up with them..."
"I know!" Cloud replied during their ride, throwing a glance back over his shoulder to her. It didn't affect their ride at all; in fact he continued to ride rather impressively on the bike. When he dropped her off, he explained why she at least needed to go to Kalm.
"He isn't gonna tell the story until you get there." Then he made sure to drive off away from Kalm--in the opposite direction from where the group would be going, of course. Then when he pulls up later, Tifa broaches the subject of something he was also dwelling over: questions. He had a few as well, but he's good about answering hers first.
"We can go wherever you want, Tifa." Cloud holds his hand out for her to take. When she does, they leave again, heading away from Kalm to the edge of the Midgar area. He stops the bike and waits for Tifa to get off first before he does the same.
He's picked a spot facing the ocean. He doesn't say it, but he always thought she would like this view best. Romantic, even. Plus it faced them away from Midgar.
Of course, Cloud's words when he left her in Kalm left her nothing short of confused. And yet if it's possible, she's even more confused by the time he helps her back onto his bike to leave together. The story that the younger Cloud told only served to solidify the doubts she's been having for a while, the feeling that there's something different with him, and not in a good way. It makes her feel sick with worry, and between that and the worry she's feeling for the older Cloud's future...
When she climbs off the bike to find herself facing the ocean, though, she forgets it all for a moment, a small smile finding her lips as she takes a few steps forward.
"It's beautiful," she says in a murmur, turning back to face him as the sea breeze whips her hair back. She doesn't say it, but there's something kind of romantic about it.
She waits until they're seated to pose the question, and she's hesitant about it, even though something tells her it's safe to ask this Cloud, even though it wasn't safe to ask the other. "He remembers that day, but he shouldn't. He wasn't there, was he? The SOLDIER who came, he had black hair..."
When Tifa faces him with her hair flowing in the breeze, the older Cloud can't help wondering if there were possibly a more beautiful sight than that. Even as they sit and face the miles of crystalline clear ocean before them, there's a smile on his face.
Not a dopey one, mind you. Just one of contentment. When she speaks about the story Cloud told everyone in Kalm, the smile is still there. Soft. Especially when he looks at her.
"Zack." Cloud hesitates about whether or not he should Tifa anything, but he is stuck here for who knew how long, so.."He was there. Or I was. We. We were there." Cloud shifts his focus back to the water, watching the way the rays of the sun give the surface a nice shimmer.
"I never made it to SOLDIER. I ended up being nothing more than a grunt. I couldn't handle facing you like that, so I never took my helmet off around you."
The smile on his face is something that's still amazing to see. He's so handsome. He always has been, of course, but that smile is something else. Despite all the worries, she finds that it's easy to smile in return.
At least until he mentions Zack. She nods. That's what she remembers too: the black-haired SOLDIER who came to town with Sephiroth...
...and the Shinra grunt who'd prevented her from following them into the reactor with a silent stretch of his arm?
Her expression softens, and she reaches for him, shaking her head as her hand rests on his forearm. "Cloud, I would never..."
She shakes her head again, falling silent. He knows, right? She's sure he does now. So she changes the subject, just a little: "He doesn't know, does he? He thinks he's telling the truth."
And then, after a beat, with a confused tilt of her head: "Wait. But your eyes..."
Cloud let's his silence do the talking: he knows by now that she wouldn't look down on him for not making it into SOLDIER. He also confirms that his younger self is convinced that what he says and thinks is indeed the truth with a nod of his head.
When Tifa points out his eyes, Cloud's small smile turns into something a little more thoughtful. "Hojo tried to make me one of his experiments. It's why we lost touch after Sephiroth took everything away from us. I barely remember it, but Zack..got us out. Died protecting me."
When he tells her that Hojo turned him into an experiment, her eyes narrow, and her fingers for a moment tighten over his arm before she realizes what she's doing and lets him go again with a small, apologetic smile.
"I'm sorry." The apology isn't for her hand, though, but for Hojo, and everything he had to have been through in that horrible man's laboratory. (She almost wishes she'd killed him before. Almost, because really it should be something Cloud gets to do himself. Maybe even has - she doesn't ask.)
She's sorry for Zack, too, for the sacrifice he made to save Cloud's life.
She folds her hands into her lap, looking out at the ocean waves before offering him another smile. She still has so many questions, but it's his turn, right?
He knows what she's apologizing for. He says as much just by placing his hand on her shoulder. His eyes lock with hers as she sends a smile his way. It's like he's learned how to respond not just in general, but in ways that she can easily pick up on.
Like the soft look in his eyes when he sees her. As if there isn't some incredible ocean right in front of them, or a beautiful world at their feet.
"Not really. Not anymore anyway. Only thing that's new to me is this whole fate thing." He pauses, trying to choose his next words. His thumb brushes against Tifa's skin in a thoughtful rubbing motion. He catches onto what he's doing and pulls back his hand, an apology on his lips before he settles for simply shaking his head.
"I guess I'm just worried about what will happen to us when I go back." Once that gets figured out, at least.
And once again she's struck by how different he is. The softness in his eyes, the way he not only touches her at will but also brushes his thumb against her skin... She averts her gaze as quick as she can to hide not only the surprise, but what feels suspiciously like heat in her cheeks.
His words before hinted at something between them, and her resolve then not to ask is shaken now by what he says next. This time, it's much more than a hint. They're together, right? He may as well have said it directly.
Of course, she knows he doesn't mean with her. He means with his Tifa, and yet still there's something about the thought that has a tingle running down her spine.
She shoves the thought back into a box for now, though, managing to turn her gaze back toward him. "I wish I could tell you I had an answer. I'm sorry."
Yet another apology, this time for what their actions may have done to his future.
"Yeah.." Cloud trails off, looking out into the ocean for a long moment. It's clear that he's thinking; tossing around his thoughts before speaking up again.
"It doesn't matter; so long as you end up okay, Tifa." His voice went a little softer, and she can tell that while he means it, there's a little something more in there.
Likely to do with what they have in the future as opposed to now.
If his words before had her feeling funny, it's nothing compared to the tumble of thoughts and emotions now. It's a tingle, a flutter of butterflies dancing over the heat that suddenly seems to want to pool in her stomach, and it takes every ounce of willpower she has not to reach for him again.
Or even to do something infinitely more foolish like kissing him.
Instead, she just looks at him, quiet, that pink dusting across her cheeks growing a little darker. "You...... Cloud." Her voice comes out in a whisper. "My... me being okay isn't more important than you, you know."
The words are strung together more awkwardly than she would like, but the point is there.
Cloud expects Tifa to say something along the lines of what she does, so his agreement comes quickly enough. "I know." It doesn't come out hard per se, but the tone of his voice suggests that he isn't budging on what he said to her prior.
This Cloud has experienced plenty of loss; at times because he wasn't strong enough to either stop it ahead of time, on time, or at all. Being able to do so much more now also helped him with learning more.
When his answer comes in the way it does, Tifa frowns at him. She can tell that he's completely serious, and as sweet as the thought is... something about it also makes her terribly unhappy.
"Hey." Her hands close over his again, fingers pressing into the skin as she moves so that she can seek his gaze with her own, despite being just a moment ago almost afraid of doing exactly that. Her eyes are narrowed, her brows creased in a frown.
"I can't be okay if you're not. I..." She catches herself, a slight grimace on her face. It's not fair to either of them for her to say that, and so she changes tactics: "You're important to me, so I need you to be okay too."
Cloud can't help the small smile that slowly shows itself in response to the way she's looking at him now. Even like this she's the most beautiful sight on the Planet.
"I know." Sure it's a repeat response, but he says it in a softer way and with a different sort of meaning altogether. That and his hand has reached up to cup Tifa's cheek. His eyes search hers subtly before lifting just as his hand moves so that his fingers can slip gently through some of her long hair.
"Who knows? Maybe everything will be okay in the end."
Every time he looks at her like that, it takes her right back off guard, destroys every last fragment of the wall she keeps trying to build up around herself. She can't help the way her eyes shift to the side, tracking the hand that cups her cheek before it disappears into her hair.
A few sharp, focused blinks, and she forces her gaze back to him instead, even as he touches her.
"I hope so." Her voice is thick with emotion and effort. "If what we did... if it ruined things for you, then... it wasn't worth it."
Especially when his sitting here in front of her now is proof that they're okay, they made it.
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sempiternals2019-11-07 04:27 pm
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And then the goggles come off, and her eyes widen at the warmth in his. Lips part, but the words of confusion won't surface no matter what she tries, and she finds herself frozen in her shock as his fingers slide up her arm to inspect the wound. There's no chance to even begin to form the wrong impression; by the time she processes that he's touching her, and that he doesn't appear averse to doing so, his hand is already falling away.
It's part instinct that her own hand moves as if to follow, part years of longing, but her brain kicks back into gear in that same moment and she snatches it back, cradling it in her other hand as if his touch burned her somehow. She meets his gaze, unflinching, but there's a vulnerability there that she'd never confess to feeling. Not to mention the confusion.
"I don't understand," she says, and her voice is low, although some miracle keeps it from trembling. "You're... different."
And not in the way she had noted in the Slums: the change of years and hardship and training that made her almost afraid of him. She saw him just a few hours ago, and yet this change seems just as complete. How...?
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Something in the air, perhaps? He's about to press Tifa on what she could mean when he turns and catches sight of--"Midgar?" His attention, attitude, and stance changes completely, the blond turning to fully face it. The city looms as large as it ever did, even from this distance.
"It's..in one piece?" He's taking a step back from all of this--several steps back. He should be done seeing things. It was finished! Over!
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How can he say that Midgar is in one piece when Sector 7 is no more, when their friends are still lying buried in the combined rubble of plate and slums? When just a few short days ago he held her as she sobbed her pain into his shoulder? She whirls to face him, tears burning fresh in angry eyes... but then she sees the look in his, something almost wild, almost panicked.
"...Cloud?" Her fingers relax again, and Tifa takes a few hesitant steps towards him. "Talk to me. Whatever it is... I'm listening."
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"Last time I saw this place, it was in ruins. All of it." More to the point, Tifa should know this. Then again, it did look like the party was splitting up when he was driving through all of that weird light...
"Hey." He turns to face Tifa once more, nodding in her direction. "I like the outfit, but you usually dress different. Were you out here training, or are you going somewhere?" He glances briefly just past Tifa towards Kalm before looking back to her.
Cloud seems like he already knows the answer, he just wants to make sure.
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Her lips part, a question on the tip of her tongue, but then he speaks again, and...
Wait, her... her outfit...? For a few long, quiet seconds, her eyes search his. Is it possible...?
"We just left Midgar," she says, her voice soft. "We're going to Kalm. Sephiroth is alive; he killed President Shinra. We're going to find him."
If it is what she thinks, somehow, then that should be enough information... right?
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Tifa can see him piecing it all together before he offers a soft, "Oh." in response. He doesn't say anything specific, but what he does follow up with really says it all.
"You're just starting out." As in not just Midgar being barely even the tipping point, but that Cloud himself is from the future. Question is: why did this happen at all?
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And isn't there something about that whole thing that she finds a relief? To know that even in the future, he's alive and well... She finds a smile coming to her lips, and this time it's she who reaches for his hand, taking it in both of her own.
"You came a long way to rescue me," she says, her voice soft. "Thank you."
There are other things to worry about, of course. Why is he here? Is it something to do with their fight with the Whispers?
And what do they do now?
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"--Looks like it, yeah. You seem to have some idea of what's going on." May as well hear her side of all of this first.
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That probably wouldn't be a good idea, right?
Instead, she just nods. "It might be our fault you're here." Her voice is quiet. "We fought the arbiters of fate. We... we don't have a destiny anymore."
It's a much longer story than that, of course...
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"Things might be different back home?" This Cloud has been through quite a bit; and after he was done, there was the aftereffects of said things to deal with on top of that.
Everything that Tifa helped him with. What if--? "Does that mean we aren't--" He stops there and shakes his head, leaving Tifa with one juicy morsel of information to mull over as Cloud slowly pulls his hands away and heads over to Fenrir, his motorcycle.
"Come on. We gotta get you to Kalm first. We can pick up where we left off once everyone else leaves." He waits for Tifa to get good and settled behind him, and then they're off to Kalm!
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Especially when Cloud starts to say something about what she can only assume is the two of them. Her lips part to ask, despite her decision not to do that only moments before, but he's already moving back to the motorcycle.
Wait, is going to Kalm a good idea? The others are there... Cloud is there...
Still, he seems to know what he's doing. So she settles herself behind him, arms wrapping around his waist. But she can't stop herself from reminding him as they speed over the fields: "We're meeting in the Inn... you're gonna have to wait somewhere, okay? I think you might be too much to explain right now."
Although by the time she emerges from the Inn a few hours later, once again alone - this time at her own insistence - she no doubt needs some explanation of her own. There's a concerned, confused frown on her face. She's had worried questions about her Cloud (is that even the right term for him?) for a while now, but this is something else entirely.
"I don't know how much is safe to ask you," she says when she reaches this new Cloud's side again. "But I have questions." Tifa pauses then, and tries a smile on for size, with a small shake of her head. She needs to be strong for him, too. "I know you have questions too. Maybe we should go somewhere quieter? I told the others I'd catch up with them..."
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"He isn't gonna tell the story until you get there." Then he made sure to drive off away from Kalm--in the opposite direction from where the group would be going, of course. Then when he pulls up later, Tifa broaches the subject of something he was also dwelling over: questions. He had a few as well, but he's good about answering hers first.
"We can go wherever you want, Tifa." Cloud holds his hand out for her to take. When she does, they leave again, heading away from Kalm to the edge of the Midgar area. He stops the bike and waits for Tifa to get off first before he does the same.
He's picked a spot facing the ocean. He doesn't say it, but he always thought she would like this view best. Romantic, even. Plus it faced them away from Midgar.
"Ask whatever you want."
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When she climbs off the bike to find herself facing the ocean, though, she forgets it all for a moment, a small smile finding her lips as she takes a few steps forward.
"It's beautiful," she says in a murmur, turning back to face him as the sea breeze whips her hair back. She doesn't say it, but there's something kind of romantic about it.
She waits until they're seated to pose the question, and she's hesitant about it, even though something tells her it's safe to ask this Cloud, even though it wasn't safe to ask the other. "He remembers that day, but he shouldn't. He wasn't there, was he? The SOLDIER who came, he had black hair..."
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Not a dopey one, mind you. Just one of contentment. When she speaks about the story Cloud told everyone in Kalm, the smile is still there. Soft. Especially when he looks at her.
"Zack." Cloud hesitates about whether or not he should Tifa anything, but he is stuck here for who knew how long, so.."He was there. Or I was. We. We were there." Cloud shifts his focus back to the water, watching the way the rays of the sun give the surface a nice shimmer.
"I never made it to SOLDIER. I ended up being nothing more than a grunt. I couldn't handle facing you like that, so I never took my helmet off around you."
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At least until he mentions Zack. She nods. That's what she remembers too: the black-haired SOLDIER who came to town with Sephiroth...
...and the Shinra grunt who'd prevented her from following them into the reactor with a silent stretch of his arm?
Her expression softens, and she reaches for him, shaking her head as her hand rests on his forearm. "Cloud, I would never..."
She shakes her head again, falling silent. He knows, right? She's sure he does now. So she changes the subject, just a little: "He doesn't know, does he? He thinks he's telling the truth."
And then, after a beat, with a confused tilt of her head: "Wait. But your eyes..."
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When Tifa points out his eyes, Cloud's small smile turns into something a little more thoughtful. "Hojo tried to make me one of his experiments. It's why we lost touch after Sephiroth took everything away from us. I barely remember it, but Zack..got us out. Died protecting me."
Another person he couldn't save.
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"I'm sorry." The apology isn't for her hand, though, but for Hojo, and everything he had to have been through in that horrible man's laboratory. (She almost wishes she'd killed him before. Almost, because really it should be something Cloud gets to do himself. Maybe even has - she doesn't ask.)
She's sorry for Zack, too, for the sacrifice he made to save Cloud's life.
She folds her hands into her lap, looking out at the ocean waves before offering him another smile. She still has so many questions, but it's his turn, right?
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Like the soft look in his eyes when he sees her. As if there isn't some incredible ocean right in front of them, or a beautiful world at their feet.
"Not really. Not anymore anyway. Only thing that's new to me is this whole fate thing." He pauses, trying to choose his next words. His thumb brushes against Tifa's skin in a thoughtful rubbing motion. He catches onto what he's doing and pulls back his hand, an apology on his lips before he settles for simply shaking his head.
"I guess I'm just worried about what will happen to us when I go back." Once that gets figured out, at least.
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His words before hinted at something between them, and her resolve then not to ask is shaken now by what he says next. This time, it's much more than a hint. They're together, right? He may as well have said it directly.
Of course, she knows he doesn't mean with her. He means with his Tifa, and yet still there's something about the thought that has a tingle running down her spine.
She shoves the thought back into a box for now, though, managing to turn her gaze back toward him. "I wish I could tell you I had an answer. I'm sorry."
Yet another apology, this time for what their actions may have done to his future.
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"It doesn't matter; so long as you end up okay, Tifa." His voice went a little softer, and she can tell that while he means it, there's a little something more in there.
Likely to do with what they have in the future as opposed to now.
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Or even to do something infinitely more foolish like kissing him.
Instead, she just looks at him, quiet, that pink dusting across her cheeks growing a little darker. "You...... Cloud." Her voice comes out in a whisper. "My... me being okay isn't more important than you, you know."
The words are strung together more awkwardly than she would like, but the point is there.
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This Cloud has experienced plenty of loss; at times because he wasn't strong enough to either stop it ahead of time, on time, or at all. Being able to do so much more now also helped him with learning more.
Things would be okay so long as Tifa herself was.
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"Hey." Her hands close over his again, fingers pressing into the skin as she moves so that she can seek his gaze with her own, despite being just a moment ago almost afraid of doing exactly that. Her eyes are narrowed, her brows creased in a frown.
"I can't be okay if you're not. I..." She catches herself, a slight grimace on her face. It's not fair to either of them for her to say that, and so she changes tactics: "You're important to me, so I need you to be okay too."
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"I know." Sure it's a repeat response, but he says it in a softer way and with a different sort of meaning altogether. That and his hand has reached up to cup Tifa's cheek. His eyes search hers subtly before lifting just as his hand moves so that his fingers can slip gently through some of her long hair.
"Who knows? Maybe everything will be okay in the end."
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A few sharp, focused blinks, and she forces her gaze back to him instead, even as he touches her.
"I hope so." Her voice is thick with emotion and effort. "If what we did... if it ruined things for you, then... it wasn't worth it."
Especially when his sitting here in front of her now is proof that they're okay, they made it.
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had to use this icon again, really
XD OoOo~ Cloud: *shakes head* Tifa: *Careless Whisper plays*
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Dammit Tifa, the fish! XD
Yep, fish totally forgotten. LOL
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