[Fic] "Two Guys and a Girl," part 7 -- Final Fantasy 7 (Mercverse AU)
This story is set about ten years before main mercverse canon, insofar as this AU can be said to have any canon. :-) So. "Two Guys and a Girl," in which I bend, staple, and otherwise mutilate normal game canon involving trips to Nibelheim, because seriously, what's the point of crack AUs if you can't play around like this?
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Two Guys and a Girl: Part 7
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Tifa felt like she'd been pounding on the door for hours when it swung open and her fist nearly smashed into Zack's face.
He ducked, shone his flashlight in her eyes, and said, groggily, "Tifa? What the fuck?"
"Let me in, I heard a ghost, let me in, let me in!" She shoved past him and slammed the door; after a few tense seconds, she let out her breath and relaxed. Whatever she'd hear out there wasn't following her in through the door, and if there were ghosts wandering inside, at least she'd have Zack to help her.
"I don't believe you," said Zack. "You're crazy enough to sneak out and walk here in the dark, with the planet only knows what sort of monsters hiding in the woods, and then you go all wussy over funny noises and say it's a ghost? You are so totally weird... in a cool way, really!" he added, dancing away from Tifa's kick.
He scrubbed a hand through his spiky hair and sighed. "Cloud's not going to be happy, but if you have a good excuse he'll probably let you stay the night. Come on, we're sleeping upstairs."
Tifa followed Zack through the empty, dusty rooms to a flight of stairs. The bannister rail was ornately carved, but instead of keeping it oiled and polished, someone had painted the wood white. Now the paint was peeling, letting splintery wood peek through. Zack kept his flashlight on the steps, letting Tifa aim hers around the stairwell, glinting off picture frames and sliding over the faded rose-print wallpaper.
"This must have been so beautiful once upon a time," she said, her voice involuntarily sinking to a whisper.
"It was, I think, though I don't remember very clearly," said Cloud, his voice drifting unexpectedly from the darkness at the top of the stairs. Tifa swung her flashlight toward him -- his eyes flashed brilliant blue in the glare -- and then lowered it so she didn't blind him. "It probably still looked good when Rosa and Vert lived here -- nobody ever accused them of lacking taste, whatever other faults they had, and I recognize this wallpaper from some of their other retreats. But the scientists and decades of neglect..." Cloud sighed. "It's going to cost a fortune to renovate."
"Not like you can't afford it," Zack said, leaping the last three stairs and attempting to punch Cloud's shoulder.
"That's not the point," Tifa told him. "He shouldn't have to fix his house in the first place, because nobody should have messed it up like this. Speaking of which," -- she turned to Cloud -- "why didn't you have caretakers out here now and then, to make sure your house didn't get so run down?"
Cloud looked slightly sheepish. "I forgot." Then he frowned. "But I'm sure I didn't forget inviting you here tonight. In fact, I specifically sent you home with your father until midday tomorrow."
Tifa fidgeted. "I did go home. But Zack invited me to stay the night, and I left a note so my dad will just think I went out for a morning walk -- he won't notice I'm gone tonight. I brought stuff with me, and it's really dark out, and I heard the scientist's ghost at the fence..." She did her best to look pitiful; it went against the grain, but she was not going back to her father's house.
Cloud's expression said that he saw right through her, but he just sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose like he had a headache. "Fine. But if you hear ghosts in the middle of the night, remember that this was your idea, and don't come running to me."
She wouldn't have gone running to him anyway -- she wasn't a child -- but now Tifa straightened her back and stared defiantly at Cloud. "I'll be so quiet you won't even know I'm here," she promised.
"Somehow, I doubt I'll forget this conversation before I get back to sleep," Cloud said dryly, but he smiled just a little as he turned and walked down the hall to a dark room, and closed the door behind himself.
Beside Tifa, Zack let out his breath explosively. "Lucky! You caught him in a good mood, considering, or maybe he's just going funny again. Cloud doesn't care about most people, but he took me in for no reason, so... I think you hit the jackpot. He likes you." He grinned at Tifa and punched her lightly in the shoulder. "Come on, I'll show you where I'm sleeping, and we'll drag in another mattress for you."
Cloud liked her?
Tifa walked on air all the way to Zack's room.
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The mansion creaked and moaned softly in the night -- boards shifting against each other, branches skreeking against walls and windows, wind whistling through cracks -- and the darkness magnified the noises instead of muffling them into familiarity the way Tifa's house did. Zack huddled on a mattress beside her, out like a light, but she couldn't sleep. Every time she started to drift off, some squeak or draft pulled her mind back from the shore of dreams.
They'd burned the demons' corpses, which was as good as a burial if you did it respectfully. Cloud had promised to make minimal restitution, and she and Zack had sworn to make sure, somehow, that things like this wouldn't happen again, which ought to have settled any angry spirits. But she could still feel something not right about the mansion, something upset, something empty and waiting.
Maybe sneaking out hadn't been such a good idea.
After what felt like forever, but was probably only an hour or so, Tifa slid out from under the musty summer blanket and grabbed her flashlight, heading downstairs for the bathroom she'd used in the afternoon. There was probably one closer upstairs, but Zack hadn't remembered to show her, and she didn't trust it to be clean in any case.
The stairs were solidly built; one or two groaned softly under her feet, but most were silent as she crept downstairs. She shone her flashlight down at her feet, letting the light pool close around her, trying to draw as little attention from the gathered darkness as she could. Something hovered out there, waiting -- she could feel its attention prickling at the back of her neck.
Tifa used the toilet and washed her hands as quickly as possible, keeping the flashlight aimed well away from the cracked mirror. Then she hurried back to the stairs -- the longer she was alone in the mansion, the more nervous she got, and the more she wanted Zack's presence, even if he was asleep like a useless lump. He was alive, and she really needed to see another living person right now.
She hesitated at the top of the stairs, wondering if she ought to check on Cloud, just to make sure nothing had happened to him. That wasn't running like a scared baby -- it was just being cautious -- and if she was very quiet, he wouldn't even wake up. She was sure he could take care of himself, but just because people could stand on their own didn't mean it wasn't nice to help out now and then. And she really didn't want anything to happen to Cloud...
Tifa looked down the hall toward Zack's room and her waiting bed. She bit her lip. Then she turned the other way.
She held her pajama sleeve over the flashlight so the cloth hid most of the light, leaving just enough for her to see the floor. That probably wouldn't wake Cloud, or attract any ghosts. Then she set out down the hallway. She wasn't sure which door led to Cloud's room -- she hadn't been able to see clearly in the darkness -- so Tifa tried all of them, twisting the knobs and inching them open just enough to peek inside.
The first two rooms, closest to the stairs, seemed to have been used as offices. Someone had emptied them in a rush -- desks and filing cabinets stood at odd angles to the walls, and their drawers had been pulled out and taken away. The third room, on the left, was filled with furniture -- dressers, a wardrobe, a vanity table, piles of mattresses, and a dismantled bed frame. She nearly missed Cloud in all the mess. He'd laid a mattress on the floor, between the wardrobe and the window, and curled up to sleep -- one hand vanished under his pillow and the other clutched a corner of his blanket. Moonlight from the open window turned his skin white and his hair silver. He looked peaceful, and very young.
Tifa switched off the flashlight and watched him sleep, her breath slowing to match his. Cloud really was from Nibelheim, she realized. He was just fine with the crisp night air -- his blanket didn't even cover his bare shoulders -- unlike Zack, who'd dragged a second blanket from a storage chest and wrapped himself up in a makeshift cocoon. "It's chilly!" he'd said in response to Tifa's funny look. If Zack thought a nice summer night was chilly, she wondered how he'd deal with a mountain winter.
Cloud twitched slightly, frowning, and Tifa realized she'd been staring at a trained fighter -- she didn't have any hostile intent, but she was probably setting off some of his subconscious alarms anyway. She backed out and shut the door before he could wake up.
She felt calmer after watching Cloud, but she was still too jittery to lie down again -- she knew she wouldn't be able to sleep. Maybe she could wake Zack and talk to him for a while? Friends could do things like that, right?
But they hadn't been friends long, and Zack thought she was stupid for worrying about ghosts; he'd probably be annoyed. She usually tried not to listen to her father, but he'd told her over and over that she shouldn't presume on any connections until she was sure of them, and he was probably right about that. She'd let Zack sleep.
Instead, she could explore the rest of this hallway. If she checked all the rooms, she'd tire herself out a little, make sure there weren't any nasty surprises, and maybe find a bathroom without a cracked mirror -- that would be nice.
Feeling better now that she had a plan, Tifa switched the flashlight back on and set out down the hall.
The first room she looked into was clearly another office for the scientists -- it had the same style desks and filing cabinets, with the same missing drawers, as well as coils of electric wire and phone cords thrown in a corner. The next room was a bathroom, complete with layers of dust, a mildewed shower, an uncracked mirror -- Tifa silently thanked the angels for small favors -- and a miraculously clean toilet. The seat lid was up, of course; men never remembered to put toilet seats down, even when they were expecting guests.
The third room was a bedroom with wide, curtained windows and delicately carved furniture. For some reason, it had been left untouched -- except for the dust, it looked like someone might come down the hallway and sleep here every night. Tifa shone her flashlight on the canopy bed, wondering if Rosa Shinra had slept here, or if this beautiful furniture had been used by the local women who'd worked here as maids. Motion caught the corner of her eyes, and she watched the curtains swirl inward, stirring dust as they dragged across the floorboards. As the fabric shifted, Tifa saw that the windows were really doors to a balcony, and they were wide open.
She walked toward them, intending to pull them shut.
Then she saw the ghost.
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End of Part 7
Back to Part 6
Continue to Part 8
original post and comments
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Mwahahahaha!!! *flees*
...
Anyway, back in real life, my friend Andrew visited on Sunday. He was in Ithaca because his sister (who I think attends IC?) was performing in two concerts this past weekend, and I had some free time before work on Sunday afternoon/evening, so he dropped by my apartment and we hung out for a couple hours.
We're both terrible at correspondence, so these occasional visits are about the only contact we have. I should fix that, I really should. After all, how hard is it to send an email once a month or so?
*makes preemptive New Year's resolution to email casual yet distant friends more often*
And by 'more often,' I mean 'at all'
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Two Guys and a Girl: Part 7
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Tifa felt like she'd been pounding on the door for hours when it swung open and her fist nearly smashed into Zack's face.
He ducked, shone his flashlight in her eyes, and said, groggily, "Tifa? What the fuck?"
"Let me in, I heard a ghost, let me in, let me in!" She shoved past him and slammed the door; after a few tense seconds, she let out her breath and relaxed. Whatever she'd hear out there wasn't following her in through the door, and if there were ghosts wandering inside, at least she'd have Zack to help her.
"I don't believe you," said Zack. "You're crazy enough to sneak out and walk here in the dark, with the planet only knows what sort of monsters hiding in the woods, and then you go all wussy over funny noises and say it's a ghost? You are so totally weird... in a cool way, really!" he added, dancing away from Tifa's kick.
He scrubbed a hand through his spiky hair and sighed. "Cloud's not going to be happy, but if you have a good excuse he'll probably let you stay the night. Come on, we're sleeping upstairs."
Tifa followed Zack through the empty, dusty rooms to a flight of stairs. The bannister rail was ornately carved, but instead of keeping it oiled and polished, someone had painted the wood white. Now the paint was peeling, letting splintery wood peek through. Zack kept his flashlight on the steps, letting Tifa aim hers around the stairwell, glinting off picture frames and sliding over the faded rose-print wallpaper.
"This must have been so beautiful once upon a time," she said, her voice involuntarily sinking to a whisper.
"It was, I think, though I don't remember very clearly," said Cloud, his voice drifting unexpectedly from the darkness at the top of the stairs. Tifa swung her flashlight toward him -- his eyes flashed brilliant blue in the glare -- and then lowered it so she didn't blind him. "It probably still looked good when Rosa and Vert lived here -- nobody ever accused them of lacking taste, whatever other faults they had, and I recognize this wallpaper from some of their other retreats. But the scientists and decades of neglect..." Cloud sighed. "It's going to cost a fortune to renovate."
"Not like you can't afford it," Zack said, leaping the last three stairs and attempting to punch Cloud's shoulder.
"That's not the point," Tifa told him. "He shouldn't have to fix his house in the first place, because nobody should have messed it up like this. Speaking of which," -- she turned to Cloud -- "why didn't you have caretakers out here now and then, to make sure your house didn't get so run down?"
Cloud looked slightly sheepish. "I forgot." Then he frowned. "But I'm sure I didn't forget inviting you here tonight. In fact, I specifically sent you home with your father until midday tomorrow."
Tifa fidgeted. "I did go home. But Zack invited me to stay the night, and I left a note so my dad will just think I went out for a morning walk -- he won't notice I'm gone tonight. I brought stuff with me, and it's really dark out, and I heard the scientist's ghost at the fence..." She did her best to look pitiful; it went against the grain, but she was not going back to her father's house.
Cloud's expression said that he saw right through her, but he just sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose like he had a headache. "Fine. But if you hear ghosts in the middle of the night, remember that this was your idea, and don't come running to me."
She wouldn't have gone running to him anyway -- she wasn't a child -- but now Tifa straightened her back and stared defiantly at Cloud. "I'll be so quiet you won't even know I'm here," she promised.
"Somehow, I doubt I'll forget this conversation before I get back to sleep," Cloud said dryly, but he smiled just a little as he turned and walked down the hall to a dark room, and closed the door behind himself.
Beside Tifa, Zack let out his breath explosively. "Lucky! You caught him in a good mood, considering, or maybe he's just going funny again. Cloud doesn't care about most people, but he took me in for no reason, so... I think you hit the jackpot. He likes you." He grinned at Tifa and punched her lightly in the shoulder. "Come on, I'll show you where I'm sleeping, and we'll drag in another mattress for you."
Cloud liked her?
Tifa walked on air all the way to Zack's room.
---------------------------------------------
The mansion creaked and moaned softly in the night -- boards shifting against each other, branches skreeking against walls and windows, wind whistling through cracks -- and the darkness magnified the noises instead of muffling them into familiarity the way Tifa's house did. Zack huddled on a mattress beside her, out like a light, but she couldn't sleep. Every time she started to drift off, some squeak or draft pulled her mind back from the shore of dreams.
They'd burned the demons' corpses, which was as good as a burial if you did it respectfully. Cloud had promised to make minimal restitution, and she and Zack had sworn to make sure, somehow, that things like this wouldn't happen again, which ought to have settled any angry spirits. But she could still feel something not right about the mansion, something upset, something empty and waiting.
Maybe sneaking out hadn't been such a good idea.
After what felt like forever, but was probably only an hour or so, Tifa slid out from under the musty summer blanket and grabbed her flashlight, heading downstairs for the bathroom she'd used in the afternoon. There was probably one closer upstairs, but Zack hadn't remembered to show her, and she didn't trust it to be clean in any case.
The stairs were solidly built; one or two groaned softly under her feet, but most were silent as she crept downstairs. She shone her flashlight down at her feet, letting the light pool close around her, trying to draw as little attention from the gathered darkness as she could. Something hovered out there, waiting -- she could feel its attention prickling at the back of her neck.
Tifa used the toilet and washed her hands as quickly as possible, keeping the flashlight aimed well away from the cracked mirror. Then she hurried back to the stairs -- the longer she was alone in the mansion, the more nervous she got, and the more she wanted Zack's presence, even if he was asleep like a useless lump. He was alive, and she really needed to see another living person right now.
She hesitated at the top of the stairs, wondering if she ought to check on Cloud, just to make sure nothing had happened to him. That wasn't running like a scared baby -- it was just being cautious -- and if she was very quiet, he wouldn't even wake up. She was sure he could take care of himself, but just because people could stand on their own didn't mean it wasn't nice to help out now and then. And she really didn't want anything to happen to Cloud...
Tifa looked down the hall toward Zack's room and her waiting bed. She bit her lip. Then she turned the other way.
She held her pajama sleeve over the flashlight so the cloth hid most of the light, leaving just enough for her to see the floor. That probably wouldn't wake Cloud, or attract any ghosts. Then she set out down the hallway. She wasn't sure which door led to Cloud's room -- she hadn't been able to see clearly in the darkness -- so Tifa tried all of them, twisting the knobs and inching them open just enough to peek inside.
The first two rooms, closest to the stairs, seemed to have been used as offices. Someone had emptied them in a rush -- desks and filing cabinets stood at odd angles to the walls, and their drawers had been pulled out and taken away. The third room, on the left, was filled with furniture -- dressers, a wardrobe, a vanity table, piles of mattresses, and a dismantled bed frame. She nearly missed Cloud in all the mess. He'd laid a mattress on the floor, between the wardrobe and the window, and curled up to sleep -- one hand vanished under his pillow and the other clutched a corner of his blanket. Moonlight from the open window turned his skin white and his hair silver. He looked peaceful, and very young.
Tifa switched off the flashlight and watched him sleep, her breath slowing to match his. Cloud really was from Nibelheim, she realized. He was just fine with the crisp night air -- his blanket didn't even cover his bare shoulders -- unlike Zack, who'd dragged a second blanket from a storage chest and wrapped himself up in a makeshift cocoon. "It's chilly!" he'd said in response to Tifa's funny look. If Zack thought a nice summer night was chilly, she wondered how he'd deal with a mountain winter.
Cloud twitched slightly, frowning, and Tifa realized she'd been staring at a trained fighter -- she didn't have any hostile intent, but she was probably setting off some of his subconscious alarms anyway. She backed out and shut the door before he could wake up.
She felt calmer after watching Cloud, but she was still too jittery to lie down again -- she knew she wouldn't be able to sleep. Maybe she could wake Zack and talk to him for a while? Friends could do things like that, right?
But they hadn't been friends long, and Zack thought she was stupid for worrying about ghosts; he'd probably be annoyed. She usually tried not to listen to her father, but he'd told her over and over that she shouldn't presume on any connections until she was sure of them, and he was probably right about that. She'd let Zack sleep.
Instead, she could explore the rest of this hallway. If she checked all the rooms, she'd tire herself out a little, make sure there weren't any nasty surprises, and maybe find a bathroom without a cracked mirror -- that would be nice.
Feeling better now that she had a plan, Tifa switched the flashlight back on and set out down the hall.
The first room she looked into was clearly another office for the scientists -- it had the same style desks and filing cabinets, with the same missing drawers, as well as coils of electric wire and phone cords thrown in a corner. The next room was a bathroom, complete with layers of dust, a mildewed shower, an uncracked mirror -- Tifa silently thanked the angels for small favors -- and a miraculously clean toilet. The seat lid was up, of course; men never remembered to put toilet seats down, even when they were expecting guests.
The third room was a bedroom with wide, curtained windows and delicately carved furniture. For some reason, it had been left untouched -- except for the dust, it looked like someone might come down the hallway and sleep here every night. Tifa shone her flashlight on the canopy bed, wondering if Rosa Shinra had slept here, or if this beautiful furniture had been used by the local women who'd worked here as maids. Motion caught the corner of her eyes, and she watched the curtains swirl inward, stirring dust as they dragged across the floorboards. As the fabric shifted, Tifa saw that the windows were really doors to a balcony, and they were wide open.
She walked toward them, intending to pull them shut.
Then she saw the ghost.
---------------------------------------------
End of Part 7
Back to Part 6
Continue to Part 8
original post and comments
---------------------------------------------
Mwahahahaha!!! *flees*
...
Anyway, back in real life, my friend Andrew visited on Sunday. He was in Ithaca because his sister (who I think attends IC?) was performing in two concerts this past weekend, and I had some free time before work on Sunday afternoon/evening, so he dropped by my apartment and we hung out for a couple hours.
We're both terrible at correspondence, so these occasional visits are about the only contact we have. I should fix that, I really should. After all, how hard is it to send an email once a month or so?
*makes preemptive New Year's resolution to email casual yet distant friends more often*
And by 'more often,' I mean 'at all'