Chapter 1: A Ray of Hope
My Final Heaven
Disclaimer: The only thing I own is the fic, not the characters, or the games.
Chapter 1: A Ray of Hope
Sweat beaded on her forehead. Tifa felt the drop gather, then roll, not down into her eyes, but up into her long, brown hair. Suspended upside down in midair from a rope tied to one of the chamber's main support beams, Tifa let the rope out, hand over hand, lowering herself to the floor. Two dozen feet up, she released her hold on the rope, flipped forward and with a soft THWACK! of her metal-plated red boots, landed.
Landed... and listened.
The sound of metal scraping along the stone floors was enough information to know that something was coming... something big. And now, she did reconize the sound... and smiled.
Barret... you did try to warn me, didn't you? she thought to herself.
Two years after Judgement Day... Shinra was gone, Sephiroth was gone, Jenova was gone... but a new threat had occured. The Turks she had spared had started a newly developed group of their own... a type of Mafia with a little more to it than just Organized Crime. Led by Reno, he managed to gather more members to join the Turks. Although they weren't as reconizable or that big a threat as Shinra Inc was, Barret had recieved word from Red XIII that the group was in possession of the Huge Materia. For whatever reason they planned to use it for, the former AVALANCHE resistance leader knew that it wasn't any good. And for this reason, Tifa had found herself in this position.
The thing moving around the outside of the chamber, hidden behind the columns and pillars she seen before, heading toward the far cornor of the room... trying to cut her off. So, therefore, that was where the Huge Materia was... that was where she needed to go. Quickly but cautiously, Tifa sprang to her feet and started sprinting. She catapulted into a diving roll, hiding behind a row of pillars, then was back on her feet again, continuing to run. She changed direction in mid-stride, and leaped over a fallen pillar... and the race began. She charged forward, picking up incredible speed, heading toward the Huge Materia...
Only it wasn't the materia at all...
She realized her mistake at the right time, and kicked off the ground, diving behind a pillar. Metal flashed, smashed into the stone, and the pillar was literally disintegrated. She managed to roll out of the rubble of stones coming in from above her, and then was one her feet, loading her gloves with materia. It was then as she filled her last slot with materia, that another flash of metal aimmed for her, shooting out from the darkness. A rod, an arm with sharp, glistening edges aimmed for her stomach. Instantly, the brunette dropped down, slamming her arms against the ground to break her fall and protect her head from any damage. The arm whizzed over her and crashed into another pillar, giving Tifa the time to roll out from underneath it and get back to her feet, praying that her fighting gloves would mean something in this mission.
She took down a dark hallway filled with thick layers of net-like cobwebs and a sandy floor. Ignoring the substance of sticky strands of webbing enwrapping around her, Tifa took down the hallway at another impressive speed. The thundering of her boots thumped against the ground echoed throughout the hallway. The clamping and thundering chunks of steel and metal was heard from behind her, causing a tremor to pass through the sand and toward the brunette, then further into the hallway. Almost instantly, the ground beneath her collasped, caving deeper into the Earth, and taking Tifa along with it. It happened so quickly she could barely remember her body suddenly falling, plummeting into the earth with chunks of rock and a large amount of sand. Before she knew it, she had collasped to her knees, then had fallen onto her side, landing into a large hill of sand. She hadn't fallen as far as she had expected to, but so far, she was away from the danger... for now. Rolling forward into a somersault, she made it to her feet and started cautiously walking forward. This chamber was a tunnel of some sort, possibly unseen by human eyes until this very moment. Strangely enough, the cobwebs weren't as thick as they were on the floor above her, allowing her to move around easily without being enwrapped and tangled in a net of a spider's home.
About a minute after finding her way deeper into the tunnel, the ceiling above her crashed, busting through the black, thick stone. The mechanical arm found itself before Tifa's face, causing her to throw a punch at it. Instantly, she slipped to the side of the arm, kicked off the ground and thrusted the heel of her boot into the "elbow" with enough force to send it bending forward, then snapping off. Landing, she took down the hallway, losing all senses of cautiousness as she heard the sound of a loud "THUD!" from behind her, followed by the returning sound of scraping metal. Darkness hued the entire hall, seeming as if she was running throughout the darkness of the Lifestream, screaming for Cloud. Only she knew that he wasn't going to call back for her... he wasn't going to appear from the darkness...
Tifa was alone now... she had to pull through this by herself...
As if her body was fused with metal, Tifa felt as if she had been being pulled right towards the wall infront of her. The next moment went by instantly as she felt herself smash into the solid stone, then feel the ground pull her down. Her fingers traced to her forehead, feeling the warm, sticky substance of blood smear against her flesh and trail down into her face. Before she had the chance to make it to her feet, let alone crawl away, a hard, cold substance was slammed against her waist and lower stomach, pinning her to the ground. Blinking away the blood from her eyes, she caught the gaze of a ten-foot-tall, six limbed (now five limbed, thanks to Tifa) monstrosity of metal, wire and high-tech cirtuitry.... a cyborg. It was pivoted on it's waist, bending over Tifa's slender frame as the bottom-left arm of the cyborg pinned her to the ground. She struggled, twisted, even kicked at the machine, only to recieve a firm yet not squeezing grip of metal lower onto her throat. Instantly, her eyes widened as her fingers gripped the claw-shaped "hand" of the machine... only to notice a sparkle in the cornor of her eye. Using nothing more then her eyeballs, she eyed to her left, seeing the top left arm clutching a multi-colored stone of glowing light.
"Looking for this, Miss Lockhart?"
Again her eyes widened... that voice...
The chest of the cyborg split into two halves, then slipped to opposite sides were the breasts of the machine woudl most likely be. A screen had appeared, resembling that of a television. In a small flash of light, a pale face appeared on the screen. The face's upper outline was that of spiked, scarlet hair, pulled back into a long ponytail.
"R-Re...no?" Tifa stammered as the grip on her throat slightly tightened.
"Looking a bit beaten up... not like the once beautiful, glorified Tifa Lockhart two years ago... the one who assisted a group of rebels to bring forth the downfall of Shinra Inc." Reno taunted.
"What... do you... need...." Tifa gasped, exhaling roughly with each word. "With.... the...Huge... Ma..ter...ri...a..."
"Tifa, you should know that I'm not one to explain my plans to. I'm not the type to give long, tiresome speeches. All I have to say is that you're going to die... and I'm going to get away with it all..."
With those words spoken, the grip on Tifa's throat increased critically. Gasping out exhaled air and saliva, Tifa found herself in a position she hoped to never return to. One wrong move would jepordise her life in an instantly. She heard Reno's sick chuckles as he watched her kicked out with her legs, striking against the machine as she felt her very life slip slowly away from her. The blood from her forehead trail along the center of her face, slipping down to her throat, then onto her shoulders. It was then... when she realized she was armed with the most powerful materia of all...
Removing her fingers from the clawed hand of the cyborg, Tifa thrusted out a fist as the shining, emerald light of Ultima materia was released, immolating and incinerating the machine's body and the screened version of Reno's face. However, seeing this attack coming for him, Reno had managed to release his grip on Tifa's waist, then raising her upwards, above the ground. As the blast of fatal energy was released, a force was sent along with it, causing Tifa to be catapulted backwards, heading right into another wall...
She would've been killed instantly... if not for one source of her survival...
A flashing light had covered the area, first that of gold... then purple... then blue... then green... and finally a fiery explosion of red light engulfed the very hue and darkness of the tunnel. The very light itself enwrapped around Tifa, slipping around every part of her body, ceasing her from collusion with the wall. It was as if gravity itself had faded away, sparing her from the catastrophic pain of death...
And blinking away the last streams of blood, she looked to the Huge Materia, glowing and shining brightly as if it were a beam from heaven...
And smiled...
Beauty Through the Eyes of the Youth
My Final Heaven
Chapter 2: Beauty Through The Eyes of the Youth
Her eyes slowly slipped open... her body screamed with pain. She felt a tight yet comfortable wrappings of bandages spiraled around her forehead, holding back the blood from her wound. A hard, shell-like support was fastened around her neck... a neckbrace. Strangely enough, she felt the same support fastened around her waist. With a sigh, the beautiful young fighter slipped her fingers to her forehead, and running her fingers through her long, brown hair that flowed down to her waist. She reclosed her eyes, relieved at the thought of living. Her cowboy hat and boots had been removed, the hat placed on a chair near the bed, and the boots on the floor beside it. They had survived the encounter... somehow.
It was then when her eyes snapped open. She sat up quickly, ignoring the aching pain of her neck and throwing the covers off of her. Her eyes widened more as her fingers trembled... she was no longer in her mini-skirt... or her tank top... she knew what she was in, but it was impossible. The buckskin skirt had fallen to her knees... the white silk shirt slipped to her waist, the buckskin vest was fastened onto her upper torso...
Just as it had been... seven years ago...
"No, no dear, you musn't sit up just yet..."
Tifa turned her head, seeing an elderly woman before her, donning a long, white jacket. Instantly, the woman rushed to Tifa's side, gently lying her back against the soft pillow. Tifa's fingers twitched, a jolt of fear and confusion shot up her spine. Was this somebody's idea for a joke? Did Barret find her and decide to play a prank? That had to be it... there was no way in the world that she was sixteen again. The woman beside her had apparently nursed her to health, she even resembled a doctor. Did she know what happened to her? And where was she? So many things came to her at once, giving her a throbbing headache as she felt the tears build up.
"No, don't be crying, dear..." the doctor said, taking a tissue and dabbing the girl's eyes.
"W-What.... happened? Where am I?" Tifa questioned, clutching the sheets of the bed.
"One of our Instructors had gone to the Fire Cavern with one of our students... they found you on the road leading to this school: Balamb Garden." was the reply. Tifa's eyes met the woman's as she inhaled a unsteady amount of air.
"How bad was I hurt... when they found me?" she stammered.
"We were surprised to see you so injured... the Headmaster was rushed down immediately. You're forehead was pouring out blood rapidly... it gave the Instructor quite a scare. So they took you to me... I was surprised to see that your hips and throat were also damaged." she explained, then looked away. "Were you... raped?"
Tifa closed her eyes again... she remembered the droid's iron grip around her throat. If she hadn't used the Ultima materia, she would've definetly lost her head. Although she did feel somewhat foolish for running full speed into a wall. She shook her head, slowly as to not cause further damage to her neck and throat, but enough so the doctor understood. She sighed, and offered Tifa a hand.
"My name is Dr. Kadowaki. And you are...?" she questioned as Tifa took her hand.
"Tifa..." she replied.
"Alright Tifa... I suppose it's time to take the neckbrace off... and you can take off the waist brace if you feel the need for it." Kadowaki explained, then leaned over the girl.
Delicately, she reached behind Tifa's head and lowered her hands onto the cast, then unclipped the cast. And very slowly, she pulled it off. After explaining how to get the cast on her waist off, Tifa pulled it off as well. It came as a surprise to her that Dr. Kadowaki could actually make something like this for the waist and hips. The outer part of the cast was hardened, but the inside was soft and comfortable. Kadowaki explained that she needed at least a two hour rest before she could get to her feet, then lifted her right hand, seeing the Premium Heart fastened onto her arm. When the wounded girl had arrived at first, it appeared to be nothing more than a stylish glove. But now, she eyed it more closly, seeing the materia slipped tightly into the slots. They looked nothing more then small gems, but she sensed a somewhat suspcious glance from these odd, glowing jewels. Tifa gently pulled her hand away from the doctor, and closed her eyes as Kadowaki walked away from her.
Am I dead...? I must be... there's no way I'm sixteen again... it's just not possible... Tifa pondered to herself, then shifted her body so she was lying on her side. Could it have been the Huge Materia...? But it doesn't make sense... Materia's used for aid in battles, a device from the planet to summon magic... it just isn't possible...
Her thoughts raced about in a frenzy... what had happened to her in the last few hours...? Where was this Balamb Garden...
But most importantly...
Was Sephiroth involved in this act...?