Heaven's Tears

The road was bumpy and the suspension poor, not to mention a metal tray made things all the more uncomfortable, but he didn’t mind so much. It was better than walking.
”So what’re you gonna do when we reach Midgar huh?” He asked, smiling warmly before he laughed and shook his head, ”I’m just kidding, I wouldn’t abandon you like that. Maybe we can work together… yeah.” He smiled and turned to face the man he addressed, who sat silently near the end of the tray, looking at his boots blankly.
”Just you and me, mercenaries for hire, the best in the business.” He stood, stretched a little, ”How’s that sound?” He sat for a few minutes of silence, still ever hopeful that maybe today would be the day Cloud would look at him and smile again, or joke with him. There came no reply, just emptiness…
He sighed, beginning to wonder if Cloud really WAS gone, and he was just dragging an empty shell with him, the truck went over a particularly large bump and jostled them both, the young Blonde boy’s head slipped sideways, balancing listlessly on his shoulders. Zack was able to imagine for a moment that Cloud was looking at him, actually listening… rather than that glassy death-like stare, ”Hey… we’re friends, right?” He asked, smiling sadly and tilting his head.

Cloud’s eyes opened suddenly, the swirling roof of his room coming slowly into focus, it was still dark, that was obvious immediately. He sat up, the covers falling away from his chest, they were damp with sweat and as his bare chest was exposed to the air, he shuddered with cold. He was covered in sweat too.
Yet another dream about him. How many now? One every night for the last year… maybe a little longer?
They were never the same; each night was a different scene from his hazy memory… or a different statement heard by unsure ears. It had been years now, since he had lost his best friend. So many he thought surely he would have moved on by now. However, the pain lingered there, burning relentlessly in his heart. He reached over to his bedside table and picked up a picture frame. Inside was a badly damaged photograph, the picture singed and the ink melted in places from heat. There was crease marks where it had been folded over and over… he’d carried it in his pocket for years, but he couldn’t remember where he got it from. There were three people in the photo but only two were still distinguishable. One was a dark haired girl in a short brown skirt and brown boots, a white top and a brown cowboy hat. Her eyes smiled into the camera lens, brilliant red.
The girl lay beside him now, much older but just as beautiful. She slept peacefully as Cloud turned to look at her, stroking a cheek, pale in the moonlight, with a gentle hand that still shook slightly. He then reluctantly turned his eyes back to the photo.
The other figure, half consumed by the damage to the photograph was tall and dark haired. His hair was spiked with a single lock of fringe and an X shaped scar on his chin. He was grinning, hands propped on his hips and chest pushed out, trying to look tough and important. Normally his expression would have made Cloud laugh, but he found no joy, peering now at this weathered face… where once, long ago, he’d found a companion. Someone he could talk too, someone who wanted him to succeed in life.
Now he was gone, reduced to a half-melted face on a piece of shiny paper.

And what was worse? The fact that he was gone, or that for nearly a year Cloud had forgotten he had even existed? How could he have forgotten the man who saved his life? Now the burning started, a choking feeling in his throat and a raging inferno in his heart that threatened to burn him alive. He hauled himself out of bed and hurried to the window, pushing it open and leaning out into the early morning air, the sun not even a pink glow on the horizon yet.
The horizon, those cliffs… how he hated them, ominous, foreboding… caging. A reminder: that’s what they were. They were there to remind him so he could never forget again, a looming shadow over his life.

’Driver! Pull over!’
‘Come on Cloud, we’re getting off’
Rain, darkness, clouds. Puddles of water, no, red water, blood? Soaking into his clothes, black cloth, loose fitting, when did he put this on?
Cracked earth, plantless, warm even despite the rain, where was he? He dragged himself out from behind the rocks he’d woke against, the red water – blood – had trickled in a stream to him from somewhere, carried by droplets of rain, like nature’s tiny messengers. He followed it; the muscles in his arms screaming protest against the effort, but his legs would not respond to his commands and dragged uselessly behind him.
Where was he? What had happened?
He pushed himself up to peer around the last rock; there were bodies… lots of them. Swords, helmets, bullet casings, strewn across the ground, left where they had fallen however long ago… was it long?
Wait, was that movement? No… breathing?
He continued to crawl, still confused, the bloody water now drenching him to the bone, shivering in the rain. The source of the laboured breathing lay on the cliffs edge, broken and bleeding. He leaned forward, looking down at the man.
”Z-Zack?” He stuttered, horror hitting him in a freezing wave, what had happened?

Cloud blinked, the cold air was messing with his head… it felt too much like that time, even the clouds above were the same. Was there no escape?
Something cold and wet fell against his hand that gripped the windowsill. Rain had begun to fall, not that… not again.
While Zack lay dying it had rained just like this, had heaven been crying? It was raining again now, surely, it was a coincidence? Or maybe the planet was remembering, like him? The planet did not mourn all death this way, surely? Had Zack been special?
Maybe there’d been people waiting for him, and it was they who cried… would there be anyone to cry for HIM? Would Zack cry?
’You are… my living legacy’
No, he would not cry… he would be angry. Who would cry for a failure?
”For us both…” he murmured, snorting, ”What made me think I could live for you too? When I can’t even live for myself right?” He turned from the window, he wanted to stand in the rain, he liked that. Whenever it rained he would stand there until he was soaked, let the droplets run across his skin, as they had that day.
It made him certain that he remembered, that the memories were his again, and not hidden away by some misguided haze.
Outside was the same cold, the same dampness, though it fell now on different ground. As he stood, eyes closed, the raindrops sliding across his skin and soaking into his clothes he couldn’t help but continue to wonder, who did heaven cry for tonight?
It could be weeping for any number of people in the city, Geostigma claimed many lives daily, and even now, Denzel fought for his life. Why had Aerith sent him a child that he could do nought for except watch him waste away? Did she want to prove he really WAS useless, a failure?
The cold was making him ache, especially his arms for some reason. He did not care though it felt cleansing. In this rain, he could imagine for a moment that the better man had not been the one lying in the cold embrace of death… he could imagine it was he who had died that day, deserving of whatever fate was dished out to him.

More tears.

It felt now, while he stood in the rain, as if someone had placed an umbrella over his head, he felt a presence, a prickling of his skin. It was unnaturally warm, hot against his cold limbs.
”Zack?” He breathed into the silence, knowing that if it were not him, whoever it was would think him insane, or at least give him strange looks. Thunder rolled in the distance as if in reply and he felt the wind change direction. Could it be? Was he there? Still, Cloud dared not open his eyes, fearing more what he might not see, rather than what he would… and there were things he wanted to say that he could never say to his face, for he’d lose the courage.
”Why me? If things had been different, would you have still saved me?” He struggled to finish his words, never the eloquent one. The thunder rolled overhead again, and the presence that shielded him from the rain remained. ”If I had just been a faceless nobody in that lab… would you still have rescued me?” Though he asked the question, deep down he knew the answer. Of course, he would have, because that was just the kind of man he was…
The wind was brushing his face now, making him shiver even more, but he spoke with courage now, words flowing awkwardly off his tongue, long contained doubts and feelings.
”You’re the only person who ever had any faith in me… and how did I repay you?” He looked down, eyes still clamped shut, it continued to rain around him, but not a single drop would reach him. ”I let you die.”
The thunder rumbled overhead, sounding strangely like a sigh and the warmth on his arm left, leaving him strangely cold all over. ”Wait!” He begged, his eyes flying up and turning up to gaze at the sky, he noted that there were stars above him; the clouds had left a ring of clear sky above his head. Was it a window? Were unseen eyes watching him from behind the glittering star-studded glass? Was that why no rain was touching him? Now the clouds were closing in on it, shutting the blinds.
”Wait!” He yelled again, but soon the clear sky was gone, and once more rain fell around him in droves, an unrelenting sea of tears.
”I never told you…” He mumbled, fists clenched and eyes squeezed shut as the tears fell, dripping along his cheeks, ”You were the only person who gave a damn about me then… anyone else would have left me for dead…” He breathed a heavy shuddering breath.
”We were friends Zack!” He yelled to the sky.

His voice was an ominous echo, just a repetitious drone of his own voice coming back to him in the rain. There was no reply, no familiar chuckle, not even the rumble of thunder this time. He was painfully alone; the cold making him ache, the safety and warmth of the presence was long gone. Had it been his imagination?
His knees buckled beneath him and his knees hit the damp ground with a loud thud, the aching was horrible in his arm as he raised a hand to hold it, feeling the moist dampness of the rain spill over his hand. When he moved it away to look, horror washed over him in torrents even more freezing than the bone-chilling rain… his hand was blackened, the substance running like water in the rain.
For me… Cloud thought, eyes wide and heart in pain, Are your tears for me…?