...It's been a few weeks. I've been getting stronger, slowly. Don't know how my friends are doing, Cloud said don't worry too much but sometimes I still worry. I'm also trying to make sense of what happened and my origins, which isn't easy.
...Since I can get down the stairs, Cloud decided to ask a friend of his, Cid Highwind, to go get Goldie from the chocobo stables, and he got permission for me to ride her in town so I could get a look around without wearing myself out. I didn't expect to meet Cait Sith..or should I say Reeve? and later, Yuffie. Cait was really nice and showed me where the drama students hang out, that was like finding a little piece of home. Yuffie..well, I don't know why she was spying on Cloud's house (I hope she's not still looking for Cloud's materia still after all this time!) but Cait scared her out. Hopefully she'll come say hey since I think she grew a little during the Jenova War, the way I understand it.
--From Zidane's journal
It had been four weeks since Zidane had woken up. Cloud had gladly let Zidane read his journals, especially the ones that pertained to the time Cloud had been on Gaia, which explained a lot. I understand now why he hid that stuff about Guardians., Zidane had thought. A promise is a promise, so I don't blame him. I don't blame Alanna either; that old lady thief was only trying to cover his butt by telling plausible fibs. I'm not going to call her out if she got back before I get back...
It'd taken a week (the doctor guessed it was because Zidane's gut had to get used to having food in it again) but Zidane had noticed he'd been getting horribly hungry, like he'd been growing again. Cloud had checked with Tara; she'd told them that was a side effect of the healing trick Nora had done for Zidane. What she'd said was that the trick worked with the body's rhythms, so that it did mess with the person's appetite because the materials for a healing had to come from somewhere. In this case, it came from what the person ate, which explained that.
Anyway Zidane had gradually been getting stronger; from getting tired from just going to the bathroom to now, when he could get down the stairs without being too worn out. This morning, he'd woken up, gotten dressed, done his business, and had just come near the stairs when he smelled something nasty. What's that? he thought. Just as he got near the stairs, he heard Cloud talking with someone.
"I brought that @#%$&^ bird, ye old spikey head. Why you wanted that @#$%^ chocobo, I have no damn idea..", someone said that Zidane didn't know.
"I have my reasons, Cid." Cid? I remember Cloud saying something about him..Cid Highwind?, Zidane thought.
"Well, I'd better get my #@$%^ ass back to Rocket Town..."
"Not staying for breakfast?"
"Not today, spikey head. I'd rather you didn't ask me to be a @#$%^ @#$%^ delivery service again."
The door shut. Zidane ran down the stairs, there seemed to be a cloud of smoke which was the source of the smell; Cloud was trying to fan it out a window. It took a moment for Zidane to catch his breath.
"Who was that? Cid?"
Cloud nodded. "Before you say anything, yeah, he was smoking. As usual. Sorry, can't get away from that. I've asked him not to around the kids, but he never listens."
"Peeyuu, that's such a smelly habit."Just then, Zidane's stomach grumbled rather audibly.
Cloud then smiled. "Let's go get breakfast, then I'll go show you what Cid was annoyed about."
Zidane nodded, then followed Cloud to the kitchen.
When Cid had come near New Midgard in the Shera, no one noticed Reeve on a nearby bridge. What is that old pilot up to? he thought. Reeve watched Cid land and lead a familiar gold chocobo into town and to Cloud's house. Cid seemed plenty annoyed, however, which just rousted Reeve's curiosity more. Something's been going on over there, I wish I knew what, but Cloud isn't talking about it..
Just then Reeve glanced at his watch. Damn, I'm late for work!, he thought. He took off for a dead run for the new ShinRa headquarters. There had been some discussion on renaming that, but no one had thought of a good replacement name for the corporation yet. Maybe soon we'll ditch that hateful name, Reeve thought as he dashed up the stairs to his office. He'd become the new CEO after the Jenova War, mainly because there were no other high ranking employees of ShinRa left; he had been doing his best to transform the company so Mako Reactors were a thing of the past. So was ShinRa being the government for anything; Reeve felt that was too tempting for anyone to abuse.
He paused at the door, out of breath. His secretary looked up and then said, "Reeve, sir? Are you okay?"
"I'm okay, Miss Potts. Just had to run for it. Is there anything I should know about? I know I'm running late.."
"Not really. The last of the Mako Reactors should be fully decommissioned by next week; there's nothing really amiss with the company. And the alternative power sources are doing very well." Miss Potts also reminded him he had a meeting after lunch today, but this morning was just routine, boring paperwork. That gave Reeve an idea.
"Make sure I'm not disturbed. I'll have that paperwork done by lunch." He entered his office, shut the door, sat down, took his keys out of a pocket, then unlocked the bottom drawer in his desk. In the drawer, was an odd pair of eyeglasses with a lens on only one side, and a pair of bangles. Reeve took the sort-of-glasses out. He carefully put them on, then snapped the bangles on under the cuffs of his shirt. He clicked a switch on the right earpiece, which switched the thing on.
A vision danced in front of Reeve's eyes, since this was the actual control device for Cait Sith. (It worked with a special materia that let Reeve control it by thought. The eye part let him see what Cait saw; it also had a sort of headphones in the part that hooked around the ears that let him hear what Cait heard.) He'd left Cait in a closet at home after the Geostigma mess; it didn't take long for Reeve to get Cait to move out of that closet. He smiled, and of course Cait smiled along with him. Let's just see what you're up to, Cloud...
After breakfast, Cloud led Zidane outside to one corner of the house. Zidane had noticed earlier through a window that there was something that looked kind of like a chocobo stable over there, but there wasn't a chocobo there when he'd last looked. Cloud turned to Zidane and handed him some greens. "Peace offering", he said with a wink. Standing there, munching a bit at the contents of a manger, was a gold chocobo with a bridle on. It raised its head. "Wak, wak?" it said.
Cloud smiled. "Meet Goldie, Zidane. Cid was in a bad mood when he went to get her since I really can't; not unless I wanted to leave my motorcycle behind or find a babysitter so I could take Tifa along. And I wouldn't want to leave the motorcycle; not to mention it's been a little tricky to find babysitters lately."
"That's understandable, but why?"
"I thought you might wanna have a look around yourself. Being sick isn't any fun, and being stuck in the house all day is worse; doctor said you should be able to ride without a problem though. Let's see if she'll take to you. She's the best chocobo I got; I got a few more but they're at some stables that are quite a ways from here, actually."
"I gotcha." Zidane stepped up, offering the chocobo the greens. She ate them, then nibbled a bit at his hair while he scratched her behind the eartufts. "She's a sweetie."
Cloud smiled. "She tends to be; there's a few folks she don't like but I can tell; she likes you."
Zidane smiled back. Cloud reached into his satchel and brought out a map and some papers. "This is for you; these are a note and papers that give you permission to ride Goldie in town. You'll have to hold her down to a walk, though. And this is a world map." Cloud showed Zidane where New Midgard was(it was on an island just a few miles offshore), then tapped an area on the map. "Stay away from there for right now. That's where old Midgard was; there's a town at the edge called Edge, but the area has a lot of air pollution. If you thought Cid's smoking was bad, that's a lot worse and I don't think your body could handle that shit right now. I won't say you shouldn't go there once you're feeling stronger; might be a good idea to go to Aeris's church if you got a lot on your mind since it's a good place to think." Cloud shook his head sadly. "Reeve had to go to a lot of trouble to make sure no one would get hurt in Edge since there were people that would not leave after Meteor hit. Had to make sure the area was reinforced so people wouldn't get crap dropping on their heads."
"Why wouldn't they leave? Seems silly not to if they might get smashed..."
Cloud sighed. "It's because their villages were originally there, before Midgard got built. People often just love their homes, no matter how bad it gets."
Zidane just nodded. Cloud continued, "If you wanna ride out of town, that's okay. Just please try to get back before dark; I don't wanna have to hunt for you. And unless you think you can handle a fight, don't get off the chocobo while you're not in town. There's still a few monsters out there."
Zidane nodded again. Cloud has been really courteous about things, he thought. Zidane remembered:
It was not long after he finished his lunch that first day. Cloud had noticed Zidane had gotten pretty quiet.
"Hey," he said. "I understand. If you want to be alone, just say so and I'll go do something else. Everything's..been turned upside down, hasn't it?"
"Well, yeah.."
"I've been there." Cloud had gotten a bit quiet himself, then said, "Don't be afraid to confront that crap in your head and think it though. It took me months, not to mention getting Geostigma and finding a cure, to finally come to terms with what happened, and it took me a little longer to come to terms with Aeris dying. Some things you just have to figure out for yourself...I should know."
He reassured me there was no way I'd get Geostigma, there'd been no new cases in quite some time. Thank goodness. Not to mention I have other stuff to worry about...
Cloud nodded and smiled. "I think you should be okay. Anyway you know what day it is, it's my turn to go work. Time to go deliver the mail.."
Zidane nodded. I know, Cloud and Tifa have been taking turns day by day working so there's always someone home with the kids. That Loki, he can't be left alone. I think he stole the toilet seat last week...brother, Baku would of laughed his head off but it's not funny when you have to use that..
Cloud walked to the other end of the yard and wheeled out his motorcycle. "I'll see you at dinner tonight, Zidane."
"Good luck and stay safe out there!"
Cloud nodded, made sure his Ultima Weapon was firmly on his back, put his helmet on, started the motorcycle, and drove off.
I think I'll take Cloud's invitation, Zidane thought. Kinda getting tired of just seeing this place out the window. He vaulted over the fence of the chocobo pen and found Goldie's saddle. She tamely submitted to being saddled; Zidane then led her to the gate, then let them both out, then mounted. "Let's go, girl!"
"Wark!" Goldie cried, and off they went slowly though the streets. Goldie seemed to understand this was not a time to run. She sure sounds strange, but same old kinda bird as back home, really. He sighed, he hadn't admitted it to Cloud but he was a little homesick. Hardly anything's familiar. I just wish I'd finish getting better so Cloud can call the Guardian and I can go home...
Just as he rounded the bend, Zidane noticed something really odd. There was this black and white cat that seemed to have hands and feet like a normal person, riding the ugliest moogle Zidane had ever seen. The face looked like someone big and fat had sat on it, and the moogle was as big as a person. It turned to look at him.
"Good morning sir, would thee please tell me thy name?", the cat asked.
That rang a bell from what Cloud had told Zidane. I think I know who this is.. "It's Zidane. And you're Cait Sith, or should I say Reeve?"
"AAAAARGH!" The cat danced on the back of the moogle. "How did you know?!"
Zidane winked. "Cloud told me about you, and I've seen his journals. What brings you out here, anyway?" "Oh, was going to try to catch Cloud but he seems to be off on mail delivery again. He didn't tell me why he needed a doctor but I can guess now...because you showed up?"
Zidane nodded. "Long story - I don't come from this world at all to be honest. But I did show up pretty badly hurt." Zidane didn't want to go into the full story. Since he knew Cloud trusted Reeve/Cait, he figured Cait could be trusted, but on the other hand, Zidane didn't really know Reeve/Cait at all. Zidane wanted to find out how he felt about Cloud's friends on his own.
Cait talked to Zidane fairly gently, it didn't take Cait long to learn a little bit about Tantalus..
"Wait, they're kinda a theater troupe? That gives me an idea. Bet you're a little homesick, eh?" Zidane nodded. "I happen to know where the dive where the drama/theater students hang out is. The plays may change, but acting never changes; you might find a kindred spirit or two there."
"Drama students?"
Cait put his hands behind his head. "Oh, did Cloud forget to tell you? One of the things I've worked on doing is I basically built the biggest school here in the world. Here, anyone can come who passes the entrance exams to gain a career - but I had another reason too. I want to make sure future generations don't forget the Jenova War and are able to learn from the past. I don't want the crap we went though to be repeated...well, if I have any say in the matter."
Zidane nodded approvingly. "I'll show you the way there, homesick on top of recovering from injuries doesn't help anyone."
It didn't take long to get there, it was a little bar called Garuda's Wings. Zidane dismounted the bird and tied her to a post; they went inside.
There were some folks in one corner doing something really familiar to Zidane; going over their lines. One of them was messing with a wooden sword..and looking terrible, like he didn't know what he was doing. Zidane stepped up to them.
"Hey, need some help with that?"
The guy looked up, startled. "Uh, sure." He handed Zidane the sword, Zidane proceeded to show him how it was done, even tho it really got him out of breath. This won a round of applause. A girl nearby offered Zidane a glass of root beer.
"Man, that was good. Where did you learn that?"
"Learned from my weapons teacher a while back, but I'm still not good enough really to fight with it, but it works for acting."
Zidane quickly learned that the girl's name was Madalynn, and her friends were working on a school project that would later be shown at the theater in town. It turned out to be a pretty nice morning after all. Cait had walked to the corner, told Zidane that if he needed him just holler since he had some garbagey paperwork to do as Reeve. For a while, Zidane was just able to forget about being homesick. Cait had been right. The plays were different, but acting never changed - it was like Madalynn and her friends were kind of speaking the same language as Zidane. Not to mention it was a lot of fun.
After they left that bar, it didn't take them too long to remount and get back to Cloud's house. Cait happened to turn his head when..there was some rustling in a nearby tree.
"What's that?" Zidane said.
"Hmm, hang on." Cait jumped off the moogle, picked up a small rock, and threw it at the top of the tree. It hit..what sounded to be someone. "Ouch!" a female voice said.
Cait shook his butt a little. "YUFFIE! What are you doing in that tree?!" He jumped back on the moogle. There was a rustling, and then a black haired girl in a rather odd outfit jumped out of the tree. Zidane believed Cait though. I haven't seen her before, but I'm sure Cait would know who that was., he thought. The girl had some kinda guard over one arm, otherwise she seemed to be dressed like a ninja.
"Um, being curious?"
"You aren't planning on sneaking into Cloud's house later, are you?"
Yuffie toed the ground. "Um, no?"
Zidane decided to speak up. "You'd better not. You'd proly scare the kids anyway."
"Awright, awright, I'll proly drop by later to play with them then!"
I don't know if she meant to go after Cloud's materia or not; I hope she outgrew that game., Zidane thought. But I guess there's quite a few of Cloud's friends around...