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(Art by RinnyBon, shared here with permission)
Cosmo Canyon was as beautiful as Aerith remembered. Its jagged cliffs and caverns and ravines were striking against the pink and purple sky, and the village hewn out of rock that Nanaki called home brimmed with ancient knowledge. Aerith felt as if she was stepping back in time as the group entered the village, to an age when her people still freely wandered the Planet and tended to it.
The group decided to stop here for the evening, and she went to the Starlet Pub with Tifa to enjoy a nice drink after the day’s travels. As they settled in with their drinks, the cavern walls whispered of times gone by, of people long gone. Aerith wondered if any of her ancestors had been to this bar before, if—
“What’s on your mind?” Tifa asked, hand resting on her chin as she searched Aerith’s face. “Something’s troubling you.”
Aerith sighed and swirled her drink till the ice clinked. “I talk a big game about defying fate, but maybe… maybe the only way for me to fully harness my powers is to… is to…”
Tifa tilted her head. “Is to what?”
“Oh, nothing. Sorry, I’m being a killjoy. We finally get to sit down for a nice drink, and here I am pondering the mysteries of the universe.” She took a sip of the cool liquid. “Pretty good, but I still wanna try one of your drinks sometime. Cloud says you make a killer Cosmo Canyon.”
“He’s flattering me,” Tifa said lightly, “but you have yourself a deal.” A heaviness filled her eyes as she added, “Once we rebuild the bar, of course.”
“You will.”
The two women sat in silence for a little while, enjoying their drinks and each other’s company, till Tifa spoke up again.
“To tell you the truth, Aerith, I’m feeling like a killjoy myself. This whole journey, protecting the Planet… I want to do that, but I keep asking myself what the cost is. Will it all be worth it in the end? What about all the people we’ve killed?”
“I wonder about that myself,” Aerith said sadly. She knew, of course, that people returned to the Lifestream after they died. She’d even talked to some of them after she’d died. But if she and the others couldn’t stop Sephiroth… if they couldn’t stop the calamity from the skies he’d taken in, the awful creature he’d merged with who’d wanted her people dead for thousands of years… who wanted her dead for defying it…
She was getting stronger by the day. Each battle won, each prayer to the Planet for assistance, was paying off. But would it be good enough? Once she’d been a goddess, able to call upon the entire Lifestream for assistance. Now she was just an ordinary young woman with an admittedly closer connection to the Planet than most.
Would it be enough to stop Sephiroth? If she couldn’t unlock her former powers soon, changing fate would be for nothing. Might be worse than nothing if people died who were meant to live. Aerith would never forgive herself if that happened. But her death, while it had enabled her to protect the Planet, had also led to… this. Sephiroth infecting the Lifestream, turning back time, and making them all relive the past like puppets on strings.
Dying wasn’t the answer, was it? But if she couldn’t get her former powers back in time, she wasn’t sure she had a choice—
The little bell on the door jingled and Cloud walked in, so she plastered on a smile. “Heya, Cloud. Come join us.”
He hesitated, then shook his head. “I’m good. Gonna check up on Red XIII next.”
“Red XIII… I wonder what’s happened to him?” Tifa said. “He’s as excited as a little boy.”
“He is acting different, yeah,” Cloud agreed, and he finally walked closer and took a seat.
The conversation soon diverged to other topics, and Cloud and Tifa fell into conversation the way only people who have known each other for a long time can. Aerith joined in for a little while, then took one final sip of her drink and stood, feeling this was the right time to make her exit. Keeping secrets from these two especially was getting harder by the hour.
“There are some people here that know about the Promised Land and the Ancients,” she told them. “I want to ask around.”
The elders of the village had helped her before. Maybe they could help her again.
“Something tells me, oh Daughter of the Ancients, that you already know what we have just told you about the Cetra and the Promised Land,” Ran said, an elderly woman with silver hair. Aerith sat on a cushion in a dimly-lit meeting room with several such elders, the fire in the corner more glowing embers than flame. Smoke from fragrant incense wafted through the air, filling it with a strong scent.
“I do,” Aerith admitted as another elder poured her more tea. “I come to you today for answers to questions that are troubling me deeply.”
“And we will do what we can to help,” Ran replied. “Our people observe the stars to divine the story of the universe: its past, its present, and its future. We have seen your story, too. You have wandered far in your quest to save the Planet from a great evil. You are called ‘The Maiden’ by the lost souls who have met you, and your constellation in the heavens guides the living.”
Aerith gripped her teacup. “What else can you tell me?”
“The stars have changed.” Ran’s face fell, and she sighed deeply. “Time has changed. The great evil has sought to rewrite destiny so that it can succeed where it was meant to fail.”
Aerith’s head drooped. “I know. I’m here so I can put a stop to it and save the Planet. My trouble is that my struggle with Sephiroth never ends, and now I’m without my full powers. How can I get them back? Without them, I can’t hope to—”
“Return to the Lifestream, and you will regain your powers.” Ran delivered the news with the solemnity it deserved, but Aerith struggled to accept it all the same.
“Surely there’s another way,” she pleaded. “I’m not afraid to die, but I want to live. I want to see for myself all the beauty this Planet has to offer and experience all the things I didn’t get to the first time around. I want to make new memories with my friends. If I die, they’ll be sad again. They grieved so deeply for me the first time… Cloud blamed himself, Tifa was wracked with survivor’s guilt, Barret felt like he should’ve stopped it from happening—”
“But they lived,” Ran gently said. “You know what will happen if you return to the Planet. You do not know what will happen if you do not.”
“Sephiroth won’t stop.” Aerith couldn’t control the trembling in her voice, knowing what she was up against. “He didn’t stop even when I had my full powers. It’s why we changed fate. If I let things go the same way, the same outcome will happen again, only Sephiroth will get even stronger.”
Aerith felt trapped. She and the others had defeated the Whispers, it was true, but she felt more imprisoned than she had before. Even if she could summon Holy successfully, Sephiroth was so powerful now that it might not be enough to defeat him for good without the help of the Lifestream again. And the only way she’d been able to ask the Lifestream for help was being a part of it herself. If she couldn’t find a way to call upon it without joining it, she had no choice but to die again.
The elders looked at her with pity.
“Daughter of the Ancients,” Ran said, “our prayers go with you. We wish you the very best on your long journey.”
Aerith took a few moments to compose herself, then nodded and thanked them. Sacrifices weren’t supposed to question their destiny; they were supposed to be happily led to their deaths like lambs to the slaughter. Aerith was willing, but only if her death would mean something. If not, it would be worse than pointless.
Once again, she was at an impasse.
The Cosmo Candle was the special fire of Cosmo Canyon, a symbol of its soul and an encouragement to its people. Their little group was seated around it now, sheltering from the chilly night air. Try as she might, Aerith couldn’t get her conversation with the elders out of her mind. It swirled around in her mind like her fate repeated over and over again, an endless cycle of death and rebirth that only made Sephiroth more powerful.
Cloud was making his rounds like a worried mother hen, and Aerith smiled sadly. How much did he remember of their past lives? How much did Tifa? Barret? Nanaki? Yuffie? Cait Sith? Would it be safe to confide in her friends, or would burdening them with her worries just make things worse?
At last Cloud settled next to her, and she wasn’t sure what to say. Thankfully, he spoke first.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked, his voice low.
She studied him curiously. This version of Cloud seemed more attuned to people’s feelings. Was it a sign his past life was influencing him, or was that just her imagination?
“Well, I spoke with the elders,” she replied, “and they taught me many things. About the Cetra and the Promised Land, mostly.” She drew her knees up to her chest and hugged herself. “And about me. I really am the only Cetra left. I’m… all alone. I’m always alone.”
Her voice broke, and tears threatened to spill from her eyes. That statement was truer than he could ever know. She wasn’t just talking about being the last Cetra, though that was a heavy burden to bear in and of itself. No, she was the only one who fully knew just what was at stake. She was the only one who knew her fate and how much it would hurt her friends.
“You know I’m here for you,” he said. She looked up, and he gestured around the fire. “We’re all here for you.”
She smiled sadly. “Thanks, Cloud, that means a lot. But there are things you don’t know about me, and there’s only so much you can do to help.”
Warning him point blank about her death ahead of time would only prolong his suffering. Best to just keep it to herself, just like she kept the future to herself—
“I won’t let you die.”
Five simple words that turned her entire reality upside down. Her eyes went wide and her breath caught as the syllables hit her ears and their meaning sank into her heart. Cloud’s mouth was pulled into a tight line, and his eyes were full of tears. But he spoke the words with conviction, and her heart raced and her mind reeled at the revelation.
“Huh?” was all she could shakily manage.
He looked to Tifa, and she left her spot by the fire to come join them. “Aerith, we know,” she said softly, resting her hand on Aerith’s arm. “We remember.”
Aerith burst into tears, and Tifa put her arms around her and held her tight. Cloud awkwardly patted her shoulder as she just cried and cried and cried. What a relief it was to know she wasn’t alone, that her friends knew about her ordeal. The others soon joined in too: Yuffie offered to steal whatever Materia would make Aerith the most powerful, Barret told her he would track Sephiroth down and deal with him personally before Sephiroth laid a single finger on her, and Cait Sith offered the services of his megaphone and his Moogle.
Aerith smiled and wiped her eyes. “Thank you all, this really means a lot to me.” She looked at each of her friends, and in their faces she saw her pain reflected, but also their care and compassion.
“Of course,” Barret said gruffly. “You’re family, Aerith.”
Everyone nodded in agreement, and she knew that even though she was the last Cetra, this ragtag group had adopted her as one of their own. A part of her was eternally grateful for that, but the other part had to share her concerns with them.
“I know you all have my back, but I still feel like my death might be the only answer to our dilemma.” She hung her head and sighed. “Sephiroth is stronger now, as I’m sure you’ve all noticed. Somehow he’s found a way to rewind time, and he’s retained his knowledge and abilities from his previous life.”
Yuffie tilted her head. “But doesn’t that mean we have too?”
“Perhaps, to a certain extent, but I… I can’t ask the Lifestream for help anymore. And I have to be able to in order to defeat Sephiroth.”
Everyone was silent as the implications of her words sunk in.
“I thought that maybe, changing fate might help us find another way, but I fear we’re running out of time.” Aerith sighed deeply. While it felt good to get this off her chest, she wasn’t sure how it would help.
“We’ll find an answer,” Tifa said, and the others nodded.
“But what if we don’t? I’m not afraid to die, but I fear we’re stuck in an endless cycle of death and rebirth that makes Sephiroth more powerful each time. Even if I let him kill me so I can ask the Lifestream to help me defeat him, he’ll just reset time all over again, even more powerful than before. What happens when he’s too strong for us to defeat?”
Cloud had been silent for a while, but at last he spoke up. “I don’t think Sephiroth fully knows what he’s dealing with. He is powerful, I’ll give him that, but he’s not as in control of everything as you might think. I don’t think he realizes that rewinding time and changing fate will have ripple effects. Maybe someone who was supposed to die lives. Maybe that’s all we need to win.”
Aerith stared at Cloud. For so long she’d worried about her friends dying thanks to her decision to defy fate that she hadn’t wondered what might happen if someone lived instead. After their victory over the Whispers, she sensed the ripples Cloud was referring to, but she didn’t dare hope they might lead to good things.
“Ripples, huh?” She smiled at Cloud. If even he could find hope in all this, perhaps she could too.
“Maybe we’ll find the results of those ripples, Aerith,” Tifa said. “Maybe that’s the key to winning.”
“Maybe so.” Aerith felt at peace in a way she hadn’t in a long time. She wasn’t alone, and while the future was daunting, there was still hope. There was always hope.
And as she looked at her friends’ smiling faces, she found the courage to keep searching for it.