closed ⚡🌠 can we come back from this

[starshower]

Who: Eustace & Tifa
Which: Closed log
Where: Their treehouse, corgi tree, maybe some other places
What: After Eustace's Noctaere episode, he and Tifa try to put their relationship back together.
Warnings: Trauma, lots of sads, and then probably gross fluff after.


[It had been a struggle even getting home. After they and the others had arrived at Ori's home together, it was at Tifa's insistence that she and Eustace go back to theirs. For as grateful and appreciative as she was for all their help in saving the both of them, there are some things that Tifa would rather they be alone for, and this... whatever this is, is one of them. Never mind the guilt that she feels for having been the one to put them all through it—Eustace can argue with her all he likes, and they can all contend that they shouldn't feel that way, that none of it was her fault, but ever since she woke up from her weakened and frozen state, Tifa couldn't look any one of them in the eye.

Including Eustace.

Even as she walks with their arms slung around each other for support with Eria at their side, the journey home is silent. Only the stirrings of dawn can be heard—the birds that chirp in the canopies, the sound of dew dripping from the leaves, but nothing is quite so loud as their staggered footsteps, or her heart beating wildly in her chest, and her blood roaring in her ears.

Tifa tries to keep her anxiety to a minimum, tries to keep her thoughts straight, but all she can see are the claws of those lindworms as they came down to strike, and their scales that shimmered as they slithered around her. All she can hear are his desperate cries, and the sound of ice and electricity crackling as her vision darkened and her consciousness had begun to fade... She remembers the chill, the grips of death when it threatened to consume her, how cold his fingers were as they brushed against her face. The red in his eyes...

And then when she woke and saw the destruction he'd left behind. Saw her friends bruised and battered from battle. Saw him like that...

The thought is cut short by a sharp breath when they finally arrive at the foot of the stairs leading up to their home, her boot bumping against them when she hadn't been paying attention. The climb up is as dreadful as everything else had been, and she can feel the heat under her boots, the fires that try to claw their way out of the cage she tries to lock them in, to struggle against the trail of ice that forms in their wake. Even the tree's branches and leaves shudder as they walk through the front door, the flowers that decorate their tree that were once bright and vibrant freezing over and shriveling up, dying without a fighting chance.

It isn't until they're safely inside that Tifa so much as looks at him for the first time since they were at Ori's. Perhaps even before. Really looks at him. He's bruised and cut up, and he looks more tired than she's ever seen him.

Her hands fold together as she skirts her gaze away again, down to where she tries to stop her fingers from trembling when she bites back the urge to sob.

Tifa wants to say something, but... what is she even supposed to say? What can she say right now that would make this easier for both of them? She searches and searches her mind for an answer to the question that's been wracking her since they left the cliffside, but she's still coming up short of nothing.

Eria trots over and nudges Tifa with her nose, as if to encourage her to say something to break this tense silence before it all snaps. So, she blurts out the first thing that comes to mind in a voice so tiny that she's not even sure she's said anything at all, and it crackles, as if this is the first time she's ever spoken a word in her life. It certainly feels that way right now.]

... Do you want to get cleaned up first?

[First.

She kicks herself for it. Any other day and she would have suggested together, but her fear—not of him, but fear for them—is getting the better of her, and maybe that's for the best.]

Comments

[starshower]

[...

She's going to reach out and take his hand again just so that they have each other's. It's a small gesture, but a big comfort to even just be touching as they talk about it.

She takes a breath, and then another as her thumb carefully traces circles over the back of his hand.]

What... what was it like?

[It's such a loaded question and there are so many things it could mean, but it's really the one thing that encompasses everything she wants to know.

Another squeeze of his hand...]

What was... going through your mind at the time?

[flamekthunder]

[That.......that is definitely a loaded question and his hand tightens over hers for a moment.]

...Which... From the beginning or...?

[He remembers it all even if he'd rather not.]

[starshower]

[She swallows, a lump in her throat forming.]

I... I guess so...

[Tifa doesn't actually know for sure when or what it is she's searching for. Just some understanding, so...]

That's probably the easiest, yeah...? Wh-whatever you're comfortable with?

[flamekthunder]

...

[How to even begin...]

Anger. Frustration. Desperation.

[That's what he starts with—the feelings that had overwhelmed him in that moment.]

The moment I saw you struck down, all sense of reasoning left me. I had to save you, and the only way I knew how was... [...To freeze her. In fairness, it was in part because that's how he knows how to use dreamotion to heal, but then it just went so much further.]

...Looking back, I could have just sealed the wound and wrote for help—or make a makeshift sled to bring you back... But the thought of your life slipping away... [His eyes shut tightly.] It was too much.

Maybe whatever nightmare energy I already had at that point fed off my emotions. But with the lindwurms still attacking and being reminded of that time... [Surely he doesn't need to specify which "time" he's talking about.] I just wanted to destroy it all. Get rid of everything that hurt you...hurt us.

[He can't look at her, the grip on her hand loosening.]

After that... I was tired. Tired of having to go through this over and over again. I just wanted to share that peace and quiet with you...the dogs... So I carried you all with me... Finding a place where no one could find us. A place I could keep you safe...

[He stares out the window, all light now gone as the room is heavy with gloom.]

It was a foolish fantasy born from my own selfish, twisted desires.

[starshower]

[She keeps her hold on his hand, tightens her fingers as his own slips away, but as he moves his gaze to the window, to the hanging branches that rustle and sway in the cool wind, Tifa keeps her eyes fixed on him. The air feels heavy, but she remains steady, sturdy, for him as she listens patiently.

Her throat tightens again at the mention of the lindwurms, and there's the slightest twitch of her fingers and the furrow of her brow. They will never be anything but a reminder of her failure—failure to save him the one time, and the other to protect herself. Even the one he transformed into in that nightmare was just another that reiterated her same worries... That she wouldn't be able to pull him free from that.

But she did... And they are here now, together. That should be enough, shouldn't it?

These nightmares really love to feed off their feelings for one another...

The silence that follows when he finishes is almost unbearable, and she wonders if it feels the same for him, too... but Tifa is sorting through her own thoughts, her own feelings on the matter. She feels no malice or anger towards him, nor does she blame him for any of what happened, but trying to find the right words that don't sound like empty clichés is difficult sometimes...]

It's not foolish. Or selfish.

[Well, it isn't a great start, she thinks, but she needed him to know that.]

If it were me... I don't think I'd know what to do. I'd want to find you someplace safe... maybe even try to save you myself.

[That's not something she wants to think about either.]

I think... I'd be tired, too.

[flamekthunder]

[Her words do ring hollow, but it's no fault of her own. It's just him naturally rejecting it. A part of him will rationalize, but it will still be difficult to accept.

With that in mind, he finally looks at her, that weariness and exhaustion evident.]

Are you sure you're not tired of me already?

[starshower]

What...?

[Her eyes go wide, and her mouth falls open, the question taking her by surprise. There's that sinking feeling in her stomach again, and she fears, suddenly, if she hasn't been making herself or her intentions clear enough for him.]

Is that... were you worried that I would be?

[flamekthunder]

[A small, wane smile, as if he knows what she's thinking.]

You've made yourself clear, and I don't doubt the sincerity. But it would be a lie to say it didn't exist.

[He looks away again.]

Maybe not now... Maybe not next time... But I'm not the only one who has been suffering. And sometimes I wonder if you would have been better off if not for me.

[It's a dark, depressing thought, made worse by how calmly he's talking about it. As if it's not the first time it's popped into his head.

But five times.

Five times they've been through this.

And then there were other times where she's had to help him.

Really, it's not so strange for him to wonder if he was somehow cursed. And it's not so strange to believe it with the kind of world they live in.]

[starshower]

[...

Tifa would be lying if she said that hearing that didn't pain her. She'd be lying if she said it didn't make her a little frustrated, even angry, that the idea that she would be tired of him or that she would have been better off without him ever crossed his mind. She doesn't realize how much she's frowning or how intense her gaze is until she remembers to breathe, and tries to go to him...

......

Only to remember that there's a cat and a wolf in the way of her going to him. Showing him that isn't the case.

She has no choice but to shrink back away from him and hold Clover close instead... although the cat seems to sense that something is wrong and stretches so that she can rub her face against Tifa's chin, purring all the while. It helps, but it does very little to make that feeling go away.]

That hurts...

[Her voice is as small as she looks now, like she's been kicked down.]

I know it isn't easy... all of this? But... [Suddenly, it becomes harder to form words.] Don't I know better than anyone what's best for me? Don't I get a say in that?

[flamekthunder]

[It does hurt him hearing it, knowing he made her feel that way.

And she's right.]

I know. And I know I would be saying the same things if our places were switched.

[A haggard sigh as he runs a hand over his face and through his hair, half slouching over.]

But I can't...seem to shake it off. I even tried to call off the wedding because of this.

[starshower]

And no one let you.

[Including Tifa.

It doesn't matter that the others protested, and it wouldn't have mattered if they agreed either, but shouldn't her own feelings on the matter have some weight? It hurt her then, and it hurts to be reminded of that moment again, and there's a very sudden but very obvious surge of heat that pulses through the room—one that has Clover lifting her head again and sniffing at the hot air.

Yet, even though it hurts her, hasn't she thought the same things before? That maybe he would be better off finding someone better for him? That she didn't deserve him...?

Even now, she still can't quite shake the feeling. Even as he says these things, Tifa still looks across at him, sees how tired and broken he is, and still loves him more than she did a day ago. So... can she blame him?]

... What will it take for you to stop thinking that?

[flamekthunder]

[He can feel that heat, and he knows why. And though he tries to keep rational, that they're supposed to be talking about all this, he can only think how even now he's just hurting her.

And his answer...]

...I don't know.

[It's infuriating, really. It really wasn't that long ago that he made all those promises and vows to her, hardened his resolve to see this life with her. And now? He's breaking them.

And he hates himself for it.

Hates himself for letting such a ridiculous thought to sink in so deep that he can't just toss it aside on his own. Hates himself for making Tifa feeling those same doubts and worsening her insecurities. Hates himself for losing all that confidence and becoming so weak and vulnerable.

Ice crackles at his fingertips as that self-loathing deepens.]

In my head I know it's all wrong...but that feeling just won't go away.

[starshower]

[Seeing the ice forming at his fingertips, Tifa reaches out with her own hand again, taking his in hers. To the touch, her own will feel hot—she doesn't mean for them to be, but... maybe that heat, awful as it is, will help to stave off the cold dread he feels. Little red embers flutter from her fingertips and brush over his...

Even at their worst, they still balance each other out. Two sides of the same coin...]

You're what's best for me...

[As if to help drive that point home, she gives his hand a squeeze, where his cold helps to reduce the sting of her burns, like a violent storm of rain or snow dousing a raging fire.]

Every time I'm scared or sad, you always find a way to bring me back. You've saved me... countless times. I'm...

[This only feels worse having Eria and Clover keeping them apart, and Tifa pauses to stare at the wolf in his lap.]

You... [Her voice falls away.] You make me happy.

[flamekthunder]

[He almost flinches at her touching her hand—not because of the heat, because that stupid feeling of inferiority. But as scalding as her heat is, it's a much needed warmth that helps melt away that ice that had started to form again. He, too, sees that perfect balance between them, once again thinking that despite their differences they're so well matched...

And her words are like a salve to his tattered heart. Even if he already knows that's what she would say, hearing it does help make it more convincing. Makes him want to really believe in her words.]

Even like this? ...Even after what I did?

[But perhaps what makes it so damn hard to really believe in it is that memory of how terrified she had been of him. It's still so fresh on his mind, haunting him.


Sensing the tension between them and how needlessly (in her opinion) insecure Eustace is feeling, Eria stares at the two of them before hopping off his lap, as if granting permission for them to be close for this. But she is going to butt in if they start being gross.]

[starshower]

[The second that Eria hops down, Tifa is gently placing Clover on the floor next to the wolf where she's happy to stretch, and within seconds, she's reaching for him at long last, pulling him to meet her halfway until she's holding him.]

Yes.

[Her eyes close against the crook of his neck where she buries her face, and he'll feel her give a small nod as well.]

Even like this, even after what you did...

[Tifa lifts her head just far enough that she can look him in the eyes.]

When you called off the wedding, I... [Only to look away from him again.] It was like I saw my life without you.

[It was brief, a split second in what felt like an infinite stretch of time, but it was there, and that hurt still lingers.]

I didn't like it.

[flamekthunder]

[Never has he felt so much warmth and relief when Tifa pulls him in and holds him, his arms automatically wrapping around her. This time he doesn't want to flinch away. This time...he wants her. Isn't that already proof enough of how he truly feels about things? So why does he keep torturing himself like this?

...Torturing them?]

I...

[He bites his lip as his arms tighten around her, eyes closing as he buries his face against her hair, her scent soothing and captivating.]

...I wasn't in my right mind then. But at the time I was thinking it would have been better if I just left completely.

[starshower]

[The hand on the back of his head only works to press him closer, to bury him further in her as she does into him, falling in so that she can rest on his shoulder.]

And go where? You'd be alone...

[They'd both be alone and right now, it's clear to her that it isn't what either of them would have needed or truly wanted, even without their right minds, or being clouded by grief. It isn't even herself that she's worried about, but what if he just spiraled back into those ways again? Being alone with his thoughts... Without anyone there to protect him from them like she's so desperately trying to do right now...]

How is that better...?

[flamekthunder]

[The silence is heavy before he lets out a long breath.]

...I meant I would return to my world.

[starshower]

[The room goes silent and still, like the world has suddenly held its breath. Even Tifa stops once her breath seizes in her lungs. The words feel like red hot claws scraping over her skin with the sole intention to tear her apart, and she thinks she'd much rather be facing another lindwurm right now than hearing that.

Tifa knows that isn't his intent anymore, or she hopes that it isn't, but that it was even an option at all is still a dagger through her heart. She doesn't want to blame him—she can't ever find it in her to do so, so she wonders what it was she did that made him believe that she would ever want or prefer such a thing. Even when things are hard...

How long she remains silent, she doesn't know, but it feels like that time stretches on forever, until it all finally starts again when she remembers to breathe.

Lifting her head, she looks at him, her eyes brimming with hurt that it falls out of her in quiet tears as she remembers the days where he had gone back to his world, and she didn't know when or if she would ever see him again. It was so cold, so dark, and this tree—their tree—had almost died under all the despair. Everything was iced over and looked like a cold, desolate wasteland. And that had been when he didn't have a choice.

... If he did and chose to leave... what would that look like?]

I'd be...

[Tifa cuts herself off. It's too selfish to beg for him to stay for her own sake, even if the thought of being alone again is so crippling that she can barely speak.]

I'd rather you be here... for us to be like this... than not here at all.

[Fighting together for what they both want... Fighting for each other. Even if it means that they'll have to endure all of this pain a hundred times over, wouldn't it be better for them to endure it together rather than alone?]

Those days you were gone... [She shrinks back away from him, but she doesn't let go.] They were the worst...

[flamekthunder]

[His own breaths are shallow and a little quick, completely aware of how his words are affecting her. Aware of what she is likely thinking. He almost doesn't want to continue, just drop it all and say he's sorry, that it won't happen again.

But...]

...I thought I was too much of a threat. I could have killed everyone, could have done so much worse... Even if I knew it would hurt you at the time it just seemed like the better choice in the end.

[...He had felt Eria's paw against his leg, as if she knew what he was thinking, knew that he had to tell her if just to be open and honest. This... Was what they were supposed to be doing, right?]

...And it wasn't just for your sake.

[There's a new tension now adding to the suffocation around them.]

[starshower]

[She almost wants to shout at him to stop before he can dare breathe any more life into those thoughts by saying them out loud, but she knows that it won't get them anywhere. She needs to hear it, and she wants to understand him, but there are some things that not even Tifa can stand to listen to.

Whether it was for her sake or his or for everyone else's, it doesn't matter, and she would argue that nothing is better off without him until she is out of breath and blue in the face if she knew that it would do anything to change how he had felt, or feels now. As they both know very well, words are never easy for Tifa, so she simply watches him, more tears falling freely while she listens...

Remembers what she saw in the cave...]

No one is better off. Nothing is better without you... [is all she can say in a choked, small, defeated voice.] Nothing...

[flamekthunder]

[For the most part he had been able to stay reasonably steady minded all things considered. But now everything is coming back like a tidal wave, and while he tries to keep in mind that it was all born from the circumstances... Those circumstances are still eating him alive.]

It doesn't matter!

[His voice comes out in a loud shout that surprises even him for a moment, but that rush of emotion is too overwhelming for him to hold back.]

You've never been there, Tifa! You've never experienced what it's like to lose your mind and do things out of your control! I tried to strangle Beat, bit through and threw Oriphi then shot her and Trahearne—electrocuted Beatrix, tried to drown Susato—I fucking speared through Aerith!

[Even as it all comes out, he knows he's losing it. But it's all been pent up, not wanting to let her know, not wanting her to hear this. To try and keep it to himself. But that has been the problem—he's only kept it to himself.]

Did you know I wanted to kill her? Kill everyone? I was thinking it would be better if I just ended their lives just so you could only think of me! Do you know how insane that is!?

[He's completely pulled away from her, his hands clenched in tight fists pressed over his eyes, as if trying to block out those memories. Block out that surge of hatred and jealousy that overwhelmed him. The room has completely blacked out, the ice erupting over the floors and the walls, withering the newly formed blossoms as it seeps into the wood.]

And do you know what I felt when I finally came to? Saw everyone's bodies lying there, seeing you? It was the lindwurm all over again! I just wanted to kill myself—!

[starshower]

[Tifa falls back, startled by his sudden and very loud outburst, and she can feel Clover leap behind her ankles to hide with a little mewl, but she doesn't move at first, too scared and stunned to do much of anything. But the longer he goes on, the more he talks... yelling about what he'd done to each of their friends, she's had enough.

Scooping the frightened cat up into her arms, Tifa stands and paces away. Only a step, but far enough that she can turn her back to him. Far enough that she can bury her face into Clover's fur where she sobs quietly to herself and hides.

"You've never been there," he tells her... but hasn't she?

She's been on both sides...

She thinks back to that night when the plate fell. She remembers the sirens blaring, the evacuation warning repeating over and over, and the deafening explosions and the groan of steel. The stifling heat of fire as it blazed over her skin when they narrowly escaped it. The sound of screams from the people she knew and came to care for below her... Barret calling out for everyone...

Her bar, her home, buried.

The only difference is that she had control over it, and it still happened anyway. She was in her right mind, and yet... Tifa could never take that back or make it right, and she isn't sure that she could ever forgive herself for not being able to stop it or being part of what caused it in the first place.

And now this...

On the other end, it's just one more thing that Tifa could have stopped... One more situation she could have taken hold of but was too weak and too scared to.

Except he doesn't know that. He might never know now...

...

Her eyes, red and sore and misty, snap open at his last words, however, and she whips around to face him.

Kill himself...?

Is that why...

She had only seen those last moments before she shoved the necklace at him, but Tifa didn't miss the way he broke the ice beneath his feet, as if he intended to drown himself in the frigid lake. She hadn't thought much of it then, but now that all the pieces are falling into place...

Her mouth falls open to speak, but her throat is so dry that nothing comes out. Not a sound. The room is still, the only noise the crackling of the ice as it spreads through the room, but there's that fiery heat that wages war against it, trying to snuff it out. It isn't a pleasant warmth by any means, but it feels like hot iron against her skin.

She could forgive him for being upset, for being scared, angry with himself, but this? What an unfathomably selfish wish...]

Eustace... [She can barely manage saying his name, or to stifle her frustration or the utter horror in her voice.] Did you really think that...

[ ... ]

Did you really think that would solve anything?

[Once upon a time, Tifa might have given up. She would have thought that there was no point—if he wasn't willing to listen, then why bother? Back then, Tifa had been ready to give up too, but Barret had said something to her then that she had shook her head to but took to heart all the same.

And she remembers what her response had been to that, and both ring true here.]

You need to look around you, Eustace. Everyone is scared. Hurt... but they're all going to try.

[There's a beat, and it's clear in the way she frowns and takes a staggered breath that she's trying to keep her voice steady, to keep it from rising too much like his did, but even her emotions are getting the better of her that it's difficult.]

I know it's hard but... We all have to keep moving forward. None of us should get to take the easy way out.

[They have both done things in their life that they regret, but they all have to face the monsters lurking in their shadows eventually, and how is he supposed to face any of them if he's gone...?

Tifa takes in another breath, or tries to, but her own have grown haggard and tired, and she folds again under the weight of the tension.

... Is she being too hard on him?]

...I'm sorry...

[flamekthunder]

[Her reaction is understandable. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of room for understanding right now. Even as he tries to keep the fraying threads from loosening further, all hope is lost when he hears her response. He's not sure what he was expecting... But it sounded so off base, so completely out of touch—]

You think I don't know that!?

[He stands up then glaring at her, the ice crashing as it rises behind him, tearing into the walls.]

But what else was I supposed to think, supposed to feel!? My emotions were out of control, I couldn't tell if anyone was dead or alive, I was about to change again! I was the reason for everything! If I killed myself then, it would be over for everyone! Hell I wish Beatrix hadn't held back and killed me so that it would have just ended there and no one else would have been hurt!

[Of course he knows it wouldn't be without its own negative repercussions. How badly it would have impacted them all, especially Tifa. But if someone had to die so that others would be able to survive, it only made sense that it would be him, the one who caused it all. So was death his answer as part of a sacrificial strategy? Or was that just an excuse because he also wanted it all to end, to make that hellish nightmare he was trapped in stop? Was it for the others? For himself? Both? There's no clear answer...especially when he hadn't been thinking clearly at the time.

So he knows she'll hate hearing it, he knows she's going to try and stop him now—but he's not finished. She wanted to know what he was feeling, what he was going through. He's going to tell her now.

All of it.]

You say you want me to try, you want me to move forward—the hell you think I've been doing all this time!?

[As he begins the recount in a chilling, harsh voice, a spike of ice breaks through from the ceiling. And although Eria growls, hackles raised as she backs up towards Tifa as if to protect her—she doesn't do anything else. She's keeping an eye on the situation, but not yet.

Not just yet.]

Halloween, I tried to hunt you down. The corgis, I lost my memories and attacked you. The gumdrop, and we fell into the lake where you almost died. Bleeding heart, I was possessed and obsessed over you. Romeo and Juliet, I was cursed to a lindwurm and killed you. This world took me away and left you alone. Trapped in that cage that drained my love for you, making me think it was impossible. The nightmare illusion of you dead on the moonscape.

[Eight spikes. Eight spikes encircling him as if ready to entrap him—or worse.]

Now I turned into a noctaere, and it took eight of you to change me back.

[Seven more appear around him, this time from the ground, each one representing those he injured and maimed—six he wanted to kill in that moment.]

Just "hard"? [A harsh laugh.] I don't want to give in, either, and I'd rather beat this than die. But even I have limits, Tifa.

So don't give me that speech as if this is just the first time. Not until you've had your complete will stripped from you and forced to see everything you love die over and over and over again. Until you feel that you are one step away from losing your mind and can only fear yourself, fear that you will one day wake up and find blood on your hands without even knowing why it happened and only remembering after the fact.

Or until you find yourself trapped watching it all without being able to do anything about it. Your mind completely torn one way and another—and it happens again and again no matter what you do.

So yes, Tifa. If I lost my mind again and it would prevent someone else from dying, I'd rather be the one to lose my life.

[starshower]

[Tifa's face is stoic the whole time she listens, but she's lost all colour in her face, like white porcelain washed out in moonlight, but that delicateness cracks and cracks with each time he lists, and each spike of ice that erupts from the floor until it finally shatters, and her tears fall, unrestrained and unchallenged.

There's a burst of hot air that rises in the room, as if to counter it. With each one, a fiery breath blasts through their home that's so hot that Tifa is forced to brace herself against it as it burns her skin and eats away at the ice that he's spreading. She tries to hold onto a purring, terrified Clover, but she wriggles free from her arms and bounds through the growling wolf's legs and away into hiding out of sight when Eustace's voice continues to rise.

She's terrified too, shellshocked at his words and the outburst. He's scaring her... more than he ever did under the influence of the nightmares. Scaring her more than the glowing eyes of the lindwurms, or their teeth that sink into her skin and their claws scraping over her chest. More than the screams and shouts of their friends as they tried to pull him free. More than waking up in a tomb of ice that he had created for her...

Scaring her because she knows that he's at his limit, and that this is what it's all come to. That this was his answer.

She wishes she could say that she understands, tell him that she's seen countless people suffer by her own hand, and yet, she's forced to move forward, but she's so stunned into silence that nothing she wants to say ever makes it to her mouth or past being a mere thought in her head. Would it even do anything? She doesn't think so. Not anymore, and she's only made it worse...

Tifa can feel her own anger and frustration rising, like a cauldron boiling over the heat that she creates and threatens to spill over. She feels the thread of her patience unraveling itself, but it's her cowardice that forces her to swallow it all down. It forces her to stare through this stifling heat at him with as steady a look as she can muster. To pull herself together for both of them...

But just as Eustace has his limits, Tifa has her own, and that patience finally snaps the moment he gives that harsh laugh and accuses her of not understanding. Of not knowing what it feels like. She thinks back to Biggs, Jessie, and Wedge in that moment. And then her mother, father, and all her friends in Nibelheim. All those people that she couldn't help or save. They are distant, fleeting memories before she's brought back to the present, brought back to the one man that she can help.

That she hopes she can help... Though even she can feel that light of hope dwindling as the room grows hotter and hotter.]

Stop thinking that running from anything is the answer!

[The words spill out of her before she can stop them, louder and sharper than they had been in her head.]

I get it. You're scared of this happening again... that you might not be able to fight it. That something might happen that can't be undone. Is that it?

[Because she understands that... She does... better than anyone. She lived in that fear every day in Midgar. Every Avalanche meeting. Every tick of those bombs that they left... She feared that one day, something would happen that could never, ever be reversed. And then... it had.]

But you need to stop. You need to accept what's happening right now. [She gestures around the room, and then to herself.] Yeah, it's going to be hard, but unless you plan to live like this until that day comes...

[Tifa shakes her head, the next words she'd wanted to say too harsh, she thinks.

So, the words fall away from her, and her silence hangs in the room again. Every word that she doesn't say is tangible, concrete, felt in the envelope of heat and smoke that makes her sweat and gasp for air.

But then she's moving towards him, step by step. Eria moves out of the way, and her feet don't make a sound as she walks over the pools of melted ice on the floor. She only stops when she's directly in front of him, and her eyes, dark and crimson, are raging with the fires that threaten to burn through the walls and tear this whole place down. Tifa stares at him, as if challenging him to push her away, before her head falls to his chest...]

You don't like fighting alone, do you?

[And then her arms reach up to wrap around him. Her hands are trembling—her whole body is, and he'll be able to feel that fear that this has struck in her, but she holds him anyway, in spite of that.]

... That's why you're still here.

[In that moment, Tifa remembers all those times he's listed from their past. Halloween, the tree, the lake, the Bleeding Heart, turning into a lindwurm, and when he'd left... And then this...

When she tries to speak, her voice splits with a small sob, and although her tears are still falling and staining her cheeks, she doesn't let herself completely break. Not yet.

It's softer now. Quieter.]

We can't lose to those memories...

[All those things in the past... the moment that Eustace and Tifa let them win, it's over...]