Surprise~! I'm not dead. Yeah. Anyways.

Disclaimer: I don't own, blah blah blah...

This chapter would not be readable if it wasn't for my amazing friend/proof-reader, Kiki-chan, who's username you'll see below.

Thoughts

Chapter 18: We Haven't Given Up, Part II (Awakened)

The spectacle before me made my heart stop. It literally just stopped working, before yet again thundering into a overdrive.

The black door was misleading. It was not a small room we stepped into, but one so large it was scary; not because of its size, but because it was packed.

A sea of people, all crammed together to fit into the room. No one paid us any mind, though. Every single body that was in the storage room from hell was silent; they were standing with perfect posture and blank expressions. Brainwashed warriors-in-the-making just waiting for their free will to be taken, only to be replaced by Zanaku's motives.

Cloud and Denzel were waiting for that fate. My vision blurred with red.

There was a ledge to the front of the room, and on the ledge stood a man. A man with the gait of madness.

Serge. Of course.

Luckily, he was facing away from us, but he could turn around at any moment, and we'd be screwed.

I bit my lip to prevent myself from actually growling, and after I was sure I wouldn't, I whispered to everyone, "Okay, come on. Meet back up under the ledge where he can't see us."

Getting a collective 'let's go' from the group, we dissolved into the crowd, lowering our heads and slipping through the people easily. Surprisingly, they didn't take note of us, just let themselves be jostled every now and then. They didn't even seem aware that we were there.

But all of them had the creepy slitted cat eyes. I could do nothing but shiver at the void that resided in them.

As I quickly made my way across the vast room, I couldn't help but look for the spiky-haired hero and my trooper, but I never found them. I did see other people I recognized, though. The girl from the flower shop, the old man who comes in to the bar every Thursday... Disgusted, I refused to believe my eyes when they locked onto a little girl, sucking a pacifier, standing on wobbly legs that weren't used to being stood on yet.

I would murder him. I didn't care what happened afterwards, but I would fucking murder him.

Without me realizing it, I was leaning against the pillar under the ledge, totally still, my knuckles white from gripping the support beam.

"Teefs? You alright in there?" a whisper sounded from my right.

Yuffie put a hand on my shoulder. Smiling at her, I shrugged it off. I jerked my head upwards, thumped my closed fist against the beam, and they got the message.

There were two pillars directly opposite of each other, with grooves every few inches, which made it a simple enough thing to climb. I waited until everyone else was halfway up before I adjusted my gloves and started scaling the roughly twenty-five feet pillar.

Barrett made it to the top first, shortly followed by Vincent, who was climbing adjacent to him. Silently, he peeked over the top of the railing, and gave us a 'wait' motion with his hands. We all tensed, frozen. My right foot was dangling between footholds, so all of my weight was currently on an half-inch ledge. I gritted my teeth, struggling to maintain my position. I tried putting more weight on my hands, but it only served to make it worse.

If Vincent didn't hurry up, I would either fall or slip down, which would make enough noise to alert Serge to our infiltration.

Just when I was getting ready to try to make the quietest fall I could manage, Vincent waved his arm forward, our signal for 'go beat shit outta people!'. We all surged upward, and I let out a quiet sigh of relief.

I heard an outraged cry and a gut-wrenching 'whump!' noise that usually accompanied a thud to the ground by the unconscious body that was stupid enough to get in the way of Barrett's deadly punches. I heard no gun-shots or power-up noises; good, that meant they're playing it safe. We didn't know if anyone was close enough that would be able to hear such a noise.

By the time I made it to the top, Serge was out cold, with a small trickle of blood leaking from the back of his head. Sighing, I bent down to check to see if he still had a pulse, courtesy of my guilty conscience. He still did. I reached down to untie the rope from my belt-loop, getting ready to rope him up so if he woke up before we made it back here, he couldn't escape or notify someone that we were in the building.

Aeris knelt down to help me. We were done within the minute. Straightening, I surveyed the area, before realizing that there was no other hallway to go down.
There was a table that went around three sides of the ledge. A few computers sat on it, some papers, but not much else. I walked over to the closed edge and nudged the mouse. The screen turned on, and a bird's eye view of the room below us popped up, along with various other places.

"Damn, it's a security camera," I said. I heard a few curses behind me. "Could anyone have seen anything?"

"Not likely," Vincent answered, tapping away at another computer. "Zanaku would have called his guards the moment he'd seen us."

"But what if I wanted to play? I've not had such good toys in a long time. The fun would have been ruined if I sent my little pawns out to stop you."

Our breathing stopped.

I couldn't help the liquid fire my eyes turned to. "Zanaku."

He smiled at me in a way that I almost mistook for tenderness, and if it wasn't for the gleam of ice in his eyes, I would've fell for it. "My sweet Tifa. It's a pleasure to see you again. I hope you aren't too terribly battered? How are you faring?"

Crossing my arms, I inspected my nails, ignoring the twinges of pain that he brought to the forefront of my brain. "I'm just perfect. How about you? Mess up some lives lately?"
"Oh, my dear Tifa, you know that's not my goal."

My eyes met his mocking ones. "Then what is?"

"It's quite simple, actually. I'm going to rule the world," he told me earnestly.

It was quiet. Zanaku took a step towards me, and when he did, Vincent continued his work on the computer.

"I thought you were going to kill me? Isn't that what you wanted?"

"At first. But I realized how small-minded that was. Why put my time and energy into destroying you when I could have my own army do it for me?"

Without any more prompting on my part, he launched into a speech about how he would conquer Edge first, and then move on to all of the surrounding cities, before then slowly picking away the Wutainian royalty line. I grabbed onto Yuffie's arm before she could charge him with her Conformer at the ready.

Zanaku 'tsked' at us, shaking his head, his face morphing into an expression of disappointment. "Really, now. Shouldn't you lot be better tempered in the face of your new god?"

"God?" Yuffie spluttered out, straining against my hold, "You're no god! You're just an arrogant jackass who's ego is so bloated he can't see the tips of his shoes!"

Smack.

My mouth dropped. Yuffie—with a quickly forming red-cheek—stared, stunned, at Zanaku, who walked five feet and slapped her so hard she dropped her shuriken to the ground in less time than any of us could see him move.

To her credit, Yuffie stood tall, took her hand off her cheek, and spat out, "You're gonna hafta hit harder than that to bruise me, bastard."

That's when she flew into action.

She wretched her arm out from my deathly tight grip, picked up her weapon, and did a slicing movement.

If Zanaku was an ordinary person, he would have been dead.

But of course, this wouldn't be so easy.

He dodged her blow, and sent her tumbling to the ground with a swift kick to her rear. She collapsed, her face flushed, and started screaming at him in Wutai. Vincent cringed over in the corner. I didn't want to know what she was saying.

With him staring at her like she was insane—which wasn't entirely a false statement—I let my fist make friends with his face before introducing my other one to his stomach, then danced my way out of his reach.

Amazingly, Zanaku wouldn't fall. If he had mako eyes, I wouldn't be surprised if he was SOLDER.

I stood back, admiring how well a fight everyone put up. As long as Vincent finished whatever it is that he was doing—at least I assumed he was doing something helpful—we could figure out how to reverse whatever Zanaku had done, and everyone could be back to normal within the hour.

We could do this. I knew we could.

That's when his stupid little cronies showed up.

Someone hit me from behind with what felt like a bat, and when I turned, I saw that it was one. Cursing, I hit him in man's weak spot and took his weapon away from him, swinging it around in a half-arc, hitting some people, knocking others completely over.
"Watch out!" someone yelled.
Not knowing who he was yelling to, I ducked all the same. I heard something land with a crash in front of me.

It was a freaking table. Where the hell did that come from?

Grunting, a heavily muscled dude that was standing behind me had this sick sort of look on his face, and I immediately knew what was on his mind. Before he got any ideas, I jabbed and kicked him into oblivion, but not before he dealt a blow to my shoulder, making it pop out of place.

Damn, that kind of hurt.

Someone slammed into me—I thought I saw a flash of dark skin—and I was propelled towards the railing surrounding the platform we were standing on. I couldn't help a glance down, staring at the people who were standing totally still, barely breathing. After all the noise we no doubt were making, they hadn't moved a hairsbreadth in any which way.

Turning around, I took inventory of everyone. They seemed to be doing okay, but this pointless fighting was getting us nowhere. Something had to be done.

I stalked towards a familiar bald-headed man. He didn't even see me coming. I could only let a small smirk slip onto my face before bestowing him with attacks.

Unfortunately, he got loose and sent a swift kick into my knees, making them crumple underneath me. He grabbed a fistful of my hair, yanked my head back, which left my neck bared to him. Okay, so not a good idea anymore.
"My sweet Tifa," he cooed, "Did you think you could play the hero when you were always destined to play the pawn?"

"Who says I'm a pawn? You don't know anything about me, or my plans. I will save them," I whispered through pained tears.
He gave me a pitying face. "Haven't you come to your own conclusions yet? When I say something will happen, it will be done, no matter the sacrifices."

I tugged against his hold. He only pulled back farther and grabbed a hold on my hurt shoulder with his other hand. I bit back a cry. "So you're willing to destroy innocent lives because of a selfish motive?"

"Dearie, I'm surprised at your naivety. Not a single person in this world we live in is innocent."

Obviously, he wasn't listening to me. You couldn't reason with a villain, which was what I was trying to do.

I wretched my arm out of his hold, slammed one fist into his neck and the other into his nose, and sprung up, no more mercy left. He was using civilians—people I knew, my friends—for his own personal gain. I held no sympathy for what I did to him.

I kicked him repeatedly in his head, until I was sure he was out cold. Blood streamed from his nose and a place in the back of his head.

I felt a hand place itself on my uninjured shoulder. It was pale-white. "It's done," Vincent said in that low voice of his.

Nodding, I wiped my bloody hands on my pants. "What did you do?"

He tried to explain it. "It was complicated," he said, eyebrows creased. "Most of it I didn't fully understand myself. Basically, he managed to create a... program that responded to the left-over cells of geostigma."

I didn't expect that. "That doesn't sound possible," I mumbled apprehensively, glancing at any cronies still standing. They were ignoring us.

"That's what I thought, too. But... it was genius." His eyes attained this glistening look of something akin to respect. "It was foolproof. The virus took away the free will of people who had geostigma. He brought them here, to..." he paused.

Impatient, I motioned for him to continue. "What, Vince?"

"He brought them here to eliminate pain receptors and deaden parts of the frontal lobe." Dimly, I recalled something about decision making and emotions residing there. My blank stare provoked him into continuing, albeit reluctantly. "Tifa, he was going to turn them into killing machines."

I knew the people below us were going to be soldiers, that was no shock. But to take away any remorse a normal warrior would feel, to take away the indications that a person had to show their physical limits before they went beyond that point of no return...?

Impossible.

But it wasn't.

"What do we do now, Vince?" Yuffie asked, who had jogged over to us, panting.

For the first time, I noticed that the whole group surrounded us, each either battered or bruised, but still wholly intact. Aeris held her wrist to her chest, grimacing.

"Somehow, we need to reverse the effects before they're permanent."

Frowning, I asked, "How do we do that?"

Quietly, he said, "We need to override the mainframe, but..."

Are they going to stay like this... forever?

Hearing coughing from somewhere behind me, I turned just before a lethargic—but still strong—hand contacted my lip, busting it. He knelt before me, shuddering, trying to make it to his feet. Shock ran through my system. How was he conscious?

As if I asked the question out loud, he gave a weak cackle. "My dear, you think I put all of my time into creating the perfect plan? That I had no side projects?" Zanaku raised his completely black eyes toward me, and it made my stomach churn. That wasn't normal. What the hell did he do to himself?

"What the fuck?" Cid yelled.

Slowly, the black color seeped from his eyes and traversed around his face, highlighting veins in his forehead and cheeks. Disturbed, I watched as his nose repaired itself before my eyes.

"Soon," he said with more confidence, "I shall be once again my godly self, and you all will die."

Without even thinking about it, I grabbed Cerberus from Vincent, grabbed onto Zanaku's neck, and placed the cold steel next to the one organ he couldn't repair.

"Wanna bet?"

He kept his eerie gaze level with mine, showing no signs of distress, but I felt his pulse quicken beneath my fingertips. "Are you positive a gun to the head will kill me? You haven't a clue, sweet Tifa, as to how well I heal."

"How do I know you're not just bluffing?" Despite my resolve, my voice wavered just slightly.

His eyes crinkled with a twisted smile. "You don't. But," he continued, "you need me. You can't kill me, if you want to ever see your friends do more than drool."

I shook him hard. "How do we reverse it? Tell me!"

An insane laugh burst from his lips, making my muscles tense. "Do you honestly think I'd give you the single bit of information that could actually help you? Tifa, tell me you're not that stupid."
I raised the gun to smash it into his head—saying that I'm unintelligent!—but a hand grabbed onto my wrist. "Tifa," Zack mumbled, "Don't."

Sighing and shaking loose of his hold, I let the gun rest back against the side of his head. This was getting us nowhere. Again, I felt stuck, and I had to pull myself out of the mess without anyone's help, because the one person who could actually help me was currently getting brain-washed off his ass.

Before I could try to think up anything relatively helpful, I heard a smash-crash that usually accompanied something really, really bad.

I watched with baited breath as Barrett peered over the ledge with a curious eye. "Shit," he mumbled, "That can't be good."

"What?" I said, impatient.

Zanaku felt the need to answer. "It must be kicking in, then."

Shaking him even more violently than before, I asked shrilly, "What is?"

His black eyes stared down at the ground below us, and somehow, they still seemed to radiate smugness. "My creations," was all he said.

I felt a growing sick feeling in my stomach clench around whatever food was still there. I pushed Zanaku to the ground—although I knew that wouldn't do shit—and scurried over to the edge, afraid of what I'd see.

I was right to be scared.

Cloud

After what felt like centuries—he had no gauge as to how much time had passed—there was something other than pain. Shiva, that pain was driving him to the brink of his shredded sanity, but finally, finally something changed.

A single, disjointed thought swept through his mind, mending together the broken bits and numbing the painful edges.

...k...ill...

The word confused him: wasn't that... a bad word...? Did it mean something bad? He couldn't, for the life of him, remember much of anything. But wasn't that something bad?

Kill.

Again, the word came to him, though this time, a sweet hint of something like pleasure coursed through his body. His broken brain got the message.

If he wanted the pain to stop, if he wanted the pure, refreshingly electric pleasure back, he'd have to kill.

Who?

Tifa Lockhart.

A slow, twisted smile forced the edges of his mouth up, and he felt the muscles in his arms ache with the desire to rip apart the fleshy bits of a certain raven-haired beauty.

With a barely contained yelp of glee, the man who used to be Cloud Strife began stalking towards the dainty scent of his prey.

Tifa

Horrified at what lay before my eyes, I stumbled back a step, my brain not functioning well enough to know that I should be formulating an escape route, and a way to make that bastard-of-a-man speak his secrets.

The now awakened civilians-turned-soldiers beneath us were roaring like starving animals. I felt the ledge we all were standing on shake lightly, due to the hundreds of bodies currently throwing themselves at the support-beams.

"Dammit! What da hell do they think they're doin'!" Barrett yelled out, scrambling back from the railing.

My back hit the wall, or what I thought was a wall, which turned out to be a door that I somehow managed to miss earlier. I swung around and yanked on the handle every-which way, but it didn't budge an inch.

"Shit," I cursed beneath my breath. What kind of crappy door didn't open when it needed to?

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Zanaku stand up, dust himself off, and started towards me, a glint of insane hate embedded in his eyes.
"Heads up! Here they come!"

Shocked to see an update?

Guess what: so am I!

Was it worth the wait? Probably not. And I might've not even updated had it not been for the insistence of a fellow writer who never posts things here, Sin and Punishment. (See, Kiki-chan) And the extra nudges from reviewers didn't hurt, either. So thanks, you guys.

I guess... my confidence just has plummeted a bit. Okay, more than a bit. Is it normal to go through little episodes like this? I dunno. But I've not written much of anything lately because of it... but I guess I'm kinda out of the slump, just a smidgen?

The next thing I post might not be the next chapter/maybe final chapter to Thoughts, but perhaps a re-post of Love at First Drink, 'cause I read it the other day, realized how much it sucked, and started editing it. So yeah.

Review for confidence boost?

Yours truly,

Thoughts.