A/N: I couldn't resist. As much as I liked the first part from an artistic perspective, the hopeless romantic in me demanded a...response, if you will. In any case, thank you so very much for the reviews. I hope you all enjoy this second part as well! Thanks!

Cloud isn't sure if what he sees is real.

Too much of what he's been seeing recently are terrifying hallucinations and twisted memories and they confuse him by screwing with the flow of time until todaytomorrowyesterday are an indistinguishable blur.

He is so used to of the pervasive evil in his mind that it startles him to see something good.

And seeing Tifa has always been good.

Well, maybe only mostly good because sometimes he sees her and feels this sharp ache in his chest that is part guilt and part something else he hadn't been able to name until he finally, finally remembers that he is nothing but a fake.

It's failure.

He's always been a failure and seeing Tifa triggers memories he's tried so hard to suppress because she is the one he's been trying to impress all along, and no one can deny that he has messed up miserably in that regard.

Even still, guilt and failure cannot stop the warmth of knowing she's here (really, really here and holding him and caring for him) from spreading deliciously through his body. He cannot command his limbs to move, but he doesn't want to be anywhere else anyway. He does wish though that he could touch her and reassure her like she always does for him.

He watches like a spectator, mind annoyingly detached from his body, as Tifa tries to spoon some soup into his mouth. Shame blazes through him when his mouth doesn't cooperate and the soup spills over his lips. He hates his weakness and he hates being so vulnerable. The thought of being vulnerable in front of her isn't so bad but he wants to be her protector, not her patient…

His thoughts stall momentarily when he suddenly feels her gentle fingers trace the ugliness of the scar on his chest. He wants to shove her hands away because her kind, comforting hands should not be stroking the same place that such a malignant evil has touched.

He cannot stop her, nor can he stop the flush of warmth—both from embarrassment and something else that brings to mind thoughts of lips and mouths and frantic touches and earthy moans—from threading through his veins.

Somehow, her touch is a benediction. The evil feels like it's been purged under her fingertips and he is branded. He tests the idea of not being marked by iniquity for once, and he finds that he likes it.

Suddenly, he wants her touch all over him.

Part of it (a lot of it) is sexual, but it is equal parts a desire to be absolved. He knows with a bone deep certainty that she can be his peace.

Then in the next moment Tifa is is tears and Cloud is straining, straining, straining so damn hard against the binds his mind has placed on his body. He wants to hold her, to comfort her but he is trapped and betrayed by himself.

Somewhere in his mind he hears the thought thirty seconds and he somehow understands that Tifa needs the time to grieve, to give her emotions a place to vent before she can rebuild her walls. He wishes she would rebuild her walls with him inside. He wishes there was another way for her to regain her strength because this…

This breaks his heart in a way he's not sure he can recover from.

Then just as abruptly, the fountain of tears cease and though Tifa doesn't have full control over the full-body hiccups yet, her breathing has calmed and she is still. She doesn't move her head from its position against his neck and he's glad.

He doesn't want her to move. He likes the idea of being her rock.

He doesn't know if it that was really only thirty seconds; all he knows is that every drop of crystalline liquid that fell from her eyes felt like an eternity.

He wants to hold her for an eternity.

So he swears.

He swears to himself that the next time Tifa breaks, he will be there to catch her.

He hears a distant ticking and prays that this time, he won't be too late.