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It starts when they enter the submarine. At first, it’s a sense of unease, a queasiness in his gut. The steady thrum of the idling engine brings bile to his mouth, but he swallows it down. The discomfort is familiar, though he hasn’t felt it this intensely since he was sixteen. Cloud ignores it, they have a mission to complete, Shinra grunts to fight, a submarine to steal.
A few swings of his sword, and the next round of guards is dispatched. He turns to see Tifa cracking her knuckles and Barret reloading, having efficiently dealt with their own adversaries. Both look back at him with a nod. It feels good to have the old team back together.
They continue towards the control room. But the further they go, the smaller the corridor feels. The walls become fluid, they curve and constrict, like a tin can crumpling in a vacuum. The green tinged lighting that bounces around the tight space reminds him of floating in mako. He sees it swirling in front of him, recalls palming the reinforced glass of the specimen tank, his home of four years, wanting to punch it until it cracked, knowing he barely had the energy to move.
He staggers, but Barret is there to catch his arm and pull him upright.
“Woah. Watch yo’self!”
“Everything ok, Cloud?” Tifa enquires, appearing on his other side.
Cloud gives his head a shake and takes a deep breath, willing his vision to clear. He wants to tell her he’s fine, like he usually does, but he said he was going to stop pretending. He settles for, “I’ll be ok, once we get off this thing.”
Three more guards are waiting for them when they enter the control room.
"Waaah, I don't wanna die!" one of them yells.
His superior blows his whistle, "Come on, you can't go into battle with that attitude."
"We never even got to do our victory pose," the other guard laments, swinging his gun above his head in a lacklustre demonstration. Cloud recognises the pose that he showed the guards at the Junon parade. They had been friendly enough, he remembers, and it was quite obvious they were inexperienced fighters.
"Uh... We could just take them hostage?" he suggests.
"Yes!" the superior officer exclaims, falling to his knees and surprising his comrades. "Please take us hostage!"
"Hey, that ain't the deal!" Barret protests, all worked up for another fight. "They're Shinra!"
"They’re just doing their job," Cloud counters, "Same as I would have when I worked for Shinra."
Barret double takes, but lowers his gun. "You've changed man," he huffs.
But Tifa gives him a smile of approval.
"If you won't stand in our way, then we won't fight," she nods to the guards.
The three of them immediately scamper out of the room. "Thank you kind lady!" the last one shouts as he leaves.
"See, it never hurts to be nice," she teases Barret. "Cloud knows."
Cloud startles, but smiles when he remembers her lectures back in Sector 7.
Barret rolls his shoulders. "A'ight girl, you have it your way. Now, how the hell are we gonna drive this thing?"
Cloud’s eyes sweep over the controls, feeling his nausea return full force. There are so many dials, and scopes, and gadgets that he doesn’t know where to start. Soon, he finds himself unable to focus on anything but the pressure in his ears, the constant vibrations, and the beeping of monitors, like the ones that monitored him in the mako tank. He had been attached to them with tubes rammed down his throat and needles stabbed into his veins. Machines kept his vital systems functioning, forcing oxygen and nutrition into him, when all he wanted was to die and be done with it.
A plea tears itself from his throat. “Ah, I can’t take it anymore. The lack of space, the shaking, the roar of the engine. I’m… sorry.”
He falls to his knees, shaking and struggling for air, consumed by memories of the never-ending hell that was the tank. He remembers flitting in and out of consciousness, the sickening green haze that was constant in both. Sweat beads on his brow as he recalls the panic of waking, the sudden awareness of tubes invading his insides and coiling around him like eels. Sometimes he would wake to see Hojo with his maniacal grin, staring at him through the glass, as though he were some animal at the zoo. He recalls the helplessness of finding himself barely able to move, barely able to form a coherent thought before he would be pulled back into green tinged nightmares of his village burning, his mother’s screams, and Tifa’s blood pooling around her.
“Get it together, man. We can’t do this without you!” Barret implores him, but he sounds muffled and far away.
Cloud stares at his hands braced on the floor, trying to slow his racing heart rate. Then Tifa comes into his unfocused vision. She kneels in front of him, hands resting on his shoulders, grounding him.
“You’re ok, Cloud. Just breathe. With me. Deep breath in… and out…” she guides him. Cloud tries to follow, holding her gaze, drinking in the rich wine colour of her eyes. As always, she is his anchor when the storm rages. When the waves of emotion threaten to overwhelm him and he no longer knows which way is up, it's Tifa that keeps him tethered to reality, it's Tifa that offers him stability. With her at his side, he knows he won’t lose himself.
“That’s it,” she soothes. “Come on, Cloud. We need you. Someone has to pilot this thing.” She cocks her head to the side, offering him a challenge, a distraction.
“You’re right,” he murmurs, “I do feel a little better driving.”
With a shaky breath, he lets her help him to his feet. He offers her a smile and nods his conviction. “Leave it to me.”
“That’s what I’m talkin’ bout!” Barret encourages from behind him, placing a large calloused hand on his shoulder and squeezing.
Tifa's expression looks something like pride when she offers him the manual. “You can do it Cloud.”
His heart feels lighter, swelling with the love and support of his friends, as he moves to sit in the pilot's chair.