I just saw her, I just saw Aeris.

She reached out her hand, offering it to me, and I reached back, shocked to see her and thrilled at the same time. There was so much I wanted to tell her. She tickled my fingers with hers, and smiled. "You're not ready for the Promised Land. Not yet."

And suddenly I was back in my body, earth crumbling around me, Tifa reaching out to me and then falling. Without even thinking I caught her and grabbed a convenient ledge. It's all in the back of my mind, because all I can comprehend right now is that I've seen Aeris.

I think I'm beginning to understand how it works, how you get to the Promised Land. I want to go there and talk to her. Tell her I'm sorry; I'm so, so sorry that I killed her. It's my fault she's gone. I was so weak that I let Sephiroth manipulate me, let the Jenova cells in my body betray me. Then, to make it even worse, I just stood there as Sephiroth murdered her. He didn't even care, he just smirked, like it was some kind of game, like it was funny that he'd caused us, caused me, so much pain.

I want to ask her if she could ever find it in herself to forgive me for such a sin. She's always forgiven me for everything else; but this one is the biggest yet, the one irrevocable wrong and so disgustingly personal, I don't think even someone like Aeris could forgive me.

It's all on my shoulders, no one else's. It makes me feel so lonely. I'm all alone in this guilt. It's not something I can share with the others. Even Tifa, though she tries her hardest to shoulder the burden with me.

The one person who's stood by me the most is Tifa; she's done nothing but support in me. Even when Sephiroth was trying to convince me that I was his failed clone, she persisted in telling me that I was myself, even when she doubted. She's always looking at me, worried about what I'm thinking or how I'm doing. I've never seen anyone who was so convinced that sleep was the ticket to health. Honestly, I think I would have missed the final battle if I listened to her. She's always putting food in front of me, or a cloak, or a joke, or a friendly ear. She hovers constantly, never leaving my line of sight.

Other people might be bothered by this, feel smothered or less independent. I find it kind of... nice. To know that someone is going to be there for me even after everything, at the end of every day, it feels good. She's home for me. Not Midgar, certainly not Nibelheim; wherever Tifa is, it's my home. The night I sent everyone away, to make sure of what they were fighting for, she was the only one who stayed. Secretly, I was really glad she did, I don't think I would have stayed sane if I was alone. But her words that night, they struck a cord with me; somewhere deep inside that I'm too afraid to look at yet.

You know, I still trying to impress her. I try to drink hard liquor - a laughable attempt, she sees right through me every time. I try to say something funny; try to be cool; try to be everything I'm not. The funny part is that she always scolds me when I do that, she doesn't want to see me impressing her, she wants to see me, just me, no fringes, no kick-ass swords, no attitude, just me. Insecure, unstable, socially inept and socially dependant, me.

Aeris was the same way. She didn't have to scold me, though, she just dove right through it and asked me some personal question, or comment that I was being cute, something that would completely startle and fluster me, leaving me blushing and stuttering and unsure how it had all happened. God, how I hated that. I don't like being caught off guard like that, and she did it repeatedly, but somehow it always made me smile.

There's a perfection to Aeris. She's deep, mature, together, and always so happy. She had no temper to speak of, always did the right thing (including sacrificing herself for humanity... that time I killed her...), and could always see the big picture and all the little details. She was friendly, nice, polite; just perfect. It scared me at first. Perfect isn't normal, that I couldn't find a flaw in her made me wonder what was wrong with me? But now, as we watch Holy and the Lifestream save Planet from Meteor, I think I saw her as perfect because she was someone who transcended stupid little things like flaws. The Ancients, the Cetra, were so far above us, spiritually, that petty things like anger or hatred was beneath them. I don't think I'll ever be like that. I'm too fucked up. But to know someone like Aeris can exist... to know that people can attain that perfection, it gives me faith in the human race.

... And I killed her.

Damn it. I hate myself so much, I hate my weakness! I was just like this when I was a kid. Tifa would want me to join her group, or come to her room, or grant me any kind of attention, and I was so scared, so damn shy, I would find excuses to not go, to hide with her mother downstairs. I wanted to be near Tifa, she was such a wonderful girl, so nice to everybody, so polite; but at the same time I was petrified that I would do something to ruin it, that I would make her sad or angry. I was so scared of her rejection because I already rejected myself. The other kids in town hated me. I was the only one with blonde hair and blue eyes, so I must have been some kind of freak. It was true; I was a freak because I was too much of a baby to talk to a girl as nice as Tifa. We had nothing in common anyway, I rationalized, and besides, she always hung out with those stupid jerks, Johnny and the others. They were the ones to beat me the most because the freak dared to try to be close to Tifa. I hated them so much, I started to think I was above them, that I was better than everyone and they were either too stupid to know it or too scared to admit it.

That was when Tifa's mother died, and suddenly we did have something in common: loss. That was the first time I entered her room, I felt I had the right to. I wonder what Aeris would say to all this. She would probably laugh in those bell tones of hers and tell me I always had the right.

I was too shy to talk to her, too nervous to stop her, and too weak to save her. I tried so hard to pull her back up and onto the bridge, but I was so damn scrawny, there was no leverage, not even brute strength to do it. Tifa tried to help, to swing her legs up. She stared into my eyes so intensely at that moment, I saw the ruby under the brown, and for the first time I felt like she saw me. That was when we fell, and that was when she saved me.

...Aeris and Tifa are always saving me, always looking out for me. I want to be the one to look out for them, to save them, and look what happens. Tifa is still saving me, god knows why, and Aeris is dead. I killed her.

Tifa's father was more than happy to blame me, and I was more than happy to let him, because it was true. Tifa was hurt because I wasn't strong enough to save her. I would never be strong enough. That's when I started thinking about Sephiroth, the hero general of the papers, about Shin-Ra, about SOLDIER.

My weakness caused me to try and fail to join SOLDIER, the burning of Nibelheim to the ground, the deaths of my mother and Tifa's father, the death of Zack, my one and only friend from those years, the birth of Sephiroth's plan to destroy the Planet, countless deaths in Midgar, the destruction of Mideel, and god only knows what else. It was all me, because I was weak. I am weak, still, even after all of this.

Aeris is dead because of me. I can't ask for her forgiveness. I don't deserve it.

I don't deserve Tifa's forgiveness either, not after everything I put her through.

"Cloud?" I look at the ruby eyes, so concerned over me.

"I think I just saw Aeris." She's whispering, not quite believing what she's saying.

Aeris... I can't ask for her forgiveness, but I can tell her that I'm sorry.

Until then, everything else has to wait.