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To the Skies	By : sailtheplains Category: Final Fantasy VII > Het - Male/Female Views: 865 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VII, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Oh yay. Final Fantasy characters belong to Square-Enix. Go them.
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I have decided to start another story. I'll still be editing my first one (as a writers/artists/actors work is never really finished, you're just forced to stop) but I've been bouncing this idea around in my head for the last couple days.

I have never seen any sort of story written about Cid Highwind's life. His family, where he lived and what he did. So I've decided to give it a try because Cid is my favorite character and since so little is really known about Cid--it leaves the door wide open to play around. I've got a basic plot thought up and I'm working out a few things. So, if nothing else, this will just be a lot of fun to write.
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Oh, I suppose I ought to mention this here. There isn't going to be any smut at first, because I start Cid as a nine-year-old. And just because this is adult fanfiction does not mean that every chapter has to have sex in it. It means that it is allowed but isn't a requirement. This is a story, not a one-shot (not that I have a problem with one-shots, m'just saying). I say this only because I received a nasty email today concerning why I was writing this story and why there no smut and I needed to put up a warning so this person would know not to read it. So there's your warning. No smut yet. Wait until Cid's a little older people. :)
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Here we go.
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Nine-year-old Cid Highwind stood on a grassy knoll overlooking the plains. It was completely flat for as far as the eye could see. No one lived on the land past the little knoll, so the grass was free to grow as long as it liked. And so it reached towards the sky with pointy little fingertips, waving back and forth in the breeze like a great, emerald sea.

Cid closed his eyes and opened his arms, letting the wind sweep over him. If he sunk himself into the darkness behind his eyelids, he could almost pretend he was flying. He ran about on the knoll, whooping in the fresh spring sky.

"Cid!!"

He immediately froze, crouching down on all fours on the backside of the knoll. He looked carefully over the tops of the grass.

His mother was outside the door. She was a tough woman, scary in her own right and formidable with a wooden spoon. Right now she had her hands on her hips, a bad sign.

"Cid!" she called again.

Scowling, he looked behind him at his bare feet, damp with dew. He curled his toes into the grass. Maybe if he lay down, she"d never find him. He could escape to the plains and run away.

His mother seemed to sigh, letting her shoulders relax. "Cid, I know you"re out here without your shoes! I"m not going to yell at you, I just need you in the house! Your father is going to be home soon!"

Cid stared at the grass, the thought of running away evaporated, he felt a little guilt in it's place--that he would leave his mother to deal with his father. He stood up. He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders, as if he were going to his death and started to run towards his house.

It was a neat little affair on the outskirts of a town called Swifton. He"d learned in school that their little town was on the western side of the globe (or, he just called it the "left" because it was easier to remember), a little ways north of a famous place called Cosmo Canyon. Cid had never been there but what"s so great about a Canyon anyway?

When Cid reached his mother, she looked down at his feet and frowned at him, but he could see a twinkle in her eye. "Go clean off your feet. Why don"t you ever put on your damn shoes?"

"There"s never nothin" out there. Just grass."

"There"s never anything out there and yes there is. You can"t wander off, you know. The monsters will eat you."

Cid"s face scrunched up in a scowl. "I"ve never seen a monster. I don"t think they"re real."

"Oh," said his mother, with an air of great surprise. "and I suppose since you haven"t seen it, that means it doesn"t exist?"

"Maybe," Cid informed her stubbornly, sitting on the floor in the kitchen with a dish towel, drying his feet off.

She laughed at him. It was a low, hearty laugh. She came into the kitchen, stepping over him to wipe down the counter. "C"mon, scoot back. No need to take up the whole damn floor."

"Sorry," he said back, smiling a little sheepishly. He put his back up against the cabinet door and finished with his feet. He started to hang the towel back up.

"Don"t hang that back up," his mother said, rolling her eyes and smiling. "Your feet are all over it."

"Nu-uh," he said. "They"re on the floor."

She stopped wiping the counter and looked at him. She smirked. "Smartass. Just for that, go wake your brother and sister up."

Cid scowled. "Fletcher"s gonna throw things at me."

"Throw things back."

"I don"t have anything to throw."

"Well, maybe if you"d worn your shoes, you could"ve thrown those."

Cid didn"t have an answer to that so he crossed his little arms and walked out of the kitchen to go upstairs. The stairwell was narrow and he latched onto the railing to climb the steep case. When he reached the top, he went left. He"d wake up Morgan first, that was easier.

Morgan was four and her birthday was tomorrow. It made a Cid a little resentful sometimes, her birthday being in the month right after his. He couldn"t help but feel sometimes that she"d stolen his thunder. But he didn"t really mind that much. He liked Morgan well enough. She didn"t talk a whole lot, so Cid could talk about whatever he wanted with her.

He opened the door to her room. It, like all their rooms, was sparse and neat. They didn"t have unnecessary toys or fancy bedcovers. His mother had made them quilts. Though she wasn"t good with needle and thread and she hated sewing anyway, they hadn"t turned out half-bad. The important thing was that they were warm, who cared about crooked squares?

He walked over to his little sister"s bed and pulled the covers back. "Morgan. Morggie-Morggie-Morgan."

She murmured in her sleep and rolled over.

"C"mon Morgan, wake up. Time to get up."

The little girl opened her eyes. She was a pretty thing, promising to be beautiful when she grew up. Her hair was black, like their father"s but hung in curls, like their mother"s. Her eyes were a strange minty green that she shared with their father and her skin was just a hint of tawny gold. She yawned. "Hi, Cid."

"Hi," he said back. He couldn"t help but smile.

"You smell like grass," she informed him.

"It"s nice outside today."

She smiled a toothy grin at him and sat up, leaning over her knees. "Y"didn"t wear your shoes, did you?"

"I dried "em off already."

"Is Mom mad?"

"No." And that made Cid consider why she wasn"t. Usually, she would have been. "She said though, Dad is going to be home soon"he must have worked late last night."

Morgan"s little face went solemn. She stood up and followed Cid out of the room.

"I gotta go get Fletcher up."

Morgan gave him a pitying nod and went on down the stairs. Cid continued straight down the hallway, until he came to the door at the very end. He opened it quietly, peeking in.

Fletcher lay strewn on his bed, nestled in old quilts. He was thirteen and thus, the Oldest, which meant he was In-Charge or something that Cid couldn"t quite figure out. Sometimes, his brother was the very best person Cid knew and other times, he hated his guts. When he was sent to wake him was one of those times.

Cid swallowed hard, squared his shoulders again and walked into the room. "Fletcher!" he called loudly. "Fletcher, wake up."

Fletcher snatched a clock off his bedside table and threw it. Cid, who had expected this, ducked. The clock hit the wall and smashed to pieces.

That seemed to wake Fletcher. He jumped up and looked at the clock. "What did y"do that for?"

Cid glared with as much ferocity as he dared. "You"re the one that threw it at me."

"Why didn"t you catch it?"

"Because it"s your clock. And I"m tied of you throwing things at me."

"I"ll show you." Fletcher jumped out of bed and went to his windowsill, picking up an empty ceramic pot. He raised it.

Cid turned tail and ran. He heard Fletcher"s laughter behind him. He scowled. He"d get him back one day"

When he got downstairs, he climbed into a chair next to Morgan and his mother set a bowl of grits in front of him.

"Is Fletcher awake?"

Cid shoved a spoonful of the hot stuff in his mouth. He nodded.

"Did he throw things at you?"

He nodded, swallowing the grits and opening his mouth to cool his burning tongue.

"And what did you do?"

"Ducked. He broke his clock. Again."

His mother snorted with laughter and rolled her eyes.

Then the door opened. She turned around.

Their father came inside through the door. He was an impressive man. Tall, with a stout build and a muscled chest. His hair black like Morgan"s but coarse and straight, like Cid"s. He looked exhausted. He hung his jacket on the hook next to the door and approached the table.

He put a rough, callused hand on Morgan and Cid"s heads and ruffled their hair. He leaned down to say something to them but then he turned towards Cid, sniffing. "You smell like grass. You been outside already?"

Cid smiled and nodded. Morgan was laughing. "That"s what I told him!"

Their father stroked the side of her face and smiled. "Well, you must be psychic. Wow." He stood up and looked at his wife.

"There"s grits if you want some."

He nodded. "Thank you." He took a bowl she offered him and sat down next to Cid.

"How was work?" she asked him.

Cid glanced over at his father"s eyes. They always seemed far away and tired. His father always seemed exhausted. The man sighed, "Busy the whole night and they asked me to stay late this morning""

"Don"t worry about it."

Cid glanced at Morgan, who glanced back and then she looked at her food. Cid did the same.

They heard a thump on the stairs.

"Mom! Cid broke my clock! This is the second time! It"s not fair that he gets away with everything!" He hopped off the stairs. "It"s not fair! You won"t ever punish him and I"!"

Suddenly, the man at Cid"s left was gone. Fletcher froze when their father grabbed him by his shirt. He raised his hand to strike him.

"Max, stop!" Their mother bounded forward, pushing herself between them and grabbing his hands.

His eyes were glassy, dilated and red. He was staring over her shoulder, watching Fletcher like a hawk.

"Max!" she snapped. She pulled his hands to her. "Stop"you"re not in it anymore""

And just as suddenly as it had come, with no logic or reason to it, it was gone. These periodic explosions where his father was suddenly gone, almost in another dimension. They all knew what their mother meant when she said, You"re not in it anymore. She was talking about the war.

Max Highwind had gone away to war when he was twenty-six years old. Fletcher had been four and Cid had just been born. And three years later, when Max returned, he was totally different. Something there had changed him.

He had been a robust man in his prime. He had flown with the Small Air and Water Vehicle Bomber Division, squad three. He"d been shot down during a raid and captured. Whatever had happened to him after that, his father never mentioned but he talked about it in his sleep. Sometimes, Cid would wake up in the middle of the night to his father"s screaming as his mother tried to calm him down. On those nights, Morgan would often come and climb into his bed, terrified.

Sometimes, their father was fully immersed in the world of the living and others, it seemed he thought he was still there"in the horrible places he dreamed about.

Once, they had all been sitting at the dinner table. His mother had lifted an empty platter and gone to set it in the sink but it had slipped from her hands and crashed to the floor. They all had winced but Cid"s father had ducked under the table.

He wouldn"t respond to their calls for him to get up until Morgan slid out of her chair and joined him.

"Hi, Daddy," she"d said, hugging his arm. "Are we going to eat under here?"

And suddenly, he was back. Cid had looked under the table. Max had stroked his daughter"s cheek and smiled. Blinking, he looked around. When he found Cid"s eyes, he turned away, as if ashamed. Then he had scooted out from under the table, picked up Morgan and set her back in her chair. He sat down in his own, seeming very out-of-sorts. He looked across the room to his wife"s blue eyes. "Laina"I""

She"d shaken her head. "It"s all right. It"s done now. Finish your supper."

That was before his father had started working nights. Fletcher told him it was because their father didn"t want to be around them. He didn"t want them to see the odd hallucinations and visions he had.

But today was a Saturday, no school"thus, it was unavoidable.

Max Highwind backed away from her and Fletcher, his eyes not seeming to register them. He started to say something but couldn"t seem to make up the words. Fletcher turned away and walked into the kitchen to get himself some breakfast.

Cid"s father and mother stood in the room for a moment. Something seemed to be passing between their eyes but Cid, young as he was, didn"t know what it could be.

Feeling a strange, suffocating presence encase the room, Cid choked down the rest of his scalding hot breakfast. He got up. "Can I go outside?"

His mother had looked past her husband"s shoulder and nodded. "If you and Ricky end up taking out the BB guns, at least come in and put an extra shirt on."

"Okay!" He told her. He jumped off his chair, eager for the freedom of the rushing wind and grassy plains. He ran upstairs, shoving another t-shirt over his head"just in case"and ran back downstairs and out the door.

The wind met him when he raced across the yard to a little shed. He hadn"t actually intended to take out his little gun but, since his mother suggested it, it seemed like a good idea. He sat on the floor of the shed with the door open so he could feel the caress of the wind and loaded the BB gun, jiggling the barrel a little to settle the BBs in place.

He"d gotten it in Midgar a year ago. His father had taken him there on his very first trip outside of Swifton. They hadn"t had a lot of money then, just like now, really"but his father had told him he"d get him a present. So he picked out the little BB gun with the impressive red box. It was a Wind-Rider Class-A Midgar grade with type B ammunition. Cid had no idea what all that meant but it sure felt impressive to sling the words and letters around with his best friend in the whole world, Rick Case.

Cid pumped the little gun and went outside. Maybe he could get a rabbit or something. Fletcher wouldn"t play Gun-Tag with him because he was Older. And Morgan wasn"t allowed because she was too young. He was glad he hadn"t grabbed his shoes. Cid was a natural on his feet, limber and agile and he only felt awkward in shoes. Maybe he"d find something fun to do?

Cid was a little boy full of energy and most would have looked at him and said he would have no patience for hunting. And really, Cid didn"t. Not the dumb type anyway (or at least that"s what he thought of it). Not sitting up in a tree waiting for some dumb animal to come close enough. He liked to stalk.

So that"s what he did. He set his sights on a little rabbit. Crouching in the grass and lowering the BB gun, as if the rabbit could possibly know what it was, he moved slowly towards the rabbit.

Don"t spook it, he heard his father"s voice. Come up quietly and slowly until you get in range. Make sure the bullet"s got enough power behind it. If you miss, let it go. Learn to hit it the first time or not at all.

Then his mother"s voice took over. But if you wound it, chase it. Don"t let it just wander around and die. Chase it and kill it, put it out of its misery. You can still eat it.

He was in range. He sunk, impossibly slow, to one knee and raised the BB gun. He set his eye on the rabbit when"

Whoooom.

Cid yelped and the rabbit fled. He whipped around, clutching his shoulder.

"You shouldn"t let yer guard down, Cid!" said a scrawny boy who was brown as a nut. He was Rick Case and he also had a BB gun (although his had been made in some fishing port called Junon and was a much fancier piece of work). He lowered the little gun. "You hurt?"

Cid shook his head, glad now that he"d put on another shirt. Gun Tag was a lot of fun, but it was a painful game. He picked up the BB that had hit him from the ground and grinned. "I"ll get you f"that."

"No more than two pumps!" Rick yelped at him, grinning and pointing at him. He raised his gun.

Cid took off after him.

Gun Tag was something that had driven his father crazy. The idea that a group of kids get BB guns and run about, hunting each other had grated on his nerves. No doubt reminding him of the war. But Cid and Rick and the others who sometimes joined them only pumped the guns twice before firing. Enough power that it hurt a lot, but it didn"t penetrate the skin. It was, again, a painful game but fun and it made Cid feel something like pride when he went inside at the end of a long afternoon and had welts all over his back.

Of course, he was getting pretty good at it lately, so he didn"t have as many welts but still, he felt an odd satisfaction in being tough enough to play the game. His mother had played it with her brothers when she was a girl and Fletcher had played when he was younger and even his father had played when he was a boy"but no more. He"d been on the verge of prohibiting Cid to play it again when his mother had intervened

So they played late into the afternoon, finally ending up past the knoll out on the endless plains.

Rick and Cid flopped down in the grass, side-by-side, panting. Rick winced as he set his gun aside and rubbed a nasty red welt on his arm.

A shadow passed over them.

They looked up into the sky.

A great league of small bi-planes passed overhead and a few large airships.

"Wow," Cid murmured, getting on his elbows. "What"s goin" on?"

Rick frowned. "My mom told me that Midgar is taking in any volunteers to join SOLDIER. She thinks there"s gonna be a war with Wutai."

"Why?"

Rick shrugged. "Dunno. She used to be a sergeant in the Combat Operative division. So she knows all "bout that kinda stuff but she doesn't talk about it to me most of the time."

Cid nodded, silent for a moment, staring at his bare feet and thought of his father. "Would you ever wanna be in a war?"

The other boy shrugged. "Dunno. My mom talks about it sometimes. She led ground forces"and she said a lot of her friends died. I don"t think I"d wanna watch my friends die. What about you?"

Cid sat up. "I don" wanna end up like my dad." He looked up into the sky, imagining the ships he"d just seen. "I wouldn"t mind havin" a plane though."

"Why?"

""Cause then I could just fly away, whenever I wanted."

"We could take it far away! Fly all the way to"to"Icicle Inn!"

"It"s cold there."

Rick snorted. "I"ll just feed you to a Bandersnatch. Then you won"t have to worry about it."

"It"s my plane, I"ll just throw you in the ocean."

"But I"ll get eaten!"

"You were gonna feed me to a Bandersnatch!"

"You"ve never even seen a Bandersnatch!"

"Yeah I have!" Cid answered immediately.

"What"s it look like?"

Cid thought for a moment. He hadn"t ever seen a Bandersnatch, of course. He licked his lips. "It"s"like a dog. Only"bigger. And"blue."

"Nu-uh! It"s like an Octopus. With"with ten tentacles".and"and big teeth!"

"Octopusses don"t have teeth. They have sucker thingies."

"Well"this kind of Octopus does."

"Why does it live on land?"

Rick appeared stumped by that.

Cid grinned. "You"ve never seen one either, have you?"

The two boys laughed.

"CID HIGHWIND!"

Little Cid froze, his heart stopping and his blood running cold. He looked at Rick. Rick looked back.

"GET IN HERE!"

Cid stood, twilight chill making the welts on his back hurt. He shouldered his little gun. He legs felt weak and he could hardly think. He knew what that voice meant. He breathed hard, trying to control his near-panic.

"Should I""

"Go home," Cid told his friend. "I"ll see you at school on Monday."

Rick bit his lip.

"CID!"

Cid flinched, tried to swallow his terror, and waved goodbye to Rick. He turned about and ran over the knoll towards his house.

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To the Skies