Work Text:
Like a Prayer
Vivid streaks of gold blended seamlessly into a fading periwinkle sky, rimmed by the heavy red glow of Meteor bleeding into the horizon. Tifa hugged her arms around her waist as a gust of wind blew by, squinting her eyes up to take in the falling darkness and the way clusters of bright stars began to emerge among the cascade of colors up above.
Her heart continued to race the way it had been since she’d stepped off of the Highwind earlier that evening with Cloud in tow behind her, intent on getting a little fresh air since they were left alone together while their friends went off to say their goodbyes to loved ones before the final battle. Ever since they’d departed and it had just been her and Cloud, her heartbeat was off rhythm, every moment spent in his presence feeling more charged than the last.
So much had been said, yet so much hadn’t been. She could feel all the unspoken words hanging in the air between them, clinging to an invisible tether that bound them to one another since she found him that night in the rain. It had only grown stronger since they fell into the Lifestream, where memories and feelings lay waiting for her to devour, encased in the crystals of his most precious thoughts and wishes. She learned so much gazing into them, led from one to the next by the tiny hand of his inner child, but since they’d emerged, neither of them have had the temerity to face those confessions with much more than shy glances and tentative handholds. They’d found safety and closeness with each other, but to speak freely of the depths of their affections that they’d both revealed within the depths of verdant vapors had somewhat alluded them.
Yet now he stood behind her, the wind the only sound as it whistled past. He shifted his weight where he stood, and Tifa could hear the gentle clink of his armor, plates of steel clanging into each other. It would seem he was trying to move closer to her, and with every step, her determination built as high as her fear.
“Hey Tifa…” his voice shook, low and thin but undergirded by resolve. “I... There are a lot of things I wanted to talk to you about…”
She glanced back up at the heavens, finding the stars brighter even as Meteor raged. She bit into her bottom lip, the pace of her heart picking up as his words settled inside of it. She tried to imagine what it was he might want to talk about… what sort of things lived inside of him that he skated around now as they stood here.
The night air was so still that she could hear him gently scratch the back of his neck as he fell silent. She tried to think about how to respond, but her own words were failing her, caught up in tangles in her throat.
So much had happened between them these last few weeks. There were moments when they’d been so close to one another that Tifa had thought it might be a dream. But there had been times when they’d been torn apart, moments when she’d thought she’d lost him forever. It had been an endless rollercoaster since they reunited in Sector Seven, and as she stood there with the stars and maybe their imminent demise coloring the sky above them, she realized that this was the first moment of true calm and serenity that they’d had together since she helped him restore his true self.
And it might be their last, she thought, chancing a shy look over her shoulder. She found him staring at her, his head cocked to one side and his expression sheepish. There were words caught in his throat, too, and when their eyes met, he lowered his hand from the back of his neck and reddened with blush.
“Cloud… words aren’t the only way to tell someone what you’re thinking…”
She wasn’t sure where that response came from, but it slipped from her lips and drifted away with the breeze before she could stop it. Cloud’s eyes widened slightly in response, and she saw his hands flex and twitch at his sides. He blinked, and the stark intensity of his blue-green stare had her own cheeks heating, her knees suddenly feeling like they might give way.
A long pause settled between them, the sounds of rustling grass and night winds scarcely filling the silence. She felt like she should follow her statement up with something more, but every string of words she came up with in her head only seemed fit to make things stranger and more confusing. But before she could ponder it any further, Cloud’s boots were shifting in the grass behind her, and Tifa’s breath hitched in her throat as she realized he was drawing closer to her.
Her heart nearly stopped when his leather-bound hand fell gently to her shoulder, his fingertips coming to wrap around the front of her clavicle. Cloud had been close to her like this many times before - shared embraces and lingering touches - but rarely had he drawn in and touched her with the kind of purpose he did now. His body heat collided with the bare skin of her arms and ran along the ridges of her spine, a wall of warmth behind her as his fingers pulled her hair out of the way so that his breath could caress her ear.
“Tifa.”
There wasn’t a question in his voice. It was a quiet beckon, almost laced through with a command. His tone had dropped several octaves and the sound of it reverberated through her, raising the hair on her arms and reaching her toes. Blinking up at the stars, Tifa turned to face him, finding him standing so close with low-lidded, expectant blue eyes.
Time stood still. She wasn’t sure if she was still breathing, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t give her enough time to think too much about it, because his gloved hand was on her cheek, thumb brushing beneath her eye and fingers tangling in her hair.
“You want me to show you how I feel?”
His words were a calm whisper, floating away in the night air. Tifa swallowed, trying to command her senses. Her thoughts were racing and despite the January chill, everything was too hot. Too sensitive. Too charged.
She had invited this, hadn’t she? They both struggled with words, Cloud especially. Sometimes she found what she wanted to say, but sometimes she didn’t. So many things between them had already been left unsaid - like the night on the gondola, her words caught up in the burst of fireworks, their faces leaned in and lips gapped until an explosion of colors ruined it all.
She parted her lips again, nodding silently. Words alluded her, cherry-red locked with his sea-blue, galaxies buried in their depths. She tried to speak, but it was his tiny, sheltered smile that stopped her.
Followed by his kiss.
Tifa closed her eyes against the warm press of his lips, every bone in her body melting. Unknowingly, she pressed her cheek against his hand, letting him steady her with their connection there. She’d never felt anything like this before, the heat of just a gentle and light touch, the softness of his lips sending her through the same stars that watched them.
She parted her lips gently, and encouraged by her open display, Cloud pressed his tongue forward. The feel of it against her own electrified her, sending fireworks into her vision and sparks into her core. She rocked forward on her toes, almost losing her balance, and Cloud lowered his hand that sat on her shoulder to her lower back, steadying her and pressing her up against him.
He was a wall of hard muscle and heat, and the feel of her tits now pressed firmly against him only drove her wilder with a sudden surge of desire that she realized she had been suppressing for weeks. Their kiss deepened, her blood soaked in lava when he leaned forward and dipped her backward slightly, his movements taking charge of her own. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, anchoring herself to him and grasping at the fine hairs at the back of his neck as a moan unwillingly escaped her throat.
She rocked on her toes as her body went boneless, but Cloud held her steady. So many times he had been there for her, had saved her from the unknown and seen and unseen disasters alike. They’d both been there for each other, she knew - but Cloud had been there in times when Tifa hadn’t even realized it.
He was her rock. Her salvation. Like a prayer she could always whisper and rely on, one that she knew would always be answered.
He held her firmly but finally drew away, breaking their kiss. She felt hungry, starved even as he pulled back, licking her lips and staring at him as he cocked his head to one side and studied her. They met eyes again, and his thumb stroked the underside of her eye.
“Tifa,” he whispered. Her name was a prayer of his own, always whispered with such need and conviction. She swallowed at the way that his voice trembled but yet was so firm, heat coursing through her entire being and electrifying every nerve ending in her body.
“You’ve always been there for me,” he went on. It was as if he had been reading her thoughts, connecting them with his own. “I… I wouldn’t be standing here if it weren’t for everything you’ve done for me.”
He was blushing severely now, and he lowered his eyes at the way he realized he was spilling his truths. She didn’t want him to stop, but she knew how difficult this was for him. Tifa leaned in closer to him, hungry for his kisses and gently pressing another sweetly to his lips, shivers of need and anticipation racing down her spine.
“You’re so sweet,” she canted against his lips, hoping to encourage more of his boldness. Keep him talking, kissing, touching, anything. She wanted all of it.
Cloud kissed her again. The sunlight had completely melted away and there was now nothing left but a starry night sky and a blood-red meteor, glows of celestial color cast all over the horizon. He pulled back again, his thumb tracing her plump bottom lip, his breath hot on her skin as aquamarine trailed her face.
“No, you are,” he corrected her with a teasing edge that was still somehow sincere. “Let me show you, Tifa.”
She blinked, mildly perplexed but unable to ruminate on it when he kissed her again, this time deeper, his tongue curling with hers as their teeth knocked lightly together. Tifa was breathless when he finally pulled away, and she could see the twin fires in his eyes when he stared back at her, his hands both falling to her waist.
He said nothing - just held her eyes as he slowly dropped to his knees in front of her. Tifa’s cheeks darkened as she considered their positions - Cloud, a man with a SOLDIER’s strength and prowess deferentially bowing before her, his hands falling to her hips while she stood above him, her knees buckling with every sway of the wind’s direction. His eyes never left hers, not as his fingers toyed with the buckles of her belt and undid its clasp, not as leatherbound hands slipped under her skirt and traced her skin, finding the waistband of her shorts and underwear and slowly, pulling them down.
She quivered as she watched him, steadying herself with one hand on his shoulder, watching as he pulled her boots gently out of the fabric and then stuffed them haphazardly into his pocket. Her heart pounded like mad, but she didn’t dare stop him, her center pulsing the closer he drew near. Sensations she knew well but had tried to ignore ever since he had reentered her life tore through her, leaving her wet and aching and flushed, desperate for more but unable to imagine how to ask.
There’s so much I wanted to say to you…
Words aren’t the only way…
She nearly jumped out of her skin when he kissed the inside of her thigh, her thoughts dashed away. His lips were so soft, like clouds caressing her flesh. She purred a quiet sound and he drifted higher, peppering her skin with soft kisses and gentle nips as he disappeared beneath her skirt. Tifa closed her eyes, holding his shoulder and swaying against him, biting into her lip, trying not to think too deeply about the fact that she was completely bare to him under there.
The howling wind and the rhythmic purring of the Highwind's engines provided the perfect cover under the star-speckled sky. Her mind whited out when Cloud lowered his head, his lips finding the heat between her legs. He breathed in her scent, a mix of passion and arousal that instantly ignited something deep and primal within him that Tifa could hear in the low growl he emitted. His fingers eagerly tore at her black stockings, caressing her bare thighs as he moved closer, his pale lips parted in anticipation, his tongue darting out to taste the sweetness at the apex of her thighs, tracing the outline of her pussy before diving in to taste her. Tifa moaned as her legs quivered weakly, and the sound of her desire fueled him, pushing him further, his breath hot against her folds as he began to worship her with his mouth. He teased her entrance with feather-light kisses before licking along the seam where her lower lips met. She whimpered softly, her fingers running through his hair in encouragement.
She had never felt anything like this, and the overwhelming cross of emotions and sensations that assaulted her brain caused her to toss her head back, her hair brushing against the back of her knees. But Cloud held her firm even as she wavered in disbelief, the vulnerability and openness of this moment between them intensifying the already overwhelming surges of pleasure that were stinging her.
His tongue traced the outline of her clit, swirling over it in circles. As he lavished his attention on her, Tifa felt herself melting into him, surrendering completely to the sensations he was eliciting with nothing more than his lips and tongue. He licked and sucked the little button, teasing it gently at first before circling it around with his tongue, pulling a sharp gasp from Tifa that seemed to stem from her very soul.
"Oh, Cloud," she whimpered, her hips bucking against him, her fingernails digging into his shoulders as she arched her back. Her moans grew louder, more needy, her body trembling with anticipation and want, the pressure building but far too slowly and without enough force to toss her over the edge. She gripped his hair tighter, pulling him closer, begging for more with her eyes. He obliged, taking her clit between his lips and sucking gently, his tongue flicking against it in rapid succession, sending shivers down her spine. Her inner walls quivered at his touch, her body yearning for more. The stars were blurring in her vision above her, her breath catching in her throat as he slid two fingers inside her, stretching her gently and filling her up just enough to feel full. With each flick of his tongue, she shuddered uncontrollably.
It was divine.
He lapped at her entrance, tasting every drop before moving down to tease her once more with soft kisses and nibbles along her inner thighs. She was panting now, her hips bucking in rhythm with his movements. Every touch from his eager mouth sent shockwaves of pleasure coursing through her body.
Tifa dug the fingernails of one hand into his shoulder as he leaned up to lave attention to her clit once more, sucking on her sweet spot, applying just enough pressure to push her closer. Her legs trembled, her knees nearly buckling, but she held onto him, needing this connection and the impending release. Her nails dug into his shoulders as she thrust her hips up to meet his tongue, and the bitter wind whistled past them, but they were both unaware of their surroundings, lost in the haze of passion and need.
His hands gripped her hips tightly, holding her down as he took her closer and closer to the edge. She was soaked now, the taste of her essence coating his lips and chin in a way that made her blush every time she looked down. He caught her eyes again as his tongue filled her core, his breath hot and urgent on her inflamed skin, and she could see everything he wanted to say to her in his blown-out pupils and sea-colored irises.
She was everything to him. A goddess whose altar he had kneeled before, who heard his prayers time and time again.
Tifa closed her eyes, soaking his benediction in over and over again as her body strained closer towards the edge, her nipples painfully stiff under her bra, her heart racing and her lips parted with her moans of desperation. She had her own prayers to cry to the heavens, all of them riding on sighs of his name.
He flicked his tongue against her swollen nub, summoning her loudest moan yet. She closed her eyes, allowing herself to sink into the sensations as he lavished her with attention, his hot breath caressing her sensitive flesh. It wasn't long before she felt the tightening in her belly, the telltale sign that she was close. Her breath came in short, sharp gasps as Cloud's tongue teased her clit mercilessly, sending waves of euphoria coursing through her body. With one last deep thrust of his fingers, Tifa cried out his name and came hard, her orgasm washing over her in a wave of bliss. She arched her back, her pleasure soaking his tongue and her moans filling the night air as she shook with aftershocks, crying out his name as her walls convulsed with unbridled ecstasy.
"I've got you," he whispered into the pillowy fullness of her swollen slit.
As she came down from her high, panting heavily, he looked up at her, their gazes locked. Slowly, Cloud got back to his feet, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the look in his eyes wild and desperate.
Without even thinking, Tifa leaned forward, kissing him fervently as she leaned into him. He caught her body with both arms around her, his lips seizing hers as they both moaned and sighed in tandem, her sweetness shared between their tongues. The relief he’d granted her may have satiated her for now, but she was left longing for more, the feel of his fingers having presaged the fullness she knew another part of him could provide.
They finally broke apart, Cloud’s teeth nearly breaking the skin of her bottom lip. He cupped her cheek again, his eyes hooded as he glanced back at the airship.
Their bodies pressed together, and Tifa’s eyes lowered when she felt the stiffness at the front of his pants nestle and tap at her thigh. Looking back up at Cloud, she found his cheeks nearly scarlet.
“I guess I have more to say,” he laughed sheepishly.
Tifa giggled, leaning into him and pressing her hips forward against his erection as she kissed him again, the bliss of her release and their intimate connection exploding every neuron in her brain. They both laughed together, clinging to each other in a delirious hug, lips and teeth tangling before they finally separated and straightened themselves out.
“We should go inside,” Cloud suggested, his voice serious and deep now, his intentions for the rest of the night laced behind every tenor of his words.
That was all it took. Tifa nodded, and he took her hand, leading her back to the airship as she tossed a cursory glance up at Meteor in the sky as they went.
Someday we'll find the answer.