Cloud x Tifa - Last Train to Brooklyn (Final Fantasy VII)

Chapter 1 - I Wasn't Looking For You

She was going to miss the last train to Brooklyn.  Again.

Getting stuck in Manhattan well after midnight was never a good idea.  Cabs were expensive, and the city wasn't exactly safe at most hours of the day, but especially not at this late hour.  Not that Tifa was worried - she'd trained in Muay Thai, and she could defend herself if needed.  She'd had to do so more than a few times since moving to the city.

Still, she reminded herself that getting stuck downtown was only going to mean a really expensive cab ride or a really long wait for the next train. Neither of which she was in the mood for.

She ran down the block, the crisp October wind filling her lungs with a sharp burn.  SoHo was an artistic, rustic Manhattan neighborhood, cramped with narrow roads, shadowed by towering brick and iron buildings that stared down from overhead, remnants of eighteenth-century architecture that housed apartment complexes and galleries and over-priced restaurants.  The sidewalks were dusty and gray,  cracked in sporadic places, forcing her to watch her step as she ran down West Broadway towards Canal Street.

Tifa Lockhart was exhausted.  It was Thursday, and she had been up since five o'clock that morning, making her way meticulously through her daily routine. Her schedule started with an early morning run through Prospect Park, before she showered and dressed for her morning graduate classes at Columbia University.  By midday, she was headed back to her apartment in Brooklyn to eat and change again, before heading back downtown to SoHo to Seventh Heaven, the local nightclub where she both bartended and helped her friend Barret Wallace manage. Thursdays in the nightclub scene in New York City were practically considered Fridays by most entertainment standards, and they always felt like the true start of the workweek for Tifa.

At twenty-three years old, Tifa had been living in New York since she was thirteen, moving to the city with her father after the sudden death of her mother, back where they had lived in Breckenridge, Colorado. Breckenridge was a sleepy, picturesque Western town that lay nestled against the purples and whites of the Rocky Mountains, a quiet village with serene views, a close-knit and small population, and an impressive tourist portfolio.  Tifa had not been back to the village since she'd left.

The balls of her feet were pinched with pain from standing all night in her booted heels, and running down the concrete sidewalk was not proving to be very helpful. The wind began to pick up, whipping strands of her dark hair into her eyes, carrying with it the scents of something sweet and fried from a nearby street vendor. Around her, handfuls of people still roamed the streets, some alone and quiet, others in noisy packs, and the lights of the buildings above filtered a synthetic shine on their surroundings, basking the street in their ethereal yellow glows.  She reached the corner of West Broadway, seeing the dark entrance to the subway below, and she ran for the stairs, pulling her jacket tighter around her.

The subway was dark with the exception of the glint of a few sporadic lights and the signs that signaled the arrival of oncoming trains. Tifa pulled her phone from her pocket to glance at the time, wincing that she had less than two minutes to make it to her train.  She darted for the stairs, carefully making her way down the steep steps without grabbing onto the railing, appalled at the thought of the germy slime and fluid that might live on its surface.  When she made it to the bottom, she veered to the left to run down the hallway, making her way for the platform for the trains that were headed to Brooklyn.

She was greeted by a cold gust when she entered the platform, the tunnels in front of her opening up like dark, underground caverns.  Her train was already there, its sleek and gray surface gleaming in sparkles under the tiny overhead lamps that provided minimal light underground.  The doors were still open, and Tifa gasped, hearing the droning robotic voice of the train's announcement system.