Eir's Tomorrow
by Jukebox Hound a Peggy Sue Final Fantasy VII fic which opens post-Advent Children with The End of the World as We Know It. A mysterious force of nature poisoned the environment and unleashed shadowy creatures that hunts people down to last man as the world starves to death. Cloud, as the last man alive, watches the Planet in its death throes. Then he wakes up in a lab....
This work contains examples of:
- And I Must Scream: During the Apocalypse How and death of his original timeline, Cloud cannot die and has to watch everyone he loves, his home and the planet die and he could do nothing to change anything.
- All the Other Reindeer: The Strifes are outcasts for their religious beliefs, they are the only people who believe in the Aesir. As a result, no one with exception of Zangan wants anything to do with them. The townspeople are afraid that the Strifes can curse them with their gods, which admittedly Cloud and his mother don't try to disprove due it's usefulness.
- Apocalypse How: First all the people die, then all the animals die, then the land grows barren and the atmosphere vanishes with the Lifestream tearing the Planet to shreds and Cloud watched all of it.
- Birth-Death Juxtaposition: The death of Gast Faremis is followed by Cloud's birth.
- Blessed with Suck: Cloud's mako enchancements plus the Planet prevent him from starving to death as quickly as regular people he has to watch all of his friends and family starve, lose hope and die, living him the sole survivor.
- Conditioned to Accept Horror: While Sephiroth doesn't like the experiments, he accepts them as a painful fact of life. Although in his adulthood, he does realize that his childhood was strange to say the least.
- Despair Event Horizon: Cloud crossed it after seeing everyone he loved die and the only thing that kept him going was the chance to save Zack, Aerith and Sephiroth.
- Doomed by Canon: Doctor Gast Faremis is killed and the pregnant Iflana is captured trying to escape.
- Downer Beginning:It took one year, eight months, and three days for the Planet to die after Jenova's final defeat.
- Driven to Suicide: In the original timeline, Reeve killed himself rather than suffer through the apocalypse.
- Eldritch Abomination: The Planet is a neutral variant of this, Cloud describes it as a blinding light whose voice is described as a roar and can't be understood by non-Cetra.
- The End of the World as We Know It: The foundation of the plot, which turns out to be the Planet's doing, as it needed those deaths to power itself to power the Time Travel and fight off its own demise.
- Fantasy Counterpart Culture: the Strifes are Scandinavian with their beliefs and their worship of Hel.
- From the Mouths of Babes: A young Sephiroth asks Cloud what sex is.
- Genius Loci: The Planet is sentient with its own beliefs and demands of Cloud.
- God Is Dead: Aerith, who commands the Lifestream, is gone when the apocalypse started despite Cloud's prayers. It's implied that the Planet absorbed her along with the rest of the Lifestream.
- Guardian Angel: Cloud acts as one to Sephiroth before his own reincarnation and even came with the wings to prove it. He would try to protect Sephiroth from the cruel experiments and other people and give him advice when needed.
- A Hero Is Born: Cloud is reborn as himself when his mother finally gives birth to him.
- Hope Spot: After the events of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, there was hope that all new green means things are getting better again. Things quickly grow wrong when animals start growing in numbers with deformities and the plant life grows poisonous.
- Angel!Cloud tells Iflana that if Hojo turns on them that she go awake Vincent from his coffin for him to help. Iflana manages to successfully awake Vincent when Hojo kills her husband, but both are shot and tranquilized before they could escape.
- Imperiled in Pregnancy: Iflana is attacked and non-fatally shot by Hojo and his Turks when she attempts to escape.
- In Spite of a Nail: Despite Cloud's warning, Iflana gets captured
- Elfe dies although in different circumstances.
- It's Quiet… Too Quiet: One of the signs of that things were turning for the worst was when whole forests were completely silent of life.
- Kill Em All: Everyone died in the apocalypse.
- Klingon Promotion: When Professor Gast takes Hojo to task for authorizing the move of Sephiroth and the project without his permission, Hojo shoots him.
- Last Stand: When the population was down to one city, Cloud and others tried banding together for one last chance against the Plague. With the exception of Cloud, everyone is wiped out.
- Reincarnation: Cloud was initially a ghost when he traveled back time only to be reborn during his birth.
- Never Found the Body: The bodies of Nanaki, Cid and Vincent were never found as their cities were overrun before anyone could reach them.
- Not-So-Imaginary Friend: Everyone initially believe that Sephiroth's angel friend is a result of him reading too much fairy tales.
- Peggy Sue: Cloud is sent back in time by the Planet itself to prevent the circumstances that lead to the end of the world.
- Slash Fic: Its pairings are Cloud/Sephiroth and Tifa/Elena
- Token Good Teammate: Professor Gast is the only scientist with any ethics in the Jenova Project and is the only one that treats Sephiroth like a child rather than an experiment. As Iflana points out this doesn't excuse him because he's still experimenting on a child
- Used to Be a Sweet Kid: To Cloud's surprise, Sephiroth is one. The adult Sephiroth Cloud knew was a Faux Affably Evil Big Bad with a massive god complex who's responsible for starting The End of the World as We Know It. The child Sephiroth is a sweet, inquisitive child who wants the affection and companionship that no one gives him. The child's blithe acceptance that his beloved Cloud will kill him, disturbs Cloud so much that he vows to save him.
- We Have Reserves: Hojo does not give a single damn about the troopers or scientists he uses as he can always get more, which he does as he tends to use them in his experiments.
