Well, I'm a major Kate Bush fan, so I listen to her work all the time (because it's amazing). :wub:

One of my favourite of her songs is the beautiful (and very romantic) "Running Up That Hill", my perfect Cloud/Aeris lovesong. It's a song about sensing that someone is trapped in themselves and wanting to see through their eyes, feel what they feel, the longing to know who someone really is by coaxing them out of their defences. It just struck me as SUCH a great song for Cloud and Aeris. It's so romantic, brave and searching...perfect for C/A (it even inspired me to write a fanfic!)! So I thought I'd share!

Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)

It doesn't hurt me,
Do you want to feel how it feels?
Do you want to know, know that it doesn't hurt me?
Do you want to hear 'bout the deal that I'm making?

You...
It's you and me...

And if only I could,
I'd make a deal with God
And I'd get him to swap our places.
Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
Be running up that building.

See, if only I could, I would...

You don't want to hurt me,
But see how deep the bullet lies.
Unaware I'm tearing you asunder
There is thunder in our hearts
Is there so much hate for the ones we love?
Tell me, we both matter don't we?

You...
It's you and me...
It's you and me...
You won't be unhappy.

And if only I could,
I'd make a deal with God
And I'd get him to swap our places.
Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
Be running up that building.

See, if only I could, I would...

You...
It's you and me...
It's you and me...
You won't be unhappy.

C'mon baby, c'mon darling,
Let me steal this moment from you now
C'mon angel, c'mon, c'mon darling -
Let's exchange the experience!

See, if only I could,
I'd make a deal with God
And I'd get him to swap our places.
Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
With no problems...

See, if only I could,
I'd make a deal with God
And I'd get him to swap our places.
Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
With no problems...

See, if only I could,
I'd make a deal with God
And I'd get him to swap our places.
Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
With no problems...

See, if only I could...
Be running up that hill...
With no problems.

If only I could, I'd be running up that hill,
If only I could, I'd be running up that hill.

Ahhh Kate Bush... that IS a good song. A group called Placebo also does a great cover of the song as well.

Interestingly enough, I found an excellent Cloud/Aerith fanfic a long time ago, written by an author called "A Thyme in Her Eyes" or something like that, who used that exact same song as inspiration for the story. I wish I could find that fic again, it was by far the best C/A fic I'd ever read. I'll have to keep an eye out for where I saw it...

That was me! :D Lol, I'm grinning like an idiot right now... And thank you so much for the compliments! You've really made my day. :wub: It's one of the stories I'm proudest of, so I'm really glad that you thought so highly of it. Unfortunately, I don't believe that I've since written a C/A piece anywhere near as good, which is a drag, but I'm working on it! I've actually posted "Running Up That Hill" here in the fanfiction section, if you're interested in reading it again.

It's great to see a fellow Kate Bush fan as well! And I had no idea that Placebo had done a cover version of that song...I'll have to try and find it somewhere...

Holy crap, your "A Thyme in Her Eyes"? Wow, talk about your weird coincidences! Haha, good thing I had good things to say about your work, huh? :lol:

Glad I made your day, and you are certainly welcome. But, you must permit me to gush some more. I read a couple of your stories back in the day, FF7 and otherwise (I recall Dracula and Greek mythology themes to name a few...), and I must say I was really impressed. You are an excellent writer. You do an exceptionally good job of depicting and describing the nuances, subtleties, and subtle complexities of the thoughts and feelings of your characters, and you do so without being overly wordy or verbose. Overall, you have a wonderful "light touch." With your FF7 stores (Running up that Hill and the Cloud + Tifa jogging story come immediately to mind) you're depictions of the personalities of the characters of the game and their interactions, in my opinion, were DEAD ON.

Anyway, I am thrilled you are on this forum, and I look forward to seeing more of your work.

I'm not terribly familiar with Kate Bush, but I have a couple of her songs, and I enjoy what I've heard from her. The Placebo version is very good - it's a slower, darker, more somber version of the song, which works well with the lyrics, in my opinion. If you have some sort of MP3 fileshare, you should find it pretty easily (I found it on Limewire).

Thanks so much for all your compliments! I'm very flattered! :D Seriously, you have no idea how much that sort of appreciation and enjoyment of my writing means to me. It's also pretty frustrating to work very hard on a 'fic and then get mostly nothing but unhelpful five-word-long ("omg luv it more plz!!!") reviews, so to hear a detailed and thoughtful appraisal is fantastic. THANK YOU.

Lol, that's true! When I first read your comments I was thinking to myself, "Someone's going to get a big surprise when they see my reply to this..." :lol:

You're in luck! There's something in the works right now! I have a Cloud/Aeris 'fic that I hope to start and finish within the week, and I've got another rather long Cloud/Aeris piece (not very thoroughly planned out though) that I'd like to write soon, as well as a fanfic about Aeris as a child (I've already started writing this but it's quite long, so it won't be finished for a while yet). I hope to have all of these done soon, though there might be a bit of a wait for the latter two because I've recently gotten back into FFVI in a big way, and I'm desperate to get some fanfiction ideas out of my head! ^_^

I thought it shouldn't be too difficult to find online! I'll look out for it then! Thanks for the recommendation! :D

Anyway, thanks again for comments. I hope to see more of you on the forum! ^_^