Disclaimer: I ran out of cool stuff to say for this. Crap. All that you have to know is that I don't own Kingdom Hearts or any of the associated characters.
A/N: This is Leon x Cloud. :D Rock on. I love these two. This chapter focuses on Cloud's return to Hollow Bastion from the Coliseum, but chapters after this one will take place in the past until it finally leads up this point in time again. So things aren't confusing, I'll put in how many years ago it was when I get to that point. Also, I'm using their official ages for this, and sometimes differences in age or things are mentioned concerning that, so: Cloud is 22, Leon is 25, Yuffie is 16, Aerith is 23, and Cid is 42. They're going to be the main characters in this, but I think Sora will also make a little appearance later on. :D
Chapter One – Photographs
"That's my shirt."
"And?" Cloud wiped toast crumbs on said article without thinking. The perfectly white shirt fell just past his hips, where there were now offending butter and crumb smears. His own shirts weren't quite as roomy, and so he was used to just being able to wipe his hands off on his pants without catching the bottom of the shirt.
The wing pressed against his back seemed to take up a decent amount of space, though. It felt weird, but Cloud could only imagine what Leon would do if he went so far as to cut a hole in his shirt. He had a blanket around his shoulders, hoping that Aerith and Cid would simply assume he was cold all the time and leave it at that.
Unrealistic, but he had to take one thing at a time.
"And you always stain them." Leon shot a pissed glance in his direction, momentarily diverting his attention from the book he was reading.
Luckily, he didn't seem to notice that Cloud had done just that. Good thing the butter wasn't as noticeable a stain as strawberry jam was. (Leon had gotten up and pulled the shirt over Cloud's head at the breakfast table in front of everyone when that particular incident had occurred.)
"Mine was torn up." Cloud stared at Leon for a second – not expecting a response, just wondering how one man could stand and read for such a long period of time. He couldn't do that sitting. Maybe Leon had supernatural powers that he was unaware of. He wouldn't be surprised. But in actuality, the reason for all the reading was probably that there wasn't much else to do here.
Cloud was starting to hate Hollow Bastion more than he ever though he could, and this was only the first morning he'd been back. At every corner, he saw a fleeting glimpse of a memory he didn't want to see, heard voices he never thought he'd hear again.
Yet Leon was determined to return things to the way they had been in this place.
Cloud stretched, turning away from Leon, running a hand through his blonde, currently not-so-fresh hair. He felt gross, to say the least. Though bathed in a morning grunginess, Cloud knew that his chances of taking a shower were pretty much nonexistent. Dens of evil just didn't have showers, after all.
That was unfortunate, because yesterday after a rather unsettling reunion, Cloud had gone straight to the ship and fallen asleep in all his clothes. Even his boots. Then he had woken up on a lumpy bunk that hadn't helped his aches – particularly the one received from Cid smacking the back of his head.
That was generally a clear sign that Cid thought he'd screwed up. Throughout his childhood, Cloud had grown to instinctively sense when to duck. Why he hadn't this last time, he didn't know.
The guilt hit him harder than Cid's hand ever could, anyway.
Cid worried about him. He worried about all of them, but Cloud knew that he would never admit it. To him, that was fine. In his opinion, it'd be scary if Cid did start expressing his well-hidden concern. Cloud understood, what with Cid and Leon, that things didn't have to be said out loud for them to matter. Neither of them were outwardly emotional people (though Cloud supposed Leon was sometimes, but only in private).
Cloud had only seen Cid cry twice in his life. Both times had terrified him. The first had been when Shera died. The second… Well, he didn't like to think about that.
Cid was most likely in the shop right now, Cloud figured. Probably even making unnecessary repairs. Cloud couldn't blame him. The air of this library was freezing but still managed to be stifling. The lack of conversation was likely the primary factor. Aerith and Yuffie were up the stairs, browsing through the books there, and even they weren't chattering. Cloud couldn't deduce whether it was because they were all angry at him or because they were so absorbed in what they were reading.
Leon had always been like that, even when they had both been kids. The living dead could be clawing at his legs, and he wouldn't so much as notice if his face was buried in a book.
"Oh! I found it!"
Finally, some sound in this quiet, musty library. Aerith flounced down the steps, head held high, the very image of satisfaction. She was followed by Yuffie, who looked as curious as Cloud felt, with her brows pushed together in that inquisitive expression Cloud recognized from the time she had been just a small child. Cloud's eyes darted from Aerith's smile to a thick book, pages yellowed with age, that she held in her hands. He stood, transfixed by the cracked leather binding. There was no possible way he could ever forget that book.
"What is it?" Yuffie asked, interested piqued, as Aerith dropped it on the table by the stairs and flipped open the cover.
"Our old photo album. You were probably too young to remember…" Aerith considered.
"I remember," came Leon's voice from beside him.
So even he-who-could-not-be-torn-away-from-his-research was intrigued. And he likely remembered more, being the oldest out of all of them.
Cloud's thoughts went silent as he gazed at the image of Cid – he looked genuinely thrilled, no matter how crooked his grin was – with an arm looped around Shera's wide waist. His arm had to really stretch, as she was noticeably pregnant. Shera's smile always appeared first in Cloud's memory, and then he filled in her kind eyes and brown hair held up behind her head. They both looked so happy. The baby. Ironically, that was what led to complications and, ultimately, Shera's death.
Everyone in Hollow Bastion had raised Cloud after his mother's death, but Cid had more than anyone else. He was still small but not too young to understand the hushed gossip of adults around him. People who had suffered great losses appeared to gravitate toward each other, possibly because they needed someone there who also realized what it was like.
Now he couldn't think of a single person who hadn't lost someone.
Aerith flipped through more of the pictures, not dwelling very long on most of them. The majority were of those who had passed away or moved long ago when things began to get rough.
"Zell." Leon pointed to a picture of a child with a huge (albeit missing a front tooth) grin and blonde hair. "Seifer used to pick on him…but he was never serious."
The mention of Leon's ex-boyfriend earned raised eyebrows from both Aerith and Yuffie. However, Cloud wasn't surprised. Leon mentioned Seifer every once and awhile in passing to him, and Cloud didn't take offense or get jealous.
He understood. How could he not?
Sometimes he had to talk about Zack to keep his sanity, although he had only looked up to Zack and had never dated him. He was half his size in the time that he had known him. Even if he had been his age, he wouldn't have. He couldn't picture it any other way than how it had been. Besides, Aerith had had a girlish crush on Zack.
The only thing that Cloud couldn't understand was how it would feel to lose a person he'd had an intimate relationship with. Well, a consensual intimate relationship, at least. For him, there was only one person who fit under that category. And it hurt to even think about losing Leon in the way he'd lost Seifer.
Another page.
"Oh, that's Tifa, right?" Aerith pointed out a pretty little girl with long brown hair and oversized cowboy hat in a picture that also contained a much younger version of Cloud.
"Yeah." Cloud hadn't seen her since he'd been very small. They'd been childhood friends. "I wonder how she's doing." He couldn't help but shift his focus from the picture of Tifa to himself.
His eyes were wide, innocent, and a striking blue – but not the almost glowing blue that they were now. This had been taken before the experiments. In his childish smile he saw a kind of optimism he knew he would never possess again. Naively, he had continued to trust, even though he was repeatedly let down by others. Even when, with such a frail, weak body, he had reason to fear. It was haunting to see the ghost of what he once was and find so little similarities.
Yuffie snickered. "Nice hair, Cloud."
"Huh?" It took him a moment to register that she was talking about his…er, lovely ponytail. "Hey…" If there was one thing Cloud was sensitive about, it was his hair. Damnit, was that disturbing ponytail going to follow him for the rest of his life?
"Wow. It was always that…pointy?" Yuffie bent over the picture, examining it more closely, completely ignoring Cloud's reaction.
"Yeah," he confirmed stiffly.
Anyone who had ever lived with Cloud longer than a period of two weeks had probably seen Cloud's hair wet and was aware of the sheer horror of the amount of cowlicks he had. It was absolutely unnatural. The spikes at least concealed this, and his hair was so used to being shaped in that way that he had no problem doing it. Cloud could only imagine how terrible it would look if he got, say, a buzz cut. He shuddered at the thought.
Thankfully, Aerith turned the pages more quickly, ending that discussion. At the pictures of Vincent and Zack, Cloud's stomach did a strange flip-flop. Vincent never smiled in these pictures. To some, he might seem mysterious and odd with all those layers of clothing and that cape, but he had sat patiently while Cloud clumsily practiced braiding his long, black hair – as horrendously unmanly as braiding was, according to what the other five-year-old boys at that time had told him. He may have never smiled with his mouth, but Cloud could always detect the mirth in his eyes.
Zack was the total opposite of Vincent. He was… He had been the most charismatic, kind guy Cloud had ever known. No matter what Cloud had gotten himself into (and it did happen pretty frequently), all Zack had to do was grin at him to make him feel better.
Cloud wondered if Leon was getting the same weird feeling he was from seeing pictures of Ellone, the graceful woman he had once referred to as – and still did, actually – as "sis." Maybe not, though. She had survived, having left Leon when he was very young.
But there were an astounding number of pictures of Leon and Seifer together, and everyone was aware that that hadn't ended as nicely.
"There are a lot of you and…" Yuffie trailed off.
"Seifer?" Leon supplied.
He was probably getting sick of everyone talking about that matter so delicately, but Cloud could tell that Leon had probably already factored in that they were just trying to be nice. There was no way to force someone to stop feeling ill at ease about a certain subject. The only way Leon could ever correct this was if he started opening up more to everyone, not just Cloud.
The very idea was almost enough to make Cloud snort. Leon getting more in touch with his feelings? That was almost as ridiculous as Cid attempting to cook breakfast while wearing an apron decorated with tiny cows.
But then, he had seen that.
"Your hair was really short," Aerith reminisced, tapping a picture of Leon as a teenager.
There was a possibility she thought it was as cute as Cloud did. Hell if he would ever admit that right now, though.
"Rinoa would love to see these," Yuffie quipped mischievously.
"No," Cloud and Leon muttered at the same time.
"Oh, here's a picture of her!" Leave to Aerith to cheerfully find the picture of the only woman Cloud had almost hit in his life.
Cloud slowly backed away. That woman was the devil. Her picture could even be cursed, for all he knew. "I don't want to see it…"
Aerith frowned. "She wasn't that bad."
"…" was Leon's only response.
"I think she was," Yuffie helpfully backed him up. "I was only ten when she was living with us that short time in Traverse Town."
Short time, indeed. Any longer and Cloud might've thrown himself off a cliff. A few times.
"That's weird…"
Aerith "hmm"ed in accordance with what Yuffie said, pursing her lips at several torn pages and, most peculiar of all, a picture where the subjects' head had been cut out in an oval shape. It had been taken from a distance, but it was clear that Leon, Seifer, Zack, and Cloud – who was much, much shorter in the photograph than he was now – were the decapitated victims.
In the uncomfortable silence that ensued, Cloud actually found himself anticipating Leon making a comment on that height difference. To this day, Leon was an inch taller than Cloud, and he freaking lorded that mere inch.
Cloud was glad when Aerith moved on. His relief only spanned a second, however, because –
"Uh… What?" Before anyone else could see, Cloud made a grab for the picture…only to find that Leon had beat him to it.
"Cloud…" Yuffie's wide-open mouth had curved up into an amused smirk. "Was that you? In undershorts? Outside?"
Damn his uncharacteristically slow reaction time. And judging by the look on Aerith's face, she'd seen it, too.
His face was burning. This was entirely too embarrassing.
"Seifer and I made a bet with Cloud. He lost," Leon explained simply, eyes never leaving Cloud's, as he held the photo just out of reach.
The asshole.
"Give it to me," Cloud demanded, stretching out an open palm.
"Give it to you…?"
It was then, coming from Leon's lips, that Cloud realized how sexual that sounded. Well. His face had to be literally on fire by now. Add to that the fact that he hadn't heard that tone of voice from Leon in a month, and then Leon had gone and said that in front of Aerith and Yuffie. Luckily, they hadn't seemed to catch on. Good.
Too bad he still wanted the picture and wasn't feeling all that merciful. He tried to snatch it, but the bastard jerked it away. This left only one option. Cloud lunged for it, easily gripping the snapshot. There was a single fatal flaw with this plan.
He forgot about the table in front of him.
Pain exploded in his stomach, along with bursts of spectacular color behind his eyelids, knocking him down onto the table. Shit. The stitches. He gritted his teeth, trying to focus on anything but that searing sensation and look normal while doing it.
This was where he discovered it was impossible to do both.
"Cloud?" Leon's voice, now tinged with concern, had lost its edge.
It wasn't anything Cloud heard often, and he definitely didn't like to. It meant he was screwed.
"Cloud…" he repeated, louder this time.
His mouth opened, but the only thing that came out was a strangled gasp. He slumped forward, the pain in his stomach now a dull throb. When he moved at all, it felt like multitudes of little sharp needles all along his wounds.
They were talking, he was sure of it – about him, obviously. He made no effort to understand what it was, but he doubt he could've if he tried. It was like when he was running water and someone was trying to speak to him. He could hear noise but couldn't distinguish what they were saying. Aerith's voice was the high-pitched, panicky one, though. He could tell that much.
Cloud brought the hand that had been clutching his stomach up to his face shakily. His palm was bright red. Oh.
Aerith's hand rested on the part of his back where his wing was neatly folded up. The blanket had fallen off. "What –?"
Cloud wrenched himself away, consequently landing on the ground with enough force to cause a horrific stabbing in his gut. Even like this, he had enough sense to prevent Aerith from seeing the mark of his covenant with Hades.
"Yuffie, take one of his arms." Leon made for the other one, but Cloud's body wouldn't cooperate. The end result was that Leon had to pull him up in an awkward hug, hand clasping his and arm outstretched so that it must have appeared like they were doing some kind of bizarre, drunken tango.
It was almost funny, thinking about it like that.
"Yuffie?" Leon tried again.
Yuffie was quiet, fixated on the bloody mess Leon's shirt had become.
He had stained another one of Leon's shirts. What a stupid thought to have at a time like this.
"Yuffie."
"Wha…?" She looked up. "Oh…"
Cloud wondered where Aerith was and figured out that he hadn't even noticed her slip away. She had most likely gone for the ship, which was probably where he was headed now.
"How well can you walk with us holding you like this?" Yuffie asked, holding onto him tighter.
Was he doing that badly? "Fine," he insisted, but his voice wavered. As if to contradict him, his feet tripped over invisible obstacles. "Don't even suggest that I get carried," he managed.
"Are you still embarrassed about what happened with Hercules?"
Cloud looked up at Leon's blurry face. He wasn't laughing or even smiling, but Cloud was certain he was getting a kick out of what had happened – that whole thing about having to be carried over Hercules's shoulder like a sack of produce. He was focusing on glaring so much that he forgot about walking altogether and stumbled again.
"You have…no idea…"
/-/
"Motherfuckin' shit," Cid breathed.
Cloud could only hear him, because he had long ago flung an arm over his eyes in an effort to block everything out. So far, it wasn't working very well. He didn't like it when people surrounded him in small spaces or when he was the center of attention. He especially didn't like how bumpy this metal bunk was or how stuffy this room was, but this ship was Cid's baby. Even if Cloud had it in himself to complain, he wouldn't.
He was ashamed at how badly he had let himself get injured. The less people who saw, the better, as far as he was concerned.
Fingers started creeping up underneath the sopping wet shirt that continued to cling stubbornly to his body. Cloud was about to sit up and stop whoever was doing that, but a hand held him down simply by pushing on his chest. The strength behind it told him that it was either Leon or Cid.
"No… I…" His mouth was so dry, it felt like cotton was crammed in it.
And just like that, his one protective barrier, a blood-soaked shirt that wasn't even his own, was tugged with much difficulty over his head. The air was cool against his damp skin.
He coughed at the cigarette smoke filling his lungs and already dry mouth. Damn Cid's tendencies to smoke when nervous – no, to smoke all the time. He heard a sharp intake of breath that wasn't his own. Dimly, he registered Cid swearing some more and Yuffie and Aerith speaking softly.
Something… There was something he hadn't wanted Aerith or Cid to see besides the cuts, but it was lost in a sea of dizziness.
Aerith's hands were pressing down on his abdomen, slick with blood, healing him. He let out a slow, unsteady breath as the pain slowly melted away from his body.
All concept of time washed away as his body told him to rest and shut itself away.
When Cloud slid his arm down, he saw that Aerith and Cid were gone. They had left without saying a word.
His wing flapped uselessly beneath him. The wing… "Shit," he murmured hoarsely. They had seen it.
Leon and Yuffie had been surprised the first time, too. But they hadn't said nothing. It was obvious to him which was worse.
"Whoever did your stitches in the first place is a moron."
Cloud glanced hazily over at Leon who, his brain reminded him, had just said that. He was sitting on the edge of the bed by Yuffie, head bent to avoid cracking it into the top bunk. The room was so cramped that they had nowhere else to sit. If Cloud swung his leg out from the bunk and stretched the tiniest bit, it would hit the wall.
"Thanks for calling me a moron."
He didn't even remember to be offended. Maybe he was even kind of relieved that Leon was back to normal. With Leon, those kinds of comments ran standard, and besides, he hadn't known.
They were pretty awful stitches. All things considered, though? At least they had served their purpose.
"Are you serious?" Yuffie seemed stuck somewhere between shock and amazement.
Leon looked ready to bring down the wrath of…something. Cloud didn't know what it was, but it couldn't be good.
Time to start reasoning and explaining. "Who the hell else was I supposed to ask –" He broke off, suddenly detecting that something was missing. His fingers scratched at the base of his throat, searching for a locket, the particular locket that he was never without. "Did I have on a locket when my shirt got taken off?" Try as he might, he couldn't keep the panic from his voice.
"…It was my shirt."
Cloud was positive he could just as easily bring down the wrath of whatever it was Leon had been about to bring down on him. "Don't be a prick. Help me find –" Cloud was about to start digging around the bed when he discovered that he was the ambassador of all things stupid. Of course. "Yuffie, give it back."
Her mouth dropped open. To someone who didn't know her, she would look convincingly insulted. "You're not accusing…me?" she protested indignantly.
"You stole my marble when you were seven," he pointed out. And damnit, there would be justice.
Yuffie laughed darkly. "And you wet your pants when you were seven."
"Aerith tickled me when I was on my way to the bathroom…" Wait… How did she know about that? She had only been one at the time. "When and why did you tell her that?" He narrowed his eyes. No one opened their mouths about that. Ever. "Squall?"
He would never call him Leon. The good thing was that it seemed Leon had grown tired of correcting him long ago. Or else he was just so used to it.
Leon shrugged. "On our way to the Coliseum, we were talking about that time you broke that guy's nose with a coffee pot, and that led into it."
"He deserved it," Cloud maintained.
Yuffie grinned. "He also told me about that time you wore a dress."
Damnit. He made a swipe for them both but couldn't reach. Being incapacitated sucked.
"I had my reasons," Cloud puffed. What the hell was this? He felt like he'd run a mile. Disastrous.
"I bet you did." Yuffie smoothly leapt off the bed without getting railed by the top bunk, tossing the locket in the process.
Cloud caught the silver chain and inspected it swiftly to make sure that Yuffie wasn't pulling a fast one on him. The intricately wrought oval gleamed up at him. He returned his gaze to Yuffie, silently asking her if…
"I didn't look inside. But, y'know, it's kind of girly to wear that." As Cloud frowned at her in irritation, she swung around the doorframe. "See ya."
It had been his mother's before she had burned to death in that freak accident. In a game of chance, she'd lost. That was what adults had always led him to believe growing up, anyway. When he was a small child, the only thing he knew for sure was that she was gone and was never coming back – though in the beginning, in his terrified denial, he hadn't considered that to be certain. It had been other children's taunts and jeers and adults' gentler "talks" with him that jerked him back to reality.
No matter who it was telling him, it had hurt.
Yuffie couldn't have known about what happened to his mother, otherwise he was sure she wouldn't have stolen the locket. He wouldn't hold it against her.
But more precious to him than the locket itself was the picture inside. He had known Yuffie long enough to know when she was lying, and her eyes had been honest. She hadn't seen it. He was relieved just from that.
"Cloud."
Leon's voice was so faint that Cloud didn't know if he had even spoken. The fact that Leon wasn't facing him and had his head down didn't exactly convince him, either.
"I didn't mean for that…" Leon murmured.
"What…?" Cloud raised an eyebrow. Leon was apologizing. How unusual. The smallest, most secret of smiles edged onto Cloud's lips. Leon must have felt guilty over the ripped stitches, even though they weren't technically his fault. But he had spurred Cloud to make that grab for the photograph.
Leon gave the worst apologies. Sometimes they could hardly be passed off as that, they were so horrible. But he said sorry so rarely that when he did, Cloud knew he was sincere. It was kind of funny how Leon's not-clearly-apologizing apologies meant the most to Cloud.
"I already figured that," he assured him, allowing some of his amusement to creep into his voice so that Leon knew there were no hard feelings. "It was an accident."
"You should sleep."
Cloud watched him leave, hand pressing the cold metal of the locket against his bare chest. His eyes found the bars above his head, but his vision made them fuzzy. He was seeing something else.
How Aerith's and Cid's faces must have looked when they saw what he had wanted so desperately to conceal from them. He had never wanted to disappoint anyone.
/-/
Cloud was walking down this hallway again. Closer to the room that he never wanted to revisit but always did. It was quiet except for the barely audible sounds of his shoes hitting the floor. Candlelight flickered against the dark walls. Although it was the middle of the day, this hall had no windows.
He was sleeping again. If he could only turn around, maybe he would wake up. He knew what was going to happen, having been here before. Even when he was consciously aware that he was dreaming, he could only helplessly allow his naïve, trusting child self to guide him to that – He wasn't even inside yet, and he already felt the fingers squeezing around his throat, stealing his ability to breathe. Never strong enough. He never was, no matter how many times he repeated the motions.
The door was right in front of him now. He had to wake up. His hand – had it really been that small back then? – reached for the knob and slowly began to twist it. He had to run, had to run, had to r –
Cloud bolted upright, gasping, and collapsed on the bed as a fierce ache assaulted his head. "Fuck," he groaned. He had struck his head into the bars above him. Rubbing his forehead, he tried to steady his breath. It was pitch black, and he could hear the soft breathing of Leon in the bed above him. That meant… Had he really slept that long?
Cloud clenched his teeth. He couldn't calm down. His pulse fluttered wildly, his heart slammed into his ribs, the rise and fall of his chest was still erratic… Squirming uneasily, he grabbed fistfuls of the sheets and wiped his skin, blotting up the abnormal amount of sweat. It felt like there was enough to bathe in.
Cloud was beginning to undergo a panic attack in the middle of the night when no one else was awake. Wonderful.
Water… That was what his parched throat needed. Curling his fingers around the bar, he swung his other arm out, preparing to stand up and walk to a sink, despite his wobbly legs. He was drowning in dizziness.
That was weird – Something warm was in the way… Oh, a hand. Leon's hand. Cloud blinked in confusion. For whatever reason, Leon's hand was dangling out of bed. He slid his own hand into Leon's, grasping it more tightly.
It had been too long since he'd held his hand like this.
A sigh escaped him. Leon's hands were slightly calloused, but he had always found that strangely comforting. Even though Cloud could fall asleep like this, Leon would wake up with a numb arm. Cloud gave himself a few more seconds to relax before pulling himself up by the bar. The wooziness returned as he stood, forcing him to lean against the bed to keep from falling. In the darkness, he fumbled for Leon's arm and paused, pressing a light kiss to his elbow, before setting it back where it belonged.
"Hey."
Surprised, Cloud halted his descent back into bed. "How long have you been awake?" he whispered, holding himself up by the side of the bed.
"A little before you hit your head. Do you need water or something?"
'Yeah. I was gonna get some." He crawled back into bed, glad that he could rest easy without having to stumble around like a dumbass in search of water.
Under ordinary circumstances, Leon would never get out of his warm bed to do a favor for someone else, and under ordinary circumstances, Cloud would never ask him or anyone else. He didn't like asking things of others, preferring to do them on his own. But Leon knew that Cloud would occasionally get panic attacks, in which his breath came up short, and he felt dizzy and nauseated. Some times were worse than others. This time had been nothing.
He remembered when it first started, when it hadn't been a routine as it was now. "I think… I think I'm going to die…"
Cloud squinted as a sliver of light from the door fell across his face. He felt the bed shift, and Leon handed him a glass of water. The cool water splashed down his aching throat.
He plopped down on the pillow. "…Thanks."
"You have to take these."
"Ugh… No." Cloud had really hoped that Leon would forget about the pills.
They were above and beyond disgusting, but he was supposed to take them after incidents like this.
"Swallow," Leon persisted simply, ever a man of few words.
"Not on the first date," Cloud replied automatically.
It had been a long-time running joke between them that wasn't even that funny anymore. (Technically, it was more of a "thing" than a joke. Cloud noticed that they had a lot of those.) It was a habit.
Like Leon's conversations inside his head that everyone ribbed him about. Cid's swearing. Aerith's humming as she cooked. Yuffie's smirk as she cheated at cards. (It was easy for her to do when Cloud or Leon spent more time thinking that strategizing. How infuriating.) Like the way Leon put three spoons of sugar in Cloud's coffee and then complained that it was an "insult to the coffee," or an insult to him, even, because he was the one forever making it. ("You make it too strong. That's the only reason I put that much sugar in it," Cloud would frequently retaliate.) Like how Leon would discreetly smell Cloud's hair after he took a shower. He probably thought Cloud didn't notice.
He did.
This was routine as well, except it seemed different somehow. As Leon climbed back up to the top bunk, it occurred to Cloud what it was. Leon was colder – still mad at him, possibly.
The silence was deafening. Then, "I didn't know that you tore out those pictures of…Sephiroth and Ansem."
Cloud swallowed, digging his nails into the mattress. "I couldn't look at them without feeling sick."
"Yuffie and Aerith…don't remember those pictures. They don't understand. They didn't understand why you left like that, either, out of nowhere."
Cloud shut his eyes, guilt flooding him. Shutting them didn't change anything. It was just as dark as before. He couldn't block this out. "Don't make me feel bad for what I had to do. I had to go there… I had to finish it."
"I was the one who…" There was an atypical waver to Leon's voice.
Cloud flinched, not wanting to hear Leon like this. He already knew what he was going to say. Cloud wasn't the only one to harbor guilt.
"I left you there with…Sephiroth, and he could have –"
Cloud felt his face flush. Sephiroth and Leon had…exchanged words in front of him. It hadn't gone very well. He knew exactly what Leon was getting at, and it was utterly humiliating. "…The moment he touched me, I killed him."
For a moment, neither of them said anything. Since he had returned, Cloud hadn't shared the outcome of what had come from looking for Sephiroth with anyone. He could understand how Leon might have difficulties swallowing all this.
"How can you be so sure?"
That was one thing that had been troubling Cloud. After all, Sephiroth wasn't an ordinary person. "I'm not completely sure, but… All I can do is go by what I saw. He's dead, unless he can rise back from the dead. I wasn't satisfied knowing he could walk free after everything that happened. Were you?"
"No. But killing him won't bring back anyone –"
"I know that –" Cloud interrupted.
"How long are you going to wear that picture from the album around your neck?"
Without a thought, he retorted, "How long are you going to call yourself Leon?"
"Until… This is our home." Without a clear answer, he changed the subject. "You thought you could find your 'light' through revenge. Who are you to –"
"Closure. Isn't that what you want, too? Why you're back at this shithole? This isn't our home. Our home is gone forever. Stories beneath us is that – that place." He shivered as memories of a freezing, wet cell and lab tables returned to him.
They were going to poke and prod at him again. The light above him was blinding, but he could make out faces –
He wasn't going back… They couldn't make him go back.
"Are you afraid? Cloud…" His tone was neither patronizing nor mocking.
To Cloud's relief. All the same, he wanted to tell him, "Yes." But to admit his fear would be to admit that – what? That no matter how hard he worked to drive all weakness from himself, a piece of it would always be there?
"I have this nightmare…" Really, he had no idea why was telling Leon this. "I'm fourteen, outside a door here, and usually I'm not lucky enough to wake up before…before Ansem chokes me."
There were rustling and thumping sounds – Leon was jumping down from the top bunk and lifting up the sheets around him. There was a rush of chilly air, but then a warm body slipping in next to his compensated for it.
"Squall…"
Leon's warm arms enveloped him, heating his exposed back. His clothed chest was pressed to Cloud's nude one, and the cotton was soft and comforting to his skin. They were so close that, had it been light enough, Leon would have been able to see the faint dusting of freckles across Cloud's cheekbones.
No words came to either of them, but that was all right. Cloud didn't need them. In Leon's firm embrace were a thousand apologies for things he didn't have to apologize for – for things he hadn't even done but that they both knew of.
Cloud nuzzled his neck sleepily, eliciting the desired response in return. Grip loosening, Leon gave a slight shiver and ducked his head down to kiss Cloud. It would be impossible for him to describe how much he had missed the feel of Leon's lips against his, even the contours inside his mouth, and – his taste –
"Too tired," Leon mumbled.
This earned him a light shove on the shoulders. Leave it to Leon to ruin the moment.
"Hnn…" Leon groaned tiredly. "Do that again, and I'll make you sleep on top."
Yes, it was a sad fact that whenever Cloud slept on the top bunk, he rolled off and woke up in very painful positions. However, there could be a better, more perverted way of looking at what Leon had just said.
Surely Leon must have felt the wicked smirk against his collarbone, and though it was this dark, Cloud didn't have to see to know that Leon was rolling his eyes at that moment.
"Whatever. You know what I meant."
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A/N: Cloud really does have freckles! I kid you not. They're not very prominent, but it's cool that they're there. If you want to see how cute/awesome this is for yourself, look at some of the FF: Advent Children pictures.
Concerning Cloud's panic attacks, some people get those symptoms when they have generalized anxiety disorder. In other words, they get these attacks for no reason. Other people have phobias, such as fear of heights or spiders, that are connected with these panic attacks.
I put in the thing about Cloud in a dress because the incident in Wall Market in FF7 was one of the best moments of my life. The part where Cloud went down the stairs on a motorcycle was pretty cool, too, but there's no way (I can't think of one yet! XD) that I could tie that into this.
I had a ton of fun writing this.