This was one of the fics I was supposed to be writing when Abnormal Utility attacked. The prompt was to write an "Amuse me" with FFVII: Advent Children Cloud, and this was the result. It sort of went in a different direction than I was expecting, so I may try to write something funnier if I get an idea. (This one might get a sequel oneshot that's directly related. I'm not sure yet.)

Characters © Square Enix, etc.

Written by aReadingHeart

Another Day ([ ν ] – εуλ 0009, approximately three months after Advent Children)

As the weak, early morning sun trickled down to a stretch of wasteland, a black motorcycle whizzed across it leaving dust clouds that quickly vanished. The only sign of life out there was the rider, the hour being too late for the monsters that roamed at night and still too early for the daytime predators. The blonde haired man drove without stopping until midday, when he reached a more mountainous section of terrain.

Skidding to a stop in a shaded area, he turned off the engine and shoved his goggles up, rubbing the marks they left on his face. Probably look like Reno now. He slowly climb off his bike, stretching cramped muscles and pulled his travel bag from the storage compartment. A warm, dusty breeze ruffled blonde spikes as he carelessly dropped his worn black gloves and unbuckled the faded black cloak from around his waist. Gaia, it's getting hot…. He used a dusty boot to spread the cloak out as a rough blanket and collapsed onto it. Vaguely rummaging in his travel bag, he fished out a sandwich and thermos of coffee and began to eat his first meal of the day. Tifa's probably calling Marlene and Denzel in for lunch… Wonder what they're having. He looked at his plain chicken sandwich, bought sometime yesterday, and sighed a bit as he continued munching it. When he finished the simple meal, he leaned back against a nearby rock closing his eyes to rest.

After awhile, a ringing noise from his motorcycle disturbed the silence. He almost ignored it out of habit. But that was a habit he was trying hard to break. Crawling on his knees to grab the cellphone from its cradle, he answered it just before it switched to voice-mail, not bothering to check who was calling.

"Strife Delivery Service. You call, we deliver."

"Oi, Cloudy! You gotta sound more enthusiastic than that if ya wanna get more customers!" an overly chipper girl's voice crackled over the speaker.

Cloud sat back and pulled the phone away from his ear to check the caller ID. "Yuffie, tell me you didn't steal Tifa's phone. Again."

"Whaaat? How could you accuse me of that?!"

Silence was the only answer. Oh, maybe past experience.

"Hmph. Geez, you steal a phone once and then everyone suspects you for the rest of your life! And stop rolling your eyes."

"I wasn't." He could imagine the look of indignation that had to be on the partially reformed thief's face.

"Were so. That was your eye roll silence," there was a definite pout in the teen's voice.

"I don't roll my eyes, Yuffie."

"No, you just silently look at someone with a blank 'could you possibly be more stupid' look, pretending to be polite, instead of giving a person the decency of an honest to goodness eye roll!"

The man's lips twitched slightly as he suppressed a snort of laughter at her tirade.

"See? I'm getting almost as good as Tifa at reading you, Mr. Silent Swordsman. Yeesh, if you and Vincent hung out more together, I don't think either of you—"

"Yuffie."

"Would say more than five words." she continued ignoring the interruption. "I mean, you guys have to have some kind of, of, of Strong Silent Type Telepathy or something since—"

"Yuuuffie." She never stops, does she.

"You almost always know what the other one is gonna do or say. 'Cept for that one time when you didn't give him directions 'cause you said he knew where we were meeting an' he got lost and—"

"Yuffie." The stress in his voice, and the fact that he actually raised his voice for a change, finally got through to the babbling ninja and she paused for a moment. "Why exactly are you calling from Tifa's phone?"

"Eh? Oh, I think she wanted to talk to you 'bout something or another or something. But I decided you hadn't heard enough from the White Rose of Wutai recently so I—"

"Give the phone to Tifa now."

"But!"

"Now."

"Hmph. Fine, Mr. Grumpy Britches. See if I spend any of my valuable time on you again!" She huffed and must have pulled away from the phone as she went hunting for Tifa, because Cloud heard a faint call of "Tifa! Your PMSing chocobo wants to talk to you!"

Muffled voices and some rustling indicated the phone changing hands and Tifa's calmer voice was heard. "Cloud? You there?"

"Yeah. Is she gone?" his voice sounded a bit strained.

"Yes," there was the sound of a door closing. "I'm in my room now. Is something—?"

Cloud finally started chuckling quietly, shaking his head at the ninja's antics.

Tifa smiled in relief and started laughing, "You didn't want Yuffie to know she could make you laugh?"

"No, because otherwise she'd never leave me alone. Like Vincent."

"But she was trying so hard to cheer you, the poor thing," the amusement was very apparent in Tifa's voice.

"Che, more like insult me," he was still smiling.

"Well…."

He looked incredulous. "PMSing chocobo? How the hell does she come up with these names?"

"A very active imagination. You should hear some of the things she's called Vince. Moody pants; tall, dark, and mute; the cloak man; our neighborhood bogey man…"

"Not as bad as PMSing chocobo."

"No," Tifa agreed, and then mischief crept into her voice. "Not until she called him a 'PMSing, Bipolar Vampire' to his face."

Cloud began chuckling again.

"For a minute I almost thought he was going to lose it, but he just glared, growled, and left. Almost had to replace the door again."

"Was it as bad, or worse, than when she called him 'Vinnykins'?"

"Worse, but not by much."

"Damn, and I missed it." His chuckling slowly trailed off and he leaned back against his rock again.

"…You sound tired, Cloud."

He exhaled, closing his eyes again. "Sort of."

"How long was your delivery run this time? According to your schedule…" there was a rustling of papers through the phone, "you should be on your way to Junon right now."

He rubbed the back of his neck hesitating for a long moment. "Well… Actually, I'm halfway to Edge now."

Tifa frowned at the world in general, mentally cursing the hardheadedness of the delivery boy. "Cloud! I thought I told you to stop doing these non-stop, no sleep delivery runs! And you promised you would."

"I know, I know. But I got an emergency call for the water, so…." he shrugged even though she would not see.

Her expression and voice softened. "So you had to go."

"Yeah."

There was a lull in the conversation as they both remembered a certain flower girl and the second gift she gave three months ago.

"How… How were they?" Tifa broke the silence first.

"Glad to get the water. Mostly kids, but a few adults. These latest Geostigma outbreaks aren't nearly as bad as before."

"That's good. I hope they'll stop completely soon."

"Yeah… Oh. I pulled a few weeds at the church. Might need to transplant a some of the flowers in a couple of months. A lot of the newer ones are trying to take over the path."

"I'll let Reeve know then, I'm sure he has some locations that could use some brightening."

"Mm. …I'm glad the city is filling with flowers."

"I'm sure they're both happy to see it too."

He nodded, chuckling softly.

"What?"

"Oh, just remembered something. Flower carts."

"Flower carts?" Tifa was clearly puzzled.

"Mmm, guess I never told you… It's an old memory."

"Ah."

Cloud slowly stood, stretching again. "I should get going. Have one more stop to make before getting home."

"What time d'you think you'll be back?"

"Probably around eight pm."

"Alright, see you then! I'll be sure to have some dinner left. Goodbye!"

"Bye, Tif." He ended the call and gathered up his things laying on the ground to repack them.

Roughly brushing the dust off his cloak, Cloud discovered a new hole in it. Great, something else to repair. Tif'll probably want me to go shopping if she finds out… He buckled it around his waist again and closed the lid of the storage compartment after checking his remaining package. "Halfway to Edge city" really meant halfway if you traveled at 200kph, so he needed to hurry if he was going to be on time. The delivery boy started Fenrir's engine and roared across the wasteland, eager to return to the city and most importantly to be home again.