It's his greatest fear.
When he was still young and stupid, apt to forget on a moment's notice, he made a promise to never forget a certain person's face. And the face was hard to forget – the bearer always had this way of smiling no one else did. His face, even when creased in concentration or covered by callous-worn hands to cover sadness (Cloud always knew, from the way Zack would suddenly turn quiet and just shut off to the world for a few moments), there was a certain confidence in his features. He was a man who knew who he was, what his emotions were, what they signified in the large scheme of things, and he wasn't afraid to show it. Unlike Sephiroth, who rarely showed any emotion in the presence of others, Zack was unbearably human, yet so easy to look up to and admire. So hard to forget.
This is what Cloud thought back then.
Fast forward eight years, two near catastrophes, and countless nightmares, and Cloud can barely remember. What he does remember is pain – an endless, infinite pain that soars on the screams of a million souls, pain that would never quite cease the way the unnatural glow in his eyes would never quite fade away. But that's the present, a present that has stretched on for seven long years. Cloud remembers green, vats glowing like tubes of materia (which is partially true – they're mako). He remembers Sephiroth snapping, staring at tubes of mako like they were his own destruction – no, damnit, no he doesn't remember, not that, not what he shouldn't remember. Cloud takes the metaphorical deep breath, clears his mind, and tries to remember Zack.
He remembers dark spiky hair – he remembers a haze, something, an existence rather than an actual essence – someone calling through it. He remembers a promise, made in the midst of the clashing of training swords, to remember. Who? Zack, that's who it was. He remember something – a figure, a face, built like a Soldier. He remembers Sephiroth, his face hardened and eyes slit into something beautifully inhuman – a pain in the abdomen – oh god it felt like it was splitting him in two, just like last time – like every time thereafter? It was implied in Aerith's haunted smile, the way she gently shoved Cloud out of the cool, gentle lull of nothing, Sephiroth mocking him even as he crumbled away to nothing – oh here's the pain again, this time jagged and tearing, and still there's a voice in the background, male, deep, but drowned out by a million others….
But Zack isn't there.
There's no smile to be remembered. There's a vague notion of a thought of a smile, but no, nothing by the way, no image, nothing that Cloud could retrieve at the moment, point to, and say 'hey, this is Zack, my buddy, my—" – no, but a sea of pain, an irretrievable past made obsolete by the assumption of an identity, a distant voice heard above the static of the world.
It isn't the first time that his greatest fear has come true. Cloud has many of them, too many to count, too many to acknowledge, but all felt with a certain sense of heightened, illogical paranoia. The difference is that he's always been able to conquer his confronted fears before. As for this one, he can only avoid it for now, avoiding anything that could trigger the absence of memory and the paranoia that inevitably comes with it.
In a certain church where light always shines, a sword lies by the pool.
It's only a replica of what Cloud really wants.
A/N: Sorry it's short. It's more me trying to grasp what the character is like than anything.... Anyways... feedback would be appreciated :) Thank you for reading.
(also: could anyone tell me how to work the beta system? I really would like a beta, but don't know how to go through the process - more like etiquette - of doing it. Thanks!)