Well originally, this was the third part of Thoughts of Hope, but halfway through plotting it, I decided I wanted it to be its own story and stuck a completed label on ToH.

To be honest, I am not sure where this fic is going at the moment, I have rough ideas which means updates will be very slow

Thoughts Anew

Perspective

He's isn't Squall.

Even when the reality of it starred him in the face, Cloud didn't like to think that the brunet he once knew grew up into a different person to the one he remembered.

As he lay on the sands of some desert on whatever world it was he and Sephiroth had landed on, Cloud stared at his sword, the scorch marks on the earths that represented what was left of Sephiroth, and he let himself think. Cloud liked to think that he could see fragments of Squall in the man. Small fragments, but pieces of Squall nonetheless. Mostly in the small, rare smiles he occasionally grants the world and the softness he allows to be seen whenever he's with the Keyblade Master. But it's still not that same. That's Leon. And Leon is a whole different creature to Squall; one Cloud isn't sure what to make of; one Cloud doesn't try to learn about because he's too busy missing what that man used to be, too busy missing Squall and the memories that are now slowly trickling back to him. His mind offers glimpses of a Squall who was often ill, who'd cling to him at the playground, who cried and insisted on patching him up anytime Cloud scrapped a knee or got a bloodied nose (a frequent occurrence, Cloud recalled), and the Squall who had to be dragged from the piano or his books to go play outside (when he was healthy, Cloud seemed to remember that an ill Squall would always beg to go outside).

That was Squall; the frail, effeminate and insecure boy. The boy who needed Cloud.

Leon doesn't need him. Leon is strong, independent. Cloud didn't like that change.

To be honest, Cloud didn't think any of them did. At least, not the way he was now. As much as he tried to ignore how different he was, it was glaringly obvious that if Squall changed so had he. He was too dark, too indifferent to everything around him and not very willing to make change.

…so why was he going back?

He isn't Cloud.

In the months following Cloud's departure from Radiant Garden, Leon allowed himself to think on that fact. Leon doesn't see much of the Cloud he can remember in the man. That Cloud was cheeky; he was hyper and he was cared. This Cloud is different and Leon wasn't so sure it was all the darkness's fault either (Not that he'd say that aloud). He can remember a Cloud who always visited him during his frequent illnesses as a child (no matter how boring it was to be so quiet and still), who found it amusing to hide Cid's toolbox; who spent all day swimming in the creek while Squall watched from the shade of a tree; a Cloud who loved to explore Crystal Fissure, no matter how much trouble it got them in. He remembers a Cloud who would come over on a weekend morning and bounce on his bed until he woke up. That was the same Cloud who'd take advantage of his sleeping to sneak onto his computer.

A lot had happened since then. Squall had taken the name Leon and certainly wasn't the timid little boy he had been; Cloud had become sombre, had wandered about in the darkness –neither was what they used to be. In six months post-Heartless, they'd fought more times than they'd ever fought throughout their nine-year friendship as kids. Quietly Leon gave up on regaining that friendship, forcing the memories to be enough, as he found Cloud's new self barely tolerable. He had little sympathy for a man who couldn't pull his head out of his ass long enough to care about their home world beyond the fact that it provided ample Heartless to use for training dummies.

Squall was someone who shared a deep bond with Cloud.

Leon was someone who wasn't even sure he liked Cloud.

So why did he worry about him?

Tbc