"Please sign here-"
Cloud raised his eyes and blinked. Where in the world was he? Gone were the busy WRO suits in the lobby and the tired looking receptionist who was supposed to accept the delivery.
Instead, he found himself in a big, dark, cavernous temple filled with the stench of old moss and decay. He sneezed once.
He sighed. If this was like that time where he ended up in a 'fight-for-all' stage with giant hands, stout plumbers, and colourful and fluffy creatures, then this was a new stage. Or if this was like that another time when he was pulled into an ongoing cosmic war with yellow dragons, manikins, and a not dead Sephiroth, then this was also a new stage, or a memory world that wasn't his.
Cloud decided to wait. If this was like any of those situations, then the foe/adversary/manikin would appear sooner or later and challenge him to a duel/smash/fight or whatever they called it. He idly rifled through the delivery slips, checking those that were still incomplete, and those that were done.
Hmm. Higher demand for Chocobo greens with the expansion of the Chocobo Farm and the racing tracks. Stock up on X-potions order for an Edge weapon shop. A delivery to Rocket Town regarding some fragile items.
He tucked the clipboard under his arm to check the PHS. 15 minutes. Nothing. This stage was taking longer to spawn enemies, at least. He expected fanfare, confetti and glitter with the announcement of a 'new challenger approaching', or the sudden drop in atmospheric pressure and the sense of wrongness when a manikin bumbled by.
But nothing so far.
Cloud sighed again, and started walking down the long corridor. Maybe this was an event, where he had to walk upon a certain threshold for something to happen. His heavy footsteps were unnaturally loud in the dark place, and the occasional drip of water from the ceiling didn't help with the eerie atmosphere.
He stopped when the distant sound of talking and hissing reached his ears.
Oh, there it is. Event threshold.
Cloud quickened his pace until he came across a cavern carved to resemble the head of a man and a giant serpent slithering out of its mouth. There were kids stumbling around, a probably dead one over there, and a bigger kid smugly posing, and an old hat being trampled on by the harried footsteps.
What was going on?
His musings were cut short when the serpent reared its head and hissed menacingly, and Cloud locked eyes with it. Ribbon tightened and his body tingled, which meant that status effects were on the table, and Cloud threw away his clipboard and unsheathed First Tsurugi in a smooth motion, readying for battle.
"Wait, who are you-"
"Don't stare at its eyes!"
"Where did he come from?"
The sudden babble of panicked voices just became background noise, and Cloud leaped with his sword ready. The serpent reared its head to strike, but Midgar Zoloms were bigger and nastier than this smaller breed. He effortlessly sidestepped the lunge of its jaws, and clipped it with a quick slash of his sword. Not enough weight put behind his attack to do serious damage, but effective to make it mad.
He stopped the lash of its tail with the flat of his blade and went flying, but he oriented himself and used the walls as a springboard to jump at it again.
The kids were throwing brightly coloured flashes of light at the monster with a stick, but immediately dove away when the serpent changed its focus to them. Smart kids. He cast All-Barrier on them, and the magic shimmered translucently under the weak light of the cavern. Were they using a stick as a weapon? Where were the materia slots on those twigs? Even Aerith's smallest staff was tall enough to reach her chest-height.
"Don't look at its eyes it will kill you, uh, sir, whoa-!"
The black, curly haired kid shouted at him, and barely managed to run behind stone pillars as the mini Zolom struck out with its tail again. He was waving a silver sword with his stick, and it looked like he had absolutely no idea how to use the weapon. Cloud bit back another small sigh.
So the monster could cast Death Sentence and he had kids with no training with a weapon. Wonderful.
"Stay away!" he barked, and pulled out one of the smaller blades from First Tsurugi, and dove under another mouthful lunge, and jumped on top of its scaly head. The serpent shook itself furiously, but Cloud used the upjump and in a whirl of black and flashes of steel, gouged out the monster's eyes.
"No!", the posh kid screamed, and Cloud rejoined his blades. What was the deal with that kid?
The beast, blinded and dripping with blood and venom, shook itself lashing out wildly. Cloud deliberated a second regarding using a Summon to end the fight quickly, but then decided against it. Whatever he pulled from the Master Summon materia would have been overkill, and would probably bring down the entire cave on them.
His limit break was close anyway.
And right on time. Energy pooled inside him, and Cloud let it loose in a high jump and brought First Tsurugi down on top of the beast's head, the energy cutting through the scales, muscle, and bone and tearing a claw-like rend on the floor.
The monster's decapitated head fell with a loud thud, reverberating inside the cavern like a loud gong and Cloud flicked away the blood and serpent flesh from his blade before clipping it to its sheath. The rest of the body followed, falling limply behind its severed head shedding scales and smelling of burnt flesh.
The ringing silence after was just more foreboding than before.
"NO!"
"Yes!"
The sudden outbreak of voices startled Cloud out of his post-battle reverie, and he looked around. The two kids darting around had come out of their hiding spots and were babbling excitedly, and the posh kid looked like he was about to faint. And speaking of which-
He made to the slumped kid, and checked her pulse. Weak, getting weaker.
"Ginny!"
The two kids broke out from their excited chatter and scrambled next to him, and the ginger-haired boy waved his snapped twig in the air. "I-I don't know any healing spells!" The other one dropped his sword to the floor and looked desperately at Cloud.
"Can you help her? Please! She is dying!"
He was about to reply when the smooth voice cut in. "Too late. I have her now." Cloud looked up to see the aristocratic kid smirk. "What do you mean?" he asked, and the two kids from before started babbling.
"That's Voldem-"
"He's killing Ginny-"
"He tried to kill us!"
"He doesn't die-"
"The notebook!"
He waved his hands in an attempt to calm them down. Undying? Killing others? That sounded unfortunately like a certain nemesis he knew. And this kid was what, seventeen? Sixteen? A bit early to start, in his opinion.
"So, you used a Vampire Fang on this kid?" If he was casting Drain on her, then this was the obvious explanation.
The kid just remained quiet, neither confirming nor denying it. The air of smug superiority still remained though, and Cloud bit back another sigh. He acted like a brattier version of Rufus, and Cloud did not have the energy nor the patience to deal with him so he shifted his attention on the girl in front of him.
Cloud focused on the materia slotted in his bracer, and cast the strongest Esuna on the slumped girl. Then Life2. The cavern was illuminated with the bright glow of Phoenix Downs falling on the floor, and the winged figures descending from the sky, and the girl, Ginny? gasped and shot up from her position.
"What did you do?" The now not so smug kid growled half in anger and half in astonishment, and his subsequent question was lost in the wake of excited chattering of the kids hugging and smiling.
It was cute. Cloud felt a smile twitch in his lips, and stood up dusting his pants. The red haired boy helped the equally red-haired girl up -brothers and sisters, Cloud decided- and the curly kid followed suit, clutching the silver sword and the stick again and pointing it at the now wary bratty Rufus wannabe. The kids glared at each other, their tension mounting, and Cloud was tired of standing around a damp, disgusting cavern with the remains of a beheaded serpent not disappearing into the Lifestream.
"Right. Moving on." Cloud muttered, and picked up the clipboard he had thrown away before the fight, -Thank Shiva it was undamaged, the re-filing claims would have been a nightmare-, and picked up the small black notebook that was also lying a few steps away.
Suddenly, the ginger girl broke away from the boys and snatched the notebook from his hands. She ran and grabbed one of the chipped fangs of the serpent, and with an angry yell, plunged the tooth into the notebook.
The tall boy screamed in pain, and the notebook started oozing black. She screamed angrily, and stabbed the notebook again and again, with the boy started gaining fractures of light, falling down in agony.
Cloud, alarmed, stopped the kid from plunging the tooth once more, snatching her wrist.
"What are you doing?"
"Let go! He started everything!" If the venom in her voiced surprised him, he didn't comment on it.
She struggled, and Cloud let her go but grabbed the almost ruined notebook out of her reach. The two other kids also looked flabbergasted by his actions, and the curled up cracked boy coughed and shakily stood up.
Cloud had seen stranger things than a glowing boy, so he just cast a quick glance to see he was not dead yet, and turned his attention to the younger trio.
"Nobody is going to kill anybody else, until things settle down. Alright?" Gaia, these kids were Denzel's age, and were threatening each other with death already. What was wrong with them?
He wiped away the drooling notebook with a slight grimace, and clipped it to the clipboard along with his delivery slips. There. No sudden snatchings or forgetting its existence now.
Cloud looked at them, and they shuffled awkwardly. Some still seething with righteous anger, and some others more subdued. They all looked tired and worn out. He cast All-Cure3 on them, and they immediately looked invigorated, even the fractured kid still keeping his distance. The notebook felt warm under his arm.
"Was that wandless magic?" the freckled boy asked, and the rest leaned in with interest, even the girl sullenly tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. "I've never seen magic pull someone from death before!" that comment made the tall boy also whip his head around and stare at him with unnerving intensity. Cloud felt uncomfortable with the sudden interest of the kids, so he just shrugged.
"I can answer your questions later. But introductions first?" He was tired of calling them ginger boy, ginger girl, tall and dark Rufus, and curly boy in his head.
The redhead boy began first. "I'm Ron!" The girl added, "I'm Ginny. His sister." Cloud nodded, and turned his attention to the curly boy who followed with a small, "I'm Harry. Harry Potter." For some reason, the redhead kids puffed up while the latter gave an uncomfortable smile. Cloud only blinked at them. "Right. And you are?" When he turned to the tall one, he could see through the corner of his eyes the other trio mouthing an incredulous He doesn't know?
"Voldem-"
The redhead- Ron, Cloud corrected himself- immediately muffled the rest of Harry's answer and Ginny only glowered at him. Right. Bad blood between these four.
"I'm Tom Marvolo Riddle."
"He's Voldem-!"
Another muffled slap. Cloud only raised his eyebrows but when the kids refused to elaborate on the naming, he let it drop. More important than that, was getting out of this dreary place.
He made eye contact with each of the kids to reassure them, and then looked around the cavern to find a discernible exit. "I'm Cloud."
Ron snorted and Ginny gave him a quick jab of elbows. "Like, the fluffy things in the sky? That sometimes rains?" Harry asked somewhat incredulously, and Cloud only nodded. He had enough teasings regarding his name, and this kids' surprise ranked pretty low on the list of offensive things he had been called before.
"So, does anybody know the layout of this cave? I would normally go exploring, but I'd rather not take any chances with the serpent not returning to the Lifestream."
Ginny asked, "What's the Lifestream?" when Harry chimed in, "It's a Basilisk." They looked baffled for a second at each other and Ron shrugged. Cloud looked back, and saw that Tom had disappeared somewhere and bit back another sigh. He couldn't go on a crusade to look for him when he had three others to take care of.
He was about to answer when he was interrupted by a musical trill that filled the air, and Harry happily cried out,
"Fawkes!"
That was a Phoenix. Smaller than the Summon, but definitely a Phoenix. Who had summoned a Phoenix? He had yet to see any of the kids use materia, and all the summon ones were back in Edge, inside his room in 7th Heaven with the exception of Leviathan, which he had returned to Yuffie.
Cloud dragged his attention back to the present where Harry was explaining how the bird could carry people while the rest of the kids were nodding and staring awed at the beautiful bird. The blond cast another look around the cavern. No Tom yet.
"Right. You kids just go on ahead. I'll just scour the floor for anything missing-"
Ron immediately stopped admiring the bird, and went pale. Did the kid need another Cure? When the other kids also looked at him with worried eyes, Ron only shook his head and screamed,
"Lockhart!"
a/n: Haven't posted anything on in forever! Was going to delete the profile but I re-read the comments on old, old fics (I love them all, thank you!) and was hit with a sudden nostalgia attack. ha. My writing style changed significantly throughout the years, and it definitely shows. Just a quick note, I haven't seen HP movies after they came out years ago so my memory of everything is fuzzy. Did research but hey, my first book of HP was the 5th one, and not even an English one at that. So I'm basing myself on movies. This won't be long, and just wrote it to see Cloud interact with strange kids haha.
Edit: Sorry I forgot that Basilisks kill with sight and HP characters were only petrified by looking at its reflection! Edited the parts now.