Disclaimer: I do not own FFVII or anything in it.

Cloud Strife stumbled a little over boots that had become impossibly heavy, dragging his toes on the floor where they caught on the linoleum. Or maybe it was the cold, the temperature had plummeted in the last few days and his feet had gone numb hours ago, unable to stay warm with only the activity of pacing the main gate. Being Third Class Soldier was harder than he expected. Well, he had expected it to be challenging, especially the fighting, but he didn't know just walking around on guard duty could be so damn exhausting. He supposed it had something to do with the mind-numbingness of it, and the long hours. The infuriating thing was that the more seasoned Third Classes seemed to breeze through it without difficulty.

The hallway of the Third Class quarters at 2:00 am was bleak and poorly lit, the whitewashed cinderblock walls scuffed and dinged and in need of paint. Cloud marveled that he had become so sensitive to decor, even though he knew why. He had become accustomed the posh hallways and living quarters in the tower. But he didn't want to go up there tonight; it was an extra ten minute walk and he would wake Sephiroth, and only to get up ridiculously early and start it all over again tomorrow. This was one of the reasons he had his own quarters, right? And he'd slept here before. Twice. All he wanted tonight was a bed to crash in for a few hours.

He opened the door with his keycard, one specially coded to open everywhere he needed to go, including the elevator to the thirty-fourth floor in the tower and Sephiroth's apartment. He stepped into the darkness of the small room.

"Cloud?" Roberto, his roommate, asked sleepily.

Roberto was a second year Third Class and like Cloud forced to share a room until he had three years in. After three years it was unlikely that a man would progress to Second Class, probably because of low mako level stabilization. At that point career Third Classes moved into another rank with single occupancy rooms and additional privileges. First and second year Third Classes were the lowest of the low.

"Yeah," Cloud said. "Sorry, late night."

Something flew across the room in front of him in the dark, and in a room with no windows Cloud heard and felt it more than saw it. Roberto had thrown something large and light onto Cloud's bed. Cloud found his bunk, with his blanket in a crumpled pile on top of it.

"I was borrowing your blanket," his roommate said.

Cloud kicked off his boots and grabbed his numb toes with his hands. This did little good, since his hands were just as cold. He decided against undressing and just slid into bed, setting the alarm on his watch by repeatedly pushing the backlight button so his could see the face long enough to get right numbers cued up. But he couldn't sleep. He lay shivering, his heart accelerated with his body's effort to keep warm. Twenty minutes passed.

"Rob, are you still up?" Cloud asked quietly.

"Yeah."

"How do you sleep in this cold?"

"Last few days I've been using your blanket."

"Isn't there any heat in here?" Cloud asked.

"There's no heat in this wing. Never has been."

Cloud made a disgusted noise and got out of bed.

"Here," he said, tossing his blanket back to the other Soldier. "I'm going upstairs."

Roberto gave a short laugh. "I don't know why you ever come down here, Strife."

"Because I miss you."

The young man laughed again. "Thanks Cloud. For the blanket."

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By the time Cloud made it upstairs he could barely focus. 3:00 AM, he'd only get two hours sleep at most. He took off his boots inside the door and headed back for the bedroom. Sephiroth would have woken, no doubt, but the General knew the sound of Cloud's step even stumbling along half asleep. Cloud stripped off all his clothes and crawled under layers of warm covers held aloft for him. He sank into the bed, the warm, warm bed.

"I didn't expect to see you tonight," Sephiroth said softly, sounding pleased. He pulled Cloud into his arms, those warm, warm arms.

"Shiva, Cloud, you're freezing! Come here."

Cloud wiggled himself until every inch of his length lay along Sephiroth, sucking heat out of him like a leach. The older man didn't seem to mind at all. As far as Cloud had observed Sephiroth never seemed to get cold.

"Can I request extra blankets for the Third Class wing?" Cloud asked.

"They don't have blankets?"

"Yeah, they do, but not enough. There's no heat down there."

"What do you mean there's no heat down there?" Sephiroth asked, now fully awake.

"There's never been heat down there."

"Well, that's not correct. I distinctly remember heat being installed when we outfitted that wing." Sephiroth wondered how long this had been going on. It was one of the disadvantages to their training- Third Classes especially, eager to impress, avoided complaining to the degree that sometimes they didn't bring up obvious problems.

"I'm leaving early for Kalm tomorrow, but I'll leave a message in the office to have maintenance check it out. In the meantime you can go down to supply and request extra blankets."

"Thanks, Seph," Cloud smiled and sunk into his two hours of sleep.

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Duty the next morning wasn't as bad as Cloud had expected. He drank a hell of a lot of coffee which both warmed him up and kept him awake. The company was lively, if a bit caffeine punchy, and he was done by noon. That was one of the good things about having back to back gate duty. He could sleep the whole afternoon away if he wanted. But Cloud had one more thing to do. He trotted over to the supply warehouse.

"I need some extra blankets," Cloud said to an aged man on the other side of a window. The man's squinty eyes and bushy eyebrows made Cloud think of the troll that guarded the bridge in the fairy tale.

"Fill this out," he croaked, and Cloud wrote his name, number, rank, division currently assigned, and under blankets wrote sixty-three. One for every Third Class currently stationed in Midgar.

Cloud handed the clip board back through the window and bushy eyebrows frowned at it. "Ye can't have sixty-three blankets!"

"Why not?" Cloud gave the man a severe look. He knew the warehouse was probably full of blankets; it was just stupid not to let him have them.

"Ye can't use sixty-three blankets yerself. Ye can have one."

"I need one," Cloud said, with a quiet intensity in his voice that always unnerved him when it was cast in his direction, "For every Third Class in residence. To compensate for the current lack of heat in that wing."

Bushy brows was not impressed.

"General's orders," Cloud added evenly.

The supply troll regarded the young man. Hadn't he seen him with General Sephiroth? Maybe he was his page or something. He supposed he could call somebody and confirm, but the truth was he was terrified of even trying to find out if this came from the General or not.

"Ok, ok, don't need to be gettin' all green on me, ye can have yer damn blankets."

Cloud kept his face severe, but smiled underneath. The blankets came out of a side door piled on an enormous wheeled cart. Cloud took the cart as well without asking. He'd return it later. If he was feeling like it. Stingy old bastard.

He wheeled the cart over to the Third Class wing, and there was stopped for lack of a plan. He could just leave them somewhere, with some sort of note, but given the recent temperatures the first guys to spot them would wind up with four or five each and the rest with none. Most of the guys were on duty, and their rooms were locked. Cloud thought about his keycard. He had been wondering how they coded it for both Sephiroth's quarters and his down here. He swiped it through the reader on first door. The light went green and the door clicked open. Bingo. His card probably opened every Third Class door on the wing. Maybe other things too. Maybe what he had was a duplicate of Sephiroth's card, which opened practically everything belonging to Soldier.

Cloud made short work of the blanket delivery, imagining he was the Winternight Elf delivering gifts. A few guys were around and thanked him heartily, making him feel a bit heroic. The hero of blankets. Cloud wondered about the message Sephiroth had left with the office regarding the heat. A secretary would be calling maintenance; it would probably get put on some enormous list of maintenance stuff to be done... Cloud headed towards the maintenance department.

Maintenance was less controlled than supply, and Cloud wandered through a large area full of spare parts and tools before finding what looked like a desk. A middle aged woman, petite and attractive for her age, sat filling out paperwork. She was dressed in coveralls and Cloud guessed she wasn't a secretary, but rather all the maintenance people just shared this desk to do their paperwork.

"Hey, I'm sorry to bother you," Cloud flashed a smile. "But General Sephiroth wants the heat looked into on the Third Class Soldier wing. He sent a message this morning but had to leave town early. I need to make sure that it gets done before he gets back tonight." Cloud gave another apologetic smile. Another worker passing by heard him and a look of fear and panic took over the man's face. Both he and the woman started rapidly shuffling through carbon triplicate forms on the desk.

"I saw it this morning," the man said.

"I didn't know it came directly from the General," the woman said, "it just said 'Office of Soldier' on it. Here it is."

Just as Cloud had thought, the request had been buried down into the pile of work orders.

"We'll get right on it," the man said. "Do you want us to call you with status when we've found the problem?"

"Uh, no," Cloud said, trying hard to act like he knew what he was doing. What if they needed a decision, or wanted to order parts? This was more than he had bargained for. "Just call the main office."

"OK," The woman said brightly.

Cloud turned to go and with his enhanced ears could hear them whispering behind him. He caught Cloud Strife and General. So maintenance knew who he was. Interesting. And maybe useful. Cloud smiled. Throwing Sephiroth's weight around had proved to be shockingly easy. He took the elevator up to the tower, feeling his fatigue and enjoying the thought of a warm comfy bed, even if Sephiroth wasn't in it.