This is an AGSZC story. But, Cloud x Aerith may be felt at times. It will NOT however go anywhere and will really only be apparent in this chapter.
Warning: A bit of swearing but nothing too bad.
(Present)
Cloud huffed, blowing bangs from his face.
He wasn't sure how long he had been trapped in this apartment. It was better than a lab at least. His wrists ached from where they were restrained to the bed that was bolted to the floor with SOLDIER issued straps. They were the same type Hojo had used on Zack and eventually him during that time.
A shiver ran through him.
He continued to stare at the paint on the wall. It was moving or maybe that was just his mind playing tricks on him. He snorted, it wouldn't be anything out of the ordinary for it to do so.
He breathed in slowly, blinking as he did so.
Who knew how long he had been lying in this bed, hours? Days? Who knew.
All the while he contemplated this he tried to understand his own thoughts and emotions as well.
There had been no sight of the others but he had a feeling that wouldn't last long.
There was however doubt on whether the anticipation he was feeling was in dread or something else entirely
He scowled at nothing.
He was was beyond angry at the moment. Pissed off was the better term.
Hadn't he done enough.
Hadn't he saved the world enough times.
Hadn't he shouldered enough pain.
Hadn't he gave up his own happiness too many times to count, time after time. Killed him countless times for the sake of others.
Even as the tears flowed down his face and the nightmares curled around him every night until they bled into day, tighter and tighter, pulling him into the void. Choking him with the memories.
Hadn't he-
He blinked back tears.
Why couldn't he just be happy, he had a new family to take place of the old even if something was missing. He couldn't bring himself to acknowledge the last part.
He now had a family that was supported of a misery ridden asshole such as himself. One he could return to without fear at the end of the day and know they would still be there. One that he cherished now more than anything in the world.
Yet that was no longer a possibility.
He screwed up.
He wasn't sure how or why.
But Gaia had so generously decided that what he had done just wasn't enough. He had to start over. At the beginning and in more way then one, the end as well.
He had understood it had been dying but he had thought, had truly thought it was healing. Green had started taking over where once had only been grey and filthy brown of broken cities and land. The people were healthier, happier and more devote to taking care of the planet more than ever. No more deadly diseases from the lifestream, no more Jenova, no more...Sephiroth.
So why?
Sometimes he wondered if in some past life he had pissed off some god or goddess or another to deserve such a fate. Perhaps the goddess Minerva herself, he thought humorlessly.
Regardless, that didn't mattered at the moment.
As far as he knew he was stuck here. For how long he couldn't be certain. He might be stuck here forever as far as he was concerned. He wasn't sure that even if he fixed things he would be sent back and even if he did, he definitely wouldn't return to the way he knew things were.
He wouldn't return back to the people he knew and loved.
Though, they would have to twist his arm behind his back to get him to admit it out loud.
That brought a small smile to his face in fondness.
But the thought of not returning to 7th Heaven with AVALANCHE made his heart ache in a way it hadn't in a very, very long time. The thought that they wouldn't even know his face or name brought an unsettling cold upon him.
The worst part was he wasn't positive on which would be worse, fixing things or leaving them as is.
Yet there was nothing he could do at the moment.
He still wished this was nothing more than some terrible nightmare and any moment he would wake up. But wishing did nothing. This was too real, too detailed, too alive to be anything but.
It was just too much and certainly was more than anything a product of his deranged mind could ever come up with.
All he could do now was simply wait. Wait for what he didn't know. Escape? A fight? Something else entirely?
He sighed. Nothing could go right for him, could it?
He thought back to how he ended up in this situation.
(Past)
He had woken up in Aerith's garden.
His first sight had been forest green eyes.
He lay there calmly for moments or maybe hours. Who knew in a dream. Suddenly he bolted upright, surprising the girl into taking a few steps back from him. Ever careful of her flowers mind you.
Cloud was used to dreaming of Aerith and her garden. It was much better than dreaming of other things...of other people.
But this, this was certainly...new. He couldn't help but noticed the differences as if they were glaring out at him.
Aerith looked the exact same. That is if you ignored her slightly more girl like appearance. Yet, she was still the same kind and level headed young woman he knew...she...however, did not seem to know him.
Secondly, she sported no pink. No pink dress, no pink ribbon instead a simply blue dress and white hair-tie in there place. He remembered the gown from memories of Zack's. Ones that had long since filtered out of his mind but had still left their impressions on him.
Despite that he had still always associated the brunette with her signature color. Never anything else. Ever.
When he dreamed everything was constant, nothing changed. He thought that it was perhaps his mind's way to cope. So many things had constantly changed in his life, left him with so many unknowns he wouldn't recover them for years. Most had been for the worse and in such a short time period as well.
That was why his dreams were always the constant.
If he could keep one thing. Anything the exact same in his dreams then maybe, maybe he would have a bigger chance at keeping them clear in his memories as well.
Keep them from fading away. Dissolving into nothingness and leaving him blank.
He never wanted to be that way ever again. It took him forever to regain his past memories including ones, he sometimes wished had never been brought up again.
It made the betrayal, the loss and hate all the more harder and so much more harsher.
So why? Why was he suddenly dreaming of her in something else? Something he had no true association with.
He glanced at his surroundings. The church which had always been in some sort of disarray especially after the remnants had left it in ruins, looked...well it looked extremely well taken and much better than he ever remembered, that Zack even remembered.
There was no hole in the ceiling, no crashed pillars, no overturned pews. A thin layer of dust here and there but nothing as bad as he was accustomed to
He continued his quick inspection, taking note of all the differences he did not immediately recognize and the ones he could recall no memory of whatsoever.
Final he noticed where he had been lying, he was surrounded by her flowers. A short sigh of relief left him. This was something he was used to. But there was something wrong here. He frowned.
They felt...real, too real.
He caught sight of sunlight shining through one of the windows onto gleaming metal. His swords, put together and intact and wholly out of place in his dreams. Never had he dreamed of his sword save for nightmares and never in Aerith's garden either.
Dread was slowly creeping over him.
Surely he must me dreaming, this was just his imagination. Right?
Yet...his dreams had never had such intensity, the colors never as vibrant, never this much detail, texture and the fragrance...
Oh Gaia.
It was too powerful to be anything but real. It was something that could only be smelled in such magnitude and severity by the flowers themselves.
He shook his head at that notion.
That couldn't be. The flowers had long since been over taken by Aerith's healing well.
He took a look around him again. His eyes finally resting and focusing on Aerith again in thought, widening as they did so.
It couldn't be...His hands clenched.
Nothing he did would ever bring her back...them back.
So how? Why?...
He must be imagining things, that could be the only answer as to this odd world he had been placed into.
"...Are you okay?" His eyes snapped to the flower girl again. She was looking at him cautiously yet a concerned look deep in her eyes.
This was becoming too much.
He must have finally lost it. This was some kind of hallucination or delusion from a mind that had finally broken down utterly and completely.
He could only stare. This wasn't at all like what he was used to. What he knew. He felt light headed and noted faintly he felt the need to hyperventilate.
This couldn't possibly be real.
A weight dropped in his stomach.
"I ha-I have to go..." He slurred out, attempting to stand but felt his knees buckle beneath him as soon as he tried.
Aerith was instantly by his side.
"You're in no place to go anywhere." She said firmly, he could see out of the corner of his eye a determination in her own.
It would be no use in fighting her.
He didn't have it in him at the moment anyway.
His body felt like lead and her warmth was too good to be ignored, he felt himself relax against hers. Even as his better judgement told him not to. The body he leaned against relaxing as well.
If he was going insane, Not that he wasn't already. He might as well enjoy it while it lasts.
(very small time skip)
He guess he should be grateful for the comfort, the warmth and the familiar-ness but somehow it had made him mournful as well.
Regardless of her own weariness of him at first because of his eyes.
Which he felt she well should be.
Ever the caring and motherly figure she was. Aerith had made sure he was 100% before he was even allowed to get up again.
His protests could barely leave his lips before she would shoot them down and away.
Though, he was allowed to help her tend to her flowers that he had inadvertently squashed.
It always left him smiling inside only to quickly be replaced by a somber one.
Despite the rightness that was Aerith, he couldn't deny that this situation was entirely wrong.
He tried desperately to believe that this wasn't real. Even as a small part of him that was quickly growing as the days past wanted it to be.
He entertained the idea that this was a chance. A gift, something he always dreamed of that was finally coming true.
A chance to actually be there for her. Yet it left him with an equally grim thought that he might ended up failing her...again.
Yet in order to succeed he would have to do things...he would have to kill. He would have to face them...
He didn't think his heart could handle it.
He had not stepped foot out of the church and couldn't bring himself to even look out its windows. Just incase he caught sight of them. Regardless of the fact it would make no sense for them to be in Sector 5 let alone near this church. Non had met Aerith as of yet or at least what he could remember of there social lives.
His heart clenched painfully in his chest.
He loved her he did but his love for them was something he didn't want to pit it up against. He knew which one would win and he couldn't stop the feeling of needing to puke at the wrongness of it.
He shouldn't feel that way about them, even after all this time. After everything they did. Everything they caused to happened to him and those he cared about. Even Za-
He blinked his eyes from the sudden moisture. Even the bubbly ravenette, he couldn't stop his feelings of loss and resentment at the taller man for leaving despite the fact the man had no control over dying.
He had lost everything and though he had gained a lot of new things back. It did not dismiss all the pain and torment he had been put through because of them. What he was still being put through.
He sighed, he seemed to be doing that a lot lately. He brushed his fingers over the soft petal of flowers without much thought.
Consumed instead by his own raging emotions.
He still held on to the hope this was all his imagination. In some way it seemed better to think this was a mental break down than to think (to know) it was real.
It wouldn't hit him until days later in the form of a certain silver haired man with mint green eyes that this was as real as it could ever get.
Soon however he had finally been deemed well enough to get up and move about at his leisure and Aerith thought the best way to help him continue to recover was some good old fashion fresh air.
He had never had a fear of the outside, if anything he preferred it to the indoors. Even as a child he felt more relaxed and at home taking walks in the forest or scaling a cliff or mountain side then he did at the small house he shared with his mother. Even as she worried and told him not to as he could get hurt. But being the stubborn little one he was he often did so anyway.
He was still that same stubborn child, or at least that is what Tifa would say with a scolding look on her face despite the laughter in her eyes.
Yet it was this stubbornness that was to blame as to why he could never admit out loud what bothered him, what he felt and what scared him.
But now he almost wanted to yell out his fear. Admit he was scared.
He was scared to leave the safety of Aerith's church. Scared of the possibility he may come across one of them.
How very real that fear was and how quickly it would become true.
That in itself scared him almost more than the thought of catching Hojo's eye again did.
Yet, he had foolishly said nothing.
Lips tight as ever he reluctantly let himself be pulled out of the safety of the building and out into the open.
He was sure the Turks already knew of his presence or at least Tseng did. He had seen the raven haired man on occasion when Aerith open the doors just a little too wide and a little too long. He knew the other must have see him as well but had yet to approach him, at least...for the moment.
He followed after Aerith quietly, like a sore thumb he could feel more than see people's eyes on him throughout the day.
He brushed them off or tried to.
He should have asked for some kinda cloak or at least a hat to disguise himself, even if only a little.
But he hadn't and now he stood there with his wild blond hair, glowing eyes, black leather and cloth, 5'7'' glory.
It didn't help he had decided to bring his sword with him as well.
If he was looking for attention, he certainly found it.
That was for sure.
Aerith, however paid no mind to the obvious gawking towards her companion. Content to enjoy the open air and sell her flowers to anyone she could.
Today, she seemed to have no problem with that and was quickly getting low on them. She chalked it up to a sudden interest in flowers but knew it was really because of the handsome blond she had dragged along with her.
She glanced over to him. He seemed lost in space.
She laughed quietly, he seemed oblivious to the longing eyes from fangirls and boys that came up to her to buy a flower.
If only to need a reason to approach the man.
Their attention was almost always solely on the blond, faces red with growing blushes and squeals leaving them when ever Cloud replied back to any of their comments or questions.
He always looked confused and would look questionably over to her after and it was time like that she couldn't help a chuckle escape her.
It was then she would see even more confusion in his eyes and she couldn't help but let out an actual laugh.
He was adorable like a lost puppy or baby chocobo based on his ridiculous amount of hair.
She could already see a growing group follow them the longer they were out.
She smiled and looked into her basket, it was almost empty now and decided now would be a good time to give the poor blond a much needed break.
She informed him they could head back now, chuckling at the flustered look on his face from a few girls that were asking if they could have his picture.
"Well let's mosey then." He grunted, untangling himself from a particularly brave and handsy one.
All Cloud wanted to do at this point was to go run and hide. Gaia, he sounded like a lost child.
That is the end for now.
I'm breaking this chapter into two and decided to leave it off on a happy note for once. Next chapter will include more on Cloud's thoughts and his fight with Sephiroth.
Thoughts on Cloud:
He is definitely angsty in this fic, that's undeniable but I also wanted to show a different side of him as well.
I wanted to show that he is still deep down that innocent trooper with larger than life dreams. Despite all the crude he's been through he would still be that person to get embarrassed easily and a bit oblivious of it at first by excess attention and would blush like crazy all the way.
