Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VII or any of it's characters, Square Enix does.
Author's Note: I'm sooooo late!! :O Sorry!! But I'm actually kind of proud of this chapter, parts of it anyway. I'll try to get back to a schedule on uploading btw, I promise ^.^
Miss Strife wasn't stupid, she wasn't born yesterday and no one dropped her on the back of her head either. She had a set of brains and she damn well intended to use them! Her mother raised no fool and her father would have beaten the flesh of her bones at the first sight of naivety. Naïve girls got nowhere in life, that's what he always told her. They got married to dumb men, raised dumb children and lived a dumb life. He had always made sure that his girl wasn't stupid and lived her life to the fullest, until he died.
Her father never met Cloud, never knew of the mistake she made by sleeping with a man while not married to him, but she knew he had turned over in shame in his grave. She'd been ashamed when she let herself being led into a bedroom and she'd been ashamed nine months later when she gave birth to a child on her own with no one to support her. The man had left her the morning after the night they came together for the first and last time and Cloud remained unclaimed, a bastard child, born out of wedlock to a mother who didn't let a man rule her life. Nibelheim had hated her the moment she first set foot on the mountain.
But even though she'd been ashamed while giving birth to him, she was not ashamed of her son. Cloud was a gift she didn't deserve and she'd always want to protect. He was a sweet and innocent boy; he was naïve in a way not even her father could have hated him for and always willing to help anyone who asked. Cloud wouldn't hurt a fly and everyone knew it and that was the reason they took out their anger on him. She knew the boys picked on him and that the girls ignored him. She knew he had no friends and that the fact he was leaving for Midgar soon was, despite lonely for her, the best decision he'd ever make. There he could get a proper education and friends, he'd grow tall and strong and Nibelheim would regret treating him so poorly when he came back as a SOLDIER First Class and showed everyone what he was worth, especially that Lockhart girl; Tifa.
But this morning she woke up to Cloud screaming and when he opened his eyes she knew he was different, that he had grown up in a heartbeat and she'd missed it. He was still the fourteen year old boy that went to bed last night with bruises in places he didn't even know could bruise and eyes filled with tears he hoped she couldn't see; only now he was older. There was something in his eyes that showed her that he had suffered a great loss, that he'd carried the weight of the world on his shoulders on his own. And still there were tears in his eyes and an abused body for his soul to live in but she could see the happiness dancing in the glowing blue windows to his soul as he saw her and in her heart she knew that the innocence was lost but her son finally came home.
That same morning her son woke up with the eyes of an old man he brought home a man with red eyes and black hair and probably an even darker past. She gave permission for the man to stay here, believed her son's words that he wasn't dangerous, that he'd help them and that in a month she could kick them both out. She'd laughed and told him, told them both and she meant it too, that they could stay for as long as they liked and the way her boy looked at her then made her realize he knew she knew he wasn't who he used to be.
Cloud stared at his mother for a couple of moments before guiding Vincent to the spare bedroom; he'd have to talk with his mom later. He had practically heard the click in her head when she had looked at him a few moments ago and realized he wasn't who he claimed to be. Somewhere he wondered if he should be afraid that she was going to kick him out but he knew she wouldn't, he was still her son after all and even is he wasn't really her son, he looked like him and she wouldn't be able to bear the thought that she kicked her only son out into a town where everyone hated him with nowhere to go.
Vincent only looked at them both for a moment before he followed Cloud to the room he was going to live in for at least the upcoming month. It was a decent room and defiantly a lot better then an old, dirty and rotten coffin in a mansion that contained nothing but fear and bad memories. Chaos had been relatively quiet in his mind ever since the dreams started, as if he knew this was a life changing occurrence and that if they didn't help the blond not quite boy or man they could and probably would die.
"Okay, Vincent, we need to talk… please tell me what you know?" Cloud sat down on the only chair in the room, forcing Vincent to sit down on the bed, which he did slowly.
"I think I know… everything. I remember talking to a girl, Aerith, she showed me how your friend Zack died and when Tifa found you." Vincent frowned slightly before continuing on with his story, "I saw your journey around the world, trying to catch Sephiroth and I saw how Aerith died and how you met up with everyone else. I saw you battle my son… and I… I saw him die. But he came back two years later, right?" Cloud nodded faintly with a look on his face Vincent couldn't understand. "You killed him again and two years later your friends helped you come back here to stop all that from happening. I know there's a catch to this Cloud, so tell me, what will happen if you fail?"
Cloud, who had been staring at his hands for quite a while now, shot up all of a sudden and started pacing in the middle of the room, gesturing wildly with his arms but not saying a word. Vincent grabbed his arm and easily avoided the punch Cloud threw at him as automatic reaction before pulling him down on the bed. Cloud sighed softly and started massaging his temples, he opened his mouth several times as if trying to explain but nothing came out. They sat in complete silence for a while until Cloud's mother started pulling out pots and pans for lunch and Cloud shot up again, startled by the sudden noise.
"The thing is Vincent, I can't fail and I'm not going to either. Zack deserves a life, as do Aerith and Sephiroth… I'm not going to let them down, okay?" Cloud sighed again and leaned heavily against the window, the mountains were looking so peaceful now compared to how they looked like in his own time.
"No Cloud, it's not okay. Tell me, what will happen if you fail?" Vincent had to stop himself from shaking the small blond not boy standing in front of him.
"The world ends… Sephiroth goes mad, he summons Meteor and succeeds, he'll sail the fucking cosmos with this planet as his vessel and he won't even know it. Jenova will rule over Gaia until it's really dead and then she'll leave Sephiroth to die somewhere in space and go looking for a new planet to destroy. Sephiroth will know what he did before he dies and then everything is gone, the Lifestream is gone and only Sephiroth's soul will be left behind to wander aimlessly through the entire universe until the end of time. Is that enough information, Vincent? The world goes boom and everyone dies because people couldn't keep their hands of off a fucking space alien!"
Cloud slammed his fist against the desk standing in one of the corners of the room with a growl of frustration and surprisingly went straight through it. The wood splintered with a loud creak and the only thing that kept the entire thing from falling apart was the fact that Vincent had immediately sprung into action. Cloud sighed and observed his hand for a moment before putting away all the things that had previously been standing on the desk.
He considered it for a moment to just throw the entire thing out of the window and deal with it later but he couldn't, his mom already suspected something so there was no need to fuel the suspicion. He'd have to apologize and try to fix it and spend precious time on something stupid as fixing a desk he hadn't even intended to break. There was a good thing to this though, he hadn't meant to break the desk but he did, so he was stronger then he had thought he was. The training session this afternoon was going to be very interesting, maybe he'd need less training to get back to full strength then he'd originally thought.
"Cloud?! What's going on up there?!" Miss Strife's footsteps were nearing the stairs and not two seconds later Cloud heard the telltale creak of the first step of the stairs.
"It's nothing mom, really. I accidentally broke the desk in the guest room; I'll fix it either tonight or tomorrow." Cloud called out. He heard his mother stepping of the stairs with a soft sigh.
"It's okay, Cloud. That desk was old anyway so… if you and your friend could at least cut it up in some firewood today?" His mother's voice sounded soft and just the slightest bit tired.
"Mom? You ok… uhm… sure? Are you sure? I can fix this thing you know, it's not that hard."
"I'm positive Cloud, now come down and eat some lunch okay? The two of you probably have a lot to do today, don't you?"
Miss Strife didn't wait for an answer, Cloud could hear her move away form the stairs and into the kitchen. He sighed again and gestured for Vincent to follow him back to the kitchen, which he did. The three of them ate their lunch in silence and afterwards Cloud brought the dishes to the kitchen and promised his mother to wash them tonight, after dinner. She agreed and watched her son but not her real son leave with a heavy heart.
She needed to talk to him because he knew she knew he wasn't who he said he was and she wanted to know why not. She wanted to know what had happened to her son and why this older version of her son had come and how he'd done it. She feared that her boy was dead but at the same time she was happy he had grown into a man, a man that could protect himself against all kinds of enemies. Maybe he wouldn't come back home bruised and broken anymore from now on.
For a while she watched the two men, her son really wasn't a boy anymore, make their way through the backyard to the foot of the mountain and slowly upwards. She knew what they were going to do up there and that when they got back she'd have to act as if she didn't. If her son came back wounded he wouldn't come to her, not that he ever did, but this time she wasn't even allowed to leave the cotton balls and disinfectant somewhere he would find them without knowing she left them there.
The boy she'd known for the past fourteen years wasn't ever coming back, she felt that in her heart, but she'd gotten a man in the boy's place with eyes which spoke of wisdom and a heart of gold. Maybe this was who her son was supposed to be and maybe, just maybe, that thought would be enough.
