MAKING THE CUT
"Honor can be quite a burden, at times." ~ Angeal Hewley
DAY 6
"Today will be your test day," Crimson announced when Cloud walked in the training room. The cadet froze. Test? He thought that wasn't for three weeks still. "Next week you will be tested again to see if you've improved any."
"What am I going to be tested on, sir?"
"Pushups, situps, jumps, laps and sprints," the redhead answered shortly. "I suggest you stretch first to make sure you don't pull any of those muscles you've been working to build."
Cloud glanced at his arms. They still looked the same to him. "Yes, sir," he nodded as he flopped down and began to stretch his legs.
"I'm not going be available tomorrow for training, so you'll have to join your combat class for the day."
The cadet grimaced. After yesterday, that was the last thing he wanted to do. But, he supposed, being a First, Crimson would inevitably be called away by more important duties. "If I may ask, sir," he said as he leaned to touch his toes. He could almost reach them now, he noticed. "Is this training cutting into your own affairs?"
Crimson snorted. "You mean am I wasting my time with a miserable excuse for a cadet when I should be doing other things?" he sneered.
A blush crept up to Cloud's cheeks. "If you want to put it that way, sir..."
"Well I'm not." The First moved closer and loomed over him. "I'm spending my well-earned time cultivating the raw talent in what I believe could become a promising student.
Had he heard Crimson correctly? "R-Really?"
"Yes. And if you're done asking stupid questions, you should start doing pushups."
Still processing his answer, Cloud absently turned over and began his pushups. Crimson had just, however indirectly, called him a promising student! Was he really? Or was the redhead lying to be nice? Then again, why would he? After all, no one in their right mind would waste their spare time working with a complete and utter failure. Perhaps there was hope for him after all.
He was suddenly knocked to the floor by a foot between his shoulder blades. "You make a fantastic worm, wiggling all over the place like that," Crimson hissed, "but that is not what I am training you for. Do it right or I'll tie both your arms behind your back and make you do them."
Cloud furrowed his brow. How was he supposed to—? He quickly straightened himself and put all his concentration into his posture. No more insults came. He managed to surprise himself by getting all the way up to thirty pushups before his arms threatened to give out on him.
"C-Can I stop now?"
"I don't know. Are you done?"
Gritting his teeth, the blond rolled over to a sitting position. Crimson was back to being frustrating and unhelpful, he saw. "Yeah, I'm done," he nodded.
"Very well. I expect you to do thirty pushups instead of twenty from now on."
The redhead remained quiet during Cloud's twenty-seven sit ups, four laps around the training room and his nineteen-second sprint. While he was jogging, he realized that for the first time since his arrival to ShinRa, he didn't feel lost. He wasn't getting buried underneath a swarm of other, better cadets, all vying for their instructor's attention. It was just him and Crimson, and Crimson would most definitely let him know if he was doing something wrong. It was... reassuring, in a way.
When he was finished, the redhead handed him a metal bat. Cloud blinked up at him owlishly.
"Ever played baseball, Strife?"
"Er, no."
Rolling his eyes, Crimson flipped the bat around in the blond's hands. "Of course not," he muttered.
"Well, I've seen it played before."
"So happy I could die, Strife."
The First grabbed the upper part of the bat and tugged on it. Cloud immediately let go, thinking he wanted it back.
"No!" Crimson looked close to slapping him. "Keep a hold of it and don't let me pull it out of your hands. You need a strong grip, bird brains."
Flushing at the insult, Cloud tightened his hands back around the base of the bat and allowed the redhead to tug at it until he was satisfied he wasn't letting go.
"I'm going to stand over there," Crimson pointed to the far end of the training room, "and throw tennis balls at you."
"Where am I supposed to go when I hit it?"
The SOLDIER blinked. "Nowhere. You just stay where you are."
"W-wait," the blond stammered, confused. "What if I get a foul? Or I miss? Can I strike out? And what about a catcher? Are you going to throw curve balls? I'm not even wearing my lucky underwear!"
Cloud took the hint to shut up when Crimson gave him a withering look. "Stand here, hit what I throw at you," he snapped, poking the cadet's chest. "You. Don't. Go. Anywhere. Capisce?"
Biting his bottom lip, he nodded hastily.
"Good. Because otherwise I'll make sure you'll never be able to get your underwear off again."
And so, under the threat of permanently sporting his moogle-print undies, Cloud remained where he was as Crimson stalked off. Plucking a tennis ball out of the infamous white bucket, the redhead chucked it at him without fanfare. The cadet's attention zeroed in on the object flying towards him. He panicked, squeezing his eyes shut, and swung the bat with all his might.
"Did I hit it?" he squeaked, opening an eye.
"What do you think?"
The next half-hour saw Crimson throwing tennis ball after tennis ball, only to have Cloud miss every single one of them. Only two actually hit; the first clipped the very tip of the bat and the second was the one that nailed him right in the forehead, but Cloud suspected Crimson had done that on purpose. Either way, the only thing that seemed to have been accomplished was discovering the fact that he was terrible at baseball.
Fed up, Cloud slammed the bat to the ground. "I'm sick of this!" he yelled. "I'm tired and this is completely pointless! I want to get into SOLDIER not a baseball league!"
Crimson silently walked back over to him and picked up the bat. "And just how do you plan on getting into SOLDIER, I wonder?" he said, almost to himself, as he went to retrieve one of the tennis balls. "You know we use swords, right?"
The blond nodded hesitantly.
"Believe it or not, it takes much more talent to wield a sword correctly and effectively than it does a gun." Crimson tossed the ball up in the air and caught it. "It's combination of power, speed and agility, as well as connecting your mind with your body."
Cloud watched as the redhead tossed the ball up into the air and swung the bat as it came down. The tennis ball zipped through the air faster than his eye could track before embedding itself deep within the wall. A loud BANG! resounded around the room.
The breath caught in his throat. Had Crimson really managed to apply enough force to get a tennis ball to dent metal and stay there? Because as far as he was aware, tennis balls bounced off of everything.
"I'll tell you a secret, Strife," the redhead said, handing Cloud the bat. "I've never played baseball in my life."
"Then how...?"
"I spend an absurd amount of time swinging at things," he shrugged. "A sword becomes an extension of oneself and it is of the utmost importance to be able to control exactly where it's going. If you can't tell where the tip of your blade is without looking, you're going to find it difficult to hit anything. Baseball requires the batter to hit a small object at various speeds and heights, thus is an ideal preparation."
Pieces began to click into Cloud's mind. "This is practice for sword fighting?" he asked. Who would have thought?
"And Cadet Strife slides home!" Crimson exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. "The crowd goes wild!"
His cheeks burned once again and he lowered his eyes to the floor in embarrassment.
"Now, please listen carefully because I am not repeating myself."
Suddenly, Crimson was behind him, forcing his shoulders back and pushing his elbows down by his sides.
"Stand up straight," he ordered. "You have this nasty habit of curling in on yourself and not only does it give enemies the impression that you'll simply roll over for them, it also takes away some of your height. And you desperately need that."
Cloud wanted to yell that it wasn't his fault he was short, but chose to remain silent and stood as tall as he could.
The redhead nudged at one of his boots. "Widen your feet a little. It'll help you keep your balance better." Crimson moved around to face him again. "And for Shiva's sake, relax," he said. "Whenever you try to move, you have to unclench your muscles, move your arms, only to tense up again. Do you know how much time you're wasting doing that? Loosen up a bit and you'll be shocked at how much faster you are."
Taking a deep breath, the blond shut his eyes and forced himself to relax. He imagined himself in a field full of flowers on a warm sunny day, where the birds were chirping and nothing was going to jump out and eat him. When he opened his eyes again, he felt calm.
"Alright," the redhead murmured, backing away a few steps and extending one arm out to the side. "Without looking at your bat, I want you to touch my hand."
Cloud concentrated, trying to estimate where the other end of the bat was. It swished underneath Crimson's hand by several inches. Gritting his teeth, he moved the bat up a little and tapped the SOLDIER's palm. Crimson raised his hand.
"Now pull it back as if you were going to take another swing and touch it again."
Angeal sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. Down below, on the other side of the one-way glass, Genesis was adjusting the blond cadet's faulty position with the baseball bat, mouth moving as he talked. He watched incredulously as Genesis stood opposite Cloud and stuck one arm out to the side. Slowly, the cadet moved the bat, only to have it swing under Genesis' hand. He corrected the miss, and the redhead lifted his hand a half-foot. The blond repeated the move, this time hitting too far above the hand.
Even after their conversation in the library yesterday, the First couldn't help remaining uneasy with Genesis' enthusiasm about training Cloud. The commander seemed only to enjoy doing one thing to cadets: making their lives miserable. Not only that, but he'd never had much patience to be around other people and tended to lose his temper rather easily. Consoling himself with the fact that he could be potentially saving Clouds life, Angeal snuck into the observation room to monitor them.
Never had Angeal been at a loss of what to think as he was right then. The first part of the training session seemed to go relatively well; the cadet did his physical exercises while Genesis looked on, but then the redhead brought out a bat and they proceeded to play baseball of all things. Cloud was bad at it too; consistently missing for the next thirty minutes or so until he got too frustrated. Which let to the bizarre activity they were doing now.
They continued on like that for a while, with Cloud having little to no success. Finally Genesis lowered his hand and gave the cadet's shoulder a squeeze as he passed, saying something over his shoulder while he walked towards the door. The blond looked after him for a moment, then began to collect the stray tennis balls.
Angeal would have been lying if he said he hadn't been secretly wishing Genesis would take an interest in teaching. He had skills that no one else did, and it would give him a chance to learn how to associate with other people better. But taking on a student as part of a bet with Sephiroth of all people was not how he'd envisioned it occurring.
Letting out a heavy sigh, Angeal stood up from his chair and turned to leave.
Only to freeze when the observation door opened.
"Angeal."
His jaw flapped a few times while Genesis' expression changed from surprised to confused to very, very angry. "Genesis, I'm—"
"You're what?" the redhead snapped, throwing an arm in the air. "You're sorry I caught you spying on me?"
"I wasn't spying on you," Angeal protested weakly.
It didn't take much to see through the obvious lie. "Like hell you weren't," Genesis growled as he stormed across the room.
"Nobody ever said I wasn't allowed to come and watch," Angeal argued. "It wasn't—" part of the bet. As if he wanted to be reminded of the bet in the first place.
The redhead went eerily still, hand on the door of the supply closet. "That's the logic you're using, is it?" he said quietly. "Just a casual visit to check up on your old friend's progress?"
Setting his jaw, the brunet took several bold steps forward. "Yes."
"That's a lie, Angeal," Genesis hissed, glaring over his shoulder, "and you know it." He turned away from the closet and jabbed a finger at Angeal. "You don't trust me. You think you're doing this for Strife's safety, don't you?"
"Genesis—"
"Well let me tell you something, old friend. If you think I'm doing this just so I can torture the shit out of some unsuspecting infantryman, you're dead wrong. Strife is going to pass that test, and he's going to do it in once piece."
"That doesn't mean you know what you're doing," Angeal blurted. "Baseball, Genesis? What kind of test to you think you're preparing him for?"
Folding his arms across his chest, the redhead narrowed his eyes. "I know exactly what I'm doing."
"And what might that be?"
"I'm not telling you."
"But—"
"Forget it," Genesis snapped. Then, much to the Angel's surprise, an immense amount of hurt crept into his expression. "I trusted you. And I thought you trusted me. But I guess you're just like everyone else." He looked away, auburn hair falling into his face. "How long have we been friends, Angeal?"
It was then that he realized why exactly Genesis was so angry. It wasn't that he'd broken some sort of unspoken rule of the bet, it was simply that he'd made a heinous misjudgment of his friend's character. "Genesis, I—" He attempted to apologize, but was cut off.
"Out."
Angeal blinked in surprise. "What?"
"Out," Genesis repeated coldly.
Opening his mouth, the brunet tried to say something, anything, to rectify the situation. But nothing came out.
"That's an order, Hewley."
RegenesisX
