A/N: Sorter than usual chapter, but hey, the next chapter I'm planning should well make up for it.... But... While it is tentatively planned to be released on Valentine's Day... That's also my birthday and I'm going out of town to celebrate it with a friend... So I don't know whether or not it will be on time. I'm hoping so since this is the chapter I've been waiting for write for forever, but you know how plans tend to go out the window from time to time.

In other news... I've decided to take a trick from out of just about every author's book and being to reward reviewers for, well, reviewing. It makes me happy to get them, so I guess it should make you happy to give them... So contest time! Woot! Reviewer 75 gets a one shot of their choice... YAY!


Chapter Eight

Day One-Hundred and Forty-Four: But We're Always Late on the First Day

"The only thing accomplished over the break was that the whole school now knows that Sephiroth is a possessive asshole who is no longer friends with my brother and that said brother can throw a right hook that would make Mike Tyson cry." Sora sighed and blew upwards on his bangs, mentally reminding himself to coerce Leon into taking him to get a haircut since Sora's car was in the shop and Leon needed one anyway. "I think that we should just give this whole bet up on both sides because it's not worth it."

Axel sighed into his coffee. "As much as I would like to agree with you, I don't think that's going to happen. There are too many people with a whole hell of a lot more than our measly two hundred munny each invested in this and they aren't going to want to pull out so long as they think they have a chance at winning."

"Wow, you can speak logically from time to time. Who knew?" Riku flipped through a few pages in his Advanced Chemistry book without taking in any of the information. "Fuck, this is the shittiest new year I think I've ever lived through."

"Just because your brother turned out to be more of a psychopath than we thought he was doesn't mean you have to be a sullen jerk about it." Roxas rubbed his fingers in soothing circles over his forehead. "The good news in all of this is that Leon's actually been speaking civilly to Axel ever since he chased away the curious mob. I guess something good can come of every situation if you just look hard enough, though I am surprised Cloud didn't get carted away for assault and battery."

"Probably because Seph was worried that Cloud was going to get him for statutory rape." Riku's grip tightened almost imperceptibly on his own coffee cup as he thought about all the things he would have liked to do his brother in retaliation for hurting someone that had been a better brother to him than his own blood had been. "Seph was eighteen back then, remember. He would be rotting away in jail forever if Cloud ever decided to press charges."

"Which he won't because he's a stubborn asshole that doesn't want to put away someone who deserves it because he thinks that he was asking for it or something equally twisted." Roxas' eyes flashed with rage and he had to take a minute to pull himself back together. It had been almost twenty days since Cloud had broken down and told them about what Sephiroth had done to him, and yet the hot flare of anger had yet to leave any of them, and they were beginning to doubt it ever would.

And Cloud had been carrying such a burden alone for four years? It was so far beyond their comprehension that it left them impotently shaking their heads and chasing their thoughts around in circles with nothing to show for it.

"How did Leon react?" Sora asked after a moment of silence. "Does anyone even know? He didn't so much as move the whole time Cloud was talking and then neither of them was there when we woke up. I'm worried about him. He doesn't take things like this lying down. He even ran away for two days when he found out about Mom. It's not like either of them to just pack up and move back to the apartment without a moment's notice either. They didn't even tell Mom where they were going or if they were going to be back."

"He seems fine now." Roxas muttered as the four boys looked up to see Cloud bouncing across the Quad with a sleep-deprived Leon in tow. "In fact, if I didn't know any better, I'd say nothing has changed at all, not even since the first day of school."

The other boys nodded in agreement and their conversation faded away as Cloud and Leon made their way to their customary seats, Cloud balancing two coffees precariously in one hand while Leon sank gratefully into his chair and buried his head in his arms in hopes of getting at least a few minutes worth of sleep before he was to be dragged off to class against his will.

"Hey, how's having to get up early treating you?" Cloud asked politely, more concerned with the way his coffees were tilting than with how his brothers' mornings had gone. He quickly placed Leon's coffee down in front of the brunette and took a gulp of his own before placing it on the table as well.

Axel shrugged. "Same as it always does. It makes me want to die a little bit on the inside, and then I spend about ten minutes plotting when I'm going to be able to catch an hour long power nap or something at some point during the day and then I move on with my life. I see eight a.m. is not treating Leon any better than it ever has."

"Sure isn't." Cloud quipped as Leon mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like a death threat concerning the early hours of the morning and exactly where they could shove themselves. "You'd think that after spending a good chunk of his life having to get up and cram knowledge into his head at the crack of dawn, he would be over this by now, but you would be wrong."

"And you would think that after spending a good portion of your life avoiding assault charges you would think to not surround yourself with people after nine p.m., but you would also be wrong." Roxas offered up sarcastically as he contemplated the inside of his empty coffee cup and wondered why no one had invented a magical self-refilling cup as of yet. "You got Valentine in the morning again?"

"Of course." Cloud answered, poking Leon in the side as a sign that time was running out and he really should get started with putting some caffeine in his system before it was too late. "I'm cruel but not heartless. I wouldn't want Leon having to break in a new teacher to his class sleeping habits with only a few months to go before we get out of here for good. That wouldn't be fair to the poor teacher."

"Wow, you guys really are leaving." Sora seemed almost awed by this thought. "I guess I never really thought about it much. I always just assumed that you guys were going to be here. Campus sure is going to be weird without you."

"Have we really ingratiated ourselves so much in the space of three and a half years that campus is going to literally wither without our presence?" Cloud asked incredulously. "Hell, if anything I would think that most people here would love to see us go."

"Teachers don't count, Cloud." Leon had lifted his head up and was now considering the cup of coffee in front of him as though trying to figure in his mind whether it was worth the effort it would take to reach out and drink it as opposed to just giving up on life and falling asleep right then and there. "And neither does Reno. He's an asshole anyway."

Cloud raised an eyebrow in amusement but otherwise seemed unconcerned. "In any case, I guess I'm going to miss this, too, at least a little bit. There is always something to be said for structured learning in any of its forms. Seems safer than the real world."

"Seems more boring than the real world." Riku added his two cents into the conversation as he scribbled something on the margin of his text. "By the way, Yuffie's on her way over and it looks like she's about to launch herself onto you."

"Thank you, sir." And with that Cloud scooted over an inch in his seat, moving out of the way as a blur of black and blue (Yuffie was going through a blue phase where the only thing she would wear was some variation of that color) attached itself to Leon with a loud squeal.

"Fuck!" Leon did not sound too pleased at this newest development and he probably would have pushed the girl away and then proceeded to pummel her into the ground had she not had his arms pinned uncomfortably to his side. "Get the bloody hell off of me!"

"But Leeeeeon, I looooove yoooooou!" Yuffie wailed as she began to rock side to side, nearly knocking not only Leon but also Cloud and Sora (who was unfortunate enough to be on Leon's other side) off their own chairs in the process.

"You suck, I hate you, GET OFF!" Leon flailed about hopelessly for a minute before giving up and leaning back his chair, hoping that going limp would be enough of a cue for Yuffie to stop trying to crush him to death.

"Professor Valentine's getting his mail. I'd say we've got about five minutes if we want to make a half-decent entrance this time around." Yuffie chirped happily, not concerned at all about Leon's lack of interest in her attack, knowing that he was just faking his disinterest. "Poor, Vinny. I wonder what he's ever going to do without us."

"Live a full and happy life without having to worry that one of us is going to stage a hostile takeover of his class just for the hell of it?" Cloud suggested as he pulled himself to his feet. "Come on, Leon. This is our last time crashing his class on the first day. We've gotta make it special."

"What if I don't want to make it special?" Leon complained, but he allowed himself to be tugged to his feet none the less, remembering to grab his untouched coffee at the last second as he went.

"Don't care." Yuffie and Cloud chorused at the same time, each one grinning evilly as they propelled the tired man forward.

"Sometimes I worry that the universe collapses just a little bit when Cloud and Yuffie come together… The other times, I'm too busy being alternately entertained and scared to bother much with thought in general." Roxas muttered to himself as he watched them make their noisy way across the Quad, Leon still protesting against any suggestion that didn't involve allowing him to go back to his dorm room to sleep and Cloud and Yuffie planning what was probably the very same hostile takeover Cloud had been talking about before over the brunette's head.

"Let's just pray that they don't decide to work together to conquer the world." Sora answered distractedly as he shook his head at his elder brother's antics.

"I hear you, brother, I hear you."


"Vinny! Did you miss us?"

Vincent Valentine was not one to openly groan in frustration or to bury his head in his hands at the thought of some struggle or task, but four years with Yuffie had very nearly broken him of his habit of holding himself back and it was by a very slim margin that he managed to keep his composure and not give into his thoughts of throwing up his hands and giving in then and there.

"Ms. Kisaragi, you are late for what must be the hundredth time. Please take your seat." Vincent was angry. In fact, he was radiating anger in such a way that the freshmen in the front row were turning green and were in danger of being forced to the floor under the oppressive weight of his barely restrained rage and loathing. The little ninja wanna-be just waved cheerfully and bounced her way up to his podium. "And where is Mr. Strife and Mr. Leonhart? You three never come to class separately."

Generally, Vincent wouldn't have cared where his students were, being very much of the opinion that if they didn't want to benefit from his terror-inducing teaching style then they deserved every last failure they got from him, but this was a different case. This was the first day of classes and the last time Yuffie, Cloud and Leon had to make a scene and leave their mark on his psyche forever more.

And while Leon would probably be too tired to care what his friends were up to, Cloud would not be and he would revel in anything and everything that could cause Vincent any amount of discomfort because he was an asshole like that.

"Right, here Mr. Valentine." And with that one statement, Vincent felt a chill of something akin to terror race through his spine in a way that was unusual and not wanted in the slightest as Cloud sauntered into the classroom with Leon stumbling behind him carrying a bundle of what looked to be bedding. All three of them were disrespectful brats that enjoyed making his life a living hell just because they could, but they had never lost that last shred of reverence that had them still referring to him as a professor, even though it was painfully obvious that he was more of an excuse to keep their hours high enough to still be classified as honor students.

Vincent bit back a horrified curse and inwardly cringed as he heard the semi-amused twitters of the freshmen behind him, realizing that all the fear he had already been in the process of instilling in their young, impressionable minds was already slipping away like the grains of his precious sanity. Damn those fucking kids to hell and back. If there hadn't been stupid little annoyances called 'laws' there would no doubt have been three bodies lying before him… Mostly likely bleeding copiously from many, many wounds.

"Hi, class!" Yuffie chirped brightly as she bounced her way up to Vincent's podium, gently pushing the teacher out of the way, him being much too stunned to protest like he should have. Cloud and Leon quickly followed, with Cloud taking up a spot next to the hyperactive ninja wanna-be and Leon dropping his bedding and beginning to construct what looked to be some kind of nest behind them, disappearing among the many folds of the comforter he'd thought to bring once he had arranged them into something resembling a working order.

"Now, Mr. Valentine has been teaching this class for forever…" Which was untrue. Vincent had only been teaching at the college for five years. He wasn't that fucking old, not that Yuffie cared. Hell, for her five years really might have felt like forever. "So Mr. Strife and I decided that we would let him lie back and relax for a period today. So I'll be your co-teacher for the day, Miss Kisaragi, and you can quite plainly see Mr. Strife, my stunning blonde other co-teacher… And, uh, you can't really see Mr. Leonhart, but he's pretty much going to be sleeping the whole time anyway so I guess there's really no point in getting him to come out and introduce himself. Oh, and anyone who wakes him up will not only fail for the day, but will also be subjected to running for their life."

"And he can run for a fucking long time, so I wouldn't do that." Cloud added helpfully even though there was a small part of him that would have immensely enjoyed watching Leon chase a terrified freshman all over campus. As amusing as watching Axel run for his life on almost a daily basis was, that tended to get old. "Oh, and only the teacher can cuss 'cause that's bad manners and you shouldn't be speaking to your elders in such a way. We are wiser than you, you know."

Vincent snorted and muttered something that sounded oddly like 'You wish' but he backed away from the podium anyway and took up a spot brooding in the corner of the room. As much as he would have loved to cause a scene and take back his classroom, he knew that Yuffie was probably banking on it and wouldn't let go without a fight. Hell, it was going to be his last agonizing semester with them as it was. They might as well have their fun now and then disappear off into the vague uncertainty that was the outside world where he would never have to see them again.

At least, he was praying that he would never have to see them again, which, considering he was a happy atheist who had no plans to find God, was saying a lot.

"Righty-O! Let's get started then, shall we?"

Although it was going to take a hell of a lot of restraint in order not to maim them if Yuffie kept cheerfully chirping each and every word as though she was a bluebird who'd found the remnants of an almost full Pixie-Stix bag and had proceeded to eat every last sugar granule she could find.

Fuck, it was going to be the longest hour of his life.


"Check YouTube! It's hilarious. I thought Professor Valentine was going to either spontaneously combust or just plain get up and walk out, but not before wounding them a bit just for good measure." Axel was bouncing up and down in his seat in the Rec Center, completely ignoring his lunch in favor of telling Roxas and Sora about the newest humorous tidbit he'd found on the Internet that morning. Normally it was something slightly on the gross side and done by people he didn't even know, but today was different. "I would just like to say, before you see it for your own eyes, that Cloud and Yuffie are a formidable team and I would never want to get on their bad side."

"I wish I could pretend for a minute that you were making this up to worry me, but, sadly enough, not even you could make up something so far-fetched." Roxas sighed into his soda and ran a hand through his hair. "God… Now we're going to be getting fifty million phone calls from Mom asking us why we didn't stop them and how dare we not keep a better eye on our elder brothers."

"Because it's totally our jobs to make sure they don't do something so horrendously stupid that they can't bullshit their way out of it." Sora offered up sarcastically as he distractedly pushed some French fries around on his plate, having suddenly lost his appetite. "So I guess that rumor about Leon being seen chasing a tiny freshman through the South Quad was true after all."

"Sure was." Axel was smirking almost as though he had been the one to entertain thousands of people via Internet that day. "He was apparently not a very smart freshman and didn't take Cloud at his word when he warned them that anyone waking Leon up would not only fail but end up running for their very lives. Cloud got every moment on camera, too. And that's not all; they were being followed by the whole class and a very harried looking Professor Valentine who was too busy yelling death threats to bother with actually helping the poor freshman. He also tackled Cloud and attempted to get the camera. Pure fucking gold."

"Mom's going to kill us, Roxas." Sora whimpered. "She's going to kill us. She's not even going to stop to think that we might not have been in on this one. Nope, she's just going to go for the jugular and ask questions later."

"If she even bothers to ask questions at all." Roxas added as he glumly pushed his tray of food away. He wasn't going to eat it now anyways.

Before anyone could comment on that Riku came running at them at a full sprint, clutching something white and paper-like in the hand not trying to keep his bookbag from tripping him.

"Sora! Your brothers are fucking amazing!" Riku sounded a bit out of breath, but he had sprinted from his dorm all the way to the Rec Center so that was to be expected. The silver-haired young man plopped down into the nearest empty chair and attempted to catch his breath before continuing on. "Dude! It's all over fucking YouTube, man! Cloud and Yuffie took over Professor Valentine's class and then Leon chased a freshman for ten minutes before Professor Highwind showed up and tackled him."

"Wait!" Axel was bouncing so quickly in his excitement that he was almost vibrating now. "I didn't see that part. The video I saw cut off when Professor Valentine tackled Cloud and the camera lens broke."

"Yeah, that's the one I found at first, but Yuffie just posted her half about ten minutes ago and it picks up about where Professor Valentine broke Cloud's camera and continues on to Leon being hauled away by a combination of Professor Highwind and Professor Wallace. Oh, and then Yuffie helps the kid escape before Leon can break free. It's fucking awesometastic."

"Damn! I have to go watch that now." Axel kicked the leg of the table in disappointment. "And here I was thinking that I had seen it all."

"Don't worry, Axel, I'm sure it's going to be up there for a long, long time. They've already got over a million hits." Riku cracked his knuckles and giggled gleefully "They'll be on the front page as a feature video if this keeps up. Then we can say we know YouTube stars! It'll be fucking raw time!"

Sora slammed his head down on the table and winced. "Why do we have to be related to the two most immature men in this hellhole? We're never going to live this down."

"We're going to go down in history as the brothers of the psychos that hijacked an entire classroom and then had to be forcibly subdued by three teachers before their reign of terror was ended." Roxas moaned and copied his twins actions, though he placed his head down on the table gently, rightly taking Sora's wince to mean that the table was harder than it looked.

"Hey, if you want to switch brothers, I'm all for it." Riku offered and Axel nodded his agreement in the background. "At least your brothers know how to have fun without hurting other people and being utter jackasses about life."

"But they are jackasses." Sora whined and twitched a little bit. "Just because they happen to be entertaining jackasses does not mean that they should get a free ride to sainthood."

"An ass is an ass is an ass." Roxas agreed.

"Were there any commas in that at all?" Axel asked curiously, ignoring his boyfriend's bad humor as the little blonde flicked him off. "Anyways… Today's tally: Cloud and Leon, well they fucking rock. Sora and Roxas… They could rock hardcore if they ever dragged the massive sticks from out of their butts!"

"Fuck you, Axel. Just fuck you."


"No, Mom, I'm quite sure that I need my spleen to live." Cloud sounded unconcerned and patient as his mother's sweet voice trickled into his ear through the receiver. In reality, he was a little bit nervous that said mother was going to show up on his doorstep in order to make good on her calm threats. "Now that you mention it, I don't exactly know what a spleen does, but I really don't want to find out the hard way when it's gone and something isn't working right, so, no, I really do think I'd like to keep it for now."

"Tell her that I want to keep my spleen, too." Leon piped up from where he was lounging around on his bed listening in on Cloud's end of the conversation.

"She doesn't want your spleen. She wants mine." Cloud smirked as Leon rolled his eyes and went back to absently turning pages in a magazine. "What was that, Mom? Hm, no I think Leon's rather attached to his eyes. Well, even if he's not, I'm rather attached to his eyes, so you can't have those either."

There was a small pause before Cloud continued. "Well, I don't see a reason why you can't have his ears. He already knows sign. It shouldn't be that hard for him to adjust to being deaf. No, no, I don't think I'd be too put out about that."

"She can't have my ears, Cloud. I like them where they are and I like hearing just fine." Leon flipped another page in his magazine. "Tell her that she can have a toe or something if she wants. Feet are gross anyway."

"That they are, that they are." Cloud agreed. "Leon offered to give you a toe… No, I didn't think you would want that either. Yeah, feet are gross. In fact, Leon and I just agreed on that. Oh we do agree sometimes. We'd kill each other if we didn't… Yes, we'll think about what we did and refrain from posting our misdeeds where the whole world can see… Okay, next time we'll make sure that your friends can't see it. Love you, too. Bye, Mom."

"She wanted your spleen?" Leon asked half-heartedly from his position on his bed as Cloud hung up the phone.

Cloud shrugged. "I'm sure that it seemed like a good organ to harvest at the time. She seemed more amused than angry, and slightly disappointed that she had to hear it from her friends as opposed to us sending her a link to it immediately."

"Good to know that she condones our bad behavior and would like to have a front row seat for the next time we let our childish impulses rule us." Leon sighed deeply and tossed his magazine to the floor. "Though I would like to put on the record that it was not my idea to take over his class, and the children were warned not to wake me. It's not my fault that someone was an idiot and wanted to prove he had balls or something. Also… Professor Highwind, he's a strong motherfucker. I think he pulled my shoulder out of socket."

"Yeah, he's had a lot of practice at holding back strong people in a blind rage." Cloud slumped down into his chair. "That reminds me. I'm going to have to see Reno in a few hours. I don't think I have it in me not to really kill him this time."

"Well, he is an ass that's protecting an even bigger asshole. I say go for it."

"You're not helping."

"I'm also not trying." Leon ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "You know how I feel about Reno. Hell, he used to be a cool guy and if he were ever to show that he wants to be that boy who punched out the bullies that were picking on Aerith and Zack in the playground again, then I may want to be friends with him again someday. I don't see it happening, but that doesn't mean I can't hope."

"Leon…" Cloud closed his eyes and tilted his head back in an attempt to ward off a headache that was brewing deep in the back of his skull. "I'm going to have to go and pretend to be civil, aren't I?"

"I don't care what you do." Leon answered. "You know yourself better than I could. What is it that you want to do?"

"I want to rewind time and go back to when we were ten and the biggest thing anyone could think to fight over was who had the brighter set of crayons or who cheated at kickball, but I don't think that's going to be happening." Cloud tapped a heel against the carpet impatiently. "I also don't think I want to be his friend right now, not with the way he is acting, but when I think about it for more than a minute, I can't help but remember that he doesn't know how bad Sephiroth is. I guess I really can't fault him for acting the way he has because he just doesn't know any better."

"So I'm going to be his friend for now, if he'll let me. I did beat up one of his best friends a few weeks ago and never apologized."

"You didn't have to apologize. You were in the right."

"Yeah, well, he's not going to see it like that so I'm going to have to swallow my pride for the greater good on this one. I really, really, really don't want to open up another can of worms right now. Maybe someday a long, long time from now if Reno insists on remaining friends with that bastard against all odds, I'll consider having a talk with him and letting him choose what side he wants to be on when he knows the full story, but right now is not a good time to do it. Not without letting the whole school know secrets they do not need to be knowing."

"Wow. Once again you have shown that you are only capable of maturity when there is no one outside of your family around to witness it. Congratulations."

"You know what, Leon? Just shut the fuck up."


"It's the only thing anyone has been talking about all day. I don't think you're going to be avoiding discussion of how amazing and completely stupid your brothers are." Kairi twirled a lock of red hair between her pale fingers as she contemplated a complex problem scribbled in Sora's notebook. "I think you're supposed to switch x and y here to make it even on both sides and then you can begin combining terms."

"Hm, yeah that makes sense. I guess I'm also going to have to switch the signs around to do that." Sora pulled the notebook back in his direction and tapped his pencil lightly on the page. "And I know that no one's going to be talking about anything else. They did make a public spectacle of themselves and then post it onto the Web. There's really nothing I can do about it, but that doesn't mean it isn't annoying as hell either."

"True story." Kairi chewed the bottom of her lip in thought as she watched Sora switch a pair of numbers around on his paper. "By the way… I'm crap at math. Why didn't you go get Leon to help you? This is more his thing."

"Because he always knows the answer without having to do any of the work. It's like pulling teeth to get him to show me how he does it instead of just letting him automatically get the answer off the top of his head. Mainly because he doesn't know how he got the answer just that he got there somehow." Sora sighed heavily and erased a number on his paper glumly. "And Roxas isn't any help either. He's not quite as bad as Leon, but he tries to take me through it the complicated way because he likes to think that he's the genius and I need for everything to be spelled out for me in as many terms as possible before I can get it. Drives me fucking insane."

"Let me guess, Cloud's the same." Kairi frowned at the problem in question once more for good measure hoping that in doing so she would somehow make it form some amount of sense.

Sora shook his head and resisted the urge to nibble on the end of his pencil. "Nah, he sucks at math just about as much as I do. In fact, I'm pretty sure he bribed Leon with something to do his homework (not that it would take much. Leon fucking loves math) and I know for a fact that he cheated on every single math test he's taken since he was in first grade and realized that Leon didn't bother to cover his answers."

"Wow…" Kairi exhaled deeply. "I know you must hear this a lot and I apologize for saying it again, but I feel as though the obvious must be pointed out after a tale of that magnitude… Your brothers are fucking crazy."

"Got that memo. Now will you stop chattering on about my brothers and help me with the damn problem before I go insane?"

"Sure thing, Boss." Kairi mock saluted and went to settle down into figuring out the evil problem from the darkest pits of math hell, when she was distracted by the vague sounds of arguing coming from somewhere off to her left. Apparently, Sore heard it, too, and he groaned into his open notebook as a sign of just how much he wanted to deal with his older brothers right at the moment.

Not that Cloud and Leon would ever have cared whether he wanted to deal with them or not. Being related tended to have such common courtesies be thrown out the window for the most part.

"I'm telling you, she was out for my spleen." The pair of arguing men ambled over to the table where Sora was desperately trying to do his homework and not focus on a conversation he didn't think he wanted to know the meaning of. "I like my spleen."

"You don't even know what your spleen does." Leon countered, seeing Sora, noting that Sora was hunched over as though he wanted to be hidden, and deciding to join Sora at his table just for shits and giggles.

"I don't have to know what a spleen does to want to keep mine." Cloud argued back, taking up the empty seat to Kairi's right as Leon took up the chair to Sora's left. "If it wasn't important to something, then we wouldn't bother to keep them inside us in the first place, now would we?"

"So my ears are something that can be thrown away on a whim, but you get to keep your spleen on the grounds that you think it might do something important?" Leon crossed his arms over his chest and scoffed. "That is not a sound argument at all, and not a valid point. Try again."

"Hey, she suggested taking your ears. I was merely stating that I wouldn't mind as much, not that she could have them." Cloud added in his defense. "Anyways, she didn't take anyone's organs, internal or otherwise, so there's really no point in beating this horse to death, is there?"

"I take it Mother was not pleased with your display this morning." Sora put in blandly, not really caring to hear the answer but knowing that he was going to be dragged into the conversation sooner or later and giving in was the easiest way to get out quickly.

Leon shrugged. "I think she was more concerned that she had to find out about it from a friend instead of hearing about it from us. At least that's what Cloud said and I don't know if he's to be believed since he was intent on selling off my appendages at the time she apparently said all this."

"Bully." Was Cloud's eloquent response to this newest mockery.

"Hm. Well you got off easy then." Sora pointed out as he frowned down at his notebook once more. "Roxas and I both received five phone calls each, and none of them were full of lollipops and rainbows. Next time you want to highjack a classroom and chase a freshman for the sole purpose of putting it on the Internet, would you mind letting Roxas and I know about it first? We're not going to stop you, but we would like some ass coverage where our mother is concerned."

"Duly noted and ignored." Cloud sounded bored and he tapped a finger against the table as Leon tilted his head a bit to better see what Sora was carefully guarding in his notebook. "What's in there? A love note? A porno magazine? Anything remotely interesting?"

"5.72."

"Oh… Just a fucking math problem… So Kairi? How's life going for you?"

"Uh…" Kairi looked at Cloud in surprise, not really expecting for him to want to talk to her. In the background Sora was squawking at Leon about the math problem he had solved but now wouldn't explain and the red-head suddenly realized that she didn't really know what to say to Sora's older brother when the brunette himself wasn't around to steer the conversation. "Um, nothing really. Just school stuff."

"Do you know what a spleen does?" Cloud asked seriously. Kairi furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. Cloud was known to be a bit on the odd side, but knowing about his oddities and being face to face with them was a completely different thing and it didn't look like Sora was in any position to help her out.

"Uh… It filters red blood cells and is a main storage site for lymphocytes…" Kairi answered hesitantly, not sure whether he was looking for a serious answer or was just asking anything for the sake of having a conversation. "At least, that's what my health teacher said in high school, but I'm pretty sure she was drunk most of the time so take that as you will."

"Do you think that I could live without it?" Cloud asked earnestly. "I mean, I don't want to live without it, but on the off chance my mother does appear in order to sell it on the black market, do you think that I will die?"

"Wow… Um, I'm sure you can live without it to an extent…." Kairi smiled nervously. "Maybe you should just not offend your mother by doing potentially illegal things and then you won't have to worry about it."

Cloud chuckled. "Not likely, but I'll keep that in mind for future endeavors."

"Okay…"

"Leon, damn it!" Sora slammed his hands down on the table in frustration. "Just tell me how you fucking got from Point A all the way to 5.72 and then go on your merry fucking way!"

"If you would calm down for two seconds, I was about to tell you that if you don't bother with combining terms and instead insert a variable to stand as y as you solve for x then you can skip about ninety percent of the harder stuff." Leon ran a hand through his hair absentmindedly. "At least I think that's what I did. Fuck, hold on."

Sora sighed and rolled his eyes. "I appreciate you trying to help me, I really do, and you are a math genius." Leon allowed a faint smirk at that. "But still, I don't think that there's anyone on this planet capable of thinking like you and I would rather like to pass my math class and I don't think Professor Merlin is going to allow for you to sit the test for me."

"I'm pretty sure Professor Merlin would rather kill himself than have Leon in his class again." Cloud commented from the sidelines, now content to be entertained by Leon's attempts at making Sora understand math once he had figured out the function of his spleen. "Next time you want to prove a teacher that his life's theory is actually wrong, you might want to make sure that he isn't a little on the crazy side."

"Maybe he should make sure his theory didn't have a hole the size of a semi and that won't be a problem." Leon shot back as he ran a finger down his scar in irritation, scowling at the offending math problem in front of him. "Well… We know the answer is 5.72, so maybe you should insert it for x and work your way backwards to understand where the answer came from."

"Wait… That's actually a good idea…" Sora quickly erased all his of previous frantic scribbles and rewrote the problem lower down in the notebook where the paper hadn't been torn and smudged by multiple erasings.

"So Leon can have good ideas from time to time. Who knew?" Cloud let out an unmanly yelp when Leon's foot connected with his shin underneath the table, but he refused to retract his statement, instead choosing to continue on with his life as though he hadn't just insulted his boyfriend for the fiftieth time that day. "So I've been thinking about Zack's request for us to clean out his cabin the week of Valentine's Day… I guess if you want to go then I wouldn't be too opposed to it."

Leon shrugged. "No, I think it would be best if we stayed here after all. We can go to the orphanage and give out candy hearts to the kids or something."

"Yeah, I supposed we could do that." Cloud pondered this newest plan of action over in his head for a moment before continuing his response. "Actually, I think that's a really good idea. I don't think I would have liked the snow too much."

Leon snorted in laughter at that. "I know you wouldn't have liked the snow. You buried yourself in a nest in the living room when we had those few hours of snow flurries back in December. I'd hate to see what you would do if there were banks of the stuff reaching up to your waist. We'd probably never get you out of the house long enough to get you in the car to go home."

"I know hiding in the mountains for a few months while waiting for the snow to melt is so inconvenient for you, but I would hope that you would have been able to suck it up for once in order to help your cousin." Cloud sighed overdramatically as he pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. "I see that I was wrong and I hope that Zack is ever going to be able to forgive you. I know it'll be hard, but I think I can find it in myself to help him try. For your sake, of course."

"I see what you're doing and it's not going to work." Leon responded as he stood as well, patting Sora gently on the head as his younger brother continued in his efforts to trace the math problem's answer back to its source. "Zack's smart enough to know when he's being manipulated. He'll never believe you."

"We'll see, we'll see."


"Cloud, can I talk to Leon about this?" Zack's voice sounded a bit strained and, considering he'd been listening to Cloud go on about snow and evil gnomes and how they were taking over Narnia or something equally insane for the past twenty minutes, the strained tone was well earned.

Zack could practically feel Cloud's slight downward twist of his lips (the closest he was ever likely to get to a pout) but the blonde handed over the phone without a fuss this time and it wasn't long before Leon's cool voice swept across the phone lines.

"Yes, Zack?"

"So he maneuvered you into agreeing that it would be best not to help me out in my time of need and then twisted it around to make it seem like it was all your idea and he was just the victim of the cruel whims of others, didn't he?" Zack asked casually, already knowing the answer.

"Of course he did. I told him you weren't going to be fooled, but he wanted to try anyways." There was a loud squawk from the other end of the line that Zack assumed was Cloud's indignant response to Leon's statement and then Leon went on. "Hey, I know Reno's not exactly the most mature person I can think of, but I don't think I have to tell you how much it would help if you could send him and get him out of our hair for a week. Maybe he'll behave if you allow him to take Rude or Tseng. We don't want to be a bother to you, but, fuck, he's being a bother to us so it would really help if he went away for awhile."

Zack paused for a second and thought about Leon's suggestion. "Yeah, I guess that might be a good idea. Aerith's not going to like it, but I think I can talk her around. I mean, Reno used to be a good guy, you know?"

"I know." Leon agreed. "Maybe he'll find a way to become the good guy again someday, but right now he's just plain annoying and I don't think any of us want this escalating to the point where we're going to lose another of our childhood friends."

In the background Zack could hear Cloud's louder than needed agreement and he sighed heavily into the phone's receiver. "I understand where you're coming from, but I don't think that this is an issue that's going to fix itself over night. First of all, Cloud's going to need to gather up the courage to tell Reno exactly how it is, and even more courage to confront Sephiroth and get some closure. The way things are now, I'm surprised he found it in him to tell you. It has been four years after all."

"I know."

"Secondly, Reno is going to have to work to re-earn our trust. It's sad and it shouldn't have happened this way, but there's nothing we can do about it now that it has, so we're going to have to make the best of it." Zack sat back on his couch and stared at a painting of a flower-filled field that Aerith had insisted on hanging in their living room. "I don't have to tell you that beating the stupid out of his skull isn't going to be taken the right way, do I?"

"No, you don't." Leon sounded a tad bit disappointed about that, though. "So we're agreed that we don't want to give up on Reno as of yet, but that we would like to take his crazy out of the picture at least for a week? Maybe then we can get a better view of the situation and it might not have to come down to an irreparable fight."

"I agree." Zack stated calmly, ginning widely as he heard the front door of his house opening and then slamming closed, excited at the prospect of seeing his wife after a long day of working. "I'm assuming the silence from the peanut gallery over there means that Cloud agrees as well?"

"You would assume correct." Leon responded.

"Good." Zack's grin widened to a full-out smile of massive proportions as his wife walked through the archway from the main hall and into the living room. "Hey, Aerith just got home so I'll talk to you later. Tell your mother I said hello the next time you talk to her, and try to remember not to post anything you haven't shown to her on the Internet if you don't want a phone call threatening the safety of your organs. By the way, fucking amazing prank."

"Thank you, and I'll be sure to pass the 'hello' along. Goodbye."

"Bye." And with that, Zack hung up the phone and turned his full attention to his gorgeous wife who was currently trying her hardest not to shake her head in disapproval. "Hello, Sunshine Light of my Life. How was your day?"

"It was okay." Aerith rolled her shoulders and plucked a stray string from her immaculate, pink scrubs before collapsing onto the sofa next to her husband and curling into his side. "Nobody died so that's a plus, but some new hotshot doctor got it into his head that he needs to be the one in charge even though he's only about two years out of residency. Needless to say, that's more hassle than he's really worth, but there's nothing I can do about it other than dream about bashing his face through a door. How are Cloud and Leon doing?"

"Fine all things considered." Zack answered as he ran a hand gently up and down her upper arm. "In fact, I don't think their relationship has ever been more stable. The twins and Riku and Axel are still upset about the whole deal, but they're adjusting, and I really think that Leon half expected Cloud had been hiding something of this magnitude for some time now. All in all, I don't think there's much to worry about, though. I think they can handle it."

Aerith let out a quiet puff of air, the only sign of her annoyance at Cloud's stubbornness and unwillingness to let anyone help him in order to not threaten his precious independence. "Well it's about time he got the balls to tell Leon about it. I don't think he needed to get them all in one go, though. I know Mrs. Strife was in hysterics about it for days, especially after they disappeared without a word. What were they thinking to drop such a bomb and then run away?"

"They didn't think, but what else is new?" Zack placed a chaste kiss on the brunette's forehead and chuckled deeply as she wiggled deeper into his embrace. "Leon thinks it's a good idea to send Reno to the cabin in their place."

"Is this Cloud being stubborn and Leon going along for the ride because he doesn't want to upset him, or is this a combined rejection?" Aerith asked curiously, internally marveling at how Leon would jump when Cloud said the word when it came to making sure that the blonde wasn't going to be upset about something. It was a very rare thing for Leon to care about other's thoughts and feelings in such a way, and such moments went generally underappreciated by the masses for the most part since pretty much anyone who knew about it was related to them in some way, shape, or form.

"Option A." Zack responded with a hearty laugh. "We've always known that Cloud has been pulling the strings from pretty much the day they met. He likes to let Leon think that he's making some decisions from time to time, but we all know who really wears the pants over there."

Aerith nodded her agreement. "I love you, Zack."

"I love you, too, Sweetheart."


"Truce?"

Cloud stared at Reno's outstretched hand in a mixture of wariness, disbelief, and hope before reaching out to tentatively shake it. "What's gotten into you?"

The red-head shrugged as he blatantly ignored the stares of their classmates and Professor Highwind, retracting his hand and smiling. "Nothing really. I just didn't think that the garage would survive if we were to upgrade to full-scale war… And to be completely truthful, Sephiroth probably deserved to be hit for doing that without your permission."

Cloud blinked in surprise. "I never thought I would see the day when you wouldn't leap to defend that bastard. I'm impressed."

"Hey, I did a little thinking, yo, and, while I still think you should give the guy a chance, he was quite a bit forward with the whole deal and I'd probably react almost the same way as you if he did the same to me, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt for know." Reno shrugged easily, his lanky frame easing into a more relaxed position. "This doesn't mean that I'm not going to pick on you or anything, 'cause I am, but it does mean that I'll stop pushing, kay?"

"Hell, that's a whole fucking lot more than I thought I was going to get out of you. I'll take it." Cloud grinned then, the first true bit of happiness he'd shown where Reno was concerned for months, and the red-head suddenly felt as though he had finally done something good. "And I guess we can call a truce for the time being."

"Fuck… This is where you say that we're still going to have to talk about this or something, isn't it?" Reno groaned and Cloud winced.

"As much as I don't want to talk about it, I think we're going to have to." Cloud rolled his shoulders back in annoyance. "Fuckin' hell I hate having conversations."

"Fuckin' A." Reno agreed as they both made their way through the stunned crowds and back to an abandoned workbench to sort out the tools they were going to need for that night's lesson. "Wanna race to see who can rebuild their transmission first?"

"Hell yes I do!"


"Wow… You think you know a relationship's dynamic down to a T and then they go and change everything up on you." Zexion murmured to himself as he stretched his arms over his head and settled down deeper into the hard-backed library chair. They had just gotten back from spying on Professor Highwind's nine o'clock mechanics class, and they had been very disappointed. Out of everyone, they wouldn't have pegged Reno as the one most likely to back off and think about what was going on instead of just blindly reacting.

Demyx rested his arms on the table and then placed his chin on them as he contemplated the dark shelves full of book in front of him. "I don't know whether I'm relieved that no one died, or that I'm disappointed Cloud didn't give a repeat performance of his formidable right hook."

"You are not going to share the information we gathered after the party with Tifa's group, are you?" Zexion asked after a moment of silence.

"Concerned for his feelings, are you?" Demyx asked sarcastically and Zexion frowned and refused to meet the musician's eye because, damn it, Demyx was right and that irked him to no end. Back in the day, the schemer wouldn't have thought twice about ruining someone's life in such a way, but now he did and that was fucking with his mind in a way that he hated… And Demyx knew damn it.

"You would not do such a thing." Zexion decided to go with the safer answer to his lover's question. He paused for a second. "You would not do such a thing."

"Repeating it isn't going to make it true." Demyx muttered sadly. "You're right, I wouldn't have done such a thing a few months ago, but I wasn't all in then. You know me. Once I'm committed, I'm committed to the bitter end. It's part of what you love about me."

"You know me as well." Zexion responded slowly, measuring his words as though the recipe of his thoughts was going to come undone if he didn't phrase them just right. "You also know that I feel as though I am to blame for your change of mind and that I am wishing I had left you alone two years ago and had never fallen in love with you because to corrupt your magnificent spirit is slowing crushing me inside and making me re-evaluate everything I thought I knew."

Demyx nodded. "And you know that I'm not going to go anywhere because of that and in a few days you're going to work your way through your guilt only to find something else to torment yourself over because you apparently can't function without your own mental adversity."

"You are picking up some rather large words, my love."

"A side effect of living with a tight-assed bookworm, I assure you." Demyx was grinning a bit now as he lifted his chin up from off of his arms. "I love you Zexy, that's not going to change, and there's nothing for you to be guilty about. I'm not going to do anything I don't want to do."

"I know that." Zexion sounded calmer, if a little frustrated still. "You are going to have to bear with me, however. This is a lot for someone like me to adjust to."

"Understandable." Demyx sighed and tilted his chair onto its back legs because he was bored and enjoyed moving more than sitting still. "I guess I'm setting myself up to be public enemy number two in the Strife-Leonhart clan's view, huh?"

"Yes, I would say so." Zexion responded as he fiddled with his bangs, a habit he hadn't had before meeting the musician, and one that told more about how stressed out he really was than anything else. "Wait… I do believe the expression is 'public enemy number one' if I recall correctly."

Demyx chuckled. "True, but I don't think there's anyone alive or dead that can replace Sephiroth in that position for the time being, so I'll just take the number two spot and hope that they never fully extract revenge from enemy number one so that I can continue living."

"Sound plan."

"I try."


A/N: So heres to fingers crossed for the next chapter actually showing up on the fourteenth!