The first thing Cloud noticed was the breeze, gentle and warm against his skin. It meant that even before he opened his eyes he was on high alert. It may have been grass prickling at his neck and arms rather than concrete or metal, and the breeze might show that he wasn't trapped in a walled enclosure, but that didn't mean he wasn't in a prison of some kind.
He lay there for a few minutes, feigning unconsciousness in case his abductor was waiting for him to revive to hurt Tifa, or worse, the children, for - well, whatever reason someone would kidnap him. Focusing on his surroundings, Cloud listened out for an indication of anyone else being present, their breath perhaps, or their footfall. However, all he heard was the shrill sound of birdsong and the breeze rustling through something green.
Cautiously, he opened his eyes, and then closed them again rapidly as the sunlight overhead blinded him. He rolled onto his side and blinked to try and clear his vision, noting that he was still in his pyjamas, before sitting up fully to try and take in his surroundings.
He was on an open meadow, lush green grass flourishing and the odd shrub haphazardly growing with birds perched among the branches. Wildflowers nodded their heads with the tugging of the playful wind, and Cloud idly reached out to still one that was tapping against his waist. No other human could be seen, and the view spanned for miles. Everything was so bright, and clear, and alive - even the blue of the sky seemed more impossibly blue than he had ever seen it before, and the air was sweet and clear in a way it had never been, not even when he was a child adventuring around Mount Nibel.
Next to him was his First Tsurugi, which made the scene even more bizarre. What kind of person would bother to knock him out, transport him to a meadow he had never seen before while he was still in his pyjamas, then considerately give him a sword so large it would probably have taken three other people to carry, before leaving without giving him any idea of what they wanted? Because someone wanted something out of this. They hadn't given him his phone or bike, after all, so for all he knew he could be here to kill a monster, or for someone to hold him for a ransom anonymously.
With no idea where he was, he could either stay and hope someone came for him, or start moving in any direction that made sense. Standing, he scouted the area. South was out - there were no natural landmarks to hint at a settlement or even a distance - and on the horizon to the west and north were mountains that could have been any distance away, but to the east there appeared to be a river behind a stretch of trees that could, hopefully lead him somewhere with people. It was the best option, but it would be a long trek.
He took a quick inventory of what he had - sword, obviously, and its harness so he could at least carry it easily; one pair of slippers, brown with rubber soles so they might last a few hours; one set of light pyjamas, pale blue with chocobo chicks on that had been given to him by Yuffie for his last birthday. It could be worse, barely, but with no food or water, no gil, no phone, and no Fenrir it was difficult to figure out how.
Still, to stay would be to dehydrate as there was no fresh water nearby, so...
No time like the present, Cloud thought, and pulled his sword's harness onto his back before starting out.
Six hours later, he was starting to flag. It had been late morning when he'd set out, so he had been walking through the heat of the sun. As a not-SOLDIER he may have been more resistant to the effects of having little sustenance, but the last time he had anything to eat was last night's dinner with Tifa and the kids and he wasn't exactly able to survive on sunlight.
I hope they're alright. I hope they're safe.
If Denzel and Marlene had been taken too, then Cloud hoped that their abductors wouldn't be so cruel or stupid as to dump them in a random place in the wilderness like they had him. Tifa was different, being an adult who had learned how to survive in a variety of situations just like he had, but they were children and city children at that who only interacted with the world outside under adult supervision. Yes, Denzel had had to go through hell after Meteor, but scavenging in a dead city was a world away from trying to survive where anything could be poisonous, venomous, or monstrous.
While he was thinking and trudging, Cloud stopped paying attention to his surroundings. There hadn't been a monster in sight since he got there (and wasn't that weird in and of itself) and he'd long since come to terms with the fact that nobody was watching him, so when he reached the treeline he was halfway into the campsite before he was aware of it.
As he stood there, a stranger's sword pointed at his throat, he wasn't sure who was more shocked - him, or the four people he'd unwittingly disturbed.
Oops.
"Who the hell are you?" the stranger with the sword asked gruffly, clearly trying to be threatening (considering he had managed to get the drop on a mako-enhanced man with issues and currently had a very sharp blade aimmed somewhere very vulnerable, Cloud couldn't really say he wasn't succeeding). He looked like he was about Cloud's age, with brown hair that looked like he'd been dragged through a forest backwards. The man's bright green eyes narrowed accusingly at him.
"My name's Cloud," he answered, slowly raising his hands in the hopes of appearing non-threatening himself . "I'm lost, and I didn't mean to disturb you. Could you tell me where I am?"
"Strip," the stranger said abruptly, and Cloud stepped back involuntarily.
"What?" he exclaimed. He has to be kidding - I'm not getting naked for some gang of bandits! "I have pyjamas, slippers, and a sword, that's it. No food, no water, no gil - just what I'm standing up in."
His hand twitched towards his sword. This could get nasty - if it does, it does.
"What?" the stranger asked with a strange expression on his face - almost as if Cloud was the lunatic. "I'm not robbing you. We need to check you aren't infected."
Looking closer, Cloud could see - he's scared. What disease could he be scared of? Geostigma?
"Infected with what?" Cloud asked, and hesitated a moment before adding, "and if I have to strip, do the two women need to be here?" He hadn't heard of any serious infections or diseases going around, not since Geostigma, and Reeve usually kept him up to date on those thanks to the travelling he did on his deliveries.
"How are you this ignorant? Didn't you see the Calamity fall? Didn't you feel the Planet heave? Have you not seen our people get infected by whatever was on that thing and turn into monsters?" the stranger asked, and Cloud could see the incredulity in his face.
"...No," was his eventual answer. "Look, I'll happily do whatever you need me to do to prove I don't have any disease, but if I could have some privacy...?" Who knows - this might be something I need to report back to the WRO, so I'd better no alienate them.
"Vahana, Cenne, stand a little way away and look into the forest," the stranger directed. The two women got up and moved to go, and the other man got to his feet too.
"Any tricks, and I'll be as happy to skewer you as Orthe is," he said, drawing his own blade and holding it steady at his side.
Cloud nodded, and once the two women were stationed with their faces turned away he shrugged off the sword harness and unbuttoned his pyjama shirt. Under more normal circumstances he might have felt embarrassed by what he was wearing, but he'd much prefer the coverage and protection from Yuffie's gag gift than being naked in front of two total strangers.
Once the shirt was off, the first stranger - Orthe, Cloud presumed - told him to turn slowly with his hands in the air. As uncomfortably vulnerable and exposed as he felt, Cloud didn't really have much of a choice if he didnt want to start and all-out brawl, and when instructed to continue with his trousers then perform the same turn he swallowed his pride, sacrificed his dignity, and did so. Fortunately, Orthe genuinely didn't seem to be aiming to humiliate or degrade him. The moment he was sure Cloud didn't show any symptoms of whatever he was looking for, he allowed him to dress and reclaim his sword.
"I'd apologise, but it's a necessity," Orthe said once Cloud had dressed and the other man had gone to retrieve the women. "We've just lost the majority of our caravan to the infection. Over eighty of us, and there's just us four left as far as we know - the rest just -" he stopped, shaking his head helplessly. "They turned into something else."
"What were you looking for?" Cloud asked, trying for a gentle tone despite being as red as a tomato and feeling slightly violated. I at least deserve to know what this disease is meant to look like.
"Marks," one of the women said. Her eyes were the same intense green as Orthe's, but her hair was cropped close to her head and was a silver hue. Cloud hid a shudder, remembering the last time he'd seen people with that combination of colours. "Typically, patches of scales or feathers, or webbing. Sometimes bone spurs on the shoulders, spine, or elbows."
"This is my sister, Vahana," Orthe introduced slinging an arm around her for a quick squeeze of a hug and letting go. "Her friend, Cenne, is over there," he waved in the other woman's direction, "and Cenne's husband, Kenhelm, is the final member of our party."
Cenne was a petite and pretty young woman, but from the fiercely tamed braid of her black hair to the thick leather gloves and armour it was clear that she wasn't a woman to dismiss. She reminds me of Tifa.
Her husband was a thin man with a short ponytail gathering his blond hair out of the way, and although he had a sword Cloud was inclined to think it was a new addition from the way he held it.
"Pleased to meet you," Cloud answered softly, thinking over what they'd told him so far.
These people... they'd spoken about the Planet heaving and the Calamity falling, but that might be a reference to the final battle with Sephiroth when Holy and Meteor duelled in the skies over Midgar. The illness that they spoke about sounded like something to do with Jenova, but at the same time it didn't match the symptoms for Geostigma and by this point there was nowhere with enough J-cells in a high enough concentration with a high enough amount of mako to spontaneously mutate people into monsters. Something was nagging in the back of his mind, but he couldn't quite piece it together.
Or I don't want to, he admitted to himself.
"Do you have anywhere to go?" Cenne asked, her voice kind.
"Actually, I don't know where I am. I need to get back to Midgar, but depending on where I am I could get to another city and contact a friend to help me out," he replied, choosing honesty.
"Midgar? Is that a new village settlement? I haven't been able to keep up, what with the boom since the Calamity," Kenhelm told him, and the bottom fell out of Cloud's stomach.
"Can you tell me the name of the largest city near here?" Cloud asked, heart starting to pound.
"Well, Ardethusa's the largest Cetra settlement, and that's not that far even if you do have to take a boat north. But if you're happy with a Leniter settlement, then I suppose it would be Nifel to the west," he offered.
"A... Leniter settlement?" Cloud probed.
"You are out of touch, aren't you?" Cenna said, not expecting a reply. "The ones who've settled completely, who can't hear the Planet anymore. Since the Calamity, there's been more and more choosing that life instead of travelling, separating from us Cetra a lot - we're the ones most affected, but we can pass the infection on to a Leniter person easily enough and they've started barricading us out."
Cloud stayed silent. He'd never heard the term Leniter before, but Cetra was... definitely familiar. These people were Cetra, and from the way they were talking he was sure that they were not the only ones. There was no Midgar, but there was a Nifel - an old name for his old hometown, Nibelheim. If Nifel was to the west, and Ardethusa was the Forgotten Capital, or somewhere like it...
It can't be.
But, Cloud had to admit, it was looking more and more likely. They talked about the Calamity and an infection that mutated Cetra into monsters like it was happening now because it was. Somehow, through some impossible miracle, Cloud had been transplanted back to the time just after Jenova first fell to the Planet.
Or am I just going insane?
"I think I'm a bit further from home than I'd realised," he said after a moment. "I think I'll head for... for Ardethusa?" Here's hoping I pronounced that right.
"That's where we're headed too," Vahana volunteered. "If you like, you can come with us?"
"Are you sure?" he asked.
"Why not? It's better to travel in numbers nowadays, and if you can use that hunk of metal you call a sword as easily as you carry it then we'd be glad to have you," Vahana replied.
"She's not wrong," Orthe agreed. "The roads are dangerous, and we're not in a position to be picky about our travelling companions beyond making sure people aren't infected."
"Then, thank you," Cloud said. "I'll take you up on that."
Though who knows what I'll do when we get there.
A/N: So, this is happening. I have a plotline written up and everything! This is going to be long, and I am looking for a beta reader to help me keep things in line. I hope you enjoy reading!
