Chapter 4 – Steel

"Is it supposed to feel like I'm dying? Because it feels like I'm dying."

Cloud could hear Zack trying (and failing) to suppress his laughter. He would have raised his arm to smack his friend in the face, if not for the fact that both hands were currently draped over his eyes in order to save himself from the dizzying lights of his apartment. How was it possible, to feel this nauseous? It was like the worse bout of motion sickness he had ever had in his life, multiplied a thousand-fold. Every nerve in his body felt sensitive and taut, like a single pull would unravel him completely, and even the soft sweatshirt his mother had sent him as a gift scraped like sandpaper against skin.

"You aren't dying, Cloud," Zack said, his tone somewhere between humor and comfort (but very much so leaning toward humor). "It'll go away soon, I promise."

"How soon?" Cloud whined. "Before or after this mako injection kills me?"

"Before."

Cloud was not convinced, but he did manage an "Ugh," while another wave of nausea pulsed through him. He turned his body toward the back of the couch, pressing his head against the fabric and gripping the pillows a little more tightly. There was no way around it – this feeling absolutely sucked, and the fact that he would have to get another two injections over the course of the next few weeks singularly heightened his sickness. His only consolation was that once it was over, it would be worth it. He would achieve what he came here for, a truth he once could only imagine while daydreaming and staring out the windows of his childhood. He would finally be a real SOLDIER.

Behind him, Zack chuckled, though every sound seemed strained and filtered through the pained buzzing in Cloud's ears. The other man was sitting on the floor next to the couch, a water bottle perched next to him on the wooden coffee table that Cloud had bought at one of the Midgar flea markets in Sector 8. The new Third Classes had been instructed to make sure that another SOLDIER watched them in the hours following the first injection, as a precaution against unusual side-effects (what counted as unusual, Cloud did not know, but they had been supplied a dauntingly long list of potential symptoms that would have made any person, even if just briefly, second guess whole thing). Though Cloud had made a few friends since his time in the program, because most of them were in his class and also receiving injections, he decided to call Zack. The Lieutenant was beyond delighted, if only because new SOLDIERs who just received their injections were often prone to doing or saying embarrassing things, and Zack wanted nothing more than to "bear witness on this momentous occasion."

Though, with the way Cloud was feeling right now, he was sure his body would not be up to doing anything remotely humiliating for a while. He had barely made it back to his apartment before the urge to puke shot right through him – in fact, the blond had to throw up in the kitchen sink because it was closer to his front door than the bathroom. And while the vomiting had ceased an hour ago, Cloud still felt uncomfortably sick enough that any significant movement seemed like an impossibility. Regardless, Zack had been quite entertained at his moaning and complaining, stifling laughter the entire time while cleaning up the mess in the kitchen and helping Cloud settle on the couch in the living room.

"You kind of look like a baby chocobo," the Lieutenant said, though he did not reach out to pet the blond spikes, probably because he knew that would make Cloud feel worse. "A very adorable, very sick baby chocobo."

Muffled and into the pillow, Cloud commented, "Baby chocobos bite."

"Oh, I bet you do, Spikey."

Cloud groaned back, his version of asking Zack to shut the hell up.

Grinning, the Lieutenant reached for the water bottle and was about to prompt the blond to drink it, when a quiet knock on the door interrupted his motion. Cloud poked his head out from his pillow, looking for all the world like a surly chocobo insulted to have had its rest interrupted.

"You not expecting anyone?" Zack said, clearly curious himself.

"No," replied Cloud. He tried sitting up and regretted it, collapsing back on the couch with another exasperated moan.

Another chuckle. "I'll get it," Zack offered. He got up from the floor and crossed the small living room, removing the deadbolt before opening the door. Once there, he stopped.

Despite the swirling in his head, Cloud recognized that the Zack's sudden silence meant that something was amiss. He lifted the pillow again, shifting his head slightly to glance at the doorway, and immediately, his heart skipped a beat.

"Sephiroth," Cloud breathed, trying to move so that he didn't look like a complete mess on the couch. He suddenly felt very self-conscious, and that feeling managed to overwhelm the nausea, if even just for a moment. "Uh…hello."

For his part, the General did not seem to mind Cloud's current state of disarray. He himself appeared much more casual than usual, in dark jeans, a navy shirt and a black coat. It was odd, seeing Sephiroth for the first time out of his normal and iconic attire, but Cloud found that he liked it.

"Cloud," Sephiroth said in return. Zack had stepped aside and let the man into the apartment, and if the black-haired man was amused before, he was positively cracking with delight now. Neither of the two paid him any mind, however.

"I heard you received your first injection. How are you feeling?"

"Fine," Cloud replied, trying to sit up. But his body was decidedly uncooperative, and all he managed to accomplish was to flail about for a second before gracelessly knocking one of the couch pillows to the living room floor.

Behind Sephiroth, Zack sniggered, an exaggerated smirk forming on his lips. "That is not what you said earlier, Spike. You said you were dying."

"Shut it!"

"Have the symptoms been serious?" Sephiroth interjected, turning his head to regard his Lieutenant. His expression was oddly genuine, obvious concern laced in his tone.

That look had somehow managed to cut through the puppy's excitable energy. Zack paused, staring at his superior officer, assessing and curious. But after a beat, the other man softened and he replied reassuringly, "Just a little vomiting that stopped a while ago. Trust me, even sick, Cloud's still as stubborn as ever."

"I'm right here, you know," Cloud grumbled.

And yet, Sephiroth now seemed to need a little more convincing, shifting toward the blond with the intent of examining him himself. He kneeled next to the couch and then paused, allowing his hand to hover over Cloud's forehead, waiting for permission to touch. Outside of their spars, that was a habit that Cloud had noticed – Sephiroth checked himself, constantly, as if fully aware of his unreal strength and its potential undesired consequences. The abundance of caution, the constant fettered control, it was admirable and, if Cloud were being honest, a little sad, too.

He nodded his assent, letting Sephiroth brush back his bangs from his forehead to get a closer look at his eyes. There, the man's gaze remained for a moment longer, indecipherable thoughts dancing behind green irises, before sweeping over his body to search for anything else unusual. The touch felt soothing and warm, like a summer breeze on a pleasant afternoon, and Cloud found he did not want Sephiroth to pull away. But of course, as soon as that thought sparked through his mind, the General stepped back and let go.

"You are feverish. It is not uncommon for SOLDIERs to experience illness as a result of the injections, but it is unfortunately on the poorer end of the spectrum of reactions we typically see."

The man looked just shy of worried, and while Cloud had seen Sephiroth concerned over him before, it was still surreal to know that the General actually regarded him at all, much less cared for him. The urge to assure the man, to take away that worry, beat through Cloud, but the blond knew better than to try and reach out in his uncoordinated state. So instead, Cloud settled for a cheesy attempt at a joke and a half-hearted grin. "Just my luck then."

It took a moment, but then it happened: Sephiroth gave another one of his rare soft smiles. It had become a habit of Cloud's now, since he first saw it that night in Sephiroth's office. He often found himself trying to do or say things to elicit that expression as often as he could. And though the smiles became less and less rare, the feeling they sent through Cloud remained just as moving, just as sweet.

"Lucky, indeed," Sephiroth added. "There have been some Third Classes that end up in much more embarrassing situations. Such as the Lieutenant here."

Zack barked, "I thought that all those videos were deleted!"

The thought of Zack, younger and somehow more ridiculous than he was now, was just too amusing an image to pass up. "What did he do?" asked Cloud.

The Lieutenant immediately went on the defensive. "C'mon, Seph," he appealed. "Think about the SOLDIER honor!"

"Cloud is also in SOLDIER," Sephiroth pointed out, amusement tilting in voice.

"Then, Wutai war buddies honor?"

Sephiroth smiled again, this time one that went all the way to his sparkling eyes, and Cloud definitely felt a lot less nauseous seeing that. The General turned to Zack, an eyebrow subtly quirked. "Alright. I suppose I have to honor that pact, after all. My apologies, Cloud."

Zack let out something close to a sigh of relief, while Cloud merely shook his head lightly. "That's okay," the blond whispered. "You can tell me later, when he's not around."

"I heard that!"

Sephiroth let out a soft breath – almost a laugh. He picked up the pillow that had fallen to the floor and handed it back to Cloud as he stood. "I am glad you are doing well, Cloud. Just get some rest. Please call if you need anything."

Cloud caught Sephiroth studying his eyes once more, in that odd and searching manner that he slipped into every so often. But after all this time, after the two months of getting to know the man that gaze belonged to, it failed to bother Cloud as much as it did before.

"Okay," Cloud said, smiling in return. "Thanks for checking on me."

Zack stepped up. "I'll walk you out, Seph."

Cloud watched the two of them move toward his door, his heart feeling fuller than it had ever before. Was this really his life? The top SOLDIERs concerned over his wellbeing, both of whom had taught him, trained him, helped him. It was a study in contrasts from his life when he first arrived in the city a year ago, or even in Nibelheim, where it was only him and his mother against the world. He was not alone anymore. He wasn't struggling and wallowing in his own mediocrity, listening endlessly to the voice in his mind telling him he was nothing, that he would stay nothing. He mattered. Somehow, to these two titans, he mattered. Despite the sickness, the buzz in his head, the twist in his stomach, Cloud knew, deep in his heart, that he would do anything to prove that he was worthy of this moment.

Cloud closed his eyes and buried his head back into the pillows of the couch.

Sephiroth knew Zack at least enough to understand that the young man had walked him out because wanted to talk. So, he waited in the hallway outside of Cloud's apartment, until Zack finally stopped fidgeting and worked up enough courage to say what he wanted to say.

"So," the man began, clearly trying to find some easier way to inch into the conversation, but evidently realizing that there was not any. "What's up with you and Cloud?"

This had been exactly what Sephiroth had been expecting, ever since Zack got that excited glint in his eyes the first time Sephiroth saw the blond's file. At first, he had assumed the Lieutenant was excited over the idea that the friend he was invested in had managed to make a good impression on him, in his capacity as their superior officer. But after a few weeks of training Cloud, of having Zack bound into his office (always uninvited, somehow, despite the secretary posted outside his door) to ask about Cloud's progress, the conversation shifted. Zack's questioning stopped being about Cloud and his career and more about how Sephiroth felt about him, instead.

While Sephiroth was inexperienced when it came to people, he was far from dense. It became obvious that Zack was mistaking his interest in Cloud as possible romantic attraction, which, if Sephiroth was being truthful with himself, was not as far a leap as he would dare admit. Over the two months of working with the blond, he had become undeniably more intrigued by him. There was that strength that first caught his eye, but there was also a wonderful softness that together melded into a fierce protective instinct. The combination reminded him, strangely, of both Genesis and Angeal all at once, and the familiarity made spending time with Cloud easy in a way it never was for Sephiroth with other people.

And to top it off, there was no denying that Cloud was physically alluring, in a completely guileless and unsuspecting way. Especially his eyes – Sephiroth had never seen eyes like that, bright even before the glow of mako made them absolutely brilliant. He could not help but stare, seeing the way that the first injection rendered the shine of Cloud's eyes so vivid, like starlight in the dark universe.

But the new eyes also reminded Sephiroth even more so of the Cloud that killed him in his dreams. Though the real Cloud certainly had a far way to go in terms of even matching Sephiroth's skill, he was a fast learner and had an instinct for the sword that was equal parts surprising and impressive. It was just unfortunate that Cloud often failed to see that gift in himself; on rare occasions, the blond's frustration would slip through his usual silent determination, in an errant curse or a careless toss of the training sword. But no matter what, even if he had to punch the mats once or twice to let out his anger, Cloud would still get up, still grasp his blade, still demand, "Again."

That unbreakable nature: that was a power that even Sephiroth could not claim that he possessed.

In the end, while Sephiroth understood there was some growing affection present, it was most definitely muddled by the messages sent in his dreams. They had not abated in the slightest since he had taken to training the blond: in fact, sometimes they grew more violent, showing him images of whole words on fire at his hands, of people begging for a mercy which his body would refuse to give them. Those nights, he would wake up in a cold sweat, with shaking hands and a thousand questions. But in the weeks since discovering Cloud's existence, Sephiroth had grown no closer to finding any answers. He was beginning to wonder if he was on the verge of some breakdown…and in truth, he was not sure if he was trying to prevent it or accelerate it.

It had occurred to Sephiroth that he had allowed himself to indulge in the distraction Cloud provided, for maybe too long. Perhaps he ought to distance himself, search another avenue for answers about these dreams, gather more information so that he could best determine how to proceed (though he supposed that required him to dig deep and ascertain what he himself actually wanted – and that was a maze he knew he was rather ill-equipped to navigate). But the thought of losing those few hours each day he had with the blond, of giving up the odd relief he felt when he traded swords with him, talked with him, shared the rare smile with him – it bothered Sephiroth too much to contemplate further. He was growing attached, something Sephiroth did not think he wanted or was even capable of after losing Genesis and Angeal.

Ultimately, Sephiroth knew better than to express that entire tangle of thoughts in his head to Zack. So, he pivoted, defaulted to what he knew best. "He's progressing impressively in his training. He'll be a fine SOLDIER in his own right."

To his surprise, Zack chuckled, crossing his arms. There was a knowing look in his eyes, and an eerie delight, the same kind that Sephiroth recognized whenever the Lieutenant had a clever plan or prank up his sleeve. "Alright. You can play it like that for now."

"I'm not sure what you mean."

Zack waved dismissively, still smiling under his breath. Then, his expression grew more serious. "You know, we never got to talk before. About Genesis and Angeal."

At the turn in conversation, Sephiroth tried to keep his face neutral, but there was no doubt that his sharp Lieutenant caught the flash in his eyes. "There are no new developments. Everything is currently under the Turks' purview. We simply have to wait until their investigation of Hollander provides more information."

All this was true – according to the update that Tseng had given him a few days ago. Dr. Hollander, despite his doughy appearance, had been stubbornly silent, refusing to give up information on any pending plots or co-conspirators. And with no Genesis related incidents since Modeoheim, there had been no new intelligence for the company to act on. In fact, Director Lazard had begun pushing for the matter to be put to bed for good, despite the unanswered questions regarding the Science Department's experiments and the missing copying technology. As if by instinct, the company seemed inclined to follow along. Sephiroth could still see it now: the red TERMINATED stamps pasted over Genesis and Angeal's photos, their files tucked away in some drawer in Lazard's office, two great men just suddenly forgotten, just suddenly put away.

Typical Shinra, sweeping things under the rug.

Zack, of course was wholly unsatisfied with the very factual response. The young man sighed, put his hands on his hips in an exasperated manner, and said, "That's not what I meant, and you know it."

"Unfortunately, I do not."

"They were your friends."

It seemed like such a silly and relatively obvious statement to make, so Sephiroth responded in kind. "Yes."

"I just wanted to know if you wanted someone to talk to about it."

Sephiroth looked down at the carpet, to the way the light brown circled around the darkness of his shoes. He was not prepared for this conversation, not when Zack wanted to have it nearly two months ago when the black-haired man had surprised him in his office, and certainly not now. And yet, he could see it in Zack's eyes – how badly the man needed to talk to him, needed someone who could understand, someone who knew Angeal and knew his pain and could share in the burden of the grief and the guilt that came with his loss. But while Sephiroth was excellent at many things, being a comfort to someone, being a friend, was not one of them, and he knew that because if he had been any better at it, Genesis and Angeal might have stayed and might have still lived.

"I am not sure there is anything to say that would mean anything now."

"Well, if you ever come up with something, let me know."

Sephiroth let his gaze flicker upward. "And if what I have to say only hurts you more than it helps?"

Surprise flashed through Zack. "You're concerned about hurting me?" he asked, tilting his head.

Sephiroth started, taken aback. He felt himself crossing his arms, almost in defense. "You were in pain, after Angeal. A pain that I forced upon you. Now, I simply do not wish to add to that."

A strange paused followed. Then, unexpectedly, Zack began to laugh, full-bodied and full-hearted, from his chest and his shoulders. There was a calm mirth twinkling in his eyes when he said, "Cloud was right. You really are something else."

Not for the first time around the talkative man, Sephiroth found himself completely lost in the conversation. "I do not understand."

"Just that, if you were avoiding talking to me about this because you were concerned about causing me pain…well, what about your own?"

No, Sephiroth was definitely not ready for that, especially not now, in the middle of a random Third-Class SOLDIER apartment building hallway. He looked pointedly away and kept his lips in a tight line of silence.

Zack seemed to sense that he pushed a bit too far and backtracked a little. "That's okay. It's okay. I just wanted to say I'm here, that's all." The young man reached forward and clapped a hand on Sephiroth's shoulder, in a manner eerily reminiscent of Angeal. It should have been unwelcome and jarring, but somehow, under Zack's friendly gaze, it was not any of those things. It was comforting, and in fact, something Sephiroth realized in the moment he missed a little, very dearly.

Sephiroth reached up, patted Zack's hand on his shoulder and offered the young man a tiny, but grateful smile. "Thank you."

"Yeah," Zack breathed, letting him go. "Of course, Seph."

They stopped for a moment, letting the pleasantness of their understanding settle between them. But then, the restless puppy started to grin again, eyebrows wiggling. "I'm sure Cloud appreciates you dropping by. I mean, he was way nicer for you than he was for me."

"He's always nice."

He heard Zack chuckle, could feel that knowing gaze like a pressure on his shoulders. "Yeah, sure he is. You can clean up his puke next time. I have a feeling Cloud would like that better."

The General resisted the urge to roll his eyes like a child, something that turned out to be exceedingly difficult around a man of Zack's unflappable humor. Luckily, the Lieutenant finally seemed to have obtained his fill of amusement for the day, simply letting out a happy laugh and another goodbye, before turning to disappear back into the apartment, taking with him his warm air and comforting cheer, and leaving Sephiroth standing there alone with his thoughts.

As he stood in that hallway for a moment longer, Sephiroth could not help but tug at the strange twist settling in his heart. Seeing Zack now compared to what the young man looked like following Angeal's death, it flooded him with relief. Despite himself, despite everything – the questions he had from those dreams, the fear of his own feelings – there was a tiny bit of hope growing in his chest like flowers among the weeds. The hope seemed to whisper that maybe one day, Sephiroth would be ready to talk to Zack, to try again at being a better friend. After all, he had been sitting in his failure of Genesis and Angeal for just too long now. And if there was anything that his time with Cloud taught Sephiroth, it was that the greatest strength seemed to be in picking oneself up off the mat, and saying, "Again."

And though he wasn't there yet, for the first time in a while, Sephiroth imagined he could be.

It took the whole night, but Cloud managed to weather the symptoms of his first mako injection. The second and the third, each scheduled a week after each other, both went down a little easier – the nausea had become more manageable and Cloud had could actually hold down food a few hours after the appointments. He was still getting used to how his body felt, however. The uptick in speed, in strength, in everything was nearly overwhelming. He had stumbled over himself more than a few times in his classes and in his training sessions with Sephiroth, though both his instructors and the General were understanding. It was actually comedic, a whole classful of Thirds that were rendered as clumsy as a bunch of preschoolers. The more experienced SOLDIERs were having a field day with the pranks, Zack included, and there wasn't a day that went by in which someone wasn't accidently trapped in a closet or dangling from the ceiling somewhere on the SOLDIER floor.

In fact, Sephiroth was becoming something far more than just understanding. Before the injections, Cloud had not noticed the way his touch seemed to linger, like a whisper on his skin, or the lovely way he smelled, mint and fresh linen with a touch of leather. It was as if the newly heighted senses allowed Cloud to capture a clearer picture of the man. Though there were still instances in which Sephiroth remained guarded and enigmatic, as the weeks rolled into months, Cloud now found that he could better discern the nuances, from calm and content to frustrated and exhausted.

There were unfortunately more days of the latter than the former, so many evenings in when Sephiroth would walk into the training room with tired, somber eyes. But he never took it out on Cloud, not even when the blond would allow his own frustration with himself to flare and lash out. Sephiroth was continuously patient. As he had from the start, the General pushed, but never too hard, taught at a pace that was challenging, but never purposefully brutal. Sometimes, when he sensed Cloud was close to his limit, the man would end a session early, and offer to sit with Cloud in the corner of the room, to listen to the blond talk about his day. Sephiroth was not particularly verbose, but Cloud found him to be a great listener, and he could not help but look forward to each time they met, each spar or conversation they shared. Being with Sephiroth was easy in a way that Cloud never expected it to be. He only hoped the man was enjoying the moments together even just a fraction of the amount that Cloud was.

But through it all, subtle warnings that the good could not last continued to stir. Because as Cloud spent more and more time with the General, advanced more and more quickly in his training sessions, started performing better and better at his missions, the rumors that he had shrugged aside early on seemed to grow more vicious in parallel.

"He's sleeping with him. He has to be."

"C'mon, the General wouldn't do something like that."

"What about Fair? Rumor has it he helped Strife pass the exam."

"Fair has a girlfriend."

"Like Strife isn't pretty enough to pass for a girl. I mean, you have to admit that he's not exactly what you think of when you think of the SOLDIER look."

"Yeah, even I would tap that."

"His record speaks for itself though."

"He only got those missions because he's sleeping with the boss."

Luckily, the gossip appeared limited to the new class of Thirds, as the majority of the other SOLDIERs had too much respect for their commanding officers to deign any of the comments with a response. But the talk made Cloud seethe all the same, to hear what some of his peers were saying about the two men that he admired so strongly. It also added fuel to that voice of insecurity in his head that he had been trying so hard to quiet, that he had thought he was finally winning against.

But it here it was again, rearing its ugly head, clawing back into the crevices of his mind. All the same, it made Cloud want to work harder, push farther, if only to prove to these people – both here in SOLDIER and out there Nibelheim – that he could be more than a bastard son of a shameless woman from a middle-of-no-where town, that he was more than the nothing they said he was.

It would not have bothered him as much if it stayed talk, but after some time, Cloud had noticed that the rumors were beginning to impact his mission work. There was an instance in which he was abandoned, without backup, on a monster clearing excursion out in the Midgar wastes, and while Cloud managed to complete the task without issue through a combination of luck and his growing skill, it left a bitter taste in his mouth to think of what would have happened had he not been better prepared. He was not about to share these occurrences with either Zack or Sephiroth, however, as he didn't want to add fodder to the already overworked rumor mill (and he didn't want to acknowledge the base implications of those rumors to begin with). Instead, Cloud started anticipating trouble depending on his mission rosters, made note of those who indulged in the gossip and those who seemed more friendly and willing to take him at face value. Thankfully, most of the Thirds did fall into the latter category, including a handful that had, surprisingly, asked him out. Cloud was not used to receiving that kind of attention, but he did what he could to turn the offers down gently, as he knew that he could not afford to make any more enemies.

But despite Cloud's careful planning, he knew he could not avert trouble forever. He just hadn't thought it would end up like this.

The mission was simple enough: there were some construction sites inside the Sector 4 plate that were overrun by a variety of monsters – grashtrikes, ringmaws and the like. He and a team of three other SOLDIERS, two Thirds and a Second, were dispatched one night to help deal with the mess, in order to allow the repair crews to come in in the morning and operate appropriately. Cloud had noted that Kunsel, Zack's friend, was the Second assigned as their squad leader, which left him feeling optimistic, despite the fact that one of the other two Thirds, Nico, was part of the group that was less-than-friendly toward him.

The antagonistic presence was only the first sign of what was to come. The second was the fact that Kunsel suggested splitting the team up in order to deal with the monsters more efficiently. He had paired Cloud with Nico, given that Cloud's stronger abilities would help render balance to the teams of two. Being left alone with someone he did not entirely trust was not ideal, but Cloud did not want to cause more trouble. He forcibly swallowed the dread under a layer of professional focus. The key was the mission, and if nothing else, Cloud knew he could at least defend himself, as he had beaten Nico several times during their introductory SOLDIER training sessions.

The first half of the affair went fine. The two Thirds made their way through their assigned sections of the underplate, eliminating the monsters in an awkward, but workable silence. But on one of the platforms, close to the whirring fans cooling the machinery that had malfunctuned due to disrepair, they encountered the third sign – a Queen Grashtrike that seemed less than pleased to have intruders in her home. She had friends, too, a couple more monsters crawling in the rafters, leaving the two of them surrounded.

"Call the Sergeant for back-up," Cloud instructed immediately, reading his sword in one hand and a fire spell in another.

The other Third scoffed at the command but after a quick scan of the number of monsters coming out to greet then, he seemed to understand where Cloud was coming from and pulled out his PHS. Meanwhile, Cloud leapt forward, casting fire to obscure his attack and hopefully throw off the monsters from his frontal assault. It worked, allowing the blond to land a few well-timed strikes and eliminate a few of the twisted insects quickly. Behind him, he could hear Nico cutting through some of the other monsters, the man's broadsword clanging against the metal surrounding them.

They managed to work together to whittle the threat down to the Queen, though not without accidentally setting fire to most of the room. The smoke was unsettling, and it made it difficult for Cloud to concentrate on avoiding the Queen Grashtrike's attacks. On one awkward landing, he felt one of the monster's pincers slice cleanly through the slide of his thigh, leaving a stinging cut. It smarted badly, but Cloud knew it would heal and more importantly, he noticed that the move left the monster wide open.

There was no time to waste. The blond gritted his teeth, rolled underneath another attacking pincer to maneuver closer, and swung his blade upward. The motion carved the Queen's limb off, earning Cloud a piercing and monstrous cry. Cloud quickly powered up the strongest fire spell he could muster and blasted the creature with it point-blank. The force of the shot staggered him backward a few feet, his knee scraping against the metal floor and the wound in his leg singing in heightened pain.

But he had done it. Through the haze, he could see the Queen fall, body disappearing into green whisps that danced with the grey smoke. He had done it! It was wild – the last few minutes left his heart pumping, and he could almost taste the adrenaline, bitter water in the back of his throat. Regardless of the slight ache in his muscles or the cut on his leg, Cloud felt the vestiges of power, of energy, of promise, singing within him. He had been on missions before, but this was the first time the certainty finally clicked into place and he couldn't help but grin a little.

Cloud felt like a SOLIDER.

The moment was interrupted, however, by the mocking slow clap of Nico behind him, the man staring with raised brows. "Wow, Strife. I guess those private lessons with the General are paying off, after all."

Cloud stood up, ignoring the momentary jolt in his injured thigh. "Where's Sergeant Kunsel?" he asked instead, swinging his sword and returning it to the metal holster on his back.

"On his way."

The blond nodded, brushed past the other SOLIDER and started toward the walkway connecting their current platform to the main section. It was fine, for about a minute. But then when he tried to take another step forward, the pain in his leg became instantly unbearable, causing him to keel over and clutch the railing for support.

Belatedly, his mind made the connection between the Queen's pincers, the burning in his thigh, the sickness in his stomach, the disoriented fuzz of his brain. Oh, Gaia. Poison.

"You don't look so good, Strife," Nico said, rather unhelpfully.

"No shit," Cloud muttered. His head throbbed, blurring his vision white at the edges. Wasn't mako supposed to make this stuff hurt less? He tried to support himself against the railing, leaning forward to alleviate some of the nausea that pulsed through him, but the entire world started to spin, making it difficult to gain even a tenuous foothold of focus.

And then, Cloud felt hands on his shoulders, his waist, felt the gravity shift. The next thing he knew, he was falling, and his back hit the steel platform below them before he even had a chance to recognize what was happening and brace himself. At the moment of contact, his eyes fixated on Nico, who was standing at the railing where he just was a moment ago. The Third's face was warped by something – but what it was, Cloud could not figure out, and he knew he was not going to get the chance to.

There was a scurry of boots tapping against the metal like a haunting, ugly drum.

"Cloud!" someone yelled.

That was the last thing Cloud heard before the white took over everything else.