Life as a SOLDIER

by Fairy Red

.:On Hiatus, AU:. Training hard to be strong, tangled love lives; mixed with lies and betrayal, corruption, and a revolution at hand. You're in SOLDIER now, boy; you'll get what you came here for, even if it kills you. Chapter 49 up.

38. Chapter 38

Life as a SOLDIER

Disclaimer: …let's continue.

A/N: Okay, we will! Really, Disclaimer, you should try to sound more excited. It keeps the readers interested! Got it? Good, let's go!
Chapter Thirty-Seven: That Calm and Collected State of Mind Called Chaos
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It was a shining bright and early Wednesday morning, albeit a darkish winter morning. In almost every single room that had alarm clocks, the clock struck 6:00 AM on the dot.

BZZT BZZZT BZZT

BAM BAAM BAM

RING RIING RIIING

DINGLE RINGLE LING

MY HEART SHINES ONLY FOR YOUUUUUUU

Groans and sighes of weariness were heard everywhere, along with the shuffling of feet to get to breakfast on time and get ready for training and such. This new rule applied to everyone; SOLDIERs, Turks, scientists. Everyone. You had to feel sorry for them. Getting up at 6 AM…

"Good morning, Cloud!" called Zack cheerfully, opening the door to Cloud's room. "My, isn't it a lovely morning?"

Cloud blinked awake, and stared up sleepily at Zack. "Morning…? Already…?"

"Yep, it is," said Zack, opening the curtains.

"Don't tell me you're a morning person," yawned Cloud as he sat up.

"How long have you known me? It took you that long to figure that out, did it?" asked Zack with a smile. "The morning is so refreshing! Just look out the window and take a HUGE deep breath! You'll feel refreshed and ready to go! Try it, Cloud!"

Cloud looked out the window, where it was still kinda darkish outside. "Not even the sun has risen," he muttered, getting out of bed reluctantly. "Why can't we wake up when the sun does?"

"Because the sun has it's own schedule," said Zack matter-of-factly. "If we all tried to follow the pattern it follows, our lives would be truly chaotic indeed. The sun is a hard thing to keep up with. And if we did follow the sun's schedule for waking up and sleeping, it would mean no more late-night things to do."

Cloud stared up at Zack, then yawned again. "It's too early in the morning for thinking like that…"

"It is?" asked Zack. "Sorry. I can get so carried away when I remember things Aeris told me…"

"Aeris told you that about the sun?" asked Cloud in disbelief.

"Yeah, she tells me many, many things about the natural world! It really amazes me at how the natural world works! How nature knows what to do, and when to do it!"

"…oh," said Cloud, rubbing his eyes. It is too early for thinking like that, thought Cloud bitterly. He's had too much time to think about Aeris… How can I get him to pay more attention to me

"Sephiroth is on his way here, by the way," said Zack. "It appears he's not exactly a morning person either."

"Sephy's coming?" asked Cloud. "What time is it?"

"It's officially 6:13 AM!" announced Zack proudly.

"Wow, Sephy's 13 minutes late," said Cloud with a smile.

"It's too -beep-ing early in the morning," muttered someone behind the door, and it opened to reveal a very-tired looking Sephiroth. "Oh, so you're awake," he asked irritably. "Good, come on."

"What? We have to leave right away?" asked Zack sadly. "What about breakfast?"

Sephiroth looked back at Zack. "We?" he repeated. "What we? I assumed I was personally training Cloud, not Zack."

"…but, even he needs to eat," said Zack. "Come on, be nice, Sephiroth!"

"I am being nice," insisted Sephiroth. "Trust me, you'll be thanking me on bended knee one day when you see how much I'll improve Cloud." He grabbed Cloud's arm an dragged him along. "Let's get going, shall we?"

"Awa! Hey, let me walk!" yowled Cloud in surprise.

Zack blinked and looked out the door. What kind of training is that? thought Zack with a sigh. Sephiroth sure has weird ways of training people…if this is his training style… Oh, dear, I hope Cloud will be all right…

Meanwhile, with the Turks (at 6:19 AM)…

"Everyone, come on!" called Tseng, walking in and out of Turks rooms, waking up any sleepys. "If you're not awake when I enter your room, I'll send the Chocobo on you!" He soon came to Elena's room, and opened it. "Elena! Come on, you heard me! I'm serious."

Elena lifted a sleepy head. "Wake up time?" she asked.

"Yes, it is," said Tseng. He walked out of Elena's room and went to Rude's room, which was next to Elena's room. He entered the room and saw that Rude was already awake, tying a tie to his suit. "Good, Rude, you're already awake."

"Yes, I got up just five minutes before the alarm," said Rude, putting on his sunglasses.

Tseng sighed. "It's not safe to wear sunglasses in the dark morning," he said warningly, leaving the room before Rude can answer. He went to the room across from Rude's room, which was Reno's room. He opened the door and called, "Reno! Come on, why aren't you awake yet?"

"Cause it's only 6:23 AM," said Reno sleepily. "I only wake up at 6:30..."

"Not anymore you do," said Tseng. "Remember the new schedule! We have to be up at 6! Wake up," he repeated, leaving the room. He woke up several more Turks and then reached Vincent's room. "Vincent, are you awake yet?" he asked, opening the door.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm awake," yawned Vincent. "I'm just not used to getting up so early…"

"Well, you'd better get used to it," said Tseng.

"Why, what time did YOU get up?" asked Vincent, curious rather then irritable.

"I got up at 6 AM, on the dot," said Tseng. "I'm always--"

"Yeah, you're always strict to the rules and plans, I know. Everybody knows," said Vincent, standing up.

"Yes, I am," said Tseng, leaving the room. After waking up the rest of the Turks, he made his way to the cafeteria. I wonder how chaotic breakfast will be when all of us have to share the cafeteria… Good thing it's so huge…

Meanwhile, with the scientists (at 6:31 AM)…

There were only about 200 scientists there, and all of them were awake. In a manner of speaking.

"Lucrecia, give Reeve another slap, will you?" asked Hojo. "We all should be getting ready to leave for breakfast.

"Yes, Hojo-sama," sighed Lucrecia sleepily, rubbing one eye while giving Reeve a slap with the other. "Reeve, quit nodding off."

"Aah!" yelled Reeve, waving the stuffed doll he was holding wildly. "Are we under attack! Quick, send the SOLDIERs, send the Turks, send the--" in his sleepy-panicked state, he fell off his chair.

"No, we're not under attack, we're getting ready for breakfast," said Hojo. "Reeve, why are you holding that doll around anyway? You've been carrying that thing around for the past week! You gonna give it to someone as a Christmas gift or what?"

"This?" asked Reeve, holding up the doll. "Oh, no, I got a brilliant idea for this doll!"

"Do you now?" asked Lucrecia, walking to the coffee table and pouring herself a cup of coffee.

"Oh, bring some over here," said Hojo. Lucrecia muttered something and grabbed two more cups. "Anyway, what's the brilliant idea with the doll?"

"Can't tell you, it's a secret," said Reeve, sitting back in his chair. "Cause it's only a hunch, Hojo-sama. And you know how Rufus is with hunches."

Hojo nodded agreement. Rufus was exactly like his father: it was either you have a brilliant plan, or get out of my office until you can tell me the idea. "Well, fine. Let me know when you have this brilliant idea formulized and such."

"It'll be the best thing to happen to Shinra since we invented SOLDIERs!"

"Here, here, and here," said Lucrecia, giving a cup of coffee to Hojo, Reeve, and herself. "Thank god for whoever invented coffee…"

Reeve and Hojo nodded agreement, and all three clank their coffee cups together and drank the glass all in one gulp. "Ah… coffee, good," said Hojo, standing up. "Let's get going to the cafeteria now." Reeve and Lucrecia nodded, and they both along with Hojo and the scientists walked to the cafeteria.

In the cafeteria…

"It's an utter state of chaos…" muttered Tseng to himself, sitting at a table with his four Turks. The cafeteria was full of SOLDIERs, Turks, and scientists now, and some of them were not morning people at all.

"Hey, get out of my way, SOLDIER, I was here first!" snarled one Turk to a SOLDIER.

"No, I was here first," argued the SOLDIER.

"Both of you out of MY way, I got here a few seconds before you!" shouted a scientist.

"I deserve to get breakfast first, you prissy pansy scientist!" said the SOLDIER. "I work hard to make sure you and those stupid Turks are protected!"

"Excuse me!" asked the Turk. "I believe it's us -beeps- of Shinra who do all the dirty work around here! WE are the ones actually out there, risking our necks for Shinra Company!"

"It's not just you SOLDIERs and Turks!" said the scientist. "We scientists are the ones who truly do all the work! You SOLDIERs wouldn't be what you are today if it wasn't for our research and results! And you Turks wouldn't have a job if it wasn't us scientists who developed things for you to research!"

"You -beep-!"

"What! HOW DARE YOU!"

A huge fight broke out, several big fights in fact.

Tseng flopped his head onto the table. "I wonder if Rufus knew what he was doing when he made that rule…"

"Wow, tough fight," said Reno.

"Yeah, they'll have to teach us that one," agreed Rude. Vincent just grunted something and drank some coffee.

"Here, Tseng, have some of my coffee!" said Elena happily, sliding Tseng a thermos of her coffee. "It's fresh from India so I thought you'd like some!"

"India?" asked Tseng, lifting his head.

"Yeah, where you're from!"

"But India's in the RealWorld, not here," said Tseng. "And I'm not from India."

"You're not?" asked Elena in confusion. "But, you have a red dot on your head," she said, poking the red dot that was on Tseng's head.

Tseng sat up straighter so Elena couldn't reach it. "No touching the red mark," he said sternly. "I had this ever since I was born."

"But the research I did yesterday in my free time, I researched India and learned that Indians have those red dots on their heads too…"

Tseng sighed, and took Elena's thermos of coffee. "I'm not from India," he said, drinking the coffee.

"Yes, we heard that," said Elena. "Will you tell us where you're from then?"

"No," said Tseng, putting the thermos down.

"Gee," said Elena, taking her thermos back.

"Whoa!" shouted Reno and Rude together as the fight got more intense.

Tseng flopped his head onto the table again, and Vincent asked, "Is Tseng showing emotion? I've never seen him so irritable."

"Probably," said Elena, looking into her thermos. "Hey, you drank all of my Indian coffee… I had it on special import…"

Meanwhile, over to where Zack was sitting…

Zack sat down, awaiting the line to thin a little before getting breakfast. What a distasteful state of chaos, he thought.

His two friends were enjoying the chaos, though. "Wow, Zack, are you sure we can't go join?" asked one SOLDIER. "It looks like fun!"

"Yeah, and it'll be good experience!" agreed the other SODLIER.

"No, no, we have to set a good example for the lower-class SOLDIERs," said Zack. "They've been programmed to follow exactly what the first-class SOLDIERs do, and both of you are newly-applied first-class SOLDIERs now, remember?"

"Yeah…" said the two SOLDIERs together.

"So, we sit here patiently for the line to thin a little, then go get breakfast."

"Okay," said one SOLDIER sadly.

"But it still looks like fun," said the other SOLDIER sadly.

Zack looked around the room. I wonder how Cloud and Sephiroth are doing… Now that I'm seeing the chaotic state this room's in, I'm almost glad Sephiroth decided to skip breakfast and go train Cloud elsewhere… Then again, if they all saw Sephiroth here, they might behave… Zack sighed and checked the progress of the line. "Still not whittled down yet…"

"Can't we just get in line now?" asked the other SOLDIER. "How long till breakfast is over?"

"We get until 8:30 AM," answered Zack, checking the clock on the wall. "It's 6:50 AM now, so we get about…two hours and forty minutes, I think."

"So let's get in line now," said one SOLDIER. "Come on, Zack…"

"Please?" asked both of them, giving Zack the puppy eyes.

"Oh, all right," said Zack with a smile, standing up. "Let's get in line then."

"Whee!" cheered the two SOLDIERs, hurrying with Zack to the line.

Well, waiting in line gives me ample time to think, thought Zack. I received an e-mail yesterday from Rufus… He's developing a new program, one he'll test on Cloud… But he wouldn't tell me what it was called or what it does. When I get the program to test… Zack it his lip in worry. But according to what Rufus told me in the e-mail…the program will use the power of the Lifestream and give it to a SOLDIER, namely Cloud… But can anyone truly use that power? Can anyone truly handle it…? What can I expect in the future for Cloud…?
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What can we expect? HAH! You can expect that this fanfic won't take a dark turn (not yet), and will continue in a semi-serious-half-funny style. Really. But dark WILL return! MWAAHAHAHAAHAH! See you next chapter!