Trapdoor (Part 20)

by anza (14.12.05)

He'd heard of SOLDIER. Who hadn't? Kadaj had three pairs of them, and he'd brought all of them on this trip. They were by far the most comfortable jeans on the Continent, if not the world. Even Cloud had a pair - tighter than he liked them, but they were stretch jeans and he looked good enough in them to pass for a teenager, so who was he to complain?

Cloud hadn't been aware the headquarters were in Nibelheim, but once Zack explained the cloth could only be cultured in certain temperatures for the right strength and flexibility, he took it in stride. "And it's just great you're here," Zack concluded with a dazzling flash of teeth, "because my last sales manager just died and you're just perfect for the job, Rowe!"

Warning bells went off in his head. Carefully Cloud asked, "How so?"

"Because you're so beautiful, of course! People will appeal to you immediately, don't worry!" Cloud and Kadaj followed the dark-haired man deeper into the building. Zack murmured hearty "good mornings" to several, nods to other, and took paperwork from five more. By the time they reached his office on the second to top floor, they could barely see his dark head over the pile of thick manila folders. Cloud was still not assured; he saw this as no coincidence. Did Zack know he had been head of the Sales Department in Shin-Ra Company? And how?

He hadn't risen there on purpose, as his childhood left him shy and avoidant of anyone. Grade school had floated through a haze of books, and then an accelerated course had taken him straight to high school and college. Sephiroth was already a higher-level grunt by the time he joined the ranks of Shin-Ra Company, eager to follow his brother. It was two years later when he saw Sephiroth in the hall, answering the Prince in a clipped, military tone, that Cloud realized he could no longer connect with the person standing in front of him. He had learned early that words were never enough, not to apologize, not to say the heart's most potent secrets - but it wasn't until then he realized the pain that accompanied them.

We were such good brothers, Seph.

Had he left Yazoo and Loz there as a sort of second chance for Seph to redeem himself?

Rarely were things in life that easy.

Zack was answering Kadaj's questions easily, telling him he could be Cloud's secretary, wouldn't that be nice? and that Cloud would have an office all to himself on the floor right below Zack's, so if he wanted he could take a broom and knock the ceiling boards out to bother Zack on bad days. Cloud was silent, thinking, though Zack was making the prospect irresistable, and would know something was wrong if Cloud refused such a good position.

Still, he wanted he and Kadaj to live in comfort, and certainly this job could easily support the two of them.

Still, there were no such things in this world as coincidences. And this was already the fourth coincidence with Zack Darklighter. No two things about it; something was up with him, and Cloud would start digging the moment he sniffed a lead.

"We'll take it," he said softly when Zack paused long enough to take a breath.

The president of SOLDIER Jeans Co. inhaled, exhaled with a whoosh of relief, and gave a shake of his head. "One last thing to ask of you," he asked primly. Cloud nodded cautiously - as long as it was short of selling his soul to the Grinning Devil Zack was, he would certainly consider it.

"I want you guys to be in my next SOLDIER Jeans Co. commercial!" Zack's grin was so wide Cloud swore it could swallow the sea.

"Oh HELL NO," came his numb answer.

----------

He was dreaming again.

It was the past, like it always was. Cloud was peeking into Sephiroth's room as he ripped sparkling chords from his guitar, hair swinging wildly in time to the beat. "Here, you can try," Sephiroth murmured once he'd spotted his spy, and tentatively Cloud had brushed his eleven-year-old fingers over the strings. They were stiffer than he thought they would be. "Like this," Sephiroth curled his hands around Cloud's hands, until they were strumming together, one clumsy B-major chord that rolled up, rolled down, rolled up, rolled down. Cloud played it slower, faster, hearing each note vibrate through him into the hollow of Sephiroth's ribcage, pressed against his back. "Like this," and the chord changed to a C-major, an E-minor, a G-minor...

"Like this," Vincent kicked open the guitar case. Cloud knelt to watch. His lover's pale hands drew away the velvet on the top and unlatched the top compartment. There was ample space for a few changes of clothes as well as pockets for some random junk - maybe spare money, spare keys, a pocketbook with addresses. "And this too." With a professional snap Vincent closed the top compartment, rolled the velvet back, and reached back and pulled back the covering on the bottom compartment. Another click, and ice-cold fear washed down Cloud's spine. He was looking at the gleaming black of a rifle, fully loaded.

"You'll need it more than I will," Vincent promised.

"Like this," Kadaj spun, hands clenched around two potholders, a cookie tray in between them. "Try one?"

"Like this," Reeve took the Rubix Cube from him and spun it deftly. Seventeen turns later, all the colors were back in their respective spots. "Got all that?" Cloud shook his head mutely, amazed.

"Like this." A hundred thousand voices pressed at him, pushing things into his face, into his hands, at his chest. They told him he would need these things for the future. They told him he would need to be strong. They told him these things would prepare him for whatever might come his way. They whispered into his mind, but Cloud knew they weren't real, they weren't true, but when he tried to push them away, his hands only went through him.

He awoke.

---------

The desk was warm against his cheek. Kadaj stumbled in with a tottering pile of paperwork, dumped it on his desk disgustedly, and went back out again to answer the phone. Cloud suppressed a moan and picked up the first sheet from the stack. He barely understood what was being said about dyes and hems. He'd certainly had enough encounters with work unions, protests, and picketing - but Shin-Ra's PR sector had had half of that under control, not like SOLDIER Jeans Co. at all. Catching the main gist was that dyes used were too weak and needed to be developed on, he signed the paper and put it on the "Development Bureau" stack.

Kadaj stomped in a moment later. "How the hell do you keep so skinny if you're sitting on your butt all the time?" he grouched, moving his previous pile over and plopping another chin-high stack onto the desk.

Absently Cloud answered, "I eat well," and signed a statement releasing the numbers for the sales amount of the Cameo line to the public. Zack had told him earlier they were selling well...

"Rowe?" Kadaj took care not to say his real name out loud. "Are you feeling alright?"

Cloud looked up then, surprised at the simplicity of the question, and blinked owlishly for a moment before turning back to his work. What could he possibly say out loud? That he was having bad dreams? That he suspected Zack Darklighter to be a Turk?

He took a deep breath and let it out. Tifa, he remembered briefly. The time when she put her hands on his shoulders and massaged out the knots seemed like a lifetime ago. He wrenched his thoughts away; not any more. Never again.

"I'm alright," he answered, feeling his heart sink with every paper he signed.