-1Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, Square Enix, Final Fantasy, or any mumbo-jumbo like that, I just write the fan fiction.

Rated: M or R if you like

Warning: Yaoi, meaning guy on guy action. If you no like that, then don't read this, or anything I write here for that matter. If I get a flame yelling at me about the Yaoi, you will get a very nasty and biting response from me, one guy and I had a huge fight over a flame he sent me…haven't heard from him since…Mwahahaa

Song of Desperation.

Cloud wandered down University street looking for Leon's brother's café. When he stumbled across it, he grumbled in dismay. It was a quaint little coffee shop across from the college, nothing special. But it was small, and couldn't have more than 3 rooms per level. Cloud normally didn't like living in such close quarters, he wasn't a people person, but it was his only choice. Sighing, he walked in the door.

The place was empty this time of day and Cloud didn't see anyone at the register. He pushed the door open further to walk in and was startled to hear a soft ding announcing him. He looked around, but not even the ding had inspired any kind of attention.

"Hello?" he asked. Still no one answered. Tentatively he stepped up to the counter and looked around on the other side. No one.

"Is anyone here? Hello?" Cloud was starting to think the place was empty, and that he should leave. In fact that was exactly what he was going to do. But as he turned to leave he heard a voice call from another room.

"Hold on a minute, I'm coming!" Cloud turned around to see where the voice had come from, but couldn't see anything.

"Hello?" he asked again.

"AHHH!! #$"

Cloud flinched as something made a loud crashing noise. It sounded like it was coming from the storage room. "You ok?" he asked.

"Oh yes, I'm just peachy! NOW GET THIS FUCKING THING OFF OF ME!" Cloud jumped and moved over to the storage room. When he pushed the door open he saw a gangly teenager with silvery-white hair buried under a pile of boxes that had fallen off the shelf. Hurriedly he ran over to him and started to remove the heavy packages.

"Damn, what do you have in these? Cloud asked as he removed a particularly heavy box. The teenager shook the rest of the boxes off and stood up.

"Flour, coffee, supplies, the usual crap. Thanks for rescuing me, I could have been under there for a week without anyone noticing…uh…who exactly are you?" The teen looked him over suspiciously. "You don't look like a college kid."

Cloud laughed. "That's because I'm not. I believe Leon called about me getting a job?"

"Oh yeah, you must be Cloud. I'm Riku, Leon's little brother."

"You don't look a thing like Leon."

"I'm adopted. Any who, I hope Leon explained that I'm not going to pay you anything except a room and food."

"Yeah he mentioned that."

"Good. I hear you're a writer, if you need a computer you'll have to get your own, I'm broke." Riku smiled. "But then again, you can use the college's computers, you can get in with a public library card."

"Yeah I know." Cloud scratched his head and looked around. "This place is bigger than it looks."

Riku nodded and picked out one of the boxes that Cloud had pulled off of him. "Yeah I know. Damn…I think I sprained my wrist, can you carry this?" He pointed to the box he was trying to pick up.

Cloud nodded and picked up the box easily. Riku walked out of the storage room, Cloud followed.

"You'll only have to work during the busy shifts, around lunch and in the afternoon. I can handle the rest. Really this job is going to be easy and you'll have a lot of free time, you can do whatever you want so long as it doesn't destroy or deface anything. Set that down over there." Riku pointed to a counter behind the cash register.

Cloud walked over and placed the package where he was told, then turned and looked at Riku. "Do you uh, think I could see my room? I'd like to get my stuff out of the middle of the floor." He nodded to the suitcase that lay abandoned in the middle of the black and white tiled floor.

"Oh right, this way." Riku moved around Cloud and started up a small flight of stairs that Cloud had missed earlier. Quickly, Cloud grabbed his luggage and followed the teen up the steps.

The second floor was divided into 4 rooms, two bedrooms, a small common room at the top of the stairs, and a bathroom. Riku gestured to one of the bedrooms to the right of the stairs. "That's your room, you can have the upstairs bathroom, I usually use the downstairs one."

"Err, thanks." Cloud replied. He walked over to inspect his new room. It wasn't big, there was only a single bed, a closet, and a small desk, and not much room for anything else. Cloud realized with dismay that there wasn't even a window.

"Sorry it's so small, but you can work downstairs if you want, it's more open down there."

"Right…" Cloud sighed and dropped his suitcase on the bed, he was about to turn around and ask Riku when he started work when he heard the downstairs door chime.

"Oh, it's 3:00, people will start coming in. Hurry up and get downstairs and you can start work." And with that, he left to go attend to his customers.

Cloud sighed and opened up his suitcase. It didn't take long to unpack, and soon he had everything out of his suitcase and in the closet or on his desk. The last thing he pulled out was his manuscript for Song of Desperation. He looked it over before sighing and leaving it on the bed. He barely got his suitcase shoved under the bed before he heard Riku call up the steps.

"Hey Cloud, can you come here a minute?"

"Coming!" He called, and walked down the steps to begin the next phase of his life.

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I know we haven't gotten into anything yet, but don't worry, it all starts soon. I may combine this chapter with the first one later, I'm not sure, but for now I'll leave it as two chapters.

R&R!