Finally! Next chapter up, though it's a bit short, but I wanna see what I get out of it and finish detailing what I have planned in my head for ahead. Oh, couple jots at the end for some ppl cause it needed to be said. It's worth it, read it.

Enjoy! Chapter 6!

Broken Rituals

I fucked it up.

Leon wanted to throw up.

He leaned back against a wall once he was far away enough from where he'd left a shocked Cloud to figure out the reasons behind Leon's actions. The darkness of the alley was comforting—a blanket that hid all his imperfections and screwed up reasoning, and the simple feeling of worthlessness and inadequacy that had plagued him since he was young. He wasn't worth enough to have parents, worth enough to have friends, worth enough to save everyone… worth enough to save the one he loved. And as a result, wasn't worth enough to have someone to love.

All he wanted was to forget Cloud existed. Not because he hated him, or thought badly of, no, that was far from it… but because he hated conflict, hated emotions, hated feeling like he was letting Irvine down — the only person who'd ever really cared. It would have been so much easier if he'd never met Cloud, if he'd never found himself plagued by thoughts of him. Was that normal? Did it mean anything?

That had been his reason. He'd only wished to suppress his thoughts of Cloud, and what better way to do that than to ignore him? If he didn't look at him, he would be reminded of those electric sapphires, that smooth, rounded face, that stance of shielded iciness, that vulnerability that flickered underneath the calm, soft voice…

He hadn't realized how painful it would be.

For both of them.

He'd been so stupid— he hadn't even considered that he might have actually hurt Cloud's feeling by doing that, and his wide, shocked eyes and the crumbled façade that had revealed the true visage of dejection had been like a punch in the stomach. Like an electrified sting in his chest, like… like someone had taken metal tweezers and pinched him hard. And still hadn't let go.

And now what was he going to do? Apologize? Explain? He scoffed to himself and leaned his head back until it thunked against the wall, and then did it again hard, for good measure. Because he deserved it.

It still didn't solve his problem… he wished he didn't have to look at Cloud again, that was all. That way, he wouldn't have to be reminded of the odd feeling he kept getting in his stomach, nor of the magnet that seemed to be pulling his eyes towards him at all times…

All he'd wanted was to stop feeling. Things were so much easier when you couldn't feel anything.

He felt like the asshole he'd been called so many times in his life. And for good reason—all he did was hurt people's feelings, brush them off as if they were dirty leaves on his pretend-pristine life, and in the end…

He'd let them all down. And not just down, but dead.

He knew he was sulking, but the heaviness was overpowering, and a glance at his gunblade—How many years had it taken for him to graduate as an expert? His whole life in Balamb had been spent avoiding people that he'd had no recollection of playing with at the orphanage, of avoiding relationships that might hurt him because, even if none of them had been able to remember their childhood thanks to the GF's, deep inside, he could still remember the feeling of being abandoned. If he forged no new relationships, he wouldn't have anyone to be abandoned by. That was his train of thought. And still was, to a certain extent. So why he'd been going against his general fear by getting closer to Cloud, he didn't know.

He traced the edge of his gunblade with gloved fingertips, and then lifted the hand to trace the scar on his face and remembered that day in the training grounds with Seifer. No one had really understood how deep their rivalry was—it was a subconscious competition for attention, for fulfillment—to feel worthy of their phantom parents and the livesthey'd left them on their own to cling to. He was probably the only living being Squall ever acknowledged—before the whole mess with Ultimacia. And then Irvine, Selphie, Quistis and Rinoa had appeared, and he'd somehow magically found that he had friends after all. And the knowledge, he remembered it had made him feel so odd and confused, and taken him months to sort through—and Irvine had been there the whole time, smoothing the path to acceptance and socializing. He knew he was still a pain to get along with, and part of it was a deliberate act, but he could feel the effects of Irvine's molding words and actions in Aerith and Yuffie and Cid's easy acceptance of him.

And then… the Heartless had appeared, and taken them all, and though he logically knew it wasn't abandonment… it was quite a different matter trying to tell that to his heart.

OoO

He remembered it was Sephiroth who was able to get him into such an emotional frenzy, and he'd never expected someone else to be able to drive him into such a cold fury meant to hide the hurt, the pain, the feeling of being lost and not belonging— not being. Even now, though he'd come to accept that he was indeed something, he still couldn't bring himself to call himself truly human. And the devil's wing pinned on his back only affirmed that he was waste, inhuman, some sort of monster created in a lab and injected with more toxins than he would ever know. The failed clone of a madman, never someone of his own.

All he wanted was to feel. Then he'd know he was human, and had emotions, and that maybe he could be lucky enough to find someone, even if he wasn't quite worth it. Zax had loved him, treated him like a human, and Cloud would never be able to forget that. Zax was the only proof Cloud had that there was something human and real inside him and capable of feeling.

It came with a price though. Even if now he knew who he was and what his real life had been like, he had the shadows of Zax's memories still imprinted in his mind, like ghosts that would not cease clouding his eyesight. When he drank something, he had to wonder whether it was really him that liked the drink, or whether it was a subconscious remnant of the taste he'd acquired from the time he'd believed he was Zax and adopted all his traits and memories. Though Aerith had told him otherwise, and he knew she accepted him for who he was now, he wondered if she could still see traces of the first man she'd loved in him. He wondered if there was any part of himself that truly belonged to him, and him alone.

Maybe that was what he was trying to accomplish in getting closer to Leon. Leon didn't know Zax, and would not be able to compare Cloud to him, and so, finally, Cloud could find something that was his alone, that was not tied to Zax, or Sephiroth, or his lonely past. Someone who would accept him as he was, and love him back, and make him feel. Was it so much to ask to want to be human?

It was… but he still could not stop this need to feel, and belong, a need embedded in him from years of being shunned and growing up alone and rejected, and then having the dream of his life—the only thing that would make him feel fulfilled— shattered. He hadn't been mentally strong enough to qualify as a SOLDIER, but to him, the failure had been so much more than just a simple refusal—it had been a rejection of his dreams, of his only feeling of self-worth, of the life he'd wanted to have just to prove himself to others and gain their acceptance…

Zax had accepted him, even after he'd failed, and Cloud could not deny he craved the comfort he'd gotten from him, needed the acceptance of somebody who loved him as he was, despite all his flaws and shortcomings, who saw that he was more than just Sephiroth's clone, or some winged demon. He needed to be reassured he was human, and that he was himself and not just some shadow's puppet. Deep inside, it was all he could bring himself to think about, and he longed for it like a child raised amidst a war longs for a childhood—an indescribably something that he knows he once had but was brutally snatched before he could truly appreciate it.

Cloud had thought he could find someone just for him in Leon.

But Leon had let him down.

After shaking away the initial shock and hurt, he'd felt himself bubbling with an indescribable rage, felt it crashing and merging with his muddled frustration and growing with each angry step he took.

How dare the bastard ignore him!

It didn't take long to find him, trailing his gunblade on the floor and walking absently, and if the picture struck some sort of sympathy in Cloud's heart, it was quickly overpowered by his anger of betrayal. He unclipped Buster from his back and went straight on at Leon, and it was only the brunet's quick reflexes and Cloud's disregard for the noise he was making that allowed Leon to lift Revolver in time to parry Cloud's attack.

"What the—" his surprised exclamation was cut short as his back smashed into a brick wall.

"What the hell was that back there, you jerk?" Cloud barked, and he didn't miss the way Leon's eyes shied away from his, but he only felt a cold twist of his stomach at it, and in response, his anger went up another notch. He shook the brunet harshly, Griever rattling away like a little bell.

But Leon wasn't exactly the passive type either, even if he appeared it, and with his advantage in brute strength, pushed Cloud away and dove at him with his gunblade.

"Shut up!" he snarled, because he had no idea what to say, or how to explain, and shoving him against a wall wasn't exactly the best way to get him to apologize either.

Cloud whirled about, easily dodging him, and planted his fist in Leon's stomach with a punch that left him breathless and reeling back slightly.

"Is that all you can say after that, huh? You ignore me, and then tell me to shut up?" those aquamarine eyes were burning eerily with barely contained rage, and his whole body shook with fury, or so Leon assumed.

The brunet took a breath to steady himself, fully aware that Cloud was waiting for his response, and if it wasn't good enough, then there was more awaiting for him at the end of that fist. The seconds dragged on, as Leon tried to find the words to express the barrage of emotions that had slowly smoldered in him since that morning.

"I—I wasn't ignoring you," he finally growled, standing up straight and scowling.

"No? Then what…" Cloud seemed to be having trouble speaking, and swallowed a moment before continuing, "Then what were you ignoring?" he wanted to scream out: My inhumanity? My unworthiness? My…

Leon opened his mouth, but he knew nothing would come out of it… "I… I wasn't ignoring you, but my…my…" my feelings. The seconds ticked, and his tongue felt like some foreign object that he did not know how to move, and he could only watch as Cloud's face grew progressively paler, and he looked like he was on the verge of being ill.

And Leon barely had a moment to dodge before a fist came at him, and he dropped Revolver to catch the other fist swung at him. Their faces were inches apart, and Cloud's panting breath and furious eyes of molten sapphire drove in guilt with a nail of fury into him and entranced him.

Cloud almost didn't want to continue, because Leon's silver eyes were confused and stormy with more than just anger—and Cloud wished he could believe what he'd said— I wasn't ignoring you— but if not him, then what?

"I thought you, of all people, knew what it was like to be rejected!" the words made Leon's mind freeze, and his body moved on autopilot to duck as Cloud's body tore away and aimed a kick high at his head, and Leon took the advantage of his upset balance to tackle him, sending both of them to the floor with a jarring jolt. Leon's hair swished across Cloud's forehead, the smaller body hot underneath his, ignoring the pain of the hands gripping his forearms painfully, listening to their heaving breaths and the angry growls that escaped Cloud's throat and sounded almost like repressed sobs.

"I do… and I wasn't trying to—" he tried, attempting to will the anger from his growl.

"Shut up!" Cloud snapped, "You did, and I want to know the hell why!"

His attempt failed, and Leon's gaze grew angry, silver mercury flashing dangerously. He tightened his hold on Cloud's collar and lifted him slightly only to ram him back onto the floor, ignoring the way Cloud's pupils widened and contracted out of focus when his head cracked against the ground.

"You know nothing! Don't even try to pretend to understand what I'm feeling, bastard!" his hands were shaking, even fisted around the blonde's collar, because he didn't know how to express what was roiling around in his head—scattered thoughts about being distant, and the iciness he was familiar and comfortable with, and Irvine, and that he was useless and unwanted, and to keep Cloud from finding all this out, and risking attachment and abandonment. He felt sick just realizing the vast canyon of logic plateaus and emotion crevices he was diving into.

Cloud's eyes narrowed and he arched his back to get momentum before pushing against Leon and managing to throw him off, and in Leon's troubled state, it was successful. They were both on bended knees, their weapons lying at a useless distance away, but their glares making up for it, their breaths like a mob of people all pushing to get past at once. Cloud snapped first, once again, because he'd been riled to a point past rationalization, which was Leon's strength —Squall's— anyway.

"I didn't start this! You decided to suddenly go off on your own, and throw me in for the worst damn morning in history, and when I finally find you, this is what I get? I get a self-centered bastard who doesn't think of what his actions might do to others, and ignores someone for the heck of it? Well, fuck this, 'cause you're—"

He gasped and reeled back as Leon's punch sent a resounding crack to ring in his head, and for a moment, his vision faded out before coming to, and he found himself sprawled on the ground, looking up at violent silver eyes that glared at him over a heaving chest and a raised palm. Cloud stared at him with unfocused half-lidded eyes, feeling his jaw throb unbearably, and his teeth felt out of place when he closed his mouth, as if his whole jaw had been dislodged. His vision had odd shapes blobbing across it, and he momentarily wanted to reach out and touch one of them. He stared at Leon's rapidly shaming face instead.

The brunet closed his eyes for a moment, ran his hand through his hair, and to Cloud's surprise, held out his hand, his expression slightly grimacing and clearly guilty. But Cloud only glared at the offending object and lifted his eyes to its owner before slapping it away, hissing, "It's not worth it. Get out of my sight."

But Leon took this to mean You're not worth it, and Cloud could not have picked better words to nail his error and make him feel so useless he suddenly couldn't face the blonde who remained on the floor, a hand placed over his jaw and the other one fisted at his side. Those burning sapphires were practically emitting waves of hatred his way, and Leon stepped back once, wondering if he could ever fix this, and trying to shove away the bitter taste of bile rising in his throat as he realized that Cloud was serious when he'd said to get out of his sight.

He realized this was a different sort of rejection, and wondered which one was more painful.

His boots ground into the dirt as he swiveled around, and only the sternest of self-control and the nausea in his stomach kept him from breaking out into a full run. I've never been worth anything… much less him.

Alright, alright, so it ends similar to the last chapter, so sue me, I decided Leon needed payback. I'm throwing them in for a little hell before they finally (if at all, in fact, they probably won't at all!) make up (notice up, not out). Gotta say I don't have artistic profanity down yet. Some people do, and it's actually pretty and adds a lot of flavor. I have yet to know how to do that. Anyway, hope it was liked, review!

Couple quick notes: Hopemia, I'd love to go the community, but links don't work on here (so you gotta separate them with spaces) so all I saw was 'visit here: (insert blank)'

And... everyone HAS to read wolfofsummerbreeze's review for chapter 5... it'll make you feel SO much better after all this conflict :hugs:sendspossible gag chapter:(sorry for the mix up, btw)

BTW, your reviews all made me laugh sooo hard! I loved them to pieces, you guys responded so ... emotionally to the last chapter! I'll figure something out about the crossdressing and stargazing and emo/suicidal stuff.XD