Disclaimer - I don't own Final Fantasy VII or its characters.
A Summon, a Wish and a Dream
Three years after his depart from Nibelhiem, Cloud Strife had entered the army regular training program and today it's a very important day for him, because Shinra Inc. will announce to them who will be entering the Third Class SOLDIER program and who will need to spend more time as a regular Shinra guard for another three years of tough training before the next test. Cloud stood at the back of the room where every cadet around his age was waiting to receive their results.
'Nii-san!' Someone screamed and Cloud mentally groaned, bracing himself as he was jumped from behind by a silver hair boy. 'Nii-san! Why didn't you wait for in our room? You know that every room in this building is so big that it's hard for me to find you.'
'Kadaj, why do you keep calling me "brother" when I'm not even related to you?' The blond asked for the billionth time since he had been placed in the same room as Kadaj is. The boy had kept calling him Nii-san ever since then and had always been very protective over him.
'Because you are older and bigger than me, Nii-san.' Kadaj answered with a wide grin as he removed himself from the back of the blond.
'We're about the same age and size, so that doesn't count.' The spiky hair boy said as he crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the silver hair boy who stuck out his tongue playfully.
Then two officers, carrying lot of envelops in their arms, had entered the room and everyone fell silent, everyone holding their breaths as the officers called them out, giving them the results of their SOLDIER test. Kadaj had his envelop first, but he didn't open it, saying that he wants to find out the results with Cloud.
When the blond had his envelop, he quickly tore it open and took out the results, Kadaj doing the same thing next to him. Sapphire blue eyes scanned the paper and widen when they saw the phase: "We're sorry to announce to you that you did not achieve the necessary marks to advance to Third Class." Cloud folded the paper and quickly hided it in his pocket, his face was emotionless.
'Yahoo! I made it, Nii-san! I made it to the Third!' His silver hair companion shouted as he brandished his results in front of the silent blond.
'Great. Congratulation, Kadaj.' Cloud mumbled before he left the now noisy room with Kadaj staring at his back worriedly before a rather mischief smirk appeared on his face.
***
The young country boy took a sword and went into the forest next the vast deserted training ground. When he was sure he was far away from the eyes of unwanted guests, he let out his anger and started to cut the nearest tree, leaving dozen of scars on the skin, he continued like this till his arms started to arch. He slowly backed away, dropping his sword in the process, until his back was against another tree and slide down to the ground. He pulled his legs up to his chest and pressed his forehead against his knees as he silently cried. To add worst to his misery, it started to rain, the branches and the leaves of tree didn't shield the sad kid from the falling small drops of water.
The blond sat there unmoving in the rain, his spiky hair and uniform were damp, crying and cursing himself for his failures to achieve the Third Class rank, but also wishing that he might have a chance to become stronger. Suddenly Cloud couldn't feel the rain on him. He thought it had stopped raining, but he could still hear the dripping sound of the water and then he felt something heavy on his left shoulder. The boy looked up and saw a black wing hovering over his head and he turned to his left to see the most beautiful creature he had ever saw in his whole life which he had only heard of in the fairy-tales his mother told him.
It was an elegant phoenix with pure black feather and a few red ones near the neck wearing a silver dagger-shaped pendant, but what amazed him the most was those red-orange glowing eyes of the creature. Why did it look so familiar? Cloud pounded the question for a minute, but when a certain accident at Mt. Nibel flashed through his mind, he stared at the bird in shock for second before he whispered: 'You're the one who saved me and Tifa...'
After a few seconds, the boy snapped out his surprising shock and told the bird to leave him alone. The black bird nodded his head as he flew off of him, Cloud stared after it, but instead of leaving, it picked up the abandoned sword on the ground and threw it at the blond who caught before it might give him an unnecessary injury. Then it squawked at him and pointing the weapon in his hands with its beck, like telling him to be ready for some things, before three red generated swords appeared out of thin air and hurled towards the unprepared boy who got knocked back by the force of the attacks.
Cloud looked up just in time to dodge another strike, but he was thrown against another tree when he tried to defend himself from one of the generated swords. This process had continued for half an hour before anger started to boil in the blood of the boy and he felt a great energy surged through his body. With an extremely fast speed, he cut down all the swords that was hurling towards him in one slash.
The boy fell to his knees, feeling suddenly disoriented, tired and also surprised by his own sudden powerful strikes. The black phoenix flew to his side and pressed its forehead against his arm, a warm glowing green light enveloped him. When the light vanished, his body is no longer aching in pain and looked back at the beautiful creature.
'What are you?' Cloud asked the bird as it looked at him, he would have sworn he had just saw a smile on the creature. Before the bird could answered, the blond heard some ruffling sounds and someone shouting his name behind him, he turned around to see Kadaj emerged from behind some bushes and when he turned back, the mysterious phoenix was gone.
'Nii-san! I have been searching all over the place for you and you are mean to not have told me about this peaceful hiding spot!' The silver hair boy whined as he sat next to Cloud. 'Oh, and by the way, I'm off the Third Class list.'
'Huh? What? Why?' Cloud asked while Kadaj just continued to smile brightly.
'The instructors said that I'm too immature, because I had accidentally set fire on some important files, and that I need more disciplines, so they decided to put in the regular Shinra Army for now.' The blond scowled at the boy, knowing that Kadaj had done it intentionally, not accidentally as he claimed it to be.
'Kadaj did you set the fire on purpose?' The matured boy asked his friend who simply smile innocently at him. This caused him to let out a furious shriek. 'WHY THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT? DON'T YOU KNOW YOU MIGHT NOT HAVE ANOTHER CHANCE TO GET INTO SOLDIER AFTER THAT?!'
'Because I love you, Nii-san.' The silver hair boy answered and the heated anger of Cloud had suddenly dropped to below 20 degree as he stared surprisingly at his companion. Kadaj moved closer to him, wrapped his arms around his back and rested his head on his shoulder. 'I want to be close to you, Nii-san. You are the only one who I have ever been close to and I don't want to lose you because I get to go to Third Class. I want to stay with you, until you are promote too. I don't care what's going to happen to me, I just want to be with you.'
The statement had caused a bright red blush to creep over Cloud's face. Does he know that he is more like confessing to me with a more lover-lover love than a brotherly love?
'You are warm, Nii-san...' Kadaj mumbled under his breath and then everything went still and silent. The blond looked down at the peaceful features of the now sleeping silver hair boy, not even bothered to remove the boy from his body, because he is sure that the vice-like grip around him won't be peel off easily, so he decided to lay in a more comfortable position on the tree and wait until Kadaj wakes up. Looks like another reason for me to become stronger. But where did the phoenix go?
Soon Cloud fell asleep too and a strange orange glow emanated from the red orb, the light covered both his and Kadaj's bodies, protecting them from the cold rain and frosty wind while both of them dreamt of a magnificent field of yellow and white flowers.
