Warnings: Language, innuendo, the usual

Chapter 17 : Soft Power

Zack stood watching Sephiroth until he disappeared into the acid-green river that doubled as Cloud's sky. The General could be swallowed up by it, entranced by it, shredded by it, or become lost forever in its swirling depths. It was dangerous there, look at what had happened to Cloud, but there had been no hesitation, no fear for himself. It was needed to reassemble Cloud so he would do it.

Just like what he'd done to rescue their physical bodies.

It still made the black-haired SOLDIER catch his breath to realize how important they were to the genetically-modified, oddly-raised, person that was Sephiroth. He didn't know if he'd ever get used to it.

A warm presence wrapped itself around his hip, "Are we going to start work, or did you need to relax first," Niisan cooed. Delicate fingers eased their way south.

Zack grabbed those fingers before they got too close to anything interesting and brought them up to his lips for a quick kiss, "Down, boy."

Niisan chuckled, "You'd be disappointed if I didn't try." Zack had to smile. The brat was right.

"Let's get to work, buddy. We can play later." Once Cloud was whole again was the unsaid but understood subtext; they'd covered this territory before. The silver-haired youth pouted but followed Zack into the house. Zack wasn't surprised by Niisan's docile obedience. He could work as hard as any of Cloud's parts, he just didn't like to. Until someone told him what to do and how to do it, he wouldn't do anything.

"Ewwww," Niisan's nose wrinkled fastidiously, "it stinks in here." One hand came up to cover his face as if that would keep the stench out.

"Hardly surprising. Nobody's been looking after it." Zack commented while looking around. "I think our first priority will be to do the wall and the roof."

"The holes make it cold in here." That wasn't Niisan's throaty purr, but a much younger, less inviting version. "And the wind blows everything around." Zack looked around for the source. Raincloud stepped out from behind a freestanding cupboard in the raised section. He was as he'd been earlier except for a being a lot dirtier, as if he'd been trying to clean up but had ended up playing in the dirt instead. Maybe he'd done both.

"Hey, Raincloud," Zack said, smiling happily. "You been here since I last saw you?"

Dusty blond locks waved as the smallest Cloud nodded. Big, solemn eyes looked at him, assessed him, even as tiny arms tightly clutched his worn toy dragon. "You made me tingly," the child finally said.

Baffled, Zack didn't know how to respond. He frowned in question, "I did?"

Again with the solemn head nodding. "You and the silver one, Outside There. It made me feel funny."

"Outside There…?" It didn't help that Niisan had figured out what Raincloud was referring to in that telepathic way the personas had with each other. The silver-haired youth was giggling in delight. Wait… There really wasn't much Niisan was interested in besides sex.

Ohmyfuckinggods!

The SOLDIER could feel colour heating his face. He doubted that even his darker skin could hide how deeply he was blushing. "You felt that?"

"I was Here. Outside There is closer when we're Here." He saw that Zack was horrified and tried to comfort him "It felt nice, kinda strange but nice."

"Hmm," Niisan purred, "I'm sorry I stayed away then." He eased up to Zack's side and clung lightly, "Maybe we could recreate it?"

"Aah, no," the black-haired First moved away, "Work first, right? Did you want to come with us, Raincloud?"

"The silver one is coming back?"

"Yeah," Zack confirmed. He'd have to call Sephiroth that to his face, just to see how he reacted. "As soon as he finds the Corporal."

Little Raincloud looked up at him, head tilted in assessment. Suddenly, the young Nibelheimer's face went blank and empty, all animation, all will just drained away. His arms dropped, his grip on the stuffed-dragon loosened and the toy fell to the floor. The child stood military straight but it was as if someone had pulled strings on him. He stared at the First, blinking slowly, revealing pupils so wide that they almost completely eradicated the iris' pale, blue colour.

"The hands of circumstance have changed. The Weapons precede Chaos. Chaos precedes Omega. The Weapons cleanse the Planet. Omega takes its spirit. Chaos can control it all if he chooses to do so." His voice was mechanical, the words and rhythm all wrong for a six-year old boy.

Zack was stunned. Raincloud often seemed to know more than he should about things that he should be oblivious to, but this was just wrong. The First's shock didn't last long however. He knelt down close to the boy, "What can you tell me of Chaos?"

"Chaos is the one in between. He is a child of Gaia but shares blood with The Man... and The Others," the blond shrugged, the move jerky and uncoordinated and completely unlike any of Cloud's parts. "The Weapons have no choice. They are what they were created to be. Chaos is the Harbinger, the Omen but he can ignore destiny. He is not alone. The cycle can continue if they have the See-er and the Heart to guide them."

Raincloud's delicate voice was growing even thinner, and Zack swore he could see the child being shredded as whatever it was used him. The SOLDIER decided that it didn't matter how important this information might be, nothing was worth watching the boy get pulled apart. It would be like Hojo's lab all over again.

Zack reached out a hand and gave him a gentle shake, "Raincloud. Raincloud, come back."

"Chaos never sleeps, The Man barely rests, but The Others are in the twilight and they might not like being awake…"

He shook the boy harder, called a little louder, put a little more energy into his call, "Raincloud!"

He knew when the odd possession ended; Raincloud sat abruptly, his legs just folding up underneath him. He blinked, dazed as his pupils slowly returned to their normal size. His face filled with personality—an innocent, ancient, disjointed personality but at least it was his. Not like before. The tiny aspect had seemed like a puppet under someone else's control and that scared Zack. He didn't want his friend, any part of his friend, to be so vulnerable. "You okay, Raincloud?"

"They said to tell you." The child picked up his stuffy and squeezed it hard.

"Who said?" Zack demanded, wondering who had taken over the kid like that. He'd like to teach them a lesson about personal space….

Strangely, it was Niisan who answered him, "The ones in the 'deep sea'," he air-quoted, "The oldest part of it. They feel the planet more strongly there." Not a helpful answer as he couldn't go into the Lifestream and pound on spirit energy. He growled in frustration.

"They say lots but most people can't hear them unless they're drowning. The Growing Lady almost hears them when she's surrounded by green things." Raincloud said in explanation and added to Zack's confusion.

Niisan smirked, "They don't like me, thank gods, so they don't bother me much but they're always nagging at someone."

Zack almost snorted, that made about as much sense as the aspects ever did. Questioning Raincloud any more was just going to give him a headache, so he'd put it aside for now. He didn't have enough information, probably wouldn't get any more information, and it's not like they didn't have other things to do after all, so he ruffled Raincloud's hair just to see him scowl.

"Do I get a hug?" He asked, because he always asked.

Raincloud looked at him, his eyes so soft, so old with remembered pain. Fuck, it made Zack's heart hurt to see it. Then the boy smiled, just a small smile, barely there in fact, but it was definitely an upward tilt of the lips. "Your wings are making shapes above your head."

"What?" He twisted to look, but of course he couldn't see what his wings were doing. He did see Niisan's slyly smiling face. "What were they doing?" he demanded of the silver-haired persona.

Niisan smiled a little deeper, "How badly do you want to know?" he cooed.

Zack rolled his eyes, "Not that badly." He turned back to Raincloud who'd hidden his face in his stuffed dragon. "Are you going to tell me?"

A silent head shake, but the boy's blue eyes were a little less solemn and haunted. Raincloud's shoulders jerked in giggles and he pressed himself deeper into his toy. Zack sighed, "They're doing it again, aren't they."

Raincloud nodded.

Zack put his hands on his hips in exasperation. "You know, we have better things to do, we should probably get to them."

"Oh I don't know," Niisan chortled, "Watching your little wings play with a five-year old child is rather entertaining." He stepped closer and purred, "Maybe they'd like to play with me later."

"Work first, brat. Did you want to come with us, Raincloud?" he asked, expecting the young boy to say no like he usually did and got ready to ask for a hug like he always did. He nearly fell over when Raincloud raised his hands and said, "Up please?"

Zack lost his breath, Raincloud had never, ever, let himself be picked up, but the SOLDIER only hesitated for an instant before reaching down to lift the little aspect up to ride on his shoulders. He held the boy's legs with one arm. His wings came up to brace his sides... and to tickle, apparently. Raincloud squirmed and giggled as long fingers played along his ribs. It was such an unexpectedly happy sound that Zack couldn't help but grin even as he skipped around to maintain their balance.

"I can't believe you go all sappy for the little larvae too," Niisan complained, unhappy that the focus wasn't on him.

"It's not me, it's my wings," Zack protested, but Niisan just tapped his foot impatiently. With a final, put-upon sigh—that nobody listened to, Zack got his appendages to settle down. "C'mon, you little diva, let's get some work done," he said and dragged Niisan's skinny butt outside to start work.

It didn't take long for Zack to have them all busy.

Raincloud he set down in the yard to pull weeds. The boy pulled weeds, and grass, and flowers with equal abandon, but at least he was happy. When he got bored with that, he arranged pebbles into a village that his dragon immediately attacked. Stupid twig people, who had built their homes in the dragon's territory and who tried to defend it, were burnt to a crisp and eaten... even though the dragon really preferred munching on the meadow's tiny purple flowers.

Zack, listening to the epic saga, smiled; trust Raincloud to turn the dragon into a misunderstood hero. He kept a cautious eye on the little guy, watching for any sign of him being dissolved into the Lifestream, but the boy played happily in the dirt. The SOLDIER couldn't help but notice that the grass was already fuller and greener, and there were bright coloured flowers in Cloud's meadow. It was a good sign.

For Niisan, he sketched the proper way to frame a house in the dirt so that he knew what to do. Then Zack dodged Niisan's busy fingers and clever tongue, and tried to keep the silver-haired youth's mind on fixing the cottage. Focus made the job go faster and Niisan could concentrate… on stuff that interested him. Fixing walls wasn't on that list.

It was a good thing that even the smallest amount of attention and care started the changes happening. It wasn't the physical stuff that had an effect—Cloud's parts could construct the whole thing from air, rather it was the attention they gave it, and just thinking fixing things was often enough to have it happen. Still, Zack had a hard time doing nothing so, while Raincloud's rough ministrations made improvements in the meadow, and Niisan's concentrated efforts made the walls grow, he threw mortar and stones up knowing that it would be smoothed into something more acceptable as soon as Niisan noticed it.

It was mindless work and it allowed his thoughts to return to what Raincloud had said in the house. He tossed it around in his head and tried to… to translate it into real-speak, or try.

Fucking metaphors.

It was somehow connected with what Tifa had talked about earlier. That materia she'd found. She said it had put on quite a show in the Pit, something to do with the spooky ex-Turk's old girlfriend and her research into Omega and Chaos and the end of the planet. Raincloud had talked about Chaos and Omega when he'd been taken over but he hadn't made any sense. Maybe Tifa could tell him more but probably not.

So it looked like, once he got back Outside There, he'd be spending some time researching Dr. Lucrecia Crescent... Sephiroth's mom. He was not looking forward to it. What kind of woman let her unborn child be used as an experiment? He wanted to go back in time and just bitch-slap her. Except that all the stuff that had been done to Sephiroth had made him what he was now and, if he could go back in time to change it, who would Sephiroth be? Zack couldn't picture him as anything other than 'The General'. Would he still be 'The General' without all the modifications Hojo had done to him?

Fuck, he sighed, sometimes life was just shitty.

Zack dragged his mind away from thoughts of time travel and Dr. Crescent, and tried to remember the other things Raincloud had mentioned. What were the Weapons? And who were the Others? Were they the-the Seer and the Heart and the Growing Lady, or had Raincloud been talking about some whole other Others?

The Weapons precede Chaos, which was wrong because if Vincent was 'The Man' which was likely because Raincloud had already named the red-eyed ex-Turk as 'The Man' when he called for them to rescue the creepy vampire from his coffin. Not that Vin was actually a vampire, but c'mon, he snorted, the guy had been sleeping in a freakin' coffin.

Bet it would piss Vinny off completely if he called him that to his face.

Shit, he was getting off-track.

Vincent Valentine was Chaos somehow, and Chaos was the key to controlling all the Weapons, or just Omega? Except that the Weapons are supposed to come before Chaos and Chaos, it seemed, was already here. With The Others, whoever the fuck they were. Vin had been by himself so it wasn't anybody, anything? from the lab... unless he and Cloud were the Others. They'd been with him in the lab, even though they hadn't known he was there. Cloud was definitely in the twilight zone, but Zack didn't think he'd mind being awake the way Raincloud had said The Others would.

Scratch them for being Raincloud's 'Others'. Which at least meant they wouldn't have to try and control the planet's Weapons, or destroy them, or whatever the fuck the message had hinted at. Obscure, useless piece of shit nonsense.

And what did the planet need Weapons for anyway? What kind of Weapons? Not 'weapons' small double-u, but 'Weapons!' capitalized and everything.

Zack had a picture in his mind of the huge gun at Junon that ShinRa had been building. What had they called it? Sister Ray. Maybe Sister Ray would come to life and start moving around the planet or something. Or would they be giant boulder-men that had lava pouring out of their mouths? Zoloms would do pretty good as Weapons. They were huge already and pretty fucking hard to kill. Only problem is that they really didn't like leaving the swamps but, if the planet wanted to, he guessed that it could change that and maybe make them three times their normal size. That'd make them fucking scary.

How would they know when the Weapons emerged or got frisky or whatever they hell they were supposed to do? Omens and portents were great for mystics and ancient fucking poems but Zack really would prefer getting an office memo or something.

Maybe Vin would suddenly become Chaos, that would be a pretty clear sign that things were going to shit. Maybe he should talk to the spooky dude instead of Tifa, because he should know about all this, right? Except, if he talked to Vinny the Vampire, he'd wind up asking him stuff he probably shouldn't and didn't really want the answer to anyway. Tifa hadn't said anything but Zack was adept at listening to what wasn't said when he wanted to be. He had a pretty good idea that what she hadn't said was that the sinister gunman was actually Sephiroth's dad. If they got talking, Zack would ask. If he asked and Vincent said 'yes, I'm his father' what should he do then?

Punch Vincent in the face, came to mind, for leaving his kid alone all these years. Except, Seph's mom had definitely been married to Dr. Insane-O, which meant that if Vincent was Seph's dad then he was the result of an affair. Which wasn't a great recommendation either.

Anyway he looked at it, he couldn't see how the fuck was he going to tell his friend.

Sephiroth emerged from Cloud's green sky some distance from the cottage, the currents having pulled him away. He turned himself in its direction and pumped his wings hard. He revelled in the fact of muscles and tendons shifting so smoothly, driving him through the air. He exulted at the freedom and control it gave him. They weren't feelings he'd not experienced much of as an experiment; belonging to ShinRa and not to himself. It was a heady feeling and his enjoyment added power to his strokes so it didn't take long to build up to an impossible speed. It took only seconds for him to reach the clearing with Cloud's house in it.

The General decided to pass over the building to assess the damage to the roof he'd glimpsed earlier. There was still a hole and many shingles missing or loose but he could already see where Niisan and Zack had started rebuilding. A wooden frame, bright like only unweathered lumber can be, was already in place over the hole in the wall and the roof. Glass no longer glittered from meadow, and the grass itself was looking somewhat healthier than when they'd arrived. There was more of it, too.

He hadn't been gone that long, had he?

He saw Zack and the silver-haired youth pause in their task and look up. He could be excused giving in to the impulse to add a little something extra to his landing, he decided, when being gazed at by his two extremely attractive lovers. Not just his two lovers…

Niisan looked a little star-struck, and not happy about it. Zack's lips had quirked up; half-mocking and half-impressed. That smile warned Sephiroth that he was about to be teased.

"Couldn't let yourself be outdone by a lowly Commander, could you, Seph? You just had to squeeze out another wing." Zack shook his head in disappointment, "On impulse too. Tsk."

"It was the most efficient way to reach my target," he barely heard Zack, his focus was on the little person that was latched onto Zack's leg, staring at him with large, blue eyes.

"That may be true," Zack conceded, "but it won't work as an explanation when people comment on how well they match your uniform. They'll think you did it for looks. "

Sephiroth pulled his eyes away from the small Cloud—Raincloud, that was the aspect's name, and looked at Zack in confusion. What was he talking about? His wing colour? The General looked at the wing on his right. It was the same solid black it always was. Then he looked at his left...

The wing looked white.

He brought it forward so he could examine it more closely. Definitely white. He gave the First a baffled look.

"Seph, you do realize that, when you pop that wing in real life, it's gonna be white too." Zack's grin was wide at the General's bewildered look.

"I only have one wing in real life."

"Maybe before," Zack argued, "Now I think you'll have a set. Don't get me wrong, they'll be very impressive. I mean their big and the colour contrast is very striking. Genesis will be jealous when he sees them."

"I think they're beautiful," Raincloud murmured.

"Of course you do," Zack responded, his little wing fingers flicked casually, "You think all of him is beautiful."

Niisan leaned on Zack, "Actually, I think 'tasty' suits him better."

"Perv," Zack responded with a smile. Niisan didn't even bother to deny it.

Raincloud and Sephiroth didn't hear their exchange. The General had tucked away his wings to wherever they went, finding their weight awkward now that he was on the ground, but his gaze was locked on the smallest Cloud. The child had walked over to the General, his eyes never faltered. "Your hair is pretty," he said.

"I like yours as well," the General responded unsure whether this was the proper response even if it was true.

"Can I touch it?"

"Of course," Sephiroth knelt and held out a strand of his hair. Raincloud took it in his hand, letting it slide through his fingers and over his hand. He kept his gaze on it, watching how it moved and how it shone in the light. When it had all fallen away, he looked up at the General with solemn, too-old eyes and Sephiroth felt like he was being examined down to his cellular structure.

Then Raincloud lifted his arms and said, "Up, please," and there was only one answer for Sephiroth to give.

"Of course." Well, he thought as he settled the small body on his hip, this would certainly limit his usefulness.

Raincloud latched on to his cross-buckle to steady himself and Sephiroth shivered at the touch of even this small part of Cloud on his bare skin.

"You smell nice too," said the smallest Cloud. "Will you make me feel tingly and floaty again later?"

The General's eyebrow went up in puzzlement but he was unwilling to commit to anything he didn't fully understand. He'd done that at Zack's house with the password and look where it had got him. His trust wasn't increased by the stifled laughter of the other two, muffled behind their hands. "Maybe later," he said mildly. And Raincloud nodded once as if they'd made some kind of a deal.

"Our Gen'ral," Raincloud announced before he pulled some of Sephiroth's long silver hair over him so that it formed a curtain between him and the rest of the world.

"Aww, that's so cute," Zack teased, "Don't you think that's cute, Niisan?" Niisan just sniffed and gave a 'whatever' shrug. The SOLDIERs wing reached out to ruffle the youth's hair, an action the skinny young man dodged with a scowl.

A question occurred to the General or, rather, he suddenly remembered a question that he had thought of earlier, no doubt inspired by the behaviour of the dark-haired First's wings. "Can you fly?"

Zack's wings spread and pumped in the air. The First lifted slightly onto his toes before frowning over his shoulder. The wings drooped and Zack stopped moving. He turned back to face his CO. "I can fly here. I've never tried anywhere else." Hyper fingers tapped out a fast rhythm on his heavy shoulder guards.

"You'll have to try them out when we get back," the silver-haired warrior suggested and then couldn't help being amused as Zack's wings pumped triumphant fists. "I don't think they'll have any trouble supporting you." The SOLDIER rolled his eyes at his exuberant little appendages, but he put a couple of his fingers on his left shoulder to be grabbed.

"Just like Cloud's, your wings seem to have a personality all their own. I've never seen anything like them," Sephiroth stated.

"His wings tease him where he can't see," Raincloud commented. Niisan smirked, Zack frowned and Sephiroth stared at them. The fingers on the free side waved a little at him, but otherwise refrained from embarrassing the First but the General couldn't help but wonder what mischief Zack's wings got into when he wasn't looking. Did he really want to know? He shuddered.

This was ridiculous. They were wasting time.

"Is there any specific order in which we should proceed?"

Zack turned to look at the cottage, hands on his hips and shoulders, "Niisan and I've been working on the outer wall then we're going to do the roof." He pointed at the new timbers and Sephiroth could see where the mortar between the stones at the bottom looked fresh. "Since Raincloud's here, you can start work on the inside of the house but it'll mostly be manual work. Raincloud doesn't focus enough to affect much in terms of fixing things but you might be able to clean up some of the dirt and stuff."

"Raincloud's ability to focus, or not, affects this how?"

"Um, well," Zack ran a hand through his hair, "We can do stuff but it doesn't really take until one of them... 'approves' isn't the right word..."

"Visualizes? Notices? Gives a fuck?" Niisan suggested.

Zack just grinned at him, "Yeah, all those. Raincloud has his own priorities and cleaning house has never been one of them. He'll pay attention for a while then drift off into his own world."

"He is a child," Sephiroth rationalized.

"Yeah. But it does mean you won't be very effective until someone else shows up."

"And once another part of him arrives?"

"Corporal Strife reporting, SIR!" shouted a voice from right behind him.

It was unexpected, to say the least. Nobody could sneak up on the General. It was a given, like the sun rising in the east. And Corporal Strife had deliberately used a voice more suited to a parade ground than to call a person standing less than a metre away. Therefore, it was completely understandable when Sephiroth jumped back, turning in mid-air and drawing Masamune to face the intruder. Raincloud squeaked and gripped tight.

"Sorry, Sir. Didn't realize you couldn't hear me." There was nothing, not a smirk, not even a hint of an upturned lip, nothing in the Corporal's expression suggested that making the General jump was anything but an unfortunate accident, but Sephiroth knew. He looked into Corporal Strife's limpid blue eyes and he knew.

Oh, he was so looking forward to having this aspect of his little blond warrior back. His eyes went half-lidded in anticipation. Only then did Corporal Strife allow his expression to change, just a small lift of one brow, but it was enough. Challenge made and accepted.

"This here is Weirdo Strife," the soldier announced, pulling forward a young boy, maybe twelve or thirteen years of age—just on the cusp of pubescence.

He was shorter than the Corporal which meant he was about the height of Sephiroth's diaphragm. Weirdo looked like just about any other pre-teen male. He wore sneakers and jeans, beat-up and stained. He wore an open plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up over a regular T-Shirt saying 'Don't Believe Everything You Think'. It was an odd and thought provoking phrase, and especially appropriate here.

The Corporal hadn't finished his introductions. "Weirdo, this is General Sephiroth. He'll be working with you for a bit."

The boy was wearing a brightly coloured, knitted cap with ear coverings and thick braids of yarn hanging down but his hair was sticking out from underneath it at all angles. It stretched up nearly to the silver warrior's collarbone—a seemingly impossible distance to reach without using some kind of product. Yet the locks waved softly and there was no artificial scent coming from the strands. It was natural then, Sephiroth conceded, if improbable. It was also… eye-catching if nothing else.

"Nice to meet you, Weirdo," he said, although the name seemed wrong; harsh and judgemental. He resisted the urge to call this younger, smaller version of his lover something more affectionate as he put out his hand.

Weirdo gulped, his Adam's apple bobbing visibly. He took a firm grip of an over-large backpack he had balanced on his shoulder and stretched out his hand to be clasped. "Hello, si-ir." His voice cracked which made him flame red in embarrassment. He retrieved his hand and stood, slouched slightly to balance the heavy bag, staring at the dirt.

"Hi, Weirdo," Raincloud waved. The boy waved back, "Hey Raincloud." He looked over at the silver-haired youth and swallowed, "Hiya Niisan."

"Hmph," Niisan snorted contemptuously, "Oddball." Zack's wing cuffed him on the back of the head. "Hey!"

Ignoring the small scuffle with the ease of an experience NCO, the Corporal asked, "Anything else you require of me, Sir?"

So very many things, Sephiroth thought, most of which involved nakedness and oil. "Not at this time, Corporal," he responded mildly with only the lightest of purrs.

Corporal Strife's lips twitched once before he got them back under control, as if he knew what the General was thinking. Then he straightened into a salute, "Very good, Sir. I'll go find the next one." Sephiroth nodded and the Corporal dissolved into mist.

Sephiroth stood for a moment, dreaming of the day Cloud would tease him once again. "Yo, Seph," Zack called, breaking into his thoughts, "Work first, remember?"

"Of course, Commander," his voice was mostly unruffled. He turned his gaze to the young boy in front of him with the even more improbable hair. It was completely unlikely that Cloud's hair had ever been this outrageous but perhaps, as a young man, it had seemed as if it was this bad. Each persona was based on Cloud's perception of who he had been at that time of his life and the General had read that puberty could be an especially awkward time. His memories were mostly of white laboratories and constant testing; not what would be considered normal by any means.

"Do you understand what we're trying to do here, Weirdo?"

"I think so. The Corporal said something about rebuilding the cot-tage." Weirdo's voice cracked.

"That's correct. However, the Commander and I," he indicated Zack who raised his hands in greeting, "can't do much on our own. We need a Strife with us in order to affect things. Do you understand?"

Weirdo was still staring at the long, skinny wing fingers which were happily wiggling at him. The boy gulped audibly, shifted his stance, and his cheeks turned bright red. The General frowned in confusion—why was the boy blushing? Then he smelled it. Young, not fully ripe, the scent of Weirdo's arousal was thin compared to the complex patterns he'd have when he got older. And it was Zack's wings that had aroused the boy; it would certainly explain the embarrassment.

Sephiroth smiled, now, he remembered what puberty was like.

"Did you hear me?" The General pitched his voice to break into Weirdo's trance.

It worked. The youth jumped, blushed a little bit more, and said, "Uh, yeah. Umm, it makes a kind of sense too. Because this is our cottage, right? So we'd have to be the ones in control."

"You don't control the General," Niisan hissed from just behind Sephiroth shoulder. Sephiroth had to control his jerk of surprise. First the Corporal and now Niisan. Maybe it had to do with the environment. Raincloud chuckled softly as the silky hair shifted around him.

Weirdo's eyes widened, "I wouldn't dream of it," he protested.

"Remember that! The General isn't yours to play with." He stepped out from behind the silver-haired warrior and Sephiroth saw with dismay that the Niisan's eyes were gleaming with emotions and his hands were curled into claws. This aspect had a possessive streak, which meant that his Cloud had one too. That was… unexpected.

"Hey, hey," Zack broke in, "No need to be jealous, Niisan. Sephiroth won't like you any less if he likes Weirdo or any of the others." The SOLDIER gave him a pointed look.

"Indeed," Sephiroth agreed with the silent order, "As much as I may like Weirdo he is barely older than Raincloud; too young for us to be anything but friends."

"You know each of you will attract him for different reasons. He'll like all of you guys but... each one differently than the others. He kissed you, remember?" Niisan's eyes dimmed and his hands relaxed as he reflexively sucked on his bottom lip to remember the feel and taste of that caress. Everybody let out a held breath.

"C'mon, brat, drag your sexy butt back over here so we can finish our job," Zack urged, his hand on Niisan's arm. With one last warning glance, the silver-haired Strife allowed himself to be pulled away.

The three at the door heard Niisan comment to Zack, "If you think my butt is sexy with clothes on…"