#fairstclass

Cloud brings his legs up under him and kneels, lifting his body up and supporting himself - albeit wobbly. as his eyes finally focus, they widen - shock, horror, he's not sure what to feel in the moment. There's so many.... they sent an army after them. An army, for two men.... He doesn't even know what's going on, or how he got here, but Zack is out there taking an an army alone.

Cloud grits his teeth and shoves himself off the ground, but the momentum is too much and knocks him to the ground almost immediately. His body won't work for him and it's maddening. The world is still a little blurry, a little hazy, a little lopsided. But he has to, he can't let him fight alone.

He gets one foot under him, then another. He's standing, anchored by his stance. One step forward. Then another. Shaky but firm all at the same time. Each step is faster than the last, a little more sure. And then he's running, catapulting himself into the fray. No weapon to use, his fist slams into one of the infantrymen and knocks him out cold, Cloud toppling to the ground with him.

Good enough.

He goes around using his fists until he can pry a sword out of the hand of some poor bastard Zack had struck down, and starts going in after them.

The weather was so nice in Costa del Sol, Cissnei just wanted to stretch out in the sun like a cat and enjoy a nap. However, it wasn’t her vacation that she was on but had been given orders to accompany on the forced downtime of a rather keyed up SOLDIER. Coming up on Zack, she intertwined her fingers together and turned her palms out to stretch her arms and hands lightly with a hum.

this is a dream, she thinks. she's had ones like it before, where zack throws open the doors of the church, alive and unscathed and happy to see her. but she doesn't remember falling asleep, and the zack she's seeing is bruised and bloody, and supporting the weight of someone else, someone with similar spiky hair but blonde. her feet are frozen in place, and she has no clue if this is real but she has to act soon.

❝ ...zack ?! ❞ her voice is half relief (he's alive!) and half shock (but how?). once she's spoken, she's unfrozen and able to move towards the duo, coming up on the other side of the blonde to take some of his weight and help them to an unbroken pew in the front. once they're sat down, she scurries back to the doors and quickly looks around ---- there are always eyes watching her ---- before shutting them and going back to zack.

@fairstclass​ said: “ you don’t get nearly enough credit for your wit. ” gossip girl.

Uh, yeah ! Even though Yufi had been nearly convinced everyone in SOLDIER was pretty dumb with the exception of a select few, here was one who would openly acknowledge her brilliance! To be fair, most adults she’d encountered had been silly fools, but those hailing from Midgar were especially laughable.

Though she does have to admit, when Zack states of the name of his town, the way it runs off his tongue makes her chuckle, too.  ❝ Gon-gaga? It sounds like it’s from Da Chao’s cousin. Are you sure you’re not Wutai? ❞

The reason for his participation is.... still ambiguous. Whether or not he just truly enjoys helping everyone, or if this is an act of reparations, or perhaps there’s something amusing to him about meeting a Treasure Princess across the globe... Yufi doesn’t know ! But she does know better than to look a gift horse in the mouth. So she does play with the new materia he’s found for her, juggles it in her hand as she looks up at the older man.

@fairstclass​ says: “there’s nothing wrong with asking for help.”

( Post-trauma sentence starters. )

☆ ━━━ Cloud knows he will never become a SOLDIER.

He’s not sure the exact moment it became so clear to him, as it is now, so obvious and certain he feels foolish for still being here wasting everyone’s time. This doubt clings to Cloud’s boots, to his arms and hunched shoulders. But it’s something more than mere anxiety--

Cloud wonders... if he chose the wrong side.

His superior officers thrust a gun in his hand and say shoot. Cloud does so, mechanically, like a doll that’s strings are being pulled. Cloud wonders a little about the people he kills--traitors to Shinra he’s told simply, but what did they do to deserve that title? Cloud always remembers the way their crimson blood spurts into the air when a bullet rips through their bodies and he wonders, and he wonders, what was their name?

As if it matters. 

Maybe it does--

Cloud is beginning to hate the red banners emblazoned with Shinra’s logo. He hates fluorescent lighting, the clack of his boots on linoleum floors. He always feels like he’s being watched and scrutinized, running through hoops to an end that isn’t really there. 

By the time he sees Zack outside of his door and leaning casually against the wall, Cloud freezes. As if his thoughts had somehow been read and Zack is ready to cut him to pieces for even pondering the possibility of Shinra’s crimes...

Zack glances over to Cloud, his blue eyes bright and sharp, a bit like cool lake water about to freeze over from winter’s seeking grasp.

Cloud stops, sputtering, “Z-Zack...”

They haven’t known each other for long--a few passing comments here and there as Cloud shuffles away down the halls or a sudden mission where they can chat a little, and even though Zack has been perfectly friendly with Cloud up until now doesn’t mean anything--

( I’m being paranoid. )

Still, his breath hitches as Zack clomps over to him. He crosses his arms and stares down at Cloud with an unreadable expression.

“There’s nothing wrong for asking for help,” Zack says softly then, his eyes twinkling with mirth.

And Cloud exhales loudly, blinking at Zack in surprise.

Cloud is silent for a moment, clutching his Shinra-issued helmet in his hands and looking to his scuffed boots.  

Zack wants to help him.

Cloud wishes he could admit the inner turmoil eating him alive now. He isn’t sure if there’s an escape from this prison, if there’s a way out without dying trying to be free. Cloud’s fingers ache from pressing into the copper plating of his helmet too hard. 

The blonde glances up at Zack then, a watery, thin smile creeping over his lips. 

“You’re right,” Cloud says in a breathy tone. “I--need help.”

The moment waiting for his truth is open, an opportunity to cave in and admit that’s he’s terrified of this place...

“I-I wanna use a sword too. But I don’t know how... maybe you can teach me? I want to use a sword like the Buster one day too.” Cloud explains hesitantly.

@fairstclass​ said: “ boo! haha, did i scare you? i think i could get used to this ghost thing... well, i guess i don't really have a choice, huh? ”

Well, it’s not that ghosts scare her, because they don’t. All Wutai have a cognition of the dead, a comprehension that because it is natural and inevitable, there is nothing to fear. There are many who revere the process of the death and life cycle, and pay homage to ancestors and those who have passed in hopes of gaining knowledge of the future. Those who are beyond have a different sense of time than those living, can see beyond the path laid before them. Fortune telling is often done by communing with those who have passed and asking them to provide signs based on their cosmic providence.

And so, for one who was raised with such a thing more science than superstition, it does not feel strange for Yufi to be approached by the dead who act alive... after all, she has seen worse, the living who would wish to be dead.

Maybe the first time Zack comes around, it confuses her. Not the idea that he’s dead...because it’s not like she expects SOLDIERs to stay alive, not with the positions they have, not for the employer they work for. It sounds cruel, insensitive, but she has no faith in the Shin-Ra, sees them only as greedy and wrathful folk who only know how to exploit and eradicate. What shocks her more is the form he comes in, ethereal, intangible. She tries to tap him on the arm, toss a materia his way, and yet it all phases through him. He seems entertained. She feels horrified.

But it’s not like she expected anything from him anyway. Not his company, not his care! Sure, it was nice to still receive his attention, but he didn’t have to do that, either. She’s been on her own for so long, it’d feel foreign if she could gather the warmth of another person, if she could pass the burden of keeping watch to someone else.

But that was always a fleeting fantasy, and Yufi sits up when she sees the flame of her camp flicker, the shape forming into something akin to the spikes of Zack’s hair. 

@fairstclass​ said: “ can't you throw that ball at someone else for once?! what about barret? yeah, yeah... try and throw it at the big guy! hehehe... ”

Rude! Hasn’t Zack noticed that she does throw her ball places... rather frequently at that. Doesn’t he remember how swiftly the blood bats were dispatched, after she’d watched him unsuccessfully incapacitate them with the back of his sword? Sure, he’s tall and the blade’s length provides reach, but swinging upward requires momentum and power, decreases the speed when he’s lugging all the weight against gravity. Time was against him, though amusing it may have been, to see him run back and forth with weapon pointed skyward, in hopes of ending his enemies.

For that, quite frankly, he deserves an extra thunk to the side of the head. His skills of observation are truly null...not unlike what she’d witnessed from him almost a decade ago, now. How did he become a mercenary? Clearly he only made it through this group through nepotism...