Author's note: Sometimes seeing a few ideas is all it takes to spark a story. Thank you @altocat for letting me do this constantly.

...

Junon always got the worst of it. Shinra built a Mako reactor beneath their waters with the promise of power to the town, but redacting any mention of its pollution constantly spewing into the sea. How Shinra assumed the retaliation for deliberate destruction only concerned the edible fish in the area was ignorant at best, and asinine at worst. 

Reports of boating accidents multiplied tenfold throughout the past few years. Missing persons and suicides as well. But no one ever found bodies. Lucky families or friends found bones. Too many victims leapt into the water, be it from the sides of a ship, or the barrel of Junon Cannon, seemingly of their own volition. 

All victims were men. In theory, it could be logical. Suicide rates in men were always higher. But too many coincidences, too high of a spike, spelled a weapon. An attacker. Something in that ocean. Something leading men to their death willingly, be it from the ship in the moment, or weeks later, like an old sailor story, come true. 

Shinra only cared when connections between the victims linked to ships, shared boat rides, shared fishing trips, or private romantic outings kept in almost impenetrable secret, a pattern finally identified. Sending their newest program, SOLDIER, on the hunt for the creature could've been their best idea yet. 

Possibly.

In theory. 

But in reality, Shinra fed the creature on every steel platter drifting its way. Not a single member of SOLDIER denied that fact even as the latest ship left the dock. Another crew with a death sentence signed by Shinra itself.

Cloud Strife couldn't avoid his shift for long. He knew it was coming, and it finally came. 

“Alright, guys, don't forget about the buddy system,” the Second Class on the ship reminded the few cadets. “No one alone except for the only bathroom, but I want your buddy standing outside the door. No exceptions. Especially for anyone on deck, okay?”

“Yes, Sir!” Each cadet confirmed at attention. 

“Good. You're dismissed.”

Only a few seconds passed before every pair separated to their section of the ship, most with sharp eyes on the water.

The Second shook his head with a soft sigh. “I hope this one works.” He smacked a hand to Cloud's shoulder with a tight grip and a small serious look. “I get even the slightest hint of danger, and we turn around. Got it?”

Cloud nodded. “Thanks, Zack.”

“Between you and me,” Zack whispered. “Shinra doesn’t choose what happens to my men.”

He smirked at that, glad his friend truly cared about their lives beyond the simple military job. But he knew that. Zack always had to be the hero, in a good way. Maybe he could let himself have the slightest shred of hope.

He wished he was right, letting himself relax for the first time since they stepped foot on this ship. He watched the waves along the surface, the occasional white caps reminding him of the snow peaked mountains back home. Memories creeped in from the corner of his mind, and slowly he let his eyes fall, only for a second. Or so he thought.

Don't let me die…

Cloud's head popped up from his near snooze on the railing of the deck. He could've swore he heard… “...Zack?”

“Yeah, buddy?” His voice came from right next to him. Good. Good, he was right there…

He swallowed carefully. “You said you'd turn us around if we're in danger, right…?”

Zack nodded, this time gaining Cloud's gaze. His friend could always read his mind. “...I'll tell the captain to head to shore. Alright?”

Cloud nodded quickly, unable to express his gratitude beyond two words: “Thank you…”

Zack smirked before giving his back a single pat and heading to the captain's cabin, Cloud following behind to keep the system together working. 

But Cloud stopped moving before reaching the door, hearing something that pulled his attention away. 

With empty and monstrous fate…

The deepest pit of his heart filled with the primal despair of the tune. The literal tune. Music. Song. He wanted to tell his comrades, but that thing out there felt far worse than him. He wanted to aid it, to soothe its sadness away. Suddenly he violently shook his head and chased after Zack. 

“You okay?” Zack asked and instantly met his eyes at the slamming of the door.

“It’s here.”

His brows raised. “Now?”

“Yes. Right now.” He swallowed. “I hear it. It picked me.”

Zack grabbed his armored shoulders, holding Cloud in place. “Cloud, then how are you in here right now?” Every report said the same thing: man overboard before the slightest hint of a warning.

“I-I don’t know,” He stuttered honestly. Then an idea popped into his head. A bad one. “But…what if we use it…?”

“What are you talking about?” Even his usual cheery voice froze with sincerity. 

“What if…I’m bait for now.” 

Zack shook his head with a glare. “I’m not gonna risk that.”

“I already feel the song,” He explained, fractured desperation seeping into his voice. “If I go, we can follow it. Find its den. Just- just give me a tracker or some-” His head suddenly snapped to the window, another line of the accursed tune calming his mind to the truth of its meaning.

“It eats most of us on the spot.”

“But if I’m different, maybe-” 

“Cloud!” Zack yelled to grab his attention, knowing there wasn’t a lot of time. By the time man overboards occurred, the trail of the creature ran still, not a single wake or ripple in the water to follow it. A waterproof tracker might work, but Shinra didn’t supply many. “Are you sure you can do this?”

The haze in his gaze disappeared as he nodded.

The captain quickly handed Zack a tracker out of a locked safe.

“I’m choosing to trust you,” the black haired Second stated as he stuck the tracker under the cadet’s left pauldron. “If you die, I expect you to haunt me, okay? I don’t want to lose you too. If not, I’ll strangle you in the Lifestream myself, got it?”

Cloud nodded softly, only a shred of appreciation for his friend’s sense of humor survived against the piece. “Got it.”

“Good luck,” Zack said in farewell, and for the sake of the mission, Cloud stopped fighting the tune.

The ship’s existence faded in his mind. The source of the song pulled him as the only feeling in his life that mattered. The dark and deadly piece had him taking one step at a time to the edge of the deck, before diving over the protective railing, desperate for the location of its source. Despair and agony breathed through his veins as he held his own breath in search, before the creature found him.

And it was beautiful. 

Its scales and hair glittered with more perfect silver than the greatest polish and the brightest stars. Its tail coiled deep below, Cloud unable to see the tip through the sandy water. Its gills moved with the tide on his chest. Only part of it looked human, its torso, arms, and face. But the eyes…

Cloud reached for it, to aid it, to calm it, to let it know everything would be alright. But it grabbed him by the chin and analyzed him with the perfect mako-blue eyes of a snake. His lungs began stinging in protest as the creature seemed to take its time, already asking for a breath.

Then it nodded once, seemingly satisfied, and pulled him along, taking him to the surface for a final fresh breath before dragging him deep, deep below. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t move. But the creature kept dragging him through the rough water long after his sight faded to black.

* * * 

Time fazed down the spiral of the tune still playing in his mind, despite the creature’s silence as it listened to him. The song pulled every detail of his life to his lips, rocky, uneasy, hesitant responses to every request. The deep agony in his chest nullified his resistance with each note, claiming his entire life story through his murky mind, details he never told anyone. Details no one should know the creature forced out into the cave, the den, of this deadly majesty. His darkest secrets cowered in the calm light, desperately trying to climb back down Cloud’s throat through any defense the cadet could fabricate or admit. 

Luminous stone weaved through the walls like veins, all but pulsing through each cerulean glow in this sealed cave. The bravest algae dared pollute the puddles of the stone, providing the cave constantly with  fresh air. The only entrance rippled and splashed against his feet, leading to the darkest sections of the unrecorded sea. If he built enough will power, could he make it to the surface before he drowned? 

He doubted it, in his small moments of self before the song consumed him again. 

“All for a girl?” Its criminally smooth voice resonated through the cave, his mind echoing each calming word like a virus. It flicked the tip of its tail against the surface casually, creating a few new ripples through the sandy liquid.

He felt himself nod. “...But I never told her…” The discomfort in his voice faded to delicious despair a while ago, now answering questions it didn’t bother asking yet.

“Of course not,” It scoffed, hiding a laugh between its sharp teeth. “Your kind waits. Never admitting or taking what it needs. Doesn’t that hurt more than aid?”

“I didn’t want to hurt her…” His explanation slipped out of his mouth. “She was popular… She had so many friends… So many other boys… I’d just be another guy confessing or asking just to get denied…”

It slowly grinned, tilting its head and claiming Cloud’s eyes against his reptilian ones. “Did anyone ask her?”

His brows knotted. No one asked in his memory. “...I don’t-”

“Did anyone confess?”

“N-no, but-”

“But you stayed silent?”

“S-stop… Please stop…”

“What if she was waiting for you?”

That sharpest knife stabbed straight through his heart. He dreamed, he prayed at one point, that she’d wait for him. But it wasn’t possible. She was Tifa Lockhart. He was only Cloud. He didn’t deserve to trap her heart like that. He shook his head. “No… No no no…”

“And now you will die without anyone learning your truth. Pray tell, what does that make you?”

A tear left Cloud’s left eye. “...weak…” He whispered, clutching his arms in a pathetic attempt at protection from his own emotions. “...It makes me weak…”

It nodded, and Cloud tried with everything he had to look away, but the reverberating sound stopped him. “Just like you were when the bridge snapped.”

“I tried to save her…” He hated every second, his mind spinning painfully, his eyes throbbing with each little attempt to fight. “She hit her head… I couldn’t stop that… I tried to carry her back home the moment I got to my feet…”

“But you didn’t make it.”

Cloud winced. He didn’t make it back then. He collapsed when town came into view, and he yelled and called and screamed to anyone that could hear him to save Tifa no matter what it took. “I tried…”

“You were weak then. You are weak now.”

Cloud steeled himself for his first attempt to pull his consciousness back. “Something like you doesn’t understand the pain of weakness…” His voice faltered at the end, but everything around him silenced. 

Including the song. 

But the remaining icy glare of the siren froze him. 

It suddenly grabbed his ankle and pulled him into the water. 

Oh gods, was this it? Was he about to die for some worthless back talk?! And fuck, why was silence so much worse than the song!?

It held him by the neck, only dangling his head above the water, and Cloud found his body clawing at its arm for survival, trying to keep himself above the liquid that burned his lungs. It calmly cupped a single scoop of water in its free hand and shoved it over Cloud’s nose and mouth, forcing the boy’s eyes to the creature’s while clearly hearing every word.

“Let me explain something,” Its voice still soothed as sweet as poisoned sugar. “Your company discovered a body of an unknown creature in a crater at the bottom of the ocean, and had the brilliant idea to create an artificial child. When I was too young to gain the strength or skills they assumed possible, they decided I was no longer worth their time, and…” It seemed lost in thought as Cloud clawed for a single untainted breath, fighting his body’s instinct to take one from the creature’s forced offering. “What do your people do with goldfish?” It glanced up with a nod before glaring back at Cloud. “Ah, yes, flush them down the toilet.” It calmed after the derogatory statement. “Of course, not literally, but now your company sends singular shipments straight into my domain.” Its eyes narrowed. “Only my preferred meal on board.” 

Cloud’s body screamed too loud to understand the meaning of the creature’s words.

“Coincidence, Cadet? I think not.” Then it finally let him breath, before throwing him back on the stone.

Cloud coughed and gasped, desperate for a true breath but also desperate to keep the song silent for as long as possible. That story sounded familiar. Weirdly familiar. Possible. “Wait-” He coughed violently but forced his words to break through, “Wait- wait- are you-” He collapsed, forced to regulate his breath before questioning, “Are you Sephiroth?”

Its eyes widened.

“There-” Cloud tried to explain through his seared lungs. “There was this leak. Shinra shut it down immediately, but the name ‘Project Sephiroth’ made it to the press with hints of child experimentation of mako and… ‘other sources’.”

The anger cracked on its face, slowly turning its grimace to a malicious sneer. It laughed deeply. “That company’s secrets will be its death. I’ll make sure of it.” It curled its grin, showing the slightest hint of teeth before beginning the song in Cloud’s mind one again. 

The poor young blonde rocked side to side through the waves of the dreadful piece, infecting through his body completely like an icy breeze. He only hoped with all he had Zack was on his way. He prayed.

Sephiroth craved Cloud’s pain. Cloud didn’t understand why his emotion, his darkest secrets, entertained and pleased the creature so. It broke him open and snapped the tiniest splinters to the largest layers into the light. It mocked and presented Cloud’s deepest unknowns, secrets no one on the Planet should know beyond him. The things he hid under his bed, the conversations he watched from bushes across town, of who, of what. His utterly mortifying reactions due to his own stupid feelings and growing body, and the clumsy, desperate ways he tried to hide them.

…the blue scarf he stole from the girl he loved most in the world, just to have her scent close to him…

It clawed everything out of him with the calmest tone he ever heard, even struggling to keep his eyes open through the despair in every note of the song. 

Hours. Days. He wasn’t sure how long he was trapped.

Until finally, a boom from the ocean shook the den, releasing the dust and weak chips from the ceiling of stone.

A submarine. Shinra’s submarine. SOLDIER’s submarine. It had to be a torpedo, or fire materia.

They found him. They saved him, and they scared the siren away. They celebrated in victory, while Cloud stared through the porthole to the sea, his mind softly ringing with the tune.

Sephiroth wouldn’t give up. It would find him again, luring him back to the ocean on the shores of Junon. He knew this wasn’t over, even with SOLDIER by his side.

Afterall, why would Sephiroth let his little play thing escape, if not for a game of his own?

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Thanks for reading!