#turk cloud

“Zack Fair, SOLDIER First Class,” Cloud absently recited, studiously not looking at where Sephiroth trailed behind them, neatly out of sight.

“You’ve heard of me?” Puppy asked, grin widening.

Cloud almost wanted to crack a smile at all his blatant enthusiasm. Almost. “Lazard sent out an email about your promotion.”

Of course, Cloud had known about him long before that. The Turks had been monitoring him since Angeal’s disappearance for signs of dissent. Besides that, Fair was the only SOLDIER who had been mentored by a First and was friendly with several other Turks. It would be stranger if Cloud didn’t know him.

“Oh, right! Hey, aren’t you pretty young to be a Turk?”

Cloud spared a glance at him to raise an eyebrow.

“I mean—you look younger than me!”

That was true, Cloud was only fourteen—making him the youngest Turk by far—something the others around the department made sure to remind him of at every opportunity, often accompanied by headpats and obnoxious coddling. Being the “baby” of the team had its many, many downsides.

SOLDIER and the infantry often had young recruits, sometimes as young as thirteen, due to the war. Shinra had needed more bodies and hapless kids from around Gaia lured in by desperation and the flashy advertising happily provided.

The Turks, on the other hand, didn't typically find their recruits in the waves of children dreaming of glory. Cloud was a special case.

…he was going to be fifteen soon, alright?

The ancient took this opportunity to provide her two-gil as well.

“You do seem rather young. They send you out on your own?” Her smile was innocently curious.

No they didn’t, in fact Veld had strictly forbidden it. It irritated Cloud to no end to be babied by his boss and co-workers, though he knew by now that his scowl did nothing to intimidate them; quite the opposite, actually.

Cloud withheld a sigh, almost feeling Sephiroth’s amusement somewhere behind them.

“I am perfectly capable of handling myself,” he curtly told them and Cloud immediately despaired to find that their smiles only seemed to widen.

They didn’t take him seriously at all.

___________________

“…Alright,” Cloud pushed himself off the wall, following Fair in the opposite direction of where the kid had gone.

When Fair started questioning the locals, Cloud hung back, conveniently out of direct sight while said locals blatantly misdirected him, letting the boy run away. He started to feel like this was a waste of time after all.

Although, Fair’s naïve enthusiasm and willingness to put trust in others was somewhat charming.

“Aren’t Turks supposed to be good at this kind of thing?” Fair accused him after running in circles and blatantly being lied to for several minutes.

“We are.”

A deep voice sounded from behind Fair, who spun around with a shout of surprise. “Another Turk?!”

Sephiroth stood a few feet away, the thief miserably held by the scruff. With his free hand, Sephiroth tossed Fair’s wallet back to him. Fair blinked at him, looking up, up at Sephiroth’s tall, broad, form, then down, down, to Cloud’s slim, short one. He repeated this a few times.

“Are you partners?” Fair loudly whispered with a grin to Cloud who rolled his eyes.

Yes, very funny. The biggest and the smallest Turks where partners.