Disclaimer: I don’t own any of them. Not making any money from this. Love the thought of Sephiroth and Cloud, they’d be so good for each other. Please leave me a review if you like the story.

Author’s Note: Sorry, know it’s been a while. Been struggling with a few personal issues. Real life (work, illness) making it harder and harder to squirrel away bits of time to write, and it’s taking all of my energy to stay focused on putting one foot in front of the other and moving forward. A heartfelt THANK YOU to all the faithful readers and reviewers who made time to leave me notes of encouragement, squees, and gentle prods to get off my duff, shake off the black dog of depression and get typing! Couldn’t keep at it without all of you. So thank you all so very much. Not my best chapter, but hopefully the start of some decent writing again. Here’s to 2007, a new year, a fresh start. And kazuhiko, this one is for you – thank you for all the messages of support.

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Chapter 5: Sound Of Silence

Come on, they’re not all that impressed with conversation!
True gentlemen avoid it when they can
But they dote and swoon and fawn
On a lady who’s withdrawn
It’s she who holds her tongue who gets her man!

- “Poor Unfortunate Souls”, Disney’s The Little Mermaid

The sound of leaves rustling was the pleasant backdrop that Cloud awoke to, warm sunlight playing lazily about his face as it peeked in through gaps in the green canopy above. He was lying in a field of yellow and white stars – Aeris’s garden, he realized belatedly as he blinked, sat up and passed a hand over his face, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. A soft sound of amusement made him look up, his instincts instantly snapping into high alertness, only to relax as he met the lady’s grey gaze. Aeris smiled, that secretive smile that he had always found particularly charming – or infuriating, depending on whether or not one was sharing the secret – but said nothing. Instead she seemed to wear an air of expectancy, as though awaiting some kind of cue from Cloud.

“Aeris?”

Nothing but that half-smile. Cloud cleared his throat and tried again. Damn, but it was nice to be able to speak, even if it was only a dream!

“Um. Aeris? What am I doing here?”

She cocked her head to one side as she toyed with the end of her braid, tugging absently on the pink ribbon, but didn’t say anything.

Cloud sighed heavily and began to get up. If the Cetra wasn’t talking, she wasn’t talking, and he was getting a little too old to be impetuous. Too old. Ha, Zack would never let it go if he heard that! And then the thought of Zack abruptly brought back memories of the events of the past few…hours? Days? He wasn’t sure anymore, but he did remember with painful clarity the extended conversation he had had with his long lost friend, and really, it was hard to forget being shot twice in the same place, and he reached reflexively for his shoulder. Aeris’s eyes followed the movement, and a rueful look flitted across her face as she somehow managed to convey her chagrin and apologies with the barest twitch of a lip.

“It’s okay,” Cloud felt compelled to reassure her. “Doesn’t hurt here in the Lifestream. And I’m sure ShinRa’s doctors are as…skilled…as they ever were, so my body’s probably fine wherever it is, right?”

Aeris nodded. Her grey eyes continued to study him closely. Cloud shifted uncomfortably under the power of that silent, pellucid gaze.

“Hey, where’s Zack? Now that we’re in this…other world, does that mean I won’t see him here in the Lifestream anymore?”

A slight tip of the head that seemed to convey the question, “Well, what do you think?”

Cloud rolled his eyes. What was with the Cetra inability to give a straight answer anyway? “Ah…it doesn’t really matter, I’ll see him when I wake up anyway, if I’m in ShinRa’s infirmary.” He hesitated, then added, “That is where I am, right? Sephiroth said he would take care of….” Ifrit, that sounded odd, trusting Sephiroth. But Sephiroth was different in this time, Cloud thought firmly, ignoring the snide voice that pointed out that sanity could be like that and as the General hadn’t yet quite lost his marbles to that disembodied alien head….

The Cetra nodded again, but remained silent. The air around them echoed the stillness, the rustling that had roused Cloud only serving to further underscore the emptiness. No birds, Cloud noted absently. He sighed.

“Look, I’m sure this is all supposed to be incredibly meaningful in some deep Cetra fashion, but clearly I’m not getting it, and since Zack isn’t here to explain things to me, perhaps you could get off the Cetra thing for a bit and try explaining it to me in simple terms? Words of one syllable, that sort of thing?” Cloud winced at the testiness in his own voice as a flicker of hurt crossed Aeris’s normally serene face, and the annoyance he felt at his own behaviour only served to further fuel his irritation. “I mean, I signed up for this task to help Seph – I mean, the Planet, but I sure didn’t get the memo that said I’d get shot again, or lose my voice – and is that permanent? – and what was that crap you fed the General and Zack about amnesia?” He was aware that he was ranting, his normally soft voice ringing hard like cold iron on stone, but this was ridiculous and the personality before him was evidently Aeris-the-Cetra as opposed to Aeris-the-flower-girl-and-friend, and really, the Cetra could be quite annoying, and why did he have to do all the talking anyway, he never enjoyed being the centre of attention in a conversation but what else could you do with Aeris playing the mute, when faced with impenetrable silence one had to say something, which was always dangerous because it meant letting your guard down and…and….

Holy Gaia. He was aware he probably looked rather like a startled chocobo which had just had a worm go down the wrong way, but all he could do was gape as he realized the extent of the Cetra’s scheming.

And Aeris smiled and nodded sweetly as the garden began to fade and he surrendered back to darkness.

---

Cloud jerked into awareness, the pain in his shoulder dulling to a throbbing ache. He vaguely felt a callused hand wrap itself loosely around his wrist as his arm was pressed gently but firmly against his chest, preventing him from moving his shoulder. The air was cold and dry in his lungs as he squinted against the glare of the lights, wincing and turning his head into the pillow as a shaft of pain lanced neatly through his left eyeball. He tried to croak out a protest, failed, mentally cursed the Cetra again and settled for making his displeasure known with a sound halfway between a moan and a grunt. There was a click and the lights dimmed to the point where he decided that he could chance opening his eyes again, so with great reluctance he pried his eyelids open…

…only to come face to face with a pair of mako blue eyes inches away from his own face. He couldn’t help it. He gasped in surprise and threw himself back against the pillows, narrowly missing the metal headboard.

Zack grinned unrepentantly, but backed off enough to allow Cloud to look at him without his eyes crossing. “Hey, you’re awake! The General sent me ta’ check on ya. He’d have come himself, but he’s stuck in some meeting with the muckety-mucks, y’know how it is.” The dark-haired SOLDIER threw himself onto the bed, nearly sitting on Cloud’s leg. “Oops. Sorry. How’re you feeling?”

Cloud opened his mouth, remembered belatedly that he couldn’t actually say anything, closed it huffily and settled for a shrug that didn’t move his shoulder too much. Zack cocked an eyebrow at him. “That great, huh? Well, the docs patched your shoulder up pretty good, but you’re gonna be healing for a bit, even with the Cure Seph administered personally.” The arch of Zack’s brow indicated quite clearly that the General was not in the habit of helping the doctors out with their patients, and Cloud flushed slightly under the SOLDIER’s unblinking regard. He shifted uncomfortably, and Zack swung himself off the bed and moved to help him sit up a little further, tossing a pillow behind his back. “Here, lemme help with that, you’re in no shape to be movin’ around. Still, all things considered, ya ain’t doing’ too badly – tougher than you look, I’d say. Did’ja ever consider signing up for SOLDIER?”

Despite the slightly muzzy feeling in Cloud’s head , the little voice of caution that had matured along with him was definitely awake and doing its job, because he managed to catch himself before nodding. Zack’s tone had been casual – too casual, and the grin on his face didn’t reach his eyes. Those familiar eyes, hints of their original grey hidden beneath the luminous blue gleam imparted by mako treatments, those eyes were sharp and watchful now, and as Cloud blinked and looked away from the intentness of that gaze, he realized two things.

One: there was a reason Zack had been a SOLDIER First Class at eighteen. He was damned good at his job. And even if Cloud did have five years on him now, he would have to stay on his toes so as not to arouse Zack’s suspicions.

Two: Zack was not his friend here. At least, not yet. His heart sank as he contemplated the reality of it. The first time around, he had had Zack by his side to make life bearable. The thought of having to struggle through the coldness of ShinRa without his friend was daunting, to say the least. He sighed tiredly and shut his eyes as a wave of lassitude washed over him.

“Shall I take that as a no?” Zack asked, all too agreeably.

Cloud opened his eyes and gave the SOLDIER his best blank look as he furrowed his brow slightly and brought his uninjured hand up to rub lightly at his temple. Ah, amnesia, that old ploy…such a wonderful refuge. Clever, clever Aeris.

“Ah, right, I forgot,” said the SOLDIER, sucking at his teeth thoughtfully. Was that the barest hint of a mocking tone in his voice? “Sorry. You probably don’t know what SOLDIER is, eh? Sorry. Must be hard, not remembering anything. Not even your name? I know we’ve been callin’ ya Strife – you don’t mind, right? - but that’s just ‘cause Seph thinks you look a lot like this guy he knew way back when. ‘s not a bad name though, really. Better than a lot of names. I knew this guy named Buttercup once. Hell of a SOLDIER, but man, the razzing he took….”

So his guess was right - Sephiroth had known his father. How? Why? And was that the reason that Sephiroth let his guard down around him? Despite the unease that this discovery of how their fates had been seemingly twisted together long ago was causing in the pit of his stomach, Cloud filed that piece of information away and allowed a hopeful look to cross his face – it wouldn’t seem out of line for an amnesiac to grasp eagerly at straws that might lead to one’s identity, he figured.

“Don’t know nothing about that,” Zack replied in answer to the look. “Ask the General, maybe he’ll tell ya. He said to tell you he’d come by after all his meetings were done too. Until then, I’m all you’ve got by way of entertainment.” Cloud raised an enquiring brow, and Zack shrugged. “Well, long as you’re awake, someone has to keep an eye on you. See that you have everything you need, that sort of thing.” And keep him safely confined, Cloud tacked on mentally, he was an unknown security risk after all. He shivered involuntarily, and the audacity of what the Cetra had planned suddenly sank in.

He was alone. In the heart of ShinRa Headquarters, never a pleasant place even on the best of days. With no means of communication, no allies, and, at least to everyone around him, no memory of who he was. And he was supposed to change the course of all the worlds. Oh dear. A wave of dizziness hit him, and he squeezed his eyes shut, swallowing hard as he tried to ride out the nausea. Turning his face into the rough cottony surface of the too-thin infirmary pillow, he breathed in the scent of fresh linen and willed himself not to panic, although that resolution fell by the wayside as a heavy hand fell on his shoulder and he flinched involuntarily. Yet the touch was firm but not unkind as it moved down to rub small circles on his back.

“Hey – you all right kid?” Zack’s voice was surprisingly kind. “Sorry, didn’t mean ta’ upset ya. I mean, couldn’t have been fun taking that shot for the General and all, and as much of a pain in the butt as he can be at times, I wouldn’t want to serve under anyone else. He’s a good man. And I never thanked ya for savin’ Aeris, did I? She’s my girl, y’know – great gal. When you feel better, we’ll go by her place so she can thank you in person, all right? She’s a great cook, you’ll like her meatloaf, way better than anything we serve ‘round here. Tell you what, I’ll see if I can sneak something in for ya – the crap they serve in the infirmary ‘ll make you sicker, if you ask me.”

Cloud took a deep breath and forced the tension in his shoulders to ease. Zack’s use of the term, “kid,” was an indication that – for now at least – the SOLDIER was satisfied with Cloud’s bona fides and willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. And that meant that maybe, just maybe, they could be friends again. Right?

“Will you be there?”

“Sure. I mean, I won’t remember nothing, and you’ll be older than I will, but I’ll be there. You’ll just have’ta work for the pleasure of my friendship again is all.”

He looked up and met Zack’s chipper grin with a tentative smile. I can do this, Cloud thought. I have to.

---

“Tifa.”

She squeezed her eyes shut a little more and tried to ignore the gently persistent hand on her shoulder. It had to be some ungodly early hour judging from the first faint hints of sunlight glowing through her eyelids; she was in no mood to wake up at the moment, and maybe if she pretended to be asleep….

“Tifa, come on girl. You’ll be more comfortable on the bed.”

Bed? Wasn’t she already in bed? Her conscious mind roused itself with great reluctance and pried open an eye to survey its surroundings. The spare room came into focus, along with Cid’s lined, worried face. She blinked slowly at him as her back began to make its protests known and the parched dry feel in her throat reminded her that drinking heavily on an empty stomach was not necessarily the most intelligent thing to do. “Wha….”

“Cloud’s…not needing it right now. Come on, up ya go. What were ya thinkin’, sleepin’ on the floor after a night like that?”

Cloud. Memories of the previous night came flooding back, and she whipped her head around so fast that she was amazed she didn’t develop whiplash. The bed was indeed as empty as Cid had indicated. The sheet was barely rumpled, and there was the faintest of indents on the pillow where a head had rested. Panic rose in her throat as she struggled to rise on legs grown stiff from her all-night vigil. “Where is he?”

Cid pursed his lips. “Wee-ell…that’s hard to say.”

Tifa’s dark eyes flashed irritably. “What do you mean? Isn’t he downstairs? Or has he run off again?” While she was desperately hoping for the former, even the latter would be fine as long as someone, anyone had seen him leave and would be able to verify that he was all right.

Her grizzled friend sighed wearily. “Don’t know for sure. His ride’s still out back, so least if he’s gone off, he hasn’t gone far.” There was a palpable hesitation in his voice, and Tifa was nothing if not tenacious.

“What aren’t you telling me, Cid?”

He was silent, then stepped over to the window and lifted the sheer curtain, motioning to her to look. Complying, she saw Vincent Valentine standing in the backyard, shoulders hunched and one pale hand on Cloud’s motorcycle, staring off into the distance. His voice was thoughtful as he murmured, “Vinnie was the first to notice he was gone. Been broodin’ out there since. Won’t say a word, except that every now and then he mumbles somethin’ about not knowing if sins can be forgiven…but about tryin’ anyway. Think it has something to do with the kid?”

Tifa put a hand to her mouth, recognizing the sentiment if not the words, and as if hearing her thoughts, Vincent turned ever so slightly, his narrow face angling up towards them as he straightened, although his eyes remained hooded in shadow. A dark lock of hair fell loosely across his face and he tossed it back casually over his shoulder, an eerily graceful gesture that reminded the viewers at the window of the prior night’s revelations.

“For some reason, Vinnie seems to know more than he’s tellin’. Maybe it’s like he said last night, Hojo’s meddlin’ did somethin’ to him, made him a little more sensitive or something. But somehow I think Cloud’s all right. Old Red-Eyes wouldn’t be this calm if he weren’t.” Cid shrugged phlegmatically, though the tightness of his jaw betrayed his unease with everything that had happened over the last twenty-four hours. The grizzled pilot was a straight-up personality, and the murky uncertainty of the situation was doing nothing for his state of mind.

“I guess Cloud did wake up after all,” Tifa muttered, more to herself than to Cid. She should feel a little more hurt, she thought vaguely, but somehow all she felt was a strange numbness. A silence more characteristic of the gruff pilot than the vivacious young woman settled over the pair as they continued to watch their red-cloaked friend from the window. A friend who seemed to be more of a stranger now than he had ever been before.

At last Cid stirred. “Wonder what Vinnie’s looking at.”

“A past that has yet to happen.” Tifa didn’t know where the seemingly contradictory words were coming from, but even as they fell from her lips, she knew them to be truth. “A future that has yet to be written.”

“A present that…that should not be.”

The pilot stared at her, even more bewildered than before. “What does that mean?”

She shook her head, wrapping her arms around herself tightly as if to stave off a chill wind. “I don’t know, Cid. I don’t know.”

---

He came to consciousness again slowly, swimming up through a murky fog veined with twisting strands of gleaming green that eddied in his wake. The feathery skeins clung to him like new tendrils of ivy, and he tried to shake them off reflexively, but they persisted, twining around him irresistibly. He tried to grab a handful of them to yank them off him, but the green strands dissipated as he closed his fingers around them, only to reappear moments later, wrapped around his upper arm. Frustrated, he lashed out with a foot and abruptly found himself in the dark as the faint glow of the Lifestream coursing through those pulsating veins winked out. Spinning around in the featureless darkness left him feeling dizzy and disoriented, and he had resigned himself to sitting tight until a faint glimmer appeared in the distance. He reached out for it eagerly as it approached, panic making him greedy as he tried to grasp hold of the now blindingly bright strand that extended towards him, becoming a hand, becoming a face….

Sephiroth looked at him, green eyes hollow and lost.

A blinding pain shot through his shoulder, travelling down his arm and causing his fingers to go lifeless, and then he was falling away from Sephiroth, who stood and watched him go, a desolate bleakness etched harshly upon his face. He opened his mouth to call out to the General, but no sound came forth, much to his horror. The tall figure in the distance seemed to slump fractionally as if disappointed, and then Sephiroth turned and began to walk away, his silver mane fanning out behind him.

Nibelheim.

But that hadn’t happened here yet, had it? He struggled to say something, but his silent cry echoed only his head. And then Sephiroth stopped, and turned to face him again, holding out one slender pale hand almost imploringly, and a soft whisper came towards him as if carried on the gentlest of breezes.

“Strife.”

---

“Strife? It is all right, you are safe. No one will hurt you, I promise.”

Cloud gasped for air, eyes blind with surprise as he struggled to sit up. A strong arm inserted itself behind his back, supporting his upper torso even as gentle pressure was applied to his chest to hold him down. The burst of energy was short-lived though, and Cloud could feel himself fading just as quickly as he was eased back onto the bed. He shook his head weakly to clear it, finally managing to focus on his caretaker.

Sephiroth looked back at him worriedly. “Do you feel any pain? I do not believe you have undone the healing, but you would know best.”

At that moment, Cloud decided that it didn’t really matter that he didn’t have a voice, because he was overcome with the suspicion that he would have been left just as tongue-tied when faced with the reason for his current trials and tribulations up close and personal. Sephiroth’s brows were currently knitted in concern, making his face look surprisingly young and vulnerable. His distinctive mane was pulled back carelessly into a high ponytail which swung freely down his back, a few stray locks falling free around his face. The silver-white strands contrasted sharply with the slight tan of his skin, the hint of high colour along his cheekbones the product of long hours spent in outdoors fighting on one front or another for ShinRa. It was odd, Cloud thought, how easily one forgot the true details of the man and remembered only the pallor of the hollow-cheeked lab-grown clones. Instead of his usual leather battle garb, Sephiroth was dressed simply in what looked to be a regulation black sweater devoid of any rank tabs and standard SOLDIER uniform pants bloused over combat boots, sleeves pushed midway up both arms. The only remnants of his usual appearance were the supple black leather gloves he was wearing and the brilliant green of his eyes.

He looked, in a word, devastatingly handsome.

Okay, so that was two words, Cloud thought fretfully, but damn it, he was allowed some fuzzy thoughts when confronted with his long-time, long-dead crush-slash-hero-slash-nemesis, right? A dog-eared book lying crumpled on the sheets betrayed what the man had been doing while watching over Cloud from the hard plastic chair by the bedside, and there was just something so normal, so…ordinary about it that it made the situation all the more fantastic, and he wondered if this was another odd dream sent by the Cetra to plague him. But when he opened his eyes again, Sephiroth was still standing there, looking just as he had before and not at all like the pallid, haunted figure of his nightmares.

“You still don’t remember anything, do you?” Though phrased as a question, the tone made it a statement of fact.

Cloud shook his head. A flicker of disappointment crossed Sephiroth’s face, but the mask of the General swiftly replaced it as a doctor came bustling up. “Ah, awake again I see! How are you feeling? Any pain?”

The blonde shook his head uncertainly. He had fallen asleep in the middle of one of Zack’s ramblings about himself, a cadet named Gump and…shrimp? Something like that. His throat was dry, his eyes were gummy and he knew without having to ask for a mirror that his hair was probably even wilder than usual, if that was possible. Next to the pin-neat white coat of the doctor and Sephiroth’s casual elegance, he felt rather like a particularly bedraggled chocobo, and he tugged uncomfortably at the too-thin sheets, wishing that he were in his usual dark garb instead of a papery, shapeless gown.

“Hmm. Hah. Yes.” The doctor was prodding at Cloud’s shoulder gleefully. His fingers were cold, and Cloud wondered if he couldn’t have at least rubbed his hands together to warm them up first. “All better!” the man proclaimed proudly, looking for all the world like he had been the one to administer the Cure himself. Cloud rolled his eyes and started as he caught a matching glimmer of amusement in Sephiroth’s gaze before the green eyes shuttered again as they turned towards the doctor.

“Then I take it he is ready to be released?”

Thin lips pursed. “Well…he really should be on bed rest. At least for another day or so. But other than that…yes. Physically at least, he appears to have wholly recovered from the gunshot wound, and from the minor concussion.”

“And the amnesia?”

“Harder to say. Could be temporary, could be permanent.” Cloud didn’t like the way the doctor peered gleefully down at him through smudged glasses. “We’ve been experimenting with some new Mako-derived serums for accelerating nervous systems though – perhaps we could try…”

“No.” That syllable dropped like a frigid icicle into the abrupt silence. “He is not a lab rat, Doctor. Until we know otherwise, he is a civilian guest and is to be treated as such. No experiments. No unauthorized treatments. Is that quite clear?”

“Really, General, I…”

“Must I repeat myself, Doctor?” Sephiroth’s baritone was deceptively mild, yet there was something about it that promised dark deeds of pain with the doctor as their focus if the General was forced to go over his previous statements. The man swallowed. Hard. And in short order, Cloud found himself with discharge papers, an armful of nondescript fatigues and a bottle of painkillers, and strict instructions not to come back for anything less than death or dismemberment. The blonde looked forlornly at the bundle in his arms, then eyed Sephiroth hopefully as he swung his legs over the side of the bed.

“Your clothes were discarded after you were brought in – they were so torn as to be unsalvageable,” explained the General sympathetically, stepping back to give him room, and Cloud mentally gave the man a point for being a good observer of body language. Sephiroth hesitated, then added, “You…there was no identification in them, in case that’s what you were wondering. And your fingerprints don’t show up in any of ShinRa’s records, which means you have never worked for or with us before. Although I could have sworn…” he trailed off and looked away.

Cloud fought to keep the relief he felt from showing on his face. At least he was thoroughly unidentifiable to ShinRa – coupled with the faked amnesia, he wouldn’t have to explain anything to anyone anytime soon. He wondered absently what this world’s Cloud had wound up doing instead of joining SOLDIER. Was he working in Nibelheim? Running a bar with Tifa, perhaps? Or maybe he’d never even been born in this world, and a shiver went down his spine at the thought. At least he knew his father had existed. Even as a child he’d known about his resemblance to his father from the few faded pictures his mother had kept, but he hadn’t seen those photographs since he was a boy. From Sephiroth’s reaction to him though, it would appear that all he needed to do to see his father was to look in a mirror.

“You look like someone just walked over your grave,” Sephiroth observed softly. “I am sorry. It was not my intent to distress you.” One slender, gloved hand reached up and rubbed the bridge of his nose tiredly. “I…Strife. May I call you Strife? It is difficult to have a conversation without a name.”

Blue eyes flicked up at the polite request. So Sephiroth hadn’t yet given up on this insistence that Cloud was the man he had known as Strife. It would make sense – he was used to responding to the name anyway, and maybe he’d get a chance further down the line to figure out what the relationship between Sephiroth and his father had been. So he nodded, shrugging to indicate that he didn’t really care much one way or the other, as he supposed an amnesiac would.

“Strife. You took a bullet for me, and as such I owe you a debt of gratitude. Given your condition, I would like to offer….my home to you, while you recover. As I mentioned earlier, we have not been able to identify you, and hence are unable to contact your family. You need somewhere to stay, and while Zack informs me that Miss Gainsborough has made the offer, her home is not in the safest of sectors. As you well know.” Green eyes flickered over Cloud’s still-bandaged shoulder and the ghost of a wry smile flitted over the man’s face. “Our background checks have revealed nothing untoward about you – technically, they have revealed nothing about you, Zack likes to remind me – but given your actions in aiding Miss Gainsborough and myself, it would be remiss of me not to look to your safety, and you would have access to follow-up medical care here, should it become necessary….”

Cloud cut off the man’s uncharacteristic nervous rambling with a nod and what he hoped was a cautiously reassuring smile to mask his confusion. He got the impression that Sephiroth was waiting not only for agreement, but also for some sort of…approval? Approbation? Another puzzle piece to make fit. Why would his father’s approval mean anything to the General of ShinRa? So many questions and so few answers, he sighed mentally. Still, he was healed, and thanks to the Cetra’s machinations, well within Sephiroth’s inner circle – he was going to be staying with the man, you couldn’t get much closer than that! – which would make his job here that much easier. Clever, clever Aeris.

And if nothing else, he was out of that damned paper gown. Things were looking up.