fic: living chemical child (ffvii/fma)
Aug. 4th, 2010 01:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jukeboxhound_backupLiving Chemical Child
VIII. Oil of Silver.
Main post.
Main Pairing: Established Sephiroth/Zack/Cloud
Canon: FFVII (original game only) + Fullmetal Alchemist
Rating/Warnings: Light R - alchemical torture (naturally), some sexuality, meandering thoughts on alchemy and philosophy, general unhappiness.
Summary: It wasn't like Hojo had left clear instructions on how to reverse a sacrifice to the Gate. Unbetaed.
Word Count: 2,060
XI. Oil of Silver.
The extracted Sulfur of Silver is efficacious for
disorders of the brain, memory, and emotions;
particularly for depression and emotional trauma.
Cloud wasn't a stranger to nightmares. They'd become a common occurrence these last two years, and while that didn't make them any easier to bear, he'd learned to face them with quiet resignation.
Nor was he the type to sit up straight in bed, a scream in his throat, or the type to flail and cry out. No, when he awoke from a nightmare, it was like a slime of horror was sliding off his face, turning the transition from sleep to awareness a surreal experience. The hitching of breath followed almost immediately, and sometimes tears but not so often anymore, and he'd turn onto his side to press his face into the pillow and breathe out the grief that tightened his chest. There was nothing dramatic, never a sound louder than a gasp or harsh exhale, as though his mind was still trapped in the border between shock and horror.
But this was the first time he'd had a nightmare during one of the rare occasions in which he was able to share a bed overnight with Sephiroth and Zack. He clawed his way away from fire and screams to wakefulness, staring for a long moment up at the ceiling and trying to breathe through the tightness in his chest, before turning over to curl into a tight ball as though collapsing in upon himself.
"Cloud?"
The hand on his shoulder made him twitch sharply, making Sephiroth immediately withdraw. He tried to open his mouth to speak, say I'm fine, sorry to wake you, except he couldn't find the words over the adrenaline and sorrow burrowing their way through his veins like living things. He must've made some sound in his sleep and triggered those soldier reflexes in the general, but it wasn't like Cloud would know, he'd never had someone beside him like this.
"Cloud?" Sephiroth whispered again, shifting to slowly slide a hand back onto Cloud's shoulder and down his arm. On Sephiroth's other side Zack made a sleepy grumbling sound.
"I'm sorry," he whispered back shakily, keeping his face in the pillow because god he was a mess. "It's all right, I didn't mean to wake you."
"You don't have to apologize." Sephiroth leaned forward slightly, his long hair sliding forward across Cloud's bare torso. "Nightmare?"
"It's nothing, really." Goddamnit, his voice was still cracking slightly. He sat up, managing a smile that felt horribly fake on his own face but unable to meet the man's eyes. "I slept a lot yesterday anyway, guess it carried over tonight. Go back to sleep, okay? I'm just gonna make some coffee and do some reading."
"Cloud…"
He slid out of bed, blushing to realize that he was still naked as he snatched up his trousers and slipped them on. He flashed another one of those fake smiles and escaped the bedroom, shoving his hands into his pockets when he realized they were shaking.
Once in the kitchen, lit by the glow of the small lamp Sephiroth habitually kept burning at night, he stood in the middle and stared sightlessly out the window overlooking a lawn turned silver in the moonlight. The clock said it was only four-thirty. Had to be back at the Academy at eight for morning drills. He should really use the time to do the reading for his tactics class, hadn't exactly had the time last night when his clothes were stripped off of him and he'd been pushed onto the bed, on his hands and knees with Zack in his mouth and Sephiroth fucking him from behind. Probably had bruises on his hips by now. Throat still felt a little raw, but that was his own fault, really, hadn't been able to resist teasing and sucking until Zack was all but senseless and uncontrolled.
Cloud wrapped his arms around himself and suddenly felt very alone. Overwhelmed. What was he doing, he was fucking two superior officers and couldn't even stop being such a wimp, it had all happened two years ago and he'd survived, hadn't he, wasn't supposed to be crying in the middle of the night like a scared little kid. Who was he kidding, he was just a teenager with absolutely no idea what he was doing or what he was supposed to do. As soon as Sephiroth and Zack realized he wasn't worth the time and was just a stand-in until they realized they loved each other best, he wasn't going to have anything but to go through the motions of the military.
He jumped again as Sephiroth's arms slid around his waist, who had to bend over slightly to accommodate the difference in their heights. A sharp chin rested lightly on the top of his head as a broad, warm body pressed itself against his back. Cloud held his breath, waiting for the questions – Zack would've pressed, he was the type to drag everything out into the open like squeezing the pus from a fresh wound –
But the silence stretched on, save for the steady ticking of the clock by the doorway. He hardly noticed when he started leaning back into the steady warmth, withdrawing into the circle of Sephiroth's arms as though he were wrapping himself up in a blanket and hiding from the rest of the world. After a little while he felt Sephiroth start to stand back, but before he could turn around the man was draping Zack's military jacket over his shoulders (he could tell, it smelled like that weirdly fruity and totally not girly aftershave that apparently reminded him of his jungle hometown) and moving towards the coffee pot on the counter.
Unsure and still feeling a little distant from the real world, Cloud shifted awkwardly, watching from under his bangs. Sephiroth was getting out two mugs, milk, and sugar as the coffee percolated. Then he filled both cups, adding just the right proportions of milk and sugar to the one that he finally handed to Cloud. Cloud hesitated, searching his face for any clue of how he was expected of respond, but all he found was calm and something soft, something that made him blush without knowing why. When he took the mug, Sephiroth wordlessly guided him towards the living room, sitting on the sofa and pulling Cloud down to stretch out on the cushions with his side pressed against the general's arm. Cloud glanced sideways at Sephiroth again, but the man was just sipping and watching the faint glow of the embers in the fireplace. Slowly Cloud relaxed, taking a sip of his own coffee and feeling its warmth pool in his belly to spread through his limbs. Zack's too-large jacket was still around his shoulders like a fitted quilt.
He was warm but not from the heat of an inferno. It was quiet and still and maybe he could finally breathe again.
…
When the alarm went off at seven, Zack padded out in his boxers to the living room. He found Sephiroth dozing with his chin tipped forward onto his chest and Cloud fast asleep with his head in Sephiroth's lap, Zack's own jacket pulled tight around him. Two half-empty mugs sat on the side table, suggesting that Sephiroth had had the foresight to set them aside before either of them had conked out.
Zack smiled ruefully. It looked like it'd been the right choice to let Sephiroth win the brief debate earlier about who was going to follow Cloud out of the bedroom. He weighed the pros and cons of letting them sleep and be late for work or the Academy, but when he saw the shadows under Cloud's eyes he decided it wouldn't be too difficult to bullshit a pardon for the cadet's absence that day.
…
Sephiroth was debating with himself the merits of having General Hakuro assassinated when the door of his office abruptly opened. Zack wandered in with an open folder in his hands, kicking the door closed behind him and flopping down onto the leather couch. He didn't look up once.
"So it seems that Cloud is from this place called Nibelheim," Zack began without preamble, not noticing the mix of annoyance and exasperation on his superior's face. "Tiny town in buttfuck nowhere near the Drachmian border."
"And?" Sephiroth asked dryly, setting aside his paperwork. It wasn't like he could turn it in, given the doodles of stick figures with nooses around their necks.
"Turns out that two years ago the whole place burned to the ground. There's a note here in Cloud's file saying he was the only survivor."
And suddenly things were a lot less entertaining. "He would've been fourteen," Sephiroth said quietly.
"Yeah." Zack finally looked up, wearing a cynical expression. "No wonder he joined the military so young, looks like he went to Briggs not long after and got transferred here. Medical records say he's got some social anxiety and a tendency towards depression, but having something like that on top of being a teenage kid? Shit."
There was a moment of silence. Sephiroth used it to absorb this information, fitting it in with what he knew of the boy. He remembered the night a few weeks ago when Cloud had been driven from bed, and here was the likeliest reason.
"What was the date?"
"Uh, August eleventh, nineteen-twelve. Oh shit, that's his fucking birthday."
Of course it was. "When was did he show up at Briggs?"
"About a month later, it looks like."
"Does it say where he was in the interim?"
"Nope."
A fourteen-year-old tragedy survivor on his own for a month. That…actually explained some things. Sephiroth leaned forward on his elbows and pinched the bridge of his nose with a gloved hand. What was one supposed to say to something like that? 'Gee, that sucks'?
Zack unknowingly echoed his thoughts with, "So what do we do?"
"I don't know," he admitted, then glanced down at the folder in Zack's hands. "You do realize that you're violating Cloud's privacy, right?"
The soldier frowned at it. "Normally I'd agree with you, but something's weird here. It's usually not that hard to get a cadet's file if you really want to, but I had to go all the way to Tseng for this one."
Now Sephiroth frowned.
"I know, right? Apparently he's been tagged somehow, but I can't figure out why, and I wasn't about to get Intelligence involved with Cloud. Especially with no real evidence of anything. Hey man, don't have to look at me twice like that, I'm worried too."
"Was there any cause listed for that fire?"
"Just the usual blame on the lack of resources in little towns. Someone's fireplace gets out of control, not enough people or whatever to stop it in time, yadda yadda. Which, okay, I know small towns too and that's not really out of the ballpark. But still."
"Zack, are you sure you're not looking for something that isn't there?"
"Sephiroth, since when has there not been a conspiracy in this government?"
"…All right, you may have a point there, but my own still stands. Are you looking for a conspiracy specifically because this is about Cloud?"
"Do I need another reason?"
The thing about Zack was that he could make these things seem so reasonable. "You do realize that we can't use military resources to look into this matter, right?" It could bring accusations of favoritism. Slanderous rumors, given Cloud's age and adolescent attractiveness. Endanger the three of them if there really was a conspiracy and the higher-ups found out about their prying.
"Yes, thank you, I do know. Don't worry, I'll keep it on the down-low. Might ask Tseng to do a bit of snooping, since he already knows about this damn file. I bet he gets bored anyway now that Rufus ShinRa's busy trying to take over Parliament, that vicious little snake," he said lightly.
"And here I thought Tseng had his hands full with Lieutenant Colonel Hughes."
"You ask me, those two were the town housewife gossips in a previous life."
"I'll be sure to let him know."
"Wait, I didn't mean it!"
