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mariyekos · 5 months ago

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Temporary Post

Trying to share something. Rant about Corel Prison below the cut.

This essay was originally a response to someone else. Text in blue comes from them. I wrote this months ago and did not proofread it so it could be better but tip.

the OG never explains how the Gold Saucer came to be, who funds it cuz if they kept it as the OG,

I’m one of those people who believes that not everything needs an explanation. FFVII Remake and Rebirth both have a problem with over-explaining things at times, but that’s another topic. The overarching theme of this mini-essay is that OG FFVII very prominently features themes of complacency, apathy, and inaction, and how those can lead to misery and destruction just as well as direct bad actions can (i.e. doing nothing can lead to just as much misery as intentionally hurting someone). One famous (misattributed, but still good) quote is this: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” And that’s part of the soul of the OG.

First, I have to lay out a VERY important difference in Corel of the OG and Corel of RE (Rebirth and Remake). The town of Corel in the OG is the land that becomes the prison. This is evident based on the scene in the house in the Prison where Barret talks about Dyne and Scarlet, and by the flashback at the ropeway where you see Corel burning and it has the same buildings/landmarks as the Prison. The town of Corel in RE is North Corel, which is a shantytown. To me, it doesn’t make sense that generations upon generations of people would be stuck in a shantytown. And, Corel being a shantytown in both RE Barret’s flashback and the present undermines his whole thing about how Corel is now worse because of Shinra, because it isn’t. It’s been a shantytown the whole time. Yes you can still argue that the people are unhappy and that shows how Shinra is bad, but it’s not nearly as bad as destroying the town and turning it into a prison so the original inhabitants are forced to create a new town from the literal scrap that’s left.

Going along with that is the difference between a Prison made from and populated by the things Shinra has destroyed, and a town populated by ruffians who chose to be there and are having a good time. In the first, it's Shinra and greed-enforced misery. In the second, it loses that. It's instead about reclaiming your own happiness, I guess. Which is an okay point, but doesn't hit as hard and is already done elsewhere so it doesn't need to be repeated. It makes Corel much more generic than it was in the OG, where it stood out via its harsh reality and the cruelty of its existence.

Now then, for the explanation of Gold Saucer in the OG: Shinra is the root of many evils, but it is not its sole source nor its sole enactor. Yes the OG doesn’t explain the details of how the Gold Saucer came to be, but I believe it doesn’t need to, because you can extrapolate based on the situation. OG Corel was destroyed by Shinra. Dio, a traveler, decides he wants to create an amusement park. The desert of Corel is a harsh environment, but in the words of that one meme, It’s Free Real Estate!

Given Shinra completely rebuilt Nibelheim to cover up what happened there, it’s possible that Shinra funded the construction of the Gold Saucer too, in order to hide Corel somewhat. Corel isn’t as damning of Shinra as Nibelheim is, so they wouldn’t need to rebuild it, just distract. Or it could be that Dio was just a rich guy who wanted an amusement park and built it independent of Shinra (until they wormed their way in anyway). When you ask “why does the Gold Saucer exist,” the answer doesn’t need to be about who funded it. The answer is “to exemplify how the rich and elite will brush away the suffering of the poor for their own gain, whether that be profit or amusement.” FFVII is a video game, not real life, and it’s okay for the answer to be a thematic one rather than a logistical one. Plus there are already several places that Shinra has obviously stuck their hands into, so we don’t necessarily need the Gold Saucer to be overtly Shinra too. (Given how many times Shinra appears there, it’s at least Shinra friendly in the OG).

it like creates a plot hole of Why would Dyne who hates Shinra, run a prison that is created from destroyed town of Corel be okay with the Gold Saucer being built on top // hell Dyne feels more organic compared to the OG, cuz like his despair and nihilism is created by Shinra leading to his descent to madness

Dyne in the OG is someone who hates not just Shinra, but the whole world. To quote him: “I want to destroy everything. The people of this city. The city itself. The whole world! I got nothing left in this world. Corel. Eleanor….. Marlene….” Dyne is someone who thrives on misery. You can ask why Dyne would be okay with the Gold Saucer being built on top in RE just like the OG- he waits 4 years both times. The answer to this I’ve always interpreted as Dyne’s nihilism and hatred building over time from apathy to action. It takes him time to be so fed up with the world that he decides he wants to actively destroy it, rather than just let it rot (as Shinra is doing). Now I think the real reason is that he waited because the writers needed the Dyne thing to happen when the party was there, but in either case we don’t get a reason for him being okay with the Gold Saucer in either game so I don’t see it as a fault with the original.

As for why Dyne would run a prison, he doesn’t run it in the traditional sense. He’s not the one keeping people down there. The way the party gets out in the OG is by winning the Chocobo Race and being pardoned by Dio. Dyne is the “boss” in that of the people stuck in prison, he’s the one people won’t cross. After you kill Dyne, Mr. Coates (Gus in the OG) says: “So Dyne's dead…Maybe now, this place'll calm down a little. Dyne didn't care who anyone was.” He’s happy Dyne is dead. I always interpreted it as Dyne being the “boss” because people are scared of him, not because he’s actually leading people in any real way. If you want to do something, you need permission from Dyne otherwise he’ll snap and murder you or something. Unlike in RE, people in the OG don’t need to outright say they don’t like Dyne. It’s instead implied. AND it’s another case of the apathy that I mentioned: people don’t like Dyne, but they’re not willing to change anything. They’re miserable and they’re going to wallow in their misery, and that’s their downfall.

As for Dyne’s descent, in both the OG and the RE it’s pretty much the same: Shinra took everything from Dyne, which drives him insane. The difference is that in the OG, Dyne decides he wants to take it out on everyone (the world, and importantly the people of Corel!), while Dyne in the RE is more targeted on Shinra. Except he’s not, fully! Because he shoots innocent people too! He just names Shinra out loud. Honestly the biggest kick to the gut in the RE was that Dyne didn’t have his line about wanting to kill Marlene because Eleanor was lonely. That line is sickening in the OG. A man so corrupted by despair that, upon hearing his daughter is alive, he decides it’s better to kill her to free her of the world he hates so she can be at peace in the afterlife, than to reunite with her to make her life happy. Thinking about it gives me chills. That’s true despair right there. And THAT is why Dyne fights Barret in the OG- because Barret wants Marlene to live, while Dyne wants her to die. In the RE, Dyne turns on Barret because he thinks Barret is working for Shinra again. It doesn’t hit nearly as hard. We already know Dyne hates Shinra; it’s when Dyne decides he wants to kill Marlene that I went “okay, there’s no walking away from this one. Someone’s got to go.” Because we all hate Shinra already, so hating Shinra doesn’t make Dyne special to me. Wanting to murder his own daughter does.

Which goes into his death. Dyne in the OG doesn’t really get a redemption arc/scene. Dyne in RE definitely does. Dyne in RE shields Barret from approaching Shinra soldiers, then dies on top of him. I’m not going to lie- I got teary eyed when Dyne fell on top of Barret. That hurt. But in the OG, Dyne doesn’t get a traditional redemption. He commits suicide. His "redemption" is much more subtle- when he goes to jump, the lighting of the scene changes and illuminates himself and the crosses (that I interpret as being for Marlene and Eleanor based on their sizes). It to me shows that he is going to the beyond, the great big light in the sky in many representations. Light is purifying, because even though he didn’t get a redemption in saving Barret, he’s come to terms with his life and death and that’s the best you can get.

In the OG, not everyone can be saved, physically OR morally. But you can try to be better. And the forgiveness comes in the form of that light and the pendant Dyne gives to Barret so Barret can save himself. He doesn’t have to kill himself to earn his redemption; the light comes after the pendant is given. He kills himself because he thinks he can’t be redeemed, not realizing he’s already been forgiven. Dyne in RE saves Barret with his body. Dyne in OG saves Barret with his medallion. Furthermore, giving the pendant to Barret also shows how Dyne has changed because he says the pendant is for Marlene, which means Dyne has come to accept or even just realize that it’s better for Marlene to be in the living world, and while his hands are too stained to hold her, he can at least give her one last gift.

There’s symbolism there too, about the survival of the next generation. A Dyne who wants to kill Marlene because she’s better off dead is one who has decided there is no saving the world (symbolically eliminating the future). This is the same thing Shinra is doing. Shinra is eliminating the future by killing the world. Barret is fighting to save the Planet, but while doing so, he’s put his personal life to the side- which is something he comments on in the RE! But we see in this scene with Dyne that his personal life and his larger goal of saving the Planet are at times the same. Yes Dyne dying for Barret in the RE shows Dyne now believes in the future, but it’s more powerful when he gives the pendant to Barret so Barret can secure Marlene’s future just like he’s securing the future of the Planet. In both suicides, Dyne is saying that the rot must be excised. That sometimes there is no redemption. But Barret’s mourning is what makes you question whether that’s true. ESPECIALLY with how Barret says his hands aren’t clean either. That’s Barret saying that even if you’ve sinned, you must push on and try to do good (because whose hands AREN’T stained, in the end? If not by murder than by other sins).

Dyne committing suicide by jumping is more powerful than him committing suicide by saving Barret because one is entirely selfish, while one is selfless. Saving Barret is selfless, even if the goal is the same. He’s explicitly helping Barret by dying to save him in the RE. But in the OG? Barret doesn’t get anything out of Dyne killing himself. Dyne could’ve given Barret the pendant and lived or gone and talked to Mr. Coates himself, but he didn’t. That shows how much Dyne has given up on the world to me. He doesn’t give himself a way out. In the OG, Shinra has completely and utterly destroyed this man to the point he doesn't see redemption as an option. In the RE, he shoots for his redemption via saving Barret. He's not as far gone. [EDIT: Also your great point about Dyne falling 4 years ago mirroring him doing it by choice here!!!!! I somehow. Never caught onto that but that's so good, nd makes the OG even better]

Last note on Dyne’s madness: Dyne in the RE is very crazy, don’t get me wrong. But him talking to his dead wife and daughter didn’t make me think he was NEARLY as far gone as the guy who wanted to murder his daughter when he found out she was alive. THAT’S true insanity to me. THAT is what Shinra has done, and it’s all the more damning of them. RE Dyne is broken. OG Dyne is corrupted.

And last note on Dyne: Him wishing for the destruction of the world in the OG is so good because it shows how Shinra’s influence not only damns themselves, but the entire world. The mako reactors are Shinra’s invention, but they are killing the Planet as a whole. Dyne’s madness is a result of Shinra’s intervention, but leads to him wanting to destroy the world as a whole. Shinra has damned the many for their own gain.

Dio who GETS an expanded role here, and explains he's just left in charge [Mari's note: this comes from a longer thing claiming Dio in Rebirth is much better than the OG because we know more about him]

Okay so this section goes beyond what you’ve brought up, I’m just going into it because it’s big to me. Another theme of both the OG and RE is of redemption. Can Cloud redeem himself for (OG late game spoilers) giving Sephiroth the Black Materia. Can Jessie and Avalanche be redeemed for the deaths they caused (Shinra’s extra involvement in RE is something I have issues with better left in another post). In Crisis Core, there’s the question of Genesis’ Redemption. And there’s Vincent’s whole character, who is the epitome of “can people be redeemed for their sins, and do they even deserve redemption in the first place.” He’s also a great example of what comes from apathy and inaction - misery and the worsening of a problem.

Dio in the OG is a character who throws Cloud and Co. in Prison without a care. They’re probably guilty, but beyond that causing problems, so to Prison they go. He is a rich elite who is willing to trod on the lower class to eliminate his problem. Once Cloud wins the Chocobo Race and they sort out the Dyne thing, only THEN does he forgive Cloud and pardon them. I think the OG has a much stronger message about the damage of jumping to conclusions, since Dio doesn’t give them a chance. And again, it shows how people are willing to turn a blind eye to the messy stuff. The stuff with the Buggy and Keystone also show how he’s trying to be redeemed. It’s a stronger message about how even if you do wrong, you can make up for it and should. That’s lessened in RE where he becomes more sympathetic from the outset.

I’m going to cut the Dio stuff off here because this is already too long so whoops. Dio in the RE is a good character since he’s more fleshed out, but I don’t think he’s as symbolic or good for the THEME/MESSAGE of the game and the Gold Saucer specifically as he was in the OG. Dio in the OG worked well as an example of blindness and complacency, whereas Dio in the RE is more fleshed out but doesn't work as well thematically.

#erurandomness #delete later

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zmediaoutlet · 1 year ago

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fic: the spare bedroom

the nostalgia bug has got me good, y'all. And man, it's so much easier to write for a new fandom, haha. For the four of you who might see this --

title: the spare bedroom pairing: Cloud/Barret rating: E length: 5000 tags: Game: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (2024), Gongaga (Compilation of FFVII), Friends With Benefits, Size Kink, Oral Sex

summary: After getting out of the desert and making their way to Gongaga, everyone splits up. Cloud comes to check on Barret.

(read on AO3)

Cissnei's house is nice enough. Small. A few beds, like maybe desperate folks have crashed here before. A kitchen. Maybe Tifa'll cook something, if they're lucky. Pay back their host for her generosity. From the burn marks on the stove they better not rely on Cissnei to provide.

Barret's not hungry, though. He's tired but he doesn't want to sleep. Piece of shit of a day, worse than just about any he's had in four years. He sits on the bed shoved against the wall in the back room and rests his elbows on his knees, trying to figure it. Between the plate getting dropped and losing his team and the reactor back in Corel blowing and his arm being shot to bloody broken bits—yeah, he's got a list. Previously he'd had the ranking pretty well defined. Maybe on some later day he'll feel less like a sorry sack of shit about the whole thing but right now, every time he closes his eyes he sees that holding shack at the prison, and he feels the hot dust under his fingers, and in his ears, his best friend saying—

"What are you doing," Cloud says. Barret jolts, opens his eyes.

"I'm bo-ored," Yuffie says, from her slump in the living room around the corner. "This town was supposed to have materia."

"It isn't just going to appear midair. I thought you were a hunter. Go find it." Barret snorts. Kid doesn't even sound like he's trying to be rude. Perfectly practical, that's our SOLDIER. Yuffie makes some whiny noise—Barret is truly not looking forward to Marlene being fifteen—and Cloud sighs, and like he's making a great concession says, "I think I heard the GYC guys talking about training with magic. Maybe you can convince one of them to hand something over."

"Really?" she squeals, and then, calling like to a distant friend, "Materia, never fear! You shall be mine!"

Running sneakers on the stone, the front door slamming closed. Barret tips his head back against the wall, watches the afternoon light coming in through the strange stone-hewed windows. Town's nice. Peaceful. If it were some other day he bets he could enjoy it.

Cloud appears in the archway. His lips part on seeing Barret and then he shakes his head. "Figures. Last place I look."

"Ain't everything in the last place you'd look?" Barret says. He stretches his boots out on the stones. "'Cause you'd stop looking then, right?"

Those big, pretty eyes narrow. "Right." Cloud studies his face and Barret lets him. Nearly all his awful secrets are out in the light, now. Don't make sense to pretend otherwise. Anyway, the rest of 'em didn't abandon him in the desert or kill him where he stood, so he figures little fearless leader here isn't about to run him through. Though, really…

"You need something?" Barret says. Better to head those kinds of thoughts off at the pass. "We ain't moving out already, are we?"

Slight head-shake. "Mission break. We don't even know if that reactor's the right place to look. Everyone needs some downtime."

Barret's got enough going on that he thinks he can be forgiven how it takes him a few seconds. Cloud's looking at the ground, his arms folded over his skinny chest, and Barret stares at him in silence until he sees how the kid's ears and cheekbones are going that telltale pale pink. He'd laugh if he didn't feel like his guts had been torn out and left all over the desert. "Don't know if I'm gonna be good company for that, man," he says.

Cloud rubs the back of his neck. "You're never good company," he says, after a second, and Barret's surprised enough to snort. Cloud's mouth tilts, barely, and then his jaw firms. "That was—messed up, today. It shouldn't have gone down like that."

"My best friend shouldn't have been mown down in a hail of bullets by Shinra goons? With it being my fault?" Barret shrugs. "Yeah, guess I'd agree with that."

Strangest look on the kid's face. He blinks hard, shakes his head. Barret frowns—he knows he sounds bitter but he didn't mean to make the kid cry, damn—but after a few seconds Cloud says, softer than he normally says just about anything, "I can't imagine." He stands there, quiet, while Barret takes a full breath, deep in his lungs, trying to clear out the thick tense fucked-up misery that's solid there, all of a sudden, his chest full of iron ore and sandstorms. Then Cloud steps forward, hands loose at his sides, cheeks pink, chin lifted. "Let me help take your mind off it."

"Cloud—" Barret starts, but Cloud gestures vaguely to the rest of town, interrupts with: "Yuffie's out chasing materia; Red's mushroom hunting; I think Cait's charging; Tifa and Aerith are… I don't know, they're doing girl stuff." He tips his head to the side, toward the real bedroom. "I'm betting that door locks."

Barret sighs. "You thought of everything, huh?"

"I try," Cloud says. He sucks his lower lip into his mouth and lets it out slow through his teeth, so it shines in the dim light. Nervous and doing a hell of a job of hiding it, and it might even work if Barret hadn't seen his badass act fail about fifty times by now. "I don't know how to make it better. Maybe it doesn't get better. But there could be an hour that didn't suck."

Damn if the kid hasn't had a 180 in personality from the day they met. Barret's heart's still lead, but—hell, the kid's right. He doesn't want to feel like this anymore. "Long as you promise it won't suck," he says. Feels heavy coming out but, damn, he's trying.

Cloud steps forward between his boots. "Or what," he says, dry.

Barret reaches out, flattens his hand over the kid's chest. The tank's thick wool, surprisingly soft. "Ain't got the energy to mess with you, man," Barret says, more honest than he means to be. Cloud's eyes change, quick as that. He gets a little nod. Barret curls a finger under one of the leather straps on Cloud's armor and tugs. Cloud leans down slow, bending at the waist, pausing for some reason when his breath touches Barret's skin—meeting Barret's eyes, checking, like Barret's some virgin that needs to be gentled—and Barret holds there like a stone until Cloud reaches whatever internal decision had to get made and sinks down the final few inches and kisses him, close-mouthed. Sweet.

He is sweet. Clumsy still, even if they've done this already. Barret holds him by the small of the back over the thick leather brace and lets Cloud take the lead, the weight still dragging at him, but distracted at least—the kid's skin smelling like salt and river-water and the jungle green they waded through to get here and also that weird sharp tang that's always around him, the mako seeping up somehow through his pores. His girl-soft mouth and his girl-soft skin, the touch of wet against Barret's lower lip, his hands warm even through the leather gloves when he frames Barret's jaw, when he sucks in a shuddery breath through his nose, when he makes this tiny deep sound in his chest, like he's tasting something he's been wanting for a while.

Barret's gut wakes, slow. Like it's remembering that he's a man and not just a hollow thing for grief to fill. He presses Cloud's mouth wider, licks his top lip, and Cloud shudders, lets Barret kiss him—deeper—his hands sliding from Barret's jaw to clench in his vest. Then he breaks away—mouth red, wet—and blinks at Barret, and then pulls at his vest, hard, that unnatural strength hauling Barret upright before he's ready so he stumbles forward into the kid, who catches him like it's nothing, and pulls again, until they're in the bedroom, the door slamming behind Barret's back as Cloud pushes him up against it. Cloud has to lift up on his toes and Barret has to bend to get their mouths together again but damn if it's not worth it, with the kid better every time, making those little noises like he's surprised, like he's learning something, like he didn't know he could like it. Hot as hell and not the first time Barret's thought it and certainly not the last, with this warmth building up in him. He was dead ten minutes ago and now he wants—damn, he wants a lot, too much, shit he can't do with responsibility about to come knocking any second, in the bedroom of some stranger's house, with a door that—

"No lock," Barret says, fumbling behind himself. Shit, shit—

Cloud stares up at him hazily, breathing heavy. "Fuck it," he says, rough. "You're a doorstop, right?"

"Screw you," Barret says, surprised into laughing, and Cloud smiles at him and then hooks his sword off that magnet on his back, leans it against the wall—careful like he always is, like the thing that cuts dragons in half will get chipped if he doesn't treat it nice—and then pushes right back in and kisses him, wrapping his arm around Barret's neck, pulling him down enough that it's easy, and then his other hand skimming down Barret's belly to his belt to the front of his fatigues, gripping there, small but firm.

Hell of a lot bolder than he was before. Barret grunts, dips and kisses the kid's jaw, lets his hips curl forward. He's not all the way there but Cloud's curious, feeling the length and the thickening girth and it feels—damn, just right, muffled pressure that's not enough to go crazy over but that feels—like a strong hand gripping his and pulling him out of swamp-muck. His nuts don't mind, that's for damn sure. He drags his fingers down the center of Cloud's back, pressing through the leather, kisses there under the kid's ear and grips his ass in a big handful, squeezes, gets a sweet tiny gasp against his jaw that makes him grin, all unexpected.

"Shut up," Cloud said, and then before Barret can protest that he didn't say nothing at all, he immediately says, "Do you want to—like before?"

Fucking the sweat-damp tunnel between Cloud's thighs, the kid squirming and panting and overcome under his bulk, so hot he's half-surprised the room didn't catch fire. Something that'll be good dreams, as long as he manages to keep his sorry ass alive. Still—"Don't think we can screw up Miss Cissnei's bedroom like that," he says. Regretting it sincerely but also somewhat glad to see Cloud pull back and blink, confused. "Made a mess, creaming you up."

His cheeks are about the color of one of those hibiscus outside, speaking of catching fire. "Right," he says. Just barely unsteady. Barret squeezes his ass again, pulls him in closer against his thigh, and Cloud half-stumbles and—yeah, he's hard too, stiff enough through the uniform that Barret could probably just get the kid to ride his leg, desperate and dizzy with it until he made a mess of himself. And that'd be fun as hell, especially if excuses had to get made about ducking back out to the river for a swim, but Barret's more selfish than that, and, anyway—

"Right," Cloud says again, harder, and then licks his lips, and drops without so much as a by-your-leave to his knees—drops, all at once, hitting the floor with a thud—and reaches for Barret's belt, and Barret's too shocked-stupid to stop him.

Belts aren't complicated and neither are trousers and Cloud's got him unzipped in record time, and that's also when Cloud gets to find out that it's been a long journey and there hasn't been much time for worrying about the delicates. He takes a deep breath and curls his hands into the waistband. "Commando, huh?" He flicks his eyes up.

"You complainin'?" Barret says, spreading his boots. Goddamn, that's a sight.

"I figured you'd need a special sling for this thing," Cloud says, cool as a mountaintop like Barret can't see his ear-tips glowing red under the mess of his hair. He pops the bracer on his right wrist and drags the leather glove off with his teeth, and it's ghostly-pale fingertips on the low of Barret's stomach, dragging down the trail from his navel to the bush he's let grow kinda thick and then touching the root, curious, feeling him all fat and ready. Ready—damn, feels like he could hammer nails—but he doesn't have to wait much longer, with Cloud's fingers peeling back the v of the fatigues and pulling down just enough that his dick—ah—pops free, hanging heavy but hard enough that it's standing out from his hips. Cloud curls his left hand around it—the leather strange and battered-soft—hefts him, fingers barely meeting his thumb—and frowns, and lifts up higher on his knees, and then dips and—presses his lips to the side, over the vein, dry, the heat just—

"Yeah," Barret says, thoughtless, and Cloud glances up at him hot-faced and then closes his eyes, licks instead, his lips dragging stutter-soft up the side of Barret's dick. "Cloud. You done this?"

He holds there with his lips just under the head, bangs hiding his face. Barret fits his hand around the back of Cloud's neck, something twisting so hard and vicious in his gut it almost hurts except that his nuts surge like he could shoot right now, no warning. He slides his thumb up over the soft hollow spot at the top of his spine, feeling the soft puffs of Cloud's breath over the head of his cock—quick, warm. "Wet your mouth," he says, quiet. Tiny space between their skin—he hears the slick noises, Cloud sucking his lower lip—and Barret closes his eyes tight but then opens them again, because hell if he's gonna miss this. "Gotta relax your jaw. Don't try to fit the whole thing. You suffocate, there'll be hell to pay."

"You'd bring me back," Cloud says, absent-minded, and Barret uses the grip at the back of his neck to pull him away—Cloud blinking up at him, startled—but he has to curl down and kiss the kid for that one, knocking his mouth open and really licking inside, pushing his jaw wide, feeling him—wet, yeah, slick and warm and good, and then he stands up again and brushes his thumb over Cloud's smooth cheek and watches him sway softly under that tenderness—what in the hell, every minute's like meeting a new merc—before Cloud licks his lower lip, and bolsters Barret's dick high, and bends to fit his mouth around the head.

Wet shock. Slick, hot—god, there are times Barret prefers this to pussy, of whatever gender. He's too big and most never offer, much less try. Cloud's tongue slicks smooth and strong under the head and Barret grips his hair, presses his hips hard back against the door not to fuck in and maybe actually cause an injury. Little grunt and Cloud pushes down another inch, pulls back, coughs. "Good," Barret says, like a dumbass. "That's good, baby."

"Don't call me that," Cloud says, but he must not mind too much because he licks a sloppy kiss there at the tip and tries again, sliding the tight ring of his lips down and down, the inside of his mouth—he sucks and it's the silk inside his cheeks and his tongue sliding and a hint, ow, of teeth, but with how hard he's trying even that's a kind of harsh hot thing that's swirling tensely at the pit of Barret's belly. Cloud switches hands, gripping with the bare right instead and sliding his left down to hold Barret's nuts, and he laps right at the slit, pressing hard, and Barret—damn, he's trying but he's mortal, isn't he?—fucks his hips forward, chasing it. Knocks into Cloud's throat, makes him yank back, coughing—and Barret does feel like a piece of shit, says, "Damn—sorry, sorry—" but Cloud, being a crazy-ass, says, "Shut up," and kneels up gripping Barret's hips and forces his mouth down. The angle's all off and he hasn't done this or at least hasn't done this with a cock as big as Barret's and he only gets maybe halfway down, but that's insane-making enough, Barret's cockhead threatening the pit of his throat and feeling that tight spasm, his hips pushing forward because he can't not under that demand, closed up in all that heaven. He's so turned around he tries for a second to grab with his right hand, forgetting somehow that it's been gone for four years, and ends up leaving his gun-arm laid heavily over Cloud's back, clanking against his iron pauldron. It's a mind-bending handful of seconds buried about as deep as anyone's managed in years before he remembers he's not supposed to kill the kid and he pulls Cloud away by the hair, his dick emerging into the horrible cold air slick and furious, calling him a fucking dumbass for not leaving it right where it belonged.

Cloud coughs once, slurps spit and air. Barret tips his head back and there are—fuck—tears in his eyes, his face red, his eyes furiously blue. Looking up like it's a challenge and like he's got not a thought in his head, all at the same time. Barret keeps his head still and pushes forward, his dick standing straight out from his hips, lets the cockhead kiss Cloud's mouth. Lets him lick at it, soft-pink and wanting. Pushes past, sliding the sticky-wet along Cloud's bizarrely soft skin, watching the fat dark of it smear along the pale cheek and past, dipping under his ear, brushing the soft ends of his hair until Cloud's lips are pressed to Barret's skin, Barret's nuts against his chin. Barret slides his own fingers against the underside of his dick, brushing Cloud's jaw. Cloud tips his head forward, forehead against Barret's belly. Kisses, careful, at his sack. God, if it were possible. If there were a dozen nights where Barret could hold his head just so and coax him and open his throat, feed in—all the way, past the constriction, in—

He can't wait. He spits in his palm and wraps his fist around his dick, and from lack of options—even crazed-headed as he is he's careful, careful, with the gun, nudging Cloud back with the muzzle against his collarbone—Cloud's eyes opening wide, darker, his jaw dropping—so Barret can feed the head in—just the head, jerking himself, Cloud watching and gripping Barret's hips and then his nuts and then just holding there, cupping Barret's sack and slurping and suckling and licking soft and sweet at the cockhead, this hot urgency in him, wanting it bad enough that he'd choke if Barret let him. Fuck, Barret could choke him. He wrings at his dick, that coil turning in and in and in on itself, tighter and hotter and clawing its way out of his nuts, and he should warn Cloud, should pull him back, should say at least—should say—except it's one of those things he knows, down somewhere deep past every other thing, that no, that this is going to be—that he will—

He bites his lip hard so he doesn't yell out. His hips jerk, once. He follows the pumping release, fisting up and up and up, drives—in—just barely, Cloud gripping his hips and then wrapping his hands over Barret's hand, holding it, letting him pump inside. Cloud's mouth opens and he gasps wetly and Barret watches the white shine on his lip and wrings his dick viciously to pull out another gob of it and then chases that right into Cloud's mouth, forces it back inside when he seems like he might lose it over his chin, and Cloud holds the back of his hand and closes his lips over Barret's thumb and sucks it clean, blurry-eyed, good. Fuck, he's good.

Barret stares at that, for a few seconds. Maybe for eternity. This insane fucker, acting like Barret's giving up the lifestream itself. His tongue pushing hard along the ridge of Barret's thumbnail. How he swallows, and gasps weird around Barret's wet thumb, and then swallows again. Then Barret's brain logs back in, or at least halfway, because he rips his hand away and grips Cloud by the bicep and hauls him bodily to his feet—fucks his tongue into Cloud's mouth for a stolen second to taste himself—bitter, god that's bitter, salt and bleach and Cloud's tongue—and then turns them around, slams Cloud back against the door and goes to his own knees, less gracefully but no less happy to do it.

"What," Cloud says, raw-voiced—god, god, because Barret fucked him there—and Barret says, "You gotta help, baby, can't do this one-handed," and Cloud stares down at him before he fumbles at his waist—rucking up the wide back-belt, peeling open his uniform, and there's—sweet, standard issue Shinra grunt white boxer-briefs with his little dick standing up so hard in them, pushing forward the cotton desperate enough that there's a damp spot at the tip, pink skin shining through the wet. Even kneeling Barret's too tall for this, though—he fumblingly helps Cloud push the trousers and briefs down to his mid-thigh and then picks up one leg, hauls Cloud's knee over his left shoulder to lift him higher—one boot thudding against his back, the other scrambling to brace on the stone floor—and it's awkward, yeah, but at that moment the bed feels a mile away and anyway he can just—"Oh!" Cloud says, as brainless as he's ever been. Barret slurps down, down, to the base—easy—while since he's had the pleasure but it ain't the kind of thing you forget. "What—Barret—"

Barret pulls off, kisses the inches of bare white thigh by his cheek. "Gotta stay quiet, you don't want the whole village coming to see," he says, and when he glances up Cloud's covered his mouth with his gloved hand, staring wide-eyed like Barret's something he never expected to see. Barret'd laugh at how fussed he is—wet-eyed and pink-faced and fluffy-haired as a chick—but it's more fun to grip his tight little ass with his good hand and push him forward into Barret's mouth. Stiff pole of it, leaking all over the place, salt and clean skin and again that strange metal flavor, a tang, somehow all off and weird and addictive all at once. Good mouthful, his nuts a sweet smooth package pulled up so tight to the base he seems ready to shoot, with thirty seconds' worth of decent attention. Barret wants to do him better than that, though, to give back even half of all that good—"Suck," he says, tapping two fingers against the metal back of Cloud's glove. A blink, confusedly hazy. "C'mon, now. My mouth's busy."

Slurped right in, after that. He ducks back down and laps at the smooth sack—truly, he'll never be over how the kid seems to be entirely hairless from the nose down—and kisses Cloud's belly and the knobby little turn of his pelvis where he's too skinny and bites real careful just under his navel, makes Cloud's cock jerk like it's on a damn lead up against the underside of his chin. His fingers are getting what he'd bet would be the gold-star VIP treatment at the Honeybee, Cloud sucking as eagerly as he did dick, and goddamn, if Barret were younger they'd have a real issue on their hands. Even so his nuts are interested, wanting another try.

"Good," he mumbles against Cloud's belly. Another jerk—his dick's pearling clear, oozing. Barret pulls his fingers out of Cloud's mouth and gets a stuttery little gasp, and then a choked noise when he applies them to the red dripping head, smears all the wet around. "Cover your mouth," he says, and Cloud doesn't quite obey but slips his own fingers inside, biting, and that works, too—well enough that when Barret slips his hand around and presses against his asshole the only sound is a chest-deep grunt, not something that'll get shouted to the village and the whole jungle, besides.

Cloud ain't a princess and he's so desperate he don't need coaxing; Barret rubs the wet around, feels him tight, flexing, and doesn't ask before he pushes his middle finger in, quick and all-at-once to the knuckle. Cloud jerks and Barret slurps his dick back in, sucks in little pulses to match his finger fucking in, and Cloud's naked hand fumbles to Barret's shoulder, grips his vest so tight Barret hears a stitch pop. Insanely hot inside. Maybe hotter than other people—those mako treatments, again?—and the ring of muscle clamping hard—and easy, damn, so easy, Barret scrubbing his finger along that front wall where all the good stuff happens and Cloud's breath going strange and high and whiny around his fingers, his thigh flexing over Barret's shoulder and his hips not knowing whether to push back or crush forward. Barret makes it easy for him, encourages the thrust, letting him rock between Barret's hand and his mouth. It feels nice, anyway, right, his lips tight, letting Cloud rock against Barret's tongue pushed flat and hard up against the base, his taste leaking all over 'til Barret's sure he'll only taste that salt-and-metal for days after. He can feel Cloud quickening, though, his tiny noises going deeper, his hips getting desperate, and he crushes his finger in hard and pulls Cloud all the way up against his face, his beard grinding against that smooth sweating skin, his nose crushed in against his belly, sucking, demanding, and—yeah, Cloud's breath stops and his whole body seizes and his bootheel bruises Barret's back and he—shoots, right up into the back of Barret's throat, quick jets that Barret swallows down right away before he pulls back, slurps soft at the head, gets those last few drops. Slippery as mercury.

Cloud's head is tipped back against the door. Fingers still in his mouth, his chest heaving. Barret kisses his cockhead, all flushed and wetly red, and his belly, and then, watching carefully, he tugs his finger out of Cloud's body and then presses back in with two. Thick—he knows, his two fingers are thicker than a lot of men's dicks—but Cloud swallows them up without a whine or a flinch, his body clamping tight but just—taking it. He missed his calling, Barret thinks, and then feels bad for thinking it but—not that bad, really.

"You're so good, baby," he says, meaning it about as sincerely as he's meant anything, and Cloud's eyes open up above and his head drops down, his chin against his chest, meeting Barret's eyes. Not protesting at all. Tilting his hips when Barret grinds his two fingers thick into that spot, his pupils huge and his lips open and everything about him seeming to say—go ahead. Go ahead, make me.

If only. Barret kisses Cloud's belly again, right at the root of his softening dick, and pulls out his fingers and then stands up, bracing against the door to do it. His knees crack, gun-shot loud. Cloud blinks at him, looking up of a sudden with Barret so close, and then gets one of those tiny, goofy smiles.

"Don't you say a thing," Barret says.

"Hm," Cloud says. He looks to the side, where one of the high windows is pouring in that syrupy late afternoon light. "Maybe we can get you a potion, later."

"Man, what'd I say," Barret says, and Cloud grins and then turns back and goes on his toes and kisses him, quick. Just this brief unselfconscious peck, not asking for another thing. He drops back to his heels and he's not smiling anymore but his eyes are soft, and Barret chucks him under the chin, gentle. Dumbass, crazy kid.

He zips up. Cloud gets his uniform back together. In less than a minute, other than how Barret's mouth tastes like cock and metal, looking around the bedroom, no one'd suspect a thing.

Cloud pulls his discarded glove back on, clicks his bracer back together. Twists his wrist back and forth to check the fit. Says, looking down, "You good?"

Barret takes a deep breath. He feels—he doesn't know. It's still this shitty day but it's not worse. His bones feel looser in their sockets and his brain feels somewhat clear and he doesn't—regret at least one thing that happened today. "I'm good," he says. Not exactly true but maybe there's not anything truer.

A steady look, sidelong across Cloud's shoulder. "Good," he says. A little soft. The tip of his tongue touches his lower lip and he swipes one gloved thumb across his mouth, like he's trying not to think about it. If he keeps doing that it's gonna be hell on Barret's composure. But then he settles his shoulders, and picks up that big-ass sword and lets it clank heavily into its place. Looks more like the badass merc he's meant to be. "I'm going to check on the others. If nothing's going on maybe we can rest here, tonight, go on to the reactor in the morning."

"Sounds good to me," Barret says. He opens the door—no one waiting in awkward silence in the rest of the house, thank the planet—and follows Cloud to the entry. Watches Cloud reach for the knob and then grabs his arm. "You—" Cloud lets himself be held still, looking over his shoulder. Barret clears his throat. "You meant it, huh. 'Bout having my back."

Cloud looks at him entirely clear-eyed. No weird tenseness or like he's thinking of ten other things or brooding on whatever dark-ass secrets he keeps locked tight. Just this kid—man, Barret amends—standing there with him. For a minute, steady as a mountain. He nods, once.

Barret swallows. "Hope you know it goes both ways."

A slow breath. "I'm counting on it," Cloud says. Means it, too.

Barret nods back, something settling low at the base of his spine. Something steel-forged, solid. He ain't got a lot of best friends left. He'll do what he can, for this one.

#cloud/barret #final fantasy vii #my writing #i'm doing this just for me and i know that #but goddamn. it feels so good.#also i wasn't gonna post this today bc it's w.w.#but i just saw the most INCREDIBLE fanart of this pairing #and it could almost be taken straight from this fic #so i just had to. i had to.

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rocketbirdie · 1 year ago

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MASSIVE dump of thoughts about Rebirth. Obvious major spoiler warning for pretty much every story beat aside from side quests. That goes for the compilation as a whole.

Think of this as a collection of what would otherwise be literally hundreds of separate obnoxious text posts. Half-review, half liveblogging. Genuine praises and criticisms interspersed with unhinged nonsense. This post is so long it's making my computer lag, so make of that what you will.

To keep it organized and make it easier to find specific moments, this is split up chapter by chapter. I cover the Zack/Biggs stuff in a separate section just before the final chapter, and then follow up with some miscellaneous thoughts.

I'm not of hardcore OG FFVII faith. I love the original, and I view it as separate from Remake/Rebirth, so I embrace most of the major changes. This is generally a very positive review, aside from a few nuisances *cough cough WHISPERS cough* and only one genuinely upsetting letdown. Rebirth is more than I could ever have asked for, and I can't wait to spend the next 4+ years obsessively gushing about it. And now, without further ado...!

Chapter 1: Fall of a Hero (The Nibelheim Incident)

NAILED it.

Love seeing Cloud's teenage squishiness scrambled together with the Zack mannerisms. Restless as a little puppy! Body language, facial expressions, etc. I wonder if they animated a lot of it with Zack's model first, and then replaced it with Cloud? Modders are gonna have a field day with this when the PC version drops.

Sephiroth really was just Some Guy, huh? It's very refreshing to see him acting fully human for once. Helps sell the catastrophic mental shitshow that ensues.

Horfin' down those sandwiches Strife style

"You went into my room?" "I did..." LMAOOO THE SHAME IN HIS VOICE. Cody Christian doing god's work voicing this sopping wet pathetic mess of a man

Zangan manhandling Cloud like that was NOT on my Rebirth bingo card.

The bridge collapse scene is beautifully expanded upon. Such a delicious moment if you know the real story. RIP Ramirez. o7

There is NO fucking way Sephiroth just... stood there unfazed by waist high rushing water. Y'all have any idea how dangerous just ankle-deep water is at those speeds? At least the generous use of artistic license in physics is established very early on.

Tifa demonstrating incredible self restraint by choosing not to strangle Zack to death at the mako spring. I would have walloped his cocky ass lol

"Such a puppy." We're establishing the homoerotic tension right away as well, thank god.

oooOOOouhh the way you can pinpoint the precise moment that Sephiroth starts to lose control at the reactor. The way he walks up those stairs.......

Mwahaha-ing over the visual parallels. Raising his hand to the candle flame... Jenova's face flickering over his own... wow. Every shot, every angle is carefully chosen. Cinematography at it's finest.

OG painted a picture of "no survivors," so it surprised me how many people seemed to have escaped from Nibelheim. Although, it's not certain what their ultimate fate was. I imagine they did it this way to show that the incident impacted far more people than just Cloud and Tifa. Makes sense, considering "sheer scale of suffering" is a recurring theme throughout the Re-trilogy so far.

Sephiroth's mass slaughter is bone chilling. The music, the tension, the iconic shot of the flames framing his figure. Goddamn. And then there's the poor trooper, reaching out for his mom.........

"Why didn't they just shoot him?? They had him surrounded!!" 1, Fear doesn't give a damn about rationality. 2, It's SEPHIROTH. They were almost certainly correct in assuming that their dinky little hunting rifles weren't gonna do jack shit.

Catch me giggling over the most mundane shit. LOVE the detail of the sword tip clanking on the metal floor as Tifa drags it. I'm obsessed with lovingly crafted, nearly unnoticeable sound design like that.

"Mother, they have come again." THANK FUCK they kept this line. I don't even know why, it just stuck with me so hard from OG.

Not sure why people are cranky that the flashback cuts off. It ends at the exact same point as in OG. That's the point, it's supposed to be frustrating.

Seeing an unfathomable number of dumbass comments going "huh??? why did cloud tell the story all wrong??? that's not what happened!!" Dear Lord Please Give Me The Strength

AERTI!!!!!!! hell yeah

Tifa being proactive instead of stewing in confusion!! Love that for her. But damn it didn't go down well, huh. "I was so happy to see you again, but maybe I shouldn't have been." BIG OOOOOF

OUCH. Cloud. At least take off the pauldron if you're gonna sleep on that side LOL

Chapter 2: A New Journey Begins (Kalm and The Grasslands)

Very interesting news broadcast ya got goin' on there, Shinra...

Kalm is so so so so pretty. Feels like an actual full sized city now! Wish we could have seen more of it at night, like in the OG.

Broden!! I like him. I want the best for him. I know he's fucked. But really, it's cool to see more SOLDIER characters. We get to see Cloud's uh-oh brain static moments from the outside perspective, and boy howdy, it ain't pretty.

Broden says he's "...on your side. Got a contact at HQ." Meanwhile, my delusional ass: CONTACT? KUNSEL? IS IT KUNSEL? DO YOU KNOW SOMEONE NAMED KUNSEL?

Mentioned it in a different post— I suspected they changed the arrangement of Midgar's sectors. Sure enough, it's confirmed by looking at Rebirth's world map. Is this a meta fate-has-been-altered thing, or is it just a curious retcon? Maybe a bit of both?

HOLLOW REMIX HOLLOW REMIX HOLLOW REMIX HOLLOW REMIX HOLLOW REMIX AAAAAAAAAAAAA

Oh my god, her name is CHLOE????????? "Chole" was a typo this whole fucking time???? I can't handle this

NOT CHOCOBO BILL BLINDSIDING US WITH THE CLOUD GETTING DOUBLE PENETRATED IN A NASTY SWAMP SHACK IMPLICATIONS???? HELLO?????????

My sweet son Chadley has returned from the time void.

Ok serious talk. Wtf is up with the audio mixing. Someone gave the thumbs up for this production?! The default music volume is WAY too loud and overpowers voice lines. Doesn't help that Remake's npc dialogue deluge in crowded areas hasn't been addressed at all. C'mon people, you had years to fix this shit. It's a shame too, because I would love to hear all of the beautiful music and talented voice acting, just... separately, please.

The Soggy Strife Agenda is off to a great start!

I know Midgar Zolom was a blind idiot translation, but I dunno man. Midgardsormr just doesn't do it for me. Zolom sweetie come home :(

FUCKING. FUCK. WHERE'S THE LINE. FUCK!!! Apparently Sephiroth Did Not Do This. Goddammit. Fucking blasphemy. Genuinely gutted that they didn't include that line. Imagine if they had pulled that shit with Me Gongaga. Unacceptable.

Chapter 3: Deeper into Darkness (Mythril Mines)

"Enough for her Standard Course twice, right?" keep it up Aerith you're doing amazing :)

Ah, the opening area of the mines has been converted into a museum. No wonder people are allowed to just waltz right on in.

ELENA!! Oooooh I love her voice!! She's got that young overconfident sass. Fits her perfectly. She's got me sweating bullets seeing her kick a grenade around like a soccer ball though YIKES

Those Boulders Are Not Made Of Solid Rock

Not much else to say about the mines. Love when the original version of the music kicked in. Barret and Red's dynamic is so good!

Chapter 4: Dawn of a New Era (Junon)

We just, uh, waiting for the bus there, folks? OH SHIT sorry about the bird of prey thing man, that sucks. Hope you feel better soon

Contrary to maybe popular opinion, but I actually love it when you know exactly what a character is going to say or do next. It means the writers have done a great job at getting that character across. Predictable does not always equal bad; tropes exist for a reason after all.

Under Junon. mwah <3

Priscilla!! Omg she's so cute and annoying. Just how I remember.

Soggy Strife Episode 2. This time featuring an off-putting amount of romantic tension between Cloud And That Dolphin

Lowkey disappointed that they cut the uncomfortably long CPR minigame. Gamers nowadays have no idea how good they have it. Back in my day, we had to give mouth-to-mouth for 5 minutes straight in deafening silence.

YUFFIE!!!!!! Oh my god the leakers weren't exaggerating about the naruto run

Yeah ok just. gonna do some good night crunches. Very. Uh. Normal of you, Cloud Strife. God I love this weirdo

ROCHEEEEE My Boyfriend Has Returned

Aerith and Priscilla doing the arm bump thing............ yeah...........

Yeah you work those tanker controls gay boy. I was really expecting a jumpscare as the tanker lifted up. Would have actually shrieked if Sephiroth was just like "sup lol"

WOW the sister ray!!! Honestly the first moment that made me go "DAMN this is Final Fantasy alright!" What a view.

Glad they kept Junon's silly amount of elevators.

Oh hi Glenn

So Aerith wants to know if there are any good restaurants in Junon. Well, maybe if this guy hadn't been busy barfing in an alleyway....

Gee Tifa and Aerith, it's a good thing you guys practiced your highly choreographed military drill, just in case you ever had to pretend to be a trooper during an inaugural parade. Gotta be prepared for even the most unlikely scenarios! (As a writer, I know how it is with suspension of disbelief. But it's still kinda doofy lol)

That being said, I'd let the commander have her way with me

THE MUSIC

Tee hee omg it's so cute to see Cloud in his element! Look at that boy go. He's so into it. I like hearing all of the Seventh Infantry's interactions, too. Really hammers it in that they're all just normal people with their own worries and hopes.

Oopsie daisy. I am not immune to Shinra Propaganda. Huh. Well done, writers.

THE GLABRESCENT!! EXCLUSIVE CLUB FOR BALD PEOPLE

Awww look at all the 1/35 soldiers! Man. This whole chapter is just one huge love letter to the OG. So much nostalgia, plus so much new exciting stuff. God I could go on and on

This Just In, Entire Junon Nursing Home Full Of Elderly People Dies Of A Heart Attack After Rufus Shinra Decides To Fire The Fucking Cannon

Roche please sign my forehead

Uh oh. Yuffie

Yeah Ok don't mind me, just a SOLDIER 1st Class, protecting these little infantrymen with my life. No parallels to be found here, folks

GENUINELY HONEST TO GOD I AM SO SORRY FOR SLICING YOUR BABY ANGEL IN HALF LIKE THAT ROCHE PLEASE FORGIVE ME. Cloud say you're sorry Right Fucking Now.

Oh good no hard feelings. Well. Actually. Uh

Chapter 5: Blood in the Water (Shinra-8/Ship to Costa)

Oh to be a girl hiding away in a cargo hold with another girl.......

Little bit of Traces of Two Pasts! So Aerith told Tifa about Faz, the weird guy that was a little bit too nice to Ifalna. Apparently Aerith is still shaken up by that. Don't blame her.

Ok. I've been avoiding the topic of Queen's Blood, because frankly, my opinion on it is completely unfounded and irrational. I fucking hate card games in video games that are not supposed to be solely about card games. I can't help it. I'm here for the pretty people rpg and the gut-wrenching t4t heartbreak, not for the Magic the Gathering subplot. Any time this game so much as breathes the name Queen's Blood in my direction, I feel something visceral welling up inside of me. So as you can imagine, The Chapter Where You Play Queen's Blood is not my personal favorite.

But I get it! It's not like there was much to do here in the OG. I like that they went out of their way to flesh the ship out and give it more to remember. And for people who like Queen's Blood, I'm happy for them!!

Silly boy humming the victory fanfare I love himmmm

*wiggles*

Gotta get me one of them bigass cardboard cutout palm trees to put on display inside of my grungy metal hallway. Wow what a vibe

DAMN RIGHT YOU SHOULD DEMAND THE MANAGER, RED

THE MOONWALK SJHSYAFDFKKFFJF oh mny fuckijngh god the terrified kid crying his eyes out LMAOOOOO

Dang It! I wanted to see what Cloud looks like swaddled up in that hammock. Why do you deny me that which I desire. Screw your fade to black.

Good to know Hojo is just as disgusting and disturbing as he should be! Yayyyyy :(

"Holy shit..." YUFFIE SAME????? TITOV BOUTTA BLOW SOME TITS OFF????

YEEEHAAWWWW time for another absolute fucking banger of a Jenova remix!!!! I cannot praise the soundtrack enough.

Chapter 6: Fool's Paradise (Costa del Sol)

Obligatory beach episode

Johnny!!!!! My favorite dramatic idiot with a heart of gold! It's ok babygirl I love your seasmell hotel. I'll stay there anytime.

Cloud acting like that lei is strangling him. Sameeee dude same but no really. This place sucks. Too many people trying to force this poor guy to have fun against his will.

If I have to hear "hang loose" one more time, there will be bloodshed.

I do not trust that man to ride safely and sanely on that wheelie. He can't even walk on his own two feet without endangering every physics object in the vicinity.

Empty materia moment actually made me gasp out loud

AERTI DATE AERTI DATE AERTI DATE AERTI DATE

OUTFIT REVIEW TIME

Cloud's Tits Out: An unusual sight. I feel like he should be smooth under there like Link BOTW. He looks a little too robust for someone who's got Big Oil And Brain Worms In There and hasn't slept in weeks. I appreciate the commitment to making him pale as paper and flat as a board. No top surgery scars lose points big time. I'm neutral about the toes. 4/10

Cloud's Business Casual: Immaculate. Tastefully hideous. That blue is NOT your color, girl. Chocobo imagery is always a plus. Absolutely mystified by the untied capris + 3/4 sleeve scoop neck combo. Pretty sure he's not wearing any socks with those tennis shoes. Sneakers in the sand is a helluva sensory experience for an autistic guy like him, I deeply respect it. 9/10.

Tifa's Frilly Miniskirt: Cute and confident. Split between it being utterly out of character for her, or 1000% perfect for her. The white and purple is a great color combo. Slightly concerned about the structural integrity of the neck strap. Uncooperative hairstyle is understandable but kills the vibe a bit. Jealous of the sandals. 8/10

Tifa's Tie Front: DAMN. Stripes with the collar, black jean shorts, hell yeah. The giant belt buckle is just asking for a nasty burn mark, though. Whatever. She's rockin' it. I dunno man, I'm at a loss for words, you just gotta see it to believe it. 10/10.

Aerith's Keepin' It Simple: Tried and true. Pink always works in her favor. Love the little matching flowers in her hair. The wrap around wallet chain is a welcome sprinkle of weirdness. Otherwise masterfully boring; it suits her city-slickin' down-to-earth attitude. 9/10

Aerith's Floral Cover Up: Classy. Got that Final Fantasy princess look with the ruffled sleeves and the push-up cut. The long skirt is nothing short of perfection. Lovestruck by the splash of lime green with the leaf pattern. Can't imagine how annoying those shin-high sandal straps might be though, that's gonna leave a mark. 9/10

Barret's Bear Wearing A Marshmallow: Pillsbury Dough Man at his finest. Faithful to the original, exquisite in 4K HD. Hoist hook arm adds that extra sailor flair, sealing the look. He's having fun with it, and that's what matters most. 10/10!

Ok back to reality

uh oh.

Yup, somehow they managed to make Hojo even more nauseating than ever before. Good. The more we hate him, the worse it'll sting when he keeps dodging his comeuppance. Hohohohoho.... That's Good Writing, Babie! Twist that knife. Keep us ravenously thirsty for revenge!!

Seen a lot of complaints about the women that accompany Hojo to the beach and shower him with compliments and oohs and aahs. Not sure why. Pretty sure it's heavily implied that they're being paid SHIT LOADS of gil to act that way. It's stated outright that they're working for Mayor Kapono, and it's well established by that point that the mayor is wrapped tight around Shinra's pinky finger.

The moment that beach fight started, I knew right away... GRAB THAT UMBRELLA, DO YOUR LEGACY PROUD

Aerith showing her vengeful side, just a tiny bit. So much pent up hatred and grief. Love how it mirrors Cloud's character. She's so forgiving, she doesn't know how to turn anger into action. He's so caught up in his anger, that he forgets what forgiveness could do for him. Man. :'(

Yuffie joins the team!!! Cloud's just like. >:/ lol

Chapter 7: Those Left Behind (Corel)

Fun time is over folks

Huh. Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but that's not even close to being a Weapon. Major retcon, or legendary fakeout?

Sighh... Aerith looking up at the sky like that... The longing sure is long isn't it

WELL! Ain't that the dolly zoom of a lifetime! It's absolutely wild to watch Cloud's mental state worsen gradually in real time. Seeing him almost walk off a cliff was freaky. Good stuff

I WILL LAY DOWN MY LIFE FOR CLOUD JUNIOR

Poor Barret...... damn dude. The people of Corel were nasty to him in the OG, but they cranked that up to eleven in Rebirth. Wow.

"She your new wife? Well good for you..." istg i'll reach through that screen and choke you out with my bare hands bitchass

"NO." Well that settles that! Gee I wonder why Cloud's not interested in helping out the doctor with his test...... hmm......

Yuffie honey... read the room.........

Chapter 8: All That Glitters (Gold Saucer First Visit)

And now for a jarring tonal shift! Yeahh... this game suffers from awkward pacing. A lot. Though I do suppose that's the point— hellish suffering juxtaposed with distasteful extravagance, just how Shinra prefers it.

Dio should snap him in half like a twig. I think it would be good enrichment for Cloud.

Ok. I'm pretty sure this is like. the fourth time Cloud's pupils have gotten all blown out upon seeing Sephiroth. There may be a clinical explanation for this, but there sure as hell ain't a straight one. The submissive little gasps are NOT helping.

I'm fucking pissed on behalf of anyone who has to stay the night at this dumbass hotel. Oh my god. How could anyone fall asleep in this obnoxious hellscape.

At least the receptionist looks good tied up and struggling ;)

Cait Sith meowing his own theme song is doing something unfathomable to the part of me that almost became a furry back in middle school. Oh god no he's so adorable. I'm screwed

I'm going to dismantle that tonberry robot bolt by bolt.

Aerith and Cloud commentating the races omg kicking my feet like a little schoolgirl i love them so muchhhh

The bike minigame is just not the same without Roche's "encouragement"

Jessie 😭

Ok I'm glad that it's made clear from the get-go that Barret isn't responsible for the shooting, and he also doesn't try to take the fall for Dyne. That left a bad taste in my mouth in the OG, so this is a welcome change.

Cait Sith is a little bit too enthused about the muggin' maimin' and murderin' lmao

OH MY GOD CLOUD. Baseball bat to the back of the head was genuinely shocking. As if he didn't have enough brain damage to begin with D:

Oh yuck. Gus is insufferable and nasty. I've known this guy for all of five seconds, and I already hate his guts. Fantastic characterization right outta the gate. The music is hilarious.

Billy???? How the hell did you end up here????? Kid you GOTTA get tf out of this place

LMAOOO Elena is my favorite turk confirmed. "NO VANILLA."

Oh man. Dyne time. This entire part is so damn good. Barret wants so badly for Dyne to be the beloved friend he used to be, but he's just way too far gone. So much resentment and grief.

Second half of the Dyne battle is a little bit weird, but I can tentatively accept it.

Was definitely wondering how they would handle Dyne's suicide given the teen rating. They circumvented the issue by having Shinra troopers gun him down in a crazed last stand. Different from the OG, but still believable and well written, considering their limitations.

Now that I think about it, this game is REALLY pushin' it with the teen rating. I'm willing to bet the rating boards were like, "yeah uh we can make an exception. it's FFVII we're talkin' about." Still... wonder why they couldn't go as far with Remake.

"You carry that guilt... That weight..." Wow. That line.

Annnnd jarring tonal shift! Robot frog fight versus the comedy relief villain. To be fair, I can't think of any other decent place to put this boss, either. On the bright side, Anuran Suppressor is awesome. Favorite fight in the game so far!

I need this soundtrack in my possession right fucking now.

Oh hi Glenn

Chapter 9: The Planet Stirs (Gongaga)

dune buggy :)

Oh Yuffie... just keep a barf bucket on hand or somethin will ya?

"I just... I feel like I've been here before." Well wouldja look at that... no jenova static...

Going over the hill and seeing the reactor... damn.

CISSNEI!!!! Ouuugh girl you know EXACTLY who tf he is, don't lie.

Noooo give Cait his little mushroom back you meanie :(

Ah. The deranged picnic music.

Gongaga has a much different vibe than it did in the OG. The intense feeling of mourning and hardship is missing. No hazy purple hues or Anxiety playing. Seems like they went in more of a CC direction, with the bright blue sky and uplifting soundtrack. Can't lie, I'm a tiny bit disappointed; I was really hoping for something more heavy and melancholic.

The existence of ordinary chickens in the FFVII universe has some frightening implications for the true nature of chocobos. If you have ever kept backyard chickens, you'll know what I mean.

Ohhhhhhh.... Zack's home............. :((((((

No. No. Don't play Sky Blue Eyes. Don't fucking do this to me. I'm gonna fucking cry. Oh my god no.

"They do say no news is good news, right?" I'm gonna do it.

You know shit's bad when even Cloud "I'm Fine" Strife admits he needs to have a lie down. Yikes.

Man, I really wish we knew more about Tifa and Aerith's chats. Dramatic irony's a bitch.

They sure went all out with the mushroom thing, huh. I know they were trying to differentiate Gongaga in terms of gameplay and worldbuilding, but I feel like they went a little overboard. Gongaga was its own unique thing in OG, not sure why they felt the need to quote unquote improve upon it. Just kinda weird.

Now the reactor is a different story. They did an incredible job here. The scale of the reactor, the unprecedented destruction—

Oh God Damn It The Whispers Are Back

Seriously trying so hard to justify in my own mind why the whispers are here. I don't despise them as a concept, but their implementation is awkward and overdone. In the Gongaga reactor, they fulfill the same narrative purpose as the black robes would: to facilitate the Reunion by mentally dragging Cloud along. Sigh... I get it's because they want to familiarize the player with the whispers in anticipation of future scenes, but it still pisses me off.

That being said, the whispers' theme goes HARD and I'm elated to hear it again. It also fits super well in the Gongaga reactor. So I guess I'm not that pissed.

Touch Me renamed to Amphidex. Can't have shit in Gongaga :/

ooOOOOO!!! The mako fumes getting to Cloud's head! Poor guy's about to pass out. Nice touch.

Sephiroth/Jenova taking advantage of Cloud's mako poisoning... Oh man... the instant change in demeanor is nuts. So fucking good. Here we get to see the first time that Sephiroth has total control over Cloud, and it does not disappoint. Ruthless.

Tifa honey how and why tf are you keeping it together right now. Girl, you do NOT have to fix him. You do not have to show him your boobs a second time. You do not have to take a single thing he says seriously. You can just get up and leave I promise he's doomed by the narrative until further notice 😭😭😭

Telluric Orca Vore Moment was also not on my rebirth bingo card but Okay

Teasing the lifestream. Sure, I can get down with it. Just... y'all got a bit of a whisper problem down here. Want me to call pest control?

"No! Don't take him too!" Damn...

I would not feel safe alone in a room with a man who just tried to kill me, let alone even remotely consider intimacy, but maybe that's just me. It is refreshing to see Tifa and Cloud actually talk things out for a change.

Cloud knows there's something wrong with him and he's so scared... man :'(

What does Aerith say to her???????????? ARRRGHHH

So we're all just perfectly fine with Cloud continuing to be in charge? Nobody's got any objections to that? Alrighty Then

SURPRISE Cid Highwind!! Leaks were right, he's cleaned up. No cigs, less swears, very friendly guy. Not as off-putting as I worried it might be. I'm convinced it's just because he's got a business to run— we'll see good ol' cranky Cid in part 3.

ROCHE NOOOOOOOOOO DON'T!!!!!!!! :(

Chapter 10: Watcher of the Vale (Cosmo Canyon)

Red's real voice reveal! Red's real name reveal!! Though I really would have preferred to see his name change to Nanaki in the menu and subtitles...

Cosmo Canyon is coming off as a hippie stoner tourist trap. Yeah all of these people are correct about the planet and the lifestream, but dang if it doesn't feel like someone's about to heckle me into buying healing crystals and dreamcatchers.

The nostalgia is A++. Beautiful remaster of the music, too.

BUGENHAGEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOOOOO!!!!!!! SO jealous of him zoomin around on that sick af crystal ball. Screw the Costa wheelies, I want one of these bad boys.

...A legendary fakeout in the making, I think!

The observatory is stunning. Can't even put it into words. The planetarium brought me to tears, it's such a flood of nostalgia and a deeply emotional scene. I love the nice detail of the planet being different from Earth— mako tinted oceans instead of deep blue. Watching the model planet rot and crumble broke my heart.

Sobbing the whole way through Aerith's speech. My god. Poor girl. Knowing what her fate is in the OG makes it hurt even worse.

Gi Nattak. Would

Expanding upon the Gi. Unexpected but super cool. Their story reminds me of FFIX, with the parasitic planet Terra lurking deep within Gaia. The Gi and the Cetra seem to have something similar going on. Who was here first? It almost sounds like the Cetra and their lifestream are invaders.

I could easily relate to the Gi's opinion, that the endless cycle of the lifestream and the persistence of the spirit is tantamount to torture. Never being able to truly rest in peace sucks. Don't worry friends, I'll bring you the black materia! :) (THIS USER CANNOT BE TRUSTED WITH THE BLACK MATERIA)

Aerith sticking her hand into the mako..............

Chapter 11: The Long Shadow of Shinra (Nibelheim)

The intense gaslighting about Nibelheim was one of my favorite things about the OG. It also helped seed even more doubt into Cloud's existence as a real person, setting up his descent into madness over the black materia and vulnerability as Sephiroth's puppet. So the changes they've made to Nibelheim in Rebirth are... unnecessary, to put it lightly.

The villagers do not argue with Tifa or Cloud about their memories of the town. They greet them and tell them all about the town's development into a mako poisoning treatment center. Sigh... Part of what made OG's Nibel revisit so dreadful was the unshakeable feeling that you are not welcome there, and that you're being watched like a hawk. I feel a little bit too comfy here in Rebirth Nibelheim, with how friendly and open everyone's being.

Love the chat with Tifa in her old room. We get so much insight into her thoughts and feelings about Nibelheim, Avalanche, and about Cloud and herself.

"Every time we made eye contact, you'd look away. And when I tried to talk to you, you'd ignore me." ouch, don't gotta poke him in the autism like that

Ohoho. The hotel's digging up some memories. I've said my piece.

dillydally

LORD have mercy. This boy's noodle is scrambled like you wouldn't believe. Good news, he remembers Zack, sort of. Bad news, he thinks he fucking drowned?!???? It's intimidating to see the lengths Jenova/Sephiroth will go to to obscure the truth from Cloud. Damn.

Ok Yuffie is actually starting to get a bit obnoxious. Please stop interrupting emotionally charged moments. We get it, you're excited about materia. Cut it out.

If I were Tifa I would be shitting my pants terrified right about now. Girl I do NOT know how you're holding it together.

And now for the most distasteful tonal shift and momentum killer of all time. It's silly kitty cat hijinks time!! ...What the actual fuck. I like Cait Sith, but this is unacceptable. The basement is supposed to be a sickening place of fear and tragedy. Turning it into a cutesy little box chucking playground is downright disrespectful to the original FFVII. I can't even believe I'm writing this, it's so absurd as a concept. This is the only major change that I'm legitimately seriously upset about.

And by god does it drag on. Every time you think, surely this is the final section!... nope. It just keeps on fucking going. Fuck my life, my blood is boiling. Unreal. Remake's slow ass hand-crane highway thing is nothing compared to this. I'll take a Queen's Blood tournament and a hurricane of whispers any day over this unrivaled masterclass in unnecessary bullshit. Fuck.

At least to some people, the reward for getting through the Cait Sith Crate Slog is worthwhile— a few cutscenes starring Vincent Valentine, and a battle against Galian Beast. But if you're like me, and you're not utterly obsessed with Vincent Valentine or Matt Mercer, then by this point, you're just feeling drained and disappointed.

Overall... least favorite chapter. Mellow start, juicy build up with great potential, completely shafted by baffling nonsense.

RIP Roche. Heartbreaking. It's been a good run. Side note, Roche's conversion into a black robe was... quite bizarre. That's just, uh, how that works, I suppose? Okie dokie then

Oh hi Glenn

Chapter 12: A Golden Key (Gold Saucer Revisit)

Always felt weird about the Gold Saucer revisit in the OG. Unusual pacing. Well, at least Rebirth's being consistent in that regard.

What's the point of the theater if you're just going to do a VR performance instead? I know it's a silly little nitpick, but I wanna hear some soles squeaking on a hardwood stage!

Ah, that's the point of the VR. So Shinra can use a dead woman's likeness to keep selling tickets to their overhyped shows. Surprised none of the characters say anything about that, given Avalanche's well-established anticapitalist message.

This is what Genesis Rhapsodos decided to hyperfixate on? No wonder the guy's hair started turning grey and falling out in chunks. [SARCASM]

Barret sobbing uncontrollably, right next to Nanaki looking like a rejected Crash Bandicoot reboot clapping his paws together. Sums up this entire game so far.

The "audience participation" in the play is altered significantly from the OG. It's, uh, very neat and tidy. I strongly prefer OG's hysterical secondhand embarrassment and awkward ad-lib.

I NEED to know what happens if you fail all of the QTEs. Please tell me it goes off the rails and Cloud gets booed off stage PLEASE.

Pretty song. But my god if that is Not What She Would Sound Like.

The gondola rides!! Overall fantastic. So difficult to pick a favorite. Tifa's is obviously phenomenal, but I think I still have a soft spot for Aerith's. I like that Barret's is taken more seriously; it's such a heartfelt moment. Yuffie reminiscing about Zack was adorable, as well as Cloud relating to her being bad with feelings. The Cait Sith/Cid/Vincent one had me laughing out loud, it was so stiff and awkward lmaoo

THE SCOTCH AND KOTCH DISS TRACK IS SENDING ME???????? SKSJKHAGAAAFDSDSDHHBFD I'm so happy to see these freaks doing their thing again.

RUFUS SHINRA?????

Yeah, no Cait Sith, you ain't garnering any pity from me. Not happening after the crate incident.

Chapter 13: Where Angels Fear to Tread (Temple of the Ancients)

So the temple is to the north now. Understandable, since that's where the Forgotten Capital is, too. Still took me by surprise. Also means we won't be going back to Gongaga... aww :(

HOLY FUCK the way the temple assembles itself... now THIS is what I'm talkin' about!

Teasing us with that fractal square symbol since all the way back in Remake...!

Roche....... "my... friend..." :(((((((

These troopers are NOT getting paid enough for this shit lmao

Oh howdy there Rathalos from Monster Hunter, you look a bit different than I remember

Thank goodness the Cetra had the foresight to incorporate some aesthetically appropriate rest benches into their temple's design!

Aerith's seance + the camera angle of the whole team watching... beautiful nod to FFX...? <3

That better not have been Kunsel.

Reno jumpscare

Elena's pretty pink pistol with the charms and stickers is so goofy. I love her. Hopefully Cloud won't try to chop her head off within the next sixty seconds or anything like tha— uh, nevermind.

oooOOURGHH Cloud is SO fucking terrifying throughout the whole temple. Cody hitting it out of the ballpark BIG TIME with the voice acting. DAMN.

Everybody but Cloud has memories to retread... broke my heart. Sad and scary. By the way Hey uhh Temple? Why the fuck would you do this to us? :(

ugly sobbing

Followed up by the Gayest Thing I Think I've Ever Seen In Video Game History

YOU! WITH THE WING!! GET DOWN HERE!!! YOU'RE UNDER ARREST!

Oh god no you're going to make me fight Demon Gate aren't you

THERE'S TWO OF THEM??!?!?!??!?!!! AAHGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HORRIFYING BUT RELATABLE, CLOUD

Wait. Cloud. Hey. Can we talk about it for a sec. Come back please

"There's no point fighting over a fake." WHOA I actually straight up forgot about that twist! Hell yeah! What a wham line!

"I wish I hadnae skipped leg day." pFFFFT LMAOOOOO

"Yeah... I'm good." The Fuck You Ain't

PHHWAAHH HE JUST GETS CRUSHED AWWW!! RIP LMAO WHAT A WAY TO GO

The temple's transformation is breathtaking. And that music score, too, holy fuck.

Honestly I'm not even mad about the whispers being there, they're just a setpiece at this point. Adds to the frantic atmosphere. I'm choosing to ignore their narrative relevance until absolutely necessary.

ROCHE? YOU GOOD THERE BUDDY?

THAT BOY on his hands and knees SCRAMBLING for that black materia. Gayass

CLOUD AARHGRFGGFFFFF OHHGGHH SEPHIROTH HAS COMPLETE CONTROL OVER HIM HHHAAAAAA!!!!!!!!

OUUGRRHHHH OAWWWWGGHH

LISTEN. Listen I cannot formulate coherent thoughts about this. Go see it for yourself. Just go.

tee hee hee he's so proud of himself handing it over :3

It Begins.

Interlude. The Zack Moments so far:

Yeahhhh not a huge fan of Zack just dropping Cloud off at the nearest recognizable npc. Not after he almost gave his goddamn life to protect him.

MAN! Finally get to see what it's like to enter/exit Midgar. No fade to black, just on your feet and out the gate. Feels good; kinda surreal honestly. Never realized how bad I wanted this.

Regardless of what you think about the Zack thing, you gotta admit, the atmosphere during his sections is ethereal. So beautiful and calming in such a tragic way.

Love how he fights different than Cloud. Throwing punches, brutal kicks, shoulder checks, much like in Crisis Core.

HOLY FUCK don't mind me just gonna uhhh rip this five hundred pound metal post out of the ground and chuck it like a toy hammer. Suddenly the Buster Sword doesn't seem all that unwieldy.

......RIP Barret, Nanaki, and Tifa. Oof. What a way to go out.

DON'T MAKE MY SWEET BOY CRY LIKE THAT FUCK YOU!!! :(((((

Damn bitch you live like this??? To be fair, that's probably the most luxurious resting spot he's had in literal YEARS. Like wow there's a mattress!! And a roof!!!!!

Good to know that Cloud's goofy ass flinging himself out of bed straight into a combat stance thing from Remake is actually a Zack mannerism lol

Ohhh... my heart... seeing things from Cloud's perspective... I like the how this expands upon what the OG established, about "dreams" of this type. Sort of like the sleeping forest scene. Also makes Aerith's resolution scene in Remake all the more curious.

Aww... walking out onto the balcony and seeing the whole garden dead...

Obsessed with the music that plays during Zack's sections. Wow.

Awwww Marlene and Zack are such a silly duo :')

Biggs wtf did you do????????

Ziggs crashing hard onto my list of OTPs. Oops.

Divine intervention preventing a headshot? I'm sure some CS:GO players can relate.

Biggs' and Zack's conflicting memories of Cloud, plus the "broken internal clocks" is intriguing.

"Zack-of-all-trades" tickles me :D

All of their dialogue together is so self-aware... two characters who have had their narrative purposes torn out from under them, desperate to find a new one. The fact that there is no reason for them to be here is the whole point.

"We're all headed for the same place. You'll see your daddy and Tifa again." Oh ok yeah sure go ahead and rip my heart right out of my chest Elmyra

"Hello in there..." 🥺

So Remake Aerith bestowed memories of her future death upon Marlene. Is childhood innocence a prerequisite for this ability to work? Seeing as she did something similar with Nanaki. Otherwise, you'd think she would try to entrust her own fate with someone more influential, like Tifa or Barret.

I cannot fucking believe that Zaclerith endgame is real. Am I dreaming

Aww Zack has Aerith's ribbon tied around his hand...

Chapter 14: End of the World (Forgotten Capital/Final Chapter)

Ok Tsengru shippers. I finally see it. You are 100% correct about them.

Now we're getting WILD with it. The timeline shenanigans are in full swing. Speculation aplenty ahead.

"...or 'homeward bound' maybe?" Still trying to make sense of what exactly these sky-rift worlds are. Aerith's line here seems to imply that this is some kind of purgatory...? Where timelines go to wallow in their death throes? That's my understanding, so far. Especially with all of the mournful npc dialogue.

Aww... Aerith's date with Cloud mirroring the one she had with Zack in Crisis Core :')

I tell you what, the Stamp figurine made me GASP. So that's three timelines now. Beagle, Terrier, Spitz.

So Terrier Zack goes to Hojo in hopes of finding a cure for Cloud. Not his finest idea... but oh well. Jealous of his motorcycle. ;)

Sephiroth is combing timelines for one version of Aerith in particular...? Am I on the right track here? Is this the same Aerith from her resolution scene in Remake?

THE PUG made me spit my fucking drink out. Hot damn, there's four! We saw this timeline's conception in the form of the bright flash of light when Terrier Zack chose to go to Hojo.

So Pug Zack instead goes to Biggs at reactor 6. I really, really love this scene. The pump is dry, the planet's life is flashing before its eyes. A heartfelt moment shared between two characters who have had their narrative purposes torn out from under them. Zack gets a delicious bit of character progression, wanting to take back control of his life. Price of Freedom playing in the background has got me wailing like an air horn.

"I'm sick of taking its shit!" WHOA Zack swearing caught me way off guard. He flees from battle for once, instead of facing Shinra head on in this timeline. Wonder how that'll change things.

"You don't look like you're on a date... More like 'at a funeral.'" Mhm. duly noted

Give it up for timeline number five! Corgi Zack is sitting on the stairs at the church.

"Cloud, Biggs, or Aerith... How the hell am I supposed to choose?" You don't have to, darling. It's called a polycule.

Sephiroth slashes a hole in reality, and the black whispers drag Corgi Zack through it. Starting to think I shoulda done my Lifestream Black/Lifestream White homework.

So far, Aerith+Cloud's date "dream" has taken place entirely in the Spitz timeline. It's not clear if this is also true of the scene inside of the church, especially since Sephiroth comes waltzing in after we just saw him outside in the Corgi timeline. I'm getting the impression that time and space are a very hand-wavey thing in this layer of reality.

HEART EXPLODING GHAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And now for one of the most exhilirating things I think I've ever seen in MY LIFE.

"Behold... The true nature of reality. When the boundaries of fate are breached, new worlds are born. The planet encompasses a multitude of worlds, ever unfolding. [...] In the planet's embrace, all life is as one." Sephiroth's entire dialogue here... I got goosebumps. That's all.

"Very poor form." LMAO

I notice now on my second watch through, that as early as the sleeping forest scenes, we're cutting back and forth between two different timelines, I believe. Whenever the black or white whispers rush past, we shift perspective from one timeline to another. Pay close attention. Two worlds, simultaneous, but different.

Cloud delivers the white materia from one Aerith to another. Is this the same white materia we see from the beginning of Rebirth? I don't think she swaps the materia out, just transfers its power into her own empty materia, then hands Cloud the newly empty one.

Interesting! Looks like the timeline had already split, all the way back when Cloud handed over the black materia. Previously we saw Cloud and Aerith fall, but now— the white whispers rush past— and we see him rescue her and pull themselves up before they fall. Interesting!

Some youtube theorycrafter will piece together the symbolic significance of literally every tiny detail in this prerendered cutscene and make perfect sense of it. Looking forward to it too, because this is WAY above my paygrade.

Hello, whiper pest control services? Hi, yes, I would like to know why the white whispers are suddenly getting in the way? I thought they were my friends :(

Aerith's prayer :(((((((((

OHHGH MY GOD fucking legendary use of the haptic/adaptive triggers. Holy shit.

👁️ 👁️

Meanwhile, Zack Fair

me, banging my fists on the table: KISS! KISS!!! KISS! KISS!!!! JUST KISS ALREADY!!!!!! KISS!!!

Lmao Zack is so indifferent to this interdimensional insanity. After being the protagonist of Crisis Core, he's just like "lol whatever this is fine"

"Look at you takin' charge! I like it!" 😏

Zack+Cloud synergy attack!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!

"What in the hell is going on!?" SAME ZACK, SAME

AERITH!!!!!!!!!

OH FUCK IT'S THE SONG

the hand hold 💔

i'm incoherent. i'll figure out my thoughts about this some other time

Oh hi Glenn— OH SHIT??!?

THE SWORD CAN DO THAT?????? what

Man... the in-game skybox does NOT do that rift in the sky justice. Absolutely staggering in the final prerendered cutscene.

Next time I have a migraine aura, I'll be at ease knowing that it's just the timelines rippling and merging. No big deal

Two separate worlds, one where she lives, one where she dies. Realities overlapping and intertwined. Cloud's fragile mind fluctuating between both… wow. Can't wait to see where this leads in part 3.

Misc. thoughts, not chapter specific:

Love the accentuated mako in SOLDIER eyes. It irked me that the iconic mako color was so muted in Remake, so seeing it so vibrant in Rebirth is sexy as hell.

Um. No comment on Glenn, really. I'm not heavily invested in his story; maybe I'd be more interested if SE had actually done anything substantial with First Soldier and Ever Crisis. I don't mind that he's here, and the Jenova/Sephiroth twist was pleasantly surprising. Matt and Lucia name drop was also a nice touch. It's pretty obvious that the only reason Glenn is here is to help set up a confict against Wutai for part 3. Fair enough.

So no Kunsel? *SMASHES PHONE ON THE GROUND* *CRUSHES SKATEBOARD*

#PHEW. finally got most of it out of my system.#ok. now i can focus my autism ray on something else.#ffvii #rebirth spoilers #my writing <3

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pen-and-umbra · 2 years ago

Note

About FS characters, you said you thought they wound up hunted by shinra maybe. But the ever crisis trailer gave me an impression that Glen was sort of hunting for Seph?? Like a revenge or a grudge, that kinda thing? So maybe Seph wronged them, somehow.

Anything’s possible, although personally I don’t see Sephiroth doing something intentionally malicious at this point. Maybe it has to do with that Rhadoran boy. Then again, how do we know the hooded figure, presumably Glenn, has a grudge against Sephiroth? Glenn’s agenda may revolve around ShinRA rather than Sephiroth himself, in which case he represents the company vicariously as a member of the SOLDIER force.

Naturally, this is all speculative, but I believe the context of the fight is a little broader. The timeframe appears to be centered on the Wutai campaign, either before or during the early Crisis Core events, with Sephiroth’s attempts to contact Genesis and the familiar environment serving as clues. The crux of the matter is that the clash between Wutai and ShinRA represents former’s struggle for independence in face of corporate greed and expansionist policy. What’s peculiar is that by that time — by the start of Crisis Core — there’s no mention of passive-type SOLDIER members. Neither the remake nor Crisis Core acknowledge their existence. Aside from formal reasons, such as the FS concept being developed after the release of Remake, the in-game reasons for their absence are unknown; in other words the current lore so far holds no explanation as to why passive types don’t appear to be even acknowledged by main installment. My tentative guess is that ShinRA sacks the first batch of SOLDIER members after Sephiroth’s field deployment proves successful, with his combat figures likely outperforming those of non-modified members. Here’s an even scarier possibility: the company could have attempted to physically eliminate its ex-employees in order to protect corporate secrets, or it could have forced them to participate in further human modification experiments. The point is that ShinRA abandons them in some way as a result of Sephiroth’s success, which could coincide with the FS trio discovering some dirt on their former employer. So yes, Sephiroth indeed “wrongs” them in a way.

Glenn’s reappearance in Wutai, of all places, leads me to believe that they’ve joined forces with whoever has the potential to turn the tide against ShinRA. To be specific, the Wutai. Surprisingly, the OG declared that the war had been won by ShinRA. In the remake, however, the fighting appears to have ended in a stalemate/ceasefire. So, besides Avalanche meddling, what other factors could have influenced the outcome? Could some ex-SOLDIER members have joined their ranks, tipping the scales in Wutai's favor? It's not an outlandish scenario. Glenn's conflict with Sephiroth may take on political significance in this case; Glenn, and possibly the rest of the trio, fight ShinRA as a whole. A development like that also allows Glenn's initial animosity towards the modified "golden child" who stole his place to be justified, as evidenced by his "Because I'm a hero" remark. When he fights for Wutai against ShinRA, he is fighting for the "right cause"; he is a true hero who triumphs through his own strength.

On the other hand, the trio's defection, if it occurred, fits in nicely with Sephiroth's abandonment issues, as every significant figure (Lucrecia, Gast, Genesis, Angeal, and so on) eventually leaves him. Furthermore, if ShinRA pursued the deserters and Sephiroth saw how much effort the company put into apprehending or silencing rogue SOLDIER members, it could have served as a deterrent, making fleeing ShinRA an unappealing idea.

Some more random thoughts. If the hooded figure in Junon in FFVII Rebirth trailer is Glenn, which is unclear at this point, then his survival of the Wutai encounter indicates that either it ended in a stalemate somehow or that Sephiroth did not go for the kill and instead spared him. In turn it lampshades the lesson he gave the boy: be merciful. And the plotline comes a full circle.

#words are cheap.#wild theorycrafting I guess #sephiroth #ever crisis #ffvii ever crisis #ff7 ever crisis #ffvii #ffvii rebirth #ffvii@luv fandoms

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the-rowdy-raven · 20 days ago

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proprietor: @nazorneku , you can call me Raven tip jar: tba (appreciated, but not obligatory) requests: considered, but will not be prioritized fandoms of interest: final fantasy xiv, final fantasy vii, gu jian qi tan, ash echoes, fellow moon, ghostrunner, dishonored, metal gear solid, nier, deus ex, cyberpunk, yakuza, bloodborne, elden ring, sekiro, ghost of tsushima, hades, tainted grail, v rising, devil may cry, baldur's gate, the elder scrolls, dragon age, castlevania, mass effect, pathfinder, warhammer 40k, pillars of eternity, arknights, onmyoji, etheria restart, touchstarved, obscura, punishing gray raven, wuthering waves spoilers: will be present, but will be tagged (name of fandom/abbreviation spoilers, example 'ffvii rebirth spoilers' , 'wuwa spoilers') rules: you DO NOT have my permission to repost my edits here or any other platforms, use them for rp promos, lewd fanfiction, mobile headers, etc. Upon the breach of such rule, I will approach you with request to take my work down, refusal to comply will be followed by a report and a block from my side. It's not my first blog and I will not be tolerant towards disrespectful ppl anymore.

grabbed some old edits from my main account i didnt tag before as examples of my work and will prob dig through my folders and see what old works i can post again

#pinned post.

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gamunity · 4 months ago

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[:ar]مسودة تلقائية[:en]FFVII Rebirth Combat Mastery Guide[:]

[:en] In Final Fantasy VII (FFVII) Rebirth, mastering combat is essential for navigating the game’s challenges and enjoying its rich narrative. This guide will provide you with detailed strategies, tips, and tricks to enhance your combat experience, ensuring you can effectively tackle enemies and bosses throughout your journey. Combat Basics in FFVII Rebirth AspectDescriptionATB GaugeThe Active…

#Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

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zmediaoutlet · 1 year ago

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fic: the tonberry suite

have you ever loved something for twenty-seven years and then FINALLY work up the gumption and energy to write it? Yeah. So this is me self-indulging, at last.

title: the tonberry suite pairing: Cloud/Barret rating: E length: 6800 tags: Game: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (2024); Gold Saucer (Compilation of FFVII); First Time; Friends With Benefits; Intercrural Sex; Size Kink; Slight D/s Elements

summary: At the Gold Saucer, the girls and Red run off for their downtime, leaving Barret and Cloud to get hotel rooms. They have a few hours to kill; Barret has a good idea how to spend the time.

(read on AO3)

Kid’s been acting weird since they got off the ship from Junon. Though, truth be told, kid’s been acting weird since Midgar. Odds are real good the kid’s been weird his whole life, but that’d be more Tifa’s call, and she’s too nice to say. “Any chance you gonna relax?” Barret says. Cloud stares straight ahead with his arms folded, boots shoulder-width apart like the freaky mako-wasting moving walkway ain’t nothing that could faze him, and Barret rolls his eyes, behind his shades. Yeah. That figures.

Long walk and a long day and a hell of a long week, though, and Barret’s due some downtime. He watches the streaking weirdness of the night blurring past the tunnel, fireworks and flashing lights and who knows what the hell else smearing the mako-green with strange colors. World moving under their feet. The girls are off somewhere playing, games and sparkly nonsense a distraction they need, probably. Long mission without a lot of light in it; he hadn’t wanted to waste the time but, hell, not like they hadn’t earned a night off. Especially since he’s feeling like he’s bruised from the top of his head to his heels with all the shit they’ve been getting heaped on ‘em, lately, and especially with…

“We’re here,” Cloud says, and takes a step forward, and sure enough the wacky walkway ends just as his boot moves from fake planet-killing speedway to cobblestone, and they look up to find—

“You gotta be kidding me,” Barret says, with the haunted hotel looming creepy and dark and just plain strange over their heads.

Cloud tips his face up, ghostly white in the shadows. “A hotel’s a hotel,” he says, quiet. He glances at Barret, quick, and then presses his lips together. “C’mon. They probably don’t have many rooms. Might have to share.”

Barret snorts. “Might have to,” he says, and watches Cloud duck his head, and resettle that fuck-off bastard of a sword on his back, and stalk forward like it ain’t no thing. Shit-hell of a day though it’s been, Barret can’t help but grin. Yeah. This is gonna go some kind of way.

That falling-apart dive of Johnny’s in Costa Del Sol was the first time he saw for sure, but not the first he suspected. In Midgar it was all chaos, and they were apart more than they were working together even after Barret had hired him at his exorbitant-ass prices. In Kalm they had rooms at the inn but after skedaddling down the road and hearing Cloud and Tifa’s godawful account of what had set them on this hunt they were all too dog-tired (apologies to Red) to do much more than collapse asleep, no more words exchanged. Then the road, and trading out sleeping in the tents and keeping watch, and clawing through caves and fiends and helping each other up out of the mud and saving each other’s lives, over and over and more times than he’d have thought possible, that first time when Tifa nervously introduced him to her childhood friend, this unsmiling little twerp in the uniform of the enemy who looked like he’d crack in two if Barret clapped his shoulder too hard, and who Barret was gonna dismiss out of hand because they needed real muscle for this mission, until the kid looked up, and met his eyes, and Barret saw that telltale unreal flicker of green.

Crazy, weird eyes. Cold half the time, the rest of the time mostly unimpressed, except those little moments Barret’ll catch, here and there. When a fight’s gone well and none of them are bleeding and he’ll turn and look at Barret’s chest, and then up to actually see his face, and he’ll be—maybe not smiling because that’s not something all those magic-infused muscles seem to know how to manage, but he looks—good, anyway. Glad. On the back of a chocobo with the wind in his stupid spiky hair and the sun on his face, looking like maybe death and pain aren’t top of mind, for once. And, every once in a while, looking one hundred percent his age, when one of the girls teases him, or when he’s reminded that there’s more to life than fighting, or when—say, just as an example—they’re sharing a decrepit room at a motel, and Barret’s claimed first shower because age before beauty’s got to work sometime, and he comes out toweling off and feeling less like hammered shit and Cloud sits up from his slump on the edge of the bed and looks where he might as well look because it’s not like Barret sees the point in covering up, when it’s just the guys and they got other crap to worry about, and he’s talking about hitting the beach and he’s thinking about where they’re headed next and he finds Cloud’s mouth parted and his eyes startled-wide and fixed low and he thinks, oh, there it is. Yeah. Something he’d half-wondered but put away because it hardly mattered, but—hey, there it was, after all.

He’s still pissed when they close the door on their room. Tonberry Suite. Fuck right the hell off. Little robot dude’s actually carrying a knife, like the little demons aren’t legit piss-off scary, merk your ass as soon as you get within five feet, like none of the goofy-ass ghosts and zombies and white-faced goth kid clerks ever could be. “Chill out,” Cloud says, and Barret says, “I’ll boot the creepy little shit out the spooky-ass window and maybe then I’ll chill out,” and Cloud rolls his eyes but, hey, there’s that expression again. Not all the way to smiling, but.

If this suite’s like the other then they’re set on beds, anyway. Two queen-sized on the one wall and an alcove in the back with another, set back behind drapes like that’s where the magic happens. All kinds of dumbass themed shit over the rest of the room—and that little Tonberry guy is looking at him, Barret swears to anything—but it’s beds and four walls and a door that locks and, hey, a bathroom. Good opportunity to shower off all the dust of the hometown he ruined. “Age before beauty,” he says, standing in the doorway.

Cloud shakes his head, setting that ridiculous sword up against the wall. “Just call dibs,” he says, like he’s too cool for school. “You’re not that old.”

“Yeah?” Barret says. “Well, maybe you’re just that pretty.” Gets the satisfaction of one of those startled-wide pretty-ass looks before he closes the door and he grunts. Score one, Wallace.

It’s a good shower. Someone’s paying a hell of a lot for this suite and the planet’s paying her share, too, so it oughta be. He comes out pummeled and mostly clean and smelling like some body wash that claims to be spiderweb soft, comfily thick black towel around his waist. Finds Cloud leaning against the wall by the window, looking out like there’s something to see besides the fake-thunderstorm effects, expression like he’s a thousand miles from here. In the shitty past or the gloomy future, Barret doesn’t know, but he ain’t having it. He was promised downtime.

“Your turn, Spiky.” A lifted shoulder, silence. Barret sighs. “C’mon, now. Red says your ass smells like blood. You wanna change that, while you got the chance.”

“My… ass,” Cloud says. Looks sidelong, slanted along his shoulder, and then his lips part again. For trying so hard to look cool he’s real bad at keeping his cards to himself. Barret’s holding the towel closed but he’s dripping on the floor and there’s a lot on display, he knows. He smiles, flat, and Cloud meets his eye and then closes his mouth and then clearly swallows, all the way across the room. Yeah. Yeah, it’s on.

Barret would’ve figured SOLDIERs would be efficient—whenever anyone asks the kid a question about his time in the service he tells some grim-ass story about control and training and everything sucking, so three minute showers would go right along with that—but Cloud’s in there for a while. Long enough that Barret steps back into his trousers, anyway, and finds the mini-bar, and makes a drink (whisky + ice cubes counts as a drink, not that he’ll tell Tifa that). He sits on the big bed at the back and listens to the rain. Fake, sure. Doesn’t sound like it. Thunder and the wind across the glass and the room dim, flickering candlelight, sconces glowing amber-red. The bed’s soft and the drapes are freakin’ velvet and it’s a cocoon, in here, like the rest of the doomed world don’t exist at all, and it’s about as far as he could get from Corel while being no more than, what, a half-mile above it. The desert stretching empty below. The wreckage so close he can see it whenever he closes his eyes.

Wrong kind of downtime. He pours a second drink, and then a third that he sets on the bedside table, waiting. The creepy little robot paces by, behind, emitting its weird humidifier-smoke. Cedar. Smell of the woods on fire. Barret breathes in deep.

Cloud finally comes out of the shower. “Took you long enough,” Barret says.

“Shut up,” Cloud says. He’s got one of the black towels around his hips, too, uniform folded neatly and boots swinging, tied over his wrist. Body a white flash against the stupid purple wallpaper, whiter when there’s a fake burst of lightning. He sets his clothes by his pack, at the foot of the bed closest to the door. Stands still, looking down. Covers the back of his neck with one hand, like… Barret doesn’t even know. What goes on in that strange head.

Not what he’s worried about, right now. “Well, don’t keep me waiting longer,” Barret says, and when Cloud turns he holds out the glass he’s had sitting there, condensation gleaming on the crystal. “Downtime.”

“Thought we were waiting until the new Heaven opened up,” Cloud says. He comes over, though, and takes the glass, so Barret can pick his own up again and hold it out. Cloud’s pale perfect little forehead gains a single line between his pale perfect little eyebrows, but he seems to remember human behavior after a second and clinks the rim of their glasses together, and takes a sip when Barret does. He doesn’t hiss or flinch or react at all to barrel-proof alcohol served nearly-neat. Freak. His tongue touches the center of his lower lip, briefly. “Hm.”

“Good shit, right?” Barret says. He tips the crystal against the light, watching how it glows amber. Watches Cloud’s face, behind it. “Yeah, I remember. And we’ll let our girl make us real cocktails when she gets that bar again. But it’s been enough of a day. Week. Shit. Enough of a life. They got a five hundred gil bottle in the bar and some cat’s paying for it? Think we deserve a taste, after all this.”

Cloud’s eyebrows raise, acknowledgment, and he looks down into his own glass. He’s wild, even just standing there. His strange, compact body. Anyone just seeing his face could mistake him for a woman, no question—Aerith told the story of just how many made the mistake back in Wall Market with vicious glee, ignoring how Cloud turned nine shades of red behind her while she did—but neck down there’s no question that this is a man. Slender as a girl, sure, but ripped where it counts, his shoulders curved with muscle, his waist and hips nipped narrow. Smaller than Barret, like most everyone is, but no frail thing, not breakable. Not oblivious, either, since as soon as he came out of the shower he glanced lightning-quick at Barret’s bare chest and shoulders and then south, to where he’d left his trousers lazily unzipped, and it’s—

“I figure we got a few hours, while the girls get all the running around out of their systems,” Barret says. Cloud squints a little, calculating, and then nods. Like it’s a battle plan they’re working out. “Yeah. So. Help me out, here.” He holds out the gun-arm.

Cloud blinks at him, startled again. For a hardcore SOLDIER-trained professional badass he sure takes his turn looking like a caught rabbit. “You can’t do that yourself?”

“Can,” Barret says. Shrugs, resting the whisky glass on his knee. “Easier if I got a partner to help out.”

One of those weird still watching moments. Cloud looking at nothing, who-knows-what thoughts passing behind his eyes. “Fine,” he says, and steps forward, and sets his hands on Barret’s arm, above the belted cover, barely damp from the shower.

Warm. Always a surprise whenever the kid’s skin touches his—seems like he should be radiating ice crystals, with how he acts half the time—and soft, like even with all that swordplay he doesn’t form calluses. The mechanism of the socket isn’t complicated and Cloud frowns down at it for a few seconds before he finds the latch, and pops it, and the release of tension from Barret’s forearm to elbow to shoulder goes through him like someone’s cast a cure spell, instantly better all the way to his toes.

He watches Cloud’s face while he finds the other latches. Frowning still, concentrating, but there’s a faint pink coming up across his cheekbones and ears. “Hey, kid,” Barret says. Flick of a glance, but Cloud’s starting to unscrew the main bolt that holds the gun into the socket and he turns back to that. “I ain’t trying to mess you around, here.”

“What does that mean,” Cloud says.

Three bolts down; Barret turns his arm over, palm up if he still had a palm, and lets the kid’s clever fingers make short work of the other half. “I’m saying, I don’t want this to be some kinda game, or confuse you, or tease, or nothing.”

The last bolt: a thunk kind of sound, and the assembly pops free, leaving Barret’s arm truncated in the steel socket that covers his elbow and where the rest of his arm was, and Cloud holding the weapon that makes him at all useful. He turns it over in his hands, curious. The broad base where the bolts connect to the socket, the gears, the internal materia-casing that makes the ammunition work. Barret’s seen it, is used to it, doesn’t care so much anymore, but he hasn’t seen someone else look at it, in a long time. Cloud frowns—of course, Cloud frowns—but clearly just trying to puzzle through the mechanism. It’s a weapon, and Cloud’s interested in those, but he looks up at Barret’s face after a few more seconds, his expression flat, cold.

“What,” he says. Distrust.

Barret shakes his head. “That’s what I’m saying. Ain’t no need for that. I ain’t teasing and I ain’t trying to make this anything it’s not. But—” He drains his drink and the whisky goes down hot, smooth, smoky-sweet, and sets the glass on the side table, and reaches out with his good left hand and cups Cloud’s bare side. God, he’s small—Barret’s hand spreading across his ribs and his thumb brushing up under the tight tiny furl of his navel—and Cloud takes a quick short breath, muscles tensing, except he couldn’t be all that surprised because he doesn’t move away, or flinch, or beat Barret’s brains in with the gun he’s still holding in both hands. Barret smiles and Cloud’s eyes—instead of squinting all bitchy or frowning or whatever else he’d expect, they get all wide again, startled, like—smiling wasn’t what he expected. This friggin’ kid. “Yeah. We got downtime. I figure, we might help each other out, maybe. ‘Cause I think maybe you been wanting to, huh? Maybe you been thinking about it, sometimes.” Cloud licks his lips, eyes dropping from Barret’s to his shoulder, his chest. “Ain’t ashamed to say I been thinking the same. You up for it, kid?”

Cloud takes a slow breath, his chest visibly rising. “That why you dropped a blanket over the Tonberry?” he says, after a second.

Flicker of a smile around his mouth. After waiting patiently through all this negotiation, Barret’s dick thickens in his trousers. He sits forward, slides his hand around to the small of Cloud’s back. “Don’t want the creepy little bastard watching, what can I say,” Barret says. Cloud rolls his eyes but does smile for real, close-lipped, and sets Barret’s gun on the table next to their whisky glasses, and Barret waits until it thunks down before he pulls Cloud in, gets him right between Barret’s knees, gets him close. Cloud’s hands land on his shoulders, tense, and Barret tips his head back, makes sure Cloud’s looking him in the eye. “To be clear,” he says, “I wanna fuck. Sound good?”

Cloud huffs. “Yeah, I got that,” he says. Nervy dart of his tongue to his lower lip, anyway. But then: “Yeah. Sounds good. But—”

“Don’t say it’ll cost me two grand,” Barret says, grinning, that hot held thing in his gut glowing like superheated ore. “Make me think you’re some other kind of merc entirely.”

“You wish,” Cloud says, and—hell, that’s a whole different world right there, unfolding in the imagination—but there he is, standing there caught between Barret’s knees, and Barret follows this kid into battle fifty times a day, trusts his orders and tactical mind more than he has anyone else in is whole life, but on this one it’s clear who’s leading and who follows, and it makes him—slide his hand gentle over Cloud’s belly, up over the skinny flat of his chest. Not smiling now, and not cool and confident and with that attitude like he’s saying fuck you to the whole world. His eyes open and surprised as any kid’s, when Barret knows the shit he’s waded through. Makes him fit his hand around the back of Cloud’s neck, thumb sliding up into the barely-damp silky soft of his hair, makes Barret pull him down—careful, guiding—and makes him kiss the kid gentle. His mouth as startled as his eyes. Breath catching in his chest, his hands gripping Barret’s shoulders so tight they might well bruise, but—after a second—he sucks in air, closes his eyes, kisses back.

Given a hundred guesses in the couple months they’ve known each other, Barret wouldn’t have pegged the kid as clumsy. That’s all it is, though, as Barret pulls him in, and gets him to climb up onto Barret’s lap—barely covered by the towel—and urges his arms around Barret’s neck, and keeps kissing him. Clumsy and maybe nervous, too, like…

Barret drags his hand down Cloud’s back, feels all that silky skin. Muscle rippling as he shrugs his shoulders, knees spreading on the bed either side of Barret’s hips. Squirming already. Barret pulls away from his mouth and kisses his jaw—no stubble, really is soft as a girl—and the side of his throat under his ear, breathing hot there in a way that’s been pretty surefire over his many years of experience, and—yep, Cloud clutches a hand to the back of his head, makes this hitched trapped little not-a-sound, like he doesn’t want to be caught enjoying himself. “Been a while,” Barret says.

Half statement, half question. Cloud shivers when Barret applies light teeth to his collarbone and then pushes him back, blinking fast, chest heaving. Looks down, and so Barret does too, and—yeah, there it is. Pushing out the front of the towel, stiff when Barret lays his hand over it, rubs. There already, damn. Has been a long time. “You good for two?” Barret says.

Cloud’s ears have gone from pink to dark red, his mouth half-open. “I—” Can’t seem to finish. Shudders when Barret closes his hand through the towel, feels his dick that way. His hips curl in and he shakes his head but it’s not no, it’s—

“Well, let’s just see,” Barret says, his own dick surging thick. He squeezes again, easily handling the whole thing, lets Cloud push forward into him, and then he takes his hand away—wait, Cloud breathes, but Barret shushes him, says, “C’mon now, help me out,” and tugs at the towel, and Cloud blinks at him confused before he lifts up on his knees and drags the thing away, tosses it to the side, and—yeah, there it is, his dick flushed-pink and stiff and hot when Barret wraps his hand around it bare, tugs, thumbs over the head where it’s peeking out of his foreskin, makes the kid shudder shoulders to hips to thighs, quivering. Doesn’t seem to know how to handle it at all but it’s hot as fuck just for that—Barret wraps his bad arm around to brace as best he can, the socket probably digging cold into Cloud’s back but he doesn’t seem to care, since he arches, curls his hips in little spasms, humping into Barret’s hand, and he comes in a minute flat, his hands gripping Barret’s shoulders, his eyes screwed shut and his face almost in pain until he’s spurting between them, striping Barret’s bare chest white, his eyes flying wide and shocked like he didn’t know what was gonna happen, like it’s a surprise.

“Goddamn,” Barret says, and he says it admiring but Cloud bites his lips together, turns his face away. “Nah,” Barret says, quick, “nah, see—” and he squeezes Cloud’s dick again—still stiff, slick now, head shiny-pink and sensitive—flips his hand around and drags his bare palm down the spine of the thing, curls his fingers under the tight smooth little package of his balls, behind, almost to his asshole. Soft, hairless. Alien creature almost except that that’s real jizz on Barret’s belly and warm skin quivering against his and a real, normal expression as Cloud frowns, slides his eyes over. Embarrassed and wanting to be told it’s okay. “Hot as hell, man,” Barret says. He leaves off petting Cloud’s crotch and drags his hand over his own belly, white smearing in the hair. “Got a backlog for me?”

“Shut up,” Cloud says, breathless sort of, and when Barret grins at him he rolls his eyes but seems to settle, maybe. Dick softer but not all the way to soft—joys of youth, right there. Long time since Barret was twenty-one and he wouldn’t go back for love nor money, but there are some advantages. He raises his eyebrows, tips his chin up, and in his lap Cloud’s barely an inch higher than him but it’s nice, sweet almost, how the kid licks his lips, and clearly has to decide to lean down and offer the kiss Barret’s asking for. Makes this little sound in his chest when he does it. If they didn’t have a hell of a to-do list in real life Barret would want to book this stupid room out for a month and see what other sounds he could drag out, past all that try-hard coolness and pretending.

But that’s later, maybe, if ever, and his dick’s straining in real time right now. “So…” he says, leaning back.

Roll of thunder from the hotel’s stupid sound system. “So?” Cloud says, arching an eyebrow—oh, he has to have practiced that move in a mirror—but when Barret’s jaw drops because—he can’t seriously—Cloud’s mouth curves, and he looks all over Barret’s face, and then pushes him back, harder, not as strong as he could be but enough that Barret drops back to his elbows, spread out on the bed. He’s inspected, and it’d look like cool analysis except Cloud’s ears are still that telltale red and his chest is flushed nearly the same color as his cockhead, standing out plump. Feels weird except there’s that echo of all those post-fight cooldowns and that shower and seeing it right in the kid’s face, as he drags his eyes over Barret’s chest and his abs and down, to where there is most definitely a lump swelling out the front of his fatigues, about as up for it as he’s been in years.

“Wanna see?” Barret says. He knows the answer but it’s gratifying anyway to see Cloud nod, and lift up on his knees to make room, and to shove the waistband down one-handed and let his dick, ah, spring out into the open. More gratifying to see that stupid expression on the kid’s face again, what’d make Barret laugh out loud if he didn’t have the ounce of sense in his head that’s kept him alive all these years.

To his credit, Cloud may be clumsy but he sure as shit ain’t shy. He reaches down and gets Barret’s dick in this underhanded grip, not tight enough and not quite right but it’s a warm hand that’s not Barret’s own and that goes a hell of a long way toward making it a better day. Barret hums, approving. Watches, propped up, while Cloud tests the weight, the thickness. His hand closing around it but only just. Barret’s not exactly vain but even after all these years of messing around with people it still does something to him, just a little. Not the size of his own equipment but seeing how they react. How this one reacts, when Barret would’ve expected indifference at best, but instead his chest lifts on a deep breath and he licks his mouth and he looks downright wild, like he’s been starving and here’s a three-course meal laid out, all his for the taking.

Not that he’s doing much taking. “Don’t mean to rush you,” Barret lies.

Cloud’s eyes sweep up. “No wonder you make such dumb decisions,” he says, and squeezes—ah—right there under the head. Learns quick. “No way you got enough blood to run your brain and this thing at the same time.”

“I make it work,” Barret says, “and screw you besides, and—god damn, kid, if you don’t—”

Cloud grins at him—an honest-to-god toothy grin, like Barret’s never seen on that porcelain doll miserable little face—and drags his hand down, cups Barret’s nuts, takes a deep breath. Bites his lower lip then. “I want…” He shakes his head. “Shit. I don’t—”

“Anything’s good with me, man,” Barret says, meaning it, not least because his dick’s fuckin’ begging at this point, with warm weight in his lap and the anticipation winding his spine so tight he feels like a volcano desperate to burst.

A soft dragging thumb over his sack, more than filling Cloud’s palm. His fingertips trace a dragging little path through the bush, up the trail to Barret’s navel. Teeth back in his lip.

Barret lays his hand on Cloud’s belly. “‘Less you want me to handle it.” Flash of relief that makes Barret want to pat him on the friggin’ head like a little kid, which isn’t exactly the image he needs right now, but hell if ain’t hot in its way, too. Little fucker’s always hot, which is half of why they’re here in the first place. “Alright,” he says, sitting up, “watch and learn,” and Cloud rolls his eyes and starts to say, “Yeah, right—” except that Barret kisses him, and it’s muffled, and Cloud doesn’t seem to mind so much that he’s not allowed to finish it.

More thunder, more lightning-strike coursing through the room. Barret hitches Cloud closer, holding him tight at the small of his back, their dicks pressing together—ah—sweet. Cloud’s hips curl in, instinct, hardening up for real again, especially when Barret kisses his throat, and his collarbone, and his absurdly pale nipple, lapping and making it tight as a bullet, provoking one of those tiny choked not-sounds that makes Barret lift his head and say, “Kid, how’m I ‘sposed to know if it’s good if you won’t let it out,” and Cloud blinks at him empty-headed until Barret drags his thumb over the nipple again, deliberately rough over the wet skin, and gets this hurt little grunt and Cloud tightening his thighs around Barret’s hips and, yeah, his dick all the way hard, ready to go again. He closes his hand around both their dicks and Cloud spasms, breath heavy, grabbing Barret’s biceps as much as he can. Looks down between them and so Barret does, too, and it’s—yeah, something else, to see the contrast. Not like Cloud’s got anything to be embarrassed about, it’s a nice little handful, pretty as a picture like every other damn thing about him, but pressed together Cloud’s all rosy petite pink to thick hefty dark, silk-smooth to hairy-rough, and the size—”What’s that, half?” Barret says, not mocking or teasing but just knowing, somewhere in the pit of his gut, that it’ll make Cloud—yeah, let out this thin whining moan, his fingers tracing the thick vein up the side of Barret’s shaft, kissing the head, feeling how much bigger. “You got it bad, kid,” Barret says, grinning, and Cloud pushes up and kisses him, to shut him up maybe, but Barret doesn’t mind that, either.

He meant it when he said he didn’t want to tease, though. He gets his hand under Cloud’s ass and flips them, gets Cloud’s thighs spread around his hips, his head tipping back on the bed, spread like an offering. Touches Cloud’s nuts again—one leaping in the sack, damn he’s hot for it—and then behind, and then back all the way, rubbing, a test. “You done this before?”

Cloud, staring up at the canopy. Expression flickers, strange. Nervous? “I…”

Barret presses with his middle finger, testing. “Don’t want to break you in half, Cloud,” he says. “Be honest on this one.”

Strange look in Cloud’s eye when he lifts his head. “We got materia for that, right?”

“Shit,” Barret says, imagination leaping in again—and the idea of being so up for it that he’d hurt that much, just to get it in, to get there—but no, no, not this time—god, he hopes soon, but not this time. He leans down and kisses Cloud again just for thinking it and then lifts up, grabs Cloud’s hip, flips him over—his dick leaping and crying at how easy the kid goes to his belly, letting Barret handle him like it’s nothing when he’s such a prickly bitch the rest of the time—and he shudders, gathers his elbows under him, braces like he’s ready for pain, like that’s all he’s expecting. But, no—Barret’s leaking he’s so ready, he’s been waiting long enough, and he can’t quite explain like he oughta but they’ve been working together long enough he’s got to trust that Cloud can follow his lead—he braces his socket by Cloud’s shoulder, spits in his palm and slicks his dick, pulls Cloud’s hips up—the kid going with it, because he’s crazy as hell—and it feels wild just to slide his cockhead against the kid’s pretty white ass, splitting the cheeks, dragging wet, pressing forward all the way so his pubes are crushed in against the pale skin and his cock’s dripping over the small of his back. Cloud’s back heaves as he drags in air, his hips tipping up. “Just—just do it—” he says, gasped thin, and Barret does pull back, dick gliding maddeningly up so close to what he can imagine would be heaven, furled tight, pale and small like the rest of him—but he ain’t an actual all-the-way bastard and so he just pushes forward, sliding his dick up between Cloud’s thighs, bulling past his sack, dragging where he’s warm and smooth and feels plenty good.

“Like that,” Barret says. Panting already, shit. Cloud looks over his shoulder, frowning muzzily, mouth open. Barret slides two fingers in and Cloud blinks at him, lets Barret drag sloppy over his tongue, and only seems to get it when a wet grip closes over his dick, Barret’s hand covering the whole thing again, curling down to touch, shit, his own dick pushing forward between Cloud’s thighs. “Close ‘em tight, huh?”

He stares over his shoulder, shuffles his knees together, makes it—tight, not slick enough but tight, hell—and then licks his own hand, reaches down, lets Barret push forward into his palm, cups and makes a tunnel for Barret to push into, knocking Barret into the underside of his own dick, taking Barret’s lead, arching his back and pushing his ass back so their hips clap together, so close to fucking for real that Barret almost doesn’t miss the real thing. Except—”Next time, baby,” he says, and his nuts surge at how Cloud’s eyes do that startle-flash, “next time, huh? I’ll get in there like you want. Spread you wide. You want that? Want me in there?”

No response but he hardly expected one. Cloud’s breathing harder than he ever does in the middle of a fight, squeezing Barret’s dick when it fills his hand, his head dropping between his shoulders, his bare shoulders and neck the perfect target for Barret to sink his teeth in—oh, and that gets a real moan, Barret’s mouth on the vulnerable knob at the top of his spine, his whole body sinking, knees sliding on the plush coverlet. Barret closes his thighs around Cloud’s, keeps him steady, bracing—the hot tunnel hotter now, sweat and smearing, Cloud’s small hand knocking them together, and Barret reaches down and covers Cloud’s hand, their fingers lacing, pressing up tight and close to Cloud’s belly, feeling how close he is with his nuts tight against the base of his little dick—”Shit, kid, you gonna beat me there?” Barret says, rough, laying flat out almost on his back. Cloud shakes his head, but just confused seems like, this whining high edge lacing every breath. Barret grins, hooks his chin over Cloud’s shoulder, breathes hot against the sweating curve of his throat. “Yeah, you are, aren’t you? C’mon, now. I’m in charge. You show me how good it feels.” Cloud presses back into him, his back curved up into Barret’s chest, his face turning so Barret can kiss his jaw, nose against his cheek. “Yeah, you got it. Now you just gotta let it go. That’s an order, SOLDIER.”

The sound Cloud makes could make Barret cream himself if he were lost in a snowfield, half-dead and unsure if help were ever gonna come. As is the kid shudders, lurching between Barret and the bed, his hand flashing back to grab Barret’s hip and pull him in harder, unnaturally strong, grip hard enough it’ll bruise. Barret takes over, cupping his spurting dick for the second time—shit, load feels as thick and strong as it was on the first go, he really does have a backlog—and it’s right there in the base of his spine, this coiling tense thing building up like reaching his limit in a fight, his balls clutching up and his dick swelling and he sinks his teeth into Cloud’s shoulder not to shout to the whole damn hotel and—ah, finally—

Dizzy for a few seconds. Fuck, it has been a long time since it was anything other than his left hand. He re-arrives in his brain in stages: loosening his jaw, and taking a deep breath, and flexing his cramped knuckles. Everything slick, sweet, enough to fuck carefully forward and smear around, making it last. Cloud’s hand’s locked onto his hip but Barret shifts his weight on his bad arm, making enough room that he can be sure the kid can take a full breath. Toothmarks in a ring on his shoulder. Barret kisses there, and then blows cool air, and is glad Cloud’s still got his face buried in his own folded elbow when he shivers all over, because hell if Barret’s gonna be able to hide the grin on that one. He really doesn’t want to tease, not yet, but he’s getting enough material for a year, here.

Speaking of—”You gotta let me go,” Barret says. Cloud makes a dazed little huh? and Barret honestly could scoop him into a bear hug. “Need my leg back here, man. We gotta clean up.”

Cloud turns his head. “Right,” he says, weak, and unclamps his hand and his thighs both, stretching out under Barret’s body.

Barret presses up on his elbow and Cloud shivers, again, muscle jumping in his thighs. Easy to urge him over, a clumsy tumble of elbows and sleek white body under Barret’s bulk, although he seems nervous, for some reason. Barret knocks his chin up with two fingers and Cloud meets his eyes. Not startled and not fuck you and not dead indifferent but some other thing entirely. “So,” Barret says. He raises his eyebrows. “That suck?”

Cloud blinks at him, lips parted, and then huffs, one of those tiny smiles starting at the corner of his mouth. “Guess not.”

“Oh, he guesses,” Barret says. He slides his thumb under Cloud’s lower lip, fair warning, and leans down slow, and is rewarded by Cloud lifting up a half-inch to meet him. Slow, sticky kiss. Soft. When Barret lifts up again Cloud looks like he could get knocked over with a feather. Cute as hell, which wasn’t how Barret expected to feel after a mutual relaxation attempt but—shit, he’ll take it. He pushes up on his good arm. “Maybe next time we don’t gotta deal with a haunted hotel for atmosphere.”

“Next time,” Cloud repeats, in a strange tone. His eyes drop from Barret’s mouth to his chest to his dick, laying soft but still thick up against Cloud’s hipbone, and his jaw clenches, and his eyes are more what Barret’s used to when he looks back up and says, “Just because you’re scared of the robot.”

“Hey, now,” Barret says, pushing upright. He lifts a finger. “Not scared. Creeped. The thing’s creepy. You just ain’t creeped because you got twenty screws loose.”

Cloud sits up, rolls his eyes. “Sure,” he says. Still with that little smile.

Thunder, again. Cloud glances at the window, sighs. Something settling over his shoulders, again, but—Barret thinks, maybe—a little less. He hopes. Or, shit, maybe not helped at all, but mutual orgasms rarely made things worse, in his experience. He ducks back into the stupid haunted bathroom, mops up. Buttons his trousers one-handed and shrugs back into his shirt and vest and brings a wet washrag out to where Cloud’s still sitting on the edge of the bed, naked and gleaming, rubbing his forehead. Hell of a sight but Barret’s got to put it away. For a while, anyway.

“I’m going to see what’s going on in this shitshow,” he says, tossing the rag. Cloud catches it, easy. “You should rest. Some shut-eye’ll do you good. Maybe you’ll be a little less weird, huh?”

Cloud’s shoulders curve in. “Maybe,” he says. Really does sound tired. Barret grabs his gun, braces it against the table until the main latch clicks and then twists his arm, locking it in place, spinning the bolts along the socket. He’s had a lot of practice. Cloud watches, holding the rag in both hands, and then says, “Hey. You mean that? About—about next time.”

Sitting there, not quite looking Barret in the eye, he looks… his age. Barret flexes his arm, makes sure the gun’s properly in place, and then picks up Cloud’s chin again, makes him look all the way up. One of the prettiest things Barret’s ever seen, truly. Lifetime to date. “I think just about any time you want it, you tell me, and barring the world blowin’ up and days needin’ saved I’ll drop trou and do my best. Won’t have to pay me no two grand, neither.”

No smile, but this little nod against Barret’s hand. Like it’s a bargain made, either way.

“Good, then,” Barret says, and lets the kid go, and walks over to the door. When he looks back Cloud seems a little more like the merc he hired all those weeks ago. Just naked, in more ways than one. He points, makes his voice firm. “Get some sleep.”

“Sure, boss,” Cloud says, dry, and Barret leaves the suite before he can do any damn-fool thing like go back over there and cover the kid with his body and drum up the enthusiasm to do the whole thing over again.

He stands in the corridor, not really taking in the stupid black velvet and the dripping sconces and the spooky organ music piped from the ceiling. His body relaxed, even if the problems of the planet are flooding back up to the top of his mind. Responsibility and history settling down in their accustomed yoke. He shrugs his shoulders, takes it. Thinks maybe it won’t be so long until there’s a little more downtime, to make the load easier to bear.

#cloud/barret #final fantasy vii #my writing #this is a real shot in the dark #and i know no one follows for this stuff #but seriously: i have loved this game since 1997 #these characters are in my veins #i have needed barret to top the shit out of cloud since approx '97 as well #doesn't get all the way there this time #but maybe in a future fic #also: it's amazing how much of a mental break this felt like #i have like 1 mil+ words of spn fic on ao3 #this is the writing equivalent of a trip to costa del sol

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zmediaoutlet · 1 year ago

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fic: the syldra inn

honestly, if you have a PS5, why aren't you playing Rebirth? Do you not love crazy identity crises and dramatic irony?

title: the syldra inn pairing: Cloud/Barret rating: E length: 6600 tags: Game: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (2024), Cosmo Canyon (Compilation of FFVII), Friends With Benefits, Shower Sex

summary: They came to Cosmo Canyon only to be told that they'd have to go to Nibelheim for answers. On the night before they leave for the north, Cloud can't sleep.

(read on AO3)

Barret breaks the promise they made a second time in Cosmo Canyon. Been a weird, weird couple of days and it's not even a drink for fun; this shit's gonna count as medicine. Bartender gives him the house special in a weird little ceramic cup, so thin the light passes through it. Barret's first thought is that it's kinda cool, that they're using natural materials and keeping to the gifts the planet gave them, and then he takes a sip—drink's not bad, kinda fruity and not up to Tifa's standard but fine, and it packs an alcoholic wallop so it's gonna do its job—but then he sees that the pretty little ceramic cup is stamped with the logo of the Inn on the base, complete with a registered trademark symbol, and it's another souring moment. Canyon's not what he thought it would be, that's for damn sure.

Quarter hour to midnight. No one much else around. The bartender's got that same ultra-serene look all the other staff around here have, doesn't seem to mind that it's nearly closing time and Barret's still occupying stool space and not letting him clean up. Bar's otherwise empty. Up the carved-in stairs he can see one clerk still at the desk, in case more wannabe planetologists wander in past the fiends and canyons to overpay for plush accommodation. The rooms otherwise seem full, the big cave mouths covered for privacy with heavy blanket curtains in greens and blues and browns. Barret wonders if those patterns are even real, from Red's people or the Cetra or whoever came before, or if they're trademarked, too. Buy your own blanket knitting kit with Real Native Artwork, only a thousand gil at the gift shop.

He grimaces. Drains the drink, tips the bartender a few extra gil. The inn sprawls through the cave system and he can only sort of remember where their room is. Red—or Nanaki, or whatever he wants to be called now—is up at Bugenhagen's observatory, and the girls and the cat are all sharing a big double-bed suite that he's sure someone pulled strings to get deeper inside the mountain, which leaves him and the merc—

He's about to climb the stairs on vague hope of recognizing the right passage when he sees it when he catches a glimpse of candlelight on blond hair and, aha. Speak of the devil.

"Can't sleep neither, huh," Barret says.

"Haven't tried," Cloud says. In that flat matter-of-fact way that sounds like fuck you but Barret has learned over the past while of traveling means that he's actually about a million miles away, in his head, thinking about who knows what. Nothing good, probably. And, yeah, maybe a little fuck you. God help him, Barret finds it charming at this point.

He's sitting on the steps down into the deep belly of the inn, watching the singers. Barret'd been so lost in bitter thought he'd stopped hearing it. Five of 'em, dressed plainer than the missionaries who travel from the canyon to any settlement big enough to preach. Different to the ones who were here when they first arrived, and the singing then was so sweet Barret had to put on his sunglasses to stop Yuffie making comments about folks going soft. Still sweet, though. Deeper. Four men and one woman and their voices blend and echo, bouncing back off the rock walls worn smooth by time and water and maybe the lifestream itself, according to the breathless tourist who'd been gossiping at the bar, earlier. Barret never did go to church, wasn't built for it, but if it sounded like this he could see the appeal.

He sits next to Cloud, who doesn't look over. "Didn't take you for a music lover," Barret says.

No response. He didn't much expect one. Cloud's left his sword against the wall of the stairwell, tipped against the handrail bolted into the rock, and as always looks about half the size without it rising ominously over his back. He sits with his elbows braced on his knees and his hands laced together between them and his chin dropped. Barret stretches his boots out, settles in to wait. It's a beautiful song, looping and hypnotic. A hymn, asking the planet to please reveal the way to the promised land. Barret didn't understand the words but he knew the feeling—hopeful, sad. Hopeful despite being sad, like—the point is the hoping, maybe, even if what's hoped for never came.

A woman comes down the stairs past where they're sitting. Barret moves his gun-arm out of the way but she only smiles at him, briefly, leaning heavily on the handrail. Hair shining silver in the lamplight. She limps to one of the men singing and clasps his hand, and he nods at her, and they trade places so she can stand with her back to the cave wall, and it doesn't seem like they miss a note before she lifts her face up to the lamps hanging from the cavern ceiling and takes her place in the song. The tone changes with her higher voice but it's still the same hymn and then there's—low bells, chiming, from somewhere else in the inn. Midnight.

Barret grips Cloud's shoulder. Deep breath, and then Cloud nods, and stands all in one smooth motion. Show-off. Barret heaves upright and follows the kid up the stairs—down a different corridor entirely to the one Barret would've picked—out to the north side of the cave system, a room tucked a little away, with a narrower cave-mouth entrance and a queen-sized bed and a reclining loveseat by the open window. The painting on the rock walls more subdued sigils, green and black and rust; stars shining in, and a lamp by the bedside glowing amber. When Barret drops the heavy quilt over the door it's quiet, the music far away and muffled. And, look at that: another minibar.

"Guess following planetology doesn't mean you can't make some gil, huh," Barret says. Cloud huffs. He leans his sword against the wall by the bed, close enough he can roll out and grab it one motion if need be. Barret investigates the bar and finds something in another ceramic bottle, with a discreet price tag on the little menu that's so ridiculous he'd be crying foul any other day, but again: medicine. He suspects Cloud needs it as much as he does.

Confirmed when Cloud takes the cup without blinking, and knocks it back without a flinch. He holds out the cup for a refill and Barret obliges but says, "Remember we gotta climb out of this place to get to Nibel in the morning." Cloud's jaw flexes. Barret pauses, and then pours another inch of whatever dark liquor this is into the ceramic cup. All right, so sometimes he's a dumbass. Like there was any chance that wasn't getting remembered. Like Tifa didn't go up to their room withdrawn and weird after a subdued dinner, with Aerith's hand soft and supportive on the small of her back.

He sits on the loveseat with his own cup, props a boot on the rock ledge below the window. Sips at the liquor—barrel-aged gin, maybe? Sweet, but with a strong herbal edge that does somehow call to mind the red rock outside, the soft sage-like plants growing in the shadows of the canyon. Different to Corel but also not—rock, and desert, and the night coming in through the window just as cold. No wonder Red's fur is so thick.

It was cold down there, too, in the caves, even with the fires burning all over. Ghosts and smoke. He shakes his head. "Gonna be glad to get out of here," he says. Cloud grunts, somewhere off behind him. "Wasn't what I thought we'd find." All that daydreaming with Avalanche feels like a hundred years ago. He sets the cup on his thigh and rubs his hand over his face, trying to shake it off. Weird memories. "Guess it ain't all bad. Red got to find out that his father weren't no coward. Plus, hell of a homecoming. He's like the town mascot. Must be nice."

"Must be," Cloud says, quietly, and appears again—his gloves stripped, his hands very white in the starlight when he tops off Barret's cup. He leans against the curved edge of the open window. A breeze comes in, soft and cold, ruffling his bangs back from his face. He looks like some carved marble thing, all white sharp lines against the rough edges here. Barret wants to touch the line of his jaw, feel if it's as cold as it looks.

"What was Corel like?" Cloud says, abruptly. Cuts off Barret's thoughts slipping into what he'd do if he had two hands. Like an ice bucket dumped over his head. Cloud glances at him and frowns, little head-shake. "I mean—I meant, before. When you were a kid."

"Oh, we talking ancient history?" Barret says. Cloud doesn't smile and Barret takes a deep breath, trying to throw away the first reaction that kinda wants to punch the kid and the second that wants to go back into bitter recrimination. "I wasn't no town mascot, that's for sure. But it was all right. Small town and pretty well everyone worked in the mine. Hard work, and it made the folks hard too, but they was all—decent. I guess that's the word. Helped each other out when they needed help, left each other well enough alone when things were fine." He sits back in the loveseat, dust and heat in his head. Snorts, remembering. "My mama said the coal made everyone the same amount of dirty and there weren't no call to pretend one set of hands was cleaner than another. We was all in the dust together."

While he was talking Cloud sat in the open well of the window, his back to the rock and his knee drawn up, his elbow hooked around it. "She worked in the mine too?" Speaking to his cup but paying attention, seems like.

"Sure, everyone did, one way or another. My dad ran the carts most of the time but he took his turns digging. Mama said he should've stuck with the carts, with the back-assward way he went about the heavy machinery."

That does get a smile, small though it is. That old, familiar weight of missing them settles in Barret's chest but it's balanced against how it feels… all right, sort of, to remember those old days. Before the bloody cough came. Before it all went wrong.

"Hard to imagine you as a kid," Cloud says. His other heel comes up, so he sits hunched in the window. Looking like a kid himself. More than usual, anyway.

"That's just 'cuz you're so blinded by my manly good looks," Barret says, and earns that sidelong skepticism. He grins and gets a brief eyeroll instead. "Trust, I was cute as hell. Had the old ladies in town wrapped my finger. Could get a hard candy from Missus Hobbs just by smiling real sweet."

"Uh-huh," Cloud says. More relaxed, seems like. His shoulders not up by his ears at least. "That where Marlene gets it?"

Barret points. "Marlene is a whole special class to herself, merc. Ain't no one cuter than my little angel." Cloud holds up a hand, surrender. "Betcha you weren't cute at all. Just brooding in the corner at people. No candy for you."

In fact he bets the opposite, because he can imagine a tiny serious blond kid with enormous blue eyes and it's about the second cutest thing he can possibly imagine (behind, obviously, Marlene). Should be obvious, too, but Cloud's tiny smile fades and he frowns back down at his knees. "Yeah," Cloud says, soft, and goddamn, that wasn't at all how that was meant to go.

Lot of miles north to Nibelheim, or whatever ashes are left of it. Tifa never mentioned the fire over the years before; she and Cloud looked at each other like folks about to go to a funeral when they were told it was their next stop. Another homecoming and it won't be a good one, no matter what they find there. Barret drains his cup and sets it down with a clink in the window well, and then closes his hand fully around Cloud's ankle. Even in the combat boots he can wrap up the whole thing. "Least you grew up cute," Barret says. "Positively adorable."

"Shut up."

"Naw, I'm serious. Like a chocochick or something. Or a little stuffed mooglet you wanna squeeze."

"Man, what?" Cloud says, baffled, and the thing is Barret wasn't exactly lying then but at least Cloud's looking at him, and he isn't somewhere inside a burning house fire. He goes along with it, mostly, when Barret pulls his ankle, and swivels on his seat so Barret's hand slides up the inside of his calf over the bloused uniform trousers and to the inside of his knee, cupping under his thigh, thumb riding higher up the inseam. Cloud's still giving him the skeptical look but Barret's got a good idea of how to bust him out of it. He squeezes there at the back of Cloud's thigh and gets raised eyebrows. "Thought we had to leave early in the morning."

"Better way to fall asleep than drinking that whole bottle," Barret says. "Plus, no hangover."

"I don't get hangovers," Cloud says—Barret rolls his eyes—but he slides his hand down to cover the back of Barret's. Small and warm, through Barret's glove. His mouth pressed thin, eyes low. "I feel…"

Like shit, is what Barret assumes, but Cloud doesn't finish it. Whatever's been going on with him seems to be getting worse and whatever he saw down there in the caves has been sitting strange behind his eyes, over and beyond the fretting over their journey north. Barret firms his grip and tugs, and Cloud's dragged bodily a few inches forward, his ass on the edge of the window well and his knees spread around Barret's leg and his eyes big, dark blue in the lamplight.

"Feel different," Barret says.

Something courses strange across Cloud's face. He swallows hard. Nods, once. Goes with it when Barret pulls, again, and lets himself be dragged down to sit on Barret's knee, and lets Barret cup his hand around the back of his neck and pull him forward and lets himself get kissed. Soft, at first. All the bruising Barret's seen him take and he just wants to let the kid be—soft press of lips, soft breath against Barret's skin. His hair silky at the back of his neck for Barret to card his fingers through. Not even hot. Medicine, too. Of another kind.

Barret kisses the corner of Cloud's mouth, lets Cloud breathe out slow and warm against his beard. "You want it quick?" he says. Lifts his head and watches Cloud close his eyes, his face turned away from the lamp. A head-shake. One battle plan changed for another, then, and Barret's gut warms, realizing. All right.

He slides his hand under Cloud's ass and stands up. Shocked double-handed grip of his vest and knees clutching his waist. "Ain't gonna drop you," Barret says. He's had some experience carrying the kid around. At least he ain't comatose or seeing visions or having a panic attack, this time.

Cloud wraps an arm around the back of his neck, shifts his weight. Like this they're about the same height, Cloud even an inch or so higher. "I can walk," he says.

His cheeks are flushing that telltale pink, though, and Barret notes he's not demanding to be put down. "World-champ walker, no doubt," Barret says, and Cloud rolls his eyes but also lifts his chin when Barret ducks in to kiss under his jaw, at his white throat just above the line of the turtleneck. Keeps him distracted enough while Barret walks them to the ensuite bathroom, tucked behind a heavy bead curtain that rattles around Cloud's shoulders when they push through—one strand catching on the iron bolts on Cloud's pauldron—and Barret wasn't sure what'd be there but this is a fancy-ass establishment under all the trappings of mysticism and serenity and, sure enough, there's a gleaming bathroom with brass pipes and a shiny mirror and a huge waterfall-style shower cut into the rock. That'll do.

He sits Cloud on the red-rock counter, kissing him still—under his ear, using his finally-free hand to tug down the soft turtleneck and bite mostly-gentle at his throat, Cloud's nails dragging bluntly over the back of his neck, his breath coming in weird little stutters. Barret hums and stands up straight to find Cloud pink all over his face, blushing and beard-burn both, and—yeah, he was right. Like a chocochick. His fingers drag down Barret's chest and Barret catches them, kisses his knuckles quick. "Hold that thought, baby," Barret says. Expects a bitchy counter but Cloud only sits there, back very straight and lips wetly parted, and Barret does have to duck back down for a quick hard kiss before he disengages, goes to the shower.

The water comes on steady and warm from turning a single smooth valve, pouring down in a column straight overhead. Barret turns around to find Cloud watching him, eyes big and dark in the gold light. His eyes jump from Barret's face to his chest to his crotch and then he closes them, and Barret gets that deep wave of heat in his gut, this smooth smug thing. Knowing what's wanted; knowing he can give it.

Cloud's jaw flexes when Barret drags his fingers along it. Not cold, not even a little. His eyes open again when Barret pushes one of the straps off over his shoulder, the leather dangling lazily over his bare arm. Barret jerks his head at the shower, raising his eyebrows, and Cloud licks his lips and ducks his head. He starts unbuckling the leather brace. Barret's gut pulses, again.

Feels weirdly comfortable. Not racing to the obvious conclusion. He unbuckles his own chest piece, shrugs out of his vest and pulls his tank off over his head, dog tags rattling. Cloud bracing one heel on the counter to unlace his boot, kick it away, repeating with the other. Barret's own boots unzip and he shucks them and his trousers all in one go and gets to see Cloud pause, eyes fixed, midway through pulling his turtleneck over his head. Barret grins and Cloud catches him grinning and then frowns, face flaming, but hey. It's nice to be acknowledged.

They're going nowhere, tonight. Barret spins the bolts on his gun and unhooks it from the socket, laying it on the other side of the sink from where Cloud's perched, still only half-naked. The buckle on the covering's harder to undo with one hand and he screws with it for a few seconds before Cloud knocks his hand away, takes over. Businesslike, frowning still, releasing the leather from the buckle and letting the canvas cloth pull away from Barret's upper arm. The metal prosthesis secures with a tension latch inside Barret's elbow; he turns his arm over and Cloud traces the mechanism for just a moment before he figures it out, releases the latch, and slides the whole piece off into his hands.

Long, long time since the whole thing's come off. Barret cups the stump with his remaining hand and it feels—same as it always does. Alien and familiar at once. Cloud lays the socket neatly next to the gun and looks, and Barret watches him look. Then he meets Barret's eyes and—Barret steps in between his spread knees, tips his chin up, kisses him. His mouth opening wetly soft under Barret's and his hands spreading over Barret's bare belly, dragging in the hair. Barret pulls away from his mouth—dumbass idea, he could've spent an hour doing just that—and looks down past the pink cheekbone and the flushing chest to how he's already hard, standing up stiff in his trousers. Turned on as anything, even with…

Even sweeter, to urge the kid down off the counter, to back up to the shower. Barret tips his head back into the waterfall and drags the wet down his chest to his belly. Good pressure, solid heat. Tastes fresh. Coming up from some deep spring beneath the canyon, no doubt. Cloud joins him after a rustling fumble and Barret catches the small of his back, pulls him into the stream. Sleek wet gleaming thing. He shakes his head under the water and then drags his hair back from his forehead. Wet chocochick. Barret hides a smile ducked into the smooth curve of Cloud's throat but not well enough, maybe, because he gets a short solid punch to his pec. "Oof," he says, obliging.

Still—this ain't the endgame. In a slot tucked into the rock there's—a ceramic bottle whose content smells like herbs, a bottle of something thick that smells like spice, a cake of cream-colored soap that smells like honey. He picks the soap, lathers up. Cloud watches, his shoulders moving heavily under the water, before he picks up the herb bottle, pours the contents into his palm, starts washing his hair. Efficient, this time. Barret watches the suds stream down his back when he rinses, gleaming over the pretty muscle. Favor returned when Barret washes his dick, not showing off but just making sure he's presentable for company, and Cloud stands with his hands hooked behind his neck, looking very much like he'd like to help but doesn't know how to ask. Barret hands over the soap, smiling, and Cloud licks his lips, clutches it to his chest, watching still while Barret sluices water over, cupping his nuts and dragging clean wet up the underside of his dick, rolling back his foreskin to make sure. Not hard really with no attention but thinking about it, plump in his hand. Cloud, on the other hand—

Pink cheeked and pink across his collarbones and his pretty pink cock, standing straight out from his hips, his sack already pulled up neat and tight. Barret steps in closer, cups the back of his neck. "Need my help, do you?" he says, and Cloud shudders under the water, lets his head drop. "C'mon, now."

He drags the soap over his chest, perfunctory. Little pink nipples pebbled, stiff when Barret smears his thumb over, clearing the soap bubbles away. Down his tight belly to his smooth crotch, and Barret follows that too, dragging slick over the wet skin and then closing his hand over the sweet little package, pulling clean water over his dick. Damn, he's hard. His hips stutter forward but Barret wants to keep him there for a while—"Slow down, baby," he says, and Cloud says, "Or what," defiant on some contrary instinct he clearly doesn't really have, because he turns his head, lets Barret handle him. Holds very still while Barret reaches back with two fingers, scrubs behind his nuts, feels the ridge of his asshole, pushes there. Shudders again, drops the soap and grabs Barret's biceps, clinging as much as he can. His forehead against Barret's pec, his dick a hot bar against the inside of Barret's wrist.

But then—he's young. Barret takes pity. "Help me out," he says, and Cloud lifts his head, blinks at him with damp-dark eyelashes. Gets it when Barret reaches for that thick stuff in the bottle—maybe for hair but it'll do for this, too—and Cloud's face is bright red from ear to ear but he helps pour it out onto Barret's hand, some smell like cloves rising up thick in the humid air between them—and it is thick, oily cream, making his fingers slide when he reaches around behind Cloud's back and rubs in heavy coaxing drags against his asshole. Has to change his stance, spreading his feet so he can reach easier, and Cloud stares up at him open-mouthed and breathing heavy and strange and then, when he presses—in—just one finger but it's tight and clinging-hot even with the slick—Cloud lets out this deep grunt, like he got punched, and Barret'd worry he was hurt except his dick's still stiff against Barret's thigh. Cloud grabs his shoulders instead, huddles in close against Barret's chest, and—goddamn, yeah—it's easy to fuck that first finger in and out, sliding on the cream, his knuckle bumping in past the tightness.

His dick's been pretty neglected but his nuts throb, feeling that. Imagining how that'd feel—shit, how it will—and he's been careful, being real sweet to be honest, but Cloud ain't a porcelain cup and he doesn't have to go as slow as he's gone with other people. He pulls that first finger out and pushes back in with two—tighter, harder to corkscrew in, but with the slick he gets inside, deep, twisting, and Cloud's lips part against his chest and there's panting hot air and damn, damn. "How's that, baby," he says, knowing the answer, and Cloud shakes his head but clearly doesn't mean it for how he reaches up, hooks his arm around the back of Barret's neck, drags his other hand down Barret's chest through the wet hair to his stomach, blunt nails nevertheless leaving bright lines of sensation on his skin. His dick leaps and cries, practically, and he nudges Cloud that half-step back so the shower's only coursing down their shoulders, making sure the slick stays slick as he shoves his fingers in, and in, and in again, fucking him sweet, breaking him open, his knuckles still breaking in past resistance but less and less with every push. Cloud's hips tilt into it, his dick smearing hot over the inside of Barret's thigh. "I'm—" Cloud bursts out—gasps—and he's sensitive, Barret's learned that, but he can't—already—

"Take it," Barret says, his head dragged down close to Cloud's wet temple, all that strength coiled up and shivering against him. "Go on, take it—" he says, stupid, his dick eager and pressed against Cloud's belly, burying his fingers up deep and dragging, his thumb braced up against the knob of bone and his free fingers pressing as best he can into the kid's hairless taint. Cloud's hips jerk, his dick sliding hot against Barret's thigh—again—and Barret fucks his fingers in hard, punching in, lips dragging against the bolt of Cloud's jaw, and Cloud lifts up on his toes and makes this terrible high little sound and spurts, heat against Barret's skin dissolving into the rest of the wet, his asshole clamping down hard over his fingers, this rhythmic sweet clench that's so, so good. God, he wants to fuck this kid.

He's going to. Cloud squirms and fucks his hips in against Barret's thigh and he grabs the bicep of the bad arm and Barret breathes deep against his jaw, noses under his ear, pulls hard with his two fingers hooked deep and gets Cloud up on his toes again, spreading him wide. A thin hiss, audible under the water streaming down. He lifts his head and Cloud lets him, his arm unlocking and his hand sliding down Barret's chest instead, his eyes opening murky blue with his pupils so blasted-wide Barret can't even see that telltale mako green, his face wiped clear of all the misery he'd carried up out of the caves. His tongue at the corner of his mouth. Barret ducks in and kisses him, once. Soft, sweet. Then he tugs his fingers out and grips Cloud's hip and flips him around, crowding forward, so Cloud has to catch himself with both hands on the red rock.

He wanted to take Cloud back to the bed, do this right, but he ain't got the patience for that anymore. He tugs Cloud's hips back and he's obeyed, the kid spreading his feet on the wet floor and bracing, looking over his shoulder, his hair plastered back from his forehead, curling behind his pink ear. Barret could ask, could reassure. He finds that bottle of hair crap instead and pours it thick over his straining dick, drops it—the ceramic doesn't break on the rock, though he wouldn't have cared at this point if it did—and fists himself, spreading the slick root to tip, grips and lines up with where Cloud's rose-red and open enough, he hopes, but to be honest if he isn't—

God, god—tight, shocking-tight, heat and slick and grip. His hand finds the low flat of Cloud's belly and he pulls, slides in, brain shrinking down to the crazy of it. Cloud's fists against the rock. His lower back curving. Swallowed, in and in, the thick fat dark of his dick disappearing up inside like a magic trick, Cloud's ass split wide, the rim smooth red and just letting him—god!—in. Stopped, and he settles there for a second, caught. The shower cascading over his back hot, the hot around him—hotter. He tugs back a few inches and Cloud makes this weird noise and his back dips further, those little sweet dimples appearing, his belly clenching when Barret pushes deep, deeper, until his hips are pressed up tight to Cloud's, his nuts throbbing, every part of him swallowed in the close dark. He resets his stance, grinding in, and Cloud goes to one elbow on the rock wall, his right hand flying back, finding Barret's side, his hip. His spine this long smooth curve, his hips—oh, pressing back, his plush little ass squirming against where Barret's got him hooked. Goddamn.

He hasn't been this deep in—years. Testing rock, just an inch or so in and out, and oh it pulls, sweet, and Cloud whines and flinches and then grinds right back into place. "Tell me how it feels," Barret says, the words arriving like from some other planet, and Cloud hiccups, body clenching, flushed, says: "Full—it feels—man, just move—"

Barret moves. Leans in, shoves. Cloud half-shouts and then buries his face in his folded arm against the rock. The best—truly, best he's had in so long, clinging tight where it counts and this incredible soft heat to bury inside. The shock of it doesn't quite recede but his brain does rearrive in his skull finally, his eyes able to pull away from the pretty drag of him busting open that pink, the magic of his separate self burying inside sweet conquered country—he finds a rhythm, looks up. Heaving shoulders, the triceps rigid as steel where he's reaching back. This deep staggering breath that sounds like he's—he's not—but no, Barret moves his hand and finds, oh, the little dick all stiff again, leaking wet. He curls his fingers down, gathers up the sweet package of nuts and dick and holds it all tight against Cloud's belly, angling his hips so he's driving right there, cockhead dragging all over the inside wall and making Cloud whine, making him drag his nails into Barret's hip, making him—not just whine but yelp when Barret drives in harder, snapping his hips now that Cloud's loose enough, busted open and letting him really move. Barret shushes but he doesn't really mean it and he's not sure Cloud even hears him, over the water and over the blood rushing in his ears—in Barret's ears—'cuz fuck does it feel good and who cares if they wake the whole inn, the whole canyon. He pulls out—shock of cooler air even in the humid fog of the shower, Cloud so loose now that there's a space of dark held open in the shape of where he was—and Cloud's head lifts, he looks over his shoulder in offended shock—so that when Barret shoves back in he glides like over silk and Cloud's jaw drops and he groans, his dick flexing under the cage of Barret's fingers. He's perfect at this like he is anything else and Barret doesn't know why they haven't been doing this all along—why he didn't drag the kid back to his room over Seventh Heaven on that first day, throw him down to his belly and crawl up over him and get inside and really make him earn every single gil of that two grand.

His gut lurches. His hand clenches over Cloud's belly and his nuts draw tight. He slams in hard and their hips together sound like a thunderclap and he says, "Damn—damn, kid—" and who knows how much experience Cloud really has but he understands that, at least, and unfolds, braces both hands back against the rock, works his hips back like a fuckin' pro. Panting, letting out these high whining noises every time he breathes out. Barret's coiling, this heat drawing tight at the low of his back and deep in his gut, but he's got a sliver of brain left—he lets go of Cloud's belly and hooks two fingers into his open mouth instead, gives him something to focus on. Cloud sucks immediately, grabs the back of Barret's hand and groans deep, licking the split between his two fingers. Barret pulls—oh, and Cloud's obedient when it matters, he lifts right up and puts his back to Barret's chest and that sinks his ass down so goddamn deep—and over Cloud's shoulder he can see the little dick red and neglecting and straining and he wants to help him but he's only got the one hand and can't—but—"Touch yourself, baby," he says, working his hips in these short jerking jolts, right up into the sweet willing body—"Let me see, c'mon, show me," he says, and Cloud reaches right down and fists his own dick, his ass clenching as he does, his lips tight around Barret's knuckles and up on his toes, making the room for Barret to get in there where it counts, and Barret squeezes his eyes closed and sinks his teeth into Cloud's shoulder and even so he shouts, can't help it, every part of him dragged to one point and punching out and pulsing, ass clenching hard and driving up and in, unloading, dissolving.

Handful of seconds, a year. Either way. He breathes out against wet skin and feels muscles that've been clenched about as long as he can remember unclench. He curls his hips in and it's—wet, squishing. This little deep noise down in his chest except—no, not his chest. Opens his eyes and—

Cloud pulls off of Barret's two fingers, slow. Kisses his knuckles, plushly sweet, and then drops his head back against Barret's shoulder. Barret holds him across the chest instead. Looks down but—ah. "Left you hanging," Barret says. Sort of sorry. Mostly so relaxed down to his marrow that he don't care all that much.

Clearly it ain't a problem, though: a little, skeptical sidelong look. "Not exactly," Cloud says. Rough-voiced like someone was using his throat. Barret slides his hand down and gathers up the sweet little thing, pink and flushed and spent. Wishes he'd seen the second go but Cloud can handle himself. Next time. Or the time after, since Barret's starting to think, in the softly satisfied haze, that maybe this could be—that they could—as long as they've both got blood in their bodies and a half hour to spare—that they might…

"Barret," Cloud says.

His fingertips resting lightly on Barret's wrist, his face pink still when Barret blinks and remembers where they are. His dick still deep up inside, even soft. "Yeah," Barret says, and coughs. "Yeah—all right. Hang on."

Cloud takes him literally and grips his wrist hard. Barret's careful, tugging out, but Cloud still makes a tiny hurt sound—Barret feels blood rush to his own face but he's not sure if he feels bad or sorry or just—entirely smug. A small hand darts down and Cloud blinks at the wall in front of them, his chest rising on a deep breath. "That's…" he starts, and Barret's only done it that way around once but he remembers. How strangely open, wet. The gush.

His face really is hot now and he knows it's all that third option and is glad that Cloud can't tell, even if he looks. Careful, he urges them backwards a step and the rushing water flows down over his shoulder and then Cloud's, sluicing between them, washing away the evidence. He slides his hand up Cloud's side and Cloud turns right up against him, pressed close enough that he has to tip his head all the way back to meet Barret's eyes. His face soft, his eyelashes wet. He lays a hand over Barret's chest and opens his mouth, then closes it. His teeth in his lip. Barret sweeps his thumb over Cloud's ribs and dips down, kisses his bitten mouth. Tastes the water.

There are towels, in another recess in the rock. Soft, deep mossy green. Barret dries enough that it won't be horrible to pull on his fatigues. When he steps out into the main room Cloud's got the towel looped around his waist and he's piling his clothes neatly on the table next to his sword.

"You want help with your arm?" Cloud says.

Quiet. No fuck you at all. "It ain't going nowhere," Barret says.

Cloud nods. He pushes his wet hair back from his forehead—it's already starting to dry, fluffy little spikes standing up all over—and sits on the edge of the bed, his elbows on his knees. Barret could offer him another drink but that's not what either of them need. He sits down next to Cloud, instead. Looks out at the dark canyon.

"If I go to sleep it'll be morning," Cloud says.

The climb down out of the canyon, to the airfield, to the plane, and then to the strange and terrible north. Barret rubs his stump, the scar tissue lumpy but smooth after all these years, and thinks of all those other mornings. Expectations, and all that had to be done to meet them. A real shitshow, sure enough. Still: "It'll still be morning even if you're tired," Barret says.

Cloud snorts. "Yeah," he says, barely audible, and after a second he drags his hand over his face, and then rolls back onto the bed. He curls close to the far side of the mattress, shoulders hunched. In just the towel he looks very small.

Barret gets up, and makes a pile of his own crap on the loveseat. The socket and gun on top, waiting for the problems the morning'll bring. Then he snuffs the lamps, so the only light coming through the opening in the cave wall is moonlight and the lanterns strung along the canyon walkways, and then lays down careful on his right side. The mattress creaks under his weight. He sets his hand on Cloud's hip, over the towel, and there's a quiet breath in the dark before Cloud turns over, a crumple of elbows and his knees knocking into Barret's and then his head tucked down against Barret's bare chest, his body warm in the cooling room.

Barret tips his chin down, soft damp hair tickling his throat. Cloud breathes very softly against his skin and there's otherwise no sound beyond the occasional breeze across the rock, the sound of his own heartbeat. Somewhere, deep in the inn, the singing continues: a gentle and constant plea for the peace that was promised. Barret slides his hand up the smooth plane of Cloud's back, settles in. Thinks, before he sleeps, how strange it was that none of them understood that the only peace that'd ever come wasn't one you begged for, but the one you worked for.

#cloud/barret #final fantasy vii #my writing #less size kink this time #tho tbh with barret #there's never *not* size kink #anyway i know like three people will see this here #but like. maybe you have a friend who likes ff. you could. share it.

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