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It’s a balmy summer night, the kind where the bitter, cool taste of beer washes down like water, and sweat keeps dampening the back of Cloud’s neck.
The light catches in those slit-pupil green eyes, which for once are staring at him with all their usual possessiveness, but with something else now, too. Something indefinable. Just like the two of them.
It took a while to get used to his presence, for Cloud. Surprisingly, it had been even harder for everyone else. Cloud thought that he would be the very last of all people to come around, if he ever did. But he was the first, actually.
Sephiroth had simply appeared out of nowhere one day, in the dry landscape beyond Edge. This time without the taunting trio of strange children. No Jenova either. Just Sephiroth. Half-naked, with no wing, no weapon. Parched and weak.
It had been two years since Geostigma. Two years since they last laid eyes on each other. Sank their blades into one another.
Naturally, Cloud’s first reaction had been of terror and dread. But also, strangely, a feeling of relief. This sense of not being alone anymore. It seemed a silly, nonsensical thought. As if he had missed his mortal enemy.
Tifa still gives him the side eye when Sephiroth enters the bar. That’s fair, Cloud supposes. She’s one of the few whose body still bears the unmistakable scars of Masamune, although it’s really the invisible ones that run much deeper.
But Cloud can’t help but think that it has more to do with him, than their once-enemy.
How he couldn’t give her the family she wanted. Or be who she wanted.
There’s still no explanation for why Sephiroth is here, like this. The only thing different this time is that the Lifestream apparently decided to give Sephiroth back what it had taken from him. All the memories that he’d surrendered to its powerful currents, the first time Cloud sent him there.
The thought of that day still makes his stomach roil. But he can feel the way it makes Sephiroth sick, too. Could see the amount of regret in his eyes. The way he threw himself at his feet and asked Cloud to kill him a fourth time.
It wouldn’t have brought any of them back. Not his mother. Or Aerith. Or Zack.
So he didn’t.
They visited the church together and the lonely cliff side that symbolized their graves. The wind howled listlessly. He tried to listen to the flowers, like Aerith once told him. They seemed a bit brighter. Vivid. Welcoming them. Cloud took that as a sign.
He wishes Aerith would talk to him. Tell him that it’s right to forgive him. Sometimes, she’s like a God that you can talk and talk to, but never answers back. Perhaps she simply wanted him to make that decision on his own.
And so here they sit, Cloud trying to make sense of it all, trying to figure out why he isn’t feeling more conflicted. It had taken a while to realize that he’d never really known the real Sephiroth at all. Only the fragmented, incomplete version of him that had clawed its way out of the Lifestream.
Fragmented. Incomplete.
He can relate to that only all too well.
There are still pieces that are missing for him, and some that are too painful to fit back in place. Not for Sephiroth, though. He remembers absolutely everything. Cloud thinks that’s worse, by far.
Tifa sets down a pitcher of beer, stiffly, and two empty glasses. “Here you go.”
“Thanks, Tifa,” Cloud says, catching her arm before she can turn away, giving her a meaningful look. If he can forgive Sephiroth, then she could forgive him for leaving, couldn’t she?
The crimson eyes hold his gaze for a few seconds, followed by a sigh. Her other hand brushes his bare shoulder, briefly. It’s a slow process, he knows. She’s getting there.
Cloud has never been the most socially fluent person. Not even close. But Sephiroth is even worse. It’s like trying to teach an alien the normal human customs. That sounds about right.
He’s part-alien, anyway. It makes him shudder to think about what kind of childhood Sephiroth had, to not know any childhood games at all. Marlene was all too eager to teach him. It was equal parts endearing, delightful, and terrifying to watch.
“This one,” Cloud says, pouring amber, foamy liquid into their glass mugs, “is a grown-up game.”
“Oh?” A silver brow quirks at him. If he didn’t know any better, Cloud would take this response to be innuendo. But he knows that it’s not. Curiosity, more like.
“Don’t worry. No one wins or loses. We just get real drunk.”
“How would one play?”
“We take turns saying a statement. Like ‘Never have I ever lived in Edge.’ Since that’s true for us, we both drink. If it’s false, you don’t drink.” Demonstrating, Cloud takes a swig and gestures for Sephiroth to follow.
“This tastes... terrible.” Sephiroth makes a face.
He hadn’t been allowed to drink while at Shinra, back when he was their prized weapon of war. There was apparently an entire list of things Sephiroth wasn’t allowed to do back then.
“It’s supposed to,” Cloud grins. He holds up his cup in the air for far too long while Sephiroth stares at him blankly. “Cheers,” he bumps their cups together, and watches as Sephiroth carefully echoes the gesture.
“Your turn, then.”
Sephiroth looks thoughtful. “Never have I ever had blond hair.”
“That’s not how you play.”
“Isn’t it? Is not the objective to get your opponent to drink more?”
No, it’s not. The point is to get to know someone better. But Sephiroth couldn’t possibly know that. And with their minds still linked, and the walls between them finally coming down, they already know each other a bit too well.
It’s part of why he forgave him so easily. Cloud felt his sincerity. Knew that it was real.
“Okay, fine. Let’s see who wins, then.” He can see a smile playing across Sephiroth’s lips in response. Competitive bastard. Always wanting to win. That’s one of the only parts about him that has remained the same.
Cloud downs another gulp. It’s rather mediocre beer, but he won’t complain. It tastes like shit because the alcohol content in it is unusually potent. SOLDIER’S special. Mostly, he just wants to get drunk enough to not awaken from nightmares. One of them inevitably does, and it wakes up the other.
“Never have I ever used up half a bottle of shampoo per bath. Your turn.”
“Would you rather I cut my hair?”
“No. It’s very pretty.” That answer seems to please Sephiroth. He’s not used to being complimented these days, even with Cloud by his side.
“Never have I ever…” Sephiroth trails off, concentration overtaking his perfect face. “…been mistaken for a chocobo.”
“That was ONE time.” Cloud scowls at the memory. They like following him around, for some reason, but that time he found himself corralled by a flock and then pecked at by their beaks in a failed attempt to groom him.
“Drink,” Sephiroth commands with a smile. Cloud never thought he would enjoy the sight of him smiling. Well, no, that isn’t true. Once, a very long time ago, he had such thoughts.
“Never have I ever carried a sword longer than I am tall.” That should get him.
It was something that horrified the others, at first. That Cloud wanted to give him the one preserved copy of Masamune they had, the same one that once impaled President Shinra. But Sephiroth has done nothing besides clear simple monster nests since then, or practiced with him out on open fields.
Conceding with a sip, Sephiroth says pointedly, “Never have I ever carried a sword heavier than myself.”
“Is it heavier than me?” he feigns. “And besides, it’s not one sword, is it?”
“I believe you are splitting hairs. And yes, it is heavier than you.” That makes heat creep into Cloud’s cheeks. Of course he would know. But Cloud doesn’t really want the others to overhear.
Or maybe he does. Maybe that’s why he comes here with him.
“Okay. Well. Never have I ever ruined five pots and pans trying to make pasta,” Cloud snorts. There was never a need to cook in Sephiroth’s past, and neither did he have a mother to learn from. That evening, arriving home to the sight of a completely inedible dinner, Cloud sighed and promptly ordered take-out.
Sephiroth takes another measured sip. Pauses thoughtfully, like he’s thinking of an equal retort. “Never have I ever joined Shinra voluntarily.”
“Hey. I joined because of you, okay.”
“Is that so?” Amusement, but with a hint of sadness.
They had used Sephiroth as a tool for propaganda, once he was no longer useful in war. Used his image to mislead thousands of boys, just like him, to join a lost cause. To be used up. Spit back out. Rufus, for his part, was one of the first to welcome Sephiroth. None of them ever would have, though, without Cloud’s support. Admitting defeat for this round, he takes another refreshing gulp.
The buzz is pleasant, making even the drink taste a bit sweeter. “Okay. I got your number. Never have I ever...had a hometown.”
The words haunt him. They haunt them both.
The look on Sephiroth’s face is startled. A low, anxious voice whispers inside his mind.
Why would you say that?
“Because,” his words coming out a bit tipsy, “talking about it is better than not talking about it. Burying things doesn’t help.” His friends taught him that.
But it doesn’t take Sephiroth’s anxiety away. Instead, it keeps pulsing sympathetically along his own nerves. Maybe enough alcohol would help, though.
“Drink,” Cloud orders softly.
Sephiroth looks down, purses his lips. “It’s because of me...that you no longer have one.”
“And I forgave you. So drink.”
After a silence, Sephiroth lifts and then sets the glass down soundlessly. “Why would you,” he asks quietly.
“Because I don’t want to hate you. I never did.”
“But I hated you,” Sephiroth says, guilt in his voice, speaking with a strange bluntness usually only observed in children. “I continued to hate you because it was the only part of myself that could not be erased. The moment of you…killing me.”
The Nibelheim reactor. Zack’s sword. The chasm below them.
He remembers the Lifestream, too. How jumbled the memories became in there. How much of himself he lost. Trapped in illusions.
“Just drink, Sephiroth, damn it.”
“I deserve your hatred.”
“You hate yourself plenty. You don’t need mine.”
That day isn’t something he can ever forget, either. It’s something that he thinks about, even, when Sephiroth is on top of him, or inside of him. Guilt, he’s found, is the most useless emotion when it comes to things that can’t be changed. So he lets it go.
Finally, Sephiroth takes a long sip, silver hair spilling over a shoulder as his head tilts back.
Cloud hums, satisfied. “Your turn now.”
“Never have I ever pretended to make deliveries when I actually just don’t want to talk to anyone.” He breathes out through his nose, in that distinct way he does to express slight annoyance.
“That’s fair.” Cloud refills from the pitcher and swallows a few large gulps. Sephiroth isn’t the first to complain about that.
“Tell you what,” words slurring, “Let’s do it differently. Let’s try to pick things we can both drink to.” Vincent is driving them home later, and they might as well make the most of this pleasant opportunity to say things that would be hard to get out, otherwise.
“Did I win, then?” Sephiroth seems significantly less drunk than he is. Must be the amount of mako in his veins. They must have drowned him in it for decades.
“Wasn’t keeping track, sorry.”
“Hmm. Never have I ever snuck into the VR training rooms,” Sephiroth offers. They both down their glasses at the same time.
Sephiroth is too eager to drink for this one. Thinking about his old friends, probably. He had forgotten them, just like Cloud had once forgotten Zack. Not because he wanted to forget, but because he couldn’t hold onto the memory.
“Never have I ever,” Cloud says, eyes not leaving Sephiroth’s, “lost a good friend.” He takes a drink for Zack. Then one for Aerith. He wishes they were here. The golden liquid helps dull the pain.
Sephiroth drops his head, then takes separate gulps of his own. One. Two. Three. It’s raw, still, his own involvement in Cloud’s suffering. But it’s nice to share it with someone for once. Someone who knew Zack. Even if it’s the last person Cloud ever thought he would share that pain with.
“Never have I ever been tortured by a mad scientist,” Sephiroth murmurs distantly, his fathomless eyes swirling with mixed emotions.
They both drink. Neither of them will mourn Hojo. Though one of them wants to.
“Cloud,” he says softly, fingers brushing over his knuckles. “Why are we playing this game?”
“I just want to remember.” His words are slurred. Tears falling. “I just want to forget.” They no longer make sense, not even to himself.
He feels strong hands supporting his weight, slinging his arm around broad shoulders and curling around his waist. Even that hurts. It’s too reminiscent of the months he spent as useless, dead weight in Zack’s arms. Unable to crawl back to life until it was already too late.
“Put me down,” he growls lightly, but Sephiroth only holds him tighter. “C’mon, let go. I can walk m’self.”
“Let’s go home. Okay?” Feels a kiss against his forehead.
“Okay,” he mumbles.
Some time later, his head is in Sephiroth’s lap in the car, a hand stroking through his hair and rubbing slow circles on his back. He remembers Sephiroth doing that on the truck to Nibelheim, too. Helping him through the motion sickness. He’d been so kind, up until the moment he believed himself to be a monster.
“Never have I ever deserved you,” Cloud hears whispered somewhere above him, before the darkness and tiredness makes his eyelids too heavy.
With a contented sigh, he drifts off into sleep.
Thank you to a lovely person who commissioned a gift art for this fic, drawn by Legendspeaker ❤️