FIC Responsive Part 19
Dec. 23rd, 2006 11:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jessara40k_ljFinal Fantasy VII fic, pre-game, mostly, with a post-AC epilogue.
CloudxSephiroth - and yes that does mean Cloud is topping.
Rating R.
Another day spent patrolling the labs and Cloud wished it had been on any day but Tuesday; this was the first time they’d patrolled the labs since Finn arrived, and there was no way he could go out drinking with his squad when Sephiroth was waiting for him.
“Off to see your girl again instead of coming with us?”
“She’s busy all day on our regular leave days, so I only get the nights with her. I’m not giving that up for you lot when I see you every day.”
“No one expects you to kid.”
“Pity you spend so much of your free time doing extra training. Our little medic’s a bit obsessive about that.”
“I don’t want to disappoint the General. And that’s why he decided to focus on me, because I did the most independent training of my class. I’m really not that talented.” Cloud’s last words had all of his squad laughing as he walked out of the room, even though they were true; he’d made up for his lack of innate talent with extra work; work the more talented cadets hadn’t felt the need to do. He dismissed the question from his thoughts and considered what he wanted to do with Sephiroth; he still needed to get those measurements and they’d only played with the dildos for use on Sephiroth, never the ones they’d bought to use on Cloud. Could he manage to get both of those objective in tonight, or should he put getting Sephiroth to use a dildo on him off for tomorrow since he was planning to get the measurements in a game to keep Sephiroth from realising what he was doing.
It would depend on how that went he supposed, if he managed to get through the measurements quickly enough, and Sephiroth was up to another round then he’d try for having his lover use the smallest smooth dildo on him. But speaking of getting those measurements he hadn’t brought the pad of paper he’d decided on using to record the measurements on and to cover what he was doing, or the tape measure he’d need, so he detoured to the barracks first.
Even though he had the authorisation to be here Cloud still tended to make a little game of dodging the patrols when he could, just for the extra training, and this was one area where his small size and experience in dodging bullies back in Nibelheim came in handy. He could get away with a few visits, but not on days his squad knew he was visiting ‘his girl’ rather than training or going out with them.
He got to Sephiroth’s room without anyone spotting him and he set up what he needed in the bathroom, leaving the tape measure in plain sight, along with a stiff brush, a soft brush, a feather and some other things as well as a blindfold and his drawing pad, pencil and pen. Then he began doing some more reading; he thought he could approve the book he was reading for Sephiroth to read, if he got it finished and still approved of what it said, and he only had a chapter or so to go.
He hadn’t quite finished when Sephiroth arrived, just a paragraph left, and Cloud broke his own rule, finishing the book before he stood to greet his lover, pulling Sephiroth’s head down to his for a kiss.
“Cloud? You aren’t...displeased are you?” Cloud hated how uncertain he’d just made his lover sound, and he stroked his back gently in comfort.
“No, I just wanted to finish this book, so I could be sure it was okay for you to read.” He hesitated, then when Sephiroth didn’t say anything decided it would be best to apologise. “I’m sorry, I should have put the book aside to greet you and then read the last few sentences.”
“You don’t need to apologise to me Cloud. I was just a bit worried.” Cloud could tell Sephiroth wanted to ask if he was allowed to read the book, and he decided to save him the trouble.
“You can read the book when you have time. Did you manage to get through that first book I said you could read?”
“Not quite, not yet.” Cloud had a feeling Sephiroth was about to apologise and he lifted his hand to lay a finger across his lips.
“Don’t apologise, but I would like to know when you do finish each book I approve for you to read.” Cloud pulled Sephiroth down to sit by him on the couch as he spoke.
“I can do that.” He smiled at Cloud, warming his heart. “And Zack has no problem moving our evening drinking together to Saturday.”
“Thanks for arranging that. Have you let him talk you into cross-dressing yet?”
“No, not yet. I’ll let him make one more attempt to persuade me before I agree.”
“Good. It might be an idea to insist that I get involved with the planning, since it could take a while to get everything together for something as elaborate as that...and to be honest you’re way too tall for it to be easy to make you look like a woman.”
“And the wrong body shape, I know. I’m not interested in women, but even the few that join the army rarely develop muscles like mine, or shoulders as wide as mine are.” The way Sephiroth shifted then drew Cloud’s attention to the tension in those shoulders, and he moved them both so he could dig his thumbs into the knotted muscles, trying to help him relax a bit.
“That might have something to do with the branches they’re allowed in. Medical and Admin aren’t really expected to be able to do the sort of things troopers can manage, and the Turks are supposed to look ordinary aren’t they?” And besides, despite his strength Sephiroth wasn’t as bulky with muscle as you’d expect, it was almost as if his muscles were denser than normal muscles - and they felt that way under his hands too.
“True, still, I’d like to see what Zack can do to make me look like a woman. If he can manage it. I...did you have anything special planned for tonight?” There was a note of hope in his voice, and Cloud pushed Sephiroth’s hair aside to kiss the back of his neck.
“Yes. I want to take you into the bathroom, blindfold you, bind you with ice and then tease you with my touch. I want to draw you like that as well.” Cloud could tell that Sephiroth was going to protest and he reached to lay a finger on his lips. “Hush, I’m not going to keep the drawing, you can have it and destroy it if you want to, if it’s good enough to be recognisable as you, I just want to have fun. And if you want you can try and draw me afterwards.”
“If that is what you want then.” Sephiroth stood and walked through to the bathroom, stripping as he went. Cloud followed him, to see Sephiroth looking through the pad of paper he’d brought with him - he’d already done a few sketches in it, as cover, and that included a very rough sketch of a man right at the front which he intended to use to note the measurements down on. “How do you want me?”
“I could probably use some more energy first. Do you want to link to me, or should I just take it from you?” Sephiroth shivered faintly in excitement when Cloud suggested taking his energy, but he reached out and made the link himself, pouring energy into Cloud’s reserves until he told him to stop. Then Cloud blindfolded and positioned his lover and used the Ice materia to weave bonds of ice around him, this time making them look deceptively fragile and avoiding the places he needed to measure. He couldn’t reach up far enough to kiss Sephiroth, not easily anyway, so instead he knelt and took him into his mouth, then pulled back once he was fully aroused, forming a cock-ring of ice, as well as a net around Sephiroth’s balls.
He flipped to the front of his pad, and made a couple of measurements, then switched to tickling Sephiroth with the brush and feather around his nipples, before leaning forward to bite lightly at one nipple. Then he began making the rough outline for his drawing of Sephiroth in position, and moved to wrap a scarf around Sephiroth’s waist, then around his wrist and made a few more measurements before picking up a ‘whip’ he’d made by tying a few ribbons to the end of a pen. He walked around Sephiroth to run it over his back, teasingly and adding a few more details to his sketch, enjoying the faint hitch of arousal in Sephiroth’s breathing.
“Do you want me to use this on you? I don’t really know how to very well, but I doubt it could really hurt anyone. Don’t answer yet.” Cloud took the scarf again, holding it around Sephiroth’s thigh and sliding it down to his ankle, then rising up as he made the last measurements and backed away to sketch a bit more, focusing on the leg he’d just teased. “You can answer now.” He walked around behind Sephiroth as he spoke, running the ‘whip’ over his back again, carefully.
“Please love.”
“How many?” Cloud hadn’t expected this, but he’d made sure the ‘whip’ wasn’t going to do more than tease anyway, so...
“Fifteen?” Cloud’s age...he really didn’t think this was a good idea, but he used the ‘whip’ on his lover, making him count the lashes out, grateful to see that his blows barely turned Sephiroth’s skin pink for a few seconds and then returned to what he’d been doing before. He actually got caught up in drawing Sephiroth after a while, working on the pattern the ice made against his skin, so he was startled to hear Sephiroth’s voice shaking when he spoke.
“Cloud...I...Hojo!”
“Shit!” He pulled the Fire materia and melted the ice around Sephiroth quickly, putting an arm around his waist in support and reaching up to pull off the blindfold. “Are you okay now Sephiroth? Just tell me what you need.”
“I...just hold me?” Sephiroth glanced at him pleadingly, and Cloud began guiding his lover through to the bedroom. “The sound of your pencil...it just bothered me. If you want to do this again don’t blindfold me, please?”
“I won’t. I promise. Do you want to look at the picture? It isn’t very good but...”
“Please. It might be a good distraction, remind me that you were drawing me, not making notes on how I was behaving.” Cloud helped Sephiroth sit down on the bed, grateful that he’d thought to grab the pad and handed it to him, open to the picture he’d been drawing. “I...you can recognise me, I have to destroy it.”
“Tomorrow, for now let’s just go to sleep.” Cloud stripped and lay down beside his lover, mentally vowing to talk about some things the next day.
“As you wish.” Sephiroth snuggled into Cloud’s arms and relaxed.
o0()0o
Cloud wasn’t particularly happy, and he knew that Alex and Marius had been a bit intimidated by his temper today when they went hunting, so it had been far less successful than he’d got used to it being. So when Zack spotted him back at the compound after putting his materia away he didn’t bother holding back his temper.
“Hey, you’re back early. Did something go wrong?”
“You could say that. You need to have a word with your sponsees, I can’t believe the way they went to pieces just because I snapped at them a bit. We didn’t have much luck finding monsters to kill either.” Cloud snorted at that. “Good thing too, Alex and Marius were getting in each other’s way and mine more than managing to work together.” Zack looked a bit taken aback by Cloud’s reaction, but he smiled and responded easily enough.
“They should have already learned that, but I’ll have a word with them, sure. Want to tell me what had you so angry then? It’s not like you.” Zack pulled him out of the corridor, into an empty office.
“I...” Cloud wasn’t sure what he could say, except one thing was obvious. “Have you seen Sephiroth today?”
“Yes, he didn’t act...no, he was a bit more distant. Did you two have a quarrel?”
“Sort of. You know we’re kinky, and there were issues with that last night. Sephiroth didn’t give me a chance to talk to him this morning either.” And he was worried about his lover, very worried.
“I don’t want to know then. You’ll talk to him tonight then?”
“Yes, I’ll talk to him, if he lets me.” But he shouldn’t be angry when he talked to Sephiroth, that would just cause problems. “You want to spar with me for a bit, let me work out some anger before I talk to Sephiroth?”
“Yeah, I can make time for that.”
“Thanks.” Had he told Zack about how he could draw on his anger to fight better? Or had Sephiroth told him about it? Or was it just their secret? Sephiroth had advised him not to let too many people know about that trick, because it would give him an advantage if his opponents didn’t know about it, so Zack probably didn’t know unless Cloud had told him and forgotten about it.
Apparently he hadn’t told Zack about it, because afterwards, once he’d worked the anger out of his system Zack looked almost shocked by the way he had attacked during their spars.
“You’ve got better, but you haven’t fought that aggressively since I sparred with you officially when you were a cadet.” It wasn’t quite a question, and Cloud wasn’t going to explain his attitude to Zack.
“Thanks, it’s been what, seven, eight weeks since we’ve had a chance to spar?”
“Eight, but I didn’t think you’d have that much time to train while you were on your mission.”
“I wasn’t allowed to leave our base camp for most of the mission, so I had plenty of time to train. Mostly by myself, but the sparring partners I had before the mission were usually willing to teach me new moves, and this gave me time to ingrain them better.” Cloud shrugged and smiled at Zack, wondering if he should bring their plans to get Sephiroth into women’s clothes up, or if Zack would.
“You know Sephiroth doesn’t seem too keen on the idea of letting us disguise him as a woman.” Zack had made sure there was no one near enough to hear them before speaking, and his voice was quiet, so he wasn’t being indiscreet. “Are you sure I’ll be able to talk him into it? Getting him into a male disguise will probably work well enough.”
“He said he’d make you work for his agreement, but I think one more try should be enough. He’s actually a bit curious about what you have in mind considering how tall and muscular he is.” Cloud grinned at Zack, but there were people in hearing range, so he wasn’t surprised when Zack made his excuses to leave.
He ate then went back into Midgar to get the deposit he needed out before going to the shop to check about his custom order. Both of the options with bands at the thighs were out of his price range, but the option of bands at wrists, elbows, ankles and knees was within his price range for chains with integral locks as well as chains without integral locks. He gave the measurements and selected the first option, slightly more expensive than the second, handing over 6940 gil as the deposit and confirmed that they’d be ready by the end of December.
“I might not be able to pick them up then, since I’d rather leave them here until as close as possible to my sub’s birthday, or it might be that I’ll be away on a mission then, but you can hold them for me, can’t you?” Cloud smiled at Wesley and Robert with all the confidence he could muster.
“Pay 10410 gil when they’re ready, and we’ll hold them for up to three months guaranteed until you pay the last 17350 gil. After that we might have to sell them to another customer to recoup our losses.”
“Fair enough.” Cloud nodded and left then, resisting the temptation to look around the shop for something new to play with - they hadn’t finished trying out what they’d already got yet. He wanted to have Sephiroth use one of the small dildos on him tonight, but he didn’t think his lover would be in any condition to tend to his pleasure like that, instead he needed to figure out what happened last night, and that meant talking to Sephiroth and probably reassuring him a lot. Not that Cloud would mind doing that, but it wasn’t exactly what he wanted to do, it was something he felt it was his duty to do, and the fact that it was a fairly pleasant duty didn’t stop it being a duty.
He spent the time he was waiting for Sephiroth thinking about what he needed to talk to him about. First the fact that Sephiroth had wanted him to use the ‘whip’ on him - not really that much of an issue, considering how it had been made, but Sephiroth hadn’t been able to tell anything about it, and the number of ‘lashes’ he’d asked for troubled Cloud. Then Cloud had the feeling that they really should talk about why he’d used his safeword to stop the game, except considering how private his lover was he didn’t think Sephiroth would be willing to explain it to him. He knew what not to do again anyway; blindfold Sephiroth and let him hear Cloud writing or drawing; that would have to be enough unless his lover was willing to say anything else and Cloud wasn’t going to pressure him.
Sephiroth moved absolutely silently as he entered the room, and something about his body language said he was feeling guilty, so Cloud let him come and kneel in front of him, head bowed, rather than stand to greet his lover.
“Are you expecting me to punish you?” Cloud stroked Sephiroth’s hair gently, leaning forward and resisting the temptation to kiss him, knowing that he needed to appear at least a little stern at the moment.
“Yes Cloud.” He’d prefer to see Sephiroth’s eyes, so Cloud reached down to lift his chin until his lover met his eyes.
“And tell me why you deserve to be punished.”
“For wakening you with pleasure I did not share physically, then leaving before you could talk to me.”
“Two different things, so I’ll punish you two different ways.” Something about those words made Sephiroth tense for a second, and Cloud added that to his list of things to ask about. “Since you didn’t want to share my pleasure this morning you don’t get to climax at all tonight. For leaving before I could speak to you I intend to ask you questions, you are to answer fully and truthfully, unless you choose to use your safewords to stop that line of questions. Do you understand?”
“Yes Cloud, you’re being very generous, thank you.”
“Good, go get yourself clean and join me in the bedroom.” Sephiroth obeyed silently and Cloud went through to the bedroom, pulling out the scarves, since he thought his lover would be more comfortable talking if he was bound, as well as the heaviest cock-ring they’d bought.
“Put this on.” He tossed the cock-ring to Sephiroth and waited for him to obey. Sephiroth didn’t look surprised, and even smiled slightly as he obeyed, which irritated Cloud just a little bit. “Good boy, now come here and lie on the bed face down.” Something in the way Sephiroth moved told Cloud that he’d liked being called a ‘good boy’, and he made a mental note of that as he tied Sephiroth’s hands over his head and his legs open.
The way the tension Sephiroth always carried in his body dissipated as Cloud completed the bindings was amazing, and he capitalised on that by beginning to massage his lover’s back before he said anything.
“The ‘whip’, why did you agree to let me use it so easily?”
“You said you doubted it would really hurt” The sheer trust in those words was breathtaking. “And...I wanted to see if I enjoyed the sensation before asking for anything heavier.”
“Thank you love. But why fifteen strokes?”
“It was the first number to come to mind.” Sephiroth sounded puzzled by the question, and Cloud laughed then, kissing the back of his neck.
“Good, very good. Now, can you tell me why you needed to safeword out?” He moved down and licked the centre of his lover’s ass to give him something pleasant to focus on.
“I...can I just say bad memories?” The strain in Sephiroth’s voice told Cloud not to push.
“Of course, if you can tell me something about why they only affected you at the end.” He had his suspicions, but he’d rather hear confirmation of them.
“Because you stopped touching me.”
“I thought it might be that. Good, you’re doing well, just one more question then.” Cloud began preparing Sephiroth as he spoke, a bit more roughly and swiftly than he usually did, since he knew that was what Sephiroth preferred. “Why did you almost flinch when I said I was punishing you for two different things?”
“In the labs...the professor would break transgressions up into different parts to give him excuses to discipline me more.” And Cloud had done almost the exact same thing, except he didn’t really think Sephiroth was upset about either of the punishments Cloud had chosen. “But...this makes a good excuse to try that orgasm denial game, doesn’t it?” There was a hint of dry humour in Sephiroth’s voice, and Cloud had to laugh in response.
“Yes, it does.” Cloud spent the rest of the evening teasing Sephiroth, without letting him climax, and taking him as many times as he could.
o0()0o
This time Cloud didn’t even join his squad to eat, since he’d taken a couple of ration bars from his gear and could eat them on the way there, as well as having eaten a heavier than usual lunch.
“Hey, where are you running off to?” Dylan could be obnoxious sometimes, but he did care. The man sometimes reminded Cloud of a watered down version of Zack, personality-wise anyway.
“I was almost late last time, I don’t want to do that again.”
“Yeah, you don’t want to piss the General off like that.”
“Or Colonel Grafton.”
“Go on then. Just get back by curfew.” Cloud felt a bit insulted by that, he’d never missed curfew yet, and he forced himself to forget about that as he made his way to his lesson.
“You’re early. The General hasn’t even got here yet.” No other response than that, certainly nothing approving or disapproving in the colonel’s voice - it was even more neutral than Sephiroth’s usually was.
“Yes sir. I wanted to ask you something before Sephiroth got here.”
“What is it?” Colonel Grafton put the sword he was working on to one side at that - or perhaps he’d just got it to a good stopping place, Cloud didn’t know.
“Can I stay back for an hour after our lessons to do some more of the repairs I need to do, and extra work on my slots?” He wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to add the next part, but it would be rude not to. “Please sir.”
“As long as I’m free to stay back and monitor you, yes you can. I can give you an extra half an hour today, but why don’t you go and pour the base for another slot or two if you have time before the General gets here?” Colonel Grafton half turned away from Cloud, looking for something on the bench behind him.
“Yes sir. He said that if I wanted to I could use the moulds you’d given him as well, since his seem to turn out perfect every time so far.” Colonel Grafton laughed at that.
“I’ll wait until I can hear that from him if you don’t mind.”
“Of course sir. I’ll probably only have time to do one slot base before he arrives anyway.” Cloud smiled up at the other man, and he laughed again, handing a Fire materia in a bracer to Cloud.
“Go on then, get started.” Cloud saluted quickly and turned towards his work area, setting up the mould first, and pouring it as slowly and carefully as he could. Sephiroth had arrived by the time he looked up, but they weren’t starting yet, so he set his other work up carefully, fitting the top plate and putting the poured slot base into the press.
“Did Cloud tell you what I said about your slots, Sephiroth?” Cloud knew that the Colonel couldn’t really take his word for it, even if it would be stupid of him to lie, so he didn’t say anything. Instead Sephiroth defended him, a hint of humour in his voice.
“Yes, and I agreed to let him use the moulds you assigned to me to pour the extra moulds he needed. Since his weren’t as ‘perfect’ as you described mine as being.”
“And since he’s enough of a perfectionist to reject a slot that would be good enough for any other student, but not good enough for one of my men.” The colonel seemed to be inviting them both to share the joke, and Cloud smiled with Sephiroth. “Oh, and we’ll use some of the extra time you’ve arranged so you can learn a bit about how to judge which slots are suitable to use, and which need to be melted down and cast again.”
“Thank you sir.” It sounded as if that was something extra he’d be learning, not something taught as standard, and Cloud made sure he sounded suitably appreciative. “Which method are we going to use to make the circuits today sir?”
“Chisels. I want both of you to be able to complete your first slot next week, and that means you need to use the method that will let you take them away to finish off today Sephiroth.” And Sephiroth was less likely to be content with that method then with melting the alloy and pouring it into moulds in Cloud’s opinion.
“Then should we do those now, to give them time to cool before we leave?” Cloud returned the looks Colonel Grafton and Sephiroth were giving him, as levelly as he could.
“They don’t take that long to cool, but you might as well. Here.” Colonel Grafton handed the shaped chisels, a small but heavy hammer and a small sheet of lunarium to Cloud, giving Sephiroth the same equipment, but with a sheet of metarium instead of lunarium and the addition of a Fire materia in a bracer.
“Right, with this exercise you need to remember to hold back. I know that you lot would normally be trying to do as much damage as you can, but to make this work you can’t melt the sheet, just soften it enough to make it easier to cut through. And if you can’t manage that there’s no way you’ll be able to manage the control you need to set your circuits in the slots.” Cloud exchanged a glance with Sephiroth and pulled the Fire materia out of the slot it was set in, and Sephiroth did the same thing.
“What are you doing?”
“I find that the finer control comes easier when I’m using a materia without slotting it.” Cloud was grateful that Sephiroth had followed his example, so he could use one of the unstable energy levels to focus power through the Fire materia, which he suspected would be a lot easier than trying to choke back a standard Fire spell.
“Ah...if you say so, sir. You know what to do?” Colonel Grafton was looking at Sephiroth, so Cloud took the opportunity to focus his energy through the materia, softening the sheet of lunarium and using the chisels to cut out the circuits as quickly as he could while focusing on what a slotted materia ‘felt’ like. He was surprised to see that the circuits stayed inside the chisels, trapped there when he lifted the chisels off, and Cloud bit his lip before reluctantly drawing Colonel Grafton’s attention from Sephiroth.
“Sir, is this normal?” He hoped he hadn’t screwed up too badly as he showed the chisels with their circuits trapped inside to the colonel. Colonel Grafton looked amused by his problem, but at least he didn’t laugh outright.
“Not quite, but I understand it does happen. They’ll come out once they cool and shrink, as long as you didn’t heat the alloy enough for it to start melting.” He glanced at the rest of the lunarium as he spoke, noting the perfect holes cut in the sheet. “But if you’d done that you probably wouldn’t have been able to remove the chisels.”
“Right sir.” He smiled as he acknowledged the information and paid attention as the colonel explained what Cloud had done wrong when he replaced one of the sprung claws, then how to do it properly. Apparently he’d made a few errors in how he’d cut the damaged claw away - he wasn’t supposed to try and shape the cut away part to the replacement, instead he should have shaped the replacement claw to the part of the slot he had to cut away. It was easier this way, and he felt a bit embarrassed by the way he’d done it the first time, but he hadn’t known any better at the time. This way took longer, but he could tell that it made for a much better fit between the slot and the replaced claw.
Once he’d finished with the slots that needed to be repaired that way and the ones with cracks he hadn’t gotten to last time Cloud turned his attention to the circuits he’d cut out, relieved to see that they weren’t trapped in the chisels any longer, and that they’d come free. These looked almost wrong though, unfinished, especially compared to the circuits he’d made from metarium, but even compared to the circuits he’d seen coming from the moulds Colonel Grafton had used. And he was pretty sure this set of circuits weren’t going to work very well, he couldn’t feel the same level of connection to them that he had to the circuits he made earlier, despite having the same type of images in mind when making these.
He glanced over to make sure the colonel wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, and hid two scraps of lunarium away in his pocket, for him to test his theory with later - they were only just cool enough to touch, even if just for a few seconds. Sephiroth’s circuits were still trapped in the chisels, but he lifted them up, and tapped them, freeing the circuits easily and letting the four of them fall into the palm of his hand.
“Be careful sir!” Colonel Grafton sounded worried, raising a faint smile from Sephiroth as he held out his hand for inspection.
“I rarely have to worry about burns, certainly not from metal that isn’t even molten.”
“I see.” But the slightly blank look in his eyes said he didn’t really see, not that it mattered Cloud supposed. “Here. You need specialised files to finish the circuits off properly.” He handed one bag to Cloud, and the other to Sephiroth, and Cloud carefully wrapped his circuits before putting them in the bag with the files. “Remember to focus on the purpose of the circuit and how a materia ‘looks’ when you’re working on them.”
“I will.” Sephiroth glanced over at the clock with a faint frown. “Do you think we have time to try the other method of making the circuits today?”
“Yes, I think you do.” There was a hint of surprise in Colonel Grafton’s voice as he followed Sephiroth’s gaze, and he brought out the moulds, as well as some more metarium and lunarium, and the appropriate equipment for that. After Sephiroth had left Cloud managed to pour the bases for two more slots before he had to leave.
o0()0o
Cloud hadn’t gotten time to read the letter he’d received until after they’d finished the platoon exercises, so he opened it just before the squad began eating. He smiled without thinking about it when he read the letter, he’d got the promotion, and it came with a 1200 gil pay rise - as well as being required to spend every other Tuesday working in the infirmary, both starting on the 1st of December.
“Good news?” Finn sounded faintly mocking, and Cloud wasn’t sure how to respond since he wanted to be rude to him, but he knew that would almost certainly cause bad feelings, especially since his words hadn’t been offensive, just his tone. Finn didn’t have many friends in the squad, and almost all of their squad mates respected Cloud, so he didn’t want to inadvertently cause him to be ostracised, in case Finn didn’t get through into SOLDIER this time.
“You waited until now to open that? It’s just the official promotion we’ve been waiting on. So, want to go out to celebrate?” Sergeant Redson had just replaced one problem with another for Cloud, and he frowned unhappily.
“No, I’m sorry, but I already had something planned this evening. Tomorrow perhaps?” Cloud finished with a hopeful smile; he was sure Zack would be perfectly happy to have Sephiroth to himself on Sunday evening after all.
“That’ll give us time to plan something good won’t it?” Dylan had what Cloud had started to think of as his ‘Zack-look’ in his eyes now, and glancing around the squad he could see that just about everyone else was willing to play along with him. Probably more for the excuse to celebrate in general than specifically for Cloud’s success, but he’d go along with them - it would certainly make Zack happy.
“If you insist.” Cloud smiled more strongly now, then glanced at the clock. “Look, Colonel Grafton’s staying behind so I’ll have a chance to talk to him about something, so I should go now.”
“Ah, right, go ahead.” Cloud thought it was interesting how even off-duty the whole squad deferred to their sergeant, but not really a surprise; they were used to that, and the power dynamics didn’t really change when they weren’t working, not the way the dynamics between him and Sephiroth changed once no one was looking. He considered that as he made his way to the armoury. Cloud had never seen Zack interacting with Sephiroth when they were both on duty, but he knew that Zack had to act differently with him then than he did while off duty, because otherwise he’d have been thrown out of the army by now. That was one thing Dylan didn’t have in common with Zack, the willingness to push his superior when he was off duty, and Cloud was glad of that, because then he was certain there’d be power struggles, which would be tiring.
“Sir?” It looked as if the head armourer was just finishing some paperwork, but this time no one had met Cloud and told him what to do, so he was careful to show proper respect, and tried not to interrupt anything important.
“Ah, Cloud, did Sephiroth want you to take his moulded circuits to him, or put them away for him?” He hadn’t expected that question, and he didn’t have the key for Sephiroth’s locker, so...
“I don’t think he considered that sir. But I’ll be seeing him tonight anyway, so I can take them to him if you want, since he didn’t give me his key.” He hadn’t planned on taking his own moulded circuits with him to work on this week - he had more time to get them ready than Sephiroth did, and he suspected that finishing the moulded ones wouldn’t feel like a chore the way finishing the cut ones did. He hoped so anyway, since he liked the process of making the moulded circuits better than the process of making the cut circuits. “Ummm...did you have to check those as well?”
“In case you screwed them up beyond all possible use, yes. With these either they come out perfect; as yours and the General’s both did; or they’re unusable, and there’s no way to allow a lesser standard for students. Shall we talk about the bases for your slots?”
“Yes please sir.”
“You did a bit better this time. One was still ‘student quality’, and a discard by the standards of a qualified armourer, but it was a bit closer to meeting my minimum standards. The second was about average quality for our production, and the last was a little above average.” He smiled approvingly and handed two slots and two bags of circuits to Cloud as he spoke, and Cloud smiled back at him.
“Thank you. I followed Sephiroth’s advice to pour the slots more slowly and carefully, so I think that might be it.” Cloud put the slots away in his locker as he spoke, and checked inside the bags before putting the lunarium circuits away as well. “I’ll probably make the rest of my circuits by pouring them into moulds, since that method feels easier, but I’d like you to check the quality of the slots I produce by each method first if you would.”
“Then you need to put two slots together at each of your next two lessons.”
“I think I can do that sir. Will we be learning how to put our slots into a form we can use, in a weapon, or a bracer or something like that as well?”
“No, I’m afraid not, but I can tell you where to go to get them put into a usable form.”
“Thank you then.” Cloud was already fairly confident about where he wanted to go to get Sephiroth’s slot set; he’d measured around his lover’s bicep and his throat, and they were close enough in size that he could get a band set with a slot that would fit both, acting as a collar in private, and a simple armband in public. He intended to order that to match the restraints he wanted to give to Sephiroth, so that this could be the birthday gift he gave his lover in front of Zack. But he needed to find out about where to get the first modified slot put into an armband or something like that so Zack could test it out for him, and as quickly as possible. “I’ll ask you about that in a week’s time then.”
“Goodbye then.” Colonel Grafton had been subtly shepherding him to the door since he shut his locker, but Cloud only realised it then as he stepped out of the door beside him. He snorted and detoured by his barracks to pick up his sewing kit and the set of circuits he would have to file into shape this week as well as the files to do it with.
“Who are you and what are you doing here?” He’d been careless, but it wasn’t as if he didn’t have the right to be here, and he had a perfect excuse.
“Private Strife, General Sephiroth’s sponsee. Running an errand for him, there were a few things he wanted me to pick up from Colonel Grafton for him.”
“Carry on then.” He didn’t recognise either of the men who’d stopped him, but they belonged to the 7th Sword, not the 3rd, and Cloud forgot about them as he made his way to Zack’s quarters.
“Colonel Grafton assumed I was supposed to pick these up for you, since I didn’t have the key to your locker.” He tossed the bag of metarium circuits at Sephiroth as he spoke, not surprised that his lover caught them easily.
“We forgot about them, didn’t we?” Sephiroth smiled ruefully as he put the bag down, and Cloud was glad to see that he had brought his other circuits with him and was working them now, so it wouldn’t be a problem for Cloud to work on his own now. After he’d sewn his new insignia onto his jacket.
“Are you going to be playing with those things too?” There was a hint of disgust in Zack’s voice, and Cloud glanced at Sephiroth, grinning at the speculation in his eyes.
“You know there’s that new programme for some SOLDIERs and medics to learn about materia slots, I think perhaps you should join it, as an example for the rest.”
“Good idea. Mind I don’t think he’ll be pushed as hard as we’re being pushed.” Cloud pulled his jacket off, putting it in his lap and putting his sewing kit to one side. “And yes, I’ll be working on my circuits, after I’ve sewn my new insignia onto my jacket.”
“You got the promotion then?” Sephiroth sounded happy for him, and Cloud couldn’t help but smile back.
“Yes, it’s effective from Tuesday, and my squad want to take me out to celebrate tomorrow.” He ran a hand teasingly down Sephiroth’s throat and chest in apology, then verbalised it. “Sorry, I couldn’t really say no, it was hard enough refusing to celebrate with them today.”
“I understand. Will I get Monday evening alone with you then?” Cloud couldn’t resist the hope in Sephiroth’s voice, and he lifted his lover’s hand to kiss the inside of the wrist.
“Oh yes. And Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday if Zack doesn’t mind.”
“No, I can go see my girl then, but I want a chance to spar with you again on Wednesday. Do you know where you’re going to celebrate with your squad?”
“No, it’s not like we have somewhere we usually go.” Cloud shrugged as he focused on his jacket, not bothering to point out that even if they did have a regular pub he wouldn’t know what it was.
“Hmmm.” There was something speculative in Zack’s voice and face, but he visibly decided to drop the subject. “Anyway Sephiroth’s agreed to that cross-dressing idea I had, so what colour are we going to make his hair and eyes? I need to know for the dress.”
“Dark red hair, and the eyes will probably be some shade of green.”
“Give me some sort of idea about the dress please, so I’ll know what sort of weapons I can hide in it.” Sephiroth sounded a bit frustrated, as if he’d asked this before, but Zack did answer now.
“A kimono, to help hide your muscles. But I’m not saying anything else. Hey, Spike, you haven’t gotten a drink yet. Let me get you a beer.”
o0()0o
CloudxSephiroth - and yes that does mean Cloud is topping.
Rating R.
Another day spent patrolling the labs and Cloud wished it had been on any day but Tuesday; this was the first time they’d patrolled the labs since Finn arrived, and there was no way he could go out drinking with his squad when Sephiroth was waiting for him.
“Off to see your girl again instead of coming with us?”
“She’s busy all day on our regular leave days, so I only get the nights with her. I’m not giving that up for you lot when I see you every day.”
“No one expects you to kid.”
“Pity you spend so much of your free time doing extra training. Our little medic’s a bit obsessive about that.”
“I don’t want to disappoint the General. And that’s why he decided to focus on me, because I did the most independent training of my class. I’m really not that talented.” Cloud’s last words had all of his squad laughing as he walked out of the room, even though they were true; he’d made up for his lack of innate talent with extra work; work the more talented cadets hadn’t felt the need to do. He dismissed the question from his thoughts and considered what he wanted to do with Sephiroth; he still needed to get those measurements and they’d only played with the dildos for use on Sephiroth, never the ones they’d bought to use on Cloud. Could he manage to get both of those objective in tonight, or should he put getting Sephiroth to use a dildo on him off for tomorrow since he was planning to get the measurements in a game to keep Sephiroth from realising what he was doing.
It would depend on how that went he supposed, if he managed to get through the measurements quickly enough, and Sephiroth was up to another round then he’d try for having his lover use the smallest smooth dildo on him. But speaking of getting those measurements he hadn’t brought the pad of paper he’d decided on using to record the measurements on and to cover what he was doing, or the tape measure he’d need, so he detoured to the barracks first.
Even though he had the authorisation to be here Cloud still tended to make a little game of dodging the patrols when he could, just for the extra training, and this was one area where his small size and experience in dodging bullies back in Nibelheim came in handy. He could get away with a few visits, but not on days his squad knew he was visiting ‘his girl’ rather than training or going out with them.
He got to Sephiroth’s room without anyone spotting him and he set up what he needed in the bathroom, leaving the tape measure in plain sight, along with a stiff brush, a soft brush, a feather and some other things as well as a blindfold and his drawing pad, pencil and pen. Then he began doing some more reading; he thought he could approve the book he was reading for Sephiroth to read, if he got it finished and still approved of what it said, and he only had a chapter or so to go.
He hadn’t quite finished when Sephiroth arrived, just a paragraph left, and Cloud broke his own rule, finishing the book before he stood to greet his lover, pulling Sephiroth’s head down to his for a kiss.
“Cloud? You aren’t...displeased are you?” Cloud hated how uncertain he’d just made his lover sound, and he stroked his back gently in comfort.
“No, I just wanted to finish this book, so I could be sure it was okay for you to read.” He hesitated, then when Sephiroth didn’t say anything decided it would be best to apologise. “I’m sorry, I should have put the book aside to greet you and then read the last few sentences.”
“You don’t need to apologise to me Cloud. I was just a bit worried.” Cloud could tell Sephiroth wanted to ask if he was allowed to read the book, and he decided to save him the trouble.
“You can read the book when you have time. Did you manage to get through that first book I said you could read?”
“Not quite, not yet.” Cloud had a feeling Sephiroth was about to apologise and he lifted his hand to lay a finger across his lips.
“Don’t apologise, but I would like to know when you do finish each book I approve for you to read.” Cloud pulled Sephiroth down to sit by him on the couch as he spoke.
“I can do that.” He smiled at Cloud, warming his heart. “And Zack has no problem moving our evening drinking together to Saturday.”
“Thanks for arranging that. Have you let him talk you into cross-dressing yet?”
“No, not yet. I’ll let him make one more attempt to persuade me before I agree.”
“Good. It might be an idea to insist that I get involved with the planning, since it could take a while to get everything together for something as elaborate as that...and to be honest you’re way too tall for it to be easy to make you look like a woman.”
“And the wrong body shape, I know. I’m not interested in women, but even the few that join the army rarely develop muscles like mine, or shoulders as wide as mine are.” The way Sephiroth shifted then drew Cloud’s attention to the tension in those shoulders, and he moved them both so he could dig his thumbs into the knotted muscles, trying to help him relax a bit.
“That might have something to do with the branches they’re allowed in. Medical and Admin aren’t really expected to be able to do the sort of things troopers can manage, and the Turks are supposed to look ordinary aren’t they?” And besides, despite his strength Sephiroth wasn’t as bulky with muscle as you’d expect, it was almost as if his muscles were denser than normal muscles - and they felt that way under his hands too.
“True, still, I’d like to see what Zack can do to make me look like a woman. If he can manage it. I...did you have anything special planned for tonight?” There was a note of hope in his voice, and Cloud pushed Sephiroth’s hair aside to kiss the back of his neck.
“Yes. I want to take you into the bathroom, blindfold you, bind you with ice and then tease you with my touch. I want to draw you like that as well.” Cloud could tell that Sephiroth was going to protest and he reached to lay a finger on his lips. “Hush, I’m not going to keep the drawing, you can have it and destroy it if you want to, if it’s good enough to be recognisable as you, I just want to have fun. And if you want you can try and draw me afterwards.”
“If that is what you want then.” Sephiroth stood and walked through to the bathroom, stripping as he went. Cloud followed him, to see Sephiroth looking through the pad of paper he’d brought with him - he’d already done a few sketches in it, as cover, and that included a very rough sketch of a man right at the front which he intended to use to note the measurements down on. “How do you want me?”
“I could probably use some more energy first. Do you want to link to me, or should I just take it from you?” Sephiroth shivered faintly in excitement when Cloud suggested taking his energy, but he reached out and made the link himself, pouring energy into Cloud’s reserves until he told him to stop. Then Cloud blindfolded and positioned his lover and used the Ice materia to weave bonds of ice around him, this time making them look deceptively fragile and avoiding the places he needed to measure. He couldn’t reach up far enough to kiss Sephiroth, not easily anyway, so instead he knelt and took him into his mouth, then pulled back once he was fully aroused, forming a cock-ring of ice, as well as a net around Sephiroth’s balls.
He flipped to the front of his pad, and made a couple of measurements, then switched to tickling Sephiroth with the brush and feather around his nipples, before leaning forward to bite lightly at one nipple. Then he began making the rough outline for his drawing of Sephiroth in position, and moved to wrap a scarf around Sephiroth’s waist, then around his wrist and made a few more measurements before picking up a ‘whip’ he’d made by tying a few ribbons to the end of a pen. He walked around Sephiroth to run it over his back, teasingly and adding a few more details to his sketch, enjoying the faint hitch of arousal in Sephiroth’s breathing.
“Do you want me to use this on you? I don’t really know how to very well, but I doubt it could really hurt anyone. Don’t answer yet.” Cloud took the scarf again, holding it around Sephiroth’s thigh and sliding it down to his ankle, then rising up as he made the last measurements and backed away to sketch a bit more, focusing on the leg he’d just teased. “You can answer now.” He walked around behind Sephiroth as he spoke, running the ‘whip’ over his back again, carefully.
“Please love.”
“How many?” Cloud hadn’t expected this, but he’d made sure the ‘whip’ wasn’t going to do more than tease anyway, so...
“Fifteen?” Cloud’s age...he really didn’t think this was a good idea, but he used the ‘whip’ on his lover, making him count the lashes out, grateful to see that his blows barely turned Sephiroth’s skin pink for a few seconds and then returned to what he’d been doing before. He actually got caught up in drawing Sephiroth after a while, working on the pattern the ice made against his skin, so he was startled to hear Sephiroth’s voice shaking when he spoke.
“Cloud...I...Hojo!”
“Shit!” He pulled the Fire materia and melted the ice around Sephiroth quickly, putting an arm around his waist in support and reaching up to pull off the blindfold. “Are you okay now Sephiroth? Just tell me what you need.”
“I...just hold me?” Sephiroth glanced at him pleadingly, and Cloud began guiding his lover through to the bedroom. “The sound of your pencil...it just bothered me. If you want to do this again don’t blindfold me, please?”
“I won’t. I promise. Do you want to look at the picture? It isn’t very good but...”
“Please. It might be a good distraction, remind me that you were drawing me, not making notes on how I was behaving.” Cloud helped Sephiroth sit down on the bed, grateful that he’d thought to grab the pad and handed it to him, open to the picture he’d been drawing. “I...you can recognise me, I have to destroy it.”
“Tomorrow, for now let’s just go to sleep.” Cloud stripped and lay down beside his lover, mentally vowing to talk about some things the next day.
“As you wish.” Sephiroth snuggled into Cloud’s arms and relaxed.
Cloud wasn’t particularly happy, and he knew that Alex and Marius had been a bit intimidated by his temper today when they went hunting, so it had been far less successful than he’d got used to it being. So when Zack spotted him back at the compound after putting his materia away he didn’t bother holding back his temper.
“Hey, you’re back early. Did something go wrong?”
“You could say that. You need to have a word with your sponsees, I can’t believe the way they went to pieces just because I snapped at them a bit. We didn’t have much luck finding monsters to kill either.” Cloud snorted at that. “Good thing too, Alex and Marius were getting in each other’s way and mine more than managing to work together.” Zack looked a bit taken aback by Cloud’s reaction, but he smiled and responded easily enough.
“They should have already learned that, but I’ll have a word with them, sure. Want to tell me what had you so angry then? It’s not like you.” Zack pulled him out of the corridor, into an empty office.
“I...” Cloud wasn’t sure what he could say, except one thing was obvious. “Have you seen Sephiroth today?”
“Yes, he didn’t act...no, he was a bit more distant. Did you two have a quarrel?”
“Sort of. You know we’re kinky, and there were issues with that last night. Sephiroth didn’t give me a chance to talk to him this morning either.” And he was worried about his lover, very worried.
“I don’t want to know then. You’ll talk to him tonight then?”
“Yes, I’ll talk to him, if he lets me.” But he shouldn’t be angry when he talked to Sephiroth, that would just cause problems. “You want to spar with me for a bit, let me work out some anger before I talk to Sephiroth?”
“Yeah, I can make time for that.”
“Thanks.” Had he told Zack about how he could draw on his anger to fight better? Or had Sephiroth told him about it? Or was it just their secret? Sephiroth had advised him not to let too many people know about that trick, because it would give him an advantage if his opponents didn’t know about it, so Zack probably didn’t know unless Cloud had told him and forgotten about it.
Apparently he hadn’t told Zack about it, because afterwards, once he’d worked the anger out of his system Zack looked almost shocked by the way he had attacked during their spars.
“You’ve got better, but you haven’t fought that aggressively since I sparred with you officially when you were a cadet.” It wasn’t quite a question, and Cloud wasn’t going to explain his attitude to Zack.
“Thanks, it’s been what, seven, eight weeks since we’ve had a chance to spar?”
“Eight, but I didn’t think you’d have that much time to train while you were on your mission.”
“I wasn’t allowed to leave our base camp for most of the mission, so I had plenty of time to train. Mostly by myself, but the sparring partners I had before the mission were usually willing to teach me new moves, and this gave me time to ingrain them better.” Cloud shrugged and smiled at Zack, wondering if he should bring their plans to get Sephiroth into women’s clothes up, or if Zack would.
“You know Sephiroth doesn’t seem too keen on the idea of letting us disguise him as a woman.” Zack had made sure there was no one near enough to hear them before speaking, and his voice was quiet, so he wasn’t being indiscreet. “Are you sure I’ll be able to talk him into it? Getting him into a male disguise will probably work well enough.”
“He said he’d make you work for his agreement, but I think one more try should be enough. He’s actually a bit curious about what you have in mind considering how tall and muscular he is.” Cloud grinned at Zack, but there were people in hearing range, so he wasn’t surprised when Zack made his excuses to leave.
He ate then went back into Midgar to get the deposit he needed out before going to the shop to check about his custom order. Both of the options with bands at the thighs were out of his price range, but the option of bands at wrists, elbows, ankles and knees was within his price range for chains with integral locks as well as chains without integral locks. He gave the measurements and selected the first option, slightly more expensive than the second, handing over 6940 gil as the deposit and confirmed that they’d be ready by the end of December.
“I might not be able to pick them up then, since I’d rather leave them here until as close as possible to my sub’s birthday, or it might be that I’ll be away on a mission then, but you can hold them for me, can’t you?” Cloud smiled at Wesley and Robert with all the confidence he could muster.
“Pay 10410 gil when they’re ready, and we’ll hold them for up to three months guaranteed until you pay the last 17350 gil. After that we might have to sell them to another customer to recoup our losses.”
“Fair enough.” Cloud nodded and left then, resisting the temptation to look around the shop for something new to play with - they hadn’t finished trying out what they’d already got yet. He wanted to have Sephiroth use one of the small dildos on him tonight, but he didn’t think his lover would be in any condition to tend to his pleasure like that, instead he needed to figure out what happened last night, and that meant talking to Sephiroth and probably reassuring him a lot. Not that Cloud would mind doing that, but it wasn’t exactly what he wanted to do, it was something he felt it was his duty to do, and the fact that it was a fairly pleasant duty didn’t stop it being a duty.
He spent the time he was waiting for Sephiroth thinking about what he needed to talk to him about. First the fact that Sephiroth had wanted him to use the ‘whip’ on him - not really that much of an issue, considering how it had been made, but Sephiroth hadn’t been able to tell anything about it, and the number of ‘lashes’ he’d asked for troubled Cloud. Then Cloud had the feeling that they really should talk about why he’d used his safeword to stop the game, except considering how private his lover was he didn’t think Sephiroth would be willing to explain it to him. He knew what not to do again anyway; blindfold Sephiroth and let him hear Cloud writing or drawing; that would have to be enough unless his lover was willing to say anything else and Cloud wasn’t going to pressure him.
Sephiroth moved absolutely silently as he entered the room, and something about his body language said he was feeling guilty, so Cloud let him come and kneel in front of him, head bowed, rather than stand to greet his lover.
“Are you expecting me to punish you?” Cloud stroked Sephiroth’s hair gently, leaning forward and resisting the temptation to kiss him, knowing that he needed to appear at least a little stern at the moment.
“Yes Cloud.” He’d prefer to see Sephiroth’s eyes, so Cloud reached down to lift his chin until his lover met his eyes.
“And tell me why you deserve to be punished.”
“For wakening you with pleasure I did not share physically, then leaving before you could talk to me.”
“Two different things, so I’ll punish you two different ways.” Something about those words made Sephiroth tense for a second, and Cloud added that to his list of things to ask about. “Since you didn’t want to share my pleasure this morning you don’t get to climax at all tonight. For leaving before I could speak to you I intend to ask you questions, you are to answer fully and truthfully, unless you choose to use your safewords to stop that line of questions. Do you understand?”
“Yes Cloud, you’re being very generous, thank you.”
“Good, go get yourself clean and join me in the bedroom.” Sephiroth obeyed silently and Cloud went through to the bedroom, pulling out the scarves, since he thought his lover would be more comfortable talking if he was bound, as well as the heaviest cock-ring they’d bought.
“Put this on.” He tossed the cock-ring to Sephiroth and waited for him to obey. Sephiroth didn’t look surprised, and even smiled slightly as he obeyed, which irritated Cloud just a little bit. “Good boy, now come here and lie on the bed face down.” Something in the way Sephiroth moved told Cloud that he’d liked being called a ‘good boy’, and he made a mental note of that as he tied Sephiroth’s hands over his head and his legs open.
The way the tension Sephiroth always carried in his body dissipated as Cloud completed the bindings was amazing, and he capitalised on that by beginning to massage his lover’s back before he said anything.
“The ‘whip’, why did you agree to let me use it so easily?”
“You said you doubted it would really hurt” The sheer trust in those words was breathtaking. “And...I wanted to see if I enjoyed the sensation before asking for anything heavier.”
“Thank you love. But why fifteen strokes?”
“It was the first number to come to mind.” Sephiroth sounded puzzled by the question, and Cloud laughed then, kissing the back of his neck.
“Good, very good. Now, can you tell me why you needed to safeword out?” He moved down and licked the centre of his lover’s ass to give him something pleasant to focus on.
“I...can I just say bad memories?” The strain in Sephiroth’s voice told Cloud not to push.
“Of course, if you can tell me something about why they only affected you at the end.” He had his suspicions, but he’d rather hear confirmation of them.
“Because you stopped touching me.”
“I thought it might be that. Good, you’re doing well, just one more question then.” Cloud began preparing Sephiroth as he spoke, a bit more roughly and swiftly than he usually did, since he knew that was what Sephiroth preferred. “Why did you almost flinch when I said I was punishing you for two different things?”
“In the labs...the professor would break transgressions up into different parts to give him excuses to discipline me more.” And Cloud had done almost the exact same thing, except he didn’t really think Sephiroth was upset about either of the punishments Cloud had chosen. “But...this makes a good excuse to try that orgasm denial game, doesn’t it?” There was a hint of dry humour in Sephiroth’s voice, and Cloud had to laugh in response.
“Yes, it does.” Cloud spent the rest of the evening teasing Sephiroth, without letting him climax, and taking him as many times as he could.
This time Cloud didn’t even join his squad to eat, since he’d taken a couple of ration bars from his gear and could eat them on the way there, as well as having eaten a heavier than usual lunch.
“Hey, where are you running off to?” Dylan could be obnoxious sometimes, but he did care. The man sometimes reminded Cloud of a watered down version of Zack, personality-wise anyway.
“I was almost late last time, I don’t want to do that again.”
“Yeah, you don’t want to piss the General off like that.”
“Or Colonel Grafton.”
“Go on then. Just get back by curfew.” Cloud felt a bit insulted by that, he’d never missed curfew yet, and he forced himself to forget about that as he made his way to his lesson.
“You’re early. The General hasn’t even got here yet.” No other response than that, certainly nothing approving or disapproving in the colonel’s voice - it was even more neutral than Sephiroth’s usually was.
“Yes sir. I wanted to ask you something before Sephiroth got here.”
“What is it?” Colonel Grafton put the sword he was working on to one side at that - or perhaps he’d just got it to a good stopping place, Cloud didn’t know.
“Can I stay back for an hour after our lessons to do some more of the repairs I need to do, and extra work on my slots?” He wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to add the next part, but it would be rude not to. “Please sir.”
“As long as I’m free to stay back and monitor you, yes you can. I can give you an extra half an hour today, but why don’t you go and pour the base for another slot or two if you have time before the General gets here?” Colonel Grafton half turned away from Cloud, looking for something on the bench behind him.
“Yes sir. He said that if I wanted to I could use the moulds you’d given him as well, since his seem to turn out perfect every time so far.” Colonel Grafton laughed at that.
“I’ll wait until I can hear that from him if you don’t mind.”
“Of course sir. I’ll probably only have time to do one slot base before he arrives anyway.” Cloud smiled up at the other man, and he laughed again, handing a Fire materia in a bracer to Cloud.
“Go on then, get started.” Cloud saluted quickly and turned towards his work area, setting up the mould first, and pouring it as slowly and carefully as he could. Sephiroth had arrived by the time he looked up, but they weren’t starting yet, so he set his other work up carefully, fitting the top plate and putting the poured slot base into the press.
“Did Cloud tell you what I said about your slots, Sephiroth?” Cloud knew that the Colonel couldn’t really take his word for it, even if it would be stupid of him to lie, so he didn’t say anything. Instead Sephiroth defended him, a hint of humour in his voice.
“Yes, and I agreed to let him use the moulds you assigned to me to pour the extra moulds he needed. Since his weren’t as ‘perfect’ as you described mine as being.”
“And since he’s enough of a perfectionist to reject a slot that would be good enough for any other student, but not good enough for one of my men.” The colonel seemed to be inviting them both to share the joke, and Cloud smiled with Sephiroth. “Oh, and we’ll use some of the extra time you’ve arranged so you can learn a bit about how to judge which slots are suitable to use, and which need to be melted down and cast again.”
“Thank you sir.” It sounded as if that was something extra he’d be learning, not something taught as standard, and Cloud made sure he sounded suitably appreciative. “Which method are we going to use to make the circuits today sir?”
“Chisels. I want both of you to be able to complete your first slot next week, and that means you need to use the method that will let you take them away to finish off today Sephiroth.” And Sephiroth was less likely to be content with that method then with melting the alloy and pouring it into moulds in Cloud’s opinion.
“Then should we do those now, to give them time to cool before we leave?” Cloud returned the looks Colonel Grafton and Sephiroth were giving him, as levelly as he could.
“They don’t take that long to cool, but you might as well. Here.” Colonel Grafton handed the shaped chisels, a small but heavy hammer and a small sheet of lunarium to Cloud, giving Sephiroth the same equipment, but with a sheet of metarium instead of lunarium and the addition of a Fire materia in a bracer.
“Right, with this exercise you need to remember to hold back. I know that you lot would normally be trying to do as much damage as you can, but to make this work you can’t melt the sheet, just soften it enough to make it easier to cut through. And if you can’t manage that there’s no way you’ll be able to manage the control you need to set your circuits in the slots.” Cloud exchanged a glance with Sephiroth and pulled the Fire materia out of the slot it was set in, and Sephiroth did the same thing.
“What are you doing?”
“I find that the finer control comes easier when I’m using a materia without slotting it.” Cloud was grateful that Sephiroth had followed his example, so he could use one of the unstable energy levels to focus power through the Fire materia, which he suspected would be a lot easier than trying to choke back a standard Fire spell.
“Ah...if you say so, sir. You know what to do?” Colonel Grafton was looking at Sephiroth, so Cloud took the opportunity to focus his energy through the materia, softening the sheet of lunarium and using the chisels to cut out the circuits as quickly as he could while focusing on what a slotted materia ‘felt’ like. He was surprised to see that the circuits stayed inside the chisels, trapped there when he lifted the chisels off, and Cloud bit his lip before reluctantly drawing Colonel Grafton’s attention from Sephiroth.
“Sir, is this normal?” He hoped he hadn’t screwed up too badly as he showed the chisels with their circuits trapped inside to the colonel. Colonel Grafton looked amused by his problem, but at least he didn’t laugh outright.
“Not quite, but I understand it does happen. They’ll come out once they cool and shrink, as long as you didn’t heat the alloy enough for it to start melting.” He glanced at the rest of the lunarium as he spoke, noting the perfect holes cut in the sheet. “But if you’d done that you probably wouldn’t have been able to remove the chisels.”
“Right sir.” He smiled as he acknowledged the information and paid attention as the colonel explained what Cloud had done wrong when he replaced one of the sprung claws, then how to do it properly. Apparently he’d made a few errors in how he’d cut the damaged claw away - he wasn’t supposed to try and shape the cut away part to the replacement, instead he should have shaped the replacement claw to the part of the slot he had to cut away. It was easier this way, and he felt a bit embarrassed by the way he’d done it the first time, but he hadn’t known any better at the time. This way took longer, but he could tell that it made for a much better fit between the slot and the replaced claw.
Once he’d finished with the slots that needed to be repaired that way and the ones with cracks he hadn’t gotten to last time Cloud turned his attention to the circuits he’d cut out, relieved to see that they weren’t trapped in the chisels any longer, and that they’d come free. These looked almost wrong though, unfinished, especially compared to the circuits he’d made from metarium, but even compared to the circuits he’d seen coming from the moulds Colonel Grafton had used. And he was pretty sure this set of circuits weren’t going to work very well, he couldn’t feel the same level of connection to them that he had to the circuits he made earlier, despite having the same type of images in mind when making these.
He glanced over to make sure the colonel wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, and hid two scraps of lunarium away in his pocket, for him to test his theory with later - they were only just cool enough to touch, even if just for a few seconds. Sephiroth’s circuits were still trapped in the chisels, but he lifted them up, and tapped them, freeing the circuits easily and letting the four of them fall into the palm of his hand.
“Be careful sir!” Colonel Grafton sounded worried, raising a faint smile from Sephiroth as he held out his hand for inspection.
“I rarely have to worry about burns, certainly not from metal that isn’t even molten.”
“I see.” But the slightly blank look in his eyes said he didn’t really see, not that it mattered Cloud supposed. “Here. You need specialised files to finish the circuits off properly.” He handed one bag to Cloud, and the other to Sephiroth, and Cloud carefully wrapped his circuits before putting them in the bag with the files. “Remember to focus on the purpose of the circuit and how a materia ‘looks’ when you’re working on them.”
“I will.” Sephiroth glanced over at the clock with a faint frown. “Do you think we have time to try the other method of making the circuits today?”
“Yes, I think you do.” There was a hint of surprise in Colonel Grafton’s voice as he followed Sephiroth’s gaze, and he brought out the moulds, as well as some more metarium and lunarium, and the appropriate equipment for that. After Sephiroth had left Cloud managed to pour the bases for two more slots before he had to leave.
Cloud hadn’t gotten time to read the letter he’d received until after they’d finished the platoon exercises, so he opened it just before the squad began eating. He smiled without thinking about it when he read the letter, he’d got the promotion, and it came with a 1200 gil pay rise - as well as being required to spend every other Tuesday working in the infirmary, both starting on the 1st of December.
“Good news?” Finn sounded faintly mocking, and Cloud wasn’t sure how to respond since he wanted to be rude to him, but he knew that would almost certainly cause bad feelings, especially since his words hadn’t been offensive, just his tone. Finn didn’t have many friends in the squad, and almost all of their squad mates respected Cloud, so he didn’t want to inadvertently cause him to be ostracised, in case Finn didn’t get through into SOLDIER this time.
“You waited until now to open that? It’s just the official promotion we’ve been waiting on. So, want to go out to celebrate?” Sergeant Redson had just replaced one problem with another for Cloud, and he frowned unhappily.
“No, I’m sorry, but I already had something planned this evening. Tomorrow perhaps?” Cloud finished with a hopeful smile; he was sure Zack would be perfectly happy to have Sephiroth to himself on Sunday evening after all.
“That’ll give us time to plan something good won’t it?” Dylan had what Cloud had started to think of as his ‘Zack-look’ in his eyes now, and glancing around the squad he could see that just about everyone else was willing to play along with him. Probably more for the excuse to celebrate in general than specifically for Cloud’s success, but he’d go along with them - it would certainly make Zack happy.
“If you insist.” Cloud smiled more strongly now, then glanced at the clock. “Look, Colonel Grafton’s staying behind so I’ll have a chance to talk to him about something, so I should go now.”
“Ah, right, go ahead.” Cloud thought it was interesting how even off-duty the whole squad deferred to their sergeant, but not really a surprise; they were used to that, and the power dynamics didn’t really change when they weren’t working, not the way the dynamics between him and Sephiroth changed once no one was looking. He considered that as he made his way to the armoury. Cloud had never seen Zack interacting with Sephiroth when they were both on duty, but he knew that Zack had to act differently with him then than he did while off duty, because otherwise he’d have been thrown out of the army by now. That was one thing Dylan didn’t have in common with Zack, the willingness to push his superior when he was off duty, and Cloud was glad of that, because then he was certain there’d be power struggles, which would be tiring.
“Sir?” It looked as if the head armourer was just finishing some paperwork, but this time no one had met Cloud and told him what to do, so he was careful to show proper respect, and tried not to interrupt anything important.
“Ah, Cloud, did Sephiroth want you to take his moulded circuits to him, or put them away for him?” He hadn’t expected that question, and he didn’t have the key for Sephiroth’s locker, so...
“I don’t think he considered that sir. But I’ll be seeing him tonight anyway, so I can take them to him if you want, since he didn’t give me his key.” He hadn’t planned on taking his own moulded circuits with him to work on this week - he had more time to get them ready than Sephiroth did, and he suspected that finishing the moulded ones wouldn’t feel like a chore the way finishing the cut ones did. He hoped so anyway, since he liked the process of making the moulded circuits better than the process of making the cut circuits. “Ummm...did you have to check those as well?”
“In case you screwed them up beyond all possible use, yes. With these either they come out perfect; as yours and the General’s both did; or they’re unusable, and there’s no way to allow a lesser standard for students. Shall we talk about the bases for your slots?”
“Yes please sir.”
“You did a bit better this time. One was still ‘student quality’, and a discard by the standards of a qualified armourer, but it was a bit closer to meeting my minimum standards. The second was about average quality for our production, and the last was a little above average.” He smiled approvingly and handed two slots and two bags of circuits to Cloud as he spoke, and Cloud smiled back at him.
“Thank you. I followed Sephiroth’s advice to pour the slots more slowly and carefully, so I think that might be it.” Cloud put the slots away in his locker as he spoke, and checked inside the bags before putting the lunarium circuits away as well. “I’ll probably make the rest of my circuits by pouring them into moulds, since that method feels easier, but I’d like you to check the quality of the slots I produce by each method first if you would.”
“Then you need to put two slots together at each of your next two lessons.”
“I think I can do that sir. Will we be learning how to put our slots into a form we can use, in a weapon, or a bracer or something like that as well?”
“No, I’m afraid not, but I can tell you where to go to get them put into a usable form.”
“Thank you then.” Cloud was already fairly confident about where he wanted to go to get Sephiroth’s slot set; he’d measured around his lover’s bicep and his throat, and they were close enough in size that he could get a band set with a slot that would fit both, acting as a collar in private, and a simple armband in public. He intended to order that to match the restraints he wanted to give to Sephiroth, so that this could be the birthday gift he gave his lover in front of Zack. But he needed to find out about where to get the first modified slot put into an armband or something like that so Zack could test it out for him, and as quickly as possible. “I’ll ask you about that in a week’s time then.”
“Goodbye then.” Colonel Grafton had been subtly shepherding him to the door since he shut his locker, but Cloud only realised it then as he stepped out of the door beside him. He snorted and detoured by his barracks to pick up his sewing kit and the set of circuits he would have to file into shape this week as well as the files to do it with.
“Who are you and what are you doing here?” He’d been careless, but it wasn’t as if he didn’t have the right to be here, and he had a perfect excuse.
“Private Strife, General Sephiroth’s sponsee. Running an errand for him, there were a few things he wanted me to pick up from Colonel Grafton for him.”
“Carry on then.” He didn’t recognise either of the men who’d stopped him, but they belonged to the 7th Sword, not the 3rd, and Cloud forgot about them as he made his way to Zack’s quarters.
“Colonel Grafton assumed I was supposed to pick these up for you, since I didn’t have the key to your locker.” He tossed the bag of metarium circuits at Sephiroth as he spoke, not surprised that his lover caught them easily.
“We forgot about them, didn’t we?” Sephiroth smiled ruefully as he put the bag down, and Cloud was glad to see that he had brought his other circuits with him and was working them now, so it wouldn’t be a problem for Cloud to work on his own now. After he’d sewn his new insignia onto his jacket.
“Are you going to be playing with those things too?” There was a hint of disgust in Zack’s voice, and Cloud glanced at Sephiroth, grinning at the speculation in his eyes.
“You know there’s that new programme for some SOLDIERs and medics to learn about materia slots, I think perhaps you should join it, as an example for the rest.”
“Good idea. Mind I don’t think he’ll be pushed as hard as we’re being pushed.” Cloud pulled his jacket off, putting it in his lap and putting his sewing kit to one side. “And yes, I’ll be working on my circuits, after I’ve sewn my new insignia onto my jacket.”
“You got the promotion then?” Sephiroth sounded happy for him, and Cloud couldn’t help but smile back.
“Yes, it’s effective from Tuesday, and my squad want to take me out to celebrate tomorrow.” He ran a hand teasingly down Sephiroth’s throat and chest in apology, then verbalised it. “Sorry, I couldn’t really say no, it was hard enough refusing to celebrate with them today.”
“I understand. Will I get Monday evening alone with you then?” Cloud couldn’t resist the hope in Sephiroth’s voice, and he lifted his lover’s hand to kiss the inside of the wrist.
“Oh yes. And Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday if Zack doesn’t mind.”
“No, I can go see my girl then, but I want a chance to spar with you again on Wednesday. Do you know where you’re going to celebrate with your squad?”
“No, it’s not like we have somewhere we usually go.” Cloud shrugged as he focused on his jacket, not bothering to point out that even if they did have a regular pub he wouldn’t know what it was.
“Hmmm.” There was something speculative in Zack’s voice and face, but he visibly decided to drop the subject. “Anyway Sephiroth’s agreed to that cross-dressing idea I had, so what colour are we going to make his hair and eyes? I need to know for the dress.”
“Dark red hair, and the eyes will probably be some shade of green.”
“Give me some sort of idea about the dress please, so I’ll know what sort of weapons I can hide in it.” Sephiroth sounded a bit frustrated, as if he’d asked this before, but Zack did answer now.
“A kimono, to help hide your muscles. But I’m not saying anything else. Hey, Spike, you haven’t gotten a drink yet. Let me get you a beer.”
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Date: 2006-12-23 10:31 am (UTC)I'm impressed with how well Cloud is able to balance his public persona and his private life.
I can't wait for Sephiroth's birthday...
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Date: 2006-12-23 11:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-24 12:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-27 09:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-23 12:31 pm (UTC)Great as always. :)
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Date: 2006-12-27 09:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-27 09:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-23 10:15 pm (UTC)Oh, and I need to ask, why is Cloud so impatient with his fellow team-mates? I'm getting the feeling that Cloud is been more arrogant in a sense. Is it suppose to be happening?
I really like seeing Seph so ...vurnerable, I guess is the best word. He's opening up more and more to Cloud. We still know almost nothing about his experiences throughout his childhood, though you left a lot of hints, and I think that is really well done.
^^ Can't wait for the next chap.
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Date: 2006-12-27 09:59 am (UTC)And yeah, I'm deliberately restricting myself to hints for the most part, because that way my readers can come up with their own interpretations of the reasons behind Sephiroth's issues.
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Date: 2007-01-04 08:30 pm (UTC)The world you write in feels more real that way.
Ohh and Sephiroth in a kimono sounds so goood!
annakas
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Date: 2007-01-05 11:26 am (UTC)