#denzel strife

[thisteaistoosweet]

Oh hey, would you look at that. I’m finally posting some ff7 artwork; just in time for the release of ff7 remake part two: electric boogaloo. Oh wait, you say it came out yesterday? No it didn’t.

Doodle page of my Cloud is Jenova’s offspring Au.

Alt colors for his wings down below.

Why yes it’s with a phone camera. Thank you for noticing. Lmao

[rivkae-winters]

For the ask game 4, 8, 12, 18 and 25 for any fandom

This is part of this ask game :3 Mostly seven with some general and one intentionally unspecified fandom

4) What was the last straw for finally blocking that annoying person?

I’m very bad at actually blocking people, I tend to cause my own problems that way, but the last time I blocked someone it was because they sent me an unsolicited DM basically trying to guilt me into commissioning them right after an artist I’d just recently commissioned posted the piece. I love getting DM’s and interaction in general even if I’m not super active myself because of anxiety so I was really upset about it when I saw the message. 

On one hand I get it, I do- I’m also a commercial artist and I’m lucky enough to have a decently stable W2 Job right now. On the other hand though: maybe make your sales pitch at least more enticing than a Jehovah's Witness knocking on your door. 

8) Common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about?

This one got WELL out of hand length wise so I'll be posting my full thoughts on why later today or tomorrow.

The apple game in CC (from the Silver Elite fan club letter) is bs, and it baffles me that people trust what Hojo says as much as they do. 

Honestly, most of the fan mail in the game is bs or has the truth heavily muddied but this example is especially egregious in my opinion. It's not an activity that Genesis, Angeal, or Sephiroth would actually enjoy much. Sephiroth himself would be bored to tears since he has such an unfair advantage since his sword is much slimmer than Rapier and Angeal's standard issue broadsword. There is also the issue of the fact that all of them likely have some element of food trauma (or in Angeal's case are confirmed as such) but the expanded post later today will expand on that.

Disclaimer that you can enjoy and write what you want or believe in the story of AGS playing with apples and swords. Make content you feel inspired to, consume content you enjoy, and don’t let me stop you from having fun. 

12) The unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

I don’t know how unpopular he is anymore but Denzel is great- if you can find the ‘on the way to a smile’ anthology and read ‘episode Denzel’ or the OVA from 2010 his character gets a lot better. He’s a complex little guy with layers and plenty of regret already trying to go forward with life. Post AC he starts working with Reeve as a protege of sorts iirc after Reeve blocks him from joining the WRO’s militia. (Which would not have gone over well with anyone if it went through, Denzel is 10ish at that point.) 

He wants to save people like Cloud saved him, somewhat so he can feel worthy of having been saved. There is also still a lingering of the unintentional toxic positivity his mom instilled in him and it is delightful.

The book mentioned above was finally released in English around a decade after Japan got it but it was $35 USD last I checked. I think there are some readings of it on YouTube but I can’t vouch for the quality of any since I don’t do well with audio books. 

The OVA can be really hard to find because it was only on the AC complete Blu-Ray discs of a certain edition- I’m pretty sure it was the first run of them but I may be wrong. Because of this and the fact that I’ve seen take-downs happen continuously each time I went back to reference it last year it’s to the point where some people are incorrectly assuming it’s just totally lost media. Either way I have a so-so quality copy I saved, I won’t put it on the post directly just to be cautious but if you’re interested DM me or contact me through discord (rivkae) if you have that and I’ll shoot you the drive link. 

18) It’s absolutely criminal that the fandom has been sleeping on…

In og CC Gillian dies with a smile on her face. In reunion it’s blocked by a vignette.

I’ve never seen it mentioned in a fic dealing with her death yet, the few that there are, so eventually I’m just going to have to do it myself.

This answer is almost pathetically short because every time I start thinking about this I get the urge to write. Since I can't really sit down to write prose right now so I'm not going to get to into it.

25) Common fandom complaint that you’re sick of hearing? 

(Slightly dramatized for effect, I’m not saying the fandom because I’m mostly out of it writing wise right now but iykyk feel free to send me your guesses)

‘Ewww I hate y and z version of [media]!!! X version of [media] is the only good one- anyone who interacts with y and z supporting posts will be blocked!’

‘I hate this version of my favorite character from x in y and z [complaint that could be very easily interpreted as racism] anyone with art of this design will be blocked! DNI if you have [bastardized version of the characters name to show distaste] content!’

Except then they don’t block you after you DNI, they start following your blog posting stuff for y and z version of [media]

Now obviously blocking is a core part of the tumblr experience, really the entire social media experience but it’s taken more seriously other places. Here though? If they breathe annoyingly it is perfectly fine and normal to block them- encouraged even! I have no issues with a DNI, BYF, etc as concepts I just get a little irked when people don’t practice what they preach while still loudly complaining about [media]. 

Now obviously adaptations make a lot of people angry for good reasons sometimes, I understand that. I dislike many adaptations myself, but it’s the incessant complaining when you aren’t even following your own rules that it gets under my skin a bit. That’s not even mentioning the drama that happens in discord servers with areas about said alternate versions of [media] where most community spaces to discuss said versions die quickly due to the toxicity of comparison and the group norm to conform to being putting x version, the original version, over the other version. You can like y and z but you should like x more- you should agree that x is objectively better. Even if x is also offensive in several ways and dated in others and isn’t as easy to consume story wise- which is how y and z brought new fans to the fandom. 

I’m going to cut myself off there but… Yeah. I hate adaptations too sometimes but it shouldn’t be used to backhandedly bully others into silence. Let people enjoy what makes them happy.

[poipoigurl]

Tender Winter Moments

Sweet moments using the side characters

A. Johnny

B. Marlene and Denzel

C. Mireille and Kyrie

D. Elmyra

Base: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/1006484216712710886/

[finalfivecarts]

Marlene and Denzel going through the universal experience of adults in your life dropping a part of their Doofenshmirtz backstory

[thirstywaffles]

Dad cloud

[seilidare]

I FORGOT TO POST CLOUD’S BIRTHDAY ART HERE

[little-black-dress-zack-fair]

Cloud: *out in the field making deliveries*

Cloud: *texting with Zack* Love, I'm working I can't talk

Zack: Sunshine, please I have a shadow

Cloud: What?

Zack: *sends several pictures of Denzel stalking him in the background*

Cloud: Oh he's revisiting his clingy era

Zack: I haven't known peace for the last two days please come home

Zack: *sends pictures of Marlene joining Denzel in stalking him*

Cloud: Adorable

Zack: NO PEACE

[priceofreedom]

Painful memories

[protemporescitor]

[wiavi]

[dezimaton]

a variety of fic-inspired scenes! I've enjoyed reading a variety of writings since falling back into vincent brainworms and wanted to share/illustrate a couple of my favorites

title & author noted top right

AO3 Links:

[Speed Demons] - crack, fun freaky fast driving at its best :)

[Mai Tai] - a bittersweet glimpse into turks holiday season

[Will You Wait Me Out?] - cozy family time, but watch out

[Failed Attempt] - short, bold take on nsfw w/ a side of horror

[rottenpumpkin13]

WHAT IF..... Their world gets hacked, and now everything CC!Cloud touches just gets deleted from the game? (Cloud obivously doesn't know this at first until he starts to make a dozen things disappear)

*Cloud touches his cup of coffee and it disappears*

Zack: I told you to stop doing that! You don't know where those things are going.

Cloud: Relax, I'm pretty sure they're disappearing for good. So far I've accidentally deleted the play station in the lounge, Sephiroth's sword, and that office plant Angeal has been taking care of.

Zack: They can't just disappear like that! I'm telling you, they're ending up somewhere.

*Sephiroth walks by*

Sephiroth: Has anyone seen my—

*Cloud touches him and he disappears*

Zack: !

Cloud: My intrusive thoughts won.

(In the post-canon future)

*Denzel is drinking a cup of coffee*

Cloud: Where did you get that?

Denzel: I'm making stuff appear just by wishing for them! Check it out, so far I've wished for a cup of coffee, a play station, a cool sword and this neat house plant I'm giving Tifa for Christmas.

Cloud: That can't possibly work.

Denzel: Try it out! Maybe it works for you too.

Cloud, sarcastically not taking it seriously at all: Alright. I wish for Sephiroth to come back.

*Crisis Core Sephiroth appears*

Sephiroth: Has anyone see my—screaming and throwing objects at me accomplishes nothing—has anyone seen my sword?

[mm3ltym00n]

Post AC Strife-Lockhart-Wallace family hcs

• Tifa makes Cloud & the kids learn how to cook so that they can be more self sufficient while she works. Cloud sucks so bad he is demoted to Marlene’s level of microwave Mac and cheese and turkey sandwiches

• Marlene eventually moves back in with Barret as her primary residence but C & T have a completely open door policy for her and they keep a bedroom so that she has somewhere to stay every time she comes over

• Cloud is That Parent™️ who storms up to the school every time his kid gets a bad grade and demands to know what the teacher was thinking cause hello his son is a genius and you just don’t get that. Fucking obviously

• Tifa gets some employees for the bar and she can take off more nights to spend with the fam and also date nights ❤️‍🔥 though she had to learn how to not micromanage and let them do their thing

• They take Denzel to the sector seven memorial whenever he needs to go and they all sit and rest together because it helps them more than sitting alone

• Tifa gets a new truck and Cloud is only allowed to drive in very rare circumstances. When they go out together Tifa always drives because Cloud is a speed demon and is rough on the brakes. He is also a horrific backseat driver and Tifa is just 👹

• Cloud and Tifa buy a house so that they can all have more room than the apartment above the bar but they keep getting so busy that moving takes forever and it’s just a building with wrapped up mattresses and boxes of random shit for ages. Tifa then decides she hates the kitchen and spends months remodeling it 💀

Actually these are all canon because I said so 💅🏾

[aceduooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

Random Headcanon Denzel dressed up as Cloud once for Halloween

[seikiro]

Tifa Lockheart + Parallels

[strayheartless]

Cloud wakes up one morning in Edge, and everything is normal...but he feels like someone something is missing. He's used to it, his memory is shit these days, whatever.

Squall wakes up one morning, in his queen sized bed, all alone. Huh, that's unusual totally normal, like he gives a shit.

Neither of them realize time and space warped them into the same world for 10 years, where they got together, then warped them out and erased them from each other's memories and worlds.

😈

I know I asked for this but HECKIN’ OWWWWWWWWWWWW.

***

Denzel is pretty used to Cloud taking a second to recognise him in the morning. Tifa and Marlene say it happens sometimes, and he’s lived with them long enough now to know that it’s not personal. Still, this morning seems particularly bad.

Cloud is staring at him perplexed across the breakfast table, ignoring his own toast. He blinks hard a couple of times, then shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut tighter. He looks upset by something, maybe even a little confused.

“Cloud, is everything okay?” Tifa asks from the sink and Cloud opens his eyes breathing deeply.

“Yeah,” he mutters, reaching out to push Denzel’s bangs out of his eyes.

“Has your hair gotten lighter?” He asks and Denzel makes a confused sound.

“I don’t think so,” he says.

Cloud pulls his hand back, letting the hair flop back into place and Scrubs at his face, frustrated.

“Hey,” Tifa rounds the table and kneels next to his chair. “You sure your okay? You look spooked,”

Cloud let his head hang for a second, gripping at his own neck so hard that Tifa reaches out to extract his nails from his nape.

“I- I feel like I’m missing something. Like someone should be here and they’re not. But I can’t tell who,”

“Marlene?” Zel guesses but Cloud shakes his head.

“Were you dreaming about Zack and Aerith again?” Was Tifa’s guess.

“Not that I can remember,” Cloud shakes his head again and lets Tifa take over massaging his neck.

They were all familiar with Clouds spotty memory. Sometimes he forgot Aerith was dead. Sometimes he would wake up and insist that he had to go meet Zack at some hole in the wall pizza joint that hadn’t existed since Meteor fall. On really bad days he didn’t talk, just stared at everyone like he didn’t know who they were. Like he was completely vacant.

“Do you want me to call your Clients for today and postpone deliveries?”

“No,” Cloudbutted his head against Tifa’s shoulder, something he’d taken to doing as a sign of affection when his words were failing him.

She ruffled the back of his hair and let him get on his way.

There weren’t many deliveries that day anyway. His first was Cid and as he walked into the shop he almost dropped the box at the sight of Shera. He doesn’t know why, but he hadn’t expected her to be there. The Workshop looked wrong too. Had Cid painted the hill of the Gum- airship? Cloud tsked. He liked the red better.

“Hey kid, Y’alright?” Cloud jumps again. He swings round to see Cid squinting at him from behind his shouldering goggles.

“Yeah,” he not-quite-lies. “Just having an off day… feel like I’ve lost something. Don’t know what,”

Cid snorts.

“That’s called getting old son,”

“That’s called almost drowning in Mako twice chief,” Cloud bites back, but there’s no real heat to it.

“Yeah yeah, you’re a walk-in’ talking’ miracle. I got it,” he hands Cloud the cash for delivery and Cloud pockets it without checking. Even if it wasn’t all there, he knew Cid was good for it. Even if he wasn’t Cloud would let him off. He always did for friends.

“You got many more o’these?” Cid asked, sucking on the end of his cigarette. Cloud thought it was a tooth pick… weird.

“Couple. Headed out to Kalm next.”

“Well you be careful, it’s gettin’ Squally out there,”

Cloud freezes. The image of a face burns itself into the forefront of his mind. A hand holding his that just a touch bigger. A body in his bed that he knows is going to start out on the other side of the bed, but will inevitably Koala itself to his back. A dumb jacket with an even dumber white fur collar. A slim set of hips adorned with far too many belts to be practical. A Gunblade. A scar across the bridge of a wonderfully sloped nose. A set of warm Hazelnut eyes.

Squall.

Clouds knees give out, hitting the tiled floor with a horrific crack.

He Screams at the sky.

****

“Can I help you Quistis?” Squall grumbles as he flips through the mornings reports. She’s been stood in his office too long and if she keeps staring at him like that he’s going to end up growsing something he regrets.

Fuck, his head is pounding.

“You seem off today.” She says like it’s an off hand comment. Squall resists the urge to roll his eyes.

“Didn’t sleep well.” He mutters, scribbling his signature at the bottom of a page. The next set of papers is about refurbishments to the western corridors. He massages between his eyes with the knuckle of his pointer finger.

Hadn’t they done that at the beginning of last year? Sora had talked his ear off about it being too much of a rabbit warr-

Who?

Squall blinks. Who the hell was Sora?

“Are you sure that’s all it is? Rinoa says you’ve been pretty in and out all day,”

“And I suppose Rinoa is the foremost authority on my moods,” it’s a unnecessary bite, one that he doesn’t even know the reason for. His wife is absolutely the authority on his mood swings. She’s generally the only one that can handle them.

No she isn’t.

Squall puts his pen down and places his head in his hands. His headache felt like someone was drilling into his eyes and temple. He just wants today to be over. He wants to go back home to C-

To Rinoa.

Quistis looks at him for a second, before seemingly deciding it’s not worth arguing with him. Instead she waits for him to finish signing papers while she looks out of his office window.

“Sure is Cloudy today,”

There’s a crash from behind her and as she spins around she finds Squall on his hands and knees on the carpet heaving up the pasty and Coffee she’d brought him. He’s sobbing hysterically as his mind faces a million miles a second and his head feels like it’s going to explode with the pressure of the memories.

A hand a little smaller than his, that was calloused and almost always covered in motor oil. A tiny waist that was just right for wrapping his arms around in the early mornings and late nights. Broad shoulders clad in paldrons. A wold at his heart. A wolf in his ear. The most dazzlingly blue eyes Squall has event seen. Bright blond hair. A stupidly large sword wrapped in bandages so he “didn’t hurt the kid”. A scarred sternum and torso under his hand.

Cloud.

Squall passed out from the pain.