#the chances of us being more than. vague acquaintances at this point are very loz

[two-wizards-in-a-trench-coat]

see when i was a girl i had a girl friend and we were both very insistent that feeling nauseous about being treated like a girl was a symptom of our feminism and we bonded quite a lot through that. Anyways i got a bereal friend ask the other day and let's say. we're both rocking the shitty T mustache

[leonawriter]

Second Chances

Read it on AO3

Fandom: Final Fantasy VII

Characters: Cloud, Shelke, Genesis, various others.

Summary: Following on from First Encounters, Shelke helps bring certain things to light about their new acquaintance. When Cloud finally finds him again, his attempts at getting answers are less than fruitful.

Written for @strifesodosweek, though this one’s mainly platonic again.

...

It happens while Genesis is away, and no one knows where he's gone. It isn't the first time that's happened, and they weren't too bothered about it, because everyone had things they didn't want to talk about, something that Cloud understood more than most.

It's one of those rare occasions when there's more people around than there aren't, too, which he'd be suspicious of if it weren't for how sometimes, that's just how things are. 

Vincent's talking to Tifa, Yuffie's stroking Nanaki's mane, and Cid's taking a drag of a cigarette by the door when Shelke comes walking in, looking vaguely uncomfortable and saying that she had 'information that she believed that everyone present might benefit from'.

...

"The man who is now staying here, I believe that he is the one that Deepground referred to as 'G'," she continues as soon as everyone is settled down. "He introduced himself to Cloud as a SOLDIER First Class, am I correct?"

Cloud nods. He doesn't look her in the eye.

"G... as we now know him, 'Genesis', was the origin of Deepground, in many ways, according to all of the information I was able to obtain on the matter, and the one whose cells were used in order to create the Tsviets. Shinra seems to have made extensive attempts to delete his existence from history, so what I was able to find was... at times inadequate, and often inconclusive, but does point to the indubitable fact that the Genesis we know may be the very same as the SOLDIER who despite Shinra's efforts, will agree caused a considerable amount of damage and loss of life up until some years ago."

It took effort for Cloud to not let the ringing in his ears overtake him, to keep listening to what was being said, to not grip the table so hard that Tifa was going to have to get a new one.

Tifa sighs, and he looks up, to see her sharing a look with Cid, who looks grim, but...

"Yeah, I figured as much," the man says. "I mean, with a name like that? There's only so many in the world, y'know? And damn, but I was around in those days - they can pretend it didn't happen as much as they like, but the Genesis war was a thing, and people tend to talk when there's something going on like a SOLDIER gone rogue. All hush-hush of course, but what wasn't."

His head- his head... 

The world flashed green, just for a split second, enough to put him off balance.

A voice-

You were a test subject in Hojo's new experiment. 

The monster has been harvested, and can be discarded.

"...thought I knew him from somewhere."

Tifa's voice snapped him free, but he still felt the sweat on the back of his neck. Her words registered to him only vaguely, as he tried to remember how to breathe again.

"Cloud?"

He shakes his head. 

"I'm fine," he says. Vincent doesn't look much like he believes him any more than Tifa does, but the last thing he wants right now is for them to start fussing over him, when they have bigger problems at hand than whatever his memories are up to this time. He's thankful when they just let the matter drop.

"Like I was saying, I thought I knew him from somewhere. His face seemed familiar, you know? And his name, somehow."

"So this guy waltzes in here like he doesn't expect anyone's gonna remember him, is that it?"

"I don't know, something about this seems-"

"He saved Raye and Este before I could get to them," Cloud cuts in, his eyes still squarely on the surface of the table and no one and nothing else. It's almost as though he's hearing someone else speak, and doesn't know whether to hate himself for speaking up for the person he didn't know if he could trust any longer, or feel relieved that he was saying it at all. "If all anyone's got is incomplete data and rumours," including me, he added silently, even now, I wouldn't rely on anything I remember from back then unless someone else is able to back it up, "then... even if nothing else... we can't judge him like that until we know everything."

When he eventually looks back up, Shelke's eyes are on her hands, crossed on her lap.

"I merely thought that additional information would be useful," she said. "Especially if something came up where a lack of prior knowledge would have caused further divisions."

...

Genesis doesn't return for several days, and it's long enough for some of the others to start wondering if he'd merely been toying with them, stringing them along, using their hospitality.

Cloud doesn't know what to think, and he doesn't really know what he wants to think, either. The two images in his head - that of the man who saved a couple of kids and their dog just because he was there, and that of someone who'd had a war named after him - clashed, irreconcilable.

He finds that his feet are taking him to the church in Sector Five, and wonders what Aerith would make of all this. What Zack would make of it.

The last thing he expects to find in the church are black feathers. His heart stops, hand going for his sword - the last time he had seen feathers like these... it hadn't been here, but Loz had been here, and fought Tifa, too.

A quick scan of the rest of the church suggested that there hadn't been another fight here, that nothing was out of place, that the pool of water that Aerith had called down that cured Geostigma was still as it should be. 

He finally sees the source of the feathers when he looks up to check that the Buster Sword is still in its place, and he feels himself go cold at the sight.

The wing was on the wrong side. Misshapen, compared to Sephiroth's. 

Instead of silvery-white hair falling straight down, the owner's hair was red, and fell over black and red leather, what little could be seen from behind, and with the way that the winged man was hunched over.

Cloud puts one foot in front of the other, and sees Genesis - because there's no one else it could be, no matter how much he wishes it wasn't - tense at the sound. 

"Shelke told us a few things," he says as he walks. "And we figured out a few other bits by ourselves."

He pauses several feet away, but Genesis still hasn't risen from the pew. He hasn't even turned to face him. A nervous tension pools in Cloud's stomach at the idea of Genesis, who had been unarmed the last he knew, taking Buster Sword and using it to turn on them all.

"What are you even doing here?"

When Loz had come, it was supposedly to find him, although he'd taken to fighting Tifa and stealing their materia. He had no such understanding of this man's motives. Not anymore, at least, if he ever had.

"My soul, corrupted by vengeance, hath endured torment... to find the end of the journey in my own salvation and your eternal slumber." Genesis let the church echo for a few moments before saying anything else, the words ringing familiar to Cloud, but not explaining anything. "I came to pay my respects, of course."

The wing shook itself out slightly, before settling down again.

"You knew Zack," he says, and it isn't a question. It's the only thing that fits.

"I... suppose you could say that."

Genesis says it in such a way that Cloud knows there's more to it, that it's complicated, and he wants to take the man by that stupid coat of his, and shake him until his feathers fall out along with some answers.

But he doesn't. Because Aerith's flowers aren't that far away, and he knew better than any that her presence still hadn't truly left them. There'd already been enough fighting in this place.

"I spoke up for you," Cloud hears himself saying. "I thought you deserved a chance."

Perhaps some part of him had intended it to come out as anything other than confrontational, but if it did, then it failed - it sounds like nothing more than an accusation.

"All in all, a terrible decision, really," Genesis says flatly. "I could list off any number of reasons why you and everyone else I've come into contact with should hate me." Something about the way he said it gave Cloud no doubt about that, either. "Unfortunately for you, however, I have promises to keep, and none of them include dying any time soon."

Genesis stands, and the wing stretches out as the man sorts himself out, head tilting up, as though attempting to judge the size of and distance to the hole in the roof.

"Promises?" Cloud asks, reaching for something, anything, to help him understand. "What sort of promises?"

"Nothing you need to worry yourself over, Cloud."

Genesis' head tilted, and Cloud wondered why hearing this man say his name already felt so different from when Sephiroth had  - there was something similar but off that he couldn't quite put his finger on. 

Then again, that was Genesis all over, it seemed. Full of contradictions, constantly shifting. Like fire.

The wing flaps once, and before Cloud can react to say or do anything else, Genesis is gone, leaving a trail of feathers floating down in his wake. 

He walks over to where the man had been, half expecting to see something there, some kind of trap, but finds nothing.

There is, however, a single Banora White apple sitting on top of a few black feathers in front of the Buster Sword, and Cloud almost thinks that he can feel a memory on the tip of his tongue before it disappears on him, like a whisper on the wind.

Zack... I hope I made the right decision. 

A single feather fell onto the water's surface as he walked back to the open doors, creating ripples as the wind blew it this way and that.

...

AN: I don't often write about 'how do the gang find out about Genesis' past', but I do feel like it should ideally be handled really carefully, and yeah, if people hadn't thought about it and then it comes up later, then there are going to be issues there. 

Timeline-wise, I'd also put this as before 'Spar With Me', which gives an idea that things do indeed get better.