avatar 19
Title: Avatar 19
Author/artist: TamLin
Setting: AU
Rating: T
Summary: waking up tonight, the team finally decided to tell me what was going on. All I've got to say is...
holy shit.
tell me if any parts of this don't make sense?
He had… the mother of all headaches.
It started somewhere in the back of his skull near the base and worked its way forward, getting thinner and sharper the closer it got to his eyes and the front of his head. It was, Cloud decided with what little thought he could put toward something other than the pain, the very last time he ever did whatever it was he'd done the night before. Until, stubborn, he forced his eyes open and realized -
Oh yeah.
In front of him was what looked like it should be an office room in ShinRa style. The carpet was red, the walls were barren of anything but a few framed prints of the ShinRa logo and the almost obscenely cute motivational poster he supposed every office had to have of a cute kitten draped from a tree branch with the cheery 'hang in there' print underneath.
As if 'hanging in there' was going to solve the kitten's problem. It needed to either let go or scrabble it's way back up onto the branch. 'Hanging in there' was going to sap its strength and make it unable to control its fall when it finally did.
There was a large, darkly wooden desk that took up most of the office space, cluttered with the expected paraphernalia and, lounging on the desk tying rubber bands together was a pale haired kid Cloud had never seen before in his life.
Before he moved and admitted to being aware, Cloud took stock of his situation. He was on his knees in front of the desk, hands cuffed behind him as well as a cuff that locked his elbows painfully close together. His legs were free, which was his captor's mistake but his effectiveness was still severely hampered. One of his shoulders felt dislocated. A careful testing of the bonds showed they were going to hold.
A quick dart of his eyes at the area around him garnered him not only a nasty case of vertigo and a renewal of the pressing headache but also a glimpse of beautiful, long brown hair carelessly falling across the floor. Ignoring the man on the desk, he turned his head to focus on Tifa. She was tied the same way he was but she was laying instead of kneeling and by her breathing she was all right but still unconscious. The tight band around his chest loosened the smallest bit and he felt his lips curve at their edges despite himself.
"She's pretty, isn't she?"
The voice from the desk, almost too smooth to be real had him turning his head to glare just as much as the words did and he saw that the boy was sitting up now, swinging his legs against the wood front of the desk, heels hardly making any sound.
"She's mine." He clarified it, voice throaty and raw feeling as it came out. The boy shrugged.
"She's a meatbag," he dismissed her with a waved hand, trailing colorful rubber bands. "The only thing that makes her special is that she got to be there front row seat for the day the world changed."
Cloud's lips twitched and his eyes narrowed. Not at the dismissal, he was glad the guy in front of him wasn't going to be prone to spend a lot of time thinking about Tifa but rather at what this sounded like the beginning of.
Shit.
The guy was going to monologue.
It was one of the oldest villain troupes in the world. The Illiad had villain monologues in it. Cloud had never understood why the opposition felt the need to ramble on about their 'great plan', especially not if it was real life and the audience wasn't waiting to be filled in on a relevant plot point. But ramble they did and oftentimes they video taped it these days and put it up on web sites for the world to see. Just before they went on a killing spree at the local mall or cut the head off of a capture journalist.
And, as much as he hated it, Cloud was going to lower himself to their level and play for time by asking:
"How's that supposed to happen?"
It was all he could do not to roll his eyes or grit his teeth when the pale boy on the desk burst into a bright, not entirely sane grin and spread his hands wide. Crap. He even felt filthy playing along. He was almost glad for the way the headache was so intently trying to break out past his skull that it was vaguely distracting.
"I'm so glad you asked! It's through your help that it's possible, you know. I could have done it without you but it would have been much harder. You showed me the way." The smile was childishly pleased. "I'm going to become the internet."
"You mean, take over the internet," Cloud corrected the grandiose error but the other boy just shook his head, still smiling.
"Oh no. I'm going to become the internet."
He probably really should have been playing along better. He was supposed to be prolonging this after all. 'Hanging in there'. But Cloud couldn't help the snort that escaped him and his dry:
"Good luck with that."
"You don't believe me," the pale boy didn't seem perturbed, slipping off of the desk to stalk in front of it. Next to him, Cloud felt Tifa stirring and he made a soft humming sound to warn her to stay put. Her wine dark eyes blinked open but other than that she didn't move. Their captor wasn't paying attention.
"You don't believe me but you should. Soon I will be everything and everywhere. Do you know of any developed country that doesn't rely on it's internet for everything? Businesses run through the internet. Stores don't even keep stock of their stock anymore, they let their computers do that and order automatically when they start to run low. No one knows how to use a map. It's all online. Everyone's money is tied up online. Banks don't keep paper records. Most people don't even get their statements in paper anymore. The governments store all their secrets in their computers with their internet access. Even the security systems that aren't connected to the internet are still connected to computers that are connected to the internet. There's not a computer today that's not made with a built in wifi connection whether it's turned on or not. The internet is everywhere and it runs everything. And soon - that's going to be me."
Tifa had apparently given up on pretending to be asleep and she struggled to sit up, shifting to lean against Cloud's side as she did. It gave up her element of surprise but Cloud understood. He would have wanted to face this kind of insane upright and aware. The boy ignored her but Cloud was glad of the warmth of her body against his.
"You're one of the terrorists holding the hostages at the TV station, aren't you?"
"Brilliant," the boy mocked him with a roll of his eyes. "And you figured that out all by yourself?"
Cloud ignored it.
"And you're hooked into the game the same way we are?"
"Oh yes. That was the easy part. There were so many extra pods just waiting to be filled with 'teammates'. All I had to do was… 'take' one of the spare spots." He sounded amused as he added: "It's not as if the original player was going to need it anymore."
Cloud felt his jaw set just a little but he refused to jump to conclusions. The kid in front of him could have murdered the preparing contestant… or he could have just snuck into a room that was still being prepped. Either way there was nothing Cloud could do about it now. The boy was hoping for a response and Cloud just have him a narrow look.
"It still means you're a meatbag too. You can't become a computer program."
It amused the pale boy and he all but giggled. Then, again for the dramatic flare, he threw his arms wide and tossed back his head.
"I already am!" His pale eyes shifted to look down at Cloud. "And you are too. Even she is." He pointed to Tifa and she shifted to press against Cloud's shoulder a bit more. He was just glad it wasn't the dislocated one. The side of her bound hands touched his but she wasn't passing him any lock pick or key. It was just more skin on skin contact and he'd take it.
"That's - " he had to pause and think about it. "Not the same."
But… he wasn't so sure.
The boy made an amused sound and wandered around to the other side of the desk.
"Not yet. But soon. The virus we planted in you two years ago is almost done adjusting now. It knows how to catch a perfect replica of it's host and then I'll leave my flesh behind and become one with the virus. I'll become one with the internet. And I'll be everywhere and do anything I want and no one will be able to stop me." He leaned forward abruptly and spread his hands so that they smacked down on the desk to support him. His eyes were very alive with a feverish fire.
"You see? It's all really very simple actually. And you showed me the way. I owe it all to you… Big Brother."
Cloud didn't appreciate the label and the look he shot the other male showed it. He resisted the urge to bare his teeth though.
"I'm still carrying the virus, aren't I?"
"Oh yes…" the gesture was flowing and flared and Cloud looked at where the hand was pointing.
The arm he'd thought was dislocated. Instead he saw it was -
…it was…
Sweet Jesus.
It was still vaguely arm shaped and it was still attached to him. He couldn't see much of it thanks to the bindings but when he twisted his head he could see -
There was a blank amount of horror that went into realizing that what was on the side of him, attached to him, had taken the place of the flesh and blood that should be there. Or… partially was…
At first glance it looked like he had a coating of slightly dull black down the skin of his exposed arm, almost like soot or some kind of smeared ash. Looking closer though - and damn his enhanced eyesight - he saw it was actually minuscule small strands, like the tendrils on a sea urchin.
And they were moving.
He had to swallow down the bile to realize that they were swaying. As if they were collecting data from the very air. Alive and definitely not a part of him at all for all they had almost entirely invaded his arm. All the way from where his gloves hid them to up his shoulder and he felt the sudden spear of animal panic to wonder if they'd reached his throat yet.
His face.
He fought it down hard. There was no place for emotion or panic in a situation like this. The only way he was going to get himself and Tifa out of this was if he kept his head and dealt with things rationally.
It didn't stop him from cringing inside when Tifa finally managed to twist around his body enough to get a look at it herself and made a small noise of horror. He pushed it away, compartmentalized it the way he did so much of what happened in his life and he focused on the immediate. His voice was cold and steady.
"If I've got the virus than it's duplicating me. Correct?" The slight narrowing of the other male's eyes gave him his answer and he let himself sneer at their captor.
"In that case, this is my show and you're nothing."
The boy's hands slammed into the desk and he snarled.
"Don't think I'm stupid! The virus needs to perform a test before it goes fully active. You're the test. And once it's done making a fake copy of you, it will be ready to make a real copy of me! Your copy will be nothing but a mindless drone but mine - I'll be perfect! The virus' perfect copy to take over the entire world!"
"But it won't be you."
It was the first time she'd spoke up and, even if Cloud could hear the slight tremble in her voice, she was still determined. For the first time the boy really focused on Tifa.
"Who cares?" he asked as if explaining it to a child. "My copy will be enough of what I want to be self-aware and to do what I want to do. I don't have to remember my mother or what my favorite color is to make that happen. It will be enough of me to matter."
Which was when the wall behind the boy exploded.
"I believe," the dry, calm voice in his ear said as Cloud dove to use the desk as cover, using his own body to both shield and move Tifa's. "That the correct term is 'the cavalry has arrived."
"White!" Cloud didn't know whether to curse or cheer at the sudden sound of his support kicking back on.
"Apologies for not arriving earlier," White continued unperturbed. "Black was laying down a diversion. We are currently in the process of rescuing the hostages in real time. Now seemed an appropriate time to rescue you as well.
"In other words, you only just now managed to hack through his security," Cloud translated and White made a quiet huffing noise.
"He's very good. Trained by one of the best though he was always too impulsive. It was - rather disappointing but he had to be let go. He's improved - though not enough."
"Yo! Enough with the chit chat." Swift's voice came over the comm. "Teef, Cloud - you gotta take this guy down. Whatever funked up thing he's doin' to you, Cloud, he's got rolling on himself too. Black's got the gal that was supposed to be playin' Vincent and they're tryin' to find what room they stashed glow boy in. Jessie an' Red an' Wedge are getting the hostages to safety which means the cops'll be here soon. We can stall but not too long and who knows what the men in lab coats will try to take over once they get back in here. Take 'em down hard, guys and don't leave any pieces behind."
"Roger." Cloud was already starting to shift before he remembered his cuffs but Tifa was ahead of him.
"This might help," her voice was surprisingly calm and he felt her hands on the cuffs. Looking down in surprise he saw that hers were already broken, dangling like gaudy bracelets from her arms. She gave him a brief, tight smile.
"Cloud… I can pile drive a WEAPON. These cuffs were pathetic."
In that instant, he fell in love with her all over again and he managed to murmur:
"That's my girl," before she tore the links between the cuffs apart like tissue. Her hand lingered briefly on the black of his useless arm and he felt the hum of it all the way up his shoulder and into the headache that had been demanding his attention for so long. On the other side of the desk there was an ominous swelling going on and Cloud was reminded of the monster they'd found in ShinRa tower so long ago in the game, a nightmare created of everything that had been available.
It, almost, distracted him from realizing exactly what the headache was. And how it's demands for his attention were so much more dangerous and deadly than a simple hangover.
He grabbed Tifa with his good arm and rolled as the desk suddenly burst apart in splinters.
"I know what you and your little meatbag friends did, brother!" the boy's voice was shrill and Cloud kept rolling as a giant hand made of concrete bits and ShinRa logos, knuckle the picture of a small hanging kitten, pounded down where they'd been.
"It doesn't matter. I'll avenge my brothers and I'll still rule the world. But I won't be as nice as I was going to be before!"
Cloud scrambled to his feet but the searing up his arm that had activated at Tifa's touch was only growing more intense and the pressure at the back of his skull made it feel as if it was going to pop off. The boy was off to the side of the now gaping hole in the wall and a huge monster of bits and pieces of building lurched forward between them. At his side, Tifa shook out her fingers and then clenched her hands into fists and Cloud thought she'd never looked more fiercely beautiful.
He would have liked the time for one more kiss.
"If you take care of the golem, I'll take care of the nut case," he murmured and she nodded, brows down. And then, for just a second she turned and flashed him a look and he knew… somehow… that she'd fallen in love with him.
"Be careful," she said - and then she was charging forward and the entire world was bending as energy gathered at her fists. Cloud gave it a single heart beat - long enough for the monstrosity to focus on the slim woman rushing toward it - and then he plunged forward as well.
The boy saw him coming and he let out a high yell - but Tifa's fist drove the concrete monster backward from it's attempts to save him, plowing it into and then through a wall into the next room of the building. Cloud could feel the pounding at the back of his skull, the way the burning had spread up the side of his throat and there were flickers of light and traces of blue squiggles across his sight on that side of his face. Reaching out as the other male tried to scramble away, he caught a fistful of that pale hair and used it to yank the boy's head down and solidly into his rising knee.
"All right, you fucker." He saw terrified pale eyes rising to look at him but he wasn't talking to the kid. Bringing his ruined hand up to grab the side of that pale face with a grip like steel he grit out: "You want to make your useless test copy, let's do this. And to hell with what you're going to get out of it."
There was a roar like an ocean wave in his ears and a flare of blue fire in front of his eyes. Under his hand the pale boy started to scream as black spread over both of them, clawing uselessly at Cloud. And somewhere… far away, he heard the way Tifa screamed his name and he felt the second White's failsafe kicked on and yanked her out of the game.
It let him smile.
And then the blue fire and black tendrils invaded his brain and that was his last honest thought.
Author/artist: TamLin
Setting: AU
Rating: T
Summary: waking up tonight, the team finally decided to tell me what was going on. All I've got to say is...
holy shit.
tell me if any parts of this don't make sense?
He had… the mother of all headaches.
It started somewhere in the back of his skull near the base and worked its way forward, getting thinner and sharper the closer it got to his eyes and the front of his head. It was, Cloud decided with what little thought he could put toward something other than the pain, the very last time he ever did whatever it was he'd done the night before. Until, stubborn, he forced his eyes open and realized -
Oh yeah.
In front of him was what looked like it should be an office room in ShinRa style. The carpet was red, the walls were barren of anything but a few framed prints of the ShinRa logo and the almost obscenely cute motivational poster he supposed every office had to have of a cute kitten draped from a tree branch with the cheery 'hang in there' print underneath.
As if 'hanging in there' was going to solve the kitten's problem. It needed to either let go or scrabble it's way back up onto the branch. 'Hanging in there' was going to sap its strength and make it unable to control its fall when it finally did.
There was a large, darkly wooden desk that took up most of the office space, cluttered with the expected paraphernalia and, lounging on the desk tying rubber bands together was a pale haired kid Cloud had never seen before in his life.
Before he moved and admitted to being aware, Cloud took stock of his situation. He was on his knees in front of the desk, hands cuffed behind him as well as a cuff that locked his elbows painfully close together. His legs were free, which was his captor's mistake but his effectiveness was still severely hampered. One of his shoulders felt dislocated. A careful testing of the bonds showed they were going to hold.
A quick dart of his eyes at the area around him garnered him not only a nasty case of vertigo and a renewal of the pressing headache but also a glimpse of beautiful, long brown hair carelessly falling across the floor. Ignoring the man on the desk, he turned his head to focus on Tifa. She was tied the same way he was but she was laying instead of kneeling and by her breathing she was all right but still unconscious. The tight band around his chest loosened the smallest bit and he felt his lips curve at their edges despite himself.
"She's pretty, isn't she?"
The voice from the desk, almost too smooth to be real had him turning his head to glare just as much as the words did and he saw that the boy was sitting up now, swinging his legs against the wood front of the desk, heels hardly making any sound.
"She's mine." He clarified it, voice throaty and raw feeling as it came out. The boy shrugged.
"She's a meatbag," he dismissed her with a waved hand, trailing colorful rubber bands. "The only thing that makes her special is that she got to be there front row seat for the day the world changed."
Cloud's lips twitched and his eyes narrowed. Not at the dismissal, he was glad the guy in front of him wasn't going to be prone to spend a lot of time thinking about Tifa but rather at what this sounded like the beginning of.
Shit.
The guy was going to monologue.
It was one of the oldest villain troupes in the world. The Illiad had villain monologues in it. Cloud had never understood why the opposition felt the need to ramble on about their 'great plan', especially not if it was real life and the audience wasn't waiting to be filled in on a relevant plot point. But ramble they did and oftentimes they video taped it these days and put it up on web sites for the world to see. Just before they went on a killing spree at the local mall or cut the head off of a capture journalist.
And, as much as he hated it, Cloud was going to lower himself to their level and play for time by asking:
"How's that supposed to happen?"
It was all he could do not to roll his eyes or grit his teeth when the pale boy on the desk burst into a bright, not entirely sane grin and spread his hands wide. Crap. He even felt filthy playing along. He was almost glad for the way the headache was so intently trying to break out past his skull that it was vaguely distracting.
"I'm so glad you asked! It's through your help that it's possible, you know. I could have done it without you but it would have been much harder. You showed me the way." The smile was childishly pleased. "I'm going to become the internet."
"You mean, take over the internet," Cloud corrected the grandiose error but the other boy just shook his head, still smiling.
"Oh no. I'm going to become the internet."
He probably really should have been playing along better. He was supposed to be prolonging this after all. 'Hanging in there'. But Cloud couldn't help the snort that escaped him and his dry:
"Good luck with that."
"You don't believe me," the pale boy didn't seem perturbed, slipping off of the desk to stalk in front of it. Next to him, Cloud felt Tifa stirring and he made a soft humming sound to warn her to stay put. Her wine dark eyes blinked open but other than that she didn't move. Their captor wasn't paying attention.
"You don't believe me but you should. Soon I will be everything and everywhere. Do you know of any developed country that doesn't rely on it's internet for everything? Businesses run through the internet. Stores don't even keep stock of their stock anymore, they let their computers do that and order automatically when they start to run low. No one knows how to use a map. It's all online. Everyone's money is tied up online. Banks don't keep paper records. Most people don't even get their statements in paper anymore. The governments store all their secrets in their computers with their internet access. Even the security systems that aren't connected to the internet are still connected to computers that are connected to the internet. There's not a computer today that's not made with a built in wifi connection whether it's turned on or not. The internet is everywhere and it runs everything. And soon - that's going to be me."
Tifa had apparently given up on pretending to be asleep and she struggled to sit up, shifting to lean against Cloud's side as she did. It gave up her element of surprise but Cloud understood. He would have wanted to face this kind of insane upright and aware. The boy ignored her but Cloud was glad of the warmth of her body against his.
"You're one of the terrorists holding the hostages at the TV station, aren't you?"
"Brilliant," the boy mocked him with a roll of his eyes. "And you figured that out all by yourself?"
Cloud ignored it.
"And you're hooked into the game the same way we are?"
"Oh yes. That was the easy part. There were so many extra pods just waiting to be filled with 'teammates'. All I had to do was… 'take' one of the spare spots." He sounded amused as he added: "It's not as if the original player was going to need it anymore."
Cloud felt his jaw set just a little but he refused to jump to conclusions. The kid in front of him could have murdered the preparing contestant… or he could have just snuck into a room that was still being prepped. Either way there was nothing Cloud could do about it now. The boy was hoping for a response and Cloud just have him a narrow look.
"It still means you're a meatbag too. You can't become a computer program."
It amused the pale boy and he all but giggled. Then, again for the dramatic flare, he threw his arms wide and tossed back his head.
"I already am!" His pale eyes shifted to look down at Cloud. "And you are too. Even she is." He pointed to Tifa and she shifted to press against Cloud's shoulder a bit more. He was just glad it wasn't the dislocated one. The side of her bound hands touched his but she wasn't passing him any lock pick or key. It was just more skin on skin contact and he'd take it.
"That's - " he had to pause and think about it. "Not the same."
But… he wasn't so sure.
The boy made an amused sound and wandered around to the other side of the desk.
"Not yet. But soon. The virus we planted in you two years ago is almost done adjusting now. It knows how to catch a perfect replica of it's host and then I'll leave my flesh behind and become one with the virus. I'll become one with the internet. And I'll be everywhere and do anything I want and no one will be able to stop me." He leaned forward abruptly and spread his hands so that they smacked down on the desk to support him. His eyes were very alive with a feverish fire.
"You see? It's all really very simple actually. And you showed me the way. I owe it all to you… Big Brother."
Cloud didn't appreciate the label and the look he shot the other male showed it. He resisted the urge to bare his teeth though.
"I'm still carrying the virus, aren't I?"
"Oh yes…" the gesture was flowing and flared and Cloud looked at where the hand was pointing.
The arm he'd thought was dislocated. Instead he saw it was -
…it was…
Sweet Jesus.
It was still vaguely arm shaped and it was still attached to him. He couldn't see much of it thanks to the bindings but when he twisted his head he could see -
There was a blank amount of horror that went into realizing that what was on the side of him, attached to him, had taken the place of the flesh and blood that should be there. Or… partially was…
At first glance it looked like he had a coating of slightly dull black down the skin of his exposed arm, almost like soot or some kind of smeared ash. Looking closer though - and damn his enhanced eyesight - he saw it was actually minuscule small strands, like the tendrils on a sea urchin.
And they were moving.
He had to swallow down the bile to realize that they were swaying. As if they were collecting data from the very air. Alive and definitely not a part of him at all for all they had almost entirely invaded his arm. All the way from where his gloves hid them to up his shoulder and he felt the sudden spear of animal panic to wonder if they'd reached his throat yet.
His face.
He fought it down hard. There was no place for emotion or panic in a situation like this. The only way he was going to get himself and Tifa out of this was if he kept his head and dealt with things rationally.
It didn't stop him from cringing inside when Tifa finally managed to twist around his body enough to get a look at it herself and made a small noise of horror. He pushed it away, compartmentalized it the way he did so much of what happened in his life and he focused on the immediate. His voice was cold and steady.
"If I've got the virus than it's duplicating me. Correct?" The slight narrowing of the other male's eyes gave him his answer and he let himself sneer at their captor.
"In that case, this is my show and you're nothing."
The boy's hands slammed into the desk and he snarled.
"Don't think I'm stupid! The virus needs to perform a test before it goes fully active. You're the test. And once it's done making a fake copy of you, it will be ready to make a real copy of me! Your copy will be nothing but a mindless drone but mine - I'll be perfect! The virus' perfect copy to take over the entire world!"
"But it won't be you."
It was the first time she'd spoke up and, even if Cloud could hear the slight tremble in her voice, she was still determined. For the first time the boy really focused on Tifa.
"Who cares?" he asked as if explaining it to a child. "My copy will be enough of what I want to be self-aware and to do what I want to do. I don't have to remember my mother or what my favorite color is to make that happen. It will be enough of me to matter."
Which was when the wall behind the boy exploded.
"I believe," the dry, calm voice in his ear said as Cloud dove to use the desk as cover, using his own body to both shield and move Tifa's. "That the correct term is 'the cavalry has arrived."
"White!" Cloud didn't know whether to curse or cheer at the sudden sound of his support kicking back on.
"Apologies for not arriving earlier," White continued unperturbed. "Black was laying down a diversion. We are currently in the process of rescuing the hostages in real time. Now seemed an appropriate time to rescue you as well.
"In other words, you only just now managed to hack through his security," Cloud translated and White made a quiet huffing noise.
"He's very good. Trained by one of the best though he was always too impulsive. It was - rather disappointing but he had to be let go. He's improved - though not enough."
"Yo! Enough with the chit chat." Swift's voice came over the comm. "Teef, Cloud - you gotta take this guy down. Whatever funked up thing he's doin' to you, Cloud, he's got rolling on himself too. Black's got the gal that was supposed to be playin' Vincent and they're tryin' to find what room they stashed glow boy in. Jessie an' Red an' Wedge are getting the hostages to safety which means the cops'll be here soon. We can stall but not too long and who knows what the men in lab coats will try to take over once they get back in here. Take 'em down hard, guys and don't leave any pieces behind."
"Roger." Cloud was already starting to shift before he remembered his cuffs but Tifa was ahead of him.
"This might help," her voice was surprisingly calm and he felt her hands on the cuffs. Looking down in surprise he saw that hers were already broken, dangling like gaudy bracelets from her arms. She gave him a brief, tight smile.
"Cloud… I can pile drive a WEAPON. These cuffs were pathetic."
In that instant, he fell in love with her all over again and he managed to murmur:
"That's my girl," before she tore the links between the cuffs apart like tissue. Her hand lingered briefly on the black of his useless arm and he felt the hum of it all the way up his shoulder and into the headache that had been demanding his attention for so long. On the other side of the desk there was an ominous swelling going on and Cloud was reminded of the monster they'd found in ShinRa tower so long ago in the game, a nightmare created of everything that had been available.
It, almost, distracted him from realizing exactly what the headache was. And how it's demands for his attention were so much more dangerous and deadly than a simple hangover.
He grabbed Tifa with his good arm and rolled as the desk suddenly burst apart in splinters.
"I know what you and your little meatbag friends did, brother!" the boy's voice was shrill and Cloud kept rolling as a giant hand made of concrete bits and ShinRa logos, knuckle the picture of a small hanging kitten, pounded down where they'd been.
"It doesn't matter. I'll avenge my brothers and I'll still rule the world. But I won't be as nice as I was going to be before!"
Cloud scrambled to his feet but the searing up his arm that had activated at Tifa's touch was only growing more intense and the pressure at the back of his skull made it feel as if it was going to pop off. The boy was off to the side of the now gaping hole in the wall and a huge monster of bits and pieces of building lurched forward between them. At his side, Tifa shook out her fingers and then clenched her hands into fists and Cloud thought she'd never looked more fiercely beautiful.
He would have liked the time for one more kiss.
"If you take care of the golem, I'll take care of the nut case," he murmured and she nodded, brows down. And then, for just a second she turned and flashed him a look and he knew… somehow… that she'd fallen in love with him.
"Be careful," she said - and then she was charging forward and the entire world was bending as energy gathered at her fists. Cloud gave it a single heart beat - long enough for the monstrosity to focus on the slim woman rushing toward it - and then he plunged forward as well.
The boy saw him coming and he let out a high yell - but Tifa's fist drove the concrete monster backward from it's attempts to save him, plowing it into and then through a wall into the next room of the building. Cloud could feel the pounding at the back of his skull, the way the burning had spread up the side of his throat and there were flickers of light and traces of blue squiggles across his sight on that side of his face. Reaching out as the other male tried to scramble away, he caught a fistful of that pale hair and used it to yank the boy's head down and solidly into his rising knee.
"All right, you fucker." He saw terrified pale eyes rising to look at him but he wasn't talking to the kid. Bringing his ruined hand up to grab the side of that pale face with a grip like steel he grit out: "You want to make your useless test copy, let's do this. And to hell with what you're going to get out of it."
There was a roar like an ocean wave in his ears and a flare of blue fire in front of his eyes. Under his hand the pale boy started to scream as black spread over both of them, clawing uselessly at Cloud. And somewhere… far away, he heard the way Tifa screamed his name and he felt the second White's failsafe kicked on and yanked her out of the game.
It let him smile.
And then the blue fire and black tendrils invaded his brain and that was his last honest thought.