Love Against Time

AN:: Sorry for the screwy paragraph breaks, if any. Was trying to find them all quickly, may not have... Hopefully you'll like this one... I'll try to be out with another section soon-ish. I've got a novel that is actually publish worthy, so who knows if it'll happen... I'll try though. Lemme know what you guys think. ::

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Shortly after his pained ponderings, the metal door was thrown open and two burly guards burst into the cell. One leered at Sephiroth while the other made a grab at him; a move he simply dodged. A quick glance past them informed him that others were being stripped and lined up in the hall. Frowning at them, he muttered that he could strip on his own and proceeded to do so. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched for any signs of movement from the statuesque blond. Cloud was, he noted smugly, watching him strip through slitted eyes. A wry thought crossed his mind, why couldn’t that dream have been the way it really happened? He pushed it on quickly, submerging it in other, more obvious thoughts. The Cetra tossed his clothes to a corner, not containing the toilet, and strode into the hall. Cat calls and jeers came at him from all directions, and thought he’d heard Cloud’s soft chuckle from within the cell. What his cellmate was laughing at, he could not determine.

Sephiroth observed that Stormy was the next one out, and he too received the roar of profanities. The General gave him a frosty nod, to which a quirked eyebrow was the response. Their cell block was marched around the circular corridor for fifteen minutes, then crammed into a freight elevator and led to a large tiled room thirteen floors below. Shower heads hung every three feet, and soap was distributed among them. Towels were stacked in neat piles on a raised step beside the door. If you wanted one, you had to bend over to get it. Several of the men groaned. It was then that Sephiroth realized that there were no females in the group. There were, however, several rather grotesque looking inmates that were eyeballing Stormy and him. Sensing trouble, he decided to stay close to the other. He could likely find a potential ally in this.

Finding the shortest distance to Stormy with an open stall, he quickly began rinsing his hair. It would do him no good to wash it then go back to the cell, but he needed the motions to feel clean. Leaning back to get his bangs wet, he felt a rough hand on his stomach. Straightening calmly, he leveled calculating eyes upon the man in front of him. Others were starting to form a half-circle around him. Cornered, Seph thought as the orc-ish man nearest him grinned evilly. The hand started to slide lower when Seph caught it by the wrist and twisted it violently. The man wailed like a siren as his bones snapped. Yanking his abused arm away, he scurried off in search of help. The rest of them closed in on him. A smirk lit his face. What did they think all his muscles were for? Combing his hair? He slammed a right hook into the nearest goomba, hurtling the man into several others. They did not get up.
Suddenly, there was someone pulling a few of them back. Glancing briefly over the heads of his pursuers, he saw that it was Stormy. Glad to have an ally after all, he fought his way to the other. They quickly cleared out the ruffians and finished up their showers in peace. The guards returned and took them to their cells. Stormy gave him a nod as he walked into his cell, to which he received a nod in return. They had an agreement, now all they needed was some verbal communication. Plans began to form in the General’s mind, and he stepped into his cell.

Cloud looked horrible when Sephiroth returned. He didn’t quite look as if he was living, which bothered the SOLDIER greatly. Dressing quickly, he walked over to Cloud and nudged him with the toe of his boot. The blond jumped violently and threw a slew of curses at him. Content that the other was alive, he lay down and stared at the ceiling for a moment.

“We may have an ally here,” he murmured, then settled into a deep strategic meditation for the next few hours. Gruel came and went, which Cloud didn’t rise for. He settled in for sleep after casting a questioning look at Cloud. He felt the heavy stare of Mako eyes on him in the dark, then murmured a silent good night and closed his eyes so sleep could claim him rapidly.

Cloud stared at Sephiroth long into the pseudo-night. The General’s words had meaning to him, more so than he really wanted to think about. He considered Cloud an ally too, judging by his words. There was something strange in hearing words like that from your sworn enemy. He shifted painfully so he might stare at the wall instead. His wounds were beginning to fester, but he didn’t want to let Sephiroth know that. How would it look to him to need help? He’d surely pull that clone crap again, true as it may be, and that would likely be his trump card. Sighing as silently as he could, he thought about the possibility of having an ally from this world. Would that really help them if the ally were locked up with them? Sephiroth shifted on his mattress. Cloud envied that mattress right then, and how much more comfortable it must be than the straw strewn floor. Still only considering yourself, eh, you bastard, he thought at the General. His eyes cast themselves in the other’s direction again. He was interesting to watch when he was asleep. So much less guarded, and quite the picture of beauty. Cloud didn’t deny his attraction to men, not even to Tifa, his girlfriend. Last night’s sleep had been very interesting indeed. Before that fucker had thrown the spoon through the window, amusing as it had been. Sephiroth must have been having some erotic dream; nothing else he could think of would make him moan like that. He’d gotten aroused just watching the tight body shift under the touch of some unknown lover. It shamed him slightly to think that he wanted his enemy as his lover from time to time, but there was more to it than that. They were both parts of the same being. In truth, the real Sephiroth had been killed and lay frozen in icy materia somewhere in their world. They’d both been cloned from that Sephiroth, but this one had been the perfect copy. Minus a few mental problems. And from him they’d wanted to make more clones. A clone of a clone was what he himself was. But as they were only pieces, they felt most whole when they were together; it drove them crazy. It drove them to hatred and desire, emotions which complicated their duties beyond measure. Still, it was there and nothing could be done about it. Now they both suffered from the strange attraction to each other in such a close proximity. Battle was a way to be close and allow the anger at their ties to be thrown at each other. But here was an entirely different matter. Here they did not have weapons or materia to fuel their angers, only their fists. And Cloud was unbelievably weakened right now. There would be no chance of him withstanding a physical fight with Sephiroth. So he was forced to submit to his desires. Watching Sephiroth, he let his fantasies run wild, imagining that it was his touch that made the other writhe like he did in his sleep. His mouth making him gasp, his hands wrapped around the other’s erection and his name being uttered as he came. He only made himself suffer by doing this, as he was too pained to make himself come under his own hand. The movement was too much for his wounds. So there he sat wounds and erection throbbing long into the night. He slept fitfully, but still he slept.

The next morning he was woken by a soft shake. There was a hand on his shoulder, gently gripping him. Blinking slowly, he looked for the perpetrator. Sephiroth was kneeling beside him.

“What the hell do you want?” Cloud grumbled.

“You look like shit, and you haven’t eaten in a while.” The Son of Jenova gestured at him with a bowl of gruel. “If you don’t eat, we’ll never make it out of here.”

Cloud looked at him, then the bowl. “What’s all this ‘we’ crap?”

“Alone, I doubt that either of us could make it out of here alive. If we work together, then I believe that we have a chance. Eat.” Cloud raised an arm to take the bowl, and then stiffened in pain. Embarrassment ran through him, but Sephiroth simply raised the spoon to his mouth. Cloud looked at him with a strange mix of wonder and suspicion. The General raised an eyebrow at him and shook his head. Cloud opened his mouth and took the food off the spoon. They settled into a comfortable silence. After a moment of spoon feeding, Seph sat beside Cloud, his firm thigh pressed against the blonde’s knee. Cloud started at this, the tension between them rising.

“What do you want?” Seph asked. “A truce? I can’t get out of here without you. I’m not going to kill you. I’m not going to anything. I need you. And right now you need me. If you aren’t going to take care of yourself, I will.”

“I’m not some plaything. I’m not your doll.” Bitter anger laced his voice.

“I know that.” Sephiroth rested his spoon hand in his lap. “You are the only thing standing between me and godhood. You are my greatest foe, and now you are my greatest ally in this. Irony runs amok with my life as well as yours. I’d say Zax was proof enough of that.”

Cloud spat in his face. “How dare you speak of Zax!?” he growled. “This is all your fault! The reason why my friends are gone and I’m here in this place!” He struggled to move away from the General, but he failed with pains and slid to the floor.
Sephiroth moved to pull Cloud upright again, but the door was flung open. Just as they had yesterday, two guards came in and yanked Cloud to his feet.

“Bath time for you, pretty boy,” one of them leered.

Sephiroth stood at this and shoved the guard away. “He can take his own clothes off, just as I can. Why don’t you go wait by the door?” The guards backed down, and Seph lay on his mattress and stared at the ceiling to give Cloud some semblance of privacy.