[OPEN]

[key_0f_light]

Characters: Sora + Anyone
Location: Death Robbins
Rating: PG
Time: 10 December, Late Afternoon
Description: On his never ending quest to satisfy his ice cream craving, Sora finds the time to wander over to the renowned 'Death Robbins' ice creamery. Where hopefully yummyness awaits.

Comments

Only Sora could sit on his phone and turn on functions ._.;;

[de_faulty_hero]

That was, by far, the weirdest looking kid he had seen since he had last been thirteen and staring into the mirror himself. It was such an eerie similarity that Cloud had stopped from sliding down another alleyway and simply watched the brunette version of himself travel to the ice cream place.

It was clear the kid was too busy staring at the sign to notice him, but he couldn't stop himself from gawking at the boy as the kid gawked at the ice cream parlour. That... wasn't him from a different world, was it? No, he would always be blonde, but that kid looked really close to him.

Cautiously, he walked silently behind the kid and stared at the mop of brown hair before reaching up and touching his own blonde spikes. "You're a weird looking kid. Did you get teased a lot?"

That's what makes him 'special' ;)

[key_0f_light]

Sora jumped at the sudden address. He has been so wrapped up in his own ice cream related imaginings he wasn't totally prepared to be spoken to. He spun around to see who had asked what he took to be an odd question. He had never before considered himself to be 'weird looking'.

Any chance of a scoffing remark was dismissed as soon as he realised who it was. Instead his eyes widened and his jaw practically dropped in shock. "Cloud!? You're here too?"

How long had it been since he'd seen Cloud? Months. And months. And last time he had been in the midst of battle. He didn't look too injured now though, thankfully.

[de_faulty_hero]

Cloud withdrew a little when the kid turned around, and he was surprised by how similar they looked from the front too. Geez, what was with everyone starting to look like him again? First Aya and Lightning and now this kid and Lightning being back. He was starting to suspect someone was playing a practical joke on him.

Of course, of all the reactions he was expecting, recognition wasn't one of them. He blinked when the kid called him by name, crossing his arms over his chest and contemplating whether he had actually met this guy before. Nope, his memory might have been faulty, but he would remember a kid like this.

"How do you know my name?"

[key_0f_light]

Sora faltered, but only for a second, "We've met a number of times. You helped us out."

People not recognising him when he knew them was something Sora had experienced in this world on a few occasions now. While it still seemed strange, and in a way a bit depressing, he was getting used to it. In Cloud's case, though, he was willing to consider the possibility that maybe he was the same Cloud, but somehow disappearing into the sky was in some way connected to memory loss. Which reminded him...

"Did you defeat Sephiroth?" He asked this in much the same way as one would ask whether you managed to buy milk on the way home from the shops. A pleasant, hopeful sort of tone.

[de_faulty_hero]

He raised an eyebrow, looking the kid up and down again before looking skeptical. "I think I would remember helping out a kid of your distinct... hair," he replied. He always remembered people who looked like him, since it was so rare.

At the mention of Sephiroth, he perked a bit and seemed to swell with his usual arrogance. The corner of his lips quirked upwards before he took on a more casual stance. "Which time? I always defeat him when I set my mind to it," he said, confident then paused and stared at the kid. "Wait, how do you know Sephiroth?"

[key_0f_light]

‘Distinct hair’? Sora’s hair wasn’t that distinct. Sure, perhaps a little spikier than the average human being, but it was totally natural. The continued insistence that Cloud didn’t recognise him didn’t phase him too much. Like other friends who’d had similar reactions, he’d just need to make another effort to get to know them in this world too. No big deal.

Hearing Cloud’s confidence with dealing with Sephiroth was reassuring too, Sora took it to mean that he had indeed won the battle with the darkness in his heart. Whether it was gone completely, or, like Tifa had suggested, just shielded where it couldn’t be reached. “That’s good to hear then!” Sora replied cheerily; “And I know him from a few places I guess. Mainly he was looking for you. I did fight him a couple of times though…” He appears to look thoughtfully across at a seemingly innocuous patch of wall. “He was not a good guy,” He adds as an afterthought.

[de_faulty_hero]

He swore the kid might have been a little offended at his reference to hair, but seriously, he hadn't seen anyone that close resembling him since... ever. It just didn't happen as much as he had hoped it would so someone else could suffer through some taunts. Still, he was no closer to knowing who this guy was.

He raised an eyebrow before scratching his head in confusion. "You fought Sephiroth?" Was there some drugs going around that made people delusional? "No offense kid, but he would have slaughtered you. You don't even look like you have SOLDIER enhancements," he said, looking at Sora's eyes. Nope, no mako glow there.

[key_0f_light]

Sora frowned. If there was one thing he disliked, it was people telling him he couldn't do something. He damn well could, and he'd prove it. Be it a pie eating contest or a competition to see who could brave the inside of a women's lingerie store the longest. Plus, he had fought Sephiroth in this case, so he felt entitled to be right.

What else Cloud was talking about made absolutely no sense to him though. Was SOLDIER a type of armour manufacturing company? Or maybe they made custom key chains? .... Were they in business with the Moogles? It seemed slightly odd that Cloud would stare at his face after saying so, but perhaps he was scrutinizing his resolve?

"It's true," Sora insisted, "I fought Sephiroth. Twice. And," He added, a little smugly, "Live to tell the tale."

[de_faulty_hero]

Geez, when the kid decided to frown, he looked a lot like him again. Was this another one of those weird BREW time paradox things where this guy was a kid from the future and Sephiroth had come back to rule the planet? Oh man, he hoped this kid wasn't his from the future and had to fight Sephiroth.

"Twice, huh?" He tipped his head to the side and noted how serious this kid was. He doubted anyone would lie about that, but it just seemed so unreal. "So, what part of Gaea did you fight him on? The Northern Crater?"

[key_0f_light]

Both those places meant nothing to Sora. They were just words, and ones he’d never heard before at that. He wondered whether Cloud was referring to a part of Hollow Bastion he’d never visited. It was definitely possible, given that Sora imagined he had only been to a limited area on that world; time had been short and he had needed to travel elsewhere. The Northern Crater sounded like a large empty hole in the middle of nowhere though, and Hollow Bastion was certainly not short of those. Maybe he actually was referring to another name for a place Sora had already been.

Knowing as he did the inhabitants of this worlds’ propensity for failing to remember things Sora knew to be true, he thought it best to clarify. “Where is that? Is it where you fought him and flew off on Hollow Bastion?” And who knows, maybe Gaea was just another name for the same place too. It had already been changed from Radiant Garden to Hollow Bastion, and back again; maybe it had a third secret name too. Maybe more.

[de_faulty_hero]

Watching this kid, he wondered why they seemed to not understand one another. The kid was assuming a bunch of stuff about him, and he was assuming a bunch of stuff the other way, yet they just seemed to be confusing one another. He disliked being confused because it happened all too often in the past, and he disliked even more unexplained events about himself.

"I've never heard of Hollow Bastion," he finally said, mulling that over. He scratched the back of his head and then shrugged his shoulders. "You said that you met me and I helped you, right? I don't...remember any of that, but I've been known not to remember important details. Who are you and what did I help you with?"

[key_0f_light]

“I’m Sora,” He rarely knew how else to describe himself except in connection to what he was searching for or his keyblade, but he hadn’t been able to summon it since arriving here so he simply moved on to the second part of the question. “You helped us out lots of times, on Hollow Bastion you fought alongside everyone when the Heartless attacked, and way before that on Olympus you helped keep me focused on looking for what was important.”

Sora tried to sound encouraging, he greatly respected Cloud and was keen for him to remember the good things he had done, and how many people he had helped out whilst still fighting his own battles against his own darkness. He hadn’t realised that Cloud’s memory wasn’t great at the best of times though, so there might have still been a chance that this was the same Cloud he knew, not one taken before they had met.

[de_faulty_hero]

He didn't recognize the name at all, but he kept the blankness off of his face as he regarded the now named kid. At least he had a name to go by now, though he wasn't sure about the story that the brunette was weaving for him. He didn't recognize the terms nor the places, and he was pretty certain he would remember visiting a place called 'Olympus'.

"What's a Heartless?" By then, he knew he didn't know who this kid was, and he was pretty sure there was a clone of him somewhere. "I don't think I'm the Cloud that you know, since I've never been to any of those places."

He contemplated for a moment, looking towards the sky and then looked back at Sora. "Regardless, if the guy looked like me, had my name and fought like me, I can safely say he must be pretty awesome."

[key_0f_light]

Cloud now seemed pretty convinced they didn’t know each other, and it was enough to make Sora begin to concede the point as well. After all, he knew from both his closest friends that people could be taken from different points in time; this Cloud must simply have been taken from a point in time before he had met him, and been to Hollow Bastion or Olympus, some years earlier. And perhaps from a time when Cloud was a lot more confidant, it certainly seemed like the Cloud he knew was more pre-occupied with his own inner turmoil than this one

[de_faulty_hero]

"Of course I am," he replied with a soft huff and folded his hands behind his head. No matter what people remembered of him, he had to be a great guy and a great fighter. That just came with the territory, and he couldn't be that much different in the future or the past or wherever Sora had met him. "Being great just comes with the territory of being a hero."

Well, he perhaps shouldn't lay it on so thick, but he found it easier than dealing with so many unanswered questions. He was told it might even be defensive somehow.

"I might not be, but that doesn't mean I can't still make a different kind of impression. You're... here for ice cream or something?" He figured that they could learn something off of each other, so why not hang out a bit?

[key_0f_light]

A different kind of impression. Sora hadn't considered that a possibility with many of the people he'd met, but he supposed it must be true. When you knew someone but they didn't know you, you could rewrite past impressions, fix mistakes...

Sora didn't think he'd made too many when it came to Cloud though. Or, anyone, really. He always simply followed his heart. Until not long ago, his heart had been telling him to get ice cream, a fact which had been all but forgotten when he saw Cloud. However his mentioning of it brought a loud reminder message from his stomach out into the open frosty air. It sounded like a bear growling.

"Yeah, I was." Sora patted his stomach and smiled apologetically. "You wanna grab some? I can always fill you in on how great you used to be back then." He grinned, he was teasing, but also genuinely interested to know how different this Cloud was to the one he knew.