#ff7 avalanche

[umbralstars]

Actually I'm more in the mood for positivity, so I'm gonna talk about something that feels meaningful to me.

I actually really love Cloud. Surprising I know, but I mean I love how his mental health struggles are actually depicted with empathy. I've had struggles with psychosis and c-ptsd for a very long time (luckily I'm not that impaired day to day but it's still a lot), and Cloud is one of the few times I can think of where a character with similar symptoms is treated well and as a hero in their narrative. Avalanche's responses to his hallucinations and delusions feels Real and human but in a way that doesn't make Cloud out to be a villain. Yes, there are times where Cloud scares them, where he may hurt them in the midst of an episode, and they may not understand what is going on or how to help him (which is rightfully frustrating); but, Cloud is never once abandoned.

He's given friendships and love over and over and over again, and he returns it with his own. Which rarely ever happens in any media I come across. Is he perfect? No. He can be a hard ass and when he's back in the throws of depression he draws away from those he loves; however, he is still not abandoned. I've actually always adored Tifa's speech in Advent Children because Cloud Needed to hear that. I'll be the first tell you that sometimes when you're dealing with severe mental health issues sometimes people you trust need to expressly call you on your shit. And Cloud listened to her. I feel so protective over the ending of Advent Children at times because Cloud absolutely deserves that chance to heal and his smile makes me cry every time because it's, again, one of the few examples I've ever seen of someone like me being allowed to heal. Being given that chance even if his struggles will be lifelong.

I know he's not a perfect allegory. But I can talk all day about how Cloud's struggles still definitely relates to psychosis even with all the ghost shenanigans (and how Sephiroth Is Cloud's mental health demon or a whole host of other things), and it's a hill I'll die on.

[ensorcello]

[sleepsentry-old-blog]

[thebirdqueen]

Thinking about Vincent and being all happy about him then BAM! I'm hit with the realization that he will live forever. He will outlive the gang. See them in all their stages of life and leave their mark on not only the planet, but on him as well as he lives on. Yet it makes sense when considering Chaos. Chaos being a Waepon of sorts and ultimately playing the role of an end-all entity. Of course he sees all those who return to the planet. Of course.......

[acnl-draws]

🎹Vinti piano duet🎄 A secret santa gift for @rosemochi 💗 Happy holidays everyone! Stay safe and warm out there also, as a bonus, here's the photos they have hanged on the wall! featuring cute moments from the AVALANCHE fam

[sometimesrufus]

I just had a thought.

So you know how, in Remake, the main branch of Avalanche shows up to raid Shinra? It is heavily implied (particularly after the release of the Yuffie DLC) that their presence there is a direct result of Rufus.

However.

In BC, Rufus and Avalanche have already cut ties. Years beforehand, in fact.

So, I have questions. Is BC being totally discarded for the purposes of Remake? Or are they doubling-down on the idea of factions, with there still being a subset that’s loyal to Rufus? Or something else entirely, like AU shenanigans?

Remake, explain.

[kooriicolada]

For the soulmate-au prompts: The danger meter one was really interesting, so maybe the members of AVALANCHE are... 95% sure that there's SOME soulmate pair among them, but whenever they try to figure out *who* they accidentally get attacked, or different people's meters went up every time the same two people fight or something. Up to you if the pairing is everyone/everyone, just a few, the concept of AVALANCHE, or none of them are soulmates and the actual soulmates just have *awful* timing.

Not sure this is what you were hoping for but...

PROMPT LIST READ ON AO3

Cloud never gave much of a hoot about soulmates.  He'd been born with eight meters.  Cloud was what people called a nexus.  A person who was the lodestone to a group— someone meant to bring and hold them together.  What it was was annoying.

They constantly felt like they were burning, not hot or painful but an awareness that made Cloud itch at them.  His Ma had taken to wrapping his arm in bandages when he was small to stop him making himself bleed. 

Everyone else he knew had one if any at all.  Tifa only had one, anyway, and Ma didn't have any.  It wasn't uncommon not to have one, in fact it was more rare to have any at all.  The folk in Nibelheim whispered alternately that it was a curse or a blessing.  Either way, they'd say, it meant you were going to have an interesting life.  Cloud just wished they'd make up their minds about which it was.

He first realized that one of them was Tifa when her mom died.  One of the little meters on his arm burned more than usual, making little hitches and jumps in growing color.  Then there was the bridge, the fall. The mark had been dulled until Tifa's injuries healed.

Her dad still tells him to stay away.  Maybe because of it.  Cloud's not sure.

But then he's leaving for Midgar and he fails to get into SOLDIER and everything just seems to keep on falling apart until all he knows is mako green and a kind voice.  Then there's Tifa again, the green is gone, and he's blowing things up and trying to get out of this nonsense.

Tifa tells him she's one of his soulmates and he believes her, because who else can he trust except Tifa.  Putting up with her friends is another matter entirely.

But one of the meters is growing in concert with the ratatatat of Barret's gun arm, and after that they come in constantly.  Aerith follows, then Red XIII.  There's Yuffie, Vincent and Cid.  The strangest one comes in the form of Cait Sithe, which is the first clue Cloud has that there's someone behind the thing.  The betrayal is still a surprise, a sting.

Then Aerith dies and Cloud's left wearing a mark that's gone stone cold and dark.  Frozen in place and never to inch higher again.  But there's little time to grieve when his world is falling to pieces alongside his mind.

They make it out somehow, Cloud pulls himself together, pulls them together.  It works.

EXTRA:

"What did you call them?" Tifa asks a little distracted.

Cloud blinks slowly from where he's settled at the bar.  "I always thought of them as experience bars."

[breezeinmonochromenight]

Ship wars about Cloti, Cloerith? Nah, it's a new millennia. It's all about Aerti. ❤ Cloud can have Jesse, Zack, etc.

Cloud 𝓕𝓤𝓒𝓚𝓢 but is also aggressively unaware he is being flirted with.

Zack is in love with Cloud and is a lovesick puppy who’s just like

every time one of his former coworkers asks Cloud out. He’ll come around one day, right?

Tifa and Aerith held hands one (1) time and it was over for all the other chumps out there. And then Tifa punched the drunk dude that ruined their moment through a wall Aerith wanted to propose on the spot.

The holy trinity are/were all boyfriends.

Kunsel doesn’t take the helmet off because he knows he’ll steal all hearts, Johnny Sasaki/Akiba style, if he does.

Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge have something going on, and you didn’t hear it from me.

Edit: Oh yeah also Valenwind because grumpy pilot + growly vampire is just. 👌 They bond over the tiniest little things that you wouldn’t think either of them would have in common.