What happened to Dark Star? I haven't seen Advent Children for years, so I'm assuming Dark Nation is out of the picture, but is Dark Star in the picture at all for Next Time You Call?
To be honest, my assumption when I began NTYC was that Dark Nation was dead, and so the line from chapter one directly references the fact that Cloud killed him:
He dreams instead of Rufus Shinra...the way he snarls as Cloud cuts down Dark Nation in a single violent swing of his sword.
I just saw Advent Children again before the release of Rebirth when it was enjoying a limited run in theaters, and Dark Nation was nowhere to be found. I'm assuming his survival (and rebrand as Darkstar), is a dyed-in-the-wool retcon. I'm totally okay with that. Rufus surviving the end of FF7 is the first and most major retcon that I can remember, and I never once was assed about it. He's such a great character, it would've been a shame if he met his end that day on the top floor of Shinra HQ (like his disgusting father...no thanks).
I never thought to include Dark Nation past the events in the original game, so I can't. I don't want Rebirth to change too much of the fic's foundational canon. It will only make it more difficult for me to keep things straight going forward, and I don't want the fic to end up having an obvious pre-and-post Remake series identity crisis. With the exception of utilizing Remake/Rebirth's beautifully expanded maps and locations, and the occasional harmless background tidbit (like learning exactly how/when Cloud left Nibelheim through both Traces of Two Pasts and Rebirth), I'm going to predominately defer to the canon that existed right up until 2016.
This was a great question, and definitely something that stays on my mind now that so much more attention has returned to FF7 in general. I think the thing that will probably affect me and my depiction of Rufus in NTYC going forward is the knowledge of just how strong his connection to his lil beastie was, because of the fact that I wrote it in such a way as to make Cloud directly responsible for killing the man's dog...yikes...
Maybe he'll get Rufus a puppy, someday, who knows? (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.)
Pairing: addcest [MMDE + them trying to get LP to join]
WC: 2222
Rating: K
AU: college au
Category: fluff
Notes: happy birthday to @rainsonata!!!!!! i hope you have a great one friend 💖💖
Masi groans deeply, running his hands through his hair and tugging at the long strands softly. They’re a bit greasy, and look more orange than white in the light of his only lamp.
The sun is long gone, its warm rays replaced by the darkness and a pleasant, cool breeze slipping into his dorm room through the open window.
His desk is littered with open textbooks and notebooks with neatly written notes that he copies down, fingers starting to glide over his laptop’s keyboard again. He works manually, not really comprehending the words as he types them out, even if he reads through them to make sure there are no grammatical errors he’d get chewed out on.
The assignment is due at nine AM, and now he curses his past self for not doing it earlier. It’s English, though, and he has about as much motivation to dedicate his time to English as he has to sports. Which is, to say, none.
He keeps unlocking his phone so he can reply to Esper, walls of hearts met with more walls of hearts as they go back and forth. He’s thankful for the small talk; he probably wouldn’t have enough nerves to finish this thing.
No later than he’s saving the doc, fingers lingering over the control and s buttons, is there knocking on the door, loud and insistent, knowing very well he’s still up.
Masi pushes his chair away from the table and stands up, rubbing at his eyes after he pushes his glasses up. He puts them back into place before he opens the door, to properly see the person standing in the hallway.
His heart skips a beat — or two — when his eyes settle on the man.
“Lusa,” he mutters, unable to hide the confusion in his voice. What’s he doing here?
The kickboxer smiles a little sheepishly. His hair is sticking up on one side, a clear testament saying he probably just woke up from a nap, probably after his training. He’s only wearing a tanktop and a pair of sweats.
Masi’s cheeks dust with pink and he tears his eyes away.
“I came to borrow the notes like we agreed,” Lusa says.
“Oh! Right.” Masi blinks; he’d almost completely forgotten about the deal they’d agreed on earlier. He retreats back into the dorm and digs through the pile of notes on his table, grabbing the two notebooks to give them to the other. “Here.”
Lusa takes them with a grateful smile, flashing his brilliant teeth.
Masi’s breath hitches a little.
“Thanks. I’ll give them back tomorrow. Or, y’know, later today,” Lusa laughs softly, looking at the clock mounted on the wall, and Masi can’t help a smile.
Lusa leaves with the notebooks and Masi is left alone with just the soft hum of the crickets from outside.
Now, done with the assignment, Masi flicks the light off and clambers into the bed, already looking forward to the morning.
He’ll have to get the essay printed and delivered, but, much more importantly, Lusa is going to take him for the morning coffee. The slight absurdity of the predicament they are in never ceases to amaze him.
They started off as nothing more than a pair working on a presentation for their applied physics class, and now, barely two and a half months later, they could even be considered best friends. Sometimes they snuck around the dorms to work together overnight, sometimes they exchanged notes, and sometimes they just went out for a coffee together. It had been a real surprise when Lusa told him he loves coffee — the guy certainly doesn’t look it, looks more of a protein shake kinda guy, but life is full of surprises, Masi supposes.
Masi walks back over to the table, double checks to make sure he actually saved the document by re-saving it a bunch of time, and then he copies it to a USB drive. With that done, he’s free to shut the laptop down and put it, along with some of the books and notebooks, into his backpack for the next day. The rest he puts away, each to its own designated spot on the shelf above the table, organized by subject.
Only then he’s satisfied enough to finally retreat to his bed, exchanging his t-shirt and pants for a pajama set. The mattress feels soft and the blanket so comfortable that he’s asleep in mere minutes, even despite his still marathoning brain.
Barely five hours later, the very same insistent knocking awakens him. The first rays of sunlight creep in through the window, creating stretched out shadows on the tidy floor. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, Masi patters his way to the door and opens it to reveal Lusa, smiling way too cheerily for such an early hour of the day.
“Nice pajamas! Did I wake you up?” Lusa asks, not sounding apologetic in the slightest as he points to the pajama set Masi is wearing.
Masi looks down at himself. He’s wearing his favorite pajamas; the ones with paw prints that are so comfortable that it overweights the sure embarrassment of being seen in them by literally anyone aside from Esper, who owns a matching pair. Except…
“Give me a minute!” he squeaks out indignantly, slamming the door closed.
He scurried to get the pajamas off and some presentable clothes on, feeling heat blooming in his cheeks. Lusa’s mirthful laugh is audible even through the door, and the flush coloring Masi’s cheeks is about thrice as bad by the time he finally reopens the door, dressed in his usual dress shirt, pants and knit vest combo and holding his travel mug in one hand as he locks his dorm room.
“Aw, those pajamas were cute,” Lusa jests, very obviously enjoying Masi’s embarrassment. He startles, as if noticing something. “You really like cats, don’t you?” His tone is lighthearted and jovial — almost as if he isn’t making fun of Masi at all. Masi follows his line of sight down to the mug he’s holding.
The cat head printed on it is pushed against Masi’s chest in an attempt to hide it. “Stop making fun of me!” he grumbles.
Lusa raises his hands and waves them a little, finally looking a tad bit sorry. “I wasn’t making fun of you! I love cats too!”
“You… do?”
“Yeah!”
Masi thinks back to Esper’s dorm room, where he secretly keeps a cat, and thinks that maybe they could introduce Lusa to the aptly named Paranoia. Hopefully she won’t be too scared.
“Okay, let’s go, Ara will kill me if we come in during the morning rush,” Lusa laughs, twisting on his heel and leading the way down the hall to the elevator.
“You know Ara?” Masi asks, slightly surprised, while he catches up, shoes squeaking just a tad bit on the floor.
“Oh boy do I… Her girlfriend is in the kickboxing course with me. I’m sure I know more about her kinks than I do about my own.” The last sentence is said with a vaguely wry tone. Masi wonders just how much he’d been told.
“I… see...” Masi mutters, face scrunching up a little as the elevator dings happily and they step in. He’d known Ara for long enough to know that both her and Elesis simply love talking about each other. A day without being told how sweet Elesis’ kisses are over coffee is a day when Masi wonders whether Ara is sick.
Though, to be fair, he also can’t resist to tell her about Esper and everything he does. They’re both just idiots in love, it’s okay.
Masi looks sideways, catching the way Lusa’s bangs bounce as he shifts. His eyes trail away again. Yes, very in love indeed.
They arrive at the ground level and Lusa leads the way again, just as chipper as each morning. Masi doesn’t know how he does it; he can’t even act alive until he’s downed his mandatory cup of coffee. Probably has to do with those energy smoothies he’d learned Lusa actually drinks.
His phone buzzes in his pocket and Masi fishes for it, unlocking it to find a new message from Esper, the messenger still open from last night.
‘have fun ;) ill see you in class later’
Despite it being a fairly normal message, Masi can feel heat filling his chest and cheeks alike. Esper had been doing this for a while, ever since him and Lusa started hanging around the shelter helping out. Actually, he should’ve figured the guy likes cats, working in a shelter, but somehow it never clicked in Masi’s brain.
Students did crazier things for credit and a nice line in their resumes.
Masi uses the rim of his mug to push his bangs out of his face as he types up a reply, thanking Esper, only to be met with the usual ‘yup~ np np’.
Putting away his phone when he gets a sticker of a cat doing a winky face and a peace sign, he catches Lusa not-so-subtly peeking over at him. The bulkier boy twists away to face forward again when he gets discovered.
Masi can swear he sees pink dusting his cheeks. His fingers itch to tell Esper, but he just curls them tighter around the mug and use his now free hand to actually push away the fringe out of his face from where it had fallen back right away.
“Ah, can you hold this for me?” he pipes up when the bangs relentlessly refuse to cooperate with him, holding up his mug.
Lusa takes the lilac plastic and watches almost enraptured as Masi undoes his ponytail to remake it, gathering the flowy locks tightly and wrapping the tie around them with deft fingers. They spill over his shoulders in a neat tail again and Lusa feels the impulse to reach out and touch it to make sure it’s as soft as he thinks it is.
“Thanks,” Masi says, taking the mug back from Lusa’s lax fingers and offering a small smile.
They walk to the coffee shop in silence after that, but somehow it isn’t uncomfortable in the slightest. Only as they’re entering the shop and Masi can feel his phone vibrating in his pocket with a new message from Esper — probably a meme at this point — does he pipe up.
“Hey, have you ever been in Esper’s dorm?” he asks, pulling Lusa’s attention as he holds the door open. Masi slips inside, accompanied by the chiming bell overhead.
“Hm?” Lusa hums, following, “No, why?”
Masi’s fingers curl around his phone. He looks away. “Well… I don’t think he told you, since it’s a secret, but Esper has a cat in his dorm. She’s super nice, uh… You could come visit her sometime?”
He isn’t quite sure why that proposal sounds so weird on his tongue or why he can’t move his eyes from the window and all the people passing by in their morning rush. He feels a little bad for putting more meaning behind it in his mind.
“Would Esper be okay with that?” Lusa asks in reply, leading the way to the counter, where Ara stands, keeping an eye on the small oven in the corner. The sweet smell of croissants fills the air.
Masi bites back the ‘it’d been Esper’s idea in the first place’ that sits at the tip of his tongue. Thinking of the three of them spending time together doing nothing but playing with Paranoia or playing those rpg games Lusa loves so much… is nice. It’s really nice; all they’d wanted for some time now.
“Yeah,” he says instead. “Ask him if you’re worried.”
Lusa seems to mull it over as they wait for Ara to acknowledge them, doing her best not to drop the tray with fresh, steaming croissants as she places it onto the counter to cool. “Nah, I’ll take your word for it. I’d love to. It feels weirdly like cheating hanging out with one of you alone anyhow.”
The way he says it is nonchalant, just a remark he probably doesn’t think much of, but Masi’s heartbeat picks up nonetheless and he bites down on his bottom lip. It hadn’t been cheating, not for the longest time. Not since Esper let it slip that Lusa looks hot after a workout. Not since Masi admitted he likes the way his chest feels lighter around Lusa. Not since they laughed together over Paranoia’s hungry meowing at each other’s stupidity for worrying so much.
“Esper’s gonna be happy,” Masi says quietly, unable to force back a smile stretching his lips. “Maybe we can make it a surprise. He’s always happy when you’re around.”
Lusa laughs, the sound finally getting Ara’s attention. “What about you? Are you happy with me? Or am I just pulling you along unwillingly?” Lusa elbows him teasingly, his eyes crinkled at the corners despite that.
Masi’s cheeks heat up when he thinks how he’d been looking forward to this. “No!” he blurts out, “I like being with you.”
There seems to be a knowing glint in both Lusa and Ara’s eyes after that. Masi hides his blush with his now filled mug, feeling like he had just spilled some age old secret.
DW messed with her magic and accidentally appeared in an alternative universe where the El no longer exists, the world isn't a mess with demons or missing priests, and magic doesn't seem to exist. How would she react if she was to stay there for 1-3 weeks? What's her decision at the end? To stay or leave?
Imagine Aisha(DW) entering into another world by mistake, which is Elrios, but more more peaceful from the world that she had came from. This leaves her unsettled because she have never seen Elrios this peaceful before.
Everyone is happy.
No one seems to be using magic.
No words of Demon attacks or missing priestesses.
She didn’t even sense the El, which leaves her unease but at relieved at the same time.
Imagine Aisha staying in this alternative world for more than 3 weeks. She feels so happy there. There was no fighting whatsoever. It was peaceful….Maybe a little too peaceful.
She misses the Elgang and mostly all of Elsword (IS)’s antics. She misses them so much, including the Elrios where she originated from.
She grabbed her staff and chants a spell that would bring her back to her Elrios. Once Aisha returns, she teleports off to find the Elgang.
I'm thinking about chapter 2 from ff7 rebirth again, where Rufus meets Cloud and tells him he had read his profile. I wonder what Rufus's thoughts were in seeing the profile of a man who calls himself a SOLDIER, but isn't. Does this topic ever come back in the present in your current fanfic?
What kind of thoughts ran through Rufus's head as he had access to everything about this man how caused so many problems for his men?
This is such a great question.
When I started thinking about what a Rufus/Cloud shippy story might look like way back in 2016, this was actually one of the things at the forefront of my mind. Even without the Remake series, it's always been clear to me that Rufus likely knew much more about Cloud than Cloud did, or at least he knew it a lot sooner. Rufus is thorough and cunning enough to have availed himself of such information if it existed, and it certainly existed, since Hojo is still around when he takes over the family business. I always wanted to address this potential flashpoint between them; would Cloud want to know? Would Rufus ever even offer, and under what circumstances? It seemed like a great focal point for drama, from the perspective of wanting to Write Fun Things.
So, imagine my complete and utter surprise when the very first time Rufus and Cloud meet after the fight atop Shinra HQ, Rufus states POINT BLANK that he's read his file. I also don't think he was lying at all about finding it to be enlightening (and finding Cloud to be fascinating). Unlike his father, Rufus wants to control things by understanding them. Fear works well enough on the idiot masses, but not on people like Cloud, Sephiroth, etc.
Some slight spoilers for NTYC under the cut.
I have to be honest, after having updated the fic in January (a month and some change before the game dropped) with a scene covering this exact topic, my jaw fucking dropped when Rufus said those words. There was a lot of internal screaming. I wasn't sure how the topic would be brought up in NTYC when it was in the early planning stages, but I always had it in my notes that at some point Rufus would throw this information out there as an offer. Without spoiling anything, I'm definitely not through with exploring the file situation. The contents, Rufus' reaction to the contents, his motive in offering to reveal them, even whether or not Cloud actually wants to know the extent of what was done to him. I can't leave that unexplored when it's something I've actually wanted to know ever since I played the original game.
"You are a fascinating individual, Cloud Strife. Your file was as gripping as it was...enlightening. (sly grin) Which is why...I have a proposition for you."
I mean...it's unbelievable to me, still. I don't talk about it much because I still can't believe it actually happened. Thanks so much for asking.
Consider Aisha's emotions when she's back in Sanders and she suspects that the ring is still somewhere out there. She looks for it, but her success may vary between the 3 paths.
Aisha (EM) would feel nostalgic as she returns back to Sanders. Memories of the past would often take her back to when she had lost her ring and she thinks that she can find her ring again with the help of her Elemental magic. She went off to search on her own without asking anyone’s help. It takes her some time to find the exact location of where she had lost it in the first place. She sets up a couple of spells that allows her to search for it. It takes her a few hours to find it and she becomes pleased, deciding that she would use the ring to enhance her magic.
Aisha (VP) would care less about the ring she lost long ago. She already has Angkor and her Dark Magic. What use can an ordinary ring do? She continued to walk among the vast mass of sand, but she thinks back. She knows that she doesn’t have anything to do with the useless ring, but what if she gives the ring to Angkor? She decides to look for it, but comes up with nothing hours later. She sighs in frustration and storms off to Sander, not caring what Angkor was complaining about.
Aisha (DW) steps around the desert of Sanders, looking exhausted and dirty. Why was she out here trying to find the ring that she lost long ago? She already has powers to travel through Time and Space! There was no need to find a ring like that! Unless she can keep it as a memoir. She teleports to the place that she lost her ring and it takes her a while to locate the ring with her Time and Space magic. She would yell in triumph and tuck it into her pocket. She then teleports to Sander to get a nice, clean bath.
How long has Rufus been interested in Cloud in your fanfic? Whether it's romantically or sexually, lmao. Their exchanged banter is already flirty in Remake, but I wonder if Rufus was aware of Cloud before that. Did Rufus view Cloud as a nuisance to his plans or did he take his appearance as a gift, a sign to making his end goal easier since his father was now dead?
This is a good question. I'm not sure if Rufus is even entirely aware of the delineation between actual interest due to attraction or interest due to opportunity.
In my mind, I was weaving chapter one from original canon, just imposing a physical attraction onto Cloud, because it's not really possible to "prove" or "disprove" such a subjective thing. I think if Rufus knew of Cloud by then, it would only be through happenstance. Rufus has learned what he needs to know about Avalanche in order to fund them and manipulate the pawns that he can. I struggle to believe he'd have any knowledge of him beforehand, because Cloud was kind of a non-issue to Shinra until he started to help blow up reactors. By the time Cloud makes it to the summit of Shinra HQ, I suppose it's possible that Rufus has read his file, but I like to think that was sort of his first exposure to him. Then, after he promptly gets his shit rocked, he does his homework. Maybe being bested is what sparked an interest, and then the curiosity swelled as he read the file and started to plot his next move. I don't think he ever viewed Coud and company as a nuisance, so much as a player on the board. Useful at times, able to be influenced at times, in the way at times. I just think Rufus is a master manipulator at that point. It's fleshed out so well in Rebirth when he flat out just asks Cloud to take care of Sephiroth for him, right? Why not use a player already on the board to check a box for him? Then he can worry about other shit. Pragmatic. I guess, by that framing, he first saw Cloud and company as possibly corruptible, and when Cloud spanked him in his own Headquarters, it was back to the drawing board. Can't necessarily win hand-to-hand, can't sway him with pretty words. Let's try meeting him where he's at or avoiding him until absolutely necessary.
In terms of NTYC, I suppose actual attraction for both of them had to have been triggered after that first encounter. It just looked different for each of them...
