I was feeling kinda shitty, so I went to bed in the middle of the day because too lazy to try and do anything useful. But waking up… waking up was fucking weird. Somehow I got kind of stuck half awake. I kept dreaming that I'd woken up and got up and started doing stuff, only to realise, oh, hey, wait, I'm still dreaming, and then I'd think I'd wake up, only I'd only dream that I'd woken up all over again. It turned into a really weird cycle, and I swear this happened like ten times. It got kind of creepy/scary towards the end, because I kept thinking I was awake but I wasn't and it felt like I was actually stuck unable to wake up at all for a while and idk, it was weird.

So I decided to write puppet!Cloud fic about it, lol.

Warnings: NSFW, smut. Also blood, canon character death references, nightmares and the accompanying surrealism/creepiness/horror, puppet!Cloud.

Cloud had felt off all day.

It was just that he'd woken up on the wrong side of the bed, Cloud decided. It had never happened to him before, but today… today was just strange.

Waking up had been more difficult even than normal. His limbs felt too heavy, too ungainly, like the signals from his brain weren't quite matching up with what his body was trying to do. His mind wasn't much better, never quite having escaped a sleep-like haze.

Cloud didn't even drink coffee, but he needed one so bad this morning.

He sighed and shouldered his rifle. It was the ass-crack of dawn and he had about five minutes to get some breakfast before he was due for inspection.

Or had they already had inspection? If Sergeant Hardass was going to come and yell at them, it was usually before they left the barracks.

Cloud couldn't remember.

He prayed to Hel that they had high-caffeine beverages at breakfast.

Now that he thought about it, there was a lot of little things he couldn't remember. He'd put on his infantry blues, but couldn't remember ever having gone through the specific motions of attaching his pauldrons, or putting on his boots, or perfecting the loop of his green grunt-status scarf. His bed had been perfectly made when he'd left, but he didn't recall having been the one to make it.

It was unsettling. Even in his earliest starts after the latest nights, Cloud felt like he'd never been this bad before.

He settled into his seat at the infantry cafeteria, threw a disposable cup of coffee down his throat (now he remembered why he never drank this stuff – ShinRa coffee was like toxic sludge), and left before anyone had the chance to talk to him.

The unease never left him. All through drills, the whole time he was stationed at his watch post. He saw plenty of the other guys in his unit, but he couldn't place the faces of any of them.

He was still half-asleep. While he was climbing a flight of stairs, he thought he was climbing a mountain instead. The rough ground had been almost tangible for a split second.

Cloud shook his head. He needed to get it together. He needed to–

…

—wake up.

Cloud blinked blearily to his room. Although it wasn't his room, really. It was Sephiroth's room, and Sephiroth's bed, and Sephiroth's naked body spooned around him.

Cloud let out a small sigh of relief and snuggled back down into the comforting warmth of the covers. He'd just been dreaming about his infantry days again. They weren't fucking kidding when they said they were gonna drill that shit into your head. He couldn't get away from it even now.

But it didn't matter, because he wasn't in the infantry anymore. He was a SOLDIER. Finally, he'd made it.

(He was a SOLDIER, right?)

Cloud grinned to himself as he rolled over, only to find Sephiroth's eyes open and watching him. Green eyes with slit pupils. Jenova eyes. Jenova?

"Good morning," Sephiroth purred softly.

Sephiroth leaned in and kissed him, and Cloud forgot about the thought. He made a face.

"Ew. I haven't even brushed yet, I must taste like morning breath."

"You taste fine," Sephiroth said, and kissed him even deeper to prove it.

Cloud smiled and let Sephiroth roll on top of him, looping his arms around his boyfriend's waist. It was so rare they got time off together to lie in like this, since they were both First Class SOLDIERs. It was idyllic.

Too idyllic. Sephiroth's touches were too reverent, his smile too heartfelt.

Why was Cloud worrying? He had the job he'd always longed for and the man of his dreams.

Sephiroth's kiss turned sensual, sexual. His hands worked lower, and Cloud found himself arching into the touch as Sephiroth explored his body.

He must have been half asleep still, because he didn't recall the details. Sephiroth's presence was all he knew, the warmth and strength of his body surrounding Cloud. There were touches and bursts of pleasure that ran like sparks in his veins, and Cloud was vaguely aware of murmuring Sephiroth's name over and over again.

Cloud was bent almost in half, his knees hooked over Sephiroth's shoulders. His arms were tossed above his head, gripping the bars of the headboard. He cried out as Sephiroth's thick, hard cock sank into him.

"S-seph, oh, fuck, yes…"

"Cloud," Sephiroth groaned in return.

"Feels so good," Cloud gasped.

So good. There was no pain at all, only pleasure, utterly breath-taking. Even the position wasn't uncomfortable, despite how far he was bent over. He could see Sephiroth in action like this, watch the way his cock was swallowed up by Cloud's ass, and, fuck, that was hot.

Cloud took his own cock in his hand, stroking roughly in time to Sephiroth's thrusts. He was trembling with need and want. His hips bucked up every time Sephiroth's cock kissed that perfect spot inside of him.

Sephiroth's eyes narrowed as he stared down at Cloud, gaze burning desire.

"Come, Cloud."

For the briefest moment, Cloud felt something like clarity. That command… it wasn't about what was happening then. It was literal; Sephiroth was summoning him. He was on a precipice at the edge of the world, and Sephiroth was waiting for him in the depths of the crater below.

"Come for me."

(Come to me.)

Cloud's orgasm crashed over him, dragging him back down beneath waves of pleasure. He wrapped his arms around Sephiroth's shoulders, clinging to him as they rode out their peaks together.

"Ohh," Cloud breathed, sinking back down onto the bed with a sigh of satisfaction. Sephiroth couldn't stay – even if they'd slept in late, Sephiroth still had things that needed doing. But he had made time for Cloud, and that meant so much. For one fleeting moment, he even felt happy.

Sephiroth's lips brushed across Cloud's. "Good, puppet."

Cloud tried to smile in return as Sephiroth left the room, but… his warm aura of contentment had shattered with just one phrase. That name kept echoing in Cloud's mind.

Puppet?

That's right… because, you are a puppet.

In an instant, an icy vice gripped around Cloud's heart. This wasn't right. He couldn't remember– he didn't understand–

Aerith…?

No!

…

"Are you alright, Cloud?" Aerith asked, head tilted and a small smile on her face.

Cloud blinked in the suddenness of jerking awake, trying to hide his trembling."Y-yeah. I'm fine…"

He took a quick stock of where he was. Tent. Open field. Aerith peering in through the front, and the smell of smoke and breakfast cooking over a campfire wafting in from behind her.

"Sorry. Just a…weird dream."

"That's okay. Bacon will be ready in a few minutes!"

She left him to it.

Cloud tried to shake off the lingering threads of disgust as he wormed his way out of his sleeping bag and rolled it up. It was sickening to think he'd been dreaming about Sephiroth like that. After everything the man had done. After Nibelheim…

Cloud knew his memory was patchy, especially from his time in SOLDIER. But there was no way he could have really been with Sephiroth. Was there? Sephiroth had seemed like a decent enough guy back then, but they were just war buddies and nothing more than that. Cloud had shoved his crush so far back into the closet that he would've had to have been in Narnia to find it again.

He ran his hands through his hair, doing absolutely nothing for the already sleep-mussed spikes. His dreams had him feeling off-center. But then he'd been feeling that way a lot, ever since they'd retrieved the black materia from the Temple of the Ancients. The way Sephiroth had been able to control him was a constant, aching fear in the back of his mind.

Cloud shook his head. He'd made his decision. Whatever happened, he had to keep going after Sephiroth.

It still bothered him, though.

Aerith was laughing with Tifa while Barret finished up with the bacon. Cid was making tea. The others were up too – looked like Cloud was the last. He turned to pack his tent down with mechanical efficiency.

There was something still nagging at him. After the Temple of the Ancients… hadn't Aerith left? He'd been so worried. But now she was here, like nothing had ever changed at all, and he couldn't remember how that had happened.

A hand was placed on his shoulder. Cloud always associated Aerith with warmth, but her touch felt like ice.

"Cloud? You are okay, right?"

"I…" Cloud's voice failed at he turned to face her. She was smiling warmly, just like Cloud remembered, but her eyes… they were blank. Dead. Sunken and lifeless in a vicious contrast to the rest of her face.

He choked.

"Cloud?"

The way she said his name sounded concerned and sinister at the same time.

No. He was dreaming. Hallucinating. Something.

A thin line of crimson blood welled up above her heart, where Masamune had pierced her through. Water bubbled up in her throat, spilling out over her lips.

"You let me die," she said.

"No!" Cloud shouted.

None of the others had noticed. They were still talking; he could hear their voices, conversational in the background of his horror.

"Cloud, what do you want to do… the black materia?" he heard murmured. He only shook his head. What were they asking? How could they not see…?

There was so much blood. So much of it, soaking Aerith's pink dress red.

The guilt struck through Cloud's chest, every bit as painful as a blade. "No. No, I'm sorry…"

She just kept smiling through the blood and the water he had laid her to rest in. Her grip tightened on his shoulder. "Bring me the black materia, Cloud." It was Sephiroth's voice that came from her mouth.

Cloud broke away, almost retching.

Fuck. Fuck. It was just a dream. A nightmare. He was dreaming, just–

…

–dreaming.

Cloud was still shaking when he shot into consciousness.

Just a dream. A nightmare, but Gaia knew he got enough of those nowadays. He had hoped he would be used to it by now, but…

It never got any easier.

Shit.

Cloud rolled over and pulled the covers over his head, waiting for his ragged breathing to even out and the sickening lurch of his stomach to settle.

He'd had more than enough of dreams and nightmares. But his heart sank even further when he finally pulled himself together enough to step out of bed.

He knew this place. It was the inn in Nibelheim, the room they had stayed in during that fateful mission.

The light from the window was flickering firelight, deep orange and red. He could hear the crackle of burning, the acrid scent of smoke.

He'd only stepped from one nightmare to another.

No. No. He wasn't doing this. He needed to wake up. Wake up for real. It was claustrophobic, being trapped in this cycle of dreams. Wake up, fuck, if he could just wake up.

He hadn't wanted to go out there, relive the horror. But his mind didn't obey him. He found himself in the town square again, surrounded by heat and smoke and destruction.

Just an illusion. Just a dream.

He saw a man run from the ShinRa manor. It should have been Cloud himself – like the memory wasn't seared into his mind. But he didn't recognise the dark-haired SOLDIER who carried the Buster Sword.

This wasn't just another nightmare. This was Sephiroth's doing. He had gotten into Cloud's head before, into his dreams… what was to say he wasn't doing it again?

Cloud's agitation morphed to anger.

"Sephiroth!" he yelled. "Why are you doing this?"

He caught a glimpse of Sephiroth amongst the flames, turning away from him as if to lead them both up to the mountain's reactor. Sephiroth's mouth never moved, but he heard that low, callous chuckle.

"What I have shown you is the reality, Cloud." Sephiroth's voice seemed to echo in Cloud's mind, not coming from anywhere at all. "What you remember is the illusion."

Cloud shook his head. "Shut up, Sephiroth."

He didn't care what Sephiroth said, what he wanted. Cloud just wanted out of these nightmares. The fire was spreading through the buildings, through the town, cutting him off. He couldn't feel the heat, not literally, but he didn't need to. It was there in his memories, and the recollection was almost as bad. The way it seared his skin, burned his throat until tears stung at his eyes.

He had to go after Sephiroth.

Cloud plunged through the fire, uncaring, and the world around him turned black.

…

Cloud woke up to the darkness.

No more dreams, no more destruction. Just… nothingness. An empty void as far as the eye could see. Somehow it was even more unsettling that another nightmare.

"Do you understand, Cloud?" Sephiroth said. He was standing behind Cloud, so close it made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. But Cloud couldn't move at all. "Should I even call you that?" he mused. "You never did have a name, did you… puppet."

"Fuck off," Cloud said through gritted teeth.

"Do you want to wake up?" Sephiroth's smile widened. "Do you want to see what you've done?"

"What do you mean?"

He could hear other voices calling him, distant through his dreams. Tifa calling him.

"Cloud."

"What do you mean, what I've done?"

"Cloud!"

The voices in his head were growing insistent. The ground around him was shaking as the Northern Crater began to split apart.

The Northern Crater?

Truly waking up felt like the first gasp of air after almost drowning. The world snapped into clarity around him, too much to take in at once.

He was at the Northern Crater. He couldn't remember how he'd got there.

He was high above the ground, amongst the twisted vines of some ancient, dead root system. And Sephiroth. Sephiroth was there, his body encased in crystallised mako. In there with him…

The black materia.

Cloud had given it to him. Again.

No. Fuck, no.

He could have sworn he saw Sephiroth smirking behind the mako. The black materia glowed, pulsing sickeningly.

The ground split open, Lifestream bubbling beneath the surface, and Cloud caught a glimpse of WEAPON as it emerged. He lost his footing.

Cloud plunged into the Lifestream, his traitorous body sinking like a stone. Maybe it was for the best. Sephiroth had the black materia. He'd failed everyone so badly…

Cloud could only pray he was dreaming again.