Comet

Cloud had not, exactly, been unconscious, but he still comes to in a crater.

Earth has been thrown high into the air and stones shoved aside and shattered by the impact of something, something hot enough to turn snow into steam. His left shoulder aches like he tried to drive it through a mountain, so maybe the something was him. Did he fall out of an airship while on fire?

Cloud hopes he went to visit Cid on the Highwind, got drunk, and fell out of the sky while on fire. That is definitely the most positive explanation possible for waking up in scorched clothes, in a steaming crater, experiencing fantastic amounts of pain.

It's a surprise to find out he's indestructible enough to wake up without magical assistance after landing hard enough to make a crater—he knew he was sturdy but this is ridiculous—

A humanoid figure is becoming visible through the steam. It's creeping forward, tension thick but something—curiosity or need but definitely not hunger, thank the Planet—driving it on. It's carrying a weapon that by its outline Cloud thinks must be a shotgun, so probably human. He can feel the weight of First Tsurugi on his back, compressing the broken ribs around his heart. Does he have Restore equipped? He doubts any Potions would have survived the fall, but materia are hard to break.

Steam wisps aside, and Cloud feels his eyes widen. A comfortably plump blonde woman maybe forty years old is looking down at him, visibly shocked. Her dress is green and her eyes are blue and—and—

"Mom?"

And then—he knows it's less the pain and stress of his injuries, because he can bear almost anything physical nowadays, than it is the emotional overload—he passes out.

He comes awake this time to the sound of his mother's voice. It takes just the barest instant to remember that this is strange, and a long second after that to remember that he did see her before he fell unconscious, so it's not as strange as it should be. "…was expecting to find a meteorite. I don't know what to think, Cloud."

There's a clinking of ladle against pot, of crockery against countertop. "And you got an ear pierced, well, I expect that's something they do in the big city, hm? I do believe whoever forged your silver for you had never been face to face with a Nibel wolf in his life, hm. Very pretty, though."

"Her."

The crockery clunks hard against something, and then is silent. "Cloud?"

He stares up at the dusty ceiling above him. It's never very bright in here. He never saw the boards this clearly as a child. But his vision is different now. "The smith. It was a woman. In Corel." He raises his head and it feels like he's got Fenrir strapped to his skull, it's such an effort. Isn't really surprised by what he sees. It doesn't make sense, but it takes more than that to surprise him.

The place looks just like it always did. Two beds, not the single wide one Shinra placed. He's in the one closer to the door. His mother is standing beside the stove, hands on her hips, shaking her head at him.

"Honestly, Cloud. You leave talking about joining SOLDIER and turn up again six months later in an impact crater, looking like this?" His mother shakes her head. "I don't know how I ever let you out of my sight."

Cloud lays his heavy head back on his pillow and makes a sound that closely resembles a small, strangled laugh. "Six months," he repeats at the ceiling. He can hear that his mother had gone still. "Six months, huh…? It's been a lot longer than that…for me."

"A lot longer, huh."

His mother is at his bedside suddenly, and sliding one arm under his shoulders to sit him up against the wall. She's not as strong as Tifa and can't spread out the force as effortlessly, but the pain barely registers. He wonders how many Cures she put into him while he was out. It takes a lot more magic to fully heal him than it did when he was fourteen. It's a fair trade for being so much harder to kill.

She presses a mug into his hands once he's sitting, guides it up to his lips and tips it until he drinks. Thick vegetable broth runs over his tongue, studded with soft foods cut small enough to swallow whole.

"I can't say I'm surprised," she says, while he carefully sips. The taste is familiar. If you'd asked him he wouldn't have been able to say what kind of soups his mother made, and even now he doesn't remember tasting this before, but the sharp tomato flavor underlaid by onion and smoked meat and a battery of dried mushrooms is as familiar as the weight of a sword in his hand.

Mom carefully lets go, and relaxes a little when he holds the mug up by himself. "Even in the growing years, adding six inches in six months would be something."

He drinks a little more soup and then lets the mug sink into his lap before he says, "Why do you believe it's really me?"

"What reason would anybody have to pretend to be my son?" his mother snorts, and adjusts the quilt over him for no particular reason he can see. He'd probably be annoyed by that if he was feeling more alive. Even though he knows it's a sign of affection.

"…you might be surprised." But he doesn't see why anything would pretend to be him to his mother, really. Especially not pretend to be his ten years older, mako-enhanced self.

He can think of more reasons to pretend to be his mother to him, but from what his broken mind can recall this house looks right, a hundred tiny details Shinra got wrong in rebuilding it all amended. And the only being likely to be able to pretend half this well…he would know the feel of her anywhere. He can sense Jenova, if he strains—in a way he hasn't been able to since before Meteor. But she isn't all that close, and she isn't awake.

"A lot of things happened," he says into his soup. "I…lost a lot. To mako." (To madness.) "I…don't remember your first name, Mom." Amusement pulls faintly at his mouth again. "I'm lucky I knew your face." Falling out of the sky and having amnesia are probably the kind of thing that would be incorporated into the story if for some reason something chose to impersonate somebody's son from the future with superpowers. Hopefully Mom won't think of it like that.

She's silent an ominous twelve seconds. Cloud can feel her gaze on the side of his face, half-masked by hair. "Finish your soup." He obediently takes another sip. His stomach is getting uncomfortably full—you'd normally expect SOLDIERs would need to eat more than most people, they expend so much energy, and it's true he gets hungry again quickly after meals and feels better overall when he's eating regularly, but the point of mako infusions is to get a body to work by drawing for the energy it needs directly on the Lifestream—or the Lifestream via Jenova, at least—so he actually needs to eat less than most people, and that means when he's on the road he misses meals a lot.

"My name's Montana, Cloud." His mom settles herself on the opposite bed, and he keeps taking tiny nips of the cooling red soup, twice as rich as blood, like Tifa slowly enjoying a Corel whiskey. "My mother's name was River, and her father's name was Stone. Strifes all. You remembered your name at least, right?"

One of the last things he expected was to have his genealogy recited to him, but he nods. "As long as I had people to remind me," he says, because it's the truth, he's pretty sure: he wasn't very alert even at the best of times in his mako stupor, but he knew more or less who he was, as long as Zack was there to tell him.

Zack had no idea, of course, that he was carrying them toward Jenova's new resting place, that Hojo had moved her remains to Shinra tower. Or even that the corpse was psychic, probably. Maybe increased proximity had contributed to Cloud's breakdown in the slums, or maybe it would have happened to him anywhere once he was left to himself, but luckily Tifa had found him before he degenerated completely, and called him by his name.

His mom—Montana Strife, and he commits that to memory—looks upset. Cloud finishes his soup. "It's been years since I forgot anything new," he assures her.

"How old are you?"

Cloud holds out the empty mug, and she takes it. Which is nice because he can let his hands relax now. He hasn't felt this tired since Geostigma. Hasn't felt this weak since his last bad round of mako poisoning. "Twenty-five."

His mother raises her eyebrows—he knows he doesn't look his age, that going into a mako pod at sixteen probably stunted his growth and that even when he's at his most drawn, that softness lingers in his features that made it so easy for Aerith to pass him off as a woman at twenty-one. "A lot must have happened in ten years," she says. There's no way she hasn't figured out that she died, though any of the details would probably surprise her.

"A lot…" Cloud agrees.

When most people might scream or cry, Cloud only knows two ways to respond. He's not sure this is actually because of the things he's been through, he thinks he might always have been this way: he needs to fight something, or he needs to just stop. Trying either of these now would alarm his mother, so he can't think too hard about the fact that Sephiroth is alive somewhere in the world, that Jenova is whole again, that Shinra is whole and strong and rules the Planet.

He'd finally made his peace with all of his mistakes. All the world's losses. He'd been forgiven, even by himself. He'd finally been as close to happy as he could ever hope for.

And now…

It is hideous and ungrateful, but he never remembered his mother enough to miss her, and having lost everyone he loves in exchange for her resurrection is—but that's no way to think about it. Whatever's happening, it isn't about him. And a lot of other people are alive now, too.

He raises his eyes to meet hers. It's much too late to leave without explaining anything. "Mom," he says. "I have a little over a year to get ready to save the Planet."

He wants to promise to protect her this time, but—he knows better than to get caught up in stupid defeat-thoughts like I'm not fit to save anyone again but this is the only real family he ever had, and he failed her once already. Promises are important—they keep you moving forward. But the only way to make sure his mother is safe is to stay beside her always, and he has too many other things to do.

He doesn't remember her very well, of course, but he doesn't think she'd actually appreciate the attempt much, either, except for how his staying nearby would give her a chance to keep an eye on him.

Doing this without his friends is going to be terrible. Even when he was avoiding them desperately he never wanted them to stop being there. But from a practical standpoint, he needs to start replacing them as fast as he can. Because Cloud may in fact be fit to help, but he'll never be the kind of hero who saves worlds on his own.

He squints a little at his mother. Sitting on her bed with no weapon but an empty soup mug. "…what exactly do you think of Shinra Corporation?"

A/N: It's always amused me that 'Comet' is a normal green materia that does a few thousand damage while 'Meteor' is cast by the forbidden black world-ender. I'm also really amused that of the three fics I have in which I'm using the same first name for Mom Strife, this is the one I'm posting first, but then this is so far a one-shot and those are stupid long. Also how is she not a taggable character on ffdotnet, who do I complain to about this?