Chapter Text
Cloud cries as he feels the weight of another man behind him. He’s lost count of how many there were.
Or more like he stopped counting.
They’re all so much larger and stronger than him. Of course they are. They’re Soldiers—he can tell that much, even if he can’t see their faces. Even for a first-year grunt, he’s always been smaller than everyone else.
After every turn, they leave Cloud alone in the room, weak and shivering, before sending in whoever’s next.
He struggles and tries to fight back, but they laugh and pin him back down to the table with an easy push. Every slam of his face on the metal surface leaves his head ringing. The sensation tastes like pain and copper.
This one is taking his time.
Nothing happens for a while. It’s unnerving, with only the silence of the man behind him and the rapid pulse inside his own chest.
He makes a questioning whimper through the gag around his mouth, and the man responds by running his fingers through Cloud’s hair, ignoring the way he shrinks from the touch.
Warm fabric is pressed against his legs. He can feel the lump in the man’s pants grow hard against him, a thick hot outline. Cloud starts trembling violently. He can’t help it.
There’s the sound of belts unbuckling slowly, the cold metal clinking and brushing against his legs. Followed by the obscene sound of lube being squeezed out of a nearly empty bottle, then slicked onto a cock that isn’t his.
Inside his mind, a voice tells him that this isn’t really happening. It’s just a bad nightmare, and when he wakes up, he won’t be tied up anymore. His pants won’t be stripped off. He’ll still be innocent.
The man behind him starts nudging apart his thighs with a knee, and his erection brushes against the bare skin of his ass. Panic wells up inside Cloud again, and he jerks away as much as he can. He tries to scream for help, but all that comes out is a pitiful moan.
“Shhhh,” he whispers to Cloud. A strong hand slides slowly up and down his back. His sobbing is muffled through the cloth gag. Still, the man behind him continues stroking over his back, shushing him until he’s not trembling quite so hard.
Then he feels the blunt tip of a cock pressing against his hole, and before he can make another sound, it pushes in sharply. He makes a pained cry, and the man arches over him, leaning down with his warm chest pressed to Cloud’s back.
“Sorry, kid,” a low voice whispers into Cloud’s ear. “This is just something I have to do.”
His cock then pushes in all the way, and Cloud chokes out another cry.
He tries to say no through the gag, but a palm presses down hard on the back of his neck, and the ropes around his wrists tighten a notch.
Cloud whimpers while the man fucks him. He’s not as rough as some of the others, but it still stings on every thrust. The man keeps shushing him, stroking his back again, like he’s trying to soothe a frightened dog.
“It’s okay, sweetheart.” The man is deranged. None of this is okay. It will never be okay.
But he knows that voice, doesn’t he?
The thought makes his stomach drop.
Rough fingers brush over Cloud’s lips, jutted out past the white cloth, stroking them. Brushing the wetness off his cheeks. He’s taken off his gloves.
The table has built-in straps—they’re in some abandoned lab, Cloud thinks, and despite how hoarse his voice is from screaming through the gag, no help has come.
He didn’t want to scream. He didn’t want to give them the satisfaction. But they made him.
The man starts shoving his cock in a little harder, lifting Cloud slightly when he thrusts, forcing him up on his tiptoes. He gasps into his gag.
“I’m sorry if it hurts,” he murmurs against Cloud’s skin, and it can’t be, it wouldn’t be—
His head is swimming in fire. His pulse is racing wildly. The million thoughts in his head get interrupted by a particularly rough thrust, and Cloud’s back arches in pain, a whimper caught in his throat.
“I know, I know,” he murmurs sympathetically, “you’re being so good. So brave.” He tucks a damp lock of hair behind Cloud’s ear so that it stops sticking to his face.
The image flits in his mind to the incidental touches that always surprised him, a pat on the head or cheek, or brushing something off his chin, and how good they made him feel.
And now he doesn’t want anyone to touch him ever again.
“Shhh,” he shushes, over and over while Cloud cries. “Shhh. It’s alright, kiddo. Almost done. We’re almost done.”
There’s only one person who calls him that.
And he wouldn’t be this mean, he wouldn’t hurt Cloud like this, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t—
Every one of his thrusts is punctuated with Cloud’s sobs, and it hurts, he keeps hitting his already bruised skin, and Cloud clamps his thighs shut to stop the onslaught, to tell him to slow down.
“Don’t do that.” He reaches down, with his cock still buried inside him, to wrench Cloud’s trembling legs apart, kicking at his feet to force him to spread wider. “Be good. We’ll be done soon, sweetheart.”
It hurts. Please stop, it hurts.
“You can get through this, okay? Just a little longer.” The voice is gentle, but the hips slamming against his body are not. He’s driving into him so hard that his face is getting smothered into the table, clenched teeth knocking against the cold metal.
Please, please stop.
His mind drifts and drifts. Tries to focus on something other than the pain.
The scent. It’s clean, like cotton, with hints of vanilla and sandalwood. He remembers using Zack’s shower that one time, reading the bottle, how he breathed it in, how it instantly made Cloud think of him.
Bright smile. Reassuring blue eyes.
Every thrust into his body is like a stab through the heart.
How could he—
Why?
It hurts more. It hurts more than what’s happening physically. It hurts more than what any of the others did to him.
A hand is stroking his cheek again, softly.
“You’re just so pretty,” he whispers to Cloud. “We had to pick you.”
Cloud sucks in a breath, blinking back tears, stomach lurching. Is that why they bothered to heal the bruises on his face, but not on his body?
The hand pulls back and slides underneath Cloud’s shirt, stroking up his hips, his stomach, his rib cage. The hand is dry, like paper. Warm. Slightly calloused. The fingers feel rough against his nipples and his hollow, smooth chest.
Every touch is like a stain on his skin.
Those same hands… sliding down his forearms, gently adjusting his trembling sword grip. His cheerful voice. An encouraging clap on the shoulder.
He tries to turn his head back. It’s hard with the restraints, but he needs to see for himself, needs to see with his own eyes—
“Stop,” the voice says in warning, slamming his face down. “Stay down, like we told you.”
The grip on the back of his neck tightens so much that Cloud starts convulsing. His vision starts to fill with static, his knees start giving.
For a moment, he thinks this is it, this is how he’s going to die. The lack of air intensifies, building, like water coming to a boil, like it’s rapidly reaching a point where he’ll burst.
Then finally, it lets go.
Cloud wheezes, choking on his own saliva and tears. He tries his best not to vomit, because with the gag it’ll just go back down his throat.
The voice is too gentle. It doesn’t match. “The more you fight, the more you’re going to get hurt.” He ruffles Cloud’s hair. “Just lie still. I promise this will all be over soon.”
Cloud sobs. The comforting strokes over his back return, and the cock lines back up with his hole. He hiccups, the way a little kid might from crying too hard. The man waits a few moments for his cries to die down to quiet sniffling before pushing back in.
He stays limp, this time, while the man keeps thrusting, and he doesn’t really feel the pain anymore—he doesn’t feel anything.
Comforting strokes over his back, comforting words in his ear. It starts working. He’ll be done soon. He’ll be done, and then Cloud can leave. He’s being so good for him. So sweet.
His breath over Cloud’s ear is getting shorter. That’s good. His hips are moving faster, stuttering against Cloud’s body in harsh, measured slaps, and his breathing turns into pants.
With a deep, satisfied groan, he comes inside Cloud, and continues thrusting into him again and again and again until he decides that he’s finally done. His cum drips out slowly, joining the dried marks already on Cloud’s thighs.
His body rests on top of him, heavy and sweaty and out of breath.
“I wanted you first,” he says, kissing his neck, “but they said I could have you last.”
It’s the last thing he hears, before passing out.
//
Cloud grips the discharge forms tightly in his hand. Everything he owns, which isn’t much at all, fits into his backpack.
He feels weak. Defeated. Like they drove him out of here. But he couldn’t stand the thought of passing by one of them in the halls, to see the curl of mockery in their lips, to not even be able to know for sure whether it was someone who had hurt him or not.
And he’s nobody. Just a grunt.
No one would believe him, anyway. No one would do anything to those Soldiers. From what he could piece together, he wasn’t their first victim. And that means they’ve gotten away with it before.
Then the idea that they would do it to him again—just the thought of it makes bile rise to his throat.
Worse than that, there’s one person he can’t think about at all. His mind won’t let him. Because it would hurt too much.
He flinches, startled by the hand gripping around his bicep.
It’s Zack.
“Hey. What’s with the civilian clothes?”
Cloud backs away, shaking. He can’t even look him in the eyes.
“Cloud? What’s wrong?” Zack’s tone is full of concern. He eyes the papers in his trembling fist and pulls his wrist up to examine them. “You’re leaving? What? Why?”
“Don’t touch me.” He pulls his wrist back sharply, the words coming out like acid.
And he actually looks hurt. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—it’s none of my business. But you just seemed so excited last week.”
It’s so weak. It’s so pathetic, but he can’t stop the tear that rolls down his cheek.
“Hey…hey,” Zack murmurs gently. He steps closer to curl an arm around Cloud’s hunched shoulders. “It’s… not like you to give up this easily. Let’s talk about this.”
“No,” Cloud manages, voice small. But his body is frozen, won’t listen to him, and Zack is already pulling them into an empty conference room. The dull fluorescent lighting flicks on automatically.
“What’s wrong?” Zack repeats, closing the door behind him. As if he doesn’t already know. Maybe he’s just testing to see how much Cloud remembers.
Cloud backs away again. He doesn’t think he can get the words out. It’s too hard to say. Too humiliating. Too shameful.
But he says them. If only to stop denying it in his mind.
“You raped me.”
There’s a moment of silence.
Zack’s expression shifts from being stunned to bewildered, then to hurt. “I… what? Cloud, I would—would never—tell me what happened, please.”
“You were there! You—”
“Cloud, I would never, ever hurt you. You have to calm down. Tell me what happened, okay?”
Zack’s warm hand strokes down his back, just like he does every time Cloud gets motion sick on a mission. His palm drifts down the side of Cloud’s face, gently cradling his jaw, and all he wants to do is hurl.
What if he—why is he still touching Cloud, even after he tried to wash off every touch but couldn’t, even while he’s trying to pull away—
He starts breaking down into sobs, and Zack holds him in place gently, but firmly, like he might crack. Like he’s something precious but fragile. He’s saying he’s so sorry over and over into Cloud’s shoulder, and what is he so sorry for?
“Sorry for what?” Cloud’s voice comes out so cracked and broken that he doesn’t even recognize it.
“For…not protecting you. For not being there,” he says, eyes reddened, pain creased into his kind face—he’d always been so kind, hadn’t he? Befriended Cloud even though he was nothing, a nobody, a failure—his sweet, kind face is filled with devastation.
Their friendship was still really in the beginning stages, and sometimes Cloud wasn’t even sure if he could call Zack a friend—if Cloud was worthy of that label. He’s friendly to everyone. Anyone. He knows everyone. And everyone knows him.
But he always seemed to pay special attention to Cloud, somehow—making sure the other grunts were nice to him, picking him out of the crowd to say hello. Treating him to lunch. Helping him train for re-testing for Soldier. Encouraging him, even when he had nearly given up on himself.
Zack…he’s the closest thing to a friend Cloud has ever had, as pathetic as that makes him feel.
And now he wonders if he had ever been a friend at all.
Cloud is silent. Shaking. He doesn’t know how to process this—the memory of being choked and fucked and violated, and the ones of every time Zack was kind to him, when he had no reason to be.
And he’d even thought, at times, that Zack liked him—liked him the way you were supposed to like girls, and then he shelved that thought away, because it seemed ridiculous. He felt ridiculous for thinking that.
“Please, Cloud, know that I’d never hurt you.” Zack says it like he’s wounded Cloud would ever believe that. “I’m sorry if it’s hard. But can you tell me what happened? Please.”
His head is starting to hurt. Two warring pieces of information in his head, colliding.
Could they really be the same person? The one who ignored him while he was in pain, who caused it, and the one who can’t seem to bear to watch him suffer?
How sure is he really, that Zack was there?
They’d hit his head so many times against the steel by the time the last one got to him. He winces, just remembering it, clutching his scalp.
“Talk to me,” Zack begs.
Cloud’s voice shrinks to a whisper. His head drops, eyes focused on the dark carpet, fingers twisting the hem of his flannel shirt. He doesn’t go into it in much detail, and Zack doesn’t ask for it. It takes a while for Cloud to speak in between choked silences, but Zack waits patiently for him to finish.
“I’m so, so sorry Cloud. I’m so sorry this happened to you,” he whispers. The hug…feels sincere. Safe. Comforting. Like someone acknowledging his pain. His body softens, the stiffness and defensiveness in it melting into Zack’s form wrapped around him.
He holds Cloud for a long time, allowing him to cry into his cable-knit top. Holding onto him so tightly, as if Cloud would fall apart if he didn’t.
He doesn’t ever cry in front of others. It makes him feel weak. Then they hurt him, and hurt him, until he couldn’t hold it back anymore.
But it feels okay to cry now, in front of Zack.
“You didn’t see any of their faces?”
He shakes his head. “Even the ones I saw, when they grabbed me, they were wearing helmets.” His lower lip trembles.
“Cloud, look at me.” He grasps his quivering chin with dry, calloused fingers.
“I won’t let them hurt you again. I’ll keep you safe, I promise. But tell me… why did you think I was there?”
Why did he? He never saw his face. Most of what he heard were whispers, not easily identifiable. The man had called him all sorts of nicknames, not just the one.
And suddenly, he thinks… how could he be so stupid?
So horrible?
Zack Fair... is the nicest person Cloud has ever met. The only person who gave him any encouragement here. The only person who would even notice when he was feeling down, and the only one who ever tried to make him feel better.
And then, somehow, it all starts making sense.
He’d… he’d imagined Zack. He imagined his smell. His touch. He must have been losing it, feeling hopeless, and his brain filled those gaps with Zack, with comforting words in his voice. To make it more bearable.
It must have been someone else.
It had to be.
“I’m sorry,” he croaks out, wiping his eyes on his sleeve. “I must have been confused… my head hurt. I was out of it, I thought… I thought I heard your voice,” and he feels so ashamed of what he said, of what he accused Zack of being. “I’m…so sorry, Zack.”
There’s a brief silence that has his heart aching.
“It’s okay, kiddo. You have nothing to be sorry for,” Zack finally says, exhaling.
He pulls Cloud close again, and he collapses into the warmth of Zack’s broad chest and arms, relief and sobs racking through his body.
To be forgiven so easily. Zack is just… a good person. Better than him. Better than most.
He strokes over Cloud’s back soothingly, and Cloud tries not to flinch.
“You’re going to get through this, okay?” He murmurs into Cloud’s ear, his lips brushing against his skin. “It’ll be nothing more than a bad memory, I promise.”
