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zmediaoutlet · 29 days

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fic: the tonberry suite

have you ever loved something for twenty-seven years and then FINALLY work up the gumption and energy to write it? Yeah. So this is me self-indulging, at last.

title: the tonberry suite pairing: Cloud/Barret rating: E length: 6800 tags: Game: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (2024); Gold Saucer (Compilation of FFVII); First Time; Friends With Benefits; Intercrural Sex; Size Kink; Slight D/s Elements

summary: At the Gold Saucer, the girls and Red run off for their downtime, leaving Barret and Cloud to get hotel rooms. They have a few hours to kill; Barret has a good idea how to spend the time.

(read on AO3)

Kid’s been acting weird since they got off the ship from Junon. Though, truth be told, kid’s been acting weird since Midgar. Odds are real good the kid’s been weird his whole life, but that’d be more Tifa’s call, and she’s too nice to say. “Any chance you gonna relax?” Barret says. Cloud stares straight ahead with his arms folded, boots shoulder-width apart like the freaky mako-wasting moving walkway ain’t nothing that could faze him, and Barret rolls his eyes, behind his shades. Yeah. That figures.

Long walk and a long day and a hell of a long week, though, and Barret’s due some downtime. He watches the streaking weirdness of the night blurring past the tunnel, fireworks and flashing lights and who knows what the hell else smearing the mako-green with strange colors. World moving under their feet. The girls are off somewhere playing, games and sparkly nonsense a distraction they need, probably. Long mission without a lot of light in it; he hadn’t wanted to waste the time but, hell, not like they hadn’t earned a night off. Especially since he’s feeling like he’s bruised from the top of his head to his heels with all the shit they’ve been getting heaped on ‘em, lately, and especially with…

“We’re here,” Cloud says, and takes a step forward, and sure enough the wacky walkway ends just as his boot moves from fake planet-killing speedway to cobblestone, and they look up to find—

“You gotta be kidding me,” Barret says, with the haunted hotel looming creepy and dark and just plain strange over their heads.

Cloud tips his face up, ghostly white in the shadows. “A hotel’s a hotel,” he says, quiet. He glances at Barret, quick, and then presses his lips together. “C’mon. They probably don’t have many rooms. Might have to share.”

Barret snorts. “Might have to,” he says, and watches Cloud duck his head, and resettle that fuck-off bastard of a sword on his back, and stalk forward like it ain’t no thing. Shit-hell of a day though it’s been, Barret can’t help but grin. Yeah. This is gonna go some kind of way.

That falling-apart dive of Johnny’s in Costa Del Sol was the first time he saw for sure, but not the first he suspected. In Midgar it was all chaos, and they were apart more than they were working together even after Barret had hired him at his exorbitant-ass prices. In Kalm they had rooms at the inn but after skedaddling down the road and hearing Cloud and Tifa’s godawful account of what had set them on this hunt they were all too dog-tired (apologies to Red) to do much more than collapse asleep, no more words exchanged. Then the road, and trading out sleeping in the tents and keeping watch, and clawing through caves and fiends and helping each other up out of the mud and saving each other’s lives, over and over and more times than he’d have thought possible, that first time when Tifa nervously introduced him to her childhood friend, this unsmiling little twerp in the uniform of the enemy who looked like he’d crack in two if Barret clapped his shoulder too hard, and who Barret was gonna dismiss out of hand because they needed real muscle for this mission, until the kid looked up, and met his eyes, and Barret saw that telltale unreal flicker of green.

Crazy, weird eyes. Cold half the time, the rest of the time mostly unimpressed, except those little moments Barret’ll catch, here and there. When a fight’s gone well and none of them are bleeding and he’ll turn and look at Barret’s chest, and then up to actually see his face, and he’ll be—maybe not smiling because that’s not something all those magic-infused muscles seem to know how to manage, but he looks—good, anyway. Glad. On the back of a chocobo with the wind in his stupid spiky hair and the sun on his face, looking like maybe death and pain aren’t top of mind, for once. And, every once in a while, looking one hundred percent his age, when one of the girls teases him, or when he’s reminded that there’s more to life than fighting, or when—say, just as an example—they’re sharing a decrepit room at a motel, and Barret’s claimed first shower because age before beauty’s got to work sometime, and he comes out toweling off and feeling less like hammered shit and Cloud sits up from his slump on the edge of the bed and looks where he might as well look because it’s not like Barret sees the point in covering up, when it’s just the guys and they got other crap to worry about, and he’s talking about hitting the beach and he’s thinking about where they’re headed next and he finds Cloud’s mouth parted and his eyes startled-wide and fixed low and he thinks, oh, there it is. Yeah. Something he’d half-wondered but put away because it hardly mattered, but—hey, there it was, after all.

He’s still pissed when they close the door on their room. Tonberry Suite. Fuck right the hell off. Little robot dude’s actually carrying a knife, like the little demons aren’t legit piss-off scary, merk your ass as soon as you get within five feet, like none of the goofy-ass ghosts and zombies and white-faced goth kid clerks ever could be. “Chill out,” Cloud says, and Barret says, “I’ll boot the creepy little shit out the spooky-ass window and maybe then I’ll chill out,” and Cloud rolls his eyes but, hey, there’s that expression again. Not all the way to smiling, but.

If this suite’s like the other then they’re set on beds, anyway. Two queen-sized on the one wall and an alcove in the back with another, set back behind drapes like that’s where the magic happens. All kinds of dumbass themed shit over the rest of the room—and that little Tonberry guy is looking at him, Barret swears to anything—but it’s beds and four walls and a door that locks and, hey, a bathroom. Good opportunity to shower off all the dust of the hometown he ruined. “Age before beauty,” he says, standing in the doorway.

Cloud shakes his head, setting that ridiculous sword up against the wall. “Just call dibs,” he says, like he’s too cool for school. “You’re not that old.”

“Yeah?” Barret says. “Well, maybe you’re just that pretty.” Gets the satisfaction of one of those startled-wide pretty-ass looks before he closes the door and he grunts. Score one, Wallace.

It’s a good shower. Someone’s paying a hell of a lot for this suite and the planet’s paying her share, too, so it oughta be. He comes out pummeled and mostly clean and smelling like some body wash that claims to be spiderweb soft, comfily thick black towel around his waist. Finds Cloud leaning against the wall by the window, looking out like there’s something to see besides the fake-thunderstorm effects, expression like he’s a thousand miles from here. In the shitty past or the gloomy future, Barret doesn’t know, but he ain’t having it. He was promised downtime.

“Your turn, Spiky.” A lifted shoulder, silence. Barret sighs. “C’mon, now. Red says your ass smells like blood. You wanna change that, while you got the chance.”

“My… ass,” Cloud says. Looks sidelong, slanted along his shoulder, and then his lips part again. For trying so hard to look cool he’s real bad at keeping his cards to himself. Barret’s holding the towel closed but he’s dripping on the floor and there’s a lot on display, he knows. He smiles, flat, and Cloud meets his eye and then closes his mouth and then clearly swallows, all the way across the room. Yeah. Yeah, it’s on.

Barret would’ve figured SOLDIERs would be efficient—whenever anyone asks the kid a question about his time in the service he tells some grim-ass story about control and training and everything sucking, so three minute showers would go right along with that—but Cloud’s in there for a while. Long enough that Barret steps back into his trousers, anyway, and finds the mini-bar, and makes a drink (whisky + ice cubes counts as a drink, not that he’ll tell Tifa that). He sits on the big bed at the back and listens to the rain. Fake, sure. Doesn’t sound like it. Thunder and the wind across the glass and the room dim, flickering candlelight, sconces glowing amber-red. The bed’s soft and the drapes are freakin’ velvet and it’s a cocoon, in here, like the rest of the doomed world don’t exist at all, and it’s about as far as he could get from Corel while being no more than, what, a half-mile above it. The desert stretching empty below. The wreckage so close he can see it whenever he closes his eyes.

Wrong kind of downtime. He pours a second drink, and then a third that he sets on the bedside table, waiting. The creepy little robot paces by, behind, emitting its weird humidifier-smoke. Cedar. Smell of the woods on fire. Barret breathes in deep.

Cloud finally comes out of the shower. “Took you long enough,” Barret says.

“Shut up,” Cloud says. He’s got one of the black towels around his hips, too, uniform folded neatly and boots swinging, tied over his wrist. Body a white flash against the stupid purple wallpaper, whiter when there’s a fake burst of lightning. He sets his clothes by his pack, at the foot of the bed closest to the door. Stands still, looking down. Covers the back of his neck with one hand, like… Barret doesn’t even know. What goes on in that strange head.

Not what he’s worried about, right now. “Well, don’t keep me waiting longer,” Barret says, and when Cloud turns he holds out the glass he’s had sitting there, condensation gleaming on the crystal. “Downtime.”

“Thought we were waiting until the new Heaven opened up,” Cloud says. He comes over, though, and takes the glass, so Barret can pick his own up again and hold it out. Cloud’s pale perfect little forehead gains a single line between his pale perfect little eyebrows, but he seems to remember human behavior after a second and clinks the rim of their glasses together, and takes a sip when Barret does. He doesn’t hiss or flinch or react at all to barrel-proof alcohol served nearly-neat. Freak. His tongue touches the center of his lower lip, briefly. “Hm.”

“Good shit, right?” Barret says. He tips the crystal against the light, watching how it glows amber. Watches Cloud’s face, behind it. “Yeah, I remember. And we’ll let our girl make us real cocktails when she gets that bar again. But it’s been enough of a day. Week. Shit. Enough of a life. They got a five hundred gil bottle in the bar and some cat’s paying for it? Think we deserve a taste, after all this.”

Cloud’s eyebrows raise, acknowledgment, and he looks down into his own glass. He’s wild, even just standing there. His strange, compact body. Anyone just seeing his face could mistake him for a woman, no question—Aerith told the story of just how many made the mistake back in Wall Market with vicious glee, ignoring how Cloud turned nine shades of red behind her while she did—but neck down there’s no question that this is a man. Slender as a girl, sure, but ripped where it counts, his shoulders curved with muscle, his waist and hips nipped narrow. Smaller than Barret, like most everyone is, but no frail thing, not breakable. Not oblivious, either, since as soon as he came out of the shower he glanced lightning-quick at Barret’s bare chest and shoulders and then south, to where he’d left his trousers lazily unzipped, and it’s—

“I figure we got a few hours, while the girls get all the running around out of their systems,” Barret says. Cloud squints a little, calculating, and then nods. Like it’s a battle plan they’re working out. “Yeah. So. Help me out, here.” He holds out the gun-arm.

Cloud blinks at him, startled again. For a hardcore SOLDIER-trained professional badass he sure takes his turn looking like a caught rabbit. “You can’t do that yourself?”

“Can,” Barret says. Shrugs, resting the whisky glass on his knee. “Easier if I got a partner to help out.”

One of those weird still watching moments. Cloud looking at nothing, who-knows-what thoughts passing behind his eyes. “Fine,” he says, and steps forward, and sets his hands on Barret’s arm, above the belted cover, barely damp from the shower.

Warm. Always a surprise whenever the kid’s skin touches his—seems like he should be radiating ice crystals, with how he acts half the time—and soft, like even with all that swordplay he doesn’t form calluses. The mechanism of the socket isn’t complicated and Cloud frowns down at it for a few seconds before he finds the latch, and pops it, and the release of tension from Barret’s forearm to elbow to shoulder goes through him like someone’s cast a cure spell, instantly better all the way to his toes.

He watches Cloud’s face while he finds the other latches. Frowning still, concentrating, but there’s a faint pink coming up across his cheekbones and ears. “Hey, kid,” Barret says. Flick of a glance, but Cloud’s starting to unscrew the main bolt that holds the gun into the socket and he turns back to that. “I ain’t trying to mess you around, here.”

“What does that mean,” Cloud says.

Three bolts down; Barret turns his arm over, palm up if he still had a palm, and lets the kid’s clever fingers make short work of the other half. “I’m saying, I don’t want this to be some kinda game, or confuse you, or tease, or nothing.”

The last bolt: a thunk kind of sound, and the assembly pops free, leaving Barret’s arm truncated in the steel socket that covers his elbow and where the rest of his arm was, and Cloud holding the weapon that makes him at all useful. He turns it over in his hands, curious. The broad base where the bolts connect to the socket, the gears, the internal materia-casing that makes the ammunition work. Barret’s seen it, is used to it, doesn’t care so much anymore, but he hasn’t seen someone else look at it, in a long time. Cloud frowns—of course, Cloud frowns—but clearly just trying to puzzle through the mechanism. It’s a weapon, and Cloud’s interested in those, but he looks up at Barret’s face after a few more seconds, his expression flat, cold.

“What,” he says. Distrust.

Barret shakes his head. “That’s what I’m saying. Ain’t no need for that. I ain’t teasing and I ain’t trying to make this anything it’s not. But—” He drains his drink and the whisky goes down hot, smooth, smoky-sweet, and sets the glass on the side table, and reaches out with his good left hand and cups Cloud’s bare side. God, he’s small—Barret’s hand spreading across his ribs and his thumb brushing up under the tight tiny furl of his navel—and Cloud takes a quick short breath, muscles tensing, except he couldn’t be all that surprised because he doesn’t move away, or flinch, or beat Barret’s brains in with the gun he’s still holding in both hands. Barret smiles and Cloud’s eyes—instead of squinting all bitchy or frowning or whatever else he’d expect, they get all wide again, startled, like—smiling wasn’t what he expected. This friggin’ kid. “Yeah. We got downtime. I figure, we might help each other out, maybe. ‘Cause I think maybe you been wanting to, huh? Maybe you been thinking about it, sometimes.” Cloud licks his lips, eyes dropping from Barret’s to his shoulder, his chest. “Ain’t ashamed to say I been thinking the same. You up for it, kid?”

Cloud takes a slow breath, his chest visibly rising. “That why you dropped a blanket over the Tonberry?” he says, after a second.

Flicker of a smile around his mouth. After waiting patiently through all this negotiation, Barret’s dick thickens in his trousers. He sits forward, slides his hand around to the small of Cloud’s back. “Don’t want the creepy little bastard watching, what can I say,” Barret says. Cloud rolls his eyes but does smile for real, close-lipped, and sets Barret’s gun on the table next to their whisky glasses, and Barret waits until it thunks down before he pulls Cloud in, gets him right between Barret’s knees, gets him close. Cloud’s hands land on his shoulders, tense, and Barret tips his head back, makes sure Cloud’s looking him in the eye. “To be clear,” he says, “I wanna fuck. Sound good?”

Cloud huffs. “Yeah, I got that,” he says. Nervy dart of his tongue to his lower lip, anyway. But then: “Yeah. Sounds good. But—”

“Don’t say it’ll cost me two grand,” Barret says, grinning, that hot held thing in his gut glowing like superheated ore. “Make me think you’re some other kind of merc entirely.”

“You wish,” Cloud says, and—hell, that’s a whole different world right there, unfolding in the imagination—but there he is, standing there caught between Barret’s knees, and Barret follows this kid into battle fifty times a day, trusts his orders and tactical mind more than he has anyone else in is whole life, but on this one it’s clear who’s leading and who follows, and it makes him—slide his hand gentle over Cloud’s belly, up over the skinny flat of his chest. Not smiling now, and not cool and confident and with that attitude like he’s saying fuck you to the whole world. His eyes open and surprised as any kid’s, when Barret knows the shit he’s waded through. Makes him fit his hand around the back of Cloud’s neck, thumb sliding up into the barely-damp silky soft of his hair, makes Barret pull him down—careful, guiding—and makes him kiss the kid gentle. His mouth as startled as his eyes. Breath catching in his chest, his hands gripping Barret’s shoulders so tight they might well bruise, but—after a second—he sucks in air, closes his eyes, kisses back.

Given a hundred guesses in the couple months they’ve known each other, Barret wouldn’t have pegged the kid as clumsy. That’s all it is, though, as Barret pulls him in, and gets him to climb up onto Barret’s lap—barely covered by the towel—and urges his arms around Barret’s neck, and keeps kissing him. Clumsy and maybe nervous, too, like…

Barret drags his hand down Cloud’s back, feels all that silky skin. Muscle rippling as he shrugs his shoulders, knees spreading on the bed either side of Barret’s hips. Squirming already. Barret pulls away from his mouth and kisses his jaw—no stubble, really is soft as a girl—and the side of his throat under his ear, breathing hot there in a way that’s been pretty surefire over his many years of experience, and—yep, Cloud clutches a hand to the back of his head, makes this hitched trapped little not-a-sound, like he doesn’t want to be caught enjoying himself. “Been a while,” Barret says.

Half statement, half question. Cloud shivers when Barret applies light teeth to his collarbone and then pushes him back, blinking fast, chest heaving. Looks down, and so Barret does too, and—yeah, there it is. Pushing out the front of the towel, stiff when Barret lays his hand over it, rubs. There already, damn. Has been a long time. “You good for two?” Barret says.

Cloud’s ears have gone from pink to dark red, his mouth half-open. “I—” Can’t seem to finish. Shudders when Barret closes his hand through the towel, feels his dick that way. His hips curl in and he shakes his head but it’s not no, it’s—

“Well, let’s just see,” Barret says, his own dick surging thick. He squeezes again, easily handling the whole thing, lets Cloud push forward into him, and then he takes his hand away—wait, Cloud breathes, but Barret shushes him, says, “C’mon now, help me out,” and tugs at the towel, and Cloud blinks at him confused before he lifts up on his knees and drags the thing away, tosses it to the side, and—yeah, there it is, his dick flushed-pink and stiff and hot when Barret wraps his hand around it bare, tugs, thumbs over the head where it’s peeking out of his foreskin, makes the kid shudder shoulders to hips to thighs, quivering. Doesn’t seem to know how to handle it at all but it’s hot as fuck just for that—Barret wraps his bad arm around to brace as best he can, the socket probably digging cold into Cloud’s back but he doesn’t seem to care, since he arches, curls his hips in little spasms, humping into Barret’s hand, and he comes in a minute flat, his hands gripping Barret’s shoulders, his eyes screwed shut and his face almost in pain until he’s spurting between them, striping Barret’s bare chest white, his eyes flying wide and shocked like he didn’t know what was gonna happen, like it’s a surprise.

“Goddamn,” Barret says, and he says it admiring but Cloud bites his lips together, turns his face away. “Nah,” Barret says, quick, “nah, see—” and he squeezes Cloud’s dick again—still stiff, slick now, head shiny-pink and sensitive—flips his hand around and drags his bare palm down the spine of the thing, curls his fingers under the tight smooth little package of his balls, behind, almost to his asshole. Soft, hairless. Alien creature almost except that that’s real jizz on Barret’s belly and warm skin quivering against his and a real, normal expression as Cloud frowns, slides his eyes over. Embarrassed and wanting to be told it’s okay. “Hot as hell, man,” Barret says. He leaves off petting Cloud’s crotch and drags his hand over his own belly, white smearing in the hair. “Got a backlog for me?”

“Shut up,” Cloud says, breathless sort of, and when Barret grins at him he rolls his eyes but seems to settle, maybe. Dick softer but not all the way to soft—joys of youth, right there. Long time since Barret was twenty-one and he wouldn’t go back for love nor money, but there are some advantages. He raises his eyebrows, tips his chin up, and in his lap Cloud’s barely an inch higher than him but it’s nice, sweet almost, how the kid licks his lips, and clearly has to decide to lean down and offer the kiss Barret’s asking for. Makes this little sound in his chest when he does it. If they didn’t have a hell of a to-do list in real life Barret would want to book this stupid room out for a month and see what other sounds he could drag out, past all that try-hard coolness and pretending.

But that’s later, maybe, if ever, and his dick’s straining in real time right now. “So…” he says, leaning back.

Roll of thunder from the hotel’s stupid sound system. “So?” Cloud says, arching an eyebrow—oh, he has to have practiced that move in a mirror—but when Barret’s jaw drops because—he can’t seriously—Cloud’s mouth curves, and he looks all over Barret’s face, and then pushes him back, harder, not as strong as he could be but enough that Barret drops back to his elbows, spread out on the bed. He’s inspected, and it’d look like cool analysis except Cloud’s ears are still that telltale red and his chest is flushed nearly the same color as his cockhead, standing out plump. Feels weird except there’s that echo of all those post-fight cooldowns and that shower and seeing it right in the kid’s face, as he drags his eyes over Barret’s chest and his abs and down, to where there is most definitely a lump swelling out the front of his fatigues, about as up for it as he’s been in years.

“Wanna see?” Barret says. He knows the answer but it’s gratifying anyway to see Cloud nod, and lift up on his knees to make room, and to shove the waistband down one-handed and let his dick, ah, spring out into the open. More gratifying to see that stupid expression on the kid’s face again, what’d make Barret laugh out loud if he didn’t have the ounce of sense in his head that’s kept him alive all these years.

To his credit, Cloud may be clumsy but he sure as shit ain’t shy. He reaches down and gets Barret’s dick in this underhanded grip, not tight enough and not quite right but it’s a warm hand that’s not Barret’s own and that goes a hell of a long way toward making it a better day. Barret hums, approving. Watches, propped up, while Cloud tests the weight, the thickness. His hand closing around it but only just. Barret’s not exactly vain but even after all these years of messing around with people it still does something to him, just a little. Not the size of his own equipment but seeing how they react. How this one reacts, when Barret would’ve expected indifference at best, but instead his chest lifts on a deep breath and he licks his mouth and he looks downright wild, like he’s been starving and here’s a three-course meal laid out, all his for the taking.

Not that he’s doing much taking. “Don’t mean to rush you,” Barret lies.

Cloud’s eyes sweep up. “No wonder you make such dumb decisions,” he says, and squeezes—ah—right there under the head. Learns quick. “No way you got enough blood to run your brain and this thing at the same time.”

“I make it work,” Barret says, “and screw you besides, and—god damn, kid, if you don’t—”

Cloud grins at him—an honest-to-god toothy grin, like Barret’s never seen on that porcelain doll miserable little face—and drags his hand down, cups Barret’s nuts, takes a deep breath. Bites his lower lip then. “I want…” He shakes his head. “Shit. I don’t—”

“Anything’s good with me, man,” Barret says, meaning it, not least because his dick’s fuckin’ begging at this point, with warm weight in his lap and the anticipation winding his spine so tight he feels like a volcano desperate to burst.

A soft dragging thumb over his sack, more than filling Cloud’s palm. His fingertips trace a dragging little path through the bush, up the trail to Barret’s navel. Teeth back in his lip.

Barret lays his hand on Cloud’s belly. “‘Less you want me to handle it.” Flash of relief that makes Barret want to pat him on the friggin’ head like a little kid, which isn’t exactly the image he needs right now, but hell if ain’t hot in its way, too. Little fucker’s always hot, which is half of why they’re here in the first place. “Alright,” he says, sitting up, “watch and learn,” and Cloud rolls his eyes and starts to say, “Yeah, right—” except that Barret kisses him, and it’s muffled, and Cloud doesn’t seem to mind so much that he’s not allowed to finish it.

More thunder, more lightning-strike coursing through the room. Barret hitches Cloud closer, holding him tight at the small of his back, their dicks pressing together—ah—sweet. Cloud’s hips curl in, instinct, hardening up for real again, especially when Barret kisses his throat, and his collarbone, and his absurdly pale nipple, lapping and making it tight as a bullet, provoking one of those tiny choked not-sounds that makes Barret lift his head and say, “Kid, how’m I ‘sposed to know if it’s good if you won’t let it out,” and Cloud blinks at him empty-headed until Barret drags his thumb over the nipple again, deliberately rough over the wet skin, and gets this hurt little grunt and Cloud tightening his thighs around Barret’s hips and, yeah, his dick all the way hard, ready to go again. He closes his hand around both their dicks and Cloud spasms, breath heavy, grabbing Barret’s biceps as much as he can. Looks down between them and so Barret does, too, and it’s—yeah, something else, to see the contrast. Not like Cloud’s got anything to be embarrassed about, it’s a nice little handful, pretty as a picture like every other damn thing about him, but pressed together Cloud’s all rosy petite pink to thick hefty dark, silk-smooth to hairy-rough, and the size—”What’s that, half?” Barret says, not mocking or teasing but just knowing, somewhere in the pit of his gut, that it’ll make Cloud—yeah, let out this thin whining moan, his fingers tracing the thick vein up the side of Barret’s shaft, kissing the head, feeling how much bigger. “You got it bad, kid,” Barret says, grinning, and Cloud pushes up and kisses him, to shut him up maybe, but Barret doesn’t mind that, either.

He meant it when he said he didn’t want to tease, though. He gets his hand under Cloud’s ass and flips them, gets Cloud’s thighs spread around his hips, his head tipping back on the bed, spread like an offering. Touches Cloud’s nuts again—one leaping in the sack, damn he’s hot for it—and then behind, and then back all the way, rubbing, a test. “You done this before?”

Cloud, staring up at the canopy. Expression flickers, strange. Nervous? “I…”

Barret presses with his middle finger, testing. “Don’t want to break you in half, Cloud,” he says. “Be honest on this one.”

Strange look in Cloud’s eye when he lifts his head. “We got materia for that, right?”

“Shit,” Barret says, imagination leaping in again—and the idea of being so up for it that he’d hurt that much, just to get it in, to get there—but no, no, not this time—god, he hopes soon, but not this time. He leans down and kisses Cloud again just for thinking it and then lifts up, grabs Cloud’s hip, flips him over—his dick leaping and crying at how easy the kid goes to his belly, letting Barret handle him like it’s nothing when he’s such a prickly bitch the rest of the time—and he shudders, gathers his elbows under him, braces like he’s ready for pain, like that’s all he’s expecting. But, no—Barret’s leaking he’s so ready, he’s been waiting long enough, and he can’t quite explain like he oughta but they’ve been working together long enough he’s got to trust that Cloud can follow his lead—he braces his socket by Cloud’s shoulder, spits in his palm and slicks his dick, pulls Cloud’s hips up—the kid going with it, because he’s crazy as hell—and it feels wild just to slide his cockhead against the kid’s pretty white ass, splitting the cheeks, dragging wet, pressing forward all the way so his pubes are crushed in against the pale skin and his cock’s dripping over the small of his back. Cloud’s back heaves as he drags in air, his hips tipping up. “Just—just do it—” he says, gasped thin, and Barret does pull back, dick gliding maddeningly up so close to what he can imagine would be heaven, furled tight, pale and small like the rest of him—but he ain’t an actual all-the-way bastard and so he just pushes forward, sliding his dick up between Cloud’s thighs, bulling past his sack, dragging where he’s warm and smooth and feels plenty good.

“Like that,” Barret says. Panting already, shit. Cloud looks over his shoulder, frowning muzzily, mouth open. Barret slides two fingers in and Cloud blinks at him, lets Barret drag sloppy over his tongue, and only seems to get it when a wet grip closes over his dick, Barret’s hand covering the whole thing again, curling down to touch, shit, his own dick pushing forward between Cloud’s thighs. “Close ‘em tight, huh?”

He stares over his shoulder, shuffles his knees together, makes it—tight, not slick enough but tight, hell—and then licks his own hand, reaches down, lets Barret push forward into his palm, cups and makes a tunnel for Barret to push into, knocking Barret into the underside of his own dick, taking Barret’s lead, arching his back and pushing his ass back so their hips clap together, so close to fucking for real that Barret almost doesn’t miss the real thing. Except—”Next time, baby,” he says, and his nuts surge at how Cloud’s eyes do that startle-flash, “next time, huh? I’ll get in there like you want. Spread you wide. You want that? Want me in there?”

No response but he hardly expected one. Cloud’s breathing harder than he ever does in the middle of a fight, squeezing Barret’s dick when it fills his hand, his head dropping between his shoulders, his bare shoulders and neck the perfect target for Barret to sink his teeth in—oh, and that gets a real moan, Barret’s mouth on the vulnerable knob at the top of his spine, his whole body sinking, knees sliding on the plush coverlet. Barret closes his thighs around Cloud’s, keeps him steady, bracing—the hot tunnel hotter now, sweat and smearing, Cloud’s small hand knocking them together, and Barret reaches down and covers Cloud’s hand, their fingers lacing, pressing up tight and close to Cloud’s belly, feeling how close he is with his nuts tight against the base of his little dick—”Shit, kid, you gonna beat me there?” Barret says, rough, laying flat out almost on his back. Cloud shakes his head, but just confused seems like, this whining high edge lacing every breath. Barret grins, hooks his chin over Cloud’s shoulder, breathes hot against the sweating curve of his throat. “Yeah, you are, aren’t you? C’mon, now. I’m in charge. You show me how good it feels.” Cloud presses back into him, his back curved up into Barret’s chest, his face turning so Barret can kiss his jaw, nose against his cheek. “Yeah, you got it. Now you just gotta let it go. That’s an order, SOLDIER.”

The sound Cloud makes could make Barret cream himself if he were lost in a snowfield, half-dead and unsure if help were ever gonna come. As is the kid shudders, lurching between Barret and the bed, his hand flashing back to grab Barret’s hip and pull him in harder, unnaturally strong, grip hard enough it’ll bruise. Barret takes over, cupping his spurting dick for the second time—shit, load feels as thick and strong as it was on the first go, he really does have a backlog—and it’s right there in the base of his spine, this coiling tense thing building up like reaching his limit in a fight, his balls clutching up and his dick swelling and he sinks his teeth into Cloud’s shoulder not to shout to the whole damn hotel and—ah, finally—

Dizzy for a few seconds. Fuck, it has been a long time since it was anything other than his left hand. He re-arrives in his brain in stages: loosening his jaw, and taking a deep breath, and flexing his cramped knuckles. Everything slick, sweet, enough to fuck carefully forward and smear around, making it last. Cloud’s hand’s locked onto his hip but Barret shifts his weight on his bad arm, making enough room that he can be sure the kid can take a full breath. Toothmarks in a ring on his shoulder. Barret kisses there, and then blows cool air, and is glad Cloud’s still got his face buried in his own folded elbow when he shivers all over, because hell if Barret’s gonna be able to hide the grin on that one. He really doesn’t want to tease, not yet, but he’s getting enough material for a year, here.

Speaking of—”You gotta let me go,” Barret says. Cloud makes a dazed little huh? and Barret honestly could scoop him into a bear hug. “Need my leg back here, man. We gotta clean up.”

Cloud turns his head. “Right,” he says, weak, and unclamps his hand and his thighs both, stretching out under Barret’s body.

Barret presses up on his elbow and Cloud shivers, again, muscle jumping in his thighs. Easy to urge him over, a clumsy tumble of elbows and sleek white body under Barret’s bulk, although he seems nervous, for some reason. Barret knocks his chin up with two fingers and Cloud meets his eyes. Not startled and not fuck you and not dead indifferent but some other thing entirely. “So,” Barret says. He raises his eyebrows. “That suck?”

Cloud blinks at him, lips parted, and then huffs, one of those tiny smiles starting at the corner of his mouth. “Guess not.”

“Oh, he guesses,” Barret says. He slides his thumb under Cloud’s lower lip, fair warning, and leans down slow, and is rewarded by Cloud lifting up a half-inch to meet him. Slow, sticky kiss. Soft. When Barret lifts up again Cloud looks like he could get knocked over with a feather. Cute as hell, which wasn’t how Barret expected to feel after a mutual relaxation attempt but—shit, he’ll take it. He pushes up on his good arm. “Maybe next time we don’t gotta deal with a haunted hotel for atmosphere.”

“Next time,” Cloud repeats, in a strange tone. His eyes drop from Barret’s mouth to his chest to his dick, laying soft but still thick up against Cloud’s hipbone, and his jaw clenches, and his eyes are more what Barret’s used to when he looks back up and says, “Just because you’re scared of the robot.”

“Hey, now,” Barret says, pushing upright. He lifts a finger. “Not scared. Creeped. The thing’s creepy. You just ain’t creeped because you got twenty screws loose.”

Cloud sits up, rolls his eyes. “Sure,” he says. Still with that little smile.

Thunder, again. Cloud glances at the window, sighs. Something settling over his shoulders, again, but—Barret thinks, maybe—a little less. He hopes. Or, shit, maybe not helped at all, but mutual orgasms rarely made things worse, in his experience. He ducks back into the stupid haunted bathroom, mops up. Buttons his trousers one-handed and shrugs back into his shirt and vest and brings a wet washrag out to where Cloud’s still sitting on the edge of the bed, naked and gleaming, rubbing his forehead. Hell of a sight but Barret’s got to put it away. For a while, anyway.

“I’m going to see what’s going on in this shitshow,” he says, tossing the rag. Cloud catches it, easy. “You should rest. Some shut-eye’ll do you good. Maybe you’ll be a little less weird, huh?”

Cloud’s shoulders curve in. “Maybe,” he says. Really does sound tired. Barret grabs his gun, braces it against the table until the main latch clicks and then twists his arm, locking it in place, spinning the bolts along the socket. He’s had a lot of practice. Cloud watches, holding the rag in both hands, and then says, “Hey. You mean that? About—about next time.”

Sitting there, not quite looking Barret in the eye, he looks… his age. Barret flexes his arm, makes sure the gun’s properly in place, and then picks up Cloud’s chin again, makes him look all the way up. One of the prettiest things Barret’s ever seen, truly. Lifetime to date. “I think just about any time you want it, you tell me, and barring the world blowin’ up and days needin’ saved I’ll drop trou and do my best. Won’t have to pay me no two grand, neither.”

No smile, but this little nod against Barret’s hand. Like it’s a bargain made, either way.

“Good, then,” Barret says, and lets the kid go, and walks over to the door. When he looks back Cloud seems a little more like the merc he hired all those weeks ago. Just naked, in more ways than one. He points, makes his voice firm. “Get some sleep.”

“Sure, boss,” Cloud says, dry, and Barret leaves the suite before he can do any damn-fool thing like go back over there and cover the kid with his body and drum up the enthusiasm to do the whole thing over again.

He stands in the corridor, not really taking in the stupid black velvet and the dripping sconces and the spooky organ music piped from the ceiling. His body relaxed, even if the problems of the planet are flooding back up to the top of his mind. Responsibility and history settling down in their accustomed yoke. He shrugs his shoulders, takes it. Thinks maybe it won’t be so long until there’s a little more downtime, to make the load easier to bear.

#cloud/barret #final fantasy vii #my writing #this is a real shot in the dark #and i know no one follows for this stuff #but seriously: i have loved this game since 1997 #these characters are in my veins #i have needed barret to top the shit out of cloud since approx '97 as well #doesn't get all the way there this time #but maybe in a future fic #also: it's amazing how much of a mental break this felt like #i have like 1 mil+ words of spn fic on ao3 #this is the writing equivalent of a trip to costa del sol

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