While not actively afraid of most of the voices, Cloud felt he had the right to
be moderately leery of the occasional unwanted commentary from the back of his
head.
It was something to be careful of, the stray thoughts that floated by. In the
heat of battle, or when otherwise distracted, one might slip in amongst his
more mundane preoccupations with food, sleep, and not getting killed by stray
bullets. It wasn't so bad if it was just an annoyed 'Piss off Barett, you're being an asshole,' the man had heard far
worse over the years, and given their usual relationship, not entirely unwarranted.
It was potentially dangerous however when the impulses he stumbled onto were
more along the lines of 'why not just kill them all, you never liked them
anyway'.
After his experience with Sephiroth's mind control Cloud was fairly confident
that he wouldn't ever be tricked again, but simply catching himself even thinking
about it was enough to seriously throw him off his stride. Sometimes he tried
to track down the source of the odd impulses. Most days he drew a blank.
Then there were the days when the voices weren't just voices, more like someone
pushing him from behind. Worse was when it felt more like someone carving a
hole in his head from the inside. He tried hard not to think about those days
much. They didn't come around often after Sephiroth died.
Still, sometime the whispered 'visitors' in the back of his head were damn
useful, such as when staring down at a menu in a rather elegant Wutanese restaurant where apparently only natives liked to
eat. The blocky symbols glared up from the page at him, defying to look any more readable for his hesitation. Hoping to buy
some time he glanced at Yuffie, who was gloating, and
then Tifa and Barret who
looked as baffled as he did, before finally surrendering to the inevitable.
Their waitress was tapping her notepad against her palm in a way that spoke of
annoyance.
Looking down at the page, he almost jerked in his chair as the impulse struck
him, and pointing to something in the middle of the list, he found himself able
to read off the name of the dish as if he was a regular. When it occurred to
him that a drink might be nice, the whisper was even kind enough to supply him
the word for beer, which he tried to make into a question for the stunned woman
taking his order.
Yuffie was looking considerably put out when he
gestured that she should go next. The others simply sighed at his confidence
and opted for blindly pointing at things they hoped were appetizing. Judging by
rapid recovery on the part of the ninja-girl, Cloud bet they were in for a
nasty shock. The teenager poked him in the arm.
"Who'd have thought you had such good taste, Cloud. I'm impressed! That's
the house specialty you know."
"That's great." He sighed, rubbing his forehead. Usually the
whispers, helpful or otherwise, left him with a bit of a headache. His friends
got weirded out when he told them that he took advice
from random voices inside his head, so he decided to just play dumb.
"Care to tell me what I just ordered?" Not surprisingly, he looked
down at his menu once more, and no longer had any idea how to pronounce what he
had just ordered. The knowledge, like the impulse, came and went without
warning.
She gave him a blank look. "Dude, you just asked for the roast Red Snapper
with black bean sauce and a side of candied shrimp and walnuts. And the house beer."
"Oh." Cloud blinked. "Sounds good to
me." He turned to Tifa. "What did
you end up getting?"
"Moogi-wo-something-or-other." The woman shrugged helplessly. "They said it
had beef in it."
Yuffie smothered a laugh.
When their dinners came, Cloud saw why. The ninja-girl was given a hearty
looking soup with mushrooms, his own platter looked and smelled perfectly
mouthwatering, but Barret was left fuming as he was
presented with what looked like a live octopus on a bed of rice, and Tifa stared at the pair of round balls in sauce on her
plate with an obvious aura of dread.
"Yuffie, dear?"
She sighed.
"Yes Tifa?" The girl smiled wickedly.
"Are these what I think they are?"
"Yup. Extra large bull testicles! Another house specialty!"
"... That's what I was afraid of."
Cloud issued a silent thank you to the back of his head as he portioned out
some of his shrimp to his childhood friend. Every now and again, hearing voices
wasn't so bad at all.