Final Fantasy VII "Time Travel" Fics

Well... I recently obsessed with "Time Travel" fics, especially in Final Fantasy VII. There are tons of time travel fics in there, though most of them are serious and angsty - but of course still good and not only good but EXCELLENT. d(>v<)b

Well, let's go to the scene, aren't we?! Three fic recs for now.

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THE FIFTH ACT

Author: Sinnatious
Status: Complete
Genre: Gen, Fantasy, Sci-Fi
Rated: T
Pairing: None

Summary:
Cloud has an accident with a Time Materia. There are people to save, and for that, some people need to die.

Perview : 

Three hours of hard riding later, and there stood the proof. Midgar.

Cloud let the reins slide from his fingers, shocked into stillness at the sight of a whole, un-ruined, pre-Meteor Midgar.

It was true.

He'd gone back in time.

Slowly, he reached back, and nicked his finger across First Tsurugi's outer edge. Blood welled briefly from his fingertip, before the mako regeneration took over and healed it before his eyes, leaving a faint burning sensation behind. Not a twisted dream then, and far too detailed to be a hallucination.

The knowledge didn't hit him as hard as it realistically should have. Maybe he was becoming used to unpleasant surprises. Discovering he'd somehow travelled back in time was far less emotionally challenging than coming to terms with the fact that he'd been unwittingly living a lie, or that Sephiroth just didn't have the good grace to stay dead.

Until he thought that last sentence over, and felt like he might throw up.

Sephiroth was still alive.

And not just Sephiroth. Zack. Aeris. His mother.

Hojo. Jenova.

He sank to his knees, vision blurring.

Oh, Gaia!

He choked, overwhelmed and unable to tear his eyes away from the unspoiled, frighteningly whole visage of the metropolis that was the beginning and end of everything. The rented chocobo let out a wuff, nudging at his arm, but the reins remained dangling in the air as all the worst moments of his life played themselves out before his eyes. Events which now lay before him.

ShinRa, Weapons, Meteor, Avalanche, Zack, Aeris, Kadaj, Deep Ground, Reunion, Nibelheim.

All of it. How many years? Four since meteor. Six since the Lab. Ten since Nibelheim. Ten years of mistakes and failures and struggles!

He didn't know how long he knelt there, fingers clutching at the dirt as he heaved in shallow gasps. An hour, perhaps two, judging by the setting sun, before his emotions started to settle down enough to allow him to think coherently again. At some point, the chocobo had grown bored, and wandered off to take a nap nearby under an outcropping of rock offering a sliver of shade. His hands and knees were dirty from kneeling on the ground. And most importantly, for all practical purposes, Cloud was still stuck in the past.

What was he supposed to do? What could he do?

That was when a new thought occurred to him, one that wiped away the shock and filled him with hope.

The possibility of change.

He knew about Jenova. Knew about the threat to the Planet, the Weapons, everything that would happen. The war in Wutai had barely begun. Maybe he could change that, too.

It wasn't a question of how, or if it were possible. There remained the chance it was all in his head after all - maybe the broken Time materia had driven him back into a mako poisoned delirium. It didn't matter. Hehad to do it. Not because it was the right thing to do, not even for the possibilities that it represented - simply because he couldn't survive watching everything happen again, real or not. It would break him for good.

Besides, how many sleepless nights had he lain awake, turning everything over in his head? He'd spent years ruminating over the what-ifs, the recriminations. If he hadn't handed over the Black Materia. If he'd been strong enough to save Aeris. If he'd been fast enough to stop the Sector 7 plate falling. If he'd woken up in time to save Zack. If he'd acted sooner, and stopped Nibelheim from burning. If he hadn't been such a failure, time and time and time again.

The people of Edge treated him like a hero, but he was really only a failure who had to clean up his own mistakes.

Cloud stood, brushing the grit from his hands and knees. He checked that First Tsurugi was still secure in its harness, ran his fingers across his materia, and patted his pocket for his PHS and supplies. Everything was in order. He whistled the chocobo, and the bird was back by his side in moments, whuffing happily and shoving its beak under his hand. He gave it a quick pat, swung up on its back, and then they were away, heading back to Kalm. Away from Midgar.

If he was going to change things, there was a person who needed to die.

Link: www.fanfiction.net/s/5951824/1/The-Fifth-Act

Sequel/Side Story: www.fanfiction.net/s/6705311/1/The-Fifth-Act-Yuffie-Redux

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COUNTER CRISIS

Author: White Mage Koori
Status: Ongoing
Genre: Adventure, Friendship
Rated: T
Pairing: Sephiroth/Cloud, Zack/Aerith

Summary:
At first it was about preventing tragedy. For Cloud it soon becomes a fight to protect new bonds, tread untrod paths and find happy endings. Second chances aren't always easy in a time where ghosts live and heroes are human.

Perview : 

Lying on the stiff, military issue bunk in the dark, Cloud listened to the rustle of cloth as someone rolled over on their own bed. The soldiers from the aborted mission had all been instructed to retire and recover, despite the relatively early hour. Not that Cloud was sleeping. He stared sightlessly at the ceiling as he let his mind wander and his body recover. It was odd; despite being dumped summarily into the past, Cloud didn't feel much different. He'd seen his face in a passing mirror; younger, his hair a wild frizz on his head from the grime and slime it had been subjected to, but still with the familiar mako glow to his eyes. Surreptitious observation led him to believe that he was depressingly even shorter now than he'd been in the future, though only by an inch or two. Other than that, he felt perfectly normal.

Even his strength was the same as before, and he knew that, logically, that shouldn't be so. Either he should have looked older, which would have brought a wealth of questions Cloud did not want to answer, or he should have been as he was years ago, a normal trooper. His body still twinged occasionally, leading him to believe the aching and muscle pains he'd experienced were connected to the amalgam of his younger and older self.

Cloud pulled his mind away from those disorientating thoughts and considered what had happened after he'd realized that Zack was real and not some sort of mako-dream. While he hadn't quite blacked out on the battlefield, he had been pretty much useless after he'd managed to stop his hysterical laughter. The adrenaline that had kept him upright up until then had run out, and his body had paid the toll. He'd been a shaky mess, unable to even walk on his own, but at least his head had finally cleared from the confusion it had suffered from his impromptu mako bath.

The helicopter ride back to Junon had been torture, however. Zack had insisted he ride with him in the smaller chopper, while the rest of the surviving troops had bundled into the larger vehicles designed to transport them and their equipment. The worst part was that Cloud was stuck in close confinement with not only a hyperactively worried Zack, but also Sephiroth, Tseng, and a much younger Reno as pilot. Cloud wondered if his ghosts had to haunt him, if they couldn't find better company next time.

As they left the area, they had passed an incoming helicopter, which Tseng had informed them–or Zack and Sephiroth, presumably, and him just by circumstance –that it was full of SOLDIER 2nds, who would take care of the cleanup of the battlefield. Cloud spent the next few hours bemusedly responding to Zack's queries about his health, mostly with a monosyllabic 'Fine'. It was slightly amusing how many times Zack had asked him if he was feeling airsick, though. The badgering had stopped when Reno lost his temper and threatened to crash the helicopter if Zack didn't shut up for five minutes. Tseng hadn't reprimanded the outburst, leading Cloud to believe that he was also tired of Zack's unending energy. It was surreal for Cloud to observe the patience Sephiroth had, and he'd been sure he saw just the hint of an amused smile at one point.

The nerve-wracking flight had finally ended when they'd landed in Junon, and Sephiroth and Tseng had taken off almost immediately. Zack stuck with Cloud, seeming to be intent on dragging him to the nearest medical facility. Cloud had resisted, not wanting to have anything to do with doctors ever again. He'd won the argument, mostly because he did seem to be fine on his feet now, having had time to recover on the trip over. Zack had trailed after him when he rejoined the troops, swiftly taking command and ordering the lot of them into the local barracks to rest and recover.

Cloud had been bunked with five others, three regular troopers and two of the SOLDIERs, who he learned were rookie Thirds. In all the confusion no one was worried about rank or division, just at finding a place to crash for a few hours as the higher-ups regrouped. It had been a surprise when the five had immediately volunteered to watch over him in response to Zack's query. He recognized a couple of the faces from the last fight among the monsters, so it was odd that they were so eager to be in his presence still. Cloud would have thought they'd have been scared off.

Link: www.fanfiction.net/s/6846513/1/Counter-Crisis

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IN WHICH CLOUD TRAVELS BACK IN TIME (AGAIN)

Author: Misminor
Status: Ongoing
Genre: Humor (and when I said "humor", it's a real humor, a good damn humor)
Rated: T
Pairing: Sephiroth/Cloud, Zack/Aerith

Summary:
You'd think that if Cloud was given another chance at life to fix everything that went wrong, he'd gladly take it. You're right. He did take it. And he was grateful for it too. The first 10 repeats, that is. Frankly, by his 30th life, Cloud no longer gave a damn.

Perview : 

When Cloud first opened his eyes, his first thought was, "Fuck!" His second thought was, "I've been spending too much time with Cid..."

You'd think that if Cloud was given a second chance at life to fix everything that went wrong, you'd think that he would gladly take it. And you're right. He did take it. And he was grateful for those second and third, and fifth chances. At least, the first ten repeats, that is.

By his 30th life, he no longer gave a damn. Sure, he was grateful that the rest of the gang remembered too, but so did Sephiroth. Thankfully, however, Jenova and Hojo never remembered.

It was strange at first. He had woken up a year later than his original birth-year. Eventually, he got used to the fact that at every rebirthing, his birth-year would change. Once, he had been born three years younger than Tifa. In another, he was five years younger than Sephiroth.

He received an unwelcomed surprise in his fourth life. Apparently, Minerva thought it would be funny if he was reborn a girl. Everyone but Aerith - who only looked giddy when she found out - was shocked when they regrouped again. Vincent and Sephiroth were the only ones who took it in stride when they found out.

After the fourth life, he was pleasantly reborn male again. In his thirteenth life, however, he was reborn female. And soon after that, he was reborn a girl a bit more frequently, but that was okay. He adjusted pretty quickly after that.

His seventeenth life... well, Cloud didn't really know how to feel about it. He was a girl again, and was only five years younger than his nemesis. He had gotten into another fight with Sephiroth, and instead of the usual out come, Cloud had somehow, in the heat of the moment, ended up in the man's bed. The next day, Cloud woke up, mortified at his previous actions and at the position he had found himself, and had to struggle out of a sleeping Sephiroth's hold before gathering his belongings and leaving in haste.

He swore to himself that there would be no repeat of that incident.

Unfortunately for Cloud, to his mortification, there was another incident. And another. And another.

Eventually, Cloud, much to his disbelief, found himself to be pregnant.

It was safe to say he had a mental breakdown. For Cloud, as accepting as he was of his female form, it still hadn't sunk in that his body was completely female, and as such, it was still very possible for him to become pregnant.

After his crisis, Cloud eventally accepted that he was now a she and would soon be a mother. Aborting the child never crossed her mind. In order to protect her unborn child, Cloud stopped travelling and getting into fights - an endeavor Tifa and Vincent had set upon her, much to her consternation.

After a few months, Sephiroth had found her in her heavily pregnant state. Strangely, after being interrogated about the child's father and reluctantly admitting that it was Sephiroth's, the man stayed. He clearly had no qualms about abandoning ShinRa once again.

At first, the man was skeptical, claiming that Hojo's projects involving his progeny all failed, nonchalantly saying that the female carriers all died - something about the potency in mako, or something along those lines. Cloud glared at him when Sephiroth admitted he had fully expected Cloud to have dropped dead after their first rendezvous. Eventually, Sephiroth soon eased into the role of an expectant father-to-be, though Cloud suspected he hadn't truly believed himself to be the sire until the child was born.

Sephiroth lived with Cloud, to the shock and apprehension of her friends when they found out, attending to her every need and whim. Cloud made sure to enjoy her free slave as much as she could, no matter how surreal it all felt.

When the child was born, male, and with his father's tell-tale silver hair, Cloud had been wary, watching Sephiroth like a hawk. She would not let the man take her baby.

To Cloud's surprise, Sephiroth stayed and had no intention of leaving. Of course, by their fifth child, she really shouldn't have been surprised when she found out Sephiroth had suddenly decided that he had most likely been going about world domination the wrong way and that his "mother" had probably meant for him to overrun the world with his progeny.

Cloud had to (reluctantly) admit that despite Sephiroth's strange Oedipus complex and goal of world domination, he made a good father. This, Cloud reasoned, was probably why she hadn't left him yet (as well as the fact that even if she did, the man would be able to track them down). Of course, with the distraction of children, Sephiroth's plans of destroying Gaia were put on hold.

After that, Cloud, much to her dismay, was always reborn female.

Whenever she asked Minerva why she even toyed with her gender in the first place, Minerva's response was only, "I've always wanted a girl."

This had to be her...76th life? Whatever. Cloud had lost count.

After her 30th life, Cloud no longer cared about saving the world. Life would just repeat anyway.

Link: www.fanfiction.net/s/9377746/1/In-Which-Cloud-Travels-Back-in-Time-Again