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Title: Abundant Harvest
Characters: Cloud/Tifa, Marlene, Denzel
Rating: K+
Prompt: FFVII: Cloud, Tifa, pumpkins on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ff_kissbattle
Cloud was unprepared for frenetic excitement to erupt when he mentioned – in passing – that the Chocobo Ranch was sponsoring a fall festival, complete with hay rides and a pumpkin carving contest. He certainly hadn’t expected to find himself borrowing a truck from an elderly neighbor in order to cart the entire Seventh Heaven family out for the event. The previous year, when fall came around and Tifa and the kids got it into their heads to celebrate the season, his sole duty had been to procure a dozen large, bright pumpkins for them to use as their decorative canvas. He’d taken his role seriously – aside from the occasional teasing comment regarding cruelty toward vegetables, or horribly disfiguring squash surgery – and had brought home one or two at a time, purchased from various farms and stalls and markets as he made his deliveries. Each offering had been duly inspected and approved, and it’s future features discussed while he’d listened, half-bemused.
Tifa had made pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread until the Seventh Heaven had been filled with the scents of cinnamon and nutmeg, and that – as far as Cloud was concerned – had been the best part of the whole production. (In fact, his taste buds and stomach had both agreed it was fantastic, and well worth the trouble of carting over-sized gourds around on Fenrir.)
Yet this – listening to Marlene and Denzel shriek with laughter as they played tag in the maze of hay bales, or watching as Denzel had his first meeting with a chocobo – was even better. Especially since Tifa had promised him the baked goods, too.
He should’ve known there would be a catch.
The downside of it all first hit him as he trailed along behind Tifa, she happily searching through the array of pumpkins to find the ‘perfect’ ones to take home. With one in each hand, and another clasped in the curve of each arm – the fruits of an hour and a half of shopping – he started to wish he’d kept his mouth shut. While Tifa and the kids had seemed terribly picky when looking over the pumpkins he’d brought home, that was nothing to the way Tifa inspected the things when buying them herself. She’d rejected dozens of perfectly beautiful specimens – enough that he was beginning to think she just liked having him follow her around, balancing orange squash like some sort of demented porter.
“What do you think Cloud?” she suddenly asked – the same way she’d asked a few hundred times already. The pumpkin in question – this time – was big enough that both Denzel and Marlene could sit on it. Together. At the same time.
“It’s huge,” he answered.
“I know! It’s perfect!”
There was that magic word. “Last one then?”
Tifa smiled and rolled her eyes at his stoic yet somehow pathetic expression. “Last one.”
Once they paid and carted the monstrosity back to the truck, she revealed that it was to be their entry in the carving contest.
“Our entry?” Cloud asked, tone somewhat suspicious. He and Tifa were watching as Denzel and Marlene energetically scooped out the inside of the pumpkin in preparation for carving. Idly, he wondered if Tifa – being by far the more practical adult in their partnership – had thought to bring a change of clothing for either child. Denzel was covered up to his armpits in stringy vegetable guts, and had pulp smeared across his forehead; Marlene’s hands and wrists were likewise coated, and her braid had somehow ended up in the mess, leaving a slimy smear across the back of her shirt. “Don’t you mean their entry?” he added, gesturing at the kids with his thumb.
Tifa shook her head, brown eyes laughing, but it was Marlene who answered. “No, Cloud,” the little girl chirped, “this is the Seventh Heaven entry. That means you and Tifa have to help, too!”
And that, apparently, was that. In short order -- and at both Denzel and Marlene’s insistence -- Cloud found himself confronted with one large, orange victim. Helpfully, they’d marked the pumpkin’s skin with grease pen to indicate precisely what form the vegetative mutilation he was being forced to perpetrate was expected to take. Tifa slapped a boning knife into his hand, and motioned for him to get started.
Instead, Cloud frowned. Both the knife and the marks he was meant to follow were so... small. Given his sword and a pumpkin the size of a small car, he could produce a perfect caricature of Reno in minutes. This, though... this he didn’t do. The kids watching and obviously expecting him to wield the flimsy thing with skill didn’t help, either. He glanced hopefully at Tifa, only to have her raise an eyebrow at him in return. Mako-infused eyes turned vaguely pleading as he gestured with the knife, striving to convey that the implement was unacceptable.
Tifa crossed her arms and tapped her foot, unmoved.
Sighing, he let his shoulders slump as he approached the truck’s tail gate where the pumpkin waited. Once there, he looked over the marks again, and then shook his head.
Watching him, Tifa was forced to bite her lip to keep from laughing. Cloud Strife was pouting. “You big baby,” she teased, earning a scowl from under his spiky bangs, “bigger isn’t necessarily better, you know. That knife will work perfectly well.”
Straightening, he folded his arms, expression falsely mutinous, blue eyes gleaming with his own humor. He was going to get his way. “Judging starts in half an hour,” he countered.
And, of course, he was right. Conceding the point, Tifa reluctantly exchanged the boning knife for an eight-inch chef’s, and Cloud got to work.
The resultant masterpiece was ready five minutes before the deadline. Cloud received a kiss on the cheek, a manly handshake, and one very rewarding lip-lock when it took first place.
Characters: Cloud/Tifa, Marlene, Denzel
Rating: K+
Prompt: FFVII: Cloud, Tifa, pumpkins on
ff_kissbattle Cloud was unprepared for frenetic excitement to erupt when he mentioned – in passing – that the Chocobo Ranch was sponsoring a fall festival, complete with hay rides and a pumpkin carving contest. He certainly hadn’t expected to find himself borrowing a truck from an elderly neighbor in order to cart the entire Seventh Heaven family out for the event. The previous year, when fall came around and Tifa and the kids got it into their heads to celebrate the season, his sole duty had been to procure a dozen large, bright pumpkins for them to use as their decorative canvas. He’d taken his role seriously – aside from the occasional teasing comment regarding cruelty toward vegetables, or horribly disfiguring squash surgery – and had brought home one or two at a time, purchased from various farms and stalls and markets as he made his deliveries. Each offering had been duly inspected and approved, and it’s future features discussed while he’d listened, half-bemused.
Tifa had made pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread until the Seventh Heaven had been filled with the scents of cinnamon and nutmeg, and that – as far as Cloud was concerned – had been the best part of the whole production. (In fact, his taste buds and stomach had both agreed it was fantastic, and well worth the trouble of carting over-sized gourds around on Fenrir.)
Yet this – listening to Marlene and Denzel shriek with laughter as they played tag in the maze of hay bales, or watching as Denzel had his first meeting with a chocobo – was even better. Especially since Tifa had promised him the baked goods, too.
He should’ve known there would be a catch.
The downside of it all first hit him as he trailed along behind Tifa, she happily searching through the array of pumpkins to find the ‘perfect’ ones to take home. With one in each hand, and another clasped in the curve of each arm – the fruits of an hour and a half of shopping – he started to wish he’d kept his mouth shut. While Tifa and the kids had seemed terribly picky when looking over the pumpkins he’d brought home, that was nothing to the way Tifa inspected the things when buying them herself. She’d rejected dozens of perfectly beautiful specimens – enough that he was beginning to think she just liked having him follow her around, balancing orange squash like some sort of demented porter.
“What do you think Cloud?” she suddenly asked – the same way she’d asked a few hundred times already. The pumpkin in question – this time – was big enough that both Denzel and Marlene could sit on it. Together. At the same time.
“It’s huge,” he answered.
“I know! It’s perfect!”
There was that magic word. “Last one then?”
Tifa smiled and rolled her eyes at his stoic yet somehow pathetic expression. “Last one.”
Once they paid and carted the monstrosity back to the truck, she revealed that it was to be their entry in the carving contest.
“Our entry?” Cloud asked, tone somewhat suspicious. He and Tifa were watching as Denzel and Marlene energetically scooped out the inside of the pumpkin in preparation for carving. Idly, he wondered if Tifa – being by far the more practical adult in their partnership – had thought to bring a change of clothing for either child. Denzel was covered up to his armpits in stringy vegetable guts, and had pulp smeared across his forehead; Marlene’s hands and wrists were likewise coated, and her braid had somehow ended up in the mess, leaving a slimy smear across the back of her shirt. “Don’t you mean their entry?” he added, gesturing at the kids with his thumb.
Tifa shook her head, brown eyes laughing, but it was Marlene who answered. “No, Cloud,” the little girl chirped, “this is the Seventh Heaven entry. That means you and Tifa have to help, too!”
And that, apparently, was that. In short order -- and at both Denzel and Marlene’s insistence -- Cloud found himself confronted with one large, orange victim. Helpfully, they’d marked the pumpkin’s skin with grease pen to indicate precisely what form the vegetative mutilation he was being forced to perpetrate was expected to take. Tifa slapped a boning knife into his hand, and motioned for him to get started.
Instead, Cloud frowned. Both the knife and the marks he was meant to follow were so... small. Given his sword and a pumpkin the size of a small car, he could produce a perfect caricature of Reno in minutes. This, though... this he didn’t do. The kids watching and obviously expecting him to wield the flimsy thing with skill didn’t help, either. He glanced hopefully at Tifa, only to have her raise an eyebrow at him in return. Mako-infused eyes turned vaguely pleading as he gestured with the knife, striving to convey that the implement was unacceptable.
Tifa crossed her arms and tapped her foot, unmoved.
Sighing, he let his shoulders slump as he approached the truck’s tail gate where the pumpkin waited. Once there, he looked over the marks again, and then shook his head.
Watching him, Tifa was forced to bite her lip to keep from laughing. Cloud Strife was pouting. “You big baby,” she teased, earning a scowl from under his spiky bangs, “bigger isn’t necessarily better, you know. That knife will work perfectly well.”
Straightening, he folded his arms, expression falsely mutinous, blue eyes gleaming with his own humor. He was going to get his way. “Judging starts in half an hour,” he countered.
And, of course, he was right. Conceding the point, Tifa reluctantly exchanged the boning knife for an eight-inch chef’s, and Cloud got to work.
The resultant masterpiece was ready five minutes before the deadline. Cloud received a kiss on the cheek, a manly handshake, and one very rewarding lip-lock when it took first place.
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Date: 2009-10-31 01:23 am (UTC)From:The thing with the knife is what made me write this. Cloud just doesn't do delicate -- he's more of a hack and slasher -- and yet he's somehow perfectly precise and only hits what he wants to. I just imagined him insisting he wanted a big carving knife and doing well with it, despite Tifa's doubts. ^__^