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It had been a long, hard road but finally Sephiroth was seeing all their hard work pay off.
Squall hadn’t been a wreck when Sephiroth had taken him in but he hadn’t been too far off. The ptsd that the brunet suffered with was not unlike that which the silveret had seen in soldiers coming back from seeing combat.
Every sharp movement would result in the brunet flinching visibly and approaching the lion made him practically shut down. He would stand there, waiting for a blow to come. It wasn’t all Squall either.
After first laying eyes on the scar crossing the bridge of the lion’s nose, Angeal had a hard time not getting angry every time he saw it. The mark was a reminder of the abuse that some human had subjected to a member of their pride, the leader of it no less and the anger would surge to the forefront of his mind; the same rage that had seen him through the pit fights.
Sephiroth had a job ahead of him not only taming the anger that his bear felt but also the lion’s mindset of being deserving of the violence. The former was easier than the latter for sure. Time spent shining a different light on the scar and its reason for being there, drawing attention instead to how it made the brunet look, how it stopped him from looking too pretty, too feminine and gave him a more fierce look deserving of a pride leader.
Helping the lion overcome the abuse he’d suffered was harder. His reactions were no longer conscious and it took long hours to coax the brunet’s subconscious out of the automatic reaction and more than once the adolescent lion’s frustration got the better of him. More than once he stormed off, more than once he went to bed with no dinner.
For a while, Cloud was the only one holding them all together, when Angeal and Squall couldn’t be close and Sephiroth’s patience wore thin. Cloud would curl up with the bear, spend time around the lion if not close to him, and spent a great deal of time around Sephiroth, thanking the man for everything, repaying him with his company and being a good wolf but it was wearing them all a bit thin. For Cloud, it wasn’t the fairytale he’d been expecting where everything was better with Squall returned to them.
Finally though, finally they were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and they were seeing signs of the old Squall that Cloud had gushed about and pined for since Sephiroth had bought him.
Squall was a little more animated, a little less the beaten down pet and more the hormonal young lion with a pride to take care of. Without that red veil descending over the bear’s eyes every time Angeal looked at him, Squall began to relax again and when he received a playful nip from his wolf companion, he could swat the blond away instead of just standing there and taking it.
The relief that Angeal felt was tangible. It had been more than a week since he’d started feeling the call of his cave beneath the bed, the nest set up there waiting for him to hibernate in but the bear had resisted, refusing to lay down and submit to that natural urge without the comfort and protection of the lion there with him. So when Angeal approached the lion and Squall actually moved forward to meet him, and when the bear reached out to take the lion’s hand and Squall met him half way.
“I’ve missed you,” Angeal confessed quietly, turning and leading the lion from the room under the watchful eye of their new master. Cloud trotted along behind them with a happy little spring in his step but kept a respectable distance behind them. He gave the hand in his a small squeeze and it brought a tired but genuine smile to his face when he received a small squeeze in return.
“I’m here now,” Squall replied quietly but with a firmness that hadn’t been there when he’d first arrived at his new home. Even with the help that Sephiroth had given him, the brunet still didn’t entirely trust the silveret, to Cloud’s disappointment. The wolf adored the man almost as much as he adored the rest of this pride. Squall though, was left with a deep distrust of them and hadn’t yet allowed the silveret to touch him.
It was a relief to be able to share space with his bear once more.
When they made it to the edge of the bed, beneath which Angeal’s nest waited, the raven turned and wrapped Squall in a hug which the normally stoic brunet would have stiffly accepted for appearance’s sake but that time he melted into it, leaning against the raven and Angeal was more than happy to just hold him for a minute. “I’m tired,” the bear announced, letting the young man go so that he could begin peeling off his clothes. To his amusement, Squall helped him do so and when the bear bent to scoot beneath the bed, Squall lowered himself along with him.
Before long, Angeal was tucked up beneath the bed, curled amongst the blankets and pillows that made up the space he’d spend a good deal of the foreseeable future in. One hand rested just beyond the warmth and safety that was his nest and tired eyes peered out from the darkness within until the lion settled himself on the waiting pillow.
As soon as Squall’s hand settled into Angeal’s waiting one, those eyes shining slightly in what little light made it beneath the bed disappeared as Squall took up his old vigil, trusted by his bear, to watch over him while he slept.
“Y’know…” Angeal murmured sleepily from the darkness. “Now you look the part of the leader defending his pride.”
Squall huffed, rolling his eyes despite how the bear couldn’t see him do it. “Shut up and go to sleep. You’re going to be ornery enough when you wake without wasting your breath now.”
After squeezing the lion’s hand lightly there was the soft sound of the last of Angeal’s shuffling before the bear hummed softly in acquiescence. “Just… make sure you’re there when I wake up.”