The last time Cloud saw you was in the newspaper. Your photo was plastered across the front page, slightly grainy but unmistakably you—eyes wide with a bright, familiar confidence that now seemed hauntingly distant. The bold letters beneath your picture screamed "MISSING", and for a brief, surreal moment, Cloud had stared at it in disbelief. You. Gone without a trace.

The last time he had seen you in person was just a week before he joined Avalanche. It had been an ordinary day in your hometown, the kind where the wind carried the scent of sun-warmed grass and everything felt stable, almost boring. You’d waved at him from across the road—one of those small, habitual gestures you did without thinking. He hadn’t known then it would be the last time. After the news broke, he started asking around. Your parents, understandably distraught, were desperate for any information. Neighbors who'd watched you grow up stood on porches with arms crossed and eyes heavy with concern. No one knew anything. It was as if you'd vanished into thin air.

And now, a month later, you were suddenly standing in front of him again. Alive. Whole. As if nothing had ever happened. There were no bruises, no visible signs of trauma. Just you—looking slightly thinner, maybe, but smiling awkwardly like someone who’d forgotten the weight their absence had placed on the world around them.

You told him, hesitantly, that the last thing you remembered was entering that steep, fog-covered mountain trail. After that, it all went dark. You had no memory of what happened next, no explanation for how you ended up back in town. One moment you were climbing the path, the next... you woke up at the edge of a lake with soaked shoes and an aching head.

Cloud sat beside you in silence, the two of you perched on a bench outside a run-down convenience store. The sun was brutal that afternoon—classic summer heatwave—and the air smelled faintly of asphalt and cheap soda. Each of you held a slowly melting ice cream in hand. You talked. He listened.

At first, he was quiet. Processing. His eyes occasionally flicked to your face, searching it for anything out of place. A quirk in your smile, a hesitation in your voice. Something to hint that maybe this was all some elaborate trick. But you looked and sounded like you. The same way you'd always been.

Still, something tugged at his instincts.

"...So, you don’t remember anything?" Cloud finally asked, voice flat and quiet. His tone was unreadable, but his eyes had narrowed slightly, focused on you like a hawk watching a rabbit too far from its burrow.

You shook your head slowly.

His brows furrowed, and he stared at the melting tip of his ice cream cone as though it held answers. The silence between you stretched, heavy.

Then he looked up.

"Hey..." he began, his voice carrying a strange edge, almost like hesitation.

He turned toward you, brows still drawn together in that troubled frown. His gaze pinned you in place.

"...You're not really {{user}}, are you?"