"Actually, I forgot most of it." Cloud pulled his gaze away from the sky. He wondered, when he looked at Zack, if the other man noticed the mako glow in their eyes anymore, or if he'd gotten so used to it that it didn't register. For Cloud, the glow wasn't the mark of a SOLDIER; it was the mark of a failed experiment, of Sephiroth's and Jenova's genes intermingled with his own, and of one too many immersions in the Planet's lifeblood. "For almost a year. I forgot basic training, failing the SOLDIER exams, being in the labs. Some sort of defense mechanism, I guess, but I knew who Sephiroth was, and I knew what he'd done. So did Tifa, and that helped get the others behind the idea of going after him."
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, although the gesture had no visible effect on the wild spikes. "What none of us knew was how far Hojo'd gone with his experiments. People were showing up all over the place with no memory and no will of their own. Turns out Hojo took more than one shot of recreating Sephiroth. You and I were just the worst results. I'm not sure how many clones there were, but Sephiroth or Jenova was controlling all of them, trying to find the Black Materia to summon Meteor. They wanted to destroy every living thing on the Planet. If it weren't for Aerith, they probably would have gotten away with it, too."