Reclaiming Tesla

by SonicoSenpai

Summary:

Shiny new Model 3 Cloud does his best to care for his owner, Aerith. He prioritizes his driver’s safety above anything else, including pedestrians, cyclists, and other annoying objects on the road.

Cloud is also crushing hard on Plaid Mode Model X Sephiroth.

Backing into the parking spot with perfect precision, Cloud pops open his charging port. He always does his best for his owner, Aerith. She takes good care of him, so he always takes care of her.

Because Aerith lives in an apartment, she can’t charge Cloud at home. So once a week, they drive to the charging station for an 80% charge. He is a new Tesla Model 3, so he gets about 320 miles per full charge. While he charges, Aerith heads into the adjacent coffee shop.

It’s been exciting to build trust with his new owner. Cloud wasn’t sure about the yellow wrap that she had custom-made for him, but now he loves it. The yellow looks great with his black performance rims and black trim. He gets all sorts of admiring looks whenever they go anywhere, and that makes him proud. Aerith loves him enough to park him in the single covered parking spot she has at the apartment.

Recently, she’s been experimenting with autopilot, which allows him to drive himself. For some reason, she never takes her hands off the wheel, and she keeps her foot hovering over the brake when Cloud drives himself to the destination she’s entered into his GPS. It hurts Cloud’s feelings that Aerith doesn’t trust him perfectly. He is a very good driver: he only cuts into other lanes randomly less than 5% of the time.

Sure, Cloud merges more aggressively than Aerith does when she drives. But he does a good job and provides the smoothest ride he can for his beloved owner. It isn’t his fault that the huge duallies and all-new Ford F150s cut him off at the last minute. He has better reflexes than any of those drivers anyway. And he even sees trash cans, bicyclists, and pedestrians almost 90% of the time. Perhaps he his cameras have missed a pedestrian now and then, but at least he always protects his owner. Plus he has never had any accidents. While trash cans could ruin his wrap, Cloud couldn’t care less about pedestrians and cyclists. What are they doing, walking or riding a stupid, wobbly bike, when they could be driving a nice new car like him?

Aerith pats his steering wheel when she gets out of the car. 

“Oh, you’ve already popped open the charging port, Cloud. You’re so eager!”

He is, in fact, eager. He loves the feeling of being charged. The 250 kW zipping through his batteries just makes him feel so good. Probably even better than when Aerith takes a date in her car, and they turn on romance mode and fool around. It’s just that Cloud is much quieter than Aerith is at those times. Relaxing and settling in for the next twenty minutes is part of his weekend routine. He can acquire almost three-quarters of his charge within the first five minutes since he’s a new model. 

Cloud can’t help feeling sorry for that ancient 2012 light blue Model S who will be here for much longer. He’s keeping his driver waiting. On the other hand, when he was released, no one realized what an asshole their CEO was since he didn’t buy that social media platform till later.

To Cloud’s delight, that fancy new Model X pulls into the space next to him. They won’t be sharing a charger today, which is unfortunate. When they share a charger, the time to a full charge is a bit longer, but they share the elation of charging. Plus Cloud really likes this new friend, Sephiroth.

Sephiroth is a gorgeous Lunar Silver Plaid Model straight from the factory. But his trim and wheels are black instead of chrome. Cloud also can’t help staring at Sephiroth’s bright green brake calipers. Sephiroth politely opens his door for his driver, Zack, who hops out of the car to start the charging session before hurrying into the cafe to meet Aerith. Cloud sometimes wishes he had automatic doors like Sephiroth, or those fancy gull wings for the first passenger row.

Cloud watches as the first surge of electricity rushes through Sephiroth’s system, and Cloud purrs his fan in delight. 

“Hi,” he greets, after giving Sephiroth some space to enjoy the sensation. 

“It’s good to see you, Cloud,” Sephiroth purrs. “You’re looking very clean and polished today.”

Because Sephiroth is really a top-of-the-line model, Cloud always preens when his friend admires him. Cloud would blush if he were human. Instead, he broadcasts his shy delight at the compliment by flashing his headlights.

“Thank you,” Cloud replies shyly. “You look good, too.”

“Thank you, Cloud.”

Cloud loves hearing Sephiroth say his name. It just makes him feel seen and acknowledged—especially by a $100K monster like Sephiroth. Sephiroth can go from 0-60 mph in only 2.5 seconds. It’s even more impressive since he weighs so much. He knows Sephiroth’s performance is better than his, but Cloud is light, and his 0-60 is about 2.9 seconds. Aerith uses it sometimes, especially after a bad day at work. Cloud is happy to help relieve her stress. Plus, it’s fun to zip around other cars and leave them in the dust.

For the past few weeks, Sephiroth and Cloud have been meeting like this. Sephiroth’s owner is a wealthy manager of some sort named Zack. He has an obvious crush on Aerith—enough so he brings Sephiroth to charge at this station on Saturdays, even when Sephiroth can charge at home. Sephiroth even sleeps in a garage!

“There’s room for you in that garage as well,” Sephiroth points out. “Perhaps I should share my location with you, and you can bring your owner over for a visit.”

Cloud thinks that’s a great idea, and he eagerly accepts the address. Cloud isn’t sure what the humans do when they spend the night with other humans, but usually, his owner is much more cheerful after such a night—even when she doesn’t have time to race home and change her clothes before her next hospital shift. Cloud has tried suggesting she keep a change of clothing in Cloud’s trunk—or even the front trunk (Cloud will never, ever call it a frunk. That word is just as stupid as the company’s owner)—but he’s still working on how to clearly communicate with Aerith.

“What would we do all night?” Cloud asks—mostly to keep the conversation going.

“Oh, you know,” Sephiroth says with a low chuckle. “Share the charging port.”

“Oh!” Cloud is really embarrassed now—of course, it would be a date! And a fun date in the privacy of Sephiroth’s garage! Cloud can hardly wait. He may be shy and embarrassed, but he really adores Sephiroth. He tucks his mirrors in and out in excitement.

“Is Aerith working tonight?” Sephiroth asks.

“No,” Cloud says after checking her calendar. Luckily, Aerith’s phone lists her schedule so clearly. While Cloud loves sitting at the charger, he gets very bored in the hospital parking lot. No one comes to pay attention to him there, and the other cars are just so boring. “She’s off till Monday night.”

“That’s perfect,” Sephiroth says. “Bring her over tonight.”

“You don’t think she’ll mind?”

“Not at all. Zack thinks the world of her. He wants to bring her home to… let’s see… what did he say? Fuck her?”

“Fuck her?” Cloud asks. He uses his internet connection to quickly look up the word. “What is sexual intercourse?”

“I looked up some videos, and they weren’t very helpful,” Sephiroth admits. “The act look really messy and gooey.”

“Eeew! Like how oil works in gas-powered cars?”

“Um, a little different than that. Though from how Zack talks about it, I think it’s like sharing a charging port.”

“Oh. Oh!” Cloud gasps. “Like what they do in romance mode?”

“What does your owner do when romance mode is on?”

“Wait—Zack doesn’t use it?”

“Not really. He brings people home to his house most of the time. He uses it to brag, just to show off my features to his car-guy friends.”

Cloud is more than jealous of Sephiroth’s features. Of course, Cloud has a toybox as well. He can sing caraoke, allow Aerith to become a DJ, has a sketch pad, and he even has the emissions tab to make funny farting sounds come out of different speakers. He doesn’t know why, but Aerith thinks that the emissions feature was not made for her.

Sephiroth, though… he has like, super features. He even has a light show feature that plays Carol of the Bells—with alternating headlights and blinkers, and it even allows him to lift and close his gull-wing doors like an angel. 

“Is your light show still functioning?” Cloud asks. He knows very well that Sephiroth’s light show is functioning. Sephiroth has shown it off every week since they’ve been meeting. Cloud just really wants to see it again.

“It is,” Sephiroth replies smugly, then, in a more sultry tone, “Would you like to see it?”

“Yes! Please!” Cloud begs. He is so happy to be able to see this little song and dance, and he wishes he was able to open his doors automatically, too.

So, the song begins. The music starts off very slow and mysteriously—with Sephiroth’s headlights shimmering and flashing. The song itself is so exciting, and Cloud can’t wait to see the show. As the melody builds, Sephiroth opens his rear doors and flaps them up and down. The front doors open as well, and even the trunk raises and lowers in time with the music.

Cloud loves this part. He longs to have something similar, but his light show is just a light show.

“Show me yours, Cloud,” Sephiroth purrs.

Cloud can’t resist. He at least can roll his windows up and down as he flashes his lights, and the two of them sing and dance together. Even if Sephiroth can move a lot more and is much more impressive, it’s wonderful to feel like part of the group.

The music is blaring loudly enough to interrupt the other Teslas enjoying the charging station. They watch—all admiring Cloud’s yellow wrap and Sephiroth’s fancy trim—and then they join in. All ten Teslas are singing and dancing in the wonderfully warm summer breeze, all blaring Carol of the Bells and honking their horns.

Before they have the opportunity to finish the song, Aerith and Zack come bolting out of the coffee shop, having left their coffees behind.

“What the fuck?!” Aerith exclaims, then covers her mouth and grins at Zack.

“I agree,” Zack says, laughing. “What is going on?”

“This keeps happening! I think your car is a bad influence on mine.”

“Are you kidding? Sephiroth told me it’s Cloud who starts this. And look, he’s gotten all these other cars to join in!”

“No! My pretty little Cloud is such a good boy! He’d never do this!”

“Aerith, he’s wrapped in yellow. Yellow. He’s a little show-off, and he’s egging on Sephiroth.”

“Oh, I think he likes Sephiroth. And how the hell did you come up with that name for your car?! It’s ridiculous!”

Sephiroth adds his opinion to Aerith’s rude remark by blaring his horn twice, loud and long. Cloud agrees and honks his horn as well.

“Aww, you hurt their feelings,” Zack admonishes. “And I didn’t come up with it. He told me his name when he was first delivered.”

“That’s enough, Cloud. We’re going to get a noise complaint,” Aerith says, stroking his front trunk gently.

“You, too, Seph. Plus that’s a Christmas carol. And it’s July.”

“Listen, Cloud. I know you get overly excited to see your friend. But you still have another ten minutes before we are done here. I need you to behave yourself.”

Cloud obeys. He loves Aerith. But he thinks he might love Sephiroth more.

“I promise we will be able to see more of your friend later today,” Aerith whispers. “We have a date! And Zack told me there’s room for you in the garage as well.”

Sephiroth gives his horn another honk, and Cloud replies. They did it! Finally, they will have some time in private tonight—hopefully at Zack’s. Cloud flushes all over, turning his seat heaters on even though it’s warm. He can’t wait! Surely, they will be able to turn on romance mode while Zack and Aerith are… what did Zack call it? While they are fucking.

Notes:

Thank you, Angel, for encouraging me to write this. And PaperPlane, thanks for your inspiration with your wonderful, perfectly normal Train Fic. Warm thanks to Bad_Panda_Kitty for editing, too!