1986
Born

1992 (6)
Wutai War begins

1995 (9)
Tifa’s mother dies
Tifa is hurt and Cloud is blamed

2000 (14)
Cloud and Tifa make a promise
Wutai War ends

2001 (14)
Cloud leaves for Midgar and joins Shinra as an infantryman

2001 (15)
Beginning of the AVALANCHE insurgency

2002 (16)
Nibelheim incident
Cloud defeats Sephiroth
Cloud and Zack become part of Hojo’s experiments

2006 (20)
Zack escapes the Nibelheim mansion with Cloud

2007 (21)
Zack and Cloud make it to Midgar
Zack is killed by Shinra
Cloud, presumed dead, makes his way into Midgar
Tifa finds him in the undercity
Events of Final Fantasy VII

Country Boy
Born in Nibelheim to a single mother. Life was not easy for the small family, especially as Claudia faced disapproval from the townspeople for having a child out of wedlock. Growing up, Cloud became defensive of the stares and muttered gossip about his mother and, eventually, himself. This made him prone to trouble, picking fights with other kids as well as adults, and making it difficult to have friends. 

He desperately wished to be Tifa’s friend, having developed a crush on her, but was never noticed by her or her friends. As a result of being brushed aside so many times, Cloud became bitter and convinced himself that her friends were childish and that he was more mature, that he was much better than them.

When he was nine, Tifa’s mother died, and she took it very hard. Unwilling to accept her mother’s death, Tifa ventured into the mountains thinking she could see her. Cloud was the only one to follow her across the bridge but Tifa lost her footing and fell. Unable to catch her, he fell too.

While Cloud got by with scraped knees, Tifa was badly wounded and in a coma for seven days. It was unsure if she would make a recovery. Her father blamed Cloud and, though Tifa recovered, he banned Cloud from seeing her again.

Cloud felt incredibly guilty over what happened to Tifa. He blamed himself, that he wasn’t stronger, that he couldn’t save her. His internalized guilt came out in the form of aggression, making him fight with others for no reason and often without regard. 

When he heard of Shinra’s great First Class SOLDIER Sephiroth, he wished he could be like him. To be strong enough to save anyone. 

Like most of the boys in their small village, he made the decision to leave for better prospects. Only, unlike the others, he was leaving to join SOLDIER.

Before leaving, he asked Tifa to meet him. He plans to tell her of his dream to become a First Class SOLDIER, hoping that it would impress her. The two made a promise. The next year, Cloud left.

ShinRa Serviceman
Cloud never made the cut for First Class. Instead, he was relegated to Infantryman, another grunt in Shinra’s cog. He became fast friends with Zack, a First Class SOLDIER, as well as other Shinra soldiers.

A short year later, Cloud was assigned on a mission with Sephiroth and Zack to his home town of Nibelheim. Their mission: to inspect the reactor within the mountains. Ashamed to show his face, Cloud kept his helmet on and, in secret, only visited his mother. No one else had any clue that Cloud Strife had returned home at last. 

With Tifa as their guide into the mountains, the group set off. At the reactor, Sephiroth uncovered evidence of Hojo’s human mako experiments. This set off a chain of events, where Sephiroth secluded himself within the Shinra Manor that resided in Nibelheim. It was also the start of events that would forever change Cloud.

The Night Nibelheim Burned
When Sephiroth came out of the depths of the Shinra Manor days later, it was as a changed man. He now believed himself to be of the Cetra and born from Jenova, another Cetra. He razed Nibeilheim to the ground and then departed to the reactor where Jenova was kept.

At the reactor, Sephiroth kills Tifa’s father and badly wounds Tifa herself. When Zack arrives, he tries to kill Sephiroth, but is outmatched. Eventually, Cloud arrives, and he takes up Zack’s buster sword to fight Sephiroth himself. For razing his home, for killing his mother, and for hurting Tifa.

Cloud manages to wound Sephiroth by getting a sneak attack on him, impaling him with the buster sword, and then returns to take care of Tifa. 

Sephiroth, still alive, exits with Jenova’s head, and Cloud follows to finish things. Sephiroth impales Cloud on his sword, but an impressive display of strength and determination lets Cloud turn the tide by instead lifting Sephiroth up with his own sword and throwing him into the depths of the reactor.

He loses consciousness soon after. Shinra finds them and he and Zack become test subjects for Hojo. Neither would see the light of day again for four years.

Escaping ShinRa
Zack was the one to plan and orchestrate their escape. Cloud could barely function, the mako poisoning too strong for him to handle, and so it was up to Zack to get them out of there. It was far from easy, with Shinra often hot on their trail, but it’s a time that Cloud remembers little of. In the times they were alone, Zack told him stories of his life, and the pieces of Cloud’s mind clung to them like flotsam in a storm. 

Just outside of Midgar, the pair were finally confronted by Shinra soldiers. Zack did his best, but was ultimately defeated. Cloud, still addled by mako, was left for dead. 

Instead, Cloud did eventually pull himself together, the site of his dead friend jarring his already broken mind. He mourned Zack on that hilltop. 

It was a slow process but his mind eventually recovered. It protected his still fragile self by constructing a false personality made from the memories Zack told him. Taking his buster sword, Cloud made his way into Midgar where he was eventually found in a delirious state by Tifa. He became lucid after meeting her again, but his inconsistent memories and obvious mental trauma concerned her.

Shortly after, he lent his sword and skills to AVALANCHE, the eco-terrorist group that Tifa was apart of. Their first mission: blow up the sector 1 reactor.