It's perhaps a good thing Sephiroth isn't the boisterously encouraging type, anyway; Cloud most likely wouldn't be able to handle that kind of shock to the system, after such a distressingly long pause. (In which he does not regain any of his height, but somehow blessedly doesn't appear to lose much more of it, either.)

As it is, he still probably isn't exactly handling this whole mess with anything so much as approaching aplomb, but maybe he hasn't embarrassed himself too fatally, if his hero is not yet writing him off as a hopeless case, is - smiling? Kind of. Maybe. But he probably just imagined that.

Wishful thinking can't account for the fact that that's an oddly generous response, no matter how his insecurities eat away at him throughout, though, and Cloud finds himself nodding shallowly, in spite of himself.

(I don't think I wanna believe this is happening, right now...)

"Thank you. Sir." Speaking freely isn't one of his strong points - but then, talking idly at all is something he tends to avoid wherever possible. If he knew the phrase "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt," he'd most heartily agree to the sentiment behind it. "I'm- Sorry for the trouble."