Okay, I'm fucking losing it. This change is fucked up. This detail eluded me until I looked at and compared these two scenes.
In the OG FFVII when Cloud falls into the Sector 5 Church, Cloud's "inner self" rouses Cloud back into consciousness. The reason I attribute this voice to Cloud's "inner self" is because it mentions "skinned knees." The disastrous fall from the bridge collapse on Mount Nibel he miraculous survives with just skimmed knees. The conscious Cloud who's in the grip of Jenova cells does not remember this and is confused by his inner voice mentioning this detail from his past.
The Ultimania Omega specifically attributes this to Cloud's inner self trying to reach out to him.
FFVII Ultimania Omega said:
****Translations from the Story Playback segment of the book**** (004)
***Enigma of the voice*** (Page 68)
As Cloud is trying to place the bomb, a mysterious voice speaks to him. Later,
this same kind of mysterious voice resounds in Cloud's head in the scene where
he and a voice have a conversation, and it offers him reminders. These voices
are the original Cloud, as -- due to Hojo's Sephiroth Clones experiment --
Zack's personality merged with his, creating the present day Cloud, producing
a conflict of multiple personalities(-->P.11).
During the scene in the first mako reactor, what [the voice] says is it
[trying] to point [Cloud] toward the memory of Sephiroth five years ago in
Nibelheim's mako reactor, as the two places were similar. However, Cloud is
not able to listen to the words of the memory.
(Accompanying screenshot caption)
"Open your eyes!" [the voice] calls out, as it does when the scene at the
Temple of the Ancients comes and the words of Sephiroth make use of Cloud as a
puppet.
So in the OG Church of FFVII, Cloud's inner self is helping Cloud rouse himself back to consciousness.
This is completely opposite of what happens in Chapter 8 of the Remake.
Sephiroth has seemingly hijacked the role of Cloud's inner voice here.
"Hey, buddy. Made it through with just a couple of scraped knees back then... Move something. Anything. Good. Slow... and steady... "
Cloud asks who the voice is, and this time.... It sinisterly responds with,
"I am... Your everything." As Sephiroth appears behind Cloud, out of his view and perception. In Japanese, he says
"I am... Your Master."
The implications of this are shocking, given what Sephiroth is capable of now. He can now hijack and mimic the voice of Cloud's inner self and lead Cloud even further astray. Was Cloud's desire to literally kill Reno an unconscious prompting from the Jenova cells in Cloud in hopes of again, "defying destiny?" I dunno, but this is another significant change that opens up.... Weird possibilities.
I really don't know what this means honestly. It seems clear Sephiroth wants to make Cloud deviate from destiny and it seems likely he's seeding things in his head to do this, however Aerith's role in this is strange. She's defying destiny too, but to what end? Maybe she's some sort of counterforce to Sephiroth but her going against the Whispers is strange since Sephiroth seemingly wants to as well.