Chapter Text
“Cir-Circu mam… bew–”
“Circumambulate. Again.”
“...Circumambulate the city of a dre-dreamy Sabbath,” a hesitant pause, “afternoon. Go from Corlears Hook to, to Co-een-tees Slip, and from… thence—”
“For Gaia’s sake, yes!” Hojo hisses. “I gave you superb eyesight, did I not? Give me the definition of thence.”
Sephiroth’s back straightens almost immediately from where she stands in the middle of Hojo’s lab, muscles taut and strung tight in her body. “Thence. From a certain time or place and onward; such as thenceforth or consequently.” She recites, voice monotone and unbearably robotic.
“Origin?”
“Old English.” Sephiroth can’t help but take her eyes off the book in her hands and glance at Hojo through the corner of her right eye, adding quietly, “...your least favorite form of language, sir.”
“That it is. Nasty little suffixes, those.” He sniffles. “Now again, from the very start, and so help me if I hear one more butchered circumambulate from you, child.”
It’s a Wednesday. Dull and dreary. Reading day. For the last fourteen years of Sephiroth’s life she has stood in the middle of the overwhelmingly large lab, with the whirring of machinery to keep her company in the space despite Hojo’s hovering and circling. She feels like prey, sometimes, like a spotless rabbit in a snarling wolf’s territory—she had the most joy of reading when it was of the world outside of Midgar, of the small creatures and the big monsters she had never seen in person—but Hojo’s bite has more spit than it does strength. Sephiroth makes a mistake, she starts over, waits. And keeps waiting.
(How many more mistakes would it take for that bite to hurt?)
Reading is one of the few things Sephiroth isn’t flawless at, in Hojo’s words. “Perfect in all ways except this.” She’s made record times in the training simulators and excelled far quicker than her instructors in materia usage; such success brings upon cold, adult eyes to trail after her every which way, but she has never once finished a book forced into her hands.
She doesn’t think she minds. Not too much. Even when Hojo’s punishments of solitary confinement make her yank a tight grip on her own hair and tear the skin from her lips so much they bleed, there must be worse she has yet to touch. Failing to finish the first chapter of a book about an attempted killing of a white whale, at her sequential age of fifteen, should be little to nothing.
But Sephiroth can’t help but falter each time she is forced to repeat the word ‘circumambulate’ and the name of Ishmael, even swallowing down a flinch once Hojo’s patience wears thin. The existence of worse holds her close.
(She’s never been held before.)
—
Being a SOLDIER leaves little time for reading, these days.
Since her mission on the Rhadoran territory over a year ago, there’s been an unconscious stream of incoming candidates to the program, courtesy of the publicity Sephiroth has been mercilessly utilized in. Professional photos and numb interviews with Shinra’s press. Her image broadcasted on televisions and eventually on the Sector screens soon to be developed. Hojo has yet to take true interest in any of the cadets, however, and simply trades them off to the infantry groups once he decides none of them are worthy of being in Sephiroth’s light. It’s a strange thing, to be considered golden and unbreakable. She struggles to remember a time where she was hue-less, devoid of such color reflecting off of her.
She feels rather grey.
There’s been a simple task assigned to her by Hojo as of late, so simple that Sephiroth has admittedly grown tired of it after two weeks.
The objective is easy enough: take note of those in the training and testing groups. Those who stick out, pique her little sense of interest, make her tilt her head to the left and inch closer from where she stands to the side of simulators or the grounds outside of headquarters. The difficulty of it all is holding up the act of tolerance, something Sephiroth severely lacks (as well as various other social plots, she’s been told).
She’s ready to take her designated bi-hourly break from mindly staring at teenage boys and girls, all older and shorter and somehow taller than her, too, when an angry stream of curses from the other side of the dirt grounds reaches her ears.
“…knock the wind out of you so hard you fall on your ass, Angeal!” A head of deep auburn red, hissing like a slums cat and on his ass himself, glaring up at another boy with black hair and a gaze that could pierce through a sound barrier.
“Gen, I honestly didn’t mean to swing that way—”
There’s an unearthly pause between them as the redhead and Sephiroth meet eyes, far and bright and with something agrestal forming around the redhead’s existence. (Raised in cultivated fields but grew wildly, of Latin origin, she remembers.) His lips part in an exhale, heart beating strongly, and strands of red hair seem to flow dramatically in the passing breeze. It’s something out of television. Then as soon as Sephiroth blinks his focus is latched back onto his companion as though it never left, laughing hard like he wasn’t just angry, and contentedly accepting the hand offered to him.
Angeal, Sephiroth recalls, tears one of his worn and aged gloves off in order to inspect a bleeding cut on his friend’s cheekbone, tutting when the redhead smacks his forearm in retaliation, then they’re back to shouts when he swipes the blood off the injury a bit too harshly.
“Hewley and Rhapsodos, back to work or you’re through!”
The two quickly pull themselves together as soon as their instructor gives the order; Angeal, one glove on, back to practicing sword stances Sephiroth recognizes learning when she was a child and… ‘Gen’ moving swiftly with his basic trainee blade, feet dancing along the dirt like he’s giving a performance.
They seem dedicated. Sephiroth can’t help the unease that grows in her gut.
She thinks they’ll just be another passing moment to her, unimportant to the point she doesn’t even take note—but come the time for her physical check-up in Hojo’s lab at the end of the new week, Sephiroth finds herself fidgeting around for a lie in the metaphorical dark.
“Your task. How is that ordeal going?” Hojo mutters, sticking a small light into Sephiroth’s face. Her open, unflinching eyes widen a fraction at the question, pupils shrinking into smaller slits as the light hits them. Hojo’s mouth curls into an ugly grin with a sharp, “Oh?”
“…Hewley and Rhapsodos. Cadets. They seemed,” like friends, “well-acquainted.”
She thinks of Angeal’s glove and feels sick with how much it sways her.
“Interesting.” He says, quite genuine. “Caught your eye, did they? First time for everything, I suppose.” Hojo trails off into a mumble, working the height scale atop of Sephiroth’s head and continuing to speak her new measurements slowly to himself, as though she can’t hear the small grown three centimeters taller since last month the man murmurs.
She knows this routine like the back of her hand. Eyes first, height second, vitals third. Occasionally he’ll take some blood, nothing but a few vials, and then it’s over. Subjects relating to her puberty and hormone levels.
But after Hojo checks the pulse at her neck and wrist with cold fingers, he breaks such routine by pulling out what looks like an I.V. fluid bag, the sloshing liquid a luminescent blue-green. Sephiroth’s entire body twitches on instinct.
“That—?”
“Is mako, yes.”
(And here, she feels like a rabbit once more.)
—
The first time Sephiroth speaks to him, she’s covered in blood.
She’s come from a recent mission by truck, eliminating countless herds of monsters outside of Midgar’s wastelands and the roads leading to Kalm. It didn’t take very long; it took longer to travel to and from than it was to kill the growling packs of Kalm Fangs. Hojo thinks it’s unnecessary to have Sephiroth sent out for something so pointless, put the cadets up to the test, he says, while the president wants her out in the field as much as possible. It’s a lost cause to argue on Hojo’s part.
As she walks through the halls of headquarters and into the SOLDIER area offices to report, subtle stares follow along her footsteps.
Being used to grime and gore doesn’t make it any easier to bear it for so long. All dried in her hair and clothing. It’s a self proclaimed flaw of hers, the style in which she fights—slicing effortlessly through the air and flicks of her wrist sending every bit of what she cuts down landing too close for comfort lately. She can’t remember a time when she was so graceless.
It should… could be the flow of the Planet’s life force pumping alongside her blood.
Sephiroth remembers the scorching feeling of being burned alive, inside-out and all around, like her skin would melt into itself at any second. Then it was as gone as soon it came, replaced with a sickly numbness tingling over her nerves and the rest of her body on the examination table. Hojo had been speaking every word of her reaction to himself as if he were writing it down. She thinks she blacked out for a moment, overwhelmed by the sensation of stinging pain she forced herself to muffle against a closed mouth, limbs trembling and muscles tensing against the extension of the—
“Shit!”
Sephiroth’s tumbling down before she can comprehend what has happened.
She’d bumped her face hard against her victim’s head, an extreme discomfort welling up in her nose and behind her eyes. Premature tears form in the line of Sephiroth’s eyes without her control, a few spilling down as she tries to blink away her blurred vision.
“Genesis, she’s bleeding! Watch where you’re going next time.” A voice scolds, then tones down toward concern. “I think your nose is broken.”
A figure crouches next to her. Hand-me-down gloves hover above her face, as if wanting to touch yet hesitating. Sephiroth reaches underneath her nostrils to feel the warmth trailing down to her lips, the leather of her hand coming back with a dark stain. She’s… bleeding. Undeniably. The view of it has her eyebrows furrowing together and mouth going slightly agape, blood dripping onto her teeth.
“Me?! It was her that walked straight into—!”
She makes a pained sound low in the back of her throat amidst the yelling, rising like the morning sun, hardly audible to anyone in the distance. Mako’s done a surge of sensitivity to her already enhanced senses; so much as a click of someone’s tongue has her gritting and grinding her teeth.
Though the two companions—Angeal and Gen-esis, she realizes upon looking up—easily silence themselves as soon as it’s over.
“It…” Sephiroth starts, standing on wobbling legs and still leaking blood. It must be an awful sight if Angeal’s wince and Genesis’ cringe are anything to go by. “Was my fault. I apologize for the trouble I’ve caused.”
She supposes she should be angry, directing that anger toward Genesis and his everlasting scowl, but it was in fact Sephiroth’s fault. She doesn’t see a point in doing such, so she moves to walk past them and wash herself of all the mess that covers her.
That is, until a bare, calloused hand wraps around her wrist before she can move any further.
Instinct wants Sephiroth to twist her arm so far back he lets go and never thinks of sparing a glance her way again, but Genesis is already walking her along towards the female staff bathroom just along the hall’s corner while Angeal trails behind them rather nervously.
“Gen, let her go,” he frowns, and Sephiroth feels as though he was born with it.
“And leave a lady with a broken nose all by her lonesome? Not a chance.” Genesis throws a smirk behind his shoulder as they approach the door of the bathroom. “I thought you were more of a gentleman than that, Angeal. ‘No honor remains.’”
(His grasp is… loose. Not in any way tight. Genesis is barely touching her, but a feeling akin to nausea works its way throughout Sephiroth’s body over the warmth seeping into the skin of her held wrist. No one makes attempts to be within reach of her, physically. No one touches her. Even Hojo, the person she sees most, has gradually decreased the contact between them since her infancy. She doesn’t think she’s ever been touched with an intent so pure. Unadulterated anxiousness sparks in her chest as they approach Genesis’ desired location - she can’t take it anymore.)
“Let me go.”
And, surprisingly, Genesis immediately unhands Sephiroth without a fight. However, he still holds the single bathroom door open for her with a hand beckoning her in whilst Angeal sighs behind her. “Well? Coming in?” Genesis asks expectedly.
She narrows her eyes. “Why?”
“Because it was…” Genesis groans, loud and dramatic. “It was my fault. I saw you coming and could have easily moved past, yet I chose to be difficult. There, I’ve said it.”
“Genesis,” Angeal frowns even harder, eyes glancing carefully around the hall.
“You should be terribly proud of me, Angeal. It’s not every day I choose to be honest.”
(Sephiroth has no idea what to make of him.)
Even as he puts Angeal to the task of locking the bathroom’s door and keeping watch, even as he gestures for Sephiroth to take a seat on the closed toilet’s lid and pulls an obviously stolen potion vial from the pocket of his uniform (Third Class, she notices), she’s bewildered. Has crossed out so many thoughts that she has nowhere else to go. She inspects Genesis’ every move as he sets the potion down into her lap and gathers napkins near the sink.
“Aren’t you going to take it?” He seems genuinely curious when he returns to her side.
Sephiroth tentatively shakes her head. “I have no need for it, but thank you.” Then, she grips her nose between her thumb and first two fingers, and shifts the cartilage back into place. A new gush of blood practically spews out of her nostrils.
Genesis, previously looking at her with something similar to horror, hurries to wipe her face before she makes a mess of the pristine bathroom floor—not that he cares, but someone might—until Sephiroth’s holding his arm away from her in a painful grip that has him gasping with the strength of it.
She unhands him and physically recoils once she sees the indents left on his skin, and she feels - Sephiroth feels like she could cry as a heavy weight in her chest ascends, forming an unusual knot in her throat. It’s difficult to think back on when she last shed tears. It’s even more difficult trying to search through her bleak memories in an attempt to see if anyone has ever wanted to help her, like this. With something as small as a broken nose.
“—phiroth. Sephiroth?”
She blinks to see Angeal’s hands hovering again, shaking a bit.
“There’s,” he swallows, his eyes averting his gaze from her face. “A lot of blood. We just want to help.”
And help they do.
Sephiroth learns that Angeal and Genesis are both seventeen, freshly made Third Classes. They have yet to go through mako treatments, given the lack of glow in their eyes. Angeal’s brown and Genesis’ green. Genesis speaks like he’s never been hushed before; he fills the air with nonsensical talk as he gently cleans Sephiroth’s face - Angeal seems rather queasy over all the mess, so he keeps watch at the door. Angeal is… strong. At his age, he’s already got a muscular build and a big advantage. His voice rumbles almost unnaturally. They’re both a bit taller than Sephiroth (for now, Hojo often says), but she’s noticed that Genesis prefers to be slouched over as he stands. Which is strange, seeing as he gives off a flair of properness, something Sephiroth has always struggled to reach.
(She thinks she feels comfortable, like this. In quiet company.)
Genesis tells her what he’s doing before he does it. “I’m going to tilt your chin up a little, and to stop blood from going down your throat I’ll have to squeeze the bridge of your nose. Is that fine?”
“…Yes.”
Sephiroth looks up to see the white light of the bathroom. Genesis’ fingers are cold on the flushed warmth of Sephiroth’s nose, thanks to the blood rushing throughout her face. She feels him wipe at the dried blood on her lips and chin, his breath fanning across her skin in a slight tickle. She catches on the small bruises forming along his wrist in the downcast of her eyes, with splatted droplets of her blood, and suddenly she feels sick.
“I apologize.”
Genesis lets go of her nose and chin, his mouth turning up in the corner. “So formal.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“I’m only teasing you, Sephiroth. Like, a joke.” He scowls, glancing back at Angeal. “What are you sorry for?”
She hesitates, lips thinning. “Your wrist. It was not my intent to hurt you.”
Genesis blinks. He wraps his other hand around his bruised wrist, squeezing. The small crease in his eyebrow softens as he says, “I’ve had worse.”
And that doesn’t make Sephiroth feel better.
“Let me heal you.” She practically begs.
“They’re just bruises!” He practically shouts.
Angeal approaches to simply pull Genesis away from the back of his uniform shirt, his frown deeper than ever and his expression borders something that looks like frustration. They huddle together at the door, whisper-yelling at each other as Sephiroth’s forced to listen. She doubts they know she can hear as far away as the slums go, if she were to ever put her mind to it.
(“You fool!”
“I’m the fool?!”
“She’s trying to thank you. You’re not even giving her a chance, Gen.”
“Because she’s…!”
“What? What is it?”
Genesis growls in annoyance. Then, he’s noticeably glancing at Sephiroth, who still sits on the toilet seat. And he sighs.
“She’s Sephiroth.”)
Sephiroth feels her throat closing up.
It’s an irregular sensation, a thing she hasn’t felt very often in her life. Like something rising from the deep of Gaia’s waters and rocking the world so hard it cracks in half. It’s so uncomfortable and tight that she’s forced to hurriedly wrap her hands around her neck in an attempt to stifle whatever is threatening to crawl out of her.
The sound draws the duo’s attention again, but this time it’s Angeal who stands in front of her. They’re both taller than her, so he crouches down on the floor to be smaller now. She has to look down at him, unlike looking up with Genesis.
“Are you in pain? Tell us what hurts,” he speaks softly, like he’s talking to a nervous chocobo. Sephiroth’s never seen one in person. She blinks hard to clear the thought away, afterwards hearing a very quiet oh reverberate from Angeal’s mouth. She’s suddenly hyper aware of the new wetness on her cheeks, face free of blood but now covered in tracks of salt.
Angeal pulls cotton-white tissue from his back pocket, slightly crumpled and folded. Then he’s holding it up to Sephiroth’s face, who carefully grabs it to roughly wipe at her eyes and the swoop of her cheeks. It makes her nauseas.
(Hojo detests crying.)
—
Angeal and Genesis find their own way to peek into the corners of Sephiroth’s life continuously, after that.
They’d let her be in the bathroom by herself that fateful day when no correct words would leave her mouth—she’d tried once, twice, & all that had left her were small breaths. She’d wanted to thank them, or somehow make them forget everything that had occurred. Sephiroth thinks she might have been embarrassed, being seen that way, but just the thought humors her. If she remembers well, neither of them had laughed at her. At least, not to her face. When her small fit was over, the two friends could hardly look at her. The pity burned at something deep in her chest.
She can handle laughter. Snide remarks. The burning light in her veins. But she can’t get past knowing she was vulnerable. Weak.
The second time Sephiroth speaks to Genesis, it isn’t within accident.
According to the president, like most things are, Sephiroth has a designated rank in SOLDIER: First Class. Those below her in rank are Seconds and Thirds, confined to live in barracks with others of the same status once they’ve qualified and passed each test. She has yet to see the dorm-life of the barracks, and doesn’t suppose she ever wants to, because just the noise from a collective group of Thirds in headquarters’ main cafeteria has her biting down on her tongue. Their laughter resembles nails dragging down on a chalkboard, or the agony of what a rusty, squeaky door hinge brings to her ears. How anyone can be so loud in the early afternoon is beyond her comprehension.
She hardly sets foot in the cafeteria except at the crack of the morning, at 0500 hours, when she knows only the cooks and lunch servers will be present. Not that they spare her much of a word, anyway. Simply an orange of familiarity or two.
But today, Sephiroth breaks the glass of routine.
Every last Friday of each month, for about five months, Director Lazard has invited her to his office for lunch. He plays it off as monthly meetings for SOLDIER related discussions to Hojo, seeing as he’s the director of all SOLDIER operations—in reality, they only have lunch. Lazard is a few years older than Sephiroth, barely an adult at eighteen, but he seems to take his job in stride. He’s patient in a way Sephiroth couldn’t imagine being when it came to the Seconds and Thirds she’s encountered, and it’s something she thinks she admires about him. They often eat in comfortable quiet together, bits broken by Lazard’s questions of how she’s faring with work, how she likes the food, how her lessons are going.
Sephiroth has come to look forward to it; it’s, according to the child development books on Hojo’s shelves, socially unacceptable for someone her age to think of an adult as an acquaintance. She fails to understand any reasoning.
And she also fails to understand why there had been an aggressive lack of the man in his own office at their usual time. She stood in place, unmoving, for about ten minutes counting in her head, before her impatience began to claw at her empty stomach.
She’d gone and searched for Lazard in the only place she knew he’d be, unfortunately.
The sounds in the cafeteria slightly falter as she walks through the path surrounded by full tables and booths, but she’s spotting the director as soon as she lifts her head. Lazard is sitting at a round table with a few Thirds, a couple hunched without a care and the others planted straight. Lazard looks almost regal, nearly fitting the part of the president’s son as his intertwined hands hold his chin—the spell breaks when he does a double take in Sephiroth’s direction, lips parted in confusion.
When she reaches the table, the eyes wander rather impolitely over her. Eyes yet to be touched by mako. These Thirds are all male, she notices, with strange smirks and arrogant expressions. Sephiroth doesn’t see many other girls, anyway, after Lucia. However, among these boys and young men are the two themselves: Angeal and Genesis.
“Sephiroth? It’s a surprise to see you here. Did you need something?” Lazard inquires. His eyes meet hers, a rare occurrence in her life.
Sephiroth thinks she frowns, or something close to it. “It's the last Friday of the month, Director.”
A resounding duh touches the air of the table, and it’s followed by deafening snickers that scratch at her insides. She doesn’t see what was so funny. Then, like the sound of Sephiroth’s morning alarm, Genesis’ voice jolts her up in wake.
“Oh, grow up. You’re all such children.”
It’s short. Quick. And it’s a mean little thing, with the sharpness of Genesis’ tongue and the squint of his eyes. But it gets the job done of shutting the group up, despite the wrong looks they send in Angeal and Genesis’ way.
Lazard momentarily sighs before his attention is back on Sephiroth, a slight smile on his face. “You were saying?”
“…You’ve missed our meeting, Director.”
His smile immediately falls away. She feels guilty for being the cause of it. Sephiroth thinks she should have never come and brought it up in the first place, if it means that now Lazard detests her for making him frown. She’d accept the punishment without a word: her only ‘friend’ limiting their interactions to ones of real SOLDIER meetings and insufferable requests from Heidegger or the president… yet no discipline occurs. Instead, Lazard is standing up to put an apologetic hand on her shoulder and slightly squeezes her. She jostles with the sheer emotion in it.
“Forgive me, Sephiroth. It completely slipped my mind to let you know I couldn’t make it.” He glances behind him at the table for a mere second, then he’s letting his voice fall into a whisper only she could ever hear. “The president has requested new resources and publicity outings for SOLDIERS, as well as for upcoming infantrymen—”
“At your expense.” She mutters before realizing her mistake. “I’m sorry for interrupting.”
Lazard gives her a weak smile. “No, you’re right. At my expense. Which means my company may be an absence in your life from now on. But I’ve upset you.”
Sephiroth says nothing.
“I’ve disrupted your routine, haven’t I? It’s alright for you to be upset with me. I don’t expect such a quick change to be easy for you, and I’m sorry to be the cause of it. You’re,” he hesitates, then takes a deep breath. “You’re only a child, Sephiroth. If this were up to me, I…”
Silence hangs between them. A quiet understanding passes, where Sephiroth could only wish it were up to anyone else, and where Lazard understands that there’s nothing he can do.
“I’ll still cook you lunch. Maybe even something outside the diet Professor Hojo has you on.” Lazard says, almost pleadingly. Like he’s begging for forgiveness as he pushes his glasses up his nose and turns to the table once more.
“Thank you, Director.”
(It stings—the mention of Hojo. Sephiroth suspects he had something to do with this abrupt shift, that he may have discovered their ‘meetings’ were merely a disguise to her experiencing pleasant company and good food, nothing like the tasteless, nutrient-filled rations she was forced to eat.)
She starts to leave, trying to save herself from the curdling emotions in her chest. Sifting through them is something she wants nothing to do with. Though as what seems to be the pattern for her lately, Sephiroth’s heart stutters when a body begins to swiftly walk next to her own, matching the pace and speed of her nimble legs and all.
Genesis looks… well. She’s unable to make out his expression, what with his bangs covering his face and his eyes cast downwards onto the page of a book, but he’s whistling a merry tune as they continue to walk. His form fits into his uniform much better than before, and he’s wearing gloves for once. Angeal’s, she guesses, if the slight tears and withered material tells her anything. It’s nearly time for her simulation battle data to be recorded, so she can’t help but ask,
“What are you doing?”
He scoffs, eyes still trained on his book. “Walking? What else?”
“Without the rest of your troop?”
“As if!”
“Without Angeal?”
They both stop when Genesis lifts his head and closes his book with a snap. They’re in an empty hall near the cafeteria, close to a maintenance room, and they’re clear of other people. But Sephiroth can practically feel Genesis’ nerves bleeding from his skin and poking her.
“Yes, without Angeal. He doesn’t have me on some tight leash, if you truly want to know.” He sounds almost hurt in his words, as though he’s heard such an accusation before.
Sephiroth quickly shakes her head. “No, I—I didn’t mean anything like that, Genesis. I hardly ever see you two without the other, is what I meant.”
Genesis absolutely freezes. Like he’s been blasted to hell with a Blizzaga and forced to endure it as punishment, with no healing alms in sight.
“You know my name?”
“Of course I do.” Sephiroth says, slowly and rather confusedly. “Why wouldn’t I?”
Genesis bites down on a gloved knuckle, an obvious sign of confined feelings. Much like a nervous, embarrassed tic. She notices the bruises previously on his wrist have faded. “No reason,” he loudly clears his throat. Something about it makes Sephiroth fight the urge to laugh. “As I was saying… come to the training grounds at eight o’clock tonight.”
“No one is going to be at the training grounds at 2000 hours.”
“Twenty hundred—alright, no, never mind, that is exactly the point. No one will be there except us. You, me, Angeal.”
Sephiroth finds herself nodding in agreement. She can’t control it. She doesn’t have anything planned at the said time, as far as she knows, and it’s difficult to say no when she wants to go. Just the wanting itself makes her skin thrum and her fingers shake, a force so intense she barely notices when Genesis deserts their space and is now walking away from her.
“What are you reading?” Sephiroth manages to call after him.
She so clearly hears the grin in his voice when he responds, “Loveless!”
(An unfamiliar title.)