Chapter Text
‘Night.’
Sephiroth ground through his pounding headache, and he turned to address the little infantry soldier standing meekly in the hallway beside him. The smallest gasp of surprise from the young man’s lips was endearing and for a moment, he could stretch a smile to the cadet, until the pain in his skull was boiling, and he had to turn to hide his grimace as he pushed the door open.
The screams and chanting outside of his window of the small-town villagers wanting to see him, touch him, feed him, echoed softly through the single-pane windows. Their adulations twisted into a rolling harmonic that felt like ants crawling behind his eyes. He pulled the curtains to shut them out, blocking the mako generator lights in the town center. He mechanically removed his gloves, boots, pauldrons and jacket in the darkness and rolled onto the bed. The reduced weight off his back seemed to help with the pain. He put a bare forearm over his eyes and pressed, hoping the pressure would help remove some of the steady throb that had been building in his skull since he had lost Angeal and Genesis. Idly, he had diagnosed his symptoms as similar to a stroke or seizure, but Hojo had been extremely attentive lately, running full body scans and finding nothing of interest to report.
‘It's not your blood leaking out of your brain,’ he laughed to himself, ‘it's your sanity.’
He wondered if this was how his friends had felt before they began to suffer from Degradation. Or if this was just the consequence of losing them, feeling the sorrow of their ignominious end with only paltry announcements from the company that left him dry-eyed and sleep deprived. The headaches had started the moment Genesis had gone awol, powered by his frantic worry, the desire to know the status of his comrade and the cure for his unusual symptoms. Now that he and Angeal were both dead, the pain was relentless. A normal human would cry and grieve, but his body seemed determined to stay introverted and contain everything he felt right inside the cranium tomb that he carried on his shoulders.
There was no point in panicking, since he had seen the fate that lay ahead for him. All Soldiers died young, and he was certain he was no exception. Now with the loss of the closest comrades he had ever known, he wasn’t sure why he was still walking around, doing whatever Shinra wanted like a good dog. Small PR jobs like killing monsters, pff, playing nice with a town that lacked any concept of the outside world save for propaganda they were fed. If he could feel anything at all under the numbing blanket of depression and migraine, he would probably be furious.
Maybe that was why he felt like a fused bomb. His anger had no outlet and he was doing his best to repress it. Sephiroth released a long breath of air, and turned onto his side in bed. The fabric was soft and worn, a hand-made quilt on his exposed skin. The air was cool but he felt no discomfort laying with his torso and arms bare. It was relieving, to be able to have darkness and privacy.
Below, he could pick up the sounds of the mayor pompously dismissing the townsfolk and informing them all of his talk with Sephiroth earlier. Zack was heard down below playfully offering to be a replacement, and met with disappointed sounds and dismissals. There were still footsteps idling but the group was dispersing with the innkeeper assuring everyone that the Shinra group was retiring for the night. He knew, from some experience, that some would stay up all night outside the inn.
Quiet began to fall like a veil and he felt his heart slow and his shoulders unclench. He wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight, just like always, but at least he might be able to nurse his head in peace.
Next door, the stomps of Zack’s feet and the rhythm of the ridiculous squats he insisted on doing continued. The infantrymen were quieter and snoring from one was soon discernable.
“So what’s it like, Cloud? How was the homecoming?” The muffled question was clear with his enhanced hearing.
Sephiroth’s eyes opened and he rolled silently to face the wall that the other group was sharing.
“...Okay.” Cloud replied, clearly not wanting to elaborate.
Zack was back to his squats. “C’mon man, we’re small-town boys! Introduce me to your mom! Were people impressed that you were working for Shinra, coming with THE Sephiroth? You gotta spill!”
“My mom is busy, a-and I was in my uniform so most people didn’t know who I was. I don’t need them to know who I am, we’re here for a job, right?”
There was a long pause, punctuated by the snoring of the other infantry soldier.
“Dude, you’re cold.” Zack was chuckling, but clearly sounded a little offended. “I’d love a chance to go see my folks - but the reactor near Gongaga blew up, so that’s never happening. You never know when you’ll get paid leave at Shinra!”
The silence that punctuated after Zack's confession meant that cadet Strife was likely making a face.
“What is it? Can’t show your face until you’re SOLDIER, too?” He was squatting faster and Cloud’s feet were also pacing out of the room. “That might take a while, buddy! You can’t wait for everything to align the way you want.”
“You wouldn’t understand.” he heard Cloud reply bitterly, “You’ve always been good at everything - you don’t even pay attention to the handbooks and you still get upgrades.”
“Because I’m the best, duh.”
Sephiroth rolled his eyes at Zack. He was such a child sometimes. The conversation reminded him of Genesis. He had never been able to conquer his ambition to defeat Sephiroth, never been able to find a welcome middle where they could fight and be friends. He had never been so loquacious or thick-headed as Zack, but it must have been frustrating regardless.
For a moment, his head felt free of pain due to the distraction of his fellow SOLDIER and cadets, but it came back as soon as he thought of the now deceased red-head. He dug his fingers into the hollows of his eyes, pinching around the arch of his nose. He wasn’t sure how long he laid there, listening to the rhythm of Zack’s anxious squatting before he was mercifully relieved by the soft sounds of the overactive man’s bedtime routine.
He lay on the old bed for several minutes, ears rotating between recognizing the hum of the mako generators and snoring from the other side of the Inn.
A small knock- almost as light as a mouse paw, drew his attention. He had been so consumed by his thoughts that he had not heard the footsteps approaching. His heart pounded, he was not in the mood to put his clothes back on, nor was he wanting company. He lay still for a minute, waiting for whoever it was to leave, but they did not. He sighed.
As if made of liquid, he slid off the bed and was in front of the door in a second. He opened it a sliver and peered into the moon-lit hallway with one bloodshot eye, his waterfall of hair blocking the exposed skin of his chest.
Standing still and holding a small cup close to his chest was young cadet Strife, eyes wide with earnest concern. He had lost his helmet and armor and looked like a chocobo who had wandered away from its herd.
“Yes?” Sephiroth’s tone dropped to a low sigh. The young infantryman likely felt awkward after his small argument with Zack and didn’t want to return to his quarters. But he hadn’t been expecting the youth to come to him of all people. His childhood home was right across from the inn, with a mother waiting inside.
“S-sir, my apologies, d-did I wake you?”
“No.” He winced slightly, one of his eyes twitching as a particularly sharp stab of pain struck.
The cadet rocked on both of his feet, unable to look at him, but offered a cup to Sephiroth, which seemed to contain an herbal tea. The steam smelled soothing, even from where he was standing, and he opened the door more to reach out and take it.
“What is this?” his hand wrapped around the hot cup comfortably and he lifted it to his face. When Cloud didn’t respond, he took a deeper smell and then brought it to his lips.
“Ah, you seemed like….” the cadet trailed off. Distant? Deranged? A bit disturbed? How interesting for a foot-soldier to notice when everyone else was happy to pretend that everything was fine.
As he took a sip, he contemplated what he was tasting. Nibelheim was saturated in mako, so he was convinced there was a tinge of spicy contamination. Fruit peel, dried mint, dried flower and other mountain herbs. Something for relaxation and loosening of mucus, most likely for treatment of the common cold. It tasted good, Sephiroth decided as he took a deeper sip.
“It's good. Thank you.” he replied, and stepped into his room, moving to give Cloud entrance. The cadet had come to him out of concern twice now, and also seemed to be struggling with his own dilemma of sharing a room with Zack Fair. He could empathize. Perhaps the company could distract him from his own internal struggle. For once, he was interested in a non-SOLDIER unit, because of his intimacy with the town and a desire to understand what it was like to be a normal person on Gaia. When he was met with silence he glanced over at the cadet who was red-faced and visibly shaking. Cloud’s eyes were locked on his bare back and body and his mouth was partly open, giving Sephiroth a glimpse at his pink tongue. Teenage arousal screamed off of his body language, making the general’s eyes widen.
Oh? Interesting and unexpected.
There was an opportunity for a different kind of distraction here- something Genesis had boasted of taking advantage of constantly. Sleeping with them is fun, Sephiroth. He had crowed, the red-head had been twirling a finger in his hair. They always loved it. Getting to touch me is the closest they’ll ever get to greatness, he had primped. What’s the harm in having some fun while we’re on duty?
At the time, he had shaken his head in disgust. But now he was seriously considering the admittedly cute blonde at his door, awkwardly arranging his uniform to hide his arousal. They might never work together again. He might be weeks from dropping dead. Cloud Strife was beautiful, he observed, his reptilian eyes now laser-focused on the little small-town youth, who without his helmet captured the best aspects of androgyny.
He had never felt safe enough to consider partnering with a woman, the implications of reproduction and Hojo’s interference killed any arousal. All of the closest relationships he formed were with men. But in terms of attraction, he innately disliked the way most men looked and smelled. But cadet Cloud…who had looked at him so sweetly earlier, and anxiously twisted his fingers together in meek submission…awakened something in him. He could feel the alien rumbling of arousal in his lower abdomen.
Impulsively, Sephiroth did something he had never done before. He arched an eyebrow, tossed some of his long, liquid hair over his shoulder and beckoned to his direct report.
“Come in.” his bare hand stretched out, signing to the small youth through the darkness like an angler fish’s lure. The little pink tongue that Sephiroth had noticed earlier, darted out to wet the cadet’s lips. He stepped in, curled over in nervous excitement, rocking his feet back and forth. He stood in the center of the room, fiddling with his hands as Sephiroth brought the warm mug to his mouth.
He gestured to the bed, which Cloud sat on obediently, while Sephiroth drank his tea, leaning against a desk by the wall of the room. With his empty hand, he pulled some of the hair from his eyes.
“It must be difficult.” he began, after another sip, his deep voice filling the room. “To be here, straddling two worlds. The Nibel mountains have a reputation of being dangerous and filled with caves created from volcanic eruptions and the constant influx and draining of mako. I’m glad to have you on this mission, a native’s knowledge is always valuable.”
Cloud coughed into one hand quietly and put the other discreetly across his lap.
“Its…uh, its - that is, I don’t want to let my personal life get in the way of the job, sir. I want to make sure this goes smoothly. I want to help, in any way I can.” His blue eyes, even without mako enhancement were shining in the dark room, catching in the meager sliver his curtains allowed in. “It means so much to me to be able to work with you.”
The cadet’s voice was trembling and Sephiroth was beginning to feel like a predator in the open plains, seeing a shivering fawn stumbling through the high grass. His muscles were tightening and his eyes had thinned to slits. It felt so good to be able to focus on something, anything besides his own complexities and sorrows. He kept perfectly still, sipping the warm tea as though he had not a care in the world, all while considering how he would take the boy apart in his bed. He hummed in approval as Cloud adjusted himself again and began to confess all of his innermost teenage thoughts.
“I’ve always admired you.” He stumbled the words out, as though Sephiroth might turn into vapor if he didn't say what he felt at that moment. “As soon as I saw you on the Shinra programs I wanted to join SOLDIER. It was like…my whole world opened up.” The cadet was smiling to himself now, likely drawing from a formative memory of his boyhood, while Sephiroth, tempering yet another youthful confession, moved to gently close the door. In the darkness, his bare feet were silent as they guided him to the desk, setting the tea aside, then fluidly to the bed beside the pretty Cloud Strife. His weight made the mattress dip and drew the cadet from his fumbling declaration of admiration.
“I-I’m going to work hard, sir.” he scooted back to give the General more space on the bed, blushing so hard that even without light Sephiroth could see the red on his ears. “To be strong like you one day.”
At that, the cadet’s eyes strayed again to the muscles that coiled across Sephiroth’s body, almost obscene in some places, from the years of warfare and sword training.
“I’ll hold you to that, soldier.” Sephiroth replied, getting Cloud’s full attention and almost a full salute as well. He reached out and pulled the young man closer by his uniform. Typical Shinra fare, it had the generic laundry treatment scent, but the sweat and natural smell of the cadet was not musky or masculine at all. The poor thing had likely been tormented in the showers and hazed in the barracks.
“Of, course, sir.” Cloud squeaked, now struggling to even breathe normally at such a close proximity. Sephiroth took pity on him then, and like a good predator, pounced to kill.
As he gripped the cadet’s chin and pulled him in for arguably the first kiss he’d ever taken, a legacy of Angeal’s lectures on honor squirmed and protested before being blanketed by pure apathy and resentment. How long had Sephiroth been honorable and good - all while functioning as Shinra’s personal monster? What was the point of honor when all it got you was a miserable death? What was the point of any of it?
Cloud’s little pink tongue tasted as delicious as it looked and Sephiroth had the young cadet pinned on the bed, sucking on the tender lips and running his own tongue along it with succor. His hair draped down Cloud’s front, like mako spilling down from a reservoir as he slowly settled his hips over the smaller man’s and lowered. Their difference in strength was laughable, as his hands could easily wrap around the youth’s biceps, neck, thighs, and he molded the trembling cadet like sculpting clay.
The infantry man was only slightly struggling as their erections met through fabric. Cloud Strife was gasping, panting, completely overwhelmed. He looked surprised, and Sephiroth even wondered if this had been on his mind the whole time, or if hero worship was now metamorphosing into something much more complicated. Sephiroth lowered a broad hand down to cup the cadet’s erection through his uniform and then dove very nimbly through the buttons and zipper to cup the hot flesh inside. He pulled it out greedily, and he schooled his face to not show the ravenous hunger he felt inside.
He wanted to make Cloud feel so much that he cried. He wanted to stretch the sensations the cadet experienced into something unsustainable. He wanted to mark him forever.
“Ah…” the young man whimpered as Sephiroth gripped his perfect pink cock and stroked it as though he was doing a sword kata. “S-Sephiroth…I-I” his eyes were tearing up, and his feet were curling. He couldn’t even budge the SOLDIER on top of him, his weight and power were so much more substantial. A large hand was placed over Cloud’s mouth and tears started to pour out of his eyes as a cataclysmic orgasm took hold of him. He couldn’t arch his back or buck his hips, he was completely at the mercy of the calloused hands gripping him and wringing out wave after wave of stimulation.
A line of semen arced across his chest and uniform, hot mess hitting his cheek and hair before endlessly dripping from his over-sensitive tip.
Sephiroth stared down at his hands, covering the mouth of the cadet and squeezing his little prick to death and felt numb arousal. There was no crashing cymbal of guilt or sadness at seeing the overwhelmed tears of the young man. But there was still hunger. He glanced to the wall where Zack and the other infantry man were staying and heard the snores from two different bodies now. The other SOLDIER slept so deeply that he was constantly late. A little fun wouldn’t wake him.
He reached down and scooped Cloud into his arms, burying his face in his neck and purring. He wiped the cum off of his face and hair and transferred it to the quilt and bedding.
“Lets keep your uniform clean.” he whispered to the cadet, pulling the rest of the buttons loose and freeing the sylphish body from his clothes. The young man fell onto the bed, still barely struggling and letting his legs fall open as Sephiroth crawled forward, prowling back to his neck, where he sucked and licked happily.
“Sephiroth, I-I…I’ve never…with anyone..” Cloud squeaked a tiny protest out, putting his hands on the SOLDIER's shoulders. Blotches of red dotted his body as the blush spread from his face down into his chest and Sephiroth had to lean down to kiss them. The cadet was shivering, from pleasure or fear, but he couldn’t stop taking little tastes, eating him up slowly.
“Mmmm.” he replied after a moment of playing with a hard nipple in his mouth. “Poor thing…let me take care of that.”
He dipped a hand down to stroke Cloud’s prick again and found it was twitching to life. “You take orders so well…Cloud. There’s no need to be nervous, I’ll be gentle.” His hand glided down to stroke the little puckered hole underneath his cock and the cadet went from blushing to trembling. “Just do as I say, and we can both feel good.”
He was so adept at lying he almost believed it himself. And a part of him was clawing the inside of his brain raw at the expression of the innocent little virgin beneath him, face cast by concern and pure adoration for a childhood hero. Who was currently pinning him to a hotel bed and steadily deflowering him. Realistically, Sephiroth could order him to suck every dick in the village and he’d have to obey. Disobedience was worse than abuse in the eyes of Shinra, and Sephiroth had always hated that hypocrisy. But here he was, finally free of his pounding headache and pursuing one of his first orgasms in years at the altar of defiled innocence in Nibelheim.
Cloud was staring down at the bulge in Sephiroth’s pants, and at his body, small hands trembling as they dragged down his chest, cupping his heavy pectorals and squeezing, before sliding down his serratus and abdominal muscles. The blue eyes were glistening and overjoyed, distracting Sephiroth as Cloud suddenly reached for his face, making him twitch as the cadet made to pull him in closer. He followed out of curiosity and was again met by the sweet pink tongue of Cloud’s mouth on his. The poor boy was trying to be romantic, stroking his hair and kissing affectionately, almost mewling in pleasure as the gestures were returned.
They made out like teenagers for several minutes, the cadet’s wandering hands never going below the belt, and Sephiroth humoring him, languidly sucking and lapping at his swollen lips and tongue. When he felt Cloud’s cock hard and wet on his thigh, he sighed and pulled back, lifting his hips off of Cloud long enough to flip him 180 degrees. He smirked at the soft ‘oof’ that Cloud let out, muffled by his face buried in the mattress, before lifting his hips up to expose his ass. Now with the cadet facing away, he pulled his restrictive pants off and let his own erection free. It had been a while since he had felt this aroused. Even that was new, on top of the compounding emotions and thoughts he had been experiencing in the past month.
Cloud made a little whine, missing the intimacy of earlier, but Sephiroth was done humoring him, now solely focused on chasing the sensation of his own pleasure to the end. It was easy to see that this would take some time, since Cloud’s hole was tight and unused, while Sephiroth was several times larger and proportional to that difference in size. He laid his cock across Cloud’s back and eyeballed how deep he would be going into the youth. He had Cure materia at hand, it would be fine.
With that in mind, he called a Potion to his hand, the small bottle uncorked with a simple flick of his index finger. It was watery, but he reduced it into a gel with the simple application of heat. He could summon fire without materia, and his palms simply flashed for an instant and it was done. As the warm gel slithered from the bottle neck, he pushed Cloud’s head into the pillow and with his other hand, let the liquid drizzle between the plump globes of his ass. This was his rank showing now, tending to his reports and making sure that they were serviceable. He couldn’t in all honesty contemplate how he would have treated the cadet if he had been a civilian or POW in this moment.
With a circle and a low command of “Relax and push into me.” he pressed a long finger all the way into the tight hold. The muscle struggled to keep him out, but he opened it easily and then hooked it for another finger to join it. He moved them in and out, scissoring and assaulting the outer and inner sphincters to exhaust them. Cloud was twitching and making cries into the pillow, but the sounds were minimal. He found himself idly considering the mission as he pumped his fingers in and out, the wet squelching punctuating his thoughts as he contemplated that he might be quitting the company soon. This, he had told Zack, was his last mission for Shinra. But what did quitting mean for a SOLDIER like him? The Turks retirement package was a bullet, but he doubted anyone that Shinra sent after him would present a challenge. He looked down at the twitching hole that was being pried open by his two fingers. It was beginning to loosen up, as he wiped three fingers in the potion gel before pressing back in. Cloud made a little whimper and his hips moved to pull away but Sephiroth corrected them and angled in deeper.
He sighed. This felt wonderful. Cloud was burning up inside, and his prick was dripping all over the quilt on the bed. Maybe Genesis had been right, maybe this would be something to remember him by before he vanished from the public eye. He knew the cadet would never speak a word of it, but it aroused him to think of having someone like Cloud, so pretty and pliant, somewhere in a remote cabin, by his side.
After several minutes of milking the hole and the small grunts coming from Cloud accompanying certain angles and depths, he was confident that the young cadet could handle his cock. He had softened some during his slow foreplay of the virgin hole, allowing him to hopefully last longer into the night. The whole town outside was now quiet, with only random militiamen moving to late shift posts. Sephiroth felt a sharp sting of satisfaction knowing that Cloud was being so luridly deflowered in his own hometown. Memories, memories, the impact in the cadet’s mind would be a stamp that overlapped everything else that came after.
As he positioned his cock and teased the puffy entrance, he heard a sharp intake of breath and leaned in to kiss Cloud’s neck. It was his first time penetrating a man and he was not prepared for how tight it would be, how hot. He moaned into the cadet’s neck as he sank in gripping his hips so hard he knew they would be bruised. Sephiroth’s mouth went from kissing and gasping at the purchase he made, to biting down hard on the juncture of Cloud’s neck and shoulder.
The scream he expected to come was covered with a broad hand as he thrust in. From there, he went from gripping Cloud’s thin hips to holding his face down in the pillow, as the youth’s cries became louder, punctuated with the slapping sounds of his cock. The tight rubberband rings of the cadet’s asshole felt like they were made to torture him and he felt himself losing control, bracing himself using the back of the blonde’s neck while pounding into him at a feral pace. He hissed as his erection pulled and caught on the tight rim of the youth’s entrance before sinking back in.
“That’s it.” he gasped. “That’s…a good boy, Cloud.”
The body underneath him was shaking and twitching, little whimpers squeezed out with each press into his hole.
“You’re perfect…” Sephiroth sighed. “So tight for me.” He punctuated the statement with a slap of his hips and then proceeded to rut against Cloud’s thin backside like a specimen in one of Hojo’s breeding experiments. He molded the pretty blonde into bending like an acrobat, ass straight up with his face muffled in the now wet pillow. He pulled out and buried into the virgin asshole over and over, making a steady tempo of slick and Cloud’s whimpers and moans. The heat and tightness were amazing, almost painful, pulling all of his tension out of his body and into the hardness of his cock. Distantly, he wondered if Cloud might suffer some effects of mako poisoning from his semen, or if in this way he was as normal as anyone else.
As he fucked the cadet into oblivion, he slid his hand down the boy’s thigh to grasp at his tender cock and found it was leaking, the viscous prostatic fluid dripping like a broken hose. The little slut. He clenched his teeth into a terrible smile. He was cumming even without any semen left to shoot. There was a wet puddle forming under them from the dripping potion gel and Cloud’s emissions. Something about it made the SOLDIER even more feral, his hand on the infantryman’s neck rising to grip his blond spikes. He yanked hard, pulling a whimper from the pinned body beneath him.
He milked the little dick in his hands and pushed his whole cock into the twitching hole.
“Did you know you were such a little slut, Cloud?” he whispered, teasing the wet tip with his fingers and feeling the cadet shudder at his voice.
Cloud’s voice was shaking nonsense, just moans and gasps as he was fully sheathed inside, a simple chant of Sephiroth’s name over and over. It was the full body seizing and twitching that finally drove him to orgasm, an experience so intense and overwhelming that he lost himself in white noise. His eyes fluttered closed as he continued to spasm inside the smaller man, each throb bringing another wave of pleasure.
His headache was gone. For the first time in over a month, the veil of pain dropped from his eyes and he let out a gasp of relief. He slumped over the cadet’s body. Cloud was utterly still under him, so he blanketed the youth, sighing slowly at the sensation of a clear head and freedom from even a moment of suffering. As he laid there, processing what had happened and where he was, he began to worry at the motionlessness of the boy under him. He slowly pulled out of Cloud, the hole swollen and a foam of potion, semen and the worrying pink of blood dribbled out. That finally elicited a groan from Cloud, who was shaking from the sensation, eyes unfocused and a wet spot on the pillow from his saliva where he had been biting the fabric.
He leaned back and off of the prone body. He called the Cure to him, a tiny spike of pain returning as he used the Materia without it equipped on his body. The spell flowed through his fingertips as he guided them across the soft skin under him. The little whipmers elicited from his touch revitalized some hunger within him and he leaned down to kiss more of the downy blonde hair on the cadet’s neck. He paid attentive attention to the boy’s hips and hole, stroking the puffy orifice and feeling it pucker and twitch from the effect of the materia. He pushed the healing force through the root of the boy’s spine and guided it out through his neck.
Cloud’s moan punctuated the quiet and Sephiroth rolled him over to inspect his face. It was flushed, red in patches from tension and the SOLDIER brushed his fingers over his cheeks in contemplation. He waited for the tears to flow, but instead was met with glazed blue and again gentle hands touching his face, pulling him in for more gentle kisses, which he curled into. The infantryman was so sweet with his mumbled endearments, and soft swipes through his hair, that he might have been able to even sleep next to the warm body beside him.
“Sephiroth…” the blond gasped into his mouth. “I…I…l-l-”
He hummed, interrupting the confession and ran his broad palms down the length of the boy’s chest and waist before pulling up, to meet the innocent blue eyes again.
“You should get some sleep.” he leaned over to hoist the cadet’s uniform onto the bed, opening it for the youth to step into. Cloud Strife flushed with embarrassment from head to toe. He shook with anxiousness and disappointment, and Sephiroth recognized that this had certainly meant something different for the youth than it had for him. Something in those earnest expressions made him lean in to stroke the cadet’s face with thumb.
“We’ll talk more later,” he spoke slowly. “But we have a mission tomorrow, and if you stay here I won’t let you sleep.”
Cloud nodded dumbly, starstruck and wobbly, likely inclined to agree with almost anything he said. He smiled indulgently, rising in all his nude glory to help the blond finish the last few buttons to his haphazard uniform.
“Th-thank you, sir. I won’t let you down!” The small hands went to make a flawed salute before the cadet stumbled to the door, looking back longingly before sneaking out and closing it behind him. The mouse-quiet steps could be heard returning to the adjacent room, and Sephiroth stalked over to the bed again, this time ripping off the quilt and depositing it on the floor before laying across the mattress.
The whole experience had been more pleasant than expected, and he thumbed his limp cock, still slick with the gel and semen the encounter had produced. If he had been younger…there might have been something there. Sweet little Cloud Strife, as soft and earnest as a hatchling chocobo, following at his heels and so utterly helpless. He had not known he had a type, but there was something there that made him itch for a second encounter. But the future before him was dark, and fathomless. His time was coming, whether it be death or evolution, but the world he had come to know no longer fit him, like the discarded egg casings in a snake’s nest. Shinra was no longer his home and not even a restorative orgasm could convince him otherwise. Clear of the throbbing headache that had plagued him, he lay there contemplating his fate, stroking the ripples along his stomach, until the sounds of insect and bird activity announced the early morning.
He cleaned with the pitcher and bowl provided by the inn, and pulled his uniform back on. There was only a sliver of green morning-light outside as he prowled past the sleeping forms of admirers and photographers trying to catch him before he left for the mission. The mist that hung around the conifer trees smelled thick with mako, and the effect was apparent on the flora around them.
He easily passed the militiamen, who were nowhere near as prescient as trained Wutai ninja, and found himself at the gate of the old Shinra mansion. In the clearing beside it, he saw the form of Zangan, a martial artist who had been performing kata in the lobby of the inn. The old man was staring at him, arms casually by his sides, assessing his body and stance. Neither spoke as they met eyes, but Sephiroth focused on him, unblinking and squared his shoulders toward the strange interloper within Nibelheim.
While he felt nothing around the threat Zangan might present, it had occurred to him the moment he had glimpsed the techniques the man was practicing that he could very well be a Wutai spy, assessing the work that Shinra was doing on the First reactor. As an older warrior, even bare-fisted, he had to be respected for surviving as long as he had. Indeed, if he was originally from Wutai, or had ties to those regions (that Sephiroth had personally scoured from the earth, on Shinra’s orders), then he might very well be one of the last surviving masters of the art. A small flicker of interest kindled at the thought of a real challenge, how those battles in Wutai within the great dojos hidden away in mountain cliffs had made him grateful and excited. How all the time spent imprisoned in test rooms and battle modules were finally put to practical use, rending flesh and dancing through materia casting.
The old man looked as though he wanted to say something - either greeting or warning, but stopped at the expression crossing Sephiroth’s face. Perhaps he saw the hundreds of battles being replayed in his mind, or the loaded hunger for stimulation. Either way, he simply nodded at the SOLDIER and moved to give him space, returning to the village without a single word.
Sephiroth stood alone, watching the night disappear into the new day, his final mission with quiet contemplation. Apart from the humanity of the village, he was at peace, except for a small thread of blonde colored hair, that now tugged at his thoughts in the form of a pleasing distraction.
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