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sephiroth looks at himself in the mirror.
he knows what he looks like. his hair, the silver strands that run down his spine, stopping at the backs of his knees. his eyes, a peculiar green, akin to sea foam or the lifestream at its brightest. his skin, pale and marbled, unnatural in its statuesque perfection.
this is how others see him, and thus this is how he sees himself. his perception of physicality has always been shaped by others. he possesses the appearance of angel, the likeness of a demon. he is a god, a false deity, perfected imperfectly. his impressions have seared themselves into people's minds, engraved themselves onto their hearts.
he was once the people's hero. but then he died and became the people's enemy. and then he returned once more, a phoenix rising from the ashes, born anew, only to fall once more. wings clipped, his flight cut short. he fell from grace and died over and over and over.
behind him, a figure moves underneath the blankets. they shift for only a few moments before settling back down, returning to their slumber with a light and soft snore.
sephiroth looks at the figure through the mirror. he looks at the incomprehensible mess of golden poking out from underneath burgundy sheets, splayed out across a plush pillow. the feet have shifted over to sephiroth's side of the bed; the right one was adorned with a black anklet with an angel wing charm. sephiroth possessed a matching one around his left ankle, a white one with a cloud charm. it was their version of wedding ring; it felt more intimate, more personal. something only for the two of them.
cloud strife shifts again, and this time the covers move slightly, just enough to reveal his sleeping face. he is peaceful. he is calm and youthful and beautiful. his long eyelashes rest prettily against his lightly freckled cheeks. his mouth is slightly parted. cloud is a living painting, a skillfully-crafted art the details of which are only ever observed by sephiroth.
sephiroth looks at himself. he starts at his face. he has a beauty mark right above his upper lip, skewed to the right. cloud once mentioned it to him, kissing the spot where he claimed it was. sephiroth had never noticed it before. there were many things he'd never noticed until cloud showed him.
the rest of his face is unremarkable. the dark circles under his eyes contrasting with the stark whiteness of his skin. the slight chap of his lips. the sharpness of his jaw, the pale column of his neck, unmarred with the sole exception of a bite mark courtesy of cloud. red and purple bloomed at the stretch of his skin where neck met his shoulder. he could still feel cloud's lips pressing against the spot, a gentle contrast to his beloved's earlier action.
his collarbone, sharp and bony, featured more of the bites. so did his chest, large and broad. a vast expanse covered with teeth marks, explored in-depth by sword-calloused hands and a tongue that scorched his naturally cool skin with every indulgent taste.
it wasn't until he reached his torso where the beauty stopped. the most noticeable was a scar that reached wide and far. it was smooth to the touch, textured slightly differently from the rest of his body. other smaller scars and marks were peppered throughout, memories carved onto his skin. he matches with cloud in this regard as well, though cloud's biggest one is on his chest, a jagged tear perfectly centered. they are ugly things, reminiscent of painful times, and yet cloud manages to find the beauty in them, kissing each and every scar. they ache with every loving touch. even now, there is a dull throb as sephiroth remembers how he and cloud used to be. every scar holds a memory that cannot be forgotten, a reminder, and they are all cherished by cloud.
sephiroth exhales a breath he didn't realize he has been holding. his eyes scan further down. his hips and thighs have been claimed by cloud, as well. just mere hours ago, his legs were wrapped around cloud's waist, trembling with a relentless desire as whispered pleas tumbled from sephiroth's lips, tears blooming at the corners of his eyes. his inner thighs are still coated in the outcome of cloud's love, a marking that sephiroth wanted imprinted on his skin for as long as possible.
underneath the bruises and bites lie more scars. more subtle scars, straight and narrow, bestowed upon him in such a precision that only sephiroth himself is capable of. the only scars that matched were on his forearms, some close to his wrists. sephiroth cries sometimes when cloud kisses those. they are silent tears that fall, and cloud lets him cry, lets him cry until there are no more tears to give, until there is no more hurt to withstand. until there is only them, cloud and sephiroth.
cloud sees all of this. he's only the only that has mapped all of sephiroth's body with his touches and kisses. he knows of his body's flaws, the flaws he is supposed to be without. cloud knows what others don't, of what others will never know.
this is what cloud was privy to every day. every minute detail of him, all of the individual aspects of sephiroth, small, trivial, insignificant. physical, emotional, mental. all of it. everything. he sees sephiroth in ways that sephiroth can't.
he knows sephiroth better than sephiroth knows himself.
he loves sephiroth more than sephiroth can love himself.
"you okay?"
sephiroth watches as his cloud rises from his sleep. his eyes remain half-lidded; the green within them is muted in the dark, so sephiroth can only see the blue, dark like the ocean deep. cloud's voice is hoarse, tired. the need to lull him back to sleep is strong; he wants to card his fingers through wild sunflower hair and kiss the tip of cloud's nose and trace circles on cloud's shoulder blades.
"i'm fine," sephiroth replies. "just a bit of trouble sleeping." he turns his body to face cloud. there is a vulnerability in this action; sephiroth notes it every time, the way he can bare all of himself to cloud. cloud does the same for sephiroth. if they could live underneath the other's skin, then they would do so. to be so close, under the muscle and sinew, encased by bone, to taste one another's heart beat, the sweetness of love.
cloud smiles. he reaches out to sephiroth, fingers spread out, beckoning to him, yearning for him. fire blazes under sephiroth's skin. oh, to be desired in such a way he once thought impossible. it is all so much.
"come back to bed. i miss you."
sephiroth obliges for he will always follow cloud's requests. when he slips under the covers that they share, in the bed they both sleep in, in the room that they share in the house that is for them, cloud moves in close and leaves no space between them. he rests his face against sephiroth's chest, his hand entangling itself in his hair. his feet become intertwined with sephiroth's; sephiroth listens to the sound of their anklet's charms clinking against one another before falling still.
sephiroth brings an arm around cloud's waist. he holds him tight, not tight enough to disturb cloud's comfort, but enough to feel cloud's warm skin heat him up, to feel the blood rushing underneath, his muscles relaxing, his cells calling out to sephiroth's. reunion, perhaps. sephiroth is unsure. all he knows is that his proximity to cloud strife tames that fire that burned brightly. it smolders now, ready to reignite at a moment's notice.
"g'night, seph," cloud mumbles, sleep heavy in his voice. sephiroth can hear cloud's heart beat, a slow rhythm, soothing and pleasant. "i love you."
"i love you, too, cloud." the words come out easily, naturally, after all these years. they no longer remain locked away in his throat, held back by shame and feelings of unworthiness. cloud had coaxed them out of sephiroth gently, delicately, handled with the utmost care.
"good night, my beloved."
cloud's breathing has become low and steady, but sephiroth is certain that cloud has heard him. they are connected, body to body, mind to mind, soul to soul.
sephiroth closes his eyes and dreams of his cloud.
Yazu Tue 11 Mar 2025 09:17AM UTC
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Tarudce Wed 12 Mar 2025 05:27PM UTC
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