#as being taller than sephiroth is here

[someartistsammy]

Was curious and wanted to do a height comparison of the current FS characters! For reference: Matt is only slightly taller than Cloud and Glenn is roughly Barret's height.

[sephirthoughts]

Hi I know this is a ship like no one has ever thought of but I figure it’s not too strange considering the last prompt was for Vincent and Rufus.

Sephiroth and Rufus with the prompts of: 14, 20, 16, or 19. Please I need food here I’m dying and your writing is delicious 🥲

PREPARE THYSELF, ANONNIE, BECAUSE THINE WISH HATH BEEN GRANTED.

I only did #14 things you said after you kissed me, and #20 things you said that i wasn't meant to hear, because it turned into a whole fucking thing. Actually #16 things you said with no space between us is technically in there too. ANYWAY it is a lil angsty and not a necessarily happy ending, which you tumblr masochists are into as i understand it. Enjoyeee

TAGS: rufus x sephiroth, rufiroth? sephirus?, implied mysophobia, implied autism, two stupid 15 year olds kissing, first kisses, first heartbreak (for one of them sry bby)

rating: teen and up

warnings: canon typical violence, blood, explosions, helicopters

When Rufus stepped out of the building, there was a tall, silver-haired young man, waiting by the door of the armored limousine he was to ride in, in the convoy. Rufus looked him up and down, with a critical eye.

So, this was the famous war hero, Sephiroth. He was taller than all the other security personnel, and obviously in top physical condition, but he was also very young. The same age as Rufus, in fact, which did not inspire confidence in the fifteen-year-old young master of the Shinra dynasty.

Sephiroth bowed, as Rufus approached, and waited respectfully, while he got in the car. Then, to Rufus’ astonished annoyance, the boy climbed into the back of the car, too, and sat down in the seat across from his own.

Rufus scowled. “What the hell are you doing? Bodyguards ride up front, with the driver.”

“I prefer to ride here, young master,” Sephiroth replied smoothly. 

“Well, I prefer you not talk back to me!” Rufus retorted, in indignant disbelief. “This is my personal space. Get out of it.”

The other boy didn’t move a muscle. “As long as I am assigned to your detail, I am responsible for your safety, and have scope to operate at my own discretion. I can do my job more efficiently from here, so I will stay where I am.” 

“My father owns you. That means you have to do what I say.”

Green cat-eyes blinked at him. “I’m a person. You can’t own people.”

Rufus snorted with laughter. “You sure are ignorant. My father owns tens of thousands of people. Including every single one of you SOLDIERs. Meaning you.”

“I’m not ignorant, we’re having a philosophical difference of opinion,” Sephiroth returned calmly. “You say your father owns me, and I say I am employed by him. You’ve been taught that everyone who disagrees with you is stupid or inferior. That might make you feel powerful, in the short term, but whoever taught you to think that way wasn’t doing you any favors. Underestimating an opponent is a serious weakness, and your enemies will exploit it.” 

Rufus’ pale cheeks flushed with anger and embarrassment at being so flatly (and effectively) contradicted, by someone he considered to be little more than a servant. “You can’t underestimate your enemies if you don’t have any! I’ll crush them all, before they get a chance to come after me!”

The silver head gave an approving nod. “A valid strategy. But how do you identify potential enemies?”

Rufus crossed his arms. “By looking for conflicting interests, obviously.”

“Exactly,” Sephiroth agreed. “Good intel is the most important element of any battlefield operation.”

“Not the most important,” Rufus argued, so engrossed in the conversation, he wasn’t aware that the convoy had departed, and they were already turning onto the freeway. “The most important things are manpower and tech. Without those, you can’t win a war.”

“Mn. True. But let’s say you have an army of fifty-thousand, and they’re equipped with the latest in cybernetic armor. And I have an army of thirty-thousand, with good but standard armor. Who is going to win?”

“I will. I have manpower and tech on my side.”

“But then, suppose my intelligence sector has done the legwork ahead of time, and I have learned of a fatal flaw in your cybernetic armor, that not only disables it, but causes injury to the wearers, making it much easier for my soldiers to incapacitate yours. Now, every one soldier of mine can easily take out two of yours. Who will win, then?”

“That takes away my armor advantage and makes your army effectively sixty-thousand strong,” Rufus frowned. “But that’s not fair! You cheated!”

“There is no fairness in war. Any and all means of achieving victory are valid, including deception and treachery. Because if you don’t win—”

“You die.”

“That’s right.”

Rufus thought for a moment. “But, what if my army had the cybernetic armor, and we went around spreading information about its fatal defect, but the information was false and the armor was sound. Then your troops would waste their efforts trying to incapacitate mine, and they’d be caught off-guard and even easier to deal with. Then I’d win.”

The silver-haired boy nodded approvingly again. “Counterintelligence. Excellent. You’re already thinking like a warrior.”

“Since you are a warrior, by trade, may I ask your opinion on something?” Rufus asked, in a more respectful tone than he’d been using, heretofore. “Do you think that…having an escape route from a fortified location is cowardly?”

“Only if you consider strategic withdrawal cowardly, which it isn’t,” Sephiroth answered, without hesitation. “Dying because you refuse to acknowledge you’ve lost ground isn’t honorable or brave, it’s foolish.”

“That’s what I think,” Rufus said, leaning forward eagerly. “All the great generals in history have used strategic withdrawal as a battlefield tactic, and no one calls them cowards.”

Silver eyebrows went up. “You like history?” 

He looked down at his hands and shrugged. “It’s…useful. To know what people did before and whether it worked. Advancement is built on accumulated knowledge.”

“They say that is what sets humanity apart from the animals.”

“Mn,” Rufus nodded. “Look, I…I’m sorry I called you ignorant, before. My father always says that soldiers are nothing but illiterate grunts, only useful as fuel for the war machine. But that’s not the way you are, at all.”

Sephiroth crossed his arms on his broad chest. “I’m a different kind of soldier than he means, but there are plenty of intelligent and honorable men, who are regular troopers. No human being should be thought of as fuel for a machine. They are, after all, the men that make up your ever so vital manpower.”

Rufus opened his mouth to reply, but several things happened at once. There was a faint whistling sound, and the silver-haired boy’s green pupils contracted to slits. Then something hit Rufus like a ton of bricks, knocking the wind out of him. 

At the same moment, the car was struck by something metallic and heavy, and there was an explosion of crackling, blue electricity, that knocked the car’s systems offline, including its shield, and made the hair stand up all over Rufus’ body. With the electronics dead, the driver lost control, and the vehicle spun out and began to roll. 

All this happened in a split second, and Rufus had barely had time to realize the object on top of him was the silver-haired boy, when Sephiroth grabbed him around the waist, and with a blinding burst of momentum, rocketed them out the window, smashing right through the glass, just before the vehicle tumbled onto that side. 

A missile screamed through the air and slammed into the exposed undercarriage of the now unshielded vehicle, flipping it all the way upside-down. Rufus felt the heat on his face, as it exploded in a gigantic ball of flames, with a noise like a sonic boom, that made his ears ring.

Sephiroth landed on his feet, thirty meters away and set Rufus down. The EMP and the missile had come from attack choppers—two of them. The rest of the Shinra convoy had been struck, too, and was in chaos and flames all over the highway. A swarm of green-camo painted, armored vehicles came roaring up, cutting off any escape, from both sides. 

“Get behind me!” Sephiroth barked, as his long, silver blade flashed out.  

Rufus ducked obediently behind him, but he knew there was no point. There was a missile coming right at them. There was no way evade it. It would vaporize them both, whether he was behind his bodyguard or not. 

He clenched his teeth in anger and unwillingness. This was not how he’d imagined his last three seconds on this planet—gunned down like a dog by his father’s enemies, a fifteen-year-old virgin, who had never accomplished anything worthwhile in his short life.

Screw that, if he was going to die, he’d look what killed him in the face. He lifted his head, just in time to see a flash of silver, and the twin vapor trails of the missile, which appeared to have been split into two parts, as they went careening wildly into the concrete pylons behind them. 

What the hell had happened? Was the missile defective? I couldn’t have been what it looked like, because what it looked like, was that his bodyguard had sliced it in half with a sword. Which was not possible.

Apparently, that had been their last missile, having used them up attacking the convoy. The helicopter’s mini-gun engaged, instead, spraying the area with bullets, which the silver-haired boy was…well, he was deflecting them with his sword. 

There was no other way to describe it, because that’s what was happening. The blade was moving faster than sight, sparking where they hit, with a strange, staccato clinking, like hail on a glass window.

The other chopper quit harassing the surviving security personnel and barreled toward them, to join the first in pelting the targets with gunfire. 

Sephiroth growled with frustration. He could deal with them on his own, but not simultaneously, and if he left Rufus unguarded to take out one, the other would cut him down in an instant. There was only one way he got out of this with the President’s son alive, and it would require perfect timing.

That opportune moment occurred, when the first chopper’s minigun overheated, and had to cool for a few seconds. Right then, Sephiroth launched his sword, like a thin, silver javelin, at the other, directly puncturing its windscreen, frightening the pilot into veering away, for long enough to grab Rufus, and make a sprint for the overpass bridge. 

Both choppers recovered and a fusillade of hot lead chased his preternaturally swift steps, but it was too late. Bullets peppered the concrete barrier, throwing sprays of grey dust into the air, as the silver-haired boy leapt over the edge, with the President’s son in his arms. 

Partially obstructed by the overpass bridge, the two plummeted toward the undercity and certain death. They were falling too fast for the gunners to sight them, but it would’ve been perfunctory, anyway. There was no surviving a drop from one of the plates.

Wind battered Rufus in the face and tore at his hair as they approached terminal velocity, and kept falling. They fell for so long, he ran out of breath screaming and had to pause to inhale, before he started again. 

This fucking psycho bodyguard! Now, rather than getting shredded by bullets, he was going to be splattered all over some filthy, undercity junkyard. Perfect. His father probably wouldn’t even send people to collect his body!

He clung tightly to Sephiroth, from sheer reflex, as the ground rushed toward them, bracing himself for impact.

Impact that…never came. Instead, Rufus felt the bizarre sensation of weightlessness, as their fall suddenly slowed, in defiance of logic and reason and science. They look the last couple of meters at a gentle drift, and Sephiroth’s black boots touched lightly down in gravelly dirt. 

He set Rufus on his feet, steadying him as he wobbled. “Young master, are you alright? Are you injured?”

Rufus attempted to stop his voice shaking, but found he couldn’t. “I…I don’t think so. How are we…alive?”

“Well, I evaded the gunships by leaping off—ah, you mean the fall. I have a mastered slow-time materia.”

“O—oh,” was all Rufus could say. The other boy was obviously lying, but he didn’t have the bandwidth to care why. 

Sephiroth looked appropriately contrite. “I apologize for frightening you, young master, but it was the only option I had, at the moment. I would have dealt with the assailants, had it just been me, but protecting you is my primary objective.”

“I understand. You did well. So…where are we?” Rufus asked, looking around dazedly, at the mountains of piled debris, nearly as high as skyscrapers. And far, far above that, the titanic plates that made up the vast overcity of Midgar. He had never seen them from below, before.

“We didn’t drift much, so approximately…right below where we fell. Which puts us close to the Sector 7 slums. Those choppers will be along shortly, to sweep the area for our remains. We’d better get under cover quickly.”

It took less than a minute for Sephiroth to find a partially collapsed section of antediluvian aqueduct pipe, which was twice as tall as he was, and had room enough to park a vehicle, to say nothing of sheltering the two boys. 

Once inside, he cast some kind of gravity spell, and drew a pile of debris over the opening, to conceal it. Just then, the thrum of helicopter rotors became faintly audible in the distance. 

Rufus felt a shiver up his spine, and the irrational urge to crouch down, despite already being under cover. There was enough sunlight filtering in through the piled scrap and rust holes in the old pipe, so that he could see fairly well, which made him feel far too visible.

“What are we going to do if they find us?” he whispered to Sephiroth. 

“They won’t,” Sephiroth answered, at normal speaking volume. “They’re only going to do visual recon, for due diligence. They’re confident that we’re dead.”

Sure enough, the roar of the choppers grew louder and louder, till they could see the sun glinting off their black hulls, directly overhead. But just as Sephiroth said, they passed over the area a few times, and then flew away, their ominous thunder fading gradually into the distance.

“Here, take these.”

Rufus looked down to see that Sephiroth had produced a bottle of water and a dry-ration packet from a storage materia somewhere about his person, and was holding them out to him.

“No, thank you,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m not—”

“Young master, I insist you take them,” Sephiroth interrupted firmly. “You may be in shock, and depriving your body of calories and hydration at this time could make you very ill.”

Rufus accepted the things, with a disconsolate huff. He was about to unscrew the lid of the bottle, when Sephiroth took him by the shoulders and looked gravely into his face.

“Listen carefully, because I only have time to say this once. My phone was destroyed by the EMP, as I can imagine yours was, as well. We are far from help, with no means of contacting anyone, for the moment. Do not leave this hiding place, and do not move that debris, no matter what. There are all kinds of monsters out here, in the scrap wastes. If I am not conscious by sunset, take my sidearm and run north, till you get to the dirt road. It’ll take you to the slums, due east of here. Do not tell anyone who you are. Just find someone with a phone and call for help. Whatever you do, you must get out of the waste before nightfall. Understood?”

“Wait, what the hell do you mean, if you’re not conscious?” Rufus demanded. “Are you planning to take a nap?”

It was only then that he observed the other boy’s face was deathly pale. Then he noticed the bullet holes in his black pullover and leather coat. And then the blood pooling at his feet. 

“Sephiroth! You—you’re hurt!” he exclaimed, in horror. “Why didn’t you tell me? What do I do? How do I help?”

“The primary objective is your safety. Do exactly as I’ve said. Do not worry about me, I’ll be…I’ll be fine…”

As he spoke those last words, Sephiroth’s voice dissolved into a slurred murmur. Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he pitched over. Rufus grabbed for him to catch him, but the boy was over six feet tall and weighed at least two hundred pounds. Resultingly, smaller, slighter Rufus only wound up getting dragged down on top of him.

He scrambled off, in a panic, not wanting to make the injuries worse, and knelt beside his bodyguard. His own white blazer and sweater were splotched all over with crimson, which would have made his skin crawl at any other time, but he couldn’t bother about uncleanliness, at the moment.  

Frantically, he searched Sephiroth’s pockets for a healing materia, but only found that storage materia. There was nothing in it but more water and rations, and a field kit for dressing minor injuries, which he had no idea how to use, anyway. 

Ok, think! He’d heard somewhere that you put pressure on deep wounds, to stop them bleeding. Forcing himself past his bone-deep aversion to touching bodily fluids, he pressed down on the most central holes, as hard as he could, while blood sponged up through Sephiroth’s black pullover and soaked his hands. But it was in vain. Sephiroth had serious wounds in more places than Rufus had hands to press on them. 

Close to panicking, Rufus tried to check for a pulse, but had no idea how to do that, and couldn’t tell if his failure to find one meant he was incompetent, or that there wasn’t one to be found. Sephiroth’s face was paper-white, now, and his chest had stopped moving. He wasn’t breathing. 

“Sephiroth! Sephiroth! No, no, no!” Rufus sobbed, yanking on the lapels of the other boy’s bullet-torn leather coat, as if he could shake him back to life. “Th—that’s an order, SOLDIER! Do you hear me? You’re not allowed to die! You have to protect me, so you can’t die! Sephiroth!! Please, don’t die! Please…please.”

Weighed down by despair, he curled over, pressing his forehead to Sephiroth’s chest, sobbing like a baby, over the body of the boy his own age, who had saved him, at the cost of his own life. 

Men were killed in action all the time. It was just a collateral cost of warfare. He knew this, and had never felt anything one way or another, about it. But seeing it happen, before his eyes, especially to such an obviously special and worthwhile person, felt completely different. 

It was real. It was personal. It was wrong and horrible and tragic and sickening. And it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair! This one belonged to him! Fate had no right to take him away! 

Buoyed up by righteous anger, he forced himself to swallow the bottle of water, like Sephiroth told him, but couldn’t even make himself think about eating the dry ration. He was sick to his stomach and his hands were covered in sticky, drying blood. 

While he was using the rest of his water bottle to try to rinse his hands, he realized that there was less blood on the ground than he'd expected. Only his watery spatters, and the puddle that had been at Sephiroth’s feet when he fell. If he’d stopped bleeding that quickly…then it must be because his heart had stopped. Which meant he was really dead. 

Flatly refusing to accept this, Rufus sat cross-legged beside him, clinging to his gloved hand. Sometimes whispering prayers to the goddess to bring him back, but mostly in silent grief. He never believed the gods had any power to help people, and they were little comfort to him, now.

Only when the sun sank below the unseen horizon, far away, and it began to get really dark, in their tiny hideout, did he move. Heavily and reluctantly, he got up and strapped on Sephiroth’s sidearm, preparing himself to make a run for the dirt road, and hopefully the relative safety of the slums, where there were a lot of people keeping the monsters away.

There were no more excuses to linger. He was as ready as he was going to get, and it was now or never. Rufus knelt down beside his erstwhile bodyguard, to say goodbye. 

“I won’t leave you here,” he said, gently brushing his silver hair out of his face. “I’ll bring people back to get you, as soon as I find some kind of civilization. I—I’m sorry you died for me. I’m so sorry. I know I act like I think I’m royalty, but…it’s all a façade. I’m completely worthless, compared to you. You deserved to live. If I could trade places with you, I would. In a heartbeat.”

In the deep blue of twilight, the boy’s face was painfully beautiful. Overcome with emotion, Rufus leaned down and pressed his lips to Sephiroth’s. A single, soft kiss, to ease the ache of meeting once and parting forever. His tears splashed onto the waxen face. 

“I’ll never forget you, Sephiroth,” he whispered, against his cold, pale lips.

When he drew back, a pair of brilliant-green eyes with catlike slit pupils were looking directly into his. He gave a shout and jumped back, falling flat in the loose rubble, then immediately scrambling back up, to grab hold of the boy’s hand.

“Sephiroth! You’re alive!” His heart was pounding like a war drum, from the sudden jolt, but he couldn’t contain his elation. “You were dead! You bled so much and I couldn’t find your pulse and you weren’t breathing! But you’re alive now! You’re alive!!”

“I wasn’t dead,” Sephiroth said faintly. “I was only…regenerating. I tried to explain.” 

“You sound weak. No, no, let me help you sit up. Good, just lean on me. I’ll get you some water.”

Rufus retrieved another bottle of water from the storage materia and sat with his arm around Sephiroth, watching attentively while he slowly sipped it. 

“I heard your voice, in the dark, calling me back,” Sephiroth said, after he’d drained the contents of the bottle. “I thought I dreamed it. But then I woke up, and you were holding my hand. Talking to me. I was going to tell you that you’re not worthless, and it was both my duty and honor to die for you. But…you kissed me, and I didn’t have a chance.”

Rufus blushed like an apple, but the deep shade of twilight concealed it. “I…uh. I’m sorry. It was just that—” He frowned suddenly and touched his lips. “Did I…bring you back with a kiss? Like a prince in a fairy tale? No, of course not. That’s stupid.”

“I don’t think it’s stupid,” Sephiroth said, squeezing his hand. “The lifestream runs through all of us. Maybe you gave me some of yours, and it made me stronger. Helped me wake up faster.”

Rufus swallowed hard. “You’re still really weak, though. We could…we could try it again. Just to see if it helps.”

“Right. To…prove the hypothesis,” Sephiroth agreed.

“Hypothesis,” Rufus murmured, wide-eyed and suddenly trembling with nervousness, as they leaned in, so close that he could feel Sephiroth’s warm breath on his cheek. 

Their lips brushed together, timidly at first, then pressing more eagerly. Rufus let his eyes fall closed and his mouth open, tongue sliding forward to caress Sephiroth’s.

His heart pounded in his ears, and his stomach did flips like he was on a roller coaster. His first kiss! Er—well, his first real kiss! It was clumsy and faltering, and neither had any idea what they were doing, but it was also perfect and wonderful and everything he’d ever imagined. He finally understood what all the fuss was about. 

When they drew apart, they were both breathless and flushed with heat, lips wet and kiss-bruised. Rufus still had his arm around Sephiroth’s waist, and Sephiroth had wrapped one of his around Rufus, as well. 

“Sorry if that was weird. I…I never kissed anyone before,” Sephiroth said, shyly lowering his eyes. 

“Neither have I,” Rufus admitted. “It was a little weird, because I always thought my first kiss would be with a girl. But…I’m glad it was you.”

The green cat-eyes came up again, to look into his, slit pupils dilating slowly. “You are?”

Rufus nodded. “Mn. I like you, and you're really handsome. You also saved my life, so we have strong emotional context. Also, you work for my father, and we both know a relationship would never be possible, between us, so there’s no danger of getting too attached, and things becoming messy and complicated later. It can just be what it is.”  

The slit pupils contracted again and Sephiroth seemed to freeze for a millisecond, but he smiled, what appeared to be a soft, placid smile. “Yes. It can just be what it is. We should go, now. The sooner I get you home safe and sound, the better.”

So saying, he hopped up and pulled Rufus to his feet, accepting back his sidearm and materia. When they were ready, he waved his hand, and all the piled up junk covering the entrance to their pipe was blown off, like a pressurized lid. Then they stepped out of their shelter into the labyrinthine canyon of rust and dry-rot and assorted garbage. 

Sephiroth took Rufus by the hand and helped him navigate the small slope, upon which debris was loosely packed and especially treacherous in the dark. Rufus intended to keep holding hands, even after they’d got down, but Sephiroth firmly withdrew his from the other boy’s grasp. 

“No need to be afraid, young master,” he said, in a tone of calm reassurance. “I’m here to protect you. Nothing can harm you, while I’m with you.”

Rufus nodded and followed after him. 

As they picked their way through the debris, his blonde brows knit together, in thought. He should be happy, to have such a strong and valiant protector, who would suffer serious injury for him, and even let Rufus kiss him, all while remaining composed and professional, and taking such care in looking after him.

But…he couldn’t shake the vague feeling that he’d somehow lost something precious. And now that it was gone, it was gone forever.

[scun-gilli]

TRT Winged Wingmen Character Descriptions

OKAY. Work is finally over (at 10pm....kill meeee) I apologize for the excessive amount of reference links and how freaking long this is.

Here are detailed descriptions of the Morningstar brothers.

We will start with the oldest and go down.

URIEL MORNINGSTAR

Hair color: White

Hair style: When he was younger, it was super long (like Sephiroth lol) but during the current story, it is short and neatly combed back. Think Connor from DBH

Skin color: PALE. LIKE A GHOST (or me lol)

Features: He looks kind of androgynous. Similar again to Connor from DBH but slightly softer. He has four white wings that come from the side of his head (around the temples) and fold over each other to hide his eyes when he's not actively using his magic. He is pretty thin and lanky. Two white wings

Eye color: He has four eyes (stacked like Stolas) That have black pupils and dark purple sclera (the sclera look similar to a starry sky with the milky way)

Magic color: Very celestial, like the milky way (like stolas)

Height: Super tall, like Sera or Valentino

Fighting style: He is TRASH at close quarters fighting or even with weapons, but he is an extremely powerful magic user.

Known abilities: [these are the ones we know of now ;)] Prophetic vision, warding, true vision (He can see the past, the true nature of souls, the prophecies written into reality and the red threads of fate)

Duty: His job is of course on the royal counsel as an advisor using his visions and conducting the thread ceremonies.

Clothing: On a day to day basis, he wears something similar to this (in fact, this is pretty close to how I imagine him in general) But in his typical white/purple/blue (more star motifs lol) tones. Also, the capelet is not present unless it's for formal occasions. Also knee high boots because I am a sucker for men in tall boots.

MICHAEL MORNINGSTAR

Hair color: blonde

Hair style: Shoulder length, typically pulled back into a half up bun hairstyle. Like this

Skin color: Also Pale like Luci.

Features: Face wise, he basically looks like Luci (without the animal features), maybe slightly sharper than luce but they overall look really similar. He is a muscle daddy, broad shoulders and abs, the whole thing. Two white wings

Eye color: Blue (now just the right one) the left eye socket is now covered with bandages but he'll eventually get an eyepatch thing.

Magic color: Gold or blue. Takes the form of little bolts of electricity (kinda like Vox ig)

Height: Still tall but not as freakishly tall as Uriel. I would say a little taller than Al.

Fighting style: Dude is a beast. Works best in hand to hand or weapon based combat (that he infuses with magic). He prefers to use his chains (think Kurapika from HxH kinda chains) or he has a sword like Luci's.

Known abilities: [these are the ones we know of now ;)] summoning weaponry (like the chains), electricity based magical pulses, being sexy, smithing (creating the armor and weapons like the armor he made for Al), battle strategy, teaching (like at the KA), convincing Al to take care of himself when needed XD

Duty: His job is the general of the royal army, writing the curriculum for the students at the knight academy and training the new knights at the academy (like he does with Al)

Clothing: He is a lot more casual than his brothers. On the daily, its usually something like a white dress shirt (no tie, only for formal occasions) and slacks OR a black turtleneck with slacks. When he is fancy, like this or something similar. He also frequently wears a cloak (like in the picture) When actively training cadets, he is in clothes he can easily move in (T-shirts/sleeveless shirts and pants) If left to his own devices, he would be dressing in sweatpants all the time.

RAPHAEL MORNINGSTAR

Hair color: light brown

Hair style: Pretty long and curly (ringlets about past the chest). He usually braids it to keep it back or will put it in a ponytail (now with assistance or magic)

Skin color: tan and with a lot of freckles (he is a sunshine boy that loves to garden and he looks like it)

Features: He looks a lot more feminine than his brothers, softer features. dimpled cheeks. Two white wings. Only one arm on the right side.

Eye color: Golden (with little flecks of green)

Magic color: Gold

Height: As tall as Alastor (who became my scale for some reason)

Fighting style: Fighting is NOT his strong suit, but when he has to, he prefers long range weapons (like spears or bows)

Known abilities: [these are the ones we know of now ;)] Extremely potent healing magic, can diagnose illnesses, green thumb, well versed in all forms of medicine (including holistic), he's well versed in nutrition and can basically find a tea for any ailment ever, he can also calm souls around him using magic.

Duty: His job is, of course, the healer. He studies medicine from all realms (he and Belphegor will get along for sure), he teaches other healers and he plants herbs and other medicinal plants anywhere he is allowed XD

Clothing: Raphael will dress both masculine and feminine. He's very fluid about it. He prefers simple clothing that he can garden in (or if he is actively healing, he wants something that is out of his way) He usually wears a cloak over his clothes (Especially after his injury in the war) but underneath I imagine something like this or this (without overcoat) I can't find a reference for his formal outfits to save my life but it would be super flowy and in earth tones. I am not too happy about the clothing reference but I am eepy and struggling to find something cute. Hell, I may make an outfit reference board at some point, but I am sweepy.

GABRIEL MORNINGSTAR

Hair color: Dark brown

Hair style: Kept fairly short, basically a big mop of brown curls. He likes to braid beads and other accessories into his hair.

Skin color: tan like Raphael

Features: He has rounder features. (for some reason Wybie from Coraline comes up) two white wings.

Eye color: Bright green

Magic color: Green

Height: Shorter than Al but taller than Luci.

Fighting style: He can fight but really prefers not to. When he does fight, he's not half bad. He uses brass knuckles or his magic. He is a very strong magic user (not quite as much as Luci or Uri but still really strong)

Known abilities: [these are the ones we know of now ;)] Can detect magic influences and can even trace it's sources, Very fast (can quickly travel between realms and is the fastest flyer), He can speak basically any language and is pretty good at reading people when he puts his mind to it.

Duty: His job is the ambassador between realms. His job is to not only be the communicator between powers but he also escorts souls into heaven for meetings with the king. He is also the voice of father, meaning that father can speak through him when needed.

Clothing: He is a huge fan of being casual (like Mike) When he is able to, he's the big sweaters and floppy pants type of guy. He also really likes jewelry. (like bohemian style. almost hippie?) But when he needs to be formal he wears something more traditional, similar to this but in greens (and is usually disheveled in some way) I am not that pleased with this clothing reference either, but I repeat, papa is EEPY.

Annnnnd we are done!!! Thank you for reading this far XD I may update this after I sleep but I will let you know if I do. This is what we are working with so far.

I can also do descriptions of Al and Luci (like outfit inspos and what headcanons I adhere to for the fic. I just wanted to focus on the bros for now)

Here you go @elkaseltzer! Thank you for your interest in knowing about the winged wingmen. This is also for @i-genuinely-dunno who requested the descriptions as well. Huge thanks to my girl, Yuzu, on X for the help with these XD

[case-of-traxits]

50 Random Character Asks:

Tseng, 1 - 50

You know you had this coming.

50 Random Character Asks: Tseng Edition

I can't even pretend to be surprised here, can I? Well, I got your second ask with your choices as well, so they're in here. 💖

50 questions. Whew. I'll give you guys a sampler on the first one, but the rest are going to be under a cut. This took me SO LONG to do. I've literally been working on it since the 17th! All together, there's 4934 words in this bad boy, excluding the questions.

So uh. Enjoy nearly 5k of meta about Tseng. XD

That said, please keep in mind that all of my answers are specific to how I personally write Tseng. I'm not going to necessarily distinguish every piece of canon from headcanon.

[For this ask game!] || [Still accepting]

1. Canon I outright reject

That Tseng knew Zack was being kept in Nibelheim. For me, it just doesn't work with the rest of Tseng's arc regarding Zack and Aerith and him keeping all of those letters. So. No. Technically, in BC, Tseng is aware that Zack and Cloud are both alive and badly injured, and Hojo orders for him to "prepare the mansion," but never actually says what he's going to be doing there. Tseng sends the Player Turk to clear it out, and then Veld shows up and sends all of the Turks to work on handling the townspeople and everything instead of the mansion. So it's entirely possible that Tseng never knew, according to BC, that Zack and Cloud were placed in those tubes in the basement.

2. A canon or headcanon hill I will die on

Tseng is absolutely capable of slapping Aerith.  I realize that they took that out of the Remake, but I just feel like it's critical for his character for you to know that he is absolutely capable of that level of violence, even against someone he cares about.

3. Obscure headcanon

Tseng is the third (and youngest) son of Kisaragi Godo's older brother, who was emperor during the Wutaian War.  He was brought up in one of the Leviathan Temples to keep him as an effective (and safe) spare to the throne before he defected to Shinra. His forehead marking is a holdover from his time in the Temple, and he'll never admit to a single soul that sometimes, he feels the guiding hand of destiny (or fate or whatever you want to call it) in his life.

4. Favorite line

"It must have been a real thrill for you… Did you enjoy it?" I think this is everyone's favorite canon line.  With the possible exception of the "Mr. President," line from the Remake. That one's pretty damn good, but it requires actual explanation, doesn't it? XD I will say, he also has the canon line of, "I put everyone else at risk because I feared feeling guilty," in BC.  Which is... telling.

5. Best personality trait

Tseng's loyalty is easily his best personality trait, in my opinion.  We see a lot of it in BC, with his dedication to trying to help and save both Veld and the department, as well as in CC, with his devotion to getting those letters to Zack.

6. Worst personality trait

Tseng's devotion to doing things "correctly" is definitely his worst personality trait.  I am firmly of the opinion that this is the thing that's held him back on just killing the President and installing Rufus early. I mean, I have no doubt that there is technically more to it, including the fact that we have no idea what kind of succession clause might have been put in place for Rufus to inherit.

7. Age/height/weight headcanon

Age // Born in 1975, so he is 8 years older than Rufus and Reno, 2 years older than Sephiroth, and 3 years younger than Reeve. Height // I usually go with 5'8", but I'm a little flexible on this. I'll go up to 5'10".  He cannot, however, be taller than Rufus for me. Weight // Eh, I don't really do weight HCs.

8. Unpopular opinion about them

Hm... Do I have an unpopular opinion about Tseng..?  I don't know that I interact with enough Tseng fans to know.  Maybe my insistence on him being fairly easy-going when he isn't at work?  I see Tseng as the sort who can go with the flow to some extent, mostly because I don't think he'd work as well with Reno if he wasn't.

9. Scene that first made me love (or hate) the character

Oh man, honestly?  This might be my unpopular opinion, but his "death" scene in the OG.  With Sephiroth.  And no, not just because of my ship goggles. But there's just so much implied trust there, at a point where Tseng probably shouldn't trust Sephiroth.  He just... He talks to Sephiroth like he's still sane, and Sephiroth cuts him down during it, and then he still drags himself back through the entire Temple of the Ancients to get to the entrance so that he can let AVALANCHE in.

10. Best moment on screen (or in the book)

 See above.  I just... I love that scene.  It's easily his best scene.

11. Faceclaim for the role

Satoh Takeru.

12. Crack headcanon

So, I don't think I have a straight "crack" headcanon for Tseng.  I do have some crack-treated-seriously headcanons, including that he doesn't heal well magically (explaining why he spends so much more time in bandages and recovery than basically everyone else), and that if he's not friends with Reeve or in a romantic relationship with a partner who insists otherwise, he would live entirely on takeout. Tseng does not cook, in my opinion.  He's perfectly capable, but why?  He's spent years curating an extensive collection of takeout menus he considers acceptable food, and he eats exclusively from restaurants that have passed his very exacting standards. Ooh! And this: Tseng drives a small black sportscar at possibly dangerous speeds in Midgar.  It also has no plates, but there's not a cop in Midgar stupid enough to try to ticket it.

13. Dumbest thing they’ve ever done

Possibly trusting Sephiroth when he ran into him at the Temple of the Ancients, but honestly, there was probably no way he was walking out of that anyway, right?  So excluding that... Probably, the actual 'dumbest' thing he canonically does is in BC, when he chooses to rescue a single lone reactor guard instead of destroying a ship full of weapons that Shinra can't afford to let get out.  That's definitely treated as his dumbest choice by the canon.

14. Most heroic moment

When he literally, while dying, drags himself through the Temple to make sure Aerith gets the keystone.

15. Worst thing they’ve ever done

I mean. He canonically murders people for his paycheck.  So probably that? Unless you're more offended by the 'abandoning his country' backstory, of course.

16. Deepest darkest secret they won’t even admit to themselves

He will always wonder if he could have made a difference for Wutai if he'd fought for them instead of going to Midgar. Not that he regrets leaving.  He is fairly sure that he was always meant to be at Rufus' side.  But there's always that small, lingering thought.

17. Quotes, songs, poems, etc. that I associate with them

I actually have an old fanmix that more or less I still use. That said, you can also add "Secret (Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists Theme)," covered by Denmark + Winter.

18. What they��d go to see a therapist about

I am going to read this is what he should see a therapist about because I'm pretty sure if he had to go see one, he would spend the entire session silent, watching the therapist and making them horribly uncomfortable. (Unless it's Angel, but she's one of @ladykf-writes' OCs that I gleefully borrow whenever I can.  She's a counselor specifically for Turks, and Tseng knows better than to try to argue with her.) Honestly though.  If Tseng were up to date on mental health, I think he'd need to see a therapist about his inability to be settled with anything less than perfection from himself.  And, you know, probably talk to them about the killing people thing.

19. Vices/bad habits

Tseng smokes.  It wasn't a habit he was in before Midgar, but while he was being 'debriefed,' he discovered that asking for a cigarette meant he got to go outside and see the sky and breathe the (admittedly not great) air.  However, due to him not healing super well magically and needing to actually recover naturally, he did eventually notice a cough and slight shortness of breath that he couldn't shake. So he tries not to smoke as much anymore.  Still, he does keep a pack of his clove cigarettes on him at all times.

20. Scars

Oh plenty. All the Turks have them, and Tseng has a few more than most given his difficulties in healing.

21. Drink of choice (not just alcoholic)

Alcoholic // Junami sake, served warm.  He has a few brands that he likes, most of which need to be imported from Wutai. Non-alcoholic // Caramel Macchiato with extra caramel and extra whip.  Not that he'd let anyone catch him ordering it.  He has a single barista that he goes to in the coffee shop in the Tower (her name is Peony), and she knows better than to call his order out.  Tseng's sweet tooth is something he keeps very much under wraps.

22. Best physical feature

I mean. How do you pick? He's gorgeous. Maybe his hair, but I have a weakness for beautiful hair.

23. If they were a scented candle, what would they smell like?

Vetiver. But that's probably just because I HC his cologne as having notes of vetiver in it.

24. Most annoying habit

According to Reeve, it's Tseng's uncanny way of reading you.  There's nothing more frustrating to him than Tseng's little, "And is that all?" sort of question because he knows that Tseng means, 'I know there's something else and here's your opportunity to tell me what it is before I go digging.'

25. 3 things they’d want to take with them if they were dropped off in the middle of nowhere

Assuming he is not allowed to bring his phone, and assuming that a backpack full of his usual supplies (he has one in his apartment, one in his car, and one in his office; he finds it unlikely he'd be caught somewhere without it) doesn't count as a single item, and assuming that he's not stripped of his usual clothes/gear when he's dropped off... 1 // A survival radio with a rechargeable battery. 2 // A waterproof map. 3 // A first aid kit. Really, he'd probably be fine even if dropped off with absolutely nothing, but trust me, he would not be happy about it.

26. What they would do if stuck in an elevator with [Lazard]

At first, there would be a long stretch of silence as they both studied the number display and then the elevator panel itself.  Lazard would be the first one to move, leaning forward to punch a few of the buttons, but once it was clear that the elevator was not moving, Tseng would sigh and tip his head back and study the ceiling. He's cataloging everything he needs to do, wondering briefly what he can hand off, what he could text some of the others about to ensure it's done in time.  Then he looks over at Lazard, who is sighing and pushing his hand through his hair. There's another few moments of silence before Lazard pushes the emergency call button, and after they're both reassured by the voice on the other end that maintenance is aware of the issue and working to restore functionality, Tseng slides down to sit.  Lazard looks over at him, then sighs and takes that as an invitation to do the same. "Do you think it's inappropriate to text Reeve?" And Tseng looks up at Lazard, a small, knowing smile on his lips.  "That depends," he murmurs.  "Do you actually want to get to that meeting?" Lazard chuckles, reaching up to rub the bridge of his nose slightly, and he looks back down at his phone.  After a moment, he lays it face down on his leg and tips his head back against the glass wall of the elevator, and he looks out over the city on display behind Tseng. Tseng notices he doesn't start texting. The silence is comfortable.  Companionable.  Neither of them have any stake in impressing one another, and there's no need to fill the silence with talking only for the sake of talking. Tseng supposes that they're lucky that it isn't winter.  Else they would have to sit much, much closer. A glance over at Lazard, who has taken off his glasses briefly to rub one of his eyes, and a little smile touches Tseng's lips. Not, he decides after a minute, that it would be a bad thing, necessarily.

27. Their guilty pleasure

Tseng loves sweets.  Basically all kinds, but he does have a particular weakness for good chocolate and good caramel.  His secret indulgence that he'll never admit to anyone who knows him is that sometimes, during the winter, he'll order a large hot chocolate with extra whipped cream and get a caramel drizzle on it from the coffee shop in the Tower. But only if his usual barista (Peony) is working.  Since she already knows his coffee order is something equally ridiculously sweet, he finds that to be less humiliating than adding someone else in on the loop.

28. How they feel about [Reeve]

Complicated.  On the one hand, Tseng and Reeve are always, always good friends when I write.  One of Tseng's first long, solo missions with the Turks (and I really should rewrite that fic with my current Tseng's backstory and clean up the prose a little) was to function as Reeve's escort on a reactor tour.  That's a minimum of two weeks if they're taking advantage of helicopters periodically, more often three full weeks of travel when Reeve drives the whole thing.  And of course, the driving is definitely Reeve's preference.  Reactor tours are practically the only vacation he takes. But there's no way you don't spend three weeks on a cross-planet roadtrip and don't end up very close to the person you spent all that time with in the car (unless, of course, it's terrible and you just want to murder them).  But at the same time, there are secrets between them that they both know they can't know about one another.  Reeve can't know all the gory details about Tseng's life as a Turk, and Tseng can't know about Reeve's... let's call it his uncanny knack with the reactors. Now, do I ship them? Honestly, yes, sometimes.  I mean, I usually pair off Tseng with Sephiroth and Reeve with either Lazard (if I want canon to happen for something later) or Genesis (if I'm wanting a fix-it), but I can absolutely ship Tseng with Reeve.  Honestly though, that's kind of an unfair question.  I can ship Tseng and Reeve with nearly anyone.

29. Eating habits

 If it weren't for Reeve's insistence on a weekly meal with him and Reeve's occasional order of groceries simply arriving at Tseng's apartment unannounced (he only really sends dry goods these days; produce and dairy get delivered by Reeve himself when Tseng invites him over), Tseng would live exclusively on takeout. Expensive takeout. But takeout nonetheless.

30. Sleeping habits

Tseng slept in a Midgardian style bed for about a week while he was in debriefing after he defected, but eventually, he took all of his blankets and everything and just started sleeping on the floor instead. Now, in his apartment in Upper Eight in the middle of Little Wutai, he's found someone who can make him a gloriously oversized futon, and his one "concession" to the Midgardian way of doing things is that he no longer puts his futon up every morning.  He has four futons to rotate between, with a veritable army of sheets and blankets for them that he's gotten as what he suspects is something akin to 'tribute' from some of the Little Wutai locals. He's done his best to make it clear that he's to be treated as anyone else in the community, but he's hardly going to refuse these things. Tseng sleeps lightly, waking up at basically any sort of unexpected sound, but he has the enviable ability to drift right back off.

31. If the had a tumblr what would it look like?

Honestly? It would be all precisely curated images/gifs of nature. Probably of waterfalls and rivers and creeks. But it would be immaculate. Perfectly tagged and maintained.

32. Something guaranteed to make them smile/laugh

I don't know that it is guaranteed, but Reno's antics often get a smile or a chuckle out of Tseng; particularly so when someone is underestimating Reno in some way.  He has a tendency to find amusement in watching someone walk right into something they should have seen coming. That said, both Reeve and Rufus are also able to routinely get a smile out of him; Reeve because he's just so warm that Tseng can't help but to smile back and Rufus because, well, to be perfectly frank, he's a sassy little shit sometimes and Tseng loves that about him. (For the record, Aerith also often fits in that "sassy little shit" box, but Tseng does his best not to let her see him smile, or else she'll take it as encouragement.) If we're talking about something other than people though, the sort of thing that will routinely get a smile out of Tseng is people watching.  He likes sitting on a bench in the Tower or in Midgar in general and just... watching people go by. It helps him feel grounded in the world.

33. Something guaranteed to make them cry

I don't know that anything specific is guaranteed to make him cry.  He's very much a 'buckle down and take care of things,' sort of guy instead of the emotional reaction sort of guy. That said, he doesn't handle it well after Nibelheim.  Even if he's not in a relationship with Sephiroth, the whole mess of 'handling' the survivors and realizing just how far the President will go to keep himself in power and the uncertainty of what's going on with Veld and with AVALANCHE and just... It's isn't pretty.

34. How they react when they are feeling [excited]

Tseng has, as a general rule, muted outward emotional tells for anything he's feeling.  It was trained into him when he was at the Temple, both as a potential heir to the throne as well as because he was being trained to be a priest.  That said, when he's genuinely excited about something and not just 'looking forward' to it, someone who knows him can tell. He's distracted from other things.  And sometimes, if you're talking to him and he's excited about something, he might ask you to repeat yourself. Not like, "Oh, I didn't hear you, what?" But you'll get a lot more of those little noncommittal "Mm?" sounds out of him. Unless you're talking about the thing he's excited about.  In that case, you'll have his complete attention, and his usually small, amused smiles (the smug ones; you know the ones) are a bit bigger, more genuine and, dare I say it, softer.

35. Their idea of a perfect day

Tseng's idea of a perfect day... well, to some extent, that varies based on where we are in the timeline and if he's in a romantic relationship, but in general, his idea of the perfect day is as follows: Nothing disastrous happens. Barring that, he'll settle for: Anything disastrous that did happen was handled.  Appropriately. In all seriousness, Tseng is very much the sort who focuses on living each day as though he won't have another, and he doesn't let himself indulge much in idle fantasies. He's much more interested in perfect moments.  A good morning run with someone he likes.  An effective training session with one of the other Turks.  Watching someone grasp something that he's been teaching them.  An evening walk with someone he loves.  Sharing a ridiculously rich chocolate cake with them afterwards.  That sort of thing.

36. Their favorite season

Tseng's favorite season in Midgar is fall, when there's a near constant wind coming off the mountains.  It can be difficult to track the seasons in Midgar, since there's not much by way of greenery, but fall means a cool wind that helps disperse some of the excess heat that comes off the Plate under his feet. Back in Wutai, his favorite season was summer.  He liked watching the fireflies in the dusk at the Temple, and no small part of him misses that.

37. What they really think about themselves

Deep down, no matter what else, Tseng knows that he is an oathbreaker.  He can justify it to himself or dress it up all he wants, but he knows that his father, that his brothers, that his country counted on him, and he walked away.  He abandoned everything he'd ever known and walked into the camp of the enemy and swore to help them instead. It's part of why his loyalty is so fiercely held now, and part of why he's so careful to be as pristine and perfect at what he does as is possible. He knows what his family— had they survived the war— would have said.  Once an oathbreaker, always an oathbreaker, and now, he's tied to the oaths he has made in a way that he wouldn't be if he hadn't defected, because he's terrified that they would be right. That puts him in the position of conflicting loyalties, and why he is so careful not to make promises once he's in Midgar.  His first loyalty is to Rufus now, his second to the rest of the Turks, and if there's anything that keeps him awake at night, it's how he's supposed to juggle the additional loyalties that he's found himself collecting (Aerith, Reeve, Zack, Sephiroth, Veld, Reno, etc.).

38. Favorite holiday

Valentine's Day.  Or, to be more exact, the day after.  When Tseng can get a box of very nice chocolates for extremely cheap. XD No, in all seriousness, Tseng quite likes the Midgar celebration of the dead, All Hallow's Eve, with the fixation on costumes and frightening people.  He finds it fascinating for a culture that spends so much of its time not talking about the dead.

39. Favorite game

Tseng likes card games.  He's good at them for the most part, and in fact, when he first defected and arrived in the SOLDIER camp, he realized very quickly that his traditional Wutaian garb was only going to keep him Othered.  So he learned to play poker from watching several hands, and he won himself gil and spare clothing alike off those SOLDIERs who heard his— at the time— thick accent and thought he'd be an easy mark. He still has a soft spot for poker.

40. Favorite book

Have two of Tseng's favorites.  Both titles have been translated from the original Wutaian for your convenience, but Tseng only has the Wutaian copies in his home. "When the Sun Rises in the West," by Yurieva Aiko.  This is a collection of poetry made from the letters recovered from the belongings of Wutaian soldiers after the war. "The Sleeve Cost Me Nothing Compared to You," by Sato Ivan.  This is a collection of short stories and poetry about love and the fleeting nature of romance.

41. If they could have lunch with anyone in the world (living or dead, from any fictional universe or the real world), who would it be?

Before he defects // Tseng would like to have lunch with one of the previous emperors at this point, just to try to get some perspective on what's happening with his country.  Particularly, he desperately wishes he had someone to ask for advice from.  He's torn on what he sees going on, and he wonders what's wrong with him that he seems to be the only one who sees that there's no possible way for them to win this engagement with Shinra. After he defects // During his time in Shinra, given the option to have lunch with literally anyone, Tseng would like one more lunch with someone he loves.  He's very much of the opinion that the best thing to do is to savor every moment you get with someone, no matter how mundane or fleeting. Post-canon // He would like one more lunch with Aerith and Zack.  Just to see them again, and to convince himself to let their ghosts go.

42. 3 comfort items

1 // Tseng has kept, over the years, exactly one kimono from his time in Wutai, and while he never wears it anymore, sometimes, when he's feeling nostalgic, he'll go and run his hands over the silk. 2 // After he completed his training to be accepted into the Turks, before he left the Academy in Junon to go back to Midgar full time, the Acting Director of Operations in The Junon Branch of the Administrative Research, Anya (also one of @ladykf-writes' OCs), gave him an inlaid bone and black alloy knife with a blade cleaning kit.  This is the knife that Tseng wears strapped to his left thigh (the left pocket is cut open in every pair of his pants so that he can reach it). 3 // When Rufus was fifteen, he gifted Tseng a solid black watch with no markers on it besides a pair of mythril white hands and a single mythril accent on the face that marked the twelve.  Rufus never intended for Tseng to keep it as a staple, but while Rufus has gifted him other watches since then, this is the one that Tseng wears as his every day watch.

43. 3 favorite foods and 3 they despise

Favorite Food 1 // Sushi from a tiny hole-in-the-wall place in Little Wutai.  And when he says hole-in-the-wall, he means this woman literally just sells bentos out of her kitchen. Favorite Food 2 // Fiola's in Upper Six is one of his favorites.  They have excellent Mideelan pasta and even better bread.  The bread is, in fact, good enough that while Tseng usually doesn't eat bread with his meals, he'll make an exception for Fiola's. Favorite Food 3 // There is a tiny bakery in Upper Three that sells the absolute best chocolate cake that Tseng has ever had.   Despised Food 1 // The "sushi" for sale in the Midgar cafeteria.  One of them had mayonnaise in it. Despised Food 2 // Pork rinds, a surprisingly popular snack in Midgar.  Tseng suspects it's a holdover from when the area was much more farming-oriented.  As it stands, every sector, Above and Below, has their own 'special' flavoring for them, and Tseng has yet to find anything redeeming about them. Despised Food 3 // Tseng doesn't despise bread exactly, but he fails to find it enjoyable to eat most of the time.  He'd prefer his carbs come in sugar, pasta, or rice, given the choice.

44. Their happiest memory

Tseng has a couple. The first one is of one of the last times he saw his mother. He was about eleven, and he was brought to her rooms so that she could see him.  They spent the evening reading poetry and him showing off his sword forms and her telling him how proud of him she was.  He helped her brush out her hair and braid it for bed, and then she returned the favor and kissed his forehead and sent him on back to his own rooms.  He has a small jade comb that he found in a secondhand shop in Little Wutai that makes him think of her. His second happiest memory is nearly always with Reeve, of their drive around the planet on that first reactor tour.  It was the first time Tseng traveled that he could just enjoy the process, and he has fond memories of the times they rolled the windows down and Tseng could let his hand hang out of the car and just... feel the breeze.  Reeve had been content to talk about nothing or put on an audiobook— and those had been something delightful to learn about, something that Tseng had immediately invested in because that was a great way to listen to the language— and let them just ride.

45. Their favorite celebrity

Tseng is embarrassed to admit it, but when he first arrived in Midgar and Junon, his Standard was not nearly as good as he'd thought it was.  The tutors he'd had in Wutai hadn't been native speakers, after all, and while he'd learned very well from them, there was no way he'd be mistaken for a natural speaker.  So he'd immediately immersed himself, watching the news and reading everything he could get his hands on, and eventually, he'd discovered what were called 'soaps.' He never really followed a lot of the plot lines— he felt sometimes like they had put several novels in a blender and poured the resulting concoction on the screen— but he did eventually decide there was one actress, Gabrielle Cooper, that he enjoyed watching. She had one of the most neutral accents he'd ever heard, and he followed her from show to show faithfully. Even long after he'd stopped watching soaps to help with his Standard, long after he'd more or less shed his own accent completely, he would catch himself picking up a magazine or a tabloid if she was featured on the cover.

46. The person they most admire

For a long, long time, it was Veld.  And then everything with Felicia happened.  And it isn't that he no longer admires Veld, but he certainly seems more human now.  What Tseng admires most about Veld now isn't the seemingly perfect Turk persona that he presents, but his dedication to what he thinks is right. Post-canon, the person he probably actually admires most is Rufus.  Rufus Shinra, who was brought up to rule the world and has been barred from the throne.  Rufus Shinra, who should have had everything and instead has had to cobble something together from the ruins left behind. In that vein, Reeve is an extremely close second. Reeve was never intended to be the one in charge, and Tseng knows that Reeve would like nothing more than to hand it all off to someone else and go back to designing houses and buildings and parks. But there's literally no one else to hand it off to. So he trudges on, running the now-largest military force in the world, making decisions that shape the entire world with almost no oversight.

47. Their dream job

If Tseng wasn't a Turk and hadn't been brought up in the Temple and was just an average Midgar citizen?  He'd be a restaurant critic.  He'd write the most detailed and possibly scathing reviews possible, and restaurants would fear him.

48. Scariest moment of their life

A few months before he defected, during a ritual for Leviathan at the Temple, Tseng nearly drowned.  This was one of his big catalyst moments for abandoning Wutai, as he realized in that moment that no matter what anyone told him about how important he was, they all saw him as expendable. After Advent Children, the scariest moment in Tseng's life was watching Rufus jump from that building.

49. Favorite toy as a child

Tseng was given a wooden training sword very young that he absolutely used to menace every Temple Guardian he ran across until he was big enough for proper training, and he cherished it right up until he left the temple.  He didn't take it with him, but he made sure to polish it and leave it in a respectful place when he left. He is sure that it was broken and/or burned upon discovery that he had chosen to side with Shinra.

50. A memory they’ve blocked out

I don't know that Tseng has very many memories that he's blocked out.  Tseng is very unflinching when it comes to facing who he is and what he's done and what's been done to him.  He believes in facing things head-on and in dealing with the consequences that brings.

Congratulations on making it all the way down here, omg. IT WAS SO LONG!!

All of the love. 💖

[lswriting]

So, I'm doing some research for my fic while there's a lull at work (like one does). Specifically, I wanted to double check Sephiroth's height and I found this handy-dandy website that lists specs for the main characters in FFVII.

And, excuse me, but, WTF??

He's TWO fucking meters in Remake?? Like, no, I'm not going with that in my current fic because I'm working on chapter 16/?? and it's far too late to introduce that little bit of trivia (plus this setting is more in line with Crisis Core's timeline but that's neither here nor there), but now I'm fighting down the urge to abandon this chapter in favor of writing a potentially hilarious one shot about Sephiroth being seven freaking inches taller than Vincent. I mean, Chaos would be miffed and would definitely make it into A Thing, I'm sure.

I'm just... WTF, Squeenix. What the Actual Fuck.

[gcldfanged]

032 , post-nibelheim era

032. — Force my muse’s arm behind their back.

Blood had seeped into the carpet, gumming up the fabric with thick viscera so dark it almost appeared black. President Shinra lay face first across his mahogany executive desk, as though he'd simply passed out in a drunken stupor. The zanbato embedded between his paunchy shoulder blades gleamed in the diffused glare of various spotlights surrounding headquarters, giving the legendary weapon an almost haunting glow.

It was a familiar, almost... comforting scene. If only the ostentatious interior design had been that of tacky crushed velvet and strobe lighting, the heavy reverberation of several bass stereos and the Masamune reduced to the size and make of a folding knife- Verdot's silhouette looming titanesque over him like one of Yama's celestial dogs swallowing the sun between his ivory fangs.

"Have you decided what you want to do?" I want to... be you. "You want to end up like me? You want me to turn you into a killer? You've already taken your first life, you don't need me-" I don't want to just be a killer, I want to be you. If you train me I'll do whatever you say, whenever and however many times you order me to. I won't complain, I won't quit, I won't hesitate. I'll take on more missions than anyone else so I can be you: perfect, the strongest, the best killer there is-

Did something die inside him that night or was something new birthed, he wondered- Gripping onto the elder man's fingers like an anchor, hands that only knew how to take away life- Not to protect, save, nor create.

"Yeah, he's been here. No sign of the target aside from the sword," he reported back into the mouthpiece of his PHS, slowly approaching the automated double doors leading to the helipad. It was strange, there was blood, sure.

No footprints, however.

Tseng and Rude were probably busy escorting Rufus through the building, it was his job to ensure that the coast was clear. He wasn't sure what to expect. Jae-hyo had figured once the fugitive acquired what he wanted, that he'd simply leave. Killing the President just read like an unexpected, but necessary detour from his original reason for being there.

"I'll keep an eye out, contact me when you're ready to go."

The agent folds up his phone and slips it back into his trouser pocket, before reaching for his sidearm. Yoon taps the barrel of his pistol against the side of his knee idly, hearing nothing save for the gentle strings of Brahms' Piano Quartet in G Minor.

A steely grip doesn't crush around his wrist so much as it pulls just so, twisting his ligaments and joints painfully. He's quickly and suddenly leveraged against the wall, pinioned like a half-trussed chicken, even his trigger finger seems to be locked in place due to the unnatural angle.

From the corner of his eye he can vaguely make out the trademark black greatcoat, little else. Sephiroth was considerably taller and had the additional advantage of being only the single greatest SOLDIER in the history of the entire program, so... Well, it was hard to feel sore about the whole being disarmed and reduced to the offensive capabilities of a turtle rolled onto the back of it's shell thing.

"Ah, I was wondering where you'd gone running off to," he managed to quip, quite the feat considering most of the side of his face was being smushed into the bulletproof glass that made up the floor to ceiling windows of the President's suite.

[marshiestars]

Tag 9 People You Want To Get To Know Better

thank you @scrawnytreedemon for tagging!! let’s begin, shall we? :3c

Three Ships: ughhhhh this is real hard because I JUST invented the most horrible, wonderful “why does it work” crackship a few weeks ago, but if I want to include it, I have to ignore one of my three big zelda ships :C

1. Ghiralink. because of course. I feel like it’s illegal to leave this one out or put it any lower. it’s the good food. it’s well-established. I can afford to be picky with my content. it’s great :D

2. Astlink! sorry Kohlink, but Astlink is less likely to scare half my audience away 😔.

tbh I’m still VERY surprised that Astor and Link aren’t paired together nearly as often as Zelast (Astor / Zelda). don’t get me wrong, both are rare pairs, but somehow Astlink is even *rarer* shksjhdjhsshs, and I can’t for the life of me figure out why. either way, it's 'moody goth bitch rejected by society (or maybe he rejected society first, it's a chicken or egg situation tbh) with the perfect golden person that everyone admires who secretly has their own issues'!! and it's about how they're on the complete opposite sides of this huge conflict and yet they find unexpected parallels in each other! and having everything fall apart but deciding to be a better person, even when the rest of the world says it's too late, because that one person believes in you and is willing to give you a chance! darkness and light! it's GOOD FOOD

(...man, I really gotta finish chapter 3 of swordsman and the seer.)

3. ...fuck it. scrawny, I hereby challenge you for the title of Weirdest Fucking Crossover Ship. Ghirahim x Godrick? Sephiroth x the Hollow Knight? I'm intrigued, but not crumbling to ash at the thought.

and so I give you this in place of gushing about Kohlink, which is unbelievably rare, but damn it, at least they're from the same source material! besides, I wasn't the first person to pair them by a long shot, no, no, no.

but there’s a special, lonely sort of pride in knowing you’re probably the first of 8 billion people in the world to ever even think of a pairing. ready? here it is:

R*x D*ng*rv*st x S*np*i from FNF.

(censored their names like that because if this shows up in the tags I’m gonna jump out a window)

yeah, man. I don't even know either.

I mean, I do know, somewhere, and my original train of thought is buried in the memory slush of a few months ago, gone forever. so now we're here. fuck. kill me. why am I writing shit for these two. girl what the hell is this

everyone who reads this post, I want a brick emoji in my inbox to simulate getting one through my window

First Ever Ship: ANYWAY, fuck, I don’t even remember at this point, I've been in greater fandom for so long. wait... oh, son of a bitch, nevermind, I do.

*sigh*

it was Billdip.

DO NOT COME AFTER ME, I DON’T SHIP IT ANYMORE. haven’t for years. I was 12. but I loved Bill Cipher (still do, he's my funny meow meow blorbo <3) and was very upset when the finale happened even though I knew that was how it had to be. but every time Billdip art came across my screen, I saw cool art where he: # 1. was still around and # 2. was more often than not a pretty human / humanoid (this was at the height of his sexymanification). hell, I didn't even give a shit about Dipper honestly, I just wanted more Bill content. and again, being literally 12, I didn’t really stop to think abt any moral implications. but yeah.

(also nowadays I hc Bill as ace sooo)

Last Song: 'She Had The World' by Panic! very nice to sing to, it's right in my range <3

Last Movie: does ‘My Little Pony: A Very Minty Christmas’ count? it’s a childhood film and practically tradition for me to watch it every year for christmas lol. although this year I’ve been replaying it for... research purposes. yeah. totally not for a lethally cursed fanfic, no sir.

if that doesn’t count, then ‘The Lego Movie’!

Currently Reading: nothing atm!! even as my 'to read' pile gets taller by the day, hhhh

Currently Watching: Minty Christmas, again, but definitely not so I can copy the dialogue verbatim to use as the base for a coked-up christmas crack fic

Currently Consuming: soup <3

Currently Craving: instant ramen, good god, especially if it’s spicy. they have cups for sale in vending machines around campus but they’re all beef and chicken flavour :C

I won't tag anyone else in this because nine people is a lot; far too many to bother with this wall of personal nonsense shdhdj but thanks anyway for tagging me scrawny, my beloved mutual!!! <3

[scorching-passion]

@ghostofnibelheim asked: It was a slow day at the bar in Edge, and the reason why couldn't possibly be because Sephiroth had been left alone at the helm. Failing to heed the unsolicited advice of his partner, he'd not opted for a more "civilian" look, and just wore what he wore best. The Masamune sorely missing, for the sake of the dozens of bottles and glass cups that would be destroyed by its lightest maneuver in the narrow space behind the counter.

Nine people had shown up so far. Three had backed out in a hurry. Two had asked for directions. Three more had opted for "just water", and the last one had asked to use the bathroom (they'd never come back from it, but Sephiroth suspected they'd left through the window. He'd heard some noises in the back).

As for the man himself, he was not at all bothered. This job was not his calling: being with Cloud was. And Cloud was not here. But he'd behave and not go after him, if only for the sake of keeping harmony in the house and not earn a scolding look from the blond upon his return.

When the door opened next with the telltale sound of bells jingling against its push, his eyes lifted from the book he'd been reading just long enough to register the figure of something short and quick making its way to the counter... at which point it disappeared from his field of vision. But he'd seen enough to know it was not an animal, at least.

"Are you lost?" He asked while his eyes shifted along the end of his current paragraph before he'd actually put the book down. Unprompted Asks - ALWAYS ACCEPTING

Small and fast was possibly quite right, perhaps in the eyes of the grownups and Bijou knew it all too well. The door was quite heavy for the youngster to push open, but the hot burst of adrenaline coursing through her system in her determination to:

1-) get as far away from papa as possible, for no other reason other than the fact that she could! and: 2-) to see if she could spy the man who lived in the sky place with his pretty hair and glowy eyes!

She'd managed the first one, at the very least, scooting her way beneath the many tables in this place, crawling between the gaps, shimmying into the open, all giggles and wide smiles in her bid to find the man in the sky.

Instead a deep rumbling voice would have her halt in her tracks just as she crossed beneath the bridge of the bar to make for the stairs, and she began to feel cold when she realised she didn't recognise the man speaking. Slowly she turned to be faced with a man she'd never seen before just staring back at her.

He was so very tall, taller than papa, even, who was the tallest person she knew... at least until now. But she tried, regardless, to puff out her chest beneath the shadows of this newest face and make her demands, just like papa had taught her... and instead she just glanced away, her face beginning to feel a bit warm and her tummy a little achy until she would meekly whimper:

"Y-you're not the man in the sky..."

[ghostofnibelheim]

surpassing-limits​:

      So the man were not stupid, in his own manner. It were good that Varis was taking care as to how to speak to him - besides that incredible power of his to cleave through steel with a weapon unknown as well as could kill without even being fully conscious at the time, he were quite perspective. But there were a streak of arrogance in him that the Emperor could see that he could rather see in his own son, which certainly didn’t bode too well if he were careless.

❝And it holds true here. So long as the results are worth it, however, those sacrifices are justified in the end. Even my life would be a small price to pay if it comes down to it. The purpose of learning beyond our world is to find the means to unify the broken people of our own here - the nations outside of this one are too reliant upon forces that ultimately destroys our world each time they are summoned by the beast tribes as well as those foolish to think they can control the forces that are known by many names. Eikons, primals, summons…❞

      From just out of eyesight of his father, the silver-haired man might see Zenos giving a tired look with a slight eyeroll at the slightly taller man as though he heard variations of this explanation many times. The Crown Prince knew that there were more to his father’s plans than he gave to both his people & to most outsiders, yet he cared little when he had his own agendas, anyway.

      Varis would raise a hand with a flick of the wrist, as though banishing the thoughts away. ❝Needless to say that we have our reason to seek out knowledge, to find the means to ultimately destroy those powers, but I understand that you likely not care. But that in itself is a question that eludes me; being encased in this mako material, you have slumbered, but now you are freed. What is it that you were meant to do?❞

Be it the dull meeting room of a megacorporation or the grandiose hall of an Emperor, it seemed that the general tone spoken by those within was the same. Many lofty words and causes that to Sephiroth were entirely lost. The man had read him well, and he was fine just with that. Secrets were the deep pockets of cowards and liars.

But even as the Emperor performed his litany of reasons and causes, the dry reception of his son didn’t go lost to their ‘guest’. Sephiroth did nothing more than let the shadow of a smirk show on his lips, cold vivid green eyes petrified on the ruler while in his mind, his idea was already made.

Perhaps Lord Zenos would find it interesting, as well.

What he was meant to do… would hearing it even make him capable of understanding? He wondered, whether this race had what it took to embrace the truth.

“You want so much, yet what you offer is so little.” Sephiroth spoke with slow and absolute cadence, a sneering huff through his nose as his head tipped down slightly; those reptilian eyes challenged the Emperor before him. “That life that you so quickly offered is old. Weak, and meaningless. I think you should up the stakes.”

As he’d done before in his prison, he lifted his left hand and swung to the side. In the same flash with which it had previously disappeared, the elongated blade materialized with a bright sheen. Its sharp surface travelled from his grip to the side… the point of its tip halting just a couple spans from Zenos’ chest.

“How about your heir, Your Highness? Is that a sacrifice you’d be willing to make for your broken people?” The warrior asked with a slow tip of his head in direction of the Crown Prince. “My knowledge against your own bloodline. Winner takes all.”

[phantasiiae]

What. The actual. Fuck.

When Sephiroth stalks over to him, Cloud stands to meet him, but it's a bit comical, isn't it? He has always been starkly aware of how much taller Sephiroth is than him, but it's quite evident now with how he leans over him. His hands curl into fists as he speaks, resisting the urge to just deck him in the face, if only for Aerith's sake. He had promised her he wouldn't start any fights, but god fucking dammit, it was so hard. He feels cornered even though he could walk away if he wanted, but it's almost like he's being kept here, even without their connection.

"You-!" Cloud sputters, his face turning red. That time in his life is still a blur. After his connections to Sephiroth and Jenova were severed so suddenly, his memories slowly began to come back to him. He had never been a SOLDIER, but he had been there when Nibelheim burned to the ground. How starstruck he had been until that moment of destruction. He would've done anything to get Sephiroth to acknowledge him then, but now...

He tries to collect himself, taking a deep breath, still painfully aware of how close they are. "Why even bring that up? That was fucking forever ago, and I still managed to kill you, even after you ran me through. Is that why you're so obsessed with me? Because I did what should've been impossible? You can be honest. It won't kill you again."

@hiislegacy

Sephiroth listened to him go on, and could plainly see the rage that was not-well regulated. How could it be, when his greatest enemy lay around in their safe spaces, lounging as though nothing terrible happened to any one of them. It only made the most sense to be one of the few to vocalize their concerns with this situation, and he allowed that to process in his own mind, wondering how he would feel if the roles were reversed. That was a first, to think about another besides himself, having not done so in a very, very long time. It was strange, and he still didn't know how to feel about it...

This, on the other hand, such comments, such threats being tossed his way, would not be something he'd allow to go on for much longer. So, he decided to finally stand up, after Cloud was finished speaking, and moved to be right in front of him, all of that imposing posture, even with the nearly-casual attire he wore; the presence of his former titles all coming into play here. This was the General, the War Hero, the monster of all his nightmares, now looking down at him with a quiet stare.

"You have way on speaking with your guests, Cloud. It is cute, this display of being fed-up, and concerned over what my intentions may be. Still... trust me, or not, I do not care. There's nothing to prove, and I can only try to atone for the mistakes I have made. Underestimating you was the greatest one, and I think so fondly on that moment, even now. My strong, little cadet... How the SOLDIER program was wrong to turn you away."

@phantasiiae

[skadren]

“you want the truth? the truth is when i love people it burns inside me like a poison. it infects every part of me until it feels like they’re in my goddamn soul…and then i fuck it up. and it’ll destroy us both“ valenstrifsodos babey!

taking angst + h/c prompts from here!

Genesis is in one of his moods today.

It's clear from the way he storms about behind the bar, his heels clacking angrily against the worn wooden floorboards as he sets down each glass with an aggressive clatter. Cloud hesitates from where he stands in the doorway, Vincent less than half a foot behind him, but the taller man halts without a single misstep, a steadying hand falling to rest against his shoulder.

"Well, don't just stand there gawking like a pair of buffoons, we're open," Genesis snaps without looking up. "Either come in and order, or stand clear for paying customers."

Cloud glances up at Vincent, troubled, but steps inside at his encouraging nod. As well as they've both come to know Genesis over the past year, Cloud still doesn’t understand what sets him off like this at times, only that time and ample attention soon have it vanishing like vapor in the sun. But it’s started happening more and more frequently, and while Vincent might have the patience to endure, Cloud can't claim to be the same-- he doesn’t know how much longer he can go without hurling his own frustrations back. Tifa would probably say they need to talk about it, but... Cloud has no idea how to bring up things like this, and the idea of him being the one to rock their still-fresh relationship--

No. No way. He can't do that. What if he's the only one this bothers, and this is the last straw before the other two decide he isn't a good fit for them, after all the trouble he'd caused before?

By the time Genesis's shift ends, the auburn-haired man seems considerably more approachable, and their walk back to their apartment passes in... not quite comfortable, but at least bearable silence. But when the door shuts behind them, surprisingly, Vincent is the one to say gently, "You've been in a bad mood lately, Genesis."

As always, Vincent has a talent for noting things without taking on a tone of judgment, and Genesis only looks mildly startled before his expression turns rueful. "I... suppose I have, haven't I?"

"You have." Vincent doesn't say it, but the invitation to speak about it is clear, and thankfully, Genesis responds in turn.

"I'm sorry," Genesis says, one hand caressing Vincent's cheek, the other reaching to taking Cloud's hand. "It's just... both of you have been gone so often, these past few weeks. I just... I suppose it gets a tad lonely, waiting all by myself for you to return."

Cloud's brows crease in a deep frown, and before he can stop himself, he accuses, "That's it? You were lonely, so you decided to act like an asshole? That tends to make people want to stay away, you know."

"I know," Genesis says, his gaze sharpening with something both guilty and angry. "Of course I know. But... I'm a very attention-seeking man, I'll have you know. No matter how I know otherwise, every time you're both gone, to feel as if I hold none of the attention of the two people I care for the most... You want the truth? The truth is when I love people it burns inside me like a poison. It infects every part of me until it feels like they're in my Goddess-forsaken soul... and then I fuck it up. And it'll destroy us all if I let it, just as it destroyed him. Sephiroth."

He looks just a bit apologetic at the way the name, as always, makes Cloud's fingers twitch in the barest of flinches, but continues nonetheless. "My obsession with challenging him to duel, my desperation for him to acknowledge me, the way it turned into resentment when I felt he did not-- there is very little I would not do to try to claim the attention of those I love, and I now understand too late the kind of strain my behavior put on his mental state. And yet try as I might to restrain myself, I still end up hurting you both."

Cloud sighs and softens, wrapping his free arm around Genesis in a half-hug. "That's not what I meant. I meant you could have just said you were lonely instead of... whatever you did. Then we could've figured something out."

"We appreciate the honesty, of course," Vincent inserts smoothly. "Knowing where it comes from... I understand why, now. But you aren't the same man you were back then, nor would you let youself act to the same extremes now. We wouldn't reject you over this, Genesis."

"You're both free spirits," Genesis defends, mouth twisting as if he can't quite believe their easy acceptance. "To attempt to chain you would only foster resentment. And I would gladly die-- hells, you would end me yourself-- before I enacted the same controlling possessiveness he tried to force upon Cloud. But clearly I still hold something of that tendency in me, if I so easily feel this way. I refuse to let a repetition of past mistakes be why our relationship ends."

"It won't be," Cloud says firmly. "Just because you have a 'tendency' or whatever doesn't mean it'll repeat. Especially now that you've told us-- now we can all work to make sure it doesn't happen. Weren't you the one who said communication was important?"

Genesis blinks down at him, then suddenly sweeps Cloud into a tight embrace, the shape of his smile, just a tad too bright to be smug, hidden in a nest of blond spikes. "I do believe I was, yes. My, when did our little bird get so smart?"

"Fuck off," Cloud grouses, but he relaxes, letting the low rumble of Vincent's amusement as he joins their hug sweep over him.

[sephirothisaslut]

Who We Fight For

His brow scrunches, and his eyes shift under their lids.

His face expresses discomfort and he slowly wakes.

Where is he?

He hears a hissing sound, like the sound of depressurizing a gas chamber. A cough bubbles out his throat. Then another, then another. It builds till it grows to a heaving fit.

What is this place?

His vision returns slowly as he realizes he’s been lying down in what looks like a stasis pod.

Who is he?

He looks around and sees there are several other like him. Disoriented, dizzy, scared. Eyes scanning the room, he realizes there are tens more like him.

He winces as he feels his mind pulse. He-...his name.

Cloud.

He tests his name in his lips. It fits. And despite it’s unusual nature, he feels as if it’s his.

BANG!

His eyes snap to one side of the room. A man slammed the door open.

“Get up you filthy maggots.” The man growls.

Everyone immediately scrambles out of their own pods. Standing awkwardly. Somehow Cloud feels the need to salute. And observes that some other men and women do too.

“My name is Hojo. And I’m the Director of this lab. And there’s been a...problem...with the pod terminals.” The man sneers. “And so some of your memories have been fragmented during the healing process.”

Cloud stills, processing the man’s words. Pods, terminals, healing processes. These are words he recognizes. Things he’s seen. He tries digging through his mind, looking for anything other than his name. He remembers gunfire. He remembers he knows how to fight. He remembers a war.

So he’s a soldier. A soldier of whatever institute this is.

“Everyone, follow me.” Hojo barks, then swiftly marches out the door.

Everyone merely follows him. Cloud assumes that everyone is the same here. Soldiers. But before he steps to follow the group, he suddenly remembers.

Sunshine, earth, flowers so white they look like they glow. Red fur, the setting sun, and silver hair.

Cloud freezes. What were those? Fragments? Yes... But why do they feel like so much more.

He shakes his head. He can deal with those later. And so he follows the group out the lab.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Hey Cloud!”

Cloud snaps his head up. “Reno, what do you want.” He grunts.

“Hey man don’t be that way. We’re chums! Best buds!” The red head hooks his arm around Cloud’s shoulders. His merry cheer reverberating through the hall.

“Fuck you Reno” Cloud rolls his eyes.

Reno is a Turk. Turks, Cloud learned, are spies. Unlike the infantry division, they wear black suits, and focus on missions involving stealth. They’re basically spies. They’re basically ShinRa’s dogs.

“Aww, you looove me” Reno’s eyes disappear as he smiles. 

“What do you want.” Cloud repeats. He has nothing against Turks. But for some reason. A part of him hates them.

Ever since he woke from that stasis pod, he hasn’t recovered any memories. But sometimes, his instincts would flare up. He distrusts most people in ShinRa, especially the Department of Research. His reactions to these instincts has caused him to retain a very bad track record.

“Nothing, just checking on you” Reno purrs.

“Then get off my back” Cloud says as he pushes Reno’s arm off. He walks away from the red-haired Turk, and leaves for his room.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Lieutenant Cloud Strife. This is the 35th instance of disobedience! Do you not have any integrity as a member of the ShinRa infantry!” The Major scolds him.

Cloud stares back into his eyes stoically.

“Lt. Strife, why did you intercept the arrest order! Answer!”

“Sir, it wasn’t right” Cloud stands his ground. 

“And pray tell, lieutenant, what part of it was not right?” The Major leans forward. His appearance shows his displeasure. A mere lieutenant talking back.

“Sir, they were children. This case should be handled by the city’s department of welfare and not by the militia.” Cloud is stubborn. But he knows he’s right.

“Those weren’t children. They are thieves.” 

“Sir the were being forced! By Dino no less!” 

“Shut up! I’m adding insubordination to your record. With this, demotion is not far off.” The Major snarls. “Dismissed! Get out”

Cloud doesn't salute. He just leaves.

It’s been a year since he woke from that pod. A year since he’s started under ShinRa’s corrupt thumb.

At first he was convinced that ShinRa was in fact where he belonged. But after several missions. Missions where they were told they are to be facing armed rebel forces, but only to be met with juveniles with rocks. Missions where they were told to fight against invaders, but only to realize that they themselves are the invaders. Missions on slaughter, injustice, and brutality.

Cloud knew something was wrong. And he’s not the only one. Several of his comrades have noticed inconsistencies. Some of them have brought this issue up with the research department, and were take for testing.

They never returned.

Cloud knew when to keep quiet. He’s not stupid.

He marches toward his barracks. Blood boiling, hot as smelted iron.

He’s decided. He’ll find his own truth.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It happened on a patrol shift.

Thanks to numerous disobedience reports, he’s been demoted to a sentry guard. A lowly patrol officer.

The night was a dull as always. The glow of Mako suffocating the stars. His bio-data indicated he was born in Midgar. So why does he know what the stars look like. He’s never left the city as far as he knows. Maybe this is just another confirmation of ShinRa’s lies.

He looks up, somehow feeling lonely. His shift will end soon.

Then someone bumps into him.

“Ah, sorry about tha-”

“Cloud?” The hooded person asks. His voice trembling.

“You know me?” Cloud’s eyes widen. Someone who remembers him. Someone who knows him. Someone who can hopefully help clear the fog in his mind.

“What? Cloud you-” The man approaches, but stills as he sees Cloud’s infantry uniform. “You’re ShinRa? But you hate-”

“Look I don’t have time. My shift’s ending soon. And if I don’t go on time ShinRa’s going to suspect me even more.” Cloud hurriedly explains. “Do you know me? Do you remember me?”

“I-... Yes, I do. Cloud what’s happening-”

“Long story short, woke up in a ShinRa stasis pod with missing memories. And I’m not the only one.”

The man grows solemn. “How long has it been since?” He asks in a whisper.

“2 years approximately.”

The man breathes out. He pauses as if to think. And then he draws down his hood.

Long silver hair ties into a braid spills down. His eyes a beautiful emerald green. He’s much taller so Cloud could clearly the shadows casted by the man’s eyelashes. He looks otherworldly.

“Sephiroth” Cloud whispers. Then his eyes widen. That name felt instinctive to him. For some reason he knows this man’s name. 

The man chuckles. “So at least you know my name. But we need to talk about this. Can you meet me later?”

Cloud nods. His mind too stunned to vocalize an answer. 

“Good. Go to the train graveyard at midnight. I’ll wait for you there.”

Before Cloud cold say goodbye, the man already walked away. His replacement already there informing him to go. Cloud returns to his barracks. 

On his way there, he ponders about the man. He’s seen him before. He knows him. He feels as if he is important to him.

“Sephiroth” Cloud whispers again. The name feels smooth on his lips. As if he’s said it a thousand times before.

He snaps out of reverie. He resolves to find the truth later tonight. For now, he’s going to take a nap.

But before he could enter his room, he was stopped by the Turks.

“Heya Cloud! We need to talk.” Reno waves.

Cloud tenses. It wouldn’t be strange if it were only Reno. But Rude, Cissnei, and even Tseng is there. He knows something’s wrong.

Before Reno reaches for him, Cloud runs.

They chase after him.

Cloud resolves. He’s confirmed.

He’s leaving.

He’s finding his own truth.

[gcldfanged]

[Continued from HERE.]

He isn't shocked that the other male is upset. So much had happened in such a short period of time, they hadn't been able to process anything, let alone breathe or relax. Jae-hyo was paranoid as ever, but couldn't leave weapons taped beneath tables and drawers for Al to get into. Sephiroth also did regular patrols around the perimeter of the property to ensure there weren't trespassers or scouts trying to ferret out their location. Between having the fix nearly everything in the abandoned hanok, they also had zero experience raising a child. Al had already tried to run away once before, but luckily he hadn't gotten hurt or lost. But that lone incident had managed to make both Seph and Jae realize they needed to deal with things in a more sensitive manner and arguing was not it.

They'd both apologized and agreed to prioritize Al's health and well being first and foremost, as they had before, but with more... situational awareness. He was just a scared kid who'd only known very business-like and unemotional interactions from people who treated him like a thing rather than a person. Sephiroth had mentioned being raised in a similar way, which sounded just about as horrifying as humanly possible. Yoon couldn't even imagine what either of them had to shoulder, all while being alone- completely isolated from anyone besides lab technicians and Shinra employees.

He immediately approached and sat down on his knees, wrapping both arms around the cage of the taller man's ribs. In any other situation, Jae would have been completely out of his element or a non-presence. He simply did not deal with real emotions of own, of course he'd balk at the concept of trying to emotionally support another human being. He wasn't even that great with Al, to be perfectly honest. As uncomfortable as these new and intense experiences were, he was finding it easier to express how he felt and communicate what he needed to.

"That's not true. I wouldn't have been able to do this without you, are you kidding?" he insists, rubbing his dominant hand in small circles between Sephiroth's shoulder blades.

"... Talk to me. Just tell me anything you want to say. I won't judge, I'll listen. I know the situation isn't ideal and that things have been tense. Anything that's hurting you or causing you stress- I want to be able to help shoulder that."

[whiitemateria]

Sephiroth was not the only one with a bitter memory of the scent of antiseptic.

As a child, Aerith had gotten so used to the tang of copper in the air, when she'd helped wrap her mother's bandages in fresh ones in the quiet of their room. She could always smell the disinfectant on her, like a sad perfume.

But she did not have quite the same stress now, did she? Sephiroth, however, he'd had it far worse. Not that she knew exactly, no, but she knew that being a SOLDIER was being changed fundamentally, and she knew that Sephiroth was more than just a SOLDIER.

Or, had been, as she meets his eye and notices something; his pupils. Blown wide with his anxiety as they were, she quickly sees it. They're different. They're — normal.

Which begged a curious question, didn't it? Where had the cells gone? She remembered, she knew, that Gaia would let nothing that was not its own return to it — so, what had the Lifestream done? Briefly, she starts but quickly compartmentalizes for there was something else to focus on, something much more immediate.

"Sephiroth! It's okay!" Her hands reach out to gently take him by the shoulders, yet she murmurs a softer, "I think ..."

Just as she says that, a voice calls out. "Goodness me, are you two awake?" It's an elderly tone, rasping around the edges, the tone of someone whose warm years had caught up to them but had not stopped them yet. Through a doorway comes an older gentleman whose tufted white hair stuck out in odd directions and whose glasses made his eyes seem three times bigger than they actually were. He doesn't even wear a white coat.

"Little miss, you shouldn't even be moving already— what if you'd fallen? You've been out for some time, after all ..." The man, who couldn't be much taller than Aerith, crosses the room to the two of them, eyes wide with a little bewilderment.

Only having caught the tail end of Sephiroth's anxiety, he adjusts his spectacles and says, "There's nothing to be worried about, lad. You're in good hands, here."

His mind is sluggish; the silence in his mind where once there had been maddening whispers and thought-breaking static is deafening. He hears his own heart beating, hears his own breathing, and when the girl makes her way over, the awkward shuffling fills his ears.

But his hearing is different, too. So is his eyesight. Neither are as sharp as he remembers them being, and part of his brain feels as if it strains to hear and to see clearly.

"...Did it...work?" Sephiroth asks, voice soft, hardly even a croaked, hoarse whisper, before suddenly he realizes that he recognizes the place.

A spike of panic shoots through him, and he'd thought he'd outgrown that ridiculous fear of hospitals, medical settings, and laboratories, yet he hadn't. Sephiroth sits upright, and if he'd had the strength in his body, he might have scrambled off the bed. As it is, he looks for an exit, a way to escape, never mind how the hospital gown slips off his shoulders.

"N-No--I can't be here--I have to get out!"

[aimeelouart]

Ok I've spent a few months lurking and just being a lil too nervous to ask about The Royal House Perdel, but now that I've read the premise ohmygod I love it. I would pay actual money to read it as a book one day.

WHAT. You’re my favorite now. I love you. Take my firstborn.

Since I assume you’re also here for FF7, have a little gift writing of my protag at age 7 hopping dimensions and interacting with the SSC Firsts.

They should have known something was off when they were able to corner Cloud so quickly, but they definitely figured it out when he started giggling.

“Cloud…?” Sephiroth asked cautiously, crouched a short distance from him.

“Pfft, ahaha, your faces!” He said, pointing and covering his mouth with the other hand. Bright orange-red bled out from the root of his hair, spreading down as the strands lengthened and curled. He grew a little taller, a little ganglier, and his face…

Not his face. That wasn’t Cloud at all, though how the laughing girl had accomplished such an effective disguise was a question for another time.

“Who the hell are you!” Genesis exploded. “Where is Cloud!”

“He’s busy,” the little girl said, breaking off her laughter to stick out her tongue at them. “Meanie. He’s following a Virtue! You can’t interrupt that!”

Sephiroth growled, standing up. “Genesis, with me. Angeal, start a conference call. We will begin where we lost Cloud.” He and Genesis darted off, leaving Angeal with the strange new child.

“Wonderful,” he sighed, pulling out his PHS and doing as Sephiroth had commanded. “Another one.” He caught the girl’s arm when she nonchalantly tried to waltz past him. “And where do you think you’re going?”

She blinked. “That way,” she said, pointing.

“Not when you’ve⁠—is that Cloud’s hair?” There was a tuft of pale golden hair clenched in her hand.

“Duh,” she said, “that’s the rule for the spell. ‘A dear thing, freely given. Closer to the skin, more power riven.’”

Angeal struggled to parse through the bewildering statement. “Because Cloud gave you his hair, you were able to...cast a spell to look like him?” He tilted her arm, looking her over for materia, but saw nothing. “Where’s your materia?”

She blinked at him. “What’s materia?”

He decided to abandon the line of inquiry entirely. “Where are your parents?”

Her expression turned sheepish. She scuffed the toe of her sandal across the concrete. “Umm...Granda’ is gonna come find me soon...I’m probably in trouble.”

For the first time, Angeal noticed the glittering jewels held in the intricate lacework of her sandals. They certainly weren’t materia, but they did tell him that her parents must have been very wealthy. “And why are you in trouble?”

She flushed and looked away. “I’m not s’pposed to go through the Gates…” she mumbled.

“The gates?”

“The Gates Between. The ones that cross the Empty Spaces.” She stared down at her feet, and nervously plucked at the hem of her skirt. “Granda’ can open the Gates cuz he’s Imperator, and I can cuz I’m a Mage but he says I’m too little. I’m not supposed to be here, but...but it was calling me! I had to!” She looked up at him with wide, unnatural golden eyes and a pleading little pout.

He had absolutely no idea what she was talking about.

⁠—

Genesis took one look at the little redhead sleeping contentedly against Angeal’s shoulder and said “no, no, we already have one, put that back.”

Angeal looked tired and a little defeated, leveling Genesis with an unimpressed glance. With Cloud in the wind, all they could do now was wait for some sign of his whereabouts—probably in the form of demolished ShinRa property. Which left them to deal with everything else for a while instead.

“Believe me,” he said, “I’m not particularly happy about this either. But her parents are impossible to find. She doesn’t exist in any records—and I do mean any records. Even the Turks can’t find anything. And I can’t exactly just leave her with someone.”

Genesis narrowed his eyes. “Why not?”

“She has...abilities. You saw the disguise earlier, but there’s more.” He looked vaguely disturbed, glancing down at the kid like she was a ticking bomb. “A lot more.”

Sephiroth sighed. “Naturally. That seems to be the theme lately, strange children with inexplicable abilities showing up on our doorsteps.”

Finally, a hint of humor broke through Angeal’s tiredness. “Well, look on the bright side. At least this one actually trusts adults.”

“Too much, if she’s sleeping in your arms two seconds after meeting you,” Genesis scoffed.

“The polar opposite of Cloud,” Sephiroth observed, a little bit of humor entering his tone as well.

Angeal shook his head. “Her parents have the resources to keep her very sheltered, from what I’ve gathered. She seems to think that all adults are inherently trustworthy, especially if they, and I quote here, ‘look like they belong in Mama’s First Legion.’”

Genesis and Sephiroth both paused.

“That...makes it sound as if her parents have a personal militia at their disposal,” Genesis said.

“Yeah,” Angeal agreed wryly, “it does, doesn’t it?”

—

She was like a spot of sunshine in the interview room—not an interrogation room, though it did have a one-way mirror and an attached observation space—beaming up at Tseng as she sat on her knees in the chair across from him. Unsurprisingly, the Turks hadn’t exactly had a booster seat handy with their typical interview equipment.

“What’s your full name?” Tseng asked, soft and polite. It was only Angeal’s familiarity with the young man that allowed him to detect the very slight edge of unease in his smile.

Angeal could understand. It wasn’t often that even he was presented with such unconditional trust and guileless curiosity, and the Turks certainly must have experienced it much less.

The little girl opened her mouth and proceeded to deliver an extremely well-rehearsed answer. “Ameliora Octavia, First Mage of the House Perdel, Blessed of the Thirteen,” she rattled off cheerfully, “Crown Princess and heir to the Perdelesian Throne, granddaughter of the Virtuous Emperor Celsus Caesar Perdel and the Virtuous Empress Julia Atossa Perdel, daughter of Caius Julius Perdel, High King of the West, and Fera Tullia Perdel, High Queen of the East.” She gasped in a breath, having spent her entire lung capacity on the extended answer. “You can call me Lora, though, I don’t mind.” She resumed beaming at him.

Even Tseng didn’t seem to know what to say to that.

Then Lora frowned abruptly. “Oh wait, I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.”

Tseng managed to get ahold of himself. “Why is that, Lora?”

She looked up at the ceiling as if trying to remember something. “Granda says that, uh, if I’m ever with strangers I’m supposed to...uhm...tell them ‘Lora’ but nothing else and wait until one of the Praetorians comes to get me.”

“I see. Lora, do you know where you are?”

“Nope!” she said, apparently unbothered by this fact.

“Do you know how you got here?”

“Uh-huh, I opened the Gate in the Archive because it was calling to me in the Strings, and then I walked the Empty Spaces until it felt right and now I’m here.”

Angeal glanced discreetly at the other Turks in the observation room. None of them seemed to know what the hell she was saying either, which was very reassuring.

Tseng looked like he wanted to sigh but restrained himself. “Do you know how to get back home?”

For the first time, Lora flushed crimson and ducked her head. “Umm...nooo…”

“No?”

“‘S why I’m gonna be in trouble...I know how to walk through the Empty Spaces but I dunno how to walk back yet…Granda will come find me, though.”

“How will he know where to find you?”

She blinked at him, and for a moment her unnatural golden eyes glowed like they had a SOLDIER’s mako gleam. “Granda will always find me,” she said. “He swore on the Thirteen the day I was born. ‘Sides, I��m a Mage. Magistra Mara says I look like a supernova when she uses the Strings to see me.” She smiled. “I’m hard to miss.”

“I see,” said Tseng, which was a bald-faced lie. “How old are you, Lora?”

“Seven and a quarter,” she said very seriously.

—

“Hey.” A little hand tugged on the bottom of his jacket and Reno practically jumped out of his skin. Shiva, it was the tiny unnatural demon child. With trepidation, he half-turned and looked down at her.

She was beaming up at him like he’d just given her the best gift in the world. He was absolutely certain that if he picked her up she would snuggle into his arms without a second thought.

It was hands-down the creepiest fucking thing he’d ever seen in his life.

“What,” he bit out, anxious to get away without looking like he was getting away. He could feel Rude laughing at him silently.

“C’mere,” she said, motioning him down. Reno glanced at her babysitter of the hour—Hewley—whose mako eyes promised death if he dared to scare or upset her. Reno weighed the odds for a long second and then slowly crouched.

Immediately, she buried her hands in his hair and started petting and patting, a puzzled little furrow to her brows. “Hey,” he said, jerking back a little, “what do you think you’re doing!”

“I’ve never seen hair like this,” she responded, peering closer.

“You have red hair,” he pointed out, growing increasingly uncomfortable. He could kill her a dozen ways with barely a flick of his hand and she was playing with his hair?

It was unnatural!

“Nuh-uh, my hair’s gold-red and and curls. Yours is all sticky-uppy and looks like an apple.”

“Well, that’s just how it was when I was born!”

“Oh. Huh.” Apparently that was enough for her. She released his hair and looked to Rude instead and Reno felt exactly zero shame for how fast he got up and moved out of range of her creepy, sunshiny eyes.

She motioned Rude down in the same way. He went, a lot more willingy than Reno had, even though Reno knew for a fact that is partner was also pretty fucking creeped out by her. All the Turks were. There was no one—no one—who had ever treated them with such unconditional trust. The little princess was genuinely happy to see them. Even Tseng was freaked out. Even Veld was, though he took it in stride like he did everything else.

Lora plucked the sunglasses right from Rude’s face and put them on. Her mouth made a little ‘o’ of surprise.

“Why would you want dark glass over your eyes?” She asked, holding them in place and looking around curiously.

Without missing a beat, Rude pulled a spare set of sunglasses out of his suit pocket and put them on. Lora giggled. Reno shamelessly abandoned his partner and speed walked away.

—

“Hello, my dear.”

Lora looked up, blinking at the strange man who’d addressed her. “Hello,” she said cheerfully. She was, technically, breaking the rules by wandering around like this, but she was just so curious. There were so many strange things in this place! And sometimes breaking the rules led to wonderful things, like coming here.

“Would you like to see something interesting?”

She gasped in delight. “Yes! What is it?”

“Come with me and I’ll show you,” he said, offering a hand. She took it without hesitation. It was weirdly cold. The man reminded her of her uncle Brutus, who stared at her all the time and Mama always glared at. Uncle Brutus was weird.

She remembered that she actually had to introduce herself here, because people didn’t automatically know her name. “I’m Lora, what’s your name?” she said.

The man smiled. “You can call me Professor Hojo, my dear.”

[Part 2]

[s-ephiroth]

Sephiroth Week 2020 ( @week-of-silver-winds )

Day 1 - The Cat In The Box [Specimen]

( Also available on AO3 )

"Are you still sure you want to go down there?" Genesis asked him. "There's still time to back away, you know? After all, he was the one who—"

"Yes, I'm aware of that. He did it three times. It's seared into my soul by this point."

He chuckled, but the sound of it was slightly off; a little anxiety showing its colors during their exploration of the place, though Sephiroth would refuse to admit it. It could've been an eternity since then, but still. Walking through areas so full of medical equipment — abandoned medical equipment — never failed to do a number on him on the inside.

"I know that you're aware. What I mean to say is that, once awake again — if we can get him to wake up, that is — he'll try again, Sephiroth. And he will succeed if he tries."

"Of course. That's what he does," he nonchalantly spoke of the matter, "Then I die, and it'll happen again and again and again. Maybe this time he'll even keep something of mine as a trophy, I believe. It wouldn't be so bad. A proof of my existence for the museums and all that. Not that I really want the fame."

"Sephiroth, please. I'm trying to show concern for your well-being here."

"Hn. I always thought you reserved that for Angeal only, after all that happened. And yet, here we are."

Genesis let out a dramatic sigh.

"You're insufferable. Is this, by any means, some sort of revenge for Loveless? Hitting the bits where it hurts worse?"

That of all things stole a little smile from Sephiroth. A little maybe. But that really was Sephiroth, so it was likely to be part that and part dodging the concerns of others about himself… albeit in a somewhat twisted way. A wounded wolf trying to bite when poked right in his wounds. Fair enough, but still—

"Bastard," Genesis mumbled under his breath, with a little touch of poorly disguised fondness.

Sephiroth had approached the door to the next chamber and pressed a hand against it, gently. Even under his gloves, the metal felt cold. It was falling apart at the edges and somewhat rusted, as most of the underground structure seemed to be after that long, but it still held itself up.

Unlike the rest of the city.

Unlike him.

"So are you," he mused aloud, "and you know it. The two of us are bastards... Unlike him."

"Who? Your murderous cat inside the box?"

Sephiroth shook his head and simply said, "No, Angeal."

Another sigh.

"You speak of me but you hold him on a pedestal way more than I do, you know that? He… our Angeal… could be a bastard, too, when he wanted. Sometimes a sneaky one at that. A soft bastard."

Genesis was pretty sure that he heard Sephiroth mumbling "our Angeal" under his breath before trailing off to process what it could've meant. He itched to explain his point about that, but thought that Sephiroth wouldn't believe him even if that bit of extra information was presented to him. So he left it at that and forbade himself from thinking once more that, had things not fallen apart as spectacularly as they did, he could've sat down in his living room at Shinra back in the day with Angeal and Sephiroth both and possibly arrived at a pleasant agreement about what he wasn't explaining directly now.

He focused on the fact that Sephiroth and him were deep down into the ruins of what used to be Deepground, instead.

And that they probably shouldn't be, but Sephiroth insisted on coming and opening the box; to discover if the cat inside was alive or dead. Or severely traumatized and ready to kill someone.

"I miss Angeal," Sephiroth said, "I wish he was here."

If he was, Genesis thought, would there be a cat inside the box to be found?

"Me too," he agreed, instead, "I miss him every day."

Sephiroth had to tear the door down, just like many others on the way. The rust eating away at them made the things troublesome to open normally, even for him. And if he stopped to open them the regular way, he would hesitate.

He was already troubled enough about it that he had to ask.

"What would anyone do to Cloud for him to be down here?"

"Guess."

"But Hojo was dead long after my last revival—"

"Wrong guess. But warm. Try again."

Sephiroth stared at him a little dumbfounded, but tried to think. That was Deepground and he had been down there a few times, under Hojo's supervision. To test things that would disrupt other people's work if tested in the building above. Things that scarred his spirit. Genesis had also been there, he had told him, kidnapped by the rebellious Tsviets and asked to "participate". Asked to offer his cells to them so they could—

"Someone else tried to clone him…?"

What for?

"Bingo," Genesis smirked, "I still don't quite know what for, but if I had to guess... Well, he killed you. When there's someone who can kill a certain Sephiroth in the world and when said Sephiroth is a threat to said world, you have to make sure that certain someone continues existing somehow, you know?"

"That's… idiotic. His clones wouldn't be him. He had to be himself to manage what he did. I don't think it would have worked otherwise."

"Oh. You put him on a pedestal, too. I see."

"I was merely stating the truth as I know it. It wasn't a matter of his strength or ability, but a matter of the technique he used. His capacity of adapting and improvising can't be copied."

"If you say so. But your eyes do sparkle when you speak of him, old friend. I stand by my point, still." Genesis took to leading before continuing, "I only found out because his clones started showing up dead in a few places. And especially now that you came back, it became possible to trace his location."

"Oh… Lucky me," Sephiroth mumbled sarcastically, a little distracted by the conversation, despite the horrifying nature of the topic. After all, he had been to the labs before as basically a lab rat through a significant portion of his life.

He never wished the same on anyone.

But Cloud… Cloud had somehow ended up that way as well, more than once, aside from all the poking around in his mind that Sephiroth himself, along with Jenova, ended up doing.

Hence why, among several other reasons, Sephiroth froze in place when his eyes landed on the mako tube containing him; probably the only truly preserved thing in that entire laboratory.

He didn't look a day older than the last time they fought, aside from his wild, long hair. Sephiroth stared him up and down; his mind a thousand miles away from there, from the scars on that body, mainly those in the center of the chest.

I don't put you on a pedestal, he thought to himself.

I never put you on this pedestal, I—

"...Sephiroth?"

It's Hojo and his legacy who put people on these pedestals. I know it, because—

"Sephiroth, are you listening to me?"

He put me on a pedestal.

"Sephiroth!"

Sephiroth blinked slowly once Genesis stood in front of him and pulled him down a little — because somehow, Sephiroth had returned from the dead even taller than he was before — to keep him from looking too much at the mako tank; to remind him to breathe.

Not that he had forgotten how to breathe. It was more that his breathing had gone all over the place with that sight.

If they all went back in time, that could've been him; staying in the tank for a solid two weeks because Hojo had been dissatisfied with his performance on tests. Grounded in the mako to reflect about his failures.

“Do you… do you want to wait outside?” Genesis asked, a little hesitant, “I definitely can handle—”

“No. It’s… it’s fine, I just… I just— Ah. Let’s just get him out.”

At that, Genesis just stared at him for a few, but far too long seconds before letting go with a sigh and turning to face the cause of their… visit. Would the mako still be fully liquid in there? Or would it have started to solidify by that point? He wondered. Wondered but didn’t let himself get distracted by such thoughts; moving fast to compensate for Sephiroth’s stiffness.

The machines, unlike the doors, could no longer be operated normally. So breaking the glass it was.

Breaking the glass and watching that wild cat fall right into Sephiroth’s arms, trembling like a fish out of water.