#hmm I miiight post this on ao3 later idk

[foreststarflaime]

One morning at Shinra Sephiroth has a black eye for 3 hours. He will acts like nothing is wrong. Rumors spiral around. What happened?

-Early that morning-

Angeal was away on a mission. That’s usually the first sign proceeding an incident of this nature. Sephiroth and Genesis left together unsupervised—Lazard keeps an extra stash of painkillers in his desk just for this kind of occasion.

They’d been tame enough last night. Genesis had managed to civilly (for once) coax Sephiroth away from his paperwork and into his apartment, where they had proceeded to devour the leftover pie Angeal had left them while watching movies until late in the night. Genesis—who had only just returned from a mission himself, and was lacking on proper sleep—had gotten perhaps a little too comfortable, and had perhaps bought too plush a sofa, since he had slumped over further and further until he had fallen asleep on Sephiroth’s shoulder. Sephiroth, unusually comfortable himself, had been disinclined to extricate himself from the situation, and had drawn the blanket up to cover them both and slept the night through right there.

They’d even been civil for a record amount of time after they’d woken up. Perhaps Genesis’ penchant for chaos had been temporarily soothed by the rare sight of Sephiroth fast asleep and curled up against him like a contented cat, his silver hair turned to gold in the morning sun peeking through the window. Perhaps the sight had stirred him to an act of love instead of mischief, since instead of grabbing a permanent marker to draw a mustache on that perfect face like he’d always wanted, he carefully pulled away—smiling fondly at the barely-audible noise of protest that prompted—and moved to the kitchen to make breakfast.

The problems started soon after.

Sephiroth was watching Genesis move about the kitchen, his head ever so slightly cocked. Genesis, mid-attempted-pancake-flip, noticed this and snorted.

“What?”

“You are…making pancakes?”

“So I am. Don’t look so surprised—or are these not up to his picky highnesses’ royal standards?”

“I…am not opposed to pancakes.”

“My friend, your desire is the bringer of life, the gift of the goddess.” Genesis flashed him a fond smile. And flipped the pancake again. Sephiroth followed it with his eyes intently, almost involuntarily.

He was silent for a moment. Then—“didn’t Angeal make fresh pancakes not three days ago? Were the leftovers not in his freezer?”

Genesis cursed and nearly dropped the pan. He had definitely forgotten about that. Trying to pass it off as him having burned his finger, he tried to save face. “What, would you rather have Angeal’s frozen days-old pancakes than my fresh ones made with love? Do gestures mean nothing to you?”

A hint of a mischevious smile ghosted Sephiroth’s face. Genesis did so love encouraging that look in him, but it was unfortunate when it was turned against him. “Angeal’s food usually tastes better. He actually reads the recipes.”

“Well, maybe I just have better things to be reading, dear. I’ll have you know, anything Angeal can do I can do with style.” He flipped a pancake with a flourish to emphasize this, higher than the last. Sephiroth tracked its movement like a cat stalking a mouse. Genesis finally noticed this and smirked widely.

“That does not seem…efficient,” Sephiroth commented. “Are you not worried about it falling?”

Genesis just smirked wider, and flipped the pancake higher. “I’ve skill enough.”

“Hm.” Sephiroth’s eyes were slightly dilated, like a predator on the hunt. “…How much?”

A challenge. Excellent. Genesis flipped the pancake several feet into the air. Sephiroth was perfectly still.

“We seek it thus…” Genesis weighed the pan in his hand—“and take to the sky!” He flipped the pancake with all of his dramatic prowess. The pancake sailed up, up, up, flipping and flipping…

And promptly collided with the ceiling. And stayed there.

Sephiroth blinked at Genesis. Genesis blinked at Sephiroth.

No one who presumed to have any sort of familiarity with Sephiroth would have recognized the shit-eating grin that spread across his face. Sephiroth took out his PHS, opened to his messages with Angeal, clicked the photo option, and began to point it at the ceiling-cake.

With a yelp, Genesis launched himself at Sephiroth. Sephiroth gracefully pirouetted out of the irate redhead’s path, moving to reposition his PHS. Genesis, for once knowing when he was bested in outright battle, decided he had a better chance of getting rid of the evidence before it could be documented.

Clambering onto the counter, he grabbed Rapier from where it was leaning and used it as a sort of stilt on which to balance to reach the errant pancake. His fingers brushed the edge, and a little of the batter peeled off onto the floor, but a gibbous of pancake still remained, mocking him. Sephiroth was laughing. Genesis strained a little further—why were these ceilings so high?—and just managed to grasp the rest. Sephiroth was moving towards him now, PHS lowered, and Genesis straightened in triumph and indignation—

And promptly felt Rapier slip out beneath him with a horrid sound against the kitchen tile. Flailing, he went down hard. Sephiroth attempted to catch him, but Genesis felt his elbow strike something painfully and they both went down hard.

Genesis scrambled for the PHS, scanning the miraculously uncracked screen to find the delete button—but the evidence had already been sent. “FUCK!”

“Hm,” Sephiroth hummed, sitting up with a hand to his eye. Genesis glanced over at him and did a double take.

“Fuck.”

-3 hours later-

“I dunno, Kuns, doesn’t seem all that believable to me,” Zack mumbled in between bites. Sephiroth was sitting a few tables away, sporting a nasty black eye (partially concealed by what appeared to be hastily-applied makeup), nonchalantly cutting up his lunch. Genesis was nowhere to be seen. “They wouldn’t be that clumsy. They’re Firsts! They have, like, crazy reflexes! I bet he got it from some spy that snuck in or something. That would be totally badass. Where’d you hear that rumor from, anyways?”