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sephirthoughts · 6 months ago

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Vincent Got a Phone

Vincent got a phone and then Aerith adopted him as her friend, and all kinds of other shit started happening and he's very tired.

ships: valenwind, background sefikura, background aerti

rating: not explicit yet but soooooooo close

Chapter 5: Shut the fuck up, Sephiroth!

“Wait, wait! Everyone calm down! He’s not here to fight! I asked him to come!”

This elicited stunned silence from the group, in which the sound of Cerberus’ hammer clicking back rang out very clearly, followed by Vincent’s deep voice.

“Care to elaborate?”

“Of course I’m going to explain,” Cloud said, trying not to stare directly into the triple barrel, that was now trained on him. “Sephiroth and I have been…talking. He wants to turn over a new leaf. He doesn’t want to be our enemy, anymore.”

“What the hell do you mean, he doesn’t want to be our enemy!” Tifa demanded. “Like that’s something he gets to decide?!”

“I know things have been complicated between us and him, in the past. That’s why he has something he’d like to say to everyone. Go ahead, Seph.”

The angelic, silver haired, six-foot seven-inch tall, black leather clad man stepped forward. “I am very��” He glanced discreetly down at a slip of paper concealed in his gloved palm. “Sony.”

“No—sorry!” Cloud whispered, elbowing him in the side. “You’re sorry!”

“Sorry,” Sephiroth corrected.

Tifa stared at him. “You’re…sorry. After everything you’ve done, you’re just fucking sorry?! You killed my father! Cloud, he killed your mother!!”

“Tifa, please, just hear me out,” Cloud said, in a conciliatory tone. “I know better than anyone what he’s done. That’s why you’ve got to trust me. It’s complicated, and I know it’s hard to understand, right now, but it really wasn’t his fault. He’s just as much a victim in all this as we are.”

“Oh, he’s a victim, is he?” she retorted. “Then who the fuck is the culprit!”

“Shinra.” Everyone turned to look, in surprise, because it was the normally reticent Vincent, who had now spoken for a record-breaking third time, in a single conversation. “When Hojo did this to us—made us into monsters—Shinra not only allowed it, they condoned it. They knew he was committing atrocities, and they stood by and watched, just like they always do. Because they will do anything to grasp more power. No matter who they have to destroy, to do it.”

“Exactly,” Cloud nodded. “The rest of you haven’t been in that place. You can’t imagine what it’s like. And what they did to me, doesn’t even compare to the torture they put Vincent and Sephiroth through. That’s why…I’m going with him.”

“Going with him, where?” Aerith asked. “What do you mean?”

“First, we’re going to make Hojo pay for what he’s done. He’s responsible for destroying countless lives. But at the end of the day, he’s still just a cog in the machine. After we deal with him, we’re going to take Shinra apart, piece by piece, till not a single brick is left standing. I know this is sudden, and probably seems totally out of the blue, so I don’t expect anyone to help us. But…if any of you want to come with us, I’d be grateful for it.”

Vincent lowered his arm and holstered Cerberus. “I am willing put aside past grievances and cooperate with you, for now. Shinra owes us a debt of blood. I will see it repaid.”

“Well, shit. If Vinnie’s in I’m in,” Cid sighed. “If you’re lookin to take down Shinra, y’all are gonna need a ride.”

“Thank you, guys,” Cloud said. “I knew I could count on you.”

Sephiroth dipped his chin, to Vincent. “Thank you, father.”

Vincent silently returned the salutation.

“Father??!!” exclaimed everyone else except Aerith, who said, “Ohhh. I totally see it.”

“Uh…Vinnie?” Cid asked, uneasily. “Why’s Sephiroth callin’ you father?”

“Because he’s my son,” Vincent replied flatly, still looking across the table at Sephiroth. “But I didn’t know he knew that.”

Yuffie made a face. “So you…with his mother?”

“No. They used my genetic material, without my knowledge. Sephiroth was told his parents were dead. He was raised in a lab, like a specimen. Systematically isolated and tortured, brainwashed into a living weapon, and set loose to commit war crimes, at the age of fourteen. When he learned the truth about his origins, he had a psychotic break, and under the influence of Jenova, defaulted to the only thing he’d ever known: violence.” Vincent turned his crimson eyes on Tifa, one flashing with a hint of gold. “Given that context, Ms. Lockhart, would it not be fair to say that perhaps, he is not entirely culpable for what he has done?”

Tifa lowered her head, biting her lip in anger and frustration, and Yuffie wrapped comforting arms around her.

“Look, I don’t expect anyone to process all of this, instantly,” Cloud spoke up. “I know it’ll take time to accept. But I asked you all here tonight, because I didn’t want to keep hiding this part of my life from the people I care most about.” He slipped his hand into Sephiroth’s and they interlaced their fingers. “I’m not asking for your blessing, but it’s important to me that you all know where I stand. Because Sephiroth and I are—uh. We’re…together.”

“Oh, ho ho!” Aerith chortled, whipping out her phone to type something on it.

“Ah-ha! That’s why I seen ya goin’ into that love hotel!” Cid asserted, swaying in his tipsy vehemence, but finding himself immediately steadied by a gauntleted hand on the small of his back. “You two musta been meetin’ up, on the sly!”

Cloud looked his way, unhappily. “You were spying on us, Cid?”

“Tch. Hell naw. I don’t have time for that shit. I was mindin’ my own business and I saw ya standin’ right there on the street, out fronta the place. Y’ain’t exactly easy to miss.”

“Tell me one thing,” Vincent said sternly (with his arm still around Cid’s waist). “That night at the Mega Karaoke. You didn’t fall into the door, at all, did you?”

Cloud laughed sheepishly. “Uh. About that. We thought that was our room. Seph was being kind of…playful and pushed me inside. When he saw you guys he poofed, so you didn’t see him.”

“Wow, you two were in such a hurry to get down, that you mixed up the rooms?” Aerith smirked.

“It’s not like it was our fault! That karaoke place should be prosecuted, what kind of assholes have a room 8B and a room B8? What is your numbering system, even?”

“Well, damn,” Yuffie remarked, raising her eyebrows. “Cloud really recruited a world-class supervillain for team good-guys, just like that. How good is that bussy?”

“How good is what?” Vincent asked, looking alarmed.

Aerith giggled gleefully and kept tapping her phone screen.

Tifa was still glaring at Sephiroth, who didn’t appear to notice, likely because his serpentine eyes hardly ever left Cloud.

Cid was rubbing his stubble, thoughtfully. “Does this mean Cloud’s gotta call Vinnie father-in-law now?”

“Never,” Cloud said.

“Please do not,” Vincent said at the exact same time.

“This is fucked!” Tifa shouted, giving everyone a second jolt. “You’re fucking mentally ill, Cloud! This guy is a mass-murderer!”

“Why are you acting so shocked about it?” Cloud asked, frowning. “You’re the one who said you already knew all about us.”

Tifa faltered, taken aback. “I what?”

“That day I ran into you and Yuffie, hiding behind the flower cart. Don’t you remember? You pretended it was a hypothetical, but you said your friend was dating someone who was bad for them and might get hurt. You told me you saw us together, and everything.”

“I wasn’t talking about you!” Tifa said, practically beside herself with exasperation. “I was talking about Aeri and Mr. Valentine!”

Aerith looked up from her phone, wide-eyed. “Eh? Who and who??”

“There’s no use pretending anymore, Aeri!” Yuffie said, pointing a righteous finger at her. “We saw you with Mr. Valentine at the Mega Karaoke.”

“Uh…huh,” Aerith replied drily. “Well, to be fair, you actually saw me with Cloud and Vincent.”

“I saw you and my father alone, together,” Sephiroth interjected. “You were embracing one another.”

“Shut the fuck up, Sephiroth! This doesn’t concern you!” Tifa fired back.

“Yeah, and stop calling Vincent your father, it’s weird,” Yuffie poked her head out to add, then ducked back behind Tifa.

Vincent, meanwhile, had withdrawn his arm from around Cid, and was standing there looking stricken. “You…you all thought that Aerith and I were…together? Cid? You too?”

Cid scratched his head. “Uh. Well, ain’t ya?”

“I confessed my feelings to you, three nights ago,” Vincent said, lowering his voice. “Do you believe I’d have done such a thing, if I were attached to another person? What kind of man do you think I am?”

Now it was Cid’s turn to look gobsmacked. “Y’did what, now?”

“I told you how I feel.”

“Well…yeah. About Ms. Aerith. Didn’t ya?”

“About you! You rejected me. You told me you’d support me but you needed time. You seemed upset and you left rather abruptly.”

“That’s cause I thought you were talkin’ about bein’ soul mates with that little girl!” Cid said, throwing his hands up in vexation. “No offense, Ms. Aerith.”

“Well, offense taken! A lot of offense taken!” Aerith returned, planting her hands on her hips. “You all thought Vincent and I had something romantic going on? And no one even bothered to ask us about it??” She turned her flashing green eyes on Tifa and Yuffie, who flinched visibly. “And I bet it’s all because you two troublemakers started meddling, and confused everyone.”

“In our defense, it was all Tifa’s idea,” Yuffie declared. “She bullied me and made me go along with her crazy scheme.”

Tifa looked theatrically offended. “What?! You shitty brat, I barely bullied you at all!”

“So, thanks to you two and your little witch hunt, Cid and Vincent think they’ve been rejected by each other,” Aerith continued. “And along the way, you managed to scare Cloud into coming clean about his actual secret affair, so now we all have to sit here, watching him be lovey-dovey with mommy-issues mcdoomsday, right in front of our salads! No offense, Sephiroth.”

“None taken,” the heretofore extremely volatile superhuman replied, causing everyone to turn and look at him in disbelief. He straightened up and crossed his arms on his impressive chest. “I thought it was funny. Also, a fairly accurate characterization.”

“Aeri, um…about the Mr. Valentine thing,” Tifa ventured. “We didn’t just pull that out of thin air. You two have been in each other’s rooms a lot, lately.”

“And going out together in public a lot, too,” Yuffie concurred.

“And, again, I did see you embracing in the karaoke room,” Sephiroth put in helpfully.

“Shut! Up!” several people said to him, in unison.

“Yes. I admit it. I was hugging my friend. Fucking sue me!” Aerith retorted, growing surprisingly heated, to the point where her eyes began to glisten and turn pink at the rims. “Girls who are just friends can hang all over each other, all day long, but people suddenly become such puritans, when it’s a man and woman! And just for your information, Ti-chan, you should be more concerned about me going into your room, than Vincent’s! Because I AM A LESBIAN!”

With that, Aerith kicked a chair out of her way and stormed off.

“I’ll…go talk to her,” Tifa said, and hurried after her friend.

“I think we, as a group, need to work on our communication,” Cait Sith said sagely, from the chair beside Cid’s.

“Gah!!” Cid yelped. “What the—where the hell’d you come from?!”

“I’ve been here the entire time,” the feline automaton said, sounding wounded. “The rest of you noticed me, didn’t you?”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, in which everyone (except Sephiroth) suddenly developed an engrossing interest in the carpet or the ceiling tiles. It was into this bewildering atmosphere that the waitress descended, like a suspenders and bow-tie clad angel of mercy, with her notebook and a jaunty smile. “So, how are we all feeling about entrees, this evening?”

Thus it happened that our motely assortment of weirdos (minus Aerith and Tifa) sat down to an awkward, but relatively congenial supper, with the man who’d been the primary antagonist in most of their lives, for the past several years, at least.

If they had any suspicions, however, regarding their erstwhile arch-enemy’s real motives, they were at least somewhat allayed by the disgustingly adoring way he focused on Cloud, as if the young man were his sun and moon, and he could see nothing else.

Cid and Vincent, meanwhile, mostly drank in silence (whiskey based cocktails and red wine, respectively), because whenever they did speak, they kept bumbling and being over-polite to one another, in their mutual discomfiture. Pretty much everyone was relieved when dinner was over. Except Sephiroth and the cat, who seemed entirely immune to embarrassment.

“So, Sephiroth,” Yuffie said, eyeing the monumental man cagily, as the party strolled out of the restaurant. “Are you still, like, batshit insane?”

“Yes,” Sephiroth replied. “But I am…working on that.”

“Are you planning on killing any of us?”

“No.”

“Bearing in mind that destroying the world counts as killing us.”

“I have given up global genocide,” Sephiroth said, glancing at Cloud. “My lover is rather attached to this world, as it turns out.”

“Welp, good enough for me. As long as I never have to hear you say the word lover again, welcome to the team,” she pronounced. “With you on our side, we can totally rail Rufus Shinra’s ass!”

“Seriously, work on your phrasing, Yuff,” Cloud groaned. “It’s getting ridiculous.”

“Huh? What did I say? Cloud! Get back here!!”

“So, uh. We probably oughta talk,” Cid said to Vincent, after they separated from the others.

“I suppose we should,” Vincent agreed, casting a sidelong glance at him. “Shall we go to the hotel garden?”

“Or we could, uh…we could go to my room,” Cid mumbled. “Y’know. Have a cup of coffee, or whatever.”

Vincent paused, scrutinizing him closely. “Are you still drunk?”

“Yeah, kinda,” Cid admitted, flushing pink, under his crimson gaze. “That’s the only reason I got the balls to be talkin’ to ya, right now.”

Vincent arched a black eyebrow. “I trust you are aware what asking a gentleman back to your room for coffee implies.”

“Tch. We’ve shared rooms about a hundred times, Vinnie. Am I supposed to be worried you’ll think I’m a slut?”

Vincent’s crimson eyes glowed a little more intensely, but he looked away quickly, to conceal it. “Coffee it is, then.”

They were already at the walkway intersection, between their two rooms, so Cid led the way, as casually as he could pretend to be—which was to say, not very. Vincent was always just his buddy Vinnie, to him. He fit in the Vinnie category and did Vinnie things, and that’s how it was.

Now that he was looking at his friend from a different perspective, he was suddenly, keenly aware of Vincent as a whole entity, outside their friendship. As it turned out, Vincent Valentine was an extremely intimidating man.

Before he became an actual monster, Vincent had already been a highly trained killing machine. Underlying his general aura of somnolent malaise, Cid was aware of the cold calculation and hyper-competence of the Turk.

Physically, he was a superior specimen. Tall and slender, but agile and astonishingly fast. Despite his ostensible indifference, and tendency to fall asleep standing up, Vincent’s whole being was suffused with quiet ferocity. Cid had seen the man snap out of his apparent ruminant state into decisive and deadly action, enough times to know that Vincent’s languor was a predator’s grace. Like a panther in repose.

And all of that was before one took into account the literal demon under his skin, looking out from that gold ring in his crimson eye, awaiting its moment to burst loose its bonds and drown the world in darkness (which idea Cid found a lot sexier than he probably should have).

His hands shook with nervousness as he unlocked the door, so much that he fumbled and almost dropped the key. But miraculously, he managed to recover, and they got into the room without him making any more excessively embarrassing blunders.

Cid’s room had a sort of steam-punk aesthetic, somewhat like the inside of an airship. It featured exposed brass pipes and other unnecessary but interesting embellishments, and the bedframe had been constructed from the actual fuselage of an old plane.

It had those awful, modern, overhead lights, too, but at the moment, it was lit only by the two lantern-style gas lamps on the wall, on either side of the headboard, so the illumination was warm and diffuse, and not troublesome to Vincent’s eyes.

Vincent took a seat on the distressed leather sofa, in front of the steamer trunk, that served as a coffee table, while Cid set about brewing a packet of hotel-provided coffee in the almost laughably small hotel-provided pot.

“So, uh. About the other night,” Cid began, after he’d placed their mugs on the steamer trunk, and sat down beside Vincent. “I said it already, but I’m sorry for actin’ like a jackass. I misunderstood about as bad as it’s possible to.”

“It was an understandable error, given that there were outside parties interfering,” Vincent replied charitably, blowing the steam off his mug.

Cid shook his head. “It’d be easy to say I had everything all wrong on account of them girls tellin’ me a whole lotta nonsense, but that’s a cop-out. There ain’t no changin’ the fact I made assumptions and didn’t ask ya myself. It’s my own fault. Also, I didn’t know you were…I mean. I never thought to ask, and you never told me. About the, uh. The umbrella.”

“No more umbrellas, please,” Vincent said, with a grimace. “Euphemizing and speaking obliquely is what caused all of this mess, in the first place.” He set his mug back down and looked Cid in the eye. “Cid…I like you. I like you in a romantic, non-platonic way. I’ve never felt this way about a man, and I have no idea how to label or define it. I only know that it is. And it is not a short-lived infatuation, or the impulse of a moment. I have felt this way for quite some time.”

“So…when ya said all that stuff about a person bein’ the missin’ part of ya, and how y’could spend every day with ‘em and never get tired of ‘em…”

“I was talking about you.”

Blood roared in Cid’s ears. He felt his heart pounding and his throat was suddenly dry. He’d thought what Vincent said had sounded a little dramatic and overwrought, the other night, but it struck the ear very differently, now he knew it was about himself. He yanked his goggles off his forehead and tossed them on the trunk-table, then pushed his hands back through his hair.

“You seem troubled by the idea,” Vincent said quietly, from where he’d receded into his cloak, concealing all of his face inside his high collar, except for his scarlet eyes.

Cid scratched his head. “I just…uh. Hoo, boy. I can’t help thinkin’ there’s still some kinda mixup. Y’sure ya like me? Like, wouldn’t you be happier with some fella your own age?”

“Ah. You did mention the age difference as an obstacle, before.”

“I ain’t sayin’ a obstacle per se,” Cid attempted. “I’m just thinkin’ about a few years from now, when you’re a little older. Y’might change your mind about what ya want, and start havin’ regrets.”

Vincent’s black brows knit in confusion. “When I’m older?”

“Well, cause like, I’m in my late thirties. That’s the settlin’ down with a long-term partner phase of life, y’know? You’ll understand once you get to be my age.”

“Cid. I’m fifty-seven.”

“Right, like I was sayin’, when you—” Cid blinked. “Ah…ha ha. I think I’m goin’ deaf, you said twenty-seven, right?”

“I said fifty-seven.”

“What the high-flyin’ fuck you mean fifty-seven?!” Cid sputtered, gesturing wildly with his coffee and nearly splashing it all over himself.

“I mean I’m fifty-seven years old.” Vincent tilted his head questioningly. “You do understand that Sephiroth is in his thirties, correct? And that he is my biological son?”

“Listen, I’m gonna be honest…I figured they grew him up super fast in one of those pods, like in the movies.”

“No, he grew up at the usual speed. Which does mean that I have a son who is nearly your age. The idea of age differences seems to bother you, quite a bit.”

“Oh, that?” Cid waved his hand dismissively. “Nah, I was talkin’ about kids in their twenties, all fresh-faced and dumb as shit, just startin’ out in the world. Who gives a fuck about a couple decades, between old-ass men like us?”

Vincent very nearly smiled. “You only call yourself old because you enjoy thinking of yourself that way. Whereas, I am quite literally an old man.”

“Come on, Vinnie,” Cid chuckled. “Ya can’t say you’re an old man, with that face, and expect me to take ya seriously.”

“Then…you like my face?” Vincent asked pointedly.

“Tch. You kiddin’ me? You’re so fuckin’ gorgeous I can’t believe you’re real, sometimes,” Cid said staunchly, then realized he’d revealed more than he intended, and became shy (and suddenly understood the appeal of having a cloak to hide in).

Vincent scooted closer, his leather armor squeaking against the leather on the couch. Eyes like scarlet embers glowed in the dim light of the gas lamps, regarding Cid with bloodthirsty intent.

Cid rubbed his hands together and chuckled nervously. “You’re…ha ha. You’re lookin’ at me like a hungry wolf, Vinnie.”

“Cid,” Vincent’s deep voice said softly. “I’m going to kiss you.”

Cid swallowed hard. “O—ok.”

He felt the cold claws of a metal gauntlet, as Vincent’s fingertips rested lightly on his cheek, turning his head. Vincent leaned in closer. So close his black hair brushed against Cid’s forehead. He paused. There was a bit of muffled jingling, as he awkwardly unbuckled his high collar. Then lips softer than any woman’s could’ve ever been were pressed against Cid’s.

Whatever he’d thought it would be like, to be kissed by a man—and his best friend, at that—all his preconceived notions were blown right out the window, when those lips pushed his apart, and Vincent’s tongue slid forward to caress his.

Sage-smoke and leather, and a hint of old books. That’s what he smelled like. He tasted like whatever heaven’s made out of. His tongue was domineering and devastatingly skilled, licking and thrusting and rolling over Cid’s, till he was clinging helplessly to Vincent and gasping for breath, between intense barrages.

He felt more like a chaste woman being ravished by a pirate captain in a romance novel, than he’d have liked to admit, but it felt so fucking good. How come no one ever told him how amazing it was to be on the receiving end of a man’s unrestrained desire?

It occurred to him then, that he could touch Vincent, too. Not that he hadn’t wanted to, it was just that, to lay entirely unworthy mortal hands on this divinity seemed almost blasphemous, so he hadn’t yet worked up the courage.

Steeling himself, he slipped a hand around Vincent’s narrow waist and kneaded the small of his back. To his utter astonishment, Vincent threw a knee over and straddled him, settling his weight on his lap, decisively closing any remaining space between their bodies.

Emboldened by this spectacular result, Cid worked his fingers into Vincent’s heavy, silky hair and tugged gently. Vincent moaned into the kiss and let his head move easily, at Cid’s direction.

Cid’s brain short-circuited, unable to process a reality in which Vincent might like to have his hair pulled. He tried again, a little harder, and was rewarded a breathy gasp, along with feeling that lithe body shudder against his.

The tables turned, then, and Cid was the aggressor, holding Vincent by his hair, invading his mouth, licking and sucking his perfect, pale lips, kissing him like the world was ending.

At long last, Vincent broke the kiss, leaving Cid overheated and dizzy—and so hard he could barely think. A clear thread of saliva stretched out between their lips and snapped, as they drew back, just enough to look at one another.

Vincent’s long, almond-shaped eyes were hazy and heavy-lidded, and his crimson irises were glowing, nearly all gold. His parted lips were wet and swollen, and very slightly flushed. The tip of his tongue traced over his elongated fangs.

“Ha…holy fuck, you’re beautiful,” Cid panted, sliding his hands up onto Vincent’s hips. “The hell you doin’ fuckin’ around with a scruffy bastard like me?”

“Beautiful,” Vincent murmured. Then he stiffened, staring into the middle-distance. The golden embers in his eyes dimmed and darkened. Seeming disoriented, he pushed himself up from Cid’s lap and stumbled back a step, nearly tripping over the steamer trunk, and upsetting a mug of coffee, in the process.

“Vinnie? What’s wrong?” Cid asked, confused and alarmed by this abrupt reversal.

“I—I can’t,” he said hoarsely. His eyes darted around manically, but didn’t seem to focus on anything. “It’s not your fault. I thought I could, but…I just can’t. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Wait, wait, Vinnie hang on,” Cid said hastily, jumping up to stop him. “Don’t run off, let’s talk—”

It was too late. Vincent had already dispersed into a whirl of crimson and vanished.

“—about it.” Cid gave a heavy sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. “God…fuckin’ damn it.”

THE AUTHOR HAS SOMETHING TO SAY cat cameo!

one more chapter to go!!!!!!!!! will our intrepid heroes resolve their problems and go to pound town???? (yes they will)

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