#crowfic

"Can you say something for me, mister?" Unidentified and way too blurry for the eyes to see, his arm touched the back of the nurse's neck, her long, tentacled hair extensions firm in his numbed hands. "It's okay, you can touch."

"I feel sick." Samuel squeaked, softly. "Where was I last?"

"Nowhere in particular." A voice said. "I don't know exactly why I'm here, either. But you were really hurt."

"Sick? So, this isn't... new? I thought... I thought maybe... maybe... it was all going to be okay. You told me."

"I did, but then you just... stumbled and collapsed. And surely enough, I couldn't... I couldn't..." The voice stopped. "Nevermind."

No, he couldn't really remember much from what was said and done. Because when his neck hit the ground, something seemed to have broke. His emotional barrier. His nerves. Everything. The whole entire barrier between universe and well, his vision fields, they all went black, dark, and never really clear enough to see where and how he got to where he was. Where was I now?

Vision still blurred, he peeked over to see a large bandage wrapped around his arm, next to it over on the side a clear tube with red, too much red, and a bit of yellowish clear, sparkly fluid. Why can't I see?

"Will my eyes ever work again?" He asked, then slouching, but a hard wrap stopped his head from falling any further. "Who did this to me?"

"The images are coming in soon, sir, there's nothing to worry about."

"I know." He sighed. "But, who gets to worry now?"

The voice clarified. "Actually, it's me."

~

The swirling hues of the cosmos danced together to the everlasting hum of vast existence and the dreams of infinite worlds therein. Glistening stars of purest fire, shades of red, purple, blue, and green, distant bows of light falling through interstellar dust….all of these coalesced and unravelled again….permitting the flow of memories from the past and future to meet and divide again in sequential harmony.

These streams of life and time were as reflective as water in the heavens, thus granting the keen-eyed observer to see what was there to be seen within themselves.

Sephiroth discovered his own river of memory in the sky, marred as it was by discord, and from it, he saw many smaller brooks running down in trickles. The archives of his long lost life. The remnants of his past. The streams of his abandoned nostalgia. With a steady peer into the web of light, he found himself drawn to one singular strain of memory….

A soft red thread of dewey blood that ran straight back to the beginning of a forgotten heartache.

To Genesis.

~

“He’s….well….quite the character….”

”What do you mean?”

Angeal stopped with a sudden intake of breath and folded his sinewy arms to ponder the question as if it were philosophical in nature. His bangs fell like shadows brushing across his eyes before he flipped them aside and looked at Sephiroth, his recently-befriended colleague, with an expression that carried a rare, juvenile uncertainty that he was prone to keep subdued in any other realm of conversation.

”I guess….Genesis is what I would call a spitfire. He’s a bit brash…he kinda has a quick temper…um…” he answered the weary-eyed silver boy, the latter cocking his head and squinting as if confused. A rather quaint trait that was befitting of Sephiroth’s mild manner, Angeal thought.

“I mean, he’s great and he’s still my best friend, don’t get me wrong. He’s just…somehow exactly like you and nothing like you at all. The difference is like…fire and ice maybe?”

Sephiroth hummed to himself and dropped his eyes to the glossy tiles of the SOLDIER floor, spying his keen reflection in the dark surface. He waited, refusing to fidget or betray his impatience. Impatience could imply nervousness. Sephiroth was not nervous. He swore it to himself.

Angeal made a noise in the back of his throat as Genesis’ imminent arrival loomed in all its glory and growing anticipation.

”Uh…you’ll see. Oh and, he has this thing….this dream that’s really important to him…it’s….”

”Angeal!”

The hasty conversation died right then and there.

He was in front of them suddenly, the echo of his call commanding the room to be still.

The fabled “spitfire” was merely a scrawny teen with a fair face and flyaway auburn locks to frame it. A sharp, dandy boy with dancing fires in his eyes and red painting the sweater of his second-class uniform like carmine.

Genesis Rhapsodos was distinguished. Unique. Refreshing. He was a sparkling, crimson flare in a sea of greys and dull blues. A sense of novelty within a world of repetition.

He went on to greet Angeal with a familiar nod before standing in front of Sephiroth with an anxious gnawing on his lower lip and hands that were visibly shaking even as they folded together.

”Hello….” Genesis said. He spoke in a quiet voice that, for the time being, lacked any temperamental qualities.

Sephiroth remained expressionless save for an intrigued lift in his brow. He bowed respectfully, as he had been taught, acknowledging Genesis with the grace he afforded newly assigned teammates, yet also with the skittishness of any young man meeting the friend of a friend for the first time. No amount of formality could suppress the hero’s hemorrhaging humanity.

“I’m Sephiroth. You must be Genesis?” Sephiroth asked in a polite tone, holding back the nervous intrigue in his greeting. He swore to himself still that he was not truly nervous.

But it was undeniable. To Sephiroth, Genesis looked…

Well, he looked “cool.”

“That’s me, yeah,” Genesis cleared his throat and held out a book that he swiftly ripped from the inside of his jacket. The movement was so effortless and fluid that Sephiroth’s eyes grew round and he could have smiled had he not been so confused.

“Would you…be willing to sign this for me…?” Genesis asked, his question timid, the pen he had prepared shaking in his gloved grip. Amusingly, his confident uncloaking of the book had been followed by another shrink in self-assuredness.

“Genesis!!” Angeal glared. He was shaking his head in a scolding manner. “Come on, what did I say?”

Genesis ignored Angeal and bit harder on his lip. His eyes were locked on Sephiroth’s face with the oddest blend of determination and uncertainty that Sephiroth had ever observed. It was bewildering to watch someone temper their cold with heat so expertly, to see them wade through the clammy swamp of anxiety that encompassed the meeting of a famous hero with such fierce impetus. It was admirable, if anything.

Sephiroth silently took the book, which was sweet and brimming with stanzas of pretty words, and proceeded to sign it with his own attempt at resolve in spite of the pooling trepidation in his stomach. Genesis watched, arms folded behind his back, patient and studious. He was unlike any other fan Sephiroth had been made to engage with. One could have noted that Genesis seemed to be more than a fan and rather an individual with the makings of a peer, whether he knew it himself or not.

“I said no signings or stuff like that….,” Angeal said, exasperated. He watched them with repeated, awkward tugs at his hair. “Gen, he gets this all the time.”

“It’s just one book, Angeal. And besides, he did it. So…thank you, Sephiroth.” Genesis failed to hide his grin behind his rusty bangs when Sephiroth handed the book back with a satisfying scrunch of leather gloves. Genesis took one look at the signature and made a high “heh” sound that betrayed immediate amusement.

There was a pause. Sephiroth held his breath.

“Your signature needs work,” Genesis said suddenly and with no regret, studying the sharp pen work that marked the cream-colored page.

Angeal fought back an unexpected laugh.

“Come on!!” he scolded again and gave Genesis a swat on his arm. Genesis smirked, his devilish bravado rearing its head, and ducked away.

Sephiroth felt like someone had thrown a bucket of water at him. He was almost laughing at the comment himself. How peculiar.

“You think so, huh?” Sephiroth was admittedly bemused, and the faintest hint of a smile graced his lips, which in turn caused Angeal to calm down.

“It looks like a scientist’s writing. Too stiff. You need some flare, you know? Think rockstar! Rockstar style…..something that would fit on the face of an album cover,” Genesis explained, showing Sephiroth the book and writing his own name with a practiced, celebrity flourish. “Like that. You’re the hero after all….you have to have a good signature.”

Angeal watched, no words to spare, as Sephiroth considered the advice and rested his chin on a folded hand like an old academic before nodding with firm agreement. “Very well. I don’t know of any rockstars or how they write, so you will have to teach me then. I would rather not write like a scientist.”

That left both Banoran boys reeling.

“What? Really??” Genesis gasped with a quick flush of excitement warming his cheeks. “Did you seriously just say that?”

“Um….well, yes?”

Sephiroth wondered for a flicker of time if it had been the wrong thing to say. What was Genesis saying? Was he surprised at the comment on not knowing any rockstars? Oh dear.

But Genesis swiftly proved any such fears to be absurd. As it turned out, he was simply delighted that Sephiroth was seeking his help.

“Yes! I can teach you!”

The ecstatic thrill of Genesis’ reaction was nearly contagious as he broke into a roguish smile and folded his hands together like a child in eager prayer. Angeal sighed, knowing full well that his red-haired friend was fighting the urge to faint in front of his idol after earning such blatant approval.

Sephiroth only chuckled mildly, relieved, and inclined his head towards the training room to suggest a change of scenery.

“We should train first, but after that, I would like to learn…yes….” he said softly. There was a geniality in his expression that had overcome his nerves. Genesis pounced on it and heartily agreed.

“We…w-we should!! Yeah…uh….yes…..good idea….” he stammered, following along as Sephiroth started towards the entrance. Angeal huffed in blithe contentment and followed along, grateful that the meeting had gone well.

There was no jealousy, no mistrust, no imbalance.

There was only the clumsy innocence of boyish admiration and acceptance. The nervous exchange of youthful approval.

After all, they were only children in those days.

~

The memory was a bittersweet thing. A soft shade of rose in the midst of pooling, inflamed hues of vermillion nebulae. Sephiroth did not scoff at its innocence or naivety. He could not. But he did not linger.

The thread shifted forward through fingers of starlight….and the fraying began to show, but for the time being, it held strong, weaving through past passions and emotions.

Sweeter memories. Thrilling trains of thought.

Fleeting moments of joy….

The stars danced in Sephiroth’s eyes as he caught another glimpse.

~

Genesis was humming for his own ears, as he was wont to do on those clear and star-graced nights in Wutai when he magically refrained from quoting from his darling Loveless. If it was not poetry, it was song that left his lips. He would always find the time to serenade the beauty of life in some form or another.

But then, why was Genesis humming to himself?

Surely, he saw his own person as part of life’s majesty, of course. And who could deny the vanity? The bard with mako irises like robin’s eggs and hair that had darkened to auburn in the evening was, well, quite a vision under the moon’s faithful spotlight. The fragile glow carved out the marble in his pale visage and complimented the gleam of his smile like nothing else could. He was a sculpture most beloved by the goddess he worshipped.

But in that moment, Genesis’ near-perfect allure was faintly marred by a nasty gash across his right ear where a piece of shrapnel had nicked his flesh, tearing through cartilage, the hollow of his cheek, and part of his jawline.

Sephiroth was tending to the injury by hand. He had no more healing materia after the three day campaign that Angeal had led in Wutai’s densest jungles, during which the Emperor’s mightiest forces had been pushed back in fury particularly by the hero and his raging red partner.

Sephiroth, as usual, had emerged unscathed, but Genesis had not been so lucky. The humiliation over his misfortune was written on Genesis’ face, but Sephiroth said nothing as he quietly cleaned the blood from his friend’s jaw and began to stitch each thread of skin back into place.

“I could do this myself if we had a mirror….,”Genesis finally said with a bitter huff. The wind passed between them and drifted into the valley below, where the lights of their encampment glowed with gentle beacons of gold. “Or Angeal could….”

“Why do you assume I care?” Sephiroth asked quickly, his hands steady as a surgeon’s as he stitched.

“Ha. Rude.”

“I mean, why do you assume that I am reluctant to help you?”

Genesis, grasping the query, thought on it for a spell. His pursed his lips and squinted as he felt himself being repaired like a torn doll.

“I don’t want you of all people to need to help me. I don’t want your help,” Genesis finally answered, his response sounding colder than he intended in his embarrassment. He quickened to warm it ever so slightly. “You have enough to deal with.”

Sephiroth paused. He looked at his friend with a firm, pointed stare that made the latter want to shrink into naught but a single atom. The angel’s elysian gaze could have pierced through stone and steel.

“You and Angeal are my first priority on the battlefield. You are my immediate teammates. It’s my job to ensure you both survive and remain fit for combat. I must help if you require it,” Sephiroth said. He returned to his stitching and Genesis released his held breath. He could have laughed at the subtle twinge of indignation in the young hero’s tone.

Sephiroth. Always so serious. Justifying every display of care with duty.

Genesis almost wished he wouldn’t frame it so.

“I suppose….it’s a bit embarrassing….,” Genesis mumbled when he found the courage to do so. His hands shook faintly and he wrung them to conceal the tell. “To stumble…in front of the great hero like that….”

Sephiroth finished his work on Genesis’ wound and leant back, dissatisfied with his own first aid skills. He sighed and looked up again. He was flushed with a blend of vexation and bewilderment thanks to the comment. Genesis almost cackled at the irregular view, but then Sephiroth suddenly reached for Masamune, removed the leather glove from his right hand, and sliced the thick of his palm across the moonlit blade before another word could be spoken.

“What….why would you….?” Genesis sputtered and threw out his arm, astonished and dismayed, his mouth agape in his dramatics.

Sephiroth shook his head and sighed, holding his palm up to display the almost instant healing capabilities that his aberrant body possessed. Genesis observed with awe as the cells seemed to crawl back together, as if craving to be whole again, threading themselves into place, and repairing the pallid skin until Sephiroth’s hand was reconstructed. Perfect, once more. It had taken only five minutes or so.

“How….”

“I’ve been scraped in battle before. Bullets, debris, artillery blasts…..,” Sephiroth explained. He spoke mildly, but held his healed hand with a tentative look and vague tension in his shoulders. He appeared to be lost in distant thought. “My cells are abnormal, as if they have wills of their own…not wanting me to die….”

Sephiroth closed his eyes and smothered a bitter chuckle. There was something ironic in it all.

“But regardless, I’ve likely been wounded far more times than you have. In my early training, it was both common and inevitable with how clumsy I was at the start. Heh.”

Genesis nearly scoffed at the image of Sephiroth stumbling in combat, hardly believing it, but he held his tongue as his friend continued to speak.

“I suppose what I am saying is…,” Sephiroth went on. “I am not impenetrable either. I simply heal faster, so you never see me in the medical tent or asking for assistance. It causes everyone to presume that I’m perfect.”

“Well, you hardly ever put yourself in reckless spots where injury is common either. You follow the rules and only unleash when you know it will be precise,” Genesis retorted, tossing his head. He wasn’t certain of what Sephiroth was trying to say. “In a way that is perfection. Perfect discipline.”

“And you are a loose cannon that doesn’t hold back. It’s bold, but not without benefit. Even if it causes you to sustain these small injuries on occasion,” Sephiroth said. The shape of his breath arose in the cool midnight air as he sighed and lifted his face to the darkling sky overhead, studying the stars. “It’s a balance that is effective on our missions. So….I don’t consider the minuscule consequences to be worthy of humiliation.”

“Is that your way of saying I should stop fussing over this and grow up? Sounds like what Angeal would say” Genesis cackled. He lightly caressed the stitching on his jaw and hissed like an offended housecat when it stung.

“Angeal would want you to hold back to preserve yourself, but I prefer you remain as you are. Like I said, it’s effective,” Sephiroth responded, now smiling. “I don’t ever want you to hold back.”

“With anything” was what Sephiroth wanted to add to the mix of words, but he chose to stop himself. He was saying more than usual. Fortunately, Genesis seemed to be in higher spirits, if not vaguely amused by the effort Sephiroth was putting in to affirm him. It was a rare and relished thing for Genesis to hear Sephiroth praise his abilities at length.

Yet what Genesis would never understand was that Sephiroth wordlessly praised his every breath and proof of existence during all moments of their shared time, as he did Angeal’s. It was in the solitary warrior’s nature to cherish what he dared to allow near his heart. The choice to do so alone was a terrifying, dangerous, and delicate thing that Sephiroth knew could one day lead him down a road dead-ended in grief.

But in those midyears of youth’s passing, he was frequently blinded to such fears, clinging to his comrades as if they were the purest rarities of the earth. Nobody save Sephiroth himself knew of the clandestine depth of his attachment. He understood that it was unnatural, and kept the shame to himself.

“I will always help you, Genesis,” Sephiroth added. There was a tremor in his gentle utterance. “Just don’t hold back.”

There was silence for a minute longer before Genesis broke it.

“Thank you.”

It was all he said.

And it was enough.

Sephiroth bowed his head, saying all with the gesture alone. Genesis’ eyes flickered blue in the glimmer of starlight that waxed and waned with the passage of clouds. The young men sat in mutual serenity, their silhouettes in close proximity, their hearts beating wildly as they each overthought and processed the other’s words.

Time moved on. Moments with similar weight scattered themselves in between the years, but regretfully became few and far even between.

~

The ribbons of light pulsed and dispersed, the train of memory sinking into distorted nets of suffering and affliction. Infrared heat at the core of a violent rending of hearts. The stars clashed and collided, the torrents rushing out into a sea of bloodshed.

Sephiroth’s heart increased in its pace as he forced himself to look into the cosmic storm of ill-fated memories.

It all fell apart.

~

He should have known.

But that didn’t change how badly it hurt, how far into his heart the wound went. Searing, bleeding pain from a gaping hole in his chest that cauterized and throbbed, only to spill out with punishing vengeance all over again at the slightest touch of longing. Dusk till dawn. Every hour of every day.

Ring, ring

Sometimes the pain would numb out of sheer, desperate necessity. The fog would settle in like a sweet mercy. The ache dulled by empty, lifeless, distraction. A survival response. A way out.

A million questions that would be answered by silence. Always silence.

Perhaps the worst part was that there was no one to listen or hear.

Sephiroth was the hero. A savior of those who could never save him, even if they had wanted to.

There was no way to receive. No way to become one with their world.

They would be safe.

They would return to family and feel the warmth of their hearths and homes, welcomed by open hands and kisses, greeted by cherished souls; parents, friends, children, lovers, and even soft, doe-eyed creatures that curled beneath their chairs or in their laps.

Food would await them on aging tables, sweet hopes of changing seasons and holidays would course through their blood, rosy songs and the simple joys of life would grace their days.

And their lives…..their lives would go on.

Sephiroth’s would stay the same.

Ring, ring

All change was temporary for him. He was destined to the cold and sterile repetition of a war machine’s solitary existence. All that could shift was his utility and purpose once the dreamy, idealized Promised Land was dug up from the sleeping earth by Shinra’s mechanical hands. Once it was ripped from the womb of its mother and eaten alive; ravished, brutalized, taken, and used until it was another hollow husk of a blackened crater. Another discarded product of Shinra.

Then they’d come back to Sephiroth with frothing need on their lips. They’d dig his body up from the grave of wires and steel and mako, sending him back into the forests of the world to cut down the way to the next “Promised Land.”

Again and again and again.

There was no true death waiting for him, no true change in scenery once he was decommissioned. No, it would all be the same. A cycle never allowed to be broken.

Ring, ring

But he had wanted to hope….to hope that they could have broken it. That they could have been the ones to save him. Those familiar faces and kind eyes that once understood him.

The ones that bothered to pull him out of the dark when he felt like giving up. The ones that opened their arms as if welcoming him instead of possessing him.

There was no denying it. Sephiroth had hoped.

He had wanted. He had trusted.

And that was what hurt so much — all of it stinging and fresh, acidic poison gushing from the cut across his heart.

He should have known.

Hope was just another lie.

The ringing dragged on and faded.

It was the tenth time he had called Genesis that evening alone. The twentieth time that day. The fiftieth time that week. It must have looked pathetic to whomever it was among the Turks that kept track of his PHS activity.

But Sephiroth hadn’t cared. Every day he tried, and by now, he was convinced Genesis had left his damned PHS in a box somewhere. The rational thought should have stopped him, but it didn’t.

He let himself fall back onto the cold sofa in his private room, lying with his eyes locked on the grey tiles of the roof, fighting the ache by holding the phone close to his chest as if it were a temporary bandage. He listened for any buzz or beep for hours while forcing himself to stay awake. His lids were drooping. He had not slept in a week.

Please come back…

Genesis had gone. Angeal had followed soon after. Angeal’s phone went directly to voicemail when called, which likely meant it was dead or destroyed. There was no use trying it.

Please.

They are going to kill you.

But Genesis…his phone rang. His always rang.

Please.

Did that mean….?

It’s your fault.

Was there a chance that Genesis was ignoring every call with religious diligence?

You hurt him. That was all it took.

What was burning behind his eyes now? Why did everything smart and sting? The ceiling began to blur, and when it warped uneasily, Sephiroth bolted up and gasped with a wet, quivering exhale.

God, the feeling was physical.

It was all hanging by a thread. It always was.

The buttons clicked under Sephiroth’s cold gloves again and the ringing returned with zeal. He steadied his breathing and held a shaky hand just above his brow as if shielding his eyes in shame.

Shinra will kill them. You can’t save them.

Not that it mattered. There was no one there to see or hear.

Stop trying. They don’t care.

It rang for another several moments. His pulse was beating like a war drum inside his skull.

Genesis certainly never did.

Suddenly there was a click. Sephiroth’s heart leapt and he nearly forgot how to speak as he felt his body tense with a visceral intake of breath. He spoke in a stammering, soft plea, hope finding its way into his reddened eyes.

“….Gen……Genesis….?

Silence.

Weak, anxious breathing.

The moment lasted an eternity.

More silence.

“Hello?”

There was a strained, weary sigh on the other end of the call.

“Do not call me anymore.”

Sephiroth’s throat constricted. He could have sworn he choked on his own words as he scrambled to think of something he could say in time. Anything to make Genesis slow down.

Slow down and think. Talk.

Please.

“I’m sorry, Sephiroth.”

“Genesis wai—”

The line went dead with a static buzzing that muffled the sharp, small cry of protest that escaped Sephiroth’s lips.

Being pierced with a dagger to the lungs could not have shaken him so much. The brutal assault of mako in the veins couldn’t compare to the scalding ice that permeated the halls beneath his skin. A churning wave of nausea overcame him and Sephiroth slumped forward in defeat, the PHS falling from his hand. The battle was lost, and he had already predicted so just moments before.

He should have known.

You did this to yourself.

He did know.

To Genesis.

It was all over.

~

Sephiroth paused, glancing down at the starlit stone beneath his boots. He was detached from these memories. Whatever sorrow they carried seemed distant. Fading emotions that he had separated from himself.

But there was an inkling part of his soul that pondered their worth. He mulled it over, trying to understand why even now there was a faint touch of grief betrayed by his pursed lips and trembling fists. These were the memories of someone he used to be. They were inconsequential now.

And yet….

Sephiroth looked up one more time, following the last thread of light that dangled from the network of interlacing rivers, all overlapping and straining in their tension. The single and final stream of memory was crimson as a fresh apple.

Ripe. Raw. Poisoned.

~

“My friend, your desire….is the bringer of life, the gift of the goddess!”

Once upon a memory, those words had warmed a frigid, neglected part of Sephiroth’s soul. He recalled standing in the tender sunlight, the wind caressing his skin with gentle whispers, and Genesis’ lilting voice rising through the air as he had shared with his comrades the passion of his cherished play.

Sephiroth found it ironic as he heard the lines of Loveless being directed at him once again.

That day, Genesis had quoted from Act I. They had been at the beginning of the story then. Young and innocent. Possibly even something like friends.

Loveless was a tragedy.

Genesis stood before him in the reactor, half ruined and mad, quoting from Act IV as if expecting Sephiroth’s awaited reply to magically provide the ending to the ancient poem. The red warrior held his head high and proud; smiling, demanding a piece of Sephiroth’s being as a whole. A part of his soul and body. A strip of his flesh. A taste of his perfect, monstrous existence.

A gift, a symbol of reunion after bitter, stark separation. Yes, Genesis wanted the hero to stitch him back together again, to freely provide him with the blood Sephiroth once offered without hesitation many moons before.

Distance had become rejection. Rejection had become betrayal. Betrayal had become violation.

Genesis craved Sephiroth’s soul and strength and fellowship. After everything the raving apostate had done. After everything he had said and left unsaid. After all of the comfortless, silent nights of fear and solitude that he had gifted Sephiroth in kind. After every knifelike word and mocking hiss he had thrown at his old friend with no regard for the hits their bond had already taken.

In Sephiroth’s eyes, Genesis had gleefully torn his old “friend” down to his level before laying the offer out with a sincerity ignorant of the damage it had done by its very suggestion after months and months of heartache.

How endearing. How naive.

Sephiroth winced and ground his jaw. He could feel the anger stirring at long last. He had tolerated enough.

My cells.

My body.

My blood.

Sephiroth looked at Genesis with cold and empty eyes, before looking on the apple in the rotting man’s outstretched hand.

It was dark, purple-poisoned, dying.

My trust.

My affection.

My heart.

He understood now.

That warmth he had seemingly felt in his chest on that day two years prior…..that lulling, sweet tone in Genesis’ voice….it had all been as false as the sunlight and wind in the now-abandoned room where everything first fell into ruin.

A simulation. An illusion.

You only ever wanted what I had.

Genesis had never been different from any of the others. A fan, a rival, a betrayer. His honeyed words coated the unctuous desire to use and to take for his own gain. It was always the same. They were all the same in the end.

What I could give you.

Genesis shouldn’t have dragged his mother into it.

“Whether your words, are lies created to deceive me….

You crossed the line.

“….or the truth I have sought all my life….”

You lied to me.

“It makes no difference….”

What’s done is done.

“You will rot.”

And it still hurts so much.

There was pain in Genesis’ eyes. His brow lifted. His horror surged like a tidal wave swallowing his haggard face. The apple fell to the floor, and Sephiroth turned his back, vanishing into the dark. Genesis would not see him again, and he gagged on the realization as the knife of rejection wedged itself into his broken chest.

Sephiroth did not look back.

Now Genesis knew what it felt like.

~

The memories reached their ruthless end after that. Sephiroth looked away and the chilled air of a sigh left his lungs beneath the galactic swirls.

He thought of the last memory from his far viewpoint, weighing the possibilities of its validity. Lingering. Reconsidering.

The memories preceding it had melded with some of Genesis’ own emotions. There had been glimpses into the other man’s mind. Could that have been a product of the empathy they once tried to harness for each other? Did those memories hold insight into Genesis’ true feelings because of the brief, mutual understanding that had blossomed in days past?

Had it all truly been a lie?

Or had the rift between them prevented Sephiroth from understanding Genesis in the reactor? After all, that memory had only revealed one perspective. A perspective marred and fogged over with bleak hurt. Genesis had no say in that memory. His side of the story was dead and lost.

Sephiroth grit his teeth. He wanted to know now. The truth. The reality.

He didn’t know why he felt the desire now. It was too late. The past was not his to change or understand any longer. Genesis was gone. Missing.

Always missing.

The stars moved on and the red rivers bled into blue, washed over with cool, arctic tears….the burns soothed with numbing, glistering ice. The glimpse had reached its end, taking Genesis away again.

And Sephiroth regretted everything.