“Hold still.”  Sephiroth instructed.

“Moron.”  Angeal had used that word enough to have it drain of all meaning--

Save the new definition of the word, Genesis, standing tall and straight with two apples stacked and perfectly balanced on his head.  “Hush.  He has to concentrate.”

Rolling his eyes, Sephiroth corrected, “You just need to be still.”

“If you could not kill him, despite... all of this...”  Angeal gestured to the situation in general.

“I won’t kill him.”  Sephiroth promised.  But he did look the slightest bit unsure.  A blade, he certainly knew.  A pistol wasn’t comfortable, but he’d been trained.  Throwing knives, while he was sure he could get the arc correct, still had unpredictable elements that he hadn’t worked out yet...

“What’s the matter?”  Genesis demanded with such haughtiness that one of the apples almost tumbled to the ground.  “I thought you were... super-adaptive or whatever he--”

“Gen.”  Angeal warned.

While Genesis rolled his eyes, Sephiroth saw an out.  “On the off-chance something does happen... I want your coat.“

“My what.”

“Your coat.”  Sephiroth repeated, taking aim.  “It’ll actually fit me, anyway.”

With a huff that caused both apples to drop from his head mid-turn, Genesis stalked away.  Angeal snorted and placed an approving hand on Sephiroth’s shoulder before following.  And Sephiroth--

Sephiroth appeared to be dutiful and obedient, for the most part.  He did learn that, as it was expected of him, but he learned more how to maintain the appearance of being dutiful and obedient.  The distinction had become extremely important when he was being monitored less, allowed to have time “for himself”.

There were still appointments, of course, schedules and expectations that couldn’t be avoided, that there weren’t shortcuts for, but they were worth dealing with for those precious moments when he could have some semblance of privacy.  Some portion of time, hours, to devote to what he’d managed to hide in the room designated his.

He’d found out, overheard, that children his age weren’t usually expected to memorize manuals on strategy, but to read books of fairy tales.  Actually acquiring one had been a monumental task, requiring the kind of care and patience he was being trained for; but even so, it’d been difficult.  And when he’d acquired the book of fairy tales, held it in his hands and so very slowly turned each and every page, finding illustrations that weren’t merely technical drawings...

...Was it..? What sat on the kitchen counter in his quarters hadn't been there that morning, and he was distinctly certain of the extremely limited number of people who could have entered, left something, and then exited without disturbing anything else.

The object itself also had a ribbon with a large bow wrapped around it. Slender, sparkly, silver. Holding a bit of crinkled sparkly silver paper against a... bowl?

Pot. Planter. What filled the planter had initially been the surprise, had resulted in the pause necessary for Sephiroth to properly identify it: a plant. A cactus, if he wasn't mistaken, but... pink...? Vibrantly so. He hesitated to approach it for a long moment, as if his very presence might immediately cause it to wilt, but there was a envelope underneath.

Curiosity struck. Carefully sliding the envelope out from under the wrapping, he went about slowly, methodically removing the note from within. Angeal's handwriting, without a doubt: the plants was a moon cactus. Glancing from the note to the plant, he supposed he had no argument. They were good for "low-light conditions", apparently, for which his quarters would certainly qualify. There was also a watering schedule which started with "NOT NOW", then moved on to some ways to tell when the optimal watering points and amounts might be.

"I will not do it and that is final.”  Genesis stated irritably.  “Angeal shouldn’t have been talking about it anyway.”  He could feel the eye roll from across the room.

“The information wasn’t particularly given on purpose.”  Sephiroth didn’t quite reason or argue; he simply presented the facts that had been presented to him.  “It was an accidental mention.”  But he did not lower his arm.  Held firmly in his grasp was a bag of bright yellow marshmallows, awaiting demonstration.

Glowering, the redhead made an irritated gesture in Angeal’s general direction.  Then at the bag.  “That was years ago.”

“Your mouth’s only grown.”  The oldest of them quipped, getting a pout.

Challenge My Writing | accepting but eternally slow

He’d known from a fairly early age that he hadn’t “grown up” like a “normal kid”.  Just because he didn’t speak much didn’t mean he wasn’t listening, but that seemed only to his advantage as he overheard other conversations going on in front of him.  Not that he knew what a “normal kid” experience was.  Nor :growing up”, it turned out, but there would be no specific realizations made there.

He distinctly recalled the difficulties that came with some tests.  Namely, getting him to feel cold, but also... fear.  Afraid.  Hojo always looked so pleased about it, but the idea left Sephiroth concerned and curious.  Of course intellectually he knew what fear was, but couldn’t describe it.  He knew he’d felt it, was quite certain, but regardless of a photographic memory, couldn’t pinpoint an incident.

Cold came much easier in the damp winter in Wutai than any lab could have planned for.  So too did fear.  It wasn’t something he documented, in spite of the request.  It wasn’t even something he talked about, something that he would ever acknowledge to another person.  Looking around him, pristine white having turned red--

He was the only one left standing for that battle.  Upright, black and silver and cold.  Colder than he’d ever been.  All that silence around him, caused by the still-dripping sword in his hand...

@ancientblxde​​:

The elder stayed silent as he waited for his master to move when he got the orders to attack. Now while Shin-ra said that the younger would be on his own, what they didn’t know is that his blade was helping him. Still, violet eyes glanced over to his young master as he rumbled slightly before he spoke up in a whisper as well. “No, I am just a weapon. You however….” He softened his gaze with the other as while he was still whispering, his tone wasn’t as sharp.

“No matter what happens or whatever you become in the next few days, the next week, month or even year…always be yourself. Don’t lose sight of that.”

Sephiroth didn’t really have too much of an understanding of the concept making up phrases like “I’ll try my best” or “I’ll do what I can”.  It was do or don’t, success or failure.  There was no other state.  (Even if, on a base intellectual level, he knew there was, there must be... just not for him.)

And neither did he want to lie, being uncertain as to whether he could succeed.  He wanted to.  He didn’t want to lose sight of either of them.  But it felt very much to him that he was a blade himself; his path set out before him, sharpened and honed and set to accomplish a task by another’s hand.

Instead, he looked to his companion for several long seconds before nodding once.  Perhaps no words needed to be said.

It was nearing damn, anyway.  The time to move was almost at hand, and whether or not he would forget himself as he accomplished his task...