Author's Notes: I've made some substantial alterations to this piece. I apologise for the long delay in updating it, but I now hope to continue...
Broken Wings
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Artistic Suicide
Blood
I waded into this world through my mother's blood; a killer before my newborn eyes could open. This is obviously not a distinction granted solely to me, nor was it of my own will, but it doesn't prevent me from feeling it keenly.
Father pretends that there is no Mother with a desperation of a frightened child taking security under its blankets. I know better. I've watched them outside. The other children, I mean. Mothers take them for walks; buy them ice-creams.
I've never had one.
A mother, of course. I've had an ice-cream, once. Father bought it for me on my fifth birthday. A special treat, he'd called it.
Tongue cautiously touching the cold, sweetened cream, Father watching me with a guarded expression. I didn't know why. I held out my prize.
"Would you like some?" I asked timidly, still trying to make peace with a man who had imprisoned me since birth. I think that I feared him more than the dark.
"No, no," he smiled, his left canine slightly yellowed, "this is your special treat. You have it. And later, I will buy you a present."
"A present?"
"Yes, of course. It's your birthday today. We give people presents on their birthdays to celebrate the fact that they were born. A silly tradition, I know, but sometimes it is better to observe these things. It is, after all, what makes us human."
Human, Father?
All of this was, however, news to me. We'd never celebrated my birthday before. The first of September had always been a day like any other. Nevertheless, this thought of a present seemed curiously tantalizing.
"A present? What is it?" I asked, not yet rid of my childish enthusiasm.
"Anything you want. You may choose."
"Anything?" the idea seemed impossible.
"Yes, yes. What would you like?"
"Really…anything?"
"Yes, Sephiroth. Come, now. What do you want?"
I warily raise my head from the vanilla ice-cream to meet his hawk-like gaze. His face was impatient. I knew that he wanted to return to his work. I decided to take a chance.
"Could I…could I have my mother back? I want to-"
His fist crunched into my nose; the first time that he'd ever struck me. Blood sprayed in a perfect arc as I staggered, staring at the crimson that now stained my "special treat".
I dropped the ice-cream to the floor in shock, watching the dark-haired man who repeatedly clenched and unclenched his left fist, imperceptibly panting. His eyes gazed at something over my shoulder. Momentarily distracted, I surreptitiously turned my head and saw the gargantuan table that occupied his study. Father was staring at it too, a look of unfathomable horror on his face. I wanted to examine the table further but stood still, my feet rooted to the ground.
Whatever nightmare he had been caught in had now released him; he grabbed my shoulder and struck my face hard enough to make me stumble. My cheek flared with heat.
I didn't cry. I've never cried.
I do believe, however, that in that moment, I wished to murder him.
"I am your mother, you hear me?" snapped Father. "I brought you into this world! I am your father, your mother, your fucking great uncle! Don't you ever ask me for that again! Now clean up this mess and go back to your room!"
He sat on the table and watched me mop up the remains of my ice-cream treat. Occasionally he put his hand over his face and a ragged sound escaped his throat, tearing through the silence that I did not dare to break.
I never did get my birthday present.
Time passed, even in the purgatory created by the man who called himself my father. I studied from home, of course. Emotionally, I cannot guess at my maturity due to being isolated from my peers. With regard to my education, though, I am light years away from Spot, Dick and Jane. By now I know that everyone is supposed to have a mother.
And I want mine.
I did manage to drag a name out of my father: Jenova. Jenova was my mother. Jenova created me. I try the name out aloud. Jenova. It has a nice ring to it. Foreign, but beautiful. I will always prefer "mommy" though. That is a name that's more familiar. I've run it through my mind every time I go to sleep; every time I wake up.
I don't know what she'd do, though. I cannot imagine what her tasks in this haunted household would be. Father won't let me read fiction. I imagine that she'd be there to make the pain stop after the experiments. That she'd be the one to hold Father back when he tried to hit me. Someone has to do it now that Gast is gone.
Gast is...was the final member of my macabre family. Uncle Ghastly, I used to call him when I was little and he'd laugh and tousle my hair. Now he's gone. Father told me that he'd died. I still wish that I knew for sure. I've learned not to trust everything that Father says.
The door opens. Father never knocks. Somehow, no matter how much I learn, no matter how strong I get, his presence has never failed to make my bowels fold in on themselves and my stomach crumple like a paper bag.
Graphic description? You've obviously never met Father. He's an inspiration.
"Sephiroth?" he bites his bottom lip and tries to smile at me. "Will you come down to the lab with me?"
I know that it is not a request. It's a pity though; around about this time, the sun enters through the window of my room and I can feel the warmth of its rays. It is the only time I ever get to feel what the outside world must be like. My father won't let me leave the house or even enter the gardens. Apart from the cherry tree that grows outside my window, I've never seen many natural things.
Father believes natural to be overrated.
We walk down the spiral staircase to the laboratory/study. I can't claim to have ever really enjoyed myself there. There are memories here that I don't want to find out about. The room has an air of an ancient tomb; a prison for the soul. Sunlight streams in through one of the smudged windows, briefly outlining the dust motes that hover in the air.
"I'd like you to lie down on the table, Sephiroth," Father mutters. I obey, eager to get a closer look at it. I allow my head to fall to one side. My hand runs over the rough wood. Turning my head to one side, my nose grazes a section of wood that is of a slightly darker hue compared to the rest of the table.
Father presses the silver needle into my arm. I'm used to this by now. The itch that spreads; the strange popping sensation that I feel...it isn't strange to me. I get shots every day of my life. I've learned to live with that. It is preferable to the alternative.
Today, something is wrong. Father looks worried. He catches my eye and smiles distractedly and explains, a rare occurence.
"This is a rather new experiment. I've tried this before and I'm positive that I've fixed the few minor errors that occurred the last time. The special cells in your blood should make you remarkably adaptable to the DNA that I'm going to introduce to your genetic make-up. Of course," he muttered distractedly, more to himself than to anyone else, "it would have been far easier to inject the DNA into your cells before you were born. But the mother would not have been able to survive long enough to give birth to you."
"Mother? You mean Jenova?" I ask, excitedly. Father gives me a strange, unreadable look.
"Yes, that." The look passes. "Anyway, being born with wings would have been too much to hope for at that stage. We must walk before we can fly, I suppose."
He approached me, forcing me to turn over and lie on my stomach. For the first time I notice the dark leather straps that are attached to the wood. Father starts to tie down my arms, his fingers bruising my wrists. I've been trained not to feel fear but my heart rebels against my mind, beating with increasing rapidity. I struggle slightly but I soon feel Father's hand slam against my skull, knocking my mouth into the wood.
For a brief moment, my tongue touches the stained wood and my eyes widen in realization. My superior senses send reams of information to my conscious mind. The taste and smell overwhelm me. Nausea bubbles up through my throat and my chest heaves. I start to scream, thrashing.
The world smacks me in the face when I open my eyes. I wake up in agony. My back is heavily bandaged but it feels stiffer, less flexible. Gulping in the rusty air, my mouth still against the blood that has soaked into the grain of the wood, I realise that I am now also covered with my own bile. I recoil slightly but feel my chest starting to heave painfully.
Just breathe. Concentrate on breathing.
I block out the putrid smell, and close my eyes before opening them again. The light makes them hurt. The light? Father must have switched on the bright ceiling ones in order to see what he was doing when he performed the experiment. I cannot yet handle the pain so I let my eyelids flicker shut once more. My stiff fingers start to unclench slowly.
"Are you awake, Sephiroth?" the voice pounds into my ears. I rasp. My mouth feels as if it was filled with sand.
I feel myself being gently turned over. A thin, strong hand raises my head slightly and puts a cup of water to my lips. I swallow greedily and choke, coughing up the water.
"Shhh, now. Easy. Drink slowly. There we go." The voice is soft, encouraging. I finish the water and let my head fall back against the hand, exhausted from that menial task. The hand does not move away. This is so comforting. A damp cloth wipes the sweat from my face; my vomit from my hair. The cloth is dropped and the hand is pressed softly against my forehead.
So cool…
I feel myself being shifted, raised by those strong arms. The hands do not drop me. I'm slowly carried out of the dungeon and taken to my room. I feel the steady footsteps of the person as we move upstairs.
I allow my eyes to open and peek at this person. My father's face swims into view as he looks ahead, a slight frown creasing his forehead. His face still looks painfully young, perhaps in his thirties; his dark hair tied back, as usual. His golden eyes look brown in the darker light of the evening.
I glance through one of the hall windows and see the moon swimming in the sky: an unreachable jewel. I sluggishly raise my right arm to snatch it but encounter my father's cheek instead. He stiffens but moves on as I withdraw it.
We reach my bedroom and I'm placed on my bed with the sheets wrapped tightly around me. My lips tilt slowly, enjoying the softness of the mattress compared to the hard, blood-stained table.
My father's hand touches my face once more. I love being touched like this; with such care. I've never ever been touched like this.
He has to love me, he has to!
Father bends down and for a split-second I am sure that he is going to kiss me but he just gives me a tight, pained smile, touches my hair with one of those healing hands...leaves my room in silence after opening the window and allowing a fresh, cool breeze to enter. The heady, sweet smell of the cherry tree is intoxicating. The pain in my back lessens and I sleep.
AN: Well, thus concludes the first bit of this story. Yes, for this one, I actually have a set plot in mind. Hopefully I'll be able to update often enough. I'm working on my other stories too. A huge thanks and muffin to everyone who's been reviewing and reading Pulling Off Butterfly Wings. It really, really helps a lot when I know that I'm not committing artistic suicide.
