(You should read now the author's note at the end of the chapter)


Project-S

The Origins


The Man in White


"I will sing alone

And then shadows will come

But if others join me

Darkness will back away in fear."

The child sang softly those verses. His words echoed through the hall, creating exquisite patterns of voices, sounds and clicks. Strange colored lights were cast in the floor, momentarily coloring the boy's clothing as he passed by. A tall man in a dark suit was leading him through the corridors of metal plate. The man didn't say a word since he took the boy from his tiny bedroom. With a quick order, the boy got up from his dirty bed, closed the damaged book he had been browsing and accompanied the man without saying a word. He knew that when that tall man gave him orders, he should obey, or would suffer the consequences later.

"The mad man will be there

Dressed in white, eyes spinning around

The mad man will be there

Waiting for me."

"I've told you, a thousand times" the tall man said to the boy. "Don't whistle that song around here. Do you want to be punished?"

"No" was the boy's quick reply. He lowered his head, looking at his torn leather shoes. He tried to find a pattern in the way that his shoelaces bounced around, but could find none. Then, he counted the number of metal plates beneath his feet. He counted 10 plates five times, because he didn't know any number above 10 - no one taught him mathematics or the alphabet. After all, the boy was only four years old. Almost five, though.

The boy lowered his voice to a tiny whisper, as if wanting to sing to the walls around him.

"Needles, pinches, stings and sticks

Vaccines, tests, lights and screams

Iron, steel, mirrors and push

Push, push, push the life away."

The man suddenly turned around, crouched, and slapped the boy in the face. The child fell to the floor, his small palm grabbing his cheek. A tear formed at the corner of his eye.

"Are you mad?" The man asked, pulling him to his feet again. He was so strong that his fingers left a red mark on the boy's bony wrist. "Who taught you that song, after all? You're singing it all the time as if you wanted the devil to come beat you out. Do you want to get him mad? Is that what you want?"

The boy said "no" and looked at the ground again. It was that kind lady who taught him that song. She said that the song "calmed her down" and "made her feel accompanied with friends." The boy always thought she was lying. The more he sang the song, the more he knew he was alone in that world. Everybody was tall, strong and scary. Everyone dressed in black or white and had serious expressions on their pale faces. They brought him every day to a big room full of monitors, counters and weird tools, carefully organized in the countless shelves that crossed the walls. And then the mad man dressed in white would laugh to himself as he analyzed a couple of sheets of paper. The whole laboratory was monochromatic, a whitish, pale look, that burned the youth's eyes. No child had to face such lack of color.

"Come" the man said, opening the door and pushing him inside the laboratory. As soon as the boy entered, the monitors on the walls turned on, reflecting a range of pictures of him in different angles. The scientist was sitting on front of a computer, his glasses slipping from the tip of his crooked nose.

"My boy!" he exclaimed, rising from the chair. Then he glanced at the man who had been leading the boy. "Turk. You may leave." The scientist's back curved in a defined arch, his neck looking exquisitely long, and straight. His greasy black hair was arranged in a messy ponytail, and the boy could see the dirt beneath his long nails. The scientist approached him. "How do you feel today, little one?"

"Normal." The child answered. He was about to reply thank you, as everyone told him to do in front of grownups, but then he remembered that he actually hated the man. The scientist observed him a little longer and then pointed at the iron table on the corner of the room. "Lie there, my boy, will you?"

The child walked to the table, a droplet of sweat running down his temple. That table scared him. When he lied there, a strange mechanical arm would lean on him, putting a strange helmet on his small head. Then the pain would come, and faintly the boy would see strange diagrams on a screen. The scientist would laugh while looking at those strange diagrams and would write on those sheets of paper that he always carried around.

Resigned, the boy lied down on the table, and his wrists and ankles were immediately tied by mechanical straps. He looked at the plates at the ceiling and one more time he started to count them. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10 plus 1, 10 plus 2, 10 plus 3…

"So, let´s begin our session." The mad man said, approaching the table. Those sheets were once again with him, and the man was writing so quickly that he seemed like his black pen was flying over the paper. The scientist darkly chuckled as he plugged some cables with a little needle on the tip to the boy's arms and legs. The child felt the needle penetrate his skin, a thin, sharp pain. The man backed away and sat on a rotating chair, holding his notebook.

"The 156th session. Let's see if I have some results today."

A mechanical arm rose from below the table. On its tip hang a strange helmet made of iron and intertwined with red and blue cables. The boy remembered the pain that that object caused. He swallowed dryly in anticipation. The scientist looked at the boy with a faint smile and then started to write his report.

"Subject name: Sephiroth."

Yes. That was the boy's name. It was fun to think that he found difficult to write his own name. They only taught him how to write a, e, i, o, u, t, p, f and s. Whenever he tried to write his name with a piece of charcoal, it would end up like "Sepiot" or "Sefiot". The boy found that really disturbing. Although he didn't have much contact to the outside world, he knew that people could write their own names. If they had the right to know how their names were spelled, why didn't he?

He observed the scientist, his face changing expression as he read the different topics.

"Age: Four."

"I'm almost five" the boy quickly added. The man didn't reply. Sephiroth insisted: "I'm almost five. It will be my birthday in November."

"Yes, yes." The scientist said. "I know you're almost five. Now, what have you eaten for lunch?"

"…A boiled egg. And half a carrot."

The scientist nodded, with a smile. He looked pleased.

"But I'm hungry" Sephiroth added. "I thought that maybe you could give me one of those nice meals that I see grownups eating."

The scientist looked annoyed. "Boy, can't you understand that you can't eat too much? Or else, your sugar levels will collide with the mako in your body, and I don't know what'll happen then."

He then spoke to himself in a low voice: you are the living being who contains more mako within its body. He composed himself and looked at the young silver-haired boy with displease.

"Now will you shut up please, and stop interrupting me?"

The boy shut his mouth tight until his lips formed a thin, white line. He waited for the scientist to finish his report. He knew that then he would have to put the strange helmet and the pain would come, provoked by what seem to be a thousand sharp needles, burying in his skull. But the man in white continued writing his report.

"Today is… the 23rd of October. Yes, yes. Levels of sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure are normal, aren't they? Yes, yes, they are. So, let's see if everything is doing as it should. Do you mind to put that in the top of your head? Yes, like this, my boy, very well. You're getting accustomed to this, aren't you? It's like we're family already!" and the scientist exploded in a burst of laughter, followed by a dark and low chuckling. Sephiroth ignored the man, and continued his work on counting the plates. 10 plus 4, 10 plus 5, 10 plus 6… However, he only counted until 20 plates because after that, his vision was so restricted by the strange helmet that he couldn't see anything else. He waited for the pain to surge, and closed his eyes shut. The only thing that came to his head was the soft song he was singing back in the corridor:

"Needles, pinches, stings and sticks

Vaccines, tests, lights and screams

Iron, steel, mirrors and push

Push, push, push the life away."

Sephiroth never knew if the man heard the song, but the pain surged in his head, as if a hammer crushed his skull. The boy hadn't the courage to scream anymore, so he bit his tongue until he felt blood on his mouth. His fists were clenched tight and all his body was stiff due to the unbearable pain. If it wasn't for the sharp humming playing inside his head, he would swear that the scientist was laughing with joy.

The pain endured for what seemed like an hour (however, we will never be sure about the true time of his pain, because at the time, Sephiroth didn't know what were seconds, minutes or hours) before it ended suddenly. His wrists and ankles were released and the helmet rose from his head through the mechanical arm. The boy got up immediately, feeling the sweat tickling down his brow and sliding down his cheeks and neck. It had hurt more than usual this time.

"Very well, very well!" the scientist exclaimed. "It's perfect, just as I wanted it to be." He chuckled again. "Very well, my boy, very well. I'm surprised you got these results so early."

Sephiroth watched the scientist as he rambled about "being a master-genius" and whatsoever. His movements were so enthusiast that the boy was getting scared. Would he be exposed to more pain? And a growing pain, perhaps?

"You have been taking the pills I have been giving you, haven't you, kid?" the scientist asked, looking at the monitors as if it contained the universal truth. "Yes, I know you have, or your mako levels wouldn't be so high. Nor you Jenova Cells. Yes… there's a big percentage of Jenova cells in your body… My dream has come true, and the project is successful. When you grow, every scientist in this damned world will bow before me. Bow before my genius, bow before my abilities. And then they say that Gast is better than me. Cruel and unfair world, this one.

Sephiroth blinked. Mako? Jenova Cells? Those were names he had never heard before. "How higher?" he asked innocently. The scientist frowned, his brow wrinkling.

"You have about 340% of the mako energy contained within a SOLDIER's body! And… and your cells…. They reached very high levels… I don't want to mention numbers, but… perhaps two millions of cells have spread inside your body in the last 6 months. I am a genius, yes, yes, I am a genius!"

Sephiroth was puzzled. Jenova Cells? Mako? SOLDIER? And 340%? Was that a number much higher than 10?

"Who's Jenova?" he asked abruptly. The scientist looked at the boy amused. His lips parted, but no sound came. Then he laughed.

"Oh my boy, I can't tell you now. But I promise that one day I will answer that question. You may leave…. Take those pills I gave you, everyday, before sleep and after breakfast. They should stabilize your mako levels."

Sephiroth got up and exited the laboratory, his head mingled into a mess of confusion. He heard Hojo's laughter ringing in his head.


Sephiroth was sitting on the top of his bed. His room was incredibly small – he could almost swear it was a cell for criminals. But throughout time, Sephiroth started to feel at home whenever he was between those metallic walls. At the side of his bed was a pile of damaged and torn books. He couldn't really read the words so he would spend a lot of time inspecting the pictures of the book. Unluckily, all the books he could find throughout the building were books with pictures of cars and other vehicles, mostly in black and white, and without a pinch of color. They weren't really interesting, but the boy would have fun trying to copy the pictures to the last pages of the books with his piece of charcoal.

On the other side of the room, a small mirror hung on the wall. It was broken at the corners and Sephiroth could only see his reflection if he climbed his bed. Then a pale face would be in front of him, and piercing, emerald eyes, filled with curiosity would be fixing his own. His silver hair was short, his small bangs covering the forehead. There was a time when that mad scientist shaved all his hair because Sephiroth ate more than necessary at dinner. The boy swore that day that when he grew up he wouldn't cut his hair ever, ever again.

In his small hand was one of the pills that the scientist gave him. It glowed in a blue-greenish light. Sephiroth swallowed it whole and felt it sliding down his throat. That would "stabilize his mako levels", as the scientist told him. Then the boy laid his head on the pillow and closed his eyes.

Those pills always gave him stomach ache.

Sephiroth knew it was going to be a long night.


Author's Important Note:

No YAOI.

The Project-S will be a compilation of Sephiroth's life, in a parallel event to Cloud's life. Of course most of it will be invented and original, but it WILL have in-game events. The first part will be called "Origins" and will cover Sephiroth's childhood and teenage, and the events that made him a 1st Class and consequently general. After that, Project-S will cover the events of Crisis Core (although it will also contain original work, besides Crisis Core events) – it will be called Project-S "Revolution". After "Revolution", Project-S will cover the events of Final Fantasy VII ("The Calling") and then it will cover the events of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and what happened to Sephiroth while on the Lifestream.

No OOC. I will try to portray the characters accurately. Probably, this series will contain every character on the game. However, it will be very hard for me to talk about Before Crisis plot, because I haven't played the game. However, if I find it necessary, I will indeed read the plot and do my best.

I would love if you would support me on this big project I have in mind. I think Sephiroth is a great character and he deserves a piece of fiction that makes readers understand what he has been through. Also, Sephiroth is the main character of this fic, but all of them will be involved without great transformations, and their personality will remain truthful to that in the game.

Cheers to all of you guys!

~Irith