Birthday present for ReplicaRiku'sgirl. I don't know why, but I imagine Sephiroth to be a cuddly drunk. All of these characters belong to Square Enix.
Angeal was wandering through Shinra Tower one day on the way to his office, ever on the lookout for Zack who had a tendency to team up with Reno or Genesis to cause trouble as of late. His most recent prank with Reno was spiking the cafeteria food with the liquid version of malboro breath. Luckily, Genesis, Sephiroth, and himself were used to cooking meals for themselves due to the normal food they served being unappetizing as is, but it caused havoc among the people who normally ate the food there.
As he shook his head at remembering this last prank, he noticed Genesis heading towards Sephiroth's office with a wicked grin on his face. Knowing that that look can never mean a good thing, he stopped him before he could get to his office. "Genesis," He began in a scolding tone with his arms crossed against his chest, "What are you doing?"
"Ah…Um…" The redhead stammered, not expecting to run into anyone, much less his childhood friend. "I was just going to see Sephiroth about a report he sent me. Said something about trying to ban Hojo from using powerful tranquilizers since he's used them badly as far back as he can remember."
"Oh yeah." Angeal said, tapping his chin with a finger. "I remember him telling me about him shooting him with malboro tranquilizers when he was a kid. Regardless, you have that look on your face that you're going to do something and Sephiroth is your favorite victim of your pranks."
Before Genesis could respond, a person screaming for their life reached their ears down the hallway. As they turned in the direction of the screams, a cadet with spiky, blond hair rushed in their direction, the source of the noise. The teenager ran behind Angeal and clung to him, staring fearfully at where he just came from, muttering, "The eyes, the eyes."
The older man grabbed him by the shoulders and lowered down to his eye level. "Soldier, calm down. Now tell me who you are and what happened." He looked up when he heard a door slam open to see Sephiroth open the door to his office in full battle mode with Masamune at the ready.
The cadet trembled and glanced between Sephiroth and hallway every once in a while as he began giving his report. "I'm cadet Cloud Strife, Sir. Zack released this creature in the cadets' barracks. He said it was perfectly harmless and then left the room, leaving the creature in the room with us. It seemed pretty harmless and cute until it injured one of the cadets. We tried to kill it, but we couldn't do enough damage to it. As far as I could tell, I was the only cadet that managed to escape without being knocked out."
"And what is this creature that Zack unleashed on you unsuspecting cadets?" Sephiroth asked in his usual calm voice while following the boy's gaze down the hallway.
"I-I don't know Sir. It had this knife, walks really slow, and had these big yellow eyes that seemed to just stare straight into your soul." Cloud told and shuddered at the last detail. "Gah!" He exclaimed, pointing down the hallway as he shook even more. "There it is!"
Angeal looked down the hallway and saw a lone Tonberry waddling slowly towards them.
Sephiroth snorted. "Seriously? An entire barracks worth of cadets got taken down by this? I'm going to have to talk to the cadet training program after this."
"Now, now Sephiroth." Angeal said calmly. "Remember that most people aren't horrible killing machines that can impale Midgar Zoloms on trees. Isn't that right, Gen?" He asked as he turned to where the redhead just was a few moments ago to find him not there.
"Got an imaginary friend now, Angeal?" The silver-haired man asked with a light snicker.
"No," The other man said while looking around. "Genesis was here just a few moments ago." After a few more seconds of searching for his friend, he shrugged. "Must've gone off to read Loveless or something. Ah well, we can kill the nemesis of the cadets by ourselves quite easily." He drew his fighting sword as he said his last sentence.
Sephiroth smirked in response as he took his fighting stance. "Hmph. This pathetic creature stands no chance against us."
"H-hey be careful against it." Cloud managed to stutter, but the SOLDIERs had already charged at the beast.
Genesis exited Sephiroth's office, noticing that his two friends were preoccupied with the tonberry he told Zack to release as a distraction. He put the stopper back on a now-empty vial and slipped it back into his trenchcoat. "Ah man…" He started, grinning cheerfully. "This is going to be a fun day."
Cloud walked through the tower on the way to Sephiroth's office, trembling while clutching a report in his hand. After his barrack mates had been revived and given their account on the Tonberry incident that happened earlier that day, someone had to deliver the report Shinra had compiled about it to Sephiroth so he could confirm his side of it as well as Angeal. So, his so-called friends had decided to toss him to the wolves and make him deliver it, seeing as how he did not have the misfortune of being knocked out by the Tonberry.
He sighed and took a few seconds to steel himself and stop from shaking before opening the door to his idol's office. His jaw dropped as he saw the mighty general of Shinra and the scourge of Wutai happily chewing on a pen that had been on his desk. He closed his mouth and shook his head to clear his mind before responding to the bizarre sight in front of him. "U-um Sir, i-if I may ask, what are y-you doing?" He asked before mentally chiding himself for stuttering from fear.
The man slowly looked up from his chew toy and blinked slowly at the cadet before rushing straight at him, arms outstretched. "Chocobo!" He crowed as he hugged the teenager tightly.
Cloud gasped and thought he felt a few ribs snap under the pressure of the older man's embrace. He managed to look up at him through the pain and noticed his eyes looked slightly bloodshot and out of focus. "Is Sephiroth drunk, and on the job no less?" He wondered to himself as the other man began to busy himself by walking around his office with him while chewing on one of his unruly spikes of golden hair, refusing to relinquish his grip even a bit on the cadet.
"Sephiroth, what on Gaia are you doing to that poor cadet?"
Cloud's head snapped back up at the voice and he turned his head to face the door as much as he could under present circumstances. He saw Angeal looking at the two of them and his face flushed red, thinking of how suggestive the pose might look to a wandering passerby.
"I'm jus' cuddlin' him, Geal." Sephiroth responded, slurring his words together as a testament to how drunk he really was.
The black-haired man's brow furrowed as he thought of possible scenarios of why Sephiroth may have gotten this hammered. Normally, the silver-haired man stays as far away from alcohol as he possibly can, for now obvious reasons. "Let's see here. The yearly lab visit isn't close and neither is the mental evaluation with Hojo." Angeal groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose as he thought of the most likely reason for this. "Genesis." He was going to submit the redhead to another visit to his fanclub after this was all over if his hunch was right. But, first thing's first, getting the cadet away from the potentially hazardous Sephiroth and containing him until the alcohol wore off. "C'mon Seph, let's get you to your bedroom so you can sober up." He said in the most soothing tone he could muster.
"No!" The general snapped, crushing the teen against his chest and receiving an unheard whimper of pain from him. "I wanna stay here and cuddle my chocobo!"
Angeal would have laughed at how childish his friend was acting if the 'chocobo's' life had not been in danger. Instead, he thought of how best to approach this problem. He could try to persuade Sephiroth to go back to his room with the cadet, but that would attract unwanted attention and the safety of the younger man could not be guaranteed after he was settled in his room. He snapped his fingers as a thought came into his head, one that would also let him avoid another possibly dangerous trip to Genesis's fanclub. "Okay, you can keep your chocobo for now, but I'll come back with something you'll probably find a lot more interesting than that."
"Okay!" The general cried cheerfully before he went back to chewing on his captive's hair.
The black-haired man sighed inwardly at this odd display before he left the room. He cracked his knuckles as he steeled himself for what would probably be a difficult battle.
About half an hour later, he was dragging Genesis down the hallways of Shinra Tower with an arm around his neck, trying his best to ignore the weird looks he got from other people.
"Let me go!" The redhead screamed up at him.
"No," Angeal responded back harshly. "I know you have something to do with this, so it's your job to fix it, or at least try." He said as he opened the door to Sephiroth's office, tossed Genesis in, and hurriedly closed the door behind him. "Hey Sephiroth!" He said through the wall to him as Genesis banged on the door while yelling curses. "That new creature I tossed in there is a rare red chocobo, much more cuddly than the yellow variety!" He laughed softly as he heard Sephiroth's cry of joy before a squawk of surprise and annoyance in Genesis's voice filled the air momentarily. He opened the door once he heard a lighter knocking on it. "He didn't hurt you, did he?" He asked the little cadet with concern evident in his voice.
The now-free blond shook his head. "Nah, he just held me and chewed on my hair. I thought he broke a few ribs at first, but turns out I'm just a little bruised." He told him while trying to get his damp, lank hair back to its bouncy spikes. "Say, why is he acting like this anyway?"
Angeal noticed a vial rolling towards him on the ground from where Sephiroth was now holding Genesis close in a vice-like grip while laying down on the floor. He picked it up and examined the label on it. "Ah. An experimental substance from the labs. Says it's like a very concentrated dose of alcohol. It has to be really potent if it has this effect on Sephiroth, probably enough to hospitalize, if not kill, a normal person."
"Wow, wonder why they made that." Cloud said with wide eyes. "Anyway, what do we do now?"
"Simple. We just let our drunken general cuddle his red chocobo all he wants." He tapped his chin. "Come to think of it, I haven't taken a day off for a while. How about coming with me to see how a sane First-class spends their free time?"
The younger man's eyes brightened at the thought of actually being able to learn about SOLDIERs first-hand. "Of course! It'll beat spending a day being the victim of Zack's pranks any day!"
Angeal chuckled softly at his eagerness. "Come on. I know this great ice cream place on Loveless Avenue." He said while leading him out of the building with a hand.
They came back to the office a few hours later to see Sephiroth sleeping happily on the floor while holding his 'chocobo' close.
"So, how goes being a pet, Gen?" Angeal asked while snickering quietly.
"Absolutely horrible." He muttered darkly in return. "He keeps drooling in my hair. C'mon, at least bring me my Loveless book to keep me occupied here."
He frowned and crossed his arms across his chest. "No. You need to learn your lesson. Plus, Sephiroth's reaction to it is bad enough when he's sober. Imagine his response when drunk. You wouldn't want your precious book ruined, now would you?"
The redhead sighed. "I suppose you're right. If all you're going to do is tease me about this, then leave me be."
The black-haired man chuckled again and obeyed him, dragging the cadet along with him.
Sephiroth groaned softly with his eyes closed as his head was pounding. "Ugh. Why does everything hurt?" He thought to himself as he slowly opened his eyes, instantly regretting it due to the sharp pain the morning sunlight streaming in through the windows caused for him. He managed to fight through the pain enough to notice that there was a warm body by him. He focused his bleary eyes on the figure to see that it was a sleeping Genesis Rhapsodos.
"Oh, what the hell!"