Thanks to jsakurachan1 for pointing out spelling mistakes! It´s corrected now.
25
Tseng turned a page and read the next passage with a concentrated frown on his face. He had paid a visit to the library this morning to re-educate himself in the matters of child abuse, for it seemed that he wouldn´t go anywhere with his technically non existent knowledge. To his surprise the assortment had been rather poor, but not because the library didn´t store any books but because someone had already taken them. A short look at the register -that authomatically saved every lending through a marvelous eye scanning device (a process one didn´t even notice)- told him that maybe Yazoo wasn´t as uninterested and detached as he pretended to be.
He just hoped the kid would actually read the books.
The dark haired man's frown deepened when somewhere outside the teachers' lounge muffled noises penetrated his ears. Slightly annoyed he rose fom his chair to see what the commotion was all about. He half expected to see Reno abuse the corridor as his own personal skateboard route again, but instead of being confronted with the overenergetic loud mouth, he only could make out two people at the end of the hallway.
Judging from their height they definitely weren´t students, and narrowing his eyes, Tseng discerned one of them as the principal. The other person however remained in the shadows, and Tseng pondered if he should join them to see if everything was alright. Even though this school had tighter security than a nunnery it couldn´t hurt to casually walk past them, pretending to be on his way to the bathroom…
Closing the distance between them he could see that the two were apparently in some kind of argument, meaning that the principal was trying to appease whoever it was with soothing gestures. Though the nearer he got the more familiar the silouette of the person standing in front of one of the high windows became.
Probably it was just one of the parents, albeit this one seemed to be one of the more higher ranked, judging fom the principals efforts to calm the man down. Tseng almost had passed them, losing interest since everything seemed to be alright so far, when his superior finally spotted him and immediately focused her attention on him.
"Oh, Tseng, what perfect timing. I was about to call you anyway. Could you come here for a moment?"
Cocking his head in question the teacher obeyed and joined their little party by the window. And finally the features of the visitor became clear. Tseng´s eyes widened in surprise and disbelief when he came to a halt in front of none other than the great general Sephiroth, who coolly looked down at the rather unhappy principal.
Now Tseng came to fully comprehend why his boss had been reduced to such a nervous wreck, even he felt uncomfortable and small under the general's imperious glare.
The principal licked her lips and quickly glanced back at the general, smiling apologetically. "This is Mister Tseng, one of our math teachers. Tseng, this is general Sephiroth, I´m sure you have heard of him."
Tseng nodded and bowed down, receiving an indifferent look and a short nod in return.
"It´s an honour to meet you sir."
There was a grunt from Sephiroth that may should have been an attempt at acknowledgement but revealed his impatience, which didn´t surprise Tseng in the least. He thought the man was someone who might be brilliant on the battlefield but was quite obviously no one for elaborate social contacts. He was used to command and expected his orders to be carried out, so usually there was no need for small talk and courtesies.
Though Tseng found this to be a bit haughty, he respected Sephiroth for his accomplishments and after all he certainly had every right to be arrogant, so the teacher choose to ignore his attitude and instead asked in a friendly manner:
"May I ask what business you have here? Maybe I can help." Oddly enough the principal gave the lead into his hands immediately and stepped a little behind him, Tseng noticed with amusement (and a bit of satisfaction).
"Now that would be something," the general remarked sarcastically with a disgusted side glance at his former discussion partner. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes at the principal he explained in a slightly, but not very significantly, less annoyed fashion. "I´m looking for my children."
Tseng was too much a professional to let his astonishment show on his face, although he couldn´t help but wonder about the fact that Sephiroth actually had offsprings. As far as he knew there had never been any reports that the famous swordsman had any kind of relationships nor that he had children. But then there wasn´t known much about said man's private life anyway and Tseng sure had better things to do than keeping up with the gossip.
When he took another scrutinizing look at the silver haired man he also seemed to look like he hadn´t been out of school since too long ago himself, despite his holier-than-thou-attitude and his grave face.
"Well, we´ll see if they are here. If you´d like to follow me..."
Tseng made an inviting gesture towards the end of the hallway and started to lead the man towards the bureau. Sephiroth followed a few steps behind, carrying himself in that proud manner of his, when Tseng asked with interest, but not too curiously, for further details. "May I ask for your infant's names?"
"You may," the general permitted amply."Their names are Loz. Kadaj. Yazoo."
The clear, deep voice cut through the warm afternoon silence like a knife through warm butter and Tseng stopped dead in his tracks. He just felt like someone had thrown him into icy water.
The general noticed the teacher´s stiff back and sudden halt and raised an eyebrow.
"Anything wrong with that?" It was not so much of a question but an order to continue their walk, but Tseng slowly turned around to face the general with widened eyes.
"You are Loz´s, Kadaj´s and Yazoo´s father?"
The general´s eyes now showed impatience and clear annoyance, although he kept his face straight otherwise. He was sick of standing in hallways and dealing with incompetent civilians. As if he didn´t have other things to do…
"I believe I just mentioned that. Now if you would be so kind to guide me to wherever they are, I don´t have all day," he retorted with false kindness, even summoning a thin smile to his lips, but his eyes didn´t smile at all.
Tseng continued to stare and something seemed to change inside him, as his body suddenly screamed rejection and his eyes went a cold, hard shade of black. Clenching his hands into fits and rising his chin, he stated dismissively "When I think about it; no. I certainly should not let you see them."
The general´s eyes widened a fraction in disbelief for he wasn´t used to be flatly told out that his orders were refused. Otherwise however he didn´t let his disbelief be shown. Though if they had been at the base and Tseng would have been one of his recruits there wouldn´t have been much left of him, save for a quivering, bloody mess. But fortunately for the math teacher they weren´t and so Sephiroth had to settle for an unruffled "Oh? And why is that?"
Tseng didn´t fall for the innocent question and remained obstinate, hardly repressing his overwhelming emotions.
"I believe you know very well why," he pressed out, having a hard time to not shove his fist into the general´s insolent, beautiful face.
Right now, everything felt so very unreal to him, like a very, very, VERY bad dream. He could hear his blood rush in his ears, his heart pounding, all the while having images of Yazoo flashing up in front of his inner eye, the boy lying in a puddle of blood on a too large bed.
This just couldn´t be real, it had to be a bad joke someone was playing on him. He half expected that the next second some hyperactive brat would jump out from behind a curtain with an entire camera team, screaming "You just got punk'd, man!".
It couldn´t be the general…!
Said general stared back blankly at the dark haired, exotic looking man, then his eyes narrowed and the smile vanished. "Take me to them. Now."
But Tseng still refused to move even his small finger and their staring contest went on for another minute, until the general threatened in a low voice "That´s an order."
Tseng's expression tightened even more and he choose to ignore the principal who completely failed to understand what was going on and why Tseng had suddenly out of the blue decided to be suicidal and even worse, drag her along. It had looked so good just a minute ago! But then she also didn´t dare to interrupt them and settled with nervous looks between the two men.
"Who told you they are here?"
The corpulent principal gasped at the open hostility her teacher showed towards the great general, but before Sephiroth could open his mouth to say something clearly threatening, the door to the office swang open and Elena stepped out with a paper she was reading.
Not bothering to look up and be impressed by the whole situation she beamed "I just found the information, sir. Their rooms are 123 and 124, that´s just down the hall and lef-". She had finally looked up and her thriumphant expression froze when she saw her desperate superiour and the two men having their silent battle of wills in the middle of the corridor.
"Ts-Tseng, what are you doing here?" She awkwardly pushed a strand of hair out of her face, taking a few uncertain steps towards them. She avoided eye contact with Tseng since she felt somehow… guilty.
Though she told herself that she hadn´t done anything wrong. To help herself out of this nasty situation, she cleared her throat and declared in a forced, joyful voice "Ooh, Tseng. What a coincidence, I was just about to show the general through our school. I´m sure you have heard about his glorius victory over at the western border, it was a masterstroke-"
"I know who he is," Tseng interrupted her harshly and she flinched.
"What I want to know is why you brought him here."
She crunched the paper in her hand, not knowing where to look. "W-Well, I thought I should inform him, since they are his children and we should really clear up this misunderstanding…" She gave a forced, nervous little laugh which endet in a cough while Tseng continued to stare at her in disbelieve.
"Misunderstanding? What misunderstanding?! It is obvoius what this man did! This guy is insane! How could you-"
"You did the absolute right thing," the genral interrupted and walked past Tseng towards the woman who looked thankfully up at his mighty figure. He laid a hand on her shoulder in a reassuring manner, but his cold gaze was focused on Tseng.
"I am wondering who the insane one out of us here is. You are obviously having serious mental problems and I don´t have time for this." He snatched the paper from Elenas hand. Tseng made a step forward in protest but was held back by the principal who had finally came back to her senses.
Not bothering to waste more of his precious time with the struggling teacher, Sephiroth turned at his heels and strode down the hall with his head upraised and a victorious smirk on his lips.
Tseng watched the man walking around a corner and prayed that the boys were strong enough to oppose him, while he was dragged into the bureau of his furious principal, followed by a bemused Elena.