A Final Fantasy VII Fanfiction by Majokai Yukiko
Pairing: Zack + Sephiroth, Cloud + Sephiroth
Warnings: Blood and gore. Yaoi.
This is an amateur effort and does not intend to infringe on the rights of Squaresoft and its associates.
A/N:
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Zack paced nervously around the sitting room of the mansion, and he had every right to be pacing. It was not an everyday affair where one had both his current lover and ex-lover with him under the same roof, with the former napping nonchalantly on the couch and the latter talking over his Portable Hand Set with his current lover.
Sephiroth was standing by the window, speaking to Cloud while looking out at the front porch, thought not really looking. He was in a daze, moving on autopilot as he explained Jenova's little house visit to the blond man. Cloud took in the information dumbly, not wanting to make any comments until the shock wore off. First the confidential information was leaked out to the media by an unknown source, then the reappearance of Jenova in his backyard. Their initial suspicion was correct. The WEAPONs had returned and evolved into a more lethal form because their greatest enemy had done the same. The 'why' part was settled. It was only the 'how' part that they were not sure of, though there was really only one possibility for it: Hojo.
Hojo was still alive and causing mayhem somewhere, possibly too close for comfort, given that Jenova managed to arrive at the Shinra mansion in style, not causing any panic on the way. Cloud sighed. This was the second time they had to fight against Hojo and his extraterrestrial extensions. Even though Sephiroth was on their side this time, he still could not do much help blind.
"Cloud?" Sephiroth asked, worried by the sudden silence on the other side of the terminal. "You there?"
"Yeah…" The white haired man contemplated briefly about telling him Zack's sudden return and quickly decided against it. There were more pressing matters at hand for Cloud to handle.
"Cloud," Sephiroth started again, slipping into old habits this time due to the imminent war. "You need to regroup AVALANCHE and the Turks. We need all the help we can get now."
Zack snapped his head up at the sudden change in tone, wanting to comment but know better than to interrupt Sephiroth when he was in General mode. Finally, Sephiroth ended the connection and turned around.
"You know as well as I do what this means, Seph." Old military training was hard to kick. Within minutes they had not only arrive at the conclusion Cloud had, they had also listed the possible locations of Hojo's base too. As Jenova could not possibly travel long distances without risking meeting the WEAPONs nor could Hojo get his hands on an airship for transportation les he attracts some unwarranted attention, there were only so many places he could be.
First and foremost being the Nibelheim reactors, his old experimentation spot.
Sephiroth nodded and made his way to the couch, taking out a dagger from his pockets. He sat down and woke the snoozing bartender.
Jake jerked awake at the nudge, saw the glint of the blade and scurried backwards a little.
"What do you think you are doing?" Zack exclaimed. Sephiroth only smiled.
"He's infected by Jenova," he answered, pointing the tip of the dagger at Jake who only paled further. Zack shook his head. He knew Sephiroth. When he was in General mode, he would not joke about things like these. Not like he jokes about them even when he wasn't in that mode.
He took the blade from Sephiroth and grabbed for Jake's hand, cutting a long but not particularly deep wound on his palm. Jake gasped. Instead of healthy red blood, a slimy green substance oozed out of the wound.
"How's it?" Sephiroth asked, holding out his hand for his dagger back. "There's only one way to cure this." Without any hesitation, Sephiroth slit the blade against his own wrist.
"What are you doing?" Jake yelled. "You will be poisoned too!" Sephiroth only smiled and shook his head.
"No, my blood is an anti-toxin. In the last war I fought alongside Jenova and Hojo. In order for me to operate in the best condition, I was injected with enough anti-toxin to kill whatever poison Jenova could use." The blind man nudged his bleeding wrist against Jake's lips. "I don't know who you are. But drink it if you don't want to die."
Jakes shifted his eyes from Sephiroth to Zack and then began to lick tentatively at the blood. The first drip that touched his tongue was like heaven. He felt cleansed as the foreign monster in him struggled and died. He kept licking until the blood began to clot before he stopped.
Zack watched all these with avid interest, at the same time, knowing what it all meant. He pulled out a handkerchief from his pocket and tied it around Sephiroth's injured hand, not caring for the absurdity of bandaging such an insubstantial wound. It gave him something to do, while he digested the information Sephiroth was trying to pass on subtly.
Sephiroth's blood could kill Jenova. It was probably the only way to destroy her completely. But in order to do so, Sephiroth had to bleed. Perhaps more than he could afford to.
The white haired man gently tugged his hand away when he sensed that Zack was done. He cradled one hand with the other and lowered his head briefly, as if ashamed to let others see his face.
The three men sat in silence.
***
Reeve spread a world map across the conference table and looked at his party.
"This," he pointed at a spot on the map, "is the Shinra mansion."
"And this," he swiveled their focus to four marked crosses, "is where the WEAPONs were last sighted."
They did not want to do this. It was tough, for all of them. The last war had taken much out of them, losing loved ones, losing their homeland, having to turn against those that they loved and trusted. Pain, hate, fire and betrayal had tainted the memories of their life. But now, fate dished another pile of shit at their doorstep.
As if one war was not enough. They need to fight two. Some of them…Yuffie bit on her thumbnail nervously…had to experience three.
Cid stood up angrily. "Isn't it obvious?" he glanced around at the rest of the people in the room. All of them were looking at him with a wide-eyed confused look on their faces, except for Vincent Valentine who was sitting in a chair at the far end with his head down. The pilot almost let out a snort. Children.
Finally, Tifa asked the question that everybody was dying to ask but dared not. "What was obvious?" Cid sighed. Sometimes it was easy to forget that while they had been through more things in their life that most people had, they were still children without the military, tactical training to see what should have been glaringly obvious.
"Can't you tell where Hojo is?" He finally asked. Just like he had expected, faces of blank confusion turned to look at him, wide innocent eyes blinking profusely.
"Nibelheim." Everybody turned to stare at Vincent, who had remained silent since the beginning of the gathering until now. "The Mako reactors at Nibelheim. That's the only place he could be."
The silence was deafening, the temperature in the room seemed to have fallen ten degrees or so. Cloud buried his face into his hands and groaned. If given a choice, he would have rather kept the war away from Sephiroth, as far as possible. All around him, plans were quickly thrown out, whatever that was remaining of the Turks were quickly contacted. It was decided, they would move off to Nibelheim, using the mansion as their base before launching an all out attack at Hojo and his petty little creations.
Tifa glanced frantically between the rest of the party and Cloud. Her eyes locked with Cid's for a moment, both knowing what had to be done but not knowing who to do it. But fortunately for them, Cloud withdrew his head from his hands and made the decision for them.
"Sephiroth was alive."
Silence fell once more. Cloud cleared his throat and repeated.
"Sephiroth was alive…I saved him…and he's now living in the mansion."
Tifa gritted her teeth and added what Cloud had left out.
"Colonel Zachary is alive too."
***
End of Chapter 6
Continue to Chapter 7