Disclaimer: I, Strange and Intoxicating -rsa-, do not own, think I own, or will ever own Final Fantasy VII or its compilation. I don't even want to know what I'd do with it if I did.


There was a tube down his throat. Sephiroth could feel the plastic slithering down his esophagus, the plastic biting against the soft flesh of his throat. It was something that he had taken for granted so many years ago, in the prison that was Hojo's labs...

The ability to feel.

There was something tying his wrists down to the metal table, and from the strength, he knew they were the good cuffs, the ones that Hojo would use if he was in a happy. These there the ones that, though strong adamantaimai, were at least laced with a little animal fur to make the bite on his skin a little less painful.

Oh, and how he could feel. He could feel the blood pumping in his ears, the smell of alcohol and bleach they scrubbed the floors with, even the clinical steel under him, the kind of steel that was so easy to clean, but Sephiroth always knew what he sat on and what was below. There was blood and gore, the kind that stuck to the surface like a grease. How was it that this dream could be so realistic that even the damned table below him felt real? He was dead, deader than anything Gaia had ever shit on before... yet... but... but here he was.

What was going on?

Sephiroth screamed, because there was nothing else that he could do, as the plastic made talking (or even thinking, because how long had it been since he had a tube down his throat, and there were no tubes in the hell that was nothingness) absolutely impossible. All he could do was let out painted, guttural noises. He was like a limp, kicked dog. Oh, what Strife would say if he could see him now, shackled to a fucking table like a common animal, like a beaten and whipped dog.

Remember that he very well knows the feeling.

Sephiroth strained against the shackles, trying to pull against the little voice in his mind. It shouldn't have been there. Nothing should have been there. In the nothingness, he was free... all he wanted was to be left alone, not hear another monster inside of his head.

I've already told you, you and I... we are more alike than you would think. Bahamut laughed inside Sephiroth's head, and he did not like it. No, he did not like it one bit.

Put me back, now. Sephiroth noticed that when he looked around the room it was like looking through a hazy fog. It was like he was missing parts of his eyes, which made little sense to him. He had perfect eyesight, ever since his birth. He was perfect. He didn't have shitty, poor eyesight. Why was everything so unfocused?

I won't be putting you anywhere. You owe me. It was difficult to know what Bahamut would look like, particularly since the beast had been in dragon form, breathing fire upon him last time he had seen it, but Sephiroth had conjured a boy, no larger than a starved orphan of maybe ten. It was the only thing he could imagine that would be so malicious. As he shut his eyes tight (because the plastic choking him reminded him of times when he was a child in the labs again, and it was difficult enough to survive it once, he couldn't be subjected to it again) he tried to imagine what this little shit would look like.

Big blue eyes, blond hair sticking up every which way, a pointed nose that stuck up ever so slightly, and of course it would be Strife who would bring misery upon him. The little brat couldn't just accept that he had won three times now, that he had been so decimated that even the thought of the Buster Sword made Sephiroth remember the feeling of being gutted like a fish in a Wutaian market.

The image in his mind's eye smirked, and yes... It certainly was Cloud Strife, though in a much more docile frame. Still, of course he would do this to himself.

You really are as bad as Vincent Valentine. It was strange hearing such a deep voice reverberating from such a small body.

Sephiroth tried not to choke. One of the worst things that could happen was to vomit while the tubes were down his throat; he had done it so many times as a child, hoping one day that the scientists would let him drown in his own sick. Of course, Hojo would have never permitted it... but it had been a fantasy, a dream of escape.

This is cruel, even for the Planet.

Well, I am not the planet. The boy was surrounded in the darkness that Sephiroth had known so well. But rather than fight it, Let's... enjoy our time together. I want you to fix things, make it so that the planet doesn't crumble to pieces... Do that, and you live. Bahamut's eyes hardened. Fail, and I will watch your destruction through every chasm of this Planet. Cloud Strife has no problem with killing you for a fourth, and fifth, or a thousandth time.

Sephiroth believed it. If there was one thing on the Planet the he knew, was Cloud Strife would always be there, Buster Sword in hand.

It hit him worse than the antiseptically clean smell.

The Buster Sword.

Angeal's sword, before passing it to Zack, who in turn passed it to Cloud. How fitting that the weapon of his best friend would gut him over and over again. After what Sephiroth had done, betraying his friends, not being with them in their time of need, unable to break the collar around his neck... Of course it would be Angeal to do him in, in the end.

Perhaps it would have been more fitting for it to have been Genesis, but the irony was not lost on Sephiroth.

He tried to laugh, but the tube made it more than a little difficult.

You have lost your mind.

Sephiroth felt his body wracked with laughter, even though he tried his best not to move his head or throat. You are the one who took me from emptiness and shoved me here. You don't have a right to judge.

And truly, where was 'here'? Sephiroth wondered. It was very obviously the labs, though Sephiroth could not tell when just from his quick look before his panic. Sephiroth slowly opened his eyes, trying to keep his breathing controlled. The bright lights above burned and he tried to raise his hand to block out the light. It was stopped by the thick chain around his wrist.

So, instead, Sephiroth slowly blinked, breathing in rhythm with each blink. It had been a trick he had learned in the labs as a way to calm himself from the overwhelming panic of being unable to move. At least when he was a puppet for Jenova he had never needed to breathe or blink. In fact, with Jenova in his head, it has been almost peaceful in its enveloping security. He let himself fall into the darkness and didn't think of the consequences.

Sephiroth stopped blinking, stilling himself. He twisted his head to the side, only a little, but it took some of the strong light from his eyes. He couldn't hear her.

It was like a tidal wave, every emotion grabbing his skin and pulling from every direction. He had become so accustomed to her feeling, her presence since he was been swaddled in diapers, the the lack of her touch almost made him weep. It was like a phantom limb; despite the length of time the gangrenous hand had been cut off, he could almost feel her in the background, moving and slithering on her own. He knew she wasn't there, but he almost wanted her to be. It was a tumor, a disease... but it was his disease.

It was a slam to the gut, and Sephiroth squeezed his eyes shut. Bahamut, still wearing Cloud Strife's childlike body, sprung forward again.

Of course I removed her from your head, Bahamut said, as if it was the most obvious thing on the Planet. Of course, to him, it was. He did not understand what it was like to lose part of him, the sweet comforting touch of a mother. And she was not your mother, she was an alien bitch who used your skin to destroy the Planet. Don't weep because I made her disappear.

I do not weep. It was true, but it was difficult to say with certainty. There had been times, particularly during the Wutaian War, where Sephiroth had felt the cold hand of death and destruction and he had wanted to weep, but he had stayed firm... He needed to protect his friends, his comrades. But this was different. It was like he was ripped from his roots. Mother or not, she had been with him through the pain, whispering her love and devotion.

Then do not complain that she is gone. This time, Bahamut frowned, his small face contorting into something ugly. She is not completely gone, but she is quiet. She will not be able to reach you, not while I am here. Do not fear, she does not know.

It would have sounded silly but Sephiroth was grateful for those words. He couldn't explain it in words, the feeling he was experiencing.

This was a lot to accept.

Sephiroth tried to open his eyes again, finding it much easier now. Perhaps it was because the sharp light was better that the face of a miniature Cloud Strife staring into his soul, having the absolute gall to remind him of his past failures- his mistakes at everything he had been. It was better than thinking about what was going on and better to rip the tape off. The faster he did it, the easier it would become.

It took a moment for his eyes to focus and Sephiroth could now understand the strange wave before his eyes; he was in a little plastic bubble? No, Sephiroth realised as he blinked again. It was a glass container, one that he has been exposed to Mako through since he was a young child. This was one of the glass containers that fit over the steel gurneys, and since his skin was not boiling, he was not in mako. Things were still fuzzy but slowly coming into focus.

It made things easier, now. He looked at the metal and glass, and searched for what he knew would be- yes. Right there, on the corner of the container. Every year Hojo needed to replace the glass, as there was chance of contamination from the mako. It was εγλ 0000...

It was... He was 23 years old again, practically a newborn babe in comparison. The Wutai War didn't even finish until εγλ 0001... Genesis did not lose his mind until then, dragging Angeal into his death spiral. Sephiroth himself did not give in until 0002, and with it came his first death. Then, five years later, only to be squished like a flea at the bottom of Strife's boot. Then, again... two years later? It was difficult to tell time when you were floating in an abyss. But, Sephiroth had always been good with time, with knowing the passage from one moment to the next.

Sephiroth noticed his hair was wet, and the tell-tale sign of mako in the tube. He must have just finished his mako shower, he surmised. They would open the lock and he would be free, they would remove the cuffs around his wrists and the tube down his throat to help with the breathing. Even a super SOLDIER, he could not breathe in the fiery liquid.

With a whir, the glass cage opened and there were hands on his face, pulling the tubing from his throat with practiced dexterity. It was if he had done this a thousand times. No. He had.

Hojo looked uglier than the last time Sephiroth had seen him, which was a remarkable feet considering the state of decomposition he had been in. The memory had been so lovingly sucked from Cloud Strife's brain during their last fight. It had brought him more than a little satisfaction to see Hojo consumed by himself, like the snake eating its own tail.

Except the snake is always reborn, Bahamut stated blankly, and it took everything in Sephiroth not to bite out a vocal retort. The last thing the scientist needed was a reason to put him in another Mako bath.

Sephiroth needed out. Now.

Hojo pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose, greasy hair pulled into a disarrayed ponytail at the name of his neck. His back, tilted forward like that of a hunchback, reminded Sephiroth of when he was a small child and trying to reach out for a hand to grasp. He had wanted Hojo to pick him up so desperately…

It must be a curse, to remember everything in your life with such clarity.

You have no idea.

"Strange, very strange…" Hojo repeated to himself as he removed the pieces of tubing from Sephiroth's throat. It was amazing, the clarity of that first deep breath, one so large he could have shattered his ribs at the thought.

Sephiroth did not care what Hojo thought was strange, but he knew better. If he wanted to be released, he would need to play the game. Ask the questions Hojo wanted to hear, state the opinions he needed to have stated, and then, with as much dignity and grace he could muster, get out.

"What, sir?" Sephiroth asked, clenching his teeth as Hojo because to unclasp the restraints from his wrists. Sephiroth dug his nails into his hands as to not reach up and snap Hojo's neck like a twig.

Best not to destroy him yet. We might need him.

Sephiroth bit his tongue, feeling the mako in his blood welling up before the taste of iron assaulted his senses.

Hojo hummed, a lock of black hair escaping his ponytail. How it was so acceptable for Hojo to walk around the Shinra laboratories looking like a homeless vagrant, Sephiroth could not understand. Mad Genius or not, Shinra had always been such a stickler about his policies.

"Your reaction to the shower was a little strange. Perhaps I will need to adjust the dosage and viscosity for our session next month." Hojo smiled. Or, rather, the closest thing to a smile Hojo could produce. It was the promise of more science to slake his thirst. "Any strange side effects? Nausea? Head aches?"

He could have laughed, truly. He had gone in for a mako shower and came out with the memories of his multiple deaths, the end of the world, the slaughter of his closest friends, the slick smell of rotting flesh from Nibelheim. Oh, yes. There were strange side effects.

"None. May I be excused?" Sephiroth deadpanned as he slowly sat up, making sure not to touch his wrists. Any sign of weakness in front of Hojo was an act against humanity. He would not see Sephiroth in discomfort, let alone fear. Certainly not fear.

Hojo made a mark with his black pen on the white paper and made a sound with his nose. Sephiroth could not be sure what the sound meant, but he knew that it was the closest he would receive to an affirmative.

Not taking a moment more, Sephiroth swung his legs down, and the feeling of the cold tile on his feel was like a massage. How long had it been since he had been barefoot, cold ground touching him?

He did not pause to relish the feeling, instead quickly looking around the brightly lit hospital lab for his clothing. He noticed his skin felt itchy, and he knew he would need to bathe the mako off before he would feel normal again. Thankfully, he always brought soft and comfortable clothes for the trip back after a mako shower.

Sephiroth did not dawdle or waste time, throwing the shirt and pants on as quickly as possible. He could feel it like he could feel the air. When he breathed through his mouth, he could even taste the metal.

This was a sensory overload. He knew this, but there was no way to logically explain.

Sephiroth thought to put on his boots, but at the last moment decided there was no point. He did not care that some would see him without shoes, or that Hojo would think it a little odd. His apartment was close enough to the labs, there wouldn't be many who would see him. And either way, no one would dare say anything.

He slung the boots over his shoulder, quickly scanning for Masamune… he, logically, knew that she would not be there. Hojo had implemented a rule against his weapon as a child. But still, after being able to summon her with nothing but a twist of a thought… But no. Now was both the time, he needed to escape. So, without further prompting he skirted the room to the exit, and as quickly as the door opened he was gone.


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