Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII is the property of Square Enix and no financial profit is sought from this work.
Warnings: language, violence, blood, death and yaoi
Chapter Five: Worming In
Sephiroth. Sephiroth. Sephiroth. One paper after another, all needing his signature. Sephiroth put the paper he had just signed into the pile with the other signed ones and leaned back in his chair, releasing a beep breath and rolling his wrist. The best SOLDIER or not, even he wasn't immune to the irritating numb pain that started to plague everyone who had to repeat the same movement over and over again. Sephiroth cast a look towards the papers on the left corner of his desk and couldn't help grimacing. That stack of papers was twice the size of the one he had already signed.
Many of the SOLDIER thirds had just been upped to Second Class and almost all of the cadets had made it into Third, and all those diplomas needed his signature, and there were lots of men in the ShinRa military. Sephiroth couldn't understand why he was the one who needed to sign all the papers; he wasn't involved with the SOLDIER training in any way. And he didn't want to be, he'd much rather lead the already trained men in battlefield than spent his time trying to teach a bunch of little kids who had never even seen a real sword before to fight. And he wasn't even the head of the Peace Department (who actually was in charge of the SOLDIER training), and he didn't want to be that either, because once he would get promoted to the position that would mean the end of fieldwork and thus the end of battles, but the number of paperwork would only increase. Believe it or not, Heidegger had once been a rather attractive man with a healthy body, but the end of physical workout and long hours in the office had caused the man to look what he did now.
Sephiroth picked another of the papers and continued his robotic work of signing his name into the diplomas of unfamiliar and faceless SOLDIERs, all the while thinking how much he hated this part of his job. Lately he had been very bored, with the resistance movement laying low, and hoping to get some sort of work to keep himself occupied. But Zack and Reno had been pestering him so much that he had already forgotten the upcoming SOLDIER exams and the paperwork that followed it, and when he had walked into his office that morning and found the stacks of papers littering his desk, he hoped that he could take back all of his previous hopes of new work, or get a chance to change it into something physically more challenging. He would probably even prefer taking part in some of the ridiculous pastime activities that Zack and Reno kept offering him rather than wasting his time with paperwork that didn't even belong to him. Stupid ShinRa bureaucracy.
As if on cue, Sephiroth heard the door opening, and once again not being informed of a visitor by his secretary, the General knew who it was.
"Hey, Seph." He heard Zack's cheerful voice greeting him. And that was all, only one voice. When the lighter voice with a street accent didn't carry into his ears, and he had only heard one person's footsteps, Sephiroth lifted his eyes from the paper he had just signed to look at Zack walking towards him alone.
"Reno isn't with you?" Sephiroth asked mildly surprised, because from what he knew Reno had an evening shift and the clock was only barely twelve A.M, and in the past week the Turk had spent almost all of his free time around Sephiroth (once even without Zack), and not even that lazy ass could still be in bed.
Zack quirked an eyebrow at his commander disbelievingly. "No," he said at last, and just to be sure, he continued: "He's working. The SOLDIER First nomination party will be held within two weeks, so the Pres doubled their workload… But you already knew that, didn't you?"
"Yes," Sephiroth said, feeling slightly embarrassed at forgetting it, but made sure that Zack couldn't notice it. "Yes, of course I knew that."
How could he have forgotten it? Tseng had mentioned it yesterday during his report. And he had the evidence of the upcoming nomination party lying on his desk in front of him. And he had the day marked on his calendar because he needed to be there. With all those things reminding him, how could he have forgotten it? He nearly never forgot work-related things.
Maybe he was just so used to Reno's presence that he just expected the redhead to walk into the room with Zack no matter where the President needed him at the moment.
And just when he had gotten used to the loud Turk? Just few days ago Sephiroth had found the youth rather irritating.
Sephiroth didn't have anything against people in general, it was just that in his childhood the only human contact he had had was mainly with Hojo, his lab assistants or Sephiroth's teachers, and especially if the former was involved, the contact was never something that could be called pleasant. So over the course of time, Sephiroth had learned that it was easiest just to be alone, and thus he acted coldly towards people to keep them at bay. And it seemed to work better than fine, a great majority of the people the General had to be in touch with on account of his job held a some sort of respecting fear towards him and feared to approach him. This far the ever so stubborn and fearless Zack was the only one who had wormed his way into Sephiroth's life.
And now it would seem that the young Turk was doing the same. The course of events was rather similar to the one Sephiroth had been through with Zack. But Zack was his second-in-command and needed to work close to the General, and even thought Sephiroth wasn't an expert at reading people, he knew that Zack couldn't stand having to work with someone that he wasn't friends with, so Zack could have befriended with him just for his own comfort. But Reno didn't need to do that, even if they were co-operating in the resistance movement case, they didn't work closely, and even if they did, Sephiroth was under the impression that the cocky Turk didn't give a damn about what other people thought of him.
But Sephiroth had to admit that the redhead's attitude had sparked a small interest in him the first day they had met… a totally professional fighter-to-fighter interest, that is. First of all, Reno's fighting talents had made the youth stand out of the crowd. But the one thing that had affected Sephiroth the most was the way Reno had treated him. Like before mentioned, almost all of the people Sephiroth had met after he became the General respected him with quiet fear. So having a Turk newbie yelling at him was something the silver haired man had never witnessed before, and that had been intriguing. Not that Sephiroth liked people who disrespected him, oh no, if someone would treat him without the respect a SOLDIER his rank deserved, that someone would be in trouble. But Reno did respect him, Sephiroth saw it in the way the redhead addressed him and he saw it in the Turk's eyes.
But even though Reno was an interesting person he still had his quirks and habits that irritated Sephiroth, which was the reason why he had treated the redhead with the same indifferent coldness he treated everyone else. Or it could have been because he had acted the same way so many years that it came naturally whether he wanted it or not?
And if his actions were involuntary, would he have in other circumstances acted differently and let Reno and his interesting nature come into his life? Well, that didn't matter now, since the redhead was already forcing his way into Sephiroth's life, despite the General's cold attitude. And he didn't know what to think of it. His immediate thought was that he didn't need anymore friends, Zack was more than enough.
'Oh, right, Zack,' Sephiroth remembered that he wasn't alone in the room and averted his eyes from the unseen spot he had been staring at and looked at the dark haired man who was leaning on his commanders desk, careful not to scatter the papers.
"Welcome back Seph," Zack said grinning, "You looked so concentrated in your thoughts that I didn't dare to bother you. Is signing your name really so challenging that you have to stop to think?"
Sephiroth answered Zack's joking voice with silence and picked another paper to sign his name in it. He couldn't believe he had been thinking about Reno when he had work to do.
If getting used to the Turk and letting him into his life meant distractions from his work, however boring it was, he had to make sure that it wouldn't happen. And the funny thing was that when Sephiroth had noticed Zack's acquaintance in his life he hadn't spared a thought to it, it had just happened and he had accepted that. So why was he now obsessing about a Turk who would probably leave when their work together was over? At least Sephiroth hoped so.
"I hate this," he said at last in a dry voice, "Heidegger would better be signing the ones next year."
"Well," Zack said eyeing the stack of unsigned papers, "I have to say that this doesn't look fun by any definition. Too bad I can't help you with it."
"Not if you can't forge my signature."
"Heh, that would be fun if I could," Zack laughed and snatched a signed paper from Sephiroth's hands studying the bold signature, "Think of all the things I could buy on your tab."
"Then I'm more than glad that you can't. I can't afford a villa in Costa del Sol," Sephiroth said and took another diploma and signed it.
"Actually, I was thinking about a widescreen TV, but a villa in 'del Sol isn't a bad idea," Zack said grinning at his commander.
"Maybe not a bad idea, but an impractical one at least," Sephiroth said slightly amused and looked up from his paperwork "Most of our work is in Midgar, so your commute would take quite a while."
"I have vacations, Seph," Zack beamed, happy about the idea of a leave and Sephiroth's amused tone. "Ah! Which reminds me, I'm here for a reason, not just to bug you, I'm not even sure if could do it properly anymore without my partner in crime," Zack chuckled.
Sephiroth flinched inwardly; 'partner in crime', no doubt who that meant. And just when he had almost forgotten about the Turk…
"Since there's no news from the resistance movement," Zack continued, "and you don't need me here, I decided to take the day off. I have a date at three. But if something happens, I'll be in the Sector Five slums, just call me and I'll be back in duty, okay?"
Sephiroth answered with a simple nod, and continued the paperwork.
After that, the dark haired SOLDIER excused himself and left, wishing Sephiroth a good day, a small note of sarcasm in his voice.
When Sephiroth was left alone with the boring paperwork, he did his best for not let his thoughts drift into a certain redhead.
A/N: Sorry about the long(ish) wait, life took over things… Or at least a writer's block, laziness and a broken wrist. And when I'm finally able to write something it's short and boring… But I promise I'll get on with the plot in next chapter. And there'll be a small slice of lemon as well.