Chapter 94 - Curse of the First Class
April, 2001
"I would like you to understand something," Sephiroth says smoothly, the words cold and smooth on his tongue. He takes a step forward. The tile clicks under his shoes. His height is finally useful for something. The Shinra employee shrinks under the bulk in front of him.
Sephiroth breathes out the next words in one long sigh. "You are choosing to uphold a policy that does not apply."
"At this point, only next of kin can-" The employee stares at the floor.
Sephiroth squeezes the space, almost pinning the employee to the locked door he won't open.
"They are all dead. Confirmed dead. There is no one else coming." Sephiroth finds his own voice strange. It is calm when under the surface he is anything but normal. It is like a piece of him has been torn out. The rest is spilling out between his fingers. His body keeps trying to heal the injury but it cannot. It is irreplaceable. He can't fix this. There is no way to heal this. All he can do is feel the slow collapse in on himself.
"Open the door." The edges of grief start to stain the edges of this tone. Even thinking about this, addressing his own feelings makes him want to break. He is too tired. There is too much in him. He is bleeding out and bursting at the same time.
"Sir, I really shouldn't." He pales. "Come back in the morning. Please . Maybe there can be an exception that can be made. I'm sure there is but I am not authorized to make it."
The exhaustion claws up his neck. He feels like he has fought a battle that hasn't ended. It keeps going. The opponents are growing more and more impossible to defeat. They aren't even possible to see. It's all crushing him. The house of cards, everything that he thought is possible, they keep telling him no .
It had gotten even worse with his "defeat" at the hands of Genesis Rhapsodos. Part of the Shinra thought that he was truly falling, finally turning into adequacy. Hojo had used it as an excuse to force Sephiroth into a few more exposures to "strengthen" him. No one asked him. They simply appeared on his schedule.
The other half, the Turks, use it to fuel their motivations to watch him like an animal in a cage who might escape at any time.
It pressed against his heart. They are compressing him relentlessly.
Now he is here with nowhere else to go.
Sephiroth leans forward and places a hand on the Shinra's employee's shoulder. The man flinches but his grip is too firm.
"You will open this door. You will take me to him or by his honor, I will take that keycard on your belt and find him myself."
The employee holds his breath and doesn't dare to move.
"Sir, I know you are upset."
"He is my friend ." Sephiroth hears the crack in his voice.
This is getting out of control. He knows it and does nothing. Saying the word "friend" outloud is a risk. He hasn't dared say it since the beginning of this nightmare. How many times had Shinra told him that they weren't friends? The word had been forbidden. Even if he says it, they don't take him seriously. Rufus' rumors are running too strong.
Admitting it sends something down his spine. It makes him remember the last time Angeal had smiled at him in worry, an expression that only he could do, and told him that he needed to eat more. That fragility had spiderwebbed up his limbs. His friend cares enough for him to say that.
He realizes that the tense is wrong.
Angeal is dead now.
His friend cared enough for him to say that. Angeal was his friend.
There is no present tense left to a man that had been killed.
Sephiroth's hand leaves the employee's shoulder. He forces himself to look away down the empty hall as that hits him dully. Squinting keeps the tears away. He's not sure how much longer that will work.
Every time that he thinks that it cannot affect him more, it lays heavier. The hurt throbs in his heart, in his skin, in his eyes. It is making him translucent. The words that come out of his mouth, the reality of the situation, he is tissue paper to it. He keeps ripping. It was one reality for Angeal to not be present in his life. It was a complete other one that he was gone from this world entirely.
His mindset, his philosophy on life, everything that he cares about, it's fading. It's already disappearing. It is even slipping out of Sephiroth's memory. The harder he tries to hold onto it, the more difficult it is. He's drifting away. Someone so important is disappearing. Sephiroth swallows and tries to settle his mask back into place.
"Please."
The morgue technician rubs his face and slowly turns. The plastic keycard shakes in his fingers. He inserts it into the reader. A scan runs, the circle pulsing yellow and then green. It chirps. The lock mechanism clicks and the door opens.
"This way. He's…this way."
Pressuring and forcing this man is probably not what Angeal would have wanted. This is not the standard that he held Sephiroth at. Yet. He wasn't here, was he?
Shinra had told Sephiroth no when he had asked to do this. There would be no use. Lazard's eyes had been gentle. He had even grasped Sephiroth's hand and told him it would only hurt him more. The grip was too much. The contact, the fake comfort, he was being swaddled like a child, safe, sound, contained, trapped and immobile.
It didn't change that he needed to see Angeal.
There was no true excuse for it. Both Zack and Lazard had repeatedly ID'ed the body. The paperwork was done. Part of him, perhaps the part of him that could still feel, knew that they might be right to try to stop him. It might hurt him. Closure is not something that he ever craved. It is not something reasonable for a SOLDIER to get. It is a rarity and beyond that, it is a luxury.
Then he found out there would be no funeral.
Lazard hadn't even been sure that there would be an unmarked grave. Genesis' body was unrecoverable. Wild and free, unhindered by other people, it would be close to what Genesis would have wanted. Angeal is different. He would have wanted an honorable rest. He deserved to be mourned, for someone to stand over him and grieve for his passing.
Lazard hadn't been sure of anything besides the factual evidence that his body was in the SOLDIER morgue.
It had broken the grief in him. It had snapped it into anger and action. It had brought him here walking behind the technician. The Turks would find out. They would all find out. He's not blind of the cameras. He was sure there would be a conversation about these actions, more of the tireless questioning of his loyalty to Shinra.
The truth is souring into a lie in his throat.
It's starting to be unsubstantial.
He doesn't know why he is here any longer.
The technician eyes Sephiroth over his shoulder as they pass through the hall. The SOLDIER morgue is a simple place. It is a cream painted hallway with a bank of doors lining either side. It doesn't smell like death. It is nothing more than any other part of this tower. Still this is the place. This is where Angeal has been resting since Sephiroth last saw him alive and worrying about him in the middle of a battle.
It's like he is approaching danger.
This will hurt him.
Sephiroth craves it.
The lights are dimmed and throw shadows against the wall. It is closed. It is late at night. The door closes behind them. Sephiroth's back is hard and straight. It stings. All the things that he has blocked out pulses along with his heart. They are there, invisible and oppressive against him.
They squeeze him.
"Did you-" The man's voice breaks and he stops in the middle of the hallway, carefully not meeting his eye. "Did you want me to bring him to observation?"
What would Angeal wish?
Sephiroth's throat closes.
He knows. He knows that Angeal wouldn't wish for this at all. Sephiroth's mind slips, spinning. Did anyone tend to his wounds? Is he wrapped up? Is he in a plastic bag? How would he breathe in there? Was he naked inside? Angeal has always been uncomfortable with being naked. He didn't like to be seen. His body, unlike Sephiroth's, had always been his own. He deserved that privacy.
A pained cramp brings him back to reality. Clothes are no longer necessary. Nor is air. Angeal is gone. What happens to the body is only partially substantial now.
Angeal isn't present to care.
He is no longer here.
"The waiting room is over here. I'll take you to him once I've got him settled," the staff member continues.
He can't wait.
"Just take me to him now."
The technician nods and starts walking. He pulls a set of keycards from his pocket and rifles through him. Sephiroth hovers to his right.
Sephiroth had not considered life after death. It seemed a moot point. It would happen and whatever it would be is what would happen. No more, no less than that.
Still, if Sephiroth got what he had hoped for, Angeal is lost in the lifestream. His soul is at peace. He is happy. What is happening now is for Sephiroth only.
"I'll have to unwrap him a bit. It won't take long. He's-" He stops again. Sephiroth wants to shake him. These considerations, these worries, it is dragging out the time. It digs against Sephiroth's body. He needs this to be over with. He needs to do this but he wants it to be over.
The man draws himself up. "Sephiroth, I…I heard about him from the tech who processed him. He's not in the best shape. He…looks like he has been killed in battle. The degradation is bad."
"I am aware." It comes out even, much more even than he feels inside.
"Alright."
He doesn't stop again.
The room smells like a strong cleaner. Sephiroth expects the smell of death that he is familiar with but instead the room labeled "body storage 3" is as sterile as a doctor's office. The technician snaps on the lights and moves across the floor. The bank of doors are neat across the other side of the room. Sephiroth lingers by the exit. He can't help himself. It is too still and quiet here.
They are the only ones breathing in this room of bodies.
And somewhere behind these thick refrigerator doors, Angeal lays after he had urged Zack Fair to cut him down.
After he twisted his own body into a monstrous shape to prove a point that would never be true.
The tech scans the clipboards hanging on a side wall before pulling one free. His eyes slip over to Sephiroth for a moment and then he walks directly to the door second to the left. The handle squeals as he turns it. The door opens to racks. Three are full. The rest hang empty. One of those is his friend.
Sephiroth is hot. Sweat has appeared in his palms. When the tech turns back to scan the tags on the bags, Sephiroth takes an emergency pill. The only reason that he is here at Shinra at all. This is the reason that he is still at this place. It is bitter on his tongue.
It tastes like blood.
There had been blood on Zack's boots and shirt when he came back. His face had been red. He had taken one look at Sephiroth and burst into tears. The kid had stumbled towards him. The buster sword was still in his hand. Sephiroth had backed away. No. He hadn't. He had run away. He had taken one look at Angeal's and Genesis' killer and fled.
It was the only thing that he could do.
"Are you sure you want to do this?"
Sephiroth blinks.
How long has the technician been standing there staring at him? His hand rests on the lowest rack. It drives up Sephiroth's heart so much that he goes lightheaded.
It's cutting away. This reality, the realness of what is happening is disappearing. He is floating in an unreality.
"Yes." It's a soft sound that comes out of his throat. "I need to see him."
A gurney is pulled from the side. One of the wheels spins in circles, unfixed and ignored. It rattles across the floor.
Sephiroth doesn't move as the staff member slides the lowest rack onto it. He pulls on gloves. He can't remember the technician getting them. The plastic snaps closed against his skin. The zipper groans as it opens. For every piece of shit that Shinra has thrown at Angeal in the last couple months, the technician moves gently. The bag makes way for cloth. Ties are unworked. The body under them shifts as they release. The light blue cloth gets folded away.
A crown of grayed black hair shines in the light. The familiar bangs stand out even from this angle.
Sephiroth's breath disappears. It's too much. He needs to leave. He couldn't do this. He wants to run. This is the man that had saved him and now here he is. The fear of this crests him like a wave, drowning out everything else.
Something changes in the technician's eyes.
"I think…perhaps just this then." Gently, he seems to dig under the blankets and rests Angeal's arm over his covered stomach. The arm moves limply and the wrist has to be set right. The cloth is smoothed over to his collarbone. Sephiroth hasn't moved. Angeal hasn't either. Of course. Sephiroth shifts his foot. That would be illogical. Why would he be expecting that? Angeal isn't going to move.
A few more moments of rustling and then the technician steps back. It is quiet again.
"I'll give you a few minutes. Just come out when you are ready. I'll handle the rest then."
He leaves too quickly.
It's just the two of them.
Sephiroth can't move. It's hard as he pulls himself from his spot. Navigating the open space between them is impossible. The body lays still half hidden under the blanket. He can hear his heart. His is the only one working in his room. His shoes scuff against the floor as he forces himself closer.
This is a dream. This shouldn't be happening. No one wanted this to happen. Sephiroth was supposed to go first. He was the sick one. He was the one that this man shored up.
He couldn't live without them.
Not anymore.
Yet, here he is.
And there is Angeal.
Perhaps, Sephiroth hopes, he might be able to imagine that Angeal is just asleep. Cutting away this environment in his head, they could be back at Angeal's apartment. It was late at night. They had been watching one of the countless cooking shows that Angeal was behind on. Because of their schedules, they had made it until midnight and then fell asleep. Genesis would have scorned them had he known.
Genesis never did.
Sephiroth realizes he never would.
The TV had shut off eventually, he narrates to himself. The room poured into a familiar darkness. Sephiroth woke up first. He would shift to find Angeal either collapsed against the couch arm or onto him. The weight of those muscles lax and trusting against his side.
Angeal had always looked so happy.
No.
This fantasy is impossible here.
This Angeal is not the same man.
This Angeal is abandoned and lifeless.
He rests with his eyes closed on the gurney but his head has fallen slightly to the side. It's almost like an afterthought, the way that he leans away. Every careful way that Angeal presented himself is gone. His hair is out of place. There is a five o'clock shadow. Deep circles hover under his eyes. His expression sits somewhere between calm and sleepy. It had been undoubtedly arranged.
Sephiroth wants to help him make it right. He can't help himself. His fingers hover as he brushes a few strands of his bangs out of his eyes. They fall into more familiar places.
Sephiroth forces a raspy breath through his lungs.
His fingers hover over his pale skin, the cuts and burns. It is an idiotic notion. How can he make this right? Who could repair damage like this? Where did all his color go? He had known approximately what had happened. Seeing the slash across his cheek, his eyes set deep in gray, the crackling skin traveling up his neck, Sephiroth wants to hide it all.
He wants it to not have never happened at all.
If anything was in his power, he would switch places with him.
How could it be him? It should have been Sephiroth. Angeal should have lived. He would have known what to do with the life left to him. Instead it is overflowing out of Sephiroth, useless, uncounted.
They were supposed to have more time. They needed more time. They had plans. How was he supposed to know it was going to be cut so short? Angeal could never take him to the beach. He could never take Sephiroth home. He would never laugh at Sephiroth's terrible attempts at humor. He would never share wisdom. There would never be another lecture. There would never be another cooked meal.
Angeal was the best of them.
He swallows thickly. He can't touch him. He should set his head right but his fingers are shaking. How many dead SOLDIERs had he moved? How many had he created? Here stands the Demon of Wutai afraid of a corpse, his mind bites at him, what a fool.
He is a fool.
The hurt drops his head towards his chest. He's lost Angeal. He has lost Genesis. Again, he's alone. He knew that this was going to happen. He knew he would get hurt. He knew they would hurt him and here he is, bleeding, the attachment ripping him apart. He thought that he had learned this lesson.
It should have been him. Sephiroth's vision twists. He closes his eyes. He hears the tears fall. It is instinctual. Sephiroth reaches for Angeal's hand. It's cold. It doesn't matter. He wraps both his hands tight around the hand that had steadied his on too many occasions. It does nothing. There is nothing left to give.
Angeal isn't here.
The remainder of Sephiroth's mask shatters. The grief boils to the surface. He has no defense. There is nothing left in him.
Tears drop onto the cloth.
His inhale is broken.
He curls forward, the grief driving through his stomach. Sephiroth has to let go with one hand to hold onto the gurney to keep himself upright. His body takes over. The room echoes in his ears, deafening him. He doesn't know how to do this. He's never felt this way. It's never been so overwhelming. Death had never been like this, so final, so tearing against his life.
The pain swallows him. It burns in him. It rips right through his core. Sephiroth is making noises he's not supposed to. He's drowning in tears. He has no control over any of it. The shaking nearly brings him to his knees.
It should have been him. If anyone was to carry on the SOLDIER name to somehow make this all right, it should have been Angeal.
Sephiroth is nothing compared to him.
Now he is dead.
Both his friends are.
It is just him.
As it had been before.
And now it is again.
It had broken him once. It would break him again.
At least there is no one left to see him cry.