Study 1: An Unnatural Hunger Has Taken Hold of You
Warning: Masturbation, voyeurism, mention of stalking, rough sex
Helena leaned onto her desk, her hands templed above her head, and her forehead resting on the edge of the desk. She knew a mark was imminent, and she felt joyful at the prospect – anything to draw her attention away from the boredom she was experiencing.
Mauve was quite kind to find her work. "I know it's not ideal, but R&D has been looking for a researcher for quite some time. They are happy to have you back." And they were. They had dissolved her position as counsellor; in fact, they dissolved the department completely. Shinra had found use for her, and she provided use.
Kathelyn once knocked on Helena's door and congratulated her for returning to the place from whence she came. Helena felt a rock forming in her stomach – she wasn't going anywhere. Kathelyn laughed at Helena's inadvertently drawn out groan. "You'll get to where you once were. Just continue pushing yourself." Helena did indeed push herself. And she was going to continue pushing herself. But there was something so hungry about the rock in her stomach. Something that drove her to an edge she didn't want to stand on again.
Helena sighed and moved a pile of papers from one side of her desk to another, trying to feel like she was doing something. That's when she saw him. "Hojo," she called out, "it's a pleasure to work under you again." She knew he didn't shake hands, but something told her to reach out. He still refused.
"You're the… what is it again? Well, you worked with Sephiroth. That much I can be bothered to remember."
Helena toughened her upper lip. Just breathe. "Yes, his therapist."
"Like I said," he snapped, "it's what I can be bothered to remember."
He took a moment to tap his chin with his fingertips, pondering the fate of the researcher. "I think you might be interested in this project of mine," he cackled.
Helena followed him down the hall to the examination rooms. Her breath was somewhere between her last and first ribs, her heart jostling about. Her head was light, and all she could think was in her sister's voice. "You've done it. I've done it."
"Wait here," Hojo instructed curtly, slamming the door shut behind him.
Helena sat on the examination table. Does it remind you of anything? The table was cool to the touch, cleaned with alcohol, and scrubbed of innards. She felt the edge of the table with her fingertips; the cool touch turned warm. She lifted her hand to her eyes, adjusting her glasses with her free hand. Blood. She instinctively went to rub it away on her lab coat or perhaps bring it closer to smell – she wasn't certain. She then decided to clean her hand on some loose examination paper and clean it with hand sanitizer.
Helena was looking through the double-sided mirror when the door opened slowly. She went to grab a clipboard that was left behind, thinking she would start an examination of a specimen. "You've done it." She turned around and saw spun silver grace black leather.
"Hello, Helena," Sephiroth said coolly, closing the door behind him.
Helena sighed, clicking her tongue on the roof of her mouth. "I guess I'm not here for a study."
"No, you are. Hojo wants you to examine me before I go back to the field." Sephiroth sat on the examination table, avoiding the mark of blood that was not properly cleaned.
"He's toying with you, you know that." Helena pushed up her glasses, avoiding the First Class's gaze.
"I know what you put in your note. It was very kind of you not to say we kissed." Sephiroth shuffled his weight, observing the researcher as she played around with the papers on her clipboard, every so often making a note with her pen.
"You mean: you. You kissed me." The words mulled around her mouth, feeling unnaturally untruthful and beautifully raw. The vivid feeling of his lips on hers, her mouth attempting to claim some semblance of control.
Sephiroth snickered, a small smirk toying with his lips. "Whatever makes you sleep at night, I suppose."
Helena decided to let his tour de force fall into silence. "You know the drill, right?"
"If you need to touch me, I don't mind." Sephiroth removed his gloves, finger by finger, removing his pauldrons shoulder by shoulder.
Helena swallowed the heat that was boiling in her stomach, toughening the muscles in her legs. She placed on nitrile gloves, offering some barrier to the warm flesh beneath. She felt for his jaw first, feeling the softened joint – slack and gently clicking. Then down his throat to his shoulders, pressing down on the connections between soft, tender muscles and hard bone.
"Should I remove anything else," Sephiroth said nothing above a purr against Helena's ear.
"You might need to remove your jacket." Helena blushed. "Because of your Port-a-Cath," she added.
Sephiroth obliged, shrugging off the leather, allowing it to cascade against his skin and piling on the examination table. Helena held her breath as she pressed against the area where the entry should have been. A sound emanated from the centre of his chest. Did he just moan?
"Who took out the catheter?"
Sephiroth smiled, albeit proudly. "I did. I told you that already."
Helena took a step back. "You couldn't have… I mean, you just…" Helena began to babble, making notes in her file. You would've liked to have seen it, wouldn't you? See him in pain?
Helena attempted to ignore the thoughts running through her mind and continued to feel around his chest. She could feel his deepening breath. He seemed so at ease as she traced her way around the catheter (or where it should have been) and stopped in the middle of his chest, breast tissue connecting at his sternum. Retractor.
"It says in your file that you have been complaining of headaches." Helena interrogated, ignoring the increasingly loud voices bouncing in her mind. Her fists balled behind her back, cracked nails digging into her palm.
"I think it's just allergies," Sephiroth joked, seemingly so out of place.
"What are you taking for them?" Helena avoided the charm she had heard through the bowels of R&D. He knew it would get him away from Hojo's grasp.
Sephiroth reached for her balled-up fists, easing them into his. "I hate it when people touch me, you do know that."
Helena pulled back. "Me too."
"You have to understand, Sephiroth, you ruined my career. I'm touching you because you decided to ruin my fucking career." Helena slapped the clipboard beside the sitting First Class, not causing even a flinch from the taller man. Helena recoiled from the sound. The voices became silent.
Sephiroth stood up, towering over the researcher. "What a shame." He took her hands, unfurling her fingers and digging her sharp nails against his skin.
Helena moaned. "Please, don't," Helena trailed off as her nails began to trace his obliques to his hips.
"Tell me you want this too."
Skin-to-skin was too much for Helena. She felt so out of her element, so touch-starved. She wanted it, she wanted to draw blood and bring it to her lips. She wanted to mount his hips and feel him tense with her weight. She wanted to wrap her hands across her throat, her thumbs interlacing on his larynx. She wanted him to reach pure ecstasy like she would.
"You need to leave me alone. Stop following me." Helena regained control, but that was little for a stronger force. Sephiroth picked up her hands and drew her towards his chest. In a fluid swing, he took her chin in his hand, moving her jaw side to side.
"You have beautiful lips," he said, as if stating a known fact. And he leaned in, a hunger claiming him, a hunger claiming her. He reached for her back, his fingertips digging into her spine, melding two drifting sacks of empty flesh into one. He saw how empty she had become, watching her as she moved from room to room in the office, walking head down to the train station. She wanted something to feel again. She wanted him.
"Hojo's watching," Helena sobered.
Sephiroth laughed. "Yes. And?"
"And that turns you on, doesn't it?" Helena tempted the First Class with another kiss. "Who's studying who?"
"How does it feel?" Sephiroth's hands snuck their way through the malleable curls and closed against a handful. Helena whimpered as he pulled, exposing her neck. Purring gently against her jaw, he continued, "I want to study you."
"Let go," Helena commanded weakly.
"If that's what you want."
"I'm not going to be some of Hojo's specimens."
"Not like me?" Sephiroth laughed.
Helena swallowed, adjusting her lab coat over her chest. "You need to leave me alone."
"I don't think I can, Ms. Menninger," Sephiroth shrugged, piece by piece collecting himself. "We're very much cut from the same cloth."
"What?"
"I know about your little experiment. I know who you really are."
Helena had been Hojo's specimen before. He can see you.
"I don't know what you're talking about." He can see you.
Helena's hands ran through her shaved head like tiny pinpricks. It will grow back, she assured herself. It might even grow back curlier than what she was used to. Or maybe even straight? She never had pin-straight hair before. What would it be like? What would it be like to be someone else? Helena let the thought linger, albeit for too long for her own good. Images of standing toe-to-toe with Level 1 researchers, pulling all-nighters without so much as batting an eye, her heart resting in the ribcage where it belonged, feeling normal… for once.
"How do you feel?" Said Level 1 researcher studied the incision with care.
"I feel," Helena took into account her entire body, "amazing."
"You'll want to take it easy for a month. We will have to do check-ins every three days." A small price to pay; to be Hojo's guinea pig for a moment of reprieve.
"And this is how SOLDIERs feel?" Helena pondered aloud.
The researcher laughed and said, "You'll love this a bit too much."
Helena walked out of the surgery room on her own merit, the world seemingly less heavy on her shoulders, her arms swaying by her side. She looked into one of the examination rooms out of habit to see if another SOLDIER was enjoying his treatments as much as she was. She was finally free. Finally in control. Finally, better than… well, anyone. The voices were gentler now and carried her on a cloud all the way to her bed. She would dream lovely dreams of green pastures and Kathelyn's smile. What she dreamt, however, was burning flesh and cold steel.
Helena went to her bathroom, splashing water on her face. In the faintness of the Midgar glow in her washroom window, she could see her reflection. Her hair was already starting to grow. She flicked on the switch for the light. It was growing. And it was growing a silvery hue.
That morning, head wrapped up in a scarf her mother sent her, hiding in some bin in the back of her closet, she went to the corner store and picked up a bottle of hair dye. Red. Helena chuckled to herself. A small price to pay.
Helena looked at her watch. It was nine-thirty. He wasn't going to come. Another night being stood up. She refused the waiter's sympathy by ordering another drink, and she decided to go home and drink to her heart's content. The prospect of a lovely bottle of tequila hiding under her bed was too much for her to bear, so she found herself walking at a quickened pace down the street. Thankfully, she picked a restaurant closer to her apartment. She tried to not think about why she was being avoided so much. She knew dates set up by Emma were a bad idea. She had the most unflattering pictures of Helena. She knew she wasn't desired.
"You have beautiful lips."
Helena's hip collided with the door, slamming it open. She was home. Alone. Alone with her thoughts and the tequila to drown them.
"Tell me you want this too."
Helena took the tequila bottle and poured herself a shot, cut a small wedge of lime, and poured some salt onto her moistened hand.
She wasn't desired. It was the idea that reassured the pain in her stomach. Sephiroth was attracted to her seemingly endless compassion. And drawing him away from her only seemed to intensify the connection – he was averse to rejection. Helena pushed the thought away with another shot. The more she pushed away, the more he wanted to attach himself to her. Was that why she pushed? To have him attach himself? Another shot.
Drunkenly, Helena sauntered to her bedroom. "I need you, Helena. I think I've become obsessed." She fell into bed. It seemed so long ago. A life once lived. A life long gone. He had a hold on her. His voice was echoing in the recesses of her sulci. She wanted to feel his touch again, to make the voices cease once and for all. But she knew that was only temporary. She would crave it. Crave him.
Helena's hand fished for something in her drawer under her underwear. She wasn't sure what, but she knew she had it when she found it. She pulled out a thick, molded toy. She let the feeling of the foreign object on her bare thigh, her dress pulled up to her hips. She imagined the thickness of the toy resembling that of his hard member. He was hard when she was examining him, and he wasn't hiding it.
Not enough to stimulate her, Helena flipped open her work phone and scrolled through her emails. She wasn't locked out of her therapy emails. She was pleased.
From: s01 shinra
To: hmenninger shinra
Subject:
Helena;
I apologize for my recent outbursts. It is unbecoming.
I have brought a notebook from the office.
She repeated the image of Sephiroth opening his notebook and laying it across his lap, looking to her for approval. Who's in control? The image of Sephiroth strapped into an examination chair replaced images of a cup of rice and half a boiled egg.
Perhaps it was the third shot of tequila appearing on her nightstand, but her fingers began searching for the keys on her phone.
From: hmenninger shinra
To: s01 shinra
Subject:
I want you too
Helena closed her phone, putting the toy back into her drawer. What are you doing? She began panicking. She sat upright and held her phone close to her. It began to vibrate against her stomach, sending panicky sensations throughout her chest.
"Hello?" The number was blocked, and she was drunk enough to answer.
"Do you want me?" Helena swallowed, sobering slightly at the sound of his voice, husky like the whiskey he drank.
"I think this is a bad idea." She wanted him to tell her that he would hold her down and take every measure to have her.
"What are you doing?"
"Drinking," she admitted.
"Not thinking about me?" She was scared of admitting that she wanted him too, for fear that it would dissipate the lust he had for her.
He chuckled. The pushing of the receiver against her eardrum sent shivers down her spine. "What are you wearing?"
"A dress. I was supposed to go on a date."
"Oh. Where are they?"
"Never showed." Helena walked into the kitchen and poured herself a drink.
"What a shame. You could have thought of me as you were having sex."
"I guess I have toys for that. I mean," Helena backpedaled, her drunken words betraying her.
"Oh, do you? Why don't we play a game?"
"This is a bad idea," Helena repeated, drowning her little reserve in more tequila.
"Whoever reaches climax first loses."
Helena bit her lip, imagining his tightening abs receiving his cum. The thought alone produced a guttural moan, with her hand reaching her lower abdomen and pulling up her dress again. "I can hear you're interested," he continued to instigate.
"Missing Genesis?" She in turn instigated, putting the phone on speaker.
"Hm. I do."
"How did you like it with him?"
"It was gentle. But we quickly became intense. I remember I broke his kitchen table."
Thumbs locked on the edge of her underwear, pulling the silky fabric down the length of her legs. She imagined the two men, hands grasping at any flesh they could get a hold of, fucking on a kitchen table. She wanted to watch suddenly. She felt the urge to sit across from them, instructing their movements to the point of mutual bliss.
"You said you had toys. Where is your biggest one?"
Helena laughed – serendipity. "What do you want me to do with it?"
"I want to know you can handle me. I want to hear you scream as I fuck you."
Helena closed her eyes, the toy's thickness filling her hand. She thought of his erection as they kissed, her hands holding onto his hips. "I think I might lose," she whispered. He, in turn, moaned into the receiver, his voice echoing over the speaker and filling her empty room.
Helena slipped the dildo between her legs, the tip prodding the lips of her wet mound. With her wet, it was easy for the tip to move across her clit, flicking the swollen member. A sound was produced from so deep within that he let out a surprised clicking of his tongue. "You're enjoying this too much." She was.
"Tell me how hard you are. How much do you want me?" Helena was desperate for more than just the teasing she was giving herself. She needed him to enter her.
"I think you are really going to lose," he laughed; short-lived as the breath was knocked out of him. He was quickening the pace of his hand down the length of his shaft. He needed to pace himself if he was going to win.
"I need you, Helena." His voice whirred in her room.
She imagined him entering her as he whispered to her how much he needed her. The toy slipped inside her without much friction, her hips positioning to accept the entire length and girth. She cried out for him to push deeper. She felt him accommodate, pistoning his hips.
"I know you want me too."
"Yes," she said so pitifully, emitting a laugh from her night caller.
He imagined her legs around his hips, acting as leverage. She wanted him to hold her down. He held her arms above her head. She wanted to feel. He bit her lip. He wanted her to know how much he wanted to be accepted by her body. She wanted to know that he craved her touch. The words were enough to send her over the edge, her body easing and a drunken headache taking hold.
"What happens now?" She asked breathlessly.
Sephiroth laughed. "We both know what happens next."
A/N: Hope y'all enjoyed it! Let me know what you think.
Song of the night: Handler by Muse