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Sephiroth leaned forward and stared into the bathroom mirror with dull eyes, the faint purple shadows traced beneath them seeming darker in the light over the sink. He flicked his gaze away, uncomfortable with meeting his own unsettling eyes. He could remember feeling special to have them, once, when he was much younger, but he'd become so familiar with others avoiding them that he'd taken up the habit himself.
He touched his fingers to the side of his nose, watching the bruise on his cheek slowly rise. Before his eyes, it darkened to purple, then lightened to a sickly mottled green against his pale skin, and slowly, eventually, faded completely.
The blood sprayed across the other side of his face was still there, bright red. Redder than Hojo's face had been when he'd struck him. He didn't know why he'd resisted his post mission medical appointment, he'd never done that before. He'd just been tired, so bone achingly weary that he just didn't want to deal with it. Didn't want to get poked and prodded and lectured when he felt torn apart inside.
He plucked a washcloth from the stack of them on the shelf, wetting it and swiping it across his cheek and beneath his nose where the blow to his face had made it bleed.
The water in the sink swirled red as he rinsed the cloth, leaving it there as he turned away to get... away. He needed to get out of the range of himself in the mirror, the condemnation in his own gaze feeling too close and visible.
He slumped down on his bed, staring around him at the small space that was only better than where he'd grown up in the labs because it was private. They never could keep cameras in here, he crushed them all the moment he got in, they'd given up in time.
Dropping back against his pillow he rolled to face the wall and dragged his blanket over himself, heedless of his muddy boots and rain-slick leathers. He didn't care, right now.
He'd killed Genesis today.
He'd killed Genesis the day before.
He'd kill Genesis again, tomorrow, probably.
So many of them, wearing his friend's face.
But were they friends? Had they ever been? He couldn't imagine that they felt the same way about him than he'd come to feel for them. He'd never had friends before, naturally, and thus had no idea how one went about making and keeping them. He must have done a terrible job, then, because they'd left him here. Left him to his orders and his paperwork and the constant agony of killing his friend over and over and over and over and over...
He brought his hand up to his mouth, biting down hard where his thumb met the thick muscle there, tasting blood as his chest heaved and his stomach churned.
He made no sound, he'd been trained out of that.
If Genesis had asked him to come, in the beginning, he wasn't sure he would have - he thought maybe he'd have accused Genesis of being dramatic, expecting that he'd be back in a few days or even a few hours once he'd had his tantrum.
But now Angeal had gone to join him, and hadn't said even one word. Hadn't sent a text, hadn't left a message where he could find it. He'd had to learn from Angeal's student who he'd also abandoned without any invitation to come along.
If they asked him now? He'd like to think he'd say yes in a heartbeat.
But he'd killed so many copies of his friend, so many pairs of blue eyes turning vacant and empty, so much blood as red as Genesis' coat slicking his hands and burning copper in his nose and on his tongue.
It was only a matter of time, probably, that he'd be killing Angeal too.
He pulled his bleeding hand against his chest, feeling blood drip down to soak into the sheets, and closed his eyes.
"I don't know if I can do this anymore," he whispered, knowing that he'd get up tomorrow and do it all again, what choice did he have?
He'd go to his appointment.
He'd submit to the tests as he should have done today.
And then he'd be sent out to kill again.
He'd kill Genesis, as many times as he had to, even as it broke his heart.