Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/6225565.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Kingdom_Hearts
  Relationship:
      Riku/Sephiroth
  Character:
      Riku_(Kingdom_Hearts), Sephiroth_(Kingdom_Hearts), Sora_(Kingdom_Hearts),
      Kairi_(Kingdom_Hearts)
  Additional Tags:
      Tentacles, Tentacle_Sex
  Series:
      Part 1 of Transformation
  Stats:
      Published: 2016-03-12 Words: 10163
****** Transformation ******
by SleepsWithCoyotes
Summary
     Seph gets changed. Riku gets to deal with the mess.
Notes
     Another from the multiverse where Riku and Sephiroth met while Riku
     was still working for Maleficent, and Sephiroth imprinted on Riku as
     substitute family. Incesty vibes and all.
The clash of swords threw sparks across the air, trails of magic and its
consequences unwinding in a loosening spiral around them as they took the fight
aloft. Lightning caught the tip of his largest wing, but Sephiroth shrugged it
away, pinion snapping out and down and heaving him up to catch other currents
while Cloud strained to follow him. Almost he wanted to laugh--Cloud's precious
light had clearly made him no stronger--but the thought distracted him, dragged
his eyes briefly to the ground.
He hadn't expected the Lockhart woman or real interference of any kind. Cloud
was his, had always been his. He couldn't remember a time this hadn't been so.
Far below the Keyblade master stood with his face tipped up to the sky, the
boy's companions flanking him in silent solidarity, but the Lockhart woman was
already gone.
A host of familiar taunts hovered on the tip of his tongue--Alone again? You
misplace your protectors quickly--but before he'd quite drawn breath to speak,
all at once Cloud was simply there, haloed in the flickering blue glow of pure
fury.
He remembers his Limits, Sephiroth had time to think, an odd hint of pride
twisting his lips in a faint smile. He didn't know why he insisted on
underestimating Cloud time and time again. Hadn't he helped teach him
everything he knew?
When the power hit, it felt different this time. He would have thought he knew
every nuance of the taste of Cloud's magic, but while the crackling bite of the
darkness was still there, it wasn't alone. For a moment it was like being
wrapped in summer: a breathless, golden heat that pressed in on him from every
side and dragged at his wings, turned his limbs heavy and unresponsive. It was,
he decided uneasily, the most disturbingly disarming attack he'd ever had
focused on him.
Then the pain sank in, warmth flickering to fire, digging into him as he
thrashed his wings to put some distance between himself and Cloud's determined
grimace. He didn't know what that attack had been, had never seen Cloud attempt
it before for all his years of watching, but he didn't have to understand to
feel the way the darkness inside him writhed desperately for escape. Mother was
howling too, and that unnerved him more than the flailing of the dark, more
than the idea that Cloud might have changed his affinity and with it his
Limits. Nothing had ever hurt Mother. She was indestructible.
But she was screaming, boiling inside him, the sensation so unpleasantly
strange Sephiroth hesitated only a moment before flaring his wings and bolting
for the upper atmosphere where even Cloud couldn't follow him. Pain licked
along his nerves, his skin prickling as if trying to creep off his bones.
Foxfire blue outlined his vision as his own Limits were triggered, but for once
in his life, he didn't turn to expend that energy on what had hurt him. The
gathering power wasn't a comfort, not with Mother searing out with a deafening
shriek, the darkness turning itself inside out and trying to take him with it,
the sense of some monstrous change hovering just beyond his understanding.
Away. He had to get away, and as the first convulsion wracked him, he reached
for the darkness and ripped open a portal to nowhere, anywhere, telling himself
it meant nothing that he left a trail of blue-black feathers in his wake as he
fell through.
                                      ***
Baked from gold to white as the tide crept out, the sand under Sora's feet was
kicked up in hissing plumes as he raced headlong across the beach, grinning
like mad though the pursuer hot on his heels was drawing closer by the stride.
The sun hung at a cockeyed angle overhead, maybe an hour past noon, but time
meant nothing on the weekends; they ate when they got hungry, slept when they
got tired, and only trudged back home when someone's parents started yelling
too loudly about homework and Mondays. That was the way things had always been,
and it was simple rightness and an aching relief to know that two long years
hadn't changed it.
Of course, it was two years later and he was still running from Riku, and Riku
was still gaining on him, and man, it really had been wishful thinking to
expect anything else, huh?
"Give it up, Sora!" Riku called out in an amused sing-song, not even having the
grace to sound winded. "I called it fair and square!"
"Ah-ah! Too slow, Riku!" Sora called right back, trying not to laugh. He needed
that breath for running. "Victory is mine!"
He didn't really know why he'd felt compelled to snatch the last creampop out
of the box...and then run. It was that weird new flavor, icy neon blue, and he
didn't even like sea salt. But Riku had been staring off into space again,
walking alongside Sora but a million miles away, the box of creampops they'd
split on the way to the beach held like an afterthought between them.
The sea-saltcicle in its waxy wrapping was mostly melted now, but that wasn't
the point. Keeping it away from Riku or surrendering it to the threat of sand
down his shorts wasn't the point either. Riku pounding after him with a toothy
grin and a wicked spark in his eyes was totally worth the sandburns he was
going to get when Riku tackled him.
"Hey! Hey, guys!" he heard from somewhere up the beach, and Sora lost just a
bit of his edge as he looked around for the source of the call, his speed
bleeding away at the sound of Kairi's voice. He spotted her almost instantly,
waving from where the shore started to bend in on itself, the water lightening
from deep aqua to a paler shade the color of Riku's eyes. It wasn't that she
didn't sound happy to see them, because she did; it was just that she sounded
more relieved than happy, and there was something about the urgent way she was
waving that he didn't like at all.
"Oof," Sora said as Riku clapped him on the shoulder, but it was nothing but a
friendly acknowledgement, Riku's way of telling him the game was over, that
Riku could've won if he'd wanted to, and now they had to get serious. It didn't
entirely dislodge the hard knot of worry in the pit of Sora's stomach, but
watching Riku draw even with him and then match him stride for stride put a
big, stupid grin on Sora's face anyway.
The grin melted away as they got close enough to see Kairi's wide eyes, lost
expression, though she didn't exactly look afraid. Just...weirded out beyond
belief, which was weird enough on its own. Next to Riku, Kairi was the most
unflappable person Sora knew, and if it ever came to a grudge match in the
unflappability stakes, Kairi would probably win, because Riku wouldn't be able
to resist the urge to snark. Whatever had put that expression on her face, it
had to be huge.
"Um," she said as they jogged up, blinking a little and pointing vaguely behind
her. "Mostly naked man on the beach."
Okay...that was actually pretty typical, but--
"With tentacles," she added, her voice carefully uninflected. "I think he's
still alive."
                                      ***
Sephiroth hadn't focused on going anywhere in particular, and so he went
nowhere for what felt like a long, long time. There was no way of gauging the
passage of minutes or hours in the dark; he was cut off from everything, hurt
and hunger fading without sight to ground him or touch to remind him of his
body. Just before he lost all sense of himself, he felt the burning in his
veins peak and spread, and for a moment he was back in the lab, listening to
Hojo's furious curses and Mother's puzzlement buzzing like a swarm of hornets
in his head. Only this time there was no Cloud, no last-minute reversal of the
experiment to infect him with wings and madness and the dark, nothing but the
feeling of things rearranging in ways they shouldn't.
Cloud had done this to him. Cloud had--somehow--stopped it from happening
before. If he could claw his way back there, perhaps Cloud could reverse this
thing that was happening to him again.
It wasn't until he gathered enough awareness and urgency to attempt a new
portal that he understood his error. Always before he could track Cloud by the
unique signature of his soul, the odd connection they shared through the
darkness, but that was gone now. Something indefinable had shifted between
them, and all Sephiroth had to go on was that muddled last impression of
mingled darkness and light in tenuous balance. It couldn't be that common a
combination--he'd only met a few who'd ever managed it, and most of them were
dead--and so he reached for that, sent his will out through the nothingness
until he latched on to a soul that burned across his senses, a steady beacon
that pulled him out of the comfortable numbness of traveling into the heavy
weight of being.
And promptly drowned him. It was so like Cloud to hold a grudge.
                                      ***
Sora had hesitated at Kairi's side, making sure she was okay, but Riku
continued past them, eyes drawn to the powerful form sprawled face-down on the
sand. If the man had been entirely human, he'd have been more out of the water
than in it, and there certainly was plenty to look at: broad shoulders, long
arms corded with muscle, sheets of silver hair spread in sand-flecked tendrils
around him. Which--minus the sand and the public nudity--was all just way too
familiar, but that was crazy. In the first place, they were half the cosmos
away from that Strife guy, and in the second place...well, tentacles.
They started at the man's hips, pale skin-toned appendages that fell laxly away
in bewildering profusion, clearly not limited to the traditional eight. Rocked
gently by the waves, they rolled and jostled against each other, deadweight,
their lengths suckerless, though the undersides of the widest pairs looked
tough, almost plated. When the waves rolled away from the shore, the pale limbs
were reeled out nearly straight, eight feet or more at a glance.
Definitely not from around here. Riku wondered how this one had gotten though
the walls between the worlds, whether they ought to take it as a fluke or an
omen, and walked around to the man's other side to get a better look at his
face.
High, sculpted cheekbones, an aquiline nose and a mouth that drew the eyes,
pale brows that always seemed arched in mocking disbelief. Realizing that he
was staring at a technical impossibility, Riku shook his head, blinked very
deliberately, and narrowed his eyes when the mirage didn't melt obligingly
away.
Right. Somewhere half a cosmos away, a pointy-haired blond was probably
treating himself to the biggest shot of whiskey ever.
"Hey," he said, toeing Sephiroth in the side. "You'd better be dead, because
I'm not carrying you otherwise."
"Riku!" Sora chided, hurrying over and--
Riku cocked a brow when Sora jumped back, Keyblade solidifying in one sun-
browned hand. Glancing back down at Sephiroth--still dead to the world, though
he did seem to be breathing at least--he lifted his eyes to Sora again with a
smirk. "Is there something you want to tell us about you and tentacles, Sora?"
"That's Sephiroth!" Sora exclaimed by way of explanation, waving his Keyblade
in the man's general direction.
"Yeah," Riku said with a shrug, "I know. Grab an arm, will you? I bet those
things weigh a ton."
                                      ***
He woke to cool shadows, the smell of brine and the raucous screaming of gulls.
He felt parched, scraped raw in places, a faint ache in his lungs reminding him
that of all the unpleasant ways to die, he hated drowning the most. It was
fortunate that he was very, very good at cheating death, his knack for survival
Mother's small gift to him.
Only her voice inside him was quiet for the first time in recent memory, and
when he cautiously opened his eyes, at first all he could see was blurry smears
of color: grey stone overhead and too-bright eyes leaning over him, peering
through a curtain of silver.
"Kadaj?" he muttered in disbelief, reaching up to push the face away from him.
It startled him to feel the burn of exhaustion in his muscles, but not as much
as hearing the other's quiet snort or feeling his hand knocked casually away.
"Do I look like Kadaj to you? Wait, don't answer that."
"Riku?" Vision cleared all at once as his eyes sharpened, and sure enough, it
was Riku kneeling at his side, shirtless and smelling of salt and sun.
"Got it in two," Riku allowed, one corner of his mouth quirking as Sephiroth
continued to stare. "You could at least pretend it's a pleasant surprise."
"I was looking for Cloud," Sephiroth replied absently, trying to get his elbows
under him.
"Oh, now there's a shock."
Growling wordlessly, Sephiroth forced himself up on shaky arms. "This is
different."
"Uh-huh. So who cursed you?" Riku asked, clearly letting the other matter
slide. "Because I'm pretty sure Maleficent's dead, and I didn't think anyone
else had the guts."
Sephiroth eyed Riku sidelong with an impatient frown, waiting for that to make
sense. "I'm proof against the power of curses," he said at last and watched
pale brows arch doubtfully. For a long moment Riku just stared at him, and
though the unblinking observation would have set his teeth on edge coming from
anyone else, from Riku it was...permissible. Though he felt nothing like
Sephiroth's odd, now-vanished family--had no trace of Mother inside him,
however diluted--he was close enough to fool the senses if Sephiroth wished to
be fooled. Loz's strength, Yazoo's brilliance and Kadaj's cocky fearlessness,
and enough raw power to remind Sephiroth of himself at that age, pure darkness
mixed with--
Light.
"Oh, Hel. It was you," he muttered without thinking.
Riku had just smacked him upside the head--lightly, to be sure--when the
Keyblade master poked his head into the small cave Sephiroth strongly suspected
he'd been dragged to.
"Oh, shit," Sora breathed with the wide eyes of someone watching a train wreck
in progress. Briefly Sephiroth considered sending the boy running for the sake
of his pride, but it wasn't worth the display.
"Apparently I'm chopped liver," Riku informed his friend wryly, ignoring
Sephiroth's frustrated huff. "Did you get the stuff?"
"Uh...yeah?" Sora offered uncertainly, edging into the cave without taking his
eyes off Sephiroth. He had a pair of white plastic bags swinging from one hand-
-the left--the fingers of his other hand twitching restlessly, longing for a
weapon. "Er, is everything okay?"
Riku shrugged. "I'm not the one who's cursed."
"I already told you, I'm not cursed."
"So what's up with those, then?" Riku asked, nodding towards Sephiroth's legs.
He'd been vaguely aware that something was covering his lower half, had assumed
it had something to do with his missing coat and harness. It hadn't
particularly worried him--Riku wouldn't have stripped him as a prank--but a
glance down at himself found him covered not by his armored coat but by a
decidedly feminine-looking beach blanket printed with smiling yellow stars.
"They're paopu fruits," Riku said with a straight face and a thread of laughter
buried in his voice, reading Sephiroth's thoughts with an ease that ought to
have disturbed him--disturbed him more than the blanket did, at least. "And
they're not what I was talking about."
Opening his mouth to demand what Riku did think he was talking about, he
shifted to sit up the rest of the way and watched his world crack open with the
sudden flex of more than a dozen snaking limbs.
When he tried to push himself away from them, their thrashing sent the blanket
flying. He saw Sora catch it reflexively before it could settle over the boy's
head, but he had far more pressing concerns. They were back. He'd thought it
was over, but he'd been changed again, less human, more monstrous than ever,
and this time there was no mad scientist to botch the job of fixing him.
Tentacles writhed, knotting fiercely and digging into the sandy floor of the
cave, a few lashing furiously and stiffening with a scorpion curl when Sora
took a wary step back. Riku glanced from the tentacles to Sephiroth's face,
understanding dawning almost unwillingly as Riku's brows arched, his smile
going tense, something fierce in his eyes. "You didn't know?"
He had to get out. Out of this place. Now.
Sora cursed, dropping bags and towel to summon his Keyblade as Sephiroth lunged
for the cave mouth. He would have swept the boy aside--he didn't have time to
deal with the little fool now--but Riku shot to his feet and dove after him,
one arm hooking around his neck from behind, the other digging its fingers into
the muscle of Sephiroth's arm.
"Whoa, whoa, hold on! Seph!" Riku cried, and it was the sheer surprise in his
voice that made Sephiroth listen. It sounded as if Riku was questioning his
sanity, not his intentions. "Where are you going?"
Riku let himself be shrugged off when Sephiroth reluctantly stilled, but the
'I'm waiting' look didn't leave his eyes.
"I need to find Strife," Sephiroth snapped, fists clenching and relaxing. He
would not notice that his...his appendages were doing something remarkably
similar.
"Okaaaay," Riku said slowly, in the tone of someone bracing themselves to be
the rational one. "You want to explain how that's going to help?"
"It helped before."
He glared at them both as Riku and Sora started in unison, their expressions
almost identically surprised, though Riku's look was more cagey, Sora's almost
wondering.
"Huh?" Sora managed before Riku could sort out the questions Sephiroth could
see building behind his eyes.
Frustration made him snarl, his altered limbs flailing in agitation. "I don't
know," he said as Sora took a wary leap back, Keyblade still held at the ready.
"Hojo did something--"
"Hojo?" Riku asked narrowly, still holding his ground.
"The scientist who thinks he made me," Sephiroth growled, trying to remember if
he'd ever mentioned the man before. "He--I think he was trying to make me
stronger, or manipulate my Limits, or--he never said. Not after this happened.
Whatever he gave me, it didn't work; I started changing, and it wouldn't stop--
I remember him trying to put me under, and then Cloud was there, and.... He did
something then, transplanted Cloud's darkness into me and--" All his memories
of that time were so vague. He didn't like thinking about it, never talked
about it, only now he couldn't seem to convince his mouth to stop. "It
overpowered whatever Hojo had done, or changed it, I suppose; after that I had
wings. But this time--"
"Wait," Sora interrupted, wide-eyed. "So you really are Cloud's darkness?"
"I was infected with him," Sephiroth snarled, furious all over again, only this
time without that undercurrent of hunger to modulate it. This time he was what
Zack would have called 'royally pissed.'
"And that's why you never leave him alone?" Sora asked, straightening from his
wary crouch to fix him with a baffled look.
"Where do you think darkness goes?" Sephiroth demanded, feeling like ten kinds
of fool for only realizing this now and covering with a scowl of scorn. "He's
in my head and my heart, and he refuses to leave."
"You sure about that?" Riku asked with that careful blandness Sephiroth had
learned to pay attention to. "You smell different."
"Of course I smell different--I've traded wings for these--" Sephiroth reminded
through gritted teeth, waving several tentacles in Riku's face.
"Not that," Riku said, leaning in closer to sniff him again. Sora made an odd
sound at the sight, but Sephiroth glared stoically, eyes narrowing when Riku's
snapped up to meet them. "Where's Mother?"
Oh. He said that like...like she was.....
No.
"Seph?"
She couldn't be gone. Not when she'd always been there, always, long before
he'd ever heard her speak.
"Uh...Sephiroth?"
What had they done to him?
"Okay," Riku said, his voice determinedly calm. "Sit. We'll work this out.
Sora?"
"Er?"
"Bags, please."
"Uh...right. You want me to...?"
The Keyblade master was shuffling his feet, Keyblade still in hand, but he
scooped up the bags he'd dropped and brought them over with a look half
sheepish and half uncertain, eyeing Sephiroth warily.
"I'll take it from here," Riku said confidently, pushing on Sephiroth's
shoulder until he sank, limbs coiling under him by fits and starts. "Thanks for
the help."
"Sure, Riku. Uh...you'll call if you...?"
"Yeah." Riku grinned suddenly, and though it was strained, it looked heartfelt.
"Don't forget to give Kairi back her towel, huh? And tell her it makes a great
stretcher for...how did she put it...?"
"Oh, man." Scooping the gaudy thing up, Sora threw a half-disturbed look at
Sephiroth that painted the tips of his ears bright red, and then he was fleeing
without a single exchange of blows.
Somehow he suspected he didn't want to know, and Riku didn't volunteer, sinking
down to sit with him--not quite beside him, but not between him and freedom,
either. Not that he needed to resort to physical escape while the dark paths
were open to him. He appreciated the gesture regardless.
"Your darkness smells different too," Riku informed him without preamble,
watching him with an open, curious look. "I think it may be only your own."
"I can't feel them anymore," he admitted, something inside him calming now that
he only had to deal with Riku's stares and questions. "Mother or Cloud."
He could tell by the carefully noncommittal expression that Riku thought this
might be a good thing, but Riku kept his opinion to himself. "So what
happened?"
"We fought," Sephiroth replied shortly, irritation warring with self-conscious
discomfiture. Riku hummed something encouraging, and Sephiroth heaved a sigh.
"Cloud and I. Sora was there; didn't he tell you?"
"Sor--but that was weeks ago," Riku said slowly, the fierce glitter seeping
back into his eyes.
"I wouldn't know; I wasn't careful when I opened a portal to...flee," he said
with marked distaste, "and I floated a long time in darkness."
"You were stuck between worlds?"
"There's no time there. I didn't notice."
"That's not the point."
Sephiroth regarded Riku with some surprise, taking in the tension of his
posture, the angry line of his mouth, the eyes both like and unlike his own
raking him as if to determine whether the tentacles were the worst of it. "It's
probably for the best. I felt very little of the changes as they happened, and
what I remember of the first time was unpleasant at best. As for the
darkness...I think he may have burned it out of me. His own. With his light."
"Cloud?" Riku asked, as if he hadn't heard right. "Cloud burned his darkness
out of you?"
"He's been searching for his light for a long time," Sephiroth said resignedly,
inexplicably tired. "Maybe he finally found it."
Which meant that Cloud likely couldn't help him this time, having no more
darkness to spare him. Maybe no one could.
Riku stared at him a moment longer, but he didn't question Sephiroth's
downturned eyes, his abrupt silence. Instead he turned briskly away to drag
close the plastic bags Sora had brought, digging through first one and then the
other. When he pulled out a bottle of something violently blue, Sephiroth
merely stared.
"Here," Riku offered; Sephiroth made absolutely no move to take it. Even mako
didn't look that unappetizing. "No, really. You're dehydrated. Trying to
breathe saltwater will do that to you."
"It's blue."
"It's a sports drink. Just try it."
"Dare I ask what it's going to taste like?"
He wasn't sure he liked the long, slow grin Riku gave him, but he opened the
bottle anyway and took a cautious sip.
He rather thought it tasted like raspberry, if raspberries could be as
artificial as that eye-searing color.
Why blue? he nearly asked, but what came out instead was, "I can't stay here."
"Do you have anywhere else to go?"
He could tell that it wasn't meant unkindly; Riku could be sharp, sarcastic,
even arrogant on occasion, but he had unexpected depths of patience as well,
and his loyalty, once given, was hard to shake. Sephiroth had tried, at first.
"No."
"Then don't worry about it," Riku said with a shrug, leaning back on his hands.
"We can hide you here. We already know all the best places."
"We?" He didn't mean to sound quite so ironic, but it couldn't be helped.
Riku snorted. "I'll take care of Sora and the others," he said, the gleam in
his eye warning that he just might be looking forward to it. "You just try to
relax. Ever thought you might be stuck like that because of stress?"
"I haven't been thinking," he acknowledged with a distracted frown. There was a
good chance that he hadn't been thinking for a long, long while.
Riku hunched one shoulder awkwardly, still leaning back, looking more
comfortable than he should have been with someone more visibly monstrous than
ever before. "Well, you know what they say. There's no time like the present to
start."
                                      ***
Sora didn't mind admitting that he was a little freaked out by the whole
situation. Harboring a guy like Sephiroth was one thing. Even with people like
Cloud and Leon around, as far as Sora could tell, they'd only ever been able to
hold the guy in check, and that just barely. If Cloud hadn't managed to hit him
with some sort of weird transformation Limit, Sephiroth would probably still be
causing havoc somewhere, showing up every so often to tick Cloud off or maybe
try to destroy the world. The guy was dangerous, tentacles or no tentacles.
Watching Riku attempt to braid those tentacles when the man wasn't
looking...that freaked him out a whole lot more.
"I can feel that," Sephiroth muttered, pulling his coils out of Riku's hands
and using them to tip Riku over into the sand. Some part of Sora tensed
automatically, only Riku was grinning hugely, sitting up without any particular
haste, and Sephiroth had already withdrawn the tentacles anyway.
"Just checking," Riku said lightly, digging his bare feet into the sand. The
tide was coming in, but they were still far enough from the surf that it
reached them only rarely, and so far Sephiroth hadn't shown any affinity for
getting wet. Those tentacles of his weren't even properly squid-like, smooth
and suckerless, more like a nest of snakes than an octopus gone wrong. "They're
tougher than I thought," Riku added, as if he'd read Sora's mind. "I mean,
they're really soft, but they're strong, too."
He had to sort of hold his breath and clap a hand over his mouth to keep
anything embarrassing from escaping, and he really hoped Riku would think it
was laughter he was trying to stifle, because...had Riku always been that
oblivious? Because he knew Riku, and Riku couldn't do "innocent" if several
worlds with bragging rights thrown in depended on it, so it was either that or
Riku knew exactly what he sounded like, and--
Bad thoughts. Bad, bad, bad. Oh, man.
Sephiroth just eyed Riku doubtfully, the very tips of his tentacles twitching
like cat tails.
"Is that good?"
"Well," Riku said, smile growing, "at least you're not slimy. Or drippy. Or
squishy."
Sephiroth growled at him, and Riku laughed. Sora wasn't sure whether he should
be relieved or appalled, because at least Riku was laughing again, but sane
people ran when Sephiroth growled at them. Riku had clearly lost his own sanity
somewhere along the way.
Still. Laughing. That was a plus, right?
"Guys!" Kairi called from the crest of the rise at their backs, waving a little
as they spotted her. "Hey, guys!"
"Oh, shit," Sora mumbled, vague panic making him sit up straight. "Kairi! Naked
man down here!"
"He's not naked," Kairi yelled back, planting her fists on her hips, and now he
knew she was alone; if Selphie had been with her, there would have been more
squealing, possibly a mad dash down the hill. "He's got tentacles!"
"Technically," Riku said with a perfectly straight face, "I guess he's naked
under the tentacles...."
"Delightful," Sephiroth grumbled, primly tucking his limbs around himself. Riku
didn't even try to hide the smirk that broke out at that, both teasing and
friendly. Sora wasn't sure he was ever going to get used to that, Riku being
friends with Sephiroth. And Sephiroth apparently letting him.
Kairi had skidded down the loose sand to join them, the only people on this
stretch of beach for miles in any direction. She was dressed for swimming, a
light pair of shorts worn over the bottom of her pink-and-white two-piece, and
Sora didn't care what Sephiroth said, that swimsuit did not make her look like
Aeris. Not unless Sephiroth knew Aeris a lot better than he did, anyway. She
also had The Towel slung over one shoulder--it was never going to be anything
but The Towel to him, ever again--and an easy grin for each of them as she
jogged over to where they sat.
"Hi, Sephiroth," she greeted, throwing herself down beside Riku. "How are you
feeling?"
And he was never going to get used to that: Kairi apparently following Riku's
lead and treating Sephiroth like...well, like a person, he supposed.
"The same, thank you," Sephiroth replied gravely, moving a few more of his
tentacles over to give her more room.
Sora rubbed sheepishly at his nose, glancing out toward the tide. Wow. Now he
sort of felt like the bad guy here.
                                      ***
Sitting a little ways up the beach from the tide line, Riku wrapped his arms
around his legs and listened to the drone of the surf, the cries of the gulls,
and watched Sephiroth attempting to reach some accommodation with his new
limbs. The practice katas he ran through had clearly been modified to suit his
new anatomy, but despite the wet sand and lapping waves that should have
dragged at him--the ground chosen, Riku had no doubt, for how quickly the waves
would wash his unusual tracks away--he was still incredibly graceful, even when
he moved so quickly Riku had trouble tracking him. Sephiroth could probably go
to Atlantica and be instantly mobbed by lovestruck mermaids...not that being
mobbed for his looks was anything new.
Riku had mentioned that just the day before, only to have Sephiroth start
muttering about torches and pitchforks.
Chewing absently on his lower lip, Riku dropped his chin to his knees with a
sigh. So Sephiroth was more talkative lately. Big deal, he tried to tell
himself, but it wasn't just that. Sephiroth had definitely changed, and not
just in the obvious ways. He seemed calmer now, less prone to snapping, though
he still had his moments. Mostly Sora had been at least half to blame for those
little slips, at least until Sora decided out of the blue to lighten up and
stop eyeing Sephiroth like he might suddenly remember where he'd misplaced his
sword.
That didn't mean the others didn't still think Riku was suicidal for teasing
the man, but he knew Sephiroth. He could tell when the teasing would be met
with tolerance instead of irritation, had a pretty good idea of how far it was
safe to push. It helped that not once had he seen that other look come into
Sephiroth's eyes, cold and fierce and hungry, looking for something soft to
sink its claws into. Sephiroth's body might have gone mad, but at least his
mind was finally in full working order.
Even so, Sephiroth didn't look happy. Riku guessed he could see that. Tentacles
aside, it couldn't be much fun, hiding from the universe in a bare little cave,
impossibly far from anything familiar. Even Riku, who found the islands all too
familiar, felt half-crazy some days from the nagging sense of being stuck in a
place where he had no purpose at all, just an endless string of too-similar
days. And that was all his life had been before: going to school, hanging out
with his friends, dreaming of escaping to somewhere better. He couldn't imagine
how much worse it must be for Sephiroth, who'd had a purpose...at least before
some mad scientist's experiments had messed him up almost too badly to fix.
Uncurling his arms, he stretched his legs out before him and leaned back on his
hands, watching Sephiroth spin and strike, retreat, advance. He had a paper for
History waiting for him at home, three chapters of a novel to be read by the
end of the week for English. He should probably go and at least pretend to work
on some of that rather than spend so much time worrying about Sephiroth, who
could take care of himself.
And who was quietest in the mornings, almost every morning, and sometimes it
took a while to bring him around to his usual wry, reserved, occasionally-
prickly self. The shadowboxing thing had worried Riku at first, but Sephiroth
never went resigned on him, never seemed to give up on the idea of changing
himself back. It was just that none of them had the first idea where to start
on that, not even Sephiroth.
The training was probably a good thing, preparation for when Sephiroth had to
leave the islands to go searching for a cure. And maybe he just needed a
distraction to take his mind off what he couldn't yet fix.
"Hey," Riku called, rising and dusting himself off before making his way down
to the waterline. Sephiroth paused and turned, looking a question at him, but
he didn't seem too annoyed at having his workout interrupted. "Want to spar?"
He waited it out as Sephiroth's look turned considering, as measuring as if
they'd never done this before, not really surprised when Sephiroth gave in with
a nod. He didn't expect Sephiroth to thank him in so many words; the swift
glance he was given, the one that no longer questioned his sanity, his
intelligence or his motives, was gratifying enough.
                                      ***
"Oh," Riku groaned, and Sephiroth smirked, shifting his coils just so. "Right
there. That's--" A yawn, barely contained behind one lazy hand. "--perfect."
Sephiroth snorted, eyeing the lanky figure curled up on his tentacles with an
ironic half-smile. Riku rather reminded him of a cat that had just kneaded
every sheet and blanket on the bed and all of the pillows besides into the
perfect configuration for a nap, and who now showed no inclination to move
whatsoever.
"I'm so glad I can be of assistance."
"Serves you right," Riku informed him without cracking open an eye. "I said
'spar,' not 'wear Riku out.' It's these guys' fault," he added, patting blindly
at a tentacle. "They can make it up to me."
"Just like a cat," Sephiroth muttered, only to watch Riku's wounded look
dissolve into a smug grin.
"That's what they all say."
He wasn't quite certain why it didn't disturb him to have Riku nestled down in
his new limbs. He'd found that he didn't like having them touched--didn't like
touching them himself--but Riku's very presence was so tied up in a trust and
goodwill he'd long thought lost to him, it was almost something outside touch
entirely. Riku wasn't like Mother's children, the ones she'd made--or had Hojo
make--and gave to him as uncomfortable presents, their devotion to him
hardwired from the beginning. Riku had his own darkness, but it was
inextricably linked to his light, and it didn't drive him anymore now that
Ansem's--Xehanort's--ghost was gone.
Maybe that was why he'd felt almost like his old self again since coming here.
Maybe having only his own darkness--strong and powerful, true, but purely and
undistractingly his--had made the difference.
And Mother. Mother and her...less than tolerant views on the rest of the
universe gone as well.
"Riku," he said, jostling his coils a little as Riku's breath evened out a
little too slowly. "You're falling asleep."
"Mm. 'Sokay," Riku mumbled, shifting until he found a new comfortable spot.
"Mom thinks I'm at Sora's."
"And does Sora know where you are?" he had to ask, amused despite himself.
"Uh-huh. He says I'm a pervert."
Sephiroth smirked, stifling the chuckle that tickled the back of his throat out
of habit. He was pretty sure Riku hadn't meant to say that out loud, but then
again, one never knew with Riku. And what precisely was he expected to do with
a lapful--in a relative sense--of innocently-sleeping teenager?
He could think of one thing, but that was...before, and had no bearing on the
present. Though he didn't expect to sleep himself, he rolled Riku up more
comfortably in his coils and dug himself into the nest of blankets and pillows
Riku and his friends had amassed for him, closing his eyes to the sound of
Riku's steady breaths.
It shouldn't perhaps have surprised him to wake with the dawn, his face buried
in silver hair only a shade darker than his own. The arm he'd slung around
Riku's middle pulled Riku back against his chest, his coils all but knotted
around Riku's legs, hips, spiraling up one arm. It shouldn't have surprised
him, but it did, and he found himself going very still, wondering how he could
possibly extricate himself before Riku woke up and panicked.
Far from panicking, Riku groaned a long, sleepy sigh of utter contentment and
settled back against him, nearly falling asleep again before Sephiroth reminded
him it was Wednesday. That woke Riku up quick...and still he didn't panic,
patting absently at too-friendly tentacles as he yawned and stretched.
"Heh. I knew you'd be a cuddler," was all he said, tossing a friendly grin over
his shoulder even as he was pushing loops of coils down, squirming out of their
hold like escaping from a particularly clingy sleeping bag, with about as much
haste.
It was apparently Sora's turn to bring him supplies for the day, which was odd
if not unwelcome. He'd been bracing himself for Selphie. It did put him on his
guard to find Sora watching him with a hint of his previous distrust,
especially when it came accompanied with a long, assessing look he was more
used to seeing on Riku's face.
When that look faded, replaced by one of the boy's rather astonishing grins, he
found himself as puzzled as he was suspicious.
"You've got scrunchy brows," Sora informed him, tapping the bridge of his own
nose when Sephiroth threw him a confused look. "Don't tell me: Riku left here
with something cryptic that's going to drive you crazy all day."
Sephiroth stared. "How did you two ever become friends?"
That modulated Sora's grin, but it only turned it soft, even fond. "Who else
would put up with us?"
Which gave Sephiroth two things to think about.
                                      ***
Sitting on her towel--The Towel, as Sora insisted on calling it--Kairi added a
last coat of sunscreen to her arms as she watched Riku and Sephiroth playing on
the beach. She knew perfectly well that Sephiroth would probably insist on
calling it 'training,' but that didn't change the fact that Riku was clearly
making a game of dodging tentacles, pausing only long enough to throw off a few
breathless taunts whenever Sephiroth missed. And Riku could move like an eel
dipped in hot oil when he felt like it; the real surprise was whenever anyone
stopped staring long enough to attack him.
She glanced over at the sigh on her right, but Sora was sitting quietly on the
sand beside her, watching the two by the water like he both wanted to join in
and didn't. At least he'd gotten more comfortable with the idea of having
Sephiroth around. She didn't know what Sephiroth had been or done in the past,
and she didn't need to know. She knew he had darkness in him, and quite a lot
of it; she could sense it in him as clearly as she could sense it in Riku. And
if that meant Sephiroth wasn't worth a second chance, she'd have to hold Riku
to the same standards, and she wasn't about to do that. Besides, Riku trusted
him.
Which still bothered her, to be honest, because she hadn't been sure of
Sephiroth herself at first, and it seemed like she ought to have known better--
what good was being a Princess of Heart otherwise? She'd been okay with faking
it in the beginning, but Riku just seemed so...at ease around him, and it
hadn't seemed right to keep treating the man like a stranger that might bite.
Riku might not be as outgoing as Sora, but he was serious about his friends,
all of them. And sometimes....
She smiled to herself, remembering how surprised she'd been when she'd realized
the one Riku was jealous of was her, not Sora. She'd even thought she'd known
how everything would turn out when Sora finally found him again, considering
how desperately Sora had searched. She'd been...well, she'd been okay with it,
if you didn't count the part of her that had wondered, squirming with
embarrassment, whether they could have worked something about between them so
that no one had to be left behind.
Only Sora still hadn't seen it, and maybe it wouldn't have mattered if he had,
because while Sephiroth might be refusing to see for reasons of his own, Riku's
heart was still right there in his eyes for anyone with the sense to look.
"Ha!" Riku shouted as he leapt over a snaking limb, backpedaling swiftly. "Too
slow, old man! You--ack! Cold!"
Kairi giggled to herself as she watched Riku duck a spray of water lashed his
way by a lightning-fast tentacle, only to do a crazed little dance as the tip
of one wave-damp coil slithered ticklishly down the back of his neck. Even Sora
snickered, the wistful look fading from brightening eyes, and she reached over
to ruffle a now-dry hand through his hair. He yelped, but he didn't quite try
to get away.
"What was that for?" he asked, giving her a mock-pitiful look.
"Nothing," she said with a grin.
She'd give the others a few minutes, she supposed. Then she'd go over there and
tackle Riku into the surf.
Sephiroth could play blind all he wanted, but she had no qualms about improving
the view.
                                      ***
Though the rain was coming down hard outside, soaking the gritty earth and
whipping the waves to foam, it was dry inside the cave set high above the tide-
line. He knew Riku felt guilty about what he perceived as Sephiroth's reduced
circumstances by how frequently attics and basements were brought up. He'd
considered more than once describing both his command tent in Wutai and his
childhood in the labs. What kept him silent was his uncertainty as to how Riku
would react. Zack, for instance, had not reacted well at all.
It was Riku who'd brought him lunch that day, a lazy Saturday with nothing to
do once the rains settled in, the first warning that fall was approaching.
Though Riku had brought his own lunch as well--thick sandwiches for the both of
them and soup in a thermos--he didn't seem very interested in it, picking at
his food and then offering the other half of his sandwich to Sephiroth. And now
he was staring out at the rain with the stillness of utter preoccupation, his
unfocused eyes glazed with a distant longing that reminded Sephiroth too much
of himself.
"What is it?" he asked when the silence had gone on too long and watched Riku
start, coming back to himself with a blink.
"Huh? Oh. Nothing."
Which was clearly a lie, but the instant fury he might have felt a month ago
failed to materialize.
"Cabin fever, I guess," Riku said after a moment, not quite meeting Sephiroth's
eyes. "If the cabin's as big as an island, that is."
"I thought you loved this place." He wondered what had changed, precisely what
it was Riku was tired of.
"It's home," Riku said simply. "But it's not the only place I ever want to
see."
"Why don't you travel, then? You spend enough time outdoors; who would notice?"
Riku gave a quiet huff of laughter, but there was no real humor in it. "Yeah,
well...I would, but I can't use the dark paths anymore. I guess my light got
too strong."
"I'm sorry," Sephiroth said as that sank in. He had chosen to stay out of
pragmatism himself--he wouldn't call it fatalism, even if all places were one
to him at the moment--but if the choice had been taken from him entirely--
This time Riku's laugh was more genuine, though just as quiet. "You're the only
person I know who could say that, mean it, and not be creepy about it," he said
with a faint smile.
"Hn."
"Thanks."
Sephiroth hesitated, but Riku went blithely back to his sandwich, popping the
last crust into his mouth and washing it down with one of the outlandishly-
colorful drinks he seemed to favor. If he wasn't going to ask, there was no
sense in offering. But.
"I could take you," he heard himself saying, his voice noncommittal.
Riku's brows went up with a jerk, but he shook his head without pausing for
thought, one corner of his mouth tipping up wryly. "Thanks, but no thanks," he
said, reaching over to...pet one of Sephiroth's tentacles; there simply wasn't
another word for it. "Not like this. People are morons."
"Yes," Sephiroth agreed with a sigh, not looking forward in the slightest to
the questions, the stares, that he knew would follow him once he left. He was
accustomed to being feared for what he'd done, knew himself more than capable
of doing it again--capable, but disinterested. Being feared for what he was, on
sight...not so different, he supposed, from his life before, merely on a larger
scale. Riku and his strange friends were an anomaly he was...grateful for.
Half resigned to being pushed away, Sephiroth let a few tentacles drift out to
coil around Riku, and when he wasn't instantly rebuffed, reeled them in and
Riku with them. Riku leaned back against him without hesitation, but then
again, Riku never had been afraid of him, that fearlessness at least as
tempting as all the rest.
"I'm almost sorry I don't still have wings."
Riku grinned. "I don't mind."
It'd been different before, the quick work of hands and mouths between
distasteful errands and private goals, hunger and need and no time to worry
about anything else. Sephiroth hadn't cared about Riku's age, and Riku hadn't
cared about Sephiroth's past; it'd been enough to build a friendship on in the
end. He hadn't been blind to the way Riku looked at him. He simply hadn't
expected it to last.
As Sephiroth bent down towards him, Riku tilted his head back to meet him,
paler eyes glittering with smug anticipation, clearly glad to be done with
patience. He had the vague thought that if Sora were to come upon them now, the
boy might well rethink his resolution to leave well enough alone, but he didn't
care about that either. Of far more interest was the contented purr Riku made
as lips parted automatically, letting Sephiroth in, and this hadn't changed at
all. Riku was still hungry for him, despite the fact that there was no
particular urgency this time, no reason to hurry things along.
When he stroked one hand down the flat muscle of Riku's stomach, Riku shifted
to cover Sephiroth's hand with his own, tacit permission in the glide of his
fingertips over Sephiroth's knuckles, the way he reached up to wrap his other
hand around the back of Sephiroth's neck. Sephiroth could almost forget that
anything at all had changed, only if he'd thought he had his new appendages
under control, he'd been wrong. They were moving now of their own volition,
twining around Riku's legs, his hips, tightly enough to forestall even the most
panicked of struggles.
He didn't think Riku intended to struggle. Instead Riku sighed a slow, pleased
hum into his kiss, lips curving against his mouth, and he knew if he looked
now, he'd find Riku giving him a smug, satisfied smirk that asked what exactly
the delay had been. But then, the one thing he'd always been able to count on
was Riku being certain.
Sephiroth's breath caught when knees pushed against his coils, flexing outward,
Riku's legs spreading in clear invitation. He might have taken that hint if
Riku had ever offered before, if there'd ever been time, but he was very
changed, and Riku was sometimes too fearless for his own good. Sephiroth didn't
entirely grasp how his altered anatomy worked in the first place; he'd only
just learned to his satisfaction that he could still fight with it.
"Sephiroth," Riku murmured as Sephiroth leaned his brow against the back of
Riku's head, trying to convince his limbs that they wanted to relax, release.
"It's okay. I want you to."
"You don't know what you're talking about."
"Well, no. I won't until you show me," Riku replied with flawless logic, "so
why not?"
"It's not--" His limbs weren't listening to him, inching up Riku's thighs now,
the tips slithering slowly and apparently ticklishly inside the loose legs of
Riku's blue swim trunks. "It's not that simple."
"It's...it's all right," Riku said, the break in his voice having nothing to do
with second thoughts. "We'll figure it out. I trust you."
He was careful to use his human hands as he pushed Riku's trunks off the sharp
blades of his hips, tentacles grabbing automatically and pulling them the rest
of the way down. He had a vague impression of them being flung to the other
side of the cave, Riku's breathless laugh turning into a groan as Sephiroth
wrapped a hand around his cock--already hard--and began to stroke.
"Nn...this had...better not be a tease," Riku warned, eyes sliding mostly-
closed as he leaned back more bonelessly still.
"Hush." As if Riku would follow that order in this lifetime.
"Whatever...you say, Seph...."
He kept things slow and deliberate, Riku's hips rocking upward in short, sharp
jerks, using the hand still hooked around Sephiroth's neck for leverage. The
coils had just enough give to let Riku move, holding him lightly, as if they
knew he wouldn't try to get away. They were still tight enough to keep Riku
from thrusting the way he'd like, and the frustrated groan that echoed through
the cave as Sephiroth pulled his hand away made him smile.
"Are you sure?" he asked, both hands on Riku's hips, thumbs stroking the arch
of narrow bone.
"Yes. Come on, already."
"All right," he said, nuzzling absently at Riku's ear, the thick silk of his
hair, the better to fill his senses with Riku's distinctive scent. "But you'll
have to help."
Riku made a questioning sound, but it faded as Sephiroth pressed two fingers to
his lips and watched intently as Riku sucked them in. Though he worked them in
and out of the heat of Riku's mouth himself, Riku's enthusiasm showed in the
caressing slide of his tongue as it twined around Sephiroth's fingers, slicking
them wet as Riku's breath went sharp and heavy. Even when Sephiroth's coils
tugged Riku's knees open wider, slid under his hips and lifted him until only
his shoulders remained braced against Sephiroth's chest, Riku only let his eyes
fall completely closed, relaxing into Sephiroth's hold with a half-heard moan.
The shuddery sigh Riku gave as his mouth was emptied at last made Sephiroth's
coils clutch tight in response, but that was nothing compared to the sound Riku
made when Sephiroth began to open him up, careful and methodical. Stroking,
circling, he waited each time for Riku to nearly lose all patience with him
before continuing, pressing in shallowly, then deeper. Riku's curses he
ignored--in this he knew what he was doing, refused to be rushed--but he
was...not entirely willing to entertain what he suspected the next step would
be. He didn't completely have control of the things now.
"Riku--"
"Seriously, Seph," Riku warned. "Make me beg, and I'll make you sorry."
He half expected Riku to change his mind dramatically when one coil snaked up
his chest and rubbed catlike against his cheek, but Riku just turned his head
and opened his mouth, tongue flicking out to draw a hot, wet path up to the tip
before taking it inside. It was different, incredibly different, but familiar
all the same: the hot suction of Riku's lips, the curl of his tongue, the way
he tipped his head back and let Sephiroth fuck his mouth, breathless and
groaning.
Naked, spread out for him, he'd expected Riku to look more like Kadaj, even
Yazoo, but Riku was too thoroughly himself. Yazoo would never have enjoyed
himself so openly, and Kadaj wouldn't have slid his hand down to thread his
fingers around the bases of Sephiroth's tentacles, trying to discover what he
liked rather than assuming he'd demand it, take it, if he wanted it. Breathing
hard as Sephiroth slid free of his mouth, Riku tensed a little, knowing what
was coming, but Sephiroth's lips against his throat made him relax, even when
Sephiroth pulled his fingers most of the way out, spread them slowly apart, and
pressed the tip of his spit-slick coil slowly inside.
Riku's breath caught, his body jerking taut and mindfully unclenching as
Sephiroth slid deeper. He didn't fight, but it was clear his body didn't quite
know what to do with itself, one set of instincts urging away as another
confusedly suggested towards, as if having it over more quickly would help.
Sephiroth was more concerned with not damaging him; he knew Riku would--
"Oh fuck, Seph, do that--that--ah...." Riku breathed, the change instantaneous
as he decided he liked this after all.
For the first time he was grateful he had the extra limbs. It gave him more to
hold on with when Riku decided he was going to move.
He wasn't certain later who decided a change was in order or how Riku came to
be straddling what would have been his hips, kissing him hungrily even as he
was being rocked by Sephiroth's thrusts. The unobstructed view of the glazed
look in Riku's eyes was reward enough, as was the restless stroking of strong,
square hands over his skin, the half-desperate press of Riku's cock against the
muscles of Sephiroth's stomach. When Riku pushed himself up, fingers biting
into Sephiroth's shoulders as lean hips ground down, he sped his stroke,
watched Riku stiffen and cry out, and then he was being turned inside out,
coming hard, black pinpricks spreading at the corners of his vision and
bleeding together at the edges.
Instinct made him tighten his arms as Riku simply collapsed on top of him,
breathing as if he'd just run a race and grinning as if he'd won it as well.
"Seph," he managed, and then seemed to forget what he was talking about, which
was likely for the best.
"So glad you approve."
"Well, I didn't say that. Wake me again in ten to do it over, and then I'll let
you know whether I approve."
Sephiroth let a huff of laughter escape, but he couldn't mistake the serious
tone beneath the teasing. Again. He thought he wouldn't mind that. At least he
knew he hadn't scared Riku away; he was beginning to think it wasn't possible.
Perhaps it was a Keyblade master trait: courage in the face of the alien.
"Perhaps," he said, but he could feel himself dropping off as well,
unaccountably exhausted. Or...maybe not so much tired as relieved, a burden he
hadn't been aware of carrying lifting from him as Riku settled down quite
comfortably for a nap, grinning still.
It wasn't quite a surprise to wake to find Riku sitting on him, straddling his
stomach and poking one blunt finger into his chest. His foggy mind tried to
explain away Riku's mock-accusing stare as a warning that they'd slept much
longer than ten minutes; he wasn't quite certain what to make of Riku's
puzzling words.
"You said you weren't cursed."
"We've been over this," he grumbled, more patiently than he really thought the
subject was worth. "I'm not cursed."
"Then why did that fix you?"
Fix...?
"What?" he demanded, sitting up fast. Riku didn't bother to climb off him,
smirking a little when he was pulled closer, Sephiroth peering past him to see-
-
Legs. He had legs again. Not a tentacle in sight.
"I don't--" He'd barely felt a thing, although he barely ever fell asleep after
sex, much less passed out, and his last conscious memory was of his vision
narrowing down to a bright, constricting tunnel. Then what Riku said sunk in,
and he pulled back to eye the younger man uncertainly. "I think you're
mistaking that with true love's kiss."
"A kiss?" Riku repeated incredulously, and Sephiroth found himself reminded yet
again that for all their resemblances, they'd come from different worlds
entirely. "What kind of fairytales have you been reading?"
"The expurgated kind, apparently," he said dryly, not needing to hear Riku's
half-amazed laughter to confirm the suspicion. "And I don't know why that
worked. Maybe it simply ran its course. Or maybe--"
"Maybe you calmed down enough," Riku offered sensibly, "for that Limit of yours
to finally ease up. You've been burning a lot of magic lately too, or at least
that's what it smells like. You've got so much of it, I wasn't sure."
Was that what it had been? An unusually persistent Limit? "Then Hojo actually
succeeded," he murmured, lip curling in belated disgust. He couldn't be sure,
of course; Hojo wasn't in the habit of explaining his aims to his experiments,
but he did think he remembered the scientist mentioning something about
improving upon his Limits. Perhaps if they hadn't all been so quick to panic,
none of what followed would have happened. Cloud wouldn't have been
experimented on; Zack wouldn't have assumed the worst. And he...well. Mother
would have driven him mad eventually, but not like that.
And the Heartless would still have come, only without his particular brand of
madness, he might not have seen anything interesting enough in Riku to stay for
that second glance. And that, he thought, would have been a great pity.
"Hm," Riku said, but he sounded preoccupied, looking wistfully over Sephiroth's
shoulder. "No wings."
His lips twitched, but he managed to avoid smirking by the narrowest of
margins. "I never needed them," he admitted, watching curiosity light Riku's
face. "They only made me more conspicuous."
"Really?"
"Shall I prove it?"
"Oh, hell, yes," Riku said, grinning hugely. "I always wanted to fly."
He thought briefly about suggesting clothes before remembering he didn't have
any. Which wouldn't make him conspicuous at all. Then again, considering the
deluge outside, it wasn't likely anyone would notice.
"You don't mind getting wet?"
"I live on an island."
"Very well," he said, urging Riku to let him up so he could stand. "Come on."
There was something alarmingly comfortable in the easy way Riku's hand slid
into his, but he wasn't going to think about it now. Time enough to worry about
it when he truly did have to leave, when he'd have to decide whether he was
going for good, going alone. He didn't miss the three..."presents" Mother and
Hojo had given him, but he would miss Riku.
And perhaps, in the meantime, he'd inquire about those fairytales Riku had
mentioned. They certainly did sound more intriguing than the ones Zack had
inflicted upon him in the name of making up for his lost childhood, though he
suspected Riku would make a perfectly terrible damsel in distress. For one
thing, he'd want to rescue himself. And for another--
His smirk softened briefly into a smile as Riku left him to go plunge out into
the rain all at once, preferring to get immediately drenched rather than feel
his way out little by little.
But that was Riku all over.
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