Archive of Our Own

Despite Glenn’s reputation as a bit unwieldy and abrasive, his subordinates still had enough respect for him to clear their throats and announce their business before entering his tent. They had done so ever since reinforcements first arrived on the tiny island nation of Rhadore, and they would continue to do so up until the moment Glenn commandeered the chopper that would catapult him, Matt, and Lucia toward a shared destiny far from the watchful eye of Shinra.

That moment, however, was different: A shadow, lithe and painstakingly silent, entered Glenn’s tent sometime after midnight. Glenn sensed their presence in the throes of sleep and remained perfectly still, trying to think through a swift and efficient response. The intruder was most likely Rhadoran, if not specifically a Rhadoran assassin given the grace and fluidity of their movements. Glenn was closest to the fortress he and the others had infiltrated earlier, and nothing about the outside of his tent distinguished it from those of the infantrymen; it made sense that the enemy would target him first. His weapon was a few feet away from where his arm lay outstretched, which was a fantastic stroke of luck. The next closest tent was Matt’s, and of the four of them—sans maybe Sephiroth, Boy Wonder—he was easily the best tactician, so if Glenn had to shout or create some sort of signal, the aftermath would find him in safe hands. 

His fingers twitched as his eyes adjusted to the moonlight pouring through the tent’s open flap. In retrospect, he should’ve considered how strange it was that his potential assassin hadn’t thought to close it as quickly as possible. He heard a soft inhale somewhere above him and froze.

Then, a voice he knew very well—or at the very least, well enough, considering the short time they’d been acquainted.

”At ease,” Sephiroth said. “It’s just me.

Huh?

Glenn rolled onto his back and sat up in a single clumsy motion, startled. 

“You’ve gotta be joking, kid.” He saw Sephiroth wince and remembered he wasn’t supposed to be talking down to him anymore. “You scared the piss outta me, sneaking in like that. What’s up?”

He didn’t bother interrogating Sephiroth about why he felt he had permanent access to his tent, nor why he thought it was acceptable to stroll in so late. At first, this was because he thought the matter must be urgent—surely it had to be if waking him up was necessary—but then, Sephiroth looked a bit lost and forlorn, his eyes falling to his feet the same way it had at the Rhadoran fortress earlier that day. All bets were off, apparently.

”I didn’t mean to disturb you. May I sit for a moment?” he asked.

And really, what the hell was Glenn supposed to say to that? Shinra's golden boy was too polite for his own good, even if he was a seemingly unrepentant tent-invader. "Yeah, sure." He rubbed the tiredness from his eyes, affecting nonchalance. "You're not still out looking for that necklace, are you?" 

Sephiroth sat down at the foot of Glenn's bedroll, tucking his knees beneath him and wringing his hands. He was angled away slightly, almost as if direct eye contact was too difficult to maintain. 

“—Ah, no…" he answered eventually, looking even more uncomfortable than he had a moment prior. His responses were somewhat stilted and delayed. Glenn hoped it was just exhaustion and not something more serious, like mako exposure. They’d been inhaling an awful lot of it lately. "I was forced to give up the search at sundown. The lamps wouldn't last, and rifling through the pockets of cadavers in the dark was beginning to earn me some strange looks." 

He cast a glance at Glenn's own mako lantern, and the latter took the opportunity to ignite it, bathing them both in an ethereal green glow. Glenn's pulse quickened as his and Sephiroth's eyes met, the boy's reptilian pupils shrinking from the sudden influx of light. Glenn tried not to let his anxiety show on his face, but Sephiroth averted his gaze quickly, almost as if he'd been burned—an accidental reminder, perhaps, of just how strange he truly was.

"I’m sorry," he said. "This is my first time outside both the Shinra Building and Midgar as a whole, and truthfully, I have no idea what I'm doing."

He’s never even left the Shinra Building? Glenn tried not to openly balk, but it was difficult to envision what kind of life that would be. What did they do, instruct him in a padded cell? Raise him with wolves, or whatever the hell else Gast and Hojo have inside the Drum’s freaky-ass tanks? He knew that the eccentrics in Shinra’s Research and Development division were, well, eccentric, but not to that degree. He trained his expression toward careful neutrality, propping an arm on one knee. "What do you mean? If you're worried about the stuff I said when you first got here—"

Sephiroth shook his head. "I'm not," he responded, turning over his words in real time. "We—That's behind us. I heard your apology."

"Then what is it?"

Sephiroth looked wounded as he cast him a sidelong glance. 

"Socially." The start of his reply was divorced from context. "I'm…inexperienced, when it comes to other people. I was told that it was unnecessary, that anyone I led would listen to me without question, but then I encountered you…and you didn't listen."

"Oh." Glenn mussed the back of his hair, feeling awkward. "For what it’s worth, it wasn’t really personal. Word around the P0 class and other folks at Shinra isn't exactly… good, when it comes to you, you know?"

Sephiroth's answering smile was rueful. He looked at anything but Glenn, continuing to fidget out of sight. "Yes, I'm aware."

"I—fuck, not like that," Glenn amended, feeling like a jerk. "I meant that when you dropped onto the battlefield like the human equivalent of a bioweapon, taking out all those Rhadoran troops and then saying surprise, I'm your new leader, it kinda pissed me off. It wasn't actually you, just ideas about what you were like based on a few crazy rumors." 

"It's alright," Sephiroth said placatingly. "I wasn't looking for reassurance. It was just…a bit of a shock to the system, I suppose. I didn't realize people like you existed. People who defy orders. Question things."

Glenn hummed semi-appreciatively. "Gotcha. Well, the way I see it, doubting people in power is normal. Like…I don't mind Shinra most days, they treat me well enough, but in the end, it's just a job. Sometimes I feel like they made a huge mistake clearing me for the SOLDIER program. I signed up for the paycheck and the glory and whatever else is involved in this whole package deal, but all the fighting and killing… I dunno if I'm cut out for it, to be honest."

Perhaps the situation with the dig site had brought his disillusionment to the forefront, because Glenn hadn't realized exactly how he felt about their present circumstances until he'd been given an open forum.

"It's 'normal'…" Sephiroth repeated, staring at his boots. He looked haunted for a moment, the light of the mako lamp turning his skin a sickly green. "Defying your superiors… To me, it seems remarkably brave." 

Glenn took that as a compliment and leaned forward, clapping him on the arm. "You could stand to do it yourself, you know. You're pretty damn special to the suits—er, coats—down at R&D. Don't ever let them forget it." 

Sephiroth scoffed. “I’m an investment,” he said, pulling his knees up to his chest. “The result of astronomical amounts of money, effort, and time—but me, myself? Hardly.”

There was a pregnant pause. The air in the tent became inexplicably charged as Sephiroth flipped through a mental catalog of names and faces in search of compassion. Judging by his silence, nobody quite fit the bill. The thought made Glenn’s stomach turn. 

“Well… Who are you, then, Seph?” he asked in a way he hoped sounded fatherly rather than patronizing. “What do you want, whenever the company sees fit to let you retire someday?”

The nickname came out of nowhere, but it felt right. Sephiroth looked taken aback by it for a moment, and his surprise eventually metamorphosed into something resembling fear. Maybe the question had been cruel to ask someone kept under lock and key, but Glenn figured he’d have to grapple with his identity at some point, and what better time to push him in the right direction than when they were being authentic with one another at…gods knew whatever time it was?

“I…have no idea,” Sephiroth admitted, his gaze unfocused. “I’ve never—nobody’s ever—” He aborted twice before changing course. “Is that something I should have an answer for?”

Glenn sighed. “Nah, not necessarily. You’re still pretty young… You’ve got plenty of time to figure this stuff out for yourself.”

Sephiroth wrapped his arms around his knees and pulled them tighter to his chest, seemingly lost in thought. Eventually, he tried to say something, but stopped himself. Glenn watched his strange pupils dart around the far corners of the tent, belying his anxiety. “… I want to be someone who knows how to return others’ kindness,” he tried again in earnest. “It’s…rare, but there are people who seem to know exactly what things to say to me, and they say them without expecting anything in return.” He looked at Glenn sheepishly, and if his pale cheeks were capable of flushing, they more than likely would’ve been dusted pink. “They…recognize when I’m at my limit, and they don’t push me. They see me cut down children like it’s nothing, and they still have it in their heart to embrace me—to comfort me, when I fail to mask my distress…”

They see me cut down children like it’s nothing. How many people had watched Sephiroth commit atrocities in Shinra’s name? Glenn could only think of three off the top of his head, and if he narrowed it down even further to those who had ‘embraced’ him, well—

He froze, the impact of Sephiroth’s confession like a hammer to the solar plexus. 

“Friendships are things cultivated over a long time, or so I’ve heard, but I feel very…close…to you,” Sephiroth finished in a voice barely above a whisper, his eyes flicking upward to meet Glenn’s before breaking contact out of shame. “Perhaps far closer than I should, considering SOLDIER’s newfound, er—hierarchy.”

That was certainly one way to put it.

There was a long moment of silence, and Glenn knew he had to say something, anything, but despite everything Sephiroth had been through and all the ways his suffering made him more mature than his peers, he was still just a kid. These feelings were more than likely just an overcorrection due to his traumatic childhood—a strong attachment forged instantaneously after years of abuse and neglect. Glenn didn’t have those same tendencies, and he couldn’t pretend he felt the same way for a teenager, but…he didn’t know what to do about it, either. 

“Don’t tell me you have a crush on me, Seph,” he landed on, his usual lightheartedness laced with apprehension. Sephiroth seemed to hone in on the latter more than anything, letting go of a shaky breath he’d been holding and barreling over the edge of some invisible precipice when he realized it came out sounding more like a sob. Glenn wanted to reach for his wrist, sensing what was coming next, but he drew up short at the last second, his fingers curling around nothing.

”I—I’m sorry, this—” Sephiroth got to his feet, teetering a little, and Glenn realized his eyes were glassy. “I don’t know what came over me. I know better, and I didn’t mean to put you in such an awkward position by—” 

“Sephiroth,” Glenn said, cutting off his frenzied apology. Sephiroth didn’t sit back down—nor did he try to make eye contact through the darkness—but he stopped trying to scramble away from him. Baby steps, Glenn thought. 

“… This is endangering the mission,” Sephiroth insisted after a moment of fraught silence, his voice more stable. “I don’t even know if what I’m feeling is real, so this entire conversation is meaningless. I shouldn’t have said anything to begin with.”

Maybe Glenn should’ve let him leave the tent and lick his wounds, but he couldn’t abandon someone in the midst of such a vulnerable moment. His fingers still buzzed with unspent potential, and he didn’t know how to release it. Another hug? Would that only get him—them—into even more trouble by seemingly reaffirming Sephiroth’s feelings? “Whatever you think is best, but before you run out of here…” he said, choosing each word carefully, “Come here real quick, okay? Sit back down for me... Please.”

Sephiroth hesitated, looking every inch the socially inept person he was. Slowly, he walked toward Glenn’s bedroll and settled down across from him. Glenn offered him a small smile, and before he could stop himself, he reached out and tucked a few errant strands of silver behind his ear, grazing the shell of it with a thin, newly-formed callus on the side of his thumb. Sephiroth shivered, his gaze lidded.

Unspent potential. That’s all it is, Glenn reminded himself unhelpfully, not sure who he was trying to convince as his tone pivoted toward syrupy, almost sleazy-sounding reassurance. He’d always been a bad liar. “Just a hug, Seph,” he said aloud, beckoning him forward. “I do care. A lot. I don’t want you to run out of here thinking anything else, you got that?”

With a long, searching look and a stiff nod, Sephiroth crawled into his arms, and Glenn couldn’t help but notice how comparatively slight his frame felt. There was no doubt he’d grow into a veritable monster someday, considering his already-imposing height and insane battle prowess, but at that moment, he was just a young soldier—a young soldier who returned Glenn’s embrace so tightly and with so much desperation, it was almost constricting. Glenn rubbed slow circles into Sephiroth’s lower back, and after a moment, the boy’s breath hitched. Nails scraped over the water-retardant outer layer of Glenn’s jacket in retaliation, simulating a lazy sort of push and pull between them.

Despite all the warning signs, Glenn didn’t stop; if anything, Sephiroth’s response made him knead the same area with even more force, quietly marveling at the way his taut muscles seemed to melt and flex beneath his touch. His hands wandered a bit lower, but not low enough to be considered inappropriate. Unless it was just his imagination, Sephiroth leaned into them.

”You’re all sorts of pent up, kid,” Glenn said, and his voice sounded a little strange to his own ears. “… Gotta work on that.”

There was a soft huff, followed by the feeling of Sephiroth nuzzling into Glenn’s neck. Their hug was gradually becoming more serpentine, with more points of contact than Glenn had allowed anyone else since joining Shinra. Something about Sephiroth was disarming: Due to his sheltered upbringing, conversations with him were difficult to navigate, and his emotional fragility made denying him anything a bit of a minefield. Glenn didn’t want to break him, but he knew he had to reject his advances more decisively. If he let Sephiroth—and let Sephiroth was very intentional framing on his part—escalate things beyond what they already were, the situation would careen completely out of control.

he knew

he knew—

Sephiroth swung a leg over one of Glenn’s and allowed gravity to do the talking, something rigid digging into Glenn’s abdomen. 

—he was utterly fucked.

“This means something to you, doesn’t it?” Sephiroth asked, his voice full of trepidation. “Show me, please… I don’t know what I’m doing, but I’d like to. Consider this another form of…mentorship, I suppose.”

Something tenuous snapped inside him. In a moment of temporary insanity, Glenn forgot the de facto leader of the P0 Class was fifteen. With a sharp exhale, he buried his fingers in Sephiroth’s silver locks, tugging them until his head was forced to the side and their noses collided with one another. Sephiroth’s lips were parted slightly, his usually-unnerving gaze dulled by what Glenn assumed was the growing predicament between his legs. As if on cue, Sephiroth moved his hips a little, seeking out friction. His fingers dug into his shoulders, and to Glenn’s surprise, it actually hurt. He allowed Sephiroth to leave bruises wherever he latched onto, awed by his strength, as the latter began to move with more enthusiasm. Glenn could take it; he could also take the increasingly aggressive drags of Sephiroth’s half-hard cock over his stomach, though part of him wondered distantly if his goal was to penetrate his navel.

”Seph—Sephiroth. Hey,” he said firmly, and Sephiroth froze, looking stricken. 

“… I’m doing it wrong,” he said breathlessly, jumping to conclusions. “Aren’t I?”

The fog in Glenn’s mind cleared, and he immediately tried to reassure him, his thoughts discordant as his conscience shouted for reprieve. “No, no,” he said hurriedly. “It’s just… If you’re going to do this—” —again, you, not we— “you should slow down a little. Take your time. It’s supposed to be…nice, you know? Steady.”

Sephiroth looked down, his gaze tracing the hem of Glenn’s rucked-up shirt. “Oh… Apologies,” he said. “I got a bit carried away.”

Glenn exhaled to diffuse some of the tension in his muscles, vowing to treat Sephiroth with as much care as possible now that they’d seemingly crossed the point of no return. He braced his hands on Sephiroth’s hips, watching him relax; when Sephiroth tried to move again, much slower than before, Glenn resisted the urge to correct him a second time.

“That’s…that’s good,” he said, his praise coming out tentative and a bit uneasy. Sephiroth cast him a similarly anxious glance, and for a moment, Glenn wondered if he was able to intuit that none of his reservations had anything to do with him personally, but rather their respective stations, their ages, their lifestyles—

“Hoj—I was told that the whole purpose of this is to breed, though I’ve always thought that word was a bit crass,” Sephiroth remarked quietly, pulling Glenn from his train of thought. A calculated maneuver to distract him from his concerns? Quite possibly, though Glenn had to wonder if he was really that intuitive. “It also doesn’t explain why I’ve never found the women I’ve been offered particularly appealing.”

Ah. “Only guys, then?”

Sephiroth responded with something akin to a shrug, the gesture hard to translate alongside a twitchy thrust. “I’m not certain,” he said. “There’s a good chance that it was just…the circumstances.”

Glenn made a nondescript noise of acknowledgment, and Sephiroth continued:

“The only time I did anything like this, I was locked into some apparatus that, er—coaxed it from me,” he confessed, and Glenn could swear he saw the faintest traces of red in his cheeks. “Anything I produced was collected as a sample, and I heard something later that same week about a woman they tried to inseminate, but unbeknownst to Hojo, she was already with child. There was another girl too—younger, by a few years—but whatever was conceived wasn’t viable… Or at least, that’s how it was presented publicly. I suspect something may have happened to her.”

If Sephiroth’s story hadn’t been so horrifying, Glenn might’ve been tempted to chastise him for the abysmal pillow talk. “People tend to go missing when it comes to Shinra. Can’t deny that,” he said. He squeezed Sephiroth’s hips reassuringly, and the latter jumped a little, startled. “But hey, we’re far away from them right now, you know? You’re on your own, and you have power here. Real power. Focus on that.”

Sephiroth considered him for a moment, still moving at an agonizing pace. He looked conflicted to the same degree he had before he outed himself to Glenn. “There’s something…wrong…with mine, I think,” he said. “Hojo noted that the color and viscosity were normal in his reports, but…that girl, she—” He screwed his eyes shut and shook his head, like he was trying to fight off a migraine. “… We should be careful. That’s all.”

Glenn wasn’t particularly interested in mutating or being given some lab-grown STD—not under any circumstance, let alone one that could cost him his job—so he fell silent for a moment, biting the inside of his cheek. He would’ve preferred Sephiroth to stay in total control of their exchange, but if any element of his genitalia or ejaculate was a wild card—if there was any legitimate reason for concern—

(And again, he couldn’t say no, could he? His back was to the wall. Sephiroth had come onto him, not visa-versa, and he was kind of a volatile kid, so really, given the situation, Glenn was just trying to be a good role model—)

Hah. Right.

“Not trying to say I don’t believe you, but I’m not too worried, Seph,” he said. “If you are, though—” He grabbed Sephiroth’s shoulders and held him at bay as he extricated himself, indicating his bedroll with a quick jut of his chin. “Lie down for me. We won’t do anything you don’t want to, I promise.”

Sephiroth seemed to have very few qualms with Glenn’s ask, eyeing the length of the bedroll before lying back and splaying out like a cat. Glenn watched Sephiroth’s back arch a little as he stretched, their eyes meeting when he finally got comfortable. His pants were noticeably more tented at this angle, and Glenn couldn’t help but get a little annoyed at his knee-jerk assessment that Sephiroth was bigger than him. He reached out to feel his erection despite himself, fingers gliding over leather.

“This okay?” Glenn asked, and Sephiroth nodded, his tongue suddenly tied. Glenn got the impression he was trying not to make noise, his hips twitching from the minute touch. Glenn got a little more adventurous, dragging his nail over the zipper there, and studied Sephiroth’s reaction. He was schooling it in the same way a torture victim would—all furrowed brows and downturned lips—but his pelvis was elevated slightly off the ground, chasing his hand. After a few more deliberate passes, Glenn’s palm catching what he was almost positive was Sephiroth’s swollen head, he said, “You’re gonna have to tell me what you do and don’t like, you know, or I might just end up doing this for the next hour.”

Sephiroth’s gaze had a far-off quality to it, and Glenn could see the gears in his head turning. “I…wouldn’t argue.”

Glenn huffed a laugh. “That’s how you end up blue-balled as hell. Wouldn’t recommend it.” He kneaded shapeless patterns into Sephiroth’s groin, this time with a bit more force, and the latter breathed sharply through his nose, wetting his lips. Glenn felt his cheeks grow hot. “You like that…?” he asked. “Come on, Seph… Talk to me.”

Sephiroth glanced away, his eyebrows knitting together once again. “It’s an odd… pressure,” he said, struggling to articulate his feelings. “I think I enjoy it, but it’s strange…like I’m not really in control of my—aah!”

Glenn jumped when he felt a hand snatch his wrist like a vise, hard and lightning-quick. Sephiroth was holding Glenn still as he rutted the excess tension into his palm, his other hand clapped over his mouth to stifle any moans that threatened to spill out. He looked almost scandalized as he came down from his momentary high, a roiling storm of anger and pain in his expression. It subsided quickly as his eyes refocused, replaced by fear.

“Good?” Glenn asked, checking in. The question was almost lost in the cacophony of insects’ mating cries outside, and he had to project his voice louder to overcome it. “… Or bad? You gotta tell me these things, or I’ll end this here.”

Sephiroth mashed his hand against him in lieu of an answer. His breathing was coming in short bursts against dry lips, and he licked them again. “Good,” he breathed. “Just…overwhelming.” 

“We can always stop,” Glenn supplied, trying—and failing—to sound courteous. He knew full-well that Sephiroth would never back down from anything he perceived as a challenge, being the high-strung perfectionist he was.  

Sure enough, Sephiroth shot him an uncharacteristically dirty look, sending a shiver down Glenn’s spine. “I’m just glad it’s dark in here,” he said. “It helps distinguish this from that previous incident I mentioned… Far less sterile-feeling.”

For a moment, Glenn wondered if he was fishing for sympathy, but there was a matter-of-factness about how Sephiroth discussed his time in the labs that led him to believe he was speaking on autopilot. It was a sad truth, and with every additional sad truth Sephiroth layered on top of one another, Glenn felt more sick to his stomach. Despite that, he was determined not to call out his tendency to return to those awful topics. It was akin to a compulsion; he knew Sephiroth couldn’t help it.

It fell on him, then, to play mood maker. Glenn made it his personal mission to redirect every branching path in the conversation that led back to Hojo’s coaxing apparatus, which he couldn’t excise from his mind soon enough. “So, how do you feel about your body, Seph? Do you like it? Dislike it?” He dedicated a few seconds to thinking about his own. “Are you comfortable with it, at least?”

Sephiroth tilted his head a little, evidently caught off-guard. “A body is a body,” he said. “I have no particular affinity for mine.” He gave Glenn’s question the same consideration he gave everything else after the fact, and added, “Certain features are…off-putting. If I could change them, I would.”

“Oh yeah?” Glenn pushed the hem of SOLDIER’s new standard-issue turtleneck over Sephiroth’s sternum, watching as the latter shimmied a little to accommodate it. His skin was perfect—hairless and poreless, like milk glass. “Talk to me,” he said for what felt like the umpteenth time that evening. “What features?”

Sephiroth joined him in taking the initiative, unbuttoning his trousers with trembling fingers. “My eyes, for one,” he said pointedly, staring into Glenn’s for so long that he fumbled his zipper. “People have a hard time maintaining eye contact with me, no matter how much I try to soften myself or appear otherwise unintimidating. I’ve seen people approach stray cats in much the same way I approach people, and it feels…” He trailed off, chewing on his feelings. “…bad.”

The string of stiff vocabulary followed by one simple, emphasized word—bad—said so much without saying anything at all. Glenn continued to examine his face, and after a moment, Sephiroth huffed. “You don’t have to keep looking at—”

“I do, actually,” Glenn said resolutely, interrupting him. “Know why?” His own hands joined Sephiroth’s, pulling down the latter’s zipper. He could see Sephiroth’s nipples stiffen beneath his turtleneck and resisted the urge to bite clean through the fabric. He was starting to lose himself in the dizzying feeling between his legs. “‘Cause they’re unique. Everything about you has this sort of otherworldly beauty to it,” he continued. “Your eyes...your hair…” He scooped up several locks and let their wispy ends sift through his fingers. “Everything.”

The air was dreadfully humid and heavy with promise. With a soft exhale, Sephiroth pushed his pants halfway down his thighs, his underwear caught in the crossfire; only the head of his cock was exposed, peeking out over the top of the elastic, but the sight was obscene enough to make Glenn’s world tilt sideways. 

“Holy shit, Seph…” Glenn murmured, enraptured. “You’re—”

“… Odd?” Sephiroth supplied feebly.

“No, fuck that.” Glenn shook his head. “You’re soaked.”

There was a lot—a lot—of precome. Dark panels of cotton had glued themselves to his body, clear fluid seeping out from his flushed tip and between his legs. Sephiroth looked away, embarrassed, and coaxed himself back into his underwear. “And that’s supposed to be a good thing?”

Glenn didn't know how to phrase what he wanted to say. He didn't want his explanation to sound too vulgar, but it was practically impossible.

Don't make a big deal out of it, Glenn thought. He's still young. He doesn't get it. 

"It's, um…considered attractive. Desirable, to be wet—" He shuddered internally at the descriptor. "—like that. Men in particular don't usually get super worked up where it's obvious beyond, yanno, just being hard, but it's no secret that R&D made some…enhancements…to you. Part of the whole SOLDIER schtick, going forward—or so all the PR says, anyway. So, this is probably your 'normal.' Which is totally fine!"

Sephiroth stared at him in the wake of his over-explanation, and unless it was a trick of the light, Glenn thought he saw the faintest bit of amusement in the smile that broke across his face. Even then, he still looked coy as he said, "Careful, now. We're rapidly approaching 'cyborg' territory once again."

Glenn let go of a performative, exasperated sigh. With one last lingering look at Sephiroth, he leaned down, pecking his bottom lip. This close, he could see the individual flecks of blue and green in his irises. He felt, rather than heard, Sephiroth's shallow intake of breath.

"... That was a kiss," the boy beneath him said, the statement sounding more like a question. Glenn made an equally dramatic show of rolling his eyes.

"You know, if you want us to stay firmly out of cyborg territory, you should probably stop talking like one," he responded in his best impression of his earlier Uncle Glenn voice. For reasons that felt obvious to him, it fell a bit flat, but he couldn’t discern anything from Sephiroth’s expression. Did he understand just how taboo what they were doing was? How much trouble they’d be in if any of the division leads, much less Hojo, found out what transpired here?

Glenn leaned in a second time, sucking in a surprised gasp when Sephiroth met him halfway. 

The first minute of exploration was shallow and tepid, Glenn taking things slow while relishing the feeling of his own coarse stubble biting into Sephiroth's skin. Sephiroth, for his part, was extremely bold despite having no idea what he was doing. He was eager to please and quick to adapt; he mirrored Glenn's movements with a precision that bordered on mimicry, fisting his collar and coiling around his body to deepen each kiss. Legs threaded through legs. Glenn’s cock, now back at half mast, grazed the vee of Sephiroth’s hips as they kicked at each other and locked ankles. Sephiroth rutted against him once, twice— gasping into Glenn's open mouth until he deflated, his head lolling back against the bedroll’s makeshift pillow.

Glenn knocked the tip of his nose into Sephiroth’s. “Hangin' in there?” He carded clammy fingers through his bangs, pushing them back from his face. Sephiroth blinked a few times. His eyes were hazy. 

“I’m not going to break,” he responded, his voice a bit strained. “Nor did I tell you to stop.”

Glenn smirked. “Didn’t know I was back to taking orders from you, Seph.” Then, after another quick peck to the jaw, “I thought you liked it when I defied authority. Said it was sexy.”

A loud, shrill bark of laughter immediately followed. “Hah! Right, of course I did.” It was a mean-spirited sort of denial that sounded right at home on Sephiroth’s lips. “And I’m sure I also told you I preferred the texture of your facial hair to grindstone.”

Glenn felt every cell in his body ignite at the sudden derision. "Nasty, too," he remarked. "A bit of a brat, when you ease into things."

Sephiroth's expression darkened at the word brat, and for a moment, Glenn wondered if he'd said the wrong thing. "I can be, I'm sure…" he said quietly, his tone skewing toward something more contemplative. "If provoked." 

The image of Sephiroth clawing marks into his caretakers' forearms as they tried to restrain him was enticing, but Glenn didn't dare voice that thought aloud. "Mm, scary…" he murmured instead. Sephiroth threw him a meaningful look, and he felt compelled to add, "In the thrilling way, of course. I dunno if you've heard, but I'm a bit of a SOLDIER myself. Could definitely kick your ass, if push came to shove."

They both knew he was lying through his teeth, but Sephiroth still searched his face, looking smaller and more vulnerable than he had all evening. "Then prove it," he whispered, shifting slightly. "Kiss me again."

Glenn didn't need to be told twice. This time, Sephiroth yielded to him wholeheartedly, his jaw lax and his kisses open-mouthed to the point of making him look debauched. Glenn felt the need to respond buzzing beneath his skin, saw the way his fingers twitched with every long press of the older man's cock, and couldn't help but think that even now, far away from the battlefield, Sephiroth was fighting something. Whether that was his own budding sexuality or some instinct programmed into him by R&D, Glenn didn't know. Looking down between their legs, however, he was reminded of Sephiroth's earlier words: The purpose of this is to breed. 

"Seph, hold on a sec. Let me see you," Glenn rasped into his ear, catching cartilage between his teeth. "Wanna confirm something, then I'm gonna take care of you. Promise."

Sephiroth made an indignant noise that sounded more akin to a whine, his hips finding only empty air as Glenn retreated. "You do it, then," he said petulantly, his gaze cutting. "I'm perfectly content to remain clothed, especially since you saw fit to point out my…abnormality.”

“Heh. Brat indeed.”

“I get the impression you enjoy it,” Sephiroth replied coolly. “Or am I mistaken?”

Glenn didn’t answer. He locked eyes with the boy beneath him before edging the band of his underwear a few inches down his length. Sephiroth’s cock was still angry and glistening, weeping with more fervor as the elastic bit into a prominent vein. He seemed particularly tense as Glenn stared at him, almost as if he was waiting for some other shoe to drop. Glenn tried to figure out what exactly he expected to happen, but came up with nothing.

“And all of this is to make penetration easier, is it?” Sephiroth asked, handing Glenn a very obvious get out of jail free card in the wake of his silence. On the contrary, however, Glenn processed his second question slowly, reeling. 

”Gonna need you to pick a mode and stick to it: either ‘flirtatious little shit’ or ‘cold and clinical.’ Can’t juggle both.”

“My intention wasn’t to flirt, but yours, evidently, was,” Sephiroth said, keeping his tone cavalier and feather-light. “A bit disappointing, considering it wasn’t able to achieve its desired effect.”

As if it hasn’t been blatantly obvious from the get-go!

“To think there’s someone inexperienced enough to miss my blatant come-ons! Oh, how you wound me!” Glenn exclaimed as loudly as he could without waking anyone, clutching his chest melodramatically. 

Sephiroth’s eyes glittered, and his line of sight drifted to the prerelease smeared across his belly. He was nervous again; Glenn was already committing his various tells to memory. “A curious choice of words. Is that a command?”

Glenn’s lip quirked. He couldn’t pass up the opportunity to take the bait, intentional or otherwise. “The wounding part, or the part about the cum-ons?”

It took Sephiroth a moment to understand, but when he did, he hummed, looking somehow even more pleased with himself than he had before. “There’s a phrase, isn’t there? ‘The sky’s the limit’, or something along those lines?” He paused for a moment, lost in thought, and his smile faltered. “Or, wait… Maybe that isn’t the saying I was looking for. Regardless—” He turned to face Glenn again. “Yes. Both.”

Glenn pretended to mull it over for a moment, tilting his head. “Well, as far as the stuff involving blades, I don’t heal like you do,” he said earnestly. “So probably not, at least not until we’re in a safer environment. Besides, I don’t even know… Is that something you think you’d enjoy?”

There was a pregnant pause. Eventually, Sephiroth made a gesture akin to a shrug, glancing at the lantern wistfully as he admitted, “I’ve had thoughts like that every once in a while, but they’re less about others and more about myself. Perhaps I’m captured by the enemy in some far-off land, and when they realize I heal far faster than most people, they decide to cut me. Test my body’s limits. Then, they realize just how different I really am—” His gaze fell to his groin, and after a moment of hesitation in which he didn’t speak or even breathe, Glenn understood the request to finish removing his underwear. It took only seconds to realize that there was a strange vacuousness behind his penis that shouldn’t be there, occupied instead by— 

Oh. His mind shorted out. 

“… And they start to see value in keeping me around as a toy,” Sephiroth finished in a low, dangerous voice, shivering from the sudden exposure to cooler air. Rhadore’s climate was extremely humid even on a milder day, but that hardly mattered as heat pooled between both of their legs, synapses firing wildly as Glenn ogled a slick labia and Sephiroth shrank almost imperceptibly under his scrutiny. “Because, as one of the orderlies so generously reminded me when I was younger, ‘a perfect being is also a perfect object.’ And if I’m an object for foreigners or a weapon for Shinra, then nothing that happens to me or the world around me truly matters. It’s easy. I’d finally be free.”

Glenn was treading dangerous waters and he knew it. A million and a half questions flooded his mind in an instant, but he discarded almost all of them immediately in favor of a slipshod attempt at tact. Instead of anything intelligible, he eventually muttered, "... Huh."

Sephiroth’s face was stony. Glenn imagined that if he'd suspected his genitalia was atypical before, he had confirmation now. "'Huh' indeed…" he murmured. His gaze flitted upward. "I take your reaction to mean that this is as uncommon as I feared, even among SOLDIERs.” 

Glenn didn't sugarcoat it. "I mean, yeah?" He made a nondescript gesture. "Not gonna feed you bullshit, but it also doesn't really change anything."

Sephiroth looked more relieved than anything else, and his shoulders drooped slightly. "Interesting," he said. "Out of curiosity, is this also something people would deem 'attractive', or is it too off-putting?”

A torrent of potential answers danced on the tip of Glenn’s tongue, but none of them properly addressed the question Sephiroth was asking. He aimed for something close to the truth, shrugging yet again to downplay his response. 

“Depends who you ask, I guess,” he said. “Who all knows about this?”

It was the wrong thing to say. Sephiroth’s expression shuttered for an instant, and Glenn felt like the shittiest person alive. 

“… R&D,” he answered reluctantly. “Not all of them, obviously, just the tenured ones... The people that were around when I was born, to be more specific.”

The coaxing apparatus came to mind once again. Glenn opened his mouth, then closed it.

“A few of the researchers who monitored me when I was around 12 or 13 found out by mistake for, well…reasons, as you might imagine. I’d never bled before, so it was a bit of a shock,” Sephiroth continued, staring at his knees. “Hojo ran tests, and I was in and out of consciousness for what felt like an eternity. I’m not sure what happened during that time, but I remember being sore and rather tired whenever I was awake. I had to take these massive pills after that for several weeks, I bled a while longer, and then…that was it. My caretakers consisted largely of women, going forward.”

Deafening silence.

“… I could venture a guess as to why,” Sephiroth finished quietly, breaking it. “I don’t know exactly how my education compares to others’, but I was taught the basics of biology. ‘Enough to keep me out of trouble,’ someone said once...”

Glenn blinked rapidly, overwhelmed. He needed Sephiroth to stop talking, but he also owed it to him to listen. He shifted uncomfortably where he sat.

“Seph…?” he tried.

“Mm?”

He shook his head. “You need to get the hell away from them... From Shinra, I mean. They’re—”

They’re going to use you until you break.

“—I know,” Sephiroth said, interrupting him. “It’s…complicated, and unfortunately, I lack your conviction.” His lips twitched into a bitter smile; it vanished in an instant. “Eventually, perhaps, once this is all over.”

Glenn was busy mulling over the ephemeral traces of Sephiroth’s actual personality when he felt fingers wrap around his wrist. Sephiroth did nothing to bridge the distance between them, instead holding onto his comrade like a lifeline. 

“I should have been more direct a moment ago,” he said, still not quite looking at him. “When I asked if I could still be considered attractive, what I truly meant was, do you see me as attractive?" He glanced down briefly. “… With this.”

Still recovering, Glenn let go of a deep breath. He didn’t dare hesitate—not in such a sensitive situation—and truth be told, he was looking for any excuse to get them both as far away from this conversation as possible.

“I can show you just how much I think you’re attractive, if you don’t believe me.”

There were cleverer and more sensual ways to say what he wanted to, but in the moment, he didn’t care. Sephiroth didn’t seem to, either, releasing him and lying back down. Glenn watched his chest rise and fall as he maneuvered himself between his legs, pushing them as far apart as he could without meeting resistance. He got the distinct feeling that Sephiroth was far more flexible than he was letting on, but deeply uncomfortable with putting himself fully on display. Glenn couldn’t help but wonder if this was something he’d fought to overcome in the labs, where he’d undoubtedly had to endure a myriad of invasive examinations, let alone swabs and metal spatulas scraping his—cervix.

I wonder if he’d be open to telling Lucia, Glenn thought, trying not to linger on the idea for too long. He grabbed the lantern and set it down in a few different spots close to Sephiroth, trying to illuminate most of what he needed to see. 

“Sorry, I just want it to be good for you. No surprises in the middle of things,” Glenn said, making out an elongated gland near the base of his penis. “This will probably feel a little like being back with R&D for a minute, but I need to know what feels okay and what doesn’t.” Sephiroth nodded his assent hastily, but Glenn needed verbal confirmation. “That okay?”

“Yes,” Sephiroth breathed. “Just… If you could, don’t go inside there. Again, they…taught me enough. About that.”

Glenn felt a wave of misplaced guilt wash over him. "Yeah… Yeah, of course." He chewed on his bottom lip. “… Are fingers okay?"

"I'm well aware that you can't get pregnant from someone's fingers, Glenn," Sephiroth replied indignantly. "Of the two of us, I should probably be the one overthinking this."

Right. No more beating around the bush, it seemed. "And, uh…my mouth?"

Sephiroth didn't answer immediately. Glenn couldn't see his face, but he got the feeling he was probably flustered. 

"I…didn't know you could do that, truthfully," he said quietly. "Is that hygienic, or…?"

Glenn moved to slide a finger through the shallows of his folds, earning a distinctly wet sound for his trouble and feeling Sephiroth's thighs spasm on either side of his head. "Not really. None of this is exactly 'up to code' though, so-to-speak."

He was so warm. Glenn couldn't resist swiping his thumb over the strange, swollen gland, seeing it glisten in the lamplight. "You feel that, right? Up at the top here?" He pressed down with a bit more force, and Sephiroth's entire body jerked involuntarily. 

"Y–Yes…!" He hissed, heaving in a sharp breath. "Shit, I—that was loud." He ran his fingers through his bangs, tangling them in the process. "My apologies. It's…a lot."

Glenn hadn't stopped, tracing gentler circles into the same spot. Sephiroth's hips jumped to meet him, though whether he was aware of it, Glenn had no idea. His self-control was deteriorating rapidly.

"Discipline, Seph," he chided him lightly, teasing his index finger a bit deeper inside him on the next pass. Fluid pulsed out around it, and it took everything in Glenn's power not to imagine how his cock would feel fully sheathed inside him. The next logical leap was accompanied by scenarios that unambiguously infringed upon Sephiroth's boundaries, but Glenn couldn't help himself: Hojo prescribing him another weeks-long diet of pills and bedrest, telling him nothing as his body fought to reject the cells implanted inside him without his consent. It was deplorable work on the part of Glenn's mind, but it didn't stop him from wedging his finger knuckle-deep, pulling it back out, and spreading him open repeatedly. 

"You have no hymen…" Glenn said in a daze after a moment, realizing there were no traces of blood on his fingers. Sephiroth's breathing was ragged, and his head lolled to the side. Glenn wondered if he was trying to shake it or if he was already exhausted from their exploits. 

"I don't know," Sephiroth mumbled nonsensically. "I don't…?"

You don't know if you're supposed to have one, or you don't know what happened to it?

Both answers were awful for different reasons. More than happy to ignore the implications, Glenn worked in a second finger, relishing the way Sephiroth's body allowed him easy access. The sounds coming from between his legs were obscene, and the sensitive gland he kept returning to—what was once a clitoris and its hood, Glenn assumed—had developed its own rapid pulse beneath his fingertips. 

"It's okay…" he whispered between his legs. He leaned in so Sephiroth could feel his breath feathering across his eager, inexperienced cunt. His tongue was so close, and his fingers continued to pry him open at a feverish pace. Their shared bedroll was already a sticky mess. "I've got you now… You're safe with me."

Sephiroth made a vague noise of acknowledgment, and he rearranged his limbs with animalistic urgency, like his skin was on fire. "I'm trying to—but I can't—" he gritted out, his chest heaving.

"You gotta, Seph…" Glenn said, almost slurring his words. "Hold on for me… Stay nice and quiet." 

He withdrew his fingers slowly, studying the subtle changes in Sephiroth's expression. The latter's eyes opened just enough to watch him in turn, and Glenn gave him a meaningful look that he hoped conveyed multiple things—you're doing so well, I'm sorry, just a little longer—before lapping at the overstimulated nerves that stretched from the crux of his labia to the base of his cock.

Sephiroth's entire body convulsed. He pressed his forearm over parted lips and teeth, muffling something that sounded conspicuously like a whimper. More warm prerelease was smeared across Glenn’s chin as he tilted his head, and he became aware that his stubble and Sephiroth’s pubic hair—soft and short enough that he didn’t think it would be an obstacle—were generating uncomfortable friction; he compromised by moving his hands from Sephiroth’s thighs to his vulva, parting the sensitive flesh there for better access. 

He inched back a bit, just enough to take in Sephiroth’s lean form, spring-loaded with tension. His shoulders and hips were supporting most of his weight.

“Everything okay?” he asked, wiping his chin on his sleeve. Sephiroth removed his forearm from where it had been grafted over his mouth and nose, his eyes bleary.

“… This cannot possibly be enjoyable for you.” His voice was hoarse and oddly husky, and Glenn had half a mind to dive back in before he could protest.

“You’d be surprised,” he said, offering a spit-slick, lopsided smirk. “I’d do this for hours, if anyone let me.” He settled back into a comfortable position and found the hand that had been threatening to tug his hair just a moment ago, guiding it to the crown of his head and squeezing it. “Loosen up, okay? You can afford to be a little needy and demanding.” He pushed one of Sephiroth’s legs toward him until it was bent at the knee, hoisting it over his shoulder. His ankle landed a bit uncomfortably across his back, but Glenn could worry about any potential bruising later. Sephiroth was visible in his entirety now, his vagina contracting slightly from the influx of cool air. 

“It feels so strange…” he murmured aloud. “It feels…wrong, somehow, like I’m not meant for this.”

Glenn gave the seam of him an experimental lick, aiming to dismantle his inhibitions. “I think it benefits people like Hojo and other people in power to make you feel that way, honestly,” he mused aloud, not really considering his words or how they might be interpreted. Sephiroth tasted like soap and salt. Cyprus, citrus, and sweat percolated on the back of Glenn’s sleeve as he wiped his mouth across it again, feeling Sephiroth turn to lead in his arms. “Shame is easy to exploit, and the more infallible Shinra and all of their rising industry makes people feel—” He pushed his tongue past tight muscle, and deceptively strong fingers were pulling his hair in an instant, gripping it for dear life. A word that sounded suspiciously like fuck left Sephiroth’s lips, and Glenn smacked his thigh, retreating just enough to admonish him.

“—Language,” he said sarcastically, dodging Sephiroth’s ensuing glare. He laughed, and for a moment, his amusement and libido were at war. Something warm settled over him, and he brushed his fingers over the delicate skin he’d just slapped, thinking.

“The more infallible and godlike they make us feel, the more they coddle people…the more we forget we’re human,” he continued. “Becomes real easy to kill people you’ve never met before, doesn’t it?” 

Sephiroth glanced into the darkness above, his eyes unfocused. The sound of his ragged breathing was like a lullaby, and the way his jaw went slack made him look even younger than he was. “I suppose so.” He tightened his grip on Glenn’s hair once again, and the sensation immediately traveled downward. A premeditated attack from a master tactician. “… Though I fail to see how my personal feelings and Shinra are connected in any meaningful way—or what inspired this tangent, for that matter.”

Glenn huffed, his pseudo-exasperation twisting into a fond smile. “You know, for someone who just said getting eaten out ‘felt strange’, this seems an awful lot like you asking me to go back down on you.”

He’s a work in progress. He’ll get there someday. 

“I’ve asked for very little, I think,” Sephiroth rebutted, attempting to sound cool and pithy and failing miserably. 

“Sephiroth, you barged into my tent at midnight.”

“Glenn, I’m essentially a doll at your mercy,” he shot back, poised to fire. “I don’t think me ending up in your bed half-naked was a happy accident, but feel free to correct me if I’ve somehow misconstrued the order of events. I seem to recall you stopping me from leaving.”

Glenn made to rebuke him and paused mid-thought, remembering that Sephiroth was right: He was the instigator in this situation.

Fuck.

“You know what?” Glenn said, patting Sephiroth’s hip to preempt his surrender. “… Shut the hell up and get comfortable, or I’m rolling you out of here without your pants.”

Something fragile in Sephiroth’s expression shattered, and for a moment, he looked like boy he was supposed to be rather than the weapon Shinra had molded him into. It was a bittersweet thing to witness—an infinitesimal second of reprieve punctuating years of abuse—and when Glenn reached up to anchor Sephiroth’s hand firmly on the back of his head, the revelation that he’d love nothing more than to stay with him in that humid little tent forever, soothing his invisible wounds, consumed him like no other sentiment had before. 

When Sephiroth finished in Glenn’s mouth, hands pressed over his eyes and legs wrapped firmly around Glenn’s shoulders, the latter disentangled himself with the precision of someone who truly cared, softening the impact of Sephiroth’s tailbone against the hard ground and massaging formless poetry into his burning quads. 

“This—everything that transpired tonight—it won’t happen again, will it?” Sephiroth asked no one in particular, seemingly pleading with some incorporeal force. “It can’t happen again… They won’t let it.”

Glenn wanted to reassure him, but he couldn’t. Shinra were fickle masters, and the company aside, both of them knew what they’d done was extremely inappropriate.

“I’m not gonna abandon you,” Glenn said, sidestepping the question. “You sure as hell don’t need any protection, but it’s my job to make sure you stay safe.”

“Your obligation, you mean,” Sephiroth corrected him.

Glenn shook his head. “Nah,” he said, reaching out and ruffling his hair in a way reminiscent of Lucia’s frequent petting. “Whether I like it or not, I guess I’m a little attached to you now.” You little shit.

Sephiroth considered him for a moment, his line of sight falling to Glenn’s lips. 

“One last one for the road?” Glenn asked, startling him out of his thoughts.

Ordinarily, Sephiroth would have had some sort of comeback, but he pressed himself into Glenn immediately, grasping at his disheveled clothes in what Glenn interpreted as some sort of misguided attempt to crawl inside him. Glenn used his hands to hold Sephiroth at bay as the latter nipped at his mouth, growling in frustration, and after a moment, he sagged into the crook of Glenn’s shoulder, pulling him into a half-hearted embrace as he openly wept.

It was ugly. It was unpleasant. It wasn’t strong at all.

You don’t have anything to prove. We all know how strong you are.

And that was okay.