Numbers, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children (Sephiroth/Genesis) Title: Numbers Author:sphinxofthenile Rating: PG Warnings: angst Word count: ~330 Summary: Was that all they meant? Prompt: Final Fantasy VII, Sephiroth: tattoos – Hojo had marked him as his property, so he thought it was natural to mark the ones he thought of as his own. A/N: Huge thanks to _ice_lady_ for the beta reading.
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The moon shone a pale silver, painting shadows on the ground, enhancing the glow of the cursed trees of the Forbidden Forest. Kadaj watched as it slid off of his double blades as he dragged a sharpening stone along them. The sounds, the movements were comforting, but he couldn’t help his thoughts that started wandering again.
Numbers.
He did not remember how he got the tattoo, but Yazoo and Loz had hazy memories of Him, of His wish that they be marked just as He was. Hojo marked Him as his property, so He thought it was natural to mark the ones He considered his own. The tattoos made that all too clear, stark against pale skin that seemed almost translucent in the moonlight.
They looked beautiful, Wutai symbols with additional meaning to them. Loz was Heart, Yazoo Beauty, he himself Power. But in the end, all it came down to was just that.
Numbers.
How convenient, how degrading, he thought with a sneer. So becoming of the man he feared, admired, hated like no other. The one who held the place in Mother’s heart Kadaj wanted for himself, the one whose presence was ever so terrifying, beauty ever so haunting and power so intoxicating.
He touched his forearm and gently ran his fingertips over the mark, the sign that read the number five. Loz was three and Yazoo four, it made him wonder where the number two went, that foreign symbol meaning Love. Was there even anyone on Gaia who could befit the meaning as well as they did their own? Kadaj highly doubted it.
Numbers.
Was it all they meant? The question came back now and again to haunt him on his sleepless nights, never offering a satisfying answer.
What Kadaj did not know was that deep down below his feet, under the bustling city of Midgar dreamt a man in red, haunted by the same questions in his troubled slumber.