013 | So clearly lightning resistance needs work....

[neverbeamemory]

Characters: Sephiroth & YOU
Passive/optional tag: Cloud, Hojo, Rufus - Side Effect: Forceful Jenova cell 'pull'.
Setting: Following evening after This - towards the end of the event. Locations below.
Format: Usual wordy prose but will switch to match
Summary: Aftermath: Sephiroth's 1st death in the Tower, at the hands of future!Hei. 1st reaction: WTF-with-the-not-moving. Later restless wandering around.
Warnings: It's late at night and it's dangerous in the Tower. Careful how you approach; edgier than usual Sephiroth 

Part 1: Next Evening - Dorm 03-02
Suddenly Sephiroth felt again. He felt the familiar give of the mattress enough to know it was his bed in the Dormitory and he breathed slowly in the precursor to waking up. So he'd died; in all it's painful glory. It wasn't as if Sephiroth wasn't used to what death felt like, but now he couldn't move. Even his eyes won't open yet even though he feels like they are ready to. A heartbeat skipped, then Sephiroth remembers that he had experienced this once before; that day when he'd first woken up here. So this was the consequence of death in the Tower - a relapse to the paralysis. Great, he'd hated that enough the first time.

Though it hadn't been this long before. Or at least not as far as he could remember. He can't even tell how long it has been, and this waiting quickly gets old. There had to be something he could do about it. Sephiroth took a long inhale and settling his focus back inside himself he concentrated on wrapping his willpower around the already panicking jenova cells inside and PULLED.

Nothing. He still couldn't move.

Again and again he PULLED. Trying to will the great Jenova-web work to give him his motor functions back quicker; each time more desperate but all in vain. He couldn't let them get away with leaving him paralyzed like this - especially since there were others in the Tower with the cells that could be made to help him. Perfect opportunity to stretch and test his influence so to speak.

For the longest ten minutes these attempts went on. Sephiroth was trying so hard, that when suddenly the paralysis let go his eyes shot open with such speed that it made him dizzy. Whatever influence he'd held over the web snapped with the shock and Sephiroth lent up somewhat heavily on his elbows while his mind adjusted to being awake, peering around the Dormitory. So it was the next evening?

Part 2: Nighttime wandering: Hallways > Elevator > Floor 12 and back again
Once settled Sephiroth felt quite proud. Sure he hadn't been able to force himself to overcome the paralysis but stretching and feeling out what connections were available to him, through Mother's gifts, was something he really should have discovered sooner. He blamed it on having to settle into his new environment, and having to deal with the blinding questions that tended to circle around in his mind too fast for him to focus on one thing.

Apparently then, the meditation was helping to re-focus him, if nothing else. Maybe it was a case of that he couldn't see the wood for the trees; maybe if he stopped looking for answers he might learn something. Something to consider.

Having been 'dead' during the daytime - followed by the panic at not being able to move, it's not like Sephiroth could just lie back down and go to sleep. So instead he got up and equipped himself for a night time wander. Though he'd certainly watch his back a lot more in case that crazy lightning guy wasn't finished with his rampage. That had certainly been a very personal attack; if only Sephiroth knew what it was he'd done, it must have been heavy to have earned that response. Well there was a bit of strangeness going on after all, Sephiroth would wait for his time to exact revenge for that insult.

Sephiroth made his way down the lift from the Dormitories and then up stairwells. He'd avoid what monsters he could, though inevitably some monsters won't be avoided especially considering how dangerous the Tower is during night time. At least his first death here hasn't blunted his sword any, and his strength is as it was as well. Finally Sephiroth would linger for a while on the 12th floor, watching the projection from start to finish a few times before the frequency of shadow-based monsters appearing was ruining his chance to get the escape he'd come here for and then he'd return back in the direction he came.

Comments

[neverbeamemory]

Part of his design eh? That certainly sounded a little too bitter to be completely true. Perhaps that was what Hojo would tell himself but Sephiroth knew better. This proved he could very much still be the puppetmaster, hell he hadn't even been trying for that outcome. That smirk continued to curl its way up at the corners of Sephiroth's mouth as he answered the scientist.

"An unexpected side effect, though satisfying enough. Don't think too much into it."

Not that he was going to tell Hojo that he'd just experienced his first death here. Indeed, Sephiroth wasn't even sure if the scientist had actually felt that as life had dried up out of Sephiroth's own body from the fatal damage that had been done. Better to give up if the damage was too great - after all as far as the cells knew, Reunion was inevitable. Sephiroth remained silent, almost testing to see if Hojo would make a comment to confirm whether he was aware of the death or not.

[denigrator]

He decided not to mention the transformation that the Jenova cells were able to affect in him, which the Tower seemed to usually prevent. The change had taken place in the tower once before, during his previous visit, and he had no desire to metamorphose again. It was inconvenient, to say the least. "I'm pleased you're so satisfied," he said, with no small amount of sarcasm.

"I don't need to think into it. I understand it completely," Hojo snapped. No one understood the phenomenon better than he did, as he was the world's primary expert on Jenova.

The connection between them wasn't completely one way. Hojo had sensed the urgency in the pull. With the cells linking them, he was technically part of Sephiroth, as galling as that was in their current forms. He didn't like to think of himself as some puppet whose strings could be pulled, like the Sephiroth clones he'd created. Although he was another matter, having injected himself outright with a large number of the cells. "I assume you were undergoing some extreme stress, and here you are in bed. It's certainly suggestive." Hojo having died a few times in the Tower, he was no stranger to the process.

[neverbeamemory]

It took all Sephiroth had to keep the smirk and not have it develop into a knowing grin. Here was Hojo, the self-proclaimed genius of the Jenova project stamping his foot in what might as well have been an echo-y canyon. While Hojo may indeed lay claim to knowing a great deal about Jenova as far as what one may learn through experimentation. Sephiroth, however, knew how to use such tools as gifted from Mother directly. No one else understood the comforting feeling of great power that he was destined to wield.

"That's one way of putting it." The scientist certainly wasn't wrong. It had been very stressful to awaken again and be unable to move. It wasn't like the Reunion where his consciousness had been fully aware of what was happening and calm enough to extend itself as needed in order to get what he wanted.

"I did hear death was a regular acquaintance to most here."

[denigrator]

He didn't care for that smirk. He had to reassert himself somehow. Knowing as much as he did about Jenova, he understood that it was Sephiroth who wielded the greater share of her power, and not himelf. Not that he had to like that fact. "So, you've died. I've died several times and saw no need to react with such vehemence." He shrugged. "My physical body is dead on Gaia, so it hardly matters to me. Death is no setback for the great scientist." Asserting that, his attitude following being pulled around by Sephiroth's will improved slightly. Sephiroth didn't know everything. In fact, there was much he didn't remember, and the Jenova Project wasn't Hojo's only project.

"However, you should be more resilient. You've been designed to withstand a great deal of damage without fatal consequences." Again, he alluded to the fact that he was responsible for Sephiroth's existence. "Emotion is an impediment. You shouldn't allow yourself to react so strongly."

[neverbeamemory]

So apparently Hojo had greeted his first death and it's following paralysis with the epitome of tranquil reactions, Sephiroth severely doubted that. Quite clearly Hojo was trying to do as Hojo would always - put himself as a cut above the rest. That smirk sure enough dropped away as the natural next logical thought ran along the similarities between them. No. Sephiroth is the superior lifeform, Hojo would always be subject to his own inferior limitations. Whatever similarities they had, they weren't relevant.

Of course Hojo would seem to think that Sephiroth had been careless to have died at all, there were after all several ways one could die here through negligence. It hadn't been like that at all and so Sephiroth partially turned off from the lecture. He didn't need Hojo to tell him what his faults were and he certainly didn't need the direction either. The very nature of their residence here got under his skin so much but having been here for a couple of months now he was starting to improve his nerve. The consequence of waking from death though, hadn't been expected and Sephiroth had done what he'd thought may have solved the issue. Simple as.

If Hojo didn't like that his will had summoned him here by accident, then what would he think should Sephiroth ever get to a point where he would need such control over the puppet strings again.

[denigrator]

His first death had ended in mutation and violence and his death at the hands of Cloud Strife, but as Sephiroth didn't ask about it, Hojo saw no reason to inform him. That was something else they had in common, however.

His own unspoken truths aside, he saw no harm in asking, "And what was the manner of your death?" It was only natural for him to inquire about what his subject's weaknesses were.

Hojo wasn't blind to the fact that Sephiroth would be able to control him, at will, but he saw no need to dwell on the fact, because the less Sephiroth thought of it, the better. He didn't need to be pulled around like some toy on a string. He had important business to conduct. He hoped this wouldn't become a regular occurrence, or even a repeated one.

[neverbeamemory]

"I'm not about to tell you." Sephiroth nearly barked back at Hojo, defensively.

Indeed, not only did it sound mad that he was killed by an older version of someone who had saved Elena from her punishment not too long ago but the irritating fact was that Sephiroth didn't know for what reason he'd been so ruthlessly hunted down. He must have done something specific to Hei but he didn't know what and it bugged him.

There was also the notion that his body could be made to have much more in the way of elemental resistance for such lightning-based magic if perhaps he had more exposure? Sephiroth wouldn't share this with Hojo as he knew the scientist wouldn't be able to resist conducting a brand-new experiment in this regard! A lifetime of being the unknowing specimen was quite enough thank you.

"But it's good to know that Mother's gifts still retain their potential here." Too late, he's already thinking down that path. It could be quite handy a tool - when he needed it.