Miasma

Chapter 18

Icicle Inn seemed like a fool's errand.

Trudging through heavy snow with the older man beside him...Sephiroth reflected that be that as it may, it was an errand of necessity. He was a SOLDIER, a warrior, a General, a leader, and a tactician, but even he knew his body's limits. His physicality was exhausted...beyond exhausted. The victory they'd incurred in Lucrecia's cave was not so much a victory as it was a standoff; a method of preventative delay that would eventually run its course. The silver-haired former FIRST was inundated with dull...achy throbs of pain; not unlike when he was recovering from one of Hojo's surgical atrocities. He was able to push it to the side in favor of focus...was able to look outwards instead of inwards and concentrate on getting through the next mile...the next several miles. Reaching a point of resiliency-related degradation that made him sensitive to the elements was jarring. Stepping outside the cave mouth days before, the younger man acknowledged, however unwillingly, that he was cold. It wasn't the sense of virulent discomfort...nothing that repelled him in his entirety, but it was still unpleasant.

In reality, the shift made sense. More of his body's resources were going to go towards their child the closer they got to the due date. Despite the fact that his blood volume was somewhat higher, it couldn't compensate for everything. This did-however-confirm his fears regarding their daughter's biology. Feasibly, a 'normal', entirely human child would not demand so much of his physicality. Sephiroth's dietary needs were higher than the average person, or even the average SOLDIER...pregnant or not. His fellow FIRST's weren't exactly dramatically lower to the par than he was, but Genesis had cheerfully proclaimed a few weeks after they met that he was 'quite happy that he didn't have to put down a quarter of a steer at every meal to stay alive'. He could-if needed-reserve his energy for long periods of time, but the lack of proper nutrition on the road and the long hours with little sleep were eventually going to take a toll, even on him. Genesis-of course-was not carrying another human being around, so he didn't have quite as much nutritional upkeep to concern himself about. But they were in a sort of mutual agreement in regards to overall exhaustion.

They took the long way around the Northern Continent to avoid any possible patrols. There was no way that their fight with the djinn could be contributed to anyone other than themselves. It was only logical to assume that security would be tight and that they would have to be more careful. They headed Northwest, nearly to the coast before they pulled back nearer to the rural areas. This proved a fortuitous decision, because they nearly ran headlong into several patrol squadrons twice, and they were forced to get up and leave half of their belongings behind in the dead of night to avoid a duo of search helicopters. Evasion was easier when snow was falling; it covered their tracks and made them harder to locate by air. Genesis had taken to melting a path through the drifts before they realized that it made them more conspicuous than their footsteps ever would. Instead, they settled with skirting trees; using the small, untouched circumferences of bare ground beneath them to befuddle possible pursuers. In all verity, it wasn't much...not for a more determined tracker...but they did it out of necessity, for their own peace of mind.

Lucrecia was not a topic that came up.
Sephiroth was hurt...but he wasn't so hurt as he'd had been when he thought Genesis had died. The knowledge of this wasn't comforting, but it at least reassured him that his biological mother had little place in his life or in his heart. He was somewhat more interested in Vincent, because it was quite obvious he'd had no say in his Fate. The former General did wonder, however, why he hadn't sought him out. This was assuming that he was still alive, of course. It was also assuming that he was his biological father. The idea that he might have access to the entirety of his hereditary line-whether one of them was a corporeal version or not-was somewhat jarring. He didn't know how to feel about it, and there wasn't time to think on it, so he tucked it away to consider when they had more leisure on their hands...which could, feasibly, be never.