Chapter Text
You had joined the church the moment you turned 18, which wasn’t the only thing that had gotten you disowned. You had a hard enough time getting your parents to keep a roof over your head when you came out years earlier. They didn’t understand, and they never would. But once you joined a ‘satan worshiping cult of cocksucking tranny demons’... they were quicker to throw you out than they had tried to be previously. But that only made things easier; you got to move into the abbey and be with likeminded people.
The form you had filled out when you got there was very detailed, although you noticed that the date the forms were made was printed at the bottom, and it was recent… from what you knew of the Ghost project, and the church, it seemed these were made after Cardinal Copia took charge of things. It had a lot of gender and sexuality markers, and you even got to choose whether you wanted to wear habits, or cassocks, of which you hastily picked the latter. The only real difference you saw was a headdress versus a zucchetto, besides the… obvious tailoring to try and show off the figures of the Sisters of Sin.
The thought of putting one of those on makes you queasy, even now as you’re rather hastily attempting to put on the absolutely-not-safe binder you’d brought with you. You knew it was gonna do something awful to your ribcage anyways, but what was a cracked rib or two to not have the god damn flesh balloons surface under your cassock? You finally managed to get everything under wraps (ha.) and dressed, off to fulfill your morning chores. Today, your first job was sweeping up around the gardens in the back of the abbey.
You’d seen a few lower Ghouls and Siblings of Sin tending to the flowers and bushes as you swept, but you mainly kept your eyes down unless someone walked by. As you swept the patio around one of Papa Emeritus I’s prized rose bushes, you hear a snip snip snip and your eyes fly up to the plant.
Cardinal Copia meets your gaze with two toned eyes, a rose in one hand, and pruning shears in the other. There’s a moment of silence between you two before he says “Buongiorno, fratello.” You pause, having started trying to learn Italian to understand what the hell the Papas and Cardinal were saying half the time, and realize he’s waiting for you to answer him.
“I’m sorry! Good morning, Cardinal.” you say, dipping down in a slight bow. “Are you… supposed to be cutting roses off Primo’s bushes?”
The Cardinal chuckles softly, moving to stand up as he walks around the impressive rose bush. “I admit, I am not. Not while they look this stunning, at least… but I am not the one, of the two of us, who is doing the worst for themself.”
You cock an eyebrow at his words, wondering what the fuck you’d done, especially if it was something the Cardinal knew about. Your eyes are locked to him as he lifts the rose to his face, inhaling its aroma deeply before he looks over you. You swear you can feel his gaze rake over your form before he sighs through his nose.
“It does not take an expert to see that you are hiding your chest unsafely, caro. You do not own a… oh, what are they called…” He trails off, the hand holding the pruning shears coming up to use them to scratch at his temple-- what the fuck are you DOING?
“....a binder?” you finish, and his eyes light up in realization.
“Si, si… it has been many years since I have had to think of one of those.”
What? You don’t get more than a second to think about that before he speaks again.
“At the very least, tell me you’re taking breaks and stretching yourself out. We cannot do much for you if you break your ribs in an attempt to feel comfortable in your body.” His eyes are locked to you as he stops speaking, waiting for your answer, and all you can think is how does he know all this? Is he…?
No. He can’t be.
“Fratello? I sure hope whatever you’re lost in thought about is more important than your health.” he waves the rose in front of your face, and the sweet scent of it snaps you back to reality.
“I… um…” You want to make it seem like you forgot the question he’d asked you, but the shame filled blush that creeps over your cheeks tells him all he needs to know. You were caught, and you weren’t going to lie to Cardinal fucking Copia.
He lets out a sigh, though it doesn’t sound disappointed… you think. After a moment, he glances to the rose bush and gives it a pat with the hand holding the shears, stating “Another time, thorny friend. I will be back to reap your flowers.”
Copia shoves the shears into-- cassocks have pockets? God damn, this church gets more and more appealing the longer you’re here. You were so lost in staring at the pocket of his cassock that you miss the hand he’d held out to you, but once you realize, you take it and start getting pulled away immediately. He doesn’t tell you where, just wordlessly leading you through the halls of the abbey… up the stairs… is he…?
He bonks into the door of his office, groans softly and lets go of your hand to open the door. Once he’d opened it, he turns and waves you in, and the first thing that you see is a rat skittering across his desk. He chitters to it softly, and wanders over, letting it crawl up into his sleeve. You knew Copia had a thing for rats, but you didn’t think he took them out of his room… it was cute, in a way.
“Easily distractible, hm?” he asks, and it snaps you back for what had to be the fifth time so far. You watch him set the rose on the desk, and look up to his face as soon as the rat peeks its way out of his collar.
“I just… have a lot on my mind.” you reply after a moment, and Copia gestures for you to sit in the chair on the opposite side of his desk.
“I am all ears, young one. You can speak your mind to me, and anything said will stay between the two of us.” His words earn a small squeak from the rodent in his cassock, and he looks down, murmuring “Three of us. You have my word, not a squeak from either of us.”
You have to laugh at the joke, but then the anxiety hits you. You figure you may as well just be honest with him, since he… seemed to know what he was talking about, had some form of experience in things like this…
After a quiet moment, you clear your throat and sigh, stating “I didn’t have anywhere to go after I started following the beliefs of this church, so I didn’t have enough time to save to get a binder… let alone a safe place to have one mailed. My parents would go through my things after I came out, to make sure I wasn’t… doing anything to ‘ruin my path to heaven’. They thought they could pray it out of me, this is just… one of those compression bandages that you’re really not supposed to use, but…” You trail off, hands coming up to rub at your eyes. Talking about your own issues was something that happened so rarely that it almost always brought you to tears. Copia notices, and digs through a few drawers in his desk before he pulls out a box of tissues. You take one, and try to pull yourself together for a moment as he lets out a hum.
“Well I’d certainly say you’ve ruined their plans for you quite successfully.” he laughs softly, and grins at the smile it brings to your face, even as you try to keep any tears from spilling out. “Listen. I am at the reigns of expenses now, si? You go to the wardrobe ghouls, ask them to measure you for a binder. They know how to do it. If it makes you uncomfortable, they can instruct you through it yourself. You bring those to me, and I will see to it that you can start binding properly. ”
You look up to him, and through your disbelief and distress, all you can say is the first thing that comes to your mind. “How do you know all this? H-How do you… know about… trans stuff…?” you question, and for a moment, Copia is silent. He stands, awkwardly so to ensure that he isn’t smooshing the friend in his clothing, and turns to the cabinets that line the bookshelves along the back wall of his office. He digs through one before he finds what he was looking for, and pulls out a folded up… piece of… no.
You watch as Cardinal Copia takes the edges of the fabric and lets it fall, spreading out a worn and old looking trans flag with his name written on it. Zilio Copia. He’s fucking trans.
He watches your expression the whole time, the grin never leaving his face. Your eyes flick up to meet his, and he chuckles softly, nodding to confirm your thoughts. He folds his flag back up and tucks it back away, and once he had, he has to pull the rat from inside his cassock and murmur “Non mi stai aiutando, piccoletto.” to him, watching the rat crawl up to sit on his shoulder instead.
“You’re…” you can’t even get the words out. This has to be a dream, there’s… there’s no way.
“I am trans, si. I knew since I was a child, but… I did not have the opportunities and connections then, that I do now. I have only been on testosterone for… nine years?” He knew that would sound far longer to you than it did to him, but he didn’t need to reveal both of his secrets to you in one day. It seems like you were having a hard enough time accepting the first one.
You’re brought to tears again, but this time, it’s from relief, comfort… you had figured the only ones around who would know your struggles would be other Siblings of Sin, maybe a Ghoul, but… not Cardinal Copia. He steps around his desk and kind of… sit-leans on the edge of it, watching you work your way through this moment. After a few minutes of crying, he hands you a new tissue, and you look up to meet his gaze.
“I-I’m sorry, I… I just didn’t… expect you of all people..” you stutter out, and he chuckles softly.
“No one does, honestly. You are not the first I’ve told, and I am planning on coming out to the public soon. Sister Imperator does not see the need, nor the importance. But she will never understand our struggles, eh?”
That alone is enough to bring on the tears again, and you feel Copia’s hand come to rest on your shoulder. You’re not sure how long it takes to pull yourself together, but once you do, you thank him and make your way back to your chores… but not before stopping to do as the Cardinal had asked of you. You have the wardrobe Ghouls write your measurements down, and take it upstairs to slide under his office door.
You didn’t run into the Cardinal all that much after your first meeting, but a few weeks later, you go to leave your dorm, only to find a box sitting outside of your door with a small note on top. You pick it up and find it’s addressed to you, from a company you don’t recognize, but you take it into your dorm, locking the door behind you.
The note reads “Al mio amico.” with a sigil you’ve learned the Cardinal uses to sign off on things he wants kept more secret. You open the box and find a binder inside of it, stripping off your cassock as fast as you physically can. You’d promised Copia you would stop binding the way you had, but you had done it today, which left you to sit there and think of the broken promise you knew he wouldn’t hold against you as you unwound yourself from the bandage.
The moment you see yourself in the mirror with the binder on, you start to sob, sitting there staring at yourself and being so happy with how you look… as you go to take the note and put it somewhere for safe keeping, you notice it was tightly folded in half, and open it up to see what the inside held.
“Should you need a true father, simply let me know. I would be proud to help my son become the man he should have been all along.”
At least crying over this father, was tears of relief, and happiness… you were absolutely going to take him up on that offer, there was no way you could deny that… you needed a father figure who would actually care about you, and if he wanted to call you his son? That was the least you could do to repay him for this.
You had no clue how much he truly had in store for you.