Apotheosis

By Memoriam Victus

Chapter 11 – Spreading Sickness

            Sephiroth sank down to his haunches and buried his face in his hands, hair pooling around his boots amidst the dust and grit of the stone floor.     

She wasn’t there.

            He had known she wouldn’t be, of course.  There was none of the jangling, grating buzz that heralded her presence as they approached Nibelheim; no cold sweats, no nausea, no pounding headache, none of the things he had experienced prior to beginning his journey with Aeria.  When he reached the summit of the mountain trail and entered the cool, dark womb of the defunct reactor’s chamber, nothing had greeted him save silence, punctuated by the occasional echoing drip of water.

No, not nothing, he thought, digging his nails into his scalp.  Think, assess what you’ve seen.

There was no mistaking the pods lining the wall of the main chamber for anything but experimental holding cells.  Very old, covered in filth, many with cracked viewplates; a few bearing traces of disturbingly unidentifiable substances; none, however, were occupied.

            One of the pods was of great interest.  Cracked open, the hinged double doors yawning wide, the grit before it was obviously disturbed, swirled bi the passage of a heavy object pushed through it, dotted with indistinct footprints.  That pod had been Jenova’s home, he guessed, and some one, or some group, had evicted her from it.

            He scrubbed at his eyes, hoping to relieve the sudden burning behind them, and settled down to sit cross-legged, peering disconsolately around the grim chamber.  It held no new information for him; he gnawed at his lower lip, wondering what in God’s name he was supposed to do now.

            It had seemed to easy, crouched in the Temple’s balcony, swept away in an ecstasy of sorrow and black, bloody fury; steal the girl, prevent Jenova from using her, then hunt down and destroy the monstrosity that had spawned him and the vile beauracracy that had nurtured them both.  Even as he had set out on his pursuit, trailing the hapless Cetra like a comet’s tail, his reserve had never wavered.  Now, though, the trail had grown cold; for the first time in his structured, methodical life he found himself unsure.  Lost.  No backup squad; no intranet to call on for more information; no air support; no anything, save his own frustrated confusion. 

            And the girl, of course.  Aeris.

            So weak.  So frail.  So evidently useless, with her delicate Midgar constitution, her tiny body, her sanctimonious morals.  It galled him, like bitter ashes in his mouth, but she had proved invaluable on the journey.  It shocked him how much he didn’t know, how many basic facts of life living in Shinra’s sheltered grasp had kept from him.  Reaching into a belt pouch, he pulled out a featureless credit chip and regarded it caustically.

            It had quickly become obvious they would need more in the way of supplies from their journey after arriving at Icicle Inn.  He had gathered them swiftly, and habitually reached for the chip to purchase them when it struck him just how swiftly Shinra would descend on him once they traced the chip’s use.  Unsure of how else to proceed, he had seriously considered simply killing the merchant; Aeris, however, swiftly ascertained the nature of the problem and interceded smoothly, making the purchase with worn gil coins.  The first time she had stepped in to cover for him, and infuriatingly, not the last.

            She never brought these incidents up to him, but that too was strange.  She didn’t refrain from mentioning them out of fear of his ire, as one of his men might have; she seemed to realize how discomfited and embarrassed these faux paxs made him, and simply didn’t want to upset him.

            Not that she bit her tongue on any other smart remark that might occur to her.  She had grown more relaxed since their encounter with the bandits, and often had a pithy comment to make on the various things they encountered.  Sephiroth grudgingly found himself coming to enjoy her surprisingly dry sense of humor, which she kept up in the face of his most foreboding silences.  Unable to ignore her, he was instead drawn out; much of the last week had been passed in witty banter.

            They never spoke of their reason for travelling together, though; the merest hint of it was enough to dissolve a conversation into anxious silence.  He knew it hurt her terribly to think of her captured friends; many an anecdote had been choked off mid-sentence, and often, as he lay awake in the long watches of the night, the rise of the moon would be accompanied by her stifled sobs.  She was always smiling the next morning, though, and asking him if he’d slept well, almost daring him to question the bruised circles under her eyes.  He could help but admire her refusal to admit her pain; was beginning to wonder if there was anything he could do to ease it.

            Clenching his hand into a fist, the credit chip shattered into meaningless shards of plastic that rained down as he rose to his feet.  Painful as she might find it, the time had come to discuss their shared objective. She or her planetary voice might have an insight; if they didn’t… well, then, there would be things much more pressing than hurt feelings to worry about.

            The main square of Nibelheim was much more subdued that afternoon than the overcast, threatening sky accounted for; people hurried about the market with their heads down, urgent to finish their errands, and Sephiroth found it no trouble to ghost around the edges to the Shinra Mansion without being seen.

            The familiar burble of the Shinra private-band station greeted him as he stepped through the secluded entrance.  Aeris had been fascinated by it ever since he had reconnected the short-wave radio.  Broadcast in the slang-filled, company-specific dialect Shinra employees spoke, he doubted she could understand much of it; that didn’t keep her from listening raptly.  He meant to ask her, unslinging the Masamune as he walked into the library.

            “Happy Birthday!”

            The question died on his lips as his brow furrowed.  “What?”

Aeris peered at him over the stack of files spread out on the wide desk before her.  “You’re not nearly as old as I thought; the white hair really throws it all off.”  She broke into a sunny smile.  “I would have baked you a cake, but somehow, you don’t strike me as the type.”

            Sephiroth frowned, thoroughly puzzled.  “What are you going on about?”

            “Silly, you turned thrity two weeks ago!  Why didn’t you tell me?  Oh, wait, let me guess.”  Aeris dropped the paper she had been holding, straightened in her seat, and schooled her features into a mask of disapproval.  “Company regulations do not permit birthdays!”

            “I imagine they don’t,” he said sardonically, stepping around the desk to scrutinize the file she had been reading.  “Was I meant to have it?”

            “What, a birthday?”

            “No, white hair.  Was it supposed to be colored?”

            Aeris’s eyes sparkled with mirth.  “Is that a hint of vanity I detect?”

            Sephiroth hooked his ankle around a nearby chair and dragged it over.  “Absolutely.”  He sat down, tilting his head to continue his reading.  “Haven’t you noticed most first-class SOLDIERs have, ah, creative hairstyles?  It’s actually encouraged.  It shows that they’re such mighty warriors they can be trusted to groom themselves.”

            She whooped with laughter.  “And you, being the mightiest of all, don’t have to worry about someone tripping you up with your silky locks.”

            Unaccountably stung, he allowed his annoyance to creep onto his face as he grinned ferally.  “Exactly.”

            “Um.”  Aeris quickly dropped her gaze, shuffling through the papers spread out before her.  “I don’t think it was in here, actually, or if it is I didn’t see it—oh!”  She looked up at him with a pained expression.  “I’m so sorry!  This is really none of my business—“

            He waved her off.  “It’s available to anyone with the right clearance; I can hardly grudge it to you.”  Seeing her continued distress, he hastened to change the subject.  “Learn anything else of interest?”

            “Nothing you don’t know already,” she said with a grimace.  Propping her chin on her fist, she regarded him uncertainly.  “I—I guess we’re kind of where we started, with that.”

            Silent for a moment, he debated how to use the opening she had given him.  “No,” he finally said with a sight, “we’re worse off.”  Meeting her curious gaze, he confessed, “Jenova is gone.”

            She went pale at the mention of the name.  “What do you mean, gone?”

            He bounded to his feet and turned to stare at a bookcase.  “Gone.  Not here.  Elsewhere.”

            “But—can’t you follow her?” she quavered.

            He spun around to glare at her.  “Aeris, we seem to have a breakdown of very basic communication here—“

            “No, listen!”  Aeris stood, wringing her hands, but did not step away.  “The Planet is always with me, in the back of my head, like a hum—“

            “I hear no hum.”

            “I said listen!”  She stamped her foot, blue eyes bright with tension.  “There’s places in the world, wellsprings of the Lifestream, temples, special places.  When I get close to them, the hum gets louder—and if I listen closely enough, I can follow the hum to them.  That’s what I meant.  Maybe you can do that with her—it.”

            “That is the stupidest—“  He stopped.  “A hum, you say.”

            “Yes.”

            “And it leads you to these special place.”

            “Yes.”

            It wasn’t nearly as crazy as many things he had recently learned to be true.  “Alright,” he said, sinking back into the chair.  He ran a hand through his hair.  “Is there anything special I need to do?”

            “No—not really.  Just relax, and listen for it.  Maybe—maybe try thinking about her.”

            “Think about her.  Right.”  He cloased his eyes and leaned back, reaching up to massage his temples.  There was no one in his head but himself; this whole magic business smacked of nonsense—but there was really no other option.  Materia, though… materia at least made

sense—

            Materia.  He quickly marshalled his thoughts into the rigid spear of will required to operate materia.  Summoning his recollections of how contact with Jenova had felt, he held them foremost in his mind, and thrust.

Vertigo washed over him, and he had a vague sensation of his palms striking the carpet.  It was entirely secondary to the dizziness, the feeling of travelling at an unimaginable speed, and a low ache that quickly throbbed into agony—

The prodigal son!

            He slammed into Jenova like a wall, her horrid influence engulfing him like quicksand.  His body thrashed, choking as he tried to vomit, and the sound of metallic laughter filled his perception.

Have you thought better of your disobedience?

            I am not disobediant I AM NOT YOURS—

“Sephiroth!”

Sephiroth!

A jumble of sights, sounds, smells, everything as he writhed in Jenova’s mental grip.  She squeezed crushingly tight at the sound of his name.

YOU HAVE NOT LEARNED!

            Sephiroth!

            Aeris--!

            Sephi—

“—roth!”

LEAVE HIM BE!

“—come back, hang on, I’ve got—“

LET HIM GO!

--you, come back—

“—PLEASE!”

            Small damp hands against his face, cool, blessedly cool, turning him over to lie on his back.  He twitched, struggling to maintain contact with that icy purity.  The hands cupped his chin, a soft voice frantically murmuring a prayer or a threat or both, and he coughed, hot bile burning his throat.  His eyes felt as if they were glued shut; he pried one open to behold Aeris’s terror-stricken countenance above him.  He coughed again.

            “You were right… she was there…”  His voice sounded pitifully weak in his own ears, and his vision began to swim.

            “You were right, that was stupid, so stupid, I can’t believe I told you to do that—no, don’t sit up!  Don’t you dare sit up!”  Her marvelous hands on his chest now, pushing him back down, but there was something else wrong…

            “Now stay there!  I need to go get my things, but you’ll be fine, just stay there—stay!”

            Footsteps pattered away.  With no immediate prospect of her soothing touch, he settled back to absorb what he had—seen?  Jenova, yes, and much more besides, but it her so badly to even think about it, and there was something else, something that looked different…

            He was so wrapped up in he hazy contemplation that he scarely noticed her return.  She worked quickly on him with a handful of materia, whispering feverishly all the while, and slowly the dreadful miasma began to recede.

            “Aera.  Mnot—I am.  Not.  Dead. Not going to be.”

            “But you almost were, and I told you to do it!  This is really bad—“

            “Aeris.”  He heaved an eyelid open, regarded her as critically as he could.

            “Shhh, don’t talk yet, save your—“

“Aeris,” he snapped, mustering as much command presence as he could.  “Your eyes.”

            “What about my eyes?”

            Sephiroth forced himself to wave a hand towards the long mirror that hung behind the desk.  “…They’re prettier than mine.”

            “You—are—crazy!”

            “Go—go look.”  He levered himself up on one elbow, and swatted at her when she attempted to push him back down.  “Go look.”

Aeris balled her hands in frustration.  “If I do, will you promise to settle down?”

            “Fine.  Go look.”

            With an exasperated sigh she leapt to her feet and stomped over to the mirror.  He took the opportunity to grab the chair and haul himself into it; he nearly lost his balance when he heard her startled gasp.

            Leaning back, he could see her reflection over her shoulder.  Her eyes were gleaming, dusted with the same molten green his own burned with.  She stared at herself in shock.  “I take it that’s”—he hawked and spat into the trashcan beside the desk—“that’s not normal.”

            As if snapped out of a dream, she turned and hurried over to him.  “No, it’s not,” she said, kneeling beside the chair.  “It’s never happened before, I don’t know what it is, but let’s not worry about it now.”

            Sephiroth wheezed a laugh and waggled his fingers at her.  “Cooties.”

            Aeris giggled, covering her mouth with her hands; then thought better of it and rocked back on her heels, shaking with peals of laughter.  They held a definite note of hysteria, but were laughter nontheless; Sephiroth began to chuckle along with her.  “Alright,” she said, gasping for breath, “I guess you can’t be dying if you can still laugh at your own jokes.  A bad one, no less.”

            He smiled.  “I said as much.  That wasn’t nearly as bad as the last time.  You—helped.”  He looked down at his hands; then, on impulse, reached out to take one of hers.  “Thank you.

“ALL POINTS BULLETIN!”

They both jumped in shock as the radio blared, and she snatched her hands away.  The broadcaster, strain obvious in his voice, lapsed into plain language as he barrelled on.

            “All available units to SH-142, I repeat, SH-142, all available units.  The President has been found dead, believed to be murder, perpetrator believed to be one Cloud Strife, 5’10”, blonde/blue, last seen in SH-142-99.  All floors are locked down, and I repeat, all available units to—“

“No!” Aeris shrieked, digging into her cheeks with her nails.  “No!  No!”

            “Aeris, wait—“

            She bolted from the room.

Chapter 12 – Rainswept Rendezvous

                The sky split with a deafening crash, the storm’s promise finally fulfilled with drops of rain plummeting, needlelike, hissing on the pavement as Aeris pounded away from the house.  The smell of damp cement filled her nostrils, almost as suffocating as the dread and anguish that crushed her heart.

Aeris Aeris Aeris

No!  No more!  I can’t, not anymore, I’ve done everything I can, but this is too much, I can’t take it, she thought frantically.  Rain stung her as she left the mansion’s grounds for the wet grass of the foothills.  She slipped, stumbled, righted herself, continued her headlong flight. 

Aeris stops Aeris waits

                “Please, just stop it!” she screamed into the howling wind.”  With a supreme effort of will she seized the warm place in her mind and throttled it.  The Planet wailed disconsolately; but for the moment she had blocked it, leaving it unable to do anything but keen maddeningly in the back of her mind.

                She reached the base of Mount Nibelheim and began to clamber over the tumbled stones, unable to do anything but follow her desire to flee, to fide from the terrible news.  The jagged rocks scraped her palms cruelly, and she scrabbled for toeholds, but she continued upward doggedly; perhaps if she could get far enough, high enough, away, it wouldn’t seem so bad—

                “Aeris!”

                The shout startled her so badly she lost her grip, skinning her knee painfully; she glanced over her should in time to see a bolt of lightning light Sephiroth’s form in negative silhouette.  “Not you too,” she moaned, and redoubled her efforts to climb.

                “Aeris, damn you, stop!”

Thunder roared again, loud enough to send pebbles skittering down past her.  The gale whipped raindrops into her face, obscuring her vision, but she managed to scramble over the last outcropping and gain the brief respite of a flat, muddy plateau.  Her foot sank deeply into the mire, and her ankle twisted, sending her tumbling forward.  A viselike grip on her bicep yanked her just short of falling.

                “What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?” Sephiroth panted, raking his sodden bangs out of his eyes.  His grasp loosened, but held steady as she struggled for balance.  He grabbed her hip and pulled her upright.  “I’m amazed you haven’t broken your neck!”

                Aeris couldn’t believe what she was hearing; her misery and confusion transmuted into blazing fury.  “And what a terrible shame it would be if I did!  You wouldn’t be able to use me in whatever half-baked scheme you have for fighting Jenova!  That’s all you care about!”

                “What I care about is getting off this mountain and out of this damn storm—“

                “As if you know how to care at all!”  Wrenching free of his grasp, she staggered back toward the rock.  “Do you know what it’s like to worry about someone?  To be terrified of what might be happening to them?  Do you know what it’s like to lose someone, you cold, inhuman—”?

                “No, I am not human,” Sephiroth snarled back at her, “and neither are you.”  The roll of thunder underscored his words.  “I don’t know what it’s like to sit around mooning after someone; I know about duty, and perseverance, and getting a job done instead of whining about it.  For God’s sake, they haven’t even caught him yet—never mind that the rest of your friends are still there!”

                “As if they won’t catch him!” Aeris sobbed, the hot flush of anger draining away under the deluge.  “I know how cruel they are—they’ll probably kill the others—“

                “They very well may,” he spat.  “But let me hasten to assure you that bawling on a mountainside won’t do a thing to change it.  It all rests on you, Aeris—Jenova, your friends, all of it!”  Whirling, he pulled a dagger from his belt and hurled it at her.  Aeris scrambled backwards much too slowly, but it only plunged into the mud at her feet.  “So choose, Aeris, settle it.  Play your part and do something about it—or finish it here, for all of us, and spare me your incessant puling.”

                Numb, Aeris sank into a crouch, her unseeing stare fixed on the knife before her.  She was dimly aware of raindrops striking her skin, of Sephiroth’s wild green glare, of the Planet’s thrumming struggles to break into her thoughts.

                It would be so easy.  None of it needed to matter; how important could the fate of the world be to a denizen of the Promised Land?  Abandoning her friends would cause only a small twinge.  They were much more resourceful than she; if they hadn’t figured out how to win free of Shinra on their own, it was unlikely there was anything she could to do help.

                Or was there?

                She looked up at Sephiroth, towering above her with his arms folded across his chest and his hair whipping around him in the near gale.  He had never shown the slightest interest in her friends’ plight, yet now he threw it in her face.  Had he learned something else from Jenova?  Had he changed his mind?

                Did it matter?

                Slowly, she raised her hands to her face.  The downpour had washed away her tears, but she knuckled her aching eyes.  In her heart of hearts, she knew it didn’t.  Rescuing them was a foolish idea, probably impossible; but any of them would do the same for her.  Had, in the past.  She swallowed with difficulty; now even the thought that she had been willing to abandon them to their fates made her feel cowardly, selfish, and small.

everyone doubts

                The familiar presence stole into her mind like a soothing balm.  She laughed shakily; for a few moments she had even turned her back on the Planet.  What vanity!

everyone stumbles

love you, Aeris, love you, always

forgive forgive forgive

Covering her face with her hands, she smiled.  People had always marveled at her unflagging cheerfulness, never guessing the true cause for it.

need them

they need Aeris

                I know, she thought.  And they’ll get me.  As much of me as there is to give.  And as for Cloud…

                Unable to finish the thought, she reached forward and pulled the knife from the ground.  It was deceptively light in her hand; such a slender, insubstantial thing, and yet capable of so much.

                She rose to her feet and met Sephiroth’s gaze.  He still stood impassively, not even blinking the rain from his eyes, but sparks danced in the verdant depths of his gaze.  She shifted her grip on the hilt, possessed by a sudden desire to fling it back at him, and he tensed at the movement; she slipped it into her belt instead.

                “So,” she said as casually as she could.  “What exactly did you have in mind?”

                His shoulders sagged slightly, and he let out a long, hissing breath.  “First,” he said after a pause, “we go back inside.”  Aeris nodded.  He held her gaze for a moment longer, as if searching for something; then he turned and began to pick his way down the tumble of stones.  “By the way,” he called over his shoulder, “you’ll want to clean that.”

                “But who knows what that really did to you—and then you had to come chasing after me—“

                “I am not your pet, Aeris, nor yet your personal disaster area.”  Sephiroth snorted.  “Although I have spent an inordinate amount of time half-dead since meeting you.  I’m sure I can survive another few minutes unassisted.”

                “But the last time—“

“Aeris.  If you do not go change into something warm and dry this instant I will do it for you, which I’m certain you’ll enjoy a great deal less than I will.”

                Flushing, she ducked her head.  “Fine,” she mumbled.  “But don’t do anything too—too—“

                “Go!”

                Unwilling to press the issue after that dubious threat, Aeris quickly padded back to her room, leaving a damp trail behind her.  A quick search of her back revealed nothing but garments so filthy they’d likely dissolve into sludge if she donned them in her current waterlogged state.  Biting her lip, she glanced around the room.  She couldn’t exactly go back to the library wrapped in the bedspread, but she remembered seeing a few things hanging in the closet.

                Rummaging through it, she discovered an ancient men’s bathrobe, musty with age and matted from disuse.  She frowned, but it was more than big enough, and there weren’t really any alternatives.  Sneezing, she pulled it out, stripped off her wet things, and shrugged into it.  Satisfied that its heavy folds provided plenty of coverage, she swept back to the library.

                The beginnings of a fire crackled encouragingly in the grate, and a few cushions from the couch were scattered before it.  Sephiroth was approaching them with an array of glassware carefully balanced in his hands as she entered.  “I see you haven’t bothered to change,” she said acerbically.

                “I weather better than you do,” he replied placidly, settling down cross-legged on one of the cushions.  “Come, sit,” he continued, setting the glass items out before him.

                One of them proved to be a decanter of burgundy liquid, which he poured into two goblets as she sat across from him.  She regarded the one he handed her dubiously.  “What is it?”

                He sniffed at his own.  “Cognac.”  He wrinkled his nose.  “I think.”

                “Oh, I don’t drink alcohol—“

                “You do now.  Consider it medicinal.”

                Aeris scowled, but didn’t see the point in arguing—she didn’t want to find out if he’d really pour it down her throat.  Remembering Barrett and Tifa taking shots at the bar, she steeled herself and gulped it down—and coughed, sputtering, as rancid sweetness burned its way down to her stomach.

                Sephiroth grinned.  “Cheers,” he said sardonically, sipping his own.

                “Oh, my,” Aeris gasped, thumping her chest.  “It certainly is—errhrrm—warming—oh, no, I don’t want any more,” she protested as he refilled her glass.

                “As you say.”  Unfolding his legs he stretched out, propping himself up on one elbow, swirling the contents of his glass.  He seemed content to stare at the ceiling while she got herself under control, which Aeris was grateful for; it was a struggle not to retch.  People do this for fun? she wondered, sniffling.

                Yet even after she regained her composure, he peered moodily into the shrouded heights.  Uncomfortable, Aeris wondered how to break the silence.  After the exchange on the mountain, a light joke was hardly appropriate; an uneasy tension coiled within her, but she could not put words to it.  He came after me… to offer me a knife.  To tell me to… but he came after me!  Fretfully, Aeris tugged the ribbons from her hair and began to untangle the matted wetness of her braid.

                Finally Sephiroth gave himself a small shake and drained the remnants from his glass.  “So.  Jenova is in Midgar.”

                Aeris looked up.  “So… so it worked, then?  I mean, obviously it worked, but…”

                His lips quirked.  “I would hardly describe the experience as anything similar to acting as a celestial compass, but yes, I made… contact.”  He shook his head.  “It was… well, it was informative.  She wants to go home.”

                The tone of his voice chilled her.  “Home?” she asked, taking up the goblet and rotating it in her hands.  Nervously, she took another sip.

                He nodded slowly.  “I think that’s it, anyway.  She is difficult to understand.  She needs a wound to infect; she wants to use the original one she made long ago, when she arrived on the tail of a comet and fell to earth.  The North Crater.”

anathema

blasphemy

anathema

                Aeris started at the vehemence, the blistering venom of the Planet’s response.  Ancient, implacable fury surged through her mind, setting her nerve-endings ablaze with a righteous, overwhelmed rage that was not her own.  Her hand clenched the glass so hard she thought it must surely shatter.

devourer

killer

deceiver

                And then, just as suddenly, it was gone, leaving her achingly bereft.  With a shudder, she unwound her fingers from around the goblet and carefully set it down, then pressed her fingers to her throbbing temples.

                “Your voice didn’t like that, did it,” Sephiroth said quietly.  “Bad memories?”

                “S-something like that,” she replied shakily.

                “Your eyes flared.”

                “Enough about my eyes!”  She squeezed them shut, willing her headache to subside.

as they should be

propriety rightness beauty

                Enough, she thought wearily.  Enough.  There is still only so much I can worry about at once.

                “Aeris?”

“What?”

“If you lean over any further, you’re going to set yourself on fire.”

                With a jerk, she straightened, suddenly aware of the roaring blaze of heat that bathed the right side of her body.  She shook her head, trying to orient herself.  “Alright.”  She took a deep breath.  “We don’t have to worry about the Northern Crater, do we?  Why would anyone take her there?”

                “A good question, but not necessarily one that applies.  I am not the only one alive who partakes of her essence.  These others will not be able to resist her as I do; they are flawed.  She can make them do as she wishes.”  He pinched the bridge of his nose.  “I don’t think it matters, though; just melodrama… ritual.  All she really needs is a place where the mako flows… a reactor, a natural formation, anything like that.”

                “So she doesn’t even need to leave Midgar.”  She blinked muzzily.  “She could… could do it right now.”

                “No.”  His eyes gleamed with more than reflected firelight.  She wants me.  There are others, as I said, but she doubts their ability to do… whatever it is.  I’m not certain.  It’s something poisonous, something devastating… and it requires a suitable sacrifice.”

                Aeris smiled wanly.  “So we really are in the same boat.  Where does that leave us?”

                “In need of assistance.  She is in Midgar.  Your friends are in Midgar.  It seems a good place to start.  It would be an even better place to finish.”

She stifled a yawn.  “It just seems to easy.  And… she wants bother of us—either of us—near her at the Lifestream… but that’s where we need to take her…”  She struggled to finish the sentence, but her train of thought had been utterly derailed.  It was difficult to keep her eyes open. 

                Soon, even that was impossible.

Chapter 13 – Vagabond Visitor

They were beautiful.

                Moonlight stole through the library’s great bay window, painting the room in a faded palette of charcoals, the glow of the fire’s banked embers providing the only real illumination.  But it was more than enough for him to see by.

                She was a small figure, huddled in front of the fireplace, a quilt casually tossed over her prone form.  The orange glow played over the flowing waves of her hair, the shadows giving its color a darker cast.  It was lovely.  It reminded him of—

                No.  No it didn’t.

                The one he had truly come to see sat upright in the wing-backed chair beside the mantle, files spread in his lap, elbows propped on the chair’s dusty arms.  Tall and lean, even in repose he radiated a sense of capable ferocity, like the sword that leaned against the wall beside him.  He wondered what it would be like to see this so-familiar stranger bound to his feet, silver hair swirling around him, to run, to leap, to lunge… it would be exquisite.  But his face…

                Ah, it was heartbreaking.

                The eyes.  Large, widely set, tip-tilted, with the small, barely noticeable fold at the inner corners… they were her eyes, set in this strange man’s face.

                It was terribly, simply terrible that they both represented such physical perfection.  Did their inner beings match their flawless outward representations?  They couldn’t.  That would be even worse.

                It would be easy enough to find out.  He could make a game of it; how close could he get before his hosts detected him?  Could he slink across the room, and stand between the two of them with his back to the fireplace?  Could he touch one of them?  Stroke their alabaster flesh?  Lean around the side of the wide chair and whisper into an ear? 

But it would upset them so when he was discovered, as he inevitably would be.  Make them frightened, angry, unwilling to take his good will seriously.  It would break his heart to see either of this pair unhappy.  There was quite enough negativity to go around… for the moment.

                His eyes.  Her eyes.  The eyes he had never thought to see again, let alone minted anew in an unknown countenance.  The long, delicate lashes… that now shielded the faintest of peridot gleams.

                The smile pained him.  “They always wondered about that,” he said, voice hoarse with disuse and emotion.  “Whether the glow would give away your positions at night.”

                Sephiroth opened his eyes completely, giving him a flat, unreadable stare.  His heart twinged, seeing such a callous look in that gaze, but he squelched it fiercely.  It was not her gaze, not her calculating hostility.

                That had been years ago.

                “I’m sorry.  What a terrible non-sequiteur,” he continued, watching Sephiroth intently for signs of movement.  “Please don’t reach for your sword.  I don’t mean any harm to you right now.”

                “To me?” Sephiroth asked.  “What do you mean, then?”

                He exhaled slowly, the boiling froth of his soul just barely restrained.  His shoulder blades were suddenly lances of pain, burning seams within his back.  He inhaled deeply.  “I mean harm,” he rapped out, “all sorts of harm.  But not here.  And not now.”  He tried to smile again.  “No.  I mean to tell you a story.  It’s one I don’t think you know.  At least, not what really happened.”

                “And why exactly should I listen to this?”  His voice was rough and grating, entirely at odds with its owner’s appearance.  A failure.  A flaw.  Utter perfection had not been produced.

                What a shame.  What a terrible, terrible waste.  Nevertheless, marring the man further would solve nothing.  Not tonight.  Perhaps not ever.

                Perhaps.

                Really, it was just too amusing, that it had all come to this.  “Because it bears on your past, and quite possibly on your future.  Your masters are hunting you, Sephiroth.”  He laughed bitterly.  “Because I’ve never told a bedtime story before.”

                Sephiroth’s eyes sparked, casting a brief fey glow over his features.  Almost beautiful enough.  Almost perfect enough.  “Go on, then.”

                “Mmm.”  He leaned lightly against a bookcase, settling himself.  He had planned this encounter out scrupulously, imagining it taking place in a million different settings, playing out in a thousand different ways, having a hundred different resolutions.  But he had never, ever guessed what her son had truly become.  No matter; no matter at all.  The tale, and its telling, were paramount.

                Sephiroth had to know.  Had to know what he had truly cost.

                “Once upon a time,” he began.  “Yes, that has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?  Once upon a time, there was a man named Vinnie.  Vinnie also worked for Shinra; was in fact a Turk, one of the President’s personal bodyguards.  He spent a great deal of time at the company headquarters.

                “It was there that he met a young research assistant, a ravishingly beautiful young woman named Lucrecia.  She had—she looked—” His throat tightened.  Oh, it hurt; it still hurt so badly, just to see her in his mind’s eye.  “Well, she looked quite a bit like you, Sephiroth.  Not nearly so strapping, of course, but… but, he met her there.

                “Since this is a fairytale, I’ll gloss over the next bit, except to say that they fell deeply in love.  But all was not as it seemed; Lucrecia had played him false!  For she was already promised to another man, a doctor and scientist named Hojo.”  His mouth curled.  “Ah, I see you know that name,” he said, seeing Sephiroth’s eyes widen fractionally.  “Much to your regret, I imagine.

                “Where was I?  Ah.  Yes.  Neither man was particularly happy with Lucrecia’s deception, and it came out in such an unfortunate manner.  Lucrecia was carrying a child, you see; a child each man thought was his.

                “It was Hojo, ever the good scientist, who first discovered the duplicity—blood work or some such—that the child was not his.  Vinnie found out about it shortly thereafter, when Hojo shot him in the back.”  The pain had been like a supernova, crisping his brain with infernal agony… the feeling of utter helplessness when he had tried to rise, failed to even crawl away… the needle plunging into his neck…

                A soft gasp interrupted his reverie.  The woman, Aeris, had awakened; was propped up on one elbow, staring at them in shock.  “Your pardon for waking you, lady.”  He touched the brim of his hat.  “Vincent Valentine, your servant.”  Her glance flicked briefly to Sephiroth, then back to him.  Such an attentive child.

                “Something tells me you’re just getting to the exciting part,” Sephiroth interrupted, his gaze never wavering.

                “Oh, as to that, I really couldn’t say.  Hojo decided to try out a few modifications on Vinnie”—he shrugged back the shoulder of his scarlet cloak, allowing moonlight to wink off the beastly, wretched steel claw—“as well as some exciting research in the field of stasis.  It was quite successful; I myself have only recently picked up the thread of the tale again.  Though as I understand it, Vinnie was not the only one to be experimented upon… and that the child grew up to be quite the SOLDIER.”

                “You’re not his—” Aeris clapped a hand to her mouth.

                “If you’re expecting an outpouring of thwarted filial devotion, you are sadly misguided,” Sephiroth said coolly.

                Was he?  Was that what he had hoped for?

                “I?  Oh, no.  Vinnie died, more than thirty years ago.  I am only Vincent.  But I… owe a duty, to him and his.  I tell you this tale simply to be informative.  And by way of explanation as to my presence tonight.”  He reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose, his mind suddenly swirling.  “I had… my first visitors in quite awhile, two days ago.  Fellow—other Turks, just like Vinnie.

                “It appears Shinra has misplaced their greatest general.  It seems that general has absconded with a girl they are most interested in reclaiming.  They worried that those two would steal something of great value stored in the area, and took it away with them.”  He jerked his head sharply, cracking his neck.  “They wish me to apprehend these two for them.”

                Terror was writ large on Aeris’s face—the poor, sweet thing—but Sephiroth did not so much as blink.  Did he feel nothing?  Had he inherited none of his mother’s great depth of passion?

                None of Vincent’s own?

                “I believe I can spike you to the wall before you can draw that gun at your hip,” he said.  “Shall we find out?”

                Vincent could have laughed with glee at Sephiroth’s stubborn fearlessness—that was pure Lucrecia, right enough.  “How presumptuous!  I said I owed a duty, did I not?  This is it.  Your warning: run.”

                “And why should I let you go, now that your ‘duty’ is discharged?”

                This time Vincent did snort.  “I said they wished me to apprehend you.  I never said I was going to.  I have another duty…”  His hand suddenly ached to caress the butt of the pistol; the claw twitched of its own volition.  “…a duty to Hojo.”

                They stayed still and silent for a long time, frozen in tableau.  Finally, slowly and deliberately, Sephiroth nodded.  “If you can get to him first.”

He laughed mockingly.  “It shall be a race, then,” he agreed.  He bowed slightly to Aeris.  “Lady.”  He touched the brim of his hat to them both.  “Fare thee both well,” he said, and faded quickly away into the shadows of the hallway, lest Sephiroth do something silly out of spite.

He was too emotional.  He knew that; he always had been.  But the boy was so standoffish… so harsh… so cold…

…so terribly, terribly flawed.

What a waste.

The storm had given way to a faint drizzle as he made his way across the lawn, striding eagerly into the wide, open possibilities of the night.  Nibelheim; he had never been here… not of his own volition.  Devil’s Head; what an utterly charming name for such a pastoral mountain village.  Quite appropriate, though; he knew exactly which devil’s head this poor, sad farce had sprung from.  Now all he need do was decide how best to remove it from its neck.  And afterwards…

It was an insult.  It was insult to injury.  This was the result of all the anguish, all the pain, the grief, the loss, the ruination of lives… The pain in his back seared him again, flaring so badly he thought the skin would burst, split, spill his inner workings into the darkness.  He gritted his teeth, and raised his face to bathe in the pale light of the gibbous moon. He sucked ragged breaths between his clenched jaws; now was not the time for temper.

It was not the first time good wombs had borne bad sons.

Chapter 14 – Fever Dreams

              Sephiroth groaned, arching his back in an attempt to tease the knots from his spine.  It was still dark out, and the damp ground radiated a dim aura of cold through the worn bedroll.  It was warm enough, though; the blanket created a comfortable seal, trapping body heat within.

                Aeris made a small discomfited noise and snuggled closer, fitting herself into the curve of his body.  Obligingly he wrapped himself around her, pulling her close and nestling her head against his shoulder.  He squeezed her, enjoying the soft, comfy roundness of her figure, and she emitted a soft trill of pleasure.

                Pleased, he reached up to stroke a loose curl of her hair, winding it between his fingers.  She snuffled, then twitched.  “Mmwrf?” she muttered.

                “Shh, it’s nothing,” he whispered, stroking her cheek.

                “Bllrrff,” she grunted, and pulled away enough to roll over.  Lifting her head, she blinked sleepily at him.  “Hey,” she said softly.

                He smiled back at her.  “Hi.”

                “Mmm,” she replied, once more snuggling against him.  Slipping her arms around him, she deftly wove her legs between his, rendering their bodies a contented, cuddly tangle, her hands sliding slowly down his flanks.  “Mmm,” she said again, as her hand wrapped firmly around his erection.

                Sephiroth sighed, arching his back again for an entirely different reason.  He gasped as her fingers clenched, which earned him a low chuckle.  He reached up, intending to grab her shoulders and roll her onto her back—

                --but his hands encountered wet meat, gristled with veins—

                --and there was so much blood—

                Sephiroth sat bolt upright in his bedroll, gasping for air.

                “Um, good morning,” came Aeris’s voice from a short distance away.  He whipped his head around; she crouched across from a new fire, the small iron skillet she carried dangling from one hand, her skin intact.  “Uh… would you like an egg?”

                He blinked stupidly, trying to reconcile himself to waking reality.  “No.”  He shook himself, grasping at threads of normality.  “I’ve always thought it’s terribly unsporting.  They ought to at least get a chance to run away.  Besides, isn’t that awfully disruptive to the natural order of life and death or some such?”

                She grinned, holding up a pair of speckled blue eggs.  “When you find a nest, take half and leave half.  The Planet only requires so much bird poop.”  With a practiced gesture she cracked both, dumped their contents into the pan, and lifted it over the flames.  The sizzle reminded him of the sound of blood splattering on metal floors.

                Running a hand through his hair he leaned forward, bracing himself on his heels.  It had been a nightmare; not exactly unfamiliar territory, though he had not remembered his dreams at all for many years.  He snorted with wry amusement.  How stereotypical of me.  I awake panting with fear from a dream of domesticity.  Never mind the strange conjunction of images; it was all just garbage, a glimpse of his brain doing the nightly filing.

                Aeris divided her attention between him and the eggs.  “You know, I think that’s the first time I’ve ever seen you sleep naturally,” she said casually.  “I was kinda beginning to wonder if you did.”

                He stretched; the ache in his shoulders had been no dream.  “You really only need four hours a night,” he yawned.  “You ought to try it.  Evil never sleeps, while virtue is ever vigilant, and all that.”

                She snorted.  “This particular bit of virtue is perfectly content to bask in the security ‘evil’ provides if it means a good night’s sleep.”  She attempted to flip the eggs, frowned, and leaned back slightly.  The fingers of her free hand curved and the fire leapt in answer, resuming its dance a few inches higher than it had been.

                Unaccountably, his spine prickled.  “Have I ever mentioned how unnerving it is when you do things like that?”  Sephiroth tugged his pack over and rummaged out a few strips of dried beef.

                “It is?”  She looked chagrined.  “I’m sorry.  I usually don’t… most people… well, you seemed so… well, I just won’t do it anymore.”  She nodded decisively; the fire snuffed itself immediately.  “Oh!”

                He nearly choked as he struggled between swallowing the bite he’d taken and snorted out laughter.  “My, my,” he coughed, thumping his chest, “don’t they teach you sylvan guardians anything these days?”  Her horrified expression made him laugh all the harder.

                “I must have been out that day,” she muttered, grabbing a fork from her pack and jabbing experimentally at the eggs.  “I knew I should have enrolled in Fire 101 instead of Dealing With Obnoxious SOLDIERs 211.  And to think, I could have majored in Saving the World as opposed to Putting Up With Sephiroth’s Crap.”

                He smirked and leaned back against his bedroll, gnawing on the jerky with a surprising degree of contentment.  Girls who claimed to speak with the earth and wielded magic, aliens, long lost fathers, plans to assault the headquarters of the most powerful military force the world had ever known single-handedly… it was all in a day’s work, evidently.

Though why I believe him… if I do… But he hadn’t disbelieved Vincent, which was the important thing.  While he certainly understood the concept of parents, it was something he had never internalized; he had to have come from somewhere.  It was a pathetic little tale, as tawdry and low-class an origin as that of any Third-Class conscript, and hardly seemed like something that could involve him.  But it was hard to disregard Vincent’s intensity, his mad, single-minded devotion.  Lucrecia must have been a remarkable woman.  Perhaps it was her Sephiroth took after.

                He scowled, annoyed with himself.  As if I could take after anyone after all the work that’s been done on me.  You don’t hear of golden chocobos warking wistfully about their lineage.  There was so much more to him than man and woman had provided; he had thought himself entirely unique until he had encountered Aeris.  Not that they were precisely the same kith, but she was as close as anyone was ever likely to get.

                Was that why he had truly become interested in her?  The idea that there was another—that there might be a place he belonged?

And why exactly have I been overwhelmed by a fit of sentimental nonsense?  I didn’t know that then; I just wanted to know what she’d done to me in the lab.  The rest all came later.

                But that touch, like so much else, remained unexplained.  She had laid hands on him to heal, and that was an unusual experience in itself, but not the same.  He rarely removed his gloves in her presence, and that phenomena seemed to want bare flesh.  He was more than a little unnerved by the results; it was lust and winter and completion and fear and… magic.  Because as much as it disturbed him, it still drew him; there was something there that cried out for exorcism, for mastery, and it twinged a little more each time she pulled a trick like she had with the fire,

                He almost wished that he were insane.  It would at least be comforting.

                “Penny for your thoughts?”

                He smiled briefly.  “Chicken feed for a phoenix?”  The embers of the fire still glowed, winking orange and amber in the brightening daylight.  It hadn’t died, then; merely obeyed.  “I wonder…”  Materia.  Magic.  Was it really all that different?  Was it merely another sort of muscle to flex?

                Sephiroth sat up, hands clenching loosely in his lap.  Embers; it would be easy enough to lean over and coax them into flame with a breath, making good on their promise of fire.  Or perhaps he could just will it so.

                His fingers curled. 

                The crisped twigs obligingly flared to life, small, wavering tongues of flame that quickly stabilized, then shuddered into near non-existence.  They rose again, slowly this time, blazing with an unnatural yellow-green heart.

                “Show off,” Aeris breathed unsteadily.

                Concentration broken, the sickly flames winked out.  Sephiroth stared at the remains of the fire, his mind curiously still.  He had done that.  He had called that to life.  What an interesting development, he thought distantly.  How utterly mystical of me.  He laughed, a little shakily.  “Well, I’m sure that one will go over well at the next board meeting.”

                Aeris searched him with her gaze, eyeing him a little warily.  Finally she shook her head and began to repack her things.  “I don’t know, Sephiroth,” she said quietly.  “I really don’t know.”

                “See?  I told you it was creepy.”

                Her lips quirked in a wry smile.  “Point.”

                Banishing all thoughts of it for now, he stood and gazed into the distance.  With any luck, they would reach the outskirts of Midgar today—mustn’t forget to don the hooded cloak.  If all went well, they could be in the Shinra complex this evening.  Their problems would be solved—or they’d be dead.

                He wondered if it was fatalism or good sense that made him almost wish they would fail.

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