Title: Back to the Planet
Pairings: Vague referencing to Angeal/Genesis.
Summary/warnings: Spoilers. Vaguely AU, depending on how you wanna look at it.

"I just want to be a hero, too!

Words spoken so often and the last thoughts of a dying man. It's what he's always wanted, ever since he was a child. To be something worthwhile, to surpass all else, to be a Real Hero.

Perhaps there were conceited reasons behind it - things involving desperate want of attention and approval. But there were a few just ones, as well. To protect and serve, to better the planet - him and Angeal. They could have been heroes together, members of ShinRa's elite First Class.

Certainly, Sephiroth's existence hindered that attempt, if only because the public's eye was on him. Always, always on him. One could ask any random person on the street if they recognized the names of Angeal or Genesis, and sometimes the answer was yes and sometimes the answer was no; but ask anyone of Sephiroth, and they knew. They knew. (How many nights had Angeal laid awake, listening to Genesis' ranting on the subject? Too many to count.)

We're doing our part, Genesis. We're helping. Isn't that enough?

No. It hadn't been. No, no no no. Never enough because they were better and they were the first and the best and -- and... and.

'The most profound mystery is the Gift of the Goddess, and in pursuit of this gift we set out on a journey and take flight. Hopeless as it may seem, we stand and carry onward with the ripples of water that surface in our hearts.'

…And they were dying and with the fading life came the fading of power. There came days where his sword felt heavier than usual and his shoulders and joints ached at the end of training. His entire body felt tired.

Wasn't fast enough, wasn't strong enough... And, oh, if they'd only caught it sooner. Only realized what was going on with their bodies before they started to fall apart and perhaps something could have been done to stop it.

Many things were tried, of course. Injections and experiments. Days where Genesis stepped outside for air and crouched, hands to his stomach, feeling the side-effects of nausea sweep over him even as he bowed his head and fought back the urge to be sick.

And there was Angeal, as always. A cool hand pressing to the back of his neck, a single, comforting word and an unspoken promise that he'd tell no one. Weaknesses, fears, were not for others to know, after all. Perhaps it said something that Genesis trusted Angeal with his.

Everything beyond that is a muddled blur. Thoughts and feelings - Monster, monster, murderer - and emotions - Anger, fear, why why why - and an assortment of nonsensical memories. Bits and pieces, fragments, cut and taped back together with chunks missing in between.

Hollander. Sephiroth. Zack Fair. SOLDIER. ShinRa. Hojo.

JENOVA. Project G. Nibelheim.

Dying, dying, dying.

Angeal.

'Waiting for it to be received. A harsh tomorrow and rolling winds defy us.'

He mourns the loss of his friend upon news of his death. Perhaps he screams, perhaps he cries, but it doesn't matter because no one is around to see or hear it. He lays there and he reads his book, words that soothe almost as well as Angeal's (almost, almost, but not quite, and not now), and perhaps he takes the words and misconstrues them horribly because he can't think straight enough for it to be otherwise. He reads things that he doesn't remember reading before, because the words are not actually on the page.

His own death follows soon enough. A goddess' beautiful face, ethereal and just within his reach and yet -- even she seems to have shunned him for reasons he does not understand. She is the last thing he loses of utmost importance before the Life Stream draws him in. He does not even remember if there was a moment, just before death, where he felt free of pain. (That was how it was supposed to be, was it not? Painless, comforting...)

He reminds himself that monsters deserve no such kind treatment.

He thinks of Angeal. Perhaps wherever it is he'll go, wherever his Goddess and the Life Steam, the Planet, decides he should go, perhaps Angeal will be there. Perhaps. It was their promise, wasn't it? Where one went, the other would follow.

'You will be taking flight? To the planet that hates us...'