36/100: Promises. Sephiroth/Genesis
Sphinx asked for a sequel to "There's Trouble In Paradise" and being the lovely person that I am, I agreed and wrote this... Although it's more angsty than dark.. being in Genesis' POV and all. Sorry D:

I played around a bit with canon here... you'll see what I mean, but I hope it has the correct effect...
Disclaimer - Characters belong to Square Enix...


Promises

Your Promise, My Heart, You've Broken Them Both.

"The hour is upon us, and yet, my love, your time has still not come." You say, a whisper that tears me from a once-pleasant dream. Your voice used to carry me amiably into a new morning, the perfect start to another day of a boring routine. Now you take me away unwillingly from my comfortable monotony. Through my protective shell formed from ignored promises and sorrow, you reach, metaphorical fingers raking through my hair, taking a grip that could shatter bones if only you willed it so - a fate long for – and you yank me, broken body, weary mind and exhausted, fearful soul back into the world of the living. I stay where I fell, surrounded by onyx feathers – still moist with blood from your puppets toying – in a beam of dying light.

It's not my time, I protest. Pleas fall upon deaf ears.

I sealed myself away to rouse in the world's time of need. Although it maybe that time now, I cannot bring myself to fight you. You know this, I know you do and you're laughing as you dance above me with the boy who is willing to fulfil that destiny for me. Your swords clash with hate, bemusement and magic. Lifeless Midgar is lit up with flames, just like the quiet little Nibelheim and for the same reason. The one the world forgot. Genesis Rhapsodos. Me. Your scheming little fox.

Does Jenova know about the obsession you're chasing up under her orders… and why isn't my Goddess helping me?

I know your taunts are not aimed at Strife.

I know your eyes are not focused upon him, rather the one underneath him; the one he represents in your twisted mind. His eyes are blue, no? Does that make it easier to visualise that it is me that you are beating into the ground. Does seeing me fall make you remember of raping me in the mountains? Does that give you a surge of power, a teasing taste of what you will take again as soon as this blonde whelp is defeated.

I see the way your fingers are gripping tightly onto the hilt of Masamune, aching with anticipation to replace the blue-ribbon wrapped metal with my own neck; to drive yourself – not your sword – into another's – my – body.

You have promised yourself a new planet, following in the Monster's footsteps, and a new shining future, but in such a future will you return back to the way you once were? Reserved to all others until it was the moon that reigned above and the only company you had was myself?

In this future of yours, will I wake to your gentle kisses or will I find myself each morning bound in chains for you fear that I will leave you? Or do you think that I will try to kill you? Does that thought excite you? I know that you would love that every time I try you would be there, the one to cause and watch me fall back into despair. Will you rape me then as well? I shall not struggle if you choose to just like I will not when you come in a few moment's time, for I once gave myself completely to you and although there was a time I recanted such I gift, I am now bound to you as a punishment to myself. I'm accepting my responsibility like you always wanted me to. You seem to thrive on this obsession, or is that you love to see me suffer? Whatever it is, your fingers twist in my hair, giving me a taste of that still yet to come, pulling my head back, so I am facing nothing but the darkened sky. I am forced to watch as you fight, the smile as wide on your face as the insanity is bright in your beautiful emerald eyes. It is then I start to see your faltering footwork. You're distracting yourself too much.

There is a cold and moist sensation on my cheek, I reach up blindly, unable to direct my eyes elsewhere as I feel what is coming next. I've never seen you like this, I've never seen you defeated and it's strange. What I spent my life doing, on either the battlefield or in bed is being accomplished by a mere boy who is nothing when it comes to you and I. You should know this, you were always so acutely sensitive to these details, as a SOLDIER such senses where implanted into our instincts from the very start… but you look so surprised when the blonde pulls his final limit. One I know will take you from me again. No, I'm lying to myself to make it feel worse. I lost you years ago. This creature – this nightmare – may have taken your form and it may speak with your voice and have your memories but it is not you. It is the one mistake of my past I will never accept.

Before I quell it, a cry of anguish expels itself from my throat at the sight of the solitary onyx wing tears through your black leather, iridescent feathers slowly making their way down to me… a prelude for that which has yet to fall.

"I will never be a memory," You mutter to Strife, another promise you will strive to keep, but fail regardless… like you always do.

And then you fall, the sky returns to a gentle cerulean but I'm not looking at that anymore. How can I when you're lying before me, bleeding and seething…? But smirking once you see my concern. But no fear… you're too weakened… too… Oh you poor marionette, why must you endeavour to break? And why must the action always echo between us?

"I will keep my promise," You whisper, turning your head just enough so that for the first time in what feels like a lifetime your eyes bore deep into mine. The venom, the hate, the lust and longing I see just behind the watery green I know will haunt me until the day I am fortunate enough to rejoin the planet. Some part of me hopes that it'll be by your hand, if only becau-

Cold leather fingers grip tightly to my jaw, bringing me down to your lips. I can taste this kiss is my last, I treat it as such, only willing that you had the life left in you to fill it with your malevolence, for in the back of my mind, it's like you're not even trying. It's like you think I'm not worth the effort. And perhaps that's true.

I place my hand upon your chest, not wanted to break away for fear of finding you gone again, I'm desperate because I need to feel you one more time. Maybe not the way we were, maybe not the way we are. I just need you.

Those green eyes narrow and you push me away, onto my back, the feeling of feathers through my jacket bringing back memories I have tried forget. You're smiling like you were back then and the corners of your lips are moist with blood. I can smell you're dying but you're too wrapped up in breaking me to care. My eyes close tight, shaking my head and you take up position above me, demanding hands asking for no permission where they wander – and they never had – but… I… I summon Rapier in my right hand, waiting until you lower your head to my neck, teeth bared and ready to break skin…

My love, just like at the start of our relationship when I had to teach you to live and love, I must now show you that some promises are made to be broken and others simply altered. When I said I would give myself to you, I never said unconditionally. Though I punish myself to let myself be abused, I am now choosing something so much more, so much worse.

A quick shove in your weakened state and it is you on your back and before you have time to retaliate, my crimson blade is buried deep inside you. Like the metal had suddenly ignited and burnt me, I release my grasp on the hilt. My actions hit me by full force; I collapse onto you as the sky releases a healing rain. Who am I to beg forgiveness for as the world rejoices? To you or to myself?

With your final strength, eyes glazing over in a way that I'd never seen before, you turn to me, offering another haunting smile. "Abandoned puppet with mangled wings," You whisper before you fade away. "Who is the master and who is the slave?"