Disclaimer: Final Fantasy/Kingdom Hearts characters and names are the property of Square Enix. This story is written purely for entertainment and not profit.

The Doppelgänger Wars

Chapter One

Oiseau dans une Cage Ouverte

—heartless eyes.

My first impression of the black-haired woman,

Yûko Ichihara, settled on that phrase.

—frightening eyes.

—cruel eyes.

—bewitching eyes.

—hard eyes.

—eyes that looked at you

as though you were less than human.

—eyes that looked right through you.

—eyes that appraised you.

—eyes that measured the world in reverse.

—eyes that denied the way of the world.

That sort of eyes.

Unable to stand having those eyes focussed on me,

and unable to continue staring back at them,

I consciously dropped my gaze.

"...'Go ahead. I dare you'..."

-NISIOISIN, xxxHOLiC: ANOTHERHOLiC: Landolt-Ring Aerosol

He felt sick.

He felt sick, sick, sick.

Oh god, oh god, oh god.

I'm going to throw up.

He would have if he wasn't so busy screaming.

He was on the verge of vomiting.

"You see what you've caused? Why? It's your fault! I didn't want to!"

He didn't even know.

He didn't even know.

"Why? It's always you—no, I'm sorry, oh no, oh god. I'm sorry—I didn't mean—I didn't want to! It's not my fault! Don't blame me! I didn't want to!"

She was trembling.

And crying. Blood pulsed about his ankles. Everything was red. Red red red and sadsadsadsadSAD.

He wanted to hit her.

"Fight BACK, damn you, why won't you fight back?"

This was hopeless. Madness. It couldn't be real.

It was a crime against nature.

It upset the synchronicity.

A pathetic fallacy.

"It's not my fault—I loved you, don't you understand? I loved YOU! WHY DID YOU DO THIS? I LOVED YOU, can't you see?"

Should I be condemned?

"I h-hate y-you-ou."

What's this?

This sensation on his face?

Tears.

"NO! NO NO NO NO NO! PLEASE, NO!"

Don't you dare.

Don't you dare lead where I can't go, not with these eyes of mine.

He'd been the Perfect Monster.

She'd completed him on the other side of the mirror.

He hadn't actually believed it was possible.

Merely a hypothetical, albeit awkward and a bit random, exchange of conversation. A tête-à-tête that maybe wasn't composed of a typical subject, but still just meaningless banter. Nothing that meaning could ever be applied to. Alternatively, that it was applicable to them. It was a talk you had from a distance, perhaps with indirect involvement.

She'd started it with a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-sister-of-a-neighbour-type alibi, though. The result had been calculable. Impossible fundamentally; but he'd forgotten to remove himself from the equation.

"What are the chances of success?"

"Define 'success'?"

"A long-term attainment. More or less an ultimate goal."

"Hmm, well I'd have ta' say slim, right, because most people don't reach that endpoint, right? They get distracted or give up."

"But when you get there, it's like nobody can touch you?"

"Yeah, well, it's like you're the first runner to cross a finish line, but all the other competitors think you cheated. Everyone always wants to take it away from you—or is that just a selfish view?"

"No, it sounds reasonable. But if you did cheat, would you still consider yourself successful?"

"I guess if you got there. You're asking if the ends justify the means, and that's subjective."

"Hmm..."

"Were you hoping for a better answer?"

"No, I'm just thinking."

"Trying to fill up time, right?"

"Exactly, nyahahahahaha!"

"It's getting late. Hopefully we'll be finished soon."

It really had been pointless. Without objective. That should have put him on high alert because it hadn't been a 'blah-blah-blah-then-blah' friendly exchange, a smug bout of bickering even. It had just been nothing. About nothing. Like she was confirming items on a nonexistent checklist with the boxes filled in, or correcting a test with all the right answers. She actually had been filling up time.

She'd already been looking through him. Looking at that mirror, at that easy-go-lucky water enigma of a reflection.

"Red is such a lovely colour on you—you should wear it more often."

It was like he'd been a shadow catching up to his own body. Everything seemed preordained; on rerun; he'd done it all before.

"Have you ever thought about being drunk?"

"Eh?"

"When you're drunk, what do you think? I mean, what do you think about yourself?"

"...that I'm being 'abnormal'."

"You don't think of you intoxicated as your actual self? Who you really are?"

"No, I'm under an influence, it can't be me."

"It's not about being wasted it`s about release. But just because you`re not in control doesn`t mean it`s not you. Perhaps the 'influence' is just revealing you, to a certain extent."

"Basically you`re asking if the true me is my intoxicated self or my conscious self?"

"I don't know. I`m speaking nonsense."

They were human beings. They were constantly under influence, volatile locomotives of flesh fuelled by emotions. She'd asked unanswerable questions. Questions with such controversial grey area diverging black and white.

"What do you think of the Heart as?"

"..."

In reality, it's our definition.

The sway to our influence.

The anchor to our goal.

"A privileged joke."

Rayleigh always had a fondness for children.

Horrified something awful by a revelation of her inability to produce such innocuous life, she'd resolved herself. No more trying. Naturally she'd been upset. A longing heart had a way of making everything feel empty, but she'd forced that urge to sleep. It wasn't just that she was gay. She had a physical debilitation. So there was no possibility. Especially since the consequences of her partner trying weren't worth it. Shalua could not support human life.

Signing onto the STRIFE Project had been her escape method. Motherless children. A childless mother. A complementation of each others' absences. She would be strong enough to resist maternity. She promised Shalua that...that...

That rich intoxicant.

That penetrating blue.

Those gorgeous sapphire resplendent eyes. She should have known the dangers. What an irony—or maybe it was just her sexist perception—to be a female masochist. That gaze morphed into a thrill, her drug, her dosage of a taste of almost. Shalua had pretty, round blue eyes. Rayleigh's own hair was blonde. So what if his eyes were deeper and head more fair a flaxen. He was close enough to a replacement, and for Rayleigh's secret covet, he would do.

Author's Note: This chapter doesn't actually end here. I'm just posting this to get a feel for it. So if anybody is reading, please give a shout. Mostly I'm annoyed at the amount of Cloud/Leon, fundamentally different from Leon/Cloud. Not that Cloud can't top. Absolutely, he can. Read Tease by Soyna lately? Cloud can top. But he's not dominant. Sorry, why am I ranting?

I have rudimentary French skills. But i really think it'll be cool to post the Chapter Titles in French. So I will, even if i horribly mess up on the grammar.

Like how everyone keeps saying 'Eclair' means 'Lightning' in French. But it's actually more specific than that-it means 'Lightning Flash'. Sort of, in reference to... See? French is picky. The verbs are so hard too.

Please let me know how you're liking the introduction to "Bird in an Open Cage".