Last chapter! Thank you all for reading! Please leave a review and tell me what you thought, it really makes my day!


Song: A Krishna - Claire de Lune ETHEREAL REMIX


She is gone. Jenova is spitting, seething and snarling. Not at the woman's absence, though.

He can feel it - the Planet is shrinking up underneath him, like the floor is being sucked away.

He dips into the Lifestream, and a wave of alarm grips him.

Where is it all?

It's still there, but so faintly, barely there.

Everything groans. Everything shakes.

'They're leaving! They're LEAVING!'

Jenova shrieks in his ear. He doesn't understand, until he sees the trickle of Lifestream beneath him vanish entirely, as though sucked away down a drain. He feels the pull on him, too. But he can resist its feeble tug. It doesn't want him. Not really. He manually follows the momentum until he stops himself to observe.

The Lifestream is gathering, pulling in on itself to swirl and coalesce into one behemoth shape of light and life.

Jenova's screams become panicked.

He silences her wailing with a growl.

She is not his mother. He knows this - has known it for some time. She is a tool, a means to an end. Her voice speaks to him and him alone, and he uses her likeness to suit his needs. Where knowledge once made him vulnerable to her, it now makes her bend to his will. His iron, indomitable will.

The Planet is evacuating, he realises. The Lifestream is preparing to eject, to sail the cosmos as was his wish.

He feels disgruntled, almost. He doesn't even try to go along with the stream, even at this knowledge. Jenova whimpers and writhes, pleading him to join them and fly.

He does not care, and blots her out.

Before he can will himself back to the strange kingdom of tainted power, a thought occurs.

The woman.

She is in that swirling monument, he is sure. She hasn't left before.

In that moment, he scowls.

He wills himself to join the Lifestream - though the energy bumps at him in a way that would have left enormous bruises on any physical form - to travel with its pull and follow its twisting currents to the looming shape ahead.

He plunges into the mass of energy and it feels like a waterfall meeting a river. Life swirls and writhes around him, both buzzing with excitement and screaming at his presence. He searches, sifting through the memories that brush against his will and leave traces of themselves.

She's not here.

He surges up, higher and higher into the beast.

And then he tastes it. A stain, scraping against him like grainy sand. There is a stain in this otherwise crystal pure Lifestream, and for once it isn't his.

The higher he pushes, the coarser it gets. The darker the stream runs. Soon it is dirty and black, almost like Geostigma, but not quite. Less of an infection, and more of a darkness.

He spins suddenly. A disturbance rips past him, a bright shining blue light, weaving and twisting. The taint reacts at once to its presence, surging into action and streaking after the blue light. It climbs, higher and higher into the darkened abyss above, until it stops, black threads twisting and coiling around it.

Something trying to escape, perhaps. Or someone trying to interfere. He understands that.

He does not, however, understand the sudden brilliant light, beyond the shining blue thing.

And then, just as suddenly, he is blinded. When he comprehends once more, both lights are gone. To where, he cannot tell, but he knows they are gone from the mass of life. There is no sharp tang like the little blue one left behind, and no warmth of the second.

He hovers and waits, contemplating on whether or not to stay or go.

He stays.


When the light returns soon after its disappearance, he watches. The blue and white come apart from the once brilliant singular glow they had been. He watches though it burns his senses. The darkness twists and binds, lashing around the two, holding them down. It stifles the light enough for him to perceive.

There she is.

The stain rubs against him angrily as he ploughs through it, diving toward the woman whose form is of the second burst of light. Before she can be completely swathed in darkness, he lashes out, slashing the tendrils at the proverbial roots. The darkness retreats skittishly at his unexpected assault and he sweeps her up, extending his power to bubble her and only her.

The rest can go.

Even the Remnants; he knows the Lifestream stole them. Even Za-

He stops himself. Nothing good has ever come of that name, of that boy.

He takes the woman and leaves. The sound of his exit is a sharp screech of grinding metal as he forces out of the Lifestream's current.


The outline of her corner has been swallowed up by the black sludge by the time they return. She will have to make a new one, he decides, and releases her from his power.

His will reforms into the figure he knows himself as. He does prefer this way of existing, unless it's called for him to play 'Mother'. And then he is invisible, a force of crushing ruin, a pressure on the lungs of those he manipulates and a flicker of green cat's eyes.

He turns to go. She is returned to her rightful place, and there she will stay. Even if the rest of the Planet will not.

"Sephiroth...?"

He stops and listens. She's already stirring.

He dissolves into the black tar around them, watching her from all around, hiding in plain sight.

Her waking is slow, but when she sees her surroundings, she sits up and leans on one hand.

"Sephiroth, are you..."

The words trail off as she looks around and the life in her eyes fades again, her head dipping down.

"...You're hiding from me." she states. "You don't even know me and you're-"

A sob chokes her, and she covers her mouth. It never makes it past her lips. She swallows it down, and tears are restrained.

"Sephiroth, I know you're here. I can feel you. Please...tell me why you pulled me from that place."

At once, his voice is all around her, rising from the black muck that seems to ooze perpetually over itself. She shakes.

"You don't belong there."

"I see. My sins...cannot be forgiven." she mumbles, lowering her head in resignation.

"You are not so important." he scoffs. She flinches, but does not protest.

"You have been touched by her."

Lucrecia thinks she might just scream if he continues talking about Jenova. She definitely will if he calls it his 'Mother'.

"I am her Chosen. As such, everything that was hers is mine."

His voice is prideful, and then spiteful.

"The puppets have already been claimed by that wretched woman."

Lucrecia looks up, not at any one particular place. She stands.

"They're planning to leave. If Omega leaves and takes the Lifestream with it, the Planet will die."

"That was inevitable." he responds blandly.

"And you along with it?"

"That won't happen." he almost chuckles.

"Tell me, woman," he asks, voice converging on a point on the muck behind her.

There's a faint sucking noise. She doesn't turn around. She doesn't want to see him rise from that, like she knows he must.

"Do you know why I was created?" His voice is hollow and echoing, speaking over the slurping as it fades.

She shakes her head.

'Liar!' Jenova hisses.

'Shut up!' Lucrecia mentally snarls back.

"Jenova herself speaks to you. You must know each other quite intimately."

Sephiroth's voice is whole and complete now. She still cannot turn to face him, even as she feels him nearing, knows that turning her back to him is dangerous, knows that even without Jenova stating the obvious, he knows she's lying.

His footsteps click - an artificial noise, and she wonders how long he must've heard the sound of his own boots on the tiled floors of the Shin-Ra building to recreate it so flawlessly, because it's so real.

A chill sweeps over her right shoulder at the same time he does. He's not looking at her until he has surpassed her and turned about-face.

"The reason why I was created," He speaks again and this time he's staring right at her, hawk-eyed and fixated. "Was because a fool thought Jenova was a Cetra."

Her face creases into a grimace despite her best efforts. Gast wasn't a fool so much as horribly misinformed.

"Shin-Ra tried to artificially recreate Ancients from its DNA." He purrs, but it's low and dangerous and he knows-

"I was created to find the Promised Land." His tone lifts, light as air, lilting and pleasant.

Lucrecia finally looks at him. There's pain in her eyes and a horrendous throbbing ache in her soul. He knows, he knows, he HAS TO KNOW.

He's smiling. It's cruel and thin and oh so not normal, but he's smiling and she's never seen him with anything but cold indifference or seething rage so she hangs onto it desperately.

His face falls flat once more.

"Let the vermin leave. Let them take the stench of Cetra and human filth with them. I will forge my own Lifestream. Those they have abandoned will be mine, and I will make the rest of this miserable speck mine."

He take half a step closer, dangerous, leaning on the leg he's extended. He's sizing her up, cutting her down, leering through her sad excuses to peel away the truth, and she doesn't think that's even his goal.

"This world is mine. Its people are mine."

Each sentence is punctuated by a step towards her and he prowls like a stalking cat, like a mo- She burns the word from her mind before the rest of the letters can follow.

By the time her mind is focused on him completely once more, he's already there, a hand around her throat and eyes boring down into her soul.

"You are mine." He's snarling and angry and she feels the tears in her eyes because it's worse than when she saw his face in the fires.

"You have been touched by her. Everything and everyone who was hers is mine."

Lucrecia wheezes as the pressure around her neck tightens. But she will not protest. She deserves it.

"So," his voice is suddenly pleasant, though his grip is still that of death, "No matter where you run, no matter what runnel of this life-stained pit of a Planet you hide in, I will drag you back."

His face twists again as he hisses, dragging her closer to loom furiously. His eyes are so thin and pale green, his brows so tense.

"I won't leave."

Her whisper gives him pause, and the look drains from his face, replaced by a terrifyingly bored one.

Lucrecia gasps, his fingers tightening further around her neck.

"What if I bruise you? Break you."

"I...won't leave!" she gasps

Her body hits the ground, and instinctively she sucks in air. It's rancid and reminds her of the disgusting taste she could never get out of her mouth almost thirty years ago.

Sephiroth's stare is unrepentant and unforgiving of her unseemly actions.

"What if I ignore you completely?"

Lucrecia forces herself to speak through an almost-crushed windpipe.

"I won't leave."

She shudders, a puff of air bursting from her lips as cold agony slides into her gut.

There's a sword in her liver. A long, perfect, slim silver sword. It catches her completely off guard. The Remnants never had weapons.

He would never allow them.

She shivers and fights not to curl in on herself.

"I-I won't leave!" she pushes, answering the unspoken question.

The sword slides out, and she presses her hand to the wound on instinct once again.

"What if I am disgusted by your very existence?"

His voice is smooth, calm as he crouches in front of her, hunched over his knees. Masamune is already dissolving in a rush of green smoke. Tears are burning in her eyes. Words are shaking in her mouth, dressed in blood.

"I won't leave!"

He reaches out a hand and runs his thumb along her lip. His glove is stained by blood and for a moment it captures his attention. Glimmering viper green eyes slide to her plain brown ones.

"And what if I leave? What if I abandon you to this wretched world?"

The droplets that fall from her eyes are ones he's seen many times, from both her and others. But the expression of pain on her face is one far greater, even than when he had stabbed her.

"Then...I will truly die."

When he leans forward and holds the side of her head in his hand, she suspects it might be to yank her hair or snap her neck. She's not scared of it. No, she feels it's a long time coming. She always thought Kadaj was so light in his temper tantrums, still a child in essence.

But when her son oh what has happened he's barely a man anymore leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to her forehead, the shaking that wracks her body stops.

"Good."

He whispers very softly, very calmly, and with almost a smile.

Pain vanishes from her body. Blood evaporates from her lips and from her middle. Her wound is gone.

The tears have not stopped by the time he sits back on the balls of his feet and tilts his head to watch her. There's a different look on his face, one that settles unnaturally, like a new pair of shoes, or an old t-shirt that's a size too small.

Lucrecia might be tempted to call it content.

He gets up, smoothly and with grace. He turns his back to her and walks. His gait is leisurely and effortless.

Lucrecia pulls herself upright and struggles after him. The trailing white robes of her skirt are nearly sucked under by bulging black tar until it shies away from the garments and waits for her to pass.

Her footsteps have no sound, make no click, but they echo his all the same.

He doesn't look behind to see her, to know she is following him, in-step but not daring to match stride. She knows better than to walk at his side. She is not his equal.

The hollow, twisting knot of anger, hate and apathy in his chest relaxes - just a tiny bit - for the first time in years.


"Do you miss them?"

Lucrecia turns her gaze down at the face of the man whose head sits in her lap. He's staring up at her. His eyes are calm and curious.

She tilts her head slightly, asking for elaboration.

"The puppets."

She lifts her eyes up, tipping her head the other way in thought.

"In a way." Lies have never gone over well with her dear, mad son. She's learned this over the time they've spent together in his black realm.

"Do you want more?"

She looks down at him sharply, eyes wide, startled by the question.

The answer is easy.

"No. I never wanted more."

She smiles, warmth spreading through her heart as she strokes his hair. He lets her.

"I just wanted you."

"Then...why do you miss them?"

There's a hint of jealousy in his tone.

She continues to lovingly stroke his hair.

"How could I not? They were facets of you, and for so long...they were the closest I ever got."

I've spent enough time missing you.

"Perhaps with time, they could have become more. They seemed to have the potential for individual growth." She says it as a concession, that she misses what might have been.

Sephiroth frowns delicately at that.

"Better the Cetra witch take them, then."

He knows how unreliable it is to have an almost clone of himself with enough personality to be individual.

He doesn't realise his hand is curled into a fist until she settles hers over it.

She doesn't tell him to stop thinking of the blonde not-really-SOLDIER who's thwarted him three times now. She knows that hate will cling forever, even when the man himself dies. She doesn't try to scrub it clean or tell him to 'be better than that'.

She understands. She accepts. And she loves him, with all her pitiable human heart.

'Ah,' he thinks, closing his eyes and relaxing against her, feeling her thumb run soothingly up and down his, even through the gloves, though really it's all so much like his own skin at this point, 'the truth of a mother's love is something beautiful indeed.'


It done!

This is really not my 'preferred' way of having Lucrecia and Sephiroth reunite, but everything else is heavily AU. This is probably the most realistic canon-compliant idea I've come up with. I also saw it as a chance to maybe have my own take on how Sephiroth would've seen the whole Omega/Deepground thing in DoC while he's presumably still floating around at the time. I can just jokingly see him sipping tea and looking at it all happening like 'You're leaving? Oh no. However will I cope.' *Goes back to reading his paper*

Hopefully it's clear that there's been a decent period of time between their DoC events and the last part, time for them to be comfortable around each other.

Aaaand I have no idea about that last line. It just popped out and I left it in cause I couldn't think of anything else to end it on. I like to think of it as he's a little bit more a peace with his actual mum taking care of him, and that he enjoys it.