Genesis met Hawke outside Shinra HQ.

She had suggested they do something a little more adventurous than visiting a Museum and he had just the thing.

She wore full armour, with her bladed staff strapped to her back and spiked gauntlet on her right arm. She was looking up at the towering skyscraper when he found her.

"Impressive, no?" he asked.

She grinned. "It's the ugliest thing I've ever seen."

"It is, isn't it?" He looked up at the bulbous monument to greed for a moment. "Shall we go inside?"

"Will they let me back out again afterwards?"

"You'll be safe with me," he said, his hand over his heart.

She flashed a toothy grin. "Lead on then."

He led the way back in and up to a level civilians and non-employees were strictly prohibited from. The Director would sigh and give him a slap on the wrist later. Hawke lifted her chin and fixed her fringe in the reflection of the 'SOLDIERS ONLY' sign.

He opened a door for her to a large metal room with nothing in it.

She looked around, a scarred eyebrow raised.

"Well," she drawled. "I'm simply gobsmacked."

"Give it a moment," he replied, pulling out his phone. He tapped into the VR room's controls and selected the jungle setting.

With a snap thick green foliage replaced the plain metal, the harsh white lighting turned to dappled sunlight falling through the canopy and damp and spongy moss appeared underfoot.

Hawke yelped and jumped at the change.

Genesis threw his head back and laughed. She looked around, flustered and wide eyed. He hadn't dared to hope it would work quite so well. After all the rude and unexplained surprises she threw at him in the Fade it was a sweet, sweet victory and he savoured it.

She relaxed at his laughter, her hand falling from her staff.

"Alright, that was pretty good," she said, a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. She tugged on a thick green vine and watched the movement shake back up to tree. "It's like the Fade but..." She swatted a hand through the air. "It's not magic. Fascinating."

Genesis recollected himself with a satisfied sigh.

Hawke spun around, her eyes still wide to take everything in. She zapped the air a couple of times to check he couldn't guess what. She kicked some shrubs and waved her arms in the air some more.

What tremendous range she was capable of, from a grim, arcane woman hunted by the gods themselves, to a laughing, whimsical dumbass. It was devastating how endearing she was. He took a surreptitious photo on his phone.

He tapped on the controls again and summoned a mid-level monster.

She moved from flailing into a combat roll without hesitation. The beast's claws sliced through the air where she had been. She leaped back to her feet behind it. She flicked her hand, lightning flashed, and the beast collapsed with the smell of burnt fur.

She drew her staff and flashed a smile. Genesis tossed his hair back and drew his sword.

The enemies came in waves. It was a training simulation that started slow, barely a warm up to him, but would escalate endlessly. What he really wanted was to see what she was capable of. She was obviously magically powerful and he had briefly seen her fight before, but for all her magic she was not enhanced. He had no information on what combat looked like on Thedas, how dangerous its monsters were or how thorough their martial training. He hung back and let her take the lead.

They fell into an easy rhythm, stalking through the jungle. She obligingly let him have every other monster and felled her own with just one blow more often than not.

"If I set off an explosion will it break the illusion?" she asked quietly, her eyes roaming the surroundings. "Will it tear through the walls?"

He shook his head. "We use these rooms for materia training. They're designed to take damage." He smirked and spoke just loud enough to draw the attention of a feline monster slinking through the nearby underbrush. "If you think you can destroy the illusion, you are welcome to try."

She gave a crooked smile and sauntered on. The feline monster leapt out at them. She swung her staff straight into its chest, then slammed it onto the ground. He frowned. She was adept at physical combat for the unenhanced, but for all her talk of explosions she hadn't fired off a single spell since the opening volley.

The flicking tail of another beast appeared in the brush. He gestured for her to take it, but she held up a hand.

"Oh, I couldn't possibly, it's all yours," she said, like it was the last cracker on a cheese board.

He threw a fireball with a graceful flick of his wrist. She watched his technique with sharp eyes.

"There's actually something of a stigma against this sort of thing where I'm from," she said, looking at the burning mess. It faded away a moment later. The system didn't bother simulating dead bodies.

"Against hunting?" he asked.

"Magic." She swung her staff and set off back into the jungle. "Technically, it's illegal. And blasphemous."

"Why should using magic be illegal?" What nonsense. The more he heard of Thedas the less he understood her desire to return to it.

"Having it is the illegal part," she replied with a crooked smile. "'Magic exists to serve man and never rule over him,' so sayeth the Chant of Light, and thus mages are kept under lock and key by divine order." She hauled herself up onto a giant fallen log. It was taller than she was and covered in moss.

He leapt up after her. "How did you escape?" A pack of giant spiders was slowly following them through the trees, if they stood still they would close in. The difficulty was about to spike.

"Heh, I was never caught. I'm the archetypical wicked apostate, I'll have you know. Damned by the Maker himself, a prowling wolf amidst the sheep, a scourge upon society, a terror to children, and so on, and so on."

She said it like it was nothing. She flicked her hair out of her eyes and surveyed the surroundings. The nearest spider hung from a silk line over the other end of the log. The slender legs of others tapped along tree branches and peaked out amidst the foliage around them.

Genesis stared at Hawke in appalled silence. "You've been told your entire life that you're damned for the way you were born?"

She shrugged. "What do they know of magic, except that they don't have it?" She turned away, her voice losing volume. "Who are they to speak for the Maker?"

"My friend, do you fly now, to a world that abhors you and I?" he murmured.

"A little on the nose."

"This is why you're so set on hiding." he said, ignoring her. "Why you hold yourself back so much."

She chuckled, brazenly flipping a knife in her offhand. "Do I act like I'm holding back?"

"No, you act like all your confidence is just hot air and you're secretly harmless."

Her eyes widened and she fumbled. "Well don't just come out and say it!"

"It's a good act." He caught the knife. "But there is no one here to condemn you. You don't need to convince me you're not a dangerous mage."

She studied him, her expression turning hard and unreadable. "I am a dangerous mage."

"I know." He flipped the knife and offered her the handle. "I wouldn't have brought you here if I didn't think you could keep up." The nearest spider set a sticky leg on the side of the log.

"Keep up? With your materia?" She took her weapon back. A smirk tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Genesis, I had no idea you were considering a career in comedy."

"Show me what you can do, then."

She spun the knife around her fingers, tossed it up into a spin and caught it again. She stretched her arm and threw it into the body of the spider. Lightning exploded out of it, splitting into multiple bolts and leaping to new targets, where it split, leapt, and split again. The wave of power washed over the whole pack in the blink of an eye.

A dozen spiders fell from the trees. They sat twitching in the undergrowth. She flicked her hand and the knife leapt back into her hand.

"Your turn," she said.

He smirked and back flipped off the log. She laughed and followed him down.

The enemy level ramped up, in numbers and in difficulty. He stopped hanging back and Hawke tentatively began to cut loose.

"Is that what you call magic in Thedas?" he called, watching her summon a string of fireballs from the sky. "How charming."

"It's because this is so very challenging," she called back, with vexing calm. She hadn't taken a single hit yet. "No wonder you SOLDIERs are so dangerous."

He narrowed his eyes. She summoned grasping vines that latched onto a monster and pulled it down into the earth to suffocate.

"I should get the new recruits in here," he said, brushing a fallen leaf out of his hair. "They would find this interesting."

A dualhorn charged through the trees. He threw out a hand and knocked it over with the force of his lightning blast. A whispering green glyph rose up beneath it and then there was no dualhorn anymore, just a pile of whispering dust.

"Do you know why your Materia-free magic always misfires?" Hawke asked, bouncing lightly on her feet and waiting for the next opponent. There was no need to hunt anymore.

"It doesn't always," he replied, waspish. He raised his sword to a high guard.

"Yes, it does."

"Why then?"

Above the canopy a dragon roared. Hawke's expression turned delighted.

"If you can outdo me," she said, casting buffs on herself, "I'll tell you."

"Please," he drawled. "I have yet to see anything that rivals what I can do with Materia, why should I bother?"

The dragon crashed through the trees.

She showed him precisely why. She cast a glyph that looked similar to Apocalypse. It held the dragon in place and scorched it with electrical and entropic magic.

"Hang on, let's try that again," she said, rolling back and lifting her staff again. The spell recast, but this time with more entropy, swapping the electricity for ice, and at nearly twice the power. He leapt in to finish it off, a volley of comets descending from the heavens.

The dragon fell and the simulation immediately spawned another, bigger and stronger than the last. They stood in a flattened clearing now, and the fighting was messy and loud. He was slinging the kind of magic that he never got to use in his normal sparring, that Angeal would have called reckless and Sephiroth too indulgent, but here it was just for the sake of it. It was glorious. The both of them were slamming back ethers and he was casting from that heart-pounding place just above empty, where every spell was high risk.

With a cry he severed the beast's spine.

Two winged shadows appeared over the clearing.

Hawke laughed like a madman. She was moving with the eye blurring jitteriness of someone who had learned to stack speed spells. He had no idea what she was casting anymore but she grinned wickedly and her hair floated in the tides of magic pouring off her. She was scratched and bleeding and didn't seem to care. What else could she do? How far could she go? What would she look like at her wildest, most powerful?

"Is that all you've got?" she called out.

He barked a laugh. "Why, are you falling behind?" Planet, he couldn't remember the last time training had been so much fun.

He charged the fire enchantments on his blade.

She swung her staff and runic glyphs lit up the battlefield.

Two dragons crashed upon them.

Chaos reigned. One dragon breathed fire and the other ice. The clearing was awash in magic: shields, blasts, rays, and glyphs. Scaly limbs clawed and stabbed and massive jaws chomped, narrowly missing them. He was drunk on it, and Hawke was too. She fought without reserve, in a savage revelry of her own strength. It was breathtaking.

The room glitched. Jagged pixels tore through the surroundings.

Sparks popped from four walls and the VR collapsed under too much pressure. The simulated dragon beneath Hawke disappeared and she landed with a thud on a hard metal floor.

He lowered his sword, breathing hard. His side ached.

"Oh, that's right," Hawke said, her cheeks red from exertion. "I forgot." Her movements were still jerky with an irresponsible number of buffs. She deactivated them and slammed back into her normal self with a gasp.

"It seems I underestimated you, Hawke." By a significant margin.

The room continued to spark around them, not merely deactivated but fully blown. He had no idea which of them threw the final spell but she had pushed him further and further and kept up blow for blow.

"Ah. Well." She scratched where her simulated injuries had been, turning sheepish.

He sheathed his sword and held out a hand. She let him pull her to her feet.

"I probably shouldn't have done that," she said, glancing around them.

"Why not?" The director would not be impressed, but the consequences would be mild and solely his.

She bit her lip. The wildness hadn't fully left her eyes, but now it looked jumpy. "Cameras?"

He shook his head. "I turned them off before we started."

"Oh. Thanks." She shook herself and squared her shoulders. There was a giant scorch mark on the upper half of the back wall that she avoided looking at. "It's not that big a deal anyway. I doubt anyone would think much of it."

Of an unenhanced civilian hurling magic to rival his? They would most certainly think something of it. He could see her instincts to hide and make small of herself rising again. He didn't like it, she ought to be able to stand tall and unashamed, but he understood the necessity now. Shinra only had one response to power that wasn't theirs.

"Who would care enough to even look?" he said, offhanded and casual.

Her shoulders relaxed slightly at his reassurance. "They'd assume you did it anyway."

"It wouldn't be the first time I've destroyed a training room." Just the first time he'd done it with anyone besides Angeal and Sephiroth. He clapped his hands together. "Lunch?"


Hawke wasn't sure what she had expected when Genesis said to wear her armour and meet him at Shinra HQ. It certainly had not been to get the most exhausting and exhilarating workout she'd had since Kirkwall.

She understood the fuss about SOLDEIRs now. She had thought they might have had a Qunari's strength, or maybe even as much as Fenris with his lyrium enhancements. There was no comparison. Genesis was stronger than a dragon.

He took a direct hit from its claws once and just walked it off. Without even trying, he was faster than her when she had more speed spells stacked on herself than the human body could strictly handle. She didn't understand how anyone could believe they were injected with nothing more than Mako. It was absurd.

The only area of combat he wasn't wildly overpowered was magic. He was still very good, with respectable reserves, just shackled to the limitations of materia. She could only imagine what absurdities he would be capable of when he weedled the techniques of actual magic out of her.

She spent the rest of the afternoon pale from magical overexertion. Her mana channels still ached the day after when she met Reno at the pub.

They were at the Duck and Cover that night. The name was curiously inaccurate, it catered to more dangerous individuals than the surly drunks of the Fat Chocobo, and as a result only rarely descended to fisticuffs. It was less seedy, more illegal, and the clientele firmly believed in minding their own business.

More importantly, it had a snooker table. Neither she nor Reno understood the rules of the game, except for 'knock ball off table with stick' and 'be fancy about it', at which they both excelled.

Hawke was lining up a trick shot and feeling pretty good about her chances. Reno leaned forward on his elbows against the other end of the table, picking from a bucket of hot chips.

"Didn't know you liked red heads," he commented. He was looking especially greasy today.

She took the shot. The cue ball jumped the first ball and bumped into the one after, rolling it towards the pocket. It stopped right on the edge. She swore.

"You think I put up with you for your conversation?" she replied, sulking.

He leered. "That what you and Rhapsodos were doing in the VR room? Making conversation?"

He lifted his cue and took the easy shot. She stole one of his fries. Genesis had said he cut the cameras. That didn't mean nobody could have seen her going in, or that they wouldn't want to know why.

"Of course," she said, letting her most self-satisfied grin stretch across her face. "He has such a clever tongue." Genesis probably wouldn't mind the insinuation.

Reno made a face. "I didn't ask."

She laughed and rounded the table, looking for her next shot. "Yes, you did. And you're going to ask again. Or are you going to dance around it all night and miss half your shots to soften me up first?" She took aim and sunk two balls handily. "You can just hand me all your gil now and save us the bother."

"Touchy."

"Nosey," she replied, leaning against the cue against her shoulder.

"It's my job to be nosy." He lined up a shot, slow and focused. "Thing is, if he just wanted kinky VR shit he's rich enough to get it somewhere specialised. And you're too shy to act out in public like that."

She snorted, little alarm bells chiming in her head. "I can't remember the last time someone accused me of being shy."

"Shy. Private. Shifty. Cowardly." He shrugged. "Pick one."

"Hn." She picked up his beer and poured it into his bucket of fries.

He scowled and stood, not taking the shot.

She leaned back against the side of the table, tapping her cue against her shoulder. "So what's your point?"

He walked slowly around the table, hunting for opportunities.

"What's so interesting about some nothing cabbage vendor that made a SOLDIER go through all the hassle of taking you up to the First Class training sim, cutting the cameras, and frying the room?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Take a guess. Hint: it's dumber than you think."

His leering smile dropped. "I think it's pretty fucking dumb already."

She paused. He came to a stop next to her and adopted the same pose, leaning against the table and slightly too close for comfort. She refused to react. What did he know? What was he trying to learn? Was it about her or was it about Genesis?

She looked around the room. It was impossible to see who was sitting in the high-backed booths, or how many people were hiding in the back rooms. She didn't know this place that well or any of the staff, likely why Reno suggested they come here.

"Do you know why we watch the flower girl?" he asked, his tone troublingly friendly.

Her eyes narrowed. "For her excellent gardening skills."

"Yeah. A one of a kind gardener." He leaned back with his elbows on the table, casual and unguarded. "'Course, if she wasn't one of a kind, that'd be different. We might not be as careful if we had a spare lying around."

Decades old caution and resentment joined her alarm, settling in her stomach like a brick. A Templar was questioning her about mages. She knew how that worked.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Good. Keep not knowing." He picked up her beer and took a swig.

She crossed her arms. That wasn't enough. Was he making the accusation because he knew or because he suspected and wanted her to confirm? Her knowing about Aerith's power wasn't damning.

"You're wrong by the way," she said, light and indifferent. She turned and looked back at the spread on the table's felt.

"Doesn't matter. It'd look good on a report and it'd keep the security budget down."

She nodded.

"How do you know Rhapsodos?" he asked, when she didn't say anything. "What am I gonna put on my report?"

"I met him during the ceasefire," she said, with a shrug. The best lies were just the truth misrepresented. "Bumped into him again a couple of weeks back. We went to the museum last week, then yesterday he got to show off and I got to have a little fun on Shinra's dime." She raised an eyebrow at him. "What mystery are you trying to solve?"

He had a damn good poker face.

"Something doesn't add up," he said like it was a threat and she had better start talking.

She let her head roll on its side to look at him. She grabbed the number 8 ball and put it in the nearest pocket.

"Depends on how you phrase the report, doesn't it?"

Reno watched her with calculating eyes. Then he scoffed, smiled, and he went looking for the next shot.


Reno's warnings left Hawke jumpy. She wanted to go check on Aerith but didn't dare risk it. She was going to be watched for the next couple of days, she assumed, in case she outed herself and anyone she spilled her heart to. So she went home.

She took no detours, walked at a relaxed pace, and said nothing of note to anyone. She behaved exactly as she normally would. She might not add up, but that was still fine so long as they could imagine the missing pieces to be something they understood and controlled.

She sent Genesis a text.

'The turks wanted to know what we got up to in the VR room.'

He replied immediately. 'What did you tell them?'

'The truth, of course,' she sent, followed by a picture of an eggplant and several emojis of water droplets.

He replied with a winking face and she breathed out a sigh of relief. He flirted openly enough but she didn't want to use him as a cover without his knowing or being alright with it.

'Do you have much interaction with Turks?' he asked.

'On a daily basis,' she replied.

'Do you suppose they've hacked your phone?'

'Almost certainly.'

She hoped somewhere a Turk analyst was frowning at his screen.

Genesis had the sense not to enquire further and they left it at that.

There was nothing more to be done. She couldn't think of anything to send to Aerith that wouldn't be remembered and utilized by the Turks. She went to bed, an obedient Midgar citizen under Shinra surveillance.

She sat up in the Fade and set off immediately for Aerith's house.

She doubted anything had happened, but it had been a couple of days. She needed to reassure herself that she hadn't put Aerith in harm's way with her recklessness. That Aerith hadn't been threatened and squeezed for information in turn. Maybe they could talk about overthrowing Shinra some more.

The Gainsborough house was empty, so she set off for the church. It was always easy to find.

She approached and marched up the stairs with great confidence.

It wilted with every step. The stone church towered, flowers and light pouring from its windows.

The doors were shut.

Maybe she could just knock and head off if nobody replied. Maybe Aerith was wandering around the Cetra city; she should probably check there first.

She didn't move.

Aerith didn't really need her. She was a perfectly capable mage at this point, and more adept at handling the individual Turks than Hawke was. Hawke only drew attention and burned things down.

The Chantry doors remained shut.

What right did Hawke have to open them? She was just some damned apostate with nothing but failure in her wake, pretending she belonged. Did she really think she mattered?

Her shoulders sagged.

Aerith mattered. And Hawke needed to make sure she was alright. Damned imposter or not, that mattered.

She steeled herself and pushed the door open.

Flowers spilled out. It smelt like lilies. She sucked in a breath and stepped inside.

It welcomed her in.

It was nothing like a chantry indoors, there were no pews or smokey candles. It was awash with flowers and climbing vines: they lined the walls and trailed across the floor. The air was perfectly still, only a gentle looking spirit drifting through the rafters disturbing the beams of steady white light. If the physical version was haunting, this was engulfing.

Aerith knelt in the flower patch at the front.

Hawke drew closer, her voice failing her. Her previous mission fell from her mind.

Like a veil lifted, it was suddenly so very obvious that the lily patch was a grave.

"Why do you hate lilies?" Aerith asked, tending to her flowers. She refused to look up. "What happened to your mother?"

Hawke lowered her head. She let out a dusty old breath.

"She was murdered." It wasn't a struggle to say. No revelation she had been hiding from, it was knowledge that always sat near the surface.

Aerith's hands stilled in the earth.

"By a serial killer. An apostate. He was a necromancer trying to rebuild his dead wife, you see, and Mother… had a similar face. His calling card was a bouquet of lilies." Her shoulders sank. "Which I knew before he took her, because I'd been tracking him on and off for years. Thought I'd finished off him too, but I… I got the wrong guy."

Aerith looked up at her, horrified.

Hawke smiled sadly at the sea of blooms. She was helpless to look away.

"A trail of beautiful, fragile flowers all across the city, that ended in a vase on my kitchen table," she said, quiet and resigned.

"I'm so sorry."

"You know, beforehand, I would have said that lilies don't have any particular scent. But we live and learn. Most of us." She couldn't maintain her tragic smile. Her eyes dropped from the flower patch. "Eventually."

"I'm sorry, Hawke."

"Don't be. It's nobody's fault but mine."

"You didn't do it. It's not your fault."

Aerith stood. She looked like she wanted to say something, but couldn't get past opening her mouth and shaking her head.

"They really are such beautiful flowers," Hawke said. "I don't blame you for liking them."

"I buried mine. My..." Aerith's voice left her. She hiked her shoulders up and looked away from Hawke. "She's under the flowerbed. That's why it matters. That's why I keep them."

"Your birthmother?" Hawke carefully closed the distance between them.

Aerith's eyes didn't leave the lilies. She puffed a breath. When she finally spoke her voice came out numb and matter of fact. "Shinra killed her. We were escaping the labs. The Turks shot her leaving the building. She made it as far as the trains." She shook her head, still terribly calm. "I didn't know what to do. We went round and round the city loop. She got so cold."

"How old were you?"

"Four. Five?" Her numb exterior cracked. She forced a smile and a shrug. It looked weak and broken. "I don't really know how old I am now."

Hawke put a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Elmyra found us and brought us here." Aerith's shoulders trembled. "These are her flowers. My mother's."

"You've taken such good care of them."

"Have I?" Her face scrunched up. She sniffled. She tried to force that broken smile back on her face.

Hawke didn't know what else to say, for all her experience.

"Are there prayers for the dead here?" she asked.

"I don't know them." Aerith finally looked up at her. "Are there any back in, from…"

"Yes. Would you like me to?"

She nodded, her eyes glassy with unshed tears.

Hawke steeled herself and sank to her knees before the flowers. The lines of the Chant she'd said for her own mother came to mind. She would omit what wouldn't fit and fudge what wouldn't mean the same thing. She wasn't good at this, but better it be said clumsily then not at all. She couldn't not try. Trying was all they had. The words halted on the tip of her tongue nonetheless.

"What was her name?" Hawke asked.

Aerith closed her eyes. "Ifalna."

She sank to her knees next to her. The spirit drifted down from the rafters, a wispy and hooded spirit of Loss. It sat with them and it became easier. The grief was still monumental, and it was… alright.

"I have heard the sound, a song in the stillness. The echo of your voice, Ifalna, here where your memory will endure."

Beside her, Aerith finally broke.

"Though before me all is shadow, your memory shall be my guide. I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the beyond. There is no darkness in the planet's heart, and nothing has been wrought that shall be lost.

"Cross the veil with joy, my friend. The light shall lead you safely, through the paths of this world, and into the next. Rest at Gaia's side… and be at peace."

Aerith wept. Hawke put out an arm and they held each other in the pit of lilies. Loss sat with them until the weight of it eased.

"Do you think…" Aerith asked, hiccuping and messy. "Do you think she'd be proud?"

"Yes," Hawke replied fiercely, holding her tighter. "You survived. In the face of everything, you're still going." She pointed at the impossible wealth of flowers. "You've come so far."

Aerith sniffed and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "I have, haven't I?" She relaxed and pulled away, sitting up on her own strength again.

"Loss is still watching, isn't he?" she asked.

Hawke looked up. Loss was gone. A tall and serious spirit stood guard by the flowers, head bowed in honour of the grave.

"That," Hawke said, smiling, "is Pride."


A/N: Thank you for reading! Reviews and concrit are always welcome.

Next Time: Mirrors