Disclaimer: Don't own any of the healing items/ summons/ jobs, those are Squaresofts. This is non-profit fun.

I am serpentine

Lost in this mad machine

Where oh where have we been

In this time, this time

It may seem obscene

Seems this one simple thing

To see it as its really been

In this time, this time

Do you know who you really are?

Can you bear to look this far?

If you thought, would you believe?

Your fear your gods retrieve

Do you know who really are?

~ Serpentine, Butterfly Messiah

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The snow had stopped falling, but the wind was blowing viciously cold; thinning the thick fog of dust that hung in the air. High in the sky covered partially by black clouds was the moon, it's silver light illuminating the rubble and gleaming off the spirals of twisted metal. It was quiet, save for the howling wind. Though the world below was frantic with sirens and panic-stricken folks, they could not be seen nor heard from that height. The ninety-ninth floor, the new top floor, was it's own little world. Separate from all logic, all the givens of reality, it was its own.

Somewhere amongst the gray hills of concrete, marble, and metal, a pebble rolls. One pebble becomes several, then grow larger until a large block of concrete falls down one of the small hill. A hand appears, resting limply for a moment then gripping the edge. Straining for every bit of strength, the hand pulls out its owner.

Bruised, broken, torn, blood matted in his white hair, dust caking his face. Barely clinging to consciousness, his body slid down the hill of its' own accord, stopping at the base, sprawled out on his stomach. His red eyes were half lidded and dazed while he laid there struggling to breathe. However, his energy began to return to him and sluggishly, bracing his arms first, he lifted himself to sit on his knees. The action left him light headed and he winced considerably at the immense pain in his right leg, brought on by the pressure of the rest of his body upon it. Suddenly his chest convulsed, irrupting in harsh coughing fit while he braced his palms against the debris beneath him. A metallic taste filled his mouth from the back of his throat and he sputtered out a viscous mixture of blood and saliva. Finished he heaved in a great inhale that hurt like hell and nearly sent him writhing again.

Ashen blinked his eyes clear of their blurred and teary state; gingerly the red orbs traced all that was surrounding him. Total devastation, nothing was recognizable. And yet he remembered them once being some of the most luxurious offices in all of Ghri; another ruined civilization.

"She's protecting you" His eyes opened to their fullest at the deep growling voice coming from the right, he slowly turned his eyes there but saw nothing.

"WHY-" It boomed on a warped wind and he whipped his head to the left, again nothing there. "is she always-" the voice seemed to come from every side and began to sound like that of a vicious mad man ending in a shrill hiss, "protecting you?" Ashen's whole body went stiff when he finally realized the voice was in his head, Odin was using the Ketsurui to converse as confusing as it was.

"II don't know who you're talking about," Ashen's voice cracked out the horse whisper into the wind.

"I-" The voice crawled in Ashen's brain with a malicious sneer becoming a snake-hissed whisper, "despise you."

The sound of metal rung in Ashen's ears briefly. His breath caught in his throat immediately, slowly he wretched his tense neck to lower his head. Looking at his torso with his large eyes full of shock, the tip of Odin's sword glaring back at him from his stomach dripping with blood, his blood.

The fullness of the pain finally hit as Ashen shuddered and choked a breath. His hands gripped the rubble weakly, his head fought between hanging and control. His eyes fluttered from the liquefying feeling consuming him from head to toe, his mind and hearing felt under water. Ramuh, I think I failed. He coughed up some blood. I'm dying The arms bracing Ashen gave out and his head fell limply against the ground.

Odin raised the skewered Ashen with the sword, all the way up so his body slid slightly down the blade. Ashen's head lolled back, his mouth open where scarcely a breath came to or from. His eyes were still open but seemed closed for his lashes obstructed them from being seen. Ashen could see Odin's face, his lips were moving but he could not hear what he was saying. Ashen read the lips as "Die."

Suddenly Ashen was weightless, freed from Odin's sword and sent airborne. Pass the hills of debris, over the side of the skyscraper. Downwards, gravity pushed him, though he was numb and could feel nothing. The wind left a shrill cry as he fell and his jacket whipped madly about him. He could see his blood flying upwards from his body, thinning from blobs to little specks. Each speck became an image of someone or something from his life before it left him.

All the orders he's followed.

Meth.

All the people he's slaughtered.

Tenth.

The villages he's destroyed.


Ramuh.

All his near death experiences.

Sesshin.

The chance he actually had at changing.

Kazu.

The fact that he ran away from it.

Nara.

The grief he felt and the joy.

Yukai.

And the woman who loved him despite everything.

Aleura

But he could only offer her death in return.

Voices of the past compounded his head in a great multitude, overlapping, warring for his attention.

"You're a weapon of mass destruction; an assassin specialized in genocide. They put you in class A because they don't like to say assassin; it's a very ugly and politically incorrect word."

"You could say that, but summoners don't exist anymore you took care of that, Oni."

"So what's it like to kill your own kind?"

"Why do you do this?"

"He's nothing but a demon like the rest of em!"

"If you really want to know. I am called Ramuh, the Good Elder."

"ONI! I will not let you kill anyone else! DO YOU HEAR ME, ONI?!"

"Well done Ashen! Look, Director Meth's giving you a reward, isn't that nice of him?"

"As of seven-thirty this evening, it has been decided that you are to be executed."

"They never really left you, not completely anyway."

"What happened today and your apparent inability to summon has endangered the financial security of this project. Your death is to save face."

"They've been watching you from afar, they like what they've seen."

"I trust you understand the importance of these orders, Ashen?"

"What gives you the right to thirst for death? When so many who deserved life died at your hands."

"I knewfrom the first moment I laid eyes on youyou would be the oneto end my life."

"Be the man I taught you to be! KILL ME!"

"You may call me Tenth."

"She did it because she cared; she wasn't about to let a single one of us be hurt. Including you, Ashen."

"You would have been proud of her AshenNo screaming at the pain. No pleading for her life."

"You lost someone you loved? So what! Who hasn't?! I've lost more to you in an hour then you will ever lose in your entire life! You have no right to mourn in such a pathetic manner!"

"I had to tell youmy opinion of youwhat I saw in your eyesit hasn't changed, despite what I've seenwhat you've done in the past. That's not you, it's what the Ghri made you do."

"I will always own you Ashen."

"They want you back. Your loss and the loss of the summoner race are the same. They burn with rage and thirst for revenge as you do. You are the only one who can help them quench this thirst."

"Everyone should have the chance to change for the better, I believe this, like I believe that inside you are a kind hearted person."

"You say you are not Oni this is your time to prove it. Which path will you decide?"

"I see kindness"

"Do you believe in irony?"

"That your cold exterior clouds the true nature within"

"Let me rephrase thatdo you believe in fate?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I've never introduced myself. My name's Aleura Goddhart, I'm the High Priestess of this monastery."

"That fate has an ironic sense of humor?"

"I fear thatI've fallen in love with you, Ashen"

In rapid succession more images from his life flashed before his eyes, memories locked away by time and one's subconscious, things people don't think they have the ability to remember but do. Needles, lab coats, electrodes, feeding tubes. Blood, rocks, dust covered grounds. Touch, soft hair, warmth. There was birth, there was life, and the light was so bright that it blocked out everything. And just when the scroll of image should have stopped, it continued. They were memories, someone else's. It was like was watching a play he had the script to.

Snow white hands cupping a dead humming bird.

A woman weeping.

"Why? Why does he do this? Why does everything have to die?!"

Blood stained iron plates of armor.

A wicked sadistic smile.

"Sufferboth of you."

Familiarity crowded Ashen at the sight of so many tears and some much blood, but it almost seemed natural like it happened everyday. A maddening cycle of hatred, violence, and grief where none of those involved could find a way out from.

"Aren't they beautiful?" A rare tender moment, "Wouldn't it be wonderful to be just like that? I wouldn't mind the brevity of it at alljust the chance to be so blissful like that."

"Would you give it all up, this existence, to live as one of them?" He asked, but it was not his voice.

More titanic clashes, more blood, more tears, they all shifted so quickly in Ashen's head that he could only catch glimpses. The cries and battle taunts cutting off one another as they leaped about in his ears.

"Do you think I'll just stand by and let you do this?!"

"Stop it, please?!"

"It's what we've decided and what will happen whether you like it or not."

"What WE'VE decided?! Oh I see, playing favorites are we? Or is it that you're both conspiring against me? Is that it my dearest sister? Conspiring against your only brother with this beast?!"

"W-What? I'm not conspiring against you, I would never do that! I swear it!"

"It's bad enough you were born, born to be my equal, born to limit me! But now you've taken to forming pacts with that beast, how dare you! Do I have to kill something else to make you be obedient? Something you hold so very dearmaybe those little summoner-humans, the ones you love so much, hmm?"

"You're hurting me, brother"

"ODIN!"

"Oh, did I incur your wrath by touching her? Or was it that I threatened your little gift to her?"

"You haven't begun to see my wrath, but you will I can promise you that."

"So be it, the only way you will ever get your wish is by ending this first!"

"No, no! Please don't fight?! He'll hurt you!"

"Protecting him? I see now where your loyalties lie, Asura."

"I don't want either of you hurt, please stop fighting?!"

"Stand down, Odin, you're beaten."

"Never!"

"NO!"

"Yield!"

"I WILL NOT YIELD TO YOU!"

"AH!"

"You've lost, give up. I won't say it again."

"I will never forgive either of youyou will never live in peace as long as I exist. I swear it so!"

"BAHAMUT!"

The scroll of images stopped and thena white light.

~***~

It wasn't warm, it wasn't cold. It felt like he was floating in water. He could hear a rhythmic thumping, at first he confused it for a tribal drum, but slowly came to the conclusion it was a heart beat. His eyes could see nothing but white and not a spacious white, white that felt six inches from his nose. He couldn't really move, but he felt he was naked because he couldn't feel any clothing on him yet he could feel something else wrapped about him. Not a blanket, not a cloak.

It shifted, the thing wrapped about him, it flexed like a muscle. Another noise intertwined with the thumping heartbeat, it sounded like a deep breath being taken in and exhaled through someone's nostrils. He knew he wasn't alone, but the sounds and feelings kept him at peace. Yes he was at peace now.

"We're the same, aren't we? My soul"

A large slit of a glowing red eye opened in response.

"Odin, Meth, Asura, Aleura, Bahamut, Ashenit was all the same thing, wasn't it?"

It shifted again, like a nod.

Ashen sighed and inclined his head slightly against the smooth leather skin.

"You must hate him just as much as I do then."

There was deep-throated growl emanating from the creature. Which caused Ashen to smile.

"Guess that's a yes."

It snorted as if annoyed. Ashen remained silent for a long while, the heartbeats changed, they grew much fainter.

"Do you want to end this? I'm tired of fighting. I want to rest."

The glowing red eye blinked.

"If you want to, you can take over from here?"

There was a nod and Ashen smiled

Outside, Ashen's body still fell. Sailing like a comet from the sky down the side of the black skyscraper. He was unconscious and was like a rag doll as the wind tore at him. However, his descent was halted long before it could ever hit the ground. White light, brilliant and seemingly coming from no where, swallowed him whole and vanished without a trace.

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AN: Well there you have it. If you didn't understand, you'll get it next chapter. Nothing more to say really. Love you all for reading, see ya next week!