Author's Notes:  See chapter one for disclaimer and explanation.

Separate Destinies

By Annie-chan

Chapter Three:  Revelation and Rejection

High up a colossal limestone cliff, a door opened.  A man walked out onto the wide ledge that served as his veranda.  The wind lifted his fine hair, making it dance in the swift breeze, swirling about his head and shoulders.  For a visitor, it would likely seem bitingly chilly, but he was used to it.  He had been living here for a good deal of his long life, after all.

On the natural balcony, there were two small tables and a few chairs around them, as well as a daybed and a bench nearer the edge.  The furniture was bolted down for when the wind became strong, as it often did at this elevation, but not by any physical means.  The magic that permeated everything in this enchanted world held them in place, moving only when someone wished to move them.  If the master of the house had wanted to, he could have had complete control over the environment in and around his dwelling, keeping it at a constant temperature, humidity, and wind speed.  He held the common belief, though, that life was better and more fun if one did not have control over everything, so he did not regulate the local climate.

There was no fence around the edge of the balcony, though they were at a vertigo-inducing height.  Even if one did fall, there was very little chance of him or her dying, unless they were unconscious.  The power of flight took care of that problem.

The man sat down on one of the chairs and looked out over the city.  Countless millennia ago, the area had been a flat plain with a large, swift river running through it.  Now, the river had carved out a canyon that averaged nine hundred feet wide and twenty-three hundred feet deep.  At the top, the river looked like one of the thin blue lines used to designate rivers on maps.  The visible parts of the "buildings" of the city were on ledges and in openings in the canyon walls, and their main bulk receded back into the cliffs as caverns and tunnels carved out of the living rock.  Some legends said that they were a spectacularly complex display of nature's wonders, while other legends said that they were the work of early rock-shapers making homes in a previously uninhabitable place, and still others claimed that they were dug out by some prehistoric, forgotten species of animal that no longer walked the planet.  Whatever the cause, the underground structures had been there for so long that their origins were beyond the memory of even the ancient, long-lived people that had ruled the One World for several ages.

The buildings' appearance from afar like giant eagles' nests gave the city its name:  Aerie.

As the man surveyed the city, the mystery of its origins was hardly on his mind.  He was waiting for a messenger from the Court of Reason, and had been waiting for a long time.  Over a week ago, he had gone to the Court and made his case, and they informed him they would make their decision in due time and let him know of the outcome.  "In due time" almost always seemed much longer than necessary.  Still, he was not one to urge haste on the judges that made up the Court.  They had more things to think about and discuss than his own problems, and demanding a quick decision could possibly cause them to refuse to even consider what he wanted judged.  Usually, it was not required to follow their advice, as one of the most highly prized values in the One World was free will, but what the man wanted was normally against about a dozen laws, and a request for an exception had to go through the Court of Reason.

Oh, how he hoped they would decide in his favor…

"Father?"

The man looked around to see his second child and only daughter.  She stood a little ways out the front door, her hair and skirts flowing gracefully to one side in the wind.

"Yes?" the man replied.

"Are you okay?" his daughter asked.  "You look awfully anxious."

"I'm fine," he answered.  "I'm just getting a little impatient to receive the Court's reply."

"Well, come inside," his daughter said.  "I hear the wind is supposed to pick up soon."

The man hesitated a moment, then sighed.  "All right.  It won't come any faster with me waiting out here, anyway."  He stood up and followed his daughter into the house.

He had just poured a cup of something warm to drink and sat down at the dining table, and his daughter had gone further into the house, when a brief sound of paper sliding against stone perked up his ears.  He looked over to the door and saw an envelope with the Court of Reason's seal on it.  A messenger had slipped it under the door.

Like a child receiving a present, he jumped up from the table and snatched the envelope from the floor, breaking the seal and pulling the letter out.  He read it three times before the realization that his request had been granted finally set in.

"Thank the powers!" he gasped in relief, feeling as if a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

"For what?" a voice said behind him.  His daughter and her brother had just emerged from the left hall.

"The Court has granted my request to let me bring Riku here to the One World," the man said.  "They said it was normally unheard of to bring someone from the Many Worlds here, but considering my connections to him, as well as the highly unusual circumstances, they have made an exception.  The only condition is that, soon after he's here, he must be brought before them for an assessment of whether or not he is qualified to join his peers in training."

"That's wonderful!" his daughter exclaimed.

"Have they ever allowed outsiders to be brought here before?" his son asked.  "It's usually just us going there, not them coming here."

"It's only been allowed once before, and it was when I was very young," the man replied.

"Are you leaving right away?" his daughter asked.

"Not right away, but soon," the man said.  "I can't just pop in and ask Riku to come with me.  It isn't every day you're asked to leave your childhood home and come to a completely new place.  I'll have to think of the best way to break it to him, and then give him ample time to think about it.  Besides, I'm a complete stranger to him.  He's never seen me before."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Riku, are you serious?!" Kairi nearly screeched, totally taken off guard by what she had just heard.

"Yes, I'm serious!" Riku responded, hurt by her reaction.  She seemed shocked and…upset.  "Kairi, I love you!"

Oh, thank God Sora isn't here, Kairi thought, though she wasn't exactly sure why she felt that way.

"I know this is sudden," Riku continued, quieter than before, "but I'm telling the truth.  I've had feelings like this for you for years."

"H-how many years…?" she ventured, half not wanting to know the answer.

"I first realized it when I was fourteen," he replied.  "I kept my mouth shut about it up until now, because I was too shy and embarrassed to admit it, regardless of my lack of shyness otherwise.  I just…I couldn't hide it anymore.  That's why I'm telling you now."

"Oh, Riku," she managed, "I don't know what to say…"

"Then, think about it," he said.  "Think about it, then come tell me when you've decided."

Before she could make a real response, Kairi gave a rapid nod and sped off, her mind whirling.  This was all so sudden!  She didn't know what to think!

She ran down the sandy beach of the Party Island, not sure where she was going, until she reached the small shack that led to the bridge that led to the roughly circular bit of land rising out of the water about twenty feet from shore.  The entrance to the secret place was near here, and it was the best place to go if she wanted to be alone.  Without another thought, she jumped up the small tiers of ground leading up to it, and crawled through the small opening to the tunnel.

As she walked slowly along the dimly lit corridor in the rock, Riku's I love you! kept echoing through her head.  He had just blurted it out after she had asked why he seemed so preoccupied.  She could recall very few shocks that had surprised her quite like this had.

She leaned against the permanently closed door and slid down to the dirt, sitting.  Riku loved her, that much was obvious, but what did she feel for Riku?  And, what about Sora?  What did she feel for Sora?  Even less certain, what did Sora feel for her?  Would it be possible for she and Riku to remain friends if she didn't return his feelings for him?  What if she and Sora paired up?  Would that be too much for Riku to tolerate?  Would they remain friends then?  Would Sora and Riku keep on their friendly rivalry, or would it turn into something much more serious?

These and so many other questions swirled around in her head for a long time.  It was all questions and no answers.  She felt just about ready to scream when her eyes landed on one of the many scribblings on the stones that made up the walls.  It was at least ten years old, and it had faded, but it was still easily seeable.  It was the crude representations of each other's heads in profile that she and Sora had scratched into the wall with sharp rocks.  Clearer and more recent were the star shapes of paopu fruit.  The picture showed her and Sora sharing the rare fruit, causing their destinies to be forever linked.

All other questions were still unanswered, but she knew for certain the answer to the questions of her feelings for Riku and Sora.  Riku was a dear friend of hers, but Sora was something special to her.  If she had to pick from the two of them, it would definitely be Sora.

She stood.  It would be cruel to keep Riku wondering, so she had to tell him now.  As hurt as he would be, and as much as she didn't want to give him her decision, it was better now than later.  She exited the secret place a few minutes later, anxious but resolved.

Kairi found Riku on the tiny circular islet, sitting on the edge next to the ladder, staring out at the flat horizon.

"Um, Riku?" she said.

"Yes?" he replied, his voice soft.

"I've thought about what you said, and…um…well…you see, it's like this…"  After several false starts, she finally took a deep breath and said it all very quickly.  "I'm sorry, but I don't feel the same!"

Riku was completely motionless and silent.

"You see, I—" Kairi started to continue, but stopped.  She was about to say what she felt for Sora, but couldn't.  She hadn't even told Sora about her feelings, and Riku's utter silence unnerved her.  "I-I'm sorry!" she sniffed, her eyes stinging, and ran off again, leaving Riku alone.

Back in the secret place, she cried for a long time, trying her hardest not to make too much noise.  She didn't want to alert anyone that may be passing by the entrance to the secret place.  Especially Sora.  Oh, God, please not Sora!

It wasn't fair!  They were all supposed to be best friends!  Yes, Sora and Riku often seemed more like competitors than actual friends, but they all cared very much about each other!  For all she knew, this was the end of their friendship as they knew it!

After finally being able to calm down, a sudden realization caused her to start crying again, perhaps even harder than before.  Riku had said that he had realized his feelings for her at fourteen, and he had been fifteen when all the trouble with the Heartless had started.  Sora and Riku had told her everything that had happened to them, and Riku's turning to darkness had been much more about helping her and getting her heart back than it had been revenge against Sora "abandoning" him.  He had allied himself with the Heartless, risked his own heart and soul, even let Ansem possess him, all for the possibility that it may retrieve her heart from wherever it had gone.  It had all been for her!

It seemed like hours before she finally crawled through the entrance again, her face dry but red, her eyes bleary from crying.  All she wanted to do right now was go home and take a nap, but who should she run into, but Sora.

"There you are, Kairi!" he said, walking over to her.  "Hey, you all right?  You look like you've been crying."

"I didn't sleep well last night," Kairi lied, not wanting Sora to know anything about what had recently transpired.

Sora looked at her for a second, as if he didn't believe her, but he didn't question her anymore.  Instead, he said, "You wanna go to the cove?  It's shadier over there on that side of the island."

Kairi slowly nodded.  She always relaxed there better than elsewhere on the Party Island.  Perhaps she could even take that nap she wanted by curling up in a grassy patch and drifting off.  She was silent as she walked there, yet smiled a thanks when Sora held the door through the rock wall open for her.

She looked around, and noted that she couldn't see anyone else there.  Looks like they were the only ones there—

A sudden flash of blinding white light filled her vision, making her squeak in surprise and cover her eyes.  Afterimage spots burned on her retinas, and a brief, scary suspicion that she may have lost her sight had pushed all other thoughts out of her head when she heard Sora gasp in shock beside her.  She lowered her hands, lifted her head, and blinked the afterimage away, allowing her to see again.

"Kairi, come on!" Sora exclaimed, grabbing her wrist and tugging her along.  "I've seen that before!  I know who's here!"  Kairi didn't resist, and they jumped across the rickety wooden platforms to the other side of the shallow water.  Just as they turned the corner, bringing the patch of palm trees into view, she saw someone she had definitely never seen before in her life.

A man stood about twenty feet away from them, half turned away, and he was looking around as if he was unfamiliar with the area.  He was dressed predominantly in black, red embellishments wandering this way and that over the leathery material.  His skin was pale, as pale as Riku's, and very soft looking silver hair cascaded in a smooth waterfall down his back, reaching almost down to the ground.  Even stranger than that was the seven-foot sword he had strapped to his back.  That had to be extremely difficult to use.  It was even longer than this man was tall!  Most unusual of all, however, was the single wing that was folded against the right side of his back.  The feathers were pitch-black along the top edge, and they gradually lightened until they shown a brilliant royal blue along the tip.

"Sephiroth!" Sora finally managed to say.

"You know this man?" Kairi asked.  She looked back at the new arrival when Sora quickly nodded.

"Sora," the one called Sephiroth said, briefly lowering his head in a slight bow.  "It's been four years, hasn't it?  Four of your years, anyway."

Eerie green eyes held Kairi's attention, and she wasn't sure if Sora answered or not.  Sephiroth's stare was almost unbearably intense, and there was something about those vertical slits for pupils that gave her a very uneasy feeling.  They seemed to emanate countless years of experience, sorrow, joy, anger, fear, power, and skill.  This man was more than what he seemed.  And, now that he was facing them directly, she noticed just how much he resembled—

"Riku!" Sora said, looking behind him.  Riku had entered the cove unnoticed, drawn by an irresistible urge to come.  He was walking slowly toward them, his eyes fixed on Sephiroth.

Riku felt strange.  A million things inside him demanded that he recognize this man, yet he knew he had never seen him before in his life.  Sephiroth turned his gaze toward him, and as soon as their eyes met, he suddenly knew.  Oh, God, he just knew

"Father…"

"WHAT?!" Sora cried, stunned.  "He's your—?!"

"Look at me, Sora," Sephiroth pointed out.  "Look how much we resemble each other.  I'm surprised you didn't suspect the first time you and I met."

"Yeah, but…" Sora began.

"You're not even human!" Riku burst out, pointing at Sephiroth's wing.  "You can't be my father!"

"Oh, can't I?" Sephiroth replied.  "Have you ever wondered why you're so much faster, stronger, and more skilled in combat than all the other kids?  Have you ever wondered why you have a glow shining from deep within your eyes?  Have you ever wondered why you recover from sickness and injury so much quicker than everyone else?  I don't deny that I am not human, but neither are you entirely.  You're the first known half-breed between my and your mother's peoples.  It was previously thought that the two species were incompatible reproductively."

Riku stared at Sephiroth in disbelief, then dropped his head enough to make his hair fall over his eyes, hiding his green irises.  "Sora, Kairi," he said, "please leave."

Sora was about to protest, but Kairi gave him a look that told him to grant Riku's request.  Silently, they quickly slipped out of the cove.

"Just what are you?" Riku asked, slowly approaching his supposed father.  His eyes were still mostly veiled by his hair.

"My people call themselves 'ylfen'," Sephiroth replied.  "It means 'winged ones'."

"I see," Riku said.  He was now right in front of Sephiroth.  "You really are my father, aren't you?"

Sephiroth nodded.  "Yes, I am."

Barely a second later, Riku's rock-hard fist connected with his jaw, making him stumble back and fall down to the sand.  The impact had been so hard that one of Sephiroth's first thoughts was that he was lucky he hadn't lost teeth to it.

"You…you…YOU!" the suddenly furious nineteen-year-old spat, speechless in his rage.

Sephiroth pushed himself up in a sitting position, but almost fell back again when Riku came down upon him, gripping his shirt tightly.

"Why?!" Riku shrieked.  "Why did you leave me with HER?!"  He gave Sephiroth a hard shake.

"Take it easy, Riku," Sephiroth said.  His voice was calm, but apprehension could be heard behind the tone.  "I never wanted to leave you."

"I don't care!" Riku roared, giving him another shake.  "WHY DID YOU DO IT?!"

Sephiroth winced, his ears ringing.  "She was going to kill you, Riku!"

Riku froze.  "What?"

Sephiroth sighed.  "You were completely unplanned, I admit.  Yes, the brief affair between your mother and I was poorly thought out and very unwise.  You have no idea how stupid I feel for letting myself get sucked into it, but at the time, I was desperate for companionship."

"Why?" Riku interrupted.  "How could you be that desperate?"

"I'd rather not get into that," Sephiroth replied.  "I'll tell you sometime, but not now.  Anyway, I knew it would most likely be a short acquaintance, I had thought little of any consequences like a child.  Like I said before, the humans and the ylfen had been thought reproductively incompatible, and though I knew human women had a much higher fertility rate than ylfe women, but I didn't know just how easy it was for a human woman to become pregnant.  The news that she was with child was the biggest shock of my life.  She found out I was not human and that you were on the way at about the same time.  She's a horrible xenophobe—"

"Yeah, don't I know…" Riku broke in.  He quieted down again when Sephiroth gave him a look.

"She's a horrible xenophobe," Sephiroth continued, "and the next time I saw her, she all but attacked me, screaming to keep away and never to touch her again.  I knew she didn't want a child, and I tried to reason with her to let me stick around at least until you were born.  I offered to take you away and relieve her of the burden of raising an unwanted baby.  She, however, came back at me with the threat to kill you if I ever came around again.  I finally did leave, and I had resolved never to let her see me again.  Leaving you to her mercies felt like ripping my own lungs out, but I was determined to wait her out.  I knew you would be an independent adult by now, and I could contact you without her knowing easier than if you were still in her care.  The fact that she's dead just makes this easier."

"She died just over a year ago!" Riku said.  "I've been an adult for longer than that, too!"

"I know," Sephiroth nodded, "but—"

"Why come back when I'm grown up, anyway?" Riku asked bitterly.  "I've lived eighteen years of hell because you couldn't find some way to get me away from her!  I've hated her all my life, and my feelings for you are just as bad!  I hate you!  What makes you think coming back after nineteen years will fix anything?!"

"Riku, nineteen years is little more than an eye-blink for the ylfen!" Sephiroth exclaimed, frustration showing in his eyes.  "You have centuries ahead of you!  You will heal!  After a time, your trials with her will feel like just a speck against the rest of your experiences!  I could have waited fifty years, and it would have made little to no difference!"

Riku blinked, stunned.  "Centuries?"

"Yes!  More like millennia!"

Riku was too shocked to speak for a moment.  "You…you're putting me on!"

"I am not!" Sephiroth sighed.  "How old do I look?"

Riku just took a guess.  "Um…thirty?"

"Think about that," Sephiroth said.  "That would have made me only eleven when you were born.  Now, look at my eyes.  Do they look like those of a thirty-year-old?"

"No," Riku admitted.  "They look much older."

"Right," Sephiroth nodded.  He leaned forward a little to emphasize his point.  "I am nearly seven thousand years old."

Riku's jaw dropped.  He couldn't believe it!

"If I had used my full power when fighting that friend of yours," Sephiroth explained, "there's no way he would have won.  He would have been a grease spot on the stadium floor."

Riku nodded slowly.

"There is a vast separation between your destiny and your friends'," the longhaired man continued.  "Theirs is to live a short while and die, hopefully making as much a difference in the world as they can.  Yours is to live on for many times their lifespan, and that alone will cause you to drift from them and become a total loner.  It's a terrible thing to happen, losing friends, and there's a solution for it."

"What is it?" Riku asked.

"Come with me," Sephiroth said.  "Come back with me.  Leave this dimension and live the rest of your life in your ancestral home."

"Dimension?!" Riku interrupted.

Sephiroth nodded.  "Yes, dimension.  You live on one of the Many Worlds, while I live on another plane called the One World."

"Oh…"  Riku didn't know what to say to that.

"I cannot tell you much, unless you agree to come," his father explained.  "Policy of the One World is to keep our existence mostly secret from the Many Worlds.  We'd rather exist to them just in legends and stories.  I can say that you are approaching the age where young ylfen begin training to hone their inborn powers.  You're showing enormous potential to be a warrior, and I can't imagine not letting you train along with your peers."

Riku stared at his father, his eyes showing mixed emotions.  Part of him was eager to follow Sephiroth and finally belong somewhere, but another part of him balked.  That part could not yet fathom living for thousands of years, and it was afraid.

"Either way you choose, you will still live for many, many human generations," Sephiroth said softly.  "If you go with me, you'll still have contact with the Many Worlds if you wish, but you'll live among people like you who will not die all too soon and leave you grieving and alone.  It will be much easier in the long run for you to come with me, but I will not force you."

Riku continued to stare at his father, utterly silent.

"Take your time to think about it," Sephiroth said.  "I know how hard it is to leave loved ones like Sora and Kairi."

Riku slowly stood, then turned around and bolted.  He yanked open the wooden door in the natural wall and fled through without bothering to slow down enough to close it.

Sephiroth watched him go, then sighed.  It may yet be a long and difficult road to redemption, and he just had to dig in and hold out as long as he could.

To be continued…

Author's Notes:  Man, that was a long dialogue sequence.  I've noticed that my chapters for this fic have been getting a little longer each time around.  I'll eventually go in the other direction, I imagine.  *looks at what she just typed*  Argh!  I have to stop obsessing over chapter length!  _;;  I always worry whether or not the chapters are all similar length, and I have to get it through my head that they don't have to be.  I've planned out what key events will happen when in the first eight or nine chapters of "Separate Destinies" (I've explained the title, now, I hope you've noticed), and some are bound to be longer or shorter than others.  I should forget about chapter length and just write my chapters.  *crosses fingers and hopes she does*  Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter!  I know Sephiroth being Riku's father isn't an entirely new concept, meaning it may not have been much of a surprise to find out who "the man" is, as well as finding out his connection to Riku, but I hope you all liked how I wrote the "mystery".  This is my first time writing something of that nature.  Let me know what you think in a review or an email to mangareader@hotmail.com, onegai shimasu!