Chapter XXVII

Kadaj

"Why can't you drop us by the dark spot?" Bergljot asked. They were strapped in, but Alpha was having trouble landing.

"I told you, I tried to get close to it, but for some reason I keep getting malfunction readings if I do. Ah-ha! Here's a place I can drop you. You'll have to walk a little way, but it's the closest I can get."

"Sephiroth, you sure you'll be okay?" Anselm asked. Sephiroth smiled and nodded.

"Of course. I'm the Great Sephiroth. I can get through anything," he reassured them with a thumbs-up.

"And your nightmares?" Gwandoya reminded him.

"I know they're not real. That's all I need."

"Alpha, take us down," Bergljot commanded. Alpha tipped the ship towards the planet. After a shaky entry, she touched down on the fog-covered ground. The others stood and prepared to leave, but she stopped them.

"Wear these. I want to know what's going on, too," Alpha said. She handed each of them a headset with a microphone.

"Right," Anselm agreed as they all put on the sets. Alpha put on another as they left.

"Bergljot? Anselm? Can all of you hear me?"

"I hear you," Bergljot confirmed.

"Gotcha," Anselm agreed.

"Loud and clear," Gwandoya spoke up.

"Yes," Sephiroth said. "Let's get moving."

"Wait, what's that?" Gwandoya said quietly. They heard a rustling by their feet. A large python with a Heartless symbol on the back of his head rose from the ground.

"Snake…" Alpha whispered. She was screaming the next moment. "Snake. Snake! SNAKE! Shit, I hate snakes!"

"At least you're in there instead of facing it," Anselm comforted her. "Sephiroth, what are you doing?"

"Taking it down!" he yelled as he ran towards the reptile. He leapt onto its back and dug his sword into the snake. It hissed angrily as the sword came out, covered in blood. In one swift movement, it turned, opened its mouth, and, as he tried to leap away, caught Sephiroth.

"NO! Sephiroth!" Bergljot screamed. Gwandoya looked in her direction questioningly as Sephiroth began to slip down the lizard's throat. "That damn snake ate him!" The three of them began to run towards it when a voice in their ears stopped them.

"Stop where you are! I'm okay!"

"Sephiroth?" Bergljot whispered. They stood still and watched the snake. It lunged suddenly and stopped just as quickly. It began to writhe in pain.

"Die, you son of a bitch," Sephiroth whispered. His sword was suddenly sticking through the lower jaw of the serpent. When the snake opened his mouth, Sephiroth was dragging the weapon along its mouth while he grabbed the forked tongue to keep from being swallowed. His friends were shocked at the slightly maniacal expression on his face. The two of them fell to the ground as Sephiroth stabbed his sword through the snake's head. He jumped off as the snake landed, and thus was smattered with blood. He stared at his friends. "This is not the first time I've fought a giant snake."

"You're a mess," Bergljot shook her head. His hair was stained red, as was his skin and armor.

"I'll be fine. I guess we've faced one person's nightmare. Who's the next contestant on 'Getting Your Ass Kicked By Sephiroth?'" he said, receiving a slight chuckle from the others. They began to walk towards the black area. When they had only gone one or two yards, the fog faded away. Behind it was…

"Milburga," Anselm whispered. They stared at the plants in the forest surrounding them, and, in the distance, there was a large city with skyscrapers that reached high into the sky. Without warning, Ansem came running up from the city.

"Get ready!" Bergljot yelled. Ansem approached her and began to swing his fist. She brought the blade up, thrust it onto his arm, and… it went through. "Huh?"

"He's not real," Sephiroth muttered. Ansem reached out towards him and punched, but the hand went right through his head. Ansem stared at them before tearing off past them.

"Why's he running?" Gwandoya asked. Ansem was staring at the sky.

"Look. There's a giant Heartless attacking the city."

The four of them watched as the large, winged Heartless tore down the buildings. Anselm began crying as the world went black and the fog returned. He sighed and turned away.

"That's what happened when he came back," Bergljot whispered. She tugged on Anselm's sleeve and made him continue the hike. Before they went much farther, Sephiroth froze.

"What's the matter?" Gwandoya inquired. Sephiroth stared into space.

"He knows I'm here."

"Who?" Bergljot pressed. Sephiroth shook his head and came out of his trance.

"Nobody important."

"It must be if you're so scared," Anselm pointed out. Sephiroth shook his head again and closed his eyes.

"Really, don't worry yourselves so," he insisted. They began to walk again, but Sephiroth yelled suddenly and bent over. "Leave me alone!"

"No, I don't think I will," said a voice. Bergljot and the others glanced around for the source while Sephiroth stood shakily.

"Who's there?" she called. Out of the fog ahead of them came a young man. He had a sword scabbard slung across his back and short silver hair that floated across his face. Over his clothes he wore a brown cloak, but his pants and boots were black. His hood was up, but his mouth was just visible. Sephiroth stared at that smiling face.

"What's wrong? Have you forgotten me already?"

"I don't know who you are," Sephiroth insisted shakily. The man laughed.

"You are a very bad liar."

"Please, leave us alone."

"Who said anything about the others?" he smiled. The man walked up behind Sephiroth and laid his hands on his shoulder. "All I want…" he whispered, leaning in closely to his ear, "…is you."

"Get away!" Sephiroth commanded. He turned around and swung his sword, but the boy was gone.

"Where is he?" Anselm asked. They stood silently before the man spoke again.

"You failed me, and you know it. I'm dead because of you."

"Shut up," he hissed quietly in reply.

"You never should have left me. I am gone now, and all because you never came back."

"No, shut up."

"You know deep down that everything I have gone through…"

"No."

"… Everything I have done…"

"Sephiroth?" Bergljot whispered.

"No."

"… It is all because you never returned to me those many years ago."

"No! Shut up! Leave me alone!" Sephiroth yelled. He began walking in circles, hand on the hilt of his sword and looking around quickly to locate the person.

"You can't escape your guilt!"

"No! No! No!" The demigod fell trembling to his knees, eyes shut and hands covering his ears, but nothing could block out the yelling of the child.

"You know what I speak is the truth!"

"Shut up! Shut up! No!"

"Now it is your turn to die! Now you will know what it's like to be killed because of someone you loved!" the voice screamed while Sephiroth yelled.

"No!"

"Die!"

"NO!"

"Sephiroth!" his friends yelled to him while they screamed at each other.

"Snap out of it!" Anselm begged.

"It's not real!" Gwandoya hollered. As he spoke, the other voice became silent, but Sephiroth remained on his knees. He muttered over and over.

"No… shut up… it's a lie… no…" he sobbed. Bergljot laid a hand upon his arm and he turned quickly. When he saw who was with him, he broke into tears again and turned away, a hand held gently over his mouth and his shoulders trembling.

"What is it? Who was that man?" Anselm asked soothingly. Sephiroth took a deep breath before answering.

"His name is Kadaj…" he muttered through his tears. He took another deep breath and ran his fingers through his bloody hair. "And… he is my son."

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"I never knew you had a son," Alpha said after an awkward silence. Sephiroth had been brought back to the ship and was now sitting in a chair in the cockpit. He shook and had his eyes shut tightly, his hands clasped together between his knees and his head bowed.

"A long, long time ago, yes."

"But when Bergljot was pregnant," Gwandoya began, "you said that you had never been around any other pregnant women."

"I was not with his mother when she carried him. I didn't even know he existed until he was six months old. At that age, his mother left him in my care as she was unable to provide for him."

"So, he's illegitimate?" Bergljot whispered. He nodded weakly in reply.

"Didn't your girlfriend die?" Gwandoya asked.

"His mother was not Kalliope. I was lonely one night about one or two years after her death and… let's just say things didn't go quite as planned with the woman I was sleeping with."

"What did he mean when he said you didn't come back to him?" Anselm inquired. Sephiroth glanced out the window.

"On my world, I was a general in the army. When Kadaj was about ten years old, I had to go on a mission to check out a Mako reactor. Monsters had been coming from them and terrorizing the town of Nibelheim."

"Mako?" Gwandoya repeated.

"On his world, it was the life blood of the planet. The soul, if you will. Man found out how to harness that power for electricity, weapons, and pretty much anything else that needed a lot of power to use," Alpha explained. They stared at her. "My ancestor, Cid, was from the same world."

"That's right," Sephiroth agreed. "Anyway, when I got to the reactor, I found a door in there with the name 'Jenova' written across it. I remembered that my mother's name was Jenova, so I began to wonder. Outside of the door were pods with humanoid creatures in them. One broke free while I was there, and I began to think, 'was this how I came to be? Was I created, and not born?' For the next three days, I sat in the basement of the mansion where we were staying and read every book down there. I found out that I was the Jenova Project. That's when I turned evil and the first time I died. I never went back to Midgar after that. Midgar was the largest city on our world, and also where Kadaj and I lived," he added.

"Sephiroth, I'm so sorry," Bergljot sighed. Sephiroth stood and, arms crossed, stood by the window.

"I... saw Kadaj two more times after I left. Five years later, I went back to Nibelheim in search of Jenova and the-" he stopped himself before he stared up at Bergljot. "You know what it is."

"The Black Materia," she whispered. Everyone else gasped.

"You're the master of Meteor?" Anselm said after a shocked silence.

"I guarantee, I have no intention of using it," he assured them. "Sometime during those five years, Kadaj went to the mansion himself, looking for me. He found me in the basement. I had no idea who he was at first. After I tried to kill him, he showed me this necklace," he said, holding up the one around his neck, "and I knew. I hugged him one more time and made him leave before Cloud came. I found out later that Kadaj had followed Cloud while he chased me down and was there when he killed me once more.

"Two years later, he joined with two of my clones to bring me back. They succeeded, but the clones were killed. When they died, Kadaj and I ran as fast and as far as we could. Cloud eventually caught up to us. My son told me to run for it, that he would hold off Cloud. Before I could tell him that I would do no such thing, Cloud caught us and tried to kill Kadaj. They fought for a few minutes while I got rid of his girlfriend who had also attacked us. When she ran, I turned to find my son's sword being knocked from his hands to the ground. I watched as Kadaj was forced to his knees and Cloud sliced through his chest and threw him aside. I ran up and cut off Cloud's arm before running to my child. I was far too late. He might have lived, Cloud's attack didn't go very deep, but Kadaj had landed on his sword and it pierced his chest. I'll never forget his scream as I tried to pull it out and save him. He…" his voice cracked a moment as he remembered the painful event. "He died in my arms a minute later. I carried him to a small field where I buried him before turning my back on my home.

"I found a way to go to another world. I went to Hollow Bastion, but Cloud, Cid, and Yuffie followed me. Aeris was there, too. I had always thought that he had brought her back the same way I was given renewed life, but now I know that was not the case. When the world was destroyed by the ruler Ansem, I fled to a Coliseum. I was undefeated among all the fighters that came there. Sora fought me at least two dozen times and lost nearly every one. He beat me one time. The night after he did, Cloud showed up and we fought. I was on the edge of death, but instead of killing me, Cloud asked Cid to freeze me so that I might be revived someday when I would be more like I was before Nibelheim. Cid took me to another world, and now here I stand for all to see."

"Sephiroth, I think you should stay here," Bergljot whispered. He turned quickly to look at her. "Whatever this is that's causing our nightmares to manifest, it wants you especially to suffer. Please, stay here."

"This is the first time I've thought of Kadaj in ages. Even if this thing wants me to die, I don't want to be away from my son again. Maybe," he said quietly, eyes on the floor, "if I see him once more, even if it means fighting and killing him, I might find closure. That's something I have not found for any deaths I have witnessed or caused."

"There's no such thing as closure when it comes to the death of a loved one," Gwandoya whispered. "I'm the one here who has lost parents, a sister, a wife, and two children. I haven't found closure for any of them."

"I don't want to stay here alone," Sephiroth resisted.

"Sephiroth, I'll be here with you," Alpha reminded him.

"Look, as long as I am the Keyblade master, I am the leader of this group. As long as I am the leader of this group, you will do as I say. You are staying here, Sephiroth. That's that," Bergljot said forcefully.

"Very well," he replied quietly. He walked back to the bedroom. "I'll be sleeping if you need me."

"The rest of us will head out," Anselm commanded. The three of them left, Sephiroth watching them through the windows.

"Kadaj," he muttered to himself. He stretched out on the bed and waited. Alpha came in a few minutes later and asked if he was asleep. No answer. When she went into the adjoining bathroom, Sephiroth sat up and removed the headset. He slowly stood, wrote something on a sheet of paper, and walked out of the room.

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"Well, we couldn't get through," Bergljot moaned five hours after they left. She, Anselm, and Gwandoya walked onto the ship covered in cuts and bruises. "There were at least fifty Heartless waiting. There was no way we could get through."

"We have a problem," Alpha said shakily.

"What?" all three asked. Alpha produced a headset and a note from the chair next to her.

"Just after you left, I went into the bathroom. I thought he was asleep, but when I came out, this was all that was on the pillow. Bergljot, Sephiroth is gone."

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NM: Aw, a father and son reunite… how touching. Especially when the son wants the dad dead. Ahem. Okay, i have no clue whether Kadaj is Sephiroth's son or not. It makes sense (youngestclone being the groups leader) to me at least, but who knows until the movie comes out?Anyway, onto reviews:

Master of the Dark Trio: Yeah, I feel your pain. So if there ever comes a time again where I don't update for a month or more, just yell at me for all of those.

Mediciner: And what a lovely pose it is! Glad to have you back, and I'm glad you enjoyed the chapter (I thought it sucked, but since when do my opinions of my own stories count on this website?), and I can't wait to read what happens next in yours!

Merielle: Raj is a pretty evil son of a you-know-what. I actually have no idea when he's going to give up the twins or when they'll even meet again. Yes, the smile… Warp Gummi Installation: 65 Munny; Renatus Babysitting Renegade Business: 200 Munny; Envisioning Sephy-chan Grinning Like an Idiot: Priceless.

NM: Review, please!

NINJA MAGE