A/N: Took me long enough, eh? Enjoy. :)

Disclaimer: FFVII is property of SquareEnix.

"When you long with all your heart for someone to love you, a madness grows there that shakes all sense from the trees and the water and the earth. And nothing lives for you, except the long deep bitter want. And this is what everyone feels from birth to death." –Denton Welch

Story's End

And so Aeris's memory of that night was mercifully erased, and she awoke the following day feeling refreshed and cheerful. The marks on her body were gone; the torn dress, vanished. The only detail that could be considered amiss was that Ifalna's material still hung around her throat, instead of being pinned in her hair. She wondered at it for a moment, then shook her head, smiled, and replaced it in her hair.

The next day a young man came to visit her, Zack. He asked are you alright, and what happened last night? She looked at him oddly. Nothing happened, silly! I stayed in. Another boring night.

Zack's very blue eyes darkened at that, but he said nothing. Aeris smiled at him sweetly, vacantly, even though he seemed confused about something.

They began seeing each other in secret. Zack could only visit her for small amounts of time; he seemed very afraid of his commanding officer for some reason that he was loathe to tell Aeris. Even so, they grew closer with the passing of every day. He would leave her notes on her windowsill, presents of flower seeds or jewelry in the mailbox.

But whenever Zack would ask her about that strange night, when she said she had done nothing but he knew that wasn't right, Aeris's eyes would take on a strange light and she would always respond with the same answer: "Nothing happened, silly!" Eventually, he gave up asking. Perhaps he was just being paranoid—it wasn't as if his memory was spotless either. But he thought it odd that after all of his insinuations, the General had left Aeris alone. Zack couldn't forget the memory of Sephiroth's eyes burning with that utterly alien combination of lust, anger, and hatred. It would stay with him for the rest of his life, lurking at the edges of his consciousness and making him wake up sweating in the middle of the night.

Sometimes Aeris, too, felt that something was strange. She felt a fog descend over her mind occasionally, when she felt the urge to sit on top of the Church's roof, or at times, when she kissed Zack. It scared her a little, this feeling of missing a piece of herself. Other times, she was overcome with a feeling of foreboding—as if her soul was waiting for something terrible to happen, just waiting.

The Planet assured her that everything was alright, that everything was taken care of.

A little wary nonetheless, Aeris took the Planet's word. It had never lied to her nor led her astray. Other than Zack and Elmyra, it was the one constant, the one thing she could depend on to be there for her when she was scared or alone.

Her life went on. Sephiroth did not bother her again. Occasionally she had disturbing dreams, where a devil of silver and black carried her away. The Planet always soothed her afterwards, sending her bright swirling colors. She couldn't help but wonder about her subconscious and what it was trying to tell her.

And even though he was many miles away from her when it happened, Aeris felt it keenly when Zack died. The terrible thing that her sub-consciousness anticipated had happened. That was the price, the repercussion she had been waiting for. Zack, her love, her life, murdered at the hands of the very man he served. And what had she, albeit unknowingly, traded his life for? Something she could not even remember. But that was how it had to be; that was the pact she had made with the Planet, though she retained no memory of it. Which, perhaps, made it easier for her.

The Planet had made it so Zack's life was forfeit; it was coincidence that Sephiroth, the man that had hurt her so badly she begged for forgetfulness, killed him. If Aeris had known that it was through her own wish that Zack was killed, she never could have lived with herself. So the Planet shielded her, never giving her the truth even if it could have provided closure for her.

Deeply hurt, a grieving Aeris kept on living, without even the solace of knowing she would see Zack again in the Promised Land. He was only human and would have been reborn twice over by the time she entered the plane of her people. The wound slowly healed over, but had scarred her heart for life.

The sutures were torn when she happened to bump into a man on the street with spiky golden hair and fragmented memories. Cloud Strife, though cold and confused, called forth the image of Zack in her mind, so much so that when he left Midgar she left with him–almost guaranteeing her eventual death at the hands of her old enemy.

She died peacefully, the same smile gracing her lips as when she had stepped onto the roof of the Church that night expecting to see Zack. She was not afraid; she went to her death gladly, knowing that she would be able to stop him once she reached the Lifestream. As always, in her quiet and unassuming way, she had known more than he, who had proclaimed to be a god.

They had sealed each others' fates from the moment they met. Like the eternal chase of the sun and the moon, one following another following another, they were destined to destroy each other. And he had made the first blow, setting all other things into irreversible motion. All because he had spotted her that day, a bright spot through the smog and grime of a city with the ability to draw anyone, even someone previously devoid of feeling anything, into her.

Do you see what you did? said the rational bit of Sephiroth left alive. Not only did you violate her, you were responsible for the death of her love. The price for her to forget your violence was his life—which you took.

She deserved it, of course. She, with her purity and goodness, had been anathema to him. He hated her and loved her for this, la masochist welcoming pain. He earned her scorn, didn't deserve anything else from such a kind soul. Sephiroth regretted nothing. To regret would be to admit wrongdoing, and to concede would be give in to weakness.

But still, there was one tiny question that nagged at him from a dark recess of his mind, that had sprung up as he remembered their meeting.

Could she have saved me? He asked the nothingness.

Yes, replied his soul sorrowfully. She could have cleansed the Jenova from you, freed you from the insanity that plagued your mind. She would have done so happily. She could have been your perfect compliment, the light to your dark. And you killed her.

I don't believe you, Sephiroth said, feeling the first vestiges of panic and guilt creep around his heart. Show me.

It did.

Images of Aeris tending to him, a bit fearfully at first but soon warming up and teasing him gently; her tentative attempts at getting him to talk; both of their feelings warming and coalescing into something scary and beautiful all at once. Images of light kisses on the mouth; a shared bed with rumpled sheets; two children, a boy and a girl, running into his open arms. And above all, the overwhelming, inexorable feeling of loving and having been loved in return.

Love. Not a weakening force like he'd thought but one that took someone and reworked him, made him better and stronger, capable of hanging onto life with a sick tenacity, of killing gods. With her as his support, he could have done great things; people could have looked up to him as a god, even if he wasn't one in form.

Mercilessly as blade, the images halted and he was left alone and cold in darkness once more. If he had had a tangible form, it would have been shaking. Having seen the happiness he could have attained, a long-abandoned part of Sephiroth awoke. The old chorus of how dare she how dare she was, remarkably, silent, leaving him to his own thoughts.

Why did I hate her? For her innocence, her existence outside the labs? He asked himself, the hatred and lust finally falling away, unable to shroud him anymore, revealing something far more real. The truth of his condition crashed into his soul without restraint—he was human, only humans could feel like this. For all of his misguided belief in the power of Jenova and his superiority, he was no better than any other human. No. I hated her because she refused to love me. I hated her because she made me feel, even if it was something base. I wanted to possess because she…she had captured me..

Sharp realization rocked him to his core. It was years later, of course, but the shock and pain of exactly what he had done—to her, to himself—was as strong as though it had only been yesterday that the sky fell around a church in the slums.

For the first and last time in his being's existence, drifting alone in the valley of the damned and without any hope of redemption, the mighty General Sephiroth cried.