Kali...

Who's there? Who's talking?

Kali, I'm here to help you.

Who are you? Where are you?

I'm right here, beside you.

But...there's no one there--

Open your eyes, Kali.

I thought my eyes were open.

Slowly, step by step. Take your time, okay?

Please, tell me who you are. I know you, I think...

Here, use this.

Use what?

The others are in trouble. You have to help them.

But I don't understand what's going on!

Caleb will be fine, Cloud's on his way.

How do you know--?

Use it, Kali. The others are depending on you.

Please! For godsakes, tell me who you are!

My name is...

Vincent Valentine cursed beneath his breath as he shuffled through his pockets and came out with only a single gun clip. "I'm out," he snapped as the huge green Hojo-monster loomed in closer to them. Nanaki snarled as he bumped into the wall, his ears flattening back on his angular head.

"This is it..."

"Any last words?" the dark-haired man rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, I wish Tifa were here," the animal glanced up at his companion. Vincent blanched, swallowed hard, then turned his dark eyes up to his fate.

"So do I."

Hojo roared and snapped his yellow fangs, bearing down on the two. They closed their eyes and turned their faces away.

Caleb and Ayden stood across from each other, Caleb slinking into the shadows of the hall, Ayden framed by the surreally-illuminated machinery on the altar behind her. He glanced down at his father's broadsword quickly. Four materias glimmered back at him: Phoenix, Contain, Ultima, and Double Cut. The other four were somewhere in the hall behind him. He slowly half-turned toward the darkness.

"Don't take your eyes off me, Caleb," he heard her call tauntingly. "You'll die."

Clink.

He crouched slowly, ever so slowly, keeping his orange eyes on her profile. His fingers skimmed along the stone floor until he found the orb and he clutched at it. Without looking, he slipped it into the sword.

"You may look like my mother," he said, standing quietly. "But there's something you didn't take into account."

She strode forward, clenching her fists threateningly: "And what is that?"

He planted his feet firmly and placed the blade between them.

"I never knew my mother."

The entire palace suddenly rocked with a huge, white explosion of light. Ayden lifted an arm to steady herself against the stone wall and Caleb rocked on his heels but did not waver otherwise. Something shrieked, a dying scream that echoed in the chambers and spiraled up toward the cieling. Ayden whirled around and shrieked back: "MASTER!"

Vincent and Nanaki slowly opened their eyes. They moved off the wall and came around to the sides of the lifeless heap that had once been a horrible mutation of a man. With its energy expended, the transformation reversed and the body shrank, morphing back into the small, scrawny mad scientist it had once been. He was breathing shallowly, just on the brink of death but still conscious, one glassy eye staring up at them through a spill of blood that was swelling from a cut on his forehead. His broken glasses lay in a mixture of mako and blood. Vincent nodded, loaded the cartridge of his Death Penalty, and lowered the barrel to the man's temple. Hojo drew in a raspy breath and smiled humorlessly up at the former Turk.

"Final...sweet revenge..." he coughed. "For...taking your woman... All those years ago..."

Vincent's eyes glazed over and Nanaki tensed instantly--if Vincent couldn't finish him, the creature would. Vincent closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again and cocked the hammer.

"Her name," he growled. "Is Lucrecia. And you killed her."

The gunshot echoed sharply in the chamber, the barking report trembling the very fibers of magic still hanging in the air. Caleb took Ayden's disbelieving gaze as an opportunity and scrambled back, his eyes picking out two of the remaining three missing orbs. He quickly rearranged them to the way they had been, and recognized the missing materia.

"The white materia," he verified out loud.

Experiment 819720 twitched but did not turn around to face him. Caleb looked past her shoulder and saw a woman descending from the sky. She was glowing white, and her hair waved wildly about her body as the power of the white orb at her chest encircled her. For a moment, Caleb saw the woman from the Sleeping Forest. His aunt, Aeris Gainsborough. Then, it was Angel, and she touched down on the platform, her hair calming, the glow fading, her eyes opening. She looked from Vincent, Nanaki, and the dead body on the ground, to the clone experiment in the hall. Her blue eyes flashed and the white glow returned.

"You," she hissed at the other woman. "Where is Caleb?" Ayden provided no answer, only stared in wide-eyed silence. Angel began to close the distance between them, and almost instantly, Caleb could feel the intensity of the power spilling out of her. He had to back away. "Where. Is. Caleb?" The marionette shook herself out of her daze and squared her shoulders.

"I don't know what that power is, little girl," she snapped, "but I will take it from you."

Angel's eyes shone white. "Where." Her hair began to lift in an invisible power stream. "Is." Her fists clenched and the undamaged arm blade slid itself from her gauntlet. "Caleb?"

Ayden finally took a step back. Caleb, despite the waves of power, made his way forward. He opened his mouth to speak when a hand clamped over his lips and another encircled his waist and yanked him back into the shadows. He tried to make a noise but someone whispered into his ear.

"Caleb, that girl isn't alone right now. She's fighting with the power of a ghost."

He turned his eyes up to his father's face and made an exclamation. Cloud let him go.

"Dad, I need to help Angel," he tried to get up. Cloud yanked on his arm and sat him roughly back down.

"She is being helped. And I think she has a way to defeat Ayden and not harm your mother."

"But mom's dead already," he argued and attempted to get up a second time.

Cloud tugged him down and grabbed his face in one hand, looking into his son's eyes: "I know that."

Their eyes returned to the two women. Caleb opened his mouth to protest again when a voice he recalled from before forced its way inside his head.

The Phoenix materia. It's the only way!

"What?" Caleb blinked.

"Shh," Cloud didn't tear his eyes from the scene before them. Caleb bit his lip and looked down at the Ultima Weapon in his hand.

The Phoenix materia! You know what to do.

"No, I don't," he whispered to the voice. "I don't know, that's just it--"

The Flame of Life will restore all that was lost. The Holy Light will guide lost souls from Gaia.

Caleb looked down at his sword again, and understood.