They had not been running for too long, but Nefilim could feel the pain in his body. He ran on. He was reminded of a mission he had a long time ago. A monster that had grown to an unusual size was straying from its homeland, threatening the people of Midgar. He had fought it, and broke many ribs, trying to stop it. He finally managed to plant a bomb on to it. Then he had run away as fast as he could. When he returned to Midgar, he found that he had run a mile in less then six minutes.

If I could do it then, I can do it now. He thought as his lungs burned.

"Are you alright?" Aeris asked. "You look a bit pale, Nef."

"I'm fine." He grunted.

Cloud stared at Aeris. "What did you call him?"

"Nefilim," Aeris replied. "Since he can't hear his own name, I gave him a nickname."

"Fallen one?" Cloud gave a weird look. "Hey… can I call you Nefily?"

"Shut up." Nefilim mumbled, turning red.

Cloud gave a mischievous look. "Ok, Nefy. Or… maybe Fily?"

Barret, Cid, and Yuffie snickered loudly. Nefilim's eyes flashed and they silenced immediately. "Sorry," Yuffie grumbled. "We were just joking around. You don't have to take it so seriously."

Nefilim didn't speak. How could they be joking around at this time? When Jenova was so near them and they could die any minute? "Do you joke around in danger because, you cover up your fear with humor?" he asked.

Everyone stared at him. They were quiet for a long time and then Yuffie spoke up. "Yeah, the jokes keep me from fear… because right now I'm afraid."

"You're not afraid of Jenova," Nefilim said, sadly. "You're all afraid of me."

Yuffie looked at the silver-haired man and almost felt sorry for him. All his life he had been confused and angry. He had been abused and now… he was paying for something that was not his fault.

The young ninja wasn't sure why she was sympathizing for Sephiroth, the one who had nearly killed her father in the war.

"Here we are," said Aeris, shaking Yuffie out of her thoughts.

Nefilim stared at the burned ground. It seemed a little too… familiar. Aeris smiled at him, giving him a wink, and he understood, and his lips spread into a grin.

"Aw hell no!" Cid yelled. "If this guy is smiling then this ain't freaking ass safe!"

Tifa stared at Sephiroth. He was actually smiling, not the one that she had seen before, when he had burned down Nibelheim, but this was a true smile. It changed his face completely, she thought he even looked a little handso…

Ok! Stop it right there, Tifa! Her mind yelled.

Aeris watched as the ground slid away. Nefilim and her exchanged glances and began to laugh.

"Oh shit! If he's laughing than this must be worse then hell!" Cid looked in horror. "This is definitely something bad…"

Cloud watched in amazement. Sephiroth laughing good-naturedly? There was definitely something wrong here. His gaze turned back to Aeris… a prank of some sort, perhaps?

Nefilim peered down the hole. The shaking came again. He took a deep breath and jumped in…

Cloud watched as Sephiroth disappeared down into the darkness.

Time to jump…

He jumped in next. A wave of nausea washed over him. It was so damn black down here. Too damn black. He wanted to scream but his mouth was glued shut in horror.

And before he knew it, it was over. He opened his eyes and was relieved to find that there was light. The urge to lose his breakfast was gone, and he breathed deeply.

Nefilim offered his hand. Cloud ignored it and got up. The silver-haired man's hand dropped to his side and he shrugged, turning away.

Cloud gave him a look that said "I don't f---in' trust you and I never will so f--- off."

Soon, the rest of AVALANCHE came flying out from the tunnel and Cid moaned about how he lost his cigarette in his fall.

"Look! I only have a few cigarettes left!" Cid whined. "And I lost a perfectly good one back there!"

Yuffie rolled her eyes. "Maybe this is the time to quit."

Cid opened his mouth to say something, but Aeris spoke up. "Come on," she said. "Let's get to my house."

"Hey!" Barret exclaimed looking around. "Doesn't this kinda look like the buildings in the City of Ancients?"

"Yeah, it's exactly the same," Yuffie said dryly, peering around. "Gosh, I woulda thought it'd be different around here.

"Yes. I thought so myself when I first came down here," Nefilim said stiffly, causing everyone to look at him.

"I'd like to know how you got in that condition," Tifa said, eyeing Sephiroth's injuries.

Nefilim averted his gaze and turned to the floor. "I… I'll just say that I'm not welcome here,"

"Hey, quit lookin' at the floor," Barret said. "It's all brown anyways."

Cloud ignored Barret's comment. "So you got beaten up?" he asked, almost snickering at the thought.

The silver-haired man slowly nodded and Red XIII shook his head sadly as all of his friends (all but Aeris mind you) giggled or snickered. "I don't see how one being attacked is a laughing matter," he said, swishing his fiery tail around, causing his friends to jump back in alarm. "If you were beaten up, you would not be laughing."

"Just 'cause you kitties don't got the same sense of humor as we humans do," Barret retorted and looked at Sephiroth. "So, how'd ol' war hero get his ass kicked?"

Nefilim seemed to be uncomfortable. "I'm not a 'war hero'," he said roughly, his instincts of being uncomfortable took over. "Like Cloud said, I'm not a hero. "Like Strife said. I'm not a hero, I'm a murderer. And I did not fight back… why should I? The people did nothing wrong by beating me. They were right to do so. I do not deserve to be here."

Lucrecia seemed hurt. "Honey, you don't have to torture yourself this way. It was never your fault."

"I told you, mother, I'm not worth it. I don't see why you haven't disowned me yet. I'd also like to know, Aeris, why am I here?" Nefilim said, his hate for himself building up again.

"Geez, talk about negative." Yuffie muttered, too low for anyone else to hear.

Aeris looked sadly over at Sephiroth. "I thought you would learn to understand what it is to be here, but it seems that you need to find out for yourself."

Cloud shoved in. "No need. We don't need him here anyways."

"You're right," Nefilim said, his voice filled with pain and ran away.

"Nefilim! Come back!" Aeris yelled, giving Cloud a hopeless look, she said. "What did you have to do that for?"

Cloud gave an innocent look. "What? Scared off an annoying bastard that doesn't deserve to be here?"

She gave an exasperated sigh, muttered something about wishing that he could learn to be friendly, and ran after the silver-haired man.

-----

Nefilim pumped hard, running down the street, getting uneasy glances from many people he passed. He couldn't stand that failure… that annoying bastard… Strife…

He didn't care how much running hurt, or for that matter, how much damage he had already done to himself.

In his thoughts, he wasn't aware that he was about to run into someone.

When they collided, he apologized to the man, profusely. "No need," the man said, his voice so familiar. "…Son…"

He looked up sharply. He hadn't looked at the man that he had collided into, closely. There stood a man of about 5'6 to 5'7. He had long greasy black hair that was tied into a ponytail. The man wore a long white lab coat and had black framed glasses.

… He called me son…

… Who is he?…

…HOJO!…

NOOOOO!

More memories came back to him. The once mysterious figure that was ever so cruel to him was revealed to be Hojo. "Don't… call… me… son…" he gasped, bending over, his head hurting like hell. "I'm… not… your… son…"

"Yes you are," Hojo said, giving an evil smile and bent over next to his son. "Look son… you've grown all strong… now go… kill…" he said the last word with a delighted hiss, his foul breath going into Nefilim's face.

"No! Get away from me!" Nefilim yelled, stumbling backwards. "Get away! I don't want to kill! I'm no puppet!" All of his yelling won stares from people passing by.

Hojo gave a disgusted and yet disappointed look. He grabbed Nefilim by hair, and the other arm grabbed his sleeve and pulled it up. He released his hair and pointed to the tattoo that said '1'. "You are not a failure! I know you are not! You are not a weakling! Get up! Where is your pride! Look at this tattoo! Look at it! You were not made to be weak!"

Nefilim had heard those words before.

He had been running for so long. Around and around the track he went. He wasn't sure how many laps he had done already, but he looked up into the sky. It was sunset. He had already been running since dawn.

If he had even slowed one bit, Hojo would beat him. If he begged for water, Hojo would beat him. If he collapsed, he would be beaten awake.

His chest burned so badly. He had a coppery taste in his mouth, it tasted like blood, but he knew there was none.

He coughed a bit, choking up a bit of phlegm. He spat it on the ground, never slowing his pace. He continued to cough, but he never slowed down.

By the next day, he had collapsed on the ground in exhaustion.

Hojo ran next to him, and began beating him. … "You are not a weakling! Get up! You are not a failure!"

But he could not get up…

"Get away from him, Hojo."

Nefilim looked up. Aeris stood next to him, her chest heaving. She must have chased after him.

Why would she come after me… a no good like me? He wondered.

Hojo leered. "Ahh… the Cetra girl. Looks like you've become friends with her, yes, son? Maybe a little closer than that!"

Nefilim's eyes filled with hate. "No, you disgusting bastard!" he yelled, and struggled to get up.

"Hojo," said a cold voice.

"Vincent. Lucrecia," Hojo said mildly. "And AVALANCHE… oh… and the failure. What a pleasant surprise."

"Get away from him," Lucrecia hissed angrily, her voice dripping with acid. "You've already ruined my life and partly your own sons! Have you no shame?"

Hojo stared at her, then began laughing. "Shame!" Tears ran down his cheeks from all the laughing. "Shame! Of course I'm shamed! Just because I've devoted my life to my son to find that he was only a weakling! A coward… son of a no good woman. A f—"

He was cut off as his breath was knocked out of him. Nefilim had tackled him, adrenaline pumping through him and forgot all his pain. "I f---in' hate you!" he yelled, punching the smaller man dozens of times. "I want you to die! Die! Look at all the pain you've caused! Look! LOOK DAMMIT!" He grabbed Hojo by the neck and forced the man to look at him.

Hojo laughed still, his face bruised and battered from all the abuse. "Good, my son! More anger! More!"

"I'LL GIVE YOU MORE ANGER!" Nefilim shouted, raining more blows on his father's face.

"Go Sephiroth?" Yuffie said.

"I could hardly care less if he 'accidentally' trips and breaks every bone in his body." Cloud muttered darkly.

Other people had gathered to watch Nefilim, some looked at Hojo and cheered him on. Other looks looked angry, and yelled at him to stop.

Vincent, as much has he wanted to join in and cheer Nefilim on, knew that he could not allow the man to do this. He grabbed Nefilim by the arms and hauled him backwards.

"Let me go, dammit!" Nefilim screamed, flailing his arms and fighting Vincent.

Lucrecia hugged Nefilim, fiercely, telling him to calm down. After a while, Nefilim had finally stopped fighting, the crowd, waited as if wanting more. Then after a while, it dissipated.

Nefilim remained, trembling.

"Nefilim, are you…" Aeris began.

He covered his head in his hands, trying to calm himself. Hojo still laughed. "Very good, very good son. A little more anger."

Nefilim felt Cloud's eyes on him. He sighed. "You got lucky… if I had the masamune… I would've… killed you…" His voice went low with evil and anger.

He shivered, hearing the words said so evil. He knew that his mother and Aeris must have been disappointed. He clenched his fists, he needed to control his anger or he would become a mindless killing machine again.

He slowly stood up, his breath calming and pain came back him. He groaned and bent over, the damage to his ribs had been done.

Aeris stared at Sephiroth's tattoo and sighed sadly. What kind of man was Hojo, to tattoo his own son and mark him as an experiment? She looked down at Hojo in disgust, she almost wished that Sephiroth had killed him.

"Where are you going, number 1?" Hojo sneered. "Home?"

Nefilim paused and looked back in disgust. "Home?" he laughed, in a way that was so close to insanity. "What home? The lab? A cell?"

He turned away and walked quickly away. Aeris came after him, looking at him pleadingly. He averted her eyes and continued walking. Cloud walked after him, but Tifa stopped him. They watched as Aeris chased after Sephiroth.

"Nefilim…"

"…………"

"Nefilim please…"

"…………."

"Nefilim…"

Nefilim found that they were already far away from everyone else. He looked back Aeris, who looked sadly back at him. He looked into her eyes, they were pleading.

"Nefilim… is something wrong?"

He realized that he was staring at her, he coughed a few times and turned away, blushing. "Nothing's wrong…" he muttered.

They kept on walking and now they were out of sight of everyone. "Aeris… I'm sorry," he said, his voice low. "…Just… the sight of my father…"

"It's alright," she replied, gently touching his face. "He caused all that pain."

He didn't shy away from her touch. He was hardly aware of raising his hand and touching her hand and giving it a gentle squeeze.

Aeris stared at her hand. Did Sephiroth just give her hand a gentle squeeze? She looked back at him, lost in his mako eyes, she could not turn her gaze away.

Suddenly, the two were shaken out of their trance and they both looked away at the same time, embarrassed. "Sorry," Nefilim muttered. "I didn't mean to."

Aeris didn't know what to say. She had been so close to him… merely inches away from his face… if she had just leaned over a bit more… she would have…

Would have… would have…

"Uh… maybe we should head back… maybe?" Nefilim said, his voice shaky.

Aeris agreed and the two walked back towards her house, neither looking at the other.

Yay! Another chappie done! Woo things growing hot between Nefy and Aeris... wooooo...

Lol... anyways... thanks to everyone who reviewed and read to here! The ending is coming!