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When we last left Seifer, Ultimecia started using his head as an intercom, Lunatic Pandora was in place, the Lunar Cry had begun, and the Pandora had scooped Adel's seal from the cascade of monsters. Time to find out what happens next.

Enjoy!

Part 13 – Back Draft

Unpleasantly surprised, Seifer's eyes widened. Upon exiting the bridge of Lunatic Pandora, he found the structure's hallways crowded by dozens of monsters, ranging in size and strength from geezards to dragons. Apparently the Pandora had sucked in a fair amount of creatures when it intercepted Adel's seal, and now they were obstructing his path. And he had so little time to begin with.

"Oh, fuck it," he sighed angrily, drawing Hyperion and summoning his magic to his hands. Then he stepped into the hallway leading away from the bridge, meeting the choice of monsters head on.

But instead of challenging him, the monsters moved away. They didn't cower, but they backed off nonetheless. Some snarled at him as he passed between them, but none of them attacked. Proud as he was, Seifer was still not stupid enough to believe that he alone had that effect on the creatures.

"They're turning away from you, aren't they? I bet they can feel your presence inside me and want to run from you, like any sane being."

The sorceress' only answer was an angry silence. It was answer enough. Still, he was cautious not to lower his defences just yet. The last thing he needed now was some big fat Behemoth with a change of heart.

He made it to the Pandora's core without incident. Fortunately, no monsters had made it to this part of the structure, so he had his hands free to deal with Adel. She still hung in the seal's cryo chamber, arms folded and head bowed. But her red eyes were blinking and her fingers were already moving in the rapidly melting ice. It wouldn't be long before she was free again.

There was no time to lose. He ran up to the seal's console and quickly examined the buttons. There was a number pad, but he guessed a code was only needed to unlock it, not to lock it. Frantically, he searched for a button to relock the seal, trying to fight off a sudden and very insistent headache.

'No! You kan't do that!' Ultimecia screamed furiously in his mind, bombarding him with a blinding pain while trying to take over his body. 'I will not let your silly ideas of protekting your ward get in the way of my plan!'

It took him every bit on concentration he had to wedge a window of clear thought between her onslaughts, but using his fire magic as leverage, he somehow managed it. He could feel her surprise when she lost her foothold in his head. It gave him the clarity he needed.

"Think, Ultimecia," he retorted vocally. "You told me you can't complete your plan without Ellone. If Adel wakes up now, you'll have to posses her to control her until the time is right. If you do, you thus lose control over me. And we both know you can't trust me…"

He paused for a moment, examining the console while letting that idea sink in with her. To his satisfaction, she didn't reply with anything more than reluctant curiosity. She knew he had a point.

"Or," he continued, eyes still fixed on the buttons, "you can leave her here until Ellone is brought here and everything is set, so you won't have to lose control over me." He could feel her silent protest and another jolt of pain shot through his head. Of course she was angry. She knew he wanted to reseal Adel to buy not Ellone but the SeeD time to arrive. But there was another way of looking at the situation.

"Don't be stupid, Ultimecia. That girl you possessed, Rinoa, is with the SeeD. Like me, she knows who, what and where you are, and that means the SeeD know. So they know that they'll have to let you achieve time compression in order to get to you. Right now, all our goals –yours, mine and the SeeD's- are exactly the same." At that moment, he figured out the seal's controls and without waiting for her reaction to his proposition, he pressed the lock button.

There was no sound from Adel when her ice seal stabilised, holding her in place once again. Only her eyes glowed defiantly.

Ultimecia, too, was less than pleased. 'You will die for this!'

Having expected no less, Seifer wasn't impressed by her threat. "Don't give me that shit, lady," he bit back. "You're gonna kill me anyway, as soon as I've outlived my usefulness." He knew it was true. Oddly enough, the knowledge that the game was almost over was strangely liberating.

'Do as I tell you, and I might choose to let you live even after you have served your purpose…'

He laughed humourlessly. "You may know my mind, but I know yours. So don't lie to me. I'm man enough to handle the truth."

Seifer stepped back, bracing for Ultimecia's punishment for his insolence. But after a few moments, to his own surprise, he was neither dead nor writhing in pain. Instead, all he heard was her now calm and chilly voice whispering in his head.

'Are you?' she cooed softly. 'Kan you really handle the truth? Not about your future and the lack thereof, but the truth about yourself?'

He sneered at her while doubled checking if Adel's cryo-seal was holding. "Don't go changing the subject."

She chuckled. 'Am I? Remember, I kan look into your soul. I kan see things you do not even know about yourself. You say that you are a man, but when I look, I only see a skared little boy.'

"Not that old horse again," he sighed in exasperation. Over the last few weeks, he had gotten used to her attempts to manipulate him, but this time was different than before. Since he no longer had to keep up the appearance of being her Knight, he was now free to use sarcasm as his shield, like he always had.

But the shield only worked against assaults from others. It did absolutely nothing against what his own mind threw at him. And she knew that about him, too. Without warning, one after another image swamped his consciousness as she riled up his memories, some of which he didn't even know he had.

Warm blood soaking his gloves as Hyperion pierces a man's chest, running him through. Terrified eyes losing focus as the body slacks on the blade.

Grey eyes, squinting, burning with hatred, and contrasting sharply against the red blood that runs from a fresh cut.

Missiles, fired at his command, exploding in Trabia Garden, slaughtering men, women and children as mere matchsticks.

The same grey eyes, this time angry and defiant, but exhausted by torture.

Bodies of comrades and class mates littering the blood-soaked Centran field beneath him, slain by his troops at his initiative.

Grey eyes again, now frowning, looking down on their defeated rival in hatred and disdain. "To us, you're just another enemy, like one of those monsters," they tell him.

A burning village, people screaming, soldiers with machine guns shooting at random. Amidst the chaos is a small boy, covered in blood, crying over the dead bodies of his parents.

Through a haze of tears, he looked up at the frozen sorceress before him. This close up, he could tell that Adel was indeed the monster she was made out to be by the history books, corrupted by her powers when they had gone rogue. Involuntarily he shivered.

A monster… That was what Squall had called him. But was he? Was he really a monster for doing what was noble and right? For protecting the one he loved without claiming credit for it, no matter what the cost to himself? Wasn't that what a Knight was supposed to do? Maybe, but there was nothing noble about ordering the death of hundreds of people in order to protect one...

He hugged himself, willing his tears to stop, but not wiping them away. He felt stupid for having been so blind all this time. He had been so devoted to his romantic dream, to protecting Squall, that he hadn't wanted to see the price at which that dream was fulfilled. Save Squall from the Sorceress. Make sure he survives, no matter what.

No matter what… It's so easy to say if you don't know what it means.

But if he considered what might have happened if he hadn't done the things he did, his heart started pounding and his mind screamed, so loud that he felt it would rip his body apart. Fear. Mindless fear of losing what you hold dear. A fear that had possessed him ever since the night his parental house was raided, and which had held on to him relentlessly to this day.

It was this fear that had made him vow to protect his foster brother, who he had come to love so. The idea of Squall dying was numbing. It had been when he had expected it, after the missile base had blown up, but if he were to be confronted with it, actually seeing Squall's dead body, grey eyes sightless, skin cold to the touch…

He swallowed hard and pushed the image away. He would do anything, absolutely anything, to prevent ever having to go through that again, even if that meant sacrificing so many others to do it. Anything not to feel so lost and bereaved again…

He could feel Ultimecia stirring his mind again. This time, it triggered recollections of the various things Squall had said to him, and the look in his grey eyes when he spoke. Seifer had sworn to protect Squall, even if it meant his brother would hate him. That hatred was something he'd gladly suffer as long as Squall was alive to hate him. And that notion still held true.

But that insistence had also made sure that he had lost Squall forever…

The realisation hit him like a blow between the shoulders. If he won and Squall killed Ultimecia, he would still lose. What he had done in the name of love was unforgivable, and everyone he cared for would hate him for it. Not only Squall and the rest of the world, but Fuujin and Raijin as well. He had pushed them all too far already.

Seifer stared ahead, the true consequences of his actions sinking in. Yes, they resented him. Squall resented him. "To us, you're just another enemy." Despite his efforts, or rather because of his efforts, he had lost Squall as surely as he would have lost him to death…

A single tear ran down his face. For the first time since he knew he would not survive the war, Seifer Almasy found himself actually wishing for death. There was nothing left to go back to, anyway. It was over, all over…

I've got half a dozen (mostly sarcastic) comments in my head now, but I'll refrain from writing them. After all, we know how this is going to end, right? Right? Or do we?

13 chaps down, 3 to go. Please R&R!