Behind Black Curtains
An AU, Sephiroth and Tifa fanfiction
- by Amaranthos-
Chapter 26: Over
Night by day
Day by night
Light for dark
Dark for light
Peace for Sin
A beast for no one
I've been pacing back and forth, steadfastly noting the time every two minutes. Unnerved it seems, as my footsteps recede almost to a troublesome beat. I've been unrest all day, and I can't quite understand why. Strange feelings of all kinds, bubble in me. Something in my mind stirs me into unresolved; I fidget nervously with the sleeves of my dress, and tap my feet annoyed against the simple wood of the floor. I chew on my lips, and they're all bruised and cut from my wicked assault of worry, and yet, I can't wrap my finger as to why I'm so unsettled.
I sighed. Perhaps I had an intuition about something – maybe something happened to my father. I grimaced at the thought. I shake my head, I shouldn't think such things. I swallowed. My father was perhaps the most accurate and single smartest person in the world, and he could by no means - be killed so simply to the war devices of Black Crescents. I smiled softly, no my father was a strategist… he couldn't die.
He just couldn't.
And as much as I tendered the thought my father was invincible, something dark came over me. It rocks my chest heavily with its dark breath.
"A realization?" I whispered to myself….
A darker kind of realization stumps me in my pacing. I weaken, compelled to moving. I clutched the side of the small table and I grit my teeth. Something was wrong and I could certainly feel it. I take a breath and swallow the large lump in my throat.
I just can't help thinking something bad was about to unfold. Could it be any stranger, my intuition? I've always had a keen six sense, but this by far has augmented the worst. I couldn't explain how I knew it, but I suddenly felt sick. It's like somebody poisoned the air about me, and I'm inhaling in a dark gas, my body grows limp and I'm suffocating in my emotions. Dark emotions.
I look out the window. The rain's falling.
I try to question the great heaven's about my turmoil. And the rain, like a beautiful yet monotonous crescendo returns from the heavens, repeating the same thing ..nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
I stare blankly, silently feeling my whole body being rape to this strange emotion. Why is it so strong to spread so fast into my nerves and blood, and incapacitate me useless? Render me down into the hold of simpletons?
The door opens and a cool air rushes in.
I jump with a start and spin around sharply. A wave of relief washes over me as my eyes tenderly collects the image of Sephiroth. I breathe, and I'm at rest for a moment. Somehow my body recognizes the stern General, as a sign of relief.
"Sephiroth…" I started observing his wet attire, "you're soaking wet" I smiled at him, unable to keep my giggles.
He's absolutely drenched from the rain, and he looks like a small wet pup.
"It's General Sephiroth" he scowls deeply.
My expression of glee drops into degrees of ice and horror as his eyes dart with a certain malice and coldness. He wears not a single friendly emotion in them, and somehow, strangely, it's all directed at me.
He walks away closing the door behind him leaving me to the destructive silence of my heart. How could he be so prompt about his rash emotions, especially to me? Since when does he become so angry, he needs someone to blow up on?
Immediately a niggling emotion rises in me, and it reminds me of when I'm very annoyed and angry. I take some deep breaths to control my surging anger, but it annoys me largely that he treats me so badly. How dare he?
In anger, I storm towards the door, vaulting it open witnessing him strip his wet garments off. He unceremoniously drops the jacket, then his sword, then his gloves and then I see the thin trail of blood on his shoulders. I freeze.
Suddenly my heart feels incarcerated by the sight of blood. I swallowed.
My heart paces quickly as the blood runs down his ivory shoulder. Immediately, I feel a sort of a pity and sorrow for being so angry with him. I never did stop to notice Sephiroth in the perspective of a killer. I guess, there were so many things I could not comprehend till this day. About war, about life… about what life causes to an individual, and to someone like Sephiroth – whose treated more like a machine, than a man, more like a God, than a human, it must become so hard to break and crack, to whine and twist, to hurt and snap under the collateral of sins to bear, and the taunts of life. And I guess, in as much as I've been close to him, I truly didn't get as close as I should have, as I still see him like everyone else… unhuman.
Slowly, my heart wrenches and I gravitate toward him. I lean my head against his back, and softly my lips touches to his back. I didn't understand him, all. But… I should try to be a better human to understand his human faults.
He stiffens immediately. His muscles tighten, but I'm use to it. I place my hands around his waist, but he quickly arrests a hold on my hands.
"Don't" he stoically replies.
Deftly he drops my hands and turns around.
I look up, utterly confused and somewhat hurt.
"Remove yourself from my room, now" he orders gruffly. He seethed his teeth, demanding me out his room.
I gritted my teeth, "what is the matter with you?" I asked…
He purses his lips and then he smirks. Almost menacingly and evilly.
"Get…out" he orders
I narrowed my brows, baffled at his order.
"What's the matter, Sephiroth? Did something happen?" I asked, my voice shaking.
Why is he treating me this way? As if I'm the enemy once again? Why?
"Do you enjoy being an annoyance, Lockhart? Surely your overture has become such the annoyance" he emphasizes matter-of-factly.
I nib my quivering lips. Why is he saying these things?
My eyes blink back, so close to flooding with tears, "please, t-tell me what happened" I begged my voice breaking.
He laughs and his eyes glimmer mischievously, coldly.
"Tell me Lockhart." He starts
"What are your feelings towards me?" he asked anew, almost expectantly, turning his back to me, throwing his wet jacket on a chair.
"W-what do you mean?" I questioned. Concerned about the oddly strewn question.
"Don't play dumb with me, Lockhart. I'm not in the mood" he returns cruelly.
"I-I d-don't know what you mean" tears fell down.
"You know exactly what I mean" he flips around barking at me angrily.
Without even knowing it, I was shaking.
He grabs me by the arm roughly and draws me near, "tell me… watch me in my face" he gritted his teeth, "and tell me how you feel for me. Let me know" his eyes are a dark green, and it scares me. I wince as he tightens his hold on my arm.
"I'm attracted to you…" comes my petite, pathetic reply.
He haughtily grunts letting me go.
He shakes his head and then goes silent.
I stand back and all the while, I'm thrown into a maelstrom of confusion. I'm witnessing an eclipse of the Sephiroth I've been with. This Sephiroth is much like the one from my past. But why?
"What do you expect from being attracted to me, Lockhart?" he asks…
He turns around and his eyes flicker with a sort of light that had a beautiful effect about them. Nevermind how I felt, I placed my hand over heart and I came closer to him. No matter how scary he was Sephiroth did something to me, he could not undo. Deftly I walk to him, my heart racing. My fingers going numb, my mind becoming black and my breath fading. He narrows his brows inspecting me as I came closer.
It doesn't matter how much of a beast he is… I adore him. I adore you. And I know he feels it to. I tip-toe, and with tears in my eyes, I stare at him. To be so close to the thing you fear and adore, brings me all the more closer to insanity. This fine tune in my heart of pain and attraction, binds as a deadly combination. But I won't reduce myself to fear. I close my eyes. Gently I lean in, planting a soft kiss on his lips, and like the many times before I prepare myself for his precalculated attacks - to take me over, but instead, there's a nothingness that penetrates.
He doesn't react. Instead he just stares back completely devoid of all life and emotion. I've never been this scared, and worried. I step back unable to face him. He reminds me of a General raped of all life and emotion. Dead.
"What do you expect to get from me? Did you think for one second we could be living in your happily ever after? Are you so daft as to entertain such lucrative thoughts?" he asks…
I shake my head. No, tell me he's not saying these things.
"I am the greatest General. Ever" he shouts at me, "and you are my enemy." He violently replies.
I quiver….
"N-No" I whisper…
He perks up, "what? What did you just say?"
Slowly he gilds himself toward me, and I feel myself going back. As much as I wanted to meet him, I can't. I'm too afraid. My tears fall down, and it hurts me to hear him say such things. He is not a device, and he is not a God. He is a man, and he feels emotions.
"You are not a God Sephiroth. You are a man. You bleed and hurt just like m-me." I cried, "you surrender to pleasures, and certainly you give into attraction and love" I whispered fiercely…
He smirks, "love?" he enquires amused.
"You think I could fall in love?" he seems interested at the question.
I cry, "y-yes"
"You foolish woman. Your pacifism has you thinking the most absurd if not foolish thing I have ever heard. I am a General - the right hand to Black Crescents. You on the other hand are the future heir and pacifist to Red Hearts. For over fifteen years our empires have done nothing but wage war on the other. Chances are petite that innocent love could save us as these two titans violently fight against the other." He explains….
"How could you say such things? Even in the pause of darkness, there are glimmers of light and how dare you for damning them. Can you not see, no matter what, sometimes destiny is bigger than all of this?" I explained…
"Destiny? You strew a word that much like my lifework, is monotonous and chosen. I chose Lockhart to get up each day and kill men like a crop. I chose to kill for pleasure and work. I chose to fxxk you when I wanted it, I chose everything in my life." He shouts…
I shake my head, "lies"
"You still dare me?" he paused to come closer, "what are you attracted to, in a man like me? Is it all the good sex, is it my fingers deep in you, or the way I make you scream?" he draws closer.
I cover my mouth, how could he say that. I shake my head.
He pushes me against the wall and leans against my neck, "you like this don't you? When I push into walls and strip you down." He laughs menacingly in my ear, "you like all the erotic things I whisper to you" he pauses "Or maybe" he easily picks me up and tosses me on his bed.
He leans over me, and never more in my life have I been more afraid of the man I so dearly adore.
"No, you're more of a bed woman. And to be honest" he leans into my neck whispering, "I enjoy fxxking you senseless. I enjoyed hurting you. I enjoyed taking your love away and certainly your precious little innocence. Soiled to darkness you are now" he pauses, "you shame them Lockhart. You're filthy and dark of a thing. You smell of the thing you took to bed, and now it reeks on your skin and what a filth you are, even to me" he confesses with eyes that aren't remotely interested in me.
"And I've taken countless women of your breed to bed, and they still make me laugh. They all fall for me, trying to understand something they never will. Tasteless miscreants of the world." He snorts
"You don't even understand what you feel, and you're jumping into the pretext of understanding someone like me. Well I have news for 'things' like you. Fix yourselves"
I cried. Such horrible things, "no, you're wrong. I am not like them" I whispered.
He smirks.
Roughly he places a finger to my lips and taunts it senselessly, "is that so, aye?" he breathes on me.
"Whereas they have failed, and are drawn to you for your power and evil, for the illusion of love itself, I am not. For I understand you, better than the ones before, and I am absolute in saying, you are not a devil, even if you or the others have made you to be. You are a man, a real man, and you're so hollow because of the things and the person they've made you to be, you don't know how -
"-How to what?" he grits his teeth.
"How to be a man" I whispered…
He smirks.
He lowers his lips to my ear, "you are very beautiful Lockhart." He pauses, "but like Rufus before me, I prefer have you pleasure me, than hear the filth out of your mouth." He whispers sardonically.
I shivered, my body quivering.
He gets off and stands up.
"As of now Lockhart, whatever you conceived faintly as attraction or remotely even as love, is over." He says, " Terminated." He bluntly adds…
And finally I understood the dark feelings in my gut. They weren't about my father, they weren't about my people, they were about Sephiroth. He wanted to end our relationship.
"Seph–
"Or I will kill you" like a poison he curtly interjects.
I freeze.
I stand to my feet and I walk to his door, "kill me now if you think I am like them. I am not that woman, Sephiroth. I do not see you that way" and silently, he flings his Masamune right above my shoulder. The long sword is impaled into the wall and Sephiroth pulls me back, whispering fiercely into my ear.
"I won't miss next time, Lockhart." he voices like dread in my ear.
My eyes enlarge. That could have been my shoulder or heart, and in someway I can't believe he'd do such a thing.
With my heart hurting in every direction, amplified by the violence of the man I once fell for, the realization is clear, everything we had, everything we did… is now over.
To be continued…