A/N: HUGE thanks to CornCob and ghost of gene rayburn for reviewing. Anyone else reading have them to thank for me getting this out so quickly. This chapter...made me realize JUST what I am getting myself into here. I said 2-3 chapters before. Now we're looking at...4-5 maybe... The whole Sephiroth/Lucifer slash...it's so difficult to get it going without me feeling like it's too rushed. This chapter is slow at parts, but I did my best to try and 'set the stage' for the smut that's inevitable at this point. And just in case, know that I am VERY rusty on my FFVII knowledge. There may be errors in the timeline or...well any of it for that matter. But for the sake of this story...consider it AU.

Anyone notice that the sword 'Masamune' is conspiciously missing?

Disclaimer: Sephiroth is not mine! Neither is Lucifer, but I plan on exploiting his evilness for the sake of this fic!

It was dark in his cabin. He shifted under the sheets, his eyes closing as he searched for rest.

It had been a few days since his encounter with that man, that strange, inexplicable man. Thoughts of Masamune had left him entirely, instead replaced with a slight feeling of acceptance, even...curiosity.

He was not one to dwell on people; he had given them up long ago. Just a few months ago, however, he hadn't been able to quiet the part of him, that childish part, that searched for acceptance, somewhere, somehow. If he couldn't have friends, then he had hoped he could at least be accepted by his peers.

While other SOLDIERs immersed themselves in their personal lives while on holiday from Shinra or as quietly as possible in their bunks, Sephiroth had been back in the labs, being tested like an animal. He knew nothing of what it was like to be with someone, on any level. Human beings seemed to mean nothing but one thing to him: pain.

Masamune, the one person he had truly felt cared for him on some level, had died by his hand. He had murdered Masamune, his teacher, the one person who thought he was something besides just a weapon.

He hadn't cried when he did it. In fact, he hadn't felt anything he was supposed to feel while doing it. It had been hard to accept, Masamune's words, but he had accepted them. Once he acknowledged that it had to be done, everything fell into place.

"I want you to kill me, Sephiroth," he had said. Those hard, brown eyes had looked at him, searched his own green eyes for signs of weakness, the briefest flickers of emotion. And Sephiroth, for once in his life, had let the old man down. He had said 'no'.

He had disobeyed, at first.

"Your training is complete. I have no more purpose now, and I wish to be ended properly, like a true samurai. I refuse to die in my bed like an ailing pet."

Somehow, Sephiroth had understood. It had sickened him a little then, when he realized he wanted to know what it was like. What it meant to kill.

In the lab he had killed his fair share of fiends, but he had never had the opportunity to kill something that rivaled himself in both intelligence and skill. The thought had been...exhilarating. Killing something...human.

He had everything against human beings, nothing against the fiends. Perhaps that was what made the two acts so different. He felt he had reason to destroy humanity. That dark part, buried so deep inside his young heart, had begun the irreversible process of making him completely...cold. He felt somehow, secretly, that murder was the one way he would be able to even the score, prove not only to Shinra, but to himself that he was worth something. He would not die unknown, he would be something.

The guilt that had been eating at his conscience had finally been put to rest. Something inside him whispered that he would never feel that emotion again, that he had reached a new state of being. He was beyond guilt. The man...he had helped bring about the change in him. Sephiroth had felt so unsure, but the man knew, he had experienced the same things, so he had said.

Sephiroth had no feelings any longer about the murder of Masamune; it was simply another step in the process, the evolution, and it had to be done. Masamune finally had his wish: Sephiroth was finally accepting his path...

His eyes moved behind their lids, his mind captured in a dream of black hair and rain pouring from the sky.

A silent shadow passed over his bed, moving closer, unseen and unheard, watching the slow rhythmic rise and decline of his small chest beneath the blankets. The stranger extended his hand so he could briefly touch the silken strands strewn across the white cotton of the pillow.

"Sleep now," he whispered quietly, as Sephiroth's angelic face contorted with confusion at something going on in his dream. "You will need it now, more than ever, for the morrow comes..."

He observed the teen, enjoying how the trained muscles of his face betrayed him in his sleep, fully expressive as Sephiroth would not allow them to be while he was awake and in control.

"For my one winged angel will leave a wake of chaos and blood and screams behind..."

He did not laugh, for fear of waking the boy, but he smiled, his inhuman eyes reflecting in the darkness like a predator's.

It was afternoon. Sephiroth was riding in transport like the other 3rds. It was a large caravan covered in typical dull-green military canvas, where everyone was shoulder to shoulder in the cramped quarters.

Dim light filtered in through the spaces and few rips in the canvas, playing white strips across the tired faces of fully-armed SOLDIERs.

Sephiroth was jammed into a corner, and didn't seem to notice how the others seated beside him were doing everything in their power not to jostle against him with every small bump and shake of the truck. Some openly gaped at him, having heard of his...pursuits...of the previous day.

Sephiroth ignored all of them, filtered out their mundane conversations that meant nothing to him. They spoke for reasons he didn't understand. Small talk was utterly lost on the misanthropic teen, as was interest at all in any of his peers or their lives. They were all nervous and talking in quick, hushed voices that for some reason irritated him.

It was colder here, further in the mountains than the other village had been. Sephiroth's exceptional hearing could already make out the sounds of warfare in the distance, the blasting of a clip by a few well-placed Turks on the battlefield, the high screams of women being butchered. Children screaming. It was these sounds that he focused on. He must learn them, for these were the sounds of the one thing that could make him whole, the one thing that separated him from all others: death.

He had thought quite a bit about his feelings toward murder. The one conclusion he had drawn was that it was pleasurable to him the way talking to a friend was enjoyable to someone else. His was an entirely different medium, however, in essence they were similar. It just so happened his newly found 'purpose' was not one that was openly accepted the way socializing was.

SOLDIER was to be his release, his freedom. He had something now, he realized, for the first time in his short young life.

The other 3rds filtered out of the truck at a trickle, not exactly thrilled at the idea that the day could be the one in which they met their death.

Sephiroth jumped off of the tailgate, landing softly and elegantly. Several SOLDIERs stumbled past him, shaky and nervous, their brows already drenched in sweat. He watched them slap each other on the back and flash each other reassuring smiles that did not reach their eyes.

"Sephiroth," one of the 2nds said, approaching the stoic form of the boy.

"Sir?" he questioned, ignoring the looks of the few straggling 3rds as they eyed him jealously.

"You've been stationed with Graves and Valik."

This was strange news, given that Graves and Valik were 2nds, however, Sephiroth said nothing of it. His performance had not gone unnoticed, apparently.

"You must be Sephiroth. I'm Graves, good to see you, soldier." A short, stocky man who had been milling around behind the 2nd who was now walking away, extended a hand. Sephiroth stared down at it, then back at Graves's face.

Sephiroth gave a curt nod of his head, not at all in the mood for introductions, and forgetting that he was supposed to take the hand extended to him.

Graves pulled his hand back awkwardly, his look a bit ruffled, and his stubbled jaw set tightly. "Well, I guess we better get going. Follow me, Valik's this way."

The landscape was heavily covered in thick, hunter green trees. The village itself was planted on the outskirts of the large forest that extended up onto the slopes of the nearby mountain range. They were plush and healthy from the constant wetness of the area due to frequent snowfall.

Their breath rose in plumes as they walked quietly, on the edge of the skirmishes taking place in the village. They were going toward the east, where smuggled missiles had been coming from at frequent intervals. The Wutians had gotten a hold of some of the supplies from one of Shinra's smaller, temporary bases, and were relentlessly hammering down on the SOLDIERs that had invaded their village.

Several trucks carrying the men, as well as the supplies for warfare, had been easily targeted and destroyed as they had come up the small, badly maintained roads. It was for this reason that Sephiroth, Graves, and Valik had been sent on foot.

Graves was quiet during the walk, while Valik chattered on in a voice laced with fear and apprehension. Sephiroth made no indication that he heard what Valik was saying, his senses focused elsewhere, particularly on the forest they were walking alongside.

It would be so easy for something to hide amongst those trees...

The nervous 2nd seemed to show no signs of ceasing his talking, even after a few more minutes of walking. If Valik wasn't quiet soon, they would definitely be heard.

"Would you just shut up, man!" Graves said, a little too loudly. It seemed he too was aware of the dangers of making too much noise. His face was red suddenly, making it clear that he had been holding back for a while. "This is war, not a fucking goddamned tea party!" he said, in almost a shout, rounding on Valik who suddenly looked very worried.

Sephiroth continued moving, instinct telling him that staying with them was not an option. That's when he heard it, a familiar click, barely discernable through the not-so-quiet voices of the two arguing 2nds.

He immediately dove for the ground, not even bothering to shout a warning to the other two. The sound of a high-powered rifle echoed off of the landscape. It was followed by the piercing 'boom' of a second shot. Sephiroth didn't see, but heard, two bodies drop.

He rose to his feet, calculating the risk, and deciding to take it. The trees were right there.

He ran, for all he was worth, his feet pounding into the soft soil, as he worked toward the trees. His breath trailed behind him, while the coldness of the wind harshly rushed upon his solemn face. He zigzagged all the way, unwilling to make an easy target of himself.

A shot hurtled past, close, but not close enough.

Sephiroth knew that the sniper would only be guessing soon, as he flew into the line of trees. His grace served him well as he leapt over fallen logs and uprooted trees, at a speed that was probably inhuman.

It was much like an obstacle course, trying to put distance between him and the shooter. The trees would easily block the bullets' path, if he could make it far enough.

Another shot, far off to Sephiroth's right hit a small sapling, snapping it in half with ease. It appeared that the Wutians had more than just stolen missiles.

Like Sephiroth had predicted, the next few shots were terribly misplaced, and nowhere near him.

It was ten minutes before Sephiroth slowed. He had already began to double back, curving in a circle to the path he had ran. He would walk more to the east, and perhaps cut the sniper from his path entirely.

It would be much simpler without others to slow down his pace or ruin his stealth. He enjoyed confrontation in battle, but this would be the first time he would have to make his way slowly, with much more forethought.

Graves had given him a relative idea of where the missiles had been coming from; Sephiroth was confident he would find them with ease anyway, given that they weren't exactly the quietest weapon on the battlefield. He needed to be swift about it though, or else there could be many more transports lost if Shinra stubbornly continued to send troops.

When he made his way to the edge of the tree line, Sephiroth waited patiently. He observed enemy movement for several moments before selecting his path.

The missiles had not been fired in some time, likely because the transports were halted for the time being. It was the building made of the more modern brick, that captured his attention. Men seemed to be coming in and out of it frequently, and it did have windows. It could possibly be where the attacks originated from.

He moved silently, making his way through the small huts sparsely placed throughout the area. There was a surprisingly low amount of troops, which made him guess that they had sent most of them to take on the SOLDIERs. Unfortunately for them, it left the area Sephiroth occupied very vulnerable.

His blood was heating already, as he watched a pony-tailed man wander over toward where he was hidden.

The man walked past the hut Sephiroth was leaned against, not even hearing as the teen moved behind him.

He did not have time to scream as the blade Sephiroth carried sliced through the front of his neck, half severing his head. Blood pumped furiously out of the wound, spattering the sword as well as Sephiroth's gloved hands. He held onto the shoulders of the corpse, then repositioned one of his arms underneath the armpit to get a better grip. He carefully dragged it toward the back of the hut, where he unceremoniously dropped it.

It would be easy to rid these people of their lives.

The bloodlust was overpowering. At times he almost felt completely out of control, consumed by it, as the man had said.

Each time his sword met flesh, something in him screamed in triumph, feeding his power. Each swing had new calculations behind it. His movements had experience behind them now. It was a lesson learned, each death, and the high never grew dull or less intense. Each murder was beautiful, perfect, just as the previous...and the next would undoubtably be.

Sephiroth did not see the man perched upon the brick building, his eyes aflame like hellfire. The man would only be seen if he wanted to be seen. And for the moment the man deemed the view too good to give any indication of his presence.

The angel slashed through body after body, his eyes holding an insanity that made the man smile knowingly. It was an art to this one-winged angel, a dance even. He moved fluidly like a predator instead of a stumbling human being. So much skill, so much focus...

He could feel the rage and exhilaration Sephiroth was utterly lost in, each time blood was sent in lovely sheets through the air. The ground was painted red, yet the youth showed no signs of stopping, and in fact quickened his pace as more enemies approached him.

The man had taken care of the sniper long ago, wanting to see just what Sephiroth planned to do with his newfound power. Yes, it was...beautiful. If anything deserved such a title, it was the death bringing angel with the godly silver hair and wicked blade. His fury matched any god's.

Death was the great equalizer, after all. Not only did it make every living thing equal in the sense of life having to end, it also allowed something as volatile and weak as a human being achieve a godly status. They had always wanted so badly to control their universe, and death was the weapon in which such things could be achieved.

He descended from the roof, walking to the teen who was finally without enemy. Sephiroth had picked the pathetically guarded area clean.

Sephiroth's eyes betrayed emotion for a moment as he saw the man approach. It had been a look of hopefulness, curiosity even.

"I see you have taken my words to heart." Distrust, ever present, flashed in Sephiroth's eyes, overtaking whatever had been there before, as he suspiciously watched the man.

"I did," he said in a clipped tone, not allowing the sudden and strange fluttering in his chest to show outwardly. What was happening to him? Why was he feeling this way? Sephiroth focused on smothering whatever was going on in his body, but could do nothing to stop the tightening in his groin that had started at the sight of blood, and worsened at the sight of the stranger.

The man cast an appreciative glance at the bloodied stumps that used to be men, before turning his gaze back to Sephiroth. The boy's face was flushed slightly, and the man knew, not from exertion...

"Well-executed. If you were not worthy in your own eyes, you must be now."

Sephiroth would have frowned, but instead he did nothing, desperately trying to stifle all of the emotions the man seemed to so easily evoke in him. It was so easy to be blank to anyone else, so why did he have so much difficulty hiding his feelings from this man?

"You are...very unique. I have never seen a grace like yours before. The way you kill, it would make even the most bitter, aged samurai, weep from its perfection." The man kicked a decapitated head, causing it to roll toward Sephiroth's feet.

Had Sephiroth been anyone else, his face would have dusted with red from the frankly-spoken words, but instead he stared down at the brown, lifeless eyes of the head that looked up at him. It had eyes like Masamune's.

"You took pride in it, I can see it in your face."

Sephiroth looked up, catching those maroon eyes with his own. He was quiet for a moment, choosing his words with care.

"It was...like you said: I am whole." Sephiroth hated that he said it, but he could not stop the words from leaving his mouth. That desperate childish part of him had somehow resurfaced from its drowning and was back to dog his steps once again. Something in him wanted that man to appreciate him, to keep looking at him with that unwavering approval and acceptance in his eyes.

Sephiroth knew nothing of the man, yet his instincts told him the man was what he said, the same as Sephiroth, lost without death, without confrontation and challenge. To be even slightly admired by someone, someone who understood...it almost hurt to think about.

All his life he had never been good enough, never kept up to the standards set for him by Hojo. It was constant disapproval, harassment for not measuring against the 'vision' of what Hojo intended.

Recently he had been praised since joining SOLDIER, told how good he was, for once in his life. For some reason, those words had not affected him. Perhaps because he did not care for the ones who spoke them. The men were normal, mediocre at best, stuck on the same things that the younger SOLDIERs were. Forged in weakness. To have an equal praise him...it was an entirely different thing.

He respected this man, for reasons he could not understand. Instinct told Sephiroth that this man was equal, if not superior to him.

"Ah. There it is you see, the thing every person seeks, to fill that empty void that resides in each of us. It is so much better to fill it for oneself than to crawl through life trying to find someone to do it for you," the man said, his bizarre grin revealing his abnormally pointed teeth.

"And now that it is filled?" Sephiroth questioned, resisting the urge to step away as the man bridged the distance between them. He held his ground.

Sephiroth could feel the hot breath wafting down at him from the man standing only a step away, smell its characteristic scent. It was like the heated breath of a predator, a fiend even, halfway between vile yet almost intoxicating for the slight edge of coppery blood to it. It was the smell of something that hunted, buried its head into raw flesh and ripped it off in large, messy chunks. Animal.

"That is up for you to decide," he said, pretending not to notice the effect he was causing by standing so close to the boy. "First, you must decide what you want, choose."

Sephiroth lowered his head, stealing a look at the brown eyes on the ground, before pushing the severed head with the tip of his boot, so that it was directly on the man's feet. The man smiled, raising his foot above the head, before bringing it crashing down, in a mess of brains, skull, and hair.

"I want to be the best," Sephiroth confessed, looking down at the grotesquely defiled head.

"And what a thing that is to aspire to," the man answered, using his right boot to flick a piece of skull off of his left. "For anyone else that is nothing but a dream. Unreachable, unattainable, as most human desires tend to be. But for you, for you..." He paused for a moment, his attention seemingly captured by the crushed head as much as Sephiroth's.

"You notice that many praise others for finishing second? There is often a saying said about this, something to the effect of, 'there will always be someone better'. This is pitiful human acceptance of shortcomings, people afraid of facing reality. Likely the reason depression can be so helpful in bring people down to earth," he said with a light laugh.

"What I mean, is that accepting this idea that 'there is always someone better', it is a solid acknowledgment that the feat is something that you personally, are incapable of. There is nothing wrong with knowing one's limits, but there is something wrong with believing that somehow those 'first place' types will always be there. You cannot know until you try."

Sephiroth was carefully slowing down his breathing, which unfortunately, due to the hormone changes in his young body, was coming in a rush from standing so close to the man. That fluttering was growing worse every second. He was slightly disgusted with himself, yet at the same time curious about his reaction to the stranger.

He was feeling sexual attraction, he knew it now. But this was a man. Sure, the other SOLDIERs occasionally used each other to get off, but it never meant anything, it's not like they would have done it were there suitable women around...

How could he even be feeling something sexual? He hadn't thought himself capable. He did his best the push the emotions as far down as he could, before finally speaking.

"And if I fail?" Sephiroth said quietly, his tone serious.

"The reason things are so unreachable for others is because they allow it to be. They never take the time to first understand then attempt. It is stupidity to try your hand at something before you have yet to even fully grasp the concept of it. And unfortunately for them, they do not have the intelligence to even begin to understand the things they so desire. But you understand killing. You have bathed yourself in its gifts... You are already halfway there."

"But I can still fall in failure," Sephiroth asserted, his gaze hardening slightly at the thought.

"No, I do not believe that of you." The man's hand latched onto Sephiroth's shoulder, the grip tight, but not painful. The boy visibly flinched, and his body stiffened, though he did not make a move to throw the hand off.

Sephiroth's look was uncomfortable as he spoke. "You do not know me," he said. "I have failed before." Those words instantly made him think of Masamune, and caused him to glace at the disaster that used to be a human head, in paranoia.

I failed him, Sephiroth's mind seemed to say.

"I know you better than you could ever believe," the man said, his eyes intently watching the slits of Sephiroth's greenish eyes.

The slits narrowed dangerously, and the words the boy spoke were laced with suspicion. "How?" He seemed to have bristled under the man's grip, more tense than ever.

"Because I was much like you once... I aspired to be something, someone, to tear myself from all the chains binding me to mediocrity. I, like you, wished to pursue a path that allowed me to be my own master, my own god."

"And did you succeed?" Sephiroth said, the muscles of his shoulders still tight beneath the surface of his dark blue uniform.

The man smiled, his thumb tracing over a silver lock that spilled over the boy's shoulder.

"I did. It was not...quite what I expected, however, it was welcome, it was freedom."

Sephiroth's eyes had softened slightly, though he still glanced at the hand with distrust.

"Who are you?" Sephiroth asked, hating the heat that seemed to be spreading from that invasive hand and further warming places he didn't dare think about.

"Who am I? Oh, if only you knew what a loaded question that is..." The man twirled section of the silver hair between his fingertips, enjoying the soft, smooth feel of it.

"Don't," Sephiroth breathed in warning, his small hand pushing the man from him by the chest, abruptly.

The man's hand withdrew without question, and his gaunt face became thoughtful as he glanced at the small hand that was pulling away from his black coat.

"I unnerve you; I apologize..."

Sephiroth's look had become hateful, though it was only a mask for the extreme awareness of his body that had flooded his brain.

The man had touched his hair... Something about the gesture was too personal, it instantly frightened Sephiroth. No one had ever touched any part of him in a way that wasn't businesslike or without malicious intent. The thought of it was foreign somehow. It made him nervous and suspicious. If life had taught him one thing, it was that people did not do things without reason, without some sort of reward in it for themselves...

"I meant nothing," the man stated, his dark eyes conveying reassurance. He sighed when Sephiroth's stance did not change. "We are...much alike you and I. I see you and I see myself. As I said, I want to help you."

"You mean you want to help yourself," Sephiroth stated bluntly, struggling with all of his mental capacity to swallow down the emotion that kept spiking inside of him and traveling down to his most ignored bodypart.

"Ever the cynic," the man said with a laugh. "No, I want to help you. I want you to succeed. If you want the selfish side of it, it thrills me to see something with such a penchant for death. You are, as I've said, unique, and that intrigues me. At the same time I want you to reach your potential. I have reached my own, and now I'd like to pass on the torch, so to speak."

Sephiroth said nothing, trying to gauge the stranger, to decide if it was all one carefully-constructed lie.

"You must see what I see," he said, taking in Sephiroth's perfect, youthful face. "I want you to know--not think---know just how magnificent you really are, how superior. I can see already that you doubt yourself; your words suggest it, even after you have accepted your..." he gestured to the corpses lying around, "talents."

"But..." Sephiroth looked to the ground, hating his own vulnerability, cursing himself for it.

The man's hand snaked out again, this time grabbing onto Sephiroth's chin. The teen drew back from the contact, but the man stepped forward and grabbed him by the shoulder.

"You have nothing to fear in me," he said, leaning down toward Sephiroth's face, his hot breath ghosting across the sensitive, and all too aware skin of the boy's neck.

Sephiroth felt paralyzed, his mind seemed to be pulling him in all directions, one a warning the other...excitement. Part of him reveled in the closeness, this person, someone, another being, that was willingly choosing to be close to him. He wanted to close his eyes and enjoy the strangeness of it, but the SOLDIER in him, and the animal, were fully alert, prepared for the worst.

"No," he whispered, taking a halfhearted step away.

"You fear that comfort is weakness?" the man said, his eyes intense with a look that Sephiroth was only beginning to understand was desire.

"I..." Sephiroth wanted to scream in unadulterated fury at the conflict going on inside of him, but his control wouldn't allow for it.

His mind kept repeating: people mean pain.

"There is no shame in wanting something. There is only shame in needing it. That is what separates independence from dependence," the man stated, his voice a little deeper than usual. "And you want something, don't you?"

A/N: Lucifer's balls are going to fall off by the end of this, I swear...