Like The Sun, Like The Moon

WARNING: Overly sensitive persons as well as young children and elderly people might regard certain aspects of the following chapter as slightly disturbing.

Chapter Eight

…
Weird.
…
He felt weird.
…

His whole body was hurting, and he didn't have a clue why.

Although… 'hurt' might not be the right word for it.

There was a certain pain, yes, but it rather felt as though his skin was being scraped. It was no true pain. True pain felt different, more intensive – but then again, had he ever experienced true pain in the body of Jenova?

Pondering, Sephiroth tilted his head. Or rather, he tried to; it wouldn't move much.

Just what the hell had happened?

When he half-opened his eyes, he could make out several colours: lots of blue and gray as well as some sandy shades of ochre swirling throughout his field of vision.

Sighing inwardly, he let his eyelids drop again. No sight, no need to watch.

He'd have to retrace the latest events in order to know just what was wrong with him.

So, what had happened?

He remembered standing with Yuffie at the railing a while ago. She had been insisting on accompanying him on his journey, and he had been trying to dissuade her – without success.
In the end, he hadn't had much of another choice but to accept her comradeship. Consequently, he also hadn't had much of another choice but to tell her the basics about his mission. Of course he hadn't apprised her of the whole truth; he had merely informed her about what she needed to know: He wasn't really schizophrenic, but occasionally controlled by Jenova, which caused him to do bad things. Said Jenova was a ruthless alien trying to destroy anything, which is why she had to be annihilated as soon as possible.

"She's possessing you?" Yuffie had asked rather anxiously.

At this, Sephiroth had smirked humourlessly. "Actually, it is the other way around."

Hm. This memory meant he had in fact informed her in just whose body he was currently wandering around.
Which was rather weird.
He had intended to keep quiet about this certain detail as long as possible, and yet he had told her about it. And what was worse, she hadn't even asked for it.

Ever since he had known her, she had managed to make him reveal more about himself than he had wanted to.
Might be something about her personality. Maybe her open-mindedness had was rubbing off on him whenever they met?
Hm. This theory was rather likely. He'd have to keep it in mind for further investigation.

A sudden twitching in his right shoulder shook him, quite literally, out of his reverie. Noting with some relief that his senses were slowing resuming their assigned activities, he realized that the pain-like feeling was originating in his right side.

But him getting injured… sounded so ridiculously unreal.

Just what the hell had happened?

Okay, he'd have to concentrate. No further digressing allowed – he'd have to find out what had happened as soon as possible.

So he had been conversing with Yuffie near the railing. And strangely enough, she had even believed him, without any doubts.
Weird.
Some years ago, she had never questioned his words. But things had changed, hadn't they? The girl hadn't exactly trusted his words the day before, which was only understandable. Yet now, she all of a sudden seemed to believe him unconditionally.

Hm…

Maybe she could sense if he was lying or if he wasn't?
Might be worth an investigation. He'd have to keep that in mind…

Once again, his shoulder twitched, causing Sephiroth to sigh. He had been zoning out again.

Okay, so he had been standing at that railing with the girl who had believed every single word he had told her and then…what?
What had happened after their little chat?

He remembered there had been something odd. And it had grown odder and odder while they had been speaking…

Another twitching of his shoulder informed him just what had been odd – it had been his right arm.
It had gone numb as though it had fallen asleep without any real reason.

Well, that alone wasn't too much to worry about. Extremities tended to fall asleep from time to time. In fact, they were even supposed to do so once in a while.
But what they were certainly not supposed to do was acting against your will.

Yet Sephiroth's, or rather Jenova's, right arm seemed to be of another opinion.

He remembered it rather clearly now – sometime during their little conversation, Yuffie had noticed his arm's poor condition and decided to do something against it. Thus she had tried to medicate it with her unfortunately non-existent first aid skills.
Well, eventually she had managed to revive his arm, yet not with a particularly positive impact – because it wasn't him, but Jenova controlling it.

And that had led to some nasty consequences.

Being able to materialize Masamune and use magic without his consent, his possessed arm would probably have injured, maybe even killed, Yuffie if he hadn't quickly retreated to the lower deck while battling Jenova's will inside of his head.

Two minutes later, when several guards had lost their lives due to his inability to regain control, Sephiroth had been forced to acknowledge that he might and possibly would fail in ever winning back his arm.

And thus…

He had chopped it off.

Frankly spoken, it hadn't even been as hard as he had thought. He had simply grabbed the Masamune with his left hand, turned it around and cut his right arm off. No hesitation, no regrets.

Well, if it had been his body, he might have been more tentative about mutilating himself, but since this wasn't the case, he didn't really have to worry about any consequences.

…did he?

Certainly, that nauseating feeling was about to drive him crazy, yet he still preferred it to involuntarily slaughtering innocents without any control whatsoever.

So if he had lost his right arm for the greater good, so be it. It might be a bit inopportune, but still manageable.

Although… thinking about it, he began assessing this outcome as rather fortunate – thanks to his nearly unlimited ability to transform, the fact that one arm was lost didn't quite matter anymore. After all, he could simply project the picture of a complete person into anyone's heads and nobody would mind. Not even he himself, because he would control whatever form the others were seeing. So all in all, the loss of his arm wasn't regrettable at all, but on the contrary, it was quite a blessing; sooner or later, the Puppet and His Friends would have to get rid of Jenova for him. So why shouldn't they start now? Disposing her bit by bit would certainly prove less difficult than defeating her as a whole.

Hm…this was indeed one useful realization. He'd have to keep that in mind.

When suddenly his right shoulder twitched once again, he noticed with a rahter bizarre kind of satisfaction that he finally knew just why it was twitching – because it lacked the arm it had used to connect to his torso. So the pseudo-pain was originating there, and he was sure it had to bleed like hell.

Although…he couldn't be all that certain whether Jenova's body would in fact bleed the way human ones tended to… Might be worth an investigation. In fact, he could start investigating right here and now – if his eyes were only at least partly useful. But, as he had to accept after catching a quick glimpse of the colourful blur that was his surroundings, he was still unable to process any visual impression.

Hence he was forced to reconsider his current situation.

So he had been watching the sea while talking to Yuffie when his arm had gone berserk. Subsequently he had backed away to the engine room in the lower deck and finally chopped off that godforsaken arm of his. And then…

Then what?

Ever since then, he had been half-lying, half-sitting on that same spot near one of the machines, trying to remember while struggling against the sleep battling his wakefulness with tenacious persistence.

That's what he had been doing – but what about his arm?

It was then that he recognized the noises sounding in the background as battle cries. This meant Jenova had indeed taken advantage of the arm, which he had so conveniently dropped, by using it to communicate with the puppet and fight it thereafter.

Sephiroth wondered briefly just why she fought the clone and his clique despite her easily predictable defeat, but he soon had to admit that there was really no way to retrace her reasoning. He simply couldn't understand her – just as most people didn't understand him.

And he was just fine with that.

After all, if people did indeed conceive his reasoning, his whole plan would lose its validity. He had to be known as the bad guy, the evil villain, the mad miscreant – or else Jenova would never be eliminated completely.
Because, if they knew, Cloud and Co. might refuse to go on, rendering all Sephiroth's sacrifices useless with that decision…

"Hey, Leon!"

A voice shook him out of his musings. Young, energetic, feminine and obviously concerned about something. Yuffie's voice. And she was worried about him.

What a caring girl.

"Leon, can you hear me?"

He might have nodded, but at the moment it still seemed impossible; his body might be in the right condition to move, which he was sure of, yet he still couldn't persuade it to actually do something.

"C'mon, answer already!"

Judging by her voice, she was growing more and more desperate. After several fruitless attempts to yell him conscious, she even tried to wake him up by gently shaking his left shoulder. However, as he wasn't exactly lacking the awareness but rather his body's cooperation, her well-meant attempts were to no avail.

"You should stop trying."

It was the puppet speaking – so they had finally defeated his arm? Sephiroth grimaced inwardly at the grotesque image this thought brought up in his mind and corrected his choice of words – So they had finally defeated Jenova?

"He's dead by now."

Obviously they had, or else the clone wouldn't be standing nearby right now while declaring Leon's – his! – death in that calm, grave tone that would have caused Sephiroth to believe it himself. If he hadn't known for a fact that the puppet couldn't be right, that is.

"He… Sephiroth doesn't do that – He doesn't hurt without killing."

He didn't even have time to ponder whether this certain aspect of his reputation was a good or a bad one, when he suddenly heard a loud slap echoing through the room.

Someone had just been smacked.

And, considering the current situation, Sephiroth noted in faint amusement that it must have been Yuffie hitting the clone.

"How dare you say that!" she was yelling frantically, "He can't be dead!" With that, she grabbed Leon by his shoulders, this time both, and shook him again. "C'mon, get up!"

"Wait…" It was the clone's voice again.

"Darn! Get up, man! Leon!" Yuffie was still shaking him, yet her optimism and consequently the force she was using kept decreasing steadily.

"Aren't you the one who stole our money?"

Immediately the girl stopped shaking.

Under different circumstances, Sephiroth might have laughed.

Honestly, how tactless could one be? It might have been an honourable attempt to considerately distract the girl, it might have been the complete opposite. Either way, the clone's behaviour wasn't the brightest course of action; infuriating Yuffie had never been a good idea…

Sephiroth could clearly hear the girl's footfalls as she was stomping towards the puppet. "Just what does it matter!" he heard her yelling frantically. But no… she wasn't yelling.

She was screaming.

And it was then, when her voice was just about to crack, that Sephiroth finally realized the girl was suffering.

"Here – I'll give it all back to you!" she screeched as she threw her purse at the ex-SOLDIER, "You can have all my money if it's so important to you!"

She was angry, she was frantic, she was desperate.

He didn't want her to be in that state. He wanted her to stop screaming. He wanted to soothe her. He wanted to regain control over his body…

"What does it matter now!" she shrieked while punching Cloud's chest weakly, "If he's dieing, then…"

"He's not."

As he opened his eyes and slowly rose to stand firmly before them, everyone's disbelieving gazes darted towards the wounded officer. Yet his focus lay only on a frantic Yuffie staring at him with wide, hopeful eyes.

"There is no need to distress yourself because of me."

Turning around to face him squarely, Yuffie struggled with her words. "But you didn't move," she muttered, "I thought you…"

"You were mistaken," Leon interrupted her ramblings in his typical, fairly indifferent manner, "I told you I do not die that easily."

"Yeah, but…" Yuffie sputtered as her gaze shifted towards the empty space his right arm would normally be located at, "what about your…injury?"

Granted, the loss of his arm caused a rather weird feeling; he felt permanently off balance although he was standing steadily. But beyond that, there was nothing. The 'pain' seemed to be subsiding, the bleeding had started fading as soon as he'd regained control. The only thing still left to do was renewing his appearance so he'd officially regain his right arm and therefore his balance. However, he couldn't do this right now, as just about the whole of Avalanche was watching him in utter speechlessness.

Finally, when he realized the girl was waiting for an answer, he simply shrugged – which felt rather weird with only one arm – and stated matter-of-factly, "It will regrow eventually."

The reactions these four words triggered off were indeed interesting…

Yuffie's right eye twitched spasmodically.

The puppet's eyes widened slightly.

The Cetra frowned.

The… barely clothed woman tilted her head to the side.

The black man was grimacing in confusion.

The red dog-wolf-something was simply doing…nothing.

"What do you mean, 'regrow'?" the busty girl, whom Sephiroth recognized as the travel guide from Nibelheim, asked uncertainly.

Tilting his head to return her gaze, he quickly thought up a halfway credible excuse. "Have you ever heard of a certain professor Hojo?" he asked them as he carefully leaned back against the wall. Yet as he didn't expect either of them to answer, he simply went on straight away. "Thanks to him…" He paused and corrected himself, "Or let's say, because of him I've got some rather useful self-recovery skills."

Immediately, the confusion left the faces of all assembled Avalanchers. Yuffie, too, seemed to be somewhat satisfied with that answer, but her reproachful gaze dared him to explain things to her later on. With that, he really didn't have a problem, since it wasn't Yuffie, but Avalanche who shouldn't get to know certain facts about his personality.

"So you've also been one of Hojo's specimen?"

Looking for the voice's source, Sephiroth recognized the red, wolf-like creature as the one who had addressed him. He answered the wolf's question with a curt nod and responded, "I take you belong to our cosy little society as well."

"I do," the creature replied with a nod of his own when all of a sudden…

"Huh?" Yuffie exclaimed noisily, staring at the wolf in utter disbelief, "You can talk!"

Sephiroth sighed. That was the question he had unhesitatingly decided not to ask, yet obviously not everyone shared his attitude towards tact and discretion.

"Just what kind of animal are you!"

"Yuffie…" he reprimanded her at a low voice, causing her to whirl around and face him stubbornly. "What's wrong about asking some questions?" she pouted. Yet her tenacity quickly melted away. Her comrade's strict stare silenced her while the miserable condition he still appeared to be in turned her determined expression into a compassionate, almost pained one.

Finally, the wolf decided to break the silence. "It is alright," it spoke calmly, "People tend to ask me this." Once he had regained the audience's attention, he added nonchalantly, "Frankly spoken, my ability to talk stems from my affiliation to a rare species only few individuals are left of."

Sephiroth nodded in acknowledgement, Yuffie expressed her thoughts in a meaningful "Oh, I see…"

"Say…" This time, it was the Cetra speaking. She seemed rather uneasy, yet stated her deduction nonetheless, "You used to be… treated by Hojo, and yet you are travelling on this ship with us." She paused briefly as she looked directly into his eyes. "You don't happen to be chasing Sephiroth as well, do you?"

Hm.

If this little accident hadn't happened, they would have never been able to draw such a conclusion and everything would be fine. But no, life just had to go the way he didn't want it to. First it had made him meet Yuffie again, then it had allowed Jenova to play extraordinarily funny tricks on him, and now even those nosy Avalanche guys were bothering him. And, what was even worse, his current situation forbade him to simply refuse an answer.

But lamenting his poor luck wouldn't help him either; he'd have to get this done and over with.

Thus, after only a short while of silence, he finally cleared his throat. "Indeed I do." While stating this response, he carefully repositioned himself in a less excruciating fashion – he might not like admitting it, but now that he had eventually resumed full control over his body, it was calling attention to the lacking arm more and more agonizingly. "However, it is not him I am after."

Hissing in pain, he slid down against the wall and concluded his statement at a low yet clearly audible whisper, "But Jenova."

While the others were staring at him in utter indecision, his sudden rendition of weakness had alarmed Yuffie immediately. "Leon?" she asked anxiously as she jumped at his side. "Anything I can do?"

He coughed. "…got a Cure or something?"

After blinking at her own stupidity for forgetting the First Aid again, Yuffie hastily touched her Enemy Skill materia and cast a White Wind on everyone assembled.

As he felt the white, calming light enter his body, Sephiroth knew it wasn't strong enough to really ease his pain. But at least it gave him a credible excuse to finally close that damned wound.

During the long minutes he had already had to suffer from this injury, he had developed the theory that at least half of the pain he perceived was originating from his current camouflage, whose sensations were emulated by Jenova's body in an unfortunately most convincing way.

Thus, he took advantage of the cover the White Wind offered and changed his current appearance of Leon the Officer with a Bleeding Stump into that of Leon the Officer with an Arm Slowly Regenerating. As long as the clone and his clique were around, he wouldn't risk regrowing his arm within a mere second, since, even despite Hojo's experiments, such a quick recovery was commonly considered as rather impossible. Yet simply moving on without a right arm at all wasn't an option either. Hence, he'd simply have to take some time in re-establishing his completeness, progressing bit by bit.

Granted, this was an annoyingly tedious course of action, yet thanks to Cloud and Co. he didn't have much of another choice.

Oh well. At least the pain was finally subsiding, this time probably for good; to all appearances Sephiroth's theory had just been proved valid: Shortly after applying the new disguise, there was still a tiny hint of itching left, yet the aching had stopped as soon as his human shell had recovered.

What a relief.

"Thank you," he told Yuffie with a small smile once the white light had vanished.

She noticed his change in appearance – the blood had vanished, his stump seemed to have healed – but inquired nevertheless, "Are you better now?"

"I'm fine," he told her truthfully and took a few deep breaths. He didn't bother standing up, but sat peacefully in order to allow his condition to improve as much as possible; of course he'd favour rising again to demonstrate he was indeed fine, yet he wouldn't risk another relapse, especially as he didn't feel as 'fine' as he'd like to. Thus, he simply kept sitting while waiting for Avalanche to resume their conversation.

However, there was a long silence until someone finally did.

It was the travel guide from Nibelheim. "I'm sorry for your arm," she began rather awkwardly before advancing to the more important matters, "But you said you were after Jenova – that's Sephiroth's mother, right?" Taking the officer's lack of an answer as a 'yes', she went on, "And that tentacle-thing back there…" She nodded towards dead arm lying peacefully several metres in the distance, "I've seen this somewhere… before."

As he followed her gaze, Cloud, too, recognized the tentacle. "…Jenova," he muttered darkly before turning back to Tifa, "You mean he's been walkin' around with that thing?"

The brunette nodded solemnly when suddenly, the tentacle transformed into a comparatively tiny, red orb, causing Sephiroth as well as Yuffie to frown in disbelief. Tentacles transforming into materia defied nature in every way you looked at it – and yet the clone didn't seem to suspect anything when he picked it up as though it was the most common thing in the world and made his way back towards the group. "So it WAS Sephiroth," he stated in utter surprise; a sentence that forced just another heavy sigh out of the villain in question.

It was more than just a frustrating realization to find his pursuers struggling with the most obvious clues when he'd prefer them to fully grasp his crazy evilness in its sheer enormity. And, honestly, it was not that hard to grasp.

But then again, this was Cloud Strife. The legendary ex-Soldier commonly referred to as 'chocobo head' throughout the world of FFs. And frankly, he hadn't been given this nickname without a reason.

I'll have to take what I get, Sephiroth finally accepted with another sigh when said puppet, up until now deeply indulged in his own deductions, suddenly addressed him. "…and he attacked you because you were a threat to Jenova."

A long moment of silence passed until Sephiroth realized the intent stare he was receiving meant he was supposed to answer. After another moment of silence, he decided to more or less gratefully accept the excuse the clone was providing and finally responded in a rather dry tone, "A…valid explanation."

"But there are still some questions left," the puppet went on in a more bewildered tone, "Why have you survived?"

Sephiroth frowned. "So you wish I hadn't?" he inquired with a fake hurt expression, causing Cloud's eyes to widen. "Oh sorry," the clone exclaimed hastily, "that's not what I wanted to say!" He cast an apologetic look at the officer and added, "But I mean – normally his attacks are deadly, you know…"

"Normally this attack would have been deadly," Sephiroth countered firmly, "However, I managed to partially dodge thanks to your glorious entry."

"I see," Cloud responded in a formally sympathetic way, yet quickly continued his little interrogation in a less compassionate tone, "Why have you come down here in the first place?"

Sephiroth sighed. This questioning was slowly but surely growing more and more annoying. He hated justifying himself, just as he didn't exactly favour thinking up new lies all the time. But in both respects he didn't have a choice, thus he'd have to simply play along – unless…

"Why don't you tell me?"

Unless he'd simply act the same way he always did.

"Think about just why I might have come down here, Mr Simpleton," he went on in rather crude manner while watching the clone out of slightly narrowed eyes, "If you have at least partly listened, figuring me out ought to be utterly facile."

Looking somewhat hurt, Cloud began to ponder.

And he pondered.

And pondered.

And pondered.

Finally, after five minutes of intensive brain activity on the clone's part, one of his team-mates had the heard to unburden the poor chocobo head. "It's Jenova, isn't it?" the wolf stated matter-of-factly, "You felt her presence."
Again, Sephiroth sighed. Yet this time, it wasn't a sigh of frustration, but one of relief – because this meant that at least a part of the puppet's gang had an actual brain. One that was even functional.

This was a more than just great revelation – a supernaturally, almost surreally great one, so to speak; and corresponding to its surreal greatness, it eased both his mind and his mission tremendously. Finally it wasn't necessary anymore to leave clues wherever he went to make sure the clone got at least a part of them; now he could rely on at least one member of his crew to be capable of figuring them out. At least partly.

Deciding the wolf was more than worthy of an answer, Sephiroth confirmed the creature's deduction with a simple yet grateful "exactly" and added as an afterthought, "Although it didn't exactly work out as I had planned."

"Are you going to continue still?" Aeris inquired quietly.

He wasn't exactly sure what she was driving at, nonetheless Sephiroth nodded. "Of course."

Returning his nod, Aeris addressed Yuffie. "And you are accompanying him, aren't you?"

As he watched the one girl affirming the other one's estimation with determination, Sephiroth's eyes suddenly widened in disbelief. The Cetra wasn't really going to…

"Then why don't you join us?"

The sheer idea of him journeying with his so called 'fated rival' was so hilarious that Sephiroth found himself actually shocked at the Cetra's naïve proposal – and shock was such an unfamiliar and unwelcome sensation that it indeed took him a while to fully process the new information.

"I don't think…" he finally began in a somewhat disturbed tone when he noticed in slight irritation that he had hesitated too long – Yuffie had started speaking only a moment after him and was already drowning him out completely.

"I think it's a GREAT idea!" she exclaimed enthusiastically and in such a shrill, high-pitched voice that it was a wonder the windows weren't shattering.

"Yuffie," Sephiroth told her indignantly as he grabbed her arm to drag her closer and discreetly hissed into her ear, "It is not a great idea."

While staring her down strictly, he tried to recall just what might entitle the girl to make decisions of such weight without his consent.

The truth was, as he concluded after a while of pondering, Yuffie didn't exactly have a right to choose his course of action at all. However, the whole friendship affair might cause her to believe so.

It was strange thing, really.
Persons considered as 'friends' could be somewhat pleasant to spend time with. However, there was one thing about this certain category of people that had always kept Sephiroth from allowing anyone to become more than a mere acquaintance – 'friends' wouldn't allow him to intimidate them; they would never follow his orders.

And already did Sephiroth regret permitting Yuffie to restore their friendship – the girl didn't take his warning seriously, but watched him with her huge, cute, puppy dog eyes while crouching directly in front of him. "Why not?" she begged, "It'll be such a lot of fun!"

"Don't be stupid, Yuffie…" he whispered in annoyance, his right eye twitching dangerously.

"Don't be stupid, Sephy…" she retorted stubbornly, leaning forward to such an extent that the tips of their noses were almost touching. She was so focussed on glaring at him that she only noticed her mistake when he scowled in disapproval. "…won't be dealt with easily if it's only the two of us, y'know," she finally added surprisingly calmly and backed away to sit down in front of him.

She was playing her role well, Sephiroth had to admit as he amusedly watched her actions. She might have almost let his secret slip, yet she had saved the situation superiorly by turning the unintended interval into a meaningful one. Yet even if she had gone on in a less calm manner, Sephiroth guessed the others would not have suspected anything – she might be trying to hide it, yet the glowing blush that was currently spreading on her face like a wildfire spoke volumes.

The poor girl had realized just how close their faces had been and was now embarrassed about it.

How endearing.

"'Sephy', huh?"

This time it was a giggling Cetra who broke the silence. "What a cute nickname," she said with a smile before addressing the one she had just unconsciously mocked, "But she's right, you know."

Frowning, 'Sephy' looked up at her.

"We can help each other in reaching our aims," she told him brightly, "even though they differ slightly." She crouched next to him and Yuffie before going on. "And I promise we won't handicap you," she concluded with a welcoming smile, "In fact, I promise we'll help fighting him, so something like this –" She nodded sensitively towards the remains of his right arm. "– won't ever happen again."

Sephiroth sighed. The fact that he had not lost his arm on account of his physical inability to combat himself invalidated the Cetra's arguments completely; he honestly doubted they could keep him from maiming his body again if Jenova ever decided to possess any further limbs. And yet he couldn't find any method of talking himself out of this; there were simply no logical reasons to assert without exposing himself, and fighting his way out of this situation wasn't an option either. Thus he didn't have much of another choice but to agree.

"Alright."

Immediately, the two girls' faces lit up.

"Great, man!" Yuffie exclaimed brilliantly, all former shyness momentarily forgotten as she patted his shoulder amicably, "You won't regret it!" Suddenly, she hesitated and turned to Aeris, "We won't, will we?"

The flower girl smiled. "Of course you won't," she guaranteed them merrily, "Welcome to Avalanche!"

Recognizing the name, Yuffie gasped audibly. Nonetheless Aeris's enthusiasm didn't even as much as falter as went on with her introduction, gesturing towards the respective member while naming them. "These lovely fellows are Tifa Lockheart…" The travel guide from Nibelheim winked at them. "Barrett Wallace." The rather voluminous man with the machine gun nodded, but kept eyeing them rather suspiciously. "Red XIII." The red wolf did a gesture akin to bowing. "Cloud Strife." The clone grinned. "And I am Aeris Gainsborough." She beamed and turned to them.

Yuffie, who had regained her composure rather quickly, returned the formality. "I'm Yuffie Kisaragi," she told them brightly and gestured towards her companion. "And his name's Leon –" Suddenly, she paused. Did her comapnion's current alias actually have a last name? But even if he'd already thought one up, he certainly didn't use it often – which meant he wouldn't mind her creating a new one, would he?

"Actually, it's Jean-Philippe Marque Marie Lyonne," she informed her new buddies rather flippantly, "But everyone calls him Leon."

If he wasn't so lazy, Sephiroth was sure he would be slamming his head against some wall right now. Over and over again.

Just where had his authority gone?

What had become of the respect people had used to pay him?

Back in the auld lang syne, nobody would have dared making fun of his nametwice in a row. Because nobody would have survived it. And yet this girl kept provoking him, jeopardizing her life and, more importantly, his self-esteem.

But why?

Why was she doing this?

Why was she daring this?

He'd definitely have to clarify certain principles later on, or else the girl might think he was actually approving of her behaviour – which he certainly wasn't.

What an annoying girl.

"Dock workers –" An announcement by the personnel – the employees he had left alive, not the dead ones – shook him out of his reverie. "We will be docking in Costa Del Sol in five minutes. Prepare for docking."

Great thing. So the ship would finally arrive after all. He was indeed looking forward to regaining some privacy, but the fact they were stowaways on a ship reaching its destination every moment now also meant…

"Woah! We'd best hurry and hide somewhere."

Exactly. The black guy, 'Barret', expressed precisely what Sephiroth felt. Only with the tiny difference that the word-like "Whoa!" certainly hadn't crossed the latter's mind.

"Can you stand?" Yuffie asked him caringly as she got up and offered him a hand.

"I am not disabled, you know," he replied with a frown and rose effortlessly, even without her help.

"Why so snappy today?" she grumbled with a frown of her own.

He raised an eyebrow. "Why so annoying today?" he responded.

Yuffie groaned, ready to retort, yet Sephiroth was faster.

"Let's go," he simply said before leaving to hide behind some crate, moody ninja in tow.

But well, at least this one single time, his orders were not questioned.

End Of Chapter Eight

A/N:Before you call me a sadist, let me inform you that our good ole pals at Square Enix virtually forced me to cut off Seph's arm. After all, Cloud and Co. were fighting Jenova's arm in the game, so I really didn't have much of another choice... But don't worry, by the next chapter (or maybe the one after that, who knows?) he'll be complete again.

I guess you are rather shoked/surprised/somethignelsed that I made him and Yuff team up with Cloud and Co. To be honest, I hadn't even planned to do this in the beginning, but it happens to be quite a good basis for me to work with in later chapters, so I thought it might be a nice idea. shrugs

Now, in case you're wondering, about the way Seph's condition developed in this chapter: You might have noticed that after being half-unconscious, he's first getting better, than suddenly worse, and finally better again. This isn't a mistake or anything – when I had a cold a while ago, I forced myself to get up and do something useful, once I felt a tiny little bit better. And then, it only got worse. Okay, I don't know whether this can really be compared to losing an arm, but… I think you know what I mean.

So anyway, I hope you liked this chapter and are willing to submit a nice little review – because those funny little fellows tend to motivate authors to write more stuff more quickly. Really!

Because of the great reviews I got since the last time posted, this chapter has become even longer than the last one, and that was already a monster.

So now, lots of special thanks to Chaotic Rei, saharasfury, Sonicron and Jillato for being such loyal reviewers, and further lots of special thanks to Somnus as well as SouthwestEggroll for actually bothering to review all eight (!) chapters of the story. You guys are so wonderful, really!

BTW: The "in-e-waite..." Yuffie uses in the first chapter is meant to be a questionably pronounce "inevitable", but for a better understanding's sake I now changed it into a flawless "in-e-witte...". Thanks to SouthwestEggroll for pointing this out :p

So now...
Thanks to all of you for reading and reviewing!

Greetings & see you in the next chapter,
Linnya