31: Drana and Sephiroth

"So, Sephiroth, this is it? We'll live together, all the way out here? I've got to wonder… Is this how two people like us are supposed to end up? Considering everything that's happened… it doesn't feel normal. But we're not normal, are we? But… We're still people, right? Aerith believes in us. She thinks we can help each other. Or... more like, I can help you. I can help you live the way you deserve to live. Right, I think that's how it goes. So I have to stay, I have to stay to help you. Something else wants me here, too... I can't explain it. Like another person... so close to you. It's... her. We care; so we're staying."

"You're sickening. But. If you'll lead me to my Promised Land, I'll endure anything.

"Although... I'm asking for hell on earth, aren't I? Hm."

-----

"We're all fools!"

--

Vincent stopped dead when quakes broke out in the hall and a surge of energy literally made him and everything else around him hover off the floor. He kicked uselessly in the air, knocking and scattering debris ahead of him like dominoes. Grunting, he flicked his rifle out of the holster at his thigh but dropped it when gravity sent him crashing him back to the floor. Light rubble rained down on his back, then all was still again, save for the slow fall of dust.

"What the hell was that?" He snatched up his gun and re-holstered it, all the while working to get back upright.

The entire floor rippled yet a second time, though less violent than the first, forcing Vincent to hug the wall for support. He couldn't tell whether these tremors were coming from above or below anymore. Regardless of the source, the entirety of Shinra HQ just became all the more treacherous. Anymore and this concrete tower of countless tons would mark his premature grave.

Not yet.

Vincent moved on to the lower levels where he eventually entered a chamber with a bottomless, glowing vat. And across the grated pathway narrowly stretching over the pit lay dead or half-dead men covered in blood. They were plainly human compared to the others, for when he passed them by, not one lit up like a candle and tried to grab him. An unfair fight played out here, though truth be told they likely deserved it for crossing Sephiroth.

Then came the stench of burnt rubble wafting in from the next corridor.

The air carried a hollowness to it that unsettled the gunman; now more than ever felt like a good time to draw his rifle in the surety that his hunch was right. He approached the iron door knocked half off it hinges from the earlier rampaging tremors. Within the dimly lit hall, a few more bodies littered the floor, one groaning weakly while pinned under a fallen chunk of ceiling.

Vincent sadly shook his head. "Sephiroth…"

--

"I'm coming. Just around the bend. And I have a gift for you."

"Heh..."

He saw the few witless men and women spying him from doorways, some of them jammed with up to three people. They literally trembled. They weren't fighters; they were just spineless scholars, so they'd be easy prey for strangling like feeble birds. But the one he dragged down the hall would suffice for now. The king of the birds, Saristis Noah. He'd finally attained his trophy for persisting so far. Now he would present it and receive his just rewards.

Saristis himself was more injured than dead, yet hardly acted the part. He seemed to willingly let himself be dragged along, mumbling things Sephiroth found ungrateful but wouldn't punish the man for just yet.

"Stay back, Kit, Jenna, Emerson," he declared weakly. "The general means business…"

"Sar!" a woman exclaimed. "You'll be k-"

"Shh…"

At the end of the hall sat three iron doors. One brimmed with hunks of concrete while another had been painted with red bars and fitted with an electronic lock. The third went wholly unnoticed. Sephiroth swayed into a stupor at the sight of the first door to his left. Drawing in a long, slow breath, he yanked the redhead into the crook of his malformed arm, squeezing yelps out of him from the thorns digging into his flesh. Wordlessly, he motioned Saristis to open the door, which the dangling man did so with a reluctant hand. The keycard slipped seamlessly through the lock, then with a buzz and green light, the door yielded entry.

"Drana!" cried Sephiroth.

"It's been fun," Saristis croaked.

"You..."

The men warily edged into the chamber, all aglow with red and green. In the center a large glass canister practically throbbed. Sephiroth knew what it was that gave off that illusion, and it filled him with increasing bliss. His eyes rolled wildly in his head, taking in all the light he could muster. Meanwhile, Jenova more forcefully clawed her way across the rest of his slim bulk, but not even the agony she ignited could stop him.

Triumph won.

"Here I am. Now everything... can be right again. Come out."

Silence.

"My poor treasure. Fine, I'll help you, you piteous thing. Then we can go home."

Sephiroth tightly balled up a fist and drew his arm back. With a sharp inhalation, he launched it straight into the glass.

A small vacuum sprayed green light over every inch of the chamber, shimmering in the tumbling shards. Awestruck, Sephiroth let Saristis fall from his grasp and threw his arms out for the light to embrace him. His body burned through both pain and pleasure, happily ignorant of Jenova slashing beneath his skin. The swirling coolness of the ribbons of Lifestream threatened to whisk him away in the face of fully reclaiming his one and only prize. So with that, he struggled to gather himself and approach the broken tube.

Sephiroth sweetly offered his hand, whispering, "Yes, yes…"

-

Past the oxygen mask strapped to my face, I could see the faint silhouette of someone reaching out to me. I knew who that someone was, because in their presence a storm of thoughts and emotions hit me: anger, vengeance, sadness, desire. This was Sephiroth in all his bloody splendor. His essence was stained with the sight and smell of it. But for now, I'd accept all of it, all of him. I would just be glad to see him, glad to be free, and we could go home.

If only I could move.

But I was still held back. And I saw Sephiroth frown when my hand didn't meet his. It was so ghastly but wasn't why I hadn't taken it. I just could not lift a finger.

"Do I have to do everything myself?" he moaned, his voice like an echo in my head.

His blue clawed hands rose up towards me, in that rare childlike manner he worked so well. They didn't touch me but rather something over me, and pulled on it tight. Whatever it was tore at my skin, and I cried. Lifestream gushed and fluttered anxiously into the air, lighting up Sephiroth's blue and white face, his body wracked with surprise but never giving up on tearing apart what shackled me.

"Stop!" I screamed.

"Just a little more-"

"I can't!"

"Sephiroth, wait!"

Above Sephiroth's gray head I saw Vincent rush the chamber, his gun pointed straight ahead. His eyes sparked with lasting awe, then darted down to Saristis sprawled on the floor, clutching and fumbling with his broken glasses. Dismissing the scholar with a scoff, the gunman leapt for Sephiroth, locking him in a chokehold with his rifle.

"Vin…"

"Can't you see what you're doing?" he exclaimed, tugging as hard as he could to move the immovable man. "You're hurting her!"

"These machines are... !"

Sephiroth's eyes steamed and boiled a feral red from the filth Jenova spread inside his body. His being so close stung me with the alien's poison and my being so close made him suffer the blistering Lifestream as it fought to conquer the other. Vincent gazed up at me from over Sephiroth's shoulder, the movement of his lips so faint I nearly wouldn't have seen him trying to speak.

A final yank tossed Sephiroth backwards, holding a metal panel with cables that spat sizzling Lifestream on his skin. My body drooped sharply in place but I was still stuck; my arms remained stretched above my head in a steadfast grip. Almost there, but not quite. One more excruciating tug and I'd be perfectly set free.

Sephiroh shrugged Vincent off his back and crawled on hands and knees to the base of the container. He grabbed a part of me, his eyes as bright and curious as a demonic child's. "What's wrong with you? You're..."

"Oh dear, she's breaking up," mumbled Saristis from afar. "What poor constitution for a Weapon."

"V, Vincent... Sephiroth, I…"

"Lies. Do you think I'll let you do that? Do you think I will let you go so easily?" Gradually, Sephiroth pulled himself up into the tube with me, his knees scraping and crushing glass. He gripped the jagged edge and hovered over me, setting off a chain reaction of pain once more. Yet he wouldn't be moved. I saw it as I looked into his bleeding eyes, as I sensed his warmth mingle on my chest and belly. "I won't forgive you."

"I, I'm sorry…"

"You don't understand," he said, then clenching both of my arms. "If you leave me, then you have no right but to die, to disappear. I won't forgive you. I've found my Promised Land and I won't surrender it without a fight."

I let my eyes slip from his infested face and chest down to his bloody knees. It warmed me to hear him speak passionately about holding on to something he thought dear. The only problem was the fact that it wasn't me. Though I didn't want to sound jealous; I was in no position to be jealous. But from his mouth, I still wasn't a person so much as a doorway to power. A thing.

"Drana," he hissed, "what do you want from me? To say one of those magical little words to you? Ha. I couldn't. You wouldn't... understand anymore than I do."

"You... you can hear me think again?" I asked, strangely brightening.

"It hurts," he said, removing my oxygen mask, bending in close to my face. "Take Mother away. Because it's time to cut the cord."

"Sephi-- Aaah!"

Bursts of agony threw me into Sephiroth's arms and together we tumbled to the floor. Faint, I looked up to find my arm where it shouldn't have been, folded a foot away from his head. Vincent knelt close by, clasping the twitching hand and peering at me in veiled shock. For me, however, it wasn't that shocking. I'd had an arm sliced off, the other almost gnawed to a pulp; I'd survived those moments like another day in the park. But this, this felt a little different.

As the Lifestream wept above like never before, it occurred to me: Somewhere along the line, the redhead scholar must have messed something up. So now, I was…

"Maybe, this is it... ?"

"Drana," Vincent called quietly.

"I apologize," rumbled Sephiroth's voice through his chest, the tender regret oozing out of him into my face. I sighed, then labored to rise up on my other arm which dripped with Lifestream at every flex of nonexistent muscle. I frowned at him beneath me, his body unmoving save for an exhausted breath or two.

"Wh, what? You rarely... you rarely say sorry to me, you know that?" I told him.

"Heal me."

"You have no manners..." I sighed again, resting my head back on his chest. His heart took its time in projecting any life it had but was nonetheless a consolation to my ears. In contrast to the Lifestream's crying, of course, effortlessly managing to eclipse Sephiroth's heartbeat in severity.

"Drana," Vincent called again.

"Mm, so you came to help me, too?" I slurred dreamily. "Thank you…"

"I-"

"Stay away, dead man. This is our time."

"Our time…" Even knowing better, I had to smile. A slip of the tongue was easy to spot with him. True or false, I was comforted by it either way. To be surrounded by people who cared, indirectly or otherwise, almost made me immediately forget that I might not survive on my way out of here. Whatever 'not surviving' meant for someone like me. "... what happens next?"

His lips didn't even so much as twitch.

"Vincent, do you know...?" I asked.

No answer.

"I can't keep myself... together. I'm trying but, but it's not working. Aerith told me that if that ever happened, I would fade away, everything that made me... me... Did she mean forever? Aerith, did you mean forever? If I tried, c-could I come back? Talk to me…"

"Aerith?" Vincent gasped. "Is she with you just like Lucrecia?"

"You and your ghosts," Sephiroth chuckled lowly. "That stupid woman had followed me here like a worthless shadow. I wonder where she is now."

"You mean Lucrecia? She's actually here?" The hopefulness surging through the gunman's voice sounded a little misplaced. But I understood. The poor thing had been the joy he was searching for all along. Which, of course, begged the question: Where was she? Where was Aerith? I heard neither their voices nor sensed their presence. When I needed my questions answered the most, they mysteriously fled like the wind. Why did all the important people do that?

Wrapping me in his arms, Sephiroth started to sit up. I saw his eyes clamped shut, but the reddish stuff still bled freely from them. I brushed a few fingers against his cheeks, smearing the steaming filth across his face. "This…"

"Mother's terrified," he said with a smirk. "She dies with every touch you lay on me, every second you're near. It'll be beautiful, her last moments…"

"Jenova?"

"Drana, call Lucrecia here," Vincent blurted out. "I want to see her, even if she's just a ghost."

"I, I just want to sleep…"

"Gods…" The gunman sidled back on one knee, his brow harshly creased. Then his body perked. "Saristis is gone."

"So what?" Sephiroth snapped, pulling me closer between his drawn legs. "Now, Drana, Mother is weak. Kill her in one swift flick of the wrist."

"Th, this may be the last-"

"We'll see. Now."

Did soldiers always risk another to save themselves? Weren't they meant to risk themselves to protect another? Maybe that only applied to all soldiers but the fighting men of Shinra. I pondered in sadness as I held tight to Sephiroth with my only arm. For him I firmly wished the Calamity, Jenova, would go away forever. As the creature that once brought the world to its knees twice— now reduced to a simple disease pawing for life in supposedly one of the greatest soldiers of all time— I wished that she went away. I wanted her to leave him alone, I had to want to. And in response to my plea, Sephiroth's chest heaved excitedly against my face.

"The Lifestream-"

Lifestream gathered hastily to seal us off from the rest of the room in a wailing, radiant cyclone. Frightened, I peered up where the lighted tunnel spun obstructed against the ceiling, dissipating in frantic waves that scarred the rusty metal green. I saw Vincent trying to force his way through the blinding light, his figure nearly whipped away by the rage of air.

Sephiroth crushed me tighter to his body, growling, "I know what the Planet's doing. But you're staying with me! And if you don't…"

"You're coming with me," I said.

--

From Sixth: I need infrastructure. Then I need to look up the word in the dictionary to be sure I'm using it right.