Here you go guys, told you it wouldnt be too long for this chapter. Hope you like it!

-Chapter Twelve-

Sephiroth's Revelation

The room was huge, about the size of a cathedral. In this room was what must have been the most high tech equipment in the world. In the middle of this grand room was a table with a map of the world imprinted on it. On this map were many different coloured lights, each either flashing or staying a solid colour. Standing in at the side of this table in the middle was a man.

This was a tall man. He looked young, possibly in his late twenties. He had dirty blonde hair which fell down over one side of his face. Only one of his startlingly bright hazel eyes were visible. This mans name was Nicholi Dimitri, and he was clearly in charge of whatever went on here.

Nicholi began to pace up and down the length of the table, looking at each of the markers on it with what appeared to be great interest. Every so often he would stop, look at one of the markers, shake his head, and then remove it from the map. On the other hand, he would stop, examine a point on the map, decide that the location was significant, and add a marker. Each marker was one of two colours, white or red.

He continued this for another few minutes before finally deciding that he was satisfied with what he had done. After this he walked swiftly to the other end of the room, where there was a long row of very complicated looking computers, most of which had someone sitting operating them.

Nicholi approached the man on the far most computer. "Anything new?" His voice had a thick Russian accent. He peered at the screen which was decked out with what looked like old news headlines.

"Nothing that we haven't heard before." The man replied. "Seems that the theft of the Crown Jewels is still making headlines." He zoomed in on the article. "As expected they didn't catch who was really behind it."

"Good." Nicholi replied. "It will make it all the more easier when we go to take it from them."

His phone then started to ring. Nicholi walked away from the man at the computer back over to the map table and answered it.

"Yes?" Whoever it was he was talking to was obviously an underling. "Fantastic, we are going to need that if we are to stand any chance, how do you know for sure it is that?" There was a short pause. "Fantastic, though I do think it was rather reckless of her to summon it, the consequences could have been severe. Who has it now?" Again there was a pause. "Unlike her to give it up, but it should make it easier to take. Anyway, good work, any news on where the others are? No…OK then, report back in five hours, we will move out soon."

He hung up the phone and looked back at the map table. He located a city in Hampshire, England, where there was currently a flashing red light. The light changed from flashing to solid. A smile crept onto Nicholi's face. His gaze then went to a flashing red light in Paris, he looked at it for a few seconds before taking out his phone and calling somebody.

"It's Nicholi, he wants to know if you are absolutely certain about this one." There was a pause. "If you are wrong he will more than likely kill you, you understand? Let's hope you confidence is not misplaced. It will be our next target on the way to Britain." He hung up without another word, and as he had done with the other light, he made the one in Paris go solid too.

He examined the map for a few more moments before walking out of the cathedral sized room into a corridor. Wherever he was going he was walking with a purpose. After a few minutes navigating through the labyrinthine passages he ended up in what was unmistakably a prison. Most of the cells in there were vacant, except for one. In the last cell on the left in the dark prison, there was a man who looked extremely weak and pale, obviously he had been in here a long time.

"I'm afraid he has decided your judgement spy, and you are to be executed if you do not co-operate." Nicholi then raised his hand and a feint yellow glow emanated from it.

The man in the cell looked as though he was trying to resist, which he succeeded. "I would rather die."

"Then die you shall, goodbye." Nicholi raised his hand again, but instead of turning yellow as it had done previously, dagger like shards of ice erupted from it. He was hit though the heart, the head and the stomach. A look of utter pain was on his face, and after a brief second, he fell to the floor, blood covering the cell.

A guard nearby winced at the sight of it. It was quite gruesome to look at. "Clear this up."

Nicholi then walked away back to the map room, where there were now three more people gathered round the huge table in the middle. They did not look as though they were of a high status, like Nicholi. They looked more like a convenience, or a fist for hire.

"We are leaving in three hours, is the jet ready?" He asked them, they all grunted which he took for a yes. "Good, make sure you are all prepared, with a little bit of luck we should be able to get into Paris undetected."

A little bit of luck was something which Nicholi was never short on. He subconsciously touched his forearm, within lay a purple orb which raised his luck considerably. The only side effect to this was a feeling of overconfidence, which could be fought, but was difficult to ignore.

"Three hours, meet at the airport." They all walked off, leaving Nicholi to his thoughts.

"It will be much easier when we manage to reunite all of the Turks so we don't have to keep using these knuckle heads." A voice inside his head said to him.

"Agreed, but for now they are the best we can do. It is better than trying to do the whole operation ourselves after all." His eyes were fixed on the solid red light in Paris. "It could be tricky to get hold of."

"Hardly." The voice replied, "Well, it won't be nearly as difficult as trying to steal one of the crown jewels, and we can breathe a sigh of relief there because that has already been done for us."

"Assuming that is that you can manage to get the materia off of the thief?"

"Assuming? It will be simple, we will outnumber them all by a huge margin. We have nothing to worry about as long as we plan everything properly." The voice in his head then fell unusually silent.

Nicholi's eyes then fell back on Great Britain to the solid blue light. "Yes…" He muttered aloud, "Assuming."

He navigated his way through the maze like passages of this huge building once more, before ending up in what must have been his quarters. The room was fairly large, yet plain in what it contained. A single bed, a mirror, drawers and what must have been a large assortment of rifles and shotguns.

Nicholi walked over to the mirror and looked into it. Instead of seeing his own reflection staring back at him however, the figure of a tall slim man with pure blonde hair and blue eyes. He had an eye patch over his right eye.

"So the Louvre. With any luck we will be able to slip in and act like a tourist." This mans voice was not Russian like Nicholi's. "Hopefully we will be able to take the materia without anybody noticing."

"We have to find it first." Nicholi said, walking away from the mirror and taking down two rifles from the wall. He attached them to his belt before turning back to address the man. "How do you propose we do that? It could be disguised like the one in the Tower."

"I will know it when I see it." He replied. "As far as our intelligence knows, we are the only people that know it is there, so we shouldn't be pushed for time. We will be able to search and search until we find it."

"You hope." Nicholi replied simply, now taking some ammunition out of the drawer next to his bed and loading the gun, he made sure the safety was kept on however. "Still no idea what the materia is."

"We assume it is a summon, however like Alexander, we won't be able to tell what it is until we have summoned it…" With that Nicholi left the room, being sure to lock it behind him, and set off for the airport.

"Rubbish!" Came Alex's voice from the other end of the phone. "Come on, can't you get out of going? It's been ages since we have actually spent an entire weekend just hanging out."

"No can do." Josh replied, walking around his room and packing a small travel bag at the same time, "Besides, I want to go, I haven't seen her in ages and she is kind of cool."

"Oh don't give me that." Alex whined down the phone, "I'm not saying she isn't cool, I'm just saying that the only reason you are going is cause your parents are making you, you do anything they ask!"

Josh didn't answer, he was too busy fighting with the zip trying to do up his bag. After about thirty seconds of trying to force the far to packed bag closed, he managed it, though he thought he heard an ominous ripping sound in the process. He did not dare investigate it however.

"I am going because I want to and that's that." Josh said, though he knew that this was only half true. "I'm only gone for the weekend, and besides we see each other at college all the time!"

Now that he thought about it however, he had notice that himself and Alex had started to drift apart. This was slightly unnerving, they had been friends for so long, and the thought of drifting apart had, as far as he knew, never occurred to either of them. But then again, Josh doubted very much that Alex would understand what he was going through at the moment, so perhaps this odd drifting was something quite good for them, a blessing in disguise.

"Meh I guess so." Alex replied. "Well be online and stuff, at least she has internet… I'm going to be bored out of my brains this weekend."

"Will do." He said, then he heard a car horn beep outside which must have been his parents asking him to hurry up. "Anyways I've got to go, I'll text you or something when I'm there!"

The car journey was extremely dull and uneventful. Josh even found himself thinking that having Sephiroth talk to him would make things a bit more bearable. It did not matter too much however, perhaps this peace and quiet was just what he needed to break away from all the strange goings on that had occurred in his life recently.

A fatigue inducing car ride late, Josh and his parents found themselves outside a nice little town house, painted a nice neutral cream colour. It had been a good two years since he had seen his mum's sister, who just so happened to be his god-mother too. It was slightly upsetting, but she had been moving around so much recently that going to visit her had just proved impossible.

Now however he found himself walking up a nice gravel path towards an old looking wood front door, his parents had to go and get fuel for the car, so Josh was left on his own at this point.

He knocked on the door, and a few seconds later his god mother Liz Edwards opened the door. Josh knew that his aunt was in her mid-forties, however for her age she looked very well. She was shorter than him, had dark brown hair with blonde highlights which enhanced it considerably, and puppy brown eyes.

"Long time no see Joshy!" She boomed upon seeing him, pulling him into a rib-crushing hug, Josh couldn't help but smile widely.

"It's great to see you again Auntie Liz." For as long as he could remember she had always been his favourite relative, and possibly the only person besides Alex whom he felt he could confide in.

"I think I may vomit…" Came a voice in Josh's head. He completely ignored this however, this was time for him to spend with his family, and nobody was going to take that away from him for the world.

He went inside, and was then attacked by a small fluffy thing. "This must be Suki!"

"That's her my darling." She said, closing the door behind her as Josh attempted to make his way into the living room.

The small fluffy thing which was trying to destroy Josh's leg happened to be a Labrador puppy. He had heard a lot about how she was planning to get one whenever she had phoned, and could not wait to meet it. Josh loved dogs.

"Now my lover." She spoke with a thick townie accent, "I need you to read through this for me, it's the article I was telling you about for the local paper."

She went over to her bureau and took out several sheets of paper. "I hope they are paying you well for this." Josh said to her as he took the article from her, "As long as it isn't anything else about those damn jewels, that's turning into old news."

"Quite agree my darling." She started laughing quietly, "But that story did make me a pretty penny, was so close to getting it into one of the mainstream tabloids, but the competition was too good."

Josh had always admired how his god mother had managed to make a living out of freelance journalism. It was her passion, and even though she was not what you would call well off, she was happy and doing what she enjoyed most. It took him a few minutes to read through the article.

"You have a couple of typos." He explained, pointing them out, "But other than that it's great, you know I can hardly find any flaws with your work."

This particular article had been about a new exhibition opening at the Louvre in France, however Josh could not say he was a huge art lover.

"I don't know, I think I'm licking their asses a bit much in the second paragraph…a critic never got anywhere by being nice." She took a pen and scribbled out something from her printed article.

"Considering yourself a critic now are you?" Josh joked.

"I would be better than some of the shit ones you see in the broadsheets nowadays." He couldn't help but laugh at how blunt and to the point she was. "Anyways where are my manners, do you want a drink my lover?"

Just as she offered this the puppy jumped up onto the sofa which he was sitting on and started licking his face to death. "That would be great thanks!" He barely managed to get the words out through the continued licking from Suki the Labrador.

His aunt went into the kitchen to make him a cup of tea, and Josh just about managed to wrestle off the Labrador.

"This new exhibit…It can't be just coincidence…maybe that is where the materia is." Josh knew that Sephiroth had to be speaking directly to him, he had been hiding his thoughts so effectively it would be impossible for him to just let this slip by accident.

"'The' materia?" Josh replied, noticing how he had not pluralised it. "You think some particular type of materia is here?"

"It's a possibility, worth a look at least." Josh could not help but wonder what this materia was, and Sephiroth had evidently noticed this. "I suppose I won't be able to keep this from you for too much longer. I'm looking for the black materia. Only one of them exists, unlike the others where there are duplicates. It's not quite as bad as it sounds…"

Josh was worried about what 'not quite as bad' was supposed to mean. "…What does it do?"

"It is just a very powerful form of magic, nothing more." Josh did not buy this one bit. "Trust me, if you got this materia you would be more powerful than anyone on the planet."

"Define powerful."

"Powerful enough to make sure that nobody else messes with you, so to speak." He considered this, however there was something about his voice which Josh did not like. Perhaps it was because they were constantly in each other's minds, but he was sure that Sephiroth was lying.

"What does it really do." Sephiroth had obviously noticed that he was not going to be able to lie to Josh like he could conceal information.

"It doesn't matter too much, it is just a powerful form of magic. Putting its function aside anyway, we need to locate it before anyone else can."

Josh did not like the sound of this one bit. At that very moment however, his aunt came back into the room carrying two cups of tea. It was amazing that she did not spill any with the dog bouncing around at her feet.

"There you go my darling…" She said, putting the tea down on the table in front of him, "…milk and two sugars."

"Thank you Liz." Josh beamed at her, then thought it would be best to finish up his conversation with Sephiroth.

"We aren't looking for it and that is that. It sounds like bad news." Josh heard nothing more from him after that.

The afternoon mostly consisted of catching up on the previous years with his aunt. By the time his parents got back to the house, nobody entering the room would be able to get a word in.

"So tomorrow I think we should all go down to the beach, Suki loves it down there." Liz said to them all. It was getting very late by this point, and she and Josh's parents had drank rather a lot, they seemed to be getting sleepy.

"Well…" Josh's mum said, "…I think we need to get some sleep then if we are going to be up early to go to the beach."

They all agreed, and Liz showed them all where they were staying. Josh's room was small, but cosy. The walls were painted a nice navy blue colour, and the single bed by the window was extremely comfortable. It did not take him long to drift off to sleep.

He was standing in what looked like a void. All he could see was black, never ending black. Then, quite suddenly out of the darkness, none other than Sephiroth appeared.

"You are dreaming, just so you are aware…" He said to Josh, walking right up to him. It was extremely odd speaking face to face with him.

"That's kind of obvious…" Josh replied, then noticed that his sarcasm would probably annoy Sephiroth greatly.

"No, it isn't, you wouldn't have realised until you woke up if I hadn't have told you. Now, we are going to search for the black materia as soon as you get back from your aunts, is that clear?"

Josh looked at him and let out a small laugh. "No we aren't, end of story."

"Then I will have to persuade you…" Sephiroth said. Without warning he was right in front of Josh, he punched him violently in the face, which hurt badly.

Josh swore loudly. "This is a dream, what the hell?" He felt blood running out of his nose at an alarming rate.

"Doesn't matter, it's still going to hurt!" He punched him in the stomach, then the chest, then face again. "And I could do this all night until you wake up, all night, every night, until you agree."

Josh laughed at him. So what if he was hurt in a dream, in no time at all he would wake up and everything would be fine, he wouldn't even remember the pain. "You have no power, only threats here."

Sephiroth hit him again, then paused. "You are right…" He agreed, much to Josh's surprise. "Then perhaps I shall have to persuade you another way." Sephiroth then drew his sword and stabbed Josh through the heart.

Josh woke with a start, covered in cold sweat. He thought back to the dream that he had just had, it felt so real. Did that all really happen? Much to his distress, something then confirmed that it wasn't just a dream.

"I shall persuade you here then, and I can guarantee you that you will not disobey after this…"

An extremely odd feeling then took over Josh. He could not feel anything, it was as though his entire body had become numb, yet he could still see, he could still hear. He watched, as he started to unwillingly get up and out of bed and head towards his bedroom door…

AN- Please review! We need to know what you are thinking. Next chapter soon!

R&A