The World That Never Will Be Chapter 37
by the infamous and notorious tocasia
10/16/2023
CHAPTER 37
Aqua wondered if this was the only room available on such short notice.
...was she to be a prisoner here?
That would be ridiculous. She had a keyblade! She wouldn't be trapped so easily.
She checked. The door was locked.
A tap of Master's Defender, and she locked it from the inside, too.
There was a small cot crammed between bookshelves, no windows blocked the gloom, the floor was bare stone. Well-made cabinets, drawers all shut, draped in ancient webbing. A candle for light.
She sneezed at the dust, and magicked it away.
There was a bell she could ring for broom service, if she hoped stale crust and flat water would satisfy.
Wait. Was this... Mickey's old room?
In the drawers were mouse-sized bed linens, sharply folded, stamped with stars and moons. Cold and thin, the kind of fabric fit for an apprentice, to teach asceticism and fortitude and humility, or at least incentivize memorizing a spell for heat.
Was Yen Sid making a point, or had he simply forgotten she was taller?
Aqua drifted through a quicksand mire of emotions she didn't have time or energy for. She felt like everything was never going to stop falling apart.
She'd never be the same. She might be stronger, or weaker, but she wasn't the same Aqua who'd gone into the darkness anymore.
...was she?
No, she had to be. She was herself, past, present, and future. She had a duty.
I won't let you down.
I won't let myself down.
She held her wayfinder, wishing it would soothe. Direction was impossible in this place, but Sephiroth was probably okay. She'd find him in the morning; he'd be guarding the ship. She could trust Yen Sid that far, couldn't she?
...Yen Sid would've left her in the darkness.
...in the morning, she'd rescue Sephiroth from whatever trouble he'd gotten himself into, and they would decide the future.
She was too tired right now to make sense of it.
Aqua sank into fatigue, curled up in the mouse-sized bed.
...she needed the rest. It'd be no good if she passed out while fighting Xehanort.
Rebuke ringing in his ears, Sephiroth picked himself up off the ground and decided there were no grass stains on his leather. He coughed at the pearly white smoke that seemed to fog his mind.
Yen Sid had hit him with...
...some kind of contingent banishment spell coupled to a strong aversion compulsion. It would take a great deal of willpower (which he of course had!) to approach the tower again. Impressive.
How should he topple it? In his hand, the fire raged...
...and, within, darkness. He snuffed it out.
He'd been so close...!
...his plan had failed.
...would Master Aqua be punished for his transgression? He would not allow it!
Sephiroth held his wayfinder, his precious gift, and concentrated.
He could sense her life, knew she was whole and hale. Relief allowed curiosity. What were they speaking of, now? What would Yen Sid say to her, in his absence? The tower's magic blocked any greater scrying.
He owed her the opportunity to operate within her hierarchy independently, to try her luck.
But... it felt... wrong.
If he needed to devise a rescue...
If she was crying, if he should be there with her...
The tower's wards would repel darkness, reflect teleportation, and were impervious to physical attack. The foundations dug deep into the fabric of the world, in tune with its meager shard of reality's resonance.
He might be able to move the tower, or the whole world, outside the barrier's boundaries and enter that way. There might be an anchoring spell, that the structure would stay in place in all its dimensions, to foil first.
...significant energy would be required. There was not enough life on this world to make it so.
The ship's weaponry, perhaps?
But, Master Aqua might not need his help. With this black star as his focus, if she called for him, he would know.
...wouldn't he?
...she might judge him too reckless to be of use, and what affection they'd built might not overcome that.
Could he blame the darkness for his failure? He didn't know.
...he didn't make mistakes. He wanted her to tell him so. He wanted to hold her, hold her bright strong heart next to his and have her keep him near.
He brought forth, in his hand, the ghosts of frozen flowers.
He began to pace.
The sword did not need cleaning, his boots would never need polishing again.
Sephiroth leaned on one of the gummi ship's wings. It was going to be alright.
He had excised his humanity (such was the power of his denial!), he could do the same to darkness.
Even if it required the death of millions more! Even if it required another rebirth!
...both of those things were likely true. He would remake himself again. He was change, the end (and the beginning!) of eras!
There are sayings, that God is a being of pure Light...
So, instead of becoming one with the darkness...
If he was Light, would Master Aqua still be afraid of him?
He liked pretending she wasn't.
...he needed to get back inside the tower.
There was a knock on the door, jarring, rousing her from almost-sleep.
...to a darkness that didn't belong.
"Hello?" Aqua braved, icy-awake, keyblade in hand.
"May I come in?" Sephiroth said.
Aqua hesitated. "How do I know it's you?"
A heavy silence.
Unseen, her visitor cast a Cura spell, origin unmistakable. The thrum of captured mana, protected, protecting, everflowing hope, awash in her own blessing. True token of their unbreakable connection.
"Sephiroth?" She opened the door, the light from her keyblade a torch.
"Yes, Master Aqua?"
"I'm glad you're safe," Aqua sighed, and stepped aside to grant him entrance.
He cradled the black wayfinder, full of shattered reflections, in his palm. "I worried, when you didn't return to the ship."
Aqua worried, too, "Did Yen Sid give you permission to be here? After all that you said?"
What did it mean, that Yen Sid had allowed Sephiroth to re-enter the tower? Was he currency, for her cooperation?
"Yes, he did," Sephiroth flashed her the proudest of conspiratorial grins, "I negotiated for the opportunity to see you. He specified a condition for my return, a task he thought impossible, which I have accomplished! I have slain all the heartless on the infinite stairways of this tower, with night to spare, to be by your side!"
Aqua did not know what to say.
Of course he would challenge her notion of 'infinity', standing there, awaiting her adulation.
"I developed a variant on an instant death spell from my world. The heartless on the staircase were infinite in number but bounded by concept, similar to magic which understands friend from foe, or differentiates between our common terms for spectra or quantized phases of the moon. With practice, I think I could cleanse an entire world of heartless with one cast! It's not quite destroying the darkness, but it's a start. To preserve efficiency, maybe you could close the gates between worlds. Sora's quarantine didn't last, but it was better than nothing."
Aqua stared at him.
"What? I thought you would like the idea. It would only target the heartless, don't worry. I came straight to you when I was finished," Sephiroth emphasized. "I had to know if you were okay. I didn't know if you would call for me, after..."
"Well, it saves me the trouble of having to rescue you tomorrow!" Aqua half-joked, in shaky cheer. "What were you thinking? You could have ruined everything! I was afraid you were hurt!"
"I am sorry." He was. He'd displayed a startling lack of foresight. His stunt had proved more dangerous than anticipated. It was not the action of a responsible commander.
...it was worth the risk, but wouldn't have been if she'd been hurt.
Aqua looked at him, knowing his sincerity but finding herself deserving of truth.
"...I am sorry I failed," Sephiroth amended, "My execution of the mission was unacceptably sloppy."
"You think?"
"I saw an opportunity and I took it. We weren't getting our answers any other way!"
"And we don't have them now!" Aqua reminded, perhaps unfairly.
"..." Sephiroth glanced down first. "I was trying to help."
"I believe you," Aqua said. And then, with a playful twist of tone, "I can see telling you not to do anything stupid isn't enough."
"I would appreciate more clarity, yes," Sephiroth smirked back.
She forgave his failure!
She would have rescued him!
...he might have needed it! Ha! He... wouldn't have minded. Not with her.
She chose to embrace his company!
She would have rescued him!
Beautiful Master Aqua!
She was here and she was safe and he was here with her.
Aqua wasn't going to apologize for the sad state of the room and its lack of seating (and sleeping!) options. It was more comfortable than the ship. But...
"I'm sorry. I couldn't refuse. I..."
"You must forgive yourself for resting, Master Aqua."
Easier said than done. He knew that. The sentiment was nice.
"But," Sephiroth continued, scanning the meager accommodations, "This cannot be all Yen Sid has to give you."
Endearingly angry on her behalf, Sephiroth advanced to pull the rope to summon broom service...
Aqua tackled him into a hug to lessen his reach, "Do not ring that bell!"
"Why not?"
"Just, trust me, please."
"...alright."
She felt him relax, devoting all his attention to holding her, as though she were his greatest comfort.
They stayed like that for a while.
"Yen Sid... wants me to betray you," Aqua mumbled into his shoulder.
"Are you going to?" Sephiroth asked.
"Of course not. Part of me just wants to kiss you and forget I have anything else to do."
"There's only one bed," Sephiroth teased, diabolical.
"I don't see the problem. Neither of us fits in the bed anyway."
Aqua sat down, on the floor, and looked at him expectantly.
He sat next to her. His legs were much longer than hers. "The floor is cold, Master Aqua."
"I don't care."
Sephiroth raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"You're not cold," Aqua smirked, hoping her eyes sparkled as wickedly as his.
"Heh." He wrapped his arms and wing around her.
She had dreams about opening treasure chests, and all of them were empty.
Aqua awoke with Sephiroth's wing for a blanket. A strand of his hair tickled her nose; she very gently reached to move it away from her face, only to find more of it tangled up in her hands.
He was certainly warm, but not particularly soft.
...and he should've had something soft to rest on, too.
He stretched out under her, and she thought she heard something crack.
"I miss your beach house," she teased, after feeling him groan he was fine.
"It would take orders of magnitude more energy to create that effect here. Thwarting Yen Sid's magic would demand more than the darkness could provide."
No no no, she was not complaining about the current arrangement! Aqua tried to find the words to tell him so, but he was faster.
"You should've let me call room service," Sephiroth teased back, with smiling eyes.
She rolled over to lie along his side and shared the story of Mickey's misadventure with the brooms. He laughed.
She didn't want to get up yet.
"Did I make a horrible mistake? Saving Terra?" A stupid, selfish question, her yearning for validation, awkwardly timed! But no self-abasement could nullify her craving for his answer.
Sephiroth did frown. "It was likely a situation Xehanort was prepared for."
"So my actions didn't matter?" Her fight had to matter! When nothing mattered, the darkness won.
"We don't know."
"I don't think the memories will ever stop hurting. The pain will still be there, even when we win."
Sephiroth consoled through probable jealousy she hadn't meant to spark, "...it will heal. The weakness will leave, because you will know you've done what you could."
"I think I would have completely fallen apart, before," Aqua admitted.
He was a large part of why she hadn't.
"Thank you," she said, with all the light in her heart.
He ran a hand through her hair again.
"If I were to stay here, would you stay with me?"
The possibility seemed to take Sephiroth by surprise; his bafflement alone was encouraging. "If you wished to stay here, I would not impede your choice. But, I have been preparing to face Xehanort, if not by your side, then in your name. I would pursue him myself."
"Thank you for the honest answer," Aqua said.
He was being a good ...friend, listening to her doubts. She wanted more. Was that wrong?
"Do you think Yen Sid is right? That the two of us aren't enough?" she asked, aloud. "Nevermind, I know you don't. You'd walk right up to Xehanort and fight him yourself. You're that brave."
...arrogant, her secret thoughts corrected.
"Arrogant," she agreed. "But what about me? I... "
...I am so tired.
"Sephiroth?"
"Yes?"
Aqua took a deep breath. "I need you to convince me, not to stay here. I need you to tell me, that I'm strong enough. That we're strong enough, together. I know these things already, but I want to hear them too."
He needed not a moment's hesitation. "Together, we cannot be defeated."
Her trust was not misplaced. Aqua recalled what she'd seen in his heart... or hadn't seen. So wrapped it was in darkness, a veil she couldn't pierce. Something boundless, an empty idea, forced into being. Belief so powerful it became truth. A magic that had nothing to do with hearts. To Sephiroth, light and darkness were a lie. He thought there was something beyond, and to touch his belief was to become it...
"My precious ally. I can, and will, destroy Xehanort. You could accomplish it yourself. However, we have established that that's not the sole condition for victory. I will need your help to save your friend. If any of him remains, Terra will recognize you. Your friendship will rekindle the light in his heart. You remember things about him that he may not remember about himself. You'll be something for him to latch on to. To rebuild a mind... is different than destroying one."
She supposed he would know.
Sephiroth gifted a fond smile forgiving of her manipulation, "Clever Master Aqua. You were never intending to stay behind."
"No, I wasn't," Aqua admitted, to herself as well. "The rest I need, I won't find it here. It's wrong, to pass this task on to another. Xehanort has to die. Some darknesses cannot be balanced."
"Then, there is nothing else to do," Sephiroth replied.
"Do you think Yen Sid is watching us?" Aqua wondered.
Sephiroth inclined his head, seeming to listen. "He is busy, with some great spell."
She felt it too, quaking through the stones. The psychic imprint of flashes under the door, and smoke, and smells more intuitively described with color words.
"I guess we'd better not disturb him." She'd done her best to be a good guest. "Let's go... check on the ship."
No one could tell her what was right. She had to make her own way.
...that's what it meant, to be given the title of Master. They'd had faith, in her strength, in her light.
Aqua hoped Terra and Ven and her hypocrisy wouldn't judge her too harshly.
They stood in front of the gummi ship. There was dew on the patchwork grass.
Aqua tried to start the engines. They sputtered a straining motor sound, a wail of mechanical distress.
"Did you touch anything?" she asked, only a little bit frantic.
"No!" Sephiroth insisted.
They achieved a dangerously wobbly takeoff. The ship was rising too slowly.
"Are we stuck on something?"
"I'll check." Sephiroth unbuckled his seatbelt.
The ship's warning lights objected, bathing them in flashing red, but Aqua unlocked the hatch.
It reminded him of leaning out of a helicopter. Those memories aided his balance.
The chains were translucent, almost invisible, purely of magic. A lock with no keyhole, tethering the gummi ship to the tower.
"Seems like Yen Sid doesn't want us going anywhere," Sephiroth relayed.
The aetheric links were not beyond his reach. He began an incantation to alter Masamune's edge, to make it drink magic as easily as it drank blood...
Air pressure plummeting, clouds closing off their exit. A sorcerous weather change.
Yen Sid's voice boomed like thunder, "Stop! It is too soon! Do not go there! Don't alert Xehanort to what we're planning!"
Sephiroth deflected a bolt of lightning with his wing. Its crackling impact dropped him into a solid crouch.
Master Aqua moved behind him, sure-footed. Her knee brushed his back, bracing. He liked the feel of her leaning against him; he would not let her fall. Sephiroth trusted she'd engaged the autopilot.
He looked up at her grim, two-handed stance, keyblade raised at her shoulder...
...beautiful...
A ray of golden white light shot from the tip of her keyblade and streaked towards the tower. A summoning...? Was that... the world's keyhole? He'd never seen...!
The brightness was such that even he struggled not to blink.
Whatever Master Aqua had done turned the Mysterious Tower inside-out. All the glowing ramps and portals exploded from the center like a bizarre bouquet of tube worms.
Yen Sid's spell snapped.
The shockwave hit. Roaring force ripped the door from their vessel. Space-worthy shielding peeled from the opening, crumpling like foil.
Sephiroth caught her as she fell back breathlessly, wrestled with the howling, tearing air to hold her inside the ship, his grip around her waist secure, and she was laughing, laughing in the face of the thinning, soon-to-be-unbreathable atmosphere relinquishing their escape, their reverse fireball away from this world.
Sephiroth slammed a magical barrier to patch the hole in the cabin, and cast an Aeroga spell to replenish the lost oxygen.
He set Master Aqua back in the captain's chair.
She was still clutching her keyblade with both hands. Her legs hung over the armrest at an awkward angle.
"I am," she gasped, or giggled, "In so much trouble."