Part I

It was late when the phone rang, hours past when she had put Marlene to bed, and Tifa was quick to answer it lest the sound wake her. She wasn't sure who would be calling, though her money was on Yuffie, who always seemed to forget--or ignore--the time difference between Mideel and Midgar and insisted on sharing her biggest victories whenever they happened.

To her surprise, it was Aeris's voice who answered her hello.

"Aeris? You're calling late." She wasn't sure if the hour was more surprising, or the fact that Aeris had called at all. She wondered if something had happened.

"I know, I'm sorry. I should have called earlier, I meant to, but I was having a hard time figuring out what to say."

"Is something wrong?"

There was a hesitation on the other end of the line. "Not exactly. But... I need to ask you something, and I know you're not going to like it."

Tifa glanced over at the door to the bedroom, open just enough that she could see Marlene's sleeping face in the thin strip of light. She stood watching the girl breathing quietly, and then stepped outside into the night air. Even this long after sunset, it still felt warm on her skin, and a soft breeze rustled the trees behind the small house. It should have been comforting.

She made sure the door was closed snugly behind her and then asked, "What is it?"

She could hear Aeris draw in a breath. "Sephiroth came to see me."

Tifa felt herself go stiff. A cold anger boiled up inside her just at the sound of that name. And she knew, she knew what Aeris wanted to ask her, if not the words but the manner of the question. Part of her wanted to say no before Aeris could even begin to get the words out; Sephiroth didn't deserve anything in this world, much less what Aeris wanted to offer him. She wanted to say no, and turn off her phone, and climb into bed with Marlene and hold her and try to forget that this had even come up.

She clenched her teeth, saying nothing.

"I know how furious you were when you found out that I just let him go," Aeris went on, "and that everyone went along with it. And I know it was selfish of me, to decide that. So I need to ask you... If I give him another chance, will you be able to forgive me?"

Tifa kept on holding her breath for a long moment. She counted backwards from ten, trying to subdue her own anger. "I was furious then," she agreed finally, in a careful tone. "And I know that if I ever see him again, I'll kill him. He doesn't deserve to live. But... more than that, I just don't want anything to do with it anymore. Between Nibelheim and Meteor... I joined Avalanche for revenge, and all that time I was fighting for revenge. I wasn't living my own life. And I just want to go back to that, to living, and not be involved in anything else. I want to move on, and I think you should do the same."

"...but will you hate me, if this is how I think I need to do that?"

"I don't see how it can be. It was really screwed up, what that man did to you. And now you think having him around again will reverse it? It won't."

"I wish I could do what you're doing, Tifa, and put it behind me. I've been trying, but... I think, before that, I need to face it. Face him."

"It's a bad idea, Aeris," Tifa said with conviction. But she was no idiot, and despite the hesitance in Aeris's words, she could tell just saying that wasn't enough to stop her. She would have to forbid it, to tell Aeris she really would hate her if she went through with it. And that would be a lie. She closed her eyes, letting out a sigh. "But you've made up your mind, so you're going to try it no matter what I think. So go ahead."

"You're all right with it?"

"I'm not really all right with it. But I won't hate you for it. Just, do me a favor and whatever happens, leave me out of it. I don't want that man anywhere near me or Marlene, no matter what you think about him."

"I understand, Tifa. And... thanks, for letting me do this."

"If he fucks up, give him hell."

"I will."

Aeris hung up, and Tifa lowered the phone to her side. She sank back against the door. Was it really all right, she wondered, that she was letting Aeris do this? Would Cloud and Barret and everyone from Nibelheim understand, that she couldn't revenge them? It wasn't something she could put herself through anymore, and wasn't it more important to hold onto what you had than to rage over what you had lost? Planet willing, they'd forgive her for being only human.

Tifa went back inside and lay down beside Marlene. She knew sleep would be a long time in coming, if it came at all, but at least here she could feel like something, at least, was all right.


Aeris went through the motions of being a good hostess, inviting Sephiroth to hang up his coat to dry and to shower. From the bathroom, he could hear her and Reno arguing, and he forced himself to let the running water muddle the words. Even without listening, he knew that now that Aeris had made up her mind, there was no way anyone could change it. He would have his two months.

Still, he stood under the water for longer than necessary, as though there were still something beyond the dirt and grime that it could wash away. The argument in the next room rose to its climax and then died away, leaving only the sound of water. It had been years since he had taken a real shower, and then he had never taken any particular pleasure in it, but now he found something almost reassuring in its normalcy. Almost, but not quite. It still seemed a fallacy to act as though he were capable of normalcy.

His clothes still hung damp when he exited the shower. He couldn't have expected otherwise--Reno had no notion of allowing him so much hospitality, he was sure. He dressed, ignoring the mild discomfort, and paused to listen. The argument had not resurfaced, nor were the two even talking with each other now. He stepped out into the short hall and looked towards the living room.

Aeris sat quietly on the couch, her hands folded in her lap, gaze focused calmly ahead of her, on something no one could see. Not knowing how to begin, he stood where he was, just out of her field of vision, and watched her.

"You shouldn't stare at people like that," she said finally. "Speak up."

"What should I say?"

At that she shook her head slightly and glanced at him. "I don't know. It's a strange situation, isn't it."

He nodded his agreement. Before, he had striven so hard not to see her as a person, not to treat her with any more respect than a plaything. And now, he wasn't sure how to be respectful to her. His entire life, he had looked down on people. He didn't know how to do the opposite, except to be silent.

"It's stopped raining," she went on. "Why don't we go for a walk? I don't want to be cooped up in here."

From her tone, he took part of that to mean that she wanted to get the both of them away from Reno. But there was something else behind it that he couldn't quite grasp.

"All right," he said, but he waited for her to move.

She closed her eyes, stretched her arms forward, and got to her feet. His eyes tracked her as she went to take her jacket from a hook, his gaze straying down to her belly and trying to imagine there the life inside her. Of all the things he had never intended, he had never wanted to father a child, never meant to leave any trace of himself behind.

She went to the door and looked back at him. "Aren't you coming?"

Silently, Sephiroth followed her out of the apartment. He drew a few uneasy gazes as they passed through the lobby, but for the time being he dismissed them. He had lost his focus already, with the shock of her decision.

By the time they stepped out into the streets below, he had reminded himself that he could not wait on her to initiate anything. He had come to her, not the other way around, and he had come claiming he could help her. What audacity that was. But however ill-qualified he was, he intended to try.

"...you are well?" he asked her, looking her over now in the sunlight. The lights in the apartment had given her a washed-out appearance, but now the morning sun caught the coppery highlights of her hair and lit up her face with a warm glow. "With the child, I mean," he added, knowing perfectly that otherwise, she was not 'well.'

"There's nothing out of the ordinary," she said. "Morning sickness, weird cravings--that's to be expected, right?"

He could tell by the way she asked that she wasn't entirely sure of herself. "Reno mentioned you were refusing to see any doctors," he said. "Are you certain that's wise?"

"It probably isn't," she admitted. "But I don't think I could handle a city doctor. I've been thinking of finding a midwife in one of the outlying villages. Maybe, that wouldn't freak me out as much."

"Maybe," he agreed.

"Can I ask you something, Sephiroth?"

It was, really, the first time she had addressed him by name since he had showed up on her doorstep. He nodded.

"Why did you give it up, really? I'm not sure you understood it yourself at the time."

He hadn't, it was true. Not fully. It had just been a feeling, something he couldn't put words to but which had nevertheless been strong enough to change everything. He had had time to think about it, since then. He pressed his lips together and then answered simply, "You believed in me."

"...I did from the start," she said quietly.

"I know," he said, shaking his head, "but I didn't realize until that moment. I didn't understand that there wasn't some ulterior motive. It isn't... anything I had ever experienced before."

"I guess I should be glad that you didn't betray that completely," she said, but in her eyes there was an accusation.

"But you aren't," Sephiroth stated. "The fact remains that I did betray it, again, and again. You believed me capable of things I repeatedly refused to be capable of. It isn't enough that I've given it up now and accepted being whatever it is that I am. What I did to you was something that you were not and never should have been prepared for. You had never had your belief in something so thoroughly tried. What you need now... is to convince yourself that it will never happen again. It was my flaw, not yours, which prevented you from reaching me."

Her eyes were on the pavement before her feet, and so hidden from him by her lashes. "You always did manage to sound like you know me better than I know myself," she said.

"What I do understand pales beside what I don't. But there is still something."

"So, based on that something, what are you suggesting we do?"

"...try this again, as equals."

"'This'?" She looked up at him uncertainly, and he met her gaze steadily.

"Knowing each other."

Aeris frowned, and he could tell she still did not quite grasp it. "You mean, forget everything that happened and start over from the beginning?"

Sephiroth shook his head. "Not forget, and not forgive either. But not to let it get in the way. As if it all happened years ago. It seems that way to me already."

"I'm... not sure how easily I'll be able to do that," she admitted. "It always seems like it's just behind me. But I think... maybe you're right, about what I need. So I'd like to try."

"You can always rail at me first, if you'd prefer."

She smiled very faintly at that. "No. That's all right."

They were still walking along the street which fronted the apartment building and although it was not one of Junon's main streets, it was broad enough to have begun attracting some traffic by this hour. People were stepping out onto the sidewalk to begin their day, and a car drove past. Aeris paid none of it any mind, and Sephiroth would have been content to ignore it as well, if he had been alone.

But though he had not acknowledged it, he had been drawing attention, and now, out of the corner of his eye, he could see a small knot of men pause at the sight of him, and hurry off down another street. It was only a matter of time before they returned, prepared, to search him out.

He turned down a smaller side street in the opposite direction, and although she gave him a questioning look, Aeris went with him. She had not noticed the group, and with luck she wouldn't have to.

"Sephiroth!"

He had been too late. It was Aeris who paused. Sephiroth had heard shouts like this one before, with its tone of vengeance and finality, and he knew what would follow, and it was better to be farther down the street when it did. He heard the shot more than he felt it. A loud clap broke into the still morning, and some pain followed in his chest. It was too low to do any serious damage, but he fell to one knee to give the man the satisfaction.

Aeris caught up and dropped to the pavement beside him, her hands on his arm, on his back where the bullet had entered. She had not hesitated, but at the same time, he could feel from her an unease at closing the distance between them.

"What are you doing?" the shooter demanded. "Don't you know who that is?"

"He's a man who's been shot," came Aeris's firm reply, and there was something to him both absurd and delightful in it.

"He's Sephiroth! How can you even think of helping him?"

"Sephiroth or not," she said, "I don't think I could stand and watch him die."

"Then go."

"I don't want to be that kind of person either."

Sephiroth could feel the warmth of her healing magic as she pressed a hand to the wound, slowly knitting his flesh back together. He said nothing.

"Would it really help you to see him die? I know it wouldn't help me." Aeris spoke quietly, and there was something about the calmness of her voice that seemed to quiet the man in turn. "I know what kind of man he is, and what he's done. I've wanted to shoot him myself, and there's a part of me that still does. But trying to hurt him didn't help me."

"But he deserves to die, after everything he's done."

Aeris withdrew her hand from his back and got to her feet. "Why don't we leave that up to the Planet?"

"If we leave it up to the Planet, it'll be gone. He's already tried to destroy it once, and all of us along with it."

She turned from Sephiroth to face the man in full. "He won't do any more harm. I'll keep an eye on him."

"But you're..."

"She is more than capable," Sephiroth interjected finally, picking himself up and glancing sideways at his attacker. "She is the one who stopped me, after all, and saved your sorry existence."

"Sephiroth," Aeris said in admonishment.

"He did shoot me." He looked down at his coat, fingering the new hole the bullet had made there with some distaste.

She shook her head as though disappointed with him, and went forward to the man who had shot him. A former soldier, by the way he held himself and his weapon, and one who likely carried it for lack of faith in those who still wore the uniform. Aeris had managed to capture his attention, for now, but although he stared at her with a mixture of distrust and amazement, he had not lowered the gun.

"Is that true? That you were the one who saved us?"

"Not just me. I was just there at the end."

The ex-soldier looked past her towards Sephiroth, and he could tell the man was appraising the truth of this from his bearing. Sephiroth recognized it himself only then, the way he had planted himself to watch the two of them, predatory towards the stranger as though he posed a threat not to Sephiroth, whom he had attacked, but to Aeris. He was behaving like a guard dog, he realized with some annoyance at himself. But then, he did not trust this man not to judge Aeris for being in his company.

"Why are you with him?" the man asked finally.

"There's something I need to come to terms with," she answered, and though the man missed the significance, she glanced down, towards her belly.

"I don't know if I can stand the thought of him being alive when so many who deserve it more are dead."

"It's best not to think of it that way, when you can't trade his life for theirs. Mourn your friends. And... you'll just have to know that his life is being put to what use it can." She gently took him by the wrist, and made him lower the gun. "I know it's hard. I've lost friends to him, too."

"And you don't think those friends would want you to avenge them?"

"...I know they'd want him dead," she confessed. "But, they wouldn't want that thought to consume me either. And, I don't think they'd really want to meet him in the Lifestream."

"Maybe." The man took a breath and then looked back at Sephiroth, glaring. "No one's going to go easy on you. Betray this woman's trust or not, you're this close to being dead. You understand?"

"Yes," Sephiroth acknowledged, though he knew he had little to fear from these would-be heroes. The only one ever to kill him was dead, and he doubted anyone now had the strength to kill him if he wished not to die.

But the ex-soldier nodded at him jerkily, bowed his head to Aeris, and turned to go. Aeris watched him until he vanished around the corner.

"You're a little too easy to recognize," she said to him at last, turning to look him over. There was something guarded about her expression as she tried to trivialize the encounter. "Maybe we should change that."

"That's not necessary," he said, but he knew she wouldn't let it lie now.

"How many times has this happened?"

"I've not been counting."

Aeris gave him a wry look and stepped close enough to inspect the hole in his coat herself. It was far from the only one. In truth, the coat had been a ragged mess since Meteorfall, but he had felt no more inclination to discard it.

"I don't think I want to have to deal with that every day," she said, and he was certain that it had probably taken more out of her than him, having to defend her reasons for letting a mass murderer live. For letting the man who had killed her friends live. And he couldn't always insist they keep to alleyways.

He sighed, knowing that he wasn't going to like this. "What did you have in mind?"

"A change of clothes," she said first. "Everyone knows that uniform. And then there's your hair..."

"My hair," he repeated. No, he didn't like this at all. He had never been too particular about the clothes on his back, but there were some aspects of his appearance about which he felt adamantly. Aeris had called him vain once, and perhaps that was the word for it.

"I hate to say it, but dye would probably be best. Even if you cut it, there's no one your age with that color."

He couldn't help bristling at the suggestion that he cut his hair, but then he glanced to her own short locks and frowned. He had taunted her then, for how much it had upset her, and here he was behaving even more the child. "Then I'll dye it," he said.

"Pick a color then, we'll take care of it while we're out." As if they were only out running errands. She went to walk on as though nothing of importance happened, as if she didn't still have some of his blood staining her hands, and he joined her, eyes still on her.

"...will you grow yours out again?" he asked her.

"Mmm... I haven't decided yet. It's a lot easier to manage short, and Reno likes it. Maybe you did me a favor."

He scoffed. He was sure that she still missed her braid, and he felt long hair had better suited her.

"You think it's silly for me to try to see the bright side of it?"

Sephiroth hesitated now, and shook his head. "Only for you to give any credit to me. It was meant as no favor."

"Maybe not," she said. "But, it's only hair."

She did not mention the White Materia, what he had cut her hair to obtain and which lay in its shards in his pocket, and they walked on in silence for a little ways. He had thought she was unaware of the blood on her hands, but as they came to a deep puddle left over from the previous night's rain, she knelt to wash it off. He stood watching her, trying to decipher her expression. She seemed to take longer than necessary, but when she got to her feet, she did not hesitate to dry her hands on her jacket.

She went on without a word as they crossed another street, and the road they were on narrowed to an alley. Seemingly unaware of it, she widened the distance between them the farther they grew from the sound of people. Whatever confidence she had in his intentions now, her body surely remembered what he had done, and she avoided him instinctively. He considered saying something, but he wasn't certain if talking would put her at ease or only make her more uncomfortable with his presence, and he could not think of exactly what to say. For a while, she seemed lost in her own thoughts, and he let her be.

"Do you still want to die?" she asked him finally.

It was not the question that surprised him, but the realization that it was something he'd not thought about in a long time. After Meteor, he had encouraged Aeris to kill him, he had expected an execution, a punishment. But death hadn't come, and he had resigned himself to living. Death hadn't been a part of his punishment, so he had stopped considering it.

"I don't know," he admitted.

"The past couple months can't have been pleasant for you. But maybe, even with what I asked, they weren't awful either? I mean... you were a soldier and a killer for so long, this must have been the first time you've been able to live without doing any harm."

"And what if that was my only enjoyment, before?"

"...it couldn't have been the only thing," she said. He noticed she didn't try to argue that he hadn't enjoyed it.

"It was the only thing that let me feel in control."

Aeris was studying his face. "So for the past two months, have you felt powerless?"

"...yes," he said. "But, neither have I felt in anyone's power. Not even, I suppose, that part of me that so desired death."

"So then, you don't hate living, even though you're still the same person."

Sephiroth frowned, and he had to shake his head in disagreement. "Perhaps it's better to say that I don't hate it enough to want to escape it. You gave me something. Part of you may hate me, but you still believed in me. Maybe some small part of me deserves to exist in this world, and isn't rejected by it."

"You know that's your own feeling, that the Planet's rejected you."

"I wasn't able to rejoin it in death, was I?"

"And I think that's part of why you couldn't. I know it's the power and will of Jenova to keep clinging to life like that, but I think you could have died if you thought you could be accepted into the Lifestream. But you saw yourself as something separate, and let the Jenova cells take hold."

He couldn't help smiling slightly. "So now that you think I can die, do you plan on killing me?"

"No," she said, actually smiling a little herself, though it quickly faded. "A lot of people might want it, but I don't want that on my hands, and maybe it is best if you keep living for a while."

"Best for whom, exactly?"

"All of us."

"Do you imagine I'll be transformed into a great philanthropist?" he asked dryly.

Aeris answered him as though the idea weren't completely absurd. "No, it's not that. But when you do die and return to the Planet, your soul will go on to feed new lives. And... I think it's best if you carry as little of your hate to that new life as possible."

"Isn't the Lifestream supposed to cleanse me of my memories, if I surrender myself to it?"

"You don't really think that'll erase everything, do you?"

She did have a point. Disagree with her philosophy as often as he did, he could not deny that some things went beyond memory. "No, I suppose not," he acceded. "Some things become too deeply buried."

"So grow old here, and die at peace."

"I don't know that I can grow old, Aeris."

"Well, your hair's already grey."

Sephiroth stared at her. "...was that a joke?"

"I'm sorry," she said, breaking into a little smile. "I think I'm out of practice."

He felt his own expression soften at that little quirk of her lips. "At least it was made at my expense."

"You want me to make fun of you?"

"It will keep my ego in check."

"I didn't know that was still a problem."

"Any man's ego may grow when a woman deigns to keep his company."

"You know, that could almost have been a compliment if you hadn't implied that any woman would do."

"Are you giving lessons now, on how to be a gentleman?"

"If I am, I should probably start with someone easier."

There was, if very faint, some laughter in her voice. And something that seemed to him, even if he had little experience in the matter, very normal and almost easy about the exchange. It was, perhaps, not a bad start to the venture.


Contents | Part II >