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Aerith's prayer, her call to wake the planet and unlock the holy place, was interrupted by the blood curdling scream that erupted and ricocheted against the altar walls. With no warning, she didn't realize it came from her own lungs...not until the pain wracked through her, exploding white hot electricity as if lighting had come down to strike straight through her flesh, blood and bone. As if the heavens themselves had launched an arrow to strike her with an agony that could only be the work of scorned deity.
She'd been impaled so suddenly she barely had the chance to widen her eyes as they caught the silver glint that had pierced her... oh gods, the pain that rang in her ears and rippled out from her gut.
White materia, abandoned from the hands of its protector, clattered across the stone floor. Aerith gagged... In the span of this moment, the half second that passed since she had been sitting in peaceful prayer now stretched on into hellish eternity, and she had recognized the weapon.
The next moment was stricken with heartbreak and betrayal only to cease instantly as her body was forced forward. Aerith choked as the blade was drawn backward in one fluid motion.
Her legs weaken, falter underneath her and she staggers as she's forced forward down the cold blade. The weapon was tossed aside, and the crashing of steel was loud but never would it be enough to drown out her silent screams, the thousands of nightmarish thoughts that flooded her screaming mind were drowning her.
No.no.no.no not him not like this.
What of the planet, what of my friends, my life….what about us, the future….
What was to become of her, of him?
She couldn't feel her limbs, and the floor came barrelling toward her, tears flooded her eyes and she simultaneously clutched at the bloodied wound. It seeped through her fingers and the fabric, soaking the front of her dress in dark red.
Heavy footsteps fell hurrying in toward her, familiar arms caught her just before she could hit the ground. Sephiroth had scooped her up, treating her far to caringly as he did so, then slowly he guided himself to his knees to settle with her cradled in his lap. All the while he stared down at her pinched face, his eyes completely unreadable, never leaving hers, she was pale and grimacing with unfathomable pain through heavied lids.
"Why..?" The plea she breathed out was hoarse, and blood leaked from her pale lips to paint them a deep red. she raised her eyes to the blurry glow of Sephiroth….his glowing Mako stare, even with her sight covered in this grim fog, his eyes bore down into hers with that hollow callous look that was too familiar, and left her numb to her body, the only thing left was her crushed soul… "but you...we…"
"Shhh" he hushed, wiping her tears away with his gloved thumb, but ignored the question. "I'm not going to leave you." His voice was low and soft, and he pressed his chin to her forehead, the fingers on her cheeks moving to caress her lips, Aerith hissed through her teeth as if he burned...but he continued to her jaw then descending to slowly trace the pulse line of her neck, the both of them felt it growing weaker and her breath catches as she shook against his body, "Do not be afraid." He soothed, the warmth of his voice was unbearable.
Aerith choked out a sob. So this is it, I'm going to die here? Sephiroth has chosen my fate for me, and this was it, after everything...despite that night, the way he'd let his guard down so that she could see him. Love him. It was all for nothing, it would all end here, dying slowly in his arms. Her hands instinctively grasp at the collar of his leather coat and they clench and relax in spasms as she desperately sought to hold onto something, anything that would anchor her to this life, this place, and him. Sephiroth shifted his weight and pulled her tighter to his body. She hated it, but god she didn't want him to leave her, he was so warm, so utterly wrong, but she didn't want to be cold and alone...
She was naive to think it would end any happier than this, she let him find her here, let it come to this, but still she forced her arms out and found the strength to embrace him in return. "please...you can still . . .fix this, please Sephiroth..." she begged though painful gasps.
"Hmm." He hums. Aerith could swear she heard the smile he wore as he considered this, "I brought only the sword my love." Emotionlessly cold those words left him, dark, deep and echoing endless. Yet she felt something falter in his aura, "I cannot save you," something fleeting and far beyond the unfeeling way his voice carried. " Aerith…" he breathed against her, his breath a touch of fire against her icy skin….
" seph..ir- klgch.." A cough surged upward and blood fills her mouth, her body is failing, and she has so much to say, so much she wanted to do, to be…"please Sephiroth..nngh...please I don't want to…" he doesn't say anything he just presses light kisses on her cheeks he flickering eyelids, and down to her chin and neck, anything to smudge away the tears that endlessly trickle across her ivory flesh. She can't see well enough to read his face.
Would he be smiling as he tasted the pain in her last moments, relishing the flavor of her tears as they bled from her a final time? She needed to know. But above all needed to know why ?
Was everything that happened between them that last night just another trick or game. Was she really just another nuisance that met their end for getting in his way. Just a slight inconvenience destined to meet the searing cold bite of his sword?
"I wante-...you, to be w-..., why...please…I dont" she thought of the young man that charmed her with his quiet politeness, the way his eyes looked at her as if she were the most strange and enticing person he had ever met…then the way he looked at her the other night how she had finally broken his cool facade, and saw the beauty of his raw vulnerability, the way it felt so powerful and utterly good as they made love, gods the sounds that came from him..she wanted that...again ...wanted to feel. ...
Her senses were dulling quicker now and terror gripped her again "please ….seph please don't let me-...Oh gods, please, I don't want to di-" the tears pour as her words are silenced by the soft commanding heat of his lips…. so gentle yet full of purpose and control, and something else much quieter. She choked on sobs as his mouth moved perfectly against hers and he felt so good, so terribly right when he kissed her like this, as if this was all they were made for and she wished it was enough to be lost in..anything to keep reality away...
..but wait… is the earth shaking? No … It didn't feel like the ground, was her body giving up, was this it.....no...it wasn't hers….it was his? Is he... trembling?
She could only make out the shadows now, could not see detail, but the canopy of beautiful silver hair that decorated her execution chamber was quaking around her. The brightness of it brimmed the silhouette of her executioner as he kissed her, held her and then something cold, something small, wet dripped from him and onto her cheek… She mumbled his name unintelligibly against his mouth in disbelief, and she used everything to reach up for his face that shivered against her touch...and there it was, beneath the feather light grace of her fingertips were the answers she needed. He leaned into the touch and his lips released hers to heave out a strained breath against her wrist. But it was there, in the cold tears that marked and cooled his hot flesh….it was there that the answer as to why...how he could do this were visible and plain as a bright day. For him. There was no other way.
Her hand falls to the stone floor and grows entirely limp. She was completely undone by this epiphany, he didn't want to kill her because she was in the way...no, he blocked his own path, it was his humanity that was in the way, the feelings that came with it, and all that was left of his grasp on love and kindness was for her...Aerith hurt for him... knowing he meant to give it to her, to let it wash over her before hed bury it all…burry it beside her. That could only mean that it was strong and impassible enough to destroy the both of them. The feelings he held for her, they were just as strong as the ones she had for him.
"I love you Aerith…" He whispers, pressing his lips against hers again and she smiles weakly against him before he pulls her tight to his body, his reserve abandoned, chest heaving against her form as he trembled violently, arms snaked around her body coiled tight and they held on with a grip that hoped it would save them both. He broke, crumbled and arched his body over her.
But it was all growing so much colder and so far away. She could only hear an echo of her own voice as it whispered in a few short breaths …"I know." Her heartbeat was quiet, so slow and she hoped he could hear the whisper of her voice, "find me sephiroth... another life...another time. Somehow..promise me?" As her lungs refused to pull once more she felt calm. She closes her eyes and savors his heat and let's it fall over her like the warm waters of Costa Dell Sol, her eyes close and she see her flowers in the delapited church, her friends, zack, her mother, and the Silver haired boy from her childhood smile as he admired her.
The tranquil smile forming over her blood smeared lips, was delicate and morbidly beautiful. Sephiroth's reply caught hard in his throat as he fought himself, swallowing his bitterly painful urge to rush her away from here, to keep her alive and keep her for himself despite it all. It could never be, and it was far too late. He buries his face in her hair and inhales her scent, he memorised the smell of flowers, something else unique to her, and blood, the sensation has him gritting teeth. This is how it had to be.
The last things to reach her terrestrial sensories that Aerith could feel were dim but gripped her entire being as her consciousness fluttered away. It was a nod against her hair, and a soft, "Yes." A simple word laced with absolution, before the press of kisses on her forehead, her cheek, and the corner of her lips and the far off feeling of his arms loosens from around her as he muttered "I will." The planet's voice called to her, the hum of the lifestream threading and melding with her lifeforce to bring her back to it, bring her home, it was so loud and in the orchestral sound of life itself she could still make out the voice that etched a promise in her soul.
"When it's all over Aerith, I will find you."
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Aerith was gone, but Sephiroth didn't budge not until she grew cold, not until he heard him, the puppet Cloud running for the altar.