#sfkr

"cloud, we can only outrun destiny for so long.." sephiroth frowned, glancing down at the hand that squeezed his own so tightly, urging him to keep up. "in the end, they will once more pit us against one another until we are torn apart by drastic means." what would it be this time, turned to ash when the world burns? one remaining while the other joins the stars above? or watching the other die to some other cosmic force that is not by means of their respected blade?

the male in question shook his head. "i don't care." he bit back immediately, out of breath. "we're not.. gonna end up following the same fucking narrative again- i'm tired of it. i'm tired of outside factors deciding our lives for us." horrible upbringings for every lifetime and the pressure of either being passed on the torch of destroying the planet or protecting it. it was exhaustingly repetitive, and outright cruel.

why them? why, of all the people inhabiting gaia, did it have to be them? could it not have been someone else? or nobody at all?

cloud never asked for this. never asked to carry the weight of the world and everyone else's wants on his shoulders. never asked for losing those he loved, and certainly never asked to be pitted against his other half. all he had ever wanted was to make a better life for himself and someday fight alongside the great war hero that had brought a ray of hope to his life.

and all sephiroth had ever wanted was a normal life. one without needles and discipline, one of free choice and liberty to think for himself- to do what he wanted to do and simply live the life that many others surrounding him had lived and taken for granted, all without having to lose anybody he dared allowed into his fragile heart.

instead, the planet and calamity found it sickeningly amusing to cast him in the role of the antagonist that had scorched the hometown of the one person that could have truly been the pillar of stability he had searched for all his life, and made an enemy out of him.

how ironic, to finally meet the one person that could have mended everything and made all the torment worth enduring, only to end up ultimately destroying each other's lives.

the look on the former general's face was pensive, bittersweet. "this is something beyond us, cloud.. i fear that resistance will be but fleeting- simply postponing the inevitable." he tried again, pursing his lips together. "the outcome will always turn out the same, no matter how differently we go about the way in which our stories play out." he couldn't count how many worlds he had traveled to now, filled with diverse tellings of the same narrative, but an equally similar outcome at the end, no matter how long it took to reach it.

this was just one of many worlds doomed to eventually fall as well, yet cloud.. cloud held firmly.

with gritted teeth, the self-proclaimed SOLDIER paused in his tracks, nearly crashing into his once nemesis to glare up at him. "this is not going to end up the same- you told me before that we could change things, that our destiny.. could be altered." he retorted frantically, mako tinted sapphires glossing in the light of the moon. "what happened to that? we did things differently- we're not.. we're not enemies here, everything's fine between us, w-we haven't hurt each other, either." inhale, exhale. "so why.. why are things not working out for us? it was supposed to work this time — you said it would!” what felt like eons ago now of that conversation they’d held at the edge of creation — a plane comprised solely of them two, proved to be a sliver of hope. a reassurance that it was possible to change fate if they worked together.

but it just, wasn't working.

they had tried, and tried, and tried some more. but the key events always played out the same way; the deaths avoided simply took place earlier or later, the black materia would still summon meteor, cloud would still lose his hometown to the wrath of his beloved under the poisonous influence of jenova, and then he would die at his hand.

"cloud, i.." sephiroth whispered brokenly, squeezing the other's hand. what was there left to say, when even he had no answers to those questions? "i know. and i am doing everything within my capabilities to go against the odds for us to be together without us being ruined in the process, but.." no matter what, it will just continue to end with my life being claimed by your blade, or the demise of this wretched planet.

the blond parted his lips to bite back a retort, only to close them soon after, as though understanding what was left unsaid. the good and bad endings, except to them- they were both bad. "so then, am i just.. not meant to be with you?"

cracked, slitted emeralds hardened with intensity as the taller trudged forward, pulling the shorter into the type of hug capable of knocking the breath out of a person from how little proximity is left behind. "you are meant to be with me- we fit together so perfectly like this, cloud." he breathed into the nest of golden tufts, squeezing the middle of his back as though the other might fade from his fingertips if he didn't. "you were made to be mine. neither the planet, nor jenova can tear you away from me or have you with another. i will not allow it."

he had lost just about everyone he had cared for throughout the course of his existence, cloud was his lifeline. sephiroth would not allow him to be paired with anyone other than himself. not the girlfriend of zack, nor the childhood friend of his beloved, and above all, gaia.

with shaky hands, the spiky haired mercenary brought them to wrap around his once nemesis' slim waist, letting out a breath into the chest he was met with as he burrowed his face deeper to hear the heartbeat separated by flesh and bone. "but they keep on trying to tear us apart.." he muttered hopelessly, tightening his grasp on the leather jacket beneath his gloved palms. "i-i can't kill you again, sephiroth- i can't do that.. they can't make me do it again. you said i'm yours, but what good is being yours if you're not mine, too? i'll be all alone again, i.." i just can't.

"you'll never be alone, cloud." the silver haired male cut in, shifting one hand to cradle the back of the other's head to his sternum. "a part of me is always inside of you, and will always allow for me to return to you. i am yours, and shall always be yours, that much is true." he reaffirmed, perhaps as a reassurance to himself, too. "the lifestream will never truly allow me to die and become one with the fallen due to my cells. the same would apply to you, in theory." with the amount of jenova's blood coursing through his veins, the planet would always spit him right back out, as though poisoned by his presence. it would be similar for his other half, as they shared the same infectious cells from the great calamity.

cloud shifted against him, biting his bottom lip to prevent it from trembling. "but if i die, it would be over for the both of us.." he whispered, looking up at him with unshed tears. "wouldn't it?"

it was his persisting memory of sephiroth that kept him alive, wasn't it? aside from the lifestream rejecting him for no longer fully being of the planet, it was the blond's memories that kept him whole.

silence befell the older as he gazed into the other's eyes, weighing the words that were expressed to him before letting out a hum. "i am.. uncertain." he answered at length, glancing away for a moment before returning his jade-colored orbs to expectant sapphire ones. "so i would rather not find out. you will not die on my watch, cloud. i would have this planet scorched and wiped off the face of the galaxy before it takes you away from me. your life is mine, as my own is yours."

for once, cloud found himself unable to protest against the planetary destruction. he was just so over everything, all he wanted was just to live a normal life with the silver that lined him.

he allowed himself to lean into the leather clad hand that now moved to cup his cheek, catching a stray tear. sephiroth's eyes were prettier up close, all of him was.

wordlessly, cloud got on the tips of his toes to claim the rosewood lips of his greatest adversary- his everything, as he had proclaimed in one of their lifetimes.

it wasn't as their usual kisses would be, packed with undying fervor, teeth and tongue, or those brief, delicate ones they would exchange. rather, it was filled with desperation, the want to forever share breath as though the air surrounding them had been polluted- death.

a twitch could be felt in his veins, one that made the ex-SOLDIER's right hand tremble, reluctantly falling from the quilted leather to reach behind him for a hilt protruding from his harness of blades.

a sphere of swirling nebulas appeared without request within the left palm of the former general, turning up begrudgingly against the sweater-like material to face the soon to be rust filled welkin.

tears streamed freely down freckled cheeks, salt tainting the flavor of their unyielding lip-lock. the end was nigh, the warmth of the great comet could be felt even from where they stood, kissing the planet's surface as the brightness flickered against the shimmer of first tsurugi.

an unspoken apology hung in the air as rouge colored the leathers separating skin from meeting skin, the taste of iron melting with what could be mistaken as seawater, and sweet death.

even still, neither dared to break away from the other, not wanting to let go even as another world came tumbling down.

notes. perhaps i should have put a warning for there not being a happy ending.. um, my bad guys</3 i hope it was okay despite the short length! if i had more time i would have done something more but school said no and gave me speeches to write instead😔

tysm for reading! consider leaving a tip if you enjoyed<3