FFVII:AC - Kadaj & co - Paved (PG-13)
Okay, here's the first of the 25_streetsigns fics. This time I had a brain and nailed down what order they'd come in and what they'd all contain first!
Title: Paved
Theme: #25
Author: chibirisuchan
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Pairing/Character: Kadaj and Loz
Rating: PG-13
Table of contents of the 25 streetsigns fics
Warnings: Don't let this one lull you into complacence. It's going to get WEIRD. And probably higher-rated, too.
Disclaimer: Totally not mine. Not even the core concept for this arc; it was based on a fic that I shan't identify just yet, because I want to hear the screams when the shoe drops.
25. Paved
(before moonrise)
The road had always been presented to him, before. Clear, straight, level, obvious -- he was His Vessel. Kadaj had come into existence in order to be His Vessel for the Reunion, and he had come into existence knowing the road he was to travel.
Loz was His Strength, to protect the Chosen One from the mortal vermin who envied and hated Him. Yazoo was His Wisdom, to guide and advise.
But it had been Kadaj's place to lead them. It was the purpose to Her Conception of him: to bring the others to the Reunion, where he would offer up his very being for the sake of their Mother and her Chosen One.
In the colder nights, Kadaj sometimes thought that his purpose was to find the place where he became irrelevant. Nothing but a moving, unwanted shell, to be cast aside for the sake of His greater glory.
But he'd done it. He'd followed his road unflinching, for Mother's sake; he'd given himself over to the Son She loved, he'd fulfilled his purpose as Vessel -- and then Her Chosen had failed in his ascendance.
And then He had abandoned the Vessel to die in His place of the wounds He had taken.
It was HIS fault. It was all His fault.
It was disloyal to think like that, though. Mother was punishing him for it already. She'd sent him back to the world, washed up on the cold shores of the forgotten capital -- cast him away yet again.
When he'd died in his twisted, misguided elder brother's arms, Her sweet voice had murmured to him of forgiveness, of second chances, of a life that was his own to live. But She'd still cast him out from that warm green place where they were together. She'd cast all of them out, together, and Kadaj hated himself for it.
It wasn't his brothers She hated; She should have let them stay with Her. Kadaj himself was the only one She'd rejected, the only one She wished to replace with Her more-beloved Son. She should have let Loz and Yazoo stay.
Kadaj was the only one She'd ever blamed for His failure. Because She never blamed Her Chosen One, of course -- but still, it was even more unfair to cast the others out with him.
He loved Mother, because he had been made to love Mother. But sometimes, he didn't like her very much at all.
He had to keep reminding himself that he wasn't alone; it would have been right if he was alone, because they hadn't deserved Her wrath -- but it would have made it too easy to give up. Too easy to give himself over to the mortals who hated him, to let them do as they would with the abandoned, hollow chrysalis that had once held His glory.
But because they were here, Kadaj couldn't give up. Neither of them knew how to lead themselves. He was still their guide back to the Reunion that had rejected him. Their existence meant that he still had his purpose.
But he no longer had his road.
Mother no longer spoke to him; there were only faint panicked scrabbling whispers, dim and distant, where once Her will had echoed in his mind and filled him to overflowing with the urgency of Her needs.
For the first time, he dimly understood what it was like for the others, for his brothers, for the mortal vermin who crawled on the surface of the earth without the piercing clarity of Her cries to guide them. How could he know where to guide his brothers, who depended upon him? He was nothing without Her voice and His power, nothing but a hollow shell of the past -- and yet he breathed, and slept, and ate, and when his brothers touched him, they were warm with life. And so he had to lead them. But Mother was denying him the certainty of the road he was to lead them upon.
Loz didn't understand why Kadaj wouldn't move from the edge of the lake, but he shrugged and built a fire, and went hunting, and busied himself with living again. Yazoo's steady, unwavering gaze said that he suspected what Kadaj had lost. But although Yazoo could understand what Loz could not, there was no comfort he could offer. Yazoo had never been made for anyone's comfort, not even his own.
Kadaj knew that while he still lived, he lived to guide them, and so he had to guide them. But he didn't know where. He might never truly know again.
He thought about asking Yazoo, in pure shuddering desperation. Yazoo was still His Wisdom; still the guide, the advisor. But he was only to advise. The Chosen One would have known His path.
That vile mortal who'd stolen Mother from him, taunted him with Her remains -- he'd been right all along. A good son would have known.
But then, he'd never been a good son. Never the son she wanted. He'd been the disposable one, and now that he'd been discarded... there was nothing left.
Huddled beside the frigid lake, Kadaj sat at the end of the shattered road to Reunion, and stared blankly down into the pit.