Greetings people! Thank you all for your feedbacks! :) As I promised before, in this chapter I will introduce one more character to the plot, I hope you like it!

About writing more stories, as this project is very long and I particularly intend to put here everything I wished to have seen in FFVII, I find it very improbably to write another story for this fandom in the future, but I digress; what I can say is that Shelke and other characters from Dirge Of Cerberus will surelly appear in later Acts of this story.

The Price of Freedom

"Ever since my childhood I could feel it. I was different than other people. I always thought I had some kind of special purpose.

But, I didn't think it would be something like this...

... Am I even human?"

Sephiroth - FFVII: Crisis Core

†

Reunion

The scientist expended her time half in the laboratories researching the essence of Chaos, and half in her own room reading scientific files and articles on the Cetras, prolonging her research on the subject of her thesis, and although apparently nothing had changed in her routine, Lucrecia somehow knew that something was different; perhaps this was due to the knowledge that she had done the procedure.

She had followed in detail the construction of the genetically modified sperm; Hojo had given her the random blood sample from an anonymous donor from Shinra's database and everything had gone according to their plan. In a short time, the last tests carried out had confirmed the success of the insertion and the beginning of her pregnancy; as soon as the specimen was confirmed alive and the beginning of its formation maintaining stable, the modified doses with Jenova cells began to be applied.

The first few sessions were uncomfortable and whenever she left the laboratory Lucrecia felt dizzy and weak; although constantly under the supervision of her team and mainly Hojo, they hadn't yet found the causes for the malaise and she had to endure the side effects in silence.

Sometimes when she found herself alone working, the woman noticed Vincent's silent presence watching her from afar; his careful and always attentive gaze always watching her and the staff. Since the brief discussion they had had in the laboratories, they didn't talk alone anymore and while internally she missed those moments, Lucrecia felt the weight of the chain around her neck that hid from view the engagement ring, still waiting for an answer. Several times she debated in how to start a non-awkward conversation with him.

Then, suddenly in one day her nausea and tiredness started to increase, and more than once Lucrecia found herself waking up after a sudden unexpected fainting; sometimes in the laboratory and sometimes in her own room. She was never caught by her colleagues or Hojo, however, still trying to understand its possible cause, the scientist initially decided to keep it to herself.

Her fainting in a black world were soon replaced by shadows and figures without faces that came and went for no reason and purpose; then one night as she walked in her room after finishing the last reports for the day, Lucrecia felt her senses weaken once more, her vision darken and her body collapsed limp on the carpet.

For the first time she dreamed.

...

When she opened her eyes, the reflection of the light coming from the crystals made her quickly close them again, feeling the sudden clarity offend her vision.

Plunged into the darkness of her eyelids, the woman embraced her own body and remained inert, waiting for something she didn't know; a subtle sound manifested itself from time to time, breaking the silence that surrounded her. Her breathing was even, the air entered and left her lungs easily, and the scientist allowed herself to only exist in that moment that lasted for a long time.

Even though she was still disoriented to her surroundings, Lucrecia felt safe; somehow that ethereal sensation that hung in the environment was familiar to her. She risked opening her eyes once more and this time her vision adjusted, revealing the crystal cave that for many years had become a refuge for her soul.

A place to rest... A place to forget.

Lying in front of the small source of crystalline waters whose light sparkled from the large crystal in the center, the woman stared at it confused as the memories invaded her being with force.

'Come on, Dr. Valentine!'

'I didn't mean for your father to die. I couldn't...'

'Am I sure? Am I sure!? If this only concerns me, then yes, I am sure!'

'No. This is no experiment. It's...'

'Give him back! Give my son back!'

'I can't take it anymore.'

'I'm so sorry.'

Lucrecia covered her face with trembling hands and felt when the tears threatened to fall; with a broken sob she furiously rubbed her eyes and struggled to contain it. Rising partially, now kneeling on the dirt floor, she wondered how she had left the crystal if her spirit's will was to remain there forever; she had done nothing to leave the prison she self-imposed upon her own soul. That was when, looking away from the crystal to the cave, the scientist realized two things:

First, someone had taken her out of the crystal; secondly, she wasn't alone.

On the opposite side from where she was kneeling there was a man sitting on a rock with his silhouette completely surrounded by shadows. She couldn't see his face, but knew that he was watching her attentively, she could feel the weight of his penetrating gaze on her, and paralyzed, Lucrecia remained on the floor, hardly breathing. A few minutes passed and they both looked at each other in silence; although the scientist could feel that his presence had strength and grandeur, he did nothing to her or to the cave, limiting himself to remain seated where he was. Gathering courage, the scientist decided to break the silence with a slightly shaky voice.

"H-How this is possible...?"

"You being out of the crystal?" The stranger finished, his voice sounded firm and contained a hint of irony. "If you want to thank or blame someone for taking you out of your... peaceful slumber... you can direct it to the Cetras."

"The Cetras?" Lucrecia's eyes widened, deeply surprised.

"Make no mistake, neither you nor I are alive." The man explained it simply and seemed to care little for the terrifying information he had just revealed. "This cave is filled with the energy of the Lifestream; a large amount of it rests in here. The fact that both you and I are now able to manifest our spirit in the shape of the body we had before is purely a gathering of this energy manipulated by the will of the Cetras. They seem to have a twisted sense of humor coupled with an irritating persistence they used to convince me; they insisted for us to have this conversation. "

"Why? Who are you?" The scientist asked, frowning.

"I am the result of your terrible choices, Dr. Crescent." His voice hardened and the woman flinched involuntarily; she turned her face away to look at her hands that rested on the floor.

"Sorry... I-I don't know you... I don't know what I did to you..."

"You know well..." He spoke to her again, this time in a deeply bitter tone. "You didn't think about the consequences, just about yourself; you thought only of your ego, your career and your reputation. You chose to close your eyes..."

Lucrecia began to shake her head; she stood up and embraced her body as if trying to protect herself from the accusations while his voice proceeded.

"You chose to turn your back and flee to this place, thinking that hiding here what happened to the world afterwards would have nothing to do with you, or that forgotten by everyone you could just fade away to nowhere without your mistakes coming here to find you. "

"NO! STOP! PLEASE STOP!"

She screamed; her voice echoed through the cave and disappeared as the environment fell back into silence; Lucrecia continued, broken and weak.

"No ... I didn't... Everything was wrong... I didn't want to... I... I wanted it to stop... I couldn't fight it... I couldn't take it ... I couldn't endure anymore... it hurt... everything hurt so much..." Tears welled up in her eyes and slid down her face; the woman sobbed, trembling and unable to hold back her own emotions. Her spirit was filled with deep sadness and all her regrets seemed to leave her bare and unprotected.

The man then chuckled, a dry, rough sound and devoid of humor.

"I wish I could hate you, Dr. Crescent... The anger and disgust that has been growing inside me has burned for a long time since I knew the truth... I never accepted what you did... But now, finally meeting you… seeing you now in this pathetic state, I... I can't blame you for leaving... Because when the time came for me to make my choices, I also followed the same shadowy abyss that you threw yourself into. "

Lucrecia looked up as the energies of the Lifestream that flowed quietly in the environment manifested itself for the first time; like a wave they passed through the cave and touched the walls and the crystals, illuminating everything, and the woman felt the air freeze with her lungs; her voice escaped silenced, her brown, tearful eyes widened and her legs faltered, she almost fell back into the floor.

He too stood from his seat to watch her; his appearance was exactly as she had seen him in her dreams so many times, a strong and imposing presence, wearing the black suit and the white shoulder pads of his armor, his long silver hair flowing straight over his shoulders; his serious and circumspect countenance, however, didn't hold anymore the remnants of cruelty and madness as she had so often seen her nightmares of fire and blood… He was now neutral and completely lucid; his deep green eyes gazed at her with bitterness and recognition.

Without realizing it the scientist took one step followed by another, trembling and reeling; the tears once more slid down her face silently and she didn't realize that she was crying, her gaze was only on him, the son she had never seen or held once in her arms since he was born.

Lucrecia approached and at the same time that an enormous joy invaded her being, she also felt a terrifying fear; fear that that was a terrible lie, an illusion that death had brought to torment and punish her for her mistakes, that he wasn't really there and that the moment she touched him he would disappear and she would return to fall back into the black, empty abysm where she hid herself, but with each step she took Sephiroth was still there, constant, watching her approaching.

The scientist stopped just a step away, her eyes observing his face for a long time; she watched his mouth and nose which resembled very much hers, as well as the way the few rebellious silver strands of his hair escaped to fall on his face, but his straight eyebrows, strong cheekbones and his enigmatic and deep look caused a wave of pain to squeeze her heart, because they reminded her of his father a lot. The bright green of a vivid and supernatural color was a perpetual reminder of the experiments that were carried out to give him life and that she was completely guilty; his pain, suffering and condemnation.

A sob escaped her lips; timidly Lucrecia extended her extremely shaky hand to his face and Sephiroth allowed the woman to touch him, her palm laying on his cheek in a ghostly caress, and when she felt that he really was there and real, the rest of the strength that Lucrecia possessed left her, her knees give out and the scientist collapsed against the man, her arms flung around his neck and she cried loudly.

"Sephiroth ... my son... my beloved son ... Sephiroth ... I'm sorry ... I'm so sorry ... Sephiroth ... honey... I'm sorry ... I'm so sorry for everything..."

The man closed his eyes and clenched his fist; he could still feel the revolt, anger, disgust and bitterness inside him that had burned for so long against all those responsible for his existence and that had led him to transform into the monster he had become; Lucrecia, Hojo, Jenova, Shinra... all of them... but the woman's weeping and her genuine pleas pierced his shield of indifference; her tender embrace and her gentle touch conveyed to him what he had never received or known before, a mother's love, and Sephiroth felt the very moment when the tears involuntarily began to slide down his own face. He internally fought to get away, to not let himself surrender; he wanted to keep his hatred and resentment, but her voice completely trapped him and broke his resolve when she repeatedly called him by the words that no one had ever called him in the past, not even Hojo while pretending to be who he wasn't.

"My son... my beloved son... Sephiroth..."

Slowly the man lifted his arms and enveloped the woman's frame, embracing her against his chest, and Lucrecia squeezed him even tighter and kissed his face, her hands caressed his long silver hair while thanking the divine forces for the miracle that occurred to her, even knowing she didn't deserved it. She thought about how many things she had wanted to say to her son after so many years imagining that meeting, but the words had left her and the scientist just let herself live it.

But in that instant that seemed so perfect and endless, they both felt when the energies of the Lifestream that were in the cave suffered a sudden and violent blow; they spread abruptly, moving away from them and breaking all the crystals of the cave, shattering them and transforming into black and corrupted streams; the flow was entered the land and disappeared. A cold, sharp wind blew around and Lucrecia departed from Sephiroth's embrace to watch the cave's entrance with growing apprehension in her heart.

She knew that corrupted energy, she had studied it all her life... Chaos... Vincent... Something was happening to him.

"It's starting..." Sephiroth told her and Lucrecia looked at her son without understanding. "It's hi ... Vincent... Valentine..."

The words came out strange and hesitant, but seeing the man's face the woman was sure that Sephiroth knew who Vincent really was to him; he knew the truth.

"Son… what do you mean...?"

"He is fighting in Midgar now... Omega is reborn, but Chaos... hasn't awake yet." The general watched the woman with a shadow in his eyes. "This world is breaking apart, mother... it's too late now."

Lucrecia's eyes widened and without thinking she ran to the exit, her dress fluttered violently with the hard wind. She left the protection of the waterfall and advanced into the open field; horror covered her countenance when in the distance, beyond the boundaries of the continent and the ocean, she saw the greenish and black currents of the Lifestreams rise in the sky and collide with each other in a violent and deadly battle; life started to leave the planet and in the middle of the war between the stars that began to die and darken, she knew that Vincent was there and that he too was also dying.

...

When Lucrecia woke up, her mind disturbed and the images of her dream still disconnected and incomprehensible to her, the woman perceived herself crying uncontrollably; there was nothing that seemed to be able to contain her tears or remove the deep and bitter sadness that weighted immeasurably in her soul.