The Final Jerusalem
By Kaj-Nrig

Final Fantasy VII is the sole property of Square Enix. I use these characters without permission.

Darkness settled upon him like a second skin, and the citizens of Rocket Town, all of whom he no longer recognized, did their best to keep their distance from him. His left hand hidden under his crimson cloak, fingering a wound on his shoulder, the man's equally crimson eyes drew unconsciously to the open space where, a half century ago, had lain four great spires of steel and rust.

A group of well-muscled men eyed him menacingly, their glares tracking the almost imperceptible shine of the eight Materia securely fastened to the belt of his outfit. He gave them no heed, opting instead to turn into an emptying town square. The locals could sense the impending battle and were hastily closing their windows and locking up doors. As the last straggler stumbled through the cobbled streets to hide in an alley, one of the muscled men strode imposingly to the front of the pack, a self-assured smirk on his face.

The darkened and infinitely smaller man stood his ground, as if hesitant to turn and face this looming giant. Finally, though, after a long moment, he took a slow, measured step to face the menacing pack. The setting sun silhouetted his figure, and when he brought his arm back to his side, the light flickered enticingly off his golden hand. The evening glow threw his form into an inky blackness, causing the ruby orbs that were his eyes to shimmer lightly, starkly contrasting against his shadowed body.

"Hey, mister," the large man said casually, an easy, carefree threat in his voice. "Strange looking get-up you've got there, but we're not here for that. We can see you've got quite a bit of Materia there, and we were wondering if you'd mind... givin' us some of 'em." The small man didn't respond, simply drilling holes into him with his crimson eyes. His resolve wavering under the heat of that otherworldly stare, the man nearly stopped his taunting, but with a look at his comrades, he continued, as if more frightened of their revenge than this red-eyed demon in front of him, "Not much of a talker, I see. Well, let me put it this way, then. If you don't give those Materia to us, then me and my buddies here'll have to take it from you... get my drift?" To prove his point, he gave a quick hand gesture and everybody unsheathed various weapons, from daggers to nightsticks to bladed whips. On each was at least one pair of Materia, their concealed powers offering them a glimmer that spoke of their thinly-veiled strength.

The stranger looked at them, and those eyes, those deadly irises, continued to pour out ruby light without so much as a shred of fear. "What happened to the rocket here?" he asked, disregarding their lethal weapons with practiced ease.

"Wha?" The leader scratched his head in confusion. The others also wondered amongst themselves. "What rocket're you talking about- hey, dick face, I didn't ask you for your damn questions! Now hand over your Materia and there won't be any trouble!"

The man stared at him, not budging an inch. The thug caught himself just on the verge of breaking under that incredibly intense gaze when a low reply wafted over the breeze. "No," the stranger answered nonchalantly.

The muscled men let out hollers of amusement and jest. "Alright, fuckface, your call!" they shouted in unison, raising their weapons. "Let 'em loose, fellas!" Sparks of flame erupted from their weapons, sailing across the vast emptiness in a matter of moments and engulfing the dark man in their magical infernos.

He waited patiently as the flames roved gently over his body and clothes, repelled almost by some magnetic force and dissipating into the open air. As the flames died off, he could faintly make out the group's astonished gasps.

"Wh-what the hell!? He wasn't even scratched!"

"Holy shit, what IS he!?"

Reaching behind him, the cloaked man pulled out a long rifle, its dark surface nearly gleaming with the bloodstains from the countless enemies it had dispatched. He noticed with contempt the distinct shimmer of greed in their eyes at the sight of eight more glimmering orbs of magic. Placing Death Penalty's sight on the leader, he sent a thread of magic into the gun, discharging the spell sealed within the hidden Materia. "Leave me alone." A ring of hot, white fire surrounded their leader, and the people nearby leapt back as immeasurable heat suddenly poured forth from that circular column of fire. Their eyes widened as the same white-hot arcs circled them, almost as if snaring them.

"Holy sh-" The flames took them then, engulfing them in Ifrit's fire and spewing them backwards in disgust. They lay quivering in the evening dirt, specters of fire licking at their clothes, burns covering their legs, and sickening bubbles slowly receding back into their super-heated skin.

Giving the powerless group one more nonchalant, assessing glance, the dark man turned and continued on his way, making his way through the town-turned-city and toward the nearby sea.

The Final Jerusalem
Chapter One: Rude Awakening

"Death... Dying... shouldn't be this hard... This pain... straight through the heart... How many times do I have to savor it?"
- Eiku Shizuma

Lingering memories stung at the back of his eyes like salt water, causing unwanted tears to trickle through his eyelids. He thought he'd buried them long ago, but apparently not even eternal, forgotten nights were enough to rid him of... himself. One remnant slipped through and carried with it the many others, and soon he drowned in them again. Flickers of blonde hair, burgundy eyes, mechanical arms, cigarette butts, fiery tails, giant moogles and spinning shuriken darted through his dark world, torturing him with their scents and sounds and touches, the last more so than all others.

Memories of joy filled him for a moment, but another, less faint shard of memory coldly knifed to the forefront of his imagination and sliced through them. And him, as well. The dark nightmare contracted his shoulder, splitting the shoulder blade in two, twisting in place to grind into it, sending lances of fire through his nerves. The stale, musty air that he'd been breathing in sleep for eternities upon eternities suddenly left him as his heart contracted spasmodically. A hazy red filled his vision, and he felt a scream touching at the tip of his tongue. The pain dove sharply to the right, nearly separating his arm from the rest of his body. The shriek of pain tumbled through his lungs, clawing to escape...

"AAAAAAAAAARRRGGH!!"

A golden arm lashed out from the insides of the coffin, crashing through the wood and grasping the vulnerable neck on the other side. An agonized scream ripped from the confines of the coffin, its recently awakened occupant leaping out in feral rage and pain. "Jesus Christ! What the hell!?" yelled a sweaty construction worker as he caught a glimpse of flowing crimson cape. In an instant, the creature had pinned his comrade to the dusty ground, the dark golden fingers of its left arm threatening to pierce the man's throat.

"Oh, God! Help! Someone, help m-"

"SHUT UP!" the monster hissed, hefting the large man easily and tossing him aside. The man ran into a bulldozer and fell to the ground like a rag doll. "Aaagh!" The monster in red wrenched the shovel from its right shoulder and slumped to the ground, cradling its nearly severed limb. A thick liquid poured from its open, gaping wound, but it seemed to blend into the maroon cape as if the two couldn't be differentiated.

A large crowd of workers formed a large circle around the monstrosity, none wanting to try their luck against the creature. In the distance, the sound of sirens and security measures created an uneasy background noise. Their eyes were all trained on the mysterious and obviously menacing demon in the middle of the courtyard. Despite the large gash splitting its arm from its shoulder, however, it didn't show any more visible signs of anguish. The profuse outpouring of blood had already decreased to a slight trickle. Its discarded coffin lay to the side, an aura of impenetrable evil surrounding it.

The red creature lifted its head up. With its crimson eyes, it bore holes into each and every worker looking back at it. Then it scanned beyond them, and seemed to widen in shock.

And suddenly, it lunged.

Vincent pinned one man next to the dirty yellow bulldozer, his yellow claw clutching the man's neck and sinking its digits into the machine's metal. "WHAT HAPPENED TO THIS MANSION!?"

"It, uh..."

"WHAT HAPPENED!!" His golden arm swept off the man's neck, landed a punch on his cheek, and reclaimed its grip before the man could start to fall.

"Ugh! I-it was getting taken down! W-we were just called in to demolish it, that's all, honest!" The man was managing to press himself closer to the large machine despite the fact that he was a foot off the ground. Vincent loosened his grip on the man slightly, allowing at least some room for the unfortunate person to breathe.

"What day is it?" he snarled, eyes swiveling wildly in animalistic rage, taking in all the action surrounding them. Men were beginning to sneak up on him with shovels and/or other rather dangerous construction equipment. A squad of odd-looking police cars was surrounding all the common escape routes, but they wouldn't be any problem. He could escape in any way he wanted to. Not that he wanted to escape yet.

"Uh, uh..." The man helplessly struggled against his grip, eyes locked on the golden claw.

"WHAT DAY IS IT!!" His fingers sunk in a bit deeper, and the man started turning blue. Let him choke on his disturbance! They should've known better than to disturb my sleep.

The worker frightfully gasped in a breath. "A-A-April tw-twenty-f-f-first." When Vincent's claw still hadn't retracted, the man continued. "S-s-s-seventy f-f-fifty-two... Please, please, dear God, let me go, please..!" The man's feeble pleas struck Vincent's deaf ears. His eyes widened slightly, and he found himself suddenly lost in the past. 7052... Fifty years... The pain in his right shoulder disappeared, the construction workers and giant machines disappeared, the sirens disappeared, everything surrounding him disappeared into a muddy, distorted background. Fifty years...

His arm lost its strength and the man crawled free, scrambling away to safety. Vincent didn't give chase; he'd gotten what he'd needed.

"H-hold it!" A group of men, all attired in matching blue uniforms, surrounded him, their large rifles trained unsteadily on the newly awakened man, trigger fingers twitching. Vincent gazed at them as if just noticing them. His eyes no longer sparkled with that murderous intent just moments before; in contrast, they glowed with a subdued appearance, softly reflective and unsteady, surprised. "P-put your arms-" they began, stopping when they noticed his horribly severed right shoulder. "P-put your left arm in the air! Now!"

He brought his claw up and pressed his nearly dismembered shoulder together, gasping as a new shock of pain went through his system. Letting a low growl issue from the back of his throat, Vincent turned around, measuring the distance to the top of the bulldozer. "Leave me alone," he replied evenly.

Then he became nothing more than a red blur, and soon he was sailing above the heavy machine. A hail of bullets gouged deep holes in the steel alloy only seconds later, but by then he was already gone.

Nanaki was dreaming. And it was a very nice dream. It was a dream in which nothing could go wrong. It was a perfect world, and he knew that no such world existed, but he still enjoyed it for what it was: lilting songbirds squawked effortlessly, streams gushed with life and food, and fleas, the bane of his existence, ceased to exist. He raced up a tree and snatched a luscious and fat bird by its feathers to drag it to be his next meal. Nearby, the river ran overflowing with large, three-foot long carp, which incidentally caused them to flop up onto the richly colored blades of grass, inviting him to get his share of white meat. Ah, yes, this dream was a good one.

He was just about to slam the bird's neck against the mighty oak tree he had just transcended when a speeding projectile suddenly snatched it from his maw. Growling in both surprise and disappointment, the beast looked to the source of his absent meal. His eyes widened at the sight, and his fur immediately stood on end as if struck by lightning.

Chaos stood before him, its slit, cat-like crimson eyes stabbing into him. The giant demon floated effortlessly above the grass, its equally large wings barely causing a ripple in the air; the earth beneath it, previously adorned with lush grass and sun-colored dandelions, was shriveled and brown. Nanaki shivered, the creature unnerving him with its intense stare and decidedly malicious grin. He'd always been wary of Vincent's transformations, and this one was, by far, the most frightening creature he'd ever faced. Not even Sephiroth, in all his unimaginable might, had evoked as much fear in him as Chaos did.

Lifting its right hand, Chaos pointed at Nanaki with jagged, knife-like claws.

"...Lucrecia."

Then darkness swirled around it, and the visage was wrapped in the black envelope, shrinking to become an evanescent point of ebony. Nanaki's hackles slowly began to sink, but they immediately rose again to the sound of a tremor. They failed to provide any support to Nanaki, however, as colossal fissures broke the surface of this serene environment and swallowed the howling dog-creature. He howled in vain, scrabbling at the walls of earth but finding no purchase, and then he felt the earth, his mother earth, squeezing in. Then everything truly went black.

Struggling fitfully, the old creature abruptly woke, clawing at something invisible, trying to escape the nightmarish walls of the earthquake-induced valley. As realization dawned on him, Nanaki tried to slowly calm his breath, taking a look at the Cosmo Candle to reassure himself that he was truly in the world of the living. The endless flame had never shown itself in his dreams before, so it served as a good reminder of reality. Shaking off the remaining effects of his nap, Nanaki began making his way to the kids' training center.

"And it had been going so well, too," he grumbled under his breath.

Chapter One: Rude Awakening END

A/N: I've removed most author's notes from these early chapters. I've also made general edits throughout the story to fix some continuity errors and plot holes and whatnot.

Notes:

Eiku Shizuma – An early character in Hiroaki Samura's Blade of the Immortal, one of the best manga to hit this side of the Pacific Ocean.