Chapter One

Meeting Netol Stargazer

It all started on a simple day…

Vincent Valentine was bored out of his mind; he hadn't been in touch with any of the others in over 3 months. So he did the only thing he knew to do go and fight a bunch of monsters till he was too tired to do anything but sleep, but even that after the fist 20 times got boring. And after that it all boiled down to one thing, there was nothing to do.

At this moment in time he was lying on his bed in his apartment staring at the ceiling. The paint was pealing and faded but that pretty much went with the rest of the place. He didn't have much and wasn't too good at decorating let alone painting so it just pretty much was ignored much like his hair which was becoming longer then even Tifa Lockhart's hair which was never good.

He finally decided that he needed to go to the market for some random reason of food even though he had just bought groceries the day before. He sat up and pushed himself off the bed and searched for his usual attire when he came to his weapons he paused… (I shouldn't need them after all it's just the market it's not like I'm going to get attacked by a rampaging grapefruit…) He thought to himself.

So he walked out looking halfly normal although his hair was a random mess as always. Yuffie once told him that if he ever cut it or brushed it no one would recognize him at all. As he walked out of the apartment he was just remembering that he had no clue where his phone was… Perhaps that's why he hadn't heard from anyone.

As he turned the corner not paying attention to any of his surroundings he ran into someone. And thud the person went flying to the ground and all of the papers and boxes that she was carrying were scattered around her.

"Oww…" the girl said rubbing her bottom.

"Er…Are you alright?" Vincent asked staring at her embarrassed that he was so careless.

Her face was obscured by her long black hair so that he couldn't clearly see her face until she looked up at him. She had a kind look in her eyes and seemed slightly embarrassed herself. She was very pretty and seemed about a year younger than he.

(He's got realy long hair... Wow he's got pretty eyes... Did I just think that?) She thought to herself.

"Oh I'm fine, don't worry, oh by the way I'm Netol, Netol Stargazer. And you?" She asked the last part quite curiously, like a small kitten prodding a ball of yarn for the first time.

"Vincent Valentine. Do you live here?" He didn't realize how stupid the question was until after he had already asked.

"I'm just moving in, and I have a lot of stuff so sorry I really would love to talk but I've got a lot of boxes and than have to set everything up…" She stated as she began to pick up the mess of boxes and papers off of the ground.

"Well if you'd like I could help you." He stated crouching down and helping pick things up.

"Oh no I couldn't ask you to do that, I hardly even know you…"

But quite frankly you're not asking, I'm suggesting."

Well I suppose so, if you're sure."

I have nothing better to do."

"Oh… I see, thank you… Mr. Valentine."

He was shocked to be called by that name; most had always called him Vincent or his nickname started by Yuffie Vince.

"Just call me Vincent."

"Oh I'm sorry."

"No it's alright."

He really hadn't cared if she did or not but she seemed slightly nervous, and then he realized it. She must be very independent; it would explain every thing… Well maybe not everything but a lot of things.

A few hours latter they had managed to get all of her stuff into the apartment and unpacked with everything set up.

"Why do you have so much stuff?" He asked warily. It was now late in the afternoon and he had token off his red cape because he had gotten overheated hours ago.

"I have a lot of hobbies, although I work as an artist."

"Really?" He asked astonished to hear something of the sort.

His face must have showed it because she smiled at him and questioned "you don't believe me?"

"Well I haven't seen anything so I really can't say now can I?"

"Fine, I was going to save this for tomorrow but just to prove you wrong." She walked over too a couple of paint cans picked them up and dragged them to a small room that was supposed to be a guest room.

And there she began to paint the walls which he immediately realized that the walls were covered in some type of canvas. (Strange…) he thought to himself.

"So what shall I paint?" She paused when she realized she had no idea what to paint.

He froze not realizing that she was asking him. "I don't know…"

"Fine… I'll paint you!" then added, "On the wall," At the strange expression on his face.

Another 2 hours of complicated calculations and her asking about 50 billion questions latter not only was there a picture of Vincent but also of the whole team that he had traveled with stretched out on the entire wall. Yet now the other walls looked quite strange in comparison.

"So how's that?"

"Amazing…"

"Thanks!" She said smiling.

He had simply nodded to this. After all of the time that they had been talking she had realized that the more she new him the more he seemed to talk less…

"Well now we just need to figure out the rest of it…" She stated staring at the other blank walls.

After a few more hours she had managed to get the other 3 walls completely covered with his help. And from a small accident she had managed to paint a stripe across his face, it was blue… LOL.

She was laughing at the look on his face from the sudden paint mark that was now on him, when he looked up at the ceiling and asked," So what are you going to do with the ceiling?"

She finally stopped giggling long enough to say that she didn't know, and then asked what time it was. He stated that it was 12:00 at night now and yawned.

She starred at the ceiling for a long moment and than said, "A map…"

"What?" He asked surprised by the sudden change in attitude.

"We shall make a map on the ceiling!" She stated jumping up. And then added slightly depressed, "But I don't have a ladder…"

"That's not good…"

"……………….. I got it! I can stand on your shoulders!"

"WHAT?!"

"Oh yeah… that is kinda stupid huh?" She realized looking at the ground slightly embarresesd.

He smiled though, it was a rare sight for him to do so but he did. "Well I suppose it is a better idea than a ladder after all a ladder would take longer… alright."

"Uh, really?!" She sounded surprised yet looked overjoyed.

"Yeah I guess." He answered shrugging.

After a few hours of detail work painting while sitting on his shoulders she was almost done when he tripped!

She went flying to the ground and her paintbrush went across the room to an unknown point, and soon after Vincent fell on top of her managing to catch himself before complete impact. She had closed her eyes before she hit the ground when she realized that something or rather someone was on top of her she opened her eyes to see that Vincent's face was only inches from her own, she blushed immediately and could see he had done so slightly as well.

Unfortunately his comrades had the worst sense of timing ever known. Yuffie walked in to the room at this moment and froze at the sight set out before her.

YUFFIE VISSION:

Vincent Valentine the most unsociable man in the world is in someone else's apartment in a room on the ground over top of her at 5:00 in the morning, not wearing his jacket or weapons (including the claw) and she was wearing a tank top and a pair of lose cargo pants. And they both looked like a mess…

BACK TO NORMAL VISSION:

Vincent immediately stood up realizing that Yuffie was in the room and helped Netol up to her feet.

"It's not what it looks like."

"Ok so what is exactly going on? And who is that? And why haven't you answered your phone or our texts…."

And after finishing explaining everything she well understood what had happened. But couldn't help cracking up afterwards because of the oddness of the whole situation, soon she managed to tell them that the others were there and that they were looking for him as well, and started laughing again.

"Is she always like this?" Netol asked Vincent smiling.

"Yeah, most of the time." He answered.

"Hey!" Yuffie said angrily.

"Well I think she found him or something weird…" Came the familiar voice of Cid Highwind.

"Hmmm… Perhaps I should make tea." Netol stated with a yawn, stretching her arms over her head and closing her eyes and finally walking off towards the kitchen.

Cid walked in fallowed by Cloud, TIfa, Berret, Nanaki/ Red XIII, and Reeve.

"A lot of tea…" Netol laughed.

Cloud starred at her for a minute and then asked, "Who is that?"

"Netol Stargazer, why?" Vincent answered.

"Just wondering, so what are you doing here?" He asked looking around.

"Yeah I thought you don't talk to women much." Cid stated raising an eyebrow at Vincent.

"It's none of your concern… and I do talk to women just not a lot." He stated slightly agitated.

"Sure you do, so how'd ya meet this one?" Cid asked sarcastically.

Berret stared at Vincent strangely as though He had thought something was going on that obviously wasn't and then he realized that they were all staring at him that way so he began the long explanation of how they had met and everything leaving out the oddness of how Yuffie had found them.

"Wow then you've been busy haven't ya?" Cid asked still looking slightly confused.

Vincent realizing that they still didn't believe him sighed and stated "You still don't believe me do you?"

Cloud had been leaning agenst one of the walls and for the fist time spoke saying, "I think that he's telling the truth… the paint is still wet…"

His back had dark blue paint smeared on it. Both Tifa and Yuffie couldn't hold in their laughter and Netol simply covered her mouth and attempted to make an apology for not warning them although she was in the kitchen making tea at the time.

After a long and silly conversation and a bit of editing of the picture on the wall of the team Cloud finally decided to explain why they were all meeting up.

"There has been a report of a new… Er… Evil if you'd call it that and we believe it could be a problem. It's a man named Sirashi…"

Netol had made more tea and was brining it in at the time he had stated this and dropped the tray that she was holding.

"Sirashi? Oh no, he's back… But when?" She asked looking frightened.

"You know him?" Cloud asked looking surprised.

"Yes, our families have a history together of… Of well… War…"