Disclaimer: Seriously? Meh, I do not own Final Fantasy nor anything sharing its titles and characters.

Okay, I've read a few OC stories in this category and decided to do my own, but with a twist thrown in. Let me state right now that the OC will not be a Mary Sue. The storyline will be slightly skewed, obviously, and while I've noticed a more realistic theme among the battles in other FFVII stories, there will be game elements and logic involved here as well.

Also, please note that there will be no slash. Pairings are undecided at this point for those of you who care as they will not be the main focus in this story. The rating is M mainly because of my OC's, Barret's, and Cid's foul language.

~Identity Crisis~

Chapter 1: What The Actual Fuck?!

Deep in a forest near Junon, a woman groaned as she slowly woke up from where she was curled up at the base of a tree, her head aching in ways she'd never thought possible. Faith Sterling slowly came to, groaning and cursing lowly as she opened her eyes, blinking at the harsh sunlight streaming down on her face.

"Ugh, what the hell?" She muttered sourly, wondering how the sun was beaming into her bedroom since it didn't have a window. It took Faith a few seconds longer to realize that she wasn't in her bedroom, nor in her apartment, or even in the city itself. Faith stared wide-eyed, gaping at the forest surrounding her. "The fuck?" She breathed out in a whisper, not understanding how she'd gotten to this place. She tossed back her mind, trying to put the pieces together, only to come up with nothing. She couldn't remember how she got here. She couldn't even remember what she'd done the night before. "No seriously, what the actual fuck?!"

Faith struggled to push herself up onto her feet, instantly noticing that there was something thick and heavy weighing down her left arm. It was, well, she didn't what to call it. It was like a gauntlet, but it only shielded the outside of her arm, covering her hand and extending all the way up to a metal shoulder guard. She twisted her arm around, bending the strange gauntlet and found it posed some resistance as it wasn't made from very flexible materials. Black leather straps held it in place and the odd arm-gauntlet itself was solid white color. Strangely enough, it didn't feel uncomfortable or out of place on her arm.

It certainly looked weird as hell, though.

Now back on her feet, she found that the rest of her clothes were different. Faith knew for a fact that she didn't own them either, as they made her feel very self-conscious. The shirt was a deep green, sleeveless turtleneck sweater that left her midriff bare. She wore a rather small pair of tan shorts that were left unbuttoned. Embarrassed, she quickly fixed that problem, cursing a little as the arm-gauntlet thing got in the way. On her feet was a pair of orange sneakers that led into white leg warmers.

Investigating the outfit further, she found the arm-gauntlet was secured into place via black straps that tied across her chest and wrapped around her back. For whatever reason, a short green sash was tied around the strap closest to the shoulder guard, trialing down the gauntlet and moving in the slight breeze. Some sort of mesh fabric, like Fishnet but thicker and hardier, covered the lower parts of her right arm and left leg, while an additional piece of metal covered the rest of her left thigh, like a leg brace. To finish the strange ensemble, she had on a pair of thick fingerless orange gloves that matched the shoes in color.

Faith fingered the odd outfit, an uneasy feeling building in the pit of her stomach. Shaken, she went to run a hand through her hair, freezing instantly as she found that it was a lot shorter than it should be. 'Oh god, not my hair!' She screamed mentally, stumbling forwards to look for anything that could show her reflection. Faith had never considered herself to be a vain person, quite the opposite really, but nobody enjoys waking up to a surprise haircut.

Fortunately, a small pond could be found some several feet away and she staggered to it, feeling unbalanced. As she looked over the shore and peered into the water, a familiar face that wasn't hers stared back. A scream broke free from her mouth as Faith landed on her backside, frantically crawling away from the pond. 'Holy shit, holy shit, holy motherfucking shit!' Her curse filled mantra continued for several minutes as she stared down wildly at her hands. No, not her hands, Faith corrected hysterically, Yuffie's.

Somehow, she looked exactly like Yuffie Kisaragi from Final Fantasy VII.

After a few minutes of panic, Faith forced herself to calm down. She looked back into the water, a large part of her hoping she'd just been seeing things, and let out sharp hiss at finding that she'd seen correctly the first time. She really did look like Yuffie.

"How the hell is this possible?" She asked her reflection, studying it. This situation was like the kind of stuff she'd read on FanFiction. At that thought, Faith gave a relieved chuckle and bonked herself on the back of her head. "Of course," she realized sheepishly, "this is just a weird dream." Happy to have things sorted out, Faith rose to her feet, admiring her appearance.

Yuffie was definitely in way better shape than she was. Faith wasn't overweight by any means, but she certainly wasn't the athletic type, though she had taken karate lessons for a few years in her adolescents. As she stretched Yuffie's lithe form though, she could practically feel the strength and energy humming through her limbs. Curious, Faith started doing some simple kicks that she could still remember. Her body, or rather Yuffie's, moved quickly and after thirty sidekicks, Faith found she wasn't even the slightest bit winded.

For the next twenty minutes, she spent her time doing back-handsprings, flips, cartwheels, punches, and kicks, fully enjoying how much skill she had in her dream. Her fun was cut short however when she heard a loud, bird sounding screech from above that left her ears ringing. Quickly turning, she spotted two monsters she recognized as Formulas flying straight towards her. Faith stared at them blankly for a second until she realized that the monsters were diving downwards to attack her.

She gave a yelp, turned tail, and ran back to where she'd come from, hoping the numerous trees would slow them down. After all, if she could run away in the game, it would only make sense that it would work in her dream too. Those thoughts were soon dismissed as something heavy slammed into her back, knocking her into the ground and leaving her breathless.

It hurt. As Faith gasped, struggling to push herself off of the ground, she realized that she wasn't supposed to get hurt. Not in dreams anyways.

But that meant–

Another shrill cry from above acted as her only warning, and Faith instinctively rolled to the left, dodging the second Formula and getting up unto her feet in a somewhat coordinated motion. She ran blindly, ducking and jumping over the attacks clumsily. Oddly enough, her body, Yuffie's body, seemed to know what to do. It was her mind that kept screwing her over, made her hesitate and doubt as she frantically scrambled over bushes and tree roots.

A sharp glint of silver caught the corner of her eye and Faith spotted Yuffie's Shuriken resting against a tree. She changed directions and dove for it, picking it up with her right hand and instinctively settling into the battle stance Yuffie had used in the game. Her left arm, the one with the arm-gauntlet, came to hover over her torso protectively. The stance came easily, her feet spread wide as her right arm crossed over her left, the Shuriken coming near her shoulder guard in a motion that felt fluid. She thought the oversized weapon would feel heavy in her hand, but it was surprisingly light and her confidence grew. As she looked over the 4-point Shuriken, Faith saw that it was only equipped with the Throw Materia.

For all her boasting about being a great Materia Hunter, Yuffie clearly sucked.

As the Formulas closed in, Faith took aim and threw the weapon as hard as she could, much like she would a Frisbee. The Shuriken spun throw the air at an amazing speed, slicing at the monster before returning to her grip. She had to jump a little to catch it and the hurt Formula retaliated with one of its impulse moves, ramming its' wing into her side. It hurt, but not as much as Faith thought it would. It was rather like taking a strong kick to the stomach, disorienting and painful, but it was hardly damaging enough to leave her unable to fight. She would definitely have a bruise though.

She threw the weapon again and it hit the previous Formula, making the bird-like monster cry out in pain. Faith gave a cheer as it started to disappear, absently noticing that something small fell from its fading body to the ground below. Game logic was clearly asserting itself here. The bad guys had always disappeared when they'd died, though Faith distinctly remembered them fading away in a red color in Final Fantasy VII. Here they seemed to burst into green glowing particles that floated in the air briefly before disappearing.

It only took two more hits to kill of the other Formula, which also disappeared in a glowing haze, and she ran over to see what the monsters had dropped. It looked like some sort of money, Gil she guessed, and a triangular shaped vial filled with a green liquid. If she had to take a guess, she say it was a Potion. Looking around, Faith spotted a normal enough burlap bag propped up at the base the tree where she'd found the 4-point Shuriken.

Picking up her winnings, Faith moved over to search through the bag. In it she found six triangular shaped vials that were a little bit smaller than the one she'd picked up from the Formula. 'So maybe the smaller ones are Potions, while the bigger ones are Hi-potions.' There was another bigger vial in the bag, as well as a narrower tear-shaped phial with blue liquid inside that could've been an Ether, and a beaker like container that held a mysterious purple liquid. What she could identify for certain was a dented canteen bottle half-filled with water, and a decent amount of Gil. 'Hmm, this must be Yuffie's stash.' There was also a thick metal bracelet that had thee circular shaped indents. Two of the holes were practically touching each other, while the other was set a few centimeters away. 'Huh, must be the Carbon Bangle Yuffie came equipped with when she joined Cloud's party. Why the hell didn't she have this on in the first place?'

Shrugging her shoulders, Faith set the Bangle onto her right wrist, where it was a little loose. She moved it, not wanting it to fall off in the middle of a fight, and set it near her elbow. It was tight and a little uncomfortable, but she could deal since it gave her more Materia slots. Taking the money out, and depositing her newly won Hi-potion in to join the other vials, Faith began to count how much Gil she had.

In the end, and if she'd counted the odd currency correctly, she had a total of 1,534 Gil. Faith knew it was enough to buy two different Materia, like Ice or Fire, from any nearby town. She was pretty sure she didn't have to worry about getting better armor since the Carbon Bangle was likely the best piece she could get her hands on at this point. As began to put her money back into the bag, Faith saw that her hands were shaking furiously. She'd like to say it was the adrenaline wearing off, but–

This was fucking real. She was inside a goddamn video game, posing as one of the games' characters, with no idea of how it happened or…

Or how to get back home.

Faith was pretty sure she fainted after that realization, because she found herself slowly waking up some time later, her neck cramped and left leg numb. She sat there silently, massaging her aches, and wondered if she should be going insane at this point. Surely waking up in a fictional world would result in a mental breakdown, right?

She wasn't though. Oh sure, she'd freaked out a little and fainted, but right now she could only feel worried and afraid. What about her family? Were her parents worrying about her? Would she ever see them again? What had caused this to happen to her?

Then again, maybe she'd already gone insane and this "being stuck in Yuffie's body" thing was actually all in her head. Maybe she was actually in a padded room right now, muttering nonsense to herself and the doctor assigned to her. If so, then why did her mind choose to make her Yuffie? Faith hated her character. The kid was a brat. And admittedly, she'd never forgiven Yuffie for stealing all of her hard earned Materia in the game.

Still, the question stood. Why hadn't her broken psyche made her into one of the cooler characters, like Tifa? Aerith was obviously out since she died. Or maybe her she was stuck in a some kind of coma. Could all of this just be a very realistic dream? Faith doubted it; her going insane seemed much more likely. She gave a frustrated sigh, eyes drifting to the sky above.

What she wouldn't give for some answers right about now.

"Hey! If this is some kind of cosmic joke you can knock it off now, I'm not laughing!" She shouted at the clouds. She wasn't expecting a response, but it felt good to vent just the same. "What the fuck do I do now, huh? Pretend to be Yuffie?" Now that she thought about it, where was Yuffie? If this was real, then was the 'Great Ninja Yuffie' in her body, stuck on Earth? Faith shivered at that thought and hoped that wasn't the case. "What?! Am I supposed to do something here? Do you want me to change things, is that it?"

'Hold on, that may not be a bad idea.' She knew what was going to happen, she'd been playing this game all her life, memorized where to find all the Materia and Weapons. She could avert so much shit from happening, and then maybe, if everybody got their happy ending, she could be sent home. Like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz or some shit. Faith threw her heels a shrewd look, clicked them together and thought. 'There's no place like home.' Predictably, nothing happened and she snorted at herself. 'Yeah, like it would be that easy.'

The thought had merit though, and if nothing more she'd get to meet up with Cloud and the others. It's not every day you meet your favorite fictional characters in real life.

Decision made, the only problem left was what to do now? She couldn't just stay here; Faith had no idea where she was. Finding a town would be best, then she could get a sense of the timeframe and see if AVALANCHE had already started taking out the Mako Reactors. If not, then maybe there was a chance she could save Zack.

It took more than a few hours of running around before Faith finally found civilization, which turned out to be Junon. The harbor city was freaking impressive, she'd give Shinra that, even if it was choking the life out of the small village underneath it. The Sister Ray cannon was ridiculously huge, and Faith had to resist the urge to run out on it. All she saw when she looked at it was the fight that Sephiroth once had with Genesis and Angeal in Crisis Core.

Now that was one fucking epic scene.

She'd of course run into some monsters along the way. It hadn't been too bad since she'd lucked out with getting groups filled with three monsters or less, but Faith had ended up using one of her Potions and had run away more often than not. She suffered some bruises and scrapes, but nothing serious. She'd even managed to collect another Hi-potion and had earned an extra 500 Gil.

Faith guessed that she was at level fourteen at this point; but it was hard to tell since there was no level up screen at the end of her battles. She vaguely wondered if she could use Sense on herself to check out her stats.

Her first stop was the Materia Shop, where she bought a Restore, Fire, and Lightning Materia, figuring that they would be the most useful to her at this point. The Steal Materia was sold in Kalm and it cost 1,200 Gil. She figured to just wait until she met up with Cloud and then ask for permission to use theirs. Throw wasn't a Materia Faith had ever used in the game, but she refrained from selling it for now. Beggars couldn't be choosers and she didn't have a lot of Materia to choose from. She knew the Long Range Materia was in the Mythril Mines, so she would pick that up to give to Cloud. And the Choco/Mog Summons was at the Chocobo Farm, which Faith would grab if she turned out to be leaving for Midgar.

She moved on to pick up all the Items she could remember being in the area, ignored the two 1/35 Soldier Items, and equipped the Enemy Skill Materia from the Beginners Hall. She drank all of the Sources, seeing as Yuffie's only powerful stat was Dexterity, and hoped it would give her an advantage in the future. Finding the Items were a relief because that likely meant that Cloud and the others hadn't passed through yet.

Her next destination was the bar. Maybe it was just instilled into her by movies and games, but Faith fully believed that you could always hear the latest gossip in bars. After a half-an-hour, a particularly drunk infantryman began rambling loud enough for the whole establishment to hear.

"That's right, a former First Class SOLDIER!" The Shinra grunt called out, getting the attention of everyone in the room, while his more sober comrade tried to quiet him down. "Can you believe it? They sent us, a bunch of Troopers, after a First! We didn't stand a fuckin' chance." The man complained even louder, his nasally voice giving Faith a headache. "Don't matter that he's got somebody with him who's sick, it sure ain't slowing the bastard down any. HQ thinks he'll be at Midgar within the week."

And that was all Faith needed to hear. Zack was still alive at this point, running away from Shinra with a comatose Cloud in tow.

She could still save him.

Faith waited a few minutes after finishing her meal and left the behind a 30 Gil tip, since she had no idea how to figure out gratuity in this world. From the bartender's broad smile and appreciative nod though, she guessed she'd given him a little too much. 'Meh, what's 30 Gil? The only thing that costs any real money is Items and Materia. Compared to that, food and clothes are cheap as hell.' She took the elevator back down to Junon, sparing a few minutes to search for Priscilla, hoping to get the Shiva Summons Materia early, but wasn't able to find the little girl down at the beach like in the game.

Knowing she'd make contact later, Faith left the small village and headed east towards her next destination.

Faith eyed Fort Condor in annoyance, her exhaustion taking its toll and making her want to collapse where she stood. She'd never done so much physical work in her entire life. The trek from Junon to Fort Condor was a hell of a lot longer than the game had made it seem.

The monsters hadn't been too bad, especially since she had Cure now to take care of any injuries. Of course, Faith hadn't managed to get away from those battles unscathed. She had been scratched, bitten, poisoned, blinded, silenced, and left bruised all over. As it turned out the mysterious beaker of purple liquid turned out to be an Antidote. Her limbs and joints were sore from the abuse and cried out for rest. Faith guessed that her resistance to injury followed that of Advent Children; there was a realism in the combat that definitely hadn't existed in the original Final Fantasy VII game.

There was no question that Yuffie was a lot more durable than a normal person though. If she'd had to take on those monsters in her own body... she's pretty sure those Formula's from this morning would've killed her easily.

Using Materia was a very tiring experience too and Faith could feel a headache developing right behind her eyes. She supposed it was a sign that she was running low on MP, but she couldn't be sure. There hadn't been any adverse effects when using Magic in the game, but then the characters hadn't ever needed to eat either.

It was almost night time though, the sun was but a few rays in the horizon and Faith was dead on her feet. All she wanted to do now was lie down and sleep for the next year and a half. The man at the entrance of the Fort, the one guarding the rope, must have pitied her sorry state because he didn't even bother to check if she was Shinra or not. Climbing up the rope was a pain in the ass since she had already felt so damn tired and she'd called down to the guy, telling him to get some fucking stairs.

The asshole merely laughed in response.

Once she made it to the top, Faith groaned miserably as she spotted the rope ladder she had to climb to reach the next level. An old man by the well, the leader and who currently had the Huge Materia if Faith remembered correctly, spoke to her briefly, giving her the sad spiel about the Condor and what Shinra was trying to do. 'God, he's worse than the animal activists back home.' She thought wryly as the man continued his preaching.

"Look, fine, whatever. I'll give you 300 Gil; it's all I can spare at the moment." Faith interrupted wearily. She'd had a little over 150 Gil left from her shopping in Junon and had made about 1,200 what with her battles, but she wasn't willing to fork over all of her hard earned cash, especially when it didn't even matter at this point.

"Oh thank you, thank you so much! This will definitely help with buying some much needed provisions." The old man praised as Faith handed him the small wad of cash. 'Everything is so damn expensive in this world.' "Please, feel free to use one of the beds on the lower level." She muttered a tired thanks and stumbled to where she knew the beds were, cursing at the ladder she had to climb down. Seeing the nearest bed, Faith gave a blissful sigh and collapsed on top of it, not even bothering to set down her bag or take off her shoes.

She was asleep within seconds…

"Hey…"

"…"

"Hey!"

"…Huh?"

"Get out!"

"What?"

"Get–"

"Miss, are you alright?" Faith felt herself jerk sharply, half-rising from where she was as she scratched her head. There was a sharp ringing in her ears, but the sensation was already beginning to fade. She blinked blearily at the face in front of her, not recognizing him.

"I'm sorry?" She asked, rubbing a hand over her face and biting back a yawn. The unknown man chuckled, adjusting the pack on his back since it was starting to fall.

"Are you alright? You seemed to be having a bad dream." Faith looked down at her bed, finding a familiar shuriken resting at her feet and that her bag had toppled over onto the floor. 'So it wasn't a dream after all. Fuck.' She quickly pushed back the heaviness that came with the thought of never going back home and focused on what the man had said.

"I was?" She mused curiously and he nodded. "Huh, well I don't remember dreaming anything, mustn't have been so bad then." Stretching her arms, Faith gave a happy sigh as she felt something pop. 'Looks like the game logic is applying itself again, sleeping apparently heals everything. I feel great!' She did too, her muscles didn't ache from yesterday's exertion and the exhaustion was completely gone. "Thanks for waking me up, buddy!" She chirped towards the man who was now settling down on one of the other beds.

"No problem kid." He replied, tucking himself under the covers. Taking the hint, Faith quietly gathered her things and made her way out of Fort Condor, stopping to talk briefly with the old man and bought some granola bars as she promised to return soon. The only free Materia in the area was the Phoenix Summons and that wouldn't be available until after the WEAPONs arrived.

Marching northeast towards the Mythril Mines, Faith only ran into a few more monsters that proved to be no trouble at all. She'd probably leveled up since yesterday after one of her many battles. The hike from Fort Condor to the Mines wasn't long, likely two hours at the most, and the morning light felt warm against her skin. Entering the mines however, proved that the terrain was very different from outside.

It was cold, dark, and filled with monsters. She could already tell she wasn't going to enjoy her stroll through the Mythril Mines.

Two hours later Faith was telling herself, I told you so. 'Note to self: do not bother exploring future caves, it's fucking pointless!' Never having been in an actual cave before, she'd stupidly thought it would be a good idea to explore. One thing led to another and Faith found herself walking in circles for well over an hour before she finally had the bright idea to mark the areas she'd been too. Meanwhile the monsters were relentless in attacking the only human in the mines. 'This shit is harder to navigate through without the guidebook.'

Faith huffed as she brought up her arm-gauntlet to block the Iron Ball attack of a Madouge, but it still managed to knock her down to one knee. Suddenly, she felt incredibly empowered and a glow of red seemed to shoot out from her body. Faith rushed forwards, slashing at the Madouge and jumped back to hit it again with a mighty throw that had her weapon cutting the monster in half, leaving it to disappear in a stream of green energy. 'Huh, so that's what using a Limit Break is like.' The rest of the battle quickly ended after that and Faith used Cure to heal her newly acquired bruises, sighing in relief as they faded away. The exhaustion, however, still lingered.

With her Enemy Skill Materia, she'd managed to learn Flamethrower from an Ark Dragon and picked up all the Items in the cave, drinking the Mind Source. Faith had a bit of trouble with the Castanets, since they traveled in the largest groups or occasionally fought with an Ark Dragon, but the Gil and experience she'd earned from the grueling battles was well worth it. She even managed to use Greased Lightning two more times before exiting the cave.

The relief of being outside quickly evaporated as she remembered that she'd forgotten about one very important thing: the Midgar Zolom.

"Fuck, what the hell do I do now?" Faith asked herself angrily as she stared out over the swamp. Again, the scenery was much bigger than the game had made it seem. She guessed it to be a couple miles long in both length and width, since she couldn't see anything beyond the marsh. She knew in the game that if you ran away from the Midgar Zolom you were sent to just outside of the swap, but she really didn't want to risk it.

Faith looked over the mountains enclosing the marsh, eyeing them with dislike. She'd never been any good at rock climbing, but it looked like she didn't have any other choice in the matter.

The game had prevented the party from climbing any mountain terrain without a Mountain Chocobo, but that rule thankfully didn't apply in this situation. Faith spent the rest of her day scaling the steep cliffs, fighting off the occasional monster that found her, and doing her best to not fall into the snake infested swap below. She was spotted by a Midgar Zolom at one point, but it left her alone, probably figuring that going after her would be too much of a hassle.

She only made it about halfway through the mountains by the time dusk came and was forced to setup the Tent she'd found earlier in the Mythril Mines. For whatever reason the Tent seemed to repel the monsters; it was like she was invisible to them. She didn't question it and decided to use her new number one explanation for matters like these.

Game Logic.

Before going to bed, she checked over her Items to see what she'd managed to collect for the day. Her Gil, which had been a total sum of 1,032 after leaving Fort Condor, was now raking in at 4,567. Her Potions had ended up at a nice even total of ten. She also had five Hi-potions, two Ethers, and a circular flask filled with red liquid that she suspected to be a Phoenix Down. Her Materia had gotten in some good uses too, but Faith had no idea how much more AP she would need to make any of them level up. Did Sense worked on Materia too?

Even though the monsters stayed well away from her Tent, Faith still had a hard time getting to sleep that night. She woke up at the slightest noise and the hard ground didn't allow her the chance to get comfortable. In the morning, when she exited her Tent, she wasn't sure if she expected the used Item to just disappear or not.

After waiting a few minutes though, the Tent stayed where it was and Faith found herself being attacked by a Formula. She guessed that whatever had warded off the monsters stopped working after using the Item once, essentially making her Tent a normal piece of fabric. After defeating the Formula, she decided to leave the Tent behind, seeing no point in carrying it with her since she planned to rest at the Chocobo Farm that night.

By now though, her stomach was growling for something to eat and her canteen was getting dangerously close to empty. She'd finished off the last of her granola bars from Fort Condor last night. Mentally promising to keep food on her person at all times in the future, Faith continued through the mountains.

It took more than a few hours. Faith guessed it was around two in the afternoon when she finally reached the grasslands bordering the mountains and swap. She didn't know exactly how far away the Chocobo Farm was, but she made it her goal to reach the farm before nightfall. Along the way Faith ran into groups of Levrikons, Elfadunks, and Mus. She didn't see any Chocobos, but that was likely because she didn't have the Chocobo Lure. She did manage to learn L4 Suicide from a Mu and also got to use her Limit Break again.

It was still light out when Faith finally found the Chocobo Farm and she eagerly ran up to the Chocobo closest to the picket fence.

"Alright let's see, how do I get a Summons Materia out of you again?" She asked the giant bird that pecked at the ground, paying her no attention. "Wark!" She mimicked the creatures' call as best as she could, actually succeeding in getting the Chocobos' attention.

"Wark? Warkwark wark?" It responded and she smirked.

"Wark." The bird peered at her curiously for a second before it, and the other three Chocobos that were fenced in, began to dance. It was actually really cool to see them pull off their synchronized performance, which realistically shouldn't have been possible, not unless Chocobo Bill went out of his way to train them to do it. Again, Game Logic seemed to be the most acceptable answer.

Faith watched the birds do their little jig, humming the Waltz de Chocobo song since it wasn't spontaneously playing overhead like it had in the game. The Chocobos seemed happier at least at hearing her slightly off-key song. When they finished the Chocobo she'd talked to let out a happy squawk.

"Wark–" It leaned forward over the fence with a shiny Red Materia in its' beak and Faith held out her hands eagerly to take the Summons. 'How the hell did it get this Materia anyways? Did it swallow the Summons at one point and just… regurgitated it now?' Faith paused at that thought and eyed the spit covered Materia in her hands 'Ugh, that's disgusting.' Frowning, she thanked the Chocobo by petting its head with her now soiled hand, making it warble appreciatively. She then found Chocobo Bill and paid for some dinner and a bed to sleep in for the night.

When she woke up the next day, Faith asked about Chocobos and how to take care of them, making polite small talk with the farmer and his family as they ate breakfast. Like in the game, there weren't any available stalls so she couldn't get her own Chocobo just yet. Bill tried to sell her the Chocobo Lure Materia, but Faith turned him down. She didn't need it at the moment and she didn't want to spend any more Gil than she had to at this point. She left soon after, buying three apples for the road, and briefly petted the Chocobo from yesterday.

The flat meadows were very much appreciated after spending two days in a cave and the mountains. As the day progressed, the Elfadunks and Levrikons were replaced with Mandragoras and Kalm Fangs, letting Faith know that she was getting closer to Midgar. She stopped by a river around midday to rest and rehydrate herself, eating her meager lunch and hoping to better stock her food supplies at Kalm. It took another couple hours to reach the city, but the monster were weaker here, so it wasn't as taxing as the woods around Junon or the Mythril Mines.

Kalm's size, as to be expected, was bigger than the game portrayed, but besides some extra houses, a couple of farms, and a few more commerce shops, it wasn't anything that Faith felt the need to check out. She headed to the pub first, ate a large dinner and managed to pick up the Items hidden in the townhouses without anyone chasing her out of their homes. She stowed the Peacemaker into her bag for when they found Vincent in Nibelheim. After downing the Guard Source she found, Faith went to the Inn, making sure to grab the Megalixir, and paid 20 Gil for a room.

The Inn had a total of three rooms on the second floor, a room that held three beds, a supply closet that also acted as the laundry room, and one public bathroom. For the first time in three days, Faith was able to properly clean herself and not just the quick wipe down she'd been giving herself at ponds and rivers. It felt gross to go so long without bathing, and brushing her teeth, but that just seemed to be the way things worked in Gaia. Fortunately, the staff was washing her clothes for her, it had cost Faith an extra 10 Gil that she'd happily paid.

As she stepped out of the shower a flash of blue-green caught her attention and she turned, finding herself staring at her reflection in the bathroom's mirror. Seeing Yuffie instead of her regular face was jarring, but as she took a closer look, Faith saw that her eyes couldn't possibly be Yuffie's. The ninja was Wutai, the equivalent of the Japanese, so naturally her eyes should be either brown or black. But these eyes, they looked closer to Faith's own blue ones, though they weren't quite the same. The was a greenish color to them and they almost seemed to... glow.

Faith stared at her slightly luminous irises for several minutes, not sure what to make of them.

Eventually, she forced herself to turn away from her reflection and decided to turn in early for the night. She had no idea just which cliff Zack was supposed to die on while defending Cloud from hundreds of Troopers, so she would head out early in the morning and scout over the area. From this point on she had to be on high alert.

Zack's life depended on it.

It wasn't until three days later after arriving in Kalm that Faith got word of Zack. A group of Troopers had scouted the town for him, claiming that two wanted SOLDIERs had been seen in the area matching Zack's and Cloud's descriptions. Unfortunately, Faith still hadn't managed to find the right cliff. She'd been scouring the wasteland bordering Midgar almost nonstop, but had nothing to show for her efforts except for learning Matra Magic from a Custom Sweeper and earning a shitload of Gil.

She left town once the Troopers had moved on, searching desperately for her quarry and running across the wastelands as swiftly as Yuffie's body would allow. At this point she was just ignoring monsters; simply launching Fire spells to distract them before running away.

When it started raining, Faith knew she had to hurry.

She smelt it long before she saw it. A copper tang poisoned the air, along with other nasty smells, making her gag. The ground was covered with broken swords, discarded helmets, and ruined guns. Blood stained the wet dirt, and the ground itself was covered in cuts and craters, as if something had cleaved through the terrain. There were a few bodies scattered about, but they were quickly breaking down into familiar green particles.

Faith distantly realized that they were returning to the Lifestream.

The gore was too much for her to handle, especially since the worst wounds she'd seen so far were her own. The monsters disappeared too quickly after she'd killed them to see what sort of damager her Shuriken had caused and for whatever reason their blood had never clung to her weapon. Faith turned away from scene, her stomach emptying itself against her will.

Inwardly, she laughed at herself. How many times had she seen people react this way in movies and sworn that she would have been able to keep her cool?

Faith slapped herself, the harsh sting giving her something else to focus on. She needed to find Zack, now was not the time to be falling apart. It was then that she noticed the rain had stopped and that the sun was beginning to break through the clouds.

She'd run out of time.

She raced deeper into the battlefield, remembering that Zack had been surrounded by the carnage in Crisis Core when he'd died. Not even a few minutes later, she found him. Just like in the ending cutscene, he was laying down on a cliff that overlooked Midgar, which was probably just a few miles away. Faith rushed forwards, noting that his Buster Sword wasn't in sight, but paid it little attention. Zack hadn't started dissolving into the Lifestream yet and until she saw those green particles, then there was a chance she could save him.

Her knees smashed hard into the bloody ground and she hovered over him uncertainly for a moment before she pressed two fingers up against his neck, looking for a pulse but unable to feel one. Her mind went blank when she realized that not eve his chest was moving and she brought up a shaking hand to his nose. No puffs of air greeted her sweaty skin and she felt her stomach clench with the urge to throw up again.

"Fuck, fuck!" Faith quickly opened her bag and scrambled to grab the Phoenix Down. "Don't you fucking die on me Zack!" She poured the red liquid into his mouth, waited a few breathless minutes and cursed when nothing happened. "Fuck you Game Logic! What, Phoenix Downs only work in the heat of battle? That's bullshit!" Zack didn't react, but he hadn't disappeared yet either.

Mind desperately searching for a solution, Faith suddenly thought about all the medical shows she'd seen and how they'd used those electric paddles to jumpstart a person's heart after cardiac arrest. She pulled out the Lightning Materia from where it was equipped on her shuriken and held it in her right hand, giving it a considering look. She'd never held back when using Materia before, but Faith knew she would have to do so now if she didn't want to fry Zack.

She quickly took her shuriken to cut through the fabric of Zack's shirt and tore off her leg warmers to wipe away the rain and blood from his bullet ridden chest. 'Okay, you can do this Faith, just a spark, that's all Zack needs.' She laid her right hand on his bare chest, ignoring the gore, and focused on the Materia clenched in her fist. 'Just a little jolt, that's all you need to do.'

Slowly breathing out, Faith activated the Materia. Zack's body jerked a little, much like how it happened on those medical shows and Faith dove forward to check for a pulse while her other hand hovered over his mouth and nose.

Nothing.

Rather than letting that deter her, Faith tried again, sending a slightly stronger bolt into his chest. His back arched off the ground and a gasp broke free from his mouth. Heart racing frantically, Faith saw his chest slowly rise up and down in a shuddering motion. She began casting Cure over and over again, hoping it would slow the bleeding and used an Ether to restore her MP when she stared to feel dizzy. She held back on giving Zack a Hi-potion; she didn't want the bullet holes to close over as the ammo would have to be removed from his chest. Right now, she was just banking on the Mako in Zack's system to keep him alive.

Faith tore off her headband and wrapped it around his chest, quickly cutting her already stained leg warmers and adding them to his chest as well. The makeshift bandages were quickly dyed a dark red and she cast another set of Cure spells before bending down to lift Zack up. She brought his right arm over her shoulders and heaved, buckling a little under his weight as she readjusted his limp form to carry him piggyback style.

She silently thanked whatever higher power out there that Yuffie was so fucking strong. She never would have been able to lift Zack in her own body. Just as she began to head out, a white feather flew in front of her face and if her hands hadn't already been full, Faith would have grabbed it. She shot a look up at the sky and saw nothing, but knew better than to trust her eyes.

"Sorry Angeal, but Zack's not ready to join you just yet." Without sparing another second, she took off in a run, heading towards Kalm. It was slow going and she checked on Zack's condition every few minutes, using Cure whenever his breathing began to slow or become irregular. 'If only I had the Time Materia, I could cast Haste on myself and get us there in a matter of minutes.' They didn't run into any monsters on the way to town, which was odd since they had to have smelt all the blood Zack was shedding. Faith liked to believe that Angeal was keeping them at bay.

Needless to say, they're arrival in Kalm caused quite the scene.

The only doctor in town was an older man who lived in the one of the houses located near the central plaza. She knew because the man had introduced himself to her the day beforehand when the town gossip had said that she'd been going out into the wastes to fight monsters. He been concerned and told her to come to him if she was injured. Faith ignored the small crowd that stared to gather behind her and rushed to his house.

The doctor took one look at Zack before ushering her inside, directing Faith to lay him on the spare bed on the upper floor. The doc's dog, who'd unfortunately been named Fido, sniffed at her and Zack curiously before the old man put him in the downstairs so that he wouldn't get in the way.

"Good heavens child! Where did you find this poor boy?" The doctor, Tot, asked as he began to unwind Zack's bloodied bandages. She noticed that while her hands seemed to be trembling, much like the rest of her body, Tot's hands were perfectly still and seemed to know exactly what they were doing.

"In the wastes, just outside of Midgar." She answered quickly, desperately trying to ignore the blood that had soaked through her clothes and clung to her back. "Can you help him?"

"This lad wouldn't happen to be one of the Ex-SOLDIERs those Troopers were searching for, would he?" The doc said instead, clearly having recognized Zack's uniform. Faith froze; she hadn't thought that anyone would sell them out to Shinra. "Easy child, I may have been born in Midgar, but I have no love for the place." Tot continued after seeing her expression. "I only ask because if he is SOLDIER, then I'll need to perform surgery immediately before the Mako in his body heals these bullet holes over."

"…Yeah, he's a SOLDIER alright." Faith replied with a forced smile. Zack had always been proud about being a member of the elite group. Tot returned the gesture, thought it was just as strained, and nodded towards the bathroom.

"It would be best to clean yourself off. While there's less than 5% of Mako in every SOLDIER's blood, it's dangerous to be in direct contact with such large amounts for an extended period of time. There should be some spare clothes in that chest in the corner; they used to belong to my wife so they'll be a little big on you." Tot was already putting on a pair of surgical gloves and a mask, pulling out a pair of tweezers as he turned his attention to Zack.

"Thanks Doc, call me if you need anything. I got a few good Cures left in me." He nodded, but was clearly focused on his job. Faith silently moved over to the formerly mentioned chest and found it full of floral dresses. Picking out a dark blue one covered in white lilies, she moved over to the bathroom and shut the door behind her.

As Faith stripped out of Yuffie's clothes, she wondered if any of them were salvageable. Her headband and leg warmers were ruined and she'd most likely have to get new shorts. Her arm-gauntlet looked easy enough to clean, as did the Carbon Bangle, but she had no idea if the blood would come out of her gloves, shoes, and shirt.

The shower was blessedly hot and Faith was learning to be grateful for things that she'd taken for granted back in her world. Here, hygiene wasn't a major issue in the grand scheme of things. Faith scrubbed at her back rigorously to get rid of the blood and the draining water was dyed a dark pink as a result.

Her thoughts turned to Zack, who would hopefully be okay, and what his survival meant for the storyline. He was supposed to be dead after all. Now that he was alive, he'd likely join Cloud and the others to stop Sephiroth, but what did that mean for Cloud's fucked up memories? He hadn't even remembered who Zack was until he'd gone back to Shinra Mansion after regaining some of his memories from the Lifestream.

Would Zack being alive cause Cloud to confront the fake identity he'd made for himself sooner? Would he think of himself as a Sephiroth Clone again, or would Zack be able to keep him grounded? If the latter happened, how would Sephiroth get his hands on the Black Materia? Faith groaned. This "changing things for the better" plan was quickly becoming a complicated pain in the ass.

She stepped out of the shower after making sure that she was squeaky clean and ruffled Yuffie's short hair unhappily. She'd always preferred having long hair, her bangs brushed to the sides of her face. Some of Yuffie's bangs kept flopping into her eyes and Faith realized that the headband had been more than just a fashion statement. She briefly studied her reflection in the bathroom mirror, taking in her eyes again, and felt unnerved at their color and the slight glow.

Tearing her gaze away from the flecks of bright blue-green, Faith pulled on the borrowed dress. It was a little big, but it would do just fine since she just planned to sleep in it anyways. She'd been normal height, standing in at 5'5", however Yuffie seemed to be a few inches shorter than that. She exited the bathroom, her ruined clothes stuffed in her bag, and turned to Doctor Tot.

"Need any help?" He sent her a thankful look before rattling off what needed to be done in order to get Zack back on his feet.

I realize that this story may not have so many reviews due to popularity, but I really just wanted to right this down. Final Fantasy VII is the best game ever in my opinion so I was happy I got to do this. I actually really don't like Yuffie, so the fact that I'm using her like this at all is sort of like a challenge directed at myself. This is going to be a sort of serious fic, but they'll be humor thrown in to.

Doctor Tot is an actual character from Final Fantasy IX. Gotta love recycling.

–Hexalys