I never make author notes at the top of stories. But I am now. I have 85% of this story completed as of right now, September 1st, 2011. Oh, and I turn 15 in two days. But that is unimportan

This story uses strong language. Please commence reading.

Together: in or into one place, mass, collection, or group the men get together every Thursday for poker

It was funny, because sometimes Cid would pull out his old deck of cards and pour some straight vodka and force Cloud to play poker with him. It was funny, because Cloud absolutely sucked at it and Barrett couldn't hold a deck of cards with his massive fingers. It was funny, because Vincent could actually play.

I asked him to teach me once, but all he did was turn away and continue brooding into the wall. But that was okay; everyone ignored me for the wall. It was sexier than me, I get it.

I looked down at myself. My entire body resembled a wall. It was all flat, like a valley of flatness in between Tifa's boobs and Barrett's muscles. I was tiny. Still, I was tiny, at the age of twenty. I was twenty freaking years old, believe it or not. It sounded too old for me and didn't like it. I missed being sixteen and wearing shirts that looked like sport bras. Maybe they were sport bras but I didn't even need a bra so they were big on me. And maybe my shorts were underwear. And maybe the thing I wore on my arm was the thing that covered me up the most.

Maybe I should wear pants. Oh, wait, I was! I, Yuffie Kisaragi, was wearing pants. Full, long, pants that covered all of my legs to the socks than popped out of my sneakers. They were tight, duh, all the way down to the ankle, but they were still pants. And I actually liked them. Tifa gave them to me when we had to go to her practice wedding ceremony thing. It was weird and their practice cake accidentally said "Congratulations Cloud and Carol!"

But I was wearing pants and I looked good. So I decided to go show them to Barrett.

"Barrett!" I exclaimed, in my normal and happy expression, "Look! Pants!"

The said (black) man turned from his scrubbing of the metal on his arm to look at me. He just stared at me for awhile and then his eyes traveled downward and downward and I thought he was going to be checking out my nonexistent boobs for awhile but then his eyes reached my pants. His eyes shot back up to mine and I smiled wide.

"Congrats, ya lil' squirt. Maybe ya should go talk to Cloud and Vincent and Reeve and ya'll can go have a little party about everyone who's ever worn some fucking pants in this world," he said.

My first thought was: Someone is the wrong shade of chocolate today!

My second though was: Reeve wears a dress, though!

"Reeve wears a dress, though!" I said.

"Tifa, take this stupid twit out of my hair, will ya? I have more im'purtant thing to worry about, god DAMN IT!" And he said GOD DAMNIT with so much vigor and vehemence I almost ran away to run into Vincent's arms. And he'd probably hug Conformer before he hugged me.

Tifa piped up from her small spot in the kitchen, because that's where all married women should be, with a wooden spoon in her hand. My eyes sparkled at the object and my mind raced to conclusions before she could say anything.

"Are you making brownies!" I exploded and forgot the attention that was brought to my leg wear. I ran over to the kitchen only to see her stirring tomato sauce. How boring.

"No. But Yuffie, you've been wearing those pants for three days now. Don't you think it'd be…smart…to put on something else?" Tifa asked in her sweet mommy voice she now used on a daily basis. Ever since Cloud had knocked her up she's been all "baby this!" and "baby that!" and "MY BOOBS ARE HUGE!" even though she never actually said that but it was so true.

Her boobs got even bigger. One time, at four in the morning, I was going to go get some frozen pancakes because I was starving to death in my room, and found her in pajamas eating Frosted Flakes with bacon in it. But she was in her pajamas and wasn't wearing a bra and my tired eyes almost made me shield my face because I was positive they were going to burst into a thousand nipples. But they didn't and I got my pancakes so it was okay.

"I beet she showers in thum, too!" Cait Sith chimed in from his corner of the room. The stupid cat had been hanging around since Reeve couldn't, and was starting to grate on everyone's nerve. We all secretly cheered when Marlene flushed his crown down the toilet.

"I shower naked, thank you very much!" I yelled and put up a middle finger over my shoulder so the cat could see. I heard him meow in displeasure.

"My eyes! You stupid yuppy! No one even likes you! Not even your mummy!"

I low whistle stopped his yapping and the captain of the ship made his appearance.

"God damn it," what was it with GOD DAMN IT today? "Yuffie, ya really wanna put that fucking nasty picture inside of my head? Yer gunna make me go blind, ya brat!" Cid yelled from his spot by the ships controls. I once again turned around and growled at him.

"Go die! I'm sexy!" I screamed at him, my fists clenched. Even in pants, I was sexy, and everyone knew it, too!

"You guys, the baby…," Tifa said quietly from the kitchen.

"But it can't even see!" I complained in a high pitched voice, whining. Once that little booger was born did I really have to stop my rude comments and actions? I had hoped not, because life on the Shera would be so boring beyond belief and I may have killed myself. Our constant fighting and loud cursing was a usual event on the airship, well, between Barrett, Cid, Cait, and I, that is. Tifa, Vincent, Red, and Cloud just sat there and were boring.

I think Vincent and Cloud had silent conventions because sometimes I seriously couldn't find them for days only to find out that they were just being so quiet they almost faded into thin air because god didn't think they existed anymore.

"Tifa, where exactly are we headed for, now?" The quiet and calm and kitty-cat-ish voice of Red said. (Rhyme!) The feline had been laying by the huge glass window at the front of the Shera, looking out at the sky, and I wondered how he didn't get sick by just purring and breathing.

"Shouldn't ya be asking me, ya damn cat? I fly this ship, I decided where we go, and I should be the one to ask!" Cid said from above me.

"No one asked you, Mr. High and Mighty!" and that was funny, because his last name was Highwind! I think even Vincent would think that would be funny. I think anyone would find that funny. Even dead people would, even though they're dead.

"Shut up Kisaragi!"

Cloud slowly walked into the room, dressed in his normal black attire, his hair spiky, his back firm, his fist clenched, his eyes narrowed, his forehead creased, his attitude emo. He opened his mouth.

"Cid," He said, and the old man shut up. I smirked at the wonderful display of karma.

But Cloud wasn't really emo, and his fists weren't really clenched, and everything I said never really happened except for Cloud walking into the room with black clothes and spiky hair. I straightened it, once, and it all fell in front of his face like a big blonde mop of goo. It was funny, and I took pictures, and Tifa almost wanted to take back all of the sex she's ever had with him because he looked horrible.

"Cid," he said and the old man looked at him. Cloud stayed in the doorway leading into the main room, Tifa in the kitchen in the room behind him. I'm pretty sure they made out while we were all arguing.

Cid was opening his mouth to say something but I stopped him to shove my foot up in Cloud's face.

"Look," I said in all seriousness. Cloud said nothing, looking at the soles of my sneakers. I smirked. "What do you see?" I said it slow, like a puzzle, hoping he could get the answer fast.

"The bottom of your sneaker."

"No…past that…"

"Your foot?"

"Pants! Pants you dumbass! I hate you guys! You're all really stupid and never get my riddles. I'm leaving and taking all of my materia with me!" I yelled and crossed my arms over my chest and huffed. Cloud smiled lightly at me which I returned sassily.

"Ha. Ha. Ha!" I said really fast, "Look at me, I'm Cloud Strife and I only know what baggy purple pants are," and after I said that I looked at his pants and realized he wasn't wearing any.

Oh wait he was! I was just remembering a dream I had had a few nights ago, which was of all eight of us, in the Northern Cave, ultimate weapons out, Mega-Elixirs at hand, Sephiroth right in front of us, without pants. Except Red had the lower half of his body shaved off. And Cait died.

I heard Tifa hoot from the kitchen. "Pasta is reaaddyyy," She said in a sing-song-mommy-bleh voice and I almost threw up. All over Cloud's baggy black pants. But I actually didn't have to throw up at all so I started to run to the kitchen. My eyes widened at the huge bowl of pasta sitting at the kitchen counter and I almost jumped into it so I could live and inhabit its squishy goodness, but then Marlene cut in front of me and got a bowl of it first.

I almost said 'fuck you' then I realized it was Marlene.

And then I realized Vincent had been sitting at the kitchen table the whole time, silent.

And then I ate some pasta and remembered I had terrible air sickness and barfed all over the kitchen table. Again.

Bottled Self Esteem

They had found me killing Beachplugs at the coast of Costa Del Sol. I was using my Enemy Skill materia, mastering it for later usage. You never knew when you could use a Big Guard.

I don't think I even noticed the Shera flying above me when I let loose my Conformer yet again, chopping the heads off of the innocent crab like creatures. I only looked up when I heard Cid scream my name from up above, and for a moment I thought it was Aerith, now a man, calling me up to the Lifestream. My breath was hitched and I almost smiled when they dropped down the rope for me to climb up and join them.

AVALANCHE was dead and gone, they said. They didn't want to save the world anymore. Cloud was over that, he was proud of himself for everything he's done, but he didn't want that responsibility anymore. At first, I yelled at him, because I still wanted to save the world, and I'm pretty sure some of the others did.

But Cloud told me that AVALANCHE was over, but the DOWNFALL was born.

"DOWNFALL? What a lame name, you couldn't have thought of anything better, Cloud? What about, like, IMPLOSION, or the Organization of Badasses, or something," I had said.

Cloud had just looked at me. "DOWNFALL. We don't save the world, but we still help. We want to help people, Yuffie. And I'm sure you do, too. We'll go around Gaia and get people out of trouble. We just want to make this world a better place, for once," He had said.

Tifa agreed with him. Well, duh, of course she did. "Everyone else wants to. And it'd be great if you could join us, Yuffie."

And everyone else had wanted to. Everyone was there, in the main room of the Shera. I wondered why I was the last person they picked up.

"That should be our tagline. DOWNFALL: We aren't going to save the world, but we'll give you canned food."

"So are you in?"

And since then I was. I was an official member of not AVALANCHE, but DOWNFALL, the stupidly named organization that gets hookers out of strip clubs and shows hobo's the way to bathrooms. One time, like two months ago, Red got peed on by a homeless woman outside of the hotel we were staying out. It would have been absolutely hilarious if the woman wasn't pregnant and dying of starvation. And it was a turning point of my life, because I realized that ever since the meteor struck, people have hit rock bottom, even more so than before it hit.

And I felt good about myself, because we were making a difference. Every week we'd go to a different village, Kalm, the Edge, even the old remains of Midgar, because people were still living there, believe it or not. I think that was the most terrifying, when I found people covered in dirt and no clothing on their bodies, eating the bugs out of the ripped apart walls of the Shin-Ra building.

I once gave a little girl, at only about five, one of my throwing stars and taught her how to hunt fiends for food, because she would have died if I didn't. I was reduced to 99 throwing stars, but I was fine with that, because she needed it more than I did.

When we visited Nibelhiem, Tifa had dropped to her knees at the sight of poverty gracing her village she loved so much. At least one hundred people traveled to the small town during the last years for shelter, and it had become a nesting site for families that had nowhere else to go.

I think Cloud and Tifa gave everything they had to those poor families.

Vincent spent the whole time in Shin-ra Mansion, looking at the ten, twenty, thirty people that inhabited the once beautiful building. I think he talked to them, once. I watched him, to make sure he didn't stalk down to the basement and lock himself away for another fifty years.

In Cosmo Canyon, which wasn't that bad, at all, Red had howled to his people, his clan, and we didn't need to do much. The Canyon's way of living seemed to be working, living off of the world and taking what they had for granted. I sort of respected them, almost, because I wish I could be like them. But for me to live, I needed blue and green orbs of magic and sneakiness.

We met up with Reeve….once. In Edge, when he was visiting. I laughed at his dress, because men shouldn't wear dresses. But he told us that he wished he could of joined us and Cloud was all fake polite because I could see in his eyes had was so angry with Reeve for ditching us and sending his little, retarded, annoying, obnoxious, stupid, Scottish cat thing. Or maybe that was just me.

Fort Crondor was boring. The hicks there still kind of hated Barrett even after he saved the world so we ditched them and left them to die.

Well, not really but I wish we did.

Barrett didn't even seem to care, he helped them anyway. We gave them canned food and gave them some gil to buy new tents and then we left. Barrett didn't say a thing. I wondered what he was thinking. Maybe he was mad at them, too, like I was, but for once didn't show his feelings. Maybe he was a big, soft, gooey teddy bear with a loving heart.

We never visited Wutai. I never wanted to.

All of the rest of our time was spent on the Shera. It was as boring as you'd think it would be, really. We all got our own room except for Tifa and Cloud who had sexy times in theirs. (I have heard them more than once!) Each of them had a private bathroom so I took those moments to sing at the top of my lungs old songs from Wutai and break down crying because I missed it so much.

But you didn't hear that from me, you didn't hear that from me.

Wutai was stupid and boring and stuck up and strict. It was the complete opposite of me. I hate Wutai. I hate my father. I hate my old house. I hate all of the elders. I hate Wutai.

When I woke up in the morning, it was bright. And I mean really bright. My curtains were pushed aside and the sun shone directly into my eyes, god's way of saying wake the hell up you lazy child.

I felt around for my bedside table and flicked on a light for no reason whatsoever, making my room even brighter and more painful. I cringed. I turned the light on out of habit and didn't feel like turning it off, just to piss off Cid. So I got up, stretched my arms above my head, and yawned. I wiped the sleep out of my eyes and cracked my knuckles like a good ninja.

I put on my sneakers and poked my head outside of my bedroom door to look down the hallway. All I could hear was the engine roaring like it always did and the steamers popping and gurgling. I put one toe outside of the door and then swiftly pulled my entire body out into the hallway.

My eyes shot to side to side and I pressed my body up against the wall. Slowly, I shimmied down the entire hallway, legs shifting with absolute precision and back straight. I made my way all the way to the entrance to the kitchen before I smelt the beautiful smell of chicken nuggets cooking in the oven.

I dropped my entire position and almost ran up to the oven to consume the wonderful things that were inside of it.

But then I saw Tifa looking really fat and pregnant with a fluffy apron around her sitting at the table.

"Good morning, Teefs!" I said happily and joined her at the kitchen table, only to be met with her red and wet eyes.

"Oh gawd," I said and patted her hands that were folded on the table, "What's wrong?" I refrained from adding on a 'this time.'

Now this was something none of us have gotten used to. Tifa was six months pregnant, bipolar as an asylum patient, and as fat as a chef at McJunon's. It was embarrassing, really, because she'd blow up at you if the television was too loud. One time, I was eating a cracker, and some of the crumbs fell onto my own bed and she made me clean them up with my own hands. And everyone laughed at me and came into my messy room, with Tifa threatening to hit me with her wooden spoon.

Tifa sniffled.

"C-Cloud wouldn't come and help me cook breakfast…I think he's going to leave me," She said in between sobs. I actually didn't know what to do.

"Well, I hate to break it to you, but chicken nuggets aren't really for breakfast," I said, trying to make it sound as nice as possible. I almost cringed when her facial expressions turned to furious to calm to probably really hungry.

She sighed and wiped her own eyes, right when I was about to go get her a napkin. I may be a nice person, but isn't it the guy's job to wipe girls' eyes? She let out a shaky laugh, much to my surprise.

"I-I know, I'm sorry if I've been acting so weird lately, this little guy," She looked down to her stomach and I wondered if it was indeed a guy or not, for Cloud and Tifa decided to wait and be surprised. I was kind of sad that they did, because I hated surprises and I really, really, really wanted to make up stupid baby names like Caportnick or Robert or something. "This little guy has been driving me crazy, and he's not even born yet."

I never wanted to have kids. Ever. If they made me cry over chicken nuggets, and I don't even cry when my dad disowns over and over again, I would surely kill myself. Or go insane. Or make everyone I know go insane. Except for Vincent. He kind of wins the prize of tolerance. But that prize was only to have more people be annoying around you, because they knew you could handle it.

Heck, I don't even know why Vincent decided to join DOWNFALL. When we found him again after the whole Omega incident, he had been slightly more cheerful, but by almost .01% Shelke, the annoying little child person thing, said that Vincent Valentine was withdrawn of all of his demons and could now live peacefully. If she had never told me this, I honestly wouldn't have looked closely enough to see how he had changed.

He began to talk more. Kinda. He'd sometimes add to the conversation and I've heard him crack a joke a few times. He would eat meals with us and help out around the world as much as a Vincent could. He'd help up build houses and count our gil and clean the Shera. And after that he would disappear into his room and did whatever he does after hours. We all wondered, but none of us found out.

I was brought out of my thoughts by the beeping of the oven to my side. Tifa was the one to get up extremely fast, as if she was doing to drop dead if she didn't shove the fried chicken pieces into her mouth at once. I was about to get up and help but then Cloud showed up in all of his pajama glory.

Now, this was a rarity. The unsaid rule was shower, wear clothes for all of us, and we all mostly followed them. Except Cid, who flew the Shera in his boxers daily with a cigarette burning away at his lips. But if you were to show yourself to the whole gang, we all really wanted you to wear actual clothes, because in our gang….some people like to sleep in weird things.

Not me! Oh gawd, I promise it wasn't me! I sleep in pajamas! Normal ones, too! Like, a tee-shirt and shorts. Normal stuff. I swear my pajamas are the most normal things about me. But, Tifa, she doesn't like wearing a bra to bed and I can understand why. She would wake up with tight bra marks for the rest of her life and would probably die from circulation cut off one night if she wore one to bed. So she's a no-no to the pajamas –in-public rule.

But Cloud, whom I had never thought would wear anything kinky to bed, was standing in front of me with a sexy bed head and no shirt, only black pajama bottoms.

"Tifa, come back to bed," He said softly. When she didn't turn to him and continued on with her cooking, he said, "Let me get them for you, go back to sleep."

If there was one man who wanted a baby the most in the world, it was Cloud. He would nurture and care for that baby until is bled. (Maybe that was a bad wording of thoughts.) He wanted a little brat to be his own so badly he's read about three parenting books already and had a baby room all set up back at the bar in Edge. God knows why he wants a little chocobo head running around, but for now he had to put all of his nurturing and care on Tifa.

Tifa just grunted in response and put on her oven mitts to grab the hot sheet on the racks of the oven. Cloud, not even looking in my direction, walked over to her and gently took the mitts off of her hands before she could open to over. He grabbed her hands in his and looked her in the eyes.

"Go back to bed. You need your rest," he said quietly.

"I'm not a child, Cloud, I can do things myself," she said.

Cloud's jaw tightened. "But you're carrying our child. Let me do it, please, I want to," he said and the whole 'I want to' got to Tifa every time. She sighed and smiled at him when he kissed her forehead, to which I almost (almost) made kissy and barfing noises but I didn't so it's okay.

Tifa left to room slowly, and very similarly to a penguin, leaving just Cloud and I. He stayed there, putting the chicken nuggets onto a small plate, just in pants. Pants. What is it with pants lately?

"Nice pants," I said, trying to get on his good side for a chicken nugget. I was about to call them sexy (please take this time to note that I do not like Cloud Strife in any way romantically he has a wife and our babies would look ugly anyway so) but I stopped when he dropped a smaller plate of chicken nuggets in front of me.

"She made the whole one hundred pack. I think she honestly thought she could eat them all," he said and my eyes stayed glued to the glory that was in front of me.

"Thank you, Strifey!" I said and bit off half of one, chewing it slowly to savor it, even though I had five left on my plate.

He said nothing accept, "We're heading to Midgar today."

And that's where this whole story began.

This story will not be updated until I complete the entire story, which I am about 15% away from doing. I need the ending scene and then the epilogue. This is quite a long story. You have been warned.

I couldn't wait to post this...I've been having a bad day and just needed something to do. So please, review. It will make me smile.

Also, high school is awesome. Algebra 2 sucks but other than that, I am having the time of my life. Thank you for reading this prologue!