AN: Hey guys! Yay, new story! You guys must hate me for not updating my other stories I know I do!
. . .No really, I actually feel really bad about it but I've been lacking in inspiration for them. Anyway this story is a Vaan/Yuffie/Cloud. Crack, I know, but you could say I'm a junkie cause I've never been one for the canon pairings. There are characters from a lot of other Final Fantasy games so just to make things clear in the disclaimer I mean ALL Final Fantasy games, not just 7 or 12 and Kingdom Hearts. Yuffie haters are warned because even though it's supposed to be a Vaan/Yuffie/Cloud story it will most likely have some Yuffie/Other fluff going on cause I love her.
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy.
Edit – 3/23/13:
Still going to work on this you guys but I've been busy with life. Right now I'm just working on the next chapter and fixing the mistakes in the current ones.
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In the situation I'm currently stuck in, I see no greater a time to tell you what exactly is going on. My name is Yuffie–just Yuffie please–and I'm seventeen years old studying at Nora Academy. Nora Academy is located in Rabanastre, Dalmasca, Ivalice; a country thousands of miles away, practically isolated, from other countries. Every country, continent, and city differs greatly in their appearance. Midgar, Edge, Bodhum, Cocoon, Palumpolum, Mobliz, Ivalice –no one country or city looks anything resembling the other. Some are much more imbued with technology (Cocoon, Bodhum, and Palumpolum) while others are rougher around the edges (Edge, Midgar, and Mobliz.) My home, Ivalice, is more on the fantasy side, pleasantly so. I came to Ivalice after fleeing from my origin country, Wutai. I'm attending Nora Academy to train so I can join their elite soldier unit, Guardian Corp, as well as get a major in tactics, philosophy, and magic studies. As to my current situation, earlier this morning, my best friend Vaan and I were running through an exercise drill when it occurred. The exercise was a simulated war disaster and our goal was to secure the area. That being said, the only way to properly secure the area is with a small group. Let me be clear, Vaan and I are not well liked in this school. And it just goes to show when our squad members decided they'd lock us into a storage cellar within the first fifteen minutes of the exercise. Vaan and I are currently leaning against each other's backs with our weapons close to us lying idly on the ground.
"Well Vaan, I guess it's just you and me now." Great. This is just dandy. We're stuck in a cellar with a huge possibility of never coming out, it stinks, and I'm going to guess it's already been a long time since the class ended.
"Guess it could be worse; I could be stuck here with an enemy and not my best friend." I smiled once I heard those words. Sometimes I can't believe I'm lucky enough to have Vaan as my best friend (even though we're both some seriously lucky bastards. It comes with being former thieves, I swear.) My eyes scanned the room, for what seemed to be the umpteenth time today, looking for a way out. A huge sigh was released from my throat before I picked up my baby from the floor. My "baby" is this amazing, cool, awesome, gorgeous weapon my friend Hope made. At first glance, it's just a sword; almost like Lightning's. But instead of turning into a gun this monster turns into a shuriken! The long blade is actually four thinner blades held together by a strong magnetic force. With just a small application of magic I can cancel the field and boom! – It pops open like a firework and low and behold my trusty shuriken! Though it may not cause as much damage normal shurikens due to the thinner blades it sure is faster and works wonderfully as a sword. Ah Hope, you wonderfully talented weapons engineer in training.
"You know," Vaan started, "we can probably just bust our way out." I look at him with my there-is-no-way-we're-doing-that face. But being my best friend comes with its advantages, which includes being able to read me like an open book with size eighteen font.
"Why not?" He asked.
"In case you've forgotten," I turned to face him. "For everything we break it comes out of our funds. Not theirs. Ours." Vaan sighed, muttering about how stupid that rule was and it is indeed a very stupid rule.
Here at Nora Academy there's this kind of allowance system for students like me and Vaan who can't afford everything we need. One, we get a free dorm but we must share, which isn't that bad since we get to choose regardless of gender and the dorms are pretty nice. I obviously chose Vaan but don't go getting any ideas! Our relationship is strictly categorized as best friends and nothing else! Two, depending on what our grades and exam scores are, the gil we earn varies. Three, we cannot score any lower than the top one hundred on any exam, quiz, and test we take to remain qualified for this program. Not only that but anything lower than a B- with deduct gil from our initial earnings and if we happen to cause any accidents we have to pay for it. Meaning we're constantly walking on egg shells and we get almost no life because we're studying. Fourth and finally, we must run errands like crazy for every employee that works at the Academy and Migelo, a shopkeeper as well as the best cook around. Errand running eliminates any and all bits of a life we had that weren't occupied by studying.
It's not like we had much competition anyway, Vaan and I are the only ones in the "Special Needs" program. Why? Cause everyone here is freaking loaded! I swear, every other kid here comes from a family of either: an important political background, historical background, or economical background with just all-round societal importance. Not many of the orphans like Vaan and I ever opted to attend the academy, even when we were star struck, dizzy little dreamers. Mainly because even back then we knew that entering a school like this would mean a lot of hard work as well as constant discrimination and teasing from our fellow students, granted that not all of them are like that. But we fight through the ones who are and we're some of the best in our field. A good thirty minutes have passed since the beginning of my long retelling and finally the door to the cellar opens. I can promise that I almost broke down in happy tears on the spot! Snow was standing there! Wonderful, celestial, holy Snow!
"Snow!" I jumped up and ran into his arms, leaving my weapon forgotten on the ground. "You life saver! They should paint a picture of you in the cathedral standing next to the apostles!" I shouted. Snow only chuckled before putting me down and taking us out of the cramped little hell whole.
"I heard what happened, are you guys alright?" Snow asked as his expression turned serious. Snow is very protective over the two of us but I guess it's because he came from the same background as us and here he is now, elite soldier of Guardian Corp, much to Lightning's dismay. We told him we were fine and, soon enough, we were out and on our way to Migelo's for a bite to eat.
"Why didn't you guys just bust your way our?" Asked Snow. Vaan put down his drink with a loud thunk.
"Because this one," he pointed to me, "didn't want to!"
"Hey!" I shouted before swiping a delicious looking piece of garlic bread. "I almost have enough gil to get that Ramuh mastered summon stone I want I'm not going to jeopardize it when we could have waited till someone opened the door!" Vaan scoffed.
"If someone opened the door." I pouted before quickly aiming for another one of those breadsticks. Vaan smacked my hand away and nicked one of my fish cakes.
"Hey!"
"One fish cake for the one break stick you stole earlier seems pretty fair." He stated with an all too smug smirk. Snow laughed before saying he had to leave so he could meet up with Serah and plan their wedding. After a good dosage of teasing from me and Vaan he left and we were on our way to our dorm. I'm not kidding when I say these dorms are nice, they're practically condos! Vaan's room is right across from mine with a large bathroom at the end of the hall. When you first enter our dorm there's a small living room area where we watch the monitor, read, study and all that jazz. To the left there's a small kitchen with a bar counter and to the left of that leads to the hallway to the bathroom and our rooms. A blueprint of our dorm would show that it is not just one long rectangular dorm but more of an L-shaped dorm. Walking into my room, I started changing out of my training clothes and into something more comfortable. Some of you are probably thinking that I'm gross and should probably take a shower first but I'm dead tired and exhausted from the day. The stink and the rancidness can be washed away in the morning. There's a shampoo and body wash store down the alleyway from Migelo's and trust me when I say this stuff is good.
Changing into tan baggy capris and a nice oversized black shirt with the number seven on it, I jumped onto my bed and sighed. The soreness from the day melting into nothingness the second I landed onto the mattress. I carefully folded my headband and tucked it into my drawer before heading outside. The picture one my nightstand stopped me however. It was a picture of all my friends from previous years, before Lightning and Snow got into Guardian Corp. There was: Vaan, Lightning, Naminé, Serah, Snow, Fang, Vanille, Hope, Noctis, Terra, Aqua, Ven, Sora, Xion, Axel, Demyx, Penelo, and Noel. I'm not close friends with all of them but we all enjoy each other's company. Take Axel and Lightning as an example. They don't seem like they would talk, and they don't normally talk, but every once in a while they'll start talking to each other like they've known each other for their entire lives. Not a close friendship but a true friendship. We all make a happy little bunch but I'm sorry to say that no matter what anyone does Vaan will always stay on top; he's been through it all with me. My "home" country (I call it my origin country because it isn't much of a home anymore) is a place farthest away from Ivalice called Wutai. My father was the ruler of that country, however, that country hasn't changed its beliefs since chocobos came into the world. Female heirs were not permitted and should be avoided at all costs. So I sat there, trying to be the perfect little princesses they wanted my to be while my father tried to produce a male heir. But not with my mother, after having me my mother could no longer bear any children and so my father had to turn to mistresses and even concubines to produce a valid heir. I have no idea as to whether he actually succeeded or not. Back then my hair was much longer, almost down to my but, a stark contrast to my hair today, which ends at the nape of my neck. I kept it long because it was tradition to grow your hair long and because my mother loved my hair. She would brush it on particularly long nights and coo at it, telling me how smooth and soft it was. I miss those times. When Wutai was invaded during a small war my mother was killed. Not by a soldier, she died slowly and painfully. Why? Because my father was a coward. In fear for his own life, he opted to sell me to the enemy as a slave but my mother wouldn't have it and she went in my place. My father was wrought with grief as he should have been but saw that is was my fault and my fault alone. Like it would have been prevented if I went, if I wasn't born. Fucker. It would have been prevented if he knew how to take care of his country in the first place. Since then, I was banished from my country and had my hair cut pixie short to rid myself of my life in Wutai and fled to the enemy country to find my mother. I spent months working and looking for her even as a child of seven years old. May hair had grown to my waste in the meantime and I thought I would have my mother back to brush it like she always did. But that wouldn't happen. I found out from a former slave and coworker of my mothers that she had died due to physical, sexual, and mental abuse from her master.
I cut my hair again.
And I vowed to keep it short as pixie short tresses brushed my face while I took the next ship to Ivalice, more specifically Ordallia. I traveled with strangers and talking alligators across deserts until I reached Dalmasca. From there I spent months walking until I finally reached Rabanastre, a royal city teaming with life from all over. I was nearly eight when I found Migelo's. Back then it was just starting up and was no more than a small room with a few tables set out. I thank Migelo even to this day for taking me in and for being the reason I met Vaan. At first, we didn't like each other at all. We would always pull each other's hair and he would call me a boy as I would call him a girl. There is no denying it. Even our friends agreed after I showed them pictures that Vaan had a really pretty face for a boy. I don't remember how or why but by the time we were nine we were inseparable, the dynamic duo. We'd steal from soldiers and shopkeepers we particularly didn't like whilst pranking the other kids on occasion. Sooner or later they others came along and we've all been this happy family ever since.
"Yuffie." I heard Vaan call from the other side of the door.
"Yeah?" I called back.
"Are you coming out anytime soon? I kinda want my magic tutor to tutor me," he said.
"Coming!" I got off my bed and ran towards the door. I swung the door open and nearly hit Vaan in the face, earning a small scolding from him.
One hundred and twenty minutes or two hours later I finished tutoring Vaan in magic and he explained the lesson the synthesis to me.
"Oh! Yuffie!" I looked up from my magic essay. "Hmm?"
"Lightning said she and Serah won't be able to hang with us during he Fal'cie festival coming up in two weeks."
"HUH!" I yelled, smacking my pen on the table. "You mean she's not going!" Oh no! Poor Faron sisters!
"No, no, they're going." He had a somewhat sour look on his face. "Just not with us."
"…Why?" My sixth sense is telling my I'm going to dread the answer.
"She and her sister are going to spend the day with their father and his family." I groaned, loud and obnoxiously. Lightning's parents divorced when she was, I don't know–just born! Because her father was having an affair with another woman who gave birth to a son before Lightning came into the world. Although all is in good terms I cannot, I mean cannot, stand Lightning's half brother. Not the younger one, the older one. Denzel's cute; I love Denzel. It's Cloud I can't stand. It gets me so irritated just thinking about it! He acts all cool and stoic like no ones worth his time but nope! Not to me! He's a complete ass! Ever since we were little kids he's been an ass, maybe not as bad as Vaan was but hey, he grew out of that! Cloud's ass-like behavior stayed constant from back then to now! Vaan poked my cheek.
"If you keep making faces it's going to freeze like that," he sing-songed. Was I really scowling that much? Probably. Grumbling, I went back to my magic essay. Poor Lightning, poor Serah, poor Denzel; they must live through hell to have a brother like that. I warned Snow but he wouldn't listen. He has no idea what he's getting into.
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AN: And that's the first chapter! Okay not much to say but to clear up the ages,
Cloud, Lightning, Noctis, Snow, and Fang - 21
Demxy and Axel - 20
Serah and Vanille - 19
Terra, Aqua, and Noel - 18
Yuffie, Vaan, and Penelo - 17
Naminé, Sora, Xion, Ven, and Hope - 16
Denzel - 14