A/N: Well, I guess I'm pretty mean, huh? This has been written and finished weeks before I even uploaded the first installment, so I've basically had this rotting in my computer for the past month or so. Well. Once again, kudos to Tasha for betaing it all, and here is the second part of three of Pretend.

o

A time later, when Aerith happened to accidentally catch a bought of semi-nasty flu, the pilot, the ninja, and the man firmly put her in bed and assured her they could take care of things (which wasn't completely true, because no matter what he put in there, Cid Highwind's soup would always taste like complete and utter crap).

So they pushed her into her bed, threatening to strap her down if she didn't stay put, and took care of her the best they could. Leon and Yuffie just made sure that Cid didn't go near the kitchen, and all was well.

Then, it was towards the close of their hours awake (need Yuffie be reminded that there was no day anymore), and Aerith was fast asleep and needed no care giving at the moment. Yuffie ambled from the hotel, her energy pumped and feeling almost alive again as she laughed at the heartless little monster ants and pretend knights, and ran from them instead of sticking it out and fighting (because running was much more fun, with almost nonexistent wind whipping through her body like flight).

She came to the First District, where the people were (she liked it so much better because it wasn't empty, and empty places didn't necessarily frighten her, but they made her feel so unhappy and lonely and remind her of something from somewhere else, some time else—), and slowed her fast sprint to an amiable stride, hands tucked in nonexistent pockets and whistling a little tune that reminded her of the martial artist cook.

Her stomach chose, at the precise time she was walking down the steps, to give a loud protest to anymore walking and a rather annoyed plea for food. Yuffie didn't even bat an eye as she promptly switched directions to comply, and headed to the little café tucked in the corner (because restaurant was a title a little too grand for it).

Much to her surprise, she found Cid and Leon at the little outdoor gathering of tables, all dark mahogany and almost painfully reminding her of something Yuffie couldn't place her finger on, and decided not to try.

Her two favorite men (because she couldn't quite remember any others—) were slouched at the bar with cans and cans of beer on the table, all of them empty save for the two they each were nursing quietly. Her eyebrows quirked, because getting drunk almost felt weird for this place (which felt so innocent, so innocent in comparison to her Pla-).

So she obnoxiously pulled up a chair and just like that was holding Cid's just-opened can – he had opened it, set it on the table, and leaned his head back, and Cid Highwind was awake no more. For now, anyway.

"Hey, Squalls," But that sounded weird, too.

Spikes. That was what the 's' was reserved for.

Yuffie resolved to just call him Squall, because the cool nicknames were for other people. Squall just got to be Squall. Poor sap.

The brooding was undeniable – he was almost scowling, but it wasn't quite there, not yet. Not to the point of anger. Just brooding.

Maybe he had figured out that they never really met, Yuffie wondered.

But she hid the thought behind a loud grin and gulping down a bit of the beer that she had never tasted before (but that's just the thing – she had, even if it was underage and Cid Highwind never cared if the ninja raided his beer cabinet when he was dead drunk and Shera could hold her alcohol but wasn't conscious, either—) and she smacked her lips a bit before setting it down.

Leon coolly watched her with stone eyes that weren't quite all there.

"You aren't old enough to drink that," he said quietly. He made no move to take it from her grasp.

"Like hell I am," she said suddenly, and used a curse that should have been a normal occurrence but wasn't. "Like hell, Squall Leonhart. I'm not seventeen."

His body jerked like it had been hit by lightning, and his eyes were wide and staring at her, unbelieving, and his chair almost tipped over. When he had righted himself, his eyes were a bit bloodshot and disbelief was stamped across his face like chocobo tracks.

"How old are you, then?" He asked, and it was rough and his throat was probably sore as all hell – that word, again – and it wasn't a very pretty sound, but it was a sound that she hoped for, because he was starting to figure out, too, and she wasn't crazy as she thought she was once.

"…" –It was her time for a silence, for once, for a completely open-ended '…' that could have meant anything and everything, and he couldn't read it because she was the one who interpreted silences. Not him (even though the silences she had come to understand had never been Squall Leonhart's silences, never his—).

"I think… Two years, huh, that's right….I'm supposed to be celebrating my twenty first birthday this November," and her voice was moody and Leon suddenly wasn't Leon. He was a lost young boy wearing a man's skin, and it was deflating faster than a balloon, the skin sagging and the little boy showing through.

It wasn't pretty. It wasn't supposed to be.

Then he raised a leather-gloved hand to rub his face, straight down like he was pulling his face off. But the mask – face, thing, whatever it was – stayed on, and he sighed. It wasn't something he wanted to talk about.

She knew, and she understood.

They had never really known each other like they thought they did. The brother sister relationship was suddenly broken, and it was frightening. Of course it was.

"Sleep on it," Yuffie stated tiredly, even if she had just been bursting at the seams with energy.

Squall Leonhart, the man she had never really known, understood. So he stood up, gathered his drinking buddy, and stumbled on home.

Yuffie was still holding her drink, and when it was done after a long time of quiet she reached for Leon's almost full can.

'Don't you think you've had enough already?'

The voice stopped her. It was deep, smooth but a little gravelly, just a little from lack of use, and it was wonderfully familiar, and she could hear the hidden warmth and when her hand stopped, it stood in midair for several second before shaking and shaking and landing on the table limply like a rag doll hand.

And there he was, sitting right across from her, dark and absolutely beautiful like once upon a time for Yuffie (because no one else's once upon a time could even pretend to like this, but hers was and didn't need to pretend at all—).

Pale skin, skin that once was no doubt once a brazen golden tan but had all the color sucked out years and years and years ago, skin that was so starkly white against wild black hair which looked so soft (like the mama she couldn't remember, who died in the war against the bad general and Sh—), just like she remembered. There were the delicate features she knew (but distinctly masculine, because he wasn't feminine in the least bit) with the lower half of his face half covered by scarlet, deep scarlet like her own country's proud colors.

And the eyes.

She could never forget them, and when Yuffie looked into those red eyes that shone like the pagoda of Wutai, she remembered him.

Not completely. His name was lost. But she shared a bond with him, and he was suddenly so close to her heart it almost hurt. It really almost did (but phantom pain only worked for things that weren't there anymore, and Yuffie-chan still had a heart, she had to or she would break—).

"Not really, unless you want it." Her smile was sunny, and this little kind of sunny smile was reserved for this one man alone, she knew. His expression – damn near unreadable, just as always – was so nostalgic she was afraid he would break, and the sunny smile faded slowly, so slowly and so cautiously like approaching an animal you didn't want to run away, until she tilted her head with her face so serious.

'No thank you,' he said, sitting so placidly and relaxed, but not quite together, that for a split second Yuffie wanted nothing more than to go over and rattle him to make him work again. But Yuffie was afraid of touching him, so afraid, because she knew she would cry if her hands passed through fake scarlet and fake black and fake pale, pale skin. She knew it, knew it so well that it hurt like hell, so she let it pass.

"What brings you to this neck of the woods?" She asked, and she pulled up the drink to take a slow sip, eyes never leaving him.

He didn't answer her for a long time, so long she began to think he wouldn't at all. And then that voice came out from bloodless lips.

'You.'

He said it so simply she almost dropped her drink because her body froze, like someone cast Blizzaga (no, Ice3) on her very bones and didn't warm them up for a while.

Neither of them moved to make a word.

"I really am almost twenty-one," she changed the subject after a few moments. She looked at him in a sideways glance. "…I think…"

She set down the cup, hands resting in her lap without moving, eyes settled on the form in front of her firmly but with a sort of smile (she would not cry she would not cry she would not cry never no never ever ever—) in them. "…That we had agreed," she continued, "that on my twenty first birthday we would get drunk as all hell."

A rare smile stole across his lips, much to her delight because she knew it so well.

'That was the deal, yes, if I recall correctly.'

"And it was only us because no one else wanted to," Yuffie grinned.

'I also recall I didn't exactly agree to it.' But his tone was amused, and so were his eyes and the slight, almost unnoticeable crinkles at the corners of both of them.

"Too bad," Yuffie all but crowed in slight glee, because he really didn't say anything to the proposition, but she had taken his silence as a positive and grinned with such a happiness she knew he didn't want to burst her bubble all those years ago. "'Cause you're gonna have to deal with it. This November, we are going to get drunk as all hell and then gorge ourselves on seasalt ice cream and dango."

He broke eye contact, and looked down and off to the side (in— shame, please don't let it be shame, dear Leviathan, because I need this just as much as he does, if he's really even sitting here at all—).

'…Almost November…? I missed two years already… I already missed two years.'

She frowned.

"What are you talking about? You're here now, ain'cha-"

'…I'm sorry,'

and it was so sincere it broke her heart.

"-Vin…nie…" And just like that, she blinked and he was gone (or maybe the wind had stolen him, that dastardly cruel force, but the wind had always been a playful little thing and it would give him back, right—?), and nothing else was there except for a few lonely beer cans.

And the worst part was that the only thing she knew would confirm he had been there, the only thing that proved his existence, was slipping from her mind like that water in her cupped hands, and then the name was gone, too.

Yuffie wouldn't let herself cry as she sat there for a long time, until standing abruptly and dragging her sorry little behind on home (which wasn't home).

o

Then, her whole world changed when something new was added into the equation. Meet Sora, and she liked the kid from the start (because he didn't remind her of anyone, not even the little boy who once had Geostigma whose name escaped her—).

He was young (fourteen years old – and when she was his age, she had already been thrown out of home to redeem her homeland), innocent (no blood on his hands – she was just like him, once, but that had passed quickly enough and she was stained just like the rest of AVA—), and he was looking for his friends (she was, too). He saw things black and white, maybe just a little too much (she wanted to see colors, but she should have been thankful for shades of grey).

His hair was too spiky, and his eyes were too blue, but he was young and his hair was brown, so she didn't mind.

Then, meet Donald and Goofy.

They couldn't possibly remind her of anyone – no, they didn't, because -(Caitwho?) because someone she had known was once upon a time a little cat with a goofy crown and cape, and Goofy was leaning more towards a dog-cartoon thing with a funny laugh and never Irish – so she couldn't help but love them and laugh and think they were funny.

Meet Riku.

She met him first – no, saw him first would be more appropriate – in Traverse Town. She had a little glimpse, just a small one from the window of that little house when the Keyblade suddenly captured their lives up in its own little web of lockets.

She saw silver hair, and that was all she needed – she undoubtedly knew she had met someone very similar to him, once, because almost on instinct she was barraged with a tirade of emotions, all these emotions that hurt her over all over again.

Anger, hatred (And oh god, my mother, my mother and Aeris and why did you do this I hate you—) then sympathy and a rush of pity and not-quite-affection because she recognized him – and then she knew she had never met him before.

Disappointment.

Then, meet Kairi.

Nobody. This little girl didn't remind her of anybody, because she wasn't so little (when Yuffie was her age, she was already a little rat who stole for fun and for home, and fourteen wasn't so little after all—).

Then Yuffie peered at the girl's young, round face a little harder and wondered why she wasn't younger and why her hair wasn't in a braid, and why her purple clothes weren't a purple dress and why her name wasn't Marlene.

It passed, and Yuffie tried to let it go. (Gods, she really did, but some wounds just wouldn't close and she just kept pouring on in that salt.)

Meet Riku, for real this time. And he wasn't a frightened little boy trying to act tough, he was overcome by that evil—

They were in Hollow Bastion (their supposed home, that was what they told Sora, but it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't because her home was Wutai and she knew it—), decrepit and ancient and torn from age, watching the two duel it out, and she saw Cid and could tell he wanted one of his cancer sticks and wanted one right then, even if Shera had broken that habit so long ago.

And then that silver-haired little boy wasn't a little boy, but when the silver hair grew and he turned into a man, for a brief moment - a flash, quicker than a butterfly's wings - Yuffie thought, perhaps, that the man had once haunted her dreams.

She wasn't afraid. Not anymore.

o

Yuffie, Leon, Aeri(-s)th and Cid slowly began to realize that their time (but what time, because she could hardly remember if… no, she remembered that they never had a time to play hero—) was over.

So they just tried to help, but they weren't the heroes. Not this time.

Before meeting Riku and Kairi, to make some extra munny (gil) on the side, Yuffie dragged Squall off to go sign up for a tournament (see the sun again!) in a different world.

They could all travel to so many different worlds. She found a little bit of hope – maybe those figures from her dreams (NO, from real life from my life from my beautiful Planet that Cid and Aerith don't remember and they are real they are they are they are—) had escaped from a crumbling world.

She wanted to meet them, and touch them, and hug them and feel their hair and fur and fake fur, too (but please don't get your hopes up, otherwise this time we really will break).

When they got there, to the colossal and magnificent coliseum, the blessed light brown wooden doors huge and the statues bright and gold as (Command materia) the sun, the welcoming party of one was a stout little goat-thing that was grossness – not that Yuffie said anything.

When Squall walked off to the arena, Yuffie held back for a moment in the almost claustrophobic beige-colored brick room to ask the little goat-man if he had ever met a man wearing a red cape – he said yes, and in fact that man was already signed up and waiting in the arena, and did she want to fight him?

She ignored him; a hope welled up like a gigantic blazing bonfire of happiness inside of her and she felt alive, she felt alive and that happiness was so big it almost hurt—

And a jump, skip and a hop later, she was ready to fly.

She would have plummeted, if she had taken off, for it was not the man at the bar all those nights ago, but that pretend big brother with chocobo hair.

She was disappointed, but still so happy (Cloud, you big fat fart—).

"…Yuffie," he stated, voice muffled through her head because she hugged him (damn tight, too, a big ol' Barret hug-) and she looked up with a big grin to see his face.

She saw his eyes (and she would not cry goddammit—).

"Cloud?"

He had to remember, he had to, because he hadn't been in Traverse Town and his head hadn't been messed with. It couldn't have been-

But that completely dulled look in his eyes said otherwise. She looked at her pretend big brother, her gaze bore into his long and hard, and it took forever and ever, almost an eternity, but something finally sparked.

Her grin returned tenfold, because that life she longed for was back in mako blue, and she wanted him to tell her about their adventures, their lives, hers and his and Aeris's and Cid's and the Red that was more orange and the cook/martial artist sister and the big black bear man who she was sure was called Barret and her quiet vampire man who she wanted to meet more than anything, anything in the world—

Then, he looked up at Squall Leonhart (her grin froze and died and no, Cloud, remember please—) and the recognition died out in less than a second, and was replaced by that look.

That look in Cid's eyes. Squall's eyes.

Her own eyes whenever she looked in the mirror, before she took a walk in the wasteland that was so much more than that (a frozen homeland).

And then, later, Yuffie was ashamed of herself (because it wasn't his fault, this man she had never really known, it wasn't, but she couldn't help it all the same—).

Because she had never hated Squall Leonhart until then.

o

"Where did you get that cape? Where did you get that claw?"

He didn't answer, because he didn't remember anymore, and Yuffie hated him, too.

And she felt (so so so so so damn bad and sorry) horrible, but it was growing like a fungus, like a virus. A big, mean nasty virus or stomach flu that only Aerith's chicken noodle soup (Tifa's piping hot tomato soup—) could cure.

And dammit, the woman's name was lost again.

Yuffie saw her vampire man (she knew she had called him a vampire before, just knew it, and until she found out his name would keep on doing it—) in her dreams, sometimes.

"Won't you stay a while?" She would ask.

Sometimes he did.

Sometimes he didn't.

And when he did, she would pull him along by that golden gauntlet and make him climb the mountains of Da Chao with her (to feel alive again) and speak Wutainese (to remember her family, her home and love) and talk for the sake of hearing familiar voices (his voice, and her old voice, not this one – her old one, when she was sixteen and loving it, stealing materia and fighting a million monsters and the general and his mother).

Other times – when he was never really there at all (which were the times she would wake up and tell herself her eyes were watering because she probably accidentally stabbed herself with her thumbs again, because it didn't hurt one damn bit and she was not crying), she would ask the empty space for his name.

The one time – so close – that she almost had it; reaching out, drifting out to the tip of her tongue –

"Yuffie, Yuffie; Sora did it, we can go home!"

Yuffie didn't hate Aerith. Wouldn't let herself. So she didn't let the almost angry and almost crying shout from her throat that would've been a name out. She smiled tiredly, leaving her bed in the hotel for one last time, and when Aerith left the room, whispered,

"No, we're not."

o

It happened, one day.

While she was dreaming of her vampire and little Irish robot and the Red that had always been more orange (but her vampire had always been a little closer than all of them), another figure added to her brain that would have been Sora.

But she woke up, and he was just another faceless entity in her head that wouldn't leave her alone.

It frightened her, terrified her beyond belief, and she forced herself to insomnia, barely sleeping and only when her body desperately needed it (because she couldn't bear to forget anyone else, and what if every time she slept, somebody disappeared?)

But she missed her vampire man (and the cook, and the big bear Barret, and the robot and his creator and the Red that had always been more orange), and when night fell for the seventh time since her arrival to Hollow Bastion (not home, this is not home—) she slept.

"I'm not ready yet."

And she frowned at the beautiful kimono that slid through her fingers like silk – because it was – and damn Chekhov to hell for giving it to her so long ago.

And she fingered the glowing orb, so small, that fit so well into the palm of her hand.

Both felt like the personification of her life—

No. Never. What her life was supposed to be, maybe.

And Yuffie loved Wutai, loved it with all her heart and soul, and she wanted nothing more than to ascend as the reigning Empress to lead her beautiful country into glory—

But she wasn't ready yet, and she was meek, and small, and not big enough to get the job done.

"…Ready for what?"

Yuffie promptly let out a surprised sound and fell from the loud orange (if a color could be loud – which it was) wing of the Tiny Bronco and deftly landed on her feet a split second after the initial shock wore off.

"Hey, monster man! You scared me for a second there." A greeting, accompanied by a big grin and a hearty wave.

He said nothing, but stood silently like an alert sentinel, scarlet eyes watching her unblinkingly and not judging.

"…Is it my turn for watch?" Yuffie asked – not nervously, never nervously, because she could smooth over lies like ironing out a few small wrinkles, it came so naturally – and she held the fabric and orb behind her back casually.

"No." Short, concise, to the point, exactly like himself; Yuffie shrugged and pulled herself back up to the low wing.

Much to Yuffie's surprise, the man quietly walked towards the plane and settled himself beneath her, leaning against the plane near where her legs dangled above the ground. They both watched the open ocean, a quiet, gentle roar against the night's music of cricket chirps and gentle wind, all under the same free navy blue sky. The dots of white littering the expanse of inky blue blanket like gems were unusually clear.

"Do ya need something?"

Silence, a pregnant pause.

"No, I do not."

"…You aren't going to make sure that the tents full of our sleeping comrades aren't going to magically catch fire or be attacked by super silent samurai monkeys?"

"…I seriously doubt that either options will happen."

"Just wondering. You don't seem like a very social person."

The man looked up at her briefly, never turning his head fully, and looked back towards the glowing moon above the sea.

"Probably not. I suppose…" he trailed off, and it was Yuffie's turn to watch the man almost struggle to form words. "I suppose that, once alone for a very long time, being able to talk to another person is very strange, but also very comforting," he confessed to the ocean, and she overheard.

"I grew up by myself," Yuffie said unexpectedly, after a few moments. The man quirked one eyebrow in slight confusion.

"Well, I mean, I had a childhood. But once I turned twelve, my old man decided that I needed to go on a journey," she continued – leaving out certain bits – "And I went back once," -(damn Chekhov, damn that stupid kimono that that stupid ninja gave her the one time she visited, and it felt like it was watching her) "-but I left after about a day and was alone until AVALANCHE found me. So I guess I can identify with that. Because… even if I could talk to shop owners, or people on the street, I could never just wake up and leave my tent or inn room, or even just a nice little niche in a tree, and have someone to say hello to for two days in a row."

The silence between them was more comfortable. Yuffie wondered absently while fingering the Steal command materia if they were a bit more comfortable around each other – not just because of their first real encounter – but because they were…

Maybe optional was the word.

There was the very real possibility that maybe AVALANCHE didn't travel through that forest, and so never found her. And there was a possibility that maybe they never played the scientist's game and found the basement room, and left him to sleep for Leviathan-knows-how-long.

That particular thought made her shudder – she didn't know why – and she absently began picking at a tiny little loose thread on the disgustingly beautiful kimono.

"Why do you have a kimono?" Softly said, but she could distinguish the light, slight accent – Yuffie realized that he was Wutainese.

The experiments must have drained him of his color.

"None of your business," Yuffie said childishly, and stuck her tongue at with a grin that clearly said to drop it.

"…The Kisaragi Clan has ruled over Wutai for well over a century," the man replied, not letting the matter drop. Her blood ran a little cold, and she tried not to look at him in alarm, tried to quell her every so gently shaking hands.

"So?"

"I have heard of the Wutain War. Nanaki was kind enough to tell me the events in recent years, and from what I understand… the linage had not been dethroned."

Yuffie didn't say anything, because he knew, and denying it would be useless – this was a spot, a very tight corner he had put her into, and if she wanted to rob these people senseless (which she didn't, dear Leviathan she didn't because they were starting to be her family, so much better than the family offered back in Wutai—), they couldn't know that she needed materia. Badly.

When she stayed silent for longer than expected, the man continued softly. "You are Kisaragi Yuffie, daughter to the Lord of Wutai. Princess."

Then she was angry.

"Shut up," and it was a little harsher than intended, "just shut up. I'm no princess. So what if I am the daughter of Godo Kisaragi? I'm no princess. Wutai isn't proud enough to have a princess. I'm not good enough – yet – to be its princess. Shinra robbed us blind," she all but snarled, and then was ashamed for completely losing her temper.

He looked at her, said nothing, and looked back at the ocean. Unfazed – on the whole – but his eyebrows were creased up, a little.

She sighed. "Sorry. Gawd. Look, the war basically killed us. You haven't been to Wutai after the war – it was glorified, before, but it's just a rattrap tourist resort town now. It's disgusting."

"…What do you intend to do about it?"

This was unexpected, but not unwelcome – not at all. She jumped down from her perch, letting the kimono fall from her fingers into the white sand, a proud expression crossing her features for once, facing the man with confidence.

"When old Godo kicks the bucket, I'll be the Lady of Wutai, and I'm going to tear it down, and rebuild from the foundation up. Any tourist agencies and hotels will be shut down and I'll burn 'em if I have to!

"The land is fertile enough to grow crops on overdrive to help improve our economy, and we'll bar our children from the outside world until they know the Wutainese language and our religion well enough to teach it to others. Then they can learn the common language. They'll be raised as shinobi, learn to love our earth, not like the Shinra who are determined to kill it with their mako reactors. The only blacksmiths we have left will take a dozen apprentices to make traditional Wutain weapons, and we'll be a leading nation again, just you wait!"

She was breathless with excitement, cheeks flushed from pure adrenaline and it felt like her body was on fire with a purpose, and she hadn't felt this way in a long time. She clutched her Steal materia tightly, and the man regarded her with – what, she didn't know.

But she broke out into a grin when Vincent smiled – a very small one, a gentle curve at his lips – and said, "That sounds like a good plan."

Yuffie opened her eyes to Hollow Bastion's sunlight flooding through her window, and sat upright, oddly alight with something akin to adrenaline, and looked into the old, dusty and slightly dirty mirror from across her bed.

She was almost breathless with excitement, cheeks flushed from pure adrenaline, and it felt like her body was on fire with a purpose, and she hadn't felt this way in a long time.

Wutai was no more, however, and the feeling took flight. That was all a long, long time ago.

And her grin, her excitement, stayed on her face like a medal to wear until it faded, so slowly, like she hadn't quite realized Wutai wasn't there anymore.

And when it all went away, Yuffie almost cried – but she was too close (had been too close for the better part of a year) to tears and didn't want to splash over. So she stood up, keeping the name to herself like a treasure that wouldn't be real if anyone else saw it, and grinned proudly at her reflection to spite it.