Entering Stage Left: The Good Guys

Entering and Leaving the Kalm Before the Storm

And we left after Barret made a comment at Cloud, we walked on foot, and walked on foot some more, and by what I assumed to be noon I was about ready to jump into the air, but we reached a road and Barret made sure that I wasn't flying off anytime soon.

Well, that wasn't followed through, about two hours after reaching the road a truck came noiselessly along behind us, actually more behind me. I did my typical reaction for when I got spooked, I opened up my wings and jumped about ten feet in the air and pumped my wings until the truck passed underneath me, and touched down refolding my wings. The truck skidded to a stop about thirty feet in front of us and the driver climbed out, and rushing over yelled, "Oh, dear God! I'm so sorry!"

I shifted my wings so they would blend in better to the back of my cloak, and said, "No foul. I'm perfectly fine."

The driver stopped and heaved a heavy sigh of relief, "Oh, thank Bahamut for that! I thought for sure I had hit you."

I looked at the middle-aged driver, which looked like the typical truck driver, large potbelly, unshaven, greasy ball cap on, and a t-shirt at least a few sizes to small. Barret approached him apparently negotiating with him and Nanaki looked at me, asking the question are you okay with his eye. I gave him a nod as Barret came up, "I jes spoke to 'im and he agreed to let us ride in the truck bed." I did my yes-ness movement and then following Barret climbed into the back of the truck. Did you know Kalm is an amazingly far distance from Midgar, by foot? We were in that truck for about five hours; it was cramped and had a peculiar smell, somewhere between old socks and a litter tray. The short version was that it was uncomfortable and I got very hungry, we all did.

When we got to Kalm the first thing I did was pull out one of Hojo's ATM cards and memorizing the PIN I went to the first ATM I saw, put it in, and pulled out the largest amount of money I could. I held well over 2,ooo gil in my hands and looking at Barret, who I had a rough feeling that could eat as much as I could, and asked, "Any one up for lunch, Hojo's buying?" Barret looked at me and knowing where to go, lead us to an "All You Can Eat Buffet".

Twenty minutes later, the manager was at our table looking at us and asked in a pleading manner, "Please, would you leave? We're actually running out of food to serve."

I looked at Barret who was about ready to go off on the poor mousy manager and kicked him in the shin, "I'm sorry if we happen to be causing an inconvenience but we're more than willing to pay extra if we need to." The manager turned his attention to me quite shocked by my statement, and unable to find any words turned away. My traveling companions looked at me amazed by how quickly the situation was dropped, "Wow, it's true. Money actually does make the world go 'round."

Barret looked at me like I just offered him the key to saving the planet, "Jes' how much gil did ya steal from Hojo?"

I reached into my pocket, pulling out the four cards, "One expense account, and three ATM cards, all with the information needed on the back, which should be more than enough for anything we should wish to buy." Barret stared at me and for the rest of the meal grumbled things under his breath; I think one of them was something like: "Damn winged girl's got sticky fingers," I didn't pay attention to what he said I just focused on finishing my meal. I figured that if I was going to be like Yuffie I could try to top her and her materia stealing ways, only being beneficial to everyone, not stealing all our materia.

We left ten minutes later, and paying a full extra thousand gil to the restaurant, and went to the inn to reserve a room. Once again I pulled forth more of the stolen gil and paid for the room, and upon reaching the three-bed room I promptly laid down on one relaxing my tired limbs. I head some familiar voices outside, it was about five in the evening now, and then upon hearing steps on the stairs I pulled my wings into their hidden and folded position, but let them back out as I heard Barret ask loudly, "You're late."

Truth be told, I feel asleep as Cloud started to tell his story and I didn't wake up until he stopped and everyone stopped discussing it. Aerith looked at me, my relaxed position where my wings were stretched across one half the bed, and asked with a slight smile, "Enjoying the bed?"

I smiled at her, "Enjoying the peace, quiet, and maybe just the lack of the threat to my well being."

"That's not all you're enjoyin'." Barret grumbled remembering the incident at lunch. Aerith looked at me questioning.

I shrugged and added for her knowledge, "I stole a few monetary affects from Hojo, and used them to buy us a pleasant lunch along with this room, for a few nights."

Cloud looked at me, along with Tifa and Aerith, and asked, "How did you get these affects?"

"When Red knocked Hojo out I stole them out of his wallet, he doesn't use them and if he did not very often, the PIN is written on the back." I answered pulling out the cards and showing them to Cloud, or at least his general direction, I was too comfortable to do otherwise.

He pulled them out of my hand and apparently checking my facts hesitated for a few moments. "We'll need these tomorrow when we refill our supplies."

I gave a stretch and, folding my wings, got up, "So, who feels like dinner on Hojo?"

Nanaki looked at me, "Remember we aren't welcome at that one restaurant we were at for lunch." Once again our group was looked at, and Nanaki supplied the information. "They nearly ate the restaurant out of product."

I looked at Nanaki sticking my tongue out him and replied, "Hey! Flying takes a lot of calories to do!" Nanaki shook he head at me, and rolled his eye at me, I was tempted to give him the finger at that moment but everyone else left saying they'd be back after dinner. I nearly flew out the door after them, nothing, I repeat, nothing gets between my stomach and food. This caused the others to give a brief laugh and then at a different "All You Can Eat" restaurant it turned into a moderate level of amazement, I take eating very seriously if you hadn't noticed. We were once again asked to leave early and we gave them an extra thousand gil as was done before. I noticed also some looks Tifa and Aerith were giving me, I think it was out of jealousy due to my ability to eat pretty much anything and not gain a pound.

We returned to the inn and beginning to settle in for the night, Cloud took the liberty of assigning us roles for our extensive preparations for our trip. I was in charge of reorganizing packs, namely my various huge pockets, checking our materia supplies, and also coming up with an amount of gil we had along with handing it out in even proportions. I gave him a mock salute and went into the bathroom to change my clothes, glad in my moment of rushed grabbing clothes that I grabbed my sleeping clothes. Slipping the top on and moving my wings out of the large hole cut in the back for that purpose, and I remembered the day Yumiko gave it to me as I touched my now slightly scaly back.

Yumiko looked at me a huge grin on her face as she pulled out a top from behind her back. I looked at it curious, and asked, "So how badly did you murder the back for my wings?"

She gave me a look, telling me to shut up about her poor arts and crafts skills, and turned it around revealing the back where it was nearly nonexistent. "I think I did a good job."

I looked at the backless shirt and laughed, "It looks like Jack the Ripper's victim, but it'll work as a night shirt." I received two looks, one from Yumiko and the other from Nanaki, and shook my head and started to explain.

I felt a tear run down my cheek and wiping it away I prepped myself and waited for my eyes to clear up. I walked out; jumping onto the bed Nanaki and I were sharing and gave him an affectionate scratch behind his ears as he gave me a look. I settled down on my share of the bed, which was near Tifa and Aerith's bed, and I shifted my wings out of their folded position, giving them a weak flap as I settled down. I put my MP3 on and ready to play a song as I went through the hard drive I faintly heard Tifa ask me something. I pulled my earphones out and turned to her.

Tifa smiled at gesturing faintly to my back where my scaled wings connected to my back, "Do the scales on your wing connect to your back also?"

I moved my wings so the full effect was taken in as I replied, "Yeah, it kinda gets annoying, but they also help protect my back." Tifa's expression was best described as amazed, as I moved my wing a little closer to her, "If you want to you can see what they're like for yourself." Tifa just dropped her jaw at this, and placing a hand lightly on the arm of my wing and started to slowly and carefully explore a scale and the way the wing was formed. I feel asleep soon after wards, and didn't expect anything until the late morning, and boy was I wrong.

The first thing in the morning Cloud kicks my leg hard enough to activate my flight or fight response, which then woke up Nanaki and Tifa, who then woke up Aerith and then Barret, and gave him the response of all of us giving him an evil glare. Cloud shrugged and calmly said, "It's time to get up and get ready, we should leave today."

I couldn't restrain my inner smart ass as it blurted out, "And what only get a mile or two away from the town before we have to camp for the night? That's highly illogical." Barret, Aerith, and Tifa agreed with me, Cloud admitted defeat and after a quick breakfast we went to do our tasks.

I sat on the bed, all my materia in front of me, and contemplated how I was going to organize them all. I then relinquished all the materia I had absorbed, well all except Bahamut's, and making contact with all the materia in order to find out what types of materia I had. I found a few good magic materia, mostly status effect spells, and the command materia wasn't my favorite ever in using, though I did have a counter materia, which I loved using. I put the materia I never used, the status effect, on the bottom of my bag and laced the top layer with the much needed materia I would frequently access, then turning to everyone else's I followed the same method and then consolidated my possessions into ordered pockets. After that was done I went to the ATM and began to work out how much ready gil we had, and started to divide it up. I was figuring for all ten members of the party dividing up the money which after I finished dividing it all up equally looked a little strange, but my awesome brainpower, powered by randomness, already came up with a perfect lie to tell to explain this. Having finished my work I went to find Nanaki, or well anyone, only after tucking the rubber banded stacks into my pockets.

I reached the door to the inn and nearly walked into Cloud and everyone else, it was around dinnertime, and I had been eating on some of the food taken from last night's restaurant, and I handed everyone their respective stack of gil. The night went peacefully and the morning after it was pure hectic. I was the one Cloud decided to wake up again, which caused everyone else to wake up, and I took my moderately weighted pack, along with the PHS handed to me, and lead the charge out of Kalm.