Bring on Tomorrow
by JestaAriadne, 2003
Hello there... nice to see you. You're here for the story? Tis a fun story... Written for enjoyment (hard-work-type-enjoyment some of the time, but still.) Read for same reason!
Disclaimer... I don't own Final Fantasy VII. Squaresoft(SquareEnix?) does. Sad, but true... 'Bring on Tomorrow' is a song from Fame which I also don't own... unrelated, but I like it as a title.
Part 1 : Of Housemates
"You try spending thirty years in a coffin and see how you feel!"
"Tifaaaaaaa!"
From inside the house there was the noise of someone jumping down stairs about ten at a time.
Tifa jumped back as the door swung rapidly towards her and a red-bandana-ed cannonball flew out and hugged her forcefully.
"Yuffie?" she asked stupidly when she'd got her breath back.
"Who'd ya think?" yelled Yuffie. "Omi... it's been like AGES since I saw you!"
"Yeah," Tifa nodded slowly, a little dazed. She had not expected Yuffie Kisaragi to come rocketing out of this particular Rocket Town residence... "Five months at least, I guess..."
Yuffie, staring in open-mouthed no-words stunned excitement, was silent for a good five seconds. Then: "Tifa! You know, I have missed you so much! How've you been? How's Cloud? Where's Cloud? Are you two -"
"You can actually come inside if you wish," said a different voice. "I'm sure Yuffie could move aside to accommodate that..."
Tifa almost fell backwards as she looked beyond Yuffie.
"Vincent?"
"Yeah!" said Yuffie cheerily, bouncing out of Tifa's way and showing her in. "Who else could it be? Actually, hey look - I can do Vincent, look!" She narrowed her eyes, frowned intensely and pulled her collar up over her nose. "I am the Dark Lord of All That Is Angsty," she intoned. "See! See!"
"I don't think all this oxygen can be too good for her," Vincent muttered confidentially.
Tifa half-smiled in astonishment and polite bewilderment: Vincent coffin-bound, sin-obsessed, Lord of All That Is Angsty Valentine... making a joke?
"Sorry," she said, more than a little bemused as the other two led her into Cid and Shera's kitchen, "um... doesn't Cid live here?"
"Yeah!"
"And Shera?"
"Yes."
"And... and you two?"
"Yeah!"
"We do."
"...You live here...?" Tifa asked, under her breath and not expecting an answer.
"Hey, sit down!" said Yuffie, energetically hitting the sofa to demonstrate its existance and purpose.
"I'd offer you some tea," said Vincent, "except that Shera will probably be down in a minute and then you'll get about twenty cups."
"Er, that's OK..." said Tifa.
"So, you both actually live here?"
Tifa was trying again; a few minutes later, when Yuffie and Vincent were sitting down and passing her generous amounts chocolate cookies.
"Yeah."
"Isn't that a little... weird?"
"Nah, not really..." said Yuffie, suddenly looking the other way.
"I thought you were going to buy a place in Mideel or something, Yuff?"
"Yeah, erm, I was... lots of cool monsters around there... but um..."
"We've got no money," said Vincent flatly. Yuffie hit him.
"But haven't you got a house in Wutai?"
"Vincent has Issues with the traps and stuff in the basement and I'm not gonna take them out."
Vincent glared. "Well, you try spending thirty years in a coffin and see how you feel. Tifa, have you seen the place?"
"Briefly," Tifa growled. "From the inside of a cage. Not an experience I'd like to repeat."
"Aw, let it go, Tif," said Yuffie, making puppy-dog eyes and rolling them, "that was like months ago! I'm sooo much more mature now. Even about materia and stuff!"
Vincent cast a patented Valentine Withering Look at her. "This coming from someone who blew all the money on a 'Super-master-everything-materia' from that guy in Junon," he pointed out.
"How was I supposed to know it wouldn't work? It looked so pretty! Besides," she added, casting the patent-pending Kisaragi Glare at Vincent, "it wasn't all of the money. Someone spent several thousand gil on a load of random gun accessories."
"I keep telling you, they're not 'random gun accessories', they're..."
Tifa let her mind wander a bit, after noting that Yuffie and Vincent for some reason appeared to be sharing a financial account. And that Yuffie wasn't staying in Wutai because Vincent didn't want to. Interesting...
"...and you never change the toilet roll!" said Yuffie with an air of finality. Vincent looked defeated.
Tifa blinked. That was - different...
"But, do you have jobs here? Or are you just leeching off Cid's hospitality?"
"Hehe, a bit of both," grinned Yuffie. "Vinnie here," - he only twitched slightly at the nickname - "works in the weapons store, and I'm a prostitute."
"WHAT?"
"Joke! Joke!" Yuffie raised her hands to defend herself from Tifa's aggressive shock. "I do the materia shop weekends."
Tifa looked slightly pacified for a second; then immediately suspicious. "You 'do' the materia shop?"
"I work in it! I sell stuff, OK? And," she added, sounding quietly pleased with herself, "I'm good at it. I only have to do a couple days and they pay me quite a lot. They say I'm a natural salesperson."
"Do they mean something like 'you don't shut up until someone's bought something'?"
Yuffie nodded cheerfully. "Like I said, natural salesperson."
"You run a museum?" Tifa almost choked on her tea when Cid broke the news.
He crushed a cookie to dust in his hand. "It was Shera's idea," he said, frowning. "She said people would pay just to see all sorts of random junk from where the famous rocket was." He brightened. "She was right, though. We always did get £&ing tourists, but at least now they pay a couple hundred gil to drop litter all over our town."
"But, I mean - do you actually work there? Show people round?" Tifa was having difficulty imagining Cid conducting an Educational And Entertaining Tour Suitable For All the Family.
"Hell, no. Kids do that for part time jobs, and we just rearrange the exhibits every once in a while. It works," he said thoughtfully. "It does kinda work for the whole town. I should thank Shera properly sometime, but... y'know."
Tifa grinned hopelessly. "Yeah, I know you're Cid."
"Speaking of which, what's with you just dropping in at my house? Invite yourself did ya?"
She shrugged. "I dunno what made me do it. I'm not planning on staying or anything-"
"I should hope not! I'd have to put you in the room Yuffie's got, an' I'm sure you'd looove that..."
"I just felt like dropping in to say hello, or something." She felt useless.
"What are you doing with your life at the moment?"
"Oh... stuff. There's a bar in Nibelhelm. Kinda like your museum. I own the place, but I'm not always around. I'm just kinda... drifting..."
"Nowhere to go, huh?" asked Cid, softening.
"No!" retorted Tifa. "I've got loads of places to go!" She paused. "I just... don't wanna go to any of them, is all."
"Mmmm..." Cid looked away, then muttered almost agressively: "Y'can stay here if you really £&ing want to. Just a couple days, mind."
End of part one! Reviews make me happy! Happiness is good! The world needs goodness! Save the world, review my fic!
...Coming soon: more characters and a plot.
