A/N: Did they mention anything about the year in FF7? I don't think so… maybe? Oh, well, the year in here I just made up. And, last chapter made me feel kind of iffy, but this chapter, I think it's a lot better, or made me laugh more at least. Although this is the actual chapter in which the contradictions originate… and also can anyone explain the Cait Sith/Shin-ra thing because I still don't understand everything that happened. :)

Chapter 5- The New Shin-ra

Tifa threw the suitcase onto the bed in the hotel room. As Shera claimed the sofa and Yuffie the other bed, Tifa opened her suitcase.

"Tifa… can I ask you something?"

"Yeah?"

"How do you explain this?" Yuffie waved over her suitcase, which was full of nothing but skimpy white tops and the shortest of the short shorts.

"I… well… how do you explain that?" Tifa indicating Yuffie's suitcase, which as well was full of green tops and equally short brown short shorts.

"Hey, I find a look I like, I stick with it."

They both looked at Shera's open suitcase, which was full of a spectrum of colorful bathing suits and summer wear.

"What about all the lab coats?" Yuffie asked, amazed.

"I didn't think bringing a lab coat to the beach was a very smart thing to do. I actually do wear real clothes most of the time, unlike..."

Yuffie and Tifa regarded themselves, suddenly noticing that all this time they had been half naked.

Tifa began taking the clothes out of her suitcase. "What's this?"

"What?"

"I didn't pack a book." Tifa retrieved from the suitcase a small brown book.

"What's that?"

She opened the cover of the book. "Property of Barret Wallace?"

"This must be his journal." She turned to a random page and read, and the three girls read with several comments from Yuffie (in parentheses) and Tifa in bold as she did.

March 3, 5416 This is quite a few years back.

Dear Diary, (How fruity…)

How are you? I am fine. (Oh my God…) Mina came over today. (Who's Mina?) That's his wife. (Oh, okay.) I went to the jewelry shop and got the ring. It's cubic zirconium, she won't tell the difference. (Did she?) Oh, I remember like it was yesterday… she totally freaked.

I wonder when I'm going to ask her the question. Whenever I think about it, it makes me so nervous… I never did finish the last thing on my list. But, maybe it's all for the better. Wish me luck, (Stop personifying your diary you psycho!)

Sincerely,

Barret

"What list is he talking about?" Yuffie asked.

"I don't know… let's see if it's in here." She flipped back a few pages until she saw something of interest.

February 22, 5416

Dear Diary,

How are you? I am fine. (Again?) Since Valentine's Day, I've been thinking. Maybe now is the right time to ask Mina the big question. We've been engaged for almost two years now. Tifa's been bothering me about it too. I guess it's now or never. But, I got an idea. What if, to end my bachelorness (Is that even a word?), I were to make a list of things to do before I get married? This is the final copy I came up with, so I can move on in my life with satisfaction. Looks like he's crossed off everything except for number 10.

1 Wear my underwear inside out. (…o…kay…)

2 See how many licks it takes to get to the center of a tootsie pop.

3 Win a toy in the claw machine. …isn't this about the same time he almost declared himself bankrupt? I wonder if… nah.

4 Wear a shirt. (Come to think of it… has he ever done that before?)

5 Call all the Barret Wallaces in the phone book. I remember that, that one was tricky. The line was always busy.

6 See life through the eyes of a towel. That explains how he broke the towel rack… and the washer.

7 Go to a blitzball game. (That's the wrong video game, you idiot!)

8 Steal Tifa's picture with her, Sephiroth, and that weird spiky hair kid in it. Why that son of a… so that's where it went!

9 Eat beef Wellington upside down. Well, I must say, this list sure does explain a lot of the weird things he does. (But nowhere near all of them.) True.

10 Tell Tifa my true feelings about her.

The three girls looked at each other, dead silent. At that moment, there was a knock on the door. "Come in," Tifa mustered, snapping out of her silence. The doorknob jiggled. "Dammit… if I only had thumbs…"

"Red, do you need us to open the door for you?" Shera suggested.

"No, I got it. Grr…"

"Are you sure that-?"

"Yes, yes, I can do it!"

After a few more awkward moments, Tifa walked over to the door and opened it, allowing in Red XIII.

"I almost had it, you know."

"Whatever you say… what's up? Are we ready to go?"

"Yeah, but… it'll only be eight of us."

Yuffie put on a pensive expression, counting her fingers.

"That's one less than we have now," Shera elaborated.

"Whoa, who's going?"

"Cait is going to Rocket Town."

"Rocket Town? You mean Gold Saucer," Yuffie said.

"No… I suspect he's going there for some Shin-ra related purposes. He did use to work for them, after all."

"He did?"

"Yes… were you even paying attention?" Tifa asked in awe. "At Gold Saucer? When they came to get Aeris?"

"Oh, I was looking at the roller coaster, I wasn't really… listening…"

"It turns out that he was being controlled by Reeve from Shin-ra?"

"Then why is his doll hanging out with us?"

"But that was a lie too, and he was actually a real living creature, but still did work for Shin-ra." Tifa narrowed her eyes. "Wait… I don't remember that! Desert, what are you doing?"

Hey, I like Cait, all right? No one pays attention to the poor guy. Reeve is cool too… but still. Just… forget it!

Yuffie squinted. "Okay, so Cait Sith used to work for Shin-ra but became good?"

"Yes."

"So back up… who's Aeris?"

Hastily, Red interrupted, "Well, he's going to Rocket Town. Shin-ra stuff, like I said."

"Figures," Tifa said tartly. "When's he leaving?"

"I'm so glad to see you care," Cait Sith said, at that moment entering, followed by Mog the moogle, who was carrying all his luggage.

"3 suitcases? You don't even wear clothes." Shera pointed out.

"Shera, Shera, please," he replied nonchalantly. "Suitcases can hold more than clothes. What about all the stuff I wanna steal, where do I put that? Well, anyway, I will be going now, just wanted to say bye."

"This isn't something to deal with Shin-ra, is it?" Tifa asked, crossing her arms.

"I can't say." He turned around to leave.

"Cait Sith," she said firmly.

He stopped, sighing. "Fine… you want the truth?"

"Yes."

"Well, I know how strongly you feel about this. So, the truth is… gotta run!" And with that, he blew past Red and Mog, who chased after him.

"Let him go," Red said as Tifa ran to the door. "Let's just try to enjoy ourselves."

Although Tifa doubted that would happen, as Barret's strange note had already bore deeply into her mind.

"Move, kid!" Barret picked up the boy and threw him off the merry-go-round, jumping onto the horse as the ride began. "Hey, guys, look at me! Guys? Guys!" But oddly enough, they were all gone.

"Phew... do you think we lost him?" Yuffie asked.

"I think so," Cid said. "Okay, there's no way we can all see the park at once, so we should split up. What do you all want to see?"

"Marlene wants to go on the rides," Tifa said.

"I would like to go to the museum," Red XIII put in.

"Okay, here's what we do," Cid said. "We'll split up, who wants to go on the rides, go with Tifa, who wants to go to the museum, come with me."

So it was decided that Cid, Shera, and Red would go to the museum, while Tifa, Marlene, Vincent, and Yuffie would go on the rides and midway. As they walked away, Tifa holding Marlene's hand, she said to Vincent, "I would've figured you'd want to go to the museum."

"Usually, but to tell you the truth I don't really like Cid too much."

"Heh, yeah. Hey... are you okay? You like pale. Well, paler than usual. Why don't you take the heavy clothes off?"

"Because... I can't."

"Why not?"

"It's... my thing, you know?"

"Whatever..." They approached the midway games.

"I wanna play that!" Marlene said, pointing to a booth at the end.

"Ooh, I know how to cheat without anyone catching you on that one," Yuffie said. "Come on, I'll go show you how. Now the trick is to..." Tifa and Vincent stayed behind as the two of them walked towards the booth.

"Tifa, are you all right? You seem to be troubled this morning."

"Oh... it's... it's nothing. Well... no. Don't worry about it."

"Fine. Let's go see that-"

"Okay, I'll tell you. Barret accidentally packed his dia... journal, his journal, in my suitcase."

"You shouldn't have read it..."

"I didn't say I did."

"But you did, didn't you?"

"Yeah... and we saw something in there that... well... I think Barret... maybe had kind of a crush on me."

Vincent snickered.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"What's so funny?"

"Well, it's obvious, isn't it? I mean, if Cloud didn't come along, you two would have no one in between you."

"In between- what are you talking about?"

"Nothing, nothing. So who else knows?"

"Yuffie and Shera. Barret knows too, of course. But he doesn't know we know."

"I didn't know he didn't know you know. Are you gonna tell him?"

"What? Look, I know that you know that if Barret knew that I knew then he would freak!"

"I guess... if he knew Shera and Yuffie knew, we all know that something will happen."

"But I have this feeling... like he knows I know. But not that the others know, I know and you know that if Barret knew that Shera and Yuffie knew, then... what the fuck are we talking about?"

"I forgot."

"Well, either way, I'm not gonna tell Barret. For now, at least."

Cait Sith saw the Highwinds' house as he walked by it. He painfully ripped off the note that Cid stapled to his hand.

Cait,

IF YOU EVEN LOOK AT MY HOUSE I WILL KILL YOU IN THE SLOWEST AND MOST PAINFUL WAY POSSIBLE. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Your friend,

Cid

P.S. I know you're looking at it. STOP LOOKING AT IT!

Cait Sith turned his head hastily, and he could have sworn that he saw some sort of camera looking at him from inside the window.

He walked past the old rocket site, and straight ahead at the sign that said "Shin-ra members come here." It pointed down a path that went behind a set of houses. He went past the houses, into the woods. In a dark part stood a small makeshift shed with a sign over it that read, "New Shin-ra Headquarters." The penmanship was horrible, and the worst part was, one of the E's and both R's were backwards. Cait Sith approached the door and knocked on it. "Cait Sith."

"Enter."

He opened the door. In there on various bean bags and wooden chairs sat the whole gang: Reeve, Reno, Elena, Rude, Heidegger, Scarlet, and-

"Rufus? What happened to your hair?"

"It got scorched off when Diamond Weapon attacked the headquarters... sit."

"You look like such a-"

"Sit down!"

Mog obediently dropped onto its bottom.

"Where's the chip and dip?" Cait asked. "I was promised chip and dip."

Everyone glared at Reno for a second before Rufus began. "Okay, everyone's here. Well, as you know, Shin-ra took a sort of... bad turn when Midgar was... you know..."

"Ruthlessly crushed by Meteor?" Elena put in.

"Yes, that's one way to put it. Shin-ra can come back. With a new persona."

"Which is?"

"Nice. We are nice."

"But we supply power through Mako, that's why people don't like us."

"But that's just it, we don't use Mako Energy anymore. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the bridge into the new age of power!" He stood up and ripped a cloth off of a board behind them. "Gerbil power!" He took a pointer out of his pocket and pointed to the picture on the board.

The board showed a picture of a gerbil in a wheel.

"Sir, what is this?"

"Gerbils. Millions of gerbils. And they run. And run and run and run. And that generates electricity. The environmentalists will be thrilled! Always nagging… you're sucking the power from our Planet! Without Mako our lives will be horrible! Bla bla bla! Bla bla bla! This is perfect!"

The team looked around at each other, deciding amongst themselves who would spoil poor Rufus's bubble. Scarlet was the one who spoke up. "Sir... the environmentalists will be glad you're not using Mako... but they'll be upset by the gerbils. Why don't we invest in another energy source? Nuclear power is growing rather popular."

"Um, excuse me, do you have the pointy stick? I didn't think so. So be quiet. Gerbils! We do that and- Cait, are you okay?"

Cait, in fact, was not okay. He and Mog were emitting a strange orange glow.

"Are you okay? What's happening to you?"

Cait gasped. "The story... the number of words in the story... it's lucky 7777!"

Do you know how hard it is to make an exact number of words in a chapter? It's hard... anyway, check it if you like... 7777 words! Muahahahaha... that really shows you how bored I am. Number of reviews? Dunno... just review please, I'll update either way, eventually... how fast I work depends on the number of reviews I get. ;) But I'm working on it, don't worry. Well, thanks for reading!