The strange thing about writing this through Rae is that I hear her comments all the time. I'm sure she thinks the same about me. That's the funny thing about being someone's "imaginary friend". That's what Rae calls me, I'm serious! It's a funny thing, isn't it? And what's funnier is, I do feel like one sometimes. I get glimpses of her world through her eyes, it's like riding around inside her somewhere, and she does the same with me in mine. So I guess in my world, when talking to people in my own world, I could even call her MY imaginary friend! Except everyone in this world can see her. Nobody in Rae's world can see me. It's weird that way.

Rae also calls this world different names. I just know it as "The Planet".

But I kind of got away from what I was trying to say. I can tell Rae's thinking now, "I thought this was supposed to be a fun story". It is! It's even just a tiny bit fun telling about the Floofers, even though they still scare me because of that night. And a lot of things change after this part. Lots and lots of things. It's sad but happy too. Life sure was different afterward. I got the chance to think about a lot of different things, like who I really was, deep things like that. I learned tons I never thought about before. So that's the happy part. The sad part...I don't really know how to say it. The sad part is part of the happy part too. But there were other sad things, more sad things, like the changes you can't ever change back if you want to. I guess those were the saddest parts.

"Do you think it'll heal?"

"I don't know. It should. He should walk again, but the scars..."

"Hey! Now he'll look even MORE like uncle Nanaki!"

"Yuffie, that's not funny. This isn't something to laugh about."

"Hey, I know! I was just-"

"Quiet, children. They're still asleep."

Who were they talking about? Ow. I hurt...alot. I tried to listen better because my eyes were too heavy to open right away. There was water somewhere, like the ocean. I still felt wet, and my skin stung in weird places, but I was warm, actually felt kind of sick and hot, and shaky. My head felt funny, like something was pressing on it. The floor was hard, and it kept moving around. Was it just because I was dizzy? Or were we actually moving? My left arm was under my head. It felt numb and cold. I rolled off it and onto my back and my eyes snapped open and so did my mouth, and I yelled and cried and rolled back onto my side faster than anything.

"Owww! AAH! It hurts! Owwiiie...!" I cried. "My back..!" I could barely talk 'cause it hurt so bad.

My mom came over and laid a paw on my cheek. "It's alright Sephi, it's alright. Shhh."

I whimpered and clung and cried until the stingy burningness on my back went away (mostly) and then I wiped my face off in my mom's fur and took a deep breath.

"What's going on?" I asked. I tried to sit up but it made me dizzy so I laid back down.

"We're on the ocean...somewhere between home and Goblin Island."

"Oh," I said slowly. "Is everything...everybody...okay?"

The silence made me feel weird. Then my dad said, "We'll be alright."

"What? Did something..."

"Reno got it pretty bad," Cait Sith mumbled.

"Reno!" I sat up suddenly and clung to mom so I wouldn't get too dizzy. I looked and found him laying a little ways off on the weird raft we were floating on. He was asleep and nearly covered in bandages- I didn't even care that those bandages were made out of my now nonexistent shirt- who cared? Where else would they get cloth? Fluffs don't need clothes. I stared at him and my eyes watered.

"Is he okay!" I asked. Mom nodded slowly.

"He'll live. He won't look the same, and he might have a few other problems, but he should be fine as long as we can keep the bites tended well."

I sniffed back my crying. "But...I tried to keep them off! I really did!"

Dad nodded. "We know, son. We know. If it weren't for that strange Fluff you both would probably be gone, and if it weren't for you, Reno would be much worse."

"Huh? What happened? I don't know what happened!"

Yuffie jumped up. "When I found you two I could hardly see you! The Floofers were all over you, and I thought you'd just died but then this weird shimmery silver Fluff came out of nowhere and drove them off. Then he just disappeared! Like a ghost!"

She bounced in excitement. Dad frowned. "Stop that, you're rocking the boat."

Yuffie's ears drooped and she stopped.

I stared at Reno. He was breathing weird, I could see his side go up and down all shaky-like. I still felt awful, and not just because my back hurt. I buried my face in mom's fur so nobody would see I was crying.

"I tried to fight them...I did..." I whispered.

Mom rubbed her head against mine a little and after a while I stopped crying and blinked around at the "boat".

"What are we floating on...?"

"The ocean, silly!" Yuffie said.

Cait Sith laughed nervously. "I think he meant what we're sitting on..."

Dad smiled in a funny way. "We're actually...sitting on the bottom of our kitchen table."

"...ohhhh!" I said. Fluff's tables are usually pretty huge, 'cause they have such big families. It made sense to use the table as a raft, it was the biggest flat surface in our cave that could be taken out.

"Everyone who made it out is on the ocean now, drifting wherever it's going," Mom said sadly. "It's the only safe place we could go."

I shivered, still feeling hot and sick. "So the Floofers...Round Island...? All the Fluffs left? Everyone?"

Dad nodded. "Everyone who made it out," he said, repeating my mom's words. "There were too many, it was hopeless to try and fight them off."

I felt my lip trembling and was about to dive back into my mom's shoulder but she smiled.

"Hey, none of that."

"Huh?" I yelped, feeling almost like she'd smacked me.

"Fluffs are to be cheerful at all times they possibly can. We can make the best out of this, you know? Hey. We're all together. Nobody was lost from our family. We have alot to be thankful for!"

"B..but..." I started, feeling stupid.

"No buts! No feeling sorry! Everything will be alright. We just have to keep our spirits up."

I bit my lip. "Mm."

It was quiet for a second and then Cait Sith coughed and said "But what about foo-"

"Everything will be fine!" My mom repeated and beamed. My dad cleared his throat.

"Come on, I'll tell you a story."

We all blinked and turned toward him. Dad only told stories every once in a while but when he did, they were usually good.

"It's the story of the three Fluffs and their brave voyage across the ocean to Mideel..."

Spending days and days and days on an upside-down table in the middle of the ocean gives you alot of time to think. I mean, sure, dad told us stories alot and Reno woke up on the second day and made sure to keep us entertained by grumbling in a low gravelly voice like he'd swallowed a bunch of sand, and we saw some weird creatures in the water (that jellyfish was scary), and a seagull perched on Cait Sith's head once and tried to steal his moogle, but other than that, it was just water water water. And no food. I forgot to say that. We didn't really have much food. Yuffie found a new hobby in trying to catch fish but she only managed once every couple of days, and I only ate a little- yes, I ate raw fish. None of us really liked fish, but it was food. Even if it was raw.

So I thought alot. I tried, but I couldn't remember anything about a silver Fluff. All I could remember was suddenly I couldn't see anything and then next thing I knew mom was carrying me. Had I gotten hit on the head or something? Weird.

Another thing I thought about was how I was different. I'd thought about that even before we left home, but now I thought about it almost all the time. I didn't worry about fur though. I worried about how I couldn't fight. Maybe if I'd had teeth and claws and had practiced play fighting more I would have been able to make it so Reno wasn't so ripped up. After a while we could take some of his bandages off, but I almost wish we didn't. He had huge patches were the Floofers had bit out chunks...it made me shiver. It would take a long time to heal, and even then, some of those parts would be scars and furless. He DID look more like uncle Nanaki, but as Cait Sith said, that's not something to laugh about. Though Yuffie did. Quietly. Nobody told her off when she did it quietly because Mom was always saying we should keep our spirits up.

So I really wanted claws. Or something. I wanted to be able to do my part somehow! What if we ever got attacked by Floofers again? What if I was the only one who could do anything? What if I COULDN'T do anything? I thought about this so much it made me feel sick. Mom wondered if maybe the Floofer's poison had sunk too deep into the gash in my head. I forgot to tell about my own hurts. My head was all bandaged up funny 'cause they'd got me a big cut on the back. My hair around there had a red tinge for a long time. My back got it the worst. I had a couple scratches on my face that healed pretty quick- they were just little. Some on my arms and legs. But my back and the big cut on my head took the longest to heal. It's hard tending wounds infected with Floofer acid when all you have is salt water. I ended up having to rip off the bottom part of my pants to make more bandages. Yeah.

It had been a long time since we'd had water either. The first couple of days it rained alot and mom and dad managed to catch some in some bowls. I don't know how we had bowls. I think mom had been getting them ready to take to a repair Fluff when the Floofers attacked, so she ended up dragging them along since they were already in her pack. They were cracked. Yeah, that was probably it. So we managed to catch some water the first couple of days, but it lasted pretty short, and then it didn't rain. So it had been a couple or three days since we had water. We were all really thirsty. It's a good thing we finally ran into someone.

It was right in the afternoon. It was really hot. We were all panting like our distant cousins (dogs) and then Yuffie bounced and the table rocked and everyone yelled at her until she pointed out the thing on the horizon. It took us a while to guess it was a boat (what else would it be? We were really out of it). Then we all started paddling horribly until it was enough in sight that Yuffie started jumping up and down waving her paws at the boat and yelling until we practically had to pin her down to keep her from turning the table over. Then we all waved while sitting down and yelled, even Reno, and finally a head popped out over the railing and disappeared, and we heard someone yelling. We settled in to wait.

A couple of young guys looked down at us. I blinked at them. Wow. I'd heard about humans and had been told I looked like one, but I'd never seen any 'cept on the posters mom and dad gave us. They blinked down at us too. They'd probably never seen fluffs before. I waved at them slowly.

"Hey!" one of them said. "What the heck are those things!" He pointed at my family.

"Uhm..." I began, feeling a strange hot flush on my face. "They're Fluffs. Just like..." I began, but my mom shook her head at me.

I felt unsettled. I wanted to stand up and do something...I don't know what. Something fast and hard. Was I angry? Maybe a little. Was I flustered? Probably.

"What're ya doin' with them, dude? And out in the middle of the ocean too...crazy, I tell ya..."

"We got run off our island!" I yelled.

"Well ya look like ya got run through a helicopter engine!" the guy chucked.

I blinked and frowned. "We need help! We got attacked!"

"Sure, sure. Chill dude. We'll get ya up asap, ya know what I mean?" he chucked again and gave me a thumbs up and smacked his friend on the shoulder and they both turned to go get some other people.

My dad lowered his tail, which had been bristled weirdly. "Strange people," he muttered. My mom looked concerned.

I felt shivery after that. Maybe I was nervous. Reno grumbled. "Weiiirdos. That guy can't even talk straight. Wonder if he'll be able to find the other people without getting lost."

Yuffie giggled. I laughed weakly. A whole bunch of people lined up on the rail and lowered a little boat into the water, which had the first two guys in it that saw us. They rowed over and motioned to me.

"Hop in, man!"

I cautiously stood up and jumped into the boat. It rocked awfully and I clung to the side with a nervous noise. The guy laughed. "'kay now we'll help your little furry friends in, I guess."

Yuffie jumped in hyperly and nearly missed and hit the water instead- but thankfully, she didn't. She just bruised her nose on the other side of the boat. Mom and dad sort of carried Reno over and the weird guy grabbed him and tried to help.

"Hey, watch it!" Reno snapped and the guy dropped him. Reno tumbled into the boat and lay there groaning.

"HOLY CHOCOBOS! That thing talked! DUDE!" the guy looked pretty shook up. He turned to his friend. "Tell me that it wasn't just me! Ya heard it too, right?"

His friend shrugged.

Mom and Dad hurried into the boat and Cait Sith followed nervously, clutching his moogle. He'd become even more attached to it recently. He of course had to walk on his back legs. It made the people look at him funny.

"Dude," the guy said to me. "Those are some talented dogs ya got there."

I bristled. "They're not dogs!" I yelled.

"Whoa man! Chill! Don't freak out on me!" The guy sweatdropped. I didn't know it then, but I looked pretty scary when I was mad. "Didn't mean nothin' by it, serious!"

I quivered and tried to calm down. I wasn't used to being angry. I hadn't ever really been mad before.

We pushed off and Yuffie waved the table goodbye while we rowed back to the boat. I watched it go sadly. The last thing from Round Island we'd had. There it went...it just drifted off. I turned around and blinked at the weird guy and his friend. Weird guy grinned cheesily. His friend was blinking thoughtfully at us. Weird guy had bright orange hair that looked like...well it kind of stood straight up. It wasn't extremely long but it shouldn't have stood up for how long it WAS. He wore pink shorts and a white vest thing with huge pockets and a black shirt underneath. He had freckles too. I had NEVER seen freckles before. His friend just had short plain brown hair and his clothes were all grey. He wore long pants and his shirt had sleeves to the elbow. They were both like completely opposites.

"So...ya from Mideel or somethin'?" weird guy asked. I shook my head quickly. No way. Floofers came from Mideel.

"Leave him alone, Jay," the quiet guy said. "He looks like he's had his share of it."

Weird guy blinked. I guess I should call him Jay. Mom always says to call people by their real names unless they had a nickname like mine and were okay with people using it. Then he laughed and put his hands behind his head.

"Whatever you say, man."

I sat still and looked at them both. Jay kept his eyes on me but his friend was staring out at the ocean and seemed to be thinking. Then he looked at me and I nearly jumped. His eyes were blue, by the way. So were Jay's, but I noticed it in his friend more. They both had different kinds of blue. The quiet guy's face changed. I don't know if he was smiling a little or frowning a little. It was hard to tell. He was doing SOMETHING. I blinked and bowed my head. If I'd had a tail I would've lowered it out of respect like other Fluffs do when meeting one another, when they're unsure of where they stand. But all I could do was lower my head, so I did.

The guy moved his head. Did he nod? It's like he only did things halfway, never all the way. He looked away at the ocean again. I lifted my head. I'd never really gotten the hang of the whole acceptance procedure. I couldn't tell what he thought.

We got to the side of the big boat and I looked up in awe. It was so HUGE! Jay hooked it up and yelled up at the people on board, and soon we were on deck. I helped Mom and Dad with Reno this time. I felt funny. Everybody looked at us. Some of them seemed scared and other people were grinning. I stood in front of my family. I guess I felt like I had to protect them, since the people had only tried talking to me so far.

A bigger man came over and I lowered my head again, sensing that he was the leader. He had a big shadow, I noticed.

"You the leader here?" he asked me. I looked up but still kept my head a little low by bending over.

"Huh?" I looked at my parents for what to do. They nodded.

"Um..yeah.." I said, and felt weird.

"Would you mind explaining how you got into the middle of the ocean with four dogs?" he chucked.

"They're not dogs!" I said again, straightening. I heard a growl behind me and looked to see my dad shaking his head at me. I turned back to the captain guy.

"Well..." I began. "We...we lived on Round Island...and-"

"Round Island?" Jay spluttered. "You kiddin' me? You've been there!"

I nodded slowly. The captain laughed.

"I don't believe you, but go on."

I blinked. "The Floofers attacked us-"

"FLOOFERS!" Jay gasped and started laughing. "Floofers? What are they, rabid squirrels?"

I stared at him, not sure what to say. I'd never had anyone not believe me before...not like this. I guess that's 'cause Fluffs don't normally lie, huh?

"It's true," I mumbled.

The captain chucked. "Well sonny, I guess we'll have to take your word on it for now. My guess is you've had a hard time of whatever it was, maybe hit your head or something and don't quite remember right. Either way, you and your little friends are welcome till we get back to the mainland. But you'll have to pull your weight once you're all rested and healthy. Anythin' we can get you right off the bat?"

I licked my lips. "Uh...water...please?"

Reno panted exaggeratedly.

The captain snapped his head toward Jay and his friend. "Get our guests some water."

"Eep! Yessir!" Jay yelped and ran off. His friend followed him.

The captain yelled at everybody else. "Stop your staring and get back to work! We're only here for the day y'know, we gotta be back at the island within the hour!"

Everyone scurried off. I was glad- I didn't like it that they looked at my family so weirdly. The captain put a hand on my shoulder and I winced. He took it off and laughed.

"I'll show you the way to the ship's doctor- lucky we brought him along. Didn't think we'd need him, but I guess fate proved me wrong."

"Mm." He led the way and I followed him, Mom, Dad, Cait Sith, Yuffie, and Reno trailing behind.