Next morning everyone was up earlier than usual, even Jay, and his usual was pretty early. Reno, who liked sleeping late nowadays, was kind of grumpy that morning and mostly grumbled under his breath and wandered around like a zombie. Everyone stayed far away from the doctor, because the ones that didn't got yelled at so loud everyone else could hear it all the way on the other side of the farm. Jay's friend went about his business getting the wild chocobos from the grasslands outside the farm all covered in packs of everyone's stuff and hitched up so they wouldn't run around too much, and I only got a few looks at him, but he always looked...I dunno. He didn't seem very happy. Not mad like the doctor or grumpy like alot of the other people. Just really...quiet. And when he looked at people he didn't see really see them.
Jay seemed extra cheerful to make up for his brother's...sullenness? He was running around double-checking everything and shouting jokes and messages at people and waving ecst..atically...when he saw someone who'd just woken up. They would grumble and wave back and then smile after another couple of steps. Sadly, it didn't work on the doctor, Jay got yelled at worse than anyone, but once he was out of the doctor's hearing range he fell over in a fit of giggles at how purple the doc's face had gotten. Everybody chucked and stepped over him, hauling more stuff over to load onto the chocobos.
Finally everything was ready. I looked up at the sky- it was in that shadowy blue time right before the sun comes up, and it was a little tiny bit chilly...just enough to make you feel awake. Sylkis was hitched up to the front of the pack-chocobo herd, with a few packs on him too. Jay's friend lead Sylkis by the head. Jay hopped on Charky and I got up on Winner with Shiva's reins in one hand and Winner's in the other. Shiva had to carry some too, but she wasn't very happy about it. She kept floofing her feathers angrily. The Captain stood up at the head of the group, whistled loudly to get our attention, and raised an arm, waving it once.
"Let's head out, boys!"
"WOOO!" Jay cheered, and he and Charky took off. His friend had a hard time keeping Sylkis from running off after him too fast. The doctor almost got trampled, and ended up throwing an empty potion bottle in Jay and Charky's general direction with a screech. Jay nearly fell off laughing again. At first it was pretty chaotic while we all moved out, but then Jay settled down and everyone just marched along through the grass humming or talking or thinking. The sun rose and it got warm. We were pretty cheerful till we got to the edge of the swamp. Then everyone groaned and got quiet. Captain got everyone's attention this time just by standing there and clearing his throat.
"Jay will take Sylkis and the pack chocobos across first, then unload them and bring them back for you all to mount. Jay's friend will walk out and distract the Zolom while everyone gets across. Move quickly- he can only give us so much time."
I blinked at Jay's friend. He looked grim, but just watched while Jay shot out across the swamp with the pack chocobos trailing behind. The Zolom picked them up scarily quick. Jay's friend, who had been sticking his materia into his weapon and bangles, seemed to jerk out of his trance and splashed out into the murky water, right into the path of the Zolom. The snake reared up out of the water and I shivered and nearly fell over. It was HUGE. It was one thing seeing it under the water, as like...a little shadow. It was another thing to see it snapping at Jay's friend, who dodged and solemnly moved in the summoning dance. I didn't get to see the monster he summoned though, because the Captain was yelling at us to get out there and across the swamp as fast as we could. Everybody splashed out there and it was really confusing, but we made it.
Once we were all on the other side, I turned around and saw Jay's friend fall into the water for a second, and the snake disappeared underneath too. Then Jay's friend stood up and ran, but the Zolom was too fast and he had to fight it again. He looked like he had gotten hurt too. Jay wasn't grinning anymore. He was looking frantically through a big bag he'd kept on Charky, and finally he picked out one item, and plunged forward into the water with Charky, running toward his friend, who yelled "NO! GO BACK!" but Jay just rode right out and threw the item he had. Smoke appeared out of nowhere, and nobody could see what was going on out there. We could hear yelling and warking and the hissing screechy and snappy noises the Zolom made, and then Jay rode out of the smoke cloud with his friend being half-dragged behind him.
When they got to the shore, the doctor sighed and cast cure quickly on Jay's friend, who then stood up and walked straight into the mines without saying anything to anyone. Now he looked kind of angry. I walked Winner over to Jay and asked quietly.
"What was that?"
"Huh? Oh, he's just mad," he said, blinking. I shook my head.
"No, the thing you threw that made all that smoke!"
"Oh, that!" Jay laughed. "A little thing I kind of swiped from battle square last time I was at the Gold Saucer. But shh...I wasn't supposed to."
"Oh..."
Everybody wandered over and into Mithril Cave, wet and muddy and shook up. Jay's friend was so far ahead of us, none of us saw him until we got to the other side. Jay kicked Charky forward and caught up to talk to him. Jay's friend just kept shaking his head, but when Jay came back he nodded at me.
"Yeah, we'll stop by Fort Condor and stay the night. He doesn't wanna, but whatever, we're supposed to take it easy on this trip, right? Anyway, it's too far to the next town to make in one day unless we ran the chocobos, but we aren't gonna do that."
"Yeah...how come he doesn't wanna go?"
Jay got distracted by something someone said so quickly I wondered if he did it on purpose. I blinked and got tackled by Reno and we both decided to race to an...invisible finish line...and of course I won...I mean lost...horribly.
Yep, the trip was off to a great start.
Fort Condor was really really cool...! We were greeted by pretty much everyone while we walked in. It was in the middle of kind of a dusty grass-less piece of ground, and then we climbed up between these big black rocks, and then we were inside the tower fort thing and Jay yelled "WE'RE HOOOOOOME!" and ran up to a little kid who had jumped out of his seat, grabbed him, and started giving him a noogie thing. The kid squirmed and laughed.
"Hey Jayyy stop iit!"
Jay chucked and let the kid off easy. "Your head getting soft or something, man?"
"Never!" the kid replied fiercely. I almost thought he'd punch Jay for a second or something, but then they both laughed. Jay's friend blew out a breath and looked up when an older guy who looked actually pretty strong walked over.
"What? No hello for me?" He asked.
Jay dropped the kid, who he'd been swinging around, and ran over to the old guy. The kid rubbed his head and laughed.
"Hey gramps! Long time no see!" Jay grinned and squished the guy. The guy went "Oh...haha!" squish-ed-ly, and when Jay let him go he closed one eye in a funny look.
"Gotta be careful there or you might just snap me in two..."
Jay chucked. "Never, gramps, you're too tough of an old stump, right?"
The old guy nodded and turned to Jay's friend. I think he said a name then...but I don't remember it now. He said it so softly I couldn't be sure anyway. But Jay's friend looked up with respect in his eyes. The old man put a hand on his shoulder.
"The family knows what you've been doing...at least part. Your efforts will be rewarded."
Jay's friend sighed as if he didn't really believe what the old guy was saying, or like he was frustrated or something. The old guy patted him.
"In any case, welcome home, whether you feel welcome or not."
The old guy turned back to Jay and gave him a thumbs up. Jay fell back on his bum with a giggle and returned it. Then the "gramps" waved at all of us to follow him, and he gave us a tour of the huge fort...it was so cool! He sure was a funny old man...Jay seemed to get along better with him than with his own half-brother. We got introduced to lots of people and then sat down for a big meal between lunch and dinner time because we'd sort of missed lunch on the way there. All the time we were there I don't remember Jay's friend saying a single word to anyone. He looked like REALLY either depressed or tired or angry or something...one of those three all the time, he seemed to trade off depending on how much people bugged him. Me and my family still ended up sleeping on the floor- there still weren't enough beds. But it was okay. They fed us really good while we were there, and on the second day they went up and showed us the young condor who guarded the tower.
"Wowwww..." I said, watching it walk around on its huge feet with the dragon type claws and scratch at a feather with...a beak that was...very scary looking. But still, it was a pretty bird.
Gramps smiled. "Hmhmhm...this one was only just hatching when the true heroes of the Meteor crisis came through here."
"Huh? True heroes?" I blinked. I'd only heard of one group of heroes. Gramps shook his head.
"Some people still somehow give Shinra credit for everything. Sad, isn't it? Even though I personally don't mind giving them blame for some things..." he chucked.
Later that morning we said goodbye to the people at Fort Condor and headed north west- Jay's friend had taught me how to use a compass a few months ago, or at least tried to. But anyway, the captain said we were going north west to Junon. We had to walk alot faster and take less stops than on the first day. We got back into grassy places and then walked up along the edge of some water...then turned almost completely west around the end of the afternoon. Everybody was really tired. We didn't even stop to eat...we ate while we were walking, and it was only a little bit of a snack. I ate some lettuce. Yum! It got dark pretty fast...people pulled out flash lights and we managed to keep going the right direction, because about two hours after dark we all looked up and there was Junon...it basically looked like...a giant cannon.
"We're staying here?" I blinked. I'd never really seen a cannon before so I didn't even know what THAT was...it was so huge too. Jay nodded.
"Yep. Nice little fishing town! A little run down...but it's a place to stay. And we'll get lotsa rest tomorrow."
"Huh? We will?" I asked hopefully.
"Uh-huh! The ship to Costa Del Sol'll do our walking for us, y'know? We're goin' across the ocean."
"Ohhhh..." I said, while we walked into the grayish fishy-smelling town. Everything looked kind of dirty and stuff, the air smelled funny, and past the houses there was a huge wall of metal with some soldiers standing in front of it. Jay looked at it longingly and nudged his friend.
"Hey, got enough money? What if we could afford to actually stay up top?"
"We can't," he said...the first words he'd spoken since we'd gotten to Fort Condor. "And even we could, I'm not spoiling you."
Jay laughed. "Aw man, that hurts!"
"Hmph..." He almost looked like he was gonna smirk, but he just sighed and walked over to an old-looking (everything really WAS run down!) house...hut...thing. He knocked on the door and a youngish guy with a patched jacket and a beard opened it and blinked.
"Oh, passing through again? Well, if you gotta stay, you gotta stay...the house is yours for tonight, just make sure it's here when I get back from my mom's, got it?"
Jay grinned and waved. "Thanks man!"
"Yeah yeah whatever, just get inside before the soldiers get wondering what such a huge group of regular people are doing around here. Them guys are dang paranoid..." the guy grumbled and walked off. The Captain nodded a thanks to the man and then started shoving everybody inside the little space. It was REALLY cramped that night. And mom kept wondering out loud why the floor felt kind of greasy. Yuffie had a hyper fur-licking contest with Cait Sith the next morning to get the weird smell out. Everybody was groaning 'cause we were all so hungry. We ate the last of the food we'd loaded up that day, but Jay said it was okay 'cause we were going on the boat and they'd serve us some meals on the way to Costa Del Sol. Reno cheered when he heard that, and everyone eagerly poured out of the hut thing and went up to the soldiers at the gate. The Captain and a long and quiet talk (nobody could hear what they were saying) with the guards and they finally let us on to the elevator. I guess I actually yelled in surprise when the wall opened up...I'd never seen anything like that before either. And then the elevator made me feel all wobbly. But we got to the top and then to the boat...I don't remember much about the top part of Junon...everyone was in a really big hurry to get to the boat, that's all. Captain dished out the money for the passage, and everybody pitched in a little, even me. I'd luckily thought to bring along all the money I'd been saving from the fights with low-level monsters around the chocobo farm. We all got on...me and my family actually got a bedroom to ourselves- that was one big ship. It all happened pretty fast- we were out on the water then, and everybody got up on deck for lunch. Oh man that was a big lunch! And lots of things that I didn't know what they were. I avoided the meat stuff of course...luckily they had a pretty good group of veggie and bread and fruit stuffs. Oh and like...cheese and stuff. So everybody finally got to eat and then we all lazed around in our cabins sleeping it all off. Yuffie and Cait Sith and Mom were still worried about how the smell of Junon was sticking to them...I don't know if the other crew members could smell it though, even I couldn't really smell it that well. But they weren't satisfied, so they had another round of licking races before curling up for a nap.
Yuffie woke us up later that night with her seasickness, but it wasn't quite as bad as it had been on the way to the continent from Goblin Island, so we managed to still be pretty cheerful. Throughout the trip I spent alot of time below deck in the chocobo stables part of the ship. Charky was really restless, and Winner and Shiva too. The wild chocobos mostly slept, they were getting spoiled worse than ever. I went down to pet them. Charky wouldn't let me pet him though- he'd try to peck me if I tried. He barely nicked my hand once and I thought I was gonna die, it scared me! It hurt alot too...
So mostly I just petted Winner, Sylkis, and Shiva. They were happy for the attention, and I found out Sylkis had a taste for spinach too. It felt good but sad to share it with him.
The trip on the boat was really fun for most of the way (except for Yuffie). Jay's friend lightened up a little bit and when Jay suggested playing some game or doing something to pass the time he didn't say no all the time anymore. I stumbled my way through tons of board games and card games on that trip, and never really learned how to play any of them. Jay didn't mind though. He just laughed.
Finally we got to Costa Del Sol. It was really warm there, and everybody seemed pretty cheerful there too. It was very...yellow! And orange. And I blinked at all the people in funny swimming suits and the people who were surfing and playing tennis...and we passed by a big house and I poked Jay.
"Who lives there? That's a big house!"
Jay shrugged. "Word is somebody came through and bought it, and either they disappeared or just nobody ever sees 'em come outta that house, ever. Nice house though, and nobody really has the right to sell it yet...and I guess nobody's tried to break in yet. Funny, huh?"
"Yeah..." I blinked at the building. Little did I know how much time I'd spend there in the future! Because that's Rae and Elie's house...well technically it was bought with Elie/Cloud's money, but whatever. I guess the reason it was deserted at that time...was because everyone was in the future. I mean, they'd sporked around the time I was born to 15 years in their future, so that means about 5 years in my own future from where the story is right now, that I'm writing, y'know?
Fool...they're dumb mortals, they wouldn't know what sporking is unless you explain it to them plainly!
They wouldn't? Okay...sporking is...when you travel through time, using a time machine/spork. Yes, sporks are time machines. You stick them on your head and spin clockwise how many years in the future you want to travel, and backward how many years in the past you want to! Cool, huh? Okay, was that a good explanation?
Good enough I suppose...
Hooray! Okay, so back to what I was saying. That was and would be Rae and Elie's house, where all the bishie playing would take place. Here, I would get to deal with insane sugar highs, and horrible tragedies. Everything from truth or dare to that horrible valentine's day madness...vampirizing people, getting kids...that huge bunch of weirdness that happened because Elie was a Turk and Kadaj zapped the swim teacher and was wanted and had to run away and make himself a disguise by cutting his hair off and dying it green. Puppet shows...kidnapping missions to Rufus' office in the Shinra building...Cloud almost getting strangled...going to Junon and finding Scotch, then Scotch getting possessed by K, Cloud and Elie being reunited with their son...then the whole big long drama with Kadaj's depression...things are never boring for very long in that house. But for now it just looked like a regular building, and one I'd never seen the inside of before. So I walked past it.
You dare think you know the bishie house better than I? Remember Fluff, I was there before you ever were! By about sixteen years!
Okay, okay! I didn't say that I knew it better...I was just listing things...
You're lucky I don't punish you for your insolence!
Eep...!
...okay, so...we stayed one night in Costa Del Sol, and after that the trip was really lazy and slow. I spent most of the first day watching a tennis game and after that I had a big fan-ness for the Midgar Meteors.
Thief! I was a fan of them first! You're stealing EVERYTHING!
Well it's...! I mean...you were inside me, how could I NOT have that...change things somehow! Right? I mean...it was probably you who gave me the idea to like them anyway. Everyone else was cheering for the Costa Del Sol Comets...!
Another piece of evidence that you are yet again nothing without me.
Whatever you say, Sephiroth.
Afterward we went into the A&W for some root beer floats. We got served by a guy named Arnold, I remember that...because I was thinking "hey, maybe he's the A in A&W?" ...yeah I know, stupid thought. But I mean it makes sense now, since the lady who works there is Walda the waddlewoman. She rolls. Literally. She's really REALLY weird, but she makes good ice cream. I wonder what happened to Arnold...?
Well anyway, from there the trip involved alot of camping along the road, and we started having practices on Charky and Winner every day. We were going southwest...it was getting really hot, so we traveled during the day and did the practice runs in the morning and evening, before we headed out and after we made camp. Everybody was getting excited and stuff, but nervousness was coming too, and at the same time we were all still taking it easy. We even had time to collect some more money off monsters- let me tell you, the monsters on that continent are WEIRD. And some of them were alot harder than the ones I fought in the grasslands area, so the Doctor started running out of potions again and was always grumpy (no surprise there), but he was pretty much the only one who was. Yuffie and Reno and Cait Sith and Mom and Dad all seemed to be having a real good time. Just the other day mom was saying "Just think! If we hadn't been kicked off the island we never would have found out what the rest of the world was like, or seen such strange and wonderful things!" Everyone immediately agreed, though Reno still said "But it would be nice if we hadn't been FORCED off..."
I had to agree, I mean, it was cool that we'd been able to meet Jay and the Captain and them, and been so many places, but I was feeling worse than ever how really really far away from home we were. Jay had showed me a map of the world the other day...pointed at Goblin Island, and then at the Chocobo Farm, then at Fort Condor, then Junon, then Costa Del Sol. I couldn't believe we were halfway across the world from where we'd come from. It kind of hurt my head to think about it too much.
Finally, about two weeks after we'd left Costa Del Sol (yeah, we were moving that slow), we came down past some mountains and one day while the sun was setting I thought I saw something shiny on the horizon.
"What's that?" I pointed. Jay grinned.
"That, little Sephiroth, is the Gold Saucer!"
"Whoaaa really?" I said, getting a funny jolt when I realized what it was. He nodded.
"But now we head north like!" We were just coming around the bottom of the mountain range and I could see that there was a way up north on the other side. I blinked.
"How come? Gold Saucer is south! That doesn't make sense!" I sure was confused.
"You'll see when we get to Corel, man." He chucked and turned me by the shoulders toward north.
"But whyyyy?" I whimpered, puzzled beyond belief.
"Just keep walkin', man! Sooner we get there, sooner I can plop ya on a rollercoaster and see if ya scream or not!" he giggled. His friend frowned.
"We're not going to do alot of playing tonight, Jay. I'm going see if we can do a practice run on the race course when we get there."
"Heh, good luck! Don't think the owners of it'll let ya do that so easy!" Jay snickered. His friend ignored him and went back to go check on the pack chocobos. I blinked, worried and wondering why in the world we were moving AWAY from the Gold Saucer...when it was just right there! Why go north? Why were we going to Corel? And there's no way we could get to the Gold Saucer by tonight if we went that way...was there!
"Hey Sephi, whatsa matter?" Yuffie boinged over to me, a bunch of weedy flowers in a falling-apart crown on her head. I blinked at it.
"Uhhh...who gave you that?" I pointed curiously. She giggled.
"Huh? This?" she pulled it off and looked at it with surprise. "Awww it's falling apaaart! Saad!" She poked one of the weedy flowers that was wilting all over the place.
"Who gave you those?" I asked again, grinning. Yuffie blinked at me and then beamed.
"Jay did!"
"Whoa...JAY did?" I stared. She nodded happily.
"Uh-huh! Isn't it pretty? Well...it was even PRETTIER before!"
"Yeah...you're always bouncing everywhere Yuffie! Maybe if you didn't bounce and roll and run around so much it would've lasted longer...!" I laughed. I also thought maybe Jay wasn't the best at making flower crowns, but then, I'd only tried it once. It had still turned out pretty good and lasted pretty long, but that might be 'cause I gave it to my mom, and she isn't quite as hyper as Yuffie. Yuffie still looked at hers with a huge amount of glee. I wondered where Jay got the flowers...I'd only seen a few. But then, I hadn't seen Jay most of the day...maybe he went out looking for some.
"OHHH!" Yuffie squeaked and bounced past me. "Jaaaay! It's falling apaaart but I still like it! WEE!"
Jay stopped in his tracks and giggled. "Oh...that's good! Means you're not slowin' down any, huh? Glad ya liked it!"
Yuffie squealed and huggled him. "Ohhh I get it! Heheheeee...you don't care that I made it fall apart with my bouncing?"
"Nahhh I like your bouncing."
I just watched all this with a "...huh?" look on my face, but then I laughed and everyone kept walking on and on, north and north, until just before sunset we got up to the most...beat up...town I'd ever seen. It wasn't really even a town...it was still in the process of being rebuilt. Even though there were alot more shacks than tents now and even some real houses and buildings...there were still plenty of people who still just lived in tents by the old railroad tracks, and there was wood and metal and weird stuff like that scattered everywhere. I looked around at it all while we walked through up toward this station type thing with a shuttle...thing...on a cable. Captain talked to the guy who was standing by it and we all got shoved on. We barely had time to get the chocobos in before it started moving. I clung to the nearest person, who happened to be the doctor. I got shoved off and landed on Cait Sith.
"Ow...off, Sephi!" Cait Sith laughed. I sat up.
"This is weiiiiird!" I said in awe. Reno grinned.
"Isn't it cool though?"
"Yeah," I agreed, scooting back so I was between them and felt more secure. The thing we were in hummed along up the cable. Jay was bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement.
"Duuude we're finally goin' to the Saucer again! It's been like, YEARS!" he looked like he might jump up and down. His friend patted him on the head like a dog. Jay laughed and ran a hand through his standy uppy hair and grinned sheepishly.
"Right, I get it. 'Calm down, you're embarrassing me', right?"
Jay's friend paused, then started laughing. Everybody looked kind of startled and then laughed too. Jay looked pleased that he'd brought a reaction like that out of his half-brother. I mean, his friend had been less quiet than usual, but he hadn't laughed like that since our first funny riding lessons back at the farm. It made me grin, and alot of everybody else too. Then the thing we were in screeched a little and stopped, and the door opened and there were all these weird carnival-y kind of sounds, which I didn't know were carnival-y because I'd never been to anything like a carnival or theme park before. But it was a little overwhelming at first. This one lady asked us for tickets and the Captain showed her the lifetime pass he'd bought. Jay nudged me.
"Took us nearly a year of all of us beating up monsters to get enough money for that pass. Man that was a tough time, and me n' him were only about as old as ya when it happened!"
"You mean...you've been working to get a Gold Chocobo for that long?" I sweatdropped.
"Yeah man, and longer! Since we were like, eight or nine I think! It'll all pay off soon though, so it doesn't seem like that long now." He scratched his head. I felt really impressed and really dismayed at the same time. Since they were eight or nine? That was probably like...seven years. Maybe a little less or more, I wasn't exactly sure how old they were back then. The idea of finding the rest of the Fluffs from Round Island seemed pretty hopeless now, but I tried not to get too sad about it. I mean, I was here to work toward getting my Island back. Since that was all I could do I had to focus!
It was really hard to focus with all that fun noise and lights and stuff going on around me, though. We wandered around, went through lifts and jumped in weird tube things that took us to different parts...it all was one big happy blur until we got to the scary graveyard place and then to the spooky mansion hotel thing.
"This is where we're staying?" I meeped, hiding behind Cait Sith and blinking at the scary person at the counter.
"Looks like it," mumbled Reno. "Hehehe. Funny place." He poked a huge rubber spider stuck on the wall.
"Ewwww don't do that Reno!" Yuffie squeaked. Reno snickered and picked up a smaller spider from the floor and threw it at Yuffie, who screeched and ran over to Jay, who giggled and patted her while she clung to him. The doctor rolled his eyes and kicked the spider back at Reno, who eeped once and then laughed to recover from the embarrassment of being scared by his own prank. The Captain went "Quiet!" and we all froze while he talked to the guy at the counter about our rooms. Then we all went upstairs and got shown where we were sleeping and given our key card things. Then Jay's friend grabbed my arm and steered me and Jay outside to where the chocobos were waiting, put Charky and Winner's reins into our hands and led us over to the Racing area. I stared around at other racers coming out of the place while Jay's friend talked to the girl at the door. The girl shook her head a couple times, then nodded slowly. Jay's friend came back looking kind of annoyed but not to the point where he wouldn't talk. Just a little.
"Alright, looks like the track's not free till midnight, so have fun until then." He took the Charky and Winner and Jay grabbed me and dragged me off saying something about roller coasters and snowboarding and battle square. I wiggled and protested and laughed and poked Jay in the side, tried alot of things to get him to let go, but they weren't really much, I was really curious after all. So he dragged me over to the rollercoaster first. That was a fun experience! Scary...but fun. I did scream. Like, alot. But I had fun anyway. Jay was actually able to pry my hands off the bars too! So by the time we got off I was actually having fun, not just being scared to death. I was scared to death and having fun at the same time!
Then we headed over to the game place, Jay skipping and me walking with shaky legs and laughing nervously. I lost really bad at that one fighting game, lost really bad at the snowboarding and motorcycle games...the only thing I did okay at was the mog game. Jay had a great time beating me at everything, and I had fun even though I lost alot and spent most of the money I'd got off monsters, that hadn't already been spent helping pay for the boat ride between Junon and Costa Del Sol. Then Jay dragged me to battle square and I ended up only lasting for one round because I was still shaky from the rollercoaster. Jay was in there for quite a while, and I had to wait out in the main area, glancing around nervously at all the scary people coming through. When he finally came out and got his prize items I stuck close to him until we were in a safer-feeling kinda place. We went on the rollercoaster one more time and then I felt pretty wiped out so I asked if we could go back to the hotel. Jay seemed a little disappointed but decided it was okay.
"Maybe Yuffie'll wanna do something! You should go get some rest anyway, right? I got a feelin' he's gonna push us pretty hard tonight."
I blinked and shrugged. "Okay."
So we headed back to the hotel and I went into the room I was sharing with my family, and Jay followed me in and held out a little chocobo plushie he'd won somewhere to Yuffie.
Yuffie's eyes got bigger than a chocobo's egg. "For MEEEEE?" she squeaked.
Jay nearly rolled but managed to restrain himself to a grin. "Yep! You wanna come help me win some more?"
"YAAAY!" Yuffie pounced on him, then suddenly froze. "...it's okay that I'm not a human right? They won't like, not let me play because I'm a Fluff?"
"Aw heck no! They get way weirder people around here than you, trust me," Jay rolled. Yuffie beamed.
"Okay! YAY! LET'S GO!" She bounced off Jay and ran out the door. Reno rolled his eyes.
"That's pathetic..." he snickered after Jay and her had left. Cait Sith laughed.
"Oh, and you weren't? Saying you liked spinach..." he stopped when he saw Reno's look and realized what he'd just said.
I shivered at the weird tension. What? It had been so funny just a second ago! Cait Sith watched Reno carefully. Reno sighed and laid his head down on his paws.
"Yeah...pretty pathetic wasn't it..." he mumbled.
"Sorry, Reno..." Cait Sith said quietly.
"Whatever," Reno sighed and slunk away under the bed where we couldn't see him. A second later he backed out with fur all prickled, and sneezing.
"Holy chocobos...! Don't they ever check to see what their guests leave under the beds!" he choked. We laughed and he laughed. I guess we were glad because the sneezing distracted us from thoughts of Floofers and other dark things. We rolled all over each other for a little while, and then Cait Sith stopped and chucked.
"What was it, Reno?"
He sat up and sneezed again, then laughed and shook the dust out of his fur. "I'm not sure I wanna know! It looked like some...rotting food...it smelled REALLY bad!"
Cait Sith snuck over and peeked under the bed, then backed out in a hurry.
"Whoaaaa that...whoa. I think...it might have been a pizza...? But who would leave a whole pizza under a bed? That's just gross!"
"I have nooo idea," I laughed.
Ah, it is SO amusing to see you following the same paths as my Cloud puppet. I hadn't thought of it, but of course he'd leave something strange like that in all the important places he's visited. He always was rather fond of Midgar.
Midgar...? What does that have to do with rotting pizzas...?
If only you knew... Hahaha...
...well now I feel left out. But anyway...after that we curled up on the bed or on the floor and fell asleep. I felt like I'd only been asleep for five seconds when Jay's friend shook me and I jumped out of bed all sleepy-like. He dragged me and a tired but happy-looking Jay out of the hotel. We passed a very cheerful but kind of dazed-looking Yuffie on the way. She waved happily at Jay and me and then twirled around once and sprang up the stairs like a slinky going backwards. Then we were back at the track and I was up on Winner, who looked tired too. Charky wasn't tired of course. It seemed like that bird never slept. So we got up on the chocobos and then Jay tried to get us more awake by slapping us on the back or the arm randomly while we walked around in circles, and talking to us about how we had to be ready in a month for the races. We just nodded, but after a while we did become more alert. Finally, we were pretty much as ready as we were going to get that night after a whole day of traveling. So Jay's friend nodded at me.
"Jay knows his strategy well enough, I want you to practice you and Winner's. Let her press to get ahead of Charky, but not too hard. You should at least not let him get out of sight. And then keep her back until the very end."
The race track was indoors, so it was a little weird. There were weird lights and pictures all along the way, and the floor underneath was kind of smooth and weird like glass or something. I wondered if the chocobos would slip, but they seemed pretty sure-footed. Jay grinned at me. I blinked back and then managed a grin. Jay's friend pulled out his PHS and put it on the timer again, then nodded.
"Ready..."
I tightened my hold on the reins and shifted so I'd be more comfortable and be able to stay on better.
"GO!"
We both shot off like taking-off rockets and ran past all the weird lights and pictures...Winner and Charky didn't seem to mind them much at all. Charky ran like a Fluff with a swarm of Floofers behind it, just like he always did, but Winner managed to keep up pretty well even though she couldn't manage to get ahead because I pulled her back a little to save her energy. She obediently stayed just behind Charky, and Jay pulled him back just a little right in the middle. Then Jay grinned at me.
"It's the very last! Just around this turn and then a straight run to the finish line!"
I nodded and urged Winner on. "GO GO WINNER!" I yelled. She ran as fast as she could, stretching her neck straight out in front and gaining on Charky fast. But Jay let him loose too, just as we were coming around the bend. You couldn't even see their legs anymore, it was just a blur, and I could barely see 'cause we were going so fast. Winner really wanted to get ahead, and she managed to stick right at Charky's side straight through the finish line. Jay jumped up in the air and ran over to us looking pleased.
"That was perfect. If we can run the race like that, we should have no problem, at least with the first few."
"Hey man, I just thought of something!" Jay panted excitedly. His friend blinked at him.
"What?"
"It's just that Winner's the most competitive when she's runnin' against her guy. Y'know, Charky!"
Jay's friend frowned. "...so?"
"So she'll climb to S class faster if she and Charky are in the same races, but that means we'd have to hold off getting Charky to S for a little while longer!"
"I see..." He looked like he was thinking. "Hmm...unless you still ran Charky in additional races to the ones with Winner."
"But man...that'd be almost like racing two races at once!" Jay sweatdropped.
His friend shrugged. "Or we could wait. It's up to you. I think you could do it, and it would save alot of time."
Jay blinked and thought. "Yeah...you're right. It would! I'll do it!"
His half brother nodded. "I thought so."
I sure felt tired, so I was really glad when Jay's friend decided that was good enough for the first night and we should get sleep so we'd be able to do better tomorrow. So we all wandered back to the hotel and I fell into bed and was asleep in a few seconds. Thank goodness for big hotels and comfy beds, even if they DO have rotting pizzas under them.