Happy Holidays, readers! I meant to post this a heckuva lot earlier, but there was the small problem that it wasn't finished. In case anyone noticed, I've upped the rating to K err plus, because everyone's going to get tipsy in the New Year's chapter. XD

Err, and sorry about the extra story not being posted yet—it's not quite finished. (pelted)

Chapter Nine: The Obligatory Holdiay Chapter

One slightly chilly day, Sephiroth was walking past Yuffie and Aeris' bedroom when he noticed something. A day on Yuffie's Gundam Seed calendar was circled in bright red. Approaching the calendar, he noticed that the day that was circled was December 25th.

OH NUES! CHRISTMAS HAD SNUCK UP ON HIM AGAIN!

Sephiroth barreled down the stairs, knocking over Reno and Red who were going out to sunbathe.

"Vincent!" he yelled running towards the kitchen. Unfortunately he slipped on a piece of bologna, hit his head on the coffee table, and never quite made it.

--

Sephiroth could hear voices.. far off in the distance…they were saying something..

"There, that ought to be enough ice."

"Yuffie, what? ACK! Don't put the ice in a plastic bag! It's on his nose! Get it off!"

Sephiroth sat up quickly, sucking air. The 5-pound bag of ice that had formerly sat on his head slipped off and onto the floor.

"Oh, you're awake," Yuffie said, sounding slightly disappointed.

Sephiroth glared at her, feeling the back of his head throb in pain at the loss of the ice. "What are you trying to do? Suffocate me?"

"Well.." Yuffie began, but was cut off by Vincent bursting through the newly repaired front door.

"LORD VOLDEMORT HAS RETURNED!" he shouted.

"Shhh!" Zack hissed. "Don't say his name!"

Then Vincent and Zack proceeded to drag a very large Christmas tree through the door, managing to scrape both walls at the same time. This elicited several moans of misery from Cloud.

"Yes! Tree!" Sephiroth jumped up in glee, but hit his head on the ceiling.

"Hey! Show respect for the great Dark Lord!" Zack said, gesturing towards the tree.

"Eh, Zack.." Vincent started, catching an Evil look from Yuffie. "Enough about the tree."

"You named the TREE after Harry Potter's arch nemesis! How dare you!" Yuffie shrieked, slapping Zack and Vincent consecutively. "Re-name it Sirius!"

"Well.." Cloud started, tearing his eyes away from the gashes in the wall. " Aeris, maybe you and I should bake some cookies. Do you want to make sugar, or heywhatdoyouwantforchristmas chocolate chip?"

Vincent chortled. Cloud could be incredibly obvious sometimes.

While Aeris proceeded to tell Cloud that she wanted to make sugar Iwantsomethingshiny cookies, Zack and Vincent got the tree set up in the living room corner.

--

"HOLY CHEESEBALL!" Rufus shrieked, grabbing Red and running back inside, where it wasn't 1 degree.

--

"Now, the secret to a successful Christmas dinner is..well, make everything taste good."

"Yeah, like that makes anything easier."

Vincent thwapped Sephiroth on the head. "Be quiet. Now, a few days from now, you and I will be solely responsible for cooking Christmas dinner. Get psyched."

Sephiroth groaned. "I don't see why you had to rope me into this. Couldn't you have gotten Cloud to help you?"

Vincent hit him again. "Right now Cloud is focused on getting Aeris something for Christmas."

Sephiroth blew raspberries at Cloud, who was standing in the living room thinking.

--

Aeris dragged the big wad of tape and wrapping paper out to the shed, and put it in the trash can. Yuffie had many problems, but one of her major ones was wrapping gifts. Aeris had to untangle her from the tape five times before she was finally finished.

Aeris had finished her shopping and wrapping a few weeks ago, being the efficient person she is. She had gotten both Vincent and Sephiroth bottles of hairspray to carry around with them because, for crying out loud, they kept zapping people! (Anyone with long hair knows about the STATIC problem.)

--

Christmas Eve came rather quickly. Twenty minutes before dinner, Cloud had grabbed Zack and said that he needed to do some last-minute shopping.

"YOU BETTER BE BACK FOR DINNER!" Sephiroth screeched, his hair coming lose from the net. Vincent grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back into the kitchen.

Because of the—err—incident that occurred the last time Sephiroth cooked, Vincent put him on strict no-oven-or-stove-orevenmicrowave-usage duty. Unfortunately, this meant that what was left was mostly chopping. Which Sephiroth did gleefully. Vincent spent most of the time staying near the stove and fearing for his limbs.

--

An hour later, nearly everyone was stuffing their faces and asking where Vincent learned to cook so well. ('Of course, I don't get any credit..' Sephiroth muttered.) They had decided to start eating without Zack and Cloud because they were forty minutes late. And Yuffie had grabbed the meat cleaver and hacked the turkey in several pieces.

Cloud and Zack came in through the front door a few minutes later. They were both very frozen, however, Cloud looked ecstatic and Zack looked peeved.

"He dragged me around five jewelry stores several times!" he whined, sliding into a chair next to Vincent. "HEY! Who ate all the cranberry relish?"

Yuffie had dumped the whole dish of cranberry relish on her plate. She had declared she was a 'cranberry-tarian' for the night and was refusing to eat anything else.

While Sephiroth tried to shove some stuffing down Yuffie's throat, Cloud sat down next to Aeris, grinning ear to ear.

--

Vincent, Sephiroth, Yuffie, and Zack were all tripping over themselves to get upstairs that night. (Because Santa Clause doesn't come when you're awake.) Cloud and Aeris were downstairs in the living room (Cloud appeared to be slightly nervous) and Reno and Red were sitting on the couch, looking expectant.

Cloud coughed. "Uh, guys, I need to talk to Aeris alone."

Reno and Red nodded.

"That means you can't be here."

Red growled and they both slunk off.

--

"Are you sure we should be doing this?" Sephiroth whispered.

"No," Vincent replied quietly. "But I want to see what Cloud got her!"

(Please note at this time that both Vincent and Sephiroth are clad in candy-cane pajamas.)

Both dweebs pressed their ears to the wall that the living room and the stairs shared.

"I can't hear!" Sephiroth whined.

Sephiroth and Vincent were practically One With the Wall when they heard Cloud say something. There was a brief silence, then a squeaky, girly shriek from Aeris that practically brought the re-patched walls down.

"It may be wise to leave now.." Vincent muttered.

Sephiroth nodded assent. "Yeah before Santa comes….and the weird noises start.."

-Happy Holidays!

Now, since it's the Holiday Season, if you review, you get anything you want. Just ask!

I would have made a more fluffy Cloud 'n Aeris scene, but my mother reads this. XD